but on this point I have never been able to overcome a repugnance
to making these direct appeals for personal attentions. In the
course of my life, I do not think, much as I have travelled, that I
have delivered half a dozen. I am fully aware of their necessity if
one would be noticed, but, right or wrong, I have preferred to be
unnoticed to laying an imposition on others that they may possibly
think onerous. The unreflecting and indelicate manner in which the
practice of giving and asking for letters is abused, in America,
may have contributed to my disgust at the usage. Just before I
left home, a little incident occurred, connected with the subject,
that, in no degree, served to diminish this reluctance to asking
favours and civilities of strangers. I happened to be present when
an improper application was made to the son of one of our ministers
in Europe, for letters to the father. Surprised that such a request
should be granted, I was explicitly told that a private sign had
been agreed upon, between the parties, whereby all applicants should
be gratified, though none were really to have the benefit of the
introduction but those who bore the stipulated mark! This odious
duplicity, had its rise in the habits of a country, in which men
are so apt to mistake their privileges. The practice of deferring
leads to frauds in politics, and to hypocrisy in morals. Some will
tell you this case was the fruits of democracy, but I shall say it
savoured more of an artifice of aristocracy, and such, in fact, was
the political bias of both father and son. Democracy merits no other
reproach in the affair, than the weakness of allowing itself to be
deceived by agents so hollow.
I had made the acquaintance of Mr. William Spencer, in Paris, a
gentleman well known in England as the author of “A Year of Sorrow,”
and several very clever pieces of fugitive poetry. Hearing that I
was about to visit London, he volunteered to give me letters to a
large circle of acquaintances, literary and fashionable. Pleading my
retired habits, I endeavoured to persuade him not to give himself the
trouble of writing, but, mistaking the motive, he insisted on showing
this act of kindness. Trusting to his known indolence, I thought
little of the matter, until the very morning of the day we left
Paris, when this gentleman appeared, and, instead of the letters, he
gave me a list of the names of some of those he wished me to know,
desiring me to leave cards for them, on reaching London, in the full
assurance that the letters would be sent after me! I put the list in
my pocket, and, as you will readily imagine, thought the arrangement
sufficiently queer. The list contained, however, the names of several
whom I would gladly have known, could it be done with propriety,
including, among others, those of Rogers, Campbell, Sotheby, Lord
Dudley, &c. &c.
Under these circumstances, I took quiet possession of the house
in St James’s Place, with no expectation of seeing any part of
what is called society, content to look at as much of the English
capital as could be viewed on the outside, and to pursue my own
occupations. This arrangement was rendered the less to be regretted
by the circumstance that we had been met in London, by the unpleasant
intelligence of the death of Mr. de ——. Of course it was the wish of
your aunt to be retired. While things were in this state, I went one
morning to a bookseller’s, where the Americans are in the habit of
resorting, and learned, to my surprise, that several of the gentlemen
named on Mr. Spenser’s list, had been there to inquire for me. This
looked as if he had actually written, and to this kindness on his
part, and to an awkward mistake, by which I was supposed to be the
son of an Englishman of the same name and official appellation as
those of your grand-father, I am indebted to nearly all of the
acquaintances I made in England, some of whom I should have been
extremely sorry to have missed.
The first visit I had, out of our own narrow circle of Americans,
occurred about a fortnight after we were established in St. James’s
Place. I was writing at the time, and did not attend particularly
when the name was announced, but supposing it was some tradesman, I
ordered the person to be admitted. A quiet little old man appeared in
the room, and we stood staring near a minute at each other, he, as I
afterwards understood, to ascertain if he could discover any likeness
between me and my supposed father, and I wondering who the diminutive
little personage might be. I question if the stature of my visitor
much exceeded five feet, though his frame was solid and heavy. He
was partly bald, and the hair that remained was perfectly white. He
had a fine head, a benevolent countenance, and a fresh colour. After
regarding me a moment, and perceiving my doubt, he said simply—“I am
Mr. Godwin. I knew your father, when he lived in England, and hearing
that you were in London, I have come, without ceremony, to see you.”
After expressing my gratification at having made his acquaintance on
any terms, I gave him to understand there was some mistake, as my
father had never been out of America. This led to an explanation,
when he took his seat and we began to chat. He was curious to hear
something of American literature, which I have soon discovered is
very little known in England. He wished to learn, in particular, if
we had any poets—“I have seen something of Dwight’s and Humphrey’s,
and Barlow’s,” he said, “but I cannot say that either pleased me
much.” I laughed and told him we could do better than that, now. He
begged me to recite something—a single verse, if possible. He could
not have applied to a worse person, for my memory barely suffices to
remember facts, of which I trust it is sufficiently tenacious, but I
never could make any thing of a quotation. As he betrayed a childish
eagerness to hear even half a dozen lines, I attempted something of
Bryant’s, and a little of Alnwick Castle, which pretty much exhausted
my whole stock. I was amused at the simplicity with which he betrayed
the little reverence he felt for our national intellect, for it was
quite apparent he thought “nothing good could come out of Nazareth.”
Mr. Godwin sat with me an hour, and the whole time the conversation
was about America, her prospects, her literature, and her politics.
It was not possible to believe that he entertained a favorable
opinion of the country, notwithstanding the liberal tendency of his
writings, for prejudice, blended with a few shrewd and judicious
remarks, peeped out of all his notions. He had almost a rustic
simplicity of manner, that, I think, must be as much attributed to
the humble sphere of life in which he had lived, as to character,
for the portion of his deportment which was not awkward seemed to
be the result of mind, while the remainder might easily enough be
traced to want of familiarity with life. At least, so both struck
me, and I can only give you my impressions. As Mr. Godwin has long
enjoyed a great reputation, and the English of rank are in the habit
of courting men of letters, (though certainly in a way peculiar to
themselves) I can only suppose that the tendency of his writings,
which is not favorable to aristocracy, has prevented him from
enjoying the usual advantages of men of celebrity.
It would savour of empiricism to pretend to dive into the depths
of character, in an interview of an hour, but there was something
about the manner of Mr. Godwin that strongly impressed me with the
sincerity of his philosophy, and of his real desire to benefit his
race. I felt several times, during his visit, as if I wished to
pat the old man’s bald head, and tell him “he was a good fellow.”
Indeed, I cannot recall any one, who, on so short an acquaintance, so
strongly impressed me with a sense of his philanthropy; and this too,
purely from externals, for his professions and language were totally
free from cant. This opinion forced itself on me, almost in spite of
my wishes, for Mr. Godwin so clearly viewed us with any thing but
favourable eyes, that I could not consider him a friend. He regarded
us a _speculating_ rather than as a _speculative_ people, and such
is not the character that a philosopher most esteems.
I returned the visit of Mr. Godwin, in a few days, although I was
indebted to his presence to a mistake, and found him, living in
great simplicity, in the midst of his books. On this occasion he
manifested the peculiarities already named, with the same disposition
to distrust the greatness of the “twelve millions.” I fancy my father
has not sent him very good accounts of us.
A few days later I got an invitation to be present at an evening
party, given by a literary man, with whom I had already a slight
acquaintance. On this occasion, I was told a lady known a little in
the world of letters, was desirous of making my acquaintance, and,
of course, I had only to go forward and be presented. “I had the
pleasure of knowing your father,” she observed, as soon as my bow was
made.—Forgetting Mr. Godwin and his visit, I observed that she had
then been in America. Not at all; she had known my father in England.
I then explained to her that I was confounded with another person,
my father being an American, and never out of his own country. This
news produced an extraordinary change on the countenance and manner
of my new acquaintance, who, from that moment, did not deign to speak
to me, or hardly to look at me! As her first reception had been
quite frank and warm, and she herself had sought the introduction,
I thought this deportment a little decided. I cannot explain the
matter, in any other way, than by supposing that her inherent dislike
of America suddenly got the better of her good manners, for the woman
could hardly expect that I was to play impostor for her particular
amusement. This may seem to you extraordinary, but I have seen many
similar and equally strong instances of national antipathy betrayed
by these people, since my residence in Europe. I note these things,
as matter of curious observation.
In the course of the same week I was indebted to the attention of Mr.
Spencer for another visit, which led to more agreeable consequences.
The author of the Pleasures of Memory was my near neighbour in St.
James’s Place, and, induced by Mr. Spencer, he very kindly sought me
out. His visit was the first I actually received from the “list,” and
it has been the means of my seeing most of what I have seen, of the
interior of London. It was followed by an invitation to breakfast for
the following morning.
I certainly have no intention to repay Mr. Rogers for his many
acts of kindness, by making him and his friends the subject of
my comments, but, to a certain degree he must pay the penalty of
celebrity, and neither he nor any one else has a right to live in so
exquisite a house, and expect every body to hold their tongues about
it.
It was but a step from my door to that of Mr. Rogers, and you may be
certain I was punctual to the appointed hour. I found with him Mr.
Carey, the translator of Dante, and his son. The conversation during
breakfast was general. The subject of America being incidentally
introduced. Our host told many literary anecdotes, in a quiet and
peculiar manner that gave them point. I was asked if the language
of America differed essentially from that of England. I thought
not so much in words and pronunciation, as in intonation and in
the signification of certain terms. Still I thought I could always
tell an Englishman from an American, in the course of five minutes’
conversation. The two oldest gentlemen professed not to be able
to discover any thing in my manner of speaking to betray me for a
foreigner, but the young gentleman fancied otherwise. “He thought
there was something peculiar—provincial—he did not know what
exactly.” I could have helped him to the word—“something that was
not cockney.” The young man however was right in the main, for I
could myself have pronounced that all three of my companions were not
Americans, and I do not see why they might not have said that I was
no Englishman. The difference between the enunciation of Mr. Rogers
and Mr. Carey and one of our educated men of the middle states, it
is true, was scarcely perceptible, and required a nice ear and some
familiarity with both countries to detect, but the young man could
not utter a sentence, without showing his origin.
Mr. Rogers had the good nature to let me see his house, after
breakfast. It stands near the head of the place, there being a
right-angle between his dwelling and mine, and its windows, in the
rear, open on the Green Park. In every country in which men begin to
live for enjoyment and taste, it is a desideratum to get an abode
that is not exposed to the noise and bustle of a thoroughfare. One
who has intellectual resources, and elegant accomplishments, in which
to take refuge, scarcely desires to be a street gazer, and I take
it to be almost a test of the character of a population, when its
higher classes seek to withdraw from publicity, in this manner. One
can conceive of a trader who has grown rich wishing to get a “good
stand,” even for a house, but I am now speaking of men of cultivated
minds and habits.
On this side of the Green Park there is no street between the houses
and the field. The buildings stand in a line, even with the place
on one side, and having small gardens between them and the park.
Of course, all the good rooms overlook the latter. The Green Park,
and St. James’s Park, are, in fact, one open space, the separation
between them being merely a fence. The first is nothing but a large
field, cropped down like velvet, irregularly dotted with trees, and
without any carriage way. Paths wind naturally across it, cows graze
before the eye, and nursery maids and children sprinkle its uneven
surface, whenever the day is fine. There is a house and garden
belonging to the ranger, on one of its sides, and the shrubbery
of the latter, as well as that of the small private gardens just
mentioned, help to relieve the nakedness. I should think there must
be sixty or eighty acres in the Green Park, while St. James’s is much
larger. On one side the Green Park is open to Piccadilly; on another
it is bounded by a carriage way in St James’s; a third joins St
James’s, and the fourth is the end on which stands the house of Mr.
Rogers.
It strikes me the dwellings which open on these two parks, (for
more than half of St. James’s Park is bounded by houses in the same
manner) are the most desirable in London. They are central as regards
the public edifices, near the court, the clubs, and the theatres,
and yet they are more retired than common. The carriage-way to them
is almost always by places, or silent streets, while their best
windows overlook a beautiful rural scene interspersed with the finer
parts of a capital. As a matter of course, these dwellings are in
great request. On the side of the Green Park is the residence of Sir
Francis Burdett, Spenser-house, Bridgewater-house, so celebrated for
its pictures, and many others of a similar quality, while a noble
new palace stands at the point where the two parks meet, that was
constructed for the late Duke of York, then heir presumptive of the
crown.
The house of Mr. Rogers is a _chef d’œuvre_ for the establishment of
a bachelor. I understood him to say that it occupied a part of the
site of a dwelling of a former Duke of St. Albans, and so well is it
proportioned that I could hardly believe it to be as small as feet
and inches demonstrate. Its width cannot be more than eighteen feet,
while its depth may a little exceed fifty. The house in which we
lodge is even smaller. But the majority of the town-houses, here, are
by no means distinguished for their size. Perhaps the average of the
genteel lodging-houses, of which I have spoken, is less than that of
Mr. Rogers’s dwelling.
This gentleman has his drawing-room and dining-room lined with
pictures, chiefly by the old masters. Several of them are the
studies of larger works. His library is filled with valuable books;
curiosities, connected principally with literature, history, and
the arts, are strewed about the house, and even some rare relics of
Egyptian sculpture find a place in this tasteful abode. Among other
things of the sort, he has the original agreement for the sale of
Paradise Lost! The price, I believe, was twenty-five pounds. It
is usual to rail at this meanness, but I question if there is a
bookseller, now in London, who would pay as much for it.
I was much interested with a little circumstance connected with these
rarities. In the drawing-room stands a precious antique vase, on a
handsome pedestal of carved wood. Chantry was dining with the poet,
as a group collected around the spot, to look at the vase. “Do you
know who did this carving?” asked the sculptor, laying his hand on
the pedestal. Mr. Rogers mentioned the carver he employed. “Yes, yes,
he had the job, but _I_ did the _work_,”—being then an apprentice, or
a journeyman, I forget which.
LETTER IV.
TO THOMAS JAMES DE LANCEY, ESQUIRE.
I shall not entertain you with many cockney descriptions of “sights.”
By this time England, in these particulars, is better understood with
us, than in points much more essential. Whenever I do diverge from
the track prescribed to myself, with such an object, it will be to
point out something peculiar, or to give you what I conceive will be
juster notions than those you may have previously imbibed. Still, one
can hardly visit London without saying something of its _matériel_,
and I shall take this occasion to open the subject.
As your —— had never before been in London, and might never be again,
it became a sort of duty to examine the principal objects, one of the
first of which was Westminster Abbey. I have already spoken of the
exterior of this building, and shall now add a word of its interior.
The common entrance is by a small door, at the Poet’s Corner; and it
was a strange sensation to find one’s self in the midst of tablets
bearing the epitaphs of most of those whose names are hallowed in
English literature, and English art. I can only liken it to the
emotion one might feel in unexpectedly finding himself in a room
with most of his distinguished contemporaries. It was startling to
see such names as Shakspeare, and Milton, and Ben Jonson, even on a
tomb-stone; and, albeit little given to ultra romanticism, I felt
a thrilling of the nerves as I read them. The abbey is well filled
with gorgeous monuments of the noble and politically great, but
they are collected in different chapels, on the opposite side of
the church, or beneath its nave, while the intellectual spirits are
crowded together, in a sort of vestibule; as if entering, one by
one, and finding good companions already assembled, they had stopped
in succession to enjoy each other’s society. Notwithstanding the
gorgeous pomp of the monuments of the noble, one feels that this
homely corner contains the best company. Westminster Abbey, in my
judgment, is a finer church internally than on its exterior. Still
it has great faults, wanting unity, and an unobstructed view. It
has a very neat and convenient choir, in which the regular service
is performed, and which bears some such proportion to the whole
interior, as the chancel of an ordinary American church bears to its
whole inside. It stands, as usual, in a range with the transept. This
choir, however, breaks the line of sight, and impairs the grandeur of
the aisles.
The celebrated chapel of Henry VIIth, like the body of the church
itself, is finer even internally than externally, although its
exterior is truly a rare specimen of the gothic. The stalls of the
Knights of the Bath are in this chapel, and its beautiful vaulted
roof is darkened by a cloud of banners, time worn and dingy. This is
a noble order of chivalry, for its rolls contain but few names that
are not known to history. Unlike the Legion of Honour, which is now
bestowed on all who want it, and the Garter, an institution that owes
all its distinction to the convention of hereditary rank, the Knights
of the Bath commonly earn their spurs by fair and honourable service,
in prominent and responsible stations, before they are permitted
to wear them. There always will be some favouritism in the use of
political patronage, but, I am inclined to think there never was an
order of chivalry instituted, or indeed any other mode of distinction
devised, in which merit and not favour has more uniformly controlled
the selections, than in bestowing the red ribbands. The greatest evil
of such rewards arises from the fact that men will not be satisfied
with simply making a distinction of merit, but they invariably rear
on a foundation so plausible, other and more mystified systems, in
which there is an attempt to make a merit of distinctions.
Among the laboured monuments of the Abbey is one in honour of Admiral
Sir Peter Warren, who died Rear Admiral of England, some seventy
years ago, erected by his wife. Lady Warren was a native of New
York, and a member of your own family; having been the sister of your
father’s grand-father. Her husband was a long time commander in chief
on our coast, and was known in our history as one of the conquerors
of Louisbourg. He was a good officer, and is said to have done most
of the fighting on the occasion of Anson’s victory, commanding the
van-squadron. On his return, the worthy citizens of London were so
much captivated with his bravery, that they offered to make him an
alderman! Sir Peter Warren was also the uncle of Sir William Johnson,
and this celebrated person first appeared in the interior of our
country, as the agent of his relative, who then owned an estate on
the Mohawk, at a place that is still called Warrensbush.
As a whole, there is little to be said in favour of the
much-talked-of monuments of Westminster Abbey. Most of them want
simplicity and distinctness, telling their stories badly, and some of
the most pretending among them are vile conceits. There are some good
details, however, and a few of the statues of more recent erection,
are works of merit. A statue of Mr. Horner by Chantry is singularly
noble, although in the modern attire. The works of this artist strike
me as having all the merit that can exist independently of the ideal.
The monuments are very numerous; for any person, of reasonable
pretensions, who chooses to pay for the privilege, can have one
erected for a friend, though I fancy, the poet’s corner is held to be
a little more sacred. It is much the fashion of late, to place the
monuments of distinguished men in St. Pauls.
You have heard that the heads of Washington and the other American
officers, which are on a _bas rélief_ of André’s monument, have been
knocked off. This fact of itself furnishes proof of the state of
feeling here, as respects us, but an answer of our cicerone, when
showing us the church, gives still stronger evidence of it. “Why
have they done this?” I demanded, curious to hear the history of the
injury. “Oh! sir, there are plenty of evil-disposed people get in
here. _Some American_ has done it, no doubt.” So you perceive we are
not only accused of hanging our enemies, but of beheading our friends!
In a room, up a flight of steps, is a small collection of figures
in wax, bedizened with tinsel, and every way worthy of occupying a
booth at Bartholemew’s fair. It is impossible for me to tell you what
has induced the dean and chapter, to permit this prostitution of
their venerable edifice, but it is reasonable to suppose that it is
the very motive which induced Ananias to lie, and Sapphira to swear
to it. These crude and coarse tastes are constantly encountering
one in England, and, at first, I felt disposed to attribute it to
the circumstance of a low national standard, but, perhaps it were
truer to say that the lower orders of this country, by being more
at their ease, and by _paying_ for their gratifications of this
nature, produce an influence on all public exhibitions that is
unfelt on the Continent, where the spectacle being intended solely
for the intellectual is better adapted to their habits. As connected
with religious superstition, moreover, the finest cathedrals of all
Catholic countries enjoy monstrosities almost as bad as these of the
Abbey.