ifo
me
ity
EX LIBRIS
W. H. BEVERIDGE
Collegii
Magnae Aulae Universitatis
Oxoniensis
Socii 1^02
Ma&istri
THE
LIFE AND LETTERS
OF
DR. SAMUEL BUTLER.
VOL. I.
THE
LIFE AND LETTERS OF
DR. SAMUEL BUTLER,
HEAD-MASTER OF SHREWSBURY SCHOOL 17981836,
AND AFTERWARDS BISHOP OF LICHFIELD
IN SO FAR AS THEY ILLUSTRATE
THE SCHOLASTIC, RELIGIOUS, AND SOCIAL
LIFE OF ENGLAND, 17901840.
BY HIS GRANDSON,
SAMUEL BUTLER,
AUTHOR OF "EREVVHON," "THE TRAPANESE ORIGIN OF THE ODYSSEY," ETC.
VOL. I.
JAN. 30, 1774 MARCH I, 1831.
LONDON :
JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET.
1896.
Printed by Hazel], Watson, & Viney, Ld., London and Aylesbury.
PREFACE.
THE following work was begun in 1889, and was
completed in its original form by the summer of
1894. I was then so generally advised that it was too
long that in the summer and autumn of 1895 I reduced
it by about a third, and left it with Mr. Murray in
November 1895.
The length of time during which the work has been
in progress must be accounted for firstly by the great
bulk of the correspondence that came into my hands,
and the difficulty of finding the due dates of many
undated letters. Moreover I was deflected from it by
the pressure put upon me to write my book Ex Voto,
on the Sacro Monte of Varallo, and by some researches
into the topography and authorship of the Odyssey, the
fascination of which I found it impossible to resist. To
these delightful studies hardly, however, to myself more
delightful than J;hose which I am now leaving I hope
immediately to return.
When my sisters, Mrs. G. L. Bridges and Miss Butler,
presented me with almost all Dr. Butler's papers, I did
not at first realise the importance of keeping the collection
as far as possible together, and gave away some few to
20GG641
vi PREFACE.
friends as autographs. Some of the drafts, again, I found
so much cancelled and rewritten that I thought it better
to copy the final state of the draft and destroy the
original. I also destroyed, with the approval of the
authorities of the British Museum (but never without
this), any letters the preservation of which might cause
pain without serving any useful purpose, or again, which
were deemed not worth the acceptance of the Museum.
The rest I gave to the British Museum, and left those
in charge of the National Collection to decide what
letters should be made accessible to the public, and
what should be, at any rate for the present, kept
back.
I may say here, therefore, that all letters or documents
given in my book are in the British Museum, unless it
is stated otherwise at the head of the letter. It may
save readers the trouble of hunting in the index if I
give the numbers of the volumes for which they should
write if they desire to see the original of any given
letter, or to search for any letters they may hope to
find. The volumes are numbered as follows :
VOL.
ADDITIONAL
MSS.
L, 1764-1813 . . 34583
II., 18141819 . . . 345 g 4
III., 1820 March 1825 .... 34585
IV., April 1825 end of 1827 . . . 34586
V., 18281830 . .... 34587
VI., 18311833. . . .
VII, 1834-1835 . . .
- ... 34590
IX., 1837 June 3oth, 1838 . . . 3459I
PREFACE. vii
ADDITIONAL
VOL. MSS.
X., July 1838 December i6th, 1839, 1'
scriptions, Verses in Latin, Greek, and
English . . 3459 2
XL, Two Letter-books, 18181828 . . 34593
XII., A third Letter-book, and Dr. Butler's
Episcopal Letters .... 34594
XIII., Dr. Butler's Exercises when at Rugby . 34595
XIV., Review of Parson's Adversaria, etc., 1817 34596
XV., A Commonplace Book, dated 1816 . 34597
XVI., Journals of Foreign Tours . . - 34598
N.B. In every case "Additional MSS." must be on the ticket.
Very few letters reached me from other sources than
the one I have indicated above. I should, however,
thank Bishop Barry (as representing the family of the
Rev. T. S. Hughes), the Rev. Walter Scott, son of the
late Dean of Rochester, the Rev. J. Irvine of Colchester,
and J. Willis Clark, Esq., for the loan of letters, some of
which will follow in due order of date.
The reader is requested to bear in mind that this work
is intended to show the scholarship and the philology of
the time, so far as they have come before me in Dr.
Butler's papers. I am aware that much of the philology
will be held to be of no present interest ; its interest,
however, as showing the state of this science at the
beginning of the century, seems, at any rate to myself,
considerable. As regards letters connected neither with
scholarship nor education, I have selected them almost
exclusively on the ground of their livingness and the
interest attaching to the personality of the writer. If
the personality has attracted me, as in the case of Dr.
VI 11
PREFACE.
James, Mr. Tillbrook, Baron Merian, and half a score
of men and women whose names are now utterly
unknown, I have given letters, though they contained
little or nothing about either scholarship or education.
I have to express my thanks to Professor J. E. B.
Mayor for much assistance given me in the course of
my work. The account of Dr. Butler given in the
second volume of his invaluable edition of Baker's
History of St. John's is so full as regards quotations
from Dr. Butler's works, that I have been left free to
pass these over much more briefly than I should other-
wise have done, and to devote my space principally to
MS. documents, the existence of which was probably
as unknown to Professor Mayor as it was to myself
until they fell into my hands. I have also to thank
Mr. Prebendary Moss, the present Head-Master of
Shrewsbury School, for the warm interest he has shown
in the work and its progress, though I should perhaps
state that he has only actually seen a small part of it.
I would also express my sense of deep obligation to
Mr. John Murray, who has read the sheets with great
care, and called my attention to many slips, omissions,
and inadvertencies, besides supplying me with informa-
tion which I could not otherwise have obtained.
As regards the accentuation of Greek words, I believe
I may say that when the reader finds the accents omitted
or wrong, if he will be good enough to turn to the original
MS., he will find that I have followed it faithfully. At
first I found it irresistible occasionally to add an accent,
or to correct one ; but before long I was advised that
PREFACE. JX
it would be a sounder course in a work that aims at
being historical to let the accents, for better or worse,
stand as I found them. I could not bring myself,
however, to take out those I had put in, or to vitiate
the few that I had corrected ; Dr. Butler in his drafts
has generally omitted them, but when he gives them he
always does so correctly.
Lastly, I would caution the reader against confusing the
three Dr. Butlers who have all been eminent as school-
masters. They are :
1. Dr. Samuel Butler, Head-Master of Shrewsbury,
17981836.
2. Dr. George Butler, Head-Master of Harrow, 1805
1829.
3. Dr. H. Montagu Butler, Head-Master of Harrow,
Christmas 1859 1885, and present Master of
Trinity College, Cambridge.
The two Dr. Butlers of Harrow were father and son,
but there was no relationship between them and Dr.
Samuel Butler.
SAMUEL BUTLER.
February 25^, 1896.
P.S. Since writing the foregoing I have heard with
very great regret of the death of my cousin Archdeacon
Lloyd, more than once referred to in the following pages
as though he were still living.
March yd, 1896.
CONTENTS OF VOL. I.
PAGE
INTRODUCTION . . [l]
CHAPTER I.
FAMILY HISTORY ... I
CHAPTER II.
SCHOOL AND COLLEGE 8
Captain Don. School Life at Rugby. Career at St. John's
College, Cambridge. -Letters from Dr. James, December roth,
1793, September jih, 1794. Engagement to Miss Harriet
Apthorp. Letters from Dr. James, December 27th, 1796,
January 23rd, 1797. Letter from S. T. Coleridge. First
Published Work. Mr. Butler commissioned by the University
to edit ^Eschylus.
CHAPTER III.
THE RUGBY CURRICULUM . 24
Installation at Shrewsbury. Dr. James's Letters of Advice
detailing the Rugby System under his Head-Mastership.
CHAPTER IV.
FIRST YEARS AT SHREWSBURY . .40
Appointment of Mr. Jeudwine as Second Master. The
Relations between him and Mr. Butler. Hostile Reception at
Shrewsbury? Candidature for the Head- Mastership of Rugby.
CHAPTER V.
HUGHES, PORSON, BLOMFIELD . . . 52
Thomas Smart Hughes. Death of Person. Publication of First
Volume of ^schylus. Blomfield's Reviews in the Edinburgh
Revieiv. Quarrel between Butler and Blomfield. Character of
Person. Butler's Letter to the Rev. C. J. Blomfield, B.A.
xii CONTENTS.
CHAPTER VI.
PAGE
INSTALLATION SERMON LUCIEN BUONAPARTE . 63
The Doctor's Degree. Correspondence, December i6th, 1810
February 4th, 1811. The Installation Sermon. Correspondence,
August i;th, 1811 December 5th, 1811. Translation of Prince
Lucien Buonaparte's Charlemagne. Correspondence, February
i8th, 1812 December 28th, 1812. Notes taken after a Visit to
Prince Lucien Buonaparte. Difficulties about the School Chapel.
CHAPTER VII.
GEOGRAPHY OWEN PARFITT 84
The Geography. Correspondence, January 29th, 1813 October
2Oth, 1813. -The Mystery of Owen Parfitt. Correspondence, June
i8th, 1814 October 20th, 1814.
CHAPTER VIII.
CORRESPONDENCE, JANUARY 29TH, 1815 MAY
28TH, 1816 103
CHAPTER IX.
WATERLOO, I8l6 BARON MERIAN . . . . I 16
Extracts from Diary, with a Visit to the Field of Waterloo, July
1816. Correspondence, November 2nd, 1816 June 3Oth, 1817.
CHAPTER X.
THE FORTUNATE YOUTH HUGHES'S INSCRIPTIONS 133
The Fortunate Youth. Correspondence on this Subject, October
29th, 1817 December 24th, 1817. Correspondence, October
3ist, 1817 June gth, 1818, with Review of Person's Adversaria.
Paper on some Greek Inscriptions that appear in Hughes's
Travels in Sicily, etc.
CHAPTER XI.
EPIDEMIC OF TURBULENCE 156
Disturbances within the School. Dr. Butler's two Circulars to
Parents. Correspondence, November 3Oth, 1818 May I7th,
1819.
CONTENTS. xiii
CHAPTER XII.
PAGE
FIRST VISIT TO ITALY 1 66
Tour in Switzerland and North Italy. Correspondence, August
5th, 1819 July loth, 1820.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE LETTERS TO HENRY BROUGHAM, ESQ., M.P. . 1 94
Correspondence, September aoth, 1820 December i6th, 1820.
Appointment to the Archdeaconry of Derby. Correspondence,
January 1st, 1821 December 3rd, 1821.
CHAPTER XIV.
UNIVERSITY REFORM 2IO
Two Pamphlets signed " Eubulus." Correspondence, January
3Oth, 1822 June i6th, 1822.
CHAPTER XV.
VISIT TO ROME 226
Third Foreign Tour. Correspondence, August I2th, 1822
November 3Oth, 1822. -Praxis on the Latin Prepositions.
CHAPTER XVI.
AN ARDUOUS UNDERTAKING 245
The School Lawsuit. Correspondence, January 4th, 1823 July
3rd, 1823. Kennedy takes the Person Prize whilst still at School.
His Rema/ks upon the Shrewsbury System. Correspondence,
August i;th, 1823 April igth, 1824.
CHAPTER XVII.
CORRESPONDENCE, MAY I3TH, 1824 DECEMBER
1824 . . 265
xiv CONTENTS.
CHAPTER XVIII.
PAGE
CORRESPONDENCE CHARGE LAWSUIT . . . 275
Correspondence, February i8th, 1825 April l8th, 1825.
Extract from a Charge delivered June 22nd and 23rd, 1825, at
Derby and Chesterfield. Correspondence and Progress of the
School Lawsuit, August 28th, 1825 December isth, 1825.
CHAPTER XIX.
CORRESPONDENCE CHARGE CORRESPONDENCE . 293
Correspondence, December (?), 1825 June I5th, 1826. Extracts
from a Charge on the Education of the Poorer Classes delivered at
Derby and Chesterfield, June I5th and i6th, 1826. Correspond-
ence, June 1 6th and I7th, 1826. Vote of Thanks from the
Trustees, October 1826.
CHAPTER XX.
THE CLERICAL SOCIETY 315
Correspondence, September I3th, 1826 February isth, 1827.
Conclusion of the School Lawsuit. Correspondence, April or
May, 1827 December I4th, 1827.
CHAPTER XXI.
CORRESPONDENCE THE " BEEF ROW " FOURTH
FOREIGN TOUR . 340
Correspondence, January 3rd, 1828 March 3(Ao/ia&js, COT? TroXu/ia^s by which is implied that a great
love of learning is necessary to make a man a scholar. But when
was Dr. Butler ^iXo/xa^s ? Not during the many years in which
I slept in the same room with him at Rugby fishing and novel-
and play-reading at that period employing by far the greater
portion of his time. Then how did he get through the business
of his class, or ' form,' as we called it at Rugby ? How were his
exercises composed ? How were his lessons construed and parsed ?
I will tell you how all this was performed. ' Fetch me half a
sheet of paper,' he would say to myself, or to any other boy
much lower in the school than himself, at the hour of awaking
in the morning ; when, taking some novel or play-book from
under his pillow, which he had been reading over-night, and
1790-1 SCHOOLFELLOWS. 1 1
using it as a desk, he would write off the best exercise of the
day, and ' play (i.e. a holiday) for Butler'' would be often heard
throughout the schools. Then his lessons : ' Where is the
place?' he would say to his neighbour, on joining his form ten
minutes before a Greek play was to be read. Perhaps half a
dozen words might be looked out in his lexicon, when the Greek
book would be shut and one more to his mind brought forth
from his pocket. If ' called up,' however, there was no mistake.
Now how this was done is quite beyond my comprehension. I
have once or twice seen a hound distinguish himself greatly the
first day he entered the field; I have observed the intuitive
knowledge some persons have displayed of what is called the run
of a fox Tom Smith of the Craven and the Cheltenham tailor
for examples but never before or since have I heard of this
Butlerian road to knowledge, if such an expression may be
allowed me. . . . That Dr. Butler (having perfected by study
what he may be said to have attained by inspiration) has arrived
at the honours he enjoys, must be grateful to every one who
wishes to see talent and merit rewarded ; and I am happy to
hear that his health is restored, so as to afford the prospect of
lengthened years ; but were his lordship not quite so liberal in
his opinions on some points, he would be more valuable as a
bishop in my eyes."
The substance of the foregoing is repeated without
alteration in an article by the same writer which appeared
in Eraser's Magazine for August 1842 ; but Dr. Butler
being now dead he continued :
" Alas, there are no pictures without shades. Butler was most
unpopular in the school. In fact, partly because he was the
son of a small shopkeeper in the small but beautiful village of
Kenilworth, and at Rugby as a foundation boy, and partly on
account of his churlish temper, we in the same boarding-house
voted him nothing better than a snob, and the meanness
of his personal appearance gave a colour to our proceedings.
Never would he offer to do us a verse or two, or construe us
over ; but he would sit with his elbow on his knee, and his face
resting on one hand and a book in the other, and never open
his mouth. My brother was near him in school, but I seldom
heard them exchange a word ; and it will be remembered a good
deal of the boy appeared in the man. When he first commenced
schoolmaster he thrashed his boys so much as to injure the
school, and nothing but his high literary reputation would have
re-established its good name. He, however, wisely profited by
the hint given him by parents that their children were not to be
1 2 SCHOOL AND COLLEGE. [Cn. II.
made the victims of his spleen. The quern Jupiter odit pedagogum
fecit was at this time verified ; for the Master of Shrewsbury was
then hated as much as he was afterwards liked by the generality
of his pupils, his conduct towards them having undergone a great
change."
The evil that men do does not live after them more
surely than a good deal of evil which they never either did
or wanted to do.
I see that Mr. Apperley has wisely printed
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1792 1797-] SUCCESS AT CAMBRIDGE. 13
earlier part of his college career, so that he was saved
from being seriously pinched by want of money. From
the few notes already referred to as written in 1838, I
find he was elected to the only Rugby exhibition vacant
in 1791, and was thus enabled to enter himself at Oxford.
" By accidental introduction to Dr. Parr," he continues,
" I was removed from Christ Church, Oxford, where a day
had been fixed by my intended tutor (Mr. Smith, after-
wards Dean) for my admission, to St. John's College,
Cambridge a circumstance which I then thought very
hard."
He entered as a sizar, but in January 1792, at the
commencement of his second term, changed his gown.
From Professor Mayor's well-known edition of Baker's
History of St. John's, I find Mr. Butler was Browne
Medallist, Latin Ode 1792-3, and Greek Ode 1794.
He was Craven Scholar 1793, defeating S. T. Coleridge,
Keate, afterwards Head-Master of Eton, and Bethel,
afterwards Bishop of Bangor. He graduated as fourth
senior optime in 1796, and took the first Chancellor's medal
in the same year. He was first Members' Prizeman 1797
and 1798, and was elected Platt Fellow of St. John's,
April 3rd, 1797.
I can find space for only two from among the several
letters written by Dr. James while Mr. Butler was still
an undergraduate :
(Original in Rugby School Library.)
" RUGBY, December loth, 1793.
"DEAR BUTTER, I told you I had bought one hundred
pounds in the 5 per cents stock, such part of which I should
make over for ever to Rugby parish, for the support of this
organ that is, such part of a hundred pounds as the overplus
of the subscription I might raise should amount to. Now I
expect something handsome from Abraham Caldecott in the
East Indies, from whom I cannot yet hear perhaps may not
hear these nine months to come therefore, as I wish to increase
14 SCHOOL AND COLLEGE. [Ca II.
this organ fund as much as I can (finding expenses of singing
books, music books for organist, teaching the charity boys, etc.,
to be now necessary attendants of the organ), I wish to continue
to receive the half-guinea subscription of any new Rugby boy
that may come to the University before next summer. I never
proposed anything to them before ; this is not heavy. I have
now no Library subscription, and you know we have here no
farewell presents ; whereas the Master of Eton, you will find,
by the custom of the place, receives a present of three, five, ten,
twenty, etc., guineas (according to circumstances) from every
boy that leaves his school in the upper part and not being on
the foundation. I have nothing, nor wish anything more than
to leave this little memorial of my mastership. You now see
my views. Any overgrown rich man, as Hopwood, etc., may
give a guinea. I suppose you settled with Mr. W. Hill."
(Original in Rugby School Library.)
" RUGBY, September Jth, 1 794.
" MY DEAR BUTLER, I received your friendly and satisfactory
letter yesterday, on the 6th, though yours was dated on the 3rd.
However, Mr. Ingles was fixed on by the trustees last Thursday
at a previous meeting, and he will be elected master next
Tuesday, the gth. He is an excellent scholar of my own
standing in King's nearly a very good man indeed, and very
fit for the office. He saved very little at Macclesfield, and seems
to me still to pant after glory.
" I received also yesterday your very elegant address to me,
which is as good Latin as can be penned. I am very proud
of it, and I went to dine immediately with Mr. Grimes, and we
both love you exceedingly for the benevolent and kind motive
that led you to collect so many subjects for me in such exact
order; and we both agree that you deserved just as much for
the good heart that conducted you to this work, as for the
good head that produced it.
" Have you chanced to stumble on any verse subjects ?
"Nothing will make me more happy than to see you on
the 1 8th, and we shall have a delightful time together as long
as you can stay.
" I am, my dear Butler, your obliged and affectionate friend,
" T. JAMES.
"Mrs. James's situation will make no difference, nor cause
us inconvenience, in respect of your visit. I thank you."
On January 3th, 1812.]
" DEAR SIR, I am sorry to inform you that on my arrival here
I found Scholefield had just been elected.
" I cannot find out with certainty who were considered second,
but am afraid I was not. Dr. Jowett certainly voted for Price ;
but the rest did not think him even second.
" Three causes contributed principally to my failure : first,
doing two copies of Alcaics ; secondly, all my verse translations
assuming an appearance of paraphrases ; and lastly, the difficulty
they had in reading my compositions, and the want of stops and
capital letters, which seemed a mark of culpable negligence.
" However, though defeated and disappointed, I am not dis-
heartened, and am pursuing a course of reading for the Greek
Ode, of which I hope I have some chance. Price reads eighteen
hours a day, and said before the scholarship was vacant that he
would with pleasure give up the health of all his life, if he could
but get one of these scholarships.
" I had very fine travelling from Shrewsbury hither. Betwixt
Birmingham and Coventry, I apprehended a man who had run
off from a public-house leaving his score unpaid. I spied him
under a holly bush, jumped off the coach, ran him over two or
three large fields, and at last caught him and held him till his
pursuers came up, and then returned to the coach with an honest
conscience as having contributed my mite towards effecting the
ends of justice.
" I staid Sunday at Leicester, where I heard the celebrated
Robinson preach on the very topic I most wished faith and
works, and he said any one who thought any works or any human
performances could have the least effect towards his salvation was
instigated by the devil.
"Towards the close he manifested some strong Calvinistic
symptoms.
" At Leicester on Saturday night I got shaved, and when I gave
the man twopence he thanked me, but as I was going out he ran
after me and said, ' I think, sir, you have made a mistake ; it is
only a penny.' I bade him keep the remainder, on which he
broke out in a fervour of gratitude. I saw a newspaper there for
nothing. The only objection was that it was in a cellar, and all
the time I was shaving there were some blackguard discontented
stocking-weavers abusing the ministry.
" At Birmingham I met with some French officers on parole,
whom I found very instructive and entertaining companions ; at
the same time they were atheists and profligates, possessed of
very little sense of religion or virtue.
" I dined with them and played at billiards. They did nothing
78 INSTALLA TION SERMON LUCIEN BUONAPARTE. [Cn. VI.
but crack their jokes on the waiter, and laugh at him. They were
astonished at seeing him affect the dress and manners of a
gentleman.
" We are here in a turbulent state. On Friday some men who
were drunk knocked up the grass on the grass plots, making
horrible outcries, and on Saturday a party at Downes's broke out
drunk at three in the morning, smashed all the lamps, broke open
Rushworth's door, pulled him out of bed, and fired a pistol.
Another row on Sunday night. Downes is confined to chapel
and gates, but the offenders are of other colleges, chiefly Trinity.
" If you will be kind enough to look over my odes before I
send them in I will send them to you, and shall be very much
obliged if you will solely mark the mediocrities.
" I play moderately at whist, billiards, and ball. Nothing can
be done here without immense reading. Give my very best
respects to Mrs. Butler, the Miss Butlers, and Tom.
" I remain, dear sir, your affectionate pupil,
"M. LAWSON."
To Monk, March 25th, 1812, Dr. Butler writes :
*****
" My fourth volume is dreadfully heavy upon my hands ; the
trouble of fragments, of revising the scholia, of making an index
rerum and an index auctorum to all Stanley's notes, of digesting
the mass of materials into a preface, with a life of yEschylus and
some criticisms on his works the weight of all this oppresses
me, and though I have made and am making some progress with
it, I fear it will not be finished till the year 1815. The Per see is
printed, but my mind sickens under these indexes. I have also
to digest near a thousand references which I have made to
passages in which ^schylus is quoted by the ancient writers, and
ignorance of which was one of the many (Aoer dans les journaux les
articles favorables. II serait bon de faire insurer dans une de
vos gazettes libres 1'article suivant :
" ' Le poeme de Charlemagne, dont. 1'impression e"tait deTendue
sous le regime imperiale, a paru bien imprime" a Paris, mais les
feuilles publiques de Paris refusent d'inse"rer la copie des
journaux anglais favorables a ce poeme et s'empressent de
prodiguer les injures a 1'ouvrage et a 1'auteur. Cette conduite
n'est elle pas encore plus dshonorante pour le pouvoir que le
refus d'imprimer ? Heureuse Angleterre ! il n'y a de lois que
chez toi. II est remarquable que la Henriade a &6 publiee chez
nous pendant la persecution de 1'auteur, et que Charlemagne,
imprime dans les memes circonstances, est accueilli a Londres
comme il le merite et couvert d'injures a Paris ! . . . Mais
quelques feuilles de Paris ne font pas 1'opinion de la France ; et
1'ouvrage et 1'auteur sont au dessus de ces folliculaires esclaves.'
"Re"digez cela comme il vous paraitra convenable. Je vous
embrasserai en Juin : Madame vous dit mille choses.
" Votre t. cher ami et eleve,
"LuciEN BONAPARTE."
To M. CH. BOYER.
[April 10th ?20th ? 1815.]
" M. C., J'ai regu ce matin 1'exemplaire frangais de Charle-
magne.
" Je ne puis pas vous exprimer comment je suis etonne" de ce
que vous venez de m'annoncer a la fin de votre lettre. Si cela
soit vrai, nous ne devons pas compter sur une seconde Edition ni
de 1'original ni de la traduction en Angleterre, tels seront les
preventions de tout le monde centre le Prince de Canino. Pour
moi je ne vois rien de de>aisonable qu'il se soit reconcilie" avec
son frere, mais il faut vous avouer que je suis bien surpris qu'un
homme d une telle grandeur d'ame, apres avoir renonce" aux affaires
1815.] CORRESPONDENCE. 105
publiques, s'y mele encore. Neanmoins je suis bien persuade"
que ses vertus et son me*rite sont beaucoup au dessus de mes
louanges, et je lui conserve une amide" zele"e et tres fidele. Mais
il me sera impossible a dessiller les yeux des prevenus, qui seront
en ce cas, je vous 1'avoue, presque tout le monde ici ; sans doute
je souffrirai moi-meme pour la partie que j'ai pris, mais patience,
je suis anglais, et je ne saurai point abandonner mes amis
lorsqu'ils ne s'abandonnent eux-memes. Re"pe"tez done au Prince,
je vous en prie, mes assurances d'une amitie bien respectueuse et
sincere, et croyez que je suis avec beaucoup d'estime
" Votre, etc.,
" S. BUTLER."
The foregoing of course refers to Prince Lucien
Buonaparte's reconciliation with the Emperor Napoleon.
FROM E. JACKSON, ESQ. (A FORMER PUPIL).
"BURY ST. EDMUNDS, April 2ist, 1815.
*****
"Cambridge now is horribly stupid, not a gown to be seen.
The fever still continues. The only remaining undergraduate at
St. John's had it when I was there on Saturday, and was scarcely
expected to survive. It is also at Trinity, where a few of the men
have been rather rebellious. The other Colleges are without a
tenant, save perhaps one or two port-drinking fellows. Lawson, of
course you know, carries the medal to Magdalene. He probably
will be a Wrangler, since he never passes a day without doing
something considerable in mathematics. The Latin Ode he also
professes to write for, and most probably the Greek, without he
quarrels with that most unfortunate of subjects, the restoration of
Louis. All this I learnt from a letter of his to Ned Hughes.
*****
" The papers for the University Scholarship are not yet, I hear,
looked over. Pennington, a freshman of King's, and Hare, an
old opponent of Lawson's, are the two favourites. Downward
professes to do nothing, but at present reads nearly as much as
any one of his compeers. Irton professes to do nothing and does
nothing. Matthews * is little more than a mad, infatuated
politician ; he reads the papers all day long, to furnish him with
matter of abuse towards the Regent and his Ministers for the
evening. George Yate, an old pupil of yours, is at Queens' the
most staunch, the most devoted, the most inveterate Simeonite in
the University, and S is as great a beast as ever. Here
ends the Shrewsbury catalogue.
* See letter of February igth, 1833, and later letters. ED,
106 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. VIII.
" Of course you have seen the decree which prevents us from
returning to Cambridge till May 2oth. Not anticipating any-
thing of this sort, Hughes and I returned on Thursday. He
remained, but I was compelled to retreat immediately. I am
now in Bury, and have procured very good private lodgings ; if
you know the town, at Winn's, a very gay toyshop in Abbeygate
Street. Hughes, I expect, rejoins me to-morrow. You perceive
we are becoming more and more intimate, and I sincerely hope
we shall continue to do so. Do not be so long before you write
to me again. I promise not to be so tardy an answer in future.
I am afraid, however, Tom Hughes is too great a monopoliser of
your affections. I hope I need not be jealous, but I confess I
fear. Mrs. Butler, I hope, is well ; it is quite a pleasure to me
even to write the name, so many kindnesses have I received from
the original, and so many grateful associations arise from the
remembrance of it. I have very often indeed, with an Euclid or
a Wood before me, detected my truant thoughts revisiting my
old haunts in the school gardens and re-enjoying their old scenes
of happiness. But all the time I lose by such reveries be assured
I lay to your charge. With kind remembrances to all my friends
in Shrewsbury, believe me
" Yours most affectionately,
" E. JACKSON."
FROM THE REV. FRANCIS HODGSON.
"April zyd, 1815.
" I was sick when I heard of Lucien's adherence, and thought
of ' Je te desavoue.' Thank Heaven, mi cartsstme, foolishness of
conduct is not faithlessness of, or to, principle. Oh, what a fall
is here if it be true !
*****
" As to Bonaparte and the Allies ' Three blue beans in one
blue bladder, rattle rattle beans, rattle rattle bladder.' See Lord
C - 's speeches."
The first of these two extracts leaves little doubt that
Lucien had used the words there quoted to his brother.
FROM MARMADUKE LAWSON, ESQ.
(Original destroyed by me. ED.)
"YARMOUTH, May \2th, 1815.
" DEAR SIR, Although my mind at present (as you may
suppose with a man far advanced in Newton) is entirely set on
1 8 1 5 . ] CORRESPONDENCE. 1 07
things above, yet I cannot neglect the less celestial duty of
thanking you for your kind advice, as on other occasions, so
more particularly on this last. As to Newton, I fear I shall never
be under much obligation to him, for any honour I may attain,
though I give him due credit for undeceiving the vanity of those
men who imagined that this little earth, like a great prince, kept
the sun and stars as butler and livery servants, when in fact she
has only one little link-girl, the moon, to show us our way home
on an evening, and she only does half duty. In fluxions, how-
ever, and algebra I have great hopes, though I cannot help
smiling at J. Wood's raptures on the consummate symmetry of
the hyperbola, and of impossible roots which always go, like
partridges, in pairs.
" They made me pay income tax for my scholarship, and much
of the money had been lying at low rate in Mortlock's hands, so
I only got about forty pounds. This, as you would say, is most
Pittiable. Having just received my salary I am bound to speak
well of the author of it, but the name is an insurmountable
obstacle.
" Cambridge will now feel her dependence on the University.
Hudson received for many weeks ten shillingsworth of letters
per day about the fever. Besides scarce any admissions for next
year ; only six in the last six weeks at Trinity, against thirty last
year. Hildyard will have another chance of a Bell. Thirlwall is
the first who ever migrated to a more honourable but less
lucrative scholarship. This is rather singular, as Price and Owen
were Bell's Scholars. Hildyard did some excellent exercises and
was first of all, and some as bad.
" Yarmouth has been ruined by the peace. Shopkeepers say
that no one buys anything but necessaries, and lament the
depression of the farmers, who were the best customers and paid
best while they had the pence. The change in affairs, however,
may do good. I am astonished at reading every day the news-
paper of that day last year. All seems a mockery. Kings
turned out for mere sport, like bag foxes. All trades surfer, but
particularly innkeepers, for no farmers stay to dine as before.
The best trade now seems that of Hangman. The one at York
has just retired after nine years' duty commuted from sheep-
stealing ; he has amassed nine hundred pounds in his professional
capacity, and is to receive the fair hand of a respectable trades-
man's daughter.
" I never ride here the horses are all broken-kneed by young
midshipmen who know nothing about the matter. I expect my
own mare to meet me at Cambridge. I travelled here with a
noted character, Amos Todd of Acton near Bury. He is the
man who wrote his name and abode on a taxed cart in such a
way that he was near being indicted for a libel on Parliament.
He wrote ' A most odd act on a taxed cart,' hereby complying
108 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. VIII.
with the act which requires that every letter of the name and
residence shall be inscribed on the vehicle. He was a very
curious fellow, but abominably mercantile. He wanted to know
what line I was in, and compared Lord Wellington exposing
himself unnecessarily in battle to a grocer who, though im-
mensely rich, will keep coming behind the counter among his
apprentices. ... I am near the church, the only one in Yarmouth,
which contains twenty-five thousand souls. This is indeed for
one man a pretty good cure of souls, which word ' cure ' implies
that they are all diseased, and thus confirms the Church's
doctrine of original sin. I see of course three or four funerals
daily, and about one marriage. Opposite me is an hospital for
seamen, who breakfast at seven, dine at twelve, tea and supper
at seven, and yet I am shocked to say are most impious people ;
and so are all sailors. To prove this, a vessel was lately wrecked
here, all the crew of which would have been saved, but they,
thinking it over, ran to the spirit room, and twelve were found
literally dead drunk I mean they died drunk. Yet if, as the
ancients held, it is dangerous for a pious man to go on board
with impious, we shall have to wait some time before we can
be safe in travelling abroad. Scholefield at Simeon's offended
many of his hearers by telling them this fever was a judgement
on Cambridge for its wickedness.
" My exercises, I hear, were criticised in the Antijacobin, how I
cannot tell ; I did not suppose a work privately circulated would
have been noticed. After all I fear the Vice-Chancellor's bias to
Eton, as he was second master there. Their style is peculiar."
FROM A PARENT (A LADY).
"Midsummer, 1815.
" MY DEAR FRIEND, In consequence of my having omitted to
send to the post on Thursday, I did not receive the unpleasant
intelligence conveyed in your letter till yesterday (Friday evening).
I am truly distressed to hear that Eliab has been concerned in
such a terrible transaction. I sent for him immediately after I
received your letter, and desired him to tell me the truth, which
he did directly, without attempting to conceal any part of his
conduct, and I found he had last week told his brother and
sisters the same account, therefore I have reason to suppose he
has not deceived me. This sad business took place a few weeks
before the vacation. Eliab says V , H , and himself
went to the cellar door, and he believes it was V who
proposed taking the wine, but that he was the first who began
with his knife to cut the spar of the door ; the others helped
him, but finding they could not accomplish their purpose, P
fetched a saw and finished cutting it ; the boys then scrambled
in, and Eliab first got out a bottle which lay within his reach,
i8is-] REJOICINGS AFTER WATERLOO. 1 09
but most of the wine was at a considerable distance from the
door, so H invented a long stick with a hook to it to get it
out. There were very few bottles that any boy could reach
excepting H , who was left-handed, and nearly all the wine
was taken out by him. H told the other boys it never could
be found out. All the boys helped to drink the wine and
rum, and Eliab says they are constantly in the habit of doing
things as bad as this, and therefore they did not think it worse
taking wine than taking other things. He does not know that
more than seven boys went to the cellar, but as he was not
always with them, and they fetched it at different times, he does
not know. Their names are . . . He thinks the latter did not
take any wine, but only helped to saw the door. All the boys
knew of the transaction ; Eliab says he is sure he is not more to
blame than the rest, and that when the windows were broken the
bigger boys ordered the little ones to break them, and, if they
refused, said they would beat them. He says no boy dare tell
of another or the rest would nearly kill him. I believe I have
now told you all he said on this subject, and I know you will
advise me what is best to be done with him. I think his share
in the transaction cannot have proceeded from a propensity to
drinking, for though I offer him wine daily he never will drink
it. If you do not think it right that Eliab should return to
Shrewsbury you will let me know immediately, because I know a
clergyman who takes a few pupils, and who would, to oblige me,
take him, but I shall leave it to you to judge for me what is best
for him. Accept my kind regards, and excuse a letter written in
hurry and agitation."
FROM DR. Du GARD TO DR. BUTLER, WHO WAS AT BARMOUTH
FOR THE HOLIDAYS, re THE REJOICINGS AFTER WATERLOO.
(Original in Shrewsbury Museum.)
"July, 1815.
" DEAR SIR, Your fireworks went off by coach from the Lion
on Monday morning, and Burrey would send the rocket sticks. Our
big days exceed all description. There could not be less than
thirty thousand to forty thousand spectators to see Lord Hill
enter the town. - I conjecture the procession must have reached
two miles foot and horse ; no less than five thousand horses were
in town; stalls and beds were at a great price. The dinner
tickets sold for thirty shillings and upwards, or ten shillings
premium, such was the enthusiasm to dine in the same room with
Lord Hill.
" To drink tea in the Quarry there could not be less than
twenty thousand to twenty-five thousand : immense tin canisters,
capable of holding all your children, were the tea-pots ; seven
110 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. VIII.
hundred pound weight of cake was cut up and distributed in
baskets, with many barrels of ale. Near three thousand people
were dined besides in the public-houses, on good roast mutton,
new potatoes, etc., etc., three pints of ale each and a paper of
tobacco. There were no drunken people about, and all were
satisfied with the dinner. The gentlemen's dinner was good : a
cold collation and hot venison ; turtle and turbot in profusion.
The ball-room crammed so that you could not move till they
divided, and part went below into the dinner-room at the Lion.
There was then a crowded ball in each room and three long sets
of dancers. Every one was delighted with Lord Hill, and his
attentions were universal. In the Quarry he was near being
crushed to death by the press upon him, and he literally ran away
across the field up to Mr. Rocke's garden the people hunting
him like a hare to shake hands with him, or touch the skirt of his
coat ; one poor woman kissed the button on his coat and went away
very much satisfied. The presentation of the box took place on
the terrace at Mr. Rocke's : the Mayor, Aldermen, and Corporation,
with the ladies, formed a crescent, the open part towards an
immense concourse of people in the Quarry below. The applause
on his Lordship's entrance was beyond anything I ever heard, and
his reply to Loxdale's speech on delivering the box was delivered
very gentlemanly and well, but the thing which amused all was
his returning thanks on the top of the wall to the Quarry assembly
(which he did neatly, feelingly, and off-hand) for their support at
the election.* Give my kind regards to all."
From a letter signed J. Sheepshanks, and dated
June 3Oth, 1815, as also from Mr. Hodgson's letter here
given, it is clear that Dr. Butler contemplated applying
for the head-mastership of Leeds Grammar School, then
vacant. I have often heard my father say that Dr. Butler
had fully made up his mind to leave Shrewsbury, but that,
as he was on the point of doing so, the school suddenly
filled in 1816, after which date the only difficulty was that
of finding accommodation.
FROM THE REV. FRANCIS HODGSON.
" BRADDEN, July 2T,rd, 1815.
" MY DEAR FRIEND, In the most rapid haste I write to ask
you what this means ? Out of Herefordshire I hear that you are
* Lord Hill was M.P. for Shrewsbury till he was raised to the
Peerage in 1814. Ep.
1815.] MR. TILLBROOK. Ill
about to leave Shrewsbury, and for Yorkshire. Of course this
means for Leeds School, of which I thought and have ever
regretted not being a candidate. For heaven's sake, if so,
remember me, and let me step into your shoes at Shrewsbury,
or turn out that horrid what's his name, and associate me with
you there. Sir, ' the Hotspur and the Douglas ' (I cannot help
this gross vanity; for heaven's sake again, forgive it) would be
' confident against the world in arms.'
" Never more affectionately, more seriously, more rapidly, or
more foolishly,
" Yours,
" FRANCIS HODGSON.
" Pray write by return of post without fail.
" Of course I shall be secret on the Herefordshire report, which
perhaps after all is most absurd. Heaven help you."
Mr. Tillbrook, many of whose letters will be given in
due order of date, must have been a great letter-writer, but
it is to be feared that no other series of letters from his
pen has been preserved save those now in the British
Museum among Dr. Butler's papers. Of all Dr. Butler's
friends there was none to whom he was more cordially
attached, and I can hardly doubt that, if asked who was
the most fascinating companion, who, if I may say so, the
most Shakespearian man whose path had ever crossed his
own, he would have at once named Mr. Tillbrook. By
the kindness of his son Major Philip Tillbrook, I am able
to furnish the following brief outline of his life. He was
born at Bury St. Edmunds, April i6th, 1784, and educated
at the free school in that town. He went thence to
Cambridge, where he entered at Peterhouse, of which
College he became both Tutor and Bursar. In May 1829
he was presente"d to the College living of Freckenham ; on
December i$th in the same year he married Frances,
daughter of the late John Ayling, Esq., of Tillington in the
county of Sussex, by whom he had two sons, Major Philip
Tillbrook, Standard-Bearer of Her Majesty's Body Guard,
the Rev. William John Tillbrook of Strath-Tay Parsonage,
I 1 2 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. VIII.
Perthshire, and one daughter, Mrs. Frederick Inman of
Bath. He died on May 2Oth, 1835.
The only work catalogued under his name at the
British Museum is Historical and Critical Remarks upon
the Modern Hexametrists, and upon Mr. Southey's Vision
of Judgement (Cambridge, 1822). It consists of eighty-four
pages, that abound with quaint and elegant scholarship.
He appears to have been a universal favourite at Cambridge.
" I have not yet seen old Tillbrook," says one correspondent,
" but we shall ere long have a laugh together ; he is a queer
old rogue ; he limps like Vulcan, and raises inextinguish-
able laughter among the immortals. His hair has fallen
off and bared his open front, which shines like Hesperus.
. . . He never sees me without uttering imprecations on
my head for defrauding him of a beefsteak which he says I
have long promised him."
FROM THE REV. S. TILLBROOK.
"PETERHOUSE COLLEGE, February ^th, 1816.
" MY DEAR DOCTOR, All the parties concerned in the future
prospects of young A feel infinitely obliged to you for the
very kind manner in which you have listened to our petition.
" But unless your good rules, like those of grammar, admit
of occasional exceptions, our labour is poured out in vain, and
our longing young protege will never drink at the fountains of
Helicon. Alas ! he is more than sixteen, for his birthday fell
the 1 2th of last September; nevertheless he is less than sixteen
in stature indeed he is not equal to the common race of fourteen-
or fifteen-year-olds. It is reckoned a pleasant thing to kill Time ;
dare you not for once become a tempicide ? Though neither you
nor I have any right to break Priscian's pate, or to transgress the
laws of the land, yet for once we may crack the hour-glass of our
old enemy, and transgress laws of our own enacting. If this
were not so, self-lawgivers would furnish fetters and manacles for
themselves, and stand in perilous similitude of certain folks alluded
to by Master Ovid's speaking nut-tree.
" Let me then beseech you by all the endearing ties of hie
h Do you remember his exclamation ? Vide
Nursery Stories, Vol. I., p. 20 : ' Fi, fo, fum, I smell the blood
of an Englishman.' Now could you not as a mythologist and
Grecian undertake to prove that this said giant was one of the
Titans, and therefore might be Prometheus, who, according to
the comparative testimony of historians, may be anybody ? Again,
in the exclamation ' Fi, fo, fum,' you might trace the use of the
digamma. Is not this succession of syllables as pleasant as
ea la la or TTO. TTO. TTOL, or any other of choric systems ? ' Heigho ! '
1 26 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. IX.
is certainly a corruption of iw, and why should not Fi, fo, fum be
something else ? Accept my challenge to produce more nonsense
in a page than I have done in this, and you may expect a better
supply than this soon, for I am reading the Latin Facetice Laus
Asini, Laus Stultitice, etc.
" Your most devoted friend,
"S. T."
FROM THE REV. T. S. HUGHES.
(Original in University Library, Cambridge. ED.)
"March iSt/t, 1817.
* * * * *
"The Fellows of Trinity are all like a hive of bees when a
wasp has got in among them. Old Saint Ramsden holds the
living of Chesterton and requires them to present him to one of
the best in their gift, without his vacating the former. This they
are unwilling to do, so he has thrown them into the visitors' hands,
and from certain circumstances will probably gain his point.
You must know that Chesterton fell when Mansell was made
Bishop, and so may, for that presentation, be considered a Crown
living."
FROM DR. BURNEY.
"RECTORY HOUSE, DEPTFORD, April i$th, 1817.
" MY DEAR DR. BUTLER, Do not suppose me insensible to
your great and continued kindness; I was unwilling to return
thanks till I had found time to look over your volume, and well
and amply have I been repaid for my delay.
" Your work has been long and laborious, and I congratulate
you very heartily on your arrival at its termination. When I
consider, indeed, the length of your task, and the difficulties by
which you were chained down, independently of your ^Eschylean
difficulties, I cannot but think that the time you have devoted to
this author has been well spent, and has been crowned with
success.
"When your fourth volume arrived from Mr. Evans, I was
fighting against or bearing with an attack of the gout. After its
leisurely departure I was obliged to give my time and thoughts to
various occupations which I had neglected during my illness. It
was not till Easter approached that I could fairly buckle on my
armour, and attack my friendly foe friendly, indeed, I may term
him, for never was a lance broken with so little hostility.
" As for my Tentamen, allow me to advise you not to waste
many lines on it ; it was merely an experiment to see how far the
generality of choruses might be reduced to antispastics, but by
1817.] CORRESPONDENCE.
no means as presenting a system for others to follow. During
its printing, I must observe, I was troubled with a complaint in
my eyes which then left a variety of blunders in the printing,
and particularly in the longs and shorts, on some of which the
critics, hie et illic, have lavished a few loose shots.
" When I am to have the pleasure of seeing you I know not,
but whenever fortune may be so much in good-humour as to
indulge me, I shall exclaim, ' Numero meliore lapillo.' "
FROM THE REV. S. TILLBROOK.
"CAMBRIDGE, April 2isf, 1817.
" DEAR DOCTOR, Do not imagine that you are to offend my
sympathies and associations and to caricature Ivy Cottage by
an uncouth hieroglyphical libel with impunity ; horribili sectare
flagello says one of the Greek poets, so take care of yourself,
Doctor Birch ! Flumina amo sylvasque, and alder-trees and banks
and other picturesque objects, and pray don't you? As to your
questions I respond as followeth.
"Black ingratitude in one pupil and desertion in three more have
left me ^"140 poorer than I expected to be at this time last year.
I am glad that better feelings have left you ^300 richer. Audaces
Fortuna juvat ; but I being a meek-spirited, modest man, clothed
with the sevenfold surtout of pride, obstinacy, and indomitable
independence, am slighted, and always have been by that fickle
rotatory Goddess. Sans interest, sans patron, sans everything
that makes a man no-man, I left my cradle to swagger through
the wilderness of life, gathering crab-apples by the way, and
munching them on the thorn-stuffed stool of repentance. But
not to depress your tender heart, which I am happy to find was
only cracked, not broken (and therefore, like ice, will bear the
better till it thaws), I will be silent on my own woes.
" I should like much to pass through Shrewsbury on my way to
the north I suppose you will be at home till June 2oth ? If I
come, I will approach like Apollo, cum cithara carminibusque. I
will be a Tibicen. Oh for the liberty of the mountain boy, the
frisky mutton of the fields, the roving tyrant of the seas, or any
other poetical type of freedom !
" My dog Pepper is as playful as a piper so much so that I
am inclined to think (being a disciple of Pythagoras) he formerly
filled that station in some of the Roman palaces. He greets your
dog, the noble Rolla to wit. He has rendered the College great
service by clearing the buttery and kitchen of rats. I have
thought of turning him into the House of Commons soon, where
he would play the very devil. The other day he went with me
to the public library in search of dog-Latin, which he found in
great abundance ; when the librarian entered Pepper set up a
128 CORRESPONDENCE. [CH. IX.
barking, and treated some of the ancient authors with great
contempt. . . .
" Farewell, amico stimatissimo ; commend me to your good and
kind household. . . .
"P.S. Young A -- 's progress is very pleasant for all the
parties therein concerned.
" Two days ago I was seanced by one of the philosophers of
the Spurzheim and Gall school ; what, think you, were the lead-
ing characteristics of my thick skull ? Pride and obstinacy, organs
full and distinct wit and imagination superabundant benevo-
lence unlimited poverty undeserved friendship strong and last-
ing of morality and religion a smattering of true scholarship a
vacuum of nonsense a plenty
FROM THE REV. S. TILLBROOK.
"CAMBRIDGE, May 2$tfi, 1817.
" Do you know what has befallen St. Peter's old house ? Who
could believe it ? An unknown person has given to the Master
and Fellows of this college no less a sum than ^20,000. Ah !
twenty thousand pounds sterling ! And down upon the nail.
The history of this affair is veiled in as much mystery as the
Eleusinian rites were ; all I know is that I began the adventure
at the risk of being made a fool of and of losing my expenses
to town, but I will give you an outline of the business.
" Ten days ago our Master received an anonymous letter, the
contents of which appeared partly like an extract from a will and
partly like a copy of instructions from a secret agent. The paper
began thus :
" ' I give and bequeath to etc., etc., and their successors the sum
of to found scholarships and fellowships, without preference
to school or county. . . . The residue of my bequest, i.e. the
annual income from such residue, I give to the Master and
Fellows for their full and entire disposal,' etc.
" On the other side of the paper was this : ' Provided the
College accept this offer a handsome present will be made to it,
but the name of the donor must not be inquired into, and an
agent must be sent to receive the money.'
" This was treated by all except Smyth and myself as a hoax.
The Master did not answer the letter. I requested him to allow
me. He did so. I wrote a rara epistola, threatening vengeance
upon the pate of any one who dared to quiz the Petersians. This
brought a reply stating that there was no hoax, that if any one
would take the trouble of a visit to town he would be referred to
a most respectable agent, and the money would be paid if the
letters were shown as credentials. No one but myself would
stir, and I was called a fool for my pains, but ever obstinate as
a brute, off I went inquired for the reference offered found
1 8 1 7-] CORRESPONDENCE. 1 29
parties highly respectable agent told me that he had the money
and would pay it to the College Bursar. I sent off for the Master
from Cambridge, and for Veasey from Bath. Bridge was in town.
In two days the regulations were drawn up to found four scholar-
ships of ^50 a year each, to be held till M.A. degree; also two
fellowships of ^125 a year, each to be vacated by marriage or
preferment, or by any permanent income above ^250 per
annum the residuary interest at the full and entire disposal of
Master and Fellows for ever. Two days after this the money was
paid, and now stands in bank stock in the name of the Master
and Fellows of Peterhouse ! Thus ended my adventure, and thus
commences a new era in the prosperity of our most antient
foundation. . . .
" P.S. Hughes is as unsettled as a pauper with a pass. He
knows not what to do or where to go. He ought to be shut
up in your school library and flogged till he had finished his
Travels."
The buildings which were paid for with part of this
curious bequest bear the initials of the Master, F. B., and of
Mr. Tillbrook, S. T. These may yet be seen. The donor
I find from Gunning's Reminiscences proved afterwards to
be the Rev. Francis Gisborne, formerly a fellow of Peter-
house.
FROM THE SAME.
" CAMBRIDGE, June $th, 1817.
" Mine Hostess of the Garter when she respondeth to Sir John
Falstaff doth not use the saying of ' Tilley Valley, Sir John,'
but she sayeth ' Filley Falley.' But you ask me for the etymo-
logy. I will endeavour to make it out, for I am not deep in
letters, yet am I ingenious or inventive, wherefore I say that
mine hostess lispeth and from ' Fiddle Faddle ' has arrived at
' Filley Falley.' Theobald, nor Steevens, nor Johnson, could
have derived this better, and I contend that, in future editions,
instead of ' Tilley Valley ' it be said ' Filley Falley,' and that
a note be appended showing how easily T and F are mistaken
in either Roman or Italian characters.
" Your friend Dr. Parr has been here. I met him at Em-
manuel, and was introduced to him as your friend by T. Hughes.
The old boy shook me by the hand, and then again for your
sake, and mentioned you in such laudatory terms that you must
have blushed had you been present. I smoked five pipes and
VOL. I. O
1 30 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. IX.
played three rubbers with him, and a cheerful day we had but
I should prefer a trio of the three Sams.
" I wish you were here to-day ; we have a feast, a symposium
in honour of our noble friend Ignoramus. I believe his bounty
will not stop at the ^20,000. There is a talk now of his buying
livings for his fellowships. I wish I could come within reach of
him. I would try and angle out of him a few of his golden fish,
to furnish Ivy Cottage with.
" What stay do you make at Barmouth ? I suppose one may
trace you by Greek inscriptions, mottoes, etc., on windows, the
bark of trees, on the sands and elsewhere. I am reading your
notes on ^Eschylus with more pleasure than you can imagine.
' I can construe but do not entirely see the construction of the
following passage, in a chorus in the Seven Chiefs : Apa/covras
u>s TIS TKva>i> {iTrepSeSoiKe Xe^ewv Svcrcwaropas Travrpo/Lio? TreXctas.
Now' [word for word, and expletive for expletive] 'what a
d d lot of genitive cases are here gotten together ! ' I have
quoted the above from one of my pupils."
FROM BARON MERIAN.
"PARIS, June loth, 1817.
" DEAR SIR, Item, a remarkable instance of book-learning :
Johnson did not know what a rake is, and had recourse to the
Edda instead of asking his farmer ! See his first note to Corio-
lanus, and his islandic dog. This puts me in mind of a cele-
brated professor who used to quote Aristotle in testimony of a
most hazardous assertion, viz. that hens lay eggs. Not long ago
I read as follows : Ha-mrd^ova-iv. Note, ' Solebant enim veterum,
scias, pueruli patrem invocantes voce quadam uti quae pappa
sonum referebat.'
" There's another doctification in the notes to Coriolanus,
about ' quarry.' Why, ' quarry ' is nothing in the world but curee.
I am surprised that your commentators titubate about such
common things.
" Steevens is very often evidently in the wrong. He may be
a very learned man; non moror ; but as for judgement, he has
none or little. I venture to say that he does not understand
Shakespeare, whose immortal flights are at least sixty thousand
stadia above Steevens' capacity. The commentator of a poet,
dear sir, needs to be a bit of a poet; atqui ergo ... I don't
know who wrote the note on Brutus' speech ' He is grown too
proud to be so valiant.' That note is wrong too ; Brutus says
Coriolanus's pride is excessive, on account of his being or because
he feels himself so valiant. See the answer of Sicinius.
" You ought to draw your sword, my dear friend, and not
suffer such inexactnesses to pass. Better no explanations than
false ones. Remember the Byzantines, and let not the glorious
1 8 1 7.] CORRESPONDENCE. I 3 I
flames of your unrivalled bard be drowned in the sentina of
muddy commentation.
" Now I stay for your commands concerning the books ; if you
would give me leave I would present ^Eschylus to the Emperor. . . .
" P.S. I am now reading again Shakespeare, and shall send
you, if you think it worth the while, a few remarks.
" Set some of your boys about S/avica. Believe me that there
is no complete linguistica unless a man be able to compare those
three large rivers, issuing most likely from one source ; viz. the
river German, comprehending English, Danish, and the river
Slavon, comprising Russian, Bohemian, Polish, etc., and the river
Welsh (Galica pars), comprehending Latin, French, Spanish, etc.
Thousands of Indian and Persian words are German. What
Englishman knows what ' bale ' is (Coriol., I.) ? The Russian will
tell you presently it is pain, suffering, evil. And so in innumer-
able instances.
" Ohe, jam satis esf, et plus quam satis. It is an odd thing in
me to fight with Englishmen about their language. But you will
excuse me, if you consider my great veneration for, and conse-
quently application to, your immortal poet, and that I speak not
from a vain notion of understanding English better, but from a
consciousness of knowing German and French perfectly, unto
which then your English resembled much more than now. So
you find in Ariel's song a burden which is by no means an onus,
but a true French bourdon.
*****
" As Cato cried ' Carthago delenda,' so I cry ' Slavica discenda ' !
Do select one or two of your pupils for that purpose. I am
confident the event and fruit will astonish. Take a tripod, knock
off one leg ; there's our linguistic without Slav. We are and shall
be out, and lame, and purblind, in ninety-nine thousand gram-
matical questions, as long as we remain ignorant of that third
essence, sure indeed quite as essential as the other two. Your
own opinion confirms this. I think it possible to get up to the
very elements of language ; general construction or articulation is
evidentest in Greek : aw, Iw, iw, oa>, v, /Sew,
/3iw, /3cxo, /?u'w (all verbs), and so on."
To BARON MERIAN.
"June 30/A, 1817.
" First to business, my dear Baron, and then to criticism. You
will greatly oblige me by retaining the English books, which you
can so perfectly understand and enjoy, for your own use. I
should feel proud indeed if you would undertake to present the
^Eschylus for me to your magnanimous Emperor. Dare I venture
a simple Latin inscription, without adulatory epithets and
132 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. IX.
flourishing superlatives ? If so, and if you approve of it, get
some plume (for to write the following in the first leaf :
ALEXANDRO
RUSSORUM IMPERATORI
MAGNAXIMO INVICTO CLEMENTI
LIBERTATIS EUROP^E.E ADSERTORI AC VINDICI
LITERARUM ATQUE ARTIUM HUMANIORUM
FAUTORI ATQUE PATRONO
RKGIIS OMNIBUS VIRTUTIBUS UBERRIME ORNATO
..ESCHYLUM POETAM NOBILEM
CIVEM BONUM MILITEM HAUD INSTRENUUM
OMNI OBSERVANTIA ATQUE OBSEQUIO COMMENDAT
SAMUEL BUTLER S.T.P.
REGIME SCHOL^E SALOPIENSIS APUD BRITANNOS ARCHIDIDASCALUS.
A.S. MDCCCXVII.
You may add before the day of the year, if you like, the day of
the month upon which your Emperor for the second time
entered Paris.
" I am not sure whether I sent you my Installation Sermon
preached at Cambridge before H.R.H. the Duke of Gloucester,
our Chancellor. If I did not, tell me in your next.
" Now for criticism. You are, I perceive, a better English
scholar than the generality of my countrymen, and your observa-
tions upon the commentators are very just ; but we laugh at
them here too. Of all editions of Shakespeare, Pope's is the
worst. Theobald's, whom Pope attacks so severely in the
Dunciad, is very superior to it, and is indeed a respectable edi-
tion. Johnson frequently misunderstood Shakespeare. Steevens
was far better versed in the ancient lore and contemporary writers
of the Elizabethan age, but you justly appreciate him. Malone's
is much the best single edition, but is now very difficult to obtain,
and there are some good recent variorum editions, one of which
you found in the chest. The preface to Shakespeare by Johnson
is inimitable. About ' quarry ' you are clearly right. Your explana-
tion of ' He's grown too proud,' etc., is certainly quite right. It
is curious that a great many Persian words are English, but they
come, I suspect, through the German. Welsh is nearly all Hebrew
and Greek, but the names for all the conveniences and luxuries
of life are not Welsh ; they are Celtic, or English celtified.
This is curious, and at once shows the antiquity of the language
and the barbarism of the people."
CHAPTER X.
THE FORTUNATE YOUTH HUGHES'S INSCRIPTIONS.
The Fortunate Youth. Correspondence on this Subject, October
29th, 1817 December 24th, 1817. Correspondence, October 3ist,
1817 June gth, 1818, with Review of Person's Adversaria. Paper
on some Greek Inscriptions that appear in Hughes's Travels in
Sicily, etc.
WITH regard to the extraordinary imposture referred
to in the heading of this chapter, I would say
what I can in extenuation of the offender, and in explana-
tion of the gullibility of the public.
It appears from a letter written by Mr. Cawston, senior,
August 5th, 1817, that his son, the so-called Fortunate
Youth, had been desperately ill for some weeks during July,
and at the beginning of August he was still unable to
go back to school. This illness, which I suppose we ought
to accept as genuine, may have affected his brain. I have
made inquiries about him from those who remember him,
and have found he was generally liked, while the tenor
of whatever few allusions to him I have found among the
letters of Mr. Sheepshanks and other schoolfellows is
kindly. The Rev. F. E. Gretton, in his Memory's
Harkback* says -of him :
" He was a big boy when I was a little one, was among the
senior lads, and held his own in point of scholarship.t He was
* Richard Bentley, 1889, p. 31.
f In a letter to Dr. Butler dated April 25th, 1826, Cawston gives his
place in the school as third, Frank Matthews being head boy, and
Andrew Lawson second.
133
134 THE FORTUNATE YOUTH. [CH. X.
a good-natured easy-going fellow, much given to sham out of
school, that he might devour novels and romances and fruit. He
called himself Augustus C , but it oozed out that his real
name was Abraham ; but woe betide us small boys if we ventured
so to address him ! "
As for the credulity of the public, it must be remembered
that a very few months previously every one had believed
that Mr. Tillbrook was being hoaxed but Peterhouse got
the 20,000 and the laugh had gone against the incredulous,
who accordingly resolved not to be sceptical next time,
hoax or no hoax. The idea, moreover, of a young man
of prepossessing manners coming unexpectedly into an
enormous fortune is one that appeals readily to those who
lead the public on domestic matters more surely than
any others can do I mean mothers with marriageable
daughters. Nine mothers out of ten will swallow with
avidity any romantic story about a lad of eighteen, which
they would not even listen to about an elderly married
man with a wife and a family of grown-up children.
Wildly improbable again as Cawston's story was, it was
hardly more improbable than that a well-conducted,
popular, and promising boy of eighteen should have the
technical skill to fabricate, and the effrontery to propound
and persist for many weeks in, such an astounding false-
hood. Lastly, an uncle, by instantly accepting the boy's
tale and placing ; 1,200 at his disposal, gave him money
enough to fling about in the eyes of the public, and make
it clear that he had a considerable sum actually in hand.
Cawston was no longer at Shrewsbury, and Dr. Butler
had no responsibility in connection with him, but when
the story reached him as a matter of common report he
accepted it. No doubt he was set off his guard, by having
already found Cawston in possession of more money than
a boy commonly has. I find from a letter of December
2 1st, 1817, which will follow in order of date, that Dr.
i8i7.] THE GENERAL CREDULITY EXPLAINED. 135
Butler had more than once remonstrated with the boy's
father about the quantity of money he appeared able
to command. This is confirmed by the account of
Cavvston given in Gunning's Reminiscences, Vol. II., p. 305.*
Mr. Gunning writes :
" When at a subsequent period Dr. Butler was writing to the
young man's father, and expressing his entire satisfaction at the
progress and general good conduct of his son, he also remarked
that being allowed so much for pocket money might eventually
be injurious to him, for that when he had asked one of his
scholars a few days previously, to procure him change for a
^10 note, young Cawston had offered to change it for him;
besides which he had learned on inquiry that he always had
abundance of money."
From the Hon. H. G. Bennet's letter of November (?), 1817,
it seems that the incident above recorded occurred some
time previously to Cawston's leaving school, and it was
most probably the occasion that led Dr. Butler to send all
parents his circular of May 3rd, 1816, in regard to the
pocket money they should allow their sons. It must be
remembered also that the imposture was not set on foot
till after Cawston had left Dr. Butler's care. Had he gone
back to Shrewsbury after his illness at Edinburgh he
would (as he probably very well knew) have been cross-
questioned and detected at once ; as it was Dr. Butler
never saw him after June 1817.
Mr. Gunning's account of Cawston is as follows :
" His story was that on his return to school after the previous
vacation he had met with an old man in the stage coach ; that
they had had mtich conversation, but as they had upon most
points differed so much in opinion, they seemed to part with no
friendly feeling for one another. He further stated that, soon
after he was settled at school, he had received a note from
his travelling companion (who was residing in the neighbour-
hood) requesting he would call upon him ; that he had found
him living in very humble style, but that he had told him
* London, George Bell, and Cambridge, Charles Wootton, 1854.
136 THE FORTUNATE YOUTH. [Cn. X.
he was possessed of enormous wealth, and had been for many
years looking out for some person to make his heir ; and he
further added that he had been so much pleased with the spirited
and independent manner in which young Cawstonhad maintained
his opinions as to become desirous of a more intimate acquaint-
ance with him. The old man then gave him a general invitation
to his house ; but he had requested their interviews should for
a time remain private. When paying him a subsequent visit he
found his patron very ill, and believing that he should not recover
he had made him a deed of gift of his whole fortune, with an
earnest request that it should not be divulged to any person till
the following January, as in the early part of 1818, he said, there
would be no further occasion for secrecy. Soon after this the
old man died, he said.
" The Fortunate Youth (for by that title after a time he became
everywhere known) expressed a desire that his good fortune
should not be generally mentioned, as he had given a solemn
promise that the iron chest in which the deed of gift had been
deposited, as also many other important documents, should not
be opened until the period stated, nor was he at liberty to divulge
where his eccentric old patron had deposited it. He, however,
expressed a desire to his father that he should lose no time in
making him and his family independent ; and that he wished
to state his views to Mr. Weatherley, a solicitor at Newmarket,
of great eminence, and who was closely connected with all the
nobility and gentry resident in that neighbourhood.
"So clear did the young man's statement appear, that although
the circumstances seemed very mysterious, Mr. Weatherley did
not doubt the fact, and in all his intentions his client seemed to
be guided by the most disinterested feelings. Mr. Weatherley
took directions for his will and agreed to be his executor.
" There is no doubt but that the want of ready money would
have puzzled this young impostor, had not an uncle requested
him to make use of twelve hundred pounds, which he said was
lying in his banker's hands at Bury.
" He entered his brother a Fellow Commoner at Emmanuel,
stating at the time that his reason for deciding on that college
was that the Master's wife (Mrs. Cory) was sister to Mrs. Butler
of Shrewsbury, by whom he had been most kindly treated.
*****
" I was afterwards informed by the Master of Emmanuel that
young Cawston had accompanied his brother to Cambridge ; that
he had been extremely pleased with his manner and address, and
that he seemed to have much general knowledge and was a
great connoisseur in paintings. When looking at the Fitzwilliam
paintings, he remarked that some of them were pretty good, but
that he had a far more valuable collection at his palace in Spain.
Dr. Procter also told me that when Weatherley was asked one
i8iy.] GUNNING'S ACCOUNT OF CAWSTON. 137
day whether his client's rent-roll equalled that of the Duke of
Rutland, his reply was that he had more than double the amount.
" Weatherley was instructed to be on the look out for a house
calculated for a nobleman's residence ; and his client also
expressed his intention of purchasing such boroughs as offered
themselves, his opinion being that the possession of parliamentary
influence was the sure road to honour and distinction in this
country.
" Among other statements, he said that the Empress of Russia
was indebted to his benefactor one hundred thousand pounds,
and that she paid annually six thousand pounds interest ; that on
the King of Spain he had immense claims ; that his most valuable
estates were in that country, but that he had also property in
Germany and Italy. To give an air of truth to these incredible
statements, he said that his mysterious benefactor had been a
diamond merchant.
"Nothing could exceed the romance of his story, nor the
ingenious stratagems he devised to keep up the delusion.
Tradesmen of all classes solicited the honour of serving him.
This perhaps is not so much to be wondered at, but that bankers
should contend for his account is rather a startling fact.
" Mr. Weatherley suggested that the first thing requisite to be
done was to make him a ward of the Court of Chancery, for
which purpose two very eminent lawyers were employed ; he also
recommended that a treaty should be entered into for the
purchase of Houghton Hall, in the County of Norfolk, which had
been for some time in the market, and would be a very suitable
residence for him when he came into possession of his wealth.
" Upon one occasion a draft to a large amount was picked up ;
when it was restored to him he affected great vexation at his
carelessness, saying it was so very material that his money trans-
actions should he kept as secret as possible. He was frequently
heard to express a hope that he should never become so
avaricious as his benefactor must have been. He further applied
to Government to take and bear the arms of Devereux ; and the
Heralds' College was actually waiting for information as to what
branch of the house of Devereux his patron belonged, when the
bubble burst and he fell a sacrifice to his apparent security.
" Dining with his friends one day, he spoke of the expected
arrival of some Sicilian wines from his estates at Mount Etna.
When they arrived he requested a few gentlemen to dine with
him, that they might give their opinion as to which quality it
would be most advisable to encourage ; he also talked much
when they met on the advantages that would be derived from
the improved cultivation of the Sicilian grape. On one of the
bottles being opened a gentleman strongly suspected he saw a
familiar name of a London wine-merchant on the cork, which
he managed to get into his possession. He then wrote to the
138 THE FORTUNATE YOUTH. [Cn. X.
wine-merchant respecting his dealings with young Cawston, and
received for answer that his son-in-law, who had been employed
for many years in the Sicilian vintage, had written to Mr.
Cawston strongly recommending a trial of his excellent Sicilian
wines, and that a supply had accordingly been sent him.
" Eyes that had so long been closed now began to open. The
papers teemed with suspicions, and in a few days a caution was
inserted against the fortunate youth, who was spoken of as an
impostor."
The Morning Chronicle of December I ith, 1817, seems to
have given the first public expression of distrust. This
was replied to in a Cambridge paper of the following day,
in a manner that shows Cawston to have still had warm
defenders.
" The delusion," continues Mr. Gunning, " lasted between two
and three months, at the sacrifice of about sixteen hundred pounds.
It was very evident that Cawston's object could not have been
altogether for pecuniary gain, for he might have availed himself
of thousands that were offered him. His repeated refusal and
his expressed desire not to launch into any heavy expenditure
previous to taking possession of his countless wealth, which,
according to his statement, was on a near approach, encouraged
the cheat."
Mr. Gunning concludes by saying :
" The deceptions practised on his family were very cruel and
must have been deeply felt. A gentleman conversing with a
farmer who resided in Mr. Cawston's neighbourhood, asked him
whether the disappointment, added to his son's misconduct, had
not materially altered him ; to which he replied that to him the
only perceptible change was, his taking his brandy and water
stronger than he had before accustomed himself to."
CORRESPONDENCE ABOUT THE FORTUNATE YOUTH,
OCTOBER 29TH, 1817 DECEMBER 24., 1817.
FROM THE REV. T. S. HUGHES.
"CAMBRIDGE, October 2gth, 1817.
" MY DEAR FRIEND, Old Till talks much of the nodes cozn&gue
deum of Shrewsbury. I hope this wonderfully fortunate boy will
think of you, his old and good master, in his strange and good
i8i7.] CAWSTOWS LETTER TO DR. BUTLER. 139
fortune. What an extraordinary incident ! I never heard of that
rich old man in Shrewsbury, and it seems no one else ever did.
What a fool and an ass to leave such a mint of money to one boy !
Why did he not augment the revenues of Shrewsbury School with
a part, or found at least a hundred almshouses ? "
FROM MR. ABRAHAM CAWSTON.
(From a copy in the handwriting of Mrs. Butler.)
" CHIPPENHAM, October $ist, 1817.
" MY DEAR SIR, A daily expectation of visiting Shrewsbury
on business with a mortgage of mine in the neighbourhood has
alone prevented my giving you the earliest intelligence of an
event 'in which your constant kindness warrants that you would
take due interest. In fact I have some thoughts of purchasing
an estate near Shrewsbury, as one has been offered on what my
lawyer considers highly advantageous terms. The newspaper
reports are equally destitute of foundation, truth, and probability.
The real fact has not yet transpired, beyond the lawyers, etc., and
my own immediate family, the full explanation of which I leave
for a personal conference. My foreign property is immense, and
my English very considerably above even that arrant jade Report,
who for once is under par. My unfunded English property
amounted to more than half a million at my friend's death, besides
innumerable mortgages, etc. Perhaps my inconsiderate and
volatile conduct when under your charge will admit of some
palliation from the consideration that this enormous fortune has
been hanging, like the fruit of Tantalus, at my very lips for
upwards of two years, though compelled by interest and honour
to conceal my expectations.
" Every one knows the nature of a rich man's promise. Had I
been disappointed, in case of a premature disclosure, what excuse
could I possibly have offered to the public ? How could I have
indemnified my friends for raising false hopes which must have
inevitably ended in their ruin. Conceive, sir, the weight of con-
cealment upon a young mind ardent and impetuous, and perhaps
you will not be so much surprised at my having plunged myself
into dissipatio"h, as the only refuge from thought and anxiety.
Hence that vacillating turn of mind, that false pride, that
indecision of conduct, which I fear too much distinguished me at
Shrewsbury. I am thus anxious to palliate my conduct because I
covet your esteem and regard more than that of any man breathing.
This from me is no flattery or blarney, but the genuine tribute of
attachment and respect. I have laid the whole circumstances
before you. I shall leave it to your judgement whether I might
or ought not to go abroad in a few months. At the same time
140 THE FORTUNATE YOUTH. [Cn. X.
I wish to consult you on two or three points upon which the
direction of my future life entirely depends. With feelings of the
deepest gratitude and respect, believe me ever your most sincere
and attached pupil, " ABM. CAWSTON.
" I do not mean it as a compliment when I entreat you to use
my means and interest to the utmost, if anything in which I can
possibly be serviceable occurs. You know me too well to be
offended at my begging that in case any sum of money would be
at all at any time convenient, no other person may be consulted
but myself. I shall be happy to furnish you with it at a day's
warning to any amount, and in fact shall by no means leave
England comfortably unless you allow me to show my gratitude
for my past favour in a manner adequate to my present situation.
Present my respects to Mrs. and Miss Butler. May I take the
liberty to request you will tell Andrew Lawson I shall, if in health,
see him soon, and also Leicester.
" Dr. and Mrs. Cory, etc., were this morning in perfect health.
I have a Hanoverian residing with me, who undertakes to teach
me Spanish, French, and German without any other assistance.
He also professes to be a correct classical scholar."
FROM THE HON. H. G. BENNET.
[UPPER GROSVENOR STREET. Letter not dated, probably
November, 1817.]
" MY DEAR SIR, I thank you very much for the trouble you
have taken in sending me so detailed an account of your acquaint-
ance with young Cawston.* I fear your own kindness of heart
and want of all guile has made you judge too favourably of him ;
from all I can hear, and I have the best authority, the whole
story is a fabrication ; there never was either gift or giver, and
he never had any acquaintance with any one who either gave
or bequeathed to him one penny. All he has is the money
advanced to him by his dupes.
"I was the more curious to learn from you what you knew
of this singular person, from the use he made of your name, and
the abuse he indulged in of your school. He said that you were
some time back so struck with his great command of money (as
his acquaintance with the gentleman began a year and a half prior
to the publication of his fortune by the testator's death), that you
wrote to his father requesting him to cease supplying him with
such large sums, as it would ruin the boy and his companions too.
*****
" I can explain no part of these phenomena but by one solution
is he insane ? Here I learn that he could not sleep alone, and
* No draft of the account here referred to was found by me. ED.
CORRESPONDENCE. 141
that a nurse and servant were with him all night. You know
perhaps that he had a typhus fever ; is it possible that his mind
has never recovered its assaults ?
" Of course a prevailing fantasy would carry all before it, and
all would be brought to aid in its accomplishment. Why should
there be delusions strong enough to make the King forget the
living and hold converse with the dead, and yet not strong enough
to make another fancy himself heir to untold millions ?
" I shall thank you to answer me as to the fact he has urged
about his possession of money. I, as you may imagine, never
fail to speak of you as you merit, which I am happy to find all the
world concurs in."
To MR. J. CAWSTON.
[KENILWORTH, December 2ist or 22nd, 1817.]
" DEAR SIR, I have received your letter on a subject too
painful for me to recur to without deep concern. Any accounts
that your son may have given you of his transactions with Messrs.
Rock, Loxdale, & Coupland at Shrewsbury, I am sure are utterly
destitute of foundation, but I am lost in amazement that on
hearing such marvellous stories you never took the trouble to
write to me to ascertain the truth. Messrs. Rock & Loxdale are
my bankers, and from what passed between us not long before I
left Shrewsbury, I am convinced in my own mind that your son
never had any pecuniary transactions with them, but I have
written to Mrs. Butler to make the necessary inquiries, and to
send me word. I shall be at Emmanuel Lodge from January ist
to January loth, and will in the course of that time contrive to
come over to Chippenham. I shall also very much like to have
half an hour's conversation with Mr. Weatherley.
" I cannot avoid feeling great surprise at your inquiring whether
your son spent much money at school, because I am sure that
once, and I believe twice, I thought it necessary to write to you
a letter of remonstrance on this very subject, owing to the profuse
supply of money which he always appeared to have. How he got
it, if you did not give it him, heaven knows.
" There is no George Inn at Shrewsbury ; I believe there is
a very small pot-house of that name. The principal inns are the
Lion, Talbot, Raven, and Raven and Bell.
" I had with great pains secured for your son an exhibition
of ;6o a year, and considered him as likely to make his way
extremely well at College. Are you aware that, after his supposed
accession to his immense property, I advised him from time to
time to be on his guard against persons who might probably wish
to make a prey of him, and recommended him to place himself
under the care of some able and highly respectable man at the
University ? The last letter I wrote to him must, I suppose, now
142 THE FORTUNATE YOUTH. [Cn. X.
lie in the dead-letter office, and is much to the same purport as
those preceding. I wrote but two or three days before his
departure in consequence of a message I received from him
through one of his schoolfellows. I have too much reason to
think, from some facts which I have heard lately, that this un-
paralleled and disgraceful imposition has been in preparation a
long time, and am anxious to see you that I may endeavour to
develop my opinion. I shall write to you from Cambridge that
I may fix a day for seeing you, and am,
" Dear Sir, your obedient and faithful servant,
"S. BUTLER.
" I am much surprised that so serious an engagement should
have taken place between your son and a young lady at Shrewsbury
with your sanction, and without the slightest inquiry or com-
munication made to me on the subject"
FROM DR. CORY, MASTER OF EMMANUEL.
"December 24th, 1817.
*****
" I am sorry to add that all is over with Cawston. I received
a letter last night from Mr. William Cawston, full of the distress
in which all the family were involved by his brother's unaccount-
able conduct, and informing me that he left London a short time
ago for Paris, where he remained two days, and thence proceeded
towards Spain, leaving no address nor any means of tracing him.
All the references which he had left with his solicitor were dis-
honoured, and there was no trace of any property whatever
except what his brother-in-law had advanced him without
solicitation."
I doubt whether Cawston went to Spain. If he did he
must have soon left for Italy, whence he wrote to Mr.
Weatherley in the early days of January 1818. Mr.
Weatherley, writing on the loth, says he had received a
letter from Cawston on the preceding day, and that he was
then in Italy ; " he speaks," says Mr. Weatherley, " of the
events of the last few months as a delirium, but still writes
as impressed with the idea of his having a large property.
He does not state any particulars, and leaves everything
relating to him as great a mystery as ever." Cawston's
father, writing April 3Vto-iov fa/vos BovKtmov rptaxaSi xpaTwv A/uviov
Kai Evytra NtKaperou (rwapeoroviTcov /cat TCOV vttov aj/aTi^eatrtv TO
8ov\iKOV avrwv Kopa&iov Soxri^av icpov TO) SepaTri, Trapa/Aetvao-av
KpaTtovi /cat EvytTa, ews av ^V vtwv it is
probable that their sons were arrived at manhood, and we may
suppose their consent is here inserted in order to prevent any
claim on their part as heirs, after the decease of their parents.
In this and the preceding inscription we have the Ionic dative
SepaTrt, and here also the Ionic form avaTifeao-iv. The adverb
aveyxX^Tos, which would be more naturally inserted after
7rapa/*vao-av, here is left to the conclusion of the sentence,
possibly having been forgotten either by the writer of the inscrip-
tion or the stone-cutter in its proper place.
"5. AP^OVTOS IIaTp(j)i/09 p.r)vos HX&.OU 1 TrevrfKaiSeKarr) HapOeva
A.6r]vo8v ApoTrtvou Mcywvos 2 K
/XT; Trpoa-rjKovra prjOevi p.r)tiev 5 TTJV ava.&o~w iroiovfj-evr], etc.
" l The month Elthius [Note unfinished. ED.]
" 2 The son's name and his father's are mentioned.
" 3 The name of the slave is omitted.
" 4 Here is a great difference in the mode of dedication. The
slave is here dedicated at once to the god, without any inter-
vening service.
" 5 ' Free from all claims of every kind.' By which I under-
stand his absolute and immediate dedication to the god.
" 6. MTJVOS AXoXxofieviou TrcvTfKaLOfKar^ K^to-oScopa KpaTwvos
7rapovro9 avrrj TOU TraTpos KpaTtovos a^irjo-t 1 TTJV IOIOLV oovXrjv
Eva/xeptSa tepav TOV SepaTTiSos, etc.
i8i8.] HUGHES'S INSCRIPTIONS. 155
" l Here is the word a^uyo-i, by which we may understand
that the slave is absolutely given up and dismissed from the
service of the owner to that of the deity which was probably a
sort of free servitude, if such an expression may be used.
" 7. Apxovros Anrycovos /xrpos IIpooTaTTjpiou TrevrocatSe/caT^
M<.?7/uvov 1 Kat T^Aejuaxis Eu/3ouAou avaTiOeaa-iv 2 TO. iSia SouXt/ca
Kopacrta AAefavSpov Kat av/xaorav tepas TU> Sepaim p.rj9vi p.r)0ev 3
Trpocn/Kovcras, 4 Trapa/u^vao-as 5 8e MiAon KCU Tr/Ae/m^iSt, CKarcpat?
CMS av a)criv aveyxA^Tws TT^V ava^etriv 7rotov)u,cvat, 6 etc.
" The dedications are made either on the i5th or 3oth.
" l The name is corrupt.
" 2 Note the Ionic form.
" 3 This expression seems inserted in a more qualified sense
in this than in the preceding. Their services are contingent to
the deity, after the death of their mistresses ; and the words
/j.T]OevL fj.f]6ev Trpocnjxovo-as seem inserted to bar all other claims.
" * The original has Trpoo-^Koucra.
" 5 Observe the usual corruption of H for El.
" 6 The original has e/carepots and TTOLOV/J-CVOL, and seems cut
by a more ignorant artist than any of the preceding.
" 8.
. . . paStov . . . ucrios . . . cri/Atov KO.I TlapOcva
TTJV tStav SouAav Epyaaiav eAev^epav tepav 2 TO> SapaTrei irapa/xeivao-av
Hapdfva ews av 77 aveyxATyrcos p-rj irpocrr)KOV(ra.v fj.r)0evi prjOfv TTJV
avaOetrw, etc.
" 1 a<^iao-t [Note unfinished. ED.]
" 2 fXcvOepav upav. The slave here seems manumitted, yet
dedicated ; but the priests, who were not slaves, were also
dedicated to the god. But then Trapa/^etrao-av ? Can this mean
that the manumission was not to take place at the death of
Parthena, or that the dedication to the god was not to take
place at that time ? "
CHAPTER XI.
EPIDEMIC OF TURBULENCE.
Disturbances within the School. Dr. Butler's two Circulars to Parents.
Correspondence, November 3Oth, 1818 May I7th, 1819.
IN 1818 there was an epidemic of serious turbulence in
almost all the leading schools of England, with (to
quote Dr. Butler's words in a letter dated April 3rd, 1819)
" one real and one ostensible exception." At Shrewsbury
insubordination began by the boys eating more than they
wanted, and then complaining that they had not had
enough ; they got up fights in the town ; they very nearly
killed a farmer's pigs, in what they called a boar hunt, and
intimidated the farmer himself so greatly that when brought
into the school by Dr. Butler, and asked to identify the
offenders, " he was either unwilling or afraid to do so " ; an
insulting placard was posted up in the hall threatening
Dr. Butler with personal violence ; the painted glass in the
school library was broken by stones of considerable size,
evidently thrown by big boys ; the glass in the Doctor's
library had been also broken ; other acts of insubordination
occurred which made it necessary to expel three boys and
dismiss a fourth. Dr. Butler therefore sent a circular to
the parents of all his boys, desiring them to examine their
sons and see whether they could find any reasonable
ground of complaint, in which case they were to let him
know. He concluded by saying :
" You will hear your son's account and give it what credit you
156
i8i8.] INSUBORDINATION. 157
think fit ; but it is my particular request that no boy may return
to me who is not duly sensible of what he owes to me and to his
parents, and who will not promise to them and to me a cheerful
submission to such rules as I may think necessary for the general
improvement and discipline of the school."
In a second circular, dated December loth, 1818, and
sent with every boy on his going home for the holidays,
Dr. Butler writes :
" I have also remarked this half-year that the boys have been
in the habit of receiving baskets of game and poultry from their
friends. This I consider a very pernicious indulgence. They
have three plentiful meals here every day, at which they are
under no limitation ; and whenever any parents are so kind as to
send me a basket of game, some is always sent to their sons,
and frequently part is dressed for the other boys in their turn.
Under these circumstances I cannot but consider supplies of
game, or hams, or any similar provisions sent to the boys them-
selves, as highly prejudicial, tempting them to form junketing
parties at low houses, and exciting to other irregularities. I have
therefore to request that where such practices have begun they
may be discontinued, and that nothing may be sent them beyond
fruit or cakes.
" It has come to my knowledge that some of the upper boys,
with whose turbulent conduct I have great reason to be dissatis-
fied, are diligently instilling insubordination into the minds of
those younger boys whom they think likely to receive their
instructions. I have resolved on removing every such upper
boy whom I know of from my school this Christmas, though,
for obvious reasons, I have never mentioned this to them ; and
I earnestly entreat every parent to whom I do not think it
necessary to recommend his son's removal, to examine him most
closely upon this subject, and impress him with the great im-
portance of regular and orderly conduct and subordination, and
of the impossibility of my showing any lenity or indulgence to a
contrary behaviour."
This was much the most serious and protracted case of
disaffection with which Dr. Butler had to cope during the
whole term of his head-mastership, not excepting the better-
known " beef row " of 1 829.
CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XI.
CORRESPONDENCE, NOVEMBER SOTH, 1818 MAY I7TH,
1819.
FROM DR. KEATE, HEAD-MASTER OF ETON.
(Original at Eton.)
"ETON, November yoth, 1818.
"SiR, I have received your letter of the 27th this morning,
and am very sorry to perceive that the contagion of rebellion has
reached your school also. I am sorry too to be thought to have
sufficient experience to be referred to as an authority on these
occasions. I beg leave, however, to assure you that I am very
ready to give my opinion.
" The best answer I can return to your question, indeed the
only one which I think I ought to give, is, that it has not been
my practice either to rescind or to mitigate a sentence of expul-
sion. I was requested to do it upon one occasion some years
ago, and I have been importuned in the same manner in six out
of the seven late unfortunate instances, but I have uniformly
resisted, thinking my public duty paramount to every considera-
tion of private feeling."
FROM DR. GABELL, HEAD-MASTER OF WINCHESTER.
(Original at Winchester.)
11 December is/, 1818.
" MY DEAR SIR, You ask me if it is usual in cases of declared
expulsion to change the sentence into dismission, or even revoke
it altogether : I never heard of such a practice, nor do I recollect
a single instance of it.
" You ask me also if the master is not bound to be inflexible,
etc. This question I would rather not answer in general terms,
but I recollect no case which justified in my opinion the reversal
of such a sentence, when once passed. No man could be more
importuned than I was on a similar occasion, after our unfortu-
nate disturbance last spring, but I thought it my duty to resist
all importunity.
" You have heard probably of the proceedings at Eton and at
the Charterhouse, but perhaps you do not know that the Military
College at Sandhurst has been in rebellion. The boys drew up
in battle array against the professors.
" It is not unlikely that I shall be in Warwickshire during the
Christmas vacation, and I hope we shall meet."
i8i8.] CORRESPONDENCE. 1 59
FROM THE HON. CECIL JENKINSON, AFTERWARDS
LORD LIVERPOOL.
" PITCHFORD HALL, December $th, 1818.
"Mv DEAR SIR, I am extremely flattered by your attention to
my feelings, as expressed to my friend Mr. H. Owen and others,
respecting the late disagreeable occurrences in your school, and
very happy that what I said to them was sufficiently noted to be
repeated to you. To say the truth, but that I always fear putting
myself forward, I should have troubled you with a letter as soon
as I had read the statement which, as parent to one of your
pupils, you sent to Mr. Corfield.
" Believe me, sir, that no one sees with more anxiety than I
do the conduct of those to whom public education in this country
is entrusted ; on it in a great measure depends the production of
those talents which, fostered and matured in this soil of rational
liberty, make England a beacon and example to every other
nation of the civilised world.
" But that I fear and dislike to flatter you, I might say that
your talents as head-master of a public school deserved a better
field of exertion than Shrewsbury ; but you have shown, even on
this comparatively unproductive soil, how much these talents
could effect, and it would, I conceive, be most unjust and
illiberal on the part of those who from property and residence
observe this, not to render every assistance in our power, or to
pay every tribute which is due to them.
" Believe me, dear Sir, with these sentiments most sincerely
" Your obedient humble servant,
"CECIL JENKINSON."
FROM THE REV. C. J. BLOMFIELD, AFTERWARDS ARCHDEACON
OF COLCHESTER, AND BISHOP, FIRST OF CHESTER, AND
THEN OF LONDON.
" CHESTERFORD, ESSEX, December a,th, 1818.
" MY DEAR SIR, I have directed my publisher, Mr. Mawman,
to send you a xopy of my Agamemnon^ which is just published.
I trust that, although I have often been compelled to dissent from
your opinions, you will not find anything offensive. At the same
time I am free to confess that, had an opportunity been afforded
me, I should have expressed two or three things rather differently,
but I beg you to bear in mind that the text and notes were
printed a twelvemonth ago. In the preface I could not avoid
alluding to the question about Casaubon and Stanley. I hope
you will think that 1 have not done so in an improper manner.
160 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XI.
My own opinion on the subject remains the same. I beg you
will present my respects to Mrs. Butler and the young ladies,
" And believe me, my dear Sir,
" Yours very sincerely,
" C. J. BLOMFIELD.
"P.S. I entirely agree with you in your explanation of
Hughes's inscriptions, with one or two trifling exceptions. I
have no doubt but that in the last HAPAMONON is the name of
the slave."
The name appears in inscription No. 5, and not in "the
last."
To THE REV. C. J. BLOMFIELD, CHESTERFORD.
"SHREWSBURY, December 6th, 1818.
" MY DEAR SIR, Before I receive your kind present I can-
not but wish to assure you that nothing which I may find in
it can make any alteration in those sentiments of friendship and
respect which I entertain for you. The past is past ; TO. /*/ Trporc-
TvxOai eao-o/xev, but I trust that each of us can add a-^^evoi -n-fp,
in one sense only, and that a different one from the meaning of
Achilles a sense of mutual regret that it ever took place.
" When I receive your Agamemnon I shall run over it as fast
as ever I can, reserving a closer study of it for a more convenient
opportunity. I have no doubt that you will often find occasion to
differ from me, and that I shall often find occasion to differ from
myself. I am glad to have the opportunity of telling you that the
whole plan of my publication was devised contrary to my most
strenuous exertions, by a literary friend now no more,* who had
great theological and more than moderate classical attainments,
but who wanted judgement and taste. Hence arose those divisions
and subdivisions which, having been adopted in the first volume,
I could never afterwards get rid of. I was wrong to yield, and
yet I can hardly blame myself. What could a young man not
two-and-twenty, and wholly unused to the press, say against a
ripe and practised scholar of nearly seventy especially when he
had a tender interest at stake ? True, I became emancipated in
the course of the work, but the first volume had given a fatal cast
to the whole, and from the first I saw no remedy but a re-publi-
cation with my own text and selected notes. Whenever I under-
take that work I shall, in the preface, say of your labours what,
under any circumstances, I should have thought it justice to say.
" I have no copy of Hughes's inscriptions, and could see them
but cursorily, having been constantly interrupted while writing
* Dr. Apthorp, to whose daughter Dr. Butler was then engaged,
i8i8.] RECONCILIATION WITH BLOM FIELD. 161
my few remarks upon them. I have not the least recollection of
the passage, but think it highly probable you are right in the
name. The verb 7rapa//,ei/o>, if I recollect, occurs so frequently
in the inscriptions that I suppose in my hasty perusal of them
I was misled by it. I cannot get at a single book till after
Christmas, my library being yet unfinished. I have had a
stirring half-year since I wrote to you. Luctantes ventos tempes-
tatesque sonoras. I hope I chain them as well as their old
master in Virgil. It has, however, completely put a stop to my
book on metres, which must be delayed half a year.
" If you see Hughes, that dAAorrpoo-aAAos now at St. John's,
now at Trinity Hall, now at Emmanuel, and at present at some
Cambridge fen curacy, you may ask him to show you a sketch
of mine on Dodona.*
" Last night I had a letter from Dr. Parr, in which he says he
has heard from you again, from which I infer that you are in
correspondence with him. I wish more that you were in his
company; you could and would appreciate him. There are
many who cannot and many who will not understand him. I
venerate him, and if you knew him as I do, I think you would
feel as I do. Mrs. Butler and my daughters beg their kind
remembrances.
" Believe me, my dear Sir, yours very sincerely,
"S. BUTLER."
So ended this long and bitter quarrel. The only breeze
that ever afterwards occurred between the two men arose
out of a little affair of which my kind and illustrious old
friend the late Rev. Richard Shilleto told me as having
happened when he was a boy at Shrewsbury School.
Blomfield had then become Bishop of Chester and was
paying a visit to Dr. Butler. He of course attended
morning chapel with the boys, and was much scandalised
at seeing Dr. Butler, towards the close of the service, begin
to cut his pencjl so as to be ready for marking and correct-
ing exercises. Dr. Butler of course promised faithfully that
he would never cut his pencil in chapel any more, and, let
us hope, kept his promise.
* Slip of the pen for Delphi. See in British Museum among Dr.
Butler's papers, Additional MSS., 34584, letters to E. D. Clarke, April 4th,
April 23rd, 1816. I know of no memo of Dr. Butler's on Dodona. ED.
VOL. I. 1 1
1 62 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XI.
FROM THE REV. S. TILLBROOK.
"December "jth, 1818.
" MY DEAR DOCTOR, I hope by this time that Heaven is
quiet, and that you have expelled the Titans and all their
rebellious crew. I have spoken to our youth Smith on the
bursting subject. He seems very ready to accept the situation,
and on comparing his strength with that of your present assistant
feels no great horror at the thoughts of treading in his shoes,
though he would avoid his steps.
" I have seen your honest letter which has been circulated
among the parents of your pupils. It seems to me that you have
been too indulgent to the appetites of the young rogues. Who
could ever hope to satisfy the real or fancied cravings of a hungry
schoolboy ? I remember a schoolfellow of mine who after
dinner drew the wick of a mould candle through his teeth, and
ate the cold tallow afterwards. Upon this he piled up eight raw
turnips and twelve large cooking apples. Besides these, he
cracked nuts during a walk of four miles from the wood where
he had gathered them, and then at night ate toasted cheese, and
drank a joram of treacle, or ate it so crumbed with bread that
the spoon stood erect in it. What do you think of that Master
Apicius ?
" I must dish up this hasty pudding."
To A TRADESMAN IN SHREWSBURY.
" SCHOOLS, Monday, December "jth, 1818.
" SIR, Great pains were taken by me to appreciate the damages
among the boys. I publicly declared my intention of exempting
Mr. Jeudwine's boarders and the day scholars if they should be
proved by their respective head boys to have no concern in the
general mischief. No attempt to exculpate them was made that
day. The next day the head boy of the day scholars said that
only one was concerned. I then declared that only one should
pay. Another was then named. I said that one, or two, or even
three, should pay individually, but that as I knew many of my
own boys and many of Mr. Jeudwine's were equally innocent,
and yet were included in the general estimate of damage (towards
which even my own son contributed, though to my knowledge
perfectly innocent), if more were concerned all should pay. I
left the head boy of the boarders and the head boy of the day
scholars to settle it, and they agreed that more were concerned."
i8i8.] CORRESPONDENCE. 163
To A PARENT.
"SHREWSBURY, December tyth, 1818.
" DEAR SIR, When I sent you my first circular I think I told
you that your son had been misled at first, but that he had
subsequently behaved very well. I wish I could confirm that
opinion, but I am persuaded that he has not a proper sense of
his duty to me, nor of my unwearied exertions for the moral and
intellectual improvement of all the boys under my care. As it is
of great consequence that there should be a frank and cordial
understanding between the master and the head boy, who is
obliged on many occasions to be in official communication with
him, and to possess his confidence in many things, I think it
right to request that he may not return to me.
" I have the pleasure to send him to you a very elegant and
accomplished scholar, and whether you send him to Trinity
College at once or place him with a private tutor for the ensuing
half-year it will make but little difference to him. I might
perhaps in justice to myself have sent him to you a week ago, if
not earlier, but I resolved that I would keep him if possible to
the end of the half-year, that he may leave me, if not with all the
satisfaction I hoped to have felt, at least without any mark of
disgrace to himself. I heartily wish him well, and have little
doubt that he will distinguish himself at college."
FROM THE MASTER OF ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE.
(Original in Cambridge University Library.)
" ST. JOHN'S, December iSth, 1818.
" MY DEAR DR. BUTLER, Every member of the University
interested in the support of discipline must feel thankful to you
for the firmness with which you have resisted the turbulence
and self-will of foolish and presumptuous boys. Children nowa-
days very early imbibe most pernicious notions, if not from their
parents and relations, at least from the spirit of the times. I
approve heartily of every point in your proceedings, and doubt
not your school will stand as high in reputation for the due
subordination and modesty of the scholars, as it does for their
improvement in Jearning.
" I wish it may be consistent with your feelings either to give
me the names of those whom you have advised to leave the
school or to withhold the usual certificate of admission to St.
John's. We have a very numerous, and, I am happy to say, a
most respectable and orderly set of young men. I could not
knowingly introduce any sowers of sedition among them. They
have no rights here, but are under obligation to submit to the
statutes, and such regulations as the Master and seniors may see
necessary."
1 64 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XI.
To DR. ROBERT W. DARWIN.
"SHREWSBURY, February ^th, 1819.
" MY DEAR SIR, I shall have great pleasure in sending my
little boy to you on Sunday. I have requested Mrs. Butler to
suspend the fulfilment of her promise to you made this morning.
Every boy has one under and one good upper blanket, and a
good quilt, which, if not new, is always double-lined. This has
been the allowance ever since I have kept house, and care is
always taken that, when an upper blanket becomes at all worn, it
shall be removed and a new one put in its place. The same
quantity of blankets, and the same quality as near as it is possible
to get them, are on every bed in my own and in the adjoining
house. What is the rule for one must be the rule for all, and I
shall immediately get an additional blanket for every bed, if after
this statement you think it necessary or even desirable. It is my
anxious wish always to attend to real complaints, but not to
gratify boys in foolish whims and prejudices, and I cannot help
thinking that some such exist or have lately arisen among them
on the subject you mention. You shall judge from what I am
about to state. Immediately on Drew's arrival he put his hands
on one of the beds (I think that of your son Charles*) and
pronounced it 'as damp as muck.' It had in fact been certainly
for two and I think for three days constantly before a large
kitchen fire. When I consider that the complaint of Erasmus
is the very first that I have received in twenty years upon the
subject, and couple it with the other fact I have mentioned, I
cannot help thinking that the boys have got some whim into
their heads on the occasion. Last night indeed was a particularly
cold night, and might perhaps be more felt than another, especi-
ally after boys have just returned to school from domestic
indulgences, but it was not so cold as many have been in other
winters when I have had no complaint. You see how much I
rely on the friendly interest I know you to take in what passes
here, and I must trespass on it still further while I make it my
particular request that you will not answer this note till you have
seen Erasmus, and questioned him a little ; if you think it
desirable that an addition should be made to the boys' blankets
after what you hear from him, you cannot do me so great a
kindness as by recommending that measure, and they will im-
mediately be put on every bed in my two houses, if they can
be procured at once in this town. Otherwise I must wait till
a sufficient number can be got, as what is done for one must
certainly be done for all."
* I need hardly say that Charles Darwin of world-wide fame as
author of the Origin of Species, etc., etc., is here alluded to. ED.
i8ig.] CORRESPONDENCE. 165
FROM BARON MERIAN.
" April gth, 1819.
*****
"My feelings on your account can never be altered; a long
war and a suspicious peace passed and pass away before them
without leaving the smallest impression; but let them preserve
their beneficent nature in its perfect purity, and may you frequently
ask 'Why does he not write?' never 'Why does he write?'
" Your rooms, my dear friend, are ready. You can, on going
and on returning, alight and stay nowhere (unless you wish to
incur a capital forfeiture) except at my humble cottage, which is
situated Chaussee d'Antin, Rue St. Lazare, No. 56. Order your
postilion to drive directly thither at any time of the day or night,
et ccetera linque mihi.
" And I shall not only creta sed minio notare the end of June
1819.
" Yours most sincerely,
" M."
To THE OVERSEER OF THE SHREWSBURY FACTORY.
"May ijth, 1819.
"SiR, I have received information of an intention of some
of the boys belonging to your factory to attack my pupils on their
way to the water, either this or some following evening. I think
the information is correct, but in my opinion it would be better
not to take public notice of it, as the plan may go by. I suppose
the scheme has been suggested by the election politics, in which
I take no part beyond perhaps giving my vote to Mr. Corbet,
perhaps not voting at all. If you think proper to commission a
couple of your workmen whom you can trust to keep a look out
from six to eight, or perhaps a little after, in the evening during
the election, I shall be very willing to give them a reasonable
compensation when the election is over, and I shall also caution
my boys not to commence provocation, but shall not state that
I have heard there has been any design of attacking them, which
it is better that they should not know.
"I remain, Sir,
"Your very obedient servant,
"S. BUTLER."
CHAPTER XII.
FIRST VISIT TO ITALY.
Tour in Switzerland and North Italy. Correspondence, August 5th,
1819 July loth, 1820.
THE following extracts from Dr. Butler's diary of his
second foreign trip are as many as my space will
permit :
" June 2$rd, 1819. Wednesday evening, 6 p.m. Left London
from the White Bear in Piccadilly; paid 3 i8s. for fare from
London to Paris, including passage from Dover to Calais and 1 2S.
for luggage. Arrived at Dover at seven on Thursday morning ;
not much troubled at the custom-house ; embarked at half-past
ten, and arrived at Calais about a quarter before one, having had
a short but rough passage of about two hours and forty minutes.
Hotel Meurice ; comfortable table-cThote at four, and a good bed-
room. Went to bed early, slept well and comfortably, without any
bugs.
*****
" At ten left Calais with tolerably agreeable companions ; dined
at six at Montreuil-sur-Mer upon a plentiful but not well-dressed
dinner at four francs each. Tea and coffee at midnight at
Abbeville (Tete de Bceuf ; twenty-five sous each, and half a franc
at dinner and three or four sous at supper). Breakfast at ten at
Beauvais (the ficu), exceeding in dirt and filth all that I ever saw
in France, except at Mezieres ; reached Paris on Saturday the
*26th, excessively tired. The diligence is not in itself a disagree-
able conveyance, going at a regular pace of six miles an hour and
being hung very easy and roomy enough for six persons and
there are no stoppages at ale-houses. But the journey from
Calais to Paris in hot weather is very fatiguing.
" Sunday, 27 th. Dined with the Baron Merian in a private
apartment au Cadran Bleu rainy day, no stirring out.
*****
" June 2<)th. Weather still unfavourable. The Baron has
engaged a caliche for me at six francs a day, and a very respect-
166
1819.] A SWITCHBACK RAILWAY. l6/
able and well-recommended servant at ten francs per day, finding
himself.
"June $oth. Passports signed at the Prefecture, where I was
obliged to attend in person ; then by the British Ambassador, the
French Minister for Foreign Affairs, the Austrian Ambassador, the
Swiss and Sardinian Ministers. Dined at the garden of Tivoli
and went down the Montagnes Russes in a car with the Baron.
The car is a kind of chair like a gig body on four low wheels
a man pushes you to the edge of the precipice and lets you loose.
The car descends nearly perpendicularly some distance and
acquires a great velocity, which is ultimately retarded by the
gradual rise of the end of the course. I did not find it very
pleasant or very disagreeable except where the car has to pass
under an artificial grotto, the roof of which when you are above
it in the course of the descent seems to threaten inevitable
destruction by being too low for the heads of those who are to
pass under it, but on arriving it is a few inches higher than the
traveller and permits him to pass with perfect safety. The whole
amusement seems very childish much more so are the swings
and what they call the chars aertennes, which consist of a number
of little boats with sails to them, fixed to the end of revolving
poles."
After saying that Paris was left at 3 and Fontainebleau
reached at 8.45 (i.e. about eight miles an hour), the writer
continues with a description of the cMteau, from which I
take the following :
" In a small apartment, a kind of cabinet to the King's bed-
chamber plainly fitted up, there stands a round wooden table
made I believe of cherry or some very ordinary wood, and about
three feet in diameter. Its intrinsic value may be four or five
francs, but at that table and in that chamber Napoleon signed
his abdication of the empire of France. It is a little notched on
the edges by a penknife, whether by his own or not I could not
learn."
Whether the table is still there or no I cannot say. The
next day the journey was made to St. Florentin, about
seventy-eight miles in eleven hours, i.e. about seven miles
an hour. Leaving St. Florentin at four in the morning of
July 3rd, Dr. Butler reached Tonnerre at seven and went
on thence to Montbard.
1 68 FIRST VISIT TO ITALY. [Cn. XII.
" At Montbard the mountains begin which are of an uninterest-
ing kind, being low, tedious, and unpicturesque ; they continue
for many leagues, but at length, on having climbed the summit of
the mountain which overhangs the Vale of Suzon, and bears the
same name, the horizon being excessively clear, what were my
feelings on discovering in the W.S.W. the majestic pyramid of
Mont Blanc ! This was at twenty minutes before seven in the
evening. I was then six leagues from Dijon, and therefore about
seventy, i.e. more than two hundred miles, from Mont Blanc. The
horizon being excessively clear, I could see the immense extent
of the Jura Mountains distinctly in a pale blue line ; above them,
but at a much greater height, and so exceedingly faint as not to
be distinguished by an eye unpractised in mountain scenery, ran a
line which marked the Alps, and very distinctly in the W.S.W. the
pyramid of Mont Blanc raised its eternal snows into the cloudless
blue of the horizon. My feelings I cannot express. I gasped
yet hardly dared to breathe as I viewed for the first time this
monarch of the mountains. I seemed to fancy the genius seated
on his stupendous throne far above his aspiring brethren, and in
his solitary might defying the universe. I was so overcome by
my feelings that I was almost bereft of my faculties, and would
not for worlds have spoken after my first exclamation, till I found
some relief in a gush of tears. With pain I tore myself from
contemplating for the first time, ' at distance dimly seen ' (though
I felt as if I had sent my soul and eyes after it), this sublime
spectacle.
" The descent into the Vale of Suzon is exquisitely beautiful ;
the road is good, and everything that rock, wood, and mountain
can contribute are here united to form this exquisitely secluded
spot. It is five leagues long, from fifty to a hundred and fifty
yards broad, and inhabited by a simple and contented race, who
support themselves by their flocks and herds."
The journey made was a hundred and eight miles in
fifteen hours, or a trifle more than seven miles an hour.
On Sunday, July 4th, Poligny was reached in nine hours
from Dijon.
" The country becomes less pleasing till we approach Champag-
nole, where the first pine woods begin. The excessive dark and
sombrous green of these trees, their formal shape and want of
branches, all tend to make them unpicturesque, while at the same
time the novelty of their appearance is such as to give them a
kind of interest.
*****
"Noirmont and Dole, along which I passed, are the highest
1819.] THE ALPS AT SUNSET. 169
points of the Jura, but after I got to Avalley the scene was most
truly magnificent. The road, as level as a bowling-green, runs
under enormous precipices of the Jura, many hundred feet in height
and quite perpendicular. These are for the most part covered
with pines, but where there is no fissure in the rock the naked
and perpendicular precipice above is sublimely terrific, and these
feelings are not a little enhanced by the traveller's recollecting
that he is hanging, as it were, in mid air on the very brink of a
precipice still more frightful, and without the least protection.
The road, however, is wide and very good, but the prodigious
height at least 3,000 feet above the level of the sea can only be
estimated by casting a look into the valley beneath. The whole
scenery, the pine-clad rocks, the green and smiling valley, the
herds which graze it and which are scarce distinguishable by the
eye, the chalets of the shepherds, and, above all, the everlasting
variety of the rocks and distant mountains, are all delightful, but
how shall I express my feelings when on a sudden turn in the
road the whole panorama of the higher Alps presented itself to
my view ! I saw all their summits piercing the very heavens and
clad with everlasting snows for the distance of a hundred and
fifty miles, from Mont Cenis along St. Bernard to the Simplon.
Mont St. Gothard was wrapt in angry storms, which swept along
the rest of the Alps to the east. Towering above them all rose
Mont Blanc in solitary majesty. It was exactly the same hour
as when I first saw this king of mountains from Mont Suzon, then
two hundred miles distant. I am now within seventy, and the
distance does not appear above fifteen or twenty miles, so clear
is the atmosphere. Above the highest Alps floated an immense
mass of thick clouds, which in about half an hour began to assume
a singular colour. As the sun declined (and it sets in these
southern regions about a quarter before eight) the clouds which
were no longer lighted by his rays assumed a very lovely sea-green
colour ; those which were partially lighted appeared of a yellowish
green, and those huge masses which still received his rays
became of a bright flame colour. The lower Alps soon began to
be indistinct ; the snow-clad region was still visible ; soon it also
became less clear, but Mont Blanc assumed an indescribable tint,
a kind of rosy purple. The twilight here is short. The descent
of the Jura is no less than twelve miles, all descent, but so
easy that a carriage need not lock more than a hundred yards,
though the postilion by way of precaution locked mine through
the whole descent, and the wheel was almost red-hot when we
arrived at Gex. I walked nine of these miles. My mind and
heart were too full to sit still, and I found some relief by exhaust-
ing my feelings through exercise.
" I reached Gex at nine, and was obliged to drive hard to get
from thence to Geneva before the gates were shut. The night
was hea> enly : the moon was so bright that I could plainly
170 FIRST VISIT TO ITALY. [Cn. XII.
distinguish all the lower Alps near Geneva, which lay absolutely
under my feet ; when I first caught the panorama of the Alps
from the summit of the Jura, I could even see the city with my
naked eye, though more than twenty miles distant, and distinguish
the houses very plainly with the telescope. It was quite dark at
nine o'clock, when I arrived at Gex. From thence I drove through
Ferney (Voltaire's abode) to Geneva. The night was heavenly :
the full moon shone brightly on the Alps. The comet was
conspicuous over the Jura, with a train of considerable length, like
a falling sky-rocket. The evening star was shining with a splen-
dour almost equal to the moon over the mountains of Voirons,
and the north-west was in a continual blaze with the flashes of
sheet lightning. I arrived at Geneva just as the gates were about
to be shut, and though at a good hotel (the Balance) it is so full
that I have been most miserably lodged this evening.
*****
"I left Geneva at half-past seven and reached Lausanne at
half-past five, having been ten hours in going eleven leagues. . . .
On sending to a tailor for stuff for a waistcoat, I found all his best
stuffs were English. ... In the catalogue of a circulating library
kept at this place (Lausanne) by Louis Knab, which is now lying
before me, I can scarcely find anything but translations of
English novels."
Vevay, Clarens, Chillon, Bex, Martigny, were visited in
due course.
" Saturday, July loth. I left the inn at Martigny, which I
found clean but not very comfortable (Les Cygnes), at about a
quarter past five. The road to the Col de Fourclas bears, as
does all the Valley of Martigny, dreadful marks of last year's
inundation. This inundation arose from a glacier having fallen
into the Val de Bagnes, nine hours from Martigny. It there
choked up the valley at a place called Malvoisin, and formed an
immense dam for the waters of the Drance. After three months
these waters were so accumulated that they burst their barrier
and arrived in an hour and a quarter at Martigny, the usual time
by the same route being nine hours. They destroyed three
hundred houses, but fortunately only thirty-five persons ; the
misfortune having been long apprehended, the inhabitants had
withdrawn at the first notice to the mountains. This notice was
a hurricane driven before the waters in their furious descent,
which caused more damage than they did. I saw trees yet
standing about ten or twelve feet from the ground, whose trunks
of enormous size were snapped by the hurricane like reeds, and
the trunks yet remain in some places where they have been
swept by the waters and carried among the rocks. The water
1819.] MARTIGNYCHAMOUNY. \J\
seems not to have risen at Martigny more than twelve or fourteen
feet, but as the valley is wide this is a great height, and the trees
that remain have still all their trunks torn and stripped of bark
by the enormous stones which were carried by the torrent and
still remain on the plain.
*****
" I have seen to-day at Chamouny that rare animal the
bouquetin. It was caught by the hunter who killed its dam
when it was just born, and is now two years old, and very playful
and lively. I have seen only one eagle soaring in the Alps, and
at present no vultures, of which I am told there are many.
*****
''Monday morning, July \2th. This morning I rose at five,
intending to reach Martigny in good time, but I have been
detained by my wish to see Jacques Balma, the guide so often
mentioned by Saussure, and the very interesting circumstance
of seeing two American travellers reach the summit of Mont
Blanc. The direct distance from the summit to this place is
only six miles, but the difficulties of approach are so great that
the journey is no less than thirty-six. I went to Balma's house,
and found the good old man not yet up (7 o'clock). He
seemed much flattered by my coming to see him, and would
accompany me a little way up Mont Blanc itself, that I might
have the pleasure of saying I had been on it. We returned by
the Glacier of Boissons, which is very magnificent. With my
telescope I can very distinctly see the travellers, now within an
hour of the summit. They have eight guides ; they took nine,
but one seems to have failed at least he is absent. It is very
curious to see these little insects, for such they look, going in
a line on the snow. They appear to proceed well and rapidly.
Their names are Dr. Van Rensselaer and Mr. W. Howard from
Baltimore. Half-past twelve. They have this moment reached
the summit, and I proceed on my journey.
*****
" Tuesday, July i$th. I am just about to set out for the Grand
St. Bernard. . . . Among several bad wooden bridges I have
had to pass, the worst was this day. A Swiss bridge is always
terrific. It is composed by two fir-trees, which if they grow near
the spot and are long enough are felled so as to cross the stream.
These are covered with a few inch boards when at best, but in
general with a few deal scantlings, round as they come from the
tree, and always loose. The bridge is almost always at a
cataract, because there the river is generally narrowest, but you
always feel and see the planks bend under the weight of your
mule and see the water through the crevices.
*****
" At a quarter past seven I reached the Hospice, involved in
172 FIRST VISIT TO ITALY. [Cn. XII.
clouds, and exceedingly cold and fatigued. The effect of coming
to a comfortable establishment after such a journey is incon-
ceivable. The porter rang a bell on my arrival, and a monk
immediately appeared, who conducted me into the refectory.
Here I found the Prior and seven brothers had just finished
dinner, and there were four strangers. Wine was instantly
brought me, and in half an hour a very good dinner, consisting
of potage au riz, eggs, spinach, and roast veal, with figs, cheese,
and nuts for dessert. As soon as I had done, grace was said by
one of the monks, and after a few minutes' general conversation
we all went to bed, about nine o'clock. I was shown into a good
room with a warm fire of pine logs, a bed well covered with an
eiderdown quilt, and all things suitable. The wind whistled at
my window like a dreary November evening, and the snow fell fast
all this on the evening of a day the morning of which I had
found intolerable for its heat. The whole of this day's journey
seemed like a dream, its conclusion especially in gentlemanly
society, with every comfort and accommodation amidst the rudest
rocks and in the region of perpetual snow. The thought that I
was sleeping in a convent, and occupied the bed of no less a
person than Napoleon, that I was in the highest inhabited spot
in the world, and in a place celebrated in every corner of it, at
. . . feet above the sea, kept me awake for some time.
" Wednesday, July \\th. . . . After breakfast I saw all their
collection of natural history and mineralogy, and the coins and
inscriptions which have been found in the Temple of Jupiter
Pceninus (for so it is always spelt), and went to the temple itself,
where are some remains of foundations. It stood at a little
distance to the west of the present Hospice, at the end of the lake,
than which nothing can be conceived more dreary, and which
has only been thawed five days ago. But my great delight in
this little excursion was the fine dogs of the Hospice, and the
monk who was with me set them to work in the snow. They are
in the head something like a Newfoundland, in the form like a
mastiff, and most exceedingly docile and sagacious, very fond of
strangers, and of great strength. When I had all the four
jumping at once about me I could hardly stand. Two were
remarkably fine, one called Courage, a sort of brindled colour
dog, but getting old, and the other Jupiter, young and quite
white. As I went to the Temple of Jupiter they all four began
to dig in different places of the snow. This they do in a manner
exactly different from a dog when he scratches a hole. They
push away the snow with their feet instead of accumulating it
behind them, and in this manner in a minute will make a hole
larger than themselves. They then put their noses to the snow
to see if there is any one underneath. . . . With regret I took
leave of these hospitable fathers, and after ten hours' descent
reached Martigny, exceedingly fatigued."
1819.] GREAT ST. BERNARD MILAN. 173
In the notebook from which I have taken the foregoing
extracts there is a copy of the Latin elegiacs on the
Hospice of the Great St. Bernard, inscribed by Dr. Butler
in the visitors' album, and given in the Arundines Cami,
to which I must refer the reader.
" Thursday, July 15^. Rose at six. . . . About a league from
Sion I hear a noise more resembling a mixture of that made by
young ducks and watchman's rattles combined than anything
I can express. On my inquiring, I had the delight to find that it
proceeded from the cigales on the neighbouring trees.
'Et cantu querulse rumpunt arbusta cicadas.'
No person can enjoy this line who has not heard them. ... I
reach Bryg at half-past five o'clock, having performed eighteen
country or twenty-five post leagues in less than eleven hours.
Good work. . . . [On the following day, after crossing the
Simplon], ... I have reached Baveno, and shall sleep, if my
feelings will allow me, for the first time on Italian soil.
*****
" Saturday, July 17 th. Set out at five in the morning to see
the Isola Bella. . . . On my return left Baveno at seven (where
I was agreeably disappointed in not finding any bugs), and pro-
ceeded through a most cheerful and lovely country till I crossed
the Ticino by a flying bridge at Sesto Calende, and entered
Lombardy. Here I found the Austrian custom-house officers
very exacting, and the face of things a little, or rather a good deal,
changed for the worst. The first alteration that strikes one is
the road, which is no longer so good, but rather like a common
English turnpike road, with high hedges on both sides, and where,
when you do not see the vines and Indian corn and hear the
cigales, you might think yourself travelling in the flat part of
England.
" I reached Milan at five, and am at a most capital hotel (De la
Grande Bretagne). I have been to see the Cathedral. . . . From
the first story upwards all the richest part has been rebuilt de novo
within the last fifteen years by Napoleon. He renewed all the
statues and pinnacles in the purest white marble after the antient
model ; instead of the decayed and miserable roof of tiles, he had
begun and had roofed more than one-third of the church with
white marble. He is in great, and I think I may reasonably say
in just, favour with the Milanese.
*****
'''Sunday, July \$>th. Set off at eight o'clock to see the most
particular curiosities. The amphitheatre of Bonaparte, in which he
174 FIRST VISIT TO ITALY, [C H . XII.
exhibited a naumachia on the birth of the King of Rome, is no
great matter ; but his superb triumphal arch of pure Carrara marble,
adorned with sculptures worthy of the best age of the antients,
is indeed a stupendous and admirable work. It is yet unfinished,
and I suppose ever will be so, to the great grief of the Milanese,
who adore Bonaparte. It was to cost ten millions of francs, of
which only about six have yet been spent. I saw a magnificent
column destined for it lying by the roadside as I was passing the
Simplon. In the cornice of the amphitheatre, which is very
finely painted in relief, I saw a curious thing. The heads of
Napoleon and Josephine were there in medallion. By the addi-
tion of a beard and hood and one wrinkle Napoleon is turned
into Neptune, but the features are evidently to be traced, and
Josephine by the help of a helmet has been transformed into
the virgin goddess Minerva. Thence I went to the Church of
St. Ambrose, and saw the cypress doors from which in antient
times the archbishop repelled the Grecian emperor. They are
quite perfect, and the outside richly carved.
*****
" Thence I went to the Cathedral to high mass, which was
celebrated with a splendour I never before witnessed, and was
certainly a most interesting and imposing spectacle. The preacher
made a very good, plain, and practical sermon of about half an hour
on Jesus opening the eyes of the blind. He divided his treatment
into bodily and mental blindness, and made proper and sensible
remarks applicable to the subject. He spoke so distinctly that 1
was able to understand him throughout.
*****
" Monday, July 19^. Left Milan for Turin at half-past four.
The road is all the way on a dead flat, cropped with rice, Indian
corn, and millet, with nothing interesting but the magnificent view
of the Alps when gilt by the morning sun. It is difficult to
express the glory of a sunrise under an Italian sky. There is
a blue in the heavens unknown to and inconceivable by the
inhabitants of our climate. A flood of fire is poured from the
east, which gradually subsides towards the west in white, pale,
and at last celestial blue. Monte Rosa, which is only two or
three hundred feet lower than Mont Blanc, and which is so
called from its summits inclining towards one another like a rose,
appeared at first almost blood-red on its snow-capped summits.
By degrees as the light spread down its sides it assumed a fainter
colour, but continued till near nine o'clock of a faint tint of blood.
... I reached Turin, exceedingly fatigued, at about half-past six,
having performed a journey of more than a hundred miles in
fourteen hours.
* * * *
" Tuesday, July 2oth. I have just made a discovery which is
1819.] TURIN CHAMBERY. 175
very characteristic of the people. I observed that all the knives
are of a singular form. Instead of coming to a point, they all of
a sudden expand again, and end in a singularly formed blunt
button, a little like the end of a foil. This is a precaution on the
part of government to diminish in some little degree the frequency
of assassination, and no other knives are allowed to be sold.
" Wednesday, July 2ist. Passed the day with William Hill.
Saw nothing but the magnificent view of the Alps from the
ramparts, and the sugar-loaf of Monte Viso where the Po rises,
directly opposite his windows. The Alps seem as if one could
actually touch them at the end of each street. I witnessed two
customs which I was gratified with remarking. One is the
Eastern mode of clapping hands instead of ringing a bell to call
servants. The other is the serenade; in returning from the
ambassador's hotel about eleven I saw three lovers in different
streets serenading their mistresses. The music consisted of a
violoncello, violin, bassoon, and (I think) clarionet. One man
sang well ; the rest was very moderate.
" Friday, July 2yd. Rose at half-past three, and found myself
very unwell, and unfit for the journey. Proceeded, however, to
Susa, where I was so very ill that I much doubted whether I
ought not to return to Turin. ... I am now by a comfortable
fire of pine logs, at the Hotel Royal at Lanslebourg, which is kept
by an Englishwoman, and I found myself better than at Susa.
About two-thirds of the way down Mont Cenis I saw a sight
that illustrated a passage of Virgil. He makes Discord mount
upon the roof of the shepherd's cottage, where, he says, ' Pastorale
canit signum.' In the very same situation on the ridge of the
roof of a chalet did I see a peasant girl stand blowing the cor des
Alpes.
" I may also note the general custom in Italy and here of
spinning in the antient classical mode, by the distaff stuck in the
bosom, and the spindle hanging from it.*
" Saturday, July 2^th. Left Lanslebourg, where I found every-
thing but my bedroom as uncomfortable as possible, at a quarter
before six. . . . After travelling a considerable distance on this
noble road, I came to the fortress of Echellons, now building by
the King of Sardinia to command the road. ... I arrived at the
Hotel de la Poste at Chambery at half-past seven, having accom-
plished about a hundred miles in thirteen hours. I have been
much better since I have been among the mountains.
" Sunday, July 2$th. Left Chambery, which is a most miserable
* When I first remember Italy, in 1843 and I remember it exceedingly
well one hardly met a woman on a country road but she was spinning
as she went along. Now it is rare to see a spindle and distaff at all.
-ED.
1 76 FIRST F/S/r TO ITALY. [Cn. XII.
town (but the Hotel de la Poste is not bad), at half-past five.
. . . Having left Beauvoisin, I met a large and jovial group with a
violin before them, leading an old man on an ass with his face
turned to the tail, and a woman following him holding a large
distaff over his head filled with flax. This I found is the rustic
mode of marking contempt for a man who suffers his wife to beat
him. ... At one of the post-houses I saw a girl carrying what I
thought at first was the top of a round oak table on her head,
but it turned out to be a loaf of rye bread : the diameter could
not possibly be less than five feet, and I found it was intended
to last a numerous family six days. It is baked of this size
because it keeps moister, and the longer it is kept the further a
little of it goes. The road to Lyons is broad, but was rather
rough. I reached this superb city, by far the finest I have seen
in France after Paris, at half-past six, having performed fourteen
and a half posts, or between eighty and ninety miles, in thirteen
hours. I am at the Hotel de Provence, a very grand house, which
looks out into the grand Place. My apartment, which is about
twenty-four feet square by eighteen feet high, is sumptuously fur-
nished. Dieu me garde de punaises. Two looking-glasses, each
above six feet high ; magnificent bed, with curtains and coverlet
of crimson satin, with green and gold frieze ; fine carpet of real
Lyons tapestry ; calico curtains, with broad striped muslin frieze.
The Rhine here, after its junction with the Saone, is a truly noble
river, wider than the Seine at Paris, but not quite so wide as the
Thames at London about equal to it at Fulham.
"Monday, July 26th. . . . The want of cleanliness in the streets
of Lyons is striking, and the stench of them is almost poisonous.
I left at two, and having bad postilions and excessive heat did
not arrive at Macon till near ten eight and a half posts, or about
fifty miles, in eight hours. ... I also now see the use of shepherds,
cowherds, and swineherds; for the fields being all unenclosed,
even a single cow requires its keeper, and one sees women and
children tending their little flocks and herds everywhere along the
road, the poor animals having nothing to eat but the grass and
weeds of the ditches.
" Tuesday, July z^th. I was up at four, but owing to the
inattention of the post I could not get off till a quarter before
five, and this has in fact been a day of vexations. I soon after
had the misfortune to overtake a caleche, which by the laws of
the post being a carriage of the same description as my own, and
drawn by the same number of horses, I might not pass. At last
I contrived to pass it while the owners were at breakfast, but I
had then the misfortune to overtake the mail, which no carriage
may pass, and was obliged to follow in its train for forty miles,
by which I lost a good hour. I got past this plague at Autun,
where the mail stopped to dinner, but broke a spring on the
road between that place and Saulieu, where I arrived at eight
1819.] LYONS PARIS DOVER. 177
o'clock, having performed nineteen and a half posts, or about
a hundred and sixteen miles, in fifteen and a quarter hours. At
the entrance of Autun there is a very large and handsome college.
I met about two hundred of the boys walking two and two,
attended by eight or ten teachers the youngest boys first, who
seemed to be from nine years and upwards. The last seventy or
eighty seemed quite adults, from eighteen or nineteen to twenty-
four. Some of the younger and middle-sized boys had a gentle-
manly appearance ; the adults were evidently of low rank and
shabbily dressed. . . . The air is indeed sensibly cold, and the
sky different in colour and transparency from that of Italy. My
dessert this evening at Saulieu has been not according to its usual
profusion of pears, plums, peaches, figs, apricots, almonds, and
filberts, but a solitary small plate of very indifferent gooseberries.
Sic transit gloria inundi. The inn here (the Poste) is small and
unpretending, but does not appear dirty, and I have found a
passable supper and a really good bottle of claret.
" Wednesday, July z^th, and legions of bugs, which are giving
me a degree of itching quite intolerable. Left at five, and pro-
ceeded five posts to Avallon. After this the country improves to
Auxerre, and the vineyards are of immense extent. . . . From
Auxerre about five posts brought me to Joigny, and 1 then fell
into the road I had passed in setting out to Sens, which I
reached at eight o'clock. ... I hope to reach Paris by three
to-morrow afternoon, being to an hour the exact month since I set
out, in which time how much have I seen ! But I am not very
sanguine in this hope, for the carriage is so very crazy that it is
next to a miracle if it does not tumble to pieces before I can reach
Paris, or at least if something does not break, to repair which will
require considerable delay.
" Thursday, July iqth. Left Sens at four o'clock, and after a
journey which offered nothing remarkable, having passed through
Charenton and by the castle of Vincennes, where the Duke
D'Enghien was shot, I arrived at my friend Baron Merian's, at
the same hour and day on which I had departed a month ago,
and found him ill in bed. He rose, however, to dinner, and we
passed the evening most agreeably.
*****
" Saturday, July 3 is/. Left Paris at six, arrived at Amiens at
ten at night, and saw its magnificent Cathedral, but little inferior to
Rheims, by moonlight. Arrived at Calais at nine o'clock, August
ist, and found near a hundred people fighting, scolding, entreating,
demanding, and tearing Madame Meurice to pieces for beds. At
last, after an hour's delay, I got one two streets off, clean and quiet.
" On Monday, August 2nd, I left Calais at half-past nine ; and
after a most delightful passage in the French mail, the officers
and sailors of which are remarkably civil and attentive, I arrived
in three hours and twenty minutes at Dover."
VOL. I. 12
1 78 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XII.
CORRESPONDENCE, AUGUST STH, 1819 JULY IOTH, 1820.
FROM THE REV. S. TILLBROOK.
"August $th, 1819.
* * * * *
" My own time has been spent leisurely enough. I have been
a little while at the Lakes, and to Scotland for a season, and am
now going to see old Cheviot put on his nightcap. By the end
of this month I hope my caravansary will reach Salop. My rod
has had harder duty than yours since we parted, and has tickled
up the Poissons in grand style. I have been a vagrant and a
vagabond ; have been suspected of passing forged banknotes
once all but apprehended in Yorkshire, with no one to give me
a character but my dog Pepper and no bail at hand. Almost
forced to pawn horse and gig."
To MR. BROOME, CHURCH STRETTON.
"SHREWSBURY, August 2oth, 1819.
" Dr. Butler feels extremely obliged to Mr. Broome for his
attention in removing the coachman who overturned the Here-
ford coach, when his boys broke up at midsummer last. The
man has been to Dr. Butler (whom he did not see), and has
stated ' that he has been fifteen years on the road, and has never
before been intoxicated nor complained of to Mr. Broome, but
that Mr. Broome will not restore him without Dr. B.'s con-
currence.' If this statement be correct, Dr. Butler would wish
Mr. Broome to consider him as not disposed to object to the
man's restoration, should he be inclined to reinstate him, but he
wishes by no means to be considered as making a request to
this effect, or as doing more than merely leaving the matter
wholly to Mr. Broome's consideration, to whom he begs to
return his very sincere thanks."
FROM BARON MERIAN.
"August 30/A, 1819.
" DEAR SIR, It is, by Jupiter, not permitted that in A.D. 1811
an erudite editor of Shakespeare should be ignorant of the mean-
ing of the word child applied to knights, warriors (see King Lear,
III. 4), and wonder like a silly ninny hammer ' how that came to
pass ' (p. 413, Chalmers). Why, on the Continent a child knoweth
that yon child is nothing in the world but held, heros, hero, a most
common German word, and by mere chance resembling your
, child,' infans, which again is corrupted from the German kind.
I say corrupted, because kind has an original signification, which
1819.] CORRESPONDENCE. 179
child has not. It is a most unconceivable thing that your
dictionaries, at least such as I saw, give not child, hero. I dare
to say that it is ridiculous to let boys and scholars believe that
child, infans, and child, hero, are one and the same word, or
teach, like Miller, that child is sometimes applied to princes and
kings in the same way as Infante is in Spain.
" This is a long speech about a single word, but it leads me or
a most serious, and I believe important, reflection. The English
grammarians and learned men will as a matter of course fot
ever be in the dark about such matters, if they continue in that
unaccountable neglect of the German languages of which they
are more than any people, and with much less excuse, guilty to
the present day. I wrote to you once upon this subject I do it
again, for it is crying aloud. How the excellent Johnson writes
an etymological dictionary of the English tongue, and, forsooth,
knows not one word of German ! ! ! Would you write a similar
work on the Italian, and not know one word of Latin ? You
laugh at the idea : give us leave not to laugh at a man like
Johnson, but to be stupefied at the phenomenon.
" Give us further leave to tell you that since Lewis XIV. you
lean altogether a great deal too much, in more than one aspect,
to French, and similar culture. Smooth Alex. Pope, for instance,
is not an English but a French poet, and will therefore not
survive among you ; and merely for running after idle wenches
the noble English maiden is grown forgetful of her own venerable
mother. I pretend no man can say ' I understand English '
unless he understand German, and I engage to show you in a
trice twenty English words which you, my dear friend, do not
understand, and which I do. What, e.g., is jeopardy, and buxom ?
And do you know what your mole-hill is ? A tautology, and no
better than hill-hill ; for mole is by no means an animal, but a
little rising ground, in German maul, meil ; in Russian mogila ; in
Latin moles. . . . You borrow daily words from the French which
are not French but German, and by passing through that filthy
medium have lost their original purity and lustre. . . . Ex. gr.
you had an old ' sicker 'the German ' sicher.' No, faith, that
would not do ; but you must run after ' secure,' which, with
e^vpos, is nothing but cant for sicher and sicker and you give
it a nonsensical accent ; for mark that every true English word
has its momentum on its radical syllable bewilder, unlucky a
quality which no language in the world has, except the German
and its offspring. And so strongly does this innate (why not
inborn ?) notion act on English minds and throats, that without
being aware of it they alter foreign words, and draw the accent
against foreign rule to its right and natural place. Thus senatus
became senate, papyrus paper, so deeply are you German, and
yet neglect German. It is wicked.
*****
T80 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XII.
" They ought, I repeat it, to look seriously back to the place
from which they sprang, and consider the three eternal partitions
of Europe, which are so well described by Madame de Stael in
the beginning of her book De FAllemagne, and which, in spite
of contrary wars, treaties, and dictionaries, will and must forcibly
break through and pop up in scecula sceculorum. Amen.
" And lastly we beg you will show this to Dr. Parr, TU> -n-dw, by
whom we should of all things like to be a little scourged."
FROM BARON MERIAN.
" September gth, 1819.
" DEAR SIR, Here's one morsel of Morcellus.* The other
will follow always at Rothschild's. Be not angry at my late
letters, but consider that if I scold 'tis only because I love
England and its literature. Now let me give you another striking
instance to support the truth of my ' grand ' letter ; take peace
and war. Ask of any English schoolboy to explain peace, he
will soon say, Peace, paix, pax, pactum, pangere. Right. Then
ask about war. He cannot answer. And yet war is of your
mother tongue, and peace is foreign, and introduced by the
Conquest only, for fred is the right word that answers war. I do
not recollect : does J ohnson or any new lexicographer explain war
and fred ? I doubt ; for to say they are Anglo-Saxon is not to
explain. Why is bellum called war? and why is, or was, pax
called fredt
" If we inquire, we find that the very same notion or observa-
tion which created the Latin pax created also the German fried
or fred, both meaning originally a stick, or term of separation :
palus solo impactus ; septum.
"This and a hundred similar questions your short but profound
vocabulary might explain, and by doing so astound many a
learned professor, who never fancied there could be sense any-
where but in Greek and Hebrew. Now the fact is the very
contrary. Greek and Latin are corrupted German."
FROM THE REV. S. TILLBROOK.
" MILLBROOK, September l$th, 1819.
" DEAR DOCTOR, Finding the ale still incomparably good at
Shiffnal, I desired the landlord to forward a two-dozen hamper
of it to your cellar. Drink the health of the donor, and save one
bottle for him till next year.
" Report i.e. the waiter at the King's Head, Coventry assured
me that at the Bear and Ragged Staff at Daventry I should
* Morcellus wrote a work entitled De Stylo Inscriptionum. 'Eto.
1819.1 CORRESPONDENCE. l8l
find the ale as good as in Shropshire. The name of this aubergc
amused me, so I determined to hobble to this interesting shrine
of Sir John Barleycorn. Under cover of the night I sneaked into
the auberge aforesaid, and found, as I opined, that the ale of
Daventry bore no comparison to that of Salop.
" I consider my summer travels at an end now, and shall begin
to celebrate them in Hudibrastic doggerel when I resume my
armchair at St. Peter's. I am afraid, excepting to such ready
wit as your own, that Monte Pulciano, Alleatico, Siracuso,
Alchermes, Curacoa, Maraschino, etc., offer insurmountable
difficulties, and yet it would be unpardonable to omit them."
FROM BARON MERIAN.
\End of September, 1819.]
" The Scotch family of Elphinstone is of German origin ; the
Counts of Helfenstein are well known in Germany, and suffered
much in what they call the War of the Peasants.
" Your Utis has on my brains the effect of I do not know
whose victories on the brains of Themistocles : he could not sleep.
But the difference is that Themistocles soon equalled those
victories : I never shall your Utis. Gin-is dp.i.
" Whatever you undertake you never fail of executing in
a masterly way. I have read the introduction and part of
Charlemagne. I have but this to say : if I had not been told so,
I should never have taken that poem for a translation. Yet on
this occasion I must lament once more do, only for the love
of me, not fetch your Saxon mythology out of French phials.
Irmensul is no more a god than General Hill's column is one.
Bless us ! Sul(?) is a column, and Irmen is not ascertained yet, but
conjectured to be Herman. Such mistakes look very pretty in
French productions ; but you noble Saxon progeny ought to
look elsewhere for the cultus of your forefathers. Suppose an
unlucky German was to travel through England, and then write
down, Habent in ista regione deum sive idolum cui nomen est
Hillicolumnus : what would you say ? Thus formerly a French
lawyer used to quote with great respect the German lawyer
Harcomannus. Now let it be known that he mistook the word
Herkommen, which means custom, law not written. I beseech you,
my dear friend, take all these criticisms and witticisms in bonam
partem. Your great superiority is acknowledged ; if you take one
flight more, you will be, not what Saumaise or Scaliger were, but
what, each in his sphere, Bacon was or Newton. You may give
grammar a new turn, and language a new foundation, i.e. the old
and only right one. Your eyes will become sharp-sighted, and you
will be struck with thousands of errors and mistakes round about
you which hitherto have escaped your sight. Dr. Hodgson, for
1 82 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XII
instance, writes Adalguise quite wrong ; it is Adel-weis, nobilis,
sapiens for mark, that anciently, and still now in the Orients, all
proper names were and are appellative ones, having a clear signi-
fication. Bagatelles, very true, but they show and demonstrate
the truth of the assertion which lies at the bottom of my scolding
letter, viz. that since Lewis XIV. you have considerably leaned to the
French side in literature, and to your vast detriment ; for French
(politics, manners, and) literature are, and must for ever be, foreign
to you ; 'twould be alloying copper to your silver. Ergo ista
bagatelles, si non seria ducunt in mala, tamen arguunt ista adesse
mala. Let levity be far from German characters ; it becomes
them not : what becomes them hath been marked out by Schiller :
Ernst und Liebe, die Beyden Ziemen dem Deutschen.
" The second morsel of Morcellus goes with this to Messrs.
Rothschild, London."
The " old Utis " in the foregoing and sundry other
letters of Baron Merian refers to an explanation given
by Dr. Butler of a passage in Shakespeare.
In a commonplace book, dated 1816, I find the
following :
" ' By the mass, there will be old Utis ; it will be an excellent
stratagem' (King Henry IV., Part I., p. 241. Ed. Malone).
' " Old Utis " signifies festivity in a high degree ' (Steevens).
' " Utis," a merry festival, from the French " huiet," " octo," " the
octaves " ' (Pope). I conceive Shakespeare alludes to the story of
Utis in the Odyssey. The Prince and Poins are going to disguise
themselves, and impose on Falstaff as two waiters or drawers.
Shakespeare, who had heard probably of the story of Ouris and
Polypheme, means to say that they will renew the old story of Utis
(as it would be written in the translation) in their imposture on
Falstaff."
FROM BARON MERIAN.
" October tfh, 1819.
" DEAR SIR, I continue my reading and remarks. General
Hill's column gave me much pleasure ; you wrote admirably, but
why is your beautiful civi suo and POPULARES EJUS not expressed
in the English inscription ? ' Contemporary ' is sorely vague, and
kills the interesting sentiment of concitizenship. Besides, why
Masonry ? * What was that good for ? Such secret societies are
* Dr. Butler must have sent Baron Merian Captain Moyle Sherer's
1819.] INSCRIPTION ON LORD HILLS COLUMN. 183
either dangerous or ridiculous. Non datur tertium. For if they
and their leaders have no idea but of doing good, assist the poor,
teach children, why for heaven's sake cannot they act sub dio ?
There is no reply to this. Now all their signs, and marks, and
shots, and aprons are fiddle-faddle and kickshaws fit for boys. All
that part of the story is a miserable cant a serious man ought to
be ashamed of, for 'tis not even ingenious. And what signifies
their brotherhood ? Arrant nonsense likewise.
*****
" That incoherent meddling of masonry has brought me off
my theme, which was your Latin composition. I doubt whether
Morcellus has any one thing finer than that so short, so strong,
so plain, so properly rising, and exit with a thunderclap. The
English inscription I don't know who wrote it I think very
fine too (the exposition of merits is delightful), only I repeat that
' contemporary ' is too weak, since something more forcible and
engaging might have been said. The Englishman does not tell
us that the hero is a Salopian."
The preceding letter makes it clear that Dr. Butler wrote
the Latin inscription on Lord Hill's column, but I have
found no draft of either Latin or English among his papers.
The English inscription is generally believed in Shrews-
bury (probably with truth) to have been also written by
Dr. Butler. The Latin inscription runs :
CIVI . SUO . ROLANDO
DOMINO . BARONI . HILL . AB . ALMARAZ . ET . HAWKSTONE
POPULARES . EJUS . EX . AGRO . ATQUE . MUNICIPIO . SALOPIENSI
COLUMNAM . HANCCE . CUM . STATUA . P.C.
A.S. MDCCCXVI.
IS . IN . RE . MILITARI . QUEMADMODUM . SE . GESSERIT
TESTES . SINT . LUSITANIA . HISPANIA . GALLL.E
NARBONENSIS . AC . BELGICA
AfcTURUS . DUX . A . WELLINGTON
SOCIORUM . ET . QUIDEM . HOSTIUM . EXERCITUS.
description of Lord Hill's column in Shrewsbury, etc., where the fact
of one of the principal contributors being a Freemason is expressly
stated. He was Mr. John Straphen, a builder in Shrewsbury, and he
gave the internal staircase.
1 84 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XII.
The English inscription is as follows :
TO LIEUTENANT-GENERAL ROWLAND LORD HILL,
BARON HILL OF ALMARAZ AND HAWKSTONE, G.C.B.
NOT MORE DISTINGUISHED FOR HIS SKILL AND COURAGE IN THE FIELD,
DURING THE ARDUOUS CAMPAIGNS IN SPAIN AND PORTUGAL,
THE SOUTH OF FRANCE, AND THE MEMORABLE PLAINS OF WATERLOO,
THAN FOR HIS BENEVOLENT AND PATERNAL CARE
IN PROVIDING FOR THE COMFORTS AND SUPPLYING THE NECESSITIES
OF HIS VICTORIOUS COUNTRYMEN,
AND FOR THAT HUMANITY AND GENEROSITY
WHICH THEIR VANQUISHED FOES EXPERIENCED AND ACKNOWLEDGED,
THE INHABITANTS OF THE TOWN AND COUNTY OF SALOP
HAVE ERECTED THIS COLUMN AND STATUE,
AS A MEMORIAL OF THEIR RESPECT AND GRATITUDE TO AN
ILLUSTRIOUS CONTEMPORARY,
AND AN INCITEMENT TO EMULATION IN THE HEROES AND
PATRIOTS OF FUTURE AGES.
A.D. MDCCCXVI.
FROM BARON MERIAN.
" October gth, 1819.
" DEAR SIR, The ENGLISH language is of a singular nature
Every other language has some foreign words admixed to it,
comparatively few (peu), but the ENGLISH is composed of two
distinct and belligerent parts, which no time will and can ever
amalgamate, the GERMAN part and the FRENCH part for a very
few remainders of ancient BRITISH are hardly worth notice.
Yon two parts are at present (xixth century] a match for one
another, the second, however, gaining continually ground, for your
fine people think themselves prodigiously witty and happy when
they may thrust in some fashionable FRENCH expression, some of
which by degrees stick fast, and are at last reputed to be ENGLISH.
I say reputed, for in fact they are not and never can be. It
is to me a wonderful thing to look attentively at an ENGLISH
page : I there perceive distinctly two languages instead of one
(very often two words instead of one, and now and then a
third one ' kingly,' ' royal,' and besides ' regal.' Now what's
the use of that ?), and am in search accordingly for two dictionaries,
a GERMAN-ENGLISH one and a FRENCH-ENGLISH one. To
illustrate this impression I have used italics for words of FRENCH
origin. In any quite new composition you'll find proportionally
more of such words, and this circumstance shows you the path
you are now in, for style is man.
CORRESPONDENCE. 185
" There is, however, this one great difference : the German
is the foundation, the French the superstructure, so this may
one day be blown away. . . . Your plan for 1820, 1821, is
delightful. Je ferai mon possible pour le realiser. I have^other
things in view besides in which I shall once more beg of you
to assist me. . . . There will be old Utis. My respects to great
Dr. Parr."
FROM THE SAME.
" October 2$th, 1819.
" DEAR SIR, I have received Etymologicum Universale* 2 vols.
Splendid : a very fine book indeed, and for which I am deeply
indebted to you. ... Is Whiter still conversant on this globe,
and where ?
" Ten thousand thanks at least for your kind answer con-
cerning our Calypso ; your advice will be strictly followed. You
have most probably by giving it saved a very worthy man from
ruin. . . .
" Champagne. I suspect it to be in England long ago. Have
you asked Dejex about it ? and has he answered ? You must
and shall have it, Meherde !
" I look with great impatience for the printed accounts of the
triumphal ya^os.f Such honours are true honours, for they
proceed from free-will. No authority can command, no money
can purchase, them. Your benevolent mind, your great activity
in forwarding whatever is KaXoKa.ya.66v, have now met with a due
and public reward ; and you might, if pride was admissible, be
justly proud of testifications, which, in exalting the daughter, tend
to exalt the father.
" Where lives now this said fair and dear daughter ? Do reflect
about marrying your elder daughter too. It is not fit that she
should long be a looker-on. Such cases engender bitterness of
heart. You are not surely one of those parents who fancy
children are born to make their tea for ever."
FROM THE SAME.
" November z^th, 1819.
"DEAR SIR, -Ecce my notes on the sermon. [Dr. Butler's
Installation Sermon of 1811, referred to on pp. 66-71.]
3fc f? $ T& SJt
" Page 31. Engine [referring to what Dr. Butler had written about
confession]. It became so by abuse. Originally to confess, i.e.
* By the Rev. Walter Whiter.
t The marriage of Dr. Butler's second daughter, Harriet, to T. J.
Lloyd, Esq.
CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XII.
to tell one's misdeeds to an aged worthy person, ask for counsel,
and even submit to opposite restrictions (as fasting for gluttonry),
is no doubt one of the best remedies, and safest. Do you
not teach your children to come and tellen you freely whenever
they did amiss ? You are the father of your children. Well,
from the day you take away the parental and filial connection
between priests and laics, you have done away the whole estab-
lishment of religion. Abba, pater, father, papa, is and was
throughout the universe the appropriate, the first name of the
priests. Unless I can consider and reverence him as a father,
I have no occasion for a priest. Atqui to a father I may, nay I
ought, to confess my failings. Ergo . . . You, for instance, Dr.
Butler I treat you as my friend and equal : we are about the same
age, both of cheerful disposition, and yet be assured that beyond
this level intercourse, and behind it, there is still something other
of respectfulness in me towards you which cannot and shall not
be in you towards me. I am perhaps older than you. I have
been furiously thrown about in this world, and so forsooth am not
deprived of experience, and yet I would most willingly repair and
fly to you, not only for advice, but for admonishment not only
for admonishment, but for correction. And why ? Because that
you are a priest and I a laic. The next year will probably evince
the truth and explain the purport of these words, and old Utis will
then become very intelligible.
" Champagne. Not cheap, faith ; but let Parliament answer for
half the price. Here's the proportion : Buying and carrying from
Epernay, Champagne, to Calais, 415 francs. 5 francs a bottle on
the spot where it grows. But now follows shipping and taxes,
395.21. Consequently nearly as much again.
" If the wine, on tasting it after some rest, prove not exquisitely
good, write to me, and you will hear at Shrewsbury the tremendous
tempest I shall raise at Epernay.
" Homer with fifty-eight drawings is preparing for his journey
to M. Rothschild's, London. Et iterum munera ? Quoadusque
tandem ? To a thousand I cannot answer one. I only wish you
could see me blush like a virgin at fifteen.
" Be tranquil of mind. Robortellus must and shall be yours,
though 'tis harder to come at him than at a quadriphyllous
trefoil.
" I pity Whiter. A great etymologist perhaps the greatest that
ever lived. A genius certainly ; but it seems, like most eminent
artists, dissolute. Ten thousand thanks for your Hamletiana.
After such intelligence only, we understand a poet. I entirely
agree with you after due rumination. Homer and Shakespeare
are the only two poets in the wide world."
, 1820.] CORRESPONDENCE. 1 8?
FROM DR. WOOD, MASTER OF ST. JOHN'S, CAMBRIDGE.
(Original in Cambridge University College Library.)
" December 2$th, 1819.
*****
" Your liberal offer of assistance to such as want and deserve
it I shall certainly bear in mind, as there is no man living in
whose hands I would sooner place a boy than yours."
*****
To DR. PARR.
" SHREWSBURY, January 2$th, 1820.
" DEAR DR. PARR, After long and very serious considera-
tion of the case in the joint letter I received from yourself and
Dr. Maltby, and after every allowance for the claims of private
friendship and public respect due to you both from me, I find
myself obliged to say that I cannot admit the boy.
*****
" One more objection, and that of high importance, remains.
From the horror in which the conduct of the boy who stole from
his schoolfellows, whoever he might be, was held, I am convinced
that, except those furta Laconica which you and I flog boys for
with a grave face, and inwardly laugh at, or admire for their
intrepidity and spirit of adventure, no meanness of the kind pre-
vails among my boys. Pickle boys rob an orchard, but they
would scorn to steal a shilling. Now is it just to introduce among
them one of a different description? And if anything should
happen, would not parents justly reproach me for the result ?
*****
" To-morrow we celebrate your birthday. With your present
vigour of mind and body it is reasonable to hope that you may
long be spared to enjoy its recurrence with your friends. God
bless you, my dear Dr. Parr ; accept our kindest united con-
gratulations on its return, and believe me yours very affectionately,
" S. BUTLER."
FROM THE VERY REV. THE DEAN OF HEREFORD.
" DEANERY, HEREFORD, February 6,th, 1820.
" MY DEAR FRIEND, I have proof enough that in your com-
mendations of my son Fred you did not flatter me. ... If
I had the ear of his mathematical master (you can vellere et
admonere), I should beg that he would enjoin upon Fred not to
read any proposition of Euclid in the book before it had been
clearly demonstrated to him and the scheme drawn, and no
finished figure as in the book shown him. Thus in the first
term I learned four books of Euclid viva voce, and thus for
1 88 CORRESPONDENCE, [CH. XII.
upwards of thirty-six years I taught geometry, and never among
my asses did one boggle at the pons asinorum. When Charles
Luxmoore was superannuated at Eton, I offered the Bishop my
services, and his son learned well, three books of Euclid in a
fortnight : from college he soon wrote to his father that by reading
he puzzled himself and despaired; but if his tutor would teach
him as I had taught him, he and ' the old carpenter ' might
have jogged on together very lovingly !
"I believe I followed this plan from a sentence of good old
Postlethwaite : ' Write, write, sir ; many a man reads without sense
and talks nonsense, but few are such fools as to write nonsense ! '
... All a lecturer in mathematics should do or can do is to
direct the march of his pupil's intellect ; he is no post-horse to
carry the lad, but a guide-post to prevent him going out of his
road. Eh bien I where is my hobby carrying me ?
" I did not examine the tradesmen's bills before this morning.
I contented myself, as well I might, with your sum-total, and
your P.S. testimonial of ' bene meruit' ; but lo ! I find a note of
thanks, and I think from the pen of dear Mary, date December
1 5th, for venison, two hares, and three partridges, folded up
among the bills. ' Oh,' said Kate, ' I remember them leaving,
and that Dr. Butler thanked you in September and one of the
hares I think you intended for Mr. Griffiths.' ' True, Kate, be
it so ; the season is well advanced, and I will look out for a puss
fit for a classic's regale, inasmuch as sapiens sectabitur annos.'
"I seem to hear you say, 'I am glad the Dean is in good
spirits.' Why, my good friend, as you approached your home on
your return from Warwickshire, did you not feel your spirits
elated at the prospect of rejoining your family ? And is not the
near termination of the long journey of life an object as ex-
hilarating as the near termination of any stage of it ? Do I not
hope to rejoin those whom I have loved with whom I have
lived ? With these hopes you will say, ' Vade, vale ' ; and do not,
I beseech you, omit to add, 'Cave ne titubes.' Ever yours most
affectionately, " GEORGE GRETTON.
" P.S. Dross of my gratitude, my pecuniary debit, is enclosed.
Corrigenda. In the mollia tempera fandi, a man is often well
corrected. Therefore at dinner I have been informed of and
correct my error. No hare was sent hence to Mr. Griffiths since
July last ; therefore both were yours. Nevertheless a gravid
hare (if I can beg one) shall, as before said, be sent to Mr.
Griffiths. The three partridges (were they salted ?) were sent
to you by the rector of Nantwich. Alas ! what a chasm fell on
Saturday last between you and my Henry ! From Hereford to
Salop, thence to Adderley, and so to Nantwich. My old friend
the rector of Adderley, whose regard I possessed during sixty
years, from a child on his knee to the olim meminisse of our age,
1 8ao.] CORRESPONDENCE. 189
died last Saturday. Good as our old King was. If kings have
chaplains in heaven, surely the coincident translation of both
together from earth would make me, what ? wish that a country
parish priest who deserved to be a bishop may be near the person
and enjoying the bliss of the best prince who ever exchanged a
temporal for an eternal crown."
Dr. Gretton died about three weeks after the foregoing
letter was written.
To A PUPIL WHO WAS LEAVING.
" April yd, 1820.
" DEAR - , You judged rightly in supposing that great
inconvenience would arise were such communications frequent as
that which I received from Gladstone on your departure. And
for that reason I should not have replied to it, had I not just
received your note enclosing the two guineas for yourself and your
brother. As I now send you a reply which you may produce in
your own defence if necessary, it would, I think, be inconsistent
with the friendship I feel towards you not to answer that
communication.
" I give you full credit for the contempt you express for dis-
honourable boys ; and though I have forgotten any particular
occurrences* of your earlier years here, I am fully satisfied they
were exempt from any acts of meanness. The cause which made
me wish your removal was the influence I observed you to have
over A , which he himself acknowledged, and which I per-
ceived was highly prejudicial to him. In fact, I did not think it
possible to keep you both, and the relationship between myself
and A made me prefer letting him return of the two. How far
I might have succeeded in keeping you both, had he not gone to
India when you returned, I do not know, for I certainly should
not have looked over some things, had he been here with you,
which while you were here alone I considered of less importance.
" In arranging the places of the boys I never pretend to
infallibility. Impartiality is my aim, and that I confidently claim.
I decide upon the evidence of their exertions which appears
before me. Boys may have much better talents than those above
them, and yet lose ground if those talents are not accompanied
with proportionate exertion. I have no doubt that, had you chosen
to put forth your strength, you would have done much more and
have been much higher ; but I am not to blame because you were
not industrious ; nor is a boy to stand so much upon points with
* From an erasure in the draft, it appears that there had been some
" particular occurrences " which Dr. Butler had not forgotten. ED.
190 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XII.
his instructors as to fancy himself ill-used when he finds others
placed above him whom the master believes to have used more
exertions. This, I know, is a common error with boys, which is
best unlearned by experience in life.
" I certainly could have wished for your own sake that you had
kept more to the spirit than to the letter of your promise ; for I
cannot say that your behaviour, though not actually contumacious,
has been altogether satisfactory by your own acknowledgement it
was not all it might have been, nor what my own goodwill towards
you had led me to expect. Do not understand me to say this
as upbraiding you ; my object is to show you why I confine the
note which you may produce when necessary to as few words as
possible. You know that you were not dismissed, and you know
the precautions I took to prevent such a supposition; but you
should also bear in mind that where it exists it has probably
originated in some rumour about your general conduct here
latterly, and especially just previous to your leaving me, and this
may help to convince you that it has been injudicious. What
you have heard me say sometimes to the boys I may now repeat
to you with more probability of your attending to it, which is, that
here, as well as at all other public schools, there are plenty of
people who have little to do but amuse themselves with prying
into the transactions of the master and boys, and magnifying all
the faults they find. Nothing is so easy as to find fault, and
wherever there are boys there will of course be opportunities of
doing so. It is fortunate when these misstatements can be cor-
rected, but this opportunity is not always found. I have thus
replied at some length to your parting letter, because I am
persuaded the time will come when you will be convinced that
the course you latterly adopted here was rather headstrong than
becoming, and because, if you are in consequence led to reflect,
you may be saved from similar errors in your academical course,
where you may perhaps not find similar indulgence. I am your
sincere friend and well-wisher, " S. BUTLER."
The letter enclosed, that was " to be shown if necessary,"
ran :
" DEAR , In reply to your note of last night, I have only
to say, what is well known to your schoolfellows, that you did not
leave me in consequence of a dismissal or any application made
on my part to your father, but in consequence of a note from him
requesting that I would send you home, in order that you might
be equipped to go to college. You are at full liberty to show
this note to any person to whom you may think proper to make
the communication. I am your sincere friend,
"$. BUTLER,"
1 820. ] CORRESPONDENCE. 1 9 1
FROM THE REV. S. TILLBROOK.
" KING'S HEAD, COVENTRY, June ist, 1820.
" Without being sent I find myself among the noisy descendants
of peeping Tom, and shall be very happy to turn my back upon
them to-morrow. I have just been reconnoitring from my bed-
room ; in front of it stand fourteen caravans containing all sorts of
beasts of the brute or human kind. The Devonshire giant is
drawn up alongside the Flemish fairy I know not why, except
that 01 TToXXot may compare great things with small. The wilder
beasts are roaring for their prey, and the rabble for the showman.
What a curse to be kept here twenty-four hours among the ferce
naturce, without a chance of earning a penny by exhibiting one's
own beauties or deformities. I think, however, that I might have
excited popular curiosity as the descendant of a fire-eater whose
nose had been likened to a furnace by a certain learned doctor,
and which was capable of being converted at will to a fire or
candle lighter.
" Talking of fire, I have had a visit from the Poet Laureate * at
Peterhouse. He stayed three days, and I had a dinner in honour
of him. I was glad to find he liked my stock, and swallowed it
more greedily than I do his poetry. He was going to Oxford to
meet Lord Hill and the Duke of Wellington an honorary degree
was to be the payment of his travelling expenses.
" But we can talk of this when we meet. I see no reason why
I should not reach your dinner-table by four o'clock on Sunday
next. Bishops travel on Sundays, so I suppose a fortiori B.D.'s
may do the same. Have the goodness to send John to bespeak
a stall for my horse, and a bed for myself in my old room adjoining
the upstairs dining-room at the Raven. Mind, I do not and
cannot think of troubling you for anything but larder and cellar
provisions, and as much of your native good-humour as you can
spare. I give you a day or two's warning that you may announce
my intended arrival to the Serjeant. I have letters to a gentleman
at Ludlow, and to Mr. Knight for Leintwardine, and long to be
at the grayling and trout. If I am not with you by Sunday, some
accident will have happened to me worse than wind or weather."
FROM THE REV. T. SHEEPSHANKS TO MRS. BUTLER.
"July 2nd, 1820.
*****
" I am glad to hear Tom is diligent ; he shall have a week's
decent drilling from me at Shrewsbury before the examination,
and after that he must trust to good luck and his own brains.
Southey.
1 92 CORRESPONDENCE. [CH. XII.
" I have read The Fortunes of Nigel would I had not ! The
author seems to me to have taken final leave of his senses, and
I trust has or will pay the same compliment to his readers.
*****
" I can't say I have been very successful in the way of obtaining
boys to fill up the vacancies (this being the most interesting
subject, I ought to have mentioned it sooner). I had one nibble
at Worcester, which I think may possibly catch a gudgeon. 1
had a bout the other day with an honest gentleman, who wanted
a private tutor for his son. I recommended him, of course, to
send him to Shrewsbury, where I would (for a consideration, of
course) be his private tutor myself. I enlarged, as in duty
bound, on the superiority of schools over private tuition, and on
the superiority of Shrewsbury over all other schools. He said
he wanted his son to have exercise and cleanliness, etc. I
observed that we had the Quarry and the Severn the best walk
and river in the kingdom ; but I took especial care not to say
that the one was out of bounds, and being caught in the other
a flogging. He reckoned, however, that he wanted his son to
have a little wine not too much, of course, after his dinner. In
order that he might have no excuse for making his son a dunce,
I said that a private tutor would take him for ^200 per annum,
whereas your terms were only forty-six guineas, and offered (what
could I do more?) that for the remaining ^151 14^. I would
myself take care that he had wine daily, and not too much. Of
the quantity necessary I was to be sole judge. This plan alto-
gether he did not approve, so I was obliged to let him go. You
see, however, I have spared no efforts. Of Mr. White I know
nothing, except that as proproctor he behaved very ill to a friend
of mine. If, however, he sends some boys who are acquaintances
and private pupils of mine, I will forgive him all his sins. Pray
give my best regards to Miss Butler, and Mrs. John Lloyd
and Mr. John Lloyd, and Tom and Lizzie, and Mrs. John
Lloyd's little baby, and Mrs. John Lloyd's little baby's little
finger in short, to the whole concern.
" Believe me, my dear madam, yours most sincerely,
"T. SHEEPSHANKS."
To A PARENT.
" SHREWSBURY, July loth, 1820.
" DEAR SIR, At the time of the breaking up I learned that
an attack was meditated by some boys on your son and some
other of his schoolfellows, the result of some party quarrel, in
which it is generally most advisable for a master not to interfere,
because the disputes of boys are best settled among themselves,
and the interference of the master tends to perpetuate ill-will.
1 820.] DR. BUTLER ON SCHOOL FIGHTS. 193
On this occasion, however, finding that there was serious and
vindictive aggression on one side, and a steady determination
to resist it on the other, I felt it my duty to prevent the mischief
by separating the contending parties. I have since learned that
your son, who appears to have been on the defensive, not the
aggressive side, was armed with so deadly a weapon as a loaded
pistol. I have therefore to request that you will insist on his
most faithfully promising you and me that he will never arm
himself with a similar weapon during his continuance under my
care, and will give up to you that which he now has.
*****
" When two boys quarrel, though battles ought not to be
encouraged, perhaps the most desirable thing is that they should
settle it between themselves by a trial of mastery, which generally
puts a stop to all further squabbles. But no master can either
say this or encourage it. I am only giving you my opinion, which
is for your private consideration, not for promulgation."
VOL. I, 13
CHAPTER XIII.
THE LETTERS TO HENRY BROUGHAM, ESQ., M.P.
Correspondence, September 2oth, 1820 December l6th, 1820.
Appointment to the Archdeaconry of Derby. Correspondence,
January ist, 1821 December 3rd, 1821.
TWO Bills were introduced by Mr. Brougham in the
summer of 1820 which threatened to prejudice the
interests of almost all future masters of endowed grammar
schools throughout the kingdom. The schools of Eton,
Westminster, Winchester, Harrow, the Charterhouse, and
Rugby were exempted, and as the Bills were not retro-
spective Dr. Butler was not affected ; believing, however,
that the Bills would lower the tone of public educa-
tion, he attacked them (or rather the second of them,
dated July I4th, 1820) in two vigorous letters to Mr.
Brougham himself, the first of which was published in
1820 and the second in 1821. The first dealt with the
effects of the measure on education generally, while the
second urged the claims of Shrewsbury to be added to
the list of schools excluded from its provisions. Among the
objectionable clauses was one empowering those who had
the appointment to the mastership of any school to limit
che number of boarders which the master might take, or,
if they chose, "to forbid altogether the taking, receiving,
or entertaining of any such boarders." By another clause
the master was liable to be compelled " to teach, either
by himself or by an usher or assistant, reading, writing,
and accounts," should those who appointed him see fit to
194
i820.] ASHTON'S ORDINANCES. 195
so require. The Bills were abandoned after having been
amended in committee. I need not therefore give any
analysis of the arguments advanced in the first of the
two letters.
A few extracts from the earlier ordinances for the
government of the school (commonly called Ashton's
ordinances), and Dr. Butler's synopsis of the course of
instruction for the fifth and sixth forms in his own time,
comprise all that is of present interest in the second letter.
" i. Schoolmaster not to frequent alehouses.
" 2. Master's families to quit, on vacancies, within three months.
"3. Item. The head schoolmaster's degree of the said school
for the time being shall be, at the time of his election, a Master
of Arts of two years' standing at the least, well able to make a
Latin verse, and learned in the Greek tongue.
" 4. Item. The second schoolmaster of the said school for the
time being shall be, at the time of his election, a Master of Arts
at the least, and well able to make a Latin verse, and learned in
the Greek tongue, before he be admitted to teach in the said
school.
" 5. Item. The third schoolmaster of the said school for the
time being shall be a Bachelor of Arts at the least, and well able
to make a Latin verse, and of such sufficient learning as that place
requireth, before he be admitted.
*****
"21. Item. Every Thursday the scholars of the highest form
before they go to play shall for exercise declaim and play one
act of a comedy, and every Saturday versify, and against Monday
morning give up their themes or epistles ; and all other exercises
of writing or speaking shall be used in Latin.
*****
" 24. Item. That no scholar shall be admitted into the Free
Grammar School before he can write his name with his own
hand, and before he can read English perfectly, and have his
accidence without (book ?), and can give any case of any number
of a noun substantive or adjective, and any person of any
number of a verb active or passive, and can make Latin by any
of the concords, the Latin words being first given him.
*****
" 33. Item. There shall be read in the same school, for prose,
in Latin, Tully, Caesar's Commentaries, Sallust, and Livy ; also
two little books of Dialogues drawn out of Tully's Offices and
196 LETTERS TO HENRY BROUGHAM, ESQ., M.P. [Cn. XIII.
Ludovicus Vives by Mr. Ashton, some time chief schoolmaster
of the said school ; for verse, Virgil, Horace, Ovid, and Terence ;
for Greek, the Greek Grammar of Clenard, the Greek Testa-
ment, Isocrates ad Demonicum, or Xenophon's Cyrus ; and those
authors, or some of them, mentioned in the table for the manner
of teaching to be read in this school,* according to the head-
master's discretion and choice, as shall seem best for the
children's capacities."
*****
The weekly course of instruction for the fifth and sixth
forms, under Dr. Butler, was as follows :
Monday. i. Chapel. 'History, Grecian, Roman, English.
Repeat Greek Grammar.
2. Dalzel's Analecta Majora, sixth and upper fifth only.
The parts read in this class are Thucydides, Plato,
Greek Orators, Aristotle, Longinus. Lecture on
Greek Grammar.
3. Cicero's Orations.
4. Virgil. Shell attend. Chapel.
Tuesday. i. Chapel. Repeat Virgil. Show up Latin theme.
2. Dalzel's Analecta Majora. Parts read are the Greek
plays, Pindar, Theocritus, Callimachus. Subject for
Latin verses given. Remainder of Latin themes
shown up. Half-holiday. Masters of accomplish-
ments attend.
Wednesday. i. Chapel. Tacitus, Demosthenes, Greek play or
Plautus, for sixth and upper fifth ; Pitman's Excerpta,
lower fifth ; and repeat Dalzel of Tuesday.
2. Greek play. Examination of a class of the lower boys.
3. Horace, Odes.
4. Scriptores Romani. Chapel.
Thursday. i. Chapel. Repeat Horace. Show up Latin
verses.
2. Homer. Shell attend. Lecture in Algebra to sixth
and upper fifth. Remaining verse exercises shown
up. Half-holiday as Tuesday.
Friday. i. Chapel. Repeat Homer. Show up lyrics.
2. Juvenal or Horace, the Satires and Epistles. Shell
attend. Show up the remainder of the lyric
exercises.
3. Tacitus, Demosthenes, Greek play or Plautus, to sixth
and upper fifth only. Lower fifth Pitman.
4. Virgil. Shell attend. Chapel.
* This table was not in existence in Dr. Butler's time. ED.
1 820.] SHREWSBURY CURRICULUM. 197
Saturday. i. Chapel. Repeat Juvenal or Horace. Lecture
in Euclid to sixth and upper fifth.
2. Open lesson, generally English translated into Greek
or Latin prose, or lesson in Greek play. Prepostors
of the week show up Greek verses.
Sunday. Church in the morning. Chapel in the evening.
Upper boys examined in Watts' Scripture History
or Tomline's Theology, Lower boys examined in
Catechism.
Examination for the Sixth and Upper Fifth Forms, commencing
August 7//fc, 1820.
Monday. i. English theme.
2. Latin theme.
3. Greek metres ; adjustment and translation into Latin
verse of a Greek chorus.
Tuesday. i. History.
2. English translated into Latin.
Wednesday. i . Geography.
2. Euclid.
3. Philology.
Thursday. i. Latin translated into English.
2. Latin verses.
Friday. i. English translated into Greek.
2. Greek translated into English.
3. Algebra.
Saturday. i. Religion.
2. Arrangement of classes. Distribution of prizes.
The questions are all given and answered in writing,
in the presence of the head-master, who never quits
the school during the period of examination, and
each subject takes on an average two hours.
CORRESPONDENCE, SEPTEMBER 20TH, 1820
DECEMBER i6TH, 1820
To THE HON. H. G. BENNET, M.P.
" September 2Oth, 1820.
*****
"Writing to you on a previous occasion I claimed that Shrews-
bury School should be put on at least as favourable a footing as
Eton, Westminster, or any other. I now see that in this Bill
Eton, Westminster and Winchester, Harrow, Charterhouse and
Rugby, are excepted as being public schools. I claim the same
198 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XIII.
exception for Shrewsbury on that ground also, and I beg to state
my reasons.
" If by a public school is meant one to which persons from all
parts of the kingdom send their sons for education and I cannot
conceive any other meaning of the term then I beg leave to
say that there is now, and usually have been during my master-
ship, boys at Shrewsbury School from almost every county in
England and Wales, some from Scotland and some from Ireland.
" If reference is made to the extent of the foundations and
exhibitions, I beg to say that this foundation is far more
extensive than Harrow, and has more numerous and valuable
exhibitions than Rugby. For particulars I refer you and Mr.
Brougham to Mr. Carlisle's books on endowed schools.
" If to merit, it is tender ground and invidious for me to speak,
but there are more prizemen at Cambridge from Shrewsbury
School in proportion to numbers than from any other school in
England, and more in actual numbers than from any school but
Eton and Charterhouse.
" If to numbers, there are now a hundred and fifty-eight boys,
and the number is limited for want of room.
" I see no right which any of the excepted schools have to
their exception, or to the title of public schools, which does not
equally belong to Shrewsbury, and I therefore claim the same
exception and the same distinction."
FROM THE REV. T. S. HUGHES.
(In reference to the letter to Henry Brougham, Esq.)
"November 1st, 1820.
" MY DEAR DOCTOR, I should have written to you before
this on the subject of your letter if I had not known that old
Till intended to do so, and had agreed with him in some opinions
which he expressed.
" I have the pleasure to tell you that I never knew a thing so
well received ; the observation of all who read it is that the argu-
ments and statements are quite unanswerable. I have lent my
copy to go round a large circuit of houses. I have introduced
the subject in all quarters, and have found no dissentient opinion.
I only heard one person say that he thought one or two of the
remarks were a little too caustic."
*****
FROM W. H. BUTLER, ESQ., OF THE STONE HOUSE, KENILWORTH.
" KENILWORTH, November $th, 1820.
*****
" We have not experienced any disturbance here or at War-
wick since you left us, and the electioneering goes on smoothly.
1 820.] CORRESPONDENCE. 199
The only incident I heard of yesterday was that one of Mr.
Spooner's friends from Coventry being over-fatigued by his
exertions, and unwilling to walk home, proceeded at dusk to the
Saltisford Common with a string formed as a bridle, caught a
horse, and rode away briskly through the outskirts of Warwick
towards the Coventry road. But the animal became restive and
set off full-speed into the town, making a dead stop at the bride-
well door. The keeper, being accidentally on the outside, recog-
nised his own horse, called the turnkey, and had both horse and
rider immediately secured."
FROM THE RIGHT HON. J. C. VILLIERS, M.P. (AFTERWARDS
EARL OF CLARENDON).
" EUSTON, November "jth, 1820.
*****
" I must recur to what I mentioned in my former letter,* and I
only do so for the further credit of your school you may depend
upon the fact that the principle of tuition by the boys is with
success carried to a greater extent than is thought of in any other
classical school ; and you may rely upon its general utility to
the scholars upon the testimony of so competent and great an
authority as the eminent Etonian whom I mentioned, and whose
testimony has satisfied me upon the subject."
FROM BULKELEY WILLIAMS, ESQ. (A FORMER PUPIL).
" MAGDALENE COLLEGE, December yd, 1820.
" REVEREND SIR, It is with considerable concern that I in-
form you that I am again refused a scholarship on Dr. Millington's
foundation. I am the more disappointed as Mr. Crawley held
out great hopes of success to me, expressing himself satisfied
with my performance at the examination. He gave me a paper
of questions, and said that if the answers to them were not satis-
factory he would give me another such paper. The first answers,
however, seemed sufficient, as he gave no more questions. Upon
this I began to feel sure of success, but some time after he
informed me that -he had written to the Master on the subject,
and observed that he was afraid I could not have the Millington
Scholarship, but that I should have some other ; his last account,
however, informs me that I can have none at all. As he really
thought me deserving of a scholarship, I am at a loss to conjecture
why the Master should give a different decision, who, being at his
living in Flintshire, can have no idea of the result of the examina-
* I did not find the letter referred to among Dr. Butler's papers.
-ED.
200 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XIII-
tion, hut from the account he has received from Mr. Crawley.
Bray is also deprived of his scholarship, being rusticated for a
very slight offence without been convened, and merely not having
an opportunity of saying anything in his defence. I trust that
this will not appear irrelevant to the subject, as there seems to
appear in it a wish on the part of the College to have as many
scholarships as possible vacant. Shall I under these circum-
stances beg the favour of that advice which you have so kindly
offered me? I should wish to change my College (and should
prefer Peterhouse to all others here) ; in this step however I
shall be happy to be ruled by you.
" I am, Reverend Sir,
" Your most obedient and grateful pupil,
" BULKELEY WILLIAMS.
" P.S. A line to my father on the subject would be thankfully
received by him."
FROM THE REV. P. WILLIAMS.
"BEAUMARIS, December i6th, 1820.
" DEAR SIR, I have received a letter from Mr. Crawley since
I troubled you before about my son Bulkeley regretting that he
had not been able to recommend his election into the scholarship
on Dr. Millington's foundation, and, after paying him some
compliments on his regular conduct in College, says ' that by
some unaccountable means he has left school so exceedingly ill-
informed as to the first principles of grammar, that I have found
it absolutely impossible to support his pretensions without
violating that duty which I owe to the College and that respect
for the institutions of the founder which I conceive ought in all
such cases to be the primary consideration.'
" Mr. Crawley had Bulkeley before him some time after the ex-
amination, and told him in direct terms he must not expect the
exhibition, and Mr. Neville has written to the same effect to Lord
Bulkeley : we must therefore give it up, but my son is so much
mortified and disappointed, and conceives himself so much ill-
treated, that I cannot prevail on him to remain at Magdalene.
He is very ready and willing to go to any other College at
Cambridge you may recommend, to which Lord Bulkeley has
also consented, and his Lordship agrees with me that my son has
been ill-used and deceived. Bulkeley has intimated a wish to go
to Peterhouse, but as I am not competent to judge what is best
now to be done with him, I shall be exceedingly thankful to you
for your friendly advice on this occasion, and be so good as to let
me hear from you soon, so that I may write to Bulkeley, who
remains at College during the Christmas recess, to arrange his
1 820, 1821.] ARCHDEACONRY OF DERBY. 2OI
plans for his removal and to have the benefit of the terms he has
kept.
" My son John has just arrived at home, and was sorry he could
not contrive to stop at Shrewsbury and call upon you, but I find
he has no means of judging of the examination of his brother, who
has kept no copy of the papers he brought up to Mr. Crawley.
Upon the whole I fear nothing can now be done but to remove
poor Bulkeley from a College where the sons of great men only
are encouraged, under the government of the Tutor as well as
the Master. I hope you will excuse my troubling you on this
occasion, and remain, with our united and best regards to Mrs.
Butler, yourself, and family, dear Sir,
" Your obliged and faithful servant,
" P. WILLIAMS."
Dr. Butler does not appear to have kept any drafts of
the answers which it may be taken as certain that he
wrote to both the foregoing letters, probably because the
letters reached him just at the end of the half-year, which
is always a busy time.
Early in 1821 Dr. Butler was appointed by Lord
Cornwallis, then Bishop of Lichfield and Coventry, to the
Archdeaconry of Derby, which office he held till he was
himself appointed to the See of Lichfield and Coventry on
the death of Bishop Ryder.
CORRESPONDENCE, JANUARY IST, 1821 DECEMBER
3RD, 1821.
FROM BARON MERIAN.
. "January 1st, 1821.
" DEAR SIR, Pray where is that verse of Homer in which a
person is commended (or blamed) for being very expert in
swearing ? I believe and am almost sure the verb 6pKietv is in that
verse. The sense of the line is equal to those where a man is
quoted for being a good runner, a wise judge, a rich farmer. I
have asked two Greek professors here, but they could not tell me.
I am, however, quite certain of the existence of such a Homeric
verse."
*****
202 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XIII.
The passage referred to is in Odyssey, xix. 392, etc, where
Autolycus is mentioned as singularly expert at thieving
and false-swearing.
Dr. Butler sent the required reference, and on March
9th, 1821, the Baron wrote, "The verse of Homer is
ipsissimus: now I shall beat my French doctors."
To AN OLD PUPIL.
44 SHREWSBURY, March $th, 1821.
"DEAR BRAY, We have examined the decree under which
you hold your exhibition, and can find no power given to the
Master and Fellows to deprive you of it All that appears is that,
if you do not keep the greater part of each term, you forfeit for the
first offence one-half the exhibition for that year, and for the
second offence die exhibition is made vacant The utmost
penalty, therefore, which you have incurred is the loss of one-half
your exhibition for the present year, and if you keep the present
and next terms you ought certainly to have the other half. If
the Master and Mr. Crawley have declared your exhibition vacant,
your remedy lies in an appeal to the visitor.
" It is true that the visitor is the Master's father ; but still, were
I you, I would appeal to him : you cannot be worse off by so
doing ; you may be better off ; and you will either obtain justice,
or subject the visitor to the same suspicion of partiality as the
Master and Mr. Crawley now labour under. Some legal advice is
necessary on making the appeal, and I think you should first
consult your father on the subject and tiien apply to some
respectable lawyer at Cambridge. By all means go to some one
who ranks high in the profession, and not to an understrapper.
He will draw out your appeal, which cannot cost you much, and
if you succeed it will be a great triumph for you. When you
have consulted your father, which I wish you to do without delay,
write to me upon the subject If your father consents to your
appealing, I presume the first step you have to take will be to call
on Mr. Crawley with your lawyer, ask him whether your exhibition
is declared vacant, and demand a decisive answer. If he says No,
tiien you have no need to appeal. If he says Yes, then tell him
you shall appeal to the visitor. In all this I give you my advice
as a friend, not as a trustee : it is my own opinion unconnected
with the trustees, and they are not responsible for it Nor will it
be in their power or mine to allow you anything from the trust
funds towards the expense of the appeal, whatever it may be. Of
course I write all this to you confidentially, and do not wish to be
mentioned in the College or to any one but your father as having
ifai.] CORRESPONDENCE. 203
given any advice in the ntiwtrr, fV*^ I ihil always be ready
eopgh to avow my opinion of Mr. C - when called upon."
FROM THE RET. S. TELLBXOOK.
" HUSTLEK'S ROOKS, JESCS C"*'*"^ Jbgr 64, 180.
a MY DEA& DOCTOR. Since I wrote to yon some days or
even weeks hate elapsed, yet I hare heard no tidings of your
convalescence. Pray write to te2 me you are well again, and mean
to keep so. My Easter was spent mainly in Hampshire tronts
and fishing-rods die order of the day. There are some ffo"fffi
streams in the neighbourhood of Andorer and Stockbridge, and
I mean to have a legal right over their inHAa .!. as soon as any
of tbe piscatorial fiberties are ofiered far hire-
"By-the-bye, Mr. Madoi and O)kd Leighton. as I understand,
have hired the fishery of Llyn Ogwyn. What is now to become of
me ? Unless I can carry on the war I may as veil keep oat of
Wales, a*l !**"" free from the contaminating influences of enw
and covetousness ; for rhnogh Gwyned and Tally LJyn be very
good reservoirs, yet Ogwyn is far die best of die three. When
yon see Mr. Madox. present my angular and drtmlmr compfiinents
to him, i.e. come round him if yon can. My ptmiM. ill r rtiiMi is
to be in Wales during August, and to return to Salop at the
beginning of September, so as to give the gMffaig a
"Ask Mr. Madox if he be acquainted with die new fly called
' the coachman ' : it is much used in Hants, and, as I suppose, took
its name from whipping its wings are white, body red hackle and
peacock neck [?], hook middle size. I know you love diese
minutiae. I moid tefl of some other pecuhanDes, and prooBse
to let yon into die arcana, provided always dot yon reward me
accordingly. You do indeed know some of die best bails for a
fisherman, and sauces tor his fishy but as I hone already pot yon
into a stew, I will leave yon there for the taotnt to fatten with
any odd fish yon may chance to faH in with. It is ten to one bat
he or some one of his connections win
and otter-like propensities.
"I have tried to g^ you stxne dotterel, but hare been at ]^
imsuth. Arrived at Paris after a most fatiguing journey in
a diligence with five very disagreeable dirty French people, and
found most comfortable apartments provided for me at Meurice's
hotel by my friend the Baron, who had also engaged an exceed-
ingly good and nearly new carriage, and one of the most agreeable
intelligent servants I ever met with. From what I have seen of
Paris, it appears much changed since I was here last, several new
streets having been built. I drove to the Bois de Boulogne from
the Champs Elyse'es, and dined there capitally ; among other good
things, we had a fine brace of partridges, no game laws existing here
as to the time of killing them.
* * * * #
" Milan, June 2$th. A great change appears in Milan since I
was last here ; every shop is shut [during church time ED.] with
even Presbyterian strictness, and I cannot be allowed so much as
to go to the top of the Cathedral or to see the body of S. Carlo
in the splendid chapel beneath the high altar. But by a singular
i822.] THE CAPITOL MASS 'AT ST. PETER'S. 22?
contrast to the general strictness, the first thing after service in the
Cathedral is a drive to the Corso, and the next to the opera.
*****
"Rome, June 2gth. At three o'clock yesterday morning I left
Radicofani, which is situated on a hill about as high as Cader
Idris, and did not get to Viterbo till three [?], having found the
mountains much more tedious than I expected. From thence I
was obliged to drive most furiously for seventy miles, in order to
get to Rome before the dangers of the Campagna are at their
height. I caught a glimpse of the Immortal City about a mile
and a half above Baccano that is, I had seen the cross and the
cupola of St. Peter's, and the city bearing away to the left. I then
closed all the avenues to the air to avoid the maVaria. On reach-
ing the Ponte Molle, and finding by the sound of the wheels that
we were going over a bridge (which I knew could be no other)
two miles from Rome, I threw open the windows of my calhhe,
knowing all danger was over, and saw on my right hand St. Peter's
one blaze of light. This being one of the greatest festivals of the
Romish Church, the eve of St. Peter's is kept as well as the day.
" At five this morning, June 3oth, I rose and got into my carriage
with a very intelligent guide. I drove first to the Capitol, and
ascended its tower. I could not contemplate from this spot, which
commands all the monuments of Antient Rome, without feeling
very strong sensations ; in short, I could not refrain from an actual
gush of tears. I stood on the Capitol : on my left was the site of
the Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus," etc., etc.
*****
" At half-past ten I drove to St. Peter's to grand mass that is to
say, to the most imposing ceremonies of the Catholic Church in
the most august temple in the world. ... I must not omit a
circumstance which had a ludicrous and almost profane effect.
Just after the cardinals had descended the steps of the high altar,
and were preparing to accompany the Pope * up them again
previous to the consecration of the mass, two dogs came and sat
down on the very seats their eminences had just quitted, and I
was really in pain for the gravity of the procession when it returned.
I thought they would have flown at one of the cardinals who
shook his robe at them.
*****
" The Church of S. Giovanni in Laterano . . . contains many
highly interesting antiquities, and many that are not a little
comical. Among the latter, as I was a favoured visitor, I saw
among the reliques the very table upon which our Saviour
celebrated the Last Supper, which is large enough in the present
On this occasion represented by one of the cardinals. ED.
228 VISIT TO ROME. [Cn. XV.
times to hold four people, so that the world cannot have degener-
ated so much as some people suppose : one corner of this table is
decayed they say that Judas sat there, and the place where his
elbow leaned is become corrupted. ... I have seen a thousand
such fooleries ; but the better class of people appear wholly to
disregard them, and I never saw any but the most squalid and
miserable objects pay them attention."
*****
The following passage goes far to explain why Mr.
Philip Browne's eyes twinkled when he was asked if Dr.
Butler knew anything about the art of painting :
" I have seen an immense number of fine paintings, as well as
all the capi d'opera, which seem to me to have a faded appearance.
Beautiful indeed they are, but they all seem past their prime.
They will, however, be preserved in the freshest beauty in the
mosaics of St. Peter's, which are eminently beautiful in them-
selves, and will be highly interesting when their originals, with
which they will bear the strictest investigation, are no more."
This can only be surpassed, if indeed it is surpassed, by
Dr. Arnold's taking the terra-cotta figures of the Varese
chapels for waxworks, and mistaking an Assumption of the
Virgin (to whose ascending figure the eyes of all present
are directed) for a visit of the Apostles to the tomb of
Christ*
"The people in the ecclesiastical states are certainly more
wretched and dirty, and probably more unprincipled, than in any
of the northern states. I believe every third person one meets
is ready to be an assassin. The look of lurking malignity, which
arises indeed from poverty and oppression, is not to be mistaken.
*****
" Amid all these ruins and trophies of ancient grandeur not a
* The passage runs : " In one of these chapels, looking in through the
window, we saw that it was full of waxen figures as large as life,
representing the Apostles on the Day of Pentecost ; and in another
there was the sepulchre hewn out of the rock, and the Apostles coming,
as on the morning of the Resurrection, ' to see the place where Jesus
lay.' I confess these waxen figures seemed to me anything but absurd ;
from the solemnity of the place altogether, and from the goodness of
the execution, I looked on them with no disposition to laugh or to
criticise" (Stanley's Life of Arnold, 1844, Vol. II., pp. 367, 368).
1 822.] TIVOLIPOPE PIUS VII. 229
sound was heard, nor a human being, except the sentinel at the
gate of the Colosseum, could be seen. The moon fell upon the
foundations of the palaces of the Caesars and the cottage of
Romulus, upon the temples of the greatest people in the world,
and on the humble shrine of their founder : all was buried in the
same repose. A gulf seems to separate antient and modern
Rome ; yet turn but a corner, and you find yourself once more in
a city whose temples and palaces, unrivalled for grandeur, for
number and magnificence, for the precious works of art which
they contain, and for the splendour with which they are still
decorated, proclaim her to be imperial and immortal. Rome is
the only city in the world which has survived every change, every
convulsion, every calamity, and which may therefore so far
deserve the epithet of ' eternal.'
*****
" I then (July 4th) drove through a very extensive wood of
antient olives (the site of Tibur) to the modern town of Tivoli,
which is of considerable extent, and beyond all comparison the
filthiest and most horribly disgusting specimen of an Italian town
I have ever seen : the inn, however, is pretty fair. ... I tasted
the wines of Tibur, but they have greatly degenerated since the
days of my friend Horace. I returned partly by day and partly
by moonlight. The heavens were red-hot, and the wind blows
like a flame.
*****
"July 6th. I went at six this evening to the Quirinal to see the
Pope * take his airing, and had an excellent view, being rather
less than two yards from him. He seems excessively feeble, bent
almost double, and quite unfit to be dragged out of his apartment.
Indeed he is so ill that this day for the first time he came
through the gardens of the Quirinal instead of the usual way,
being unable to bear the fatigue of going downstairs. His
carriage, drawn by four black horses, proceeded only at a foot's
pace, and I followed in mine about eighty yards' distant to see
the people great and small ; and those who were in carriages got
out and knelt in the dust. The Pope was dressed in light buff-
coloured clothes ; his hair is grey, but not white : he is eighty-
six years of age. I went about a mile and a half to watch this
procession.
*****
"J u fy 9*h- From Arezzo to Florence is but little more than
forty miles, but I took more than twelve hours to perform it
without losing an instant. It is a succession of ups and downs,
and yet I am at a loss to conceive how I could have been from
two in the afternoon till half-past two in the morning about it."
Pius VII., who was succeeded in the following year by Leo XII.
230 VISIT TO ROME. [Cn. XV.
Dr. Butler continued his journey to Pisa, Lucca, and
Massa, intending to go on to Genoa by the coast road from
Lerici to Genoa. On arriving there, he found that he could
not proceed. He therefore returned to Pisa.
"Pisa, Saturday evening, July i$th. I am safe and well, but
am obliged to retrace all my steps. By to-morrow morning I
hope to reach Florence once more, from whence I shall in one
hour commence my journey homewards.
" The case is, that a storm which happened the night before
last has utterly destroyed fourteen miles of the road to Genoa
just made, so that for six months it will be impassable ; and when
I got my carriage embarked at Lerici in order to proceed by sea,
which was as clear and as smooth as a looking-glass, an accidental,
or I may rather say providential, delay in signing my bill of health
of Genoa saved me from a sudden hurricane that must have been
fatal if I had been out at sea. The captain of the felucca refused
to go (but he got my money), and I find these sudden hurricanes
are very frequent at this season on this coast. I have now
renounced all intention of going by sea, or of going to Genoa at
all ; and owing to this adventure, I have taken in vain a journey
of two hundred and fifty miles at an expense of ,30, and the
loss of four good days."
It seems, then, that there were three violent storms
within a few days of one another. From the foregoing
passage the most violent appears to have been, not the one
that occurred on the 8th, in which Shelley lost his life, nor
that of the day on which Dr. Butler was writing, but an
intermediate one on the nth ; for it is not likely that he is
confusing the 8th and the nth. He must have perfectly
well known of the disaster which had been fatal to Shelley ;
but Shelley's body was not found till the 22nd : it was not
yet therefore absolutely certain that he had not been
picked up and saved. Dr. Butler would naturally say
nothing about what had happened, for fear of alarming
his wife and daughters ; but it is curious that there should
be no reference in a very long letter from the Hon. W. Hill
(dated Genoa, August I2th, 1822, and dealing almost
entirely with the real or supposed effects of the storms in
1 822.] SHELLEY'S STORM 231
question) to an event which is now held as epoch-making
in the literary annals of the century.
" Bologna, July ibth. After a long, harassing, and fruitless
journey from Pisa to Florence, my carriage broke down at the
gates of the latter place, and it cost me a day to repair it. I set
off last night to cross the Apennines ; and though the road is good,
yet it took me sixteen hours to accomplish fifty miles.
* * * ^^ * *
" Wednesday, July \ith. Thank God! after many difficulties
and never having had my clothes off once but to change them
since Saturday, I am now arrived safe at Turin, tolerably well,
but fatigued and heated to death. I have now done with the
dangers of banditti and malaria. ... I am just going to the
ramparts to take an evening view. I shall then go to bed for six
hours, an immense indulgence which I have not had anything like
since I left Rome nor indeed ever more than that there, having
been in bed at ten and up at four regularly. It is surprising with
how little sleep (for I do not sleep half the time I am in bed)
a man may live in a hot country. I believe what has kept me
alive and well is the tepid bath which I always feel a great relief
from fatigue.
*****
" Paris. I am just arrived here safe and well, and have sent
immediately for my letters. My disappointment is extreme; I
have not heard from England once since I left it. I hope to be
at Shrewsbury on Tuesday the 30th."
CORRESPONDENCE, AUGUST i2TH, 1822 NOVEMBER
3OTH, 1822.
FROM THE HON. W. HILL.
" GENOA, August 12th, 1822.
" MY DEAR FRIEND, I had been rather unwell before you
fixed your time for being with me, when I worked day and night
to prepare some despatches for your conveyance, that I might
have the entire enjoyment of your society for the few hours you
meant to give me. My labours and anxiety of mind at your non-
arrival affected my health deeply, and I am now but just crawled
out of my bed, to which or my room I have been confined ever
since. Not having tasted food for twelve days consecutively,
during the progress of my illness, and having been nourished by
broth and jellies only, I am still in such a state of weakness that
I scarcely know how I shall get through this letter. Thanks to
an English physician lately settled here, oceans of bark, and
232 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XV.
diminution of heat, I recover a little strength daily, and the first
use I make of it is to express my regret, and (may I add without
reproach after all your own sufferings ?) my astonishment at our
curious misfortunes. When three or four days had elapsed after
the latest time fixed, I turned to my nephew and said despond-
ingly that I could not guess what had happened, but that I gave
you up. He laughed and said, What were two or three days'
delay to a traveller ? I acknowledged in every other case he
might be right, but he did not know Dr. Butler or his engage-
ments, and that I was sure you would be punctual if health per-
mitted. Among my conjectures I expressed my fears that you
had been induced by some felucca rascals to abandon the road
for their own interest, but Noel, who likes the sea, would hear
nothing against the sailors.
"I had prepared a passport for you to go 'en courrier' with
despatches for the British Government, which, without obliging
you to go faster than you pleased (and you might have slept
every night on the road), would have given you innumerable
advantages between this place and Paris, where you would have
left the letters with Charles Vaughan or carried them on as you
liked. You would have had the right to pass every other carriage,
to be served first with horses, exemption from every search of
baggage and stoppage whatever ! ! ! For this I hoped to have
screwed out of you another day, if not two; and as it was, you had
better have given me six days than have turned back from Lerici,
except to go to the Spezia, and so on to Genoa by land or even
waited for the wind. I can easily conceive the fidget you must
have been in, but a moment's reflection must have convinced you
that I would not have recommended that road upon light grounds,
in spite of the foolish information of Prince Engarin [?]. Prince
Leopold's sister went over that road in the winter; Lord and
Lady Bradford in April or May ; Lord Clare went from my house
to see his old schoolfellow Lord Byron at Pisa, and returned and
dined with me again, carrying letters for me to Paris ; the Prussian
envoy's wife and daughters, and innumerable persons you do
not know by name, were going and coming every day. It is true
Lord William Russell, who was living with me when I expected
you, told me that the road-makers, where reparations are wanting,
like to be tipped for moving machines and carts out of the way
when a carriage passes, but this is all. Lord William prefers a
felucca a strange taste, like Noel, and the wind had been east
and south-east for two months consecutively, as it frequently is at
this time of year, and perfectly fair from Lerici. It might have
been too boisterous the day you were there, but twelve hours
would have settled it, and perhaps it was so only in the Gulph, or
not at all, but some rascality of the felucca-men, who wished to
go to some fete, when they had secured your carriage, and found
you frightened about the road. If your bargain was written and
1 822.] THE HON. W. HILL. 233
made in a proper manner I could make the rascal vomit up all
your money. You may guess how painful it was to learn your
adventure and determination when every day before and every
day after numerous feluccas arrived under my windows, bringing
different passengers, some of my acquaintances, some with letters
of recommendation, etc. Last year, at the very time you arrived,
I passed twice myself before the road was finished, but where
there was no carriage road there was an excellent horse road,
and delightful mules and horses, for about two hours only. As
Noel preferred the sea I gave him my carriage baggage and a
servant, and went with Mr. Hamilton and one servant in a
carriage of the country from Spezia, except where we rode. I
remember the innkeeper at Massa telling me I could not cross
some torrents. I never saw them, at least the water. You had
better have remained two or three days at Lerici than have done
what you did, or sent an estafette to me, or threatened the
rascally felucca-man with complaint to me. It is but seven or
eight hours with a fair wind, but you might have landed at Sestri
in four, five, or six, according to its state.
"You could not certainly know what arrangements I had
prepared for you here, but there was one thing above all which
must have struck you with your road book in your hand con-
tinually, and your different calculations, if your agitation and
anxiety had not blinded you. I am an old resident of the
country, and must have known (as I dare say you have) that
Alexandria is but nine hours from this place. If I had not been
certain of my fact, and that it was an immense saving to you
to avoid the dreadful hills of Bologna, I would have advised your
coming from thence and returning, particularly as you had
preceded your time, and indeed you might have turned long
before you got to Alexandria. I go through that place five or
six times every year, and the waiters there are my oldest friends,
by which means I got your letter the next morning. As I had
by that time given you up, it gave me no disappointment, but
relieved me as to any anxiety for your personal safety. My first
impression was to send my despatches after you, but I must have
been too late, .as you would have even left Turin. My illness
made such rapid progress I could not even direct a purpose
messenger with them for some time to Paris. For the want of
two or three hours' sober reflection or inquiry, you have missed
seeing a beautiful country, a singular and beautiful city adorned
with the finest palaces in Italy and many fine pictures, of which
you have seen enough; but what is worse, you have hurried,
fatigued, and vexed yourself to death, and lost much precious
time and your health and money to avoid seeing them. We
have both suffered sufficiently, so God bless you, and pray
believe me to be yours always truly and affectionately,
"W. H."
234 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XV.
FROM THE REV. WALTER WHITER.
"CAMBRIDGE, August l$th, 1822.
" DEAR SIR, I must express to you my best acknowledgements
for the trouble which you have had in conveying to me the
literary packet from your friend Baron Merian. The packet
arrived safe on Sunday last at this place, where I have now taken
up my abode for a few months.
*****
" Let me take this occasion to express what I think on the
support you have given to the Etymologicum Universak* It
appears to me that your zeal in the cause has introduced the work
to the Continent, and I shall always be prompt to declare this
opinion. In our own country these studies are not cultivated,
and it would perhaps be difficult to discover in what pursuits
our literature consists. Yet there are some men in our country of
the genuine stamp, whose scholarship is of the highest order, and
who read and meditate with unceasing diligence, urged by no other
motives than those which the love of literature supplies. I have
been fortunate enough to obtain the favourable opinion of some
men who do honour to this order of scholars, and I rejoice at the
occasion which the present letter affords me of expressing to you
with acknowledgements of my gratitude what I feel on this subject.
" Your friend Baron Merian is full of zeal in the cause of good
letters, and ardent to proclaim and to applaud what he conceives
to be well and diligently performed for the advancement of truth.
To you, sir, I owe this auxiliary who is at once so able and so
willing to promote the cause which he espouses. I have looked
over the little pamphlet on language by the Russian [Gulianow],
and agree with you that it savours of mysticism. You say that
the author and the French Institute are at loggerheads on the
subject. I tremble for a subject when the loggerheads of Insti-
tutes, Academies, etc., etc., have taken it under their care or
jurisdiction, either as athletes or arbiters.
*****
" I have no copy of this work [the Etymologicufti Magnum^ here,
nor do I know where a copy is to be had. Poor Billy Lunn told me
that when the price of this book in one volume was reduced to its
fourth part five shillings and became an inhabitant of the stalls
about London, the copies suddenly disappeared, and came into the
possession of those ambulating readers who hang about the stalls
in the capital a powerful, numerous, contemplative body of stu-
dents, of more weight, as I am told, in deciding the final fate of
books, than the greedy collectors of libraries are disposed to imagine.
" So unknown is the Etym. Univ. in this country that Todd,
* Cambridge, 1822 1825, 3 vols., 4to. ED.
t Cambridge, 1800, Part I. (no more published). ED.
I822.J SHILLETO'S LATIN COUPLET. 235
the editor of Johnson's dictionary (whom I know a little), a
regular bookman, seems to be ignorant that such a work exists.
He quotes always, as I believe, the former work Etym. Mag.
The traffic of literature, as it reigns at present in our own country,
is, I am informed, alike potent and active in its sway. Whether
it executes its province of publishing, or exerts its propensities to
conceal not to be enrolled in some band of literary conscripts is
to suffer the penalties of proscription, and to be banished from
their roll of fame."
MEMO IN DR. BUTLER'S FIRST LETTER-BOOK.
" August ljth, 1822.
" Went to Harwood with Mr. Sheepshanks and told him that
I had strictly forbidden the boys to hire boats, and that if any
accident happened in consequence of his letting them have boats
after warning, the blame would rest with him, and that he was
hereby most earnestly requested by me not to let them. He
replied that he kept his boats for hire, and should let them when-
ever desired to do so. Upon this I called on the Mayor with
Mr. Sheepshanks, and was promised by the Mayor that he would
see Harwood this evening, and inform him that if he did so in
defiance of this warning, the law should lay hold on him."
There had been no boating at Rugby, and Dr. Butler
was afraid of the boys getting drowned ; hence a pro-
hibition which was for some years a fertile source of
trouble, and in connection with which my good old friend
and tutor the late Rev. Richard Shilleto once told me the
following story. Dr. Butler was reprimanding the boys
about the boating, and spoke with a slight hesitancy, which
Mr. Shilleto told me was habitual with him when pre-
tending to be more angry than he really was. " If the
men," he said t " will let the boys have boats, I will have
them up before the magistrates."
As these words fell gradually from the Doctor's lips,
Shilleto wrote on a scrap of paper :
" Quando velint homines pueris conducere cymbas,
Ante magistratus Butler habebit eos."
Having done so, he slid them on to Dr. Butler's desk.
236 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XV.
" Psha, boy, psha," was all the answer made him ; " but,"
said Mr. Shilleto, " the Doctor folded the paper carefully
up and put it in his pocket. I knew 'conducere' was
wrong, but it was the nearest thing I could get at the
moment, and I have never been able to set it right since
without spoiling the whole thing : so it must stand."
FROM THE REV. AUTHORITY NORMAN.
" BRAILSFORD, August 26th, 1822.
" REV. SIR, I think it my duty to inform you that a practice
which prevails in this part of the country of deteriorating the
Church property under the guise of repairing it has now reached
this parish. Since I mentioned to you at Derby the condition
of my church, it has been determined to repair the roof after the
practice of which I speak, by taking away the lead and covering
it with slate. The old lead I am told will sell for sixty pounds,
and the cost of the slate will be about twenty and these repairs
are only over the aisle. The roof of the church body will soon
require to be repaired, and the lead which covers it will sell for
upwards of a hundred pounds.
" At the vestry meeting, where this measure was proposed, I
stated my opinion of its illegality, and begged that no such step
might be taken without Mr. Mott's advice. I was answered that
it must be done ' under the rose,' and that I need not to
notice it, as other clergymen had not ; and it was held out to
me that I should have a vestry built if there was money to spare.
Since that time it is determined without a public meeting to
pursue this plan. Yesterday the churchwarden informed me of
it, and I think it imperative upon me to make you acquainted
with it. But should you in consequence deem it proper to
pursue any measure, may I beg that the source of your informa-
tion be not named, as it would certainly be followed by every
vexation and hostility to me, with which the troubles of the present
day are so familiar ?
# * * * *
" I named the promise of building a vestry, as I also spoke
to you concerning one. My house is distant half a mile from
the church, and I often have to walk through the wet grass,
but the personal inconvenience is not so much to be regretted
as the consequent loss of official dignity by being obliged to mix
with the people before the service, and even by putting on and
off the surplice and gown in their sight. I have refrained from
asking for a vestry in consideration of the difficulty of the times,
1 822.] EARLY ALPHABETIC CHARACTERS. 237
but after such an offer on the part of the parish it needs no
further delicacy on mine. I trust that the nature of this case
will excuse the liberty of my address."
FROM THE REV. WALTER WHITER.
"CAMBRIDGE, August 271/1, 1822.
*****
" You ask whether any analogy can be traced between the
form of letters and the position of the organs of speech that
utter them in any of the earliest written languages, and you add
that you can trace none. No more can I. I think, however,
that many of the things that have been frequently repeated on
the formation of letters are sufficiently true, and such observations
as occur to me at the moment without looking into any books
I shall write down till my paper obliges me to stop.
"I do not think that attempts were made to form figures
according to any conceived resemblances of those figures or
letters with the organs of speech. In hieroglyphical writing
something of this kind may have occasionally taken place, but
in general I imagine nothing of this sort was attempted or
conceived. The marks adopted were such as were suggested
to the inventor at the moment. They were straight lines, not
curves, which were more difficult to mark on stones, etc. as
most seem to agree. The resemblance of letters in different
alphabets has been observed by all, but they do not seem to
have perceived the full extent of this resemblance especially
in letters supposed to have a different power. I think that more
dexterity has been exhibited by reformers of alphabets in noting
this resemblance than is commonly imagined. I think that we
shall discover similarities before hidden if we turn our curves
into straight lines forming angles.
"The passage in Don Quixote (I have brought my Don Quixote
with me) in which Cervantes describes the mode of forming the
name of Dulcinea del Toboso always appeared to me to contain
words which admirably described this dexterity of these inventors
of alphabets, though the artifice adopted by these inventors and
Don Quixote proceeds on a different principle. ' Buscandole
nombre que no desdixasse mucho del suyo, y que tirasse, y se
encaminasse al de Princesa,' etc. In the formation of cognate
letters it is contrived that they do not much gainsay each other,
as it were, that they draw near to each other in their forms and
traces ; that they walk, as it were, in the same track, or that
they are entrack'd with one another, if I may so put it ; or, in
other words, that cognate letters are traced or drawn not much
different from each other. You have justly seen that B and
3_belong to each other. Turn the curves of our English B into
straight lines and you have E (two Hebrew B's, C L), which,
238 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XV.
accommodated to the Hebrew mode of writing from right to left,
becomes U U, the Hebrew Beth 3.
" Let us examine the other labials. The English F is the
^Eolic digamma f, and the P turned into straight lines be-
comes F.
" The V or V V, U or u u, contain the Beth cavity C 3. When
the parallel lines in L, 2, or 3 form angles > < V, the M is M or
two V V inverted, A A ; hence the cognates ft. and ft.
11 Mu and beta are, as you say, almost indistinguishable from one
another. The modern Greeks represent the sound of B (English)
by M B. The Greek II is another 3 n, in Hebrew 3. The Greek
3> represented by straight lines becomes ^, which is two F's or 1 F.
" We cannot but note how S, etc., appears under a similar form
in various languages : W (Heb.), ) (^Egypt.), 2 or x? or E,
or w , -^ , the Arabic ^ -., in Russian IU. N is an organical ap-
pendage to M in many cases, and hence it is like it in shape.
In modern Greek N before n becomes as M, TOV -n-arepa, torn
batera.
"There is a mingled sound of the guttural and labial in the
human voice, and hence the Q and U are united with each other
in Latin words, so that Gualterus becomes Walter, guerre war, etc.,
as all understand. Hence G and F are sometimes like each
other, as F~. F, or F. and hence F is called the two gammas, or
digamma. This muffled sound is expressed in Hebrew by y
(Am).
" Those who wish to know anything about the nature of this
mingled sound of G and U or V or of the digamma would do
well to study Mr. Owen's dictionary among the Welsh words
beginning with gw, where they will see how in each word the two
forms are adopted, of the guttural G and the labials w and [letter
illegible] beginning the word, and from hence they will pass to
their parallel words in other languages, and see how terms appar-
ently different in form belong to one another.
"Thus 'Gwener' 'that confers happiness, Venus' becomes
Wener, and hence we have the Latin Venus, Vener-is, and
understand how gun in gune may belong to the Ven in Venus,
and how in other dialects of the Celtic the name for woman
appears under the labial form Bean, and sometimes under the
guttural form Gean (see Shaw's diet.). Wenin is another form
of queen, quean, and this is the origin of the en in Helen, etc.,
quasi Olwen, the Celtic Venus (see Owen's Welsh dictionary).
You will at once call to mind the passage in Herodotus that the
temple dedicated to a foreign Venus in Egypt was no other than
the Grecian hEL-EN. The war of Troy was a war of two
states rivals in religion and commerce, and if Paris ravished
away from Argos a material personage of flesh and blood called
) a priestess of Olwen, whose name she bore, he like-
1822.] EARLY ALPHABETIC CHARACTERS. 239
wise, we may conjecture, may have taken away the mistress
the goddess Olwen, the deity of the temple without flesh and
blood, under form of a statue. The people of Argos might have
considered this insult to their religion a more reasonable cause
of war than the insult offered to Menelaus by taking away his
wife. Herodotus would have been altogether of the same opinion.
This will account for the story of the image of Helen in
Lycophron, Euripides, etc. By examining Gn in Mr. Owen's
dictionary, you will see that it means whatever is delightful,
beautiful what is white, bright, fair, etc., and you will agree that
it belongs to the Greek Gan-os (Tavos), which is explained in
Prelim. Dissert, to Etym. Univ., page 121. The Olwen is
supposed to mean the person with fair or beautiful traces of
countenance, and thus by considering the sense of Ol, the track,
trace, and by examining the words connected with ala, etc., in
Mr. Shaw's Gaelic dictionary, you will see how Ol belongs to
Hole and to av\a, c EA/cos, ovX-t], etc. Such is the composition
of the Grecian Hel-En. These observations have drawn me from
the remarks on letters, with which I will fill the remaining part
of my paper.
" It might be asked whether the cavity of 3 and p belongs to
the cavity of Beth 3, and whether their similarity arises from the
connexion between the guttural and labial sound. Though the
figures of letters are not taken from the supposed resemblance
to the organs of speech, yet their names may, and the Hebrews
might have called these letters Beth, Capa, Coph, from j-Q, the
hollow, as a den, bed, etc., etc., HDD [or rather cp], the hollow of
the hand, as some have conjectured, and such might be the
Hebrew idea. Yet Beith is the Irish name for B, and this signifies
a birch-tree, though we are reminded of the Irish Both, a cottage
or booth, which corresponds with the sense of JV3.
"Some tribes of the Celts called their alphabet from trees,
and the twigs of trees under certain relations to parallel horizontal
lines represented the letters. This species of writing was called
the Ogham. From this the notation of musical sounds is derived,
and by this Ogham we take our degrees in Cambridge. These
twigs were sometimes put loosely upon the tablet, and hence, I
imagine, is the story of the Sibyl's books being dispersed by the
wind. In Vallancey's grammar the forms of the Ogham may be
seen, and in other books on alphabetical writing. These are very
hasty remarks, which I should have only ventured to write from
your desire to hear what I think on a subject, on which I have
only thought enough to convince me that nothing satisfactory
can be made of it. I am, my dear Sir, your most faithful servant,
"WALTER WHITER.
" There is still a little room left. The Rho of the Greeks and
the English P are alike P. Hence I should conjecture some
240 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XV.
relation in their sound, and should conceive that the Greek Rho
had sometimes a vowel breathing before it in the beginning of
a word with a labial kind of sound. Our rudiments tell us in the
same article that v and p have an aspirate, v8r). The rough breathing would be the due
accompaniment. I cannot but think that this observation on the
P is of some weight. These are only the slightest sketches of
very many things that might be said on the same subject, but I
fear that even some of these things may appear fanciful. Some-
thing, however, of this sort I think must exist, if it was only
developed, or if there should be evidence enough belonging to
the subject to ensure conviction."
To A LADY.
" August 2%th, 1822.
*****
" I am myself a loyal member of that Church in which I have
the honour to hold an office of some importance. I aim at
nothing better, and in truth I know nothing batter. I cannot
comprehend the meaning of the term ' evangelical,' which some
of those who profess to be its ministers assume to themselves in
exclusion of the rest. 1 teach those principles of religion to my
pupils in which I have been educated myself, and in which I
believe myself, and I teach no more."
To THE VENERABLE ARCHDEACON BLOMFIELD.
" August 31 st, 1822.
" I know nothing likely to remove me hence if I have my
health till this boy shall have completed his education, but of
course he must take his chance as to my continuance. My
belief is that I shall remain here till he is fit to go to college, and
longer, but one cannot look so far into futurity, and all that I can
promise is that as long as I am master of this school he shall have
his board and education gratis. I should not have mentioned
this had I not been tormented lately with letters of inquiry, owing
to a report that I had expressed an intention of becoming a
candidate for Rugby, which is, and always will be, the farthest
thing from my intention."
I presume there must have been some rumours about
Dr. Wooll's intending to resign the head-mastership of
Rugby. As a matter of fact he did not do so till 1828.
1 822.] CORRESPONDENCE. 24!
To THE EDITOR OF THE " SHEFFIELD INDEPENDENT."
(Original written on the back of a document which I de-
stroyed. ED.)
" September 2 1st, 1822.
" SIR, Observing a paragraph in the St. James's Chronicle of
September igth quoted from the Sheffield Independent, which
states that the Vicar, churchwardens, and constable of one of the
most populous parishes of the High Peak had attended a large
cattle fair for the purpose of selecting a bull to be baited for the
pleasure of their parishioners, I beg leave to say that I shall feel
much obliged to you if you will inform me which parish in the
High Peak you allude to, and am, Sir," etc.
*****
FROM DR. PARR.
(Signature and address only in Dr. Parr's handwriting.)
" November (?) $oth, 1822.
" In general terms I scouted the tale, and of course I did
justice to the calm and genuine virtues of your venerable mother.
I anticipated in my mind all and more than all that you have
written in detail. Her whole life was a course of preparation for
everything which is intelligible and credible in a future state. I
quite approve of the word ' veneration ' which you propose,
and should disapprove of any epithet affixed to it. The term is
strong, sufficiently strong, and it harmonises with the general
simplicity and seriousness of the inscription.
" As to the contest in your county, I certainly exult in the
victory gained over Toryism, and from the events which are
passing among us and around us, your sagacity must perceive
that Toryism has endangered the Church and State. I shall always
reprobate the invidious and indiscriminate application of the
word Radical. They who opposed the French war were called
Jacobins ; they who censured the measures of administration and
dread the servility and corruption of Parliament are now called
Radicals. This perversion of language is convenient for the very
worst purposes and the very worst rulers. No man of common
sense would suppose for a moment that I would co-operate with
such miscreants as Hunt and Cobbett ; yet I hold that Hunt was
cruelly punished, and I further hold that Cobbett has diffused
the knowledge of many substantial and important truths. Many
of his disciples will in practice be found wiser and better men
than their master. They will separate the tares from the wheat,
and they will apply to good ends what the wretch himself pro-
claims for very bad ones. As to myself, I am a man of too much
research and too much discernment to be even in speculation a
VOL. I. 1 6
242 CORRESPONDENCE. [CH. XV.
republican, and in practice I hope to die as I have hitherto lived,
a constitutional Whig. I divide my hatred among the Minis-
terialists and the Radicals in portions nearly equal, but as matters
now stand my fears of the Ministerialists are greater than my
fears of the Radicals. I observe, too, that when men are pre-
paring to apostatise they disguise their latent views under the
pretence of condemning and resisting that which is indisputably
evil. You, namesake, have too much sincerity and too much
magnanimity for such paltry artifices. Again, I dislike the
doctrine that all statesmen are rogues, and I have observed that
doctrine employed as a pretence for joining those rogues who
are in power at the time. In the present state of Europe nothing
can be adiaphorous to a wise man. I have been, and ever shall
be, a partisan, but my approbation of the Whigs is not indis-
criminate, and they know it. My good friend, no man will
undertake to defend the system upon which the English Govern-
ment has been conducted since the accession of George III., and
surely the party which for more than sixty years has deliberately
sacrificed power gives the best possible pledge for sincerity.
The Radicals are shrewd in their generation when they inculcate
distrust and dislike of the persons with whom I sympathise. The
Tories, by long success, have multiplied perils to the Church
and State ; the Whigs will not be permitted to save them ; the
Radicals would subvert them to-morrow. Namesake, I decidedly
prefer Canning to Londonderry, and do not you believe that
Romilly would have been a more desirable statesman than Lord
Eldon ? Let us talk these matters over when we meet. I hear a
favourable account of the four Cambridge candidates, and par-
ticularly of Bankes, but I detest the principle on which Bankes
relies. Among the Herveys, from the time of Pope to the present
hour, there never was a dunce nor a worthy, unless your corre-
spondent forms an exception. Grant has a large share of talent
and virtue. Scarlett's integrity in private life is adorned by his
steadiness in public, and if he had played fast and loose he
would have risen to the situation which is now filled by Abbott.
Respect him at least for his consistency, and prefer him you
must to such deserters as Charles Warren, Copley, and Gifford.
If Scarlett fails, as I think he will, the death-blow is given to the
cause of freedom in Cambridge. That the young men should
have caught the contagion of servility from the old is a dreadful
spectacle ; but the plain truth is that, to an extent quite unpre-
cedented, the Church and both the Universities are corrupt to
the very root. Your grandchildren will be eye-witnesses of the
mischief. I have lived, and happily my head will be under the
sod when the storm bursts."
*****
The inscription referred to in the preceding letter is the
1 822.] EPITAPH ON DR. BUTLER'S PARENTS. 243
one written by Dr. Butler for the mural tablet that stands
unless the modern practice of moving old monuments has
found its way also to Kenilworth in the old church on
the south side of the chancel arch. It runs :
NEAR THE PULPIT ARE INTERRED
THE REMAINS OF MR. WILLIAM BUTLER AND LUCY HIS WIFE,
THE FORMER OF WHOM DEPARTED THIS LIFE
MARCH 21, 1815, IN HIS 8;TH YEAR,
THE LATTER NOV. 2, 1822, IN THE 84TH YEAR OF HER AGE.
THEY WERE UNOSTENTATIOUS BUT EXEMPLARY
IN THE DISCHARGE OF THEIR RELIGIOUS, MORAL, AND SOCIAL DUTIES.
THIS MONUMENT IS ERECTED BY THEIR ONLY SON,
SAMUEL BUTLER, D.D.,
ARCHDEACON OF DERBY AND VICAR OF THIS CHURCH,
IN VENERATION FOR THE MEMORY OF HIS BELOVED PARENTS,
AND IN HUMBLE THANKFULNESS TO ALMIGHTY GOD,
WHO VOUCHSAFED TO GRANT THEM
LENGTH OF DAYS, ESTEEM OF FRIENDS, CONTENT OF MIND,
AND AN EASY, GENTLE PASSAGE TO ETERNITY.
I see Professor Mayor places here among Dr. Butler's
works An Essay upon Education; intended to show that
the Common Method is defective in Religion, Morality, etc.
(8vo, London, no date) ; he queries it, however, as by another
author. This is the case ; it is by one S. Butler of Bristol,
and was first published in 1753 as "By a gentleman of
Bristol," though later editions are signed S. Butler. In the
British Museum, catalogue it is rightly excluded from the
list of Dr. Butler's works.
Of the Praxis on the Latin Prepositions, published in
December 1822, Professor Mayor says:
" The book held its ground about twenty-five years, but seems
to have been superseded by Mr. T. K. Arnold's and other exercise
books, which follow the dry, mechanical system of Ollendorf.
There is great reason to believe that the quality of the ele-
mentary books used in many schools has fallen off : it may well
244 DR. BUTLER'S PRAXIS. [Cn. XV.
be questioned whether this Praxis might not be re-introduced
with advantage."
I am not philologist enough to know whether the
derivations given by Dr. Butler of the several prepositions
will in all cases be held correct, but the book is pleasant
reading from its clearness and from the excellence of the
translations given as examples. These translations from
a Latin writer are intended to be re-translated into Latin
by the student, and the master is furnished with a key
containing the original passage.
CHAPTER XVI.
AN ARDUOUS UNDERTAKING.
The School Lawsuit. Correspondence, January 4th, 1823 July 3rd,
1823. Kennedy takes the Person Prize whilst still at School.
His Remarks upon the Shrewsbury System. Correspondence,
August 1 7th, 1823 April igth, 1824.
IN January 1823 I meet with the first traces among
Dr. Butler's papers of a lawsuit which, originating in
the reign of James I., had been continued intermittently
from that date till Dr. Butler took it in hand. The
successful strangling of this suit was perhaps the most
arduous and important of the many services he rendered
to Shrewsbury School, and it is evident from his letter
to the Master and Fellows of St. John's, written in 1835,
and announcing his intended resignation, that he so con-
sidered it himself.
After a period of repose that had lasted for some years,
there had been a recrudescence of legal activity between
the years 1806 and 1823, which brought the school property
into such serious difficulties that on the 6th of January, 1823,
the trustees unanimously resolved to reduce by 50 per cent,
the salaries of the masters that had been augmented since
the passing of the School Act, and also to reduce by 50 per
cent, the head-money allowed for each boy on the founda-
tion. At the same time they declined, on the score of
want of funds, to render assistance in the matter of closing
the school-lane thoroughfare, which passed along the whole
245
246 AN ARDUOUS UNDERTAKING. [CH. XVI.
front of what are now the Museum buildings, and so into
Castle Street.
Dr. Butler, knowing that the suit would never be ended
as long as it was in the hands of the trustees, and seeing
that things kept on going from bad to worse, determined
to get the matter into his own hands, and accordingly
wrote to the trustees asking them to make an order that
should give him access to all documents in the hands of
their bailiff and solicitor relative to the lawsuit, which he
might have occasion to consult.
At their meeting in July 1823 the trustees made the
necessary order ; and from that time until the final settle-
ment of their claims, in the early months of 1827, the
direction of the whole matter was practically left to
Dr. Butler. It should be remembered that the very
arduous task on which he now entered a work more than
sufficient to occupy any man's whole time was undertaken
in addition to the wearing labours of his school, then enter-
ing on its most brilliant period, and the by no means
light business of his archdeaconry. I have heard my
aunt, Mrs. Bather, say that her father's health, at no time
robust, never fully recovered from the strain now put
upon it.
i
CORRESPONDENCE, JANUARY 4TH, 1823 JULY 3RD, 1823.
FROM THE REV. T. S. HUGHES.
" YARMOUTH, January qth, 1823.
" I have just accidentally heard the pleasing intelligence, and
send you a line instantly to tell you, that I am elected Christian
Advocate in the room of Lonsdale. I am writing this before
going to bed, having come from a dinner party where the master
of the house put me into no small surprise by wishing me joy of my
new honours. Upon expressing my total ignorance of his meaning,
he produced the paper which announced the appointment, very
gallantly cut out the paragraph, and presented it to my dear Maria.
The fact is that about three months ago I sent in my name,
1823.] "A BISHOP ABLE MAN." 247
but ... I gave up all hopes of success, and had really almost
forgotten the whole affair. How I came to be chosen is yet a
secret ; I suppose I slipped in through contending interests. The
appointment is very gratifying to me, especially as it may promote
my success in the world wherein I am now going to settle ; and I
well know that no one will rejoice more in my good prospects than
you, my oldest and dearest friend."
*****
FROM BARON MERIAN.
"January 24th, 1823.
*****
" Pray push Mr. Whiter to send me his letter. 'Tis a great
drama we are about, and he has opened the scene. Whatever is
printed here of that sort shall be sent to you. It has been found
that nine hundred years ago the Chinese had paper money (bank-
notes) just as we have, and with the same vicissitudes of rising and
falling, the same wry remedies, etc. But that's another chapter.
*****
" Two circumstances make a man rise : favour, which you
disdain ; and merit, which you possess but merit often subsides
when it is not supported by what the French call ' la force des
choses,' a power infinitely more powerful than the ' force des
hommes? We Christians might call it the views and decrees of
Providence. You will never get a bishop's mitre and crook for
your sake : you will get them for the sake of your flock not
because you have friends, but because you are a bishopable man."
* * ' * * *
To THE REV. T. S. HUGHES.
(Original in possession of addressee's representatives.)
"March I2tk, 1823.
*****
" What you tell me about your projected review * interests me
much more. If you can effect a change in the present disgraceful
system of public classical examinations and awards of prizes you
will do a great thing. I have lately conversed with Parr, Dobree,
and Blomfield on this subject, who are all quite of my opinion.
The utter ignorance of all Latinity which allows such detestable
verse and prose to go forth to the world under the shape of odes
and essays is an teternum opprobrium to the University. I must
write to you again on this .subject if I can. I know that ' Eubulus '
had an intention of putting forth a pamphlet on that subject, and
that he was deterred by fearing he should be misunderstood by
the young men, who might suppose he was criticising them
instead of their judges. I suggested a plan to him by which this
* I was unable to discover what review was here contemplated ED.
248 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XVI.
difficulty might be avoided, but other occupations, I believe, will
prevent him from undertaking it. And here, in strict confidence,
let me give you a piece of advice which you may do well to
profit by. If you are disposed to fall foul upon ' Eubulus,' read
temperately and dispassionately his two pamphlets, and do not
petulantly think to write him down. He is not one whom it is
wise to provoke, and I know he has an esteem for you, and is
your well-wisher, and inclined to think of you as highly as I
believe he does contemptuously of ' Philograntus.' I give you
this piece of advice in the strictest confidence, but you must
profit or not by it as you please. And let me give you another
hint : do not toady anybody in your review. I heartily wish you
well on your marriage and your subsequent plans."
FROM BARON MERIAN.
"May \$th, 1823.
" DEAR SIR, Nothing can be more judicious than the rules
which you lay down for the investigation of Analogy. I am bound
to say so, because they are the very same which we follow. Nay,
we make use of a printed formulary (first sketched by the Empress
Catherina II.), containing about three hundred chief words of the
identical classes which you mention. Bread, however, is perhaps
not quite proper, as being an artefactum which many nations have
been and some are still without.
" Grammar (inflexions) is less important than Roots ; roots are
the inalterable stuff, grammatical accidents are the variable forms ;
it signifies little that the Germans say hack-end and the English
hack-ing, or the Romans por-orum and the English ' of the por-z&J
the first syllable, i.e. the root, being decisive. I call herepor a
root, though, strictly spoken, gutturals only can form roots.
" The expression ' fas coming from fa ' is not quite in our style ;
fas comes not from fa, and fa. comes not from fas. They are
not father and son ; but, as you yourself perfectly indite, they are
' brothers and sisters ' sprung from one general idea and primitive
verb, fa, pa, or ba (cry, speak), which you will meet with in fifty
distant places, modified into rj-fu, fa-or, for, bo-o, (3o-dw, as
you justly observe. The Chinese have preserved fa and pa
(Deguignes, 1118, 1157, 11683).
" Lex (legs) belongs not to lego in the sense of ' read ' ; it might
belong to Ae'yw in the sense of ' say ' ; but in fact it belongs to Ae'yu
in the sense of ' lay,' ' lay down.' (Compare the second line of
this letter, and Ge-setz, seize, statutum, statuo, #T/AOS, 0e de trouver une autre, mais je ferai mon possible,
et je repeterai mes exactes recherches pour le pacquet qui est
malheureusement perdu."
FROM THE REV. S. TILLBROOK.
"Ivy COTTAGE, August i^th, 1828.
" MY DEAR ARCHDEACON, I thank you over and over again
not only for your good opinion, but for your spiritual reasonings
and consolation. I have been very low at times, and have felt
the want of society. Now I have two visitors with me a son
of my old friend Koch of Frankfort, and a worthy brother of the
angle, Mr. Clutterbuck, Fellow of Exeter, Oxford. My thoughts
and attentions are now turned to my guests, and I freely con-
fess that society is better medicine than calomel and opium,
which might be necessary for my bodily ailment, though their
counteraction was very debilitating. My appetite is now return-
ing, and I feel the benefit of a few glasses of red port and
Margaret's mutton soup. I do not yet know how long I may
stay here, for Clutterbuck is anxious to accompany me to
1828.] VISIT OF H.R.H. THE DUKE OF SUSSEX. 345
Leintwardine, to try his skill with the grayling, and I am nothing
Icth.
" Who is to be the new Dean of Norwich ? Bishopgate is
given to Lord Grey's brother. I wish they would make you
Dean of Norwich. I am very anxious to see you handsomely
preferred. As for myself I have no claim, except it can be found
in the character you have been so kind as to give me. Nor
would I accept of any preferment unless I looked forward to
sharing it with a helpmate. I should have enough to keep me
and my angle, and might vagabondise to the end of my days ; but
the fates seem to decree otherwise and I think for my happiness,
could that one obstacle, res angusta domi, be obviated. It is quite
ridiculous to read the number of congratulations sent me, first on
Copley's advancement, and now on Blomfield's, as if my fortunes
were secured, and myself in the high road to clerical appointments
and independence.
" I have jogged on nearly half a century, and a much shorter
time will set all these worldly matters at rest. If I am not to be
a Benedict in this world, I hope I may be so in the next. God
bless you !
" Ever yours affectionately and gratefully,
" S. TILLBROOK."
To DR. BUTLER'S SON.
[August (1), 1828.]
*****
"We have had a great visitor to-day the Duke of Sussex
called and stayed two hours with me, though he said he could not
stay a minute, and means to come at some future time and stay
here, to your mother's infinite delight. We have set on foot our
subscription for the church at St. Mary's,* and started with ^700.
" Your affectionate father,
" S. BUTLER."
FROM THE REV. S. TILLBROOK.
" October 22nd, 1828.
" MY DEAR ARCHDEACON, Our learned Caput, with Dr.
Wordsworth as chief dissentient, have just thrown out the grace
for admitting Pearson t to an ad eundem B.A. degree. This is
hard and unjust, because no notice was given or grace passed
previously subjecting Dublin to such contempt ; besides, I take
the thing to be illegal, and have very little doubt but that Pearson
might compel us by mandamus to confer the ad eundem degree.
No objection under similar circumstances was ever taken before.
* I.e. St. Michael's.
t An old pupil in whom Dr. Butler took much interest. ED.
346 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XXI.
" But it is no great matter, and Pearson, instead of being a B.A.
of Peterhouse College, must be content to remain for the present
a pensioner undergraduate. Dr. Hollingworth will allow him to
attend his course of lectures, and you must do what you can with
the Bishop of Hereford. I only returned to Peterhouse College
on Friday last from Sussex, where I spent my time most agreeably.
I went to Fulham to thank Bishop Blomfield for making me a
Whitehall preacher. He was most kind, hospitable, and personally
attentive to me. I staid three days, and was much pleased with
the palace and grounds, which are contiguous to the river. We
will go together some day and look at his larder and cellar, etc.
*****
" Tom has just popped in, and looks very well. He did not,
however, report so favourably of your health as I could have
wished. Let me hear better tidings soon.
*****
" Very glad the grayling proved good.
" Ever yours, etc.,
" S. TILLBROOK.
"P.S. It would be an act of kindness in Mrs. Butler if she
would consider me one of her boys, and buy for me six pair of
Welsh fleecy hosiery lambs' wool stockings for the winter and
forward them by coach.
" N.B. Small foot, large calf ! "
Almost on the same day Pearson wrote a very sensible
letter to Dr. Butler, telling him what had passed between
himself and Dr. Wordsworth. This immediately drew
from Dr. Butler the following proposed circular, addressed
to Mr. Tillbrook :
"October 2$th, 1828.
"In consequence of the extraordinary refusal of the Master of
Trinity College to grant an ad eundem A.B. degree to a member
of the University of Dublin, whose character is unimpeached, and
who produced a regular certificate from that University, some
members of the Senate, who consider such proceedings to be
arbitrary and illegal, and who are of opinion that it would be
extremely hard to tax an individual with the expense of obtaining
redress for an act of oppression and indignity hitherto unknown in
the University, have agreed to subscribe the under-mentioned sums
towards applying to the Court of King's Bench for a mandamus
upon this occasion.
"S. BUTLER, D.D., ST. JOHN'S Gioo)."
1 828.] PEARSON'S DEGREE. 347
FROM THE REV. S. TILLBROOK.
"PETERHOUSE COLLEGE, October 2"jlh, 1828.
" MY DEAR ARCHDEACON, I never wish to fight under a better
captain than you. I really believe that we could muster a good
stout body of forces between us, for old Barnes always says that
I am the best fellow that ever beat up for recruits under the keys
of St. Peter. I must also do justice to this said veteran, who has
been laying about the Caput most stoutly, and banging them into
a sense of decency and justice. At the next congregation Dr.
Davy, of Caius, Vice-Chancellor, will preside, and our Master has,
I believe, overcome the scruples of Wordsworth. If at the next
presentation of Pearson's grace his admission ad eundem be
refused, it will then be time enough to take other steps ; and if
it be not refused, the sense of the Senate will be shown when
Wordsworth's threatened grace is offered.
" Besides, when Ds. Pearson is incorporated, we can cudgel
Wordsworth without fearing his spite and malice. I would
advise you therefore to wait patiently. If Pearson succeeds, you
can write, if you like, a civil note to Dr. Davy, the ex- Vice-Chan-
cellor, and you can, si placeat tibi, give Wordsworth a touch over
the raw place with a little Salopian caustic. Pearson himself sent
a very respectful and well-written statement of his case to Dr.
Davy. Indeed, I have been much pleased with your old pupil's
conduct generally, though in this particular instance his appeal
to the Vice-Chancellor should have been through the father of
the College, whose peculiar office it is to attend to matters of
degrees, etc., etc,
" Do not let this matter annoy you. Believe me, the liberal
feeling is all on our side. But as we can only ask, and not
demand legally, we must not be too hasty. It is always at the
option of the Caput to allow this privilege, though courtesy and
custom have led some to conclude that it is a positive and legal
right on the part of the Dublin B.A. The old tactic ' Cunctandi '
will suit our purpose.
" Thank Mrs. B. for taking care of my legs.
-***
" P.S. I have kept quiet because I saw that I could strike
hard by waiting a little in ambuscade. I never yet in my life had
to fight Vice-Chancellors and Proctors that I did not ultimately
utterly rout them and put them to shame. Ask Le Blanc ; ask
Dr. Proctor ; ask half the boys who have been Proctors. Our
old house flourishes ; we have nearly thirty freshmen come up
this term."
From a letter from Pearson to Dr. Butler dated
348 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XXI.
November 28th, 1828, it appears that on that day the
Caput withdrew their opposition and admitted him to
an ad eundein degree.
FROM THE REV. AUTHORITY NORMAN.
" BRAILSFORD, October 22nd, 1828.
" DEAR SIR, I think it is due to you to state the alteration
which has taken place in our Clerical Society, and led to the
secession of the Revs. Hope, Gell, Wood, Swain, and a few
others. Perhaps I had better speak plainly, and call them in
modern language the Ultras of the High Church party. I hope
I do this without any offensive meaning, as describing a party
who would not give up something of their opinions for the
purpose of uniting with their opposed brethren. The conse-
quence has been that the middle party, to which I belong, has
become more united with the party generally termed the Evan-
gelical party in the purposes of the society.
" Discussions on doctrinal subjects were forbidden, and this
restriction seemed to give a character of dryness to our meetings,
so much so that the younger members broke through the order,
and introduced questions on forbidden subjects ; and now there
is no restraint except their own good sense over the discussion of
the meeting.
" But I must say that great care has hitherto been taken to
keep within the bounds of propriety. The last question was,
The best means of establishing and maintaining the pastoral
connection between the minister and his parishioners ? which
led to many observations that must be useful to our body. But
who can say that such discussions will be always conducted with
prudence and decorum ? I thought it right to inform you of
this step, to afford you the means of judging of the future. For
my part, I scarcely know how to proceed. So long as I can
carry moderation with me I may do more good than evil in
attending the meetings. But assuredly I will not lend myself to
any extravagance. At the same time I fear I am too fond of
seeing the picture of human nature which such a meeting
exhibits ; and this s 6, for I cannot
submit to elds 6. This is too generally put.] f Before a liquid it
holds well :
KOI yap T? Amu pronounced reAA
/uaAa /Acya ,, ayu/x.
Kara voov aw
X(oAai re pvcrcrai re ,, Tf PP
" Before the smooth and middle mutes tolerably, but examples
are not so frequent. TT is common in a long compound word,
i ; K not so common, but I bring to mind vavXa^ov s
Acva KCU; T in the famous exhortation Xav#e re KCU
* No draft of this letter was found by me. 1 print the accents and
breathings as I find them in the draft. ED.
t The passage in brackets is cancelled in the original MS. ED,
1830.] CORRESPONDENCE. 373
ft unusual I cannot recollect an instance, unless you insist on
writing e/3oAe for the usually written e/3/3oAe, and I think it hardly
fair to adduce w/x,oio-t /3aXe, where v may be inserted ; 8 unusual, but
not so much so, yet we write eSSeto-ev, not ISeurei/. Now why do
we do this, and not write aTnroveea-dai, Sieju,//,otpa,To, unless that the
two latter are so common as to make the representation to the
eye unnecessary, while the former are so unusual as to make it
requisite? y you may perhaps find in yeve'r; or some such in-
stances, but I think not very usual. [Of the aspirates some seem
to have had much the same fate as their corresponding lenes,
only that I must insist upon those who double the consonant not
doubling the aspirate. I mean, if aioXov o^tv had the consonant
doubled at all, I suppose it must have been pronounced. A^avaros
may have been pronounced aOOdvaTos, but I do not believe it.
I would rather imagine it to have been drflavaros, or, still better,
a$avaros ; OTTw, not ow at least the second aspirate
must have been, if I may coin a word, sdrucciolated, or slurred
exceedingly.] *
" But I conceive that if the second aspirate was pronounced at
all, it must have been slurred exceedingly, so as hardly to have
been heard, no more so than to give a hardness to the vowel
preceding aOavaro-s, o and often call upon a Welsh boy (the
language of this country has a singular affinity to that of the
Greeks and Hebrews) to do it for me, when I want an example
of its guttural power for the purposes of grammatical illustration.
" Now to the point. You recollect a line in Catullus, ' Chom-
moda dicebat, si quando commoda vellet,' i.e. he pronounced the
cum or com of commoda as though it had been written with a \.
He gave more than the present aspiration of O/AOU to the word,
by pronouncing it as if it were x /* ^- From such a Latin
pronunciation as this, attempted to be softened down by persons
of ears and organs less delicate than the Greeks, as the Romans
certainly were, the guttural K remained, though the dental aspirate
was dropped, and thus I get the connection between the c of cum
and the ' of 0/j.ov.
" Now you observe, and justly, that is answers to quis 1 ea to
qu&l id to quid? tantus to quantusl talis to qualis ? etc., and so
tarn quant, tot quot, and turn quum. You observe again, and very
acutely, pp. 228, 229, that the qu or cu in quum or cum originally
expressed interrogation, and to this answer (as in analogical
instances) was made by the similar sound turn. [All this is the
result of a philosophical and reflecting mind ; but I think you will
grant, after what I have said, that your quum, with its two letters
expressing interrogation, is different from my cum, with its c
derived from the aspirate of 6/xoS ; and though want of accuracy
led the Romans to write c for gu, just as they wrote in a slovenly
way cui for quot, and qui for quei, yet I am advocate for preserving
this distinction, and for writing quum when the adverb of time
and cum when the preposition of union is meant to be used.] *
"But what is this guJ Certainly not the two first letters of
qucero, which perhaps is derived from this very qu, and atpw.
Not the Cu of Curetes, who, I suppose, derived their Cu from the
Sabine word Qu-iris, a spear.
" I conceive it to be this. In all countries, but especially in
those in which the feelings are warm and the imagination quick,
as was, and is, the case in warmer and more Eastern climates,
* The part within brackets was cancelled in the draft. ED.
1830.] LETTER TO THE REV. J. P. POTTER. 381
there is a greater natural impetuosity than in colder ones, and this
would lead men in their ruder state and in the infancy of language
to speak their words more vehemently, and to pour them forth, if
I may say so, from the bottom of their hearts. This occasioned
those deep and by us unutterable gutturals of the Oriental languages
and of early Greece. But in asking questions there would be
more than usual impetuosity among an eager and inquisitive
people. Hence those words which are in general use as interro-
gatives would be most deeply articulated and would be all strongly
aspirated. In process of time as language refined these aspirates
would soften, and what is chol in Hebrew, and was first ^o\os in
Greek, would become 6Xos ; and what was 6A.os would become still
softened among nations of colder climates till it settled into whole,
with the aspirated digamma.
" Now as opov becomes changed into chom or com or cum, so
other words, especially of general interrogation, would be softened
down, and the guttural part only of the x would remain, instead of
the guttural and aspirate : hence you would have quis, quantus,
quot, qualis, etc., in Latin as interrogatives, the qu being sufficient
to mark the earnestness of the speaker.
" That this is not merely chimerical may be seen by examina-
tion into other languages besides the Latin. Thus what in Latin
is qu is in Greek ' and in English ivh. The original rough
OTTOV of the Greeks was softened into TTOU, OTTOIOS into TTOIOS and
KOIOS, OTTOO-QS into Trocrcros, OTrore into TTOTC, and SO on OTTOJS into TTCOS.
" The deep guttural of the Greeks was diluted by the Saxons
(who, I suppose, received it from the Scythians or Sarmatians north
of Greece) into the aspirated digamma.
" Hence we have for our general interrogatives who, which,
what, when, why, where, whence, etc. I need not remark on the
close affinity between qu and w, and how far our who, where,
when, whence, etc., is the Scottish quho, quhair, quhen, quhence,
etc., thus connecting the Roman and Saxon forms.
" Your observation about the answer to quum being made (as
in analogical instances) by the similar sound turn is very true, and
I think affords a strong confirmation of my theory of the origin
of these sounds, for it is singular that in almost all instances the
answer is made by the thinnest of the cognate mutes : 71-00-09, TOO-OS,
otos, TOIOS, TTOTC, Tore, etc. ; qualis, talis, quantus, tantus, quum, turn,
etc. ; when, then, where, there, which, this, whence, thence, etc.
This cannot be chance there must be a cause for it ; and if I have
not assigned the right one, I shall be very thankful to anybody
who will give me a better.
" I have to beg your pardon for troubling you with so long a
letter. You owe it to the pleasure I have received from your
book, and the opportunity I have of a little leisure here ; for had
I been at Shrewsbury, I could only have returned you my thanks
in a few words, I shall be gratified in knowing that you have
382 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XXII.
received this unmerciful packet, and in any opportunity that may
occur of seeing you at Shrewsbury.
" I remain, dear Sir,
"Your obliged and faithful servant,
" S. BUTLER."
To H.R.H. THE DUKE OF SUSSEX.
" August 2Oth, 1830.
" SIR, I have the honour to present to your Royal Highness
an attempt in my humble capacity of archdeacon to reform and
simplify the ecclesiastical laws relating to my office. The in-
quisitorial farrago which I have swept away is really curious as a
specimen of the exercise of spiritual authority, especially where
it relates to the laity. I venture to hope that I have made what
I now substitute plain and intelligible to all parties whom it
affects ; and though the labour is confined to an humble subject,
I venture to offer it to your Royal Highness, knowing that you
despise nothing, however humble, which is likely to be useful.
" I am, Sir,
" Your Royal Highness's most dutiful and faithful servant,
"S. BUTLER."
I found no copy of the scheme above referred to among
Dr. Butler's papers, nor any notes or other trace of it.
FROM THE REV. A. C. BROMEHEAD.
"ECKINGTON, October qth, 1830.
" DEAR SIR, I have been applied to in a matter wherein I
should like to be favoured with your opinion. A man of bad
character married into a respectable family in this parish. She
(his wife) is dead and buried in the part of the churchyard appro-
priated to the sepulture of his wife's family, and was buried at
their expense. He is desirous of putting up a headstone, and
they think with a view of taking possession of a part of their
burial-ground. They wish me to prevent him from putting up
the headstone ; but I am not quite sure of the power a minister
has to prevent the introduction of tombstones, provided the party
wishing to put up the stone be willing to pay the usual fee. 'Tis
true the claim of 5*. for a headstone and ios. for a flat stone
seems to imply a power to refuse the introduction of the stone
altogether. But quere, has not custom sanctioned a right on the
part of the parishioners to bring tombs into the churchyard on
the parties paying the usual fee ?
" There is a clause in your printed directions to the church-
wardens forbidding the introduction of heavy cattle into the
churchyard. Is this meant totally to exclude cows or heavy
COWS IN CHURCHYARDS. 383
horses? The latter I think very dangerous, on account of
stamping on the flat tombstones with iron shoes ; but cows put
in occasionally can't, I think, do much harm ; and indeed I
don't see how a country churchyard can be kept decent without
either cows or horses being admitted. The grass gets so long
that the headstones are half hid, and the long grass is very
troublesome in making graves. I believe that (although objec-
tionable) the parson's horse has from time immemorial had the
depasturing of the churchyard in country places ; but this is a
custom much better discontinued. Cows I never knew do any
mischief, although I have known them for years in this church-
yard. Something must consume the grass, because to mow it is
impossible on account of the unevenness of the surface. I shall
also esteem your opinion on this subject a favour. The family
alluded to are anxious to have your opinion at your earliest con-
venience. I hope my son conducts himself to your satisfaction."
Cows now are never seen in a churchyard ; but when I
was young, in my father's parish certain of the cottagers
who kept a cow used regularly to turn their cows into the
churchyard to eat the coarser grass which sheep would
not touch, and this, so far as my recollection serves, was
the practice of the neighbouring parishes. In Gunning's
reminiscences of Cambridge the following passage (Vol. II.,
p. 263) bears upon the same practice :
" During 's first year at Gorleston he was very popular
with his parishioners, who fully believed his representations of
the cruel persecutions he had undergone at Cambridge ; but after
a time their confidence in him was shaken, and constant con-
tentions were the result, in which he usually came off victorious,
as his parishioners had great dread of lawsuits. Among many
claims he made was the right of removing from the churchyard
all gravestones that chanced to be thrown down by cattle, which
he kept there himself. When subsequently building a house
these gravestones were used for the pavement of a scullery and
also of an oven, out of which it was reported that a huge loaf
was drawn ' AGED 73.'
" He died in April 1832, after a long and painful illness, in the
sixty-sixth year of his age."
FROM ROBERT SCOTT, ESQ.
"CH. CH., December 2^th, 1830.
" MY DEAR SIR, Having had the pleasure of being made a
student of Ch. Ch. this day, I think that there are none beyond
384 CORRESPONDENCE. [CH. XXII.
the circle of my own relations to whom I am more bound to
communicate it than to yourself. And certainly next to the
Dean who gave me it for what I had done, no one has a better
claim to my gratitude than you, under whose auspices I learned
everything that procured it for me. I assure you I often try to
compare what, thanks to you, I am with what I certainly should
have been if I had not been so fortunate as to have been
under you ; and I trust I never shall forget how much I owe to
Shrewsbury.
" I was much gratified to hear of the success of the play this
Christmas, and wished earnestly to have been able to see it.
But wishes will not alter the Calendar term, and our tutors would
think an English play but a sorry excuse for deserting a Greek
one. So here I was obliged to stay past the time of its per-
formance ; and as at collections the Dean was kind enough to
offer me the studentship, I was too glad to remain the week
intervening before the election. To-night I set off for Ludlow,
and am to stay with the Beales for a week ; from thence I must
return to commence, before term begins, my direct reading for
the Ireland. As to this scholarship I am in a very great
perplexity : for I am conscious, on the one hand, that a great
deal is expected from me on account of my last year's place,
and that it would look very disgraceful if I seemed to relax
in my exertions after having received this reward from my
College ; while, on the other, I feel that the course of reading,
etc., here is so far from making me more fit for the trial than I
was last time, that, fresh as I was, I actually had an advantage
from my having come newly from school. However, I shall
of course do my best, and exert myself to appear at least by
my diligence, if not success, grateful to those who have such
claims upon me."
To ROBERT SCOTT, ESQ.
"EMMANUEL LODGE, January 1st, 1831.
" DEAR SCOTT, Though I hardly know where a letter will
be likely to find you, I think it best to send my congratulations
to Oxford, from which place the cause of them is derived.
Possibly Mrs. Butler and myself may pass through if we return
home from Eton, as I have some thought of doing.
"The Dean has done you an act of kindness not the less
valuable for its being just, as well as highly honourable to him
and to yourself. Read for the Ireland and fear not; even
should you fail you cannot but acquit yourself with great credit.
Accept my best thanks for what you have done already for the
credit of Shrewsbury School, and what I trust you will yet do
1831-] AN OXFORD EXAMINATION. 385
on more than one occasion. My first letter in the new year is
this of congratulation I will only add multos etfelices.
" Believe me, dear Sir,
" Your very sincere friend,
"S. BUTLER."
FROM THE REV. R. A. THORP.
" C. C. C., February loth, 1831.
" MY DEAR SIR, I beg to inform you, as I have done on other
occasions, that we are about to fill up three scholarships now
vacant in our society. Two of them are confined to persons
born in the diocese of Exeter, and one to natives of the county
of Gloucester. I need not say how glad we shall be to find
amongst the candidates any who have had the very great
advantage of being pupils of yours.
"Allow me to take this opportunity of mentioning a subject
which has given me considerable pain. A pupil of yours, whose
name I will not mention, applied through a friend in Oxford to
me to know if he could stand here without testimonials from you,
inasmuch as he feared he should fail of procuring such, as you
felt very indignant at one of your pupils who had been a candidate
for a Lancashire Scholarship not having been elected by us to it.
I was not the least aware of your considering your pupil aggrieved
on that occasion, or that you bore towards us any grudge in
consequence, and I freely mention the circumstance to you,
because I believe there is either a mistake or misunderstanding
respecting it. I thought highly of your pupil, and I expressed
myself so to you in a letter afterwards. But I think you yourself,
if the whole examination had been laid before you, would have
decided as we did. We still, however, thanked you for having
sent up so good a scholar as a candidate, and I think I mentioned
the feeling of the College on that subject in my letter to you. I
trust, however, there is no ground for the story at all, and I am
sure, for my part, I never had the slightest suspicion of any
displeasure on your part."
To THE REV. R. A. THORP.
"February iqtft, 1831.
" DEAR SIR, Two candidates intend to offer themselves for
scholarship at Corpus from this school. Templer, a Devonshire
boy, and Waller, of Gloucestershire : of the good conduct and
moral character of both I can speak in the highest terms of
their attainments the examiners must judge for themselves.
" As you fairly enter upon the subject of the last examination
of one of my pupils, I will be quite candid in my reply. I was
dissatisfied, and I had resolved never to volunteer sending
VOL. I. 25
386 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XXII.
another candidate to you, but I never said that I would not give
any boy who applied to me a testimonial, and in fact I have been
asked for and readily consented to give testimonials to the two
boys in question. They are highly deserving boys, and I trust
my direct and plain answer to the question you have asked
me will be no disadvantage to them in their examination. It
becomes me to give you a statement of my reason for dissatisfac-
tion, which I hope you will take in good part, and which I also
hope may lead to an explanation satisfactory to all parties.
" With regard to the merits of the respective candidates on the
occasion I allude to, I can say nothing, having had no opportunity
of judging. I am not foolish enough to suppose that a boy whom
I bring forward may not meet with competitors much better
qualified than himself, and if the business had been one of mere
examination of the candidates I should have concluded that the
examiners did their duty between the candidates according to the
best of their judgement, and there the matter would have ended.
" The statement which I took down from Bateson on his return
here is in substance as follows.
" That he was asked a number of questions by you respecting
me which I can hardly conceive a gentleman would feel himself
justified in putting to the pupil of any respectable master.
" One of these was, whether I was not in the habit of particu-
larly preparing boys for examinations of this sort (in plain
words therefore, whether I did not cram them, as it is called, for
a particular purpose, instead of giving them general and scholar-
like knowledge) : to which he indignantly and truly answered in
the negative. Another was, whether I did not give private
instructions, and what I charged for doing so which met with the
same answer. A third was, whether I actually attended the school
myself as if I reaped the fruits of a deputy's talents and labours.
Surely, sir, the station I hold might exempt me from indignities
like these.
" Another question was to give you an accurate account of a
week's work here which he did. He then says that, having
learnt that English themes formed no part of this (in fact they
are written in a lower part of the school), you particularly asked him
if he had done any English themes, and that to this he answered
' No ' ; that after this the whole composition given in the
examination consisted of two English themes and a copy of
Latin verses ; no Latin theme no Greek prose no Greek verse
no Lyrics all of which he had told you were part of the week's
work here were set. In the course of this examination, he says,
you asked him if the examination was as hard as he had expected,
and if he had read the parts he was examined in, which I hold
to be very unfair and ensnaring questions though he answered
them fairly, which is more than every candidate is likely to do.
With regard to the former of these questions, it was asked him on
1831.] AN OXFORD EXAMINATION. ffi
the Wednesday night, when there was yet a day and a half of the
examination to come, and to this was added a question whether
as much composition had been set as he had expected : to which
he replied ' No.' He was then asked what he expected more to
which he replied, ' Greek composition.' The next question was,
Would that have helped you ? ' His answer was, ' I think it would.'
No more composition was set, though it was allowed by young B.
that the candidates were so nearly equal that it was difficult to
decide, and they would probably have made the decision easier.
"These are the points, in a short compass, on which I feel
that I have ground of dissatisfaction. As you have entered on
the subject I have fairly stated them. I hope they may not be
prejudicial to the two present candidates from this school, neither
of whom are nearly so much versed in composition of any kind
as Bateson was in fact they have scarcely begun to compose in
Greek.
" I am, dear Sir, your obedient, faithful servant,
" S. BUTLER."
FROM THE REV. R. A. THORP, CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE.
" February 2^th, 1831.
" MY DEAR SIR, I have to acknowledge the receipt of your
letter of the i4th inst. ; and when I add that I read it with
unmixed amazement, I feel that the expression will hardly convey
a just idea of my utter unconsciousness that the few passing words
I exchanged with Mr. Bateson could have been so misinterpreted
and abused. I have hitherto been prevented by a press of other
duties from replying, but I take the earliest leisure to give you the
very fullest explanation, and shall be truly glad if the causes of
your dissatisfaction are removed.
" In the first place let me preface thus much that your pupil
had a sort of a claim on my notice, and I felt desirous as far as I
could to notice, him, remembering that when I stood myself a
word of recognition from any one of the electors would have been
a great encouragement to me. Under such circumstances, where
both parties are unexpectedly thrown together, one is often puzzled
to find conversation ; and what so natural in the case of a boy fresh
from school as to ask how he liked school, what he did there, and
so forth ? And I say this because I am just as likely as not to
make the same or similar remarks to any boy who comes to me
from any school direct. To fancy that every such question has
beneath it a deeply concerted meaning or covert indignity is
really to make one's words as significant as the celebrated shake
of Lord Burleigh's wig. In fact I spoke to Bateson just what
occurred to me at the moment on the occasions when I wag
388 CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XXII.
obliged to meet him ; and so far from there being anything con-
strained in his replies, he was disposed to speak to me of school
with just as much freedom as he seems to have spoken of college
on his return.
" Having said thus much generally, I proceed to the several
causes of offence enumerated. With regard to the first, I did ask
if he had been reading out of school hours with a view to the
present examination. It would surely have been no discredit to
him to have done so, or to you to have directed him. When an
undergraduate here is about to undergo any important examina-
tion as, for his degree, the Ireland Scholarship, fellowships at
Oriel, Balliol, etc. he not only has, but expects to have, assist-
ance from his tutor beyond and above the course of ordinary
lectures ; nay, from them he is often altogether excused, in order
to be enabled to devote his time exclusively to the special examina-
tion before him.
" Masters of some of the highest and best schools have asked
of me beforehand what kind of reading and composing would be
most likely to promote the success of their pupils in our examina-
tion, and I have recommended books, and in the case of rejected
candidates who could stand a second time I have particularised
the causes of failure for the very purpose of directing their
master's attention to those deficiencies. All this, both at college
and school, may by you be called ' cramming ' (for I never used
the word nor expressed myself in the coarse manner which appears
to have been reported to you) ; but surely it is of little moment
if a boy can produce the knowledge in his own person from what
wiser head he derived it. Therefore there could be no indignity
meant in my question, inasmuch as I should have thought it very
creditable to all parties if your pupil had been ' particularly pre-
pared.' As to the inference drawn, in which lies the sting, that I
entirely disclaim.
" The two next questions are much distorted ; but I will tell
you what I did wish to know, and why that information was
desirable for me. I am often asked to recommend schools, and
on one of these occasions had been urgent with a friend of mine
to send his son to Shrewsbury. The boy was young, and his
father was anxious to know if he would come at all, at first, under
your care and instruction in school or out of it. Every one
knows that at Eton, Westminster, Winchester, and other schools
the head-master does not teach any but the higher forms, and
has under him other masters to take the care of the lower parts
of the school. Therefore I asked when a boy came under you.
I never inquired whether you attended the school yourself, but
I said interrogatively, ' I suppose Dr. Butler does not teach all the
school himself? Is there any system of private tuition ?' If you
are acquainted with the practice at Eton, you will see at once
what I meant, where the lessons, though said in school, are learned
1831.] AN OXFORD EXAMINATION. 389
under a private tutor at their boarding-houses. There again I
am obliged to correct the form of my questions, and again to
disclaim altogether your inferences.
" To proceed. I perfectly recollect asking for an account of
a week's studies at Shrewsbury. I was comparing, in my own
mind, the studies there with those pursued here. Your pupils
have lately proved themselves great proficients in scholarship,
and I confess I should have been glad to borrow any hint from
your system in improvement of our own.
" I think I need not reply to what you insinuate, that there was
a disposition to take your pupil at a disadvantage in the progress
of the examination. From the indignity of such a suspicion I
too, in your words, might be exempted. I simply say this much,
that we are by our statutes obliged to require Latin verse, that
it has always been our practice to set most store by English
composition, but I asked of Bateson if he had been practised in
English themes in order to make all allowance in his favour with
regard to those exercises, and that the plan of the whole written
examination is arranged long before the candidates present
themselves, and that all of it is printed which can be so a
practice now generally adopted throughout the University.
" After the examination was over I spoke as kindly as I could
to Bateson, and commended his examination. He made a pettish
reply (the only time he did so), and appears to have impressed
you with very incorrect notions of the treatment he received here.
As to the result of the election, our judgement turned more on
the viva-wee separate construings than upon the quality of the
exercises.
" I have, in conclusion, to thank you for your candour, and for
the power you have given me of endeavouring to satisfy your
mind that you have mistaken both me and my words. What I,
to adopt the same freedom, have to be sorry for is that you make
imputations of motives and design which my words will not bear
out, and which I think the station I hold ought to protect
me from. Had you, for instance, met any pupil of mine and
asked him if he had any extra help from me previous to taking
his degree, if he was under the care of the tutors, or only
instructed by one, or if the public tutors took private pupils or
not, I should not have concluded you had any meaning beyond a
passing inquiry in such questions ; and if my pupil had told me
you had covert design in what you asked, I should have impressed
upon him that he must have been mistaken, and that your char-
acter protected you from the imputation. But even without any
ground you have permitted yourself to think and write unworthily,
when you twice say you hope your freedom of remark will not
injure the new candidates from your school. However, I will
not press this point beyond merely mentioning it. I thank you
again for your unreserved statement. I have shown by the length
39O CORRESPONDENCE. [Cn. XXII.
of my reply my wish to satisfy you, and it ought to be satisfactory
to you to know that, whilst the questions with some alterations
are allowed, the interpretations of them are altogether disclaimed.
" I remain, with undiminished regard, very faithfully,
" R. A. THORP."
To THE REV. R. A. THORP.
" SHREWSBURY, March 1st, 1831.
" MY DEAR SIR, I must beg leave to inform you that I have
only this afternoon received by post your letter dated February
24th, and bearing the Oxford postmark of February 27th. This
will I hope satisfactorily account to you for a silence which might
otherwise appear the result of premeditated rudeness or delay.
" As you are good enough to disclaim any intention of hurting
my feelings by the questions which you put to Bateson, I very
readily acquiesce in your disavowal, and beg to thank you for
your courtesy in making it ; but as you appear to impute to me
something like precipitance in taking up the matter too warmly
and in listening to a perverted account, I will beg to add a few
words in my own justification on that head.
" I took down the account from the boy's lips as he returned.
He is a boy whose manners are blunt, but whose word may as
safely be relied on as that of any person I know. I have again
examined him to-day, and he does not make the slightest differ-
ence in his account ; and though he may, and indeed must, have
been mistaken in one point, I am sure he makes no wilful
misrepresentation. He says that he still believes your first
question to have been, not whether I taught the upper form (which
in fact is all I do teach, though I examine some form every week),
but whether I taught at all in the upper school. I should also
have placed much less stress on this and all the other questions
had he not told me (and he now repeats the declaration) that he
inquired of several of the other candidates whether you had asked
them similar questions, and that they uniformly answered in the
negative. It was this which made them look pointed in his
case. Farther, with regard to the arrangement of the examination
previously to the candidates coming up, he told me then, and he
repeats it now, that so far as the printed papers were concerned
he doubts not that the whole was previously arranged, but that
the subjects for the English themes were brought in with the ink
wet, and that they thus formed an exception to the rest of the
examination, which exception, after the questions put to him, did
seem to him remarkable, especially as two English themes were set.
" Now though you have kindly explained this, and though I
find that your inquiries were dictated by nothing but a blameless
curiosity or even a friendly intention towards him or myself, under
1831.] AN OXFORD EXAMINATION. 39!
the circumstances I have stated I cannot but think myself excus-
able for the view I took of them. I rejoice to find myself mis-
taken, and I beg in my turn to apologise to you for my error, for
such I must now consider it, though I trust you will see by this
explanation that it was not taken up on light or captious grounds.
" Hoping that we have now brought this matter to a mutually
satisfactory conclusion,
" I remain, dear Sir, yours faithfully,
"S. BUTLER."
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