i! 7^2. T REPRESENTATIVE BIOGRAPHIES OF ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS THE MACMILLAN COMPANY NEW YORK BOSTON CHICAGO ATLANTA SAN FRANCISCO MACMILLAN & CO., LIMITED LONDON BOMBAY CALCUTTA MELBOURNE THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, LTD. TORONTO REPRESENTATIVE BIOGRAPHIES OF ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS CHOSEN AND EDITED BY CHARLES TOWNSEND COPELAND LECTURER ON ENGLISH LITERATURE IN HARVARD UNIVERSITY AND FRANK WILSON CHENEY HERSEY INSTRUCTOR IN ENGLISH IN HARVARD UNIVERSITY gorfc THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 1909 All rights reserved COPYRIGHT, 1909, BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. Set up and electrotyped. Published September, 1909. J. 8. Cushing- Co. Berwick & Smith Co. Norwood, Mass., U.S.A. PREFACE THIS collection of biographies and autobiographies of English men of letters has been prepared to serve various purposes. It is primarily designed to illustrate the varieties of biographical writing. To this end, it includes: first, extracts from notable autobiographies, among which are those of Lord Herbert of Cher- bury, Colley Gibber, Gibbon, and Ruskin; second, examples of the method and style of such famous biographers as Izaak Walton, Dr. Johnson, Boswell, Lockhart, Southey, Macaulay, and Carlyle ; and third, many complete Lives from the Dictionary of National Biography which represent the work of the most accomplished of modern literary historians. In the first group, the selections of autobiography exemplify both formal and informal records of life and character. Here may be studied such types as the diary, the letter, the reminiscence, and the memoir. The attention of students should be called to the diversity of mood and style inherent in these types, and due to the moment of writing and the author's mental attitude. For the study of these differences, Pepys's Diary, Swift's Journal to Stella, Carlyle's Reminiscences, and Gibbon's Memoirs offer ex- cellent material. Furthermore, the manner and degree of self- revelation are to be considered. The comparison of Lord Her- bert's vainglorious account of his prowess, or of Colley Gibber's naive avowal of vanity, with Ruskin's reverent narrative of his great awakening in Italy should prove highly interesting. When we turn to the second group, the examples of the work of famous biographers, we meet new phases of the art of recording men's lives. Now, the shrewdness with which the author has understood his hero, the justness with which he has interpreted his character, the skill and spirit with which he has portrayed his actions, become matters of fundamental importance. Here, too, 488622 vi ' PREFACE are illustrated the various elements narrative, dramatic, de- scriptive, and analytical which combine to make good biography. Students should note the use of narrative in Lockhart's relation of the death of Scott, and the use of dialogue which is almost pure drama in BoswelPs scene between Dr. Johnson and Wilkes. Boswell, again, offers a striking contrast to Izaak Walton in this same matter of dialogue. Where Boswell is most triumphant, Walton is least successful. The discourse of Sanderson in the tavern (see p. 165) lacks the "sweet persuasiveness of the living and naturally cadenced voice" which is never absent from the narrative parts of Walton's Lives. But in Boswell the voice of Johnson is indeed the vox humana. Finally, the analytical ele- ment, illustrated by the Character of Pope at the end of Johnson's Life of that poet, may be contrasted with the descriptive element in Macaulay's picturesque account of Fanny Burney's servitude at Court. The third group of brief, complete biographies of men whose lives and characters are interesting for their own sake leads to the statement of a second purpose of this book. It is expected, indeed, that a volume including not only selec- tions from famous biographies and autobiographies, but also a large number of Lives reprinted from the Dictionary of National Biography will be of service to both teachers and students of English Literature. To teachers such a collection will suggest ways of enlivening and humanizing the study of literature for their pupils. To students it will make available several of the best Lives in a great work not conveniently accessible to classes of even moderate size. In this practical way, it will furnish material which will enable them to study the relation of an author's life and his work. How close is the relation of life and work, students some- times forget. It is as unreasonable to deem a book exclusively an isolated entity as to deem it exclusively the embodiment of a move- ment. Books "do preserve as in a vial," said Milton, " the purest efficacy and extraction of that living intellect that bred them." It was the realization of this human background of literature that led Gibbon to say, " I may judge from the experience both of past and of the present times, that the public are always curious to know the men who have left behind them any image of their minds: PREFACE vil the most scanty accounts of such men are compiled with diligence, and perused with eagerness. ... If they be sincere, we seldom complain of the minuteness or prolixity of these personal me- morials"; and it led Dr. Johnson to declare, "The biographical part of literature is what I love most." The arrangement of the book deserves a word of explana- tion. It is fitting that Carlyle's energetic essay on Biography should stand as prologue to the collection, for this essay not only emphasizes the fact that "man is perennially interesting to man," but it insists upon the "worth that lies in Reality" as the basis of all good biographical writing. In order to suggest various points of view from which the selections may be regarded, intro- ductory notes are prefixed to many of them. These notes contain a synopsis of the author's life when that is necessary to understand the selection, and short passages from the essays and letters of distinguished critics. Moreover, the selections in the first and second groups in the table of contents are arranged chronologically, and at the beginning of each extract is given the date of publication or if a considerable time elapsed between writing and publica- tion the date of writing. By this means, one may trace not only the development of biographical methods, but the progress of English narrative style. Thanks are due to the following publishers for their permission to use extracts from their books : Messrs. Charles Scribner's Sons, Houghton Mifflin Company, Harper and Brothers, The Macmillan Company, and Smith, Elder & Company. F. W. C. HERSEY. HARVARD UNIVERSITY, June 28, 1909. TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE PREFACE . . . v BIOGRAPHY by Thomas Carlyle I CHAPTERS IN AUTOBIOGRAPHY: Lord Herbert of Cherbury : The Fight -with Sir John Ayr es . . 16 Samuel Pepys: Extracts from the Diary 23 Jonathan Swift : Extracts from the Journal to Stella ... 40 Colley Gibber : " Talking of Himself '" 53 Edward Gibbon : At Oxford 62 My Early Love 71 " The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire " . 73 Thomas Carlyle : Life in London 80 Charles Dickens : Hard Experiences in Boyhood .... 96 JohnRuskin: The Campo Santo 115 Robert Louis Stevenson : Learning to Write .... 127 SELECTIONS FROM FAMOUS BIOGRAPHERS: Izaak Walton: The Life of Dr. Robert Sanderson . . .130 Samuel Johnson : The Life of Pope ...... 182 James Boswell : The Meeting of Dr. Johnson and Wilkes . .261 Robert Southey : The Death of Nelson 272 John Gibson Lockhart : The Death of Scott 281 Thomas Babington Macaulay : Fanny Bur ney at Court . . . 292 Thomas Carlyle : Torrijos and John Sterling 310 William Makepeace Thackeray : Oliver Goldsmith . . . .318 LIVES FROM THE Dictionary of National Biography ; Sir Walter Ralegh Sidney Lee 330 Sir Philip Sidney Sidney Lee 373 John Bunyan . Edmund Venables 405 Sir Richard Steele Austin Dobson 425 Samuel Johnson Sir Leslie Stephen 439 TABLE OF CONTENTS Richard Brinsley Sheridan Fraser Rae 473 Charles Lamb Alfred Ainger 487 Lord Byron Sir Leslie Stephen 501 Percy Bysshe Shelley Richard Garnett 551 Charles Dickens Sir Leslie Stephen 569 Robert Browning ....... Edmund Gosse 595 Robert Louis Stevenson Sidney Colvin 623 REPRESENTATIVE BIOGRAPHIES OF ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS BIOGRAPHY THOMAS CARLYLE [First published in Fraser's Magazine, April, 1832. Critical and Mis~ cellaneous Essays.] MAN'S sociality of nature evinces itself, in spite of all that can be said, with abundant evidence by this one fact, were there no other: the unspeakable delight he takes in Biography. It is written, ' The proper study of mankind is man ; ' to which study, / let us candidly admit, he, by true or by false methods, applies himself, nothing loth. 'Man is perennially interesting to man; nay, if we look strictly to it, there is nothing else interesting/ \[How inexpressibly comfortable to know our fellow-creature; to see into him, understand his goings-forth, decipher the whole heart of his mystery: nay, not only to see into him, but even to see out of him, to view the world altogether as he views it; so that we can theoretically construe him, and could almost practi- cally personate him; and do now thoroughly discern both what manner of man he is, and what manner of thing he has got to work on and live on ! J A scientific interest and a poetic one alike inspire us in this matter. A scientific: because every mortal has a Problem of Existence set before him, which, were it only, what for the most it is, the Problem of keeping soul and body together, must be to a certain extent original, unlike every other; and yet, at the same time, so like every other; like our own, therefore; instructive, moreover, since we also are indentured to live. A poetic interest still more: for precisely this same struggle of human Freewill against material Necessity, which every man's Life, by the mere circumstance that the man continues alive, will more or less vic- toriously exhibit, is that which above all else, or rather inclu- sive of all else, calls the Sympathy of mortal hearts into action; 2 BIOGRAPHY and whether as acted, or as represented and written of, not only is Poetry, but is the sole Poetry possible. Borne onwards by which two all-embracing interests, may the earnest Lover of Biog- raphy expand himself on all sides, and indefinitely enrich him- self. Looking with the eyes of every new neighbour, he can dis- cern a new world different for each: feeling with the heart of every neighbour, he lives with every neighbour's life, even as with his own. Of these millions of living men, each individual is a mirror to us ; a mirror both scientific and poetic ; or, if you will, both natural and magical ; from which one would so gladly draw aside the gauze veil; and, peering therein, discern the image of his own natural face and the supernatural secrets that propheti- cally lie under the same ! Observe, "accordingly, to what extent, in the actual course of things, this business of Biography is practised and relished, Define to thyself, judicious Reader, the real significance of these phe- nomena, named Gossip, Egoism, Personal Narrative (miraculous or not), Scandal, Raillery, Slander, and such like; the sum-total of which (with some fractional addition of a better ingredient, generally too small to be noticeable) constitutes that other grand phenomenon still called ' Conversation.' Do they not mean wholly: Biography and Autobiography? Not only in the com- mon speech of men; but in all Art too, which is or should be the concentrated and conserved essence of what men can speak and show, Biography is almost the one thing needful. \Jven in the highest works of Art, our interest, as the critics complain, is too apt to be strongly or even mainly of a Biographic sort. In the Art, we can nowise forget the Artist: while looking on the Transfiguration, while studying the Iliad, we ever strive to figure to ourselves what spirit dwelt in Raphael; what a head was that of Homer, wherein, woven of Elysian light and Tartarean gloom, that old world fashioned itself together, of which these written Greek characters are but a feeble though perennial copy. The Painter and the Singer are present to us; we partially and for the time become the very Painter and the very Singer, while we enjoy the Picture and the Song. Perhaps too, let the critic say what he will, this is the highest enjoyment, the clearest recog- nition, we can have of these. Art indeed is Art ; yet Man also is THOMAS CARLYLE 3 Man. Had the Transfiguration been painted without human hand; had it grown merely on the canvas, say by atmospheric influences, as lichen-pictures do on rocks, it were a grand Picture doubtless; yet nothing like so grand as the Picture, which, on opening our eyes, we everywhere in Heaven and in Earth see painted; and everywhere pass over with indifference, because the Painter was not a Man. J Think of this; much lies in it. The Vatican is great ; yet poor to Chimborazo t>r the Peak of Teneriffe : its dome is but a foolish Big-endian or Little-endian chip of an egg-shell, compared with that star-fretted Dome where Arcturus and Orion glance forever; which latter, notwithstand- ing, who looks at, save perhaps some necessitous stargazer bent to make Almanacs; some thick-quilted watchman, to see what weather it will prove? The Biographic interest is wanting; no Michael Angelo was He who built that * Temple of Immensity ; ' therefore do we, pitiful Littlenesses as we are, turn rather to won- der and to worship in the little toybox of a Temple built by our like. Still more decisively, still more exclusively does the Biographic interest manifest itself, as we descend into lower regions of spirit- ual communication; through the whole range of what is called Literature. Of History, for example, the most honoured, if not honourable species of composition, is not the whole purport Bio- graphic? 'History/ it has been said, 'is the essence of innumer- able Biographies.' Such, at least, it should be: whether it is, might admit of question. But, in any case, what hope have we in turning over those old interminable Chronicles, with their garrulities and insipidities; or still worse in patiently examining those modern Narrations, of the Philosophic kind, where ' Philos- ophy, teaching by Experience/ has to sit like owl on housetop, seeing nothing, understanding nothing, uttering only, with solem- nity enough, her perpetual most wearisome hoo-hoo : what hope have we, except the for most part fallacious one of gaining some acquaintance with our fellow-creatures, though dead and vanished, yet dear to us; how they got along in those old days, suffering and doing; to what extent, and under what circumstances, they resisted the Devil and triumphed over him, or struck their colours to him, and were trodden under foot by him; how, in short, the 4 BIOGRAPHY perennial Battle went, which men name Life, which we also in these new days, with indifferent fortune, have to fight, and must be- queath to our sons and grandsons to go on fighting, till the En- emy one day be quite vanquished and abolished, or else the great Night sink and part the combatants; and thus, either by some Millennium, or some new Noah's Deluge, the Volume of Uni- versal History wind itself up! Other hope, in studying such Books, we have none : and that it is a deceitful hope, who that has tried knows not ? A feast of widest Biographic insight is spread for us; we enter full of hungry anticipations: alas, like so many other feasts, which Life invites us to, a mere Ossian's 'feast of shells, ,' - the food and liquor being all emptied out and clean gone, and only the vacant dishes and deceitful emblems thereof left! Your Modern Historical Restaurateurs are indeed little better than high- priests of Famine; that keep choicest china dinner-sets, only no dinner to serve therein. Yet such is our Biographic appetite, we run trying from shop to shop, with ever new hope ; and, unless we could eat the wind, with ever new disappointment. Again, consider the whole class of Fictitious Narratives; from the highest category of epic or dramatic Poetry, in Shakspeare and Homer, down to the lowest of froth Prose, in the Fashionable Novel. What are all these but so many mimic Biographies? Attempts, here by an inspired Speaker, there by an uninspired Babbler, to deliver himself, more or less ineffectually, of the grand secret wherewith all hearts labour oppressed : The significance of Man's Life; which deliverance, even as traced in the unfurnished head, and printed at the Minerva Press, find readers. For, observe, though there is a greatest Fool, as a superlative in every kind; and the most Foolish man in the Earth is now indubitably living and breathing, and did this morning or lately eat breakfast, and is even now digesting the same; and looks out on the world, with his dim horn-eyes, and inwardly forms some unspeakable theory thereof: yet where shall the authentically Existing be per- sonally met with ! Can one of us, otherwise than by guess, know that we have got sight of him, have orally communed with him? To take even the narrower sphere of this our English Metropolis, can any one confidently say to himself, that he has conversed with the identical, individual Stupidest man now extant in London? THOMAS CARLYLE 5 No one. Deep as we dive in the Profound, there is ever a new depth opens: where the ultimate bottom may lie, through what new scenes of being we must pass before reaching it (except that we know it does lie somewhere, and might by human faculty and opportunity be reached,) is altogether a mystery to us. Strange, tantalising pursuit ! We have the fullest assurance, not only that there is a Stupidest of London men actually resident, with bed and board of some kind, in London; but that several persons have been or perhaps are now speaking face to face with him : while for us, chase it as we may, such scientific blessedness will too probably be forever denied ! But the thing we meant to enforce was this comfortable fact, that no known Head was so wooden, but there might be other heads to which it were a genius and Friar Bacon's Oracle. Of no given Book, not even of a fashionable Novel, can you predicate with certainty that its vacuity is absolute; that there are not other vacuities which shall partially replenish themselves therefrom, and esteem it a plenum. How knowest thou, may the distressed Novelwright exclaim, that I, here where I sit, am the Foolishest of existing mortals ; that this my Long-ear of a Fictitious Biography shall not find one and the other, into whose still longer ears it may be the means, under Providence, of instilling some- what? We answer, None knows, none can certainly know: therefore, write on, worthy Brother, even as thou canst, even as it has been given thee. Here, however, in regard to ' Fictitious Biographies,' and much other matter of like sort, which the greener mind in these days inditeth, we may as well insert some singular sentences on the importance and significance of Reality, as they stand written for us in Professor Gottfried Sauerteig's ^Esthelische Springwurzeln; a W T ork/ perhaps, as yet new to most English readers. The Pro- fessor and Doctor is not a man whom we can praise without res- ervation; neither shall we say that his Springwurzeln (a sort of magical picklocks, as he affectedly names them) are adequate to ' start ' every bolt that locks up an aesthetic mystery : nevertheless, in his crabbed, one-sided way, he sometimes hits masses of the truth. We endeavour to translate faithfully, and trust the reader will find it worth serious perusal: 1 This is one of Carlyle's characteristic inventions. 6 BIOGRAPHY 'The significance, even for poetic purposes,' says Sauerteig, ' that lies in REALITY is too apt to escape us ; is perhaps only now beginning to be discerned. When we named Rousseau's Con- fessions an elegiaco-didactic Poem, we meant more than an empty figure of speech ; we meant a historical scientific fact. ' Fiction, while the feigner of it knows that he is feigning, par- takes, more than we suspect, of the nature of lying; and has ever an, in some degree, unsatisfactory character. All My- thologies were once Philosophies ; were believed; the Epic Poems of old time, so long as they continued epic, and had any complete impressiveness, were Histories, and understood to be narratives of facts. In so far as Homer employed his gods as mere ornamen- tal fringes, and had not himself, or at least did not expect his hearers to have, a belief that they were real agents in those antique doings; so far did he fail to be genuine; so far was he a partially hollow and false singer ; and sang to please only a portion of man's mind, not the whole thereof. ' Imagination is, after all, but a poor matter when it has to part company with Understanding, and even front it hostilely in flat contradiction. Our mind is divided in twain: there is contest; wherein that which is weaker must needs come to the worse. Now of all feelings, states, principles, call it what you will, in man's mind, is not Belief the clearest, strongest; against which all others contend in vain? Belief is, indeed, the beginning and first con- dition of all spiritual Force whatsoever : only in so far as Imagina- tion, were it but momentarily, is believed, can there be any use or meaning in it, any enjoyment of it. And what is momentary Belief? The enjoyment of a moment. Whereas a perennial Belief were enjoyment perennially, and with the whole united soul. 'It is thus that I judge of the Supernatural in an Epic Poem; and would say, the instant it has ceased to be authentically super- natural, and become what you call "Machinery:" sweep it out of sight (schaff' es mir vom Halse} \ Of a truth, that same " Ma- chinery," about which the critics make such hubbub, was well named Machinery; for it is in very deed mechanical, nowise inspired or poetical. Neither for us is there the smallest aesthetic enjoyment in it; save only in this way; that we believe it to have been believed, by the Singer or his Hearers ; into whose case we THOMAS CARLYLE 7 now laboriously struggle to transport ourselves; and so with stinted enough result, catch some reflex of the Reality which for them was wholly real, and visible face to face. Whenever it has come so far that your "Machinery" is avowedly mechanical and unbelieved, what is it else, if we dare tell ourselves the truth, but a miserable, meaningless Deception, kept up by old use and wont alone ? If the gods of an Iliad are to us no longer authentic Shapes of Terror, heart-stirring, heart-appalling, but only vague, glittering Shadows, what must the dead Pagan gods of an Epigoniad be, the dead-living Pagan- Christian gods of a Lusiad, the concrete-abstract, evangelical-metaphysical gods of a Paradise Lost f Superannuated lumber ! Cast raiment, at best ; in which some poor mime, strutting and swaggering, may or may not set forth new noble Human Feelings (again a Reality), and so secure, or not secure, our pardon of such hoydenish masking ; for which, in any case, he has a pardon to ask. 'True enough, none but the earliest Epic Poems can claim this distinction of entire credibility, of Reality: after an Iliad, a Shatter, a Koran, and other the like primitive performances, the rest seem, by this rule of mine, to be altogether excluded from the list. Accordingly, what are all the rest, from Virgil's dEneid downwards, in comparison? Frosty, artificial, heterogeneous things : more of gumflowers than of roses ; at the best, of the two mixed incoherently together: to some of which, indeed, it were hard to deny the title of Poems; yet to no one of which can that title belong in any sense even resembling the old high one it, in those old days, conveyed, when the epithet "divine" or "sacred," as applied to the uttered Word of man, was not a vain metaphor, a vain sound, but a real name with meaning. Thus, too, the farther we recede from those early days, when Poetry, as true Poetry is always, was still sacred or divine, and inspired (what ours, in great part, only pretends to be) , the more impossible becomes it to produce any, we say not true Poetry, but tolerable semblance of such; the hollower, in particular, grow all manner of Epics; till at length, as in this generation, the very name of Epic sets men a-yawning, the announcement of a new Epic is received as a public calamity. 'But what if the impossible being once for all quite discarded, 8 BIOGRAPHY the probable be well adhered to : how stands it with fiction then ? Why, then, I would say, the evil is much mended, but nowise com- pletely cured. We have then, in place of the wholly dead modern Epic, the partially living modern Novel ; to which latter it is much easier to lend that above-mentioned, so essential "momentary credence" than to the former: indeed, infinitely easier; for the former being flatly incredible, no mortal can for a moment credit it, for a moment enjoy it. Thus, here and there, a Tom Jones, a Meister, a Crusoe, will yield no little solacement to the minds of men; though still immeasurably less than a Reality would, were the significance thereof as impressively unfolded, were the genius that could so unfold it once given us by the kind Heavens. Neither say thou that proper Realities are wanting : for Man's Life, now, as of old, is the geniune work of God; wherever there is a Man, a God also is revealed, and all that is Godlike: a whole epitome of the Infinite, with its meanings, lies enfolded in the Life of every Man. Only, alas, that the Seer to discern this same Godlike, and with fit utterance uniold it for us, is wanting, and may long be wanting ! 'Nay, a question arises on us here, wherein the whole German reading- world will eagerly join: Whether man can any longer be so interested by the spoken Word, as he often was in those primeval days, when rapt away by its inscrutable power, he pronounced it, in such dialect as he had, to be transcendental (to transcend all measure), to be sacred, prophetic, and the inspiration of a god? For myself, I (ich meines Ortes), by faith or by insight, do heartily understand that the answer to such question will be, Yea! For never that I could in searching find out, has Man been, by Time which devours so much, deprivated of any faculty whatsoever that he in any era was possessed of. To my seeming, the babe born yesterday has all the organs of Body, Soul, and Spirit, and in exactly the same combination and entireness, that the oldest Pelas- gic Greek, or Mesopotamian Patriarch, or Father Adam himself could boast of. Ten fingers, one heart with venous and arterial blood therein, still belong to man that is born of woman : when did he lose any of his spiritual Endowments either; above all, his highest spiritual Endowment, that of revealing Poetic Beauty, and of adequately receiving the same ? Not the material, not the sus- THOMAS CARLYLE 9 ceptibility is wanting; only the Poet, or long series of Poets, to work on these. True, alas too true, the Poet is still utterly want- ing, or all but utterly : nevertheless have we not centuries enough before us to produce him in ? Him and much else ! I, for the present, will but predict that chiefly by working more and more on REALITY, and evolving more and more wisely its inexhaustible meanings ; and, in brief, speaking forth in fit utterance whatsoever our whole soul believes, and ceasing to speak forth what thing so- ever our whole soul does not believe, will this high emprise be accomplished, or approximated to.' These notable, and not unfounded, though partial and deep- seeing rather than wide-seeing observations on the great import of REALITY, considered even as a poetic material, we have inserted the more willingly, because a transient feeling to the same purpose may often have suggested itself to many readers ; and, on the whole, it is good that every reader and every writer understand, with all intensity of conviction, what quite infinite worth lies in Truth: how all-pervading, omnipotent, in man's mind, is the thing we name Belief. For the rest, Herr Sauerteig, though one-sided, on this matter of Reality, seems heartily persuaded, and is not perhaps so ignorant as he looks. It cannot be unknown to him, for ex- ample, what noise is made about 'Invention;' what a supreme rank this faculty is reckoned to hold in the poetic endowment. Great truly is Invention ; nevertheless, that is but a poor exercise of it with which Belief is not concerned. 'An Irishman with whisky in his head,' as poor Byron said, will invent you, in this kind, till there is enough and to spare. Nay, perhaps, if we con- sider well, the highest exercise of Invention has, in very deed, nothing to do with Fiction; but is an invention of new Truth, what we can call a Revelation; which last does undoubtedly transcend all other poetic efforts, nor can Herr Sauerteig be too loud in its praises. But, on the other hand, whether such effort is still possible for man, Herr Sauerteig and the bulk of the world are probably at issue ; and will probably continue so till that same 'Revelation,' or new 'Invention of Reality,' of the sort he desiderates, shall itself make its appearance. Meanwhile, quitting these airy regions, let any one bethink him how impressive the smallest historical fact may become, as con- 10 BIOGRAPHY trasted with the grandest fictitious event; what an incalculable force lies for us in this consideration: The Thing which I here hold imaged in my mind did actually occur; was, in very truth, an element in the system of the All, whereof I too form part; had therefore, and has, through all time, an authentic being; is not a dream, but a reality ! We ourselves can remember reading, in Lord Clarendon? with feelings perhaps somehow accidentally opened to it, certainly with a depth of impression strange to us then and'now that insignificant-looking passage, where Charles, after the battle of Worcester, glides down, with Squire Careless, from the Royal Oak, at nightfall, being hungry : how, ' making a shift to get over hedges and ditches, after walking at least eight or nine miles, which were the more grievous to the King by the weight of his boots (for he could not put them off when he cut off his hair, for want of shoes), before morning they came to a poor cottage, the owner whereof being a Roman Catholic was known to Careless. 1 How this poor drudge, being knocked up from his snoring, 'carried them into a little barn full of hay, which was a better lodging than he had for himself;' and by and by, not with- out difficulty, brought his Majesty 'a piece of bread and a great pot of buttermilk,' saying candidly that "he himself lived by his daily labour, and that what he had brought him was the fare he and his wife had:" on which nourishing diet his Majesty, 'staying upon the haymow,' feeds thankfully for two days; and then de- parts, under new guidance, having first changed clbthes, down to the very shirt and 'old pair of shoes,' with his landlord; and so, as worthy Bunyan has it, 'goes on his way, and sees him no more.' Singular enough, if we will think of it ! This then was a genuine flesh-and-blood Rustic of the year 1651 : he did actually swallow bread and buttermilk (not having ale and bacon), and do field- labour: with these hobnailed 'shoes' has sprawled through mud- roads in winter, and, jocund or not, driven his team a-field in summer: he made bargains; had chaff erings and higglings, now a sore heart, now a glad one ; was born ; was a son, was a father ; toiled in many ways, being forced to it, till the strength was all worn out of him: and then lay down 'to rest his galled back/ and sleep there till the long-distant morning ! How comes it, 1 History of the Rebellion, iii. 625. THOMAS CARLYLE II that he alone of all the British rustics who tilled and lived along with him, on whom the blessed sun on that same 'fifth day of September' was shining, should have chanced to rise on us; that this poor pair of clouted Shoes, out of the million million hides that have been tanned, and cut, and worn, should still subsist, and hang visibly together? We see him but for a moment; for one moment, the blanket of the Night is rent asunder, so that we be- hold and see, and then closes over him forever. So too, in some BosweWs Life of Johnson, how indelible, and magically bright, does many a little Reality dwell in our remem- brance ! There is no need that the personages on the scene be a King and Clown; that the scene be the Forest of the Royal Oak, 'on the borders of Staffordshire:' need only that the scene lie on this old firm Earth of ours, where we also have so surprisingly arrived ; that the personages be men, and seen with the eyes of a man. Foolish enough, how some slight, perhaps mean and even ugly incident, if real and well presented, will fix itself in a suscep- tive memory, and lie ennobled there; silvered over with the pale cast of thought, with the pathos which belongs only to the DeaclT] For the Past is all holy to us; the Dead are all holy, even they that were base and wicked while alive. Their baseness and wicked- ness was not They, was but the heavy and unmanageable En- vironment that lay round them, with which they fought unpre- vailing: they (the ethereal god-given Force that dwelt in them, and was their Self) have now shuffled-off that heavy Environment, and are free and pure: their life-long Battle, go how it might, is all ended, with many wounds or with fewer; they have been re- called from it, and the once harsh- jarring battle-field has become a silent awe-inspiring Golgotha, and Gottesacker (Field of God) ! - Boswell relates this in itself smallest and poorest of occurrences : 'As we walked along the Strand to-night, arm in arm, a woman of the town accosted us in the usual enticing manner. "No, no, my girl," said Johnson; "it won't do." He, however, did not treat her with harshness ; and we talked of the wretched life of such women.' Strange power of Reality! Not even this poorest of occurrences, but now, after seventy years are come and gone, has a meaning for us. Do but consider that it is true; that it did in very deed occur! That unhappy Outcast, with all her sins and 12 BIOGRAPHY woes, her lawless desires, too complex mischances, her waitings and her riotings, has departed utterly ; alas ! her siren finery has got all besmutched, ground, generations since, into dust and smoke; of her degraded body, and whole miserable earthly exist- ence, all is away: she is no longer here, but far from us, in the bosom of Eternity, whence we too came, whither we too are bound ! Johnson said, "No, no, my girl; it won't do;" and then * we talked ; ' and herewith the wretched one, seen but for the twinkling of an eye, passes on into the utter Darkness. No high Calista, that ever issued from Story-teller's brain, will impress us more deeply than this meanest of the mean ; and for a good reason : That she issued from the Maker of Men. It is well worth the Artist's while to examine for himself what it is that gives such pitiful incidents their memorableness ; his aim likewise is, above all things, to be memorable. Half the effect, we already perceive, depends on the object; on its being real, on its being really seen. The other half will depend on the observer; and the question now is: How are real objects to be so seen; on what quality of observing or of style in describing, does this so intense pictorial power depend? Often a slight circumstance contributes curiously to the result: some little, and perhaps to appearance accidental, feature is presented; a light-gleam, which instantaneously excites the mind, and urges it to complete the pic- ture, and evolve the meaning thereof for itself. By critics, such light-gleams and their almost magical influence have frequently been noted : but the power to produce such, to select such features as will produce them, is generally treated as a knack, or trick of the trade, a secret for being ' graphic ; ' whereas these magical feats are, in truth, rather inspirations ; and the gift of performing them, which acts unconsciously, without forethought, and as if by nature alone, is properly a genius for description. One grand, invaluable secret there is, however, which includes all the rest, and, what is comfortable, lies clearly in every man's power : To have an open loving heart, and what follows from the possession of such! Truly it has been said, emphatically in these days ought it to be repeated : A loving Heart is the beginning of all Knowledge. This it is that opens the whole mind, quickens every faculty of the intellect to do its fit work, that of knowing; and THOMAS CARLYLE 13 therefrom, by sure consequence, of vividly uttering-forth. Other secret for being 'graphic' is there none, worth having: but this is an all-sufficient one. See, for example, what a small Boswell can do ! Hereby, indeed, is the whole man made a living mirror, wherein the wonders of this ever-wonderful Universe are, in their true light (which is ever a magical, miraculous one) represented, and reflected back on us. It has been said, ' the heart sees farther than the head:' but, indeed, without the seeing heart, there is no true seeing for the head so much as possible ; all is mere oversight, hallucination and vain superficial phantasmagoria, which can per- manently profit no one. Here, too, may we not pause for an instant, and make a practical reflection? Considering the multitude of mortals that handle the Pen in these days, and can mostly spell, and write without glaring violations of grammar, the question naturally arises: How is it, then, that no Work proceeds from them, bearing any stamp of authenticity and permanence; of worth for more than one day? Ship-loads of Fashionable Novels, Sentimental Rhymes, Tragedies, Farces, Diaries of Travel, Tales by flood and field, are swallowed monthly into the bottomless Pool: still does the Press toil; in- numerable Paper-makers, Compositors, Printers' Devils, Book- binders, and Hawkers grown hoarse with loud proclaiming, rest not from their labour; and still, in torrents, rushes on the great array of Publications, unpausing, to their final home; and still Oblivion, like the Grave, cries, Give ! Give ! How is it that of all these countless multitudes, no one can attain to the smallest mark of excellence, or produce aught that shall endure longer than ' snow- flake on the river,' or the foam of penny-beer? We answer: Because they are foam; because there is no Reality in them. These Three Thousand men, women and children, that, make up the army of British Authors, do not, if we will well consider it, see anything whatever; consequently have nothing that they can record and utter, only more or fewer things that they can plausibly pretend to record. The Universe, of Man and Nature, is still quite shut-up from them ; the ' open secret ' still utterly a secret ; because no sympathy with Man or Nature, no love and free sim- plicity of heart has yet unfolded the same. Nothing but a pitiful Image of their own pitiful Self with its vanities, and grudgings, 14 BIOGRAPHY and ravenous hunger of all kinds, hangs forever painted in the retina of these unfortunate persons; so that the starry ALL, with whatsoever it embraces, does but appear as some expanded magic-lantern shadow of that same Image, and naturally looks pitiful enough. It is vain for these persons to allege that they are naturally with- out gift, naturally stupid and sightless, and so can attain to no knowledge of anything; therefore, in writing of anything, must needs write falsehoods of it, there being in it no truth for them. Not so, good Friends. The stupidest of you has a certain faculty; were it but that of articulate speech (say, in the Scottish, the Irish, the Cockney dialect, or even in ' Governess-English '), and of physi- cally discerning what lies under your nose. The stupidest of you would perhaps grudge to be compared in faculty with James Boswell ; yet see what he has produced ! You do not use your faculty honestly ; your heart is shut up ; full of greediness, malice, discontent ; so your intellectual sense cannot be open. It is vain also to urge that James Boswell had opportunities ; saw great men and great things, such as you can never hope to look on. What make ye of Parson White in Selborne ? He had not only no great men to look on, but not even men; merely sparrows and cock- chafers: yet has he left us a Biography of these; which, under its title Natural History of Selborne, still remains valuable to us; which has copied a little sentence or two faithfully from the In- spired Volume of Nature, and so is itself not without inspiration. Go ye and do likewise. Sweep away utterly all frothiness and falsehood from your heart ; struggle unweariedly to acquire, what is possible for every god-created Man, a free, open, humble soul : speak not at all, in any wise, till you have somewhat to speak; care not for the reward of your speaking, but simply and with undivided mind for the truth of your speaking : then be placed in what section of Space and of Time soever, do but open your eyes, and they shall actually see, and bring you real knowledge, wondrous, worthy of belief; and instead of one Boswell and one White, the world will rejoice in a thousand, stationed on their thousand several watch- towers, to instruct us by indubitable documents, of whatsoever in our so stupendous World comes to light and is! O, had the Editor of this Magazine but a magic rod to turn all that not in- THOMAS CARLYLE 15 considerable Intellect, which now deluges us with artificial fictitious soap-lather, and mere Lying, into the faithful study of Reality, what knowledge of great, everlasting Nature, and of Man's ways and doings therein, would not every year bring us in ! Can we but change one single soap-latherer and mountebank Juggler, into a true Thinker and Doer, who even tries honestly to think and do, great will be our reward. But to return; or rather from this point to begin our journey! If now, what with Herr Sauerteig's Springwurzeln, what with so much lucubration of our own, it have become apparent how deep, immeasurable is the ' worth that lies in Reality,' and farther, how exclusive the interest which man takes in Histories of Man, may it not seem lamentable, that so few genuinely good Biog- raphies have yet been accumulated in Literature ; that in the whole world, one cannot find, going strictly to work, above some dozen or baker's dozen, and those chiefly of very ancient date ? Lam- entable; yet, after what we have just seen, accountable. An- other question might be asked : How comes it that in England we have simply one good Biography, this BoswclVs Johnson; and of good, indifferent, or even bad attempts at Biography, fewer than any civilised people? Consider the French and Germans, with their Moreris, Bayles, Jordenses, Jochers, their innumerable Memoirs, and Schilderungen, and Biographies Universelles ; not to speak of Rousseaus, Goethes, Schuberts, Jung-Stillings : and then contrast with these our poor Birches and Kippises and Pecks; the whole breed of whom, moreover, is now extinct ! With this question, as the answer might lead us far, and come out unflattering to patriotic sentiment, we shall not intermeddle; but turn rather, with great pleasure, to the fact, that one excellent Biography is actually English ; and even now lies, in Five new Volumes, at our hand, soliciting a new consideration from us ; such as, age after age (the Perennial showing ever new phases as our position alters), it may long be profitable to bestow on it; to which task we here, in this position, in this age, gladly address ourselves. First, however, let the foolish April-fool day pass by; and our Reader, during these twenty-nine days of uncertain weather that will follow, keep pondering, according to convenience, the purport 1 6 LORD HERBERT OF CHERBURY of BIOGRAPHY in general : then, with the blessed dew of May-day, and in unlimited convenience of space, shall all that we have written on Johnson and BosweWs Johnson and Croker's BosweWs Johnson be faithfully laid before him. LORD HERBERT OF CHERBURY THE FIGHT WITH SIR JOHN AYRES [From The Autobiography of Edward, Lord Herbert of Cherbury, written in 1643, first printed by Horace Walpole in 1764. HERBERT, EDWARD, first BARON HERBERT OF CHERBURY (1583-1648), philosopher, historian, and diplomatist; while at University College, Oxford, taught himself the Romance languages and became a good musician, rider, and fencer; went to court, 1600; sheriff of Montgomeryshire, 1605; dur- ing a continental tour became intimate with Casaubon and the Constable Montmorency, and fought several duels, 1608-10; volunteer at recapture of Juliers, 1610; joined Prince of Orange's army, 1614; visited the elector palatine and the chief towns of Italy; offered help to the Savoyards, but was imprisoned by the French at Lyons, 1615; stayed with Prince of Orange, 1616; on his return became intimate with Donne, Carew, and Ben Jonson; named by Buckingham ambassador at Paris, 1619; tried to obtain French support for elector palatine, and suggested marriage between Henrietta Maria and Prince Charles; recalled for quarrelling with the French king's favourite, De Luynes, 1621, but reappointed on De Luynes's death, 1622; recalled, 1624, owing to his disagreement with James I about the French marriage negotiations; received in Irish peerage the barony of Cherbury, 1629, and seat in council of war, 1632; attended Charles I on Scottish ex- pedition, 1639-40; committed to the Tower for royalist speech in House of Lords, 1642, but released on apologising; aimed at neutrality during the war; compelled to admit parliamentary force into Montgomery Castle, 1644; submitted to parliament and received a pension, 1645; steward of duchy of Cornwall and warden of the Stannaries, 1646; visited Gassendi, 1647; died in London, Selden being one of his executors. His autobiog- raphy (to 1624), printed by Horace Walpole, 1764 (thrice reissued), and edited by Mr. Sidney Lee, 1886, scarcely mentions his serious pursuits. His 'De Veritate' (Paris, 1624, London, 1645), the chief of his philosophical works, is the first purely metaphysical work by an Englishman. It was un- favourably criticised by Baxter, Locke, and others, but commended by Gassendi and Descartes. Though named the father of English deism, Herbert's real affinity was with the Cambridge Platonists. His poems were edited by Mr. Churton Collins, 1881; his 'Life of Henry VIII' (apologetic) first published, 1649. Index and Epitome of D. N. B. "But it is doubtful if any other autobiography breathes quite as freely the writer's overweening conceit of his own worth, which is the primary condition of all autobiographical excellence. At every turn Lord Herbert THE FIGHT WITH SIR JOHN AY RES 17 applauds his own valour, his own beauty, his own gentility of birth. At home and abroad he flatters himself that he is the cynosure of neighbouiing eyes. He, in fact, conforms from end to end to all the conditions which make autobiography successful. He is guilty of many misrepresentations. No defect is more patent in his memoirs than the total lack of a sense of proportion. Lord Herbert's self-satisfaction is built on sand. It is bred of the trivialities of fashionable life, of the butterfly triumphs won in court society. He passes by in contemptuous silence his truly valuable contri- butions to philosophy, history, and poetry. But the contrast between the grounds on which he professed a desire to be remembered and those on which he deserved to be remembered by posterity, gives his book almost all its value. Men of solid mental ability and achievements occasionally like to pose in society as gay Lotharios; it is rare, however, for them to endeavour, even as autobiographers, to convey the impression to all succeeding genera- tions that they were gay Lotharios and not much else besides. Yet it is such transparent errors of judgment that give autobiography its finest flavour." SIDNEY LEE, The Autobiography of Edward, Lord Herbert of Cherbury, Second Edition, Introduction, p. xiii. Routledge & Sons, London.] And now taking boat, I passed along the river of Rhine to the Low Countries, where after some stay, I went to Antwerp and Brussels; and having passed some time in the court there, went from thence to Calais, where taking ship, I arrived at Dover, and so went to London. I had scarce been two days there, when the Lords of the Council sending for me, ended the difference betwixt the Lord of Walden and myself. And now, if I may say it without vanity, I was in great esteem both in court and city ; many of the greatest desiring my company, though yet before that time I had no acquaintance with them. Richard, Earl of Dorset, to whom otherwise I was a stranger, one day invited me to Dorset House, where bringing me into his gallery, and showing me many pictures, he at last brought me to a frame covered with green taffeta, and asked me who I thought was there; and therewithal presently drawing the curtain, showed me my own picture; whereupon demanding how his lordship came to have it, he answered, that he had heard so many brave things of me, that he got a copy of a pic- ture which one Larkin a painter drew for me, the original whereof I intended before my departure to the Low Countries for Sir Thomas Lucy. But not only the Earl of Dorset, but a greater person l than I will here nominate, got another copy from Larkin, and plac- ing it afterwards in her cabinet (without that ever I knew any such 1 This was probably Queen Anne, the consort of James I. c 1 8 LORD HERBERT OF CHERBURY thing was done), gave occasion to those who saw it after her death of more discourse than I could have wished; and indeed I may truly say, that taking of my picture was fatal to me, for more reasons than I shall think fit to deliver. There was a lady also, wife to Sir John Ayres, knight, who find- ing some means to get a copy of my picture from Larkin, gave it to Mr. Isaac Oliver, the painter in Blackfriars, and desired him to draw it in little after his manner ; which being done, she caused it to be set in gold and enamelled, and so wore it about her neck, so low that she hid it under her breasts, which, I conceive, coming afterwards to the knowledge of Sir John Ayres, gave him more cause of jealousy than needed, had he known how innocent I was from pretending to any thing which might wrong him or his lady; since I could not so much as imagine that either she had my picture, or that she bare more than ordinary affection to me. It is true that she had a place in court, and attended Queen Anne, and was beside of an excellent wit and discourse, she had made herself a considerable person; howbeit little more than common civility ever passed betwixt us, though I confess I think no man was welcomer to her when I came, for which I shall allege this passage : Coming one day into her chamber, I saw her through the curtains lying upon her bed with a wax candle in one hand, and the picture I formerly mentioned in the other. I coming thereupon somewhat boldly to her, she blew out the candle, and hid the pic- ture from me ; myself thereupon being curious to know what that was she held in her hand, got the candle to be lighted again, by means whereof I found it was my picture she looked upon with more earnestness and passion than I could have easily believed, especially since myself was not engaged in any affection towards her. I could willingly have omitted this passage, but that it was the beginning of a bloody history which followed : howsoever, yet I must before the Eternal God clear her honour. And now in court a great person l sent for me divers times to at- tend her, which summons though I obeyed, yet God knoweth I declined coming to her as much as conveniently I could, without incurring her displeasure; and this I did not only for very 1 Queen Anne. THE FIGHT WITH SIR JOHN AY RES ig honest reasons, but, to speak ingenuously, because that affec- tion passed betwixt me and another lady (who I believe was the fairest of her time) as nothing could divert it. I had not been long in London, when a violent burning fever seized upon me, which brought me almost to my death, though at last I did by slow degrees recover my health. Being thus upon my amend- ment, the Lord Lisle, afterwards Earl of Leicester, sent me word that Sir John Ayres intended to kill me in my bed, and wished me keep a guard upon my chamber and person ; the same advertise- ment was confirmed by Lucy, Countess of Bedford, and the Lady Hobby shortly after. Hereupon I thought fit to entreat Sir William Herbert, now Lord Powis, to go to Sir John Ayres, and tell him that I marvelled much at the information given me by these great persons, and that I could not imagine any sufficient ground hereof ; howbeit, if he had anything to say to me in a fair and noble way, I would give him the meeting as soon as I had got strength enough to stand upon my legs; Sir William hereupon brought me so ambiguous and doubtful an answer from him, that whatsoever he meant, he would not declare yet his intention, which was really, as I found afterwards, to kill me any way that he could. Finding no means thus to surprise me, he sent me a letter to this effect; that he desired to meet me somewhere, and that it might so fall out as I might return quietly again. To this I re- plied, that if he desired to fight with me upon equal terms, I should upon assurance of the field and fair play, give him meeting when he did any way specify the cause, and that I did not think fit to come to him upon any other terms, having been sufficiently informed of his plots to assassinate me. After this, finding he could take no advantage against me then in a treacherous way, he resolved to assassinate me in this manner; hearing I was to come to Whitehall on horseback, with two lacqueys only, he attended my coming back in a place called Scotland Yard, at the hither end of Whitehall, as you come to it from the Strand, hiding himself there with four men armed, on purpose to kill me. I took horse at Whitehall Gate, and passing by that place, he being armed with a sword and dagger, without giving me so much as the least warning, ran at me furiously, but instead of me, wounded my horse in the brisket, as far as his sword could enter 20 LORD HERBERT OF CHERBURY for the bone ; my horse hereupon starting aside, he ran him again in the shoulder, which, though it made the horse more timorous, yet gave me time to draw my sword. His men thereupon encompassed me, and wounded my horse in three places more; this made my horse kick and fling in that manner as his men durst not come near me ; which advantage I took to strike at Sir John Ayres with all my force, but he warded the blow both with his sword and dagger; instead of doing him harm, I broke my sword within a foot of the hilt. Hereupon some passenger that knew me, and ob- serving my horse bleeding in so many places, and so many men assaulting me, and my sword broken, cried to me several times, "Ride away, ride away; " but I, scorning a base flight upon what terms soever, instead thereof alighted as well as I could from my horse. I had no sooner put one foot upon the ground, but Sir John Ayres pursuing me, made at my horse again, which the horse perceiving, pressed on me on the side I alighted, in that manner that he threw me down, so that I remained flat upon the ground, only one foot hanging in the stirrup, with that piece of a sword in my right hand. Sir John Ayres hereupon ran about the horse, and was thrusting his sword into me, when I, finding myself in this danger, did with both my arms reaching at his legs pull them towards me, till he fell down backwards on his head; one of my footmen hereupon, who was a little Shropshire boy, freed my foot out of the stirrup; the other, which was a great fellow, having run away as soon as he saw the first assault. This gave me time to get upon my legs, and to put myself in the best posture I could with that poor remnant of a weapon. Sir John Ayres by this time likewise was got up, standing betwixt me and some part of Whitehall, with two men on each side of him, and his brother behind him, with at least twenty or thirty persons of his friends, or attendants of the Earl of Suffolk. 1 Observing thus a body of men standing in opposition against me, though to speak truly I saw no swords drawn but by Sir John Ayres and his men, I ran violently against Sir John Ayres; but he, knowing my sword had no point, held his sword and dagger over his head, as believing I could strike rather than thrust, which I no sooner per- 1 Father of Lord Howard of Walden, with whom Herbert had lately quar- relled. Lee. THE FIGHT WITH SIR JOHN AY RES 21 ceived but I put a home thrust to the middle of his breast, that I threw him down with so much force, that his head fell first to the ground, and his heels upwards. His men hereupon assaulted me, when one Mr. Mansel, a Glamorganshire gentleman, finding so many set against me alone, closed with one of them; a Scotch gentleman also closing with another, took him off also. All I could well do to those two which remained was to ward their thrusts, which I did with that resolution that I got ground upon them. Sir John Ayres was now got up a third time, when I mak- ing towards him with the intention to close, thinking that there was otherwise no safety for me, put by a thrust of his with my left hand, and so coming within him, received a stab with his dagger on my right side, which ran down my ribs as far as my hip, which I feeling, did with my right elbow force his hand, together with the hilt of the dagger, so near the upper part of my right side, that I made him leave hold. The dagger now sticking in me, Sir Henry Gary, afterwards Lord of Falkland, and Lord Deputy of Ireland, find- ing the dagger thus in my body, snatched it out. This while I, being closed with Sir John Ayres, hurt him on the head, and threw him down a third time, when kneeling on the ground and bestriding him, I struck at him as hard as I could with my piece of a sword, and wounded him in four several places, and did almost cut off his left hand ; his two men this while struck at me, but it pleased God even miraculously to defend me; for when I lifted up my sword to strike at Sir John Ayres, I bore off their blows half a dozen times. His friends now finding him in this danger, took him by the head and shoulders, and drew him from be- twixt my legs, and carried him along with them through Whitehall, at the stairs whereof he took boat. Sir Herbert Croft (as he told me afterwards) met him upon the water vomiting all the way, which I believe was caused by the violence of the first thrust I gave him. His servants, brother, and friends, being now retired also, I remained master of the place and his weapons ; having first wrested his dagger from him, and afterward struck his sword out of his hand. This being done, I retired to a friend's house in the Strand, where I sent for a surgeon, who searching my wound on the right side, and finding it not to be mortal, cured me in the space of some 22 LORD HERBERT OF CHERBURY ten days, during which time I received many noble visits and messages from some of the best in the kingdom. Being now fully recovered of my hurts, I desired Sir Robert Harley to go to Sir John Ayres, and tell him, that though I thought he had not so much honour left in him, that I could be anyway ambitious to get it, yet that I desired to see him in the field with his sword in his hand ; the answer that he sent me was, that he would kill me with a musket out of a window. The Lords of the Privy Council, who had first sent for my sword, that they might see the little fragment of a weapon with which I had so behaved myself, as perchance the like had not been heard in any credible way, did afterwards command both him and me to appear before them ; but I absenting myself on purpose, sent one Humphrey Hill with a challenge to him in an ordinary, which he refusing to receive, Humphrey Hill put it upon the point of his sword, and so let it fall before him and the company then present. The Lords of the Privy Council had now taken order to appre- hend Sir John Ayres; when I, finding nothing else to be done, submitted myself likewise to them. Sir John Ayres had now published everywhere, that the ground of his jealousy, and conse- quently of his assaulting me, was drawn from the confession of his wife the Lady Ayres. She, to vindicate her honour, as well as free me from this accusation, sent a letter to her aunt the Lady Crook, to this purpose : That her husband Sir John Ayres did lie falsely ; but most falsely of all did lie when he said he had it from her confession, for she had never said any such thing. This letter the Lady Crook presented to me most opportunely as I was going to the Council table before the Lords, who having examined Sir John Ayres concerning the cause of the quarrel against me, found him still persist in his wife's confession of the fact; and now he being withdrawn, I was sent for, when the Duke of Lennox, afterwards of Richmond, telling me that was the ground of his quarrel, and the only excuse he had for assaulting me in that manner ; I desired his Lordship to peruse the letter, which I told him was given me as I came into the room. This letter being publicly read by a clerk of the Council, the Duke of Lennox then said, that he thought Sir John Ayres the most miserable man living; for his wife had not only given him the lie, as he found by THE FIGHT WITH SIR JOHN AYRES 23 her letter, but his father had disinherited him for attempting to kill me in that barbarous fashion, which was most true, as I found afterwards. For the rest, that I might content myself with what I had done, it being more almost than could be believed, but that I had so many witnesses thereof ; for all which reasons he com- manded me, in the name of his Majesty and all their Lordships, not to send any more to Sir John Ayres, nor to receive any message from him, in the way of fighting, which commandment I observed. Howbeit I must not omit to tell, that some years afterwards, Sir John Ayres, returning from Ireland by Beaumaris, where I then was, some of my servants and followers broke open the doors of the house where he was, and would, I believe, have cut him into pieces, but that I, hearing thereof, came suddenly to the house and recalled them, sending him word also, that I scorned to give him the usage he gave me, and that I would set him free out of the town ; which courtesy of mine, as I was told afterwards, he did thankfully acknowledge. SAMUEL PEPYS EXTRACTS FROM THE DIARY [From Memoirs of Samuel Pepys, Esq., F. R. S., comprising his Diary from 1659 to 1669. First edited by Lord Braybrooke, 1825; edited, with additions, by H. B. Wheatley, 1893-99. PEPYS, SAMUEL (1633-1703), diarist; son of John Pepys, a London tailor, was educated at St. Paul's School, London, and Trinity Hall and Magdalene College, Cambridge; M. A., 1660; entered the family of his father's first cousin, Sir Edward Montagu (afterwards first Earl of Sand- wich) [q. v.], 1656; 'clerk of the king's ships' and a clerk of the privy seal, 1660; surveyor-general of the victualling office, 1665, in which capacity he showed himself an energetic official and a zealous reformer of abuses; com- mitted to the Tower of London on charge of complicity with the popish plot, and deprived of his offices, 1679, but released, 1680; secretary of the admiralty, 1686; deprived of the secretaryship of the admiralty at the revo- lution, after which he lived in retirement, chiefly at Clapham. Fifty volumes of his manuscripts are in the Bodleian Library, Oxford. His 'Diary* re- mained in cipher in Magdalene College, Cambridge, until 1825, when it was deciphered by John Smith and edited by Lord Braybrooke. An enlarged edition by Mynors Bright [q. v.] appeared in 1875-9, and the whole, except a few passages which cannot be printed, was published in eight volumes (1893, &c.) by Mr. Henry B. Wheatley. Index and Epitome of D. N. B. 24 SAMUEL PEPYS "Now, if ever, we should be able to form some notion of that unparalleled figure in the annals of mankind unparalleled for three good reasons: first, because he was a man known to his contemporaries in a halo of almost historical pomp, and to his remote descendants with an indecent familiarity, like a taproom comrade ; second, because he has outstripped all competitors in the art or virtue of a conscious honesty about one's self; and, third, be- cause, being in many ways a very ordinary person, he has yet placed himself before the public eye with such a fulness and such an intimacy of detail as might be envied by a genius like Montaigne. Not then for his own sake only, but as a character in a unique position, endowed with a unique talent, and shedding a unique light upon the lives of the mass of mankind, he is surely worthy of prolonged and patient study. . . . "The whole world, town or country, was to Pepys a garden of Armida. Wherever he went, his steps were winged with the most eager expectation; whatever he did, it was done with the most lively pleasure. An insatiable curiosity in all the shows of the world and all the secrets of knowledge, filled him brimful of the longing to travel, and supported him in the toils of study. Rome was the dream of his life; he was never happier than when he read or talked of the Eternal City. When he was in Holland, he was 'with child' to see any strange thing. Meeting some friends and singing with them in a palace near the Hague, his pen fails him to express his passion of delight, 'the more so because in a heaven of pleasure and in a strange coun- try.' He must go to see all famous executions. He must needs visit the body of a murdered man, defaced 'with a broad wound,' he says, 'that makes my hand now shake to write of it.' He learned to dance, and was 'like to make a dancer.' He learned to sing, and walked about Gray's Inn Fields 'humming to myself (which is now my constant practice) the trillo.' He learned to play the lute, the flute, the flageolet, and the theorbo, and it was not the fault of his intention if he did not learn the harpsichord or the spinet. He learned to compose songs, and burned to give forth 'a scheme and theory of music not yet ever made in the world.' When he heard 'a fellow whistle like a bird exceeding well,' he promised to return another day and give an angel for a lesson in J;he art. Once, he writes, 'I took the Bezan back with me, and with a brave gale and tide reached up that night to the Hope, taking great pleasure in learning the seamen's manner of singing when they sound the depths.' If he found himself rusty in his Latin grammar, he must fall to it like a schoolboy. He was a member of Harrington's Club till its dissolution, and of the Royal Society before it had received the name. Boyle's 'Hydrostatics' was 'of infinite delight' to him, walking in Barnes Elms. We find him comparing Bible concord- ances, a captious judge of sermons, deep in Descartes and Aristotle. We find him, in a single year, studying timber and the measurement of timber; tar and oil, hemp, and the process of preparing cordage; mathematics and accounting; the hull and the rigging of ships from a model; and 'looking and improving himself of the (naval) stores with' hark to the fellow! 'great delight.' His familiar spirit of delight was not the same with Shel- ley's; but how true it was to him through life! He is only copying some- thing, and behold, he 'takes great pleasure to rule the lines, and have the capital words wrote with red ink;' he has only had his coal-cellar emptied and cleaned, and behold, 'it do please him exceedingly.' A hog's harslett is 'a piece of meat he loves.' He cannot ride home in my Lord Sandwich's coach, but he must exclaim with breathless gusto, 'his noble, rich coach.' EXTRACTS FROM THE DIARY 25 When he is bound for a supper party, he anticipates a 'glut of pleasure.' When he has a new watch, 'to see my childishness,' says he, 'I could not forbear carrying it in my hand and seeing what o'clock it was an hundred times.' To go to Vauxhall, he says, and 'to hear the nightingales and other birds, hear fiddles, and there a harp and here a Jew's trump, and here laugh- ing, and there fine people walking, is mighty divertizing.' And the night- ingales, I take it, were particularly dear to him; and it was again 'with great pleasure' that he paused to hear them as he walked to Woolwich, while the fog was rising and the April sun broke through." ROBERT Louis STEVENSON, "Samuel Pepys," in Familiar Studies of Men and Books, 1882. Charles Scribner's Sons, New York.] April 8th, 1661. About eight o'clock, we took barge at the Tower, Sir William Batten and his lady, Mrs. Turner, Mr. Fowler, and I. A very pleasant passage, and so to Gravesend, where we dined, and from thence a coach took them, and me and Mr. Fowler, with some others, come from Rochester to meet us, on horseback. At Rochester, where alight at Mr. Alcock's, and there drank, and had good sport, with his bringing out so many sorts of cheese. Then to the Hill-house at Chatham, where I never was before, and I found a pretty pleasant house, and am pleased with the armes that hang up there. Here we supped very merry, and late to bed ; Sir William telling me that old Edgeborrow, his predecessor, did die and walk in my chamber, did make me somewhat afraid, but not so much as, for mirth sake, I did seem. So to bed, in the Treas- urer's chamber. 9th. Lay and slept well till three in the morning, and then waking, and by the light "of the moon I saw my pillow (which overnight I flung from me) stand upright, but, not bethinking myself what it might be, I was a little afraid, but sleep overcome all, and so lay till nigh morning, at which time I had a candle brought me, and a good fire made, and in general it was a great pleasure all the time I staid here to see how I am respected and honoured by all people ; and I find that I begin to know now how to receive so much reverence, which, at the beginning, I could not tell how to do. Sir William and I by coach to the dock, and there viewed all the storehouses, and the old goods that are this day to be sold, which was great pleasure to me, and so back again by coach home, where we had a good dinner, and, among other strangers that come, there was Mr. Hempson and his wife, a pretty woman, and speaks Latin; Mr. Allen, and two daughters of his, both very tall, 26 SAMUEL PEPYS and the youngest 1 very handsome, so much as I could not forbear to love her exceedingly, having, among other things, the best hand that ever I saw. After dinner, we went to fit books and things (Tom Hater having this morning come to us) for the sale, by an inch of candle, and very good sport we and the ladies that stood by had, to see the people bid. Among other things sold there was all the State's armes, 2 which Sir W. Batten bought; intending to set up some of the images in his garden, and the rest to burn on the Coro- nation night. The sale being done, the ladies and I, and Captain Pitt, and Mr. Castle took barge, and down we went to see the Sovereigne which we did, taking great pleasure therein, sing- ing all the way, and among other pleasures, I put my Lady, Mrs. Turner, Mrs. Hempson, and the two Mrs. Aliens, into the lanthorn, and I went in and kissed them, demanding it as a fee due to a principall officer, with all which we were exceeding merry, and drunk some bottles of wine, and neat's tongue, &c. Then back again home, and so supped, and, after much mirth, to bed. loth. In the morning to see the Dock-houses. First, Mr. Pett's, the builder, and there was very kindly received, and among other things he did offer my Lady Batten a parrot, the best I ever saw, that knew Mingo so soon as it saw him, having been bred formerly in the house with them ; but for talking and singing I never heard the like. My Lady did accept of it. Then to see Commissioner Pett's house, he and his family being absent, and here I wondered how my Lady Batten walked up and down with curious looks to see how neat and rich everything is; and indeed both the house and garden is most handsome, saying that she would get it, for it be- longed formerly to the Surveyor of the Navy. Then on board the Prince, now in the dock, and indeed it has one and no more rich cabins for carved work, but no gold in her. After that, back home, and there eat a little dinner. Then to Rochester, and there saw the Cathedrall, which is now fitting for use, and the organ then a-tuning. Then away thence, observing the great doors of the church, as they say, covered with the skins of the Danes. And also had much mirth at a tombe. So to the Salutacione tavern, where Mr. Alcock and many of the towne come and entertained 1 Rebecca. 2 i.e. Coats of arms. EXTRACTS FROM THE DIARY 27 us with wine and oysters and other things, and hither come Sir John Minnes to us, who is come to-day from London to see " the Henery," in which he intends to ride as Vice-Admiral in the narrow seas all this summer. Here much mirth, but I was a little troubled to stay too long, because of going to Hempson's, which afterwards we did, and found it in all things a most pretty house, and rarely furnished, only it had a most ill accesse on all sides to it, which is a greatest fault that, I think, can be in a house. Here we had, for my sake, two fiddles, the one a base viall, on which he that played, played well some lyra lessons, but both together made the worst musique that ever I heard. We had a fine collacion, but I took little pleasure in that, for the illness of the musique, and for the intentnesse of my mind upon Mrs. Rebecca Allen. After we had done eating, the ladies went to dance, and among the men we had, I was forced to dance, too; and did make an ugly shift. Mrs. R. Allen danced very well, and seems the best humoured woman that ever I saw. About nine o'clock Sir William and my Lady went home, and we con- tinued dancing an houre or two, and so broke up very pleasant and merry, and so walked home, I leading Mrs. Rebecca, who seemed, I know not why, in that and other things, to be desirous of my favours, and would in all things show me respects. Going home, she would needs have me sing, and I did pretty well, and was highly esteemed by them. So to Captain Allen's (where we was last night, and heard him play on the harpsichon, and I find him to be a perfect good musician), and there, having no mind to leave Mrs. Rebecca, I did what with talk and singing (her father and I), Mrs. Turner and I staid there till two o'clock in the morn- ing, and was most exceeding merry, and I had the opportunity of kissing Mrs. Rebecca very often. nth. At two o'clock, with very great mirth, we went to our lodging and to bed, and lay till seven, and then called up by Sir W. Batten; so I rose, and we did some business, and then come Captain Allen, and he and I withdrew, and sang a song or two, and among others, took great pleasure in " Goe and bee hanged, that's twice good bye." The young ladies come too, and so I did again please myself with Mrs. Rebecca; and about nine o'clock, after we had breakfasted, we sett forth for London, 28 SAMUEL PEPYS and indeed I was a little troubled to part with Mrs. Rebecca, for which God forgive me. Thus we went away through Rochester. We baited at Dartford, and thence to London, but of all the journeys that ever I made, this was the merriest, and I was in a strange mode for mirth. Among other things, I got my Lady to let her mayd, Mrs. Anne, to ride all the way on horseback, and she rides exceeding well; and so I called [her] my clerk, that she went to wait upon me. I met two little schoolboys going with pichers of ale to their schoolmaster to break up against Easter, and I did drink of some of one of them, and give him two-pence. By and by, we come to two little girls keeping cowes, and I saw one of them very pretty, so I had a mind to make her aske my blessing, and telling her that I was her godfather, she asked me innocently whether I was not Ned Warding, and I said that I was, so she kneeled down, and very simply called, " Pray, godfather, pray to God to bless me," which made us very merry, and I gave her two- pence. In several places, I asked women whether they would sell me their children, but they denied me all, but said they would give me one to keep for them, if I would. Mrs. Anne and I rode under the man that hangs upon Shooter's Hill, and a filthy sight it was to see how his flesh is shrunk to his bones. So home, and I found all well, and a good deal of work done since I went. So to bed very sleepy for last night's work, con- cluding that it is the pleasantest journey in all respects that ever I had in my life. January 2d, 1665-6. Up by candle-light again, and my busi- ness being done, to my Lord Brouncker's, and there find Sir J. Minnes and all his company, and Mr. Boreman and Mrs. Turner, but, above all, my dear Mrs. Knipp, with whom I sang, and in perfect pleasure I was to hear her sing, and especially her little Scotch song of "Barbary Allen;" and to make our mirth the completer, Sir J. Minnes was in the highest pitch of mirth, and his mimicall tricks, that ever I saw, and most excellent pleasant com- pany he is, and the best musique that ever I saw, and certainly would have made an excellent actor, and now would be an excel- EXTRACTS FROM THE DIARY 29 lent teacher of actors. Then, it being past night, against my will, took leave. 5th. I with my Lord Brouncker and Mrs. Williams by coach with four horses to London, to my Lord's house in Covent Garden. 1 But, Lord ! what staring to see a nobleman's coach come to town ! And porters every where bow to us ; and such begging of beggars ! And delightful it is to see the town full of people again ; and shops begin to open, though in many places seven or eight together, and more, all shut ; but yet the town is full, compared with what it used to be. I mean the City end: for Covent Garden and West- minster are yet very empty of people, no court nor gentry being there. Home, thinking to get Mrs. Knipp, but could not, she be- ing busy with company, but sent me a pleasant letter, writing her- self "Barbary Allen." Reading a discourse about the river of Thames, the reason of its being choked up in several places with shelfes: which is plain is, by the encroachments made upon the River, and running out of causeways into the River, at every wood-wharfe : which was not heretofore, when Westminster Hall and White Hall were built, and Redriffe Church, which now are sometimes overflown with water. 6th. To a great dinner and much company. Mr. Cuttle and his lady and I went, hoping to get Mrs. Knipp to us, having wrote a letter to her in the morning, calling myself " Dapper Dicky," 2 in answer to her's of "Barbary Allen," but could not, and am told by the boy that carried my letter, that he found her crying ; and I fear she lives a sad life with that ill-natured fellow her husband : so we had a great, but I a melancholy dinner. After dinner to cards, and then comes notice that my wife is come unexpectedly to me to town : so I to her. It is only to see what I do, and why I come not home ; and she is in the right that I would have a little more of Mrs. Knipp's company before I go away. My wife to fetch away my things from Woolwich, and I back to cards, and after cards to choose King and Queene, and a good cake there was, but no marks found ; but I 1 In the Piazza; and one of the largest houses in what was then the most fashionable part of London. 2 A song called "Dapper Dick" is in the British Museum; it begins, "In a barren tree." It was printed in 1710. 30 SAMUEL PEPYS privately found the clove, the mark of the knave, and privately put it into Captain Cocke's piece, which made some mirth, because of his lately being known by his buying of clove and mace of the East India prizes. At night home to my lodging, where I find my wife returned with my things. It being Twelfth-Night, they had got the fiddler, and mighty merry they were ; and I above, come not to them, leaving them dancing, and choosing King and Queene. * Feb. 23d, 1665-6. To my Lord Sandwich's, who did lie last night at his house in Lincoln's Inne Fields. It being fine walking in the morning, and the streets full of people again. There I staid, and the house full of people come to take leave of my Lord, who this day goes out of towne upon his embassy towards Spain ; and I was glad to find Sir W. Coventry to come, though I know it is only a piece of courtship. To Mr. Hales's, and my wife's picture pleases me well, and I begin to doubt the picture of my Lady Peters my wife takes her posture from, and which is an excellent picture, is not of his making it is so master-like . Comes Mrs. Knipp to see my wife , and I spend all the night talking with this baggage, and teaching her my song of "Beauty, retire," which she sings and makes go most rarely, and a very fine song it seems to be. She also entertained me with repeating many of her own and others' parts of the play-house, which she do most excellently; and tells me the whole practices of the play-house and players, and is in every respect most excellent company. So I supped, and was merry at home all the evening, and the rather it being my birthday 33 years, for which God be praised that I am in so good a condition of health and estate, and everything else as I am, beyond expectation, in all. May 4th. To Mr. Hales, to see what he had done to Mrs. Pierce's picture, and whatever he pretends, I do not think it will ever be so good a picture as my wife's. Thence home to dinner, and had a great fray with my wife about Browne's coming to teach her to paint, and sitting with me at table, which I will not yield to. I do thor- oughly believe she means no hurt in it; but very angry we were, and I resolved all into my having my will done, without disputing, EXTRACTS FROM THE DIARY 31 be the reason what it will ; and so I will have it. This evening, being weary of my late idle courses, I bound myself to very strict rules till Whitsunday next. 5th. It being a very fine moonshine, my wife and Mercer come into the garden, and, my business being done, we sang till about twelve at night, with mighty pleasure to ourselves and neighbours, by their casements opening. ******* 9th. To White Hall, and heard the Duke commend Deane's ship, "The Rupert," before "The Defyance," built by Castle, in hear- ing of Sir W. Batten, which pleased me mightily. To Pierce's, where I find Knipp. Thence with them to Cornhill, to call and choose a chimneypiece for Pierce's closet. My wife mightily vexed at my being abroad with these women ; and, when they were gone, called them I know not what, which vexed me, having been so innocent with them. 1 2th. I find my wife troubled at my checking her last night in the coach, in her long stories out of Grand Cyrus, which she would tell, though nothing to the purpose, nor in any good manner. 1 This she took unkindly, and I think I was to blame indeed ; but she do find with reason, that, in the company of Pierce, Knipp, or other women that I love, I do not value her, or mind her as I ought. However, very good friends by and by. . . . i3th. (Lord's day.) To Westminster, and into St. Margett's Church, where I heard a young man play the fool upon the doctrine of Purgatory. ******* May 2 gth. King's birthday, and Restoration day. Waked with the ringing of bells all over the town: so up before five o'clock 1 Sir Walter Scott observes, in his Life of Dryden, that the romances of Cal- prenede and Scuderi, those ponderous and unmerciful folios, now consigned to oblivion, were, in their day, not only universally read and admired, but supposed to furnish the most perfect models of gallantry and heroism. Dr. Johnson read them all. "I have," says Mrs. Chapone, "and yet I am still alive, dragged through 'Le Grand Cyrus,' in twelve huge volumes; 'Cleopatra/ in eight or ten; 'Ibrahim,' 'Clelie,' and some others, whose names, as well as all the rest of them, I have forgotten." (Letters to Mrs. Carter.) No wonder that Pepys sat on thorns, when his wife began to recite "Le Grand Cyrus" in the coach, "and trembled at the impending tale." BRAYBROOKE. 32 SAMUEL PEPYS and to the office. At noon I did, upon a small invitation of Sir W. Pen's, go and dine with Sir W. Coventry at his office, where great good cheer, and many pleasant stories of Sir W. Coventry. After dinner, to the Victualling Office; and there, beyond belief, did acquit myself very well to full content; so that, beyond expectation, I got over that second rub in this business; and if ever I fall on it again, I deserve to be undone. My wife comes to me, to tell me, that if I would see the handsomest woman in England, I shall come home presently; and who should it be but the pretty lady of our parish, that did heretofore sit on the other side of our church, over against our gallery, that is since married she with Mrs. Anne Jones, one of this parish, that dances finely. And so I home; and indeed she is a pretty black woman her name Mrs. Horsely. But, Lord ! to see how my nature could not refrain from the temptation ; but I must invite them to go to Fox- hall, to Spring Gardens, though I had freshly received minutes of a great deal of extraordinary business. However, I sent them before with Creed, and I did some of my business; and so after them, and find them there, in an arbour, and had met with Mrs. Pierce, and some company with her. So here I spent 20$. upon them, and were pretty merry. Among other things, had a fellow that imitated all manner of birds, and dogs, and hogs, with his voice, which was mighty pleasant. Staid here till night : then set Mrs. Pierce in at the New Exchange ; and ourselves took coach, and so set Mrs. Horsely home, and then home ourselves, but with great trouble in the streets, by bonfires, it being the King's birthday and day of Restoration ; but, Lord ! to see the difference how many there were on the other side, and so few on ours, the City side of the Temple, would make one wonder the difference between the temper of one sort of people and the other : and the difference among all between what they do now, and what it was the night when Monk come into the City. Such a night as that I never think to see again, nor think it can be. ******* March 2d, 1667. After dinner, with my wife, to the King's house to see "The Maiden Queene," a new play of Dryden's, mightily commended for the regularity of it, and the strain and wit; and, the truth is, there is a comical part done by EXTRACTS FROM THE DIARY 33 Nell, 1 which is Florimell, that I never can hope ever to see the like done again, by man or woman. The King and Duke of York were at the play. But so great performance of a comical part was never, I believe, in the world before as Nell do this, both as a mad girle, then most and best of all when she comes in like a young gallant; and hath the motions and carriage of a spark the most that ever I saw any man have. It makes me, I con- fess, admire her. March 3d, 1668. Up betimes to work again, and then met at the Office, where to our great business of this answer to the Par- liament; where to my great vexation I find my Lord Brouncker prepared only to excuse himself, while I, that have least reason to trouble myself, am preparing with great pains to defend them all: and more, I perceive, he would lodge the beginning of dis- charging ships by ticket upon me : but I care not, for I believe I shall get more honour by it when the Parliament, against my will, shall see how the whole business of the Office was done by me. I with my clerks to dinner, and thence presently down with Lord Brouncker, W. Pen, T. Harvey, T. Middleton, and Mr. Tippets, who first took his place this day at the table, as a Com- missioner, in the room of Commissioner Pett. Down by water to Deptford, where the King, Queen, and Court are to see launched the new ship built by Mr. Shish, called "The Charles." God send her better luck than the former ! Here some of our breth- ren, who went in a boat a little before my boat, did by appoint- ment take opportunity of asking the King's leave that we might make full use of the want of money, in our excuse to the Parlia- ment for the business of tickets, and other things they will lay to our charge, all which arise from nothing else: and this the King did readily agree to, and did give us leave to make our full use of it. The ship being well launched, I back again by boat. 4th. Vexed and sickish to bed, and there slept about three hours, but then waked, and never in so much trouble in all my life of mind, thinking of the task I have upon me, and upon what dissatisfactory grounds, and what the issue of it may be to me. 1 Nell Gwynne. 34 SAMUEL PEPYS 5th. With these thoughts I lay troubling myself till six o'clock, restless, and at last getting my wife to talk to me to comfort me, which she at last did, and made me resolve to quit my hands of this Office, and endure the trouble no longer than till I can clear myself of it. So with great trouble, but yet with some ease, from this discourse with my wife, I up, and at my Office, whither come my clerks, and so I did huddle the best I could some more notes for my discourse to-day, and by nine o'clock was ready, and did go down to the Old Swan, and there by boat, with T. Harvey and W. Hewer with me, to West- minster, where I found myself come time enough, and my brethren all ready. But I full of thoughts and trouble touching the issue of this day; and, to comfort myself, did go to the Dog and drink half-a-pint of mulled sack, and in the Hall [West- minster] did drink a dram of brandy at Mrs. Hewlett's; and with the warmth of this did find myself in better order as to courage, truly. So we all up to the lobby; and, between eleven or twelve o'clock, were called in, with the mace before us, into the House, where a mighty full House : and we stood at the bar, namely, Brouncker, Sir J. Minnes, Sir T. Harvey, and myself, W. Pen being in the House, as a Member. I perceive the whole House was full of expectation of our defence what it would be, and with great prejudice. After tne Speaker had told us the dissatisfaction of the House, and read the Report of the Committee, I began our defence most acceptably and smoothly, and continued at it without any hesitation or losse, but with full scope, and all my reason free about me, as if it had been at my own table, from that time till passed three in the afternoon ; and so ended, with- out any interruption from the Speaker; but we withdrew. And there all my Fellow-Officers, and all the world that was within hearing, did congratulate me, and cry up my speech as the best thing they ever heard; and my Fellow-Officers were overjoyed in it; and we were called in again by and by to answer only one question, touching our paying tickets to ticket-mongers; and so out; and we were in hopes to have had a vote this day in our favour, and so the generality of the House was; but my speech, being so long, many had gone out to dinner and come in again half-drunk; and then there are two or three that are EXTRACTS FROM THE DIARY 35 professed enemies to us and every body else; among others, Sir T. Littleton, Sir Thomas Lee, Mr. Wiles, the coxcomb whom I saw heretofore at the cock-fighting, and a few others ; I say, these did rise up and speak against the coming to a vote now, the House not being full, by reason of several being at dinner, but most because that the House was to attend the King this afternoon, about the business of religion, wherein they pray him to put in force all the laws against Nonconformists and Papists ; and this prevented it, so that they put it off to to-morrow come se'nnight. However, it is plain we have got great ground, and every body says I have got the most honour that any could have had opportunity of getting; and so our hearts mightily overjoyed at this success. We all to dinner to my Lord Brouncker's that is to say, myself, T. Harvey, and W. Pen, and there dined; and thence with Sir Anthony Morgan, who is an acquaintance of Brouncker's, a very wise man, we after dinner to the King's house, and there saw part of "The Discontented Colonel." To my wife, whom W. Hewer had told of my success, and she overjoyed; and, after talking awhile, I betimes to bed, having had no quiet rest a good while. 6th. Up betimes, and with Sir D. Gauden to Sir W. Coventry's chamber: where the first word he said to me was, "Good-morrow, Mr. Pepys, that must be Speaker of the Parliament-house : " and did protest I had got honour for ever in Parliament. He said that his brother, that sat by him, admires me ; and another gentleman said that I could not get less than 1000 a-year, if I would put on a gown and plead at the Chancery-bar ; but, what pleases me most, he tells me that the Solicitor-General did pro- test that he thought I spoke the best of any man in England. After several talks with him alone touching his own businesses, he carried me to White Hall, and there parted; and I to the Duke of York's lodgings, and find him going to the Park, it be- ing a very fine morning, and I after him ; and, as soon as he saw me, he told me, with great satisfaction, that I had converted a great many yesterday, and did, with great praise of me, go on with the discourse with me. And, by and by, overtaking the King, the King and Duke of York came to me both; and he said, "Mr. Pepys, I am very glad of your success yesterday;" 36 SAMUEL PEPYS and fell to talk of my well speaking ; and many of the Lords there. My Lord Barkeley did cry me up for what they had heard of it; and others, Parliament-men there, about the King, did say that they never heard such a speech in their lives de- livered in that manner. Progers, of the Bedchamber, swore to me afterwards before Brouncker, in the afternoon, that he did tell the King that he thought I might match the Solicitor-General. Every body that saw me almost came to me, as Joseph William- son and others, with such eulogys as cannot be expressed. From thence I went to Westminster Hall, where I met Mr. G. Montagu, who came to me and kissed me, and told me that he had often heretofore kissed my hands, but now he would kiss my lips: protesting that I was another Cicero, and said, all the world said the same of me. Mr. Ash- burnham, and every creature I met there of the Parliament, or that knew any thing of the Parliament's actings, did salute me with this honour: Mr. Godolphin; Mr. Sands, who swore he would go twenty miles, at any time, to hear the like again, and that he never saw so many sit four hours together to hear any man in his life as there did to hear me. Mr. Chichly, Sir John Duncomb, and everybody do say that the kingdom will ring of my abilities, and that I have done myself right for my whole life : and so Captain Cocke, and others of my friends, say that no man had ever such an opportunity of making his abilities known; and, that I may cite all at once, Mr. Lieutenant of the Tower did tell me that Mr. Vaughan did protest to him, and that, in his hearing, he said so to the Duke of Albemarle, and afterwards to Sir W. Coventry, that he had sat twenty-six years in Parliament, and never heard such a speech there before : for which the Lord God make me thankful ! and that I may make use of it, not to pride and vain-glory, but that, now I have this esteem, I may do nothing that may lessen it ! I spent the morning thus walking in the Hall, being complimented by every- body with admiration : and at noon stepped into the Legg with Sir William Warren, who was in the Hall, and there talked about a little of his business, and thence into the Hall a little more, and so with him by coach as far as the Temple almost, and there 'light, to follow my Lord Brouncker's coach, which I spied, and EXTRACTS FROM THE DIARY 37 so to Madam Williams's, where I overtook him, and agreed upon meeting this afternoon. To White Hall, to wait on the Duke of York, where he again, and all the company magnified me, and several in the Gallery: among others, my Lord Gerard, who never knew me before, nor spoke to me, desires his being better acquainted with me; and [said] that, at table where he was, he never heard so much said of any man as of me, in his whole life. May i6th, 1668. Up; and to the Office, where we sat all the morning; and at noon, home with my people to dinner; and thence to the Office all the afternoon, till, my eyes weary, I did go forth by coach to the King's playhouse, and there saw the best part of "The Sea Voyage," 1 where Knipp did her part of sorrow very well. I afterwards to her house; but she did not come presently home; and there I did kiss her maid, who is so mighty belle; and I to my tailor's, and to buy me a belt for my new suit against to-morrow; and so home, and there to my Office, and afterwards late walking in the garden ; and so home to supper, and to bed, after Nell's cutting of my hair close, the weather being very hot. April 3oth, 1669. Up, and by coach to the coachmaker's : and there I do find a great many ladies sitting in the body of a coach that must be ended by to-morrow: they were my Lady Marquess of Winchester, Bellassis, and other great ladies, eating of bread and butter, and drinking ale. I to my coach, which is silvered over, but no varnish yet laid on, so I put it in a way of doing; and myself about other business, and particularly to see Sir W. Coventry, with whom I talked a good while to my great content ; and so to other places among others, to my tailor's: and then to the beltmaker's, where my belt cost me 555. of the colour of my new suit; and here, understanding that the mistress of the house, an oldish woman in a hat, hath some water good for the eyes, she did dress me, making my eyes smart most horribly, and did give me a little glass of it, which I will 1 A comedy, by Beaumont and Fletcher. 38 SAMUEL PEPYS use, and hope it will do me good. So to the cutler's, and there did give Tom, who was with me all day, a sword cost me 125. and a belt of my owne ; and sent my own silver-hilt sword a-gild- ing against to-morrow. This morning I did visit Mr. Olden- burgh, and did see the instrument for perspective made by Dr. Wren, of which I have one making by Browne ; and the sight of this do please me mightily. At noon my wife came to me at my tailor's, and I sent her home, and myself and Tom dined at Hercules Pillars; and so about our business again, and partic- ularly to Lilly's, the varnisher, about my prints, whereof some of them are pasted upon the boards, and to my full content. Thence to the frame-maker's, one Norris, in Long Acre, who showed me several forms of frames, which were pretty, in little bits of mouldings, to choose patterns by. This done, I to my coachmaker's, and there vexed to see nothing yet done to my coach, at three in the afternoon ; but I set it in doing, and stood by till eight at night, and saw the painter varnish it, which is pretty to see how every doing it over do make it more and more yellow: and it dries as fast in the sun as it can be laid on almost; and most coaches are, now-a-days, done so, and it is very pretty when laid on well, and not too pale, as some are, even to show the silver. Here I did make the workmen drink, and saw my coach cleaned and oyled; and, staying among poor people there in the ally, did hear them call their fat child Punch, which pleased me mightily, that word being become a word of common use for all that is thick and short. 1 At night home, and there find my wife hath been making herself clean against to-morrow; and, late as it was, I did send my coachman and horses to fetch home the coach to-night, and so we to supper, myself most weary with walking and standing so much, to see all things fine against to-morrow, and so to bed. Meeting with Mr. Sheres, to several places, and, among others, to buy a perriwig, but I bought none ; and also to Dancre's, where he was about my picture of Windsor which is mighty pretty, and so will the prospect of Rome be. 1 "Puncheon, the vessel, Fr. poinfon, perhaps so called from the pointed form of the staves; the vessel bellying out in the middle, and tapering towards each end: and hence punch (i.e., the large belly) became applied, as Pepys records, to anything thick or short." RICHARDSON'S Dictionary. EXTRACTS FROM THE DIARY 39 May i st. Up betimes. Called by my tailor, and there first put on a summer suit this year; but it was not my fine one of flowered tabby vest, and coloured camelott tunique, because it was too fine with the gold lace at the bands, that I was afraid to be seen in it; but put on the stuff suit I made the last year, which is now repaired; and so did go to the Office in it, and sat all the morning, the day looking as if it would be fowle. At noon home to dinner, and there find my wife extraordinary fine, with her flowered tabby gown that she made two years ago, now laced exceeding pretty; and, indeed, was fine all over; and mighty earnest to go, though the day was very lowering; and she would have me put on my fine suit, which I did. And so anon we went alone through the town with our new liveries of serge, and the horses' manes and tails tied with red ribbons, and the standards gilt with varnish, and all clean, and green reines, that people did mightily look upon us; and, the truth is, I did not see any coach more pretty, though more gay, than our's, all the day. But we set out, out of humour I because Betty, whom I expected, was not come to go with us; and my wife that I would sit on the same seat with her, which she likes not, being so fine : and she then expected to meet Sheres, which we did in the Pell Mell, and, against my will, I was forced to take him into the coach, but was sullen all day almost, and little com- plaisant: the day being unpleasing, though the Park full of coaches, but dusty, and windy, and cold, and now and then a little dribbling of rain; and, what made it worse, there were so many hackney-coaches as spoiled the sight of the gentlemen's; and so we had little pleasure. But here was W. Batelier and his sister in a borrowed coach by themselves, and I took them and we to the lodge; and at the door did give them a syllabub, and other things, cost me 125., and pretty merry. And so back to the coaches, and there till the evening, and then home, leaving Mr. Sheres at St. James's Gate, where he took leave of us for altogether, he being this night to set out for Portsmouth post, in his way to Tangier, which troubled my wife mightily, who is mighty, though not, I think, too fond of him. 40 JONATHAN SWIFT JONATHAN SWIFT EXTRACTS FROM THE JOURNAL TO STELLA [From the Journal to Stella. Written 1710-1713; published in part 1766, 1768; complete 1784. Edited by G. A. Aitken, Methuen & Co., London, 1901. SWIFT, JONATHAN (1667-1745), dean of St. Patrick's, Dublin, and satirist; cousin of Dryden and son of Jonathan Swift by Abigail (Erick) of Leicester; born at Dublin after his father's death; grandson of Thomas Swift, the well-known royalist vicar of Goodrich, who was descended from a York- shire family, a member of which, 'Cavaliero' Swifte, was created Baron Car- lingford, 1627; educated at Kilkenny grammar school, where Congreve was a schoolfellow, and at Trinity College, Dublin, 1682; neglected his studies, showed an impatience of restraint, was publicly censured for offences against discipline, and only obtained his degree by the ' special grace ' ; attributed his recklessness himself to the neglect of his family, for whom he felt little regard; joined his mother at Leicester on the troubles which followed the expulsion of James II; admitted into the household of Sir William Temple, who had known his uncle Godwin, c. 1692, where he acted as his secretary; introduced to William III and sent by Temple to him, to convince him of the necessity for triennial parliaments, 1693; wrote pindarics, one being printed in the 'Athenian Mercury,' 1692, which, according to Dr. Johnson, provoked Dryden's remark, 'Cousin Swift, you will never be a poet'; chafed at his position of dependence, and was indignant at Temple's delay in pro- curing him preferment; left Temple's service, returned to Ireland, was ordained, 1694, and was given the small prebend of Kilroot; returned to Temple at Moor Park, 1696; read deeply, 'mostly classics and history, and edited Temple's correspondence; wrote (1697) 'The Battle of the Books,' which was published in 1704, together with 'The Tale of a Tub,' his famous and powerful satire of theological shams and pedantry; met 'Stella,' Esther Johnson [q. v.j, who was an inmate of Temple's family at the time; went again to Ireland on the death of Temple, 1699; given a prebend in St. Patrick's, Dublin, and Laracor, with other livings; made frequent visits to Dublin and London; D.D.Dublin, 1701; wrote his ' Discourse on the Dis- sensions in Athens and Rome' with reference to the impeachment of the whig lords, 1701; in his visit to London, 1705 and 1707, became acquainted with Addison, Steele, Congreve, and Halifax; entrusted (1707) with a mis- sion to obtain the grant of Queen Anne's bounty for Ireland; wrote some pamphlets on religious or church subjects ; published ' Letter on the Sacra- mental Test,' 1708, an attack on the Irish presbyterians which, though anonymous, injured him with the whigs; in disgust at the whig alliance with dissent, ultimately went over to the tories on his next visit to England, 1710; attacked the whig ministers in pamphlets, in the ' Examiner,' Novem- ber 1710 to June 1711, and wrote the ' Conduct of the Allies,' 1711; became dean of St. Patrick's, 1713; had already commenced the 'Journal to Stella,' had become intimate with the tory ministers, and had used his influence in helping young and impoverished authors, including Pope and Steele; re- turned to England, 1713, to reconcile Bolingbroke and Harley, but in vain; EXTRACTS FROM THE JOURNAL TO STELLA 41 wrote more pamphlets, notably 'The Public Spirit of the Whigs considered,' 1714, in reply to Steele's ' Crisis/ but at length gave up all for lost and retired to the country; left for Ireland, 1715, after the fall of the ministry and the death of Queen Anne ; his marriage to Stella, an incident which still remains unproven, and also his final rupture with 'Vanessa' (Miss Vanhomrigh, whose acquaintance he had made in London), supposed to have taken place about this time; his rupture with Vanessa the cause of her death, before which she entrusted to her executors his poem ' Cadenus and Vanessa/ which relates the story of their love affair; though always contemptuous of the Irish, was led, by his personal antipathies to the whigs, to acquire a sense of their unfair dealings with Ireland; successfully prevented the introduc- tion of ' Wood's Half-pence ' into Ireland by his famous 'Drapier Letters/ 1724; came to England, 1726, visited Pope and Gay, and dined with Walpole, for whose behoof he afterwards wrote a letter complaining of the treatment of Ireland, which had, however, no effect on the minister; broke with Wal- pole in consequence; was introduced to Queen Caroline, but gained nothing by it; published ' Gulliver's Travels/ 1726; made his last visit to England, 1727, when the death of George I created for a moment hopes of dislodg- ing Walpole; wrote some of his most famous tracts and some of his most characteristic poems during these last years in Ireland; kept up his cor- respondence with Bolingbroke, Pope, Gay, and Arbuthnot, and though remaining aloof from Dublin society, maintained good relations with Lord Carteret, the lord-lieutenant; attracted to himself a small circle of friends, and was adored by the people; set up a monument to Schomberg in the cathedral at his own expense, spent a third of his income on charities, and saved up another third to found a charitable institution at his death, St. Patrick's Hospital (opened, 1757); symptoms of the illness from which he appears to have suffered all his life very marked, c. 1738; buried by the side of Stella, in St. Patrick's, Dublin, his own famous inscription, 'ubi saeva indignatio ulterius cor lacerare nequit/ being inscribed on his tomb. Dr. Johnson, Macaulay, and Thackeray, among many other writers, were alienated by his ferocity, which was, however, the result of noble qualities soured by hard experience. His indignation at oppression and unfairness was genuine. His political writings are founded on common sense pure and simple, and he had no party bias. His works, with the exception of the letter upon the correction of the language, 1712, were all anonymous, and for only one, 'Gulliver's Travels/ did he receive any payment (2oo/.). A large number of publications appear to have been attributed to him by dif- ferent editors without sufficient authority. Index and Epitome of D.N.B. "Swift has left one monument, which he would not himself have recog- nized as of any literary value, but which the world, most assuredly, will never allow to die. This is the Journal to Stella: a continuous series of letters in which he depicts, for her who, in all his busy and bustling surroundings, ever occupied the place closest to his heart, the scenes in which he moved. Half the charm of the Journal lies in its absolute ease and unconsciousness of effort ; in the humour alternately playful and sarcastic, in the pathos and the anger, in the fierce self-assertion which would not conceal itself, in the fidelity which made his genius the willing servant of smaller men who played the part of his patrons in a word, in all those varying traits which reflect Swift's character so exactly, and which let us see him at once in his pride, and in his tenderness, in his power, and in his weakness. We see him as the 42 JONATHAN SWIFT confidant of ministers, and the dispenser of patronage: as the frequenter of the Court, and the companion of the great, and, again, as the boon companion of the victors and the vanquished in the world of letters; as the friend of Addison, of Congreve, of Atterbury, of Arbuthnot, of Pope; as the protector of Parnell and others more obscure who had fallen into misfortune ; and as the fierce combatant, who enjoyed recounting his triumphs to the one listener, so far removed, for whom all that affected him was the first interest of life." SIR HENRY CRAIK, Selections from Swift, Vol. I, pp. 19-20. 1892. "I know of nothing more manly, more tender, more exquisitely touching, than some of these brief notes, written in what Swift calls 'his little language' in his journal to Stella. He writes to her night and morning often. He never sends away a letter to her but he begins a new one on the same day. He can't bear to let go her kind little hand, as it were. He knows that she is thinking of him, and longing for him far away in Dublin yonder. He takes her letters from under his pillow and talks to them, familiarly, paternally, with fond epithets and pretty caresses as he would to the sweet and artless creature who loved him. 'Stay,' he writes one morning it is the i4th of December, 1710 'Stay, I will answer some of your letter this morning in bed. Let me see. Come and appear, little letter ! Here I am, says he, and what say you to Stella this morning fresh and fasting? And can Stella read this writing without hurting her dear eyes ? ' he goes on, after more kind prattle and fond whispering. The dear eyes shine clearly upon him then the good angel of his life is with him and blessing him." WILLIAM MAKE- PEACE THACKERAY, "Swift," in The English Humourists of the Eighteenth Century. 1853.] London, Oct. 22, 1710. I was this morning with Mr. Lewis, the under-secretary to Lord Dartmouth, two hours, talking politics, and contriving to keep Steele in his office of stamped paper: he has lost his place of Gazetteer, three hundred pounds a year, for writing a Tatler, 1 some months ago, against Mr. Harley, 2 who gave it him at first, and raised the salary from sixty to three hundred pounds. This was devilish ungrateful; and Lewis was telling me the particulars: but I had a hint given me, that I might save him in the other employment: and leave was given me to clear matters with Steele. Well, I dined with Sir Matthew Dudley, and in the evening went to sit with Mr. Addison, and offer the matter at distance to him, as the discreeter person; but found party 3 had so possessed him, that he talked as if he suspected me, and would not fall in with anything I said. So I stopped short in my overture, and we parted very drily; and I shall say nothing 1 No. 193. 2 Robert Harley: raised to the peerage in May, 1711, as Earl of Oxford, and made Lord High Treasurer. 3 Swift was a Tory; Addison and Steele were Whigs. For the life of Sir Rich- ard Steele see post, p. 425. EXTRACTS FROM THE JOURNAL TO STELLA 43 to Steele, and let them do as they will; but, if things stand as they are, he will certainly lose it, unless I save him; and therefore I will not speak to him, that I may not report to his disadvantage. Is not this vexatious? and is there so much in the proverb of preferred service? When shall I grow wise? I endeavour to act in the most exact points of honour and conscience; and my nearest friends will not understand it so. What must a man expect from his enemies? This would vex me, but it shall not; and so I bid you good-night, etc. 23. I know 'tis neither wit nor diversion to tell you every day where I dine; neither do I write it to fill my letter; but I fancy I shall, some time or other, have the curiosity of seeing some particulars how I passed my life when I was absent from MD l this time; and so I tell you now that I dined to-day at Moles- worth's, the Florence Envoy, then went to the Coffee-house, where I behaved myself coldly enough to Mr. Addison, and so came home to scribble. We dine together to-morrow and next day by invi- tation; but I shall alter my behaviour to him, till he begs my pardon, or else we shall grow bare acquaintance. I am weary of friends; and friendships are all monsters, but MD's. March 7, 1710-11. . . . And so you say that Stella is a pretty girl; and so she be, and methinks I see her just now as handsome as the day is long. Do you know what ? when I am writing in our language, I make up my mouth just as if I was speaking it. I caught myself at it just now. And I suppose Dingley is so fair and so fresh as a lass in May, and has her health, and no spleen. In your account you sent do you reckon as usual from the ist of November was twelvemonth ? Poor Stella, will not Dingley leave her a little daylight to write to Presto? Well, well, we'll have daylight shortly, spite of her teeth; and zoo must cly Lele and 1 The 'little language' which Swift used when writing to Stella (Esther Johnson) was the language he employed when playing with her as a little child at Moor Park. It is marked chiefly by such changes of letters (e.g., I for n, or n for /) as a child makes when learning" to speak. Swift is Presto, and Pdfr, sometimes Podefar (perhaps Poor dear foolish rogue). Stella is Ppt (Poor pretty thing). MD (my dears) usually stands for both Stella and Mrs. Dingley, but sometimes for Stella alone. Mrs. Dingley is indicated by ME (Madame Elderly). The letters FW may mean Farewell, or Foolish Wenches. Lele seems to be There, there, and sometimes Truly. G. A. AITKEN. 44 JONATHAN SWIFT Hele, andHele aden. Must loo mimitate Pdfr, pay? Iss, and so la shall. And so lele's fol ee rettle. Dood-mollow. At night, Mrs. Barton sent this morning to invite me to dinner; and there I dined, just in that genteel manner that MD used when they would treat some better sort of body than usual. 8. O dear MD, my heart is almost broken. You will hear the thing before this comes to you. I writ a full account of it this night to the Archbishop of Dublin ; and the Dean may tell you the par- ticulars from the Archbishop. I was in a sorry way to write, but thought it might be proper to send a true account of the fact ; for you will hear a thousand lying circumstances. It is of Mr. Har- ley's being stabbed this afternoon, at three o'clock, at a Committee of the Council. I was playing Lady Catharine Morris's cards, where I dined, when young Arundel came in with the story. I ran away immediately to the Secretary l which was in my way : no one was at home. I met Mrs. St. John in her chair; she had heard it imperfectly. I took a chair to Mr. Harley, who was asleep, and they hope in no danger; but he had been out of order, and was so when he came abroad to-day, and it may put him in a fever : I am in mortal pain for him. That desperate French vil- lain, Marquis de Guiscard, stabbed Mr. Harley. Guiscard was taken up by Mr. Secretary St. John's warrant for high treason, and brought before the Lords to be examined; there he stabbed Mr. Harley. I have told all the particulars already to the Arch- bishop. I have now, at nine, sent again, and they tell me he is in a fair way. Pray pardon my distraction; I now think of all his kindness to me. The poor creature now lies stabbed in his bed by a desperate French Popish villain. Good-night, and God preserve you both, and pity me ; I want it. 9. Morning; seven, in bed. Patrick is just come from Mr. Harley's. He slept well till four ; the surgeon sat up with him ; he is asleep again: he felt a pain in his wound when he waked: they apprehend him in no danger. This account the surgeon left with the porter, to tell people that send. Pray God preserve him. I am rising, and going to Mr. Secretary St. John. They say Guiscard will die with the wounds Mr. St. John and the rest 1 The Secretary of State, Henry St. John, created Viscount Bolingbroke in 1712. EXTRACTS FROM THE JOURNAL TO STELLA 45 gave him. I shall tell you more at night. Night. Mr. Harley still continues on the mending hand ; but he rested ill last night, and felt pain. I was early with the Secretary this morning, and I dined with him, and he told me several particularities of this accident, too long to relate now. Mr. Harley is still mending this evening, but not at all out of danger ; and till then I can have no peace. Good-night, etc., and pity Presto. ******* Mar. 1 6. I have made but little progress in this letter for so many days, thanks to Guiscard and Mr. Harley ; and it would be endless to tell you all the particulars of that odious fact. I do not yet hear that Guiscard is dead, but they say 'tis impossible he should recover. I walked too much yesterday for a man with a broken shin; to-day I rested, and went no farther than Mrs. Vanhomrigh's, 1 where I dined; and Lady Betty Butler coming in about six, I was forced in good manners to sit with her till nine ; then I came home, and Mr. Ford came in to visit my shin, and sat with me till eleven: so I have been very idle and naughty. It vexes me to the pluck that I should lose walking this delicious day. Have you seen the Spectator 2 yet, a paper that comes out every day? 'Tis written by Mr. Steele, who seems to have gathered new life, and have a new fund of wit ; it is the same nature as his Tatlers, and they have all of them had something pretty. I believe Addison and he club. I never see them ; and I plainly told Mr. Harley and Mr. St. John, ten days ago, before my Lord Keeper and Lord Rivers, that I had been foolish enough to spend my credit with them in favour of Addison and Steele; but that I would engage and promise never to say one word in their behalf, having been used so ill for what I had already done. So, now I am got into the way of prating again, there will be no quiet for me. When Presto begins to prate, Give him a rap upon the pate. O Lord, how I blot ! it is time to leave off, etc. * * * * * * * 1 Mrs. Vanhomrigh was the mother of Esther Vanhomrigh, "Vanessa," the heroine of Swift's poem Cadenus and Vanessa. 2 The first number of the Spectator appeared on March i, 1711. 46 JONATHAN SWIFT Windsor, July 29, 1711. I was at Court and church to-day, as I was this day se'ennight : I generally am acquainted with about thirty in the drawing-room, and I am so proud I make all the lords come up to me : one passes half an hour pleasant enough. We had a dunce to preach before the Queen to-day, which often hap- pens. Windsor is a delicious situation, but the town is scoundrel. I have this morning got the Gazette for Ben Tooke and one Barber a printer; it will be about three hundred pounds a year between them. The other fellow was printer of the Examiner, which is now laid down. I dined with the Secretary: we were a dozen in all, three Scotch lords, and Lord Peterborow. The Duke of Ham- ilton would needs be witty, and hold up my train as I walked up- stairs. It is an ill circumstance that on Sundays much company always meet at the great tables. Lord Treasurer told at Court what I said to Mr. Secretary on this occasion. The Secretary showed me his bill of fare, to encourage me to dine with him. "Poh," said I, "show me a bill of company, for I value not your dinner." See how this is all blotted, I can write no more here, but to tell you I love MD dearly, and God bless them. Windsor, Sept. 23,1711. The Secretary did not come last night, but at three this afternoon. I have not seen him yet, but I verily think they are contriving a peace as fast as they can, without which it will be impossible to subsist. The Queen was at church to-day, but was carried in a chair. I and Mr. Lewis dined pri- vately with Mr. Lowman, Clerk of the Kitchen. I was to see Lord Keeper this morning, and told him the jest of the maids of hon- our ; and Lord Treasurer had it last night. That rogue Arbuth- not l puts it all upon me. The Court was very full to-day. I expected Lord Treasurer would have invited me to supper; but he only bowed to me ; and we had no discourse in the drawing- room. It is now seven at night, and I am at home ; and I hope Lord Treasurer will not send for me to supper: if he does not, I will reproach him ; and he will pretend to chide me for not com- ing. So farewell till I go to bed, for I am going to be busy. 1 Dr. John Arbuthnot, Physician in Ordinary to Queen Anne. To him Pope addressed his famous Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot. See post, p. 236. EXTRACTS FROM THE JOURNAL TO STELLA 47 It is now past ten, and I went down to ask the servants about Mr. Secretary : they tell me the Queen is yet at the Council, and that she went to supper, and came out to the Council afterwards. It is certain they are managing a peace. I will go to bed, and there is an end. It is now eleven, and a messenger is come from Lord Treasurer to sup with them ; but I have excused myself, and am glad I am in bed; for else I should sit up till two, and drink till I was hot. Now I'll go sleep. London, Dec. 30, 1711. I writ the Dean and you a lie yester- day ; for the Duke of Somerset is not yet turned out. I was to-day at Court, and resolved to be very civil to the Whigs ; but saw few there. When I was in the bed-chamber talking to Lord Rochester, he went up to Lady Burlington, who asked him who I was; and Lady Sunderland and she whispered about me: I desired Lord Rochester to tell Lady Sunderland I doubted she was not as much in love with me as I was with her; but he would not deliver my message. The Duchess of Shrewsbury came running up to me, and clapped her fan up to hide us from company, and we gave one another joy of this change ; but sighed when we reflected on the Somerset family not being out. The Secretary and I, and brother Bathurst, and Lord Windsor, dined with the Duke of Ormond. Bathurst and Windsor are to be two of the new lords. 1 I desired my Lord Radnor's brother, at Court to-day, to let my lord know I would call on him at six, which I did, and was arguing with him three hours to bring him over to us, and I spoke so closely that I believe he will be tractable ; but he is a scoundrel, and though I said I only talked for my love to him, I told a lie ; for I did not care if he were hanged: but everyone gained over is of consequence. The Duke of Marlborough was at Court to-day, and nobody hardly took notice of him. Masham's being a lord begins to take wind : nothing at Court can be kept a secret. Wednesday will be a great day: you shall know more. ******* London, Nov. 15, 1712. Before this comes to your hands, you will have heard of the most terrible accident that hath almost ever 1 Twelve new peers were created to secure a Tory majority in the House of Lords. 48 JONATHAN SWIFT happened. This morning, at eight, my man brought me word that the Duke of Hamilton had fought with Lord Mohun, 1 and killed him, and was brought home wounded. 2 I immediately sent him to the Duke's house, in St. James's Square ; but the porter could hardly answer for tears, and a great rabble was about the house. In short, they fought at seven this morning. The dog Mohun was killed on the spot; and while the Duke was over him, Mohun shortening his sword, stabbed him in at the shoulder to the heart. The Duke was helped toward the cake-house by the Ring in Hyde Park (where they fought), and died on the grass, before he could reach the house ; and was brought home in his coach by eight, while the poor Duchess was asleep. Maccartney, and one Ham- ilton, were the seconds, who fought likewise, and are both fled. I am told that a footman of Lord Mohun's stabbed the Duke of Hamilton ; and some say Maccartney did so too. Mohun gave the affront, and yet sent the challenge. I am infinitely concerned for the poor Duke, who was a frank, honest, good-natured man. I loved him very well, and I think he loved me better. He had the greatest mind in the world to have me go with him to France, but durst not tell it me; and those he did, said I could not be spared, which was true. They have removed the poor Duchess to a lodging in the neighbourhood, where I have been with her two hours, and am just come away. I never saw so melancholy a scene ; for indeed all reasons for real grief belong to her; nor is it possible for anybody to be a greater loser in all regards. She has moved my very soul. The lodging was inconvenient, and they would have removed her to another; but I would not suffer it, because it had no room backward, and she must have been tor- tured with the noise of the Grub Street screamers mentioning] her husband's murder to her ears. I believe you have heard the story of my escape, in opening the bandbox sent to Lord Treasurer. 3 The prints have told a thou- sand lies of it; but at last we gave them a true account of it at 1 Charles Mohun, fifth Baron Mohun, had been twice arraigned of murder, but acquitted. He had taken part in many duels. See Thackeray's Henry Esmond. 2 " This duel between the Duke of Hamilton and Lord Mohun, who had married nieces of Lord Macclesfield, had its origin in a protracted dispute about some property. Tory writers suggested that the duel was a Whig conspiracy to get rid of the Duke of Hamilton (Examiner, Nov. 20, 1712)." AITKEN. 3 The story is told in the Tory Postboy of November n to 13. EXTRACTS FROM THE JOURNAL TO STELLA 49 length, printed in the evening; only I would not suffer them to name me, having been so often named before, and teased to death with questions. I wonder how I came to have so much presence of mind, which is usually not my talent; but so it pleased God, and I saved myself and him; for there was a bullet apiece. A gentleman told me that if I had been killed, the Whigs would have called it a judgment, because the barrels were of inkhorns, with which I had done them so much mischief. There was a pure Grub Street of it, full of lies and inconsistencies. I do not like these things at all, and I wish myself more and more among my willows. There is a devilish spirit among people, and the Ministry must exert themselves, or sink. Nite dee sollahs, I'll go seep. 16. I thought to have finished this yesterday; but was too much disturbed. I sent a letter early this morning to Lady Masham, 1 to beg her to write some comforting words to the poor Duchess. I dined to- [day] with Lady Masham at Kensington, where she is expecting these two months to lie in. She has promised me to get the Queen to write to the Duchess kindly on this occasion; and to-morrow I will beg Lord Treasurer to visit and comfort her. I have been with, her two hours again, and find her worse : her violences not so frequent, but her melancholy more formal and settled. She has abundance of wit and spirit ; about thirty-three years old; handsome and airy, and seldom spared anybody that gave her the least provocation; by which she had many enemies and few friends. Lady Orkney, her sister-in-law, is come to town on this occasion, and has been to see her, and behaved herself with great humanity. They have been always very ill together, and the poor Duchess could not have patience when people told her I went often to Lady Orkney's. But I am resolved to make them friends ; for the Duchess is now no more the object of envy, and must learn humility from the severest master, Affliction. I design to make the Ministry put out a proclamation (if it can be found proper) against that villain Maccartney. What shall we do with these murderers? I cannot end this letter to-night, and there is no occasion; for I cannot send it till Tuesday, and the crowner's inquest on the Duke's body is to be to-morrow, and I shall know 1 Abigail Hill, afterwards Lady Masham, had supplanted the Duchess of Marl- borough as the Queen's favorite. She was a cousin of Harley, the Lcrd Treasurer. 50 JONATHAN SWIFT more. But what care oo for all this? Iss, poo MD im sorry for poo Pdfr's friends; and this is a very surprising event. 'Tis late, and I'll go to bed. This looks like journals. Nite. 17. I was to-day at noon with the Duchess of Hamilton again, after I had been with Lady Orkney, and charged her to be kind to her sister in her affliction. The Duchess told me Lady Orkney had been with her, and that she did not treat her as gently as she ought. They hate one another, but I will try to patch it up. I have been drawing up a paragraph for the Postboy, to be out to-morrow, and as malicious as possible, and very proper for Abel Roper, the printer of it. I dined at Lord Treasurer's at six in the evening, which is his usual hour of returning from Windsor: he promises to visit the Duchess to-morrow, and says he has a message to her from the Queen. Thank God. I have stayed till past one with him. So nite deelest MD. Dec. 27, 1712. I dined to-day with General Hill, Governor of Dunkirk. Lady Masham and Mrs. Hill, his two sisters, were of the company, and there have I been sitting this evening till eleven, looking over others at play ; for I have left off loving play myself ; and I think Ppt is now a great gamester. I have a great cold on me, not quite at its height. I have them seldom, and therefore ought to be patient. I met Mr. Addison and Pastoral Philips on the Mall to-day, and took a turn with them ; but they both looked terrible dry and cold. A curse of party! And do you know I have taken more pains to recommend the Whig wits to the favour and mercy of the Ministers than any other people. Steele I have kept in his place. Congreve I have got to be used kindly, and secured. Rowe I have recommended, and got a promise of a place. Philips I could certainly have provided for, if he had not run party mad, and made me withdraw my recommendation; and I set Addison so right at first that he might have been em- ployed, and have partly secured him the place he has; yet I am worse used by that faction than any man. Well, go to cards, sollah Ppt, and dress the wine and olange, sollah MD, and I'll go seep. 'Tis rate. Nite MD. EXTRACTS FROM THE JOURNAL TO STELLA 51 April 13, 1713. This morning my friend, Mr. Lewis, came to me, and showed me an order for a warrant for the three vacant deaneries; but none of them to me. This was what I always foresaw, and received the notice of it better, I believe, than he expected. I bid Mr. Lewis tell Lord Treasurer that I took noth- ing ill of him but his not giving me timely notice, as he promised to do, if he found the Queen would do nothing for me. At noon, Lord Treasurer hearing I was in Mr. Lewis's office, came to me, and said many things too long to repeat. I told him I had nothing to do but go to Ireland immediately; for I could not, with any reputation, stay longer here, unless I had something honourable immediately given to me. We dined together at the Duke of Ormond's. He there told me he had stopped the warrants for the deans, that what was done for me might be at the same time, and he hoped to compass it to-night ; but I believe him not. I told the Duke of Ormond my intentions. He is content Sterne should be a bishop, and I have St. Patrick's; but I believe nothing will come of it, for stay I will not; and so I believe for all oo . . . 1 00 may see me in Dublin before April ends. I am less out of humour than you would imagine : and if it were not that imperti- nent people will condole with me, as they used to give me joy, 1 would value it less. But I will avoid company, and muster up my baggage, and send them next Monday by the carrier to Chester, and come and see my willows, against the expectation of all the world. Hat care I? Nite deelest logues, MD. 14. I dined in the City to-day, and ordered a lodging to be got ready for me against I came to pack up my things ; for I will leave this end of the town as soon as ever the warrants for the deaneries are out, which are yet stopped. Lord Treasurer told Mr. Lewis that it should be determined to-night : and so he will for a hundred nights. So he said yesterday, but I value it not. My daily jour- nals shall be but short till I get into the City, and then I will send away this, and follow it myself; and design to walk it all the way to Chester, my man and I, by ten miles a day. It will do my health a great deal of good. I shall do it in fourteen days. Nite dee MD. 15. Lord Bolingbroke made me dine with him to-day; he was 1 The words are illegible. 52 JONATHAN SWIFT as good company as ever; and told me the Queen would deter- mine something for me to-night. The dispute is, Windsor or St. Patrick's. I told him I would not stay for their disputes, and he thought I was in the right. Lord Masham told me that Lady Masham is angry I have not been to see her since this business, and desires I will come to-morrow. Nite deelest MD. 16. I was this noon at Lady Masham's, who was just come from Kensington, where her eldest son is sick. She said much to me of what she had talked to the Queen and Lord Treasurer. The poor lady fell a shedding tears openly. She could not bear to think of my having St. Patrick's, etc. I was never more moved than to see so much friendship. I would not stay with her, but went and dined with Dr. Arbuthnot, with Mr. Berkeley, one of your Fellows, whom I have recommended to the Doctor, and to Lord Berkeley of Stratton. Mr. Lewis tells me that the Duke of Or- mond has been to-day with the Queen ; and she was content that Dr. Sterne should be Bishop of Dromore, and I Dean of St. Pat- rick's; but then out came Lord Treasurer, and said he would not be satisfied but that I must be Prebend [ary] of Windsor. Thus he perplexes things. I expect neither; but I confess, as much as I love England, I am so angry at this treatment that, if I had my choice, I would rather have St. Patrick's. Lady Masham says she will speak to purpose to the Queen to-morrow. Nite, . . . dee MD. 17. I went to dine at Lady Masham's to-day, and she was taken ill of a sore throat, and aguish. She spoke to the Queen last night, but had not much time. The Queen says she will determine to- morrow with Lord Treasurer. The warrants for the deaneries are still stopped, for fear I should be gone. Do you think any- think will be done ? I don't care whether it is or no. In the mean- time, I prepare for my journey, and see no great people, nor will see Lord Treasurer any more, if I go. Lord Treasurer told Mr. Lewis it should be done to-night; so he said five nights ago. Nite MD. 1 8. This morning Mr. Lewis sent me word that Lord Treasurer told him the Queen would determine at noon. At three Lord Treasurer sent to me to come to his lodgings at St. James's, and told me the Queen was at last resolved that Dr. Sterne should be Bishop of Dromore, and I Dean of St. Patrick's ; and that Sterne's warrant EXTRACTS FROM THE JOURNAL TO STELLA 53 should be drawn immediately. You know the deanery is in the Duke of Ormond's gift; but this is concerted between the Queen, Lord Treasurer, and the Duke of Ormond, to make room for me. I do not know whether it will yet be done; some unlucky accident may yet come. Neither can I feel joy at passing my days in Ire- land ; and I confess I thought the Ministry would not let me go ; but perhaps they can't help it. Nite MD. COLLEY GIBBER "TALKING OF HIMSELF" [From An Apology for the Life of Mr. C alley Gibber written by Himself, Chap. II. 1740. Edited by R. W. Lowe, John C. Nimmo, London, 1889. GIBBER, COLLEY (1671-1757), actor and dramatist; son of Caius Gabriel Gibber [q. v.]; educated at Grantham school, 1682-7; served in the Earl of Devonshire's levy for the Prince of Orange, 1688; joined united companies at Theatre Royal, 1690; known as 'Mr. Colley'; played minor parts, 1691; failed in tragedy, but made a good impression in comedy, 1692-4; brought out his first play, 'Love's Last Shift,' 1696; recognised as the leading actor of eccentric characters, 1697-1732; brought out some thirty dramatic pieces, 1697-1748, including several smart comedies; ob- tained a profitable share in the management of Drury Lane, c. 1711, and held it in spite of the machinations of the tories; brought out 'The Non- juror,' 1717, a play directed against the Jacobites; fiercely attacked by other writers on his appointment as poet laureate, December 1730; 'retired' from the stage, 1733, but reappeared at intervals till 1745; published an autobiography entitled 'Apology for the Life of Colley Gibber, Comedian,' 1740, two letters to Pope, 1742-4, a poor 'Character ... of Cicero,' 1747, and some worthless official odes; made by Pope the hero of the 'Dunciad' (1742). The title of the chap-book, 'Colley Gibber's Jests,' 1761, shows his notoriety. Index and Epitome of D. N . B. "And Gibber himself is the honestest man I know, who has writ a book of his confessions, not so much to his credit as St. Augustine's, but full as true and as open. Never had impudence and vanity so faithful a professor. I honour him next to my Lord." ALEXANDER POPE, Letter to Lord Orrery, 1742-3; Pope's Works, ed. Elwin and Courthope, Vol. VIII, p. 509. " He was not, indeed, a very wise or lofty character nor did he affect great virtue or wisdom but openly derided gravity, bade defiance to the serious pursuits of life, and honestly preferred his own lightness of heart and of head, to knowledge the most extensive or thought the most profound. He was vain even of his vanity. At the very commencement of his work, he avows his determination not to repress it, because it is part of himself, and therefore will only increase the resemblance of the picture. Rousseau did not more clearly lay open to the world the depths and inmost recesses of his 54 COLLEY GIBBER soul, than Gibber his little foibles and minikin weaknesses. The philosopher dwelt not more intensely on the lone enthusiasm of his spirit, on the allevia- tions of his throbbing soul, on the long draughts of rapture which he eagerly drank in from the loveliness of the universe, than the player on his early aspirings for scenic applause, and all the petty triumphs and mortifications of his passion for the favour of the town." SIR THOMAS NOON TALFOUKD, "Gibber's Apology for His Life," Critical and Miscellaneous Writings, p. 72.] It often makes me smile to think how contentedly I have set myself down to write my own Life ; nay, and with less Concern for what may be said of it than I should feel were I to do the same for a deceased Acquaintance. This you will easily account for when you consider that nothing gives a Coxcomb more delight than when you suffer him to talk of himself ; which sweet Liberty I here enjoy for a whole Volume together ! A Privilege which neither cou'd be allow'd me, nor wou'd become me to take, in the Company I am generally admitted to; but here, when I have all the Talk to myself, and have no body to interrupt or contradict me, sure, to say whatever I have a mind other People shou'd know of me is a Pleasure which none but Authors as vain as myself can conceive. But to my History. However little worth notice the Life of a Schoolboy may be supposed to contain, yet, as the Passions of Men and Children have much the same Motives and differ very little in their Effects, unless where the elder Experience may be able to conceal them : As there- fore what arises from the Boy may possibly be a Lesson to the Man, I shall venture to relate a Fact or two that happen'd while I was still at School. In February, 1684-5, died King Charles II. who being the only King I had ever seen, I remember (young as I was) his Death made a strong Impression upon me, as it drew Tears from the Eyes of Multitudes, who looked no further into him than I did: But it was, then, a sort of School-Doctrine to regard our Monarch as a Deity; as in the former Reign it was to insist that he was ac- countable to this World as well as to that above him. But what, perhaps, gave King Charles II. this peculiar Possession of so many Hearts, was his affable and easy manner in conversing ; which is a Quality that goes farther with the greater Part of Mankind than many higher Virtues, which, in a Prince, might more immediately regard the publick Prosperity. Even his indolent Amusement " TALKING OF HIMSELF" 55 of playing with his Dogs and feeding his Ducks in St. James's Park, (which I have seen him do) made the common People adore him, and consequently overlook in him what, in a Prince of a different Temper, they might have been out of humour at. I cannot help remembering one more Particular in those Times, tho' it be quite foreign to what will follow. I was carry'd by my Father to the Chapel in Whitehall; where I saw the King and his royal Brother the then Duke of York, with him in the Closet, and present during the whole Divine Service. Such Dispensation, it seems, for his Interest, had that unhappy Prince from his real Religion, to assist at another to which his Heart was so utterly averse. I now proceed to the Facts I promis'd to speak of. King Charles his Death was judg'd by our Schoolmaster a proper Subject to lead the Form I was in into a higher kind of Exercise; he therefore enjoin'd us severally to make his Funeral Oration: This sort of Task, so entirely new to us all, the Boys receiv'd with Astonishment as a Work above their Capacity; and tho' the Master persisted in his Command, they one and all, except myself, resolved to decline it. But I, Sir, who was ever giddily forward and thoughtless of Consequences, set myself roundly to work, and got through it as well as I could. I remember to this Hour that single Topick of his Affability (which made me mention it before) was the chief Motive that warm'd me into the Undertaking; and to shew how very foolish a Notion I had of Character at that time, I raised his Humanity, and Love of those who serv'd him, to such Height, that I imputed his Death to the Shock he receiv'd from the Lord Arlington's being at the point of Death about a Week before him. This Oration, such as it was, I produc'd the next Morning: All the other Boys pleaded their Inability, which the Master taking rather as a mark of their Mod- esty than their Idleness, only seem'd to punish by setting me at the Head of the Form: A Preferment dearly bought! Much happier had I been to have sunk my Performance in the general Modesty of declining it. A most uncomfortable Life I led among them for many a Day after ! I was so jeer'd, laugh'd at, and hated as a pragmatical Bastard (School- boys Language) who had betray'd the whole Form, that scarce any of 'em wou'd keep me company; and tho' it so far advanc'd me into the Master's 56 COLLEY GIBBER \, Favour that he wou'd often take me from the School to give me an Airing with him on Horseback, while they were left to their Les- sons; you may be sure such envy'd Happiness did not encrease their Good- will to me: Notwithstanding which my Stupidity cou'd take no warning from their Treatment. An Accident of the same nature happen'd soon after, that might have frighten'd a Boy of a meek Spirit from attempting any thing above the lowest Capacity. On the 23rd of April following, being the Coronation- Day of the new King, the School petition'd the Master for leave to play; to which he agreed, provided any of the Boys would produce an English Ode upon that Occasion. The very Word, Ode, I know makes you smile already ; and so it does me ; not only because it still makes so many poor Devils turn Wits upon it, but from a more agreeable Motive ; from a Reflection of how little I then thought that, half a Century afterwards, I shou'd be calPd upon twice a year, by my Post, to make the same kind of Oblations to an unexceptionable Prince, the serene Happiness of whose Reign my halting Rhimes are still so unequal to This, I own, is Van- ity without Disguise; but Haec olim meminisse juvat: The remembrance of the miserable prospect we had then before us, and have since escaped by a Revolution, is now a Pleasure which, without that Remembrance, I could not so heartily have enjoy'd. The Ode I was speaking of fell to my Lot, which in about half an Hour I produc'd. I cannot say it was much above the merry Style of Sing ! Sing the Day, and Sing the Song, in the Farce: Yet bad as it was, it serv'd to get the School a Play-day, and to make me not a little vain upon it; which last Effect so disgusted my Play-fellows that they left me out of the Party I had most a mind to be of in that Day's Recreation. But their Ingratitude serv'd only to increase my Vanity; for I consider'd them as so many beaten Tits that had just had the Mortification of seeing my Hack of a Pegasus come in before them. This low Passion is so rooted in our Nature that sometimes riper Heads cannot govern it. I have met with much the same silly sort of Coldness, even from my Contemporaries of the Theatre, from having the super- fluous Capacity of writing myself the Characters I have acted. Here, perhaps, I may again seem to be vain; but if all these Facts are true (as true they are) how can I help it ? Why am I "TALKING OF HIMSELF" 57 oblig'd to conceal them ? The Merit of the best of them is not so extraordinary as to have warn'd me to be nice upon it ; and the Praise due to them is so small a Fish, it was scarce worth while to throw my Line into the Water for it. If I confess my Vanity while a Boy, can it be Vanity, when a Man, to remember it? And if I have a tolerable Feature, will not that as much belong to my Pic- ture as an Imperfection ? In a word, from what I have mentioned, I. wou'd observe only this : That when we are conscious of the least comparative Merit in ourselves, we shou'd take as much care to conceal the value we set upon it, as if it were a real Defect : To be elated or vain upon it is shewing your Money before People in want ; ten to one but some who may think you to have too much may borrow, or pick your Pocket before you get home. He who assumes Praise to himself, the World will think overpays himself. Even the Suspicion of being vain ought as much to be dreaded as the Guilt itself. Casar was of the same Opinion in regard to his Wife's Chastity. Praise, tho' it may be our due, is not like a Bank-Bill, to be paid upon Demand; to be valuable it must be voluntary. When we are dun'd for it, we have a Right and Privi- lege to refuse it. If Compulsion insists upon it, it can only be paid as Persecution in Points of Faith is, in a counterfeit Coin: And whoever believ'd Occasional Conformity to be sincere? Nero, the most vain Coxcomb of a Tyrant that ever breath'd, cou'd not raise an unfeigned Applause of his Harp by military Execution ; even where Praise is deserv'd, Ill-nature and Self-conceit (Pas- sions that poll a majority of Mankind) will with less reluctance part with their Mony than their Approbation. Men of the greatest Merit are forced to stay 'till they die before the World will fairly make up their Account : Then indeed you have a Chance for your full Due, because it is less grudg'd when you are incapable of enjoying it : Then perhaps even Malice shall heap Praises upon your Memory: tho' not for your sake, but that your surviving Competitors may suffer by a Comparison. 'Tis from the same Principle that Satyr shall have a thousand Readers where Panegyric has one. When I therefore find my Name at length in the Satyr- ical Works of our most celebrated living Author, 1 1 never look upon those Lines as Malice meant to me, (for he knows I never pro- 1 Pope satirized Gibber in the Dunciad. See post, pp. 240-242. 58 COLLEY GIBBER vok'd it) but Profit to himself : One of his Points must be, to have many Readers: He considers that my Face and Name are more known than those of many thousands of more consequence in the Kingdom : That therefore, right or wrong, a Lick at the Laureat will always be a sure Bait, ad captandum vulgus, to catch him little Readers: And that to gratify the Unlearned, by now and then interspersing those merry Sacrifices of an old Acquaintance to their Taste, is a piece of quite right Poetical Craft. But as a little bad Poetry is the greatest Crime he lays to my charge, I am willing to subscribe to his opinion of it. That this sort of Wit is one of the easiest ways too of pleasing the generality of Readers, is evident from the comfortable subsistence which our weekly Retailers of Politicks have been known to pick up, merely by making bold with a Government that had unfortunately neg- lected to find their Genius a better Employment. Hence too arises all that flat Poverty of Censure and Invective that so often has a run in our Publick Papers upon the Success of a new Author; when, God knows, there is seldom above one Writer among hundreds in Being at the same time whose Satyr a man of common Sense ought to be mov'd at. When a Master in the Art is angry, then indeed we ought to be alarm'd ! How terrible a Weapon is Satyr in the Hand of a great Genius ? Yet even there, how liable is Prejudice to misuse it? How far, when general, it may reform our Morals, or what Cruelties it may inflict by being angrily particular, is perhaps above my reach to determine. I shall therefore only beg leave to interpose what I feel for others whom it may personally have fallen upon. When I read those mortifying Lines of our most eminent Author, in his Character of Atticus 1 (Atticus, whose Genius in Verse and whose Morality in Prose has been so justly admir'd) though I am charm'd with the Poetry, my Imagination is hurt at the Severity of it; and tho' I allow the Satyrist to have had personal Provocation, yet, me- thinks, for that very Reason, he ought not to have troubled the Publick with it: For, as it is observed in the 242nd Taller, "In all Terms of Reproof, when the Sentence appears to arise from Personal Hatred or Passion, it is not then made the Cause of Mankind, but a Misunderstanding between two Persons." But 1 For an account of Pope's satire on Addison, see post, pp. 211-214, 237. "TALKING OF HIMSELF" 59 if such kind of Satyr has its incontestable Greatness ; if its exem- plary Brightness may not mislead inferior Wits into a barbarous Imitation of its Severity, then I have only admir'd the Verses, and expos'd myself by bringing them under so scrupulous a Re- flexion: But the Pain which the Acrimony of those Verses gave me is, in some measure, allay'd in finding that this inimitable Writer, as he advances in Years, has since had Candour enough to celebrate the same Person for his Visible Merit. Happy Genius ! whose Yerse, like the Eye of Beauty, can heal the deepest Wounds with the least Glance of Favour. . . . This so singular Concern which I have shown for others may naturally lead you to ask me what I feel for myself when I am unfavourably treated by the elaborate Authors of our daily Papers. Shall I be sincere? and own my frailty? Its usual Effect is to make me vain ! For I consider if I were quite good for nothing these Pidlers in Wit would not be concerned to take me to pieces, or (not to be quite so vain) when they moderately charge me with only Ignorance or Dulness, I see nothing in That which an honest Man need be asham'd of: There is many a good Soul who from those sweet Slumbers of the Brain are never awaken'd by the least harmful Thought; and I am sometimes tempted to think those Retailers of Wit may be of the same Class; that what they write proceeds not from Malice, but Industry ; and that I ought no more to reproach them than I would a Lawyer that pleads against me for his Fee; that their Detraction, like Dung thrown upon a Meadow, tho' it may seem at first to deform the Prospect, in a little time it will disappear of itself and leave an involuntary Crop of Praise behind it. When they confine themselves to a sober Criticism upon what I write; if their Censure is just, what answer can I make to it? If it is unjust, why should I suppose that a sensible Reader will not see it, as well as myself ? Or, admit I were able to expose them by a laughing Reply, will not that Reply beget a Rejoinder? And though they may be Gainers by having the worst on't in a Paper War, that is no Temptation for me to come into it. Or (to make both sides less considerable) would not my bearing Ill-language from a Chimney-sweeper do me less harm than it would be to box with him, tho' I were sure to beat him? Nor indeed is the 60 COLLEY GIBBER little Reputation I have as an Author worth the trouble of a De- fence. Then, as no Criticism can possibly make me worse than I really am; so nothing I can say of myself can possibly make me better: When therefore a determin'd Critick comes arm'd with Wit and Outrage to take from me that small Pittance I have, I wou'd no more dispute with him than I wou'd resist a Gentle- man of the Road to save a little Pocket-Money. Men that are in want themselves seldom make a Conscience of taking it from others. W r hoever thinks I have too much is welcome to what share of it he pleases: Nay, to make him more merciful (as I partly guess the worst he can say of what I now write) I will prevent even the Imputation of his doing me Injustice, and honestly say it myself, viz. That of all the Assurances I was ever guilty of, this of writing my own Life is the most hardy. I beg his Pardon ! Impudent is what I should have said ! That through every Page there runs a Vein of Vanity and Impertinence which no French Ensigns memoires ever came up to; but, as this is a common Error, I pre- sume the Terms of Doating Trifler, Old Fool, or Conceited Cox- comb will carry Contempt enough for an Impartial Censor to be- stow on me; that my style is unequal, pert, and frothy, patch'd and party-colour' d like the Coat of an Harlequin; low and pom- pous, cramm'd with Epithets, strew'd with Scraps of second-hand Latin from common Quotations; frequently aiming at Wit, without ever hitting the Mark ; a mere Ragoust toss'd up from the offals of other authors : My Subject below all Pens but my own, which, whenever I keep to, is flatly daub'd by one eternal Ego- tism: That I want nothing but Wit to be as accomplish'd a Cox- comb here as ever I attempted to expose on the Theatre: Nay, that this very Confession is no more a Sign of my Modesty than it is a Proof of my Judgment, that, in short, you may roundly tell me, that Cinna (or Cibber) vult videri Pauper, et est Pauper. When humble Cinna cries, I'm poor and low, You may believe him he is really so. Well, Sir Critick ! and what of all this ? Now I have laid myself at your feet, what will you do with me ? Expose me ? Why, dear Sir, does not every Man that writes expose himself ? Can you make me more ridiculous than Nature has made me ? You cou'd "TALKING OF HIMSELF" 6 1 not sure suppose that I would lose the Pleasure of Writing because you might possibly judge me a Blockhead, or perhaps might pleasantly tell other People they ought to think me so too. Will not they judge as well from what / say as what You say ? If then you attack me merely to divert yourself, your excuse for writing will be no better than mine. But perhaps you may want Bread : If that be the Case, even go to Dinner, i' God's name ! If our best Authors, when teiz'd by these Triflers, have not been Masters of this Indifference, I should not wonder if it were dis- believ'd in me ; but when it is consider'd that I have allow 'd my never having been disturb 'd into a Reply has proceeded as much from Vanity as from Philosophy, the Matter then may not seem so incredible : And tho' I confess the complete Revenge of making them Immortal Dunces in Immortal Verse might be glorious ; yet, if you will call it insensibility in me never to have winc'd at them, even that Insensibility has its happiness, and what could Glory give me more ? For my part, I have always had the comfort to think, whenever they design'd me a Disfavour, it generally flew back into their own Faces, as it happens to Children when they squirt at their Play-fellows against the Wind. If a Scribbler cannot be easy because he fancies I have too good an Opinion of my own Productions, let him write on and mortify; I owe him not the Charity to be out of temper myself merely to keep him quiet or give him Joy: Nor, in reality, can I see why anything misrepre- sented, tho' believ'd of me by Persons to whom I am unknown, ought to give me any more Concern than what may be thought of me in Lapland : 'Tis with those with whom I am to live only, where my character can affect me ; and I will venture to say, he must find out a new way of Writing that will make pass my Time there less agreeably. You see, Sir, how hard it is for a man that is talking of himself to know when to give over; but if you are tired, lay me aside till you have a fresh Appetite. 62 EDWARD GIBBON EDWARD GIBBON [From The Memoirs of the Life of Edward Gibbon with Various Observa- tions and Excursions by Himself, 1795. Edited by G. B. Hill, Methuen & Co., London, 1900. GIBBON, EDWARD (1737-1794), historian; educated at Westminster; owed his taste for books to his aunt, Catherine Porten ; spent fourteen ' un- profitable' months at Magdalen College, Oxford, 1752-3; became a Romanist after reading Middleton's 'Free Inquiry' and works by Bossuet and Parsons, 1753; at Lausanne (1753-8), where his tutor, Pavillard, drew him back to protestantism, and where he made friends with Deyver- dun and read widely; became attached to Susanne Curchod (afterwards Madame Necker), but in deference to his father broke off the engagement, 1757; published 'Essai sur 1'Etude de la Litterature,' 1761 (English version, 1764); served in Hampshire militia, 1759-70, and studied military litera- ture; at Lausanne met Holroyd (afterwards Lord Sheffield); during a tour in Italy, 1764-5, formed plan of his 'History' amid the ruins of the Capi- tol; with Deyverdun published 'Memoires Litteraires de la Grande-Bre- tagne,' 1767-8, contributing a review of Lyttelton's 'Henry II': issued 'Critical Observations on the Sixth Book of the .^Eneid/ attacking Warbur- ton, 1770; settled in London, 1772; joined Dr. Johnson's Club, 1774; be- came professor in ancient history at the Royal Academy in succession to Goldsmith; M.P., Liskeard," 1774-80, Lymington, 1781-3; drew up a state paper against France, and was commissioner of trade and planta- tions, 1779-82; issued in 1776 the first volume of his 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,' which passed into three editions, and obtained the favourable verdict of Hume, Robertson, Warton, and Walpole; defended the chapters on growth of Christianity in his 'Vindication,' 1779; issued the second and third volumes, 1781, after a visit to Paris, where he met Buffon and disputed with De Mably; retired with Deyverdun to Lausanne, 1783, where he finished the work, 1787 (published, 1788); returned to England, 1793; died suddenly in London; a Latin epitaph written for his monument at Fletching, Sussex, by Dr. Samuel Parr [q. v.]. His 'Miscellaneous Works' (edited by his friend Lord Sheffield, 1796) contained an autobiographical memoir, and 'Antiquities of the House of Brunswick' (1814). Index and Epitome of D. N, B. "If, as Johnson said, there had been only three books 'written by man that were wished longer by their readers,' the eighteenth century was not to draw to its close without seeing a fourth added. With Don Quixote, The Pilgrim's Progress and Robinson Crusoe, the Autobiography of Edward Gibbon was henceforth to rank as 'a work whose conclusion is perceived with an eye of sorrow, such as the traveller casts upon departing day.' It is indeed so short that it can be read by the light of a single pair of candles; it is so interesting in its subject, and so alluring in its turns of thought and its style, that in a second and third reading it gives scarcely less pleasure than in the first. Among the books in which men have told the story of their own lives it stands in the front rank. It is a striking fact that one of the first of autobiographies and the first of biographies were written in the same years. AT OXFORD 63 Boswell was still working a,t his Life of Johnson when Gibbon began those memoirs from which his autobiography, in the form in which it was given to the world, was so skilfully pieced together. But a short time had gone by since Johnson had said that 'he did not think that the life of any literary man in England had been well written.' That reproach against our writers he himself did much to lessen by his Lives of Cowley and of Milton, of Dryden and of Pope. It was finally removed by two members of that famous club which he had helped to found. However weak was the end of the eighteenth century in works of imagination, in one great branch of literature it faded nobly away. Both in the Life of Johnson and in the Autobiography of Edward Gibbon it ' left something so written to after-times as they should not willingly let it die.' " GEORGE BIRKBECK HILL, The Memoirs of the Life of Edward Gibbon, Preface, p. v. AT OXFORD A traveller who visits Oxford or Cambridge is surprised and edi- fied by the apparent order and tranquillity that prevail in the seats of the English Muses. In the most celebrated universities of Holland, Germany, and Italy, the students, who swarm from different countries, are loosely dispersed in private lodgings at the houses of the burghers: they dress according to their fancy and fortune; and in the intemperate quarrels of youth and wine, their swords, though less frequently than of old, are sometimes stained with each other's blood. The use of arms is banished from our English universities; the uniform habit of the academics, the square cap and black gown, is adapted to the civil and even clerical professions; and from the doctor in divinity to the under- graduate, the degrees of learning and age are externally distin- guished. Instead of being scattered in a town, the students of Oxford and Cambridge are united in colleges; their maintenance is provided at their own expense, or that of the founders; and the stated hours of the hall and chapel represent the discipline of a regular and, as it were, a religious community. The eyes of the traveller are attracted by the size or beauty of the public edifices; and the principal colleges appear to be so many palaces which a liberal nation has erected and endowed for the habitation of science. My own introduction to the University of Oxford forms a new era in my life, and at the distance of forty years I still remember my first emotions of surprise and satisfaction. In my fifteenth year I felt myself suddenly raised from a boy to a man : the persons whom I respected as my superiors in age and 64 EDWARD GIBBON academical rank entertained me with every mark of attention and civility; and my vanity was flattered by the velvet cap and silk gown which distinguish a gentleman commoner from a plebeian student. A decent allowance, more money than a school-boy had ever seen, was at my own disposal ; and I might command among the tradesmen of Oxford an indefinite and dangerous latitude of credit. A key was delivered into my hands which gave me the free use of a numerous and learned library, my apart- ment consisted of three elegant and well-furnished rooms in the new building, a stately pile, of Magdalen College, and the adja- cent walks, had they been frequented by Plato's disciples, might have been compared to the Attic shade on the banks of the Ilissus. Such was the fair prospect of my entrance (April 3, 1752) into the University of Oxford. A venerable prelate, whose taste and erudition must reflect honour on the society in which they were formed, has drawn a very interesting picture of his academical life. " I was educated," says Bishop Lowth, "in the University of Oxford. I enjoyed all the advantages, both public and private, which that famous seat of learning so largely affords. I spent many years in that illus- trious society, in a well-regulated course of useful discipline and studies, and in the agreeable and improving commerce of gentle- men and of scholars ; in a society where emulation without envy, ambition without jealousy, contention without animosity, incited industry and awakened genius ; where a liberal pursuit of knowl- edge and a genuine freedom of thought was raised, encouraged, and pushed forward by example, by commendation, and by authority. I breathed the same atmosphere that the Hookers, the Chillingworths, and the Lockes had breathed before; whose benevolence and humanity were as extensive as their vast genius and comprehensive knowledge; who always treated their adver- saries with civility and respect ; who made candour, moderation, and liberal judgment as much the rule and law as the subject of their discourse. And do you reproach me with my education in this place, and with my relation to this most respectable body, which I shall always esteem my greatest advantage and my highest honour?" I transcribe with pleasure this eloquent passage, without examining what benefits or what rewards were derived by AT OXFORD 65 Hooker, or Chillingworth, or Locke, from their academical institu- tion ; without inquiring whether in this angry controversy the spirit of Lowth himself is purified from the intolerant zeal which War- burton had ascribed to the genius of the place. It may indeed be observed that the atmosphere of Oxford did not agree with Mr. Locke's constitution ; and that the philosopher justly despised the academical bigots who expelled his person and condemned his principles. The expression of gratitude is a virtue and a pleasure : a liberal mind will delight to cherish and celebrate the memory of its parents; and the teachers of science are the parents of the mind. I applaud the filial piety, which it is impossible for me to imitate ; since I must not confess an imaginary debt to assume the merit of a just or generous retribution. To the University of Oxford / ac- knowledge no obligation ; and she will as cheerfully renounce me for a son as I am willing to disclaim her for a mother. I spent four- teen months at Magdalen College ; they proved the fourteen months the most idle and unprofitable of my whole life ; the reader will pro- nounce between the school and the scholar; but I cannot affect to believe that Nature had disqualified me for all literary pursuits. The specious and ready excuse of my tender age, imperfect prepara- tion, and hasty departure may doubtless be alleged ; nor do I wish to defraud such excuses of their proper \veight. Yet in my sixteenth year I was not devoid of capacity or application ; even my childish reading had displayed an early though blind propensity for books; and the shallow flood might have been taught to flow in a deep channel and a clear stream. In the discipline of a well-constituted academy, under the guidance of skilful and vigilant professors, I should gradually have risen from translations to originals, from the Latin to the Greek classics, from dead languages to living science : my hours would have been occupied by useful and agreeable studies, the wanderings of fancy would have been restrained, and I should have escaped the temptations of idleness which finally precipitated my departure from Oxford. Perhaps in a separate annotation I may coolly examine the fabulous and real antiquities of our sister universities, a question which has kindled such fierce and foolish disputes among their fanatic sons. In the meanwhile it will be acknowledged that these venerable bodies are sufficiently old to partake of all the 66 EDWARD GIBBON prejudices and infirmities of age. The schools of Oxford and Cambridge were founded in a dark age of false and barbarous science; and they are still tainted with the vices of their origin. Their primitive discipline was adapted to the education of priests and monks; and the government still remains in the hands of the clergy, an order of men whose manners are remote from the present world, and whose eyes are dazzled by the light of phi- losophy. The legal incorporation of these societies by the charters of popes and kings had given them a monopoly of the public instruction; and the spirit of monopolists is narrow, lazy, and oppressive ; their work is more costly and less productive than that of independent artists ; and the new improvements so eagerly grasped by the competition of freedom are admitted with slow and sullen reluctance in those proud corporations, above the fear of a rival, and below the confession of an error. We may scarcely hope that any formation will be a voluntary act; and so deeply are they rooted in law and prejudice, that even the omnipotence of parliament would shrink from an inquiry into the state and abuses of the two universities. The use of academical degrees, as old as the thirteenth century, is visibly borrowed from the mechanic corporations; in which an apprentice, after serving his time, obtains a testimonial of his skill, and a licence to practise his trade and mystery. It is not my design to depreciate those honours, which could never gratify or disappoint my ambition ; and I should applaud the institution, if the decrees of bachelor or licentiate were bestowed as the reward of manly and successful study: if the name and rank of doctor or master were strictly reserved for the professors of science, who have approved their title to the public esteem. In all the universities of Europe, excepting our own, the lan- guages and sciences are distributed among a numerous list of effective professors: the students, according to their taste, their calling, and their diligence, apply themselves to the proper masters ; and in the annual repetition of public and private lectures these masters are assiduously employed. Our curiosity may inquire what number of professors has been instituted at Oxford? (for I shall now confine myself to my own university). By whom are they appointed, and what may be the probable chances of merit or AT OXFORD 67 incapacity? How many are stationed to the three faculties, and how many are left for the liberal arts ? What is the form, and what the substance, of their lessons? But all these questions are silenced by one short and singular answer, " That in the University of Oxford, the greater part of the public professors have for these many years given up altogether even the pretence of teaching." Incredible as the fact may appear, I must rest my belief on the posi- tive and impartial evidence of a master of moral and political wis- dom, who had himself resided at Oxford. Dr. Adam Smith assigns as the cause of their indolence, that, instead of being paid by voluntary contributions, which would urge them to increase the number, and to deserve the gratitude of their pupils, the Oxford professors are secure in the enjoyment of a fixed stipend, without the necessity of labour or the apprehension of control. It has in- deed been observed, nor is the observation absurd, that excepting in experimental sciences, which demand a costly apparatus and a dexterous hand, the many valuable treatises that have been pub- lished on every subject of learning may now supersede the ancient mode of oral instruction. Were this principle true in its utmost latitude, I should only infer that the offices and salaries which are become useless ought without delay to be abolished. But there still remains a material difference between a book and a professor; the hour of the lecture enforces attendance; attention is fixed by the presence, the voice, and the occasional questions of the teacher ; the most idle will carry something away; and the more diligent will compare the instructions which they have heard in the school with the volumes which they peruse in their chamber. The ad- vice of a skilful professor will adapt a course of reading to every mind and every situation; his authority will discover, admonish, and at last chastise the negligence of his disciples ; and his vigilant inquiries will ascertain the steps of their literary progress. What- ever science he professes he may illustrate in a series of discourses, composed in the leisure of his closet, pronounced on public occasions, and finally delivered to the press. I observe with pleasure that in the University of Oxford Dr. Lowth, with equal eloquence and erudition, has executed this task in his incom- parable Preelections on the Poetry of the Hebrews. The College of St. Mary Magdalen was founded in the fifteenth 68 EDWARD GIBBON century by Waynflete, Bishop of Winchester; and now consists of a president, forty fellows, and a number of inferior students. It is esteemed one of the largest and most wealthy of our academical corporations, which may be compared to the Benedictine abbeys of Catholic countries; and I have loosely heard that the estates belonging to Magdalen College, which are leased by those in- dulgent landlords at small quit-rents and occasional fines, might be raised, in the hands of private avarice, to an annual revenue of nearly 30,000. Our colleges are supposed to be schools of science as well as of education; nor is it unreasonable to expect that a body of literary men, devoted to a life of celibacy, exempt from the care of their own subsistence, and amply provided with books, should devote their leisure to the prosecution of study, and that some effects of their studies should be manifested to the world. The shelves of their library groan under the weight of the Benedictine folios, of the editions of the fathers, and the collec- tions of the Middle Ages, which have issued from the single abbey of St. Germain de Prez at Paris. A composition of genius must be the offspring of one mind ; but such works of industry as may be divided among many hands, and must be continued during many years, are the peculiar province of a laborious community. If I inquire into the manufactures of the monks of Magdalen, if I extend the inquiry to the other colleges of Oxford and Cambridge, a silent blush, or a scornful frown, will be the only reply. The fellows or monks of my time were decent easy men, who supinely enjoyed the gifts of the founder: their days were filled by a series of uniform employments; the chapel and the hall, the coffee- house and the common room, till they retired, weary and well satisfied, to a long slumber. From the toil of reading, or think- ing, or writing, they had absolved their conscience ; and the first shoots of learning and ingenuity withered on the ground, without yielding any fruits to the owners or the public. As a gentleman commoner, I was admitted to the society of the fellows, and fondly expected that some questions of literature would be the amusing and instructive topics of their discourse. Their conversation stagnated in a round of college business, Tory politics, personal anecdotes, and private scandal: their dull and deep potations excused the brisk intemperance of youth ; and their constitutional AT OXFORD 69 toasts were not expressive of the most lively loyalty for the house of Hanover. A general election was now approaching : the great Oxfordshire contest already blazed with all the malevolence of party zeal. Magdalen College was devoutly attached to the old interest; and the names of Wenman and Dash wood were more frequently pronounced than those of Cicero and Chrysostom. The example of the senior fellows could not inspire the under- graduates with a liberal spirit or studious emulation ; and I cannot describe, as I never knew, the discipline of college. Some duties may possibly have been imposed on the poor scholars whose ambition aspired to the peaceful honours of a fellowship (ascribi quietis ordinibus . . . Deorum) ; but no independent members were admitted below the rank of a gentleman commoner, and our velvet cap was the cap of liberty. A tradition prevailed that some of our predecessors had spoken Latin declamations in the hall, but of this ancient custom no vestige remained: the obvious methods of public exercises and examinations were totally un- known; and I have never heard that either the president or the society interfered in the private economy of the tutors and their pupils. The silence of the Oxford professors, which deprives the youth of public instruction, is imperfectly supplied by the tutors, as they are styled, of the several colleges. Instead of confining them- selves to a single science, which had satisfied the ambition of Burman or Bernouilli, they teach, or promise to teach, either his- tory or mathematics, or ancient literature, or moral philosophy; and as it is possible that they may be defective in all, it is highly probable that of some they will be ignorant. They are paid, indeed, by private contributions; but their appointment depends on the head of the house: their diligence is voluntary, and will consequently be languid, while the pupils themselves, or their parents, are not indulged in the liberty of choice or change. The first tutor into whose hands I was resigned appears to have been one of the best of the tribe : Dr. Waldegrave was a learned and pious man, of a mild disposition, strict morals, and abstemious life, who seldom mingled in the politics or the jollity of the college. But his knowledge of the world was confined to the university; his learning was of the last, rather than of the present age; his 70 EDWARD GIBBON temper was indolent; his faculties, which were not of the first rate, had been relaxed by the climate, and he was satisfied, like his fellows, with the slight and superficial discharge of an important trust. As soon as my tutor had sounded the insufficiency of his pupil in school-learning, he proposed that we should read every morning from ten to eleven the comedies of Terence. The sum of my improvement in the University of Oxford is confined to three or four Latin plays; and even the study of an elegant classic, which might have been illustrated by a comparison of ancient and modern theatres, was reduced to a dry and literal interpretation of the author's text. During the first weeks I constantly attended these lessons in my tutor's room; but as they appeared equally devoid of profit and pleasure, I was once tempted to try the experi- ment of a formal apology. The apology was accepted with a smile. I repeated the offence with less ceremony; the excuse was ad- mitted with the same indulgence: the slightest motive of laziness or indisposition, the most trifling avocation at home or abroad, was allowed as a worthy impediment; nor did my tutor appear con- scious of my absence or neglect. Had the hour of lecture been constantly filled, a single hour was a small portion of my academic leisure. No plan of study was recommended for my use; no exercises were prescribed for his inspection; and, at the most precious season of youth, whole days and weeks were suffered to elapse without labour or amusement, without advice or account. I should have listened to the voice of reason and of my tutor; his mild behaviour had gained my confidence. I preferred his society to that of the younger students ; and in our evening walks to the top of Heddington Hill we freely conversed on a variety of subjects. Since the days of Pocock and Hyde, Oriental learning has always been the pride of Oxford, and I once expressed an inclination to study Arabic. His prudence discouraged this childish fancy; but he neglected the fair occasion of directing the ardour of a curious mind. During my absence in the summer vacation, Dr. Waldegrave accepted a college living at Washington in Sussex, and on my return I no longer found him at Oxford. From that time I have lost sight of my first tutor; but at the end of thirty years (1781) he was still alive; and the practice of exercise and temperance had entitled him to a healthy old age. AT OXFORD 71 The long recess between the Trinity and Michaelmas terms empties the colleges of Oxford as well as the courts of West- minster. I spent, at my father's house at Buriton in Hampshire, the two months of August and September. It is whimsical enough that as soon as I left Magdalen College my taste for books began to revive, but it was the same blind and boyish taste for the pursuit of exotic history. MY EARLY LOVE I hesitate, from the apprehension of ridicule, when I approach the delicate subject of my early love. By this word I do not mean the polite attention, the gallantry, without hope or design, which has originated in the spirit of chivalry, and is interwoven with the texture of French manners. I understand by this passion the union of desire, friendship, and tenderness, which is inflamed by a single female, which prefers her to the rest of her sex, and which seeks her possession as the supreme or the sole happiness of our being. I need not blush at recollecting the object of my choice; and though my love was disappointed of success, I am rather proud that I was once capable of feeling such a pure and exalted senti- ment. The personal attractions of Mademoiselle Susan Curchod were embellished by the virtues and talents of the mind. Her fortune was humble, but her family was respectable. Her mother, a native of France, had preferred her religion to her country. The profession of her father did not extinguish the moderation and philosophy of his temper, and he lived content with a small salary and laborious duty in the obscure lot of minister of Grassy, in the mountains that separate the Pays de Vaud from the county of Burgundy. 1 In the solitude of a sequestered village he bestowed 1 Extracts from the Journal. March 1757. I wrote some critical observations upon Plautus. March 8th. I wrote a long dissertation on some lines of Virgil. June. I saw Mademoiselle Curchod Omnia vincit amor, et nos cedamus amori. August. I went to Grassy, and stayed two days. Sept. i$th. I went to Geneva. Oct. i$th. I came back to Lausanne, having passed through Grassy. Nov. ist. I went to visit M. de Watteville at Loin, and saw Mademoiselle Curchod in my way through Rolle. Nov. i-jth. I went to Grassy and stayed there six days. Jan. 1758. In the three first months of this year I read Ovid's Metamor- 72 EDWARD GIBBON a liberal, and even learned, education on his only daughter. She surpassed his hopes of her proficiency in the sciences and languages ; and in her short visits to some relations at Lausanne, the wit, the beauty, and erudition of Mademoiselle Curchod were the theme of universal applause. The report of such a prodigy awakened my curiosity; I saw and loved. I found her learned without pedantry, lively in conversation, pure in sentiment, and elegant in manners ; and the first sudden emotion was fortified by the habits and knowledge of a more familiar acquaintance. She per- mitted me to make her two or three visits at her father's house. I passed some happy days there, in the mountains of Burgundy, and her parents honourably encouraged the connection. In a calm retirement the gay vanity of youth no longer fluttered in her bosom ; she listened to the voice of truth and passion, and I might presume to hope that I had made some impression on a virtuous heart. At Grassy and Lausanne I indulged my dream of felicity : but on my return to England I soon discovered that my father would not hear of this strange alliance, and that without his consent I was myself destitute and helpless. After a painful struggle I yielded to my fate : I sighed as a lover, I obeyed as a son ; my wound was in- sensibly healed by time, absence, and the habits of a new life. My cure was accelerated by a faithful report of the tranquillity and cheerfulness of the lady herself, and my love subsided in friendship and esteem. The minister of Grassy soon afterwards died; his stipend died with him : his daughter retired to Geneva, where, by teaching young ladies, she earned a hard subsistence for herself and her mother ; but in her lowest distress she maintained a spot- less reputation and a dignified behaviour. A rich banker of Paris, a citizen of Geneva, had the good fortune and good sense to discover and possess this inestimable treasure; and in the capital of taste and luxury she resisted the temptations of wealth as she had sus- tained the hardships of indigence. The genius of her husband has exalted him to the most conspicuous station in Europe. In every phoses, finished the Conic Sections with M. de Traytorrens, and went as far as the infinite series ; I likewise read Sir Isaac Newton's Chronology, and wrote my critical observations upon it. Jan. zyd. I saw Alzire acted by the society at Monrepos. Voltaire acted Alvares; D'Hermanches, Zamore; De St. Cierge, Gusman; M. de Gentil, Monteze; and Madame Denys, Alzire. MY EARLY LOVE 73 change of prosperity and disgrace he has reclined on the bosom of a faithful friend ; and Mademoiselle Curchod is now the wife of M. Necker, the Minister, and perhaps the legislator, of the French monarchy. "THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE" It was at Rome, on the i5th of October 1764, as I sat musing amidst the ruins of the Capitol, while the barefooted friars were singing vespers in the Temple of Jupiter, 1 that the idea of writing the Decline and Fall of the city first started to my mind. But my original plan was circumscribed to the decay of the city rather than of the empire ; and though my reading and reflections began to point towards that object, some years elapsed, and several avocations intervened, before I was seriously engaged in the execu- tion of that laborious work. . . . In the fifteen years between my " Essay on the Study of Litera- ture " and the first volume of the " Decline and Fall " (1761-76), this criticism on Warburton, and some articles in the Journal, were my sole publications. It is more especially incumbent on me to mark the employment, or to confess the waste of time, from my travels to my father's death, an interval in which I was not diverted by any professional duties from the labours and pleasures of a studious life. i. As soon as I was released from the fruit- less task of the Swiss Revolutions (1768), I began gradually to advance from the wish to the hope, from the hope to the design, from the design to the execution, of my historical work of whose limits and extent I had yet a very inadequate notion. The classics, as low as Tacitus, the younger Pliny, and Juvenal, were my old and familiar companions. I insensibly plunged into the ocean of the Augustan history; and in the descending series I investigated, with my pen almost always in my hand, the original records, both Greek and Latin, from Dion Cassius to Ammianus Marcellinus, from the reign of Trajan to the last age of the Western Caesars. The subsidiary rays of medals and inscriptions, of geography and chronology, were thrown on their proper objects ; and I applied the collections of Tillemont, whose inimitable accuracy almost assumes 1 Now the church of Santa Maria in Aracceli. 74 EDWARD GIBBON the character of genius, to fix and arrange within my reach the loose and scattered atoms of historical information. Through the darkness of the Middle Ages I explored my way in the Annals and Antiquities of Italy of the learned Muratori ; and diligently com- pared them with the parallel or transverse lines of Sigonius and Maffei, Baronius and Pagi, till I almost grasped the ruins of Rome in the fourteenth century, without suspecting that this final chapter must be attained by the labour of six quartos and twenty years. Among the books which I purchased, the Theo- dosian Code, with the commentary of James Godefroy, must be gratefully remembered. I used it (and much I used it) as a work of history rather than of jurisprudence ; but in every light it may be considered as a full and capacious repository of the political state of the Empire in the fourth and fifth centuries. As I be- lieved, and as I still believe, that the propagation of the Gospel and the triumph of the Church are inseparably connected with the decline of the Roman monarchy, I weighed the causes and effects of the revolution, and contrasted the narratives and apolo- gies of the Christians themselves with the glances of candour or enmity which the Pagans have cast on the rising sects. The Jewish and Heathen testimonies, as they are collected and illus- trated by Dr. Lardner, directed, without superseding, my search of the originals; and in an ample dissertation on the miraculous darkness of the Passion, I privately drew my conclusions from the silence of an unbelieving age. I have assembled the prepara- tory studies directly or indirectly relative to my History;, but in strict equity they must be spread beyond this period of my life, over the two summers (1771 and 1772) that elapsed between my father's death and my settlement in London. 2. In a free conversation with books and men, it would be endless to enumerate the names and characters of all who are introduced to our ac- quaintance ; but in this general acquaintance we may select the degrees of friendship and esteem. According to the wise maxim, Multum legere potius quam multa, I reviewed again and again the immortal works of the French and English, the Latin and Italian classics. My Greek studies (though less assiduous than I designed) maintained and extended my knowledge of that in- comparable idiom. Homer and Xenophon were still my favourite "THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE" 75 authors, and I had almost prepared for the press an essay on the Cyropcedia, which in my own judgment is not unhappily laboured. After a certain age, the new publications of merit are the sole food of the many; and the most austere student will be often tempted to break the line for the sake of indulging his own curiosity and of providing the topics of fashionable currency. A more respectable motive may be assigned for the third perusal of Black- stone's Commentaries, and a copious and critical abstract of that English work was my first serious production in my native language. 3. My literary leisure was much less complete and independent than it might appear to the eye of a stranger. In the hurry of London I was destitute of books ; in the solitude of Hampshire I was not master of my time. My quiet was gradually disturbed by our domestic anxiety, and I should be ashamed of my unfeeling philosophy had I found much time or taste for study in the last fatal summer (1770) of my father's decay and dissolution. . . . No sooner was I settled in my house and library, than I under- took the composition of the first volume of my History. At the outset all was dark and doubtful ; even the title of the work, the true era of the Decline and Fall of the Empire, the limits of the introduction, the division of the chapters, and the order of the narrative; and I was often tempted to cast away the labour of seven years. The style of an author should be the image of his mind, but the choice and command of language is the fruit of exercise. Many experiments were made before I could hit the middle tone between a dull chronicle and a rhetorical declama- tion: three times did I compose the first chapter, and twice the second and third, before I was tolerably satisfied with their effect. In the remainder of the way I advanced with a more equal and easy pace; but the fifteenth and sixteenth chapters have been reduced, by three successive revisals, from a large volume to their present size ; and they might still be compressed without any loss of facts or sentiments. An opposite fault may be imputed to the concise and superficial narrative of the first reigns from Corn- modus to Alexander ; a fault of which I have never heard, except from Mr. Hume in his last journey to London. Such an oracle might have been consulted and obeyed with rational devotion; but I was soon disgusted with the modest practice of reading the 76 EDWARD GIBBON manuscript to my friends. Of such friends some will praise from politeness, and some will criticise from vanity. The author him- self is the best judge of his own performance ; no one has so deeply meditated on the subject ; no one is so sincerely interested in the event. . . . The volume of my History, which had been somewhat delayed by the novelty and tumult of a first session, 1 was now ready for the press. After the perilous adventure had been declined by my friend Mr. Elmsley, I agreed, upon easy tetms, with Mr. Thomas Cadell, a respectable bookseller, and Mr. William Strahan, an eminent printer; and they undertook the care and risk of the publication, which derived more credit from the name of the shop than from that of the author. The last revisal of the proofs was submitted to my vigilance; and many blemishes of style, which had been invisible in the manuscript, were dis- covered and corrected in the printed sheet. So moderate were our hopes, that the original impression had been stinted to five hundred, till the number was doubled by the prophetic taste of Mr. Strahan. During this awful interval I was neither elated by the ambition of fame nor depressed by the apprehension of contempt. My diligence and accuracy were attested by my own conscience. History is the most popular species of writing, since it can adapt itself to the highest or the lowest capacity. I had chosen an illustrious subject. Rome is familiar to the school-boy and the statesman ; and my narrative was deduced from the last period of classical reading. I had likewise flattered myself that an age of light and liberty would receive without scandal an inquiry into the human causes of the progress and establishment of Christianity. I am at a loss how to describe the success of the work without betraying the vanity of the writer. The first impression was exhausted in a few days ; a second and third edition were scarcely adequate to the demand ; and the bookseller's property was twice invaded by the pirates of Dublin. My book was on every table, and almost on every toilette; the historian was crowned by the 1 " The eight sessions that I sat in parliament were a school of civil prudence, the first and most essential virtue of an historian." GIBBON, Memoirs, ed. G. B. Hill, p. 193. "THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE" 77 taste or fashion of the day; nor was the general voice disturbed by the barking of any profane critic. The favour of mankind is most freely bestowed on a new acquaintance of any original merit; and the mutual surprise of the public and their favourite is productive of those warm sensibilities which at a second meeting, can no longer be rekindled. If I listened to the music of praise, I was more seriously satisfied with the approbation of my judges. The candour of Dr. Robertson embraced his disciple. A letter from Mr. Hume overpaid the labour of ten years; but I have never presumed to accept a place in the triumvirate of British Historians. . . . Nearly two years had elapsed between the publication of my first and the commencement of my second volume, and the causes must be assigned to this long delay, i. After a short holiday, I indulged my curiosity in some studies of a very different nature, a course of anatomy, which was demonstrated by Dr. Hunter; and some lessons of chemistry, which were delivered by Mr. Higgins. The principles of these sciences, and a taste for books of natural history, contributed to multiply my ideas and images; and the anatomist and chemist may sometimes track me in their own snow. 2. I dived, perhaps too deeply, into the mud of the Arian controversy, and many days of reading, thinking, and writing were consumed in the pursuit of a phantom. 3. It is diffi- cult to arrange, with order and perspicuity, the various trans- actions of the age of Constantine ; and so much was I displeased with the first essay, that I committed to the flames above fifty sheets. 4. The six months of Paris and pleasure must be de- ducted from the account. But when I resumed my task, I felt my improvement ; I was now master of my style and subject, and while the measure of my daily performance was enlarged, I dis- covered less reason to cancel or correct. It has always been my practice to cast a long paragraph in a single mould, to try it by my ear, to deposit it in my memory, but to suspend the action of the pen till I had given the last polish to my work. Shall I add, that I never found my mind more vigorous nor my com- position more happy than in the winter hurry of society and parliament? . . . So flexible is the title of my History, that the final era might 78 EDWARD GIBBON be fixed at my own choice ; and I long hesitated whether I should be content with the three volumes, the Fall of the Western Empire, which fulfilled my first engagement with the public. In this interval of suspense, nearly a twelvemonth, I returned by a natural impulse to the Greek authors of antiquity; I read with new pleasure the Iliad and the Odyssey, the Histories of He- rodotus, Thucydides, and Xenophon, a large portion of the tragic and comic theatre of Athens, and many interesting dialogues of the Socratic school. Yet in the luxury of freedom I began to wish for the daily task, the active pursuit, which gave a value to every book and an object to every inquiry ; the preface of a new edition announced my design, and I dropped without reluctance from the age of Plato to that of Justinian. The original texts of Procopius and Agathias supplied the events and even the characters of his reign; but a laborious winter was devoted to the Codes, the Pandects, and the modern interpreters, before I presumed to form an abstract of the civil law. My skill was improved by practice, my diligence perhaps was quickened by the loss of office; and excepting the last chapter, I had finished the fourth volume before I sought a retreat on the banks of the Leman Lake. . . . My transmigration from London to Lausanne could not be effected without interrupting the course of my historical labours. The hurry of my departure, the joy of my arrival, the delay of my tools, suspended their progress; and a full twelvemonth was lost before I could resume the thread of regular and daily in- dustry. A number of books most requisite and least common had been previously selected ; the academical library of Lausanne, which I could use as my own, contained at least the Fathers and Councils: and I have derived some occasional succour from the public collections of Berne and Geneva. The fourth volume was soon terminated by an abstract of the controversies of the In- carnation, which the learned Dr. Prideaux was apprehensive of exposing to profane eyes. It had been the original design of the learned Dean Prideaux to write the history of the ruin of the Eastern Church. In this work it would have been necessary, not only to unravel all those controversies which the Christians made about the hypostatical union, but also to unfold all the niceties and subtle notions which each sect entertained concerning it. The "THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE" 79 pious historian was apprehensive of exposing that incomprehensible mystery to the cavils and objections of unbelievers; and he durst not, "seeing the nature of this book, venture it abroad in so wanton and lewd an age. " 1 In the fifth and sixth volumes the revolutions of the empire and the world are most rapid, various, and instructive; and the Greek or Roman historians are checked by the hostile narratives of the barbarians of the East and the West. 2 It was not till after many designs and many trials that I pre- ferred, as I still prefer, the method of grouping my picture by nations ; and the seeming neglect of chronological order is surely compensated by the superior merits of interest and perspicuity. The style of the first volume is, in my opinion, somewhat crude and elaborate; in the second and third it is ripened into ease, correctness, and numbers; but in the three last I may have been seduced by the facility of my pen, and the constant habit of speak- ing one language and writing another may have infused some mixture of Gallic idioms. Happily for my eyes, I have always closed my studies with the day, and commonly with the morning ; and a long but temperate labour has been accomplished without fatiguing either the mind or body; but when I computed the remainder of my time and my task, it was apparent that, according to the season of publication, the delay of a month would be productive of that of a year. I was now straining for the goal, and in the last winter many evenings were borrowed from the social pleasures of Lausanne. I could now wish that a pause, an interval, had been allowed for a serious revisal. I have presumed to mark the moment of conception: I shall now commemorate the hour of my final deliverance. It was on the day, or rather night, of the 2yth of June 1787, between the hours of eleven and twelve, that I wrote the last lines of the last page in a summer-house in my garden. After laying down my pen, I took several turns in a berceau, or covered walk of acacias, which commands a prospect of the country, the lake, and the 1 See preface to the Life of Mahomet, p. xxi. GIBBON. 2 I have followed the judicious precept of the Abbe de Mably (Maniere d'ecrire PHistoire, p. no), who advises the historian not to dwell too minutely on the decay of the eastern empire; but to consider the barbarian conquerors as a more worthy subject of his narrative. "Fas est et ab hoste doceri." 80 THOMAS CARLYLE mountains. The air was temperate, the sky was serene, the silver orb of the moon was reflected from the waters, and all nature was silent. I will not dissemble the first emotions of joy on the recovery of my freedom, and perhaps the establishment of my fame. But my pride was soon humbled, and a sober melan- choly was spread over my mind, by the idea that I had taken an everlasting leave of an old and agreeable companion, and that whatsoever might be the future date of my History, the life of the historian must be short and precarious. THOMAS CARLYLE LIFE IN LONDON [From "Jane Welsh Carlyle," written in 1866, Reminiscences, Vol. I, pp. 171-175, 185-203. Edited by C. E. Norton, Macmillan & Co., London, 1887. CARLYLE, THOMAS (1795-1881), essayist and historian; son of a mason at Ecclefechan, Dumfriesshire; educated at the parish school, and (1805) at Annan academy; entered Edinburgh University, 1809; studied mathe- matics; intended for the church; mathematical teacher at Annan, 1814; schoolmaster at Kirkcaldy, 1816, where he became intimate with Edward Irving; read law in Edinburgh, 1819, where he developed extreme sensitiveness to physical discomforts; took pupils; read German; met his future wife [see JANE BAILLIE WELSH CARLYLE], 1821; tutor to Charles Buller at Edinburgh and Dunkeld, 1822-4; contributed a 'Life of Schiller' to the 'London Magazine,' 1824; translated Legendre's 'Geome- try' and Goethe's 'Wilhelm Meister,' 1824; visited Paris, 1824; lodged in Islington, 1825; retired to Dumfriesshire, 1825; married and settled in Edinburgh, 1826; contributed to the 'Edinburgh Review,' 1827-9; un ~ successful candidate for the moral philosophy chair at St. Andrews; re- moved to Craigenputtock, Dumfriesshire, 1828, where he wrote on German literature for the magazines; in great monetary difficulties, 1831; in Lon- don, 1831, where he failed to get 'Sartor Resartus' published; returned to Craigenputtock, 1832; removed to Cheyne Row, Chelsea, 1834; the manu- script of the first volume of his 'French Revolution' accidentally burnt by John Stuart Mill, March 1835; met John Sterling, 1835; published his 'French Revolution,' 1837, and made his reputation; gave four lecture- courses in London, 1837-40, the last on 'Hero-worship' (published 1841); urged formation of London Library, 1839; published 'Chartism,' 1839, 'Past and Present,' 1843, and 'Oliver Cromwell,' 1845; visited Ireland, 1846 and 1849; published 'Life of Sterling,' 1851; wrote 'Frederick the Great,' 1851-1865 (published 1858-65); travelled in Germany, 1852 and 1858; lord rector of Edinburgh University, 1865-6; lost his wife, 1866; wrote his 'Reminiscences' (published 1881); published pamphlet in favour LIFE IN LONDON 8 1 of Germany in regard to Franco-German war, 1870; his right hand para- lysed, 1872; received the Prussian order of merit, 1874; buried at Eccle- fechan; benefactor of Edinburgh University. His 'Collected Works' first appeared 1857-8. His 'life' was written with great frankness by his friend and disciple, James Anthony Froude. Index and Epitome of D. N. B. "The paper of this poor Notebook of hers is done; all I have to say, too (though there lie such volumes yet unsaid), seems to be almost done: and I must sorrowfully end it, and seek for something else. Very sorrowfully still ; for it has been my sacred shrine, and religious city of refuge from the bitterness of these sorrows, during all the doleful weeks that are past since I took it up: a kind of devotional thing (as I once already said), which softens all grief into tenderness and infinite pity and repentant love; one's whole sad life drowned as if in tears for one, and all the wrath and scorn and other grim elements silently melted away. And now, am I to leave it ; to take farewell of Her a second time? Right silent and serene is She, my lost Darling yonder, as I often think in my gloom; no sorrow more for Her, nor will there long be for me." CARLYLE, Note at end of Reminiscences of Jane Welsh Carlyle. "Two hours of hysterics can be no good matter for a sick nurse, and the strange, hard old being, in so lamentable and yet human a desolation crying out like a burnt child, and yet always wisely and beautifully how can that end, as a piece of reading, even to the strong but on the brink of the most cruel kind of weeping? I observe the old man's style is stronger on me than ever it was, and by rights, too, since I have just laid down his most attaching book. God rest the baith o' them ! But even if they do not meet again, how we should all be strengthened to be kind, and not only in act, in speech also, that so much more important part. See what this apostle of silence most regrets, not speaking out his heart." ROBERT Louis STEVENSON, Letter to Colvin, "Spring, 1881," Letters, Vol. I, p. 231. Charles Scribner's Sons, New York, 1899.] She 1 liked London constantly; and stood in defence of it against me and my atrabilious censures of it; never had for herself the least wish to quit it again, though I was often talking of that, and her practice would have been loyal compliance for my behoof. I well remember my first walking her up to Hyde Park Corner in the summer evening, and her fine interest in everything. At the corner of the Green Park, I found something for her to sit on; "Hah, there is John Mill coming!" I said; and her joyful ingenuous blush is still very beautiful to me. The good Child ! It did not prove to be John Mill (whom she knew since 1831, and liked for my sake) : but probably I showed her the Duke of Wellington, whom 1 Mrs. Carlyle. 82 THOMAS CARLYLE one often used to see there, striding deliberately along, as if home from his work, about that hour : him (I almost rather think, that same evening), and at any rate, other figures of distinction or notoriety. And we said to one another, "How strange to be in big London here; isn't it?" Our purchase of household kettles and saucepans etc. in the mean Ironmongery, so noble in its poverty and loyalty on her part, is sad and infinitely lovely to me at this moment. We had plenty of " company " from the very first : John Mill, down from Kensington once a week or oftener; the " Mrs. Austin " of those days, so popular and almost famous, on such exiguous basis (Translations from the German, poorly done, and of original noth- ing that rose far above the rank of twaddle) : "femme alors celebre, " as we used to term the phenomenon, parodying some phrase I had found in Thiers: Mrs. Austin affected much sisterhood with us (affected mainly, though in kind wise) ; and was a cheery, sanguine, and generally acceptable member of society, already up to the Marquis of Lansdowne (in a slight sense), much more to all the Radical Officials and notables : Charles Buller, Sir W. Molesworth, etc. etc. of "alors." She still lives, this Mrs. Austin, in quiet though eclipsed condition: spring last she was in Town for a couple of weeks ; and my Dear One went twice to see her, though I couldn't manage quite. Erasmus Darwin, a most diverse kind of mortal, came to seek us out very soon ("had heard of Carlyle in Germany" etc.) ; and continues ever since to be a quiet house- friend, honestly attached ; though his visits latterly have been rarer and rarer, health so poor, I so occupied, etc. etc. He has some- thing of original and sarcastically ingenious in him; one of the sincerest, naturally truest, and most modest of men. Elder brother of Charles Darwin (the famed Darwin on Species of these days) , to whom I rather prefer him for intellect, had not his health quite doomed him to silence and patient idleness; Grandsons, both, of the first famed Erasmus ("Botanic Garden" etc.), who also seems to have gone upon "species" questions; " Omnia ex Cone his" (all from Oysters) being a dictum of his (even a stamp he sealed with, still extant), as the present Erasmus once told me, many long years before this of "Darwin on Species" came up among us ! Wonderful to me, as indicating the capricious stupidity of mankind; LIFE IN LONDON 83 never could read a page of it, or waste the least thought upon it. Erasmus Darwin it was who named the late Whewell, seeing him sit, all ear (not all assent) at some of my Lectures, "The Har- monious Blacksmith;" a really descriptive title. My Dear One had a great favour for this honest Darwin always ; many a road, to shops and the like, he drove her in his Cab (Darwingium Cabbum, comparable to Gear glum Sidus), in those early days, when even the charge of Omnibuses was a consideration ; and his sparse utterances, sardonic often, were a great amusement to her. "A perfect gentleman," she at once discerned him to be; and of sound worth, and kindliness, in the most unaffected form. "Take me now to Oxygen Street; a dyer's shop there !" Darwin, without a wrinkle or remark, made for Oxenden Street and drew up at the required door. Amusingly admirable to us both, when she came home. Our commonest evening sitter, for a good while, was Leigh Hunt, who lived close by, and delighted to sit talking with us (free, cheery, idly melodious as bird on bough), or listening, with real feeling, to her old Scotch tunes on the Piano, and winding up with a frugal morsel of Scotch Porridge (endlessly admirable to Hunt) I think I spoke of this above ? Hunt was always accurately dressed, these evenings, and had a fine chivalrous gentlemanly carriage, polite, affectionate, respectful (especially to her) and yet so free and natural. Her brilliancy and faculty he at once recognised, none better; but there rose gradually in it, to his astonished eye, something of positive, of practically steadfast, which scared him off, a good deal ; the like in my own case too, still more ; which he would call "Scotch," "Presbyterian," who knows what; and which gradually repelled him, in sorrow, not in anger, quite away from us, with rare exceptions, which, in his last years, were almost pathetic to us both. Long before this, he had gone to live in Ken- sington ; and we scarcely saw him except by accident. His Household, while in "4 Upper Cheyne Row," within few steps of us here, almost at once disclosed itself to be huggermugger, wwthrift, and sordid collapse, once for all; and had to be associated with on cautious terms ; while he himself emerged out of it in the chivalrous figure I describe. Dark complex- ion (a trace of the African, I believe), copious clean strong black hair, beautifully-shaped head, fine beaming serious hazel 84 THOMAS CARLYLE eyes; seriousness and intellect the main expression of the face (to our surprise at first), he would lean on his elbow against the mantel-piece (fine clean, elastic figure too he had, five feet ten or more), and look round him nearly in silence, before taking leave for the night : " as if I were a Lar, " said he once, "or a permanent Household God here!" (such his polite Ariel-like way). Another time rising from this Lar attitude, he repeated (voice very fine) as in sport of parody, yet with something of very sad perceptible: "While I to sulphurous and penal fire" as the last thing before vanishing. Poor Hunt ! no more of him. She, I remember, was almost in tears during some last visit of his, and kind and pitying as a Daughter to the now weak and time-worn old man. . . . By much the tenderest and beautifullest reminiscence to me out of those years is that of the Lecture times. The vilest welter of odious confusions, horrors and repugnancies; to which, mean- while, there was compulsion absolute ; and to which she was the one irradiation; noble loving soul, not to be quenched in any chaos that might come. Oh, her love to me; her cheering, un- affected, useful practicality of help: was not I rich, after all? She had a steady hope in me, too, while I myself had habitually none (except of the "desperate" kind) ; nay a steady contentment with me, and with our lot together, let hope be as it might. " Never mind him, my Dear," whispered Miss Wilson to her, one day, as I stood wriggling in my agony of incipiency, "people like it; the more of that, the better does the Lecture prove ! " W r hich was a truth; though the poor Sympathiser might, at the moment, feel it harsh. This Miss Wilson and her brother still live; opulent, fine, Church of England people (scrupulously orthodox to the secularities not less than the spiritualities of that creed), and Miss Wilson very clever too (i.e. full of strong just insight in her way) ; who had from the first taken to us, and had us much about them (Spedding, Maurice, etc. attending) then and for some years afterwards ; very desirous to help us, if that could have much done it (for indeed, to me, it was always mainly an indigestion purchased by a loyal kind of weariness). I have seen Sir James Stephen there, but did not then understand him, or that he could be a "clever man," as reported by Henry Taylor and other good judges. "He shuts his eyes on you," said the elder Spring-Rice (Lord LIFE IN LONDON 85 Monteagle), "and talks as if he were dictating a Colonial De- spatch " (most true ; " teaching you How Not to do it," as Dickens denned afterwards) : one of the pattest things I ever heard from Spring-Rice, who had rather a turn for such. Stephen ultimately, when on half-pay and a Cambridge Professor, used to come down hither pretty often on an evening; and we heard a great deal of talk from him, recognisably serious and able, though always in that Colonial-Office style, more or less. Colonial-Office being an Impotency (as Stephen inarticulately, though he never said or whispered it, well knew), what could an earnest and honest kind of man do, but try and teach you How not to do it? Stephen seemed to me a master in that art. The Lecture time fell in the earlier part of the Sterling Period, which latter must have lasted in all, counting till John's death, about ten years (Autumn 1844 when John died). To my Jeannie, I think, this was clearly the sunniest and wholesomest element in her then outer life. All the Household loved her; and she had virtually, by her sense, by her felt loyalty, expressed oftenest in a gay mildly quizzing manner, a real influence, a kind of light com- mand one might almost call it, willingly yielded her among them. Details of this are in print (as I said above). In the same years, Mrs. Buller (Charles's mother) was a very cheerful item to her. Mrs. Buller (a whilom Indian Beauty, Wit and finest Fine Lady), who had at all times a very recognising eye for talent, and real reverence for it, very soon made out something of my little woman ; and took more and more to her, all the time she lived after. Mrs. Buller's circle was gay and populous at this time (Radical, chiefly Radical, lions of every complexion), and we had as much of it as we would consent to. I remember being at Leatherhead too ; and, after that, a pleasant rustic week at Troston Parsonage (in Suffolk, where Mrs. Buller's youngest son "served," and serves) ; which Mrs. Buller contrived very well to make the best of, sending me to ride for three days in Oliver Cromwell's country, that she might have the Wife more to herself. My Jane must have been there altogether, I dare say, near a month (had gone before me, returned after me) ; and I regretted never to have seen the place again. This must have been in September or October 1842 ; Mrs. Welsh's death in early Spring past. I remember well my 86 THOMAS CARLYLE feelings in Ely Cathedral, in the close of sunset or dusk ; the place was open, free to me without witnesses ; people seemed to be tuning the organ, which went in solemn gusts far aloft; the thought of Oliver, and his "Leave off your fooling, and come down, Sir!" l was almost as if audible to me. Sleepless night, owing to Cathedral bells, and strange ride next day to St. Ives, to Hinchinbrook, etc., and thence to Cambridge, with thundercloud and lightning dogging me to rear, and bursting into torrents few minutes after I got into the Hoop Inn. My poor Darling had, for constant accompaniment to all her bits of satisfactions, an altogether weak state of health, continually breaking down, into violent fits of headache in her best times, and in winter-season into cough, etc., in lingering forms of a quite sad and exhausting sort. Wonderful to me how she, so sensitive a creature, maintained her hoping cheerful humour to such a degree, amidst all that; and, except the pain of inevitable sympathy, and vague fluttering fears, gave me no pain. Careful always to screen me from pain, as I by no means always reciprocally was ; alas, no ; miserable egoist in comparison ! At this time I must have been in the thick of Cromwell; "four years" of abstruse toil, obscure tentations, futile wrestling, and misery, I used to count it had cost me, before I took to editing the Letters and Speeches ("to have them out of my way") ; which rapidly drained off the sour swamp water bodily, and left me, beyond all first expectations, quite free of the matter. Often I have thought how miserable my Books must have been to her; and how, though they were none of her choosing, and had come upon her like ill weather or ill health, she at no instant (never once, I do believe) made the least complaint of me or my behaviour (often bad, or at least thoughtless and weak) under them ! Always some quizzing little lesson, the purport and effect of which was to encourage me ; never once anything worse. Oh, it was noble; and I see it so well now, when it is gone from me, and no return possible ! Cromwell was by much the worst Book-time; till this of Friedrich; which indeed was infinitely worse; in the dregs of our strength too; and lasted for about thirteen years. She was 1 Cromwell's Letters and Speeches (Library Edition, 1869), I, 185. LIFE IN LONDON 87 generally in quite weak health, too, and was often, for long weeks or months, miserably ill. . . . It was strange how she contrived to sift out of such a troublous forlorn day as hers, in such case, was, all the available little items ; as she was sure to do, and to have them ready for me in the evening when my work was done ; in the prettiest little narrative anybody could have given of such things. Never again shall I have such melodious, humanly beautiful Half-hours ; they were the rainbow of my poor dripping day, and reminded me that there otherwise was a Sun. At this time, and all along, she "did all the society;" was all brightness to the one or two (oftenest rather dull and prosaic fellows, for all the better sort respected my seclu- sion, especially during that last Friedrich time), whom I needed to see on my affairs in hand, or who, with more of brass than others, managed to intrude upon me: for these she did, in their several kinds, her very best; all of her own people, whom I might be apt to feel wearisome (dislike any of them I never did, or his or her discharge from service would have swiftly followed), she kept beautifully out of my way, saving my "politeness" withal: a very perfect skill she had in all this. And took my dark toiling periods, however long sullen and severe they might be, with a loyalty and heart- acquiescence that never failed. The heroic little soul ! Latter-Day Pamphlet time, and especially the time that pre- ceded it (1848 etc.) must have been very sore and heavy: my heart was long overloaded with the meanings at length uttered there, and no way of getting them set forth would answer. I forget what ways I tried, or thought of; Times Newspaper was one (alert, airy, rather vacant editorial gentleman I remember going to once, in Printing House Square) ; but this way of course, proved hy- pothetical merely, as all others did, till we, as last shift, gave the rough MSS. to Chapman (in Forster's company one winter Sunday). About half of the ultimately printed might be in Chap- man's hands ; but there was much manipulation as well as addition needed. Forster soon fell away, I could perceive, into terror and surprise ; as indeed everybody did : " A lost man ! " thought everybody. Not she at any moment; much amused by the out- side pother, she ; and glad to see me getting delivered of my black electricities and consuming fires, in that way. Strange letters 88 THOMAS CARLYLE came to us, during those nine months of pamphleteering ; strange visitors (of moonstruck unprofitable type for most part), who had, for one reason or another, been each of them wearing himself half-mad on some one of the public scandals I was recognizing and denouncing. I still remember some of their faces, and the look their paper bundles had. She got a considerable entertain- ment out of all that ; went along with me in everything (probably counselling a little here and there; a censorship well worth my regarding, and generally adaptable, here as everywhere); and minded no whit any results that might follow this evident speaking of the truth. Somebody, writing from India I think, and clearly meaning kindness, "did hope" (some time afterwards) "the tide would turn, and this lamentable Hostility of the Press die away into friendship again ; " at which I remember our innocent laugh- ter, ignorant till then what "The Press's" feelings were, and leaving "The Press" very welcome to them then. Neuberg helped me zealously, as volunteer amanuensis etc., through all this business; but I know not that even he approved it all, or any of it to the bottom. In the whole world I had one com- plete Approver; in that, as in other cases, one; and it was worth all. On the back of Latter-Day Pamphlets followed Life of Sterling; a very quiet thing; but considerably disapproved of too, as I learned ; and utterly revolting to the Religious people in particular (to my surprise rather than otherwise) : " Doesn't believe in us, then, either?" Not he, for certain; can't, if you will know! Others urged disdainfully, " What has Sterling done that he should have a Life?" "Induced Carlyle somehow to write him one!" answered she once (to the Ferguses, I think) in an arch airy way, which I can well fancy; and which shut up the question there. The book was afterwards greatly praised, again, on rather weak terms, I doubt. What now will please me best in it, and alone will, was then an accidental quality, the authentic light, under the due conditions, that is thrown by it on her. Oh, my Dear One; sad is my soul for the loss of Thee, and will to the end be, as I compute ! Lonelier creature there is not henceforth in this world ; neither person, work, nor thing going on in it that is of any value, in comparison, or even at all. Death I feel almost daily in express LIFE IN LONDON 89 fact, Death is the one haven; and have occasionally a kind of kingship, sorrowful, but sublime, almost godlike, in the feeling that that is nigh. Sometimes the image of Her, gone in her car of victory (in that beautiful death), and as if nodding to me with a smile, " I am gone, loved one ; work a little longer, if thou still canst ; if not, follow ! There is no baseness, and no misery here. Courage, courage to the last!" that, sometimes, as in this mo- ment, is inexpressibly beautiful to me, and comes nearer to bringing tears than it once did. In 1852 had come the new-modelling of our House; attended with infinite dusty confusion (head-carpenter stupid, though hon- est, fell ill, etc. etc.) ; confusion falling upon her more than me, and at length upon her altogether. She was the architect, guiding and directing and contriving genius, in all that enterprise, seem- ingly so foreign to her. But, indeed, she was ardent in it ; and she had a talent that way which was altogether unique in my expe- rience. An "eye" first of all; equal in correctness to a joiner's square, this, up almost from her childhood, as I understood. Then a sense of order, sense of beauty, of wise and thrifty con- venience ; sense of wisdom altogether in fact ; for that was it ! A human intellect shining luminous in every direction, the highest and the lowest (as I remarked above) ; in childhood she used to be sent to seek when things fell lost; "the best seeker of us all," her Father would say, or look (as she thought) : for me also she sought everything, with such success as I never saw elsewhere. It was she who widened our poor drawing-room (as if by a stroke of genius) and made it (zealously, at the partial expense of three feet from her own bedroom) into what it now is, one of the prettiest little drawing-rooms I ever saw, and made the whole house into what it now is. How frugal, too, and how modest about it ! House was hardly finished, when there arose that of the "Demon-Fowls," as she appropriately named them : macaws, Cochin-chinas, endless concert of crowing, cackling, shrieking roosters (from a bad or misled neighbour, next door) which cut us off from sleep or peace, at times altogether, and were like to drive me mad, and her through me, through sympathy with me. From which also she was my deliverer, had delivered and contrived to deliver me from hundreds of such things (Oh, my beautiful little Alcides, 90 THOMAS CARLYLE in the new days of Anarchy and the Mud-gods, threatening to crush down a poor man, and kill him with his work still on hand !) I remember well her setting off, one winter morning, from the Grange on this enterprise ; probably having thought of it most of the night (sleep denied), she said to me next morning the first thing: "Dear, we must extinguish those Demon- Fowls, or they will extinguish us ! Rent the house (No. 6, proprietor mad etc. etc.) ourselves ; it is but some 4o/. a year, pack away those vile people, and let it stand empty. I will go this very day upon it, if you assent ! " And she went accordingly ; and slew altogether this Lerna Hydra; at far less expense than taking the house, nay al- most at no expense at all, except by her fine intellect, tact, just discernment, swiftness of decision, and general nobleness of mind (in short). Oh, my bonny little woman; mine only in memory now! I left the Grange two days after her, on this occasion ; hastening through London, gloomy of mind ; to see my dear old Mother yet once (if I might) before she died. She had, for many months before, been evidently and painfully sinking away, under no disease, but the ever-increasing infirmities of eighty-three years of time. She had expressed no desire to see me; but her love from my birth upwards, under all scenes and circumstances, I knew to be emphatically a Mother's. I walked from the Kirtle-bridge ("Galls") Station that dim winter morning; my one thought, "Shall I see her yet alive?" She was still there; weary, very weary, and wishing to be at rest. I think she only at times knew me ; so bewildering were her continual distresses ; once she entirely forgot me ; then, in a minute or two, asked my pardon ah me ! ah me! It was my Mother and not my Mother; the last pale rim or sickle of the moon, which had once been/w//, now sinking in the dark seas. This lasted only three days. Saturday night she had her full faculties, but was in nearly unendurable misery ; not breath sufficient etc., etc. : John tried various reliefs, had at last to give a few drops of laudanum, which eased the misery, and in an hour or two brought sleep. All next day she lay asleep, breathing equally but heavily, her face grand and solemn, almost severe, like a marble statue; about four P.M. the breathing suddenly halted ; recommenced for half an instant, then fluttered, LIFE IN LONDON 91 ceased. 1 "All the days of my appointed time," she had often said, "will I wait, till my change come" The most beautifully religious soul I ever knew. Proud enough she was too, though piously humble; and full of native intellect, humour, etc., though all undeveloped. On the religious side, looking into the very heart of the matter, I always reckon her rather superior to my Jane, who in other shapes and with far different exemplars and conditions, had a great deal of noble religion too. Her death filled me with a kind of dim amazement, and crush of confused sorrows, which were very painful, but not so sharply pathetic as I might have expected. It was the earliest terror of my childhood that I " might lose my Mother;" and it had gone with me all my days: But, and that is probably the whole account of it, I was then sunk in the miseries of Friedrich etc. etc., in many miseries; and was then fifty-eight years of age. It is strange to me, in these very days, how peaceable, though still sacred and tender, the memory of my Mother now lies in me. (This very morning, I got into dreaming confused nightmare stuff about some funeral and her; not hers, nor obviously my Jane's, seemingly my Father's rather, and she sending me on it, the saddest bewildered stuff. What a dismal debasing and confusing element is that of a sick body on the human soul or thinking part !) It was in 1852 (September-October, for about a month) that I had first seen Germany, gone on my first errand as to Friedrich: there was a second, five years afterwards ; this time it was to in- quire (of Preuss and Co.); to look about me, search for books, portraits, etc. etc. I went from Scotsbrig (my dear old Mother painfully weak, though I had no thought it would be the last time I should see her afoot) ; from Scotsbrig by Leith for Rotterdam, Koln, Bonn (Neuberg's) ; and on the whole never had nearly so (outwardly) unpleasant a journey in my life ; till the second and last I made thither. But the Chelsea establishment was under car- penters, painters ; till those disappeared, no work possible, scarcely any living possible (though my brave woman did make it possible without complaint) : " Stay so many weeks, all painting at least shall then be off!" I returned, near broken-down utterly, at the set time ; and alas, was met by a foul dabblement of paint oozing 1 Carlyle's mother died at Scotsbrig, Ecclefechan, December 25, 1853. 92 THOMAS CARLYLE downstairs : the painters had proved treacherous to her ; time could not be kept ! It was the one instance of such a thing here ; and, except the first sick surprise, I now recollect no more of it. " Mamma, wine makes cosy ! " said the bright little one, perhaps between two and three years old, her Mother, after some walk with sprinkling of wet or the like, having given her a dram-glass of wine on their getting home: "Mamma, wine makes cosy!" said the small silver voice, gaily sipping, getting its new bits of insight into natural philosophy ! What " pictures " has my Beauti- ful One left me ; what joys can surround every well-ordered human hearth. I said long since, I never saw so beautiful a child- hood. Her little bit of a first chair, its wee wee arms, etc., visible to me in the closet at this moment, is still here, and always was; I have looked at it hundreds of times; from of old, with many thoughts. No daughter or son of hers was to sit there ; so it had been appointed us, my Darling. I have no Book a thousandth-part so beautiful as Thou; but these were our only " Children," - and, in a true sense, these were verily OURS; and will perhaps live some time in the world, after we are both gone ; and be of no damage to the poor brute chaos of a world, let us hope ! The Will of the Supreme shall be accomplished: Amen. But to proceed. Shortly after my return from Germany (next summer I think, while the Cochin-chinas were at work, and we could not quit the house, having spent so much on it, and got a long lease), there began a new still worse hurly-burly of the building kind; that of the new top-story, whole area of the house to be thrown into one sublime garret-room, lighted from above, thirty feet by thirty say, and at least eleven feet high; double-doored, doubled- win- dowed ; impervious to sound, to in short, to everything but self and work! I had my grave doubts about all this; but John Chorley, in his friendly zeal, warmly urged it on; pushed, super- intended ; and was a good deal disgusted with my dismal experience of the result. Something really good might have come of it in a scene where good and faithful work was to be had on the part of all, from architect downwards; but here, from all (except one good young man of the carpenter trade, whom I at length noticed thankfully in small matters), the "work," of planning to LIFE IN LONDON 93 begin with, and then of executing, in all its details, was mere work of Belial, i.e. of the Father of LIES; such "work" as I had not conceived the possibility of among the sons of Adam till then. By degrees, I perceived it to be the ordinary English "work" of this epoch; and, with manifold reflections, deep as Tophet, on the outlooks this offered for us all, endeavoured to be silent as to my own little failure. My new illustrious "Study" was definable as the least inhabitable, and most entirely detestable and despic- able bit of human workmanship in that kind. Sad and odious to me very. But, by many and long-continued efforts, with endless botherations which lasted for two or three years after (one winter starved by "Arnott's improved grate" I recollect), I did get it patched together into something of supportability ; and continued, though under protest, to inhabit it during all working hours, as I had indeed from the first done. The whole of the now printed Friedrich was written there (or in summer in the back court and garden, when driven down by baking heat) ; much rawer matter, I think, was tentatively on paper, before this sublime new "Study." Friedrich once done, I quitted the place for ever ; and it is now a bedroom for the servants. The "architect" for this beautiful bit of masonry and carpentry was one "Parsons," really a clever creature, I could see, but swimming as for dear life in a mere "Mother of Dead Dogs" (ultimately did become bankrupt); his men of all types, Irish hodmen and upwards, for real mendacity of hand, for drunkenness, greediness, mutinous nomadism, and anarchic malfeasance throughout, excelled all experience or con- ception. Shut the lid on their " unexampled prosperity " and them, for evermore. The sufferings of my poor little woman, throughout all this, must have been great, though she whispered nothing of them, the rather, as this was my enterprise (both the Friedrich and it) ; indeed it was by her address and invention that I got my sooterkin of a "study" improved out of its worst blotches; it was she, for example, that went silently to Bramah's smith people, and got me a fireplace, of merely human sort, which actually warmed the room and sent Arnott's miracle about its business. But undoubtedly that Friedrich affair, with its many bad adjuncts, was much the worst we ever had; and sorely tried us both. It lasted thirteen 94 THOMAS CARLYLE years or more. To me a desperate dead-lift pull all that time; my whole strength devoted to it; alone, withdrawn from all the world (except some bores who would take no hint, almost nobody came to see me, nor did I wish almost anybody then left living for me), all the world withdrawing from me; I desperate of ever getting through (not to speak of ' succeeding ") ; left solitary "with the nightmares" (as I sometimes expressed it), "hugging unclean creatures" (Prussian Blockheadism) "to my bosom, trying to caress and flatter their secret out of them !" Why do I speak of all this ? It is now become coprolith to me, insignificant as the dung of a thousand centuries ago: I did get through, thank God ; let it now wander into the belly of oblivion for ever. But what I do still, and shall more and more, remember with loving admiration is her behaviour in it. She was habitually in the fee- blest health; often, for long whiles, grievously ill. Yet by an alchemy all her own, she had extracted grains as of gold out of every day, and seldom or never failed to have something bright and pleasant to tell me, when I reached home after my evening ride, the most fordone of men. In all, I rode, during that book, some 30,000 miles, much of it (all the winter part of it) under cloud of night, sun just setting when I mounted. All the rest of the day, I sat silent aloft ; insisting upon work, and such work, invitissimd Minerva for that matter. Home between five and six, with mud mackintoshes off, and, the nightmares locked up for a while, I tried for an hour's sleep before my (solitary, dietetic, altogether simple) bit of dinner; but first always came up for half an hour to the drawing-room and Her; where a bright kindly fire was sure to be burning (candles hardly lit, all in trustful chiaroscuro), and a spoonful of brandy in water, with a pipe of tobacco (which- I had learned to take sitting on the rug, with my back to the jamb, and door never so little open, so that all the smoke, if I was careful, went up the chimney) : this was the one bright portion of my black day. Oh, those evening half-hours, how beautiful and blessed they were, not awaiting me now on my home-coming, for the last ten weeks ! She was of tenest reclining on the sofa ; wearied enough, she too, with her day's doings and endurings. But her history, even of what was bad, had such grace and truth, and spontaneous tinkling melody of a naturally cheerful and loving LIFE IN LONDON 95 heart, that I never anywhere enjoyed the like. Her courage, patience, silent heroism, meanwhile, must often have been im- mense. Within the last two years or so she has told me about my talk to her of the Battle of Mollwitz on these occasions, while that was on the anvil. She was lying on the sofa; weak, but I knew little how weak, and patient, kind, quiet and good as ever. After tugging and wriggling through what inextricable labyrinth and Sloughs-of-despond, I still remember, it appears I had at last conquered Mollwitz, saw it all clear ahead and round me, and took to telling her about it, in my poor bit of joy, night after night. I recollect she answered little, though kindly always. Privately, she at that time felt convinced she was dying : dark winter, and such the weight of misery and utter decay of strength ; and, night after night, my theme to her, Mollwitz I This she owned to me, within the last year or two ; which how could I listen to without shame and abasement ? Never in my pretended-superior kind of life, have I done, for love of any creature, so supreme a kind of thing. It touches me at this moment with penitence and humiliation, yet with a kind of soft religious blessedness too. She read the first two volumes of Friedrich, much of it in printer's sheets (while on visit to the aged Misses Donaldson at Hadding- ton) ; her applause (should not I collect her fine Notekins and reposit them here ?) was beautiful and as sunlight to me, for I knew it was sincere withal, and unerringly straight upon the blot, however exaggerated by her great love of me. The other volumes (hardly even the third, I think) she never read, I knew too well why ; and submitted without murmur, save once or twice perhaps a little quiz on the subject, which did not afflict her, either. Too weak, too weak by far, for a dismal enterprise of that kind, as I knew too well ! But those Haddington visits were very beautiful to her (and to me through her letters and her) ; and by that time we were over the hill and "the worst of our days were past" (as poor Irving used to give for toast, long ago), worst of them past, though we did not yet quite know it. 96 CHARLES DICKENS CHARLES DICKENS HARD EXPERIENCES IN BOYHOOD [From The Life of Charles Dickens^ by John Forster, Book I, Chaps. I and II. Chapman and Hall, London, 1872. For the Life of Dickens, see post, p. 569. ". . . . This Third Volume throws a new light and character to me over the Work at large. I incline to consider this Biography as taking rank, in essential respects, parallel to Boswell himself, though on widely different grounds. Boswell, by those genial abridgements and vivid face to face pictures of Johnson's thoughts, conversational ways, and modes of appear- ance among his fellow-creatures, has given, as you often hear me say, such a delineation of a man's existence as was never given by another man. By quite different resources, by those sparkling, clear, and sunny utterances of Dickens's own (bits of aw/a-biography unrivalled in clearness and credibility) which were at your disposal, and have been intercalated every now and then, you have given to every intelligent eye the power of looking down to the very bottom of Dickens's mode of existing in this world; and, I say, have performed a feat which, except in. Boswell, the unique, I know not where to parallel. So long as Dickens is interesting to his fellow-men, here will be seen, face to face, what Dickens's manner of existing was. His bright and joyful sympathy with everything around him ; his steady practicality, withal ; the singularly solid business talent he continually had ; and, deeper than all, if one has the eye to see deep enough, dark, fateful, silent elements, tragical to look upon, and hiding, amid dazzling radiances as of the sun, the elements of death itself. Those two American journeys especially tran- scend in tragic interest, to a thinking reader, most things one has seen in writing!" THOMAS CARLYLE, Letter to the Author, 16 February, 1874.] In Bayham-street, meanwhile, affairs were going on badly; the poor boy's visits to his uncle, while the latter was still kept a pris- oner by his accident, were interrupted by another attack of fever; and on his recovery the mysterious ' deed ' had again come upper- most. His father's resources were so low, and all his expedients so thoroughly exhausted, that trial was to be made whether his mother might not come to the rescue. The time was arrived for her to exert herself, she said; and she 'must do something/ The godfather down at Limehouse was reported to have an Indian connection. People in the East Indies always sent their children home to be educated. She would set up a school. They would all grow rich by it. And then, thought the sick boy, 'perhaps even I might go to school myself.' A house was soon found at number four, Gower-street north; HARD EXPERIENCES IN BOYHOOD 97 a large brass plate on the door announced MRS. DICKENS'S ESTAB- LISHMENT ; and the result I can give in the exact words of the then small actor in the comedy, whose hopes it had raised so high. 1 1 left, at a great many other doors, a great many circulars calling attention to the merits of the establishment. Yet nobody ever came to school, nor do I recollect that anybody ever proposed to come, or that the least preparation was made to receive any- body. But I know that we got on very badly with the butcher and baker; that very often we had not too much for dinner; and that at last my father was arrested.' The interval between the sponging-house and the prison was passed by the sorrowful lad in running errands and carrying messages for the prisoner, de- livered with swollen eyes and through shining tears ; and the last words said to him by his father before he was finally carried to the Marshalsea, were to the effect that the sun was set upon him for ever. 'I really believed at the time,' said Dickens to me, 'that they had broken my heart.' He took afterwards ample revenge for this false alarm by making all the world laugh at them in David Copperfield. The readers of Mr. Micawber's history who remember David's first visit to the Marshalsea prison, and how upon seeing the turn- key he recalled the turnkey in the blanket in Roderick Random, will read with curious interest what follows, written as a personal experience of fact two or three years before the fiction had even entered into his thoughts. 'My father was waiting for me in the lodge, and we went up to his room (on the top story but one), and cried very much. And he told me, I remember, to take warning by the Marshal- sea, and to observe that if a man had twenty pounds a-year, and spent nineteen pounds nineteen shillings and sixpence, he would be happy; but that a shilling spent the other way would make him wretched. I see the fire we sat before, now; with two bricks inside the rusted grate, one on each side, to prevent its burning too many coals. Some other debtor shared the room with him, who came in by-and-by; and as the dinner was a joint-stock repast, I was sent up to " Captain Porter" in the room over- head, with Mr. Dickens's compliments, and I was his son, and could he, Captain P, lend me a knife and fork? H 98 CHARLES DICKENS ' Captain Porter lent the knife and fork, with his compliments in return. There was a very dirty lady in his little room; and two wan girls, his daughters, with shock heads of hair. I thought I should not have liked to borrow Captain Porter's comb. The Captain himself was in the last extremity of shabbiness; and if I could draw at all, I would draw an accurate portrait of the old, old, brown great-coat he wore, with no other coat below it. His whiskers were large. I saw his bed rolled up in a corner; and what plates, and dishes, and pots he had, on a shelf; and I knew (God knows how) that the two girls with the shock heads were Captain Porter's natural children, and that the dirty lady was not married to Captain P. My timid, wondering station on his threshold, was not occupied more than a couple of min- utes, I dare say; but I came down again to the room below with all this as surely in my knowledge, as the knife and fork were in my hand.' How there was something agreeable and gipsy-like in the dinner after all, and how he took back the Captain's knife and fork early in the afternoon, and how he went home to comfort his mother with an account of his visit, David Copperfield has also accurately told. Then, at home, came many miserable daily struggles that seemed to last an immense time, yet did not perhaps cover many weeks. Almost everything by degrees was sold or pawned, little Charles being the principal agent in those sorrowful transactions. Such of the books as had been brought from Chatham, Peregrine Pickle, Roderick Random, Tom Jones, Humphrey Clinker, and all the rest, went first. They were carried off from the little chiffonier, which his father called the library, to a bookseller in the Hamp- stead-road, the same that David Copperfield describes as in the City-road ; and the account of the sales, as they actually occurred and were told to me long before David was born, was reproduced word for word in his imaginary narrative. 'The keeper of this bookstall, who lived in a little house behind it, used to get tipsy every night, and to be violently scolded by his wife every morn- ing. More than once, when I went there early, I had audience of him in a turn-up bedstead, with a cut in his forehead or a black eye, bearing witness to his excesses over night (I am afraid he was quarrelsome in his drink) ; and he, with a shaking hand, HARD EXPERIENCES IN BOYHOOD 99 endeavouring to find the needful shillings in one or other of the pockets of his clothes, which lay upon the floor, while his wife, with a baby in her arms and her shoes down at heel, never left off rating him. Sometimes he had lost his money, and then he would ask me to call again ; but his wife had always got some (had taken his, I dare say, while he was drunk), and secretly completed the bargain on the stairs, as we went down together. ' The same pawnbroker's shop, too, which was so well known to David, became not less familiar to Charles; and a good deal of notice was here taken of him by the pawnbroker, or by his prin- cipal clerk who officiated behind the counter, and who, while making out the duplicate, liked of all things to hear the lad con- jugate a Latin verb, and translate or decline his musa and dominus. Everything to this accompaniment went gradually; until at last, even of the furniture of Gower-street number four, there was nothing left except a few chairs, a kitchen table, and some beds. Then they encamped, as it were, in the two parlours of the emptied house, and lived there night and day. All which is but the prelude to what remains to be described. . . . [In 1847,] I learnt in all their detail the incidents that had been so painful to him, and what then was said to me or written respecting them revealed the story of his boyhood. The idea of David Copperfield, which was to take all the world into his confidence, had not at this time occurred to him ; but what it had so startled me to know, his readers were afterwards told with only such change or addition as for the time might sufficiently disguise himself under cover of his hero. For, the poor little lad, with good ability and a most sensitive nature, turned at the age of ten into a ' labouring hind ' in the service of ' Murdstone and Grinby,' and conscious already of what made it seem very strange to him that he could so easily have been thrown away at such an age, was indeed himself. His was the secret agony of soul at finding him- self ' companion to Mick Walker and Mealy Potatoes, ' and his the tears that mingled with the water in which he and they rinsed and washed out bottles. It had all been written, as fact, before he thought of any other use for it; and it was not until several months later, when the fancy of David Copperfield, itself suggested by what he had so written of his early troubles, began to take 100 CHARLES DICKENS shape in his mind, that he abandoned his first intention of writing his own life. Those warehouse experiences fell then so aptly into the subject he had chosen, that he could not resist the temptation of immediately using them; and the manuscript recording them, which was but the first portion of what he had designed to write, was embodied in the substance of the eleventh and earlier chapters of his novel. What already had been sent to me, however, and proof-sheets of the novel interlined at the time, enable me now to separate the fact from the fiction; and to supply to the story of the author's childhood those passages, omitted from the book, which, apart from their illustration of the growth of his character, present to us a picture of tragical suffering, and of tender as well as humorous fancy, unsurpassed in even the wonders of his published writings. The person indirectly responsible for the scenes to be described was the young relative James Lamert, the cousin by his aunt's marriage of whom I have made frequent mention, who got up the plays at Chatham, and after passing at Sandhurst had been living with the family in Bayham-street in the hope of obtaining a com- mission in the army. This did not come until long afterwards, when, in consideration of his father's services, he received it, and relinquished it then in favour of a younger brother; but he had meanwhile, before the family removed from Camden-town, ceased to live with them. The husband of a sister of his (of the same name as himself, being indeed his cousin, George Lamert), a man of some property, had recently embarked in an odd sort of com- mercial speculation; and had taken him into his office, and his house, to assist in it. I give now the fragment of the autobiography of Dickens. 'This speculation was a rivalry of "Warren's Blacking, 30, Strand," at that time very famous. One Jonathan Warren (the famous one was Robert), living at 30, Hungerford-stairs, or market, Strand (for I forget which it was called then), claimed to have been the original inventor or proprietor of the blacking recipe, and to have been deposed and ill-used by his renowned relation. At last he put himself in the way of selling his recipe, and his name, and his 30, Hungerford-stairs, Strand (30, Strand, very large, and the intermediate direction very small), for an HARD EXPERIENCES IN BOYHGdb' IQI annuity; and he set forth by his agents that a little capital would make a great business of it. The man of some property was found in George Lamert, the cousin and brother-in-law of James. He bought this right and title, and went into the blacking busi- ness and the blacking premises. ' In an evil hour for me, as I often bitterly thought. Its chief manager, James Lamert, the relative who had lived with us in Bayham-street, seeing how I was employed from day to day, and knowing what our domestic circumstances then were, proposed that I should go into the blacking warehouse, to be as useful as I could, at a salary, I think, of six shillings a week. I am not clear whether it was six or seven. I am inclined to be- lieve, from my uncertainty on this head, that it was six at first, and seven afterwards. At any rate the offer was accepted very willingly by my father and mother, and on a Monday morning I went down to the blacking warehouse to begin my business life. 'It is wonderful to me how I could have been so easily cast away at such an age. It is wonderful to me, that, even after my descent into the poor little drudge I had been since we came to London, no one had compassion enough on me a child of singular abilities, quick, eager, delicate, and soon hurt, bodily or mentally to suggest that something might have been spared, as certainly it might have been, to place me at any common school. Our friends, I take it, were tired out. No one made any sign. My father and mother were quite satisfied. They could hardly have been more so, if I had been twenty years of age, distinguished at a grammar-school, and going to Cambridge. 'The blacking warehouse was the last house on the left-hand side of the way, at old Hungerford-stairs. It was a crazy, tumble- down old house, abutting of course on the river, and literally overrun with rats. Its wainscotted rooms, and its rotten floors and staircase, and the old grey rats swarming down in the cel- lars, and the sound of their squeaking and scuffling coming up the stairs at all times, and the dirt and decay of the place, rise up visibly before me, as if I were there again. The counting- house was on the first floor, looking over the coal-barges and the river. There was a recess in it, in which I \vas to sit and work. My work was to cover the pots of paste-blacking; first with a 102 ' CHARLES DICKENS piece of oil-paper, and then with a piece of blue paper; to tie them round with a string; and then to clip the paper close and neat, all round, until it looked as smart as a pot of ointment from an apothecary's shop. When a certain number of grosses of pots had attained this pitch of perfection, I was to paste on each a printed label; and then go on again with more pots. Two or three other boys were kept at similar duty downstairs on similar wages. One of them came up, in a ragged apron and a paper cap, on the first Monday morning, to show me the trick of using the string and tying the knot. His name was Bob Fagin ; and I took the liberty of using his name, long afterwards, in Oliver Twist. 'Our relative had kindly arranged to teach me something in the dinner-hour; from twelve to one, I think it was; every day. But an arrangement so incompatible with counting-house busi- ness soon died away, from no fault of his or mine; and for the same reason, my small work-table, and my grosses of pots, my papers, string, scizzors, paste-pot, and labels, by little and little, vanished out of the recess in the counting-house, and kept com- pany with the other small work-tables, grosses of pots, papers, string, scizzors, and paste-pots, downstairs. It was not long, before Bob Fagin and I, and another boy whose name was Paul Green, but who was currently believed to have been christened Poll (a belief which I transferred, long afterwards again, to Mr. Sweedlepipe, in Martin Chuzzlewit), worked generally, side by side. Bob Fagin was an orphan, and lived with his brother-in- law, a waterman. Poll Green's father had the additional dis- tinction of being a fireman, and was employed at Drury-lane theatre; where another relation of Poll's, I think his little sister, did imps in the pantomimes. 'No words can express the secret agony of my soul as I sunk into this companionship; compared these every day associates with those of my happier childhood; and felt my early hopes of growing up to be a learned and distinguished man, crushed in my breast. The deep remembrance of the sense I had of being utterly neglected and hopeless; of the shame I felt in my posi- tion; of the misery it was to my young heart to believe that, day by day, what I had learned, and thought, and delighted HARD EXPERIENCES IN BOYHOOD 103 in, and raised my fancy and my emulation up by, was passing away from me, never to be brought back any more; cannot be written. My whole nature was so penetrated with the grief and humiliation of such considerations, that even now, famous and caressed and happy, I often forget in my dreams that I have a dear wife and children; even that I am a man; and wander desolately back to that time of my life. 'My mother and my brothers and sisters (excepting Fanny in the royal academy of music) were still encamped, with a young servant-girl from Chatham-workhouse, in the two parlours in the emptied house in Gower-street north. It was a long way to go and return within the dinner-hour, and, usually, I either carried my dinner with me, or went and bought it at some neighbouring shop. In the latter case, it was commonly a saveloy and a penny loaf; sometimes, a fourpenny plate of beef from a cook's shop; sometimes, a plate of bread and cheese, and a glass of beer, from a miserable old public-house over the way: the Swan, if I remember right, or the Swan and something else that I have forgotten. Once, I remember tucking my own bread (which I had brought from home in the morning) under my arm, wrapped up in a piece of paper like a book, and going into the best din- ing-room in Johnson's alamode beef-house in Clare-court Drury- lane, and magnificently ordering a small plate of alamode beef to eat with it. What the waiter thought of such a strange little apparition, coming in all alone, I don't know; but I can see him now, staring at me as I ate my dinner, and bringing up the other waiter to look. I gave him a halfpenny, and I wish, now, that he hadn't taken it.' I lose here for a little while the fragment of direct narrative, but I perfectly recollect that he used to describe Saturday night as his great treat. It was a grand thing to walk home with six shillings in his pocket, and to look in at the shop windows, and think what it would buy. Hunt's roasted corn, as a British and patriotic substitute for coffee, was in great vogue just then; and the little fellow used to buy it, and roast it on the Sunday. There was a cheap periodical of selected pieces called the Portfolio, which he had also a great fancy for taking home with him. The new proposed 'deed,' meanwhile, had failed to propitiate his 104 CHARLES DICKENS father's creditors; .all hope of arrangement passed away; and the end was that his mother and her encampment in Gower-street north broke up and went to live in the Marshalsea. I am able at this point to resume his own account. 'The key of the house was sent back to the landlord, who was very glad to get it; and I (small Cain that I was, except that I had never done harm to any one) was handed over as a lodger to a reduced old lady, long known to our family, in Little- college-street, Camden-town, who took children in to board, and had once done so at Brighton; and who, with a few alterations and embellishments, unconsciously began to sit for Mrs. Pipchin in Dombey when she took in me. ' She had a little brother and sister under her care then ; some- body's natural children, who were very irregularly paid for; and a widow's little son. The two boys and I slept in the same room. My own exclusive breakfast, of a penny cottage loaf and a pennyworth of milk, I provided for myself. I kept another small loaf, and a quarter of a pound of cheese, on a particular shelf of a particular cupboard; to make my supper on when I came back at night. They made a hole in the six or seven shil- lings, I know well; and I was out at the blacking warehouse all day, and had to support myself upon that money all the week. I suppose my lodging was paid for, by my father. I certainly did not pay it myself; and I certainly had no other assistance whatever (the making of my clothes, I think, ex- cepted), from Monday morning until Saturday night. No advice, no counsel, no encouragement, no consolation, no support, from any one that I can call to mind, so help me God. 'Sundays, Fanny and I passed in the prison. I was at the academy in Tenterden-street, Hanover-square, at nine o'clock in the morning, to fetch her ; and we walked back there together, at night. ' I was so young and childish, and so little qualified how could I be otherwise ? to undertake the whole charge of my own existence, that, in going to Hungerford-stairs of a morning, I could not resist the stale pastry put out at half-price on trays at the confectioners' doors in Tottenham-court-road ; and I often spent in that, the money I should have kept for my dinner. HARD EXPERIENCES IN BOYHOOD 105 Then I went without my dinner, or bought a roll, or a slice of pudding. There were two pudding shops between which I was divided, according to my finances. One was in a court close to St. Martin's-church (at the back of the church) which is now removed altogether. The pudding at that shop was made with currants, and was rather a special pudding, but was dear: two penn'orth not being larger than a penn'orth of more ordinary pudding. A good shop for the latter was in the Strand, some- where near where the Lowther-arcade is now. It was a stout, hale pudding, heavy and flabby; with great raisins in it, stuck in whole, at great distances apart. It came up hot, at about noon every day; and many and many a day did I dine off it. 'We had half-an-hour, I think, for tea. When I had money enough, I used to go to a coffee-shop, and have a half-a-pint of coffee, and a slice of bread and butter. When I had no money, I took a turn in Covent-garden market, and stared at the pine- apples. The coffee-shops to which I most resorted were, one in Maiden-lane; one in a court (non-existent now) close to Hun- gerford-market ; and one in St. Martin's-lane, of which I only recollect that it stood near the church, and that in the door there was an oval glass-plate, with COFFEE-ROOM painted on it, addressed towards the street. If I ever find myself in a very different kind of coffee-room now, but where there is such an inscription on glass, and read it backward on the wrong side MOOR-EEFFOC (as I often used to do then, in a dismal reverie), a shock goes through my blood. 'I know I do not exaggerate, unconsciously and unintention- ally, the scantiness of my resources and the difficulties of my life. I know that if a shilling or so were given me by any one, I spent it in a dinner or a tea. I know that I worked, from morning to night, with common men and boys, a shabby child. I know that I tried, but ineffectually, not to anticipate my money, and to make it last the week through; by putting it away in a drawer I had in the counting-house, wrapped into six little parcels, each parcel containing the same amount, and labelled with a different day. I know that I have lounged about the streets, insufficiently and unsatisfactorily fed. I know that, but for the 106 CHARLES DICKENS mercy of God, I might easily have been, for any care that was taken of me, a little robber or a little vagabond. 'But I held some station at the blacking warehouse too. Be- sides that my relative at the counting-house did what a man so occupied, and dealing with a thing so anomalous, could, to treat me as one upon a different footing from the rest, I never said, to man or boy, how it was that I came to be there, or gave the least indication of being sorry that I was there. That I suffered in secret, and that I suffered exquisitely, no one ever knew but I. How much I suffered, it is, as I have said already, utterly beyond my power to tell. No man's imagination can overstep the reality. But I kept my own counsel, and I did my work. I knew from the first, that if I could not do my work as well as any of the rest, I could not hold myself above slight and contempt. I soon became at least as expeditious and as skilful with my hands, as either of the other boys. Though perfectly familiar with them, my conduct and manners were different enough from theirs to place a space between us. They, and the men, always spoke of me as "the young gentleman." A certain man (a soldier once) named Thomas, who was the foreman, and another named Harry, who was the carman and wore a red jacket, used to call me " Charles " sometimes, in speaking to me; but I think it was mostly when we were very confidential, and when I had made some efforts to entertain them over our work with the results of some of the old readings, which were fast perishing out of my mind. Poll Green uprose once, and rebelled against the "young gentleman" usage; but Bob Fagin settled him speedily. 'My rescue from this kind of existence I considered quite hopeless, and abandoned as such, altogether; though I am solemnly convinced that I never, for one hour, was reconciled to it, or was otherwise than miserably unhappy. I felt keenly, however, the being so cut off from my parents, my brothers, and sisters; and, when my day's work was done, going home to such a miserable blank; and that, I thought, might be corrected. One Sunday night I remonstrated with my father on this head, so pathetically and with so many tears, that his kind nature gave way. He began to think that it is was not quite right. I do be- lieve he had never thought so before, or thought about it. It HARD EXPERIENCES IN BOYHOOD 107 was the first remonstrance I had ever made about my lot, and perhaps it opened up a little more than I intended. A back- attic was found for me at the house of an insolvent-court agent, who lived in Lant-street in the borough, where Bob Sawyer lodged many years afterwards. A bed and bedding were sent over for me, and made up on the floor. The little window had a pleasant prospect of a timber-yard; and when I took posses- sion of my new abode, I thought it was a Paradise.' There is here another blank, which it is however not difficult to supply from letters and recollections of my own. What was to him of course the great pleasure of his paradise of a lodging, was its bringing him again, though after a fashion sorry enough, within the circle of home. From this time he used to~ breakfast 'at home,' in other words in the Marshalsea; going to it as early as the gates were open, and for the most part much earlier. They had no want of bodily comforts there. His father's income, still going on, was amply sufficient for that; and in every respect indeed but elbow-room, I have heard him say, the family lived more comfortably in prison than they had done for a long time out of it. They were waited on still by the maid-of -all-work from Bayham-street, the orphan girl of the Chatham workhouse, from whose sharp little worldly and also kindly ways he took his first impression of the Marchioness in the Old Curiosity Shop. She too had a lodging in the neighbourhood that she might be early on the scene of her duties; and when Charles met her, as he would do occasionally, in his lounging-place by London-bridge, he would occupy the time before the gates opened by telling her quite astonishing fictions about the wharves and the tower. ' But I hope I believed them myself,' he would say. Besides break- fast, he had supper also in the prison; and got to his lodging generally at nine o'clock. The gates closed always at ten. I must not omit what he told me of the landlord of this little lodging. He was a fat, good-natured, kind old gentleman. He was lame, and had a quiet old wife; and he had a very innocent grown-up son, who was lame too. They were all very kind to the boy. He was taken with one of his old attacks of spasm one night, and the whole three of them were about his bed until morning. They were all dead when he told me this, but in 108 CHARLES DICKENS another form they live still very pleasantly as the Garland family in the Old Curiosity Shop. He had a similar illness one day in the warehouse, which I can describe in his own words. ' Bob Fagin was very good to me on the occasion of a bad attack of my old disorder. I suffered such excruciating pain that time, that they made a temporary bed of straw in my old recess in the counting-house, and I rolled about on the floor, and Bob filled empty blacking-bottles with hot water, and applied .relays of them to my side, half the day. I got better, and quite easy towards evening; but Bob (who was much bigger and older than I) did not like the idea of my going home alone, and took me under his protection. I was too proud to let him know about the prison; and after making several efforts to get rid of him, to all of which Bob Fagin in his good- ness was deaf, shook hands with him on the steps of a house near Southwark-bridge on the Surrey side, making believe that I lived there. As a finishing piece of reality in case of his looking back, I knocked at the door, I recollect, and asked, when the woman opened it, if that was Mr. Robert Fagin's house.' The Saturday nights continued, as before, to be precious to him. 'My usual way home was over Blackfriars-bridge, and down that turning in the Blackfrairs-road which has Rowland Hill's chapel on one side, and the likeness of a golden dog licking a golden pot over a shop door on the other. There are a good many little low-browed old shops in that street, of a wretched kind ; and some are unchanged now. I looked into one a few weeks ago, where I used to buy boot-laces on Saturday nights, and saw the corner where I once sat down on a stool to have a pair of ready- made half-boots fitted on. I have been seduced more than once, in that street on a Saturday night, by a show-van at a corner; and have gone in, with a very motley assemblage, to see the Fat-pig, the Wild-indian, and the Little-lady. There were two or three hat- manufactories there, then (I think they are there still) ; and among the things which, encountered anywhere, or under any circum- stances, will instantly recall that time, is the smell of hat-making.' His father's attempts to avoid going through the court having failed, all needful ceremonies had to be undertaken to obtain the benefit of the insolvent debtors' act; and in one of these little HARD EXPERIENCES IN BOYHOOD 109 Charles had his part to play. One condition of the statute was that the wearing apparel and personal matters retained were not to exceed twenty pounds sterling in value. 'It was necessary, as a matter of form, that the clothes I wore should be seen by the official appraiser. I had a half-holiday to enable me to call upon him, at his own time, at a house somewhere beyond the Obelisk. I recollect his coming out to look at me with his mouth full, and a strong smell of beer upon him, and saying good-na- turedly that "that would do," and " it was all right." Certainly the hardest creditor would not have been disposed (even if he had been legally entitled) to avail himself of my poor white hat, little jacket, or corduroy trowsers. But I had a fat old silver watch in my pocket, which had been given me by my grandmother before the blacking days, and I had entertained my doubts as I went along whether that valuable possession might not bring me over the twenty pounds. So I was greatly relieved, and made him a bow of acknowledgment as I went out.' Still the want felt most by him was the companionship of boys of his own age. He had no such acquaintance. Sometimes, he remembered to have played on the coal-barges at dinner time, with Poll Green and Bob Fagin ; but those were rare occasions. He generally strolled alone, about the back streets of the Adelphi ; or explored the Adelphi arches. One of his favourite localities was a little public-house by the water-side called the Fox-under- the-hill, approached by an underground passage which we once missed in looking for it together ; 1 and he had a vision which he has mentioned in Copperfield of sitting eating something on a bench outside, one fine evening, and looking at some coal-heavers dancing before the house. 'I wonder what they thought of me,' says David. He had himself already said the same in his frag- ment of autobiography. Another characteristic little incident he made afterwards one of David's experiences, but I am able to give it here without the disguises that adapt it to the fiction. 'I was such a little fellow, 1 " Will you permit me to say," a correspondent writes (1871), " that the house, shut up and almost ruinous, is still to be found at the bottom of a curious and most precipitous court, the entrance of which is just past Salisbury street. It was once the approach, I think, to the half-penny boats. The house is now shut out from the water-side by the Embankment." 110 CHARLES DICKENS with my poor white hat, little jacket, and corduroy trowsers, that frequently, when I went into the bar of a strange public-house for a glass of ale or porter to wash down the saveloy and the loaf I had eaten in the street, they didn't like to give it me. I remember, one evening (I had been somewhere for my father, and was going back to the borough over Westminster-bridge), that I went into a public-house in Parliament-street, which is still there though altered, at the corner of the short street leading into Cannon-row, and said to the landlord behind the bar, " What is your very best the VERY best ale, a glass ? " For, the occasion was a festive one, for some reason: I forget why. It may have been my birthday, or somebody else's. " Twopence," says he. "Then," says I, " just draw me a glass of that, if you please, with a good head to it." The landlord looked at me in return, over the bar, from head to foot, with a strange smile on his face; and instead of drawing the beer, looked round the screen and said something to his wife, who came out from behind it, with her work in her hand, and joined him in surveying me. Here we stand, all three, before me now, in my study in Devonshire- terrace. The landlord, in his shirt sleeves, leaning against the bar window-frame; his wife, looking over the little half-door; and I, in some confusion, looking up at them from outside the partition. They asked me a good many questions, as what my name was, how old I was, where I lived, how I was employed, etc, etc. To all of which, that I might commit nobody, I invented appropriate answers. They served me with the ale, though I sus- pect it was not the strongest on the premises ; and the landlord's wife, opening the little half-door and bending down, gave me a kiss that was half -admiring and half-compassionate, but all womanly and good, I am sure.' A later, and not less characteristic, occurrence of the true story of this time found also a place, three or four years after it was written, in his now famous fiction. It preceded but by a short term the discharge, from the Marshalsea, of the elder Dickens ; to whom a rather considerable legacy from a relative had accrued not long before ('some hundreds' I understood), and had been paid into court during his imprisonment. The scene to be described arose on the occasion of a petition drawn up by him HARD EXPERIENCES IN BOYHOOD m before he left, praying, not for the abolition of imprisonment for debt as David Copperfield relates, but for the less dignified but more accessible boon of a bounty to the prisoners to drink his majesty's health on his majesty's forthcoming birthday. 'I mention the circumstance because it illustrates, to me, my early interest in observing people. When I went to the Marshal- sea of a night, I was always delighted to hear from my mother what she knew about the histories of the different debtors in the prison; and when I heard of this approaching ceremony, I was so anxious to see them all come in, one after another (though I knew the greater part of them already, to speak to, and they me), that I got leave of absence on purpose, and established myself in a corner, near the petition. It was stretched out, I recollect, on a great ironing-board, under the window, which in another part of the room made a bedstead at night. The internal regulations of the place, for cleanliness and order, and for the government of a common room in the ale-house; where hot water and some means of cooking, and a good fire, were provided for all who paid a very small subscription; were ex- cellently administered by a governing committee of debtors, of which my father was chairman for the time being. As many of the principal officers of this body as could be got into the small room without filling it up, supported him, in front of the petition ; and my old friend Captain Porter (who had washed himself, to do honour to so solemn an occasion) stationed himself close to it, to read it to all who were unacquainted with its contents. The door was then thrown open, and they began to come in, in a long file; several waiting on the landing outside, while one entered, affixed his signature, and went out. To everybody in succession, Captain Porter said, " Would you like to hear it read?" If he weakly showed the least disposition to hear it, Captain Porter, in a loud sonorous voice, gave him every word of it. I remember a certain luscious roll he gave to such words as "Majesty gracious Majesty your gracious Majesty's un- fortunate subjects your Majesty's well-known munificence " as if the words were something real in his mouth, and delicious to taste : my poor father meanwhile listening with a little of an author's vanity, and contemplating (not severely) the spikes on 112 CHARLES DICKENS the opposite wall. Whatever was comical in this scene, and whatever was pathetic, I sincerely believe I perceived in my corner, whether I demonstrated or not, quite as well as I should perceive it now. I made out my own little character and story for every man who put his name to the sheet of paper. I might be able to do that now, more truly: not more earnestly, or with a closer interest. Their different peculiarities of dress, of face, of gait, of manner, were written indelibly upon my memory. I would rather have seen it than the best play ever played; and I often thought about it afterwards, over the pots of paste-black- ing, often and often. When I looked, with my mind's eye, into the Fleet-prison during Mr. Pickwick's incarceration, I wonder whether half-a-dozen men were wanting from the Marshalsea crowd that came filing in again, to the sound of Captain Porter's voice ! ' When the family left the Marshalsea they all went to lodge with the lady in Little-college-street, a Mrs. Roylance, who has obtained unexpected immortality as Mrs. Pipchin; and they afterwards occupied a small house in Somers-town. But, before this time, Charles was present with some of them in Tenterden- street to see his sister Fanny receive one of the prizes given to the pupils of the royal academy of music. 'I could not bear to think of myself beyond the reach of all such honourable emulation and success. The tears ran down my face. I felt as if my heart were rent. I prayed, when I went to bed that night, to be lifted out of the humiliation and neglect in which I was. I never had suffered so much before. There was no envy in this.' There was little need that he should say so. Extreme enjoyment in witnessing the exercise of her talents, the utmost pride in every success obtained by them, he manifested always to a degree otherwise quite unusual with him ; and on the day of her funeral, which we passed together, I had most affecting proof of his tender and grateful memory of her in these childish days. A few more sentences, certainly not less touching than any that have gone before, will bring the story of them to its close. They stand here exactly as written by him. 'I am not sure that it was before this time, or after it, that the blacking warehouse was removed to Chandos-street, Covent- HARD EXPERIENCES IN BOYHOOD 113 garden. It is no matter. Next to the shop at the corner of Bedford-street in Chandos-street, are two rather old-fashioned houses and shops adjoining one another. They were one then, or thrown into one, for the blacking business; and had been a butter shop. Opposite to them was, and is, a public-house, where I got my ale, under these new circumstances. The stones in the street may be smoothed by my small feet going across to it at dinner-time, and back again. The establishment was larger now, and we had one or two new boys. Bob Fagin and I had- attained to great dexterity in tying up the pots. I forget how many we could do, in five minutes. We worked, for the light's sake, near the second window as you come from Bedford-street; and we were so brisk at it, that the people used to stop and look in. Sometimes there would be quite a little crowd there. I saw my father coming in at the door one day when we were very busy, and I wondered how he could bear it. 'Now, I generally had my dinner in the warehouse. Some- times I brought it from home, so I was better off. I see myself coming across Russell-square from Somers-town, one morning, with some cold hotch-potch in a small basin tied up in a handkerchief. I had the same wanderings about the streets as I used to have, and was just as solitary and self-dependent as before ; but I had not the same difficulty in merely living. I never however heard a word of being taken away, or of being otherwise than quite provided for. 'At last, one day, my father, and the relative so often mentioned, quarrelled; quarrelled by letter, for I took the letter from my father to him which caused the explosion, but quarrelled very fiercely. It was about me. It may have had some backward reference, in part, for anything I know, to my employment at the window. All I am certain of is, that, soon after I had given him the letter, my cousin (he was a sort of cousin, by marriage) told me he was very much insulted about me; and that it was impossible to keep me, after that. I cried very much, partly because it was so sudden, and partly because in his anger he was violent about my father, though gentle to me. Thomas, the old soldier, comforted me, and said he was sure it was for the best. With a relief so strange that it was like oppression, I went home. 114 CHARLES DICKENS 1 My mother set herself to accommodate the quarrel, and did so next day. She brought home a request for me to return next morning, and a high character of me, which I am very sure I deserved. My father said I should go back no more, and should go to school. I do not write resentfully or angrily: for I know how all these things have worked together to make me what I am: but I never afterwards forgot, I never shall forget, I never can forget, that my mother was warm for my being sent back. 'From that hour until this at which I write, no word of that part of my childhood which I have now gladly brought to a close, has passed my lips to any human being. I have no idea how long it lasted; whether for a year, or much more, or less. From that hour, until this, my father and my mother have been stricken dumb upon it. I have never heard the least allusion to it, however far off and remote, from either of them. I have never, until I now impart it to this paper, in any burst of confidence with any one, my own wife not excepted, raised the curtain I then dropped, thank God. 'Until old Hungerford-market was pulled down, until old Hungerford-stairs were destroyed, and the very nature of the ground changed, I never had the courage to go back to the place where my servitude began. I never saw it. I could not endure to go near it. For many years, when I came near to Robert Warren's in the Strand, I crossed over* to the opposite side of the way, to avoid a certain smell of the cement they put upon the blacking-corks, which reminded me of what I was once. It was a very long time before I liked to go up Chandos-street. My old way home by the borough made me cry, after my eldest child could speak. 'In my walks at night I have walked there often, since then, and by degrees I have come to write this. It does not seem a tithe of what I might have written, or of what I meant to write.' THE CAMPO SANTO 115 JOHN RUSKIN THE CAMPO SANTO [From " Praterita," Outlines of Scenes and Thoughts, Perhaps Worthy of Memory, in My Past Life, Vol. II., Chap. VI, 1885-1889. Library Edition, George Allen, London, 1903. RUSKIN, JOHN (1819-1900), author, artist, and social reformer; son of John James Ruskin (1785-1864), who entered partnership as wine mer- chant in London, 1809; brought up on strict puritanical principles; edu- cated by Dr. Andrews, father of Coventry Patmore's first wife, and under the Rev. Thomas Dale (1797-1870) at Camberwell; studied at King's College, London; learned drawing under Copley Fielding and J. D. Hard- ing; entered Christ Church, Oxford, 1836; won Newdigate prize, 1839; contributed verse to 'Friendship's Offering' and other miscellanies; travelled for his health, 1840-1; B.A., 1842; M.A., 1843; his first published writings were articles in London's 'Magazine of Natural History,' 1834; made ac- quaintance of Turner, 1840; paid first visit to Venice, 1841; published, 1843, first volume of 'Modern Painters, by a Graduate of Oxford' (his name first appeared on title-page in edition of 1851); second volume published 1846, the authorship being by that time an open secret; the third and fourth volumes appeared 1856, the fifth, 1860; married, 1848, Euphemia Chalmers Gray, daughter of George Gray, a lawyer of Perth ; made acquaint- ance of Millais, 1851; delivered at Edinburgh, 1853, lectures on 'Architec- ture and Painting,' published, 1854; his marriage annulled on his wife's suit, which he did not defend, 1855; published, 1849, 'Seven Lamps of Architecture,' which had considerable influence in encouraging the Gothic revival of the time, and 'Stones of Venice,' 3 vols. 1851-3; warmly defended the pre-Raphaelites in letters to 'The Times,' and in pamphlets, 1851 ; pub- lished annually, 1855-9, 'Notes on the Royal Academy'; arranged Turner drawings at National Gallery; took charge of drawing classes at Working Men's College, Great Ormond Street, London, 1854-8; published 'Ele- ments of Drawing,' 1856, and 'Elements of Perspective,' 1859; honorary student of Christ Church, Oxford, 1858; devoted himself to economic studies, and published 'Unto this Last' (some of the papers being first contributed to 'Cornhill Magazine'), 1860, 'Munera Pulveris' (contributed in part to 'Eraser's Magazine'), 1862, 'Gold,' 1863, 'Time and Tide,' 1867, and various letters and pamphlets, 1868, advocating a system of national educa- tion, the organisation of labour, and other social measures ; honorary LL.D., Cambridge, 1867; between 1855 an< ^ 1870 he delivered in all parts of the country lectures, some of which were published in 'Sesame and Lilies,' 1865, 'The Crown of Wild Olive,' 1866, and 'The Ethics of the Dust,' 1866; removed, 1871, to Brantwood, Coniston Lake, where he remained till death; established 'Fors Clavigera,' a monthly letter 'to the workmen and labourers of Great Britain,' and founded, 1871, the guild of St. George on principles that 'food can only be got out of the ground and happiness out of honesty,' and that 'the highest wisdom and the highest treasure need not be costly or exclusive'; engaged in several industrial experiments, in- cluding the revival of the hand-made linen industry in Langdale, and the Il6 JOHN RUSKIN establishment of a cloth industry at Laxey, Isle of Man; inspired and was first president of 'The Art for Schools Association'; first Slade professor of art at Oxford, 1870-9; again filled the post, 1883-4, and published eight volumes of lectures; founded a drawing school at Oxford and endowed a drawing-master; honorary fellow of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, 1871; suffered at times from brain fever after 1878; published at intervals during 1885-9 'Praeterita,' an autobiography which was never completed; died from influenza, 20 Jan. 1900, and was buried at Coniston. A bibliography of his writings by Thomas J. Wise and James P. Smart was issued, 1893. Many of the illustrations to his works were executed from his own draw- ings. He inherited from his father a large fortune, all of which was dis- persed, chiefly in charitable and philanthropic objects, before his death. Index and Epitome of D. N. B. "The spirit and style of the book are thoroughly delightful, and truly represent the finer characteristics of his nature. He has written nothing better, it seems to me, than some pages of this book, whether of descrip- tion or reflection. The retrospect is seen through the mellowing atmosphere of age, the harshness of many an outline is softened by distance, and the old man looks back upon his own life with a feeling which permits him to de- lineate it with perfect candor, with exquisite tenderness, and a playful live- liness quickened by his humorous sense of its dramatic extravagances and individual eccentricities." CHARLES ELIOT NORTON, Letters of John Ruskin to Charles Eliot Norton, Vol. II, p. 221. Houghton, MifSin & Co., Boston.] The summer's work of 1844, so far from advancing the de- sign of "Modern Painters," had thrown me off it first into fine botany, then into difficult geology, and lastly, as that entry about the Madonna shows, into a fit of figure study which meant much. It meant, especially, at last some looking into ecclesiastical history, some notion of the merit of fourteenth century painting, and the total abandonment of Rubens and Rembrandt for the Venetian school. Which, the reader will please observe, signified not merely the advance in sense of color, but in perception of truth and modesty in light and shade. And on getting home, I felt that in the cyclone of confused new knowledge, this was the thing first to be got firm. Scarcely any book writing was done that winter, and there are no diaries; but, for the first time, I took up Turner's " Liber Studiorum" instead of engravings; mastered its principles, prac- tised its method, and by spring-time in 1845 was a ^le to study from nature accurately in full chiaroscuro, with a good frank power over the sepia tinting. I must have read also, that winter, Rio's "Poesie Chretienne," THE CAMPO SANTO 117 and Lord Lindsay's introduction to his " Christian Art." And perceiving thus, in some degree, what a blind bat and puppy I had been, all through Italy, determined that at least I must see Pisa and Florence again before writing another word of " Modern Painters." How papa and mamma took this new vagary, I have no rec- ollection; resignedly, at least: perhaps they also had some notion that I might think differently, and it was to be hoped in a more orthodox and becoming manner, after another sight of the Tribune. At all events, they concluded to give me my own way entirely this time ; and what time I chose. My health caused them no farther anxiety ; they could trust my word to take care of myself every day, just the same as if I were coming home to tea: my mother was satisfied of Couttet's skill as a physician, and care, if needed, as a nurse ; he was engaged for the summer in those capacities, and, about the first week in April, I found myself dining on a trout of the Ain, at Champagnole ; with Switzerland and Italy at my feet for to-morrow. . . . By Gap and Sisteron to Frejus, along the Riviera to Sestri, where I gave a day to draw the stone-pipes now at Oxford; and so straight to my first fixed aim, Lucca, where I settled myself for ten days, as I supposed. It turned out forty years. The town is some thousand paces square; the unbroken rampart walk round may be a short three miles. There are upward of twenty churches in that space, dating between the sixth and twelfth centuries; a ruined feudal palace and tower, un- matched except at Verona : the streets clean cheerfully in- habited, yet quiet; nor desolate, even now. Two of the churches representing the perfectest phase of round-arched building in Europe, and one of them containing the loveliest Christian tomb in Italy. The rampart walk, unbroken except by descents and ascents at the gates, commands every way the loveliest ranges of all the Tuscan Apennine: when I was there in 1845, besides the ruined feudal palace, there was a maintained Ducal Palace, with a living Duke in it, whose military band played every evening on the most floral and peaceful space of rampart. After a well- spent day, and a three-course dinner, military band, chains, Il8 JOHN RUSKIN double braided, of amethyst Apennine linked by golden clouds, then the mountain air of April, still soft as the marble towers, grew unsubstantial in the starlight, such the monastic discipline of Lucca to my novitiate mind. I must stop to think a little how it was that so early as this I could fasten on the tomb of Ilaria di Caretto with certainty of its being a supreme guide to me ever after. If I get tiresome, the reader must skip; I write, for the moment, to amuse myself, and not him. The said reader, duly sagacious, must have felt, long since, that, though very respectable people in our way, we were all of us definitely vulgar people; just as my aunt's dog Towser was a vulgar dog, though a very good and dear dog. Said reader should have seen also that we had not set ourselves up to have "a taste" in anything. There was never any question about matching colors in furniture, or having the correct pattern in china. Everything for service in the house was bought plain, and of the best; our toys were what we happened to take a fancy to in pleasant places a cow in stalactite from Matlock, fisher-wife doll from Calais, a Swiss farm from Berne, Bacchus and Ariadne from Carrara. But, among these toys, principal on the drawing-room chimney-piece, always put away by my mother at night, and "put out" in the afternoon, were some pieces of Spanish clay, to which, without knowing it, I owed a quantity of strenuous teaching. Native baked clay figures, painted and gilded by untaught persons who had the gift ; manufacture mainly practised along the Xeres coast, I believe, and of late much decayed, but then flourishing, and its work as good as the worker could make it. There was a Don Whiskerandos contrabandista, splendidly handsome and good-natured, on a magnificent horse at the trot, brightly caparisoned : everything finely finished, his gun loose in his hand. There was a lemonade seller, a pomegranate seller, a matador with his bull animate all, and graceful, the coloring chiefly ruddy brown. Things of constant interest to me, and altogether wholesome ; vestiges of living sculpture come down into the Herne Hill times, from the days of Tanagra. For loftier admiration, as before told, Chantrey in Lichfield, Roubilliac in Westminster, were set forth to me, and honestly felt; a scratched white outline or two from Greek vases on the THE CAMPO SANTO 119 black Derbyshire marble did not interfere with my first general feeling about sculpture, that it should be living, and emotional; that the flesh should be like flesh, and the drapery like clothes; and that, whether trotting contrabandista, dancing girl, or dying gladiator, the subject should have an interest of its own, and not consist merely of figures with torches or garlands standing alter- nately on their right and left legs. Of " ideal " form and the like, I fortunately heard and thought nothing. The point of connoisseurship I had reached, at sixteen, with these advantages and instincts, is curiously measured by the criticism of the Cathedral of Rheims in my Don Juan journal of The carving is nof rich, the Gothic heavy, The statues miserable; not a fold Of drapery well-disposed in all the bevy Of Saints and Bishops and Archbishops old That line the porches gray. But in the nave I Stared at the windows purple, blue, and gold: And the perspective's wonderfully fine When you look down the long columnar line. By the "carving" I meant the niche work, which is indeed curiously rude at Rheims; by the "Gothic" the structure and mouldings of arch, which I rightly call "heavy" as compared with later French types ; while the condemnation of the draperies meant that they were not the least like those either of Rubens or Roubilliac. And ten years had to pass over me before I knew better ; but every day between the standing in Rheims porch and by Ilaria's tomb had done on me some chiselling to the good ; and the discipline from the Fontainebleau time till now had been severe. The accurate study of tree branches, growing leaves, and foreground herbage, had more and more taught me the differ- ence between violent and graceful lines; the beauty of Clotilde and Cecile, essentially French-Gothic, and the living Egeria of Araceli, had fixed in my mind and heart, not as an art-ideal, but as a sacred reality, the purest standards of breathing womanhood; and here suddenly, in the sleeping Ilaria, was the perfectness of these, expressed with harmonies of line which I saw in an instant were under the same laws as the river wave, and the aspen branch, 120 JOHN RUSKIN and the stars' rising and setting ; but treated with a modesty and severity which read the laws of nature by the light of virtue. Another influence, no less forcible, and more instantly effective, was brought to bear on me by my first quiet walk through Lucca. Hitherto, all architecture, except fairy-finished Milan, had depended with me for its delight on being partly in decay. I revered the sentiment of its age, and I was accustomed to look for the signs of age in the mouldering of its traceries, and in the inter- stices deepening between the stones of its masonry. This looking for cranny and joint was mixed with the love of rough stones them- selves, and of country churches built like Westmoreland cottages. Here in Lucca I found myself suddenly in the presence of twelfth century buildings, originally set in such balance of masonry, that they could all stand without mortar; and in material so incor- ruptible, that after six hundred years of sunshine and rain, a lancet could not now be put between their joints. Absolutely for the first time I now saw what mediaeval builders were, and what they meant. I took the simplest of all facades for analysis, that of Santa Maria Foris-Portam, and thereon literally began the study of architecture. In the third and, for the reader's relief, last place in these technical records, Fra Bartolomeo's picture of the "Magdalene, with St. Catherine of Siena," gave me a faultless example of the treatment of pure Catholic tradition by the perfect schools of painting. And I never needed lessoning more in the principles of the three great arts. After those summer days of 1845, I advanced only in knowledge of individual character, provincial feeling, and details of construction or execution. Of what was primarily right and ultimately best, there was never more doubt to me, and my art-teaching, necessarily, in its many local or personal interests partial, has been from that time throughout consistent, and pro- gressing every year to more evident completion. The full happiness of that time to me cannot be explained ex- cept to consistently hard workers; and of those, to the few who can keep their peace and health. For the world appeared to me now exactly right. Hills as high as they should be, rivers as wide, pictures as pretty, and masters and men as wise as pretty and THE CAMPO SANTO 1 21 wise could be. And I expected to bring everybody to be of my opinion, as soon as I could get out my second volume ; and drove down to Pisa in much hope and pride, though grave in both. For now I had read enough of Gary's " Dante," and Sismondi's ''Italian Republics," and Lord Lindsay, to feel what I had to look for in the Campo Santo. Yet at this moment I pause to think what it was that I found. Briefly, the entire doctrine of Christianity, painted so that a child could understand it. And what a child cannot under- stand of Christianity, no one need try to. In these days- of the religion of this and that, briefly let us say, the religion of Stocks and Posts in order to say a clear word of Campo Santo, one must first say a firm word concerning Christianity itself. I find numbers, even of the most intelligent and amiable people, not knowing what the word means; because they are always asking how much is true, and how much they like, and never ask, first, what was the total meaning of it, whether they like it or not. The total meaning was, and is, that the God who made earth and its creatures, took at a certain time upon the earth, the flesh and form of man ; in that flesh sustained the pain and died the death of the creature He had made; rose again after death into glorious human life, and when the date of the human race is ended, will return in visible form, and render to every man according to his work. Christianity is the belief in, and love of, God thus manifested. Anything less than this, the mere acceptance of the sayings of Christ, or asserting of any less than divine power in His Being, may be, for aught I know, enough for virtue, peace, and safety ; but they do not make people Christians, or enable them to understand the heart of the simplest believer in the old doctrine. One verse more of George Herbert will put the height of that doctrine into less debatable, though figurative, picture than any longer talk of mine : Hast them not heard that my Lord Jesus died? Then let me tell thee a strange story. The God of Power, as he did ride In his majestic robes of glory, Resolved to light; and so, one day He did descend, undressing all the way. 122 JOHN RUSKIN The stars his tire of light, and rings, obtained, The cloud his bow, the fire his spear, The heavens his azure mantle gained, And when they asked what he would wear, He smiled, and said as he did go, "He had new clothes a-making, here, below." I write from memory; the lines have been my lesson, ever since 1845, f tne noblesse of thought which makes the simplest word best. And the Campo Santo of Pisa is absolutely the same in painting as these lines in word. Straight to its purpose, in the clearest and most eager way; the purpose, highest that can be ; the expression, the best possible to the workman according to his knowledge. The several parts of the gospel of the Campo Santo are written by different persons ; but all the original frescoes are by men of honest genius. No matter for their names; the contents of this wall- scripture are these. First, the Triumph of Death, as Homer, Virgil, and Horace thought of death. Having been within sight of it myself, since Oxford days ; and looking back already over a little Campo Santo of my own people, I was ready for that part of the lesson. Secondly, the story of the Patriarchs, and of their guidance by the ministries of visible angels; that is to say, the ideal of the life of man in its blessedness, before the coming of Christ. Thirdly, the story of Job, in direct converse with God him- self, the God of nature, and without any reference to the work of Christ except in its final surety, "Yet in my flesh I shall see God." Fourthly, the life of St. Ranier of Pisa, and of the desert saints, showing the ideal of human life in its blessedness after the coming of Christ. Lastly, the return of Christ in glory, and the Last Judgment. Now this code of teaching is absolutely general for the whole Christian world. There is no papal doctrine, nor antipapal; nor any question of sect or schism whatsoever. Kings, bishops, knights, hermits, are there, because the painters saw them, and painted them, naturally, as we paint the nineteenth century prod- uct of common councilmen and engineers. But they did not conceive that a man must be entirely happy in this world and the THE CAMPO SANTO 123 next because he wore a mitre or helmet, as we do because he has made a fortune or a tunnel. Not only was I prepared at this time for the teaching of the Campo Santo, but it was precisely what at that time I needed. It realized for me the patriarchal life, showed me what the earlier Bible meant to say; and put into direct and inevitable light the questions I had to deal with, alike in my thoughts and ways, under existing Christian tradition. Questions clearly not to be all settled in that fortnight. Some, respecting the Last Judgment, such as would have occurred to Professor Huxley, as for instance, that if Christ came to judg- ment in St. James's Street, the people couldn't see him from Pic- cadilly, had been dealt with by me before now; but there is one fact, and no question at all, concerning the Judgment, which was only at this time beginning to dawn on me, that men had been curi- ously judging themselves by always calling the day they expected, "Dies Irae," instead of "Dies Amoris." Meantime, my own first business was evidently to read what these Pisans had said of it, and take some record of the sayings; for at that time the old-fashioned ravages were going on, honestly and innocently. Nobody cared for the old plaster, and nobody pretended to. When any dignitary of Pisa was to be buried, they peeled off some Benozzo Gozzoli, or whatever else was in the way, and put up a nice new tablet to the new defunct; but what was left was still all Benozzo, (or repainting of old time, not last year's restoration). I cajoled the Abbe Rosini into letting me put up a scaffold level with the frescoes; set steadily to work with what faculty in outline I had; and being by this time practised in delicate curves, by having drawn trees and grass rightly, got far better results than I had hoped, and had an extremely happy fort- night of it ! For as the Triumph of Death was no new thought to me, the life of hermits was no temptation; but the stories of Abraham, Job, and St. Ranier, well told, were like three new Scott's novels, I was going to say, and will say, for I don't see my way to anything nearer the fact, and the work on them was pure delight. I got an outline of Abraham's parting with the last of the three angels ; of the sacrifice of Job ; of the three beggars, and a 124 JOHN RUSKIN fiend or two, out of the Triumph of Death ; and of the conversion of St. Ranier, for which I greatly pitied him. For he is playing, evidently with happiest skill, on a kind of zithern-harp, held upright as he stands, to the dance of four sweet Pisan maids, in a round, holding each other only by the bent little fingers of each hand. And one with graver face, and wearing a purple robe, approaches him, saying I knew once what she said, but forget now; only it meant that his joyful life in that kind was to be ended. And he obeys her, and follows, into a nobler life. I do not know if ever there was a real St. Ranier; but the story of him remained for truth in the heart of Pisa as long as Pisa herself lived. I got more than outline of this scene: a colored sketch of the whole group, which I destroyed afterward, in shame of its faults, all but the purple-robed warning figure ; and that is lost, and the fresco itself now lost also, all mouldering and ruined by what must indeed be a cyclical change in the Italian climate : the frescoes exposed to it of which I made note before 1850, seem to me to have suffered more in the twenty years since, than they had since they were painted: those at Verona alone excepted, where the art of fresco seems to have been practised in the fifteenth century in absolute perfection, and the color to have been injured only by violence, not by time. There was another lovely cloister in Pisa, without fresco, but exquisite in its arched perspective and central garden, and noble in its unbuttressed height of belfry tower ; the cloister of San Francesco : in these, and in the meadow round the baptistery, the routine of my Italian university life was now fixed for a good many years in main material points. In summer I have always been at work, or out walking, by six o'clock, usually awake by half-past four; but I keep to Pisa for the present, where my monkish discipline arranged itself thus. Out, any how, by six, quick walk to the field, and as much done as I could, and back to breakfast at half -past eight. Study bit of Sismondi over bread and butter," then back to Campo Santo, draw till twelve; quick walk to look about me and stretch my legs, in shade if it might be, before lunch, on anything I chanced THE CAMPO SANTO 125 to see nice in a fruit shop, and a bit of bread. Back to lighter work, or merely looking and thinking, for another hour and a half, and to hotel for dinner at four. Three courses and a flask of Aleatico (a sweet, yet rather astringent, red, rich for Italian, wine provincial, and with lovely basketwork round the bottle). Then out for saunter with Couttet; he having leave to say any- thing he had a mind to, but not generally communicative of his feelings; he carried my sketch-book, but in the evening there was too much always to be hunted out, of city; or watched, of hills, or sunset ; and I rarely drew, to my sorrow, now. I wish I knew less, and had drawn more. Homewards, from wherever we had got to, the moment the sun was down, and the last clouds had lost their color. I avoided marshy places, if I could, at all times of the day, because I didn't like them; but I feared neither sun nor moon, dawn nor twilight, malaria, nor anything else malefic, in the course of work, except only draughts and ugly people. I never would sit in a draught for half a minute, and fled from some sorts of beggars; but a crowd of the common people round me only made me proud, and try to draw as well as I could ; mere rags or dirt I did not care an atom for. As early as 1835, and as late as 1841, I had been accustomed, both in France and Italy, to feel that the crowd behind me was interested in my choice of subjects, and pleasantly applausive of the swift progress under my hand of street perspectives, and richness of surface decoration, such as might be symbolized by dex- trous zigzags, emphatic dots, or graceful flourishes. I had the better pleasure, now, of feeling that my really watchful delineation, while still rapid enough to interest any stray student of drawing who might stop by me on his way to the Academy, had a quite unusual power of directing the attention of the general crowd to points of beauty, or subjects of sculpture, in the buildings I was at work on, to which they had never before lifted eyes, and which I had the double pride of first discovering for them, and then imitating not to their dissatisfaction. And well might I be proud; but how much more ought I to have been pitiful, in feeling the swift and perfect sympathy which the " common people" companion-people I should have said, for in Italy there is no commonness gave me, in Lucca, or Florence, or 126 JOHN RUSKIN Venice, for every touch of true work that I laid in their sight. 1 How much more, I say, should it have been pitiful to me, to recognize their eager intellect, and delicate senses, open to every lesson and every joy of their ancestral art, far more deeply and vividly than in the days when every spring kindled them into battle, and every autumn was red with their blood: yet left now, alike by the laws and lords set over them, less happy in aimless life than of old in sudden death; never one effort made to teach them, to com- fort them, to economize their industries, animate their pleasures, or guard their simplest rights from the continually more fatal op- pression of unprincipled avarice, and unmerciful wealth. But all this I have felt and learned, like so much else, too late. The extreme seclusion of my early training left me long careless of sympathy for myself ; and that which I gave to others never led me into any hope of being useful to them, till my strength of active life was past. Also, my mind was not yet catholic enough to feel that the Campo Santo belonged to its own people more than to me ; and indeed, I had to read its lessons before I could interpret them. The world has for the most part been of opinion that I entered on the task of philanthropy too soon rather than too late : at all events, my conscience remained at rest during all those first times at Pisa, in mere delight in the glory of the past, and in hope for the future of Italy, without need of my becoming one of her demagogues. And the days that began in the cloister of the Campo Santo usually ended by my getting upon the roof of Santa Maria della Spina, and sitting in the sunlight that transfused the warm marble of its pinnacles, till the unabated brightness went down beyond the arches of the Ponte-a-Mare, the few footsteps and voices of the twilight fell silent in the streets, and the city and her mountains stood mute as a dream, beyond the soft eddying of Arno. 1 A letter, received from Miss Alexander as I correct this proof, gives a singu- lar instance of this power in the Italian peasant. She says: "I have just been drawing a magnificent Lombard shepherd, who sits to me in a waistcoat made from the skin of a yellow cow with the hairy side out, a shirt of homespun linen as coarse as sailcloth, a scarlet sash, and trousers woven (I should think) from the wool of the black sheep. He astonishes me all the time by the great amount of good advice which he gives me about my work ; and always right ! Whenever he looks at my unfinished picture, he can always tell me exactly what it wants." LEARNING TO WRITE 127 ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON LEARNING TO WRITE [From "A College Magazine," in Memories and Portraits, 1887. Thistle Edition, Charles Scribner's Sons, New York. For the Life of Stevenson, see post, p. 623.] All through my boyhood and youth, I was known and pointed out for the pattern of an idler; and yet I was always busy on my own private end, which was to learn to write. I kept always two books in my pocket, one to read, one to write in. As I walked, my mind was busy fitting what I saw with appropriate words; when I sat by the roadside, I would either read, or a pencil and a penny version- book would be in my hand, to note down the features of the scene or commemorate some halting stanzas. Thus I lived with words. And what I thus wrote was for no ulterior use, it was written con- sciously for practice. It was not so much that I wished to be an author (though I wished that too) as that I had vowed that I would learn to write. That was a proficiency that tempted me; and I practised to acquire it, as men learn to whittle, in a wager with myself. Description was the principal field of my exercise ; for to any one with senses there is always something worth describing, and town and country are but one continuous subject. But I worked in other ways also; often accompanied my walks with dramatic dialogues, in which I played many parts; and often exercised myself in writing down conversations from memory. This was all excellent, no doubt ; so were the diaries I sometimes tried to keep, but always and very speedily discarded, finding them a school of posturing and melancholy self-deception. And yet this was not the most efficient part of my training. Good though it was, it only taught me (so far as I have learned them at all) the lower and less intellectual elements of the art, the choice of the essential note and the right word: things that to a happier con- stitution had perhaps come by nature. And regarded as training, it had one grave defect ; for it set me no standard of achievement. So that there was perhaps more profit, as there was certainly more effort, in my secret labours at home. Whenever I read a book or a 128 ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON passage that particularly pleased me, in which a thing was said or an effect rendered with propriety, in which there was either some conspicuous force or some happy distinction in the style, I must sit down at once and set myself to ape that quality. I was unsuccess- ful, and I knew it ; and tried again, and was again unsuccessful and always unsuccessful; but at least in these vain bouts, I got some practice in rhythm, in harmony, in construction and co- ordination of parts. I have thus played the sedulous ape to Hazlitt, to Lamb, to Wordsworth, to Sir Thomas Browne, to Defoe, to Hawthorne, to Montaigne, to Baudelaire and to Ober- mann. I remember one of these monkey tricks, which was called The Vanity of Morals: it was to have had a second part, The Vanity of Knowledge; and as I had neither morality nor scholar- ship, the names were apt ; but the second part was never attempted, and the first part was written (which is my reason for recalling it, ghostlike, from its ashes) no less than three times: first in the manner of Hazlitt, second in the manner of Ruskin, who had cast on me a passing spell, and third, in a laborious pasticcio of Sir Thomas Browne. So with my other works: Cain, an epic, was (save the mark ! ) an imitation of Sordello : Robin Hood, a tale in verse, took an eclectic middle course among the fields of Keats, Chaucer, and Morris : in Monmouth, a tragedy, I reclined on the bosom of Mr. Swinburne ; in my innumerable gouty-footed lyrics, I followed many masters ; in the first draft of The King's Pardon, a tragedy, I was on the trail of no lesser man than John Webster ; in the second draft of the same piece, with staggering versatility, I had shifted my allegiance to Congreve, and of course conceived my fable in a less serious vein for it was not Congreve's verse, it was his exquisite prose, that I admired and sought to copy. Even at the age of thirteen I had tried to do justice to the inhabitants of the famous city of Peebles in the style of the Book of Snobs. So I might go on for ever, through all my abortive novels, and down to my later plays, of which I think more tenderly, for they were not only conceived at first under the bracing influence of old Dumas, but have met with resurrections : one, strangely bettered by another hand, came on the stage itself and was played by bodily actors; the other, originally known as Semiramis: a Tragedy, I have observed on bookstalls under the alias of Prince Otto. But enough LEARNING TO WRITE 1 29 has been said to show by what arts of impersonation, and in what purely ventriloquial efforts I first saw my words on paper. That, like it or not, is the way to learn to write; whether I have profited or not, that is the way . It was so Keats learned, and there was never a finer temperament for literature than Keats's; it was so if we could trace it out, that all men have learned ; and that is why a revival of letters is always accompanied or heralded by a cast back, to earlier and fresher models. Perhaps I hear someone cry out : But this is not the way to be original ! It is not ; nor is there any way but to be born so. Nor yet, if you are born original, is there any- thing in this training that shall clip the wings of your originality. There can be none more original than Montaigne, neither could any be more unlike Cicero ; yet no craftsman can fail to see how much the one must have tried in his time to imitate the other. Burns is the very type of a prime force in letters : he was of all men the most imitative. Shakespeare himself, the imperial, proceeds directly from a school. It is only from a school that we can expect to have good writers ; it is almost invariably from a school that great writers, these lawless exceptions, issue. Nor is there anything here that should astonish the considerate. Before he can tell what cadences he truly prefers, the student should have tried all that are possible; before he can choose and preserve a fit- ting key of words, he should long have practised the literary scales ; and it is only after years of such gymnastic that he can sit down at last, legions of words swarming to his call, dozens of turns of phrase simultaneously bidding for his choice, and he himself knowing what he wants to do and (within the narrow limit of a man's ability) able to do it. And it is the great point of these imitations that there still shines beyond the student's reach his inimitable model. Let him try as he please, he is still sure of failure ; and it is a very old and a very true saying that failure is the only highroad to success. I must have had some disposition to learn ; for I clear-sightedly condemned my own performances. I liked doing them indeed; but when they were done, I could see they were rubbish. In consequence, I rarely showed them even to my friends ; and such friends as I chose to be my confidants I must have chosen well, for they had the friendliness to be quite plain with me. "Padding, " said one. Another wrote : K 130 IZAAK WALTON "I cannot understand why you do lyrics so badly. " No more could I ! Thrice I put myself in the way of a more authoritative rebuff, by sending a paper to a magazine. These were returned ; and I was not surprised nor even pained. If they had not been looked at, as (like all amateurs) I suspected was the case, there was no good in repeating the experiment; if they had been looked at well, then I had not yet learned to write, and I must keep on learning and living. Lastly, I had a piece of good fortune which is the occasion of this paper, and by which I was able to see my literature in print, and to measure experimentally how far I stood from the favour of the public. IZAAK WALTON THE LIFE OF DR.. ROBERT SANDERSON [First published in 1678. Walton's Lives, John Major, London, 1825. WALTON, IZAAK (1593-1683), author of 'The Compleat Angler'; born in Stafford; apprentice to a London ironmonger; in business for himself in London, 1614; freeman of the Ironmongers' Company, 1618; wrote verses before 1619; contributed copies of verses to books by his friends, 1638-61; favoured the royalists, 1642; married his second wife, 1646; lived with Bishop George Morley at Farnham, 1662-78; lived at Winchester with his son-in-law, Dr. William Hawkins, canon of Winchester, 1678-83; published his biographies of Dr. John Donne, 1640, of Sir Henry Wotton, 1651, of Richard Hooker, 1665, of George Herbert, 1670, and of Bishop Robert Sanderson, 1678; 'The Compleat Angler' first appeared in 1653, and the second edition in 1655. Cotton wrote his dialogue between 'Piscator' and 'Viator' in 1676, and it was published as a second part in the 'Compleat Angler,' 5th ed., 1676. Index and Epitome of D. N. B. "It is very delightful, and though more rambling than Plutarch, comes nearer to him than any other life-writing I can think of. Indeed, I shall be inclined to say that Walton had a genius for rambling rather than that it was his foible. The comfortable feeling he gives us that we have a definite purpose, mitigated with the license to forget it at the first temptation and take it up again as if nothing had happened, thus satisfying at once the conscientious and the natural man, is one of Walton's most prevailing charms. . . . "I have hesitated to say that Walton had style, because, though that quality, the handmaid of talent and the helpmeet of genius, have left the unobtrusive traces of its deft hand in certain choicer parts of Walton's writ- ing, his guest-chambers as it were, yet it does by no means pervade and regulate the whole. For in a book we feel the influence of style every- where, though we never catch it at its work, as in a house we divine the THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 131 neat-handed ministry of woman. Walton too often leaves his sentences in a clutter. But there are other qualities which, if they do not satisfy like style, are yet even more agreeable, draw us nearer to an author, and make us happier in him. Why try to discover what the charm of a book is, if only it charm? If I must seek a word that more than any other explains the pleasure which Walton's way of writing gives us, I should say it was its innocency. It refreshes like the society of children. I do not know whether he had humor, but there are passages that suggest it, as where, after quoting Montaigne's delightful description of how he played with his cat, he goes on: 'Thus freely speaks Montaigne concerning cats,' as if he had taken an undue liberty with them; or where he makes a meteorologist of the crab, that 'at a certain age gets into a dead fish's shell, and like a hermit dwells there alone studying the wind and weather;' or where he tells us of the palmer- worm, that 'he will boldly and disorderly wander up and down, and not endure to be kept to a diet or fixed to a particular place.' And what he says of Sanderson that ' he did put on some faint purposes to marry ' would have arrided Lamb. These, if he meant to be droll, have that seem- ing inadvertence which gives its highest zest to humor and makes the eye twinkle with furtive connivance. Walton's weaknesses, too, must be reck- oned among his other attractions. He praises a meditative life, and with evident sincerity; but we feel that he liked nothing so well as good talk. His credulity leaves front and back door invitingly open. For this I rather praise than censure him, since it brought him the chance of a miracle at any odd moment, and this complacency of belief was but a lower form of the same quality of mind'that in more serious questions gave him his equanimity of faith. And how persuasively beautiful that equanimity is ! " JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL, "Walton," 1889, in Latest Literary Essays and Addresses, pp. 76, 90-91. Houghton, Mifflin & Co., Boston.] Doctor Robert Sanderson, the late learned Bishop of Lin- coln, whose life I intend to write with all truth and equal plainness, was born the nineteenth day of September in the year of our Redemp- tion 1587. The place of his birth was Rotherham 1 in the county of York ; a town of good note, and the more for that Thomas Rother- ham, sometime archbishop of that see, was born in it ; a man whose great wisdom, and bounty, and sanctity of life have made it the more memorable : as indeed it ought also to be, for being the birth- place of our Robert Sanderson. And the reader will be of my belief, if this humble relation of his life can hold any proportion with his great piety, his useful learning, and his many other ex- traordinary endowments. He was the second and youngest son of Robert Sanderson, of Gilthwaite Hall, in the said Parish and County, Esq., by Elizabeth, one of the daughters of Richard Carr, of Butterthwaite 1 This is a mistake; Bishop Sanderson was born at Sheffield. 132 IZAAK WALTON Hall, in the Parish of Ecclesfield, in the said County of York, Gentleman. This Robert Sanderson, the father, was descended from a numerous, ancient, and honourable family of his own name : for the search of which truth, I refer my reader, that inclines to it, to Dr. Thoroton's History of the Antiquities of Nottinghamshire, and other records; not thinking it necessary here to engage him into a search for bare titles, which are noted to have in them nothing of reality: for titles not acquired, but derived only, do but show us who of our ancestors have, and how they have achieved that honour which their descendants claim, and may not be worthy to enjoy. For, if those titles descend to persons that degenerate into vice, and break off the continued line of learning, or valour, or that virtue that acquired them, they destroy the very foundation upon which that honour was built; and all the rubbish of their vices ought to fall heavy on such dishonourable heads; ought to fall so heavy as to degrade them of their titles, and blast their memories with reproach and shame. But our Robert Sanderson lived worthy of his name and family: of which one testimony may be, that Gilbert, called the Great Earl of Shrewsbury, thought him not unworthy to be joined with him as a godfather ,to Gilbert Sheldon, the late Lord Archbishop of Canterbury; to whose merits and memory posterity the clergy especially ought to pay a reverence. But I return to my intended relation of Robert the son, who began in his youth to make the laws of God, and obedience to his parents, the rules of his life; seeming even then to dedicate him- self, and all his studies, to piety and virtue. And as he was inclined to this by that native goodness with which the wise Disposer of all hearts had endowed his, so this calm, this quiet and happy temper of mind his being mild, and averse to oppositions made the whole course of his life easy and grateful both to himself and others : and this blessed temper was maintained and improved by his prudent father's good example ; and by frequent conversing with him, and scattering short apoph- thegms and little pleasant stories, and making useful applications of them, his son was in his infancy taught to abhor vanity and vice as monsters, and to discern the loveliness of wisdom and virtue ; and THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 133 by these means, and God's concurring grace, his knowledge was so augmented, and his native goodness so confirmed, that all became so habitual, as it was not easy to determine whether nature or education were his teachers. And here let me tell the reader, that these early beginnings of virtue were, by God's assisting grace, blessed with what St. Paul seemed to beg for his Philippians; * namely, "That he that had be- gun a good work in them would finish it. " And Almighty God did : for his whole life was so regular and innocent, that he might have said at his death and with truth and comfort what the same St. Paul said after to the same Philippians, when he advised them to walk as they had him for an example. 2 And this goodness of which I have spoken, seemed to increase as his years did ; and with his goodness his learning, the founda- tion of which was laid in the grammar school of Rotherham that being one of those three that were founded and liberally endowed by the said great and good Bishop of that name. .And in this time of his being a scholar there he was observed to use an unwearied diligence to attain learning, and to have a serious- ness beyond his age, and with it a more than common modesty; and to be of so calm and obliging a behaviour, that the master and whole number of scholars loved him as one man. And in this love and amity he continued at that school till about the thirteenth year of his age; at which time his father designed to improve his grammar learning by removing him from Rotherham to one of the more noted schools of Eton or Westminster; and after a year's stay there, then to remove him thence to Oxford. But as he went with him, he called on an old friend, a minister of noted learning, and told him his inten- tions; and he, after many questions with his son, received such answers from him, that he assured his father, his son was so perfect a grammarian, that he had laid a good foundation to build any or all the arts upon; and therefore advised him to shorten his journey, and leave him at Oxford. And his father did so. His father left him there to the sole care and manage of Dr. Kilbie, who was then Rector of Lincoln College. And he, after 1 Phil. i. 6. 2 . Phil. iii. 17. 134 IZAAK WALTON some time and trial of his manners and learning, thought fit to enter him of that college, and after to matriculate him in the university, which he did the first of July, 1603 ; but he was not chosen Fellow till the third of May, 1606; at which time he had taken his degree of Bachelor of Arts : at the taking of which degree his tutor told the rector, "That his pupil Sanderson had a meta- physical brain and a matchless memory; and that he thought he had improved or made the last so by an art of his own inven- tion." And all the future employments of his life proved that his tutor was not mistaken. I must here stop my reader, and tell him that this Dr. Kilbie was a man of so great learning and wisdom, and was so excellent a critic in the Hebrew tongue, that he was made Professor of it in this university; and was also so perfect a Grecian, that he was by King James appointed to be one of the translators of the Bible ; and that this Doctor and Mr. Sanderson had frequent discourses, and loved as father and son. The Doctor was to ride a journey into Derbyshire, and took Mr. Sanderson to bear him company: and they going together on a Sunday with the Doctor's friend to that parish church where they then were, found the young preacher to have no more discretion than to waste a great part of the hour allotted for his sermon in exceptions against the late translation of several words, not expecting such a hearer as Dr. Kilbie, and showed three reasons why a particular word should have been otherwise translated. When evening prayer was ended, the preacher was invited to the Doctor's friend's house; where after some other conference the Doctor told him, "He might have preached more useful doctrine, and not have filled his auditors' ears with needless exceptions against the late translation: and for that word for which he offered to that poor congregation three reasons why it ought to have been translated as he said, he and others had considered all them, and found thirteen more con- siderable reasons why it was translated as now printed;" and told him, " If his friend, then attending him, should prove guilty of such indiscretion, he should forfeit his favour." To which Mr. Sanderson said, " He hoped he should not." And the preacher was so ingenuous as to say, "He would not justify himself." And so I return to Oxford. In the year 1608, July the nth, THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 135 Mr. Sanderson was completed Master of Arts. I am not ignorant, that for the attaining these dignities the time was shorter than was then or is now required; but either his birth or the well performance of some extraordinary exercise, or some other merit, made him so: and the reader is requested to believe, that 'twas the last: and requested to believe also, that if I be mistaken in the time, the college records have misinformed me: but I hope they have not. In that year of 1608, he was November the ;th by his college chosen Reader of Logic in the house ; which he performed so well, that he was chosen again the sixth of November, 1609. In the year 1613, he was chosen Sub-Rector of the college, and the like for the year 1614, and chosen again to the same dignity and trust for the year 1616. In all which time and employments, his abilities and behav- iour were such as procured him both love and reverence from the whole society; there being no exception against him for any faults, but a sorrow for the infirmities of his being too timorous and bashful; both which were, God knows, so con- natural as they never left him. And I know not whether his lovers ought to wish they had ; for they proved so like the radical moisture in man's body, that they preserved the life of virtue in his soul, which by God's assisting grace never left him till this life put on immortality. Of which happy infirmities if they may be so called more hereafter. In the year 1614 he stood to be elected one of the Proctors for the university. And 'twas not to satisfy any ambition of his own, but to comply with the desire of the rector and whole society, of which he was a member; who had not had a Proctor chosen out of their college for the space of sixty years ; namely, not from the year 1554, unto his standing; and they persuaded him, that if he would but stand for Proctor, his merits were so generally known, and he so well beloved, that 'twas but ap- pearing, and he would infallibly carry it against any opposers; and told him, "That he would by that means recover a right or reputation that was seemingly dead to his college." By these, and other like persuasions, he yielded up his own reason to theirs, and appeared to stand for Proctor. But that election was car- 136 IZAAK WALTON ried on by so sudden and secret, and by so powerful a faction, that he missed it. Which, when he understood, he professed seri- ously to his friends, "That if he were troubled at the disappoint- ment, it was for theirs, and not for his own sake: for he was far from any desire of such an employment, as must be managed with charge and trouble, and was too usually rewarded with hard censures, or hatred, or both." In the year following he was earnestly persuaded by Dr. Kilbie and others to review the logic lectures which he had read some years past in his college; and, that done, to methodise and print them, for the ease and public good of posterity. But though he had an averseness to appear publicly in print; yet after many serious solicitations, and some second thoughts of his own, he laid aside his modesty, and promised he would: and he did so in that year of 1615. And the book proved as his friends seemed to prophesy, that is, of great and general use, whether we respect the art or the author. For logic may be said to be an art of right reasoning; an art that undeceives men who take falsehood for truth; enables men to pass a true judgment, and detect those fallacies, which in some men's understandings usurp the place of right reason. And how great a master our author was in this art will quickly appear from that clearness of method, argument, and demonstration which is so conspicuous in all his other writ- ings. He, who had attained to so great a dexterity in the use of reason himself, was best qualified to prescribe rules and direc- tions for the instruction of others. And I am the more satisfied of the excellency and usefulness of this, his first public under- taking, by hearing that most tutors in both universities teach Dr. Sanderson's Logic to their pupils, as a foundation upon which they are to build their future studies in philosophy. And, for a further confirmation of my belief, the reader may note, that since his book of logic was first printed there has not been less than ten thousand sold: and that 'tis like to continue both to discover truth and to clear and confirm the reason of the unborn world. It will easily be believed that his former standing for a Proc- tor's place, and being disappointed, must prove much displeasing to a man of his great wisdom and modesty, and create in him an THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 137 averseness to run a second hazard of his credit and content : and yet he was assured by Dr. Kilbie, and the Fellows of his own college, and most of those that had opposed him in the former election, that his book of logic had purchased for him such a belief of his learning and prudence, and his behaviour at the former election had got for him so great and so general a love, that all his former opposers repented what they had done; and therefore persuaded him to venture to stand a second time. And, upon these, and other like encouragements, he did again, but not without an inward unwillingness, yield up his own reason to theirs, and promised to stand. And he did so; and was, the tenth of April, 1616, chosen Senior Proctor for the year following; Mr. Charles Crooke of Christ Church being then chosen the Junior. In this year of his being Proctor, there happened many memo- rable accidents; namely, Dr. Robert Abbot, Master of Balliol College, and Regius Professor of Divinity, who being elected or consecrated Bishop of Sarum some months before, was solemnly conducted out of Oxford towards his diocese by the heads of all houses, and the chief of all the university. And Dr. Prideaux succeeded him in the Professorship, in which he continued till the year 1642, being then elected Bishop of Worcester, and then our now Proctor, Mr. Sanderson, suc- ceeded him in the Regius Professorship. And in this year Dr. Arthur Lake then Warden of New College was advanced to the Bishopric of Bath and Wells: a man of whom I take myself bound in justice to say, that he has made the great trust committed to him the chief care and whole business of his life. And one testimony of this proof may be, that he sate usually with his chancellor in his consistory, and at least advised, if not assisted, in most sentences for the punish- ing of such offenders as deserved Church censuses. And it may be noted that, after a sentence for penance was pronounced, he did very rarely, or never, allow of any commutation for the of- fence, but did usually see the sentence for penance executed; and then as usually preached a sermon on mortification and repentance, and did so apply them to the offenders that then stood before him, as begot in them a devout contrition, and at 138 IZAAK WALTON least resolutions to amend their lives: and having done that, he would take them though never so poor to dinner with him, and use them friendly, and dismiss them with his blessing and per- suasions to a virtuous life, and beg them to believe him. And his humility and charity, and other Christian excellencies, were all like this. Of all which the reader may inform himself in his life, truly writ, and printed before his sermons. And in this year also, the very prudent and very wise Lord Ellesmere, who was so very long Lord Chancellor of England, and then of Oxford, resigning up the last, the Right Honourable, and as magnificent, William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke, was chosen to succeed him. And in this year our late King Charles the First then Prince of Wales came honourably attended to Oxford ; and having deliberately visited the university, the schools, colleges, and libraries, he and his attendants were entertained with ceremonies and feasting suitable to their dignity and merits. And this year King James sent letters to the university for the regulating their studies; especially of the young divines: advising they should not rely on modern sums and systems, but study the fathers and councils, and the more primitive learning. And this advice was occasioned by the indiscreet inferences made by very many preachers out of Mr. Calvin's doctrine con- cerning predestination, universal redemption, the irresistibil- ity of God's grace, and of some other knotty points depending upon these; points which many think were not, but by inter- preters forced to be, Mr. Calvin's meaning ; of the truth or false- hood of which I pretend not to have an ability to judge; my meaning in this relation being only to acquaint the reader with the occasion of the King's letter. It may be observed that the various accidents of this year did afford our Proctor large and laudable matter to dilate and discourse upon: and that though his office seemed, according to statute and custom, to require him to do so at his leaving it; yet he chose rather to pass them over with some very short observations, and present the governors, and his other hearers, with rules to keep up discipline and order in the university; which at that time was, either by defective statutes, or want of THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 139 the due execution of those that were good, grown to be extremely irregular. And in this year also, the magisterial part of the Proc- tor required more diligence, and was more difficult to be man- aged than formerly, by reason of a multiplicity of new statutes, which begot much confusion; some of which statutes were then, and others suddenly after, put into an useful execution. And though these statutes were not then made so perfectly useful as they were designed, till Archbishop Laud's time who assisted in the forming and promoting them ; yet our present Proctor made them as effectual as discretion and diligence could do: of which one example may seem worthy the noting; namely, that if in his night walk he met with irregular scholars absent from their colleges at university hours, or disordered by drink, or in scandalous company, he did not use his power of punishing to an extremity ; but did usually take their names, and a promise to appear before him unsent for next morning: and when they did, convinced them, with such obligingness, and reason added to it, that they parted from him with such resolutions as the man after God's own heart was possessed with, when he said, "There is mercy with thee, and therefore thou shalt be feared" Psa. cxxx. 4. And by this and a like behaviour to all men, he was so happy as to lay down this dangerous employment, as but very few, if any, have done, even without an enemy. After his speech was ended, and he retired with a friend into a convenient privacy, he looked upon his friend with a more than common cheerfulness, and spake to him to this purpose: "I look back upon my late employment with some content to myself, and a great thankfulness to Almighty God that he hath made me of a temper not apt to provoke the meanest of man- kind, but rather to pass by infirmities, if noted; and in this employment I have had God knows many occasions to do both. And when I consider how many of a contrary temper are by sudden and small occasions transported and hurried by anger to commit such errors as they in that passion could not foresee, and will in their more calm and deliberate thoughts up- braid, and require repentance : and consider, that though repent- ance secures us from the punishment of any sin, yet how much more comfortable it is to be innocent than need pardon: and 140 IZAAK WALTON consider, that errors against men, though pardoned both by God and them, do yet leave such anxious and upbraiding im- pressions in the memory, as abates of the offender's content: when I consider all this, and that God hath of his goodness given me a temper that hath prevented me from running into such enormities, I remember my temper with joy and thankful- ness. And though I cannot say with David I wish I could, that therefore "his praise shall always be in my mouth" (Psa. xxxiv. i) ; yet I hope, that by his grace, and that grace seconded by my endeavours, it shall never be blotted out of my memory; and I now beseech Almighty God that it never may." And here I must look back, and mention one passage more in his Proctorship, which is, that Gilbert Sheldon, the late Lord Archbishop of Canterbury, was this year sent to Trinity College in that university; and not long after his entrance there, a letter was sent after him from his godfather the father of our Proctor to let his son know it, and commend his godson to his acquaintance, and to more than a common care of his be- haviour; which proved a pleasing injunction to our Proctor, who was so gladly obedient to his father's desire, that he some few days after sent his servitor to entreat Mr. Sheldon to his chamber next morning. But it seems Mr. Sheldon having like a young man as he was run into some such irregularity as made him conscious he had trangressed his statutes, did therefore appre- hend the Proctor's invitation as an introduction to punishment; the fear of which made his bed restless that night: but, at their meeting the next morning, that fear vanished immediately by the Proctor's cheerful countenance, and the freedom of their discourse of friends. And let me tell my reader, that this first meeting proved the beginning of as spiritual a friendship as human nature is capable of; of a friendship free from all self- ends: and it continued to be so, till death forced a separation of it on earth ; but it is now reunited in heaven. And now, having given this account of his behaviour, and the considerable accidents, in his Proctorship, I proceed to tell my reader, that, this busy employment being ended, he preached his sermon for his degree of Bachelor in Divinity in as elegant THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 141 Latin, and as remarkable for the matter, as hath been preached in that university since that day. And having well performed his other exercises for that degree, he took it the nine-and-twen- tieth of May following, having been ordained deacon and priest in the year 1611, by John King, then Bishop of London, who had not long before been Dean of Christ Church, and then knew him so well, that he became his most affectionate friend. And In this year, being then about the twenty-ninth of his age, he took from the university a licence to preach. In the year 1618, he was by Sir Nicholas Sanderson, Lord Viscount Castleton, presented to the rectory of Wibberton, not far from Boston, in the county of Lincoln, a living of very good value ; but it lay in so low and wet a part of that country as was inconsistent with his health. And health being next to a good conscience ' the greatest of God's blessings in this life, and requiring therefore of every man a care and diligence to pre- serve it, he, apprehending a danger of losing it, if he continued at Wibberton a second winter, did therefore resign it back into the hands of his worthy kinsman and patron, about one year after his donation of it to him. And about this time of his resignation he was presented to the rectory of Boothby Pannell, in the same county of Lincoln; a town which has been made famous, and must continue to be famous, because Dr. Sanderson, the humble and learned Dr. Sanderson, was more than forty years parson of Boothby Pannell, and from thence dated all or most of his matchless writings. To this living which was of no less value, but a purer air than Wibberton he was presented by Thomas Harrington, of the same county and parish, Esq., who was a gentleman of a very ancient family, and of great use and esteem in his country during his whole life. And in this Boothby Pannell the meek and charitable Dr. Sanderson and his patron lived with an endear- ing, mutual, and comfortable friendship, till the death of the last put a period to it. About the time that he was made parson of Boothby Pannell, he resigned his Fellowship of Lincoln College unto the then Rector and Fellows; and his resignation is recorded in these words : 142 IZAAK WALTON Ego Robertus Sanderson perpetuus, etc. I, Robert Sanderson, Fellow of the College of St. Mary's and All-Saints, commonly called Lincoln College, in the University of Oxford, do freely and willingly resign into the hands of the Rector and Fellows, all the right and title that I have in the said college, wishing to them and their successors all peace, and piety, and happiness, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen. May 6, 1691. ROBERT SANDERSON. And not long after this resignation, he was by the then Bishop of York, or the King sede vacante, made Prebend of the Collegiate Church of Southwell in that diocese ; and shortly after of Lincoln by the bishop of that see. And being now resolved to set down his rest in a quiet privacy at Boothby Pannell, and looking back with some sadness upon his removal from his general acquaintance left in Oxford, and the pecul- iar pleasures of a university life ; he could not but think the want of society would render this of a country parson the more uncom- fortable, by reason of that want of conversation ; and therefore he did put on some faint purposes to marry. For he had considered, that though marriage be cumbered with more worldly care than a single life ; yet a complying and a prudent wife changes those very cares into so mutual a content, as makes them become like the sufferings of St. Paul (Colos. i. 24), which he would not have wanted, because they occasioned his rejoicing in them. And he, having well considered this, and observed the secret unutterable joys that children beget in parents, and the mutual pleasures and contented trouble of their daily care and constant endeavours to bring up those little images of themselves, so as to make them as happy as all those cares and endeavours can make them : he, having considered all this, the hopes of such happiness turned his faint purposes into a positive resolution to marry. And he was so happy as to obtain Anne, the daughter of Henry Nelson, Bachelor in Divinity, then Rector of Haugham,in the county of Lincoln, a man of noted worth and learning. And the Giver of all good things was so good to him, as to give him such a wife as was suitable to his own desires; a wife that made his life happy by being always content when he THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 143 was cheerful; that divided her joys with him, and abated of his sorrow, by bearing a part of that burden ; a wife that demonstrated her affection by a cheerful obedience to all his desires, during the whole course of his life; and at his death too, for she outlived him. And in this Boothby Pannell, he either found or made his parish- ioners peaceable and complying with him in the decent and regular service of God. And thus his parish, his patron, and he lived together in a religious love and a contented quietness ; he not trou- bling their thoughts by preaching high and useless notions, but such plain truths as were necessary to be known, believed and practised, in order to their salvation. And their assent to what he taught was testified by such a conformity to his doctrine, as declared they be- lieved and loved him. For he would often say, "That, without the last, the most evident truths heard as from an enemy, or an evil liver either are not, or are at least the less effectual ; and do usually rather harden than convince the hearer." And this excellent man did not think his duty discharged by only reading the Church prayers, catechising, preaching, and ad- ministering the Sacraments seasonably ; but thought if the law or the canons may seem to enjoin no more, yet that God would require more, than the defective laws of man's making can or do enjoin; the performance of that inward law which Almighty God hath imprinted in the conscience of all good Christians, and in- clines those whom he loves to perform. He, considering this, did therefore become a law to himself, practising what his conscience told him was his duty, in reconciling differences, and preventing law-suits, both in his parish and in the neighbourhood. To which may be added his often visiting sick and disconsolate families, persuading them to patience, and raising them from dejection by his advice and cheerful discourse, and by adding his own alms, if there were any so poor as to need it: considering how accept- able it is to Almighty God, when we do as we are advised by St. Paul (Gal. vi. 2), " Help to bear one another's burden," either of sorrow or want : and what a comfort it will be, when the Searcher of all hearts shall call us to a strict account for that evil we have done, and the good we have omitted, to remember we have comforted and been helpful to a dejected or distressed family. 144 IZAAK WALTON And that his practice was to do good, one example may be, that he met with a poor dejected neighbour, that complained he had taken a meadow, the rent of which was fy a year; and when the hay was made ready to be carried into his barn, several days' constant rain had so raised the water, that a sudden flood carried all away, and his rich landlord would bate him no rent; and that unless he had half abated, he and seven children were utterly undone. It may be noted, that in this age, there are a sort of people so unlike the God of Mercy, so void of the bowels of pity, that they love only themselves and children; love them so, as not to be concerned whether the rest of mankind waste their days in sorrow or shame; people that are cursed with riches, and a mistake that nothing but riches can make them and theirs happy. But it was not so with Dr. Sanderson; for he was concerned, and spoke comfortably to the poor dejected man; bade him go home and pray, and not load himself with sorrow, for he would go to his landlord next morning; and if his landlord would not abate what he desired, he and a friend would pay it for him. To the landlord he went the next day, and, in a conference, the Doctor presented to him the sad condition of his poor dejected tenant; telling him how much God is pleased when men compas- sionate the poor : and told him, that though God loves sacrifice, yet he loves mercy so much better, that he is pleased when called the God of Mercy. And told him, the riches he was possessed of were given him by that God of Mercy, who would not be pleased if he, that had so much given, yea, and forgiven him too, should prove like the rich steward in the gospel, "that took his fellow-servant by the throat to make him pay the utmost farthing. " This he told him : and told him, that the law of this nation by which law he claims his rent does not undertake to make men honest or merciful ; but does what it can to restrain men from being dishonest or unmer- ciful, and yet was defective in both : and that taking any rent from his poor tenant, for what God suffered him not to enjoy, though the law allowed him to do so, yet if he did so, he was too like that rich steward which he had mentioned to him; and told him that riches so gotten, and added to his great estate, would, as Job says, "prove like gravel in his teeth:" would in time so corrode his conscience, THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 145 or become so nauseous when he lay upon his death-bed, that he would then labour to vomit it up, and not be able : and therefore advised him, being very rich, to make friends of his unrighteous Mammon, before that evil day come upon him: but however, neither for his own sake, nor for God's sake, to take any rent of his poor, dejected, sad tenant; for that were to gain a temporal, and lose his eternal happiness. These, and other such reasons were urged with so grave and compassionate an earnestness, that the landlord forgave his tenant the whole rent. The reader will easily believe that Dr. Sanderson, who was so meek and merciful, did suddenly and gladly carry this comfortable news to the dejected tenant; and we believe, that at the telling of it there was mutual rejoicing. It was one of Job's boasts, that "he had seen none perish for want of clothing : and that he had often made the heart of the widow to rejoice" (Job xxxi. 19). And doubtless Dr. Sanderson might have made the same religious boast of this and very many like occasions. But, since he did not, I re- joice that I have this just occasion to do it for him ; and that I can tell the reader, I might tire myself and him, in telling how like the whole course of Dr. Sanderson's life was to this which I have now related. Thus he went on in an obscure and quiet privacy, doing good daily both by word and by deed, as often as any occasion offered itself; yet not so obscurely, but that his very great learning, pru- dence, and piety, were much noted and valued by the bishop of his diocese, and by most of the nobility and gentry of that county. By the first of which he was often summoned to preach many visitation sermons, and by the latter at many assizes. Which sermons, though they were much esteemed by them that procured, and were fit to judge them; yet they were the less valued, because he read them, which he was forced to do; for though he had an extraordinary memory, even the art of it, yet he had such an innate in- vincible fear and bashfulness, that his memory was wholly useless, as to the repetition of his sermons as he had writ them ; which gave occasion to say, when they were first printed and exposed to cen- sure, which was in the year 1632, "that the best sermons that were ever read were never preached. " In this contented obscurity he continued, till the learned and 146 IZAAK WALTON good Archbishop Laud, who knew him well in Oxford, for he was his contemporary there, told the King 'twas the knowing and conscientious King Charles the First that there was one Mr. San- derson, an obscure country minister, that was of such sincerity, and so excellent in all casuistical learning, that he desired his Majesty would make him his chaplain. The King granted it most will- ingly, and gave the Bishop charge to hasten it, for he had longed to discourse with a man that had dedicated his studies to that useful part of learning. The Bishop forgot not the King's desire, and Mr. Sanderson was made his Chaplain in Ordinary in No- vember following, 1631. And when they became known to each other, the King did put many cases of conscience to him, and received from him such deliberate, safe, and clear solutions, as gave him great content in conversing with him; so that, at the end of his month's attendance, the King told him, " he should long for the next November; for he resolved to have a more in- ward acquaintance with him, when that month and he returned." And when the month and he did return, the good King was never absent from his sermons, and would usually say, "I carry my ears to hear other preachers; but I carry my con- science to hear Mr. Sanderson, and to act accordingly. " And this ought not to be concealed from posterity, that the King thought what he spake ; for he took him to be his adviser in that quiet part of his life, and he proved to be his comforter in those days of his affliction, when he apprehended himself to be in danger of death or deposing. Of which more hereafter. In the first Parliament of this good King, which was 1625, he was chosen to be a Clerk of the Convocation for the Diocese of Lincoln ; which I here mention, because about that time did arise many disputes about predestination, and the many critical points that depend upon, or are interwoven in it; occasioned as was said, by a disquisition of new principles of Mr. Calvin's, though others say they were before his time. But of these Dr. Sanderson then drew up, for his own satisfaction, such a scheme he called it Pax EcclesicR as then gave himself, and hath since given others, such satisfaction, that it still remains to be of great estimation among the most learned. He was also chosen Clerk of all the Con- vocations during that good King's reign. Which I here tell my THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 147 reader, because I shall hereafter have occasion to mention that Con- vocation in 1640, the unhappy Long Parliament, and some debates of the predestination points as they have been since charitably handled betwixt him, the learned Dr. Hammond, and Dr. Pierce, the now Reverend Dean of Salisbury. In the year 1636, his Majesty, then in his progress, took a fair occasion to,visit Oxford, and to take an entertainment for two days for himself and honourable attendants; which the reader ought to believe was suitable to their dignities. But this is mentioned, because at the King's coming thither, Dr. Sanderson did attend him, and was then the 3ist of August created Doctor of Divinity; which honour had an addition to it, by having many of the nobility of this nation then made Doctors and Masters of Arts with him; some of whose names shall be recorded and live with his, and none shall outlive it. First, Dr. Curie and Dr. Wren, who were then Bishops of Winton and of Norwich, and had formerly taken their degrees in Cambridge, were with him created Doctors of Divinity in his University. So was Meric, the son of the learned Isaac Casaubon; and Prince Rupert, who still lives, the then Duke of Lenox, Earl of Hereford, Earl of Essex, of Berkshire, and very many others of noble birth too many to be named were then created Masters of Arts. Some years before the unhappy Long Parliament, this nation being then happy and in peace, though inwardly sick of being well, namely, in the year 1639, a discontented party of the Scots Church were zealously restless for another reformation of their Kirk government; and to that end created a new Covenant, for the general taking of which they pretended to petition the King for his assent, and that he would enjoin the taking of it by all of that nation. But this petition was not to be presented to him by a committee of eight or ten men of their fraternity; but by so many thousands, and they so armed as seemed to force an assent to what they seemed to request ; so that though forbidden by the King, yet they entered England, and in the heat of zeal took and plundered Newcastle, where the King was forced to meet them with an army : but upon a treaty and some concessions, he sent them back, though not so rich as they intended, yet, for that time, without bloodshed. But, oh ! this peace, and this Covenant, were but the 148 IZAAK WALTON forerunners of war, and the many miseries that followed : for in the year following there were so many chosen into the Long Parliament, that were of a conjunct council with these very .zealous and as fac- tious reformers, as begot such a confusion by the several desires and designs in many of the members of that Parliament, and at last in the very common people of this nation, that they were so lost by contrary designs, fears, and confusions, as to believe the Scots and their Covenant would restore them to their former tranquillity. And to that end the Presbyterian party of this nation did again, in the year 1643, invite the Scotch Covenanters back into England: and hither they came marching with it gloriously upon their pikes and in their hats, with this motto : " For the Crown and Covenant of both Kingdoms. " This I saw, and suffered by it. But when I look back upon the ruin of families, the bloodshed, the decay of common honesty, and how the former piety and plain dealing of this now sinful nation is turned into cruelty and cunning, I praise God that he prevented me from being of that party which helped to bring in this Covenant, and those sad confusions that have followed it. And I have been the bolder to say this to myself, because in a sad dis- course with Dr. Sanderson, I heard him make the like grateful acknowledgment. This digression is intended for the better information of the reader in what will follow concerning Dr. Sanderson. And first, that the Covenanters of this nation, and their party in Parliament, made many exceptions against the Common Prayer and ceremonies of the Church and seemed restless for a reformation : and though their desires seemed not reasonable to the King, and the learned Dr. Laud, then Archbishop of Canterbury; yet, to quiet their con- sciences, and prevent future confusion, they did, in the year 1641, desire Dr. Sanderson to call two more of the Convocation to advise with him, and that he would then draw up some such safe alterations as he thought fit in the service-book, and abate some of the cere- monies that were least material for satisfying their consciences: and to this end they did meet together privately twice a week at the Dean of Westminster's house, for the space of three months or more. But not long after that time, when Dr. Sanderson had made the reformation ready for a view, the Church and State were both fallen into such a confusion, that Dr. Sanderson's model for refor- THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 149 mation became then useless. Nevertheless, his reputation was such, that he was, in the year 1642, proposed by both Houses of Parlia- ment to the King, then in Oxford, to be one of their trustees for the settling of Church affairs, and was allowed of by the King to be so : but that treaty came to nothing. In the year 1643, the two Houses of Parliament took upon them to make an ordinance, and call an assembly of divines, to debate and settle some Church controversies, of which many were unfit to judge ; in which Dr. Sanderson was also named, but did not appear; I suppose for the same reason that many other worthy and learned men did forbear, the summons wanting the King's authority. And here I must look back, and tell the reader, that in the year 1642, he was, July 2ist, named by a more undoubted authority to a more noble employment, which was to be Professor Regius of Divinity in Oxford : but, though knowledge be said to puff up, yet his mod- esty and too mean an opinion of his great abilities, and some other real or pretended reasons, expressed in his speech, when he first appeared in the Chair, and since printed, kept him from enter- ing into it till October, 1646. He did, for about a year's time, continue to read his matchless lectures, which were first de Juramento, a point very difficult, and at that time very dangerous to be handled as it ought to be. But this learned man, as he was eminently furnished with abilities to satisfy the consciences of men upon that important subject ; so he wanted not courage to assert the true obligation of oaths in a degen- erate age, when men had made perjury a main part of their religion. How much the learned world stands obliged to him for these, and his following lectures de Conscientid, I shall not attempt to declare, as being very sensible that the best pens must needs fall short in the commendation of them: so that I shall only add, that they con- tinued to this day, and will do for ever, as a complete standard for the resolution of the most material doubts in casuistical divinity. And therefore I proceed to tell the reader, that about the time of his reading those lectures, the King being then prisoner in the Isle of Wight, the Parliament had sent the Covenant, the Negative Oath, and I know not what more, to be taken by the Doctor of the Chair, and all heads of houses; and all other inferior scholars, of what degree soever, were all to take these oaths 150 IZAAK WALTON by a fixed day ; and those that did not, to abandon their college and the university too, within twenty-four hours after the beating of a drum ; for if they remained longer, they were to be proceeded against as spies. Dr. Laud, then Archbishop of Canterbury, the Earl of Strafford, and many others, had been formerly murdered by this wicked Parliament; but the King yet was not: and the university had yet some faint hopes that in a treaty then in being, or pretended to be suddenly, there might be such an agreement made between King and Parliament, that the dissenters in the university might both preserve their consciences and subsistence which they then enjoyed by their colleges. And being possessed of this mistaken hope, that the Parliament were not yet grown so* merciless as not to allow manifest reason for their not submitting to the enjoined oaths, the university appointed twenty delegates to meet, consider, and draw up a manifesto to the Parliament, why they could not take those oaths but by violation of their consciences: and of these delegates Dr. Sheldon, late Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Hammond, Dr. Sanderson, Dr. Morley, now Bishop of Winchester, and that most honest and as judicious civil lawyer, Dr. Zouch, were a part; the rest I cannot now name : but the whole number of the dele- gates requested Dr. Zouch to draw up the law part, and give it to Dr. Sanderson: and he was requested to methodise and add what referred to reason and conscience, and put into form. He yielded to their desires and did so. And then, after they had been read in a full convocation, and allowed of, they were printed in Latin, that the Parliament's proceedings and the university's sufferings might be manifested to all nations: and the imposers of these oaths might repent, or answer them : but they were past the first; and for the latter, I might swear they neither can, nor ever* will. And these reasons were also suddenly turned into English by Dr. Sanjderson, that those of these three kingdoms might the better judge of the loyal party's sufferings. About this time the Independents who were then grown to be the most powerful part of the army had taken the King from a close to a more large imprisonment; and, by their own pretences to liberty of conscience, were obliged to allow some- THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 151 what of that to the King, who had, in the year 1646, sent for Dr. Sanderson, Dr. Hammond, Dr. Sheldon, the late Arch- bishop of Canterbury, and Dr. Morley, the now Bishop of Winchester, to attend him, in order to advise with them, how far he might with a good conscience comply with the proposals of the Parliament for a peace in Church and State: but these, having been then denied him by the Presbyterian Parliament, were now allowed him by those in present power. And as those other divines, so Dr. Sanderson gave his attendance on his Majesty also in the Isle of Wight, preached there before him, and had in that attendance many, both public and private, conferences with him, to his Majesty's great satisfaction. At which time he desired Dr. Sanderson, that, being the Parliament had proposed to him the abolishing of episcopal government in the Church, as inconsist- ent with monarchy, that he would consider of it; and declare his judgment. He undertook to do so, and did it ; but it might not be printed till our King's happy restoration, and then it was. And at Dr. Sanderson's taking his leave of his Majesty in his last attendance on him, the King requested him to betake himself to the writing cases of conscience for the good of posterity. To which his answer was, "That he was now grown old, and unfit to write cases of conscience." But the King was so bold with him as to say, "It was the simplest answer he ever heard from Dr. Sanderson ; for no young man was fit to be a judge, or write cases of conscience." And let me here take occasion to tell the reader this truth, not commonly known; that in one of these con- ferences this conscientious King told Dr. Sanderson, or one of them that then waited with him, " that the remembrance of two errors did much afflict him ; which were, his assent to the Earl of Straff ord's death, and the abolishing Episcopacy in Scotland ; and that if God ever restored him to be in a peaceable possession of his crown, he would demonstrate his repentance by a public confession, and a voluntary penance," I think barefoot from the Tower of London, or Whitehall, to St. Paul's Church, and desire the people to intercede with God for his pardon. I am sure one of them that told it me lives still, and will witness it. And it ought to be observed, that Dr. Sanderson's lectures de Juramento were so ap- proved and valued by the King, that in this time of his imprison- I$2 1ZAAK WALTON ment and solitude he translated them into exact English ; desiring Dr. Juxon, then Bishop of London, Dr. Hammond, and Sir Thomas Herbert, who then attended him, to compare them with the original. The last still lives, and has declared it, with some other of that King's excellencies, in a letter under his own hand, which was lately showed me by Sir William Dugdale, King at Arms. The book was designed to be put into the King's library at St. James's; but, I doubt, not now to be found there. I thought the honour of the author and the translator to be both so much concerned in this relation, that it ought not to be concealed from the reader, and 'tis therefore here inserted. I now return to Dr. Sanderson in the Chair in Oxford ; where they that complied not in taking the Covenant, Negative Oath, and Parliament Ordinance for Church discipline and worship, were under a sad and daily apprehension of expulsion : for the visitors were daily expected, and both city and university full of soldiers, and a party of Presbyterian divines, that were as greedy and ready to possess, as the ignorant and ill-natured visitors were to eject the dissenters out of their colleges and livelihoods: but, notwithstanding, Dr. Sanderson did still continue to read his lecture, and did, to the very faces of those Presbyterian divines and soldiers, read with so much reason, and with a calm fortitude make such applications, as, if they were not, they ought to have been ashamed, and begged pardon of God and him, and forborne to do what followed. But these thriving sinners were hardened; and as the visitors expelled the orthodox, they, without scruple or shame, possessed themselves of their colleges; so that, with the rest, Dr. Sanderson was in June, 1648, forced to pack up and be gone, and thank God he was not imprisoned, as Dr. Sheldon, and Dr. Hammond, and others then were. I must now again look back to Oxford, and tell my reader, that the year before this expulsion, when the university had denied this subscription, and apprehended the danger of that visitation which followed, they sent Dr. Morley, then Canon of Christ Church, now Lord Bishop of Winchester, and others, to petition the Parliament for recalling the injunction, or a mitiga- tion of it, or accept of their reasons why they could not take the oaths enjoined them ; and the petition was by Parliament referred THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 153 to a committee to hear and report the reasons to the House, and a day set for hearing them. This done, Dr. Morley and the rest went to inform and see counsel, to plead their cause on the day appointed; but there had been so many committed for pleading, that none durst undertake it ; for at this time the privileges of that Parliament were become a Noli me tangere, as sacred and useful to them, as traditions ever were, or are now, to the Church of Rome ; their number must never be known, and therefore not with- out danger to be meddled with. For which reason Dr. Morley was forced, for want of counsel, to plead the university's reasons for non-compliance with the Parliament's injunctions: and though this was done with great reason, and a boldness equal to the justice of his cause ; yet the effect of it was, but that he and the rest appearing with him were so fortunate as to return to Oxford without commitment. This was some few days before the vis- itors and more soldiers were sent down to drive the Dissenters out of the university. And one that was, at this time of Dr. Morley's pleading, a powerful man in the Parliament, and of that committee, observing Dr. Morley's behaviour and reason, and inquiring of him and hearing a good report of his morals, was therefore willing to afford him a peculiar favour; and, that he might express it, sent for me that relate this story, and knew Dr. Morley well, and told me, "he had such a love for Dr. Morley, that knowing he would not take the oaths, and must therefore be ejected his college, and leave Oxford ; he desired I would therefore write to him to ride out of Oxford, when the visitors came into it, and not return till they left it, and he should be sure then to return in safety; and that he should, without taking any oath or other molestation, enjoy his canon's place in his college." I did receive this intended kindness with a sudden gladness, because I was sure the party had a power, and as sure he meant to perform it, and did therefore write the Doctor word : and his answer was, that I must not fail to return my friend who still lives his humble and undissembled thanks, though he could not accept of his intended kindness ; for when the Dean, Dr. Gardner, Dr. Paine, Dr. Hammond, Dr. Sanderson and all the rest of the college were turned out, except Dr. Wall, he should take it to be, if not a sin, yet a shame, to be left behind with him only. Dr. Wall I knew, and will speak nothing of him, for he is dead. 154 IZAAK WALTON It may easily be imagined with what a joyful willingness these self-loving reformers took possession of all vacant preferments, and with what reluctance others parted with their beloved colleges and subsistence: but their consciences were dearer than their subsistence, and out they went; the reformers possessing them without shame or scruple : where I leave these scruple-mongers, and make an account of the then present affairs of London, to be the next employment of my reader's patience. And in London all the bishop's houses were turned to be prisons, and they filled with divines, that would not take the Covenant, or forbear reading Common Prayer, or that were accused for some faults like these. For it may be noted, that about this time the Parliament set out a proclamation, to encourage all laymen that had occasion to complain of their ministers for being troublesome or scandalous, or that conformed not to orders of Parliament, to make their complaint to a committee for that purpose ; and the minister, though a hundred miles from London, should appear there, and give satisfaction, or be sequestered ; and you may be sure no parish could want a covetous, or malicious, or cross-grained complaint; by which means all prisons in London, and in some other places, became the sad habitations of conforming divines. And about this time the Bishop of Canterbury having been by an unknown law condemned to die, and the execution sus- pended for some days, many of the malicious citizens, fearing his pardon, shut up their shops, professing not to open them till justice was executed. This malice and madness is scarce credible ; but I saw it. The bishops had been voted out of the House of Parliament, and some upon that occasion sent to the Tower: which made many Covenanters rejoice, and believe Mr. Brightman who probably was a good and well-meaning man to be inspired in his Comment on the Apocalypse, an abridgment of which was now printed, and called Mr. Brightman's Revelation of the Revela- tion. And though he was grossly mistaken in other things, yet, because he had made the Churches of Geneva and Scotland, which had no bishops, to be Philadelphia in the Apocalypse, the angel that God loved (Rev. iii. 7-13), and the power of prelacy to be THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 155 Anti-christ, the evil angel, which the House of Commons had now so spewed up, as never to recover their dignity; therefore did those Covenanters approve and applaud Mr. Brightman for discovering and foretelling the bishops' downfall; so that they both railed at them, and rejoiced to buy good pennyworths of their land, which their friends of the House of Commons did afford them, as a reward of their diligent assistance to pull them down. And the bishop's power being now vacated, the common people were made so happy, as every parish might choose their own minister, and tell him when he did, and when he did not, preach true doctrine : and by this and like means, several churches had several teachers, that prayed and preached for and against one another: and engaged their hearers to contend furiously for truths which they understood not ; some of which I shall men- tion in the discourse that follows. I have heard of two men, that in their discourse undertook to give a character of a third person : and one concluded he was a very honest man, "for he was beholden to him; " and the other that he was not, "for he was not beholden to him." And some- thing like this was in the designs both of the Covenanters and Independents, the last of which were now grown both as numerous and as powerful as the former : for though they differed much in many principles, and preached against each other, one making it a sign of being in the state of grace, if we were but zealous for the Covenant ; and the other, that we ought to buy and sell by a measure, and to allow the same liberty of conscience to others, which we by scripture claim to ourselves; and therefore not to force any to swear the Covenant contrary to their consciences, and lose both their livings and liberties too. Though these differed thus in their conclusions, yet they both agreed in their practice to preach down Common Prayer, and get into the best sequestered livings; and whatever became of the true owners, their wives and children, yet to continue in them without the least scruple of conscience. They also made other strange observations of Election, Reproba- tion, and Free Will, and the other points dependent upon these; such as the wisest of the common people were not fit to judge of; I am sure I am not : though I must mention some of them histon- 156 IZAAK WALTON cally in a more proper place, when I have brought my reader with me to Dr. Sanderson at Boothby Pannell. And in the way thither I must tell him, that a very Covenanter, and a Scot too, that came into England with his unhappy Covenant, was got into a good sequestered living by the help of a Presbyterian parish, which had got the true owner out. And this Scotch Presbyterian, being well settled in this good living, began to reform the churchyard, by cutting down a large yew-tree, and some other trees that were an ornament to the place, and very often a shelter to the parishioners; who, excepting against him for so doing, were answered, "That the trees were his, and 'twas lawful for every man to use his own, as he, and not as they thought fit." I have heard, but do not affirm it', that no action lies against him that is so wicked as to steal the winding-sheet of a dead body after it is buried ; and have heard the reason to be, because none were supposed to be so void of humanity; and that such a law would vilify that nation that would but suppose so vile a man to be born in it : nor would one suppose any man to do what this Covenanter did. And whether there were any law against him, I know not; but pity the parish the less for turning out their legal minister. We have now overtaken Dr. Sanderson at Boothby Parish, where he hoped to enjoy himself, though in a poor, yet in a quiet and desired privacy; but it proved otherwise; for all corners of the nation were filled with Covenanters, confusion, committee-men, and soldiers, serving each other to their several ends, of revenge, or power, or profit : and these committee-men and soldiers were most of them so possessed with this Covenant, that they became like those that were infected with that dreadful plague of Athens ; the plague of which plague was, that they by it became maliciously restless to get into company, and to joy, so the historian saith, when they had infected others, even those of their most beloved or nearest friends or relations : and though there might be some of these Covenanters that were beguiled and meant well ; yet such were the generality of them, and temper of the times, that you may be sure Dr. Sanderson, who though quiet and harmless, yet an eminent dissenter from them, could not live peaceably; nor did he; for the soldiers would appear, and visibly disturb him in the church when he read prayers, pretending to advise him how THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 157 God was to be served most acceptably : which he not approving, but continuing to observe order and decent behaviour in reading the Church service, they forced his book from him, and tore it, expecting extemporary prayers. At this time he was advised by a Parliament man of power and note, that valued and loved him much, not to be strict in reading all the Common Prayer, but make some little variation, especially if the soldiers came to watch him; for then it might not be in the power of him and his other friends to secure him from taking the Covenant, or sequestration : for which reasons he did vary somewhat from the strict rules of the rubric. I will set down the very words of confession which he used, as I have it under his own hand ; and tell the reader, that all his other variations were as little, and much like to this. HIS CONFESSION "O Almighty God and merciful Father, we, thy unworthy servants, do with shame and sorrow confess, that we have all our life long gone astray out of thy ways like lost sheep; and that, by following too much the vain devices and desires of our own hearts, we have grievously offended against thy holy laws, both in thought, word, and deed; we have many times left undone those good duties which we might and ought to have done; and we have many times done those evils, when we might have avoided them, which we ought not to have done. We confess, O Lord ! that there is no health at all, nor help in any creature to relieve us; but all our hope is in thy mercy, whose justice we have by our sins so far provoked. Have mercy therefore upon us, O Lord ! have mercy upon us, miserable offenders : spare us, good God, who confess our faults, that we perish not; but, according to thy gracious promises declared unto mankind in Christ Jesus our Lord, restore us upon our true repentance into thy grace and favour. And grant, O most merciful Father ! for his sake, that we hence- forth study to serve and please thee by leading a godly, righteous, and a sober life, to the glory- of thy holy name, and the eternal comfort of our own souls, through Jesus Christ our Lord." Amen. 158 IZAAK WALTON In these disturbances of tearing his service-book, a neighbour came on a Sunday, after the evening service was ended, to visit and condole with him for the affront offered by the soldiers. To whom he spake with a composed patience, and said : " God hath restored me to my desired privacy, with my wife and children ; where I hoped to have met with quietness, and it proves not so : but I will labour to be pleased, because God, on whom I depend, sees it is not fit for me to be quiet. I praise him, that he hath by his grace pre- vented me from making shipwreck of a good conscience to main- tain me in a place of great reputation and profit : and though my condition be such, that I need the last, yet I submit; for God did not send me into, this world to do my own, but suffer his will, and I will obey it." Thus by a sublime depending on his wise, and powerful, and pitiful Creator, he did cheerfully sub- mit to what God had appointed, justifying the truth of that doctrine which he had preached. About this time that excellent book of The King's Meditations in his Solitude was printed and made public ; and Dr. Sanderson was such a lover of the author, and so desirous that the whole world should see the character of him in that book, and some- thing of the cause for which they suffered, that he designed to turn it into Latin: but when he had done half of it most excellently, his friend Dr. Earle prevented him, by appearing to have done the whole very well before him. About this time his dear and most intimate friend, the learned Dr. Hammond, came to enjoy a conversation and rest with him for some days ; and did so. And having formerly persuaded him to trust his excellent memory, and not read, but try to speak a ser- mon as he had writ it, Dr. Sanderson became so compliant as to promise he would. And to that end they two went early the Sunday following to a neighbour minister, and requested to exchange a sermon ; and they did so. And at Dr. Sanderson's going into the pulpit, he gave his sermon which was a very short one into the hand of Dr. Hammond, intending to preach it as it was writ : but before he had preached a third part, Dr. Hammond looking on his sermon as written observed him to be out, and so lost as to the matter, that he also became afraid for him ; for 'twas dis- cernible to many of the plain auditory. But when he had ended THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 159 this short sermon, as they two walked homeward, Dr. Sanderson said with much earnestness, "Good Doctor, give me my sermon; and know that neither you nor any man living shall ever persuade me to preach again without my books." To which the reply was, "Good Doctor, be not angry: for if I ever persuade you to preach again without book, I will give you leave to burn all those that I am master of." Part of the occasion of Dr. Hammond's visit was at this time to discourse with Dr. Sanderson about some opinions, in which, if they did not then, they had doubtless differed formerly : it was about those knotty points, which are by the learned called the Quinquarticular Controversy; of which I shall proceed, not to give any judgment, I pretend not to that, but some short historical account which shall follow. There had been, since the unhappy Covenant was brought and so generally taken in England, a liberty given or taken by many preachers those of London especially to preach and be too positive in the points of Universal Redemption, Predestina- tion, and those others depending upon these. Some of which preached, "That all men were, before they came into this world, so predestinated to salvation or damnation, that it was not in their power to sin so, as to lose the first, nor by their most diligent en- deavour to avoid the latter. Others, that it was not so : because then God could not be said to grieve for the death of a sinner, when he himself had made him so by an inevitable decree, before he had so much as a being in this world;" affirming therefore, "that man had some power left him to do the will of God, because he was advised to work out his salvation with fear and trembling;" maintaining, "that it is most certain every man can do what he can to be saved;" and that "he that does what he can to be saved, shall never be damned." And yet many that affirmed this would confess, "That that grace, which is but a persuasive offer, and left to us to receive, or refuse, is not that grace which shall bring men to heaven." Which truths, or untruths, or both, be they which they will, did upon these, or the like' occasions, come to be searched into, and charitably debated betwixt Dr. San- derson, Dr. Hammond, and Dr. Pierce, the now Reverend Dean of Salisbury, of which I shall proceed to give some account, but briefly. l6o IZAAK WALTON In the year 1648, the fifty- two London ministers then a fraternity of Sion College in that city had in a printed declara- tion aspersed Dr. Hammond most heinously, for that he had in his Practical Catechism affirmed, that our Saviour died for the sins of all mankind. To justify which truth, he presently makes a charitable reply as 'tis now printed in his works. After which there were many letters passed betwixt the said Dr. Hammond, Dr. Sanderson, and Dr. Pierce, concerning God's grace and decrees. Dr. Sander- son was with much unwillingness drawn into this debate; for he declared it would prove uneasy to him, who in his judgment of God's decrees differed with Dr. Hammond, whom he reverenced and loved dearly, .and would not therefore engage him into a controversy of which he could never hope to see an end : but they did all enter into a charitable disquisition of these said points in several letters, to the full satisfaction of the learned ; those be- twixt Dr. Sanderson and Dr. Hammond being printed in his works; and for what passed betwixt him and the learned Dr. Pierce, I refer my reader to a letter annexed to the end of this relation. I think the judgment of Dr. Sanderson was, by these debates, altered from what it was at his entrance into them; for in the year 1632, when his excellent sermons were first printed in quarto, the reader may on the margin find some accusation of Arminius for false doctrine; and find that, upon a review and reprinting those sermons in folio, in the year 1657, that accusation of Ar- minius is omitted. And the change of his judgment seems more fully to appear in his said letter to Dr. Pierce. And let me now tell the reader, which may seem to be perplexed with these several affirmations of God's decrees before mentioned, that Dr. Hammond, in a postscript to the last letter of Dr. Sanderson's, says, " God can reconcile his own contradictions, and therefore advises all men, as the apostle does, to study mortification, and be wise to sobriety." And let me add further, that if these fifty-two ministers of Sion College were the occasion of the debates in these letters, they have, I think, been the occasion of giving an end to the Quinquartic- ular Controversy : for none have since undertaken to say more ; but seem to be so wise, as to be content to be ignorant of the rest, till they come to that place where the secrets of all hearts shall be THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 161 laid open. And let me here tell the reader also, that if the rest of mankind would, as Dr. Sanderson, not conceal their alteration of judgment, but confess it to the honour of God, and themselves, then our nation would become freer from pertinacious disputes, and fuller of recantations. I cannot lead my reader to Dr. Hammond and Dr. Sanderson, where we left them at Boothby Pannell, till I have looked back to the Long Parliament, the Society of Covenanters in Sion College, and those others scattered up and down in London, and given some account of their proceedings and usage of the late learned Dr. Laud, then Archbishop of Canterbury. And though I will forbear to mention the injustice of his death, and the barbarous usage of him, both then and before it; yet my desire is that what follows may be noted, because it does now, or may hereafter, concern us ; namely, that in his last sad sermon on the scaffold at his death, he having freely pardoned all his enemies, and humbly begged of God to pardon them, and besought those present to pardon and pray for him; yet he seemed to accuse the magistrates of the city for suffering a sort of wretched people, that could not know why he was condemned, to go visibly up and down to gather hands to a petition, that the Parliament would hasten his execution. And having declared how unjustly he thought himself to be con- demned, and accused for endeavouring to bring in Popery, for that was one of the accusations for which he died, he declared with sadness, " That the several sects and divisions then in England which he had laboured to prevent were like to bring the Pope a far greater harvest than he could ever have expected without them." And said, " These sects and divisions introduce profane- ness under the cloak of an imaginary religion; and that we have lost the substance of religion by changing it into opinion : and that by these means this Church, which all the Jesuits' machina- tions could not ruin, was fallen into apparent danger by those which were his accusers." To this purpose he spoke at his death: for this, and more of which, the reader may view his last sad sermon on the scaffold. And it is here mentioned, because his dear friend, Dr. Sanderson, seems to demonstrate the same in his two large and remarkable prefaces before his two volumes of sermons; and he seems also with much sorrow M 162 IZAAK WALTON to say the same again in his last will, made when he apprehended himself to be very near his death. And these Covenanters ought to take notice of it, and to remember that by the late wicked war begun by them, Dr. Sanderson was ejected out of the Professor's Chair in Oxford ; and that if he had continued in it for he lived fourteen years after both the learned of this and other nations had been made happy by many remarkable cases of conscience, so rationally stated, and so briefly, so clearly, and so convincingly determined, that posterity might have joyed and boasted that Dr. Sanderson was born in this nation, for the ease and benefit of all the learned that shall be born after him : but this benefit is so like time past, that they are both irrevocably lost. I should now return to Boothby Pannell, where we left Dr. Hammond and Dr. Sanderson together; but neither can be found there: for the first was in his journey to London, and the second seized upon the day after his friend's departure, and carried prisoner to Lincoln, then a garrison of the Parliament's. For the pretended reason of which commitment I shall give this following account. There was one Mr. Clarke, the minister of Alington, a town not many miles from Boothby Pannell, who was an active man for the Parliament and Covenant; one that, when Belvoir Castle then a garrison for the Parliament was ta'ken by a party of the King's soldiers, was taken in it, and made a prisoner of war in Newark, then a garrison of the King's ; a man so active and useful for his party, that they became so much concerned for his enlarge- ment, that the Committee of Lincoln sent a troop of horse to seize and bring Dr. Sanderson a prisoner to that garrison : and they did so. And there he had the happiness to meet with many that knew him so well as to treat him kindly ; but told him, " He must con- tinue their prisoner, till he should purchase his own enlargement by procuring an exchange for Mr. Clarke, then prisoner in the King's garrison of Newark." There were many reasons given by the Doctor of the injustice of his imprisonment, and the inequality of the exchange: but all were ineffectual; for done it must be, or he continue a prisoner. And in time done it was, upon the following conditions. First, that Dr. Sanderson and Mr. Clarke, being exchanged. THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 163 should live undisturbed at their own parishes; and if either were injured by the soldiers of the contrary party, the other, having notice of it, should procure him a redress, by having satisfaction made for his loss, or for any other injury; or if not, he to be used in the same kind by the other party. Neverthe- less, Dr. Sanderson could neither live safe nor quietly, being several times plundered, and once wounded in three places: but he, apprehending the remedy might turn to a more intol- erable burden by impatience or complaining, forbore both; and possessed his soul in a contented quietness, without the least repining. But though he could not enjoy the safety he expected by this exchange, yet, by His providence that can bring good out of evil, it turned so much to his advantage, that whereas as his living had been sequestered from the year 1644, and con- tinued to be so till this time of his imprisonment, he, by the Articles of War in this exchange for Mr. Clarke, procured his sequestra- tion to be recalled, and by that means enjoyed a poor but contented subsistence for himself, wife, and children, till the happy restora- tion of our King and Church. In this time of his poor but contented privacy of life, his casuis- tical learning, peaceful moderation, and sincerity became so remarkable, that there were many that applied themselves to him for resolution in cases of conscience; some known to him, many not; some requiring satisfaction by conference, others by letters; so many, that his life became almost as restless as their minds; yet he denied no man: and if it be a truth which holy Mr. Herbert says, "That all worldly joys seem less, when com- pared with showing mercy or doing kindnesses," then doubtless Dr. Sanderson might have boasted for relieving so many restless and wounded consciences; which, as Solomon says, "are a burden that none can bear, though their fortitude may sustain their other infirmities;" and if words cannot express the joy of a conscience relieved from such restless agonies; then Dr. Sanderson might rejoice that so many were by him so clearly and conscientiously satisfied, for he denied none, and would often praise God for that ability, and as often for the occasion, and that God had inclined his heart to do it to the meanest of any of those poor but precious souls, for which his Saviour vouchsafed to be crucified. 164 IZAAK WALTON Some of these very many cases that were resolved by letters have been preserved and printed for the benefit of posterity, as namely 1. Of the Sabbath. 2. Marrying with a Recusant. 3. Of Unlawful Love. 4. Of a Military Life. 5. Of Scandal. 6. Of a Bond taken in the King's Name. 7. Of the Engagement. 8. Of a Rash Vow. But many more remain in private hands, of which one is of Simony; and I wish the world might see it, that it might un- deceive some patrons, who think they have discharged that great and dangerous trust, both to God and man, if they take no money for a living, though it may be parted with for other ends less justifiable. And in this time of his retirement, when the common people were amazed and grown giddy by the many falsehoods and missapplications of truths frequently vented in sermons; when they wrested the Scripture by challenging God to be of their party, and called upon him in their prayers to patronise their sacrilege and zealous frenzies ; in this time he did so compassion- ate the generality of this misled nation, that though the times threatened danger, yet he then hazarded his safety by writing the large and bold preface, now extant, before his last twenty sermons first printed in the year 1655 m which there was such strength of reason, with so powerful and clear convincing applications made to the Nonconformists, as being read by one of those dissenting brethren, who was possessed with such a spirit of contradiction, as being neither able to defend his error, nor yield to truth manifest, his conscience having slept long and quietly in a good seques- tered living, was yet at the reading of it so awakened, that after a conflict with the reason he had met, and the damage he was to sustain if he consented to it, and being still unwilling to be so convinced, as to lose by being over-reasoned, he went in haste to the bookseller of whom it was bought, threatened him, and told THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 165 him in anger, "he had sold a book in which there was false divinity ; and that the preface had upbraided the Parliament, and many godly ministers of that party, for unjust dealing." To which his reply was, 'twas Tim. Garth waite, "That 'twas not his trade to judge of true or false divinity, but to print and sell books : and yet if he, or any friend of his, would write an answer to it, and own it by setting his name to it, he would print the answer, and promote the selling of it." About the time of his printing this excellent preface, I met him accidentally in London, in sad-coloured clothes, and, God knows, far from being costly. The place of our meeting was near to Little Britain, where he had been to buy a book, which he then had in his hand. We had no inclination to part presently, and therefore turned to stand in a corner under a pent-house, for it began to rain, and immediately the wind rose, and the rain increased so much, that both became so inconvenient, as to force us into a cleanly house, where we had bread, cheese, ale, and a fire for our money. This rain and wind were so obliging to me, as to force our stay there for at least an hour, to my great content and advantage, for in that time he made to me many useful observations, with much clearness and conscientious freedom. I shall relate a part of them, in hope they may also turn to the ad- vantage of my reader. He seemed to lament that the Parlia- ment had taken upon them to abolish our Liturgy, to the scandal of so many devout and learned men, and the disgrace of those many martyrs who had sealed the truth and use of it with their blood : and that no minister was now thought godly that did not decry it, and at least pretend to make better prayers ex tempore: and that they, and only they, that could do so prayed by the Spirit, and were godly; though in their sermons they disputed, and evidently contradicted each other in their prayers. And as he did dislike this, so he did most highly commend the Common Prayer of the Church, saying, "the Collects were the most pas- sionate, proper, and most elegant expressions that any language ever afforded ; and that there was in them such piety, and so in- terwoven with instructions, that they taught us to know the power, the wisdom, the majesty, and mercy of God, and much of our duty both to him and our neighbour : and that a congregation, l66 IZAAK WALTON behaving themselves reverently, and putting up to God these joint and known desires for pardon of sins, and praises for mercies re- ceived, could not but be more pleasing to God than those raw, un- premeditated expressions to which many of the hearers could not say, Amen." And he then commended to me the frequent use of the Psalter, or Psalms of David; speaking to this purpose: "That they were the treasury of Christian comfort, fitted for all persons and necessi- ties ; able to raise the soul from dejection by the frequent mention of God's mercies to repentant sinners ; to stir up holy desires : to increase joy; to moderate sorrow; to nourish hope, and teach us patience, by waiting God's leisure : to beget a trust in the mercy, power, and providence of our Creator ; and to cause a resignation of ourselves to his will; and then, and not till then, to believe ourselves happy." This, he said, the Liturgy and Psalms taught us; and that by the frequent use of the last, they would not only prove to be our soul's comfort, but would become so habitual as to transform them into the image of his soul that composed them. After this manner he expressed himself concerning the Liturgy and Psalms; and seemed to lament that this, which was the devotion of the more primitive times, should in common pulpits be turned into needless debates about Freewill, Election, and Reprobation, of which, and many like questions, we may be safely ignorant, because Almighty God intends not to lead us to Heaven by hard questions, but by meekness and charity, and a frequent practice of devotion. And he seemed to lament very much that, by the means of irregular and indiscreet preaching, the generality of the nation were possessed with such dangerous mistakes, as to think "they might be religious first, and then just and merciful; that they might sell their consciences, and yet have something left that was worth keeping; that they might be sure they were elected, though their lives were visibly scandalous; that to be cunning was to be wise; that to be rich was to be happy, though their wealth was got without justice or mercy; that to be busy in things they understood not was no sin." These and the like mistakes he lamented much, and besought God to remove them, and restore us to that humility, sincerity, and single-hearted- THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 167 ness with which this nation was blessed before the unhappy Cove- nant was brought into the nation, and every man preached and prayed what seemed best in his own eyes. And he then said to me, "That the way to restore this nation to a more meek and Christian temper, was to have the body of divinity or so much of it as was needful to be known to be put into fifty-two homi- lies or sermons, of such a length as not to exceed a third or fourth part of an hour's reading: and these needful points to be made so clear and plain, that those of a mean capacity might know what was necessary to be believed, and what God requires to be done ; and then some applications of trials and conviction : and these to be read every Sunday of the year, as infallibly as the blood circulates the body; and then as certainly begun again, and con- tinued the year following: and that this being done, it might probably abate the inordinate desires of knowing what we need not, and practising what we know and ought to do." This was the earnest desire of this prudent man. And Oh that Dr. Sander- son had undertaken it ! for then in all probability it would have proved effectual. At this happy time of enjoying his company and his discourse, he expressed a sorrow by saying to me, "Oh that I had gone chaplain to that excellently accomplished gentleman, your friend, Sir Henry Wotton ! 1 which was once intended, when he first went Ambassador to the State of Venice : for by that employment I had been forced into a necessity of conversing, not with him only, but with several men of several nations ; and might thereby have kept myself from my unmanly bashfulness, which has proved very troublesome, and not less inconvenient to me; and which I now fear is become so habitual as never to leave me: and by that means I might also have known, or at least have had the satisfaction of seeing, one of the late miracles of general learning, prudence, and modesty, Sir Henry Wotton's dear friend, Padre Paulo, 2 who, the author of his life says, was born with a bashful- ness as invincible as I have found my own to be : a man whose fame must never die, till virtue and learning shall become so useless as not to be regarded." 1 Sir Henry Wotton, 1568-1639, English diplomatist and author. 2 Fra Paolo Sarpi, 1552-1623, Venetian philosopher, historian, and patriot. 1 68 IZAAK WALTON This was a part of the benefit I then had by that hour's conver- sation: and I gladly remember and mention it as an argument of my happiness, and his great humility and condescension. I had also a like advantage by another happy conference with him, which I am desirous to impart in this place to the reader. He lamented much that in many parishes, where the maintenance was not great, there was no minister to officiate; and that many of the best sequestered livings were possessed with such rigid Covenanters as denied the Sacrament to their parishioners, unless upon such conditions and in such a manner as they could not take it. This he mentioned with much sorrow, saying, "The blessed Sacrament did, by way of preparation for it, give occasion to all conscientious receivers to examine the performance of their vows, since they received their last seal for the pardon of their sins past; and to examine and research their hearts, and make penitent reflections on their failings; and, that done, to bewail them, and then make new vows or resolutions to obey all God's commands, and beg his grace to perform them. And this done, the Sacrament repairs the decays of grace, helps us to conquer infirmities, gives us grace to beg God's grace, and then gives us what we beg ; makes us still hunger and thirst after his righteous- ness, which we then receive, and being assisted with our endeav- ours, will still so dwell in us, as to become our satisfaction in this life and our comfort on our last sick-beds." The want of this blessed benefit he lamented much, and pitied their condition that desired, but could not obtain it. I hope I shall not disoblige my reader, if I here enlarge into a further character of his person and temper. As first, that he was moderately tall : his behaviour had in it much of a plain comeliness, and very little, yet enough, of ceremony or court- ship; his looks and motion manifested affability and mildness, and yet he had with these a calm, but so matchless a fortitude, as secured him from complying with any of those many Parlia- ment injunctions that interfered with a doubtful conscience. His learning was methodical and exact, his wisdom useful, his integrity visible, and his whole life so unspotted that all ought to be preserved as copies for posterity to write after; the clergy especially, who with impure hands ought not to offer sacrifice to that God, whose pure eyes abhor iniquity. THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 169 There was in his sermons no improper rhetoric, nor such perplexed divisions, as may be said to be like too much light, that so dazzles the eyes that the sight becomes less perfect : but there was therein no want of useful matter, nor waste of words ; and yet such clear distinctions as dispelled all confused notions, and made his hearers depart both wiser, and more confirmed in virtuous resolutions. His memory was so matchless and firm, as 'twas only over- come by his bashfulness; for he alone, or to a friend, could repeat all the Odes of Horace, all Tully's Offices, and much of Juvenal and Persius, without book: and would say, "the repetition of one of the Odes of Horace to himself was to him such music, as a lesson on the viol was to others, when they played it to them- selves or friends." And though he was blessed with a clearer judgment than other men, yet he was so distrustful of it, that he did over-consider of consequences, and would so delay and reconsider what to determine, that though none ever determined better, yet, when the bell tolled for him to appear and read his divinity lectures in Oxford, and all the scholars attended to hear him, he had not then, or not till then, resolved and writ what he meant to determine; so that that appeared to be a truth, which his old dear friend Dr. Sheldon would often say, namely, "That his judgment was so much superior to his fancy, that whatsoever this suggested, that disliked and controlled; still considering and re-considering, till his time was so wasted, that he was forced to write, not, probably, what was best, but what he thought last." And yet what he did then read appeared to all hearers to be so useful, clear, and satisfactory, as none ever determined with greater applause. These tiring and per- plexing thoughts begot in him an averseness to enter into the toil of considering and determining all casuistical points; because during that time, they neither gave rest to his body or mind. But though he would not be always loaden with these knotty points and distinctions; yet the study of old records, geneal- ogies, and heraldry were a recreation, and so pleasing, that he would say they gave rest to his mind. Of the last of which I have seen two remarkable volumes ; and the reader needs neither to doubt their truth or exactness. 170 IZAAK WALTON And this humble man had so conquered all repining and am- bitious thoughts, and with them all other unruly passions, that if the accidents of the day proved to his danger or damage, yet he both began and ended it with an even and undisturbed quiet- ness; always praising God that he had not withdrawn food and raiment from him and his poor family ; nor suffered him to violate his conscience for his safety, or to support himself or them in a more splendid or plentiful condition ; and that he therefore resolved with David, "That his praise should be always in his mouth." I have taken a content in giving my reader this character of his person, his temper, and some of the accidents of his life past ; and more might be added of all; but I will with great sorrow look* forward to the sad days, in which so many good men suf- fered, about the year 1658, at which time Dr. Sanderson was in a very low condition as to his estate; and in that time Mr. Robert Boyle a gentleman of a very noble birth, and more eminent for his liberality, learning, and virtue, and of whom I would say much more, but that he still lives having casually met with and read his lectures de Juramento, to his great satis- faction, and being informed of Dr. Sanderson's great innocence and sincerity, and that he and his family were brought into a low condition by his not complying with the Parliament's in- junctions, sent him by his dear friend Dr. Barlow the now learned Bishop of Lincoln 50, and with it a request and promise. The request was, that he would review the Lectures de Conscientid, which he had read when he was Doctor of the Chair in Oxford, and print them for the good of posterity: and this Dr. Sanderson did in the year 1659. And the promise was, that he would pay him that, or a greater sum if desired, during his life, to enable him to pay an amanuensis, to ease him from the trouble of writing what he should conceive or dictate. For the more particular account of which I refer my reader to a letter writ by the said Dr. Barlow, which I have annexed to the end of this relation. Towards the end of this year, 1659, when the many mixed sects, and their creators and merciless protectors, had led or driven each other into a whirlpool of confusion: when amaze- ment and fear had seized them, and their accusing consciences THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 171 gave them an inward and fearful intelligence, that the god which they had long served was now ready to pay them such wages, as he does always reward witches with for their obeying him: when these wretches were come to foresee an end of their cruel reign, by our King's return; and such sufferers as Dr. San- derson and with him many of the oppressed clergy and others could foresee the cloud of their afflictions would be dispersed by it; then, in the beginning of the year following, the King was by God restored to us, and we to our known laws and liber- ties, and a general joy and peace seemed to breathe through the three nations. Then were the suffering clergy freed from their sequestration, restored to their revenues, and to a liberty to adore, praise, and pray to God in such order as their con- sciences and oaths had formerly obliged them. And the reader will easily believe, that Dr. Sanderson and his dejected family rejoiced to see this day, and be of this number. It ought to be considered which I have often heard or read that in the primitive times men of learning and virtue were usually sought for, and solicited to accept of episcopal govern- ment, and often refused it. For they conscientiously considered that the office of a bishop was made up of labour and care ; that they were trusted to be God's almoners of the Church's revenue and double their care for the poor; to live strictly themselves, and use all diligence to see that their family, officers, and clergy did so; and that the account of that stewardship must, at the last dreadful day, be made to the Searcher of all hearts: and that in the primitive times they were therefore timorous to under- take it. It may not be said that Dr. Sanderson was accomplished with these, and all the other requisites required in a bishop, so as to be able to answer them exactly; but it may be affirmed, as a good preparation, that he had at the age of seventy-three years for he was so old at the King's return fewer faults to be pardoned by God or man, than are apparent in others in these days, in which God knows, we fall so short of that visible sanctity and zeal to God's glory, which was apparent in the days of primitive Christianity. This is mentioned by way of prepa- ration to what I shall say more of Dr. Sanderson; namely, that, at the King's return, Dr. Sheldon, the late prudent Bishop 172 IZAAK WALTON of Canterbury, than whom none knew, valued, or loved Dr. Sanderson, more or better, was by his Majesty made a chief trustee to commend to him fit men to supply the then vacant bishoprics. And Dr. Sheldon knew none fitter than Dr. San- derson, and therefore humbly desired the King that he would nominate him: and, that done, he did as humbly desire Dr. Sanderson that he would, for God's and the Church's sake, take that charge and care upon him. Dr. Sanderson had, if not an unwillingness, certainly no forwardness to undertake it; and would often say, he had not led himself, but his friend would now lead him into a temptation, which he had daily prayed against; and besought God, if he did undertake it, so to assist him with his grace, that the example of his life, his cares and endeavours, might promote his glory, and help forward the salvation of others. This I have mentioned as a happy preparation to his bish- opric; and am next to tell, that he was consecrated Bishop of Lincoln at Westminster, the 28th of October, 1660. There was about this time a Christian care taken, that those whose consciences were, as they said, tender, and could not comply with the service and ceremonies of the Church, might have satisfaction given by a friendly debate betwixt a select number of them, and some like number of those that had been sufferers for the Church service and ceremonies, and now restored to liberty; of which last some were then preferred to power and dignity in the Church. And of these Bishop Sanderson was one, and then chose to be a moderator in that debate: and he performed his trust with much mildness, patience, and reason; but all proved ineffectual; for there be some prepossessions like jealousies, which, though causeless, yet cannot be removed by reasons as apparent as demonstration can make any truth. The place appointed for this debate was the Savoy in the Strand : and the points debated were, I think, many; some affirmed to be truth and reason, some denied to be either; and these debates being then in words, proved to be so loose and perplexed as satisfied neither party. For some time that which had been affirmed was immediately forgot or denied, and so no satisfac- tion given to either party. But that the debate might become more useful, it was therefore resolved that the day following the THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 173 desires and reasons of the Nonconformists should be given in writing, and they in writing receive answers from the conform- ing party. And though I neither now can nor need to mention all the points debated, nor the names of the dissenting brethren; yet I am sure Mr. Baxter 1 was one, and am sure what shall now follow was one of the points debated. Concerning a command of lawful superiors, what was sufficient to its being a lawful command; this proposition was brought by the conforming party. "That command which commands an act in itself lawful, and no other act or circumstance unlawful, is not sinful. " Mr. Baxter denied it for two reasons, which he gave in with his own hand in writing, thus: One was, "Because that may be a sin per accidens, which is not so in itself, and may be unlawfully commanded, though that accident be not in the command." Another was, "That it may be commanded under an unjust penalty." Again, this proposition being brought by the Conformists, "That command which commandeth an act in itself lawful, and no other act whereby any unjust penalty is enjoined, nor any circumstance whence, per accidens, any sin is consequent which the commander ought to provide against, is not sinful." Mr. Baxter denied it for this reason, then given in with his own hand in writing thus: "Because the first act commanded may be per accidens unlawful, and be commanded by an unjust penalty, though no other act or circumstance commanded be such." Again, this proposition being brought by the Conformists, "That command which commandeth an act in itself lawful, and no other act whereby any unjust penalty is enjoined, nor any circumstance, whence directly, or per accidens, any sin is con- sequent, which the commander ought to provide against, hath in it all things requisite to the lawfulness of a command, and particularly cannot be guilty of commanding an act per accidens unlawful, nor of commanding an act under an unjust penalty." Mr. Baxter denied it upon the same reasons. PETER GUNNING. JOHN PEARSON. 1 Richard Baxter, 1615-1691, author of The Saints' Everlasting Rest. 174 IZAAK WALTON These were then two of the disputants, still alive, and will attest this; one being now Lord Bishop of Ely, and the other of Chester. And the last of them told me very lately, that one of the Dissenters which I could but forbear to name ap- peared to Dr. Sanderson to be so bold, so troublesome, and so illogical in the dispute, as forced patient Dr. Sanderson who was then Bishop of Lincoln, and a moderator with other bishops to say, with an unusual earnestness, "That he had never met with a man of more pertinacious confidence, and less abili- ties, in all his conversation." But though this debate at the Savoy was ended without any great satisfaction to either party, yet both parties knew the de- sires, and understood the abilities, of the other, much better than before it: and the late distressed clergy, that were now restored to their former rights and power, did, at the next meet- ing in Convocation, contrive to give the dissenting party satis- faction by alteration, explanation, and addition to some part both of the Rubric and Common Prayer, as also by adding some necessary Collects, and a particular Collect of Thanksgiving. How many of those new Collects were worded by Dr. Sanderson, I cannot say; but am sure the whole Convocation valued him so much that he never undertook to speak to any point in ques- tion, but he was heard with great willingness and attention; and when any point in question was determined, the Convocation did usually desire him to word their intentions, and as usually approve and thank him. At this Convocation the Common Prayer was made more com- plete, by adding three new necessary Offices; which were, "A Form of Humiliation for the Murder of King Charles the Martyr; A Thanksgiving for the Restoration of his Son our King ; and For the Baptising of Persons of riper Age." I cannot say Dr. Sanderson did form, or word them all, but doubtless more than any single man of the Convocation; and he did also, by desire of the Convocation, alter and add to the forms of prayers to be used at sea now taken into the service-book. And it may be noted, that William, the now Right Reverend Bishop of Canter- bury, was in these employments diligently useful; especially in helping to rectify the Calendar and Rubric. And lastly, it may THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 175 be noted, that, for the satisfying all the dissenting brethren and others, the Convocation's reasons for the alterations and additions to the Liturgy were by them desired to be drawn up by Dr. San- derson; which being done by him, and approved by them, was appointed to be printed before the Liturgy, and may be known by this title, "The Preface;" and begins thus "It hath been the wisdom of the Church." I shall now follow him to his bishopric, and declare a part of his behaviour in that busy and weighty employment. And first, that it was with such condescension and obligingness to the meanest of his clergy, as to know and be known to them. And indeed he practised the like to all men of what degree soever, especially to his old neighbours or parishioners of Boothby Pan- nell; for there was all joy at his table, when they came to visit him: then they prayed for him, and he for them, with an un- feigned affection. I think it will not be denied but that the care and toil required of a bishop may justly challenge the riches and revenue with which their predecessors had lawfully endowed them : and yet he sought not that so much, as doing good both to the present age and posterity ; and he made this appear by what follows. The Bishop's chief house at Buckden, in the county of Hunt- ingdon, the usual residence of his predecessors, for it stands about the midst of his diocese, having been at his consecration a great part of it demolished, and what was left standing under a visible decay, was by him undertaken to be erected and repaired : and it was performed with great speed, care, and charge. And to this may be added, that the King having by an injunction commended to the care of the bishops, deans, and prebends of all Cathedral Churches, "the repair of them, their houses, and augmentation of small vicarages;" he, when he was repairing Buckden, did also augment the last, as fast as fines were paid for renewing leases : so fast, that a friend, taking notice of his bounty, was so bold as to advise him to remember "he was under his first-fruits, and that he was old, and had a wife and children yet but meanly provided for, especially if his dignity were considered. " To whom he made a mild and thankful answer, saying, " It would not become a Chris- tian bishop to suffer those houses built by his predecessors to be 176 IZAAK WALTON ruined for want of repair; and less justifiable to suffer any of those, that were called to so high a calling as to sacrifice at God's altar, to eat the bread of sorrow constantly, when he had a power by a small augmentation, to turn it into the bread of cheerfulness : and wished, that as this was, so it were also in his power to make all mankind happy, for he desired nothing more. And for his wife and children, he hoped to leave them a competence, and in the hands of a God that would provide for all that kept innocence, and trusted His providence and protection, which he had always found enough to make and keep him happy. " There was in his diocese a minister of almost his age, that had been of Lincoln College when he left it, who visited him often, and always welcome, because he was a man of innocence and open heart- edness. This minister asked the Bishop what books he studied most, when he laid the foundation of his great and clear learning. To which his answer was, "that he declined reading many; but what he did read were well chosen, and read so often, that he became very familiar with them;" and said, "they were chiefly three, Aristotle's Rhetoric, Aquinas's Secunda Secundce, and Tully, but chiefly his Offices, which he had not read over less than twenty times, and could at this age say without book. " And told him also, "the learned civilian Doctor Zouch who died lately had writ Elementa Juris prudentice, which was a book that he could also say without book; and that no wise man could read it too often, or love or commend too much;" and told him "these had been his toil ; but for himself he always had a natural love to genealogies and heraldry; and that when his thoughts were harassed with any perplexed studies, he left off, and turned to them as a recreation ; and that his very recreation had made him so perfect in them, that he could, in a very short time, give an account of the descent, arms, and antiquity of any family of the nobility or gentry of this nation. " Before I give an account of Dr. Sanderson's last sickness, I desire to tell the reader that he was of a healthful constitution, cheerful and mild, of an even temper, very moderate in his diet, and had had little sickness, till some few years before his death ; but was then every winter punished with a diarrhoea, which left not till warm weather returned and removed it: and this distemper did, THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 177 as he grew older, seize him oftener, and continue longer with him. But though it weakened him, yet it made him rather indis- posed than sick, and did no way disable him from studying indeed too much. In this decay of his strength, but not of his memory or reason, for this distemper works not upon the under- standing, he made his last will, of which I shall give some account for confirmation of what hath been said, and what I think convenient to be known, before I declare his death and burial. He did in his last will give an account of his faith and persuasion in point of religion, and Church government, in these very words : "I, Robert Sanderson, Doctor of Divinity, an unworthy Minister of Jesus Christ, and, by the providence of God, Bishop of Lincoln, being by the long continuance of an habitual distemper brought to a great bodily weakness and faintness of spirits, but by the great mercy of God without any bodily pain otherwise, or decay of understanding, do make this my Will and Testament, written all with my own hand, revoking all former Wills by me heretofore made, if any such shall be found. First, I commend my soul into the hands of Almighty God, as of a faithful Creator, which I humbly beseech him mercifully to accept, looking upon it, not as it is in itself infinitely polluted with sin, but as it is redeemed and purged with precious blood of his only beloved Son, and my most sweet Saviour Jesus Christ ; in confidence of whose merits and medita- tion alone it is, that I cast myself upon the mercy of God for the pardon of my sins, and the hopes of eternal life. And here I do profess, that as I have lived, so I desire, and by the grace of God resolve, to die in the communion of the Catholic Church of Christ, and a true son of the Church of England : which, as it stands by law established, to be both in doctrine and worship agreeable to the word of God, and in the most, and most material points of both conformable to the faith and practice of the godly Churches of Christ in the primitive and purer times, I do firmly believe : led so to do, not so much from the force of custom and education, to which the greatest part of mankind owe their particular different persuasions in point of religion, as upon the clear evidence of truth and reason, after a serious and impartial examination of the grounds, as well of Popery as Puritanism, according to that meas- ure of understanding, and those opportunities which God hath 178 IZAAK WALTON afforded me : and herein I am abundantly satisfied, that the schism which the Papists on the one hand, and the superstition which the Puritan on the other hand, lay to our charge, are very justly charge- able upon themselves respectively. Wherefore I humbly beseech Almighty God, the Father of mercies, to preserve the Church by his power and providence, in peace, truth, and godliness, ever- more to the world 's end : which doubtless he will do, if the wicked- ness and security of a sinful people and particularly those sins that are so rife, and seem daily to increase among us, of un- thankfulness, riot, and sacrilege do not tempt his patience to the contrary. And I also further humbly beseech him, that it would please him to give unto our gracious Sovereign, the reverend bish- ops, and the Parliament, timely to consider the great danger that visibly threatens this Church in point of religion by the late great increase of Popery, and in point of revenue by sacrilegious inclos- ures; and to provide such wholesome and effectual remedies, as may prevent the same before it be too late." And for a further manifestation of his humble thoughts and desires, they may appear to the reader by another part of his will which follows. "As for my corruptible body, I bequeath it to the earth whence it was taken, to be decently buried in the Parish Church of Buckden, towards the upper end of the chancel, upon the second, or at the furthest the third day after my decease ; and that with as little noise, pomp, and charge as may be, without the invitation of any person how near soever related unto me, other than the inhabitants of Buckden; without the unnecessary expense of escutcheons, gloves, ribbons, etc., and without any blacks to be hung anywhere in or about the house or Church, other than a pulpit cloth, a hearse cloth, and a mourning gown for the preacher ; whereof the former after my body shall be interred to be given to the preacher of the funeral sermon, and the latter to the curate of the parish for the time being. And my will further is that the funeral sermon be preached by my own household chaplain, containing some wholesome discourse concerning Mortality, the Resurrection of the Dead and the Last Judgment; and that he shall have for his pains 5, upon con- dition that he speak nothing at all concerning my person, either THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 179 good or ill, other than I myself shall direct ; only signifying to the auditory that it was my express will to have it so. And it is my will, that no costly monument be erected for my memory, but only a fair flat marble stone to be laid over me, with this incription in legible Roman characters, DEPOSITUM ROBERTI SANDERSON NU- PER LINCOLNIENSIS EPISCOPI, QUI OBIIT ANNO DOMINI MDCLXII. ET ^TATIS SU.E SEPTUAGESIMO SEXTO, HIC REQUIESCIT IN SPE BEATE RESURRECTIONIS. This manner of burial, although I cannot but foresee it will prove unsatisfactory to sundry my nearest friends and relations, and be apt to be censured by others, as an evidence of my too much parsimony and narrowness of mind, as being altogether unusual, and not according to the mode of these times : yet it is agreeable to the sense of my heart, and I do very much desire my will may be carefully observed herein, hoping it may become exemplary to some or other : at least however testifying at my death what I have so often and earnestly professed in my lifetime my utter dislike of the flatteries commonly used in funeral sermons, and of the vast expenses otherwise laid out in funeral solemnities and entertainments, with very little benefit to any; which if bestowed in pious and charitable works, might redound to the public or private benefit of many persons." I am next to tell, that he died the 2gth of January, 1662;* and that his body was buried in Buckden, the third day after his death ; and for the manner, that it was as far from ostentation as he desired it ; and all the rest of his will was as punctually performed. And when I have to his just praise told this truth, " that he died far from being rich," I shall return back to visit, and give a further account of him on his last sick-bed. His last will of which I have mentioned a part was made about three weeks before his death, about which time, finding his strength to decay, by reason of his constant infirmity, and a con- sumptive cough added to it, he retired to his chamber, expressing a desire to enjoy his last thoughts to himself in private, without dis- turbance or care, especially of what might concern this world. And that none of his clergy which are more numerous than any other bishop's might suffer by his retirement, he did by commission empower his chaplain, Mr. Pullin, with episcopal power to give 1 Should be 1663. l8o IZAAK WALTON institutions to all livings or Church preferments, during this his disability to do it himself. In this time of his retirement he longed for his dissolution ; and when some that loved him prayed for his recovery, if he at any time found any amendment, he seemed to be displeased, by saying, " His friends said their prayers backward for him : and that it was not his desire to live a useless life, and by fill- ing up a place keep another out of it, that might do God and his Church service." He would often with much joy and thankful- ness mention, " That during his being a housekeeper which was more than forty years there had not been one buried out of his family, and that he was now like to be the first." He would also often mention with thankfulness, "That till he was threescore years of age, he had never spent five shillings in law, nor upon himself so much in wine : and rejoiced much that he had so lived as never to cause an hour's sorrow to his good father; and hoped he should die without an enemy. " He, in his retirement, had the Church prayers read in his chamber twice every day; and at nine at night, some prayers read to him and a part of his family out of The Whole Duty of Man. As he was remarkably punctual and regular in all his studies and actions, so he used himself to be for his meals. And his dinner being appointed to be constantly ready at the ending of prayers, and he expecting and calling for it, was answered, " It would be ready in a quarter of an hour." To which his reply was, " A quarter of an hour! Is a quarter of an hour nothing to a man that probably has not many hours to live?" And though he did live many hours after this, yet he lived not many days ; for the day after which was three days before his death he was become so weak and weary of either motion or sitting, that he was content, or forced, to keep his bed : in which I desire he may rest, till I have given some account of his behaviour there and imme- diately before it. The day before he took his bed, which was three days before his death, he, that he might receive a new assurance for the pardon of his sins past, and be strengthened in his way to the New Jerusalem, took the blessed Sacrament of the Body and Blood of his and our blessed Jesus, from the hands of his chaplain, Mr. Pullin, accompanied with his wife, children, and a friend, in as awful, THE LIFE OF DR. ROBERT SANDERSON 181 humble, and ardent a manner as outward reverence could express. After the praise and thanksgiving for it was ended, he spake to this purpose : " Thou, O God ! tookest me out of my mother's womb, and hast been the powerful protector of me to this present moment of my life: Thou hast neither forsaken me now I am become grey-headed, nor suffered me to forsake thee in the late days of temptation, and sacrifice my conscience for the preservation of my liberty or estate. It was by grace that I have stood, when others have fallen under my trials: and these mercies I now re- member with joy and thankfulness; and my hope and desire is, that I may die praising thee." The frequent repetition of the Psalms of David hath been noted to a great part of the devotion of the primitive Christians; the Psalms having in them not only prayers and holy instructions, but such commemorations of God's mercies as may preserve, comfort, and confirm our dependence on the power, and providence, and mercy of our Creator. And this is mentioned in order to telling, that as the holy Psalmist said, that his eyes should prevent both the dawning of the day and night watches, by meditating on God's word (Psal. cxix. 147), so it was Dr. Sanderson's constant practice every morning to entertain his first waking thoughts with a repetition of those very psalms that the Church hath appointed to be constantly read in the daily morning service: and having at night laid him in his bed, he as constantly closed his eyes with a repetition of those appointed for the service of the evening, remem- bering and repeating the very Psalms appointed for every day ; and as the month had formerly ended and began again, so did this exer- cise of his devotion. And if his first waking thoughts were of the world, or what concerned it, he would arraign and condemn him- self for it. Thus he began that work on earth, which is now his employment in heaven. After his taking his bed, and about a day before his death, he desired his chaplain, Mr. Pullin, to give him absolution : and at his performing that office, he pulled off his cap, that Mr. Pullin might lay his hand upon his bare head. After this desire of his was satisfied, his body seemed to be at more ease, and his mind more cheerful; and he said, "Lord, forsake me not now my strength faileth me; but continue thy mercy, and, let my mouth be filled 1 82 SAMUEL JOHNSON with thy praise. " He continued the remaining night and day very patient, and thankful for any of the little offices that were performed for his ease and refreshment : and during that time did often say the i03rd Psalm to himself, and very often these words, "My heart is fixed, O God ! my heart is fixed where true joy is to be found. " His thoughts seemed now to be wholly of death, for which he was so prepared, that the King of Terrors could not surprise him as a thief in the night ; for he had often said, he was prepared, and longed for it. And as this desire seemed to come from heaven, so it left him not till his soul ascended to that region of blessed spirits, whose employments are to join in concert with him, and sing praise and glory to that God, who hath brought them to that place, into which sin and sorrow cannot enter. Thus this pattern of meekness and primitive innocence changed this for a better life. 'Tis now too late to wish that my life may be like his ; for I am in the eighty-fifth year of my age : but I humbly beseech Almighty God, that my death may: and do as earnestly beg of every reader, to say, Amen. Blessed is the man in whose spirit there is no guile, Psal. xxxii. 2. SAMUEL JOHNSON THE LIFE OF POPE [From The Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets, 1779-1781. Cor- rected Edition, London, 1800. "His [Johnson's] knowledge of the literary history of England since the Restoration was unrivalled. That knowledge he had derived partly from books, and partly from sources which had long been closed; from old Grub Street traditions; from the talk of forgotten poetasters and pamphleteers who had long been lying in parish vaults ; from the recollections of such men as Gilbert Walmesley, who had conversed with the wits of Button's; Gibber, who had mutilated the plays of two generation of dramatists; Orrery, who had been admitted to the society of Swift; and Savage, who had rendered services of no very honourable kind to Pope. The biographer therefore sate down to his task with a mind full of matter. He had at first intended to give only a paragraph to every minor poet, and only four or five pages to the great- est name. But the flood of anecdote and criticism overflowed the narrow channel. The work, which was originally meant to consist only of a few sheets, swelled into ten volumes, small volumes, it is true, and not closely printed. The first four appeared in 1779, the remaining six in 1781. THE LIFE OF POPE 183 " The Lives of the Poets are, on the whole, the best of Johnson's works. The narratives are as entertaining as any novel. The remarks on life and on human nature are eminently shrewd and profound. The criticisms are often excellent, and, even when grossly and provokingly unjust, well deserve to be studied. For, however erroneous they may be, they are never silly. They are the judgments of a mind trammelled by prejudice and deficient in sensibility, but vigorous and acute. They therefore generally contain a portion of valuable truth which deserves to be separated from the alloy; and, at the very worst, they mean something, a praise to which much of what is called criticism in our time has no pretensions. " Savage's Life Johnson reprinted nearly as it had appeared in 1744. Who- ever, after reading that life, will turn to the other lives will be struck by the difference of style. Since Johnson had been at ease in his circumstances he had written little and had talked much. When, therefore, he, after the lapse of years, resumed his pen, the mannerism which he had contracted while he was in the constant habit of elaborate composition was less perceptible than formerly; and his diction frequently had a colloquial ease which it had formerly wanted." THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY, "The Life of Samuel Johnson," 1856, in Critical and Miscellaneous Essays.} Alexander Pope was born in London, May 22, 1688, of parents whose rank or station was never ascertained: we are informed that they were of gentle blood; that his father was of a family of which the Earl of Downe was the head, and that his mother was the daughter of William Turner, Esquire, of York, who had like- wise three sons, one of whom had the honour of being killed, and the other of dying, in the service of Charles the First; the third was made a general officer in Spain, from whom the sister inherited what sequestrations and forfeitures had left in the family. This, and this only, is told by Pope ; who is more willing, as I have heard observed, to shew what his father was not, than what he was. It is allowed that he grew rich by trade ; but whether in a shop or on the Exchange was never discovered, till Mr. Tyers told, on the authority of Mrs. Racket, that he was a linen-draper in the Strand. Both parents were papists. Pope was from his birth of a constitution tender and delicate; but is said to have shewn remarkable gentleness and sweetness of disposition. The weakness of his body continued through his life, but the mildness of his mind perhaps ended with his childhood. His voice, when he was young, was so pleasing, that he was called in fondness the little Nightingale. Being not sent early to school, he was taught to read by an aunt; and when he was seven or eight years old, became a lover of books. 1 84 SAMUEL JOHNSON He first learned to write by imitating printed books; a species of penmanship in which he retained great excellence through his whole life, though his ordinary hand was not elegant. When he was about eight, he was placed in Hampshire under Taverner, a Romish priest, who, by a method very rarely practised, taught him the Greek and Latin rudiments together. He was now first regularly initiated in poetry by the persual of Ogylby's Homer, and Sandys 's Ovid: Ogylby's assistance he never repaid with any praise; but of Sandys he declared, in his notes to the Iliad, that English poetry owed much of its present beauty to his translations. Sandys very rarely attempted original compositions. From the care of Taverner, under whom his proficiency was considerable, he was removed to a school at Twyford near Winches- ter, and again to another school about Hyde-park Corner; from which he used sometimes to stroll to the playhouse, and was so delighted with theatrical exhibitions, that he formed a kind of play from Ogylby's Iliad, with some verses of his own intermixed, which he persuaded his school-fellows to act, with the addition of his master's gardener, who personated Ajax. At the two last schools he used to represent himself as having lost part of what Taverner had taught him, and on his master at Twyford he had already exercised his poetry in a lampoon. Yet under those masters he translated more than a fourth part of the Metamorphoses. If he kept the same proportion in his other exercises, it cannot be thought that his loss was great. He tells of himself, in his poems, that he lisp'd in numbers; and used to say that he could not remember the time when he began to make verses. In the style of fiction it might have been said of him as of Pindar, that when he lay in his cradle, the bees swarmed about his mouth. About the time of the Revolution his father, who was un- doubtedly disappointed by the sudden blast of popish prosperity, quitted his trade, and retired to Binfield in Windsor Forest, with about twenty thousand pounds; for which, being conscientiously determined not to entrust it to the government, he found no better use than that of locking it up in a chest, and taking from it what his expenses required ; and his life was long enough to consume a great part of it, before his son came to the inheritance. THE LIFE OF POPE 185 To Binfield Pope was called by his father when he was about twelve years old ; and there he had for a few months the assistance of one Deane, another priest, of whom he learned only to construe a little of Tulles Offices. How Mr. Deane could spend, with a boy who had translated so much of Ovid, some months over a small part of Tidly^s Offices, it is now vain to enquire. Of a youth so successfully employed, and so conspicuously improved, a minute account must be naturally desired ; but curios- ity must be contented with confused, imperfect, and sometimes improbable intelligence. Pope, finding little advantage from external help, resolved thenceforward to direct himself, and at twelve formed a plan of study which he completed with little other incitement than the desire of excellence. His primary and principal purpose was to be a poet, with which his father accidentally concurred, by proposing subjects, and oblig- ing him to correct his performances by many revisals ; after which the old gentleman, when he was satisfied, would say, these are good rhymes. In his perusal of the English poets he soon distinguished the versification of Dryden, which he considered as the model to be studied, and was impressed with such veneration for his instructor, that he persuaded some friends to take him to the coffee-house which Dryden frequented, and pleased himself with having seen him. Dryden died May i, 1701, some days before Pope was twelve; so early must he therefore have felt the power of harmony, and the zeal of genius. Who does not wish that Dryden could have known the value of the homage that was paid him, and foreseen the greatness of his young admirer ? The earliest of Pope's productions is his Ode on Solitude, written before he was twelve, in which there is nothing more than other forward boys have attained, and which is not equal to Cowley's performances at the same age. His time was now wholly spent in reading and writing. As he read the Classicks, he amused himself with translating them ; and at fourteen made a version of the first book of the Thebais, which, with some revision, he afterwards published. He must have been at this time, if he had no help, a considerable proficient in the Latin tongue. l86 SAMUEL JOHNSON By Dryden's Fables, which had then been not long published, and were much in the hands of poetical readers, he was tempted to try his own skill in giving Chaucer a more fashionable ap- pearance, and put January and May, and the Prologue of the Wife of Bath, into modern English. He translated likewise the Epistle of Sappho to Phaon from Ovid, to complete the version, which was before imperfect; and wrote some other small pieces, which he afterwards printed. He sometimes imitated the English poets, and professed to have written at fourteen his poem upon Silence, after Rochester's Nothing. He had now formed his versification, and in the smooth- ness of his numbers surpassed his original: but this is a small part of his praise ; he discovers such acquaintance both with human and publick affairs, as is not easily conceived to have been attain- able by a boy of fourteen in Windsor Forest. Next year he was desirous of opening to himself new sources of knowledge, by making himself acquainted with modern languages ; and removed for a time to London, that he might study French and Italian, which, as he desired nothing more than to read them, were by diligent application soon dispatched. Of Italian learning he does not appear to have ever made much use in his subsequent studies. He then returned to Binfield, and delighted himself with his own poetry. He tried all styles, and many subjects. He wrote a comedy, a tragedy, an epick poem, with panegyricks on all the princes of Europe; and, as he confesses, thought himself the greatest genius that ever was. Self-confidence is the first requisite to great undertakings; he, indeed, who forms his opinion of him- self in solitude, without knowing the powers of other men, is very liable to errour; but it was the felicity of Pope to rate himself at his real value. Most of his puerile productions were, by his maturer judgment, afterwards destroyed; Alcander, the epick poem, was burned by the persuasion of Atterbury. The tragedy was founded on the legend of St. Genevieve. Of the comedy there is no account. Concerning his studies it is related, that he translated Tully on Old Age; and that, besides his books of poetry and criticism, he read Temple's Essays and Locke on Human Understanding. His THE LIFE OF POPE 187 reading, though his favourite authors are not known, appears to have been sufficiently extensive and multifarious; for his early pieces shew, with sufficient evidence, his knowledge of books. He that is pleased with himself, easily imagines that he shall please others. Sir William Trumbal, who had been ambassador at Constantinople, and secretary of state, when he retired from business, fixed his residence in the neighbourhood of Binfield. Pope, not yet sixteen, was introduced to the statesman of sixty, and so distinguished himself, that their interviews ended in friend- ship and correspondence. Pope was, through his whole life, am- bitious of splendid acquaintance, and he seems to have wanted neither diligence nor success in attracting the notice of the great; for from his first entrance into the world, and his entrance was very early, he was admitted to familiarity with those whose rank or station made them most conspicuous. From the age of sixteen the life of Pope, as an author, may be properly computed. He now wrote his Pastorals, which were shewn to the Poets and Criticks of that time ; as they well deserved, they were read with admiration, and many praises were bestowed upon them and upon the Preface, which is both elegant and learned in a high degree : they were, however, not published till five years afterwards. Cowley, Milton, and Pope, are distinguished among the English Poets by the early exertion of their powers ; but the works of Cow- ley alone were published in his childhood, and therefore of him only can it be certain that his puerile performances received no improvement from his maturer studies. At this time began his acquaintance with Wycherley, a man who seems to have had among his contemporaries his full share of reputation, to have been esteemed without virtue, and caressed without good-humour. Pope was proud of his notice ; Wycherley wrote verses in his praise, which he was charged by Dennis with writing to himself, and they agreed for a while to flatter one another. It is pleasant to remark how soon Pope learned the cant of an author, and began to treat criticks with contempt, though he had yet suffered nothing from them. But the fondness of Wycherley was too violent to last. His esteem of Pope was such, that he submitted some poems to his 1 88 SAMUEL JOHNSON revision ; and when Pope, perhaps proud of such confidence, was sufficiently bold in his criticisms, and liberal in his alterations, the old scribbler was angry to see his pages defaced, and felt more pain from the detection than content from the amendment of his faults. They parted; but Pope always considered him with kindness, and visited him a little time before he died. Another of his early correspondents was Mr. Cromwell, of whom I have learned nothing particular but that he used to ride a-hunting in a tye-wig. He was fond, and perhaps vain, of amusing himself with poetry and criticism; and sometimes sent his performances to Pope, who did not forbear such remarks as were now and then unwelcome. Pope, in his turn, put the juvenile version of Statins into his hands for correction. Their correspondence afforded the publick its first knowledge of Pope's epistolary powers ; for his Letters were given by Cromwell to one Mrs. Thomas, and she many years afterwards sold them to Curll, who inserted them in a volume of his Miscellanies. Walsh, a name yet preserved among the minor poets, was one of his first encouragers. His regard was gained by the Pastorals, and from him Pope received the counsel by which he seems to have regulated his studies. Walsh advised him to correctness, which, as he told him, the English poets had hitherto neglected, and which therefore was left to him as a basis of fame ; and, being delighted with rural poems, recommended to him to write a pastoral comedy, like those which are read so eagerly in Italy ; a design which Pope probably did not approve, as he did not follow it. Pope had now declared himself a poet; and, thinking himself entitled to poetical conversation, began at seventeen to frequent Will's, a coffee-house on the north side of Russell-street in Covent- garden, where the wits of that time used to assemble, and where Dryden had, when he lived, been accustomed to preside. During this period of his life he was indefatigably diligent, and insatiably curious; wanting health for violent, and money for expensive pleasures, and having certainly excited in himself very strong desires of intellectual eminence, he spent much of his time over his books; but he read only to store his mind with facts and images, seizing all that his authors presented with undistin- guishing voracity, and with an appetite for knowledge too eager to THE LIFE OF POPE 189 be nice. In a mind like his, however, all the faculties were at once involuntarily improving. Judgement is forced upon us by experi- ence. He that reads many books must compare one opinion or one style with another; and when he compares, must necessarily distinguish, reject, and prefer. But the account given by himself of his studies was, that from fourteen to twenty he read only for amusement, from twenty to twenty-seven for improvement and instruction; that in the first part of this time he desired only to know, and in the second he endeavoured to judge. The Pastorals, which had been for some time handed about among poets and cri ticks, were at last printed (1709) in Tonson's Miscellany, in a volume which began with the Pastorals of Philips, and ended with those of Pope. The same year was written the Essay on Criticism; a work which displays such extent of comprehension, such nicety of distinction, such acquaintance with mankind, and such knowledge both of ancient and modern learning, as are not often attained by the maturest age and longest experience. It was published about two years afterwards, and being praised by Addison in the Spectator with sufficient liberality, met with so much favor as enraged Dennis, 'who,' he says, 'found himself attacked without any manner of provocation on his side, and attacked in his person, instead of his writings, by one who was wholly a stranger to him, at a time when all the world knew he was persecuted by fortune ; and not only saw that this was attempted in a clandestine manner, with the utmost falsehood and calumny, but found that all this was done by a little affected hypocrite, who had nothing in his mouth at the same time but truth, candour, friendship, good-nature, humanity, and mag- nanimity.' How the attack was clandestine is not easily perceived, nor how his person is depreciated ; but he seems to have known something of Pope's character, in whom may be discovered an appetite to talk too frequently of his own virtues. The pamphlet is such as rage might be expected to dictate. He supposes himself to be asked two questions ; whether the Essay will succeed, and who or what is the author. Its success he admits to be secured by the false opinions then prevalent ; the author he concludes to be young and raw. 190 SAMUEL JOHNSON ' First, because he discovers a sufficiency beyond his little ability, and hath rashly undertaken a task infinitely above his force. Secondly, while this little author struts, and affects the dictatorian air, he plainly shews that at the same time he is under the rod; and while he pretends to give law to others, is a pedantick slave to authority and opinion. Thirdly, he hath, like schoolboys, bor- rowed both from living and dead. Fourthly, he knows not his own mind, and frequently contradicts himself. Fifthly, he is al- most perpetually in the wrong.' All these positions he attempts to prove by quotations and re- marks; but his desire to do mischief is greater than his power. He has, however, justly criticised some passages: in these lines, There are whom heaven has bless'd with store of wit, Yet want as much again to manage it; For wit and judgement ever are at strife it is apparent that wit has two meanings, and that what is wanted, though called wit, is truly judgement. So far Dennis is undoubtedly right; but, not content with argument, he will have a little mirth, and triumphs over the first couplet in terms too elegant to be forgotten. 'By the way, what rare numbers are here! Would not one swear that this youngster had espoused some antiquated Muse, who had sued out a divorce on account of impotence from some superannuated sinner; and, having been p xed by her former spouse, has got the gout in her decrepit age, which makes her hobble so damnably.' This was the man who would reform a nation sinking into barbarity. In another place Pope himself allowed that Dennis had detected one of those blunders which are called bulls. The first edition had this line : What is this wit Where wanted, scorn'd ; and envied where acquir'd ? 'How,' says the critick, 'can wit be scorn'd where it is not? Is not this a figure frequently employed in Hibernian land? The person that wants this wit may indeed be scorned, but the scorn shews the honour which the contemner has for wit.' Of this re- mark Pope made the proper use, by correcting the passage. THE LIFE OF POPE 191 I have preserved, I think, all that is reasonable in Dennis's criticism; it remains that justice be done to his delicacy. 'For his acquaintance (says Dennis) he names Mr. Walsh, who had by no means the qualification which this author reckons absolutely necessary to a critick, it being very certain that he was, like this Essayer, a very indifferent poet ; he loved to be well-dressed ; and I remember a little young gentleman whom Mr. Walsh used to take into his company, as a double foil to his person and capacity, . . . Enquire between Sunninghill and Oakingham for a young, short, squab gentleman, the very bow of the God of Love, and tell me whether he be a proper author to make personal reflections? - He may extol the antients, but he has reason to thank the gods that he was born a modern; for had he been born of Grecian parents, and his father consequently had by law had the absolute disposal of him, his life had been no longer than that of one of his poems, the life of half a day. Let the person of a gentleman of his parts be never so contemptible, his inward man is ten times more ridiculous ; it being impossible that his outward form, though it be that of downright monkey, should differ so much from human shape, as his unthinking immaterial part does from human under- standing.' Thus began the hostility between Pope and Dennis, which, though it was suspended for a short time, never was ap- peased. Pope seems, at first, to have attacked him wantonly; but though he always professed to despise him, he discovers, by mentioning him very often, that he felt his force or his venom. Of this Essay Pope declared that he did not expect the sale to be quick, because not one gentleman in sixty, even of liberal education, could understand it. The gentlemen, and the education of that time, seem to have been of a lower character than they are of this. He mentioned a thousand copies as a numerous impression. Dennis was not his only censurer; the zealous papists thought the monks treated with too much contempt, and Erasmus too studiously praised; but to these objections he had not much re- gard. The Essay has been translated into French by Hamilton, author of the Comte de Grammont, whose version was never printed, by Roboth am secretary to the King for Hanover, and by Resnel; and commented by Dr. Warburton, who has discovered in it 192 SAMUEL JOHNSON such order and connection as was not perceived by Addison, nor, as is said, intended by the author. Almost every poem, consisting of precepts, is so far arbitrary and immethodical, that many of the paragraphs may change places with no apparent inconvenience; for of two or more positions, depending upon some remote and general principle, there is seldom any cogent reason why one should precede the other. But for the order in which they stand, whatever it be, a little ingenuity may easily give a reason. // is possible, says Hooker, that by long cir- cumduction, from any one truth all truth may be inferred. Of all homogeneous truths at least, of all truths respecting the same general end, in whatever series they may be produced, a concatenation by intermediate ideas may be formed, such as, when it is once shewn, shall appear natural ; but if this order be reversed, another mode of connection equally specious may be found or made. Aristotle is praised for naming Fortitude first of the cardinal virtues, as that without which no other virtue can steadily be practised; but he might, with equal propriety, have placed Prudence and Justice before it, since without Prudence Fortitude is mad; without Justice, it is mischievous. As the end of method is perspicuity, that series is sufficiently regular that avoids obscurity; and where there is no obscurity it will not be difficult to discover method. In the Spectator was published the Messiah, which he first sub- mitted to the perusal of Steele, and corrected in compliance with his criticisms. It is reasonable to infer, from his Letters, that the verses on the Unfortunate Lady were written about the time when his Essay was published. The Lady's name and adventures I have sought with fruitless enquiry. I can therefore tell no more than I have learned from Mr. Ruff- head, who writes with the confidence of one who could trust his information. She was a woman of eminent rank and large fortune, the ward of an unkle, who, having given her a proper education, expected like other guardians that she should make at least an equal match ; and such he proposed to her, but found it rejected in favour of a young gentleman of inferior condition. Having discovered the correspondence between the two lovers, THE LIFE OF POPE 193 and finding the young lady determined to abide by her own choice, he supposed that separation might do what can rarely be done by arguments, and sent her into a foreign country, where she was obliged to converse only with those from whom her unkle had nothing to fear. Her lover took care to repeat his vows ; but his letters were inter- cepted and carried to her guardian, who directed her to be watched with still greater vigilance; till of this restraint she grew so im- patient, that she bribed a woman-servant to procure her a sword, which she directed to her heart. From this account, given with evident intention to raise the Lady's character, it does not appear that she had any claim to praise, nor much to compassion. She seems to have been im- patient, violent, and ungovernable. Her unkle's power could not have lasted long; the hour of liberty and choice would have come in time. But her desires were too hot for delay, and she liked self-murder better than suspence. Nor is it discovered that the unkle, whoever he was, is with much justice delivered to posterity as & false Guardian; he seems to have done only that for which a guardian is appointed; he endeavoured to direct his niece till she should be able to direct herself. Poetry has not often been worse employed than in dignify- ing the amorous fury of a raving girl. Not long after, he wrote The Rape of the Lock, the most airy, the most ingenious, and the most delightful of all his compositions, occasioned by a frolick of gallantry, rather too familiar, in which Lord Petre cut off a lock of Mrs. Arabella Fermor's hair. This, whether stealth or violence, was so much resented, that the com- merce of the two families, before very friendly, was interrupted. Mr. Caryl, a gentleman who, being secretary to King James's Queen, had followed his Mistress into France, and who being the author of Sir Solomon Single, a comedy, and some translations, was entitled to the notice of a Wit, solicited Pope to endeavour a reconciliation by a ludicrous poem, which might bring both the parties to a better temper. In compliance with Caryl's request, though his name was for a long time marked only by the first and last letter, C 1, a poem of two cantos was written (1711), as is said, in a fortnight, and sent to the offended Lady, who liked it well I 9 4 SAMUEL JOHNSON enough to shew it; and, with the usual process of literary transac- tions, the author, dreading a surreptitious edition, was forced to publish it. The event is said to have been such as was desired ; the pacifica- tion and diversion of all to whom it related, except Sir George Brown, who complained with some bitterness that, in the character of Sir Plume, he was made to talk nonsense. Whether all this be true, I have some doubt; for at Paris a few years ago, a niece of Mrs. Fermor, who presided in an English Convent, mentioned Pope's work with very little gratitude, rather as an insult than an honour; and she may be supposed to have inherited the opinion of her family. At its first appearance it was termed by Addison merum sal. Pope, however, saw that it was capable of improvement; and, having luckily contrived to borrow his machinery from the Rosi- crucians, imparted the scheme with which his head was teeming to Addison, who told him that his work, as it stood, was a delicious little thing, and gave him no encouragement to retouch it. This has been too hastily considered as an instance of Addison's jealousy ; for as he could not guess the conduct of the new design, or the possibilities of pleasure comprised in a fiction of which there had been no examples, he might very reasonably and kindly persuade the author to acquiesce in his own prosperity, and forbear an attempt which he considered as an unnecessary hazard. Addison's counsel was happily rejected. Pope foresaw the future efflorescence of imagery then budding in his mind, and resolved to spare no art, or industry of cultivation. The soft luxuriance of his fancy was already shooting, and all the gay varieties of diction were already at his hand to colour and embellish it. His attempt was justified by its success. The Rape of the Lock stands forward, in the classes of literature, as the most exquisite example of ludicrous poetry. Berkeley congratulated him upon the display of powers more truly poetical than he had shewn before; with elegance of description and justness of precepts, he had now exhibited boundless fertility of invention. He always considered the intermixture of the machinery with the action as his most successful exertion of poetical art. He indeed could never afterwards produce any thing of such THE LIFE OF POPE 195 unexampled excellence. Those performances, which strike with wonder, are combinations of skilful genius with happy casualty; and it is not likely that any felicity, like the discovery of a new race of preternatural agents, should happen twice to the same man. Of this poem the author was, I think, allowed to enjoy the praise for a long time without disturbance. Many years after- wards Dennis published some remarks upon it, with very little force, and with no effect ; for the opinion of the publick was already settled, and it was no longer at the mercy of criticism. About this time he published The Temple of Fame, which, as he tells Steele in their correspondence, he had written two years before ; that is, when he was only twenty-two years old, an early time of life for so much learning and so much observation as that work exhibits. On this poem Dennis afterwards published some remarks, of which the most reasonable is, that some of the lines represent motion as exhibited by sculpture. Of the Epistle from Eloisa to Abelard, I do not know the date. His first inclination to attempt a composition of that tender kind arose, as Mr. Savage told me, from his perusal of Prior's Nut-brown Maid. How much he has surpassed Prior's work it is not necessary to mention, when perhaps it may be said with justice, that he has excelled every composition of the same kind. The mixture of religious hope and resignation gives an elevation and dignity to disappointed love, which images merely natural cannot bestow. The gloom of a convent strikes the imagination with far greater force than the solitude of a grove. This piece was, however, not much his favourite in his later years, though I never heard upon what principle he slighted it. In the next year (1713) he published Windsor Forest; of which part was, as he relates, written at sixteen, about the same time as his Pastorals, and the latter part was added afterwards: where the addition begins, we are not told. The lines relating to the Peace confess their own date. It is dedicated to Lord Lansdowne, who was then high in reputation and influence among the Tories ; and it is said, that the conclusion of the poem gave great pain to Addison, both as a poet and a politician. Reports like this are often spread with boldness very disproportionate to their evidence. 196 SAMUEL JOHNSON Why should Addison receive any particular disturbance from the last lines of Windsor Forest? If contrariety of opinion could poison a politician, he would not live a day; and, as a poet, he must have felt Pope's force of genius much more from many other parts of his works. The pain that Addison might feel it is not likely that he would confess ; and it is certain that he so well suppressed his discontent, that Pope now thought himself his favourite; for having been consulted in the revisal of Cato, he introduced it by a Prologue; and, when Dennis published his Remarks, undertook not indeed to vindicate but to revenge his friend by a Narrative of the Frenzy of John Dennis. There is reason to believe that Addison gave no encouragement to this disingenuous hostility ; for, says Pope, in a Letter to him, ' indeed your opinion, that 'tis entirely to be neglected, would be my own in my own case ; but I felt more warmth here than I did when I first saw his book against myself (though indeed in two minutes it made me heartily merry).' Addison was not a man on whom such cant of sensibility could make much impression. He left the pamphlet to itself, having disowned !t to Dennis, and per- haps did not think Pope to have deserved much by his officiousness. This year [1713] was printed in the Guardian the ironical com- parison between the Pastorals of Philips and Pope ; a composition of artifice, criticism, and literature, to which nothing equal will easily be found. The superiority of Pope is so ingeniously dis- sembled, and the feeble lines of Philips so skilfully preferred, that Steele, being deceived, was unwilling to print the paper lest Pope should be offended. Addison immediately saw the writer's design; and, as it seems, had malice enough to conceal his dis- covery, and to permit a publication which, by making his friend Philips ridiculous, made him for ever an enemy to Pope. It appears that about this time Pope had a strong inclination to unite the art of Painting with that of Poetry, and put himself under the tuition of Jervas. He was near-sighted, and therefore not formed by nature for a painter : he tried, however, how far he could advance, and sometimes persuaded his friends to sit. A picture of Betterton, supposed to be drawn by him, was in the posses- sion of Lord Mansfield : if this was taken from life, he must have THE LIFE OF POPE 197 begun to paint earlier; for Betterton was now dead. 'Pope's ambition of this new art produced some encomiastick verses to Jervas, which certainly shew his power as a poet, but I have been told that they betray his ignorance of painting. He appears to have regarded Betterton with kindness and esteem ; and after his death published, under his name, a version into modern English of Chaucer's Prologues, and one of his Tales, which, as was related by Mr. Harte, were believed to have been the performance of Pope himself by Fenton, who made him a gay offer of five pounds, if he would shew them in the hand of Betterton. The next year (1713) produced a bolder attempt, by which profit was sought as well as praise. The poems which he had hitherto written, however they might have diffused his name, had made very little addition to his fortune. The allowance which his father made him, though, proportioned to what he had, it might be liberal, could not be large; his religion hindered him from the occupation of any civil employment, and he complained that he wanted even money to buy books. He therefore resolved to try how far the favour of the publick extended, by soliciting a subscription to a version of the Iliad, with large notes. To print by subscription was, for some time, a practice peculiar to the English. The first considerable work for which this ex- pedient was employed is said to have been Dryden's Virgil; and it had been tried again with great success when the Tatters were collected into volumes. There was reason to believe that Pope's attempt would be successful. He was in the full bloom of reputation, and was personally known to almost all whom dignity of employment or splendour of reputation had made eminent; he conversed indiffer- ently with both parties, and never disturbed the publick with his political opinions; and it might be naturally expected, as each faction then boasted its literary zeal, that the great men, who on other occasions practised all the violence of opposition, would emulate each other in their encouragement of a poet who delighted all, and by whom none had been offended. With those hopes, he offered an English Iliad to subscribers, in six volumes in quarto, for six guineas ; a sum, according to the 198 SAMUEL JOHNSON value of money at that time, by no means inconsiderable, and greater than I believe to have been ever asked before. His pro- posal, however, was very favourably received, and the patrons of literature were busy to recommend his undertaking, and promote his interest. Lord Oxford, indeed, lamented that such a genius should be wasted upon a work not original; but proposed no means by which he might live without it : Addison recommended caution and moderation, and advised him not to be content with the praise of half the nation, when he might be universally favoured. The greatness of the design, the popularity of the author, and the attention of the literary world, naturally raised such expecta- tions of the future sale, that the booksellers made their offers with great eagerness; but the highest bidder was Bernard Lintot, who became proprietor on condition of supplying, at his own ex- pence, all the copies which were to be delivered to subscribers, or presented to friends, and paying two hundred pounds for every volume. Of the Quartos it was, I believe, stipulated that none should be printed but for the author, that the subscription might not be de- preciated; but Lintot impressed the same pages upon a small Folio, and paper perhaps a little thinner; and sold exactly at half the price, for half a guinea each volume, books so little inferior to the Quartos, that, by a fraud of trade, those Folios, being afterwards shortened by cutting away the top and bottom, were sold as copies printed for the subscribers. Lintot printed two hundred and fifty on royal paper in Folio for two guineas a volume; of the small Folio, having printed seventeen hundred and fifty copies of the first volume, he reduced the number in the other volumes to a thousand. It is unpleasant to relate that the bookseller, after all his hopes and all his liberality, was, by a very unjust and illegal action, defrauded of his profit. An edition of the English Iliad was printed in Holland in Duodecimo, and imported clandestinely for the gratification of those who were impatient to read what they could not yet afford to buy. This fraud could only be counter- acted by an edition equally cheap and more commodious; and Lintot was compelled to contract his Folio at once into a Duodecimo, and lose the advantage of an intermediate gradation. The notes, THE LIFE OF POPE 199 which in the Dutch copies were placed at the end of each book, as they had been in the large volumes, were now subjoined to the text in the same page, and are therefore more easily consulted. Of this edition two thousand five hundred were first printed, and five thousand a few weeks afterwards ; but indeed great numbers were necessary to produce considerable profit. Pope, having now emitted his proposals, and engaged not only his own reputation, but in some degree that of his friends who pat- ronised his subscription, began to be frighted at his own under- taking ; and finding himself at first embarrassed with difficulties, which retarded and oppressed him, he was for a time timorous and uneasy; had his nights disturbed by dreams of long journeys through unknown ways, and wished, as he said, that somebody would hang him. This misery, however, was not of long continuance; he grew by degrees more acquainted with Homer's images and expres- sions, and practice increased his facility of versification. In a short time he represents himself as despatching regularly fifty verses a day, which would shew him by an easy computation the termination of his labour. His own diffidence was not his only vexation. He that asks a subscription soon finds that he has enemies. All who do not encourage him defame him. He that wants money will rather be thought angry than poor, and he that wishes to save his money conceals his avarice by his malice. Addison had hinted his suspicion that Pope was too much a Tory; and some of the Tories suspected his principles because he had contributed to the Guardian, which was carried on by Steele. To those who censured his politicks were added enemies yet more dangerous, who called in question his knowledge of Greek, and his qualifications for a translator of Homer. To these he made no publick opposition; but in one of his Letters escapes from them as well as he can. At an age like this, for he was not more than twenty-five, with an irregular education, and a course of life of which much seems to have passed in conversa- tion, it is not very likely that he overflowed with Greek. But when he felt himself deficient he sought assistance; and what man of learning would refuse to help him? Minute enquiries 200 SAMUEL JOHNSON into the force of words are less necessary in translating Homer than other poets, because his positions are general, and his repre- sentations natural, with very little dependence on local or tempo- rary customs, on those changeable scenes of artificial life, which, by mingling original with accidental notions, and crowding the mind with images which time effaces, produces ambiguity in diction, and obscurity in books. To this open display of unadul- terated nature it must be ascribed, that Homer has fewer passages of doubtful meaning than any other poet either in the learned or in modern languages. I have read of a man, who being, by his ignorance of Greek, compelled to gratify his curiosity with the Latin printed on the opposite page, declared that from the rude simplicity of the lines literally rendered, he formed nobler ideas of the Homeric majesty than from the laboured elegance of polished versions. Those literal translations were always at hand, and from them he could easily obtain his author's sense with sufficient certainty; and among the readers of Homer the number is very small of those who find much in the Greek more than in the Latin, except the musick of the numbers. If more help was wanting, he had the poetical translation of Eobanus Hessus, an unwearied writer of Latin verses; he had the French Homers of La Valterie and Dacier, and the Eng- lish of Chapman, Hobbes, and Ogylby. With Chapman, whose work, though not totally neglected, seems to have been popular almost to the end of the last century, he had very frequent con- sultations, and perhaps never translated any passage till he had read his version, which indeed he has sometimes been suspected of using instead of the original. Notes were likewise to be provided ; for the six volumes would have been very little more than six pamphlets without them. What the mere perusal of the text could suggest, Pope wanted no assistance to collect or methodize; but more was necessary; many pages were to be filled, and learning must supply materials to wit and judgement. Something might be gathered from Dacier; but no man loves to be indebted to his contemporaries, and Dacier was accessible to common readers. Eustathius was therefore necessarily consulted. To read Eustathius, of whose THE LIFE OF POPE 2OT work there was then no Latin version, I suspect Pope, if he had been willing, not to have been able; some other was therefore to be found, who had leisure as well as abilities, and he was doubtless most readily employed who would do much work for little money. The history of the notes has never been traced. Broome, in his preface to his poems, declares himself the commentator in part upon the Iliad; and it appears from Fenton's Letter, preserved in the Museum, that Broome was at first engaged in consulting Eustathius; but that after a time, whatever was the reason, he desisted: another man of Cambridge was then em- ployed, who soon grew weary of the work ; and a third, that was recommended by Thirlby, is now discovered to have been Jortin, a man since well known to the learned world, who complained that Pope, having accepted and approved his performance, never testified any curiosity to see him, and who professed to have forgotten the terms on which he worked. The terms which Fen- ton uses are very mercantile : I think at first sight that his per- formance is very commendable, and have sent word for him to finish the ijth book, and to send it with his demands for his trouble. I have here enclosed the specimen; if the rest come before the re- turn, I will keep them till I receive your order. BroQme then offered his service a second time, which was prob- ably accepted, as they had afterwards a closer correspondence. Parnell contributed the Life of Homer, which Pope found so harsh, that he took great pains in correcting it; and by his own diligence, with such help as kindness or money could procure him, in somewhat more than five years he completed his version of the Iliad, with the notes. He began it in 1712, his twenty-fifth year, and concluded it in 1718, his thirtieth year. When we find him translating fifty lines a day, it is natural to suppose that he would have brought his work to a more speedy conclusion. The Iliad, containing less than sixteen thousand verses, might have been despatched in less than three hundred and twenty days by fifty verses in a day. The notes, compiled with the assistance of his mercenaries, could not be supposed to require more time than the text. According to this calculation, the progress of Pope may seem to have been slow; but the dis- 202 SAMUEL JOHNSON tance is commonly very great between actual performances and speculative possibility. It is natural to suppose, that as much as has been done to-day may be done to-morrow; but on the morrow some difficulty emerges, or some external impediment obstructs. Indolence, interruption, business, and pleasure, all take their turns of retardation ; and every long work is length- ened by a thousand causes that can, and ten thousand that can- not, be recounted. Perhaps no extensive and multifarious per- formance was ever effected within the term originally fixed in the undertaker's mind. He that runs against Time has an antagonist not subject to casualties. The encouragement given to this translation, though report seems to have overrated it, was such as the world has not often seen. The subscribers were five hundred and seventy-five. The copies for which subscription were given were six hundred and fifty-four; and only six hundred and sixty were printed. For those copies Pope had nothing to pay; he therefore received, including the two hundred pounds a volume, five thousand three hundred and twenty pounds four shillings, without deduction, as the books were supplied by Lintot. By the success of his subscription Pope was relieved from those pecuniary distresses with which, notwithstanding his popularity, he had hitherto struggled. Lord Oxford had often lamented his disqualification for publick employment, but never proposed a pension. While the translation of Homer was in its progress, Mr. Craggs, then secretary of state, offered to procure him a pension, which, at least during his ministry, might be enjoyed with secrecy. This was not accepted by Pope, who told him, however, that if he should be pressed with want of money, he would send to him for occasional supplies. Craggs was not long in power, and was never solicited for money by Pope, who disdained to beg what he did not want. With the product of this subscription, which he had too much discretion to squander, he secured his future life from want by considerable annuities. The estate of the Duke of Buckingham was found to have been charged with five hundred pounds a year, payable to Pope, which doubtless his translation enabled him to purchase. THE LIFE OF POPE 203 It cannot be unwelcome to literary curiosity, that I deduce thus minutely the history of the English Iliad. It is certainly the noblest version of poetry which the world has ever seen ; and its publication must therefore be considered as one of the great events in the annals of Learning. To those who have skill to estimate the excellence and difficulty of this great work, it must be very desirable to know how it was performed, and by what gradations it advanced to correctness. Of such an intellectual process the knowledge has very rarely been attainable; but happily there remains the original copy of the Iliad, which, being obtained by Bolingbroke as a curiosity, descended from him to Mallet, and is now by the solicitation of the late Dr. Maty reposited in the Museum. Between this manuscript, which is written upon accidental fragments of paper, and the printed edition, there must have been an intermediate copy, that was perhaps destroyed as it returned from the press. From the first copy I have procured a few transcripts, and shall exhibit first the printed lines; then, in a smaller print, those of the manuscripts, with all their variations. Those words in the small print which are given in Italicks are cancelled in the copy, and the words placed under them adopted in their stead. The beginning of the first book stands thus: The wrath of Peleus' son, the direful spring Of all the Grecian woes, O Goddess, sing; That wrath which hurl'd to Pluto's gloomy reign The souls of mighty chiefs untimely slain. The stern Pelides' rage, O Goddess, sing, wrath Of all the woes of Greece the fatal spring, Grecian That strew'd with warriors dead the Phrygian plain, heroes And peopled the dark shades with heroes slain; fill'd the shady hell with chiefs untimely Whose limbs, unburied on the naked shore, Devouring dogs and hungry vultures tore, Since great Achilles and Atrides strove; Such was the sovereign doom, and such the will of Jove. Whose limbs, unburied on the hostile shore, Devouring dogs and greedy vultures tore, 204 SAMUEL JOHNSON Since first Atrides and Achilles strove; Such was the sovereign doom, and such the will of Jove. Declare, O Muse, in what ill-fated hour Sprung the fierce strife, from what offended Power! Latona's son a dire contagion spread, And heap'd the camp with mountains of the dead; The King of Men his reverend priest defy'd, And for the King's offence, the people dy'd. Declare, O Goddess, what offended Power Enflam'd their rage, in that ill omen'd hour; anger fatal, hapless Phoebus himself the dire debate procur'd, fierce T'avenge the wrongs his injured priest endur'd; For this the God a dire infection spread, And heap'd the camp with millions of the dead: The King of Men the sacred Sire defy'd, And for the King's offence the people dy'd. For Chryses sought with costly gifts to gain His captive daughter from the Victor's chain; Suppliant the venerable Father stands, Apollo's awful ensigns grace his hands, By these he begs, and, lowly bending down, Extends the sceptre and the laurel crown. For Chryses sought by presents to regain costly gifts to gain His captive daughter from the Victor's chain; Suppliant the venerable Father stands, Apollo's awful ensigns grac'd his hands, By these he begs, and lowly bending down The golden sceptre and the laurel crown, Presents the sceptre For these as ensigns of his God he bare, The God that sends his golden shafts afar ; Then low on earth, the venerable man, Suppliant before the brother kings began. He sued to all, but chief implor'd for grace The brother kings of Atreus' royal rare; Ye kings and warriors, may your vows be crown'd, And Troy's proud walls lie level with the ground; May Jove restore you, when your toils are o'er, Safe to the pleasures of your native shore. To all he sued, but chief implor'd for grace The brother kings of Atreus' royal race. Ye sons of Atreus, may your vows be crown'd, Kings and warriors Your labours, By the Gods be all your labours crowrfd; THE LIFE OF POPE 205 So may the Gods your arms with conquest bless, And Troy's proud walls lie level with the ground; Till laid And crown your labours with deserv'd success; May Jove restore you, when your toils are o'er, Safe to the pleasures of your native shore. But, oh ! relieve a wretched parent's pain, And give Chryseis to these arms again; If mercy fail, yet let my present move, And dread avenging Phoebus, son of Jove. But, oh ! relieve a hapless parent's pain, And give my daughter to these arms again; Receive my gifts ; if mercy fails, yet let my present move, And fear the God that deals his darts around, avenging Phoebus, son of Jove. The Greeks, in shouts, their joint assent declare The priest to reverence, and release the fair. Not so Atrides; he, with kingly pride Repuls'd the sacred Sire, and thus reply'd. He said, the Greeks their joint assent declare, The father said, the gen'rous Greeks relent, T' accept the ransom, and release the fair: Revere the priest, and speak their joint assent : Not so the tyrant, he, with kingly pride, Atrides, Repuls'd the sacred Sire, and thus reply'd. [Not so the tyrant. DRYDEN.] Of these lines, and of the whole first book, I am told that there was yet a former copy, more varied, and more deformed with interlineations. The beginning of the second book varies very little from the printed page, and is therefore set down without any parallel: the few differences do not require to be elaborately displayed. Now pleasing sleep had seal'd each mortal eye; Stretch'd in their tents the Grecian leaders lie; Th' Immortals slumber'd on their thrones above, All but the ever-watchful eye of Jove. To honour Thetis' son he bends his care, And plunge the Greeks in all the woes of war. Then bids an empty phantom rise to sight, And thus commands the vision of the night: directs Fly hence, delusive dream, and, light as air, To Agamemnon's royal tent repair; Bid him in arms draw forth th' embattled train, March all his legions to the dusty plain. 206 SAMUEL JOHNSON Now tell the King 'tis given him to destroy Declare ev'n now The lofty walls of wide-extended Troy; tow'rs For now no more the Gods with Fate contend; At Juno's suit the heavenly factions end. Destruction hovers o'er yon devoted wall, hangs And nodding Ilium waits th' impending fall. Invocation to the Catalogue of Ships. Say, Virgins, seated round the throne divine, All-knowing Goddesses ! immortal Nine ! Since earth's wide region, heaven's unmeasur'd height, And hell's abyss, hide nothing from your sight, (We, wretched mortals ! lost in doubts below, But guess by rumour, and but boast we know) Oh say what heroes, fir'd by thirst of fame, Or urg'd by wrongs, to Troy's destruction came! To count them all, demands a thousand tongues, A throat of brass and adamantine lungs. Now, Virgin Goddesses, immortal Nine ! That round Olympus' heavenly summit shine. Who see through heaven and earth, and hell profound, And all things know, and all things can resound; Relate what armies sought the Trojan land, What nations follow' d, and what chiefs command; (For doubtful Fame distracts mankind below, And nothing can we tell, and nothing know) Without your aid, to count th' unnumber'd train, A thousand mouths, a thousand tongues were vain. Book V. v. i. But Pallas now Tydides' soul inspires, Fills with her .force, and warms with all her fires: Above the Greeks his deathless fame to raise, And crown her hero with distinguish'd praise, High on his helm celestial lightnings play, His beamy shield emits a living ray; Th' unwearied blaze incessant streams supplies, Like the red star that fires th' autumnal skies. But Pallas now Tydides' soul inspires, Fills with her rage, and warms with all her fires; force, O'er all the Greeks decrees his fame to raise, Above the Greeks her warrior's fame to raise, his deathless And crown her hero with immortal praise: distinguish'd THE LIFE OF POPE 207 Bright from his beamy crest the lightnings play, High on helm From his broad buckler flash'd the living ray, High on his helm celestial lightnings play, His beamy shield emits a living ray. The Goddess with her breath the flame supplies, Bright as the star whose fires in Autumn rise; Her breath divine thick streaming flames supplies, Bright as the star that fires th' autumnal skies: Th unwearied blaze incessant streams supplies, Like the red star that fires th' autumnal skies. When fresh he rears his radiant orb to sight, And bath'd in ocean shoots a keener light. Such glories Pallas on the chief bestow'd, Such from his arms the fierce effulgence flow'd; Onward she drives him, furious to engage, Where the fight burns, and where the thickest rage. When fresh he rears his radiant orb to sight, And gilds old Ocean with a blaze of light, Bright as the star that fires th' autumnal skies, Fresh from the deep, and gilds the seas and skies. Such glories Pallas on her chief bestow'd, Such sparkling rays from his bright armour flow'd, Such from his arms the fierce effulgence flow'd. Onward she drives him headlong to engage, furious Where the war bleeds, and where the fiercest rage, fight burns, thickest The sons of Dares first the combat sought, A wealthy priest, but rich without a fault; In Vulcan's fame the father's days were -led, The sons to toils of glorious battle bred; There lived a Trojan Dares was his name, The priest of Vulcan, rich, yet void of blame; The sons of Dares first the combat sought, A wealthy priest, but rich without a fault. Conclusion of Book VIII. v. 687. As when the moon, refulgent lamp of night, O'er heaven's clear azure spreads her sacred light; When not a breath disturbs the deep serene, And not a cloud o'ercasts the solemn scene; Around her throne the vivid planets roll, And stars unnumber'd gild the glowing pole: O'er the dark trees a yellower verdure shed, And tip with silver every mountain's head; Then shine the vales the rocks in prospect rise, A flood of glory bursts from all the skies; 208 SAMUEL JOHNSON The conscious swains, rejoicing in the sight, Eye the blue vault, and bless the useful light. So many flames before proud Ilion blaze, And lighten glimmering Xanthus with their rays; The long reflexion of the distant fires Gleam on the walls, and tremble on the spires: A thousand piles the dusky horrors gild, And shoot a shady lustre o'er the field; Full fifty guards each flaming pile attend, Whose umber'd arms by fits thick flashes send; Loud neigh the coursers o'er their heaps of corn, And ardent warriors wait the rising morn. As when in stillness of the silent night, As when the moon in all her lustre bright, As when the moon, refulgent lamp of night, O'er heaven's dear azure sheds her silver light; pure spreads sacred As still in air the trembling lustre stood, And o'er its golden border shoots a flood; When no loose gale disturbs the deep serene, not a breath And no dim cloud o'ercasts the solemn scene; not a Around her silver throne the planets glow, And stars unnumber'd trembling beams bestow; Around her throne the vivid planets roll, And stars unnumber'd gild the glowing pole: Clear gleams of light o'er the dark trees are seen, o'er the dark trees a yellow sheds, O'er the dark trees a yellower green they shed, gleam verdure And tip with silver all the mountain heads: forest And tip with silver every mountain's head. The valleys open, and the forests rise, The vales appear, the rocks in prospect rise, Then shine the vales, the rocks in prospect rise, All Nature stands reveal'd before our eyes; A flood of glory bursts from all the skies. The conscious shepherd, joyful at the sight, Eyes the blue vault, and numbers every light. The conscious swains rejoicing at the sight shepherds gazing with delight Eye the blue vault, and bless the vivid light, glorious useful So many flames before the navy blaze, proud Ilion And lighten glimmering Xanthus with their rays, Wide o'er the fields to Troy extend the gleams, And tip the distant spires with fainter beams; The long reflexions of the distant fires Gild the high walls, and tremble on the spires; Gleam on the walls arid tremble on the spires; A thousand fires at distant stations bright, Gild the dark prospect, and dispel the night. THE LIFE OF POPE 209 Of these specimens every man who has cultivated poetry, or who delights to trace the mind from the rudeness of its first con- ceptions to the elegance of its last, will naturally desire a greater number; but most other readers are already tired, and I am not writing only to poets and philosophers. The Iliad was published volume by volume, as the transla- tion proceeded; the four first books appeared in 1715. The expectation of this work was undoubtedly high, and every man who had connected his name with criticism, or poetry, was desir- ous of such intelligence as might enable him to talk upon the popular topick. Halifax, who, by having been first a poet, and the$ a patron of poetry, had acquired the right of being a judge, was willing to hear some books while they were yet unpublished. Of this rehearsal Pope afterwards gave the following account. 'The famous Lord Halifax was rather a pretender to taste than really possessed of it. When I had finished the two or three first books of my translation of the Iliad, that Lord de- sired to have the pleasure of hearing them read at his house. Addison, Congreve, and Garth, were there at the reading. In four or five places, Lord Halifax stopt me very civilly, and with a speech each time, much of the same kind, "I beg your pardon, Mr. Pope; but there is something in that passage that does not quite please me. Be so good as to mark the place, and con- sider it a little at your leisure. I am sure you can give it a little turn." I returned from Lord Halifax's with Dr. Garth, in his chariot; and, as we were going along, was saying to the Doctor, that my Lord had laid me under a good deal of difficulty by such loose and general observations; that I had been thinking over the passages almost ever since, and could not guess at what it was that offended his Lordship in either of them. Garth laughed heartily at my embarrassment; said, I had not been long enough acquainted with Lord Halifax to know his way yet; that I need not puzzle myself about looking those places over and over, when I got home. "All you need do (says he) is to leave them just as they are ; call on Lord Halifax two or three months hence, thank him for his kind observations on those passages, and then read them to him as altered. I have known him much longer than you have, and will be answerable for the event." I followed his 210 SAMUEL JOHNSON advice ; waited on Lord Halifax some time after ; said, I hoped he would find his objections to those passages removed; read them to him exactly as they were at first: and his Lordship was ex- tremely pleased with them, and cried out, Ay, now they are perfectly right: nothing can be better.' It is seldom that the great or the wise suspect that they are despised or cheated. Halifax, thinking this a lucky opportunity of securing immortality, made some advances of favour and some overtures of advantage to Pope, which he seems to have received with sullen coldness. All our knowledge of this transaction is derived from a single Letter (Dec. i, 1714), in which Pope says, 1 1 am obliged to you, both for the favours you have done me, and those you intend me. I distrust neither your will nor your memory, when it is to do good; and if I ever become troublesome or so- licitous, it must not be out of expectation, but out of gratitude. Your Lordship may cause me to live agreeably in the town, or contentedly in the country, which is really all the difference I set between an easy fortune and a small one. It is indeed a high strain of generosity in you to think of making me easy all my life, only because I have been so happy as to divert you some few hours ; but, if I may have leave to add it is because you think me no enemy to my native country, there will appear a better reason ; for I must of consequence be very much (as I sincerely am) yours, &c.' These voluntary offers, and this faint acceptance, ended with- out effect. The patron was not accustomed to such frigid grati- tude, and the poet fed his own pride with the dignity of indepen- dence. They probably were suspicious of each other. Pope would not dedicate till he saw at what rate his praise was valued; he would be troublesome out of gratitude, not expectation. Halifax, thought himself entitled to confidence; and would give nothing, unless he knew what he should receive. Their commerce had its beginning in hope of praise on one side, and of money on the other, and ended because Pope was less eager of money than Hali- fax of praise. It is not likely that Halifax had any personal benevolence to Pope; it is evident that Pope looked on Halifax with scorn and hatred. The reputation of this great work failed of gaining him a patron ; THE LIFE OF POPE 211 but it deprived him of a friend. Addison and he were now at the head of poetry and criticism; and both in such a state of elevation, that, like the two rivals in the Roman state, one could no longer bear an equal, nor the other a superior. Of the gradual abatement of kindness between friends, the beginning is often scarcely discernible by themselves, and the process is continued by petty provocations, and incivilities sometimes peevishly re- turned, and sometimes contemptuously neglected, which would escape all attention but that of pride, and drop from any memory but that of resentment. That the quarrel of these two wits should be minutely deduced, is not to be expected from a writer to whom, as Homer says, nothing but rumour has reached, and who has no personal knowledge. Pope doubtless approached Addison, when the reputation of their wit first brought them together, with the respect due to a man whose abilities were acknowledged, and who, having attained that eminence to which he was himself aspiring, had in his hands the distribution of literary fame. He paid court with sufficient diligence by his Prologue to Cato, by his abuse of Dennis, and, with praise yet more direct, by his poem on the Dialogues on Medals, of which the immediate publication was then intended. In all this there was no hypocrisy ; for he confessed that he found in Addison something more pleasing than in any other man. It may be supposed, that as Pope saw himself favoured by the world, and more frequently compared his own powers with those of others, his confidence increased, and his submission lessened; and that Addison felt no delight from the advances of a young wit, who might soon contend with him for the highest place. Every great man, of whatever kind be his greatness, has among his friends those who officiously, or insidiously, quicken his attention to offences, heighten his disgust, and stimulate his resentment. Of such adherents Addison doubtless had many, and Pope was now too high to be without them. From the emission and reception of the Proposals for the Iliad, the kindness of Addison seems to have abated. Jervas the painter once pleased himself (Aug. 20, 1714) with imagining that he had re-established their friendship; and wrote to Pope that Addison once suspected him of too close a confederacy with Swift, but was 212 SAMUEL JOHNSON now satisfied with his conduct. To this Pope answered, a week after, that his engagements to Swift were such as his services in regard to the subscription demanded, and that the Tories never put him under the necessity of asking leave to be grateful. But, says he, as Mr. Addison must be the judge in what regards him- self, and seems to have no very just one in regard to me, so I must own to you I expect nothing but civility from him. In the same Letter he mentions Philips, as having been busy to kindle animosity between them; but, in a Letter to Addison, he ex- presses some consciousness of behaviour, inattentively deficient in respect. Of Swift's industry in promoting the subscription there remains the testimony of Kennet, no friend to either him or Pope. ' Nov. 2, 1713, Dr. Swift came into the coffee-house, and had a bow from every body but me, who, I confess, could not but despise him. When I came to the anti-chamber to wait, before prayers, Dr. Swift was the principal man of talk and business, and acted as master of requests. Then he instructed a young nobleman that the best Poet in England was Mr. Pope (a papist), who had begun a translation of Homer into English verse, for which he must have them all subscribe; for, says he, the author shall not begin to print till I have a thousand guineas for him.' About this time it is likely that Steele, who was, with all his politieal fury, good-natured and officious, procured an interview between these angry rivals, which ended in aggravated malevolence. On this occasion, if the reports be true, Pope made his complaint with frankness and spirit, as a man undeservedly neglected or opposed ; and Addison affected a contemptuous unconcern, and, in a calm even voice, reproached Pope with his vanity, and, telling him of the improvements which his early works had received from his own remarks and those of Steele, said, that he, being now engaged in publick business, had no longer any care for his poetical reputation ; nor had any other desire, with regard to Pope, than that he should not, by too much arrogance, alienate the publick. To this Pope is said to have replied with great keenness and severity, upbraiding Addison with perpetual dependance, and with the abuse of those qualifications which he had obtained at the publick cost, and charging him with mean endeavours to obstruct THE LIFE OF POPE 213 the progress of rising merit. The contest rose so high, that they parted at last without any interchange of civility. The first volume of Homer was (1715) in time published; and a rival version of the first Iliad, for rivals the time of their appearance inevitably made them, was immediately printed, with the name of Tickell. It was soon perceived that, among the followers of Ad- dison,Tickell had the preference, and the criticksand poets divided into factions. 7, says Pope, have the town, that is, the mob, on my side; but it is not uncommon for the smaller party to supply by industry what it wants in numbers. / appeal to the people as my rightful judges, and, while they are not inclined to condemn me, shall not fear the high-flyers at Button's. This opposition he immediately imputed to Addison, and complained of it in terms sufficiently resentful to Craggs, their common friend. When Addison's opinion was asked, he declared the versions to be both good, but Tickell's the best that had ever been written ; and sometimes said that- they were both good, but that Tickell had more of Homer. Pope was now sufficiently irritated ; his reputation and his in- terest were at hazard. He once intended to print together the four versions of Dryden, Maynwaring, Pope, and Tickell, that they might be readily compared, and fairly estimated. This design seems to have been defeated by the refusal of Tonson, who was the proprietor of the other three versions. Pope intended at another time a rigorous criticism of Tickell's translation, and had marked a copy, which I have seen, in all places that appeared defective. But while he was thus meditating defence or revenge, his adversary sunk before him without a blow; the voice of the publick were not long divided, and the preference was universally given to Pope's performance. He was convinced, by adding one circumstance to another, that the other translation was the work of Addison himself ; but if he knew it in Addison's lifetime, it does not appear that he told it. He left his illustrious antagonist to be punished by what has been considered as the most painful of all reflections, the remembrance of a crime perpetrated in vain. The other circumstances of their quarrel were thus related by Pope. 214 SAMUEL JOHNSON ' Philips seemed to have been encouraged to abuse me in coffee- houses, and conversations : and Gildon wrote a thing about Wycherley, in which he had abused both me and my relations very grossly. Lord Warwick himself told me one day, that it was in vain for me to endeavour to be well with Mr. Addison ; that his jealous temper would never admit of a settled friendship between us; and, to convince me of what he had said, assured me, that Addison had encouraged Gildon to publish those scandals, and had given him ten guineas after they were published. The next day, while I was heated with what I had heard, I wrote a Letter to Mr. Addison, to let him know that Iw r asnot unacquainted with this behaviour of his ; that if I was to speak severely of him, in return for it, it should be in such a dirty way, that I should rather tell him, himself, fairly of his faults, and allow his good qualities ; and that it should be some- thing in the following manner : I then adjoined the first sketch of what has been since called my satire on Addison. Mr. Addison used me very civilly ever after/ The verses on Addison, when they were sent to Atterbury, were considered by him as the most excellent of Pope's performances; and the writer was advised, since he knew where his strength lay, not to suffer it to remain unemployed. This year (1715) being, by the subscription, enabled to live more by choice, having persuaded his father to sell their estate at Binfield-, he purchased, I think only for his life, that house at Twickenham to which his residence afterwards procured so much celebration, and removed thither with his father and mother. Here he planted the vines and the quincunx which his verses mention ; and being under the necessity of making a subterraneous passage to a garden on the other side of the road, he adorned it with fossile bodies, and dignified it with the title of a grotto; a place of silence and retreat, from which he endeavoured to persuade his friends and himself that cares and passions could be excluded. A grotto is not often the wish or pleasure of an Englishman, who has more frquent need to solicit than exclude the sun ; but Pope's excavation was requisite as an entrance to his garden, and, as some men try to be proud of their defects, he extracted an ornament from an inconvenience, and vanity produced a grotto where necessity enforced a passage. It may be frequently remarked of the studious THE LIFE OF POPE 215 and speculative, that they are proud of trifles, and that their amuse- ments seem frivolous and childish; whether it be that men con- scious of great reputation think themselves above the reach of censure, and safe in the admission of negligent indulgences, or that mankind expect from elevated genius an uniformity of greatness, and watch its degradation with malicious wonder; like him who having followed with his eye an eagle into the clouds, should lament that she ever descended to a perch. While the volumes of his Homer were annually published, he collected his former works (1717) into one quarto volume, to which he prefixed a Preface, written with great spriteliness and elegance, which was afterwards reprinted, with some passages subjoined that he at first omitted ; other marginal additions of the same kind he made in the later editions of his poems. Waller remarks, that poets lose half their praise, because the reader knows not what they have blotted. Pope's voracity of fame taught him the art of obtaining the accumulated honour both of what he had published, and of what he had suppressed. In this year his father died suddenly, in his seventy-fifth year, having passed twenty-nine years in privacy. He is not known but by the character which his son has given him. If the money with which he retired was all gotten by himself, he had traded very suc- cessfully in times when sudden riches were rarely attainable. The publication of the Iliad was at last completedin 1720. The splendour and success of this work raised Pope many enemies, that endeavoured to depreciate his abilities. Burnet, who was afterwards a Judge of no mean reputation, censured him in a piece called Ilomerides before it was published ; Ducket likewise endeavoured to make him ridiculous. Dennis was the perpetual persecutor of all his studies. But, whoever his criticks were, their writings are lost, and the names which are preserved, are preserved in the Dunciad. In this disastrous year (1720) of national infatuation, when more riches than Peru can boast were expected from the South Sea, when the contagion of avarice tainted every mind, and even poets panted after wealth, Pope was seized with the universal passion, and ventured some of his money. The stock rose in its price ; and he for a while thought himself the Lord of thousands. But this 2l6 SAMUEL JOHNSON dream of happiness did not last long, and he seems to have waked soon enough to get clear with the loss only of what he once thought himself to have won, and perhaps not wholly of that. Next year he published some select poems of his friend Dr. Parnell, with a very elegant Dedication to the Earl of Oxford ; who, after all his struggles and dangers, then lived in retirement, still under the frown of a victorious faction, who could take no pleasure in hearing his praise. He gave the same year (1721) an edition of Shakespeare. His name was now of so much authority, that Tonson thought himself entitled, by annexing it, to demand a subscription of six guineas for Shakespeare's plays in six quarto volumes; nor did his expec- tation much deceive him ; for of seven hundred and fifty which he printed, he dispersed a great number at the price proposed. The reputation of that edition indeed sunk afterwards so low, that one hundred and forty copies were sold at sixteen shillings each. On this undertaking, to which Pope was induced by a reward of two hundred and seventeen pounds twelve shillings, he seemed never to have reflected afterwards without vexation; for Theobald, a man of heavy diligence, with very slender powers, first, in a book called Shakespeare Restored, and then in a formal edition, detected his deficiencies with all the insolence of victory; and, as he was now high enough to be feared and hated, Theobald had from others all the help that could be supplied, by the desire of hum- bling a haughty character. From this time Pope became an enemy to editors, collators, com- mentators, and verbal criticks; and hoped to persuade the world, that he miscarried in this undertaking only by having a mind too great for such minute employment. Pope in his edition undoubtedly did many things wrong, and left many things undone; but let him not be defrauded of his due praise. He was the first that knew, at least the first that told, by what helps the text might be improved. If he inspected the early editions negligently, he taught others to be more accurate. In his Preface he expanded with great skill and elegance the character which had been given of Shakespeare by Dryden ; and he drew the publick attention upon his works, which, though often mentioned, had been little read. THE LIFE OF POPE 21 7 Soon after the appearance of the Iliad, resolving not to let the general kindness cool, he published proposals for a translation of the Odyssey, in five volumes, for five guineas. He was willing, how- ever, now to have associates in his labour, being either weary with toiling upon another's thoughts, or having heard, as Ruffhead relates, that Fenton and Broome had already begun the work, and liking better to have them confederates than rivals. In the patent, instead of saying that he had translated the Odyssey, as he had said of the Iliad, he says that he had undertaken a trans- lation ; and in the proposals the subscription is said to be not solely for his own use, but for that of two of his friends who have assisted him in this work. In 1723, while he was engaged in this new version, he appeared before the Lords at the memorable trial of Bishop Atterbury, with w r hom he had lived in great familiarity, and frequent correspond- ence. Atterbury had honestly recommended to him the study of the popish controversy, in hope of his conversion ; to which Pope answered in a manner that cannot much recommend his principles, or his judgement. In questions and projects of learning, they agreed better. He was called at the trial to give an account of Atterbury's domestick life, and private employment, that it might appear how little time he had left for plots. Pope had but few words to utter, and in those few he made several blunders. His Letters to Atterbury express the utmost esteem, tenderness, and gratitude : perhaps, says he, it is not only in this world that I may have cause to remember the Bishop of Rochester. At their last interview in the Tower, Atterbury presented him with a Bible. Of the Odyssey Pope translated only twelve books ; the rest were the work of Broome and Fenton : the notes were written wholly by Broome, who was not over-liberally rewarded. The Publick was carefully kept ignorant of the several shares ; and an account was subjoined at the conclusion, which is now known not to be true. The first copy of Pope's books, with those of Fenton, are to be seen in the Museum. The parts of Pope are less interlined than the Iliad, and the latter books of the Iliad less than the former. He grew dexterous by practice, and every sheet enabled him to write the next with more facility. The books of Fenton have very few alterations by the hand of Pope. Those of Broome have not been 2l8 SAMUEL JOHNSON found ; but Pope complained, as it is reported, that he had much trouble in correcting them. His contract with Lintot was the same as for the Iliad, except that only one hundred pounds were to be paid him for each volume. The number of subscribers was five hundred and seventy-four, and of copies eight hundred and nineteen ; so that his profit, when he had paid his assistants, was still very considerable. The work was finished in 1725, and from that time he resolved to make no more translations. The sale did not answer Lintot's expectation, and he then pre- tended to discover something of fraud in Pope, and commenced or threatened, a suit in Chancery. On the English Odyssey a criticism was published by Spence, at that time Prelector of Poetry at Oxford; a man whose learning was not very great, and whose mind was not very powerful. His criticism, however, was commonly just; what he thought, he thought rightly; and his remarks were recommended by his coolness and candour. In him Pope had the first experience of a critick without malevolence, who thought it as much his duty to display beauties as expose faults; who censured with respect, and praised with alacrity. With this criticism Pope was so little offended, that he sought the acquaintance of the writer, who lived with him from that time in great familiarity, attended him in his last hours, and compiled memorials of his conversation. The regard of Pope recom- mended him to the great and powerful, and he obtained very valu- able preferments in the Church. Not long after Pope was returning home from a visit in a friend's coach, which, in passing a bridge, was overturned into the water; the windows were closed, and being unable to force them open, he was in danger of immediate death, when the postilion snatched him out by breaking the glass, of which the fragments cut two of his fingers in such a manner, that he lost their use. Voltaire, who was then in England, sent him a Letter of Conso- lation. He had been entertained by Pope at his table, where he talked with so much grossness that Mrs. Pope was driven from the room. Pope discovered, by a trick, that he was a spy for the Court, and never considered him as a man worthy of confidence. THE LIFE OF POPE 219 He soon afterwards (1727) joined with Swift, who was then in England, to publish three volumes of Miscellanies, in which amongst other things he inserted the Memoirs of a Parish Clerk, in ridicule of Burnet's importance in his own History, and a Debate upon Black and White Horses, written in all the formalities of a legal process by the assistance, as is said, of Mr. Fortescue, afterwards Master of the Rolls. Before these Miscellanies is a preface signed by Swift and Pope, but apparently written by Pope; in which he makes a ridiculous and romantick complaint of the robberies com- mitted upon authors by the clandestine seizure and sale of their papers. He tells, in tragick strains, how the cabinets of the Sick* and the closets of the Dead have been broke open and ransacked; as if those violences were often committed for papers of uncertain and accidental value, which are rarely provoked by real treasures ; as if epigrams and essays were in danger where gold and diamonds are safe. A cat, hunted for his musk, is, according to Pope's account, but the emblem of a wit winded by booksellers. His complaint, however, received some attestation ; for the,same year the Letters written by him to Mr. Cromwell, in his youth, were sold by Mrs. Thomas to Curll, who printed them. In these Miscellanies was first published the Art of Sinking in Poetry, which, by such a train of consequences as usually passes in literary quarrels, gave in a short time, according to Pope's account, occasion to the Dunciad. In the following year (1728) he began to put Atterbury's advice in practice; and shewed his satirical powers by publishing the Dunciad, one of his greatest and most elaborate performances, in which he endeavoured to sink into contempt all the writers by whom he had been attacked, and some others whom he thought unable to defend themselves. At the head of the Dunces he placed poor Theobald, whom he accused of ingratitude ; but whose real crime was supposed to be that of having revised Shakespeare more happily than himself. This satire had the effect which he intended, by blasting the char- acters which it touched. Ralph, who, unnecessarily interposing in the quarrel, got a place in a subsequent edition, complained that for a time he was in danger of starving, as the booksellers had no longer any confidence in his capacity. 220 SAMUEL JOHNSON The prevalence of this poem was gradual and slow: the plan, if not wholly new, was little understood by common readers. Many of the allusions required illustration ; the names were often expressed only by the initial and final letters, and, if they had been printed at length, were such as few had known or recollected. The subject itself had nothing generally interesting, for whom did it concern to know that one or another scribbler was a dunce ? If therefore it had been possible for those who were attacked to conceal their pain and their resentment, the Dunciad might have made its way very slowly in the world. This, however, was not to be expected: every man is of im- portance to himself, and therefore, in his own opinion, to others; and, supposing the world already acquainted with all his pleasures and his pains, is perhaps the first to publish in juries or misfortunes, which had never been known unless related by himself, and at which those that hear them will only laugh ; for no man sympathises with the sorrows of vanity. The history of the Dunciad is very minutely related by Pope himself, in a Dedication which he wrote to Lord Middlesex in the name of Savage. 'I will relate the war of the Dunces (for so it has been com- monly called), which began in the year 1727, and ended in 1730. ' When Dr. Swift and Mr. Pope thought it proper, for reasons specified in the Preface to their Miscellanies, to publish such little pieces of theirs as had casually got abroad, there was added to them the Treatise of the Bathos, or the Art of Sinking in Poetry. It happened that in one chapter of this piece, the several species of bad poets were ranged in classes, to which were prefixed almost all the letters of the alphabet (the greatest part of them at random) ; but such was the number of poets eminent in that art, that some one or other took every letter to himself : all fell into so violent a fury, that, for half a year or more, the common newspapers (in most of which they had some property, as being hired writers) were filled with the most abusive falsehoods and scurrilities they could possibly devise. A liberty no way to be wondered at in those people, and in those papers, that for many years, during the un- controuled license of the press, had aspersed almost all the great THE LIFE OF POPE 221 characters of the age ; and this with impunity, their own persons and names being utterly secret and obscure. 'This gave Mr. Pope the thought, that he had now some op- portunity of doing good, by detecting and dragging into light these common enemies of mankind; since to invalidate this universal slander, it sufficed to shew what contemptible men were the authors of it. He was not without hopes, that, by manifesting the dulness of those who had only malice to recommend them, either the booksellers would not find their account in employing them, or the men themselves, when discovered, want courage to proceed in so unlawful an occupation. This it was that gave birth to the Dunciad; and he thought it an happiness, that, by the late flood of slander on himself, he had acquired such a peculiar right over their names as was necessary to this design. 'On the i2th of March, 1729, at St. James's, that poem was presented to the King and Queen (who had before been pleased to read it) by the right honourable Sir Robert Walpole ; and some days after the whole impression was taken and dispersed by several noblemen and persons of the first distinction. 'It is certainly a true observation, that no people are so im- patient of censure as those who are the greatest slanderers, which was wonderfully exemplified on this occasion. On the day the book was first vended, a crowd of authors besieged the shop ; in- treaties, advices, threats of law and battery, nay cries of treason, were all employed to hinder the coming-out of the Dunciad: on the other side, the booksellers and hawkers made as great efforts to procure it. What could a few poor authors do against so great a majority as the publick ? There was no stopping a torrent with a finger, so out it came. 'Many ludicrous circumstances attended it. The Dunces (for by this name they were called) held weekly clubs, to consult of hostilities against the author : one wrote a Letter to a great minister, assuring him Mr. Pope was the greatest enemy the government had; and another bought his image in clay, to execute him in effigy, with which sad sort of satisfaction the gentlemen were a little comforted. ' Some false editions of the book having an owl in their frontis- piece, the true one, to distinguish it, fixed in his stead an ass laden 222 SAMUEL JOHNSON with authors. Then another surreptitious one being printed with the same ass, the new edition in octavo returned for distinction to the owl again. Hence arose a great contest of booksellers against booksellers, and advertisements against advertisements; some recommending the edition of the owl, and others the edition of the ass; by which names they came to be distinguished, to the great honour also of the gentlemen of the Dunciad. 1 Pope appears by this narrative to have contemplated his victory over the Dunces with great exultation; and such was his delight in the tumult which he had raised, that for a while his natural sensibility was suspended, and he read reproaches and invectives without emotion, considering them only as the necessary effects of that pain which he rejoiced in having given. It cannot however be concealed that, by his own confession, he was the aggressor; for nobody believes that the letters in the Bathos were placed at random; and it may be discovered that, when he thinks himself concealed, he indulges the common vanity of common men, and triumphs in those distinctions which he had affected to despise. He is proud that his book was presented to the King and Queen by the right honourable Sir Robert Walpole ; he is proud that they had read it before; he is proud that the edition was taken off by the nobility and persons of the first dis- tinction. The edition of which he speaks was, I believe, that, which by telling in the text the names and in the notes the characters of those whom he had satirised, was made intelligible and diverting. The criticks had now declared their approbation of the plan, and the common reader began to like it without fear ; those who were strangers to petty literature, and therefore unable to decipher initials and blanks, had now names and persons brought within their view; and delighted in the visible effect of those shafts of malice which they had hitherto contemplated, as shot into the air. Dennis, upon the fresh provocation now given him, renewed the enmity which had for a time been appeased by mutual civilities ; and published remarks, which he had till then suppressed, upon the Rape of the Lock. Many more grumbled in secret, or vented their resentment -in the newspapers by epigrams or invectives. Ducket, indeed, being mentioned as loving Burnet with pious THE LIFE OF POPE 223 passion, pretended that his moral character was injured, and for sometime declared his resolution to take vengeance with a cudgel. But Pope appeased him by changing pious passion to cordial friendship, and by a note, in which he vehemently disclaims the malignity of meaning imputed to the first impression. Aaron Hill, who was represented as diving for the prize, ex- postulated with Pope in a manner so much superior to all mean solicitation, that Pope was reduced to sneak and shuffle, sometimes to deny, and sometimes to apologize ; he first endeavours to wound, and is then afraid to own that he meant a blow. The Dunciad, in the complete edition, is addressed to Dr. Swift : of the notes, part was written by Dr. Arbuthnot, and an apologeti- cal Letter was prefixed, signed by Cleland, but supposed to have been written by Pope. After this general war upon dulness, he seems to have indulged himself awhile in tranquillity; but his subsequent productions prove that he was not idle. He published (1731) a poem on Taste, in which he very particularly and severely criticises the house, the furniture, the gardens, and the entertainments of Timon, a man of great wealth and little taste. By Timon he was universally supposed, and by the Earl of Burlington, to whom the poem is addressed, was privately said, to mean the Duke of Chandos; a man perhaps too much delighted with pomp and show, but of a temper kind and beneficent, and who had consequently the voice of the publick in his favour. A violent outcry was therefore raised against the ingratitude and treachery of Pope, who was said to have been indebted to the patronage of Chandos for a present of a thousand pounds, and who gained the opportunity of insulting him by the kindness of his invitation. The receipt of the thousand pounds Pope publickly denied ; but from the reproach which the attack on a character so amiable brought upon him, he tried all means of escaping. The name of Cleland was again employed in an apology, by which no man was satisfied ; and he was at last reduced to shelter his temerity behind dissimulation, and endeavour to make that disbelieved which he never had confidence openly to deny. He wrote an exculpatory letter to the Duke, which was answered with great magnanimity, 224 SAMUEL JOHNSON as by a man who accepted his excuse without believing his pro- fessions. He said, that to have ridiculed his taste, or his buildings, had been an indifferent action in another man; but that in Pope, after the reciprocal kindness that had been exchanged between them, it had been less easily excused. Pope, in one of his Letters, complaining of the treatment which his poem had found, owns that such criticks can intimidate him, nay almost persuade him to write no more, which is a compliment this age deserves. The man who threatens the world is always ridiculous; for the world can easily go on without him, and in a short time will cease to miss him. I have heard of an idiot, who used to revenge his vexations by lying all night upon the bridge. There is nothing, says Juvenal, that a man will not be- lieve in his own favour. Pope had been flattered till he thought himself one of the moving powers in the system of life. When he talked of laying down his pen, those who sat round him intreated and implored, and self-love did not suffer him to suspect that they went away and laughed. The following year deprived him of Gay, a man whom he had known early, and whom he seemed to love with more tenderness than any other of his literary friends. Pope was now forty-four years old; an age at which the mind begins less easily to admit new confidence, and the will to grow less flexible, and when there- fore the departure of an old friend is very acutely felt. In the next year he lost his mother, not by an unexpected death, for she had lasted to the age of ninety-three ; but she did not die unlamented. The filial piety of Pope was in the highest degree amiable and exemplary; his parents had the happiness of living till he was at the summit of poetical reputation, till he was at ease in his fortune, and without a rival in his fame, and found no dimi- nution of his respect or tenderness. Whatever was his pride, to them he was obedient; and whatever was his irritability, to them he was gentle. Life has, among its soothing and quiet com- forts, few things better to give than such a son. One of the passages of Pope's life, which seems to deserve some enquiry, was a publication of Letters between him and many of his friends, which falling into the hands of Curll, a rapacious book- seller of no good fame, were by him printed and sold. This THE LIFE OF POPE 22$ volume containing some Letters from noblemen, Pope incited a prosecution against him in the House of Lords for breach of privilege, and attended himself to stimulate the resentment of his friends. Curll appeared at the bar, and, knowing himself in no great danger, spoke of Pope with very little reverence. He has, said Curll, a knack at versifying, but in prose I think myself a match for him. When the orders of the House were examined, none of them appeared to have been infringed ; Curll went away trium- phant, and Pope was left to seek some other remedy. CurlPs account was, that one evening a man in a clergyman's gown, but with a lawyer's band, brought and offered to sale a num- ber of printed volumes, which he found to be Pope's epistolary correspondence; that he asked no name, and was told none, but gave the price demanded, and thought himself authorised to use his purchase to his own advantage. That Curll gave a true account of the transaction, it is reasonable to believe, because no falsehood was ever detected; and when some years afterwards I mentioned it to Lintot, the son of Bernard, he declared his opinion to be, that Pope knew better than any body else how Curll obtained the copies, because another parcel was at the same time sent to himself, for which no price had ever been demanded, as he made known his resolution not to pay a porter, and consequently not to deal with a nameless agent. Such care had been taken to make them publick, that they were sent at once to two booksellers ; to Curll, who was likely to seize them as a prey, and to Lintot, who might be expected to give Pope information of the seeming injury. Lintot, I believe, did nothing; and Curll did what was expected. That to make them publick was the only purpose may be reasonably supposed, because the numbers offered to sale by the private messengers shewed that hope of gain could not have been the motive of the impression. It seems that Pope, being desirous of printing his Letters, and not knowing how to do, without imputation of vanity, what has in this country been done very rarely, contrived an appearance of compulsion ; that when he could complain that his Letters were surreptitiously published, he might decently and defensively pub- lish them himself. Pope's private correspondence, thus promulgated, filled the Q 226 SAMUEL JOHNSON nation with praises of his candour, tenderness, and benevolence, the purity of his purposes, and the fidelity of his friendship. There were some Letters which a very good or a very wise man would wish suppressed; but, as they had been already exposed, it was impracticable now to retract them. From the perusal of those Letters, Mr. Allen first conceived the desire of knowing him; and with so much zeal did he cultivate the friendship which he had newly formed, that when Pope told his purpose of vindicating his own property by a genuine edition, he offered to pay the cost. This, however, Pope did not accept ; but in time solicited a sub- scription for a Quarto volume, which appeared (1737), I believe, with sufficient profit. In the Preface he tells that his Letters were reposited in a friend's library, said to be the Earl of Oxford's, and that the copy thence stolen was sent to the press. The story was doubtless received with different degrees of credit. It may be suspected that the Preface to the Miscellanies was written to prepare the publick for such an incident; and to strengthen this opinion, James Worsdale, a painter, who was employed in clandes- tine negotiations, but whose veracity was very doubtful, declared that he was the messenger who carried, by Pope's direction, the books to Curll. When they were thus published and avowed, as they had re- lation to recent facts, and persons either then living or not yet forgotten, they may be supposed to have found readers; but as the facts were minute, and the characters being either private or literary, were little known, or little regarded, they awakened no popular kindness or resentment: the book never became much the subject of conversation ; some read it as contemporary history, and some perhaps as a model of epistolary language; but those who read it did not talk of it. Not much therefore was added by it to fame or envy; nor do I remember that it produced either publick praise, or publick censure. It had, however, in some degree, the recommendation of novelty. Our language has few Letters, except those of statesmen. Howel indeed, about a century ago, published his Letters, which are commended by Morhoff , and which alone of his hundred volumes continue his memory. Loveday's Letters were printed only once ; THE LIFE OF POPE 227 those of Herbert and Suckling are hardly known. Mrs. Phillip's [Orinda's] are equally neglected ; and those of Walsh seem written as exercises, and were never sent to any living mistress or friend. Pope's epistolary excellence had an open field ; he had no English rival, living or dead. Pope is seen in this collection as connected with the other con- temporary wits, and certainly suffers no disgrace in the comparison ; but it must be remembered, that he had the power of favouring himself: he might have originally had publication in his mind, and have written with care, or have afterwards selected those which he had most happily conceived, or most diligently laboured; and I know not whether there does not appear something more studied and artificial in his productions than the rest, except one long Letter by Bolingbroke, composed with all the skill and in- dustry of a professed author. It is indeed not easy to distinguish affectation from habit ; he that has once studiously formed a style, rarely writes afterwards with complete ease. Pope may be said to write always with his reputation in his head ; . Swift perhaps like a man who remembered that he was writing to Pope; but Arbuthnot like one who lets thoughts drop from his pen as they rise into his mind. Before these Letters appeared, he published the first part of what he persuaded himself to think a system of Ethicks, under the title of an Essay on Man, which, if his Letter to Swift (of Sept. 14, 1725) be rightly explained by the commentator, had been eight years under his consideration, and of which he seems to have desired the success with great solicitude. He had now many open and doubtless many secret enemies. The Dunces were yet smarting with the war; and the superiority which he publickly arrogated, disposed the world to wish his humiliation. All this he knew, and against all this he provided. His own name, and that of his friend to whom the work is inscribed, were in the first editions carefully suppressed; and the poem, being of a new kind, was ascribed to one or another, as favour determined, or conjecture wandered; it was given, says Warburton, to every man except him only who could write it. Those who like only when they like the author, and who are under the dominion of a name, condemned it; and those admired it who are willing to 228 SAMUEL JOHNSON scatter praise at random, which while it is unappropriated excites no envy. Those friends of Pope, that were trusted with the secret, went about lavishing honours on the new-born poet, and hinting that Pope was never so much in danger from any former rival. To those authors whom he had personally offended, and to those whose opinion the world considered as decisive, and whom he suspected of envy or malevolence, he sent his essay as a present before publication, that they might defeat their own enmity by praises, which they could not afterwards decently retract. With these precautions, in 1733 was published the first part of the Essay on Man. There had been for some time a report that Pope was busy upon a System of Morality; but this design was not discovered in the new poem, which had a form and a title with which its readers were unacquainted. Its reception was not uni- form ; some thought it a very imperfect piece, though not without good lines. While the author was unknown, some, as will always happen, favoured him as an adventurer, and some censured him as an intruder; but all thought him above neglect; the sale in- creased, and editions were multiplied. The subsequent editions of the first Epistle exhibited two memo- rable corrections. At first, the poet and his friend Expatiate freely o'er this scene of man, A mighty maze of walks without a plan. For which he wrote afterwards, A mighty maze, but not without a plan: for, if there were no plan, it was in vain to describe or trace the maze. The other alteration was of these lines: And spite of pride, and in thy reason's spite, One truth is clear, whatever is, is right: but having afterwards discovered, or been shewn, that the truth which subsisted- in spite of reason could not be very clear, he sub- stituted And spite of pride, in erring reason's spite. THE LIFE OF POPE 229 To such oversights will the most vigorous mind be liable, when it is employed at once upon argument and poetry. The second and third Epistles were published ; and Pope was, I believe, more and more suspected of writing them; at last, in 1734, he avowed the fourth, and claimed the honour of a moral poet. In the conclusion it is sufficiently acknowledged, that the doctrine of the Essay on Man was received from Bolingbroke, who is said to have ridiculed Pope, among those who enjoyed his confidence, as having adopted and advanced principles of which he did not perceive the consequence, and as blindly propagating opinions contrary to his own. That those communications had been consolidated into a scheme regularly drawn, and delivered to Pope, from whom it returned only transformed from prose to verse, has been reported, but hardly can be true. The Essay plainly appears the fabrick of a poet : what Bolingbroke supplied could be only the first principles; the order, illustration, and embellishments must all be Pope's. These principles it is not my business to clear from obscurity, dogmatism, or falsehood ; but they were not immediately examined ; philosophy and poetry have not often the same readers ; and the Essay abounded in splendid amplifications and sparkling sen- tences, which were read and admired, with no great attention to their ultimate purpose ; its flowers caught the eye, which did not see what the gay foliage concealed, and for a time flourished in the sunshine of universal approbation. So little was any evil tendency discovered, that, as innocence is unsuspicious, many read it for a manual of piety. Its reputation soon invited a translator. It was first turned into French prose, and afterwards by Resnel into verse. Both trans- lations fell into the hands of Crousaz, who first, when he had the version in prose, wrote a general censure, and afterwards reprinted ResnePs version, with particular remarks upon every paragraph. Crousaz was a professor of Switzerland, eminent for his treatise of Logick, and his Examen de Pyrrhonisme, and, however little known or regarded here, was no mean antagonist. His mind was one of those in which philosophy and piety are happily united. He was accustomed to argument and disquisition, and perhaps 230 SAMUEL JOHNSON was grown too desirous of detecting faults ; but his intentions were always right, his opinions were solid, and his religion pure. His incessant vigilance for the promotion of piety disposed him to look with distrust upon all metaphysical systems of Theology, and all schemes of virtue and happiness purely rational: and therefore it was not long before he was persuaded that the posi- tions of Pope, as they terminated for the most part in natural religion, were intended to draw mankind away from revelation, and to represent the whole course of things as a necessary con- catenation of indissoluble fatality; and it is undeniable, that in many passages a religious eye may easily discover expressions not very favourable to morals, or to liberty. About this time Warburton began to make his appearance in the first ranks of learning. He was a man of vigorous faculties, a mind fervid and vehement, supplied by incessant and unlimited enquiry, with wonderful extent and variety of knowledge, which yet had not oppressed his imagination, nor clouded his perspicacity. To every work he brought a memory full fraught, together with a fancy fertile of original combinations, and at once exerted the powers of the scholar, the reasoner, and the wit. But his know- ledge was too multifarious to be always exact, and his pursuits were too eager to be always cautious. His abilities gave him an haughty confidence, which he disdained to conceal or mollify; and his impatience of opposition disposed him to treat his ad- versaries with such contemptuous superiority as made his readers commonly his enemies, and excited against the advocate the wishes of some who favoured the cause. He seems to have adopted the Roman Emperor's determination, oderint dum metuant; he used no allurements of gentle language, but wished to compel rather than persuade. His style is copious without selection, and forcible without neatness ; he took the words that presented themselves : his diction is coarse and impure, and his sentences are unmeasured. He had, in the early part of his life, pleased himself with the notice of inferior wits, and corresponded with the enemies of Pope. A Letter was produced, when he had perhaps himself forgotten it, in which he tells Concanen, ' Dryden I observe borrows for want of leisure, and Pope for want of genius: Milton out of pride, and THE LIFE OF POPE 231 Addison out of modesty.' And when Theobald published Shake- speare, in opposition to Pope, the best notes were supplied by Warburton. But the time was now come when Warburton was to change his opinion, and Pope was to find a defender in him who had con- tributed so much to the exaltation of his rival. The arrogance of Warburton excited against him every artifice of offence, and therefore it may be supposed that his union with Pope was censured as hypocritical inconstancy; but surely to think differently, at different times, of poetical merit, may be easily allowed. Such opinions are often admitted, and dismissed, with- out nice examination. Who is there that has not found reason for changing his mind about questions of greater importance ? Warburton, whatever was his motive, undertook, without solici- tation, to rescue Pope from the talons of Crousaz, by freeing him from the imputation of favouring fatality, or rejecting revelation ; and from month to month continued a vindication of the Essay on Man, in the literary journal of that time called The Republick of Letters. Pope, who probably began to doubt the tendency of his own work, was glad that the positions, of which he perceived himself not to know the full meaning, could by any mode of interpretation be made to mean well. How much he was pleased with his gra- tuitous defender, the following Letter evidently shews : 'April n, 1739. 'SiR, 'I have just received from Mr. R. two more of your Letters. It is in the greatest hurry imaginable that I write this ; but I can- not help thanking you in particular for your third Letter, which is so extremely clear, short, and full, that I think Mr. Crousaz ought never to have another answerer, and deserved not so good an one. I can only say, you do him too much honour, and me too much right, so odd as the expression seems; for you have made my system as clear as I ought to have done, and could not. It is indeed the same system as mine, but illustrated with a ray of your own, as they say our natural body is the same still when it is glorified. I am sure I like it better than I did before, and so will every man 232 SAM UEL . JOHNSON else. I know I meant just what you explain ; but I did not explain my own meaning so well as you. You understand me as well as I do myself ; but you express me better than I could express myself. Pray accept the sincerest acknowledgements. I cannot but wish these Letters were put together in one Book, and intend (with your leave) to procure a translation of part, at least, of all of them into French ; but I shall not proceed a step without your consent and opinion, &c.' By this fond and eager acceptance of an exculpatory comment, Pope testified that, whatever might be the seeming or real import of the principles which he had received from Bolingbroke, he had not intentionally attacked religion; and Bolingbroke, if he meant to make him without his own consent an instrument of mischief, found him now engaged with his eyes open on the side of truth. It is known that Bolingbroke concealed from Pope his real opinions. He once discovered them to Mr. Hooke, who related them again to Pope, and was told by him that he must have mis- taken the meaning of what he heard; and Bolingbroke, when Pope's uneasiness incited him to desire an explanation, declared that Hooke had misunderstood him. Bolingbroke hated Warburton, who had drawn his pupil from him; and a little before Pope's death they had a dispute, from which they parted with mutual aversion. From this time Pope lived in the closest intimacy with his com- mentator, and amply rewarded his kindness and his zeal; for he introduced him to Mr. Murray, by whose interest he became preacher at Lincoln's Inn, and to Mr. Allen, who gave him his niece and his estate, and by consequence a bishoprick. When he died, he left him the property of his works ; a legacy which may be reasonably estimated at four thousand pounds. Pope's fondness for the Essay on Man appeared by his desire of its propagation. Dobson, who had gained reputation by his version of Prior's Solomon, was employed by him to translate it into Latin verse, and was for that purpose some time at Twicken- ham; but he left his work, whatever was the reason, unfinished; and, by Benson's invitation, undertook the longer task of Paradise Lost. Pope then desired his friend to find a scholar who should THE LIFE OF POPE 233 turn his Essay into Latin prose ; but no such performance has ever appeared. Pope lived at this time among the Great, with that reception and respect to which his works entitled him, and which he had not impaired by any private misconduct or factitious partiality. Though Bolingbroke was his friend, Walpole was not his enemy; but treated him with so much consideration as, at his request, to solicit and obtain from the French Minister an abbey for Mr. Southcot, whom he considered himself as obliged to reward, by this exertion of his interest, for the benefit which he had received from his attendance in a long illness. It was said, that, when the Court was at Richmond, Queen Caroline had declared her intention to visit him. This may have been only a careless effusion, thought on no more : the report of such notice, however, was soon in many mouths; and if I do not forget or misapprehend Savage's account, Pope, pretending to decline what was not yet offered, left his house for a time, not, I suppose, for any other reason than lest he should be thought to stay at home in expectation of an honour which would not be conferred. He was therefore angry at Swift, who represents him as refusing the visits of a Queen, because he knew that what had never been offered, had never been refused. Beside the general system of morality supposed to be con- tained in the Essay on Man, it was his intention to write distinct poems upon the different duties or conditions of life ; one of which is the Epistle to Lord Bathurst (1733) on the Use of Riches, a piece on which he declared great labour to have been bestowed. Into this poem some incidents are historically thrown, and some known characters are introduced, with others of which it is difficult to say how far they are real or fictitious ; but the praise of Kyrl, the Man of Ross, deserves particular examination, who, after a long and pompous enumeration of his publick works and private charities, is said to have diffused all those blessings from five hundred a year. Wonders are willingly told, and willingly heard. The truth is, that Kyrl was a man of known integrity, and active benevolence, by whose solicitation the wealthy were persuaded to pay contributions to his charitable schemes; this influence he obtained by an example of liberality exerted to the utmost extent 234 SAMUEL JOHNSON of his power, and was thus enabled to give more than he had. This account Mr. Victor received from the minister of the place, and I have preserved it, that the praise of a good man being made more credible, may be more solid. Narrations of romantick and impracticable virtue will be read with wonder, but that which is unattainable is recommended in vain; that good may be en- deavoured, it must be shewn to be possible. This is the only piece in which the author has given a hint of his religion, by ridiculing the ceremony of burning the pope, and by mentioning with some indignation the inscription on the Monu- ment. When this poem was first published, the dialogue, having no letters of direction, was perplexed and obscure. Pope seems to have written with no very distinct idea ; for he calls that an Epistle to Bathurst, in which Bathurst is introduced as speaking. He afterwards (1734) inscribed to Lord Cobham his Characters of Men, written with close attention to the operations of the mind and modifications of life. In this poem he has endeavoured to establish and exemplify his favourite theory of the ruling Passion, by which he means an original direction of desire to some particular object, an innate affection which gives all action a determinate and invariable tendency, and operates upon the whole system of life, either openly, or more secretly by the intervention of some accidental or subordinate propension. Of any passion, thus innate and irresistible, the existence may reasonably be doubted. Human characters are by no means constant ; men change by change of place, of fortune, of acquaint- ance; he who is at one time a lover of pleasure, is at another a lover of money. Those indeed who attain any excellence, com- monly spend life in one pursuit ; for excellence is not often gained upon easier terms. But to the particular species of excellence men are directed, not by an ascendant planet or predominating humour, but by the first book which they read, some early con- versation which they heard, or some accident which excited ardour and emulation. It must be at least allowed that this ruling Passion, antecedent to reason and observation, must have an object independent of human contrivance ; for there can be no natural desire of artificial good. THE LIFE OF POPE 235 No man therefore can be born, in the strict acceptation, a lover of money; for he may be born where money does not exist; nor can he be born, in a moral sense, a lover of his country; for so- ciety, politically regulated, is a state contradistinguished from a state of nature; and any attention to that coalition of interests which makes the happiness of a country, is possible only to those whom enquiry and reflection have, enabled to comprehend it. This doctrine is in itself pernicious as well as false : its tendency is to produce the belief of a kind of moral predestination, or over- ruling principle which cannot be resisted; he that admits it, is prepared to comply with every desire that caprice or opportunity shall excite, and to flatter himself that he submits only to the lawful dominion of Nature, in obeying the resistless authority of his ruling Passion. Pope has formed his theory with so little skill, that, in the ex- amples by which he illustrates and confirms it, he has confounded passions, appetites, and habits. To the Characters of Men he added soon after, in an Epistle supposed to have been addressed to Martha Blount, but which the last edition has taken from her, the Characters of Women. This poem, which was laboured with great diligence, and in the author's opinion with great success, was neglected at its first publication, as the commentator supposes, because the publick was informed by an advertisement, that it contained no Charac- ter drawn from the Life; an assertion which Pope probably did not expect or wish to have been believed, and which he soon gave his readers sufficient reason to distrust, by telling them in a note, that the work was imperfect, because part of his subject was Vice too high to be yet exposed. The time, however, soon come, in which it was safe to display the Dutchess of Marlborough under the name of Atossa; and her character was inserted with no great honour to the writer's gratitude. He published from time to time (between 1730 and 1740) Imi- tations of different poems of Horace, generally with his name, and once, as was suspected, without it. What he was upon moral principles ashamed to own, he ought to have suppressed. Of these pieces it is useless to settle the dates, as they had seldom 236 SAMUEL JOHNSON much relation to the times, and perhaps had been long in his hands. This mode of imitation, in which the ancients are familiarised, by adapting their sentiments to modern topicks, by making Hor- ace say of Shakespeare what he originally said of Ennius, and accommodating his satires on Pantolabus and Nomentanus to the flatterers and prodigals of our own time, was -first -practised in the reign of Charles the Second by Oldhanr r iarid>rtochester, at least I remember no instances more ancient. It is a kind of middle composition between translation and original design, which pleases when the thoughts are unexpectedly applicable, and the parallels lucky. It seems to have been Pope's favourite amusement; for he has carried it further than any former poet. He published likewise a revival, in smoother numbers, of Dr. Donne's Satires, which was recommended to him by the Duke of Shrewsbury and the Earl of Oxford. They made no great impression on the publick. Pope seems to have known their imbecility, and therefore suppressed them while he was yet contending to rise in reputation, but ventured them when he thought their deficiencies more likely to be imputed to Donne than to himself. The Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot, which seems to be derived in its first design from Boileau's Address a son Esprit, was pub- lished in January, 1735, about a month before the death of him to whom it is inscribed. It is to be regretted that either honour or pleasure should have been missed by Arbuthnot; a man estimable for his learning, amiable for his life, and venerable for his piety. Arbuthnot was a man of great comprehension, skilful in his profession, versed in the sciences, acquainted with ancient litera- ture, and able to animate his mass of knowledge by a bright and active imagination; a scholar with great brilliancy of wit; a wit, who, in the crowd of life, retained and discovered a noble ardour of religious zeal. In this poem Pope seems to reckon with the publick. He vindicates himself from censures; and with dignity, rather than arrogance, enforces his own claims to kindness and respect. Into this poem are interwoven several paragraphs which had THE LIFE OF POPE 237 been before printed as a fragment, and among them the satirical lines upon Addison, of which the last couplet has been twice corrected. It was at first, Who would not smile if such a man there be? Who would not laugh if Addison were he? Then, Who would not grieve if such a man there be? Who would not laugh if Addison were he? At last it is, Who but must laugh if such a man there be? Who would not weep if Atticus were he? He was at this time at open war with Lord Hervey, who had distinguished himself as a steady adherent to the Ministry; and, being offended with a contemptuous answer to one of his pam- phlets, had summoned Pulteney to a duel. Whether he or Pope made the first attack, perhaps cannot now be easily known: he had written an invective against Pope, whom he calls, Hard as thy heart, and as thy birth obscure; and hints that his father was a hatter. To this Pope wrote a reply in verse and prose: the verses are in this poem; and the prose, though it was never sent, is printed among his Letters, but to a cool reader of the present time exhibits nothing but tedious malignity. His last satires, of the general kind, were two Dialogues, named from the year in which they were published, Seventeen Hun- dred and Thirty-eight. In these poems many are praised and many are reproached. Pope was then entangled in the opposi- tion ; a follower of the Prince of Wales, who dined at his house, and the friend of many who obstructed and censured the conduct of the Ministers. His political partiality was too plainly shewn ; he forgot the prudence with which he passed, in his earlier years, uninjured and unoffending through much more violent conflicts of faction. In the first Dialogue, having an opportunity of praising Allen of Bath, he asked his leave to mention him as a man not illustrious by any merit of his ancestors, and called -him in his verses low- born Allen. Men are seldom satisfied with praise introduced or followed by any mention of defect. Allen seems not to have 238 SAMUEL JOHNSON taken any pleasure in his epithet, which was afterwards soft- ened into humble Allen. In the second Dialogue he took some liberty with one of the Foxes, among others; which Fox, in a reply to Lyttelton, took an opportunity of repaying, by reproaching him with the friend- ship of a lampooner, who scattered his ink without fear or decency, and against whom he hoped the resentment of the Legislature would quickly be discharged. About this time Paul Whitehead, a small poet, was summoned before the Lords for a poem called Manners, together with Dods- ley, his publisher. Whitehead, who hung loose upon society, sculked and escaped; but Dodsley's shop and family made his appearance necessary. He was, however, soon dismissed; and the whole process was probably intended rather to intimidate Pope than to punish Whitehead. Pope never afterwards attempted to join the patriot with the poet, nor drew his pen upon statesmen. That he desisted from his attempts of reformation is imputed, by his commentator, to his despair of prevailing over the corruption of the time. He was not likely to have been ever of opinion that the dread of his satire would countervail the love of power or of money ; he pleased himself with being important and formidable, and gratified sometimes his pride, and sometimes his resentment; till at last be began to think he should be more safe, if he were less busy. The Memoirs of Scriblerus, published about this time, extend only to the first book of a work projected in concert by Pope, Swift, and Arbuthnot, who used to meet in the time of Queen Anne, and denominated themselves the Scriblerus Club. Their purpose was to censure the abuses of learning by a fictitious Life of an infatuated Scholar. They were dispersed; the design was never completed; and Warburton laments its miscarriage, as an event very disastrous to polite letters. If the whole may be estimated by this specimen, which seems to be the production of Arbuthnot, with a few touches perhaps by Pope, the want of more will not be much lamented; for the follies which the writer ridicules are so little practised, that they are not known; nor can the satire be understood but by the THE LIFE OF POPE 239 learned: he raises phantoms of absurdity, and then drives them away. He cures diseases that were never felt. For this reason this joint production of three great writers has never obtained any notice from mankind; it has been little read, or when read has been forgotten, as no man could be wiser, better, or merrier, by remembering it. The design cannot boast of much originality; for, besides its general resemblance to Don Quixote, there will be found in it particular imitations of the History of Mr. Duffle. Swift carried so much of it into Ireland as supplied him with hints for his Travels; and with those the world might have been contented, though the rest had been suppressed. Pope had sought for images and sentiments in a region not known to have been explored by many other of the English writers; he had consulted the modern writers of Latin poetry, a class of authors whom Boileau endeavored to bring into con- tempt, and who are too generally neglected. Pope, however, was not ashamed of their acquaintance, nor ungrateful for the advantages which he might have derived from it. A small selec- tion from the Italians who wrote in Latin had been published at London, about the latter end of the last century, by a man who concealed his name, but whom his Preface shews to have been well qualified for his undertaking. This collection Pope amplified by more than half, and (1740) published it in two volumes, but injuriously omitted his predecessor's preface. To these books, which had nothing but the mere text, no regard was paid, the authors were still neglected, and the editor was neither praised nor censured. He did not sink into idleness; he had planned a work, which he considered as subsequent to his Essay on Man, of which he has given this account to Dr. Swift. 'March 25, 1736. 'If ever I write any more Epistles in verse, one of them shall be addressed to you. I have long concerted it, and begun it; but I would make what bears your name as finished as my last work ought to be, that is to say, more finished than any of the rest. The subject is large, and will divide into four Epistles, which naturally follow the Essay on Man, viz. i. Of the Ex- 240 SAMUEL JOHNSON tent and Limits of Human Reason and Science. 2. A View of the useful and therefore attainable, and of the unuseful and therefore unattainable, Arts. 3. Of the Nature, Ends, Applica- tion, and Use of different Capacities. 4. Of the Use of Learn- ing, of the Science, of the World, and of Wit. It will conclude with a satire against the Misapplication of all these, exemplified by Pictures, Characters, and Examples.' This work in its full extent, being now afflicted with an asthma and finding the powers of life gradually declining, he had no longer courage to undertake ; but, from the materials which he had provided, he added, at Warburton's request, another book to the Dunciad, of which the design is to ridicule such studies as are either hopeless or useless, as either pursue what is un- attainable, or what, if it be attained, is of no use. When this book was printed (1742) the laurel had been for some time upon the head of Gibber; a man whom it cannot be supposed that Pope could regard with much kindness or esteem, though in one of the Imitations of Horace he has liberally enough praised the Careless Husband. In the Dunciad, among other worthless scribblers, he had mentioned Gibber; who, in his Apology, complains of the great poet's unkindness as more in- jurious, because, says he, I never have offended him. It might have been expected that Pope should have been, in some degree, mollified by this submissive gentleness; but no such consequence appeared. Though he condescended to com- mend Gibber once, he mentioned him afterwards contemptu- ously in one of his Satires, and again in his Epistle to Arbuthnot ; and in the fourth book of the Dunciad attacked him with acri- mony, to which the provocation is not easily discoverable. Perhaps he imagined that, in ridiculing the Laureat, he satirised those by whom the laurel had been given, and gratified that ambitious petulance with which he affected to insult the great. The severity of this satire left Gibber no longer any patience. He had confidence enough in his own powers to believe that he could disturb the quiet of his adversary, and doubtless did not want instigators, who, without any care about the victory, de- sired to amuse themselves by looking on the contest. He there- fore gave the town a pamphlet, in which he declares his resolution THE LIFE OF POPE 241 from that time never to bear another blow without returning it, and to tire out his adversary by perseverance, if he cannot conquer him by strength. The incessant and unappeasable malignity of Pope he imputes to a very distant cause. After the Three Hours after Marriage had been driven off the stage, by the offence which the mummy and crocodile gave the audience, while the exploded scene was yet fresh in memory, it happened that Gibber played Bayes in the Rehearsal; and, as it had been usual to enliven the part by the mention of any recent theatrical transactions, he said, that he once thought to have introduced his lovers disguised in a Mummy and a Crocodile. 'This,' says he, 'was received with loud claps, which indicated contempt of the play.' Pope, who was behind the scenes, meeting him as he left the stage, attacked him, as he says, with all the virulence of a Wit out of his senses ; to which he replied, * that he would take no other notice of what was said by so particular a man than to declare, that, as often as he played that part, he would repeat the same provocation.' He shews his opinion to be, that Pope was one of the authors of the play which he so zealously defended; and adds an idle story of Pope's behaviour at a tavern. The pamphlet was written with little power of thought or lan- guage, and, if suffered to remain without notice, would have been very soon forgotten. Pope had now been enough acquainted with human life to know, if his passion had not been too powerful for his understanding, that, from a contention like his with Gibber, the world seeks nothing but diversion, which is given at the expence of the higher character. When Gibber lampooned Pope, curiosity was excited; what Pope would say of Gibber nobody enquired, but in hope that Pope's asperity might betray his pain and lessen his dignity. He should therefore have suffered the pamphlet to flutter and die, without confessing that it stung him. The dishonour of being shewn as Gibber's antagonist could never be compensated by the victory. Gibber had nothing to lose; when Pope had exhausted all his malignity upon him, he would rise in the esteem both of his friends and his enemies. Silence only could have 242 SAMUEL JOHNSON made him despicable ; the blow which did not appear to be felt would have been struck in vain. But Pope's irascibility prevailed, and he resolved to tell the whole English world that he was at war with Gibber; and to shew that he thought him no common adversary, he prepared no common vengeance; he published a new addition of the Dunciad, in which he degraded Theobald from his painful pre- eminence, and enthroned Gibber in his stead. Unhappily the two heroes were of opposite characters, and Pope was unwill- ing to lose what he had already written ; he has therefore depraved his poem by giving to Gibber the old books, the cold pedantry, and sluggish pertinacity of Theobald. Pope was ignorant enough of his own interest, to make another change, and introduced Osborne contending for the prize among the booksellers. Osborne was a man entirely destitute of hame, without sense of any disgrace but that of poverty. He told me, when he was doing that which raised Pope's resentment, that he should be put into the Dunciad; but he had the fate of Cassandra. I gave no credit to his prediction, till in time I saw it accomplished. The shafts of satire were directed equally in vain against Gibber and Osborne; being repelled by the impenetrable impudence of one, and deadened by the impassive dulness of the other. Pope confessed his own pain by his anger; but he gave no pain to those who had provoked him. He was able to hurt none but himself; by transferring the same ridicule from one to another, he destroyed its efficacy; for, by shewing that what he had said of one he was ready to say of another, he reduced himself to the insignificance of his own magpye, who from his cage calls cuckold at a venture. Gibber, according to his engagement, repaid the Dunciad with another pamphlet, which, Pope said, would be as good as a dose of hartshorn to him; but his tongue and his heart were at variance. I have heard Mr. Richardson relate, that he attended his father the painter on a visit, when one of Gibber's pamphlets came into the hands of Pope, who said, These things are my diversion. They sat by him while he perused it, and saw his features writhen with anguish; and young Richardson said to his father, when they returned, that he hoped to be preserved from such diversion as had been that day the lot of Pope. THE LIFE OF POPE 243 From this time, finding his diseases more oppressive, and his vital powers gradually declining, he no longer strained his faculties with any original composition, nor proposed any other employment for his remaining life than the revisal and correction of his former works; in which he received advice and assistance from Warburton, whom he appears to have trusted and honoured in the highest degree. He laid aside his Epick Poem, perhaps without much loss to mankind ; for his hero was Brutus the Trojan, who, according to a ridiculous fiction, established a colony in Britain. The subject therefore was of the fabulous age; the actors were a race upon whom imagination has been exhausted, and attention wearied, and to whom the mind will not easily be recalled, when it is invited in blank verse, which Pope had adopted with great imprudence, and, I think, without due consideration of the nature of our language. The sketch is, at least in part, preserved by Ruffhead ; by which it appears, that Pope was thoughtless enough to model the names of his heroes with terminations not consistent with the time or country in which he places them. He lingered through the next year; but perceived himself, as he expresses it, going down the hill. He had for at least five years been afflicted with an asthma, and other disorders, which his physicians were unable to relieve. Towards the end of his life he consulted Dr. Thomson, a man who had, by large promises, and free censures of the common practice of physick, forced himself up into sudden reputation. Thomson declared his dis- temper to be a dropsy, and evacuated part of the water by tincture of jalap; but confessed that his belly did not subside. Thomson had many enemies, and Pope was persuaded to dismiss him. While he was yet capable of amusement and conversation, as he was one day sitting in the air with Lord Bolingbroke and Lord Marchmont, he saw his favourite Martha Blount at the bottom of the terrace, and asked Lord Bolingbroke to go and hand her up. Bolingbroke, not liking his errand, crossed his legs, and sat still; but Lord Marchmont, who was younger and less captious, waited on the Lady; who, when he came to her, asked, What, is he not dead yet ? She is said to have neglected him, with shameful unkindness, in the latter time of his decay; yet, of the little which he had to 244 SAMUEL JOHNSON leave, she had a very great part. Their acquaintance began early ; the life of each was pictured on the other's mind ; their conversa- tion therefore was endearing, for when they met, there was an immediate coalition of congenial notions. Perhaps he considered her unwillingness to approach the chamber of sickness as female weakness, or human frailty; perhaps he was conscious to himself of peevishness and impatience, or, though he was offended by her inattention, might yet consider her merit as overbalancing her fault; and, if he had suffered his heart to be alienated from her, he could have found nothing that might fill her place; he could have only shrunk within himself; it was too late to transfer his confi- dence or fondness. In May 1 744, his death was approaching ; on the sixth, he was all day delirious, which he mentioned four days afterwards as a suffi- cient humiliation of the vanity of man ; he afterwards complained of seeing things as through a curtain, and in false colours; and one day, in the presence of Dodsley, asked what arm it was that came out from the wall. He said that his greatest inconvenience was inability to think. Bolingbroke sometimes wept over him in this state of helpless decay; and being told by Spence, that Pope, at the intermission of his deliriousness, was always saying something kind either of his present or absent friends, and that his humanity seemed to have survived his understanding, answered, // has so. And added, I never in my life knew a man that had so tender a heart for his particular friends, or a more general friendship for mankind. At another time he said, I have known Pope these thirty years, and value myself more in his friendship than his grief then suppressed his voice. Pope expressed undoubting confidence of a future state. Being asked by his friend Mr. Hooke, a papist, whether he would not die like his father and mother, and whether a priest should not be called, he answered, / do not think it essential, but it will be very right; and I thank you for putting me in mind of it. In the morning, after the priest had given him the last sacraments, he said, There is nothing that is meritorious but virtue and friend- ship, and indeed friendship itself is only a part of virtue. He died in the evening of the thirtieth day of May, 1744, so THE LIFE OF POPE 2 45 placidly, that the attendants did not discern the exact time of his expiration. He was buried at Twickenham, near his father and mother, where a monument has been erected to him by his com- mentator, the Bishop of Gloucester. He left the care of his papers to his executors, first to Lord Boling- broke, and if he should not be living, to the Earl of Marchmont, undoubtedly expecting them to be proud of the trust, and eager to extend his fame. But let no man dream of influence beyond his life. After a decent time Dodsley the bookseller went to solicit preference as the publisher, and was told that the parcel had not been yet inspected; and whatever was the reason, the world has been disappointed of what was reserved for the next age. He lost, indeed, the favour of Bolingbroke by a kind of post- humous offence. The political pamphlet called The Patriot King had been put into his hands that he might procure the impression of a very few copies, to be distributed according to the author's direction among his friends, and Pope assured him that no more had been printed than were allowed ; but, soon after his death, the printer brought and resigned a complete edition of fifteen hundred copies, which Pope had ordered him to print, and to retain in secret. He kept, as was observed, his engagement to Pope better than Pope had kept it to his friend; and nothing was known of the transaction, till, upon the death of his employer, he thought himself obliged to deliver the books to the right owner, who, with great indignation, made a fire in his yard, and delivered the whole impression to the flames. Hitherto nothing had been done which was not naturally dictated by resentment of violated faith; resentment more acrimonious, as the violator had been more loved or more trusted. But here the anger might have stopped; the injury was private, and there was little danger from the example. Bolingbroke, however, was not yet satisfied; his thirst of ven- geance excited him to blast the memory of the man over whom he had wept in his last struggles ; and he employed Mallet, another friend of Pope, to tell the tale to the publick, with all its aggrava- tions. Warburton, whose heart was warm with his legacy, and tender by the recent separation, thought it proper for him to interpose; and undertook, not indeed to vindicate the action, for 246 SAMUEL JOHNSON breach of trust has always something criminal, but to extenuate it by an apology. Having advanced, what cannot be denied, that moral obliquity is made more or less excusable by the motives that produce it, he enquires what evil purpose could have induced Pope to break his promise. He could not delight his vanity by usurping the work, which, though not sold in shops, had been shewn to a number more than sufficient to preserve the author's claim; he could not gratify his avarice, for he could not sell his plunder till Bolingbroke was dead; and even then, if the copy was left to another, his fraud would be defeated, and if left to him- self, would be useless. Warburton therefore supposes, with great appearance of reason, that the irregularity of his conduct proceeded wholly from his zeal for Bolingbroke, who might perhaps have destroyed the pamphlet, which Pope thought it his duty to preserve, even without its author's approbation. To this apology an answer was written in a Letter to the most impudent man living. He brought some reproach upon his own memory by the petulant and contemptuous mention made in his will of Mr. Allen, and an affected repayment of his benefactions. Mrs. Blount, as the known friend and favourite of Pope, had been invited to the house of Allen, where she comported herself with such indecent arrogance, that she parted from Mrs. Allen in a state of irreconcilable dis- like, and the door was for ever barred against her. This exclusion she resented with so much bitterness as to refuse any legacy from Pope, unless he left the world with a disavowal of obligation to Allen. Having been long under her dominion, now tottering in the decline of life, and unable to resist the violence of her temper, or, perhaps with the prejudice of a lover, persuaded that she had suffered improper treatment, he complied with her demand, and polluted his will with female resentment. Allen accepted the legacy, which he gave to the Hospital at Bath, observing that Pope was always a bad accomptant, and that if to 150^. he had put a cypher more, he had come nearer to the truth. The person of Pope is well known not to have been formed by the nicest model. He has, in his account of the Little Club, compared himself to a spider, and by another is described as protuberant THE LIFE OF POPE 247 behind and before. He is said to have been beautiful in his infancy ; but he was of a constitution originally feeble and weak ; and as bodies of a tender frame are easily distorted, his deformity was probably in part the effect of his application. His stature was so low, that, to bring him to a level with common tables, it was necessary to raise his seat. But his face was not displeasing, and his eyes were animated and vivid. By natural deformity, or accidental distortion, his vital functions were so much disordered, that his life was a long disease. His most frequent assailant was the headach, which he used to relieve by inhaling the steam of coffee, which he very frequently required. Most of what can be told concerning his petty peculiarities was communicated by a female domestick of the Earl of Oxford, who knew him perhaps after the middle of life. He was then so weak as to stand in perpetual need of female attendance; extremely sensible of cold, so that he wore a kind of fur doublet, under a shirt of a very coarse warm linen with fine sleeves. When he rose, he was invested in bodice made of stiff canvas, being scarce able to hold himself erect till they were laced, and he then put on a flannel waistcoat. One side was contracted. His legs were so slender, that he enlarged their bulk with three pair of stockings, which were drawn on and off by the maid ; for he was not able to dress or undress himself, and neither went to bed nor rose without help. His weakness made it very difficult for him to be clean. His hair had fallen almost all away ; and he used to dine some- times with Lord Oxford, privately, in a velvet cap. His dress of ceremony was black with a tye-wig, and a little sword. The indulgence and accommodation which his sickness required, had taught him all the unpleasing and unsocial qualities of a valetu- dinary man. He expected that every thing should give way to his ease or humour, as a child, whose parents will not hear her cry, has an unresisted dominion in the nursery. C'est que V enfant toujours est homme, C'est que I' homme est toujours enfant. When he wanted to sleep he nodded in company; and once slum- bered at his own table while the Prince of Wales was talking of poetry. 248 SAMUEL JOHNSON The reputation which his friendship gave, procured him many invitations; but he was a very troublesome inmate. He brought no servant, and had so many wants, that a numerous attendance was scarcely able to supply them. Wherever he was, he left no room for another, because he exacted the attention, and employed the activity of the whole family. His errands were so frequent and frivolous, that the footmen in time avoided and neglected him; and the Earl of Oxford discharged some of the servants for their resolute refusal of his messages. The maids, when they had neglected their business, alleged that they had been employed by Mr. Pope. One of his constant demands was of coffee in the night, and to the woman that waited on him in his chamber he was very burthensome: but he was careful to recompense her want of sleep ; and Lord Oxford's servant declared, that in a house where her business was to answer his call, she would not ask for wages. He had another fault, easily incident to those who, suffering much pain, think themselves entitled to whatever pleasures they can snatch. He was too indulgent to his appetite; he loved meat highly seasoned and of strong taste; and, at the intervals of the table, amused himself with biscuits and dry conserves. If he sat down to a variety of dishes, he would oppress his stomach with repletion ; and though he seemed angry when a dram was offered him, did not forbear to drink it. His friends, who knew the avenues to his heart, pampered him with presents of luxury, which he did not suffer to stand neglected. The death of great men is not always proportioned to the lustre of their lives. Hannibal, says Juvenal, did not perish by a javelin or a sword ; the slaughters of Cannae were revenged by a ring. The death of Pope was im- puted by some of his friends to a silver sauce-pan, in which it was his delight to heat potted lampreys. That he loved too well to eat, is certain ; but that his sensuality shortened his life will not be hastily concluded, when it is remem- bered that a conformation so irregular lasted six and fifty years, notwithstanding such pertinacious diligence of study and medita- tion. In all his intercourse with mankind, he had great delight in artifice, and endeavoured to attain all his purposes by indirect and THE LIFE OF POPE 249 unsuspected methods. He hardly drank tea without a stratagem. If, at the house of his friends, he wanted any accommodation, he was not willing to ask for it in plain terms, but would mention it re- motely as something convenient; though, when it was procured, he soon made it appear for whose sake it had been recommended. Thus he teized Lord Orrery till he obtained a screen. He prac- tised his arts on such small occasions, that Lady Bolingbroke used to say, in a French phrase, that he played the politician about cab- bages and turnips. His unjustifiable impression of the Patriot King, as it can be imputed to no particular motive, must have proceeded from his general habit of secrecy and cunning; he caught an opportunity of a sly trick, and pleased himself with the thought of outwitting Bolingbroke. In familiar or convivial conversation, it does not appear that he excelled. He may be said to have resembled Dryden, as being not one that was distinguished by vivacity in company. It is remarkable, that, so near his time, so much should be known of what he has written, and so little of what he has said : traditional memory retains no sallies of raillery, nor sentences of observation ; nothing either pointed or solid, either wise or merry. One apoph- thegm only stands upon record. When an objection raised against his inscription for Shakespeare was defended by the authority of Patrick, he replied horresco referens that he would allow the publisher of a Dictionary to know the meaning of a single word, but not of two words put together. He was fretful, and easily displeased, and allowed himself to be capriciously resentful. He would sometimes leave Lord Oxford silently, no one could tell why, and was to be courted back by more letters and messages than the footmen were willing to carry. The table was indeed infested by Lady Mary Wortley, who was the friend of Lady Oxford, and who, knowing his peevishness, could by no intreaties be restrained from contradicting him, till their disputes were sharpened to such asperity, that one or the other quitted the house. He sometimes condescended to be jocular with servants or in- feriors; but by no merriment, either of others or his own, was he ever seen excited to laughter. Of his domestick character, frugality was a part eminently 250 SAMUEL JOHNSON remarkable. Having determined not to be dependent, he determined not to be in want, and therefore wisely and magnanimously rejected all temptations to expence unsuitable to his fortune. This general care must be universally approved ; but it sometimes appeared in petty artifices of parsimony, such as the practice of writing his compositions on the back of letters, as may be seen in the remaining copy of the Iliad, by which perhaps in five years five shillings were saved; or in a niggardly reception of his friends, and scantiness of entertain- ment, as, when he had two guests in his house, he would set at supper a single pint upon the table; and having himself taken two small glasses, would retire, and say, Gentlemen, I leave you to your wine. Yet he tells his friends, that he has a heart for all, a house for all, and, whatever they may think, a fortune for all. He sometimes, however, made a splendid dinner, and is said to have wanted no part of the skill or elegance which such performances require. That this magnificence should be often displayed, that obstinate prudence with which he conducted his affairs would not permit; for his revenue, certain and casual, amounted only to about eight hundred pounds a year, of which, however, he declares himself able to assign one hundred to charity. Of this fortune, which as it arose from publick approbation was very honourably obtained, his imagination seems to have been too full : it would be hard to find a man, so well entitled to notice by his wit, that ever delighted so much in talking of his money. In his Letters, and in his Poems, his garden and his grotto, his quincunx and his vines, or some hints of his opulence, are always to be found. The great topick of his ridicule is poverty ; the crimes with which he reproaches his antagonists are their debts, their habitation in the Mint, and their want of a dinner. He seems to be of an opinion not very uncommon in the world, that to want money is to want every thing. Next to the pleasure of contemplating his possessions, seems to be that of enumerating the men of high rank with whom he was acquainted, and whose notice he loudly proclaims not to have been obtained by any practices of meanness or servility ; a boast which was never denied to be true, and to which very few poets have ever THE LIFE OF POPE 251 aspired. Pope never set genius to sale; he never flattered those whom he did not love, or praised those whom he did not esteem. Savage however remarked, that he began a little to relax his dignity when he wrote a distich for his Highness' s dog. His admiration of the Great seems to have increased in the ad- vance of life. He passed over peers and statesmen to inscribe his Iliad to Congreve, with a magnanimity of which the praise had been complete, had his friend's virtue been equal to his wit. Why he was chosen for so great an honour, it is not now possible to know; there is no trace in literary history of any particular intimacy between them. The name of Congreve appeals in the Letters among those of his other friends, but without any observ- able distinction or consequence. To his latter works, however, he took care to annex names dignified with titles, but was not very happy in his choice; for, except Lord Bathurst, none of his noble friends were such as that a good man would wish to have his intimacy with them known to posterity : he can derive little honour from the notice of Cobham, Burlington, or Bolingbroke. Of his social qualities, if an estimate be made from his Letters, an opinion too favourable cannot easily be formed; they exhibit a perpetual and unclouded effulgence of general benevolence, and particular fondness. There is nothing but liberality, gratitude, constancy, and tenderness. It has been so long said as to be com- monly believed, that the true characters of men may be found in their Letters, and that he who writes to his friend lays his heart open before him. But the truth is, that such were the simple friendships of the Golden Age, and are now the friendships only of children. Very few can boast of hearts which they dare lay open to themselves, and of which, by whatever accident exposed, they do not shun a distinct and continued view; and, certainly, what we hide from ourselves we do not shew to our friends. There is, indeed, no transaction which offers stronger temptations to fallacy and sophistication than epistolary intercourse. In the eagerness of conversation the first emotions of the mind often burst out, before they are considered; in the tumult of business, interest and passion have their genuine effect ; but a friendly Letter is a calm and deliberate performance, in the cool of leisure, in the 252 SAMUEL JOHNSON stillness of solitude, and surely no man sits down to depreciate by design his own character. Friendship has no tendency to secure veracity; for by whom can a man so much wish to be thought better than he is, as by him whose kindness he desires to gain or keep ? Even in writing to the world there is less constraint; the author is not confronted with his reader, and takes his chance of approbation among the different dispositions of mankind; but a Letter is addressed to a single mind, of which the prejudices and partialities are known; and must therefore please, if not by favouring them, by forbearing to oppose them. To charge those favourable representations, which men give of their own minds, with the guilt of hypocritical falsehood, would shew more severity than knowledge. The writer commonly be- lieves himself. Almost every man's thoughts, while they are gen- eral, are right; and most hearts are pure, while temptation is away. It is easy to awaken generous sentiments in privacy; to despise death when there is no danger; to glow with benevolence when there is nothing to be given. While such ideas are formed they are felt, and self-love does not suspect the gleam of virtue to be the meteor of fancy. If the Letters of Pope are considered merely as compositions, they seem to be premeditated and artificial. It is one thing to write because there is something which the mind wishes to discharge, and another, to solicit the imagination because ceremony or vanity requires something to be written. Pope confesses his early Letters to be vitiated with affectation and ambition: to know whether he disentangled himself from these perverters of epistolary integrity, his book and his life must be set in comparison. One of his favourite topicks is contempt of his own poetry. For this, if it had been real, he would deserve no commendation ; and in this he was certainly not sincere, for his high value of him- self was sufficiently observed ; and of what could he be proud but of his poetry ? He writes, he says, when he has just nothing else to do; yet Swift complains that he was never at leisure for conversa- tion, because he had always some poetical scheme in his head. It was punctually required that his writing-box should be set upon his bed before he rose ; and Lord Oxford's domestick related, that, THE LIFE OF POPE 253 in the dreadful winter of Forty, she was called from her bed by him four times in one night, to supply him with paper, lest he should lose a thought. He pretends insensibility to censure and criticism, though it was observed by all who knew him that every pamphlet disturbed his quiet, and that his extreme irritability laid him open to per- petual vexation ; but he wished to despise his criticks, and therefore hoped that he did despise them. As he happened to live in two reigns when the Court paid little attention to poetry, he nursed in his mind a foolish disesteem of Kings, and proclaims that he never sees Courts. Yet a little regard shewn him by the Prince of Wales melted his obduracy ; and he had not much to say when he was asked by his Royal Highness, how he could love a Prince while he disliked Kings ? He very frequently professes contempt of the world, and repre- sents himself as looking on mankind, sometimes with gay indiffer- ence, as on emmets of a hillock, below his serious attention; and sometimes with gloomy indignation, as on monsters more worthy of hatred than of pity. These were dispositions apparently counter- feited. How could he despise those whom he lived by pleasing, and on whose approbation his esteem of himself wassuperstructed ? Why should he hate those to whose favour he owed his honour and his ease? Of things that terminate in human life, the world is the proper judge ; to despise its sentence, if it were possible, is not just ; and if it were just, is not possible. Pope was far enough from this unreasonable temper ; he was sufficiently a fool to Fame, and his fault was that he pretended to neglect it. His levity and his sullenness were only in his Letters; he passed through common life, sometimes vexed, and sometimes pleased, with the natural emotions of common men. His scorn of the Great is repeated too often to be real ; no man thinks much of that which he despises ; and as falsehood is always in danger of inconsistency, he makes it his boast at another time that he lives among them. It is evident that his own importance swells often in his mind. He is afraid of writing, lest the clerks of the Post-office should know his secrets; he has many enemies; he considers himself as surrounded by universal jealousy ; after many deaths, and many 254 SAMUEL JOHNSON dispersions, two or three of us, says he, may still be brought to- gether, not to plot, but to divert ourselves, and the world too, if it pleases; and they can live together, and shew what friends wits may be, in spite of all the fools in the world. All this while it was likely that the clerks did not know his hand ; he certainly had no more enemies than a publick character like his inevitably excites, and with what degree of friendship the wits might live, very few were so much fools as ever to enquire. Some part of this pretended discontent he learned from Swift, and expresses it, I think, most frequently in his correspondence with him. Swift's resentment was unreasonable, but it was sin- cere; Pope's was the mere mimickry of his friend, a fictitious part which he began to play before it became him. When he was only twenty-five years old, he related that a glut of study and retirement had thrown him on the world, and that there was danger lest a glut of the world should throw him back upon study and retirement. To this Swift answered with great propriety, that Pope had not yet either acted or suffered enough in the world to have become weary of it. And, indeed, it must be some very powerful reason that can drive back to solitude him who has once enjoyed the pleasures of society. In the Letters both of Swift and Pope there appears such narrow- ness of mind, as makes them insensible of any excellence that has not some affinity with their own, and confines their esteem and approbation to so small a number, that whoever should form his opinion of the age from their representation, would suppose them to have lived amidst ignorance and barbarity, unable to find among their contemporaries either virtue or intelligence, and persecuted by those that could not understand them. When Pope murmurs at the world, when he professes contempt of fame, when he speaks of riches and poverty, of success and dis- appointment, with negligent indifference, he certainly does not express his habitual and settled sentiments, but either wilfully disguises his own character, or, what is more likely, invests himself with temporary qualities, and sallies out in the colours of the present moment. His hopes and fears, his joys and sorrows, acted strongly upon his mind ; and if he differed from others, it was not by care- lessness; he was irritable and resentful; his malignity to Philips, THE LIFE OF POPE 255 whom he had first made ridiculous, and then hated for being angry, continued too long. Of his vain desire to make Bentley contemp- tible, I never heard any adequate reason. He was sometimes wanton in his attacks; and, before Chandos, Lady Wortley, and Hill, was mean in his retreat. The virtues which seem to have had most of his affection were liberality and fidelity of friendship, in which it does not appear that he was other than he describes himself. His fortune did not suffer his charity to be splendid and conspicuous; but he assisted Dodsley with a hundred pounds, that he might open a shop; and of the subscription of forty pounds a year that he raised for Savage, twenty were paid by himself. He was accused of loving money, but his love was eagerness to gain, not solicitude to keep it. In the duties of friendship he was zealous and constant; his early maturity of mind commonly united him with men older than himself, and therefore, without attaining any considerable length of life, he saw many companions of his youth sink into the grave ; but it does not appear that he lost a single friend by coldness or by in- jury; those who loved him once, continued their kindness. His ungrateful mention of Allen in his will, was the effect of his adherence to one whom he had known much longer, and whom he naturally loved with greater fondness. His violation of the trust reposed on him by Bolingbroke could have no motive inconsistent with the warmest affection ; he either thought the action so near to indiffer- ent that he forgot it, or so laudable that he expected his friend to approve it. It was reported, with such confidence as almost to enforce belief, that in the papers intrusted to his executors was found a defama- tory Life of Swift, which he had prepared as an instrument of vengeance to be used, if any provocation should be ever given. About this I enquired of the Earl of Marchmont, who assured me that no such piece was among his remains. The religion in which he lived and died was that of the Church of Rome, to which in his correspondence with Racine he professes himself a sincere adherent. That he was not scrupulously pious in some part of his life, is known by many idle and indecent applica- tions of sentences taken from the Scriptures; a mode of merri- ment which a good man dreads for its profaneness, and a witty 256 SAMUEL JOHNSON man disdains for its easiness and vulgarity. But to whatever levities he has been betrayed, it does not appear that his principles were ever corrupted, or that he ever lost his belief of Revelation. The positions which he transmitted from Bolingbroke he seems not to have understood, and was pleased with an interpretation that made them orthodox. A man of such exalted superiority, and so little moderation, would naturally have all his delinquencies observed and aggravated : those who could not deny that he was excellent, would rejoice to find that he was not perfect. Perhaps it may be imputed to the unwillingness with which the same man is allowed to possess many advantages, that his learning has been depreciated. He certainly was in his early life a man of great literary curiosity ; and when he wrote his Essay on Criticism had, for his age, a very wide acquaintance with books. When he entered into the living world, it seems to have happened to him as to many others, that he was less attentive to dead masters; he studied in the academy of Paracelsus, and made the universe his favourite volume. He gathered his notions fresh from reality, not from the copies of authors, but the originals of Nature. Yet there is no reason to believe that literature ever lost his esteem; he always professed to love reading; and Dobson, who spent some time at his house translating his Essay on Man, when I asked him what learning he found him to possess, answered, More than I expected. His frequent references to history, his allusions to various kinds of knowledge, and his images selected from art and nature, with his observations on the operations of the mind and the modes of life, shew an intelligence perpetually on the wing, excur- sive, vigorous, and diligent, eager to pursue knowledge, and atten- tive to retain it. From this curiosity arose the desire of travelling, to which he alludes in his verses to Jervas, and which, though he never found an opportunity to gratify it, did not leave him till his life declined. Of his intellectual character, the constituent and fundamental principle was Good Sense, a prompt and intuitive perception of consonance and propriety. He saw immediately, of his own con- ceptions, what was to be chosen, and what to be rejected ; and, in THE LIFE OF POPE 257 the works of others, what was to be shunned, and what was to be copied. But good sense alone is a sedate and quiescent quality, which manages its possessions well, but does not increase them ; it collects few materials for its own operations, and preserves safety, but never gains supremacy. Pope had likewise genius; a mind active, am- bitious, and adventurous, always investigating, always aspiring; in its widest searches still longing to go forward, in its highest flights still wishing to be higher; always imagining something greater than it knows, always endeavouring more than it can do. To assist these powers, he is said to have had great strength and exactness of memory. That which he had heard or read was not easily lost; and he had before him not only what his own medita- tion suggested, but what he had found in other writers, that might be accommodated to his present purpose. These benefits of nature he improved by incessant and unwearied diligence ; he had recourse to every source of intelligence, and lost no opportunity of information ; he consulted the living as well as the dead; he read his compositions to his friends, and was never content with mediocrity when excellence could be attained. He considered poetry as the business of his life, and however he might seem to lament his occupation, he followed it with constancy; to make verses was his first labour, and to mend them was his last. From his attention to poetry he was never diverted. If con- versation offered anything that could be improved, he committed it to paper; if a thought, or perhaps an expression more happy than was common, rose to his mind, he was careful to write it ; an independent distich was preserved for an opportunity of insertion, and some little fragments have been found containing lines, or parts of lines, to be wrought upon at some other time. He was one of those few whose labour is their pleasure : he was never elevated to negligence, nor wearied to impatience ; he never passed a fault unamended by indifference, nor quitted it by despair. He laboured his works first to gain reputation, and afterwards to keep it. Of composition there are different methods. Some employ at once memory and invention, and, with little intermediate use of the pen, form and polish large masses by continued meditation, and 258 SAMUEL JOHNSON write their productions only when, in their own opinion, they have completed them. It is related of Virgil, that his custom was to pour out a great number of verses in the morning, and pass the day in retrenching exuberances and correcting inaccuracies. The method of Pope, as may be collected from his translation, was to write his first thoughts in his first words, and gradually to amplify, decorate, rectify, and refine them. With such faculties, and such dispositions, he excelled every other writer in poetical prudence; he wrote in such a manner as might expose him to few hazards. He used almost always the same fabrick of verse; and, indeed, by those few essays which he made of any other, he did not enlarge his reputation. Of this uni- formity the certain consequence was readiness and dexterity. By perpetual practice, language had in his mind a systematical arrange- ment ; having always the same use for words, he had words so se- lected and combined as to be ready at his call. This increase of facility he confessed himself to have perceived in the progress of his translation. But what was yet of more importance, his effusions were always voluntary, and his subjects chosen by himself. His independence secured him from drudging at a task, and labouring upon a barren topick : he never exchanged praise for money, nor opened a shop of condolence or congratulation. His poems, therefore, were scarce ever temporary. He suffered coronations and royal marriages to pass without a song, and derived no opportunities from recent events, nor any popularity from the accidental disposition of his readers. He was never reduced to the necessity of soliciting the sun to shine upon a birthday, of calling the Graces and Virtues to a wedding, or of saying what multitudes have said before him. When he could produce nothing new, he was at liberty to be silent. His publications were for the same reason never hasty. He is said to have sent nothing to the press till it had lain two years under his inspection: it is at least certain, that he ventured nothing without nice examination. He suffered the tumult of imagination to subside, and the novelties of invention to grow familiar. He knew that the mind is always enamoured of its own productions, and did not trust his first fondness. He consulted his friends, and listened with great willingness to criticism; and, what was THE LIFE OF POPE 2 59 of more importance, he consulted himself, and let nothing pass against his own judgement. He professed to have learned his poetry from Dryden, whom, whenever an opportunity was presented, he praised through his whole life with unvaried liberality ; and perhaps his character may receive some illustration, if he be compared with his master. Integrity of understanding and nicety of discernment were not allotted in a less proportion to Dryden than to Pope. The rectitude of Dryden's mind was sufficiently shewn by the dismission of his poetical prejudices, and the rejection of unnatural thoughts and rugged numbers. But Dryden never desired to apply all the judgement that he had. He wrote, and professed to write, merely for the people ; and when he pleased others, he contented himself. He spent no time in struggles to rouse latent powers; he never attempted to make that better which was already good, nor often to mend what he must have known to be faulty. He wrote, as he tells us, with very little consideration ; when occasion or necessity called upon him, he poured out what the present moment happened to supply, and, when once it had passed the press, ejected it from his mind; for when he had no pecuniary interest, he had no further solicitude. Pope was not content to satisfy ; he desired to excel, and therefore always endeavoured to do his best : he did not court the candour, but dared the judgement of his reader, and, expecting no in- dulgence from others, he shewed none to himself. He examined lines and words with minute and punctilious observation, and retouched every part with indefatigable diligence, till he had left nothing to be forgiven. For this reason he kept his pieces very long in his hands, while he considered and reconsidered them. The only poems which can be supposed to have been written with such regard to the times as might hasten their publication, were the two satires of Thirty-eight; of which Dodsley told me, that they were brought to him by the author, that they might be fairly copied. 'Almost every line,' he said, 'was then written twice over ; I gave him a clean transcript, which he sent some time afterwards to me for the press, with almost every line written twice over a second time.' His declaration, that his care for his works ceased at their 260 SAMUEL JOHNSON publication, was not strictly true. His parental attention never abandoned them; what he found amiss in the first edition, he silently corrected in those that followed. He appears to have revised the Iliad, and freed it from some of its imperfections; and the Essay on Criticism received many improvements after its first appearance. It will seldom be found that he altered without add- ing clearness, elegance, or vigour. Pope had perhaps the judge- ment of Dryden ; but Dryden certainly wanted the diligence of Pope. In acquired knowledge, the superiority must be allowed to Dryden, whose education was more scholastick, and who before he became an author had been allowed more time for study, with better means of information. His mind has a larger range , and he collects his images and illustrations from a more extensive circumfer- ence of science. Dryden knew more of man in his general nature, and Pope in his local manners. The notions of Dryden were formed by comprehensive speculation, and those of Pope by minute attention. There is more dignity in the knowledge of Dryden, and more certainty in that of Pope. Poetry was not the sole praise of either ; for both excelled like- wise in prose ; but Pope did not borrow his prose from his prede- cessor. The style of Dryden is capricious and varied; that of Pope is cautious and uniform. Dryden obeys the motions of his own mind; Pope constrains his mind to his own rules of compo- sition. Dryden is sometimes vehement and rapid ; Pope is always smooth, uniform, and gentle. Dryden's page is a natural field, rising into inequalities, and diversified by the varied exuberance of abundant vegetation ; Pope's is a velvet lawn, shaven by the scythe, and levelled by the roller. Of genius, that power which constitutes a poet; that quality without which judgement is cold and knowledge is inert; that energy which collects, combines, amplifies, and animates ; the su- periority must, with some hesitation, be allowed to Dryden. It is not to be inferred that of this poetical vigour Pope had only a little, because Dryden had more; for every other writer since Milton must give place to Pope ; and even of Dryden it must be said, that if he has brighter paragraphs, he has not better poems. Dryden's performances were always hasty, either excited by some external occasion, or extorted by domestick necessity; he com- THE LIFE OF POPE 261 posed without consideration, and published without correction. What his mind could supply at call, or gather in one excursion, was all that he sought, and all that he gave. The dilatory caution of Pope enabled him to condense his sentiments, to mul- tiply his images, and to accumulate all that study might pro- duce, or chance might supply. If the flights of Dryden there- fore are higher, Pope continues longer on the wing. If of Dryden's fire the blaze is brighter, of Pope's the heat is more regular and constant. Dryden often surpasses expectation, and Pope never falls below it. Dryden is read with frequent aston- ishment, and Pope with perpetual delight. This parallel will, I hope, when it is well considered, be found just; and if the reader should suspect me, as I suspect myself, of some partial fondness for the memory of Dryden, let him not too hastily condemn me ; for meditation and enquiry 'may, perhaps, shew him the reasonableness of my determination. JAMES BOSWELL THE MEETING OF DR. JOHNSON AND WILKES [From The Life of Samuel Johnson, LL.D., 1791. Edited by G. B. Hill, Vol. Ill, pp. 64-79, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1887. For the Life of Johnson, see post, p. 439. " The Life of Johnson is assuredly a great, a very great work. Homer is not more decidedly the first of heroic poets, Shakspeare is not more decidedly the first of dramatists, Demosthenes is not more decidedly the first of orators, than Boswell is the first of biographers. He has no second. He has dis- tanced all his competitors so decidedly that it is not worth while to place them. Eclipse is first, and the rest nowhere." THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY, "Samuel Johnson," 1831, in Critical and Miscellaneous Essays. "Consider too, with what force, diligence and vivacity he has rendered back all this which, in Johnson's neighbourhood his 'open sense' had so eagerly and freely taken in. That loose-flowing, careless-looking Work of his is as a picture by one of Nature's own Artists; the best possible resem- blance of a Reality; like the very image thereof in a clear mirror. Which indeed it was: let but the mirror be clear, this is the great point; the picture must and will be genuine. How the babbling Bozzy, inspired only by love, and the recognition and vision which love can lend, epitomises nightly the words of Wisdom, the deeds and aspects of Wisdom, and so, by little and little, unconsciously works together for us a whole Johnsoniad; a more free, 262 JAMES BOSWELL perfect, sunlit and spirit-speaking likeness, than for many centuries had been drawn by man of man ! Scarcely since the days of Homer has the feat been equalled ; indeed, in many senses, this also is a kind of Heroic Poem. The fit Odyssey of our unheroic age was to be written, not sung; of a Thinker, not of a Fighter; and (for want of a Homer) by the first open soul that might offer, looked such even through the organs of a Boswell. We do the man's intellectual endowment great wrong, if we measure it by its mere logical outcome; though here too, there is not wanting a light ingenuity, a figurativeness and fanciful sport, with glimpses of insight far deeper than the common. But Boswell's grand intellectual talent was, as such ever is, an unconscious one, of far higher reach and significance than Logic; and showed itself in the whole, not in parts. Here again we have that old saying verified, 'The heart sees farther than the head.' " THOMAS CARLYLE, "Boswell's Life of Johnson," 1832, in Critical and, Miscellaneous Essays.] I am now to record a very curious incident in Dr. Johnson's life, which fell under my own observation; of which pars magna fui, and which I am persuaded will, with the liberal-minded, be much to his credit. My desire of being acquainted with celebrated men of every description, had made me, much about the same time, obtain an introduction to Dr. Samuel Johnson and to John Wilkes, Esq. Two men more different could perhaps not be selected out of all mankind. They had even attacked one another with some asperity in their writings; yet I lived in habits of friend- ship with both. I could fully relish the excellence of each ; for I have ever delighted in that intellectual chymistry, which can separate good qualities from evil in the same person. Sir John Pringle, "mine own friend and my Father's friend," between whom and Dr. Johnson I in vain wished to establish an acquaintance, as I respected and lived in intimacy with both of them, observed to me once, very ingeniously, "It is not in friendship as in mathematicks, where two things, each equal to a third, are equal between themselves. You agree with Johnson as a middle quality, and you agree with me as a middle quality; but Johnson and I should not agree." Sir John was not sufficiently flexible ; so I desisted ; knowing, indeed, that the repulsion was equally strong on the part of Johnson; who, I know not from what cause, unless his being a Scotchman, had formed a very erroneous opinion of Sir John. But I conceived an irresistible wish, if possible, to bring Dr. Johnson and Mr. Wilkes together. How to manage it, was a nice and difficult matter. THE MEETING OF DR. JOHNSON AND WILKES 263 My worthy booksellers and friends, Messieurs Dilly in the Poultry, at whose hospitable and well-covered table I have seen a greater number of literary men, than at any other, except that of Sir Joshua Reynolds, had invited me to meet Mr. Wilkes and some more gentlemen, on Wednesday, May 15. "Pray (said I,) let us have Dr. Johnson." "What with Mr. Wilkes? not for the world, (said Mr. Edward Dilly ;) Dr. Johnson would never forgive me." "Come, (said I,) if you'll let me negociate for you, I will be answerable that all shall go well." DILLY. "Nay, if you will take it upon you, I am sure I shall be very happy to see them both here." Notwithstanding the high veneration which I entertained for Dr. Johnson, I was sensible that he was sometimes a little actu- ated by the spirit of contradiction, and by means of that I hoped I should gain my point. I was persuaded that if I had come upon him with a direct proposal, "Sir, will you dine in company with Jack Wilkes?" he would have flown into a passion, and would probably have answered, " Dine with Jack Wilkes, Sir ! I'd as soon dine with Jack Ketch." l I therefore, while we were sitting quietly by ourselves at his house in an evening, took occasion to open my plan thus: "Mr. Dilly, Sir, sends his respectful compliments to you, and would be happy if you would do him the honour to dine with him on Wednesday next along with me, as I must soon go to Scotland." JOHNSON. "Sir, I am obliged to Mr. Dilly. I will wait upon him " BOSWELL. "Provided, Sir, I suppose, that the company which he is to have, is agreeable to you." JOHNSON. "What do you mean, Sir? What do you take me for? Do you think I am so ignorant of the world, as to imagine that I am to prescribe to a gentleman what company he is to have at his table ? " BOSWELL. "I beg your pardon, Sir, for wishing to prevent you from meeting people whom you might not like. Perhaps he may have some of what he calls his patriotick friends with him." JOHNSON. "Well, Sir, and what then ? What care / for his patriotick friends ? Poh ! " BOSWELL. "I should not be surprized to find Jack Wilkes there." JOHNSON. "And if Jack Wilkes should be there, what is that to 1 This has been circulated as if actually said by Johnson ; when the truth is, it was only supposed by me. B. 264 JAMES BOSWELL me, Sir? My dear friend, let us have no more of this. I am sorry to be angry with you ; but really it is treating me strangely to talk to me as if I could not meet any company whatever, occa- sionally. " BOSWELL. "Pray, forgive me, Sir: I meant well. But you shall meet whoever comes, for me." Thus I secured him, and told Dilly that he would find him very well pleased to be one of his guests on the day appointed. Upon the much-expected Wednesday, I called on him about half an hour before dinner, as I often did when we were to dine out together, to see that he was ready in time, and to accompany him. I found him buffeting his books, as upon a former occasion, covered with dust, and making no preparation for going abroad. " How is this, Sir ? (said I) . Don't you recollect that you are to dine at Mr. Billy's?" JOHNSON. "Sir, I did not think of going to Dilly's : it went out of my head. I have ordered dinner at home with Mrs. Williams." BOSWELL. "But, my dear Sir, you know you were engaged to Mr. Dilly, and I told him so. He will expect you, and will be much disappointed if you don't come. " JOHNSON. " You must talk to Mrs. Williams about this. " Here was a sad dilemma. I feared that what I was so confident I had secured, would yet be frustrated. He had accustomed himself to shew Mrs. Williams such a degree of humane attention, as frequently imposed some restraint upon him; and I knew that if she should be obstinate, he would not stir. I hastened down stairs to the blind lady's room, and told her I was in great uneasiness, for Dr. Johnson had engaged to me to dine this day at Mr. Dilly's, but that he had told me he had forgotten his engagement, and had ordered dinner at home. " Yes, Sir, (said she, pretty peevishly,) Dr. Johnson is to dine at home. " " Madam, (said I,) his respect for you is such, that I know he will not leave you, unless you absolutely desire it. But as you have so much of his company, I hope you will be good enough to forego it for a day : as Mr. Dilly is a very worthy man, has frequently had agreeable parties at his house for Dr. Johnson, and will be vexed if the Doctor neglects him to-day. And then, Madam, be pleased to consider my situation ; I carried the message, and I assured Mr. Dilly that Dr. Johnson was to come, and no doubt he has made a dinner, and invited a company, and boasted of the honour he expected to have. I shall be quite THE MEETING OF DR. JOHNSON AND WILKES 265 disgraced if the Doctor is not there." She gradually softened to my solicitations, which were certainly as earnest as most entreaties to ladies.upon any occasion, and was graciously pleased to empower me to tell Dr. Johnson, " That all things considered, she thought he should certainly go." I flew back to him, still in dust, and careless of what should be the event, "indifferent in his choice to go or stay; " but as soon as I had announced to him Mrs. Williams's consent, he roared, " Frank, a clean shirt, " and was very soon drest. When I had him fairly seated in a hackney-coach with me, I exulted as much as a fortune-hunter who has got an heiress into a post- chaise with him to set out for Gretna-Green. When we entered Mr. Dilly's drawing-room, he found himself in the midst of a company he did not know. I kept myself snug and silent, watching how he would conduct himself. I observed him whispering to Mr. Dilly, "Who is that gentleman, sir?" " Mr. Arthur Lee." JOHNSON. " Too, too, too," (under his breath,) which was one of his habitual mutterings. Mr. Arthur Lee could not but be very obnoxious to Johnson, for he was a not only a patriot, but an American. He was afterwards minister from the United States at the court of Madrid. " And who is the gentleman in lace ? " "Mr Wilkes, Sir." This information confounded him still more ; he had some difficulty to restrain himself, and taking up a book, sat down upon a window-seat and read, or at least kept his eye upon it intently for some time, till he composed himself. His feelings, I dare say, were aukward enough. But he no doubt recollected his having rated me for supposing that he could be at all disconcerted by any company, and he, therefore, resolutely set himself to behave quite as an easy man of the world, who could adapt himself at once to the disposition and manners of those whom he might chance to meet. The cheering sound of "Dinner is upon the table," dissolved his reverie, and we all sat down without any sympton of ill humour. There were present, beside Mr. Wilkes, and Mr. Arthur Lee, who was an old companion of mine when he studied physick at Edin- burgh, Mr. (now Sir John) Miller, Dr. Lettsom, and Mr. Slater, the druggist. Mr. Wilkes placed himself next to Dr. Johnson, and behaved to him with so much attention and politeness, that he gained upon him insensibly. No man eat more heartily than 266 JAMES BO SWELL Johnson, or loved better what was nice and delicate. Mr. Wilkes was very assiduous in helping him to some fine veal. " Pray give me leave, Sir ; It is better here A little of the brown * Some fat, Sir A little of the stuffing Some gravy Let me have the pleasure of giving you some butter Allow me to recommend a squeeze of this orange; or the lemon, perhaps, may have more zest. " " Sir, Sir, I am obliged to you, Sir, " cried Johnson, bowing, and turning his head to him with a look for some time of " surly virtue, " l but, in a short while, of complacency. Foote being mentioned, Johnson said," He is not a good mimick. " One of the company added, "A merry Andrew, a buffoon." JOHNSON. " But he has wit too, and is not deficient in ideas, or in fertility and variety of imagery, and not empty of reading; he has knowledge enough to fill up his part. One species of wit he has in an eminent degree, that of escape. You drive him into a corner with both hands ; but he's gone, Sir, when you think you have got him like an animal that jumps over your head. Then he has a great range for wit ; he never lets truth stand between him and a jest, and he is sometimes mighty coarse. Garrick is under many restraints from which Foote is free. " WILKES. " Garrick's wit is more like Lord Chesterfield's. " JOHNSON. " The first time I was in company with Foote was at Fitzherbert's. Having no good opinion of the fellow, I was resolved not to be pleased ; and it is very difficult to please a man against his will. I went on eating my dinner pretty sullenly, affecting not to mind him. But the dog was so very comical, that I was obliged to lay down my knife and fork, throw myself back upon my chair, and fairly laugh it out. No, Sir, he was irresistible. 2 He upon one occasion experienced, in an extraordinary degree, the efficacy of his powers of entertaining. Amongst the many and various modes which he tried of getting money, he became a partner with a small-beer brewer, and he was to have a share of the profits for procuring customers amongst his numerous acquaintance. Fitzherbert was one who took his small- beer; but it was so bad that the servants resolved not to drink it. They were at some loss how to notify their resolution, being afraid of offending their master, who they knew liked Foote much as a 1 Johnson's "London, a Poem," v. 145. 2 Foote told me, that Johnson said of him, "For loud obstreperous broad- faced mirth I know not his equal." B. THE MEETING OF DR. JOHNSON AND WILKES 267 companion. At last they fixed upon a little black boy, who was rather a favourite, to be their deputy, and deliver their remonstrance ; and having invested him with the whole authority of the kitchen, he was to inform Mr. Fitzherbert, in all their names, upon a certain day, that they would drink Foote's small-beer no longer. On that day Foote happened to dine at Fitzherbert's, and this boy served at table; he was so delighted with Foote's stories, and merriment, and grimace, that when he went down stairs, he told them, ' This is the finest man I have ever seen. I will not deliver your message. I will drink his small-beer.'" Somebody observed that Garrick could not have done this. WILKES. " Garrick would have made the small-beer still smaller. He is now leaving the stage; but he will play Scrub all his life." I knew that Johnson would let nobody attack Garrick but him- self, as Garrick once said to me, and I had heard him praise his liberality; so to bring out his commendation of his celebrated pupil, I said, loudly, "I have heard Garrick is liberal." JOHN- SON. "Yes, Sir, I know that Garrick has given away more money than any man in England that I am acquainted with, and that not from ostentatious views. Garrick was very poor when he began life ; so when he came to have money, he probably was very unskilful in giving away, and saved when he should not. But Garrick began to be liberal as soon as he could; and I am of opinion, the reputation of avarice which he has had, has been very lucky for him, and prevented his having many enemies. You despise a man for avarice, but do not hate him. Garrick might have been much better attacked for living with more splen- dour than is suitable to a player: if they had had the wit to have assaulted him in that quarter, they might have galled him more. But they have kept clamouring about his avarice, which has rescued him from much obloquy and envy." Talking of the great difficulty of obtaining authentick infor- mation for biography, Johnson told us, "When I was a young fellow I wanted to write the Life of Dryden and in order to get materials, I applied to the only two persons then alive who had seen him ; these were old Swinney l and old Gibber. Swin- 1 [Owen M'Swinney, who died in 1745, and bequeathed his fortune to Mrs. Woffington, the actress. He had been a Manager of Drury Lane Theatre, and 268 JAMES BOSWELL ney's information was no more than this, 'That at Will's coffee- house Dryden had a particular chair for himself, which was set by the fire in winter, and was then called his winter-chair; and that it was carried out for him to the balcony in summer, and was then called his summer-chair.' Gibber could tell no more but 'That he remembered him a decent old man, arbiter of critical disputes at Will's.' You are to consider that Gibber was then at a great distance from Dryden, had perhaps one leg only in the room, and durst not draw in the other." BOSWELL. "Yet Gibber was a man of observation ? " JOHNSON. "I think not." BOSWELL. "You will allow his Apology to be well done." JOHNSON. "Very well done, to be sure, Sir. That book is a striking proof of the justice of Pope's remark: 'Each might his several province well command, Would all but stoop to what they understand.' " BOSWELL. "And his plays are good." JOHNSON. "Yes; but that was his trade; V esprit du corps; he had been all his life among players and play-writers. I wondered that he had so little to say in conversation, for he had kept the best company, and learnt all that can be got by the ear. He abused Pindar to me, and then shewed me an ode of his own, with an absurd couplet, making a linnet soar on an eagle's wing. I told him that when the ancients made a simile, they always made it like some- thing real." Mr. Wilkes remarked, that "among all the bold flights of Shakspeare's imagination, the boldest was making Birnam- wood march to Dunsinane; creating a wood where there never was a shrub; a wood in Scotland! ha! ha! ha!" And he also observed, that "the clannish slavery of the Highlands of Scotland was the single exception to Milton's remark of 'The Mountain Nymph, sweet Liberty/ being worshipped in all hilly countries." "When I was at Inverary (said he), on a visit to my old friend Archibald, Duke of Argyle, his dependents congrat- ulated me on being such a favourite of his Grace. I said, 'It afterwards of the Queen's Theatre in the Haymarket. He was also a dramatic writer, having produced a comedy entitled "The Quack's, or Love's the Physi- cian," 1705, and two operas. M.] THE MEETING OF DR. JOHNSON AND WILKES 269 is then, gentlemen, truly lucky for me; for if I had displeased the Duke, and he had wished it, there is not a Campbell among you but would have been ready to bring John Wilkes's head to him in a charger. It would have been only 'Off with his head! so much for Aylesbury.' I was then member for Aylesbury." Dr. Johnson and Mr. Wilkes talked of the contested passage in Horace's Art of poetry, "Difficile est proprie communia dicer e" Mr. Wilkes, according to my note, gave the interpretation thus: "It is difficult to speak with propriety of common things; as, if a poet had to speak of Queen Caroline drinking tea, he must endeavour to avoid the vulgarity of cups and saucers." But upon reading my note, he tells me that he meant to say, that "the word communia, being a Roman law-term, signifies here things communis juris, that is to say, what have never yet been treated by any body; and this appears clearly from what followed, Tuque Rectius Iliacum carmen deducis in actus Quam si proferres ignota indictaque primus.' You will easier make a tragedy out of the Iliad than on any subject not handled before." JOHNSON. "He means that it is difficult to appropriate to particular persons qualities which are common to all mankind, as Homer has done." WILKES. "We have no City-Poet now: that is an office which has gone into disuse. The last was Elkanah Settle. There is something in names which one cannot help feeling. Now Elkanah Settle sounds so queer, who can expect much from that name ? We should have no hesitation to give it for John Dryden, in preference to Elkanah Settle, from the names only, without knowing their different merits." JOHNSON. "I suppose, Sir, Settle did as well for Aldermen in his time, as John Home could do now. Where did Beckford and Trecothick learn English ?" Mr. Arthur Lee mentioned some Scotch who had taken pos- session of a barren part of America, and wondered why they should choose it. JOHNSON. "Why, Sir, all barrenness is comparative. The Scotch would not know it to be barren." 270 JAMES BOS WELL BOSWELL. "Come, come, he is flattering the English. You have now been in Scotland, Sir, and say if you did not see meat and drink enough there." JOHNSON. "Why yes, Sir; meat and drink enough to give the inhabitants sufficient strength to run away from home." All these quick and lively sallies were said sportively, quite in jest, and with a smile, which showed that he meant only wit. Upon this topick he and Mr. Wilkes could perfectly assimilate; here was a bond of union between them, and I was conscious that as both of them had visited Caledonia, both were fully satisfied of the strange narrow ignorance of those who imagine that it is a land of famine. But they amused them- selves with persevering in the old jokes. When I claimed a superiority for Scotland over England in one respect, that no man can be arrested there for a debt merely because another swears it against him; but there must first be the judgment of a court of law ascertaining its justice ; and that a seizure of the person, before judgment is obtained, can take place only, if his creditor should swear that he is about to fly from the country, or, as it is technically expressed, is in meditatione fugce : WILKES. "That, I thould think, may be safely sworn of all the Scotch nation." JOHNSON. (To Mr. Wilkes) "You must know, Sir, I lately took my friend Boswell, and shewed him genuine civil- ized life in an English provincial town. I turned him loose at Lichfield, my native city, that he might see for once real civility : for you know he lives among savages in Scotland, and among rakes in London." WILKES. "Except when he is with grave, sober, decent people, like you and me." JOHNSON, (smiling) "And we ashamed of him." They were quite frank and easy. Johnson told the story of his asking Mrs. Macaulay to allow her footman to sit down with them, to prove the ridiculousness of the arguments for the equality of mankind; and he said to me afterwards, with a nod of sat- isfaction, "You saw Mr. Wilkes acquiesced." Wilkes talked with all imaginable freedom of the ludicrous title given to the Attorney-General, Diabolus Regis; adding, "I have reason to know something about that officer; for I was prosecuted for a libel." Johnson, who many people would have supposed must have been furiously angry at hearing this talked of so lightly, said THE MEETING OF DR. JOHNSON AND WILKES 271 not a word. He was now, indeed, "a good-humoured fellow." After dinner we had an accession of Mrs. Knowles, the Quaker lady, well known for her various talents, and of Mr. Alderman Lee. Amidst some patriotick groans, somebody (I think the Alderman) said, "Poor old England is lost." JOHNSON. "Sir, it is not so much to be lamented that old England is lost, as that the Scotch have found it." 1 WILKES. "Had Lord Bute gov- erned Scotland only, I should not have taken the trouble to write his eulogy, and dedicate Mortimer to him." Mr. Wilkes held a candle to shew a fine print of a beautiful female figure which hung in the room, and pointed out the elegant contour of the bosom with the finger of an arch connoisseur. He afterwards, in a conversation with me, waggishly insisted, that all the time Johnson shewed visible signs of a fervent admiration of the corresponding charms of the fair Quaker. This record, though by no means so perfect as I could wish, will serve to give a notion of a very curious interview, which was not only pleasing at the time, but had the agreeable and benignant effect of reconciling any animosity, and sweetening any acidity, which, in the various bustle of political contest, had been produced in the minds of two men, who though widely different, had so many things in common classical learning, modern literature, wit and humour, and ready repartee that it would have been much to be regretted if they had been for ever at a distance from each other. Mr. Burke gave me much credit for this successful negotia- tion; and pleasantly said, that "there was nothing equal to it in the whole history of the Corps Diplomatique" I attended Dr. Johnson home, and had the satisfaction to hear him tell Mrs. Williams how much he had been pleased with Mr. Wilkes's company, and what an agreeable day he had passed. 1 It would not become me to expatiate on this strong and pointed remark, in which a very geat deal of meaning is condensed. B. 272 ROBERT SOUTHEY ROBERT SOUTHEY THE DEATH OF NELSON [From The Life of Horatio, Lord Nelson, Chap. ix. 1813. John Murray, London. "Though in general we prefer Mr. Southey's poetry to his prose, we must make one exception. The Life of Nelson is, beyond all doubt, the most per- fect and the most delightful of his works. The fact is, as his poems most abundantly prove, that he is by no means so skilful in designing as in rilling up. It was therefore an advantage to him to be furnished with an outline of characters and events, and to have no other task to perform than that of touching the cold sketch into life. No writer, perhaps, ever lived, whose talents so precisely qualified him to write the history of the great naval war- rior. There were no fine riddles of the human heart to read, no theories to propound, no hidden causes to develop, no remote consequences to predict. The character of the hero lay on the surface. The exploits were brilliant and picturesque. The necessity of adhering to the real course of events saved Mr. Southey from those faults which deform the original plan of almost every one of his poems, and which even his innumerable beauties of detail scarcely redeem. The s'ubject did not require the exercise of those reasoning powers the want of which is the blemish of his prose. It would not be easy to find, in all literary history, an instance of a more exact hit between wind and water." THOMAS BABINGTON MACATJLAY, " Southey's Colloquies," 1830, in Critical and Miscellaneous Essays.] At daybreak the combined fleets 1 were distinctly seen from the Victory's 2 deck, formed in a close line of battle ahead, on the starboard tack, about twelve miles to leeward, and standing to the south. Our fleet consisted of twenty-seven sail of the line and four frigates ; theirs of thirty-three, and seven large frigates. Their superiority was greater in size, and weight of metal, than in numbers. They had four thousand troops on board; and the best riflemen who could be procured, many of them Tyrolese, were dispersed through the ships. Little did the Tyrolese, and little did the Spaniards, at that day, imagine what Jiorrors the wicked tyrant whom they served was preparing for their country ! Soon after daylight Nelson came upon deck. The 2ist of October 3 was a festival in his family; because on that day his uncle, Captain Suckling, in the Dreadnought, with two other line of battle ships, had beaten off a French squadron of four sail of the line and three frigates. Nelson, with that sort of 1 French and Spanish. 2 Nelson's flagship. 3 1805. THE DEATH OF NELSON 273 superstition from which few persons are entirely exempt, had more than once expressed his persuasion that this was to be the day of his battle also; and he was well pleased at seeing his prediction about to be verified. The wind was now from the west, light breezes, with a long heavy swell. Signal was made to bear down upon the enemy in two lines; and the fleet set all sail. Collingwood, in the Royal Sovereign, led the lee-line of thirteen ships; the Victory led the weather-line of fourteen. Hav- ing seen that all was as it should be, Nelson retired to his cabin, and wrote this prayer : 'May the Great God, whom I worship, grant to my country, and for the benefit of Europe in general, a great and glorious victory; and may no misconduct in any one tarnish it; and may humanity after victory be the predominant feature in the British fleet ! For myself individually, I commit my life to Him that made me, and may His blessing alight on my endeavours for serving my country faithfully! To Him I resign myself, and the just cause which is intrusted to me to defend. Amen, Amen, Amen.' ******* Blackwood went on board the Victory about six. He found him in good spirits, but very calm; not in that exhilaration which he had felt upon entering into battle at Aboukir and Copen- hagen ; he knew that his own life would be particularly aimed at, and seems to have looked for death with almost as sure an expec- tation as for victory. His whole attention was fixed upon the enemy. They tacked to the northward, and formed their line on the larboard tack; thus bringing the shoals of Trafalgar and St. Pedro under the lee of the British, and keeping the port of Cadiz open for themselves. This was judiciously done: and Nelson, aware of all the advantages which it gave them, made signal to prepare to anchor. Villeneuve l was a skilful seaman ; worthy of serving a better master and a better cause. His plan of defence was as well con- ceived, and as original, as the plan of attack. He formed the fleet in a double line, every alternate ship being about a cable's 1 The French admiral. 274 ROBERT SOU THEY length to windward of her second ahead and astern. Nelson, certain of a triumphant issue to the day, asked Blackwood what he should consider as a victory. That officer answered, that considering the handsome way in which battle was offered by the enemy, their apparent determination for a fair trial of strength, and the situation of the land, he thought it would be a glorious result if fourteen were captured. He replied : ' I shall not be satisfied with less than twenty.' Soon afterwards he asked him if he did not think there was a signal wanting. Cap- tain Blackwood made answer that he thought the whole fleet seemed very clearly to understand what they were about. These words were scarcely spoken before that signal was made, which will be remembered as long as the language, or even the memory, of England shall endure Nelson's last signal : ' England expects every man to do his duty ! ' It was received throughout the fleet with a shout of answering acclamation, made sublime by the spirit which it breathed and the feeling which it expressed. 'Now,' said Lord Nelson, 'I can do no more. We must trust to the Great Disposer of all events, and the justice of our cause. I thank God for this great opportunity of doing my duty.' He wore that day, as usual, his admiral's frock coat, bearing on the left breast four stars of the different orders with which he was invested. Ornaments which rendered him so conspicuous a mark for the enemy, were beheld with ominous apprehensions by his officers. It was known that there were riflemen on board the French ships, and it could not be doubted but that his life would be particularly aimed at. They communicated their fears to each other; and the surgeon, Mr. Beatty, spoke to the chaplain, Dr. Scott, and to Mr. Scott, the public secretary, desir- ing that some person would entreat him to change his dress, or cover the stars : but they knew that such a request would highly displease him. 'In honour I gained them,' he had said when such a thing had been hinted to him formerly, 'and in honour I will die with them.' Mr. Beatty, however, would not have been deterred by any fear of exciting his displeasure, from speak- ing to him himself upon a subject in which the weal of England as well as the life of Nelson was concerned, but he was or- dered from the deck before he could find an opportunity. This THE DEATH OF NELSON 275 was a point upon which Nelson's officers knew that it was hopeless to remonstrate or reason with him; but both Blackwood, and his own captain, Hardy, represented to him how advantageous to the fleet it would be for him to keep out of action as long as possible; and he consented at last to let the Leviathan and the Temeraire, which were sailing abreast of the Victory, be ordered to pass ahead. Yet even here the last infirmity of this noble mind was indulged ; for these ships could not pass ahead if the Victory continued to carry all her sail; and so far was Nelson from shortening sail, that it was evident he took pleasure in press- ing on, and rendering it impossible for them to obey his own orders. A long swell was setting into the Bay of Cadiz: our ships, crowding all sail, moved majestically before it, with light winds from the south-west. The sun shone on the sails of the enemy; and their well-formed line, with their numerous three- deckers, made an appearance which any other assailants would have thought formidable; but the British sailors only admired the beauty and the splendour of the spectacle; and, in full con- fidence of winning what they saw, remarked to each other, what a fine sight yonder ships would make at Spithead ! The French admiral, from the Bucentaure, beheld the new manner in which his enemy was advancing, Nelson and Colling- wood each leading his line; and, pointing them out to his offi- cers, he is said to have exclaimed, that such conduct could not fail to be successful. Yet Villeneuve had made his own dispo- sitions with the utmost skill, and the fleets under his command waited for the attack with perfect coolness. Ten minutes before twelve they opened their fire. Eight or nine of the ships imme- diately ahead of the Victory, and across her bows, fired single guns at her, to ascertain whether she was yet within their range. As soon as Nelson perceived that their shot passed over him, he desired Blackwood, and Captain Prowse, of the Sirius, to re- pair to their respective frigates; and, on their way, to tell all the captains of the line of battle ships that he depended on their exertions; and that, if by the prescribed mode of attack they found it impracticable to get into action, immediately, they might adopt whatever they thought best, provided it led them quickly and closely alongside an enemy. As they were standing on the 276 ROBERT SOUTH EY front of the poop, Blackwood took him by the hand, saying, he hoped soon to return and find him in possession of twenty prizes. He replied: 'God bless you, Blackwood! I shall never see you again.' Nelson's column was steered about two points more to the north than Collingwood's, in order to cut off the enemy's escape into Cadiz: the lee-line, therefore, was first engaged. 'See,' cried Nelson, pointing to the Royal Sovereign, as she steered right for the centre of the enemy's line, cut through it astern of the' Santa Anna, three-decker, and engaged her at the muzzle of her guns on the starboard side: 'see how that noble fellow, Collingwood, carries his ship into action ! ' Collingwood, de- lighted at being first in the heat of the fire, and knowing the feelings of his commander and old friend, turned to his captain, and exclaimed, 'Rotherham, what would Nelson give to be here !' Both these brave officers, perhaps, at this moment thought of Nelson with gratitude, for a circumstance which had occurred on the preceding day. Admiral Collingwood, with some of the captains, having gone on board the Victory to receive instructions, Nelson inquired of him where his captain was? and was told, in reply, that they were not upon good terms with each other. 'Terms !' said Nelson; 'good terms with each other !' Imme- diately he sent a boat for Captain Rotherham; led him, as soon as he arrived, to Collingwood, and saying, 'Look, yonder are the enemy!' bade them 'shake hands like Englishmen.' The enemy continued to fire a gun at a time at the Victory, till they saw that a shot had passed through her main-topgallant- sail; then they opened their broadsides, aiming chiefly at her rigging, in the hope of disabling her before she could close with them. Nelson, as usual, had hoisted several flags, lest one should be shot away. The enemy showed no colours till late in the action, when they began to feel the necessity of having them to strike. For this reason, the Santissima Trinidad, Nelson's old acquaintance, as he used to call her, was distinguishable only by her four decks; and to the bow of this opponent he ordered the Victory to be steered. Meantime an incessant raking fire was kept up upon the Victory. The admiral's secretary was one of the first who fell : he was killed by a cannon-shot, while convers- THE DEATH OF NELSON 277 ing with Hardy. Captain Adair, of the marines, with the help of a sailor, endeavoured to remove the body from Nelson's sight, who had a great regard for Mr. Scott; but he anxiously asked, 'Is that poor Scott that's gone?' and being informed that it was indeed so, exclaimed, 'Poor fellow!' Presently a double-headed shot struck a party of marines, who were drawn up on the poop, and killed eight of them : upon which Nelson immediately desired Captain Adair to disperse his men round the ship, that they might not suffer so much from being together. A few minutes afterwards a shot struck the fore brace bits on the quarter-deck, and passed between Nelson and Hardy, a splinter from the bit tearing off Hardy's buckle and bruising his foot. Both stopped, and looked anxiously at each other, each supposing the other to be wounded. Nelson then smiled, and said, 'This is too warm work, Hardy, to last long.' The Victory had not yet returned a single gun: fifty of her men had been by this time killed or wounded, and her main- topmast, with all her studding sails and their booms, shot away. Nelson declared that, in all his battles, he had seen nothing which surpassed the cool courage of his crew on this occasion. At four minutes after twelve she opened her fire from both sides of her deck. It was not possible to break the enemy's line without running on board one of their ships : Hardy informed him of this, and asked which he would prefer. Nelson replied: 'Take your choice, Hardy, it does not signify much.' The master was then ordered to put the helm to port, and the Victory ran on board the Redoubtable, just as her tiller ropes were shot away. The French ship received her with a broadside; then instantly let down her lower-deck ports, for fear of being boarded through them, and never afterwards fired a great gun during the action. Her tops, like those of all the enemy's ships, were filled with riflemen. Nelson never placed musketry in his tops; he had a strong dislike to the practice, not merely because it endangers setting fire to the sails, but also because it is a murderous sort of warfare, by which individuals may suffer, and a commander, now and then, be picked off, but which never can decide the fate of a general engagement. Captain Harvey, in the Temeraire, fell on board the Redoubtable 278 ROBERT SOUTHEY on the other side. Another enemy was in like manner on board the Temeraire: so that these four ships formed as compact a tier as if they had been moored together, their heads lying all the same way. The lieutenants of the Victory, seeing this, depressed their guns of the middle and lower decks, and fired with a diminished charge, lest the shot should pass through, and injure the Temeraire. And because there was danger that the Redoubtable might take fire from the lower-deck guns, the muzzles of which touched her side when they were run out, the fireman of each gun stood ready with a bucket of water, which, as soon as the gun was discharged, he dashed into the hole made by the shot. An incessant fire was kept ,up from the Victory from both sides; her larboard guns playing upon the Bucentaure and the huge Santissima Trinidad. It had been part of Nelson's prayer that the British fleet might be distinguished by humanity in the victory which he expected. Setting an example himself, he twice gave orders to cease firing upon the Redoubtable, supposing that she had struck, because her great guns were silent ; for, as she carried no flag, there was no means of instantly ascertaining the fact. From this ship, which he had thus twice spared, he received his death. A ball fired from her mizzen-top, which, in the then situation of the two vessels, was not more than fifteen yards from that part of the deck where he was standing, struck the epaulette on his left shoulder, about a quarter after one, just in the heat of the action. He fell upon his face, on the spot which was covered with his poor secretary's blood. Hardy, who was a few steps from him, turning round, saw three men raising him up. 'They have done for me at last, Hardy,' said he. 'I hope not!' cried Hardy. 'Yes,' he replied; 'my back bone is shot through.' Yet even now, not for a moment losing his presence of mind, he observed, as they were carrying him down the ladder, that the tiller ropes, which had been shot away, were not yet replaced, and ordered that new ones should be rove imme- diately: then, that he might not be seen by the crew, he took out his handkerchief, and covered his face and his stars. Had he but concealed these badges of honour from the enemy, England, perhaps, would not have had cause to receive with sorrow the news of the battle of Trafalgar. The cockpit was crowded with wounded and dying men, over THE DEATH OF NELSON 279 whose bodies he was with some difficulty conveyed, and laid upon a pallet in the midshipmen's berth. It was soon perceived, upon examination, that the wound was mortal. This, however, was concealed from all, except Captain Hardy, the chaplain, and the medical attendants. He himself being certain, from the sensa- tion in his back, and the gush of blood which he felt momently within his breast, that no human care could avail him, insisted that the surgeon should leave him, and attend to those to whom he might be useful : ' For,' said he, 'you can do nothing for me.' All that could be done was to fan him with paper, and frequently to give him lemonade, to alleviate his intense thirst. He was in great pain, and expressed much anxiety for the event of the action, which now began to declare itself. As often as a ship struck the crew of the Victory hurraed ; and at every hurra a visible expression of joy gleamed in the eyes, and marked the countenance, of the dying hero. But he became impatient to see Captain Hardy; and as that officer, though often sent for, could not leave the deck, Nelson feared that some fatal cause prevented him, and repeatedly cried: 'Will no one bring Hardy to me? He must be killed! He is surely dead ! ' An hour and ten minutes elapsed, from the time when Nelson received his wound, before Hardy could come to him. They shook hands in silence ; Hardy in vain struggling to suppress the feelings of that most painful, and yet sublimest mo- ment. 'Well, Hardy,' said Nelson, 'how goes the day with us?' 'Very well,' replied Hardy; 'ten ships have struck, but five of their van have tacked, and show an intention of bearing down upon the Victory. I have called two or three of our fresh ships round, and have no doubt of giving them a drubbing.' 'I hope,' said Nelson, ' none of our ships have struck ? ' Hardy answered, 'There was no fear of that.' Then, and not till then, Nelson spoke of himself. 'I am a dead man, Hardy,' said he; 'I am going fast : it will be all over with me soon. Come nearer to me. Let my dear Lady Hamilton have my hair, and all other things belonging to me.' Hardy observed, that he hoped Mr. Beatty could yet hold out some prospect of life. ' Oh no ! ' he replied ; ' it is impossible. My back is shot through. Beatty will tell you so.' Captain Hardy then, once more, shook hands with him; and, with a heart almost bursting, hastened upon deck. 280 ROBERT SOUTHEY By this time all feeling below the breast was gone, and Nelson, having made the surgeon ascertain this, said to him: 'You know I am gone. I know it. I feel something rising in my breast ' putting his hand on his left side 'which tells me so.' And upon Beatty's inquiring whether his pain was very great? he replied, 'So great, that he wished he was dead. Yet,' said he, in a lower voice, ' one would like to live a little longer too ! ' And after a few minutes, in the same under-tone, he added : ' What would become of poor Lady Hamilton if she knew my situation ! ' Next to his country she occupied his thoughts. Captain Hardy, some fifty minutes after he had left the cockpit, returned ; and, again taking the hand of his dying friend and commander, congratulated him on having gained a complete victory. How many of the enemy were taken he did not know, as it was impossible to perceive them distinctly but fourteen or fifteen at least. 'That's well,' cried Nelson; 'but I bargained for twenty.' And then, in a stronger voice, he said, 'Anchor, Hardy; anchor.' Hardy, upon this, hinted that Admiral Collingwood would take upon himself the direction of affairs. 'Not while I live, Hardy!' said the dying Nelson, ineffectually endeavouring to raise himself from the bed : 'do you anchor.' His previous order for preparing to anchor had shown how clearly he foresaw the necessity of this. Presently, calling Hardy back, he said to him, in a low voice, ' Don't throw me overboard ' ; and he desired that he might be buried by his parents, unless it should please the king to order otherwise. Then, re- verting to private feelings : ' Take care of my dear Lady Hamilton, Hardy; take care of poor Lady Hamilton. Kiss me, Hardy,' said he. Hardy knelt down, and kissed his cheek : and Nelson said, ' Now I am satisfied. Thank God, I have done my duty.' Hardy stood over him in silence for a moment or two, then knelt again, and kissed his forehead. 'Who is that?' said Nelson; and being informed, he replied, 'God bless you, Hardy.' And Hardy then left him for ever. Nelson now desired to be turned upon his right side, and said: 'I wish I had not left the deck ; for I shall soon be gone.' Death was, indeed, rapidly approaching. He said to the chaplain: 'Doctor, I have not been a great sinner' ; and, after a short pause, 'Remember that I leave Lady Hamilton, and my daughter Horatia, THE DEATH OF NELSON 281 as a legacy to my country.' His articulation now became difficult ; but he was distinctly heard to say, 'Thank God, I have done my duty ! ' These words he had repeatedly pronounced ; and they were the last words he uttered. He expired at thirty minutes after four, three hours and a quarter after he had received his wound. JOHN GIBSON LOCKHART THE DEATH OF SCOTT [From Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Bart., Vol. VII, Chap. xi. 1837-1838. Robert Cadell, Edinburgh. "Of the literary merits of the ' Life of Scott ' it is not possible for one whose breviary, as it were, the book has been from boyhood, to speak with impar- tiality. To a Scot, and a Scot of the Border, the book has the charm of home, and is dear to us as his own grey hills were dear to Sir Walter. Nec- essarily, inevitably, the stranger cannot, or seldom can, share this sentiment. Mr. Saintsbury, now in some degree a Scot by adoption, has, indeed, placed the book beside or above Boswell's. That is a length to which I cannot go; for Boswell's hero appears to myself to be of a character more universally human, a wiser man, a greater humourist, his biography a more valuable possession, than Sir Walter and Sir Walter's ' Life.' But it were childish to dispute about the relative merits of two chefs-d'ceuvre. Each work is perfect in its kind, and in relation to its subject. The self-repression of Lockhart, accompanied by his total lack of self-consciousness (so astonishing in so shy a man), when his own person has to figure on the scene, is as valu- able as the very opposite quality in Boswell. " Later writers, Thackeray, Macaulay, Mr. Ruskin, Mr. Carlyle, Mr. Louis Stevenson, Mr. Pater, have given examples of styles more personal, infinitely more conspicuous, than Lockhart's; to many, doubtless to most readers, more taking. Lockhart has no mannerisms, no affectations, no privy jargon, no confidences with the reader; but it may almost be said that he has no faults. His English is like the English of Swift, all the light is concentrated on the object. Without disparagement of the great or pleas- ing authors already named; with every acknowledgment of the charming or the astonishing qualities of their various manners, we must also claim a place, and a high place, for the style of Lockhart. He wrote English." ANDREW LANG, The Life and Letters of John Gibson Lockhart, Vol. II, pp. 122-124. John C. Nimmo, London, 1897.] He reached London about six o'clock on the evening of Wednes- day the 1 3th of June. Owing to the unexpected rapidity of the journey, his eldest daughter had had no notice when to expect him ; and fearful of finding her either out of town, or unprepared 282 JOHN GIBSON LOCKHART to receive him and his attendants under her roof, Charles Scott drove to the St. James's Hotel in Jermyn Street, and established his quarters there before he set out in quest of his sister and myself. When we reached the hotel, he recognised us with many marks of tenderness, but signified that he was totally exhausted; so no at- tempt was made to remove him further, and he was put to bed immediately. Dr. Fergusson saw him the same night, and next day Sir Henry Half ord and Dr. Holland saw him also ; and during the next three weeks the two latter visited him daily, while Fergus- son was scarcely absent from his pillow. The Major was soon on the spot. To his children, all assembled once more about him, he repeatedly gave his blessing in a very solemn manner, as if expecting immediate death ; but he was never in a condition for conversation, and sunk either into sleep or delirious stupor upon the slightest effort. Mrs. Thomas Scott came to town as soon as she heard of his arrival, and remained to help us. She was more than once recognised and thanked. Mr. Gadell, too, arrived from Edinburgh, to render any assistance in his power. I think Sir Walter saw no other of his friends except Mr. John Richardson, and him only once. As usual, he woke up at the sound of a familiar voice, and made an attempt to put forth his hand, but it dropped power- less, and he said, with a smile "Excuse my hand." Richard- son made a struggle to suppress his emotion, and, after a moment, got out something about Abbotsford and the woods, which he had happened to see shortly before. The eye brightened, and he said "How does Kirklands get on?" Mr. Richardson had lately purchased the estate so called in Teviotdale, and Sir Walter had left him busied with plans of building. His friend told him that his new house was begun, and that the Marquis of Lothian had very kindly lent him one of his own, meantime, in its vicinity. "Ay, Lord Lothian is a good man," said Sir Walter; "he is a man from whom one may receive a favour, and that's saying a good deal for any man in these days." The stupor then sank back upon him, and Richardson never heard his voice again. This state of things continued till the beginning of July. During these melancholy weeks, great interest and sympathy were manifested. Allan Cunningham mentions that, walking THE DEATH OF SCOTT 283 home late one night, he found several workingmen standing to-, gether at the corner of Jermyn Street, and one of them asked him as if there was but one deathbed in London "Do you know, sir, if this is the street where he is lying?" The inquiries both at the hotel and at my house were incessant ; and I think there was hardly a member of the royal family who did not send every day. The newspapers teemed with paragraphs about Sir Walter ; and one of these, it appears, threw out a suggestion that his travels had exhausted his pecuniary resources, and that if he were capable of reflection at all, cares of that sort might probably harass his pillow. This paragraph came from a very ill-informed, but, I dare say, a well-meaning quarter. It caught the attention of some members of the Government ; and, in consequence, I received a private com- munication, to the effect that, if the case were as stated, Sir Walter's family had only to say what sum would relieve him from embarrass- ment, and it would be immediately advanced by the Treasury. The then Paymaster of the Forces, Lord John Russell, had the delicacy to convey this message through a lady with whose friend- ship he knew us to be honoured the Honourable Catherine Arden. We expressed our grateful sense of his politeness, and of the liberality of the Government, and I now beg leave to do so once more ; but his lordship was of course informed that Sir Walter Scott was not situated as the journalist had represented. Dr. Fergusson's Memorandum on Jermyn Street will be accept- able to the reader. He says " When I saw Sir Walter, he was lying in the second floor back-room of the St. James's Hotel, in a state of stupor, from which, however, he could be roused for a moment by being addressed, and then he recognised those about him, but immediately relapsed. I think I never saw anything more magnificent than the symmetry of his colossal bust, as he lay on the pillow with his chest and neck exposed. During the time he was in Jermyn Street he was calm but never collected, and in general either in absolute stupor or in a waking dream. He never seemed to know where he was, but imagined himself to be still in the steam-boat. The rattling of carriages, and the noises of the street, sometimes disturbed this illusion and then he fancied him- self at the polling-booth of Jedburgh, where he had been insulted and stoned. During the whole of this period of apparent helpless- 284 JOHN GIBSON LOCKHART ness, the great features of his character could not be mistaken. He always exhibited great self-possession, and acted his part with wonderful power whenever visited, though he relapsed the next moment into the stupor from which strange voices had roused him. A gentleman [Mr. Richardson] stumbled over a chair in his dark room; he immediately started up, and though unconscious that it was a friend, expressed as much concern and feeling as if he had never been labouring under the irritability of disease. It was impossible even for those who most constantly saw and waited on him in his then deplorable condition to relax from the habitual deference which he had always inspired. He expressed his will as determinedly as ever, and enforced it with the same apt and good-natured irony as he was wont to use. "At length his constant yearning to return to Abbotsford in- duced his physicians to consent to his removal; and the moment this was notified to him, it seemed to infuse new vigour into his frame. It was on a calm, clear afternoon of the 7th July, that every preparation was made for his embarkation on board the steam-boat. He was placed on a chair by his faithful servant Nicolson, half-dressed, and loosely wrapped in a quilted dressing- gown. He requested Lockhart and myself to wheel him towards the light of the open window, and we both remarked the vigorous lustre of his eye. He sat there silently gazing on space for more than half an hour, apparently wholly occupied with his own thoughts, and having no distinct perception of where he was, or how he came there. He suffered himself to be lifted into his carriage, which was surrounded by a crowd, among whom were many gentlemen on horseback, who had loitered about to gaze on the scene. His children were deeply affected, and Mrs. Lock- hart trembled from head to foot, and wept bitterly. Thus sur- rounded by those nearest to him, he alone was unconscious of the cause or the depth of their grief, and while yet alive seemed to be carried to his grave." On this his last journey, Sir Walter was attended by his two daughters, Mr. Cadell, and myself and also by Dr. Thomas Watson, who (it being impossible for Dr. Fergusson to leave town at that moment) kindly undertook to see him safe at Abbotsford. We embarked in the James Watt steam-boat, the master of which THE DEATH OF SCOTT 285 (Captain John Jamieson), as well as the agents of the proprietors, made every arrangement in their power for the convenience of the invalid. The Captain gave up for Sir Walter's use his own private cabin, which was a separate erection a sort of cottage on the deck; and he seemed unconscious, after being laid in bed there, that any new removal had occurred. On arriving at Newhaven, late on the gth, we found careful preparations made for his landing by the manager of the Shipping Company (Mr. Hamilton) and Sir Walter, prostrate in his carriage, was slung on shore, and conveyed from thence to Douglas's hotel, in St. Andrew's Square, in the same complete apparent unconsciousness. Mrs. Douglas had in former days been the Duke of Buccleuch's housekeeper at Bowhill, and she and her husband had also made the most suitable provision. At a very early hour on the morning of Wednesday the nth, we again placed him in his carriage, and he lay in the same torpid state during the first two stages on the road to Tweedside. But as we descended the vale of the Gala he began to gaze about him, and by degrees it was obvious that he was recognising the features of that familiar landscape. Presently he murmured a name or two -"Gala Water, surely Buckholm Torwoodlee." As we rounded the hill at Ladhope, and the outline of the Eildons burst on him, he became greatly excited ; and when, turning himself on the couch, his eye caught at length his own towers at the distance of a mile, he sprang up with a cry of delight. The river being in flood, we had to go round a few miles by Melrose bridge; and during the time this occupied, his woods and house being within prospect, it required occasionally both Dr. Watson's strength and mine, in addition to Nicolson's, to keep him in the carriage. After passing the bridge, the road for a couple of miles loses sight of Abbotsford, and he relapsed into his stupor; but on gaining the bank immediately above it, his excitement became again un- governable. Mr. Laidlaw was waiting at the porch, and assisted us in lifting him into the dining-room, where his bed had been prepared. He sat bewildered for a few moments, and then resting his eye on Laidlaw, said "Ha ! Willie Laidlaw ! O man, how often have I thought of you!" By this time his dogs had assembled about 286 JOHN GIBSON LOCKHART his chair they began to fawn upon him and lick his hands, and he alternately sobbed and smiled over them, until sleep oppressed him. Dr. Watson having consulted on all things with Mr. Clarkson of Melrose and his father, the good old " Country Surgeon" of Selkirk, resigned the patient to them, and returned to London. None of them could have any hope but that of soothing irritation. Recovery was no longer to be thought of: but there might be Euthanasia. And yet something like a ray of hope did break in upon us next morning. Sir Walter awoke perfectly conscious where he was, and expressed an ardent wish to be carried out into his garden. We procured a Bath chair from Huntley Burn, and Laidlaw and I wheeled him out before his door, and up and down for some time on the turf, and among the rose-beds then in full bloom. The grand-children admired the new vehicle, and would be helping in their way to push it about. He sat in silence, smiling placidly on them and the dogs their companions, and now and then ad- miring the house, the screen of the garden, and the flowers and trees. By and by he conversed a little, very composedly, with us said he was happy to be at home that he felt better than he had ever done since he left it, and would perhaps disappoint the doctors after all. He then desired to be wheeled through his rooms, and we moved him leisurely for an hour or more up and down the hall and the great library: "I have seen much," he kept saying, "but nothing like my ain house give me one turn more !" He was gentle as an infant, and allowed himself to be put to bed again the moment we told him that we thought he had had enough for one day. Next morning he was still better. After again enjoying the Bath chair for perhaps a couple of hours out of doors, he desired to be drawn into the library, and placed by the central window, that he might look down upon the Tweed. Here he expressed a wish that I should read to him, and when I asked from what book, he said "Need you ask ? There is but one." I chose the i4th chapter of St. John's Gospel; he listened with mild devotion, and said when I had done "Well, this is a great comfort I have followed you distinctly, and I feel as if I were yet to be myself THE DEATH OF SCOTT 287 again." In this placid frame he was again put to bed, and had many hours of soft slumber. On the third day Mr. Laidlaw and I again wheeled him about the small piece of lawn and shrubbery in front of the house for some time ; and the weather being delightful, and all the richness of summer around him, he seemed to taste fully the balmy influences of nature. The sun getting very strong, we halted the chair in a shady corner, just within the verge of his verdant arcade around the court-wall; and breathing the coolness of the spot, he said, "Read me some amusing thing read me a bit of Crabbe." I brought out the first volume of his old favourite that I could lay hand on, and turned to what I remembered as one of his most favourite passages in it the description of the arrival of the Players in the Borough. He listened with great interest, and also, as I soon perceived, with great curiosity. Every now and then he exclaimed, "Capital excellent very good Crabbe has lost nothing" and we were too well satisfied that he considered himself as hearing a new pro- duction, when, chuckling over one couplet, he said, "Better and better but how will poor Terry 1 endure these cuts?" I went on with the poet's terrible sarcasms upon the theatrical life, and he listened eagerly, muttering, "Honest Dan!" "Dan won't like this." At length I reached those lines "Sad happy race! soon raised, and soon depressed, Your days all passed in jeopardy and jest; Poor without prudence, with afflictions vain, Not warned by misery, nor enriched by gain." "Shut the book," said Sir Walter "I can't stand more of this it will touch Terry to the very quick." On the morning of Sunday the i5th, he was again taken out into the little pleasaunce, and got as far as his favourite terrace-walk between the garden and the river, from which he seemed to survey the valley and the hills with much satisfaction. On re-entering the house, he desired me to read to him from the New Testament, and after that he again called for a little of Crabbe ; but whatever I selected from that poet seemed to be listened to as if it made part 1 Daniel Terry, an actor, and friend of Scott. 288 JOHN GIBSON LOCKHART of some new volume published while he was in Italy. He at- tended with this sense of novelty even to the tale of Phoebe Dawson, which not many months before he could have repeated every line of, and which I chose for one of these readings, because, as is known to every one, it had formed the last solace of Mr. Fox's deathbed. On the contrary, his recollection of whatever I read from the Bible appeared to be lively; and in the afternoon, when we made his grandson, a child of six years, repeat some of Dr. Watts' hymns by his chair, he seemed also to remember them perfectly. That evening he heard the Church service, and when I was about to close the book, said " Why do you omit the visitation for the sick ? " which I added accordingly. On Monday he remained in bed, and seemed extremely feeble ; but after breakfast on Tuesday the zyth he appeared revived some- what, and was again wheeled about on the turf. Presently he fell asleep in his chair, and after dozing for perhaps half an hour, started awake, and shaking the plaids we had put about him from off his shoulders, said "This is sad idleness. I shall forget what I have been thinking of, if I don't set it down now. Take me into my own room, and fetch the keys of my desk." He repeated this so earnestly, that we could not refuse ; his daughters went into his study, opened his writing-desk, and laid paper and pens in the usual order, and I then moved him through the hall and into the spot where he had always been accustomed to work. When the chair was placed at the desk, and he found himself in the old posi- tion, he smiled and thanked us, and said "Now give me my pen, and leave me for a little to myself." Sophia put the pen into his hand, and he endeavoured to close his fingers upon it, but they refused their office it dropped on the paper. He sank back among his pillows, silent tears rolling down his cheeks ; but com- posing himself by and by, motioned to me to wheel him out of doors again. Laidlaw met us at the porch, and took his turn of the chair. Sir Walter, after a little while, again dropped into slumber. When he was awaking, Laidlaw said to me "Sir Walter has had a little repose." "No Willie," said he "no repose for Sir Walter but in the grave." The tears again rushed from his eyes. "Friends," said he, "don't let me expose myself get me to bed that's the only place." THE DEATH OF SCOTT 289 With this scene ended our glimpse of daylight. Sir Walter never, I think, left his room afterwards, and hardly his bed, except for an hour or two in the middle of the day ; and after another week he was unable even for this. During a few days he was in a state of painful irritation and I saw realised all that he had himself prefigured in his description of the meeting between Chrystal Croftangry and his paralytic friend. Dr. Ross came out from Edinburgh, bringing with him his wife, one of the dearest nieces of the Clerks' table. Sir Walter with some difficulty recognised the Doctor; but on hearing Mrs. Ross's voice, exclaimed at once " Isn't that Kate Hume ? " These kind friends remained for two or three days with us. Clarkson's lancet was pronounced neces- sary, and the relief it afforded was, I am happy to say, very effectual. After this he declined daily, but still there was great strength to be wasted, and the process was long. He seemed, however, to suffer no bodily pain ; and his mind, though hopelessly obscured, appeared, when there was any symptom of consciousness, to be dwelling, with rare exceptions, on serious and solemn things ; the accent of the voice grave, sometimes awful, but never querulous, and very seldom indicative of any angry or resentful thoughts. Now and then he imagined himself to be administering justice as Sheriff; and once or twice he seemed to be ordering Tom Purdie about trees. A few times also, I am sorry to say, we could perceive that his fancy was at Jedburgh and Burk Sir Walter escaped him in a melancholy tone. But commonly whatever we could follow him in was a fragment of the Bible (especially the Prophecies of Isaiah and the Book of Job), of some petition in the litany, or a verse of some psalm (in the old Scotch metrical version), or of some of the magnificent hymns of the Romish ritual, in which he had always delighted, but which probably hung on his memory now in connection with the Church services he had at- tended while in Italy. We very often heard distinctly the cadence of the Dies Irce; and I think the very last stanza that we could make out was the first of a still greater favourite : "Stabat Mater dolorosa, Juxta crucem lachrymosa, Dum pendebat Filius." 290 JOHN GIBSON LOCKHART All this time he continued to recognise his daughters, Laidlaw, and myself, whenever we spoke to him and received every at- tention with a most touching thankfulness. Mr. Clarkson, too, was always saluted with the old courtesy, though the cloud opened but a moment for him to do so. Most truly might it be said that the gentleman survived the genius. After two or three weeks had passed in this way, I was obliged to leave Sir Walter for a single day, and go into Edinburgh to transact business, on his account, with Mr. Henry Cockburn (now Lord Cockburn), then Solicitor- General for Scotland. The Scotch Reform Bill threw a great burden of new duties and re- sponsibilities upon the Sheriffs ; and Scott's Sheriff-substitute, the Laird of Raeburn, not having been regularly educated for the law, found himself unable to encounter these novelties, especially as regarded the registration of voters, and other details connected with the recent enlargement of the electoral franchise. Under such circumstances, as no one but the Sheriff could appoint an- other substitute, it became necessary for Sir Walter's family to communicate the state he was in in a formal manner to the Law Officers of the Crown; and the Lord Advocate (Mr. Jeffrey), in consequence, introduced and carried through Parliament a short bill (2 and 3 William IV. cap. 101), authorising the Government to appoint a new Sheriff of Selkirkshire, " during the incapacity or non-resignation of Sir Walter Scott." It was on this bill that the Solicitor- General had expressed a wish to converse with me : but there was little to be said, as the temporary nature of the new appointment gave no occasion for any pecuniary question; and, if that had been otherwise, the circumstances of the case would have rendered Sir Walter's family entirely indifferent upon such a subject. There can be no doubt, that if he had recovered in so far as to be capable of executing a resignation, the Government would have considered it just to reward thirty-two years' faithful services by a retired allowance equivalent to his salary and as little, that the Government would have had sincere satisfaction in settling that matter in the shape most acceptable to himself. And perhaps (though I feel that it is scarcely worth while) I may as well here express my regret that a statement highly unjust and in- jurious should have found its way into the pages of some of Sir THE DEATH OF SCOTT 291 Walter's biographers. These writers have thought fit to insinuate that there was a want of courtesy and respect on the part of the Lord Advocate, and the other official persons connected with this arrangement. On the contrary, nothing could be more hand- some and delicate than the whole of their conduct in it; Mr. Cockburn could not have entered into the case with greater feeling and tenderness, had it concerned a brother of his own ; and when Mr. Jeffrey introduced his bill in the House of Commons, he used language so graceful and touching, that both Sir Robert Peel and Mr. Croker went across the House to thank him cordially for it. Perceiving, towards the close of August, that the end was near, and thinking it very likely that Abbotsford might soon undergo many changes, and myself, at all events, never see it again, I felt a desire to have some image preserved of the interior apartments as occupied by their founder, and invited from Edinburgh for that purpose Sir Walter's dear friend, Sir William Allan whose presence, I well knew, would even under the circumstances of that time be nowise troublesome to any of the family, but the contrary in all respects. Sir William willingly complied, and executed a series of beautiful drawings. He also shared our watchings, and witnessed all but the last moments. Sir Walter's cousins, the ladies of Ashestiel, came down frequently, for a day or two at a time, and did whatever sisterly affection could prompt, both for the sufferer and his daughters. Miss Mary Scott (daughter of his uncle Thomas), and Mrs. Scott of Harden, did the like. As I was dressing on the morning of Monday the i;th of Sep- tember, Nicolson came into my room, and told me that his master had awoke in a state of composure and consciousness, and wished to see me immediately. I found him entirely himself, though in the last extreme of feebleness. His eye was clear and calm every trace of the wild fire of delirium extinguished. "Lockhart," he said, " I may have but a minute to speak to you. My dear, be a good man be virtuous be religious be a good man. Noth- ing else will give you any comfort when you come to lie here." He paused, and I said " Shall I send for Sophia and Anne ?" "No," said he, "don't disturb them. Poor souls! I know they were up all night God bless you all." With this he sunk into a very tranquil sleep, and, indeed, he scarcely afterwards gave any 292 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAU LAY sign of consciousness, except for an instant on the arrival of his sons. They, on learning that the scene was about to close, obtained a new leave of absence from their posts, and both reached Abbots- ford on the iQth. About half-past one p.m. on the 2ist of Septem- ber, Sir Walter breathed his last, in the presence of all his children. It was a beautiful day so warm, that every window was wide open and so perfectly still, that the sound of all others most delicious to his ear, the gentle ripple of the Tweed over its pebbles, was distinctly audible as we knelt around the bed, and his eldest son kissed and closed his eyes. THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY FANNY BURNEY AT COURT [From "Madame D'Arblay," 1843, in Critical and Miscellaneous Essays. Longmans, Green & Co., London, 1870. ARBLAY, FRANCES (BURNEY), MADAME D' (1752-1840), novelist, daugh- ter of Dr. Burney; self-educated; published her first novel, 'Evelina,' anonymously (though her father soon divulged the secret), 1778; brought by its success to the notice of most of the literary personages of the day ; published 'Cecilia/ with similar success, 1782; made the acquaintance of Mrs. Delaney, who procured her the appointment of second keeper of the queen's robes, 1786; being broken in health, obtained with difficulty per- mission to retire, 1790; married General d'Arblay, a French refugee in England, 1793; published 'Camilla,' 1796; joined her husband, who had endeavoured to obtain employment in Paris, 1802; returned to England, 1812; published her last novel, 'The Wanderer,' 1814; rejoined her hus- band in Paris, and retired to Belgium; passed the rest of her life in Eng- land, after the Waterloo campaign; edited her father's 'Memoirs,' 1832; published 'Diary and Letters,' 1842-6. Index and Epitome of D. N. B. "A style to dazzle, to gain admirers everywhere, to attract imitators in multitude! A style brilliant, metallic, exterior; making strong points, al- ternating invective with eulogy, wrapping in a robe of rhetoric the thing it represents; not, with the soft play of life, following and rendering the thing's very form and pressure. For, indeed, in rendering things in this fashion, Macaulay's gift did not lie." MATTHEW ARNOLD, "A French Critic on Milton," Mixed Essays, pp. 237-238. Macmillan & Co., New York, 1879. "Shall we go back to the art of which Macaulay was so great a master? We could do worse. It must be a great art that can make men lay aside the novel and take up the history, to find there, in very fact, the movement and FANNY BURNEY AT COURT 293 drama of life. What Macaulay does well he does incomparably. Who else can mass the details as he does, and yet not mar or obscure, but only heighten, the effect of the picture as a whole ? Who else can bring so amazing a pro- fusion of knowledge wfthin the strait limits of a simple plan, nowhere en- cumbered, everywhere free and obvious in its movement? How sure the strokes, and how bold and vivid the result ! Yet when we have laid the book aside, when the charm and the excitement of the telling narrative have worn off, when we have lost step with the swinging gait at which the style goes, when the details have faded from our recollection, and we sit removed and thoughtful, with only the greater outlines of the story sharp upon our minds, a deep misgiving and dissatisfaction take possession of us. We are no longer young, and we are chagrined that we should have been so pleased and taken with the glitter and color and mere life of the picture." WOOD- ROW WILSON, Mere Literature and Other Essays, pp. 167, 168. Houghton, Mifflin & Co., Boston, 1896.] In December 1785, Miss Burney was on a visit to Mrs. Delany at Windsor. The dinner was over. The old lady was taking a nap. Her grandniece, a little girl of seven, was playing at some Christmas game with the visitors, when the door opened, and a stout gentle- man entered unannounced, with a star on his breast, and "What? what? what?" in his mouth. A cry of "The King!" was set up. A general scampering followed. Miss Burney owns that she could not have been more terrified if she had seen a ghost. But Mrs. Delany came forward to pay her duty to her royal friend, and the disturbance was quieted. Frances was then presented, and underwent a long examination and cross examination about all that she had written and all that she meant to write. The Queen soon made her appearance and his Majesty repeated, for the benefit of his consort, the information which he had extracted from Miss Burney. The good-nature of the royal pair might have softened even the authors of the Probationary Odes, and could not but be delightful to a young lady who had been brought up a Tory. In a few days the visit was repeated. Miss Burney was more at ease than before. His Majesty, instead of seeking for information, condescended to impart it, and passed sentence on many great writers, English and foreign. Voltaire he pro- nounced a monster. Rousseau he liked rather better. "But was there ever," he cried, "such stuff as great part of Shakspeare? Only one must not say so. But what think you? What? Is there not sad stuff ? What ? What ? " The next day Frances enjoyed the privilege of listening to some 294 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY equally valuable criticism uttered by the Queen touching Goethe and Klopstock, and might have learned an important lesson of economy from the mode in which her Majesty's library had been formed. " I picked the book up on a stall," said the Queen. " Oh, it is amazing what good books there are on stalls ! " Mrs. Delany, who seems to have understood from these words that her Majesty was in the habit of exploring the booths of Moorfields and Holy- well Street in person, could not suppress an exclamation of surprise. "Why," said the Queen, "I don't pick them up myself. But I have a servant very clever; and, if they are not to be had at the booksellers, they are not for me more than for another." Miss Burney describes this conversation as delightful ; and, indeed, we cannot wonder that, with her literary tastes, she should be de- lighted at hearing in how magnificent a manner the greatest lady in the land encouraged literature. The truth is, that Frances was fascinated by the condescending kindness of the two great personages to whom she had been pre- sented. Her father was even more infatuated than herself. The result was a step of which we cannot think with patience, but which, recorded as it is, with all its consequences, in these volumes, deserves at least this praise, that it has furnished a most impressive warning. A German Lady of the name of Haggerdorn, one of the keepers of the Queen's robes, retired about this time; and her Majesty offered the vacant post to Miss Burney. When we consider that Miss Burney was decidedly the most popular writer of fictitious narrative then living, that competence, if not opulence, was within her reach, and that she was more than usually happy in her domes- tic circle, and when we compare the sacrifice which she was invited to make with the remuneration which was held out to her, we are divided between laughter and indignation. What was demanded of her was that she should consent to be almost as completely separated from her family and friends as if she had gone to Calcutta, and almost as close a prisoner as if she had been sent to gaol for a libel ; that with talents which had instructed and delighted the highest living minds, she should now be employed only in mixing snuff and sticking pins; that she should be summoned by a waiting-woman's bell to a waiting- FANNY BURNEY AT COURT 295 woman's duties; that she should pass her whole life under the restraints of a paltry etiquette, should sometimes fast till she was ready to swoon with hunger, should sometimes stand till her knees gave way with fatigue; that she should not dare to speak or move without considering how her mistress might like her words and gestures. Instead of those distinguished men and women, the flower of all political parties, with whom she had been in the habit of mixing on terms of equal friendship, she was to have for her perpetual companion the chief keeper of the robes, an old hag from Germany, of mean understanding, of insolent manners, and of temper which, naturally savage, had now been exasperated by dis- ease. Now and then, indeed, poor Frances might console herself for the loss of Burke 's and Windham's society, by joining in the " celestial colloquy sublime" of his Majesty's Equerries. And what was the consideration for which she was to sell her- self to this slavery? A peerage in her own right? A pension of two thousand a year for life ? A seventy-four for her brother in the navy ? A deanery for her brother in the church ? Not so. The price at which she was valued was her board, her lodging, the at- tendance of a man-servant, and two hundred pounds a year. The man who, even when hard pressed by hunger, sells his birth- right for a mess of pottage, is unwise. But what shall we say of him who parts with his birthright, and does not get even the pottage in return ? It is not necessary to inquire whether opulence be a n ade- quate compensation for the sacrifice of bodily and mental freedom ; for Frances Burney paid for leave to be a prisoner and a menial. It was evidently understood as one of the terms of her engagement, that, while she was a member of the royal household, she was not to appear before the public as an author; and, even had there been no such understanding, her avocations were such as left her no leisure for any considerable intellectual effort. That her place was incompatible with her literary pursuits was indeed frankly ac- knowledged by the King when she resigned. " She has given up," he said, "five years of her pen." That during those five years she might, without painful exertion, without any exertion that would not have been a pleasure, have earned enough to buy an annuity for life much larger than the precarious salary which she received at Court, is quite certain. The same income, too, which 296 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAU LAY in Saint Martin's Street would have afforded her every comfort, must have been found scanty at Saint James's. We cannot venture to speak confidently of the price of millinery and jewellery; but we are greatly deceived if a lady, who had to attend Queen Charlotte on many public occasions, could possibly save a farthing out of a salary of two hundred a year. The principle of the ar- rangement was, in short, simply this, that Frances Burney should become a slave, and should be rewarded by being made a beggar. With what object their Majesties brought her to their palace, we must own ourselves unable to conceive. Their object could not be to encourage her literary exertions ; for they took her from a situation in which it was almost certain that she would write, and put her into a situation in which it was impossible for her to write. Their object could not be to promote her pecuniary interest; for they took her from a situation where she was likely to become rich, and put her into a situation in which she could not but continue poor. Their object could not be to obtain an eminently useful waiting-maid; for it is clear that, though Miss Burney was the only woman of her time who could have described the death of Harrel, thousands might have been found more expert in tying ribands and filling snuff-boxes. To grant her a pension on the civil list would have been an act of judicious liberality, honourable to the Court. If this was impracticable, the next best thing was to let her alone. That the King and Queen meant her nothing but kindness, we do not in the least doubt. But their kindness was the kindness of persons raised high above the mass of mankind, accustomed to be addressed with profound deference, accustomed to see all who approach them mortified by their coldness and elated by their smiles. They fancied that to be noticed by them, to be near them, to serve them, was in itself a kind of happiness; and that Frances Burney ought to be full of gratitude for being permitted to purchase, by the surrender of health, wealth, freedom, domestic affection, and literary fame, the privilege of standing behind a royal chair, and holding a pair of royal gloves. And who can blame them? Who can wonder that princes should be under such a delusion, when they are encouraged in it FANNY BURNEY AT COURT 297 by the very persons who suffer from it most cruelly ? Was it to be expected that George the Third and Queen Charlotte should understand the interest of Frances Burney better, or promote it with more zeal, than herself and her father? No deception was practised. The conditions of the house of bondage were set forth with all simplicity. The hook was presented without a bait; the net was spread in sight of the bird : and the naked hook was greedily swallowed, and the silly bird made haste to entangle her- self in the net. It is not strange indeed that an invitation to Court should have caused a fluttering in the bosom of an inexperienced young woman. But it was the duty of the parent to watch over the child, and to show her that on one side were only infantine vanities and chimerical hopes, on the other liberty, peace of mind, affluence, social enjoy- ments, honourable distinctions. Strange to say, the only hesitation was on the part of Frances. Dr. Burney was transported out of himself with delight. Not such are the raptures of a Circassian father who has sold his pretty daughter well to a Turkish slave- merchant. Yet Dr. Burney was an amiable man, a man of good abilities, a man who had seen much of the world. But he seems to have thought that going to Court was like going to heaven ; that to see princes and princesses was a kind of beatific vision; that the exquisite felicity enjoyed by royal persons was not confined to themselves, but was communicated by some mysterious efflux or reflection to all who were suffered to stand at their toilettes, or to bear their trains. He overruled all his daughter's objections, and himself escorted her to her prison. The door closed. The key was turned. She, looking back with tender regret on all that she had left, and forward with anxiety and terror to the new life on which she was entering, was unable to speak or stand; and he went on his way homeward rejoicing in her marvellous prosperity. And now began a slavery of five years, of five years taken from the best part of life, and wasted in menial drudgery or in recreations duller than even menial drudgery, under galling restraints and amidst unfriendly or uninteresting companions. The history of an ordinary day was this. Miss Burney had to rise and dress herself early, that she might be ready to answer the royal bell, which rang at half after seven. Till about eight she attended in the Queen's 298 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAU LAY dressing-room, and had the honour of lacing her august mistress's stays, and of putting on the hoop, gown, and neckhandkerchief. The morning was chiefly spent in rummaging drawers and laying fine clothes in their proper places. Then the Queen was to be powdered and dressed for the day. Twice a week her Majesty's hair was curled and craped; and this operation appears to have added a full hour to the business of the toilette. It was generally three before Miss Burney was at liberty. Then she had two hours at her own disposal. To these hours we owe great part of her Diary. At five she had to attend her colleague, Madame Sch wel- lenberg, a hateful old toadeater, as illiterate as a chambermaid, as proud as a whole German Chapter, rude, peevish, unable to bear solitude, unable to conduct herself with common decency in society. With this delightful associate, Frances Burney had to dine, and pass the evening. The pair generally remained together from five to eleven, and often had no other company the whole time, except during the hour from eight to nine, when the equerries came to tea. If poor Frances attempted to escape to her own apart- ment, and to forget her wretchedness over a book, the execrable old woman railed and stormed, and complained that she was neglected. Yet, when Frances stayed, she was constantly assailed with insolent reproaches. Literary fame was, in the eyes of the German crone, a blemish, a proof that the person who enjoyed it was meanly born, and out of the pale of good society. All her scanty stock of broken English was employed to express the contempt with which she regarded the author of Evelina and Cecilia. Frances detested cards, and indeed knew nothing about them ; but she soon found that the least miserable way of passing an evening with Madame Schwellenberg was at the card-table, and consented, with patient sadness, to give hours, which might have called forth the laughter and the tears of many generations, to the king of clubs and the knave of spades. Between eleven and twelve the bell rang again. Miss Burney had to pass twenty minutes or half an hour in undress- ing the Queen, and was then at liberty to retire, and to dream that she was chatting with her brother by the quiet hearth in Saint Martin's Street, that she was the centre of an admiring assemblage at Mrs. Crewe's, that Burke was calling her the first woman of the age, or that Dilly was giving her a cheque for two thousand guineas. FANNY BURNEY AT COURT 299 Men, we must suppose, are less patient than women; for we are utterly at a loss to conceive how any human being could endure such a life, while there remained a vacant garret in Grub Street, a crossing in want of a sweeper, a parish work-house, or a parish vault. And it was for such a life that Frances Burney had given up liberty and peace, a happy fireside, attached friends, a wide and splendid circle of acquaintance, intellectual pursuits in which she was qualified to excel, and the sure hope of what to her would have been affluence. There is nothing new under the sun. The last great master of Attic eloquence and Attic wit has left us a forcible and touch- ing description of the misery of a man of letters, who, lured by hopes similar to those of Frances, had entered the service of one of the magnates of Rome. "Unhappy that I am, " cries the victim of his own childish ambition: " would nothing content me but that I must leave mine old pursuits and mine old companions, and the life which was without care, and sleep which had no limits save mine own pleasure, and the walks which I was free to take where I listed, and fling myself into the lowest pit of a dungeon like this ? And, O God ! for what ? Was there no way by which I might have enjoyed in freedom comforts even greater than those which I now earn by servitude ? Like a lion which has been made so tame that men may lead him about by a thread, I am dragged up and down, with broken and humbled spirit, at the heels of those to whom, in mine own domain, I should have been an object of awe and wonder. And, worst of all, I feel that here I gain no credit, that here I give no pleasure. The talents and accomplishments, which charmed a far different circle, are here out of place. I am rude in the arts of palaces, and can ill bear comparison with those whose calling, from their youth up, has been to flatter and to sue. Have I, then, two lives, that, after I have wasted one in the service of others, there may yet remain to me a second, which I may live unto myself?" Now and then, indeed, events occurred which disturbed the wretched monotony of Frances Burney 's life. The Court moved from Kew to Windsor, and from Windsor back to Kew. One dull colonel went out of waiting, and another dull colonel came into waiting. An impertinent servant made a blunder about tea, and caused a misunderstanding between the gentlemen and the ladies. 300 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY A half-witted French Protestant minister talked oddly about con- jugal fidelity. An unlucky member of the household mentioned a passage in the Morning Herald, reflecting on the Queen; and forthwith Madame Schwellenberg began to storm in bad English, and told him that he made her "what you call perspire!'* A more important occurrence was the King's visit to Oxford. Miss Burney went in the royal train to Nuneham, was utterly neglected there in the crowd, and could with difficulty find a servant to show the way to her bedroom, or a hairdresser to arrange her curls. She had the honour of entering Oxford in the last of a long string of carriages which formed the royal procession, of walking after the Queen all day through refectories and chapels, and of standing, half dead with fatigue and hunger, while her august mistress was seated at an excellent cold collation. At Magdalen College, Frances was left for a moment in a parlour, where she sank down on a chair. A good-natured equerry saw that she was ex- hausted, and shared with her some apricots and bread, which he had wisely put into his pockets. At that moment the door opened ; the Queen entered ; the wearied attendants sprang up ; the bread and fruit were hastily concealed. "I found," says poor Miss Burney, "that our appetites were to be supposed annihilated, at the same moment that our strength was to be invincible." Yet Oxford, seen even under such disadvantages, "revived in her," to use her own words, " a consciousness to pleasure which had long lain nearly dormant." She forgot, during one moment, that she was a waiting-maid, and felt as a woman of true genius might be expected to feel amidst venerable remains of antiquity, beautiful works of art, vast repositories of knowledge, and me- morials of the illustrious dead. Had she still been what she was before her father induced her to take the most fatal step of her life, we can easily imagine what pleasure she would have derived from a visit to the noblest of English cities. She might, indeed, have been forced to travel in a hack chaise, and might not have worn so fine a gown of Chambery gauze as that in which she tot- tered after the royal party; but with what delight would she have then paced the cloisters of Magdalen, compared the antique gloom of Merton with the splendour of Christ Church, and looked down from the dome of the Radcliffe Library on the magnifi- FANNY BURNEY AT COURT 301 cent sea of turrets and battlements below! How gladly would learned men have laid aside for a few hours Pindar's Odes and Aristotle's Ethics to escort the author of Cecilia from college to college ! What neat little banquets would she have found set out in their monastic cells ! With what eagerness would pictures, medals, and illuminated missals have been brought forth from the most mysterious cabinets for her amusement! How much she would have had to hear and to tell about Johnson, as she walked over Pembroke, and about Reynolds, in the antechapel of New College ! But these indulgences were not for one who had sold herself into bondage. About eighteen months after the visit to Oxford, another event diversified the wearisome life which Frances led at Court. Warren Hastings was brought to the bar of the House of Peers. The Queen and Princesses were present when the trial commenced, and Miss Burney was permitted to attend. During the subsequent proceedings a day rule for the same purpose was occasionally granted to her ; for the Queen took the strongest interest in the trial, and when she could not go herself to Westminster Hall, liked to receive a report of what had passed from a person of singular powers of observation, and who was, moreover, acquainted with some of the most distinguished managers. The portion of the Diary which relates to this celebrated proceeding is lively and picturesque. Yet we read it, we own, with pain ; for it seems to us to prove that the fine understanding of Frances Burney was beginning to feel the pernicious influence of a mode of life which is as incompatible with health of mind as the air of the Pomptine marshes with health of body. From the first day she espouses the cause of Hastings with a presumptuous vehemence and acrimony quite inconsistent with the modesty and suavity of her ordinary deportment. She shudders when Burke enters the Hall at the head of the Commons. She pronounces him the cruel oppressor of an innocent man. She is at a loss to conceive how the managers can look at the defendant, and not blush. Windham comes to her from the manager's box, to offer her refreshment. "But," says she, "I could not break bread with him. " Then, again, she exclaims, "Ah, Mr. Windham, how came you ever engaged in so cruel, so unjust a cause ? " " Mr. Burke saw me," she says, "and he bowed with the most marked 302 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAU LAY civility of manner." This, be it observed, was just after his opening speech, a speech which had produced a mighty effect, and which, certainly, no other orator that ever lived, could have made. "My curtsy," she continues, "was the most ungrateful, distant and cold ; I could not do otherwise ; so hurt I felt to see him the head of such a cause. " Now, not only had Burke treated her with constant kindness, but the very last act which he performed on the day on which he was turned out of the Pay Office, about four years before this trial, was to make Dr. Burney organist of Chelsea Hos- pital. When, at the Westminster election. Dr. Burney was divided between his gratitude for this favor and his Tory opinions, Burke in the noblest manner disclaimed all right to exact a sacrifice of principle. "You have little or no obligations to me," he wrote; "but if you had as many as I really wish it were in my power, as it is certainly in my desire, to lay on you, I hope you do not think me capable of conferring them, in order to subject your mind or your affairs to a painful and mischievous servitude. " Was this a man to be uncivilly treated by a daughter of Dr. Burney, because she chose to differ from him respecting a vast and most complicated question, which he had studied deeply during many years, and which she had never studied at all ? It is clear, from Miss Burney 'sown narrative, that when she behaved so unkindly to Mr. Burke, she did not even know of what Hastings was accused. One thing, however, she must have known, that Burke had been able to convince a House of Commons, bitterly prejudiced against himself, that the charges were well founded, and that Pitt and Dundas had concurred with Fox and Sheridan, in supporting the impeachment. Surely a woman of far inferior abilities to Miss Burney might have been expected to see that this never could have happened unless there had been a strong case against the late Governor- General. And there was, as all reasonable men now admit, a strong case against him. That there were great public services to be set off against his great crimes is perfectly true. But his services and his crimes were equally unknown to the lady who so confidently asserted his perfect innocence, and imputed to his accusers, that is to say, to all the greatest men of all parties in the State, not merely error, but gross injustice and barbarity. She had, it is true, occasionally seen Mr. Hastings, and had FANNY BURNEY AT COURT 363 found his manners and conversation agreeable. But surely she could not be so weak as to infer from the gentleness of his deport- ment in a drawing-room, that he was incapable of committing a great State crime, under the influence of ambition and revenge. A silly Miss, fresh from a boarding-school might fall into such a mistake; but the woman who had drawn the character of Mr. Monckton should have known better. The truth is that she had been too long at Court. She was sinking into a slavery worse than that of the body. The iron was beginning to enter into the soul. Accustomed during many months to watch the eye of a mistress, to receive with boundless gratitude the slightest mark of royal condescension, to feel wretched at every symptom of royal displeasure, to associate only with spirits long tamed and broken in, she was degenerating into some- thing fit for her place. Queen Charlotte was a violent partisan of Hastings, had received presents from him, and had so far departed from the severity of her virtue as to lend her countenance to his wife, whose conduct had certainly been as reprehensible as that of any of the frail beauties who were then rigidly excluded from the English Court. The King, it was well known, took the same side. To the King and Queen all the members of the household looked submissively for guidance. The impeachment, therefore, was an atrocious persecution ; the managers were rascals ; the defendant was the most deserving and the worst used man in the kingdom. This was the cant of the whole palace, from Gold Stick in Waiting, down to the Table-Deckers and Yeoman of the Silver Scullery ; and Miss Burney canted like the rest, though in livelier tones, and with less bitter feelings. The account which she has given of the King's illness contains much excellent narrative and description, and will, we think, be as much valued by the historians of a future age as any equal por- tion of Pepys's or Evelyn's Diaries. That account shows also how affectionate and compassionate her nature was. But it shows also, we must say, that her way of life was rapidly impair- ing her powers of reasoning and her sense of justice. We do not mean to discuss, in this place, the question, whether the views of Mr. Pitt or those of Mr. Fox respecting the regency were the more correct. It is, indeed, quite needless to discuss that 304 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAU LAY question : for the censure of Miss Burney falls alike on Pitt and Fox, on majority and minority. She is angry with the House of Commons for presuming to inquire whether the King was mad or not, and whether there was a chance of his recovering his senses. "A melancholy day," she writes; "news bad both at home and abroad. At home the dear unhappy king still worse; abroad new examinations voted of the physicians. Good heavens ! what an insult does this seem from Parliamentary power, to investigate and bring forth to the world every circumstance of such a malady as is ever held sacred to secrecy in the most private families ! How indignant we all feel here, no words can say. " It is proper to ob- serve, that the motion which roused all this indignation at Kew was made by Mr. Pitt himself. We see, therefore, that the loyalty of the Minister, who was then generally regarded as the most heroic champion of his Prince, was lukewarm indeed when compared with the boiling zeal which filled the pages of the backstairs and the women of the bedchamber. Of the Regency Bill, Pitt's own bill, Miss Burney speaks with horror. "I shuddered," she says, "to hear it named." And again, "Oh, how dreadful will be the day when that unhappy bill takes place ! I cannot approve the plan of it." The truth is that Mr. Pitt, whether a wise and upright states- man or not, was a statesman ; and whatever motives he might have for imposing restrictions on the regent, felt that in some way or other there must be some provision made for the execution of some part of the kingly office, or that no government would be left in the country. But this was a matter of which the household never thought. It never occurred, as far as we can see, to the Exons and Keepers of the Robes, that it was necessary that there should be somewhere or other a power in the State to pass laws, to pre- serve order, to pardon criminals, to fill up offices, to negotiate with foreign governments, to command the army and navy. Nay, these enlightened politicians, and Miss Burney among the rest, seem to have thought that any person who considered the subject with reference to the public interest, showed himself to be a bad-hearted man. Nobody wonders at this in a gentleman usher ; but it is melancholy to see genius sinking into such debasement. During more than two years after the King's recovery, Frances dragged on a miserable existence at the palace. The consolations .FANNY BURNEY AT COURT 305 which had for a time mitigated the wretchedness of servitude were one by one withdrawn. Mrs. Delany, whose society had been a great resource when the Court was at Windsor, was now dead. One of the gentlemen of the royal establishment, Colonel Digby, appears to have been a man of sense, of taste, of some reading, and of pre- possessing manners. Agreeable associates were scarce in the prison house, and he and Miss Burney therefore naturally became attached to each other. She owns that she valued him as a friend; and it would not have been strange if his attentions had led her to entertain for him a sentiment warmer than friendship. He quitted the Court, and married in a way which astonished Miss Burney greatly, and which evidently wounded her feelings, and lowered him in her esteem. The palace grew duller and duller; Madame Schwellenberg became more and more savage and insolent; and now the health of poor Frances began to give way ; and all who saw her pale face, her emaciated figure, and her feeble walk, pre- dicted that her sufferings would soon be over. Frances uniformly speaks of her royal mistress, and of the prin- cesses, with respect and affection. The princesses seem to have well deserved all the praise which is bestowed on them in the Diary. They were, we doubt not, most amiable women. But "the sweet Queen, " as she is constantly called in these volumes, is not by any means an object of admiration to us. She had undoubtedly sense enough to know what kind of deportment suited her high station, and self-command enough to maintain that deportment invariably. She was, in her intercourse with Miss Burney, generally gracious and affable, sometimes, when displeased, cold and reserved, but never, under any circumstances, rude, peevish, or violent. She knew how to dispense, gracefully and skilfully, those little civilities which, when paid by a sovereign, are prized at many times their intrinsic value ; how to pay a compliment ; how to lend a book ; how to ask after a relation. But she seems to have been utterly regard- less of the comfort, the health, the life of her attendants, when her own convenience was concerned. Weak, feverish, hardly able to stand, Frances had still to rise before seven, in order to dress the sweet Queen, and to sit up till midnight, in order to undress the sweet Queen. The indisposition of the handmaid could not, and did not, escape the notice of her royal mistress. But the established 306 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY doctrine of the Court was, that all sickness was to be considered as a pretence until it proved fatal. The only way in which the invalid could clear herself from the suspicion of malingering, as it is called in the army, was to go on lacing and unlacing till she fell down dead at the royal feet. "This," Miss Burney wrote, when she was suffering cruelly from sickness, watching, and labour, "is by no means from hardness of heart; far otherwise. There is no hard- ness of heart in any one of them ; but it is prejudice, and want of personal experience. " Many strangers sympathised with the bodily and mental suffer- ings of this distinguished woman. All who saw her saw that her frame was sinking, that her heart was breaking. The last, it should seem, to observe the change was her father. At length, in spite of himself, his eyes were opened. In May 1790, his daughter had an interview of three hours with him, the only long interview which they had had since he took her to Windsor in 1786. She told him that she was miserable, that she was worn with attendance and want of sleep, that she had no comfort in life, nothing to love, nothing to hope, that her family and her friends were to her as though they were not, and were remembered by her as men remem- ber the dead. From daybreak to midnight the same killing labour, the same recreations, more hateful than labour itself, followed each other without variety, without any interval of liberty and repose. The Doctor was greatly dejected by this news ; but was too good- natured a man not to say that, if she wished to resign, his house and arms were open to her. Still, however, he could not bear to re- move her from the Court. His veneration for royalty amounted in truth to idolatry. It can be compared only to the grovelling superstition of those Syrian devotees who made their children pass through the fire to Moloch. When he induced his daughter to accept the place of keeper of the robes, he entertained, as she tells us, a hope that some worldly advantage or other, not set down in the contract of service, would be the result of her connection with the Court. What advantage he expected we do not know, nor did he probably know himself. But, whatever he expected, he certainly got nothing. Miss Burney had been hired for board, lodging, and two hundred a year. Board, lodging, and two hundred a year, she had duly received. We have looked carefully through FANNY BURNEY AT COURT 307 the Diary, in the hope of finding some trace of those extraordinary benefactions on which the Doctor reckoned. But we can dis- cover only a promise, never performed, of a gown: and for this promise Miss Burney was expected to return thanks, such as might have suited the beggar with whom Saint Martin, in the legend, divided his cloak. The experience of four years was, however, insufficient to dispel the illusion which had taken possession of the Doctor's mind ; and between the dear father and the sweet Queen, there seemed to be little doubt that some day or other Frances would drop down a corpse. Six months had elapsed since the inter- view between the parent and the daughter. The resignation was not sent in. The sufferer grew worse and worse. She took bark ; but it soon ceased to produce a beneficial effect. She was stimulated with wine ; she was soothed with opium ; but in vain. Her breath began to fail. The whisper that she was in a decline spread through the Court. The pains in her side became so severe that she was forced to crawl from the card-table of the old Fury to whom she was tethered, three or four times in an evening, for the purpose of taking hartshorn. Had she been a negro slave, a humane planter would have excused her from work. But her Majesty showed no mercy. Thrice a day the accursed bell still rang ; the Queen was still to be dressed for the morning at seven, and to be dressed for the day at noon, and to be undressed at midnight. But there had arisen, in literary and fashionable society, a general feeling of compassion for Miss Burney, and of indigna- tion against both her father and the Queen. "Is it possible," said a great French lady to the Doctor, "that your daughter is in a situation where she is never allowed a holiday?" Horace Walpole wrote to Frances, to express his sympathy. Boswell, boiling over with good-natured rage, almost forced an entrance into the palace to see her. "My dear ma'am, why do you stay? It won't do, ma'am; you must resign. We can put up with it no longer. Some very violent measures, I assure you, will be taken. We shall address Dr. Burney in a body." Burke and Reynolds, though less noisy, were zealous in the same cause. Windham spoke to Dr. Burney; but found him still irresolute. "I will set the club upon him," cried Windham; "Miss Burney has some very true admirers there, and I am sure they will eagerly 308 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY assist." Indeed the Burney family seem to have been appre- hensive that some public affront such as the Doctor's unpar- donable folly, to use the mildest term, had richly deserved, would be put upon him. The medical men spoke out, and plainly told him that his daughter must resign or die. At last paternal affection, medical authority, and the voice of all London crying shame, triumphed over Dr. Burney's love of courts. He determined that Frances should write a letter of resignation. It was with difficulty that, though her life was at stake, she mustered spirit to put the paper into the Queen's hands. "I could not," so runs the Diary, "summon courage to present my memorial; my heart always failed me from seeing the Queen's entire freedom from such an expectation. For though I was frequently so ill in her presence that I could hardly stand, I saw she concluded me, while life remained, inevitably hers." At last with a trembling hand the paper was delivered. Then came the storm. Juno, as in the sEneid, delegated the work of vengeance to Alecto. The Queen was calm and gentle; but Madame Schwellenberg raved like a maniac in the incurable ward of Bedlam ! Such insolence ! Such ingratitude ! Such folly! Would Miss Burney bring utter destruction on herself and her family? Would she throw away the inestimable ad- vantage of royal protection? Would she part with privileges which, once relinquished, could never be regained? It was idle to talk of health and life. If people could not live in the palace, the best thing that could befall them was to die in it. The resignation was not accepted. The language of the medical men became stronger and stronger. Dr. Burney's parental fears were fully roused; and he explicitly declared, in a letter meant to be shown to the Queen, that his daughter must retire. The Schwellenberg raged like a wild cat. "A scene almost horrible ensued," says Miss Burney. "She was too much enraged for disguise, and uttered the most furious expressions of indignant contempt at our proceedings. I am sure she would gladly have confined us both in the Bastile, had England such a misery, as a fit place to bring us to ourselves, from a daring so outrageous against imperial wishes." This passage deserves notice, as being FANNY BURNEY AT COURT 309 the only one in the Diary, so far as we have observed, which shows Miss Burney to have been aware that she was a native of a free country, that she could not be pressed for a waiting-maid against her will, and that she had just as good a right to live, if she chose, in Saint Martin's Street, as Queen Charlotte had to live at Saint James's. The Queen promised that, after the next birthday, Miss Bur- ney should be set at liberty. But the promise was ill kept; and her Majesty showed displeasure at being reminded of it. At length Frances was informed that in a fortnight her attend- ance should cease. "I heard this," she says, "with a fearful presentiment I should surely never go through another fort- night, in so weak and languishing and painful a state of health. ... As the time of separation approached, the Queen's cor- diality rather diminished, and traces of internal displeasure appeared sometimes, arising from an opinion I ought rather to have struggled on, live or die, than to quit her. Yet I am sure she saw how poor was my own chance, except by a change in the mode of life, and at least ceased to wonder, though she could not approve." Sweet Queen! What noble candour, to admit that the undutifulness of people, who did not think the honour of adjusting her tuckers worth the sacrifice of their own lives, was, though highly criminal, not altogether unnatural ! We perfectly understand her Majesty's contempt for the lives of others where her own pleasure was concerned. But what pleasure she can have found in having Miss Burney about her, it is not so easy to comprehend. That Miss Burney was an eminently skilful keeper of the robes is not very probable. Few women, indeed, had paid less attention to dress. Now and then, in the course of five years, she had been asked to read aloud or to write a copy of verses. But better readers might easily have been found: and her verses were worse than even the Poet Laureate's Birthday Odes. Perhaps that economy, which was among her Majesty's most conspicuous virtues, had something to do with her conduct on this occasion. Miss Bur- ney had never hinted that she expected a retiring pension; and indeed would gladly have given the little that she had for freedom. But her Majesty knew what the public thought, and what became 310 THOMAS CARLYLE her own dignity. She could not for very shame suffer a woman of distinguished genius, who had quitted a lucrative career to wait on her, who had served her faithfully for a pittance during five years, and whose constitution had been impaired by labour and watching, to leave the Court without some mark of royal liber- ality. George the Third, who, on all occasions where Miss Bur- ney was concerned, seems to have behaved like an honest, good- natured gentleman, felt this, and said plainly that she was en- titled to a provision. At length, in return for all the misery which she had undergone, and for the health which she had sac- rificed, an annuity of one hundred pounds was granted her, dependent on the Queen's pleasure. Then the prison was opened, and Frances was free once more. Johnson, as Burke observed, might have added a striking page to his poem on the Vanity of Human Wishes, if he had lived to see his little Burney as she went into the palace and as she came out of it. THOMAS CARLYLE TORRIJOS AND JOHN STERLING [From The *Life of John Sterling, Part I., Chap, x., 1851. Centenary Edition, Chapman and Hall, London, 1897. STERLING, JOHN (1806-1844), author; son of Edward Sterling; of Trinity College, then of Trinity Hall, Cambridge, 1824-7; an 'apostle' and speaker at the union ; through his tutor, Julius Charles Hare, came to know Coleridge and Wordsworth; friend of Frederick Denison Maurice and Richard Chenevix Trench; with Maurice conducted the 'Athenaeum,' July to December 1828; meditated accompanying volunteer expedition against Ferdinand VII of Spain, but stayed behind to marry, 1830; manager of sugar estate in St. Vincent, 1831-2; studied philosophy in Germany, 1833; curate of J. C. Hare at Hurstmonceaux, 1834-5; became acquainted with Carlyle, 1835; contributed to 'Blackwood's Magazine/ 1837-8, and 'Lon- don and Westminster Review'; Sterling Club (founded, 1838) called after him; in Rome, 1838-9; introduced to Caroline Fox's circle, 1839; reviewed Tennyson's 'Poems' in 'Quarterly,' September 1842; his 'Essays and Tales' edited by Julius Charles Hare, 1848 ; rendered famous by Carlyle's biog- raphy, 1851. Index and Epitome of D. N . B. "Nor shall the irremediable drawback that Sterling was not current in the Newspapers, that he achieved neither what the world calls greatness nor what intrinsically is such, altogether discourage me. What his natural size, TORRIJOS AND JOHN STERLING 311 and natural and accidental limits were, will gradually appear, if my sketching be successful. And I have remarked that a true delineation of the smallest man, and his scene of pilgrimage through life, is capable of interesting the greatest man; that all men are to an unspeakable degree brothers, each man's life a strange emblem of every man's; and that Human Portraits, faithfully drawn, are of all pictures the welcomest on human walls. Monitions and moralities enough may lie in this small Work, if honestly written and honestly read; and, in particular, if any image of John Sterling and his Pilgrimage through our poor Nineteenth Century be one day wanted by the world, and they can find some shadow of a true image here, my swift scribbling (which shall be very swift and immediate) may prove useful by and by. "Nay, what of men or of the world? Here, visible to myself, for some while, was a brilliant human presence, distinguishable, honourable and lovable amid the dim common populations; among the million little beauti- ful, once more a beautiful human soul: whom I, among others, recognised and lovingly walked with, while the years and the hours were. Sitting now by his tomb in thoughtful mood, the new times bring a new duty for me. ' Why write the Life of Sterling ? ' I imagine I had a commission higher than the world's, the dictate of Nature herself, to do what is now done. Sic prosit.'' THOMAS CARLYLE, The Life of Sterling, from the first and last chapters.] Torrijos, who had now in 1829 been here some four or five years, having come over in 1824, had from the first enjoyed a superior reception in England. Possessing not only a language to speak, which few of the others did, but manifold experiences courtly, military, diplomatic, with fine natural faculties, and high Spanish manners tempered into cosmopolitan, he had been welcomed in various circles of society; and found, perhaps he alone of those Spaniards, a certain human companionship among persons of some standing in this country. With the elder Sterlings, among others, he had made acquaintance; be- came familiar in the social circle at South Place, and was much esteemed there. With Madam Torrijos, who also was a person of amiable and distinguished qualities, an affectionate friend- ship grew up on the part of Mrs. Sterling, which ended only with the death of these two ladies. John Sterling, on arriving in London from his University work, naturally inherited what he liked to take-up of this relation : and in the lodgings in Regent Street, and the democratico-literary element there, Torrijos became a very prominent, and at length almost the central object. 312 THOMAS CARLYLE The man himself, it is well known, was a valiant, gallant man ; of lively intellect, of noble chivalrous character: fine talents, fine accomplishments, all grounding themselves on a certain rugged veracity, recommended him to the discerning. He had begun youth in the Court of Ferdinand; had gone on in Well- ington and other arduous, victorious and unvictorious, sol- dierings; familiar in camps and council-rooms, in presence- chambers and in prisons. He knew romantic Spain ; he was himself, standing withal in the vanguard of Freedom's fight, a kind of living romance. Infinitely interesting to John Sterling, for one. It was to Torrijos that the poor Spaniards of Somers Town looked mainly, in their helplessness, for every species of help. Torrijos, it was hoped, would yet lead them into Spain and glorious victory there; meanwhile here in England, under de- feat, he was their captain and sovereign in another painfully in- verse sense. To whom, in extremity, everybody might apply. When all present resources failed, and the exchequer was quite out, there still remained Torrijos. Torrijos has to find new resources for his destitute patriots, find loans, find Spanish les- sons for them among his English friends: in all which chari- table operations, it need not be said, John Sterling was his fore- most man; zealous to empty his own purse for the object; im- petuous in rushing hither or thither to enlist the aid of others, and find lessons or something that would do. His friends, of course, had to assist; the Bartons, among others, were wont to assist; and I have heard that the fair Susan, stirring-up her indolent enthusiasm into practicality, was very successful in finding Spanish lessons, and the like, for these distressed men. Sterling and his friends Were yet new in this business; but Tor- rijos and the others were getting old in it, and doubtless weary and almost desperate of it. They had now been seven years in it, many of them; and were asking, When will the end be? Torrijos is described as a man of excellent discernment: who knows how long he had repressed the unreasonable schemes of his followers, and turned a deaf ear to the temptings of falla- cious hope? But there comes at length a sum-total of oppres- sive burdens which is intolerable, which tempts the wisest to- TORRIJOS AND JOHN STERLING 313 wards fallacies for relief. These weary groups, pacing the Euston- Square pavements, had often said in their despair, "Were not death in battle better? Here are we slowly mouldering into nothingness; there we might reach it rapidly, in flaming splen- dour. Flame, either of victory to Spain and us, or of a patriot death, the sure harbinger of victory to Spain. Flame fit to kindle a fire which no Ferdinand, with all his Inquisitions and Charles- Tenths, could put out." Enough, in the end of 1829, Torrijos himself had yielded to this pressure; and hoping against hope, persuaded himself that if he could but land in the South of Spain with a small patriot band well armed and well resolved, a band carrying fire in its heart, then Spain, all inflammable as touch- wood, and groaning indignantly under its brutal tyrant, might blaze wholly into flame round him, and incalculable victory be won. Such was his conclusion; not sudden, yet surely not deliberate either, desperate rather, and forced-on by circum- stances. He thought with himself that, considering Somers Town and considering Spain, the terrible chance was worth try- ing; that this big game of Fate, go how it might, was one which the omens credibly declared he and these poor Spaniards ought to play. His whole industries and energies were thereupon bent to- wards starting the said game; and his thought and continual speech and song now was, That if he had a few thousand pounds to buy arms, to freight a ship and make the other preparations, he and these poor gentlemen, and Spain and the world, were made men and a saved Spain and world. What talks and con- sultations in the apartment in Regent Street, during those winter days of 1829-30; setting into open conflagration the young democracy that was wont to assemble there ! Of which there is now left next to no remembrance. For Sterling never spoke a word of this affair in after days, nor was any of the actors much tempted to speak. We can understand too well that here were young fervid hearts in an explosive condition; young rash heads, sanctioned by a man's experienced head. Here at last shall enthusiasm and theory become practice and fact; fiery dreams are at last permitted to realise themselves; and now is the time or never! How the Coleridge moonshine comported itself 314 THOMAS CARLYLE amid these hot telluric flames, or whether it had not yet begun to play there (which I rather doubt), must be left to conjecture. Mr. Hare speaks of Sterling 'sailing over to St. Valery in an open boat along with others,' upon one occasion, in this enter- prise ; in the final English scene of it, I suppose. Which is very possible. Unquestionably there was adventure enough of other kinds for it, and running to and fro with all his speed on behalf of it, during these months of his history! Money was subscribed, collected: the young Cambridge democrats were all a-blaze to assist Torrijos; nay certain of them decided to go with him, and went. Only, as yet, the funds were rather incomplete. And here, as I learn from a good hand, is the se- cret history of their becoming complete. Which, as we are upon the subject, I had better give. But for the following circumstance, they had perhaps never been completed ; nor had the rash enter- prise, or its catastrophe, so influential on the rest of Sterling's life, taken place at all. A certain Lieutenant Robert Boyd, of the Indian Army, an Ulster Irishman, a cousin of Sterling's, had received some affront, or otherwise taken some disgust in that service; had thrown-up his commission in consequence; and returned home, about this time, with intent to seek another course of life. Having only, for outfit, these impatient ardours, some experience in Indian drill-exercise, and five thousand pounds of inheritance, he found the enterprise attended with difficulties; and was somewhat at a loss how to dispose of himself. Some young Ulster com- rade, in a partly similar situation, had pointed out to him that there lay in a certain neighbouring creek of the Irish coast, a worn-out royal gun-brig condemned to sale, to be had dog-cheap : this he proposed that they two, or in fact Boyd with his five thou- sand pounds, should buy ; that they should refit and arm and man it; and sail a-privateering "to the Eastern Archipelago," Philip- pine Isles, or I know not where ; and so conquer the golden fleece. Boyd naturally paused a little at this great proposal; did not quite reject it; came across, with it and other fine projects and impatiences fermenting in his head, to London, there to see and consider. It was in the months when the Torrijos enterprise was in the birth - throes ; crying wildly for capital, of all things. TORRIJOS AND JOHN STERLING 315 Boyd naturally spoke of his projects to Sterling, of his gun- brig lying in the Irish creek, among others. Sterling naturally said, "If you want an adventure of the Sea-king sort, and propose to lay your money and your life into such a game, here is Torrijos and Spain at his back ; here is a golden fleece to conquer, worth twenty Eastern Archipelagos." Boyd and Torrijos quickly met; quickly bargained. Boyd's money was to go in purchas- ing, and storing with a certain stock of arms and etceteras, a small ship in the Thames, which should carry Boyd with Torrijos and the adventurers to the south coast of Spain; and there, the game once played and won, Boyd was to have promotion enough, 'the colonelcy of a Spanish cavalry regiment,' for one express thing. What exact share Sterling had in this negotiation, or whether he did not even take the prudent side and caution Boyd to be wary, I know not; but it was he that brought the parties together; and all his friends knew, in silence, that to the end of his life he painfully remembered that fact. And so a ship was hired, or purchased, in the Thames; due furnishings began to be executed in it; arms and stores were gradually got on board; Torrijos with his Fifty picked Span- iards, in the mean while, getting ready. This was in the spring of 1830. Boyd's 5ooo/. was the grand nucleus of finance; but vigorous subscription was carried on likewise in Sterling's young democratic circle, or wherever a member of it could find access; not without considerable result, and with a zeal that may be imagined. Nay, as above hinted, certain of these young men decided, not to give their money only, but themselves along with it, as democratic volunteers and soldiers of progress; among whom, it need not be said, Sterling intended to be foremost. Busy weeks with him, those spring ones of the year 1830! Through this small Note, accidentally preserved to us, addressed to his friend Barton, we obtain a curious glance into the sub- terranean workshop: 'To Charles Barton, Esq., Dorset Sq., Regent's Park. [No date; apparently March or February 1830.] 'MY DEAR CHARLES, I have wanted to see you to talk to you about my foreign affairs. If you are going to be in Lon- 316 THOMAS CARLYLE don for a few days, I believe you can be very useful to me, at a considerable expense and trouble to yourself, in the way of buying accoutrements ; inter alia, a sword and a saddle, not you will understand, for my own use. 'Things are going on very well, but are very, even fright- fully near; only be quiet! Pray would you, in case of neces- sity, take a free passage to Holland, next week or the week after ; stay two or three days, and come back, all expenses paid ? If you write to B at Cambridge, tell him above all things to hold his tongue. If you are near Palace Yard to-morrow before two, pray come see me. Do not come on purpose ; especially as I may perhaps be away, and at all events shall not be there until eleven, nor perhaps till rather later. 'I fear I shall have alarmed your Mother by my irruption. Forgive me for that and all my exactions from you. If the next month were over, I should not have to trouble any one. Yours affectionately, *J. STERLING.' Busy weeks indeed ; and a glowing smithy-light coming through the chinks ! The romance of Arthur Coningsby lay written, or half -written, in his desk; and here, in his heart and among his hands, was an acted romance and unknown catastrophes keeping pace with that. Doubts from the doctors, for his health was getting ominous, threw some shade over the adventure. Reproachful reminis- cences of Coleridge and Theosophy were natural too ; then fond regrets for Literature and its glories: if you act your romance, how can you also write it? Regrets, and reproachful reminis- cences, from Art and Theosophy ; perhaps some tenderer regrets withal. A crisis in life had come; when, of innumerable pos- sibilities one possibility was to be elected king, and to swallow all the rest, the rest of course made noise enough, and swelled themselves to their biggest. Meanwhile the ship was fast getting ready: on a certain day, it was to drop quietly down the Thames; then touch at Deal, and take on board Torrijos and his adventurers, who were to TORRIJOS AND JOHN STERLING 317 be in waiting and on the outlook for them there. Let every man lay-in his accoutrements, then; let every man make his pack- ages, his arrangements and farewells. Sterling went to take leave of Miss Barton. "You are going, then; to Spain? To rough it amid the storms of war and perilous insurrection; and with that weak health of yours ; and we shall never see you more, then ! " Miss Barton, all her gaiety gone, the dimpling softness become liquid sorrow, and the musical ringing voice one wail of woe, 'burst into tears,' so I have it on authority: here was one possibility about to be strangled that made unex- pected noise ! Sterling's interview ended in the offer of his hand, and the acceptance of it ; any sacrifice to get rid of this horrid Spanish business, and save the health and life of a gifted young man so precious to the world and to another ! 'Ill-health,' as often afterwards in Sterling's life, when the ex- cuse was real enough but not the chief excuse; 'ill-health, and insuperable obstacles and engagements,' had to bear the chief brunt in apologising: and, as Sterling's actual presence, or that of any Englishman except Boyd and his money, was not in the least vital to the adventure, his excuse was at once accepted. The English connexions and subscriptions are a given fact, to be presided over by what English volunteers there are: and as for Englishmen, the fewer Englishmen that go, the larger will be the share of influence for each. The other adventurers, Torrijos among them in due readiness, moved silently one by one down to Deal: Sterling, superintending the naval hands, on board their ship in the Thames, was to see the last finish given to everything in that department; then, on the set even- ing, to drop down quietly to Deal, and there say Andad con Dios, and return. Behold ! Just before the set evening came, the Spanish Envoy at this Court has got notice of what is going on ; the Spanish Envoy, and of course the British Foreign Secretary, and of course also the Thames Police. Armed men spring suddenly on board, one day, while Sterling is there ; declare the ship seized and embargoed in the King's name ; nobody on board to stir till he has given some account of himself in due time and place ! Huge consternation, naturally, from stem to stern. Sterling, whose presence of mind 318 WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY seldom forsook him, casts his eye over the River and its craft ; sees a wherry, privately signals it, drops rapidly on board of it : " Stop ! ' ' fiercely interjects the marine policeman from the ship's deck. " Why stop ? What use have you for me, or I for you ? " and the oars begin playing. "Stop, or I'll shoot you ! " cries the marine policeman, drawing a pistol. "No, you won't." "I will ! " "If you do you'll be hanged at the next Maidstone assizes, then; that's all,' 1 and Sterling's wherry shot rapidly ashore; and out of this perilous adventure. That same night he posted down to Deal; disclosed to the Torrijos party what catastrophe had come. No passage Spain- ward from the Thames ; well if arrestment do not suddenly come from the Thames ! It was on this occasion, I suppose, that the passage in the open boat to St. Valery occurred; speedy flight in what boat or boats, open or shut, could be got at Deal on the sudden. Sterling himself, according to Hare's authority, actually went with them so far. Enough, they got shipping, as private passengers in one craft or the other; and, by degrees or at once, arrived all at Gibraltar, Boyd, one or two young democrats of Regent Street, the fifty picked Spaniards, and Torrijos, safe, though without arms ; still in the early part of the year. WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY OLIVER GOLDSMITH [From The English Humourists of the Eighteenth Century, 1853. Smith, Elder & Co. London, 1869. "The lectures ['The English Humourists'] soon became popular, as they deserved to be. Thackeray was not given to minute research, and his facts and dates require some correction. But his delicate appreciation of the congenial writers and the finish of his style give the lectures a permanent place in criticism. His ' light-in-hand manner,' as Motley remarked of a later course, 'suits well the delicate hovering rather than superficial style of his composition.' " SIR LESLIE STEPHEN, "Thackeray," Dictionary oj Na- tional Biography, Vol. LVI, p. 99. "We think there was no disappointment with his lectures. Those who knew his books found the author in the lecturer. Those who did not know his books were charmed in the lecturer by what is charming in the author OLIVER GOLDSMITH 319 the unaffected humanity, the tenderness, the sweetness, the genial play of fancy, and the sad touch of truth, with that glancing stroke of satire which, lightning-like, illumines while it withers. The lectures were even more delightful than the books, because the tone of the voice and the appearance of the man, the general personal magnetism, explained and alleviated so much that would otherwise have seemed doubtful or unfair. For those who had long felt in the writings of Thackeray a reality quite inexpressible, there was a secret delight in finding it justified in his speaking; for he speaks as he writes simply, directly, without flourish, without any cant of oratory, commending what he says by its intrinsic sense, and the sympathetic and humane way in which it was spoken." GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS, "Thackeray in America," 1853. Literary and Social Essays, p. 130. Harper & Brothers, New York, 1895.] "Jete sur cette boule, Laid, chetif et souffrant; Etouffe dans la foule, Faute d'etre assez grand: Une plainte touchante De ma bouche sortit. Le bon Dieu me dit: Chante, Chante, pauvre petit! Chanter ou je in'abuse, Est ma tache ici-bas. Tous ceux qu'ainsi j 'amuse Ne m'aimeront-ils pas?" In those charming lines of Beranger one may fancy described the career, the sufferings, the 'genius, the gentle nature of Gold- smith, and the esteem in which we hold him. Who, of the millions whom he has amused, doesn't love him ? To be the most beloved of English writers, what a title that is for a man ! A wild youth, wayward but full of tenderness and affection, quits the country village where his boyhood has been passed in happy musing, in idle shelter, in fond longing to see the great world out of doors, and achieve name and fortune: and after years of dire struggle and neglect and poverty, his heart turning back as fondly to his native place as it had longed eagerly for change when sheltered there, he writes a book and a poem, full of the recollections and feelings of home; he paints the friends and scenes of his youth, and peoples Auburn and Wakefield with remembrances of Lissoy. Wander he must, but he carries away a home-relic with him and 320 WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY dies with it on his breast. His nature is truant ; in repose it longs for change : as on the journey it looks back for friends and quiet. He passes to-day in building an air-castle for to-morrow or in writing yesterday's elegy ; and he would fly away this hour but that a cage and necessity keep him. What is the charm of his verse, of his style, and humor? His sweet regrets, his delicate compassion, his soft smile, his tremulous sympathy, the weakness which he owns ? Your love for him is half pity. You come hot and tired from the day's battle, and this sweet minstrel sings to you. Who could harm the kind vagrant harper? Whom did he ever hurt? He carries no weapon save the harp on which he plays to you, and with which he delights great and humble, young and old, the captains in the tents, or the soldiers round the fire, or the women and children in the villages, at whose porches he stops and sings his simple songs of love and beauty. With that sweet story of The Vicar of Wakefteld he has found entry into every castle and every hamlet in Europe. Not one of us, however busy or hard, but once or twice in our lives has passed an evening with him and undergone the charm of his delightful music. Goldsmith's father was no doubt the good Doctor Primrose, whom we all of us know. Swift was yet alive when the little Oliver w&s born at Pallas, or Pallasmore, in the county of Long- ford, in Ireland. In 1730, two years after the child's birth, Charles Goldsmith removed his family to Lissoy, in the county Westmeath, that sweet " Auburn" which every person who hears me has seen in fancy. Here the kind parson brought up his eight children; and loving all the world, as his son says, fancied all the world loved him. He had a crowd of poor dependants besides those hungry children. He kept an open table, round which sat flatterers and poor friends, who laughed at the honest rector's many jokes and ate the produce of his seventy acres of farm. Those who have seen an Irish house in the present day can fancy that one of Lissoy. The old beggar still has his allotted corner by * the kitchen turf; the maimed old soldier still gets his potatoes and buttermilk ; the poor cottier still asks his Honor's charity, and prays God bless his Reverence for the sixpence ; the ragged pen- sioner still takes his place by right and sufferance. There's still a crowd in the kitchen, and a crowd round the parlor table ; pro- OLIVER GOLDSMITH 321 fusion, confusion, kindness, poverty. If an Irishman comes to London to make his fortune, he has a half-dozen of Irish depend- ants who take a percentage of his earnings. The good Charles Goldsmith left but little provision for his hungry race when death summoned him; and one of his daughters being engaged to a squire of rather superior dignity, Charles Goldsmith impoverished the rest of his family to provide the girl with a dowry. The small-pox, which scourged all Europe at that time, and ravaged the roses off the checks of half the world, fell foul of poor little Oliver's face, when the child was eight years old, and left him scarred and disfigured for his life. An old woman in his father's village taught him his letters, and pronounced him a dunce : Paddy Byrne, the hedge-schoolmaster, took him in hand : and from Paddy Byrne he was transmitted to a clergyman at Elphin. When a child was sent to school in those days, the classic phrase was that he was placed under Mr. So-and-So's ferule. Poor little ancestors ! It is hard to think how ruthlessly you were birched, and how much of needless whipping and tears our small forefathers had to undergo ! A relative, kind Uncle Contarine, took the main charge of little Noll, who went through his school-days righteously doing as little work as he could : robbing orchards, playing at ball, and making his pocket-money fly about whenever fortune sent it to him. Everybody knows the story of that famous "Mistake of a Night," when the young schoolboy, provided with a guinea and a nag, rode up to the "best house" in Ardagh, called for the land- lord's company over a bottle of wine at supper, and for a hot cake for breakfast in the morning; and found, when he asked for the bill, that the best house was Squire Featherstone's, and not the inn for which he mistook it. Who does not know every story about Goldsmith? That is a delightful and fantastic picture of the child dancing and capering about in the kitchen at home, when the old fiddler gibed at him for his ugliness and called him ^Esop ; and little Noll made his repartee of "Heralds proclaim aloud this saying See ^Esop dancing and his monkey playing." One can fancy a queer, pitiful look of humor and appeal upon that little scarred face the funny little dancing figure, the funny little brogue. In his life, and his writings, which are the honest expres- sion of it, he is constantly bewailing that homely face and person ; 322 WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY anon he surveys them in the glass ruefully ; and presently assumes the most comical dignity. He likes to deck out his little person in splendor and fine colors. He presented himself to be examined for ordination in a pair of scarlet breeches; and said honestly that he did not like to go into the Church, because he was fond of colored clothes. When he tried to practise as a doctor, he got by hook or by crook a black velvet suit, and looked as big and grand as he could, and kept his hat over a patch on the old coat : in better days he bloomed out in plum-color, in blue silk, and in new velvet. For some of those splendors the heirs and assignees of Mr. Filby, the tailor, have never been paid to this day: perhaps the kind tailor and his creditor have met and settled their little account in Hades. They showed until lately a window at Trinity College, Dublin, on which the name of "O. Goldsmith" was engraved with a dia- mond. Whose diamond was it ? Not the young sizar's, who made but a poor figure in that place of learning. He was idle, penniless, and fond of pleasure: he learned his way early to the pawn- broker's shop. He wrote ballads, they say, for the street-singers, who paid him a crown for a poem; and his pleasure was to steal out at night and hear his verses sung. He was chastised by his tutor for giving a dance in his rooms, and took the box on the ear so much to heart that he packed up his all, pawned his books and little property, and disappeared from college and family. He said he intended to go to America ; but when his money was spent, the young prodigal came home ruefully, and the good folks there killed their calf it was but a lean one and welcomed him back. After college, he hung about his mother's house, and lived for some years the life of a buckeen passed a month with this relation and that, a year with one patron, a great deal of time at the public-house. Tired of this life, it was resolved that he should go to London and study at the Temple ; but he got no far- ther on the road to London and the woolsack than Dublin, where he gambled away the fifty pounds given to him for his outfit, and whence he returned to the indefatigable forgiveness of home. Then he determined to be a doctor, and Uncle Contarine helped him to a couple of years at Edinburgh. Then from Edinburgh OLIVER GOLDSMITH 323 he felt that he ought to hear the famous professors of Leyden and Paris, and wrote most amusing pompous letters to his uncle about the great Farheim, Du Petit, and Duhamel du Monceau, whose lectures he proposed to follow. If Uncle Co'ntarine believed those letters ; if Oliver's mother believed that story which the youth re- lated of his going to Cork, with the purpose of embarking for Amer- ica, of his having paid his passage-money and having sent his kit on board; of the anonymous captain sailing away with Oliver's valuable luggage in a nameless ship, never to return if Uncle Contarine and the mother at Ballymahon believed his stories, they must have been a very simple pair, as it was a very simple rogue indeed who cheated them. When the lad, after failing in his clerical examination, after failing in his plan for studying the law, took leave of these projects and of his parents, and set out for Edin- burgh, he saw mother and uncle and lazy Ballymahon and green native turf and sparkling river for the last time. He was never to look on old Ireland more, and only in fancy revisit her. "But me, not destined such delights to share, My prime of life in wandering spent and care; Impelled, with steps unceasing, to pursue Some fleeting good that mocks me with the view; That, like the circle bounding earth and skies, Allures from far, yet, as I follow, flies; My fortune leads to traverse realms alone, And find no spot of all the world my own." I spoke in a former lecture of that high courage which enabled Fielding, in spite of disease, remorse, and poverty, always to retain a cheerful spirit, and to keep his manly benevolence and love of truth intact, as if these treasures had been confided to him for the public benefit, and he was accountable to posterity for their honorable employ; and a constancy equally happy and admirable, I think, was shown by Goldsmith, whose sweet and friendly nature bloomed kindly always in the midst of a life's storm and rain and bitter weather. The poor fellow was never so friendless but he could befriend some one, never so pinched and wretched but he could give of his crust and speak his word of compassion. If he had but his flute left, he could give that, and make the children happy in the dreary London court. He 324 WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY could give the coals in that queer coal-scuttle we read of to his poor neighbor; he could give away his blankets in college to the poor widow, and warm himself as he best might in the feathers ; he could pawn his co'at to save his landlord from jail; when he was a school-usher, he spent his earnings in treats for the boys, and the good-natured schoolmaster's wife said justly that she ought to keep Mr. Goldsmith's money as well as the young gentle- men's. When he met his pupils in later life, nothing would satisfy the Doctor but he must treat them still. "Have you seen the print of me after Sir Joshua Reynolds ?" he asked of one of his old pupils. "Not seen it ? not bought it ? Sure, Jack, if your picture had been published, I'd not have been without it half -an -hour." His purse and his heart were everybody's, and his friends' as much as his own. When he was at the height of his reputation, and the Earl of Northumberland, going as Lord Lieutenant to Ireland, asked if he could be of any service to Doctor Goldsmith, Goldsmith recommended his brother, and not himself, to the great man. "My patrons," he gallantly said, "are the booksellers, and I want no others." Hard patrons they were, and hard work he did; but he did not complain much: if in his early writings some bitter words escaped him, some allusions to neglect and poverty, he withdrew these expressions when his works were republished and bette- days seemed to open for him; and he did not care to complain that printer or pub- lisher had overlooked his merit or left him poor. The Court face was turned from honest Oliver the Court patronised Beattie; the fashion did not shine on him fashion adored Sterne. Fashion pronounced Kelly to be the great writer of comedy of his day. A little not ill-humor, but plaintiveness a little betrayal of wounded pride which he showed, render him not the less amiable. The author of The Vicar of Wakefield had a right to protest when Newbery kept back the manuscript for two years; had a right to be a little peevish with Sterne; a little angry when Coleman's actors declined their parts in his delightful comedy, when the manager refused to have a scene painted for it, and pronounced its damnation before hearing. He had not the great public with him; but he had the noble Johnson and the admirable Reynolds and the great Gibbon and OLIVER GOLDSMITH 325 the great Burke and the great Fox friends and admirers illus- trious indeed; as famous as those who, fifty years before, sat round Pope's table. Nobody knows, and I dare say Goldsmith's buoyant temper kept no account of, all the pains which he endured during the early period of his literary career. Should any man of letters in our day have to bear up against such, Heaven grant he may come out of the period of misfortune with such a pure, kind heart as that which Goldsmith obstinately bore in his breast. The insults to which he had to submit are shocking to read of slander, contumely, vulgar satire, brutal malignity perverting his commonest motives and actions; he had his share of these, and one's anger is roused at reading of them, as it is at seeing a woman insulted or a child assaulted, at the notion that a creature so very gentle and weak and full of love should have had to suffer so. And he had worse than insult to undergo to own to fault and deprecate the anger of ruffians. There is a letter of his extant to one Griffiths, a bookseller, in which poor Goldsmith is forced to confess that certain books sent by Griffiths are in the hands of a friend from whom Goldsmith had been forced to borrow money. '"He was wild, sir," Johnson said, speaking of Gold- smith to Boswell with his great, wise benevolence and noble mer- cifulness of heart, "Dr. Goldsmith was wild, sir; but he is so no more." Ah ! if we pity the good and weak man who suffers undeservedly, let us deal very gently with him from whom misery extorts not only tears but shame ; let us think humbly and chari- tably of the human nature that suffers so sadly and falls so low. Whose turn may it be to-morrow ? What weak heart, confident before trial, may not succumb under temptation invincible ? Cover the good man who has been vanquished cover his f-ace and pass on. For the last half-dozen years of his life, Goldsmith was far removed from the pressure of any ignoble necessity, and in the receipt, indeed, of a pretty large income from the booksellers, his patrons. Had he lived but a few years more, his public fame would have been as great as his private reputation, and he might have enjoyed alive a part of that esteem which his country has ever since paid to the vivid and versatile genius who has touched 326 WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY on almost every subject of literature, and touched nothing that he did not adorn. Except in rare instances, a man is known in our profession and esteemed as a skilful workman, years before the lucky hit which trebles his usual gains and stamps him a popular author. In the strength of his age and the dawn of his reputation, having for backers and friends the most illustrious literary men of his time, fame and prosperity might have been in store for Goldsmith, had fate so willed it, and, at forty-six had not sudden disease carried him off. I say prosperity rather than competence for it is probable that no sum could have put order into his affairs or sufficed for his irreclaimable habits of dissipation. It must be remembered that he owed 2000 when he died. "Was ever poet," Johnson asked, " so trusted before?" As has been the case with many another good fellow of his nation, his life was tracked and his substance wasted by crowds of hungry beggars and lazy dependants. If they came at a lucky time (and be sure they knew his affairs better than he did himself, and watched his pay-day), he gave them of his money : if they begged on empty- purse days, he gave them his promissory bills; or he treated them to a tavern where he had credit; or he obliged them with an order upon honest Mr. Filby for coats, for which he paid as long as he could earn and until the shears of Filby were to cut for him no more. Staggering under a load of debt and labor; tracked by bailiffs and reproachful creditors; running from a hundred poor dependants, whose appealing looks were perhaps the hardest of all pains for him to bear; devising fevered plans for the morrow, new histories, new comedies, all sorts of new literary schemes; flying from all these into seclusion, and out of seclusion into pleasure at last, at five-and-forty, death seized him and closed his career. I have been many times in the cham- bers in the Temple which were his, and passed up the staircase which Johnson and Burke and Reynolds trod to see their friend, their poet, their kind Goldsmith the stair on which the poor women sat weeping bitterly when they heard that the greatest and most generous of all men was dead within the black oak door. Ah, it was a different lot from that for which the poor fellow sighed when he wrote, with heart yearning for home, those most charm- ing of all fond verses, in which he fancies he revisits Auburn : OLIVER GOLDSMITH 327 "Here as I take my solitary rounds, Amidst thy tangling walks and ruined grounds, And, many a year elapsed, return to view Where once the cottage stood, the hawthorn grew, Remembrance wakes, with all her busy train, Swells at my breast, and turns the past to pain. In all my wanderings round this world of care, In all my griefs and God has given my share I still had hopes, my latest hours to crown, Amidst these humble bowers to lay me down; To husband out life's taper at the close, And keep the flame from wasting by repose: I still had hopes for pride attends us still Amidst the swains to show my book-learned skill, Around my fire an evening group to draw, And tell of all I felt and all I saw; And as a hare whom hounds and horns pursue Pants to the place from whence at first he flew I still had hopes, my long vexations past, Here to return, and die at home at last. O blest retirement, friend to life's decline, Retreats from care that never must be mine, How blest is he who crowns, in shades like these, A youth of labor with an age of ease; Who quits a world where strong temptations try, And, since 'tis hard to combat, learns to fly ! For him no wretches born to work and weep Explore the mine or tempt the dangerous deep; Nor surly porter stands in guilty state To spurn imploring famine from the gate: But on he moves to meet his latter end, Angels around befriending virtue's friend; Sinks to the grave with unperceived decay, Whilst resignation gently slopes the way; And, all his prospects brightening to the last, His heaven commences ere the world be past." In these verses, I need not say with what melody, with what touching truth, with what exquisite beauty of comparison as indeed in hundreds more pages of the writings of this honest soul the whole character of the man is told his humble con- fession of faults and weakness; his pleasant little vanity, and desire that his village should admire him; his simple scheme of good in which everybody was to be happy no beggar was to be refused his dinner nobody in fact was to work much, and he to be the harmless chief of the Utopia, and the monarch of the Irish Yvetot. He would have told again, and without fear of their failing, those famous jokes which had hung fire in 328 WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY London; he would have talked of his great friends of the Club of my Lord Clare and my Lord Bishop, my Lord Nugent sure he knew them intimately, and was hand and glove with some of the best men in town and he would have spoken of Johnson and of Burke, and of Sir Joshua, who had painted him and he would have told wonderful sly stories of Ranelagh and the Pantheon, and the masquerades at Madame Cornelys; and he would have toasted, with a sigh, the Jessamy Bride the lovely Mary Horneck. The figure of that charming young lady forms one of the prettiest recollections of Goldsmith's life. She and her beautiful sister, who married Bunbury, the graceful and humorous amateur artist of those days, when Gilray had but just begun to try his powers, were among the kindest and dearest of Goldsmith's many friends ; cheered and pitied him, travelled abroad with him, made him welcome at their home, and gave him many a pleasant holiday. He bought his finest clothes to figure at their country- house at Barton he wrote them droll verses. They loved him, laughed at him, played him tricks, and made him happy. He asked for a loan from Garrick, and Garrick kindly supplied him, to enable him to go to Barton : but there were to be no more holi- days and only one brief struggle more for poor Goldsmith. A lock of his hair was taken from the coffin and given to the Jessamy Bride. She lived quite into our time. Hazlitt saw her, an old lady but beautiful still, in Northcote's painting-room, who told the eager critic how proud she always was that Goldsmith had admired her. The younger Coleman has left a touching reminiscence of him : "I was only five years old/' he says, "when Goldsmith took me on his knee one evening whilst he was drinking coffee with my father, and began to play with me, which amiable act I returned, with the ingratitude of a peevish brat, by giving him a very smart slap on the face : it must have been a tingler, for it left the marks of my spiteful paw on his cheek. This infantile outrage was followed by summary justice, and I was locked up by my indignant father in an adjoining room to undergo solitary imprisonment in the dark. Here I began to howl and scream most abominably, which was no bad step towards my liberation, since those who were not inclined to pity me might be likely to set me free for abating a nuisance. OLIVER GOLDSMITH 329 At length a generous friend appeared to extricate me from jeop- ardy, and that generous friend was no other than the man I had so wantonly molested by assault and battery it was the tender-hearted Doctor himself, with a lighted candle in his hand, and a smile upon his countenance, which was still partially red from the effects of my petulance. I sulked and sobbed as he fondled and soothed, till I began to brighten. Goldsmith seized the propitious moment of returning good-humour, when he put down the candle and began to conjure. He placed three hats, which happened to be in the room, and a shilling under each. The shillings he told me were England, France, and Spain. 'Hey presto cockalorum!' cried the Doctor, and lo, on uncovering the shillings, which had been dispersed each beneath a separate hat, they were all found con- gregated under one. I was no politician at five years old, and therefore might not have wondered at the sudden revolution which brought England, France, and Spain all under one crown ; but as also I was no con juror, it amazed me beyond measure. . . . From that time, whenever the Doctor came to visit my father, 'I plucked his gown to share the good man's smile' ; a game at romps constantly ensued, and we were always cordial friends and merry playfellows. Our unequal companionship varied somewhat as to sports as I grew older ; but it did not last long : my senior playmate died in his forty-fifth year, when I had attained my eleventh. ... In all the numerous accounts of his virtues and foibles, his genius and absurdities, his knowledge of nature and ignorance of the world, his 'compassion for another's woe' was always predominant; and my trivial story of his humoring a froward child weighs but as a feather in the recorded scale of his benevolence." Think of him reckless, thriftless, vain, if you like but merciful, gentle, generous, full of love and pity. He passes out of our life, and goes to render his account beyond it. Think of the poor pensioners weeping at his grave; think of the noble spirits that admired and deplored him ; think of the righteous pen that wrote his epitaph and of the wonderful and unanimous response of affection with which the world has paid back the love he gave it. His humor delighting us still, his song fresh and beautiful as when first he charmed with it, his words in all our mouths, his very weaknesses beloved and familiar his benevolent spirit 330 SIDNEY LEE seems still to smile upon us, to do gentle kindnesses, to succor with sweet charity, to soothe, caress, and forgive, to plead with the fortunate for the unhappy and the poor. THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH SIDNEY LEE [From the Dictionary of National Biography.] RALEGH, SIR WALTER (i552?-i6i8), military and naval com- mander and author, was born about 1552 at Hayes or Hayes Bar- ton, near Budleigh Salterton, South Devonshire (for description of birthplace see Trans, of Devonshire Association, xxi. 312-20). His father, Walter Ralegh (i496?-i58i), a country gentleman, was originally settled at Fardell, near Plymouth, where he owned property at his death; he removed about 1520 to Hayes, where he leased an estate, and spent the last years of his long life at Exeter. He narrowly escaped death in the western rebellion of 1549, was church-warden of East Budleigh in 1561, and is perhaps the 'Walter Rawley' who represented Wareham in the parliament of 1558. He was buried in the church of St. Mary Major, Exeter, on 23 Feb. 1580-1. He married thrice: first, about 1518, Joan, daughter of John Drake of Exmouth, and probably first cousin of Sir Francis Drake; secondly, a daughter of Darrell of London; and, thirdly, after 1548, Katharine, daughter of Sir Philip Champernowne of Modbury, and widow of Otho Gilbert (d. 18 Feb. 1547) of Compton, near Dartmouth. By his first wife the elder Ralegh had two sons: George, who is said to have furnished a ship to meet the Spanish armada in 1588, and was buried at Withycombe Ralegh on 12 March 1596-7, leaving issue believed to be illegitimate; and John, who succeeded to the family property at Fardell, and died at a great age in 1629. Mary, the only child of the second marriage, was wife of Hugh Snedale. By his third wife, Katharine (d. 1594), whose will, dated ii May 1594, is in the probate registry at Exeter, the elder Ralegh had, together with a daughter Margaret and Walter, the subject of this notice, THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 331 SIR CAREW RALEGH (i55o?-i625?), Sir Walter's elder brother of the whole blood. Carew engaged in 1578 in the expedition of his half-brother, Sir Humphrey Gilbert [q. v.], 1 and figured with Sir Walter and his two elder half-brothers, George and John, on the list of sea-captains drawn up in consequence of rumours of a Spanish invasion in January 1585-6. He sat in parliament as member for Wiltshire in 1586, for Ludgershall in 1589, for Down- ton both in 1603-4 and in 1621, and he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth in 1601 at Basing House/ For some time he was gentle- man of the horse to John Thynne of Longleat, and on Thynne's death he married his widow, Dorothy, daughter of Sir William Wroughton of Broad Heighten, Wiltshire. On his marriage he sold his property in Devonshire, and settled at Downton House, near Salisbury. Until 1625 he was lieutenant of the Isle of Port- land (cf. Col. State Papers, Dom. 1608-25). Aubrey says of him that he ' had a delicate clear voice, and played skilfully on the olpharion' (Letters, ii. 510). His second son, Walter (1586-1646), is separately noticed. Through his father and mother, who are both credited by tra- dition with puritan predilections, Walter Ralegh was connected with many distinguished Devon and Cornish families the Courtenays, Grenvilles, St. Legers, Russells, Drakes, and Gilberts. Sir Humphrey Gilbert was his mother's son by her first husband. His early boyhood seems to have been spent at Hayes, and he may have been sent to school at Budleigh; Sidmouth and Ottery St. Mary have also been suggested as scenes of his education. It was doubtless by association with the sailors on the beach at Bud- leigh Salterton that he imbibed the almost instinctive understand- ing of the sea that characterises his writings. Sir John Millais, in his picture 'The Boyhood of Ralegh/ painted at Budleigh Salterton in 1870, represents him sitting on the seashore at the foot of a sunburnt sailor, who is narrating his adventures. He cer- tainly learnt to speak with the broadest of Devonshire accents, which he retained through life. From childhood he was, says Naunton, 'an indefatigable reader.' At the age of fourteen or fifteen he would seem to have gone to Oxford, where he was, 1 The letters q. v. (quern vide) refer to other articles in the Dictionary of National Biography. 332 SIDNEY LEE according to Wood, in residence for three years as a member of Oriel College. His name appears in the college books in 1572, but the dates and duration of his residence are uncertain. In 1569 Ralegh sought adventures in France as a volunteer in the Huguenot army. With it he was present in the battle of Jarnac (13 March), and again at Moncontour (Hist, of the World, v. ii. 3, 8). It has been conjectured that on 24 Aug. 1572, the day of the massacre of St. Bartholomew, he was in Paris; it is more probable that he was in the south of France, where, according to his own testimony, he saw the catholics smoked out of the caves in the Languedoc hills (ib. iv. ii. 16). It is stated authoritatively that he remained in France for upwards of five years, but nothing fur- ther is known of his experiences there (OLDYS, p. 21). In the spring of 1576 he was in London, and in a copy of congratulatory verses which he prefixed to the 'Steele Glas' of George Gas- coigne [q. v.], published in April 1576, he is described as 'of the Middle Temple.' It may be supposed that he was only 'a pass- ing lodger ; ' he has himself stated that he was not a law student (Works, i. 669). In December 1577 he appears to have had a residence at Islington, and been known as a hanger-on of the court (GossE, p. 6). It is possible that in 1577 or 1578 he was in the Low Countries under Sir John Norris or Norreys [q. v.], and was present in the brilliant action of Rymenant on i Aug. 1578 (OLDYS, p. 25) ; but the statement is conjectural. In April 1578 he was in England (Trans, of the Devonshire Association, xv. 174), and in September he was at Dartmouth, where he joined his half-brother Sir Humphrey Gilbert in fitting out a fleet of eleven ships for a so-called voyage of discovery. After tedious delays, only seven, three of which were very small, finally sailed on 19 Nov. That the 'voyage of discovery' was a mere pretence may be judged by the armament of the ships, which according to the standard of the age, was very heavy. Gilbert commanded the Admiral, of 250 tons; Carew, Ralegh's elder brother, commanded the Vice- Admiral ; Ralegh himself the Falcon of 100 tons, with the distinguishing motto, ' Nee mor- tem peto, nee finem fugio' (cf. State Papers, Dom. Elizabeth, cxxvi. 46, i. 49; cf. McDouGALL, Voyage of the Resolute, pp. 520-6). It is probable that Gilbert went south to the Azores, THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 333 or even to the West Indies. After an indecisive engagement with some Spaniards, the expedition was back at Dartmouth in the spring of 1579 (HAKLUYT, Principal Navigations, iii. 186). A few months later Ralegh was at the court, on terms of intimacy at once with the Earl of Leicester, and with Leicester's bitter enemy and Burghley's disreputable son-in-law, the Earl of Oxford. At Oxford's request he carried a challenge to Leicester's nephew, Sir Philip Sidney, which Sidney accepted, but Oxford refused to fight, and, it is said, proposed to have Sidney assassinated. Ra- legh's refusal to assist in this wicked business bred a coldness between him and Oxford, which deepened on the latter's part into deadly hatred (ST. JOHN, i. 48). But Ralegh's temper was hot enough to involve him in like broils on his own account. In February 1579-80 he was engaged in a quarrel with Sir Thomas Perrot, and on the 7th the two were brought before the lords of the council 'for a fray made betwixt them,' and 'committed prisoners to the Fleet.' Six days later they were released on finding sureties for their keeping the peace (ib. i. 50), but on 17 March Ralegh and one Wingfield were committed to the Mar- shalsea for 'a fray beside the tennis-court at Westminster' (Acts of Privy Council, xi. 421). Next June Ralegh sailed for Ireland as the captain of a company of one hundred soldiers. The friendship of Leicester, and, through Sidney, of Walsingham, brought him opportunities of personal distinction. In August he was joined in commission with Sir Warham St. Leger for the trial of James Fitzgerald, brother of the Earl of Desmond, who was sentenced and put to death as a traitor. Ralegh expressed the conviction that leniency to bloody- minded malefactors was cruelty to good and peaceable subjects (ib. i. 38). When, in November, the lord deputy, Grey, forced the Spanish and Italian adventurers, who had built and garrisoned the Fort del Oro at Smerwick, to surrender at discretion, Ralegh had no scruples about carrying out the lord deputy's order to put them to the sword, to the number of six hundred (ib. i. 40) [see GREY, ARTHUR, fourteenth LORD GREY DE WILTON]. Although the exploit has the aspect of a cold-blooded butchery, it must be re- membered that the Spaniards were legally pirates, who had with- out valid commissions stirred up the native Irish to rebellion, and 334 SIDNEY LEE that English adventurers in the same legal position on the Spanish main [cf. OXENHAM, JOHN], although they were free from the added imputation of inciting to rebellion, had been mercilessly slain. The only fault found by the queen was that the superior officers had been spared (Cal. State Papers, Ire- land, Ixxix. 13). Edmund Spenser [q. v.], who was pres- ent at Smerwick, approved of Grey's order and of Ralegh's obedience (View of the Present State of Ireland, Globe edit, p. 656), and Mendoza, the Spanish ambassador in London, ventured on no remonstrance (FROUDE, Hist, of England, Cabinet edit. x. 582-91). During the campaign Spenser and Ralegh were necessarily brought together, but it does not appear that any intimacy then sprang up between them, and in January Ralegh was sent into garrison at Cork, where, except for an occasional journey to Dub- lin to confer with Grey or a dashing skirmish, he lay till the end of July. He was then appointed one of a temporary commission for the government of Munster, which established its headquarters at Lismore, and thence kept the whole province in hand. It was apparently in November that Ralegh, on his way from Lismore to Cork with eight horse and eighty foot, was attacked by a numerous body of Irish. They could not, however, stand before the disciplined strength of the English, and fled. Ralegh, hotly pursuing them with his small body of horse, got in among a crowd of the fugitives, who turned to bay, and fought fiercely, stabbing the horses with their knives. Ralegh's horse was killed, and Ralegh, entangled under the falling animal, owed delivery from imminent danger to the arrival of reinforcements. This marked the end, for the time, of Ralegh's Irish service. In the beginning of December 1581 he was sent to England with despatches from Colonel Zouch, the new governor of Munster, and, coming to the court, then at Greenwich, happened to attract the notice a#id catch the fancy of the queen. There is nothing improbable in the story of his spreading his new plush cloak over a muddy road for the queen to walk on. The evidence on which it is based (FULLER, Worthies) is shadowy ; but the incident is in keeping with Ralegh's quick, decided resolution, and it is certain that Ralegh sprang with a sudden bound into the royal favour. THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 335 Fuller's other story of his writing on a window of the palace, with a diamond, Fain would I climb, yet fear I to fall and of Elizabeth's replying to it with If thy heart fails thee, climb not at all, rests on equally weak testimony, and is inherently improbable. Naunton's story that Ralegh first won the queen's favour by the ability he showed in pleading his cause before the council has been satisfactorily disproved by Edwards (i. 49). It, in fact, appears that a handsome figure and face were his real credentials. He was under thirty, tall, well-built, of 'a good presence,' with thick dark hair, a bright complexion, and an expression full of life. His dress, too, was at all times magnificent, to the utmost limit of his purse; and, when called on to speak, he answered 'with a bold and plausible tongue, whereby he could set out his parts to the best advantage.' He had, moreover, the reputation of a bold and dashing partisan, ingenious and daring; fearless alike in the field and in the council-chamber, a man of a stout heart and a sound head. For several years Ralegh belonged to the court, the recipient of the queen's bounties and favour to an extent which gave much occasion for scandal. He was indeed consulted as to the affairs of Ireland, and Grey's rejection of his advice was a chief cause of Grey's recall; but such service, in itself a mark of the queen's confidence, does not account for the numerous appointments and grants which, within a few years, raised him from the position of a poor gentleman-adventurer to be one of the most wealthy of the courtiers. Among other patents and monopolies, he was granted, in May 1583, that of wine licenses, which brought him in from 8oo/. to 2,ooo/. a year, though it involved him in a dispute with the vice-chancellor of Cambridge, on whose jurisdiction his lessee had encroached. In 1584 he was knighted, and in 1585 was appointed warden of the stannaries, that is of the mines of Cornwall and Devon, lord lieutenant of Cornwall, and vice-admiral of the two counties. Both in 1585 and 1586 he sat in parliament as member for Devonshire. In 1586, too, he obtained the grant of 336 SIDNEY LEE a vast tract of land some forty thousand acres in Cork, Water- ford, and Tipperary. The grant included Youghal, with manorial rights and the salmon fishery of the Blackwater, and Ralegh began building houses at both Youghal and Lismore. He was also appointed captain of the queen's guard, an office requiring immediate attendance on the queen's person. In 1587 he was granted estates in Lincolnshire, Derbyshire, and Nottinghamshire, forfeited by Babington and his fellow-conspirators. Ralegh, however, was ill-fitted to spend his life in luxury and court intrigue, of which, as the queen's favourite, he was the centre. His jurisdiction of the stannaries marked an era of reform, and the rules which he laid down continued long in force. As vice- admiral of the western counties, with his half-brother Sir John Gilbert as his deputy in Devon, he secured a profitable share in the privateering against Spain, which was conducted under cover of commissions from the Prince of Conde or from the Prince of Orange. In 1583 he had a large interest in the Newfoundland voyage of Sir Humphrey Gilbert, fitting out a vessel of two hundred tons, called the Bark Ralegh, which he had intended to command himself, till positively forbidden by his royal mistress. After Gil- bert's death he applied for a patent similar to that which Gilbert had held to discover unknown lands, to take possession of them in the queen's name, and to hold them for six years. This was granted on 25 March 1584, and in April he sent out a preliminary expedition under Philip Amadas and Arthur Barlow, who, taking the southern route by the West Indies and the coast of Florida, made the land to the southward of Cape Hatteras. They then coasted northwards, entered the Oregon Inlet, and in the queen's name took possession of Wokoken, Roanoke, and the mainland adjacent. To this region, on their return in September, the queen herself gave the name of Virginia, then, and for many years afterwards, applied to 'the whole seaboard of the continent, from Florida to Newfoundland. Ralegh now put forward the idea, possibly conceived years before in intercourse with Coligny (BESANT, Gaspard Coligny, chap, vii.), of establishing a colony in the newly discovered country ; and, as the queen would not allow him to go in person, the expedition sailed in April, 1585, under the command of his cousin, Sir Richard THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 337 Grenville or Greynvile [q. v.], with Ralph Lane [q. v.] as governor of the colony, and Thomas Harriot [q. v.], who described himself as Ralegh's servant, as surveyor. The rules for its government were drawn up by Ralegh ; but quarrels, in the first instance be- tween Lane and Grenville and afterwards between the English settlers and the natives, rendered the scheme abortive, and in June 1586 the settlement was evacuated, the colonists being carried home by the fleet under Sir Francis Drake. Ralegh had mean- time sent Grenville out with reinforcements and supplies ; but, as he found the place deserted, he came back, leaving fifteen men on Roanoke. In the summer of 1587 another and larger expedition was sent out under the command of John White, who, when supplies ran short, came home, leaving eighty-nine men, seventeen women, and two children, including his own daughter and her child. Ralegh fitted out two ships in the following spring, but the captains converted the expedition into a privateering cruise, and, after being roughly handled by some Rochelle men-of-war, they came back to England. When, in 1589, a tardy relief was sent, the colonists had disappeared, nor was any trace of them ever recovered; and Ralegh, having spent upwards of 4o,ooo/. in the attempt to found the colony, was compelled to abandon the project for the time. In after years he sent out other expeditions to Vir- ginia, the latest in 1603. On his downfall in that year his patent reverted to the crown. It is by his long, costly, and persistent effort to establish this first of English colonies that Ralegh's name is most favourably known ; and, though the effort ended in failure, to Ralegh belongs the credit of having, first of Englishmen, pointed out the way to the formation of a greater England beyond the seas. But he had no personal share in the actual expeditions, and he was never in his whole life near the coast of Virginia. Among the more immedi- ate results of his endeavours is popularly reckoned the introduction, about 1586, into England of potatoes and tobacco. The assertion is in part substantiated. His 'servant' Harriot, whom he sent out to America, gives in his 'Brief and True Report of Virginia,' (1588) a detailed account of the potato and tobacco, and describes the uses to which the natives put them; he himself made the experi- ment of smoking tobacco. The potato and tobacco were in 1596 338 SIDNEY LEE growing as rare plants in Lord Burghley's garden in the Strand (GERARD, Catalogus, 1596). In his 'Herbal' (1597, pp. 286-8, 781) Gerard gives an illustration and description of each. Although potatoes had at a far earlier period been brought to Europe by the Spaniards, Harriot's specimens were doubtless the earliest to be planted in this kingdom. Some of them Ralegh planted in his garden at Youghal, and on that ground he may be regarded as one of Ireland's chief benefactors. This claim is supported by the statement made to the Royal Society in 1693 by Sir Robert Southwell [q. v.], then president, to the effect that his grandfather first cultivated the potato in Ireland from specimens given him by Ralegh (G. W. JOHNSON, Gardener, 1849, i- 8). The cultivation spread rapidly in Ireland, but was uncommon in England until the eighteenth century. The assertion that Sir John Hawkins and Sir Francis Drake introduced the potato long before Ralegh initiated colonial enterprise appears to be erroneous. It seems that they brought over in 1565 some specimens of the sweet potato (convolvolus battata), which only distantly resembles the common potato (ALPHONSE DE CANDOLLE, Origin of Culti- vated Plants, 1884; CLOS, 'Quelques documents sur 1'histoire de la pomme de terre,' in Journal Agric. du midi de la France, 1874, 8vo). With regard to tobacco, the plant was cultivated in Portugal before 1560, and Lobel, in his 'Stirpium Adversaria Nova' (pp. 251-2), declares that it was known in England before 1576. Drake and Hawkins seem to have first brought the leaf to England from America; but Ralegh (doubtless under the tuition of Harriot) was the first Englishman of rank to smoke it; he soon became confirmed in the habit, and taught his fellow- courtiers to follow his example, presenting to them pipes with bowls of silver. The practice spread with amazing rapidity among all classes of the nation (CAMDEN, Annals, s.a. 1586; TIEDEMANN, Geschichte des Tabaks, 1854, pp. 148 sq. ; FAIRHOLT, Tobacco, 1859, pp. 50-1; cf. GERARD, Herbal, 1597, p. 289). In March 1588, when the Spanish invasion appeared imminent, Ralegh was appointed one of a commission under the presidency of Sir Francis Knollys, with Lord Grey, Sir John Norris, and others all land officers, with the exception of Sir Francis Drake to draw up a plan for the defence of the country (Western Antiquary, THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 339 vii. 276). The statement that it was by Ralegh's advice that the queen determined to fit out the fleet is unsupported by evidence (STEERING, p. 65). The report of the commission seems to trust the defence of the country entirely to the land forces, possibly because its instruction referred only to their disposition. It no- where appears that Ralegh had any voice as to the naval prepara- tions. As the year advanced, he was sent into different parts of the country to hurry on the levies (GosSE, p. 38), especially in the west, where, as warden of the stannaries and lord lieutenant of Cornwall, it was his duty to embody the militia. It is stated in every 'Life' of Ralegh that when the contending fleets were coming up Channel, Ralegh was one of the volunteers who joined the lord admiral and took a more or less prominent part in the subsequent fighting. Of this there is no mention in the English state papers or in the authentic correspondence of the time. Nor can any reliance be placed on the report that Ralegh took part in the naval operations mentioned in the 'Copie of a Letter sent out of England to Don Bernardin Mendoza' (1588, and often reprinted) (cf. A Pack of Spanish Lies). This doubtful authority also credits Robert Cecil with having joined the fleet a manifest misstatement (Defeat of the Spanish Armada, i. 342). In the early part of September Ralegh was in Cornwall ; after- wards in London, and about the ipth he crossed over to Ireland in company with Sir Richard Grenville (State Papers, Dom. ccxv. 64, ccxvi. 28, Ireland, 14 Sept.; Sir Thomas Heneage to Carew, 19 Sept., Carew MSS.), By December he was again at court, and came into conflict with the queen's new favourite Es- sex. The latter strove to drive Ralegh from court, and on some unknown pretext sent him a challenge, which the lords of the coun- cil prevented his accepting, wishing the whole business 'to be repressed and to be buried in silence that it may not be known to her Majesty' (State Papers, Dom. ccxix. 33) [see DEVEREUX, ROBERT, second EARL OF ESSEX]. The statement that in the early summer of 1589 Ralegh took part in the expedition to Por- tugal under Drake and Norris (OLDYS, p. 119) is virtually contra- dicted by the full and authoritative documents relating to the ex- pedition (cf. State Papers, Dom. ccxxii. 90, 97, 98, ccxxiii. 35, 55). In May 1589 Ralegh was in Ireland (ib. Ireland, cxliv. 27, 28), 340 SIDNEY LEE and possibly continued there during the summer; he was cer- tainly there in August and September (Cal. Carew MSS. 5, 24 Aug.). To this period may be referred his intimacy with Edmund Spenser [q. v.], who bestowed on him in his poems the picturesque appellation of 'The Shepherd of the Ocean.' Ralegh returned to court in October, and, taking Spenser with him, se- cured for the poet a warm welcome from the queen. Ralegh's stay at court was short. His departure was apparently due to some jealousy of Sir William Fitzwilliam, lord deputy of Ireland, a friend of Essex, with whom he had quarrelled in Ireland. On 28 Dec. he wrote to Carew, 'My retreat from the court was upon good cause. . . . When Sir William Fitzwilliam shall be in England, I take myself for his better by the honourable offices I hold, as also by that nearness to her Majesty which still I enjoy ' (CaL Carew MSS. ; cf . Notes and Queries, 3rd ser. iv. 3) . Court intrigues, his duties in Cornwall, the equipment of the various privateers in which he had an interest, seem to have occu- pied him through 1590. In the beginning of 1591 he was appointed to command in the second post, under Lord Thomas Howard, a strong squadron of queen's ships and others, to look out for the Spanish plate fleet from the West Indies. Ultimately, however, the queen refused to let him go, and his place afloat was taken by his cousin, Sir Richard Grenville, whose death he celebrated in 'A Report of the Truth of the Fight about the Isles of the Acores this last Sommer, betwixt the Revenge, one of her Majesties Shippes, and an Armada of the King of Spaine.' This, published anonymously in the autumn of 1591, was afterwards acknow ledged in Hakluyt's 'Principal Navigations,' and forms the basis of a contemporary ballad by Gervase Markham [q. v.] and of Tennyson's well-known poem. In the following year (1592) a still stronger squadron was fitted out, mainly at the cost of Ralegh, who ventured all the money he could raise, amounting to about 34,ooo/. ; the Earl of Cumberland also contributed largely, and the queen supplied two thips, the Foresight and Garland. It was intended that Ralegh should command it in person, though the queen had expressed herself opposed to the plan, and as early as 10 March he wrote to Cecil, 'I have promised her Majesty that, if I can persuade the com- THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 341 panics to follow Sir Martin Frobiser, I will without fail return, and bring them but into the sea some fifty or three-score leagues ; which to do, her Majesty many times, with great grace, bade me re- member ' (EDWARDS, ii. 45). But in the early days of May, as the fleet put to sea, Ralegh received an order to resign the com- mand to Frobiser and return immediately. He conceived himself warranted in going as far as Cape Finisterre. There dividing the fleet, he sent one part, under Frobiser, to threaten the coast of Portugal so as to prevent the Spanish fleet putting to sea; the other, under Sir John Burgh, to the Azores, where it captured the Madre de Dios, the great carrack, homeward bound from the East Indies with a cargo of the estimated value of upwards of half a million sterling. By the beginning of June Ralegh had arrived in London, and although on 8 June he was staying at his own residence, Durham House in the Strand, the ancient London house of the bishops of Durham, which he had held since 1584 on a grant from the crown (ib.ii. 252 seq.), he was in July committed to the Tower. His recall and imprisonment were due to the queen's wrath on discovering that the man whom she had delighted to honour and enrich, who had been professing a lover's devotion to her, had been carrying on an intrigue with one of her maids of honour, Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Nicholas Throgmorton. In March there had been circulated a rumour that Ralegh had married the lady, but this, in a letter to Robert Cecil on 10 March 1592, Ralegh had denounced as a 'malicious report.' According to Camden, Ralegh seduced the lady some months before, an assertion which J. P. Collier needlessly attempted to corroborate by printing a forged news-letter on the topic (Archaologia, xxxiv. 160-70). The queen showed no more mercy to Mistress Throgmorton than to her lover, and she also was imprisoned in the Tower. In a letter addressed to Sir Robert Cecil in July Ralegh affected frenzied grief and rage at being debarred from the presence of the queen, whose personal attractions he eulogised in language of absurd extravagance (EDWARDS, ii. 51-2). In his familiar poem 'As you came from the Holy Land,' he seems to have converted into verse much of the flattering description of Elizabeth which figured in this letter to Cecil (Poems, ed. Hannah, pp. 80-1). But, despite these blandishments, he continued a close prisoner till the 342 SIDNEY LEE middle of September, when, on the arrival of the great carrack, the Madre de Dios, at Dartmouth, he was sent thither with Cecil and Drake, in the hope that by his local influence he might be able to stop the irregular pillage of the prize. He arrived in charge of a Mr. Blunt (State Papers, Dom. ccxliii. 17), perhaps Sir Chris- topher Blount [q. v.], the stepfather and friend of the Earl of Essex. On going on board the carrack his friends and the mariners congratulated him on being at liberty, but he answered 'No, I am the Queen of England's poor captive.' Cecil, his fellow- commissioner, treated him respectfully. 'I do grace him,' wrote Cecil, ' as much I may, for I find him marvellous greedy to do anything to recover the conceit of his brutish offence' (ib.). By 27 Sept. the commissioners had reduced the affairs of the carrack to something like order (EDWARDS, ii. 73), and eventually the net proceeds of the prize amounted to about i5o,ooo/., of which the queen took the greatest part. Ralegh considered himself ill-used in receiving 36,ooo/., being only 2,ooo/. more than he had ventured, while the Earl of Cumberland, who had ventured only i9,ooo/., also received 36,ooo/. (ib. ii. 76-8). But her majesty, gratified, it may be, by her share of the booty, so far relented as to restore Ralegh his liberty. It is probable that Ralegh and Elizabeth Throgmorton were married immediately afterwards. Being forbidden to come to court, they settled at Sherborne, where in January 1591-92 Ralegh had obtained a ninety-nine years' lease of the castle and park (ib. i. 463). He now busied himself with building and plant- ing, 'repairing the castle, erecting a magnificent mansion close at hand, and laying out the grounds with the greatest refinement of taste' (Sx. JOHN, i. 208). But he did not wholly withdraw him- self from public life. Early in 1593 he was elected for Michael in Cornwall, and took an active part in the proceedings of the house. On 28 Feb. he spoke in support of open war with Spain. On 20 March he strenuously opposed the extensions of the privi- leges of aliens, and his speech was answered by Sir Robert Cecil. On 4 April he spoke with much ability and tact in favour of the Brownists, or rather against religious persecution (D'EwES, Journals, pp. 478, 490, 493, 508-509, 517; EDWARDS, i. 271). New difficulties followed his sojourn in London during the ses- THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 343 sion. Passionately devoted to literature and science, he asso- ciated in London with men of letters of all classes and tastes. He was, with Cotton and Selden, a member of the Society of Anti- quaries that had been formed by Archbishop Parker and lasted till 1605 (ArchcBologia, I. xxv), and to him is assigned the first suggestion of those meetings at the Mermaid tavern in Bread Street which Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, and many lesser writers long graced with their presence. He made valuable suggestions to Richard Hakluyt, when he was designing his great collection of 'Voyages' (cf. History of the World, bk. ii. cap. iii. sect. viii.). But it was not only literary and archaeological topics that Ralegh discussed with his literary or antiquarian friends. Although he did not personally adopt the scepticism in matters of religion which was avowed by many Elizabethan authors, it attracted his speculative cast of mind, and he sought among the sceptics his closest companions. Thomas Harriot, who acknowledged him- self to be a deist, he took into his house, on his return from Vir- ginia, in order to study mathematics with him. With Christopher Marlowe, whose religious views were equally heterodox, he was in equally confidential relations. Izaak Walton testifies that he wrote the well-known answer to Marlowe's familiar lyric, ' Come, live with me and be my love.' There is little doubt that Ralegh, Harriot, and Marlowe, and some other personal friends, including Ralegh's brother Carew, were all in 1592 and 1593 members of a select coterie which fre- quently debated religious topics with perilous freedom. Accord- ing to a catholic pamphleteer writing in 1592, and calling himself Philopatris, the society was known as 'Sir Walter Rawley's School of Atheisme.' The master was stated to be a conjuror (doubtless a reference to Harriot) , and ' much diligence was said to be used to get young gentlemen to this school, wherein both Moyses and our Sauior, the old and the new Testaments are iested at and the schollers taught among other things to spell God backwards' (An Advertisement written to a Secretarie of my L. Treasurers of Ingland by an Inglishe Intelligencer, 1592, p. 18). In May 1593 the coterie's proceedings were brought to the notice of the privy council. A warrant was issued for the arrest of Marlowe and another, but Marlowe died next month, before it took effect. 344 SIDNEY LEE Ralegh had doubtless returned to Sherborne after the dissolution of parliament on 10 April. But later in the year the lord keeper, Puckering, made searching inquiries into Ralegh's and his friends' relations with the freethinking dramatist. A witness deposed that Marlowe had read an atheistical lecture to Ralegh and others. On 21 March 1593-4 a special commission, headed by Thomas Howard, viscount Bindon, was directed to pursue the investiga- tion at Cerne in Dorset, in the neighbourhood of Sherborne, and to examine Ralegh, his brother Carew, 'Mr. Thynneof Wiltshire,' and 'one Heryott of Sir Walter Rawleigh's house' as to their alleged heresies. Unfortunately the result of the investigation is not acessible (Harl. MS. 7042, p. 401) [see KYD, THOMAS; MAR- LOWE, CHRISTOPHER]. In June 1594 Ralegh spent a whole night in eagerly discussing religious topics with the Jesuit John Corne- lius [q. v.], while the latter lay under arrest at Wolverton (FOLEY, Jesuits, iii. 461-2). But Ralegh was soon seeking with characteristic versatility somewhat less hazardous means of satisfying his speculative in- stinct. He had been fascinated by the Spanish legend of the fabulous wealth of the city of Manoa in South America, ' which the Spaniards call Eldorado,' and he desired to investigate it. Early in 1594 his wife, who deprecated the project, wrote to Cecil entreating him 'rather to stay him than further him' (EDWARDS, i. 160). Probably owing to his wife's influence, Ralegh delayed going out himself, and in the first instance sent his tried servant, Jacob Whiddon, with instructions to explore the river Orinoco and its tributaries, which intersect the country now known as Venezuela, but long called by the Spanish settlers Guayana or Guiana. Whiddon returned towards the end of the year without any definite information. Ralegh was undaunted. He had already resolved to essay the adventure himself, and on 9 Feb. 1594-5 he sailed from Plymouth with a fleet of five ships, fitted out principally at his own cost, Cecil and the lord admiral being also interested in the voyage, and with a commission from the queen to wage war against the Spaniard. On 22 March he arrived at the island of Trinidad, off the Venezuelan coast, where he at- tacked and took the town of San Josef. He seized Berreo, gov- ernor of Trinidad, who, stimulated by the appearance of Whiddon THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 345 the year before, had written home suggesting the immediate occu- pation of the country adjoining the Orinoco. In fact an expedi- tion for this purpose sailed from San Lucar about the same time that Ralegh sailed from Plymouth, but it did not arrive at Trinidad till April. Ralegh's intercourse with his prisoner had meantime been most friendly, and Berreo showed Ralegh an official copy of a deposi- tion made by one Juan Martinez, who, on the point of death, declared that, having fallen into the hands of the Indians of the Orinoco, he had been detained for seven months in Manoa, the rich- ness and wonders of which he described at length. Ralegh, like the Spaniards, accepted the story, in which there is nothing im- probable. 'It is not yet proven that there was not in the six- teenth century some rich and civilised kingdom, like Peru or Mexico, in the interior of South America' (KINGSLEY, Miscel- lanies, 1859, i. 44). The reports of dogheaded men, or of 'men whose heads do grow beneath their shoulders,' may have originated in the disguises of the Indian medicine-men (ib. i. 45). Early in April, leaving his ships at Los Gallos, Ralegh started on his ad- venturous search for the gold-mine of Manoa, with a little flotilla of five boats, about one hundred men, and provisions for a month. The equipment and the means at his disposal proved inadequate. Entering by the Manamo mouth from the bay of Guanipa, and so into the Orinoco itself, near where San Rafael now is, the labour of rowing against the stream of the river in flood was excessive ; and when, after struggling upwards for an estimated distance of four hundred miles, they turned into the Caroni, it was often found impossible to make more than 'one stone's cast in an hour.' They pushed on for forty miles further, when their provisions were nearly exhausted, and they were still without any prospect of reaching Manoa. Ralegh reluctantly decided to give up the attempt for the present, hoping to try again at some future time. Leaving a man and a boy behind with a tribe of friendly Indians, so that on his return he might find competent interpreters, or possibly even guides to Manoa, he and his companions rapidly descended the river with the current, and rejoined their ships. They carried with them sundry pieces of 'white spar' or quartz, 'on the out- ' 346 SIDNEY LEE side of which appeared some small grains of gold,' and these, being afterwards assayed in London, were reported to contain pure gold in proportions varying from 12,000 to 26,900 pounds to the ton, the reference being apparently to the ' assay pound' of 12 grains (information from Professor Roberts-Austen). They are also said to have brought back the earliest specimens of mahogany known in England. From Trinidad Ralegh followed the north coast of South America, levied contributions from the Spaniards at Cumana and Rio de Hacha, and returned to England in August. But he had powerful enemies, some of whom declared that the whole story of the voyage was a fiction. It was to refute this slander that he wrote his 'Discoverie of Guiana,' 1596, 4to. At the same time he drew a map, which was not yet finished when the book was published. This map, long supposed to be lost (SCHOM- BURGK, p. 26n.), is identical with a map in the British Museum (Add. MS. I794OA), dated about 1650 in the Catalogue, but shown to be Ralegh's by a careful comparison with the text of the 'Dis- coverie' and with Ralegh's known handwriting (KoHL, Des- criptive Catalogue of Maps . . . relating to America. . . men- tioned in vol. Hi. of Hakluyfs Great Work', information from Mr. C. H. Coote). A facsimile of the map is in vol. ii. of 'Ham- burgische Festschrift zur Erinnerung an die Entdeckung Am- erikaV (1892). Ralegh's accuracy as a topographer and cartographer of Guiana or the central district of Venezuela has been established by sub- sequent explorers, nor is there reason to doubt that the gold-mine which he sought really existed. The quartz which he brought home doubtless came from the neighbourhood of the river Yuruari (an affluent of the Caroni), where gold was discovered in 1849 by Dr. Louis Plassard, and has, since 1857, been procured in large quan- tities. The prosperous El Callao mine in this region was probably the object of Ralegh's search (C. LE NEVE FOSTER, ' Caratal Gold Fields of Venezuela,' reprinted from Quarterly Jour, of Geolog. Soc. August 1869, and the same writer's 'Ralegh's Gold Mine,' in Brit. Assoc. Rep. 1869, pp. 162-3). On his return in 1595 Ralegh retired to Sherborne, and, as lord lieutenant of Cornwall, prepared for the defence of the country against a threatened invasion from Spain. This prevented his THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 347 personally undertaking a new voyage to Guiana; but in January 1595-1596 he sent out his trusty friend, Lawrence Kemys [q. v.], w r ho brought back the news that the Spaniards, under orders from Berreo, had re-established themselves in force at San Tomas, near the mouth of the Caroni, where an earlier settlement had been abandoned (HAKLTJYT, iii. 672; GARDINER, iii. 444-5, where the position of San Tomas is discussed). Meantime Ralegh took a brilliant part in the expedition to Cadiz in June 1596. He commanded the van himself in the leading ship, the Warspite as the fleet forced its way into the harbour, and, though severely wounded, he was carried on shore when the men landed for the storming of the town. By his com- mission as a general officer he had a voice in the councils of war, but his share in swaying the decision to attack, which we know only from his own narrative (EDWARDS, ii. 147-8), may easily be exaggerated, and is contradicted by Sir William Monson, the captain of Essex's ship, the Dieu Repulse ('Naval Tracts' in CHURCHILL, Voyages, 1704, iii. 185). On his return Ralegh was again busied with the despatch of a vessel to push discovery in the Orinoco. She sailed from the Thames in October, but did not leave Weymouth till 27 Dec., and by the end of June 1597 she was back at Plymouth without having been able to gain any further in- telligence (HAKLUYT, iii. 692). As far as Ralegh was concerned, the project was dropped for the next twenty years, though others made fruitless attempts in the same direction [see LEIGH, CHARLES, d. 1605]. Ralegh had been commended for his share in the taking of Cadiz ; his friends believed that the queen's wrath was wearing itself out, and Essex was not hostile. In May 1597 Ralegh was in daily attendance at the court, and on i June he 'was brought by Cecil to the queen, who used him very graciously and gave him full authority to execute his place as captain of the guard. In the evening he rid abroad with the queen, and had private conference with her' (EDWARDS, i. 226). For the next few weeks he seems to have been on familiar, almost friendly, terms with Essex. Mean- time the intelligence from Spain showed that Philip was preparing to take revenge for the loss he had sustained at Cadiz. Ralegh drew up a paper entitled 'Opinion on the Spanish Alarum,' in 348 SIDNEY LEE support of the contention that the cheapest and surest way to defend England was to strike beforehand at Spain. The idea had been forcibly urged by Drake ten years before, but the time was now more favourable and the advice accorded with the queen's inclinations. It had been intended to send out a squadron of ten ships under Lord Thomas Howard, with Ralegh as vice-admiral. The fleet was now increased, it was joined by a squadron of Dutch ships, and Essex, as admiral and general, took command of the whole. On 10 July it put to sea, but was dispersed in a gale and driven back with some loss. It could not sail again till 17 Aug., and then with a diminished force, a great part of the troops being left behind. Off Cape Finisterre the fleet was for the second time scattered by bad weather, and only by slow degrees was it collected at Flores, in the Azores, where it was determined to lie in wait for the Spanish treasure ships from the West Indies. But Essex had intelligence that it was doubtful if they would come at all, and that, if they did, they would take a more southerly route. He therefore resolved to wait for them at Fayal, and sailed thither, giving Ralegh orders to follow as soon as his ships had watered. Ralegh, following in haste, arrived at the rendezvous before Essex, and seeing that the inhabitants were putting the town in a state of defence, he landed and took it without waiting for Essex, who, on coming in, was exceedingly angry to find that he had been antici- pated. He accused Ralegh of having disobeyed the instructions, by landing 'without the general's presence or order.' Ralegh appealed to the actual words, that ' no captain of any ship or company . . . shall land anywhere without directions from the general or some other principal commander,' he being, he main- tained, 'a principal commander, named by the queen as com- mander of the whole fleet in succession to Essex and Howard.' Common sense justified Ralegh's action, and Essex was obliged to waive the point, though several of his friends are said to have in- cited him to bring Ralegh to a court-martial (ib. i. 242). The quarrel was healed for the time by the intervention of Howard, and the fleet kept at sea till the middle of October, making some valuable prizes and destroying many others. On its return the troops were distributed in the western garrisons, and Ralegh, in conjunction with Lord Thomas Howard and Lord Mount joy, THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 349 was occupied in preparations for the defence of the coast against any possible attempts on the part of Spain. During the years immediately following, his time was, for the most part, divided between the court and the west country, with an occasional visit to Ireland. In 1597 he was chosen member of parliament for Dorset, and in 1601 for Cornwall. In the last par- liament he defended monopolies, which were attacked with much heat in a debate of 19 Nov. 1601. He is reported to have blushed when a fellow-member spoke of the Iniquity of a monopoly of playing-cards, and he elaborately explained his relations with the monopoly of tin, which he owned as lord warden of the stannaries, but he said nothing of his equally valuable monopoly of sweet wines (D'EwES, Journals of Parliaments, p. 645). In July 1600, after the news of the battle of Nieuport, he, jointly with Lord Cobham, with whom he was now first intimately associated, was sent to Ostend with a gracious message from the queen to Lord Grey [see BROOKE, HENRY, eighth LORD COBHAM ; GREY, THOMAS, fifteenth LORD GREY OF WILTON]. In the following September he was appointed governor of Jersey, and at once repaired to the island, w r here he instituted a public registry of title-deeds, which is still an important feature of the insular land system, and he practically created the trade in fish between Jersey and Newfound- land (PEGOT-OGIER, lies de la Manche, p. 326; FALLE, Jersey, ed. Durell, p. 397; PROWSE, Hist, of Newfoundland, pp. 52, 76). But the old quarrel with Essex was still smouldering. In season and out of season, Essex and his partisans, especially Sir Chris- topher Blount [q. v.], were loud in their denunciations of Ralegh. Essex, writing to the queen on 25 June 1599, accused him of 'wish- ing the ill-success of your majesty's most important action, the decay of your greatest strength, and the destruction of your faith- fullest servants' (EDWARDS, i. 254), and at the last he asserted that it was to counteract Ralegh's plots that he had come over from Ireland, and 'pretended that he took arms principally to save himself from Cobham and Ralegh, who, he gave out, should have murdered him in his house' (Cecil to Sir George Carew, ib. i. 255). It was untruthfully alleged that Ralegh had placed an ambuscade to shoot Essex as he passed on his way from Ireland to the lords of the council in London. Blount, pretending to seek 350 SIDNEY LEE a means of retaliating, shot four times at Ralegh ; he had already vainly suggested to Sir Ferdinando Gorges that Ralegh's removal would do Essex good service (OLDYS, p. 333). Ralegh was not disposed to submit meekly to this active hos- tility. At an uncertain date probably in 1601 he wrote of Essex to Cecil: 'If you take it for a good counsel to relent towards this tyrant, you will repent it when it shall be too late. His malice is fixed, and will not evaporate by any your mild courses. . . . For after revenges/ fear them not ; for your own father was esteemed to be the contriver of Norfolk's ruin, yet his son followeth your father's son and loveth him' (cf. ST. JOHN, ii. 38; and DEVEREUX, Lives of the Devereux, ii. 177). When Essex was brought out for execution, Ralegh was present, but withdrew on hearing it murmured that he was there to feast his eyes on his enemy's sufferings. Blount afterwards admitted that neither he nor Essex had really believed that Ralegh had plotted against the earl's life; 'it was,' he said, 'a word cast out to colour other matters;' and on the scaffold he entreated pardon of Ralegh, who was again present, possibly in his official capacity as captain of the guard. His attitude towards Essex and his party seems to have led Sir Amyas Preston to send him, in 1602, a challenge, which he accepted. He arranged his papers and affairs as a precautionary measure, entailing the Sherborne estate on his son Walter; but for some unexplained reason the duel did not take place. About the same date he began negotiations for the sale of much of his Irish property to Richard Boyle, first earl of Cork; the transaction was not completed until 1604, after Ralegh's attainder, when Boyle secured all the Irish estates (cf. Lismore Papers, ed. Grosart, ist ser. iv. 258; 2nd ser. ii. 38-49, 157-9, n 'i- 59- 62 > v - passim). Meantime political intrigues centred round the king of Scots. For at least two years before the death of the queen, James was systematically informed that Ralegh was opposed to his claims, and was ready to proceed to any extremities to prevent his acces- sion to the throne. The letters were written by Lord Henry Howard (afterwards Earl of Northampton) [q. v.], probably with the knowledge, if not the approval, of Cecil. The result, at any rate, was that James crossed the border with a strong prepossession THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 351 against Ralegh; and when Ralegh, who had been in the west, hastened to meet him, he was received with marked discourtesy. A fortnight later he was deprived of his post of captain of the guard ; he was persuaded or compelled to resign the wardenship of the stannaries and the governorship of Jersey; his lucrative patent of wine licenses was suspended as a monopoly; and he was or- dered, 'with unseemly haste,' to leave Durham House in the Strand. Such measures were a sure presage of his downfall ; but he still remained at court in occasional attendance on the king, hoping, it may be, to overcome the prejudice and win the royal favour. On or about 14 July he was summoned before the lords of the council, who examined him as to any knowledge he might have of the plot 'to surprise the king's person' [see WATSON, WILLIAM], or of any plot contrived between Lord Cobham and Count Aremberg, the Spanish agent in London. Of Watson's plot he was most probably entirely ignorant. With Cobham he was still on friendly terms, and Cobham had taken from his house a book by one Snagge, contesting James's title. Ralegh had once borrowed the work from Lord Burghley's library. More- over he knew that Cobham had been in correspondence with Aremberg. This he denied before the council, but he afterwards admitted it, and his prevarication, joined to his known intercourse with Cobham and his reasonable causes for discontent, appeared so suspicious that on 17 July he was sent a prisoner to the Tower. 'Unable to endure his misfortunes,' he attempted to commit suicide (EDWARDS, i. 375). During the following months he was repeatedly examined by the lords of the council, and on 17 Nov. was brought to trial at Winchester before a special commission, which included among its members Lord Thomas Howard, now earl of Suffolk, Sir Charles Blount, now earl of Devonshire [q. v.], Lord Henry How- ard, the newly created Lord Cecil, Sir John Popham [q. v.], lord chief justice, and several others. Of these, only Suffolk could be considered friendly. Nothing was proved in a manner which would satisfy a modern judge or a modern jury ; but the imputa- tion of guilt attached at the time to every prisoner committed by the lords of the council for trial on a charge of treason, un- less any convincing proof of his innocence were forthcoming. 352 SIDNEY LEE This Ralegh could not produce. He knew something of Cob- ham's incriminating correspondence, and to know of or suspect the existence or even the conception of a traitorous plot without revealing it was to be particeps criminis. The jury without hesitation brought in a verdict of guilty guilty of compassing the death of the king, 'the old fox and his cubs;' of endeavour- ing to set Arabella Stuart on the throne ; of receiving bribes from the court of Spain ; of seeking to deliver the country into the hands of its enemy. Sentence was pronounced by Popham, but the commissioners undertook to petition the king to qualify the rigour of the punishment. The trial is a landmark in English constitutional history. The harsh principles then in repute among lawyers were enunciated by the judges with unprecedented distinctness, and as a consequence a reaction steadily set in from that moment in favour of the rights of individuals against the state (GARDINER, i. 138). Two days before Ralegh's trial, Watson, George Brooke, and four others were tried and condemned; a week later, Cobham and Grey. Ralegh was ordered to be executed on n Dec., and, in full expectation of death, he wrote a touching letter of farewell to his wife. This was published in 1644 with a few other small pieces in a volume entitled 'To-day a Man, To-morrow None,' in the 'Arraignment' of 1648, and in the 'Remaines 7 of 1651 (cf. EDWARDS, ii. 284). But on 10 Dec. Ralegh, with Cobham and Grey, was reprieved; and on the i6th the three were sent up to London and . committed to the Tower. All Ralegh's offices were vacated by his attainder, and his estates forfeited, but his personal property was now restored to him. In 1602, when he had assigned the manor of Sherborne to trustees for the benefit of his son Walter, he reserved the income from it to himself for life. This life interest now fell to the king, but on 30 July 1604 a sixty years' term of Sherborne and ten other Dorset and Somerset manors was granted by the crown to trustees to be held by them for Lady Ralegh and her son. Soon afterwards a legal flaw was discovered in the deed of 1602 conveying Sherborne to the trustees of the son Walter. After much legal argument the judges in 1608 declared the whole property to be forfeited under the attainder, and the arrangement of 1604 to be void. Lady Ralegh, in a per- sonal interview, entreated James to waive his claim, but withdrew THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 353 her opposition on receiving a promise of 400^. a year for her life and that of her son, together with a capital sum of 8,ooo/. The Sherborne property, which was of the estimated rental of 75o/., was thereupon bestowed on the king's favourite, Robert Carr, earl of Somerset. Shortly before Prince Henry's death in 1612 he begged it of James, who compensated Carr with 2o,ooo/. The prince intended to restore the estate to Ralegh, but died before he could effect his design, and Carr retook possession, but on his attainder in 1616, Sherborne was sold to John Digby, earl of Bristol, for io,ooo/. (STEBBING, pp. 244, 261-4; CAREW RALEGH, Brief Relation, 1669). Ralegh was treated leniently in prison. He had apartments in the upper story of the Bloody Tower, where his wife and son, with their personal attendants, also lived, at the rate, for household expenses, of about 2oo/. a year. But his health suffered from cold (Notes and Queries, 2nd ser. viii. 107), and frequent efforts were made by his enemies to concoct fresh charges of disloyalty against him. In 1610 they succeeded in depriving him for three months of the society of his wife, who was ordered to leave the Tower. In Prince Henry, however, he found a useful friend. The prince was mainly attracted by Ralegh's studies in science and literature, to which his enforced leisure was devoted. For the prince, Ralegh designed a model of a ship. Encouraged by him, he began his ' History of the World.' and for his guidance designed many political treatises. In a laboratory, or 'still-house,' allowed him in the Tower garden for chemical and philosophical experiments, he condensed fresh from salt water (an art only practised generally during the present century) (cf. Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1606-7), and compounded drugs, chief among which was his 'Great Cordial or Elixir.' Ralegh's own prescrip- tion is not extant, but Nicholas le Febre compounded it in the presence of Charles II on 20 Sept. 1662 (EVELYN, Diary, ii. 152), and printed an account of the demonstration in 1664. At the same time whatever books Ralegh chose to buy or borrow were freely at his disposal, and he interested himself in the scientific researches of his fellow-prisoner, Henry Percy, ninth earl of Northumberland [q. v.], into whose service he introduced Harriot, his old friend and fellow-worker. 2A 354 SIDNEY LEE As early as 1610, possibly earlier, Ralegh sought permission for another venture to the Orinoco. He was willing to command an expedition himself, or to serve as guide to any persons appointed. 'If I bring them not,' he wrote, 'to a mountain covered with gold and silver ore, let the commander have commission to cut off my head there' (EDWARDS, ii. 393). His proposal received some en- couragement, and in 1611 or 1612 certain lords of the council offered to send Kemys with two ships, on condition that the charge should be borne by Ralegh if Kemys failed to bring back at least half a ton of gold ore similar to the specimens. Ralegh objected that it was 'a matter of exceeding difficulty for any man to find the same acre of ground again in a country desolate and overgrown which he hath seen but once, and that sixteen years since.' 'Yet,' he wrote, 'that your lordships may be satisfied of the truth, I am contented to adventure all I have, but my reputation, upon Kemys' memory;' the condition on the other side being * that half a ton of the former ore being brought home, then I shall have my liberty, and in the meanwhile my free pardon under the great seal, to be left in his majesty's hands till the end of the journey' (ib. ii. 338-9). There can, however, be little doubt that Cecil, now earl of Salisbury, did not encourage the scheme, but the king yielded to the representations of Sir Ralph Winwood [q. v.], Ralegh's steadfast friend, and of Sir George Villiers (afterwards duke of Buckingham) [q. v.]. The warrant for his release was dated 19 March 1615-16; but it appears that he was actually discharged from the Tower two or three days earlier, though he continued throughout the year under the guard of a keeper (ib. i. 563; ii. 341; GARDINER, ii. 381). During the following months he was busy in preparations for the voyage. He had no support from the crown, and he and his wife adventured all they had, including the 8,ooo/., or as much of it as had been paid in compensation for the resumption of Sher- borne, and some land of hers at Mitcham (cf. Notes and Queries, ist ser. xi. 262, 2nd ser. ix. 331). The gentlemen volunteers who gathered round Ralegh subscribed the rest. Among these were Charles Parker, a brother of William Parker, fourth baron Monteagle [q. v.]; Captain North, brother of Dudley, third lord THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 355 North [q. v.]; Sir Warham St. Leger, son of Ralegh's old comrade in Ireland; and George Ralegh, a son of Ralegh's brother George. With them were Kemys, Captain (afterwards Sir John) Penington [q. v.], and others of good repute as sea- men or as soldiers; but as a rule the merchants of London, or Bristol, or Plymouth, like the seafaring folk of the west country, held aloof from the enterprise. His ships were thus rilled up with 'the world's scum.' Even of the volunteers, many of them were 'drunkards, blasphemers, and other such as their fathers, brothers, and friends thought it an exceeding good gain to be discharged of with the hazard of some thirty, forty, or fifty pounds, knowing they could not have lived a whole year so cheap at home' ('Apology for the Voyage to Guiana,' Works, viii. 480). As soon as the proposed voyage to the Orinoco was publicly spoken of, Sarmiento, the Spanish ambassador, vehemently pro- tested against it. All Guiana (the modern Venezuela), he asserted, belonged to the king of Spain, and Ralegh's incursion would be an invasion of Spanish territory, but he thought it more probable that Ralegh meant to lie in wait for and attack the Mexican plate fleet, in practical disregard of the peace between the two countries. Ralegh protested that he had no intention of turning pirate ; that the mine really existed, and added, according to Sarmiento, that it was neither in nor near the king of Spain's territories a state- ment palpably false (GARDINER, iii. 39). Ralegh knew that the Spaniards had taken possession of the district (EDWARDS, ii. 338). Ralegh had stringent orders not to engage in any hostili- ties against the Spaniards, and was assured that disobedience would cost him his life (GARDINER, iii. 44 ). This warning he treated as mainly intended to satisfy Sarmiento, and as an inti- mation of the possible result of failure. To Bacon he spoke openly of seizing the Mexican plate fleet, and to Bacon's objection that that would be piracy, he answered 'Did you ever hear of men being pirates for millions?' (ib. p. 48). While the preparations were in progress another design occurred to him. Towards the end of 1616 war again broke out between Spain and Savoy, and Savoy turned to France and England for support. Genoa, nominally neutral, was rendering valuable aid 356 SIDNEY LEE to Spain. James was not unwilling to assist Savoy, but was destitute of the means, and Ralegh, understanding the situation from Winwood, suggested to the Savoyard ambassador in London that he should urge the king to divert the Guiana squadron to an assault on Genoa. James, after considering the proposal, de- clined to sanction a change in the destination of Ralegh's expedi- tion (ib. pp. 50-52). Ralegh, however, was anxious to obtain some further security for his life in case of failure. With that view he entered into negotiations with the French ambassador in London, and with the admiral of France, hoping for the assistance of some French ships, and a safe retreat to France in the event of defeat. The confused evidence points to the conclusion that Ralegh had determined to attempt the capture of the Mexican plate fleet, to establish himself in force at the mine, and to seize the islands of Trinidad and Margarita as the keys of the position. He believed that success, in spite of his orders, would win the king's pardon, but, if not, that the treasure he would carry with him would insure him a favourable reception in France. He sailed from Plymouth with a squadron of fourteen ships on 12 June 1617. The voyage was unfortunate from the first. Foul winds and storms drove him back, and afterwards scattered his fleet; one ship was sunk. Most of them, more or less disabled, put into the harbour of Cork. In July Ralegh paid a visit to Sir Richard Boyle, who lent him ioo/., and next month he entered into a part- nership with Boyle for the working of the copper mine at Balli- garren (Lismore Papers, ed. Grosart, ist ser. i. 158, 163, 2nd ser. ii. 86-96). He was not ready to sail again till 19 Aug. At the Canaries the Spaniards were sullenly obstructive; it was only after being refused at two of the islands that they were allowed to water at Gomera. From the Cape Verde Islands they were driven by a hurricane. Calms and foul winds followed; they lay for forty days in the Doldrums, short of water, a prey to scurvy and fever. Great numbers of the men, with several of the captains and superior officers, died. Ralegh himself was stricken with fever. The crews were mutinous. It was afterwards stated that Ralegh encouraged them with assurances of capturing the Mexican fleet if the mine failed (GARDINER, iii. 118). On arriving off the mouth of the Oyapok he hoped to be joined by THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 357 Leonard, an Indian whom he had brought to England on his former voyage, and who had lived with him for three or four years. But Leonard was not there, and Ralegh moved his squad- ron, reduced by wreck or separation to ten ships, to the mouth of the Cayenne. There he was welcomed by friendly natives whose affection he had won twenty years before. ' To tell you,' he wrote to his wife on 14 Nov., 'that I might be king of the Indians were but vanity. . . . They feed me with fresh meat and all that the country yields' (EDWARDS, ii. 347). When the men were somewhat refreshed, and recovered from sickness, he moved to the Isle de Salut, and there prepared for the farther adventure. Five of the ships were small enough to cross the bar and go up the river, and in these he put four hundred men. He himself was too feeble from the effects of the fever to accompany them, and it was the general wish that he should remain behind. It was ex- pected that a hostile Spanish fleet would arrive, with which Ralegh could best deal. 'You shall find me,' he told the expeditionary force, 'at Pun to Gallo, dead or alive; and if you find not my ships there, yet you shall find their ashes. For I will fire with the galleons if it come to extremity, but run away I will never' (GARDINER, iii. 121). The chief command of the expedition up the river he entrusted to Kemys; his nephew, George Ralegh, was to command the soldiers, among whom was his son Walter. Ralegh gave orders that they should land at a point agreed on, and march to the mine, said to be three miles distant. If they were attacked by the Span- iards in moderate force they were to repel them ; but ' if without manifest peril of my son,' he said to Kemys, ' yourself, and other captains, you cannot pass toward the mine, then be well advised how you land. For I know, a few gentlemen excepted, what a scum of men you have, and I would not for all the world receive a blow from the Spaniard to the dishonour of our nation' (ib. p. 120). The expedition started on 10 Dec., but the settlement of San Tomas had been moved several miles lower down the river, and it was impossible to pass it without being seen, or to march to the mine without the danger of falling into an ambuscade. Kemys de- cided to attack the town, which was stormed and burnt, though with the loss of young Walter, Ralegh's son. The Spaniards 358 SIDNEY LEE took to the woods, and, in face of their opposition, Kemys judged it impossible to reach the mine. He accordingly returned, and rejoined Ralegh at Punto Gallo, only to kill himself in despair at the bitter reproach to which Ralegh gave vent. He had brought fresh evidence of the existence and wealth of the mine, and Ralegh wished to lead his men back for another attempt. But they shrank from adventure; he could neither persuade nor compel them; they were thoroughly disheartened. He proposed to them to look out for the Mexican fleet ; they refused, the captains equally with the men. 'What shall we be the better?' they said; 'for when we come home the king shall have what we have gotten, and we shall be hanged' (ib. p. 127). Several of the ships parted company. Some of them went to Newfoundland, and thence, with a cargo of fish on their own account, to the Mediterranean. After touching at St. Kitts, whence he sent letters to England, Ralegh also went to Newfoundland. He had only now four ships with him, and though with these he would fain have kept the sea in hopes of capturing some rich prize, his men refused to follow him. He realised the danger that awaited him in England, and, as a penniless outcast, he would be scarcely more welcome in France. With much hesitation he went to meet his fate in Eng- land, and arrived at Plymouth about the middle of June 1618. Already the news of the attack at San Tomas and of the failure of the expedition had reached the king, and the Spanish minister, now Conde de Gondomar, demanded satisfaction in accordance with James's promise that 'if Ralegh returned loaded with gold acquired by an attack on the subjects of the king of Spain, he would surrender it all, and would give up the authors of the crime to be hanged in the public square of Madrid.' James assured him that he would be as good as his word (ib. iii. 132). The council resented Gondomar's language to the king; but James, supported by Buckingham, convinced it that Ralegh ought to be punished. On 22 June James assured Gondomar that justice should be done, and Gondomar replied with a sneer 'that Ralegh and his followers were in England, and had not been hanged.' James, although stung to fury, agreed to propose to the council to send Ralegh and some dozen of his followers to Spain. Three days -later he promised Gondomar that Ralegh should be sur- THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 359 rendered, unless Philip expressly asked that he should be hanged in England (cf. 'Documents relating to Ralegh's last voyages' by S. R. Gardiner in Camd. Soc. Miscellany, 1864, vol. v.). Shortly after his arrival at Plymouth Ralegh set out for London ; but at Ashburton he was arrested by his cousin, Sir Lewis Stucley or Stukeley [q. v.], who took him back to Plymouth, where he was left much to himself. The opportunity suggested the advisability of escaping to France, but while he was still hesitating orders came for him to be taken to London. There also he was left at large, but, attempting to escape to a French ship at Gravesend, he was arrested, brought back, and lodged in the Tower. He had mean- time drawn up his 'Apology' (Works, viii. 479), which is rather a justification of his conduct than a defence against the charge. 'To James it must have appeared tantamount to a confession of guilt ; to all who knew what the facts were it stamped him as a liar convicted by his own admission' (GARDINER, iii. 141). Commissioners were now appointed to inquire into what had been done. With Lord-chancellor Bacon at their head, they were all men of good repute, and there is no reason to doubt that they performed their duty conscientiously; Ralegh was examined, but his statements contradicted each other, till, 'exasperated by the audacity of his lying, they came to the conclusion that there was not a single word of truth in his assertions ; that his belief in the very existence of the mine was a mere fiction invented for the purpose of imposing upon his too credulous sovereign' (ib. p. 142); and that his lies must be taken as an admission of his guilt. James accordingly gave orders for him to be brought to trial, but was told that, as Ralegh was already under sentence of death, he could not now be legally tried. If he was to be executed, it must be on the former sentence. On 22 Oct. Ralegh was brought for the last time before the commissioners, when, in the name of his colleagues, Bacon, after pronouncing him guilty of abusing the confidence of his sovereign, told him that he was to die. On 28 Oct. he was brought before the justices of the king's bench, when he argued that the Winchester sentence was dis- charged by his commission for the late voyage. He was told that, 'unless he could produce an express pardon from the king, no argument that he could use would be admissible.' In that case, 360 SIDNEY LEE he answered, he had nothing to do but throw himself on the king's mercy; whereupon the chief justice, Sir Henry Montagu (after- wards earl of Manchester) [q. v.], awarded execution according to law (ib. p. 148). On the following morning, 29 Oct., he was brought to the scaffold erected in Old Palace Yard. He met his death calmly and cheerfully, and of his last words many have become almost proverbial. As he laid his head on the block some one objected that it ought to be towards the east. 'What matter,' he answered, 'how the head lie, so the heart be right?' than which, says Mr. Gardiner, no better epitaph could be found for him. An official ' Declaration ' of his demeanour and carriage was issued a few days later and was frequently reprinted. His remains were delivered to his wife, and they were buried in the chancel of St. Margaret's Church, Westminster, in spite of Lady Ralegh's wish that he should be buried at Beddington ; the head she caused to be embalmed, and she kept it by her in a red leather bag as long as she lived. It seems to have passed into the possession of her son Carew, but what ultimately became of it is uncertain. A me- morial window was placed in 1882 by American citizens in St. Margaret's Church, with an inscription by James Russell Lowell. The high position Ralegh had occupied, the greatness of his down- fall, the general feeling that the sentence pronounced in 1603 was unjust, and that the carrying of it into execution in 1618 was base, all contributed to exalt the popular appreciation of his character. His enemies had denounced him as proud, covetous, and unscrupu- lous, and much evidence is extant in support of the unfavourable judgment. But the circumstances of his death concentrated men's attention on his bold exploits against his country's enemies, and to him was long attributed an importance in affairs of state or in conduct of war which the recital of his acts fails to justify. He was regarded as the typical champion of English interests against Spanish aggression, a view which found its most concentrated expression in the popular tract ' Sir Walter Rawleigh's Ghost, or England's Forewarner,' by Thomas Scott (Utrecht, 1626, and frequently reissued). Physical courage, patriotism, resourceful- ness may be ungrudgingly ascribed to him. But he had small regard for truth, and reckless daring was the main characteristic of his stirring adventures as politician, soldier, sailor, and traveller. THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 361 Ralegh acquired, however, a less ambiguous reputation in the pacific sphere of literature, and his mental calibre cannot be fairly judged, nor his versatility fully realised, until his achieve- ments in poetry, in history, and political philosophy have been taken into account. However impetuous and rash was he in action, he surveyed life in his writings with wisdom and in sight, and recorded his observations with dignity and judicial calmness. It is difficult to reconcile the religious tone of his writings with the reputation for infidelity which attached to Ralegh until his death, and was admitted to be justifiable by Hume. The charges brought against Ralegh and Marlowe in 1593 were repeated in general terms within four months after his execution by Arch- bishop Abbot, who attributed the catastrophe to his 'question- ing' of 'God's being and omnipotence' (Abbot to Sir Thomas Roe, 19 Feb. 1618-19). Such a charge seems confuted on almost every page of his 'History of the World,' in which he follows in the early chapters the Old Testament narrative with most confiding literalness, and earnestly insists throughout on God's beneficence. A similar sentiment finds repeated expression in his political essays. Nor in incidental references to the New Testament does he give any sign of incredulity (cf. Historic, bk. ii. chap. iv. sect, xi.), and nothing actually inconsistent with these views can be detected in two works in which he dealt with meta- physical speculation. The one 'The Sceptic,' first published in 1651, is a scholastic and inconclusive dissertation Dr. Parr called it a 'lusus ingenii' in which it is argued that the end- less varieties of physical formation, temperament, and capacity, discernible in living organisms, present insuperable obstacles to the universal acceptance among men of any one conception of truth. Doubt is therefore inevitable to man's reason; but no mention is made of religious belief, which, it seems clear from Ralegh's references to it elsewhere, he did not regard as dependent on man's reason. His 'Treatise of the Soul' (first published in the collected 'Works,' 1829) is a supersubtle and barren inquiry into the nature and function of the soul, mainly based on scriptural texts. The contemporary tone of religious orthodoxy generated reputations for infidelity on very slender provocation, and in 362 SIDNEY LEE Ralegh's case the evil report doubtless sprang from his known love of orally discussing religion with men of all opinions, and of thus encouraging freedom of speech. But his friend Sir John Haring- ton affirmed that he personally kept within conventional bounds in such conferences. 'In religion/ Harington wrote in 1603, ' he hath shown in private talk great depth and good reading, as I once experienced at his own house before many learned men' (Nug& Antique?, ii. 132). Throughout his career Ralegh solaced his leisure by writing verse, much of which is lost. All that is positively known to survive consists of thirty short pieces, many of which were origi- nally published anonymously, or under his initials in poetical anthologies, like the ' Phoenix Nest,' 1593; 'England's Helicon,' 1600; or Davison's 'Poetical Rhapsody,' 1608 (cf. England's Helicon and DAVISON'S Poetical Rhapsody, both edited by Mr. A. H. Bullen). But the signature of 'Sir W. R.' or of 'Ignoto,' which he adopted occasionally, is not always conclusive testimony that the pieces to which those signatures are attached were from Ralegh's pen. Dr. Hannah has noted twenty-five poems which have been wrongly assigned to him on such grounds. Nor can reliance be placed on the pretension advanced in behalf of very many of his poems that they were penned ' on the night before his execution.' A fragment only remains of Ralegh's chief effort in verse, a poem called 'Cynthia, the Lady of the Sea,' which was probably written during his enforced withdrawals from court in 1589 and 1592-3. Gabriel Harvey described so much as was written before 1590 as 'a fine and sweet invention.' Puttenham doubtless referred to it in his 'Arte of Poesie' (1589), when he described Ralegh's 'vein' as 'most lofty, insolent, and passionate.' Ed- mund Spenser, who generously encouraged Ralegh's essays in poetry, wrote to him in 1590 of 'your own excellent conceit of Cynthia,' and thrice elsewhere referred to the work appreciatively, viz. in a sonnet to Ralegh prefixed to the first three books of the 'Faerie Queene' (1590), in the introduction of the third book, and in 'Colin Clout's come home again,' 1591. 'The twenty-first and last Book of the Ocean to Cynthia,' with a few verses of an unfinished twenty-second book is alone extant; this remains THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 363 among the Hatfield manuscripts, and has been printed by Dr. Hannah. But the latter erroneously styles it ' Continuation of the lost poem ''Cynthia," ' and assigns it to the period of Ralegh's imprisonment in the Tower. The two short poems which were found by Dr. Hannah in the same manuscript, and are printed by him as introductory to the twenty-first book, do not appear to form any part of 'Cynthia.' 'The twenty-first and last book' portrays with much poetic fervour and exuberance the despair of Ralegh at his exile from the presence of 'Cynthia,' who clearly is intended for Queen Elizabeth. Ralegh refers to himself as 'the Shepherd of the Ocean,' an appellation that Spenser had con- ferred on him. The poem is in four-line stanzas, alternately rhymed. Among other attractive specimens of Ralegh's extant verse are a fine epitaph on Sir Philip Sidney (first printed anony- mously in the 'Phoenix Nest,' 1593); two commendatory poems on the 'Faerie Queene' (in the 1590 edition of the first three books) ; 'If all the world and love were young,' the reply to Mar- lowe's 'Come, live with me' (in 'England's Helicon,' 1600, signed 'Ignoto,' but ascribed to Ralegh in WALTON'S Compleat Angler); 'The Silent Lover,' a lyric (signed 'Sir W. R.;' quoted by Lord Chesterfield in Letter 183; cf. HANNAH, p. 20); 'The Lie, or the Soul's Errand,' beginning 'Go Soul, the body's guest' (written before 1593; printed in Davison's 'Poetical Rhapsody,' 1608 anon., and with feeble alterations and additional stanzas in Joshua Sylvester's 'Posthumi,' 1633 and 1641); 'The Pilgrimage' (probably written in 1603; cf. Notes and Queries, ist ser. iv. 353), a remarkable proof of Ralegh's resigned temper in the presence of death, and a poem of somewhat lascivious tone, beginning 'Nature that wash'd her hands in milk,' which was first printed in full, from Harleian MS. 6917, f. 48, in Mr. Bul- len's ' Speculum Amantis,' p. 76. The masterly concluding stanza ('O cruel Time, which takes on trust') of this last lyric was printed as a separate poem in the 'Remaines.' Among the books of his friend which Ralegh graced with prefatory verses were Gascoigne's 'Steele Glas,' 1576; Sir Arthur Gorges's 'Pharsalia,' 1614; and William Lithgow's 'Pilgrims' Farewell,' 1618. Many quotations from the classics are translated metrically in the 'History of the World.' Ralegh's poems were collected by Sir 364 SIDNEY LEE S. Egerton Brydges in 1814, but the best collection is that by Dr. Hannah, 1885. Somewhat similar difficulties to those that attach to the identi- fication of Ralegh's poetry beset his prose works. David Lloyd, in his 'Statesmen of England,' 1665, states that Hampden before the civil wars had transcribed at his cost 3,452 sheets of Ralegh's writings. The works remaining in manuscript or published under his name do not account for so bulky a mass. That much is lost is known. The missing works apparently include a 'Treatise of the West Indies' (cf. Discovery of Guiana, Ded.), a 'Description of the River Amazon' (WOOD), a 'Treatise of Mines and the Trial of Minerals,' and, according to Ben Jonson, a 'Life of Queen Elizabeth' (Conversations with Drummond). Only three prose works by Ralegh were published in his lifetime. The earliest was 'A Report of the Truth of the Fight about the Isles of Azores,' London (for William Ponsonby), 1591, anon, (reprinted under Ralegh's name by Hakluyt in 1595, and sepa- rately by Mr. Arber in 1871). It was followed by the 'Discovery of the Empyre of Guiana' (London, by Robert Robinson), of which two editions appeared in 1596 (copies of both are in the British Museum); this was reprinted in Hakluyt, iii. (1598), and immediately translated into Dutch (Amsterdam, 1605) and into Latin (Nuremberg, 1599, and also in Hulsius's 'Collection'). The best edition is that published by the Hakluyt Society (1848), with introduction by Sir R. H. Schomburgk. The last work that Ralegh printed was his 'History of the World.' Begun for the benefit of Prince Henry, who died before its completion, it was executed while Ralegh was in the Tower, between, it is said, 1607 and 1614. During his imprisonment he extended his learning in all directions, but he did not know Hebrew, and when he could find no Latin translation of a Hebrew work, which he deemed it needful to consult, he borrowed 'the interpre- tation' of some learned friend. He thus derived occasional aid from Robert Burhill [q. v.], John Hoskins (1566-1638) [q. v.], and Harriot; but there is no good reason to doubt that most of the 660 authors which he cited were known to him at first hand. Ben Jonson, who regarded Ralegh as his 'father' in literature, claims to have revised the 'History' before it went to press, and THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 365 to have written 'a piece of the Punic War;' but even if Jonson's testimony be accepted, it does not justify Algernon Sidney's comment, in his 'Discourses on Government/ that Ralegh was 'so well assisted than an ordinary man with the same helps might have performed the same thing.' In this view Isaac D'Israeli unwarrantably followed Sidney. But the insinuation that Ralegh borrowed his plumage rests on no just foundation. Ralegh's labours, which began with the creation, only reached to 130 B.C., the date of the conversion of Macedonia into a Roman province. He traced the rise and fall of the three great empires of Babylon, Assyria, and Macedon, and dealt exhaustively with the most flourishing periods of Jewish, Greek, and Roman history. As originally designed the work was to fill three volumes, and the published volume, consisting of five books, is called 'The First Part.' But Ralegh relinquished his task without doing more than amass a few notes for a continuation. In a desultory fashion he collected materials for an English section, and asked Sir Robert Cotton for works on British antiquities and 'any old French history wherein our nation is mentioned.' But the report that he completed a second volume, which he burnt, may be safely rejected. Winstanley, in his 'English Worthies,' 1660, who is copied by Aubrey, says that the publisher, Walter Burre, told Ralegh that the first part had failed to sell, whereupon Ralegh flung a second completed part into the fire. Another apocryphal anecdote (related in Robert Heron's 'Letters on Literature,' 1785, p. 213, and accepted by Carlyle) assigns the same act to Ralegh's despair of arriving at historic truth, after hearing a friend casually describe an incident that both had witnessed in terms that proved that it took in his friend's eyes a wholly different aspect from that which it took in his own. The work had so far advanced by 15 April 1611 as to warrant the publisher, Walter Burre, in securing on that date a license for publication. 'Sir Walter Rawleighe' is mentioned as the author in the 'Stationers' Register' (ARBER, iii. 357). It was pub- lished in 1614 Camden says on 29 March. In no extant copy of either of the two editions of 1614 is the author's name given, nor do they contain a title-page ; but there is a frontispiece elab- orately engraved by Reinold Elstracke, which is explained in 366 SIDNEY LEE some anonymous verses ('The Mind of the Front') by Ben Jonson. Of the two editions of 1614, the earlier supplies a list of errata, which are corrected in the later. The work attained an immediate popularity. Hampden, Cromwell, Bishop Hall, and Princess Elizabeth, the Electress Palatine, were among its earliest readers and admirers. James I alone condemned it. He complained that Ralegh had in his preface spoken irreverently of Henry VIII, and he believed he could detect his own features in Ralegh's portrait of Ninus, the effeminate successor of Queen Semiramis. On 22 Dec. 1614 the archbishop of Canterbury wrote asking the Stationers' Company, by direction of the king, to call in and suppress ' all copies of the book lately published by Sir Walter Rawleigh ' (ARBER, Stationers 1 Register, vol. v. p. Ixxvii). The reference is obviously to the 'His- tory of the World,' and not, as Mr. Gardiner assumed, to Ralegh's 'Prerogative of Parliaments,' which was not begun before May 1615. Chamberlain, the letter writer, declared, on 5 Jan. 1615- 16, that the 'History' l was called in by the king's command- ment for divers exceptions, but especially for being too saucy in censuring princes.' But the inhibition was apparently not per- sisted in. The book was permitted to continue in circulation after the publisher had contrived to cancel the title-page (Notes and Queries, 8th ser. v. 441-2). A second edition appeared in 1617 (with a title-page bearing Ralegh's name); others, in folio, are dated 1621, 1624, 1628, 1634, 1652 (two), 1666, 1671, 1677 (with a life by John Shirley), 1678, 1687, 1736 (the 'eleventh'). An octavo reprint appeared in 1820 at Edinburgh in6vols., and it fills vols. ii.-vii. of the Oxford edition of Ralegh's works of 1829. 'Tubus Historicus, or Historical Perspective' (1631), a summary of the fortunes of the four great ancient empires, is a bookmaker's compilation from it rather than, what it professes to be, an independent production of Ralegh's. An excerpt, en- titled ' Story of the War between the Carthaginians and their own mercenaries from Polybius,' was issued in 1657. Avowed abridg- ments, by Alexander Ross (called the 'Marrow of History') and by Lawrence Echard, are dated respectively 1650 and 1698. A brief continuation, by Ross, from 160 B.C. to A.D. 1640 appeared in 1652. THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 367 The design and style of Ralegh's 'History of the World 7 are instinct with a magnanimity which places the book among the noblest of literary enterprises. Throughout it breathes a serious moral purpose. It illustrates the sureness with which ruin over- takes 'great conquerors and other troublers of the world' who neglect law, whether human or divine, and it appropriately closes with an apostrophe to death of rarely paralleled sublimity. Ra- legh did not approach a study of history in a critical spirit, and his massive accumulations of facts have long been superannuated. But he showed an enlightened appreciation of the need of studying geography together with history, and of chronological accuracy. His portraits of historical personages Queen Jezebel, Deme- trius, Pyrrhus, Epaminondas are painted to the life ; and the frequent digressions in which he deals with events of his own day, or with philosophic questions of perennial interest, such as the origin of law, preserve for the work much of its original freshness. Remarks on the tactics of the armada, the capture of Fayal, the courage of Englishmen, the tenacity of Spaniards, England's re- lations with Ireland, emerge in the most unlikely surroundings, and are always couched in judicial and dignified language. His style, although often involved, is free from conceits. To Ralegh is also traditionally ascribed the history of the reign of William I in Samuel Daniel's 'History of England' (1618). This essay closely resembles 'An Introduction to the Breviary of the History of England with the reign of King William I, entitled the Conqueror,' which was printed in 1693 from a manuscript belonging to Archbishop Sancroft, who believed it to be by Ralegh. The authorship is not quite certain. 'A Discourse of Tenures which were before the Conquest,' by Ralegh, is printed in the Oxford edition of his works. Numerous essays by Ralegh on political themes were circulated in manuscript in his lifetime, and manuscript copies are to be found in many private and public collections. The following, which were published after his death, may be assigned to him with certainty : i. 'The Prerogative of Parliaments in England,' an argument, suggested by the proceedings against St. John in the Star-chamber in April 1615, in favour of parliamentary institutions, though over- laid with so much conventional adulation of James I as to obscure 368 SIDNEY LEE its real aim; 1628, 4to (title-pages are met with variously giving the place of publication as London, Hamburg, and Middleburg), dedicated to James I and the parliament; London, 1657, with a dedication to the parliament. 2. * Advice to his Son,' London, 1632, two editions; 1636 (a collection of sensible, if somewhat worldly, maxims). 3. 'The Prince, or Maxims of State, written by Sir Walter Rawley and presented to Prince Henry,' London, 1642. 4. 'To-day a Man, To-morrow None,' London, 1644; containing the well-known letter to his wife. 5. 'The Arraigne- ment and Conviction of Sir Walter Rawleigh,' with a few letters, 1648. 6. 'Judicious and Select Essays and Observations upon the first Invention of Shipping, the Misery of Invasive War, the Navy Royal, and Sea Service, with his Apology for his Voyage to Guiana,' London, 1650, and 1657. 7. A collection of tracts, including i, 2, and 3 above, with his 'Sceptick, an Apology for Doubt,' 'Observations concerning the Magnificency and Opu- lency of Cities,' an apocryphal 'Observations touching Trade and Commerce,' and 'Letters to divers persons of quality,' published with full list of contents on title-page in place of any general title in 1651 and again in 1656 (with Vaughan's portrait); reissued in 1657, with the addition of 'The Seat of Government,' under the general title of 'Remaines.' 8. 'The Cabinet Council, or the Chief Arts of Empire discabinated. By that ever-renowned knight Sir Walter Rawleigh,' published by John Milton, 1658; reissued in same year as 'Chief Arts of Empire' (cf. Notes and Queries, 5th ser. iii. 302). 9. 'Three Discourses: (i.) of a W T ar with Spain; (ii.) of the Cause of War; (iii.) of Ecclesiastical Power;' published by Philip Ralegh, his grandson, London, 1702. 10. 'A Military Discourse, whether it would be better to give an invader battle or to temporise and defer the same,' published by Nath. Booth of Gray's Inn, 1734. n. 'The Interest of England with regard to Foreign Alliances,' on the proposed marriage al- liances with Savoy, 1750. 'A Relation of Cadiz Action in the year 1596,' first printed in Cayley's 'Life,' 1805, chap, v., reappears, with many other pre- viously unprinted pieces of smaller interest, including the meta- physical 'Treatise of the Soul,' in the only collective edition of Ralegh's works, Oxford, 1829, 8 vols. 8vo. 'Choice Passages THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 369 from the Writings and Letters of Sir Walter Raleigh ' was edited by the Rev. Dr. Grosart in 1892. Some of the posthumous publications attributed to his pen are of doubtful authenticity. 'Observations touching Trade and Commerce with the Hollands and other Nations' (1650, and in 'Remaines,' 1651) an account of a scheme for diverting the Dutch carrying trade into English hands, which is repeated in McCulloch's 'Tracts,' 1859 is more likely by John Keymer. 'A Dialogue between a Jesuit and a Recusant in 1609,' 'The Life and Death of Mahomet' (1637), 'The Dutiful Advice of a loving Son to his aged Father' (in Oxford edit.), may be safely rejected as obvious imitations of Ralegh's style. Two volumes attributed to Ralegh by Sir Henry Sheeres [q. v.], their editor, and respectively entitled 'A Discourse on Sea Ports, principally on the Port and Haven of Dover,' 1700-1 (reprinted in 'Harleian Miscellany') and 'An Essay on the Means to maintain the Honour and Safety of England,' 1701, are more probably by Sir Dudley Digges [q. v.]. The portraits of Ralegh are numerous. Among them is a full-length, probably by Zucchero, in the National Portrait Gal- lery, dated '1588 astatis suae 34,' with a pair of compasses in the hand; another, in the Dublin Gallery, is assigned to the same artist ('aet. 44, 1598'); a third, with his son Walter (anon, dated 1602), belongs to Sir John Farnaby Lennard, bart. (cf. Cat. Tudor Exhibition, 1890) ; a fifth belongs to the Marquis of Bath (cf. Cat. National Portraits at South Kensington, 1866, 1868); a beautiful miniature at Belvoir Castle, inscribed 'aet. 65, 1618,' forms the frontispiece to Mr. Stebbing's 'Memoir,' 1891; and a portrait by Isaac Oliver is described in the ' Western Antiquary/ 1881 (i. 126). There are engraved portraits by Simon Pass (pre- fixed to his 'History of the World,' 1621), by R. Vaughan (prefixed to his ' Maxims of State'), by Houbraken (in Birch's 'Lives'), and by Vertue (prefixed to Oldys's 'Life,' 1735). The spelling Ralegh (pronounced Rawley) is that which he adopted on his father's death in 1581, and persistently used after- wards. In April 1578 he signed 'Rauleygh' (Trans, of the Devon Assoc. xv. 174) ; from November 1578 (State Papers, Dom. cxxvi. 46 i) till 1583 he signed 'Rauley.' His brother Carew signed 2B 370 SIDNEY LEE 'Raullygh' in 1578 and 'Raulligh' in 1588 (ib. ccxvi. 48 i). Mr. Stabbing gives (pp. 30-1) a list of about seventy other ways in which the name has been spelt. The form Raleigh he is not known to have employed. Lady Ralegh died in 1647. By her Ralegh had two sons, Walter and Carew. Walter, baptised at Lillington, Dorset, on i Nov. 1593, was probably born at Sherborne. He matriculated from Corpus Christi College, Oxford, on 30 Oct. 1607, and gradu- ated B. A. in 1610, his tutor being Dr. Daniel Fairclough, alias Featley, who describes him as addicted to ' strange company and violent exercises.' In 1613 Ben Jonson accompanied him as his governor or tutor to France. Jonson declares he was 'knav- ishly inclined/ and reports a humiliating practical joke which young Ralegh played on him (Conversations with Drummond, p. 21). Attending his father in his latest expedition to Guiana, he was killed at San Tomas before 8 Jan. 1617-18, when Cap- tain Kemys announced his death to his father. The second son CAREW RALEGH (1605-1666), was born in the Tower of London and baptised at the church of St. Peter ad Vin- cula on 15 Feb. 1604-5; Richard Carew [q. v.] of Antonie was his godfather. In 1619 he entered Wadham College, Oxford, as a fellow-commoner, matriculated on 23 March 1620-1, and his name remained on the books until 1623 (GARDINER, Reg. Wad- ham Coll. Oxford). He is said to have written poetry while at Oxford. Wood saw some sonnets of his composition ; a poem by him beginning ' Careless of love and free from fears ' was printed in Lawes's 'Ayres and Dialogues,' 1653 (p. n). His distant kinsman William Herbert, third earl of Pembroke, brought him to court, but James I complained that he looked like his father's ghost, and, taking the hint, he spent a year in foreign travel. A bill restoring him in blood passed through the House of Lords in 1621 and through both houses of parliament in 1624, but James I withheld his assent, and, although it was submitted again in 1626, it did not receive the royal assent, till 1628, when it was made a condition that Ralegh should resign all claim to the Dorset estates (Lords Journals, vol. iii. passim; Commons' Journals, i. 755 sq.). In other respects Charles I treated him considerately, and in 1635 he became a gentleman of the privy chamber. In 1639 he was THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER RALEGH 371 sent to the Fleet prison for a week and suspended from his at- tendance at court for drawing his sword on a fellow-courtier (cf. Hist. MSS. Comm. 4th Rep. p. 294). But he nominally remained in the king's service until the king's escape to the Isle of Wight in 1645. According to Wood, Charles I 'honoured him with a kind token at his leaving Hampton Court' (cf. Lords' Journals, vi. 186). He is said by Wood to have 'cringed afterwards to the men in power.' He had long set his heart on recovering his father's estates at Sherborne, and he presented to the House of Commons between 1648 and 1660 several petitions on the subject, one of which largely autobiographical was published in 1669 as 'A brief Relation of Sir Walter Ralegh's Troubles' (reprinted in Harl. Misc. and in Somers Tracts; cf. Commons' Journals, vi. 595, viii. 131 seq. ; Lords' Journals, xi. 115 seq.). Wood chroni- cles a rumour that ne defended his father's memory by writing 'Observation upon some particular persons and passages [in William Sanderson's 'Compleat History'], written by a Lover of the Truth,' London, 1659, 4to. The pamphlet doubtless owed something to Carew's suggestions. He certainly expostulated with James Ho well for expressing doubt in his ' Epistolae Hoeli- anae' of the existence of the mine in Guiana, and induced Howell to retract his suspicions in 1635 (cf. Epistola Hoel. ed. Jacobs, ii. 479 seq.). Meanwhile he took some active part in politics. He sat in parliament as member for Haselmere (1648-53) ; Carlyle is apparently in error in saying that he represented Callington in the closing years of the Long parliament (Notes and Queries, 6th ser. vol. xii. passim, yth ser. vol. i. passim). In May 1650 he was committed to the Tower for a few days for ' passionate words ' spoken at a committee (Commons Journals, vi. 413, 416). On 10 Aug. 1658 John Evelyn dined with him in his house at West Horsley (EVELYN, Diary, ii. 102). He took his place in the re- stored Rump parliament on 7 May 1659, and sat regularly till the members were expelled on 13 Oct. He was reinstated with his fellow-members on 26 Dec. and attended the house till the dis- solution in March (MASSON, Milton, iv.). He zealously seconded Monck's efforts for the restoration, and through Monck's influence was appointed governor of Jersey on 29 Feb. 1659-60 (WHITE- LOCKE, p. 697), but it is doubtful if he visited the island. On 372 SIDNEY LEE Charles IPs return he declined knighthood, and the honour was conferred upon his son Walter (15 June 1660). He owned prop- erty in Surrey; in 1629 the Earl of Southampton conveyed to him the manor of East Horsley, and he succeeded in 1643, on the death of his uncle Sir Nicholas Throgmorton, to the estate of West Horsley (MANNING and BRAY, Surrey, iii. 31; BRAYLEY and BRITTEN, Surrey, ii. 76). In December 1656 Ralegh settled the West Horsley property on his sons Walter and Philip, but the arrangement was voided by Walter's death, about 1663, and he sold the estate in 1665 to Sir Edward Nicholas for 9,75o/. (Gent. Mag. 1790, i. 419). Ralegh's London house was in St. Martin's Lane, and, dying there in 1666, he was buried on i Jan. 1666-7, in his father's grave in St. Margaret's Church, Westminster. The register describes him as 'kild,' which has been interpreted as murdered. By his will he made his widow sole executrix (Gent. Mag. 1850, ii. 368). He married Philippa (born Weston), 'the rich widow of Sir Anthony Ashley.' His son Philip, of London and Tenchley in Surrey, was stated in 1695 to have four sons (Wal- ter, Carew, and two others) and three daughters (LE NEVE, Knights, p. 74) ; he edited in 1702 No. 9 in the list given above of his grandfather's tracts, and died in 1705. Carew's daughter Anne married Sir Philip Tyrell of Castlethorpe (WOOD, A thence Oxon. ed. Bliss, ii. 244). The commonly repeated statement that Sir Walter Ralegh also left an illegitimate daughter rests apparently on a reference made by Ralegh 'to my poor daughter to whom I have given nothing,' in a letter which he is reputed to have addressed to his wife in July 1603. 'Teach thy son,' he adds, 'to love her for his father's sake.' The letter, the genuineness of which is doubtful, was first printed in Bishop Goodman's 'Court of James T (ed. Brewer, 1839; cf. EDWARDS, ii. 383-387; STEBBING, pp. 195-8). THE LIFE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY 373 THE LIFE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY SIDNEY LEE [From the Dictionary of National Biography.'} SIDNEY, SIR PHILIP (1554-1586), soldier, statesman, and poet, born at Penshurst 30 Nov. 1554, was eldest son of Sir Henry Sidney [q. v.] by his wife Mary, daughter of John Dudley, duke of Northumberland. A tree still standing in Penshurst Park is identified with one which, according to Ben Jonson, Of a nut was set, At his great birth, where all the Muses met. His godfathers were Philip II of Spain, Queen Mary's husband, after whom he was named, and John Russell, first earl of Bedford [q. v.]. His godmother was his widowed grandmother, Jane, duchess of Northumberland. The child's infancy was apparently passed at Penshurst. When he was nine and a half his father, who was lord president of Wales, appointed him lay rector of the church of Whitford, Flintshire, of which the incumbent, Hugh Whitford, had just been deprived on account of his Roman Catholic leanings. On 8 May 1564 Gruff John, rector of Skyneog, acting as Philip's proctor, was duly admitted to the church and rectory of Whitford, and Philip thenceforth derived from the bene- fice an income of 6o/. a year (cf. manuscripts at Penshurst). On 16 Nov. 1564 he entered Shrewsbury school, of which Thomas Ashton was the master. Fulke Greville [q. v.] entered the school on the same day, and their friendship was only interrupted by death. Of Sidney's youth Greville wrote : ' I will report no other won- der than this, that, though I lived with him and knew him from a child, yet I never knew him other than a man ; with such staidness of mind, lovely and familiar gravity, as carried grace and reverence above greater years ; his talk ever of knowledge, and his very play tending to enrich his mind, so that even his teachers found some- thing in him to observe and learn above that which they had usually read or taught. Which eminence by nature and industry made his 374 SIDNEY LEE worthy father style Sir Philip in my hearing, though I unseen, lumen families suce.' A grave demeanour accentuated through life his personal fascination. From his infancy Philip was a lover of learning. At the age of eleven he wrote letters to his father in both French and Latin, and Sir Henry sent him advice on the moral conduct of life, which might well have been addressed to one of maturer years. In 1568 Philip left Shrewsbury for Christ Church, Oxford. There he continued to make rapid progress, and the circle of his admirers grew. His tutor, Thomas Thornton, left directions that the fact that Philip had been his pupil should be recorded on his tomb- stone. His chief friends at Christ Church were Richard Carew [q. v.], Richard Hakluyt [q. v.], and William Camden. But, as at Shrewsbury, his most constant companion was Greville, who joined Broadgates Hall (now Pembroke College) at the same time as Philip went to Christ Church. His health was delicate, and his uncle, Leicester, who was chancellor of the university, wrote to Archbishop Parker soliciting a license to eat flesh during Lent in behalf of 'my boy Philip Sidney, who is somewhat subject to sickness.' On 2 Aug. 1568 Sir Henry visited his son at Oxford, and took him back with him to Ludlow. On the road they turned aside to inspect Leicester's castle of Kenil worth. An earlier introduction of the boy to Sir William Cecil had in- spired that statesman with an active interest in his welfare. Writ- ing to. his father on 9 Aug. 1568, Cecil sent his remembrances to 'the darling Philip.' On 3 Sept. Cecil wrote reproaching Sir Henry for having carried away 'your son and my scholar from Oxford. ' Philip spent his holidays at the end of the year with the Cecils at Hampton Court. 'He is worthy to be loved,' wrote Cecil to his father, 'and so I do love him as he were my own' (5 Jan. 1569). Sir Henry took practical advantage of the affection which his son inspired in the great statesman by proposing that a marriage should be arranged between Philip and Cecil's elder daughter, Anne, who was two years the lad's junior. Cecil po- litely hinted in reply that his daughter, who was only thirteen, must seek a richer suitor. Sir Henry anxiously pressed the negotia- tion. He or his brother-in-law, the Earl of Leicester, who heartily approved the match, undertook to provide Philip with an income THE LIFE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY 375 of 266^. 135. 4^. on the day of his marriage, with a reversion to a fixed income of 84o/. 45. 2d. and other sums on the death of his parents. Cecil soon agreed to pay down i,ooo/. and to leave his daughter an annuity of 66/. 135. $d. A marriage settlement was drafted on these lines, but Sir Henry mislaid it when it was sent to him to Ireland for signature, and, although on 24 Feb. 1570 Sir Henry wrote to Cecil that he would not wish the match broken off, even if his son were offered 'the hand of the greatest prince's daughter in chrysendom,' the scheme fell through. Philip often wrote to Cecil while the marriage negotiations were in progress, and expressed anxiety to stand high in his estimation, but no ref- erence was made to Anne, and it is obvious that the boy and girl were not consulted. Cecil arranged next year for Anne's marriage with Edward Vere, seventeenth earl of Oxford [q. v.]. On 26 Oct. 1573 it was suggested that both Philip and his brother Robert should be married to daughters of the twelfth Lord Berkeley, but the suggestion was not seriously entertained. Early in 1571 the plague raged at Oxford, and Philip left the university, not to return. He took no degree. The next few months seem to have been spent partly at Ludlow with his family, partly at Kenilworth with his uncle Leicester, and partly at Pens- hurst, but he contrived to pay frequent visits to the court. In May 1572 he received the queen's license to undertake a two years' visit to the continent 'for his attaining the knowledge of foreign languages.' Leicester, in a letter of introduction forwarded to Francis Walsingham, the English ambassador at Paris, described his nephew as 'young and raw.' Philip left London on 26 May in the suite of the Earl of Lincoln, who was proceeding to the French court to negotiate a marriage between Queen Elizabeth and the Due d'Alencon. He remained in Paris for nearly three months, residing at the English embassy. Walsingham intro- duced him to the leaders of French society, and Charles IX, king of France, gave him a cordial welcome, bestowing on him the title of baron and appointing him gentleman in ordinary of the royal bedchamber. With the religious sentiments of the Huguenots he was already in deep sympathy, and he was soon on terms of close intimacy with their leaders. Henry of Navarre treated him as a friend and equal, and Phih'p was doubtless present on 18 Aug. 376 SIDNEY LEE at Henry's marriage in Notre Dame with Margaret, the king's sister. There followed on 23 Aug., on the eve of St. Bartholomew's day, the great massacre of the protestants. Sidney enjoyed the protection of the English embassy, and ran no personal risk, but on 9 Sept. 1572, when the news of the great crime reached the English privy council, Burghley and Leicester at once despatched orders to Walsingham to procure passports for Sidney so that he might at once leave the country. In charge of Dr. Watson he set out for Lorraine, whence he passed to Strasburg and afterwards down the Rhine through Heidelberg to Frankfort. Between March and June 1573 he lodged at Frankfort with Andrew Wechel, a learned printer. In the same house there was living Hubert Languet, the learned protestant controversialist and scholar. Languet was fifty-four years old, but similarity of tastes and views attracted him to the young traveller, and there sprang up between them a lasting friendship. To Languet's influence Sidney attributed practically all his knowledge of literature and religion. In the 'Arcadia' Sidney recalled how Languet's 'good strong staff ' his 'slippery years upbore.' In the summer of 1573 Sidney accompanied Languet to Vienna, and visited the court of the Emperor Maxi- milian II. In August he left Vienna ostensibly to make a three days r journey to Presburg, but he remained in Hungary more than a month. After returning for a few weeks to Vienna in October, he left Languet to make an extended tour in Italy. On parting they agreed to correspond with each other every week. The older man seems to have kept the bargain more faithfully than the younger, but many interesting letters from Sidney survive. Sir Thomas Coningsby [q. v.], Lodowick or Lewis Bryskett [q. v.], and Griffin Madox, a faithful servant, bore him company in Italy. Most of his time was spent at Venice, where the council of ten granted him a license to bear arms in all parts of the republic's dominions. Arnaud du Ferrier, the French ambassador, and Count Philip Lewis of Hanau, a visitor like himself, showed him many attentions. He came to know the painters Tintoretto and Paolo Veronese, and he enjoyed the magnificent hospitality of the Venetian merchants. At Venice he also continued his studies, learning astronomy and music, and reading history and THE LIFE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY 377 current Italian literature. Languet sent him valuable advice, urging him to form his Latin style on Cicero's letters, and not to absorb himself in astronomy and geometry. Such services tended to gravity, of which Sidney already possessed abundance. 'lam more sober/ Sidney admitted in reply, 'than my age or business requires.' During the early months of 1574 Sidney visited Genoa, and spent several weeks at Padua. In February he sat to Paolo Veronese for his portrait (now lost) which was sent as a gift to Languet. Languet thought the expression ' too sad and thought- ful.' During the latter part of Sidney's stay in Venice, politics chiefly occupied him. He sent letters to Leicester full of enthusiasm for the protestant cause. At Nimeguen on 15 April 1574 Count Lewis of Nassau (brother of William of Orange), whom Sidney had met both at Paris and Frankfort, was killed in battle with the Span- iards, and the sad incident filled Sidney with fears for the future of protestantism. In July 1574 Sidney, whose health was still weak, fell seriously ill from drinking too much water, it was thought. He long felt the effects of the illness. At the end of July Sidney left Italy to revisit Languet at Vienna, and he accompanied him to Poland. There he is said to have received and to have rejected a suggestion that he should offer him- self as a candidate for the throne which Henry of Valois had vacated in June on succeeding to the crown of France. In De- cember he sent to Lord Burghley from Vienna a survey of politics in the east of Europe, and he was apparently entrusted during the winter with some diplomatic duties as secretary of legation, jointly with Edward Wotton. Together they learnt horsemanship from John Peter Pugliano, esquire of the emperor's stables, and Sidney gave a vivid account in the opening passage of his 'Apologie for Poetrie' of Pugliano's enthusiasm for soldiers and horses. At the end of February 1575 Sidney rode in the train of the emperor from Vienna to Prague, whither the emperor went to preside over the Bohemian diet. While still at Prague, early in March, Sidney received a summons to return home. Reports had been circulated that he had become a catholic, but Languet proved in a letter to Walsingham, how secretary of state, the absurdity of the rumour. Sidney travelled by way of Dresden, Heidelberg, Strasburg, Frank- 378 SIDNEY LEE fort, and Antwerp, reaching London early in June 1575. He visited or was visited by many learned men on the way. Zacharias Ursinus, the protestant controversialist, and Henri Estienne (Stephanus), the classical printer, who dedicated to Sidney his edi- tion of Herodian in 1581, met him at Heidelberg. Languet spent some time with him at Frankfort ( JANSON, De Vitis Stephanorum, Amsterdam, 1683, p. 67). Settled again in England, Sidney frequented the court, where his uncle Leicester was anxious to advance his interests. Walsing- ham also gave him a kindly welcome, and the queen received him favourably. In July 1576 he was present at the ornate festivities with which Leicester entertained his sovereign at Kenilworth. Thence he removed with the court to Chartley Castle, the seat of Walter Devereux, first earl of Essex [q. v.]. His charm of manner at once captivated the earl. At Chartley, too, he probably first met the earl's daughter Penelope, then a girl twelve years old, who some years later was to excite in him an overmastering passion. Now Philip had other troubles. His pecuniary position was un- satisfactory. In August 1575 he gave a bond for42/. 65. to Richard Rodway, a London tailor, and later he sent a boot bill for 4/. los. 4d. to his father's steward with a request that he would meet it. In the winter of 1576 he was staying at his uncle's house in London, and was improving his acquaintance with Essex, whose guest he often was at Durham House. Essex saw in him a promising suitor for his daughter Penelope. In July Essex travelled to Ire- land to take up his appointment as earl marshal. Philip went with him in order to pay a visit to his father, who was then lord deputy. Father and son met at Dublin, and in September travelled together to Athlone and Galway, where Philip saw much of the difficulties of Irish government. On 21 Sept. his new friend, Essex, died at Dublin. Almost his last words were of his admiration for Philip : ' I wish him well so well that, if God move their hearts, I wish that he might match with my daughter. I call him son he is so wise, virtuous, and godly. If he go on in the course he hath begun, he will be as famous and worthy a gentleman as ever England bred.' The earl's secretary, Edward Waterhouse [q. v.], wrote to Sir Henry Sidney on 14 Nov. that his late master anxiously desired Philip's marriage with the Lady Penelope, and spoke of the THE LIFE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY 379 dishonour that would attend a breach of the engagement (Sydney Papers, i. 147). Philip was a serious youth of two-and-twenty, and the girl a coquette of fourteen. They were thenceforth often in each other's society, and he began addressing to her the series of sonnets in which he called himself Astrophel and the lady Stella. But it would appear that Sidney's relations with Penelope very slowly passed beyond the bounds of friendship. At the outset, his sonnets were, in all probability, mere literary exercises designed in emula- tion of those addressed by the Earl of Surrey to Geraldine, which were themselves inspired by Petrarch's sonnets to Laura; Surrey's 'lyrics' are eulogised by Sidney in his 'Apologie for Poetrie' (p. 51). Neither his nor Penelope's friends regarded their union with serious favour, while some references in Philip's correspond- ence with Languet during 1578 suggest that he had no immediate intention of submitting to the restraints of matrimony. In such sonnets as can be assigned on internal evidence to an early date, Sidney confined himself to calm eulogies of Penelope's beauty. When a deeper note was sounded, Stella had become another's wife [see RICH, PENELOPE, LADY RICH], and it was her marriage in 1581 that seems to have first stirred in Sidney a genuine and barely controllable passion. Public affairs absorbed too much of his interest to render him an easy prey to women's blandishments. Early in 1577 he was directed to convey Elizabeth's messages of condolence and con- gratulation to the Elector Palatine Lewis at Heidelberg, and to the Emperor Rudolf II at Prague. Both princes had just suc- ceeded to their thrones on the death of their fathers. His friend Fulke Greville accompanied him, and Sir Henry Lee and Sir Jerome Bowes were members of his suite. Permission was granted him to confer with the rulers whom he met abroad about the wel- fare of the reformed religion and of civil liberty. Arrived in the Low Countries, Sidney paid his respects at Louvain to Don John of Austria, the Spanish general, who showed him every civility. While awaiting in the middle of March the arrival of the Lutheran Elector Lewis at Heidelberg, he had much friendly intercourse with the elector's brother, John Casimir, a bigoted Calvinist. His in- structions ordered him to urge a reconciliation between the Luther- 380 SIDNEY LEE ans and Calvinists of the Palatinate, and to demand certain sums of money which Queen Elizabeth had lent the late elector. In neither negotiation did he make much progress. He left Heidel- berg while the Elector Lewis was still absent, and on Easter Mon- day he presented his credentials to the emperor at Prague. In defi- ance alike of his instructions and of diplomatic etiquette, he recom- mended the emperor, in an impassioned oration, to form a league of nations against the tyrannies of Spain and Rome an appeal which the emperor naturally ignored. At Prague, Sidney paid a visit of condolence to the widow of the late Emperor Maximilian, and to his daughter, the widow of the French king, Charles IX; but he passed most of his time with Languet and his friends. On the return journey in April, Languet accompanied Sidney to Neustadt, where he met the Elector Lewis, and begged him to bring the strife between the Lutherans and Calvinists in his domin- ions to a close. He visited the Landgrave William of Hesse; but of all the princes and statesmen whom he interviewed, only John Casimir expressed approval of his project of a protestart league. At Cologne Languet left him, and, in conformity with new instructions and his own wishes, he turned aside from Antwerp to offer Queen Elizabeth's congratulations to William of Orange on the birth of a son. William received him with enthusiasm at Dordrecht, and invited him to stand godfather at the boy's bap- tism. Sidney left on William of Orange the best possible impres- sion. The prince subsequently declared that her majesty had in Sidney one of the ripest and greatest counsellors of state that lived in Europe (GREVILLE, p. 31). Very early in June Sidney arrived at the court at Greenwich, and on the pth Walsingham wrote to Philip's father in Ireland: 'There hath not been any gentleman, I am sure, these many years that hath gone through so honourable a charge with as great commendations as he.' On 21 April 1577 Philip's sister Mary had married Henry Herbert, second earl of Pembroke [q. v.], and in July he hurried down to his sister's new home at Wilton to pay her the first of many visits there. But he soon returned to court in order to use his influence with the queen against those who were poisoning her mind as to his father's conduct of the Irish government. When the Earl of Ormonde, who had steadily resisted Sir Henry Sidney THE LIFE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY 381 in Dublin, arrived on a visit to the queen, Philip was anxious to incite him to a personal encounter. In September he drew up an elaborate treatise, for the queen's perusal, in defence of his father's Irish policy (in Brit. Mus. Cotton MSS. Titus B. xii. ff. 557-9). It was divided into seven sections, of which the first three are missing, but enough survives to attest Philip's masterly grasp of the most difficult problem that confronted English statesmen. He proved his father's wisdom in levying taxation equally on the great Anglo-Irish nobles, the poorer settlers, and the native popu- lation, and attributed the frequency of disturbance to the unreason- able and arrogant pretensions of the nobility. For the moment the queen was pacified by his arguments, and Sir Henry enjoyed a few months' peace. Philip's position at court was growing steadily in influence and dignity. In the summer of 1577 he entertained Philip du Plessis Mornay, an envoy from the French protestants, who brought an introduction to him from Languet. When in June 1578 Mornay and his wife paid a second visit to England, Philip stood godfather to an infant daughter who was born during the parents' visit. On new year's day 1578 he presented the queen not only with a cambric smock, the sleeves and collar wrought in black and edged with gold and silver lace, but also with a pair of ruffs laced with gold and silver, and set with spangles that weighed four ounces. The queen sent him in return gilt plate weighing twenty-two ounces. When the queen visited Leicester on the following May-day at Wanstead, Philip turned his literary gifts to account, and prepared a fantastic masque in her honour entitled 'The Lady of May.' Philip's wide intellectual interests led him at the same time to extend the circle of his friends beyond the limits of the. court. 'There was not,' wrote Greville, 'an approved painter, skilful engineer, excellent musician, or any other artificer of fame that made not himself known to him.' But it was with men of letters that he found himself in fullest sympathy. When, in July 1578, representatives of Cambridge University waited on the queen, while she was staying at Audley End (near Saffron Walden), Gabriel Harvey [q. v. , who was a member of the deputation, met Sidney, who was in attendance on Elizabeth. That eccentric 382 SIDNEY LEE scholar at once fell under the sway of his fascination, and in his ' Gratulationes Valdinenses' which celebrated the royal visit he included an enthusiastic Latin eulogy of his new friend. It was doubtless Harvey who recommended his pupil Edmund Spenser to Sidney's notice, and to the notice of Sidney's uncle, Leicester. At the end of 1578 Spenser was Leicester's guest in London at Leicester House, and there Sidney frequently met him. Sir Edward Dyer [q. v.], a court acquaintance of Sidney, shared his affection for literature, and he, too, spent much time with Spenser at Leicester House. On 16 Oct. 1579 the poet wrote to Harvey: 'The two worthy gentlemen, Mr. Sidney and Mr. Dyer, have me, I thank them, at some use in familiarity' (cf. GABRIEL HARVEY'S Letterbook, Camden Soc. p. 101). Spenser's devotion to Sidney is not the least interesting testimony to the latter's ver- satile culture. Spenser subsequently recalled Remembrance of that most heroic spirit Who first my muse did lift out of the floor To sing his sweet delights in lowly lays. Among the complimentary verses prefixed to the first edition of the 'Faerie Queen' in 1590 were some by 'W. L.,' which reiterate Sidney's abiding influence on Spenser's literary development. At the end of 1579 Spenser dedicated to Sidney, whom he de- scribed as 'the president of nobless and of chivalry,' his 'Shep- herd's Calendar;' and the editor of the volume, Edward Kirke [q. v.], wrote of Sidney as 'a special favourer and maintainer of all kinds of learning.' With a view to converting Sidney and his friends to his own theories of the need of naturalising the classical metres in English verse, Harvey persuaded them to form a literary society which they called the Areopagus, and they seem to have often met in London during 1579 to engage in formal literary debate. Under these influences Sidney attempted many sapphics and hexameters in English, some of which he incorporated in the 'Arcadia.' He commemorated such intercourse with literary friends in a poem 'upon his meeting with his two worthy friends and fellow-poets,' Dyer and Greville (DAVISON'S Poetical Rhap- sody, ed. Bullen, i. 32). The drama also attracted Sidney, and he interested himself in the THE LIFE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY 383 welfare of his uncle Leicester's company of players. In 1582 he stood godfather to the son of Richard Tarleton, who was a member of the company. When, in 1579, Stephen Gosson [q. v.] without authority dedicated to him his denunciation of playhouses, which he entitled ' The Schoole of Abuse,' Sidney circulated an en- lightened defence of the drama in his 'Apologie for Poetrie.' To him, as the avowed champion of the stage, Thomas Lodge subsequently dedicated his 'Alarum against Usurers ' (1584). Meanwhile in the summer of 1578 Sidney received some small office about the court, and at Christmas welcomed his friend Languet, who accompanied Prince John Casimir on a visit to Elizabeth. Languet reproached Sidney with inhaling too freely the somewhat enervating atmosphere of the court. But Sidney's independence of character unfitted him for the permanent role of courtier. During the summer of 1579 he was often absent while superintending on behalf of his father the enlargement of Pens- hurst, and in August he experienced the fickleness of the favour of the queen, who extended to him the anger with which she re- ceived the news of Leicester's secret marriage with the Countess of Essex. In September Sidney was forced into a personal quarrel which gave him a further distaste for court life. While he was playing tennis at Whitehall, the Earl of Oxford came in uninvited and joined in the game. Sidney politely raised objections. The earl bade all the players leave the court, and when Sidney protested the earl called him a puppy. Sidney gave him the lie direct. 'Puppies,' he quietly retorted, 'are gotten by dogs, and children by men.' But the earl ignored the insult, and it was left to Sidney to send him a challenge. The dispute reached the queen's ears, and she forbade a duel ; but Sidney declined to act upon the queen's suggestion that he owed the earl an apology on the ground of his superior rank. Early in January 1580 he incurred the queen's wrath anew. He sent her an elaborate treatise condemning her proposed marriage with the Duke of Anjou. It was a vehemently worded appeal to the queen's patriotism and protestant zeal (Sydney Papers, i. 287-92). For some months Sidney was excluded from her presence. Retiring to Wilton, or, according to Aubrey, to the neighbouring village of Ivychurch, he engaged with his sister in literary work. Jointly they versified the psalms, and for 384 SIDNEY LEE her amusement he wrote his 'Arcadia,' a romance in prose with interludes of verse. To the same period may doubtless be referred his poem in 'dispraise of a courtly life' (DAVISON, Poetical Rhapsody, ed. Bullen, i. 34). On 18 Oct. 1580 Sidney was at Leicester House, and thence addressed to his younger brother Robert, who was travelling abroad, an elaborate letter of counsel, in which he sketched a sensible method of studying history (Sydney Papers, i. 283-5; reprinted in Profitable Instructions for Travellers, 1633). At the end of October Sidney had returned to court, apparently after promising to abstain from protests against the French marriage. Money was still scarce with him, and, with a view to increasing his narrow resources, his uncle Leicester procured for him at the end of 1580 the stewardship to the bishopric of Winchester. Sub- sequently he begged Lord Burghley to induce the queen to grant him ioo/. a year out of property seized from the papists (10 Oct. 1581). He was able on new year's day 1581 to present the queen with a gold-headed whip, a chain of gold, and a heart of gold. On 1 6 Jan. he was returned at a by-election, in place of his father, to Queen Elizabeth's fourth parliament as M. P. for Kent, but the only part he is known to have taken at the time in the proceedings of the House of Commons was as a member of the committee which recommended stringent measures against catholics and slanderers of the queen. On 3 May 1581 Don Antonio, the claimant to the throne of Portugal, addressed to his 'illustrious nephew Philip Sidney ' an appeal for help in his hopeless struggle with Philip II of Spain (Sydney Papers, i. 294). On Whit Monday and Whit Tuesday, 15 and 16 May, Sidney distinguished himself as a chief performer in an elaborate tournament which was held at White- hall in honour of an embassy from France. He was at Wilton at Christmas 1581 while the Duke of Anjou was on a visit to Eliza- beth in London. But in February 1582, with his uncle and other courtiers, he escorted the duke on leaving London to Antwerp, where he mourned anew the death of his old friend Languet, who had died in that city on 30 Sept. 1581. In August 1582, when Sir Henry was invited to resume the office of lord deputy of Ireland, he assented to the proposal on the con- dition that Philip accompanied him, but the proposal was not THE LIFE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY 385 seriously entertained. At the time Philip was in Wales. Later in the year he wrote from Wilton to ask his uncle Leicester's per- mission to stay there over Christmas. On 13 Jan. 1583 he was knighted, but the honour was not conferred on him in recognition of his personal merits. Prince John Casimir had chosen Sidney to represent him at his installation by proxy as knight of the Garter, and etiquette prescribed that a knight of the Garter's proxy must not be of lower rank than a knight-bachelor. \ He was still in need of a settled appointment and a settled income ; and soon afterwards it was agreed to associate Sidney with his uncle Warwick in the mastership of the ordnance. Thenceforth he frequently assisted his uncle, but the letters patent formally appointing him joint- master of the ordnance with Warwick were not issued, owing to the queen's vacillation, till 21 July 1585. In 1583, too, he was an unsuccessful candidate for the office of captain of the Isle of Wight, but military dignity was during the year bestowed on him by his nomination as ' general of horse;' and he was granted some por- tion of the fines paid by clerical recusants. The need of money was the more pressing in that Walsingham had proposed to Sir Henry Sidney early in 1583 that Philip should marry his daughter Frances. Sir Henry highly approved the proposal, but deplored his 'present biting necessity,' which would not allow him to make any satisfactory pecuniary settlement. Of Philip's devotion to the girl, who was only fourteen, the parents of both felt assured. Lady Penelope Devereux had married Lord Rich in 1581. Philip had never ceased writing sonnets to her, and those that seem assignable to the period when his own mar- riage was under consideration are more passionate, if more des- perate, in tone than before. It is therefore improbable that the match with Walsingham's daughter was of his own making. Nevertheless, he readily acceded to the wishes of his own and of the lady's parents. The queen at first refused to countenance the engagement, but after two months' debate with Walsingham she 'passed over the offence,' and the courtship proceeded without hindrance. The marriage was celebrated on 20 Sept. 1583, and the young couple took up their residence with the bride's parents, who divided their time between Walsingham House in London and the manor-house at Barn Elms, Surrey. Sidney's relations 2C 386 SIDNEY LEE with Lady Rich were not apparently interrupted, but he stirred in his wife a genuine affection, and the union contributed to their mutual happiness. Routine duties at court or in the department of the ordnance combined with literary study to occupy Sidney during the first months of his married life. Early in 1584 he frequently met, at the house of Fulke Greville, Giordano Bruno, the Italian phi- losopher, who had arrived in England on a visit to the French am- bassador, M. Castelnau de Mauvissiere. Sidney's fame had reached Bruno at Milan as early as 1579. At Greville's house they discussed together 'moral, metaphysical, mathematical, and natural speculations.' On 13 Feb. 1584 the Italian stated to his English friends 'the reasons of his belief that the earth moves.' Bruno dedicated two books to Sidney, 'Spaccio de la BestiaTrionfante' (1584), and the poetic 'Degli Heroici Furori' (1585). But Sidney evinced little sympathy with Bruno's scepticism in matters of religion. At the same time as he was debating science and philosophy with him, he was translating from the French of his protestant friend, Philip du Plessis Mornay, 'a work concerning the trueness of the Christian religion.' In October 1584 he went to Wilton to stand godfather to Philip, his sister's second son, and before the year was at an end he wrote a spirited defence of his uncle Leicester against the savage libel that was popularly known as 'Leicester's Commonwealth.' Sidney, who at the close of his tract dared the anonymous libeller to defend his allegations with the sword, apparently wrote with a view to publication, but the tract remained in manuscript until it was printed in Collins's 'Sydney Papers' in 1746 (i. 62-8). But Sidney's marriage did not abate his anxiety for more active employment. Despairing of the queen's intervention in the affairs of the Low Countries, he contemplated taking some part in the colonisation of North America. Philip had long shown much interest in the enterprise. When, in June 1575, the Earl of War- wick, his uncle, was fitting out Martin Frobisher's expedition in search of the North- West Passage, Philip took up at first a 2$l. share, and afterwards a 5o/. share. In his correspondence with Languet he described Frobisher's adventures with enthusiasm, and he estimated at a recklessly high rate the value of the metal THE LIFE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY 387 Frobisher brought back from Meta Incognita. In 1582 his old college friend, Richard Hakluyt, dedicated to him the first edition of his 'Voyages.' In 1583 Philip wrote to his friend, Sir Edward Stafford [q. v.], that he was half persuaded to join in the expedition to Newfoundland, under Sir Humphrey Gilbert, which ended in disaster. Meanwhile letters patent were issued to him authorising him to discover new land in America, and to hold for ever 'such and so much quantity of ground as should amount to the number of thirty hundred thousand acres.' He does not seem to have intended to personally conduct the expedition, and in July 1583 made over to Sir George Peckham the right to thirty thousand of the three million acres assigned to him. Through 1584 Sidney watched with interest Ralegh's designs on America, and in De- cember, after he had been re-elected to serve as M.P. for Kent, he sat on a committee of the House of Commons which defined the boundaries of the projected colony of Virginia. He recom- mended in February 1585 the appointment of Ralph Lane as the first governor, and some of the letters which Lane wrote to Sidney the former incorporated in his account of Virginia. In the autumn of 1 584 the queen chose Sidney to carry her con- dolences to Henri III of France on the death of his brother, the Duke of Anjou. The duty could hardly have been congenial, and before Sidney started the news of the murder of his friend and admirer, William of Orange, seemed to jeopardise the position of protestantism throughout Europe. Sidney received instructions to sound the French king as to his willingness to oppose the prog- ress of the Spaniards in the Low Countries. But the embassy proved of no effect. The French king was at Lyons when Sidney reached Paris, and he sent him word that he would not return for two months. Sidney therefore came home, more firmly con- vinced than before of the duty of England actively to resist the aggressions of Spain. With masterly insight into the situation, he argued that Spain should be challenged in her own citadels; and that her advance in Flanders, where her armies were admirably equipped to meet her enemies, should be checked by raids of Eng- lish ships on seaports of the Spanish peninsula, and on her trade with South America. But the queen hesitated, and Sidney con- centrated all his energy on endeavours to overcome her indifference. 388 SIDNEY LEE During the winter of 1584-5 he regularly attended the debates in the House of Commons, and vehemently supported the proposed penal legislation against the Jesuits. Outside parliament he inter- vened in the pending negotiations with James VI of Scotland, and used all his influence to detach that monarch from the cause of his catholic mother and from alliance with Spain. He was in repeated communication with the Scottish envoy in London, the Master of Gray, who was attracted by his personal charm, and appeared to follow his advice. Sidney did not detect the double game which the astute ambassador was playing. At length, in June 1585, the queen agreed to send an army to the Low Countries to support the cause of the protestants. Sidney was still convinced that a direct attack on Spain was the wiser course. But, wherever the blow was to be struck, he was anxious to lend a hand. There seemed much doubt whether any command would be offered him in the Low Countries, and, holding aloof from the discussions which the queen's change of policy excited in court circles, he actively interested himself during the summer in the great expedition to the Spanish coast which Drake was fitting out at Plymouth. He knew well that he could not obtain the queen's assent to take part in that enterprise, but he made up his mind to join it without inviting the royal permission. In August he hurried secretly to Plymouth, whence Drake's fleet was ready to set sail. But Drake understood the situation, and declined to risk the queen's anger. He informed the court of Sidney's plans, and the queen's imperious summons to Sidney to present himself at court proved irresistible. On 2 1 Sept. he made his peace with the queen at Nonsuch, and on 7 Nov. she signed at West- minster a patent appointing him governor of Flushing, one of the towns which the States-General had surrendered to her as security for the aid she was rendering them. At the same time Leicester was nominated commander-in-chief of the queen's forces in the Low Countries. On 1 6 Nov. Sidney left Gravesend to take up his command at Flushing, where he arrived two days later. He found the garrison weak and dispirited, and set about strengthening the defences. On 10 Dec. Leicester joined him, and passed on to the Hague amid much popular rejoicing. The Spaniards, who had held THE LIFE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY 389 Antwerp since 17 Aug., were in formidable strength, and Sidney soon realised the difficulties of the position of himself and his fellow-countrymen. Supplies were slow in coming from England. The Dutch allies were listless or suspicious, and Leicester was soon involved in a quarrel with the queen, in which he had Sidney's full sympathy. But Sidney did what he could to prevent the dis- pute from wholly diverting Leicester's attention from the perils of the immediate situation. Repeatedly did he hurry to the Hague to urge on his uncle and on the Dutch government the necessity, at all hazards, of immediate and resolute action in the field. But disappointments accumulated. When, in February 1586, Sidney was appointed by Leicester colonel of the Zeeland regiment of horse, a rival candidate, Count Hohenlohe, protested against the promotion of a foreigner, and the queen judged the count's griev- ance just. To Lord Burghley and to his father-in-law Sidney sent vehement appeals to rouse the queen to a fuller sense of her responsibilities. At any rate, he pointed out, it was a point of honour for her to equip the army with the supplies requisite for the work that awaited it. 'I understand I am called ambitious and proud at home/ he protested to Walsingham; 'but certainly, if they knew my heart, they would not altogether so judge me.' At the end of March his wife joined him at Flushing, and soon after he learnt there of his father's death on 6 May, and of his mother's death on 1 1 Aug. Leicester did not encourage him to take service in the field. Nevertheless, on 6-7 July Sidney, with his friend Prince Maurice, effected a raid on Axel, a village in the Spaniards' hands only twenty miles from Flushing. The attack was made by night and in boats. Sidney showed great courage and alertness, and the garrison surrendered without striking a blow. After providing for the government of the town, Sidney joined the main body of the army, which was with Leicester at Arnhem, but he was soon ordered back to his post at Flushing. On 2 Sept. he took part in the successful assault on Doesburg, a weak fortress near Arnhem. A few days later Leicester wisely resolved to attack the strong- hold of Zutphen. On 13 Sept. he brought his army within sight of the town, and encamped with the infantry on the left bank of the river Yssel, which ran beside the town, leaving the cavalry 390 SIDNEY LEE on the right bank, near the village of Warnsfeld, under the joint command of Count Lewis William of Nassau and Sir John Norris. Sidney joined the latter as a volunteer and knight-errant (MOTLEY, ii. 46). His regiment of horse was at Deventer, whither it had been sent to quell an anticipated revolt. On the 2ist news arrived that a troop of Spaniards convoying provisions was to arrive at Zutphen at daybreak next morning. Leicester directed Norris, with two hundred horsemen, and Sir William Stanley, with three hundred horsemen, to intercept the approaching force. Sidney and his brother Robert determined on their own initiative to join in the attack. When leaving his tent at a very early hour in the morning of Thursday the 22nd, Philip met Sir William Pelham, who had omitted to put on his leg-armour. Sidney, rashly disdaining the advantage of better equipment than a friend, quixotically threw off his own cuisses. A thick fog at first obscured the enemy's movements. When it lifted, the little force of five hundred English horsemen found itself under the walls of Zutphen and in face of a detachment of the enemy's cavalry three thousand strong. The English charged twice, but were compelled on each occasion to retreat after hard fighting. During the second charge Sidney's horse was killed under him. Mounting another, he foolhardily thrust his way through the enemy's ranks, and, when turning to rejoin his friends, he was struck by a bullet on the left thigh, a little above the knee. He managed to keep his saddle until he reached the camp, a mile and a half distant. There, parched with thirst, he called for drink. A bottle of water was brought, but as he was placing it to his lips, a grievously wounded foot soldier was borne past him and fixed greedy eyes on the bottle. Sidney at once handed it to the dying man with the famous words, ' Thy necessity is yet greater than mine' (GREVILLE, p. 145; cf. MOTLEY, ii. 51 seq., where the dates, given in the new style, are ten days later). From the camp Sidney was carried in Leicester's barge down the Yssel and the Rhine to Arnhem, and lodged in the house of a lady named Gruithuissens. His wife, although far advanced in pregnancy, hastened from Flushing to nurse him, and his brother Robert was a frequent visitor to the sick-chamber. The wound failed to heal, and ultimately mortified. Sidney at the outset THE LIFE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY 391 trembled at the approach of death, but the consolations of religion restored his equanimity, and he awaited the end with pathetic composure. He improvised a short poem, called 'La Cuisse rompue," and caused it to be set to music and sung at his bedside. To a learned friend, Belarius, he wrote a Latin letter, a copy of which was forwarded to the queen. Both poem and letter are lost. He ordered his 'Arcadia' to be burned. Finally he dictated a will in which he showed characteristic consideration for his friends and dependents. His widow was nominated sole executrix. A codicil, dated the day of his death, made some trifling changes in the smaller legacies. He died after twenty-six days' suffering on 17 Oct., bidding his relatives with his last breath love his memory and cherish his friends (GREVILLE, p. 160). The States-General begged the honour of according the hero burial within their own dominions, and offered to spend half a ton of gold on a memorial. But the request was refused. On 24 Oct. the body, after being embalmed, was removed to Flushing. On i Nov. twelve hundred English soldiers and a great concourse of Dutch burghers escorted the coffin to Sidney's own vessel, The Black Pinnace, which, with sails of black, landed its burden at Tower Hill on 5 Nov. Thence the coffin was borne to a house in the Minories to await a public funeral. But three months expired before the interment. The delay was due to pecuniary difficulties. The creditors of Sidney and his father were numerous and importunate. It appeared that lands assigned by Sidney's will to Walsingham for the satisfaction of his creditors were diffi- cult to realise, while the lawyers raised doubts as to the lawfulness of the disposition of his property. Walsingham reluctantly paid 6,ooo/. out of his own pocket, and then appealed for help to Leicester. It was not till 16 Feb. that Sidney's friends found themselves in a position to face the heavy expenses of the public funeral which his deserts in their eyes and in the eyes of the nation demanded. On 1 6 Feb. 1586-7 seven hundred mourners of all classes walked in the procession to St. Paul's Cathedral. At its head marched thirty-two poor men and Sidney's regiment of horse. The pall- bearers were Fulke Greville, Edward Wotton, Edward Dyer, and Thomas Dudley. His brother Robert was chief mourner. Each 392 SIDNEY LEE of the seven united provinces sent a representative. The cortege was closed by the lord-mayor and three hundred of the city trained bands. The grave was under the lady-chapel at the back of the high altar. In 1590 Sir Francis Walsingham was laid in the same tomb, which was destroyed in the great fire of 1666. Thomas Lant [q. v.] published thirty-four engraved copper- plates of the funeral procession and ceremony, with a description in Latin and English. It was entitled 'Sequitur Celebritas et Pompa Funeris' (London, 1587, oblong folio). By the terms of his will, Sidney's father-in-law Walsingham and his brother Robert had authority to defray his own and his father's debts from the sale of his lands in Lincolnshire, Sussex, and Hampshire. His wife he left for life half the income of his various properties. His daughter Frances received a marriage portion of 4,ooo/., and his younger brother Thomas lands to the value of ioo/. a year. To his sister, the Countess of Pembroke, he left 'his best Jewell beset with diamonds;' to his friends Edward Dyer and Fulke Greville he bequeathed his books. Surgeons and divines who attended his deathbed, and all his ser- vants at home, from his steward Griffith Madox, who received an annuity of 4o/., downwards, were substantial legatees. The re- sidue of his estate passed to his brother Robert (cf . Sydney Papers, \. 109-13). Sir Philip's widow, who, at great risk to her life, was delivered of a still-born child in December 1586, proved the will on 19 June 1589. Next year she married Robert Devereux, second earl of Essex [q. v.], and, after his death in 1601, Richard de Burgh, earl of Clanricarde. She died before 1635. By her Sidney was the father of a daughter, Frances, on whose birth, on 31 Jan. 1583-4, Scipio Gentili, the civilian, wrote a Latin poem entitled 'Nereus' (London, 1585, 4to); Queen Elizabeth was her god- mother; she married Roger Manners, earl of Rutland [q. v.], and died without issue in August 1612. Jonson describes her as 'nothing inferior to her father in poesie' (Conversations, p. 16). The grief which Sidney's death evoked has been rarely paral- leled. It was accounted a sin for months afterwards for any gentleman of quality to wear gay apparel in London. From all classes came expressions of dismay. The queen was overwhelmed with sorrow, although she afterwards complained that Sidney THE LIFE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY 393 invited death by his rashness (NAUNTON, p. 19). 'What perfec- tion he was born unto, and how able he was to serve her majesty and his country, all men here almost wonder,' wrote his uncle Leicester to Walsingham from the Hague eight days after his death. The sentiment was repeated in every variety of phrase. 'This is that Sidney,' wrote Camden, 'who as Providence seems to have sent him into the world to give the present a specimen of the ancients, so it did on a sudden recall him and snatch him from us as more worthy of heaven than of earth.' Thomas Nash, in his 'Piers Penilesse,' apostrophised Sidney in the words 'Well couldst thou give every virtue his encouragement, every wit his due, every writer his desert, 'cause none more virtuous, witty, or learned than thyself.' Both the universities published collections of elegies. At Cambridge the volume which was edited by Alex- ander Neville (1544-1614) [q. v.] was dedicated to Leicester, and included a sonnet in English by James VI of Scotland, with Latin translations of it by the king, by Patrick, lord Gray, Sir John Maitland, Alexander Seton, and by James Halkerston, who con- tributed two version's. At Oxford two volumes appeared, one edited by William Gager and entitled 'Exequiae | Illustrissimi Equitis D. Philip- | Pi Sidnaei, Gratissi- | mae Memoriae Ac No- Mini Impensae,' with a dedication to Leicester; the other, edited by John Lhuyd and dedicated to Sidney's brother-in-law, the Earl of Pembroke, under the title 'Peplos | Illustrissimi | viri D. Phi- lippi | Sidnaei Supre- | Mis Honoribus Dictatus | .' The chief contributors to the latter were members of New College. The most interesting of the poetic memorials, which numbered fully two hundred, is the collection of eight elegies which was appended in 1595 to Spenser's 'Colin Clouts come Home again.' The opening poem, entitled 'Astrophel: a Pastorall Elegie,' after which the collection is usually named, was by Spenser himself, and was dedicated to Sidney's widow, who had then become the Earl of Essex's wife. Sidney's sister, the Countess of Pembroke, Lodowick Bryskett, Matthew Roydon, and Sir Walter Ralegh are among the contributors to the collection. Other poetical tributes of literary or bibliographical interest were issued in separate vol- umes by Sir William Herbert (d. 1593) [q. v.] in 1586; by George Whetstone [q. v.] in 1586; by John Philip (ft. 1566) [q. v.] in 1587, 394 SIDNEY LEE dedicated to the Earl of Essex; by Angel Day [q. v.] in 1587; and by Thomas Churchyard [q. v.], dedicated to Lady Sidney (n. d.). Funeral songs with music appeared in William Byrd's 'Psalms, Sonnets, and Songs,' 1588, while five pieces on the same theme by the mysterious 'A. W.' are in Davison's 'Poetical Rhapsody' (ed. Bullen, i. 63-71, ii. 90-3). A charming elegy, 'Amoris Lachrymae,' figures in Breton's 'Bowre of Delights ' (London, R. Johnes, 1591, 4to), and an eclogue on Sidney in Drayton's 'Eclogues' (1593, No. 4). Sidney's force of patriotism and religious fervour were accom- panied by much political sagacity, by high poetical and oratorical gifts, and by unusual skill in manly sports. Such versatility, allied to a naturally chivalric, if somewhat impetuous, temperament, generated a rare personal fascination, the full force of which was brought home to his many friends by his pathetic death, from a wound received in battle, at the early age of thirty-two. His achievements, when viewed in detail, may hardly seem to justify all the eulogies in verse and prose which his contemporaries be- stowed upon his brief career ; but the impression that it left in its entirety on his countrymen's imagination proved ineffaceable. Shelley, in his 'Adonais,' gave expression to a sentiment still almost universal among Englishmen when he wrote of Sidney as he fought And as he fell, and as he lived and loved, Sublimely mild, a spirit without spot. Portraits of Sidney are very numerous. A picture containing full- length life-size figures of Sir Philip and his younger brother Robert is at Penshurst. There also is the familiar and often engraved three-quarter length, life-size, with clean-shaven face, by Zucchero, dated 1577, when Sidney was twenty-two. The miniature by Isaac Oliver, in which Sidney is represented reclining under a tree and wearing a tall hat, with the gardens at Wilton in the back- ground, is now at Windsor ; it was finely engraved by Vertue for the 'Sydney Papers,' to which it forms the frontispiece, and there is a good photogravure in Jusserand's 'English Novel' (English transl. 1890). Another miniature by Oliver, in a silver filigree frame, belongs to Sir Charles Dilke, and a third miniature (anony- mous) is at Penshurst. There seems nothing to confirm the con- THE LIFE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY 395 jecture that the last reproduces the portrait, apparently lost, which was painted for Sidney's friend Languet by Paolo Veronese at Venice in 1574, and there is no means of identifying a second por- trait noticed by Languet as in the possession of one Abondius at Vienna in the same year (cf . Notes and Queries, 2nd ser. x. 308 ; Gent. Mag. 1854, ii. 152-3). At Woburn a portrait doubtfully assigned to Sir Antonio More is on fairly good grounds identified with Sidney; it has been engraved. A very attractive half-length portrait (anonymous) is in the collection of the Earl of Warwick. Another portrait attributed to Zucchero, painted after Sidney's death, belongs to the Marquis of Lothian. A portrait labelled 'Sir Philip Sidney who writ the Arcadia' belongs to the Earl of Darnley. Another is at Knole. An engraving by C. Warren, from a portrait at Wentworth Castle, inaccurately attributed to Velasquez, prefaces Zouch's ' Memoirs' (1809); Dr. Waagen assigns this portrait to the Netherlandish school. Dallaway (Anecdotes of Paintings) mentions a portrait by J. de Critz. Among numerous engravings may be mentioned the rare copper- plates by Renold Elstracke [q. v.], by Thomas Lant [q. v.] (in the account of Sidney's funeral, 1587, reproduced in 'Astrophel and Stella,' ed. Pollard), and by Simon Pass [q. v.] in Holland's 'Herwologia.' There is a stained-glass window with a full- length portrait in the hall of the university of Sydney, New South Wales. Sidney's literary work has done much to keep his fame alive. None of it was published in his lifetime, but all of it was widely read in manuscript copies, and the reluctance of his friends to authorise its publication led to the issue of surreptitious editions which perplex the conscientious bibliographer. In 1587 there appeared a translation from the French prose of Plessis du Mornay, entitled 'A Woorke concerning the trewnesse of the Christian Religion.' This was begun by Sidney, but was completed and published by Arthur Golding [q. v.]. It was at once popular, and reissues are dated 1587, 1592, 1604, and 1617. The 'Arcadia,' begun in 1580 and probably completed before his marriage in 1583, was the earliest of Sidney's purely literary compositions to be printed. Within a few months of its author's death Greville wrote to Walsingham that the publisher, William 396 SIDNEY LEE Ponsonby, had told him of a forthcoming edition, of which Sidney's friends knew nothing. Greville suggested that 'more delibera- tion' was required before Sidney's books should be given to the world (cf . State Papers, Dom. Eliz. cxcv. No. 43 ; ARBER, Garner, i. 488-9). On 23 Sept. 1588, however, Ponsonby obtained a license for the publication of the 'Arcadia.' In 1589 Puttenham, in his 'Art of English Poesie,' wrote: 'Sir Philip Sidney in the description of his mistresse excellently well handled this figure of resemblaunce by imagerie, as ye may see in his booke of Archadia.' But the romance was not published till 1590, when Ponsonby issued in quarto 'The Covntesse of Pembroke's Arcadia, written by Sir Philippe Sidnei' (copies are at the British Museum, and in the Huth, Britwell, and Rowfant Libraries). The 'overseer' (i.e printer's reader) admitted his own responsibility for the division of the work into chapters, and for the distribution through the prose text of the poetical eclogues. The whole was divided into three books. Another edition, 'now since the first edition aug- mented and ended,' was issued by Ponsonby in 1593 in folio (a unique copy is at Britwell). In an address to the reader H. S. (possibly Henry Salisbury [q. v.]) stated that the work had been revised and supplemented from Sidney's manuscripts by his sister, the Countess of Pembroke. She now divided the work into five books instead of three, while changes were made in the arrange- ment of the poems and many new ones supplied. An edition, 'now the third time published, with sundry new additions of the same author' (London, 1598, fol.), also undertaken by Ponsonby under Lady Pembroke's direction, contained the previously pub- lished 'Apologie for Poetrie' and 'Astrophel and Stella,' with some hitherto unprinted poems and the masque of the 'Lady of May.' This is the definitive edition of Sidney's works, and it was constantly reissued. Robert Waldegrave printed an edition at Edinburgh in 1599, copies of which were unlawfully imported into England. Later folio issues of bibliographical interest were dated 1605 (by Matthew Lownes), 1613 (for Simon Waterson, with a new 'dialogue betweene two shepherds ... at Wilton'), 1621 (Dublin, printed by the Societie of Stationers, with the supplement to the third book of the 'Arcadia' by Sir William Alexander, originally published separately), 1623 (London, with Alexander's THE LIFE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY 397 supplement), 1627 (with Beling's sixth book, separately title- paged). Other reissues appeared in 1629, 1633, 1638 (with a second supplement to the third book by Ja. Johnstoun), 1655 (with memoir and 'a remedie of love'), 1662, and 1674. A reprint of 1725 of Sidney's 'works ... in prose and verse,' in 3 vols. 8vo, was described as the fourteenth edition, and a modern- ised version of the 'Arcadia' by Mrs. Stanley was issued in the same year. No other reprint was attempted till 1867, when J. Hain Friswell edited an abridgement. A facsimile reprint of the quarto of 1590, with bibliographical introduction by Dr. Oskar Sommer, appeared in 1891. The 'Arcadia' was written by Sidney for the amusement of his sister, the Countess of Pembroke. It was 'done,' he wrote, 'in loose sheets of paper, most of it in his sister's presence, the rest by sheets sent unto her as fast as they were done.' The work bears traces of this method of composition. It relates in rambling fashion the stirring adventures of two princes, Musidorus of Thessaly and Pyrocles of Macedon, who, in the face of many dangers and difficulties, sue for the hands of the princesses Pamela and Philoclea, daughters of Basilius, king of Arcady, and of his lascivious queen Gynecia. Numerous digressions divert the reader's attention from the chief theme. Battles and tournaments fill a large space of the canvas, and they are portrayed with all the sympathy of a knight-errant. But the chivalric elements are balanced by the complications incident to romance, in which the men often disguise themselves as women and the women as men, and by pastoral eclogues mainly in verse, in which rustic life and feeling are contrasted with those of courts. In the long speeches which are placed in the mouths of all the leading actors, much sagacious philosophic or ethical reflection is set before the reader, and there are some attractive descriptions of natural scenery. The work, in which the tumult of a mediaeval chivalric romance thus alternates with the placid strains of pastoral poetry, is an out- come of much reading of foreign literature. The title of the whole id most of the pastoral episodes were drawn from the 'Arcadia' )f the Neapolitan, Jacopo Sanazaro, which was first published at Milan in 1504 (French translation, 1544). But Sidney stood more lirectly indebted to Spanish romance to the chivalric tales of 398 SIDNEY LEE 'Amadis' and 'Palmerin,' and above all to the 'Diana Enamo- rada,' by George Montemayor (itself an imitation of Sanazaro's 'Arcadia'), which was first published in 1542, and first translated into English by Bartholomew Yong in 1598. From 'Diana' Sidney avowedly translated two songs that figure in the 'certain sonnets' appended to the 'Arcadia.' Signs are not wanting, too, that Sidney had studied the '^Ethiopica' of Heliodorus, of which Thomas Underdown [q. v.] published a translation in 1587. Sidney, in his 'Apologie for Poetrie' (ed. Shuckburgh, p. 12), made appreciative reference to Heliodorus's 'sugred invention of that picture of love in his Theagines and Cariclea.' Possibly, too, apart of Sidney's scheme was due to Lyly's 'Euphues,' which was published a year before the 'Arcadia' was begun. Both in his 'Apologie' and in his 'Sonnets' (No. iii.), Sidney condemned the conceits of the euphuists who 'rifled up' stories of beasts, fowls, and fishes on which to nurture conceits, and Drayton (in Of Poets and Poesy) claimed for 'noble' Sidney that he made a successful stand against the tyranny of Lyly's ' Euphues : ' [And] throughly paced our language, as to show The plenteous English hand in hand might go With Greek and Latin, and did first reduce Our tongue from Lilly's writing then in use. But the prose of the 'Arcadia' is diffuse and artificial, and abounds in tricks as indefensible and irritating as any sanctioned by Lyly. Sidney overloads his sentences with long series of weak epithets, while he abounds in far-fetched metaphors. Oases of direct narrative exist, but they are rare. Mr. George Macdonald, in his 'Cabinet of Gems' (1892), has, however, shown that, by gentle pruning, short extracts from the 'Arcadia' can assume graces of simplicity which are only occasionally recognisable in the work in its original shape. In the verse in the 'Arcadia' Sidney not only experimented in English with classical metres, but with the terza rima, sestina, and canzonet of modern Italy. But defects of theme and style passed unrecognised in the six- teenth and seventeenth centuries. The book at once established it- self in popular esteem, and for more than a hundred years enjoyed an undisputed vogue. In Holinshed's 'Chronicle,' while Sidney was still alive, and the work in manuscript, the 'Arcadia' was THE LITE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY 399 eulogised by his friend Edmund Molyneux for 'its excellencie of spirit, gallant invention, varietie of matter, orderlie disposition,' and 'apt words.' Greville described the work as, in the opinion of Sidney's friends, much inferior to 'that unbounded spirit of his,' but he regarded it as at once an artistic and ethical tour deforce. Gabriel Harvey eulogised it as ' the simple image of his gentle wit and the golden pillar of his noble courage.' Hakewill called it 'nothing inferior to the choicest piece among the ancients.' Almost from the day of its publication court ladies imitated its affected turns of speech (cf. DEKKER, Gull's Hornbook, 1609; BEN JONSON, Every Man out of his Humour, act ii. sc. i. 1600). Early in the seventeenth century a gentleman of fashion would compliment a lady 'in pure Sir Philip Sidney' (Anecdotes, Cam- den Soc. p. 64). A prayer spoken by Pamela (Arcadia, bk. iii.) was almost literally reproduced in a few copies of the 'EIKWV Bao-iAiK?},' and one of the charges made against the king's memory by Milton was that he stole a prayer 'word for word from the mouth of a heathen woman, praying to a heathen god, and that in no serious book, but in the vain amatorious poem of Sir Philip Sidney's Arcadia' (Eikonoklastes, 1649, I ^5o). The influence of the romance on contemporary literature was considerable. Shakespeare based on Sidney's story of the ' Paphla- gonian unkind king' (bk. ii.) the episode of Gloucester and his sons in ' King Lear, ' while many phrases in his plays, especially in the 'Tempest' and 'Midsummer Night's Dream,' closely resemble expressions in the 'Arcadia,' and justify the conjecture that he studied the romance as carefully as he studied Sidney's sonnets or his masque of the 'Lady of May' (cf. Shaksperian Parallelisms collected from Sir Philip Sydney's 'Arcadia' by Eliza M. West, privately printed, 1865). There is an unmistakable resemblance between Holofernes in 'Love's Labour's Lost' and Rombus, the pedantic schoolmaster in Sidney's masque, which reads like a first draft of one of the pastoral incidents of the 'Ar- cadia,' and was from 1598 onwards always printed with it. Spenser's 'Faerie Queene' also stands indebted at many points to Sidney's romance (cf. Notes and Queries, 3rd ser. vols. iii. and iv. passim). Extracts and epitomes of the 'Arcadia' were long popular as 400 SIDNEY LEE chap-books, and continuations abounded. 'The English Arcadia alluding his beginning to Philip Sidnes ending,' by Gervase Mark- ham [q. v.], appeared in 1607. William Alexander, earl of Stirling, published in 1621 'a supplement of a defect in the third part of Sidney's Arcadia.' A 'Sixth Booke to the Countesse of Pem- brokes Arcadia, written by R[ichard] Bjeling] of Lincolnes Inn/ was issued in 1624, and this, like Alexander's supplement, was included in all the later editions. 'Continuation of Sir Philip Sidney's Arcadia, wherein is handled the loves of Amphialus and Helen . . . written by a young gentlewoman, Mrs. A. Wfeames],' was published in 1651. Among avowed imitations may be mentioned Nathaniel Baxter's philosophical poem 'Sir Philip Sidney's Ourania' (1606), 'The Countess of Montgomery's Urania,' by Lady Mary Wroth, Sid- ney's niece (1621), and John Reynolds 's 'Flower of Fidelitie' (1650). Sidney's incidental story of 'Argalus and Parthenia' was retold in verse by Francis Quarles in 1629. Plots of plays were also drawn from the 'Arcadia.' John Day described the argument of his 'He of Guls' (1606) as 'a little string or rivolet drawne from the gull streme of the right worthy gentleman Sir Philip Sidneys well knowne Archadea.' The plots of Shirley's pastoral play called 'The Arcadia' (1614) and Beau- mont and Fletcher's 'Cupid's Revenge' (1615) came from the same source. Similar efforts of later date were 'Andromana, or the Merchant's Wife,' by J. S., doubtfully identified with Shirley (1660); William Mountfort's 'Zelmane' (1705); Macnamara Morgan's 'Philoclea' (1754), and 'Parthenia, an Arcadian drama' (1764). During the eighteenth century Sidney's romance gradually lost its reputation. Addison noticed it among the books which the fair Leonora bought for her own shelves (Spectator, 12 April 1711). Richardson borrowed from Sidney's character of Pamela the name of his heroine, and at least one of her adventures. Cowper read the 'Arcadia' with delight, and wrote in 'The Task' (bk. iii. 1. 514) of 'those Arcadian scenes' sung by 'Sidney, warbler of poetic prose.' But more recent critics estimate the merits of the romance more moderately. Horace Walpole declared that Sidney wrote with the sangfroid and prolixity of Mile. Scuderi. THE LIFE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY 401 Hazlitt regarded the 'Arcadia' as one of the greatest monuments of the abuse of intellectual power upon record. Hallam was more favourable, but classes it with 'long romances, proverbially the most tiresome of all books.' To the literary historian the 'Ar- cadia ' is now mainly of value as the most famous English example of the type of literature which the modern novel displaced. Abroad the 'Arcadia' met, in its early days, with an enthusiastic reception. Du Bartas in his 'Seconde Semaine' (1584) spoke of 'Milor Cidne' as constituting, with More and Bacon, one of the three pillars of the English speech. The romance was twice translated into French, first by J. Baudouin as 'L'Arcadie de la Comtesse de Pembrok, mise en nostre langage' (Paris, 1624, 3 vols. 8vo), with fancy portraits of Sidney and of his sister. The second translation, of which the opening part was the work of 'un brave gentilhomme,' and the rest by Mile. Genevieve Chap- pelain, was published by Robert Fouet in 1625, and is ornamented with attractive engravings. In Charles Sorel's satire on sixteenth- century romance, entitled 'Le Berger Extravagant,' 1628 (iii. 70, 134), praise was lavished on the discourses of love and politics which figure in the 'Arcadia.' 'La Cour Bergere,' a tragi- comedy in verse, largely drawn from the 'Arcadia,' by Antoine Mareschal, was published at Paris in 1640, with a dedication to Sidney's nephew, Robert Sidney, second earl of Leicester [q. v.]. Niceron in 1731 described the 'Arcadia' as full of intelligence and very well written in his 'Memoires pour servir,' while Florian, in his 'Essai sur la Pastorale,' which he prefixed to 'Estelle' (1788), described Sidney with D'Urfe*, Montemayor, and Cer- vantes as his literary ancestors. A German translation by Valentinus Theocritus was published at Frankfurt-am-Main in 1629, and was revised by Martin Opitz in an edition of 1643. A reprint of the latter appeared at Leyden in 1646. The collection of sonnets called 'Astrophel and Stella' has, of all Sidney's literary achievements, best stood the tests of time. It consisted in its authentic form of 108 sonnets and eleven songs. In 1591, within a year of the first issue of the 'Arcadia,' a publisher, Thomas Newman, secured a manuscript version of the sonnets, and on his own initiative issued an edition with a dedication to a 2D 402 SIDNEY LEE personal friend, Francis Flower, with an epistle to the reader by Thomas Nash (doubtless the editor of the volume), and an appen- dix of 'sundry other rare sonnets by diuers noblemen and gentle- men.' Sidney's friends in September 1591 appealed to Lord Burghley to procure the suppression of this unauthorised venture (cf. ARBER, Stationers' Registers, i. 555). A month later, appar- ently, another unauthorised publisher, Matthew Lownes, issued an independent edition, a copy of which, said to be unique, is in the Bodleian Library. Finally Newman, at the solicitation of Sid- ney's friends, reissued his volume in 1591 without the prefatory matter and with many revisions of the text (cf. copy in Brit. Mus.). The poems were again reprinted with the authorised edition of the 'Arcadia' in 1598. There they underwent a completer recension ; an important sonnet (xxxviii), attacking Lord Rich by name, and two songs (viii and ix) were added for the first time, and the songs, which had hitherto followed the sonnets en bloc, were dis- tributed among them. This volume of 1598 also supplied for the first time 'certaine sonets of Sir Philip Sidney never before printed,' among which was the splendid lyric entitled ' Love's dirge,' with the refrain 'Love is dead,' which gives Sidney a high place among lyric poets. The sonnets were reprinted from Newman's two editions of 1591 by Mr. Arber in his 'English Garner,' i. 493 sq. With the songs and the 'Defence of Poesie,' they were edited by William Gray (Oxford, 1829), and by Dr. Flugel, again with the 'Defence of Poesie,' in 1889. A compact reissue of 'Astrophel and Stella,' edited by Mr. A. W. Pollard, was published in 1891. The sonnets, which were probably begun in 1575, and ceased soon after Sidney's marriage in 1583, are formed on the simple model of three rhyming decasyllabic quatrains, with a concluding couplet. Whether or no they were designed at the outset as merely literary exercises, imitating Surrey's addresses to Geraldine, they portray with historical precision the course of Sidney's ambiguous relations with Lady Rich. There is no reason to contest Nash's description of their argument as 'cruel chastity the prologue Hope, the epilogue Despair.' The opening poems, which are clumsily contrived, are frigid in temper, but their tone grows by slow degrees genuinely passionate; the feeling becomes 'full, THE LIFE OF SIR PHILIP SIDNEY 403 material, and circumstantiated,' and many of the later sonnets, in reflective power, in felicity of phrasing, and in energy of senti- ment, are ' among the best of their sort ' (cf . LAMB, ' Some Son- nets of Sir Philip Sydney,' in Essays of Elia, ed. Ainger, pp. 286 sq.). Shakespeare was doubtless indebted to them for the form of his own sonnets, and at times Sidney seems to adumbrate Shake- speare's subtlety of thought and splendour of expression. Next in importance, as in date of publication, comes Sidney's 'Apologie for Poetrie.' About August 1579 Stephen Gosson published an attack on stage-plays, entitled 'The School of Abuse,' and he followed it up in November with an ' Apologie of the School of Abuse.' Both were dedicated to Sidney. On 16 Oct. 1579 Spenser wrote from Leicester House to Gabriel Harvey: "Newe Bookes I heare of none but only of one, that writing a certaine booke called The Schoole of Abuse, and dedicating it to Maister Sidney, was for hys labor scorned : if at leaste it be in the goodnesse of that nature to scorne. Suche follie is it, not to regarde afore hande the inclination and qualitie of him, to whom we dedicate oure bookes." Sidney at once set about preparing a retort to Gos- son, which took the form of an essay on the influence of imagina- tive literature on mankind. By poetry he understood any work of the imagination. 'Verse,' he wrote, 'is but an ornament and no cause to poetry.' His 'Apologie' is in three parts; in the first, poetry is considered as teaching virtuous action, in the second the various forms of poetry are enumerated and justified, and in the third a sanguine estimate is offered of the past, present, and future position of English poetry. Sidney commended the work of Chaucer, Surrey, and Spenser, but failed to foresee the imminent greatness of English drama. He concluded with a spirited de- nunciation of the earth-creeping mind that cannot lift itself up to look at the sky of poetry. There is much that is scholastic and pedantic in the detailed treatment of his theme, but his general attitude is that of an enlightened lover of great literature. The work was first printed as an ' Apologie for Poetrie ' in a separate volume with four eulogistic sonnets by Henry Constable [q. v.] for Henry Olney in 1595. It was appended, with the title of the 'Defence of Poesie,' to the 1598 edition of the 'Arcadia' and to all the reissues; it was edited separately in 1752 (Glasgow), bv 404 SIDNEY LEE Lord Thurlow in 1810, by Professor Arber in 1868, and by Mr. E. S. Shuckburgh in 1891. Sidney's translation of the Psalms, in which his sister joined him, was long circulated in manuscript, and manuscript copies are numerous (cf. Bodl. Rawlinson MS., Poet. 25; Brit. Mm. Addit. MSS. 12047-8; and manuscript in Trin. Coll. Cambridge). Donne wrote a fine poem in praise of the work (cf. Poems, 1633 ; cf. J onsen's Conversations with Drummond, p. 15). It was first printed in 1823 by Robert Triphook under the editorship of Samuel Weller Singer [q. v]., from a manuscript in the handwriting of John Davies of Hereford, then in the possession of B. H. Bright, but now at Penshurst. The title ran: 'The Psalmes of David translated into divers and sundry kindes of Verse, more rare and excellent for the Method and Variety than ever yet had been done in English. Begun by the noble and learned gent. Sir Philip Sidney, Knt, and finished by the right honorable the Countess of Pembroke, his sister.' The first forty- three psalms are, according to notes in the manuscript, alone by Sidney. The metres are very various. Psalm xxxvii is an early example of that employed by Tennyson in 'In Memoriam.' Sidney's renderings enjoyed the advantage of republication with discursive commentary by Mr. Ruskin ; Mr. Ruskin's edition of them forms the second volume of his 'Bibliotheca Pastorum,' 1877, and bears the sub-title of 'Rock Honey-comb.' Sidney's paraphrase, . according to Mr. Ruskin, 'aims straight, and with almost fiercely fixed purpose, at getting into the heart and truth of the thing it has got to say; and unmistakably, at any cost of its own dignity, explaining that to the hearer, shrinking from no familiarity and restricting itself from no expansion in terms, that will make the thing meant clearer' (Pref. p. xvii). One of Sidney's poetic works is lost. When William Ponsonby obtained a license for the publication of the 'Arcadia' on 23 Sept. 1588, he also secured permission to print 'a translation of Salust de Bartas done by the same S r P. into englishe.' Greville men- tioned in his letter to Walsingham that Sidney had executed this translation; and Florio, when dedicating the second book of his translation of Montaigne (1603) to Sidney's daughter, the Countess of Rutland, and to Sidney's friend, Lady Rich, notes that he had THE LIFE OF JOHN BUN VAN 405 seen Sidney's rendering of 'the first septmane of that arch-poet Du Bartas,' and entreats the ladies to give it to the world. Nothing further is known of it. All Sidney's extant poetry was collected by Dr. Grosart in 1873 (new edit. 1877). The editor includes, besides the sonnets, songs, poems from the 'Arcadia,' and the psalms, two 'pastoralls' from Davison's * Poetical Rhapsody;' 'Affection's Snare,' from Rawlinson MS. Poet. 84; and 'Wooing-stuffe,' from 'Cottoni Posthuma' (p. 327), where it is appended to a short prose essay, 'Valour Anatomized,' doubtfully assigned to Sidney. THE LIFE OF JOHN BUNYAN EDMUND VENABLES [From the Dictionary of National Biography.] BUNYAN, JOHN (1628-1688), author of the 'Pilgrim's Progress,' 'Holy War,' 'Grace abounding,' &c., was born at the village of Elstow, Bedfordshire, a little more than a mile south of the town of Bedford, in November 1628. His baptism is recorded in the parish register of Elstow on the 3oth of that month. The family of Buignon, Buniun, Bonyon, or Binyan (the name is found spelt in no fewer than thirty-four different ways), had been settled in the county of Bedford from very early times. Their first place of settlement appears to have been the parish of Pulloxhill, about nine miles from John Bunyan's native village. In 1199 one Wil- liam Buniun held land at Wilstead, a mile from Elstow. In 1327 one of the same name, probably his descendant, William Boynon, was living at the hamlet of Harrowden, at the south-eastern boun- dary of the parish, close to the very spot which tradition marks out as John Bunyan's birthplace, and which the local names of 'Bunyan's End,' 'Bunyan's Walk,' and 'Farther Bunyan's' (as old^ certainly, as the middle of the sixteenth century) connect beyond all question with the Bunyan family. A field known as 'Bonyon's End' was sold in 1 548 by ' Thomas Bonyon of Elstow, labourer,' son of William Bonyon, to Robert Curtis, and other portions of his ancestral property gradually passed to other pur- 406 EDMUND V ENABLES chasers, little being left to descend to John Bunyan's grandfather, Thomas Bunyan (d. 1641), save the 'cottage or tenement' in which he carried on the occupation of 'petty chapman/ or small retail trader. This, in his still extant will, he bequeathed to his second wife, Ann, and after her death to her stepson Thomas and her son Edward in equal shares. Thomas, the elder son, the father of the subject of this biography, was married three times, the first time (10 Jan. 1623) when only in his twentieth year, his second and third marriages occurring within a few months of his being left a widower. John Bunyan was the first child by his second mar- riage, which took place on 23 May 1627. The maiden name of his second wife was Margaret Bentley. She, like her husband, was a native of Elstow, and was born in the same year with him, 1603. A year after her marriage, her sister Rose became the wife of her husband's younger half-brother, Edward. The will of John Bun- yan's maternal grandmother, Mary Bentley (d. 1632), with its 'Dutch-like picture of an Elstow cottage interior two hundred and fifty years ago,' proves (J. BROWN, Biography of John Bunyan, to which we are indebted for all these family details) that his mother 'came not of the very squalid poor, but of people who, though hum- ble in station, were yet decent and worthy in their ways.' John Bunyan's father, Thomas Bunyan, was what we should now call a whitesmith, a maker and mender of pots and kettles. In his will he designates himself a 'brasier;' his son, who carried on the same trade and adopted the same designation when describing himself, is more usually styled a 'tinker.' Neither of them, how- ever, belonged to the vagrant tribe, but had a settled home at El- stow, where their forge and workshop were, though they doubtless travelled the country round in search of jobs. Contemporary liter- ature depicts the tinker's craft as disreputable; but we must dis- tinguish between the vagrant and the steady handicraftsmen, dwelling in their own freehold tenements, such as the Bunyans evidently were. Bunyan, in his intense self-depreciation, writes: 'My descent was of a low and inconsiderable generation, my father's house being of that rank that is meanest and most despised of all the families of the land.' This is certainly not language that we should be disposed to apply to a family which had from time immemorial occupied the same freehold, and made testamen- THE LIFE OF JOHN BUN Y AN 407 tary dispositions of their small belongings. The antiquity of the family in Bunyan's native county effectually disposes of the strange hallucination which even Sir Walter Scott was disposed to favour, that the Bunyans, 'though reclaimed and settled,' may have sprung from the gipsy tribe. Bunyan's parents sent their son to school, either to the recently founded Bedford grammar school, or, which is more probable, to some humbler school at Elstow. He learned reading and writing ' according to the rate of other poor men's children.' 'I never went to school,' he writes, 'to Aris- totle or Plato, but was brought up at my father's house in a very mean condition, among a company of poor countrymen.' And what little he learned, he confesses with shame, when he was called from his primer and copy-book to help his father at his trade, was soon lost, ' even almost utterly.' In his sixteenth year (June 1644) Bunyan suffered the irreparable misfortune of the loss of his mother, which was aggravated by his father marrying a second wife within two months of her decease. The arrival of a step- mother seems to have estranged Bunyan from his home, and to have led to his enlisting as a soldier. The civil war was then drawing near the end of its first stage. Bedfordshire was distinctly par- liamentarian in its sympathies. In the west it was cut off from any communication with the royalists by a strong line of parlia- mentary posts. These circumstances lead to the conclusion that a Bedfordshire lad was more likely to be found in the parliamen- tarian than in the royalist forces. This is Lord Macaulay's conclusion, and is supported by Bunyan's latest and most pains- taking biographer, the Rev. J. Brown. Mr. Froude, on the other hand, together with Mr. Offor and Mr. Copner, holds that ' prob- ability is on the side of his having been with the royalists.' As there is not a tittle of evidence either way, the question can never be absolutely settled. But we hold, against Mr. Froude, that all probability points to the parliamentary force as that in which Bunyan served. In all likelihood, on his attaining the regulation age of sixteen, which he did in November 1644, he was one of the 'able and armed men' whom the parliament commanded his native county to send 'for soldiers' to the central garrison of Newport Pagnel, and included in one of the levies. The army was disbanded in 1646. Before this occurred Bunyan's provi- 408 EDMUND V ENABLES dential preservation from death, which, according to his anony- mous biographer, 'was a frequent subject of thankful reference by him in later years.' 'When I was a soldier/ he says, 'I, with others, was drawn out to go to such a place to besiege it. But when I was just ready to go, one of the company desired to go in my room; to which when I consented, he took my place, and coming to the siege, as he stood sentinel he was shot in the head with a musket bullet and died.' Bunyan gives no hint as to the locality of the siege ; but, on the faith of a manifestly incorrect account of the circumstance in an anonymous life, published after his death, it has been currently identified with Leicester, which we know to have been taken by the royalist forces in 1645; and in direct contradiction to Bunyan's own words for he says plainly that he stayed behind, and a comrade went in his room he is described, and that even by Macaulay, as having taken part in the siege, either as a royalist assailant or as a parliamentary de- fender. Wherever the siege may have been, it is certain that Bunyan was not there. When the forces were disbanded, Bunyan must have returned to his native village and resumed his paternal trade. He 'presently afterwards changed his condition into a married state.' With characteristic reticence Bunyan gives neither the name of his wife nor the date of his marriage ; but it seems to have occurred at the end of 1648 or the beginning of 1649, when he was not much more than twenty. He and his wife were ' as poor as poor might be,' without 'so much household stuff as a dish or spoon between them.' But his wife came of godly parents, and brought two pious books of her father's to her new home, the reading of which awakened the slumbering sense of religion in Bunyan's heart, and produced an external change of habits. Up to this time, though by no means what would be called 'a bad character' for he was no drunkard, nor licentious Bun- yan was a gay, daring young fellow, whose chief delight was in dancing, bell-ringing, and in all kinds of rural sports and pastimes, the ring-leader of the village youth at wake or merry-making, or in the Sunday sports after service time on the green. As a boy he had acquired the habit of profane swearing, in which he became such an adept as to shock those who were far from scrupulous in their language as 'the ungodliest fellow for swearing they ever THE LIFE OF JOHN BUNYAN 409 heard.' All this the influence of his young wife and her good books gradually changed. One by one he felt himself compelled to give up all his favourite pursuits and pastimes. He left off his habit of swearing at once and entirely. He was diligent in his attendance at services and sermons, and in reading the Bible, at least the narrative portions. The doctrinal and practical part, 'Paul's epistles and such like scriptures,' he 'could not away with.' The reformation was real, though as yet superficial, and called forth the wonder of his neighbours. 'In outward things,' writes Lord Macaulay, 'he soon became a strict Pharisee;' 'a poor painted hypocrite,' he calls himself. For a time he was well content with himself. ' I thought no man in England could please God better than I.' But his self-satisfaction did not last long. The insufficiency of such a merely outward change was borne in upon him by the spiritual conversation of a few poor women whom he overheard one day when pursuing his tinker's craft at Bedford, 'sitting at a door in the sun and talking about the things of God.' Though by this time somewhat of 'a brisk talker on religion,' he found himself a complete stranger to their inner experience. This conversation was the beginning of the tremendous spiritual conflict described by him with such graphic power in his ' Grace abounding.' It lasted some three or four years, at the end of which, in 1653, he joined the nonconformist body, to which these poor godly women belonged. This body met for wor- ship in St. John's Church, Bedford, of which the 'holy Mr. Gifford,' once a loose young officer in the royal army, had been appointed rector in the same year. His temptations ceased, his spiritual conflict was over, and he entered on a peace which was rendered all the more precious by the previous mental agony. The sudden alternations of hope and fear, the fierce temptations, the torturing illusions, the strange perversions of isolated texts, the harassing doubts of the truth of Christianity, the depths of despair and the elevations of joy through which he passed are fully described ' as with a pen of fire ' in that marvellous piece of reli- gious autobiography, unrivalled save by the 'Confessions' of St. Augustine, his 'Grace abounding to the Chief of Sinners.' Bunyan was at this time still resident at Elstow, where his blind child Mary and his second daughter Elizabeth were born. It 410 EDMUND V ENABLES was probably in 1655 that Bunyan removed to Bedford. Here he soon lost the wife to whose piety he had owed so much, and about the same time his pastor and friend, the ' holy Mr. Gifford.' His own health also suffered; he was threatened with consumption, but his naturally robust constitution carried him safely through what at one time he expected would have been a fatal illness. In 1655 Bunyan, who had been chosen one of the deacons, began to exercise his gift of exhortation, at first privately, and as he gained courage and his ministry proved acceptable 'in a more publick way.' In 1657 n ^ s calling as a preacher was formally recognised, and he was set apart to that office, ' after solemn prayer and fast- ing,' another member being appointed deacon in his room, ' brother Bunyan being taken off by preaching the gospel.' His fame as a preacher soon spread. When it was known that the once blaspheming tinker had turned preacher, they flocked 'by hundreds, and that from all parts,' to hear him, though, as he says, ' upon sundry and divers accounts ' some to marvel, some to mock, but some with an earnest desire to profit by his words. After his ordination Bunyan continued to pursue his trade as a brazier, combining with it the exercise of his preaching gifts as occasion served in the various villages visited by him, ' in woods, in barns, on village greens, or in town chapels.' Opposition was naturally aroused among the settled ministry by such remarkable popularity. 'All the midland counties,' writes Mr. Froude, ' heard of his fame and demanded to hear him.' In some places, as at Meldreth and Yelden, at the latter of which he had preached on Christmas day by the permission of the rector, Dr. William Dell, master of Gonville and Caius, the pulpits of the churches were opened to him ; in other places the incumbents of the parishes were his bitterest enemies. They, in the words of Mr. Henry Deane when defending Bunyan against the attacks of Dr. T. Smith, keeper of the university library at Cambridge, were 'angry with the tinker because he strove to mend souls as well as kettles and pans.' ' When I went first to preach the word abroad,' he writes, ' the doctors and priests of the country did open wide against me.' In 1658 he was indicted at the assizes for preaching at Eaton Socon, but with what result is unrecorded. He was called 'a witch, a Jesuit, a highwayman ; ' he was charged with keeping THE LIFE OF JOHN BUN Y AN 411 'his misses,' with ' having two wives at once,' and other equally absurd and groundless accusations. His career as an author now began. His earliest work, 'Some Gospel Truths opened,' pub- lished at Newport Pagnel in 1656, with a commendatory letter by his pastor, John Burton, was a protest against the mysticism of the teaching of the quakers. Having been answered by Edward Bur- rough [q. v.], an ardent and somewhat foul-mouthed member of that sect, Bunyan replied the next year in 'A Vindication of Gos- pel Truths,' in which he repays his antagonist in his own coin, calling him 'a gross railing Rabshakeh,' who 'befools himself,' and proves his complete ignorance of the gospel. Like the former work it is written in a very nervous style, showing a great command of plain English, as well as a thorough acquaintance with Holy Scripture. A third book was published by Bunyan in 1658 on the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, under the horror-striking title of 'Sighs from Hell, or the Groans of a Damned Soul.' It issued from the press a few days before Cromwell's death. In this work, as its title would suggest, Bunyan gives full scope to his vivid imagination in describing the condition of the lost. It contains many touches of racy humour, especially in his similes, and the whole is written in the nervous, forcible English of which he was master. On the Restoration the old acts against nonconformists were speedily revived. The meeting-houses were closed. All persons were required under severe penalties to attend their parish church. The ejected clergy were reinstated. It became an illegal act to conduct divine service except in accordance with the ritual of the church, or for one not in episcopal orders to address a congregation. Bunyan continued his ministrations in barns, in private houses, under the trees, wherever he found brethren ready to pray and hear. So daring and notorious an offender was not likely to go long un- punished. Within six months of Charles's landing he was arrested, on 12 Nov. 1660, at the little hamlet of Lower Samsell by Har- lington, about thirteen miles from Bedford to the south, where he was going to hold a religious service in a private house. The issuing of the warrant had become known, and Bunyan might have escaped if he had been so minded, but he was not the man to play the coward. If he fled, it would 'make an ill-savour in the 412 EDMUND VENABLES county' and dishearten the weaker brethren. If he ran before a warrant, others might run before 'great words.' While he was conducting the service he was arrested and taken before Mr. Jus- tice Wingate, who, though really desirous to release him, was com- pelled by his obstinate refusal to forbear preaching to commit him for trial to the county gaol, which, with perhaps a brief interval of enlargement in 1666, was to be his 'close and uncomfortable' place of abode for the next twelve years. The prison to which Bunyan was committed was not, as an obstinate and widespread error has represented, the ' town gaol,' or rather lock-up house, which occupied one of the piers of the many-arched Ouse bridge, for the temporary incarceration of petty offenders against municipal law, but the county gaol, a much less confined and comfortless abode. A few weeks after his committal the quarter sessions for January 1661 were held at Bedford, and Bunyan was indicted for his offence. The proceedings seem to have been irregular. There was no desire on the part of the justices to deal hardly with the prisoner ; but he confessed the indictment, and declared his deter- mination to repeat the offence on the first opportunity. The justices had therefore no choice in the matter. They were bound to administer the law as it stood. So he was sentenced to a further three months' term of imprisonment, and if then he persisted in his contumacy he would be ' banished the realm,' and if he returned without royal license he would ' stretch by the neck for it.' To- wards the end of the three months, with an evident desire to avoid proceeding to extremities, the clerk of the peace was sent to him by the justices to endeavour to induce him to conform. But, as might have been anticipated, all attempts to bend Bunyan's sturdy nature were vain. Every kind of compromise, however kindly and sensibly urged, was steadily refused. He would not substitute private exhortation, which might have been allowed him, for public preaching. 'The law,' he replied, 'had provided two % ways of obeying one to obey actively, and if he could not bring his conscience to that, then to suffer whatever penalty the law enacted.' Three weeks later, 23 April 1661, the coronation of Charles II afforded an opportunity of enlargement. All prisoners for every offence short of felony were to be released. Those who were waiting their trials might be dismissed at once. Those convicted THE LIFE OF JOHN BUNYAN 413 and under sentence might sue out a pardon under the great seal at any time within the year. Bunyan failed to profit by the royal clemency. Although he had not been legally convicted, for no witnesses had been heard against him, nor had he pleaded to the indictment, his trial having been little more than a conversation between him and the court, the authorities chose to regard it as a legal conviction, rendering it necessary that a pardon should be sued for. About a year before his apprehension at Samsell, Bunyan had taken a second wife, Elizabeth, to watch over his four little mother- less children. This noble-hearted woman showed undaunted cour- age in seeking her husband's release. She travelled to London with a petition to the House of Peers, from some of whom she met with kindly sympathy but little encouragement. * The matter was one for the judges, not for them.' At the next midsummer assize, therefore, the poor woman on three several occasions presented her husband's formal request that he might be legally put on his trial and his case fully heard. Sir Matthew Hale, who was one of the judges of that assize, listened to her pitiful tale, and manifested much kind feeling. But he was powerless. 'Her husband had been duly convicted. She must either sue out his pardon, or obtain a writ of error.' Neither of these courses was adopted ; and wisely so, for, as Mr. Froude remarks, ' a pardon would have been of no use to Bunyan because he was determined to persevere in dis- obeying a law which he considered to be unjust. The most real kindness which could be shown him was to leave him where he was.' At the next spring assizes, in 1662, a strenuous effort was again made to get his case brought into court. This again failed. After this he seems to have desisted from any further attempt, and, with a slight interval in 1666, he remained in prison, not altogether unhappily, till 1672, twelve years from his first committal. The character of his imprisonment varied with the disposition of his gaolers. During the earlier part of the time he was allowed to follow his wonted course of preaching, 'taking all occasions to visit the people of God,' and even going to 'see Christians in London.' The Bedford church books show that he was frequently present at church meetings during some periods of his imprison- ment. Such indulgence, however, was plainly irregular. Its 414 EDMUND V ENABLES discovery nearly cost the gaoler his place, and brought on Bunyan a much more rigorous confinement. He was forbidden 'even to look out at the door.' For seven years out of the twelve, 1661-8, his name never occurs in the records of the church. In 1666, after six years of prison life, 'by the intercession of some in trust and power that took pity upon his suffering,' Bunyan was released. But in a few weeks he was arrested once more for his former offence, at a meeting, and returned to his former quarters for another six years. Being precluded by his imprisonment from carrying on his trade, he betook himself, for the support of his family, to making long tagged laces, many hundred gross of which he sold to the hawkers. Nor was 'the word of God bound.' The gaol afforded him the opportunity of exercising his ministerial gifts forbidden outside its walls. Many of his co-religionists from time to time were his fellow-prisoners, at one time as many as sixty. He gave religious instruction and preached to his fellow- prisoners, and furnished spiritual counsel to persons who were allowed to visit him. Some of his prison sermons were the rough drafts of subsequent more elaborate publications. His two chief companions were the Bible and Foxe's 'Book of Martyrs.' Bun- yan, as we have seen, had ventured on authorship before his im- prisonment. The enforced leisure of a gaol gave him abundant opportunity for its pursuit. Books and tracts, some in prose, some in verse, were produced by his fertile pen with great rapidity. His first prison book was in metre we can hardly call it poetry entitled 'Profitable Meditations,' in the form of dialogue, and has 'small literary merit of any sort' (BROWN, p. 172). This was followed by 'Praying in the Spirit,' written in 1662 and published in 1663 ; 'Christian Behaviour,' written and published in the same year; the 'Four Last Things' and 'Ebal and Gerizim,' both in verse, the 'Holy City/ the 'Resurrection of the Dead,' and 'Prison Meditations,' a reply in verse to a friend who had written to him in prison, which all appeared between 1663 and 1665. These minor productions were succeeded by his ' Grace abounding to the Chief of Sinners,' one of the three books by which Bunyan's name is chiefly known, which will ever hold a high place among records of spiritual experience. This appeared in 1666. About this time took place the few months' release from prison previously THE LIFE OF JOHN BUN VAN 415 alluded to. Our knowledge of this second six years' incarceration is almost a blank. Even his literary activity appears to have suf- fered a temporary paralysis. It was not till 1672 that his 'Defence of Justification by Faith ' appeared. This was a vehement attack on the 'brutish and beastly latitudinarianism ' of the 'Design of Christianity,' a book written by the Rev. Edward Fowler [q. v.], rector of Northill, which had recently attained great popularity, and which Richard Baxter also deemed worthy of a reply. Fowler's book seemed to Bunyan to aim a deadly blow at the very foundations of the gospel, and he took no pains to conceal his abhorrence of the attempt. With 'a ferocity' that, as Lord Macaulay has said, 'nothing can justify,' he assails the book and its author with a shower of vituperative epithets savouring of the earlier stage in his career when he was notorious for the bold license of his talk. He describes Fowler as 'rotten at heart,' 'heathen- ishly dark,' 'a prodigious blasphemer' 'dropping venom from his pen,' 'an ignorant Sir John,' one of 'a gang of rabbling, counterfeit clergy, "like apes covering their shame with their tail.' An anonymous reply, entitled 'Dirt wip't off,' supposed to be the joint production of Fowler and his curate, appeared the same year, almost rivalling Bunyan in the mastery of abusive epithets. Bun- yan 's last work before his enlargement, written in the early part of 1672, was the ' Confession of my Faith and Reason of my Practice.' Its object was to vindicate his teaching and if possible to secure his liberty. That the imperishable allegory on which Bunyan's claim to immortality chiefly rests, the 'Pilgrim's Progress,' was also written in prison, we know on Bunyan's own authority. The 'den' in which he dreamed his wonderful dream is identified by himself, in the third or first complete edition of 1679, w * tn ' tne gaol.' That this gaol was the strait and unwholesome lock-up house on Bedford bridge was long accepted as an undoubted fact. When it was shown that being a county prisoner it was impossible for him to have passed his twelve years' captivity in a town gaol intended for casual offenders, it was concluded that the county gaol, which was certainly the place of his incarceration, was also the place of the composition of the 'Pilgrim's Progress.' This conclusion has been recently called in question by the Rev. J. Brown, who gives reasons for believing that the composition of the 416 EDMUND V ENABLES allegory belongs to a short six months' confinement, which, accord- ing to the story told by his anonymous biographer, and confirmed by Charles Doe, he was subjected to at a later period. The date of this imprisonment is fixed by Mr. Brown as 1675, an d, according to the account preserved in Asty's 'Life of Owen,' he was released from it by the intervention of Dr. Thomas Barlow, bishop of Lin- coln, whose diocese then included the county of Bedford. The strongest argument in support of Mr. Brown's view is the improb- ability that if the 'Pilgrim's Progress' had been written during the twelve years' imprisonment which came to an end in 1672, it should have remained six years unpublished, the first edition not appearing till 1678. It was not Bunyan's way to keep his works so long in manuscript. Besides, in the author's poetical 'Apology for his Book,' his account of its composition and publication suggests that there was no such prolonged interval as the common accounts represent. Bunyan's twelve years' imprisonment came to an end in 1672. With the covert intent of setting up the Roman catholic religion in England, Charles II had suspended all penal statutes against nonconformists and popish recusants. Bunyan was one of those who profited by this infamous subterfuge. His pardon under the great seal bears date 13 Sept. 1672. This, however, was no more than the official sanction of what had been already virtually granted and acted on. For Bunyan had received one of the first licenses to preach given by the royal authority, dated 9 May of that year, and had been called to the pastorate of the nonconformist congre- gation at Bedford, of which he had been so long a member, on the 2ist of the preceding January. The church of St. John, which had been occupied by this congregation during the Protectorate, had, on the Restoration, returned to its rightful owners, and the place licensed for the exercise of Bunyan's ministry was a barn in the orchard belonging to a member of the body. This continued to be the place of meeting of the congregation until 1707, when a new chapel was erected on its site. Though Bunyan made Bed- ford the centre of his work, he extended his ministrations through the whole country, and even beyond its limits. One of his first acts after his liberation was to apply to the government for licenses for preachers and preaching places in the country round. Among THE LIFE OF JOHN BUN VAN 417 jhese he made stated circuits, being playfully known as 'Bishop Bunyan,' his diocese being a large one, and, in spite of strenuous efforts at repression by the ecclesiastical authorities, steadily in- creasing in magnitude and importance. It is interesting to notice that Bunyan's father, the tinker of Elstow, lived on till 1676, being buried at Elstow on 7 Feb. of that year. In his will, while leaving a shilling apiece to his famous son and his three other children, he bequeathed all he had to his third wife, Ann, who survived him four years, and was buried in the same church -yard as her husband on 25 Sept 1680. Bunyan's active ministerial labours did not interfere with his literary work ; this continued as prolific as when writing was almost the only relief from the tedium of his confinement. Besides minor works, in 1676 appeared the 'Strait Gate/ directed against an inconsistent profession of Christianity by those who, in his graphic language, can 'throw stones with both hands, alter their religion as fast as their company, can live in water and out of water, run with the hare and kill with the hounds, carry fire in one hand and water in the other, very anythings.' This was succeeded in 1678 by the first edition of the 'Pilgrim's Progress,' and in the same year by the second, and the next year by the third, each with very important additions, including some of the best-known and most characteristic personages, such as Mr. Worldly Wiseman, Mr. By-ends and his family, and Mrs. Diffidence, the wife of Giant Despair. 'Come and welcome to Jesus Christ,' 'with its musical title and soul- moving pleas,' was published in 1678, and his 'Trea- tise of the Fear of God ' in 1679. The next year gave to the world one of Bunyan's most characteristic works, 'The Life and Death of Mr. B adman,' which, though now almost forgotten, and too disagreeable in its subject and its boldly drawn details to be alto- gether wholesome reading, displays Bunyan's inventive genius as powerfully as the universally popular 'Pilgrim,' of which, as Bunyan intended it to be, it is the strongly drawn contrast and foil. The one gives a picture of a man ' in the rank of English life with which Bunyan was most familiar,' to quote Mr. Froude, 'a vulgar, middle-class, unprincipled scoundrel,' 'travelling along the prim- rose path to the everlasting bonfire,' while the other sets before us a man essentially of the same social rank, fleeing from the wrath 2E 418 EDMUND V ENABLES to come, and making his painful way 'to Emmanuel's Land through the Slough of Despond and the Valley of the Shadow of Death.' As a portrait of rough English country- town life in the days of Charles II, the later book is unapproached, save by the unsavoury tales of Defoe. ' The Life and Death of Mr. Badman' was followed, after a two years' interval, by Bunyan's second great work, 'The Holy War made by Shaddai upon Diabolus,' of which Macaulay has said, with somewhat exaggerated eulogy, that 'if there had been no "Pilgrim's Progress," the "Holy War" would have been the first of religious allegories.' There is a necessary unreality about the whole narrative as compared with Bunyan's former allegory. The characters are shadowy abstractions by the side of the 'representative realities' of the other work. With a truer estimate of the relative value of the two works, Mr. Froude says: '"The Holy War" would have entitled Bunyan to a place among the masters of English literature. It would never have made his name a household word in every English-speaking family in the globe.' Other works, notably the 'Barren Fig Tree' and 'The Pharisee and the Publican,' were given to the world in 1682 and the four succeeding years. In 1684 appeared the sec- ond part of the 'Pilgrim's Progress,' completing the history of Christian's pilgrimage with that of his wife Christiana and her children, and her companion, the young maiden Mercy. Like most second parts of popular works, this shows a decided falling off. It is ' but a feeble reverberation of the first part. Christiana and her children are tolerated for the pilgrim's sake to whom they belong.' But it bears the stamp of Bunyan's genius, and not a few of the characters, Old Honest, Mr. Valiant-for-the-Truth, Mr. Despondency and his daughter Miss Much-afraid, and the 'young woman whose name was Dull,' have a vitality that can never decay. There is little more to notice in Bunyan's life. His activity was ceaseless, but ' the only glimpses we get of him during this time are from the church records, and these were but scantily kept,' and are quite devoid of public interest, chiefly dealing with the internal discipline of the body. Troublous times fell upon nonconformists. The Declaration of Indulgence was withdrawn the same year it was issued. The Test Act became law the next year (1673). In THE LIFE OF JOHN BUNYAN 419 1675 the acts against nonconformists were put in force. Bunyan's preaching journeys were not always free from risk. There is a tradition that he visited Reading disguised as a wagoner, with a long whip in his hand, to escape detection. But he continued free from active molestation, with the exception of the somewhat hazy imprisonment placed by Mr. Brown in 1675. In Mr. Froude's words, ' he abstained, as he had done steadily throughout his life, from all interference with politics, and the government in turn never meddled with him.' He frequently visited London to preach, always getting large congregations. Twelve hundred would come together to hear him at seven o'clock on a weekday morning in winter. When he preached on a Sunday, the meeting-house would not .contain the throng, half being obliged to go away. A sermon delivered by him at Pinners' Hall in Old Broad Street was the basis of one of his theological works. He was on intimate terms with Dr. John Owen, who, when Charles II expressed his astonishment that so learned a divine could listen to an illiterate tinker, is recorded to have replied that he would gladly give up all his learning for the tinker's power of reaching the heart. In the year of his death he was chaplain, though perhaps unofficially, to Sir John Shorter, then lord mayor of London. He did not escape temptation to leave Bedford for posts of greater influence and dignity ; but all such offers he steadily refused, as he did any opportunities of pecuniary gain for himself and his family, quietly staying at his post through all ' changes of ministry, popish plots, and Monmouth rebellions, while the terror of a restoration of popery was bringing on the revolution, careless of kings and cabi- nets' (FROUDE, p. 174). When James II was endeavouring to remodel the corporations, Bunyan was pointed out as a likely instrument for carrying out the royal purpose in the corporation of Bedford. It seems that some place under government w r as offered as the price of his consent; but he declined all such overtures, and refused to see the bringer of them, though by no means un- willing to give his aid in securing the repeal of the penal laws and tests under which he and his flock had so long smarted. This was in November 1687, barely twelve months before James's abdica- tion. Three years before he had felt it so possible that he might be called again to suffer for conscience' sake under these same laws, 420 EDMUND V ENABLES that he executed a deed of gift, dated 23 Dec. 1685, making ovei all his worldly possessions to his wife, Elizabeth Bunyan. Bunyan did not live to see the revolution. His death took place in 1688, four months after the acquittal of the seven bishops. In the spring of that year he had been enfeebled by an attack of ' sweating sickness.' He caught a severe cold on a ride through heavy rain to London from Reading, whither he had gone to effect a reconciliation between a father and a son. A fever ensued, and he died on 31 Aug. at the house of his friend John Strudwick, who kept a grocer's and chandler's shop at the sign of the Star, Holborn Bridge, two months before he had completed his sixtieth year. He continued his literary activity to the last. Four books from his pen had been published in the first half of the year, and he partly revised the sheets of a short treatise entitled 'The Acceptable Sacrifice' on his deathbed. He was buried in Mr. Strudwick's vault in the burial-ground in Bunhill Fields, Finsbury. His personal estate was sworn under loot. Bunyan was the father of six children, four by his first wife, and two by the second. His elder child Mary, his blind child (born in 1650), of whom he writes in the 'Grace abounding' with such exquisite tenderness, died before her father. His chil- dren, John, Thomas, and Elizabeth by his first wife, and Sarah and Joseph by his second wife, survived him. His heroic wife lived only a year and a half after him, and died early in 1691. The only known representatives of Bunyan are the descendants of his youngest daughter Sarah. In 1686, two years before her father's death, she had married her fellow-parishioner, William Browne, and her descendants form a rather numerous and widespread clan. Bunyan's personal appearance is thus described by a contem- porary: 'He was tall of stature, strong-boned though not cor- pulent, somewhat of a ruddy face with sparkling eyes, wearing his hair on his upper lip after the old British fashion ; his hair reddish, but in his latter days had sprinkled with grey ; his nose well-set, but not declining or bending, and his mouth moderately large, his fore- head something high, and his habit always plain and modest.' Another contemporary writes: 'His countenance was grave and sedate, and did so to the life discover the inward frame of his heart, that it was convincing to the beholders, and did strike something THE LIFE OF JOHN BUN Y AN 421 of awe into them that had nothing of the fear of God.' A third thus describes his manner and bearing: 'He appeared in coun- tenance to be of a stern and rough temper, but in his conversation mild and affable, not given to loquacity or much discourse in com- pany, unless some urgent occasion required it, observing never to boast of himself in his parts, but rather seem low in his own eyes, and submit himself to the judgment of others.' The works left in manuscript at Bunyan's death were given to the world by his devoted friend and admirer, the good, simple- minded combmaker by London Bridge, Charles Doe, who soon after his decease set about a folio edition of his collected works as ' the best work he could do for God.' The first volume, pub- lished in 1692, contained ten of these posthumous books, most of which had been prepared for the press by Bunyan himself. These were followed by the 'Heavenly Footman,' one of the most char- acteristic of Bunyan's works, published by Doe in 1698, and by the 'Account of his Imprisonment,' that invaluable supplement to his biography, which was not given to the world till 1765. Doe's second intended folio was never published. The first complete collected edition of Bunyan's works, containing twenty-seven in addition to the twenty previously published by Doe, appeared in 1736, edited by Samuel Wilson of the Barbican. A third issue of the collected works was published in two volumes folio in 1767, with a preface by George Whitefield. Other editions of the whole works are that by Alexander Hogg, in six volumes 8vo, in 1780; that by Mr. G. Off or, in three volumes imperial 8vo, in 1853, revised in 1862 ; and that by the Rev. H. Stebbing, in four volumes imperial 8vo, in 1859. The following is a list of Bunyan's works, arranged in chro- nological succession, based on that drawn up by Charles Doe and annexed to the first issue of the 'Heavenly Footman' in 1698. The full titles are not given, which in some cases extend to ten or a dozen lines: i. 'Some Gospel Truths opened,' 1656. 2. 'A Vindication of " Some Gospel Truths opened," ' same year. 3. ' A few Sighs from Hell, or the Groans of a Damned Soul,' 1658. 4. 'The Doctrine of the Law and Grace unfolded,' 1659. All the preceding were published previous to his imprisonment. The first book written by him in prison was in verse: 5. 'Profitable 422 EDMUND V ENABLES Meditations, fitted to Man's different Conditions. In nine par- ticulars' (no date). 6. 'I will pray with the Spirit and with the Understanding also,' 1663. 7. 'Christian Behaviour; being the Fruits of True Christianity,' 1663. 8, 9, 10. 'The Four Last Things,' 'Ebal and Gerizim,' and 'Prison Meditations.' All in verse, and published in one volume. The date of the first edi- tion is not known, n. 'The Holy City,' 1665. 12. 'The Resurrection of the Dead and Eternal Judgment,' 1665. 13. 'Grace abounding to the Chief of Sinners,' 1666. 14. ' De- fence of the Doctrine of Justification by Faith,' 1672. 15. 'Con- fession of Faith,' 1672. These two were the last books published by him in prison. His release was speedily followed by: 16. 'Difference of Judgment about Water Baptism no Bar to Communion,' 1673. 17. 'Peaceable Principles and True' (a rejoinder to attacks on the preceding work), 1674. 18. 'Repro- bation asserted, or the Doctrine of Eternal Election promiscuously handled' (no date). This work, though accepted by Charles Doe and inserted by him in the catalogue of Bunyan's works, and in- cluded by Hogg and Offor in their collected editions, is rejected by Mr. Brown on internal evidence of style and substance, but hardly perhaps on sufficient grounds. 19. 'Light for them that sit in Darkness,' 1675. 20. 'Instruction for the Ignorant, or a Salve to heal that great want of knowledge which so much rtigns in Old and Young,' 1675. A 'Catechism for Children,' written in prison, but not published till after his release. 21. 'Saved by Grace,' 1675. 22. 'The Strait Gate, or the great Difficulty of going to Heaven,' 1676. This is an expansion of a sermon on Luke xiii. 24, preached by Bunyan after his release. 23. 'The Pilgrim's Progress,' 1678. Two other editions with large addi- tions appeared in the same and the following year, evidencing its rapid popularity. 24. 'Come and welcome to Jesus Christ,' 1678. The expansion of a sermon on John vi. 37. 25. 'A Treatise of the Fear of God,' 1679. 26. 'The Life and Death of Mr. Badman,' 1680. 27. 'The Holy War,' 1682. 28. 'The Barren Fig Tree, or the Doom and Downfall of the Fruitless Professors,' 1682. 29. 'The Greatness of the Soul,' 1683. Originally a sermon preached at Pinners' Hall, expanded. 30. 'A Case of Conscience resolved,' 1683. A curious little tract on the THE LIFE OF JOHN BUN Y AN 423 propriety of women meeting separately for prayer, &c., l without their men.' 31. 'Seasonable Counsel or Advice to Sufferers,' 1684. 32. 'A Holy Life the Beauty of Christianity,' 1684. 33. 'A Caution to stir up to Watch against Sin,' 1684. A half-sheet broadside poem in sixteen stanzas. 34. ' The second part of the Pilgrim's Progress,' 1684. 35. Ques- tions about the Nature and Perpetuity of the Seventh- day Sabbath,' 1685. 36. 'The Pharisee and the Publican,' 1685. 37. 'A Book for Boys and Girls, or Country Rhymes for Children,' in verse ; or, as in later editions, ' Divine Emblems, or Temporal Things spiritualised,' 1686. 38. 'The Jerusalem Sinner saved, or Good News for the Vilest of Men,' 1688. 39. 'The Work of Jesus Christ as an Advocate,' 1688. 40. 'Dis- course of the Building, Nature, Excellency, and Government of the House of God,' 1688. A poetical composition in twelve divisions. 41. 'The Water of Life,' 1688. 42. 'Solomon's Temple spiritualised, or Gospel-light fetcht out of the Temple at Jerusalem,' in seventy particulars, 1688. 43. ' The Acceptable Sacrifice, or the Excellency of a Broken Heart,' the proofs of which were corrected by the author on his deathbed and published, with a preface, after his decease by his friend George Cokayn, 21 Sept. 1688. 44. His 'Last Sermon,' on John i. 13, preached on 19 Aug. 1688, two days before he sickened, and about twelve days before his death, was published from notes shortly after his decease. The 'Dying Sayings,' which appeared immediately after his death, bears internal evidence of being 'a compilation from various sources made in haste for some publisher with a shrewd eye to business and trading on the interest attaching to Bun- yan's name' (BROWN). Posthumous publications. Ten of these were contained in the folio edition of 1692, which had been pre- pared for the press by Bunyan himself : 45. 'An Exposition of the Ten first Chapters of Genesis and part of the Eleventh.' A frag- ment of an intended continuous commentary on the Holy Scriptures. 46. 'Justification by imputed Righteousness.' 47. 'Paul's Departure and Crown,' an expansion of a sermon on 2 Tim. iv. 6-8. 48. 'Israel's Hope encouraged,' a discourse on Ps. cxxx. 7. 49. 'The Desires of the Righteous granted,' a ser- mon on Prov. x. 24 and xi. 23. 50. 'The Saint's Privilege and 424 EDMUND V ENABLES Profit/ a treatise on prayer based on Heb. iv. 16. 51. 'Christ a Compleat Saviour,' a discourse on the intercession of Christ, on Heb. vii. 25. 52. 'The Saint's Knowledge of Christ's Love/ an exposition of St. Paul's prayer, Ephes. iii. 18-19. 53. 'The House of the Forest of Lebanon,' a discourse on i Kings vii. 2, in which by a fanciful and baseless analogy he makes this palace a type of the church under persecution. 54. ' Antichrist and her Ruin, and the Slaying of the Witnesses,' a work which singularly enough breathes the most profound loyalty to the sovereign, though that sovereign was then doing all in his power to establish popery. To these ten posthumous works must be added: 55. 'The Heavenly Footman,' a discourse on i Cor. ix. 24, bought of Bun- yan's eldest son, John, in 1691 by Charles Doe, and published by him in 1698. 56. The 'Relation of his Imprisonment,' which was not given to the world till 1765, a hundred years after it was written in Bedford gaol. Neither 57. 'The Christian Dialogue,' nor 58. 'The Pocket Concordance,' enumerated by Charles Doe, 'though diligently sought,' has been discovered. 59. The ' Scriptural Poems,' in which a far from unsuccessful attempt has been made to versify the histories of Joseph, Samson, Ruth, the Sermon on the Mount, and the Epistle of St. James, are regarded as spurious by Mr. Brown on the ground that they were unknown to Charles Doe and were not published till twelve years after Bun- yan's death, and then by one Blare, who issued other certainly spurious works in Bunyan's name. The internal evidence he also regards as unfavourable to their genuineness : 'There is but little to remind us of Bunyan's special verse.' Mr. Froude's verdict on this point is altogether different: 'The "Book of Ruth" and the "History of Joseph" done into blank verse are really beautiful idylls, which if we found in the collected works of a poet laureate we should consider that a difficult task had been accomplished successfully, and the original grace completely preserved.' THE LIFE OF SIR RICHARD STEELE 425 THE LIFE OF SIR RICHARD STEELE AUSTIN DOBSON [From the Dictionary of National Biography.} STEELE, SIR RICHARD (1672-1729), essayist, dramatist, and politician, was born in Dublin in March 1672 (N.S.), and was baptised at St. Bridget's Church on the i2th of that month. He was consequently some weeks older than Joseph Addison, who was born on i May following. Steele's father, also Richard Steele, was a well-to-do Dublin attorney, who had a country house at Mountain (Monkstown), and was at one time sub- sheriff at Tipperary. He married, in 1670, an Irish widow named Elinor Symes (or Sims), born Sheyles. When his son was 'not quite five years of age' (Tatter, No. 181), the elder Steele died, and of Mrs. Steele we know nothing but what the same authority tells us, namely, that she was 'a very beautiful woman, of a noble spirit.' She cannot have long survived her husband, since Steele seems to have passed early into the care of an uncle, Henry Gascoigne, private secretary to James Butler, first duke of Ormonde, by whose influence the boy in November 1684 obtained a nomination to the Charterhouse, of which the duke was a governor. Two years later Addison entered the same school, and a lifelong friendship began between the pair. In November 1689 Steele was * elected to the university' of Oxford, whither Addison had already preceded him. On 13 March 1690 he matriculated at Christ Church, and on 27 Aug. 1691 he became a postmaster of Merton, his college tutor being Dr. Welbore Ellis, afterwards mentioned in the 'Christian Hero.' He continued his friendship with Addison, then a demy at Mag- dalen, and appears to have visited him in his home at Lichfield (Preface to the Drummer, 1722, and Taller, No. 235). While at college he enjoyed some reputation as a scholar. He dabbled also in letters, composing a comedy which, by the advice of a friend, Mr. Parker of Merton, he burned. Then suddenly, in 1694, much to the regret of 'the whole Society,' he left Merton with- out taking a degree, and entered the army as a cadet or gentle- 426 AUSTIN DOBSON man-volunteer in the second troop of life-guards, at that time under the command of the second duke of Ormonde, thereby losing, as he tells us in 'The Theatre,' No. n, 'the succession to a very good estate in the county of Wexford in Ireland.' What this estate was his biographers have failed to discover, although it has been conjectured that, if it existed at all, it belonged to a relative of his mother. On 28 Dec. 1694 Queen Mary died, and among the mourn- ing bards who, in black-framed folio, celebrated her funeral was Steele, whose verses, described as ' by a Gentleman of the Army,' and entitled 'The Procession,' were, doubtless from motives of policy, dedicated to John, Lord Cutts, who had just become colonel of the 2nd or Coldstream regiment of foot-guards. Lord Cutts took Steele into his household, and in 1696-7 employed him as his confidential agent or secretary (cf. CARLETON, Memoirs, 1728, ch. iii.). Ultimately he gave him a standard in his own regiment. By 1700 Steele is referred to as 'Captain,' and there is also evidence that he was in friendly relations with Sedley, Congreve, Vanbrugh, Garth, and other contemporary wits. In the same year (16 June), ' one or two of his acquaintance' hav- ing 'thought fit to misuse him and try their valour upon him' (Apology for himself and his Writings, 1714, p. 80), he fought a duel in Hyde Park with a Captain Kelly, whom he wounded dangerously, but not mortally (LUTTRELL, Diary, iv. 657). This occurrence made a serious impression upon him, and laid the foundation of that dislike of duelling which he ever afterwards exhibited. In all probability it is connected with his next liter- ary effort, the treatise called 'The Christian Hero: an Argu- ment proving that no Principles but those of Religion are suffi- cient to make a great Man.' This (which was also dedicated to Lord Cutts) was published by Tonson in April 1701, a second and enlarged edition following on 19 July. Steele's own account of this work in his ' Apology,' p. 80, is that, finding the military life 'exposed to much irregularity,' he wrote it 'to fix upon his own mind a strong impression of virtue and religion, in opposi- tion to a stronger propensity towards unwarrantable pleasures,' which admission has probably been construed too literally (cf. Biogr. Brit. 1763, vol. vi. pt. i. p. 3823). ' The Christian Hero ' THE LIFE OF SIR RICHARD STEELE 427 was at first designed solely for his private use, but finding ' that this secret admonition was too weak,' he ultimately 'printed the book with his name,' as a 'standing testimony against himself.' It differs considerably both in style and teaching from the ordi- nary devotional manual, and without much straining may be said to exhibit definite indications of that faculty for essay-writ- ing which was to be so signally developed in the 'Spectator,' in which indeed certain portions of it were afterwards embodied. Upon his colleagues at the Tower Guard (whence its Preface is dated) its effect was what might have been anticipated. * From being thought no undelightful companion, he was soon reck- oned a disagreeable fellow. . . . Thus he found himself slighted, instead of being encouraged, for his declarations as to Religion, and it was now incumbent upon him to enliven his character, for which reason he writ the comedy called "The Funeral," in which (tho' full of incidents that move laughter) virtue and vice appear as they ought to do' (Apology, p. 80). 'The Funeral; or, Grief-a-la-Mode,' was acted at Drury Lane late in 1701, and was published in book form in December of that year, with a dedication to the Countess of Albemarle. The principal parts were taken by Gibber, Wilks, and Mrs. Verbrug- gen, and the championship of the author's military friends helped to secure its success. 'With some particulars enlarged upon to his advantage' (by which must probably be understood certain politic references to William III in the 'Christian Hero'), it also obtained for him the notice of the king. ' His [Steele's] name, to be provided for, was in the last table-book ever worn by the glorious and immortal William the Third' (ib. p. 81). His majesty, how- ever, died on 8 March 1702, and Steele's fortunes were yet to make. In the preceding month he had become a captain in Lord Lucas's newly formed regiment of foot (AITKEN, Life, i. 79) ; and in December 1703 he produced at Drury Lane a second comedy, 'The Lying Lover; or, the Ladies Friendship,' which was pub- lished on 26 Jan. 1704. This piece was based upon the 'Men- teur' of Corneille, and differed from its predecessor, 'The Fu- neral,' in that it was a more deliberate attempt to carry out upon the stage those precepts which, a few years earlier, Jeremy Collier had advocated in his 'Short View of the Profaneness and Im- 428 AUSTIN DOBSON morality of the English Stage.' Among other things it contained an indictment of duelling. Upon its first appearance it ran but six nights. Its author described it years afterwards as ' damned for its piety' (Apology, p. 48), but it was also inferior to its prede- cessor. Steele nevertheless set to work upon a third effort, ' The Tender Husband; or, the Accomplished Fools.' This, a frank imitation of Moliere's ' Sicilien,' was brought out at Drury Lane in April 1705. It was better than the ' Lying Lover,' but scarcely more successful, though Addison (now back from Italy) wrote its prologue, and added 'many applauded [though now undis- tinguishable] strokes' to the piece itself (Spectator, No. 555). In May, when the play was printed, it was dedicated to Addison 'as no improper memorial of an inviolable friendship.' Soon after the production of ' The Tender Husband,' which, for several years, closed Steele's career as a playwright, he married. His wife (for particulars respecting whom we are indebted to the researches of Mr. Aitken) was a widow named Margaret Stretch, nee Ford, the possessor of more or less extensive estates in Bar- bados, which she had inherited from a brother then recently dead. It has been also hinted that she was elderly, and that her fortune was the main attraction to her suitor, whose indefinite means had about this time been impaired by futile researches for the philoso- pher's stone (New Atalantis and Town Talk, No. 4). The marriage must have taken place not long after March 1705, when Mrs. Stretch took out letters of administration to her West Indian property, which is said to have been worth 850^. per annum. It was, however, encumbered with a debt of 3,ooo/., besides legacies, &c. In December 1706 Mrs. Steele died, and Steele, in his turn, administered to her estate in January 1707. During the brief period of his married life in August 1 706 he had become a gentleman waiter to Prince George of Denmark (salary zoo/, yearly, 'not subject to taxes'), and in April or May 1707, on the recommendation of Arthur Mainwaring, he was appointed by Harley gazetteer, at a further annual salary of 300^., which was, however, liable to a tax of 457. 'The writer of the "Gazette" now,' says Hearne in May 1707, 'is Captain Steel, who is the author of several romantic things, and is accounted an ingenious man.' Steele seems to have honestly endeavoured to comply THE LIFE OF SIR RICHARD STEELE 429 with 'the rule observed by all ministries, to keep the paper very innocent and very insipid' (Apology, p. 81) ; but the rule was by no means an easy one to abide by. His inclinations still leaned towards the stage. Already, in March 1703, he had received from Rich of Drury Lane part payment for an unfinished comedy called 'The Election of Goatham' (AITKEN, i. 112), a subject also essayed by Gay and Mrs. Centlivre; and in January 1707 he was evidently meditating the completion of this or some other piece when his wife's death interrupted his work (Muses Mercury, January 1707). But his only definite literary production between May 1705 and 1707 was a 'Prologue' to the university of Oxford, published in July 1706. Before he had held the post of gazetteer many months he mar- ried again. The lady, whose acquaintance he had made at his first wife's funeral, was a Miss, or Mistress, Mary Scurlock, the daughter and heiress of Jonathan Scurlock, deceased, of Llangun- nor in Carmarthen, and, according to Mrs. Manley (New Atalan- tis, 6th ed. vol. iv.), ' a cry'd up beauty.' For reasons now obscure, the marriage was kept a secret, but it is supposed to have taken place on 9 Sept. 1707, soon after which time Steele set up house in Bury Street, or (as his letters give it) 'third door, right hand, turning out of Jermyn Street.' This was a locality described by contemporary advertisements as in convenient proximity 'to St. James's Church, Chapel, Park, Palace, Coffee and Chocolate Houses,' and was obviously within easy distance of the court and Steele's office, the Cockpit at Whitehall. Both before and after marriage Steele kept up an active correspondence with his 'Charmer' and 'Inspirer,' names which,, later on, are ex- changed, not inappropriately, for 'Ruler' and 'Absolute Govern- ess.' Mrs. Steele preserved all her husband's letters, over four hundred of which John Nichols the antiquary presented in 1787 to the British Museum (Add. MSS. 5145, A, B, and C), where they afford a curious and an instructive study to the inquirer. The lady, though genuinely attached to her husband, was im- perious and exacting; the gentleman ardent and devoted, but incurably erratic and impulsive. His correspondence reflects these characteristics in all their variations, and, if it often does credit to his heart and understanding, it as often suggests that 430 AUSTIN DOBSON his easy geniality and irregular good nature must have made him 'gey ill to live with.' It was a part of his sanguine tempera- ment to overestimate his means (AiTKEN, passim). Hence he is perpetually in debt and difficulties (he borrowed i,ooo/. of Addison, which he repaid; letter of 20 Aug. 1708); hence always (like Gay) on the alert for advancement. In October 1708 the death of Prince George deprived him of his post as gentleman waiter, and, though he had previously been seeking an appointment as usher of the privy chamber, and almost immediately afterwards tried for the under-secretaryship rendered vacant by Addison's departure for Ireland as secretary of state to Lord Wharton, the lord-lieutenant, he was successful in neither attempt. All these things were but unpromising accompaniments to a chariot and pair for his 'dear Prue,' with a country box (in the shadow of the palace) at Hampton Wick ; and it seems certain that towards the close of 1708 an execution for arrears of rent was put into the Bury Street house. In the following March his daughter Elizabeth was born, having for godfathers Addison and Wortley Montagu. A month later, without premonition of any kind, Steele inaugurated his career as an essayist by establishing the'Tatler.' The first number of the ' Tatler,' a single folio sheet, was issued on 12 April 1709, and it came out three times a week. The first four numbers were given away gratis ; after this the price was a penny. The supposed author" was one 'Isaac Bickerstaff,' the pseudonym borrowed by Swift from a shopdoor to demolish John Partridge the astrologer. The paper's name, said Steele ironi- cally, was invented in honour of the fair sex (No. i), and it pro- fessed in general to treat, as its motto for many numbers indi- cated, of 'Quicquid agunt homines,' dating its accounts of gal- lantry, pleasure, and entertainment from White's coffee-house, its poetry from Will's, its learning from the Grecian, and its foreign and domestic intelligence (which Steele hoped to supplement out of his own official gazette) from the St. James's. Whatever came under none of these heads was dated from ' My own apartment.' As time went on the project developed, and when the first volume was dedicated to Mainwaring (who, as already stated, had helped Steele to his gazetteership), it was already claimed for the new THE LIFE OF SIR RICHARD STEELE 431 venture that it had aimed at ' exposing the false arts of life, pulling off the disguises of cunning, vanity, and affectation, and recom- mending a general simplicity in our dress, our discourse, and our behaviour' (see also Taller, No. 89). In this larger task Steele was no doubt aided by Addison, who, playing but an inconspicuous part in the first volume (his earliest contribution was to No. 18), gave very substantial aid in its successors ; and from a hotch-pot of news and town gossip the ' Tatler ' became a collection of indi- vidual essays on social and general topics. In the preface to the fourth and final volume, Steele, with a generosity which never failed him, rendered grateful testimony to his anonymous coad- jutor's assistance. In thanking Addison for his services as 'a gentleman who will be nameless,' he goes on to say: 'This good office [of contributing] he performed with such force of genius, humour, wit, and learning, that I fared like a distressed Prince who calls in a powerful neighbour to his aid ; I was undone by my auxiliary; when I had once called him in, I could not subsist without dependence on him.' After a career, prolonged to 271 numbers, about 188 of which were from Steele's own pen, the 'Tatler' came to a sudden end on 2 Jan. 1711. The ostensible reason for this was that the public had penetrated the editor's disguise, and that the edifying pre- cepts of the fictitious ' Mr. Bickerstaff ' were less efficacious when they came to be habitually identified in the public mind with the fallible personality of Steele himself (Tatler, No. 271). But it has been shrewdly surmised that there were other and more pressing reasons (which Steele also hints at) for its abrupt cessation. In addition to his office of gazetteer, he had been made in January 1710 a commissioner of stamps, an office which increased his income by 3oo/. per annum. When in August of the same year Harley became head of the government, certain papers satirising him had recently made their appearance in the 'Tatler;' and in the following October Steele lost his gazetteership. That he was not deprived of his commissionership of stamps as well has been ascribed to the intervention of Swift, whose friends were in power (Journal to Stella, 15 Dec. 1710), and with this forbearance of the ministry the termination of the 'Tatler' is also supposed to be obscurely connected. ' What I find is the least excusable part of 432 AUSTIN DOBSON this work,' says Steele in the final number quoted above, 'is that I have in some places in it touched upon matters which concern both the church and state.' But however this may be, the ' Tatler ' was not long without a successor. Two months later (i March) began the 'Spectator,' professing in its first number 'an exact neutrality between the whigs and tories,' and setting in motion almost from the first that famous club of which Sir Roger de Coverley is the most prominent member. The first sketch (in No. 2) of this immortal friendly gathering was undoubtedly due to Steele's inventive alertness. But Addison, working at leisure upon his friend's rapid and hasty outline, gradually filled in the features of the figure whose fortunes to-day constitute the chief interest of the periodical. Diversified in addition by the critical essays of Addison and the domestic sketches of Steele, the * Spec- tator' proceeded with unabated vivacity to its five hundred and fifty-fifth number and seventh volume, surviving even that baleful Stamp Act of August 1712 (10 Anne, cap. 19) which nipped so many of its contemporaries. Out of the whole of the papers Addison wrote 274 and Steele 236. As before, no satisfactory explanation is forthcoming for the termination of the enterprise, the success of which is admitted. Towards the end of its career, the 'Spectator' was selling ten thousand per week, and Steele himself says that the first four volumes had obtained it a further sale of nine thousand copies in book form (No. 555). What is clear is that Addison's assistance was still anonymous, and Steele's gratitude to him as strong as ever. 'I am indeed,' he wrote, ' much more proud of his long-continued friendship than I should be of the fame of being thought the author of any writings he is capable of producing. ... I heartily wish that what I have done here were as honorary to that sacred name [of friendship] as learn- ing, wit, and humanity render those pieces which I have taught the reader now to distinguish for his' i.e. by the letters C, L, I, O. During the progress of the 'Spectator,' Steele had made his first definite plunge as a politician by ' The Englishman's Thanks to the Duke of Marlborough.' This appeared in January 1712, just after the duke had been deprived of all his offices, a catas- trophe which also prompted Swift's opposition 'Fable of Midas.' There were other signs of political disquiet in some of Steele's sub- THE LIFE OF SIR RICHARD STEELE 433 sequent contributions to the 'Spectator' ('he has been mighty impertinent of late,' wrote Swift to Stella in July 1712); and although in the new periodical, which he began in March 1713, he made profession of abstinence from matters of state, only seven days before he had put forth a 'Letter to Sir Miles Wharton con- cerning Occasional Peers.' In the 'Guardian' he philosophi- :ally declared himself to be, with regard to government of the :hurch, a tory ; and with regard to the state, a whig. But he was, Johnson's phrase, ' too hot for neutral topics ; ' and before the middle of 1713 he was actively embroiled with the 'Examiner,' the casus belli being an attack that tory paper (behind which was the formidable figure of Swift) had made in its No. 41 upon Lord Nottingham's daughter, Lady Charlotte Finch, the Nottinghams having deserted to the whigs. On 4 June he resigned his com- missionership of stamps, and his pension as Prince George's gentleman-in-waiting, and entered the lists of faction with an indictment of the government upon the vexed question of the postponed demolition, under the treaty of Utrecht, of the Dunkirk fortifications. 'The British nation,' he declared, 'expects the demolition of Dunkirk' (Guardian, No. 128). The 'Examiner' retorted by charging him with disloyalty. Steele rejoined (22 Sept.) by a pamphlet entitled 'The Importance of Dunkirk con- sider 'd,' addressed to the bailiff of Stockbridge, Hampshire, for which town in August he had been elected M. P. Swift answered by a bitterly contemptuous 'Importance of the Guardian con- sider'd.' Before this came out, however, on 31 Oct. the 'Guard- ian' had been dead for a month, and had been succeeded on 6 Oct. by the 'Englishman,' 'a sequel' of freer political scope. By this time Steele was in the thick of party strife. In Novem- a scurrilous 'Character' of him 'by Toby Abel's kinsman* (i.e. Edward King, nephew of Abel Roper of the 'Postboy') was sued by some of Swift's 'under spur-leathers,' and early in [anuary 1714 Swift himself followed suit with a paraphrase of [orace (ii. i), in which it was suggested that when he (Steele) lad settled the affairs of Europe, he might find time to finish lis long-threatened (but unidentified) play. Shortly afterwards (19 Jan.) Steele put forth another widely circulated pamphlet, 'The Crisis,' in which, aided by the counsels of Addison, Hoadly, 2F 434 AUSTIN DOBSON William Moore of the Inner Temple, and others, he reviewed the whole question of the Hanoverian succession. Swift was promptly in the field (23 Feb.) with the 'Public Spirit of the Whigs,' one of his most masterly efforts in this way; and when Steele took his seat in parliament he found that his doom was sealed, and on 12 March he was formally accused of uttering seditious libels. Supported by Walpole, Addison, General Stanhope, and others of his party, he spoke in his own defence for some three hours, and spoke well; but what he afterwards called, with pardonable energy, 'the insolent and unmanly sanction of a majority' (Apology, p. xvi) prevailed, and on 18 March 1714 he was expelled the House of Commons. In these circumstances he turned once more to his proper vo- cation letters. Even at the end of 1714 he had contrived to issue a volume of 'Poetical Miscellanies,' dedicated to Congreve, and numbering Pope, Gay, and Parnell among its contributors. In this he reprinted his own 'Procession' of 1695. The short- lived 'Englishman' came to an end in February 1714, and was immediately succeeded by the 'Lover' (25 Feb.). In April came the 'Reader.' Both of these were dropped in May. In No. 6 of the latter Steele announced that he was preparing a 'History of the War in Flanders,' a subject for which he was not without qualifications. But the project came to nothing. He produced, however, several pamphlets: the 'Romish Ecclesiastical History of late Years' (25 May), a 'Letter concerning the Bill for pre- venting the Growth of Schism' (3 June), and another on Dunkirk (2 July). Then, on i Aug., Queen Anne died. On 18 Sept. George I landed at Greenwich, and the tide turned. The cham- pion of the Hanoverian succession was speedily appointed J. P., deputy-lieutenant for the county of Middlesex, and surveyor of the royal stables at Hampton Court. What was better still (and more definitely lucrative), he obtained the position of supervisor of the Theatre Royal of Drury Lane, the license of which had expired with the queen's death. The license was shortly after- wards converted into a patent, and Steele in this manner came into receipt of i,ooo/. per annum. Henceforward his life grows more and more barren of notable incident. In the same month in which his honours came upon THE LIFE OF SIR RICHARD STEELE 435 him he published the compilation known as 'The Ladies' Library,' volume iii. of which was dedicated, with much grace and tender- ness, to his wife. He also vindicated his past proceedings with considerable spirit in the pamphlet entitled ' Mr. Steele's Apology for himself and his Writings' (22 Oct.), citations from which have already been made. On 2 Feb. 1715 he was elected M. P. for Boroughbridge, Yorkshire, and two months later (8 April) the presentation of an address to the king procured him a knighthood. During the next few years he continued as of old to busy himself with projects, literary and otherwise. He established in Villiers Street, York Buildings, Strand, a kind of periodical conversazione called the 'Censorium,' which he inaugurated on his majesty's birthday (28 May) by a grand banquet and entertainment, to which Tickell supplied the prologue and Addison the epilogue (Town Talk, No. 4). He wrote another overgrown pamphlet on the Roman catholic religion (13 May), began a new volume of the 'Englishman' (n July to 21 Nov.), and established and aban- doned three more periodicals, 'Town Talk' (17 Dec.), 'The Tea- Table' (2 Feb. 1716), and 'Chit Chat' (6 March). In June he was appointed one of the thirteen commissioners for forfeited estates in Scotland, the salary being i,ooo/. per annum. Two years later, in June 1718, he obtained a patent for a project called the 'Fish pool,' a plan (which proved unsuccessful) for bringing salmon alive from Ireland in a well-boat. Then, in December 1718, he lost his 'dear and honoured wife.' Lady Steele died on the 26th, and was buried in Westminster Abbey. Early in the succeeding year Steele's evil star involved him in a painful con- troversy with his lifelong friend Addison. He started a periodical called the 'Plebeian' (14 March) to denounce Lord Sunderland's bill for limiting the power of creating new peers. Addison replied acrimoniously in the 'Old Whig,' and, what was worse, died so soon afterwards (17 June) that the breach thus created was never healed, while Steele's opposition to the measure (which was dropped) led indirectly to the withdrawal by the Duke of Newcastle in January 1720 of the Drury Lane patent. With this last occurrence is connected the establishment of another, and perhaps the most interesting, of his later periodical efforts, as it was also the last, 'The Theatre' (2 Jan. to April 1720). 436 AUSTIN DOBSON His next publications were two pamphlets, ' The Crisis of Prop- erty' (i Feb.) and its sequel 'A Nation a Family' (27 Feb.), in which he warmly combated the South Sea mania. In 1721 his former ally, Walpole, became chancellor of the exchequer, and the Drury Lane patent was restored (2 May). In December of the same year he published a second edition of Addison's ' Drum- mer, 5 in the preface to which, addressed to Congreve, he vindi- cated himself against the aspersions cast upon him in the edition of Addison's works, which Tickell had put forth in the preceding October. In March 1722 he became member for Wendover, Buckinghamshire. Then, in November of the same year, he produced at Drury Lane his last comedy, 'The Conscious Lovers/ which, notwithstanding that (in Parson Adams's words) it con- tained 'some things almost solemn enough for a sermon,' proved a hit, and brought its writer five hundred guineas from George I, to whom it was dedicated. Its groundwork was the 'Andria' of Terence, and it attacked duelling. Besides the 'Conscious Lovers,' Steele began, but did not finish, two other pieces, 'The School of Action' and 'The Gentleman,' fragments of which were printed by Nichols in 1809. Lawsuits and money difficulties thickened upon him in his later days, and in 1724, in pursuance of an honourable arrangement with his creditors, and not, as Swift wrote, 'from perils of a hundred gaols,' he retired first to Hereford, and finally to Carmarthen, where he lived chiefly at Tygwyn, a farmhouse overlooking the Towy. In Victor's ' Origi- nal Letters' (1776, i. 330) there is a pretty picture of his still unabated kindliness of nature. Broken and paralytic, he is shown delightedly watching from his invalid's chair the country folk at their sports on a summer evening, and writing an order upon his agent for a prize of a new gown to the best dancer. He died at a house in King Street, Carmarthen, on i Sept. 1729, aged 58, and was buried in St. Peter's Church, where in 1876 a mural tablet was erected to him. There is also an earlier memorial to him at his old estate of Llangunnor. Two only of his four children survived him: Mary, who died in the year following his death; and Elizabeth, the eldest daughter, who ultimately married a Welsh judge (afterwards the third Lord Trevor of Bromham). His two sons, Richard and Eugene, died in 1716 and 1723 re- THE LIFE OF SIR RICHARD STEELE 43^ spectively. He had also a natural daughter, known as Miss Ousley, who married a Welsh gentleman named Stynston. About 1718 it seems to have been proposed to marry her to Richard Savage the poet. There are three principal portraits of Steele, all mentioned by himself (Theatre, No. 2) in answer to an attack made upon him by John Dennis the critic. The first, by Jonathan Richardson, now in the National Portrait Gallery, was executed in 1712, and gives us the Steele of the 'Spectator.' It was engraved in the following year by J. Smith, and later by Bartolozzi and Meadows. The second, by Sir Godfrey Kneller, was painted shortly after- wards for the Kit-Cat Club (of which Steele was among the earlier members), and exhibits him in one of the fine full-bottomed black periwigs he wore when he rode abroad (DRAKE, Essays, 1814, i. 179). This belongs to Mr. Baker of Bayfordbury, and has been engraved by Vertue, Simon, Faber, Houbraken, and others. The third, by Thornhill, is at Cobham Hall, and was reproduced in copper by Vertue in 1713, and by James Basire. In this Steele appears in a dressing-gown and a tasselled cap. The Richard- son, he tells us, makes him 'indolent,' the Kneller 'resolute,' the Thornhill 'thoughtful.' There is another reputed Kneller at Stationers' Hall ; and there is said to be a portrait of him when he was a commissioner in Scotland, by Michael Dahl. The Thornhill is the best known; the Kneller Kit-Cat is probably the best likeness. Sir Godfrey also executed a picture of Lady Steele, which does full justice to her good looks. It belongs to Mrs. Thomas of Moreb, Llandilo, Carmarthenshire, and figures as the frontispiece to vol. ii. of Mr. Aitken's 'Life.' As regards the written portraits of his character, Macaulay in his famous essay on Addison sought by deeply drawn lines to heighten the contrast between Steele and his colleague. Thack- eray softened the asperity of the likeness in his lecture (in the ' English Humourists ') . Forster's vindicatory study in the ' Quar- terly ' is not entirely sympathetic. That Steele was an undetected hypocrite and a sentimental debauchee is now no longer main- tained, although it cannot be denied that his will was often weaker than his purpose; that he was constitutionally improvident and impecunious; and that, like many of his contemporaries in that 438 AUSTIN DOBSON hard-drinking century, he was far too easily seduced by his com- pliant good-fellowship into excess in wine. ' I shall not carry my humility so far as to call myself a vicious man,' he wrote in ' Tat- ler' No. 271, * but must confess my life is at best but pardonable.' When so much is admitted, it is needless to charge the picture, though it may be added that, with all his faults, allowed and imputed, there is abundant evidence to prove that he was not only a doting husband and an affectionate father, but also a loyal friend and an earnest and unselfish patriot. As a literary man his claim upon posterity is readily stated. As a poet even in that indulgent age of Anne he cannot be classed ; as a pam- phleteer he is plain-spoken and well-meaning, but straggling and ineffectual ; as a dramatist, despite his shrewd perceptive faculty and his laudable desire to purify the stage, his success is no more than respectable. In the brief species of essay, however, which he originated and developed the essay of the 'Tatler' and its immediate successors he is at home. Without ranking as a great stylist his hand was too hasty for laboured form or finish, and he claimed and freely used the license of ' common speech ' he was a master of that unembarrassed manner which (it has been well said) is the outcome of an unembarrassed matter. He writes, as a rule, less from his head than from his heart, to the warmth of which organ his rapid pen gives eager and emphatic expression. His humour is delightfully kindly and genial, his sympathies quick- springing and compassionate, his instincts uniformly on the side of what is generous, honest, manly, and of good report. ' He had a love and reverence of virtue,' said Pope; and many of his lay sermons are unrivalled in their kind. As the first painter of domesticity the modern novel owes him much, but the women of his own day owe him more. Not only did be pay them collec- tively a magnificent compliment when he wrote of Lady Elizabeth Hastings, that 'to love her was a liberal education' (Taller, No. 49) ; but in a time when they were treated by the wits with con- temptuous flattery or cynical irreverence, he sought to offer them a reasonable service of genuine respect which was immeasurably superior to those 'fulsome raptures, guilty impressions, senseless deifications and pretended deaths' with which (as he himself wrote in 'The Christian Hero') it was the custom of his contemporaries to insult their understandings. THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON 439 THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON SIR LESLIE STEPHEN [From the Dictionary of National Biography.] JOHNSON, SAMUEL (1709-1784), lexicographer, son of Michael Johnson, bookseller at Lichfield, by his wife Sarah (Ford), was born at Lichfield on 18 Sept. (N.S.) 1709, and was baptised 17 Sept. (i.e. 28 Sept. N.S.), according to the parish register (Gent. Mag. October 1829 ; cf . A. L. READE'S The Reades of Blackwood Hill . . . with account of Dr. Johnson's ancestry, 1906). The father, born in 1656, remembered the publication of * Absalom and Achito- pheF in 1681 (JOHNSON, Life of Dry den). He transmitted to his son a powerful frame and 'a vile melancholy/ Besides keep- ing his shop (now preserved as a public memorial) at Lichfield he sold books occasionally at Birmingham, at Uttoxeter, and at Ashby-de-la-Zouch. He was churchwarden in 1688, sheriff of Lichfield (then a county) in 1709, junior bailiff in 1718, and senior bailiff in 1725. As became a bookseller in a cathedral town, he was a high churchman, and something of a Jacobite. Unbusiness- like habits or a speculation in the 'manufacture of parchment' brought him into difficulties. His wife, born in 1669 at King's Norton, Worcestershire, is described as ' descendant of an ancient race of yeomanry in Warwickshire.' They married on 9 June 1706 (ib. ii. 384), and had, besides Samuel, a son Nathanael, born in 1712, who died in 1737. Strange stories were told of Samuel's precocity. It is said that before he was three years old he insisted upon going to church to hear Sacheverell preach (BOSWELL, Life, by Hill, i. 39). His father was foolishly proud of him, and passed off an epitaph on ' Good Master Duck,' really written by himself, as Samuel's com- position at the age of three. The child . suffered from scrofula, which disfigured his face and injured or destroyed the sight of one eye. He was 'touched' by Queen Anne, and he retained a vague recollection of a ' lady in diamonds and a long black hood ' (Piozzi, Anecdotes, p. 10). He learnt his letters at a dame-school under one Jane Brown, who published a spelling-book, and * dedi- 440 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN cated it to the Universe,' which, however, has preserved no copies. He next learnt Latin in Lichfield school. After two years he was under the head-master, Hunter, who was a brutal but efficient teacher. Johnson afterwards valued the birch as a less demoral- ising incentive than emulation. His force of mind and character already secured respect, and three of his school-fellows used regu- larly to carry him to school. One of them, named Hector, survived to give information to Boswell. He was indolent and unwieldy, unable to join in games, and 'immoderately fond' of reading the old romances, a taste which he retained through life. In the autumn of 1725 (HAWKINS) he visited an uncle, Cornelius Ford, a clergyman, who wasted considerable ability by convivial habits (JOHNSON, Life of Fentori). Ford was struck by the lad's talents, and kept him till the next Whitsuntide. He was then excluded from the Lichfield school, and sent, by Ford's ad vice, to a school at Stourbridge under a Mr. 'Wentworth, whom he is also said to have assisted in teaching. After a year he returned home, and spent two years in 'lounging.' It was at this time probably that he refused, out of pride, to attend his father to Uttoxeter market. On the same day some fifty years later he performed penance for this offence by visiting Uttoxeter market and standing bareheaded for an hour in the rain on the site of his father's bookstall (BOSWELL, iv. 373; R. WARNER, Tour through the Northern Counties; for some slight discrepancies in these statements see Notes and Queries, 6th ser. xi. 1,91, 193). He read a great deal in a desultory fashion, and said afterwards (BOSWELL, Letters, p. 34) that he knew as much at eighteen as he did at fifty-two. He had written verses, of which Boswell gives specimens (one of them inserted in the Gent. Mag. for 1743, p. 378), and had no doubt made a reputation among his father's customers at Lichfield. A 'neighbouring gentleman, Mr. Andrew Corbet,' according to Hawkins (p. 9), offered to send Johnson to Oxford to read with his son, who had entered Pembroke College in 1727. Johnson was entered as a commoner on 31 Oct. 1728. According to Hawkins a disagree- ment with Corbet followed, and Johnson's supplies from this source were stopped after a time. The dates, however, are con- fused. Hawkins and Boswell say that Johnson remained three years at Oxford. The college books show him to have resided THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON 441 continuously till 12 Dec. 1729, after which he only resided for a few brief periods, and his name was removed on 8 Oct. 1731 (see appendix to HILL'S Dr. Johnson, his Friends and his Critics). Johnson's tutor was a Mr. Jorden. He despised Jorden's lectures, though he respected the kindliness of the lecturer. Johnson seems to have surprised the college authorities by the extent of his reading, and a Latin translation of Pope's ' Messiah,' performed as a Christ- mas exercise, spread his reputation in the university, and was printed in 1731 in an Oxford 'Miscellany' brought out by J. Husbands, a fellow of Pembroke. Pope, to whom it was shown by George, son of Dr. Arbuthnot, is said to have paid it a high compliment (HAWKINS, p. 13). Johnson was said by William Adams (1706-1789) [q. v.], who succeeded Jorden as tutor, to have been a 'gay and frolicsome fellow,' and generally popular at Oxford. Johnson told Boswell, upon hearing this, that he was only 'mad and violent.' He was * miserably poor,' meant to 'fight his way by his literature and wit, and so disregarded all authority.' He was occasionally insubordinate (BOSWELL, i. 59, 271), but amenable to kindness. He suffered from hypochondria, of which (ib. p. 63) he had a violent attack at Lichfield during the vacation of 1729. He frequently, says Boswell, walked from Lichfield to Birmingham and back in order to overcome his melan- choly by violent exertion. He wrote an account of his case in Latin, and laid it before his godfather, Dr. Swinfen, who was so much struck by its ability that, to Johnson's lasting offence, he showed it to several friends. While at Oxford he took up the 'Serious Call' of William Law [q. v.], by which he was profoundly affected. He had previously fallen into indifference to religious matters, and was even 'a lax talker against religion.' From this time his religious sentiments were always strong, though he continued to reproach himself with carelessness in practice. His poverty exposed him to vexations. His schoolfellow, John Taylor, afterwards J. Taylor of Ashbourne, proposed to become his com- panion at Pembroke, but upon Johnson's advice went to Christ Church to be under a Mr. Bateman, regarded as the best tutor at Oxford. Johnson used to get Bateman's lectures from Taylor, till he observed that the Christ Church men laughed at his worn- out shoes. Some one placed a new pair of shoes at his door, 442 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN when he 'threw them away with indignation.' Johnson read Greek and ' metaphysics J at Oxford in his usual desultory fash- ion, and, in spite of his sufferings, retained a warm regard for his college and the university. Johnson's poverty no doubt caused his premature departure. He returned at the end of 1729 to Lichfield, where his father died in December 1731. The father was on the verge of bankruptcy, though not actually bankrupt. Johnson in July 1732 received* 2o/. from the estate, all that he could expect until his mother's death, and had therefore to 'make his own fortune' (Diary, quoted by BOSWELL, i. 80). He had some friends at Lichfield, especially Dr. Swinfen, Garrick's father, and Gilbert Walmsley, whom he describes with warm gratitude in the 'Life of Edmund Smith.' He also was on friendly terms with Miss Hill Boothby [q. v.], to whom he wrote affectionate letters in her last illness (first published in Piozzi's Letters), and with Miss 'Molly Aston,' the loveliest creature he ever saw (BOSWELL, i. 83 ; PIOZZI, A need. p. 157). He now tried for some scholastic employment, though the dates are rather confused, and was (probably in the first part of 1732) usher at Market Bosworth school. On 30 Oct. 1731 he describes himself as 'still unemployed,' having failed in an appli- cation for an ushership at his old school at Stourbridge. On 1 6 July (apparently 1732) he says that he walked to Market Bosworth (BOSWELL, i. 84-5), and on 27 July he had recently left the house of Sir Wolstan Dixie, the patron of the Bosworth school. He can hardly have been usher, as Hawkins says, under Anthony Blackwall [q. v.], who died 8 April 1730. His life at Bosworth, whatever the date, was miserable. Dixie, to whom he acted as chaplain, treated him harshly, and he always spoke of the monoto- nous drudgery with 'the strongest aversion, and even a degree of horror.' A letter from Addenbrooke, dean of Lichfield, recom- mending him for a tutorship about this time, is given in 'Notes and Queries,' 6th ser. x. 421. He gave up the place after a few months, and went to live with an old schoolfellow, Hector, who was boarding at Birmingham with a Mr. Warren, the chief bookseller of the place and publisher of the 'Birmingham Journal.' John- son is said to have contributed to this paper, besides giving other help to Warren. He translated Lobo's 'Voyage to Abyssinia/ THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON 443 for which Warren gave him five guineas. It was published in 1735. About 1734 he returned to Lichfield, and there made proposals for publishing Politian's Latin poems, with notes and a life. He addressed a letter to Edward Cave [q. v.] from Birmingham, dated 25 Nov. 1734, proposing to write a 'literary article' for the 'Gentleman's Magazine.' Johnson had been introduced by Hector to a Henry Porter, a mercer at Birmingham. He was brother-in-law of Johnson's old master, Hunter (NICHOLS, Lit. Illustr. vii. 363). Porter was buried on 3 Aug. 1734, leaving a widow (born 4 Feb. 1688-9), whose maiden name was Jarvis, with a daughter, Lucy (baptised 8 Nov. 1715), and two sons. Miss Seward told Boswell that John- son had been in love with the daughter, whom she identified as the object of some verses written by him at Stourbridge. Hector emphatically denied this (see controversy in Gent. Mag. vols. liii. and liv., partly reprinted in NICHOLS'S Lit. Illustr. vii. 321-64). After Porter's death Johnson married Mrs. Porter, 9 July 1735. It was, as he told Beauclerk, 'a love marriage on both sides,' and, though outsiders mocked, the strength of Johnson's affection was unsurpassable. Though his face was scarred, his 'huge structure of bones . . . hideously striking, his head wigless, his gesticulations grotesque,' Mrs. Porter at once recognised him as the 'most sensible man' she had ever seen. She was twenty years his senior. Her appearance is chiefly known from Garrick's comic descriptions to Boswell and Mrs. Piozzi. She was, he told Boswell, fat, with red painted cheeks, fantastic dress, and affected manners. Mrs. Piozzi, however, to whom he described her as a 'little painted puppet,' saw a picture of her at Lichfield, 'very pretty,' and, according to her daughter, 'very like.' The pair rode from Birmingham to be married at St. Werburgh's Church, Derby, and on the way Johnson showed his bride, by refusing to alter his pace at her bidding, that he would not be treated like a dog, which she had learnt from 'the old romances' to be the cor- rect mode of behaving to lovers. The author of ' Memoirs . . . of Johnson ' (1785) says that she brought him jool. or 8oo/., and Mr. Timmins (' Dr. Johnson in Birmingham,' from Transactions of Midland Institute, 1876) shows that she had ioo/. in the hands of an attorney. Mrs. Johnson's small fortune probably enabled 444 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN him to take a house at Edial, near Lichfield, where, as an advertise- ment announced in the 'Gentleman's Magazine' for 1736, 'young gentlemen are boarded and taught the Greek and Latin languages by Samuel Johnson.' Johnson's impatience, irregular habits, and uncouth appearance were hardly likely to conciliate either parent or pupils. Objections to these peculiarities prevented him from obtaining the mastership of Solihull school in August 1735, and an ushership at Brewood school in 1736 (Notes and Queries, 6th ser. x. 465; NICHOLS, Lit. Anecd. iii. 333). According to Boswell his only boys at Edial were 'David and George Garrick and one other.' Hawkins says that the number 'never exceeded eight.' The school collapsed, and Johnson resolved to try his fortunes in London. He left Lichfield on 3 March 1737, in com- pany with Garrick Johnson, as he said jokingly, having two- pence halfpenny in his pocket, and Garrick three halfpence in his. The pair had also a letter from Walmsley to John Colson [q. v.], then master of a school at Rochester. Walmsley expected that Johnson would turn out 'a fine tragedy-writer.' He had written three acts of 'Irene' at Edial. Johnson left his wife at Lichfield, lodged at a staymaker's in Exeter Street, Strand, occasionally retiring to Greenwich, and lived with the utmost economy and temperance. A friend told him that he could live for 30^. a year without being contemptible. He found a patron, it seems, in Henry Hervey, third son of the Earl of Bristol, who had been in a regiment quartered at Lichfield. Hervey, as he said to Boswell in his last years, 'though a vicious man, was very kind to me. If you call a dog Hervey I shall love him.' Johnson, however, had to gain independence by literary work. The profession of authorship was beginning to be a recognised, though still a very unprofitable, pursuit. Cave's foundation of the 'Gentleman's Magazine' in 1731 had opened new prospects of employment, and Johnson now applied to Cave (12 July) proposing a new translation of the 'His- tory of the Council of Trent.' He returned in the summer to Lichfield, where he finished ' Irene' (he afterwards gave the manu- script to Langton, who presented it to the King's Library, now in the British Museum), and, after three months' stay, returned with his wife to London, leaving Lucy Porter at Lichfield, and took lodgings in Woodstock Street, Hanover Square, and afterwards THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON 445 in Castle Street, Cavendish Square. Lucy Porter lodged with Johnson's mother at Lichfield till her fortieth year, when the death of a brother improved her means, and she lived at Lichfield till her death, 13 Jan. 1786. Johnson was always indulgent to her, allowed her to scold him 'like a schoolboy, and kept up constant communications with her till his death' (SEWARD, Letters, i. 116). He offered 'Irene,' without success, to Fleetwood, patentee of Drury Lane. In March 1738 a Latin ode by him to 'Sylvanus Urban' appeared in the 'Gentleman's Magazine,' and he soon became a regular contributor. He beheld St. John's Gate, the printing-office of the magazine, 'with reverence.' He still had illusions about authors. Hawkins (p. 49) tells of his introduction by Cave to an ale-house where he could see the great Mr. Browne smoking a pipe. Malone (BOSWELL, i. 63) gives a similar account of his dining behind a screen at Cave's to hear Walter Harte's [q. v.] conversation without exposing his shabbiness. If Harte, as is said, praised the life of Savage, this was as late as 1744. Johnson's employment upon the parliamentary debates began about 1738, when they were given, with fictitious names, as debates in the 'Senate of Lilliput.' They were written by William Guthrie (1708-1770) [q. v.], and only corrected by Johnson at this period (ib. i. 136). He wrote those published in the 'Magazine' from July 1741 to March 1744. The debates were often delayed till some time after the session, in order to avoid a breach of privi- lege, and the last report by Johnson was of a debate on 22 Feb. T 743- Johnson was never in the gallery himself, but had some assistance from persons employed by Cave. Some of the debates, however, were 'the mere coinage of his own imagination' (ib. iv. 409). They evidently bear a very faint resemblance to the real debates, as Mr. Birkbeck Hill shows by a comparison with Seeker's notes. In fact it is not conceivable that all the speakers confined themselves to sonorous generalities in the true Johnsonian style. At the time, however, they were often regarded as genuine, and Johnson near his death (ib.) expressed some compunction for the deception. Murphy describes a dinner at Foote's when Johnson claimed a speech attributed to Pitt and compared by the elder Francis to Demosthenes. He took care, he added, that the 'whig dogs should not have the best of it.' One debate was translated 446 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN into French, German, and Spanish, as was stated in the 'Maga- zine 7 for February 1743; and Johnson's immediate cessation is plausibly regarded by Mr. Hill as a confirmation of his statement to Boswell that he stopped reporting because he 'would not be accessory to the propagation of falsehood' (ib. i. 152; see a full discussion by Mr. Birkbeck Hill, BOSWELL, i. App. A.). In May 1738 Johnson published 'London,' in imitation of the third satire of 'Juvenal.' It was offered to Cave, who seems to have received it favourably, but was finally published by Dodsley, who gave ten guineas for the copyright. Johnson was determined not to take less than had been given to Paul Whitehead, whom he despised. Though Boswell denies it, the 'Thales' of the poem may perhaps refer to Savage (see Mr. Hill's note on BOSWELL, i. 125). It ap- peared on the same day as Pope's 'Epilogue,' originally called '1738,' and reached a second edition in a week. Though without the consummate polish of the 'Epilogue,' one of Pope's most finished pieces, it showed a masculine force of thought, which caused the unknown writer to be welcomed as a worthy follower of the chief poet of the day. Many passages expressed the pa- triotic sentiment which then stimulated the growing opposition to Walpole, both among tories and malcontent whigs. Pope himself inquired the author's name, and hearing his obscurity said, 'He will soon be deterred Johnson, however, was still poor enough to apply in 1739 for the mastership of a school at Appleby. The salary was 6ol. a year, and it was required that masters should have the degree of M.A. Pope, knowing nothing of Johnson, it is said, but his satire, recommended him to Lord Gower, probably as having interest with the trustees ; and Gower wrote to a friend of Swift (i May 1739) in order to obtain a M.A. degree from Dublin. Johnson, as Gower reported, would rather die upon the road to an examination (if required) 'than be starved to death in translating for booksellers, which has been his only subsistence for some time past.' The application failed, and the want of a degree was also fatal to an application made by Johnson for leave to practise as an advocate at Doctors' Commons. Cave meanwhile had accepted his proposed translation of Father Paul's history, and in 1738-9 he received 49/. js. on account of work done upon it; but it fell through in consequence of a project THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON 447 for a translation of the same book by another Samuel Johnson- In the ' Gentleman's Magazine' of 1739 he wrote a 'Life of Father Paul,' and continued to contribute various small articles. A squib against Walpole, called 'Marmor Norfolciense,' April 1739, was not very lively, and seems to have failed, though Hawkins tells a story (contradicted by Boswell) that warrants were issued against the author. Pope refers to it as 'very Humerous' in a note sent to Richardson the painter, with 'London,' in which he says that Johnson's convulsive infirmities made him 'a sad spec- tacle.' In 1742 Johnson was employed by Thomas Osborne, a bookseller, to catalogue the library of Edward Harley, second earl of Oxford [q. v.]. Osborne, treating Johnson with insolence, was knocked down for his pains. 'I have beat many a fellow,' as Johnson told Mrs. Piozzi, 'but the rest had the wit to hold their tongues' (BOSWELL, i. 154; PIOZZI, Anecd. p. 233). A folio Septuagint of 1594 was shown at a bookseller's shop in 1812 as the weapon with which the deed was performed (NICHOLS, Lit. A need. viii. 446). Except his contributions to the 'Magazine,' and a letter (i Dec. 1743) in which he takes upon himself a debt owed by his mother, little is preserved about Johnson till in February 1744 his very powerful life of Savage (who died i Aug. 1743) was published by one Roberts. The book was written with great rapidity, forty-eight octavo pages at a sitting. It gives a striking account of miseries in which Johnson was himself a sharer. Sav- age and Johnson had passed nights in roaming the streets without money to pay for a lodging, and on one such occasion passed the time in denouncing Walpole, and resolved to 'stand by their country.' It seems possible that for a time Johnson had to part from his wife, who may have found a refuge with friends (BOSWELL, i. 163; HAWKINS, pp. 53 sq.), though Hawkins kindly suggests that Johnson's 'irregularities' were the cause of the temporary separation. A period follows of such obscurity that Croker ventured the ab- surd hypothesis that Johnson was in some way implicated in the rebellion of 1745. A pamphlet of observations upon 'Macbeth,' with remarks upon Hanmer's edition of Shakespeare and pro- posals for a new edition by himself, was published in 1745. Warburton two years later, in the preface to his own 'Shake- 448 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN speare,' excepted Johnson's remarks from a sweeping con- demnation of other critics, as written by a 'man of parts and genius,' and Johnson was grateful for praise given 'when praise was of value.' Warburton met Johnson once (BOSWELL, iv. 48), and was so pleased as to 'pat him.' He afterwards told Hurd, however, that Johnson's 'Shakespeare' showed 'as much folly as malignity' (Letters to Hurd, p. 367). Johnson was deterred by Warburton's edition, or diverted by a new undertaking, from attempting 'Shakespeare' at present. In 1747 he issued the plan of his dictionary, inscribed to Lord Chesterfield. The inscription, as Johnson said, was the accidental result of his agreeing, at Dods- ley's request, to write it in order to have a pretext for delay. The wording implies, however, that some communication had passed between them. The booksellers who undertook the enter- prise (including Dodsley, Millar, and the Longmans) agreed to pay i,575/. for the copyright. The payment included the whole work of preparing for the press; and Johnson lost 2o/. on one occasion for a transcription of some leaves which had been written on both sides. He employed six amanuenses, five of whom, as Boswell is glad to record, were Scotsmen. From a letter published by Mr. Hill (BOSWELL, vi. xxxv) it appears that they received 235. a week, which he agreed to raise to 2/. 2s. , not, it is to be hoped, out of the i,575/. To all of them he afterwards showed kindness when in distress. He began (HAWKINS, p. 175) by having an interleaved copy of the dictionary of Nathan Bailey [q. v.], then the most in use. He read through all the books to be quoted, marked the sentences, and had them transcribed by his clerks on separate slips of paper. After they had been arranged he added definitions and etymologies from Skinner, Junius, and others. The work was done in a house in Gough Square, near the printers, which was visited by Carlyle and described in his article on John- son. While the dictionary was still in preparation Johnson pub- lished his 'Vanity of Human Wishes' in January 1749. He received fifteen guineas for the copyright. In this and subsequent agreements he reserved a right to print one edition for himself. This the finest of his poems was profoundly admired by Byron and Sir Walter Scott, and is scarcely rivalled in the language in its peculiar style of grave moral eloquence. He said that he had com- THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON 449 posed seventy lines of it in one day before writing them down. Garrick had become manager of Drury Lane in 1747, when John- son contributed the opening prologue. Garrick now offered to bring out his friend's tragedy. Some alterations which he sug- gested were so resented by the author that Dr. Taylor had to be called in as pacificator. 'Irene' was produced on 6 Feb. 1749, with an epilogue by Sir W. Yonge, secretary-at-war under Walpole. It went off tolerably till Irene (Mrs. Pritchard) appeared with the bowstring round her neck, when the audience cried * Murder ! ' The scene was altered, and Garrick managed to carry the piece through nine nights, when the author's three nights brought him 195^. 175., and the copyright was sold to Dodsley for lool. The play, however, was felt to be a failure, and Johnson had the sense to dis- cover that his talents were not those of a dramatic author. The only explanation, indeed, of his rash attempt is that the drama was still the most profitable field of authorship, and Johnson was better paid for his play than for his other writing. When asked how he felt its ill-success he replied, 'Like the monument.' He is reported to have appeared in a side-box in a scarlet waistcoat with rich gold lace and a gold-laced hat. In 1750 Johnson began a more congenial task by writing the 'Rambler.' The first number appeared on Tuesday, 20 March 1750, and it came out every Tuesday and Saturday till the last number, published on Saturday, 14 March 1752. Johnson wrote the whole, except No. 10, partly by Mrs. Chapone, No. 30 by Miss Catherine Talbot, No. 97 by Samuel Richardson, and Nos. 44 and 100 by Mrs. Elizabeth Carter. Johnson received two guineas a paper (MURPHY, 1806, p. 59). The papers were written in great haste, but carefully revised for the collected editions. Chalmers says, on the authority of Nichols the publisher, that there were six thousand corrections in the second and third edi- tions. The 'Rambler' attracted little notice at first, although the author was gratified by his wife's declaration that he had sur- passed even her expectations. The sale is said to have rarely exceeded five hundred; the only one which had a 'prosperous sale' being Richardson's (CHALMERS, British Essayists, xix. xiv, xxvi). As the price was twopence, the profits cannot have been large. When collected, however, the papers acquired a high repu- 2G 450 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN tation, and ten editions (1,250 copies each) were published in London during Johnson's lifetime, besides Scottish and Irish editions. James Elphinston [q. v.] superintended the publication at Edinburgh. The 'Rambler' had probably a more lasting success than any other imitation of the ' Spectator,' though its rare modern readers will generally consider it as a proof of the amazing appetite of Johnson's public for solid sermonising. Omit- ting its clumsy attempts at occasional levity, it may be granted that in its ponderous sentences lie buried a great mass of strong sense and an impressive and characteristic view of life. From this time Johnson became accepted as an imposing moralist. In 1750 Johnson wrote a prologue for 'Comus,' which was per- formed on 5 April at Drury Lane for the benefit of Milton's grand- daughter. He had written a preface to the pamphlet in which William Lauder (d. 1771) [q. v.] published his forgeries as to Milton's alleged imitations of the moderns, and in it urged a sub- scription for the benefit of the granddaughter. Upon the exposure of the forgery by Douglas, Johnson dictated a letter of confession to Lauder. The 'Rambler' was hardly finished when Johnson lost his wife, 17 March 1752. He felt the blow with extreme keenness, and ever afterwards cherished her memory with a tenderness which appears from many touching references in his 'Prayers and Meditations.' Compunction for little disagreements was no doubt exaggerated by his melancholy temperament. She was buried at Bromley in Kent, and he wrote a sermon to be delivered by Taylor on the occasion. It was not preached, but printed after his death. Taylor is said (Piozzi, Letters, ii. 384) to have declined because the sermon was too complimentary to the deceased. In 1753-4 Johnson wrdte some papers in the 'Adventurer,' undertaken by his friend and closest imitator, Hawkesworth, and enlisted Joseph Warton as a contributor. The dictionary was now approaching completion, and produced a famous encounter with Chesterfield. A story told by Hawkins, that the first offence was caused by Chesterfield's reception of Colley Gibber, while Johnson was left in the antechamber, was denied to Boswell by Johnson himself. His only complaint was Chesterfield's continued neglect. Chesterfield now wrote a couple of papers in the ' World ' (28 Nov. THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON 451 and 5 Dec. 1754), recommending the book, no doubt with a view to a dedication. Johnson wrote a letter, dated 7 Feb. 1755, repelling this advance with singular dignity and energy. He felt bound, it seems, to preserve some reticence in regard to his letter, but ultimately gave copies to Baretti and to Boswell. Boswell deposited both in the British Museum. Johnson says that the notice has been delayed 'till I am indifferent and cannot enjoy it, till I am lonely and cannot impart it, till I am known and do not want it.' Warburton complimented Johnson, through Adams, upon his manly spirit. Chesterfield was wise enough not to reply, but suggested, in conversation with Dodsley, that he had always been ready to receive Johnson, whose pride or shyness was there- fore to be blamed for the result. Dr. Birkbeck Hill proves that Chesterfield did not, as Boswell believed, refer to Johnson as the 'respectable Hottentot' of his letters (Dr. Johnson, &c., pp. 214- 29). Johnson said that he had once received io/. from Chester- field, doubtless in recognition of the 'plan' inscribed to him, but thought it too trifling a favour to be mentioned in the letter. The letter justifies itself, and no author can fail to sympathise with this declaration of literary independence. Hawkins (p. 191) says that Chesterfield sent Sir Thomas Robinson to apologise, and that Robinson declared that, if he could have afforded it, he would have settled an annuity of 5oo/. a year upon Johnson. Johnson replied that if the first peer of the realm made such an offer he would show him downstairs. In 1754 Johnson visited Oxford for the first time since he had ceased to reside, in order to consult some books for the dictionary, although he seems to have in fact collected nothing, and stayed five weeks at Kettel Hall, near Trinity College. His chief com- panion was Thomas Warton, then resident at Trinity, in whose company he renewed his acquaintance with the university. War- ton also helped to obtain for him the M.A. degree. It was thought desirable that these letters should appear on the title-page of the dictionary for the credit both of himself and the university. The official letter from the chancellor referred to the 'Rambler' and to the forthcoming work. The diploma is dated 20 Feb. 1755. The dictionary appeared, in 2 vols. folio, on 15 April 1755, and at once took its place as the standard authority. It was a great 452 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN advance upon its predecessors. The general excellence of its defi- nitions and the judicious selection of illustrative passages make it (as often observed) entertaining as well as useful for reference. Its most obvious defect arises from Johnson's ignorance of the early forms of the language and from the conception then natural of the purpose of a dictionary. Johnson (see his preface) had sensibly abandoned his first impression that he might be able to 'fix the language,' as he came to see that every living language must grow. He did not aim, however, at tracing the growth historically, but simply at defining the actual senses of words as employed by the 'best authors.' He held that the language had reached almost its fullest development in the days of Shakespeare, Hooker, Bacon, and Spenser, and thought it needless to go further back than Sidney. He also, as a rule, omitted living authors. The dic- tionary, therefore, was of no philological value, although it has been the groundwork upon which many later philologists have worked. Taking for granted the contemporary view of the true end of a dictionary, it was a surprising achievement, and made an epoch in the study of the language. Johnson's labours during the preparation of the dictionary must have been enormous, especially while he was also publishing the 'Rambler.' He never afterwards overcame his constitutional indolence for so strenuous and prolonged an effort. He was already attracting many friends, and no man ever had a more numerous or distinguished circle, or was more faithful to all who had ever done him a kindness. He took an early delight in the tavern clubs characteristic of the time. The first mentioned ap- pears to be a club in Old Street, at which he met Psalmanazar, and the 'Metaphysical Tailor,' an uncle of John Hoole [q. v.]. In the winter of 1 749 he formed a club which met weekly at ' a famous beefsteak-house,' the King's Head, Ivy Lane. Among the members were Richard Bathurst [q. v.], the 'good hater,' who was a 'man after his own heart,' John Hawkesworth [q. v.], his spe- cial imitator, Samuel Dyer [q. v], and (Sir) John Hawkins [q. v.], his biographer. Johnson already made it a rule to talk his best and thus acquired his conversational supremacy (HAWKINS, pp. 219-59, gives a long account of this club; see BOSWELL, i. 190-1, with Mr. Hill's note). Among other friends acquired at this THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON 453 period was Bennet Langton [q. v.], who had been attracted to him by reading the 'Rambler.' Through Langton he became known to Topham Beauclerk [q. v.], and with the pair had his famous night's frisk to Billingsgate (BOSWELL, i. 251). He made the acquaintance of Reynolds at the house of their common friends, two daughters of Admiral Cotterell, who had been neighbours of Johnson in 1738. Reynolds, it seems, had been induced by the life of Savage to cultivate Johnson's acquaintance. Charles Burney (1726-1814) [q. v.] had been impressed by the 'Rambler,' and in 1755 wrote to Johnson from Lynn Regis offering to take some copies of the dictionary. Their first interview seems to have been in 1758 (ib. i. 328). Johnson made Goldsmith's acquaint- ance in 1761, and must have become known to Burke by the same time. He constantly added friends to his circle, and declared late in life that he thought a day lost in which he did not make a new acquaintance. 'A man,' he said, 'should keep his friendship in constant repair,' and he scarcely lost a friend, except by death. Some time after the loss of his wife he received into his house Miss Anna Williams, daughter of a Welsh physician, Zachariah Will- iams, who died 12 July 1755. Miss Williams had come to Lon- don, for an operation upon her eyes, during Mrs. Johnson's life. She afterwards became totally blind, and had a permanent apart- ment in Johnson's house. Her father had invented a method for determining the longitude by means of the variation of the com- pass, of which Johnson wrote an account in 1755 (published, with an Italian translation, by Baretti; a copy, presented by Johnson, is in the Bodleian Library). Miss Williams was well-educated and intelligent. Johnson took pleasure in her conversation, took her advice, and always treated her with high respect, in spite of her growing 'peevishness ' in later years. She seems to have had some small means. Lady Knight (see CROKER'S Johnsoniana) says that she was never dependent on Johnson, and that each drew freely on the other's purse. Garrick, however, gave her a benefit, at Johnson's desire, by which she made 20o/. (BOSWELL, i. 393), and Mrs. Montagu gave her a small annuity in 1775. Another inmate of Johnson's house from an early period was Robert Levett, who had been waiter in a French coffee-house, picked up a know- ledge of physic, and practised among the poor. Johnson had 454 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN known him from about 1746. He was grotesque, stiff, and silent, according to Boswell (i. 24), and always waited upon Johnson at breakfast. Johnson, however, never treated him as a dependent, and upon his death, 20 Jan. 1782, wrote the most pathetic of his poems. In 1777 or 1778 Johnson took into his house Mrs. Des- moulins (to whom he allowed half a guinea a week), widow of a writing-master and daughter of his godfather, Dr. Swinfen, and a Miss Carmichael, of whom little is known (ib. iv. 222). The party was not harmonious. Williams, said Johnson, 'hates everybody; Levett hates Desmoulins, and does not love Williams ; Desmoulins hates them both; Poll [Miss Carmichael] loves none of them.' Johnson sometimes feared to go home on account of their com- plaints, says Mrs. Piozzi (Anecdotes, p. 213); but if any one reproached them, he always defended them. His charity to the unprotected was unbounded through life, according to the testi- mony of Boswell, Mrs. Piozzi, Murphy, and even Hawkins (see Mr. Hill's appendix to BOSWELL,VO!. iii.). Johnson had also a black servant, Francis Barber, born in Jamaica as a slave of Colonel Bathurst, father of Richard Bathurst. He was freed by the colo- nel's will, and about 1752 entered Johnson's service. Johnson sent him to school, and Barber left him to go to sea in 1759. John- son applied to Smollett, who applied to Wilkes, who obtained Barber's discharge by his influence with one of the lords of the admiralty. From this time till Johnson's death Barber continued in his service (ib. i. 238, 348). The sum due for the dictionary had been advanced, and ap- parently lool. more (MURPHY, p. 78), before the task was com- pleted. Johnson's poverty is shown by a note addressed to Rich- ardson on 1 6 March 1756, stating that he had been arrested for 5/. 135. and asking for a loan (ib. p. 86). Richardson sent him six guineas. He undertook to edit the 'Literary Magazine, or Uni- versal Review,' of which the first number appeared in May 1756, and contributed a good many essays. A review of Jonas Hanway provoked a retort from the author, and Johnson made the only reply to which he ever condescended. He was defending his favourite tea, of which his potations were enormous. Cumber- land's report of his having drunk twenty-five cups at a sitting seems to mark the maximum. Another remarkable article was his THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON 455 attack on Soame Jenyns's 'Inquiry into the Origin of Evil/ which gave an occasion- for some characteristic utterances. The maga- zine expired in 1758, Johnson having ceased to write in it. He now took up again, in 1756, his proposed edition of Shakespeare, but dawdled over it unconscionably. On 15 April 1758 appeared the first number of his 'Idler,' published on Saturdays in New- 'bery's 'Universal Chronicle.' The last appeared on 5 April 1760. Twelve of the 103 numbers were contributed by friends, including Langton, Thomas Warton, and Reynolds. They were written hastily and were less impressive than the 'Rambler.' The first collected edition in 2 vols. appeared in October 1761, and Johnson's two-thirds of the profits produced 84/. 2S. ^d. In January 1759 (about the 2oth) Johnson's mother died at the age of ninety. Johnson had been unable to see her for some years, though he had helped her with money and wrote some very touching letters to her on her deathbed. In order to raise a small sum to meet the expense of her illness and death and to discharge some small debts he wrote ' Rasselas ' in the evenings of one week (BOSWELL, i. 341, 512-16). He received zoo/, for the copyright, and had a present of 25^. more on a second edition. This power- ful though ponderous work was apparently the most popular of his writings. It reached a fifth edition in 1775, and has been trans- lated into French, German, Italian, Dutch, Bengalee, Hungarian, Polish, modern Greek, and Spanish (J. MACAULAY, Bibliography of Rasselas). Johnson himself remarked the curious coincidence with Voltaire's 'Candide.' On 20 Jan. Johnson promised to deliver 'Rasselas' to the printers on Monday (the 25th), and it appeared about the end of March (BOSWELL, i. 516. vi. xxviii). 'Candide' is mentioned by Grimm on i April as having just appeared. Each is a powerful assault upon the fashionable optimism of the day, though Voltaire's wit has saved 'Candide' from the partial oblivion which has overtaken 'Rasselas.' About this time Johnson 'found it necessary to retrench his expenses.' He gave up his house in Gough Square ; Miss Williams went into lodgings in Bolt Court, Fleet Street: and he took chambers at No. i Inner Temple Lane, where he lived in indolent poverty (MURPHY, p. 90). Though most of Johnson's literary services to friends were gratuitous, he occasionally received money for such 456 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN work. Thomas Hervey [q. v.] gave him 50^. for a pamphlet (never published) written in his defence (BOSWELL, ii. 33), and he received id. i os. from Dr. Madden for correcting his 'Boulter's Monu- ment.' Occasional windfalls of this kind must have been of some importance to his finances. Johnson took tea with Miss Williams every night (as Boswell mentions in 1763) before going home, however late he might be. Beyond helping his friends with a few dedications and articles and writing an introduction to the proceed- ings of a committee for clothing French prisoners (1760), he did little unless he worked at his Shakespeare. On i Feb. 1762 he took part in examining into the ridiculous Cock Lane ghost story, and published an account of the detection of the cheat in the 'Gentleman's Magazine' (xxxii. 81). After the accession of George III a few pensions were given to literary persons, chiefly, it seems, to hangers-on of the Bute min- istry. Thomas Sheridan and Murphy, who were common friends of Johnson and Wedderburne (afterwards Lord Loughborough), suggested to Wedderburne to apply to Bute on behalf of Johnson. Other friends appear to have concurred in the application, and a pension of 300^. a year was granted in July 1762. Johnson, who had said in his dictionary that a pension in England was 'gen- erally understood to mean pay given to a state hireling for treason to his country,' hesitated as to the propriety of accepting the offer. Reynolds, whom he consulted, told him, of course, that the defini- tion would not apply to him; and the scruple was probably of the slightest. Bute assured Johnson emphatically that the grant was solely for what he had done, not for anything that he was to do. There is no reason for doubting either Bute's sincerity or Johnson's. The opposition writers naturally made a little fun out of the pension. Johnson laughed at the noise, and wished that his pension were twice as large and the noise twice as great (Bos WELL, i. 429). Johnson was requested to write pamphlets by ministers, and received materials from the ministry for writing upon the Falkland Islands. It is probable that he felt some obligations as a pensioner, in spite of the assurances given him at the time ; but the pamphlets clearly expressed his settled convictions. The first was not written for seven years after this time, and he received nothing for them except from the booksellers (ib. ii. 147). No THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON 457 imputation can be made upon his independence, though the impulse to write would hardly have come to him had it not been for his connection with the government. The pamphlets thus written were 'The False Alarm' (1770), upon the expulsion of Wilkes and the seating of his opponent Lut- trell; 'Thoughts on the late Transactions respecting Falkland's Islands' (1771), in answer to the Junius letter of 30 Jan. 1771 (Junius took no notice of the attack); 'The Patriot' (1774), written on behalf of Thrale, then candidate for Southwark at the general election (ib. ii. 286); and 'Taxation no Tyranny' (1775), in answer to the address of the American congress. The first edition of the Falkland Islands pamphlet was stopped by Lord North, after some copies had been sold, in order to suppress a sneer at George Grenville ('if he could have got the money' [the Manilla ransom] 'he could have counted it') ( see BOSWELL, ii. 136; and Junius' Letters, 1812, ii. 199). The ministry cut out at least one insulting passage from the American pamphlet (B OS- WELL, ii. 313). The pamphlets are written forcibly and with less than the usual mannerism; but they have in general the natural defect of amateur political writing. They are interesting as ex- pressions of Johnson's sturdy toryism, his conviction of the neces- sity of subordination and of the frivolity of popular commonplaces about liberty. He hated whigs, not so much because they had different principles of government as because he held that 'whig- gism was a negation of all principle ' (ib. i. 43 1). The attack upon the Americans is arrogant and offensive. Although Mr. Hill truly points out (vol. ii. App. B) that Johnson's dislike to America was associated with his righteous hatred of slavery and consequent prejudice against the planters, it is equally true that he states the English claims in the most illiberal and irritating fashion. The pension unfortunately led to a quarrel with Thomas Sheri- dan, who had helped to procure it. Sheridan also received a pension of 2oo/. a year, and a petulant remark of Johnson's ('that it is time for me to give up mine') was repeated to Sheri- dan and caused a lasting alienation, the only case recorded of the loss of a friend of Johnson's by his rough remarks. Johnson was willing in this case to be reconciled, and Reynolds observes that, after he had given offence by his rudeness, he was always the first to seek for reconciliation (TAYLOR, Reynolds, ii. 457). 458 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN Beauclerk hoped that Johnson would now 'purge and live cleanly like a gentleman,' and for the rest of his life Johnson was free from pecuniary troubles. He paid off old debts and made loans to friends. He was enabled to indulge his constitutional indolence and to write comparatively little. 'No man but a blockhead,' he said, 'ever wrote except for money' (ib. iii. 19). His spreading reputation at the same time increased his oppor- tunities for social relaxation. According to Dr. Maxwell, who knew him from 1754, he was often in bed till twelve o'clock or 'declaiming over his tea.' Literary people looked in about that time, and, after talking all the morning, he dined at a tavern, stayed late, and afterwards loitered long at some friend's house, though he seldom took supper. He never refused an invitation to a tavern, often amused himself at Ranelagh, and, according to Maxwell, must have read and written at night (ib. ii. 119). It was on 1 6 May 1763 that he made the acquaintance of Boswell [see under BOSWELL, JAMES], and thus became visible to posterity. One famous field for conversational display was opened by the foundation of the Club, probably in the winter of 1763-4. Sir Joshua Reynolds suggested it to Johnson, and the other original members were Burke, Dr. Nugent (Burke's father-in-law), Beau- clerk, Langton, Goldsmith, Anthony Chamier [q. v.], and Hawkins. It began by a weekly supper in the Turk's Head, Gerrard Street, Soho, where it was held till 1783. In 1772 the supper was changed to a fortnightly dinner during the meeting of parliament. Boswell was elected, owing chiefly to Johnson's influence, on 30 April 1773, and the numbers were gradually increased till in 1780 there were thirty-five members. Among the chief members elected in John- son's lifetime were Bishop Percy, G. Colman, Garrick, Sir W. Jones, C. J. Fox, Gibbon, Adam Smith, R. B. Sheridan, Dunning, Lord Stowell, Bishop Shipley, Thomas and Joseph Warton, and Charles Burney (see list of Club in CROKER, Boswell, ii. App. i). Johnson was annoyed by Garrick's assumption in saying, ' I'll be of you,' but welcomed his election in 1773, and upon his death de- clared that the Club should keep a year's widowhood. Johnson did not attend very regularly after the first years; but the Club no doubt extended the conversational empire of the man whom Smollett had called in 1759 the 'great Cham of literature.' THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON 459 The connection with the Thrales, formed about this time, was of more importance to Johnson's happiness. Henry Thrale was a prosperous brewer, who was member for Southwark (1768-80). He had a house at Streatham, called Streatham Park, a large white house in a park of about a hundred acres on the south side of the lower common. It was pulled down in May 1863 (THORNE, Environs of London, p. 590). His wife, Hesther Lynch Salisbury, afterwards Mrs. Piozzi [q. v.], was a very bright little woman of literary tastes. Murphy, who was intimate with the Thrales, introduced them to Johnson in 1764 (Piozzi, Anecd. p. 125). He dined with them frequently and followed them to Brighton in the autumn of 1765. Johnson appears to have had a serious illness about this time, and in February 1766 Boswell found that he had been obliged to give up the use of wine. His constitutional melan- choly seems to have been developed, although he was now free from money troubles and had settled in a comfortable house in Johnson's Court, Fleet Street, with Miss Williams and Levett. The Thrales tried to soothe him, and on one occasion found him in such despair, apparently fearing that his melancholy would lead to insanity, that they prevailed upon him to leave the close London court for Streatham. He stayed there from midsummer to October 1766 (Bos WELL, ii. 25 ; see Mr. Hill's Appendix F to vol. ii. for a discussion of dates). He soon became almost a member of the family. He had a room at Streatham, where he generally spent some months in the summer, coming up to town from Saturday to Monday to see that his dependents got three good dinners in the week (Piozzi, Anecd. p. 85). He had also a room in their town houses, first in South- wark, and, for a short time before Thrale's death, in Grosvenor Square. Thrale was a sensible man, with some scholarship as well as knowledge of business, and a delight, according to Madame d'Arblay (Memoirs of Burney, ii. 104), in 'provoking a war of words,' which Johnson frequently gratified. He was, however, rather given to foolish speculations, and in his last years, when his mind was probably weakened, became troublesome to his wife. Johnson learned to drop some of his roughness and irregular habits at the house. His presence naturally attracted literary society, and Mrs. Thrale was flattered by her power over the literary 460 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN dictator. Johnson, who called her 'my mistress' and Thrale 'my master,' was alternately a wise monitor and a tolerably daring flatterer, while Thrale invariably treated him with profound respect. They soothed, as he said long afterwards, ' twenty years of a life radically wretched.' Johnson's intellectual activity henceforward found its chief outlet in conversation. To the inimitable reports of Boswell may be added the sayings reported by Mrs. Piozzi (though obviously not very accurate), the excellent descriptions in Mme. d'Arblay's ' Diary,' and a variety of detached sayings scattered through works to which a reference is given below. His interview with George III, especially valued by Boswell, took place in February 1767 (BOSWELL, ii. 33-43) ; that with Wilkes, which showed Bos- well's diplomatic powers at their highest, on 15 May 1776 (ib. iii. 69-78) ; and that in which the quaker Mrs. Knowles claimed to have confuted him in an argument about a convert to her faith, on 15 April 1778 (ib. iii. 284-98). Mrs. Knowles published a counter-version of this in the 'Gentleman's Magazine' for June 1791 (reprinted in ' Johnsoniana'), and Miss Seward gave a third account (Letters, i. 97). The quaintest proof of Johnson's dic- tatorship is the ' round-robin ' presented to him in 1776 to request him to write Goldsmith's epitaph in English (facsimile in BOSWELL, iii. 83), written by Burke, presented by Reynolds, and signed (among others) by Gibbon. Nearly every distinguished man of letters of the period came more or less into contact with Johnson, except David Hume, to whom he would hardly have consented to speak, and Gray, whose acquaintance in town was limited to the Walpole circle. Walpole speaks of Johnson with aversion, and doubtless expressed the prejudices of 'good society.' 'Great lords and ladies,' said Johnson (BOSWELL, iv. 116), 'don't love to have their mouths stopped.' Their curiosity was therefore soon satisfied, and, in spite of his reverence for rank, he saw little of the leaders in society or politics. In October 1 765 Johnson had at last brought out his Shakespeare, which he describes as at press in 1757. A sneer in Churchill's 'Ghost' (1763) is supposed to have hastened the appearance: He for subscribers baits his hook, And takes the cash but where's the book? THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON 461 (bk. iii. 11. 801-2). The commentary may perhaps be said to be better than could have been expected from a man whose strong intellect, unprovided with the necessary knowledge of contemporary authors, was steeped in the narrow conceptions of poetry most unlike Shakespeare's, and too indolent for minute study. He received 375^. for the first and ioo/. for the second edition (NICHOLS, Lit. Anecd. v. 597). After this, besides occasionally helping friends and writing his 'Tour to the Hebrides' (see below), he did little until he wrote the most permanently valuable of his books. On 29 May 1777 he agreed with the booksellers to write prefaces for a proposed collection of the English poets. They judiciously asked him to name his own price. He suggested two hundred guineas, though, according to Malone, they would have given one thousand or fifteen hundred (BoswELL, iii. 114). An- other ioo/. was given afterwards, and a further ioo/. on the pub- lication of a separate edition of the lives (ib. iv. 35). The poets were selected by the booksellers, though Blackmore, Watts, Pom- fret, and Yalden were added on Johnson's advice. The first four volumes appeared in 1779, the last six in 1781. They include a reprint of the life of Savage and a life of Young by Sir Herbert Croft (1751-1816) [q. v.]. Johnson's mannerism had become less marked ; and the book, except in the matter of antiquarian re- search, is a model of its kind. Of all his writings this falls least behind his conversation in excellence, and is admirable within the limits of his critical perception. Johnson's pension enabled him to indulge in frequent excursions from London. Though constantly expressing his passion for London (e.g. 'when a man is tired of London he is tired of life, for there is in London all that life can afford') (ib. iii. 178), he often showed interest in travel. His journeys consisted chiefly of visits to Oxford and Lichfield, and to Dr. Taylor at Ashbourne, where he discussed his old friend's bulls and bulldogs. He en- joyed the motion, and said that he should like to spend his life 'driving briskly in a post-chaise with a pretty woman' (ib. iii. 162). His chief performance, however, was his journey with Boswell in 1773. Leaving Edinburgh on 18 Aug. they travelled by St. Andrews and the east coast to Inverness, crossed to Skye, and spent some time in visiting the neighbouring islands. They 462 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN returned by Inverary to Glasgow, and by Auchinleck, where he had a smart encounter with the elder Boswell, to Edinburgh. The account of his journey was published in 1775, and, if it shows little taste for the picturesque, proved a keen interest in the social condition of the natives. It was commended by Burke and others, much to Johnson's pleasure (ib. Hi. 137) ; but its dignified disquisition is less amusing than Boswell's graphic account of the same journey, in which Johnson is himself the chief figure. An expression of disbelief in the authenticity of Ossian's poems, chiefly on the ground that MacPherson had appealed to original manu- scripts which were never produced, caused MacPherson to write an angry letter to Johnson. Johnson replied in a contemptuous letter saying that he ' would not be deterred from detecting what he thought a cheat by the menaces of a ruffian ' (original sold in 1875 for 5o/.). The letter implies that MacPherson had threatened violence (see Academy, 19 Oct. 1878, for MacPherson's letters), which Johnson despised. Boswell relates that when Foote threatened to mimic him on the stage he sent for a stout oak stick to administer punishment. Foote judiciously gave up the plan (BOSWELL, ii. 299). In 1774 Johnson made a Welsh tour with the Thrales, and in 1775 accompanied them to Paris. His brief diaries give little of the impressions made upon him. In France he persisted in talk- ing Latin, and saw nothing of the literary society which had wel- comed Hume. His name was probably little known, and it was as well for the credit of English good manners that his hosts should not hear his opinion of them. Although Johnson had talked of a visit to Ireland in early days, and after his Scottish tour wanted Boswell to go up the Baltic with him, he never left England except on his French tour. An intended journey to Italy with the Thrales in 1776 was abandoned in consequence of the death of Thrale's only son (see Mr. Hill's list of Johnson's travels, BOSWELL, Hi. App. B). In his later years Johnson's health gradually declined. He suffered much from asthma and gout. The comforts of Streatham and Mrs. Thrale's attentions were the more valuable as he became more of an invalid. On 4 April 1781 Thrale, who had had an apoplectic attack in 1779, died of another fit, to Johnson's pro- THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON 463 found sorrow. 'I looked,' he said, 'for the last time upon the face that for fifteen years had never been turned upon me but with respect and benignity.' Johnson was appointed executor with a legacy of 2oo/., and enjoyed a taste of practical business, observing at the sale of the brewery that 'we are not here to sell a parcel of boilers and vats, but the potentiality of growing rich beyond the dreams of avarice' (BoswELL, iv. 87). According to Mrs. Piozzi he took a simple-minded pleasure in discharging his duties as executor and signing cheques for large sums. For some time the loss of Thrale did not affect Johnson's posi- tion in the family. In the autumn he made his usual visit to Lich- field, where he was depressed by the growing infirmities of his friends, especially Miss Aston and his stepdaughter Lucy Porter. In the beginning of 1782 he was seriously ill; and his household was made desolate by the death of Levett (17 Jan.) and the decline of Miss Williams, who, however, lingered till i Sept. 1783 (Piozzi, Letters, ii. 309). The comforts of Streatham were therefore more valuable than ever; but in the autumn of 1782 this resource failed. Mrs. Piozzi in her 'Anecdotes' (1785) gave an account of the circumstances, which was an implicit apology for her own conduct. She says that she had only been able to bear Johnson's 'yoke' while she had the support of her 'coadjutor' Thrale; that, after Thrale's death, Johnson's roughness and demands upon her time became intolerable; and that she 'took advantage of a lost lawsuit' to abandon London and Streatham on the plea of economy, and retire to Bath, where she could be free. Johnson's health, she adds, no longer needed her attention, as he suffered from nothing but 'old age and infirmity,' and had abundance of medical advice and at- tendance. This statement, accepted by her biographer, Hay ward, has helped to support the accusations of brutality made against Johnson. The documents, however, which he publishes show that it is incomplete and misleading. During Thrale's illness of two years, and for a year or so after his death, Johnson's 'yoke' had been a most valued support. She had attended him affectionately during his illness in 1781-2, and in her diary had spoken even passionately of his value. 'If I lose him,' she says i Feb. 1782, 'I am more than undone' (HAYWARD, Piozzi, i. 164, 167). A 464 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN sudden change appears when she made up her mind to travel in Italy in order to economise. She felt that it was impossible to take Johnson, and yet that it would be 'shocking' to leave him. A temporary improvement in his health encouraged her (22 Aug.) to reveal her plan to him. To her annoyance he approved of it, and told her daughter that he should stay at home. She at once decided that his connection with her (though not his connection with Thrale) was intere'sted, and that he cared less for her con- versation than for her 'roast beef and plumb pudden, which he now devours too dirtily for endurance' (ib. p. 171). The habits which she had borne for sixteen years became suddenly intoler- able. The explanation of this change, naturally passed over in the 'Anecdotes,' is obvious. She was already (ib.) contemplating marriage with Piozzi, an Italian musician whom she had first met in 1780. To visit Italy under his guidance 'had long been her dearest wish.' Johnson had already, in 1781, written of Piozzi (Piozzi, Letters, ii. 227, 229) in terms which, though civil, imply some jealousy of his influence. * Mrs. Thrale knew that the mar- riage to a poor popish foreigner would (however unreasonably) disgust all her friends, and especially her daughters, now growing up. It led to sharp quarrels with them, and she condemns their heartlessness as vigorously as Johnson's. That Johnson would be furious if he suspected was certain, and he could hardly be without suspicions. Mme. d'Arblay declared in her memoirs of her father (1832) that Mrs. Thrale had become petulant, that she neglected and slighted Johnson, and that he resented the change. Although this statement, written many years later, contains some palpable and important inaccuracies, it gives a highly probable account of the relations between Johnson and Mrs. Thrale at the time. Mrs. Thrale resolved to give up Streatham. On 6 Oct. 1782 Johnson took a solemn leave of the library and the church, record- ing also in Latin the composition of his last dinner (possibly for medical reasons). He accompanied the Thrales to Brighton, where, according to Mme. d'Arblay 's 'Diary' (ii. 177), he was in his worst humour and made himself generally disagreeable. Mrs. Thrale had given up the Italian journey, and was now induced by THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON 465 her daughter's remonstrances to break with Piozzi for a time. Johnson was still on apparently friendly terms with her during her stay in London in the winter. She went to Bath in April 1783 and corresponded with Johnson. Their letters, however, show a marked want of cordiality and frequent irritation on both sides. Johnson complains of the now desolate state of his house, and gives details of his growing infirmities. On 17 June he had a paralytic stroke. He recovered for the time, and in July spent a fortnight with Langton at Rochester. Mrs. Thrale finally ob- tained her daughters' consent and married Piozzi in June 1784. Upon her announcing the marriage to Johnson he replied in a letter of unjustifiable fury, to which she made a dignified reply. He ad- mitted that he had exceeded his right, thanked her for her kindness, and took leave with sad forebodings. She states that she replied affectionately ; but they never again met, as she was abroad until his death. Johnson, deprived of his old asylum, endeavoured to find solace in his old resources. In 1781 his friend John Hoole had formed a city club for him at the Queen's Arms, St. Paul's Churchyard. In the winter of 1783-1784 he collected a few survivors of the old Ivy Lane Club, who held some rather melancholy meetings. At the end of 1783 he formed another club at the Essex Head in Essex Street, kept by an old servant of Thrale's. Among the members were Daines Barrington [q. v.], Dr. Brocklesby [q. v.], Arthur Murphy [q. v.], Samuel Horsley [q. v.] (afterwards bishop of St. Asaph), and William Windham, who was strongly attached to him in his later years (a list of members is given in NICHOLS, Lit. Anecd. iv. 553). His infirmities, however, were now becoming oppressive, and his letters give painful details of his suffering. His spirits occasionally revived. He visited Oxford in June 1784 with Bos- well, staying with his old friend Adams, the master of Pembroke College, where he gave characteristic utterance to his fears of death. He dined for the last time at the Literary Club on 22 June. Boswell thought that some benefit to Johnson's health might be derived from a winter in Italy. After consulting Reynolds he applied to Thurlow, lord chancellor, for a grant which would enable Johnson to bear the expense. Thurlow made a favourable answer, which was communicated to Johnson by Reynolds and 2H 466 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN Boswell. Johnson was much affected, and mentioned that Brock- lesby had offered to settle upon him an annuity of ioo/. For some reason which does not appear, Thurlow's application was unsuc- cessful. He proposed, however, that Johnson should draw upon him for 500^. or 6oo/., and to lessen the obligation suggested a mortgage on the pension. Johnson declined the offer in a grateful letter, saying that his health had improved so far that by accepting he would be now 'advancing a false claim.' In the autumn he made his last visit to Lichfield and Ashbourne, returning to Lon- don on 1 6 Nov. In December he sent directions to Lichfield for epitaphs to be placed over his father, mother, and brother in St. Michael's Church, Lichfield. He now rapidly failed. He was attended by Brocklesby, He- berden, Cruikshank, and others, who refused fees ; and his friends Burke, Langton, Reynolds, Windham, Miss Burney, and others, attended him affectionately. An account of his last illness (10 Nov. to 13 Dec.) was drawn up by Hoole. He begged Reynolds to for- give him a debt of 30^. ; to read his bible, and never to paint on a Sunday ; and gave pious admonitions to many friends. He sub- mitted courageously to operations for the relief of his dropsy, and called to his surgeon to cut deeper. He made his will on 8 and 9 Dec., became composed after some agitation, and died quietly on 13 Dec. 1784. He was buried on 20 Dec. in Westminster Abbey, in the presence of many members of the Literary Club, Taylor reading the funeral service. Complaints were made of the ab- sence of any special cathedral service ; Hawkins, as executor, not considering himself justified in paying the fees, which the cathe- dral authorities did not offer to remit (TWINING, in Country Clergymen of the Eighteenth Century, p. 129; STEEVENS and PARR in Johnsoniana). A subscription opened by the Literary Club provided the monument by John Bacon [q. v.], with an epitaph by Dr. Parr, erected in St. Paul's in 1785 at a cost of eleven hun- dren guineas. From an account of a post-mortem examination, published by G. T. Squibb, it appears that Johnson suffered from gout, emphysema of the lungs, and granular disease of the kidneys. A plate of an emphysematous lung in Baillie's 'Morbid Anatomy' represents one of Johnson's. In his will Johnson describes his property, which amounted to THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON 467 about 2,300^. He left 2/. to the representatives of Thomas Innys, bookseller, in gratitude for help formerly given to his father ; ioo/. to a female servant; while the rest was to be applied to a provision for his negro servant Barber. In a codicil he left some sums to obscure relations, and a number of books to various friends. Boswell and others were omitted, probably from mere inadvertence. Langton, in consideration of 750^. left in his hands, was to pay an annuity of yo/. to Barber, who was also made residu- ary legatee. Barber settled at Lichfield. Johnson gave Boswell a list of his lodgings in London (BOSWELL, iii. 407). After leaving Castle Street (now East) about 1738, he lived successively in the Strand, Boswell Court, the Strand, Hoi- born, Fetter Lane, Holborn, Gough Square (1749-59), Staple Inn, Gray's Inn, i Inner Temple Lane (present site of Johnson Buildings), 7 Johnson's Court, and 8 Bolt Court (the house in Bolt Court was burnt in 1819, Notes and Queries, ist ser. v. 232). Johnson's house at Lichfield was sold in 1785 for 235^ It was bought in 1887 for 8oo/. by Mr. G. H. Johnson of Southport (no relation), who preserves it without alteration. A statue by T. C. Lucas was erected at Lichfield in 1838, and a monument at Uttox- eter (commemorative of his penance there) in 1878 (Notes and Queries, 7th ser. iv. 402). Johnson received the degree of LL.D. from Dublin in 1765, and from Oxford in 1775; but scarcely ever himself used the familiar title of 'Dr.' Johnson' (BOSWELL, ii. 332). His library was sold after his death by James Christie the elder [q. v.] for 242/. 95. A sale-catalogue is in the Bodleian Library. A miniature of Johnson by an unknown painter before 1752 was engraved for Croker's edition. Reynolds painted him: (i) In 1756 (Boswell's picture, often engraved, given in HILL'S Boswell, vol. i. opposite p. 392); (2) in 1770 for Lucy Porter, arms raised with characteristic gesture; replica at Knole Park, shown at Guelph Exhibition, 1891; (3) in 1773 for Beauclerk, afterwards Langton's, replica at Streatham, afterwards Sir Robert Peel's, now in National Gallery; frontispiece to Hill's 'Boswell,' vol. iii.; (4) in 1778 for Malone; the picture which made Johnson say that he would not be 'blinking Sam' (Piozzi, Anecdotes, p. 248; LESLIE and TAYLOR, Life of Reynolds, i. 147, 357, ii. 143, 468 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN 221). He was painted by Barry about 1781; for Kearsley, by S. C. Trotter, in 1782, an 'ugly fellow, like the original,' accord- ing to Johnson (Life of, 1785, published by Kearsley); by Miss Reynolds in 1783, called by the original 'Johnson's grimly ghost' (Piozzi, Letters, ii. 302) ; and by Opie, who never finished the picture, according to Hawkins, p. 569. A fine mezzotint from this by Townley is in the common-room of University College; given in Hill's 'Boswell,' frontispiece to vol. iii. 245. Nollekens in 1777 made a bust in clay, never put into marble. There is a draw- ing of it by Wivell reproduced in Hill's 'Boswell' (frontispiece to vol. ii.). Johnson had a tall, well-formed, and massive figure, indicative of great physical strength, but made grotesque by a strange infirm- ity. Madame d'Arblay speaks of his 'vast body in constant agi- tation, swaying backwards and forwards;' Miss Reynolds (Johnsoniana, p. 222) describes his apparently unconscious 'an- tics,' especially when he crossed a threshold. Sometimes when he was reading a book in the fields a mob would gather to stare at his strange gestures. Reynolds mentioned that he could constrain them when he pleased (BOSWELL, i. 144), though Boswell called them St. Vitus's dance. He had queer tricks of touching posts and carefully counting steps, even when on horseback (ib. i. 484, v. 306; WHYTE, Miscellanea Nova, pp. 49, 50). He was con- stantly talking or muttering prayers to himself. His face, accord- ing to Campbell (Diary, p. 337), had 'the* aspect of an idiot.' He remained in silent abstraction till roused, or, as Tyers said (BOSWELL, v. 73), was like a ghost, who never speaks till he is spoken to. In spite of his infirmities he occasionally indulged in athletic performances. Mrs. Piozzi says that he sometimes hunted with Thrale. He understood boxing, and regretted the decline of prize-fighting, jumped, rowed, and shot, in a 'strange and unwieldy' way, to show that he was not tired after a 'fifty miles' chase,! and, according to Miss Reynolds, swarmed up a tree and beat a young lady in a foot-race when over fifty. Langton described to Best how at the age of fifty-five he had solemnly rolled down a hill. His courage was remarkable; he separated savage dogs, swam into dangerous pools, fired off an overloaded gun, and defended himself against four robbers single-handed (ib. ii. 299). THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON 469 His physical infirmities were partly accountable for roughness of manner. He suffered from deafness and was shortsighted to an extreme degree, although by minute attention he could often per- ceive objects with an accuracy which surprised his friends (Piozzi, Anecdotes, p. 287; Miss REYNOLDS in Johns oniana; MADAME D'ARBLAY, Diary, i. 85, ii. 174; BOSWELL, i. 41, &c.). He was thus often unable to observe the failings of his companions. Manners learnt in Grub Street were not delicate; his mode of gratifying a voracious appetite was even disgusting (BOSWELL, i. 468); while his dress was slovenly, and he had 'no passion for clean linen' (ib. i. 397). He piqued himself, indeed, upon his courtesy; and, when not provoked by opposition, or unable to perceive the failings of others, was both dignified and polite. Nobody could pay more graceful compliments, especially to ladies, and he was always the first to make advances after a quarrel. His friends never ceased to love him ; and their testimony to the singular tenderness which underlay his roughness is unanimous. He loved children, and was even too indulgent to them; he re- joiced greatly when he persuaded Dr. Sumner to abolish holi- day tasks (Piozzi, Anecdotes, p. 21), and was most attentive to the wants of his servants. He was kind to animals, and bought oysters himself for his cat Hodge, that his servants might not be prejudiced against it (BOSWELL, iv. 178). He loved the poor, as Mrs. Piozzi says, as she never saw any one else do; and tended to be indiscriminate in his charity. He never spent, he says, more than 70^. or 8o/. of his pension upon himself. Miss Reynolds was first attracted by hearing that he used to put pen- nies into the hands of outcast children sleeping in the streets, that they might be able to buy a breakfast. Boswell (iv. 321) tells of his carrying home a poor outcast woman from the streets and doing his best to restore her to an honest life. His services to poor friends by lending his pen or collecting money from the rich were innumerable. His constantly expressed contempt for 'sentimental' grievances was not, as frequently happens, a mask for want of sympathy, though it was often so interpreted. He not only felt for all genuine suffering, from death, poverty, and sickness to the wounded vanity of his friends, but did his utmost to alleviate it. 470 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN This depth of tender feeling was, in fact, the foundation of John- son's character. His massive and keenly logical, but narrow and rigid intellect, was the servant of strong passions, of prejudices imbibed through early association, and of the constitutional melan- choly which made him a determined pessimist. He feared mad- ness, and constantly expressed his dread of the next world, and his conviction of the misery of this. His toryism and high-church - manship had become part of his nature. He looked leniently upon superstitions, such as ghosts and second-sight, which ap- peared to fall in with his religious beliefs, while his strong common sense often made him even absurdly sceptical in ordinary matters. According to Mrs. Piozzi (Anecdotes, pp. 138, 141) he would not believe in the earthquake at Lisbon for six months, and ridiculed the statement that red-hot balls had been used at the siege of Gibraltar. His profound respect for truth, emphasised by all his friends, had made him impatient of loose talk, and a rigid sifter of evidence. His melancholy, as often happens, was combined with a strong sense of humour. Hawkins (p. 258), Murphy (p. 139), and Mrs. Piozzi (Anecdotes, pp. 205, 298) agree that he was admirable at sheer buffoonery, and Madame d'Arblay de- scribes his powers of mimicry. No man could laugh more heartily; like a rhinoceros, said Tom Davies (BOSWELL, ii. 378) ; or as Boswell describes it, so as to be heard from Temple Bar to Fleet Ditch (ii. 268). The faculty shows itself little in his earlier writings. His sesquipedalian style appears in his early efforts, and seems to have been partly caught from the seven- teenth-century writers, such as Sir Thomas Browne, whom he studied and admired; and in whose high-built latinised phraseology there was something congenial. The simplicity and clearness of the style accepted in his youth affected his taste, and he acquired the ponderosity without the finer qualities of his model. His love of talk diminished his mannerism in later years ; and, at his worst, his phrases are not mere verbiage, but an awk- ward embodiment of very keen dialectical power. The strong sense, shrewd and humorous observations which appear in his 'Lives of the Poets' give him the very first rank among all the talkers of whom we have any adequate report. Carlyle calls him the last of the tories. He was the typical embodiment of the THE LIFE OF DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON 471 strength and weakness, the common sense masked by grotesque prejudice, and the genuine sentiment underlying a rough outside, which characterise the 'true-born Englishman of the eighteenth century.' He was the first author who, living by his pen alone, preserved absolute independence of character, and was as much respected for his high morality as for his intellectual power. A full list of Johnson's works, drawn up by BOSWELL, is in Hill's 'Boswell,' i. 16-24. The works, published separately, are: i. Abridgment and translation of Lobo's 'Voyage to Abyssinia,' 1735. 2. 'London,' 1738. 3. 'Marmor Norf olciense ; or an Essay on an Ancient Prophetical Inscription in Monkish Rhyme, lately discovered near Lynne in Norfolk by Probus Britannicus,' 1739 (also in Gent. Mag.). 4. 'Proposals for Publishing "Biblio- theca Harleiana," a Catalogue of the Library of the Earl of Oxford ' (also in Gent. Mag., and prefixed to first volume of Catalogue), 1742. 5. 'Life of Richard Savage,' 1744. 6. 'Miscellaneous Observations on the Tragedy of Macbeth, with Remarks on Sir T[homas] H[armer's] Edition of Shakespeare, and Proposals for a New Edition of that Poet,' 1745. 7. 'Plan for a Dictionary of the English Language, addressed to Philip Dormer, Earl of Chesterfield,' 1747. 8. 'The Vanity of Human Wishes, being the Tenth Satire of Juvenal Imitated,' 1749. 9. 'Irene,' 1749; 2nd edit. 1754. 10. The 'Rambler,' 1750-2 (see above), ii. Papers in the 'Adventurer,' 1753 (see above). 12. 'A Dic- tionary, with a Grammar and History of the English Language,' 1755. Five editions appeared during his lifetime; the eleventh in 1816. A verbatim reprint of the author's last edition was published by Bohn in 1854. An abridgment by Johnson ap- peared in 1756 and was several times reprinted. Supplements, abridgments, and editions by other authors have also appeared. 13. 'Account of an Attempt to ascertain the Longitude at Sea . . .' (for Z. Williams), 1755 (see above). 14. 'Life of Sir Thomas Browne,' prefixed to new edition of 'Christian Morals,' 1756. 15. 'The Idler,' 1758-1760 (see above). 16. 'Ras- selas, Prince of Abyssinia,' 1759; a facsimile of the first edition, with a bibliography by James Macaulay, was published in 1884. 17. 'Life of Ascham,' prefixed to 'Ascham's English Works,' by Bennet, 1763. 18. 'Plays of William Shakespeare, with 472 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN Notes,' 8 vols. 1765. 19. 'The False Alarm,' 1770. 20. 'Thoughts on the late Transactions respecting Falkland Islands,' 1771. 21. 'The Patriot,' 1774. 22. 'A Journey to the Western Isles of Scotland,' 1775. 23. 'Taxation no Tyranny,' 1775. 24. 'Prefaces Biographical and Critical to the Works of the most Eminent English Poets,' 1779 and 1781. Published separately as 'Lives of the English Poets.' The edi- tion by Peter Cunningham appeared in 1854; the six chief lives, with preface by Matthew Arnold, in 1878, and a complete edition, begun by Dr. Birkbeck Hill and completed by H. Spencer Scott, in 1905 (Oxford, 3 vols.). Johnson's 'Prayers and Meditations,' edited by G. Strahan, appeared in 1785; and his 'Letters' to Madame Piozzi in 1788. 'Sermons left for Publication,' by John Taylor, which appeared in 1788 and passed through several editions, have also been at- tributed to him. 'An Account of the Life of Dr. Samuel Johnson from his Birth to his Eleventh Year, written by Himself (1805) was a fragment saved from some papers burnt by him before his death, and not seen by Boswell. Johnson also contributed many articles to the 'Gentleman's Magazine' from 173810 1748; some to the 'Universal Visitor' in 1756; and some to the 'Literary Magazine' of the same year. He wrote many prefaces, dedica- tions, and other trifles for his friends. His collected works were edited by Hawkins in 1787 in n vols., to which two, edited by Stockdale, were added. Murphy edited them in. n vols. in 1796. The Oxford edition of 1825 was edited by Francis Pearson Walesby, fellow of Lincoln College, and pro- fessor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford. This contains the works in 9 vols., and the 'Parliamentary Debates' (also published sepa- rately, 2 vols. 1787) in 2 vols. THE LIFE OF RICHARD BRINSLEY SHERIDAN 473 THE LIFE OF RICHARD BRINSLEY SHERIDAN FRASER RAE [From the Dictionary of National Biography.} SHERIDAN, RICHARD BRINSLEY (1751-1816), statesman and dramatist, born 30 Oct. 1751 at 12 Dorset Street, Dublin, was grandson of Thomas Sheridan (1687-1738) [q. v.], and son of Thomas Sheridan (1719-1788) [q. v.]. He received the rudiments of learning from his father, and from the age of seven till eight and a half attended a school in Dublin kept by Samuel Whyte. Then he rejoined his parents, who had migrated to London, and he never revisited his native city. In 1762 he was sent to Harrow school, where he remained till 1768, two years after his mother's death. Subsequently a private tutor, Lewis Ker, directed his studies in his father's house in London, while Angelo instructed him in fencing and horsemanship. At the end of 1770 Sheridan's father settled in Bath and taught elocution. His children became acquainted with those of Thomas Linley (1732-1795) [q. v.], a composer and teacher of music, who had given Sheridan's mother lessons in singing. One of Sheridan's friends at Harrow was Nathaniel Brassey Halhed [q. v.], who went to Oxford from Harrow. With him Sheridan carried on a corre- spondence from Bath. They projected a literary periodical called 'Hernan's Miscellany,' of which the first number was written but not published; and they prepared a metrical vers'on of the epistles of Aristaenetus, which appeared in 1771, and in a second edition in 1773. Halhed translated the epistles, and Sheridan revised and edited them. Another volume of translations from the same author which Sheridan undertook never saw the light. A farce called ' Ixion ' was written by Halhed, recast by Sheridan, and renamed 'Jupiter.' It was offered Garrick and Foote, but not accepted by either. Sheridan wrote two sets of verses, which appeared in the 'Bath Chronicle' during 1771 ; the title of one set was * Clio's Protest or the Picture Varnished ; ' of the other 'The Ridotto of Bath,' which was reprinted and had a large sale. 474 FRASER RAE Sheridan's letters to Halhed have not been preserved; those from Halhed contain many references to Miss Linley, who sang in oratorios at Oxford, and for whom Halhed expressed great ad- miration, although he failed to excite a corresponding feeling in her. Desiring to escape from the persecution of Major Mathews, an unworthy admirer, Miss Linley appealed to Sheridan to escort her to France, where she hoped to find refuge and repose in a convent. The scheme had the approval and support of Sheridan's sisters. At the end of March 1772 Sheridan, Miss Linley, and a lady's maid left Bath for London, where Mr. Ewart, a friend of Mr. Sheridan, gave them a passage to Dunkirk in one of his vessels. Sheridan's younger sister, Elizabeth, who was in Miss Linley's confidence as well as her brother's, gives the following account of what followed: 'After quitting Dunkirk, Mr. Sheridan was more explicit with Miss Linley as to his views in accompanying her to France. He told her that he could not be content to leave her in a convent unless she consented to a previous marriage, which had all along been the object of his hopes ; and she must be aware that, after the step she had taken, she could not appear in England but as his wife. Miss Linley, who really preferred him greatly to any person, was not difficult to persuade, and at a village not far from Calais the marriage ceremony was performed by a priest who was known to be often employed on such occasions.' This marriage, if contracted as described, was valid ; but neither of the parties to it regarded the ceremony as more binding than a be- trothal. Her own feelings were subsequently expressed in a letter to him: 'You are sensible when I left Bath I had not an idea of you but as a friend. It was not your person that gained my affec- tion. No, it was that delicacy, that tender compassion, that inter- est which you seemed to take in my welfare, that were the motives which induced me to love you' (Biography of Sheridan, i. 255). The lady's father followed the fugitives and took his daughter back to Bath. Meanwhile Mathews had published a letter de- nouncing Sheridan 'as a liar and a treacherous scoundrel,' and on their meeting in London a duel with swords ended with the disarming of Mathews, who was compelled to beg his life and to publish an apology in the 'Bath Chronicle.' On 2 July 1772 a second duel was fought, in which Sheridan was seriously wounded. THE LIFE OF RICHARD BRINSLEY SHERIDAN 475 After his recovery, as his father and Mr. Linley both objected to his marrying Miss Linley, he was sent to Waltham Abbey in Essex on 27 Aug. in order that he might continue his studies undisturbed. He remained at Waltham Abbey till April 1773, reading hard and writing many letters to his friends, of whom the chief was Thomas Grenville (1755-1846) [q. v.]. He wrote to him: 'I keep regular hours, use a great deal of exercise, and study very hard. There is a very ingenious man here with whom, besides, I spend two hours every evening in mathematicks, mensuration, astronomy.' Charles Brinsley, the son of Sheridan by his second marriage, has recorded that his father left behind him ' six copybooks, each filled with notes and references to mathematics, carefully written by Mr. S. at an early age/ that is, probably at Waltham Abbey. He told his friend Grenville : ' I am determined to gain all the knowledge that I can bring within my reach. I will make myself as much master as I can of French and Italian/ Yet his inclination was for the bar, and he was entered at the Middle Temple on 6 April 1773. On the 1 3th of the same month he at length married Miss Linley, with her father's consent. His own father looked upon the union, and wrote about it, as a disgrace. The young couple went to live at East Burnham. In the winter of 1773 they lived with Stephen Storace [q. v.] in London, and in the spring of 1774 took a house in Orchard Street. Sheridan wrote much at this period, a scheme for a training school for children of the nobility and comments on Chesterfield's * Letters' being among the subjects he treated; but he published nothing with his name. On 17 Nov. 1774 he informed his father-in-law that a comedy by him would be in rehearsal at Covent Garden Theatre in a few days. This comedy was 'The Rivals,' and it was performed for the first time on 17 Jan. 1775. It failed, was withdrawn, and then performed in a revised version on 28 Jan. From that date it has remained one of the most popular among modern comedies. A farce, ' St. Patrick's Day, or the Scheming Lieutenant/ was written for the benefit of Mr. Clinch, who had made his mark in the 'Rivals' as Sir Lucius O 'Trigger, and it was played on 2 May. It was favourably received, and repeated several times at Covent Garden. A comic opera, 'The Duenna,' was represented at Covent Garden on 476 FRASER RAE 21 Nov. 1775 and on seventy-four other nights during the season, a success which was then unprecedented. By the end of 1775 Sheridan had become a favourite with play- goers. Before the end of the next year he was manager of Drury Lane Theatre in succession to Garrick, having entered into part- nership with Mr. Linley and Dr. Ford, and become the proprietor of Garrick's share in the theatre, for which Garrick received 35,ooo/. Two years later the share of Lacy, the partner of Garrick, which was valued at the same sum, was bought by the new pro- prietors. Mr. Brander Mathews has pointed out, in his intro- duction to Sheridan's 'Comedies' (pp. 30, 31), that the money was chiefly raised on mortgage ; that when Sheridan bought one- seventh of the shares in 1776 he only had to find i,3oo/. in cash; and that when he became the proprietor in 1778 of the half of the shares, this sum was returned to him. Drury Lane Theatre was opened under Sheridan's management on 21 Sept. 1776. A prelude written for the occasion by Colman, containing a neat compliment to Garrick, was then performed. On 1 6 Jan. 1777 Sheridan gave 'The Rivals' for the first time at Drury Lane, and on 24 Feb. 'A Trip to Scarborough,' which he had adapted from Vanbrugh's 'Relapse;' but he achieved his crowning triumph as a dramatist on 8 May in that year, when 'The School for Scandal' was put on the stage. The play nar- rowly escaped suppression. Sheridan told the House of Commons on 3 Dec. 1793 that a license for its performance had been refused, and that it was only through his personal influence with Lord Hertford, the lord chamberlain, that the license was granted the day before that fixed for the performance. On 29 Oct. 1779 Sheridan's farce, 'The Critic,' and, on 24 May 1799, his patriotic melodrama, 'Pizarro,' were produced at Drury Lane. With 'Pizarro' his career as a dramatist ended. Sheridan had meanwhile become as great a favourite in society and in parliament as among playgoers. In March 1777 he was elected a member of the Literary Club on the motion of Dr. Johnson, and he lived to be one of the oldest of the thirty-five members. Having made the acquaintance of Charles James Fox, he joined him in his efforts for political reform, and desired to enter parliament as his supporter. He failed in his candidature THE LIFE OF RICHARD BRINSLEY SHERIDAN 477 for Honiton, but he was returned for Stafford on 12 Sept. 1780. A letter in his favour from the Duchess of Devonshire proved of great service. On the proposition of Fitzpatrick, he was elected a member of Brooks's Club on 2 Nov. 1780. Two years before, he had been twice proposed by Fox and rejected, the first time on 28 Nov., the second on 25 Dec. 1778 (candidates' book, Brooks's Club). His first speech in parliament was made on 20 Nov. 1780, in defence of a charge of bribery which Whitworth, his defeated opponent at Stafford, had brought against him, and the speech was both well received and successful in its object. The allegation that he had failed was circulated for the first time by Moore forty- five years after the speech was delivered (cf. FRASER RAE, Biog- raphy, i. 359). He became a frequent speaker, and by common consent was soon ranked as highly among parliamentary orators as among dramatic writers. His opposition to the war in America was deemed so effective by the representatives of congress that a thank-offering of 2o,ooo/. was made to him. He wisely and gracefully declined to accept the gift (MooRE, Diary, i. 212, 213). In 1782 his marked abilities received more practical recognition. Lord Rockingham, who then became premier for the second time, appointed him under-secretary for foreign affairs. After the death of Rockingham on i July, Shelburne was appointed prime minister. Sheridan, with other colleagues in the Rockingham administration, refused to serve under him. But he returned to office on 21 Feb. 1783 as secretary to the treasury when the coalition ministry, with the Duke of Portland as figure-head, was formed. The ministry was dismissed by the king on the i8th of the following December. During the brief interval, Sheridan addressed the house twenty-six times on matters concerning the treasury. Sheridan made the personal acquaintance of the Prince of Wales at Devonshire House soon after he entered parliament, and thence- forth acted as his confidential adviser. He gave advice and drafted documents for the prince in 1788, when the king was suffering from mental disorder, and it was proposed to appoint the prince as regent subject to certain restrictions. With Fox and Lord Loughborough he injudiciously upheld the right of the prince to assume the regency without the sanction of parliament. It was 478 FRASER RAE arranged that, should the king not recover and should a whig administration be formed by the regent, the office of treasurer of the navy would be assigned to Sheridan; but the king's recovery rendered the plan nugatory. Sheridan was conspicuous in the proceedings against Warren Hastings [q. v.]. He attended the committee which examined witnesses in connection with charges whereupon to frame an impeachment, and when the articles were settled it fell to him to obtain the assent of the house to the one re- lating to the begums or princesses of Oude. The speech in which he brought the matter before the house on 7 Feb. 1787 occupied five hours and forty minutes in delivery, and was one of the most memorable in the annals of parliament. When he sat down 1 the whole house the members, peers, and strangers in- voluntarily joined in a tumult of applause, and adopted a mode of expressing their approbation, new and irregular in that house, by loudly and repeatedly clapping their hands' (Parliamentary Hist. xxv. 294). Pitt moved the adjournment of the debate on the ground that the minds of members were too agitated to discuss the question with coolness and judicially. No full report of the speech has been preserved ; the best appeared in the ' London Chronicle ' for 8 Feb. 1787. The excitement which Sheridan had aroused in the House of Commons spread throughout the nation. Sheridan began his speech as a manager of the impeachment in Westminster Hall on 3 June 1788. The event was the topic of the day. Fifty pounds were cheerfully given for a seat. His speech lasted, not, as Macaulay wrote, 'two days,' but for several hours on Tuesday the 3rd, Friday the 6th, Tuesday the loth, and Friday the i3thof June. Gibbon asserted that Sheridan sank back into Burke's arms after uttering the concluding words, 'My lords, I have done.' Macaulay repeated this story with embellishments, writing that 'Sheridan contrived, with a knowledge of stage effect which his father might have envied, to sink back, as if exhausted, into the arms of Burke, who hugged him with the energy of generous ad- miration' (Collected Works, vi. 633). Sir Gilbert Elliot, one of the managers who sat beside Sheridan, wrote to his wife, 'Burke caught him in his arms as he sat down. ... I have myself en- joyed that embrace on such an occasion, and know its value ' (Life and Letters, i. 219). Sheridan paid Gibbon a graceful compli- THE LIFE OF RICHARD BRINSLEY SHERIDAN 479 ment by speaking of 'his luminous page.' Moore is responsible for the fiction that Sheridan afterwards said he meant 'voluminous.' Dudley Long told Gibbon that Sheridan had spoken about his 'voluminous pages' (SiR GILBERT ELLIOT, Life and Letters, i. 219). The trial of Hastings lasted till 1794, and Sheridan was con- stant in attendance. On 14 May in that year he replied to the arguments of Plumer and Law, counsel for Hastings, relative to his charge concerning the begums, and the speech which he then de- livered was described by Professor Smyth, who heard it, as an extraordinary rhetorical triumph (Memoir of Mr. Sheridan, pp. 31-5). While the trial was in progress Sheridan suffered much domestic affliction. His father died at Margate on 14 Aug. 1788. Sheridan thereupon took charge of his sister Elizabeth, and, on her marriage with Henry Lefanu, provided for her maintenance. His wife died at Hot Wells on 28 June 1792. He remarried on 27 April 1795, his second wife being Esther Jane, eldest daughter of Newton Ogle, dean of Winchester. He was unremitting in the discharge of his parliamentary duties, and he gave special attention to finance, saying to Pitt, on 1 1 March 1793, that he did not require to watch with vigilance all matters relating to the public income and outlay, as 'he had uniformly acted on that principle upon all revenue questions.' He laboured to abate the rigour of the game laws and to repress the practice of gaming. Whenever a question relating to social improvement and progress was before the house he gave his support to it, and when, in 1787, the convention of Scottish royal boroughs had failed in getting a sympathiser with their grievances, they enlisted him in their service, and they thanked him in after days for his earnest- ness in their cause, which he twelve times upheld in the house. What he had vainly urged between 1787 and 1794 was effected for the Scottish burgesses in 1833 in a reformed parliament. The parliamentary reform which rendered this improvement possible had been advocated by Sheridan, and, when others despaired of its attainment, he wrote, on 21 May 1782, to Thomas Grenville: 'We were bullied outrageously about our poor parliamentary reform; but it will do at last in spite of you all' (Courts and Cabinets of George III, i. 28). 480 FRASER RAE When the revolution in France tried men's souls in Great Britain and made many friends of progress recant in a panic the convictions of their wiser years, Sheridan stood firm with Fox in maintaining the right of the French to form their own government, and upheld, with him, the duty of this country to recognise and treat with any government which exercised authority there. The Earl of Mornington (afterwards Marquis Wellesley) made an elaborate appeal to the house on 21 Jan. 1794 to prosecute the war with France till the French should have discarded their republican principles. The reply on this occasion was one of Sheridan's finest debating speeches, and a most able argument against ille- gitimate interference with the domestic concerns of France. He was quite as ready, however, to oppose the French when they began to propagate their principles by the sword. The fleets at Ports- mouth and the Nore mutinied in May and June 1797, partly at the instigation of French agents. Then Sheridan gave warm sup- port and good advice to the government, and largely contributed to the removal of the danger which menaced the country. Dundas said on behalf of the ministry that 'the country was highly in- debted to Sheridan for his fair and manly conduct ' (Parliamentary Hist, xxxvi. 804). When invasion was threatened in 1803 by Bonaparte, he urged unconditional resistance, and declared in the house on 10 Aug. that no peace ought to be made so long as a foreign soldier trod British soil. Moreover he urged the house to encourage the volunteers who had assembled in defence of their homes, while he set the example by acting as lieutenant-colonel of the St. James's volunteer corps. The revolt of the Spaniards against the French invaders was lauded by him, and he was earnest in urging the government to send Sir Arthur Wellesley (afterwards Duke of Wellington) to represent 'the enthusiasm of England' in the cause of Spain struggling against the yoke of Bonaparte. His last speech in parliament, which was delivered on 21 June 1812, ended with a heart-stirring appeal to persevere in opposing the tyranny to which Bonaparte was subjecting Europe, and with the assertion that, if the British nation were to share the fate of others, the historian might record that, when after spending all her treasure and her choicest blood the nation fell, there fell with her ' all the best securities for the charities of human life, for the power and THE LIFE OF .RICHARD BRINSLEY SHERIDAN 481 honour, the fame, the glory, and the liberties of herself and the whole civilised world.' Sheridan was conspicuous and energetic among the opponents of the union between Great Britain and Ireland. He said on 23 Jan. 1799, when the subject was formally brought before the house, 'My country has claims upon me which I am not more proud to acknowledge than ready to liquidate to the full measure of my ability.' He held that the bargain concluded in 1782 between the two countries was final, and also that, if a new arrangement were to be made, it should be based on 'the manifest, fair, and free consent and approbation of the parliaments of the two countries.' Twenty-five members of parliament followed his lead. Mr. Lecky affirms that he fought 'a hopeless battle in opposition with conspicuous earnestness and courage' (History of England in Eighteenth Century, viii. 356). After the union was carried and Addington had succeeded Pitt as prime minister, it was in Sheridan's power, as it may have been previously, to enter the House of Lords by changing the party to which he had belonged since entering political life, but he then declined, as he phrased it, ' to hide his head in a coronet ' (Memoir of Lady Dufferin, by her son, p. 17). He sometimes dined with Addington when he was premier, and Addington records that one night Sheridan said to him, ' My visits to you may possibly be mis- understood by my friends : but I hope you know, Mr. Addington, that I have an unpurchasable mind' (Life of Lord Sidmouth, ii. 105). When Pitt died in 1806 and the ministry of 'all the talents' was formed, Sheridan held the office in it of treasurer of the navy, with the rank of privy councillor. After Fox's death in the same year he succeeded him as member for Westminster; but he was not called, as he had a right to anticipate he would have been, to lead the whig party in the commons. He was rejected for Westminster at the general election in 1807, and found a seat at Ilchester which he held till 1812. He had been proposed in 1807 as a candidate for the county of Wexford without his knowledge, and his election seemed assured, as the electors expressed their readiness to vote for 'the great Sheridan.' Mr. Colclough, who proposed him as a fellow candidate, was challenged by Mr. Alcock, one of his opponents, to fight a duel, and was shot 21 482 FRASER RAE through the heart. The supporters of both Colclough and Sheridan consequently held aloof from the poll, and Mr. Alcock and Colonel Ram were declared to have been duly elected (Personal Sketches of his Own Times, by Sir Jonah Barrington, i. 302, 305). Sheridan endeavoured in 1812 to be returned again for Stafford; but the younger generation of burgesses was as little disposed as the elder to vote for any candidate unless he paid each of them the accustomed fee of five guineas, and, as Sheridan had not the money, he lost the election. As a dramatic writer Sheridan had no equal among his con- temporaries, and as manager and chief proprietor of Drury Lane Theatre he maintained the popularity of the theatre and obtained from it an average income of io,ooo/. In 1791 the theatre was pronounced unsafe, and it had to be pulled down and rebuilt, and the new house was much larger than the old one. The esti- mated cost was i5o,ooo/. ; this was exceeded, however, by 75,000^. While the theatre was rebuilding, the company played at the theatre in the Haymarket, and the expenses there exceeded the receipts. The first performance in the new building took place on 21 April 1794. With mistaken chivalry Sheridan rashly undertook to de- fray out of his own pocket the liabilities which had been incurred owing to the expenses exceeding -the estimate. Whatever prospect he may have had of achieving this chivalrous but quixotic under- taking was dashed to the ground on 24 Feb. 1809, when the new theatre was destroyed by fire. When the news reached the House of Commons that the theatre was burning, the unusual compliment was paid him by Lord Temple and Mr. Ponsonby of moving the adjournment of the debate 'in consequence of the extent of the calamity which the event just communicated to the house would bring upon a respectable individual, a member of that house.' While grateful for the kindness displayed towards himself, he objected to the motion on the ground that 'whatever might be the extent of the individual calamity, he did not consider it of a nature to interrupt their proceedings.' Two years later the house displayed a like feeling of admiration and sympathy. It was then proposed to authorise the building of another theatre, and Sheridan contended that the proprietors of the Drury Lane patent ought to be the persons entrusted with this privilege. His conduct THE LIFE OF RICHARD BR1NSLEY SHERIDAN 483 with regard to Drury Lane Theatre was eulogised by political opponents as well as by political friends, General Tarleton calling upon the house 'to consider the immortal works of Mr. Sheridan and the stoical philosophy with which in that house he had wit- nessed the destruction of his property. Surely some indulgence was due to such merit.' (Parl. Debates, xix. 1142, 1145). None of the many effective speeches which Sheridan delivered in the house did him more honour, or has given him more deserved credit, than those relating to the liberty 'of the public press at a time when the press had fewer friends among statesmen than at present. He was magnanimous in upholding the liberty of unfettered print- ing, because, as he declared to Sir Richard Phillips, his life had been made miserable by calumnies in the newspapers. The greater his magnanimity and statesmanship, then, in declaring, as he did in the House of Commons on 4 April 1798, 'that the press should be unfettered, that its freedom should be, as indeed it was, com- mensurate with the freedom of the people and the well-being of a virtuous State; on that account he thought that even one hun- dred libels had better be ushered into the world than one prosecution be instituted which might endanger the liberty of the press of this country. ' At a later day he condemned the conduct of the benchers of Lincoln's Inn, and shamed them into rescinding a regulation which they had passed for excluding from the bar any member of the inn who contributed to newspapers. His monetary affairs, after the burning of Drury Lane Theatre in 1809, were greatly involved, and the sums owing to him were withheld while his creditors clamoured for payment. A committee, presided over by Mr. Whitbread, for rebuilding the theatre gave him shares for much of the amount due to him, but by retaining i2,ooo/. in cash hindered him from being returned to parliament for Stafford, and caused him to be arrested for debt in August 1813, when he became an inmate of a sponging-house in Took's Court, Cursitor Street, till Whitbread handed over the sum required. It was not known till after Whitbread's self-inflicted death, on 6 July 1815, that a disease of the brain was the explanation of some actions which would have been otherwise inexplicable. Sheridan's own health had been impaired several years before his life ended. He had long suffered from insomnia; in his later years varicose 484 FRASER RAE veins in his legs gave him much pain and made walking difficult. He had always been a jovial companion, and few who enjoyed his society could have surmised that in private he was subject to fits of depression which made life a burden. In common with his contemporaries he frequently drank wine to excess, yet without drinking as much as many others, a small quantity affecting him more seriously. Sir Gilbert Elliot records that at a dinner in 1788 Sheridan drank much wine, but that Grey drank far more. Sheri- dan preferred claret till his later and darker years, and then brandy had a baneful fascination for him. Nevertheless, he weaned him- self from the bad habit, and he became very temperate latterly, drinking nothing but water. Mental worries about the health of his elder son Tom, who went to the Cape of Good Hope in 1813, without being cured there of consumption and about the means wherewith to satisfy the demands of inexorable creditors, to which an abscess in the throat added a physical torment, compelled him to take to his bed in the spring of 1816. He was then occupying the house at 17 Savile Row. A writ was served upon him when he could no longer leave the house, and the sheriff's officer consented to remain there, and, by so doing, hindered other creditors from giving further annoyance. It was incorrectly announced in the newspapers that Sheridan was in dire poverty, and offers of assistance were made ; but these were declined because they were not required. Several years after- wards a story was circulated by Croker, on the authority of George IV, to the effect that Sheridan's last hours upon earth were those of a neglected pauper. The story is the reverse of the truth. Charles Brinsley, the son of Sheridan by his second marriage, wrote from Fulham Palace, on Sunday, 7 July 1816, where his mother and he were staying, to his half-brother at the Cape, eight days after their father's death, that 'you will be soothed by learning that our father's death was unaccompanied by suffering, that he almost slumbered into death, and that the reports which you may have seen in the newspapers of the privations and the want of comforts which he endured are unfounded; that he had every attention and comfort that could make a deathbed easy.' Mrs. Parkhurst, who was acquainted with the Sheridans, wrote to Dublin from London to Mrs. Lefanu, his elder sister, a fortnight after his THE LIFE OF RICHARD BRINSLEY SHERIDAN 485 death : ' Mr. Sheridan wanted neither medical aid, the attention of true affection, the consolations of piety, nor the exertions of friendship. He had three of the first physicians of London every day; his wife, his son, and his brother-in-law were constantly with him ; the bishop of London (Howley, afterwards archbishop of Canterbury) saw him many times, and (Lord) Lauderdale did all he could for the regulation of his affairs.' The funeral was arranged by Lord Lauderdale and Peter Moore [q. v.], member for Coventry, both being Sheridan's old and at- tached friends, and the coffin was taken, for the sake of convenience, to Peter Moore's house in Great George Street. The remains were laid in Westminster Abbey, and the funeral was on a far grander scale than those of Pitt and Fox, the flower of the nobility uniting with the most notable men of letters and learning in paying the last homage to Sheridan. The Duke of Wellington and his brother, the Marquis Wellesley, who were absent, expressed in writing their regret that their absence was unavoidable. As a dramatist Sheridan carried the comedy of manners in this country to its highest pitch, and his popularity as a writer for the stage is exceeded by that of Shakespeare alone. As an orator he impressed the House of Commons more deeply than almost any predecessor, and as a politician in a venal age he preserved his independence and purity. He left debts which were trifling com- pared with those of Pitt, and which, unlike those of Pitt, were defrayed by his family. He never received a pension, though he was as much entitled to one as Burke. The Prince of Wales induced him to accept the office of receiver of the duchy of Cornwall, with a salary of about 8oo/., and this he enjoyed for the last few years of his life. His widow and his son by her inherited a property in 1 nd which he had bought, and which sufficed to maintain them during the remainder of their lives. Throughout life Sheridan was the victim of misrepresentation. He declared to Sir Richard Phillips in his closing years that his life 'had been miserable by calumnies.' To these words, taken from a manuscript by Sir Richard supplied to Moore, but sup- pressed, may be added the following from a manuscript which Sheridan left behind him : ' It is a fact that I have scarcely ever in my life contradicted any one calumny against me ... I have 486 FRASER RAE since on reflection ceased to approve my own conduct in these respects. Were I to lead my life over again, I should act other- wise.' After his death many stories about him have been cir- culated and accepted as genuine, though they are counterfeit. They begin when he was seven years old, and end when he was in his coffin; the first being that his mother told Samuel Whyte he was an 'impenetrable dunce,' a statement for which not a shadow of proof has been given ; and the last that he was arrested for debt when laid out for burial, a statement which is as ridiculous and unauthentic as the other. The story is often told of his hoaxing the House of Commons, and many correspondents of * Notes and Queries' have exercised their ingenuity in describing the kind of spurious or imitation Greek which he is assumed to have used, the truth being that he once corrected Lord Belgrave, who mis- applied a passage of Demosthenes, which he had quoted in the original. He is finely characterised in a few words written by Mrs. Parkhurst in the letter from which a quotation has been made above: 'He took away with him a thousand charitable actions, a heart in which there was no hard part, a spirit free from envy and malice, and he is gone in the undiminished brightness of his talent, gone before pity had withered admiration.' On the morning after his death the * Times ' eulogised him as a member of the legislature in terms which could not be justly applied to many of his colleagues and contemporaries : ' Throughout a period fruitful of able men and trying circumstances [he was regarded] as the most popular specimen in the British senate of political consistency, intrepidity, and honour.' Sheridan's portrait was painted more than once by Sir Joshua Reynolds. The finest example belonged to H. N. Pym., esq., of Brasted ; another portrait by Sir Joshua was engraved by W. Read. Both these are reproduced in Mr. Rae's 'Biography,' together with a pencil sketch attributed to the same artist. The portrait by John Russell, R.A., is at the National Portrait Gallery, and a drawing of Sheridan in old age was engraved by the artist George Clint. John Hoppner painted the second Mrs. Sheridan with her infant son Charles. A collected edition of Sheridan's plays appeared at Dublin in 1792-3, and in London 1794. Of many later editions, one was THE LIFE OF RICHARD BRINSLEY SHERIDAN 487 edited by Moore in two volumes (1821), and to another (1840) Leigh Hunt contributed a biographical notice. Sheridan's speeches were edited 'by a constitutional friend' in 1798 (5 vols.), and with a life in 1816 (5 vols.; 2nd edit. 1842, 3 vols.). His speeches in the trial of Warren Hastings, reprinted from the verbatim shorthand report of the proceedings, were edited by E. A. Bond, London, 1859-61. Sheridan's only son, THOMAS SHERIDAN (1775-1817), usually called Tom, was born on 17 March 1775, and died, as colonial treasurer, at the Cape of Good Hope, on 12 Sept. 1817. He was very accomplished and a skilful versifier; a poem on the loss of the Saldanha was printed and praised. He entered the army and was for a time aide-de-camp to Lord Moira. In November 1805 he married, with his father's approval, Caroline Henrietta Callan- der, by whom he had four sons and three daughters. His wife is separately noticed. The eldest son, Richard Brinsley Sheridan (d. 1888), married in 1835 Marcia Maria, only surviving child and heiress of Lieut. -general Sir Colquhoun Grant [q.v.] of Framp- ton Court, Dorset, and sat in parliament as member for Shaftes- bury from 1845 to ^5 2 ^ an d for Dorchester from 1852 to 1868. His son, Algernon Thomas Brinsley Sheridan of Frampton Court, owns many of his great-grandfather's papers. Tom Sheridan's three daughters were noted for their great beauty and talent. All were married: the eldest became Lady Dufferin, and afterwards Countess of Gifford [see SHERIDAN, HELEN SELINA]; the second became the Honourable Caroline Norton [q. v.], and afterwards Lady Stirling-Maxwell of Keir; and the youngest became Lady Seymour, and afterwards Duchess of Somerset [see SEYMOUR, EDWARD ADOLPHUS]. THE LIFE OF CHARLES LAMB ALFRED AINGER [From the Dictionary of National Biography.] LAMB, CHARLES (1775-1834), essayist and humourist, was born on 10 Feb. 1775 in Crown Office Row in the Temple, London. His father, John Lamb, who is described under the name of Lovel 488 ALFRED AINGER in Charles Lamb's essay 'The Old Benchers of the Inner Temple/ was the son of poor parents in Lincolnshire, and had come up as a boy to London and entered domestic service. He ultimately became clerk and servant to Samuel Salt, a bencher of the Inner Temple, and continued to fill that position until Salt's death in 1792. He married Elizabeth Field, whose mother was for more than fifty years housekeeper at Blakesware in Hertfordshire, a few miles from Ware, a dower-house of the Plumers, a well-known county family. This Mary Field, Charles Lamb's grandmother, played an important part in the early development of his affec- tions, and is a familiar presence in some of the most character- istic and pathetic of his writings. To John and Elizabeth Lamb, in Crown Office Row, were born a family of seven children, of whom only three survived their infancy. The eldest of these three was John Lamb, born in 1763; the second Mary Ann, better known as Mary, born in 1764; and the third Charles, baptised 10 March 1775 'by the Rev. Mr. Jeffs.' The baptisms of the entire family duly appear in the registers of the Temple Church, and were first printed by Mr. Charles Kent in his 'Centenary Edition of Lamb's Works' in 1875. The block of buildings in which Samuel Salt occupied one or more sets of chambers, and in which the Lamb family were born and reared, is at the eastern end of Crown Office Row, and though considerably modified since in its interior arrangements, still bears upon its outer wall the date 1737. Charles Lamb received his earliest education at a humble day-school kept by a Mr. William Bird in a court leading out of Fetter Lane (see Lamb's paper, 'Captain Starkey,' in HONE'S Every-day Book, 21 July 1826). It was a school for both boys and girls, and Mary Lamb also attended it. At the age of seven Charles obtained a nomination to Christ's Hospital (the 'Blue Coat School'), through the influence of his father's employer, and within its venerable walls he passed the next seven years of his life, his holidays being spent with his parents in the Temple or with his grandmother, Mrs. Field, in Hertfordshire. What Charles Lamb learned at Christ's Hospital, what friend- ships he formed, and what merits and demerits he detected in the THE LIFE OF CHARLES LAMB 489 arrangements, manners, and customs of the school, are all familiar to us from the two remarkable essays he has left us, ' On Christ's Hospital, and the Character of the Christ's Hospital Boys,' published in the 'Gentleman's Magazine' in 1813, and the later essay 'Christ's Hospital Five- and- thirty Years Ago,' one of the Elia series, in the 'London Magazine' of November 1820. On the whole he seems to have been happy in the school, and to have acquired considerable skill in its special studies, notably in Latin, which he was fond of reading, and in a rough-and-ready way writing, to the end of his life. At the time of quitting the school he had not attained the highest position, that of 'Grecian,' but the nearest in rank to it, that of deputy Grecian. Perhaps the school authorities were not careful to promote him to the superior rank, seeing that he was not to proceed to the university. As a Grecian Lamb would have been entitled to an exhibition, but it was understood that the privilege was intended for those who were to enter holy orders, and a fatal impediment of speech an in- surmountable and painful stutter made that profession im- possible for him even if his gifts and inclinations had pointed that way. He left Christ's Hospital in November 1789, carrying with him, among other precious possessions, the friendship of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, a friendship destined to endure, and to be the main living influence upon his mind and character till the latest year of his life. Coleridge was two years Lamb's senior, and re- mained at the school till 1792, when he went to Cambridge. At the date of Lamb's leaving school his elder brother John was a clerk in the South Sea House, and a humbler post in the same office was soon found for Charles through the good offices of Samuel Salt, who was a deputy-governor of the company. But early in 1792 he was appointed to a clerkship in the accountant's office of the India House, and remained a member of the staff for the next thirty years. The court minutes of the old India House record that on 5 April 1792 'William Savory, Charles Lamb, and Hutcher Trower' were appointed clerks in the ac- countant's office on the usual terms. Another entry of three weeks later tells that the sureties required by the office were in Lamb's case Peter Peirson, esq., of the Inner Temple, and John Lamb 'of the Inner Temple, gentleman.' The name of Peter 4QO ALFRED AINGER Peirson recalls one of the most touching passages in the essay on the 'Old Benchers.' Samuel Salt died in this same year, leaving various legacies and other benefactions to his faithful clerk and housekeeper. The Lamb family had accordingly to leave the Temple, and there is no record of their place of residence until 1796, when we hear of them as lodging in Little Queen Street, Holborn. The family were poor, Charles's salary, and what his sister could earn by needlework, in addition to the interest on Salt's legacies, forming their sole means of subsistence, for John Lamb the younger, a fairly prosperous gentleman, was living an independent life elsewhere. John Lamb the elder was old and sinking into dotage. The mother was an invalid, with apparently a strain of insanity. Mary Lamb was overworked, and the continued strain and anx- iety began to tell upon her mind. On 22 Sept. 1796 a terrible blow fell upon the family. Mary Lamb, irritated with a little apprentice-girl who was working in the family sitting-room, snatched a knife from the table, pursued the child round the room, and finally stabbed her mother, who had interposed in the girl's behalf. The wound was instantly fatal, Charles being at hand only in time to wrest the knife from his sister and prevent further mischief. An inquest was held and a verdict found of temporary insanity. Mary Lamb would have been in the ordinary course trans- ferred to a public lunatic asylum, but interest was made with the authorities, and she was given into the custody of her brother, then only just of age, who undertook to be her guardian, an office which he discharged under the gravest difficulties and discouragements for the remainder of his life. Mrs. Lamb was buried in the grave- yard of St. Andrew's, Holborn, on 26 Sept. 1796, and Charles Lamb, with his imbecile father and an old Aunt Hetty, who formed one of the household, left Little Queen Street. (The house no longer stands, having been removed with others to make room for a church, which now stands on its site.) The family removed to 45 Chapel Street, Pentonville, with the exception of Mary, who was placed under suitable care at Hackney, where Charles could frequently visit her. In February 1797 old Aunt Hetty died, and Charles was left as the solitary guardian of his father until the latter 's death in 1799. THE LIFE OF CHARLES LAMB 491 The letters of Charles Lamb, through which his life may be henceforth studied, open with a correspondence with Coleridge, beginning in May 1796. The earliest of these letters records how Charles Lamb himself had been for six weeks in the winter of 1795-6 in an asylum for some form of mental derangement, which, however, seems never to have recurred. It is likely that this tendency was inherited from the mother, and that moreover the immediate cause, in this case, may have been a love disappoint- ment. This at least is certain, that already Charles Lamb had lost his heart to a girl living not far from Blakesware, his grand- mother's home in Hertfordshire. The earliest intimation of the fact is afforded by the existence of two sonnets which Lamb sub- mits to Coleridge in 1796 as having been written by him in the summer of 1795 (see Lamb's Letters, i. 4). Both poems refer to Hertfordshire, and the second distinctly reveals an attachment to a 'gentle maid' named Anna, who had lived in a 'cottage,' and with whom 'in happier days' he had held free converse, days which, however, 'ne'er must come again.' At that early date, therefore, it is clear that the course of love had not run smooth, and it is reasonable to connect Lamb's mental break- down in the following winter with this cause. A year later, in writing to Coleridge after his mother's death, he speaks of his attachment as a folly that has left him for ever. All that is cer- tain of this episode in Lamb's life is that the girl's name was Ann Simmons, that she lived with her mother in a cottage called Blen- heims, within a mile of Blakesware House, and that she ultimately married a Mr. Bartram, a silversmith, of Princes Street, Leicester Square (she is mentioned under that name in the essay 'Dream Children'). Thus far all is certain. The whole pedigree of the Simmons family is in the present writer's possession, but an old inhabitant of Widford (the village adjoining Blakesware), and intimate friend of the Lambs, from whom he obtained it, had never heard of the circumstances attending Lamb's unsuccessful wooing. In the spring of 1796 Coleridge made his earliest appearance as a poet in a small volume published by Cottle of Bristol, ' Poems on Various Subjects, by S. T. Coleridge, late of Jesus College, Cambridge,' and among these were four sonnets by Lamb. 'The 492 ALFRED AINGER effusions signed C. L. were written by Mr. Charles Lamb of the India House. Independently of the signature, their superior merit would have sufficiently distinguished them.' Two of these sonnets refer also to Anna with the fair hair and the blue eyes. This was Lamb's first appearance in print. The sonnets are chiefly remarkable as reflecting the diction and the graceful melancholy of William Lisle Bowles [q. v.], whose sonnets had in a singular degree influenced and inspired both Lamb and Coleridge while they were still at Christ's Hospital. A year later, in 1797, Coleridge produced a second edition of his poems, 'To which are now added Poems by Charles Lamb and Charles Lloyd' ( I 775~ I ^39) fa- v -l- Among these were included the 'Anna' sonnets, and the lines entitled 'The Grandame,' written on his grandmother, Mrs. Field, who had died at Blakesware in 1792. (These latter had already appeared in print, in a handsome quarto, with certain others of Charles Lloyd's.) In the summer of 1797 Lamb devoted his short holiday (only one week) to a visit to Coleridge at Nether Stowey, where he made the acquaintance of Thomas Poole [q. v.], and met Wordsworth and others (see MRS. SANDFORD, Thomas Poole and his Friends; and Lamb's Letters, i. 79). The following year, 1798, saw the publication of a thin volume, 'Blank Verse, by Charles Lamb and Charles Lloyd,' containing the touching verses on the 'Old Familiar Faces.' Later appeared Lamb's prose romance, 'A Tale of Rosamund Gray and Old Blind Margaret,' a story of sentiment written under the influence of Mackenzie, and having the scene laid in Lamb's favourite village of Widford in Hertford- shire. During this year Cottle of Bristol had a portrait taken of Lamb by Hancock, an engraving of which appeared many years later in Cottle's 'Recollections of Coleridge.' This is the earliest portrait of Lamb we possess. In November 1798 Coleridge, with Wordsworth and his sister, left England for Germany, and for the next eighteen months Lamb was thrown for literary sym- pathy upon other friends, notably on Southey, with whom he began a frequent correspondence. In these letters Lamb's in- dividuality of style and humour became first markedly apparent. In the spring of 1799 Lamb's father died, and Mary Lamb returned to live with her brother, from whom she was never again THE LIFE OF CHARLES LAMB 493 parted, except during occasional returns of her malady. But rumours of this malady followed them wherever they went. They had notice to quit their rooms in Pentonville in the spring of 1799, and they were accepted as tenants for a while by Lamb's old school-fellow, John Mathew Gutch [q. v.], then a law-stationer in Southampton Buildings, Holborn. Here they remained for nine months, but the old difficulties arose, and the brother and sister were again homeless. Lamb then turned to the familiar precincts of the Temple, and took rooms at the top of King's Bench Walk (Mitre Court Buildings), where he remained with his sister for nearly nine years. They then removed to Inner Temple Lane for a period of another nine years. Lamb's letters to Thomas Manning [q. v.], the mathematician and orientalist, and to Coleridge on his return from Germany, begin at the date of his settling in the Temple, and continue the story of his life. Manning's acquaintance he had made at Cam- bridge while visiting Charles Lloyd. Lamb now began to add to his scanty income by writing for the newspapers (see his Elia essay, Newspapers Thirty-Jive Years Ago}. He contributed for some three years facetious paragraphs and epigrams to the ' Morn- ing Post,' ' Morning Chronicle,' and the 'Albion.' In 1802 he published his 'John Woodvil,' a blank-verse play of the Restoration period, but showing markedly the influence of Mas- singer and Beaumont and Fletcher, full of felicitous lines, but crude and undramatic. It was reviewed in the 'Edinburgh Review,' April 1803, not unfairly, but ignorantly. The Elizabethan drama- tists were still sealed books save to the antiquary and the specialist. Meantime Charles and Mary Lamb were struggling with poverty, and with worse enemies. Lamb's journalistic and literary associates made demands on his hospitality, and good company brought its temptations. In 1804 Mary Lamb writes that they are 'very poor,' and that Charles is trying in various ways to earn money. He was still dreaming of possible dramatic successes, but these were not to be. In 1803 he sends Manning his well-known verses on Hester Savory, a young quakeress with whom he had fallen in love, though without her knowledge, when he lived (1797-1800) at Pentonville, and who had recently died a few months after her marriage. In September 1805 he is still 494 ALFRED AINGER thinking of dramatic work, and has a farce in prospect. The project took shape in the two-act farce, 'Mr. H.,' accepted by the proprietors of Drury Lane, and produced on 10 Dec. The secret of Mr. H's real name (Hogsflesh) seemed trivial and vulgar to the audience, and in spite of Elliston's best efforts, the farce was hopelessly damned. Lamb was himself present, and next day re- corded the failure by letter to several of his friends. He now turned to a wider field of work in connection with the drama. He made Hazlitt's acquaintance in 1805, and Hazlitt introduced him to William Godwin, who had turned children's publisher. For Godwin Lamb and his sister agreed to write the 'Tales from Shakespeare,' published in January 1807, a second edition fol- lowing in the next year. Lamb did the tragedies and Mary the comedies. This was Lamb's first success, and first brought him into serious notice. . It was followed by a child's version of the adventures of Ulysses, made from Chapman's translation of the 'Odyssey,' for Lamb's knowledge of Greek was moderate. This appeared in 1808. A much more important work was at hand. The publishing house of Longmans commissioned him to edit selections from the Elizabethan dramatists. This also appeared in 1808, under the title of 'Specimens of English Dra- matic Poets contemporary with Shakespeare.' Lamb was at once recognised as a critic of the highest order, and of a kind as yet unknown to English literature, and from this time forward his position as a prose writer of marked originality was secure among the more thoughtful of his contemporaries, though it was not till some ten years later that he reached the general public. Between 1808 and 1818 his chief critical productions were the two noble essays on Hogarth and on the tragedies of Shakespeare, published in Leigh Hunt's 'Reflector' in 1811, while the 'Recollections of Christ's Hospital,' in the 'Gentleman's Magazine' of 1813, and the 'Confessions of a Drunkard,' contributed to his friend Basil Montagu's 'Some Enquiries into the Effects of Fermented Liquors' in 1814, were the first specimens of the miscellaneous essay in the vein he was to work later, with such success, in the 'Essays of Elia.' Meantime he was strengthening his position and widening his interests by new and stimulating friendships, Talfourd, Proctor, Crabb Robinson, Haydon, and others appearing THE LIFE OF CHARLES LAMB 495 among his correspondence, while the old relations with the Words- worths and Coleridge remained among the best influences of his life. In the autumn of 1817 Lamb and his sister left the Temple for lodgings in Great Russell Street, Covent Garden. Soon after a young bookseller, Charles Oilier, induced him to publish a collection of his miscellaneous writings in verse and prose, includ- ing some, like 'John WoodviP and * Rosamund Gray,' long out of print. These appeared in two volumes, dedicated to Coleridge, in 1818, and at once obtained for Lamb a wider recognition. A more important result was to follow. The 'London Magazine' made its first appearance in January 1820. Hazlitt, who was on the staff, introduced Lamb to the editor, John Scott, and he was invited to contribute occasional essays. The first of these, 'Recollections of the South Sea House,' appeared in August 1820. In writing the essay, Lamb remembered an obscure clerk in that office during his own short connection with it as a boy, of the name of Elia, and as a joke appended that name to the essay. In subse- quent essays he continued the same signature, which became inseparably connected with the series (see letter of Lamb to his publisher, John Taylor, in July 1821). 'Call him Ellia,' writes Lamb, and it seems probable that the name was really thus spelled. Between August 1820 and December 1822 Lamb contributed five-and-twenty essays, thus signed, at the rate of about one a month. These were reprinted in a single volume in 1823: 'Elia -Essays that have appeared under that signature in the "Lon- don Magazine." ' Meantime, Lamb's elder brother John had died (November 1821), and to the increasing loneliness of his existence we owe the beautiful essay, 'Dream Children.' In 1822 Charles and his sister for the first time went abroad, paying a short visit to their friend James Kenney [q. v.] the dramatist, who lived at Ver- sailles, and whose son, born in 1823, was christened Charles Lamb Kenney [q. v.]. During his absence from England Mary Lamb had one of her now more frequent attacks of mental de- rangement. The next year brought a new anxiety into Lamb's life, in the form of a criticism from the pen of an old friend on the 'Elia' volume of 1823. Southey, in reviewing a work by 496 ALFRED AINGER Gregoire upon deism in France, drew a moral from the hopeless tone of one of Lamb's essays that on 'Witches and other Night Fears' adding that the essays as a whole lacked a 'sound re- ligious feeling.' The charge pained Lamb keenly, both as com- ing from an old friend and as touching a vein of real sorrow and anxiety in his mental history. He replied to the charge in the well-known ' Letter of Elia to Robert Southey, Esq.,' in the 'Lon- don Magazine' for October 1823. Southey, in reply, wrote a loving and generous letter of explanation to Lamb, and the breach between the old friends was at once healed. The same year that brought Lamb this distress was to bring compensation in a new interest added to his life. He and his sister were in the habit of spending their autumn holiday in Cambridge, where they had a friend, Mrs. Paris, sister of Lamb's old friend, William Ayrton. Here the Lambs met a little orphan girl, Emma Isola, daughter of Charles Isola, one of the esquire bedells of the university. They invited her to spend subsequent holidays with them, and finally adopted her. During the remaining ten years of Lamb's life the companionship of the young girl supplied the truest solace and relief amid the deepening anxieties of the home life. Lamb and his sister devoted themselves to her education, and though in after years she left them at times to become herself a teacher of others, their house was her home until her marriage with Edward Moxon, the publisher, in 1833. Mrs. Moxon died in March 1891. In August 1823 the Lambs left their rooms in Russell Street, Covent Garden, 'over the Brazier's,' and took a cottage in Colebrooke Row, Islington, the New River flowing at the foot of their garden. Lamb describes the house in a letter of 2 Sept. to Bernard Barton [q. v.], the quaker poet of Woodbridge, who was one of Lamb's later friends, acquired through the 'London Magazine.' To him many of Lamb's happiest letters are ad- dressed. Meantime Lamb was writing more 'Elia' essays, though with weakening health and increasing restlessness. Al- ready he was considering the chances of retirement from the India House, and a severe illness in the winter of 1824-25 brought the matter to an issue. His doctors urgently supported his appli- cation to the directors, and the happy result was made known to him in March 1825, when it was announced that a retiring pen- THE LIFE OF CHARLES LAMB 497 sion would be awarded him, consisting of three-fourths of his salary, with a slight deduction to insure an allowance for his sister in the event of her surviving. 'After thirty-three years' slavery,' he wrote to Wordsworth, 'here am I a freed man, with 44i/. a year for the remainder of my life.' The first use that Lamb made of his freedom was to pay visits of varying length in the country, always in the direction of his favourite Hertfordshire. The brother and sister took lodgings occasionally at the Chace, Enfield, and after two years became sole tenants of the little house. Meantime the trials of having nothing to do became very real to them both. Lamb was an excellent walker, and in the summer months he found great pleasure in exploring the scenery of Hertfordshire, with the comforting remembrance that he was still in easy touch with London and friends. But old friends were dying, and Lamb's loyal nature found little compensation in the cultivation of new ones. That devoted friend of his childhood, Mr. Randal Norris, sub-treasurer of the Inner Temple, died in January 1827, and is the subject of a pathetic letter to Crabb Robinson 'To the last he called me Charley. I have none to call me Charley now.' Randal Norris left two daughters who set up a school at Widford, to which village their mother had belonged. The younger, Mrs. Arthur Tween, who was well known to the present writer, died at an advanced age at Widford in July 1891. During the few remain- ing years of Lamb's life it was a favourite excursion for him and Miss Isola to walk over to Widford and beg a half -holiday for the girls and tell them stories. In 1828 Lamb obtained some literary work of a kind thoroughly congenial. He wished to assist Hone, then producing his 'Table Book,' and undertook to make extracts (after the model of his 'Dramatic Specimens' of 1808) from the Garrick plays in the British Museum. He had written also for the 'New Monthly Magazine,' in 1826, his essays called 'Popular Fallacies.' He wrote also occasional verse, and at times in his happiest and most characteristic vein, such as the lines ' On an Infant dying as soon as born,' written on the death of Thomas Hood's first child, in 1828. Acrostics also, and other such trifles, and album verses, became increasingly in request among his young lady friends. And in 1830, to help his friend Moxon, then newly starting as 2K 498 ALFRED AINGER publisher, he made a collection of these, under the title of ' Album Verses, with a few others.' In the summer of 1829 the brother and sister had again to change their residence. Mary's health was steadily weakening, her attacks and periods of absence from home became longer, and the cares of housekeeping proved in- tolerable. They moved, accordingly, to the adjoining house in Enfield Chace, and boarded with a retired tradesman and his wife, a Mr. and Mrs. Westwood. The immediate effects were satis- factory, and for a while Mary Lamb seemed to improve in health and spirits. But Charles meantime became less at ease in country life. The next year brought him new distractions. Emma Isola, for whom the Lambs had found a situation as governess in Suffolk, had a serious illness, during which Lamb visited her, and finally brought her home, convalescent, to Enfield. In 1833 the Lambs moved once more, and for the last time. Mary's improvement in health had been merely temporary, and it became necessary for her to be under more skilful and constant nursing. During previous illnesses she had been placed under the care of a Mr. and Mrs. Walden, at Bay Cottage, Edmonton (the parish adjoining Enfield), and now the brother and sister moved together, to spend, as it proved, the last two years of their united lives under the Waldens' roof. In the same year Emma Isola became engaged to Edward Moxon, and the marriage took place in July 1833, leaving Charles Lamb yet more lonely, and without social resource. The 'Last Essays of Elia,' mainly from the 'London Magazine,' were pub- lished this year by Moxon, and but for an occasional copy of verses for a friend's album, Lamb's literary career was closed. In July 1834 Coleridge died, and with this event Lamb's last surviving friend passed from him. He himself, more and more lonely and forlorn, bore his heavy burden five months longer. One day in December, while walking on the London Road, he stumbled and fell, slightly wounding his face. A few days later erysipelas supervened, and he had no strength left to battle with the disease. He passed away without pain, on 27 Dec. 1834, and was buried in Edmonton churchyard. His sister survived him nearly thirteen years, dying at Alpha Road, St. John's Wood, on 20 May 1847; she was buried beside her brother. Charles left her his savings, THE LIFE OF CHARLES LAMB 499 amounting to about 2,ooo/., and she was also entitled to the pen- sion reserved to her by the terms of Lamb's retirement from the India House. No figure in literature is better known to us than Lamb. His writings, prose and verse, are full of personal revelations. We possess a body of his correspondence, also of the most confidential kind, and his friends have left descriptions of him from almost I every point of view. He numbered among his earliest friends | Coleridge, Southey, Wordsworth, and among his later Proctor, Talfourd, Hood, Leigh Hunt, Hazlitt, Crabb Robinson, while many of his most characteristic letters were written to men who have attained general fame mainly through Lamb's friendship. Notable among these are Thomas Manning and Bernard Barton. No man was ever more loved by a wide and varied class of friends. His lifelong devotion to his sister, for whose sake he abjured all thoughts of marriage; the unique attachment between the pair; Lamb's unfailing loyalty to' his friends, who often levied heavy taxes on his purse and leisure; his very eccentricities and petu- lances, including his one serious frailty a too careless indul- gence in strong drinks excited a profound pity in those who knew the unceasing domestic difficulties which he surmounted so bravely for eight-and-thirty years. It is likely that the necessity of protecting and succouring his sister acted as a strong power over his will, and helped to preserve his sanity during the hardship of the years that followed. But one result of the taint of insan- ! ity inherited from his mother was that a very small amount of alcohol was enough at any time to throw his mind off its balance. I He was afflicted moreover, all his life with a bad stutter, and the eagerness to forget the impediment, which put him at a disadvan- tage in all conversations, probably further encouraged the habit. The infirmity, which has been in turn denied and exaggerated by : friends and enemies, never interfered with the regular performance of his official duties, or with his domestic responsibilities. The extant portraits of Lamb are the following : i . By Robert Hancock of Bristol, 1798, drawn for Joseph Cottle; in the Na- tional Portrait Gallery. 2. By Wm. Hazlitt, 1805, in a fancy dress; in the National Portrait Gallery. 3. By G. F. Joseph, A.R.A., 1819; water-colour drawing made to illustrate a copy of 500 ALFRED AINGER 'English Bards and Scotch Reviewers;' in the British Museum. 4. Etching on copper by Brook Pulham, a friend of Lamb's in the India House, 1825. 5. By Henry Meyer, 1826; in the India Office : of two small replicas one is in the National Portrait Gal- lery and the other belongs to Sir Charles Dilke, bart, M.P. 6. By T. Wageman, 1824 or 1825; engraved in Talfourd's 'Letters of Charles Lamb,' 1837; in America. 7. Charles Lamb and his sister together, by F. S. Gary, 1834; in the National Portrait Gallery. 8. By Maclise, sketch in 'Eraser's Magazine,' 1835 (cf. LUCAS'S Life, ii. App. i.). Lamb's writings published in book form are:, i. 'Poems on Various Subjects, by S. T. Coleridge, late of Jesus College, Cam- bridge,' 1796, contains four sonnets by Lamb signed 'C. L.,' referred to by Coleridge in his preface as by 'Mr. Charles Lamb of the India House.' 2. 'Poems by S. T. Coleridge, 2nd edit., to which are now added Poems by Charles Lamb and Charles Lloyd,' J 797- 3- "Blank Verse by Charles *Lloyd and Charles Lamb,' 1798. 4. 'A Tale of Rosamund Gray and Old Blind Margaret, by Charles Lamb,' 1798. 5. 'John Woodvil, a Tragedy, by Charles Lamb,' &c., 1802. 6. 'Mrs. Leicester's School,' &c., 1807, by Charles and Mary Lamb, Charles contributing three of the stories, 'The Witch Aunt,' 'First going to Church,' and the 'Sea Voyage.' 7. 'Tales from Shakespeare, &c., by Charles Lamb,' 1807. The bulk of the tales were written by Mary Lamb, Charles contributing the tragedies. 8. ' The Adventures of Ulys- ses, by Charles Lamb,' 1808. 9. 'Specimens of English Dra- matic Poets, with Notes by Charles Lamb,' 1808. 10. 'Poetry for Children, entirely original, by the author of "Mrs. Leicester's School," ' anonymous, by Charles and Mary Lamb. The respec- tive shares of the two writers were not indicated. A few of Lamb's verses were reprinted by him in his 'Collected Works' in 1818. ii. 'Prince Dorus,' a poetical version of an ancient tale, 1811. 12. 'The Works of Charles Lamb,' in 2 vols. Lon- don, 1818. 13. 'Elia Essays which have appeared under that signature in the "London Magazine,"' 1823. 14. 'Album Verses, with a few others,' by Charles Lamb, 1830. 15. 'Satan in Search of a Wife,' 1831. 16. 'The Last Essays of Elia,' 1833. In this list are not included Lamb's occasional contributions to THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 501 periodical literature, such as albums and keepsakes, prologues, and epilogues to plays, and the like. Lamb's children's books (for Godwin) also include 'The King and Queen of Hearts' (slight anonymous verses to illustrations by Mulready), 1805 (edited in facsimile by E. V. Lucas, 1902). It is improbable that Lamb was responsible for another anonymous volume in verse issued by Godwin about 1811, 'Beauty and the Beast,' which was reprinted, with preface by Shepherd, 1886, and by Andrew Lang, 1887. THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON SIR LESLIE STEPHEN [From the Dictionary of National Biography.] BYRON, GEORGE GORDON, sixth lord (1788-1824), poet, de- scended from John, first Lord Byron, who was succeeded by his brother Richard (1605-1679). Richard's son, William (d. 1695), became third lord, and wrote some bad verses. By his wife, Elizabeth, daughter of Viscount Chaworth, he was father of William, fourth lord (1669-1736), gentleman of the bedchamber to Prince George of Denmark. The fourth lord was father, by his wife, Frances, daughter of Lord Berkeley of Stratton, of William, fifth lord, John, afterwards Admiral Byron, and Isabella, wife of the fourth and mother of the fifth earl of Carlisle. The fifth lord (1722-1798) quarrelled with his cousin Mr. Chaworth (great grand- son of Viscount Chaworth) at a club dinner of Nottinghamshire gentlemen, 26 Jan. 1765, and killed him after a confused scuffle in a room to which they had retired by themselves after dinner. Byron was convicted of manslaughter before the House of Lords, 16 April 1765 (State Trials, xix. 1175), and, though exempted from punishment by his privilege as a peer, became a marked man. He lived in seclusion at Newstead Abbey, ill-treated his wife, was known as the 'wicked lord,' encumbered his estates, and made a sale of his property at Rochdale, the disputed legality of which led to a prolonged lawsuit. His children and his only grandson (son of his son by the daughter of his brother, the admiral) died 502 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN before him. Admiral Byron had two sons, John and George Anson (ancestor of the present peer), and three daughters, one of whom became wife of her cousin, son of the fifth lord ; another of Admiral Parker; the third of Colonel Leigh, by whom she was mother of another Colonel Leigh, who married his cousin, Augusta, daughter of John Byron, the admiral's eldest son. This John Byron (born 1756) was educated at Westminster, entered the guards, was known as ' mad Jack,' and was a handsome profligate. He seduced the Marchioness of Carmarthen, who became Baroness Conyers on the death of her father, fourth earl of Holderness. He married her (June 1779) after her divorce, and had by her in 1782 a daughter, Augusta, married to Colonel Leigh in 1807. Lady Conyers's death in France, 26 Jan. 1784, deprived her husband of an income of 4,000^. a year. He soon afterwards met at Bath a Miss Catherine Gordon of Gicht, with a fortune of 23,ooo/., doubled by rumour. The pair were married at St. Michael's Church, Bath, 13 May 1785 (parish register). John Byron took his second wife to France, squandered most of her property, and returned to England, where their only child, George Gordon, was born in Holies Street, London, 22 Jan. 1788. John Hunter saw the boy when he was born, and prescribed for the infant's feet (Mrs. Byron's letters in Add. MS. 31037). A malformation was caused, as Byron afterwards said, by his mother's 'false delicacy.' Trelawny (Records, ii. 132) says that the tendo Achillis of each foot was so contracted that he could only walk on the balls of the toes, the right foot being most distorted and bent inwards. Injudicious treatment increased the mischief, and through life the poet could only hobble a few paces on foot, though he could at times succeed in concealing his infirmity. John Byron's creditors became pressing. The daughter, Augusta, was sent to her grandmother, the Dowager Countess Holderness. Mrs. Byron retired to Aberdeen, and lived upon i5o/. a year, the interest of 3,000^. in the hands of trustees, the sole remnant of her fortune. She took lodgings in Queen Street, Aberdeen, and was followed by her husband, who occupied sepa- rate lodgings and sometimes petted the child, who professed in later years to remember him perfectly (MEDWIN, p. 58). With money got from his wife or his sister, Mrs. Leigh, he escaped to France THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 503 January 1791, and died at Valenciennes, 2 Aug. 1791, possibly >y his own hand QEAFFRESON, i. 48; HARNESS, p. 33; Letter No. 460 in MOORE'S Life of Byron implicitly denies suicide). Mrs. Byron's income, reduced to 135^ by debts for furniture and by helping her husband, was raised to 190^. on the death of her grandmother, and she lived within her means. Capricious and passionate by nature, she treated her child with alternate excesses of violence and tenderness. Scott (MOORE, ch. xxiv.) says that in 1784 she was seized with an hysterical fit during Mrs. Siddons's performance in Southern's ' Fatal Marriage,' and carried out screaming, 'Oh, my Biron, my Biron' (the name of a character in the play). She was short and fat, and would chase her mocking child round the room in impotent fury. To the frank remark of a schoolfellow, 'Your mother is a fool,' he replied, 'I know it.' Another phrase is said to have been the germ of the * Deformed Transformed.' His mother reviling him as a ' lame beast,' he re- plied, ' I was born so, mother.' The child was passionately fond of his nurse, May Gray, to whom at the final parting he gave a watch and his miniature afterwards in the possession of Dr. Ewing of Aberdeen and by whose teaching he acquired a familiarity with the Bible, preserved through life by a very reten- tive memory. At first he went to school to one 'Bodsy Bowers,' and afterwards to a clergyman .named Ross. The son of his shoemaker, Paterson, taught him some Latin, and he was at the grammar school from 1794 to 1798 (BAIN, Life of Arnott, in the papers of the Aberdeen Philosophical Society, gives his places in the school) . He was regarded as warm-hearted, pugnacious, and idle. Visits to his mother's relations and an excursion to Ballater for change of air in 1796 varied his schooldays. In a note to the 1 Island' (1813) he dates his love of mountainous scenery from this period ; and in a note to ' Don Juan' (canto x. stanza 18) he recalls the delicious horror with which he leaned over the bridge of Balgounie, destined in an old rhyme to fall with ' a wife's ae son and a mare's ae foal.' An infantile passion for a cousin, Mary Duff, in his eighth year was so intense that he was nearly thrown into convulsions by hearing, when he was sixteen, of her marriage to Mr. Robert Cockburn (a well-known wine merchant, brother of Lord Cockburn). She died 10 March 1858 (Notes and 504 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN Queries, 2nd series, iii. 231; she is described in Mr. Ruskin's 'Praeterita'). In 1794, by the death of the fifth Lord Byron's grandson at the siege of Calvi in Corsica, Byron became heir to the peerage. A Mr. Ferguson suggested to Mrs. Byron that an application to the civil list for a pension might be successful if sanctioned by the actual peer (Letters in Morrison MSS.). The grand-uncle would not help the appeal, but after his death (19 May 1798) a pension of 3/. was given to the new peer's mother (warrant dated 2 Oct. 1799). In the autumn Mrs. Byron with her boy and May Gray left Aberdeen for Newstead. The house was ruinous. The Rochdale property was only recoverable by a lawsuit. The actual income of the Newstead estate was estimated at i,ioo/. a year, which might be doubled when the leases fell in. Byron told Med- win (p. 40) that it was about i,5oo/. a year. Byron was made a ward in chancery, and Lord Carlisle, son of the old lord's sister, was appointed his guardian. Mrs. Byron settled at Nottingham, and sent the boy to be pre- pared for a public school by Mr. Rogers. He was tortured by the remedies applied to his feet by a quack named Lavender. His talent for satire was already shown in a lampoon on an old lady and in an exposure of Lavender's illiteracy. In 1799 he was taken to London by his mother, examined for his lameness by Dr. Baillie, and sent to Dr. Glennie's school at Dulwich, where the treatment prescribed by Baillie could be carried out. Glennie found him playful, amiable, and intelligent, ill-grounded in scholarship, but familiar with scripture, and a devourer of poetry. At Glennie's he read a pamphlet on the shipwreck of the Juno in 1795, which was afterwards worked up in 'Don Juan;' and here, about 1800, he wrote his first love poem, addressed to his cousin Margaret Parker. Byron speaks of her transparent and evanescent beauty, and says that his passion had its ' usual effects' of preventing sleep and appetite. She died of consumption a year or two later. Meanwhile Mrs. Byron's tempers had become insupportable to Glennie, whose discipline was spoilt by her meddling, and to Lord Carlisle, who ceased to see her. Her importunity prevailed upon the guardian to send the boy to Harrow, where (in the summer of 1801) he became a pupil of the Rev. Joseph Drury. THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 505 Drury obtained the respect and affection of his pupil. A note to ' Childe Harold ' (canto iv.) , upon a passage in which he describes his repugnance to the 'daily drug' of classical lessons, expresses his enthusiastic regard for Drury, and proves that he had not profited by Drury's teaching. His notes in the books which he gave to the school library show that he never became a tolerable scholar. He was always 'idle, in mischief, or at play,' though reading voraciously by fits. He shone in declamation, and Drury tells how he quite unconsciously interpolated a vigorous passage into a prepared composition. Unpopular and unhappy at first, he hated Harrow (MOORE, ch. iv.) till his last year and a half; but he became attached to it on rising to be a leader. Glennie had noticed that his deformity had increased his desire for athletic glory. His strength of arm made him formidable in spite of his lameness. He fought Lord Calthorpe for writing ' d d atheist ' under his name (MED WIN, p. 68). He was a cricketer (Notes and Queries, 6th ser. viii. 245), and the late Lord Stratford de Red- cliffe remembered seeing him playing in the match against Eton with another boy to run for him. Byron was one of the ringleaders in a childish revolt against the appointment of Dr. Butler (March 1805) as Drury's successor, and in favour of Mark Drury. Byron said that he saved the hall from burning by showing to the boys the names of their ancestors on the walls (MEDWIN, p. 68). He afterwards satirised Butler as 'Pomposus' in 'Hours of Idleness,' but had the sense to apologise before his first foreign tour. * My school friendships,' says Byron, ' were with me passions.' Byron remonstrates with a boyish correspondent for calling him 'my dear' instead of 'my dearest Byron.' His most famous contemporary at Harrow was Sir Robert Peel, for whom he offered to take half the thrashing inflicted by a bully. He protected Har- ness, his junior by two years, who survived till 1869. His closest intimates were apparently Lords Clare and Dorset and John Wing- field. When he met Clare long afterwards in Italy, he was agi- tated to a painful degree, and says that he could never hear the name without a beating of the heart. He had been called at Glennie's 'the old English baron,' and some aristocratic vanity perhaps appears in his choice of intimates and dependents. His mother was at Bath in 1802 (where he appeared in Turkish 506 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN costume at a masquerade) ; at Nottingham in 1803 ; and at South- well, in a house called Burgage Manor, in 1804. Byron visited Newstead in 1803, then occupied by Lord Grey de Ruthin, who set apart a room for his use. He was often at Annesley Hall, the seat of his distant cousins the Chaworths. Mary Anne Chaworth was fifth in descent from Viscount Chaworth, and her grandfather was brother to the William Chaworth killed by the fifth Lord Byron. A superstitious fancy (duly turned to account in the ' Siege of Cor- inth,' xxi.), that the family portraits would descend from their frames to haunt the duellist's heir, made him refuse to sleep there ; till a ' bogle ' seen on the road to Newstead or some less fanciful motive induced him to stay for the night. He had fallen des- perately in love with Mary Anne Chaworth, two years his senior, who naturally declined to take him seriously. A year later Miss Pigot describes him as a 'fat bashful boy.' In 1804 he found Miss Chaworth engaged to John Musters. The marriage took place in 1805. Moore gives a report, probably inaccurate (see JEAFFRESON, i. 123), of Byron's agitation on hearing of the wedding. He dined with her and her husband in 1808, and was much affected by seeing her infant daughter. Poems addressed to her appeared in 'Hours of Idleness' and Hobhouse's 'Mis- cellany.' He told Medwin (p. 65) that he had found in her ' all that his youthful fancy could paint of beautiful.' Mrs. Musters's marriage was unhappy; she was separated from her husband; her mind became affected, and she died in 1832 from a shock caused by riots at Nottingham. This passion seems to have left the most permanent traces on Byron's life; though it was a year later (if his account is accurate) that the news of Mary Duff's marriage nearly caused convulsions. In October 1805 Byron entered Trinity College, Cambridge, as a nobleman. A youth of ' tumultuous passions ' (in the phrase of his college tutor), he was exposed to the temptations of his rank, yet hardly within the sphere of its legitimate ambition. He rode, shot with a pistol, and boxed. He made a friend of the famous pugilist, Jackson, paid for postchaises to bring 'dear Jack' to visit nim at Brighton, invited him to Newstead, and gave him commis- sions about dogs and horses. He was greatest at swimming. The pool below the sluice at Grantchester is still called by his THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 507 name. Leigh Hunt first saw him (HUNT, Byron, &c. p. i) swim- ming a match in the Thames under Jackson's supervision, and in August 1807 he boasts to Miss Pigot of a three miles swim through Blackfriars and Westminster bridges. He travelled to various resorts with a carriage, a pair of horses, a groom and valet, besides a bulldog and a Newfoundland. In 1806 his mother ended a quarrel by throwing the poker and tongs at his head. She followed him to his lodgings in London, whither he retreated, and there another engagement resulted in the defeat of the enemy his mother. On a visit to Harrogate in the same summer with his friend Pigot he was shy, quiet, avoided drinking, and was polite to Professor Hailstone, of Trinity. On some of his rambles he was accompanied by a girl in boy's clothes, whom he introduced as his younger brother. He tells Miss Pigot that he has played hazard for two nights till four in the morning; and in a later diary (MooRE, chap, viii.) says that he loved gambling, but left off in time, and played little after he was of age. It is not surpris- ing to find him confessing in 1808 (Letter 25) that he is ' cursedly dipped,' and will owe 9,ooo/. or io,ooo/. on coming of age. The college authorities naturally looked askance at him; and Byron symbolised his opinion of dons by bringing up a bear to college, and declaring that the animal should sit for a fellowship. Byron formed friendships and had pursuits of a more intellectual kind. He seems to have resided at Cambridge for the Michael- mas term 1805, and the Lent and Easter terms 1806; he was then absent for nearly a year, and returned to keep (probably) the Easter term of 1807, the following October and Lent terms, and perhaps the Easter term of 1808, taking his M.A. degree on 4 July 1808 (information kindly given by Cambridge authorities). In the first period of residence, though sulky and solitary, he became the ad- miring friend of W. J. Bankes, was intimate with Edward Noel Long, and protected a chorister named Eddlestone. His friend- ship with this youth, he tells Miss Pigot (July 1807), is to eclipse all the classical precedents, and Byron means to get a partnership for his friend, or to take him as a permanent companion. Eddie- stone died of consumption in 1811, and Byron then reclaimed from Miss Pigot a cornelian, which he had originally received from Eddlestone, and handed on to her. References to this friend- 508 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN ship are in the 'Hours of Idleness,' and probably in the ' Cornelian Heart' (dated March 1812). Long entered the army, and was drowned in a transport in 1809, to Byron's profound affliction. He became intimate with two fellows of King's Henry Drury and Francis Hodgson, afterwards provost of Eton. Byron showed his friendship for Hodgson by a present of i,ooo/. in 1813, when Hodgson was in embarrassment and Byron not over rich (HODG- SON, Memoirs, i. 268). In his later residence a closer 'coterie' was formed by Byron, Hobhouse, Davies, and C. S. Matthews (Letter 66). John Cam Hobhouse, afterwards Lord Broughton, was his friend through life. Scrope Berdmore Davies, a man of wit and taste, delighted Byron by his 'dashing vivacity,' and lent him 4,8oo/., the repayment of which was celebrated by a drinking bout at the Cocoa on 27 March 1814. Hodgson reports (i. 104) that when Byron exclaimed melodramatically 'I shall go mad/ Davies used to suggest 'silly' as a probable emendation. Matthews was regarded as the most promising of the friends. Byron described his audacity, his swimming and boxing, and conversational powers in a letter to Murray (20 Nov. 1820), and tells Dallas (Letter 61) that he was a 'most decided' and out- spoken 'atheist.' Among these friends Byron varied the pursuit of pleasure by literary efforts. He boasts in a juvenile letter (No. 20) that he has often been compared to ' the wicked ' Lord Lyttelton, and has already been held up as ' the votary of licentiousness and the dis- ciple of infidelity.' A list (dated 30 Nov. 1807) shows that he had read or looked through many historical books and novels 'by the thousand.' His memory was remarkable (see e.g. GAMBA, p. 148; LADY BLESSINGTON, p. 134). Scott, however, found in 1815 that his reading did 'not appear to have been extensive, either in history or poetry;' and the list does not imply that he had strayed beyond the highways of literature. At Southwell, in September 1806, he took the principal part (Penruddock, an 'amiable misanthrope') in an amateur per- formance of Cumberland's 'Wheel of Fortune,' and 'spun a pro- logue ' in a postchaise. About the same time he confessed to Miss Pigot, who had been reading Burns to him, that he too was a poet, and wrote do\vn the lines 'In thee I fondly hoped to clasp.' In THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 509 November 1806 Ridge, a Newark bookseller, had privately printed for him a small volume of poems, entitled 'Fugitive Pieces.' His friend Mr. Becher, a Southwell clergyman [see BECHER, JOHN], remonstrated against the license of one poem. Byron immediately destroyed the whole impression (except one copy in Becher 's hands and one sent to young Pigot, then studying medicine at Edinburgh). A hundred copies, omitting the offensive verses, and with some additions, under the title ' Poems on Various Occa- sions,' were distributed in January 1807. Favourable notices came to the author from Bankes, Henry Mackenzie ('The Man of Feeling ') , and Lord Woodhouselee. In the summer of 1 807 Byron published a collection called 'Hours of Idleness, a series of Poems, original and translated, by George Gordon, Lord Byron, a minor,' from which twenty of the privately printed poems were omitted and others added. It was praised in the 'Critical Review' of September 1807, and abused in the first number of the 'Satirist.' A new edition, with some additions and without the prefaces, appeared in March 1808 (see account of these editions in appendix to English translation of ELZE'S Byron (1872), p. 446). In Janu- ary 1808 the famous criticism came out in the 'Edinburgh' (Byron speaks of this as about to appear in a letter (No. 24) dated 26 Feb. 1808). The critique has been attributed both to Brougham and Jeffrey. Jeffrey seems to have denied the authorship (see MED- WIN, p. 174), and the ponderous legal facetiousness is certainly not unlike Brougham, whom Byron came to regard as the author (see Notes and Queries, 4th ser. vi. 368, 480). The severity was natural enough. Scott, indeed, says that he remonstrated with Jeffrey, thinking that the poems contained 'some passages of noble promise.' But the want of critical acumen is less obvious than the needless cruelty of the wound inflicted upon a boy's harmless vanity. Byron was deeply stung. He often boasted afterwards (e.g. Letter 420) that he instantly drank three bottles of claret and began a reply. He had already in his desk (Letter 18), on 26 Oct. 1807, 380 lines of his satire, besides 214 pages of a novel, 560 lines in blank verse of a poem on Bosworth Field, and other pieces. He now carefully polished his satire, and had it put in type by Ridge. On leaving Cambridge he had settled at Newstead, given up in 510 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN ruinous condition by Lord Grey in the previous April, where he had a few rooms made habitable, and celebrated his coming of age by some meagre approach to the usual festivities. A favour- able decision in the courts had given him hopes of Rochdale, and made him, he says, 6o,ooo/. richer. The suit, however, dragged on through his life. Meanwhile he had to raise money to make repairs and maintain his establishment at Newstead, with which he declares his resolution never to part (Letter of 6 March 1809). The same letter announces the death of his friend Lord Falkland in a duel. In spite of his own difficulties Byron tried to help the widow, stood godfather to her infant, and left a 500^. note for his godchild in a breakfast cup In a letter from Mrs. Byron (Athe- H(eum,6 Sept. 1884) this is apparently mentioned as a loan to Lady Falkland. On 13 March he took his seat in the House of Lords. Lord Carlisle had acknowledged the receipt of ' Hours of Idleness,' the second edition of which had been dedicated to him, in a 'tolerably handsome letter,' but would take no trouble about introducing his ward. Byron was accompanied to the house by no one but Dallas, a small author, whose sister was the wife of Byron's uncle, George Anson, and who had recently sought his acquaintance. Byron felt his isolation, and sulkily put aside a greeting from the chancellor (Eldon). He erased a compliment to Carlisle and substituted a bitter attack in his satire which was now going through the press under Dallas's superintendence. 'English Bards and Scotch Reviewers' appeared in the middle of March, and at once made its mark. He prepared a second edition at the end of April with additions and a swaggering prose postscript, announcing his departure from England and declaring that his motive was not fear of his victims' antipathies. The satire is vigorously written and more carefully polished than Byron's later efforts ; but has not the bitterness, the keenness, or the fine work- manship of Pope. The retort upon his reviewers is only part of a long tirade upon the other poets of the day. In 1816 Byron made some annotations on the poem at Geneva, admitting the injustice of many lines. A third and fourth edition appeared in 1810 and 1811 ; in the last year he prepared a fifth for the press. He sup- pressed it, as many of his adversaries were now on friendly terms with him, and destroyed all but one copy, from which later editions THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 511 have been printed. He told Murray (23 Oct. 1817) that he would never consent to its republication. Byron had for some time contemplated making his 'grand tour.' In the autumn of 1808 he got up a play at Newstead; he buried his Newfoundland, Boatswain, who died of madness 18 Nov. 1808, under a monument with a misanthropical inscription^ and in the following spring entertained his college friends. C. S. Mat- thews describes their amusements in a letter published by Moore. They dressed themselves in theatrical costumes of monks (with a recollection, perhaps, of Medmenham), and drank burgundy out of a human skull found near the abbey, which Byron had fash- ioned into a cup with an appropriate inscription. Such revelries suggested extravagant rumours of reckless orgies and 'harems' in the abbey. Moore assures us that the life there was in reality 'simple and inexpensive,' and the scandal of limited application. Byron took leave of England by some verses to Mrs. Musters about his blighted affections, and sailed from Falmouth in the Lisbon packet on 2 July 1809. Hobhouse accompanied him, and he took three servants, Fletcher (who followed him to the last), Rushton, and Joe Murray. From Lisbon he rode across Spain to Seville and Cadiz, and thence sailed to Gibraltar in the Hyperion frigate in the beginning of August. He sent home Murray and Rushton with instructions for the proper education of the latter at his own expense. He sailed in the packet for Malta on 19 Aug. 1809, in company with Gait, who afterwards wrote his life, and who was rather amused by the affectations of the youthful peer. At Malta he fell in with a Mrs. Spencer Smith with a romantic history (see Memoirs of the Duchesse d'Abrantes (1834), xv. 1-74), to whom he addressed the verses 'To Florence,' 'stanzas composed during a thunderstorm,' and a passage in 'Childe Harold' (ii. st. 30-3), explaining that his heart was now past the power of loving. From Malta he reached Prevesa in the Spider, brig of war, on 19 Sept. 1809. He thence visited Ali Pasha at Tepelen, and was nearly lost in a Turkish man-of-war on his return. In November he travelled to Missolonghi (21 Nov.) through Acarnaniawith a guard of Albanians. He stayed a fortnight at Patras, and thence left for Athens. He reached Athens on Christmas eve and lodged with Theodora Macri, widow of the English vice-consul, who had 512 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN three lovely daughters. The eldest, Theresa, celebrated by Byron as the Maid of Athens, became Mrs. Black. She fell into poverty, and an appeal for her support was made in the 'Times' on 23 March 1872. She died in October 1875 (Times, 21, 25, 27 Oct. 1875). He sailed from Athens for Smyrna in the Pylades, sloop of war, gn 5 March 1810; visited Ephesus; and on n April sailed in the Salsette frigate for Constantinople, and visited the Troad. On 3 May he repeated Leander's feat of swimming from Sestos to Abydos. In February 1821 he wrote a long letter to Murray, defending his statements against some criticisms in W. Turner's 'Tour in the Levant' (see Appendix to MOORE). Byron reached Constantinople on 14 May, and sailed in the Salsette on 14 July. Hobhouse returned to England, while Byron landed at Zea, with Fletcher, two Albanians, and a Tartar, and returned to Athens. Here he professed to have met with the adventure turned to account in the 'Giaour' about saving a girl from being drowned in a sack. A letter from Lord Sligo, who was then at Athens, to Byron (31 Aug. 1813), proves that some such report was current at Athens a day or two later, and may possibly have had some foundation. Hob- house (Westminster Review, January 1825) says that Byron's Turkish servant was the lover of the girl. He made a tour in the Morea, had a dangerous fever at Patras (which left a liability to malaria), and returned to Athens, where he passed the winter of 1810-11 in the Capuchin convent. Here he met Lady Hester Stanhope, and formed one of his strong attachments to a youth called Nicolo Giraud. To this lad he gave a sum of money on parting, and left him 7,000^. in a will of August 1811. From Athens Byron went to Malta, and sailed thence for England in the Volage frigate on 3 June 1811. He reached Portsmouth at the beginning of July, and was met by Dallas at Reddish's Hotel, St. James's Street, on 15 July 1811. Byron returned to isolation and vexation. He had told his mother that, if compelled to part with Newstead, he should retire to the East. To Hodgson he wrote while at sea (Letter 51) that he was returning embarrassed, unsocial, ' without a hope and almost without a desire.' His financial difficulties are shown by a series of letters published in the 'Athenaeum' (30 Aug. and 6 Sept. 1884). The court of chancery had allowed him 500^. a year at Cambridge, THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 513 to which his mother had added as much, besides incurring a debt of i,ooo/. on his behalf. He is reduced to his last guinea in De- cember 1807, has obtained loans from Jews, and expects to end by suicide or the marriage of a 'golden dolly.' His mother was put to the greatest difficulties during his travels, and he seems to have been careless in providing for her wants. The bailiffs were at Newstead in February 1810; a sale was threatened in June. Byron writes from Athens in November refusing to sell Newstead. While returning to England he proposed to join the army, and had to borrow money to pay for his journey to London. News of his mother's illness came to him in London, and before he could reach her she died (i Aug. 1811) of 'a fit of rage caused by reading the upholsterer's bills.' The loss affected him deeply, and he was found sobbing by her remains over the loss of his one friend in the world. The deaths of his school-friend Wingfield (14 May 1811), of C. S. Matthews, and of Eddlestone, were nearly simultaneous blows, and he tells Miss Pigot that the last death 'made the sixth, within four months, of friends and relatives lost between May and the end of August.' In February 1812 he mentions Eddlestone to Hodgson (Memoirs, i. 221) as the 'only human being that ever loved him in truth and entirely.' He adds that where death has set his seal the impression can never be broken. The phrase recurs in the most impressive of the poems to Thyrza, dated in the same month. The coincidence seems to confirm Moore's statement that Thyrza was no more than an impersonation of Byron's melancholy caused by many losses. An apostrophe to a l loved and lovely one ' at the end of the second canto of ' Childe Harold' (st. 95, 96) belongs to the same series. Attempts to identify Thyrza have failed. Byron spoke to Trelawny of a pas- sion for a cousin who was in a decline when he left England, and whom Trelawny identifies with Thyrza. No one seems to answer to the description. It may be added that he speaks (see MOORE, chap, iv.) of a 'violent, though pure love and passion' which ab- sorbed him while at Cambridge, and writes to Dallas (n Oct. 1811) of a loss about this time which would have profoundly moved him but that he 'has supped full of horrors,' and that Dallas un- derstands him as referring to some one who might have made him happy as a wife. Byron had sufficient elasticity of spirit for a 2L 514 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN defiance of the world, and a vanity keen enough to make a boastful exhibition of premature cynicism and a blighted heart. At the end of October 1811 he took lodgings in St. James's Street. He had shown to Dallas upon his return to England the first two cantos of 'Childe Harold' and 'Hints from Horace,' a tame paraphrase of the 'Ars Poetica.' According to Dallas, he preferred the last, and was unwilling to publish the 'Childe.' Cawthorn, who had published the * English Bards,' &c. > accepted the 'Hints' (which did not appear till after Byron's death), but the publication was delayed, apparently for want of a good classical reviser (To Hodgson, 13 Oct. 1811). The Longmans had re- fused the 'English Bards,' which attacked their friends, and Byron told Dallas to offer 'Childe Harold' elsewhere. Miller objected to the attack upon Lord Elgin (as the despoiler of the Parthenon) , for whom he published ; and it was ultimately accepted by Mur- ray, who thus began a permanent connection with Byron. ' Childe Harold' appeared in March 1812. Byron had meanwhile spoken for the first time in the House of Lords, 27 Feb. 1812, against a bill for suppressing riots of Nottingham frameworkers, and with con- siderable success. A second and less successful speech against catholic disabilities followed on 21 April 1812. He made one other short speech in presenting a petition from Major Cartwright on i June 1813. Lord Holland helped him in providing materials for the first, and the speeches indicate a leaning towards something more than whiggism. The first two are of rather elaborate rhetoric, and his delivery was criticised as too theatrical and sing-song. Any political ambition was extinguished by the startling success of 'Childe Harold,' of which a first edition was immediately sold. Byron 'woke one morning and found himself famous.' Murray gave 6oo/. for the copyright, which Byron handed over to Dallas, declaring that he would never take money for his poems. The two cantos now published are admittedly inferior to the continuation of the poem; and the affectation of which ft set the fashion is obsolete. Byron tells Murray (3 Nov. 1821) that he is like a tiger. If he misses his first spring, he goes ' grumbling back to the jungle again.' His poems are all substantially impromptus; but the vigour and descriptive power, in spite of all blemishes, are enough to explain the success of a poem origi- THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 515 nal in conception and setting forth a type of character which em- bodied a prevailing sentiment. Byron became the idol of the sentimental part of society. Friends and lovers of notoriety gathered round this fascinating rebel. Among the first was Moore, who had sent him a challenge for a passage in 'English Bards' ridiculing the bloodless duel with Jeffrey. Hodgson had suppressed the letter during Byron's absence. Moore now wrote a letter ostensibly demanding ex- planations, but more like a request for acquaintance. The two met at a dinner given by Rogers, where Campbell made a fourth. Byron surprised his new friends by the distinction of his appearance and the eccentricity of his diet, consisting of potatoes and vinegar alone. Moore was surprised at Byron's isolation. Dallas, his solicitor, Hanson, and three or four college friends were at this time (November 1811) his only associates. Moore rapidly became intimate. Byron liked him as a thorough man of the world and as an expert in the arts which compensate for inferiority of birth, and which enabled Moore to act as an obsequious monitor and to smother gentle admonition in abundant flattery. In his diary (10 Dec. 1813) Byron says that Moore was the best-hearted man he knew and with talents equal to his feelings. Byron was now at the height of his proverbial beauty. Coleridge in 1816 speaks enthusiastically of the astonishing beauty and expressiveness of his face (GILLMAN, p. 267). Dark brown locks, curling over a lofty forehead, grey eyes with long dark lashes, a mouth and chin of exquisite symmetry are shown in his portraits, and were ani- mated by an astonishing mobility of expression, varying from apathy to intense passion. His head was very small; his nose, though well formed, rather too thick; looking, says Hunt (i. 150), in a front view as if ' grafted on the face ; ' his complexion was colourless ; he had little beard. His height, he says (Diary, 17 March 1814), 5ft. 8 Jin. or a little less (MEDWIN, p. 5). He had a broad chest, long muscular arms, with white delicate hands, and beautiful teeth. A tendency to excessive fatness, inherited from his mother, was not only disfiguring but productive of great discomfort, and increased the unwieldiness arising from his lameness. To remedy the evil he resorted to the injurious system of diet often set down to mere affectation. Trelawny (ii. 74) observes more justly that 516 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN Byron was the only human being he knew with self-restraint enough not to get fat. In April 1807 he tells Pigot that he has reduced himself by exercise, physic, and hot baths from i4St. ylbs. to i2st. ylbs. ; in January 1808 he tells Drury that he has got down to lost. ylbs. When last weighed at Genoa he was lost. Qlbs. (TRELAWNY). He carried on this system at intervals through life ; at Athens he drank vinegar and water, and seldom ate more than a little rice ; on his return he gave up wine and meat. He sparred with Jackson for exercise, and took hot baths. In 1813 he lived on six biscuits a day and tea; in December he fasts for forty-eight hours; in 1816 he lived on a thin slice of bread for breakfast and a vegetable dinner, drinking green tea and seltzer- water. He kept down hunger by chewing mastic and tobacco (HUNT, i. 65). He sometimes took laudanum (Diary, 14 Jan. 1821; and Lady Byron's Letter, 18 Jan. 1816). He tells Moore (Letter 461) in 1821 that a dose of salts gave him most exhilaration. Occasional indulgences varied this course. Moore describes a supper (19 May 1814) when he finished two or three lobsters, washed down by half a dozen glasses of strong brandy, with tumblers of hot water. He wrote 'Don Juan' on gin and water, and Medwin (p. 336) speaks of his drinking too much wine and nearly a pint of hollands every night (in 1822). Trelawny (i. 73), however, declares that the spirits was mere 'water bewitched.' When Hunt reached Pisa in 1822, he found Byron so fat as to be scarcely recognisable. Medwin, two or three months later, found him starved into 'unnatural thinness.' Such a diet was no doubt injurious in the long run ; but the starvation seems to have stimu- lated his brain, and Trelawny says that no man had brighter eyes or a clearer voice. In the spring of 1813 Byron published anonymously the 'Waltz,' and disowned it on its deserved failure. Various avatars of ' Childe Harold,' however, repeated his previous success. The 'Giaour' appeared in May 1813; the 'Bride of Abydos' in December 1813; the ' Corsair' in January 1814. They were all struck off at a white heat. The ' Giaour ' was increased from 400 lines in the first edition to 1,400 in the fifth, which appeared in the autumn of 1813. The first sketch of the 'Bride' was written in four nights (Diary, 16 Nov. 1813) 'to distract his dreams from . . . ,' and afterwards THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 517 increased by 200 lines. The 'Corsair,' written in ten days, or between 18 and 31 Dec., was hardly touched afterwards. He boasted afterwards that 14,000 copies of the last were sold in a day. With its first edition appeared the impromptu lines, 'Weep, daughter of a royal line;' the Princess Charlotte having wept, it was said, on the inability of the whigs to form a cabinet on Per- ceval's death. The lines were the cause of vehement attacks upon the author by the government papers. A satire called ' Anti- Byron,' shown to him by Murray in March 1814, indicated the rise of a hostile feeling. Byron was annoyed by the shift of favour. He had said in the dedication of the * Corsair ' to Moore that he should be silent for some years, and on 9 April 1814 tells Moore that he has given up rhyming. The same letter announces the abdication of Napoleon, and next day he composed and sent to Murray his ode upon that event. On 29 April he tells Murray that he has resolved to buy back his copyrights and suppress his poetry, but he instantly withdrew the resolution on Murray's assurance that it would be inconvenient. By the middle of June he had finished 'Lara,' which was published in the same volume with Rogers's 'Jacqueline' in August. The 'Hebrew Melodies/ written at the request of Kinnaird, appeared with music in January 1815. The 'Siege of Corinth,' begun July 1815 and copied by Lady Byron, and 'Parisina,' written the same autumn, appeared in January and February 1816. Murray gave yoo/. for 'Lara' and 500 guineas for each of the others. Dallas wrote to the papers in February 1814, defending his noble relative from the charge of accepting payment ; and stated that the money for ' Childe Harold ' and 'The Corsair' had been given to himself. The sums due for the other two poems then published were still, it seems, in the publisher's hands. In the beginning of 1816 Byron declined to take the 1,000 guineas for 'Parisina' and the ' Siege of Corinth, ' and it was proposed to hand over the money to Godwin, Coleridge, and Maturin. The plan was dropped at Murray's objection, and the poet soon became less scrupulous. These poems were written in the thick of many distractions. Byron was familiar at Holland, Melbourne, and Devonshire Houses. He knew Brummell and was one of the dandies; he was a member of Watier's, then a 'superb club,' and appeared as a caloyer in a masquerade given 518 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN by his fellow-members in 1813; of the more literary and sober Alfred; of the Union, the Pugilistics, and the Owls, or 'Fly-by- nights.' He indulged in the pleasures of his class, with intervals of self-contempt and foreboding. Scott and Mme. de Stael (like Lady Byron) thought that a profound melancholy was in reality his dominant mood. He had reasons enough in his money em- barrassments and in dangerous entanglements. Fashionable women adored the beautiful young poet and tried to soothe his blighted affections. Lady Morgan (ii. 2) describes him as 'cold, silent, and reserved,' but doubtless not the less fascinating. Dal- las (iii. 41) observed that his coyness speedily vanished, and found him in a brown study writing to some fine lady whose page was waiting in scarlet and a hussar jacket. This may have been Lady Caroline Lamb, a woman of some talent, but flighty and excitable to the verge of insanity. She was born 23 Nov. 1785, the daughter of the Earl of Bessborough, and in June 1805 married William Lamb, afterwards Lord Melbourne. The women, as she says, 'suffocated him' when she first saw him. On her own introduction by Lady Westmorland, she turned on her heel and wrote in her diary that he was 'mad, bad, and dangerous to know.' The acquaintance was renewed at Lady Holland's, and for nine months he almost lived at Melbourne House, where he contrived to 'sweep away' the dancing, in which he could take no part. Lady Caroline did her best to make her passion notorious. She 'absolutely besieged him,' says Rogers (Table Talk, p. 235); told him in her first letter that all her jewels were at his service ; waited at night for Rogers in his garden to ask him to reconcile her to Byron; and would return from parties in Byron's carriage or wait for him in the street if not invited. At last, in July 1813 (see JACKSON, Bath Archives, ii. 146), it was rumoured in London that after a quarrel with Byron at a party Lady Caroline had tried to stab herself with a knife and then with the fragments of a glass (the party was on 5 July; HAYWARD, Eminent Statesmen, i. 350-3). Her mother now insisted upon her retirement to Ireland. After a farewell interview, Byron wrote her a letter (printed from the original manuscript in JEAFFRESON, i. 261), which reads like an attempt to use the warmest phrases consistent with an acceptance of their separation, though ending with a statement of his readiness THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 519 to fly with her. She corresponded with Byron from Ireland till on the eve of her return she received a brutal letter from him (printed in 'Glenarvon,' and apparently acknowledged by Byron, MEDWIN, p. 274), saying roundly that he was attached to an- other, and telling her to correct her vanity and leave him in peace. The letter, marked with Lady Oxford's coronet and initials, threw Lady Caroline into a fit, which involved leeching, bleeding, and bed for a week. Lady Caroline's mother-in-law, Lady Melbourne, was sister of Sir R. Milbanke, who, by his wife, Judith Noel, daughter of Lord Wentworth, was father of an only daughter, Anne Isabella Milbanke, born 17 May 1792. Miss Milbanke was a woman of intellectual tastes ; fond of theology and mathematics, and a writer of poems, one or two of which are published in Byron's works (two are given in Madame Belloc's 'Byron,' i. 68). Byron de- scribed her to Medwin (p. 36) as having small and feminine, though not regular, features; the fairest skin imaginable; perfect figure and temper and modest manners. She was on friendly terms with Mrs. Siddons, Miss Baillie, Miss Edgeworth, and other literary persons who frequented her mother's house (see HARNESS, p. 23). A strong sense of duty, shown in a rather puritanical precision, led unsympathetic observers to regard her as prudish, pedantic, and frigid. Her only certain fortune was io,ooo/. Her father had injured a considerable estate by electioneering. Her mother's brother, Lord Wentworth, was approaching seventy. His estate of some 7,ooo/. a year was at his own disposal, and she was held to be his favourite ; but he had illegitimate children, and his sister, Lady Scarsdale, had sons and a daughter. Miss Milbanke was therefore an heiress with rather uncertain prospects. Byron, from whatever motives, made her an offer in 1812, which was refused, and afterwards opened a correspondence with her (CAMPBELL, New Monthly, xxviii. 374, contradicts, on Lady Byron's authority, Medwin's statement (p. 37), that she began the correspondence), which continued at intervals for two years. On 30 Nov. 1813 he notices the oddness of a situation in which there is 'not a spark of love on either side.' On 15 March 1813 he receives a letter from her and says that he will be in love again if he does not take care. Meanwhile he and his friends naturally held that a marriage might 520 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN be his salvation. Lady Melbourne, whom on her death in 1818 he calls (Letter 316) the 'best, kindest, and ablest female' he ever knew, promoted a match with her niece, possibly because it would effectually bar the intrigue with her daughter-in-law. In Septem- ber 1814 he made an offer to Miss Milbanke in a letter, which, according to a story told by Moore, was the result of a momentary impulse. Byron may be acquitted of simply mercenary motives. He never acted upon calculation, and had he wished, he might probably have turned his attractions to better account. The sense that he was drifting into dangerous embarrassments, which (see Diary, 10 Dec. 1813) suggests hints of suicide, would no doubt recommend a match with unimpeachable propriety, as the lady's vanity was equally flattered by the thought of effecting such a con- version. Byron was pre-eminently a man who combined strange infirmity of will with overpowering gusts of passion. He drifted indolently as long as drifting was possible, and then acted im- petuously in obedience to the uppermost influence. Byron's marriage took place 2 Jan. 1815 at Seaham, Durham, the seat of Sir R. Milbanke. The honeymoon was passed at Halnaby, another of his houses in the same county. The pair re- turned to Seaham 21 Jan. ; in March they visited Colonel and Mrs. Leigh at Six Mile Bottom, Newmarket, on their way to London, where they settled, 18 March 1815, at 13 Piccadilly Terrace for the rest of their married life. Byron, in 'The Dream,' chose to de- clare that on his wedding day his "thoughts had been with Miss Chaworth. He also told Medwin (p. 39) that on leaving the house he found the lady's-maid placed between himself and his bride in the carriage. Hobhouse, who had been his 'best man,' authori- tatively contradicted this (Westminster Review, No. 5), and the statement of Mrs. Minns (first published in ' Newcastle Chronicle,' 23 Sept. 1869), who had been Lady Byron's maid at Halnaby and previously, is that Lady Byron arrived there in a state ' buoyant and cheerful;' but that Byron's 'irregularities' began there and caused her misery, which she tried to conceal from her mother. Lady Byron also wrote to Hodgson (15 Feb. 1816) that Byron had married her 'with the deepest determination of revenge, avowed on the day of my marriage and executed ever since with systematic and increasing cruelty' (Byron contradicts some report to this THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 521 effect to Medwin, p. 39). The letters written at the time, however, hardly support these statements. Byron speaks of his happiness to Moore, though he is terribly bored by his 'pious father-in-law' (see a reference to this in TRELAWNY, i. 72). Lady Milbanke speaks of their happiness at Seaham (Bland-Burgess Papers, p. 339). Mrs. Leigh tells Hodgson that Lady Byron's parents were pleased with their son-in-law, and reports favourably of the pair on their visit to Six Mile Bottom. In April Lord Wentworth died. The bulk of his property was settled upon Lady Milbanke (who, with her husband, now took the name of Noel) and Lady Byron. On 29 July 1815 Byron executed the will proved after his death. He left all the property of which he could dispose in trust for Mrs. Leigh and her children, his wife and any children he might have by her being now amply provided for. Lady Byron fully ap- proved of this provision, and communicates it in an affectionate letter to Mrs. Leigh. Harness says that when the Byrons first came to London no couple could be apparently more devoted (HARNESS, p. 14) ; but troubles approached. Byron's expenses were increased. He had agreed to sell Newstead for 140,000^. in September 1812; but two years later the purchaser withdrew, forfeiting 25,ooo/., which seems to have speedily vanished. In November 1815 Byron had to sell his library, though he still declined Murray's offers for his copyrights. Creditors (at whose expense this questionable deli- cacy must have been exercised) dunned the husband of an heiress, and there were nine executions in his house within the year. He found distractions abroad. He was a zealous playgoer; Kean's performance of Sir Giles Overreach gave him a kind of convulsive fit a story which recalls his mother's at the Edinburgh theatre, and of the similar effect afterwards, produced upon himself by Alfieri's 'Mirra' (MoORE, chap. xxii.). He became member of the committee of management of Drury Lane, and was brought into connections of which Moore says that they gave no real cause of offence, though the circumstances were dangerous to the 'steadi- ness of married life.' We hear, too, of parties where all ended in ' hiccup and happiness ; ' and it seems that Byron's dislike of seeing women eat led to a separation at the domestic board. The only harsh action to which he confessed was that Lady Byron once 522 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN came upon him when he was musing over his embarrassments and asked 'Am I in your way?' to which he replied 'Damnably' (MEDWIN, p. 43). On 10 Dec. 1815 Lady Byron gave birth to her only child, Augusta Ada. On 6 Jan. 1816 Byron gave directions to his wife 'in writing' to leave London as soon as she was well enough. It was agreed, he told Medwin (p. 40), that she should stay with her father till some arrangement had been made with the creditors. On 8 Jan. Lady Byron consulted Dr. Baillie, 'with the concurrence of his family,' that is, apparently, Mrs. Leigh and his cousin, George Byron, with whom she constantly communicated in the following period. Dr. Baillie, on her expressing doubts of Byron's sanity, advised her absence as an 'experiment.' He told her to correspond with him on 'light and soothing' topics. She even believed that a sudden excitement might bring on a 'fatal crisis.' She left London on 15 Jan. 1816, reaching her parents at Kirkby Mallory on the i6th. She wrote affectionately to her husband on starting and arriving. The last letter, she says, was circulated to support the charge of desertion. It began, as Byron told Med- win, 'Dear Duck,' and was signed by her pet name 'Pippin' (HUNT, Autobiogr. 1860, pp. 247, 254). She writes to Mrs. Leigh on the same day that she has made 'the most explicit statement' to her parents. They are anxious to do everything in their power for the 'poor sufferer.' He was to be invited at once to Kirkby Mallory, and her mother wrote accordingly on the iyth. He would probably drop a plan, already formed, for going abroad ^with Hob- house on her parents' remonstrance. On 18 Jan. she tells Mrs. Leigh that she hopes that Byron will join her for a time and not leave her till there is a prospect of an heir. Lady Noel has sug- gested that Mrs. Leigh might dilute a laudanum bottle with water without Byron's knowledge. She still writes as an affectionate wife, hoping that her husband may be cured of insanity. An apothecary, Le Mann, is to see the patient, and Lady Noel will go to London, consult Mrs. Leigh, and procure advice. The medical advisers could find no proof of insanity, though a list of sixteen symptoms had been submitted to them. The strongest, according to Moore, was the dashing to pieces of a 'favourite old watch' in an excess of fury. A similar anecdote THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 523 (HODGSON, ii. 6) was told of his throwing a jar of ink out of window, and his excitement at the theatre is also suggested. Lady Byron upon hearing the medical opinion immediately decided upon separation. Dr. Baillie and a lawyer, by Lady Noel's desire, 'almost forced themselves upon Byron' (MEDWIN, p. 46), and con- firmed Le Mann's report. On 25 Jan. 1816 Lady Byron tells Mrs. Leigh that she must resign the right to be her sister, but hopes that no difference will be made in their feelings. From this time she consistently adhered to the view finally set forth in her statement in 1830. Her letters to Mrs. Leigh, to Hodgson, who had ventured to intervene, and her last letter to Byron (13 Feb. 1816), take the same ground. Byron had been guilty of conduct inexcusable if he were an accountable agent, and therefore making separation a duty when his moral responsibility was proved. She tells Mrs. Leigh and Hodgson that he married her out of revenge ; she tells Hodgson (15 Feb.) that her security depended on the 1 total abandonment of every moral and religious principle,' and tells Byron himself that to her affectionate remonstrances and forewarnings of consequences he had replied by a 'determination to be wicked though it should break my heart.' On 2 Feb. 1816 Sir R. Noel proposed an amicable separation to Byron, which he at first rejected. Lady Byron went to London and saw Dr. Lushington, who, with Sir S. Romilly, had been con- sulted by Lady Noel, and had then spoken of possible reconciliation. Lady Byron now informed him of facts 'utterly unknown/ he says, ' I have no doubt, to Sir R. and Lady Noel.' His opinion was 'entirely changed.' He thought reconciliation impossible, and should it be proposed he could take no part, 'professionally or otherwise, towards effecting it.' Mrs. Leigh requested an inter- view soon after, which Lady Byron declined 'with the greatest pain.' Lushington had forbidden any such interview, as they 'might be called upon to answer for the most private conversation.' In a following letter (neither dated) Lady Byron begs for the inter- view which she had refused. She cannot bear the thought of not meeting, and the 'grounds of the case are in some degree changed' (Addit. MS. 31037, ff. 33, 34). According to Lady Byron's state- ment (in 1830) Byron consented to the separation upon being told that the matter must otherwise come into court. We may easily 524 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN believe that, as Mrs. Leigh tells Mr. Horton, Byron would be happy to 'escape the exposure,' whatever its precise nature. He afterwards threw the responsibility for reticence on the other side. He gave a paper to Mr. Lewis, dated at La Mira in 1817, saying that Hobhouse had challenged the other side to come into court; that he only yielded because Lady Byron had claimed a promise that he would consent to a separation if she really desired it. He declares his ignorance of the charges against him, and his desire to meet them openly. This paper was apparently shown only to a few friends. It was first made public in the ' Academy ' of 9 Oct. 1869. Hobhouse (see Quarterly Review for October 1869, January 1870, and July 1883) also said that Byron was quite ready to go into court, and that Wilmot Horton on Lady Byron's part dis- claimed all the current scandals. It would seem, however, Byron could have forced an open statement had he really chosen to do so. This paper shows his consciousness that he ought to have done it if his case had been producible. Lady Byron tells Hodgson at the time (15 Feb. 1816) he 'does know, too well, what he affects to inquire.' The question remains, what were the specific charges which decided Lady Byron and Lushington? A happy marriage be- tween persons so little congenial would have surprised his best friends. So far we might well accept the statement which Moore assigns to him: 'My dear sir, the causes were too simple to be easily found out.' But this will not explain Lady Byron's state- ments at the time, nor the impression made upon Lushington by her private avowal. Lady Byron only exchanged the hypothesis of insanity for that of diabolical pride. Byron's lifelong habit of 'inverse hypocrisy' may account for something. Harness reports (p. 32) that he used to send paragraphs to foreign papers injurious to his own character in order to amuse himself by mystifying the English public. Some of Lady Byron's statements may strengthen the belief that she had taken some such foolish brags too seriously. Other explanations have been offered. In 1856 Lady Byron told a story to Mrs. Beecher Stowe. She thought that by blasting his memory she might weaken the evil influence of his writings, and shorten his expiation in another world. Lady Byron died in 1860. After the publication of the Guiccioli memoirs in 1868, THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 525 Mrs. Stowe thought it her duty to publish the story in 'Macmillan's Magazine' for September 1869 and the 'Atlantic Monthly.' Her case is fully set forth, with documents and some explanations, in 'Lady Byron Vindicated; a History of the Byron Controversy,' 1870. According to Mrs. Stowe, Lady Byron accused her husband to Lushington of an incestuous intrigue with Mrs. Leigh. An examination of all that is known of Mrs. Leigh (see Quarterly Review, July 1869), of the previous relations between brother and sister, and especially of Lady Byron's affectionate relations to Mrs. Leigh at the time, as revealed in letters since published, proves this hideous story to be absolutely incredible. Till 1830 Mrs. Leigh continued to be on good terms with Lady Byron, and had conveyed messages between Byron and his wife during his life. The ap- pointment of a trustee under Byron's marriage settlements in 1830 led to a disagreement. Lady Byron refused with consider- able irritation a request made by Mrs. Leigh. All acquaintance dropped, till in 1851 Lady Byron consented to an interview. Mrs. Leigh was anxious to declare that she had not (as she supposed Lady Byron to believe that she had) encouraged Byron's bitterness of feeling towards his wife. Lady Byron replied simply, ' Is that all?' No further communication followed, and Mrs. Leigh died 1 8 Oct. 1851. It can only be surmised that Lady Byron had be- come jealous of Byron's public and pointed expressions of love for his sister, contrasted so forcibly with his utterances about his wife, and in brooding over her wrongs had developed the hateful sus- picion communicated to Mrs. Stowe, and, as it seems, to others. It appears too, from a passage in the Guiccioli memoirs, that at a time when Byron was accused of 'every monstrous vice,' his phrases about his pure fraternal affection suggested some such addition to the mass of calumny ('Reminiscences of an Attache/ by Hubert Jerningham (1886), contains a curious statement by Mme. Guiccioli as to Byron's strong affection for his sister). Another suggestion made by Mr. Jeaffreson, that the cause was a connection formed by Byron about the time of the first separation with Jane Clairmont, daughter, by a previous marriage, of William Godwin's second wife, seems quite inadmissible. It entirely fails to explain Lady Byron's uniform assertions at the time and in 1830 (see ante, and letter to Lady Anne Barnard, published by Lord 526 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN Lindsay in the 'Times' in September 1869) that Byron had been guilty of conduct excusable only on the ground of insanity, and continued during their whole cohabitation. Byron's extreme wrath against a Mrs. Clermont (a former governess of Lady Byron's), whom he accused (MEDWIN, p. 43) of breaking open a desk, seems to suggest that some discovery was made subsequently to Lady Byron's departure from London, but affords no confirmation of this hypothesis. The problem must remain unsolved. The scandal excited a general explosion of public indignation. In some ' Observations upon an article in " Black wood's Magazine"' (dated 15 March 1820, but not published till after Byron's death) Byron describes the state of feeling ; he was accused of ' every monstrous vice ; ' advised not to go to the theatre or to parliament for fear of public insults, and his friends feared violence from the mob when he started in his travelling carriage. This indignation, perhaps ex- aggerated (see HOBHOUSE in Westminster Review), has been ridi- culed ; and doubtless included mean and hateful elements love of scandal and delight in trampling on a great name. Yet it was not unnatural. Byron's very guarded sceptical utterances in 'Childe Harold' frightened Dallas into a formal and elaborate protest, and shocked a sensitive public extravagantly. He had been posing as a rebel against all the domestic proprieties. So long as his avowed license could, pass for a literary affectation, or be condoned in the spirit of the general leniency shown to wild young men in the era of the prince regent, the protest was confined to the stricter classes. But when a Lara passed from the regions of fancy to 13 Piccadilly Terrace, matters became more serious. Byron was outraging a woman of the highest character and with the strong- est claims on his tenderness ; and a feeling arose such as that which, soon afterwards, showed itself when the prince regent passed from simple immorality to the persecution of a wife with infinitely less claims to respect than Lady Byron's. Lady Caroline Lamb claimed her part in the outcry by her wild novel of ' Glenarvon,' published at this time. The separation was signed, and Byron left his country for ever. Some friends still stood by him. Lady Jersey earned his lasting gratitude by giving an assembly in his honour; and Miss Mercer THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 527 (afterwards Lady Keith) met him there with marked cordiality. Leigh Hunt in the ' Examiner ' and Perry in the ' Morning Chroni- cle' defended him. Mrs. Leigh's affection was his chief comfort, when even his cousin George took his wife's part (MEDWIN, p. 49). Two poems appeared in the papers, through the 'injudicious zeal of a friend,' says Moore, in the middle of April. 'A Sketch' (dated 29 March) is a savage onslaught upon Mrs. Clermont. 'Fare thee well' (dated 17 March), written with tears, it is said, the marks of which still blot the manuscript, expostulates pathetically with his wife for inflicting a 'cureless wound.' On 8 March Byron told Moore that there was ' never a brighter, kinder, or more ami- able and agreeable being' than Lady Byron, and that no blame attached to her. He appeals to Rogers (25 March) to confirm his statement that he had never attacked her. In 1823 he repeated this statement to Lady Blessington (p. 117). In fact, however, he oscillated between attempts to preserve the air of an injured yet forgiving husband and outbursts of bitterness. At the instance of Mme. de Stael he made some kind of overture for reconciliation in 1816, and (apparently) upon its failure wrote the 'Dream,' in- tended to show that his love had always been reserved for Mary Chaworth ; and a novel upon the ' Marriage of Belphegor,' rep- resenting his own story. He destroyed it, says Moore, on hearing of her illness; but a fragment is given in the notes to 'Don Juan.' In a poem written at the same time, ' On hearing that Lady Byron was ill,' he attacks her implacability, and calls her a -moral Cly- temnestra.' He never met Lady Blessington without talking of his domestic troubles. He showed an (unsent) conciliatory letter, and apologised for public allusions in his works. Some angry communications were suppressed by his friends, but the allusions in the last cantos of 'Childe Harold' and in 'Don Juan' were unpardonable. While Byron was bemoaning his griefs to even casual acquaintance with a strange incontinence of language, and circulating letters and lampoons, his occasional conciliatory moods were of little importance. Lady Blessington remarks on his curious forgetfulness of the way in which he had consoled himself when he complained of his wife's implacability. Her dignified reticence irritated and puzzled him, and his prevailing tone only illustrates the radical incompatibility of their characters. 528 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN Byron sailed for Ostend (24 April 1816) with a young Italian doctor, Polidori, a Swiss and two English servants, Rushton and Fletcher, who had both started with him in 1809. Byron's good nature to his servants was an amiable point in his character. Har- ness describes the 'hideous old woman' who had nursed him in his lodgings and followed him through all his English establishments, and speaks of his kindness to an old butler, Murray, at Newstead. Byron travelled in a large coach, imitated from Napoleon's, carry- ing bed, library, and kitchen, besides a caleche bought at Brussels. His expenses were considerable, and his scruples about copyright soon vanished. In 1817 he was bargaining sharply with Murray. He demanded 6oo/. for the 'Lament of Tasso' and the last act of 'Manfred' (9 May 1817). On 4 Sept. 1817 he asks 2,5/. instead of i,5oo/. for the fourth canto of ' Childe Harold,' accepting ultimately 2,000 guineas. The sums paid by Murray for copyrights to the end of 1821 amounted to 1 5,455^, including the amounts made over to Dallas. He must have received at least 12,500^. at this period, and the i,ioo/. for 'Parisina' and the 'Siege of Corinth' was in Murray's hands. In November 1817 he at last sold Newstead for 90,000 guineas. Payment of debts and mort- gages left the 6o,ooo/. settled upon Lady Byron, the income of which was payable to Byron during his life. He was aggrieved by the refusal of his trustees in 1820 to invest this in a mortgage on Lord Blessington's estates (Diary, 24 Jan. 1821; Letter 374). Hanson, Byron's solicitor-, went to Venice to obtain his signature to the necessary deeds in November 1818 (HODGSON, ii. 53). Byron declared that he would receive no advantage from Lady Byron's property. On the death of Lady Noel in 1822, however, her fortune of 7,ooo/. or 8,ooo/. a year was divided equally between her daughter and Byron by arbitrators (Sir F. Burdett and Lord Dacre) ; and such a division had, it seems, been provided for in the deed of separation (HOBHOUSE in Westminster Review, January 1825). Byron then became a rich man for his Italian position, and grew careful of money. He spent much time in settling his weekly bills (TRELAWNY, ii. 75), and affected avarice as a 'good old gentlemanly vice.' But this must be taken as partly humor- ous, and he was still capable of munificence. From Brussels Byron visited Waterloo, and thence went to THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 529 Geneva by the Rhine, where (June 1816) he took the Villa Diodati, on the Belle Rive, a promontory on the south side of the lake (see Notes and Queries, 5th ser. viii. i, 24, 115). Here Byron met the Shelleys and Miss Clairmont. Miss Clairmont came ex- pressly to meet him, but it is authoritatively stated that the Shelleys were not in her confidence. The whole party became the objects of curiosity and scandal. Tourists gazed at Byron through tele- scopes (see letter from Shelley, GUICCIOLI, i. 97). When he visited Mme. de Stae'l at Cappet, a Mrs. Hervey thought proper to faint. Southey was in Switzerland this year, and Byron believed that he had spread stories in England imputing gross immorality to the whole party. They amused themselves one rainy week by writing ghost stories; Mrs. Shelley began 'Frankenstein,' and Byron a fragment called 'The Vampire,' from which Polidori 'vamped up ' a novel of the same name. It passed as Byron's in France and had some success. Polidori, a fretful and flighty youth, quarrelled with his employer, proposed to challenge Shelley, and left Byron for Italy. He was sent out of Milan for a quarrel with an Austrian officer, but afterwards got some patients. Byron tried to help him, and recommended him to Murray (Letters 275, 285). He com- mitted suicide in 1821. Byron and Shelley made a tour of the lake in June (described in Shelley's 'Six Weeks' Tour'), and were nearly lost in a storm. Two rainy days at Ouchy produced Byron's 'Prisoner of Chillon;' and about the same time he finished the third canto of 'Childe Harold.' Shelley, as Byron told Medwin (p. 237), had dosed him with Wordsworth 'even to nausea,' and the influence is apparent in some of his ' Childe Harold ' stanzas (see Wordsworth's remarks in MOORE'S Diary (1853), iii. 161). In September Byron made a tour in the Bernese Oberland with Hobhouse, and, as his diary shows, worked up his impressions of the scenery. At the Villa Diodati he wrote the stanzas 'To Au- gusta' and the verses addressed to 'My sweet sister,' which by her desire were suppressed till after his death. Here, too, he wrote the monody on the death of Sheridan, and the striking fragment called 'Darkness.' On 29 Aug. the Shelley party left for England. In January 1817 Miss Clairmont gave birth to Allegra, Byron's daughter. The infant was sent to him at Venice with a Swiss nurse, and 530 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN placed under the care of the Hoppners. Byron declined an offer from a Mrs. Vavasour to adopt the girl, refusing to abdicate his paternal authority as the lady desired. He afterwards sent for the child to Bologna in August 1819, and kept her with him at Venice and Ravenna till April 1821, when he placed her in a con- vent at Bagna-Cavallo (twelve miles from Ravenna), paying double fees to insure good treatment. He wished her, he said, to be a Roman catholic, and left her 5,000^. for a marriage portion. The mother vehemently protested against this (Eg. MS. 2332), but the Shelleys approved (To Hoppner, n May 1821; To Shelley, 26 April 1821). The child improved in the convent, and is described by Shelley as petted and happy (GARNETT, Select Letters of Shelley, p. 171, 1882). She died of a fever 20 April 1822. Byron was profoundly agitated by the news, and, as the Countess Guiccioli says, would never afterwards pronounce her name. He directed her to be buried at Harrow, and a tablet to be erected in the church, at a spot precisely indicated by his school recollections (Letter 494). Of the mother he spoke with indifference or aversion (BLESSINGTON, p. 164). Byron and Hobhouse crossed the Simplon, and reached Milan by October. At Milan Beyle (Stendhal) saw him at the theatre, and has de- scribed his impressions (see his Letter first published in Mme. BELLOC'S Byron, i. 353, Paris, 1824). He went by Verona to Venice, intending to spend the winter in this 'the greenest island,' as he says, 'of my imagination.' He stayed for three years, tak- ing as a summer residence a house at La Mira on the Brenta. April and May 1817 were spent in a visit to Rome, whence, 5 May, he sent to Murray a new third act of 'Manfred,' having heard that the original was thought unsatisfactory. On arriving at Venice he found that his 'mind wanted some- thing craggy to break upon' (Letter 252), and he set to work learn- ing Armenian at the monastery. He saw something of the literary salon of the Countess Albrizzi. Mme. Albrizzi wrote a book of portraits, one of which is a sketch of Byron, published by Moore, and not without interest. He became bored with the Venetian 'blues,' and took to the less pretentious salon of the Countess Benzoni. He soon plunged into worse dissipations. He settled in the Palazzo Mocenigo on the Grand Canal. And here, in THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 531 ostentatious defiance of the world, which tried to take the form of contempt, he abandoned himself to degrading excesses which injured his constitution, and afterwards produced bitter self- reproach. 'I detest every recollection of the place, the people, and my pursuits,' he said to Medwin (p. 78). Shelley, whose im- pressions of a visit to Byron are given in the famous 'Julian and Maddalo,' says afterwards that Byron had almost destroyed him- self. He could digest no food, and was consumed by hectic fever. Daily rides on the Lido kept him from prostration. Moore says that Byron would often leave his house in a fit of disgust to pass the night in his gondola. In the midst of this debasing life his intellectual activity continued. He began the fourth canto of 'Childe Harold' by i July 1817, and sent 126 stanzas (afterwards increased to 186) to Murray on 20 July. On 23 Oct. he states that 'Beppo,' in imitation, as he says, of ' Whistlecraf t ' (J. H. Frere), is nearly finished. It was sent to Murray 19 Jan. 1819, and published in May. This experiment led to his greatest per- formance. On 19 Sept. 1818 he has finished the first canto of ' Don Juan.' On 25 Jan. 1819 he tells Murray to print fifty copies for private distribution. On 6 April he sends the second canto. The two were published without author's or publisher's name in July 1819. The third canto was begun in October 1819. The outcry against its predecessors had disconcerted him, and he was so put out by hearing that a Mr. Saunders had called it ' all Grub Street,' as to lay it aside for a time. The third canto was split into the third and fourth in February 1820, and appeared with the fifth, still anonymously and without the publisher's name, in August 1821. A new passion had altered his life. In April 1819 he met at the Countess Benzoni's Teresa, daughter of Count Gamba of Ravenna, recently married at the age of sixteen to a rich widower of sixty, Count Guiccioli, also of Ravenna. Her beauty is de- scribed by Moore, an American painter West, who took her portrait, Medwin, and Hunt. She had regular features, a fine figure, rather too short and stout, and was remarkable among Italians for her fair complexion, golden hair (see JEAFFRESON, ii. 80) , and blue eyes. She at once conceived a passion for Byron, and they met daily at Venice. Her husband took her back to Ravenna in the same month, and she wrote passionate letters to Byron. She had 532 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN fainted three times on her first day's journey ; her mother's death had deeply affected her; she was ill, and threatened by consump- tion; and she told him in May that her relations would receive him at Ravenna. In spite of heat and irresolution, Byron left La Mira on 2 June 1819, and moved slowly, and after some hesitation, to Ravenna, writing on the way 'River that rollest by the ancient walls' (first published by Medwin). Here he found the countess really ill. He studied medical books, she says, for her benefit, and sent for Aglietti, the best physician in Venice. As she re- covered, Byron felt rather awkward under the polite attentions of her husband, though her own relations were unfavourable. His letters to her, says Moore, show genuine passion. His letters to Hoppner show a more ambiguous interest. He desired at times to escape from an embarrassing connection; yet, out of 'wil- fulness,' as Moore thinks, when she was to go with her husband to Bologna, he asked her to fly with him, a step altogether desperate according to the code of the time. Though shocked by the pro- posal, she suggested a sham death, after the Juliet precedent. Byron followed the Guicciolis to Bologna, and stayed there while they made a tour of their estates. Hence (23 Aug.) he sent off to Murray his cutting 'Letter to my Grandmother's Review.' Two days later he wrote a curious declaration of love to the countess in a volume of 'Corinna' left in her house. A vehement quarrel with a papal captain of dragoons for selling him an unsound horse nearly led to an impromptu duel like his granduncle's. On the return of the Guicciolis the count left for Ravenna, leaving his wife with Byron at Bologna 'on account of her health.' Her health also made it expedient to travel with Byron to Venice by way of the Euganean Hills ; and at Venice the same cause made country air desirable, whereupon Byron politely 'gave up to her his house at La Mira,' and 'came to reside there' himself. The whole proceeding was so like an elopement, that Venetian society naturally failed to make a distinction. Moore paid a visit to Byron at this time, was cordially received at La Mira, and lodged in the palace at Venice. Hanson had described Byron in the previous year as 'enormously large' (HODGSON, ii. 2), and Moore was struck by the deterioration of his looks. He found that his friend had given up, or been given up by, Venetian society. THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 533 English tourists stared at him like a wild beast, and annoyed him by their occasional rudeness. It was at this time that Byron gave his memoirs to Moore, stipulating only that they should not appear during his lifetime. Moore observed that they would make a nice legacy for his little Tom. Moore was alarmed at Byron's position. The Venetians were shocked by the presence of his mistress under his roof, especially as he had before 'conducted himself so ad- mirably.' A proposed trip to Rome, to which Byron had almost consented, was abandoned by Moore's advice, as it would look like a desertion of the countess. The count now wrote to his wife proposing that Byron should lend him i,ooo/., for which he would pay 5 per cent.; the loan would otherwise be an avvilimento. Moore exhorted Byron to take advantage of this by placing the lady again under her husband's protection, a result which would be well worth the money. Byron laughingly declared that he would 'save both the lady and the money.' The count himself came to Venice at the end of October. After a discussion, in which Byron declined to interfere, the lady agreed to return to her husband and break with her lover. Byron, set free, almost re- solved to return to England. Dreams of settling in Venezuela under Bolivar's new republic occasionally amused him, and he made serious inquiries about the country. The return to England, made desirable by some business affairs (Letters 346, 359, 367), was apparently contemplated as a step towards some of these plans, though he also thought a year later (Letter 403) of settling in Lon- don to bring out a paper with Moore. In truth, he was restless, dissatisfied, and undecided. He shrank from any decided action, from tearing himself from Italy, and, on the other hand, from such a connection with the countess as would cause misery to both unless his passion were more durable than any one, he least of all, could expect. The journey to England was nearly settled, how- ever, when he was delayed by an illness of Allegra, and a touch of malaria in himself. The countess again wrote to him that she was seriously ill, and that her friends would receive him. While actually ready for a start homewards, he suddenly declared that if the clock struck one before some final preparation was ready, he would stay. It struck, and he gave up the journey. He wrote to the countess that he would obey her, though his departure would 534 S IR LESLIE STEPHEN have been best for them all. At Christmas 1819 he was back in Ravenna. He now subsided into an indolent routine, to which he adhered with curious pertinacity. Trelawny describes the day at Pisa soon afterwards, and agrees with Moore, Hunt, Medwin, and Gamba. He rose very late, took a cup of green tea, had a biscuit and soda-water at two, rode out and practised shooting, dined most abstemiously, visited the Gambas in the evening, and re- turned to read or write till two or three in the morning. At Ra- venna previously and afterwards in Greece he kept nearly to the same hours. His rate of composition at this period was surprising. Medwin says that after sitting with Byron till two or three the poet would next day produce fresh work. He discontinued 'Don Juan ' after the fifth canto in disgust at its reception, and in com- pliance with the request of the Countess Guiccioli, who was shocked at its cynicism. In February 1820 he translated the 'Morgante Maggiore;' in March the 'Francesca da Rimini' episode. On 4 April he began his first drama, the 'Marino Faliero,' finished it 1 6 July, and copied it out by 17 Aug. It was produced at Drury Lane the next spring, in spite of his remonstrance, and failed, to his great annoyance. ' Sardanapalus,' begun 13 Jan. 1821, was finished 13 May (the last three acts in a fortnight). The 'Two Foscari' was written between n June and 10 July; 'Cain,' begun on 1 6 July, was finished 9 Sept. The 'Deformed Transformed' was written at the end of the same year. ' Werner,' a mere drama- tisation of Harriet Lee's 'Kruitzner' in the 'Canterbury Tales,' was written between 18 Dec. 1821 and 20 Jan. 1822. The vigorous, though perverse, letters to Bowles on the Pope controversy are also dated 7 Feb. and 25 March 1821. No literary hack could have written more rapidly, and some would have written as well. The dramas thus poured forth at full speed by a thoroughly undra- matic writer, hampered by the wish to preserve the 'unities,' mark (with the exception of ' Cain ') his lowest level, and are often mere prose broken into apparent verse. Count Guiccioli began to give trouble. Byron was warned not to ride in the forest alone for fear of probable assassination. Guic- cioli's long acquiescence had turned public opinion against him, and a demand for separation on account of his ' extraordinary THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 535 usage' of his wife came from her friends. On 12 July a papal decree pronounced a separation accordingly. The countess was to receive 2oo/. a year from her husband, to live under the paternal roof, and only to see Byron under restrictions. She retired to a villa of the Gambas fifteen miles off, where Byron rode out to see her 'once or twice a month,' passing the intervals in 'perfect solitude.' By January 1821, however (Diary, 4 Jan. 1821), she seems to have been back in Ravenna. Byron did all he could (Diary, 24 Jan. 1821, and Letter 374) to prevent her from leaving her husband. Political complications were arising. Italy was seething with the Carbonaro conspiracies. The Gambas were noted liberals. Byron's aristocratic vanity was quite consistent with a conviction of the corruption and political blindness of the class to which he boasted of belonging. The cant, the imbecility, and immorality of the ruling classes at home and abroad were the theme of much of his talk, and inspired his most powerful writing. His genuine hatred of war and pity for human suffering are shown, amidst much affectation, in his loftiest verse. Though no democrat after the fashion of Shelley, he was a hearty detester of the system sup- ported by the Holy alliance. He was ready to be a leader in the revolutionary movements of the time. The walls of Ravenna were placarded with * Up with the republic ! ' and ' Death to the pope!' Young Count Gamba (Teresa's brother) soon after- wards returned to Ravenna, became intimate with Byron, and introduced him to the secret societies. On 8 Dec. 1820 the com- mandant of the troops in Ravenna was mortally wounded in the street. Byron had the man carried into his house at the point of death, and describes the event in 'Don Juan' (v. 34). It was due in some way to the action of the societies. A rising in the Ro- magna was now expected. Byron had offered a subscription of one thousand louis to the constitutional government in Naples, to which the societies looked for support. He had become head of the Americani, a section of the Carbonari (Letter 450), and bought some arms for them, which during the following crisis were suddenly returned to him, and had to be concealed in his house (Diary, 16 and 18 Feb. 1821). An advance of Austrian troops caused a collapse of the whole scheme. A thousand mem- 536 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN bers of the best families in the Roman states were banished (Letter 439), and among them the Gambas. Mme. Guiccioli says that the government hoped by exiling them to get rid of Byron, whose position as an English nobleman made it difficult to reach him directly for his suspected relations with the Carbonari. The countess helped, perhaps was intentionally worked upon, to dis- lodge him. Her husband requested that she should be forced to return to him or placed in a convent. Frightened by the threat, she escaped to her father and brother in Florence. A quarrel in which a servant of Byron's proposed to stiletto an officer made his relations with the authorities very unpleasant. The poor of Ravenna petitioned that the charitable Englishman might be asked to remain, and only increased the suspicions of the government. Byron fell into one of his usual states of in- decision. Shelley, at his request, came from Pisa to consult, and reports him greatly improved in health and morals. He found Byron occupying splendid apartments in the palace of Count Guiccioli. Byron had now, he says, an income of 4,ooo/. a year, and devoted i,ooo/. to charity (the context seems to disprove the variant reading iool.), an expenditure sufficient to explain the feeling at Ravenna mentioned by Mme. Guiccioli. Shelley, by Byron's desire, wrote to the countess, advising her against Switzer- land. In reply she begged Shelley not to leave Ravenna without Byron, and Byron begged him to stay and protect him from a relapse into his old habits. Byron lingered at Ravenna till 29 Oct., still hoping, it seems, for a recall of the Gambas. At last he got in motion, with many sad forebodings, and preceded by his family of monkeys, dogs, cats, and peahens. He met Lord Clare on the way to Bologna, and accompanied Rogers from Bologna. Rogers duly celebrated the meeting in his poem on Italy; but Trelawny (i. 50) tells how Byron grinned sardonically when he saw Rogers seated upon a cushion under which was concealed a bitter satire written by Byron upon Rogers himself (it was after- wards published in 'Fraser,' January 1833). Byron settled in the Casa Lanfranchi at Pisa, an old ghost-haunted palace, which Trelawny contrasted with the cheerful and hospitable abode of the Shelleys (i. 85). The Gambas occupied part of the same palace (HUNT, Byron, i. 23). Byron again saw some English society. THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 537 A silly Irishman named Taaffe, author of a translation of Dante, for which Byron tried to find a publisher, with Medwin, Trelawny, Shelley, and Williams, were his chief associates. Medwin, of the 24th light dragoons, was at Pisa from 30 Nov. 1821 till 15 March 1822, and again for a few days in August. Trelawny, who reached Pisa early in 1822, and was afterwards in constant intercourse with Byron, was the keenest observer who has described him. Trelawny insists upon his own superiority in swimming, and re- gards Byron as an effeminate pretender to masculine qualities. Byron turned his worst side to such a man ; yet Trelawny admits his genuine courage and can do justice to his better qualities. Mme. Guiccioli had withdrawn her prohibition of 'Don Juan' on promise of better behaviour (Letter 500). On 8 Aug. 1822 he has finished three more cantos and is beginning another. Meanwhile 'Cain' (published December 1821) had produced hostile reviews and attacks. Scott had cordially accepted the dedication. Moore's timid remonstrances showed the set of public opinion. When Murray applied for an injunction to protect his property against threatened piracy, Eldon refused; holding (9 Feb. 1822) that the presumption was not in favour of the innocent character of the book. Murray had several manuscripts of Byron in hand, including the famous 'Vision of Judgment;' and this experience increased his caution. Byron began to think of a plan, already suggested to Moore in 1820, of starting a weekly news- paper with a revolutionary title, such as ' I Carbonari. ' In Shelley's society this plan took a new shape. It was proposed to get Leigh Hunt for an editor. In 1813 Byron had visited Hunt when im- prisoned for a libel on the prince regent. Hunt had taken Byron's part in the 'Examiner' in 1816, and had dedicated to him the 'Story of Rimini.' Shelley and Byron now agreed (in spite of Moore's remonstrances against association with ill-bred cockneys) to bring Leigh Hunt to Italy. They assumed that Hunt would retain his connection with the 'Examiner,' of which his brother John was proprietor (see TRELAWNY, ii. 53). Hunt threw up this position without their knowledge, and started for Italy with his wife and six children. Shelley explained to Hunt (26 Aug. 1821) that he was himself to be 'only a sort of link,' neither partner nor sharer in the profits. He sent i5o/., to which Byron, taking 538 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN Shelley's security, added 2ool. to pay Hunt's expenses. Hunt re- proaches Byron as being moved solely by an expectation of large profits (not in itself an immoral motive). The desire to have an organ under his own command, with all consequent advantages, is easily intelligible. When Hunt landed at Leghorn at the end of June 1822, Byron and Shelley found themselves saddled with the whole Hunt family, to be supported by the hypothetical profits of the new journal, while Hunt asserted and acted upon the doctrine that he was under no disgrace in accepting money obligations. Hunt took up his abode on the ground-floor of the palace. His children, says Trelawny, were untamed, while Hunt considers that they behaved admirably and were in danger of corruption from Byron. Trelawny describes Byron as disgusted at the very start and declaring that the journal would be an 'abortion.' His reception of Mrs. Hunt, according to Williams, was 'shameful.' Mrs. Hunt naturally retorted the dislike, and Hunt reported one of her sharp sayings to Byron, in order, as he says, to mortify him. No men could be less congenial. Byron's aristocratic loftiness en- countered a temper forward to take offence at any presumption of inequality. Byron had provided Hunt with lodgings, furnished them decently, and doled out to him about ioo/. through his steward, a proceeding which irritated Hunt, who loved a cheerful giver. Shelley's death (8 July) left the two men face to face in this un- comfortable relation. The 'Liberal,' so named by Byron, survived through four num- bers. It made a moderate profit, which Byron abandoned to Hunt (HUNT, i. 87, ii. 412), but he was disgusted from the outset, and put no heart into the experiment. He told his friends, and probably persuaded himself, that he had engaged in the journal out of kindness to the Hunts, and to help a friend of Shelley's; and takes credit for feeling that he could not turn the Hunts into the street. His chief contributions, the 'Vision of Judgment' and the letter 'To my Grandmother's Review,' appeared in the first number, to the general scandal. 'Heaven and Earth' appeared in the second number, the 'Blues' in the third, the ' Morgante Maggiore ' in the fourth, and a few epigrams were added. Hunt and Hazlitt, who wrote five papers (Memoirs of HazlUt, ii. 73), did most of the remainder, which, however, had clearly THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 539 not the seeds of life in it. The 'Vision of Judgment' was the hardest blow struck in a prolonged and bitter warfare. Byron had met Southey, indeed, at Holland House in 1813, and speaks favourably of him, calls his prose perfect, and professes to envy his personal beauty (Diary, 22 Nov. 1813). His belief that Southey had spread scandalous stories about the Swiss party in 1816 gave special edge to' his revived antipathy. In 1818 he dedi- cated 'Don Juan' to Southey in 'good simple savage verse' (Let- ter 322), bitterly taunting the poet as a venal renegade. In 1821 Southey published his 'Vision of Judgment,' an apotheosis of George III, of grotesque (though most unintentional) profanity. In the preface he alludes to Byron as leader of the 'Satanic school.' Byron in return denounced Southey's -'calumnies' and 'cowardly ferocity.' Southey retorted in the 'Courier' (n Jan. 1822), boast- ing that he had fastened Byron's name 'upon the gibbet for reproach and ignominy, so long as it shall endure.' Medwin (p. 179) describes Byron's fury on reading these courtesies. He instantly sent off a challenge in a letter (6 Feb. 1822) to Douglas Kinnaird, who had the sense to suppress it. His own 'Vision of Judgment,' written by i Oct. 1821, was already in the hands of Murray, now troubled by ' Cain.' Byron now swore that it should be published, and it was finally transferred by Murray to Hunt. Byron meanwhile had been uprooted from Pisa. A silly squabble took place in the street (21 March 1822), in which Byron's servant stabbed an hussar (see depositions in MEDWIN). Byron spent some weeks in the summer at Monte Nero, near Leghorn (where he and Mme. Guiccioli sat to the American painter West), and returned to Pisa in July. About the same time the Gambas were ordered to leave Tuscan territory. Byron's stay at Pisa had been marked by the death of Allegra (20 April) and of Shelley (8 July). Details of the ghastly ceremony of burning the bodies of Williams and Shelley (15 and 16 Aug.) are given by Trelawny, with char- acteristic details of Byron's emotion and hysterical affectation of levity. Shelley, who exaggerated Byron's poetical merits (see his enthusiastic eulogy of the fifth canto of ' Don Juan ' on his visit to Pisa), was kept at a certain distance by his perception of Byron's baser qualities. Byron had always respected Shelley as a man of simple, lofty, and unworldly character, and as undeniably a 540 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN gentleman by birth and breeding. Shelley, according to Trelawny (i. 80), was the only man to whom Byron talked seriously and con- fidentially. He told Moore that Shelley was ' the least selfish and the mildest of men,' and added to Murray that he was 'as perfect a gentleman as ever crossed a drawing-room ' (Letters 482 and 506). He was, however, capable of believing and communicating to Hoppner scandalous stories about the Shelleys and Claire, and of meanly suppressing Mrs. Shelley's confutation of the story (see Mr. Froude in Nineteenth Century, August 1883; and Mr. Jeaffreson's reply in the Athen&um, i and 22 Sept. 1883). Trelawny had stimulated the nautical tastes of Byron and Shelley. Captain Roberts, a naval friend of his at Genoa, built an open boat for Shelley, and a schooner, called the Bolivar, for Byron. Trelawny manned her with five sailors and brought her round to Leghorn. Byron was annoyed by the cost ; knew noth- ing, says Trelawny, of the sea, and could never be induced to take a cruise in her. When Byron left Pisa, after a terrible hubbub of moving his household and his baggage, Trelawny sailed in the Bolivar, Byron's servants following in one felucca, the Hunts in another, Byron travelling by land. They met at Lerici. Byron with Trelawny swam out to the Bolivar, three miles, and back. The effort cost him four days' illness. On his recovery he went to Genoa and settled in the Casa Salucci at Albaro ; the Gambas occupying part of the same house. Trelawny laid up the Bolivar, afterwards sold to Lord Blessington for four hundred guineas (TRELAWNY, i. 62), and early next year went off on a ramble to Rome. Lord and Lady Blessington, with Count d'Orsay, soon afterwards arrived at Genoa ; and Lady Blessington has recorded her conversations with Byron. His talk with her was chiefly senti- mental monologue about himself. Trelawny says that he was a spoilt child; the nickname 'Baby Byron' (given to him, says HUNT, i. 139, by Mrs. Leigh) 'fitted him to a T' (TRELAWNY, i. 56). His waywardness, his strange incontinence of speech, his outbursts of passion, his sensitiveness to all that was said of him come out vividly in these reports. His health was clearly enfeebled. Residence in the swampy regions of Venice and Ravenna had increased his liability to malaria (see Letter 311). His restlessness and indecision grew THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 541 upon him. His passion for Madame Guiccioli had never blinded him to its probable dangers for both. This experience had made him sceptical as to the durability of his passions; especially for a girl not yet of age, and of no marked force of intellect or char- acter. Hunt speaks of a growing coldness, which affected her spirits and which she injudiciously resented. Byron's language to Lady Blessington (BLESSINGTON, pp. 68 and 117) shows that the bonds were acknowledged but no longer cherished. He talked of returning to England, of settling in America, of buying a Greek island, of imitating Lady Hester Stanhope. He desired to restore his self-esteem, wounded by the failure of the ' Liberal.' He had long before (28 Feb. 1817) told Moore that if he lived ten years longer he would yet do something, and declared that he did not think literature his vocation. He still hoped to show himself a man of action instead of a mere dreamer and dawdler. The Greek committee was formed in London in the spring of 1823, and Tre- lawny wrote to one of the members, Blaquiere, suggesting Byron's name. Blaquiere was soon visiting Greece for information, and called upon Byron in his way. The committee had unanimously elected him a member. Byron was flattered and accepted. His old interest in Greece increased his satisfaction at a proposal which fell in with his mood. He at once told the committee (12 May) that his first wish was to go to the Levant. Though the scheme gave Byron an aim and excited his imagination, he still hesitated, and with reason. Weak health and military inexperience were bad qualifications for the leader of a revolt. Captain Roberts con- veyed messages and counter messages from Byron to Trelawny for a time. At last (22 June -1823) Trelawny heard from Byron, who had engaged a 'collier-built tub' of 120 tons, called the Her- cules, for his expedition and summoned Trelawny's help. Byron had taken leave of the Blessingtons with farewell presents, fore- bodings, and a burst of tears. He took 10,000 crowns in specie, 40,000 in bills, and a large supply of medicine ; Trelawny, young Gamba, Bruno, an 'unfledged medical student,' and several servants, including Fletcher. He had prepared three helmets with his crest, 'Crede Byron,' for Trelawny, Gamba, and himself; and afterwards begged from Trelawny a negro servant and a smart military jacket. They sailed from Genoa on Tuesday, 15 July; 542 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN a gale forced them to return and repair damages. They stayed two days at Leghorn, and were joined by Mr. Hamilton Browne. Here, too, Byron received a copy of verses from Goethe, who had inserted a complimentary notice of Byron in the 'Kunst und Alterthum,' and to whom Byron had dedicated 'Werner.' By Browne's advice they sailed for Cephalonia, where Sir C. J. Napier was in command and known to sympathise with the Greeks. Trelawny says that he was never ' on shipboard with a better com- panion.' Byron's spirits revived at sea; he was full of fun and practical jokes; read Scott, Swift, Grimm, Rochefoucauld; chatted pleasantly, and talked of describing Stromboli in a fifth canto of 'Childe Harold.' On 2 Aug. they sighted Cephalonia. They found that Napier was away, and that Blaquiere had left for England. Byron began to fancy that he had been used as a decoy, and declared that he must see his way plainly before mov- ing. Napier soon returned, and the party was warmly received by the residents. Information from Greece was scarce and doubt- ful. Trelawny resolved to start with Browne, knowing, he says, that Byron, once on shore, would again become dawdling and shilly-shallying. Byron settled at a village called Metaxata, near Argostoli, and remained there till 27 Dec. Byron's nerve was evidently shaken. He showed a strange irritability and nervousness (TRELAWNY, ii. 116). He wished to hear of some agreement among the divided and factious Greek chiefs before trusting himself among them. The Cephalonian Greeks, according to Trelawny, favoured the election of a foreign king, and Trelawny thought that Byron was really impressed by the possibility of receiving a crown. Byron hinted to Parry afterwards of great offers which had been made to him. Fancies of this kind may have passed through his mind. Yet his general judgment of the situation was remarkable for its strong sense. His cynical tendencies at least kept him free from the enthusiasts' illusions, and did not damp his zeal. In Cephalonia Byron had some conversations upon religious topics with Dr. Kennedy, physician of the garrison. Kennedy reported them in a book, in which he unfortunately thought more of expounding his argument than of reporting Byron. Byron had, in fact, no settled views. His heterodoxy did not rest upon reason- THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 543 ing, but upon sentiment. He was curiously superstitious through life, and seems to have preferred Catholicism to other religions. Lady Byron told Crabb Robinson (5 March 1855) that Byron had been made miserable by the gloomy Calvinism from which, she said, he had never freed himself. Some passages in his letters, and the early ' Prayer to Nature ' an imitation of Pope's ' Uni- versal Prayer ' seem to imply a revolt from the doctrines to which Lady Byron referred. 'Cain,' his most serious utterance, clearly favours the view that the orthodox theology gave a repulsive or a nugatory answer to the great problems. But, in truth, Byron's scepticism was part of his quarrel with cant. He hated the re- ligious dogma as he hated the political creed and the social system of the respectable world. He disavowed sympathy with Shelley's opinions, and probably never gave a thought to the philosophy in which Shelley was interested. Trelawny was now with Odysseus and the chiefs of Eastern Greece. Prince Mavrocordato, the most prominent of the Western Greeks, had at last occupied Missolonghi. Byron sent Colonel Stanhope (afterwards Lord Harrington), a representative of the Greek committee, with a letter to Mavrocordato and another to the general government (2 Dec. and 30 Nov. 1823), insisting upon the necessity of union ; and on 28 Dec. sailed himself, on the en- treaty of Mavrocordato and Stanhope. The voyage was hazard- ous. Gamba's ship was actually seized by a Turkish man-of- war, and he owed his release to the lucky accident that his captain had once saved the Turkish captain's life. Byron, in a 'mistico,' took shelter under some rocks called the Scrophes. Thence, with some gunboats sent to their aid, they reached Missolonghi, in spite of a gale, in which Byron showed great coolness. Byron was heartily welcomed. Mavrocordato was elected governor-general. Attempts were made to organise troops. Byron took into his pay a body of five hundred disorderly Suliotes. He met thickening difficulties with unexpected temper, firmness, and judgment. Demands for money came from all sides ; Byron told Parry that he had been asked for fifty thousand dollars in a day. He raised sums on his own credit, and urged the Greek committee to provide a loan. His indignation when Gamba spent too much upon some red cloth was a comic exhibition of his usual economy hardly 544 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN unreasonable under the circumstances. His first object was an expedition against Lepanto, held, it was said, by a weak garrison ready to come over. At the end of January he was named com- mander-in-chief. His wild troops were utterly unprovided with the stores required for an assault. The Greek committee had sent two mountain guns, with ammunition, and some English artisans under William Parry, a 'rough burly fellow' (TRELAWNY, ii. 149), who had been a clerk at Woolwich. Parry after a long voyage reached Missolonghi on 5 Feb. 1824. In the book to which he gave his name, and for which he supplied materials, he professes to have received Byron's confidence. Byron called him 'old boy,' laughed at his sea slang, his ridiculous accounts of Bentham (one of the Greek committee), and played practical jokes upon him. Parry landed his stores, set his artisans to work, and gave himself military airs. The Suliotes became mutinous. They demanded com- missions, says Gamba, for 150 out of three or four hundred men. Byron, disgusted, threatened to discharge them all, and next day, 15 Feb., they submitted. The same day Byron was seized with an alarming fit the doctors disputed whether epileptic or apo- plectic ; but in any case so severe that Byron said he should have died in another minute. Half an hour later a false report was brought that the Suliotes were rising to seize the magazine. Next day, while Byron was still suffering from the disease and the leeches applied by the doctors, who could hardly stop the bleeding, a tumultuous mob of Suliotes broke into his room. Stanhope says that the courage with which he awed the mutineers was 'truly sublime.' On the iyth a Turkish brig came ashore, and was burned by the Turks after Byron had prepared an attack. On the i gth a quarrel arose between the Suliotes and the guards of the arsenal, and a Swedish officer, Sasse, was killed. The English artificers, alarmed at discovering that shooting was, as Byron says, a 'part of housekeeping' in these parts, insisted on leaving for peaceable regions. The Suliotes became intolerable, and were induced to leave the town on receiving a month's wages from Byron, and part of their arrears from government. All hopes of an expedition to Lepanto vanished. Parry had brought a printing-press, though he had not brought some greatly desired rockets. Stanhope, an ardent disciple of THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 545 Bentham's, started a newspaper, and talked of Lancasterian schools, and other civilising apparatus, including a converted blacksmith with a cargo of tracts. Byron had many discussions with him. Stanhope produced Bentham's 'Springs of Action' as a new pub- lication, when Byron 'stamped with his lame foot,' and said that he did not require lessons upon that subject. Though Trelawny says that Stanhope's free press was of eminent service, Byron may be pardoned for thinking that the Greeks should be freed from the Turks first, and converted to Benthamism afterwards. He was annoyed by articles in the paper, which advocated revo- lutionary principles and a rising in Hungary, thinking that an alienation of the European powers would destroy the best chance of the Greeks (To Barff, 10 March 1824). He hoped, he said, that the writers' brigade would be ready before the soldiers' press. The discussions, however, were mutually respectful, and Byron ended a talk by saying to Stanhope, 'Give me that honest right hand,' and begging to be judged by his actions, not by his words. Other plans were now discussed. Stanhope left for Athens at the end of February. Odysseus, with whom was Trelawny, pro- posed a conference with Mavrocordato and Byron at Salona. Byron wrote agreeing to this proposal 19 March. He had de- clined to answer an offer of the general government to appoint him ' governor-general of Greece ' until the meeting should be over. The prospects of the loan were now favourable. Byron was trying, with Parry's help, to fortify Missolonghi and get together some kind of force. His friends were beginning to be anxious about the effects of the place on his health. Barff offered him a country-house in Cephalonia. Byron replied that he felt bound to stay while he could. ' There is a stake worth millions such as I am.' Missolonghi, with its swamps, meanwhile, was a mere fever- trap. The mud, says Gamba, was so deep in the gateway that an unopposed enemy would have found entrance difficult. Byron's departure was hindered by excessive rains. He starved himself as usual. Moore says that he measured himself round the wrist and waist almost daily, and took a strong dose if he thought his size increasing. He rode out when he could with his body-guard of fifty or sixty Suliotes, but complained of frequent weakness and dizziness. Parry in vain commended his panacea, brandy. Tre- 2N 546 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN lawny had started in April with a letter from Stanhope, entreating him to leave Missolonghi and not sacrifice his health, and perhaps his life, in that bog. Byron produced his last poem on the morning of his birthday, in which the hero is struggling to cast off the dandy with partial suc- cess. He had tried to set an example of generous treatment of an enemy by freeing some Turkish prisoners at Missolonghi. A lively little girl called Hato or Hatagee, who was amongst them, wished to stay with him, and he resolved to adopt her. A letter from Mrs. Leigh, found by Trelawny among his papers, contained a transcript from a letter of Lady Byron's to her with an account of Ada's health. An unfinished reply from Byron (23 Feb. 1824) asked whether Lady Byron would permit Hatagee to become a companion to Ada. Lady Byron, he adds, should be warned of Ada's resemblance to himself in his infancy, and he suggests that the epilepsy may be hereditary. He afterwards decided to send Hatagee for the time to Dr. Kennedy. On 9 April he re- ceived news of Mrs. Leigh's recovery from an illness and good accounts of Ada. On the same day he rode out with Gamba, was caught in the rain, insisted upon returning in an open boat, and was seized with a shivering fit. His predisposition to malaria, aided by his strange system of diet, had produced the result anticipated by Stanhope. He rode out next day, but the fever continued. The doctors had no idea beyond bleeding, to which he submitted with great reluctance, and Parry could only suggest brandy. The attendants were ignorant of each other's language, and seem to have lost their heads. On the i8th he was delirious. At intervals he was conscious and tried to say something to Fletcher about his sister, his wife, and daughter. A strong ' antispasmodic potion' was given to him in the evening. About six he said, ' Now I shall go to sleep,' and fell into a slumber which, after twenty-four hours, ended in death on the evening of 19 April. Trelawny arrived on the 24th or 25th, having heard of the death on his journey. He entered the room where the corpse was lying, and, sending Fletcher for a glass of water, uncovered the feet. On Fletcher's return he wrote upon paper, spread on the coffin, the servant's account of his master's last illness. Byron's body was sent home to England, and after lying in THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 547 state for two days was buried at Hucknall Torkard (see Edin- burgh Review for April 1871 for Hobhouse's account of the funeral). The funeral procession was accidentally met by Lady Caroline Lamb and her husband. She fainted on being made aware that it was Byron's. Her mind became more affected ; she was separated from her husband; and died 26 Jan. 1828, generously cared for by him to the last. (For Lady Caroline Lamb see LADY MORGAN, Memoirs, i. 200-14; Annual Obituary for 1828; Mr. TOWNSHEND MAYER in Temple Bar for June 1868; LORD LYTTON, Memoirs, vol. i. ; PAUL, Life of Godwin, vol. ii.) Lady Byron afterwards led a retired life. Her daughter Ada was married to the Earl of Lovelace 8 July 1835, and died 29 Nov. 1852. She is said to have been a good mathematician. A por- trait of her is in Bentley's 'Miscellany' for 1853. Lady Byron settled ultimately at Brighton, where she became a warm admirer and friend of F. W. Robertson. She took an interest in the reli- gious questions of the day, and spent a large part of her income in charity. Miss Martineau (Biographical Sketches, 1868) speaks of her with warm respect, and some of her letters will be found in Crabb Robinson's diary. Others (see HOWITT'S letter in Daily News, 4 Sept. 1869) thought her pedantic and over strict. She died 1 6 May 1860. Mme. Guiccioli returned to her husband; she married the Marquis de Boissy in 1851 and died at Florence in March 1873. The following appears to be a full list of original portraits of Byron (for fuller details see article by Mr. R. EDGCUMBE and Mr. A. GRAVES in Notes and Queries, 6th series, vi. 422, 472, vii. 269). Names of proprietors added: i. Miniature by Kaye at the age of seven. 2. Full-length in oils by Sanders; engraved in standard edition of Moore's life (Lady Dorchester). 3. Miniature by same from the preceding (engraving destroyed at Byron's request). 4. Half-length by Westall, 1814 (Lady Burdett-Coutts). 5. Half- length by T. Phillips, 1814 (Mr. Murray); engraved by Agar, R. Graves, Lupton, Mote, Warren, Edwards, and C. Armstrong. 6. Miniature by Holmes, 1815 (Mr. A. Morrison); engraved by R. Graves, Ryall, and H. Meyer. 7. Bust in marble by Thorwaldsen, 1816 (Lady Dorchester); replicas at Milan and elsewhere. 8. Half-length by Harlowe, 1817; engraved by 548 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN H. Meyer, Holl, and Scriven. 9. Miniature by Prepiani, 1817, and another by the same; given to Mrs. Leigh. 10. Miniature in water-colours of Byron in college robes by Gilchrist about 1807-8; at Newstead. n. Half-length in Albanian dress by T. Phillips, R. A. (Lord Lovelace); replica in National Portrait Gallery; engraved by Finden. 12. Pencil Sketch by G. Cattermole from memory (Mr. Toone). 13. Medallion by A. Stothard. 14. Bust by Bartolini, 1822 (Lord Malmesbury) ; lithographed by Fro- mentin. 15. Half-length by West (Mr. Horace Kent); engraved by C. Turner, Engleheart, and Robinson. 16. Three sketches by Count d'Orsay, 1823; one at South Kensington. 17. Statue by Thorwaldsen, finished 1834. This statue was ordered from Thorwaldsen in 1829 by Hobhouse in the name of a committee. Thorwaldsen produced it for i,ooo/. It was refused by Dean Ireland for Westminster Abbey, and lay in the custom-house vaults till 1842, when it was again refused by Dean Tinton. In 1843 Whewell, having just become master of Trinity, accepted it for the college, and it was placed in the library (Correspondence in Notes and Queries, 6th ser. iv. 421). 18. A silhouette cut in paper by Mrs. Leigh Hunt is prefixed to 'Byron and some of his Contem- poraries/ Byron's works appeared as follows: i. 'Hours of Idleness' (see above for a notice of first editions). 2. 'English Bards and Scotch Reviewers' (Cawthorne) (for full details of editions see Notes and Queries, 5th ser. vii. 145, 204, 296, 355). 3. 'Imitations and Translations, together with original poems never before pub- lished, collected by J. C. Hobhouse, Trinity College, Cambridge' (1809) (contains nine poems by Byron, reprinted in works, among 'occasional pieces,' 1807-8 and 1808-10). 4. 'Childe Harold, a Romaunt,' 4to, 1812 (an appendix of twenty poems, including those during his travels and those addressed to Thyrza). 5. 'The Curse of Minerva' (anonymous; privately printed in a thin quarto in 1812 (Lowndes) ; at Philadelphia in 1815, 8vo; Paris (Galignani), 1 2 mo, 1818; and imperfect copies in Hone's 'Domestic Poems' and in later collections). 6. 'The Waltz' (anonymous), 1813 (again in Works, 1824). 7. 'The Giaour, a Fragment of a Turk- ish Tale,' 1813, 8vo. 8. 'The Bride of Abydos, a Turkish Tale,' 1813, 8vo. 9. 'The Corsair, a Tale,' 1814, 8vo (to this THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 549 were added the lines, 'Weep, daughter of a royal line,' omitted in some copies; see Letters of 22 Jan. and 10 Feb. 1814). 10. 'Ode to Napoleon Buonaparte' (anonymous), 8vo, 1814. n. 'Lara, a Tale,' 1814, 8vo (originally published with Rogers's 'Jacqueline'). 12. 'Hebrew Melodies,' 1815 (lines on Sir Peter Parker appended); also with music by Braham and Nathan in folio. 13. 'Siege of Corinth,' 1816, 8vo. 14. 'Parisina,' 1816, 8vo (this and the last together in second edition, 1816). 15. 'Poems by Lord Byron' (Murray), 1816, 8vo ('When all around,' 'Bright be the place of thy soul,' 'When we two parted,' 'There's not a joy,' 'There be none of beauty's daughters,' 'Fare thee well;' poems from the French and lines to Rogers). The original of 'Bright be the place of thy soul,' by Lady Byron, corrected by Lord Byron, is in the Morrison MSS. 16. 'Poems on his Domestic Circumstances by Lord Byron,' Hone, 1816 (includes a 'Sketch,' and in later editions a ' Farewell to Malta ' and ' Curse of Minerva ' (mutilated); a twenty-third edition in 1817. It also includes 'O Shame to thee, Land of the Gaul,' and ' Mme. Lavalette,' which, with an 'Ode to St. Helena,' 'Farewell to England,' 'On his Daughter's Birthday,' and 'The Lily of France,' are disowned by Byron in letter to Murray 22 July 1816, but are reprinted in some later unauthorised editions. 17. 'Prisoner of Chillon, and other Poems,' 1816, 8vo (sonnet to Lake Leman, 'Though the day of my destiny's over,' 'Darkness,' ' Churchhill's Grave,' the 'Dream,' the 'Incantation ' (from Manfred), 'Prometheus'). 18. 'Childe Harold's Pilgrimage,' canto iii., 1816, 8vo. 19. 'Monody on the Death of Sheridan' (anonymous), 1816, 8vo. 20. 'Manfred, a Dramatic Poem,' 1817, 8vo. 21. 'The Lament of Tasso,' 8vo, 1817. 22. ' Childe Harold's Pilgrimage,' canto iv., 1818 (the Alhama ballad and sonnet from Vittorelli appended). 23. 'Beppo, a Venetian Story' (anonymous in early editions), 1818, 8vo. 24. 'Suppressed Poems' (Galignani), 1818, 8vo ('English Bards and Scotch Reviewers,' 'Land of the Gaul,' 'Windsor Poetics, a Sketch'). 25. Three Poems not included in the works of Lord Byron (Effingham Wilson), 1818, 8vo ('Lines to Lady J[ersey];' 'Enigma on H.,' often erroneously attributed to Byron, really by Miss Fanshawe; 'Curse of Minerva,' fragmentary). 26. 'Mazeppa,' 1819 (fragment of the 'Vampire' novel appended). 550 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN 27. 'Marino Faliero,' 1820. 28. 'The Prophecy of Dante,' 1821 (with 'Marino Faliero'), 8vo. 29. ' Sardanapalus, a Tragedy;' ' The Two Foscari, a Tragedy ; ' ' Cain, a Mystery ' (in one volume, 8vo), 1821. 30. 'Letter ... on the Rev. W. L. Bowles's Stric- tures on Pope,' 1821. 31. 'Werner, a Tragedy' (J. Hunt), 1822, 8vo. 32. 'The Liberal' (J. Hunt), 1823, 8vo (No. I. 'Vision of Judgment,' 'Letter to the Editor of my Grandmother's Review/ 'Epigrams on Castlereagh.' No. II. 'Heaven and Earth.' No. III. 'The Blues.' No. IV. 'Morgante Maggiore'). 33. 'The Age of Bronze' (anonymous) (J. Hunt), 1823, 8vo. 34. 'The Island' (J. Hunt), 1823, 8vo. 35. 'The Deformed Transformed' (J. & H. L. Hunt), 1824, 8vo. 36. 'Don Juan' (cantos i. and ii. 'printed by Thomas Davison,' 4to, 1819; cantos iii., iv., and v. (Davison), 8vo, 1821; cantos vi., vii., and viii. (for Hunt & Clarke), 8vo, 1823; cantos ix., x., and xi. (for John Hunt), 8vo, 1823; cantos xii., xiii., and xiv. (John Hunt), 8vo, 1823; cantos xv. and xvi. (John & H. L. Hunt), 8vo, 1824), all anonymous. A iyth canto (1829) is not by Byron; and 'twenty suppressed stanzas' (1838) are also spurious. Murray published from i8i5toi8i7a collective edition of works up to those dates in eight volumes i2mo; other collective editions in five volumes 16 mo, 1817 ; and an edition in eight volumes 16 mo, 1818-20. In 1824 was published an 8vo volume by Knight & Lacy, called vol. v. of Lord Byron's works, including 'Hours of Idleness,' 'English Bards and Scotch Reviewers,' the 'Waltz,' and various minor poems, several of the spurious poems mentioned under Hone's domestic pieces, and 'To Jessy,' a copy of which is in Egerton MS. 2332, assent to 'Literary Recreations.' In 1824 and 1825 the Hunts also published two volumes uniform with the above and called vols. vi. and vii. of Lord Byron's works, including the poems (except 'Don Juan') published by them separately as above, and in 'The Liberal.' In 1828 Murray published an edition of the works in four volumes 12 mo. Uni- form with this were published two volumes by J. F. Dove, in- cluding 'Don Juan' (the whole) and the various pieces in Knight & Lacy's volume, with 'Lines to Lady Caroline Lamb,' 'On my Thirty-sixth Birthday,' and the lines 'And wilt thou weep?' There are various French collections: in 1825 Baudry & Amyot THE LIFE OF LORD BYRON 551 published an 8vo edition in seven volumes at Paris, with a life by J. W. Lake, including all the recognised poems, the letter to Bowles, and the parliamentary speeches (separately printed in London in 1824). Galignani published one- volume 8vo editions in 1828 (with life by Lake), in 1831 (same life abridged), and 1835 (with life by Henry Lytton Bulwer, M.P.). To the edition of 1828 were appended twenty-one 'attributed poems,' including 'Remember thee, remember thee,' the 'Triumph of the Whale' (by Charles Lamb, CRABB ROBINSON, Diary (1872), i. 175), and 'Remind me not, remind me not.' Most of these were omitted in the edition of 1831, which included (now first printed) the 'Hints from Horace,' of which fragments are given in Moore's 'Life' (1830). The collected 'Life and Works' published by Murray (1832- 5), 8vo, includes all the recognised poems, and adds to the fore- going works a few 'published for the first time' (including the second letter to Bowles, and the 'Observations on Observations'), and several poems which had appeared in other works: 'River that rollest,' &c., from Medwin (1824); 'Verses on his Thirty-sixth Birthday,' from Gamba (1824) ; 'And thou wert sad' and 'Could love for ever,' from Lady Blessington; 'I speak not, I wail not;' 'In the valley of waters;' 'They say that hope is happiness,' from Nathan's 'Fugitive Pieces,' &c. (1829); 'To my son,' 'Epistle to a friend,' 'My sister, my sweet sister,' 'Could I lament,' the 'Devil's Drive,' and many trifles from Moore's 'Life' (1830). This edition, which has been reprinted in the same form and in one volume royal 8vo, is the most convenient. THE LIFE OF PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY RICHARD GARNETT [From the Dictionary of National Biography.] SHELLEY, PERCY BYSSHE (1792-1822), poet, was born at Field Place, Warnham, near Horsham, on 4 Aug. 1792, and was the eldest son of Timothy, afterwards Sir Timothy Shelley, bart, and of his wife Elizabeth, daughter of Charles Pilfold. The family, an offshoot of the Shelleys of Michelgrove, had been transplanted 552 RICHARD GARNETT for a time to America, in the person of Percy's great-grandfather Timothy, whose son Bysshe, returning at an early age, made the fortune of his house by two successive runaway matches, the first with Mary Catherine, daughter of the Rev. Theobald Michell of Horsham. Percy's father (b. 1753) was the offspring of this marriage. Bysshe Shelley, who is described as handsome, enter- prising, and not over-scrupulous, dignified in appearance and manners, but addicted to inferior company, survived his grand- son's birth by twenty-two years. He was a warm supporter of the Duke of Norfolk's interest in the county, and, upon the brief return of the whigs to office in 1816, was rewarded with a baronetcy, 'the whim,' according to a local rhymer, 'of his son Tim.' Timothy Shelley's character is fairly given by Professor Dowden : 'He had a better heart than his father, and not so clear a head. A kindly, pompous, capricious, well-meaning, ill-doing, wrong- headed man.' His letters evince singular confusion, both of thought and expression. The accounts of Shelley's mother are somewhat contradictory, except as regards the beauty which all her children derived from her, and the facility of composition which became the special inheritance of Percy. It is important to re- mark that the family was not, as sometimes assumed, tory, but pronouncedly whig, and that Shelley would grow up with an addic- tion to liberty in the abstract and with no special aversion to the revolution. Shelley received his first instruction from the Rev. Thomas Edwards of Horsham. At ten he was transferred to Sion House academy, Brentford, kept by the Rev. Dr. Greenlaw, a bad middle- class school, which nevertheless profoundly influenced him in two ways. The persecutions which the shy, sensitive boy under- went from his schoolfellows inspired him with the horror of op- pression and indomitable spirit of resistance which actuated his whole life; and the scientific instruction he received, though little more than a pretence in itself, awoke a passionate desire to pene- trate the secrets of nature. It may almost be said that science was to Shelley what abstract thought was to Coleridge, and that the main peculiarity of the genius of each resulted from the thirst for discovery becoming engrafted upon a temperament originally most unscientifically prone to the romantic and marvellous. THE LIFE OF PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 553 Eton, whither Shelley went at the age of twelve, repeated the ex- perience of Sion House on a larger scale. Here, again, his torment was the persecution of his schoolfellows, and his consolation scientific research conducted agreeably to his own notions. He destroyed an old willow with a burning-glass, and, endeavouring to raise the devil, succeeded so far as to raise a tutor. Many other tales of his residence at Eton are probably legendary, but there is no doubt of the influence exerted upon him by the benevolent physician James Lind (1736-1817) [q.v.], whom he has celebrated as the hermit in 'The Revolt of Islam.' He w r as nicknamed 'Mad Shelley,' or 'Shelley the Atheist,' and he was known among his schoolfellows for a habit of ' cursing his father and the king.' He was no inapt scholar, and his progress in the classics eventually made him acquainted with Pliny's 'Natural History/ the first two books of which exercised a strong influence upon his theological opinions. His literary instincts also awoke ; and while at Eton (at the age of sixteen) he not only wrote but published his romance of 'Zastrozzi,' a boy's crude imitation of Mrs. Radcliffe's style. Somewhat later he composed another romance in the same manner, 'St. Irvyne, or the Rosicrucian,' which was also published (in 1810); joined his cousin, Thomas Medwin [q.v.], in writing a poem on the 'Wandering Jew,' which found no publisher at the time, but eventually appeared in 'Eraser's Magazine;' and in conjunction, as is probable, either with his sister Elizabeth or with his cousin, Harriet Grove to whom he was, or thought himself, attached published in 1810 'Original Poetry by Victor and Cazire,' which he withdrew on discovering that his coadjutor had cribbed wholesale from Matthew Gregory Lewis. A hundred copies are said to have been puHnto circulation, but not one has ever come to light. Another early poem, 'A Poetical View of the Existing State of Things,' published anonymously while he was at Oxford, has also disappeared. Shelley matriculated at University College, Oxford, on 10 April 1810, and commenced residence at the Michaelmas term follow- ing. Oxford might have been a happy residence for him had he not brought along with him not only the passion for research into whatever the university did not desire him to learn, and the panthe- ism, miscalled by himself and others atheism, which he had imbibed 554 RICHARD GARNETT from Pliny, but also a spirit of aggressive propaganda. Of this he afterwards cured himself, but at the time it was certain to involve him in collision with authorities whom he had indeed no great reason to respect, but of whose real responsibility for his behaviour he took no proper account. This trait was no doubt encouraged by the intimacy he contracted with Thomas Jefferson Hogg [q.v.], a man of highly original character entirely dissimilar to his own, whose sketch of him during the Oxford period is the most vivid, and probably the most accurate, portrait of the youthful Shelley (cf. C. K. SHARPE, Letters, i. 37, 444). Hogg's sarcastic humour encouraged, if it did not prompt, Shelley to such dangerous freaks as composing and circulating, in conjunction with his friend, a pamphlet of burlesque verses gravely attributed to Margaret Nicholson [q.v.], a mad woman who had attempted to kill the king (Posthumous Fragments of Margaret Nicholson, Oxford, 1810); and afterwards submitting a printed syllabus of arguments, sup- posed to demonstrate 'The Necessity of Atheism,' to the bishops and heads of colleges. The authorities summoned Shelley before them on the morning of 25 March 1811, and, upon his refusal to answer interrogatories, delivered to him a sentence of expulsion, which had been signed and sealed in anticipation. Hogg's generous protest brought a similar sentence upon himself. Shelley's expulsion was rather favourable than otherwise to the development of his genius, but involved him in the greatest mis- fortune of his life, his imprudent marriage. Excluded from home, he took rooms in London, at 15 Poland Street, and frequented the hospitals, with the idea of ultimately becoming a physician. While in town he renewed the slight acquaintance he had already formed with Harriet Westbrook, the daughter of an hotel-keeper retired from business, and a feJlow pupil of Shelley's sisters at a school in Clapham. A schoolgirl verging on sixteen, she thought herself persecuted ; Shelley sympathised, and interfered sufficiently to give her some apparent claim upon him ; and when in July he retired to his cousin's country house at Cwm Elan in Radnorshire, letter after letter came from Harriet complaining of the oppres- sions she underwent, and threatening to commit suicide. Shelley hastened back to town, saw her, commiserated her appearance, and under the influence of compassion and embittered feeling at THE LIFE OF PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 555 his own renunciation by Harriet Grove, who had rejected him before his expulsion from Oxford, committed the weakest action of his life in engaging to marry her. They fled northward, and were wedded in Edinburgh on 28 Aug. 1811. It seems unlikely that Harriet's father should have had any violent objection to his daughter marrying the eventual heir to a baronetcy; and it is no unreasonable conjecture that the transaction was, in fact, ar- ranged by Harriet's family. If so, however, Harriet was certainly an innocent tool. Pleasing in appearance, fairly well educated, good-mannered and good-humoured as she was, an ordinary man might have promised himself much happiness with her; and indeed, until the affection which she originally felt for Shelley had become indifference, the marriage might have passed for fortunate. His own feelings when it was contracted, and for some time afterwards, are portrayed in his letters to Miss Kitchener, a Sussex school- mistress, then the object of his ardent intellectual admiration. Shelley's varied adventures for the next three years are unim- portant in comparison with the phenomenon in the background, the silent growth of his mind. In the winter of 1811-1812 he lived chiefly at Keswick, where he met with the kindest reception from Southey, where he opened his momentous correspondence with Godwin, whose 'Political Justice' had deeply impressed him, and whence, in February, he departed on the most quixotic of his undertakings, an expedition to redress the wrongs of Ireland. He spoke at meetings, wrote 'An Address to the Irish People' (1812) and 'Proposals for an Association for the Regeneration of Ireland,' and in April departed for Wales, leaving things as he had found them. About this time he adopted the vegetarian system of diet, to which he adhered with more or less constancy when in England, but seems to have generally discarded when abroad. He spent the early summer at his old haunt of Cwm Elan, and by the end of June was settled at Lynmouth in North Devon, where he wrote his powerful remonstrance with Lord Ellenborough on the condemnation of Daniel Isaac Eaton for publishing the third part of Paine's 'Age of Reason' (Barnstaple, 1812, 8vo). He excited the attention of government by sending a revolutionary 'Declaration of Rights' [Dublin, 1812], and his poem 'The Devil's Walk' (a broadsheet, of which the only known 556 RICHARD GANNETT copy is in the Public Record Office) to sea in boxes and bottles. Finding it advisable to disappear, he took refuge at Tanyrallt, a house near Tremadoc in North Wales, where his landlord, Mr. Madocks, M.P. for Boston, was constructing the embankment which, at a great sacrifice of natural picturesqueness, has redeemed from the sea the estuary of the Glaslyn. The work was battered by storms, and its financial situation was precarious. Shelley hurried up to London to raise money on its behalf, and there made the personal acquaintance of Godwin, who had previously come down to visit him at Lynmouth, and ' found only that he was not to be found.' His residence at Tanyrallt was terminated by a mysterious occurrence in the following February, which he rep- resented as the attack of an assassin, but which was in all pro- bability an hallucination. He sought refuge in Ireland with his family, which had for some time included Harriet's elder sister Eliza, an addition pernicious to his domestic peace. Leaving her at Killarney 'with plenty of books but no money,' Shelley and Harriet travelled up to London, where on 28 June 1813, their daughter lanthe (afterwards Mrs. Esdaile, d. 1876) was born. By the end of July they had taken a house at Bracknell in Berk- shire, near Windsor Forest. ' Queen Mab,' principally written, as would seem, in 1812, was privately printed about this time ('Queen Mab: A Philosophical Poem,' London, 1813, 8vo), with notes that might very well have been spared, including 'a vindication of natural diet' (the 'Vindication' was separately printed London, 1813, 8vo, but is excessively rare). It remained unknown until a piratical reproduction of it in 1821 (which Shelley vainly endeavoured to suppress by an injunction) excited attention, and it obtained a celebrity long denied to his maturer and more truly poetical writings. It is indeed admirably adapted to serve as a freethinking and socialistic gospel, being couched in a strain of rhetoric so exalted as to pass easily for poetry. Early in 1814 he published anonymously an ironical 'Refutation of Deism' in a dialogue (London, 8vo), perhaps the rarest of his writings; it was, however, reprinted in 1815 in the 'Theological Inquirer.' Shelley was now on the eve of the great crisis of his life, his separa- tion from Harriet. So late as September 1813 he speaks of their 'close-woven happiness.' But radical incompatibility of tern- THE LIFE OF PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 557 perament had already laid the foundation of an estrangement. Hogg, writing of January 1814, says: 'The good Harriet was now in full force, vigour, and effect; roseate as ever, at times perhaps rather too rosy. She had entirely relinquished her favourite practice of reading aloud . . . neither did she read much to her- self ; her studies, which had been so constant and exemplary, had dwindled away, and Bysshe had ceased to express any interest in them, and to urge her, as of old, to devote herself to the culti- vation of her mind. When I called upon her, she proposed a walk . . . the walk commonly conducted us to some fashionable bonnet- shop." These ominous details are followed by a pathetic letter from Shelley, dated 16 March, deploring the ruin of his domestic happiness and the desolation of his home, from which he has been absent for a month. In these circumstances it is preposterous to attribute the estrangement to Shelley's passion for Mary Godwin, whom, except perhaps casually as a girl, he had not even seen. Nor is there any reason to impugn Harriet's conjugal fidelity; her attachment had involuntarily decayed, and her tastes and habits had rendered Shelley's society uncongenial to her. None would affirm that the youth of twenty either exercised the patience or made the efforts which he ought to have done, yet he was far from acting with the precipitancy commonly attributed to him. He seems to have foreseen that a separation might ensue ; for on 23 March Harriet, hitherto only united to him by a Scots ceremony, was remarried with the rites of the church of England, thus secur- ing her legal status in any event. But so late as May, some time after his meeting with Mary Godwin, he is found pleading in pathetic verse for the restoration of Harriet's affections; and his lines to Mary a month later, though betraying great agitation of mind, are not those of one who is or wishes to be an accepted lover. But matters were evidently tending this way, and the crisis was precipitated by Harriet's ill-judged step of leaving her home and retiring with her child to her father's house at Bath towards the end of June. She speedily saw her error, but it was too late. Shelley seems to have summoned her to town about 14 July, and after several interviews between them, partly relating no doubt to the 'deeds and settlements' mentioned in subsequent corre- spondence, he quitted England with Mary Godwin on 28 July. 558 RICHARD GARNETT They took with them Jane Clairmont [q. v.], a daughter by her first marriage of Mary Godwin's stepmother, a most imprudent step and the source of many calumnies. The fugitives crossed the Channel in an open boat, hastened to Paris, and made their way through the eastern provinces of France, still black with the devastation of war, to Switzerland, where they hoped to find a permanent abode. On the way Shelley wrote to Harriet, proposing that she should join them, a project sufficiently repellent, but indicating that Shelley had parted with his wife on terms that, in his eyes at any rate, rendered friendly relations possible. Residence in Switzerland, however, soon proved impracticable for himself and Mary ; expected remittances failed to arrive, and they were only enabled to effect their return home by the cheapness of the Rhine water-carriage. Their ad- ventures were recorded in a little narrative (* The History of a Six Weeks' Tour,' written and published in 1817) recently republished with a charming commentary, by Mr. Charles Isaac Elton (Lon- don, 1894, 8vo). The remainder of the year, during which Harriet gave birth to Charles Bysshe, a son by Shelley, was very trying. Shelleys, Godwins, and Westbrooks were all inimical, and every source of pecuniary supply was cut off but the post-obit. At the beginning of 1815 Shelley's affairs took a favourable turn owing to the death of his grandfather. The new baronet, Sir Timothy, finding that his son could now encumber the estate, thought it best to come to terms with him. No real reconciliation was effected, but Shelley received i,ooo/. a year, 2ool. out of which he settled on Harriet. After a tour in the south of England, he took a house at Bishopgate, close by Windsor Forest. Consumption seemed to threaten for a time but passed away. The feeling thus en- gendered combined with the solemnity of the forest scenery to inspire 'Alastor,' the first poem in which he is truly himself, where the presentiment of impending dissolution and 'the desire of the moth for the star' are shadowed forth in an obscure but majestic allegory. It was published in 1816 ('Alastor, or the Spirit of Solitude,' London, 8vo), with some minor poems, also in a purely Shelleyan key. During the winter Shelley pursued the study of Greek literature in conjunction with his friends Hogg and Thomas Love Peacock [q. v.], who had been introduced to him by THE LIFE OF PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 559 their common publisher Hookham. Both were excellent classical scholars, but Shelley alone of the three could assimilate the inner spirit of Greece, and these studies were most favourable to his development. At this time dawns the tranquillity of soul which, though sorely tried by storms from within and without, beamed more and more throughout the remainder of his life. Hence- forth he no longer aspired to enter personally into political agi- tation, and was content to work upon the world by his writings. About this time, too, was most probably written the beautiful if inconclusive 'Essay on Christianity,' first printed in 'Shelley Memorials' (1859), which shows so remarkable a progress from the prejudice and unreason of the notes to 'Queen Mab.' In May 1816 this repose was interrupted by a hasty flight to the continent, precipitated in all probability by the unbearable annoyance of Godwin's affairs. Godwin's pecuniary embarrass- ments had led him to revise his opinion of Shelley's conduct. He importuned Shelley for money, which Shelley was for a time only too ready to supply; but patience failed at last, and, weary of perpetual contest, he withdrew from the scene with more expedi- tion than dignity. The influence of Jane, or, as she now called herself, Claire Clairmont, no doubt also contributed to their de- parture, although both Shelley and Mary were ignorant of the liaison with Bryon which made her anxious to join him in Switzer- land. Shelley now met Byron there for the first time, and little as their characters had in common, similarity of fortune and affinity of genius made them friends. 'The most gentle, the most amiable, and the least worldly-minded person I ever met,' said Byron afterwards. ' I have seen nothing like him, and never shall again, I am certain.' They travelled together, and Byron's poetry, to its great advantage, was deeply influenced by his new friendship. Shelley composed his 'Mont Blanc,' and Mary conceived and partly wrote her 'Frankenstein.' Returning to England in the autumn, they established themselves at Bath, prior to occupying the house which, probably at Peacock's recommenda- tion, they had taken at Great Marlow, where two stunning blows fell upon them. The melancholy death of Fanny Godwin, Mary's half-sister [see GODWIN, WILLIAM, the younger, and GODWIN, MRS. MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT], was succeeded by the dismal 560 RICHARD GARNETT tragedy of Harriet Shelley. Learning that she had quitted her father's house, Shelley was having every search made for her, when, on 10 Dec. 1816, her body was taken from the Serpentine, where it had been for three or four weeks. She was apparently in an advanced state of pregnancy (cf. Times, 12 Dec. 1816; the verdict at the inquest on 'Harriet Smith' was 'Found drowned'). The circumstances immediately occasioning her death are too obscure to be investigated with profit. Shelley certainly had no share in them, but his relations with her were no doubt present to his mind when he afterwards spoke of himself as 'a prey to the reproaches of memory.' He hastened, nevertheless, to perform the obvious duty of giving his union with Mary a legal sanction (they were married on 30 Dec. at St. Mildred's, in the city of Lon- don), and next endeavoured to obtain his two children by Harriet (lanthe and Charles Bysshe) from her relatives. The case went before the court of chancery, and, by a memorable decision of Lord Eldon, on 27 March 1817, was decided against Shelley. Early in this year (1817) appeared Shelley's 'Proposal for putting Re- form to the Vote throughout the Kingdom. By the Hermit of Marlow,' London, 8vo; and, under a like pseudonym, he issued in the same year 'An Address to the People on the Death of the Princess Charlotte' (London, 1843, 8vo; being a reprint of the lost edition of 1817). A son, William, had been born to Shelley and Mary Godwin in January 1816, and September 1817 saw the birth of a daughter, Clara. The household was further augmented by the company of Claire and her child Allegra, the fruit of her amour with Byron, which had ended in mutual disgust and bitter recrimination. Peacock was a near neighbour, but a closer friend was Leigh Hunt, whom Shelley had come to know upon his return from Switzerland, and whose delicate attentions had soothed the miseries of the pre- ceding winter. Shelley gave him i,4oo/. to relieve his difficulties a noble action, if it had not been performed at the expense of others who had juster claims upon him. He made the acquaintance of Keats through Leigh Hunt, but it did not become intimacy. Coleridge he never met, to the loss of both. Godwin renewed his importunities for pecuniary help, which, after a long display of patience and magnanimity on Shelley's part, ended in complete THE LIFE OF PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 561 estrangement. Nothing gives a higher idea of the energy of Shelley's mind than that, amid all these troubles, the most ambi- tious of his poems should have been written within six months. 'The Revolt of Islam' (London, 1818, 8vo) originally called 'Laon and Cythna' (a few copies were printed under this title in 1817), and wisely altered before publication may be described as a poet's impassioned vision of the French revolution and the succeeding reaction. Compared with the later 'Prometheus Unbound' it is the product of a mighty ferment, as the other poem is of the calm ensuing upon it. The music of its Spenserian stanza is unsurpassed in the language; and although the middle part is somewhat tedious, Shelley never excelled the opening and the close Cythna's education and bridal, the picture of the fallen tyrant, the tremendous scenes of pestilence and famine; above all, perhaps, the dedication to Mary. It was written partly on a high seat in Bisham Wood, partly as he glided or anchored in his boat amid the Thames islets and miniature waterfalls. Its publication occasioned a bitter attack in the 'Quarterly,' and drew enthusiastic praise from Professor Wilson, writing under the influence of De Quincey; but it was otherwise received with the indifference which, during Shelley's lifetime, the public, in- cluding his own friends, almost invariably manifested towards his works. When not writing 'The Revolt of Islam' Shelley was much engaged in relieving the distress of the cottagers in his neighbour- hood, and was publishing his political tracts under the signature of 'The Hermit of Marlow.' By the beginning of 1818 he had be- come restless, and indeed the motives for emigration were weighty as well as numerous. Of one he did not think the great benefit which his genius was destined to receive by transplantation to a land of romantic beauty and classical association. He left England on n March, and arrived at Turin on 31 March 1818. He remained in Italy till his death. The incidents of Shelley's life in Italy were mainly intellectual. After spending the spring of 1818 at Como and Milan, and the summer at the baths of Lucca, where he translated Plato's ' Sym- posium,' and finished 'Rosalind and Helen' (commenced the year before at Marlow), he went to Venice on the unwelcome 562 RICHARD GARNETT errand of delivering Claire's daughter to her father, Byron. Here his own daughter Clara died of a disorder induced by the climate. Byron lent him a villa at Este, where he began ' Prometheus Un- bound,' and wrote the 'Lines on the Euganean Hills,' published, along with ' Rosalind and Helen ' and a few other poems, in the following year. He also wrote about this time ' Julian and Mad- dalo,' inspired by his visits to Byron at Venice. Venice and Byron stand out vividly in the poem against a background of utter obscurity. In November he set out for Rome, and began upon the journey the series of descriptive letters to Peacock, which places him at the head of English epistolographers in this department. The masters of a splendid prose style rarely carry this into their familiar correspondence, but Shelley's prose writings" and his letters are of a piece. December was spent at Naples, where painful circumstances imperfectly known produced the 'Lines written in Dejection,' the first great example of that marvel of melody and intensity, the characteristically Shelley an lyric. Returning to Rome, he remained there until June 1819, when the death of his infant son William drove him to Leghorn, and subsequently to Florence, where his youngest son, afterwards Sir Percy Florence Shelley, was born in November. The greater part of 'Prome- theus Unbound' had been written at Rome, and immediately afterwards he turned to the tragedy of Beatrice Cenci, whose countenance, or reputed countenance, had fascinated him in Guide's portrait in the Colonna palace at Rome. Both pieces were published in the course of 1819-20 ('The Cenci: a Trag- edy in five Acts,' Leghorn, 1891, 8vo; 2nd edit. London, 1821, 8vo; 'Prometheus Unbound, a lyrical drama in four acts, with other Poems,' London, 1820, 8vo). The 'Prometheus' is a dithyrambic of sublime exultation on the redemption of humanity, and an assemblage of all that language has of gorgeousness and verse of melody; the diction and passion of the 'Cenci' are toned down to their sombre theme, as different from the 'Pro- metheus' as the atrocity of its chief male character is from the transcendent heroism of the suffering demi-god. But both, the tragedy no less than the mythological drama, are effusions of lyrical emotion, and precisely correspond to the state of feeling which produced them. THE LIFE OF PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 563 The 'Ode to the West Wind,' perhaps the grandest of Shelley's lyrics, was written at Florence in October 1819, about which time he also produced 'Peter Bell the Third,' a parody of Words- worth, evincing more genuine if more discriminating admiration than many panegyrics. 'The Masque of Anarchy,' a poem provoked by the indignation at the 'Manchester massacre' of August 1819, was another composition of this period. It did not appear until 1832. 'Peter Bell the Third' remained in manu- script until 1839. At the close of 1819 Shelley removed to Pisa, which was in the main his domicile for the rest of his life. He had become greatly interested in a project of his friends, the Gisbornes, for a steamboat between Genoa and Leghorn. The undertaking proved premature, but produced (July 1820) that incomparable union of high and familiar poetry, the 'Epistle to Maria Gisborne.' The year 1820 also produced the dazzling 'Witch of Altas' and the humorous burlesque on Queen Caroline's trial, 'Swellfoot the Tyrant' ('(Edipus Tyrannus, or Swellfoot the Tyrant : a Tragedy in two Acts. Translated from the original Doric,' London, 1820, 8vo, written in August and published anonymously; on the Society for the Suppression of Vice threaten- ing to prosecute, it was withdrawn, and only some seven copies of the original are known; reprinted, London, 1876, 8vo). But the year was chiefly remarkable for its lyrics, ranging from the ' Sensi- tive Plant' and the 'Skylark' down to the eight lines for which Landor, ever hyperbolical in praise and dispraise, would have bartered the whole of Beaumont and Fletcher. The year was uneventful until near its end, when Shelley made the acquaintance of the lovely Emilia Viviani, a young Italian lady who had been imprisoned in a convent with a view to extorting her consent to an obnoxious marriage. The first draft of his ' Epipsychidion ' existed some time before Shelley met Emilia, but his meeting with her supplied the needful impulse to perfect and complete that piece of radiant mysticism and rapturous melody (100 copies, London, 1821, 8vo). It attests the growing influence of Plato whose 'Banquet' he had already translated. That influence is even more apparent in another composition of 1821, the 'Defence of Poetry,' written in answer to Peacock, almost contemporane- ously with 'Epipsychidion.' Two additional parts were contem- 564 RICHARD GARNETT plated, but never written, and the essay remained in manuscript until the publication of Shelley's prose writings in 1840. Before long a further incentive to composition was supplied by the death of Keats, whose memory inspired 'Adonais' (Pisa, 1821, 4to), not the most magnificent of Shelley's poems, but perhaps the one of most sustained magnificence. The concluding stanzas more fully than any other passage in his writings embody his ultimate speculative conclusions, substantially identical with Spinoza's, whose 'Tractatus' he began to translate about the same time. The chief external incident of the year (1821) was Shelley's visit to Byron at Ravenna, for the sake of seeing Byron's and Claire Clairmont's daughter, the little Allegra, before Byron removed to Pisa. The relations between Byron and Claire, who now taught Lady Mountcashell's daughters in Florence, were a con- tinual source of friction. Shelley's conduct towards both parties was unexceptionable, and showed what progress he had made in calm judgment and self-control. Shelley had refused any further contributions to Godwin, but the latter's demands continued, and Shelley permitted Mary to send to her father the money she received for her new novel, 'Valperga.' Byron's residence at Pisa, with all its drawbacks, enlivened and diversified Shelley's life, which was further cheered by the society of the gentle and generous Edward Elliker Williams [q. v.] and of his wife Jane, the subject of Shelley's 'With a Guitar' and other exquisite lyrics. In the autumn of 1821 the tidings of the Greek insurrection prompted his 'Hellas' (London, 1822, 8vo), an imitation in plan, though not in diction, of the 'Persae' of ^Eschy- lus, containing some of his noblest lyrical writing. The indifference of the public seems to have discouraged him from prolonged efforts to which he was not constrained, as he was in this instance, by some overmastering impulse. The tragedy on Charles I, which he began to write early in 1822, made little progress; but his powers as a translator appeared at their best in the scenes from 'Faust' and Calderon's 'Magico Prodigioso' which he rendered somewhat later as the basis of papers for the 'Liberal.' His ap- pearance and conversation at this time are vividly described by Edward John Trelawny [q. v.], a new addition to the Pisan circle. In April the Shelleys and Williamses removed to Lerici, near THE LIFE OF PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 565 Spezzia. The wild scenery and primitive people were most con- genial to Shelley, who declared himself ready to say with Faust to the passing hour, 'Verweile doch, du bist so schon.' While sailing, studying, listening to Mrs. Williams's music, and writing his ' Triumph of Life ' as his boat rocked in the moonlight, h^ieard of the Leigh Hunts' arrival at Pisa, and hastened to mee^hem. Having made them as comfortable as Byron's moodiness and Mrs. Hunt's apparently mortal sickness permitted, Shelley sailed for Spezzia from Leghorn on 8 July 1822, accompanied by Williams. Scarcely had they embarked when the face of sky and sea darkened ominously. Trelawny watched the little vessel sailing in the company of many others, and graphically describes how all were blotted from view by the squall, and how, when this had passed off, all reappeared except Shelley's, which was never seen again until months afterwards she was dredged up from the bottom of the sea. Some thought that she had been accidentally or de- signedly run down in the squall, but many circumstances militate against this theory. Shelley's body, best recognised by the volumes of Sophocles and Keats in the pockets, was cast ashore near Viareg- gio on 1 8 July, and, after having been buried for some time in the sand, was on 16 Aug., in the presence of Byron, Hunt, and Tre- lawny, cremated, to allow of the interment of the ashes in the prot- estant cemetery at Rome. This took place on 7 Dec. immediately under the pyramid of Caius Cestius. Leigh Hunt wrote the Latin epitaph, with the famous Cor Cordium, and Trelawny added three English lines from 'The Tempest.' The heart, which would not burn, and had been snatched from the flames by Trelawny, was given to Mary Shelley, and is in the keeping of her family (cf . GUIDO BIAGI, Gli ultimi giorni di P. B. Shelley, Florence, 1892). In 1823 there appeared 'Poetical Pieces,' containing 'Prome- theus Unmasked' (sic), 'Hellas,' 'The Cenci,' 'Rosalind and Helen,' with other poems. 'Julian and Maddalo' and 'The Witch of Atlas,' which had hitherto remained in manuscript, were published in 1824 along with the unfinished 'Triumph of Life,' the 'Epistle to Maria Gisborne,' a large number of minor lyrics, and translations, including those executed for the 'Liberal.' The title of the collection was 'Posthumous Poems' (London, 8vo), and the expenses were guaranteed by two poets, B. W. 566 RICHARD GARNETT Procter and T. L. Beddoes, and Beddoes's future biographer, T. Kelsall. It was almost immediately withdrawn in virtue of an arrangement with Sir Timothy Shelley, and for long the public demand continued to be supplied by pirated editions, the refusal of the courts to protect 'Queen Mab' being apparently taken as implying a license to appropriate anything. A pirated edition of 'Miscellaneous Poems' appeared in numbers during 1826 (London, 12 mo). The consequent cheapness of circulation greatly extended Shelley's fame and influence, although it some- times brought his poems into singular company. In 1829 ad- mirers at Cambridge reprinted 'Adonais,' and undertook a fruit- less mission for the conversion of his own university. In 1829 and 1834 very imperfect issues of his 'Poetical Works' appeared, the former along with those of Coleridge and Keats, and with a memoir by Cyrus Redding [q. v.]. In 1839, the obstacles to an authentic edition having been removed in some unexplained man- ner, Mrs. Shelley published what was then supposed to be a definitive edition in four volumes, enriched with biographical notes and some very beautiful lyrics which had remained in manuscript. An American edition of this, with a memoir by J. Russell Lowell, ap- peared at Boston in 1855, 3 vols. i2mo. A collection of his letters and miscellaneous prose writings followed in 1840. The letters, published in 1852 with a preface by Robert Browning, are mostly fabrications by a person claiming to be a natural son of Byron. Many most important additions, however, have been made to those published in 1840. In 1862 the present writer, as the result of an examination of Shelley's manuscripts, published a number of fragments in verse and prose^ some of extreme interest, under the title 'Relics of Shelley.' These, as well as many of the new letters continually coming to light, have been incorporated into more recent editions of Shelley's writings. The only recent edition virtually complete is Mr. Buxton Forman's in eight volumes, con- taining both verse and prose (London, 1876-80, 8vo); but those of Mr. W. M. Rossetti (1870, 1878, and 1888) and of Mr. G. E. Woodberry (American, 1892, 1893) a ^ so deserve high con- sideration. Letters to Claire Clairmont and Miss Kitchener, and Harriet Shelley's letters to Miss Nugent, have been printed sepa- rately in limited editions. Translations into French, Italian, Ger- THE LIFE OF PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 567 man, and Russian are becoming numerous. Selections have been issued by, among others, Mathilde Blind (with memoir, Tauchnitz, 187 2), the Rev. Stopford A. Brooke (1880), and by the present writer (Parchment Library, 1880). The bulk of Shelley's manuscripts has been deposited by his daughter-in-law, Lady Shelley, in the Bodleian Library. Shelley's eldest son, Charles Bysshe, the offspring of his union with Harriet Westbrook, did not long survive him, and upon the death of Sir Timothy Shelley in 1844 the baronetcy passed to the poet's only surviving son by Mary Godwin, Sir Percy Florence Shelley (1819-1889). This most gentle and lovable man, the in- heritor of most of his father's fine qualities and of many of his tastes and accomplishments, died in December 1889. He married, 22 June 1848, Jane, daughter of Thomas Gibson, and widow of the Hon. Charles Robert St. John, who survives him; but, the marriage having proved childless, the baronetcy devolved upon Edward, son of Shelley's younger brother John, and is now en- joyed by Sir Edward's brother Charles. The excessive vehemence which hurried Shelley into many hasty and unjustifiable steps, was, from a moral point of view, a serious infirmity, but failure to control impulse seems to have been a condition of his greatness and of his influence on mankind. He took Parnassus by storm. His poetical productiveness would have been admirable as the result of a long life ; as the work in the main of little more than five years, it is one of the greatest marvels in the history of the human mind. Had it been as unequal in matter as Dryden, in manner as Wordsworth, it would still have been wonderful ; but, apart from occasional obscurities in meaning and lapses in grammar, it is as perfect in form as in substance, and equable in merit to a degree unapproached by any of his contem- poraries. The lucidity and symmetry of the minor lyrics, in partic- ular, rival anything in antiquity, and surpass the best modern examples by their greater apparent spontaneity, the result in fact of the most strenuous revision. In 1835 Stuart Mill ably compared and contrasted him with Wordsworth; and the finest passage in his 'Pauline' (1833) is the outburst of Browning's passionate admiration. After many vicissitudes, opinion seems to be agreeing to recognise Shelley 568 RICHARD GARNETT as the supreme lyrist, all of whose poems, whatever their outward form, should be viewed from the lyrical standpoint. This is a just judgment, for even the apparently austere and methodical 4 Cenci ' is as truly born of a passionate lyrical impulse as any of his songs. Despite his limitations, no modern poet, unless it be Wordsworth, has so deeply influenced English poetry. The splendour of his prose style, while exalting his character for imagination, has seemed incompatible with homely wisdom. In reality his essays and correspondence are not more distinguished by fine insight into high matters than by sound common-sense in ordinary things. No contemporary, perhaps, so habitually con- veys the impression of a man in advance of his time. His ca- pacity for calm discussion appears to advantage under the most provoking circumstances, as in his correspondence with Godwin, Booth, and Southey. As a critic, Shelley does not possess Cole- ridge's subtlety and penetration, but has a gift for the intuitive recognition of excellence which occasionally carries him too far in enthusiasm, but at all events insures him against the petty and self- interested jealousies from which none of his contemporaries, except Scott and Keats, can be considered exempt. This delight in the work of others, even more than his own poetical power, renders him matchless as a translator. Of his lyrics, those which have been most frequently set to music are: 'I arise from dreams of thee,' 'The Cloud,' 'The fountains mingle with the river,' 'One word is too often profaned,' and 'Music when soft voices die.' Only two genuine portraits of Shelley are extant, and neither is satisfactory. The earlier, a miniature, was taken when he was only thirteen or fourteen, and is authenticated by its strong and undesigned resemblance to miniatures of the Pilfold family. The later portrait, painted by Miss Curran at Rome in 1819, was left in a flat and unfinished state. 'I was on the point of burning it before I left Italy,' the artist told Mrs. Shelley; 'I luckily saved it just as the fire was scorching.' There is a general agreement among the descriptions of personal acquaintance; all agree as to the slight but tall and sinewy frame, the abundant brown hair, the fair but somewhat tanned and freckled complexion, the dark blue eyes, with their habitual expression of rapt wonder, and the general appearance of extreme youth. Resemblances, by no THE LIFE OF CHARLES DICKENS 569 means merely fanciful, have been found with the portraits of No- valis, of Sir Robert Dudley, styled duke of Northumberland and earl of Warwick [q. v.], and of Antonio Leisman in the Florentine Ritratti de' Pittori. The preternatural keenness of his senses is well attested, and contributed to the illusions which play so large a part in his history. Of late years two splendid monuments have been erected to Shelley by the piety of his son and daughter-in-law ; one is in Christchurch minster, Hampshire; the other, designed by Mr. Onslow Ford, R.A., is at University College, Oxford. THE LIFE OF CHARLES DICKENS SIR LESLIE STEPHEN [From the Dictionary of National Biography.] DICKENS, CHARLES (1812-1870), novelist, was born 7 Feb. 1812 at 387 Mile End Terrace, Commercial Road, Landport, Portsea. His father, John Dickens, a clerk in the navy pay office, with a salary of 8o/. a year, was then stationed in the Portsmouth dock- yard. The wife of the first Lord Houghton told Mr. Wemyss Reid that Mrs. Dickens, mother of John, was housekeeper at Crewe, and famous for her powers of story-telling (WEMYSS REID, in Daily News, 8 Oct. 1887). John Dickens had eight children by his wife, Elizabeth, daughter of Charles Barrow, a lieutenant in the navy. The eldest, Fanny, was born in 1810. Charles, the second, was christened Charles John Huffam (erroneously entered Huffham in the register), but dropped the last two names. Charles Dickens remembered the little garden of the house at Portsea, though his father was recalled to London when he was only two years old. In 1816 (probably) the family moved to Chatham. Dickens was small and sickly; he amused himself by reading and by watching the games of other boys. His mother taught him his letters, and he pored over a small collection of books belonging to his father. Among them were ' Tom Jones,' the 'Vicar of Wakefield,' 'Don Quixote,' 'Gil Bias,' and especially Smollett's novels, by which he was deeply impressed. He wrote an infantine tragedy called * Misnar, 'founded on the l Tales of the 570 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN Genii.' James Lamert, the stepson of his mother's eldest sister Mary (whose second husband was Dr. Lamert, an army surgeon at Chatham), had a taste for private theatricals. Lamert took Dickens to the theatre, in which the child greatly delighted. John Dickens's salary was raised to 2oo/. in 1819, and to 35o/. in 1820, at which amount it remained until he left the service, 9 March 1825. It was, however, made insufficient by his careless habits, and in 1821 he left his first house, 2 (now n) Ordnance Terrace, for a smaller house, 18 St. Mary's Place, next to a baptist chapel. Dickens was then sent to school with the minister, Mr. Giles (see LANGTON, Childhood of Dickens) . In the winter of 1822-3 his father was recalled to Somerset House, and settled in Bayham Street, Camden Town, whither his son followed in the spring. John Dickens, whose character is more or less represented by Micawber, was now in difficulties, and had to make a composition with his creditors. He was (as Dickens emphatically stated) a very affectionate father, and took a pride in his son's precocious talents. Yet at this time (according to the same statement) he was entirely forgetful to the son's claims to a decent education. In spite of the family difficulties, the eldest child, Fanny, was sent as a pupil to the Royal Academy of Music, but Charles was left to black his father's boots, look after the younger children, and do small errands. Lamert made a little theatre for the child's amusement. His mother's elder brother, Thomas Barrow, and a godfather took notice of him occasionally. The uncle lodged in the upper floor of a house in which a book- selling business was carried on, and the proprietress lent the child some books. His literary tastes were kept alive, and he tried his hand at writing a description of the uncle's barber. His mother now made an attempt to retrieve the family fortunes by taking a house, 4 Gower Street North, where a brass plate announced 'Mrs. Dickens's establishment,' but failed to attract any pupils. The father was at last arrested and carried to the Marshalsea, long afterwards described in 'Little Dorrit.' (Mr. Langton thinks that the prison was the king's bench, where, as he says, there was a prisoner named Dorrett in 1824.) All the books and furniture went gradually to the pawnbroker's. James Lamert had become manager of a blacking warehouse, and obtained a THE LIFE OF CHARLES DICKENS 571 place for Dickens at 6s. or js. a week in the office at Hungerford Stairs. Dickens was treated as a mere drudge, and employed in making up parcels. He came home at night to the dismantled house in Gower Street till the family followed the father to the Marshalsea, and then lodged in Camden Town with a reduced old lady, a Mrs. Roylance, the original of Mrs. Pipchin in 'Dombey and Son.' Another lodging was found for him near the prison with a family which is represented by the Garlands in his ' Old Curiosity Shop.' The Dickenses were rather better off in prison than they had been previously. The maid-of-all-work who fol- lowed them from Bayham Street became the Marchioness of the 'Old Curiosity Shop.' The elder Dickens at last took the benefit of the Insolvent Debtors Act, and moved first to Mrs. Roylance's house, and then to a house in Somers Town. Dickens's amazing faculty of observation is proved by the use made in his novels of all that he now saw, especially in the prison scenes of ' Pickwick ' and in the earlier part of ' David Copperfield.' That he suffered acutely is proved by the singular bitterness shown in his own narrative printed by Forster. He felt himself degraded by his occupation. When his sister won a prize at the Royal Academy, he was deeply humiliated by the contrast of his own position, though incapable of envying her success. This was about April 1824. The family circumstances improved. The elder Dickens had received a legacy which helped to clear off his debts ; he had a pen- sion and after some time he obtained employment as reporter to the 'Morning Chronicle.' About 1824 Dickens was sent to a school kept by a Mr. Jones in the Hampstead Road, and called the Well- ington House Academy. His health improved. His school- fellows remembered him as a handsome lad, overflowing with ani- mal spirits, writing stories, getting up little theatrical performances, and fond of harmless practical jokes, but not distinguishing him- self as a scholar. After two years at this school, Dickens went to another kept by a Mr. Dawson in Henrietta Street, Brunswick Square. He then became clerk in the office of Mr. Molloy in New Square, Lincoln's Inn, and soon afterwards (from May 1827 to November 1828) clerk in the office of Mr. Edward Blackmore, attorney, of Gray's Inn. His salary with Mr. Blackmore rose from 135. 6d. to 155. a week. Dickens's energy had only been stimulated 572 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN by the hardships through which he had passed. He was determined to force his way upwards. He endeavoured to supplement his scanty education by reading at the British Museum, and he studied shorthand writing in the fashion described in 'David Copperfield.' Copperfield's youthful passion for Dora reflects a passion of the same kind in Dickens's own career, which, though hopeless, stimulated his ambition. He became remarkably expert in short- hand, and after two years' reporting in the Doctors' Commons and other courts, he entered the gallery of the House of Commons as re- porter to the 'True Sun.' He was spokesman for the reporters in a successful strike. For two sessions he reported for the ' Mirror of Parliament,' started by a maternal uncle, and in the session of 1835 became reporter for the 'Morning Chronicle.' While still reporting at Doctors' Commons he had thoughts of becoming an actor. He made an application to George Bartley [q. v.], manager at Covent Garden, which seems to have only missed acceptance by an accident, and took great pains to practise the art. He finally abandoned this scheme on obtaining his appointment on the ' Morn- ing Chronicle' (FORSTER, ii. 179). His powers were rapidly devel- oped by the requirements of his occupation. He was, as he says (Letters, i. 438), 'the best and most rapid reporter ever known.' He had to hurry to and from country meetings, by coach and post- chaise, encountering all the adventures incident to travelling in the days before railroads, making arrangements for forwarding re- ports, and attracting the notice of his employers by his skill, re- source, and energy. John Black [q. v.], the editor, became a warm friend, and was, he says, his 'first hearty out-and-out appreciator.' He soon began to write in the periodicals. The appearance of his first article, ' A Dinner at Popular Walk ' (reprinted as ' Mr. Minns and his Cousin'), in the 'Monthly Magazine' for Decem- ber 1833, filled him with exultation. Nine others followed till February 1835. The paper in August 1834 first bore the signature 'Boz.' It was the pet name of his youngest brother, Augustus, called 'Moses,' after the boy in the 'Vicar of Wakefield,' which was corrupted into Boses and Boz. An 'Evening Chronicle,' as an appendix to the 'Morning Chronicle,' was started in 1835 under the management of George Hogarth, formerly a friend of Scott. The 'Monthly Magazine' was unable to pay for the THE LIFE OF CHARLES DICKENS 573 sketches, and Dickens now offered to continue his sketches in the new venture. His offer was accepted, and his salary raised from five to seven guineas a week. In the spring of 1836 the collected papers were published as 'Sketches by Boz,' with illustrations by Cruikshank, the copyright being bought for i5o/. by a pub- lisher named Macrone. On 2 April 1836 Dickens married Cath- erine, eldest daughter of Hogarth, his colleague on the 'Morning Chronicle.' He had just begun the 'Pickwick Papers.' The 'Sketches,' in which it is now easy to see the indications of future success, had attracted some notice in their original form. Albany Fonblanque had warmly praised them, and publishers heard of the young writer. Messrs. Chapman & Hall, then beginning business, had published a book called 'The Squib Annual' in November 1835, with illustrations by Seymour. Seymour was anxious to produce a series of 'cockney sporting plates.' Chapman & Hall thought that it might answer to publish such a series in monthly parts accompanied by letterpress. Hall applied to Dickens, suggesting the invention of a Nimrod Club, the members of which should get into comic difficulties suitable for Seymour's illustra- tions. Dickens, wishing for a freer hand, and having no special knowledge of sport, substituted the less restricted scheme of the Pickwick Club, and wrote the first number, for which Seymour drew the illustrations. The first two or three numbers excited less attention than the collected 'Sketches,' which had just appeared. Seymour killed himself before the appearance of the second num- ber. Robert William Buss [q. v.] illustrated the third number. Thackeray, then an unknown youth, applied to Dickens for the post of illustrator; but Dickens finally chose Hablot Knight Browne [q. v.], who illustrated the fourth and all the subsequent numbers, as well as many of the later novels. The success of 'Pickwick' soon became extraordinary. The binder prepared four hundred copies of the first number, and forty thousand of the fifteenth. The marked success began with the appearance of Sam Weller in the fifth number. Sam Weller is in fact the incarnation of the qualities to which the success was due. Educated like his creator in the streets of London, he is the ideal cockney. His exuberant animal spirits, humorous shrewdness, and kindliness under a mask of broad farce, made him the favourite 574 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN of all cockneys in and out of London, and took the gravest readers by storm. All that Dickens had learnt in his rough initiation into life, with a power of observation unequalled in its way, was poured out with boundless vivacity and prodigality of invention. The book, beginning as farce, became admirable comedy, and has caused more hearty and harmless laughter than any book in the language. If Dickens's later works surpassed 'Pickwick' in some ways, 'Pickwick' shows, in their highest development, the qualities in which he most surpassed other writers. Sam Weller's peculiar trick of speech has been traced with probability to Samuel Vale, a popular comic actor, who in 1822 performed Simon Spat- terdash in a farce called 'The Boarding House,' and gave cur- rency to a similar phraseology (Notes and Queries, 6th ser. v. 388 ; and Origin of Sam Weller, with a facsimile of a contemporary piratical imitation of 'Pickwick,' 1883). Dickens was now a prize for which publishers might contend. In the next few years he undertook a great deal of work, with con- fidence natural to a buoyant temperament, encouraged by unprec- edented success, and achieved new triumphs without permitting himself to fall into slovenly composition. Each new book was at least as carefully written as its predecessor. 'Pickwick' ap- peared from April 1836 to November 1837. 'Oliver Twist' began, while 'Pickwick' was still proceeding, in January 1837, and ran till March 1839. 'Nicholas Nickleby' overlapped 'Oliver Twist,' beginning in April 1838 and ending in October 1839. In February 1838 Dickens went to Yorkshire to look at the schools caricatured in Dotheboys Hall (for the original of Dothe- boys Hall see Notes and Queries, 4th ser. vi. 245, and 5th ser. iii. 325). A short pause followed. Dickens had thought of a series of papers, more or less on the model of the old 'Spectator,' in which there was to be a club, including the Wellers, varied essays satirical and descriptive, and occasional stories. The essays were to appear weekly, and for the whole he finally selected the title 'Master Humphrey's Clock.' The plan was carried out with modifications. It appeared at once that the stories were the pop- ular part of the series ; the club and the intercalated essay disap- peared, and 'Master Humphrey's Clock' resolved itself into the two stories, 'The Old Curiosity Shop' and 'Barnaby Rudge.' THE LIFE OF CHARLES DICKENS 575 During 1840 and 1841 'Oliver Twist' seems to have been at first less popular than its fellow-stories; but 'Nicholas Nickleby' surpassed even 'Pickwick.' Sydney Smith on reading it con- fessed that Dickens had 'conquered him,' though he had 'stood out as long as he could.' 'Master Humphrey's Clock' began with a sale of seventy thousand copies, which declined when there was no indication of a continuous story, but afterwards revived. The 'Old Curiosity Shop,' as republished, made an extraordinary success. 'Barnaby Rudge' has apparently never been equally popular. The exuberant animal spirits, and the amazing fertility in creaj;- ing comic types, which made the fortune of 'Pickwick,' were now combined with a more continuous story. The ridicule of 'Bum- bledom' in 'Oliver Twist,' and of Yorkshire schools in 'Nicholas Nickleby,' showed the power of satirical portraiture already dis- played in the prison scenes of 'Pickwick.' The humorist is not yet lost in the satirist, and the extravagance of the caricature is justified by its irresistible fun. Dickens was also showing the command of the pathetic which fascinated the ordinary reader. The critic is apt to complain that Dickens kills his children as if he liked it, and makes his victims attitudinise before the foot- lights. Yet Landor, a severe critic, thought 'Little Nell' equal to any character in fiction, and Jeffrey, the despiser of sentimen- talism, declared that there had been nothing so good since Cordelia (FORSTER, i. 177, 226). Dickens had written with sincere feeling, and with thoughts of Mary Hogarth, his wife's sister, whose death in 1837 had profoundly affected him, and forced him to suspend the publication of 'Pickwick' (no number was published in June 1837). When we take into account the command of the horrible shown by the murder in 'Oliver Twist,' and the unvary- ing vivacity and brilliance of style, the secret of Dickens 's hold upon his readers is tolerably clear. 'Barnaby Rudge' is remarkable as an attempt at the historical novel, repeated only in his 'Tale of Two Cities ' ; b'ut Dickens takes little pains to give genuine local colour, and appears to have regarded the eighteenth century chiefly as the reign of Jack Ketch. Dickens's fame had attracted acquaintances, many of whom were converted by his genial qualities into fast friends. In March 576 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN 1837 he moved from the chambers in Furnival's Inn, which he had occupied for some time previous to his marriage, to 48 Doughty Street, and towards the end of 1839 he moved to a 'handsome house with a considerable garden' in Devonshire Terrace, facing York Gate, Regent's Park. He spent summer holidays at Broad- stairs, always a favourite watering-place, Twickenham, and Peters- ham, and in the summer of 1841 made an excursion in Scotland, received the freedom of Edinburgh, and was welcomed at a public dinner where Jeffrey took the chair and his health was proposed by Christopher North. He was at this time fond of long rides, and delighted in boyish games. His buoyant spirit and hearty good- nature made him a charming host and guest at social gatherings of all kinds except the formal. He speedily became known to most of his literary contemporaries, such as Landor (whom he visited at Bath in 1841), Talfourd, Procter, Douglas Jerrold, Harrison Ainsworth, Wilkie, and Edwin Landseer. His closest intimates were Macready, Maclise, Stanfield, and John Forster. Forster had seen him at the office of the 'True Son,' and had afterwards met him at the house of Harrison Ainsworth. They had become intimate at the time of Mary Hogarth's death, when Forster visited him, on his temporary retirement, at Hampstead. Forster, whom he afterwards chose as his biographer, was service- able both by reading his works before publication and by helping his business arrangements. Dickens made at starting some rash agreements. Chapman & Hall had given him 15^. 155. a number for 'Pickwick,' with ad- ditional payments dependent upon the sale. He received, Forster thinks, 2,5oo/. on the whole. He had also, with Chapman & Hall, rebought for 2,ooo/. in 1837 the copyright of the 'Sketches' sold to Macrone in 1831 for 1507. The success of 'Pickwick' had raised the value of the book, and Macrone proposed to reissue it simultaneously with 'Pickwick' and 'Oliver Twist.' Dickens thought that this superabundance would be injurious to his repu- tation, and naturally considered Macrone to be extortionate. When, however, Macrone died, two years later, Dickens edited the 'Pic-Nic Papers' (1841) for the benefit of the widow, contributing the preface and a story, which was made out of his farce 'The Lamplighter.' In November 1837 Chapman & Hall agreed that THE LIFE OF CHARLES DICKENS 577 he should have a share after five years in the copyright of ' Pick- wick,' on condition that he should write a similar book, for which he was to receive 3,ooo/., besides having the whole copyright after five years. Upon the success of ' Nicholas Nickleby,' written in fulfilment of this agreement, the publishers paid him an addi- tional i,5oo/. in consideration of a further agreement, carried out by 'Master Humphrey's Clock.' Dickens was to receive 5o/. for each weekly number, and to have half the profits ; the copy- right to be equally shared after five years. He had meanwhile agreed with Richard Bentley (1794-1871) [q. v.] (22 Aug. 1836) to edit a new magazine from January 1837, to which he was to supply a story; and had further agreed to write two other stories for the same publisher. * Oliver Twist' appeared in 'Bentley's Miscellany' in accordance with the first agreement, and, on the conclusion of the story, he handed over the editorship to Harrison Ainsworth. In September 1837, after some misunderstandings, it was agreed to abandon one of the novels promised to Bentley, Dickens undertaking to finish the other, 'Barnaby Rudge,' by November 1838. In June 1840 Dickens bought the copyright of 'Oliver Twist' from Bentley for 2,2507., and the agreement for 'Barnaby Rudge' was cancelled. Dickens then sold 'Barnaby Rudge' to Chapman & Hall, receiving 3,ooo/. for the use of the copyright until six months after the publication of the last number. The close of this series of agreements freed him from conflicting and harassing responsibilities. The weekly appearance of 'Master Humphrey's Clock' had imposed a severe strain. He agreed in August 1841 to write a new novel in the 'Pickwick' form, for which he was to receive 2oo/. a month for twenty numbers, besides three-fourths of the profits. He stipulated, however, in order to secure the much-needed rest, that it should not begin until November 1842. During the pre- vious twelve months he was to receive 1507. a month, to be de- ducted from his share of the profits. When first planning ' Master Humphrey's Clock,' he had talked of visiting America to obtain materials for descriptive papers. The publication of the 'Old Curiosity Shop' had brought him a letter from Washington Irving; his fame had spread beyond the Atlantic, and he resolved to spend part of the interval before his next book in the United 2P 578 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN States. He had a severe illness in the autumn of 1841 ; he had to undergo a surgical operation, and was saddened by the sudden death of his wife's brother and mother. He sailed from Liverpool 4 Jan. 1842. He reached Boston on 21 Jan. 1842, and travelled by New York and Philadelphia to Washington and Richmond. Returning to Baltimore, he started for the west, and went by Pitts- burg and Cincinnati to St. Louis. He returned to Cincinnati, and by the end of April was at the falls of Niagara. He spent a month in Canada, performing in some private theatricals at Mon- treal, and sailed for England about the end of May. The Ameri- cans received him with an enthusiasm which was at times over- powering, but which was soon mixed with less agreeable feelings. Dickens had come prepared to advocate international copyright, though he emphatically denied, in answer to an article by James Spedding in the 'Edinburgh Review' for January 1843, tnat ne had gone as a 'missionary' in that cause. His speeches on this subject met with little response, and the general opinion was in favour of continuing to steal. As a staunch abolitionist he was shocked by the sight of slavery, and disgusted by the general desire in the free states to suppress any discussion of the dangerous topic. To the average Englishman the problem seemed a simple question of elementary morality. Dickens's judgment of America was in fact that of the average Englishman, whose radicalism increased his disappointment at the obvious weaknesses of the republic. He differed from ordinary observers only in the decisiveness of his utterances and in the astonishing vivacity of his impressions. The Americans were still provincial enough to fancy that the first impressions of a young novelist were really of importance. Their serious faults and the superficial roughness of the half-settled dis- tricts thoroughly disgusted him ; and though he strove hard to do justice to their good qualities, it is clear that he returned disillu- sioned and heartily disliking the country. The feeling is still shown in his antipathy to the northern states during the war (Letters, ii. 203, 240). In the 'American Notes,' published in October 1842, he wrote under constraint upon some topics, but gave careful accounts of the excellent institutions, which are the terror of the ordinary tourist in America. Four large editions were sold by the end of the year, and the book produced a good deal of THE LIFE OF CHARLES DICKENS 579 resentment. When Macready visited America in the autumn of 1843, Dickens refused to accompany him to Liverpool, thinking that the actor would be injured by any indications of friendship with the author of the * Notes' and of 'Martin Chuzzlewit.' The first of the twenty monthly numbers of this novel appeared in January 1843. The book shows Dickens at his highest power. Whether it has done much to enforce its intended moral, that self- ishness is a bad thing, may be doubted. But the humour and the tragic power are undeniable. Pecksniff and Mrs. Gamp at once became recognised types of character, and the American scenes, revealing Dickens's real impressions, are perhaps the most sur- prising proof of his unequalled power of seizing characteristics at a glance. Yet for some reason the sale was comparatively small, never exceeding twenty-three thousand copies, as against the seventy-thousand of 'Master Humphrey's Clock.' After Dickens's return to England, his sister-in-law, Miss Georgina Hogarth, became, as she remained till his death, an in- mate of his household. He made an excursion to Cornwall in the autumn of 1842 with Maclise, Stanfield, and Forster, in the highest spirits, 'choking and gasping, and bursting the buckle off the back of his stock (with laughter) all the way.' He spent his summers chiefly at Broadstairs, and took a leading part in many social gatherings and dinners to his friends. He showed also a lively interest in benevolent enterprises, especially in ragged schools. In this and similar work he was often associated with Miss Coutts, afterwards Baroness Burdett-Coutts, and in later years he gave much time to the management of a house for fallen women established by her in Shepherd's Bush. He was always ready to throw himself heartily into any philanthropic movement, and rather slow to see any possibility of honest objection. His impatience of certain difficulties about the ragged schools raised by clergymen of the established church led him for a year or two to join the congregation of a Unitarian minister, Mr. Edward Tagart. For the rest of his life his sympathies, we are told, were chiefly with the church of England, as the least sectarian of reli- gious bodies, and he seems to have held that every dissenting min- ister was a Stiggins. It is curious that the favourite author of the middle classes should have been so hostile to their favourite form of belief. 580 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN The relatively small sale of ' Chuzzlewit ' led to difficulties with his publishers. The ' Christmas Carol ' which appeared at Christ- mas 1843, was the first of five similar books which have been enor- mously popular, as none of his books give a more explicit state- ment of what he held to be the true gospel of the century. He was, however, greatly disappointed with the commercial results. Fifteen thousand copies were sold, and brought him only y26/., a result apparently due to the too costly form in which they were published. Dickens expressed a dissatisfaction, which resulted in a breach with Messrs. Chapman & Hall and an agreement with Messrs. Bradbury & Evans, who were to advance 2,8oo/. and have a fourth share of all his writings for the next eight years. Dickens's irritation under these worries stimulated his character- istic restlessness. He had many claims to satisfy. His family was rapidly increasing; his fifth child was born at the beginning of 1844. Demands from more distant relations were also frequent, and though he received what, for an author, was a very large income he thought that he had worked chiefly for the enrichment of others. He also felt the desire to obtain wider experience natural to one who had been drawing so freely upon his intellectual resources. He resolved, therefore, to economise and refresh his mind in Italy. Before starting he presided, in February 1844, at the meetings of the Mechanics' Institution in Liverpool and the Polytechnic in Birmingham. He wrote some radical articles in the 'Morning Chronicle.' After the usual farewell dinner at Greenwich, where J. M. W. Turner attended and Lord Normanby took the chair, he started for Italy, reaching Marseilles 14 July 1844. On 16 July he settled in a villa at Albaro, a suburb of Genoa, and set to work learning Italian. He afterwards moved to the Peschiere Palace in Genoa. There, though missing his long night walks in London streets, he wrote the 'Chimes,' and came back to London to read it to his friends. He started 6 Nov., travelled through Northern Italy, and reached London at the end of the month. He read the 'Chimes' at Forster's house to Carlyle, Stanfield, Maclise, La- man Blanchard, Douglas Jerrold, Fox, Harness, and Dyce. He then returned to Genoa. In the middle of January he started with his wife on a journey to Rome, Naples, and Florence. He returned to Genoa for two months, and then crossed to St. Goth- THE LIFE OF CHARLES DICKENS 581 ard, and returned to England at the end of June 1845. O n coming home he took up a scheme for a private theatrical performance, which had been started on the night of reading the 'Chimes.' He threw himself into this with his usual vigour. Jonson's ' Every Man in his Humour' was performed on 21 Sept. at Fanny Kelly's theatre in Dean Street. Dickens took the part of Bobadil, Forster appearing as Kitely, Jerrold as Master Stephen, and Leech as Master Matthew. The play succeeded to admiration, and a public performance was afterwards given for a charity. Dickens is said by Forster to have been a very vivid and versatile rather than a finished actor, but an inimitable manager. His contributions to the ' Morning Chronicle ' seem to have suggested his next under- taking, the only one in which he can be said to have decidedly failed. He became first editor of the 'Daily News,' the first number of which appeared 21 Jan. 1846. He had not the neces- sary qualifications for the function of editor of a political organ. On 9 Feb. he resigned his post, to which Forster succeeded for a time. He continued to contribute for about three months longer, publishing a series of letters descriptive of his Italian journeys. His most remarkable contribution was a series of letters on capital punishment. (For the fullest account of his editorship see WARD, pp. 68, 74.) He then gave up the connection, resolving to pass the next twelve months in Switzerland, and there to write another book on the old model. He left England on 31 May, having pre- viously made a rather singular overture to government for an ap- pointment to the paid magistracy of London, and having also taken a share in starting the General Theatrical Fund. He reached Lausanne n June 1846, and took a house called Rose- mont. Here he enjoyed the scenery and surrounded himself with a circle of friends, some of whom became his intimates through life. He specially liked the Swiss people. He now began 'Dom- bey,' and worked at it vigorously, though feeling occasionally his oddly characteristic craving for streets. The absence of streets 'worried' him 'in a most singular manner,' and he was harassed by having on hand both 'Dombey' and his next Christ- mas book, 'The Battle of Life.' For a partial remedy of the first evil he made a short stay at Geneva at the end of September. The 'Battle of Life' was at last completed, and he was cheered 582 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN by the success of the first numbers of 'Dombey.' In November he started for Paris, where he stayed for three months. He made a visit to London in December, when he arranged for a cheap issue of his writings, which began in the following year. He was finally brought back to England by an illness of his eldest son, then at King's College School. His house in Devonshire Terrace was still let to a tenant, and he did not return there until September 1847. 'Dombey and Son' had a brilliant success. The first five num- bers, with the death, truly or falsely pathetic, of Paul Dombey, were among his most striking pieces of work, and the book has had great popularity, though it afterwards took him into the kind of social satire in which he was always least successful. For the first half-year he received nearly 3,ooo/., and henceforth his pe- cuniary affairs were prosperous and savings began. He found time during its completion for gratifying on a large scale his passion for theatrical performances. In 1847 a scheme was started for the benefit of Leigh Hunt. Dickens became manager of a company which performed Jonson's comedy at Manchester and Liverpool in July 1847, an d added four hundred guineas to the benefit fund. In 1848 it was proposed to buy Shakespeare's house at Stratford- on-Avon and to endow a curatorship to be held by Sheridan Knowles. Though this part of the scheme dropped, the projected performances were given for Knowles's benefit. The 'Merry Wives of Windsor,' in which Dickens played Shallow, Lemon Falstaff, and Forster Master Ford, was performed at Manchester, Liverpool, Edinburgh, Birmingham, and Glasgow, the gross profits from nine nights being 2,5517. In November 1850 'Every Man in his Humour' was again performed at Knebworth, Lord Lytton's house. The scheme for a 'Guild of Literature and Art' was suggested at Knebworth. In aid of the funds, a comedy by Lytton, 'Not so bad as we seem,' and a farce by Dickens and Lemon, 'Mr. Nightingale's Diary,' were performed at the Duke of Devonshire's house in London (27 May 1851), when the queen and prince consort were present. Similar performances took place during 1851 and 1852 at various towns, ending with Man- chester and Liverpool. A dinner, with Lytton in the chair, at Manchester had a great success, and the guild was supposed to be effectually started. It ultimately broke down, though Dickens and THE LIFE OF CHARLES DICKENS 583 Bulwer Lytton were enthusiastic supporters. During this period Dickens had been exceedingly active. The 'Haunted Man or Ghostly Bargain,' the idea of which had occurred to him at Lausanne, was now written and published with great success at Christmas 1848. He then began 'David Copperfield,' in many respects the most satisfactory of his novels, and especially remark- able for the autobiographical element, which is conspicuous in so many successful fictions. It contains less of the purely farcical or of the satirical caricature than most of his novels, and shows his literary genius mellowed by age without loss of spontaneous vigour. It appeared monthly from May 1849 to November 1850. The sale did not exceed twenty-five thousand copies ; but the book made its mark. He was now accepted by the largest class of readers as the undoubted leader among English novelists. While it was proceeding he finally gave shape to a plan long contemplated for a weekly journal. It was announced at the close of 1849, when Mr. W. H. Wills was selected as sub-editor, and continued to work with him until compelled to retire by ill-health in 1868. After many difficulties, the felicitous name, 'Household Words,' was at last selected, and the first number appeared 30 March 1849, with the beginning of a story by Mrs. Gaskell. During the rest of his life Dickens gave much of his energy to this journal and its successor, 'All the Year Round.' He gathered many contribu- tors, several of whom became intimate friends. He spared no pains in his editorial duty; he frequently amended his contribu- tors' work and occasionally inserted passages of his own. He was singularly quick and generous in recognising and encouraging talent in hitherto unknown writers. Many of the best of his minor essays appeared in its pages. Dickens's new relation to his readers helped to extend the extraordinary popularity which con- tinued to increase during his life. On the other hand, the excessive strain which it involved soon began to tell seriously upon his strength. In 1848 he had been much grieved by the loss of his elder sister Fanny. On 31 March 1851 his father, for whom in 1839 he had taken a house in Exeter, died at Malvern. Dickens, after attending his father's death, returned to town and took the chair at the dinner of the General Theatrical Fund 14 April 1851. After his speech he was told of the sudden death of his infant 584 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN daughter, Dora Annie (born 16 Aug. 1850). Dickens left Devon- shire Terrace soon afterwards, and moved into Tavistock House, Tavistock Square. Here, in November 1851, he began 'Bleak House,' which was published from March 1852 to September 1853. It was followed by 'Hard Times,' which appeared in 'Household Words' between i April and 12 Aug. 1854; and by 'Little Dorrit,' which appeared in monthly numbers from Jan- uary 1856 to June 1857. Forster thinks that the first evidences of excessive strain appeared during the composition of 'Bleak House.' 'The spring,' says Dickens, 'does not seem to fly back again directly, as it always did when I put my own work aside and had nothing else to do.' The old buoyancy of spirit is decreasing; the humour is often forced and the mannerism more strongly marked; the satire against the court of chancery, the utilitarians, and the 'circumlocution office 7 is not relieved by the irresistible fun of the former caricatures, nor strengthened by additional insight. It is superficial without being good-humoured. Dickens never wrote carelessly; he threw his whole energy into every task which he undertook ; and the undeniable vigour of his books, the infallible instinct with which he gauged the taste of his readers, not less 'than his established reputation, gave him an increasing popularity. The sale of 'Bleak House ' exceeded thirty thou- sand; 'Hard Times' doubled the circulation of 'Household Words;' and 'Little Dorrit' 'beat even "Bleak House" out of the field ; ' thirty-five thousand copies of the second number were sold. 'Bleak House' contained sketches of Landor as Lawrence Boy- thorn, and of Leigh Hunt as Harold Skimpole. Dickens defended himself for the very unpleasant caricature of Hunt in 'All the Year Round,' after Hunt's death. While Hunt was still living, Dickens had tried to console him by explaining away the likeness as confined to the flattering part ; but it is impossible to deny that he gave serious ground of offence. During this period Dickens was showing signs of increasing restlessness. He sought relief from his labours at 'Bleak House' by spending three months at Dover in the autumn of 1852. In the beginning of 1853 he re- ceived a testimonial at Birmingham, and undertook in return to give a public reading at Christmas on behalf of the New Midland Institute. He read two of his Christmas books and made a great THE LIFE OF CHARLES DICKENS 585 success. He was induced, after some hesitation, to repeat the experiment several times in the next few years. The summer of 1853 was spent at Boulogne, and in the autumn he made a two months' tour through Switzerland and Italy, with Mr. Wilkie Col- lins and Augustus Egg. In 1854 and 1856 he again spent sum- mers at Boulogne, gaining materials for some very pleasant de- scriptions; and from November 1855 to May 1856 he was at Paris, working at 'Little Dorrit.' During 1855 he found time to take part in some political agitations. In March 1856 Dickens bought Gadshill Place. When a boy at Rochester he had conceived a childish aspiration to become its owner. On hearing that it was for sale in 1855, he began nego- tiations for its purchase. He bought it with a view to occasional occupation, intending to let it in the intervals; but he became attached to it, spent much money on improving it, and finally in 1860 sold Tavistock House and made it his permanent abode. He continued to improve it till the end of his life. In the winter of 1856-7 Dickens amused himself with private theatricals at Tavistock House, and after the death of Douglas Jerrold (6 June 1857) got up a series of performances for the bene- fit of his friend's family, one of which was Mr. Wilkie Collins 's 'Frozen Deep,' also performed at Tavistock House. For the same purpose he read the 'Christmas Carol' at St. Martin's Hall (30 June 1857), with a success which led him to carry out a plan, already conceived, of giving public readings on his own account. He afterwards made an excursion with Mr. Wilkie Collins in the north of England, partly described in 'A Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices.' A growing restlessness and a craving for any form of distraction were connected with domestic unhappiness. In the beginning of 1858 he was preparing his public readings. Some of his friends objected, but he decided to undertake them, partly, it would seem, from the desire to be fully occupied. He gave a reading, 15 April 1858, for the benefit of the Children's Hospital in Great Ormond Street, in which he was keenly interested, and on 29 April gave the first public reading for his own benefit. This was immediately followed by the separation from his wife. The eldest son lived with the mother, while the rest of the children remained with 586 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN Dickens. Carlyle, mentioning the newspaper reports upon this subject to Emerson, says: 'Fact of separation, I believe, is true, but all the rest is mere lies and nonsense. No crime and no mis- demeanor specifiable on either side ; unhappy together, these two, good many years past, and they at length end it' (CARLYLE AND EMERSON, Correspondence, ii. 269). Dickens chose to publish a statement himself in 'Household Words,' 12 June 1858. He entrusted another and far more indiscreet letter to Mr. Arthur Smith, who now became the agent for his public readings, which was to be shown, if necessary, in his defence. It was published without his consent in the 'New York Tribune.' The impro- priety of both proceedings needs no comment. But nothing has been made public which would justify any statement as to the merits of the question. Dickens's publication in 'Household Words' and their refusal to publish the same account in ' Punch,' led to a quarrel with his publishers, which ended in his giving up the paper. He began an exactly similar paper, called 'All the Year Round' (first number 30 April 1859), and returned to his old publishers, Messrs. Chapman & Hall. Dickens seems to have thought that some public statement was made necessary by the quasi-public character which he now assumed. From this time his readings became an important part of his work. They formed four series, given in 1858-9, in 1861-3, m 1866-7, an( ^ in 1868-70. They finally killed him, and it is impossible not to regret that he should have spent so much energy in an enter- prise not worthy of his best powers. He began with sixteen nights at St. Martin's Hall, from 29 April to 22 July 1858. A provincial tour of eighty-seven readings followed, including Ireland and Scot- land. He gave a series of readings in London in the beginning of 1859, and made a provincial tour in October following. He was everywhere received with enthusiasm; he cleared 3oo/. a week before reaching Scotland, and in Scotland made 5oo/. a week. The readings were from the Christmas books, 'Pickwick,' 'Dom- bey,' 'Chuzzlewit,' and the Christmas numbers of 'Household Words.' The Christmas numbers in his periodicals, and espe- cially in 'All the Year Round,' had a larger circulation than any of his writings, those in 'All the Year Round' reaching three hun- dred thousand copies. Some of his most charming papers ap- THE LIFE OF CHARLES DICKENS 587 peared, as the 'Uncommercial Traveller,' in the last periodical. For his short story, 'Hunted Down,' first printed in the 'New York Ledger,' afterwards in 'All the Year Round,' he received i,ooo/. This and a similar sum, paid for the 'Holiday Romance' and 'George Silverman's Explanation' in a child's magazine published by Mr. Fields and in the 'Atlantic Monthly,' are mentioned by Forster as payments unequalled in the history of literature. In March 1861 he began a second series of readings in London, and after waiting to finish ' Great Expectations ' in ' All the Year Round,' he made another tour in the autumn and winter. He read again in St. James's Hall in the spring of 1862, and gave some readings at Paris in January 1863. The success was enormous, and he had an offer of io,ooo/., 'afterwards raised,' for a visit to Australia. He hesitated for a time, but the plan was finally aban- doned, and America, which had been suggested, was closed by the civil war. For a time he returned to writing. The 'Tale of Two Cities' had appeared in 'All the Year Round' during his first series of readings (April to November 1859). 'Great Expec- tations' appeared in the same journal from December 1860 to August 1 86 1, during the part of the second series. He now set to work upon 'Our Mutual Friend,' which came out in monthly numbers from May 1864 to November 1865. It succeeded with the public ; over thirty thousand copies of the first number were sold at starting, and, though there was a drop in the sale of the second number, this circulation was much exceeded. The gloomy river scenes in this and in 'Great Expectations' show Dickens 's full power, but both stories are too plainly marked by flagging invention and spirits. Forster publishes extracts from a book of memoranda kept from 1855 to 1865, in which Dickens first began to preserve notes for future work. He seems to have felt that he could no longer rely upon spontaneous suggestions of the moment. His mother died in September 1863, and his son Walter, for whom Miss Coutts had obtained a cadetship in the 26th native infantry, died at Calcutta on 31 Dec. following. He began a third series of readings under ominous symptoms. In February 1865 he had a severe illness. He ever afterwards suffered from a lameness in his left foot, which gave him great pain 588 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN and puzzled his physicians. On 9 June 1865 he was in a terrible railway accident at Staplehurst. The carriage in which he travelled left the line, but did not, with others, fall over the via- duct. The shock to his nerves was great and permanent, and he exerted himself excessively to help the sufferers. The accident is vividly described in his letters (ii. 229-33). I* 1 spite of these in- juries he never spared himself; after sleepless nights he walked distances too great for his strength, and he now undertook a series of readings which involved greater labour than the previous series. He was anxious to make a provision for his large family, and, probably conscious that his strength would not long be equal to such performances, he resolved, as Forster says, to make the most money possible in the shortest time without regard to labour. Dickens was keenly affected by the sympathy of his audience, and the visible testimony to his extraordinary popularity and to his singular dramatic power was no doubt a powerful attraction to a man who was certainly not without vanity, and who had been a popular idol almost from boyhood. After finishing 'Our Mutual Friend,' he accepted (in February 1866) an offer, from Messrs. Chappell of Bond Street, of 50^. a night for a series of thirty readings. The arrangements made it necessary that the hours not actually spent at the reading-desk or in bed should be chiefly passed in long railway journeys. He began in March and ended in June 1866. In August he made a new agreement for forty nights at 6ol. a night, or 2,500^. for forty- two nights. These readings took place between January and May 1867. The success of the readings again surpassed all prec- edent, and brought many invitations from America. Objections made by W. H. Wills and Forster were overruled. Dickens said that he must go at once if he went at all, to avoid clashing with the presidential election of 1868. He thought that by going he could realise 'a sufficient fortune.' He 'did not want money,' but the 'likelihood of making a very great addition to his capital in half a year' was an 'immense consideration.' In July Mr. Dolby sailed to America as his agent. An inflammation of the foot, followed by erysipelas, gave a warning which was not heeded. On i Oct. 1867 he telegraphed his acceptance of the engagement, and after a great farewell banquet at Freemasons' Hall (2 Nov.), THE LIFE OF CHARLES DICKENS 589 at which Lord Lytton presided, he sailed for Boston 9 Nov. 1867, landing on the igth. Americans had lost some of their provincial sensibility, and were only anxious to show that old resentments were forgotten. Dick- ens first read in Boston on 2 Dec. ; thence he went to New York ; he read afterwards at Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, again at Philadelphia, Syracuse, Rochester, Buffalo, Springfield, Port- land, New Bedford, and finally at Boston and New York again. He received a public dinner at New York (18 April), and reached England in the first week of May 1868. He made nearly 2o,ooo/. in America, but at a heavy cost in health. He was constantly on the verge of a break down. He naturally complimented Ameri- cans, not only for their generous hospitality, but for the many social improvements since his previous visits, though politically he saw little to admire. He promised that no future edition of his 'Notes' or 'Chuzzlewit' should be issued without a mention of the improvements which had taken place in America, or in his state of mind. As a kind of thank-offering, he had a copy of the ' Old Curiosity Shop' printed in raised letters, and presented it to an American asylum for the blind. Unfortunately Dickens was induced upon his return to give a final series of readings in England. He was to receive 8,ooo/. for a hundred readings. They began in October 1868. Dickens had preferred as a novelty a reading of the murder in * Oliver Twist.' He had thought of this as early as 1863, but it was 'so horrible ' that he was then ' afraid to try it in public ' (Letters, ii. 200). The performance was regarded by Forster as in itself 'illegitimate,' and Forster's protest led to a 'painful corre- spondence.' In any case, it involved an excitement and a degree of physical labour which told severely upon his declining strength. He was to give weekly readings in London alternately with read- ings in the country. In February 1869 he was forced to suspend his work under medical advice. After a few days' rest he began again, in spite of remonstrances from his friends and family. At last he broke down at Preston. On 23 April Sir Thomas Watson held a consultation with Mr. Beard, and found that he had been 'on the brink of an attack of paralysis of his left side, and possibly of apoplexy,' due to overwork, worry, and excite- 590 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN ment. He was ordered to give up his readings, though after some improvement Sir Thomas consented to twelve readings without railway travelling, which Dickens was anxious to give as some compensation to Messrs. Chappell for their disappointment. In the same autumn he began 'Edwin Drood.' He was to receive 7,5oo/. for twenty-five thousand copies, and fifty thousand were sold during his life. It 'very, very far outstripped every one of its predecessors' (J. T. FIELDS, p. 246). He passed the year at Gadshill, leaving it occasionally to attend a few meetings, and working at his book. His last readings were given at St. James's Hall from January to March. On i March he took a final leave of his hearers in a few graceful words. In April appeared the first number of 'Edwin Drood.' In the same month he appeared for the last time in public, taking the chair at the newsvendors' dinner, and replying for 'literature' at the dinner of the Royal Academy (30 April), when he spoke feelingly of the death of his old friend Maclise. He was at work upon his novel at Gadshill in June, and showed unusual fatigue. On 8 June he was working in the 'chalet' which had been presented to him in 1859 by Fechter, and put up as a study in his garden. He came into the house about six o'clock, and, after a few words to his sister-in-law, fell to the ground. There was an effusion on the brain; he never spoke again, and died at ten minutes past six on 9 June 1870. He was buried with all possi- ble simplicity in Westminster Abbey 14 June following. Dickens had ten children by his wife: Charles, born 1837; Mary, born 1838; Kate, born 1839, afterwards married to Charles Allston Collins [q. v.], and now Mrs. Perugini; Walter Landor, born 1841, died 12 Dec. 1863 (see above); Francis Jeffrey, born 1843; Alfred Tennyson, born 1845, settled in Australia; Sydney Smith Haldemand, born 1847, in the navy, buried at sea 2 May 1867; Henry Fielding, born 1849; Dora Annie, born 1850, died 14 April 1851; and Edward Bulwer Lytton, born 1852, settled in Australia. Dickens's appearance is familiar by innumerable photographs. Among portraits may be mentioned (i) by Maclise in 1839 (en- graved as frontispiece to 'Nicholas Nickleby'), original in possession of Sir Alfred Jodrell of Bayfield, Norfolk; (2) pen- THE LIFE OF CHARLES DICKENS 591 cil drawing by Maclise in 1842 (with his wife and sister); (3) oil-painting by E. M. Ward in 1854 (in possession of Mrs. Ward) ; (4) oil-painting by Ary Scheffer in 1856 (in National Portrait Gallery) ; (5) oil-painting by W. P. Frith in 1859 (in Forster collection at South Kensington) . Dickens was frequently compared in later life to a bronzed sea captain. In early portraits he has a dandified appearance, and was always a little over-dressed. He possessed a wiry frame, implying enormous nervous energy rather than muscular strength, and was most active in his habits, though not really robust. He seems to have overtaxed his strength by his passion for walking. All who knew him, from Carlyle downwards, speak of his many fine qualities: his generosity, sincerity, and kindliness. He was intensely fond of his children (see Mrs. Dickens's interesting account in Cornhill Magazine, January 1880) ; he loved dogs, and had a fancy for keeping large and eventually savage mastiffs and St. Bernards ; and he was kind even to contributors. His weaknesses are sufficiently obvious, and are reflected in his writings. If literary fame could be safely measured by popularity with the half-educated, Dickens must claim the highest position among English novelists. It is said, apparently on authority (Mr. Mowbray Morris in Fortnightly Review for December 1882) that 4,239,000 volumes of his works had been sold in England in the twelve years after his death. The criticism of more severe critics chiefly consists in the assertion that his merits are such as suit the half-educated. They admit his fun to be irresistible; his pathos, they say, though it shows boundless vivacity, implies little real depth or tenderness of feeling ; and his amazing powers of observation were out of proportion to his powers of reflection. The social and political views, which he constantly inculcates, imply a deliberate preference of spontaneous instinct to genuine reasoned conviction; his style is clear, vigor- ous, and often felicitous, but mannered and more forcible than delicate ; he writes too clearly for readers who cannot take a joke till it has been well hammered into their heads; his vivid percep- tion of external oddities passes into something like hallucination; and in his later books the constant strain to produce effects only legitimate when spontaneous becomes painful. His books are therefore inimitable caricatures of contemporary ' humours' 592 "SIR LESLIE STEPHEN rather than the masterpieces of a great observer of human nature. The decision between these and more eulogistic opinions must be left to a future edition of this dictionary. Dickens's works are : i. ' Sketches by Boz, illustrative of Every- day Life and Everyday People,' 2 vols. 1835, 2nd series, i vol. December 1836, illustrated by Cruikshank (from the 'Monthly Magazine,' the 'Morning' and 'Evening Chronicle,' 'Bell's Life in London,' and the 'Library of Fiction'). 2. 'Sunday under Three Heads : as it is ; as Sabbath-bills would make it ; as it might be. By Timothy Sparks,' illustrated by H. K. Browne, June 1836. 3. 'The Strange Gentleman,' a comic burletta in two parts 1837 (produced 29 Sept. 1836 at the St. James's Theatre). 4. 'The Village Coquettes,' a comic opera in two parts, December 1836 (songs separately in 1837). 5. 'Is she his Wife? or Some- thing Singular;' a comic burletta acted at St. James's Theatre, 6 March 1837, printed at Boston, 1877. 6. ' Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club,' November 1837 (originally in monthly num- bers from April 1836 to November 1837), illustrated by Seymour, Bass, and H. K. Browne. 7. 'Mudfog Papers,' in 'Bentley's Miscellany' (1837-9) 5 reprinted in 1880. 8. 'Memoirs of Joseph Grimaldi; edited by Boz,' 2 vols. 1838. 9. 'Oliver Twist; or the Parish Boy's Progress,' 2 vols. October 1838 (in 'Bentley's Mis- cellany,' January 1837 to March 1839), illustrated by Cruikshank. 10. 'Sketches of Young Gentlemen,' illustrated by H. K. Browne, 1838. ii. 'Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nicklebly,' October 1839 (in monthly numbers April 1838 to October 1839). 12. 'Sketches of Young Couples, with an Urgent Remonstrance to the Gentlemen of England (being bachelors or widowers) at the present alarming Crisis,' 1840, illustrated by H. K. Browne. 13. 'Master Humphrey's Clock,' in eighty-eight weekly numbers, from 4 April 1840 to 27 Nov. 1841, first volume published Septem- ber 1840; second volume published March 1841 ; third November 1841 ; illustrated by George Cattermole and H. K. Browne ('Old Curiosity Shop' from vol. i. 37 to vol. ii. 223; 'Barnaby Rudge' from vol. ii. 229 to vol. iii. 420). 14. 'The Pic-Nic Papers,' by various hands, edited by Charles Dickens, who wrote the preface and the first story, 'The Lamplighter' (the farce on which the story was founded was printed in 1879), 3 vo ^ s - I ^4 I (Dickens had noth- THE LIFE OF CHARLES DICKENS 593 ing to do with the third volume, Letters, ii. 91). 15. ' American Notes for General Circulation/ 2 vols. 1842. 16. 'A Christmas Carol in Prose; being a Ghost Story of Christmas,' illustrated by Leech, 1843. 17. 'The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit,' illustrated by H. K. Browne, July 1844 (originally in monthly numbers from January 1843 to July 1844). 18. 'Evenings of a Working Man,' by John Overs, with a preface relative to the author by Charles Dickens, 1844. 19. 'The Chimes; a Goblin Story of some Bells that Rang an Old Year out and a New Year in,' Christmas, 1844; illustrated by Maclise, Stanfield, R. Doyle, and J. Leech. 20. 'The Cricket on the Hearth; a Fairy Tale of Home,' Christmas, 1845; illustrated by Maclise, Stanfield, C. Landseer, R. Doyle, and J. Leech. 21. 'Pictures from Italy,' 1846 (originally in 'Daily News' from January to March 1846, where it appeared as a series of 'Travelling Letters written on the Road') 22. 'The Battle of Life; a Love Story,' Christmas, 1846; illustrated by Maclise, Stanfield, R. Doyle, and J. Leech. 23. 'Dealings with the Firm of Dombey and Son, Wholesale, Retail, and for Exportation,' April 1848; illustrated by H. K. Browne (originally in monthly numbers from October 1846 to to April 1848). 24. 'The Haunted Man, and the Ghost's Bargain; a Fancy for Christmas Time, Christmas,' 1848; illus- trated by Stanfield, John Tenniel, Frank Stone, and J. Leech. 25. 'The Personal History of David Copperfield,' November 1850; illustrated by H. K. Browne (originally in monthly parts from May 1849 to November 1850). 26. 'Bleak House,' Sep- tember 1853 ; illustrated by H. K. Browne (originally in monthly numbers from March 1852 to September 1853). 27. 'A Child's History of England,' 3 vols. 1854 (originally in 'Household Words' from 25 Jan. 1851 to 10 Dec. 1853). 28. 'Hard Times for these Times,' August 1854 (originally in 'Household Words' from i April to 12 Aug. 1854). 29. 'Little Dorrit,' June 1857; illus- trated by H. K. Browne (originally in monthly numbers from December 1855 to June 1857). 30. 'A Tale of Two Cities,' November 1859; illustrated by H. K. Browne (originally in 'All the Year Round,' from 30 April to 26 Nov. 1859). 3 I; 'Great Expectations,' 3 vols. August 1861 ; illustrated (when published in one volume 1862) by Marcus Stone (originally in 'All the Year 2Q 594 SIR LESLIE STEPHEN Round' from i Dec. 1860 to 3 Aug. 1861). 32. 'Our Mutual Friend,' November 1865 ; illustrated by Marcus Stone (originally in monthly numbers, May 1864 to November 1865). 33. ' Reli- gious Opinions of the late Rev. Chauncy Hare Townshend,' edited by Charles Dickens, 1869. 34. 'The Mystery of Edwin Drood' (unfinished); illustrated by S. L. Fildes (six numbers from April to September 1870). The following appeared in the Christmas numbers of 'House- hold Words' and 'All the Year Round:' 'A Christmas Tree,' in Christmas 'Household Words,' 1850; 'What Christmas is as we grow Older,' in 'What Christmas is,' ib. 1851; 'The Poor Rela- tion's Story' and 'The Child's Story,' in 'Stories for Christmas/ ib. 1852; 'The Schoolboy's Story' and 'Nobody's Story,' in 'Christmas Stories/ ib. 1853; 'In the Old City of Rochester,' 'The Story of Richard Doubledick,' and 'The Road,' in 'The Seven Poor Travellers,' ib. 1854; 'Myself,' 'The Boots,' and 'The Till,' in ' The Holly Tree,' ib. 1855 ; ' The Wreck,' in ' The Wreck of the Golden Mary,' ib. 1856; 'The Island of Silver Store' and 'The Rafts on the River,' in 'The Perils of certain English Pris- oners,' ib. 1857; 'Going into Society,' in 'A House to Let,' ib. 1858; 'The Mortals in the House' and 'The Ghost in Master B.'s Room,' in 'The Haunted House,' 'All the Year Round,' 1859: 'The Village' (nearly the whole), 'The Money,' and 'The Restitution,' in 'A Message from the Sea,' ib. 1860; 'Picking up Soot and Cinders,' ' Picking up Miss Kimmeens,' and ' Picking up the Tinker,' in 'Tom Tiddler's Ground,' ib. 1861; 'His Leaving it till called for,' 'His Boots,' 'His Brown Paper Parcel,' and 'His Wonderful End,' in 'Somebody's Luggage,' ib. 1862; 'How Mrs. Lirriper carried on the Business,' and 'How the Parlour added a few Words,' in ' Mrs. Lirriper's Lodgings,' ib. 1863 ; ' Mrs. Lir- riper relates how she went on and went over' and 'Mrs. Lirriper relates how Jemmy topped up,' in 'Mrs. Lirriper's Legacy,' ib. 1864; 'To be Taken Immediately,' 'To be Taken for Life,' and 'The Trial,' in 'Dr. Marigold's Prescriptions,' ib. 1865; 'Barbox Brothers,' 'Barbox Brothers & Co.' 'The Main Line,' the 'Boy at Mugby,' and 'No. i Branch Line: the Signalman,' in 'Mugby Junction,' ib. 1866; 'No Thoroughfare' (with Mr. Wilkie Collins), ib. 1867. THE LIFE OF CHARLES DICKENS 595 Besides these Dickens published the 'Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices ' (with Mr. Wilkie Collins) in ' Household Words ' for October 1857; 'Hunted Down' (originally in the 'New York Ledger') in 'All the Year Round,' August 1860; 'The Uncom- mercial Traveller' (a series of papers from 28 Jan. to 13 Oct. 1860, collected in December 1860). Eleven fresh papers from the same were added to an edition in 1868, and seven more were written to 5 June 1869. A 'Holiday Romance/ originally in ' Our Young Folks/ and ' George Silverman's Explanation/ originally in the ' Atlantic Monthly/ appeared in 'All the Year Round/ from 5 Jan. to 22 Feb. 1868. His last paper in 'All the Year Round* was 'Landor's Life/ 5 June 1869. A list of various articles in news- papers, &c., is given in R. H. Shepherd's 'Bibliography.' The first collective edition of Dickens's works was begun in April 1847. The first series closed in September 1852; a second closed in 1861 ; and a third in 1874. The first library edition began in 1857. The ' Charles Dickens' edition began in America, and was issued in England from 1868 to 1870. ' Plays and Poems/ edited by R. H. Shepherd, was published in 1882, suppressed as containing copyright matter, and reissued without this in 1885. 'Speeches' by the same in 1884. For minuter particulars see ' Hints to Collectors/ by J. F. Dexter, in 'Dickens Memento/ 1870; 'Hints to Collectors . . .' by C. P. Johnson, 1885; 'Bibliography of Dickens/ by R. H. Shepherd, 1880; and 'Bibliography of the Writings of Charles Dickens/ by James Cook, 1879. THE LIFE OF ROBERT BROWNING EDMUND GOSSE [From the Dictionary of National Biography.^ BROWNING, ROBERT (1812-1889), P oet > was descended, as he believed, from an Anglo-Saxon family which bore in Norman times the name De Bruni. As a matter of fact the stock has been traced no further back than to the early part of the eighteenth century, when the poet's natural great-grandfather owned the 596 EDMUND GOSSE Woodgates inn in the parish of Partridge in Dorset. The son of this man, Robert Browning, was born in 1749, and was a clerk in the bank of England, rising to be principal of the bank stock office. He married, in 1778, Margaret Tittle, a West Indian heiress. He died at Islington on n Dec. 1833. By his first wife he had two children, a son Robert, and a daughter who died un- married; by his second wife he had a large family. The second Robert Browning, who was born in 1781, was early sent out to manage the parental estate in St. Kitts, but threw up his appoint- ment from disgust at the system of slave labour prevailing there. In 1803 he became a clerk in the bank of England, and in 1811 settled in Camberwell, and married the daughter of a small shipowner in Dundee named Wiedemann, whose father was a Hamburg merchant. He was a fluent writer of accurate verse, in the eighteenth century manner, and of tastes both scholarly and artistic. He had wished to be trained as a painter, and it is said that he was wont in later life to soothe his little boy to sleep by humming odes of Anacreon to him. The poet, who had little sympathy for his grandfather, adored the memory of his father, and gave impressions of his genius, which were perhaps exag- gerated by affection. He was athletic and enjoyed magnificent health ; a ruddy, active man, of high intelligence and liberality of mind. He lived on until 1866, vigorous to the end. A letter from Frederick Locker Lampson preserves some interesting im- pressions of this fine old man. He had two children Robert, the poet, and Sarianna, who still survives (born 1814). Robert Browning, one of the Englishmen of most indisputable genius whom the nineteenth century has produced, was born at Southampton Street, Camberwell, on 7 May 1812. 'He was a handsome, vigorous, fearless child, and soon developed an unrest- ing activity and a fiery temper' (MRS. ORR). He was keenly susceptible, from earliest infancy, to music, poetry, and painting. At two years and three months he painted (in lead-pencil and black-currant jam-juice) a composition of a cottage and rocks, which was thought a masterpiece. So turbulent was he and de- structive that he was sent, a mere infant, to the day-school of a dame, who has the credit of having divined his intellect. One of the first books which influenced him was Croxall's 'Fables' in THE LIFE OF ROBERT BROWNING 597 verse, and he soon began to make rhymes, and a little later plays. From a very early age he began to devour the volumes in his father's well-stocked library, and about 1824 he had completed a little volume of verses, called ' Incondita,' for which he endeavoured in vain to find a publisher, and it was destroyed. It had been shown, however, to Miss Sarah Flower, afterwards Mrs. Adams, who made a copy of it ; this copy, fifty years afterwards, fell into the hands of Browning himself, who destroyed it. He told the present writer that these verses were servile imitations of Byron, who was at that time still alive; and that their only merit was their mellifluous smoothness. Of Miss Eliza Flower (elder sister of Sarah Flower), his earliest literary friend, Browning always spoke with deep emo- tion. Although she was nine years his senior, he regarded her with tender boyish sentiment, and she is believed to have inspired 'Pauline.' In 1825, in his fourteenth year, a complete revolution was made in the boy's attitude to literature by his becoming ac- quainted with the poems of Shelley and Keats, which his mother bought for him in their original editions. He was at this time at the school of the Rev, Thomas Ready in Peckham. In 1826 the ques- tion of his education was seriously raised, and it was decided that he should be sent neither to a public school nor ultimately to a university. In later years the poet regretted this decision, which, however, was probably not unfavourable to his idiosyncrasy. He was taught at home by a tutor; his training was made to include ' music, singing, dancing, riding, boxing, and fencing.' He became an adept at some of these, in particular a graceful and intrepid rider. From fourteen to sixteen he was inclined to believe that musical composition would be the art in which he might excel, and he wrote a number of settings for songs ; these he afterwards de- stroyed. At his father's express wish, his education was definitely literary. In 1829-30, for a very short time, he attended the Greek class of Professor George Long at London University, afterwards University College, London. His aunt, Mrs. Silverthorne, greatly encouraged his father in giving a lettered character to Robert's training. He now formed the acquaintance of two young men of adventurous spirit, each destined to become distinguished. Of these one was (Sir) Joseph Arnould, and the other Alfred Domett; both then lived at Camberwell. Domett early in his 598 EDMUND GOSSE career went out to New Zealand, in circumstances the suddenness and romance of which suggested to Browning his poem of ' War- ing.' To Domett also ' The Guardian Angel' is dedicated, and he remained through life a steadfast friend of the poet. While he was at University College, the elder Browning asked his son what he intended to be. The young man replied by asking if his sister would be sufficiently provided for if he adopted no business or profession. The answer was that she would be. The poet then suggested that it would be better for him 'to see life in the best sense, and cultivate the powers of his mind, than to shackle himself in the very outset of his career by a laborious training, foreign to that aim.' 'In short, Robert, your design is to be a poet?' He admitted it ; and his father at once acquiesced. It has been said that the bar and painting occurred to him as possible professions. It may be so, but the statement just made was taken from his own lips, and doubtless represents the upshot of family discussion cul- minating in the determination to live a life of pure culture, out of which art might spontaneously rise. It began to rise immediately, in the form of colossal schemes for poems. In October 1832 Robert was already engaged upon his first completed work, 'Pauline.' Mrs. Silverthorne paid for it to be printed, and the little volume appeared, anonymously, in January 1833. The poet sent a copy to W. J. Fox, with a letter in which he described him- self as ' an oddish sort of boy, who had the honour of being intro- duced to you at Hackney some years back' by Sarah Flower Adams. Fox reviewed 'Pauline' with very great warmth in the ' Monthly Repository,' and it fell also under the favourable notice of Allan Cunningham. J. S. Mill read and enthusiastically ad- mired it, but had no opportunity of giving it public praise. With these exceptions 'Pauline' fell absolutely still-born from the press. The life of Robert Browning during the next two years is very obscure. He was still occupied with certain religious speculations. In the winter of 1833-4, as the guest of Mr. Benckhausen, the Russian consul-general, he spent three months in St. Petersburg, an experience which had a vivid effect on the awakening of his poetic faculties. At St. Petersburg he wrote ' Porphyria's Lover ' and 'Johannes Agricola,' both of which were printed in the 'Monthly Repository' in 1836. These are the earliest specimens THE LIFE OF ROBERT BROWNING 599 of Browning's dramatico-lyrical poetry which we possess, and their maturity of style is remarkable. A sonnet, 'Eyes calm beside thee,' is dated 17 Aug. 1834. In the early part of 1834 he paid his first visit to Italy, and saw Venice and Asolo. 'Having just returned from his first visit to Venice, he used to illustrate his glowing descriptions of its beauties, the palaces, the sunsets, the moonrises, by a most original kind of etching' on smoked note- paper (MRS. BRIDELL-FOX). In the winter of 1834 he was ab- sorbed in the composition of 'Paracelsus/ which was completed in March 1835. Fox helped him to find a publisher, Effingham Wilson. 'Paracelsus' was dedicated to the Comte Amadee de Ripert-Monclar (b. 1808), a young French royalist, who had sug- gested the subject to Browning. John Forster, who had just come up to London, wrote a careful and enthusiastic review of 'Paracelsus' in the 'Examiner,' and this led to his friendship with Browning. The press in general took no notice of this poem, but curiosity began to awaken among lovers of poetry. 'Paracelsus' introduced Browning to Carlyle, Talfourd, Landor, Home, Monckton Milnes, Barry Cornwall, Mary Mitford, Leigh Hunt, and eventually to Wordsworth and Dickens. About 1835 the Browning family moved from Camber- well to Hatcham, to a much larger and more convenient house, where the picturesque domestic life of the poet was developed. In November W. J. Fox asked him to dinner to meet Macready, who was already prepared to admire 'Paracelsus;' he entered in his famous diary ' The writer can scarcely fail to be a leading spirit of his time.' Browning saw the new year, 1836, in at Macready's house in Elstree, and met Forster for the first time in the coach on the way thither. Macready urged him to write for the stage, and in February Browning proposed a tragedy of 'Narses.' This came to nothing, but after the supper to celebrate the success of Talfourd's 'Ion' (26 May 1836), Macready said, 'Write a play, Browning, and keep me from going to America. What do you say to a drama on Strafford ? ' The play, however, was not com- pleted for nearly another year. On i May 1837 ' Strafford ' was pub- lished and produced at Covent Garden Theatre. It was played by Macready and Helen Faucit, but it only ran for five nights. Van- denhoff, who had played the part of Pym with great indifference, 600 EDMUND GOSSE cavalierly declined to act any more. For the next two or three years Browning lived very quietly at Hatcham, writing under the rose trees of the large garden, riding on 'York,' his horse, and steeping himself in all literature, modern and ancient, English and exotic. His labours gradually concentrated themselves on a long narrative poem, historical and philosophical, in which he re- counted the entire life of a mediaeval minstrel. He had become terrified at what he thought a tendency to diffuseness in his ex- pression, and consequently 'Sordello' is the most tightly com- pressed and abstrusely dark of all his writings. He was partly aware himself of its excessive density; the present writer ( in 1875) saw him take up a copy of the first edition, and say, with a grimace, 'Ah! the entirely unintelligible "Sordello."' It was partly written in Italy, for which country Browning started at Easter, 1838. He went to Trieste in a merchant ship, to Venice, Asolo, the Euganean Hills, Padua, back to Venice; then by Verona and Salzburg to the Rhine, and so home. On the outward voyage he wrote ' How they brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix,' and many of his best lyrics belong to this summer of 1838. In 1839 he finished 'Sordello' and began the tragedies 'King Victor and King Charles' and 'Mansoor the Hierophant,' and formed the acquaintance of his father's old schoolfellow, John Kenyon. In 1840 he composed a tragedy of 'Hippolytus and Aricia,' of which all that has been preserved is the prologue spoken by Artemis. ' Sordello' was published in 1840, and was received with mockery by the critics and with indifference by the public. Even those who had welcomed ' Paracelsus ' most warmly looked askance at this congeries of mystifications, as it seemed to them. Browning was not in the least discouraged, although, as Mrs. Orr has said, ' he was now entering on a period of general neglect which covered nearly twenty years of his life.' The two tragedies were now com- pleted, the title of 'Mansoor' being changed to 'The Return of the Druses.' Edward Moxon proposed to Browning that he should print his poems as pamphlets, each to form a separate brochure of just one sheet, sixteen pages in double columns, the entire cost of each not to exceed twelve or fifteen pounds. In this fashion were produced the series of 'Bells and Pomegranates,' eight num- THE LIFE OF ROBERT BROWNING 6oi bers of which appeared successively between 1841 and 1846. Of the business relations between Browning and Moxon the poet gave the following relation in 1874, in a letter still unpublished, addressed to F. Locker Lampson : ' He [Moxon] printed, on nine occasions, nine poems of mine, wholly at my expense: that is, he printed them and, subtracting the very moderate returns, sent me in, duly, the bill of the remainder of expense. . . . Moxon was kind and civil, made no profit by me, I am sure, and never tried to help me to any, he would have assured you.' 'Pippa Passes' opened the series of 'Bells and Pomegranates' in 1841 ; No. ii. was l King Victor and King Charles,' 1842 ; No. iii. 'Dramatic Lyrics/ 1842; No. iv. 'The Return of the Druses,' 1843 ; No. v. 'A Blot in the 'Scutcheon,' 1843 J No - vi. ' Colombe's Birthday,' 1844; No. vii. 'Dramatic Romances and Lyrics,' 1845; an d No. viii. 'Luria' and 'A Soul's Tragedy,' 1846. In a suppressed ' note of explanation ' Browning stated that by the title 'Bells and Pomegranates' he meant 'to indicate an endeavour towards something like an alternation, or mixture, of music with discoursing, sound with sense, poetry with thought.' Of the com- position of these works the following facts have been preserved. 'Pippa Passes' was the result of the sudden image of a figure walking alone through life, which came to Browning in a wood near Dulwich. 'Dramatic Lyrics' contained the poem of 'The Pied Piper of Hamelin,' which was written in May 1842 to amuse Macready's little son William, who made some illustrations for it which the poet preserved. At the same time was written ' Cres- centius,' which was not printed until 1890. 'The Lost Leader' was suggested by Wordsworth's ' abandonment of liberalism at an unlucky juncture;' but Browning resisted strenuously the notion that this poem was a 'portrait' of Wordsworth. In 1844 and 1845 Browning contributed six important poems to 'Hood's Magazine;' all these they included 'The Tomb at St. Praxed's' and 'The Flight of the Duchess' were reprinted in 'Bells and Pome- granates.' The play, 'A Blot in the 'Scutcheon,' was written at the desire of Macready, and was first performed at Drury Lane on ii Feb. 1843. ^ nac ^ been read in manuscript by Charles Dickens, who wrote, 'It has thrown me into a perfect passion of sorrow, and I swear it is a tragedy that must be played, and must 602 EDMUND GOSSE be played, moreover, by Macready.' For some reason Forster concealed this enthusiastic judgment of Dickens from Browning, and probably from Macready. The latter did not act in it, and treated it with contumely. Browning gave the leading part to Phelps, and the heroine was played by Helen Faucit. The 'Blot in the 'Scutcheon/ though well received, was 'underacted' and had but a short run. There followed a quarrel between the poet and Macready, who did not meet again till 1862. * Colombe's Birthday' was read to the Keans on 10 March 1844, but as they wished to keep it by them until Easter, 1845, the poet took it away and printed it. It was not acted until 25 April 1853, when Helen Faucit and Barry Sullivan produced it at the Hay market. About the same time it was performed at the Howard Athenaeum, Boston, U.S.A. In the autumn of 1844 Browning set out on his third journey to Italy, taking ship direct for Naples. He formed the acquaint- ance of a cultivated young Neapolitan, named Scotti, with whom he travelled to Rome. At Leghorn Browning visited E. J. Tre- lawney. The only definite relic of this journey which survives is a shell, 'picked up on one of the Syren Isles, October 4, 1844,' but its impressions are embodied in 'The Englishman in Italy,' 'Home Thoughts from Abroad,' and other romances and lyrics. Browning was now at the very height of his genius. It was through Kenyon that Browning first became acquainted with Elizabeth Barrett Moulton Barrett, who was already celebrated as a poet, and had, indeed, achieved a far wider reputation than Browning. Miss Barrett was the cousin of Kenyon; a confirmed invalid, she saw no one and never left the house. She was an admirer of Browning's poems; he, on the other hand, first read hers in the course of the opening week of 1845, although he had become aware that she was a great poet. She was six years older than he, but looked much younger than her age. He was induced to write to her, and his first letter, addressed from Hatcham on 10 Jan. 1845 to Miss Barrett, at 50 Wimpole Street, is a declaration of passion: ' I love your books, and I love you too.' She replied, less gushingly, but with warmest friendship, and in a few days they stood, without quite realising it at first, on the footing of lovers. Their earliest meeting, however, took place at Wimpole Street, in the afternoon THE LIFE OF ROBERT BROWNING 603 of Tuesday, 20 May, 1845. Miss Barrett received Browning prone on her sofa, in a partly darkened room; she 'instantly inspired him with a passionate admiration.' They corresponded with such fulness that their missives caught one another by the heels ; letters full of literature and tenderness and passion; in the course of which he soon begged her to allow him to devote his life to her care. She withdrew, but he persisted, and each time her denial grew fainter. He visited her three times a week, and these visits were successfully concealed from her father, a man of strange eccentric- ity and selfishness, who thought that the lives of all his children should be exclusively dedicated to himself, and who forbade any of them to think of marriage. In the whole matter the conduct of Browning, though hazardous and involving great moral courage, can only be considered strictly honourable and right. The happi- ness, and even perhaps the life, of the invalid depended upon her leaving the hothouse in which she was imprisoned. Her father acted as a mere tyrant, and the only alternatives were that Elizabeth should die in her prison or should escape from it with the man she loved. All Browning's preparations were undertaken with delicate forethought. On 12 Sept. 1846, in company with Wilson, her maid, Miss Barrett left Wimpole Street, took a fly from a cab-stand in Marylebone, and drove to St. Pancras Church, where they were privately married. She returned to her father's house; but on 19 Sept. (Saturday) she stole away at dinner-time with her maid and Flush, her dog. At Vauxhall Station Browning met her, and at 9 P.M. they left Southampton for Havre, and on the 2oth were in Paris. In that city they found Mrs. Jameson, and in her company, a week later, started for Italy. They rested two days at Avignon, where, at the sources of Vaucluse, Browning lifted his wife through the ' chiare, frische e dolci acque,' and seated her on the rock where Petrarch had seen the vision of Laura. They passed by sea from Marseilles to Genoa. Early in October they reached Pisa, and settled there for the winter, taking rooms for six months in the Collegio Ferdinando. The health of Mrs. Browning bore the strain far better than could have been anticipated; indeed, the courageous step which the lovers had taken was completely jus- tified; Mr. Barrett, however, continued implacable. The poets lived with strict economy at Pisa, and Mrs. Browning 604 EDMUND GOSSE benefited from the freedom and the beauty of Italy : ' I was never happy before in my life,' she wrote (5 Nov. 1846). Early in 1847 she showed Browning the sonnets she had written during their courtship, which she proposed to call 'Sonnets from the Bosnian.' To this Browning objected, ' No, not Bosnian that means nothing but "From the Portuguese"! They are Catarina's sonnets.' These were privately printed in 1847, and ultimately published in 1850; they form an invaluable record of the loves of two great poets. Their life at Pisa was 'such a quiet, silent life,' and by the spring of 1847 the health of Elizabeth Browning seemed entirely restored by her happiness and liberty. In April they left Pisa and reached Florence on the 2oth, taking up their abode in the Via delle Belle Donne. They made a plan of going for several months, in July, to Vallombrosa, but they were 'in- gloriously expelled' from the monastery at the end of five days. They had to return to Florence, and to rooms in the Palazzo Guidi, Via Maggio, the famous ' Casa Guidi.' Here also the life was most quiet : ' I can't make Robert go out for a single evening, not even to a concert, nor to hear a play of Alfieri's, yet we fill up our days with books and music, and a little writing has its share' (E.B.B. to Mary Mitford, 8 Dec. 1847). Early in 1848 Browning began to prepare a collected edition of his poems. He proposed that Moxon should publish this at his own risk, but he declined; whereupon Browning made the same proposal to Chapman & Hall, or Forster did it for him, and they accepted. This edition appeared in two volumes in 1849, but contained only 'Bells and Pomegranates' and 'Paracelsus.' The Brownings had now been living in Florence, in furnished rooms, for more than a year, so they determined to set up a home for them- selves. They took an apartment of 'six beautiful rooms and a kitchen, three of them quite palace rooms, and opening on a terrace ' in the Casa Guidi. They saw few English visitors, and 'as to Italian society, one may as well take to longing for the evening star, it is so inaccessible' (15 July 1848). In August they went to Fano, Ancona, Sinigaglia, Rimini, and Ravenna. In October Father Prout joined them for some weeks, and was a welcome apparition. The 'Blot in the 'Scutcheon' was revived this winter at Sadler's Wells, by Phelps, with success. On 9 March THE LIFE OF ROBERT BROWNING 605 1849 was born in Casa Guidi the poets' only child, Robert Wiedemann Barrett Browning, and a few days later Browning's mother died. Sorrow greatly depressed the poet at this time, and their position in Florence, in the disturbed state of Tuscany, was precarious. They stayed there, however, and in July moved merely to the Bagni di Lucca, for three months' respite from the heat. They took ' a sort of eagle's nest, the highest house of the highest of the three villages, at the heart of a hundred mountains, sung to continually by a rushing mountain stream.' Here Brown- ing's spirits revived, and they enjoyed adventurous excursions into the mountains. In October they returned to Florence. Dur- ing this winter Browning was engaged in composing 'Christmas Eve and Easter Day,' which was published in March 1850. They gradually saw more people Lever, Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Kirkup, Greenough, Miss Isa Blagden. In September the Brown- ings went to Poggio al Vento, a villa two miles from Siena, for a few weeks. The following months, extremely quiet ones, were spent in Casa Guidi, the health of Elizabeth Browning not being quite so satisfactory as it had previously been since her marriage. On 2 May 1851 they started for Venice, where they spent a month ; and then by Milan, Lucerne, and Strassburg to Paris, where they settled down for a few weeks. At the end of July they crossed over to England, after an absence of nearly five years, and stayed until the end of September in lodg- ings at 26 Devonshire Street. They lived very quietly, but saw Carlyle, Forster, Fanny Kemble, Rogers, and Barry Cornwall. As Mr. Barrett refused all communication with them, in September Browning wrote 'a manly, true, straightforward letter' to his father-in-law, appealing for a conciliatory attitude ; but he received a rude and insolent reply, enclosing, unopened, with the seals unbroken, all the letters which his daughter had written to him during the five years, and they settled, at the close of September, at 138 Avenue des Champs-Elysees ; the political events in Paris interested them exceedingly. It was on this occasion that Carlyle travelled with them from London to Paris. They were received by Madame Mohl, and at her house met various celebrities. Browning attracted some curiosity, his poetry having been intro- duced to French readers for the first time in the August number 606 EDMUND GOSSE of the ' Revue des Deux Mondes,' by Joseph Milsand. They walked out in the early morning of 2 Dec. while the coup d'etat was in progress. In February 1852 Browning was induced to contribute a prose essay on Shelley to a volume of new letters by that poet, which Moxon was publishing ; he did not know anything about the provenance of the letters, and the introduction was on Shelley in general. However, to his annoyance, it proved that Moxon was deceived ; the letters were shown to be forgeries, and the book was immediately withdrawn. The Brownings saw George Sand (13 Feb.), and Robert walked the whole length of the Tuileries Gardens with her on his arm (7 April) ; but missed, by tiresome accidents, Alfred de Musset and Victor Hugo. At the end of June 1852 the Brownings returned to London, and took lodgings at 58 Welbeck Street. They went to see Ken- yon at Wimbledon, and met Landor there. They saw, about this time, Ruskin, Patmore, Monckton Milnes, Kingsley, and Tenny- son; and it is believed that in this year Browning's friendship with D. G. Rossetti began. Towards the middle of November 1852 the Brownings returned to Florence, which Robert found deadly dull after Paris 'no life, no variety.' This winter Robert (afterwards the first earl) Lytton made their acquaintance, and became an intimate friend, and they saw Frederick Tennyson, and Power, the sculptor. On 25 April 1853 Browning's play, 'Colombe's Birthday/ was performed at the Haymarket for the first time. From July to October 1853 they spent in their old haunt in the Casa Tolomei, Bagni di Lucca, and here Browning wrote 'In a Balcony,' and was 'working at a volume of lyrics.' After a few weeks in Florence the Brownings moved on (Novem- ber 1853) to Rome, where they remained for six months, in the Via Bocca di Leone; here they saw Fanny Kemble, Thackeray, Mr. Aubrey de Vere, Lockhart (who said, 'I like Browning, he isn't at all like a damned literary man'), Leigh ton, and Ampere. They left Rome on 22 May, travelling back to Florence in a vettura. Money embarrassments kept them 'transfixed' at Flor- ence through the summer, ' unable even to fly to the mountains,' but the heat proved bearable, and they lived ' a very tranquil and happy fourteen months on their own sofas and chairs, among their own nightingales and fireflies.' THE LIFE OF ROBERT BROWNING 607 This was a silent period in Browning's life ; he was hardly writ- ing anything new, but revising the old for 'Men and Women.' In February 1854 his poem 'The Twins' was privately printed for a bazaar. In July 1855 they left Italy, bringing with them the manuscripts of ' Men and Women' and of ' Aurora Leigh.' They went to 13 Dorset Street, where many friends visited them. It was here that, on 27 Sept., D. G. Rossetti made his famous drawing of Tennyson reading 'Maud' aloud. Here too was written the ad- dress to E.B.B., ' One Word More.' Soon after the publication of ' Men and Women ' they went in October to Paris, lodging in great discomfort at 102 Rue de Grenelle, Faubourg St. -Germain. In December they moved to 3 Rue du Colisee, where they were happier. Browning was now engaged on an attempt to rewrite ' Sordello' in more intelligible form; this he presently abandoned. He had one of his very rare attacks of illness in April 1856, brought on partly by disinclination to take exercise. The poem of 'Ben Karshook's Wisdom,' which he excised from the proofs of 'Men and Women,' and which he never reprinted, appeared this year in 'The Keepsake' as 'May and Death' in 1857. Kenyon having offered them his London house, 39 Devonshire Place, they returned in June 1856 to England, but were called to the Isle of Wight in September by the dangerous illness of that beloved friend. He seemed to rally, and in October the Brownings left for Florence; Kenyon, however, died on 3 Dec., leaving large legacies to the Brownings. ' During his life his friendship had taken the practical form of allowing them ioo/. a year, ,in order that they might be more free to follow their art for its own sake only, and in his will he left 6,5oo/. to Robert Browning and 4,5oo/. to Elizabeth Brown- ing. These were the largest legacies in a very generous will the fitting end to a life passed in acts of generosity and kindness' (F. G. KENYON). The early part of 1857 was quietly spent in the Casa Guidi; but on 30 July the Brownings went, for the third time, to Bagni di Lucca. They were followed by Robert Lytton, who wished to be with them ; but he arrived unwell, and was pros- trated with gastric fever, through which Browning nursed him. The Brownings returned to Florence in the autumn, and the next twelve months were spent almost without an incident. But in July 1858 they went to Paris, where they stayed a fortnight at the 608 EDMUND GOSSE Hotel Hyacinthe, Rue St.-Honore, and then went on to Havre, where they joined Browning's father and sister. In October they went back, through Paris, to Florence; but after six weeks left for Rome, where, on 24 Nov., they settled in their old rooms in 43 Via Bocca di Leone. Here they saw much of Hawthorne, Massimo d'Azeglio, and Leighton. Browning, in accordance with a desire expressed by the queen, dined with the young prince of Wales at the embassy. They returned to Florence in May 1859, and to Siena, for three months, in July. It was at Florence at this time that the fierce and aged Landor presented himself to Brown- ing with a few pence in his pocket and without a home. Browning took him to Siena and rented a cottage for him there; at the end of the year Browning secured apartments for him in Florence, where he ended his days nearly five years later. At Siena Edward Burne- Jones and Mr. Val Prinsep joined the Brownings, and they saw much of one another the ensuing winter at Rome, whither the poets passed early in December, finding rooms at 28 Via del Tritone. Here Browning wrote 'Sludge the Medium,' in reference to Home's spiritualistic pranks, which had much affected Mrs. Browning's composure. They left Rome on 4 June 1860, and travelled by vettura to Florence, through Or- vieto and Chiusi ; six weeks later they went, as before, to the Villa Alberti in Siena, returning to Florence in September. The steady decline of Elizabeth Browning's health was now a matter of con- stant anxiety ; this was hastened by the news of the death of her sister, Henrietta Surtees-Cook (December 1860). From Siena the Brownings went this winter direct to Rome, to 126 Via Felice. In March 1861 Robert Browning, now nearly fifty, was 'looking remarkably well and young, in spite of all lunar lights in his hair. The women adore him everywhere far too much for decency. In my own opinion he is infinitely handsomer and more attractive than when I saw him first, sixteen years ago' (E. B. B.). At the close of May 1861, no definite alarm about Mrs. Browning being yet felt, they went back to Florence. She died at last after a few days' illness in Browning's arms, on 29 June 1861, in their apart- ments in Casa Guidi. Thus closed, after sixteen years of un- clouded marital happiness, one of the most interesting and romantic relations between a man and woman of genius which the history of literature presents to us. THE LIFE OF ROBERT BROWNING 609 Browning was overwhelmed by a disaster which he had refused to anticipate. Miss Isa Blagden, whose friendship had long been invaluable to the Brownings in Florence, was * perfect in all kind- ness' to the bereaved poet. With Browning and his little son Miss Blagden left Florence at the end of July 1861, and travelled with them to Paris, where he stayed at 151 Rue de Grenelle, Faubourg St.-Germain. Browning never returned to Florence. In Paris he parted from Miss Blagden, who went back to Italy, and he proceeded to St.-Enegat, near Dinard, where his father and sister were staying. In November 1861 he went on to London, wishing to consult with his wife's sister, Miss Arabel Barrett, as to the education of his child. She found him lodgings, as his intention was to make no lengthy stay in England ('no more housekeeping for me, even with my family'). Early in 1862, however, he became persuaded that this was a wretched arrange- ment, for his little son as well as for himself. Miss Arabel Barrett was living in Delamere Terrace, facing the canal, and Browning took a house, 19 Warwick Crescent, in the same line of buildings, a little further east. Here he arranged the furniture which had been around him in the Casa Guidi, and here he lived for more than five-and-twenty years. The winter of 1861, the first, it is said, which he had ever spent in London, was inexpressibly dreary to him. He was drawn to spend it and the following years in this way from a strong sense of duty to his father, his sister, and his son. He made it, moreover, a practice to visit Miss Arabel Barrett every afternoon, and with her he first attended Bedford Chapel to listen to the eloquent ser- mons of Thomas Jones (1819-1882). He became a seatholder there, and contributed a short introduction to a collection of Jones's sermons and addresses which appeared in 1884. He lived through 1862 very quietly, in great depression of spirits, but devoted, like a mother, to the interests of his little son. In August he was per- suaded to go to the Pyrenees, and spent that month at Cambo; in September he went on to Biarritz, and here he began to meditate on 'my new poem which is about to be, the Roman murder story,' which ultimately became 'The Ring and the Book.' At the same time he made a close study of Euripides, which left a strong mark on his future work, and he saw through the press the ' Last Poems ' 2R 6 10 EDMUND GOSSE of his wife, to which he prefixed a dedication 'to grateful Florence.' In October he returned by Paris to London. On reappearing in London he was pestered by applications from volunteer biographers of his wife. His anguish at these imperti- nences disturbed his peace and even his health. On this subject his indignation remained to the last extreme, and the expressions of it were sometimes unwisely violent. 'Nothing that ought to be published shall be kept back,' however, he determined, and there- fore in the course of 1863 he published Mrs. Browning's prose essays on * The Greek Christian Poets.' His own poems appeared this year in two forms: a selection, edited by John Forster and Barry Cornwall, and a three-volume edition, relatively complete. Up to this time the Procters (Barry Cornwall and his wife) were almost the only company he kept outside his family circle. But with the spring of 1863 a great change came over his habits. He had refused all invitations into society; but now, of evenings, after he had put his boy to bed, the solitude weighed intolerably upon him. He told the present writer, long afterwards, that it suddenly occurred to him on one such spring night in 1863 that this mode of life was morbid and unworthy, and, then and there, he determined to accept for the future every suitable invitation which came to him. Accordingly he began to dine out, and in the process of time he grew to be one of the most familiar figures of the age at every dining-table, concert-hall, and place of refined entertainment in London. This, however, was a slow process. In 1863, 1864, and 1865 Browning spent the summer at Sainte-Marie, near Pornic, ' a wild little place in Brittany,' by which he was singularly soothed and refreshed. Here he wrote most of the 'Dramatis Personae.' Early in 1864 he privately printed, as a pamphlet, 'Gold Hair: a legend of Pornic,' and later, as a volume, the im- portant volume of 'Dramatis Personae,' containing some of the finest and most characteristic of his work. In this year (12 Feb.) Browning's will was signed in the presence of Tennyson and F. T. Palgrave. He never modified it. Through these years his constant occupation was his 'great venture, the murder-poem,' which was now gradually taking shape as ' The Ring and the Book.' In September 1865 he was occupied in making a selection from Mrs. Browning's poems, whose fame and sale continued greatly to exceed THE LIFE OF ROBERT BROWNING 6ll his own, although he was now at length beginning to .be widely read. In June 1866 he was telegraphed for to Paris, and arrived in time to be with his father when he died (14 June). On the igth he returned to London, bringing his sister with him. For the remainder of his life she kept house for him. They left almost immediately for Dinard, and passed on to Le Croisic, a little town near the mouth of the Loire, which delighted Browning exceed- ingly. Here he took ' the most delicious and peculiar old house I ever occupied, the oldest in the town; plenty of great rooms.' It was here that he wrote the ballad of 'Herve Riel' (September 1867) which was published four years later. During 1866 and 1867 Browning greatly enjoyed Le Croisic. In June 1868 Arabel Barrett died in Browning's arms. She had been his wife's favour- ite sister, and the one who resembled her most in character and temperament. Her death caused the poet long distress, and for many years he was careful never to pass her house in Delamere Terrace. In June of this year he was made an hon. M.A. of Ox- ford, and in October honorary fellow of JSalliol College, mainly through the friendship of Jowett. At the death of J. S. Mill, in 1868, Browning was asked if he would take the lord-rectorship of St. Andrews University, but he did not feel himself justified in accepting any duties which would involve vague but consider- able extra expenditure. In 1868 Messrs. Smith, Elder, & Co. became Browning's pub- lishers, and with Mr. George Smith the poet formed a close friend- ship which lasted until his death. The firm of Smith, Elder, & Co. issued in 1868 a six- volume edition of Browning's works, and in November-December 1868, January-February 1869, they published, in four successive monthly instalments, ' The Ring and the Book.' Browning presented the manuscript to Mr. Smith. The history of this, the longest and most imposing of Browning's works, appears to be as follows. In June 1860 he had discovered in the Piazza San Lorenzo, Florence, a parchment-bound proces- verbal of a Roman murder case, 'the entire criminal cause of Guido Franceschini, and four cut-throats in his pay,' executed for their crimes in 1698. He bought this volume for eight-pence, read it through with intense and absorbed attention, and imme- diately perceived the extraordinary value of its group of parallel 6l2 EDMUND GOSSE studies in psychology. He proposed it to Miss Ogle as the subject of a prose romance, and ' for poetic use to one of his leading con- temporaries ' (MRS. ORR). It was not until after his wife's death that he determined to deal with it himself, and he first began to plan a poem on the theme at Biarritz in September 1862. He read the original documents eight times over before starting on his work, and had arrived by that time at a perfect clairvoyance, as he be- lieved, of the motives of all the persons concerned. The reception of ' The Ring and the Book ' was a triumph for the author, who now, close on the age of sixty, for the first time took his proper place in the forefront of living men of letters. The sale of his earlier works, which had been so fluctuating that at one time not a single copy of any one of them was asked for during six months, now became regular and abundant, and the night of Browning's long obscurity was over. A second edition of the entire ' Ring and the Book' was called for in 1869. In the summer of that year Browning travelled in Scotland with the Storys, ending up with a visit to Louisa, Lady Ashburton, at Loch Luichart. For the monument to Lord Dufferin's mother he composed (26 April 1870) the sonnet called ' Helen's Tower/ The summer of this year, in spite of the Franco- German war, was spent by the Brownings with Milsand in a primitive cottage on the sea-shore at St.-Aubin, opposite Havre. The poet wrote, * I don't think we were ever quite so thoroughly washed by the sea- air from all quarters as here.' The progress of the war troubled the Brownings' peace of mind, and, more than this, it put serious diffi- culties in the way of their return to England. They contrived, after some adventures, to get themselves transported by a cattle- vessel which happened to be leaving Honfleur for Southampton (September 1870). In March 1871 the ' Cornhill Magazine' published 'Herve Riel' (which had been written in 1867 at Le Croisic) ; the ioo/. which he was paid for the serial use of this poem he sent to the sufferers by the siege of Paris. In the course of this year Browning was writing with great activity. Through the spring months he was occupied in completing 'Balaustion's Ad- venture,' the dedication of which is dated 22 July 1871; it was published early in the autumn. After a very brief visit to the Mil- sands at St.-Aubin, Browning spent the rest of the summer of this THE LIFE OF ROBERT BROWNING 613 year in Scotland, where he composed ' Prince Hohenstiel-Schwan- gau,' which was published early the following winter. In this year (1871) Browning was elected a life-governor of University College, London. Early in 1872 Milsand visited him in London, and Alfred Domett (Waring) came back at last from New Zealand ; on the other hand, on 26 Jan. 1873 died the faithful and sym- pathetic Isa Blagden (cf. T. A. TROLLOPE, What I Remember, 11. 174). In 1872 Browning published one of the most fantastic of his books, 'Fifine at the Fair,' composed in Alexandrines; this poem is reminiscent of the life at Pornic in 1863-5, and of a gipsy whom the poet saw there. Mrs. Orr records that 'it was not without misgiving that he published " Fifine.'" He spent the summer of 1872 and 1873 at St.-Aubin, meeting there in the earlier year Miss Thackeray (Mrs. Ritchie) ; she discussed with him the symbolism connecting the peaceful existence of the Norman peasantry with their white head-dress, and when Browning re- turned to London he began to compose 'Red Cotton Nightcap Country,' which was finished in January and published in June 1873, with a dedication to Miss Thackeray. In 1874, at the in- stance of an old friend, Miss A. Egerton-Smith, the Brownings took with her a house, Maison Robert, on the cliff at Mers, close to Treport, and here he wrote 'Aristophanes' Apology,' including the remarkable 'transcript' from the 'Herakles' of Euripides. At Mers his manner of life is thus described to us : ' In uninter- rupted quiet, and in a room devoted to his use, Mr. Browning would work till the afternoon was advanced, and then set forth on a long walk over the cliffs, often in the face of a wind which he could lean against as if it were a wall.' 'Aristophanes' Apology' was published early in 1875. During the spring of this year he was engaged in London in writing ' The Inn Album,' which he com- pleted and sent to press while the Brownings were at Villers- sur-Mer, in Calvados, during the summer and autumn of 1875, again in company with Miss Egerton-Smith. In the summer of 1876 the same party occupied a house in the Isle of Arran. Browning was at this time very deeply occupied in studying the Greek dramatists, and began a translation of the 'Agamemnon.' In July 1876 he published the volume known from its title-poem as ' Pacchiarotto.' This revealed in several of its numbers. a condition 6 14 EDMUND GOSSE of nervous irritability, which was reflected in the poet's daily life ; he was far from well in London during these years, although a change of air to France or Scotland never failed to produce a sudden improvement in health and spirits ; and it was away from town that his poetry was mainly composed. In 1877 there appeared his translation of the ' Agamemnon ' of ^Eschylus, and he again refused the lord-rectorship of St. Andrews University, as in 1875 he had refused that of Glasgow. For the summer and autumn of 1877 the friends took a house at the foot of La Saleve, in Savoy, just above Geneva; it was called La Saisiaz ; here Browning sat, as he said, ' aerially, like Euripides, and saw the clouds come and go.' He was not, however, in any- thing like his usual spirits, and he suffered a terrible shock early in September by the sudden death of Miss Egerton-Smith. The present writer recollects the extraordinary change which appeared to have passed over the poet when he reappeared in London, nor will easily forget the tumult of emotion with which he spoke of the shock of his friend's dying, almost at his feet. He put his reflec- tions on the subject into the strange and noble poem of ' La Saisiaz,' which he finished in November 1877. He lightened the gloom of what was practically a monody on Miss Egerton-Smith by con- trasting it with one of the liveliest of his French studies, 'The Two Poets of Croisic,' which he completed in January 1878. These two works, the one so solemn, the other so sunny, were pub- lished in a single volume in the spring of 1878. In August 1878 he revisited Italy for the first time since 1861. He stayed some time at the Spliigen, and here he wrote 'Ivan Ivanovitch.' Late in September his sister and he passed on to Asolo, which, for the moment, failed to reawaken his old pleasure ; and in October they went on to Venice, where they stayed in the Palazzo Brandolin-Rota. This was a comparatively short visit to Italy, but it awakened all Browning's old enthusiasm, and for the remainder of his life he went to Italy as often and for as long a time as he could contrive to. During this autumn, and while in the south, he wrote the greater part of the ' Dramatic Idyls,' pub- lished early in 1879. His fame was now universal, and he enjoyed for the first time full recognition as one of the two sovereign poets of the age. ' Tennyson and I seem now to be regarded as the two THE LIFE OF ROBERT BROWNING 615 kings of Brentford,' he laughingly said in the course of this year. His sister and he returned to Venice, and to their former quarters, in the autumn of 1879 and again in that of 1880. In the latter year he published a second series of 'Dramatic Idyls,' including' Clive,' which he was accustomed to mention as perhaps the best of all his idyllic poems 'in the Greek sense.' In the summer of 1881 Dr. Furnivall and Miss E. H. Hickey started the 'Browning Society' for the interpretation and illustra- tion of his writings. He received the intimation of their project with divided feelings; he could not but be gratified at the enthu- siasm shown for his work after long neglect, and yet he was appre- hensive of ridicule. He did not refuse to permit it, but he declined most positively to cooperate in it. He persisted, when talking of it to old friends, in treating it as a joke, and he remained to the last a little nervous about being identified with it. It involved, indeed, a position of great danger to a living writer, but, on the whole, the action of the society on the fame and general popularity of the poet was distinctly advantageous; and so much worship was agreeable to a man who had passed middle life without the due average of recognition. He became, about the same time, presi- dent of the New Shakspere Society. The autumn of 1881 was the last which the Brownings spent at the Palazzo Brandolin-Rota. On their way to it they stopped for six weeks at Saint-Pierre-la-Chartreuse, close to the monastery, where the poet lodged three days, ' staying there through the night in order to hear the midnight mass.' This autumn, in spite of 'abominable and un- Venetian' weather, was greatly appreciated. ' I walk, even in wind and rain, for a couple of hours on Lido, and enjoy the break of sea on the strip of sand as much as Shelley did in those old days' (n Oct. 1881). Browning had now reached his seventieth year, and, for the first time, the flow of his poetic in- vention seemed to flag a little. He did not write much from 1879 to 1883. In 1882 the Brownings proceeded again to Saint-Pierre- la-Chartreuse for the summer, intending to go on to Venice ; but at Verona they learned that the Palazzo Brandolin-Rota had been transformed into a museum, and, while they hesitated whither they should turn, the floods of the Po cut them off from Venice. This autumn, therefore, they made Verona their headquarters; and 616 EDMUND GOSSE here Browning wrote several of the poems which appeared early in 1883, under the Batavian-Latin title ' Jocoseria.' In 1883 the Brownings spent the summer opposite Monte Rosa, at Gressoney St. -Jean, a place to which the poet became more attached than to any other Alpine station ; later on they passed to Venice, where their excellent friend, Mrs. Arthur Bronson (she died on 6 Feb. 1901), received them as her guests in the Palazzo Giustiniani Recanati. Here Browning wrote the sonnets ' Sighed Rawdon Brown' and 'Goldoni.' In these later years, his bodily endurance having steadily declined, Browning saw fewer and fewer people during his long Venetian sojourns, depending mainly out- side the salon of Mrs. Bronson on ' the kindness of Sir Henry and Lady Layard, of Mr. and Mrs. Curtis of Palazzo Barbazo, and of Mr. and Mrs. Frederic Eden, for most of his social pleasure and comfort' (MRS. ORR). In 1884 Browning was made an hon. LL.D. of the university of Edinburgh ; for a third time he declined to be elected lord rector of the university of St. Andrews. There had been a suggestion in 1876 that he should stand for the professor- ship of poetry at Oxford; this idea was now revived, and greatly attracted him; he said that if he were elected, his first lecture would be on 'Beddoes: a forgotten Oxford Poet.' It was dis- covered, however, that not having taken the ordinary M.A. degree, he was not eligible. He wrote much in this year, for besides the sonnets, 'The Names' and 'The Founder of the Feast,' and an introduction to the posthumous sermons of Thomas Jones, he com- posed a great number of the idyls and lyrics collected in the winter of 1884 as 'Ferishtah's Fancies.' The summer of 1884 was broken up by an illness of Miss Browning, and the poet did not get to Italy at all, contenting himself with spending August and September in her villa at St.-Moritz with Mrs. Bloomfield Moore, a widow lady from Philadelphia with whom Browning was at this time on terms of close friendship. In 1885 Browning accepted the honorary presidency of the Five Associated Societies of Edinburgh, and in April wrote the fine 1 Inscription for the Gravestone of Levi Thaxter.' In the summer he went again to Gressoney St.- Jean, thence proceeding for the autumn and winter to Venice. He was now settled in the Palazzo Giustiniani Recanati, but his son, who joined him, urged the THE LIFE OF ROBERT BROWNING 617 purchase of a house in Venice. Accordingly, in November 1885 Browning secured, or thought that.he had secured, the Palazzo Manzoni, on the Grand Canal ; but the owners, the Montecuccule, raised so many claims that he withdrew from the bargain just in time happily, as it proved, for the foundations of the palace were not in a safe condition ; but the failure of the negotiations annoyed and distressed him to a degree which betrayed his decrease of nerve power. Early in 1886 Browning succeeded Lord Houghton as the foreign correspondent to the Royal Academy, a sinecure post which he accepted at the earnest wish of Sir Frederic Leighton. Venice having ceased to attract him for a moment, in 1886 he made the poor state of health of his sister his excuse for remaining in England, his only absence from London being a somewhat lengthy autumnal residence at the Hand Hotel in Llangollen, close to the house of his friends, Sir Theodore and Lady Martin at Brintysilio. After his death a tablet was placed in the church of Llantysilio to mark the spot where the poet was seen every Sunday afternoon during those weeks of 1886. On 4 Sept. of this year his oldest friend passed away in the person of Joseph Milsand, to whose memory he dedicated the 'Parleyings' which he was now composing. This volume, the full title of which was 'Parleyings with certain People of Importance in their Day,' consisted, with a prologue and an epilogue, of seven studies in biographical psychology. In June 1887 the threat of a railway to be constructed in front of the house in which he had lived so long (a threat which was not carried out) induced him to leave 19 Warwick Crescent and take a new house in Kensington, 29 De Vere Gardens. While the change was being made he went to Mrs. Bloomfield Moore at St.-Moritz for the summer, but, instead of proceeding to Venice, returned in September to London. This winter 'he was often suffering; one terrible cold followed another. There was general evidence that he had at last grown old' (MRS. ORR). But he was still writing ; ' Rosny ' belongs to December of this year, and ' Flute- Music' to January 1888. He now began to arrange for a uniform edition of his works, which he lived just long enough to see com- pleted. In August his sister and he left for Italy; they stayed first at Primiero, near Feltre. By this time his son (who had married in 618 EDMUND GOSSE October 1887) had purchased the Palazzo Rezzonico in Venice, with money given him for the purpose by his father, and this he was now fitting up for Browning's reception. Browning stayed first in Ca'Alvise, and had on the whole a very happy autumn and winter in Venice. He did not return to London until February 1889. 'He still maintained throughout the season his old social routine, not omitting his yearly visit, on the anniversary of Water- loo, to Lord Albemarle, its last surviving veteran' (MRS. ORR). In the summer he paid memorable visits to Jowett at Balliol College, Oxford, and to Dr. Butler at Trinity College, Cambridge. But his strength was visibly failing, and when the time came for the customary journey to Venice, he shrank from the fatigue. However, in the middle of August he was persuaded to start for Asolo, where Mrs. Bronson was, instead of Venice. He was extremely happy at Asolo, and 'seemed possessed by a strange buoyancy an almost feverish joy in life, which blunted all sen- sations of physical distress.' He tried to purchase a small house in Asolo ; he meant to call it Pippa's Tower ; and since his death it has, with much other land in the town, become the property of his son. At the beginning of November he tore himself away from Asolo, and settled in at the Palazzo Rezzonico in Venice. He thought himself quite well, and walked each day in the Lido. But the temperature was very low, and his heart began to fail. He wrote to England (29 Nov.) : ' I have caught a cold ; I feel sadly asthmatic, scarcely fit to travel, but I hope for the best;' on the 3oth he declared it was only his 'provoking liver,' and hoped soon to be in England. But he now sank from day to day, and at ten P.M., on 12 Dec. 1889, he died in the Palazzo Rezzonico. 'It was an unexpected blow,' his sister wrote, ' he seemed in such excellent health and exuberant spirits.' On the i4th, with solemn pomp, the body was given the ceremony of a public funeral in Venice, but on the i6th was conveyed to England, where, on 31 Dec., it was buried in Poets' Corner, Westminster Abbey, the pall being carried by Lord Dufferin, Leighton, Sir Theodore Martin, George M. Smith (his publisher), and other illustrious friends. Brown- ing's last volume of poems, ' Asolando,' was actually published on the day of his death ; but a message with regard to the eagerness with which it had been ' subscribed ' for had time to reach him on THE LIFE OF ROBERT BROWNING 619 his death-bed, and he expressed his pleasure at the news. Shortly after his death memorial tablets were affixed by the city of Venice to the outer wall of the Palazzo Rezzonico, and by the Society of Arts to that of 19 Warwick Crescent. He left behind him his sister, Miss Sarianna Browning, and his son, Mr. Robert Wiedemann Barrett Browning, who are now resident at Venice and Asolo. Browning's rank in the literature of the nineteenth century has been the subject of endless disputation. It can be discussed here only from the point of view of the illustration of his writings by his person and character. As a contributor to thought, it is notice- able in the first place that Browning was almost alone in his genera- tion in preaching a persistent optimism. In the latest of his published poems, in the 'Epilogue' to 'Asolando,' he sums up and states with unflinching clearness his attitude towards life. He desires to be remembered as One who never turned his back, but marched breast forward, Never doubted clouds would break, Never dreamed, though right were worsted, wrong would triumph, Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight better, Sleep to wake. No poet ever comprehended his own character better, or com- prised the expression of it in better language. This note of mili- tant optimism was the ruling one in Browning's character, and nothing that he wrote or said or did in his long career ever belied it. This optimism was not discouraged by the results of an im- passioned curiosity as to the conditions and movements of the soul in other people. He was, as a writer, largely a psychological monologuist that is to say, he loved to enter into the nature of persons widely different from himself, and push his study, or con- struction, of their experiences to the furthest limit of exploration. In these adventures he constantly met with evidences of baseness, frailty, and inconsistency ; but his tolerance was apostolic, and the only thing which ever disturbed his moral equanimity was the evi- dences of selfishness. He could forgive anything but cruelty. His optimism accompanied his curiosity on these adventures into the souls of others, and prevented him from falling into cynicism or indignation. He kept his temper and was a benevolent observer. 620 EDMUND GOSSE This characteristic in his writings was noted in his life as well. Although Browning was so sublime a metaphysical poet, nothing delighted him more than to listen to an accumulation of trifling (if exact) circumstances which helped to build up the life of a hu- man being. Every man and woman whom he met was to Brown- ing a poem in solution; some chemical condition might at any moment resolve any one of the multitude into a crystal. His optimism, his curiosity, and his clairvoyance occupied his thoughts in a remarkably objective way. He was of all poets the one least self-centred, and therefore in all probability the happiest. His physical conditions were in harmony with his spiritual charac- teristics. He was robust, active, loud in speech, cordial in manner, gracious and conciliatory in address, but subject to sudden fits of indignation which were like thunderstorms. In all these respects it seems probable that his character altered very little as the years went on. What he was as a boy, in these respects, it is believed that he continued to be as an old man. 'He missed the morbid over- refinement of the age; the processes of his mind were sometimes even a little coarse, and always delightfully direct. For real deli- cacy he had full appreciation, but he was brutally scornful of all exquisite morbidness. The vibration of his loud voice, his hard fist upon the table, would make very short work with cobwebs. But this external roughness, like the rind of a fruit, merely served to keep the inner sensibilities young and fresh. None of his in- stincts grew old. Long as he lived, he did not live long enough for one of his ideals to vanish, for one of his enthusiasms to lose its heat. The subtlest of writers, he was the singlest of men, and he learned in serenity what he taught in song.' The question of the 'obscurity' of his style has been mooted too often and emphasised too much by Browning's friends and enemies alike, to be passed over in silence here. But here, at the same time, it is impossible to deal with it exhaustively. Something may, however, be said in admission and in defence. We must admit that Browning is often harsh, hard, crabbed, and nodulous to the last degree; he sup- pressed too many of the smaller parts of speech in his desire to produce a concise and rapid impression. He twisted words out of their fit construction, he clothed extremely subtle ideas in lan- guage which sometimes made them appear not merely difficult THE LIFE OF ROBERT BROWNING 621 but impossible of comprehension. Odd as it sounds to say so, these faults seem to have been the result of too facile a mode of composition. Perhaps no poet of equal importance has written so fluently and corrected so little as Browning did. On the other hand, in defence, it must be said that it is always, or nearly always, possible to penetrate Browning's obscurity, and to find excellent thought hidden in the cloud, and that time and familiarity have already made a great deal perfectly translucent which at one time seemed impenetrable even to the most respectful and intelligent reader. In person Browning was below the middle height, but broadly built and of great muscular strength, which he retained through life in spite of his indifference to all athletic exercises. His hair was dark brown, and in early life exceedingly full and lustrous; in middle life it faded, and in old age turned white, remaining copi- ous to the last. The earliest known portrait of Browning is that engraved for Home's ' New Spirit of the Age' in 1844, when he was about thirty- two. In 1854 a highly finished pencil drawing of him was made in Rome by Frederic Leighton, but this appears to be lost. In 1855, or a little later, Browning was painted by Gordigiani, and in 1856 Woolner executed a bronze medallion of him. In 1859 Mr. and Mrs. Browning sat to Field Talfourd in Florence for life-sized crayon portraits, of which that of Elizabeth is now in the National Portrait Gallery, where that of Robert, long in the possession of the present writer, joined it in July 1900. Of this portrait Browning wrote long afterwards (23 Feb. 1888), ' My sister a better authority than myself has always liked it, as resembling its subject when his features had more resemblance to those of his mother than in after-time, when those of his father got the better or perhaps the worse of them.' He was again painted by Mr. G. F. Watts, R.A., about 1865, and by Mr. Rudolf Lehmann in 1859 and several later occasions. The portraits by Watts and Lehmann are in the National Portrait Gallery. In his last years Browning, with extreme good-nature, was willing to sit for his portrait to any one who asked him. He was once discovered in Venice, surrounded, like a model in a life-class, by a group of artistic ladies, each taking him off from a different point of view. Of these representations of Browning as an old man, the best are 622 EDMUND GOSSE certainly those executed by his son, in particular a portrait painted in the summer and autumn of 1880. The publications of Robert Browning, with their dates of issue, have been mentioned in the course of the narrative. The first of the collected editions, the so-called 'New Edition' of 1849, in 2 vols., was not complete even up to date. Much more comprehen- sive was the 'third edition' (really the second) of the 'Poetical Works of Robert Browning' issued in 1863. A 'fourth' (third) appeared in 1865. 'Selections' were published in 1863 and 1865. The earliest edition of the 'Poetical Works' which was complete in any true sense was that issued by Messrs. Smith, Elder, & Co. in 1868, in six volumes; here 'Pauline' first reappeared, and here is published for the first time the poem entitled ' Deaf and Dumb.' These volumes represent Browning's achievements down to, but not including, 'The Ring and the Book.' Further independent selections were published in 1872 and 1880 ; and both were reprinted in 1884. A beautiful separate edition of 'The Pied Piper of Hamelin,' made to accompany Pinwell's drawings, belongs to 1884. The edition of Browning's works, in sixteen volumes, was issued in 1888-9, an( ^ contains everything but ' Asolando.' In 1896 there appeared a complete edition, in two volumes, edited by Mr. Augustine Birrell, Q.C., M.P., and Mr. F. G. Kenyon. A claim has been made for the authorship by Browning of John Forster's 'Life of Strafford,' originally published in 1836; and this book was rashly reprinted by the Browning Society in 1892 as 'Robert Browning's Prose Life of Strafford.' This attribution was immediately repudiated, in the least equivocal terms possible, by the surviving representatives of the Browning and Forster families. It is possible that Forster may have received some help from Browning in the preparation of the book, but it was certainly written by Forster. THE LIFE OF ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 623 THE LIFE OF ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON SIDNEY COLVIN [From the Dictionary of National Biography.} STEVENSON, ROBERT Louis (1850-1894), novelist, essayist, poet, and traveller, was born at 8 Howard Place, Edinburgh, on 13 Nov. 1850. He was baptised Robert Lewis Balfour, but from about his eighteenth year dropped the use of the third Christian name and changed the spelling of the second to Louis; signing thereafter Robert Louis in full, and being called always Louis by his family and intimate friends. On both sides of the house he was sprung from capable and cultivated stock. His father, Thomas Stevenson, was a member of the distinguished Edinburgh firm of civil engineers. His mother was Margaret Isabella (d. 14 May 1897), youngest daughter of James Balfour, for many years minister of the parish of Colinton in Midlothian, and grandson to James Balfour (1705-1795), professor at Edinburgh first of moral philosophy and afterwards of the law of nature and of nations. His mother's father was described by his grandson in the essay called 'The Manse.' Robert Louis was his parents' only child. His mother was subject in early and middle life to chest and nerve troubles, and her son may have inherited from her some of his con- stitutional weakness as well as of his intellectual vivacity and taste for letters. His health was infirm from the first. He suffered from frequent bronchial affections and acute nervous excitability, and in the autumn of 1858 was near dying of a gastric fever. In January 1853 his parents moved to No. i Inverleith Terrace, and in May 1857 to 17 Heriot Row, which continued to be their Edinburgh home until the father's death in 1887. Much of his time was also spent in the manse at Colinton on the water of Leith, the home of his maternal grandfather. If he suffered much as a child from the distresses, he also enjoyed to the full the pleasures, of imagination. He was eager in every kind of play, and made the most of all the amusements natural to an only child kept much indoors by ill-health. The child in him never died; and the zest with which in after life he would throw himself into the pursuits of 624 SIDNEY COLVIN children and young boys was on his own account as much as on theirs. This spirit is illustrated in the pieces which he wrote and published under the title 'A Child's Garden of Verses,' as well as in a number of retrospective essays and fragments referring with peculiar insight and freshness of memory to that period of life ('Child's Play,' 'Notes of Childhood,' 'Rosa quo locorum,' and others unpublished). Such a child was naturally a greedy reader, or rather listener to reading ; for it was not until his eighth year that he learned to read easily or habitually to himself. He began early to take pleasure in attempts at composition: a 'History of Moses,' dictated in his sixth year, and an account of 'Travels in Perth,' in his ninth, are still extant. Ill-health prevented his getting much regular or continuous schooling. He attended first (1858-61) a preparatory school kept by a Mr. Henderson in India Street ; and next (at in- tervals for some time after the autumn of 1861) the Edinburgh Academy. For a few months in the autumn of 1863 he was at a boarding-school kept by a Mr. Wyatt at Spring Grove, near London; from 1864 to 1867 his education was conducted chiefly at Mr. Thompson's private school in Frederick Street, Edin- burgh, and by private tutors in various places to which he travelled for his own or his parents' health. Such travels in- cluded frequent visits to health resorts in Scotland; occasional excursions with his father on his nearer professional rounds, e.g. to the coasts and lighthouses of Fife in 1864; and also longer journeys to Germany and Holland in 1862, to Italy in 1863, to the Riviera in the spring of 1864, and to Torquay in 1865 and 1866. From 1867 the family life became more settled between Edinburgh and Swanston cottage, a country home in the Pent- lands which Thomas Stevenson first rented in that year, and the scenery and associations of which inspired not a little of his son's work in literature (see especially A Pastoral and St. Ives). In November of the same year, 1867, Louis Stevenson was entered as a student at the Edinburgh University, and for several winters attended classes there with such regularity as his health and inclinations permitted. According to his own account (essay on A College Magazine; Life of Fleeming Jenkin, &c.), he was alike at school and college an incorrigible idler and truant. But THE LIFE OF ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 625 outside the field of school and college routine he showed eager curiosity and activity of mind. ' He was of a conversable temper/ so he says of himself, ' and insatiably curious in the aspects of life ; and spent much of his time scraping acquaintance with all classes of man and woman kind.' At the same time he read precociously and omnivorously in the belles-lettres, including a very wide range of English poetry, fiction, and essays, and a fairly wide range of French; and was a genuine student of Scottish history, and to some extent of history in general. He had been intended as a matter of course to follow the family profession of engineering; and from 1868 his summer excursions took a professional turn. In that and the two following years he went to watch the works of the firm in progress at various points on the mainland and in the northern and western islands. He was a favourite, though a very irregular, pupil of the professor of engineering, Fleeming Jenkin; and must have shown some aptitude for the calling hereditary in his family, inasmuch as in 1871 he received the silver medal of the Edinburgh Society of Arts for a paper on a suggested improvement in lighthouse apparatus. The outdoor and seafaring parts of the profession were in fact wholly to his taste, as in spite of his frail health he had a passion for open-air exercise and adven- ture (though not for sports). Office work, on the other hand, was his aversion, and his physical powers were unequal to the workshop training necessary to the practical engineer. Accordingly in this year, 1871, it was agreed that he should give up the hereditary profession and read for the bar. For several ensuing years Stevenson attended law classes in the university, giving to the subject some serious although fitful atten- tion, until he was called to the bar in 1875. But it was on another side that this 'pattern of an idler,' to use his own words, was gradu- ally developing himself into a model of unsparing industry. From childhood he had never ceased to practise writing, and on all his truantries went pencil and copybook in hand. Family and school magazines in manuscript are extant of which, between his thirteenth and sixteenth years, he was editor, chief contributor, and illustrator. In his sixteenth year he wrote a serious essay on the 'Pentland Rising of 1666' (having already tried his hand at an historical romance on the same subject). This was printed as a pamphlet, 28 626 SIDNEY COLVIN and is now a rarity in request among collectors. For the following four or five years, though always writing both in prose and verse, he kept his efforts to himself, and generally destroyed the more ambitious of them. Among these were a romance on the life of Hackston of Rathillet, a poetical play of 'Semiramis' written in imitation of Webster, and 'Voces Fidelium,' a series of dramatic dialogues in verse. A few manuscript essays and notes of travel that have been preserved from 1868 to 1870, together with his letters to his mother of the same period, show almost as good a gift of observation and expression as his published work of five or six years later. Less promising and less personal are a series of six papers which he contributed in 1871 to the 'Edinburgh University Magazine,' a short-lived periodical started by him in conjunction with one or two college friends and fellow-members of the Speculative Society. With high social spirits and a brilliant, somewhat fantastic, gaiety of bearing, Stevenson was no stranger to the storms and perplexities of youth. A restless and inquiring conscience, per- haps inherited from covenanting ancestors, kept him inwardly calling in question the grounds of conduct and the accepted codes of society. At the same time his reading had shaken his belief in Christian dogma; the harsher forms of Scottish Calvinistic Christianity being indeed at all times repugnant to his nature. From the last circumstance arose for a time troubles with his father, the more trying while they lasted because of the deep at- tachment and pride in each other which always subsisted between father and son. He loved the aspects of his native city, but neither its physical nor its social atmosphere was congenial to him. Amid the biting winds and rigid social conventions of Edinburgh he craved for Bohemian freedom and the joy of life, and for a while seemed in danger of a fate like that of the boy-poet, Robert Fergus- son, with whom he always owned a strong sense of spiritual affinity. But his innate sanity of mind and disposition prevailed. In the summer of 1873 he made new friends, who encouraged him strongly to the career of letters. His first contribution to regular periodical literature, a little paper on 'Roads,' appeared in the 'Portfolio' (edited by Philip Gilbert Hamerton) for December 1873. In the meantime his health had suffered a serious breakdown. In conse- THE LIFE OF ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 627 quence of acute nervous exhaustion, combined with threatening lung symptoms, he was ordered to the Riviera, where he spent (chiefly at Mentone) the winter of 1873-4. Returning with a cer- tain measure of recovered health in April 1874, he went to live with his parents at Edinburgh and Swanston, and resumed his reading for the bar. He attended classes for Scots law and con- veyancing, and for constitutional law and history. He worked also for a time in the office of Messrs. Skene, Edwards, & Bilton, of which the antiquary and historian, William Forbes Skene was senior partner. On 14 July 1875 he passed his final examination with credit, and was called to the bar on the i6th, but never prac- tised. Since abandoning the engineering profession he had re- sumed the habit of frequent miscellaneous excursions in Scotland, England, or abroad. Now, in 1875, began the first of a series of visits to the artistic settlements in the neighbourhood of Fontaine- bleau, where his cousin, Mr. R. A. M. Stevenson, was for the time established. He found the forest climate restorative to his health, and the life and company of Barbizon and the other student re- sorts congenial. In the winter of 1874-5 he made in Edinburgh the acquaintance of Mr. W. E. Henley, which quickly ripened into a close and stimulating literary friendship. In London he avoided all formal and dress-coated society; and at the Savile Club (his favourite haunt) and elsewhere his own Bohemian oddities of dress and appearance would sometimes repel at first sight persons to whom on acquaintance he soon became endeared by the charm of his conversation. Among his friends of these years may be espe- cially mentioned Mr. Leslie Stephen, Mr. James Payn, Dr. Apple- ton (editor of the ' Academy'), Professor Clifford, Mr. Walter Pol- lock, Mr. Cosmo Monkhouse, Mr. Andrew Lang, and Mr. Edmund Gosse. In 1876 he went with Sir Walter Simpson on the canoe tour in Belgium and France described in the ' Inland Voyage.' In the spring of 1878 he made friends at Burford Bridge with a senior whom he had long honoured, Mr. George Meredith; and in the summer had a new experience in serving as secretary to Professor Fleeming Jenkin in his capacity of juror on the Paris Exhibition. In the autumn of the same year he spent a month at Monastier in Velay, whence he took the walk through the moun- tains to Florae narrated in the ' Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes.' 628 SIDNEY COLVIN During these years, 1874-8, his health, though frail, was pass- able. With his vagrant way of life he combined a steady and grow- ing literary industry. While reading for the bar in 1874-5, much of his work was merely experimental (poems, prose-poems, and tales not published) . Much also was in preparation for proposed undertakings on Scottish history. His studies in Highland history, which were diligent and exact, in the end only served to provide the historical background of his Scottish romances. Until the end of 1875 he had only published, in addition to essays in the magazines, an 'Appeal to the Church of Scotland,' written to please his father and published as a pamphlet in 1875. In 1876 he contributed as a journalist, but not frequently, to the ' Academy' and ' Vanity Fair,' and in 1877 more abundantly to 'London,' a weekly review newly founded under the editorship of Mr. Glas- gow Brown, an acquaintance of Edinburgh Speculative days. In the former year, 1876, began the brilliant series of essays on life and literature in the ' Cornhill Magazine ' which were afterwards collected with others in the volumes called severally 'Virginibus Puerisque ' and ' Familiar Studies of Men and Books.' They were continued in 1877, and in greater number throughout 1878. His first published stories were: 'A Lodging for the Night' (Temple Bar, October 1877) ; ' The Sire de Maletroit's Door' (Temple Bar, January 1878); and 'Will o' the Mill' (Cornhill Magazine, January 1878). The year 1878 was to Stevenson one of great productiveness. In May was issued his first book, ' The Inland Voyage,' containing the account of his canoe trip, and written in a pleasant fanciful vein of humour and reflection, but with the style a little over- mannered. Besides six or eight characteristic essays of the ' Virginibus Puerisque ' series, there appeared in ' London ' (edited by Mr. Henley) the set of fantastic modern tales called thr ' New Arabian Nights,' conceived in a very spirited and entertaining vein of the realistic-unreal, as well as the story of ' Providence and the Guitar;' and in the 'Portfolio' the 'Picturesque Notes on Edinburgh,' republished at the end of the year in book form. During the autumn and winter of this year he wrote ' Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes,' and was much engaged in the planning of plays in collaboration with Mr. Henley, of which one, ' Deacon THE LIFE OF ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 629 Brodie,' was finished in the spring of 1879. This was also the date of the essay ' On some Aspects of Burns.' In the same spring he drafted in Edinburgh, but afterwards laid by, four chapters on ethics (a study to which he once referred as being always his 'veiled mistress') under the name of 'Lay Morals.' In few men have the faculties been so active on the artistic and the ethical sides at once, and this fragment is of especial interest in the study of its author's mind and character. By his various published writings Stevenson had made little- impression as yet on the general reader. But the critical had recognised in him a new artist of the first promise in English letters, who aimed at, and often achieved, those qualities of sustained precision, lucidity, and grace of style which are characteristic of the best French prose, but in English rare in the extreme. He had known how to stamp all he wrote with the impress of a vivid personal charm ; had shown himself a master of the apt and ani- mated phrase ; and whether in tale or parable, essay or wayside musing, had touched on vital points of experience and feeling with the observation and insight of a true poet and humourist. The year 1879 was a critical one in Stevenson's life. In France he had met an American lady, Mrs. Osbourne (nee Van de Grift), whose domestic circumstances were not fortunate, and who was living with her daughter and young son in the art-student circles of Paris and Fontainebleau. At the beginning of 1879 she returned to California. In June Stevenson determined to follow. He travelled by emigrant ship and train, partly for economy, partly for the sake of the experience. The journey and its discomforts proved disastrous to his health, but did not interrupt his industry. Left entirely to his own resources, he stayed for eight months partly at Monterey and partly at San Francisco. During a part of these months he was at death's door from a complication of pleurisy, malarial fever, and exhaustion of the system, but managed never- theless to write the story of ' The Pavilion on the Links/ two or three essays for the ' Cornhill Magazine,' the greater part of a Calif ornian story, 'A Vendetta in the West' (never published), a first draft of the romance of ' Prince Otto,' and the two parts of the 'Amateur Emigrant' (not published till some years later). He also tried to get work on the local press, and some contributions 630 SIDNEY COLVIN were printed in the ' Monterey Independent ; ' but on the whole his style was not thought up to California standards. In the spring of 1880 he was married to Mrs. Osbourne, who had obtained some months before a divorce from her husband. She nursed him through the worst of his illness, and in May they went for the sake of health to lodge at a deserted mining station above Calistoga, in the California coast range. The story of this sojourn is told in the ' Silverado Squatters.' Family and friends, who had at first opposed the marriage, being now fully reconciled to it, Stevenson brought his wife home in August 1880. She was to him a perfect companion, taking part keenly and critically in his work, sharing all his gipsy tastes and love of primitive and natural modes of life, and being, in spite of her own precarious health, the most devoted and efficient of nurses in the anxious times which now ensued. For the next seven or eight years his life seemed to hang by a thread. Chronic lung disease had declared itself, and the slightest exposure or exertion was apt to bring on a prostrating attack of cough, haemorrhage, and fever. The trial was manfully borne; and in every interval of respite he worked in unremitting pursuit of the standards he had set before himself. Between 1880 and 1887 he lived the life of an invalid, vainly seeking relief by change of place. After spending six weeks (August and September 1880) with his parents at Blair Athol and Strathpeffer, he went in October, with his wife and stepson, to winter at Davos, where he made fast friends with John Adding- ton Symonds (1840-93) and his family. He wrote little, but prepared for press the collected essays 'Virginibus Puerisque,' in which he preaches with captivating vigour and grace his gospel of youth, courage, and a contempt for the timidities and petty respectabilities of life. For the rest, he amused himself with verses playful and other, and with supplying humorous text and cuts ('Moral Emblems,' 'Not I,' &c.) for a little private press worked by his young stepson. Returning to Scotland at the end of May with health somewhat improved, he spent four months with his parents at Pitlochry and Braemar. At Pitlochry he wrote ' Thrawn Janet ' and the chief part of * The Merry Men,' two of the strongest short tales in Scottish literature, the one of Satanic THE LIFE OF ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 631 possession, the other of a conscience and imagination haunted, to the overthrow of reason, by the terrors of the sea. At Braemar he began 'Treasure Island,' his father helping with suggestions and reminiscences from his own seafaring experiences. At the suggestion of Mr. A. H. Japp, the story was offered to, and ac- cepted by, the editor (Mr. Henderson) of a boys' periodical called 'Young Folks.' In the meantime (August 1881) Stevenson had been a candidate for the vacant chair of history and constitutional law at Edinburgh. In the light of such public reputation as he yet possessed, the candidature must have seemed paradoxical ; but it was encouraged by competent advisers, including the retiring pro- fessor, Dr. /Eneas Mackay. It failed. Had it succeeded, his health would almost certainly have proved unequal to the work. A cold and wet season at Braemar did him much harm ; and in October he was ordered to spend a second winter (1881-2) at Davos. He here finished the tale of 'Treasure Island,' began, on the suggestion of Mr. George Bentley, a life (never completed) of William Hazlitt, and prepared for press the collection of literary essays ' Familiar Studies of Men and Books.' In the summer of 1882 he again tried Scotland (Stobo Manse in Upper Tweedale, Lochearnhead, and Kingussie), and again with bad results for his health. As his wife was never well at Davos, they determined to winter in the south, and settled before Christmas in a cottage near Marseilles (Campagne Defli, St. Marcel) . Thence being presently driven by a fever epidemic, they moved in January 1883 to a chalet in a pleasant garden on a hill behind Hyeres (Chalet la Solitude). Here Stevenson enjoyed a respite of nearly a year from acute illness, as well as the first breath of popular success on the publication in book form of ' Treasure Island.' In this story the force of invention and vividness of narrative appealed to every reader, including those on whom its other qualities of style and character-drawing would in themselves have been thrown away ; and it has taken its place in literature as a classic story of pirate and mutineer adventure. It has been trans- lated into French, Spanish, and other languages. Partly at Mar- seilles and partly at Hyeres he wrote the ' Treasure of Franchard,' a pleasant and ingenious tale of French provincial life ; and early in 1883 completed for 'Young Folks' a second boys' tale, 'The 632 SIDNEY COLVIN Black Arrow.' This story of the wars of the Roses, written in a style founded on the ' Paston Letters,' was preferred to ' Treasure Island ' by the audience to whom it was first addressed, but failed to please the critics when published in book form five years later, and was no favourite with its author. Stevenson's other work at Hyeres consisted of verses for the ' Child's Garden ; ' essays for the 'Cornhill Magazine' and the 'Magazine of Art' (edited by Mr. Henley); the 'Silverado Squatters,' first drafted in 1880, and finally 'Prince Otto.' In this tale of fantasy, certain problems of character and conjugal relation which had occupied him ever since his boyish tragedy of 'Semiramis' are worked out with a lively play of intellect and humour, and (as some think) an exces- sive refinement and research of style, on a stage of German court life and with a delightful background of German forest scenery. The book, never very popular, is one of those most characteristic of his mind. It was translated into French in 1896 by Mr. Egerton Castle. In September 1883 Stevenson suffered a great loss in the death of his old friend Mr. James Walter Ferrier (see the essay Old Mortality). In the beginning of 1884 his hopes and spirits were rudely dashed by two dangerous attacks of illness, the first occur- ring at Nice in January, the second at Hyeres in May. Travelling slowly homewards by way of Royat, he arrived in England in July in an almost prostrate condition, and in September settled at Bournemouth. In the autumn and early winter his quarters were at Bonallie Tower, Branksome Park; in February 1885 his father bought and gave him the house at Westbourne which he called (after the famous lighthouse designed by his uncle Alan) Skerryvore. This was for the next two years and a half his home. His health, and on the whole his spirits, remained on a lower plane than before, and he was never free for many weeks together from fits of haemorrhage and prostration. Nevertheless he was able to form new friendships and to do some of the best work of his life. In 1885 he finished for publication two books which his illness had interrupted, the ' Child's Garden of Verses ' and ' Prince Otto,' and began a highway romance called 'The Great North Road,' but relinquished it in order to write a second series of ' New Arabian Nights.' These new tales hinge about the Fenian dyna- THE LIFE OF ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 633 mite conspiracies, of which the public mind was at this time full, and to the old elements of fantastic realism add a new element of witty and scornful criminal psychology. The incidental stories of 'The Destroying Angel' and 'The Fair Cuban' were supplied by Mrs. Stevenson. During the same period he wrote several of the personal and literary essays afterwards collected in the volume ' Memories and Portraits ; ' a succession of Christmas stories, 'The Body Snatcher' in the 'Pall Mall Gazette,' 1884; ' Olalla' in the ' Court and Society Review,' and ' The Misadventures of John Nicholson' in 'Cassell's Christmas Annual,' both for 1885; and 'Markheim' in 'Unwin's Christmas Annual,' 1886; as well as several plays in collaboration with Mr. Henley, viz. 'Beau Austin,' ' Admiral Guinea,' and ' Robert Macaire.' Stevenson, like almost every other imaginative writer, had built hopes of gain upon dramatic work. His money needs, in spite of help from his father, were still somewhat pressing. Until 1886 he had never earned much more than 3oo/. a year by his pen. But in that year came two successes which greatly increased his reputation, and with it his power to earn. These were ' The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde' and 'Kidnapped.' The former, founded partly on a dream, is a striking apologue of the double life of man. Published as a 'shilling shocker,' a form at that time in fashion, it became instantly popular; was quoted from a thousand pulpits; was translated into German, French, and Danish; and the names of its two chief characters have passed into the common stock of proverbial allusion. In 'Kidnapped' a boys' highland story suggested by the historical incident of the Appin murder the adventures are scarcely less exciting than those of 'Treasure Island,' the elements of character-drawing subtler and farther carried, while the romance of history, and the sentiment of the soil are expressed as they had hardly been expressed since Scott. The success of these two tales, both with the critics and the public, established Stevenson's position at the head of the younger English writers of his day, among whom his example encouraged an increased general attention to technical qualities of style and workmanship, as well as a reaction in favour of the novel of action and romance against the more analytic and less stimulating types of fiction then prevailing. 634 SIDNEY COLVIN About this time Stevenson was occupied with studies for a short book on Wellington (after Gordon his favourite hero), intended for a series edited by Mr. Andrew Lang. This was never written, and in the winter and spring of 1886-7 m ' s chief task was one of piety to a friend, viz. the writing of a life of Fleeming Jenkin from materials supplied by the widow. In the spring of 1887 he pub- lished, under the title 'Underwoods' (borrowed from Ben Jonson), a collection of verses, partly English and partly Scottish, selected from the chance production of a good many years. Stevenson's poetry, written chiefly when he was too tired to write anything else, expresses as a rule the charm and power of his nature with a more slippered grace, a far less studious and perfect art, than his prose. He also prepared for publication in 1887, under the title ' Memories and Portraits,' a collection of essays personal and other, including an effective exposition of his own theories of romance, which he had contributed to various periodicals during preceding years. His father's death in May 1887 broke the strongest tie which bound him to this country. His own health showed no signs of improvement; and the doctors, as a last chance of recovery, recommended some complete change of climate and mode of life. His wife's connections pointing to the west, he thought of Colorado, persuaded his mother to join them, and with his whole household mother, wife, and stepson sailed for New York on 17 Aug. 1887. After a short stay under the hospitable care of friends at Newport, he was persuaded, instead of going farther west, to try the climate of the Adirondack mountains for the winter. At the beginning of October the family moved accordingly to a house on Saranac Lake, and remained there until April 1888. Here he wrote for'Scrib- ner's Magazine' a series of twelve essays (published January- December 1888 and partly reprinted in 'Across the Plains'). Some of these (' Dreams,' ' Lantern Bearers,' ' Random Memories ') contain his best work in the mixed vein of autobiography and criticism; others ('Pulvis et Umbra,' 'A Christmas Sermon') his strongest, if not his most buoyant or inspiriting, in the ethical vein. For the same publishers he also wrote the ballad of ' Ticonderoga ' and began the romance of ' The Master of Ballantrae,' of which the scene is partly laid in the country of his winter sojourn. This tragic story of fraternal hate is thought by many to take the first THE LIFE OF ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 635 place among its author's romances, alike by vividness of present- ment and by psychologic insight. In April Stevenson came to New York, but, soon wearying of the city, went for some weeks' boating to Manasquan on the New Jersey coast. At this time (March-May 1888), by way of ' a little judicious levity,' he revised and partly rewrote a farcical story drafted in the winter by his stepson, Mr. Lloyd Osbourne, 'The Wrong Box,' which was pub- lished in the course of the year under their joint names. The fact that the farce turns on the misadventures of a corpse caused most readers to think the levity more apparent than the judgment; but the book cannot be read without laughter. In the meantime the family had entertained the idea of a yachting excursion in the South Seas. The romance of the Pacific had attracted Stevenson from a boy. The enterprise held out hopes of relief to his health ; an American publisher (Mr. S. S. McClure) provided the means of undertaking it by an offer of 2,ooo/. for letters in which its course should be narrated. The result was that on 26 June 1888 the whole family set out from San Francisco on board the schooner yacht Casco (Captain Otis). They first sailed to the Marquesas, where they spent six weeks; thence to the Paumotus or Dangerous Archipelago; thence to the Tahitian group, where they again rested for several weeks, and whence they sailed northward for Hawaii. Arriving at Honolulu about the new year of 1889, they made a stay of nearly six months, during which Stevenson made several excur- sions, including one, which profoundly impressed him, to the leper settlement at Molokai. His journey so far having proved a source of infinite interest and enjoyment, as well as greatly im- proved health, Stevenson determined to prolong it. He and his party started afresh from Honolulu in June 1889 on a rough trading schooner, the Equator. Their destination was the Gilberts, a remote coral group in the western Pacific. At two of its petty capitals, Apemama and Butaritari, they made stays of about six weeks each, and at Christmas 1889 found their way again into semi-civilization at Apia in the Samoan group. After a month or two's stay in Samoa, where the beauty of the scenery and the charm of the native population delighted them, the party went on to Sydney, where Stevenson immediately fell ill, the life 636 SIDNEY COLVIN of the city seeming to undo the good he had got at sea. This experience set him voyaging again, and determined him to make his home in the South Seas. In April 1890 a fresh start was made, this time on a trading steamer, the Janet Nicoll. Touching first at Samoa, where he had bought a property of about four hun- dred acres on the mountain above Apia, to which he gave the name Vailima (five rivers), he left instructions for clearing and building operations to be begun while he continued his voyage. The course of the Janet Nicoll took him during the summer to many remote islands, from Penhryn to the Marshalls, and landed him in Septem- ber in New Caledonia. Returning the same month to Samoa, he found the small house already existing at Vailima to be roughly habitable, and installed himself there to superintend the further operations of clearing, planting, and building. The family be- longings from Bournemouth were sent out, and his mother, who had left him at Honolulu, rejoined him at Vailima in the spring of 1891. During these Pacific voyages he had finished the 'Master of Ballantrae,' besides writing many occasional verses, and two long, not very effective, ballads on themes of Polynesian legend, the ' Song of Rahero' and the ' Feast of Famine.' He had also planned and begun at sea, in collaboration with Mr. Lloyd Osbourne, his one attempt at a long and sustained story of modern life, ' The Wrecker/ At Samoa he had written the first of his Pacific stories in prose, ' The Bottle Imp.' This little tale of morals and of magic appealed strongly to the native readers to whom (in a missionary translation) it was first addressed (published in English in 'Black and White,' 1891, and reprinted in 'Island Nights' Entertainments'). At Sydney he had written in a heat of indignation, and published in pamphlet form, the striking ' Letter to Dr. Hyde' in vindication of the memory of Father Damien. Lastly, on board the Janet Nicoll, ' under the most ungodly circumstances,' he had begun the work of composing the letters relating his travels, which were due under the original contract to the Messrs. McClure. This and 'The Wrecker' were the two tasks unfinished on his hands when he entered (November 1890) on the four years' residence at Vailima which forms the closing period of his life. In his new Samoan home Stevenson soon began to exercise a THE LIFE OF ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 637 hospitality and an influence which increased with every year. Among the natives he was known by the name of Tusitala (teller of tales), and was supposed to be master of an inexhaustible store of wealth, perhaps even to be the holder of the magic bottle of his own tale. He gathered about him a kind of feudal clan of servants and retainers, whom he ruled in a spirit of affectionate kindness tem- pered with firm justice; and presently got drawn, as a man so forward in action and so impatient of injustice could not fail to do, into the entanglements of local politics and government. In health he seemed to have become a new man. Frail in comparison with the strong, he was yet able to ride and boat with little restriction, and to take part freely in local festivities, both white and native. The chief interruptions were an occasional trip to Sydney or Auckland, from which he generally came back the worse. From the middle of 1891 to the spring of 1893 his intromissions in politics embroiled him more or less seriously with most of the white officials in the island, especially the chief justice, Mr. Cedercrantz, and the president of the council, Baron Senfft von Pilsach. The proceed- ings of these gentlemen were exposed by him in a series of striking letters to the 'Times,' and the three treaty powers (Germany, Great Britain, and the United States) ultimately decided to dispense with their services. At one period of the struggle he believed him- self threatened with deportation. Whether all his own steps on that petty but extremely complicated political scene were judicious is more than can be said ; but impartial witnesses agree that he had a considerable moderating influence with the natives, and that his efforts were all in the direction of peace and concord. His literary industry during these years was more strenuous than ever. His habit was to begin work at six in the morning or earlier, continue without interruption until the midday meal, and often to resume again until four or five in the afternoon. In addi- tion to his literary labours he kept up an active correspondence both with old friends and new acquaintances, especially with writers of the younger generation in England, who had been drawn to him either by admiration for his work or by his ever ready and generous recognition of their own. He had suffered for some time from scrivener's cramp, and in the last three years of his life was much helped by the affectionate services as amanuensis of his 638 SIDNEY COLVIN stepdaughter, Mrs. Strong, who had become a member of the household since 1889. In 1894 the plan devised by his business adviser and lifelong friend, Mr. Charles Baxter, of a limited edition de luxe of his collected works, under the title of the ' Edin- burgh Edition,' afforded him much pleasure, together with a pros- pect of considerable gain. This experiment, without precedent during the lifetime of an author, proved a great success, but Steven- son did not live long enough to enjoy the opportunity of rest which its results were calculated to bring him. Of his writings during the Samoan period, 'The Wrecker' was finished in collaboration with Mr. Lloyd Osbourne in the* winter 1890-1. Throughout 1891 he had a heavy task with the promised letters relating his Pacific voyages. Work undertaken to order seldom prospered with him, and these 'Letters,' having cost him more labour than anything he ever wrote, have less of his characteristic charm, despite the interest and strangeness of the matters of which they tell. They were published periodically in the New York ' Sun ' and in ' Black and White,' and have been in part reprinted in the ' Edinburgh Edition.' A far more effective result of his South Sea experiences is the tale of the 'Beach of Falesa,' written in the same year and first published under the title ' Uma ' in the ' Illustrated London News ' (reprinted in ' Island Nights' Entertainments'). In 1892 he was much occupied with a task from which he could expect neither fame nor profit, but to which he was urged by a sense of duty and the hope of influencing the treaty powers in favour of what he thought a wiser policy in Samoa. This was the ' Footnote to History,' an account, composed with an intentional plainness of style, of the intricate local politics of the preceding years, including a description of the famous hurri- cane of 1888. The same spring (1892) he took up again, after six years, the unfinished history of David Balfour at the point where ill-health had compelled him to break it off in 'Kidnapped.' This sequel (published first in ' Atalanta ' under the title ' David Balfour,' and then in book form as ' Catriona ') contains some of the author's best work, especially in the closing scenes at Leyden and Dunkerque. The comedy of the boy and girl passion has been hardly anywhere more glowingly or more delicately expressed. In the same year (1892) was published 'Across the Plains/ a volume THE LIFE OF ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 639 of collected essays, to which was prefixed the account of his emi- grant journey from New York to San Francisco, much revised and compressed from the original draft of 1879 ; and in the spring of 1893 'Island Nights' Entertainments/ containing with 'The Beach of Falesa,' and ' The Bottle Imp,' a new tale of magic, 'The Isle of Voices,' first published in the 'National Observer.' In the same year (1892) Stevenson made beginnings on a great variety of new work, some of it inspired by his Pacific experiences, and some by the memories and associations of Scotland, the power of which on his mind seemed only to be in- tensified by exile. To the former class belonged 'Sophia Scarlet,' a sentimental novel of planters' life in the South Seas, and ' The Ebb-Tide,' a darker story of South Sea crime and adventure, planned some time before under the title of the 'Pearl- Fisher' in collaboration with Mr. Lloyd Osbourne. Of the latter class were ' Heathercat,' a tale of covenanting times and of the Darien adven- ture ; ' The Young Chevalier,' an historical romance partly founded on facts supplied to him by Mr. Andrew Lang ; ' Weir of Hermis- ton,' a tragic story of the Scottish border, in which the chief charac- ter was founded on that of the famous judge Lord Braxfield; and 'A Family of Engineers,' being an account of the lives and work of his grandfather, uncles, and father. Some progress had been made with all these when a fit of influenza in January 1893 diverted him to a lighter task, that of dictating (partly, when for- bidden to speak, in the deaf-and-dumb alphabet) a tale of manners and the road called 'St. Ives,' dealing with the escape from Edin- burgh Castle and subsequent adventures of a French prisoner of war in 1814. Of these various writings, the ' Ebb-Tide ' was alone completed; it was published in 'To-day,' November 1893 to January 1894, and in book form in September 1894. The family history was carried as far as the construction of the Bell Rock lighthouse. 'Sophia Scarlet,' 'Heathercat,' and the 'Young Chevalier' never got beyond a chapter or two each. 'St. Ives' had been brought to within a little of completion when the author, feeling himself getting out of vein with it, turned again to ' Weir of Hermiston.' This, so far as it goes, is his strongest work. The few chapters which he lived to complete, taken as separate blocks of narrative and character presentment, are of the highest imagina- tive and emotional power. 640 SIDNEY COLVIN Despite the habitual gaiety which Stevenson had continued to show before his family and friends, and his expressed confidence in his own improved health, there had not been wanting in his later correspondence from Vailima signs of inward despondency and distress. At moments, even, it is evident that he himself had presentiments that the end was near. It came in such a manner as he would himself have wished. On the afternoon of 4 Dec. 1894, he was talking gaily with his wife, when the sudden rupture of a blood-vessel in the brain laid him at her feet, and within two hours all was over. The next day he was buried on a romantic site of his own selection, whither it took the zealous toil of sixty natives to cut a path and carry him, on a peak of the forest-clad Mount Vaea. The romance of Stevenson's life and the attraction of his character procured for him a degree of fame and affection dispro- portionate to the numerical circulation of his works. In this point he was much outstripped by several of his contemporaries. But few writers have during their lifetime commanded so much ad- miration and regard from their fellow-craftsmen. To attain the mastery of an elastic and harmonious English prose, in which trite and inanimate elements should have no place, and which should be supple to all uses and alive in all its joints and members, was an aim which he pursued with ungrudging, even with heroic, toil. Not always, especially not at the beginning, but in by far the greater part of his mature work, the effect of labour and fastidious selection is lost in the felicity of the result. Energy of vision goes hand in hand with magic of presentment, and both words and things acquire new meaning and a new vitality under his touch. Next to finish and brilliancy of execution, the most remarkable quality of his work is its variety. Without being the inventor of any new form or mode of literary art (unless, indeed, the verses of the 'Child's Garden' are to be accounted such), he handled with success and freshness nearly all the old forms the moral, critical, and personal essay, travels sentimental and other, romances and short tales both historical and modern, parables and tales of mystery, boys' stories of adventure, drama, memoir, lyrical and meditative verse both English and Scottish. To some of these forms he gave quite new life: through all alike he ex- THE LIFE OF ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 641 pressed vividly his own extremely personal way of seeing and being, his peculiar sense of nature and of romance. In personal appearance Stevenson was of good stature (about 5 ft. 10 in.) and activity, but very slender, his leanness of body and limb (not of face) having been throughout life abnormal. The head was small ; the eyes dark hazel, very wide-set, intent, and beaming ; the face of a long oval shape ; the expression rich and animated. He had a free and picturesque play of gesture and a voice of full and manly fibre, in which his pulmonary weakness was not at all betrayed. The features are familiar from many photo- graphs and cuts. There exist also two small full-length portraits by Mr. John S. Sargent one in the possession of the family, the other of Mr. Fairchild of Newport, U.S.A. ; an oil sketch, done in one sitting, by Sir W. B. Richmond, now in the National Portrait Gallery; a drawing from life, by an American artist, Mr. Alex- ander; a large medallion portrait in bronze, in some respects excellent, by Mr. A. St. Gaudens of New York; and a portrait painted in 1893 at Samoa by Signer Nerli, now in private posses- sion in Scotland. His published writings, in book and pamphlet form, are as follows: i. 'The Pentland Rising, a Page of History, 1666' (pamphlet), 1866. 2. 'An Appeal to the Church of Scotland' (pamphlet), 1875. 3. 'An Inland Voyage,' 1878. 4. 'Picturesque Notes on Edinburgh,' 1879. 5. 'Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes,' 1879. 6 - ' Virginibus Puerisque,' 1881. 7. 'Familiar Studies of Men and Books,' 1882. 8. 'Treasure Island,' 1882. 9. 'New Arabian Nights,' 1882. 10. ' The Silverado Squatters,' 1883. ii. 'Prince Otto,' 1885. 12. 'The Child's Garden of Verses,' 1885. 13. 'More New Arabian Nights: the Dynamiter,' 1885. 14. 'The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,' 1886. 15. 'Kidnapped,' 1886. 16. 'The Merry Men and other Tales,' 1886. 17. 'Underwoods,' 1887. 18. 'Memories and Portraits,' 1887. 19. 'Memoir of Fleeming Jenkin' (prefixed to 'Papers of Fleeming Jenkin,' 2 vols.), 1887. 20. 'The Black Arrow,' 1888. 21. 'The Wrong Box' (in collaboration with Mr. Lloyd Osbourne), 1888. 22. 'The Master of Ballantrae,' 1889. 23. 'Ballads,' 1890. 24. 'Father Damien: an Open Letter' (pamphlet), 1890. 25. 'The Wrecker' (in collaboration with 2T 642 SIDNEY COLVIN Mr. Lloyd Osbourne), 1892. 26. 'Across the Plains,' 1892. 27. 'A Footnote to History,' 1893. 28. ' Island Nights' Entertain- ments,' 1893. 29. ' Catriona' (being the sequel to ' Kidnapped'), 1893. 30. 'The Ebb-Tide' (in collaboration with Mr. Lloyd Osbourne), 1894. The above were published during his lifetime; the following have appeared posthumously : 31.' Vailima Letters,' 1895. 32. 'Fables' (appended to a new edition of 'Jekyll and Hyde'), 1896. 33. 'Weir of Hermiston,' 1896. 34. 'Songs of Travel,' 1896. 35. 'St. Ives,' with the final chapters supplied by Mr. A. T. Quiller Couch, 1897. All the above have been re- printed in the limited 'Edinburgh Edition,' which also contains the 'Amateur Emigrant,' entire for the first time (the title-paper of No. 26, 'Across the Plains,' was the second part of this) ; the unfinished 'Family of Engineers,' which has not been printed elsewhere ; the ' Story of a Lie,' the ' Misadventures of John Nichol- son ; ' and the fragmentary romance, ' The Great North Road ' - all here reprinted from periodicals for the first time ; the ' South Sea Letters,' not elsewhere reprinted; as well as 'The Pentland Rising,' 'A Letter to the Church of Scotland,' the 'Edinburgh University Magazine Essays,' ' Lay Morals,' ' Prayers written for Family Use at Vailima,' and a number of other papers and frag- ments, early and late, which have not been collected elsewhere. The edition is in twenty-seven volumes, of which the first series of twenty appeared 15 Nov. 1894-15 June 1896, and the supple- mentary series of seven December i896-February 1898. 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