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 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 THE HAZLITTS
 
 
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 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 PART THE SECOND 
 
 A NARRATIVE OF THE LATER 
 FORTUNES OF THE FAMILY 
 
 WITH A SURVEY OF THE WESTERN AND 
 
 OTHER SUBURBS OF LONDON AS THEY 
 
 WERE SIXTY YEARS SINGE 
 
 WITH PORTRAITS AND OTHER ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 EDINBURGH: PRINTED BY 
 BALLANTYNE, HANSON & GO. 
 
 M G M X II
 
 Hn 7 3 
 
 FOREWORDS 
 
 When I brought out at my own expense last year 
 (1011) a limited number of copies of the volume 
 entitled The Hazlitts, I had no intention of carry- 
 ing the enterprize farther. But the matter before 
 me awaiting re- editorship struck me on reflection as 
 sufficiently important on more than one account to 
 justify its committal to the press under the same 
 special conditions as regards the issue of copies, 
 which are exclusively for gratuitous presentation. 
 This pair of volumes, in the former of which Hazlitt 
 is left to so large an extent to tell his own story, 
 appears to me to afford the sole resource of such few 
 as may be solicitous of gaining a fair idea and esti- 
 mate of my grandfather and our family. Mr. Birrell's 
 booklet was a sadly disappointing affair. It was 
 half-hearted, weak, and not free from a certain un- 
 becoming levity. Mr. Birrell has dabbled in politics 
 like his friend Asquith, and in literature like his 
 friend Locker. Obite?^ Dicta may answer in Pater- 
 noster Row ; but at Dublin and AVestminster some- 
 thing more is expected. 
 
 In 1867, when I first entered on this labour, I 
 found very few persons who could recollect facts 
 relative to my grandfather and his family either on 
 the father's or mother's side, or who possessed letters 
 from him to his friends and literary correspondents. 
 1 judged it to be barely credible that so little could 

 
 vi FOREWORDS 
 
 have survived of a man who had done so much, and 
 who had so recently died ; it has only been in con- 
 sequence of my unwearying pursuit of the matter 
 that, after the lapse of almost half a century, I have 
 succeeded in accumulating the means, by personal 
 and local inquiries and otherwise at very considerable 
 cost, of throwing clearer light on the origin of our 
 family, on the early history of the most distinguished 
 member of it, and on much of his later literary 
 transactions. 
 
 The paucity of correspondence is not apparently 
 attributable to the destruction of letters, since the 
 most trivial scraps have been religiously preserved 
 by their recipients, except in the case, perhaps, of 
 Lamb, who kept next to nothing after perusal. 
 This shortcoming, which to a biographei' is always a 
 serious drawback, arose from the simple fact that 
 Hazlitt was not a letter- writer. 
 
 The side which Hazlitt espoused — the only one 
 which he cared to espouse — was not then the winning 
 side, and he laboured under the enormous and cruel 
 disadvantage of struggling, with a sensitive and irri- 
 table temperament, against hopeless odds on behalf 
 of a young and weak cause. Nor did his own posi- 
 tion and prospects alone suffer from his election. 
 His descendants have not yet come into enjoyment 
 of the full benefit which such writings as his should 
 and would have conferred on us all, had not he 
 thrown the entire force of his energy as a publicist 
 and an essay-writer into the scale against the Govern- 
 ment of those days. We still live in the shadow of 
 that policy. It has coloured more or less all our 
 subsequent careers, and it rcHects itself in many of
 
 FOREWORDS vii 
 
 the following pages. The blood of the Peterborough 
 ironmonger, whose daughter married the Rev. William 
 Hazlitt, ran with unabated strength in the veins of 
 the author of Table Talk. 
 
 It was open to Hazlitt to have followed in the 
 footsteps of several of his literary contemporaries, 
 who improved their fortunes by changing their 
 opinions. But the Loftus blood was in him, and 
 he threw in his lot — and ours, and 1 am glad that 
 he did — with the claims of freedom and truth. But 
 of course his Liberalism and that of our present 
 century are totally dissimilar principles, and if he 
 were among us to-day, he would be, 1 think, as 
 earnest an opponent of the Socialist as he was of 
 the Tory. 
 
 W. C. H. 
 
 July, 1912.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAP. PAGE 
 
 I. After Hazlitt's Death 1 
 
 II. My Father's Establishment in Life and his 
 Marriage — Fairly Prosperous Days — Varied 
 Experiences— Bad Times (1833-48) . 20 
 
 III. My own Childhood and School-days , . 37 
 
 IV. The War Office — Drift toward Literature . 49 
 
 V. Western Suburbs of London Sixty Years Since 58 
 
 VL Western Suburbs of London Sixty Years 
 
 Since {continued) . . . . . . 71 
 
 VII. Our Brompton Friends 100 
 
 VIII. The Old Actors at Brompton and a Few 
 
 Others . . . ■ . .116 
 
 IX. Kensington and the Environs — The Fulham 
 
 CaU SERIES 134 
 
 X. Fulham Causeries {conUnued) . . . .152 
 
 XL Hammersmith, Putney, Barnes, and other Out- 
 skirts 
 
 XII. My Father's Legal Environments and my 
 
 — Death of my Father ..... 181 
 
 XIII. Jerrold's Club • . 196 
 
 XIV. High Life — A Few Asalecta . . . .218 
 
 XV. High Life — A Few Analecta (rontinued) . . 230 
 
 XVI. My Own Labours on Charles Lamb and other 
 
 Subjects — Bushbeaters and Birdcatchers . 243 
 
 Own 
 
 165
 
 X CONTENTS 
 
 CUAP. PIGE 
 
 XVH. Recollections of the British Museum and of 
 
 Fkiexds an'd Helpers ix my Work . 250 
 
 XVIII. Notes about Distixguished Collectors axd 
 
 Others whom I have Kxowx . . . .268 
 
 XIX. Literary Acquaintances and a Few Friends . 281 
 
 XX. Literary Acquaintances and a Few Friends 
 
 {continxted) ....... 303 
 
 XXI. Literary Acquaintances and a Few Friends 
 
 {continued) . . . . . . .315 
 
 XXII. Apprenticeship to Bibliography — Gradual At- 
 tainment of my Majority .... 323 
 
 Index 339
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 Rev. William Hazlitt and his Wife, from Miniatures on ivory 
 
 by Jolm Hazlitt (c. 1788) Frontispiece 
 
 (1) Watch-guard formed from the Hair of Catherine Hazlitt 
 (1804-60). (2) Two Rings belonging to her before her 
 Marriage in 1833 To face page 44 
 
 Remains of the Nunnery at Putney .... » » 170 
 
 Winterslow, Barnes Common, the Writer's Residence (1881- 
 
 1910) To/ace page 175 
 
 W. Carew Hazlitt, from a private Photograph (18o'J) „ „ 176 
 
 W. C. Hazlitt's Hair (1859) „ „ 180
 
 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 AFTER HAZLITTS DEATH 
 
 Various schemes had been propounded for arranging^ 
 some settlement in life for Hazhtt's only representa- 
 tive. His earliest recollections, of course, belonged 
 to the house in York Street, Westminster, to which 
 his parents had removed from the country in 1812, 
 when he was a mere infant ; and the whole of his 
 youth may be said to have been passed under that 
 roof. He was not more than eleven, when the rela- 
 tions between his mother and fatlier became strained, 
 and he subsequently divided his time between his 
 various relations in an only too casual manner. From 
 the date at which he left school (1824) my father 
 spent a considerable share of his life at the Reynells' 
 in Broad Street, which was a kind of second home 
 to him. Hazlitt appears to have cherished to the 
 last a hope of leaving him sufficient to make any 
 occupation unnecessary ; but the best that can be 
 pleaded for such a visionary notion, is that he did 
 not anticipate so early and abrupt a close of the 
 scene, or the financial collapse of the firm which had 
 engaged to pay him a handsome amount for the Life 
 of Napoleon, The appeals of those who foresaw the 
 impending crisis were ineffectual, and absolutely 
 nothing was done. That my father accomplished 
 
 A
 
 2 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 what he did under ahiiost every conceivable drawback 
 and difficulty, and that, with the steadfast help in their 
 several ways of his mother, Sir John Stoddart, and 
 the Reynells, he at length succeeded in winning a 
 recognition of the claims of Hazlitt to public grati- 
 tude, is a piece of the romance of life, which reflects 
 honour on liim and on his memory. 
 
 W^e do not gain a great amount of insight into 
 the boj^hood of the younger Hazlitt beyond the 
 glimpses which are discernible between the lines of 
 his mother's affectionate letters to him at school in 
 1824, in which she sometimes confides to him matters 
 of business and literary topics ; and, again, such 
 casual mentions as the reference by Mrs. Procter 
 to having seen him on his father's knee, and by 
 Keats, who, in writing to Armitage Erowne, tells 
 liim tliat he has just seen Mrs. Hazlitt "and that 
 little Nero, her son." This was allusive to my 
 father's black curly hair, which he preserved within 
 my personal recollection to a large extent ; and we 
 can picture him at that stage marching with the 
 Guards, as I have elsewhere said, to and from St. 
 James's Palace Yard, and the young heart, exempt 
 from the cares of life, leaping to the music of the 
 band.^ 
 
 In her Diary my grandmotlier Hazlitt speaks of 
 her husband going to Winterslow and taking the 
 child with liim, or, if the Diarist left town first, the 
 child might go with her to Winterslow and on to 
 Crediton. 
 
 The meagre co-operation and light which my 
 father obtained in aid of a connected narrative of the 
 
 ' See The llazlitts, 1011, pp. 280, .'522, 497-503, for accounts of my 
 father's ficliool-flays. The only pchool-fellow of wliom I have heard my 
 father speak was "fatty" Crihson, who adopted tlie medical profession, 
 and became Surgeon at Newgate. He attended my motlier in her last 
 illness in 1800, and his voice still rings in my eai-s, as, following him 
 downstairs on his final visit, he said in low tones^ "The scene will soon 
 close."
 
 AFTER HAZLITT'S DEATH 3 
 
 I^ife of Hazlitt, and the failure to gain a favourable 
 hearing for his own inherited pretensions, were 
 leavened, if they indeed were, by a bountiful supply 
 of evidence from many quarters of grateful en- 
 thusiasm for the writings of the departed. The over- 
 whelming majority of those to whom he appealed 
 possessed the common property of at all events 
 professing inability to serve him. So far as assistance 
 in preparing a Memoir went, even Godwin, in a letter 
 of May 24, 1831, merely agreed to see him, and, 
 although one of the oldest of Hazlitt's friends, 
 afforded him slender hope of being of any use. 
 Nor do I think that he was. 
 
 A cursory review of other members of the old 
 set to which Hazlitt belonged, and which survived 
 to come face to face with the next generation, may 
 have its interest and utilitj^ 
 
 When John Black, whom Hazlitt himself had 
 known several years before his death,^ and whom 
 we find engaged in literary pursuits at least as far 
 back as 1810, lost the editorship of the Cliroiiicle, 
 through his indiscreet remarks about Sir John 
 Easthope in an after-dinner speech, AV alter Coulson 
 befriended him, and not only allowed him the use 
 of a cottage, I believe at Snodland, near Maidstone, 
 and subsequently in the New Forest district, but 
 gave him a pension of £200 a year. Black was a 
 good pedestrian, and sometimes walked up to town 
 to receive his quarterly money, and on one occasion, 
 my father told me, was cozened out of the w^hole 
 of it on his way back by a fascinating casual. 
 
 The rupture between Black and Easthope arose 
 from the former being so candid as to divulge the 
 fact, that both of them came up to London to seek 
 their fortunes, and that he believed the sole differ- 
 ence was that he had shoes to his feet and Easthope 
 
 1 The Hazlitts, 1911, p. 479.
 
 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 had not. This was a case where honesty was not the 
 best poHcy, or was it honesty ? 
 
 \Vhile he remained at his post, and collected 
 books, he used to ramble about after breakfast to 
 ransack the stalls, then more fruitful of bargains 
 than now. He was generally accompanied by his 
 lartje do^- Brutus. 
 
 During his sojourn with Bentham, Coulson lived 
 in a small tenement formed out of the stable of 
 Bentham's residence, and Henry Leigh Hunt, a 
 nephew of the author of Rimini, at one time shared 
 the quarters with him. A very constant visitor to 
 Coulson was Jefferson Hogg, who became known 
 at a later date by his book on Shelley. My aunt 
 Rebecca lleynell told me (10th October 1876) that 
 the only time she heard Bentham speak was when 
 she went to witness the athletic performances at 
 the place he had taken for \^oelker in the 3Iaryle- 
 bone Road, opposite St. Mary's Church. He was 
 speaking of his picture by Pickersgill, and said he 
 never possessed the crimson dressing-gown in which 
 he is painted. 
 
 Bentham only took two meals a day — a late 
 breakfast in the French fashion, and dinner at eight. 
 He usually had company. Brougham was often 
 there. He had his bed made once a month, and had 
 it sewed up to prevent untucking. 
 
 Voelker's Gymnasium was first established at 
 North l^ank. Regent's Park, but was subsequently 
 removed to more spacious premises in the New 
 Road. My uncle, William Reynell, drew up the 
 regulations for Voelker. There was a scheme for 
 opening a similar institution for ladies under the 
 management of a Miss Mason, but I am not sure 
 whether it came to anything. 
 
 The Reynells met at the Gymnasium the Earl 
 of Clarendon and his brother, Mr. Villiers, M.P. for
 
 AFTER HAZLITT'S DEATH 5 
 
 Wolverhampton. One of them recollected that 
 both these gentlemen were laughed at, because they 
 went through the exercise in gloves, from fear of 
 spoiling their hands. Another frequenter was 
 Henry Southern, at one time Editor of the 
 London Magazine and the Retrospective Review. 
 Southern went as Secretary of Legation when I^ord 
 Clarendon was appointed to the Embassy at INIadrid ; 
 he received his knighthood on being nominated 
 Minister to Brazil. It was while he resided near 
 London that he attended the Gymnasium ; but he 
 was a man of poor physique, and did not cut a very 
 good figure. My father never joined any institution 
 of this character ; but I have heard him speak of 
 Henry Angelo, the fencing-master, who, when asked 
 where one should put one's hands, replied, " Don't 
 put them in your pockets." 
 
 There is an account of Eentham and his friend 
 Place, the tailor and pamphlet-collector, who after- 
 ward lived in Brompton Square, and who married 
 i\lrs. Chatterton the actress. The two went out 
 together one day, and Bentham arranged to wait 
 for Place while the latter went into some house. 
 Bentham sat down on the doorstep, and a worthy 
 lady, passing by and struck by his venerable aspect, 
 offered him a small gratuity, taking him for a 
 mendicant. Bentham translated the White Bull 
 from the French of A'oltaire, and in the preface he 
 seems to refer to the author as if he had been per- 
 sonally acquainted with him. 
 
 The Westminster Review was originally projected 
 by Bentham, and was subsequently the property 
 in succession of Sir William ^lolesworth, Mr. John 
 Stuart ISIill, and ]Mr. Hickson, of Fairfield, Kent. 
 While it was in the hands of Molesworth, John 
 Robertson edited it, and Henry Cole was among 
 the contributors. It was Cole who prepared the
 
 6 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 illustrated Cruiksluink number. Robertson lived 
 near my uncle Reynell in Brompton Vale. 
 
 There is no doubt tliat Cole was the real originator 
 of the Exhibition of 18.51. When my uncle ques- 
 tioned him on this point, and said that it was 
 generally understood that Prince Albert threw out 
 the first idea, he laughed, but made no reply. It 
 suited him to let the Prince enjoy the credit. 
 
 In connection with Cole, many may still recollect 
 the name of Joseph Cundall, the bookseller and 
 publisher of Old Bond Street, a man of great taste 
 and feeling for art, and whose shop was in my 
 boyish days a treasury of interesting books for young 
 and old, attired in all sorts of fanciful bindings, 
 composed of papier-mache, stamped in imitation 
 of leather and other materials, of which the novel 
 singularity and the weightiness impressed my 
 juvenile fancy, and are yet palpable to my sight 
 and touch. Cundall was led to bring out a new 
 edition of Robinson Crusoe with Stothard's plates 
 by a copy which my father lent to him of that of 
 1820. 
 
 There was a set, of which my father was little 
 more than a casual member ; that, which numbered 
 Cole, Cundall, and their friends, and of which some 
 subsequently attained a sort of notoriety as pro- 
 moters, in concert with Prince Albert, of the South 
 Kensington Museum. The earlier history, at all 
 events, of this institution, is not very creditable to 
 his Royal Highness or to those who settled like 
 burrs upon his coat-sleeves, and made their account 
 out of the scheme. All are now dead ; the abuses 
 committed are probably forgotten ; a new building 
 has arisen to accommodate the inestimable treasures 
 gathered under its roof; and a coming generation 
 will know the circumstances cormected with the 
 original undertaking only as a malodorous and fairly
 
 AFTER HAZLITT'S DEATH 7 
 
 uninteresting scandal. Whether the Prince actually 
 made money out of the affair, as it was commonly 
 reported, or not, or whether he was a tool in the 
 hands of Cole and the rest, I am unable to say, and 
 I do not in the least care. It is something that we 
 have got out of our sight the Brompton Boilers or 
 Coles Fish-Kettle, as the place was dubbed — ? Cole 
 and Co. 
 
 Bentham left his body for dissection ; but under 
 the direction, I believe, of Bowring, the remains 
 were reunited and presented to University College. 
 I conclude that his property, which he nmst have 
 improved by his frugality, went to his nephew 
 George, son of Sir Samuel Bentham. 
 
 Another notability, who was to be met at 
 Bentham's, was Neal, who wrote Brother Jonathan, 
 and contributed during his stay in England to tlie 
 London and other magazines. He came over here 
 to endeavour by judicious articles in the press to 
 improve the state of feeling between us and the 
 States, and JNIr. Reynell used to see him at the 
 Gymnasium. Neal was a man of middle height, 
 and looked like a sailor. My uncle remembered his 
 yellow suit. There is an imitation of his style of 
 writing in Patmore's Rejected Articles, 1826. 
 
 John Bowring, who was afterward knighted, 
 and became Governor of Hong Kong, was intimate 
 with the Reynells as a young man, and frequently 
 dined at my grandfather Reyncll's table. He was 
 also one of the set which Bentham collected round 
 him, and edited his works, in which he took the 
 liberty of expunging or altering passages. He was 
 very civil to my brother when he visited Hong Kong 
 as a midshipman, and sent a special messenger to 
 the ship aboard which my brother lay, to invite him 
 to his house. 
 
 A curious thing was mentioned to me by INIr.
 
 8 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Spiers, of Essex Hall, as having occurred after 
 Bowring's death. His widow wished to print a 
 memoir and some inedited poems, but she was 
 assured that the book would not answer. She did 
 not object, liowever, to put £10 or £20 into the 
 venture, and Mr. Spiers worked the oracle so well 
 among Bowring's friends and admirers that 8000 
 copies were sold. 
 
 The Reynells persuaded Bowring, then in Parlia- 
 ment, to intercede about 1838 on behalf of Leigh 
 Hunt, who was then in great distress, and Bowring 
 went to Lord Melbourne to see if he could obtain a 
 pension for Hunt. But IMelbourne told him that he 
 could not recommend the Queen to assist a man who 
 had libelled her uncle, the Adonis of fifty. 
 
 Through Hazlitt and the Stoddarts the Reynells 
 came in professional contact Avith Brougham, who 
 was an early acquaintance of Stoddart, and remained 
 intimate with liim to the end ; and my mother always 
 averred that it was through her father that Brougham 
 had his first brief. I hold a bundle of letters which 
 Sir John Stoddart and my father received from the 
 ex-Chancellor, while my father was canvassing succes- 
 sive Governments for official employment. 
 
 The Hunts, as I have elsewhere taken the oppor- 
 tunity of explaining, were connected with our family 
 through the Reynells. Leigh Hunt died at my 
 uncle Reynell's residence, Cliatfield House, High 
 Street, Putney, on Sunday, August 28, 1859. On 
 the Saturday previous my cousin Ada heard him 
 cougliing in his bedroom just beneath her, and went 
 down to him. He was very feverish, and she gave 
 him some water. His daughter Jacintha told her 
 that slie had felt his feet and legs, and that they 
 were already getting cold. He was then dying. 
 His eyes were brilliant, and, my cousin adds, as soft 
 and clear as a small child's.
 
 AFTER HAZLITTS DEATH 9 
 
 On that night his son Thornton had arrived from 
 Paris. He or some one else read the Examiner to 
 Mr. Hunt, who manifested a warm interest in the 
 last news from France. He had always delighted 
 in music, and his daughter Julia played on the 
 piano for him in the adjoining room — the little 
 chamber assigned him for writing. I paid several 
 visits to Mr. Hunt while he was at Putney, and 
 recollect well the small apartment facing the street, 
 where I sat and conversed with him. 
 
 One of the old clerks in the War Office told me 
 in 18.54 that he remembered Leigh Hunt wlien he 
 was there, and described him to me as a very indif- 
 ferent official, though doubtless " a very ingenious 
 person." It was this same functionary who had two 
 set phrases always ready at hand. If he was put out, 
 he invariably " damned his sister's shirt " ; and his 
 other expression, significant of modified regard or 
 confidence, was that he valued you as an acquaint- 
 ance, but declined you as a son-in-law. 
 
 Hunt used to tell a story of Sheridan Knowles. 
 Knowles was expatiating on the ingratitude of the 
 Prince Regent toward his former boon-companion 
 Sheridan in his last days — how he only sent £100 
 to him — " to this expiring angel," exclaimed Knowles 
 — but observing a titter among the company, he 
 corrected himself — "to this expiring angel of a 
 janius ! " 
 
 Thornton Hunt, Leigli Hunt's eldest son, was 
 a man of very considerable acquirements, but very 
 diffident and retiring. When llintoul established the 
 Spectator, the younger Hunt contributed a good deal 
 to its success, although Rintoul took the credit. As 
 Albany Fonblanque said at the time, the latter was 
 not capable of writing such papers as appeared in this 
 periodical ; in fact, they were Hunt's. 
 
 Robert Hunt, a grandson of John Hunt, Leigh
 
 10 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Hunt's elder brother, became JNIaster of the Mint at 
 Sydney, and it was arranged, after a time, that his 
 two sisters should join him there. The vessel in 
 which these poor girls sailed went down not far from 
 its destination, and only one on board escaped. He 
 was said at the time to have been providentially 
 saved. He was the greatest rascal among the crew. 
 
 Leigh Hunt and his elder brotlier John owed a 
 good deal of annoyance and misrepresentation to the 
 twofold fact of having relatives of the same names 
 and of not very reputable character ; and there was 
 another respect in which the accomplished essayist 
 suffered injustice. I refer to the report which spread 
 abroad after the appearance of Dickens's Bleak 
 House, that the creation of Harold Skiitipole was 
 borrowed from Hunt. The prevalence of this 
 impression naturally afforded much pain to the 
 individual most concerned, and his feelings were 
 commimicated to the author, who came down to 
 Hammersmitli in order to tender Hunt his solemn 
 assurance tliat he had not designed anything of the 
 kind, and that he would do anything in his power to 
 make reparation for the unintentional wrong. Hunt 
 told my informant that Dickens was affected almost 
 to tears ; but I never heard of any public or direct 
 disavowal. All that I can say is, that if I were 
 to be summoned on a jury to try the question, I 
 should be for bringing in Dickens guilty. 
 
 My fatlier, indeed, would say of Leigh Hunt that 
 he did not excel as a liousekeeper or economist, and 
 that while his circumstances were indifferent, if his 
 wife placed liot-house grapes on the table for dessert, 
 her Imsband would not question the proceeding, 
 but apparently treated the costly dish as a gift from 
 the gods. 
 
 Among tlie guests at Maida Hill, when Mr. John 
 Hunt's family resided there, was Mr. Stephen Hunt,
 
 AFTER HAZLITT'S DEATH 11 
 
 Hunt's eldest brother, and a lawyer. He has been 
 described to me as a tall man of the most courtly 
 and agreeable manners, but of a most violent temper. 
 Hazlitt and he used to have frequent argumentative 
 duels on religion and politics, and an eyewitness has 
 said that, if a reporter had been present to take down 
 Hazlitt's remarks, he would have made his fortune. 
 
 I was much struck by Hunt's friend and literary 
 executor, Townshend ]\Iayer, who lived and died 
 at Richmond, characterising the park there as " a 
 desert." He was terribly afflicted, and could not 
 enjoy that beautiful place. So far as sentiment 
 went, he was prepared to deny its general claim to 
 appreciation. 
 
 Charles Jeremiah Wells, the solicitor whom 
 Hazlitt, in kindheartedly commending him for some- 
 thing which he had written, advised to stick to his 
 profession, visited my father in Great Russell Street. 
 I subsequently recognised him as the author of certain 
 books, produced before I was born under the name 
 of Hoiicard, He became a contributor to the Illus- 
 trated Parlour Miscellany, 1847. He is understood 
 to have composed the elaborate epitaph on Hazlitt 
 in St. Anne's, Soho, and had, no doubt, a strong 
 regard for him. 
 
 It was about 1846, while I was still at Merchant 
 Taylors', and just about the same time we had a visit 
 from George Byron, as he called himself, a natiu-al 
 son of Byron by the INIaid of Athens. I was at home 
 recovering from an attack of brain-fever, and, my 
 father being out, I saw Byron, who disgusted me by 
 the small interest which he manifested in my suffer- 
 ings. He was a short, dark man, and, I have been 
 told, like the poet. His real name appears to have 
 been De Gibler, 
 
 The peculiar Christian name of Wells justifies the 
 suggestion, that he was descended from Jeremiah
 
 12 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 A Veils, who printed a volume of poems in 1667. We 
 saw nothing of \\^ells after that date, but his wife 
 stayed with us whenever she visited England. They 
 then resided at Quimper in Brittany, and had become 
 Romanists. He was a short man, and struck me as 
 elderly, but I was a schoolboy. He had been born, 
 however, in 1703. He died at Marseilles, whither 
 he had removed from Quimper, in 1870. I saw 
 Madame Bonne-INIaison at Quimper in 1803. She 
 had been intimate with the Wells family, and was 
 in her ninety-sixth year. She sat upright in her chair 
 in the middle of the room, and was cheerful and in- 
 telligent. She spoke of Wells as plein d esprit, and 
 complimented me on m}'- Breton accent. She re- 
 ferred me to his daughter in the Carmelite convent 
 at Morlaix, and I went to pay her a visit in October. 
 She was ]Mary Wells, and said that she was sixty-four 
 years of age. Her father had been obliged to give 
 lessons at Marseilles to make out an income. When 
 they thought that he was no more, he revived, and 
 said : "Ah ! you thought that the little man had gone, 
 but he has come back again, and you're all caught," 
 He was eighty- six, Monte Carlo Wells was his son ; 
 him 1 never saw. 
 
 Home, who had also known Hazlitt, was a far 
 more voluminous and a far more pretentious writer 
 than AVells, and affected both prose and verse. We 
 saw much of him at Alfred Place, Old Brompton, 
 about 1840. I confess that I have often tried to 
 appreciate his Farthing Epic and other effusions, but 
 I have laid the books down, wondering that such 
 works should meet with appreciation, save on some 
 principle of mutual insurance. 
 
 Yet infinitely more flimsy and empirical than 
 Wells or Home was Wainewright, the " Janus 
 AA^eathercock " of the London Magazine, who, like 
 John I^amb, had the hardihood to pose as a fine-art
 
 AFTER HAZLITT'S DEATH 13 
 
 critic side by side with Hazlitt, and to hang his cattle- 
 subjects at the Royal Academy. He was a genuine 
 disciple of the Dandy School. 
 
 Raymond Yates, a son of a brigadier-general, and 
 a relative of the better known Edmund and Richard, 
 introduced himself to us about the same time as an 
 admirer of the literary set of which Hazlitt had 
 formed one. But I fancy that his bias was rather 
 toward Coleridge- He led my father to believe that 
 he had been a member of the Spanish Legion under 
 Sir De Lacy Evans in the insurrection about 1836 ; 
 but I am sure that my father accepted his account of 
 his military achievements under considerable reserve. 
 
 Among the most imperishable recollections of my 
 own boyhood, while my parents lived at Chelsea, 
 were my occasional visits, sometimes accompanied by 
 my father, sometimes alone, to Broxbourne in Hert- 
 fordshire, where Mr. Francis Hill kept a proprietary 
 school. One of Hill's daughters had married Wells. 
 I never belonged to the establishment, but was a 
 welcome guest, and made one of the party when 
 Hannah Hill conducted a select detachment of pupils 
 for a walk in the Bosanquet woods or elsewhere 
 within reach. I used to watch Miss Hill with interest 
 while she attended to her garden, and I have not for- 
 gotten the pride which this excellent lady took in her 
 roses, of which one variety was almost black. There 
 was a periodical pastime connected with the institu- 
 tion, where the boys, or some of them, raced for 
 apples, which were thrown down the lawn. Quite 
 lately I encountered at Windermere a grandson of 
 Hill, who lent me the copy of Joseph and His 
 Brethren (the reprint of 1876), which had belonged 
 to the author, and which Wells had prepared with a 
 view to a new edition. I confess that I do not share 
 the enthusiasm of Swinburne about the book, and I 
 see that Home, in a copy which belonged to him, has
 
 14 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 added a MS. gloss of a not very ftivourable charac- 
 ter. In a passage where he deems that Potiphar is 
 improperly reticent, he suggests a stage direction, 
 " Potiphar twiddles his thumbs." 
 
 Hannah Hill married Moxsy, a Jamaica sugar- 
 planter, and his son is, I learn, carrying on the busi- 
 ness. Another of her sisters became the Avife of 
 William Smith \Villiams, a personal friend of Leigh 
 Hunt, and a gentleman identified witli the literary 
 liistory of the Brontes. Captain Montagu, a retired 
 Guardsman, married another, and I had, when I went 
 to Broxbourne and there was no bed for me, to sleep 
 at their place between Broxbourne and Hoddesdon. 
 At a particular point in the road there was a cavern, 
 which was said to be haunted, and the journey was 
 partly through a wood. I braved it somehow. The 
 ex-Guardsman's carbine and broadsword awakened 
 my fanatical admiration as a lad. 
 
 It may be treated as a favourable illustration of 
 the security of tlie open country in the forties, at 
 least thereabout, that the Montagus' house was left 
 at night unlocked, front door and bedrooms alike. 
 
 Joseph Parkes, a parliamentary agent, who came 
 from Birmingham, and was connected with Dr. 
 Priestley, was another of the set in which Hazlitt 
 moved. Parkes is chiefly associated with him in 
 connection with tlie prize-fight at Newbury between 
 Hickman and Neate. He was, I know, civil and 
 even serviceable to my father previous to the arrival 
 of official relief 
 
 Patmore, whom I perfectly remember, and whose 
 name is fairly conspicuous in the earlier instalment 
 of the present biographical record, was an original 
 character. AVhile he was at Mill Hill his circum- 
 stances appear to have been unusually flourishing, 
 and he not only had land in hay, but an excellent 
 garden with wall-fruit, which the members of his
 
 AFTER HAZLITT'S DEATH 15 
 
 family were forbidden to touch. He reconnoitred 
 the ground after breakfast in the season to count his 
 peaches and plums. There were probably quinces 
 too, and I remember that l*atmore was very partial 
 to cold quince roly-poly for supper. He had married 
 a Miss llobertson, a lady with a small fortune, and 
 my father always thought that he treated her very 
 badly. There were two sons, Coventry or Koventry 
 (he spelled the name both ways) and Eugene Gurney, 
 and a daughter Eliza, who married, faute de mieuoc, 
 an old man named Smith. Eugene Patmore at one 
 time assisted my father as a sort of secretary and 
 amanuensis, but was fairly inefficient. He went 
 abroad, married, was prostrated by paralj^sis, and 
 latterly lived at Hastings at his brother's expense. 
 
 Patmore was the author, I understand, of the 
 volume anonymously issued by Colburn in 182G, under 
 the title of Rejected Articles. One of these papers is 
 on Hazlitt. That on Plumer Ward's Tremaine was 
 withdrawn, or is not, at all events, in most copies. 
 
 There was a tale about a field, which Patmore 
 had turned at least once to good account by selling 
 the hay-crop two or three times over to different 
 parties. Patmore's mother, the pawnbroker's widow, 
 laid hold of me, when I paid a visit with my father, 
 and shewed me all over the domain the very evening 
 I arrived. 
 
 He came at the time of the railway mania to my 
 father in a state of great dismay and asked his advice. 
 " Hazlitt," he said, " what, in God's name, am I to 
 do ? I am in for a million ! " " Do ? " returned my 
 father, " why, stay where you are ; they know well 
 enough you haven't got it," 
 
 We saw him last at Church Street, Chelsea, about 
 1848, when I fear that he had fallen on bad days. 
 He had known us intermittently, since, as secretary 
 to the Russell Institution, he arranged with my
 
 IG THE HAZLITTS 
 
 grandfather for the series of lectures deUvered there 
 in 1812. But his real signiticance to Hazlitt was the 
 so far serviceable part which he and Knowles played 
 in the Liber Amor is business by furnishing a vent 
 for the momentary volcanic frenzy. 
 
 A personage, v/hom I really believe that I am 
 warranted in ranking among the benefactors of the 
 younger Hazlitt after the loss of his father, was that 
 Edward Moxhay, whom 1 have noticed in my edition 
 of Lamb's Letters, 188G. In a letter to me in 1885 
 my father says : '* My general recollection of ISIoxhay 
 is that he came from Exeter, and had been a cobbler 
 or something of that sort, and a prize-fighter. How 
 he got into the baker's shop at the north-east corner 
 of Threadneedle Street, I have no idea. It was an old- 
 established shop of repute — I forget the name ; and 
 then he took or set up a thriving eating-house nearly 
 opposite, and later on built the block of buildings at 
 the corner of Old Broad Street and the street that 
 goes up to Gracechurch Street. He purported to 
 have literary tastes, and to admire Lamb and your 
 grandfather among otliers ; and he was very kind to 
 me in a rough way. . . . He had a fine house and 
 grounds at Stamford Hill, with an enormous organ, 
 wliich cost him some thousands of pounds ; and he 
 was perpetually rearranging his garden at great ex- 
 pense. ..." Moxhay is honourably identified with 
 the preservation of a Roman pavement discovered 
 about IS^o in Threadneedle Street, and presented by 
 him to the British Museum. He died in 1849. 
 
 The relations with tlie Procters continued after 
 Hazlitt's death to a certain extent, though I never 
 heard that they and my parents were on familiar 
 visiting terms. In a letter from Procter, under date 
 of 1852, lie explains to my father the origin of his 
 Effigies Poeticce, 1824 : " Nearly thirty years ago 
 I agreed to edit an edition of the English poets
 
 AFTER HAZLITT'S DEATH 17 
 
 (adopting a different plan to that generally in use), 
 for which I was to receive about £1000. After I 
 had taken an enormous deal of trouble — not so much 
 in writing as in searching — the booksellers found 
 their funds insufficient, and sent me a cheque for 
 £10, with their best compliments. Previously to 
 this, liQwever, I had framed a sort of catalogue 
 raisonnc of the portraits of the English poets, which 
 was afterwards published, a.d. 1824, by Carpenter 
 and Son, Bond Street. In this I ventured upon such 
 portraits (about one hundred in number;, about 
 twenty or thirty lines, sometimes a page, sometimes 
 less, of matter, partaking somewhat of tlie biogra- 
 phical and critical — brief, as you will see ; but in my 
 case I fear that brevity was not the soul of wit. 
 Your father liked some of those that I read to him, 
 and this is the best that I can say of them. This 
 book or catalogue, upon which the bookseller 
 inflicted the title of Effigies Poeticce^ is, I suppose, 
 easily attainable. If not, I have a copy which I can 
 lend you, but you must be good enough to take care 
 of it and return it, as it is the only evidence I possess 
 of my incompetency at that particular period of 
 my life." 
 
 Both Procter, his wife, and the Montagus had 
 undoubtedly a very high respect for Hazlitt. INIrs. 
 Montagu, in writing to my father about some point 
 in relation to my grandfather's manuscripts, says : 
 " I could do nothing respecting Mr. Plazlitt in which 
 I did not consider his own wish, and I think I kno^\ 
 his mind in this matter." And, again, ]Mrs. Procter, 
 referring to the fourth generation of the family, and 
 to the approaching publication by myself of the 
 Memoirs (1867), writes as follows : " AVhat an old 
 woman it makes me to receive instruction from the 
 son of the little boy whom I have seen sitting on 
 the knee of one whom I have never ceased to regret I
 
 18 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 AMien I read a fine piece of modern writing, my 
 greatest expression of praise is, ' Almost as good as 
 Hazlitt.' " Does not the last sentence remind us 
 a little of what Louis Stevenson said ? 
 
 This excellent lady once tried to befriend me 
 by recommending me to Sir Francis Goldsmid, M.P., 
 as a sort of secretary. I do not know that I should 
 have been of much use to him ; but I perpetrated 
 the appalling indiscretion on the threshold of suggest- 
 ing that 1 could, 1 thought, draw up his speeches for 
 him. Our acquaintance was naturally ephemeral. 
 It was in 1824 that she married Procter, with whom 
 she had become acquainted in 1820. In their early 
 married life they resided at Merton ; but when my 
 fatlier took me to see them about 18G0, they were 
 living in \\' eymouth Street. Procter wrote some ex- 
 cellent songs, which may live ; but his dramatic poetry, 
 notwithstanding the laudations which his friends 
 were pleased to lavish on it as a matter of compli- 
 ment, is of the tliinnest and poorest quality. Lamb 
 characterized it as redundant, like the wen which 
 appeared on the author's neck. 
 
 Procter as a young man had a way of twitching 
 his ears, and when he was courting Miss Sheppen, 
 who was reputed to have a will of her own, Hazlitt 
 said that, when they were married, she w^ould make 
 him twitch his ears still more. JMrs. Procter used 
 to say that I'atmore's statement as to Hazlitt's going 
 to ^Iontagu's ill dressed, or being disconcerted by 
 M.'s footman, was rubbish. He always, she said, 
 came properly dressed, though not, perhaps, in 
 rigorous evening attire. 
 
 A slight testimonial from one of Charles Lamb's 
 later acquaintances, Thomas Hood, lies before me in 
 the shape of a note to my father on a matter of 
 business. Hazlitt met Hood at the house of their 
 common friend. The former was associated in his
 
 AFTER HAZLITT'S DEATH 19 
 
 host's recollection with those early days when he, 
 and Coleridge, and Wordsworth, and tlie rest of 
 the Temple coterie, and the whist-boys, were young, 
 poor, and happy together. The latter, with his 
 geniality and wit, came in brighter times, when 
 resources were ampler and fame had been realized ; 
 but the old set was scattered, and new fiices formed 
 almost a need to distract Lamb from melancholy 
 reflections and depressing home scenes. The allusion 
 to the devolution of the JVew Monthlij is a charac- 
 teristic touch of Colburn : — 
 
 17 Elm Tree Road, 
 
 St. John's Wood, 
 Tuesday. 
 
 Sir — I have so often enjoyed the conversation 
 and writings of your Father that, predisposed to 
 look favourably on your own IMS., it would have 
 given me great pleasure to iind you a contributor 
 to the yew Monthly 3Iagazine. 
 
 You would therefore have heard from me sooner 
 but for an uncertainty, which is resolved by my 
 renouncing my own connexion with the New 
 Monthly, — I am. Sir, yours very truly, 
 
 Tho. Hood. 
 
 I return your paper for your own disposal, as 
 there is no successor appointed to the Editorship, 
 which is to be managed, 1 understand, " in the 
 house," or by the publisher and his clerks. 
 
 W. Hazlitt, Esq. 
 
 One of the lessons taught by these later pieces 
 of correspondence is the admission by more than 
 one eminent man of the next succeeding generation 
 of the indebtedness to Hazhtt for much that he 
 knew, and much which had promoted his success 
 and repute.
 
 II 
 
 MY FATHER'S ESTABLISHMENT IN LIFE AND 
 HIS IMARRIAGE— FAIRLY PROSPEROUS DAYS 
 —VARIED EXPERIENCES— BAD TIMES 
 
 (1833-48) 
 
 The eifective circle by which my father saw himself 
 siiiTOunded, and from which in different ways he 
 might fairly look for help and sympathy, were his 
 own mother, the Reynells, Lamb, Moxhay, and 
 Walter Coulson. Of those whom Hazlitt had 
 known, his son had either lost sight, or they had 
 died, while others were unable to render any practical 
 service. My father's youth — he was nineteen — 
 necessarily stood in the way of maintaining the 
 intercourse in certain cases on the old basis, and it 
 went far to loosen or even sever the tie with the many 
 with whom Hazlitt had been brought into contact in 
 his peculiar literary capacity, or who limited their 
 sympathy to admiration and homage. 
 
 Apart from private aid, it was Walter Coulson, 
 indeed, who lent his godson a friendly hand in pro- 
 curing for him a berth on the Morning Chronicle, 
 of which Black was at that time editor and Easthope 
 proprietor, and on which Hazlitt had made his 
 maiden effort as a journalist so far back as 1812. It 
 was thus in a certain way not entirely strange or cold 
 ground — almost an hereditary atmosphere. 
 
 Tlie commercial disaster which had befallen the 
 publisliers of the JLiJ'e of Napoleon unhappily 
 involved the Reynells, and cast a cloud over the 
 
 20
 
 MY FATHER'S EARLY LIFE 21 
 
 fortunes of a family which had become so singularly 
 endeared to my fatlier by the proposed alliance 
 between him and one of the daughters of ^Ir. Carew 
 Henry Reynell. This complicated, and in every 
 sense untoward, catastrophe necessitated the recon- 
 struction of the printing business. Tlie engagement 
 to Catherine Reynell, liowever, had been contracted 
 antecedently to Hazlitt's death, and had been cor- 
 dially approved both by him and my grandmother. 
 Side by side with the regular work on the Morning 
 Chronicle, my father was already busy in devoting 
 intervals of leisure in collecting material for a suit- 
 able literary memorial to Hazlitt. He had apart- 
 ments at this juncture at No. 15 Wardour Street, 
 Soho, and the replies of some of his correspondents 
 to his appeal for information and assistance in his 
 task are directed to him there. Others were sent to 
 the care of Miller the bookseller in Oxford Street. 
 Unquestionably he had been led into entering on 
 such a votive enterprise by the advice of well-wishers, 
 who discerned the importance of keeping the name 
 before the world, and of the younger Hazlitt 
 identifying himself with his father's works and 
 services. 
 
 The Literary Remains, introduced by biographical 
 and critical notices from the pens of Bulwer, Talfourd, 
 and the Editor, represent the fruit of some years' 
 intermittent work succeeded by the difficulty of find- 
 ing a publisher willing to undertake the book. 
 Hazlitt had been dead six years when this tribute 
 to his memory appeared at length in 1836. 
 
 At first sight there is a sentiment of regret that 
 such a delay should have occurred, as interest and 
 sympathy are usually apt to suffer modification from 
 lapse of time ; yet in the particular case it is impos- 
 sible to judge whether prompter action, had it been 
 feasible, would have been more effectual, and w^ould
 
 22 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 have spared my father many long years of anxiety. 
 Buhver stood well with the Melbourne Cabinet, and 
 when we cast our eyes over the glowing periods in 
 w^iicli he testifies his unbounded admiration for 
 Hazlitt, it seems unaccountable on ordinary prin- 
 ciples that he could not have spoken a w^ord in 
 season for Hazlitt's son. 
 
 I have quite a series of letters from Bulwer- 
 Lytton to my father ; but they are of no permanent 
 or general interest. Though a man of considerable 
 fortune and influence, he never assisted us in any 
 shape or way. He w^as notoriously, and even self- 
 consciously, penurious, and used to explain this by 
 saying that he had the blood of Elwes the miser in 
 his veins ; but he was at the same time totally 
 deficient in real sympathy with anyone. He was a 
 word-painter and ideologist. One of Hazlitt's latest 
 projects was to review his novels in the Edinburgh, 
 He had read Paul Clifford^ and wanted, rather char- 
 acteristically, a practical inducement to go through 
 the rest. But the notion was never carried out. 
 
 Meanwhile, the Morning Chronicle was supplying 
 the means of support, and on June 8, 1833, my father 
 and Miss Catherine Reynell were married at St. 
 James's, Piccadilly, at first taking lodgings over 
 Warren's, a cabinet-maker, at No. 76 Charlotte Street, 
 Fitzroy Square, where I was born, August 22, 1834. 
 They subsequently removed to two successive sets of 
 apartments in Percy Street, Tottenham Court Road, 
 where they continued to live till, in 1838, they settled 
 at a small house next the chapel in Alfred Place, 
 Old Brompton. At one of our addresses in Percy 
 Street, our landlord was a JNIr. McComie, a book- 
 binder. I did not recognise him as such, of course, 
 till long subsequently ; but he was one of the enemies 
 of books, and many volumes were desecrated by this 
 villainous artist, for whom Mr. Blades would probably
 
 MY FATHER'S EARLY LIFE 23 
 
 have recommended capital punisliment. Percy Street 
 may be recollected as the locality where the Rev. 
 Mr. Hazlitt lodged in 1787, after his return from 
 America, and where I^amb visited his friend Hume. 
 
 The love of the theatre, which had developed in 
 Hazlitt from his early visits to London, before he 
 regularly resided there, and which I have traced to 
 the Unitarian minister himself in a modified degree, 
 descended to his son, with whom it doubtless proved 
 a valuable resource at a period when his purse was 
 thinly lined, and an instructive and amusing evening 
 was attainable, in company with the Reynells, without 
 any appreciable expense. 
 
 One of the old-fashioned institutions connected 
 with the drama was the Free List. At one time, 
 while the practice of papering the theatres was 
 comparatively unknown, complimentary tickets and 
 admissions by signing the book were far more 
 general. It is unnecessary to mention that Hazlitt 
 himself enjoyed a sort of carte-blanche at all the 
 principal houses, where his dramatic criticisms were 
 apt to be such influential agents in deciding the 
 fortunes of a new piece ; and at one or two theatres 
 I have understood that his place — even a box — was 
 kept for him. My father himself had a free admis- 
 sion at Covent Garden at a very early age (he used to 
 say at twelve), and went there some thirty times to 
 see a piece called Ivanhoe ; or, The Black Knight 
 — the Noir Faineant of Sir AValter. Some of 
 the gentlemen connected with the press took half 
 a dozen or more of their friends in with them gratis, 
 when he was a boy. By a sort of prescriptive 
 sufferance, he probably, if he had no actual entree 
 on the same lines elsewhere, experienced no difficulty 
 in procuring orders. The Free List survives under 
 different conditions. My father and I never dreamed 
 of paying for admission in former days.
 
 24 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 During a fairly long term of years, under [the 
 older and freer conditions, my father always found 
 a succedaneum in miscellaneous literary work, and 
 he had no reason to be dissatisfied on the whole with 
 his relations with sundry publishers. Bohn told him 
 that Bogue's European Library, edited by my 
 father, and on the same (then novel) lines as re- 
 garded price, had been a loss to him {diocit Bohn) of 
 thousands. But the two capital undertakings were 
 Defoe and Montaigne. The former was never com- 
 pleted ; my father sought the aid of Harrison 
 Ainsworth with a view to procuring the use of the 
 rarer pieces from James Crossley of Manchester, 
 a specialist in Defoe ; but that gentleman declined 
 to lend his copies, as Ainswortii states in a note 
 of 1841. The JMontaigne has run through several 
 editions, and with extensive improvements intro- 
 duced by myself in 1902, is still the standard English 
 text. AVhat we reall}^ want, however, is a direct 
 transfer from the author's Gascon original. Cotton's 
 translation, adopted by my father, is indifferent 
 enough, and Florio's still more so, although among 
 people who do not read the old provincial French it 
 has become the fashion to applaud it. You hear the 
 Jeunes precieux of London speaking rapturously of 
 Florio. If he were living, and did not belong to 
 their circle, how different it might be ! 
 
 My father possessed a tolerable share of ordinary 
 miscelhmeous information and a certain acquaint- 
 ance with French and even Italian. As a boy he 
 had been an assiduous reader, and found in the 
 employment a precious resource as well as ulterior 
 profit. The concluding paragraph of Hazlitt's 
 " Common Places," 1823, is wholly devoted to a 
 pleasant and affectionate notice of him. 
 
 It was while he was on the staff at the Chronicle 
 tliat my father was twice thrown into contact with
 
 MY FATHER'S EARLY LIFE 25 
 
 liOrd Palmerston, and in both instances personally 
 experienced a pleasing and forcible illustration of 
 that easy affability and ingenuous straightforwardness, 
 for which the former Premier was so remarkable. 
 
 On the first occasion, my father having gone 
 down in the recess to attend the election at Tiverton 
 for the paper, he was by some accident the only 
 London reporter present, and took notes of his 
 lordship's speech to his constituents. The speech 
 contained some rather strong remarks upon certain 
 proceedings of the then French Government, and 
 the reporter took upon himself, at the conclusion of 
 the address, to ask his lordship whether he desired 
 those remarks to be given, or whether they were 
 not rather merely designed ad captandum (as it 
 were). I^ord Palmerston smiled, and said : " I thank 
 you for the alternative, but what I say here I say 
 for ever)'' where ; " and he added, in his own kindly 
 manner, " How are you going up ? I am going 
 up to town at once, to take part in the London 
 election." The reporter replied (this was before 
 railways) : " If your lordship will take up my report 
 and send it for me to the Morning Chronicle office 
 in time for publication, I shall be much obliged, for 
 that will enable me to proceed West." His lord- 
 ship accepted the mission, and ere he left Tiverton 
 took charge of the report, which was duly delivered 
 at the Chronicle office in time for press. 
 
 In the other case, when Palmerston, as Foreign 
 Minister, had made on the last day of the session an 
 important speech, Benjamin Hawes, then his Under- 
 Secretary, meeting my father outside the House, 
 said : " That was a fine speech of Palmerston's ; I 
 hope the reporters have a full note of it." The 
 answer was that, if they had no more notes of it 
 than he himself had, in consequence of the darkness, 
 the probabilities were there would be excessively
 
 26 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 little in the papers. The much alarm (my father's 
 0"wn phrase) of Hawes at this doubt suggested a 
 proposition that, if it was so desired, my father 
 would take down such notes of the speech as his 
 lordship might dictate. This being accepted, he 
 and the Foreign Secretary proceeded to Downing 
 Street, where, my father being seated at a table, 
 and the noble lord being requested to regard him 
 as the Lower House of Parliament, Palmerston, 
 pacing up and down, and with a good-natured smile 
 from time to time, repeated his address. By this 
 means an important Ministerial statement was rescued 
 from oblivion. 
 
 On the Morning Chronicle they arranged to pay 
 certain members of the staff all the year round, and 
 to provide work for them to do in the Parliamentary 
 recess. My father's pay was £7, 7s. a week ; and 
 while translations were in tolerable vogue, and 
 brought three guineas a sheet, the literary side 
 importantly aided the other. 
 
 The reporters in the Parliamentary gallery were a 
 free and rough set even in my father's time. He used 
 to take me up occasionally with him to the office 
 facing Somerset House, and I recollect the men at 
 their work round the table in the room upstairs, men 
 of a stamp not much altered from those who had 
 served under Black and Perry. Nor do I forget that 
 my father was, to our great concern, brought home to 
 Thurloe l^lace, about 1843, in some vehicle suffering 
 from the injury which he liad sustained from having 
 been run over by a hand fire-engine just outside the 
 office. 
 
 My father occasionally reviewed a book or under- 
 took a theatrical criticism. On one occasion, a new 
 piece at one of the houses, of which he had 
 gleaned tlie general character and knew the cast, was 
 announced, and he was asked to furnish a notice.
 
 MY FATHER'S EARLY LIFE 27 
 
 But he thought he had all the facts before him, and 
 sent in an article based on his imagination. The 
 performance was unfortunately postponed. The 
 same thing once happened to Davison, musical critic 
 on the Times, in the case of a new opera at the 
 house in the Haymarket. 
 
 These days, until employment grew more and 
 more difficult to procure, and certain classes of work 
 ceased to be remunerative, seem to me, as I look 
 back wistfully at them, to have been brighter and 
 happier in some ways than those when relief arrived, 
 and my father no longer suffered the tension and 
 suspense of a precarious and inadequate livelihood. 
 At the same time there were annoyances and 
 vicissitudes, against which he bore up bravely ; and 
 I was too young and inexperienced to aid him in 
 his literary tasks till toward the critical juncture, 
 when resources began to grow more narrow, and 
 his health and spirits, and those of my mother, 
 began to give way ; and the fruit of a longer post- 
 ponement of Government patronage must have been 
 calamitous. The earliest books in which I co- 
 operated were the translations of Hue's Travels in 
 Tartary and of the Works of Napoleon III. in 
 1852 and 1853. I am prouder of the bit of money 
 which I then made for my parents than of any 
 which I have since made for myself. 
 
 My father's income in those years which preceded 
 his appointment had a sad tendency to recede from 
 the decline in the call for the classes of literature by 
 which he had once made a fair amount of money. 
 Rent and taxes were then perhaps rather lower ; but 
 while some kinds of provisions, as fish and poultry, 
 were cheaper, the bulk of household requisites was 
 more expensive. We used to get poultry occasion- 
 ally from Devonshire ; a goose or a couple of ducks 
 would cost half-a-crown ; and fish was sold differently
 
 28 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 — by the fish in the case of soles and other smaller 
 kinds, not by the pound. A pair of soles cost Is. 6d. 
 about 1850. 
 
 I retain a very vivid impression of a cabinet 
 council, at which I was present as a lad, about this 
 period, when money was scarce and precious. The 
 second Duke of Wellington intimated his wish to 
 Murray of Albemarle Street that my father should 
 edit a volume connected with the series of the old 
 Duke's Despatdies ; and the question was, what to 
 ask ; for no price was fixed either by the Duke 
 or by INIurray. My father and mother and I sat 
 accordingly in conclave upon this weighty matter. 
 My father held that £50 would be ample. 
 
 "Oh," put in my mother, "these folks have 
 plenty; why not make it sixty." 
 
 " Seventy would only be ten more," suggested I. 
 
 " Egad ! " cried my father, taking courage, " I'll 
 try eighty." 
 
 " I should go as far as ninety, if I were you," 
 was my counsel. My father and mother looked at 
 each other; my view carried the day, and ninety 
 sovereigns, rather easily earned, my father had. That 
 was a beau jour. 
 
 But we never had any farther transactions with 
 Murray. My father once suggested to him an idea, 
 which he declined, and then employed a lady friend 
 to carry out. This was the same man who published 
 Knapp's Journal of a Naturalist, stolen from AVhite's 
 Natural History of Selborne, and caused it to be 
 puffed in the QiLarterly as a most desirable book for 
 everyone to possess.^ 
 
 A second case, in which I had the happiness to 
 make a little money for my father, was when through 
 
 ^ See, apropos of this, a strange letter from Byron from Genoa to John 
 Hunt of 1822, where the poet intimates liis intention of giving up Murray, 
 and furnishes his reason. Comp. The Hazlitts, 1911, p. 1(34.
 
 MY FATHER'S EARLY LIFE 29 
 
 the Escombes on my initiative he obtained some 
 shares in a mine for £10, and might have sold them 
 for £170, but against my advice he retained half, 
 which subsequently became next to waste paper. 
 
 About that time my father saw a good deal of the 
 second Duke. While Apsley House was under 
 repairs, his Grace hired a residence in Relgrave 
 Place. My father called one morning early, and 
 found him at breakfast on a bit of cold mutton, 
 bread-and-butter, and tea. A servant came in, 
 when they were together, and brought some message 
 from the Duchess, who was not on the most cordial 
 terms with her husband. The same thing was said 
 of Lord Sydney and his wife, and the same reason 
 was given. Lady S. used to travel abroad with 
 her maid and footman, and leave Sydney to shift 
 for himself. 
 
 He and Wellington were very intimate, and had 
 travelled together. Hinc ilkje lachrynice. I saw the 
 Duke — my father's acquaintance — more than once 
 in Piccadilly, and recall his shabby dress and his 
 silver watch-chain, which impressed my j'outhful 
 imagination as derogatory to a man of such high rank. 
 
 While my father resided in Cheyne Row, Chelsea, 
 his near neighbour was Carlyle ; but we saw com- 
 paratively little of him, nor did he take much 
 account of us. I was quite a youth, and was not 
 qualified to form any judgment of a man whose reputa- 
 tion was then at its height. Rut my maturer experi- 
 ence has not raised him in my estimation as a writer, 
 although it would be absurd to contest his powerful 
 and perhaps enduring personality as a dramatis 
 persona. The references in his Cromicell and French 
 Revolution are often of a very flimsy and second-hand 
 cast, and I was terribly vexed at having been led to 
 insert in a little book of anecdotes a letter from the 
 Protector on the strength of his biographer having
 
 30 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 given it, but which is almost unquestionably a 
 forgery. 
 
 Carlyle strikes me, indeed, as having been very 
 undiscriminating in the choice of his authorities, and 
 the reason may be that he mainly used them as pegs 
 to hang his own ideas upon, couched in his peculiar 
 Anglo-Teutonic phraseology. I suspect that more 
 than one of the letters in the Cromwell book is 
 spurious. Indeed I fear that there is not so much 
 beyond the grotesque jargon which forms the con- 
 necting letterpress to be trusted either here or in the 
 Frederick ; and I understood some time since that 
 revised editions of the historical works were in pre- 
 paration. I gravely doubt if they are worth even 
 that process. 
 
 The germ of Sartor Resartus is in Swift's Tale 
 of a Tub, and the Dean was himself a borrower. 
 Some persons have taken me to task, and even 
 bestowed uncompHmentary epithets on me, because 
 it has been my cue to trace ideas back to their 
 apparent sources. Thus the saying of Coleridge 
 about Lamb, that his was a mind as incapable of 
 receiving pollution as is the sun when it shines on a 
 dunghill, may be found in a Life of St. Agnes, by 
 Daniel Pratt, 1G77, and occurs long before that in 
 Diogenes Laertius, w'hence perhaps Coleridge con- 
 veyed it. A famous saying of I..amb,^ " Give me 
 Man as he is not to be," is on the title-page of a 
 forgotten novel of 170.*3, which may have fallen under 
 liis eyes. 
 
 The late Algernon Black of Broadwoods related 
 to me a curious instance of unconscious or spon- 
 taneous sympathy and the freemasonry of tobacco. 
 Carlyle and Tennyson spent an evening together at 
 Cheyne Row, and sat opposite each other, pipe in 
 mouth, saying scarcely anything. Carlyle, when the 
 Laureate had left, remarked to his wife what a 
 
 ^ See The Hazlitts, 1911, p. 174.
 
 MY FATHER'S EARLY LIFE 31 
 
 capital fellow the latter was, and Tennyson made 
 the same comment at home about his entertainer. 
 The story may be familiar. 
 
 I formerly threw into book form what I termed 
 Studies in Jocular Literature ; it was an effort to 
 trace out these anecdotes, and discover their real 
 sources or p?ima stainina ; and I recollect that I was 
 described by one of the reviewers as a ghoul for my 
 pains, just as somebody else was on a somewhat 
 similar account characterized as a chiffonier. 
 
 Just by us at Chelsea was the little cottage on 
 the riverside where Turner the painter passed his 
 last days as a lodger with Mrs. Booth, he taking her 
 name. He left her a liberal annuity. A\'hen the 
 woman asked for references, Turner drew out a 
 bundle of bank-notes. He used to travel by the 
 steamboat from Battersea Bridge, and in case he 
 observed any one recognizing him, to disembark at 
 the next landing-place. 
 
 In one of the best houses in Cheyne Walk resided 
 in these days Mr. and jNIrs. Handford. She had 
 been a Mrs. David, and her son by the former hus- 
 band produced one of the earliest Turkish Grammars 
 in this country. The Handfords entertained a good 
 deal, and we met under their roof Dr. Lee of Hart- 
 well, the book-collector ; Sir Charles Aldis, and his 
 son, Dr. Aldis. The latter wore his white hair ; but 
 Sir Charles, with the help of enamel, stays, and a 
 wig, contrived to pass off as the junior of the two — 
 in fact, the Doctor seemed to have been born many 
 years before his father. In the Handfords' garden, 
 which robbed all the others, was one of the numerous 
 mulberry-trees planted by Queen Elizabeth, who 
 must have spent much of her time in this employ- 
 ment. I remember climbing up as a boy, and 
 descending with a rich coat of colour on my hands 
 and features.
 
 32 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 In another house the Venetian ducal family of 
 Grimani settled in the person of Mrs. Hornby, 
 daughter of a gentleman of that once illustrious 
 name, who followed the profession of a teacher of 
 Italian in I^ondon, and wife of Mr. Thomas Hornby, 
 a solicitor. Their younger son, Sir Edmund Grimani 
 Hornby, carried down a step farther the distinguished 
 provenance, although Hornby himself had, in a far 
 i^reater degree than Miss Grimani, the air of a 
 descendant of Doges. Hornby was a thorough 
 gentleman, and before the periodical press was so 
 fabulously cheapened and multiplied, he was a 
 bountiful patron to journalism. His drawing-room 
 table was covered from week to week with the most 
 extraordinary assortment of papers of every class and 
 persuasion ; of books, on the contrary, I remember 
 few ; although his grandson, INIr. Francis Villiers 
 Hornby, has informed me tliat he possesses about 
 1500 volumes, formerly his paternal ancestor's 
 property. 
 
 \\''e knew the Hoxnbys through W. J. Fox, 
 M.P. for Oldham, who, like Hornby, was an Unitarian. 
 Mrs. Fox, who long survived her husband, and whom 
 I have often met at the Reynells', attended Hazlitt's 
 lectures as far back as 1818, and described to me the 
 lecturer's appearance and manner. 
 
 I recollect my father telHng me, about this time, 
 that he had been dancing the evening before with a 
 lady who was so thin that he was afraid she would 
 have worn liis coat into holes. 
 
 A striking contrast between the busy thorough- 
 fare which traverses the entire length of the way 
 from Cheyne Walk to Pimlico, and the road as it 
 was fifty years ago, must be immediately evident to 
 anyone old enough to recall the aspect of the locality 
 so far back, when a private path ran by the Mihtary 
 Hospital and was open only in the daytime. Such
 
 MY FATHER'S EARLY IJFE 33 
 
 antique bits as the Archway, Turks' Row, and Jews' 
 Row, had their picturesque side, especially before 
 the population overflowed all reasonable limits ; but 
 at present, notwithstanding certain improvements, 
 Chelsea has dropped to a low general level, and is a 
 district blocked from nearly every point by squalid 
 approaches. 
 
 A good deal of confusion appears to have arisen 
 out of the existence at different times of two or three 
 so-called Chelsea bun-houses. One of the childish 
 reminiscences of a personal acquaintance is a visit to 
 that which was once known as Bath House, toward 
 the old church and in the portion of Cheyne AValk 
 fronting what was once the old China Factory, and 
 subsequently Wedgwood's depot. The bun was 
 given to him so hot that he could hardly hold it 
 in his hand. My informant adds that it was here 
 that they first made the Bath buns, which I used as 
 a school-boy to prefer out of a particular shop in 
 Orange Street, Red Lion Square, as 1 did the three- 
 cornered tarts from one in St. Swithin's Lane. But. 
 this was not the real original house, which lay much 
 farther eastward in the Queen's Road, at the end of 
 Jews' Row, near Ranelagh Creek, and which was 
 taken down in 1839. The buns were square, without 
 plums, very greasy, and served hot, being baked on 
 iron plates in the shop itself. They were adapted 
 only for folks with elastic digestions, and, like many 
 other characteristics of the bygone time, would not 
 suit the present taste. 
 
 In Smith's Booh for a Rainy Day, 1861, p. 2.59, 
 he prints a notice by Mrs. Hand, proprietress of the 
 " Royal Bun House, Chelsea," that no cross buns 
 would be sold in 1793, but the Chelsea buns as 
 usual, on Good Friday. Mrs. Hand here returns 
 thanks for more than fifty years' patronage, thus 
 carrying back the Bun Hegira to 1740 or thereabouts. 
 
 c
 
 34 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 The ordinary books of reference mention the 
 changes which Lindsey Row has undergone. My 
 father had three landladies — Mrs. Ham, Mrs. Pepper, 
 and another, Avhose name I forget, but which was 
 oddly congruous. In my father's time, behind our 
 residence and the others lay the Distillery Garden, 
 witli its Clock House. It was a large piece of ground 
 devoted to the growth of lavender and other plants, 
 or of lierbs ; and I more than suspect that it originally 
 formed part of the demesne of Old Lindsey House, 
 as well as of the conventual establishment which is 
 supposed to have preceded that. Our own cellarage 
 toward the river was very extensive, and ran under 
 the front garden and part of the road ; and it was 
 said that in one of the houses a secret subterranean 
 passage, long since stopped up, once existed, crossing 
 the Thames to the Battersea shore, as a means of 
 escape for the nuns in case of danger. The Distillery 
 Garden had a long dead wall abutting on the King's 
 Road at the bend opposite the ISIan in the Moon 
 tavern at the corner of Park Walk. Mr. Whistler 
 the artist, who subsequently occupied our house, 
 threw that and the Kscombes' into one. 
 
 All our residences at Chelsea were at or near the 
 waterside ; and those were the rowing days of the 
 writer. The chief points for hiring boats were 
 Searle's at Lambeth, Greaves's at Chelsea, and 
 liifFen's at Hammersmith. I joined the Merchant 
 Taylors' eight, and the only occasion on which, as 
 an oarsman, I got into trouble was when, owing to 
 the negligence of our coxswain, our boat was nearly 
 capsized off Battersea Reach one day by the swell of 
 two steamers. One of the patrons of Greaves, when 
 I hired his boats, was Gordon Cumming, the African 
 explorer, who was fond of exhibiting his muscular 
 .strength by holding out a pair of oars (not sculls) 
 horizontally. The river has since my time under-
 
 MY FATHER'S EARLY LIFE 35 
 
 gone a complete cliange in its rowing aspects — not 
 for the better. 
 
 The Escombes' eldest daughter Priscilla was a very 
 handsome girl, and afterward married a man much 
 older than herself, a Cape merchant named Jerram. 
 I recollect a trivial incident connected with the visit 
 which P. E. and I (then seventeen) paid together 
 to the Exhibition of 1851. We returned to her 
 father's house, and I thoughtlessly remarked : " Oh, I 
 don't want any tea." She quietly replied : " Perhaps 
 you'll allow me to have some ? " One of her brothers 
 was the late Sir Henry Escombe, who became Premier 
 of one of our colonies. A rather unkind acquaintance 
 of the family once observed to one of Priscilla's 
 sisters : "I should hardly have taken you to be her 
 sister, for you have small eyes and a large mouth, 
 and she has a small mouth and large eyes." 
 
 Perhaps the recompense, which came to my father 
 in 1854, was barely adequate to the load of anxiety 
 which he suffered in the interval, and certainly in 
 one respect the boon arrived too late ; for, had it 
 been conceded ten years sooner, it might have saved 
 my mother from a premature grave. She was our 
 good genius through all these troubled times, and 
 was only spared, as it were, to look for a short 
 season on the land of Canaan. I feel confident, 
 from what my mother once told me, that her 
 husband did his best in those early days of trial and 
 straits, before I understood how narrow and how 
 precarious were their means, to sustain her courage 
 and his own ; I remember her speaking of one 
 occasion, when he was unusually silent and thought- 
 ful, and when, at length, he owned to her that he 
 had lost his engagement on the press and their sole 
 source of livelihood. I am relating over again the ex- 
 perience of many and many — of some whose careers 
 have been full of such incidents to heart-breaking.
 
 36 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 AVhen affiiirs were at their worst in Cheyne Row 
 in 185.*3— i, I suggested to my father that, if he 
 could get the Government to give me a berth, I 
 would hand over the whole of the money to him, 
 save just enough for my bare necessities. But the 
 appointment in the Bankruptcy Court fell in soon 
 after. I remember being impressed in Church 
 Street with the tendency to drift, when my father 
 accepted a couple of guineas for translating Victor 
 Cousin's pamphlet, Justice and Charity, in 1848. 
 While my father resided at Lindsey Row, I used 
 occasionally to meet a tall, quite elderly French 
 gentleman, rather shabbily dressed (as it struck me), 
 but of an aristocratic air, about whom there was a 
 mysterious story, that he was the Dauphin, supposed 
 to have died in 1795. There were several pretenders. 

 
 / 
 / 
 
 III 
 
 MY OWN CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOL-DAYS 
 
 Two of the earliest reminiscences which I have, 
 however, are connected with our residence at Alfred 
 Place ; the death of my younger brother Richard in a 
 lit in 1839 — he lies, poor little fellow I in Brompton 
 churchyard ; and the visit of Lord Lansdowne to 
 my father on horseback to deliver a copy of the 
 catalogue of his pictures for a projected edition in 
 1843 of Hazlitt's Criticisms on Art. A passage in 
 the Life of Arthur Young of Bradfield reminds me 
 that as a child my mother used to call me Robin 
 from the largeness and openness of my eyes. 
 Young's pet daughter Bobbin owed her sobriquet 
 to much the same cause. 
 
 Another very childish recollection is the visit of 
 my parents and my uncle Reynell and his children, 
 my brother, and myself, to Felixstowe in 1840, and 
 the distinct image in my mind of the two cottages 
 lying back from the lane, which we engaged. At 
 that time Felixstowe was a mere seaside hamlet. 
 We spent a week of the time at Ipswich, and were 
 transported in the carrier's cart, except my father 
 and uncle, who walked. I have never seen Ipswich 
 since, yet I preserve a vivid idea of the look of the 
 principal street after sixty years. 
 
 My juvenile conception of freehold monopoly 
 was perhaps not more imperfect and delusive than 
 that of other youngsters. A Captain de Villa, 
 Knight of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, was
 
 38 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 an acquaintance of my father in early days, and 
 I went to his residence in Brighton with one or 
 both of my parents, subsequently questioning to 
 him or them the knight's title to the stair carpet, 
 as it was identical in pattern with that at home. 
 
 My grandfather Hazlitt's first wife lived with 
 us at one time at Alfred Place. She had her little 
 peculiarities, as pouring her tea into her saucer, which 
 scandalized more strait-laced folks. I remember that 
 it was a custom at the tea-table to put your spoon 
 in your cup, if you desired no more. But another 
 plan was to place it on the right hand of the cup 
 if you wished the latter replenished, and on the left 
 otherwise. 
 
 I also realize the almost opaque deafness of 
 Thomas Landseer, whom my father, when I was 
 as a great treat in his company, met at one of 
 the theatres, and with whom it amounted to an 
 interruption of the performance to converse. The 
 great painter. Sir Edwin, shared, or at least acquired 
 in later life, this infirmity. Hazlitt himself had 
 known John and Thomas Landseer at least as early 
 as 1818. 
 
 AVhen I had had some preparatory schooling in 
 Brompton, I was taken by my father, on account of 
 a cousin being already there, to a boarding establish- 
 ment kept by a ]Mr. Mecklenburg at Margate, since 
 developed into the Margate College. I remained there 
 only two months, and then proceeded to Merchant 
 Taylors' in Suffolk Lane, in the City. AVhile I was 
 at Margate, I remember the meal, which my father 
 and I shared in 1841 in the harbour — steak and 
 onions, followed by some green figs. I keep the 
 taste on my palate still. And I also recall that I 
 took off my shoes and stockings to wade in the sea, 
 and that on the way back a small crab intercepted 
 me, and made a reconnaissance of my toes.
 
 MY CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOL-DAYS 39 
 
 I was nominated to Merchant Taylors' througli 
 my father's cousin, WilHam Wellwood Stoddart, of 
 St. John's College, Oxford, in 1842. The course 
 of studies there at that time was very slightly varied, 
 I apprehend, from what it had been a century 
 before. The only subjects taught were Hebrew, 
 Greek, Latin, writing, mathematics, and arithmetic. 
 The school was held in an upper and a lower room, 
 of which the latter was reserved for writing and 
 arithmetic classes in the afternoon. In the upper 
 apartment during the mornings, the five forms, with 
 the JNIonitors and Prompters, and sixth form, on a 
 sort of raised platform at the top, followed their 
 studies or repeated their lessons to four masters. 
 In 1842, and for some time after, the head-master 
 was Dr. Bellamy, father of the late President of 
 St. John's College, Oxford, who, when I saw him, 
 struck me as just such another diminutive individual 
 as my old acquaintance. I have thought that the 
 latter was immediately related to Daniel Bellamy of 
 St. John's, who lost his fortune in the South Sea 
 scheme, and who became a miscellaneous writer 
 and editor, his wife, Mrs. Anne Bellamy, keeping 
 a girls' school, first at Chelsea and subsequently at 
 Kingston-on-Thames. His earlier troubles did not 
 prevent him from living to eighty -eight. The 
 vitality of the Bellamys was evidently considerable — 
 more so than their dimensions. In the afternoons 
 this room was devoted to mathematics. There were 
 about 200 boys altogether ; but a small minority 
 took the more difficult classics and mathematics, 
 and a still smaller one Hebrew, although I under- 
 stood that Bellamy was a fair Hebraist. Prayers 
 were read every morning before school by one of 
 the sixth form, who knelt in the centre of the room 
 just below the Monitors' table, and held a printed 
 sheet in front of him with the appointed ritual.
 
 40 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 It was long my duty to perform this ceremony. 
 It has occurred to me that the sheet in question 
 might liave been similar to that described by 
 Mr. Tuer as in use at Westminster School.^ Of 
 the Prayers selected for use at Merchant Taylors' 
 there is an edition dated 1786 in my hands, accom- 
 panied by a Catechism. On Election Day, I always 
 noted the tall and commanding figure of Sir Moses 
 ^Nlontefiore, who gave the Hebrew medal annually. 
 He had been a successful contractor in the Crimean 
 'War, and was a most benevolent man. 
 
 Before I quitted this institution in 1850, it had 
 undergone a remarkable development. Vigorous 
 efforts were made to meet modern demands by 
 enlarging the programme and extending the utility 
 of the old foundation. One by one, French, draw- 
 ing, music, and other sciences, were added to the 
 meagre educational regime of my own earlier boy- 
 hood. I stayed long enougli to join the French 
 class, and one of my most agreeable associations is 
 the delightful manner of Delille, who presided over 
 it. What a contrast to the other instructors ! He 
 was before his time. 
 
 I never heard to what influence or agency the 
 improvement of the school was due, but as it existed 
 down to 1850 it was little better than a charity 
 school of a higli grade. There was once a year a 
 strange piece of barbarism in the shape of an Exami- 
 nation or Probation Day, when we had to put in an 
 appearance at eight o'clock in the morning, and to 
 have our breakfast on the premises. All the arrange- 
 ments were of tlie meanest and most barbarous charac- 
 ter. Except that the menu was differentiated by the 
 modern introduction of sausage rolls, three-cornered 
 tarts, and I'ath buns, the scene was perchance, in its 
 general costume, not dissimilar from what it had been 
 
 ^ History of the Horn-Book , 1897, i>. 407-
 
 MY CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOL-DAYS 41 
 
 in the founder's lifetime. Of course the Merchant 
 Taylors' Company could not afford to find us our 
 modest repast. For 200 boys it might have involved 
 them in an outlay of £lO. Think of that ! 
 
 It long used to be considered a good joke to lay 
 hold of every newcomer to the establishment, and 
 throw him into a large clothes-chest upstairs as an 
 introductory ceremony ; it was at any rate a dry 
 christening ; and if it did no good, it did little harm. 
 It is curious how a mere accident gave me a peculiar 
 ascendancy over nearly the whole school. While I 
 was in the fifth form, a schoolfellow (Fat Nelham) 
 attacked me one day, and I went for him. I was 
 very strong, and I thrashed him well. My reputa- 
 tion and prestige were placed on the most solid 
 foundation from that hour till the day on which I 
 left I was lionoured by the sobriquet of the " Black 
 Sheep," not by reason of any misdemeanour of which 
 I had to plead guilty, but on account of the awe 
 which my exploit inspired. 
 
 Better books, better masters, more liberal ideas, 
 have no doubt set ^lerchant Taylors' on a totally 
 different footing from the place as I knew it more 
 than sixty j^ears ago. I spent eight years of my life 
 within the walls of the old mansion in Suffolk Lane, 
 and I came out grounded. 
 
 I believe that I possessed a slight knowledge of 
 figures, of Latin, of Greek, and of French. 1 had 
 mastered a few of the problems of Euclid, and 
 quadratic equations. Writing was an art which I 
 never acquired either then or since, although many 
 of the printers of Great Britain, and a very large 
 number of correspondents all over the world, have 
 made the best of a sort of substitute for the English 
 written character in vogue with me. 
 
 I shall never forget the mingled despair and con- 
 tempt which his futile endeavours to educate me in
 
 42 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 this direction inspired in the breast of an eminent 
 calligrapher, commissioned by my father in after 
 years to qualify me for clerical duties. My chief at 
 the AVar Office declared that, if he had not had 
 absolute ocular testimony to the contrary, he should 
 have thought that I held my pen with my left foot. 
 
 The books chiefly used were Eutropius, Ceesar, 
 and A'irgil for Latin ; Xenophon, Euripides, Sophocles, 
 and perhaps Herodotus, for Greek. The text-books 
 which I recollect were Bos, Potter [Antiquities of 
 G-reece), Anthon, and Lempriere (who had been 
 preceded, I think, by Adam's Roman Antiquities). 
 Tlie information imparted by these works was, ac- 
 cording to present notions, meagre and imperfect 
 enough ; but they marked an advance on the yet 
 older material. Lempriere's Classical Dictionai'y was, 
 in particular, a highly creditable commencement on 
 modern lines. The first edition was in 1792, but 
 Hazlitt, as a boy, met the author at Liverpool two 
 years before, and tells his father in a letter that he 
 paid him (L.) great attention. 
 
 The Lemprieres are Jersey people, and the lexi- 
 cograplier's grandson was recently living at Roselle. 
 The late Sir John Millais was a countryman of theirs, 
 and is made by an interviewer to offer very high 
 testimony to their character and breeding. By the 
 way, tlie said interviewer misunderstood the late 
 President of the Royal Academy where he refers to 
 his knowledge of Hazlitt — he meant my father. Sir 
 .John was not born till 1829. 
 
 In the main, whatever I have acquired may be 
 regarded not unfairly or very disrespectfully as self- 
 taught. 1 have in nearly the whole intervening 
 period occupied my time in reading and writing 
 books by way of supplementing compulsorily my 
 shortcomings ; and here I must not be understood 
 to imply that the deficiency would or could have
 
 MY CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOL-DAYS 43 
 
 been made good by a longer course at the school 
 and a translation to the University, for on that topic 
 I hold my own special convictions, which gain strength 
 as I grow older; an academical career may be socially 
 beneficial ; but it warps and narrows the intellect, and 
 as the colleges of Oxford and Cambridge are consti- 
 tuted, they do not form tlie best training for a man 
 who aspires to independent thought, although I quite 
 see and grant that they are excellent nurseries for 
 clergymen, schoolmasters, and mathematicians. I 
 never met with any Merchant Taylor who had at- 
 tained distinction beyond that possibly latent in a 
 colonial bishopric or a silk gown ; and all the L^ni- 
 versity men with whom I liave associated have struck 
 me as wanting in originality of ideas. I challenged 
 Dr. Baker, a former headmaster, to supply me with 
 the names of five other scholars of national and 
 catholic celebrity, who had belonged to the school 
 since its foundation 350 years ago, giving him a 
 start and a cue with the author of the Faery Queen ; 
 but he did not vouchsafe, or did not dare, to reply. 
 
 Even in those isolated instances, where distin- 
 guished persons have belonged to one of our ancient 
 seminaries of learning, I am tempted to ask myself 
 the question, how far greater they might have been, 
 had they never graduated. There seems to be an 
 atmosphere about those time - hallowed spots, to 
 which the blood assimilates, and which renders the 
 brain proof against external thought and progress. 
 Time will alone modif}^ this growth of centuries, and 
 then every one who is really great will become, from 
 contact with the master-minds of antiquity, and from 
 a power of collating ancient with modern philosophy, 
 all the more eminent. 
 
 The mood and temper in which the classical 
 authors, as they are termed, were taught, were 
 utterly deceptive and unprofitable. Poets and prose-
 
 44 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 writers, like Homer, Horace, Herodotus, Caesar, in- 
 stead of beinsf introduced to our notice and rendered 
 intelligible and tangible to us as writers, of whom the 
 best part still lived, were made to appear impersonal 
 abstractions. There was no attempt to bring these 
 masters before us in their relationship to their own 
 times and to ours. 
 
 I was usually considered a rather proficient scholar. 
 My name repeatedly, almost habitually, stands at the 
 head of the respective forms in the printed school-lists, 
 and I preserve five volumes purchased at the cost of 
 the Gild of ^Merchant Taylors, and handed to me as 
 prizes between 1845 and 1850 ; they are of the usual 
 type and quality. 
 
 But I declare that it was not till long after I had 
 bidden farewell to Suffolk Lane that I acquired any- 
 thing resembling a correct estimate of the great 
 authors of antiquity, and learned that they were 
 men of flesh and blood, actual realities, as much as 
 Chaucer and Spenser, or as Shakespear and Milton. 
 
 Two circumstances of my life, which cling to my 
 memory the longest, were my being at Merchant 
 Taylors', of which I used to dream years and years 
 afterward, and the death of my mother, which was 
 my waking thought the 17th August 1897 — nearly 
 forty years after the sad event. I fancy that this 
 must have been due to reading Johnson's last letters 
 to his mother and to the sympathetic chord which 
 they touched. But I again dreamed of M. T. S. on 
 tlie 27th August 1897, without having had it on my 
 mind. 
 
 \Vhen I entered Merchant Taylors' I was eight 
 years old, and I continued for some time after, while 
 I was an occupant of the Petty Form, to wear a 
 tunic or frock with clocked stockings. I believe 
 that I was rather proud of a very smart red velvet 
 dress which my mother had made me ; but Dr.
 
 (1) WATCH-GUARD FORMED FROM THE HAIR 
 
 OF CATHERINE HAZLITT (1804 60) 
 
 (2) TWO RINGS BELONGING TO HER BEFORE 
 
 HER MARRIAGE IN 1833
 
 MY CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOL-DAYS 45 
 
 Bellamy beckoned me up to him one memorable day, 
 and made a deep impression on my mind by saying, 
 though good-humouredly enough, that if my parents 
 did not find me a pair of trousers, he thought he 
 should have to try and see what he could do to make 
 a man of me. 
 
 It was a very long journey for a little boy in those 
 days from Old Brompton to Suffolk Lane. We were 
 due at nine in the morning. The founders of the 
 charity had not provided for scholars residing beyond 
 the precincts of the City. Not merely were there no 
 trains, but the omnibus service was very imperfect, 
 and with my parents' humble means cabs were out of 
 the question. There were small omnibuses, holding 
 ten inside, plying between London and Hounslow, 
 Brentford, and Richmond, and a few others which 
 accommodated twelve. On the Brompton and 
 Chelsea roads I do not retain in my memory the 
 first experiments. I walked to and from Sloane 
 Street, and from or to that point a Hounslow 
 omnibus conveyed me to my destination ; my place 
 was reserved. All these vehicles were in the hands 
 of private proprietors. There were no fares below^ 
 sixpence when I began to ride to and fro. The 
 Richmond hackney carriages had drivers and con- 
 ductors in livery, but their terminus was in St. Paul's 
 Churchyard, and the charge for the entire distance 
 was a shilling. 
 
 The Rev. John Bathurst Deane,M.A., F.S. A., who 
 was master of the fourth and fifth forms in my time, 
 was author of a somewhat empirical work on Serpent - 
 worship and of a biography of his ancestor, General 
 Deane, and during his life formed some collections 
 toward a history of his family, which was subsequently 
 printed with additions by others. He was an irascible 
 and foolish person, addicted to giving extravagant 
 tasks and personal chastisement, and to Bath buns.
 
 46 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 of which the iindevoured remainder often distended 
 his cheek on entering the schoolroom after lunch, 
 awakening a titter which, if the culprit was detected, 
 brought down on him an order (usually rescinded) to 
 write out the Iliad or the jEneid. But these vagaries 
 indicate to us a little in how untrue and unfortunate a 
 light the classics were viewed, as I have remarked, by 
 the teachers of two or three generations or so back, 
 and made to appear to their pupils. 
 
 Deane was rather fond of the cane, which was 
 applied to the back and to the hand in the bender 
 and the cut. Probably this system of corporal chastise- 
 ment is now unknown — scarcely recollected. It was 
 as often administered without as with reason, and I 
 once incurred the temporary displeasure of Hessey for 
 resisting his advances in this way on some totally 
 inadequate ground. 
 
 I once fell under the displeasure of Deane when he 
 was giving our form some English dictation to turn 
 into Latin by rendering " the soil of Rhodes " solum 
 viaj'um ; and I also received his censure by making 
 virtuo.ma the I^atin equivalent of " virtuous." He 
 himself was partial to fantastic etymologies, as deriv- 
 ing by means of transpositions and the digamma the 
 English " bread " from the Greek apro?. The boys 
 sometimes made fun of him by bringing old battered 
 halfpence, and making out that they had discovered 
 them during some excavations. 
 
 INIr. Barlow, who presided over the junior after- 
 noon classes in arithmetic and writing, was, of course, 
 ))aptized Billy Barlow. An unlucky wight was over- 
 heard by him using this irreverent sobriquet^ and 
 summoned to his desk. Taking him by one ear, he 
 said to him : " My name, small boy, is not Mr. 
 Wil-li-am 15arlovv, but Mr. Sam-u-el Barlow," spelling 
 out the words, and giving at each syllable a lug at 
 the offender's auricular pendant. Barlow was rather
 
 MY CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOL-DAYS 47 
 
 short-siglited. A boy played him a practical joke 
 one day by spitting on the floor just where the old 
 fellow used to patrol up and down before the tables, 
 and poor Barlow stooped down, mistaking the white 
 object for a shilling. 
 
 Of the seminary where I acquired my alphabet I 
 have given some farther particulars in Schools, School- 
 books, and Schoolmasters, 1888. 
 
 I witnessed one morning on Ludgate Hill, as 
 I passed to school in the omnibus, a not unusual 
 spectacle in those days. At the turning to the Old 
 Bailey a man who had been hanged that morning 
 was still suspended in the air, preparatory to being 
 cut down. It was not then quite nine o'clock, and 
 an hour was always allowed to intervene. This was 
 about 1845. 
 
 What the school is it has become since my day. 
 Down to 1850, save the institution of classes for 
 drawing and one or two other matters, and an im- 
 provement in the mathematical department, over 
 which Deane and Blunt presided when I joined, 
 this noble Elizabethan foundation, of which so 
 much might have been made, preserved its ancient 
 poverty of design and narrowness of scope. There 
 was progress without — the stir and bustle of modern 
 life — but there was an inarticulate archaism within, 
 out of tune and touch with the age. Everything 
 was mechanical and doctrinaire ; all was done by 
 rote. The classics and mathematics were taught by 
 men who had no feeling for them, and who could, of 
 course, communicate no feeling to you. A^irgil was 
 as impersonal as the authors of the Scandinavian 
 Saga, as wanting in individuality as Ossian, or more 
 so. There was as wide a difference between their 
 treatment of the writers of antiquity as there is 
 between the Life of Virgil by Donatus the gram- 
 marian and the hife of Horace by Sir Theodore
 
 48 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Martin ; the present writer printed many years ago 
 a paper breathing the modern spirit on Homer's 
 Odyssey. 
 
 Robinson, an old Merchant Taylors' boy, and 
 Vicar of Upper Hackney, once shewed me his 
 Fasti of the school, where I stood accredited with 
 a single wholly insignificant book of mine. He was 
 surprised to hear that I had done any more or any 
 better, which was not unreasonable, as his other 
 schoolfellows' biographies were unleavened by any 
 such matters. Yet it struck me as a piece of ridicu- 
 lous ignorance on the part of the compiler of such a 
 work, especially as a proper account could have done 
 no harm to an institution so poverty-stricken in dis- 
 tinguished pupils, although it might have told per- 
 sons of decent culture what they already knew. 
 This Robinson was the same intelligent individual 
 who, when I once met him in later life, remarked 
 that I did not look so young as when we were at 
 school together. Did he 1 
 
 In the printed account of the Merchant Taylors' 
 Company there is some difficulty about a piece of 
 land which was left to the Gild in trust, and I 
 mentioned to the Clerk one day, in much later 
 life, when I had been dining with the Company, 
 that I thought I knew where it was. "Where?" 
 he asked. " Why, your Hall stands upon it," was 
 my reply.
 
 IV 
 
 THE WAR OFFICE. DRIFT TOWARD 
 LITERATURE 
 
 I CONFESS that I look back without pleasure at 
 the two years which I passed during the Crimean 
 War in the AVar Department about 1854, and a few 
 years after quitting school. The late Sir Robert 
 Hamilton and I were both supernumeraries, and 
 both failed to pass the examination for the per- 
 manent staff. AVhen it was a question of the 
 examination my father, who through his uncle 
 Stoddart knew Sir Benjamin Hawes, then Under- 
 Secretary for War, spoke to him about the matter. 
 Hawes did not think highly of the principle, and 
 assured my father that if he himself had been sub- 
 jected to it he should certainly have been ploughed. 
 Under some forgotten circumstances I called on 
 one of the Civil Service Commissioners, Sir Edward 
 Ryan, and his delightful affability to an obscure 
 youth I shall never forget. Hamilton and myself 
 were the only two who succeeded in our several 
 ways in emerging from that slough, or rising above 
 the ordinary dead-level of official routine. 
 
 He constantly came down to my father's house 
 at Brompton to dinner " when we were clerks to- 
 gether," and was not sorry to have the opportunity ; 
 but I lost sight of him when, by the assiduous sup- 
 port of Sir Charles Trevelyan (his father's distant 
 connection by marriage), he succeeded in outstripping 
 me, so far as official status went. His abilities were
 
 50 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 not of a liigh order. He was a canny Scot to the 
 backbone. He had not an atom of sentiment or in- 
 tellectual insioht, or gratitude for benefits received. 
 He was a simple functionary with influential backers, 
 and (as I understood) a specialist in accounts, though, 
 when he was sent to the Admiralty to restore order 
 in that direction, I heard that he left matters rather 
 worse than he found them. He inculcated on me 
 the excellent maxim that you should never put 
 out your foot farther than you could draw it back 
 again. 
 
 He was a son of the Rev. Zachary Macaulay 
 Hamilton, a relative of the historian, and incumbent 
 of a parish in Shetland not far from Lerwick, where 
 part of his income was derived from a tithe of 
 herring. It was through Macaulay and his sister, 
 who married Trevelyan, that my fellow-clerk was en- 
 abled to profit by natural intelligence and industry. 
 An extremely intimate friend of Hamilton was 
 Charles Ogilvy of Lerwick, who is, however, not 
 otherwise memorable than as the victim of a strange 
 corruption of his name by a correspondent into 
 Huckleford. An old acquaintance of my uncle 
 Reynell, a Mr. Hicks, was transformed in a similar 
 way into Ix. The youthful son of an acquaintance 
 adopted the Oriental method of spelling, when he 
 described an ox on paper as xo. I projected a visit 
 to Shetland, Hamilton's father having invited me 
 to stay with him, and Ogilvy's sister Charlotte 
 accompanied me. She was much my senior, but 
 her manners were very pleasing, and I cannot get 
 rid of the sensation of her head resting on my 
 shoulder in the night train to Edinburgh. My 
 father said of her that she danced like a fairy. I 
 returned with Hamilton by water, and we nearly 
 undid the steward by compounding for our meals 
 on board.
 
 THE WAR OFFICE 51 
 
 The Crimean War found Hamilton and myself 
 a little behind the scenes. I had acted during a 
 short time before as editor of the evening edition 
 of the Daily News, where my successor was the late 
 Sir John Robinson. It was certainly not a very 
 creditable campaign from beginning to end, what- 
 ever the general reader or critic, looking back after 
 all tliese years, may tliink of it. I was in two or 
 tlu-ee departments, and Hamilton visited the Crimea, 
 as did my own brother ; and we all heard more than 
 enouijli of the shameful abuses and blunders in the 
 commissariat, clothing, medical, and other services, of 
 the positive dearth of food among the troops,^ of the 
 shoddy arms and accoutrements, the brown-paper 
 boots, the useless swords and bayonets, and the 
 surgeons sent in one direction, and their drugs and 
 appliances in another. In one transport tlie medical 
 requisites were stored underneath bomb-shells, which 
 crushed and spoiled them. Then, when we had every- 
 thing in order, because the French could not proceed, 
 we abandoned the business, and let Russia restore 
 Sebastopol. What we did achieve was by pluck 
 and muscle ; our Generals were deplorable. The 
 part played by His Royal Highness, the then Com- 
 mander-in-Chief, is familiar. 
 
 We have since done the same kind of thing over 
 again, even more than once. It asks time before 
 we are thoroughly in working order. We want 
 plenty of time to look round. If we were as great 
 as a Government as we are as a people, and were 
 not the playthings of rogues and fools, we should 
 be strong, and we might be indeed proud. 
 
 As matters now go, I most earnestly trust that 
 our foreign friends will find on closer inquiry that 
 behind the British Crown and Government there is 
 
 ^ An aged artilleryman, who went out there, emphatically said to me, 
 "We were starved, sir."
 
 52 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 such a thing as the Nation, which pays for both, and 
 gets very poor results. AVhen I look at successive 
 British Governments since my youth (including that 
 egregious one now in power) I am reminded of the 
 rebuke administered by Pope Julius II., 400 years 
 ago, to the representatives of the European Powers 
 at the Vatican : " Vui siete tutti ribaldi (You are all 
 rascals)." 
 
 I am not, however, without some mixed reminis- 
 cences of my association with that establishment. 
 One of the most genial and conciliatory personages 
 with wliom I was brought into contact was Gleig, 
 the Chaplain-General, who was at Waterloo, and 
 who lived to a patriarchal age (ninety-four, I believe) ; 
 and one of the most distasteful, the Right Honour- 
 able Sir Frederic Peel, about whom I committed to 
 writing an official minute, for which, looking back, 
 I feel surprised that I was not cashiered, inasmuch 
 as, I gave the Under-Secretary of State the lie direct. 
 There was a cousin of Hannay the writer ; two brothers 
 of AVilliams of Kars, very charming fellows ; William 
 Ord Marshall, a most urbane gentleman ; and Henry 
 Driver, subsequently Sir Henry Delabere, whose 
 amiable manners I vividly recall. The sole literary 
 gain which I derived from my two years' stay was, 
 however, the light thrown by jMr. Leslie on the 
 history of my grandfather's second wife. I lament 
 that it was not a stronger one.^ I remember a 
 late ]\Iarquis of Clanricarde coming to AVhitehall 
 Place in the summer season in a pair of trousers 
 which I took it that his lordship had purchased from 
 a necessitous Etliiopian minstrel ; and I had a very 
 agreeable chat one day with the JNIarquis of West- 
 minster, a man concerning whom all sorts of odd 
 contradictory stories used to circulate. i3ut I have 
 heard several to his credit. His son was a person of 
 
 ^ The Ilazlitts, 1911, pp. 251, 259.
 
 THE WAR OFFICE 53 
 
 strangely plebeian aspect, of whom no one, I believe, 
 had much good to report. 
 
 Of my colleagues many were grossly ignorant ; 
 hardly one possessed a notable degree of gentlemanly 
 culture save Talboys AVheeler, who published the 
 monograph on Herodotus. The reply to a letter 
 from a noble Duke was addressed by one of these 
 elegant creatures to Messrs. Buckingham and 
 Chandos, but it was luckily intercepted. Another, 
 wliom I take to have been a sheer blackguard, was 
 fond of applying to clergymen the (I think) un- 
 glossed designation of Gluepots. 
 
 There was, by the way, a very decent fellow 
 named Hodgson, whose entire literary capital was 
 a story, which he narrated to me, of the then 
 Princess Mary of Cambridge. He made out that 
 her royal highness and himself once crossed Picca- 
 dilly from opposite sides at the same spot and 
 moment, and that she fell into his arms. He was 
 a spare little man, and she was, as we know, rather 
 a portly lady. As George Stephenson said about the 
 train and the cow, I would be sorry for Hodgson. 
 
 If I had pursued my official career, I might be 
 at present a richer and more dignified member of 
 society, but I should not be writing these Memorials, 
 nor should I have been a sufficiently free agent to 
 have elaborated a book ten times more important 
 in my estimation, Man Considered in Relation to 
 God and a Church, which I am trying to bring 
 under public notice regardless of cost. 
 
 When Hamilton was Under-Secretary for Ireland, 
 I roughly formulated a scheme for the settlement of 
 that unhappy country, and it may be known to a 
 few that in 188G, in a pamphlet, which was mainly 
 a criticism on Gladstone's policy at home and abroad, 
 I pointed out what had struck me as being the weak 
 points in his management of Irish affairs.
 
 54 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 But in my plan T entered a little farther into 
 detail, and set forth what appeared to me at that 
 time the only method of vindicating public order, 
 and protecting the peaceable portion of the com- 
 munity in that part of the Empire. I scarcely see 
 ground for hoping that without a stronger element of 
 militarism any plans for the gradual social and moral 
 amelioration of the country are likely to succeed. 
 
 Militarism, however, can never be more than a 
 temporary expedient. The soldier is the worst of 
 rulers. But he may prepare the way, or restore 
 order. In a State no undue preponderance is con- 
 sistent witii welfare. If the sovereign is too strong, 
 he is a tyrant ; if he is too weak, he suffers his 
 agents to tyrannize, of which the Asquith INlinistry 
 is an apt illustration. Where the community is too 
 strong or too free, anarchy ensues from jealousy 
 and emulation, and the result is an oligarchy or a 
 despotism. Authority and influence must be nicely 
 and permanently balanced. Even the best of princes 
 is all the better for being kept in his or her place. 
 We cannot tell how far Queen \' ictoria might have 
 gone had she had the power, and the same, I fear, is 
 predicable of her son, who was an example of the 
 suaviter in inodo,fortiter in re. Her grandson is at 
 most only tlic former. 
 
 Hamilton told me this story of second-sight : A 
 party of fishermen started one day from Lerwick ; 
 the weather was pretty fair, and their friends were 
 there to see them off. After their departure a storm 
 arose, and great anxiety was felt for the absent boat. 
 The relatives came down to the shore to make 
 inquiries and to watch, but nothing was heard of 
 it, till one of the look-out group (so ran the tale) 
 descried the craft nearing land, saw it touch the 
 ground, and tlie inmates file out one by one, and 
 proceed to their homes in the town. But the boat
 
 THE WAR OFFICE 55 
 
 had really been wrecked, and all hands lost, and 
 some of the bodies were subsequently washed ashore. 
 
 H. was, as I have implied, profoundly illiterate. 
 I once offended him at the War Office by referring 
 to a Scot as a Sawny, and had to explain to him 
 that Saxvny was merely an abbreviated form of 
 Alexande7\ He shrewdly remarked that of whatever 
 you hear you may believe half, after dividing it again 
 by two. 
 
 A version of 7Vie Months from the French of 
 Garcin de Tassy, printed in Cluunhers s Journal for 
 December 10, 185o, was, so far as my memory goes,. 
 my first independent literary effort (for I had already 
 begun to assist my father in some of his literary 
 labours), and brought me the apparently extravagant 
 sum of fifty shillings. I certainly did not look for 
 so much money ; but it was a form of surprise and 
 oppi'ession of which in later life I have not been 
 troubled by too frequent experience. 
 
 Before Smith and Elder started their Dictionary 
 of National Biography, Murray projected a similar 
 undertaking under the inevitable William Smith, 
 with my erudite acquaintance Thompson Cooper 
 as sub-editor. The latter was a capable man. He 
 set me to compile certain lives, and the manuscript 
 was duly delivered. After a lapse of time I wrote 
 to Smith, and suggested a settlement. He asked 
 me to wait till the book was printed. 1 might have 
 waited till the proverbial Greek Calends. The work 
 was abandoned. Of course Albemarle Street paid 
 the score. 
 
 My interest in the historical antiquities of Venice 
 arose, I remember, from reading Smedley's Sketches 
 from Venetian History, and I flattered myself that 
 something more worthy of the subject miglit be the 
 result of my own labours, more especially when I 
 was apprised that the large French work by Count
 
 50 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Daru was far from satisfactory. This was in 1853, 
 when I was a youth of nineteen ; my opportunities 
 of consulting books were rather limited, and my 
 ftithers circumstances rendered it at that time out 
 of the question to purchase any ; but my parents, 
 on their return from a visit to Paris in 1855, brought 
 me a copy of Galibert's Histoire de Venise, 1847, 
 which was many degrees, at all events, in advance 
 of Smedley. I succeeded, however, in procuring a 
 reading ticket for the British Museum, and we had 
 a subscription to the London Library. At a distance 
 of nearly sixty years from that date, when we were 
 residing in Chelsea, I am still keenly looking out for 
 every fresh point illustrative of that subject ; in a 
 periodical I printed separate papers from time to time 
 illustrative of \'enetian Architecture, Trade, Coinage, 
 Prison Discipline, and other points, and in 1900 I 
 reproduced the book in a different form from the 
 edition of 1800, which was only too indulgently 
 received. But it was the work of a young man of 
 five-and-t^venty. I have now decided to send to 
 press at an early date a text which represents the com- 
 pletion of a fifty years' labour on this theme, and far 
 more fully deals with the institutions of the Republic. 
 AVhile I was planning my history, I wrote a 
 deferential letter to Ruskin, soliciting his advice 
 regarding method and autliorities, and that wayward 
 philanthropist did me the honour to leave my appeal 
 unanswered. ^Vhen the first crude edition appeared 
 in 1858 (I was only twenty-three), my father sent a 
 copy to Macaulay, who replied in a most kind note, 
 saying all that he could say — that the work did credit 
 to so young a writer. My unreasoning objection to 
 write in my books led to my father putting an inscrip- 
 tion in the copy sent to Macaulay, and after his death 
 it was offered by a bookseller as a presentation one 
 with the autlior's autograph. I have always thought
 
 THE WAR OFFICE 57 
 
 that in Raskin's literary vein was to be detected a 
 trace of his physical conditions, which so potently 
 operated on his life. 
 
 AVhen I was at Venice in 1883, I visited the 
 Library of St. Mark, and asked the custodian 
 whether he could shew me any interesting manu- 
 scripts or otlier archives relating to the old Republic. 
 He went away, and when he returned he bore in his 
 hands a copy of my own book on the subject. I sup- 
 pose that he thought it the only one which I was 
 likely to understand. It is more to the point that 
 my short stay led to the formation of my acquaint- 
 ance, now of over twenty years' standing, with 
 Count Nicolo Papadopoli, the ardent and distin- 
 guished Venetian numismatist. 
 
 A fellow-traveller and myself were one day 
 strolling about the Piazzetta, and we noticed a 
 couple of women, who might have stepped out of 
 some cinquecento canvas, and presently a gondolier 
 (perhaps in league with them) made signs to us, 
 and called out : " Comandare, signori ? " He saw 
 that we were not keen upon his boat, and he 
 added, as an inducement, in another tongue : " Avec 
 mesdames ? "
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON SIXTY 
 YEARS SINCE 
 
 I NOAV propose to devote some space to a description 
 of the suburban districts in which we as a family, 
 and I as the founder of an independent home in the 
 usual course of events, resided and moved between 
 1838 and 1909, taking occasion to intersperse the 
 topographical sketch with particulars of such friends 
 and acquaintances as we were fortunate enough to 
 acquire within this radius, and especially in Old 
 Brompton from time to time, and of others of whom 
 our knowledge was more indirect, yet sufficiently 
 considerable to justify a passing mention. There 
 are many names, which I cherish and value, as there 
 are places and spots, both in my own country and 
 abroad, which reappear at my bidding in their full 
 and true solidity. 
 
 The westward route from Sloane Street — as at 
 one time, indeed, from Hyde Park Corner — lay 
 about three-quarters of a century since between 
 garden-houses, only broken occasionally by stretches 
 of dead wall appertaining to the Park or some 
 ancient mansion, by lines of fencing where a nursery 
 abutted on tlie road, or by the boundary hedge of 
 a market-garden. The undulating and uneven sur- 
 face betrayed the absence of a Highway Board 
 for the parish ; and the variations in the elevation 
 and width of the footpaths were traceable to changes 
 in the character of the buildings adjoining. 
 
 53
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 59 
 
 If there were such a thing as a plan of Old 
 Brompton and the environs as they appeared many 
 hundreds of years ago, it would present to our view 
 an open and probably uncultivated tract, abounding 
 in wood and morass, and intersected by streams 
 flowing from the northern heights of Hampstead, 
 Highgate, and HoUoway. Within living memory 
 a few of these water-courses still existed, while 
 others had dwindled into ditches, or, as in the case 
 of the Efra, which flowed into the Thames at 
 Vauxhall, and was navigable by small craft up to 
 Brixton or farther, had been converted into an 
 underground sewer, except where a portion may 
 be yet seen dammed up at the Lawn. Queen 
 Elizabeth is said to have ascended the Efra in 
 her barge, possibly on a visit to one of her court 
 at Kennington or Brixton. Two other streams 
 connected with the Efra were the Neckinger and 
 the Tygris, of the latter of wdiich the site was 
 not ascertained till 1910. 
 
 There are probably many who have not taken 
 into account the vast changes produced in the course 
 of ages by the creation or improvement of thorough- 
 fares. Modern Paris is said to be 8 feet higher 
 than it was in the days of Philip Augustus. Modern 
 London stands 20 feet above the Roman city. The 
 bulk of the superficial area of all great centres of 
 population and building is made ground, which, as 
 immense bodies of soil or muck are frequently trans- 
 ported from a distance to supply a vacuum where 
 the gravel or sand has been removed, as well as 
 for the purpose of raising the level, is apt to do 
 violence to geological harmony. 
 
 Thus, in the decline of a district from its early 
 speciality of aspect, and its adaptation to a general 
 standard suitable to the requirements of the builder, 
 we find a variety of contributing factors. Some of
 
 60 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 the details are bound to vary according to the level ; 
 but the reforming hand of the enterprising owner or 
 speculator is equal to all emergencies. In low lands 
 the causeway and the shoot play a leading part. 
 They did so in Battersea, where they long emptied 
 the mud-carts day by day, and in Pimlico, where, 
 between Knightsbridge and the river, lay a desolate 
 waste, dotted with ponds, the wreckage of Ebury 
 Farm and the contiguous fields. I used to think 
 that Battersea Fields, with the Red House and other 
 amenities, were not all that could be desired ; yet 
 I would joyfully vote for their restoration instead 
 of the actual scene which they present, with their 
 honeycomb of railw^ay-line and doleful blocks of 
 poverty-stricken houses. 
 
 The hedge, the park-pale, or the buttress wall, 
 gives way to the railing before a terrace or a row 
 of detached or semi-detaclied houses, and these are 
 subsequently degraded into places of business, of 
 which the front gardens make a part. So it has 
 been in Brompton on the A^^est, and in Whitechapel 
 on the East — exactly the same law and same process. 
 
 In parts of Westminster, built on the ancient 
 Thorny Island, they have come, in laying founda- 
 tions, on submerged and buried willows, formerly 
 flourishing on the banks of the water-courses, which 
 branched from the Thames inland, and of which the 
 sole modern vestige is the Long Water in St. James's 
 Park. One of tliese channels passed through Dela- 
 haye Street, a lately demolished thoroughfare named 
 after Pierre de la Haye, Chief Confectioner to 
 Charles II., who died in 1G84, and is buried at 
 Mickleham. He had two houses here, of which 
 one went to the St. Aubyns with his coheiress ; the 
 other formerly belonged to a personal acquaintance 
 of the writer, and it was in rebuilding the premises 
 about 1840 that the original nature of the soil, and
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 61 
 
 the strangely altered conditions of the scene, were 
 brought to light. 
 
 The site of the southern extremity of Delahaye 
 Street, where Royal Charles's head-pastrycook lived, 
 was once designated Long Ditch, the original stream 
 having degenerated in the usual manner. But the 
 levels hereabout must have suffered a remarkable 
 change, and nearly the whole of the ground, as it 
 now stands, is doubtless artificial. It was two cen- 
 turies ago several feet lower — in a line with the 
 Stuart willow-beds. So, again, in the City proper 
 the Wallbrook once flowed through the moor, now 
 only known by tradition, but originally stretching at 
 least as far as the site of the Bank of England. 
 On removinsr an old house in Coleman Street in 
 189G, the peaty bottom was reached, with its Roman 
 remains. 
 
 The brook degenerates into a ditch, the latter into 
 a sewer, as the builder spreads his ravages. The old 
 maps do not assist us much in tracing the waterways 
 of this particular tract. There were at least two, 
 of which one, the most westerly, flowed through 
 Brompton Vale across the fields and the Fulham 
 Road, before it was constructed as a highway, and 
 so through Chelsea to the Thames. A second tra- 
 versed Hyde Park and Knightsbridge. The latter 
 my uncle Reynell remembered before it was trans- 
 formed into a covered drain, and when the stream 
 was skirted on the northern side by old wooden 
 tenements. Some of the portion which flowed 
 through Hyde Park has been filled up within my 
 time. 
 
 The environs of London on all sides were formerly 
 rich in roadside inns, of which the custom was derived 
 in principal measure from the waggoners, carriers, 
 and stage-coaches which plied between tlie JNIetro- 
 polis and the provinces. The carriers and coaches
 
 62 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 liad regular days for going and returning to London, 
 AVestminster, and Southwark, and small penny and 
 twopenny handbooks were published from time to 
 time to enable travellers, or persons desirous of 
 transmitting parcels and messages, to keep them- 
 selves informed of the times of arrival and departure 
 on the various routes. It once took our family 
 a week to reach Wales or Cornwall. I see that in 
 1641 from four to six days were required for a 
 dispatch from Sir Edward Nicholas at Westminster 
 or at Thorpe to reach Charles I. at Edinburgh. 
 
 Anterior to omnibuses and railways, the transport 
 service was, in fact, performed by coaches, waggons, 
 and carts ; the two latter were employed not only 
 by the lower, but by the middle class, and such a 
 man as Shakespear, when even the coach was un- 
 known, must have journeyed to and from Stratford 
 in a waggoner's or carrier's conveyance, or on horse- 
 back. The supply of fish to inland towns within a 
 measurable time was by cart or van from the nearest 
 port. The local dealer kept a vehicle constantly on 
 the road, and had to arrange for relays of horses. 
 
 Folks whose traditions happen to be associated 
 with the AVest End may not have heard, as a rule, 
 of any halting-stages or starting-points less central 
 than the AVhite Horse Cellar (whence my grand- 
 father set out for Winterslow Hut, and on a special 
 occasion on his way to see the Fight), or the houses 
 in Coventry Street and Holborn, where the Old 
 Bell long survived. But about Bishopsgate and in 
 the Borough this feature in everyday life, prior to 
 railways and other modern appliances, was seen in 
 its fullest vigour and picturesqueness, and the atten- 
 dant costliness and loss of time would under present 
 mercantile and social conditions be out of the ques- 
 tion. Scott, the City Chamberlain, who died at 
 eighty-nine, and had known personally sixty Lord
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 63 
 
 Mayors, paid half a crown, when he became rich 
 enougli to afford it, for his fare part of the journey 
 from Hampstead to the City, in what he described 
 to me as '* a blue-beUied " coach. When the omnibus 
 began to compete with the coach, the fare was usually 
 and long one shilling. 
 
 Piccadilly, \Vestminster, Holborn, Bishopsgate, 
 Islington, and the Borough, we see, were the points 
 of departure and arriv^al for the mails, and a little 
 later on came the long-distance omnibus, starting 
 from some of these centres. Judging from the 
 number of coaches (about sixteen) which left Picca- 
 dilly, the Angel at Islington, and elsewhere, daily, 
 there must have been a large complement altogether ; 
 and there were also the mail-carts and post-chaises, 
 the latter with the boy-outrider. This illustrates 
 Dunton's periodical, 1692, entitled JVie Post-boy 
 robbed of his Mail. One prime feature in the coach 
 was the guard, with his blunderbuss and pistols, 
 which were so carefully wrapped up against the 
 weather that a highwayman might have scuttled the 
 conveyance before they could be disengaged. 
 
 The Piccadilly coaches chiefly took the Great 
 Western Road on their way to Oxford, AVorcester, 
 Salisbury, Devizes, and elsewhere ; but one crossed 
 the old wooden bridge at Putney en route for Ports- 
 mouth. The northern, eastern, and southern counties 
 were served from Islington, Aldersgate (the Saracen's 
 Head), Bishopsgate, Westminster, and South wark. 
 In my earlier days, the omnibus which used to take 
 Charles Lamb and his friends to and from Edmonton 
 still started regularly from the Flower-Pot at Bishops- 
 gate, an inn demolished about 1866. I never went 
 by it farther than Tottenham. A second ran be- 
 tween the Bell in Holborn and Wendover; and a 
 tedious journey it was. You had earned more than 
 the five shillings, when you alighted, if it was in the
 
 64 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 winter, after nightfall ; and the driver looked for 
 largesse. It appears from a small volume printed 
 in 1829 that a stage, as it is called, started from 
 Bartholomew Lane, City, and conveyed passengers 
 to Putney, l^arnes, I^rentford, and other points. No 
 farther details are furnished.^ 
 
 Places which now constitute part of our great 
 city were till a comparatively recent date distinct 
 hamlets. Hounslow, Turnham Green, Brentford, and 
 even Kensington and Old Brompton, were rendered 
 independent of the capital by wide stretches of open 
 ground and impracticable roads — the latter such as 
 are pictured by JMacaulay in his History of England, 
 and by many travellers and diarists of the eighteenth 
 century. Yet within my time and recollection many 
 of these outskirts were delightful homes and resorts, 
 and to a modern eye fabulously rural and solitary. 
 Those who have only known the western approach 
 to London since 1850 must be strangers to what it 
 was when I was a boy. INIy mother, who was born 
 in 1804, remembers that when she was a child, and 
 lived in her father's house in Craven Place, Black 
 Lion T^ane, Bayswater, there were no buildings be- 
 tween til em and Harrow ; and in her Memoir of her 
 father, Vincent Novello, 1862, Mrs. Cowden Clarke 
 mentions his removal with his family to Craven Hill, 
 while that neigh})ourhood still retained its primitive 
 simplicity and consisted of small detached dwellings, 
 with gardens. The Oxford Road, as it was called, 
 was so desolate in Hazlitt's day that he was afraid to 
 traverse it by night. When he walked to the Reynells', 
 he became at last so alarmed by the reports which 
 reached his ears that he purchased a brace of pistols, 
 which his son used to carry, till, growing more afraid of 
 the weapons than of tlie footpads, he discarded them. 
 
 * Pcrmnal Narrative of a Journeii Overland from the Bank to Barnes : 
 12mo, 1829. Attributed to Theodore Hook.
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON G5 
 
 Within my personal recollection what is Lan- 
 caster Gate was a meadow with a hedge to the high- 
 way. Between this meadow and Porchester Terrace 
 was a tea-garden. The property hereabout included 
 the Bread and Cheese land left to Paddington parish 
 by maiden ladies for the periodical distribution of 
 relief from the church-steeple. It was after my settle- 
 ment in Addison Road, Kensington, in 1862, that 
 those sweeping changes occurred, which thoroughly 
 demoralized the neighbourhood and drove me to 
 Barnes. Like General Boone, who hunted up to 
 ninety, 1 retreat before civilization. I feel that I 
 have been long hovering between dignified repose 
 and the Fuga Sceculi. 
 
 Notting Hill, properly Nutting Hill, is at present 
 beyond redemption. I recollect it a very pleasant 
 countrified locality, surrounded on the north and 
 west by fields. I have walked with the Warnes from 
 Clarendon Road, even after that was built, the whole 
 way to Hampstead with very few houses, and those 
 scattered about, between. To the north of Notting 
 Hill behind Norland Square there yet survived some 
 very old-fashioned cottages fronted by long narrow 
 gardens, and the latter may have formed part of the 
 original Notting Dale, which at present exists only 
 in name. The entire vicinity, when I lived at Ken- 
 sington, had become sordid and disreputable, and part 
 of it was known as the Potteries. Notting Barns, 
 which was a farm lying between Notting Hill and 
 Campden Hill, still survives in a small patch of open 
 ground near Bute House and in Farm Street, which 
 is just where the turnpike gate stood. You go down 
 from the main thoroughfare in entering Farm Street, 
 probably because the highroad has been much raised. 
 The causeway throughout this region seems to have 
 generally preceded the regular road and footpath, 
 as it must have long done elsewhere; and hence, I 
 
 E
 
 66 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 presume, comes the French expression rez-de-cliaussee 
 for the orround-rioor. 
 
 I liave mentioned that the environs of London on 
 this side were down even to 1850 very lonely and 
 insecure, and that both the liighwayman and footpad 
 formerly infested the whole tract of country now 
 almost completely covered by houses and protected 
 by well-lighted thoroughfares and police. In the 
 Kensington highroad, just beyond Knightsbridge 
 Barracks, I recall a queer old hostelry with the back 
 looking to the Park, and I have always understood 
 that this was a regular haunt of the knights of the 
 post, who, if pursued into the premises, escaped at 
 the rear into the large open space behind, and so got 
 away from the not very dexterous or alert guardians 
 of public safety and order. A second lay at the 
 junction of the Fulham Road and Bell and Horns 
 Lane, and a third formed part of a short row of very 
 antique shops on the northern side of the Fulham 
 Road, opposite Stewart's Grove. In the Fulham 
 Fields there was a very quaint halting-place of this 
 kind ; it was on the riglit-hand going toward Ham- 
 mersmith Broadway. It was known as the Grey- 
 hound, and was a noted haunt of highwaymen ; and 
 tlie site of Holcrofts in the village itself was originally 
 occupied by a similar establishment, before it was 
 transformed into a private mansion — the usual pro- 
 cess inverted. 
 
 The oldest house at Walham Green was the 
 King's Head, previously known as the Hare and 
 Hounds, and dating from 1680; and at Putney the 
 Fox and Hounds was said in 1800 to have been 
 established above »300 years, and had probably at the 
 outset an extensive view in the rear. 
 
 There were waggon-houses of a similar type, no 
 doubt, on those sides of the city with which I was 
 less famihar. Three yet lingered in modern times :
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 07 
 
 two on the Uxbridge and one on the Oxford Road. 
 Of the former, one lay at the corner of Wood Lane, 
 facing Shepherd's Bush ; the other, not far from 
 Kew Bridge, was a halting-place for George III. on 
 his way to Windsor. A few may call to mind how at 
 Bayswater, opposite the Park, not far from I^ancaster 
 Gate, survived an ancient structure of the same class 
 seeming to have no relationship to the scene around it. 
 
 The changes in the route from the Metropolis to 
 the north have been, ever since the last century, 
 equally immense. The road to Barnet used to be 
 straight down Gray's Inn Lane, till it was diverted 
 through the Bishop of London's park at Paddington. 
 The gate which gave its name to Highgate was 
 placed to collect the Bishop's tolls. I personally 
 spoke at the Holborn end of Gray's Inn Lane to a 
 well-known artist more than fifty years since, who 
 remembered a haystack where King's Cross station 
 now is. 
 
 The scattered markets, which formerly lay at 
 intervals over all this area, possess greater signifi- 
 cance than may at first sight appear. They were the 
 sole depots for the convenience of the householder 
 when all the small neighbourhoods about the west 
 and other parts of the Metropolis were yet detached 
 villages, with oases of meadow or demesne between 
 them. I may mention Oxford Market, Newport 
 Market, Clare Market, Carnaby Market, Shepherd's 
 Market (at the foot of Down Street, Piccadilly), 
 Chelsea Market, and the one which used to be at 
 Knightsbridge, or rather on the w^estern side of 
 Sloane Street, near the remains of Knightsbridge 
 Green. There was another on the north side of 
 Lincoln's Inn Fields. 
 
 My maternal grandfather Reynell, who was born 
 in 1777, remembered Sloane Street, which w^as laid 
 out or planned in 1780, partly in carcase, and his son
 
 68 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 (my uncle) has fished for sticklebacks in the ponds 
 about the Five Fields, Pimlico — the area between 
 Sloane Square and St. Peter's Church. Cattle used 
 to graze on the site of Belgrave Square within living 
 memory, and my informant recollected the erection 
 of the Square railing. 
 
 Tn a view of St. George's Hospital (the old Lanes- 
 borough House) as it was in 1746, the locality is 
 perfectly open, and the building isolated. It is 
 almost equally so in another, which occurs in 
 Knight's London, 1841. 
 
 We have all heard of the sport enjoyed by General 
 Oglethorpe in the time of Queen Anne, where 
 Regent Street now is, and snipe were also shot in 
 Tuthill Fields behind Bird Cage Walk. The old 
 door belonging to the barracks, from which some 
 of the officers sallied in pursuit of their game, was 
 formerly preserved in situ; but snipe were also to 
 be found in the osier-beds and the Willow Walk 
 at Pimlico, near the present Warwick Square and 
 Street. Tuthill Fields in their integrity represented 
 the second state of the Forest of Tuthill or Tottel, 
 which included Thorney Island. Under the earlier 
 Stuarts market-gardens appear to have occupied part 
 of tliis area. Howell, in one of his Letters, announces 
 his transmission to a York friend of Tuthill-Field 
 melons. It is said that in a lease held by a wine 
 merchant in Regent Street he is debarred from 
 shooting wild birds there. 
 
 London in allusion to its numerous turnpikes, 
 gained the Theban sobriquet of the Hundred-gated. 
 There was a parallel series on all the main roads. 
 From the Piccadilly side, the first was at Clarges 
 Street, Piccadilly,' and was transferred in 1721 to Hyde 
 
 ^ See a letter of Nelson to Lady Hamilton, whose husband was then 
 residing at No. 23 Piccadilly, Aug. 20, 1B0;3, where he refers to Piccadilly 
 Gates for tlie house at Merton, apparently on the model of those at 
 Hamilton's.
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 69 
 
 Park Corner, with the weighing apparatus a little 
 lower down for the heavier traffic. This bar was 
 successively set back to Sloane Street (1825) and the 
 Queen's Elm, before which within living memory the 
 actual tree spread its branches and its shadow, lend- 
 ing its name equally to the terrace opposite, which 
 dates from about 1822, when Mayers the })aker 
 built his premises at the corner of what was long 
 known as Elm Terrace. The general structure on 
 the northern side from the church to the end of 
 Brompton Row has undergone vital alteration, 
 including the removal of the gardens and the en- 
 largement of frontages ; but opposite the entire 
 aspect is changed for better or for worse. These 
 suburban gates were long farmed by Jonas Levi, 
 whose name was to be found upon them, and who 
 was recollected by Mayers aforesaid coming periodi- 
 cally down to inspect his property. The speculation 
 must have succeeded, for Levi lived in good style at 
 Kingsgate Castle, near Broadstairs. He was a large 
 shareholder in the Brighton Railway. My father 
 dealt with Mayers during a long series of years. 
 The old man lived to a very advanced age. He 
 made a lightly baked and pale-coloured breakfast-roll, 
 called a turn-over, of semi-circular shape, which I 
 have never seen since. 
 
 The King's and Queen's Roads were what were 
 known as the King's private roads, for which special 
 passes were required. 1 have two before me, dated 
 1731 and 1737, with G. R. on obverse and The King's 
 Private Roads on reverse. These vouchers probably 
 served for other routes closed to the general public. 
 The latter was a virtual cul-de-sac at both ends till 
 it was opened up by the modern builder and the 
 removal of the barrier at Chelsea Hospital, and even 
 now it is not a main artery. Within the writer's 
 memory the King's Road was far quieter and less built
 
 70 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 in than now. When we hved at Church Street, 
 two women came early one morning in a cab quite 
 naked, and ran a race down the road to a certain 
 point for a wager, starting from Smith Street. 
 
 The gate at Hyde Park Corner was exactly 
 parallel with the one at Tyburn, near the Marble 
 Arch; it was removed in 1829. On a blue earthen- 
 ware cheese-plate belonging to the commencement 
 of the last century is painted a view of Tyburn turn- 
 pike, with all the country towards Bayswater and 
 Edgeware open.
 
 VI 
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON SIXTY 
 YEARS SINCE {continued) 
 
 In 1840 there were very few shops in the Brompton 
 Road between Sloane Street and the Bell and Horns, 
 nor again between tliat and the Queen's Elm. 
 
 The original village of Knightsbridge extended 
 in a broken and irregular manner or form from the 
 western corner of Sloane Street (then unknown) 
 to the end of Queen's Buildings. There were at 
 the outset no houses on the southern side till you 
 passed Sloane Street, nor on the northern till you 
 reached the village of Brompton. Even now the 
 peculiar levels shew that the primitive road (in- 
 cluding the pathway) has undergone repeated altera- 
 tions.^ Of the mediaeval Knightsbridge mentioned 
 in records of the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth 
 centuries, probably not a vestige remains ; and the 
 made ground here, as well as at Brompton Row, 
 was found necessary to lift the residences, which 
 were gradually erected, above the uncared-for and 
 sometimes almost impassable coach and cart track. 
 The place derived its name from the bridge which 
 (above the modern Albert Gate) spanned the stream 
 running from the North of London across Hyde 
 Park and Pimlico to its outlet into the Thames 
 opposite Vauxhall. This structure in some shape 
 was of very great antiquity. It was the theatre 
 of an adventure narrated in the Hundred Merry 
 
 1 See History of Sign Boards, 1866, p. 169. 
 71
 
 72 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Tales, 152C, but one by no means merry in its 
 denouement. We hear in 1371 — 525 years ago — of 
 Knightsbridge as a hamlet, to which tlie Butchers' 
 Gild was permitted to send cattle for slaughtering 
 purposes. A second principal abattoir was Stratford- 
 le-Bow. 
 
 Plantagenet Knightsbridge presumably consisted 
 of a single row of tenements, first on the northern 
 side by the old bridge, and then (after an interval) 
 of others on the southern side, where Queen's Build- 
 ings at present stand, the former facing the fields 
 toward the river, where Ebury Farm subsequently 
 extended, and having at the back an enormous sandy 
 area, now partly represented by Hyde Park, the 
 latter facing an open heath, successively reduced to 
 a great and a triangular grass-plot, and looking 
 behind, till the eighteenth century was far advanced, 
 on a wide expanse of waste. I have understood 
 that there was no regular grass-land in the Park 
 till George III. caused parts to be sown with seed 
 as a relief to his eyes when he began to suffer from 
 ophthalmia. There used to lie in the rear of Shout 
 the goldsmith's former premises toward Sloane Street 
 a nest of curious antique hovels, which might have 
 been a detached part, in their first state, of the 
 primaeval hamlet. They were reached by a court, 
 possibly once a lane. A view of these occurs in 
 Davies's K night Hbridge, 1859. 
 
 On the once waste plot between the present 
 Knigiitsbridge Green and Sloane Street stood the 
 watch-house for the district, and a friend remembers 
 peeping in at the window one day when he was 
 a boy, and seeing the body of a woman just re- 
 covered from the Serpentine lying for identification. 
 The ordinary use of these places was as a lock-up 
 for pickpockets and other nocturnal offenders, till 
 they were taken before the magistrate.
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 73 
 
 Knightsbridge Green must have been in its second 
 state, so to speak — that is, subsequently to the 
 creation of Ih'ompton Row and Queen's Buildings — 
 of much greater extent than I can recollect it. It 
 appears to have fallen a gradual prey to encroach- 
 ment by private persons and the Highway l^oard ; 
 but it is easy to recognise that the whole tract 
 was at the outset waste of the ISIanor of St. Mary 
 Abbots, Kensington, and came down in a fork to 
 the point where Sloane Street at present opens into 
 Knightsbridge. 
 
 In or before 1705 I see that John Marsh set up 
 in this outskirt a manufactory of inversable carriages 
 of all descriptions, from a curricle to a caravan, and 
 in the above-mentioned year he printed an account 
 of his invention with illustrations in a folio volume 
 now of extreme scarcity. It purports to be on sale 
 only at the Inventor's JNIanufactory, Knightsbridge, 
 facing the New Barracks. 
 
 Queen's Buildings, which face the Green, were 
 originally private residences, with small plots of 
 pleasure-ground divided from them by the footway 
 exactly as the case was in Brompton Row; and these 
 spaces were gradually absorbed into the thorough- 
 fare, one or two at the western extremity being the 
 last to disappear. At the opposite corner, where 
 the ground began to recover the natural level, you 
 formerly descended a short flight of steps to the 
 first shop. Here, in fact, the country at one time 
 recommenced, and all was open in the rear. There 
 is in the Hundred 3Ierry Tales, 1526, an account 
 of a thief making his escape across the fields just 
 at this point. There were down to my time only 
 a few primitive places of business on the southern 
 side, facing Brompton Row, and then private houses 
 standing back in long gardens. That was doubtless 
 the second state of the locality, when it had ceased
 
 74 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 to be a meadow or arable land protected by 
 hedges. 
 
 JNIaiiy of us recall the cavalry barracks in Ken- 
 sington Gardens, near the turnpike at Gloucester 
 Road ; but there were also barracks for the foot- 
 guards on the site of St. Paul's, Knightsbridge, the 
 church standing where the old barrack-yard once was. 
 
 The scene is as different as if we were looking 
 back on occurrences of two centuries ago. The 
 exigencies of traffic, the feverish competition of trade, 
 the seething population springing up around us and 
 choking many healthy forms of the earlier English 
 life, have accomplished the metamorphosis. The 
 region formerly known as Old Brompton was once 
 and long a country village, or little more. The 
 scenes amid which I spent much of my youth now 
 survive only in the mind's eye. The ancient mansions 
 which abounded there, the historical sites or records, 
 the fine residences in grounds, the market gardens, 
 and, best of all, the old Vale, have vanished like 
 a dream. 
 
 Brompton Row, which connected the place itself 
 on tlie northern side of the road with Knightsbridge 
 Green (in its far greater amplitude) at an epoch long 
 posterior to the existence of Old Brompton as an 
 independent name and locality, I take to have a 
 topographical affinity with Bunhill Row, Chigwell 
 Row, AVoodford Row, Channor Row, and Forest 
 Row — a block of buildings erected on the skirt of a 
 hamlet or a waste. The first houses which occupied 
 the site were of low elevation and humble preten- 
 sions ; they lay back some forty or fifty feet from 
 the main road, and the boundary-line of their front- 
 gardens, with the projection on the opposite side, 
 where Brompton Grove and Grove House stood, 
 left a sort of gorge for vehicles of all kinds, yet 
 enough to meet the demand of that day. During
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 75 
 
 a protracted period the dwellings just here enjoyed 
 an uninterrupted view of the open area behind, so 
 far as the eye could scan. 
 
 The Row about 1840 presented altogether a 
 sufficiently picturesque aspect ; it was quiet, green, 
 and rural ; and the grape vines trailed over one or 
 two of the exteriors, witli the clusters hanging 
 unmolested in the season, may give some idea of 
 the transition which the locality has undergone. 
 
 Faulkner, in speaking of the villages which 
 bounded the town of Kensington proper on the 
 southern side, mentions Old and New Brompton ; 
 but he omits to delimit them, and to do so would 
 now involve greater trouble than it would have done 
 almost a century ago, when Faulkner wrote his 
 account of Kensington. Still I think it probable 
 that New Brompton was the name applied to the 
 eastern end, including Brompton Row, and that 
 Old Brompton centred round Cromwell or Hale 
 House, Cromwell Lane, and the lower end of Bell 
 and Horns Lane toward Brompton Hall and Cowper 
 House. The Row was plainly, as I have suggested, 
 an aftergrowth, and originally abutted on the waste 
 of St. Mary Abbots, without any other buildings 
 between it and the Manor of Hyde. Like Queen's 
 Buildings opposite, its level was probably raised to 
 what we now see it, when at a later date private 
 residences of a superior character were erected there. 
 
 Two celebrities who resided in Brompton Row 
 were Sir Benjamin Thompson, better known as 
 Count Rumford, who had married the widow of 
 Lavoisier the chemist, and who was there quite in 
 the beginning of the last century, and Leach, a 
 boatswain who had served on the Victory, and had 
 lost an arm. He was full of all sorts of yarns, 
 and his conversation was eagerly sought by the 
 frequenters of the Crown and Sceptre at the corner
 
 76 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 of Rauston Street, going toward Montpelier Square, 
 Avhere Trafalgar was fought over again almost 
 nightly in a recital accompanied by copious potations 
 of malt liquor. Leach had an adroit way of order- 
 ing a half-pint of beer in a quart measure, and his 
 tankard was constantly replenished for him by his 
 admiring audience. He it was who used to give 
 an account of the Duchess of Kent, the Queen's 
 mother, tripping on some occasion and saving her- 
 self by catching at the stump of Leach's arm, on 
 which occasion Her Royal Highness, according to 
 the narrator, expressed her satisfaction at being able 
 to lean on the buttocks (bulwarks) of England. 
 This may have been while the Duke and his wife 
 resided at Kent House, Kensington Gore. 
 
 Count Rumford did not probably reside long at 
 Old Brompton. I have seen a letter from him 
 written there in 1801, and in the following year he 
 settled in France. He was one of the earliest 
 improvers of our domestic stove. John Reeve I 
 notice elsewhere. Then there was Mrs. Cooper, 
 who in my boyhood kept the confectioner's shop 
 in the Row, and made a speciality of the Brompton 
 Bun, of which I was a munificent patron. The 
 Brompton product had some consanguinity with its 
 Chelsea prototype ; it was greasy to the touch. 
 I have noted elsewhere my other preferences in 
 the same direction. In later life, wliile my father 
 lived in Bloomsbury, I was one of the financial 
 pillars of an establisliment in Hanway Street, where 
 cakes, ratafias, bonbons filled with liqueur, et alia 
 similia, were made to perfection ; and, moreover, 
 wlierever I went in the country, I generously be- 
 friended the tuck-shop. 
 
 A notability of a different character in the Row 
 was denoted by a brass plate with the name Lloyd 
 on it, attached to one of the doors. Mrs. Lloyd
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 77 
 
 resided here, and was a person of some means. She 
 had a son, an officer in one of the Hne regiments. 
 Mrs. I^loyd was, in fact, in business — what business 
 was not exactly known, not even to her son. Her 
 headquarters, however, as a matter of fact, were in 
 Crown Court, St. James's, where she could shew 
 a cheval-glass in a silver mounting, given to her 
 by H.R.H. the Prince Regent ; I dare say that she 
 was very proud of it. A very sad story was con- 
 nected with this woman and this house. One day 
 a lady brought a gentleman there, and the door was 
 opened by Mrs. Lloyd. The gentleman was her 
 son — he had discovered the secret ; and he never 
 recovered from the shock. The poor fellow's com- 
 mission had been bought out of Crown Court. 
 
 One of the earliest houses in the Row adapted 
 as a place of business — a sort of semi-private one — 
 was Symonds the joiner's. My mother called him 
 the Spider, because he limped badly, lifting one leg 
 behind him. He had his workshop next door to 
 Hume the baker's, near Brompton Crescent. 
 
 Facing Brompton Row lay Brompton Grove, 
 Grove House, and other private residences in 
 grounds. In the Grove was living in 1824 William 
 Wilberforce, who had removed from Kensington 
 Gore, where he is described as residing in 1820. He 
 died in 1833. Wilberforce, a native of Hull, and who 
 at one time represented that borough in Parliament, 
 became intimate with the Yorkshire branch of the 
 Stanhopes, and had been partly educated at AA'imble- 
 don. A personage of his standing would doubtless be 
 at least acquainted with other members of the same 
 family. He apparently settled in London about 
 1780, being then quite a young man. 
 
 Grove House in or about 1840 was converted 
 into a dame-school, kept by Mrs. Warne. Mrs. 
 Warne, a INIiss Ferryman, whose sister married
 
 78 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Colonel Maceroni, aide-de-camp to Murat, brother- 
 in-law of Napoleon, did her best to initiate the 
 writer into some of the rudiments of learning. Her 
 o'overness, Miss Foster, who married Osborn the 
 Fiilham nurseryman, tried to make me an advanced 
 scholar by teaching me a few words of French, and 
 one day it came to the turn of the word oui. "Say 
 out, Willy," quoth the lady. " I won't say oui, Miss 
 Foster," was my hardy, Loftus-like, but not perfectly 
 logical, reply. 
 
 A portion of the extensive gardens once attached 
 to these old buildings survives in the small oblong 
 enclosure of Ovington Square. Between the next 
 tiu-ning westward, after leaving Grove House, a line 
 of houses, a few shops inclusive, lay well back from 
 the road, and had in front of them down to Michael 
 Place an open space within low open iron railings, 
 over which I have often vaulted as a boy, which 
 might originally have been gardens, but which I 
 personally knew only as gravelled. It has been 
 completely absorbed and obliterated by the modern 
 improver. 
 
 At tlie back of Grove Place, Elliot's Pine Pits 
 occupied ten acres, extending nearly to the western 
 side of Hans Place, where Sir Charles Shuckborough 
 had a mansion in grounds. Elliot afterward removed 
 to Fulham, but he naturally found pine-growing 
 unremunerative when a better specimen than he 
 could produce for a guinea was obtained from 
 abroad for half a crown. 
 
 In one of the small houses in Grove Place, Mr. 
 John Hunt, Leigh Hunt's elder brother, spent his 
 last days and died. I recall visits which we paid 
 to liim there. His wife, like old Mrs. Hazlitt, was 
 addicted to distinguishing liim as ^'my INIr. Hunt." 
 She might have iiad good reasons for this. 
 
 My oldest recollection of Brompton, Alfred Place,
 
 W^ESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 79 
 
 was a short cul-de-sac, abutting at the western ex- 
 tremity on what was at a later period Thurloe 
 Square, and dividing Alexander Square, so named after 
 a solicitor and speculative builder, Henry Brown 
 Alexander, who was my father's landlord, but who 
 is better known as the father of AVilliam Alexander, 
 donor of tlie National Portrait Gallery. The elder 
 Alexander must have been almost the first to spoil 
 the rural character of this neighbourhood. He died 
 at Hillersdon House, l^arnes, a residence once be- 
 longing to a family of that name, in my time at a 
 patriarchal age, leaving a large fortune. In earlier 
 life he had been a great horseman. 
 
 In Alexander Place was a magazine for the sale, 
 among other sundries, of short basket - hilted iron 
 swords and wooden broadswords. My brother and 
 I fought a outrance with the former, and exhausted 
 many a pair, regardless of the outlay, which was 
 fourpence each ; but the broadsword was a shilling, 
 and was only for ceremonial use. The reports which 
 came to us from our elders of the sanguinary con- 
 flicts in transpontine melodramas led to this playing 
 at soldiers or brigands ; but I think that the shilling 
 weapon associated itself in my mind with a commis- 
 sion in the Household Cavalry. How many foster 
 such illusions and mental cobwebs, varying only in 
 character as time goes on ! There was in my young 
 time in Brompton a fellow who produced a sort of 
 sensation after dark by haunting the unlighted lanes 
 and byeways. He was known as Spring-heel Jack. 
 I suppose that he moved about on stilts. It was 
 prior to the more systematic organization of the 
 police. I believe that I am right in saying that Bell 
 and Horns Lane was his headquarters. 
 
 Faulkner, who wrote the local histories of Chelsea 
 and other places, was a second-hand bookseller at 
 the corner of Smith Street, Chelsea, nearly opposite
 
 80 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Gough House. He was a little man, and had a 
 brother as small as himself, who died in 1895 in 
 Paulton Square. Faulkner brought out his Hrent- 
 ford and Ealing in 1843, and proposed to my father, 
 then living in Church Street, Chelsea, to exchange a 
 copy for some book of my father's doing. I recollect 
 — it was about 184-7 — Faulkner left his own book, 
 the equivalent not being ready, and called nearly 
 every day, till my father told him, I think, he might 
 have his volume back again. His books have a 
 value, but they suffer from the chronic mischief of 
 being written up to subscribers. 
 
 I have the most distinct impression of Bell and 
 Horns Lane, commencing with the old-fashioned 
 unpretending hostelry at the corner, with its yard, 
 in which a cobbler had his stall. 
 
 A hedge bounded the lane right down the south 
 side, wliere Thurloe Place and Square were subse- 
 quently erected, and the ditch was a good hunting- 
 ground for the rat-catcher. And on the highroad, 
 before Alexander Place and Square and the rest of 
 the Alexander estate were laid out, a second hedge 
 skirted the thoroughfare on the north side with few 
 interruptions as far as Swan Lane. On the north side 
 of Bell and Horns Lane beyond Brompton Church, of 
 which in my boyhood Mr. Irons was minister,^ lay 
 Pollard's School, a nursery ground, Ingestre House, 
 and a number of other detached residences in their 
 own grounds. AVebster and Harley the actors lived 
 there. The high massive wall enclosing the nursery 
 and Ingestre House was supported by buttresses, 
 which formed a source of alarm in those days to 
 women and children who were passing after dusk, 
 from fear of attacks by thieves or footpads. Leigh 
 Hunt said that these buttresses reminded him of 
 
 ' ^\'as lie related to the Ilev. Mr. Irons of Lingstead, Kent, who died 
 in or about 178G ? The name is unusual.
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 81 
 
 the legs of the Knave of Clubs. At the other end 
 of the lane was the Hoop and Toy public-house, 
 originally an old-fashioned estaljlishment, with trees 
 in front of it. Nearly opposite on the north was 
 Gore Lane, a narrow bending thoroughfare leading 
 to Kensington Govor or Gore, and down there, on 
 the riglit hand, was a house once tenanted by Charles 
 jNIathews the younger. The lane debouched at Gore 
 House, Lady Blessington's. 
 
 I accompanied my father as a child to the sale of 
 the effects at Ingestre House prior to its demolition ; 
 it had been at one time a residence of the Talbots, 
 Earls of Shrewsbury. The last private residence of 
 all those once standing hereabout was Brompton Park, 
 the residence of Sir John Fleming, Bart., who had 
 two handsome daughters. These ladies long kept 
 their maiden condition, but had their love affairs. 
 Their father used to say that they were very good 
 girls, and never did him any discredit. In 1779 
 Jane, the elder, was married at Marylebone Church 
 to the third Earl of Harrington (1753-1829). The 
 younger became Lady Worsley. 
 
 Prospect Place owed its once more appropriate 
 designation to the complete absence of any buildings 
 between the lane at that point and the Fulham Road, 
 till the first wing of the Consumption Hospital was 
 begun, and Sunmer Terrace interposed. On some of 
 the ground nearly opposite the Toxophiiite Societ}- 
 held its meetings. Robert Cruikshank, the brother 
 of George, was one of the members. Of George 
 Cruikshank I have said a word in my Confessions, 
 1897. He had two establishments and families ; and 
 the story goes that on one occasion one of his children 
 by the sinistral Mrs. C. had him pointed out as the 
 great George Cruikshank. But the boy said, " Tliat 
 is not JNIr. Cruikshank ; that is my father." A wine- 
 merchant employed by Shirley Brooks had to inquire* 
 
 F
 
 82 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 if Brooks did not say, to which of the two Mrs. B.'s 
 tile order was to be sent. 
 
 Pursuing the course of the lane, one had Cowper 
 House (ultimately a lunatic asylum) on the left and 
 Brompton Hall, a house with eagles over the en- 
 trance, on tlie right ; this is said to have represented 
 the site of a residence of Lord Burleigh, Elizabeth's 
 minister ; and turning sharply round by the Hall, 
 the pedestrian found himself in Cromwell Lane, 
 wliich led to l^rompton Vale, the Almshouses, two 
 or three imrseries, and then either to Gloucester Road 
 through a turning to the left or to Kensington across 
 the fields. By taking the right hand instead of the 
 left, which brought you to Gloucester Road, you 
 reached, down a sb.ort cul-de-sac — at one corner of 
 which, by a bridge over the ditch, was a cottage once 
 occupied by Colonel Maceroni already named — the 
 entrance to Cromwell House, otlierwise called Hale 
 House, one of the many reputed residences of the 
 Protector Cromwell, and of which my uncle Reynell 
 was the latest occupier.^ One of the mantels from 
 this ancient edifice, which stood in four acres of 
 ground, is now in the Victoria and Albert Museum, 
 but it has been imskilfuUy repaired. O'Keefe the 
 dramatist, in his Memoirs, mentions a Tea Garden 
 concert as held here in 1762, as if the building had 
 even then been converted to different or casual nses. 
 In this degraded state it acquired the designation 
 of Cromiiiell Gardens, preceding in order of time 
 the more generally known Florida Gardens, on 
 which Gloucester Lodge was built in 180.5. In 
 1820 Cromwell House scarcely retained any trace 
 of its character and importance. It passed through 
 the Methwolds, founders in 1652 of the Alms- 
 houses in Cromwell I^ane, to the Harringtons by the 
 marriage to the elder daughter of Sir John Fleming. 
 
 ' Near Cromwell House was Bath Cottage, so called from a bath just 
 by. It is mentioned, I understand, in trerdan's Autobiography.
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 83 
 
 What seems a piece of corroborative evidence of 
 the settlement of the Crom wells at Brompton, is the 
 fact that the fjimily chose Kensington Church as 
 the place where members of it were married. 
 
 The \'ale, of which no trace now remains, lay on 
 the right-hand side of Cromwell Lane, turning down 
 from Brompton Hall toward Gloucester Road and 
 Kensington. It was approached through a door- 
 way, and consisted of a group of cottages on either 
 side of a sinuous footpath. 'J'here was no carriage- 
 road. Each residence stood in about half an acre of 
 garden ground, and was enclosed by a high black 
 fence. The \'ale, which partly abutted on Crom- 
 well Lane, had been originally formed by the 
 enclosure of some of the demesne of Cromwell 
 House, and the waste plots along the lane were 
 gradually occupied by houses of various styles, 
 including one where the Gunnings formerly lived. 
 On the left-hand side once stood Bute House, and 
 beyond it the Almshouses above-mentioned. 
 
 A mysterious personage preceded my uncle as 
 tenant of the premises in the Vale. It was a forger 
 or utterer, or both, of flash bank-notes ; and an old 
 gardener, who afterward worked for Mr. Reynell, 
 gave this account of him, that he rode out every 
 morning on horseback, and returned in the even- 
 ing, both his beast and himself presenting the ap- 
 pearance of having ridden far and hard. It was 
 conjectured that his practice was to change the 
 notes at different points, and at as considerable a 
 distance as possible from headquarters. AVhat be- 
 came of the fellow the narrator did not know ; if 
 he was apprehended, the " three-legged mare " was 
 his infallible destiny ; and the mere fact that his 
 proceedings were capable of explanation seems to 
 shew that the fraud was discovered, if it was not 
 punished.
 
 84 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 The ditch which traversed the Vale and skirted 
 the Reynells' garden on tlie southern side (one of its 
 slopes was tlieir strawberry-bed) came out at the 
 Admiral Keppel Inn, where the Chelsea Pound 
 stood, and where there was a meeting of cross- 
 roads. When they were draining this ground about 
 eighty years since, the skeleton of a man who had 
 been buried in lime — a suicide or a murderer — was 
 discovered. 
 
 Through the Reynells we knew" the Edward 
 \Vrights and the Spagnolettis, through the latter the 
 Farrens, and through these the Holls, and so on. 
 This was in the early forties. The Byrons became 
 acquainted w^ith us through my father's engagement 
 in the reporting gallery. 
 
 Spagnoletti, father of my old friend Charles 
 Spagnoletti, was not only the son of the famous 
 leader of the Italian Opera, and one of the immortal 
 triumvirate in the ballad of Old King Cole, but he 
 married the daughter of Stowasser, leader of the 
 Horse Guards Band, My friend's father was a first- 
 rate musical teacher, and might have done very 
 well in his profession. But he was not very 
 methodical, and was greatly addicted to the gentle, 
 but not remunerative, science of angling. Many a 
 time, when his pupils were expecting him, Spagno- 
 letti absented himself on the plea of indisposition, 
 while he had really set off on a pleasant little excur- 
 sion with his rod and bag. 
 
 I owe to Charles Spagnoletti the following 
 anecdote : 
 
 Mr. .James Forbes and Sir Edward VVatkin, 
 long the two leading spirits on the Chatham and 
 Dover and South-Eastern Railways, conferring to- 
 gether on some arrangements propounded by the 
 former to be for mutual advantage, Watkin 
 allowed his friend to go on for some time, but.
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 85 
 
 at last interrupting, said very quietly : " And 
 where do I come in, James ? " 
 
 On the site of Pelham Crescent was Colville's 
 Nursery, or rather one of them. A path, flanked 
 by a ditch on one side and a hedge on the other, 
 led right across to that portion of Bell and Horns 
 I^ane, by Brompton Hall. The Crescent was built 
 about 1837 by Bonnin. I recollect the fields there, 
 and the stile over which you had to climb to the 
 path which led to Brompton Hall. Pelham Place 
 was a later creation. Our relatives. Sir John and 
 Lady Stoddart, on their return from Malta, were 
 among the earliest residents there. This was about 
 1840.^ Guizot and George Godwin I elsewhere 
 signalize. I used as a boy to be frequently a 
 visitor at the Stoddarts', and have a lively re- 
 collection of a carpet which Lady Stoddart was 
 long engaged in weaving against her son William 
 Wellwood Stoddart's marriage, and of a cake, 
 which I was engaged to convey to our house in 
 Thurloe Place just by, of which a nefariously 
 abstracted burnt currant nearly choked me. For 
 some time I attended St. Luke's Church with Sir 
 John, while he lived as a widower in Brompton 
 Square. 
 
 Opposite Pelham Crescent there was in my early 
 time a considerable open space immediately at the 
 back of Pond Place, and I went with Byron, when 
 we were quite lads, to see a fair held there. This 
 space may have been the last vestige of Chelsea 
 Common, which, according to Lysons, consisted of 
 thirty-seven acres, and lay between the Fulham and 
 King's Roads. It is said to have been also, if not 
 originally, known as Chelsea Heath, and to have had 
 an undergrowth of furze and heather, which flourished 
 in a soil formed of sandy loam, as well as certain 
 
 ' See The Uazlitts, 1911, p. 341.
 
 86 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 botanical features in common with Hounslow and 
 Hampstead Heaths. Adjoining the Common was 
 Chelsea Common Field, skirted to the north by 
 Elacklands Lane. So late as 1881 the area left 
 open at the junction of iNIarkham and College 
 Streets retained the name of The Common} 1 
 believe that St. I^uke's Church and churchyard 
 occupy part of the area, for it is observable that 
 an unusually large piece of ground was assigned 
 to this purpose, bespeaking the relatively small 
 value of land at the time, or the easy terms on 
 which this open space had been acquired. 
 
 Onslow Square covers the old grounds of several 
 mansions, including Cowper House, where Messrs. 
 Elliot had a lunatic asylum. One of the brothers 
 afterward removed to Munster House, Fulham.^ 
 It is the mutilated avenue of Cowper House, which 
 is seen in the centre and in a passage leading from 
 the Fulham Road. 
 
 Bell and Horns Lane practically extended to 
 EarFs Court, and was bounded on both sides the 
 wliole way down to about 1850 by private mansions 
 or other liouses, market-gardens, and nurseries, among 
 wliicJi I may mention those of Gray, Siggers, Col- 
 viile, Conway (by the turnpike, where the Bolton 
 estate was laid out), Kigby, and Kirke. My mother 
 bouglit her morello cherries for preserving at Con- 
 way's. Gray had succeeded first as a partner, and 
 eventually (1788) as principal, to the original Bromp- 
 ton Park Nurseries, founded in 1681, and belonging 
 to a succession of proprietors or lessees. Gray was 
 tliere in 18J3.5. Among his predecessors had been 
 George London, formerly gardener to Sir Christopher 
 AV^ren, and Henry \\ ise, who were long in partner- 
 
 * See what I say iu my .Supplement to Blouut's Tenures, 100L>, v. 
 Chelsea. 
 
 * He is the E. of my paper " Off the Straight Line" {Prone Writlnys, 
 2nd Series, 1910, jip. 17.5-80).
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 87 
 
 ship. There is much information concerning this and 
 other suhurban nurseries in a foHo vohnne collected 
 by Mr. William Forsytli. Of all tlie specialities once 
 and long grown in this neighbourhood, the Brompton 
 Stock is the only one I have heard mentioned by 
 florists in my time. 
 
 The lane eventually debouched near what is now 
 the Brompton Cemetery and the Redcliffe estate, 
 and on the left was AValnut-tree Walk, leading to 
 the Fulham Road (a not very safe place for pedes- 
 trians, as I have known ladies robbed at mid-day), 
 w^hile on the right the road wound round to Ken- 
 sington, and brought one out opposite Holland 
 House. One of the earlier residents at Earl's 
 Court was Tattersall the auctioneer, whose house 
 was called Coleherne Court. A portrait of him, 
 seated at a table writing, was painted by C. Han- 
 cock and engraved by W. Giller, October 4, 1841. 
 He died in 1795. 
 
 On the right and left of AValnut-tree Walk, and 
 between that and the cemetery, there w^as nothing 
 but market-grounds and orchards, except a field on 
 the right, where, years after the presence of any 
 actual danger, a board was to be seen, warning the 
 public " to beware of the bull." 
 
 On the other side of the cemetery toward the 
 Fulham Fields was a country road, where one of 
 my godfathers. Sir Goldsworthy Gurney, inventor 
 of the Ikide Light and of the Steam Tram, was the 
 first, I believe, to put up houses. I accompanied 
 him as a youth on his visits to his property, and 
 have the iiavour of the red currants yet on my 
 palate, which I gathered in the remains of the old 
 dismantled orchard. 
 
 An amusing experience befell my father while he 
 was in his e arly married life a visitor at Gurney's in 
 Cornwall. He was rather addicted to woodmanship,
 
 88 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 and sallied out one day with an axe, wherewith he 
 lopped a number of trees on somebody else's estate. 
 Tlie owner applied to Gurney, who was on the com- 
 mission of the peace, for a warrant for his guest's 
 apprehension, which I have had in my hands. But 
 I believe that the matter occasioned some merriment, 
 and was amicably settled. 
 
 Gurney impressed me as a boy with his strange 
 passion for butter. Unlike other men, he would take 
 a slice of the latter, and unite it to a very thin one of 
 bread. His daughter gave £500 toward the endow- 
 ment of Truro Cathedral, and placed a painted 
 window in St. Margaret's, Westminster, to the 
 memory of her father, of whose career it is emble- 
 matical. This lady in her earlier life used to pay 
 occasional visits to London, and pester my mother 
 by dragging her to the West End shops to see the 
 fashions. She overhauled the whole stock, and 
 bouglit nothing. My own most juvenile produc- 
 tion is a letter to my father, while he was staying 
 at Gurney's, as just mentioned, requesting him to 
 come home and whip my brother. It was in 1843. 
 I was then nine, my brother four. A second 
 episode belonging to the same period and occasion 
 was the dangerous sea voyage to Plymouth on the 
 way to Cornwall, and the thrilling intelligence on the 
 return home that tlie captain had at one point of 
 time abandoned all hope of saving the vessel. 
 
 The ground now occupied by the Brompton 
 Cemetery was a market - garden down to 1836, 
 when, or in 1837, it was surv^eyed, enclosed, and 
 laid out. The whole area between it and Walnut- 
 tree Walk, and between the Earl's Court and Fulham 
 lloads, was also cultivated, and principally orchards. 
 The grounds of Mr. Toogood's house at the Earl's 
 Court end of the AValk, and INIr. Popart's at the 
 other, nearly met. This was a tJiorouglily rural bit.
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 89 
 
 Gunter the pastrycook lived at Earl's Court, 
 wliile it was still a retired and rustic neighbour- 
 hood. Of course, he had had the opportunity of 
 availing himself of any chance of prohting by the 
 development of local property, and he eventually 
 purchased of tlie Gilbert family for £30,000 (as I was 
 informed by Colonel Gilbert) what is now known as 
 the Gunter estate, and employed George Godwin 
 the architect, one of the first occupiers of the houses 
 in Pelham Crescent, to lay out the property for him 
 in what is known as Bolton's, 'IVegunter Road, 
 where Halliwell-Pliiliipps resided many years, and 
 (on the opposite side) in Gunter's Grove, on the 
 borders of Chelsea and Fulham. 
 
 A friend of mine, who was articled to Godwin, 
 recollects Pollard the schoolmaster, next door to 
 Brompton Church, coming in every week to see 
 the Builder, which was then a comparatively new 
 undertaking, at Pelham Crescent. Pollard sold his 
 school-site to the Oratory. 
 
 Opposite Chelsea Park, or Wharton Park, as it 
 was originally named, in Little Chelsea, lay Brompton 
 Heath, an open space which must have originally 
 extended from the village of Little Chelsea to Swan 
 Lane on the east side, and have abutted on the 
 Earl's Court Road, or continuation of Bell and 
 Horns Lane. Thistle Grove preserves in its name 
 an indication of the former condition of the site. 
 There is evidence that, so early as 1712, a portion 
 was occupied by Sell wood's Nursery, a name pre- 
 served in Selwood Place. In 1663 the tenant or 
 proprietor of the Goat (afterward Goat in Boots) 
 enjoyed the right of commonage for two cows and 
 one Iieifer on the heath. At Shaftesbury House in 
 Little Chelsea died in 1786 Mr. Edward AA'ynne, 
 who inherited in 1740 the library and the residence 
 of Narcissus I^uttrell, author of the Historical Diary.
 
 90 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 At this house the Earl of Shaftesbury, author of the 
 Cluwactvristics, had his Hbrary, a iire-proof room. 
 He sold tlie house to Luttrell in 1710. It appears 
 to have oceupied the site of St. George's Workhouse. 
 
 Thistle Grove appears to have been parcelled out 
 into building- allotments about 1816, and was a cul- 
 de-sac at the northern end, the extension known as 
 Drayton Grove being under cultivation, the sole 
 approach from the Fulham Road at this point to 
 Earl's Court and Kensington being through the 
 narrow lane at the back of the Grove. 
 
 I do not exactly know what were the original 
 boundaries of the hamlet of Brompton. In England's 
 Gazetteer^ 1751, it is simply described as "near 
 Knightsbridge, Kensington and Chelsea." In 1851 
 the population is returned at 14,870. 
 
 Beyond Little Chelsea lay Walham Green and 
 Fulham, and to the south Sand's End and Parson's 
 Green, all detached hamlets separated from London 
 and eacli other by wide stretches of open land or 
 garden, now consolidated into one huge continuous 
 street, as it were, resonant with some of the least 
 attractive forms of modern life. Scarcely anything 
 but Fulliam I^alace remains to shew what this side 
 of the Metropolis originally was. Peterborough 
 House, JNIoore Park, and Fulham Park have dis- 
 appeared. The I*alace possesses a unique interest 
 as the only moated house within the Metropolitan 
 area. 
 
 Between \Valham Green and Fulham, on the 
 left-hand side, after turning the angle in the road 
 by the modern fire-engine iiouse, lay Purser's Cross, 
 which is lost in the so-called Percy Cross House 
 opposite. 
 
 Sixty-five years ago, Siggers the market-gardener 
 had a large piece of tiie ground on the Earl's Court 
 side, opposite Conway's Nursery, and contiguous to
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 91 
 
 the turnpike. I met Siggers many years since in 
 Brooks's shop at Hammersmith — the Brooks, whom 
 I describe in my Confessions of a Collector — and 
 entered into conversation with him about the old 
 place. He narrated a curious anecdote of the Duke 
 of York. He had instructed all his children never 
 to accept gratuities from strangers ; it was a very 
 secluded and thinly-populated part, and the precau- 
 tion was necessary enough. His daughters came 
 home one day, and told him that a gentleman on 
 horseback had stopped them, asked them their 
 names, and, pulling a shilling out of his pocket, 
 stooped to offer it to them. They declined to 
 receive it, and the gentleman asked their reason. 
 They said that their father had ordered them not 
 to take money from anyone. From their description 
 Siggers guessed who their interviewer had been. 
 
 This account probably referred to the time when 
 the Duke kept Mrs. Carey at Fulham or another 
 lady at the White House, Putney. His Royal 
 Highness had children by the former, who passed 
 under the name of Gibbs, and strongly resembled 
 the Georges. They went to Roy's school, at 
 Burlington House, Fulham, and were afterward 
 drafted into the War Office. The public service at 
 that period was the ordinary destination of the off- 
 shoots or superannuated servants of the nobility and 
 of Royalty. Indeed, so late as the time of the 
 Crimean War such was still the case. While I 
 was at the War Office, an illegitimate son of the 
 right honourable Sidney Herbert was on the staff 
 under an assumed name ; he was well nursed. He 
 was not the only one. 
 
 Siggers told me some unproducible stories of 
 the old Duke of Wellington in connection with 
 Brompton, where he favoured a resort partaking of 
 the character of a casino and something else. His
 
 02 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Grace was an Orlando Inamorato of a not very high 
 order. 
 
 He had the habit of keeping at Apsley House 
 a considerable amount in bank-notes, and on one 
 occasion, when he was paying for a heavy purchase, 
 the vendor respectfully suggested a cheque. But 
 the Duke told him that he liked to settle such 
 matters in cash, as he did not wish Coutts's to know 
 what a fool lie was sometimes. 
 
 In Sydney Street, Fulham Road, during the last 
 years of his life resided Thomas Wright, the dis- 
 tinguished antiquary and man of letters, the intimate 
 associate of Halliwell-Phillipps. Wright married a 
 discarded mistress of Francisque INIichel. I saw her 
 once or twice — a lady of imposing appearance, but, 
 from what Halliwell gave me to understand, and 
 from what I learned otherwise, by no means a crown 
 to her husband, unless it was one of tliorns. A 
 credulous relative of mine described her to me on 
 one occasion as a scion of the ancient French noblesse. 
 
 She was poor Wright's evil genius. He was a 
 man of vast industry and erudition, and deserved a 
 better fortune. Halliwell allowed him a pension 
 supplemental to the munificent one of £6.5 with 
 which the discerning and impartial l^ritish Govern- 
 ment requited thirty years of archaeological scholar- 
 ship and research. The royal housekeeper at Kew 
 Palace, her nephew informed me, had £.-3.50 a year, 
 \vith lodging and perquisites. How equitable and 
 how consistent ! 
 
 People used to express surprise that Wright could 
 get tlirough so much work, whereas he was always to 
 be seen about among his friends. ]5ut he used to 
 rise at four, and do a day's work before breakfast. 
 He was a familiar figure in many parts of England, 
 where he had been engaged with others in conduct- 
 ing archaeological inquiries ; but Henry Holl seemed
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 93 
 
 to say that this was especially so at Ludlow, where 
 he was once with liini, and Holl spoke of him as the 
 King of Liidlozv. 
 
 Wright was not a journalist, nor a Liverpool man, 
 nor a Scot, or Gladstone and his alter ego Rosebery 
 might have made him a grant out of the public funds, 
 followed at a decent interval by a pension for life, as 
 they did in the case of William Watson, who had 
 written a few copies of verses, and who will, it is to 
 be feared, be a charge on the taxpayers during the 
 next forty or fifty years, thanks to these two eminent 
 Liberal statesmen — liberal in much the same sense 
 as the gallant knights of tlie post of old time, who 
 magnanimously presented to B. what they had pre- 
 viously stolen from A. 
 
 One of the small detached houses along- the Earl's 
 Court Road was the Rosery, or, as Jerrold called it, 
 the Roguery. I recollect being taken here as a boy 
 to see the Carter Halls, and being struck by their 
 wall-plums, the bloom on which is not dead to me. 
 My escort was Lilly (Lavinia) Blanchard, afterward 
 Mrs. Blanchard Jerrold.^ 
 
 Mrs. Carter Hall was generally allowed to be a 
 very accomplished and able woman ; 1 have always 
 heard that the gray mare was the better horse in this 
 case, and " Cairter," as she used to call him, was little 
 better than a scissors and paste man. Some irrever- 
 ently alluded to him as " INlrs. Carter Hall's husband." 
 Yet he continued during a long series of years to earn 
 a handsome income out of journalism and letters, and 
 to secure a pension. He never failed from lack of 
 courage. He asked Moxon & Co. £000 for the right 
 to reprint in book-form his Memories of Writers, 
 which he had communicated to some periodical. This 
 was toward the close of his career. I happened to 
 be tlie next client whom the firm was to see, and Hall 
 
 ^ She died at Kensington in 1899.
 
 94 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 went out as I went in. His aspect was truly vener- 
 able, and I noted the amplitude of his shirt-collar, 
 to which he was indebted for the nickname of S/m^t- 
 Collar Hall. 
 
 How often T have passed the sweet creeper-clad 
 cottage, where Jenny Lind, the Swedisli Nightingale. 
 resided during some time ! It was on the right-hand 
 side, as one walked from Gloucester Road, not far 
 from the Carter Halls. An acquaintance of mine at 
 Barnes, the late Mr. Morten Cotton, told me that he 
 went to hear the new-comer, waited at the doors 
 from four to seven, and when the public was at last 
 admitted, had his coat nearly torn off his back in the 
 struggle to get in. 
 
 At Hereford Lodge, of which the entrance lay in 
 a recess, just before one came to the Rosery, toward 
 Earl's Court, and at the turning down to Gloucester 
 Road, resided Lady Hotliam, an acquaintance of our 
 friends the Bryans ; but the site has long been occupied 
 by Hereford Square and otlier houses. The name 
 awakens the suspicion tliat the Hothams had been 
 preceded by a family, to which the mansion owed 
 its name — perhaps the Devereux. 
 
 A temporary resident at 20 Pelham Crescent in 
 Brompton about this time was the ex-Minister Guizot, 
 whose works on Civilization and the English Revolu- 
 tion of 1640 my father translated. He sent the 
 books to Guizot, and received a polite acknowledg- 
 ment.^ 
 
 The father of Guizot had perished on the scaffold 
 in the first Revolution, and as, next to his master, he 
 was the best hated man in France in 1848, he natur- 
 ally lost no time in placing the Channel between 
 himself and his countrymen. Those who were in 
 Paris at the acute crisis heard the ominous cries of 
 "^ ban Guizot!'' 
 
 * See it printed in The llazlitls, 1911, j). 610.
 
 AVESTERN SU15UIIES OF LONDOX 95 
 
 One of the famous old houses in 15roinpton was 
 Gloucester Lodij^e, built in 1805 for the Duchess of 
 Gloucester, widow of one of the sons of George III. 
 It stood on the right-hand side of what developed 
 into Gloucester lload on the way to Kensington, 
 and occupied the site of Florida Gardens. George 
 Canning afterward lived there, and at a later period 
 Don Carlos, whose sudden disappearance one morn- 
 ing in July, 1834, was soon explained by his arrival 
 as the head of an insurrectionary movement in 
 Spain. The building, which occupied with its 
 grounds a considerable area, surrounded by a very 
 high fence, remained unoccupied for a very long 
 time, and was at last pulled down. I saw it just 
 before its disappearance. 
 
 Both Lord Howard of Effingham, the hero of the 
 Armada, and Kichard Percival, the Spanish scholar, 
 who published the Dictionary and Grammar of that 
 language, and translated portions of the Mi7'ror of 
 Knighthood, were in the reign of Elizabeth residents 
 at Old Brompton. Percival had his son Philip 
 christened at Brompton Church. 
 
 Although Michael Place and Grove and Bromp- 
 ton Crescent were in the parish of Chelsea, they were 
 in such immediate contiguity to Old Brompton that 
 I may mention the residence of Braham the singer 
 in the house at the end of JNIichael Grove. The 
 singer's daughter became Lady VValdegrave — the 
 Waldegrave of Lady Cardigan's Recollectiom ; but 
 his two sons never achieved any success. My father, 
 who had a very promising voice, was very nearly 
 becoming his pupil. In 1845 J. R. Plauche the 
 herald resided at Michael Grove Lodge. 
 
 Leading up to Braham's house, on the left hand, 
 and not far from the highroad, was Hume the 
 baker's, a depot for white and brown parliament, 
 oblonc^ cakes of farinaceous material slightly
 
 96 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 sweetened, and cruciformly divided on the face into 
 four smaller squares. The brown variety is still 
 in commerce ; but the other is forgotten, and the 
 cruciformity has been discontinued. A curious book 
 might be written on the origin and archseology of 
 sweets. My mother dealt at Robb's in St. Martin's 
 Lane for what were termed tops and bottoms, a 
 species of rusk given to children ; and another baker, 
 Caldwell in the Strand, opposite Coutts's Bank, 
 supplied us in those days with a special sort of oval 
 sultana bun, which Caldwell's successor Gilruth 
 continued to make, but which I have not seen 
 elsewhere. 
 
 Within the limits of Chelsea lay also York 
 Place, adjoining the Jewish Burial Ground, and 
 opposite the site on which the Consumption Hospital 
 subsequently stood. I merely refer to it because 
 there was in my nonage a preparatory establishment 
 kept in one of the houses by Dr. Frampton, who, 
 when I was among his pupils, freely applied the 
 ruler to our knuckles, and also employed the old- 
 fashioned abacus for arithmetical purposes. I was 
 of the day-scholars, and Frampton rather uncom- 
 mercially took us out for a walk before dinner, 
 which put a serious edge on our appetites. We had 
 pudding twice a week — plum-pudding on Tuesdays 
 and baked rice on Thursdays. The former was 
 always the day when my step on the homeward 
 route was most elastic. 
 
 I do not know whether Frampton was the same 
 gentleman, who had kept a Grammatical Academy 
 at Parson's Green, near Fulham.^ He had his 
 favourite scholars, and when he ate a peach, sig- 
 nalized his affection by lianding one of them the 
 stone to suck. 
 
 But ])efore T went to Frampton's, I was for a 
 
 ' Feret, Fulham, iii. 291.
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 97 
 
 short time at Mrs. Martin's in Brompton Square. 
 After Frampton came Mrs. Warne at Grove House. 
 
 From tlie preference shown by many of the 
 musical and theatrical professions for this delightful 
 retreat, we are led to infer that the soft air of the 
 locality recommended itself to the bronchial require- 
 ments of these gentlemen and ladies, as well as the 
 attraction of rural scenery and quiet. 
 
 I judge it to have been one of the truest pleasures 
 of my life, if not one of its greatest privileges, to 
 contemplate with my own eyes the beautiful hamlet 
 of Old Brompton, as it appeared prior to the 
 Exhibition of 1851, which virtually destroyed it — 
 and not it alone. When I was a child this outskirt 
 of London was much in its primitive condition as 
 it had been in the days of the early Georges, if 
 not of the Stuarts — in the time of Evelyn and his 
 good acquaintances the market gardeners and florists, 
 who then abounded there. 
 
 In order to realize Old Brompton proper one 
 has to withdraw from the map, as it were, not only 
 Brompton Row, Brompton Square, and the buildings 
 opposite, but the whole of the Alexander estate, 
 leaving nothing but the Bell and Horns at the angle 
 between Bell and Horns Lane and the Fulham Road, 
 till you come to the Hoop and Toy, Brompton 
 Hall, and the opening to the Vale. On the 
 northern side of Bell and Horns Lane were a series 
 of private residences and Kirke's Nursery, and at 
 the western corner a group of mean houses of con- 
 siderable antiquity, adjoining the turning to Gore 
 Lane, but on the southern side nothing but market 
 ground. Cromwell Road is a relatively modern 
 development of a narrow lane, which led to Glou- 
 cester Road, and in its later state probably passes 
 over what was part of Cromwell House. The Bell 
 and Horns (with its cobbler's stall) and the old 
 
 G
 
 98 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Hoop and Toil, with its frontage of trees, may 
 very well have been at first and long in the fields, 
 skirted by the solid, buttressed walls of the few 
 detached residences on the northern side. The 
 difficulty of precise restoration of the scene, as it 
 met the eye seventy years since, is aggravated by 
 the apparent absence of such an archeeological chart 
 of the district as might liave been left by some one 
 privileged enough to anticipate its charm for many 
 coming after him, before ancient boundaries and 
 landmarks disappeared. I have only to rely on a 
 fairly accurate memory of a spot where I dwelled so 
 long, and which I so fondly loved, and which a 
 dismal moraine of bricks and mortar, the homes 
 (if they are not empty) of a very different race or 
 class of people, has all but obliterated. 
 
 Gloucester Road follows to some extent the lines 
 of what was, down to the early part of the nineteenth 
 century, when Gloucester Lodge was erected, known 
 as Hogmore Lane, and was reached from Gore Lane 
 by a narrow turning called Love Lane, and Hogmore 
 Lane itself suggests a distant retrospect, when it 
 was bounded eastward by an expanse, still visible 
 and almost intact in my time, but originally existing 
 under totally different conditions. For, as Frog- 
 more, near Windsor, was even in the seventeenth 
 century the Frog Moor, so, 1 apprehend, this area 
 represents the site of the Hog JNloor, a second state 
 perhaps of the woodland, where so far back as 
 Doomsday 15ook tliere was pannage for large 
 numbers of swine. 
 
 (xore Lane, of which hardly any vestiges survive, 
 has always been associated in my mind, not only 
 with St. Govor's Well in Kensington Gardens, but 
 with a local church or other ecclesiastical building, 
 of which the exact site and character have not been 
 recovered. St. Govor is not a name of frequent
 
 WESTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON 99 
 
 occurrence ; he is described as the patron saint of 
 the church of I..hinover in Monmouthshire ; but 
 Kensington is probably older than Llanover, and 
 much of its ancient history is apparently lost. There 
 may have been a churcli dedicated to St. Govor 
 there too. 
 
 The widow of the second Earl of Harrington 
 was buried at Kensington. But there appears to be 
 no distinct trace of any capital mansion belonging 
 to the Stanhopes here, although more than one block 
 of buildings seems to be reminiscent of the name, and 
 although it is more than likely that by his union 
 in 1779 with the elder daughter of Sir John Fleming 
 the third earl may have succeeded to the possession 
 of Brompton Park. At Earl's Court I personally 
 recollect spacious remains enclosed in an old and 
 lofty wall of premises alleged to represent an early, 
 though of course neither an ancient nor original, seat 
 of the Veres, who probably migrated at a remote date 
 from Veer in Zeeland, and settled in Essex.
 
 Vll 
 
 OUR BROMPTON FRIENDS 
 
 Whex we first knew the Holls, they resided in a 
 small cottage in Stewart's Grove, a turning out of 
 the Fulham Road. He was a handsome man, and 
 had married a very pretty woman, connected with 
 the Yaldwins of Blackdown House, Sussex. So 
 far back as I can remember, Henry Holl had an 
 engagement at the Haymarket under Webster's 
 management at the fairly generous salary of ten 
 guineas a week ; but latterly he joined Gustavus 
 Vasa Brooke at the Olympic, and eventually gave 
 up the stage. He was the author of a few dramatic 
 trifles and two or three novels, of which the best, 
 the Kings Ma/I, was foimded on an incident 
 connected with the Haslemere district — his wife's 
 native place. 
 
 We often saw Brooke at Chelsea. He was one 
 of those lost in the London in 1866. Holl played 
 second to him in Shakespear and melodrama. As 
 a boy I was most impressed by the American 
 tragedian's OtJiello, Richard III., and Sir Giles 
 Overreach. I presumed to set him before Charles 
 Kean all round ; he had a better presence and voice. 
 Alike in Kean and in his wife the voice failed, but 
 he (Kean) was fairly good in such pieces as the 
 Cor.ncan Brothers and Pizarro. 
 
 Holl had known a very wide circle of educated 
 and intelligent people ; his family had been always 
 associated with art ; and his own ties were princi- 
 
 100
 
 OUR BROMPTON FRIENDS 101 
 
 pally dramatic and literary. He was fond of books, 
 and sought the acquaintance of bookish men. There 
 were few of the prominent authors of his day whom 
 he had not met, and with some of them he was on 
 intimate terms. He was a man of excellent address, 
 but I always looked upon him as rather artificial. 
 He once possessed a very fair little collection of 
 the dramatists and poets, with which he parted in 
 his lifetime to defray the expenses of his eldest 
 daughter's wedding to a rather well-to-do man. I 
 thought it plucky and honourable on his part, for he 
 did love those books. 
 
 I mention elsewhere his entertaining imitations 
 of his leading theatrical contemporaries — Keeley, 
 Buckstone, Macready, Webster, and others. When 
 HoU was in the right cue, an evening spent at his 
 house in Brompton over talk about the old poets 
 and playwrights, or, as an alternative, a taste of our 
 host's quality as a remembrancer of other men's 
 styles, was an enrichment of the experience and the 
 thought. To his great annoyance, people often 
 confounded the late Henry Howe and him, both at 
 one time members of the Haymarket establishment ; 
 and I believe that the displeasure was reciprocal. 
 It was at Holl's that I once met Peter Cunningham, 
 an industrious and careful editor, who was in one 
 of the public offices. I understood from Holl that 
 Cunningham had a wonderful library ; but when it 
 was sold, I was not much impressed by it. Some one 
 gave me an equally glowing account of Edward Solly's 
 books, and they were of small account. So it is. 
 
 Holl used to say that when Dickens and Forster 
 took a long walk together, the latter, being some- 
 what pursy, had to pause occasionally to get breath, 
 and would try to make Dickens relax his pace by 
 drawing his attention to the beauty of the scenery, 
 especially if the route was uphill. Holl's mode of
 
 102 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 telling the story was very funny — the way that 
 Forster puffed and blew, and held his sides with, 
 
 " My dear Dickens, just observe that bit " He 
 
 was an excellent raconteur as well as mimic. 
 
 I pointed out long ago that the Bill Stumps 
 pleasantry in Pickwick was borrowed from the 
 ScJiool for WitSy a jest-book published in 1813. 1 
 have heard that the notion of the Golden Dustman 
 in Our Mutual Friend was derived from the im- 
 mense pile of dust which remained for many years 
 untouched at the back of Gray's Inn Lane, some- 
 where between Coldbath Fields and Mount Pleasant, 
 and that a large sum was eventually cleared by the 
 owner, who sold it to the Russian Government in 
 1812, after the destruction of Moscow, to mix with the 
 lime for cement. I give this dit for what it is worth. 
 
 John Forster — Lady Bulwer's Butcher's Boy — 
 was a self-made man, very agreeable to those who 
 could keep him at a distance, but highly unpleasant 
 when he chose. A cabman once described him 
 idiomatically as " an arbitrary cove." There was a 
 small jeu d'esprit about him related in connection 
 with some wine at the dinner-table, of which Forster, 
 on being asked, characteristically affected to know 
 nothing. 
 
 When I was preparing the Hazlitt Memoirs of 
 1867, P^'orster, who had married Colburn's widow, 
 and was a collector, struck me as a likely holder of 
 letters or notes by or relative to Hazlitt ; but on my 
 application to him he rather loftily disclaimed any 
 knowledge of the matter. The widow's cash was 
 all that concerned him. In the Note - Book of 
 " Ingoldsby " Barham, giving an account of his con- 
 temporaries at the Garrick Club, there is a highly 
 uncomplimentary one of Forster. The latter was in 
 fact tlie son of a Scotish butcher, whom he deserted 
 to come up to London to seek his fortune.
 
 OUR BROMrTON FRIENDS 103 
 
 The artificial condescension of Forster was a thing 
 never to be forgotten. This manner arose from his 
 poor training, and was a kind of self-protection. He 
 did not know how you were going to approach him, 
 and he put out his elbow first. His letters to me 
 were polite enough, but he was unpleasantly over- 
 bearing to those who did not hold their ground. He 
 was a thorough beggar on horse-back. 
 
 Frank HoU the Academician, a nephew of our 
 old acquaintance, was most unassuming and agree- 
 able, but very irritable, partly owing, perhaps, to 
 his always indifferent health, for he was a chronic 
 sufferer from angina pectoris, and I was surprised at 
 his lasting even so long as he did. One day, when a 
 right reverend prelate was sitting for his portrait, 
 everything seemed to go wrong. Holl could not 
 find his colours, and when he found them he missed 
 something else. Then something slipped down ; 
 Holl began to mutter curses on Fortune, and at last 
 he swore audibly, till the Bishop got up and, taking 
 his liat, wished the painter good-morning, observing, 
 " You are the most ungentlemanly man, Mr. Holl, 
 I ever met." 
 
 A common acquaintance of the Holls and our- 
 selves was Dr. Duplex, M.D., to whom I have 
 understood that the Duplex lamp owed its origin. 
 The name always haunts me as a felicitous one 
 for a novel, where the central character was some 
 medical Janus. 
 
 Mr. Thomas Scott, of Ramsgate, a deputy-lieu- 
 tenant for Sussex, the collaborateur of Bishop 
 Colenso, and a very intimate acquaintance of my 
 uncle during many years, served in his boyhood as 
 a page at the Court of Louis XVIII. AVhen he 
 was quite a young man, he went on a surveying 
 expedition in Canada, and used to say that for 
 seven years he never slept in a bed. His father had
 
 104 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 considerable property in Brighton, including the 
 ground on which Mahomet's Bath stood. That was 
 the earliest Turkish bath, I believe, in England. Our 
 acquaintance, Walter Keating Kelly, in his Syria 
 and the Holy Land, 1843, gives a very graphic 
 account of one which he experienced in the East. 
 Scott and the late Emperor Napoleon TIL, who were 
 of the same age, acted as squires to Lord Gage at the 
 Eglinton Tournament. 
 
 I used to see JMr. Scott occasionally, when I 
 happened to Ije at Ramsgate, and was instrumental 
 in procuring for the London Library in St. James's 
 Square a considerable number of pamphlets on theo- 
 logical topics, printed by Mr. Reynell. He told me 
 that it would scarcely be credited to what a large 
 extent the clergy '>vas really at one with him, and 
 how many correspondents he had among members of 
 the Establishment, who desired to express to him 
 their concurrence in his views, and at the same time 
 to keep their names out of print from fear of losing 
 their preferments. 
 
 Henry Byron, father of Henry James Byron the 
 dramatist, was on the Morning Post, and secretary 
 of the Conservative Association. He had married 
 Josepliine Bradley, daughter of a medical man at 
 Buxton, whom with his wife I have often met, and 
 an extremely attractive woman, who played and sang 
 well. Young Byron, when he left school, w^as in- 
 tended to take up his grandfather's profession. I 
 knew him when we were lads togetlier, and his father 
 lived in a small house near Eaton Square. Henry 
 Byron, who was related to the poet, had been a 
 College man, and had squandered a fortune. He 
 obtained a consular appointment in later life. 
 
 The elder Byron was a most genial fellow, and 
 a thorough gentleman by breeding and instinct ; but 
 he was deplorably insincere, and that defect was
 
 OUR BROMPTON FRIENDS 105 
 
 doubtless aggravated by his straitened circumstances 
 and his fondness for httle dinners and other sweet 
 impoverishments. I remember that we generally 
 knew when the Ryrons of Pimlico were expecting 
 friends to dinner, as an application for a loan of wine, 
 if not of other accessories, was at the last almost a 
 matter of course. A\'^hen he obtained his appoint- 
 ment, he proposed to requite my father's manifold 
 kindness by an early consignment of choice cigars and 
 preserved ortolans, which never presented tliemselves. 
 Nor did we expect them. 
 
 The dramatic bias of Byron betrayed itself at a 
 very precocious age. He used, almost as a schoolboy 
 at St. Peter's, to compose scenes, and, like a second 
 JNloliere, recite them before his father's cook when 
 Mv. and ]Mrs. Byron were out. From the date 
 of his father's departure for Hayti till his own 
 marriage and settlement in Brompton, I saw nothing 
 of him. The last glimpse which I had had was as a 
 medical student with a practitioner near Westbourne 
 Grove. It was of the latter individual that he quoted 
 the joke about the boiled rice on two successive days 
 for dinner, and his principal's exclamation : " What ! 
 boiled rice again ! How we do live ! " 
 
 Subsequently to Byron and myself resuming our 
 intercourse, in direct consequence of our accidental 
 meeting one day in 1858 near the Queen's Elm, I 
 probably saw more of him than anyone till within 
 a few years of his death, when certain private circum- 
 stances produced an estrangement. But during a 
 long succession of years I had the good fortune to 
 enjoy his society and conversation, and I affirm tliat, 
 while I knew Byron, I owed to him some of the 
 pleasantest days of my life, and that in losing him 
 I lost that which it was out of my power to replace. 
 
 The evenings which he and myself had together 
 at Brompton and in Doughty Street proved to me
 
 lOG THE HAZLITTS 
 
 his inexhaustible store of humour and fun, and that 
 his productions for the stage and the press were very 
 inferior to his real powers of talk and aptitude for 
 repartee. His remarks and his anecdotes, unlike 
 tliose of duller men, were diverting and racy without 
 being coarse ; and I believe that if his training had 
 been better, and his mind more balanced, he might 
 have shone in the most briUiant society. The lax 
 and corrupt school into which he was brought by his 
 choice of a dramatic and theatrical career exercised 
 the most pernicious influence on a not very staunch 
 character. Tlie environments of the theatres and 
 the seductions of the green-room sapped his morals 
 and his health. He had eloped with a young lady 
 belonging to a family of good standing in Wales ; 
 they were married at St. Pancras Church in London. 
 He took her to be an heiress. At all events she was 
 a lady, and his professional circle was at first not par- 
 ticularly congenial. But one hardens to one's lot. 
 
 At Doughty Street I met Sothern and his wife, 
 Mrs. Cliarles Mathews, Edward and Albert Levi, 
 Arthur Sketchley, Tom llobertson, Mary Wilton, 
 Bancroft, and many others. It was the house 
 associated with Byron's most prosperous period and 
 with his unliappy downfall through the Liverpool 
 speculation. The Levis were the sons of Joseph 
 Moses Levi, who was at one time a very small 
 printer in Fleet Street. He published a sixpenny 
 series of Tales, including Joan of Naples, for which 
 he paid my father as the translator £7, 10s. I 
 recollect Mr. Levi handing me the sum on my 
 father's account, and I likcAvise call to mind a small 
 trait of the same gentleman when he was proprietor 
 of the Daily Telegi'aph, namely, his aversion to 
 tautology. He must have emphasized this senti- 
 ment to lead Byron to mention it to me. The Levis 
 were long on the most cordial terms with my friend.
 
 OUR BROMPTON FRIENDS 107 
 
 While Byron, Arthur Sketchley, and myself 
 were once at early dinner, an area sneak found his 
 way to the kitchen window, and made off with the 
 silver teapot and some spoons. It was very droll 
 to watch Byron, with his tall, slim figure, and 
 George Rose (Sketchley's real name), a very Falstaff, 
 pursuing the thief into the neighbouring square, and 
 picking up the spoons, which the fellow dropped 
 one by one, to enable him to secure the teapot, 
 at all events. But he was overtaken. A second 
 incident occurred one day just before dinner. There 
 was a roast fowl, and the servant, in bringing it into 
 the room, tripped over something and shot the fowl 
 into the apartment in front of her. 
 
 Byron's earliest acknowledged theatrical flame 
 was the accomplished lady once known far and wide 
 as JMiss Woolgar. It was a lad's fancy for a woman 
 considerably his senior, and the passion, such as it 
 was, was quenched by the mortifying discovery that 
 his goddess was in reality a married person playing 
 under her maiden name — in fact, that she was the 
 wife of Alfred Mellon. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Bancroft were architects of their 
 own fortune. He was a provincial adventurer 
 named Butterworth, who originally took the name 
 of Bancroft-Bancroft, and whom Byron brought 
 from Liverpool to the Prince of Wales's Theatre, 
 formerly the Queens Dusthole, when it was first 
 opened under the joint management of Byron and 
 Mary Wilton. Bancroft, although barely tolerable 
 in private life as I saw him on his first settlement 
 in London, made a very gentlemanly and careful 
 performer on the boards. I have not set eyes on 
 him for half a lifetime ; they tell me that he is not 
 easily mistaken in the street, and that the gamins 
 know him. 
 
 Mary Wilton, I heard from Byron, who was
 
 108 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 very intimate with her through their theatrical 
 companionship, and called her indifferently Mary 
 and Jfllfo/i, was said to be the daughter of strolling 
 players ; her mother was, I heard, a laundress. 
 A\'hat the real name was, I know not. I knew 
 nothing of her till through his association with the 
 Strand Theatre I saw her in his burlesques, where 
 she was very much applauded for her success in 
 the breakdonnis. I recollect her retrousse nose, her 
 very curtailed petticoats, and her saucy carriage. 
 Quantum mutata ! A neighbour of mine at Barnes 
 met her and her husband at Lucerne some years 
 since. She told him that she had sent one of her 
 sons to Eton, and she complained of the rather 
 severe discipline. 
 
 Robertson, author of several well-known Society 
 pieces, attracted notice as a playwright at last ; but 
 his fortunes had been sadly checkered, and his 
 success came too late to be of much service to 
 him. When his comedy of Ours was in course of 
 performance at the Prince of AVales's Theatre, the 
 name was posted up all over the neighbourhood, 
 and some Frenclimen went, thinking it was an 
 exhibition of bears. 
 
 Poor fellow ! when his first wife was dying, he 
 could scarcely buy her necessaries. He was a very 
 quiet, unpretentious man, who struck a successful 
 line in the drama : but I apprehend that his work 
 will not live. His sister married a gentleman, who 
 assumed the theatrical name of Kendal. I never 
 met her. 
 
 When Byron and I have been together talking 
 over things, putting matters in queer lights, or doing 
 a little quiet scandal about common acquaintance, 
 we have sometimes become so convulsed with 
 laughter that we have been scarcely able to keep 
 our feet. It was a favourite trick to pace up and
 
 OUR BROMPTON FRIENDS 109 
 
 down the room while we talked, and often he took 
 one side and I the other. He was thorouohly 
 honourable, thoiif^'h extravagant and unbusinesslike. 
 When his affairs were on the drift, and he was short 
 of money, I offered to lend him a considerable sum ; 
 but he declined to take it, not being certain whether 
 he should have it in his power to repay me. He 
 proposed as a motto for the booking-office at the 
 Prince of Wales's, " So much for I^ooking 'm." 
 
 JNIy old friend was a lover of good things in a 
 convivial sense as well as otherwise, and keenly 
 enjoyed his meals when there was anything to his 
 liking on the table. I once impudently suggested 
 that the family motto, instead of Crede Byron, should 
 be Greedy Hyron. On the other hand, from my 
 fondness for that article of diet, he nicknamed me 
 Bread. 
 
 Byron amused me by his description of his inter- 
 views with old INIr. Swanborough, who was stone deaf. 
 The two sat at opposite sides of a table, and Byron, 
 having provided himself with a series of small slips 
 of paper, had to do his part of the conversation by 
 writing down what he had to say, and passing the 
 memorandum over to the manager. Swanborough 
 read it, and replied orally ; but sometimes, when the 
 topic under discussion involved a serious divergence 
 of opinion, the singular medley of WTitten and verbal 
 dialogue became more and more animated, till the 
 dramatist exhausted his stock of material and his 
 companion grew breathless with excitement and 
 indignant gesticulation. Byron, however, main- 
 tained his amicable relations with the Strand during 
 many years, and it was the scene of some of his 
 earliest successes. 
 
 He was mentioning one day at dinner that he 
 had met the manager of the Surrey Theatre. This 
 was when his pieces were commanding high figures.
 
 no THE HAZLITTS 
 
 or bringing him in a splendid royalty. The manager 
 said that he should be very happy to arrange for 
 something. B. : " ^Vell, it's only a question of 
 price. How much do you give ? " *' Well," replied 
 Manager, " I have given £5." B. : " Oh, don't let 
 me rob you of all that money, my boy." 
 
 Byron, being at Plymouth, meets an acquaint- 
 ance weak in his mastery of a certain letter of the 
 alphabet. Friend: "I've just been trotting round the 
 O." B. : *' I advise you to trot round the H. next." 
 
 I was told a story about a barn-stormer who used 
 to make the round of the out-of-the-way Scotish 
 towns and play the regular pieces, not forgetting 
 Hamlet. He and his company were so successful 
 that they ventured at last to raise the tariff from 
 threepence to sixpence, when the Prince of Denmark 
 was put upon the stage. The audience was, of 
 course, rather dissatisfied and mutinous, and after 
 the performance, says Sandy to Jock : " Wall, an' 
 what did ye think of it ? " " Wall," says Jock, " it 
 war })ratty well, but war not a saxpenny Hamlet.'' 
 
 Someone having been sent up into the gallery of 
 a theatre where Nelly Farren was playing in Cupid 
 and Psiiche, to test the acoustic properties of the 
 building for her voice, heard two men debating the 
 signification of the title of the piece and the proper 
 mode of pronouncing the name ; one said to tlie 
 other: "It's Cupid and Zych, you know; you must 
 pronounce it like :: in zinc." 
 
 Iking very behindhand with some piece he had 
 undertaken to write for one of the theatres, Byron was 
 waited on by the lessee. The latter complaining of 
 delay, Byron assured liim tliat he had begun the 
 production, and shewed him a sheet of paper on 
 which was written Act /., Scene 1. 
 
 As in the case of Henry Holl and so many others, 
 the .special characteristics of Byron were purely
 
 OUR BROMPTON FRIENDS 111 
 
 personal. He was in a certain sense the first and 
 the last of his family. He had a daughter, however, 
 who married Major Seton. She was telling me one 
 day that Lord Byron called at Colonel Byron's while 
 she was staying there to ask the Colonel or one of 
 his sisters what relation he was to the poet of the 
 same name, in case he should be questioned. 
 
 Byron and myself happened to bring out a novel 
 concurrently. His was called CyriVn Success. It was 
 in 1865. We both knew an editor very well, and 
 I applied to that gentleman for leave to review my 
 friend's book, and he to review mine. We were 
 mutually encomiastic — too much so, I fear. Gentle 
 reader, if you have not yet printed anything, be sure, 
 before you do, that you engage your critics, and see 
 that they are perfect in their parts. Of course, they 
 must all be friendly, but their friendliness has to 
 be adroitly varied, and even to be thinly sprinkled 
 with guarded qualification, for that evinces a dis- 
 criminating vein and the hand of a man whom money 
 will not buy. I am rather proud to be able to say 
 that this was the sole occasion on which I thus 
 compromised myself. It is a common practice, 
 however, and probably has long been so. But the 
 bespoken criticism is, as a rule, a sad traitor and 
 tell-tale. Mrs. Garrick said that her husband always 
 wrote the reviews of his own performances. 
 
 When Byron brought out his Robinson Crusoe, 
 he had a little difficulty with one of the lady artistes, 
 ISliss Sophia Larkin, because the latter had a part 
 assigned to her (that of the mariner of York himself) 
 which required her investiture in tights, and the fair 
 performer was not too slight in figure. There was 
 some fun over the matter at the time, but Miss 
 Larkin pulled through — the tights and the part. 
 The author was immensely tickled, however, when 
 his buxom Crusoe presented herself for approval.
 
 112 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 The remarkable gancheries about persons who 
 were till yesterday, so to speak, among us, only 
 become amusing from their preposterous character. 
 The son of a publisher in Fleet Street, who had 
 something to do with Byron's literary productions, 
 when I asked him whether he had not frequently 
 seen him at his father's place of business, promptly 
 replied : " Yes ; he wTote the School fo?^ Scandal.'^ 
 
 One of the last sayings recorded of him was when 
 Hollingshead and one or two others were with him 
 in his bedroom, and John Coleman the actor asked 
 him if he was not the first Hamlet he ever saw. 
 " No," replied Byron, leaning on his arm in bed, 
 " you mistook me, John ; I said you were the worst.''' 
 
 I used now and then to venture at Byron's table 
 to edge in something of my own. When the ad- 
 vertisements of a now wellnigh forgotten public 
 character were placarded everywhere in the London 
 thoroughfares, I remarked that those were the Woodin 
 walls of old England. Woodin was for some time 
 the rage. He was to be seen at the Hall in King 
 \Villiam Street, Strand, where the Christy Minstrels 
 once performed, and where Toole's Theatre sub- 
 sequently stood. 
 
 I recollect that, when I did not wear a beard 
 or moustache, I informed Byron that I was in the 
 habit of using the razor without looking in the glass. 
 " Ah," said he, " one of these days you will come 
 across a thick hair, and find that you have cut ofT 
 your nose." He suggested that a good title for a 
 jest-book \\'ould be Broad Giins frovi Broad Stares. 
 We were staying in the vicinity together. 
 
 Neiglibours of l^yron's parents in the region 
 bordering on Sloanc Square, and equally a family 
 which my father knew through his association with 
 the press, were the IMcCabes. They were Irish folks 
 and Romanists, and had literary evenings, at which
 
 OUR BROMPTON FRIENDS 113 
 
 my father was occasionally present. He would say 
 that if he got McCabe on a theological point, and 
 fancied that he had him in a corner, his opponent 
 would always slip somehow between his legs. He 
 used to speak of this gentleman as Fatlier McCabe 
 or as the Patriarch of Pimlico ; I have understood 
 that he was officially known as the Reverend Father 
 Antony. Many years after Joseph JNIcCabe's retire- 
 ment to Ireland, he wrote to me personally to solicit 
 my aid in obtaining a publisher for a monograph 
 which lie had written on the Romano-British Emperor 
 Carausius. The work was scholarly enough, but the 
 topic was not judged to be saleable. 
 
 Two names intimately identified with our Bromp- 
 ton, and indeed Chelsea, life are those of Blanchard 
 and Keymer, families connected by marriage. Key- 
 mer lived at Kennington, opposite the Common, and 
 subsequently at Peckham Rye, and under his hospit- 
 able roof assembled Kenny Meadows, James Hannay, 
 F. G. Stephens, whom I so vividly remember in his 
 studio at Lupus Street, Pimlico, and many other 
 literary men and artists. Laman Blanchard, whose 
 sister INIargaret married Keymer, was annoyed at 
 being confounded with E. L. Blanchard the play- 
 wright, and the disapprobation was fully shared, I 
 believe, by the latter. Blanchard, whom we knew, 
 was desperately improvident and equally kind- 
 hearted. Once, coming home from a party in a cab 
 on a pouring night, he insisted on riding on the 
 box in his dress clothes, and gave all his available 
 cash between the driver and the toll-gate keeper. 
 
 Keymer's eldest daughter was the late iNIrs. 
 Charles Heaton, Editor of Cunningham's Lives of 
 the Painters. I saw a great deal of JNIary Maud 
 Keymer during many years, and her family had an 
 idea that I intended to propose marriage to her. 
 Indeed Edmund Blanchard, her cousin, mentioned 
 
 H
 
 114. THE HAZLITTS 
 
 one day semi - seriously that Keymer would be 
 bringing a fresh pair of candles some evening if I 
 remained so constant a visitor, and asking my vievv^s. 
 Possibly cousin Edmund had been laid on. 
 
 Meadows was a desperate stay-maker. He liked 
 his glass perliaps a little too well, and he had no 
 notion of hours. The Keymers often went to bed, 
 and left their guest to finish the bottle and find his 
 way out. Meadows was a fair designer, but had a 
 very poor idea of drawing. 
 
 There are many who look upon Roidcuid's Odonto 
 and 3Iacassa7' Oil as mere trade terms, but Alexander 
 Rowland and his wife lived at liCAvisham, and were 
 acquainted with the Keymers. He was a small man 
 and she a large lady. One night there was an alarm 
 of thieves, and the two got out of bed and proceeded 
 downstairs to reconnoitre, she leading the way, and 
 little Rowland bringing up the rear with the hem of 
 lier nightdress in his hand. The scene must have 
 been one calculated to disconcert the apprehended 
 invaders. 
 
 One of Charles I^amb's latest contributions to a 
 particular class of literature was written in Keymers 
 album, and after Lamb's death he sent an account to 
 Bernard Barton, wliich evoked a reply which has 
 been more tlian once printed. 
 
 At that time, what a neighbourhood it was ! All 
 the environs were unspoiled ; they had not been 
 .socialized ; Dulwich AV^ood liad not been desecrated. 
 Halliwell-Phillipps lived at Brixton Rise, Ruskin 
 at Denmark Hill. City merchants chose these 
 southern suburbs for their residences, as they had 
 the northern a generation earlier. 
 
 After leaving the Elepliant and Castle, one was 
 not long in reaching a district fairly free from the 
 ravages of tlie builder. Kennington, Brixton, Forest 
 Hill, Camberwell, Peckham, Peckham Rye, Clapham,
 
 OUR BROMPTON FRIENDS 115 
 
 Stockwell, Walworth, were more or less absolutely 
 rural. Walworth had a large common in 1787, 
 eventually, after severe litigation, covered with 
 houses. At Kennington were the premises of 
 William INlalcolm, Nursery, Seedsman, and Ground- 
 workman. He subsequently removed to Stockwell. 
 1851 marked the first notable and uninterrupted 
 progress toward the sacrifice of the suburbs to the 
 exigencies of an increasing population. Malcolm, 
 of whom there is a MS. biography by his son 
 among the Forsyth papers, was an Aberdeen- 
 shire man, and had originally served with Lee 
 of Hammersmith. He set up for himself in 1755. 
 Among his visitors were Sir Joseph Banks and 
 Dr. Solander ; and both he and his son James, 
 who succeeded him in 1802, and was living in 
 1835, were personages held in the highest esteem.
 
 VIII 
 
 THE OLD ACTORS AT BROMPTON AND A 
 
 FEW OTHERS 
 
 Among the actors who formerly made Old Brompton 
 their home from its rural attractions, which recom- 
 mended it to them, or otherwise, was John Reeve, 
 who lived in Brompton Row, and who was long 
 remembered at the Adelphi in the Commissariat; 
 Liston, who had one of the smaller houses, after- 
 ward for years in Chancery, in St. George's Ter- 
 race, opposite Hyde Park ; JNIr. and INIrs. Keeley, 
 the Buckstones, the Farrens, JNIathews the younger, 
 who had a place in large grounds in Gore Lane, and 
 Edward Wright. Reeve, who died in 1838, lies in 
 Brompton churchyard. I have noted above the con- 
 nection of Mrs. Chatterton with Brompton Square 
 after her marriage to Place, the literary tailor 
 who resided in Brompton Square, where Sir John 
 Stoddart spent his last days. The Earl of Carlisle, 
 whose name is associated with the Russell, Grey, 
 and ^Nlinto set, is said to have resembled Liston ; 
 they were botli remarkable for their plainness. 
 
 The Keeleys were familiar figures in Brompton 
 in my boyliood, and Mrs. Keeley long survived her 
 husband. The last time I met them was in Bromp- 
 ton Row, and my impression was that they were 
 even then — it is sixty years ago — pretty old. But 
 young people have that sort of notion about their 
 seniors, where the difference is sometimes not so very 
 considerable. This distinguished couple belonged to 
 
 110
 
 THE OLD ACTORS xVT BROMPTON 117 
 
 an epoch which can never return or be so much as 
 reahzed by those who did not form part of it either 
 personally or by direct tradition. Such as had the 
 privilege of intimacy with Keeley or his wife might 
 listen to their account of the stage as they found it — 
 as it was when Hazlitt uTote. 
 
 I have personally known three generations of 
 Farren. The original WiUiam Farren lived, when I 
 first remember him, in Brompton Square. He was 
 a man of the most gentlemanly appearance and 
 address, and his wife was a handsome and showy 
 woman. My father, when he lived at Thurloe 
 Place, got into trouble by asking the Durrant 
 Coopers to meet them at dinner. Farren excelled 
 in old men's parts. 1 saw him in Grandfather 
 AYhitehead, the character he was playing at the 
 Strand when he was seized with a fit. His son 
 Henry, who died young, took the same sort of 
 business, when he was hardly more than twenty. 
 His other son William, who cut a sorry figure 
 when he first came on the boards, eventually be- 
 came a finished and delightful artist. My uncle 
 Reynell told me that the elder Farren was con- 
 sidered very fine as Dr. Primrose in the Vicar of 
 Wakefield. 
 
 It was Durrant Cooper, the Sussex antiquary, 
 and his amiable sister, who met the Farrens on 
 the occasion just alluded to, and the former was 
 scandalized at having to sit down at table, or at 
 his sister having to do so, with — well, it was a 
 case, as rumour went, of Bonaparte and Josephine, 
 according to Talleyrand's mot, over again, and per- 
 haps with no better foundation. Farren and his 
 wife were a remarkably majestic couple. It is a 
 lifetime since, yet I retain their appearance dis- 
 tinctly. Child as I was, I thought the Coopers too 
 squeamish; perhaps it was because my parents did so.
 
 118 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Cooper had been solicitor to the Reform Club, but 
 proved too porous. He was a lamentable chatter- 
 box, and some of his ccuiards were excruciating, but 
 a thoroughly good-hearted fellow and an excellent 
 local archaeologist. One of Cooper's tales for the 
 INlarines was about the late Prince Consort. He 
 made out that Queen \^ictoria, when Her INlajesty 
 found her husband stopping out late rather fre- 
 quently, put her royal foot down, and declared that 
 she would not permit him to go so often to that 
 Mr. Cooper's in Bloom sbury. 
 
 The Coopers were folks of the good old kind sort, 
 in spite of Currant's more or less venial foibles. Of his 
 sister Lucy Anne I cherish a most pleasant boyish re- 
 collection. They long continued to be familiar faces 
 at Henley annual regatta. This gave me as a lad, 
 taken with the ^'old fender in the drawing-room, at 
 their house in Guildford Street, Russell Square, an 
 impression of their being rather wealthy ; and the 
 idea gained additional vigour from the alleged owner- 
 ship (for ocular evidence I had not) by dear Lucy 
 Anne of certain family jewelry, which she repre- 
 sented to my mother, even when she had attained, 
 as it seemed to me, womanhood, that she was too 
 young to wear. I must have reached the ripe age 
 of ten (1844), when 1 was taken by the Coopers to 
 a juvenile party at their relations', the Henry 
 Coopers, in Camden Town, and 1 recall the long 
 drive through ill-lighted thoroughfares to a neigh- 
 bourhood, which had not yet been deflowered of 
 all its verdant glory, of all its loveable quiet. 
 
 Cooper once asserted that he had seen fourteen 
 cuckoos perched on one bough of a tree, prepared 
 to leave the country for a warmer climate. Some 
 good peo])le may be of opinion that the utterer of 
 such fibs deserved to go to a warmer climate himself. 
 1 recollect him telling me that Sir George Beaumont
 
 THE OLD ACTORS AT BROMPTOX 119 
 
 had once asked him to put his leg across a certain 
 horse, in order to give him the benefit of his opinion. 
 C. might have found it as difficult as Mr. AVinkle 
 did, as he was pursy to a fault, and I never heard of 
 him having anything to do with horseflesh. 
 
 William Farren the younger, as we used to call 
 him, succeeded in keeping or recovering some of 
 the property left by his father, and latterly per- 
 formed only very occasionally, or for benefits. He 
 formed a plan one autumn for revisiting Italy, when 
 an offer or proposal arrived from one of the theatres, 
 inviting him to take his favourite part in Holcroft's 
 Road to Ruin. He wrote back, asking, as his 
 daughter told me, exorbitant terms, in the hope 
 that the manager might decline, and he might go 
 abroad. But I believe that he was disappointed. 
 
 Farren resembled, in the extraordinary change 
 which occurred in the public estimation of his power 
 and value as an actor, a second distinguished 
 theatrical character of our time, the so-called Sir 
 Henry Irving, than whom any one more desperately 
 hopeless at the outset probably never trod the stage, 
 and who at first cannot have been much of a bargain 
 at 30s. a week. But the comparison ends with the 
 broad circumstances ; for Farren rose by unassisted 
 ability and genius, while Irving seems to have owed 
 his triumph to collateral auspices and the happy 
 (not new) idea of making his pieces spectacularly 
 attractive and accurate — accurate, so far as his 
 knowledge permitted. Irving was not very well 
 advised in his presentments, which are, of course, 
 useful to make out any shortcomings in strict 
 dramatic art. The popular ideas, or want of ideas, 
 on certain theatrical subjects may answer for a 
 Covent Garden or Drury Lane pantomime ; but 
 ^\hen a manager aspires to classical propriety, we 
 expect something rather better.
 
 120 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Benjamin Webster and John Pritt Harley were 
 both inhabitants of Bell and Horns Lane. The 
 former had a house in that portion which was de- 
 molished to widen the thorouglifare opposite the 
 Kensington JMuseum. Harley lived in one lower 
 down on the same side of the way, facing the 
 site of Thurloe Square. He had quitted the stage 
 before my time, l3ut I recollect AVebster both at 
 the Adelphi and Hay market. He was in his true 
 element in melodrama, and might have done in- 
 finitely better if he had never deserted his old 
 quarters in the Strand. I retain in my mind a 
 trivial incident about Harley. Some street musicians 
 played before his house, to his infinite annoyance, 
 and when they asked the servant for a douceur^ 
 Harlej^ desired to see them personally. They 
 were not pleased when he, in response to their 
 appeal, explained his idea that they had come to 
 apologize. 
 
 Barham in his sketches of the Garrick Club, 
 speaks of Harley as " a very respectable man in 
 private life, of quiet gentlemanly manners, and 
 possessed of a handsome fortune." He adds that 
 he first saw him on the stage at Canterbury, where 
 he took a very subordinate part, about 1806, and 
 that his fatlier was a shopkeeper in Sydney's Alley, 
 Leicester Square. He was a bachelor, and main- 
 tained his motlier and sister.^ 
 
 When AVebster brought out 31 ante Cristo at the 
 Adelphi, it was thought, as his daughter had married 
 Mr. Edward Levi, son of the proprietor of the 
 Daihj Telegraph, that a good lift might be fairly 
 looked for in that quarter. Sala was sent to notice 
 it, and the critufLe was anxiously expected. The 
 next morning a most elaborate and characteristic 
 
 ' See a letter from C. Lamh in 1820 to Harley. {Letters, ed, by 
 Hazlitt, ii. .'315^.)
 
 THE OLD ACTORS AT BROMPTON 121 
 
 account of Dumas, pcre et fils, their various works, 
 their careers, and so forth, running to two or three 
 columns, appeared in the Telegnq)}^ and at the 
 very end tliere was a casual announcement that 
 Mr. Webster had recently produced a drama on 
 the romance of Monte Crista. 
 
 Webster was a liberal, kind-hearted man. When 
 Dion Boucicault was once on the eve of starting 
 for America, he went to him, and asked him to 
 advance him £100 on a manuscript play he brought 
 with him. Webster did so, and did not discover, 
 till his good friend had gone, tliat only the title-leaf 
 was filled in. Boucicault was a natural son of Dr. 
 Dionysius Lardner, and I conclude that his own 
 full name was Dionysius. 
 
 Webster died poor, yet it used to be averred that 
 at more than one period of his career he might have 
 retired with an ample fortune. 
 
 Another resident at Brompton was Mr. Francis 
 Fladgate, a barrister, and a committee-man on the 
 Garrick Club. Barham says of him that " he was 
 one of the most polished gentlemen and good-natured 
 persons I ever met." F.'s father was a solicitor in 
 Essex Street, and left him nearly £G0,000, much of 
 which he lost in various ways. 
 
 In a note from Buckstone to my father he men- 
 tions the Crimson Hei^mit as a piece which the 
 latter had recommended to his notice. The title is 
 suggestive of the Coburg or the Surrey, or even of 
 the meridian of Shoreditch. It was beyond doubt 
 abundantly sensational and sanguinary — perhaps 
 rather too much so for the Theatre Royal, Hay- 
 market. 
 
 It must have struck many besides myself that the 
 parts in which Buckstone appeared were mere noms 
 de theatre. His acting was essentially personal. 
 He performed under a variety of designations, but
 
 122 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 it was always Buckstone under an alias: the same 
 voice, the same gestures, the same mannerism. He 
 never threw himself into a part, or realized to the 
 spectators any character but his own ; and if he is 
 remembered as having excelled in anything, I take 
 it to be the case that it was a creation which fairly 
 suited his style, and in which he could not perpe- 
 trate any serious impropriety. 
 
 The short-skirt movement in the ballet and ex- 
 travaganza under the auspices of Vestris at the 
 Lyceum, and during Buckstone's management at the 
 Haymarket in Miss Priscilla Horton's palmy days, 
 made considerable progress just before the period 
 when the burlesque came so much into vogue, with 
 its supremely offensive and silly impersonations of 
 female characters by men. The abridged petticoats 
 of the ladies proceeded, no doubt, to an intolerable 
 pitch ; and they tried, as Byron said, to outstrip 
 one another. Speaking of Menken, he remarked 
 that her costume began too late and ended too 
 soon, and with more particular reference to his 
 Mazcppa, he calculated her toilet in the first act 
 at thousands, and in the third, where she is lashed 
 to the wild steed of the desert, at 4jd. 
 
 The Spanish Dancers made their debut at the 
 Haymarket about sixty years since, and I, as a mere 
 spectator, was very agreeably impressed by their 
 graceful and restrained action, shewing the com- 
 patibility of this class of art with decorum. 
 
 Buckstone was very deaf, and his son, who lived 
 under the same roof with him in Brompton Square, 
 inlnerited the infirmity. Such as were familiar with 
 the men will appreciate the oddity of the two Buck- 
 stones conversing and shouting at each other, each 
 in turn with his hand to his ear to catch what the 
 other said. There was a tremendous fuss one day, 
 because the younger 13uckstone had given a cabman
 
 THE OLD ACTORS AT BROMPTOX 123 
 
 half a sovereign instead of sixpence. The family- 
 hardness of hearing would contribute something. 
 The son had at one time an engagement under his 
 father at the Haymarket. 
 
 I was once taken by my father to Richmond 
 Lodge, Putney, where Mrs. Fitzwilliam lived under 
 Buckstone's protection. It was a low - pitched 
 bungalow house, lying back from the road, just 
 before you came to the Arab Boy ; it has long been 
 pulled down to make room for a row of modern 
 buildings of the common stereotyped character. 
 There were in 1909 those still living who remember 
 Fitzwilliam, the lady's husband, who acquired a 
 certain popularity as a comic performer. 
 
 The very first time I was behind the scenes at 
 any theatre was at the performance for Jerrold's 
 benefit at the Olympic, when I saw Mrs. Fitzwilliam 
 and Madame A^estris. I went behind once or twice 
 during Byron's management of the Prince of 
 Wales's ; but I found the practice rather dis- 
 illusionizing. There Avas, of course, a wonderful 
 contrast between what Madame Vestris had been, 
 and what she became in old age. Byron went to 
 see her toward the last at the house called Holcrofts 
 at Fulham, and found her darning Charles Mathews's 
 stockings. 
 
 They were both mournfully extravagant creatures, 
 and had run through a fortune — or two. The second 
 Mrs. Mathews, whom I met at Doughty Street, 
 tried hard to induce her husband to economize. 
 The very last time I saw him was in Sotheran's 
 in the Strand. He was as jaunty as could be, with 
 his cigar in his mouth and the old gay swagger; it 
 cannot have been long before his death. 
 
 A near neighbour of my uncle Reynell, while he 
 was in Brompton Vale, was Edward AVright, the 
 eminent Adelphi comedian, whose name used to be
 
 124 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 so much coupled with that of Paul Bedford. The 
 AVrights and Reynells became very intimate, and 
 the friendship even survived the lifetime of Wright 
 himself. He afterward removed to INIerton Villa at 
 Chelsea, and I have often seen him standing at the 
 corner, in the King's Road, waiting for the omnibus. 
 During a length of years he was paramount at the 
 Adelplii, and excelled in farce and melodrama. 
 Bedford and he generally played together, and 
 ^Vright saved money, which partly disappeared in 
 bricks and mortar (his ■ besetting sin) and partly 
 through legal channels. 
 
 AVright belonged to the school of Liston, Robson, 
 Toole, and Buckstone, but was unlike them all. He 
 was a genuine personality, and could hold the 
 Adelphi audience in the hollow of his hand. He 
 had only to shew half his inimitable face, and the 
 house was convulsed. Bedford and he. Celeste and 
 Webster, went far to make the Adelphi what it was 
 in the days of the Wreck AsJiore and the Green 
 
 JNIy uncle Reynell had a strong distaste for the 
 clergy, and particularly for Dean Close, who at the 
 time I mention — the fifties — was making himself 
 very prominent. One day, while Mr. Reynell lived 
 at Putney in the High Street, the servant opened 
 the door of the room where he sat, and announced 
 that Dean Close had called, and desired to see him. 
 She was told to say that her master was engaged, but 
 the Dean pushed his way in, and found my uncle, 
 who at once recognized Edward Wright. Wright 
 had come to ask him to drive over with him to see 
 his new house at Kingston. The Reynells, who knew 
 the Wrights most intimately, gave an amusing 
 account of the actor's visits to Kingston, while he 
 was putting up his house there, in which he never 
 lived : the makeshift schemes for securing provisions,
 
 THE OLD ACTORS AT BROMPTON 125 
 
 and the active participation of Wright, whose droll 
 countenance and humorous gesture lent an almost 
 comic character to the scene. A\'right very often 
 went down after the play there. He died, leaving 
 the costly hobby incomplete. 
 
 Lester Wallack is not much remembered by the 
 playgoers of our day ; but in the once favourite 
 melodrama of Don Cesar de Bazan, when he sup- 
 ported the chief part, he was thought unsurpassed. 
 I have seen him more than once at the Haymarket 
 in that piece, and vividly retain the song, accom- 
 panied by the guitar, wliere the disguised brigand 
 reveals himself to the terrified lieroine. 
 
 They at present produce j^antomimes year by 
 year at the houses with names which are little more 
 than clothes-pegs. Puss in Boots, Cinderella, A laddin, 
 Robinson Crusoe, Ali Baba, are mere noms de guerre. 
 There is scarcely any of the true comic element left ; 
 they are pieces of spectacular incongruity, setting at 
 defiance all known or accepted facts. But these 
 meretricious shows seem to appeal successfully to 
 uncritical sightseers. The earliest thing of the kind 
 I can call to mind was at Co vent Garden. It was 
 Robinson Crusoe, where the curtain rose to a view 
 of the ship, occupying the whole of the stage, and 
 the hero the only person seen. The serious piece of 
 the evening was Balfe's Bohemian Girl. 
 
 Many of these theatrical celebrities were, we thus 
 see, associated with Old Brompton, Kensington, or 
 Chelsea, and it was an every-day occurrence to meet 
 some of them walking to town in the forenoon on 
 their way to rehearsal, or in the sixpenny omnibus 
 proceeding to the business of the evening. I am 
 also speaking of a period when theatres were few, 
 and when Sadler's Wells was very little frequented 
 by West-Enders, while the Theatre Royal, Shore- 
 ditch, might have as well been in Tasmania. But
 
 126 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 the Adelphi, Surrey, and Astley's were great houses 
 for certain specialities. 
 
 I accompanied my father as a boy to see at 
 St. James's Tlieatre two very dissimilar entertain- 
 ments, the French Plays, where Lablache, Lemaitre, 
 Achard, Cartigny, and other artists, made their first 
 appearance before a London audience, and the 
 Ethiopian Serejiadcrs, the prototype of Christy s 
 Minstrels. Grisi I never heard, and I mention her, 
 because I believe that she was among the eminent 
 residents in Old Brompton in my boyhood. 
 
 Comparatively limited, however, as the theatres 
 were in number, some of them were often let, faute 
 cle mieiLV, for conjuring and other miscellaneous 
 purposes. M. Philippe, at the St. James's, was the 
 first conjurer I ever saw. Do 1 not recollect the 
 sugar-plums, which he distributed among the occu- 
 pants of the boxes ? 
 
 AVhen we were in Brompton, either at Alfred or 
 Prospect Place, the Kenneys lived in South Street, 
 Alexander Square. Mrs. Kenney was a daughter of 
 Mercier, author of the Tableau de Paris. 1 thought 
 her, when I was a boy, a good old soul, and she was 
 always very kind. I shall never forget that she once 
 gave me a sovereign. AVe have heard of her good- 
 ness to the Lambs, when they were in France, and 
 Miss Lamb was so ill. 
 
 The name and fame of Kenney are at the present 
 moment chiefly identified with his Sweethearts and 
 Wives. He had married the widow of Holcroft, and 
 was a dramatist almost jure uxoris. When I saw 
 him he was sadly afflicted, and the household was 
 broken up by his death. All the members of the 
 family, including Mrs. Kenney, were delightful 
 associates, and accomplislied men and women. 
 
 James, the eldest son, was in the Post-Office, 
 and was a short, dark man, very pleasant and full
 
 THE OLD ACTORS AT BROMPTON 127 
 
 of anecdote, like his mother, but strangely choleric. 
 He had lodgings in an upper storey in the Strand 
 at one time, and owing to some squabble over the 
 tea-table threw a quartern loaf out of tlie window on 
 to the hat of a passer-by. His younger brother, 
 Charles Lamb Kenney, so-called after the essayist, 
 was a mercurial, hilarious fellow, who carried the 
 gaiyon into middle life. He used to prepare librettos 
 for the operas, and pretty indifferent they were. 
 The last time I saw him he dined at my father's 
 in Brompton, and my brother accompanied him to 
 the omnibus home. He could with difficulty be 
 restrained from climbing each lamp-post as he came 
 to it. 
 
 All the Kenneys shone in a particular sort of 
 conversation; they had mixed in very good society, 
 and in their company there was very slight risk of 
 not being entertained. They were all rather prone 
 to hyperbole, and the odd part was that each would 
 put you on your guard as to the propensity of the 
 rest in this direction. I cannot lay claim to having 
 known so many distinguished drawers of the long 
 bow as Swift, but I have had my fair and sufficing 
 experience. 
 
 Theresa Kenney, who became Madame Le Crol- 
 lier, mentioned to me that within her recollection 
 the bakeries of Paris in tlie early morning exhibited 
 the workers much in the same deshabille as they 
 appear in Lacroix ; ^ and she said that they would 
 knead the dough with their bare feet, as they press 
 the grapes and the apples (for cider) in some parts 
 of the Continent. 
 
 Louisa, another of ]\Irs. Kenney's daughters by 
 Holcroft, married as her second husband the Baron 
 de Merger, of Plessis Barbe, near Tours, and her 
 brother was settled at Tours itself as a civil engineer. 
 
 ^ Manirs et Usages, 1872, p. 113.
 
 128 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 I spent some time at the INIergers' in 1855 or there- 
 about, and I laid the opening scene of the ballad 
 of the Barons DaugJiter at the point where the 
 bridge spans the Loire by the city. On reaching 
 Tours I had to traverse about eighteen miles by 
 diligence, and I was apprehensive from the moun- 
 tain of luggage and the unwieldiness of the vehicle, 
 of being upset from one moment to another. We 
 had started from the hotel at Tours, where I was 
 strongly impressed by a pictorial advertisement 
 attached to a door of a prize-fight which had just 
 taken place between two women, the Amazons being 
 represented in full action and equal deshabille. 
 
 Madame Holcroft was an excellent type of the 
 French gentlewoman, and studied etiquette to an 
 extent which rather puzzled me as a youth. She set 
 me right when I once offered her my chair, and 
 when I was staying the night there, and we were 
 leaving the house together, she almost immediately 
 bowed to me, it not being in form to be seen even 
 with a lad like myself. Conventionality could not 
 go much farther. ^Vas it not a sort of indelicacy ? 
 1 here first and last tasted black pudding, which was 
 made on tlie premises. A celebrated depot for this 
 dainty was in the last century Birch's in Cornhill. 
 Birch was on intimate terms with Dodd the player, 
 and it is related that he used to take away two (or 
 three) and only pay for one. I once took tea with 
 the Holcrofts in their bed-room, and it impressed me 
 powerfully to notice that her bed and his were on 
 opposite sides of the door. 
 
 De Merger's fatlier had been in the service of 
 the great Napoleon, and had been invited by him 
 to become one of his aides-de-camp, but he declined. 
 His son used to tell me how the Emperor never 
 met the elder Merger without saying to him : " Ah, 
 M. Merger, why would you not become my aide-de-
 
 THE OLD ACTORS AT BROMPTON 129 
 
 camp ? " In the Memoirs of Holer oft there is a note 
 from the Marquis de Dampierre to him, 6th October 
 1792, introducing INIerger, then a youth and probably 
 already a subaltern in the army of the Republic. 
 
 My host spoke very fair English. I suppose that 
 it was hot, thirsty weather when I was at the chateau, 
 but I have in my remembrance the Baron's dis- 
 interested counsel to me on sanitary grounds never 
 to swallow down too much claret, but to moisten 
 the lips and throat with it. I had contracted the 
 tertian ague during a previous visit to the Nether- 
 lands, and had a recurrence of it here. De Merger 
 cured me with a tasteless coffee-coloured tisane, in 
 which the leading ingredient was the inner bark of 
 the elm. At another time, being with him in a field, 
 where his men were carrying clover, a grain made 
 its way into my eyelid, and the Baron at once took 
 off his first wife's wedding-ring, and, delicately intro- 
 ducing it beneath the lid, removed the obstruction. 
 We were altogether excellent friends, jNIerger and I. 
 I recollect that he used to send me into the garden 
 to pick the melon for our breakfast. 
 
 While I was at Plessis Barbe, I committed the 
 indiscretion of referring to myself or someone else 
 having the stomach-ache, and was rather sharply 
 reproved by the ladies. They did not give me credit 
 for understanding much French, and there was a 
 general laugh one day at dinner over the pets de 
 nonne, sl sort of soujiet, which formed one of the 
 sweets. 
 
 De Merger was in politics a Rouge, and belonged 
 to a very advanced political club at Tours, to which 
 he took me one evening, and where I was somewhat 
 uneasy, lest the police should pay us a visit. It was 
 the dawn of the Third Empire. In fact, he himself 
 was rather alarmed one day when a small detach- 
 ment of cavalry galloped over the bridge of the 
 
 I
 
 330 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 moat, and drew up in front of the house. He 
 imagined that the soldiers might have instructions 
 to arrest him as a malcontent. It turned out, how- 
 ever, that they had merely come to solicit a boire. 
 The view from the chateau was very extensive. My 
 entertainer looked after his property personally, 
 and had a kiln just outside the moat, where he made 
 his draining tiles. 
 
 Not so many years after, he, his wife, and his 
 only son and heir, Paul, died, and the property 
 passed to the Kenneys, I believe. From a con- 
 temporary memorandum I see that my travelling 
 expenses on my return home from the Mergers' to 
 Dover were 83 francs only, yet quite as much as my 
 father could then afford. 
 
 It was while I was in the West of France that 
 I first made an acquaintance with the illustrated 
 French literature of the Dumas type and period. 
 It was early in the fifties. Perhaps the most in- 
 teresting and remarkable books were Monte Cristo 
 and Henri Miirger's Semes de la Vie Bohemc, 
 1851, the former, of course, still well remem- 
 bered, but Miirger's admirable book only a few 
 years ago made familiar to the modern English 
 reader in a translation issued by the late Henry 
 Vizetelly, 
 
 The nearest approach to it that we have is Du 
 Mauri er's Trilbij, where his own student life and 
 that of some of his friends are evidently portrayed. 
 I think that I could fill in the names. Trilby her- 
 self is an idealized model, and the English writer's 
 altogether appears to be an inadequate translation 
 of the French " ensemble," the expression used when 
 a woman poses for the whole figure. 
 
 I hardly know whether it was through his contact 
 with the Kenneys, whose conversation was rather 
 Anglo- Gallic, that my father acquired the habit of
 
 THE OLD ACTORS AT BROMPTON 131 
 
 interlarding his sentences with scraps of French, or 
 whether it arose from his experience as a translator, 
 or both ; and I find myself a little prone to the same 
 practice, more especially in soliloquy. I have read 
 in my time an exceptional number of French books 
 of all kinds and periods. 
 
 Virginia Kenney, a daughter of Mrs. Kenney by 
 her final husband, married rather late in life Cox, 
 proprietor of the British Gallery in Pall Mall. This 
 person was very intimate with Joseph Gillott, the 
 Birmingham pen-manufacturer, whose collection of 
 paintings he assisted to form. I believe that Joe^ 
 as Cox called him, was largely instrumental in 
 building up the other's fortune. The contents of 
 the British Gallery were estimated by the owner 
 at £100,000 ; but when a day of adversity arrived, 
 and the property was sold, the public modified these 
 figures to a very serious extent. 
 
 Perhaps even prior to the Kenneys and others 
 whom I have mentioned as part and parcel of our 
 Old Brompton life, were the Bryans, who slightly 
 knew Hazlitt, and who were connected with the 
 Bedingfields of Stowmarket, in Suffolk, where I was 
 christened, one of the Bryans being a sponsor. This 
 was Dr. Edward Bryan, a man of considerable pro- 
 fessional and literary ability. When I was a boy, I 
 used to visit him at his rooms in Great Russell 
 Street, Bloomsbury, and he sometimes took me out 
 with him in his cab with the tiger behind — the boy 
 in livery so called. The doctor's cab with its hood 
 and tiger is a thing of the past. It was Dr. Bryan's 
 mother who wrote in 1836 those lines on Hazlitt, 
 printed before The Hazlitts, 1911. 
 
 There was another household of which we saw 
 some little about this time — that of Mr. Saxe 
 Bannister, who wrote the Life of Pater son, founder 
 of the Bank of England. Bannister had been
 
 132 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Attorney- General in one of our colonies, and was 
 a man with a grievance which, with Paterson and 
 teetotalism, absorbed his whole thought and con- 
 versation, and constituted, I believe, no inconsider- 
 able part of his estate. It was Paterson who 
 originated the Council of Trade and Plantations, 
 the prototype of the Board of Agriculture, which 
 Arthur Young, its other promoter, not improbably 
 conceived to be a novelty in our administrative 
 system. 
 
 The widow of Astor, of the Tottenham Court 
 Road, the pianoforte-maker, lived in Brompton 
 Crescent. One of her daughters was the second wife 
 of Mr. George Reynell of Kingston-on-Thames, my 
 maternal great-uncle. The Astors came from Wal- 
 dorf, near Heidelberg. The American millionaire, 
 .lohn .Jacob Astor, was a younger brother of this one, 
 wlio fitted him out when he went to America to 
 make, not seek, his fortune, which was largely due to 
 successful investments in land in or near New York. 
 Of this his sister-in-law assured my uncle Reynell, 
 when he once called on her at Brompton. John 
 Jacob Astor used to send his nephews and nieces in 
 England every year handsome presents. Consider- 
 ing his wealth, they were poor. Mrs. George 
 Reynell had an allowance of £200 or £300 a year ; 
 but she does not appear to have seen much of her 
 own family subsequently to her marriage, although 
 there was no objection to it, as far as I have 
 understood, on the Astors' side. They were then 
 comparatively obscure. Their eminence is purely 
 financial, like that of the Morgans and other Yankee 
 grandees. 
 
 Mrs. Reynell was a type of a fine old lady. 
 She sat bolt upright in her chair, and never lay on a 
 sofa or used an arm-chair. She always rose at eight. 
 She wrote every day to her step-daughter Mrs.
 
 THE OLD ACTORS AT BROMPTON 133 
 
 Fanny Room, and the latter to her.^ Of Mr. George 
 Reynell I cherish a very clear and agreeable impres- 
 sion, when he came to inquire for my father, suffer- 
 ing from an attack of brain fever, at our house in 
 Church Street, Chelsea, in 1848. His gracious air 
 of kind concern is still present to me, when I was 
 deputed to see him. He was not at all like his 
 brother my grandfather. 
 
 ^ I have always beeu au indifferent correspondent, but, Algernon 
 Black mentioning that when his wife and he were engaged, they wrote to 
 each other daily, I told him I nearly lost my wife, because I left her so 
 long without a letter from my reluctance to put pen to paper, that she 
 threatened to cancel the arrangement.
 
 IX 
 
 KENSINGTON AND THE ENVIRONS— THE 
 FULHAM CAUSERIES. 
 
 I HAVE not been a frequent remover. When I 
 quitted my father's house in Ovington Square, 
 Brompton, in 1862, my wife and I took lodgings in 
 Buckingham Street, Strand, whence I went into un- 
 furnished apartments at the house of Mr. Tilbury the 
 actor in Powis Place, Great Ormonde Street, who from 
 his habit of wearing a white neck-tie, used to be known 
 as the Rev. Mr. Tilbury. I was here five months, 
 when I took a house in Addison Road, Kensington. 
 
 Kensington, as I knew it about 1850, while I was 
 yet under my father's roof, was bounded to the east 
 by Kensington Gardens and westward by the bridge 
 spanning the canal, which ran between the Thames 
 and Bayswater, and which subsequently developed 
 into part of the metropolitan railway system, but was 
 originally nicknamed Pimclis Railway. I have rowed 
 on the canal, and I recollect a fellow at the mill 
 exacting a shilling on the pretence that I was a tres- 
 passer. Beyond the bridge lay Lee's Nursery, which 
 stretched as far as the turnpike with nothing but a 
 hedge and a ditch as a fence. Northward was Not- 
 ting Hill and Shepherd's Bush, and southward Old 
 Brompton, Earl's Court, North End, Chelsea and 
 Little Chelsea, all still comparatively unspoiled, no 
 less than Hannnersmith, Turnham Green, Chiswick, 
 Acton, Pealing, Willesden, to the west. 
 
 My walks when I lived there (1862 to 1881) as a 
 
 134
 
 KENSINGTON AND THE ENVIRONS 135 
 
 householder on my own account, extended over the 
 whole region within a dozen miles or so, and of 
 course took in places in the immediate vicinity. It 
 may be worth noting, in reference to St. JNIary 
 Abbot's, of which the grounds once probably ex- 
 tended to Addison Road and the manor to Knights- 
 bridge, that during my residence in the immediate 
 neighbourhood an ancient silver crucifix was dug up 
 in one of the gardens on the eastern side of the road ; 
 the relic was by possibility the property of one of 
 the members of the Abbey. 
 
 The place, as it appeared even in 18G2, was an 
 agreeable abode, with many old-fashioned houses and 
 places of business, and surrounded by market-gardens 
 and country, which separated it from Brompton, 
 Fulham, and other neighbouring hamlets. In twenty 
 years it grew so that I was glad to quit it. It had 
 lost nearly every trace of the past and every object of 
 interest. What a delightful residence it must have 
 been in the twenties, when William Cobbett lived 
 there ! By the way, Mr. Judson the ironmonger in 
 High Street, who sold Cobbett's American fireplaces, 
 was still there in my earlier time, though a very old 
 man. I dealt with him. His shop was at the corner 
 of Young Street. At Holland House itself I was 
 too late to see Lord Holland ; but his widow^ was in 
 occasional residence there, and the story went that 
 whenever she went from home, she carried her coffin 
 as part of her luggage. It was for some time on 
 view in Kensington in the maker's windows 
 
 One of the earliest attempts to build on the high- 
 road to Uxbridge was on the site of Norland House, 
 for many years occupied by tlie Drummonds. It 
 was a very large structure, standing back from the 
 thoroughfare, and was celebrated for a spring, called 
 the Norland Spring, wdthin the walls. This used to 
 survive in a house in Norland Terrace. But at the
 
 136 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 time that the original mansion stood, the whole 
 neighbourhood was perfectly countrified and very 
 desolate. There were only a few dwellings dotted 
 here and there. The builder had not entered upon 
 the ground. No one had dreamed of Addison Road 
 and its surroundings. My uncle Reynell recollected 
 the latter spot when there was scarcely a house there. 
 1 remember it a private thoroughfare with a bar at 
 the northern extremity, and not a break or turning 
 from end to end. General Charles Fox, brother of 
 Lord Holland, lived in a house on the Uxbridge 
 Road in large grounds taken out of Holland Park. 
 He had married Lady INlary Fitzclarence, one of the 
 daughters of William IV. by Mrs. Jordan ; and he 
 was a noted coin- collector, particularly of the Greek 
 series. After his death his cabinet was sold to the 
 German Government for £23,000. Fox was a 
 familiar figure in Addison Road about 1860. He 
 used to drive past our house with his wife. 
 
 In High Street, Kensington, down a turning on 
 the southern side, and backing on Young Street, lay 
 Jennings' Buildings, originally perhaps in decent 
 occupation, but ultimately and long a horrid and 
 dangerous Irish rookery, which the police scarcely 
 dared penetrate. I saw the place before its de- 
 molition to make room for Albert Grant's mansion. 
 The tradespeople, or some of them, did not dislike 
 the rookery, for it supplied them with ready-money 
 customers.^ 
 
 As a young man, my recollection of Mr. Kenelm 
 Henry Digby, author of the Broadstone of Honour 
 and other well-known works, is that he was a tall, 
 heavily built man, with a shambling gait and a 
 negligent toilette. I was more powerfully struck by 
 
 ' There was a larp^e common tank for the supply of water for all 
 purposes to the tenants. Someone, hearing voices issuing from it, 
 climbed up, and found four youngsters bathing inside.
 
 KENSINGTON AND THE ENVIRONS 137 
 
 his ungainliness of manner and shabby dress, I fear, in 
 those days than by his literary fame, of which I knew 
 httle enough, although it was perhaps greater than it 
 is now. Digby then lived in a large house in the 
 Kensington high road next to John Leech — a widely 
 different genius. 
 
 Next door to us at Addison Road lived Carl 
 Engel, the musical antiquary and expert. He had 
 married a sister of Bowman the oculist. Bowman's 
 daughter was a somewhat studious maiden, and I 
 used to see her occasionally at Engel's. I remember 
 that she spoke to me of Chaucer's Canterbury TalcH 
 as a book of which she had heard, and which she 
 Avould like to read. I lent it to her without reflection, 
 and it was returned to me with compliments and 
 many thanks too soon to admit the possibility of the 
 girl having read it. She had shown it to mamma. 
 What would Chaucer have thought of the works of 
 fiction which were not, I presume, judged unfit for 
 ISIiss Bowman's perusal, and which were either vapid 
 or meretricious ? Her brother, m' hom I also saw at 
 Engel's, the latter always alluded to as "the good 
 bo-oy." After his first wife's death Engel became 
 engaged to a second lady, but on the eve of the 
 marriage hanged himself in a bedroom cupboard. 
 
 A striking figure here in the sixties was a late 
 Duke of Bedford, whose brougham regularly drew up 
 at a house in Leonard Place, opposite Holland Park, 
 when his grace, a deplorable cripple, emerged to call 
 on two then middle-aged ladies of quiet and genteel 
 appearance, whom I never saw out of doors accom- 
 panied by anyone else or with him. While my 
 wife and I resided in this once charming suburb, it 
 was remarkable for the number of tall girls belonging 
 to residents. They were known as the Kensington 
 Dragoons. 
 
 Fulham, like Brompton, was a quiet country
 
 138 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 hamlet, apportioned between labourers' cottages; 
 mansions of long standinq- and historical interest, 
 such as ]Moore Park and P^'ulham Park (both oblite- 
 rated), and Holcrofts, Avhere Charles Mathews latterly 
 resided — of course in style ; wide acres of arable and 
 pasture; the village itself; and the old-fashioned 
 moated Palace, where the vernal glory of the scene 
 on an April day is worth the whole episcopal bench. 
 But generations anterior to these and other ac- 
 quaintances of my own or my father's there were 
 such personalities as John Florio, who died at his 
 house in Bear Lane in 1625 ; his sister Rose is 
 reputed to have married Samuel Daniel. Richard 
 Burbage and Shakespear himself visited their friends 
 in this place, and the Burbages remained here till far 
 into the eighteenth century. Sir Thomas Bodley 
 died in 1607 at Parson's Green.^ 
 
 Walham and Parson's Greens, again, and Eel- 
 brook Common, mark the site of an extensive 
 primeval forest of which the vestiges were dis- 
 covered in forming the line of railway from Earl's 
 Court, and which was long sparingly covered with 
 buildincfs. This forest doubtless stretched from the 
 river-banks over the whole adjacent country ; the 
 subsoil })elow the alluvial formation was described 
 to me as resembling black soap ; and its effect on 
 vegetation was electrical. An acquaintance of mine 
 — Addison, whose name will recur — bought some cart- 
 loads for his garden. 
 
 What a retrospect the imagination fills up behind 
 one of the sluggish rivulet meandering through the 
 dark unbroken wold to the Thames, and of Master 
 Piers of Fuliiam, that angler ages before Walton, 
 and Master Geoffrey Chaucer enjoying together a 
 spring morning's fishing or fowling, where now 
 
 The greater portion of the common at Walham 
 
 * See my Shakespttar : The Man and his- Work, 1912, pp. 124-6.
 
 KENSINGTON AND THE ENVIRONS 139 
 
 Green, which is mentioned in Dr. Simon Forman's 
 Diary under 1595 as Wallom Green, has been ruth- 
 lessly absorbed ; the erection of a church was, as 
 usual, the first act of spoliation and sacrilege. 
 
 It may be taken for granted that the by-paths 
 and lanes connecting Fulham with Hammersmith 
 and Kensington were, half a century since, alike 
 lonely and insecure. The roads on the outskirts in 
 this as in other directions were infested by high- 
 waymen of various pretensions. In Colehill Cottage,^ 
 opposite the Bishop's Palace, while it remained what 
 its name imports, lived during some time Mr. Samuel, 
 popularly known as Captain Webb. His father had 
 been a contractor at Greenwich, and the captain was 
 in very easy circumstances, fond of conviviality and 
 of occasional frolics, which gave rise to stories about 
 him being a highwayman. I met his great grandson, 
 Mr. Laurie, of Heron Court, Brentwood, who told 
 me that Webb came to Fulham in 1816, and lived in 
 one of the two small cottages subsequently forming 
 the servants' offices of Colehill Cottage, and that he 
 died at Wythyaw House, Walham Green, in 1835. 
 He is of course of no importance or interest what- 
 ever beyond the vulgar legend about him narrated by 
 two persons, Dobson a cooper, and John Phelps a 
 waterman, both of whom lived to an advanced age. 
 
 A later resident in the house, when it had been 
 greatly enlarged, yet preserved the old name, was 
 from 1863 to 1899 Mr. .John Addison, who had had 
 a share in the promotion of the North-Western. 
 Midland, and other railways, and my long and inti- 
 mate acquaintance with this gentleman during more 
 than thirty years supplied the opportunity of col- 
 lecting numerous notices of bygone and forgotten 
 facts about persons and places, with which the owner 
 
 ^ Previously known as Grove Bank. Mr. Scartli was livintr there in 
 1833.
 
 140 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 as my by a long way senior was more or less inti- 
 mately conversant. He was educated at Burlington 
 House. Fulham, which has been already mentioned. 
 His earliest recollection was being taken on some- 
 body's shoulder to see the procession at the corona- 
 tion of George IV. Hewes, a friend of Collas of 
 Jersey, was born in 1814, and equally recollected 
 this event. Addison, who was very reticent even 
 to me about his belongings and environments, knew 
 me thirty years or more without mentioning his origin 
 or his father. But quite late in our acquaintance he 
 spoke of his connection with the Stapyltons of York- 
 shire, and of having been to the house at Myton. 
 
 My friend met with Dobson, the cooper in Ful- 
 ham who had been A¥ebb's servant at the original 
 Colehill Cottao-e as a youth, and who remembered 
 waiting on the company whom his master occasion- 
 ally invited to dinner. In these cases, according 
 to his tale, the party usually broke up about 
 midnight, but, instead of going home, dispersed on 
 their respective beats in quest of plunder. It was 
 like a meet before the hunt. Webb lies in Fulham 
 churchyard under one of the best monuments. He 
 was eighty years of age when he died. Thomas 
 AVebb, probably a son, lived at Colehill some time 
 after the so-called captain's departure from that house. 
 
 The principal market-gardeners and florists in 
 Fulham were Osborn and the Bagleys. The latter 
 had two extensive plots of ground at Sand's End. 
 One of them was a great tomato-grower, and I 
 recollect the old boundary wall on the north side an 
 absolute mass of bloom. The last of the Bagleys 
 shot himself in Grant's Nursery at Castlenau, Barnes. 
 Osborn's faced Elysium V^illas, now meriting that 
 name no longer. Adjoining Osborn's ground was a 
 meadow in which stood a magnificent cedar. 
 
 A. told me that lie dined with Lock the
 
 KENSINGTON AND THE ENVIRONS 141 
 
 engineer the evening that the line from Vauxhall to 
 Waterloo was opened. It cost upwards of £800,000, 
 on which he understood that Lock took 5 per cent. 
 The most expensive piece of work on whicli he him- 
 self was ever engaged was the "Wolverhampton and 
 Walsall, the extent being only six and a half miles, 
 and the cost £650,000. He was mentioning on the 
 same occasion that, when he was in full professional 
 swing, if a £10,000 job had been brought to him, he 
 would have given £100 to have it taken away again, 
 as these small contracts often involved an actual loss. 
 
 Sir Matthew Thompson used to say to him : 
 "Addison, when I am at Guisiey, I am the squire; 
 when I am at Derby, I am chairman of the Midland 
 Railway ; and when I am at Bradford, I am a common 
 brewer " — the last a technical term. 
 
 It was through Brunei asking him to recommend 
 a counsel for a great case which was then impending 
 in Parliament that Sir Alexander Cockburn obtained 
 his first important brief. Cockburn was then, curi- 
 ously enough, in the Queen's Bench — not as a judge, 
 but as a debtor for £150, and Brunei had to get him 
 out before his services were available. My friend 
 often saw him after that, and furnished him with 
 technical information, which enabled Cockburn to 
 surprise witnesses by the amount of knowledge which 
 he appeared to possess of the minutice of engineering 
 work. The old judge would call at A.'s office either 
 on his w^ay to the Court or on his return. 
 
 When Cockburn went down to Leicester as a 
 commissioner to inquire into the management of 
 the Corporation, he spent a good deal of his time 
 at Mother Slack's, and if he was wanted, it was the 
 surest place to find him. It used to be alleged that 
 he drew up his report there. In his earlier pro- 
 fessional life a lady (not always the same) was often 
 to be observed walking up and down outside West-
 
 142 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 minster Hall waiting for the learned counsel. No 
 one probably could have related such a varied series 
 of boiiJies-fortiDics. To the country, which paid him 
 so well for his services, he proved himself grateful 
 by distributing his sinistral representatives of both 
 sexes pretty freely, when there was a berth at his 
 disposal or the conditional holder of one, as the case 
 might be. You took the place perhaps — the place 
 and the lady, perhaps. Cockburn was a familiar 
 figure in the thoroughfares which he had to traverse 
 from the Court to his house : a small man, negligent 
 in his attire, and wnth his neckerchief as frequently 
 as not hind part before. But he was a great lawyer ; 
 some of his successors on the Bench have proved 
 themselves his inferiors in capacity, and his equals, 
 or nearly so, in less desirable respects. Cockburn 
 was very grateful to those who had served him in 
 early life. He was, like Henry Hawkins, one of the 
 party which accompanied A. in his shooting excursions. 
 George Stephenson, even in his time, said that, 
 give him a clear and good road without fishings, 
 and he w^ould make a train run a hundred miles an 
 hour. He had a poor opinion of canals, and declared 
 that they would all become in the end dry ditches. 
 A. observed to me, when I referred to the railway 
 journey between Manchester and W^arrington over 
 Chat Moss, that the most striking thing was to 
 stand on the line a quarter of an hour before a 
 train came up, and feel the vibration arise and 
 gradually increase, as if the whole spongy mass had 
 one pulse and one centre of motion. It was from 
 Robert Stephenson that my friend acquired the habit 
 of leaving his tliroat open and not wearing a com- 
 forter, which, as Stephenson said, tended to render 
 you susceptible to cold, especially when, as in those 
 days and in both their cases, you had to travel so 
 constantly at all liours of the day and night.
 
 KENSINGTON AND THE ENVIRONS 143 
 
 Not long before Thomas Brassey's death, while 
 he was staying at Hastings, he sent for John 
 Stephenson, who had rendered him valuable service 
 in his undertakings as an assistant. AVhen he 
 arrived, the old contractor was very kind in his 
 manner and kept him for some time in conversation ; 
 and when at last he left, Brassey pressed something 
 into his hand. It was a clieque for £5000. 
 
 John Flabell, the contractor from the Black 
 Country, was selected to do the tunnelling on the 
 Brighton line, and had some 350 men under him. 
 These rough fellows rather scandalized the then 
 quiet district, and the local parson begged Flabell 
 to try and keep them in better order. " And can't 
 you get them to come to church ? " Flabell on the 
 next Saturday pay-day bribed the navvies with a 
 promise of a pint each if they came to church next 
 day in their best ; and they not only came accord- 
 ingly, but filled the building before the rest of the 
 congregation arrived. Flabell and his lady were 
 there, too. The other worshippers presented them- 
 selves, saw no room, and went away in a fume. Pre- 
 sently a loud tap was heard on one of the windows, 
 and a voice outside shouted : " Gaffer, gaffer, can't 
 get in. Don t forget the pint ! " 
 
 The printed evidence taken in railway bills before 
 Parliamentary committees occasionally offers rather 
 amusing features, and it is necessarily little known. 
 Lord Grimthorpe as Mr. Beckett-Denison was a 
 very noted figure in these matters and scenes in 
 the old days. His cross-examination of Sir Frederick 
 Bramwell, whose name was so much associated with 
 public business, arbitrations, and so forth, in one 
 instance, when Bramwell opposed the promoters 
 of a new northern line, was inimitable for its 
 dexterity. From posing as a personage of immense 
 practical experience in that class of enterprise, he
 
 144 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 was by a series of cleverly-marshalled questions 
 whittled down at last to the solitary superintendence 
 of the West Bromwich Gas Works; and when 
 Beckett-Denison had forced from his adversary 
 this admission, he said to him with exasperating 
 suavity : " I think, Sir Frederick, we need not 
 detain you any longer." 
 
 Hawksley the engineer, being under examination 
 in some case by Grimthorpe, was very decided in 
 his replies, and Grimthorpe observed to him : " You 
 appear, Mr. Hawksley, to have formed very definite 
 opinions about most things." The other assenting, 
 Beckett-Denison added : " And pray tell us, are 
 there any points on which you have not arrived at a 
 conclusion ? " " Why, yes," returned Hawksley ; " I 
 can think of three." "What are they?" Beckett- 
 Denison inquired. " Wills, clocks, and bells," said 
 Hawksley, referring to the other's three failures. 
 Had he lived longer he might have added to the 
 list. 
 
 A. and myself knew in common the two Rennies 
 — Sir John and his brother George. The original 
 Rennie died in 1821. He was an eminent book- 
 collector, and his library was sold some years after 
 his death. His son, Sir John, reserved the first and 
 third folios of Shakespear. I have a very lively re- 
 membrance of accompanying the second Rennie (Sir 
 John, not George) to Antwerp when I was a youth, 
 and his impatience to disembark, which nearly led to 
 my immersion in the Scheldt. It was just then 
 thought that I might try my hand at engineering, 
 and I did for eight months. Anyone who only 
 knows Antwerp as it is to-day can have a very 
 imperfect idea of what it was when I landed there 
 with Rennie in 1852. If I was under no other 
 obligations to the Rennies, I owed to them this — 
 that I planted my foot on that historical ground.
 
 KENSINGTON AND THE ENVIRONS 145 
 
 that my eye fell on Antwerp, before a thousand 
 gables and a labyrinth of steep, tortuous, dark 
 streets or water-lanes were clean swept away to 
 meet the demands of commerce, more tyrannous 
 than Spaniard or Austrian. Before I knew Ant- 
 werp well, I asked a Belgian the way one day to 
 the Cathedral. I inquired for la CatJicdrale. He 
 regarded me with an opaque stare. I repeated the 
 question. He shook his head. Presently a light 
 began to break on his honest countenance, and he 
 lifted a finger significantly. '• Ah ! " he cried, 
 " Monsieur cherche la CatheDRALE ! " 
 
 In the Galerie du Boi, at Brussels, I was once 
 accosted by a person who spoke good English, and 
 demanded if he could serve me in his capacity as 
 cicerone to one of the places of resort for a certain 
 purpose in the City. He said that his fee was five 
 francs. " Well," I answered, " and do you depend on 
 this employment ? " " No," said he. " What do 
 you do, then, in the day ? " " Why," said he, " I 
 shew gentlemen and ladies over St. Gudule." This 
 ran on all fours with the female pluralist in Jersey, 
 who, Collas mentioned, was reputed to be the only 
 suspicious character, but who on Sundays acted as 
 pew-opener at her parish church. 
 
 I related to A. a singular little episode which 
 occurred while I was in the Netherlands under the 
 Rennies. I often spent from Saturday to ^londay 
 under the hospitable roof of my friend Henry 
 Wright at Yerseke, a few miles from Bath. We 
 played at whist one Saturday evening, and suddenly 
 a card was missed. We searched for it everywhere 
 in vain till by chance someone descried it stuck fast 
 in my slipper. No effort or ingenuity of mine could 
 have placed it there. 
 
 Wright, who afterward married a daughter of 
 the second Duke of Wellington and became secre- 
 
 K
 
 146 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 tary to the Duke of Sutherland, was a low-built man 
 about five- and- twenty, and was extraordinarily supple 
 and ao'ile, I have seen him clear eighteen feet on 
 the level with a very short run, and when we were 
 alone at Yerseke he would in the not very spacious 
 drawing-room go to one end, and spring over the 
 loo-table with a fresh pair of long wax candles in the 
 centre of it without extinguishing the lights. 
 
 I casually met him in later years in Stable Yard, 
 St. James's, and he told me that he was a sort of 
 secretary to the Duke of Sutherland. I called at 
 Stafford House some time after, and I was struck by 
 the fact that, when the Duke opened the door of the 
 room where Wright and I were talking, ^Vright just 
 cast his eye in that direction and continued the 
 conversation, while the Duke withdrew his head 
 and closed the door. 
 
 I used to travel from Bath to Yerseke in a top- 
 heavy antediluvian coach, passing through several 
 villages on the way. In one, on either side of the 
 road, was an avenue of pear-trees, with the ripe 
 fruit hanoinof from the branches. When I told A. 
 of tins, he concurred with me in thinking that if it 
 had been in England the public would have picked 
 the pears to prove their social and political equality. 
 My lodgings at Bath faced the chapel. I recounted 
 to A. a petty incident which I witnessed one day as 
 I looked out of my window. A small procession, 
 headed by a man and a woman, came up and entered 
 the chapel. I asked my landlady what they were 
 going to do. To be married. Well, they had lived 
 together twenty years, these two Hollanders, just to 
 see how they suited each other before they passed 
 the probationary stage. 
 
 iVmong my associates on the polders, which 
 Rennie engaged to enclose and reclaim, were Mr. 
 R. Winder and Heer Midler, the former an engineer,
 
 KENSINGTON AND THE ENVIRONS 147 
 
 who had in his professional capacity enjoyed a wide 
 experience, and the last a most gentlemanly and 
 agreeable Hollander, who spoke })roken English, 
 with a \'er}^ pretty and very French wife. I was 
 once with him on the Scheldt in a boat, and seeing 
 how mveterately he smoked, I innocently asked him 
 whether he was very fond of it. " Yes," was his 
 answer, "for it do make me dink." At a dinner 
 given by A^^inder to the Dutch officers of the small 
 garrison at Bath, he, in responding to the toast 
 of his absent wife's liealth, declared that he loved 
 her better tlian his life; but he put life in the 
 wrong gender. The two peculiarly unseductive old 
 women Avith whom I lodged in this place, Tantje 
 Mi and Tantje Co, remembered the visit of 
 Napoleon and ^laria Louisa there more than forty 
 years before. 
 
 Sub ?^osd, I fell in love at Bath (which they pro- 
 nounce Bats), or rather just outside it, with a maiden 
 of the country called Antje Dronkers, whose papa 
 pursued some local industry ; but we were both 
 persons unius Unguce, and this kept the flame low. 
 I do not recollect any tears. 
 
 But I told A. that I did recollect crying, because 
 I had sent to my father for a little pecuniary aid, 
 my salary being modest, and he had remitted halj' a 
 croicn, which was all lie could afford, he wrote. I 
 felt ashamed of mvself that I should not have been 
 more thoughtful than to ask for the money, and I 
 tried to earn forgiveness some time afterward, when 
 I had saved enough out of my very lunnble pay, 
 by purchasing a scent-bottle, which I took to the 
 captain of one of tlie steamboats plying between 
 London and Antwerp, and asked him to deliver it 
 to my mother at Chelsea, which he did. 
 
 I put it to A. whether such reminiscences were 
 not prouder and sweeter than fame or wealth, and
 
 148 
 
 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 he said that he thouglit so. He was much my 
 senior, but his mother was constantly on his lips. 
 Tliis led me to speak about my mother's people, 
 the Reynells, their former consequence, and the 
 important assemblage of family portraits, now partly 
 scattered ; and I mentioned a table at the Reynells' 
 printing office, bought by JNlr. Henry Reynell at 
 the Aikin sale at Stoke Newington about 1798, 
 and said to have belonged to Sir Godfrey Kneller ; 
 it contained an easel, which disclosed itself by touch- 
 ing a spring. 
 
 He had heard me mention my grandmother 
 Hazlitt and her relatives the Stoddarts. I said to 
 him one day : "A lady whom I formerly met 
 recollected very well the first visit INlrs. Hazlitt 
 paid to her family at Bayswater. It was a very 
 wet day, and she had been to a ivalking match. 
 She was dressed in a white muslin gown, a black 
 velvet spencer, and a Leghorn hat with a white 
 feather. Her clothes were perfectly saturated, and 
 a complete change of things was necessary, before 
 she could sit down. The stiff, ceremonious ways 
 of Sir John Stoddart and his family did not please 
 her at all. AMien one of her nephews (Sir John's 
 sons) was praised in her hearing as an example of 
 good breeding and politeness, she laughed, and 
 exclaimed, ' Oh, do you like such manners ? John 
 seems to me like an old-fashioned dancing-master.'" 
 
 A., as a former large employer of labour, appre- 
 ciated my relation of a small experience, when I 
 was last in Rouen. I saw a man sauntering, as 
 I was, up a street, pipe in mouth, and took him 
 for a fellow-traveller. He turned out to be a 
 Londoner, who had come there in search of work^ 
 and wanted to know if I could recommend him. 
 
 Of Thomas Earnshaw, the famous chronometer- 
 maker in Rloomsbury (the second of the name).
 
 KENSINGTON AND THE ENVIRONS 149 
 
 Addison was full of anecdotes. He possessed 
 a chronometer, which Earnshaw gave him. The 
 latter, a small man witli a disproportionately large 
 head, and not remarkable for the elegance either 
 of his dress or his diction, was a violent democrat 
 and something of a freethinker. He did not prosper 
 very much with the clerical authorities in his parish. 
 When the collector called for an Easter offering, 
 he feigned a difficulty in comprehending his mean- 
 ing. "Easter offering? What is that, sir?" "Why, 
 ^Ir. Earnshaw, what they give every year to the 
 rector. It is usual, sir." " Is it, sir ? Well, here is 
 sixpence to buy a length of rope for his reverence 
 to hang himself" He once took part in a political 
 open - air meeting in Clerkenwell, and was very 
 fierce and trenchant in his language before he 
 addressed his audience. AVhen he ascended the 
 platform, he was going to commence, when the 
 superintendent of 23olice pulled him by the skirt 
 of his coat, and whispered to him, as a man whom 
 he knew and humoured : " Mr. Earnshaw, pray 
 come down. If you speak, I must take you." 
 Little Earnshaw melted away among the crowd. 
 
 It must have been very funny when, having been 
 chosen headborough for his parish, he called on the 
 rector-archdeacon and apprised him of his nomina- 
 tion by the votes of his fellow - parishioners ; and, 
 says he, " I shall be obliged, Mr. Archdeacon, if 
 you will accompany me to explain to me my out- 
 door duties, as I am in a difficulty about them, and 
 the law prescribes that in such case I shall apply to 
 you, sir." 
 
 A. was of the Clockmakers' Gild. I told him 
 about the watch which Calvert had mentioned to 
 me (whether truly or not, God knows) as having 
 been made about 1680 for his ancestor Lord 
 Baltimore, proprietor of Maryland, by John Fepys,
 
 150 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 who, according to my informant, occupied seven 
 months in the work. He offered to shew^ it to me 
 if I would go up to his liouse in Camden Town. 
 
 I understood Addison to say that Tommy Hope 
 of Pershore in A\^orcestershire, who made the famous 
 perry, and kept it in vats until it was as dark as 
 porter, came to Pershore Avitli eighteenpence in his 
 pocket, and made a boast that lie had always kept in 
 his possession the two original coins. 
 
 We were speaking of Tom Saj-ers the pugilist. 
 He was a Staffordshire man and a bricklayer by 
 trade. Brassey employed him to do some of the 
 two-arched bridge at llugeley on the North Western. 
 He was a pleasant, civil little fellow, nimble on his 
 feet, and standing about five feet six ; but the muscles 
 of his arms were as hard as iron. 
 
 Tlie old watch-house in Marylebone Lane, from 
 which the Charlies for that district used to turn out 
 every evening to the number of the days in the year, 
 was referred to. No man knew beforehand to what 
 beat he would be ordered, and the practice was to 
 bring the file to a halt, call a name, and give him 
 his round. This checked collusion and bribery. 
 There was a similar institution on Islington Green, 
 at Knightsbridge, and elsewhere. 
 
 Glyn the banker, speaking to A. about the gain 
 to the Bank of England and other similar institutions 
 from the loss of their notes, related a curious instance 
 of the ignorance of seamen in money matters. Be- 
 fore Trafalgar, the crews had been paid in Bank of 
 England notes, the wages having accumulated and 
 specie being scarce ; and many of them, not having 
 tlie opportunity, perhaps, of spending their earnings 
 in the free manner usual with the profession, carried 
 them down to Portsmouth, but before embarking 
 took the precaution to exchange them for local 
 l^ank paper, which, like the Scotchman of former
 
 KENSINGTON AND THE ENVIRONS 151 
 
 days and his £1 note, they thought better security 
 than that of the National estabhshment. The Port- 
 sea Bank made a good haul over the transaction, as 
 so many of the holders of its paper went to the 
 bottom.
 
 X 
 
 FULHAM CAUSERIES {continued) 
 
 Thistlethwaite, who was a life-tenant of a large 
 property on the Paddington estate (the next heir fell 
 at the Alma), and who married Laura Bell, lived in 
 Grosvenor Square. A singular illustration of the 
 universality of commissions or tips occurred one day. 
 He had told a man to send him round a horse on 
 approval or inspection, and the animal was duly 
 trotted up and down his side of the square, when 
 
 Captain , of the Guards, happened by the merest 
 
 accident to pass that way. He learned what was 
 going on, and his opinion was asked by T. He was 
 loud in his commendations ; but unluckily T. differed 
 and declined, and tlie Captain in the Guards lost his 
 percentage. 
 
 It was a singular household. Thistlethwaite and 
 his wife, a very pretty little woman, did not see 
 much company, and did not agree very well. Every 
 evening there v.as a sort of state dinner at eight, and 
 a costly dessert, and only those two, one at one 
 extremity of a long table, and the other at the 
 other. The latest occasion on which they came 
 before the public was in a sort of petty cause ceUbrCy 
 wliich T. won, arising from Laura's extravagance 
 and a huge bill sent in by a West End firm for 
 dress. Before she married, Laura Bell had a house 
 in AVilton Place, where she received her gentlemen 
 friends, like a modern Aspasia or Phryne. A late 
 Marquis of Lansdowne was a noted figure there, 
 
 152
 
 FULHAM CAUSERIES 153 
 
 and he often came on his white pony. The pony- 
 was carried off one day hy a preconcerted arrange- 
 ment, and was not recovered without a handsome 
 reward. On her visit to Loch Luichart in the 
 Highlands she deUvered a series of rehgious ad- 
 dresses to audiences probably unacquainted with 
 her antecedents. 
 
 Skittles, who was of a similar type to Laura 
 Bell, was at one time in equal vogue, and used to 
 hold a sort of levee at the Holborn Restaurant. 
 The Lord Hartington of that day paid her homage 
 as a young man, if he did not keep her. I have 
 heard that when his lordship told Iier that he had 
 spent upon her enough to build the Great Eastern, 
 she replied that she had spent upon him enough to 
 float that ship. But poor Skittles came to grief, 
 and died in very bad circumstances indeed. 
 
 We spoke of the British earthworks so widely 
 spread over England, and sometimes buried in 
 underwood. I had just returned from Listed in 
 Sussex. Outside the Fitzhall estate there, I told 
 A., I noticed some remains of this sort. They lie 
 unheeded, being so common. I added that, as I 
 was climbing up Trundle Hill by Goodwood with 
 Mr. Piggott, of Fitzhall, he informed me that from 
 the summit one could see almost all tlie kingdoms 
 of the earth. "And are you," I inquired, "the 
 gentleman who shews them ? " — allusively to the 
 scriptural scene. 
 
 At a garden party at Fitzhall I met Lord and 
 Lady Egmont. He married her ladyship under what 
 are usually termed romantic circumstances, she being 
 of very humble birth — some said, a carrier's daughter, 
 others, a gipsy ; and she struck me as much resembling 
 the latter. She had been educated, so far as possible, 
 for her new patli in life, and in course of time (for she 
 had been married twenty years or so) intercourse with
 
 154 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 tolerable society had done a good deal to improve 
 and polish her. She was at the same time unassum- 
 ing, agreeable, and self-possessed. She introduced 
 me to "the Earl, of whom I did not think much. 1 
 understood that Lord Leconfield would not inter- 
 visit with the Egmonts by reason of the misalliance, 
 which seemed odd and forgetful on the part of 
 Leconfield. But the Egmonts were certainly not 
 too eligible on independent grounds. 
 
 I mentioned to A. a trait of the unphilosophical 
 and guileless simplicity of childhood. My son, when 
 he was a very little fellow, was with me in a field 
 in Wales, and we observed a cow gazing at a dog, 
 after the manner of her kind. The boy looked up 
 at me, and said with a dry gravity : " Might be 
 its mother." 
 
 I offered the remark that, as mental power often 
 skips a generation, a man may be nothing more than 
 a medium of communication between his father and 
 his son. 
 
 The late Mr. Thomas Miles, land-agent of Key- 
 ham, near I^eicester, who probably knew more of the 
 concerns of the families for miles round than any 
 individual of his time, used to tell A. that Jones, the 
 parson at Ashby, would have a cloth laid over the 
 drawing-room carpet on Sundays between services, 
 and have a couple of cocks in " to give them wind." 
 This was about 18:J0. 
 
 Mr. Miles, who was born at the close of the 
 eighteenth century, was one of those rare characters 
 who seem to possess in one sense neither progenitors 
 nor descendants. He left no actual representative to 
 fill his place. In his professional capacity he natur- 
 ally enjoyed a good deal of the confidence of his 
 clients, but Miles was regarded by all those who 
 employed him as a personal friend. He was the 
 never-failing resource when anyone was in trouble
 
 FULHAM CAUSERIES 155 
 
 or in straits, and many a delicate piece of business 
 outside his immediate or strict functions it fell to his 
 lot, in the course of a pr(^longed life, to discharge. 
 
 A remarkably fine Stilton cheese received from 
 Leicester one Christmas (1889-1)0) led to a con- 
 versation on the subject. Stilton cheese, A. said, 
 had been made at Leicester, Coldnewton, and other 
 places near ever since he remembered. They got 
 their name from the circumstance that their peculiar 
 character was first noticed by the frequenters of the 
 Angel at Stilton, which is some thirty-five miles 
 from Leicester, and they became known as Stilton 
 cheeses. But they were never made there. Of late 
 years, since the practice of sending the milk away to 
 London and other great centres set in, they have lost 
 their reputation, and a cheese of the old type, full of 
 butter, is an absolute rarity. You have, in fact, to 
 get it built expressly for you. 
 
 Among the Leicestershire set in the forties was 
 Captain Haymes, formerly of the Guards, and a 
 Waterloo man. He lived to be ninety-four, and 
 hunted within six months of his death. He lived 
 at Great Glen, near Leicester, had a select circle of 
 intimates, a good cellar of port, and a knife and fork 
 for any of the set at three p.m. — the then usual hour 
 for dinner in the middle classes both in town and 
 country. Haymes and his guests drank water with 
 their dinner, and port after, and each man had his bin 
 and his bottle. The butler knew everybody's taste. 
 Haymes deprecated too much talk over the wine. 
 He would say, if there was a tendency to conversa- 
 tion in excess of what he judged desirable : '' Gentle- 
 men, I hope you like your wine ? Drink it, then. 
 Don't talk, or you'll get drunk." But H anbury the 
 brewer used to hold that no man should be pro- 
 nounced drunk if he could lie in bed without being 
 held there. It was Miles, who disliked fat, but
 
 156 THE HAZLITTS j 
 
 otlered the pertinent counsel that the lean should 
 be that of fat meat. 
 
 Haynies and INIrs. Packe- Reading owned between 
 them nearly the whole of the parish. The latter ^ 
 
 conceived the notion of establishing schools for the 
 children, and sent jNIr. Miles to Haymes to invite 
 him to join her. " What ! " said the Waterloo man, 
 " schools — education ! Damn education ! There was 
 my old soldier who could neither read nor write, and 
 he attended to his business as my body-servant. 
 Now I have a fellow who is a scholar forsooth ; 
 why, he spends most of his time in reading the 
 paper and my letters." Miss Reading, who married 
 Charles \Viiriam Packe, M.P. for the southern divi- 
 sion of Lincolnshire, kept her maiden name. Her 
 husband took the property with the proviso that 
 there should be no jointures or dowers made ; and 
 as she had a separate estate, it was arranged in that 
 way. 
 
 Michael Ikss the brewer told Packe that when 
 the Bank holiday had been instituted, the first 
 year's brewings of his firm alone increased by 
 -£00.000, and liad never receded. 
 
 Leicester itself in the early times was, as we 
 all know, an important coaching and hunting centre, 
 and I believe that the Bell was one of the leading 
 houses. A. remembered it before the place had 
 declined through the railways. Yet I stayed there 
 with him a few years since only on our way from 
 Harrogate, and we found a capital cellar of port — 
 or the remains of one, at least — left by Boyer the 
 landlord, wlio had been chef at Badminton. They 
 let us liave an excellent bottle of '47 for 10s., which 
 in London would have cost a guinea or more. 
 
 Speaking of Harrogate, there was a Bishop at 
 one of the hotels. His lordship desired to insert his 
 address on a letter, and was dubious on a point of
 
 FULHAM CAUSERIES 157 
 
 orthography. '* Waiter, is there a w in Harrogate ? " 
 " Well, my lord, they do say as the — sexton's wife — 
 sometimes, my lord." " Answer my question, sir. 
 Is Harrogate spelled with or without a w ? " The 
 prelate's dilemma was so far excusable, for the Spa 
 owed its name to its contiguity to one of the gates 
 of Knaresborough Forest, of which the Stray is the 
 last vestige. 
 
 A. and I strolled one day into a curiosity shop in 
 York. We saw nothing; but the owner invited us 
 to accompany him to his other store, and we followed 
 him up a ladder into a chamber above. The place 
 was a model of disorder and congestion. JNIy eye 
 caught sight of two large china figures in the distance. 
 " What were they ? " " Chelsea — old — magnificent." 
 Their owner read in our looks our desire to enjoy a 
 closer inspection, but the position was impregnable. 
 We seemed as if we might be customers. Isaac 
 looked about him, seized a pair of tongs, balanced 
 his person with much adroitness and agility, and 
 the objects were before us. A. turned to me. I 
 shook my head and muttered Tournai. We did 
 not exchange any more words, but while the tongs 
 were absorbed with the restoration of the magni- 
 ficent old Chelsea to its stronghold, we descended 
 the ladder, professing our acknowledgments, and 
 emerged. I asked A. if he felt more easy outside, 
 and he said that he did. 
 
 There was a settlement in the Bradgate estate of 
 the Earl of Stamford requiring the outlay of £1000 
 a year on plate, and at last this obligation led to the 
 grates in the reception and other rooms being of 
 silver. Lord S. had been rather noted for his ill- 
 assorted marriages. Lord Berners once remarked to 
 Addison : " U'hat a fimcy Stamford has for marrying 
 whores ! " His first wife, however, was a shoemaker's 
 daughter, his second, not so good as that. I recollect
 
 158 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 walking with Alexander Ireland through Lord Stam- 
 ford's park at Bovvdon, Cheshire. The family had 
 enormous property in that and the adjoining counties ; 
 but it was heavily encumbered, and a firm of solicitors 
 personally known to me was long engaged in arrang- 
 ing the affairs. 
 
 lieriah Botfield, best known from his work on the 
 Cathedral Libraries of England, also produced other 
 books, especially the Stemmata BotteviUiana, where 
 he laboured to prove his consanguinity with the 
 Thynnes of Longieat, more to his own satisfaction 
 than that of the late Lord Bath ; and he formed a 
 considerable library at Decker Hill, Shifnal, dispersed 
 after his death. In Brompton Cemetery is a tomb 
 inscribed only with the single word Laura. There 
 lies interred a lady, to whom Botfield was romantically 
 attached. It was a settlement in this estate that a 
 pipe of port should be laid down every year ; but 
 when the property passed to Mr. Garnett, a clergy- 
 man with a large family and an abstainer, he had the 
 proviso set aside by the Court of Chancery. 
 
 A. luid always kept a good cellar of wine, and we 
 had frequent conversations on the subject. I found 
 that he was interested when I mentioned that at the 
 sale of Lord Peterborough's collection in Portman 
 Square in 1812, port of 1802 (only ten years old) 
 brought 90s. a dozen ; while claret of the same year 
 was carried to £G 10s. a dozen; and six bottles of 
 malaga, said to be fifty years old, reached £6 lis., 
 or upward of a guinea each. I took an occasion to 
 notice that Athenaeus, in his Deijrnosophistcc, lets us 
 understand how the ancient Greeks laid down their 
 wine from three to sixty years, according to its 
 strength and character, just as we do. 
 
 The coal-field in the Forest of Dean is one of 
 the latest geological deposits or formations of the 
 kind, said A. to me. In some of the coal which
 
 FULHAM CAUSERIES 159 
 
 used to be got tlience there are traces of the fir- 
 bark ahnost visible to the naked eye, but readily 
 distinguishable under the microscope. Sir Roderick 
 Murchison held that coal existed everywhere. Yes, 
 the possibilities of it, given sufficient pressure. But 
 a good deal never becomes more than lignite. 
 
 It was my grandfather lleynell who had seen 
 Hazlitt dressed to go to Curran's in black silk smalls 
 and blue coat and gilt buttons, and he observed how 
 well he looked. The blue coat and gilt buttons were 
 much affected by the \Vhig Club seventy years ago, 
 and were worn by Fox and Burdett. Mr. Byng, 
 M.P. for INI iddlesex, a member of a singularly ill- 
 fated family, was one of the last public men who 
 retained the fashion ; but I remember my father 
 wearing such a coat made by Griffiths and Pearson ; 
 perhaps he took to it jure pair is. 
 
 The Byngs were great gamblers, and perhaps it 
 was the member of the family mentioned above who 
 was so valuable a client to Crockford, that he for- 
 gave him a debt to the bank of £30,000, observing, 
 however, that in future there must be a nightly 
 settlement. 
 
 When the Earl of Lichfield's property was sold 
 at Shuckborougii, tlie old seat of the Ansons, George 
 Robins was employed as the auctioneer, and, from 
 his usual fashion of delivering an impressive pre- 
 liminary address, something uncommon was expected 
 on this occasion. But George ascended the rostrum 
 and said : "My name is George Robins. Porter, 
 bring the first lot." This affair was the unhappy 
 outcome of Lord Lichfield's turf transactions. One 
 year he won the Derby, and made £100,000. The 
 next morning he was at his solicitor's, AVhite of 
 Bedford Row, before the latter was dressed, and 
 White, when he heard it, remarked that he was 
 sorry for it. The next year, my lord came with
 
 160 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 a different tale. He had lost the race and thrice 
 the amount. This was on a Friday, and jNIonday 
 was settling day. White had to get the money from 
 the insurance offices and mortgage the property, and 
 the sale above-mentioned was one of the fruits. 
 
 After the death of Mr. George Tomline in 1889, 
 the portion of the famous Paston Correspondence, 
 which appears to have been lent out of the Royal 
 collection in the eighteenth century, and which 
 ]Mr. Gairdner was unable to trace, was discovered 
 among the papers at Orwell Park, near Ipswich. 
 Considering the circumstances connected with the 
 matter, it is strange that Mr. Gairdner should not 
 have thought of making an inquiry in that quarter. 
 From what one knows of George Tomline himself, I 
 do not imagine that he had any notion personally 
 that he possessed these manuscripts. He had no 
 taste for literature. 
 
 Comparatively trifling incidents are so soon for- 
 gotten nowadays, that it may be hardly recollected 
 that it was Tomline who for years kept up a con- 
 troversy with tlie Government as to the right of 
 every British subject to have his bullion coined into 
 money at the Mint on demand. Tomline always 
 had the Chinese overland tea, and drank it without 
 milk and sugar with a little lemon juice in the 
 Russian fashion. 
 
 Tomline's father, Dr. George Pretyman, succes- 
 sively bishop of Lincoln and Winchester, had 
 taken the name of Tomline on succession to the 
 property of Tomline, the Bristol sugar-baker. The 
 latter, it is traditionally said, made the acquaintance 
 of the prelate in a perfectly accidental manner 
 through seeing him in his park, where Tomline was, 
 as a stranger and a visitor to the locality, strolling 
 about. The Bishop at first sent someone to warn 
 the trespasser off"; then, learning at the inn where
 
 FULHAM CAUSEKIES IGl 
 
 he stayed wlio he was, invited him to })reakfast the 
 next morning, and finally put him up at the palace. 
 Tomline left him all his money — about a million, 
 something like half of which his son lost in the 
 Felixstow railway scheme. 
 
 The unreserved portion of the effects of Tomline 
 was sold at Christie's and on the premises. Mr. 
 Miles of Keyham remembered well his father, the 
 Bishop of Winchester, wlio had been tutor to the 
 younger l*itt. Through this connection Dr. Tomline 
 succeeded in obtaining a footing in nearly all the 
 Enclosure Acts, and particularly in Charnwood 
 Forest and at lianbury. On his mother's side, 
 George Tomline was alhcd to the Bagot-Lanes, 
 descendants of the Lane who befriended Charles II. 
 after the Battle of AVorcester; and it w^as from this 
 source that the Ribey Grove estate, comprising a 
 large property in Great Grimsby, was derived. The 
 Orwell Park estate, twenty-four miles long by seven 
 miles wide, was all in a ring-fence, except a small 
 triangular piece owned by a lawyer. This Tomline 
 never succeeded in securing, and it vexed him, 
 because it broke the continuity of his shooting. He 
 used to say that he would have covered it with 
 five-pound notes to get rid of the proprietor. 
 
 I had the following story from A. A fashionably 
 attired gentleman called on a London mechanician 
 with a sketch of an instrument which he desired to 
 be made for him. The shopkeeper examined the 
 drawing with some curiosity, and at last undertook 
 to execute the order, but observed that it would 
 cost fifteen guineas. His customer did not object, 
 however, so long as the work was done to his satis- 
 faction, and wx-nt away, promising to call at an 
 appointed time. He came accordingly, approved of 
 the work, and put do^^^l the money, which the other 
 deposited in his purse. Before the party left the
 
 162 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 sliop, the ineclianicijin took the liberty of demanding, 
 as the instrument was of such a pecuHar cliaracter, 
 what its utiHty was. " I will tell you, sir," quoth 
 his customer, leaning across the counter to him ; 
 " the fact is, it is a contrivance /o?' picki?ig pockets." 
 The man was so disconcerted that he lost all pres- 
 ence of mind, and before he could collect himself, 
 I^arrington (for it was he) had left the premises, 
 carrying with him the apparatus and the purse. 
 ]?arrington was a regular frequenter of Ranelagh 
 Gardens, which he found a highly lucrative hunting- 
 ground. 
 
 15ull-baiting was still carried on in the Midlands 
 and in the North down to the second half of the 
 nineteenth century ; and the women enjoyed the 
 sport as keenly as the men. At I^eigh, near Preston, 
 according to a story told me by a Leigh man, a 
 fellow, in a room with his wife and a dog trained 
 to this exercise, laid his head on the table ; the dog 
 rushed at his nose, the husband cried out from the 
 pain, and would have got up ; but says the woman, 
 " Lie still, man, he must draw blood, or he will be 
 just ruined." 
 
 A., all the years I had known him, had taken 
 the Times newspaper. The unique and long 
 unassailable prestige enjoyed by Mr. Walter's under- 
 taking was a phenomenon unlike anything else in 
 journalistic literature. It was almost a fetich. 
 Without being so constituted, the organ possessed 
 an official authority. Its statements were judicial. 
 A good deal of this superstition (for superstition it 
 was) proceeded from the consunnnate tact of the 
 management. The Editoi' of the Times was im- 
 personal ; no one was supposed to know who he 
 was ; the pul)lic had as distinct a notion of his 
 individuality as of the Cumaean Sibyl or the Grand 
 Lama of Thibet. Now all is changed. Vet A. was
 
 FULHAJNI CAUSERIES 1G3 
 
 of the old scliool ; and he ching to Iiis Times usque 
 ad finem. AV^hen you hud disposed of his other pleas 
 for it, he brouglit up his last reserv'e — it was printed 
 on better paper. The field was to him I 
 
 A. referred to Euckingliam in Seven Dials, who 
 supplied the rope for executions, and mentioned that 
 there used to be in the window a speeimen with a 
 notice — "Any length cut." It was a peculiar twist, 
 and specially manufactured for the purpose. 
 
 A. was absolutely illiterate, but a handsome 
 bookcase iilled with a few presentable volumes was 
 part of the furniture. In his better days he w^ould 
 say that he regretted not having lived a hundred 
 years earlier, provided that he could have been inside, 
 as he expressed it, for he thought, perhaps rightly, 
 that those who were more or less privileged were 
 better off formerly than now. 
 
 John Addison was the only son and child of 
 David Addison, a private gentleman of Inverness, 
 who came to England, and married a JMiss Curtis, 
 daughter of Levi Curtis by a daughter of Halford, 
 the brewer at Mortlake, who lies buried at Rich- 
 mond. The Curtis family was chiefly in the army, 
 except one, I think, who had the Brentford distillery. 
 Addison lost his father at a very early age. He told 
 me that he (his father) watched as a civilian the 
 mihtary operations at A¥aterloo. It was in that 
 year, on the 23rd November, that my old friend 
 saw the light at Chiswick. He died at Fulham, 
 January 3, 1899. It is a singular circumstance that he 
 only confided his parentage to me a short time before 
 his death, and that ten minutes before his death 
 he dictated to his nurse where and how he desired 
 to be buried. Even his wife knew nothing about 
 his family ; but he occasionally in conversation with 
 me referred in affectionate terms to his mother. 
 His maternal aunt married into the Stapleton or
 
 1C4 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Stapylton family of JNIyton, Yorkshire. J. A.'s full 
 name was John Garret Curtis A., the Garret coming 
 in throu(:^h his paternal grandmother. One of the 
 sons of William Curtis, who lived on the Mall at 
 C his wick, fell down the hatchway in a ship, and 
 injured his brain. He was a tall, powerful man, 
 and he was chained down in a padded room at 
 Bedlam.
 
 XI 
 
 HAMMERSMITH, PUTNEY, BARNES, AND 
 OTHER OUTSKHITS 
 
 The state of the village of Hammersmith is very 
 slightly indicated by a very rough woodcut on the 
 title of a tract of 1G41, shewing a few low-pitched 
 cottages by the side of the highroad, such as here 
 and there yet exist beyond the site of the new St. 
 Paul's School. Few places near London have so 
 thoroughly lost within the last two generations their 
 old aspect and attraction, and are more hopelessly 
 abandoned to the vulgarer forms of modern suburban 
 life. The engraving to which I have referred re- 
 presents the flight of the Vicar of Christ Church, 
 Newgate Street, from his Parliamentary enemies, 
 and there is the inscription on it ; away for 
 hamer smith. 
 
 Of these always low-pitched, but originally and 
 long picturesque and characteristic buildings, once 
 doubtless exclusively private residences on a country 
 road, where they had superseded the hedge and the 
 ditch, the old leases have in the few cases observed 
 not yet expired. The tenant of one informed me 
 that it was the Gomm or Gomme estate, and that 
 Mr. Gomm or Gomme formerly resided a few doors 
 away. He said that it was at one time open in the 
 rear, and that there were market gardens and many 
 mulberry trees, of which one survived on his own 
 premises, and still fruited well. Mr. Gomm, I 
 understood him to say, had married into the market- 
 
 165
 
 IGG THE HAZLITTS 
 
 garden industry, and I recollect G. L. Gomme 
 telling me tliat his father was a market-gardener's 
 auctioneer, and that the latter, or himself, or both, 
 had made collections toward a history of tlie parish. 
 There is not a single one of tliese houses, which pre- 
 serves its integrity ; all have suffered a sad change ; 
 but the shop, which I explored a little, was still, 
 except tlie refrontage of brick, wholly wood, and 
 retained its old elevation. 
 
 We hear very little indeed of this hamlet (for it 
 was nothing more) in history and literature. There 
 was a very curious case of alleged diabolical pos- 
 session connected with it, in which the principal actor 
 was Susanna, wife of John Fowles. 'J'he particulars 
 are printed in a contemporary pamphlet (1698). 
 
 ^lany years subsequently to my settlement in 
 the neighbourhood the place preserved a fair share 
 of its original gentility and seclusion, and could boast 
 many historical residences, foremost among which was 
 l^randenburg House, removed about 1827 to make 
 room for the new bridge. Lee's Nursery, known as 
 the Vineyard, occupied a considerable area between 
 the bridge over the Canal and the turnpike on the 
 northern side. James I^ee brought out in 1760 an 
 Iidroduction 1o Botaiijj, which met with a favour- 
 al^le reception. His family had been established here 
 since 171o. 
 
 TuRNHA^i Green was another of the spots which 
 I periodically visited in my desultory rambles in the 
 neighbourhood of Kensington during the twenty years 
 which I passed in that once pleasant suburb. In 
 the earlier part of my sojourn there Turnham Green 
 had not lost by any means so much of its original 
 character and aspect as it has since, and most of the 
 fine old Iiouses in grounds were still standing. 
 
 Among them, foremost in more than one point
 
 HAMMERSMITH, PUTNF.Y, BARNES 1G7 
 
 of interest, was Linden House, on the left side of 
 the highroad as you approached the Green. This 
 "capital" mansion, which was demolished in 1879, 
 was for many years the residence of Dr. Ralpli 
 Griffiths, proprietor of the Moutlily Ilevicxv, and he 
 died here in 1803. Grifliths liad heeri acquainted 
 with many of tlie famous men of his time, ijicluding 
 Johnson and Goldsmitli ; and he was on intimate 
 terms Avith AVedgwood, whose partner Rentley was 
 his neighbour at one time. The Doctor played his 
 trump card by buying of Cleland the manuscript 
 of Fannij Hill, and employing a certain Dry butter 
 to improve the book, which is said to have been 
 worth £20,000 to him. 
 
 I visited the house sliortly prior to its removal, and 
 as I passed along the spacious passage leading from 
 the grand old-fashioned doorway to the hall, ascending 
 on the way two or three short flights of steps, it 
 awakened an interesting reflection — how often that 
 very ground had been trodden before me by the literary 
 and artistic ornaments of the preceding century. 
 
 But nearer my own time it had a very diflerent 
 association and quite another sort of tenant in that 
 consummate scoundrel, Thomas Griffiths AVaine- 
 wright, the Janus Weathercock of the London 
 3Iagazine, and the intimate on equal terms at one 
 period of his life of well-nigh the whole world of 
 letters and art. 
 
 Putney, beyond its manorial and otlier local 
 archives, comes under notice very early in the seven- 
 teenth century as the place where the drama of 
 Thomas Lo7-d Cromi^clh 1602, opens at "a Smith's 
 Forge," and the scene of the murder of Edward Hall, 
 a miller of the village. But at a later period it 
 became in the civil troubles an important and busy 
 political centre, and after the Restoration a seat of
 
 168 THE HAZIJTTS 
 
 some of the earliest Ladies' Colleges in England. 
 Evelyn refers to that kept by Mistress 15athsua 
 Makins, who before the Troubles had been gover- 
 ness to the Princess Henrietta, one of the daughters 
 of Charles I., a trust at one time held by a 
 niece of the Duke of Buckingham ; and Herrick, 
 in his Ilcsperides, 1648, commemorates Mistress 
 Mary Portman as " The School and pearl of Putney." 
 She died in 1671. 
 
 Mrs. Trimmer kept a ladies' school here, and 
 her family had establishments for young gentlemen 
 tlirough at least two generations at the large house 
 where Colonel Chambers, Garibaldi's Englishman, 
 afterward lived. This school was founded by Mr. 
 Carmalt, whose name survives in the block of 
 houses erected on the site. Opposite, at Fulham, 
 was Miss Batsford's Seminary, now incorporated 
 with the churchyard. 
 
 By the way, at Wimbledon, some time since. Dr. 
 Birch kept a seminary for youths. Had Thackeray's 
 eye fallen on the brass plate outside ? 
 
 I am told that in old plans of Putney Coopers' 
 Arms I^ane is marked as the Whorple or Whorpul 
 AVay, and that a similar name, sometimes in a 
 corrupt form, occurs elsewhere in this neighbour- 
 hood. But I observe no mention in the topo- 
 graphical books of the term, much less of its mean- 
 ing.^ A second spot is the Piatt, a name given at 
 present and ever since I can remember to a turning 
 
 * Ilalliwell {Arch. Diet, in v.) defines warpes to be "distinct pieces of 
 ploufjlif'd land sep:irated by tlie furrows." In 7 l^liz. in the Court Rolls 
 of Wimbledon, we licar of an order for layinf^ out {exponendo) the warpells. 
 Notes and (^leries, April G, 1889. 'I'liere the word warpell is associated 
 with common fields {communes campi), and combined with way may be 
 tboufj^ht to signify a path, or ridire, between fields. The original state 
 of the western side of tlie I'utney High Street was, except a few mansions, 
 a hedge enclosing these common fiehls, broken by the said warpell way, 
 possibly by more than one. All tlie life and business centred round the 
 church.
 
 HAMMERSMITH, PUTNEY, BARNES 169 
 
 out of the same lane, but evidently bestowed at the 
 outset on a piece of ground laid out in buildings. 
 Opposite the Piatt was Piatt House, a detached 
 residence in a large garden, now long since 
 demolished. 
 
 A very early and curious glimpse of Putney 
 occurs in a few of his letters in 1519 to his Govern- 
 ment of the \^enetian Envoy to the Court of Henry 
 V^III., Sebastian Giustinian, who retired hither, while 
 the plague was prevailing in London. 
 
 In one of Lilburne's tracts, printed in 1649, he 
 speaks of the future Protector and his son-in-law, 
 Ireton, holding an earnest conversation in a garden- 
 house at Putney ; but he does not specify whether 
 it was Fairfax House or some other, and the writer 
 on the next page brings before us Ireton standing 
 before the fireside at his quarters in Kingston, so 
 that he had probably come over to consult the Lord 
 General. And after the interview we hear that he 
 mounted his horse, and departed hurriedly on his 
 return. The little village (for it was no more) was 
 for the time the centre of England. 
 
 There is a second tract of the same period by 
 John Wildman called Putney Pi'ojects: Or the Old 
 Serpent in a new forme, 4to, 1647, which is the 
 second publication I have seen with the name on 
 the title. 
 
 The capital mansions were, at all events, Lime 
 Grove, Fairfax House, Essex House, where one of 
 the decorated ceilings bore the date 1596, and the 
 one ultimately occupied by Madame Daranda, but 
 where John Lacy, clothworker, formerly resided 
 and frequently received Queen Elizabeth, and of 
 which the site was subsequently converted into a 
 terrace, now swept away. It has been said that at 
 the sale of tlie Uaranda effects title-deeds to certain 
 property in Putney were acquired, or were, at least.
 
 170 THE IIAZIJTTS 
 
 broiifrlit to lii^ht. This and Fairfax House were 
 the phices where the Parhameiitary leaders met 
 during the Civil War, and where they were quar- 
 tered. lUit there was probably still another house 
 in Putney (unless the family oceupied at one time 
 either of those above speeified), where resided in the 
 sixteenth century Edward Banister, Esq., who had 
 moved hither from Idsworth in Hampshire, and who 
 left this place to settle in Blackfriars, where he died 
 in IGOO. Banister by his will left to his son his 
 valuable collection of pictures, statues, books, &c., 
 and I question whether he was not the original 
 possessor of the Arundelian marbles. 
 
 'J'here used to be Pike Lane near the church. 
 It was the spot where the soldiers piled tlieir weapons 
 during their stay here. It is, I believe, identical with 
 Brewhouse I^ane, and was tlie landing-place prior to 
 the erection of the bridge of 17^0. 
 
 I possess an etching, executed in 1881<, by Arthur 
 Ball of tlie supposed nunnery (ultimately converted 
 into shops) which immediately faced the church just 
 by the Surrey end of the old bridge. 
 
 At present what was down to 18G0 a village is a 
 sorrowful desolation of bricks and morlar, touching 
 A\^andsworth on one hand and Barnes on tlie other. 
 The whole of the High Street appears to be made 
 ground ; the levels must formerly have been far 
 lower ; for in carrying out long since some public 
 works, at the corner facing the entrance gates to 
 I^ime Grove, the foundations of an extensiv^e red- 
 brick building were discovered below the surface,^ 
 and a rivulet flowed from the top of the street to 
 the river on the right-hand side within memory. 
 A second stream divided Putney from AVandsworth 
 just by the modern railway bridge and East Putney 
 
 > The present writer saw tliese remains while the ground remained 
 open.
 
 REMAINS OF THE NUNNERY AT PUTNEY
 
 HAMMERSMITH, PUTNEY, BARXES 171 
 
 station. It has long been converted into a closed 
 sewer. The " spacious house with gardens and 
 lands," to use the historian's own expression, which 
 was the birthplace of Gibbon, was a copyhold com- 
 prising a messuage and 85 acres of land acquired in 
 1718 by tlie father of the historian for £400 from Sir 
 Theodore Jansen, and was subsequently the seat of 
 the St. Aubyns, who resided here down to modern 
 times. 
 
 All trace of the building has disappeared, as well 
 as that of the home of the Portens, his maternal 
 relatives, where he spent a portion of his childhood, 
 unless, which is not improbable, it was substantially 
 the same as the residence immediately adjoining the 
 church and churchyard, as Gibbon himself describes it 
 in his Autobiogj'aphij, long occupied by Mrs. Major, 
 an acquaintance of Sir Robert Hamilton. Since the 
 death of Swinburne nobody lives in Putney, yet how 
 many more than of yore walk about there — Carlyle's 
 friends ! When Gibbon resided here, one of his 
 neighbours and acquaintances was the poet David 
 Mallet, alias Malloch, alias Macgregor, who had 
 married as a second wife the daughter of a noble- 
 man's steward, and who was distinguished not only 
 by the smartness of his dress, which his wife always 
 bought for him, but by his taste for old books, for 
 which also perhaps Mrs. ]Mallet paid. ^lallet's library 
 was sold in 17GG. 
 
 A fund of gossip and anecdote has already accumu- 
 lated round Swinburne and forsooth, in a different 
 way, round his friend Watts-Dunton. 
 
 It is an illustration of altered conditions that, 
 when the South- W'^estern Railway opened its station 
 lierc, it was feared that the traffic would only be a 
 summer one. Time was when the shooting of the 
 George I. wooden bridge, with its irregular square 
 openings for traffic and its picturesque Dutch toll-
 
 172 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 lioiise, was accounted by oarsmen a notable feat, as 
 it demanded a quick eye and a knowledge of the 
 current. There is a rare engraving of the bridge in 
 its first state (for it was altered and one or two of 
 the openings for traffic widened, before it was finally 
 removed) by Rowlandson. 
 
 I have never seen any explanation of the name 
 still attached to a minor turning out of the High 
 Street — Tokenhouse Yard^ over the entrance to which 
 1 noted in 1904 "The Tokenhouse." Here, no 
 doubt, were struck — or at least issued — the tokens 
 of the seventeenth century (1657-68) enumerated by 
 AVilliamson, and some of them especially relevant to 
 the local ferry. 
 
 A singular character lived at Putney many years 
 — a Mr. JNIorris. He had been a tailor, like his 
 father before him. He was with Poole and Buck- 
 master before he set up for himself on Ludgate 
 Hill. INlorris was an astronomer, a musician, a 
 mechanic, and a botanist, and, indeed, seemed to 
 possess some knowledge of everything. He had 
 been a great reader. 
 
 His fiither was at one time in the army, and 
 served at Waterloo. He was afterward orderly 
 Serjeant to the Duke of Wellington, and was with 
 him at Paris during the occupation in 1815. One 
 of young Morris's earliest reminiscences was going 
 with his father one day to the Palace with despatches 
 for the Duke, and being patted on the head by 
 I^ouis XV^III., who held out his hand for him to 
 kiss. But he would not, he told me, because he 
 disliked Frenchmen, who, he had heard, ate frog. 
 1 think that the legs are the only edible part of 
 this creature, and that they are of a rabbity flavour. 
 If a cat takes possession of one in a garden, it eats 
 the legs and leaves the rest. 
 
 My uncle Rcyncll, who lived here from 1855 to
 
 HAMMERSMITH, PUTNEY, BARNES 173 
 
 1892, told me that he had seen Mr. W. H. Smith, 
 M.P., First Lord of the Admiralty, at the bookstall 
 personally inspecting the accounts, and satisfying 
 himself that everything was in order. 
 
 John Aubrey says that there was in his time — 
 about 1G70 — a maze on Putney Heath. 
 
 The original hamlet of Roehampton, otherwise 
 called Rokehampton and Roughampton ^ in the 
 Wimbledon Court Rolls, on the western side of 
 Putney, on rather low ground, consisted of the 
 King's Head, a wooden structure, and forty or fifty 
 cottages and shops of timber and thatch. Tliere 
 was only a single narrow, steep street, with a 
 quaint side-alley or so. Does the name import a 
 fairly remote epoch, before Wimbledon Park was 
 enclosed, or the various encroachments on the 
 Heath had commenced, when the deer roamed at 
 pleasure over the whole adjoining area, and the 
 village was a mere group of keepers' and labourers' 
 huts ? On the 15th October, 1780, Roehampton 
 was visited by a severe and extraordinary hurricane, 
 Avhich pursued its desolating course in a straight 
 line, leaving the area outside untouched, as far as 
 Hammersmith.^ 
 
 Wandsworth Common, on the other side of 
 Putney, was in my thne a magnificent expanse, 
 and preserved its dimensions down to about 1875, 
 when much fell a prey to Railway, Builder, Church, 
 and Patriotic Institution. Very few remember the 
 lovely spot known as the Black Sea, which was 
 equally used for bathing and angling. It was a 
 large sheet of water over-canopied by ancient trees. 
 
 ^ My father used to pronounce tlie word rough semi-jocularly roii ; 
 so Roughampton miglit have been simply Rou'hampton or not far from 
 the accepted form. 
 
 * An account of tliis, with four plates, was printed hy Mr. H. Reynell, 
 of Piccadilly, in ]78(!, oblong folio.
 
 174 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Tlie entrance from Putney into AVandsworth 
 was twenty years ago a pleasingly rural and charac- 
 teristic bit, resonant with the music of Nature. You 
 liad not to go as far as Nightingale I.ane, Tooting, 
 to hear that songster. Not only in Turnham Green, 
 Chiswick, Bedford I'ark, Fulham, and Barnes, were 
 it and the cuckoo regular visitors in their respective 
 seasons, but at the point where Putney merges in 
 Wandsworth, so long as the vicinity was open and 
 quiet. I^oth on the right and left hand of the road 
 formerly lay stretches of garden and pasture, and 
 on the former side the footway rose two or three 
 feet above the road, and was bordered by fine old 
 trees. 'I'he carriageway had been even then 
 widened from the original dimensions, when the 
 whole extent from the village was a lane, the dead 
 wall of Lime Grove, Sir Jolin St. Aubyn's, 
 occupying the greater part of the southern side. 
 Altogether, AVandsworth has so far been less de- 
 naturalized than its more westerly neighbour. The 
 narrow thoroughfare at the toj:) of Putney Hill 
 leading into Wandsworth used to be called Cuta- 
 thwart, vulgarly Cut-throat, Lane. 
 
 Beyond Roehampton, to the south and west, 
 extends Wimbledon Common, of which the more 
 thickly wooded portion on the Kingston side forms one 
 of the most noteworthy spots in the vicinity of the 
 Metropolis, as it is, to a large extent, in its primitive 
 condition, and may be once more enjoyed by the 
 pedestrian without danger and molestation, provided 
 that the golf-players are kept within reasonable 
 bounds. There is very slight doubt that the point 
 known as C^jcsar's Camp was the site of British 
 earthworks, and that the entire ground represents 
 the scene of conflicts between the Britons and the 
 Uomaiis, and a fortified position of the former, when
 
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 HAMMERSMITH, PUTNEY, BARNES 175 
 
 they retired from the more immediate precincts of 
 the river. This is tlie nearest point to Eondon, 
 where a rehc is under the protection of the Historical 
 Monuments Committee. 
 
 Baiines may be regarded as the last important 
 suburban survival, with its own common, the exten- 
 sive grounds of Barn Elms, and an expanse behind 
 of 3000 or 4000 acres of heath, parkland, and 
 demesne, including that unique feature. Putney 
 Park Lane and its immediate environs. Barnes 
 lived to see the successive degradation of Putney, 
 Wandsworth, Richmond, Kensington, Old Bromp- 
 ton. Hammersmith, Fulham, Chiswick, Turnham 
 Green, Acton, and Ealing; and now Barnes itself 
 is perishing. 
 
 In the Antiquary for July, 1885, I collected all 
 the available information of a local or manorial 
 nature. One of the quern stones is still to be seen 
 at the garden entrance to a house on Mill PI ill. 
 The common was once the home of many rare 
 descriptions of fern and aquatic plants; and in the 
 marshy part near the cemetery the latter still 
 flourished and attracted certain uncommon genera 
 of the moth, till the local busybodies levelled the 
 whole area for the benefit of the tennis-player and 
 such like. Altogether the entomology of this 
 narrow area is still fairly extensive and interesting. 
 Dr. Diamond told me that the common was once 
 famous for a particular species of fly, of which he 
 mentioned the name ; but it has escaped my 
 memory. I met one of the oldest inhabitants, who 
 said that he had known Barnes sixty years, and that 
 he perfectly recollected this fly, but not the name. 
 It frequented the young furze in tlie spring. I have 
 been credibly informed that snipe were once to be 
 got, and on the western side rabbit-burrows still
 
 17G THE HAZLITTS 
 
 remain. The cuckoo and the niglitingale used to 
 be habitual visitors ; but they have long naturally 
 become shyer and rarer. 
 
 Prior to the advent of the railway and the 
 builder, it was a sequestered spot. I have bathed 
 as a boy in the large sheet of water once existing 
 on the southern side near the present station, before 
 the latter was built ; and 1 remember a foot-race 
 which Sir Robert Hamilton and myself had at the 
 cross-roads when we were at the War Office 
 together, but his longer legs made me a very bad 
 second. ]\ly uncle Foulkes was intimate with 
 JNIr. Scarth, owner of a large estate at Barnes, now 
 divided. He lived at Mill Hill, and had an Arab 
 boy as one of his servants. He had brought him 
 home from his travels in the East, and eventually 
 set him up in a public-house at Putney, still called 
 after him. 
 
 Priory Lane, Barnes Common, was so called 
 from the Priory, formerly the seat of Vice-Chancellor 
 Kniglit Bruce, but probably at an early date the 
 site of a monastic establishment, with which Priests' 
 Bridge, just by, may have something to do. The 
 latter, as it appears from the Court Rolls of the 
 Manor of Wimbledon, was once on the Common. 
 
 The White Hart at Barnes, at the end of the 
 Terrace, purports from an inscription formerly on 
 the front to date from 1G62. The Bull's Head in 
 the village is a very old house, and was a very 
 primitive building, partly timbered, till it was 
 modernized since my settlement in the neighbour- 
 hood. The date of the White Hart was chiselled 
 out of one of the old bricks in ancient characters. 
 It is now kept inside in a wooden frame. I went 
 expressly to see it, September 16, 1897. 
 
 Tliere must be some inborn principle in our 
 moral nature which renders such things as murders
 
 W. CAREW HAZLITT 
 
 From a private photo<^raph (1859)
 
 IIAMMERSxMITH, PUTNEY, BARNES 177 
 
 attractive, and holds them fast in the memory. 
 Those which 1 never forgot are the cases of James 
 Greenacre, in Putney Park I^ane, immediately 
 adjacent to Barnes, in 1837;^ of Mr. De la Rue, 
 murdered at Highgate, by Hocker, in 1845; and 
 of Patrick O'Connor, the victim of the Mannings, 
 in 1849. My father was personally acquainted with 
 O'Connor, who is described as a ganger at the 
 London Docks, but whom my father knew as 
 a reporter on one of the papers. Not far from 
 St. Helier, Jersey, you have the small house 
 pointed out where the Mannings lived j^rior 
 to their settlement in London. O'Connor lived 
 with the INIannings, I believe, at INlinver Place, 
 Bermondsey. 
 
 In Barnes churchyard is a yew-tree, planted, as 
 appears from the register, in 1653 (possibly to 
 inaugurate the Protectorate). When I last saw it, 
 it did not present an aspect of great antiquity. I 
 remember that the Rector and 1 conversed about 
 it one day outside, while the congregation were 
 waiting for the service. Here was buried in 1672 
 Abiezer Cobb alias Higham, a fanatic in the days 
 of Cromwell ; he was a native of Warwick, and 
 was at one time post-master of Merton College, 
 Oxford. 
 
 I>ysons, writing nearly a century ago, loosely 
 estimates the Common at about 150 acres; but its 
 extent was formerly greater. On the southern side 
 the Charity estate and the South-Western Railway 
 premises, and on the northern the cemetery, have 
 been taken out of it, and encroachments have for- 
 merly been made everywhere. It originally stretched 
 from the Richmond Road on the south, to the borders 
 of Mortlake on the west, to the villaore of Barnes on 
 
 * In 1837 a volume of 5o6 pages, containing two portraits, a vignette, 
 and four plates, appeared, giving an account of this aflfair.
 
 178 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 the north, and the boundary ditch between Barnes 
 and Putney eastward. Priestbridge, in Edward IV.'s 
 time, abutted on it westward. Of course, it has 
 fallen, in common with other open spaces, a prey 
 to indifference, ignorance, and dishonesty (the most 
 ancient trespass dating back to the Plantagenet 
 times). The pound, which stood near Mill Hill, no 
 longer exists ; it forms the scene of a well-known 
 metrical jeic d'esp7it, in which Quin, who was a ban 
 viveu?' and something withal of a roisterer, and Foote 
 were the actors. The mill was valued at fifteen 
 shillings a year 800 years ago. 
 
 FOOTE AND QUIN. 
 
 As Quin and Foote 
 One day walk'd out 
 
 To view the country round, 
 In merry mood 
 They chattinof stood, 
 
 Hard by the village pound, 
 
 Foote from his poke 
 A shilling took, 
 
 And said, " I'll bet a penny, 
 In a short space 
 Witliin this place 
 
 I'll make this piece a guinea." 
 
 Upon the ground, 
 Within the pound, 
 
 The shilling soon was thrown : 
 " Behold," says Foote, 
 "The thing's made out, 
 
 For there is one pound one." 
 
 " I wonder not," 
 
 Says Quin, " that thought 
 
 Should in your head be found. 
 Since that's the way 
 Your debts you pay — 
 
 A shilling in the pound." 
 
 Iceton the nurseryman, who now has a place in 
 Putney Park Lane, was formerly at Castelnau in this 
 (Barnes) parish. He was a servant to a sporting
 
 HAMMERSMITH, PUTNEY, BARNES 179 
 
 character, who liired the cottage as a sort of rural 
 retreat, and Iceton, taking to horticulture, at first 
 practised it in liis leisure intervals and eventually 
 took to the business. I recollect the cottage well. 
 It stood back some little way from the road, nearly 
 opposite Grant's, where I bought many of my trees 
 and bushes, when I planted my garden at Winter- 
 slow. Grant was agent to General Eoileau, from 
 whose ancestral seat near Nismes Castelnau derives 
 its name. 
 
 Between this and Roehampton, in relaying the 
 drains, many years since, between the Jesuits' College 
 and the Convent, the workmen came upon a con- 
 siderable number of children's skeletons, of which I 
 leave the history to conjecture. 
 
 The occasional discovery of Roman coins on the 
 shore here is supposed to be due to the utilization of 
 the soil removed in laying the foundations of the 
 modern London Bridge up the river, where it served 
 to make up the towing-path at the point named. 
 
 Lawrence of Wandsworth told me that a small 
 bronze Hercules was found on Barnes Common in 
 some ground brought probably from the Reservoir, 
 and originally from the same source as the coins. 
 The British Museum possesses some bronzes obtained 
 from Barnes. 
 
 In a view of the south side of Barnes appears, 
 on the site of the actual Mill I^odge, a second and 
 probably later mill, which was perhaps placed there 
 on the removal of the other. The spot was till 
 lately nearly as open (1897), and the church was 
 visible across the fields. In a comedy entitled 
 Debtor and Creditor (about 1820), Gosling says: 
 " In the winter you should have all the pleasures 
 of London, and in the summer and autumn we'd 
 have a snug shooting-box on Barnes Common, and 
 live as happy as the day's long." " Barbara : You
 
 180 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 may shoot away on Barnes Common as much as 
 you like." 
 
 The late Samuel AVolfe Keene, one of the most 
 prominent of the gentry at Barnes in my day, a 
 cousin of the artist, and a justice of peace and 
 quorum, expressed his opinion that I was a clever 
 man. It may be easily imagined how sensible I was 
 of the flattery, when I add that this worshipful 
 individual thought Shakespear a clever man too.
 
 W. C. HAZLITT'S HAIR (1859)
 
 XII 
 
 MY FATIIER^S LEGAL ENVIRONMENTS AND MY 
 OWN. DEATH OF MY FATHER 
 
 My father, my brother and myself all belonged to 
 the legal profession. INIy brother was a passed 
 solicitor, and I a member of the Inner Temple. 
 l>ut none of us ever practised, and all had a 
 common distaste, nay, contempt, for what hardly 
 deserves to be called a profession either in the 
 case of a barrister or a solicitor. At the present 
 time, with very few exceptions, all ranks of lawyers, 
 including the Bench itself, are lamentably con- 
 spicuous by their incapacity or something else, or 
 both. There has been of late a movement for 
 checking the moneylenders. Surely the lawyer is 
 the greater offender. I cordially sympathize with 
 all that Dickens in his writings and correspondence 
 has to say about the vocation. I think that it is 
 in one of his letters that he alludes to AVatts's 
 Charity at llochester, which was established to 
 harbour six poor travellers, not being rogues or 
 proctors. 
 
 When my father first went to the Court of Bank- 
 ruptcy in 1854', his knowledge of his work was very 
 rudimentary. But by application and tlu'ough a re- 
 ceptive mind he gradually became one of tiie most 
 efficient officers in the building. 
 
 The Court in Basinghall Street, as my father 
 originally knew it in the fifties, was a very different 
 place from the present one. Hardly one of the 
 
 ibi
 
 182 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 old staff remains. I recollect Campbell, Whitehead, 
 Abrahall, Tepys, and Brougham. W^illiam Henry 
 >Vhitehead was popularly supposed to be more than 
 a protegd of his Majesty William IV. Abrahall 
 received with his appointment a wife as part of 
 the bargain ; Mrs. Registrar was a very stylish and 
 agreeable person. Tiiey w^ere our neighbours for 
 some time in Brompton. Stubbs, founder of the 
 Gazette, was my father's messenger, and a very 
 pleasant and obliging fellow. I never approached 
 him officially, nor he me. There were also Aldridge 
 and Denny — the Crown Solicitor and the Half-Crown 
 Barrister — the latter, this pleasantry notwithstanding, 
 a very estimable man in private life. 
 
 The late Chief Registrar, when I spoke to him of 
 Edmund Yates, mentioning his apparently flourishing 
 state, observed that he thought the time had come 
 for him to pay his creditors the remaining 19s. 6d. in 
 the pound. Was this an epigram ? 
 
 My father has ere now consulted the present 
 writer on cases before him, and he occasionally 
 instanced remarkable courage on the part of solici- 
 tors in the direction of charges. I remember that 
 lie reduced one claim from £192 to £12, and then 
 deemed the amount allowed to the honest practi- 
 tioner too high. In another aflfair solicitors and 
 counsel talked out the remaining estate, as there 
 was a mere balance of £200. He had a good deal 
 of trouble with some eminent firms, whose represen- 
 tatives came to the Court with an equally imperfect 
 knowledge of their business and of the law. The 
 so-called Baron Grant, wliile he was still in evidence, 
 called at the Court, and laid before the Registrar, 
 in connection witii some pending arrangement, 
 securities valued by him at £200,000. My father 
 had to signify to the Baron that commercially they 
 were worth precisely nothing.
 
 LEGAL ENVIRONMENTS 183 
 
 V^ice-Chancellor Bacon was of a very placid 
 laisser aller temperament, and seldom allowed him- 
 self to be perturbed by any untoward incident or 
 turn. He more than once said to my father, 
 when the latter seemed excited about some case 
 before the Court : " Point de zele, my dear fellow — 
 point de zele " — which had been Talleyrand's maxim 
 and advice. 
 
 At the time that Mr. Kay, afterward judge, 
 practised before Bacon, it used to be said that the 
 latter spelled equity with a k because he was ruled 
 by the counsel's views, and so long as suitors might 
 choose the V.C. before whom they would appear, 
 the plan in a doubtful case was to retain Kay, and 
 have the matter tried by Bacon. 
 
 I could never exactly understand why Bacon was 
 promoted to the Bench. He certainly disappointed 
 the expectations which had been formed of him 
 while he wore silk, and no man's judgments were 
 more frequently reversed on appeal. To succeed in 
 the discharge of judicial functions, as in other things, 
 demands unwearied industry, even though one 
 possess greater talent than Bacon had ; but I do 
 not think that Bacon was what the copy-books call 
 applique — he took matters too easily. There was 
 probably never a man so extravagantly estimated. 
 
 My father had a much wider experience of 
 practice in bankruptcy, and would have been better 
 qualified than either Bacon or Cave for the place 
 of Chief Judge. His decisions, when he has sat 
 vicariously on the Bench, have been almost invari- 
 ably upheld ; but 
 
 " Non cuivis homini contingit adire Corinthum." 
 
 One of the two persons to whom the Turk appeals 
 in the cartoon in Punch, July 81, 1880, is my father 
 — the other, of course, is Gladstone. I was talking
 
 184 THE IIAZLITTS 
 
 to the former at the Bankruptcy Court about some 
 one whom we both thought to be not overwise. 
 " ^Vell," said Mr. Registrar dryly, " he zvcis a fool, 
 and as much of a rogue with it as his incapacity 
 icuii/d permit.'' 
 
 On his way home one day by train from the 
 Court to Richmond, he observed that one of his 
 fellow-passengers had let something in her hand 
 drop, and he said to the fellow with her : " I think 
 the young woman has let her parcel fall." The party 
 referred to looked daggers, but made no remark till 
 she left the carriage just after, and, turning to the 
 venerable Registrar, relieved her pent-up resentment 
 by the crushing retort, delivered with an immense 
 air : " Thank you, young man." A former Chief 
 Registrar, Mr. AVilliam Henry Campbell, whom I 
 well recollect as a gentleman who helped to obtain 
 my father's first appointment in the Court for him, 
 Avas son of AV^illiam Campbell, Esq., lord of the 
 manor of Eiston in Essex, and his son acted as his 
 deputy at tlie coronation of William IV. in 1837 in 
 serving his Majesty with wafers. The King was sup- 
 posed on a different sort of occasion to have acted as 
 tlie lord of the manor's deputy ; but the younger 
 Campbell passed as the King's godson. He had 
 several. 
 
 Mr. Commissioner Goulburn, who had been a 
 Cornet in the army, in answer to some one who 
 had asked him if he was not once a Welsh judge, 
 said : " Yes ; I was one with an understanding " — 
 meaning, on certain conditions. " Oh," returned 
 his friend, " I never heard before of a Welsh judge 
 who possessed such a thing." 
 
 Goulburn told my father, when the law permitting 
 personal petitions in bankruptcy was passed, that he 
 knew a Cornet Goulburn who would have been very 
 glad of such a facility. Thougli I think that I have
 
 LEGAL ENVIRONMENTS 185 
 
 seen the same joke related of some one else, I per- 
 fectly remember, when Goulburn once fell on his 
 head out of his carriage on the pavement, an inquiry 
 was made as to the damage done to the latter. It 
 was My. Commissioner Fonblanque, of the Bank- 
 ruptcy Court, who, when a suitable motto for the 
 Serjeants' rings was mooted, suggested Scilicet. 
 
 When Hazlitt Road, West Kensington, was so 
 christened, some one asked the builder why he gave 
 it that name, and whether it was after the author 
 of Tahle-T'alk (ISIaclise Road being immediately 
 adjacent). " Oh no ! " he replied ; " after dear old 
 Mr. Registrar Hazlitt ! " That gentleman, perhaps, 
 in his official capacity had let him off more easily 
 than he expected or deserved. 
 
 A fellow once sidled up mysteriously to the 
 Registrar, and demanded sotto voce what his terms 
 for advances were. My father held some scrip in a 
 Welsh mine, which he had long regarded as waste 
 paper, but one day some one stealthily approached 
 him, and inquired if he was aware that these securi- 
 ties wxre again quoted. His Honour adjourned the 
 case, took the shares out of the safe, jumped into a 
 cab, and had very shortly the current price in his 
 pocket, or at all events in his mind's eye. 
 
 Lord Kenyon spoke of Julian the Apostate as 
 Julian the Apostle. But perhaps one appellation is 
 as sensible and fit as the other. The Emperor pro- 
 voked the enmity of the clergy or priesthood by his 
 advanced opinions, and since the Church formerly 
 infiuenced so much the making of history, all who 
 incurred its displeasure have naturally come down to 
 us with tarnished characters or nicknames. 
 
 Of the old school of lawyers Brougham was 
 perhaps the last, if he was not the greatest. He 
 was a man of varied attainments, and spared no 
 labour to render himself conversant with every sub-
 
 ISG THE HAZLITTS 
 
 ject which happened to be coming before him as a 
 judge or as a legislator, and which he had not studied, 
 no matter how mean or trivial it might appear. He 
 did not account it sufficient for a lawyer to be read 
 only in the statute-book, the rules of the turf, the 
 daily paper, and Joe Miller, or deem that the de- 
 mands of culture were satisfied by the possession of 
 a library. He was my father's steadfast friend and 
 the intimate associate from college days of my great- 
 uncle Stoddart. Ill-natured persons were fond of 
 repeating the epigram, that his lordship knew every- 
 thing except law, and I have heard it said that he 
 was thought greater as H. B. than as I^. C. 
 
 Brougham's physical constitution was as perfect 
 a marvel as his intellectual activity and versatility. 
 His power of endurance must have been enormous, 
 and he was far from abstemious in any sense. The 
 fatigue and strain which, in his earlier professional 
 career he constantly bore, would have killed nine 
 men out of ten. Port and brandy, of which he so 
 freely partook, and which habitually accompanied 
 him in his travelling carriage before railways, instead 
 of impairing his energy, served as invigorating and 
 recuperative stinnilants. 
 
 Tlie Chancellor was apparently led by the coin- 
 cidence of the name to make his country seat 
 (Brougham Hall) near the ancient castle of the 
 \'iponts and Cliffords in Westmoreland, where 
 Queen Elizabeth was entertained in one of her 
 numerous progresses. 
 
 J^ord Chancellor \Vest})ury once took part in a 
 discussion on eternal punishment, of which he re- 
 pudiated the existence, and, lawyer-like, he wound 
 up his argument by saying: "Hell is dismissed with 
 costs ! " Westbury was remarkable for preserving 
 the old pronunciation of certain words, such as tvliole, 
 hot, which he pronoiuiccd rto/f, ivof. When my
 
 LEGAL ENVlRONxMENTS 187 
 
 father was at work with liim on the Eankniptcy l^ill, 
 1869, he once said to him: "I am sick, HazUtt, of 
 the wole business." 
 
 His lordship had his foibles, and one of them was 
 in the shape of an Italian Countess, whom he scan- 
 dalized some of his guests at Hackwood Hall by- 
 placing at the head of his table. Yet he was not 
 wanting in polite attentions to his wife, whose 
 parcels, and even bonnet-boxes, he would often be 
 seen carrying home. JNlany a time he borrowed 
 sixpence of some one at hand to pay for his omnibus. 
 
 Our judges are in the nature of things unequal 
 in capacity and efficiency. There is perhaps too 
 large a proportion of indifferent hands or rather 
 understandings. But the occupants of the Bench 
 from early association study, first, the Bar, secondly, 
 the solicitors, who formerly gave them briefs, and 
 thirdly and lastly, the suitors whom they are engaged 
 and paid to protect. I of course am speaking only 
 of the civil side, and I do not include the func- 
 tionary's personal comfort and convenience, which 
 comes first of all. A fitting successor to Bacon in 
 point of incompetence was Kekewich — Kekewich ! 
 — as Byron said of Amos Cottle, " — Phoebus ! what 
 a name !" I am sorry to say from careful personal 
 observation that the appointment of such a man to 
 the Bench was a disgraceful abuse of patronage. 
 
 A bookseller assured me that he had been com- 
 missioned to make the catalogue of the late Lord 
 Coleridge's private library, but that, owing to certain 
 circumstances, the business was a rather delicate one. 
 J believe that this was a thorough fiction, for Cole- 
 ridge's books were sold in the ordinary way, and the 
 person who was employed by the auctioneers to go 
 to tlie house to look at the collection informed me 
 that lie discovered no trace of anything of the sort 
 beyond the presence of such generally recognized
 
 188 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 works as the ^Irabian Nights or Payne's version of 
 Boccaccio. As Lamb's friend and correspondent, 
 Alsop, very truly pointed out, the man to whom his 
 family owed any distinction which they acquired was 
 neglected by them, and the anticlimax was reached 
 in a noble and learned lord, who inherited the name 
 and nothing else. Of tJie Coleridge's views on many 
 subjects we are at present at liberty to question the 
 soundness, more especially those on theology ; but 
 his intellectual majesty will never be doubted. 
 
 Mr. Justice Hawkins, whose partiality for the 
 turf is very well known, had once a horse case before 
 him. There had been some betting on a horse for 
 the Derby, and at the last moment the animal was 
 scratched. His lordship interrupted the speech of 
 the learned counsel in order to inquire what he meant 
 by Herat died. " JNIy lord," said the counsel, looking 
 very hard at Hawkins, " I am not exactly in a posi- 
 tion to tell your lordship offhand, but I will consult " 
 — eyeing the Bench all the time — "a very high 
 judicial authority, and shall be prepared to give your 
 lordship tlie information to-morrow morning." 
 
 Serjeant AVilkins, who died in poverty, com- 
 menced his professional career at Liverpool, but 
 afterward removed his practice to Durham. His 
 first case there was the defence of a young woman 
 committed for the murder of her illegitimate child, 
 and it brouglit him at once into notoriety. AVhen 
 the case for the Crown had closed, leaving no doubt 
 of the prisoner's guilt, Wilkins rose, looked at the 
 judge, then at the prisoner, then at the jury. Then 
 he seemed to be collecting himself; but a second 
 and third time he did the same thing. The Court 
 was in a state of astonishincnt ; but after the third 
 repetition Wilkins left his place, went up to the 
 dock, tore off a piece from the wretched tatters in 
 which the girl was dressed, and, holding it up, cried :
 
 LEGAL ENVIRONMENTS 189 
 
 " This was the cause of all ! Now, -gentlemen, I 
 consent to a verdict of Guilty." The prisoner was 
 convicted, but her sentence was commuted — at a 
 time when commutations were less usual. At the 
 next sessions thirty briefs awaited Wilkins. 
 
 Street, who took the superintendence and drew 
 the plans of the new Courts of Justice in I^ondon, 
 had travelled a good deal abroad, including Italy, 
 and had seen many public buildings everywhere, 
 erected at intervals piecemeal from pecuniary or 
 other exigencies in various tastes or schools of 
 architecture. He had the opportunity, with the 
 fine area cleared for the purpose, of placing on the 
 site a grand homogeneous structure — there was no 
 pretence for irregularity of design — and what did 
 he do ? He did just as a Chinese tailor would do, 
 if you gave him a pair of breeches with a patch in 
 them as a pattern. It was certainly a deplorable 
 muddle, yet characteristic enough, no doubt, of all 
 similar arrangements in this country. There was 
 no adequate provision for light, air, or hearing, and 
 solid mahogany doors had to be unhinged, that the 
 panels might be cut out and glass squares sub- 
 stituted, when it was found by this person of genius 
 that staircases or corridors were in almost complete 
 darkness at mid-day. 
 
 Baxter, of the firm of Baxter, Rose and Norton, 
 was an Evangelical preacher, and used to go down 
 to Aldershot to deliver discourses to the soldiers. 
 This procured him the name of Holy Baxter. The 
 business of his firm was at one time extraordinarily 
 great; they had 130 clerks in 32 rooms. It might 
 be said of them, as Horace does of Rome : 
 
 " Suis et ipsa Roma viribus ruit." 
 
 Baxter himself was not considered a first-rate 
 man of business ; but he was an excellent lawyer,
 
 190 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 and much consulted in railway cases. He carried 
 about an inch of pencil, and often amended a clause 
 in a Bill by adding a few words, as when he out- 
 witted Sir James AUport, of the Midland, in the 
 "running" question with the Wolverhampton and 
 AValsall, by inserting the words " and account," 
 which precluded the Midland from evading the 
 liability to pay under certain contingencies. 
 
 The misfortune of Baxter was his support of the 
 Tichborne Claimant; it led to a reconstruction of 
 the firm, and he died a poor man. I have been 
 told that there was little doubt as to the relationship 
 of Orton to the family, and that the Colonel of 
 tlie regiment to which Tichborne had belonged re- 
 cognized the Claimant as the same man who had 
 served under him, when he happened to see him 
 coming out of Court, and mentioned the matter to 
 Baxter casually, without knowing that the latter was 
 concerned in the defence. 
 
 Cockburn the jeweller of Richmond, Surrey, said 
 to me that, while he was engaged in breaking up 
 sovereigns for his professional purposes, Mr. Arnold, 
 the police magistrate, came into the shop, and asked 
 him what he was doing. He answered that he 
 hoped he was doing no harm, but did not like being 
 challenged by such an authority. There seems, 
 however, no objection to utilizing the currency for 
 jewellery, so long as it is not defaced and passed into 
 other hands. You may destroy it, but you must not 
 tamper with it. 
 
 In a case at a London police court, where two 
 Jews were parties, the magistrate asked one of them 
 whether he called himself Montagu. He replied in 
 the affirmative. He asked him again if it had 
 always been his name, and he said that he believed 
 so. " Had it ever been Moses ? " " Well, yes ; but 
 Closes and Montagu were the same." " Oli, then,"
 
 LEGAL ENVIRONMENTS 191 
 
 said the magistrate, " I suppose that the JMoses in 
 the Bible was also known as Montagu." The race 
 being so ancient, and its prospective advantages so 
 exceptional, it seems strange that so many Jews 
 should be anxious to disguise their nationality and 
 nomenclature. Hyman Montagu the numismatist 
 married a Miss Moses, who became Mrs. Montagu ; 
 but she ought by right to have kept her maiden 
 name. INIontagu did not desire to pass as a Jew, 
 but it was relevantly to him that some one expressed 
 to me his regret that the extinction of the Hebrews 
 had not been accomplished by King John. 
 
 My father told me the following anecdote about 
 Sir Charles Lewis, ISI.P. Lewis had had his full- 
 length portrait presented to him by his constituents 
 just before some one called to see him. " I have 
 something to shew you," said Lewis, and took the 
 other into the room where the likeness had been 
 placed. " What do you think of it ? " he asked. 
 " Very good indeed," replied the friend, " except 
 that the artist has painted you with your hands in 
 your own pockets." 
 
 A curious circumstance happened to an intimate 
 friend. Several thousand pounds, which he had 
 been entitled to expect, were left elsewhere, owing 
 to offence taken by the lady-relative who had the 
 money at her disposition. He came behind her 
 chair at dinner one day as a boy, and pulled her cap 
 or her wig. At the death of the party to whom she 
 bequeathed it, he willed it away with other property, 
 but this money could only pass by deed ; my friend 
 brought his action, and recovered it. I observed to 
 him that in this instance the will was not as good as 
 the deed. 
 
 A man, who had bought land at Brockley in 
 Kent, when it was cheap, and boundaries were 
 occasionally obscure, used to classify his property
 
 192 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 jocularly among his intimates as freehold, leasehold, 
 and catchhold. 
 
 Pleasantries at the cost of the legal profession 
 have always abounded ; but it may be a moot point, 
 whether the lawyer or the law is chieHy to blame. 
 Without doubt our existing judicial macliinery is a 
 disgrace to a civilized country. Take the case of a 
 difficult and complex question. You may have to 
 carry it into three or four courts, and they will all 
 disagree. AVhere is the law or the justice ? The 
 suitor has three sets of costs to pay. 
 
 If it were not for this atrocious condition of 
 affairs, three-fourths of the lawyers might starve. 
 As to solicitors, my father, brother, and myself have 
 known thousands, but of honest practitioners the 
 merest fraction. 
 
 The general illiteracy of the legal profession is 
 tolerably well known to such as have mixed in that 
 kind of society, or even have taken the trouble to 
 study tlic I^aw Reports in the daily press. The 
 explanation is that lawyers are specialists, and have 
 no leisure to devote to topics outside their vocation ; 
 but unhappily the public has to choose, in selecting a 
 counsel, between a gentleman, who has the ear of the 
 Court, and has too much to do, and a gentleman, who 
 has little enough to do, but to whom the judge does 
 not listen. Tlie former often learns his lesson, as he 
 goes on. Of the two, barristers are perhaps more 
 open to this charge than solicitors ; yet there is little 
 enough to choose between them. The late I\Ir. 
 Crump, Q.C., speaking on this subject to my father, 
 observed that lie was not at all so well versed as he 
 could have desired in points of general culture, but 
 that most men at the 15ar were utterly ignorant of 
 languages, even of Latin and French, and of literary 
 history. Another learned counsel mentioned to my- 
 self his intention of writing a monogram on a subject
 
 LEGAL ENVIRONMENTS 193 
 
 in which he happened to feel an interest. A Q.C. 
 (Warmino'ton, 1 think, was his name) once informed 
 me in Court that it miglit be a matter of opinion, 
 whether the i in subs/dence was long or short. I 
 sliould have liked to send him to his Latin Dictionary. 
 Even poor Kekewich, who sat on the Bench at tlie 
 time, knew better than that. When I conlidentially 
 disclosed to a third party — a professional man who, 
 as I thought, had some knowledge of French — the 
 slip about monograpli, he smiled, and expressed his 
 surprise that the gentleman should have been guilty 
 of such a gohery. 
 
 While I was engaged in editing Browne's works, 
 I went to the Inner Temple to inquire for particulars 
 of the performance there of the Inner Temple Masque 
 in 1014. But they knew nothing of it, and did not 
 exhibit a particle of interest in the matter. 
 
 It is a painful business if you have to go into 
 Court on any matter pertaining to literary copyright. 
 It is vast odds if the judge, the counsel, and the 
 solicitors are not absolute blanks, unless they have 
 very greatly improved since I committed my father 
 to an action in respect to his edition of Montaigne. 
 1 was never more frightened in my whole life, for it 
 was not more than a sum of £10 that was at issue. 
 I worked hard, however, to protect my fathers 
 pocket, and the result was that the defendant had 
 to pay about £300 in costs on both sides. If the 
 suit had concerned the Turf, the Stock Exchange, 
 or the Prize lling there would have been less 
 difficulty. 
 
 Chief Baron Pollock was an honourable exception 
 to a prevailing rule. He was a person of cultivated 
 taste, and liked to gather round him men of letters 
 and artists. Thackeray used to visit at the house. 
 The Chief Baron expressed in a letter of 18G8 to his 
 friend Dr. Diamond, of Twickenham, a warm admira- 
 
 N
 
 194 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 tion of my grandfather, and he stated there that he 
 always kept HazHtt's vohnnes near him. Among 
 soHc'itors 1 suppose that the hite Sir George Lewis 
 held the first place, and he was not deficient in 
 chivalry. But it was my fortune to know JMr. 
 Thomas INliles of Keyham in Leicestershire, who, 
 though not a solicitor, was the keeper of half the 
 county's secrets, and was consulted on all sorts of 
 family matters. 
 
 The late Chief Justice Coleridge and Justice Day 
 belong to the roll of book-collectors — the latter in a 
 very mild way. 
 
 The last time that my father saw George Henry 
 Lewes, husband of George Eliot (Miss Marian 
 Evans), he was standing, like Collier, at Charing 
 Cross, and presented a singular appearance, being 
 dressed from top to toe in white, and the only thing 
 about him that was not white was his red hair and 
 beard. 
 
 There was about my good father a certain 
 Shandean vein. There descended to him a share 
 of tlie spirit which yielded the Liber Amoiis^ yet 
 at a different level. Among his more intimate ac- 
 quaintances I observed from boyhood a tendency — 
 1 thoroughly believe without any improper motive — 
 to tlie feminine side. The men were rather poor 
 creatures. This unfortunate delusion experienced its 
 latest and gravest development in a remarriage at 
 seventy-five to a middle-aged woman without any 
 better credentials than those of a nurse at wages. 
 
 1 caused the insertion in the Antiquainj for April, 
 189.'}, as the reports of my father's death in the press 
 had been more or less inaccurate, of the following 
 notice : — 
 
 "On February 21, at his residence, Addlestone, Sun-ey, 
 where his t^raTid father, the Rev. William Ila/litt, officiated and 
 lived duriiif; several years, died suddenly Mr. William Hazlitt,
 
 I.EGAT. ENVIRONMENTS 195 
 
 only son of the essayist and critic, and fatlicr of Mr. W. Carew 
 Ila/litt. Charles Lamb, in a letter which has been repeatedly 
 printed, mentions his birth, at AVinterslow, near Salisbury, 
 September 20, 1811. The deceased gentleman devoted the 
 earlier part of his career to journalism and literature, and was 
 on friendly terms with most of the men of the day. He was 
 on the staff at different periods of the Morning Chronicle, Daily 
 Nexcs, Times, and Morning Post ; he belonged to the Daily 
 Nexos while John and Charles Dickens were employed there ; 
 and Mr. Hazlitt was one of the original members of the club 
 founded by Douirlas Jerrold under the name of the Hooks 
 and Eyes. He married, in 1833, one of the sisters of the late 
 Mr. Charles Reynell {Antiquary, xxv. 89), whom he survived 
 nearly thirty-three years. From 1854 to 1890 he was one of 
 the registrars of the London Bankruptcy Court. In him we 
 have lost another link with the last age." 
 
 He had, it appeared, gone to bed on the night of 
 the 20th as usual, enjoying his game after dinner, and 
 woke about midnight, complaining of a pain. The 
 doctor was summoned, and thought that tliere was 
 nothing serious. But about two hours later my 
 father grew worse and expired at about 2 a.m. on 
 Tuesday the 21st. His last intelligible words were : 
 " I'm dying." He muttered something more ; but it 
 could not be made out. 
 
 During many years subsequent to my most dear 
 mother's death in 1860 and my marriage I saw a 
 good deal of my father, who frequently stayed with 
 me. AVhen he had lodgings in Mount Street, Gros- 
 venor Square, he was ill, and I hastened up to inquire 
 for him or see him. He was out, and I told the 
 landlady that, if they telegraphed to me, 1 would 
 instantly come at any hour of the day or night.
 
 XIII 
 
 JERROLD^S CLUB 
 
 Aroint sixty years ago Douglas Jerrold and a few 
 friends established a social club called the Hooks and 
 Kijcs. I believe that the number was very limited 
 at first, but it was at all events made up to forty, 
 when the name was changed to the Forty Thieves. 
 The final nomenclature, Our Cluh, was adopted prior 
 to 1800. My father was an original member, either 
 a Hook or an Eye. He became in due course one 
 of tlie Forty, and he continued Avith the set when it 
 was rebaptized for the third and last time. 
 
 During a long series of seasons a good evening 
 might be fairly counted upon. Jerrold himself, his 
 son Blanch ard Jerrold, Shirley Ih'ooks, the younger 
 Dickens, Dillon Croker, Henry HoU, Dr. Diamond, 
 Dr. Richardson, Dr. Percy the metallurgist, F. AV. 
 Cosens, Sir George Jessel, Charles Knight, Hepworth 
 Dixon, Professor IMasson, Josepli Durham and 
 Thomas AVoolner the sculjDtors, Robert Keeley, Dr. 
 Doran, my father, and others — all these I have seen 
 round tlie dinner-table together or in succession, and 
 besides tlie roll of members there were the guests, as 
 each fellow had the privilege of introducing one or 
 more friends. Some of these gentlemen had suffi- 
 ciently slender pretensions to anything beyond good- 
 fellowship. One of them (Cosens) once invited me 
 to punish his viulton — a figure of speech which was 
 new to me. 
 
 Horace Mayhew once brought Thackeray. They 
 came after dinner, and I lecollect Thackeray's com- 
 
 I'JO
 
 JERROLD'S CLUI? 197 
 
 manding fio-ure as he entered the door. It was 
 the only time I ever saw him. He paused on the 
 threshold in a hesitating manner, as if uncertain of 
 his reception, and his introducer had almost to 
 thrust him forward. 
 
 Charles Dickens the younger, my fatlicr, Holl, 
 and Croker were the mainstay of the institution in 
 one respect, for each of them, if present, was expected 
 to favour the company with a song or recitation. 
 Holl and Croker furnished recollections of the old 
 and livinff actors. Hazlitt contributed one of his 
 \Vest-Country songs. There was a fair gathering, as 
 a rule, of men of mark and likelihood, and some good 
 talk passed. 
 
 Chappell, in his Popular 3In.s-ic of the Olden Tivie, 
 has printed one of Hazlitt's Wiltshire ditties,^ which 
 I have so often heard my fatlier give with all the 
 gusto and raciness of the local twang, to the infinite 
 enjoyment of the audience, and here is the remain- 
 ing production from a copy in JNlr. Registrar's 
 autograph : 
 
 THE WILTSHIRE CONVICT'S FAREWELL. 
 
 Come, all you young fellaws^ wherever that you be ; 
 Come, all you young m'idtns, j'in choruus with nic ; 
 'Tis of ten stout young fellaws as was tried the other tl'y ; 
 And they are bound doon for Woolwich to set s'il for Botany B'y. 
 
 With a 7-igktfol de riddle, Jul da raij. 
 
 Then we went from the D'vizes bound doon in iron so Strang ; 
 From D'vizes unto Fislierton they march'd us all alang ; 
 As I was passing by I heard the })eoplc s'y : 
 
 " What a pity such foine fellaws should be gaain' to Botany B'y!" 
 
 With a rightful, etc. 
 
 Tlien in comes the j'iler about six o'clock ; 
 Then in comes the j'iler our doors to unlock, 
 
 ' Po/iu/ar Music of the Olden Time, p. 7«^>2. It is a very c^irnip) version 
 of the soiij^ printed at p. 4."il of the same work.
 
 198 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Sayiiii!; : " Come, my lads, make ready, for ye must liastc aw'y, 
 For you're bouu' doon for Woolwich to set s'il for Botany B'y." 
 
 With a right fol, etc. 
 
 Then in comes pretty Sally, with ten fjuineas in her han', 
 Saying: " Take this, my laddies, I've brought ye all I can." 
 So fill us up a glass, I will drink my love's adieu ; 
 'Tis ten thoosan' to one I ever more sees you. 
 
 IVilh a right fol, etc. 
 
 And when we gets to Botany B'y some letters we will write, 
 Unto our loving sweethearts and pretty girls in white ; 
 So kind heaven noAV protect us for ever and a d'y. 
 And God send every Wiltshire lad safe home fro' Botany B'y ! 
 
 With a rightful, etc. 
 
 This effusion, which is traceable to a real event, 
 namely, to the suppression of a local gang of 
 smugglers and malefactors, of "svhich an account was 
 printed at Devizes, was a wonderful favourite, and 
 was invariably encored, a circumstance which made 
 tlie singer a less frequent visitor of late years, as a 
 call for Hazlitt was as much a part of the evening as 
 tiie dinner itself. Cliief Earon Pollock was greatly 
 delighted with the performance when he heard it. 
 Ijltllc Blllce was often given as a sequel on the same 
 evening. IVIy fatlier, when he delivered his part of 
 the entertainment, would throw himself back in his 
 arm-chair, shut his eyes, and purse up his mouth into 
 the shape of O. 
 
 He not only possessed a voice, which with proper 
 training might have proved a fine one, but was a 
 highly proficient whistler, and would accompany him- 
 self or another to the piano. He carried what is 
 generally a nuisance to a pleasing accomplishment, 
 as those who liave heard him might have testified. 
 J)uring the best years of his life, and chiefly in 
 Jh'ompton and Chelsea days, Jie was much in request 
 at musical soirees, and there were certain Italian 
 songs, which he could iujprovise, thougii I fear that
 
 JERROLD'S CLUB 109 
 
 I never clearly penetrated their drift. He once 
 laboured under a not uncommon form of delicate 
 embarrassment, in going in morning dress to the 
 Ewbanks', and told me that he kept himself in- 
 trenched behind the piano to conceal the incorrect- 
 ness of his nether habiliments. 
 
 It was an inexorable ordinance of the Club that 
 invited guests should, in response to the toast of 
 their health, which was equally peremptory, deliver 
 an oration. But if there was more than a single 
 stranger, one spoke for the rest, whereas at the 
 Noviomagian gatherings each individual had to rise 
 in turn — a refinement of cruelty. I was once ap- 
 prised to my astonishment by the visitor who had to 
 follow me, when I had struggled through a few 
 sentences, that I had left nothing for him to say. 
 
 Professor Bain, of Aberdeen, told me, when I 
 once met him out at dinner, two or three anecdotes 
 of Jerrold which I had not heard before. 
 
 Jerrold was dining at some place where a salad 
 was put on the table. Some one observed that it 
 was unusually gritty. Jerrold calls the waiter, and 
 says: "What's this?" "Salad, sir." "No," says 
 Jerrold, " it's a gravel walk with a good many 
 weeds in it." 
 
 He was at a lecture on the races of men, and 
 specimens of the various types were exhibited. 
 AVhen the Caucasian type was shown, " Ah," he 
 says, "that's the type I would go to press with." 
 This reminded me of the story of tlie girl in an 
 omnibus on a very cold day, who observed to a 
 fellow-passenger that it was fine embracing weather. 
 
 Jerrold was rather partial to his tumbler of brandy- 
 and-water, and was, as we know, of singularly short 
 stature. One evening (not at the Club), where he 
 was waited on by some nymph, she grew so im- 
 patient at the wit's calls for refreshers that, making
 
 200 THE IIAZLITTS 
 
 up for him a tall soda-water glass of liquor, she 
 exclaiuied to a friend, " There, let the little beast go 
 and drown himself in it ! " 
 
 When he was living on Lower Putney Common, 
 and money was short, his landlord came to press for 
 the overdue rent, and said, " lleally, JMr. Jerrold, 1 
 must be paid, or I must put a man in." " You 
 could not make it a woman, could you ? " de- 
 manded Jerrold. 
 
 When INIrs. Jerrold was once enceinte her 
 husband mentioned to a friend that an addition to 
 tlie family was expected, but that it was not at 
 present visible to the naked eye. 
 
 In reference to a literary man, who was supposed 
 to be dead, but wlio, thougli of great age, proved to 
 be still extant, Jerrold said : " He may be ever-green, 
 but he is never red.'" 
 
 I hardly know what station .Jerrold at present 
 liolds in a literary and social sense. I lately saw him 
 dismissed as A Forgotten Jester. 
 
 At " Our Club " someone referred to a novel by 
 Cordy JeafFreson, called (or to be called) TJie llapicrs 
 of t/ie Ilegenfs Park. Finch, one of the members, 
 suggested that JeafFreson might follow it up by the 
 lUiinderlmsses of Bloomsbnry. 
 
 1 never met JMark Lemon at tlie Club, of v/hich 
 he would, I suppose, have been merely a guest. I 
 never lieard of him otherwise than by the appelhition 
 commonly known. My father clearly understood 
 that he was in early life a potman at a public-house 
 in or near the Strand. On one occasion, my brother 
 suggesting that the portly editor of Pumch and he 
 miglit share a hansom, the former raised the question 
 of space, wliereupon his companion said that a lemon 
 ought not to object to being squeezed. 
 
 Holl and C'roker, of wlioni the latter was never, I 
 Ijeheve, a member, were excellent mimics. 1 used
 
 JERROLD'S CLUR 201 
 
 to prefer Holl. His impersoniitions of some of the 
 cliaracters of O'Smith, Keeley, IMacready, Fechter, 
 Charles Kean, Riickstone, and Webster were capital. 
 He was always ready, when he was in fair cue, to 
 favour us with a specimen at his own house in 
 camera. Henry James 15yron was also a very clever 
 hand at hitting off Ruckstone and other artists of his 
 own day ; but some of those whom Holl had known 
 were before his time. 
 
 One of the standard pleasantries at Our Club was 
 at the expense of the late Sir IJenjamin Richardson, 
 an extremely pleasant and popular member, but a 
 prominent advocate of tcetotalism. A noble lord 
 having bequeathed his fine cellar of wines to 
 Richardson, the latter found himself in possession 
 of a white elephant of very unusual dimensions. 
 Of course, the doctor could not dream of drinkhig 
 the wine himself, still less of offering it to his friends. 
 Nor could he sell it, nor could he present it to a 
 public institution. A^'hat would he do ? One 
 sunftjestion was that he should run it down the 
 sewer, where it would destroy the rats ; but this 
 was deliberate cruelty to animals, and tlie doctor 
 was a kind-hearted man. The liquor v/as ultimately 
 wasted, 1 believe. 
 
 Dr. Diamond, of Our Club, and Dr. Powell, were 
 the two earliest amateur photographers in England. 
 The latter dined wqth my fatb.er at Erompton when 
 he was last in England on a visit from tlie ^lauritius.^ 
 He had become acquainted there with the only son 
 of John liazlitt the miniature-painter, wlio, after 
 settling at Demerara, removed to JNlauritius, and 
 died there.- He possessed a few miniatures executed 
 
 ^ Another family, which took an oxtra-pn)fessioii.nl interest in photo- 
 p:raphy, was that of C'rawsliay of CyfarthCa. Botli the fatlier and sons 
 followed tlie pursuit, and I have understood tliat they included un- 
 conventional studies, like the late Mr. Edward Ilailsti'Ue. 
 
 ^ See Tha Ilazlittn, 1911, p. 834.
 
 202 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 by his fjither, but I never heard what became of 
 theni.^ He had at one time accumulated a tolerable 
 fortune, and lived to lose it, to make a second, and 
 lose a great part of that, too, in a commercial paper. 
 \Ve corresponded together during many years, and 
 his letters to me contain many interesting particulars 
 relating to the island. He once forwarded to me 
 some representations as to political parties there, 
 with the desire that I should get them printed. I 
 submitted them (unread, I confess) to an editor, 
 who returned them with the observation that their 
 appearance in his columns would have probably 
 involved the paper in several lawsuits. 
 
 The Sundays at Twickenham House, while 
 Diamond resided there, and so long as the estab- 
 lishment and its excellent host were in their palmier 
 state, were remarkably enjoyable and instructive. I 
 never heard much about the Doctor's origin and 
 antecedents. When he once visited me at Midhurst 
 in Sussex, he intimated that he was of that county — 
 even of that vicinity ; and 1 perceive that in 1848 a 
 " \y. H. Diamond, Esq." resided in Frith Street, 
 Solio, and lent Chatto a curious pack of cards for his 
 monograph on that subject. Was this our friend 
 with his initials transposed ? But the name is not 
 common. There was a Diamond mixed up in the 
 Sussex smugglers' case of 1747. The circle which 
 collected round the Doctor during several years in- 
 cluded a \on(T catalogue of names illustrious in letters 
 and art. Some of the same set which assembled at 
 Our Club and at the Noviomagians formed also the 
 habitual visitors at Twickenham, where there was a 
 free entree and a hearty welcome for every recognised 
 comer. Three o'clock was the dinner-hour. 
 
 The house was filled with valuable curiosities of 
 
 * Three were sold in London in July, 1011, almost certainly from this? 
 original source. 1 hought two. The third did not interest me.
 
 JERROLD'S CLUB 203 
 
 every description ; but the speciality of Diamond was 
 old china, about which his knowledge and fund of 
 anecdote were inexhaustible. The room in which 
 we all dined resembled a crockery shop: every 
 available nook and corner was filled ; the cases were 
 two or three deep, and the drawers of the cabinets, 
 if opened, disclosed treasures which the owner him- 
 self had almost forgotten, but of which he soon 
 recalled every particular — the place and date of 
 purchase, the name and personal history of the 
 former owner, and the circumstances under which 
 he had secured this teapot or that jar. 
 
 It was not an unfrcquent observation on his part 
 that his friend Lord VVilloughby d'Eresby, who was 
 a connoisseur of old ciiina, considered no thorough 
 judge ought to require to see the potter's mark, but 
 should be able to pronounce what the piece was 
 from the texture and the paste. Concurrently with 
 Diamond, Mr. and JMrs. Thomas Haliburton formed a 
 cabinet of old china at Isleworth. I heard my father 
 speak of it, but I never saw it. Haliburton sent me 
 a copy of his Sam Slick with an autograph inscription. 
 
 The Doctor had also a few coins, a few prints, and 
 a few books, and latterly he was bitten by the 
 rat-tailed spoon and Queen Anne plate crazes. I 
 remember him when he was extraordinarily tenacious 
 of his acquisitions, and would not have listened to 
 any proposal to part with his specimens. One day 
 he shewed me a very fine old \^incennes saucer, to 
 which I had the cup ; but his piece was badly broken, 
 and I should not have valued it, yet he anticipated 
 me by saying that he never let anything leave his 
 hands. 
 
 Toward the end, however, his feeling in tliis 
 respect underwent a great change, and many of the 
 beautiful old bits of plate and other rarities mysteri- 
 ously disappeared ; and the house with its circular
 
 204 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 dniwing - room, once the residence of Sir John 
 Hawkhis, and the (grounds, and our kind-hearted 
 entertainer, and nearly all who once met under that 
 hospitable roof, have disappeared, too. There was 
 an atmosphere envelopinj^ tlie wliole spot, and seem- 
 ing to raise it out of tiie dead level of common- 
 place every-day life ; and of good fare there was no 
 stint, nor of good talk. 
 
 Diamond kept pigeons, which according to their 
 wont multiplied enormously, till their food cost 
 about three guineas a week. At last they per- 
 suaded him to sell a great part of them. But they 
 all returned to their old home. 
 
 The Doctor had a way, on a Sunday in spring or 
 in summer in the garden, of finding a worm, placing 
 it on the open palm of one hand, and whistling, when a 
 robin appeared, and, after circumspectly reconnoitring 
 for a few moments, alighted on Diamond's hand, 
 seized its prey, and flew off to a more convenient 
 ])lace for its meal. This once took place while 1 
 stood by, and the little creature was rather bashful. 
 Our host used to relate that it was his practice to 
 patronize the INIaid of Honour shop at Richmond 
 for his cheese-cakes ; but he had them made at home 
 after detectinij a hair of a maid in one of those 
 acquired by purchase. A very similar confection 
 was formerly made at an old-fashioned depot in the 
 market - place at Wokingham in Berkshire. The 
 Doctor had an eccentric lady patient, who once 
 engaged with liim in a theological discussion on 
 the teaching of St. Paul the Apostle. He entered 
 a little into tlie views and doctrines of the latter on 
 a certain point ; ])Lit his listener interrupted him by 
 observing: "Ah, yes, I am aware of it; but that's 
 just where Paul and I differ." 
 
 Diamond unquestionably carried away with him, 
 when he died in 188G, much curious and unique in-
 
 JERROLD'S CLUB 205 
 
 formation about those mjittcrs wliich interested him, 
 and it was hard to say what had not done so at some 
 period or other of his aetive and observant life. On 
 ehina, books, eni,a-avings, birds' eggs, stuffed birds, 
 medals, and coins, he could discourse largely and 
 learnedly, and in conversation on any of these topics, 
 he was peculiarly sii/pplemcntal. He generally knew 
 all tliat you did and a little more. If you mentioned 
 a man who was tolerably in years in your youth, and 
 narrated some trait of him, the Doctor would be very 
 apt to chime in with, "Ah, sir, I knew his father," 
 and so forth ; and he did so without improper 
 assumption or any desire to hurt. 
 
 Diamond occasionally contributed to N'otes and 
 Qiieries — a miscellany which Thomas Wright assured 
 me he never saw anyone read except an old woman 
 once in an omnibus. The Doctor's friends often 
 pressed him to prepare a descriptive catalogue of his 
 china, Avith all the valuable and attractive minutice^ 
 of which he was the sole repository. But he never 
 did. 
 
 My late brother was his executor ; and I conclude 
 that it was only in a Pickwickian sense that he once 
 said of him, that he was the most trustworthy man 
 he knew, for if he engaged to do anything, you might 
 depend upon it that he would not. JMy brotlier had 
 no literary taste, but was a reader, and possessed 
 some sense of humour. He repeated to me what an 
 omnibus-driver had once said to him, as he sat by 
 him in the old days on the box : " Ave 'eared say, 
 sir, as there's countries where elephants burrows 
 in the ground." 
 
 AVilliam Hepworth Dixon — the second name 
 proba])ly a superstructure — was, I have understood, 
 the son of a Lancashire mill-hand. When he was sent 
 down in later life on some official inquiry, the folks 
 recognized him as Bill Dixon ; but he affected not to
 
 20G THE IIAZLITTS 
 
 know them nor the neighbourhood. He was u clever 
 but superficial person, and had no breeding. Jerrold 
 used to call him " Ha'portli Dixon." I had a conver- 
 sation with Dixon one morning about the relative 
 merits of two of our old poets, Herbert and Crashaw, 
 and he said to me, paring his nails, when I had ex- 
 pressed my preference for Crashaw : " Well, that's a 
 matter of opinion." I do not imagine he knew any- 
 thing about either ; and when Henry Holl was once 
 speaking at Our Club about our old writers, Dixon 
 broke in with some critical remarks, and concluded 
 with, "Just the sort of thing, you know, that Jack 
 AVebster would have said," without the faintest idea 
 of AVebster or his style of writing. He never did 
 much after leaving the Athenceum. Dilke took him 
 rather unexpectedly at his word when they differed 
 on some principle, and he told "Charlie" that he 
 w^as ready to go if he could get another man to suit 
 him better, which " Charlie " did. 1 have elsewhere 
 incidentally noticed his confusion at a dinner-table 
 between ice-pudding and rice-pudding. There was 
 also his failure to understand the proper use of 
 tlie rose-water dish — he took it to be a drinking 
 vessel. 
 
 It was a trait perfectly in keeping with his utter 
 want of sensibility and training, that one Sunday, at 
 Diamond's, he took up his son, and threw him into 
 the centre of a splendid box hedge on which the 
 Doctor especially prided himself — a hedge, so far as 1 
 recollect, some four feet across. It stood — alas ! it 
 stands no longer — close by a fence formed of old 
 Culloden sword-bladcs, which the Duke of Athol 
 went down to Twickenham House one day to see. 
 This, too, of course, lias vanished ; but the blades had 
 almost utterly perished from rust and corrosion. 
 
 As an editor, however, Dixon was, on the whole, 
 comparatively fair and moderate in the tone which
 
 JERROLD'S CLUB 207 
 
 he maintained, and whicli he prescribed to his staff 
 of reviewers. He instructed them not only to be 
 just, but to be generous, where a book possessed 
 a reasonable share of merit and evidences of genuine 
 work. 
 
 Dixon utilized his vacations by visiting some 
 locality likely to yield marketable stufF for a book 
 against the next winter season. One year he went 
 to Cyprus, and after a six weeks' stay appeared 
 in due course as the historian of that island and 
 ancient seat of arts and government. These literary 
 manufiictures can only be viewed in the same light 
 as the artist's " pot-boiler," but in this particular case 
 the question is whether the writer was capable of 
 anything better and more permanent. 
 
 The author of Spiritual Wives was haunted by 
 the curse of quick study. He came, saw, and con- 
 quered. The history of an ancient empire or the 
 picture of a later-day heresy, it mattered little. He 
 had the knack of disguising his lack of knowledge and 
 information under a specious and flippant style em- 
 phatically Dixonian, and his object was achieved. 
 His work meant money, even if at present it means 
 nought. I do not at all know what sort of account 
 the AthenoeiLm gave of it. 
 
 It was rather trying to listen to him as he delivered 
 a speech on some subject, such as Shakespear, with 
 which his conversance was of the most deplorably 
 limited and empirical nature ; and it was this facility 
 for uttering a string of commonplaces in the absence 
 of a competent knowledge of the topic under treat- 
 ment which first led me to speculate on the title of 
 Tarliamentary and other orators to rank ijjso facto 
 as possessors of first-class gifts, or, in otlier words, 
 whether fluency of speech is not, except in a few 
 cases, the actual outcome of a deficiency of critical 
 acquaintance with a subject.
 
 208 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 At the Club the younger Dickens sang well, and 
 Lawrence had his song, too, with tlie peculiarity of 
 ignoring a certain letter of the alphabet — it was 
 always Tom I>oivli?i^n^, Smollett's hero, but the song 
 which Dibdin wrote at Han<]fer Hill, Ealinsf. The 
 
 CD ^ O 
 
 concluding visit of my fjither and the writer to the 
 Club found only seven others present, of whom six 
 were knights — such knights as we now have. 
 
 Dr. Doran came to dine at my father's at l^romp- 
 ton about 18.57. I was a very young man, and heard 
 Doran, in speaking of books, declare to my father 
 that he never gave more than fourpence for any. I 
 had at that time a very imperfect acquaintance with 
 bibliography ; but I remember that I formed a very 
 unfavourable estimate of Doran's library. I imagine 
 that it was never publicly sold. 
 
 The last letter which Doran wrote was addressed 
 to my father, and was inserted by Cordy JeafFreson 
 in the biographical notice which he wrote at tlie time 
 of our common friend's death. Doran had been 
 private physician at one period of his life to the 
 Earl of Harewood. I once met him and Dixon at 
 a private dinner given by F. W. Cosens, and I was 
 infinitely disgusted by the coai'sencss of both in their 
 conversation. I do not think that our kind host was 
 either pleased or Mattered by the gross vulgarity of 
 the two distinguished litter al curs. 
 
 The Club passed some of its happiest and most 
 prosperous times at Clun's Hotel under the Piazza in 
 Covent Garden, next to Evans's. It migrated from 
 place to place, and at each removal left some of its 
 old prestige behind. My father at length gave up 
 attending ; and, as Lamb said of himself in refer- 
 ence to the London Maii;azine in its declining days, 
 Cordy .JeafFreson and Macmillan (not the publisher) 
 lingered among the rafters of the sinking ship like 
 the last rat.
 
 JERROLD'S CLUB 209 
 
 Our Club long kept up its Shakespear night, 
 when it became fi'oni season to season increasingly 
 difficult to moot any fresh point, and to lend an 
 original air to the gathering, of which the guests 
 formed a majority. There was also the annual 
 meeting. Some years ago it was held at Rich- 
 mond. JNIy father invited me to join him, and 
 Woolner was there. The cliief thing which I 
 recollect is that, as we were coming away to the 
 train, AVoolner's laugh could be heard from one 
 end of the hill to the other. 
 
 What may be called the Fasti of the Club were 
 composed by Holl and Brooks at different times. 
 The production of the former bears no note of date, 
 and describes a representative evening in the earlier 
 and brighter epoch, but after the loss of Jerrold. 
 Here it is : 
 
 "THE RETALIATION" 
 
 IMITATED. 
 
 " Our Club " here to-night a new session commences ; 
 
 The members assemble, refresh'd in their senses. 
 
 With study the studious each wiser you meet. 
 
 The dissolute sober, the noisy discreet ! 
 
 The silent not dull, the thoughtful still thinking : 
 
 The deeper the wit, the deeper his drinking. 
 
 The merits of each would pose me to mention — 
 
 I never pretended to too much invention. 
 
 The tixble is full ! I can scarce find a nook. 
 When Hamstede pulls out his horrid " Blue Book " : 
 Each man pays his guinea — if he does, it's a wonder — 
 And down sits our " Sec." to reckoji his plunder. 
 They're so crowded together, I shall ne'er make 'em out. 
 Midst the shouting and laughing, and ranting, and rout. 
 But the Chairman now rises ; the noise is subsiding, 
 Tho' the laughing laugh on, the derided deriding : 
 Their faces upturn'd, I can view them aroiuid. 
 And write, as I sit, their praises profoinid. 
 
 Who shall I begin with ? 'J'he Serjeant so portly. 
 His air so imposing, so jolly, yet courtly ? 
 
 O
 
 210 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 With humour so full, it runs o'er as he speaks, 
 
 While jeering, each sentence unmannerly breaks ; 
 
 With law, and with logic, so fully he's cramm'd, 
 
 His logic may save what the lawyer has damn'd : 
 
 And next him sits Lawrence, so famed for his pleading — 
 
 But I doubt that Ms merit lies most in his feeding : 
 
 And both look askance, as on nice points they'd wrestle ; 
 
 On Gammon Liiw Practice, with Chancery Jessel. 
 
 While Barrister Cooke starts up in the crowd, 
 
 And welcomes the new legal member O'Dowd. 
 
 But the Club is so full of lawyers profound, 
 
 'Twould require the " Law List " to name them all round. 
 
 On all things they quibble, but that's nothing new, 
 
 And midst their cross-questions what are we to do ? 
 
 But one thing there's good, in their presence so dubious, 
 
 If we of the Club, in prison lugubrious. 
 
 Should fall into grief, or in " Bailey " the " Old," 
 
 They'd defend us for nothing — at least so I'm told. 
 
 My eyes glancing round, regard with delight, 
 \^^lite-headed, warm-hearted, the "genial " Charles Knight : 
 Still true to his mission, mankind he has taught, 
 How knowledge and science may cheajjiy be bought. 
 To all men a friend — of none a detractor. 
 Not this land alone, but the world's benefactor ! 
 And constant in good — how he does it's a mystery. 
 Of England he's writing a " Popular History," 
 Of brave Robin Hood, and men of his kin. 
 Not even forgetting our own Tom-a-Lin. 
 
 'Tis Dixon comes next, that wonderful critic, 
 At all points he's arm'd in his study ascetic- 
 He uses a steel pen, instead of a quill. 
 And slaughters a book with terrible skill ; 
 And yet, after all, not so hard as he looks. 
 With tenderness touch'd, he loves his own books ! 
 Witli eloquence gifted, he'll speak by the yard. 
 And tho' somewliat caustic, he never hits hard. 
 He has hewn his own path — he has fought and has struggled. 
 Yet never with vices or meanness has juggled ! 
 Unaided he's master'd position and pay. 
 Not stooj)ing, as some do, to meet folly half-way. 
 
 Beside him is musing — as writing I pass on, 
 A man we know well, deep-thinking, dear Masson ! 
 'i his true son of .Scotia, who never had kilt on, 
 Has lately been writing tlie life of great Milton. 
 Our English to touch up, and our language to weed. 
 We've got a Professor from the far side the Tweed.
 
 JERROI.D'S CLUB 211 
 
 A Scot sits beside liini, ;ui(l I much (loul)t if whether 
 A finer built Scot ever trod on the heather ; 
 Of all Macs that I know — but their names are a bore — 
 I don't know a Mac that can vie with Maclure. 
 A third Scot we muster our numbers amontr, 
 A man who has written, whose Father has sung, 
 No sailor more jovial — but one of that sort. 
 Our Peter's so love-sick, he still runs to Port. 
 And near to these three, so cosy and canny, 
 A head that belongs to sharj)-sj)okeu Hanuay. 
 He says what he thinks ; slashes left, and then right ; 
 And belabours his man in a well-worded fight. 
 
 Both Doctors and Artists the table surround, 
 Tho' thei/ may not be, yet their looks are profound. 
 There's Sibson and Duplex, with sharp tongues at will. 
 Can cut up a man with surgical skill. 
 We've Durham will chisel your full length from a slab, 
 And Ward, who can paint you with his brush at a dab. 
 While ])i'mond and Fenton, photographers rare. 
 Will knock off your likeness to a curl of your hair. 
 
 There's one man I see, good-looking and burly, 
 (You'll know at a glance I am thinking of Shirley,) 
 And tho' some are grumbling at men and at books. 
 No voice is so soft as murmuring Brooks ! 
 So ready's his pen, and so quick his invention. 
 His works are too many, and " too numerous to mention." 
 He'll write you to order — a Novel, what not, — 
 And (I wish he would cut it) a long " Gordian Knot." 
 
 Now shouting, and whooping, and wild as a Yahoo, 
 (He's famed for his noise) in rushes mad Mayhew ! 
 His voice has aroused from his dreams theological, 
 (Tho' well used to bears) the " Sec." Zoological ; 
 While Joyce, in his wrath, says, " he thinks it a pity 
 He was not turn'd out with the ' feeding Committee.' 
 Stuff'd beasts in a row, how glad he would see 'em, 
 A wonder for Vaux in the British Museum ! " 
 
 Of Poets and Writers we've quantum sufficit. 
 Each man wields a pen, and knows how to price it. 
 And slily to Evans an author is hinting, 
 A book he would make a large fortune by printing; 
 While he shakes his head, as doubting if buyers 
 For copies would rush, and blockade Whitefriars ! 
 There's Doran the Doctor, so apt at his tools, 
 He'll write you of " Kings" as well as of " Fools." 
 Perplex'd with crown'd follies, their crimes and their vices. 
 His " Fools" come quite easy, and sell at good prices :
 
 212 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 But peaceful their weapons, whilst a man of the sword 
 
 Is seen in the Captain, the " Staymaker's " adored ! 
 
 And close by his side, " most musical" sits, 
 
 The new-married Davison, restored to his wits. 
 
 His marriage-bells rung, may he still bless their chimes, 
 
 And as Musical Critic make his " notes " of the Times. 
 
 But Keeley now drops in, that marvellous actor, 
 Tho' little his size, he's the greatest attractor ; 
 Whilst Eastwick, grown tired with the noise of the Babel, 
 Gets up, and resigns him his seat at the table, 
 And calls upon Ha/litt, whose accent surprises, 
 As he sings of " Young Thomas " and lads from Devizes. 
 
 We've \Vright, a grave Doctor, tho' sometimes uproarious — 
 And Del'pierre who's famed for his books chaste and curious ; 
 And Buckland the " Natural," who for "six shillings" shows 
 More wonders of Nature, than she dreaiTis of or knows; 
 While young Blanehard Jerrold all hazard avoids. 
 His go-a-head Leaders, " underwritten " in " Lloyds." 
 
 There's Barlow the Proctor, and Ibbetson tall, 
 Ikit a truce to my rhyming, for now I've named all — 
 Yet hold, here comes Cooke, whom the authors low greet, 
 In hopes of a job from Albemarle Street; 
 And no one is left, knoAvn in Art or in Letters, 
 For Holl's only famous for mocking his betters. 
 
 My lines and myself must now beg your mercy — 
 So long they are grown, I'm afraid to name Percy ; 
 His seience and size must plead in excuse, 
 Wliilst the eulprit behind him lies hid from abuse. 
 
 The " Forty" are number'd— a sad lot of Thieves, 
 Unable to praise them — to censure them grieves ! 
 " Associates " we have too — wise men, I've no doubt ; 
 I can't write their virtues, for I've not found 'em out. 
 
 Yet one man we miss, tho' he lives in our hearts. 
 Whose name, when it's mentioned, a brilliance imparts; 
 As the star that's just set, leaves behind it its light, 
 So his radiance illumines our darkness to-night — 
 Dear Jt-rrold we loved so ! our delight and our wonder. 
 His wit the quick lightning, our laughter the thunder! 
 In knowledge so various — so gentle in deed, 
 'J'he faithful of j)roniise — the earnest in need ! 
 In friendship unfailing — in integrity strong. 
 The Right he still champion'd, and stood against Wrong. 
 'Tis //e that we miss, and hush'd is our mirth 
 At the loss of his genius, the loss of his worth. 
 Poor Jerrold has jjass'd ! Let us hope as we sit, 
 " Our Club" by him founded — the loved of his wit — 
 In honours shall grow, as its members in fame, 
 And Hist'ry record in its pages our name I
 
 JERllOLD'S CLUB 213 
 
 Shirley Brooks prepared his effusion for the 
 Shakespeur anniversary. It proeeeds on the plan 
 of making eaeh of the company, members or guests, 
 deliver a sentiment more or less appropriate to the 
 circumstances or characteristic of the supposed 
 speaker. It is sufficiently clever and interesting 
 to warrant its insertion here, more particularly as 
 it is probably almost unknown even to the present 
 generation : 
 
 SHAKESPEAIl AT OUR CLUB. 
 April 21, 1860. 
 
 II. Fenton. 
 
 Why, Iiow now, what does Master Fenton here ? Truly an 
 
 honest gentleman. 
 
 O. Delepieuue. 
 
 He has done nobly, and cannot go witlumt any honest man's 
 voice ; therefore let him be Consul, and the Gods give him joy. 
 
 G. Duplex. 
 
 How he solicits Heaven 
 Himself best knows. But strangely visited peo[)le. 
 The mere despair of surgery, he cures. 
 
 P. Cunningham. 
 
 If you want drier logs. 
 Call Peter, he will tell you where they lie. 
 
 F. Lawrence. 
 
 Now, afore God, this reverend holy Lawrence, 
 All our whole city is much bound to him. 
 
 J. H. Paiiuv. 
 
 This is the Serjeant. 
 
 I charge you by the law, 
 Whereof you are a well-deserving pillar. 
 Proceed to [the bench of] Judgment.
 
 214 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 G. Jessel. 
 
 And you, his yoke fellow of Equity, 
 Bench by his side. 
 
 H. Mayiiew. 
 
 The Prince of Darkness is a gentleman, 
 Modo he's Ciilled, and Mahii. 
 
 C. Dickens, Junr. 
 
 Your mind is tossing on the ocean. They arc not China dishes, 
 but very good dishes. 
 
 G. Chesterton. 
 
 Not your Gaoler, then, 
 But your kind host. 
 
 W. Hazlitt. 
 Or Zummerset or York, all's one to him. 
 
 W. H. Cooke. 
 
 Yea, marry, William Cook, bid him come hither. Any pretty 
 little tiny kickshaws tell William Cook. 
 
 J. C. O'DowD. 
 
 The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, 
 The solemn temples, the great Globe itself, 
 Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve. 
 
 Allen. 
 
 He sings several tunes, faster than you'll tell money. He hath 
 songs for man or woman, and the prettiest love songs for maids, 
 without mischief, which is strange. 
 
 H. Dixon. 
 He gives you all the duties of a man, 
 Trims up your praises with a princely tongue. 
 Speaks your deservings like a chronicle. 
 And chides your truant youth with such a grace. 
 
 H. HOLL. 
 
 He shall taste of my bottle. If he have never tasted wine before, 
 it will go near to remove his fit. . . . 
 
 He's a Brave God, and bears Celestial Liquor.
 
 JERROLD'S CLUB 215 
 
 F. Joyce. 
 
 He is soniethiiifr stern. 
 But, if he vow a Irlendship, he'll perform it. 
 
 F. SiBSON. 
 
 He is a gentleman. One that indeed 
 Physics the subject. 
 
 W. A. Matthews. 
 My man's as true as steel. 
 
 W. B. Jerrold. 
 
 Thou bearest thy father's face. 
 
 Thy father's moral part 
 Mayst thou inherit too. 
 
 D. Masson. 
 
 Sir, we bless God for you. Your reasons at dinner (and else- 
 where) have been sharp and sententious, pleasant without scurrility, 
 witty without affectation, audacious without impudency, learned 
 without opinion, and strange without heresy. . . . Well said, 
 Davy. 
 
 J. Hannay. 
 
 He did ever fence the right, 
 Nor buckle falsehood with a pedigree. 
 
 J. B. ToMALIN. 
 
 Now, what news on the Rialto } 
 What news among the Merchants .'* 
 
 F. M. Evans. 
 
 In faith, he is a worthy gentleman, 
 Exceedingly well read, and profited, 
 And wondrous affable, and bountiful. 
 
 C. Knight. 
 
 (Shakespear loq.) He is a Knight, and will not any way dis- 
 honour me. 
 
 T. Reeks. 
 Shall we be thus afflicted in his wreaks ? 
 
 J. W. Davison. 
 He hath the musician's melancholy, which is fantastical.
 
 216 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 R. Orridge. 
 
 Sinpf, sir ! You shall not boh us out of our melody. He gave 
 you such a masterly Report for art and exercise in your Defence. 
 
 J. DoRAN. 
 
 After ray death I wish no other herald. 
 No other speaker of my living actions, 
 Thau such a chronicler. 
 
 S. Brooks. 
 Such Brooks are welcome to me that overflow such liquor. 
 
 The Treasurer. 
 (F. Hamstede loq.) You owe me No Subscription. 
 
 Our Club constituted from its commencement 
 a feature in the social life of my father — nay, in my 
 own ; and it was the sole institution of the kind 
 with which either of us has ever been connected, 
 save a concern in Arundel Street, of which my 
 father enjoyed an ephemeral membership ; this must 
 have been the place to which, no liquor fit to touch 
 being procurable on the premises, Frank Talfourd 
 said that it was necessary to come drunk. I have, 
 no doubt, kept unwisely aloof from literary fellow- 
 sliip, and my life has been disadvantageously 
 secluded. IMiss Toulmin Smith, when I once, in 
 reply to an inquiry, told her that I had never 
 joined any society, turned round on me, and rather 
 unkindly observed : " Perhaps you think that you 
 are a society in yourself." It is certainly my own 
 fault, that I have not belonged to many. When 
 I was quite a young man, Aaron Asher Goldsmid 
 offered to put me up at the Athen;rum, but I 
 respectfully declined. It is years upon years since 
 1 was elected a corresponding member of some 
 American Institution, of which I forget the name ; 
 and a singular experience bcfel me, when a revival 
 of some Literary Club in AVatcrloo Place was con-
 
 I 
 
 I 
 
 JERROT.D'S CLUB 217 
 
 templated, and a treaty for new premises, where 
 H. S. King and Co. now are, was set on foot. I 
 was invited to become a vice-president ; but when 
 I called at the temporary offices, and shewed the 
 provisional secretary his letter, he had lost all 
 recollection of having written it. He had no 
 memory I The scheme came to nothing. 
 
 I did not even join the Merchant Taylors' Old 
 Boys Club, though I have been repeatedly honoured 
 by an invitation to do so. 1 once attended a dinner 
 as a guest, and all the faces were strange. There 
 was no one there, save perhaps the late Vicar of 
 Upper Hackney, who had been with me in the 
 forties in Suffolk Lane. I left the scene early, 
 never to revisit it. 
 
 A famous resort close by Clun's was Evans's. 
 Evans, who started the Cider Cellars in Maiden 
 Lane about 1831, was originally a singer, and had 
 an engagement at one of the theatres at v/hat was 
 then accounted a heavy salary. But, losing his 
 voice, he arranged to retire with a sum, and started 
 the establishment so well identified with his name. 
 The speciality in Maiden Lane was kidneys and 
 stout ; there was no wine till just before the removal 
 to the Piazza in Covent Garden ; and no women 
 were admitted. There was music and singing, and 
 for some time a man named Sloman was the pianist.
 
 XIV 
 
 HIGH LIFE— A FEW ANALECTA 
 
 I>.ORD RoMiLi.Y used to relate that the great book- 
 collector, Richard Heber, was once dining with 
 George IV. soon after the accession of the latter, 
 and the Russian Ambassador was also at table. 
 The King was speaking to the Ambassador about 
 the library his father had collected, and was saying 
 that he did not care much about it. He added that 
 he thought he should not mind letting it go, and the 
 Russian Envoy intimated that his Imperial master, 
 he felt assured, would be only too glad to become 
 the purchaser. The King seemed to like the notion ; 
 but nothing more was said just then. Heber left the 
 table, to hasten to the Premier's, told him what had 
 passed, said that it would be a disgrace to the country 
 if the books went, and so on, and Lord Liverpool 
 waited on his INIajesty and gave him to understand 
 that it would not do, but that if he would present 
 them to the nation, he (Liverpool) would use his 
 influence to get a vote in the Commons to pay the 
 King's debts. This view of the circumstance attend- 
 ing the gift to the public in 1823 will read curiously 
 by the side of the glowing eulogiums on the muni- 
 licence and literary zeal of his Majesty, both as 
 Prince and King, which meet our eye in various 
 contemporary publications. 
 
 Miss Clara Maceroni said that at a party, where 
 she met the Duke of Sussex, the King's brother, 
 Jiis Royal Highness was asked to sing, and when 
 
 '^18
 
 HIGH LIFE 219 
 
 he had finished there was cordial applause. He 
 whispered to someone near him : " It was well 
 enough for a Duke." This was the collector of 
 Bibles and miscellaneous literature sold in 1827. 
 The taste for books certainly appears to have been 
 hereditary in the older members of the Hanoverian 
 line ; and we trace it back to other branches, beside 
 that of Limeburg. Now Books have gone out of 
 favour, and Horses and Cards have their turn. The 
 Kaiser's toys, soldiers and ships, are perhaps to be 
 preferred. The Duke belonged to the Second St. 
 James's Royal Arch Lodge of INIasons, which is 
 entitled to wear a crown in its badge. I have given 
 some account in my Livery Companies of London 
 of the probable origin of this movement. 
 
 Besides the Kent family mixed up with a cele- 
 brated tragedy many years ago in the person of one 
 of the members, Constance Kent, Victoria's father is 
 credited with having had a bastard son, half-brother 
 to the Queen, a Colonel Augustus Lloyd, who spent 
 some of his life in Bolivia, was a Commissioner of 
 the Great Exhibition of 1851, and died in Circassia 
 during the Crimean War. He is said to have been 
 in great favour at Court, and he had a son, Ernest 
 Augustus, named after the King of Hanover. 
 
 I only once saw the late Queen, nor have I ever 
 beheld any other member of the family. It was on 
 Constitution Hill, when her Majesty was driving 
 in a carriage and pair with one or two others ; the 
 Prince was not with her. In response to my re- 
 spectful salutation, her JNIajesty bowed to me ; for 
 not a soul save myself was in sight. This was in 
 the days when I have seen the Duke of AVellington 
 in Piccadilly, leading his horse at the edge of the 
 kerb. 
 
 The most singular circumstance connected with 
 what is improperly termed the Jubilee money — for
 
 220 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 the type was settled witliout reference to thiit anni- 
 versary — is that, although it is by a German artist, 
 it was not even by a good one. The Government, 
 perhaps, would not pay the price for a first-class 
 design, like that for the beautiful commemorative 
 thaler of JNIaria Theresa, produced in 1888 under 
 the auspices of the Numismatic Society of Vienna. 
 
 It really constitutes an interesting consideration, 
 that the majority of the subjects of the British Crown 
 never beheld the countenance of Victoria, nor heard 
 the tone of her voice, and that there may be an un- 
 certainty whether the effigies on the coinage repre- 
 sent the same person. It is an understood thing 
 that there is a succession of august individuals at 
 the head of affairs, and the machinery works tolerably 
 well. But what effect the stealthy levelling down 
 may produce, no one is far-sighted enough to fore- 
 cast. AVe might go farther and fare worse ; and 
 perhaps sufficient influence may be brought to bear 
 on popular sentiment by the united agency of all 
 responsible citizens to stop at such reforms as may 
 be practicable in the existing system without changing 
 its external characteristics. 
 
 Victoria unquestionably contributed to impart 
 a higher and purer tone to society, and corruption 
 and immorality have had in our time to be a good 
 deal more sub rosd. It was quite time in 1837 that 
 a term should be put to the scandalous state of 
 affairs under the four Georges and William I V^., which 
 Cireville in his Memoirs, and Thackeray and Carlyle, 
 and indeed Dickens, in their works, did so much to 
 expose. Very much depends on the Crown, as we 
 found under the late reign, whatever the merits 
 of Edward VII. might be. During his brief rule 
 matters were drifting back. INIy own and beyond 
 tliat the Diaries of others have yet to give up their 
 secrets.
 
 HIGH lAVF. 221 
 
 We complain of h.aving rulers of foreign origin, 
 yet we succeeded very poorly when we had English- 
 men over us. Since IJosworth our Kings and 
 Queens have been Welsh, Scotish, Dutch, or 
 German. 
 
 It is the inevitable penalty of a lengthened reign 
 to lose all early, and many later, friends, associates, 
 and servants. Victoria lived to see one old face dis- 
 appear after another, and to be surrounded by almost 
 totally different conditions from those in which she 
 was brought up, and it is no slight praise to say that 
 her Majesty in large measure adapted herself to the 
 vast change. From the exceptional length of the 
 Victorian reign the next heir soon began to experi- 
 ence the same kind of trouble in the loss of friends, 
 and he had also to discard some of his earlier malo- 
 dorous associates. Greasy Coleman inclusive. 
 
 It is characteristic of her Majesty's usual 
 frugality, that when a bookseller sent a stray 
 from the old Royal Library to be submitted to 
 her by the librarian at Windsor, for £150, she 
 wrote on the memorandum : "A very nice book — 
 but the price ! " How different from her royal 
 grandfather, who was a munificent book-buyer, and, 
 even if the figure had been rather outrageous, 
 would not in his better days have stuck at a 
 few pounds to secure such an article, and he had 
 probably far less means for the purpose than her 
 Majesty. Yet the royal lady bought a copy which 
 belonged to Henry VIII. of the Assertio Sacra- 
 mentorum, 1521, and expressed her interest in it — 
 'pretio £600 ! It had been bought abroad a few years 
 before for a few shillings, and before her JNIajesty saw 
 it, it was shewn to myself. 
 
 Her alleged offer at the outset to pay income-tax 
 was very properly met in the negative. A certain 
 specific sum having been set aside for the Queen's
 
 222 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 use in her ofBcial capacity, it would have been un- 
 dignified on the part of the nation to have insisted 
 on any deduction. On the contrary, the Prince 
 Consort was said to have left a will, which was 
 never proved, its provisions being kept a secret ; 
 and it seems a question whether, had the point been 
 pressed, it was, under such circumstances, a valid 
 document, the Prince being a subject of the Crown, 
 however exalted his rank. 
 
 Is it not apt to strike one as a case where the 
 realities of life infringe on the melodramatic present- 
 ment, where one, going through the throne-room at 
 Puckingham Palace, and seeing no one, ventures to 
 approach the seat of majesty, only to discover beneath 
 it a dustpan and a broom ? But it is, after all, yet 
 stranger that we should so constantly forget that 
 kings and queens are human beings like ourselves, 
 wlio look down upon us from the very elevation con- 
 ferred on them by us for our own convenience. How 
 many ages ago Commines, the personal friend of 
 more than one King of France, remarked, immedi- 
 ately in reference to Louis XI., '* En lui et en tons 
 autres princes, que j'ai connu ou servy, j'ai connu 
 du bien et du mal, car Us sont homines covime nous.'" 
 An early impeachment of Dei gi^atid. 
 
 The creation of Orders of Merit and the ad- 
 mission in some cases of ladies was a very sagacious 
 and opportune movement. Civilians, as well as 
 soldiers and sailors, must be freely decorated and 
 honoured. We shall want a solid barrier against 
 aggressive Socialism ; and the Court is apparently 
 aware of it — forsooth all Courts are — judging from 
 their somewhat promiscuous affability and their 
 almost affecting solicitude for the health even of 
 the Unpresented. 
 
 Our Royal Family are excellent people of busi- 
 ness, and from the tiirie of the Cireat Exiiibition of
 
 HIGH LIFE 223 
 
 1851 onward have had the most favourable oppor- 
 tunities of making advantageous investments in 
 every direction and of ahnost every class. The 
 Prince Consort, who is reputed to have known 
 what it was to liv^e in the Fatherland on £300 a 
 year, knew how to manage his private affairs with 
 all that attention to detail which is so essential to 
 commercial success — an aptitude derived from his 
 youthful experiences. Was there not a story of 
 some cheque which a certain artist framed, and 
 hung on the wall, as a souvenir of a transaction 
 with his Royal Highness ? The Prince was not 
 uncommonly in his lifetime stigmatized as a specu- 
 lator in building and other ventures ; and his august 
 partner was not exempt from this indecorous failing 
 — and in her JNIajesty's case without any excuse 
 for it. She employed an agent, who acted on her 
 account in these matters. I have forgotten the 
 name ; perchance there was more than one. But 
 the same sort of thing has been going on ever since 
 these Hanoverians came over ; and does not Spence 
 make Pope say : " they (kings) are turned mere 
 tradesmen " ? He excepted the King of Sardinia. 
 
 But his Royal Highness shewed his common 
 sense in declining to join the Freemasons, on the 
 ground that he would not swear allegiance to laws 
 of which he had no previous cognizance. The lady, 
 whose newly-admitted husband refused disclosure of 
 the arcana, was perhaps not far from the truth 
 when she said that they amounted to nothing more 
 than early duck and green peas — a housekeeper's 
 way of putting it. 
 
 My uncle Reynell gave me to understand tliat 
 the l5uke of Cambridge, father of the ex-Com- 
 mander-in-Chief, acquired from the Government 
 for £8000 the Combe \Vood property, for which a 
 farmer in the neighbourhood was prepared to give
 
 224 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 double the money. He was a tradesman within 
 l*ope\s meaning — a land-grabber, as his royal cousin 
 was a breeder of cattle. These forsooth are the folks 
 whom the nation had to tolerate from want of some- 
 thing better. 
 
 JNIy wife came home to our house at Kensington 
 one afternoon, and told me that she had seen the 
 Queen at the Albert Memorial in Hyde Park. She 
 was standing there when her JNIajesty drove up and 
 approached the spot. The Queen stopped in front 
 of the ^Memorial, close by my wife, who heard her 
 say, " Very nice." This made me laugh, for it 
 reminded me of what the fellow said about the 
 Marlborough gems, and Grimaldi the clown about 
 the sausages. But it was declared at the time 
 that the Memorial was not at first, when brand 
 new, unlike a large piece of gilt gingerbread. 
 
 I was crossing Putney Bridge on the evening of 
 December 14, 1861, when I heard the Bell of St. 
 I'auFs toll, and I asked the gatekeeper what was the 
 matter. He told me that the Prince Consort was 
 dead. After his death at so early an age, the 
 Queen is said to have suffered from insomnia to 
 such an extent that her JMajesty's health was 
 seriously impaired, and there was even a degree of 
 anxiety on the subject. It was a saying that his 
 Royal Highness set the example of men dispensing 
 with gloves on ordinary occasions. 
 
 There used to be a silly superstition about 
 " Queen's weather." It was said that her Majesty 
 appointed a day for a given ceremony, and the rest 
 was a foregone conclusion. Anyone might securely 
 make his own arrangements ; it would be " Queen's 
 weather." To be on the right side his Grace the 
 Primate of All England formerly authorized special 
 forms of prayer for rain or drought ; but, as the more 
 candid country parson declared, it depends on the
 
 HIGH LIFE 225 
 
 quarter from which the wind blows. We do im- 
 prove a httle, in spite of the Church. 
 
 The kite Dr. Doer of Zurich, whom I met at a 
 house in Surrey, gave me an odd account of the fire 
 near Darmstadt, where the Princess Beatrice was 
 staying. She was in bed, about one in the morning, 
 and was so tormented by mosquitoes that she rose, 
 ht a candle, and rang for her maid. The two, in 
 their nightdresses, candle in hand, began to hunt for 
 the small game. AVhen a gnat was seen overhead, 
 one or the other bobbed up to try and catch it in the 
 flame, and at last one of them set fire to the curtains. 
 The whole place was soon in a blaze, and the Prin- 
 cess and her maid ran down to the courtyard for 
 their lives, just as they were. Her Royal Highness 
 lost all her clothes, as well as (I understood) the 
 pearls of the Duchess of Kent, which she had had 
 from the Queen. 
 
 The Battenbergs of Hesse-Darmstadt have no 
 pretension to claim kindred with the great house of 
 Brederode, Barons of Bronkhorst in Gronsfelt and of 
 Batenborg, which belonged to Gelderland, and be- 
 came, and remained during centuries, one of the 
 most distinguished families in the Low Countries. 
 It was Hendrik van Brederode of this ancient and 
 illustrious line who personally presented to the 
 Duchess of Parma in 1566, on behalf of the Nether- 
 lands, a protest against the establishment there of 
 the Inquisition, and who raised troops at his own 
 expense to resist the Spaniards. I have seen this 
 patriot described as " a madman, if there ever were 
 one," and as "the bold, debauched Brederode, with 
 handsome, reckless face, and turbulent demeanour " — 
 two pieces of criticism, which I could challenge, if 
 this were the place. 
 
 His Royal Highness the Duke of Cambridge 
 married in Ireland a Miss Louisa Farebrother, an
 
 226 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 actress in burlesque, a popular singer and dancer, 
 and daughter of the theatrical publisher in Exeter 
 Court, Catherine Street, Strand, who was the mother 
 of Colonel Fitzgcorge and other children. She 
 seems to have been an elegant and fascinating 
 woman. The Colonel, whom I liave met at a 
 boarding-house at Ramsgate, united himself to a 
 Quaker lady, whose parents used to frequent the 
 same watering-place. The Duke's own alliance was 
 as creditable to his courage and judgment as any- 
 thing which he ever did, which may not be saying 
 much. The lady was an excellent and exemplary 
 person, whose memory was sweeter and purer than 
 that of some royal and serene highnesses. Even 
 Victoria, who at first looked askance at the marriage, 
 made the best of the matter, when children were 
 born, and recognized her cousin's wife. 
 
 The German Kaiser is understood to ascribe his 
 withered arm to the corrupt blood on his mother's 
 side. It has no doubt been deteriorating through 
 intermarriages and other agencies, and it was not 
 very pure when George I. came over, so that it is no 
 doubt a step in the right direction to have begun to 
 seek alliances outside the charmed circle. But, after 
 all, the alleged taint has only gone back whence it 
 came, to the Vatcrland. 
 
 No Act of Parliament can safeguard even imperial 
 and royal personages from the pernicious conse- 
 quences of contravening the law of nature. George 
 1 1, seems to have thought that his son Frederic, by 
 his marriage with a princess of Saxe-Gotha, brought 
 scrofula and madness into the family. 
 
 If Louis XIV. was, as reported, the son of M. le 
 Grand by the Queen, he was very properly called 
 I^e Grand Monarque. The word carrosae in French 
 was originally feiriinine. But Louis, when young, 
 having once called for man carrossc, its gender was,
 
 HIGH LIFE 227 
 
 from deference to his most Christian majesty, altered 
 thenceforward. JNIadame de Maintenon succeeded 
 to other ladies, whose influence had been paramount 
 with the King by turn. Some one proposed to call 
 her Madame JNIaintenant; but she held her ground 
 well. She was a great woman. 
 
 It used to be said that the Bourbons never forgot 
 and never learned anything. Is not this equally 
 true of the Stuarts ? The Hanoverians began their 
 lessons rather late and rather sulkily. 
 
 An English gentleman who was in Paris in 1840, 
 when the remains of Napoleon arrived there from 
 St. Helena, saw the coffin, which was on view for a 
 short time at the Invalides, and described it as hardly 
 larger than a child's. The Duke of WeUington and 
 the Emperor are said to have been of the same 
 height, five feet six inches, and the latter would be 
 wasted by illness before his death. Yet this account 
 seems scarcely credible. The Napoleon relics at 
 Madame Tussaud's are a ridiculous imposition. 
 
 The foundress of this place of entertainment died 
 in the forties, and her wax figure, which used to be 
 not far from the entrance in Baker Street, was so 
 realistic that when my father-in-law came up from 
 the country in 1851, and visited Tussaud's, he took 
 it to be the little old lady herself; and next to her, 
 I think, was Cobbett, to whom, the story goes, he 
 offered a pinch of snuff. 
 
 I confess that I laid down IMasson's Napoleon ct 
 Ics Femmes with a very unusual feeling — that I could 
 read it again. It is decidedly a piece justificative ^ and 
 one not without its sadness. 
 
 Pauline Buonaparte (Princess Borghese) sat to 
 Canova for one of his classical models absolutely 
 naked. Being asked whether she did not feel un- 
 comfortable, she replied, " Why, no ; it was not 
 cold ; there was a fire in the room." There is a
 
 228 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 medalet with the three sisters of Napoleon as the 
 Three Graces. 
 
 There is an on dit about Louis XVIII. which 
 may be true or not. After his restoration, he asked 
 Fouche whether he had ever set spies over him. 
 The Minister of Pohce under Napoleon admitted 
 tliat he liad. The King asked who it was. Fouche 
 said, " The Comte de Blacas." *' How much did he 
 get ? " was the farther inquiry. " Two hundred 
 thousand francs a year." " Ah, well," said Louis, 
 " he was honest, after all. / had hcdf.'" This was 
 the same nobleman whose collections, partly acquired, 
 perhaps, out of the secret-service money, are now in 
 the British INIuseum. 
 
 I have heard it said of Nicholas of Russia that 
 he remarked on one occasion to his son, afterward 
 Alexander II., "You and I are the only honest men 
 in the Empire," and that was because it did not pay 
 them to be otherwise. Sir Roderick Murchison, 
 wlio had, in the course of his geological researches, 
 experienced great assistance from the Czar Nicholas, 
 and been enabled to explore the mineral riches of 
 the Ural range, inverted his glass when, in the 
 Crimean War, he was present at a banquet, and the 
 success of the operations against Russia was proposed 
 as a toast. 
 
 While Napoleon III. was residing in London in 
 18.30, my fatlier sent him a copy of the biography of 
 his illustrious relative, and received as a souvenir in 
 return the LcttrcH de Napoleon a Josephine^ 1833, 
 with an inscription on the flyleaf: " Offert par le 
 I''* Napoleon Louis a Monsieur Hazlitt en memoire 
 de I'ouvrage de son pere sur I'empereur Napoleon. 
 Londres, le 18 Mai, 1839." It is a scarce book, 
 and one of superlative literary interest, and it gives 
 us tlie most pleasing likeness of Josephine. 
 
 In 181-8 he and my father served as special
 
 HIGH LHE 229 
 
 constables. I remember my fatlier's staff, which 
 he had to restore on disembodiment. 
 
 His Majesty favoured a certain Dutch Admiral 
 in his phlegmatic temperament ; he bore no resem- 
 blance to his reputed father, the King of Holland ; 
 and until the matter was more or less generally 
 known, his cousin Jerome, who was in the secret, 
 and was in possession of all the facts, used his 
 power as a financial lever. Prince Napoleon used 
 to call the Emperor the kite in the eagle's nest. 
 
 A dealer in autographs told me tliat he had 
 formerly overhauled Waller's stores after the retire- 
 ment of the latter to Bayswater, and found some 
 valuable things put aside and forgotten — among 
 others, a letter, 4 pp. 4to, WTitten by Victoria 
 herself to Napoleon IH. during the Crimean War. 
 
 Our late King doubtless revered the memory of 
 his mother, and never travelled without one or two 
 likenesses of her, which lay on the table of the room 
 where he sat. It was a trait of filial piety, which 
 might have exercised a beneficial counter-active in- 
 fluence. I similarly continue to live wdtli mine.
 
 XV 
 
 HIGH LIFE— A FEW ANALECTA {contimied) 
 
 ]\Ir. Hexdersox, who was sixty-three years clerk to 
 the Horners' Company, told me (January 17, 1H90) 
 that he was eighty-eight years of age. He had a 
 remarkably full head of hair and a flowing beard, 
 with very little admixture of gray ; but he was 
 much bent, and walked feebly. He mentioned to 
 me that his father took him in 1817 to the House 
 of Commons, and that he often went there afterward. 
 He recollected listening to the speeches of Canning 
 and Peel, of whom the latter struck him at the time 
 as very young in appearance, like a red-headed boy. 
 His father, he said, pointed to Peel, and declared 
 that if he lived he would make a name. I was told 
 by one of the older officials in Cox and Greenwood's, 
 in Craig's Court, that Peel on one occasion applied at 
 some moment of pressure to Mr. Cox for an advance 
 of £.500,000 for a few days for the Government, and 
 tliat Cox said tliat he could have a million the next 
 morning if he wanted it. 
 
 It was Palmerston who was questioned in the 
 Commons as to tlie duties of archdeacons. He had 
 not an idea himself, and asked everybody near him. 
 Not a soul could say. No one was aware that an 
 archdeacon was a sort of ecclesiastical surveyor and 
 appraiser appointed for each county or district. The 
 minister had to inform the honourable member that 
 an archdeacon was a personage who dis(;harged archi- 
 diaconal functions. VVhcn a stipendiary magistrate's 
 
 230
 
 HIGH lAFE 231 
 
 place fell vacant durin<r his Home Secretaryship, he 
 arrived at Downing Street one morning, and was 
 confronted with a pile of letters. '* What the devil 
 are these?" said he to his subordinate. "Applica- 
 tions for the vacant magistracy." "Do they think 
 I am going to read all these damned things ? D'ye 
 know," addressing the sub, " anyone who would 
 do ? " " There's JNIr. Burrell, my lord— Mr. Burrell 
 of Gray's Inn, a very good man." "Well, well," 
 said Palmerston, " let him have it, then." And 
 Burrell had it, and held it many years. He was 
 an intimate friend of Sir John Stoddart and of my 
 father, from whom I had the story. 
 
 Palmerston wrote an unusually clear hand, and 
 used to complain of the slovenly and illegible way 
 in which the clerks in the public service made 
 their communications. If he had seen mine, he 
 might have been yet more seriously displeased. 
 
 Lord John Russell, while my father was place- 
 hunting, was one of the objects of his attention. I 
 recollect the account of his lordship's weak eyes, 
 which he kept blinking, and of his peculiar mode 
 of pronouncing certain words. He would, like 
 George III., say ohJeege. He is much forgotten. 
 
 I first saw Gladstone at the London Library, 
 St. James's Square, in 1859. I had never seen him 
 before, and likenesses of him were comparatively 
 rare at that time. But 1 felt sure it was he. I 
 realize at this moment his steadfast gaze. I saw him 
 again at his own house in the following year, and 
 after that I never set eyes on him till 1890, when 
 I met him at a bookshop in New Oxford Street. 
 I had meanwhile published, prior to the General 
 Election of 1887, my Adchess to the Electors of the 
 Kingston Division of Surrey, which the then I^ord 
 Chancellor's brother described as " a parting kick " 
 to the Separatists and Home Rulers. In that inter-
 
 232 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 val of thirty years Gladstone reached the summit 
 of his political glory and the lowest point of his 
 political impotence. 
 
 One of the counts in my indictment against him 
 in my pamphlet was the treatment by the INIinistry, 
 of wliich he was the responsible head, of poor, brave 
 Gordon. It was impressive to read in the papers 
 that Gordon admitted having carried out many exe- 
 cutions, but always, before he gave the order, laid 
 his Bible on his knee, that the Almighty might re- 
 verse his judgment if He thought lit, and, quoth 
 Gordon, He never did. AVhat sublime fanaticism ! 
 AVhat fatuity beyond all redemption — almost beyond 
 credibility ! A child's brain joined to a man's heart ! 
 This was the very Bible, perchance, which the 
 General's sister gave to the Queen after his death. 
 
 I have said that I was at Gladstone's house at 
 a reception in 1860. ^Irs. G. and he were civil 
 enough ; I had just published a new edition of my 
 J^e?Lice, and he introduced me to the Italian envoy. 
 I remember liim mentioning, in reply to a question, 
 that he had in self-defence to keep his books in the 
 country, lest he should overtax himself, while he was 
 in ofHce. AMien I asked him about some object in a 
 show-case, he politely referred me to his wife. 
 
 The late Mr. Quaritch told me one day that 
 Gladstone had been in his shop, and he had told him 
 tluit if he desired to study the history of Ireland, and 
 had not leisure to work up the subject, he (Quaritch) 
 had a gentleman (Kerny) who would do it for him. 
 15 lit Gladstone replied that he only wanted know- 
 ledge sufficient for Parliamentary purpones. This 
 was "the old Parliamentary hand," of whom we 
 have all heard more than enough ; and who has 
 inflicted greater injury on tlie country than any 
 individual within my knowledge, and the just-cited 
 observation reads with the letter he wrote to a
 
 HIGH LIFE 233 
 
 correspondent, advising him to study Irish history, 
 which he had done, so far as his engagements would 
 permit. Our later experience leads us to select for 
 employment in distant operations men who, like 
 Kitchener of Khartoum, know the ground. We do 
 not want old Parliamentary hands, who scarcely 
 perhaps take the trouble to look at the map. Glad- 
 stone's phenomenal incapacity for government appears 
 to have been quite unknown to himself, till the 
 country sent him finally about his business. 
 
 But it is ever so. So long as the nation will pay, 
 these fellows are glued to their seats. Conscience 
 and shame are not in their vocabulary ; and a change 
 of rulers, what is it but a change of robbers ? 
 
 If " the fatal gift of beauty " was the curse of 
 Italy, the fatal gift of words has been the curse of 
 Enghmd in tlie person of a gentleman who was 
 unfit to become a responsible INIinister of the 
 Crown. 
 
 I may take the opportunity of mentioning that I 
 have also met at the Library in former years JMr. and 
 Mrs. Carlyle (not together), JMr. Alarie Watts, Lord 
 Arundell of Wardour, &c. 
 
 Yet such was his personality that in 1898, when 
 Gladstone was dying, we already began to forget his 
 faults and errors, and to think of him as the man we 
 had once known. I shall never cease to hold in 
 remembrance the spectacle afforded by AVhitehall 
 when he lay in a critical state at Downing Street, 
 and the crowd was so dense that one might have 
 almost walked on the people's heads, and so noiseless 
 that one might have almost heard a sixpence drop. 
 
 In his earlier life G. was constantly in diffi- 
 culties. At one time it was said that the very 
 footmen, who attended at dinner, v/ere disguised 
 officers of the Sheriff of JNliddlesex. I conclude that 
 these vmpleasant experiences preceded his brother- in-
 
 234 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 law's sudden death and JMrs. Gladstone's succession 
 to the Hawarden property. 
 
 Sir Henry Taylor used to relate an anecdote of 
 INlr. Stephen, father of Sh James, illustrative of the 
 gratitude of the authorities toward those who exert 
 themselves in the civil service. You may, he said, 
 wear out a finfTer in writing ; you may wear out a 
 second and a third, and all they will have to remark 
 is, AVliat deformed fingers you have I 
 
 The late General Cunningham, one of a trio of 
 accomplished brothers, sons of Allan Cunningham, 
 mentioned that the word pussy for a cat came, he 
 believed, from the Persian pushy, and was used to 
 distinguish the Persian breed from our own. He 
 also suggested that hogshead was a corruption of ox- 
 hide, a measure equal to the capacity of an ox's hide. 
 It might therefore somewhat vary according to the 
 prevailing breed in different countries. 
 
 I^ord Rosebery once said a good thing about Lord 
 Meath and his fondness for securing recreation- 
 grounds. " ^^^hy, you know," said he, '* Meath 
 would like to pull down the whole of London, and 
 make it an open space for the use of the inhabitants." 
 
 Mr. Primrose, an uncle of Lord Rosebery, was 
 a brewer at Adelaide, South Australia, and was a 
 near neighbour of my friend the late IMr. Archibald 
 Jaffrey. He lived to a good old age, but was a 
 great tippler, and was very unfortunate in his family, 
 nearly the whole of which predeceased him. When 
 Rosebery visited Adelaide, lie called on the Prim- 
 roses, and went over the brewery, tasting the various 
 ales ; and he was very well received. These 
 Primroses first figure in the time of .James VL of 
 Scotland, under whom they laid the foundation of 
 their fortunes. The l*rimrose of those days did not 
 disdain to accept the profit arising from the sale of 
 James L's trumpery Deus et Hex, 1G15.
 
 HIGH LIFE 235 
 
 Roscbery was a special protege of Gladstone, and 
 an admitted failure as a political and Parliamentary 
 leader. As a rich man, he was apt to be a valuable 
 ally, and when Gladstone felt it necessary to retire, 
 he let his lordship slip into his seat, ere long to slip 
 out of it again. I was brought up among Liberals, 
 and with a respect for their principles, till I could 
 not avoid seeing that those principles were merely a 
 passport to office, and that much of the Liberalism 
 consisted in being free with other people's money in 
 a public sense. Rosebery's premiership was not 
 entirely bond fide, so long as Gladstone was in the 
 prompter's box. It was a disagreeable blend, of 
 which even his lordship, perhaps, grew a little tired, 
 if not ashamed. 
 
 Jaffrey was saying that a visitor to the gallery 
 at Holyrood, after looking at the portraits of the 
 Scotish kings on the walls, inquired of the old 
 woman who shewed the place to him : " Did you do 
 these? " And, she shaking her head, he added, "You 
 might have done better." 
 
 JafFrey was born near Stirling in 1817, and left his 
 home January 1, 1839, on his way to seek his fortune 
 in South Australia. He witnessed at Liverpool the 
 terrific storm of that month, which strewed the 
 whole coast with bodies and wreckage, and the 
 splendid sight, when the calm returned, of the 
 Mersey filled with craft in full sail preparing to leave 
 for their destinations. He reminded me of the later 
 one of January, 18G6, in which the London was lost 
 in the Bay of Biscay, Draper the chaplain praying 
 to the last in the midst of the drowning crew and 
 passengers. At that moment Draper's son was 
 proceeding to one of our convict settlements, un- 
 known to him, having been found guilty of some 
 felony. 
 
 The old-fashioned type of pedagogue survived in
 
 236 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Scotland in the actual flesh in Sir Walter's day, for 
 Jaffrey gave me a description of JNIunro, his own 
 schoolmaster at Stirling, with his ballups and his 
 spectacles on the top of his head — two or three pairs 
 sometimes — wliich impressed me at the time with a 
 persuasion that the cause of learning was even more 
 backward in the North than with us ; and this would 
 have been about 1825. 
 
 It is a singular circumstance that, from its geo- 
 logical lay, Stirling is affected by nearly every shock 
 of earthquake of a severe character which occurs 
 witliin a very broad zone. 
 
 Jaffrey told me many stories about the earlier 
 settlers in South Australia — among others, a brother 
 of George Grote the historian and a son of Charles 
 Babbage. He was mentioning to me that Sir Henry 
 Ayers, who at one time filled a higli position at Ade- 
 laide, used to say that David, " the man after God's 
 own heart," probably had no hand whatever in the 
 Psalms which pass under his name, unless it was the 
 one where he speaks of walking up to his ankles in 
 the blood of his enemies. He (that is, JafFrey) assured 
 me that he was personally acquainted with all the 
 circumstances of the case where a man in a Scotish 
 village, when gold was much scarcer than it is at 
 present, made money by exhi})iting at a bawbee a 
 head a sovereign in his possession. He had cleared 
 a fair amount in this way, when some one (there is 
 always a last man) came, and put down his coin, 
 'i'he other, however, said : " I canna shew ye the 
 piece ; but ye can see the paper it was wrop in." 
 .JafFrey often spoke of the former exceeding poverty 
 of his country, and its dependence on oatmeal, her- 
 ring, and poaching. I was amused by my neighbour 
 at l*utney, George Pitt, saying that his fatlier used to 
 think tliat the oatcake was a product of the carpenter's 
 shop, and was a compound of glue and sawdust.
 
 HIGH LIFE 237 
 
 Jaffrcy was speaking one day of a Highlander 
 who, as he lay on his baek on a hill-side, was asked 
 by a passenger where such and such a place was. 
 He put out one of his feet to indicate the direction 
 without attempting to make any farther exertion. 
 " Now," said the other, " if you'll shew me a lazier 
 trick than that, I'll give you a shilling." He placed 
 a hand in his pocket so as to allow room for the coin 
 to pass. 
 
 In tlie portrait on a tetradrachm of Antigonus 
 Doson of Macedonia there is a superficial resemblance 
 to Jaffrey. J. wrote a particularly good hand, and 
 used to quiz me for my very indifferent "hand of 
 write," as he termed it. 
 
 My acquaintance died in 1893. It is remarkable 
 enough that his father was born in 17GG, so that the two 
 lives covered 127 years. The family at one time owned 
 the property on which the field of Eannockburn is situ- 
 ated. I si 1 all notice two other striking cases of trans- 
 mission of a name and race through few links, partly 
 arising from late marriages, which, so far as Scotland 
 was concerned, were formerly much more usual. A 
 son of Captain Groves, R.N., was born in 1829, when 
 his father was sixty years of age. The latter was born 
 in 1769. The Captain used to tell a story apropos of 
 the former defective victualling of ships, even those 
 belonging to the service, and how, when his vessel 
 was once weather-bound, they had to catch all the rats 
 aboard, and cook them. They tasted like chicken. The 
 late Captain JMaude, R.N., who died in October, 1880, 
 in his eighty-eighth year, was the son of the first Lord 
 Hawarden, who was born in 1729, and whose father, 
 again. Sir Robert INIaude, was born in 1C73. Here 
 three generations lasted 213 years. I have furnished 
 some analogous data in relation to our own family. 
 
 Lord Tollemache sold his Hcynolds and Gains- 
 borough portraits, I understand, to Colnaghi for
 
 238 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 £00,000, to provide for his second family of nine. 
 He did not wish to send them to Christie's, on account 
 of the piibUcity, and came to terms with the print- 
 seller, whose first business would be, of course, to 
 notify the fact to everyone likely to be a customer. 
 AVas not this somewhat on the ostrich's principle? 
 His lordship bargained for an engraving of each to 
 put in the places of the oils. I believe that his estate 
 in Cheshire is charged with a heavy annual sum for 
 plantations. 
 
 A neighbour of mine at Kensington knew one of 
 the ToUemaches in New Zealand, where he had a 
 large property. He told me that this gentleman 
 would take off his shirt and stockings, and wash them 
 himself in a roadside pool. Another of this race, a 
 tall, ungainly, ill-dressed man of elderly appearance, 
 with a cape which barely covered his elbows, and a 
 weather-beaten umbrella, used to frequent in my 
 brother's time Judges' Chambers, and declaim with 
 equal vehemence and zest against the rascality of 
 his brother, with whom he was engaged in some 
 mysterious litigation. It appeared to be his chief 
 employment. 
 
 It is to be lamented, for their own sakes and that 
 of their country, that the British aristocracy is either 
 so poor, or, if otherwise, so sordid. The death of 
 Baron Hirsch put it into my head to consider how 
 much prouder we might be of those who enjoy sundry 
 mediaeval designations, no longer articulate or proper 
 to the time, if they could follow a little — to the extent 
 of their power in each case — the example of such a 
 man, or of Count Tolstoi. There was a statement 
 the other day only of the generous hospitality and 
 })enevolence of the JMostyns of IMostyn and Glod- 
 daeth, who are, I believe, freeholders of I^landudno. 
 It must have been the present man's father, who 
 borrowed £400 of my father-in-law, and repaid him
 
 HIGH LIFE 239 
 
 wholly or in part in garden tools. I heard of the 
 existing representative of the family sitting at the 
 auctioneer's table, and carefully registering the prices, 
 when a collection of old plays, acquired by a worthier 
 ancestor, was offered for sale in 1907. But that 
 was not so bad as the undisguised identification of 
 two other very well-known peers of the realm with 
 a sale including some of the most obscene books in 
 French literature. You could not say where the 
 first noble lord ended, and the second began ; it was 
 between them. 
 
 The great families of the country, titled and un- 
 titled, appear to be broadly classifiable into two cate- 
 gories : those which accumulate and hoard their 
 resources, and those which dissipate them ; and it 
 may be difficult to determine which involves the 
 larger amount of injustice and inconvenience. In 
 a vast artificial community no ideal redistributive 
 arrangement is probably feasible. 
 
 A lady, who had been employed as a governess 
 in some of the great South-German houses, was de- 
 scribing to me the extraordinary wealth and splendour 
 of some of their establishments, and was saying that 
 in England we have a very imperfect idea of this 
 question, deriving our knowledge from the impe- 
 cunious foreigners who come over here. My in- 
 formant instanced to the contrary Count Schonborn, 
 whose family repeatedly filled the archiepiscopal see 
 of ^lainz, and who possessed nine residences at least, 
 all maintained in perfect repair, and many of them 
 seldom or never visited by him. Pommersfelder Castle 
 appears to be the principal mansion. One of them 
 sold some of the Gobelin tapestry and other effects ; 
 but the furniture, books, and pictures are said to he 
 very fine, and the first named to be in the English 
 taste of the beginning of the last century. 
 
 JNIy dear old friend Henry JNlay Davis, whom I
 
 240 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 often visited at Dorkinc^, gave me an account of his 
 visit to the late W. J. Evelyn at Wootton. He and 
 a companion found Evel3'n alone, and the latter 
 asked them to stay dinner. The somewhat Barme- 
 cide repast was laid in the banqueting-hall — a pair 
 of soles, a fowl, and a jelly. They had coffee before 
 dinner, and tea with it, but no wine or beer. The 
 servant-maid brought in the dishes, and left them 
 to help themselves. Evelyn rose when he had 
 finished his fish, and put the empty plate on the side- 
 board. The others had to do the same. Evelyn 
 grasped his teacup with his hand, instead of taking 
 it by the handle. He spoke very brusquely, and was 
 dressed in a very rough manner. He had been 
 gardening when they arrived. 
 
 JNIy friend noticed a good many books in the 
 library, a model of John Evelyn's tomb in Wootton 
 Church, the manuscript of the Diary, and some fine 
 old plate of the Diarist's time, including a tall silver 
 cup in the original leathern case. 
 
 Evelyn and INIartin Tupper were schoolfellows, 
 and Tupper used to be invited to stay at Wootton. 
 Charles JNIackay the journalist, who spent his last 
 days, and died in a small cottage at the foot of Box 
 Hill, was also occasionally asked there. This was 
 so far creditable to Evelyn, as JMackay could not 
 possibly be of the slightest utility to him, and did 
 not offer the same sort of interesting personal asso- 
 ciation as Tupper. There is a note of March 19, 
 1844, from Dickens to Talfourd, introducing Mackay 
 as a poet, sub-editor, and paste-and-scissorsorial crafts- 
 man on the jMoniliig CJiroidcle. My father and my- 
 self were intimate with him, wlien he had a hand- 
 some residence in the Regent's Park district. I pre- 
 serve a lively impression of a visit to him and the 
 condescension of this y/^r/.s7-iMa!cenas. 
 
 Tlie name of Mackay awakens in my mind the
 
 HIGH LIFE 241 
 
 reflection that John 'riin}).s and he were two of the 
 men whom my father, solicitous for my settlement 
 in life, held up to me as oreat exemplars of literary 
 genius and prosperity, and likely to prove influential 
 helpers. Timbs, who once occupied one of the private 
 residences in Sloane Street near Sir Charles 13ilke's, 
 and to whom I looked up with a sort of awe, died in 
 the Charterhouse. JNIarie Corelli, who is one of tlie 
 literary birds of passage, and is feathering her nest 
 excellently well at tlie expense of tlie highly in- 
 telligent public, claims to be the adopted daughter 
 of Mackay. The Land of Shadows, ah me ! how full 
 it has grown of those who once stood at my side ! 
 
 I have observed that librarians are often selected 
 with a special regard to their ignorance of literature 
 and books, and such was the case here. Evelyn 
 himself had no feeling in this direction, though a 
 fairly good botanist, and so far doing credit to his 
 name ; but he might have pitched on some one who 
 would have helped to recover the numerous volumes 
 which, in Upcott's time, were abstracted from the 
 collection — probably by Upcott. These were some- 
 times reported to JEvelyn at exorbitant prices ; but 
 he most frequently missed them altogether, when 
 they might, by a little management, have been 
 secured on moderate terms. The list of these strays, 
 which I have drawn up and printed, and which 
 receives periodical additions, begins to be a sadly 
 long one. 
 
 The house has, in short, been mercilessly stripped 
 of its ancient treasures, and the late owner was not 
 proud enough, though to the full rich enough, to 
 redeem them when he could, notwithstanding the 
 somewhat heavy penalty payable for his predecessors' 
 gross neglect of the acquisitions and belongings of 
 the historical Evelyn. It was only the other day 
 that the Wootton copy of the first edition of 
 
 Q
 
 242 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Spenser's Faery Queen was sold at an auction for 
 £71. It is many years since it left its old home. 
 But a large number of valuable old letters and 
 books was given away in former years by Lady 
 Evelyn. The collection has suffered both from 
 sheer dishonesty and a want of appreciation on 
 the part of the later owners. 
 
 Davis related to me the following. A clergy- 
 man meets a little girl, and, regarding her thought- 
 fully and solemnly, says, " Child, do you know who 
 made that vile body of yours ? " " Yes, sir," replies 
 the child ; " mother made the body, and I made the 
 skirt." It was also from this gentleman, who had 
 been many years on the medical staff under the 
 Indian Government, that I heard a singular case 
 of infectious disease missing a generation. An 
 Englishman, walking somewhere outside a town 
 in British India, saw a beautiful Hindoo girl bathing 
 in a pool, and was irresistibly smitten by her attrac- 
 tions. The result was a daughter, who married, and 
 who herself had one. The Hindoo's child never 
 betrayed any symptom of carrying in her blood the 
 germ of a particular malady actually communicated 
 by the mother ; but the taint betrayed itself in the 
 granddaughter, to whom it proved fatal, after she 
 had conveyed it to her husband. A tardy retribution, 
 and an unmerited one !
 
 XVI 
 
 MY OWN LABOURS ON CHARLES LAMB AND 
 OTHER SUBJECTS. BUSHBEATERS AND BIRD- 
 CATCHERS 
 
 Two essays of recent years in the direction of pre- 
 senting the singular and extensive correspondence 
 of Charles Lamb in a better and more complete 
 shape appear to have been undertaken about the 
 same time by the present writer and Canon Ainger. 
 Both had before them the antecedent labours of 
 Talfourd, Fitzgerald, Babson, Cowden Clarke, Kegan 
 Paul, Procter, and one or two more, not to mention 
 that I enjoyed the advantage of having already 
 launched an edition of the works in 1868 and a 
 monograph on Charles and Mary Lamb six years 
 later, while Canon Ainger had in addition an 
 opportunity of consulting and using the Hazlitt 
 book, which preceded his own in order of publica- 
 tion by two years. 
 
 The Ainger and Hazlitt collections of the L,ctters 
 constitute, as I have said, the two latest attempts 
 to serve the English-speaking community in this 
 particular direction. But than the treatment and 
 temper manifest in the books of the layman and 
 the Canon nothing can well be imagined more 
 thoroughly distinct and unsympathetic. The evi- 
 dent object of the latter has been to draw together 
 as many specimens as he, in council with a few 
 trusted advisers, deemed sufficient to convey to the 
 reader an idea of the subject, and to eliminate with-
 
 244. THE HAZLITTS 
 
 out comment all passages calculated to shock the 
 delicacy of prudish perusers, however characteristic 
 they might be of tlie author and the age, and how- 
 ever important for a full comprehension of the 
 subject-matter. The writings of Lamb are to be 
 administered to us in elegant or genteel extracts, 
 like spoon-meat. On this principle, nothing in time 
 would be sacred from these meddling Philistines. 
 All our classics — nay, the Bible — would have their 
 turn. 
 
 It may be a moot point whether the Church is 
 entitled to lay a veto on the exercise of private 
 judgment in religious questions; but an ecclesiastic 
 who devotes his leisure to the belles lettres ought 
 surely to permit some latitude to his readers in 
 a purely literary question affecting, comparatively 
 speaking, a very limited and a very liberal con- 
 stituency. 
 
 The committal by God-fearing publishers of the 
 letters and other writings of Lamb to the editorial 
 supervision and censorship of reverend personages 
 must strike thousands on both sides of the Atlantic 
 and among English-speaking communities in general 
 as a grotesque anticlimax. We recall to our memory 
 the passage in the paper on the " Old and New 
 Schoolmaster," where Lamb describes the pedagogue 
 who offered to instruct him in the science of literary 
 composition. Because the prurient imagination of 
 a Churchman descries indelicacy where none was 
 intended, and at the time none was perceived, are 
 the writings of an English classic to be emasculated ? 
 And if English publishers insist on employing gentle- 
 men of dignified position and squeamish temper to 
 edit their books, and there arises a natural reaction 
 against this sort of abuse, the process, instead of 
 being, as now, openly avowed, will be carried out 
 under the rose, so that by degrees ordinary readers
 
 MY OWN LABOURS 245 
 
 will scarcely know wluit the older writers committed 
 to paper, but will be helped to just as much as is 
 considered good and safe for them to receive. This 
 is the clerical element under new colours, the pap- 
 boat in a new guise ; and 1 maintain that an irre- 
 parable wrong has been done to literature by this 
 viauvaise honte and this counterfeit gentility, and 
 that no useful end is attainable by the continuance 
 of Bowdler in office. 
 
 Ainger was, in 1887, a-s I have said, a rather raw 
 recruit at this sort of work, and was indebted to 
 friends all round for help and guidance, not merely 
 in the editorship of the Letters, but in that of the 
 Essays. I feel bound in self-defence to state tliat 
 he consulted me, among many others, on questions 
 of authorship, and in particular he asked whether 
 two papers in the London Magazine by Procter 
 and Allan Cunningham were by Lamb — a circum- 
 stance which I should not have mentioned, had 
 not the Canon, after appropriating so much of my 
 plan and text, improved the occasion by a dishonest 
 disparagement of my enterprize. There comes into 
 one's head a passage in a certain dramatist about a 
 man's purse and his good name. The Canon was, 
 in short, not only a slipshod impostor but some- 
 tliing more, and how could his publishers be un- 
 aware of the sort of fellow with whom they dealt ? 
 
 As for the Talfourd text of his friend's epistolary 
 writings, one can never tell whether one is reading 
 T^amb or his executor. Even in 1848, however, 
 Talfourd was hampered by the survival of many 
 who might be naturally supposed to take umbrage 
 at certain allusions in tlie correspondence, and he 
 held it to be necessary, as perhaps it was, to refuse 
 admittance into his select garland of much which 
 there is no longer any adequate justification for 
 keeping back. The judge was to Lamb what
 
 246 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Southey might have been to his own offspring 
 if he had yielded to the temporary clamour, and 
 brouglit into the Avorld the '* Family " Doctor. 
 Ainger was quite differently situated in 1888. 
 
 Of my own performances in the present direction 
 I may say this, that although I have been inde- 
 fatigable in hunting for unpublished letters of Lamb, 
 as well as for the means of collating those already 
 in type witli the original manuscripts, I have not 
 been quite so successful as I could have desired in 
 either of these respects. Not merely the appearance 
 at intervals of new material, but my ow^n systematic 
 appropriation of every autograph scrap which came 
 into the market or into the hands of friends, has 
 gradually, however, produced a result which, still 
 imperfect as I know it to be, even those (including 
 myself) who were aware that a considerable un- 
 printed residue was in existence, could scarcely have 
 hoped to realize. 
 
 JVIy Elian Recoveries are div^isible into four 
 epochs or stages: 1868, when I added very notably 
 to the correspondence in jNIoxon and Co.'s edition ; 
 IST-l-, when I brought out my 3Iary and Charles 
 Lanihy on which the late INIrs. Gilchrist coolly based 
 much of her volume; 1886, when I completed 
 Bell and Sons' edition, already specified; and 1896, 
 when I gathered into a small book the biographical 
 and epistolary gleanings of the last decade, includ- 
 ing sixty-four new or uncollected notes and letters, 
 beyond which I have periodically communicated 
 important new matter to English and American 
 publications. The aggregate effect has been, and is, 
 to cast a vast amount of new and unexpected light 
 on the personal and literary history of the brother 
 and sister, and to widen very importantly and 
 interestingly their already fairly large circle of 
 friends and admirers. As for the Reverend Canon,
 
 MY OWN LABOURS 247 
 
 when Smith and Elder offered him the editorship of 
 the Lloyd Letters, he virtuously declined it. Hut 
 Macmillan and Co. suhsequently arranged with their 
 reverend and upright friend to superintend a new 
 collected edition of the entire works in twelve 
 volumes — an Edition de L,uxe ! ! ! Lamb would 
 have shuddered at the bare idea. 
 
 My other literary publications extend over an 
 exceptionally large area from the self-educational 
 motive, which has partly underlain them through- 
 out ; they embrace Early and Modern History and 
 Biography, Anthropology, Poetry and the Drama, 
 and other departments of the belles lettres. But 
 they are before the section of the reading com- 
 munity which cares for such topics as I have 
 happened to treat, and I shall say no more about 
 that point. My bibliogi'aphical researches, stretch- 
 ing over fifty-two years (1860 to 1912), have, I hope 
 and beheve, been of value to some, as I am sure that 
 they have been a source of pleasure to myself. They 
 await consolidation into one large corpus, so soon as 
 I can arrange it. 
 
 This is the only civilized country in the world in 
 which an undertaking of national magnitude would 
 have been permitted to devolve on an individual of 
 slender means, and where he would have found 
 himself reduced to the necessity of printing his 
 Collections at a pecuniary sacrifice. I add to my 
 manuscript accumulations day by day ; it is my 
 desire and intention to enable Great Britain to point 
 to such a work of reference and authority as no 
 other literature can boast of possessing. This is a 
 part of my habitual employment, yet only a part — 
 a small one ; and the time is not far distant, 
 when we shall have something like a real British 
 Bibliography. 
 
 George Redway flattered me by saying that he
 
 248 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 thouglit I wjis the most indolent person whom he 
 liad ever known, and my brother would declare that 
 he never saw me doing any work. But Redway at 
 least tried to make me some amends by volunteer- 
 ing the opinion tliat my style excelled that of any 
 writer with whom he was acquainted. Only to 
 think, what a plague I sliould have been to society 
 liad 1 been even moderately industrious ! I once 
 maliciously disconcerted Ordisli by observing to him 
 that I had laid myself across the age. " Laid your- 
 self acToss the age ? " he repeated after me with his 
 eyes fully expanded. He did not quite perceive 
 my drift. A\''liat I meant was that I had produced 
 certain books which would in all probability perforce 
 remain works of reference and keep my name before 
 a portion, at least, of the public during, if not after, 
 my life. O. did not pursue the subject, nor did I 
 open my mind to him ; but he left me, considerably 
 to my amusement, with the impression that I was 
 a deuced conceited fellow. 
 
 From my personal point of view, noblemen, 
 gentlemen, and others, during a long series of years, 
 seem to have gathered together, regardless of time 
 and cost, all the most curious and rare books of 
 former periods in order to send them, when the 
 result in each case justified them in giving me so 
 much trouble, to the auction-rooms for my use. It 
 is so infinitely more comfortable, you perceive, to 
 work in this sort of piecemeal fjisliion — a library 
 or so at a time — and the process can always be 
 going on. Other parties do their share, and I mine. 
 They beat the bush, and I catch the bird. 
 
 There still remain a few collections which I 
 have not yet had tlie means of examining, particu- 
 larly those at Ham House, and the residue of the 
 Cunliffe library. The former, when I applied for 
 leave to take a note of a certain volume, was
 
 MY OWN LABOURS 249 
 
 declared to be " in a state of chaos " — ratlier a good 
 hearing for an opportunist ! 
 
 It is, 1 ventin-e to conclude, superfluous to 
 mention that I could readily fill more than a single 
 volume with details of my literary correspondence 
 and bibliographical experiences. Probably no one 
 has an adequate idea of the extraordinary variety of 
 the written demands or representations which have 
 been addressed to me since I began to assume the 
 form of a distinct individuality on certain branches 
 of knowledge and inquiry. JNIy special bent might 
 lead some to augur that my views w^ere almost 
 exclusively sought on matters connected with old 
 books ; but such is by no means the case. 
 
 I have in my mind's eye about a ream of paper 
 covered with extracts from Burns by a clerk in the 
 service of the Great Western Railway, soliciting my 
 opinion, and a long letter from an operative at 
 Newcastle-on-Tyne, wishing to know if I deemed 
 it expedient for him to emigrate with his family. 
 Some of those who honoured me with these and 
 other questions were occasional in their appeals ; 
 others, gentlemen of repute, till I had in self-defence 
 to expostulate, interviewed me through the post two 
 or three times a week. Now and then my help was 
 recognized ; more frequently it was not. 
 
 But the worst luck was, where one had furnished 
 the most important material to the Reverend Doctor 
 Grosart for his edition of Donne, a very rare portrait 
 inclusive, and he disparaged its value in acknowledg- 
 ing its arrival, was absolutely silent as to the source 
 wlience he derived the manuscripts, and cited them 
 tlu'oughout as the basis and backbone of his volumes. 
 He was not merely a Doctor, but a Reverend one. 
 Think of that. Master Brook ! ' 
 
 1 A wise gentleniaii reproved mc for tliis personality, as he thought, 
 toward Mr. Brook, 1 referred him to Shakei^pear's Merri/ Wires of 
 Windsor !
 
 XVII 
 
 RECOLLECTIONS OF THE BRITISH MUSEUM AND 
 OF FRIENDS AND HELPERS IN MY WORK 
 
 The acting (as distinguished from the ex officio and 
 hereditary) Trustees of the British Museum are of 
 necessity a weak body ; there is not a soul from 
 century to century, who is practically conversant 
 with the classes of knowledge qualifying him to 
 render useful service to the public, least of all, the 
 three Principal Trustees ; and as a consequence the 
 Secretary and Principal Librarian is virtually the 
 Director in Cliief, like the Mayor of the Palace in 
 the days of the Jxois Faineans. The first Lord 
 Houghton was one of the elected members, but 
 I suppose that his lordship hardly succeeded in 
 placing on the shelves of the library the section 
 of literature most attractive to himself. 
 
 After the retirement of Sir Henry Ellis in 1856, 
 the influence of Lord Brougham procured the 
 appointment of Antonio Panizzi, who had succeeded 
 in ingratiating himself with that once powerful 
 statesman and JNlinister, and had made himself 
 useful in Queen Caroline's T'rial. He had also 
 courted Mr. Grenville. Winter Jones, who followed 
 Panizzi, and whom I never saw, owed his fortune 
 to the latter, who toadied liim, as he (1\) had 
 done Brougham ; but my respected acquaintance 
 the late Sir Augustus Bond was selected partly 
 on the alternate principle, and partly from the 
 absence of anyone at the moment from the other 
 
 250
 
 HECOLLECTIONS 251 
 
 Departments willing or competent to take the post. 
 Newton had the first offer, and declined. Bond was 
 by far the best and most liberal man whom we have 
 had ; I preserve a most agreeable impression of him ; 
 but Thompson, who was brought up under him in 
 the Manuscript Department, was a sort of Hobson's 
 choice, in spite of his ludicrous and repellent pom- 
 posity, when Bond left. Neither Bond nor his 
 protege knew much about printed literature. 
 
 When I first frequented the Museum, the old 
 Reading Room was, of course, still in use. Mr. 
 Watts was keeper of the Printed Books. At that 
 time the national library was very deficient in early 
 English literature, and Watts took comparatively 
 little interest in it, having made no special study of 
 the subject. Under the advice of one or another, 
 certain gaps had been filled up as opportunities 
 presented themselves, and at the Bright sale in 1845 
 more particularly the Museum authorities secured 
 many valuable items. Under the successive auspices, 
 however, of Mr. Rye, Mr. Bullen, Mr. Garnett, and 
 Mr. Fortescue (particularly the first and last), the 
 acquisitions in this direction have been continuous 
 and immense. Even phenomenal prices have been 
 given for exceptionally interesting and important 
 articles, and had it not been for the keenness of 
 private competition, the national collection would at 
 this moment be marvellously complete. But the 
 available resources are moderate ; and while the 
 English or American amateur can afford to outbid 
 the Trustees, the latter can afford on their part to 
 wait. They are the heirs of all men ; and, besides, 
 a good deal has been achieved on an emergency by 
 private co-operation, and by gifts — notably the noble 
 Huth donation of 1910. 
 
 Yet it is more than ridiculous to expend 
 £22,000,000 on the Navy, because that step
 
 252 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 strengthens the Government in the popular estima- 
 tion, and to make a pretence of economy in another 
 (hrection, of which the general knowledge is less 
 clear, by paring down the allowance for books and 
 manuscripts a thousand or so. It is not that 
 .Ministers care for the Navy more than the Museum ; 
 but the Navy means Votes, and the otiier does not. 
 "Ministers will descend to anything for the means 
 of strenn-thenino' themselves at the hustinfrs — will 
 propitiate even the cyclists. But I fear that a 
 remark made seventy years ago in the Betrospective 
 Review is almost equally true to-day — " that, what- 
 ever emanates from, or is in any way dependent 
 upon, the constituted authorities of this country, 
 connected with literature, science, or the arts, is 
 sure to betray the grossest ignorance." 
 
 At the same time, the steady absorption of our 
 early literature by the British Museum, and of 
 ancient books generally by that and other public 
 libraries in Europe and America, with the tendency 
 to destroy volumes belonging to the theological 
 and scientific series, for which tlie demand has 
 ceased, must have tlie ultimate effect of narrowing 
 the opportunities for forming important private 
 cal)inets, and of gradually diminishing the bulk of 
 old printed matter in existence ; and with what 
 is actually valueless much which was highly de- 
 serving of preservation has not only perished in 
 tlie past, but perishes from ignorance or accident 
 year by year. 
 
 Take one case out of thousands. An old gentle- 
 man in Suffolk was discovered by his cousin, my 
 informant, not long since making a bonfire of some 
 old ))Ooks, including a copy of Burton's Anatomy 
 of Mehuicholjj, 1G21. On being challenged for his 
 reason for committing this act of vandalism, the 
 owner remarked that he had been looking into the
 
 RECOLLECTIONS 25.3 
 
 Burton, and did not think it was a fit book for 
 the girls — his four daugliters, of whom tlie most 
 juvenile was about fifty. Here was one of the 
 makers of rare books ! The same gentleman had 
 included in the holocaust a JNIS. Diary kept by his 
 father during sixty years. 
 
 Some of the present staff of officials are fully 
 sensible of the injudicious character of the plan 
 formerly pursued in regard to the General Catalogue 
 of Printed Books, and seem to be of my opinion, 
 that the whole fabric ought to be reconstructed in 
 the public interest. Tlie practice of mixing up I 
 and J and U and V, and of ranging certain classes 
 of books under AcademicSy must ultimately be 
 given up. 
 
 The fifth article of the Protest made by Bolton 
 Corney against the appointment of Panizzi to the 
 head of the JNluseum in 1856 runs thus: "Because 
 the said Antonio Panizzi, on account of the failure 
 of his engagements with regard to the Catalogue 
 of printed books, and the fictions and absurdities 
 of the only fragment thereof hitherto published, 
 appears to have deserved reprehension rather than 
 promotion." 
 
 When my father lived in Great Russell Street 
 in 1846, the INIuseum was still enclosed within a 
 dead wall, and was guarded by sentinels. 
 
 It was from Sir Henry Ellis that I obtained my 
 first reader's ticket. My next step was to lose it, 
 and during about twenty years I held none, nor 
 was ever challenged. Then came the dynamite 
 scare, and one day I was stopped at the door of 
 the Library. "You know me?" I said. "Yes, 
 sir." "How singular!" " AVell, you see, sir, it 
 is our orders. If you were the Archbishop of 
 
 Canterbury, sir " This appeal I was powerless 
 
 to resist, and I went round the other way.
 
 254 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 I never saw Ellis ; but I had to communicate 
 with him in 1869 on a literary matter in which he 
 liad a voice. So far back as 1813 he had edited 
 Brand's Popular Antiquities; and without taking 
 into account the legal bearing of his phenomenal 
 survivorship till I had printed off, and was ready 
 to issue, my new recension, I found myself in the 
 dilemma of having to secure his assent prior to 
 publication. Ellis peremptorily refused ; but twelve 
 days after he died, and, although the copyright did 
 not ipso facto determine, I launched my scheme 
 neck or naught. The letter to me, written in his 
 ninety-second year, was probably the last which the 
 old gentleman ever despatched. 
 
 My father found himself in a similar dilemma, 
 wlien he inserted in the Romancist in 1840 a tale 
 called tlie Children of the Abbey, written by Regina 
 M aria Roche years and years before ; but he was 
 less fortunate than myself. The authoress emerged, 
 to his consternation, from her hiding-place, and had 
 to be squared. God knows if she might not do the 
 same thing now, if anyone had the hardihood to try 
 the experiment ! 
 
 Bullen is my authority for stating that at Paris 
 they have among the archives both the original IMict 
 of XantcH and tlie original Revocation. Panizzi 
 told Bullen that " he never knew a Protestant turn 
 Papist unless he was a damned fool, or a Papist 
 turn Protestant unless he was a damned rogue." 
 Bullen was civilly elbowed out of the Keepership 
 of the Printed Books, as Reid was out of that of 
 the Prints. The former had applied to P^urnivall 
 for a testimonial to support his candidature for 
 Bond's place as principal librarian ; but F. informed 
 me that he felt bound to excuse himself. At the 
 same time, it is due alike to Bullen and Reid, and 
 1 may add \'aux, to testify that they always
 
 RECOLLECTIONS 255 
 
 displayed toward myself, as a student and in- 
 quirer, the utmost amount of friendly sympathy 
 and interest. 
 
 Bullen had, however, a tiresome and tantalizing 
 way of disparaging commercial values (of which 
 forsooth his knowledge was slight) or of soliciting 
 the views of all the members of the staff. His 
 predecessor Rye was a much more capable man. 
 There is assuredly no present ground for apprehen- 
 sion or complaint. Bullen cherished a harmless 
 persuasion, I have heard, that he was a scion of the 
 Roleyns. He was in fact a genial, good-humoured 
 Irishman, whose attitude toward me left little to 
 be desired in the way of courtesy. I am afraid 
 that his acquirements were limited, and that he 
 was careless, for a title-page to IVie Shcphearch- 
 Pipe by ^V. Browne, 1614, required to complete the 
 royal copy in Great Russell Street, was handed by 
 me to him, with a request that it might be applied 
 to the desired purpose, when I had finished my 
 edition of the poet, and no longer needed my own 
 otherwise imperfect copy ; and that leaf has never 
 since been seen. 
 
 Elliot Stock told me that Bullen, sometimes 
 alone, sometimes accompanied by his first wife, was 
 a regular frequenter of the Oxford Music Hall, 
 which I knew only in its infancy, when I once 
 spent an evening there with the Byrons to see the 
 opera of 0?'pheus. It was distinctly, however, to 
 BuUen's credit that he declined an invitation to 
 dine with Elliot Stock at his mansion at Highgate — 
 one partly at all events kept up out of the pockets 
 or rather brains of underpaid authors and by a 
 sordid trade in theological garbage. I have never 
 met with anyone who had a good word to say for 
 Stock. I recollect being in the shop, when he was 
 talking to a woman with his usual suavity, till
 
 25G THE HAZLITTS 
 
 she disclosed the object of her visit, and Stock 
 turned upon her Hke a tiger. It used to be a 
 standing joke among the hterary set, which worked 
 for Stock that, if one asked him £5 for editing a 
 volume, he would burst into tears, grasp you warmly 
 by the hand, and insist on your acceptance of £50. 
 
 A reminiscence of the INIuseum, as agreeable as it 
 is permanent, is the gracious reply by Mr. Watts, 
 when he was superintendent of the Reading Room, 
 to my explanation that I was ]\lr. Hazlitt's son. 
 " Mr. Hazlitt yourseljT ^Ir- Watts was kind enough 
 to say. The words made me feel that I was really 
 a whole quantity. 
 
 The Grenville collection at the INIuseum is, of 
 course, infinitely precious ; but the owner unfor- 
 tunately displayed too little caution in examining 
 the copies of books wliich he bought, and many of 
 which liave proved imperfect. I recollect that, when 
 my father resided at Old Brompton in the early 
 forties in Mr. Grenville's lifetime, he occasionally 
 obtained the loan of some volume for a passing 
 literary purpose, and that the old servant wdio 
 brought it to our house flattered his master, as we 
 thought, by his resemblance to him in his general 
 manner and bearing. It had been my father's wish 
 to dedicate his edition of Defoe to Grenville ; but 
 the latter, in a note in my possession, dated 1841, 
 excused himself on the ground of his withdrawal 
 from public life. 
 
 How many a worthy soul with a mysterious pied 
 a icrre — God knows where or what — finds shelter 
 and warmth beneath the ample and friendly dome 
 of the new Reading Room ! AV^hat many of them 
 do, how they live, may be within the knowledge of 
 some ; all that I can affirm is that, within my ex- 
 perience, a succession of them, which seems inter- 
 minable, has come and gone, and has vexed tlie souls
 
 RECOLLECTIONS 257 
 
 of hapless oflicials, to whom Job the prophetic was, 
 in point of patience, a baby. 
 
 The Superintendent must perforce be genial and 
 obliging to all comers. It is in his diploma. The 
 public has been exceedingly fortunate here. The 
 successive holders of the office have left nothing to 
 be desired in the way of courtesy and good temper. 
 I once watched a lady-reader, who had manifestly 
 made some subject her absorbing study, while she 
 catechized Garnett, and I have to avow that even he 
 at last came to the end of his tether. But he had a 
 thousand topics at his fingers' ends, the lady, perhaps, 
 only that one. Garnett was most courteous, most 
 informed, and most likeable ; yet he had a decided 
 tendency to be " omnia omnibus." But he tried to 
 spread his net too wide, and overtaxed his powers. 
 He began before his retirement to shew a failure of 
 memory and eyesight. 
 
 I am not going for an instant to allege that 
 Garnett was addicted to favouritism; but if any 
 gentleman called to see him, and found that he had 
 an American lady with him, his best plan was to say 
 that he would look in again that day week. Our 
 lady-cousins from the other side are certainly des- 
 perate button-holers. 
 
 Two of the not least singular apparitions in the 
 Reading Room were Ebsworth the parson and 
 literary man and his sister, who was just E. in 
 petticoats. Furnivall was another curious study, 
 with his unkempt hair, his flannel shirt, and his 
 cherry-coloured tie. 
 
 I have been of recent years a sparing visitor to the 
 Room. But when I was a more habitual visitor, there 
 were such odd figures, occasionally with cloaks of 
 imposing amplitude — such bizarre costumes! Gentle- 
 men of foreign extraction and ancient lineage — 
 maybe, counts in the land of their birth ; elderly 
 
 li
 
 258 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 persons of the softer sex in motley toilettes, in 
 whom the softness had become barely recognisable, 
 with whom one almost associated the notion of a 
 snuffbox ; damsels in spectacles, who, if they did 
 time-work, spent unconscionably too large a share of 
 the day in mild flirtations with picturesquely pallid 
 and neglige young men, which relieved the pervading 
 silence with a sort of sotto-voee buzz. If one had 
 the means of forming these and the rest to be found 
 in the Rotunda any given morning into a procession, 
 what spectacle stranger ? — and if one could get at 
 the story of the Thousand and One Readers, it might 
 have its instructive and amusing side. Ah me I it 
 would have its mournful and tragic. 
 
 A late Keeper of the Prints told me an anecdote 
 about the Temptation by Diirer. The Museum ex- 
 ample was very fine ; but a gentleman called one 
 day, asked to see it, and said that he had a better 
 one, he thought. AVould they like to look at his ? 
 Of course, Mr. Reid was incredulous, and replied that 
 they would. The owner brought it shortly after ; 
 it completely eclipsed the one in the national col- 
 lection, and Mr. Edwards presented it. 
 
 Dr. Gray, of the Natural History Section, received 
 Du Chaillu, the African explorer, on his visit to 
 London and the Museum, and, there being some 
 scepticism at the time as to the truth of the writer's 
 account of the gorilla, and Gray seeming to share the 
 prevailing doubts, Du Chaillu expressed his disap- 
 probation by spitting in his face. It was a brother 
 of Gray who was engaged as an assistant by Sir 
 Richard Phillips, and who was stated by my uncle 
 Reynell to be the boy attending the author in the 
 vignette of a book, of which my relative furnished 
 the wrong title, but which I dare say that he saw. 
 Ci ray's brother had also a taste for natural history and 
 botany. He was subsequently secretary at Crockford's.
 
 RECOLLECTIONS 259 
 
 The shiibbiest tricks were at least formerly played 
 by persons frequenting the Reading Room, as no one 
 will be surprised to hear who has studied the physi- 
 ognomy and costume of many of those admitted. 
 Rullen shewed me one day a volume of one of the 
 Quarterlies with several pages cut out by a student, 
 who had presumably a commission to copy the 
 matter. Another time both copies of Halliwell's 
 Dictio7iary of Old Plays had been simultaneously 
 stolen. Even the leaden weights disappeared. A 
 detective was placed at a reading-desk to reconnoitre ; 
 he lost his great-coat, which he had laid on the back 
 of his chair ; and the thief was not detected till a 
 second spy was stationed in the roof to watch for 
 him. 
 
 There are schools of Publishers as there are of 
 Art and Cookery. We get the old-established 
 respectable houses, which deal only with certain 
 classes of books and people, and correspond with 
 you on quarto paper. There are the specialists, 
 who limit themselves to subjects or topics. There 
 are the opportunists, who seek to profit by every 
 ephemeral taste and fancy which takes the public 
 captive. There are the book-drapers, who treat 
 literature like any other dry goods, and sell it in 
 gross, as if it were cheese or sugar. They will 
 deliver you a hundredweight of Dickens, or shoot 
 down into your shop-cellar half a ton of assorted 
 sixpenny ware. 
 
 Two men whom I should select as, in their re- 
 spective lines, models of integrity in the publishing 
 way are William Reeves and John Russell-Smith ; 
 but the latter was less liberal than Reeves. Certain 
 houses, of course, carry loyally out any undertaking 
 into which they may enter, and their word is as good 
 as their bond. But there are others with whicli it is 
 an absolute courtship of misery to deal, even if you
 
 200 THEIIAZLITTS 
 
 hold them in the clauses of an agreement as in a 
 vice. 
 
 The late George Routledge was a very frank and 
 unpretending North-Countryman, though latterly 
 rather fond of letting one know that he was a justice 
 of the peace. The last time I saw him was at his 
 place of business at the back of Ludgate Hill. He 
 mentioned to me that he had been served with a 
 notice of action by a lady for some remark about 
 her in a book recently published by him, but which 
 he had not examined, or even seen, prior to issue ; 
 and he also told me that he had just had an in- 
 dignant letter from some clergyman for reprinting 
 A^oltaire's Candide in Professor Morley's cheap 
 series. I took the occasion to inquire where the 
 Professor saw the affinity between Candide and 
 .Fohnson's Rassclas, which he had put together in a 
 volume on that account. 
 
 lloutledge was originally apprenticed to a book- 
 seller at Carlisle, but on obtaining a berth in the 
 Tithe Office, came up to London. He after a while 
 took a small place on Ludgate Hill near ]]enson's, 
 which he opened after office hours, and subsequently 
 removed to St. Martin's Court, where he conceived 
 the plan of reproducing American authors at a low 
 price, his earliest venture being Fenimore Cooper's 
 Pioneers. 
 
 When I first remember Routledge, he was in 
 Soho Square, where Chidley had been before him, 
 and where llussell-Smith succeeded him. My old 
 acquaintance, INIr. Henry Pyne, late Assistant Tithe 
 Conmiissioner, used to refer sometimes to him, for 
 Jloutledge had been at first, by the interest of the 
 Member for Carlisle, a clerk in that office, and 
 occasionally his first wife would bring him his 
 dinner in a pocket-handkerchief if there was any- 
 thing very special at liome.
 
 RECOLLECTIONS 2G1 
 
 The ediLion oC Lowndes whicli bears the name 
 of II. G. Hohn as the overseer was, in faet, done, 
 so far as it was done at all, by Jhyant, Avith the 
 oecasional assistance of others. JJohn, when anyone 
 came to him with a complaint of mistakes in the 
 book, used always to exclaim, " Oh, it was that ass 
 Bryant " ; but if you went to IJolm, and mentioned 
 that some particular article was im^^roved, he would 
 say, " Ah, yes, I did that myself." My father used 
 to say of H. G. Bohn that he was bad in all the 
 relations of life : a bad son, a bad parent, a bad 
 husband. At the Phiiobiblon dinners it was who 
 should not sit next to him. 
 
 As regarded the relations between Bohn and his 
 sisters, he used to insist that he had made them 
 handsome proposals, which they rejected. They 
 came into Russell-Smith's in Soho Square, when 
 I was there one day, to beg him to give them 
 sixpence. 
 
 Ihyant of W ardour Street was the predecessor 
 of John Bohn as principal cataloguer at Sotheby's. 
 It was he who supplied Dr. Bliss and other collectors 
 of a b^^gone generation with some of their treasures, 
 and who had a hand in the new Lowndes, liryant, 
 who died in 18G4, once made this very judicious 
 observation to me — that there were many books 
 which occurred very seldom, and when they did, 
 were worth very little. 
 
 J. W. Parker, the publisher, speaking of books 
 which paid, asked Furnivall what book he sup- 
 posed had proved most remunerative to him. On 
 F. shaking his head, Parker said, " Why, I gave my 
 daughter £25, thirty-six years ago, to compile a 
 little selection of hymns and psalms, and last year 
 it brought in £200 profit, and it has never been 
 worth less to me." 
 
 There are here and there instances where a firm.
 
 262 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 enjoying an independent fortune, consults its own 
 pleasure or caprice in its selection of authors and its 
 espousal of schemes, sometimes quite irrespectively 
 of the financial question; it is Maecenas in the 
 counting-house ; and modern litterateurs, even if 
 they are not Horaces, might be apt to find a better 
 account in paying their addresses to such than to 
 noble lords or royal highnesses, who have nowadays, 
 as a rule, a very different game to play. 
 
 If ever there should come a time when publisher 
 and author act in loyal and mutually satisfactory 
 co-operation, it would be the Golden Age indeed — 
 the lion lying down with the lamb, although which 
 is the lion and which is the lamb in this case I 
 forbear to pronounce. 
 
 " Repairs neatly executed " might be a good title 
 for a paper on the well-known literary contingency, 
 
 where a famous author, such as , or , or 
 
 , is just the least weak in his information, his 
 
 grammar, and his points, and where some obscure 
 person in the background is engaged by the pub- 
 lisher with his privity and at his cost to make the 
 otherwise chef cCaeuvre exactly suitable for public 
 use and view. The odd part comes when the 
 famous author carries about his volume, as a 
 sample of his cunning and style, and perhaps 
 receives a commission to execute a second master- 
 piece. 
 
 It can only yield astonishment to general readers 
 to hear that there have long been individuals whose 
 most lucrative employment consists in '* finishing," 
 to use bookbinders' parlance, works which have been 
 " forwarded " by the author. The name of the 
 former seldom appears, and it is often the case — 
 always, wliere it happens that anyone has much 
 credit to lose — that it is to the reviser's advantage 
 that he should preserve a strict incognito. For
 
 RECOLLECTIONS 263 
 
 here the exceptions, where a manuscript emerges 
 from this process a source of gratifying surprise to 
 the parties concerned, are so rare, that they prove 
 the rule indeed. Every season witnesses the sale 
 of hundredweights of written matter by auction or 
 otherwise, which has been carefully prepared by 
 the departed author with a view to publication by 
 Murray or Longman, and which is at last en route 
 to that Alma Mater of Scriblerus, the omnivorous 
 paper-mill. I have known S. in the flesh. 
 
 Edward Stibbs, whom my father knew during a 
 long series of years, first came under my notice at 
 a shop in the Strand next the Morning Otronicle 
 office ; but he was previously in Holywell Street. He 
 was accustomed to speak of himself as a Gloucester- 
 sheer man, and would describe a superior binding as 
 being extree. He worked very hard all his life, and 
 left very little. A gentleman, who frequented Stibbs's 
 shop in JNIuseum Street, never went out without 
 putting a volume in his pocket. S. noted where the 
 gap was, usually remembered the item, and sent in 
 a bill, which was always paid, or included it in the 
 account. I met here the kleptomaniac Earl of Derby. 
 But Stibbs did not say that he had ever taken any 
 book away from his place. 
 
 George Willis the bookseller, who reached an 
 advanced age, was an Essex man. My father told 
 me that he recollected him as a stall-keeper in 
 Prince's Street, Coventry Street, and his wife 
 attended to the stall, while he went in quest 
 of stock — sometimes in the rain with an umbrella 
 over her head. He used to say that his main idea 
 was to buy for a shilling and sell for eigliteen- 
 pence — very good interest, but only sixpence. 
 
 I believe that he subsequently occupied the corner 
 shop where Noah Huett was in my time — originally 
 small premises, which Huett enlarged. Then he
 
 2G4 THE ITAZLITTS 
 
 went to the Piazza in Covent Garden, where he 
 failed. But he was a man of persevering character 
 and commercial aptitude, and during the time that 
 he was in partnership with Mr. Sotheran completely 
 recovered his position. I personally remember Willis 
 as a very pleasant, courteous, and intelligent man of 
 business, and his Ciun^ent Notes — a sort of illus- 
 trated Notes and Queries — is a favourite book with 
 me. He joined his sons in the card-making way, 
 and, as I heard, lost a good deal of the money which 
 he had taken out of the concern in the Strand. 
 
 AVillis introduced me, about 18G5, to Mr. Frith, 
 a member of the Society of Friends, a former neigh- 
 bour of his at lleigate and an eminent photographer, 
 who, having executed a series of views in Egypt, 
 desired to publish the work with a poetical letter- 
 p7'ess in the old spelling. I agreed to revise this 
 for him, and after some delay the first instalment 
 arrived, was put as far as possible into form in a 
 couple of hours, and was despatched home. Hearing 
 no more for some time I dropped the poetical photo- 
 grapher a civil reminder, and was then apprised that 
 he had abandoned the project. But he kept his 
 engagement with me. It was £25 not very hardly 
 earned. 1 have sometimes speculated whether he 
 would have printed the text in Gothic letter. Good, 
 as Jerrold once said of a weak play shown to him, 
 was not the word for his literary offspring. 
 
 There was another bookseller besides Stibbs 
 above-mentioned, for whom my father entertained a 
 particular esteem. It was llobert Heath of New 
 Oxford Street. Heath told me a typical little story. 
 He had a visit one day from an old lady who liked 
 })argains. She saw some volumes near the door, and 
 called out to Heath, who was at the other end of 
 a very deep shop, to tell her the prices. " Five 
 shillings, ma'am." " I will give you 24s." " But
 
 RECOLLECTIONS 265 
 
 I only asked you five, ma'am." " I will give you 
 4s. Gd." 
 
 Not far from IJaldock in Holborn, whom I shall 
 have again to mention, were the places of business 
 of Pethcram and Newman. The former had an 
 assistant named John Hotten, a Cornish man, better 
 known as John Caviden Hotten, who, before he set 
 up in business in London, spent some time in the 
 United States at Petheram's suggestion. Newman 
 was a strictly upright man, and dealt in topography. 
 He found in his later days, when his health failed, a 
 valuable friend in Leonard Hartley the collector, at 
 whose house in Hastings he died. A story was once 
 told about Newman. There was a sale at Sotheby's 
 just in his way, rich in the very class of books which 
 he wanted for Hartley and other clients. He was 
 not an habitual attendant at the auctions, but on 
 this occasion he was there in person, and bad for 
 every lot. A whisper circulated that it was a rig, 
 that it was Newman's property. " Let him have his 
 stuff back again," said his confreres. But it turned 
 out that they were mistaken ; and some of them had 
 to go round to him the next day and give him his 
 own price for what they required, or find that the 
 items w'cre bought on commission for connnon 
 acquaintances. F. S. Ellis used to say that the mean- 
 ing of tlie term confrere in the book trade was a man 
 who would cut your throat, if he could do it with 
 impunity. 
 
 Another person of whom I bought a few cujious 
 books was Elkins. He had an odd little sliop at the 
 top of Lombard Street, about the size of a rabbit- 
 hutch, into which, as into a spider's web, he was wont 
 to inveigle the unwary. He laid his net, I conceive, 
 for the City groundlings, who are still affectionatel}'' 
 nursed by Jew and Gentile, planting on the route 
 from railway terminus to counting-house triumphs
 
 266 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 of pictorial art. Occasionally these interesting char- 
 acters reside on a line, and enter into conversation 
 with their fellow-passengers, who are quite casually 
 apprised that certain masterpieces of the Leadenhall 
 or Cornhill school are to be seen at such and such 
 an address. But the old book-shop has migrated 
 westward. 
 
 The book-buyer is not exempt from the danger 
 which besets all other classes of enthusiasts for what 
 strikes the fancy as rare or curious, or both. It is 
 by no means invariably the case that an inexperi- 
 enced collector can safely place himself in the hands 
 of an occupier of ordinary business premises ; he will 
 probably have to pay for his education before he can 
 trust to his own judgment ; but the back-parlour, 
 where property is introduced to gentlemen of means 
 by enterprising merchants, whose affairs are entirely 
 conducted by correspondence, is the rock to be 
 avoided. It is a type of the confidence-trick. 
 
 Edward Hanson was laughing at the edition de 
 liLve ; and he said that he thought, if the craze had 
 gone much farther, it would have been necessary for 
 an intending purchaser, before his book came home, 
 to hire a paddock. The only kind of work suitable 
 for such treatment is what may be termed literary 
 bijouterie. 
 
 Hanson once took an opportunity, when we were 
 looking at the Duke of AtholFs Family Papers, which 
 the firm had just privately printed for the Duke, of 
 referring to the latter as " a personage," and he 
 pleasantly and kindly added, " You are a personage 
 too." No one can have been more polite and con- 
 siderate toward myself than my nearly forty years 
 old friend E. H. 
 
 Another unwholesome development is the Illus- 
 trated Copy. This first arose from the Grangerite 
 movement, and, the trade having accumulated a
 
 RECOLLECTIONS 267 
 
 vast number of portraits and views, every book 
 which contained copious references to persons and 
 places became a convenient and remunerative shoot 
 for these productions, intrinsically and independently 
 unsaleable. The conception has been worn well- 
 nigh threadbare, but there must be up and down the 
 world cartloads of this species of manufacture, since 
 it was found to be so profitable, and appealed to so 
 many who were not critical judges of prints or 
 drawings. 
 
 There is not one book of this character in ten 
 thousand which is unimpeachable throughout. To 
 obtain certain material it is necessary to wait perhaps 
 months, perhaps years ; and the commercial illus- 
 trator cannot afford to lock up his capital too long. 
 It is only in those excessively rare cases where a 
 private connoisseur of fortune engages in the under- 
 taking that a creditable result accrues. But, from 
 tlie increasing scarcity of fine early prints in the 
 right state, the pursuit has become almost hopelessly 
 difficult. Even the few examples purchased by the 
 late Mr. Huth struck me as very unequal and 
 unsatisfying.
 
 XVIII 
 
 NOTES ABOUT DISTINGUISHED COLLECTORS 
 AND OTHERS WHOM I HAVE KNOWN 
 
 The liite Earl of Ashbiiniliam formed two collec- 
 tions of Greek coins. The first lie used to carry 
 about with him in his yacht, and it was taken by 
 pirates. Lord A. saw one of his coins offered for 
 sale in a Greek or Mediterranean town, and it led 
 to a revival of the Jiobby. His cabinet was not 
 extensive, but included many rare pieces. 
 
 Edward Wigan, of the great hop firm in the 
 Borough, wliose cabinets were privately bought by 
 Rollin and Feuardent of l*aris after his death, was 
 one of the most ardent collectors we have ev^er had 
 of Greek and Roman silver and copper coins. But 
 of Greek copper lie made a speciality, lie bouglit 
 a good deal of Whelan in the Haymarket, and JMr, 
 F. Wlielan, then a boy, recollected his visits to his 
 father's, when the slierry was invariably brought 
 out, and any fresh acquisition discussed. One day 
 a rare type of Greek money lay on AVlielan's table, 
 and Wigan was tantalized by the announcement 
 that it was not for immediate sale. He went on 
 talking to Whelan, and every now and then revert- 
 ing to the coin. At last lie took up a slip of paper, 
 and, writing his name at the foot, cried : " There, fill 
 it up with what figure you like." He could aflbrd to 
 be liberal. He told F. \\^ that his share of the profits 
 one half-year was £.'34,000. Wigan to a considerable 
 extent derived his taste for coins from General York- 
 
 263
 
 NOTES ABOUT COLLECTORS 2C9 
 
 Moore, with whom he grew very intimate, and in 
 whose company he was often to be seen — too 
 often, some say ; for the General was convivial to 
 a fault. 
 
 The Duke of Marlborougli, I believe, imagined 
 that the proceeds of the sale of the Blenheim library 
 would be handed over to liim ; but the trustees in- 
 sisted on the fund being applied to the improvement 
 of the estate, and a round sum went in a contract 
 with Fentimis for new grates for Blenheim. While 
 the auction was going on in I^eicester Square, a firm 
 of solicitors at INlanchester was kept informed from 
 day to day of the result. 
 
 The gentleman who gave a large sum for the 
 Marlborough gems, without knowing much about 
 them, once allowed my good friend the Rev. S. S. 
 Lewis, of Corpus, Cambridge, to shew the collection 
 to a friend of his. Vmt the owner chose to be pre- 
 sent, and after observing silence for some time, w^hile 
 Lewis was doing the honours, he ventured to inter- 
 polate at a pause in the proceedings a humble piece 
 of criticism. Taking up one of the treasures, he said 
 
 to the visitor: "That's 7iice/'' ''Nice! Mr. ," 
 
 exclaimed Lewis : " ' nice ' is a word to apply to a 
 jam- tart, not to an ancient gem." 
 
 Lewis himself left an important collection of coins 
 and other antiquities to Corpus. 1 was told that he 
 had laid out £500 a year on this fancy or pursuit 
 during more than twenty years. Among much that 
 was mediocre in point of preservation (for Lewis did 
 not specially study what is called state), there were 
 many fine things which he had acquired during his 
 travels in Greece and elsewhere. Some one related 
 to me an odd trait in him, when a young lady Avho 
 had died testified her regard for Lewis, to whom 
 she had been engaged, by leaving him £5000. Pie 
 went into Lincoln's coin-sliop with the cheque, and
 
 270 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 asked liini if he would oblige him with change. He 
 had a brother, whom I never saw, but who had, I 
 was told, a funny way, if he met you and you made 
 an observation which struck him, of saying : " Ah ! 
 very curious," pulling out a memorandum - book, 
 " would you mind me jotting that down ? " 
 
 Lord Spencer told me in 1868, when I paid a 
 visit to Althorp to take notes of some of the books 
 so far unseen by me, many years prior to the dis- 
 persion of the Blenheim-Sunderland library, that the 
 latter books were so neglected that birds had built 
 their nests behind the shelves. 
 
 I met General Beauchamp at Althorp, and as an 
 illustration of the changes in manners, he mentioned 
 that he recollected, when there were two water- 
 closets in the house, one marked Homines^ the other 
 Dames. The unsanitary condition of our old dwell- 
 ings no doubt promoted many diseases, includ- 
 ing smallpox, to which so many of the Evelyns 
 succumbed. 
 
 Hearing recently that the Spencer collection had 
 gone to Manchester, and recalling the look of Althorp 
 as it was when the library remained there, I asked 
 some one in town what had been done to fill up the 
 gaps ; and I was told that the large billiard room 
 with the gallery had been clean swept azvay, and that 
 the empty shelves were replenished with all sorts of 
 commonplace stuff gathered from the shops. What 
 a fall ! Tliey sold AVimbledon to save the books, 
 and they have sold the books to save themselves. 
 What would Dibdin's Spencer say, if he could behold 
 Althorp almost a sepulchre? Let the pictures and 
 china go, and the house might as well be levelled 
 with the ground. 
 
 The 13uke of Devonshire, Lord Ellesmere, Lord 
 Dysart, and (to some extent) Lord Mostyn, preserve 
 so far their libraries, and fme collections they are.
 
 NOTES ABOUT COLLECTORS 271 
 
 That at Eridgewater House used to be kept in a 
 small closet on the ground floor near the principal 
 entrance. Dr. George Kingsley, a brother of the 
 author, was librarian at the time I visited the house 
 to examine the books. I mentioned him to Lady 
 Spencer, and she seemed to be amused. She asked 
 me if I observed his red wig. INIore recently some 
 one wrote to me to inquire about the EUesmere copy 
 of Titus Aiidronicus, IGOO, and reported to his lord- 
 ship that I had actually seen it at Eridgewater House, 
 whereupon the Earl suggested that I might indicate 
 the precise place where the little volume stood — 
 indicate it after thirty years. 
 
 The Reverend Robert Redford of Putney told 
 me one day an anecdote of Tennyson. About half 
 a century ago this gentleman was at Somersby in 
 Lincolnshire, where the poet's father lived, and an 
 old servant of the family, when he left, said to him : 
 " You'll be sure, sir, and remember me to Master 
 Alfred." 
 
 Old Dr. Tennyson was rather — well, very irrit- 
 able. The tale goes that his cook, her dress having 
 caught fire one day, first ran to her master's door, 
 but, being afraid of his temper, went back, and out 
 into the yard, screaming for help. The air fanned 
 the flames, and the woman died of her burns. The 
 Doctor, to prevent the recurrence of such a tragedy, 
 had a butt of water placed outside the kitchen door, 
 so that the cook, if she became ignited again, might 
 jump or be lifted into it, and not trouble him. 
 
 Rich men, and even lords, may make verses, 
 though they do not usually cut a very good flgure 
 among the freemen of Parnassus. Tennyson was 
 made a peer, because he had first proved himself a 
 man of genius, and had, moreover, written adulatory 
 addresses ea; officio to the Sovereign and to the 
 memory of the Prince Consort.
 
 272 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Emily Davison, daughter of Sir Henry, an Indian 
 functionary of our acquaintance in Brompton days, 
 used to visit a friend of her father's in Onslow 
 Square, and met Tennyson there. The first time 
 she saw him, he was leaning out of the drawing- 
 room window, smoking a pipe with the strongest 
 tobacco, and very roughly dressed, and, the house 
 being in the painter's hands, she took him for one 
 of the workmen — a not unnatural notion for a 
 schoolgirl, as Miss Davison then was. There is a 
 letter to Davison from Thackeray, inviting him to 
 dinner, accompanied by two pen-and-ink sketches, 
 one in which the late Queen is knighting Davison, 
 and the other with two flags crossed and Glory for 
 JjJver in reference to the then member for Hull. 
 
 A pretty little story is told of Longfellow and his 
 love for children, which, as usual, was understood 
 and reciprocated. A little fellow was taken to the 
 poet's house, and found Longfellow in his library. 
 The child looked round the room, and after a while 
 ventured to ask if his host, among his books, had 
 Jack-tlie-Giant-killcr. Longfellow had to own that 
 his collection did not boast it. The boy said nothing, 
 but, paying a second visit, approached Longfellow, 
 holding something in one hand very firmly. He had 
 brought him two cents to buy a copy of the deficient 
 romance, which was to be " all his own book." 
 
 At one time Robert Browning used to follow the 
 dictates of his own inspiration, and produced poetry, 
 when he had anything worth saying and printing. 
 But latterly I understand that his publishers would 
 jog him on the elbow, and let him know that there 
 was room for a new volume, and the bard would 
 cast about for a subject or a peg to hang a book 
 upon. Messrs, Smith and Elder's cheques are very 
 excellent securities ; but they are an indifi'ercnt Tenth 
 Muse.
 
 NOTES ABOUT COLLECTORS 273 
 
 My uncle once went with Robertson, editor of 
 the Westminster Review, to wait on Browning at Iiis 
 I^ondon residence on tlie subject of an article for the 
 periodical, and vividly retained an impression of the 
 flowered dressing-gown in which the poet came down 
 to them. There was no idea at that time tliat he 
 would become a writer of such importance. 
 
 Browning having sent to I^ord Coleridge one of 
 his new poetical productions, the latter expressed his 
 admiration of what little he was able to understand. 
 Brownino; observed that if such a reader could com- 
 prehend ten per cent, of his work, he ought to be 
 well satisfied. I agree so far with Mr. Reynell, that 
 it was a bizarre kind of proceeding to start a Society 
 to expound the writings of a living author, and I 
 have heard it whispered that the oracle, on being 
 pressed for a solution of some obscure passage in a 
 composition, had sometimes to confess that he could 
 not help the inquirer, though he had no doubt that 
 he knew what he meant when he wrote it. This 
 goes some way to justify Lord Coleridge's criticism. 
 
 When Furnivall was dining with me at Barnes 
 one day, I asked the president of the Browning 
 Society what could have possessed him or the 
 Society to establish such a thing, and I entered a 
 little into the apparent value and rank of his writ- 
 ings as a whole, admitting the excellence and charm 
 of a few earlier pieces. But F. had nothing to say. 
 I do not believe that he knew much. 
 
 Browning died without doing more than leave 
 verbal instructions in respect to his funeral or burial- 
 place. He said that, if he died at Paris, he desired 
 to lie by his father there ; if at Florence, by his wife 
 in the old cemetery ; and if at Venice, in some par- 
 ticular church, which I have forgotten — not,!l believe, 
 at Lido. The difficulty was, so far as Florence was 
 concerned, that the old cemetery had been closed, 
 
 s
 
 274 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 and that the municipality could not grant permission 
 for his interment there without some special Minis- 
 terial authority ; and the family declined the proposal 
 to exhume his wife, and lay both together in the new 
 gi'ound. It was then that Dean Bradley, who had 
 wavered so long as it was a mere question of com- 
 pliment, came forward, and assented to his remains 
 being deposited in the Abbey. 
 
 I heard from Furnivall an odd story related to 
 him by Arthur Symonds of a visit paid to two sport- 
 ing acquaintances in Buckinghamshire. S. referred 
 to the recent death of Browning, and one of the 
 Nimrods, turning to the other pensively, said, " Poor 
 Browning ! did he hunt with you ? " 
 
 Furnivall started at Hammersmith a Rowing 
 Club and Recreation Room for factory girls, and 
 told me that the subscriptions were apt to be tardy. 
 He lived, after his wife's departure, at the same ad- 
 dress, and had a cook-housekeeper and house-maid. 
 There was a piano in the kitchen, on which the said 
 cook-housekeeper played, and F. sometimes went 
 down and made one. Like Johnson, F. used at one 
 time at least to be an insatiable tea-drinker. One 
 evening at the Reynells' at Putney, to whom I had 
 introduced him, he had eight cups of ordinary size. 
 
 Furnivall spoke favourably of my Early Poj)ular 
 Poetry, published (1864-6) in the*' Library of Old 
 Authors," and remarked that it was the best twenty 
 shillings' worth he knew. " But," said he, " of course 
 you did not write all the notes yourself." He meant 
 to flatter me, perhaps. There are various ways of 
 doing that. I know full well that the work cost 
 me a vast amount of labour, and brouglit me a very 
 small return. 
 
 He gave me a slightly disquieting idea of Henry 
 Bnidshaw, before I had seen the latter, and felt proud 
 of his acquaintance, by telling me that lie found him
 
 NOTES ABOUT COT.LFXTORS 275 
 
 in his rooms iit Kiiif^'s College, walkinf^ about bare- 
 foot. Tlie sight impressed F. favourably, seeming 
 to him to import a simple manliness. Furnivall de- 
 rived all his original knowledge of early English 
 literature (especially that in JNIS.) from Eradshaw. 
 Of Shakespear he really knew to the last next to 
 nothing. But he was enthusiastic and disinterested. 
 T have understood that his father kept a private 
 lunatic asylum at Egham. 
 
 Furnivall may perhaps be not unjustly defined as 
 the successful communicant of enthusiasm to others 
 rather than the possessor of much solidity of know- 
 ledge or steadfastness of conviction. Numerous in- 
 stances have come to my personal notice, where he 
 abandoned a statement or a view, so soon as he 
 perceived that he was face to face with somebody 
 who had thought the question out. I dare say that 
 I hold a larger number of his letters and notes, 
 which, in common with those of the late Rev. 
 Dr. Grosart, formerly reached me about thrice a 
 week, than anyone else. Yet I was not approached 
 by his biographer. 
 
 It has not been my lot to come across a person 
 so thoroughly superior to pecuniary considerations. 
 On one occasion, when the money could scarcely 
 have been indifferent to him, two literary commis- 
 sions were thrown in his way : one was worth £120 ; 
 the other was gratuitous — what they term iLonorary. 
 He preferred the latter. 
 
 He was mentioning to me the case of the 
 Trinity College manuscript of Chaucer, borrowed 
 by Halliwell-Phillipps from the then librarian with- 
 out any voucher given, and never returned, as the 
 borrower alleged, after the death of the librarian, 
 that he had restored it to him. It was afterward 
 in a lot which came into the hands of llodd the 
 bookseller, either from an auction or by private pur-
 
 27G THE HAZLITTS 
 
 chase, and sliown to Sir F. Madden, then Keeper of 
 the JManuscripts at the British Museum. Madden 
 recognized tlie volume, although the Chaucer portion 
 had been taken out and destroyed, and the remain- 
 ing two parts bound up separately ; but he could 
 hardly swear to it in its altered state ; it is now in 
 the ]\Iu.seum. Bond told me without reserve, when 
 he was Keeper, that he would not buy any manu- 
 script from Phillipps ; and in fact I have heard that 
 he did one or two queer things in the printed book 
 department. 
 
 \Mien the Birmingham folks declined his SJiakes- 
 peareana at £7000, an American lady offered to 
 buy them, and present them to the New York 
 Shakespear Society, if they would undertake to 
 preserve them. Halliwell, I understand, was made 
 F.R.S. on the belief that he would draw up the 
 catalogue of the Society's library, which he never 
 did, though he had promised to do it. But it was 
 at tliat time easier to gain admission. 
 
 I have already referred to Phillipps's extraordinary 
 nervousness. He invited me to the wedding of his 
 second daughter to Mr. Hall, and at the breakfast, 
 when tlie health of the father of the bride was pro- 
 posed and drunk, 1 heard a sudden rustle of paper 
 all over the room, and anon perceived that (by a 
 preconcerted arrangement, no doubt) tlie response 
 was being circulated in the form of a printed slip, 
 owing to Phillipps's constitutional inability to get on 
 his feet and say a few words. 
 
 I saw his second wife once or twice at HoUing- 
 bury Copse. It was said that her aunt imagined 
 that Phillipps had his eye on Jicr, and was surprised 
 and piqued when she found that it was " my niece " 
 who was the object of courtship. 
 
 When he succeeded Sir Thomas Phillipps, I con- 
 gratulated liim, and mentioned that the estate was
 
 NOTES ABOUT COLLECTORS 277 
 
 said to be worth :(*! 0,000 a year. lie asked me to 
 divide that by two and to consider the dilapidations. 
 
 Dr. Ingleby, of N'^alcntines, near Ilford, the Shake- 
 spearean scholar, used to drive out about the neigh- 
 bourhood without his hat, and went by the name of 
 the Uafless Heacbnan. \Vhcn 1 knew Ingleby, he 
 rented Wanstead from Lord Cowley, and I recall 
 a delightful drive with him in a dogcart tlirough the 
 woods, and the imminent risk I more than once ran 
 of having my head broken by contact with some 
 overhanging bougli. 
 
 Valentines is a historical mansion, where Arch- 
 bishop Tillotson formerly resided, and an avenue 
 called his IFalk still remains. But all the fine 
 old wood-carving by Grinling Gibbons has been 
 replaced by plaster. When I more than once 
 visited Ingleby there were eight gardeners kept, 
 of whom JNIr. Early (a happy name) was the chief. 
 Early was an author on the subject, in which he 
 was a specialist. The place belonged to INIrs. 
 Ingleby, as she soon let everyone know. 
 
 Sala was a man of rare industry and capacity. 
 He was a journalist par excellence, and his other 
 works were assemblages of articles in book form. 
 But he shewed great power and fluency as a public 
 speaker. I heard him with a good deal of interest 
 and amusement one evening at a dinner at the 
 Mansion House, where he was far away the leading 
 star among the after-dinner orators. He poked 
 some fun at Smith of the Dictionaries, as to his 
 notion, till he met him there in the flesh, that he 
 was a sort of nomiuis umbra. 
 
 Sala was an unimaginative Alexandre Dumas 
 'pcre. He was eminently successful, I should 
 imagine, in a pecuniary point of view, yet, like 
 the true Bohemian, died none the richer for that. 
 He left his widow something like a beggar.
 
 278 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Alexander Ireland, of Manchester, who was, 
 I believe, an Edinburgh man, and who, I hear, 
 had been brought up under Robert and William 
 Chambers, made himself known to me about 1866. 
 He professed to take a warm interest in the 
 writings of my grandfather, and during many years 
 we corresponded. But, as a person who has alike in- 
 herited and accumulated a vast amount of informa- 
 tion on all sorts of subjects and people, I have met 
 with passing many of these almost hysterically 
 entliusiastic interviewers, asking one for opinions 
 about Ih'itisli Columbia, Burns, Lamb, Hazlitt, the 
 early English poets, and a legion of other topics; 
 and Ireland was no exception to the rule. These 
 folks gush for a season, while they glean and recon- 
 noitre, then put up their note-books and wish you 
 good-day. 
 
 The gentleman just now in question overrated 
 his intimacy with me, as I have already implied, 
 by appropriating without leave or adequate acknow- 
 ledgment the material collected by me and printed 
 in my 1867 Hazlitt book. I was more sorry than 
 angry, because in the interval I had brought 
 together, unknown to him, a mass of new informa- 
 tion, which placed my worthy acquaintance in the 
 unenviable situation described by Macaulay. I 
 cannot altogether refrain from dwelling on the 
 matter, because I am constantly given to under- 
 stand that the pei'son who thus obliged me is the 
 only recognized antJiority on the subject ! 
 
 Richardson the bookseller of Glasgow informed 
 me that Ireland had once stayed with him two or 
 three days, and that in tlie evenings, after dinner, 
 Ireland talked incessantly about old Edinburgh 
 people and episodes, so that lie (R.) could not get 
 a word in. 
 
 I Iiave involuntarily acted as bush-beater to two
 
 NOTES ABOUT COLLECTORS 279 
 
 in succession — to Mr. Ireland for Ilazlitt and to 
 Canon Aini^er for I^amb, and need I say how 
 deeply sensible I am of the double honour ? But I 
 honestly regard the Reverend Canon as the less 
 venial offender. 
 
 Ireland was engaged to print in confidence the 
 Vestiges of Cieation by the late Robert Chambers, 
 published anonymously. The copies were sent up 
 by the typographer to the London houses, and the 
 authorship was for some time kept as a close secret. 
 But, like other secrets, greater and smaller, it was in 
 due course divulged. 
 
 When I first visited him at Bowdon, on the 
 Cheshire side of the Irwell, he appeared to be in 
 affluent circumstances through his interest in the 
 Manchester Examiner and his general printing 
 business, and he subsequently built a large house 
 in the same suburb to accommodate his library. 
 Of his later history I know very little, except that 
 he sold his books, retired to Southport, and ulti- 
 mately returned to Bowdon. There was a serious 
 loss of money, I understood, by the editorial mis- 
 management of the paper, and Ireland and his wife 
 were temporarily in great straits. It was then, I 
 suppose, that Gladstone gave him £200 out of the 
 Royal Bounty. 
 
 He had an old-fashioned way of asking after 
 my wife. He would always say : "I hope that 
 Mistress Hazlitt is well. Mistress Ireland is 
 pretty well, I thank you." The second Mistress 
 Ireland was a remarkably intelligent and agree- 
 able woman, the daughter of a gentleman named 
 Nicholson in Cumberland ; her brother, Henry 
 AUeyne Nicholson, published an interesting mono- 
 graph on the geology of Cumberland and W^est- 
 moreland, 18G8. 
 
 Ireland had a son and a daughter by his first
 
 280 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 wife. The son I never met, but I recollect JNl iss 
 Ireland, Avho resembled her father in height and 
 general appearance. There was at one time a talk 
 of this lady marrying ^\'illiam AVatson. But she 
 was afraid of his temper, which was impetuous.
 
 XIX 
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES AND 
 A FEW FRIENDS 
 
 JNIy old and most estimable friend, the Rev. Thomas 
 Corser, the distinguished book-collector, of Stand, 
 near Manchester, was a native of Whitchurcli, and 
 had been a great angler in his earlier days. He 
 interested me, when 1 saw him at Stand, by telling 
 me that his father was very intimate with Mr. Jenkins, 
 who was Presbyterian minister at Whitchurch, and 
 on very affectionate terms witli my great-grandfather 
 at AVem. I went to Stand two or three times, and 
 Corser was always most cordial. The Rectory was 
 a small detached house near the church, and the 
 books were from insufficient space stowed away in 
 bedroom cupboards and even under beds. Corser 
 had to light a candle to look for a Caxton in a 
 cupboard which, I remember, opened the wrong 
 way. He could give you a good glass of port, and 
 was not averse to it himself. His library cost, he 
 told me, £9000, and, although many of the books 
 were given away, realized £20,000. It curiously 
 illustrates the change in the market value of some 
 old books, that Corser kept his second folio Sliake- 
 spear in the dining-room among the more ordinary 
 works. A five-pound note secured a good copy in 
 his day and well within my own recollection. 
 
 A second leading figure in Manchester literary 
 circles some years since was James Crossley, a re- 
 tired solicitor and an enthusiastic book-lover. I 
 
 281
 
 282 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 saw him repeatedly, when I visited the city, and 
 I ever found him most urbane and communicative. 
 He remembered JNIarket Street, Manchester, when 
 two vehicles could not pass each other. His col- 
 lection of books was very extensive and multi- 
 farious ; but he had certain specialities, particularly 
 the writings of Defoe and of Lancashire and 
 Cheshire authors. 
 
 The removal of his library, when he left Booth 
 Street, l*iccadilly, to reside at Stocks House, Cheet- 
 ham, occupied three weeks, to the amazement and 
 loss of the contractor, who, surveying it cursorily, 
 calculated on achieving the task in as many days, 
 and estimated accordingly. 
 
 Crossley was rather a keen hand at a bargain, 
 and was during months engaged in a treaty for a 
 copy of the first edition of Pai^adise Lost. When 
 he had settled on the price, he asked the vendor if 
 he had any more copies ; he would take all he had. 
 Tlie price for a fine copy thirty years ago was a 
 couple of guineas, at which figure I acquired a 
 beautiful one in the original sheep from Tomlins, 
 in Great llussell Street, and when an American 
 agent offered me double, I thought that he was 
 in jest. 
 
 The Rev. Alexander Dyce was invariably willing 
 to afford any information to me on literary or 
 bibliographical subjects. AVhen my father was first 
 acquainted with him he lived in Gray's Inn. He 
 was a bachelor. I recollect that in a letter to my 
 father or to myself he spoke of being engaged on 
 a new English edition of Athenjcus — a real want — 
 but I never heard any more about it. I met him 
 one day at Russell-Smith's, in Soho Square : a 
 singularly huge, sliambling, awkward, ungainly 
 figure. He had come about an eighteenpenny 
 book he required for use. There was some nego-
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES 283 
 
 tiation as to an abatement of the price, and ulti- 
 mately he left the shop, book in hand. In a few 
 moments he returned, and asked Smith if, when he 
 had done with it, he would take the volume back 
 at a reasonable reduction. On another occasion 
 when I met Dyce, it was the Mitford sale in 18G0, 
 and he spoke of Mitford's handwriting as a curious 
 mixture of neatness and illegibility — in fact, that 
 the writer had come to him before then to ask 
 him to assist in deciphering it. Dyce himself, 
 although he wrote a fairly legible hand, was an 
 interminable reviser of his own copy, and I heard 
 that he almost threw his publishers and printers 
 into despair. He was at one time intending to 
 leave his library to one of the universities — the 
 Rodleian, I believe, but he changed his plan. 
 
 There was a creepy story about Mitford and a 
 mysterious affair which took place at his rectory in 
 Suffolk. A dead child was discovered behind a 
 chimney - piece at Benham Hall, Suffolk. This 
 gentleman edited many of the modern poets for 
 AVhittingham ; but all that he did, I understand, 
 was to prefix a poorly-worded memoir and a pass- 
 able sonnet. The texts took care of themselves. 
 
 Of the late Mr. Henry Bradshaw, of the Univer- 
 sity Library, Cambridge, I now regret that I saw so 
 little. His name deserves to be written in letters of 
 gold. The only other member of that University, 
 whom I can specially signalize, is Aldis Wright, who 
 has always been equally distinguished in my case by 
 his courtesy and accuracy. Through my old friend, 
 Sir G. A. Greenhill, of Emmanuel, whom I have 
 known since he was a Bluecoat boy, I had been in 
 communication with Bradshaw some little time before 
 I went to Cambridge in 1875 to examine personally 
 as many of the rarities there as I could. 
 
 I was in the habit of applying to Bradshaw for
 
 284 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 occasional assistance in regard to unique books at 
 Cambridge, and as he was a very bad correspondent, 
 I employed Greenhill to go to him, and obtain the 
 required information. The curious part was that 
 Hradshaw seated himself at one of the tables with 
 Greenhill, and wrote him a note, which he threw 
 across. When I waited on him myself, however, 
 no man could have been more studiously attentive 
 or friendly. Incidentally naming to him one day in 
 conversation the Oxindens of Barham, near Canter- 
 bury, he gave me to understand that he was related 
 to that family. I think that his sister was Lady 
 Oxinden. 
 
 Bradshaw was sadly unpractical and inconse- 
 quent. He entered warmly into projects, but 
 scarcely ever pursued the matter any farther. Pub- 
 lishers announced books by him as about to appear, 
 because, judging him by ordinary rules, they con- 
 cluded that some arrangement, into which he had 
 ostensibly entered, was a settled affair, whereas our 
 excellent friend probably thought no more about it. 
 
 l^radshaw had some project for rearranging Sir 
 David Lyndsay's works, as they occur in my Collec- 
 tions, according to Furnivall ; but I never under- 
 stood what it was, nor did it come to anything, and 
 when I mentioned the matter to David Laing, he 
 did not seem to see what room or scope there could 
 be for it ; Lyndsay's case stands so differently from 
 Chaucer and tlie author of Piers Ploughmcui, yet I 
 can hardly exclude from my mind a suspicion that 
 the insight of Bradshaw was superior to that of 
 Laing. 
 
 Tiie last time we met was in I^ondon, not very 
 long prior to his unexpected death, and he informed 
 me tliat a gentleman at Cambridge had just brought 
 to liglit a tract which had been mislaid, adding that, 
 as soon as lie returned, he would ask him to transmit
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES 285 
 
 me a full account. I knew too well that this was all 
 that I should ever hear of it. I subsequently went 
 to King's College, and after some difliculty found 
 the piece. 
 
 I account it a privilege and an honour to have met 
 Rradshaw, and to have associated with him, for how- 
 ever brief a term. He was so thoroughly genuine 
 and original, and he left no one to till liis place. 
 He was ambidexter ; for he was almost equally at 
 home in the manuscript and the printed book. I see 
 him before me, as I write ; he is one of my most 
 enduring and sweetest reminiscences. Oxford has 
 yet to yield such a man. It was Furnivall who 
 gave me the account of him which was substantially 
 printed at the time in a memoir ; I consider that to 
 Bradshaw Furnivall owed his philological taste and 
 much of his reputation as a scholar. Bradshaw's life 
 was sacrificed to his inveterate neglect to take 
 exercise. It was rather trying to hear George 
 Bullen speak of him as a man who had been ab- 
 surdly overrated in his (Bullen's) opinion. 
 
 During my stay at Cambridge, when I daily 
 lunched with Bradshaw in his fine rooms at Kind's, 
 I visited most of the libraries, and left very little un- 
 noted ; but Bradshaw, if there was anything which he 
 imagined that I might like to see outside his im- 
 mediate domain, would send for it. I had at Magdalen 
 a rather interesting conversation with the chamber- 
 fellow of IMinors Bright, who was himself away. He 
 furnished me with a few samples of the passages in 
 Pepys's Diary which Bright had deemed it necessary 
 to suppress. One I remember was where the Secre- 
 tary to the Admiralty described his intrigue with a 
 pretty Dutch lady (it was well for his domestic peace 
 that the account was in cryptogram), and another 
 referred to his dilemma at his lodgings, where he was 
 overtaken in the night, and secreted something in
 
 28G THE HAZLITTS 
 
 the cliiinney, fauic de cabinet. But I must on no 
 account omit to record the kindnesses, which as a 
 bibhofyrapher I have experienced from Mr. Patrick 
 and from Professor Newton of Ma<rdalen, Mr. Moule 
 of University College, and Bradshaw's successor, 
 ISIr. Jenkinson. At Oxford I have found steadfast 
 and cheerful auxiliaries in my studies in Dr. Coxe, 
 Mr. Falconer INIadan, Mr. Thompson of Queens', the 
 Provost of Worcester ; and last, but very far indeed 
 from least, Mr. George Waring of Oxford, who 
 literally spared no pains to promote the accuracy 
 and completeness of my work ; and long before he 
 assumed a mitre, Dr. Stubbs, while he officiated as 
 librarian at Lambeth, supplied me with much valu- 
 able information in a handwriting which put me out 
 of conceit with my own. 
 
 A perfectly fortuitous circumstance introduced 
 me in the winter of 18GG to Henry Huth. I solicited 
 in writing the particulars of a unique volume which 
 he had lately acquired, and he responded by inviting 
 me to his house to inspect it. My conversance with 
 the class of literature in which he ultimately took the 
 greatest amount of interest, and for which his library 
 was remarkable, led to a continuance of our inter- 
 course, and during ten years I saw him regularly, as 
 a rule, on Sunday afternoons when he was in town. 
 My practice was to go to his house about one, lunch 
 with the family, and spend two or three hours after- 
 ward in the library with him. Sometimes a guest or 
 two called — Mr. Turner, ]Mr. Russell, or Don Pascual 
 de Gayangos ; but more frequently we were alone, 
 1 recollect him mentioning to me, when his sister 
 died, that he had directed the servants to admit no 
 one but myself — that is, no stranger. 
 
 The late ]\Ir. Quaritch told me (May 5, 1898) 
 that (iayangos was run over in the street here in 
 London about a month before, and died of the injuries
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES 287 
 
 he received. His (Q.'s) son went to the place to 
 which he was carried, but Gayangos was dead before 
 he reached it. It appears that he knew scarcely 
 anyone in England. 
 
 Mr. Huth was a gentleman, a scholar, and a 
 linguist. He was particularly affable and kind, and 
 no one could be less ostentatious and presuming. 
 He afforded me enormous assistance in the prepara- 
 tion of the later letters of my Handbook, and was at 
 all times ready to lend me books, irrespectively of 
 their pecuniary value. I have known what it was 
 to return home from one of my afternoons with him 
 with a hundred-guinea tome under my arm or in my 
 pocket. 
 
 He was born in 1815, I believe in Finsbury, 
 where his father, Mr. Frederick Huth, lived at all 
 events when he was a boy. He told me that his 
 brothers and sisters and himself were taken out for 
 exercise in what was then the open ground about. 
 An uncle of my neighbour at Putney, Mr. George 
 Pitt, was born in 1798, and was used to relate how 
 as a schoolboy he was chased by a bull in Moorfields, 
 and had some ado to get over the fence. It was long 
 the fashion for men of business in the City to fix 
 themselves tolerably near to their offices, and when 
 the Huths removed from Finsbury it was to settle at 
 Clapton, formerly another favourite resort of City 
 men. 
 
 TJie founder of the firm of F. Huth and Co. was 
 originally a clerk in a mercantile establishment at 
 Hamburg. He went thence to Spain, where he 
 settled and married a Spanish lady; but in 1812, 
 during the disturbances in the Peninsula, he deter- 
 mined to remove to England. It was with great 
 difficulty that he escaped, and shots were fired into 
 the vessel in which he embarked. His aptitude for 
 business gradually gave him a footing in London,
 
 288 THE H2VZLITTS 
 
 and he, from modest beginnings, rose to a sliare in 
 more ambitious transactions. His son, who charac- 
 teristically described his father to me as an adven- 
 turer, mentioned that folks opened their eyes when a 
 bill drawn upon F. Huth and Co. for £30,000 came 
 into the market, and was duly met. But Frederick 
 Huth was evidently a man of genius. 
 
 The house accepted any sort of factorship on a 
 large scale. Huth told me, by way of illustration, 
 that a single transaction in silkworms' eggs from 
 Japan to Italy was worth to them £2,5,000, or 10 per 
 cent, on a quarter of a million. It is not everybody 
 w^ho can aiibrd to be generous that proves so ; but 
 F. Huth and Co., as the firm continues to be called, 
 were in nearly every public subscription in London 
 for a handsome figure — where or what the object 
 was, so long as it was legitimate, it did not signify. 
 I once inquired of him what he thought of the 
 financial prospects of his house, and he at once 
 replied that he foresaw its decline from increased 
 competition and the diversion of business into new 
 channels. 
 
 Huth never went back ])eyond his father, but he 
 shewed me, as we were going down from the library 
 to lunch one day, a queer-looking portrait on the 
 staircase at I'rince's Gate, which purported to be the 
 elTigy of a certain person of his name, whether 
 related to him or not, I am, as he was, uncertain. 
 INIy former acquaintance married a Viennese lady, 
 whose brother was a Consul at Hamburg, the cradle 
 of the Huths tiiemselves, and a quiet, gentlemanly 
 fellow. Mrs. Huth laid greater stress, poor soul! on 
 her husband's wealth than he did, for of all the men 
 whom I have known he was the least self-complacent 
 and self-asserting. I remember him apologizing to 
 me at table one Sunday, because he imagined that I 
 took something which he said as a contradiction, and
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES 289 
 
 seemed vexed. l>iit on another occasion lie gently 
 reproved me for some expression, which he held to 
 be too democratic. Altogether we long continued 
 to understand each otiier fairly well. As a book- 
 collector, he possessed a tolerable knowledge of the 
 insides of volumes, and he was the master of several 
 languages. It was a saying of his — that no man 
 could be a gentleman who did not understand I^atin. 
 I do not know what account he would have given of 
 many who claim the name, and who do not possess 
 more refinement or culture of any kind than an 
 errand-boy. lie observed to me one day in a playful 
 tone and in a normal sense, that a man, even if he 
 was very rich, could not wear two hats. 
 
 He remarked to me more than once that all that 
 he wanted was peace and quietness. In anyone else 
 this would have been affectation ; but 1 think it was 
 the beginning of that nervous debility which so 
 strongly developed itself, and led to his going abroad 
 one year for change and relief. I have known him 
 so overcome by depression that he declared himself 
 to me unable to face the process of looking for a 
 book on the shelves. Halliwell-Phillipps was nearly 
 as hypochondriacal, while he lived at Brompton. 
 
 Although Huth had the command of a well- 
 appointed stable in town (that at Wykehurst, he 
 told me, was nearly as large as the house), his 
 regular routine was to go to the City in the morning 
 in a four-wheeled cab, and to walk home, taking 
 the booksellers in his way. I have occasionally met 
 him at his favourite resorts, and once he quickened 
 his pace to overtake me in Piccadilly. The carriages 
 were for the ladies. 
 
 The earliest dealings of Huth with booksellers 
 were when he was quite a young man, and he used 
 to buy classics of Baldock in Holborn. Baldock, an 
 old-fashioned gentlemanly individual, it was who let 
 
 T
 
 290 THE HAZLTTTS 
 
 me understand liow Macanlay would scale his ladder 
 in quest of material for his historical purposes. I do 
 not fancy that Hutli retained any of his juvenile 
 acquisitions. At a later period his brother Louis, 
 to whom he once introduced me, was slightly 
 smitten by bibliomania, and frequented the shop 
 of Payne and Foss. Old Spanish romances were his 
 game, and one day, when the two brothers were 
 there together, Henry diffidently asked the price of 
 one of those excessively rare early folio tales of 
 chivalry in the charming contemporary Spanish 
 vesture. The bookseller replied. Eight ; but his 
 questioner did not know whether he meant pounds 
 or shillings. Louis Huth, however, bought it, and 
 subsequently, when he abandoned the pursuit, handed 
 over the volume to the other. 
 
 It was on the staircase at Tokenhouse Yard that 
 I saw Louis Huth, a bald-headed, courteous, elderly 
 man, who was said by his relatives to get rid of some 
 of his surplus wealth by having the common house- 
 hold utensils (hot- water cans, &c.) of silver, as at 
 Enkhuisen, on the Zuyder Zee, formerly the rich 
 merchants put gold handles to their doors. 
 
 A brother of Crouch, Louis Huth's house-steward 
 at Possingworth, gave me an excellent idea of the 
 splendid style in which the residence was furnished 
 and maintained, and shewed me a copy of the illus- 
 trated catalogue, where there are views of the old 
 manor-house and the modern palatial structure 
 based upon it, with all the fine old oak preserved. 
 After the death of the owner his widow married 
 a gentleman mucli her junior, and I understand that 
 tlie upper storey has been removed. I^ouis Huth 
 had acquired a considerable estate in the vicinity, 
 and was a good landlord ; but his experiment 
 in bringing over from Scotland some of the small 
 black cuttle had to be abandoned, as the strangers
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES 291 
 
 proved a, source of alarm and complaint. Henry 
 Huth or liis wife told me, that Possingworth was 
 known in the family as Windsoi^ Castle. The 
 Bachelors' Room was furnished and upholstered in 
 black ; the ebony bedstead cost £200. 
 
 While the Daniel sale was going on in 1864, 
 Henry Huth was at Thames Ditton, and Joseph Ully 
 took Huth down the day's purchases every evening. 
 Huth gave me a droll account of Lilly's embarrass- 
 ment, when he asked him on one of these occa- 
 sions into the room, where they w^ere at dessert, 
 and begged him to take a glass of wine. The old 
 bookseller spilled the liquor over the tablecloth and 
 his own clothes, and retreated in the utmost con- 
 fusion into the servants' hall. 
 
 I have heard very unpleasant stories of the 
 tricks played by Lilly with some of the books 
 which he placed with Mr. Huth — a peculiarly dis- 
 creditable course toward a man who trusted him 
 implicitly, and was an income to him for years. 
 The close of the scene was melancholy enough. 
 Poor Lilly was found one morning at his own resi- 
 dence at the bed's foot on his knees by his family 
 quite dead. 
 
 The circumstances of Huth's own tragic end 
 are perhaps not generally known. One evening 
 in December, 1878, when the other members of 
 the family were from home, he appears to have sat 
 as usual in the little book-room out of the hall, and 
 in rising to have had a slight fit, as there was evi- 
 dence that, in trying to save himself, he bent the 
 fire-screen. He recovered, however, for the time, 
 and went up by the front-staircase to bed. On 
 the way he experienced a second and more violent 
 seizure, and fell backward, fracturing the skull ; and 
 the next morning the servants, not finding him in 
 the breakfast-room, discovered him on the stairs.
 
 292 THE HAZIJTTS 
 
 Life Iiad been long extinct, but there is the possi- 
 bihty that, had his wife and children not been in the 
 country, he miglit have been saved. All the Huths 
 of that generation, and two of Henry Huth's own 
 children, are no more. The founder of the house 
 during his last days was mentally affected. 
 
 I am more than afraid that the personage here 
 immediately concerned was not studied by his family 
 so assiduously or vigilantly as his nervous tempera- 
 ment and evidently growing proneness to vertigo 
 demanded at their hands — he, the individual to 
 whom the rest owed so much, and through whom 
 alone they are likely to be remembered. Some con- 
 siderable time before, I had paid him a visit on a 
 week-day evening, and found him dining alone. He 
 was at dessert, and offered me wine and grapes. I 
 merely mention on his account, not on my own, that 
 both were of a quality which I should not have liked 
 to set before him at my table. Where was his steward, 
 nay, his wife ? The latter amused me, in the course 
 of occasional meetings with her at table or otherwise, 
 by her air of vulgar or what Byron termed insolent 
 condescension, since her sole claim to notice w^as 
 her relationship to a distinguished man, whom she 
 neglected, and left to die miserably in solitude. Such 
 is the fact. 
 
 Some considerable interval elapsed between the 
 first broach of the ([uestion of a catalogue and the 
 decision of JNIr. Huth to have one prepared, and I 
 perfectly remember our conferences on many suc- 
 cessive Sundays in regard to details. The name of 
 Mr. Ellis was not at first mentioned to me as a 
 coadjutor in the work. He was fairly well quali- 
 fied to execute certain portions — far better than 
 myself — but altogether, as an editor of the whole, 
 which lie practically became, he was deplorably in- 
 competent, nor, althougli Mr. Huth himself was an
 
 LITERAKY ACQUAINTANCES 203 
 
 accomplished gentleman, had my excellent acquaint- 
 ance any bibliographical or miicli literary training.' 
 
 The consequence is that the volumes, which the 
 owner of the collection fondly hoped to render im- 
 maculate, are replete alike with grave and absurd 
 errors, and that, in spite of my strong representa- 
 tions, nmch valuable information was withheld. 
 Yet it was peculiarly a case in which expense was 
 immaterial, and it did not signify a straw whether 
 the work made five, or six, or ten volumes. 
 
 The catalogue does not contain all the Huth 
 books. He did not for some reason wish the 
 Chinese Bible, which some one sold to him in the 
 streets of Mexico,^ inserted ; and he always told 
 me that there was a copy of one of Southwell's 
 books, which he intended to restore to Stonyhurst 
 College, from which it was a stray, not desiring to 
 keep anything vmder such circumstances. I do not 
 know what was actually done. 
 
 His late successor in the possession of the books 
 projected a Supplement, including his own acquisi- 
 tions since his father's death. Of these I have very 
 slight knowledge. A Table of JEri^atd. might be a 
 desirable feature, and it would form an additional 
 volume. For instance, in one place the Ilomish 
 Breviary of 1518 is stated to have been printed at 
 the expense of the Count and Countess Frangepane 
 [Frangipani] while they were confined as prisoners 
 of war " in the gaol called Liora.sel ( Toircllo, near 
 Venice)''' ]5ut Dorasel was the Venetian form of 
 Torricella, the state-prison contiguous to the Ducal 
 Palace at \^enice itself. And here I must mention 
 that, owing to my perhaps too earnest stress on the 
 
 * The account of lilm in the hkt. Nat. Bioyrujilnj by liis son Alfred 
 is f;ir from satisfactory. 
 
 * He also on behalf of his firm visited South America as a yoinif^ 
 man, and depicted to me tlie sordid depravity of the poverty-stricken 
 popiilatiou, with which he came iu contact.
 
 294 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 unsatisfactory manner in which the hbrary was being 
 dealt with by EUis, w^hom I always took to be a Jew,* 
 and who undoubtedly created a prejudice against 
 nie in Mr. Huth's mind, my employer took offence, 
 imwisely, as I then judged, and yet do, and the 
 undertaking was virtually ruined, as my own copy 
 amply and sadly establishes. 
 
 Huth, as a commercial man, regarded the " knock- 
 out" in auctions as a moot question. He saw, what 
 many others cannot help seeing, the injustice of one, 
 or two, or more experts attending a public sale of 
 any kind, and virtually giving away the fruit of a 
 life-long study of some subject for the benefit of the 
 vendor's estate ; and it is to be noted that, while a 
 share of the feeling against the process is due to 
 tlie class of persons principally concerned in it, an 
 arrangement substantially similar is capable of being 
 made between two gentlemen or two purchasers of 
 acknowledged position, who may say to one another : 
 " I will leave such a lot to you, if you will leave such 
 another to me " ; or, " Do you buy lot 10, and what- 
 ever you give for it I will recoup you, instead of 
 bidding myself, and perhaps, by drawing attention, 
 making it dearer." The methods of varying the 
 " knock-out," in short, are numerous ; and it may 
 seem to many (I tiiink it did so to Huth) that the 
 chief objection is superficial, in two senses — an 
 objection to the idea of vulgar brokers reselling 
 goods in a vulgar pot-house parlour over their 
 lirjuor, and the objection which a judge or other 
 illiterate person might raise prima facie without 
 any practical conversance with the bearings of the 
 matter. It is related that at the Mason sale in 1798 
 the Duke of Roxburgh and Lord Althorp obtained 
 what they severally wanted at moderate prices by 
 one bidding for the two, and then tossing up after- 
 
 ' He was one of the eons of f^llis of the Star and Gaiter at Richmond.
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES 295 
 
 wiird. This was a type of " knock-out," omitting 
 some of the less genteel agrcmcns. 
 
 It was Huth who laid down very fairly, as I 
 thought, the principle on which men sliould be 
 estimated and accepted by society. This is a most 
 important point at the present time, when the 
 classes have become so mixed. He considered 
 that the cliaracter of the occupation ought to 
 govern the matter ; he remarked that he would 
 not recognise a lucifer-match-maker, a blacking- 
 maker, or a dealer in any other sordid or offensive 
 commodity, whatever his means or surroundings 
 might be.^ But this does not appear to me even 
 to touch the most material element. Something 
 depends, no doubt, on the employment ; but we 
 have also to look at what a man is, and there is 
 then the chronic difficulty that tlie acquaintance 
 must be personal, as the master of the house is 
 nearly always in these cases far superior to the rest. 
 It asks three generations to make a family, and too 
 often by that time the money has disappeared, and 
 the members are statu quo ante — not quite so well 
 off, because they have pretensions which they are 
 too poor to support. 
 
 Huth set aside Sunday afternoons for the visits 
 of his bibliographical acquaintance, and he would 
 make no exceptions to this rule, although I have 
 occasionally called on a week-day in the evening, 
 when I saw so much of him, and had a special 
 object. The late Lord Ashburnham expressed a 
 desire to see the library, but intimated some difficulty 
 or scruple about Sundays, and Huth told me that 
 there the matter rested. I never heard that his 
 lordship came. Huth could afford to be indepen- 
 dent, yet courtesy in his case less amounted to a 
 
 * He micht have declined to receive at dinner, as the Kaiser lately 
 did, a Yankee beef-magnate.
 
 29G THE IIAZLITTS 
 
 study than a fine natural instinct. It was not his 
 habit to refer to his more exalted or fashionable 
 ac(|uaintances. But he once mentioned to me that 
 he had asked the Due d'Aumale, a beau ideal of 
 a French gentleman, to accept the presidency of 
 some institution in which he was interested, and 
 when the duke seemed to hesitate, that he hoped 
 liis royal hifjhness was not offended. " On the 
 contrary," returned the duke, " I am flatt-ered," 
 laying stress on the last syllable. 
 
 On one of the very few occasions when T per- 
 mitted myself to call otherwise than on a Sunday, 
 riuth related that Furnivall had lately looked in, 
 but pleaded his inability to stay beyond the few 
 minutes required for some inquiry or communica- 
 tion, because his wife was waiting for him outside, 
 llutli very good-naturedly suggested that he should 
 bring her in, and "a very fine woman she seemed 
 to be," quoth my friend. This was by lamplight. 
 The lady was one of the two girls whom Furnivall 
 had brought up to see which he should prefer to 
 marry — tlie dark one. 
 
 Here I once or twice met Herbert Spencer. He 
 struck me as rather frail and languid. I do not 
 know that any very striking observation escaped 
 from him in my hearing. ]5ut I was impressed by 
 his statement of the breakdown of a trial which he 
 had given to vegetarianism, and the loss of brain- 
 power which lie had experienced from that sort of 
 diet. Furnivall found the same thing. He came 
 to one's house and dined, like a rabbit, on a cabbage 
 or a lettuce ; but he had to return to animal food. 
 
 Hei'bert Spencer stayed three or four years ago 
 at Dorking with (^rant Allen, while I was in tlie 
 same neigh i)ourhood ; and I heard that he was then 
 in very failing health and terribly nervous and 
 crotchety. 1 called with my friend Henry May
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES 297 
 
 Davis, but Spencer was from home, lie had con- 
 ceived an intolerance of remarks of a commonplace 
 and unfruitful character, and had brou<^ht with him 
 an apparatus which he could at pleasure slip over 
 his ears, and which spared him the pain of auricular 
 contact with less gifted mortals. Yet how vast a 
 profit some of our greatest writers have derived from 
 the comparative study of inferior minds ; and the 
 investigation of graduated intellectual force must 
 be very incomplete without a survey of every form 
 and measure of development. But I conclude that 
 Herbert Spencer adopted this precaution as a vale- 
 tudinarian in self-defence. He should have taken 
 ship for Laputa, where he might have been free from 
 intrusion. 
 
 Huth and I sometimes talked on clerical topics. 
 He used to say that he was not himself a church-goer, 
 but that he never interfered with the arrangements 
 of the house in this respect, leaving it open to his 
 children to follow their own inclinations. As so 
 often happens, whatever distinguished him above 
 other persons of great wealth was a life-tenancy ; 
 his qualities were personal and not transferable. 
 
 He spoke at lunch one day of having brought 
 under Thackeray's notice the old publisher, AVilliam 
 Thackeray, who printed much of the popular litera- 
 ture of the day, and of the novelist being thus made 
 aware for the first time that he had been forestalled 
 in the book way by a sort of namesake. In ftict, 
 there had been more than one. 
 
 When the Leigh Hunt IMemorial started, he 
 gave me £5 toward it, and it led to him remarking 
 that he once sent £20 to a son of the author, who 
 pleaded great distress. I felt bound to explain to 
 him that it was probably no such matter, and that 
 the applicant was a person who made use of his name 
 for begging purposes.
 
 298 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 He seldom spoke about money, unless it was to 
 ask the price of a book, and that was not often. 
 Even when he employed me to execute literary 
 work, he left the remuneration open. But I recollect 
 that, when I once spoke of some one who had £7000 
 a year, he quietly observed that it was a very good 
 income to have, yet a man could not do much 
 with it. 
 
 It was a pleasant little trait which Huth once 
 related to me of his sister, who had married a partner 
 in tlie house, and who lived on Wimbledon Common. 
 A very old friend arrived at the house on a visit, and 
 she was at hand to receive him personally in the hall, 
 and to take his bag, or whatever he carried, from 
 him — of course, to transfer it to a servant. But the 
 attention under the circumstances was what Huth's 
 own wife would have called very "sweet." 
 
 Huth himself was by tempej'ament rather cere- 
 monious and reserved ; I ascribed this to his Spanish 
 blood. At first, in his letters, I was Si?\ then Dear 
 iSi?\ Once I became 3Ijj Dear Sir ; but he repented 
 this gushing familiarity, and returned and adhered to 
 the middle form, 
 
 Huth mentioned to me once at table that the 
 firm kept a certain number of professional works in 
 JNloorgate Street, where their place of business was 
 at that time, for reference and consultation. " Ah ! " 
 I was tempted to say, " that is your Chitty library." 
 But my worthy acquaintance was joke-proof. Yet 
 he repeated to me with relish an incident when he 
 stood in the street to look at Punch for a moment, 
 and the proprietor, at once catching sight of him, 
 came forward, cap in hand, and said, " May I take 
 your cheque, my lord?" There was always, too, 
 about liim a simple frankness and pleasantry, as 
 wlien he informed me one day, that his wife had only 
 just allowed liim to have a silver teapot.
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES 299 
 
 He was more exempt than anyone I have met 
 from that narrow partiality for their own property, 
 whatever it may be, which distinguishes the majority 
 of amateurs. He was essentially a man of liberal 
 feeling in all questions ; but he offered a powerful 
 contrast to such pettifogging collectors as George 
 Daniel, who invariably pronounced his own copies of 
 books the ne plus ultra of excellence and value. 
 
 The prepossession in favour of personal appur- 
 tenances, no matter how unimportant they may be, 
 frequently co-exists, however, with the most amiable 
 qualities. 'J'he owner of a few defaced coins, some 
 odds and ends of china, a ragged regiment of non- 
 descript books, does not seek to enlarge his know- 
 ledge or to refine his taste, even if he has the 
 opportunity. You may tell him where the true 
 examples are to be seen, or you may possess them 
 yourself, and exhibit them to him. It is his mission 
 or cue to admire, not what is worthy of admiration, 
 but what is his. He has passed through life with 
 his eyes shut, and declines to open them to please 
 you or me. The brokers' shops have made his house 
 a shoot for the last half-century ; but he is perfectly 
 satisfied, and is impervious to argument. This is 
 the history of the lamentable assemblages of literary 
 and artistic effects which every season brings to 
 the hammer. The unsophisticated enthusiast is the 
 dealer's and auctioneer's godsend. My uncle Reynell 
 was one of those who never stumbled, save by a 
 miracle and unconsciously, on the right article. He 
 was very wroth with me for throwing a doubt on 
 some painted glass, which had been sold to him as 
 coming from the Lucys' house at Charlecote, and he 
 also suspected me of disparaging it to Furnivall, who 
 met me at his (R.'s) house to look at it, and (1 think) 
 shared my scepticism. 
 
 Huth and some of his friends projected about
 
 300 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 1808 a new literary paper, and promised me a place 
 upon the staff; but nothing came of it. Periodicals 
 experience the ailments of old age, like ourselves. 
 
 iSIacaulay pronounced criticism extinct in this 
 country long before he died ; but it would be desirable 
 to possess, at any rate, an organ free from bias and 
 animus, and capable of informing its readers Avhat the 
 books sent to it for notice really are. There is no 
 necessity, in general, to call into service the almost 
 painful culture of official pluralists ; all that seems to 
 be ordinarily required is a certain measure of educated 
 intelligence and a certain measure of equity. Of 
 course, we want something more than the flippant 
 school-usher and the strait-witted compositor, whose 
 eyes instinctively gravitate to accents and commas, 
 something higher tlian the KrratuviAiuwtev, and more 
 respectable than the party with the vendetta, whose 
 commission, or even whose friend's, to execute a 
 book you may have unluckily intercepted. These 
 prevailing types demonstrate the justice of JMacaulay's 
 remark, and explain Mr. Hutli's sense of a deficiency 
 in this direction — one w^hich Dickens in his published 
 correspondence with Macready and Austin, and ]Mrs. 
 l*rocter in hers with Mrs. .Jamieson, had long ago ex- 
 posed — Dickens in trenchant, bitter, even fierce terms. 
 
 I have betrayed my personal lack of interest in 
 the official notices of my own literary efforts. I have 
 also, I fear, been rather backward in replying to 
 challenges in the press. Once it happened that some 
 one in a newspaper desired to know my authority for 
 ascribing a particular tract to a particular writer, and 
 [luth recommended me to send a reply to the editor. 
 Eventually, when he found me indomitably apathetic 
 on the point, he very kindly set to work and wrote 
 a letter for me, or in my name, I forget which. He 
 was certainly most friendly, and when I borrowed a 
 valuable book now and then, and I suggested that
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES 301 
 
 it should be packed up, he, instead of call in f^ ;i servant, 
 did it himself, for, if there is a thing in which I succeed 
 worse tlian in writing, it is in making a parcel. 
 
 Huth was looking one day, when we were 
 together, at some volumes just newly bound by 
 ] Bedford in his favourite brown calf, and my good 
 acquaintance remarked that the artist (as he was) 
 made the colour too dark instead of leaving it to 
 mature spontaneously in tone. 
 
 Of the Hutli household 1 did not see much. 
 It was a case of a family represented by an unit. 
 Mrs. Henry Huth was, no doubt, an excellent lady, 
 but she manifested very slight interest in her hus- 
 band's tastes as a collector. To the elder daughter 
 Augusta I was indebted for a saying : " It is hard 
 to get on ; it is harder to get on-er ; it is hardest to 
 get on-est." She wrote a minute hand, and signed 
 herself A. Uufh; and she said that letters came to 
 her addressed: A. Huth, Esq. AVliile I was busy 
 with her father's catalogue about 1876, she came into 
 the room with a girl-friend, and asked me to help her 
 to find a Book of Hours. I did so ; and she opened 
 it at the place where there was a picture of David 
 and l^athsheba. I feigned unconsciousness of the 
 contretemps, and they did likewise. I have a fancy 
 that in opening their leaves these books have some 
 way of perversely gravitating just to that episode. 
 
 I surprised Collas of Jersey by saying that 
 although I had seen the finest libraries in the 
 country, and they had served me passing well in a 
 bibliographical sense, my private inclination as a 
 book-lover was in favour of the humbler gathering 
 wliich a man makes from choice of the authors or 
 volumes for which he has a genuine personal affection. 
 I like the old-fashioned book-closet, as I do the 
 china-closet. There are two classes of literatiu'e to 
 wliich one may be partial : one, whicli it seems
 
 302 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 sufficient to borrow at need, and another, wliich 
 cannot be spared, lest we should desire to turn to 
 a passage or to peruse once more a favourite poem 
 or paper. There is a want of intimacy between the 
 book and its owner in your great library. He is the 
 caretaker ratlier than the master — the mere normal 
 liolder by the riglit of purchase of certain objects 
 which we associate, not with him, but with tliose 
 by whom they were written, for whom they were 
 bound, to whom they were presented. He is no 
 more than first cousin to the professional vendor. 
 This was less true of Henry Huth, however, I 
 sincerely think, than of many others with even more 
 limited collections. It was less true of his treasures 
 of this class than of his brother's at Possingworth in 
 other departments. 
 
 Of Frederic Huth the picture-collector I heard 
 and knew very little, except that his daughter 
 Octavia married her cousin Alfred, who consequently 
 became a collector of a small library of works on 
 the marriaire of near kin, and that one of his sons 
 signalized himself as a numismatist. Mr. Frederic 
 Huth did not apparently derive from his hobby 
 much real enjoyment, as he probably bought under 
 advice, and he would represent that he felt the 
 responsibility of looking after his artistic treasures and 
 dreaded the periodical calls for loans to exhibitions. 
 
 Alfred Henry Huth, my friend's son, exhibited 
 a welcome generosity by his gift to the British 
 Museum ; but otherwise he was generally disliked — 
 at all events by his bibliographical associates. He ex- 
 pressed by letter a solicitude to continue the acquaint- 
 ance which I had so long enjoyed with his excellent 
 father ; but I left the communication unanswered. 
 His wife, a pleasant person enough, told me that she 
 had been educated at one of the old-fashioned ladies' 
 schools at Putney near the top of the High Street.
 
 XX 
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES AND A FEW 
 FRIENDS (continued) 
 
 Three members of tlie Tyssen family were distin- 
 guished early in the last century in different ways. 
 One brother was a book-collector, a second a numis- 
 matist, a third a sportsman. At dinner one evening, 
 when the three were together, and a friend, an 
 Admiral R.N., made the fourth, the enthusiast for 
 coins threw on the table a rare early English silver 
 penny. " There ! " cried he. " Congratulate me. I 
 gave twenty guineas for it." Of course they did. 
 When he left the room, the sportsman remarked, 
 '* What a fool ! Why, he might have got a couple of 
 pointers with the money ! " " Ah ! " chimed in the 
 sailor ; " or, better still, the model of a ship." The 
 bibliophile was generous enough to say nothing. 
 This I had from the son of one of those present. 
 
 Concurrently with my knowledge of Mr. Huth, I 
 formed the acquaintance of the late INIr. Frederic 
 William Cosens, the wine-shipper, a self-raised and 
 self-educated man, but a person of the kindest and 
 most amiable character, and of tastes which did him 
 infinite honour. He laboured under many draw- 
 backs. He told me that he was thrown on the world 
 to make his living at fifteen ; he had worked hard at 
 his business during the best years of his life ; and 
 when he sought me, he was only just beginning to 
 relax his attendance on his commercial duties. His 
 relationship with Spain as a wine-importer had 
 
 303
 
 304, THE HAZIJTTS 
 
 iintiirally led him to contract an interest in the 
 Hterature of that country, and the circle into which 
 he was drawn at home lent him an inducement to 
 extend his range as a collector to our own early 
 literature, especially Shakespereana and poetical 
 manuscripts. He was one of the most munificent 
 contributors to the Stratford-on-Avon Fund ; and 
 he was of the Forty whom I have commemorated in 
 an antecedent section. Huth, as a Spanish scholar, 
 thought rather poorly, I must own, of Cosens's efforts 
 as a translator from Lope de A^ega of certain novels 
 cognate in their subject to Shakespear. 
 
 I was once at a bookseller's while the present 
 Earl of Crawford was looking at the first book printed 
 at Xew York — the Laws and Acts of the State, 
 which issued from the parent-press of William Brad- 
 ford in 1693-94, bearing, of course, the same relation 
 to American literature and bibliography as a Caxton 
 does to our own. Vet, incredible as it may appear, 
 his lordship put the precious volume down, with 
 the remark that it did not interest him, not Jiavhig 
 been printed in America. At the foot of the title- 
 page he might have read: '^ At Neiv Vo?^k, Printed 
 (Did Hold by William, Bradford, Piinter to Tlieir 
 Majentics, King IFillia/n, and Queen Mary, 1094." 
 It was the copy which had belonged to I^ord Chan- 
 cellor Somers. JNlr. Charlemagne Tower knew 
 better, and the book is at present, by his bequest, in 
 the library of the Pennsylvania Historical Society. 
 From having been since I^ord Somers's day in the 
 centre of a volume of tracts, it is in the most 
 beautiful condition imaginable. 
 
 It rather surprised me, I confess, when the late 
 Mr. Evelyn Philip Shirley, who was greatly interested 
 in all matters lelating to early Irish history, said to 
 me that he did not include tracts in his collection, as 
 it is to that class of record, transmitting to us, as they
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES 305 
 
 do, the impressions of contemporaries, .and preserving 
 facts not to be found in larger works, that we owe so 
 much information which would have been otherwise 
 lost. Foxe, in his Book of Martyrs, especially in the 
 first edition, has inserted the texts of a large number 
 of pamphlets, sometimes ipmsimis verbis, but more 
 usually in substance, and in certain cases we are 
 unable, perhaps, to detect his obligations from the 
 disappearance of the originals. Stow did much the 
 same, I think, in his Chronicle. 
 
 I hold a number of letters on literary or biblio- 
 graphical topics from David Laing, who was not 
 only an interesting man as a link between the Scot- 
 land of Sir Walter Scott and the Scotland which 
 we know, but was quite an Aristarchus in his way, 
 occupying a position, as I have always contended, 
 never attained by any literary person on this side of 
 Tweed. Laing was, in a certain sense, ambidexter. 
 He was equally at home in the old Scotish writers 
 and in the more modern. While he personally knew, 
 and cordially appreciated, the author of Waverley, 
 he vindicated from oblivion and neglect the writings 
 of Knox and of the early makars. But I suspect 
 that with us Southrons his sympathy was less 
 profound. 
 
 The only occasion on which I had the honour 
 of shaking him by the hand was in the Museum 
 Reading Room. We met by appointment, and I 
 shall never forget the veteran antiquary's change of 
 countenance and accent when I suggested that he 
 should dine with me at Kensington on the next 
 ensuing Sabbath. He might have been the disciple 
 of Knox, as well as his editor. He was of the unco' 
 guid and godly. I heard from him, however, almost 
 down to the last, and often forwarded information 
 to him about books beyond his reach, bearing on 
 some undertaking on which he was engaged. He 
 
 u
 
 306 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 was the very opposite to a bookmaker. Except 
 Henry Bradshaw, no one of my time ever chewed 
 the cud over an author or a subject as Laing did. 
 His edition of AViUiam Dunbar, wliich had been 
 commenced in 1820, was not pubUshed till 1834, 
 nor did the Supplement appear till 1865, because he 
 had been hoping to recover certain pieces or facts, 
 whicli, after all, he never did ; and his edition of 
 Robert Henryson, although he was collecting the 
 material for it pari passu with Dunbar, did not see 
 the light till the Supplement to the latter poet just 
 mentioned came out. It was in hand between thirty 
 and forty years. 
 
 He used to explain how this arose. He did not 
 derive any pecuniary advantage from these publica- 
 tions ; his personal means were limited. He had 
 manifold occupations, and the printing process had 
 to await a convenient opportunity. He was a pure 
 littcratciir and a fine old fellow, to boot. I have 
 known him travel miles at his own expense to verify 
 some trivial point in person, instead of acquiring the 
 information at second-hand. 
 
 When I was in Edinburgh about 1855, Sir Walter 
 Scott's *' dear George " was dead ; but his son, T. G. 
 Stevenson, kept a bookshop in Princes Street in a 
 sort of cellar, to which you descended by a few steps. 
 His near neighbour William l^xterson and he had 
 an odd way of putting visitors, to whom they gave 
 their confidence, on their guard one against the 
 other. Paterson spoke of his neighbour as Black 
 Tarn, and Stevenson referred to Paterson as Stveet 
 jni/iajn. 
 
 Sir Walter's inkstand, which he used in his office 
 at Edinburgh while lie discharged the duties of 
 Sheriff-deputy, came to lu's assistant or closet-keeper, 
 Mr. Carmichael, wliose daughter Charlotte inherited 
 it, and used to shew it as a curiosity. 'J'his accom-
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES 307 
 
 plished lady married Henry Stopes. Messrs. Rallan- 
 tyne and Co. have at their London house the desk 
 upon whicli Scott corrected his proofs in his private 
 room at their office. 
 
 Mr. WilHam Henry IVIiller, the founder of the 
 Britwell Library, was an attorney at Edinburgh, and 
 made his fortune by farming the City sewage, or, 
 at all events, by a share in the enterprise. When 
 Measure or Inchrule Miller, as he was called, from his 
 habit of carrying about an inch-rule to test the 
 relative tallness of copies, began to collect, I do not 
 quite know ; but he was a buyer at the White Knights 
 sale in 1819. An odd story was once afloat that 
 Miller was really a woman ; but how that may have 
 been, I cannot say. He had no family, at any rate, 
 and died without issue in or about 1849, leaving 
 sisters, but bequeathing his property, including the 
 library, to his cousin Miss JNIarsh, as I am credibly 
 informed, who left it to a Mr. Samuel Christy, of the 
 firm of hatters in Piccadilly, to whom he or she (as 
 it seems to me rather unaccountably) had taken a 
 liking. This fortunate but extremely ordinary in- 
 dividual took the name of Miller, and altered his 
 original name into Christie. He came into a pretty 
 good thing for a hatter, as Riviere the bookbinder 
 used to remark to me. He had the house at Craigen- 
 tinny, near Edinburgh ; a second at Britwell, near 
 Maidenhead ; and a town house in St. James's Place 
 — the same which had once belonged to Samuel 
 Rogers. Christie-Miller was very proud of his pos- 
 sessions, of which he spoke as if they had been in his 
 family since the Conquest, and laughably distrustful 
 of any and every one. Bradshaw once went to 
 Britwell to see some of the books, and little Miller 
 watched him, as a cat watches a mouse. His own 
 vulgar instincts led him to suspect even a man above 
 suspicion.
 
 308 THE HAZLTTTS 
 
 I met S. Christie-Miller one morning near the 
 Haymarkct, and he sought my opinion on the best 
 way of printing his catalogue, which yet remains in 
 MS. He conceived that it would be an adroit 
 course to issue it in classified sections, that he might 
 be thus enabled to present to anyone only the 
 part in which he (the recipient) might feel an 
 interest. 
 
 He remarked to me one day that he did not quite 
 understand the value and interest of these old books, 
 and he particularly resented the incorrectness of the 
 orthography, which was a farther betrayal of his 
 extraction. On another occasion he objected to add 
 to his collection a volume, which was intended as a 
 completion of S/jdnej/s Arcadia, and was accordingly 
 called the Second and Last Part, because, said he, 
 he must have both parts, as if one were offered the 
 Last of the Moliicans, and insisted on having the 
 First of the Mohicans, too. This poor fellow was 
 almost absolutely illiterate. 
 
 He more than once rather contemptuously referred 
 to the Huth books, saying that it was impossible for 
 the owner to have secured more than a few here 
 and there of the rarer early English works in poetry 
 and romance ; and, of course, had it not been for 
 the Daniel and Corser sales, Huth would have 
 never succeeded in obtaining much, although his 
 large resources and the incessant vigilance of Lilly 
 and other caterers for him did a great deal. It was 
 rather absurd, however, for a jmrvenit like the hatter 
 to pose as a man of tlie old school, seeing that the 
 library came to him ready-made and by a fluke, and 
 that his knowledge of it was infinitesimal. It may 
 be added that the Britwcll Library itself is what we 
 see it mainly througli the acquisition by the founder 
 at tlie Ileber sale of the rarest early English books 
 at relatively nominal amounts. The wholly unlocked
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES 309 
 
 for rise in value has conferred on the collection its 
 importance and rank. 
 
 Frederic Locker-Lampson, who was at the out- 
 set a precis-writer at the Board of Trade, always 
 struck me as a bizarre figure. He posed as a friend 
 to men of letters, and subscribed, I believe, to the 
 Literary Fund ; yet he held up his head as if his sole 
 status had been his ancient descent and his territorial 
 importance, whereas in reality his main title to notice 
 was what he did in vers de socicte — a few very clever 
 and pretty things, but assuredly no poetry. Like 
 Tennyson, he was destitute of humour ; but of course 
 he lacked Tennyson's power. Locker-Lampson was 
 comparing his position with that of Huth one day in 
 conversation with me, and pleading on his own behalf 
 that he had at any rate done something — meaning 
 the London Lyrics. But Huth was a man of 
 altogether superior calibre and morale. The other 
 was a virtuoso, and a little of the petit maitre. He 
 was one of the spoiled children of fortune. His 
 metrical trifles shewed you, if you did not know 
 him, that he had a taste for culture and a handsome 
 balance at his banker's. Canon Greenwell very 
 judiciously observed to me that culture might make 
 or mar ; the young men who affect it too frequently 
 carry the hobby to a point where it becomes dis- 
 tasteful or ridiculous. But Locker, as a man of 
 fortune, had no object to gain by enunciating extreme 
 opinions. He held the middle way. 
 
 It was one of the most grotesque sights possible 
 to see him, as I did one day, arrive in a liigli-pitched 
 chariot at Coutts's with some of his belongings. He 
 was perched up on a seat which placed him on a level 
 with the top of an omnibus or a hay-cart, and his 
 expression and air were ludicrously coxcombical. 
 But it was when I had occasion to call at his 
 residence one evening, and he was in full dress, that
 
 310 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 I was most amused. I had met him in town just 
 before in a stupendous fur-coat, in which he miglit 
 have passed for a man of fifteen stone ; and in his 
 swallow-tails, with his attenuated frame and his 
 wizen face, you felt as if you could lift him with 
 one liand. 
 
 He distinguished me by sending me a volume 
 called Patc/nvo7'k, published in 1879 ; but he did not 
 mention that it was on the exact lines of one edited 
 by myself a few years before. He might be sup- 
 posed not to be aware of it ; we moved in such 
 dilFerent circles. 
 
 Locker also gave me a copy of his London 
 Lt/rics, with a request that I would send him my 
 written opinion of it. I did so with a certain diffi- 
 culty, as in a budget of vcts de socictc\ not of the 
 highest class, one scarcely knew what to say. I 
 have not looked into the book for years ; it left on 
 my mind an agreeable impression of a few neatly- 
 turned and graceful stanzas with the same fault 
 which the writer displayed as a collector — an absence 
 of breadth and strength. I remember that Locker 
 characteristically asked me to call for the little 
 volume at a wine-shop in Piccadilly, in which he 
 then had an interest. In the Confessions of a 
 Collector, 181)7, I take occasion to refer to presenta- 
 tion copies and to the neglect of ordinary persons 
 to do even so much as to acknowledge the receipt 
 of them. On the contrary one perceives almost with 
 emotion how sedulous l)ickens, amid all his vast 
 and multifarious employments, ever was to write to 
 announce with thanks and some words of pleasant 
 welcome the arrival of the most unimportant gift of 
 tliis kind. 
 
 Locker in his parsimonious ways resembled his 
 relative by marriage, the late l*oet Jjaureate. I met 
 liim in the Strand shortly after his accession to the
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES 311 
 
 Lampson property through his second wife, and 
 congratulated him. He looked rather grave, and 
 said, " Ah, yes ; but it is terrible to think of the 
 expense 1 have to incur for repairs" — precisely 
 what Halliwell-Phillipps had remarked under similar 
 circumstances. I once sent him on my side a copy 
 of a small book which I had printed for presents, 
 and I was honoured by a note of thanks, written on 
 her husband's behalf by the second Mrs. Locker in 
 a hand suggestive of a not very high-class housemaid. 
 
 It always seemed to me that Locker assumed a 
 false attitude. His claim to consideration was not 
 that he enjoyed so many thousands a year jure 
 ^Lxoi'isy but (as he owned himself) that he was the 
 author of a creditable little book of verses, a lover 
 of old literature, and the possessor of a certain 
 feeling for art. A man of fortune who is also a 
 man of letters is apt to be persuaded by his friends 
 that he is a man of genius. Locker was a second- 
 rate versifier of the Dobson and Calverley school. 
 
 He was very manneristic in the way in which he 
 approached you as an applicant for information on 
 literary or bibliographical matters. He assumed an 
 air of bland and almost infantile simplicity, and was 
 apt to draw you out, unless you were on your guard. 
 He once asked me, when I was at his house, to 
 write a note on a flyleaf of a very rare edition of 
 Hey wood's Epigrams, 1550, which he had bought 
 of John Pearson, calculating that some day my 
 attestation as to the book might make it fetch a few 
 pounds more. 
 
 He was a very poor and injudicious buyer. He 
 selected, it is true, for the reputation rather than for 
 the mere rarity, and was so ftir wise. But he had a 
 fiddling, undecided way of setting about his acquisi- 
 tions, and the booksellers thought him mean. His 
 collection was formed without any particular method.
 
 312 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 and its importance lias been greatly overrated. Most 
 of his rarest books were miserable copies. The 
 libraiy has been sold. It seemed to me strange that 
 Andrew I.ang should have identified his name with 
 such pitiful twaddle as his verses on the Rowfant 
 books. 
 
 One day, at Chesham Place, Locker was speaking 
 of the habit of stealing books, apropos of something 
 1 had told him about a fellow who habitually 
 abstracted a volume whenever he went to Russell- 
 Smith's in Soho Square, and, like I^amb in writing 
 about Fauntleroy, he looked at his own hands, and 
 laughingly wondered whether, had he been put to 
 his shifts, he might not have done something of the 
 same sort. His daughter, who afterward married 
 Lionel Tennyson, was in tlie room. I comprehended 
 and liked Locker's deferential mention of his relative 
 the laureate. He spoke of him to you in an awe- 
 stricken undertone as M'mtcr Tennyson. He was a 
 kind of small shareholder in his reputation. 
 
 Infinitely diverse are the methods by which I 
 have accomplished the task, piecemeal, of drawing 
 togetlier authentic particulars of the early printed 
 literature of my country for the first time on a 
 systematic and comprehensive principle; how far I 
 have succeeded I shall leave others to discover and 
 decide, when my Bibliography in its consolidated 
 form sees the light. At the auction-rooms I have 
 seldom met with much inconvenience ; the leading 
 members of the book-trade have, as a rule, been 
 most helpful ; and the British Museum staff has 
 invariably done its best to promote my objects. But 
 among the minor dealers I have known what it is to 
 witness disappointment, when, instead of an expected 
 and desired customer, it was only a person in search of a 
 title, or some such matter, wjio had presented himself. 
 
 Locker had agreed, if I would come to Chesham
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES 313 
 
 Place, where he then resided, that he would let me 
 see a particular Elizabethan tract ; but when I went, 
 everyone was out, and the book was in charge of a 
 domestic, apparently a kitchenmaid, who apprised 
 me that I might look at it, but that I was on no 
 account to take it away, INIr. Locker said. I archly 
 feigned unawareness of this superfluous communica- 
 tion for the sake of the highly welcome addition 
 to my stores, yet thinking how differently Huth 
 would have behaved. The latter, in truth, possessed 
 qualities rarer and more valuable than the rarest 
 and most valuable book in his fine library. I did 
 not apprise Locker through his servant that his little 
 volume was reported missing from a public library, 
 where I had wished to take a note of it. The 
 Bodleian had been made poorer. 
 
 Altogether Locker was a man of the time, and 
 owed his position to the fact that he w^as a person 
 of means and a genuine amateur. His taste for 
 books he had perhaps inherited from his father, 
 Captain Locker, who seems to have been a sort of 
 collector, and whose eoo libris I have seen. This 
 was the Edward Locker who published the Naval 
 Gallery of Greenicich Hospital and other now not 
 very well recollected works. The Captain was a 
 particular friend and correspondent of Nelson, and 
 I saw at llowfant some years ago an assemblage of 
 letters from that great man. 
 
 Locker was accustomed to say of a certain book- 
 seller who had " done time," that when he met him 
 his eyes always mechanically gravitated to his hair. 
 He was assuredly not prepossessing in his physical 
 appearance, yet he seems to be entitled to rank 
 among modern lady-killers, and owed his fortune, 
 which so materially seconded his literary and social 
 advancement, as it had done in the case of IJisraeli, 
 to two successive marriages.
 
 3U THE HAZLITTS 
 
 1 have often smiled at the sort of common accord 
 with wliich the booksellers spoke of him as " Fred 
 Locker"; it was a piece of affectionate familiarity, 
 almost caiimradcrie, by which he might or might 
 not have been flattered. I cannot be sure whether 
 his rather artificial afFability or bonhomie was mis- 
 construed by some of those to whom he addressed 
 himself. He was withal a gentleman, however, and 
 his manners were even courtly, yet virile. He struck 
 one as a person accustomed to excellent society, as 
 of course he was. Some men are apt to be a little 
 too effeminate — too ladylike. There is the so-called 
 INIr. Le Gallienne, for example. A couple of girls 
 looking in at a photographer's window, one ex- 
 claimed, " Oh, there's Mr. Le Gallienne. Isn't he 
 pj'cttij?'' He might almost say with Ralph Roister 
 Doister: "I am sorry God made me so comely." 
 He was the son of one John Gallen of I^iverpool, 
 who has been described as an accountant, but who 
 originally came from Ireland, where he followed the 
 trade of a shipwright. 
 
 I^ocker's brother, who formerly edited the Graphic, 
 paid him full fraternal homage by the sympathetic 
 and obsequious way in which he deployed his eye- 
 glass. I do not know what other literary claims he 
 possessed. I once had a paper in the Graphic, and 
 getting no cheque as usual, I called. A. L. asked 
 me whether I had brought a stamp. I handed him 
 a penny, and thouglit him worthy of a place in any 
 new edition of Thackeray's Book of Snobs.
 
 XXI 
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES AND A FEW 
 FRIENDS {continued) 
 
 1 PAID a flying visit to Beaumanor Park, near 
 Loughborough, in 1860, to see the Herrick manu- 
 scripts, which it was necessary to collate for an 
 edition of the poet undertaken gratuitously by 
 me for the Library of Old Autliors. INlr. W. Perry- 
 Herrick, an indirect descendant of the poet, shewed 
 me the stables on this occasion, with some of the old- 
 fashioned carriages, which had belonged to members 
 of his family in the two last centuries ; and in the 
 house was the truckle-bed on which, according to his 
 account, llichard III. slept the night before Bos- 
 worth.^ You see at Leicester the little bridge over 
 the Soar which occupies the site, and may follow the 
 lines, of that which llichard crossed on horseback on 
 his way to the fatal field, and they shew you the very 
 spot where his foot struck against the side, and refer 
 to the old woman's propliccy. Evelyn speaks in 1C54< 
 of the King's tomb having been then desecrated. 
 
 J\Ir. Perry- Herrick more immediately owed his 
 large fortune to his connection with the Perrys of 
 Wolverhampton, two brothers, who had an interest 
 in the deep coal, and by very penurious habits 
 amassed, it is said, £2,000,000. I do not think that 
 much, if any, of the house built by the poet's uncle 
 remains. I was driven to the station down a narrow 
 lane in the dark in a dog-cart with a while horse, 
 
 ^ See Current Notes, May, IBJU. 
 
 315
 
 316 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 which was the sole visible object, and seemed to 
 know the way from habit. 
 
 It is a highly touching trait, which a writer in 
 the Quart crhj Review for 1810 preserves, of an old 
 woman, named Dorothy King, who lived, as her 
 parents had done, at Dean Prior, the poet Herrick's 
 residence and preferment in Devonshire. The 
 Reviewer states that he found, on a visit to the spot, 
 that JMrs. King used to repeat five of Herrick's 
 Xoble Numbers, including his Litany, which she 
 called her Prayers, and she had no idea that they 
 had ever been printed, or that the writer's name was 
 known outside her native village. She had learned 
 them, as a child, from her mother. It is curious that 
 on Prudence Baldwin there is an epitaph in the 
 Hesperides, yet she survived him. 
 
 INIany years ago I heard a boy in the street 
 singing Che?Ty Ripe} Of course, he had no idea 
 who wrote the verses, nor had he the whole poem. 
 He had caught it from some one else. If you had 
 stopped him and said that it was produced by a 
 clergyman in Devonshire, named Robert Herrick, two 
 hundred and odd years since, he would have grinned 
 from ear to ear and been as wise as before. I passed on. 
 There is a tradition that Herrick, on his super- 
 session at the time of the Commonwealth, repeated 
 to himself his "Farewell to Dean Uourn" as he 
 crossed tlie brook on his way to return to London. 
 
 But I tliink tliat the finest thing in all the 
 Ilesperidea is to be found among the Noble 
 Numbers : 
 
 'j'o kk]:p a true lent 
 
 1. Is this a Fast, to keep 
 
 Tlic Larder leane ? 
 
 And ckane 
 From fat of Vealcs, and SlieLj) ? 
 
 > l)i<l Ilcrrick borrow the idea from W. Turner's Klizabethun Ballad?
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES 317 
 
 2. Is it to quit the dish 
 
 Of Flesh, yet still 
 'lo fill 
 The platter hi<^h with Fish ? 
 
 3. Is it to fast an hourc, 
 
 Or rajr'd to <jjo, 
 
 C)r show 
 A down-cast look, and sowre ? 
 
 4. No : 'tis a Fast, to dole 
 
 Thy sheaf of wheat. 
 And meat 
 Unto the hungry Soule. 
 
 5. It is to fast from strife. 
 
 From old debate. 
 
 And hate ; 
 To circumcise thy life. 
 
 6. To show a heart grief-rent : 
 
 To sterve thy sin, 
 
 Not I3in ; 
 And that's to keep thy Lent. 
 
 R. S. Turner and E. H. Lawrence were, as col- 
 lectors, two men of the rarest taste and discrimina- 
 tion, and in their personal appearance two of the 
 most commonplace. Lawrence had the idiosyncrasy 
 of signing himself F.S.A. even on his cheques. Ihit 
 no one comprehended better the difference between 
 a fine article and a poor one than he did. He was, 
 I believe, a thoroughly kind-hearted fellow, and 
 from his vocation as a stockbroker must have 
 accumulated a handsome fortune. The only pur- 
 chase on his part I never understood was that of 
 a miscellaneous assemblage of Cypriot glass and 
 pottery. 
 
 While the Cypriot antiquities of Cesnola were 
 being packed at Rollin and Feuardent's in Great 
 Russell Street, preparatory to their transfer to the 
 American Government, which bought them entire 
 for £1G,000, several distinguished persons interested
 
 318 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 in art came to see them, among others Ruskin, who 
 made some sketches from these fine objects. He 
 went down on his knees to examine the details more 
 carefully, but many had been already packed up. 
 *' Ah," said he, " I wish I had known of this before. 
 T must go to America to see them when they are on 
 view." Did he ? The British Museum would have 
 gladly purchased a few ; but, as Cesnola observed, 
 they would have left him with the less valuable 
 bulk. 
 
 Turner's death was even more melancholy than 
 Huth's. He had long suffered from morbid de- 
 pression, and at last threw himself from the top 
 of the well-staircase of a hotel at Brighton. His 
 physical bearing was just as unprepossessing and 
 unaristocratic as Lawrence's ; but he had a more 
 polished manner, and spoke correctly. I am sure 
 that he was not a scholar ; but he knew a great deal 
 superficially about French and Italian books. 
 
 Among the sufferers from the acute agricultural 
 depression in East Anglia were the Freres of 
 Koydon Hall, Norfolk. In February, 1896, Mr. 
 John Tudor Frere, who had previously sold other 
 inherited effects, and had found it necessary to live 
 in the lodge attached to the Hall, parted with certain 
 of his books, which derived their chief interest from 
 including the collections of Sir John Fenn. The 
 library had been formed by Sheppard Frere, John 
 Frere, and John Hookham Frere, the last a man of 
 some literary and political repute in his day. The 
 prices realized were wholly in excess of the value. I 
 saw three or four members of the family in the 
 auction-room, and I understood that many lots were 
 bought in, and that tliere is a considerable body of 
 books behind unsold. A portion of the Paston 
 IjCttcrs (about two-fifths) fetched £400, and ought, 
 with tlie Tomline volumes elsewhere referred to, to
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES 319 
 
 find a home in the Ih-itish Museum, if they have not 
 done so. 
 
 Another of my bibhographical expeditions was to 
 Llanhydrock, near Bodmin, Cornwall, the seat of 
 the late Mr. Agar-Robartes, M.P., afterward Lord 
 Robartes. He had married the daughter of Mr. 
 Carew of Antony. Both Robartes and his wife 
 were very polite and attentive, and shewed me, or 
 allowed me to examine, the rare and curious books 
 in the Long Room there. The house was built by 
 John, Lord Roberts, first Earl of Radnor, Lord- 
 Lieutenant of Ireland in the time of Charles II., and 
 had his initials and the date of erection carved 
 on several parts of the premises. I once attended 
 the little church in the Park, and Robartes himself 
 read the lessons. There were several old horses 
 wandering about, their term of service expired ; for 
 their master never allowed one to be destroyed. 
 
 I was permitted to take what notes I pleased of 
 the old books in the I^ong Room, and I met with a 
 few singularly rare items. IMrs. Robartes was good 
 enough to look out personally for me some volumes 
 containing manuscript remarks by the first Earl 
 of Radnor, who died in 1G85. My examination of 
 the library was very cursory, as I was accompanied 
 by a friend who entertained no literary sympathies. 
 
 Robartes was a very benevolent man, and spent 
 a good deal in charity in the poorer quarters of 
 London, as well as in his native county. His only 
 son Charles, the present Lord Robartes, was a lad 
 when I was last in Cornwall ; he had been very 
 simply brought up, and it was said that he thought 
 much of being asked out to tea. There was a serious 
 fire at Llanhydrock in 1881 ; but I conclude that the 
 books escaped. 
 
 One of our common acquaintances at tliis time 
 (1875) was Mr. Thomas Quiller Couch of Bodmin,
 
 320 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 the eminent arclijuologist, whose father, Jonatlian 
 Couch of l*olpcrro, wrote the work on British Fishes. 
 The latter derived his information on ichthyology 
 from personal research, and was often to be seen 
 about the precincts of the fishing village, where he 
 lived and died, in primitive attire and barefoot, on 
 liis way to the shore and rocks or on his return. 
 He photographed the more remarkable objects 
 cauglit, while they yet preserved their natural 
 iridescence. Thomas Couch, who assisted me in 
 my edition of Brand's Popular Antiquities, 1870, 
 compiled a Glossary of JFords used in East Corn- 
 xvalU of which a copy, given me by him in 18G5, con- 
 tains large manuscript additions made by me in the 
 course of my Cornish sojourns. He long acted as 
 confidential adviser to Robartes in local matters. 
 
 The last time I was at Bodmin, I saw in the 
 Asylum poor Blight, the accomplished artist, and 
 author of A Week at the Land's End; he was 
 hopelessly hypochondriacal. 
 
 But one of the most noted characters in those 
 parts was Mr. William Hicks, whose powers as a 
 ?*at'07^/^?/?' of Cornish stories have probably never been 
 surpassed. His accurate and humorous rendering of 
 the provincial patois and mannerism was irresistible. 
 He was a perfect host in himself at any entertain- 
 ment. Hicks was intimate with Jackson the water- 
 colour painter, and received him at his house during 
 many years ; and .Jackson executed quite a series of 
 complimentary pictures for Hicks, who highly prized 
 them. After his death, they were unfortunately re- 
 moved to a damp house, and I understood that they 
 suffered serious detriment. 
 
 The literary circle here in my time also comprised 
 Sir John Maclean, author of a History of the Deanery 
 of Trif^fr Minor and other works, with whom I once 
 had an interesting interview on the Beacon ; William
 
 LITERARY ACQUAINTANCES ;32I 
 
 .In.go, a thoiiglitful and well-informed local antiquary ; 
 and Henry Sewell Stokes, the Cornish poet. INIy 
 daughter had written to I\Ir. Jago's, describing in 
 rather glowing colours an article of dress just 
 acquired; and her young correspondent replied, 
 " Your hat is a dreavi'' She was probaljly un- 
 acquainted with the fact that this expression is 
 common in French literature. But both were 
 juveniles. 
 
 When I met Stokes, he spoke of Tennyson 
 having been with him when he was formerly at 
 Truro, and of their conversation together about 
 the Arthur Poems. Stokes said that T. admitted 
 to him his obligations to the old metrical Morte 
 Arthur, and I went so far as to express my opinion 
 that, looking at the antiquity and priority of it, the 
 prototype was the finer production, and it is extra- 
 ordinary how modern it strikes one as being in com- 
 parison with much of the poetry belonging to the 
 same period. This is the common attribute of genius 
 — to make us lose sight of chronological boundaries. 
 It is so with Chaucer. It is so with Shakespear. I 
 would add, it is so largely with the author of Piers 
 Ploughman. The essence is of all time ; the outward 
 texture only is antique. 
 
 The County Asylum occupies a large plot of 
 ground formerly open and the site of the gallows. 
 The name Bodmin is identical with Bodnam or 
 Bodenham. ; the original town lay at some distance 
 in the valley. On the high ground above, three roads 
 run parallel with each other : tlie pack-horse road, 
 the old coach road, and the modern coach road. Just 
 about here tliere are some strange low - pitched 
 hovels, which they call British huts, and which are 
 not dissimilar from what are termed Pictish dwell- 
 ings in Scotland. Probably they were, when in use, 
 partly subterranean. INIr. Collins the solicitor, of 
 
 X
 
 322 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Bodmin, drove me to the spot, and enabled me to 
 examine them. I recollect that, on anotlier occasion, 
 I set out from Bodmin to walk to Brown Willy, 
 but had to relinquish the task, as in the first place 
 the ground was swampy, and in the second tlie 
 fartlier I proceeded the more distant Brown Willy 
 seemed to grow. 
 
 The pack-liorse tracks are of the greatest antiquity. 
 They just remind me of those over the mountains 
 in Cumberland, some distance from Broughton-in- 
 Furness. The keeper of the inn at Broughton, in 
 former days, used to see the packmen from a long 
 way off coming over the hills, and set to work to 
 brew his ale, which was ready against their arrival. 
 They eat the oat-cake in this country, as they do in 
 Nidderdale, instead of bread. 
 
 Newquay, when I was there in 1875, was still a 
 primitive place. There was no postman. A woman 
 brought round the letters, and allowed every one to 
 pick out his own. A man used to go round the 
 village in a cart, selling suet, and announced his 
 approach by playing the Blue Bells of Scotland on a 
 horn. 
 
 Mr. Aid rich of Iowa, who has been only one of 
 the gentlemen on the other side of the Atlantic to 
 honour me by their correspondence and personal 
 visits, formed the plan of establishing at Webster 
 City, where he lived, a public collection of auto- 
 graphs and manuscripts, and he had met with some 
 considerable success in inducing people, her Britannic 
 Majesty included, to contribute to his object. I 
 gave him some Hazlitt manuscript. 
 
 When he last called on me, he had not long since 
 visited .lefferson Davis and his wife, who were very 
 cheerful, with just enough to live upon from the 
 wreck of their fortune. 11 is attainder was never 
 reversed ; but he was left unmolested.
 
 XXII 
 
 APPRENTICESHIP TO BIBLIOGRAPHY. GRADUAL 
 ATTAINMExNT OF MY MAJORITY 
 
 It must have been about 1855 that a copy of the 
 new Loivndes fell in my way, and that I bought a 
 few books, which circumstances led me to submit 
 to public competition at Sotheby's. I realized at 
 a loss, and thought it high time to have done with 
 book-buying. I can hardly tell how it was, but I 
 began to look at my Loivndes with different eyes, 
 and to discern and note shortcomings in it. My 
 copy became a repository for marginalia and cut- 
 tings. It was as if Sotheby's had baited a hook with 
 that work, guessing that I must bite and be caught ; 
 and I was ! So I forgave Sotheby's, and stole back 
 to the old ground. A strange new awakening had 
 taken place. I was a bibliographer, with some of 
 the chrysalis still visible. Neither myself nor any- 
 one else at that juncture was aware that I should 
 carry the hobby farther than scores of others who 
 have done the same thing, left their mark on a few 
 fly-leaves, and there stopped — that I should carry it, 
 if I may so say, farther than any Englishman before 
 me. INIy eyes were soon turned on other publica- 
 tions treating of our old English authors, and I saw 
 how curiously they resembled the INIanual I had and 
 each other in the imperfect justice which they did to 
 the subject. 1 felt that I could do something better, 
 and I soon began to try. 
 
 I knew Sotheby's when there was a Sotheby, 
 
 323
 
 324 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 and was in the room when, in 1804, the tidings 
 came of his death by drowning while on an anghng 
 excursion. I retain his short, shght figure perfectly 
 in my mind. An episode during his tenure of autho- 
 rity reflected great credit on him. A consignment 
 of highly exceptionable books liad been made to the 
 firm for sale. INIr. Sotheby either saw them, or had 
 his attention drawn to them, and he ordered their 
 destruction, bidding the owner take what course 
 he chose. 
 
 Tiie last of the Sothebys, besides the works on 
 typographical antiquities and other matters witli 
 which his name is honourably connected, compiled 
 a bibliographical account of the Early English 
 Poets, so far as their publications came under the 
 notice of the firm in \\^ellington Street. The 
 manuscript was offered to the British JMuseum by 
 his widow, and Bond consulted me about the pur- 
 chase, from which I felt bound to dissuade him, as 
 it was an imperfect and jejune performance which 
 my own labours had gone very far to reduce to a 
 caput morUium. But it was bought, nevertheless, 
 I observe — perhaps at a much lower price than 
 that asked by Mrs. Sotheb}^ who thought the MS. 
 worth £250. 
 
 It was precisely when the sale of the grand 
 TIarleian library, of wliich the catalogue was drawn 
 up for Osborne by Dr. .Johnson, was impending, and 
 a larger sliare of public notice was attracted to these 
 matters, that Samuel Baker started in York Street, 
 Co vent Ciarden. 'i'he maiden sale was the collection 
 of books bclongingtoThomasl'ellet, ]Vl.D.,whichlasted 
 sixteen days, in 1744, and produced £8.59 odd. The 
 ivory liammer which had been used by Mr. George 
 Leigh during his Ijrief association with the firm as a 
 partner, liad belonged to Langford the auctioneer. 
 
 Of course very interesting days have been ex-
 
 ATTAINMENT OF MY MAJORITY 325 
 
 perienced where tlie financial result was not very 
 striking, as when, in 1701), the firm disposed of tlie 
 library of tlie Right Hon. Joseph Addison, " Author 
 and Secretary of State," for £533 4s. 4d. ; and in 
 1833 of that of "the Emperor Napoleon Buona- 
 parte " (sic), removed from St. Helena, for £450 9s. 
 (his tortoiseshell walking-stick bringing £38 17s.); 
 and, once more, when the drawings of T. Rowlandson 
 the caricaturist were sold in 1818 for £700. Rut 
 the portions of the stupendous Heber lii)rary dis- 
 persed here in 1834, owing to what Dibdin called 
 the bililiop/iobia, nearly ruined the auctioneers. 
 They rallied from the blow, however, and have 
 never suffered any relapse to bad times, whatever 
 account they may be pleased to give of the very 
 piping ones which they have known pretty well 
 ever since '45, when Mr. Benjamin Heywood Bright's 
 important library was entrusted to their care. 
 
 It was the second Sotheby — the Mister Sotheby 
 of or about 1816-30 — who impressed on the concern 
 his powerful and enduring individuality. He had 
 a long innings, and had excellent opportunities of 
 building up the structure which his son and suc- 
 cessor inherited. The latter was the link between 
 the old regime and the new. He lived to see many 
 modifications, and to contract an alliance with fresh 
 blood ; and he survives to-day in Wellington Street, 
 hard by AVaterloo Bridge, as certainly as Shakespear 
 does in Stratford-upon-Avon, and elsewhere, carry- 
 ing on his affairs by proxy, as it were. Others, for 
 the sake of convenience, act on his behalf; never- 
 theless, no one should deceive himself. Tlie place 
 is " Sotheby's " in 1912 just as it was in 1790. 
 
 Mr. Wilkinson, who had been the accountant, 
 and was made a partner in 1842, was the principal 
 seller in my earlier days. His appearance, as it was 
 impressed on my mind when I became an habitual
 
 326 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 frequenter of tlie rooms about 1858, was very agree- 
 able, and his manner highly prepossessing ; he was 
 then in the full vigour of life. Halliwell and he 
 were very intimate, and I have dined with him and 
 the author of the Gentle Life at Halliwell's table. 
 One not very unreasonable eccentricity on his part 
 was his tenacious resistance to the admission of 
 anyone else to a share in the conduct of the sales ; 
 he persisted in keeping his junior partner out so 
 long as he physically could. He liked to lord over 
 the whole concern to the very last. The spirit of 
 monarchy long remained rather powerful here. 
 
 AVilkinson had settled in Brompton in 1839, and 
 of course remembered, as we did, marvellous changes 
 in that suburb. He told me, as an illustration of the 
 ignorance of lawyers, that the very morning after 
 the conclusion of the David Laing sale, amounting to 
 many thousands, the solicitors called for a cheque, 
 and the firm handed them one for £10,000, pending 
 the contingency of returns. It was from Wilkinson 
 that I had the information that a gentleman residing 
 in his time in Onslow Square possessed a large col- 
 lection of papers on Old Brompton, but he did not 
 divulge his name. 
 
 I can just recall the Wolfreston sale in 1856. I 
 was not actually present, but I heard a good deal 
 about it soon afterward. It was a small collection 
 of early English books and tracts formed under the 
 Tudors and Stuarts ; the copies were often uncut, 
 and as often imperfect or dog's-eared. But there 
 were among them a few startling rarities — some not 
 even till then put on record by the learned in these 
 affairs. The owner would have gladly accepted 
 £30 for tlie lot, and the day's sale realized £750. 
 jMiss Wolfreston dined with me years after, and told 
 me how it was. The l^ooks had lain in a corner of the 
 library time out of mind unnoticed and unheeded,
 
 ATTAINMENT OF MY MAJORITY 327 
 
 and it was thought as well to get rid of them. They 
 should have marked the day with a white stone 
 when a friend (he ivas a friend) recommended them 
 to apply to AVellington Street. 
 
 Of the frequenters of these rooms, the names 
 which rise up to one's lips are those of persons 
 eminent in nearly every vocation and walk of life : 
 men of genius, of culture, of rank : the student, 
 the amateur, the spectator ! I have beheld with my 
 own eyes J. 13. Inglis, who had sold a magnificent 
 library in 182G, before I was born, and lived to 
 form a second ; George Daniel, David Laing, Henry 
 Bradshaw, Alexander Dyce, John Forster, J. O. 
 Halliwell, Sir Stirling ]Maxwell, Henry Stevens of 
 Vermont, Sir Thomas Phillipps of Middle Hill, 
 George Smith, Christie-Miller, 11. S. Turner, and 
 Samuel Addington. But Lord JNIelbourne, Tommy 
 Hill (Paul Pry), Lord jMacaulay, JM. Libri, Philip 
 Bliss, Bulkeley Bandinel, Lord Crawford, and a host 
 of others, have crossed this threshold. Henry Huth 
 looked in once or twice while the Daniel sale was 
 going on, and you brush elbows at this moment with 
 other notabilities of our own day. I recollect, as one 
 recollects trifles, standing at the side of Sir Thomas 
 Phillipps one day, and tlie book which he bought — 
 the lloxburghe Club edition of Drayton, 1856. I 
 once met a gentleman at these rooms, who casually 
 disclosed himself to me as a relative of the Right 
 Honourable Thomas Grenville ; we had an interest- 
 ing conversation when he found that my father had 
 personally known JNIr. Grenville, and the peculiar 
 grace and odour of his manner remain my property. 
 He was unlike anyone else who had fallen in my 
 way under such circumstances, although two other 
 names occur to me as having inspired to a certain 
 extent a similar sense of an arresting personality, 
 namely those of JNIr. Samuel Sandars and INIr.
 
 328 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 ISrCleiin of Tunbridt^e Wells, both benefactors to 
 the University of Cambridge. 
 
 There has always been a weird fascination, 
 there is a charm, which draws us all more or less 
 toward the spot where the game of chance (for 
 such it is) is being played, even if we do not enter 
 the lists, or let our own voices become audible. 
 Leigh Hunt used to be fond of telling me how he 
 had attended the Roxburghe sale in 1812, just as 
 a looker-on, out of a sort of speculative curiosity, 
 wliich it miglit ask a separate paper to define. The 
 tap of the hammer against the desk is often awaited 
 with considerable anxiety by those actually competing 
 for the lot before the room. 
 
 I had a singular adventure here in 1858. Among 
 a mass of rubbish a unique copy of the Earl of 
 Surrey's English Virgil was put up one day. Tlie 
 bidding for it stopped at £6 12s. Gd. At that sum 
 it was mine. But the hammer did not fall. The 
 auctioneer repeated the amount several times, and 
 kept his eye on tlie open door. The company did 
 not understand what this strange movement signified. 
 No one topped my offer. All at once, breathless, 
 rushed in Mr. Thorpe, agent for the library at 
 Uritwell, asked what lot was up, and what price 
 liad been reached. "£G 12s. Gd.," now said Mr. 
 Wilkinson, unmasking, and I lost my gem, which 
 Mr. Thorpe carried off' at £20. llow I disliked him I 
 
 An occasional visitor to the rooms was George 
 Daniel, of Canonbury, whose kid gloves I well 
 recollect. I sat next to him at a sale, and when 
 some ordinary bookseller's lot was knocked down in 
 his name, I innocently in(|uired if he had purchased 
 it. "No, sir," he urbanely replied; "if I were to 
 buy ;dl tltut Mr. Daniel does, I should have an 
 Alexandrian library." The authentic (i. D. was a 
 retired accountant, wliose bent consisted of ixircs
 
 ATTAINMENT OF MY MAJOUITV 320 
 
 inorrcaux, bonnes houclies, iinicjiies — copies of books 
 with a provenance^ or in jackets made for them by 
 lloger Payne ; nay, in the original parchment or 
 paper wrapper, or in a bit of real mutton, which 
 certain men call sheep. He was a person of literary 
 tastes, and had written books in his day. But his 
 chief celebrity was as an acquirer of those of others, 
 provided always that they were old enough or rare 
 enough. An item never passed into his possession 
 without at once ipso facto gaining new attributes, 
 almost invariably worded in a holograph memor- 
 andum of a not depreciatory tenor on the fiy-leaf. 
 
 Daniel was in the market at a fortunate and 
 peculiar juncture, just when prices were depressed, 
 about tlie time of the great Ileber sale. His 
 marvellous gleanings came to the hammer pre- 
 cisely when the quarto Shakespear, the black-letter 
 romance, the unique book of Elizabethan verse, had 
 grown worth ten times their weight in sovereigns. 
 Sir William Tite, J. O. Halliwell, and Henry Huth 
 were to the front. 
 
 It was in 1864. What a wonderful sight it was ! 
 No living man had ever witnessed the like. Copies 
 of Shakespear printed from the prompters' manu- 
 scripts and published at fourpencCj fetched £300 
 or £400. I remember Joseph Lilly, when he had 
 secured the famous ballads, which came from the 
 Tollemaches of Helmingham Hall, holding up 
 the folio volume in which they were contained in 
 triumph, as INIr. Huth happened to enter the room. 
 
 Daniel had a luxuriant estimate of his treasures ; 
 what he had was always better than what you had. 
 Books, prints, autographs, it was all the same. I 
 met him one morning in I^ong Acre. I had bouglit 
 a very fine copy of Taylor the AVater Poet. " Oh 
 yes, sir," he said, " I saw it ; but not quite so fine as 
 mine." He went up to Ilighgate to look through
 
 330 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 Charles INIathews the elder's engravings. They 
 were all duplicates — of course, inferior ones. " Damn 
 him, sir ! " cried JNIathews afterward to a friend ; " I 
 should like him to have had a duplicate of my poor 
 leg." This was the commercial bias of the ex- 
 accountant. INIathews, by the way, belonged to a 
 singular club at Plymouth, called the Blue Friars, 
 and his nom de guerre there was Prisrn^ which he 
 subscribes to the oath or declaration on entrance. 
 The members attired themselves in blue serge 
 cassocks and ate off wooden platters. 
 
 Another thing which I had direct from Daniel 
 was the occasional habit which Charles I^amb had 
 of paying him a visit, and looking at his old books — 
 looking at them, not touching. " For," said Daniel 
 to me, " you know, sir, I could not have allowed 
 that. AA'^hy, Mr. Lamb would turn over the leaves 
 of a volume with his wet finger " — and the narrator 
 represented the operation in the street, so far as 
 he could without a book and with gloved hands — 
 " and I always kept a particular copy of old ballads 
 for him." 
 
 W^hile DanieFs books were on view at the 
 auction-room, in 1864, one of his family came for 
 the purpose of seeing them, as it appeared that he 
 never shewed his treasures to his children. From 
 the account which a descendant gave me, I judge 
 that the handsome result of the sale did not prove 
 of much benefit to those interested. 
 
 Daniel was a virtuoso rather than a connoisseur. 
 He studied the commercial barometer, and knew 
 tlie riglit things to buy. Still, as the money ex- 
 pended would have realized at compound interest 
 more than even the extravagant prices paid for his 
 bibliographical rarities in 18G4, and as he could not 
 have forecast tlie issue, some credit is due to him 
 for liaving preferred to invest his savings as he did
 
 ATTAINMENT OF MY MAJORITY 381 
 
 in early Eni^lish books, lie purchased in later life 
 very sparingly, and so far did not obey the ordinary 
 instincts of the collector, whose zest is derived from 
 acquiring, not from possessing. He is apt to con- 
 template the treasures which he has secured with the 
 sated feeling of the author toward the printed trans- 
 fers from his own mind. 
 
 A noted and conspicuous character in the rooms 
 during many years, whenever any remarkable objects 
 were to be submitted to competition, was Mr. Samuel 
 Addington, of St. JMartin's Lane. A tall, imposing 
 figure, with an inclination at the last to stoop some- 
 what, Addington deserves to be regarded in one or 
 two respects as the most extraordinary person who 
 frequented Sotheby's in my earlier recollection. He 
 was, like R. S. Turner and Edwin Lawrence, 
 illiterate, but also, like them, a man of the keenest 
 and truest instinct for what was worth having. His 
 collection of Prints, Miniatures, Books, JManuscripts, 
 Coins, were a-iJer-se. I once had occasion to solicit 
 for Grosart the loan of the miniature of Dr. Donne 
 by Oliver, and Addington shewed me some of his 
 gems, and gems they were. His knowledge of them 
 was mainly per catalogue. When he upset a tray 
 of coins, some one had to go and set it in order again. 
 It was his instinct which was so surprising. His 
 liandwriting was rather worse, I think, than mine, 
 and was wanting in character. 
 
 1 frequently met him (he generally walked with 
 his head slightly inclined and his hands crossed be- 
 hind his back), and have more than once seen him 
 arming JNIrs. Noseda the printseller to the Royal 
 Academy. She was the only person on whose judg- 
 ment in her particular line he relied. But Adding- 
 ton also saw a good deal of Wareham the dealer in 
 antiquities, and, it is said, helped him. 
 
 He bought in his time almost everything, and of
 
 .332 THE riAZLITTS 
 
 the finest iind choicest, for the cost did not signify. 
 He lived over his shop in the Lane, and was a 
 haclielor with some -£15,000 a year. 1 think that he 
 dined nearer the Elizabethan hour than most of us 
 do ; and when there was something to attract him to 
 W^ellington Street, it was his not unfrequent habit 
 to arrive there on the stroke of 1 p.:m., his frugal 
 dessert — an orange — in his hand. If you were on 
 the scent after a prize in the rooms, and Addington. 
 had fixed his mind upon the same lot, you were as 
 one whose chance had gone. 
 
 He was perhaps the first who set the precedent of 
 giving prices for articles totally beyond record and 
 example. It was his cue, and it is, so to speak, his 
 epitaph, Addington, as a collector, followed some- 
 what parallel lines to Quaritch as a man of business 
 — lie declined to be beaten. As some of us are said 
 to be makers of history, Addington was, and the 
 autocrat of the auction-room still is, a maker of 
 market values and prices current. I hardly believe 
 that his knowledge of books and other curiosities 
 was in any way great. He watched the biddings 
 carefully, ignored all lots which fell at humble prices, 
 but began to prick up his ears when £10 or £20 had 
 been reached. His entrance into the fray was 
 ordinarily prefigured by the relegation of his glasses 
 to the top of his head. 
 
 Let me consecrate a few lines to a widely different 
 individual- who haunted this purlieu in my youth, 
 Adams the Sixpenny Solicitor. He was a tall, 
 poorly-clad man who wore an appalhngly bad hat. 
 He used to sit at the table too, but as far as he could 
 from everybody else. He might harbour a conscious- 
 ness that he was not too welcome ; and sixpence was 
 his Alpha and his Omega. Ay, and you would 
 liavc been surprised at tlie lots which fell to him. 
 He was one of the surest customers of tlie firm, for
 
 ATTAINMENT OF MY MAJORITY 33.3 
 
 he invariably paid casli, wliicli is a strono-ly-markcd 
 exception to the general rule. At last 1 lost sight of 
 him. Of his humble profits nmch, I fear, went in 
 the purchase of liquor, probably on a par in quality 
 with his habiliments and his hat. 
 
 Among the booksellers who have assembled here, 
 I may enumerate Joseph Lilly, the Boones, Bernard 
 Quaritch, F. S. Ellis, the two JNIolini, the younger 
 Pickering, James Toovey (of the Temple of Leailier 
 and Literature, Piccadilly), George Willis, Edward 
 Stibbs, the two AVallers, the llussell-Smiths, the 
 AValfords, AV^illiam Reeves, George Bumstead, and 
 the Rimells. I once fell in with Robert Triphook, 
 and conversed with him ; but he had retired before 
 my time. The elder Boone had a curious way of 
 bidding ; he sat just under the auctioneer, and would 
 tap the heel of JNIr. AVilkinson's boot with his pencil. 
 Bumstead, who executed commissions for George 
 Smith and Sir Stirling JNIaxwell, usually stood by 
 the side of the rostrum, and, laying his hand on his 
 right cheek, made his thumb turn as on a hinge, 
 each movement signifying an advance. A third was 
 supposed to remain in the field so long as he kept 
 his eye on the seller, or continued to strike his 
 catalogue with his pencil. 
 
 These and other comedians were the employers 
 of a secret language. Is it necessary to say that 
 they all conceived themselves unobserved? But, 
 again, there was the opposite extreme — the sten- 
 torian throat, generally of some provincial or Conti- 
 nental tyro, which made the room vibrate, and 
 everybody present look round ; and an occasional 
 episode, a generation or so ago, was the echoing 
 shout with which Tom Arthur, if he had indulged 
 rather too freely at his mid-day repast before the 
 sale, bad at random for whatever was on the 
 table.
 
 334 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 One sicfnal difference between the auction-room, 
 as it now exists, and as I was familiar with it in my 
 younger days, lies in the almost ruined hopes of the 
 Hundle-hunter. There was a time when this peculiar 
 pursuit was attended by lucrative results, and partook 
 of that adventurous complexion so dear to the trader, 
 the dream of whose life it is to become rich soon and 
 retire early. Weird tales used to be related of fabu- 
 lous bargains acquired by keen and persistent study 
 of the Bundle. Those are living who remember what 
 it was to discover in the heart of one some gem beyond 
 price, some reputed introuvable. The very interior 
 was a terra incognita, a Pandora's box, a possible 
 Eldorado. A relic of the days of the earlier Tudors 
 or a AVynkyn de Worde, a lost Elizabethan fragment 
 or some piece by Taylor the Water Poet, which the 
 world had long despaired of ever beholding, can it 
 be that such, and many more like these — nay, better 
 — were once not seldom the portions of the wary 
 and diligent harvestman ? Ay, verily ; and not very 
 different was it of old with the composite volume — 
 the heterogeneous assemblage of pieces united by 
 unforeseeing owners or indiscreet bibliopegists (bless 
 them both !) in unlioly wedlock ; nor with the folio 
 volume, lettered outside perchance, " Old News- 
 papers," and the resting-place of black-letter ballads 
 threescore and upward, which, a beneficent spirit 
 casting a spell on all save one alone, no other eye 
 discerned. 
 
 Yet now and again the labours of the seeker are 
 still rewarded. Stories have been rife within reason- 
 able years of literary sugar-plums disinterred by the 
 vigilant and sagacious explorer from unpromising, 
 nay, repellent, upper stratifications of ragged, dust- 
 ingrained, penny-box ware. Mark you, the success- 
 ful expert of the present era has all his work before 
 him. He has to be wary to excess. He has to
 
 ATTAINMENT OF MY MAJORITY 335 
 
 snatch the riglit moment for investigating the con- 
 tents of these " parcels," as the plirase is. He must 
 assure himself that no enemy is in ambush. A quick 
 eye, a deft hand, and an impassible demeanour are 
 essential. Let him not be too sanguine till the 
 liammer is down, and the prize is his ; for instances 
 are cited by the knowing in these by-paths of re- 
 search w^iere the hidden quarry has been secretly 
 noted by more than a single hunter — by a second 
 Argus — and then, w^hile others have beaten the bush, 
 the auctioneer it is who catches the hare ; for, how- 
 ever sorrowful it may be to relate it, the baffled game 
 operates exactly in a contrary direction, and the 
 article, instead of dropping for a song, realizes in the 
 heat of exasperated competition a figure which makes 
 the occupant of the rostrum lick his lips, as it is not 
 etiquette for him to betray emotion in a more 
 obstreperous way. 
 
 But the prevailing experience at present is cer- 
 tainly in the direction opposite to that which the 
 nugget -digger desiderates. The auctioneer's staff, 
 doubtless obeying instructions, is most distastefully 
 minute in detailing out the contents of lots and 
 parcels, and in searching beforehand for hidden ore. 
 From the bundle-hunter's seeing-point the game is 
 well-nigh up. Ere long the bladder will be pricked, 
 and he will be like another Othello. AVhen a 
 volume of commonplace tracts fills an entire page, 
 if not two, of a catalogue, it is time for him to break 
 his staff. The latter-day auctioneer, sooth to say, 
 errs on the side of accentuation. It nevertheless 
 seems as if the keenest and most jealous competition, 
 the most strongly emphasized printed accounts, and 
 the latest improvements in distributing and circulat- 
 ing catalogues of sales, are unequal to the removal 
 of a curious phenomenon which periodically recurs, 
 and yet on each occasion is declared to be so remark-
 
 330 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 able that it cannot by possibility happen again : I 
 mean the Frost — tlie sudden and capricious fall of 
 the temperature in the room, or in the veins of those 
 frequenting it, to zero. 
 
 Provided always that property of a certain stamp 
 usually protects itself by guaranteeing attendance 
 and opposition, it is not that the character of the 
 sale is unfavourable, or that of the articles offered 
 liable to question, for there have been notable cases 
 where some of the rarest books and best copies went 
 at nominal figures. I once asked the late JNIr. 
 Quaritch wliat he thouglit that he should have given 
 for a lot which went for £61 in his absence, and his 
 reply was, " about £700." Now it begins, I apprehend, 
 to be better understood that it is not only the pro- 
 perty whicli governs the result, but the atmosphere 
 and the name. Some years ago, for instance, Glad- 
 stone placed his old china in the hands of Christie's 
 for sale. It was a very second-rate collection ; but 
 tiie reputation of the owner drew a company which 
 was willing to pay for sentiment. 
 
 On the dispersion of the Edkins collection of 
 Bristol porcelain many years ago, my brother had 
 been asked by Dr. Diamond of Twickenham, who 
 could not be there in person, if he would mind 
 going to £20 for a certain teapot. The trust was 
 accepted, and the holder of this heavy commission 
 (as it seemed to liini to be) imagined himself the 
 central figure in a thrilling episode — the hero, in 
 fact, of the day. AVhen the item came on, a gentle- 
 man stepped forward and said to the auctioneer : 
 *' If it will save the time of the company, sir, I will 
 say £105 just to start you!" My relative assumed 
 the cap of invisibility. 
 
 The series of priced catalogues from 1805 in the 
 possession of Messrs. I*uttick and Simpson is a 
 strange sort of homily on the fortunes of families, the
 
 ATTAINMENT OF MY MAJORITY 337 
 
 progress of learning, and the caprices of taste. To 
 the litt(b'ateur and bibliograplier, tln'ough all the long 
 vista of years, these classic rooms, associated with 
 Sir Joshua Reynolds and his friends, and with the 
 Western Literary Institution, have afforded many 
 and many a precious gem and fascinating discovery. 
 The prices obtained were, in the old days, fairly 
 high ; but even chef Douvres (as a former member 
 of the house was pleased to write it) did not 
 invariably answer the expectations of the parties 
 interested. Do we not occasionally still find the 
 same thing ? 
 
 It would be ungrateful to the house in Leicester 
 Square if I were not to confess that it has yielded 
 me in my time many a pleasant discovery and many 
 an excellent bargain. Was it not there that I met 
 with the classic Somers Tracts in thirty folio volumes, 
 with the " Laws of New York," 1G93— the first book 
 printed there, I take it — and several other unique 
 Americana among them ? Did I not attend the 
 great Surrenden sale there, when the Dering books 
 were offered, and have to my next neighbour at the 
 table no less a man than John Forster Esquire ? 
 How distinctly I call to mind pointing out to him 
 the rarity and interest of an uncut copy on large 
 paper of Archbishop Laud's "Speech in the Star 
 Chamber," 1G37, and his magnificent affability in 
 rendering me thanks ! 
 
 Puttick has been dead many years. He was a 
 tall, powerful man, and on one occasion, wlien a too 
 clamorous Hebrew persisted in interrupting a sale, 
 the auctioneer quitted the rostrum, took the fellow 
 by the collar, led him to the door, and pitched him 
 downstairs. 
 
 It was while Mr. B. R. Wheatley belonged to a 
 firm of auctioneers in Piccadilly, and prior to his 
 father's death, that the auction-room was converted
 
 338 THE HAZLITTS 
 
 on one occasion into a theatre for the production of 
 Goldsmith's SJic Stoops to Conquer by amateurs, Mr. 
 \\^heatley himself, then quite a lad with a strong 
 taste and talent for theatricals, taking the part of 
 Tony Lumpkin.
 
 INDEX 
 
 Abacus, 96 
 
 Actors in Old Brompton, SO-1, 100-1, 
 
 Il(j-2G 
 whom I knew through Byron, 
 
 106-12 
 
 imitations of, at Our Cluh, 201 
 
 Addington, Samuel, 331-2 
 
 Addison, David, of Inverness, 163 
 
 John, 60, 138-9 ct scqq. 
 
 Road, Kensington, 65, 134-5 
 
 Addlestone, Surrey, 194 
 
 Address (My) to the Electors of King- 
 ston Division of Surrey, 231 
 
 " Adonis of fifty," 8 
 
 Agar-Robartes, 319 
 
 Agriculture, Board of, 132 
 
 Aikin sale in 1798, 148 
 
 Ainger, Canon, 243-7 
 
 Ainsworth, W. H., 24 
 
 Albert, Prince, 6-7, 222-4, 271 
 
 Aldis, Sir Charles, 31 
 
 • Dr. 31 
 
 Aldrich of Iowa, U.S., Mr. 322 
 
 Alexander, H. B., 79 
 
 Square, 79 
 
 W.. 79 
 
 Alfred Place, Old Brompton, 12, 22, 
 87-8, 78-9 
 
 Allen, Grant, 296 
 
 Alrtm Mater of Scriblerus, 263 
 
 Almshouses in Cromwell Lane, 82 
 
 Althorp, 270 
 
 America, 132, 135, 293, 304 
 
 Angelo, Henry, 5 
 
 Anscns of Shuckborough, 159 
 
 Antwerp in 1852, 144-5 
 
 Arnold the stipendiary, 190 
 
 Arthur, Thomas, 333 
 
 Arundell of Wardour, Lord, 233 
 
 Ashburnham, Earl of, 268, 295 
 
 Ashby, Leicestershire, 154 
 
 Asquith, H. H., v 
 
 Astors, The, 132 
 
 Athenffius, Deipnosophistos, 158 
 
 Atholl Papers, 226 
 
 Atmosphere and values, 336 
 
 Aubrey, John, 173 
 
 Australia, 234 
 
 Bacon, Vice-Chancellor, 183 
 Bagot-Lanes, The, 161 
 Bain, Professor, 199 
 Baldock the bookseller, 289-90 
 Baldwin, Prudence, 316 
 Balfe's BolLcmian Girl, 125 
 Ball, Arthur, 170 
 Ballantyne& Co., 307 
 Baltimore, Lord, 149 
 Banbury, 161 
 Banister, Edward, 170 
 
 Saxe, 131 
 
 Bannockburn, 238 
 
 Bankruptcy Court, 181 
 
 Banks, Sir Joseph, 115 
 
 Bargains, 334-5 
 
 Barham, R. H., 102, 120-1 
 
 Barlow, Samuel, 46 
 
 Barnes, 79, 175-80 
 
 Baron's Daughter, The, 12S 
 
 Barrington the pickpocket, 162 
 
 Bass, Michael, brewer, 156 
 
 Bath Cottage, 82 n. 
 
 Battenbergs, The, 225 
 
 Battersea Fields, 60 
 
 Baxter, Rose, and Norton, 189-90 
 
 Bear Lane, Fulham, 138 
 
 Beatrice, Princess, 225 
 
 Beauchamp, General, 270 
 
 Beaumanor Park, Loughborough, 315 
 
 Beaumont, Sir George, 118-19 
 
 Bedford, Duke of, 137 
 
 Francis, 301 
 
 Paul, 124 
 
 Bolgrave Square, 68 
 
 Bell and Horns Lane,66, 79-81, 86-7,97 
 
 Bell at Leicester, 156 
 
 Bellamys, The, 39, 44-5 
 
 Bentham, Jeremy, 4-5 
 
 Berners, Lord, 157 
 
 Bibliography, my approaching Early 
 
 British, 247 
 Birch, Dr., of Wimbledon, 168 
 Birch's in Cornhill, 128 
 Bird Cage Walk, 68 
 Birrell, Angustine, v 
 Black, Algernon, 30, 133 n. 
 John, 3-4, 20 
 
 339
 
 340 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Black Lion Lane, Bayswater, G4 
 
 Sea at Wauds worth, 173 
 
 Blades, W., 22 
 Blancbard, E. L., 113 
 Blanchards, Tlic, 93, 113 
 Blessington, Lady. 81 
 Blight the artist," 320 
 Blue Friars of Plymouth, 330 
 Bodleian librarv, 313 
 Bodlev, Sir Thomas, 138 
 Bodmhi, 320-1 
 Bogue's European Library, 24 
 Boiiu, H. G., 24, 2G1 
 
 John, 2(51 
 
 Boileau, General, 179 
 
 Bolton estate, 86 
 
 Bonapartes, The, 227 
 
 Bond, Sir Augustus, 250-1 
 
 Bonne-Maison, Mine., 12 
 
 Boom, Fanny, 133 
 
 Boone, General, 65 
 
 Bosanquet woods, Broxbourne, 13 
 
 Bosworth field, 315 
 
 Botfield, Beriah, 158 
 
 Boucicault, Dion, 121 
 
 Bowdon, Cheshire, 1l8 
 
 Bowmans, The, 137 
 
 Bowring, Sir John, 7-8 
 
 Box Hill, Surrey, 240 
 
 Boyer the chef a.t Badminton, 156 
 
 Bradford, William, New York printer, 
 
 304 
 Bradley, Dean, 274 
 Bradshaw, Henry, 274-5, 283-5, 
 
 30G-7 
 Braham, John, 95 
 Bramwell, Sir F., 143 
 Brandenburg House, 160 
 Brand's Popidar Antiqv,itics, 254, 320 
 Brassey, Thomas, 143, 150 
 Bread and Cheese Land, 65 
 Brederode, House of, 225 
 Brentford Distillery, 163 
 Breviary, Roman, of 1518, 293 
 Brighton, 38 
 
 Railway, 143 
 
 British Earthworks in Sussex, 153 
 
 Gallery, Pall Mall, 131 
 
 huts in Cornwall, 318. 321 
 
 Museum, 250-9, 305, 312 
 
 Britwell library, 307-9, 328 
 Broad Street. Old, 16 
 
 Westminster, 1 
 
 Brockley, Kent, 191 
 Brompton Bun, 76 
 
 Cemetery, 88, 158 
 
 Crescent, 132 
 
 friends, 84-5 
 
 Brompton Grove, 77 
 
 Hall, 82 
 
 Heath, 89 
 
 (Old), 74 et seqq., 97-9, 256, 326 
 
 Park, 99 
 
 Park Nurseries, 86 
 
 Row, 69, 71, 74-7 
 
 Square, 5 
 
 Stock, 87 
 
 Vale, 61, 83-4, 123 
 
 Brontes, The, 14 
 
 Bronzes found at Barnes, 179 
 
 Brooke, G. V., 100 
 
 Brooks, Shirley, 81, 196, 209, 211, 213 
 
 Brougham, Lord, 4, 8, 185-6, 250 
 
 Broughton-in-Furness, 322 
 
 Browne, Armitage, 2 
 
 William, 193, 255 
 
 Browning, Robert, 272-4 
 
 Broxbourne, Herts, 13 
 
 Brussels, 145 
 
 Bryans, The, 94, 131 
 
 Bryant of Wardour Street, 261 
 
 Buckingham of Seven Dials, 163 
 
 Buckstone, J. B., 121-3 
 
 Bull-baiting, 162 
 
 BuUen, George, 254-5, 285 
 
 Bulwer, E. L., 21-2 
 
 Lady, 102 
 
 Buvbages, The, 138 
 
 Burleigh, Lord, 82 
 
 liurrcU the stipendiary, 231 
 
 Bute House, 83 
 
 Byngs, The, 159 
 
 Byron, Henry James, 85 et seqq., 122 
 
 Lord, 28,111 
 
 (the poet), 292 
 
 Byrous, The, 104-12 
 
 Caldwell the baker, 90 
 Cambridge, 285 
 
 Duke of, 51, 223-6 
 
 helpers, my, 283-6 
 
 Camden Town, 118, 150 
 
 Campden Hill, 65 
 
 Canning, George, 9.5 
 
 Canova, Antonio, 227 
 
 Cardigan's (Lady) Recollections, 95 
 
 Carey, Mrs., 91 
 
 Carew of Antony, 319 
 
 Carlisle, Earl of, 116 
 
 Carlos, Don, 95 
 
 Carlyle, Thomas, 29-31, 233 
 
 Carrosse, 226 
 
 Carter Halls, The, 93-4 
 
 Castlenau, Barnes, 140 
 
 Celeste, Mme., 124 
 
 Chambers's Journal, 55
 
 INDEX 
 
 341 
 
 Chambers, Colonel, 1(18 
 
 K. tind W., 27« 
 
 Chappell, W., 197 
 
 Cbarics I., 1G8 
 
 Charlies, The, 150 
 
 Charlotte Street, Fitzroy Square, 22 
 
 Chaniwood Forest, 161 
 
 Chat Moss, 142 
 
 Chatfleld House, Putney, 8 
 
 Chatterton, Mrs., 5, 11(3 
 
 Chaucer, Geoffrey, 137-8, 275-G, 2S4, 
 321 
 
 Cheese-cakes, 204 
 
 Chelsea Bun-houses, 33 
 
 Common, 85 
 
 Field, 8G 
 
 days, 31-G, 100, 124 
 
 Park, 89 
 
 Ponnd, 84 
 
 Little, 89 
 
 Cherry Ripe, 316 
 
 Cheyne Walk, 31-2 
 
 Chinese Bible, 293 
 
 Christy the hatter, 307 
 
 Church Street, Chelsea, 15, 133 
 
 Cider Cellars, Maiden Lane, 217 
 
 Clanricarde, Marquis of, 52 
 
 Clapton, 287 
 
 Clarendon, Earl of, 4 
 
 Classical authors, imperfect appre- 
 ciation of, 43-4, 47 
 
 Cleland's Fanny Hill, 167 
 
 Clockmakers' Giid, 149 
 
 Close, Dean, 124 
 
 Clubs, 216-17 
 
 Clan's Hotel, Covent Garden, 208 
 
 Coaches, 62—4 
 
 Coal, 158-9 
 
 Cobb, Abiezer, 177 
 
 Cobbett, William, 185, 227 
 
 Cockburn, Sir Alexander, 141-2 
 
 John, 190 
 
 Cock-fighting parson, 154 
 
 Colburn, Henry, 19 
 
 Cole, Henry, 5-7 
 
 Coleherne Court, 87 
 
 Colehill Cottage, Fulham, 139 
 
 Colenso, Bishop, 103 
 
 Coleridge, S. T., 13. 19 
 
 Coleridges, The, 187, 194, 273 
 
 "Cole's Fish Kettle," 7 
 
 Collas, Jules, of Jersey, 140, 145, 301 
 
 Collectors, 299, 301-2 
 
 Collier, John Payne, 194 
 
 Colville's Nursery, 85 
 
 Consanguinity and marriage, 302 
 
 Conway's Nursery, 86, 90 
 
 Cooper, Fenimore, 260 
 
 Coo[)er, Mrs., 76 
 
 Thompson. 55 
 
 Coopers, The, 117-19 
 Corelli, Miss, 241 
 Corney, Bolton, 253 
 Correspondence, my own literary, 249 
 Corser, Kev. Thomas, 281, 308 
 Cosens, F. W., 196, 208, 303-4 
 Cotton, Morten, 94 
 Crawford, Earl of, 302 
 Crawshays of Cyfarthfa, 201 n. 
 Crockford's. 159 
 Croker, Dillon, 106-7, 200 
 Coucli, Jonathan, 320 
 
 Thomas Quiller, 319-20. 
 
 Coulson, Walter, 3, 20 
 Cousin, Victor, £6 
 Covent Garden Theatre, 23 
 Cowden-Clarks, The, 64 
 Cowley, Lord, 277 
 Cowper House, 82, 87 
 Craven Hill, Bayswater, 64 
 
 Place, 64 
 
 Crimean War, 49-51 
 Crimson Hermit, The, 121 
 Cromwell, Gardens, 82 
 
 House, 82 
 
 Lane, 82-3 
 
 Oliver, 82, 169, 171 
 
 Road, 97 
 
 Crora wells, The, 83 
 Crossley, James, 24, 281 
 Crown Court, St. James's, 77 
 Solicitor and Half-Crown Bar- 
 rister, 182 
 Cruikshank, George, 81 
 
 Robert, 81 
 
 Crump the counsel, 192 
 Gumming, Gordon, 34 
 Cundall, Joseph, 6 
 Cunningham, Allan, 234, 245 
 
 General, 234 
 
 Peter, 101, 211, 213 
 
 Curran, J. P., 159 
 
 Curtis family of Chiswick, 163-4 
 
 Cyprus, 207, 317-18 
 
 Daily Nev;s, 51 
 
 Dandy School, The, 13 
 
 Daniel, George, 291, 308, 328-31 
 
 Samuel, 138 
 
 Daranda, Mme., 169 
 Dauphin, The, at Chelsea, 36 
 D'Aumale, Due, 296 
 David's Turkish Grammar, 31 
 Davis, Henry May, 239-40, 242, 296-7 
 
 Jefferson, 322 
 
 Davison (J. W.) of the Times, 27, 212
 
 34.2 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Davison, Emily, 272 
 
 Sir Henrv, 272 
 
 Day, Mr. Justice, 194 
 Dean, Forest of, 158 
 
 Prior, Devon, 316 
 
 Deane, Rev. J. Bathurst, 45 
 
 General, 45 
 
 Decker Hill, Shifnal, 158 
 
 De Dampierre, Marquis, 129 
 
 Defoe, D., 24 
 
 De Gayangos, Don P., 286 
 
 Delabere, Sir Henry, 52 
 
 De la Haye, Pierre, 60 
 
 Delille, M., 40 
 
 De Maintenon, Mme., 227 
 
 De Merger, Baron, 127-30 
 
 Devereux, The, 94 
 
 Devonshire, Duke of, 270 
 
 De Vega, Lope, 304 
 
 De Villa, Captain, 37-8 
 
 Diamond, Dr., 175,196, 201-5,211,336 
 
 W. H., 202 
 
 Dickens, Charles, 10, 101-2, 181, 195, 
 240, 259, 300, 310 
 
 the younger, 196-7, 208 
 
 John, 195 
 
 Digby, Kenelm Henry, 13G 
 
 Dilke, Sir Charles, 206, 241 
 
 Disraeli, B., 313 
 
 Distillery Garden at Chelsea, 34 
 
 Dbcon, W. H., 196, 205-8 
 
 Dodd the pLiyer, 128 
 
 Doer, Dr., of Zurich, 225 
 
 Donne, John, 249, 331 
 
 Doran, Dr., 196, 208, 211 
 
 Dorking, 296-7 
 
 Down Street, Piccadilly, 67 
 
 Driver. See Ddahcre 
 
 Dronkers, Antje, 147 
 
 Drummonds, The, 135 
 
 Da Chaillu, 258 
 
 Dulwich Wood, 114 
 
 Dumas, Alexandre, 121, 130, 277 
 
 Dunbar, William, 306 
 
 Du Maurier, George, 130 
 
 Duplex, Dr., 103 
 
 Diirer, Albrocht, 258 
 
 Durham, Joseph, 196, 211 
 
 Dyce, Rev. Alexander, 282-3 
 
 Earl's Court, 86, f 8-9, 99 
 Early, Mr., a gardener, 277 
 Earnshaw, Thomas, 148-9 
 East-End theatres, 121, 125 
 Easter offerings, 149 
 Eastbope, Sir John, 3, 20 
 Ebsworth, Rev. J. M., 257 
 Ebury Farm, 60, 72 
 
 Edgeware, 70 
 
 Edinburgh, 306 
 
 Edinhuryh Review, 22 
 
 Edition de luxe, 266 
 
 Edmonton, 63 
 
 Edward VII., 229 
 
 Eel-V>rook Common, 138 
 
 Ejji'jics Poeticce, 16-17 
 
 Efra, the river, 59 
 
 Eglinton Tournament, 104 
 
 Egmonts, The, 153-4 
 
 Elian (my own) labours, 243 et seqq. 
 
 Eliot, George, 194 
 
 Elizabeth, Queen, 31, 59, 82, 169, 
 
 186 
 Elkins of Lombard Street, 265 
 Ellesmere, Earl of, 271 
 Elliot's Pine Pits, Hans Place, 78 
 Elliots, The, 86 
 Ellis, F. S., 265, 292, 294 
 
 Sir Henry, 253-4 
 
 Elwes, John, 22 
 
 Enclosure Acts, 161 
 
 Engel, Carl, 137 
 
 Enkhuisen, 290 
 
 Entomology and wild life of Barnes 
 
 Common, 175 
 Escombe, Priscilla, 35 
 Escombes, The, 29, 34-5 
 Essex House, Putney, 169 
 Ethiopian Serermders, 126 
 Evans, Sir De Lacy, 13 
 Evans's in Covent Garden, 208, 217 
 Evelyn, John, 97, 168, 240-2 
 
 W. J., 240-2 
 
 Lady, 241 
 
 Evelyns, The, 270 
 
 Ewbanks, The, 199 
 
 Exhibition of 1^51, 6, 97, 219, 222 
 
 Expenses, household, sixty years ago, 
 
 27-8 
 
 Fairfax House, Putney, 169 
 
 Farebrother, Miss Louisa, 225-6 
 
 Farrens, The, 117 
 
 Faulkners of Chelsea, The, 79-80 
 
 Felixstowe, 37 
 
 Fiyht, The, 14, 62 
 
 Finch of Our Club, 200 
 
 Finsbury, 287 
 
 Fitzclarence, Lady Mary, 136 
 
 Fitzgeorge, Colonel, 226 
 
 Fitzwilliams, Tho, 123 
 
 Five Fields, Pimlico, 68 
 
 Flabell, John, 143 
 
 Fladgate, Francis, 121 
 
 Fleming, Sir John, 81, 99 
 
 See Ifarriwjton
 
 INDEX 
 
 343 
 
 Florida Gardens, 82, 95 
 Florio, John, 138 
 
 Rose, 138 
 
 Fonblanque, Albany, 9 
 Foote, Samuel, ITS 
 Forest at Fulham, 138 
 Forman, Simon, 139 
 Forster, John. 101-3, 338 
 Forsyth, William, 87, 115 
 Forty Thieves, The, 19G, 212 
 Foster, Miss, 78 
 Foulkes, John, 227, 238-9 
 
 W. L., 176 
 
 Fowles, Susanna, IGG 
 Fox, General Charles, 136 
 
 John, 305 
 
 W. J., M.F.,32 
 
 Mrs., 32 
 
 Frampton, Dr., 96 
 
 Frangipani, 293 
 
 Free List, 23 
 
 Freemasonry, 219 
 
 French players in London, 126 
 
 Freres, The, 318 
 
 Friswell, J. H., 326 
 
 Frith the photographer, 26-1 
 
 Frog Moor, The, or Frogmore, 98 
 
 Fulham, 138 et scqq., 168 
 
 Causeries, 138-64 
 
 — -- Fields, 66, 87 
 
 Palace, 90, 138 
 
 rark, 90, 138 
 
 Road, 66 
 
 Furnivall, F. J., 234, 237, 261, 273-5, 
 284-5, 296, 299 
 
 Gage, Lord, 104 
 
 Gallen, John, of Liverpool, 314 
 
 Garibaldi, Giuseppe, 168 
 
 Garnett, Richard, 257 
 
 Garricks, The, 111 
 
 George I., 226 
 
 II., 226 
 
 IIL, 67, 231 
 
 IV., 140, 218 
 
 v., 54 
 
 Gibbons, The. at Putney, 171 
 
 Grinling, 277 
 
 Gibson, Rowland, 2 n. 
 Gilbert, Colonel, 89 
 Giustinian, Sebastian, 169 
 Gladstone, W. E., 53, 93, 183, 231-4, 
 
 279, 336 
 Gleig, Rev, G. R., 52 
 Gloucester Lodge, 82, 95 
 Road, 74, 82-3 
 
 Gloucester, Duchess of, 95 
 Gluepots, a phrase, 53 
 Glyn the banker, 150-1 
 Godwin, George, 85, 89 
 
 William, 3 
 
 Golden Dustman, 102 
 Goldsmid, Aaron Asher, 216 
 
 Sir Francis, 18 
 
 Goldsmith, Oliver, 338 
 
 Gomm family, 165 
 
 Gomme, G. L., 166 
 
 Goodwood, 153 
 
 Gordon, General, 232 
 
 Gough House, 80 
 
 Goulburn, Commissioner, 184-5 
 
 Govor (St.), 98-9 
 
 Govor's Well(St.), 98 
 
 Grammatical Academy, Parson's 
 
 Green, 96 
 Grant, Albert, 136, 182 
 Gray, Dr., 258 
 Gray's Inn Lane, 67 
 Greenhill, Sir A. G., 283-4 
 Greenwell, Canon, 309 
 Grenville Library, Br. Museum, 256 
 
 T., 256, 327 
 
 Griffiths, Ralph, 167 
 
 Grimani family, 32 
 
 Grimthorpe, Lord, 143 
 
 Grisi, Giulia, 126 
 
 Grosart, Rev. Dr., 249, 275, 331 
 
 Grove House, 77-8 
 
 Guizot, 85, 94 
 
 Gunnings, The, 83 
 
 Gunter the pastrycook, 89 
 
 Gurneys, The, 87-8 
 
 Gymnadum (proposed) for women, 4 
 
 Hailstone, Edward, 201 
 Halliwell-Phillipps, J. 0., 89, 92, 114, 
 
 275-7,289,311,326 
 Hamburg, 287-8 
 Ham House,! 248 
 Hamilton , Sir Robert, 49-50, 53-5, 
 
 171, 176 
 
 Rev. Zachary Macaulay, 50 
 
 Hammersmith, 165-6, 274 
 Hampstead, 65 
 Handfords, The, 31 
 Hanoverians, 223 
 Hanson, Edward, 266 
 Hans Place, 78 
 Harewood, Earl of, 208 
 Harley, John Pritt, 80, 120 
 Harrington, Earls of, 81, 99 
 Jane, Countess of, 81-2, 99 
 
 1 The writer has been since favoured by lord Dysart with permission to take notes of all 
 his desiderata there.
 
 344 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Harrogate, 15G-7 
 HarrU y, Leonard, 2G5 
 Hasleiuere, 100 
 JIatless Ileadimin, 277 
 Hawes, Sir B., 25, 49 
 Hawkins. Henry, 1S8 
 
 Sir John, 204 
 
 Hawksley the engineer, 144 
 Haymarket Theatre, 27, 121 
 Havnies, Captain, 155-15 
 Hazliit, Gladys, H. C, 321 
 
 Grace, 78 
 
 John, 201-2 
 
 San.h, 2, 20, 88, 148 
 
 William, v-vii, 3, 8, 11, IS-lfi, 
 
 18, 20-4, 37-8, 42, 52, 62, 04, 117, 
 
 131,193-4,278, 322 
 junior, 2-3, 5-6, 8, 10, 18, 
 
 20 €t scqq., 130, 181 ct seqq., 194-5, 
 197-8, 209, 212, 214, 231, 240, 254 
 
 Rev. William, 23, 194 
 
 Road, West Kensington, 185 
 
 Heath, Robert, 264 
 
 Heber, Richard, 218, 308 
 
 Henderson, Mr., 230 
 
 Henrietta, Princess, 168 
 
 Henrvson, R>bert, 306 
 
 Herbert, Sidi-ey, 91 
 
 Hereford Lodge, 94 
 
 Herrick, Robert, 168, 315-17 
 
 Hevwood, John, 311 
 
 Hicks, William, 320 
 
 Hickson of Fairfield, Kent, Mr., 5 
 
 Highwaymen, (Ui 
 
 liiils ofBroxbourne, 13-14 
 
 Hirsch, Baron, 238 
 
 Hog Moor, 98 
 
 Hogmore Lane, 98 
 
 HolcrofU,m, 138 
 
 Holcroft, Henry, 127-8 
 
 Thomas, 129 
 
 Holland House, 135 
 
 Holls, The, 92-3, 100-2, 19G-7, 200, 
 209 212 
 
 Holt, Frank, R.A., 103 
 
 Hood, Thomas, lS-19 
 
 Hook, Theodore, 64 
 
 Hooks and Eycx, 195-6 
 
 Ho(.p and Toy, 81 
 
 llopij of Pershore, Tommy, 150 
 
 Hornbvs, The, 32 
 
 Horned R. H., 12, 14 
 
 Homers' Ccjmpany, 230 
 
 Horton, Priscilla, 122 
 
 Hotten, John, 265 
 
 Hotham, Lady, 94 
 
 Houghton, Lord, 230 
 
 Howard of Eflingham, Lord, 95 
 
 Howell, James, 68 
 
 Hue's Travels in Tartary, &c., 27 
 
 Huctt, Noah, 263 
 
 Hume the Baker, 76-7, 95-6 
 
 Hundred Merry Talcs, 152G, 71-3 
 
 Hunt, Henry Leigh, 4 
 
 John, 10, 28, 78 
 
 Leigh, 4, 8-11, 14, 80-1, 297, 
 
 328 
 
 Robert, 9-10 
 Stephen, 10-11 
 Thornton, 9 
 
 Hunts, The, 8-11 
 
 lluth Catalogue, 292-4 
 
 Henry, 267, 286-301, 304, 308, 
 
 309 327 329 
 Huths, The, 251, 287-8, 290, 293, 
 
 301-2 
 Hyde Park, 71-2 
 Corner, 68, 70 
 
 Idsworth, Hants, 170 
 
 Illustrated copies of books, 266-7 
 
 Ingestrc House, 80-1 
 
 Ingleby, Dr., 277 
 
 Inner Temple, 193 
 
 Inns, Roadside, 61, 66 
 
 Interviewers, 278 
 
 Ipswich, 37 
 
 Ireland, Alexander, 93, 158, 278-80 
 
 Ireton, Henry, 169 
 
 Irons, Rev. Mr., 80 
 
 Irving, lieurv, 119 
 
 Lslington Green, 150 
 
 Ivanhoe, 23 
 
 Jackson the water-colour painter, 
 
 320 
 Jaflrev, Archibald, 234-7 
 Jago, Rev. William, 320-1 
 Jamieson, Mrs., 300 
 Jansen, Sir Theodore, 171 
 Jeaffreson, J. C, 200, 208 
 Jenkin.son, F., 286 
 Jennings' Buildings, Kensington, 
 
 136 
 Jcrrold, Douglas, 123. 196-217, 195, 
 
 199-200, 206, 212, 264 
 Jerrolds, The, 93, 196 
 Jersey, 1:7, 301 
 Jessel, Sir George, 196 
 Jews' Row, Chelsea, 33 
 Jcndar Literature, Slv.dics in, 30-1 
 Johnson. S., 260, 274 
 Jordan, Mrs., 136 
 Jubilee money of 1887, 219-20 
 Judson the ironmonger, 135 
 Julius II., Pope, 52
 
 INDEX 
 
 345 
 
 Kaisek, Tho, 226 
 
 Koats, John, 2 
 
 Kceleys, The, llfi, 19G, 212 
 
 Keene, S. W., 180 
 
 Keep (To) a True Lent, 310-17 
 
 Kekewich, Mr. Justice, 1H7, 193 
 
 Kelly, Walter Keating, 104 
 
 Kenneys, The, 120-31 
 
 Kensington, 60, 74 ct scqq., 134 et seqq. 
 
 Church, 83, 95 
 
 Dragoons, 137 
 
 Gore, 76-7, 81, 98-9 
 
 Kent, Constance, 219 
 
 Duke and Duchess of, 76, 225 
 
 Kenyon, Lord, 185 
 Kerny, Michael, 232 
 Keymer, James, 113 
 
 Mary Maud, 113-14 
 
 King, Dorothy, 316 
 King's Cross, 67 
 
 and Queen's Roads, 69 
 
 Kingsley, George, 271 
 Kingston-on-Thames, 132, 169 
 Kirke's Nursery, 97 
 Kitchener of Khartoum, 233 
 Knaresborough Forest, 157 
 Knapp's Journal of a Naturalist, 28 
 Kneiler, Sir Godfrey, 148 
 Knight, Charles, 190, 210 
 Knightsbridge, 60-1, 66-7, 71 ct seqq., 
 150 
 
 Green, 72-3 
 
 " Knock-out" at auctions, 294 
 Knowles, Sheridan, 9 
 Knox, John, 305 
 
 Lacy, John, clothworker, 169 
 
 Ladies' schools at Putney, 168 
 
 Laing, David, 284, 305-6 
 
 Lamb, C, vi, 10, 30, 63, 195, 243-7, 
 330 
 
 John, 12, 19-20 
 
 Mary, 2 13 
 
 Lancaster Gate, 65, 67 
 
 Landseers, The, 38 
 
 Lanesborough House, 08 
 
 Langland, William, 284, 321 
 
 Lansdowne, a former ilarquis of, 153 
 
 Lardner, Dionysius, 121 
 
 Laurie of Brentwood, Essex, 139 
 
 Law and lawyers, unsatisfactory con- 
 dition of, 192 
 
 Lawrence, E. IL, 317, 331 
 
 Leach the boatswain, 76 
 
 Leconfield, Lord, 154 
 
 Lee of Hammersmith, nurseryman, 
 115, 134, 166 
 
 Lee of Hartwell, Dr., 31 
 
 Leech, John, 137 
 
 Lc Gallienne, K., 314 
 
 Legal profession, ignorance of, 192-3 
 
 Lc (Jrand Monarque, 226 
 
 Lemon, Mark, 200 
 
 Lemprieres, The, 42 
 
 Lerwick, 54 
 
 Leslie of the War OITice, Mr., 52 
 
 Levels, changes of, 59 
 
 Levi, Jonas, 09 
 
 Levis, The, 100, 121 
 
 Lewes, G. H., 194 
 
 Lewis, Sir Charles, 191 
 
 Sir George, 194 
 
 Rev. S. S., 269 
 
 Liber A maris, 16 
 
 Lichfield, Earl of, 159 
 
 Lilly, Joseph, 291, 308, 329 
 
 Lime Grove, Putney, 170-1, 174 
 
 Lincoln's Inn Fields, 67 
 
 Liud, Jenny, 94 
 
 Linden House, Turnham Green, 167 
 
 Lindsey Row, 34 
 
 Liston, John, 116 
 
 Liverpool, Earl of, 218 
 
 Llandudno, 239 
 
 Llanover, co. Monmouth, 99 
 
 Lloyd, Colonel Augustus, 219 
 
 Locker, Arthur, 314 
 
 Edward, 313 
 
 Locker-Lampson, F., v, 309-14 
 
 Mrs., 311 
 
 I^ondon, loss of the, 235 
 London the Hundred-Gated, 68 
 
 George, 86 
 
 Library, 56, 104, 231, 233 
 
 London Magazine, 12, 245 
 Long Ditch, W(istminster, 61 
 Longevity, 237 
 Longfellow, H. W., 272 
 Louis XIV., 226 
 
 XVIIL, 172 
 
 Love Lane, 98 
 
 Lowndes's Manual, 201, 323 
 
 Lucys of Charlecote, 299 
 
 Ludlow, 93 
 
 Luttrell, Narcissus, 89-90 
 
 Lyndsay, Sir David, 284 
 
 Macaulay, T. B., 50, 64, 278, 290, 
 
 300, 327 
 Maceroni, Clara, 218 
 
 Colonel, 78, 82 
 
 Mackay, Charles, 240-1 
 Maclean, Sir John, 320 
 JIacmillan of Our Club, 208 
 Madan, Falconer, 286 
 Madden, Sir F. , 276
 
 31G 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Mahomet's Bath at Brighton, 104 
 
 Maids of Honour at Richmond, 204 
 
 Major, Mrs., 171 
 
 Malcolm, William, Florist, 115 
 
 Mallet, David, 171 
 
 Manchester Examiner, 279 
 
 Man Considered in Relation to God and 
 
 a Church, 53 
 Mannings, The, 177 
 Margaret's (St.), Westminster, 88 
 Margate, 38 
 Markets, London, G7 
 Marlborough gems, 224, 2G9 
 
 Library, 2(J9 
 
 Marsh, John, 73 
 
 Miss, 307 
 
 Mary, Princess, of Cambridge, 53 
 Marv Abbots, Kensington (St.), 73, 
 
 135 
 JIarylebone Lane, 150 
 Mason, Miss, 4 
 Massou, David, 19G, 210 
 Masson's Napoleon et les Fcmmcs, 227 
 Mathews, Charles, 81, 123, 138, 330 
 Mayer, Townshend, 11 
 Mayers the baker, 69 
 Mavhew, Horace, 196 
 M'Cabes, The, 112-13 
 M'Clean of Tunbridge Wells, 328 
 McComie the bookbinder, 22-3 
 Meadows, Kenny, 113-14 
 Melbourne, Lord, 8 
 Mellon, Alfred, 107 
 Menken, Ida, 122 
 
 Merchant Tavlors' School, 39-48, 217 
 Merton College, Oxford, 177 
 Methwolds, The, 82 
 Mexico, City of, 203 
 Michael Grove, 95 
 Michel, Francisque, 92 
 Midland Railway, 141 
 Miles, Thomas, 154-5. 161, 194 
 Militarism, 54 
 Millais, Sir John, 42 
 Miller the bookseller, 21 
 Jlill-Hill, Hendon, 14-15 
 Mill, John Stuart, 5 
 Millers and Christie-Millers, 307-9. 
 
 See Christy. 
 Mills at Barnes, 179 
 Mitford, Rev. John, 283 
 Moleswortli, Sir William, 5 
 Montagu, Captain, 14 
 
 Hyman, 190 
 
 Montagus, The, 17-18 
 Montaigne, 24, 193 
 Montefiorc, Sir Moses, 40 
 Moorfields, 287 
 
 Moore Park, Fulham, 90, 138 
 ]\Iorlaix, Brittany, 12 
 Morley, Henry, 260 
 Morning Chronicle, 3, 20-2, 25-7 
 Morris the tailor, 173 
 Morte Arthur, 321 
 Mostjns of Mostyn, 239-40, 270 
 Moule of University College, Cam- 
 bridge, 286 
 Moxhay, Edward, 16, 20 
 Moxsy of Jamaica, sugar- planter, 14 
 Mulberry-tree at Chelsea, 31 
 Muller, Heer, 146-7 
 Munster House, Fulham, 86 
 Murchison, Sir R., 159, 228 
 Murders, 176-7 
 Miirger, Henri, 130 
 Murray, John, 28, 55 
 
 Napoleon I., 78, 117, 128-9, 227 
 
 Ill, 27, 104,228-9 
 
 Neal, John, 7 
 Nelham, Fat, 41 
 Nelson, Horatio, 68 n., 76, 313 
 Netherlands in 1852, 144-7, 225 
 New-man of Oxford Street, 265 
 Ne\u Monthly Magazine, 19 
 Newquay in 1875, 322 
 Newspaper criticism, 299-300 
 Newton, Professor, 286 
 New York, Laws of, 1694, 304, 337 
 Nicholas, Sir Edward, 62 
 Nicholson, H. A., 279 
 Nightingale Lane, Tooting, 174 
 Norland House, 135 
 
 Spring, 135 
 
 Northern Heights of London, 59 
 Noseda, Mrs., 331 
 Netting Barns, 65 
 
 Hill, 65, 135 
 
 Novello, Vincent, 64 
 Noviomar/ians, The, 199, 202 
 Nunnery (supposed) at Putney, 170 
 Nurseries, 78, 85-7, 89, 90-1, 115, 
 140, 166 
 
 O'CONNOE, Patrick, 177 
 Odorous names, 327-8 
 Ogilvys of Lerwick, The, 50 
 Oglethorpe, General, 68 
 O'Keefe, John, 82 
 Oliver, Isaac, 331 
 Omnibus, Early, 63 
 Ordish, T. F., 248 
 Orwell Park, 160 
 Our Club, 196-216 
 Overland tea, 160 
 Oxford, 285
 
 INDEX 
 
 347 
 
 Oxford helpers, my, 286 
 
 Road, 04, 67 
 
 Oxindons of Barham, 284 
 
 Packe, C. W., M.P., 156 
 
 Pack-horse tracks in Cornwall, 322 
 
 Palmerston, Lord, 24-6, 230-1 
 
 Papadopoli, Nicolo, 57 
 
 Paperinp; the theatres, 23 
 
 Parker, J. W., 261 
 
 Parkes, Josejih, 14 
 
 Parliament, a sort of cake, 95-6 
 
 Parry, Serjeant, 20i), 213 
 
 Parson's Green, 138 
 
 Paston correspondence, 160, 318 
 
 Panizzi, Antonio, 250, 253-4 
 
 Pannage for swine at Kensington, 98 
 
 Pantomimes, 125 
 
 Paterson, W., 131-2 
 
 bookseller, 306 
 
 Patmore, Coventry, 15 
 
 Eugene, 15 
 
 P. G., 7, 14-16 
 
 Pattmore, Charles, 15 
 Pearson, John, 311 
 Peel, Sir F., 52 
 
 Sir Robert, 230 
 
 Pelham Crescent, 85, 94 
 
 Place, 85 
 
 Pepys, John, 149-50 
 
 Samuel, 285 
 
 Percivals, The, 95 
 Percy, Dr., 196 
 
 Street, Tottenham Court Road, 
 
 22—3 
 Perry-HerrJcks, The, 315 
 Pershore, 150 
 Peterborough House, 90 
 Petherara, John, 265 
 Philippe the conjurer, 126 
 Phillips, Sir Richard, 250 
 Phillipps, Sir Thomas, 3-7 
 Philobiblon Society, 261 
 Piccadilly, 68-9 
 
 coaches, 63 
 
 Pictish dwellings in Scotland, 321 
 Piers of Fidham, 138 
 Piggott of Fitzhall, 153 
 Pike Lane, Putney, 170 
 Pimlico, 60, 68, 71 
 Pitt, George, 236, 286 
 
 William, 161 
 
 Place the tailor and collector, 5, 116 
 Planche, J. K., 95 
 Plat, The, Putney, 168 
 
 House, 169 
 
 Plessis Barhe. near Tours, 127 et scqq. 
 Plymouth, 330 
 
 Pollard's School, 80, 89 
 Pollock, Chief Baron, 193, 198 
 Pom mersf elder Castle, 239 
 Pond Place, Chelsea, 85 
 Possingworth, Sussex, 290-1 
 Potteries, The, Bayswater, 65 
 Powell, Dr., of the Mauritius, 201 
 Prayers at Merchant Taylors' School, 
 
 39-40 
 
 for weather, 224 
 
 Pretymans, The, 160-1 
 Priestley, Dr., 14 
 Priests'-Bridge, Barnes, 176-8 
 Primroses, The, 234 
 Prince-Regent, 9 
 Priory at Barnes, 176 
 Proctor, B. W., lG-18, 245 
 
 Mrs., 2, 16-18, 300 
 
 Prospect Place, 81 
 
 Punch's Raihvay, 134 
 
 Purser's Cross, 90 
 
 Putney, 66, 91, 123, 167-73, 274, 287, 
 
 302 
 Puttick and Simpson, 335-8 
 Pyne, Henry, 200 
 
 QUARITCII, Bernard, 232, 336 
 
 the younger, 287 
 
 Queen's Elm, 69 
 " Queen's weather," 224 
 Quimper, Brittany, 12 
 Quin, James, 178 
 
 Ranelagh Ckeek, 33 
 
 Gardens, 162 
 
 Reading Room at British Museum, 
 
 257-8 
 Red ford. Rev. Robert, 271 
 Redway, George, 247-8 
 Reeve, John, 116 
 Reeves, William, 259 
 Regent Street, 68 
 Rejected Articles, 15 
 Rennies, The, 144 
 Retaliation Imitated, The, 209-12 
 Reynell,Catherine, 21-2,64,86,147, 195 
 Charles, 6-7-8, 37, 61, 67-8, 82-3, 
 
 104, 117, 123-4, 136, 172, 195, 223, 
 
 273, 299 
 
 George, 132-3 
 
 Henry, 148 
 
 Rebecca, 4 
 
 William, 4 
 
 Revnells, The, 1-2, 7-8, 20-1, 37, 67, 
 
 148, 159, 274 
 Reynolds, Sir Joshua, 237 
 7i'( z-de-chaussif, 66 
 Ribey Grove estate, 161
 
 348 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Richardson, Sir Benjamin, 196, 201 
 
 of Glasgow, 27S 
 
 Richmond, Surrey, 204, 209 
 Riviere, Robert, 307 
 Robartes of Llanh.vdrock, 319 
 Roberts, John, Earl of Radnor, 319 
 Robertson, John, 5, 273 
 
 Miss, 15 
 
 Thomas, 108 
 
 Robins, George, 159 
 Robinson, Sir John, 51 / 
 
 Robinson's Fasti of M.T. School, 48 
 Roche, Regiua Maria, 254 
 Roehampton, 173 
 
 Hurricane, 1780, ibid. 
 
 Rogers, Samuel, 307 
 
 Romilly, Lord, 218 
 
 Rose, George, 107 
 
 Rosebery, Earl of, 93, 234-5 
 
 Rosery, The, at Old Brorupton, 03 
 
 Roses at Broxbourne, 13 
 
 Rouen, 148 
 
 Routledge. George, 2G0 
 
 Rowfant, 313 
 
 Rowland, Alexander, 114 
 
 Rowlandson the artist, 171 
 
 Rowing days, 34 
 
 Royal Library, gift of, 218 
 
 housekeeper at Kew, 92 
 
 Roydon Hall, Norfolk, 318 
 Roy's School at Fulham, 91, 140 
 Ruskin, John, 5(), 114 
 Russell, Lord John, 231 
 
 Institution, 15-lG 
 
 Russia, 218, 228 
 Ryan, Sir Edward, 49 
 
 Sadler's Wells, 125 
 
 St. Aubyns, The, (JO, 171 
 
 Sala, G. A., 120-1, 277 
 
 Saudars, Samuel, 327 
 
 Saxe-Gotha, house of, 226 
 
 Saycrs, Tom, 150 
 
 Scarth, Mr., 139 n., 176 
 
 Schools, my own {jreparatory, 38, 96-7 
 
 Schiinborn. Count, 239 
 
 Scothind, 321 
 
 Scott the City Chamberlain, 62 
 
 Thomas, of Ramsgaie, 1015-4 
 
 Sir Walter, 23, 305, 30G-7 
 
 Selwood's Nursery, 89 
 
 Serpent-worship, 45 
 
 Serpentine, 72 
 
 Shaftesburj- House, 89 
 
 Shakcspcar, W., 62, 138, 180, 275, 304, 
 
 321,325,329 
 Shepherd's Bush, 67 
 Shcppens, The, 18 
 
 Sheridan, R. B., 9 
 
 Shirley, E. P., 304-5 
 
 Shrewsbury, Earls of, 81 
 
 Shropshire, 158 
 
 Shuckborough, Sir Charles, 78 
 
 Sidney's Arcadia, 308 
 
 Signers the market-gardener, 90-1 
 
 Sixpenny Solicitor, The, 332 
 
 Skittles,' 153 
 
 Slack's (Mother) at Leicester, 141 
 
 Sloane Street, 67, 71, 241 
 
 Smith, John Russell, 259, 261 
 
 Miss Toulmin, 216 
 
 Sir William, 277 
 
 William Henry, 173 
 
 Social status, 295 
 
 Solander, Dr., 115 
 
 Solly, Edward, 101 
 
 Somcrs, Lord, 304, 337 
 
 Sotheby, Mister, 325 
 
 Sothebys' and its associations, 323-83 
 
 Sotheran, Henry, 264 
 
 South Kensington Museum, 6, 82 
 
 Western Railway, 140-1 
 
 German Houses, 209 
 
 Southern suburbs of London before 
 
 1851, 114-15 
 
 Henry, 5 
 
 Spanish Dancers, 122 
 Spanish Lef/ion, 13 
 Spectator, The, 9 
 Spencer, Herbert, 296-7 
 
 Lady, 271 
 
 Lord, 270 
 
 Spenser's Faery Queen. 241-2 
 Spiers of Essex Hall, Mr., 8 
 Spring-heel Jack, 79 
 Stafford House, 146 
 Stamford Hill, 16 
 
 Earl of, 157 
 
 Stanhopes, The, 77-81 
 
 Stapyltons of My ton, Yorkshire, 140, 
 
 163-4 
 Steam-tram, 87 
 Stephen, Sir James, 234 
 Stephenson, George, 53, 142 
 
 John, 143 
 
 Robert, 142 
 
 Stevenson, R. L., 18 
 
 T. G., 306 
 
 Stibbs, Edward, 263 
 
 Stilton cheese, 155 
 
 Stirling, 236 
 
 Stock, Elliot, 255-6 
 
 Stoddart, Sir John, 2, 8, 49, 85, 116, 
 
 148, 231 
 
 Lady, 85 
 
 Rev. W. W., 39, 85
 
 INDEX 
 
 349 
 
 Stoddarts, The, 148 
 Stokes, H. S.,321 
 Stopes, Charlotte, 306 
 
 Henry, 807 
 
 Stow, Jolin, '.'>()') 
 
 Stratfurd-le-15ow, 72 
 
 Stray at Harropate, 157 
 
 Street. G. E., 189 
 
 Stubbs, W., Bishop of Oxford, 28G 
 
 Suburbs of London (Western), 58-99 
 
 Surreudcn sale, HHJ 
 
 Sussex, Duke of, L'18-ID 
 
 Sutherland, Duke of, 146 
 
 Swan Lane, 80, 89 
 
 Swanboroughs, The, 109 
 
 Swinburne, A. C, 171 
 
 Sydney, Lord and Lady, 29 
 
 Street, Fulham Road, 92 
 
 Symonds the Spider, 77 
 Arthur, 274 
 
 Talfourd, T. N., 21, 240 
 
 Tattersall the auctioneer, 87 
 
 Taylor, Sir Henry, 234 
 
 Temple coterie, 19 
 
 Tennyson, A., 30-1, 271-2, 309-10, 
 
 312, 321 
 
 Lionel, 312 
 
 Thackeray, W. M., IGS, 193, 19G-7, 
 
 272, 297, 314 
 Theatre, The, 23 
 Thistle Grove, 89-90 
 Thistlethwaites, The, 152 
 Thompson, Sir Benjamin (Count 
 
 Rumford), 7G 
 
 Sir Matthew, 141 
 
 Mr., of Queen's College, Oxford, 
 
 286 
 Thorny Island, 60, 68 
 Three Graces (sisters of Napoleon), 
 
 228 
 Thynnes of Longleat, 158 
 Tichborne case, 190 
 Tilbury the actor, 134 
 Timbs, John, 241 
 Times newspaper, 162-3 
 Tokenhouse Yard, Putney, 172 
 ToUemaches, The, 237-8, 329 
 Tolstoi, Count, 238 
 Tomato- culture, 140 
 Tomline, George, 160-1 
 
 the sugar-baker, 160 
 
 Tower, Charlemagne, 304 
 
 Toxophilite Society, 81 
 
 Trade and Plantations, Council of, 
 
 132 
 Travelling methods, Older, 61-4 
 Trevelyan, Sir Charles, 50 
 
 Triphnok, Robert, 333 
 Trundle Hill, 153 
 Truro Cathedral, 88 
 Tuck-shops, 76 
 T upper, Martin, 240 
 Turkish Lath, 104 
 Turner, J. M. W, 31 
 
 R. S., 317, 331 
 
 W., 316 
 
 Turnhara Green, 166-7 
 Turn-over, a roll, fJl) 
 Turnpikes, 68-9, 86 
 Tussaud's, Mme., 227 
 Tuthill Fields, 68 
 
 Forest, 68 
 
 Twickenham House, 202 
 Tyburn, 70 
 
 Tygris at Kennington, 59 
 Tyssens, The, 303 
 
 Udall's Ralph Roister Bolster, 314 
 Upcott, William, 241 
 
 Valentines, Ilford, 277 
 Venice, 55-7, 169, 293 
 Veres, Earls of Oxford, 99 
 
 Vers de Societf, 310-11 
 
 Vestris, Madame, 122-3 
 
 Victoria, Queen, 54, 118, 219-24, 229, 
 
 232, 272, .322 
 Villicrs, C.'P., M.P.,4-5 
 
 Vineyard a,t Hammersmith, 166 
 Voelker's Gymnasium, 4 
 Voltaire, 5, 2G0 
 
 Wandsworth, 173-4 
 Waggon-houses, (51, G6-7 
 Wainewright, T. G., 1^13 
 Waldegrave, Ladv, 95 
 Walham Green, 66, 90, 138-9 
 Wallack, Lester, 125 
 Wallbrook, 61 
 Walnut-tree Walk, 87 
 Walworth Common, 115 
 Ward, Plumer, 15 
 Wardour Street, Soho, 21 
 Wareham the dealer, 331 
 Waring, George, of Oxford, 286 
 Warmington, Q.C., Mr., 193 
 Warnes,^The, 65, 77-8, 97 
 War Office, 9, 49-53 
 Warpell ways, 168 
 Watch-houses, 72, 150 
 Waterloo, 163, 172 
 Watts, Alaric, 233 
 
 Thomas, 251, 256 
 
 Watts-Dunton, VV. T., 171 
 Watson. William, 93, 280
 
 350 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Webbs, The, 139-40 
 Webster, Benjamin, 80, 120 
 
 City, U.S., 322 
 
 John, 201) 
 
 Wedgwood, Josiah, 107 
 Wedgwood's Depot at Chelsea, 33 
 Wellington, Duke of, 91-2, 172, 210, 
 
 228 
 
 second Duke of, 2S-9, 145 
 
 Wells, C. J., 11-12-13 
 
 Mary, 12 
 
 Monte Carlo, 12 
 
 Westbury, Lord, 18G-7 
 Westminster, (30 
 
 Marquis of, 52 
 
 Wcitminstcr Review, 5 
 Wharton or Chelsea Park, 89 
 Wheatley, B. R., SS.*^ 
 Wheeler, Talboys, 53 
 Whelan, F., 268 
 Whist-Bovs, 19 
 Whistler the artist, 34 
 White Hart at Barnes, 176 
 
 Horse Cellar, 62 
 
 House, Putney, 91 
 
 Wigan, Edward, 268 
 
 Wiiberforce, W., 77 
 
 Wildman, John, 169 
 
 Wilkins, Serjeant, 188 
 
 Wilkinson, John, 325 G, 333 
 
 Williams of Kars (two brothers of), 
 
 52 
 Willis, George, 263-4 
 Willow Walk, 68 
 
 Willoughby d'Eresby, Lord, 203 
 
 Wimbledon, 174, 298 
 
 Wiltshire Convict's Fareiocll, 197-8 
 
 Windermere, 13 
 
 Winder, R., 146-7 
 
 Wine, conversations on, 158 
 
 Winterslow, 2 
 
 Hut, 62 
 
 Wise, Henry, 86 
 Wokingham, Berks, 204 
 Wolfrestons, The, 32G-7 
 Wood Lane, 67 
 Woolgar, Miss, 107 
 Wooluer, Thomas, 196, 209 
 Wootton, Dorking, 240 
 Wordsworth, W., 19 
 Worsley, Lady, 81 
 Wren, Sir Christopher, 86 
 Wright, Edward, 123-5 
 
 Henry, 145-6 
 
 Thomas, 92-3, 205 
 
 Wythyaw House, Walham Green, 
 139 
 
 Yaldwins, The, 100 
 Yankee grandees, 132 
 Yates, Edmund, 13, 182 
 
 Raymond, 13 
 
 Richard, 13 
 
 York, 157 
 
 Duke of, 91 
 
 Street, Westminster, 1 
 
 York-Moore, General, 268-9 
 Young, Arthur, 37, 132 
 
 THE END
 
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