THE HOME OF DR. JOHNSON
Lichfield, Staffordshire, July 31, 1890.--To a man of letters there is
no name in the long annals of English literature more interesting and
significant than the name of Samuel Johnson. It has been truly said
that no other man was ever subjected to such a light as Boswell threw
upon Johnson, and that few other men could have endured it so well.
He was in many ways noble, but of all men of letters he is especially
noble as the champion of literature. He vindicated the profession of
letters. He lived by his pen, and he taught the great world, once
for all, that it is honourable so to live. That lesson was needed in
the England of his period; and from that period onward the literary
vocation has steadily been held in higher esteem than it enjoyed up to
that time. The reader will not be surprised that one of the humblest
of his followers should linger for a while in the ancient town that is
glorified by association with his illustrious name, or should write a
word of fealty and homage in the birthplace of Dr. Johnson.
[Illustration: _Dr. Johnson._]
Lichfield is a cluster of rather dingy streets and of red-brick and
stucco buildings, lying in a vale, a little northward from Birmingham,
diversified by a couple of artificial lakes and glorified by one of
the loveliest churches in Europe. Without its church the town would be
nothing. Lichfield cathedral, although an ancient structure,--dating
back, indeed, to the early part of the twelfth century,--has been so
sorely battered, and so considerably "restored," that it presents the
aspect of a building almost modern. The denotements of antiquity,
however, are not entirely absent from it, and it is not less venerable
than majestic. No one of the cathedrals of England presents a more
beautiful front. The multitudinous statues of saints and kings that are
upon it create an impression of royal opulence. The carving upon the
recesses of the great doorways on the north and west is of astonishing
variety and loveliness. The massive doors of dark oak, fretted with
ironwork of rare delicacy, are impressive and are exceptionally
suitable for such an edifice. Seven of the large gothic windows in the
chancel are filled with genuine old glass,--not, indeed, the glass they
originally contained, for that was smashed by the Puritan fanatics,
but a great quantity [no less than at least three hundred and forty
pieces, each about twenty-two inches square], made in Germany, in the
early part of the sixteenth century, when the art of staining glass was
at its summit of skill. This treasure was given to the cathedral by a
liberal friend, Sir Brooke Boothby, who had obtained it by purchase, in
1802, from the dissolved Abbey of Herckenrode. No such colour as that
old glass presents can be seen in the glass that is manufactured now.
It is imitated indeed, but it does not last. The subjects portrayed in
those sumptuous windows are mostly scriptural, but the centre window on
the north side of the chancel is devoted to portraits of noblemen, one
of them being Errard de la Marck, who was enthroned Bishop of Liège in
1505, and who, toward the end of his stormy life, adopted the old Roman
motto, comprehensive and final, which, a little garbled, appears in the
glass beneath his heraldic arms:
"Decipimus votis; et tempore fallimur;
Et Mors deridet curas; anxia vita nihil."
[Illustration: _Lichfield Cathedral--West Front._]
The father of the illustrious Joseph Addison was Dean of Lichfield from
1688 to 1703, and his remains are buried in the ground, near the west
door of the church. The stately Latin epitaph was written by his son.
This and several other epitaphs here attract the interested attention
of literary students. A tablet on the north wall, in the porch,
commemorates the courage and sagacity of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, who
introduced into England the practice of inoculation for the small-pox.
Anna Seward, the poet, who died in 1809, aged sixty-six, and who was
one of the friends of Dr. Johnson, was buried and is commemorated
here, and the fact that she placed a tablet here, in memory of her
father, is celebrated in sixteen eloquent and felicitous lines by Sir
Walter Scott. The father was a canon of Lichfield, and died in 1790.
The reader of Boswell will not fail to remark the epitaph on Gilbert
Walmesley, once registrar of the ecclesiastical court of Lichfield,
and one of Dr. Johnson's especial friends. Of Chappel Woodhouse it is
significantly said, upon his memorial stone, that he was "lamented
most by those who knew him best." Here the pilgrim sees two of the
best works of Sir Francis Chantrey,--one called The Sleeping Children,
erected in 1817, in memory of two young daughters of the Rev. William
Robinson; the other a kneeling figure of Bishop Ryder, who died in
1836. The former was one of the earliest triumphs of Chantrey,--an
exquisite semblance of innocence and heavenly purity,[46]--and the
latter was his last. Near by is placed one of the most sumptuous
monuments in England, a recumbent statue, done by the master-hand of
Watts, the painter, representing Bishop Lonsdale, who died in 1867.
This figure, in which the modelling is very beautiful and expressive,
rests upon a bed of marble and alabaster. In Chantrey's statue of
Bishop Ryder, which seems no effigy but indeed the living man, there
is marvellous perfection of drapery,--the marble having the effect
of flowing silk. Here also, in the south transept, is the urn of
the Gastrells, formerly of Stratford-upon-Avon, to whom was due the
destruction [1759] of the house of New Place in which Shakespeare died.
No mention of the Rev. Gastrell occurs in the epitaph, but copious
eulogium is lavished on his widow, both in verse and prose, and she
must indeed have been a good woman, if the line is true which describes
her as "A friend to want when each false friend withdrew." Her chief
title to remembrance, however, like that of her husband, is an
unhallowed association with one of the most sacred of literary shrines.
In 1776 Johnson, accompanied by Boswell, visited Lichfield, and Boswell
records that they dined with Mrs. Gastrell and her sister Mrs. Aston.
The Rev. Gastrell was then dead. "I was not informed till afterward,"
says Boswell, "that Mrs. Gastrell's husband was the clergyman who,
while he lived at Stratford-upon-Avon, with Gothic barbarity cut down
Shakespeare's mulberry-tree, and as Dr. Johnson told me, did it to
vex his neighbours. His lady, I have reason to believe, on the same
authority, participated in the guilt of what the enthusiasts of our
immortal bard deem almost a species of sacrilege." The destruction
of the house followed close upon that of the tree, and to both their
deaths the lady was doubtless accessory.
[Illustration: _Lichfield Cathedral--West Front, Central Doorway._]
Upon the ledge of a casement on the east side of the chancel, separated
by the central lancet of a threefold window, stand the marble busts of
Samuel Johnson and David Garrick. Side by side they went through life;
side by side their ashes repose in the great abbey at Westminster;
and side by side they are commemorated here. Both the busts were made
by Westmacott, and obviously each is a portrait. The head of Johnson
appears without his customary wig. The colossal individuality of the
man plainly declares itself, in form and pose, in every line of the
eloquent face, and in the superb dignity of the figure and the action.
This work was based on a cast taken after death, and this undoubtedly
is Johnson's self. The head is massive yet graceful, denoting a
compact brain and great natural refinement of intellect. The brow is
indicative of uncommon sweetness. The eyes are finely shaped. The nose
is prominent, long, and slightly aquiline, with wide and sensitive
nostrils. The mouth is large, and the lips are slightly parted, as if
in speech. Prodigious perceptive faculties are shown in the sculpture
of the forehead,--a feature that is characteristic, in even a greater
degree, of the bust of Garrick. The total expression of the countenance
is benignant, yet troubled and rueful. It is a thoughtful and venerable
face, and yet it is the passionate face of a man who has passed through
many storms of self-conflict and been much ravaged by spiritual pain.
The face of Garrick, on the contrary, is eager, animated, triumphant,
happy, showing a nature of absolute simplicity, a sanguine temperament,
and a mind that tempests may have ruffled but never convulsed. Garrick
kept his "storm and stress" for his tragic performances; there was no
particle of it in his personal experience. It was good to see those
old friends thus associated in the beautiful church that they knew
and loved in the sweet days when their friendship had just begun and
their labours and their honours were all before them. I placed myself
where, during the service, I could look upon both the busts at once;
and presently, in the deathlike silence, after the last response of
evensong had died away, I could well believe that those familiar
figures were kneeling beside me, as so often they must have knelt
beneath this glorious and venerable roof: and for one worshipper the
beams of the westering sun, that made a solemn splendour through the
church, illumined visions no mortal eyes could see.
Beneath the bust of Johnson, upon a stone slab affixed to the wall,
appears this inscription:
The friends of SAMUEL JOHNSON, LL.D., a native of Lichfield, erected
this monument as a tribute of respect to the memory of a man of
extensive learning, a distinguished moral writer and a sincere
Christian. He died the 13th of December, 1784, aged 75 years.
A similar stone beneath the bust of Garrick is inscribed as follows:
Eva Maria, relict of DAVID GARRICK, Esq., caused this monument to be
erected to the memory of her beloved husband, who died the 20th of
January 1779, aged 63 years. He had not only the amiable qualities
of private life, but such astonishing dramatick talents as too well
verified the observation of his friend: "His death eclipsed the gayety
of nations and impoverished the publick stock of harmless pleasure."
This "observation" is the well-known eulogium of Johnson, who, however
much he may have growled about Garrick, always loved him and deeply
mourned for him. These memorials of an author and an actor are not
rendered the more impressive by being surmounted, as at present they
are, in Lichfield cathedral, with old battle-flags,--commemorative
souvenirs of the 80th Regiment, Staffordshire volunteers,--honourable
and interesting relics in their place, but inappropriate to the
effigies of Johnson and Garrick.
[Illustration: _House in which Johnson was born._]
The house in which Johnson was born stands at the corner of Market
street and Breadmarket street, facing the little market-place of
Lichfield. It is an antiquated building, three stories in height,
having a long, peaked roof. The lower story is recessed, so that the
entrance is sheltered by a pent. Its two doors,--for the structure
now consists of two tenements,--are approached by low stone steps,
guarded by an iron rail. There are ten windows, five in each row, in
the front of the upper stories. The pent-roof is supported by three
sturdy pillars. The house has a front of stucco. A bill in one of
the lower windows certifies that now [1890], this house is "To Let."
Here old Michael Johnson kept his bookshop, in the days of good Queen
Anne, and from this door young Samuel Johnson went forth to his school
and his play. The whole various, pathetic, impressive story of his
long, laborious, sturdy, beneficent life drifts through your mind
as you stand at that threshold and conjure up the pictures of the
past. Opposite to the house, and facing it, is the statue of Johnson,
presented to Lichfield in 1838 by James Thomas Law, then Chancellor
of the diocese. On the sides of its massive pedestal are sculptures,
showing first the boy, borne on his father's shoulders, listening to
the preaching of Dr. Sacheverell; then the youth, victorious in school,
carried aloft in triumph by his admiring comrades; and, finally, the
renowned scholar and author, in the meridian of his greatness, standing
bareheaded in the market-place of Uttoxeter, doing penance for his
undutiful refusal, when a lad, to relieve his weary, infirm father,
in the work of tending the bookstall at that place. Every one knows
that touching story, and no one who thinks of it when standing here
will gaze with any feeling but that of reverence, commingled with the
wish to lead a true and simple life, upon the noble, thoughtful face
and figure of the great moralist, who now seems to look down with
benediction upon the scenes of his innocent and happy youth. The
statue, which is in striking contrast with the humble birthplace,
points the expressive moral of a splendid career. No tablet has yet
been placed on the house in which Johnson was born. Perhaps it is not
needed. Yet surely this place, if any place on earth, ought to be
preserved and protected as a literary shrine.[47] Johnson was not a
great creative poet; neither a Shakespeare, a Dryden, a Byron, nor a
Tennyson; but he was one of the most massive and majestic characters
in English literature. A superb example of self-conquest and moral
supremacy, a mine of extensive and diversified learning, an intellect
remarkable for deep penetration and broad and generally sure grasp of
the greatest subjects, he exerted, as few men have ever exerted, the
original, elemental force of genius; and his immortal legacy to his
fellow-men was an abiding influence for good. The world is better and
happier because of him, and because of the many earnest characters
and honest lives that his example has inspired; and this cradle of
greatness ought to be saved and marked for every succeeding generation
as long as time endures.
[Illustration: _The Spires of Lichfield._]
One of the interesting features of Lichfield is an inscription that
vividly recalls the ancient strife of Roundhead and Cavalier, two
centuries and a half ago. This is found upon a stone scutcheon, set
in the wall over the door of the house that is No. 24 Dam street, and
these are its words: "March 2d, 1643, Lord Brooke, a General of the
Parliament Forces preparing to Besiege the Close of Lichfield, then
garrisoned For King Charles the First, Received his deathwound on
the spot Beneath this Inscription, By a shot in the forehead from
Mr. Dyott, a gentleman who had placed himself on the Battlements of
the great steeple, to annoy the Besiegers." One of them he must have
"annoyed" seriously. It was "a long shot, Sir Lucius," for, standing
on the place of that catastrophe and looking up to "the battlements
of the great steeple," it seemed to have covered a distance of nearly
four hundred feet. Other relics of those Roundhead wars were shown in
the cathedral, in an ancient room now used for the bishop's consistory
court,--these being two cannon-balls (fourteen-pounders), and the
ragged and dusty fragments of a shell, that were dug out of the ground
near the church a few years ago. Many of these practical tokens of
Puritan zeal have been discovered. Lichfield cathedral close, in the
time of Bishop Walter de Langton, who died in 1321, was surrounded with
a wall and fosse, and thereafter, whenever the wars came, it was used
as a fortification. In the Stuart times it was often besieged. Sir
John Gell succeeded Lord Brooke, when the latter had been shot by Mr.
Dyott,--who is said to have been "deaf and dumb," but who certainly was
not blind. The close was surrendered on March 5, 1643, and thereupon
the Parliamentary victors, according to their ruthless and brutal
custom, straightway ravaged the church, tearing the brasses from the
tombs, breaking the effigies, and utterly despoiling beauty which it
had taken generations of pious zeal and loving devotion to create.
The great spire was battered down by those vandals, and in falling
it wrecked the chapter-house. The noble church, indeed, was made a
ruin, and so it remained till 1661, when its munificent benefactor,
Bishop Hackett, began its restoration, now happily almost complete.
Prince Rupert captured Lichfield close, for the king, in April, 1643,
and General Lothian recovered it for the Parliament, in the summer of
1646, after which time it was completely dismantled. Charles the First
came to this place after the fatal battle of Naseby, and sad enough
that picturesque, vacillating, shortsighted, beatific aristocrat must
have been, gazing over the green fields of Lichfield, to know,--as
surely even he must then have known,--that his cause was doomed, if not
entirely lost.
It will not take you long to traverse Lichfield, and you may ramble all
around it through little green lanes between hedgerows. This you will
do if you are wise, for the walk, especially at evening, is peaceful
and lovely. The wanderer never gets far away from the cathedral. Those
three superb spires steadily dominate the scene, and each new view of
them seems fairer than the last. All around this little city the fields
are richly green, and many trees diversify the prospect. Pausing to
rest awhile in the mouldering graveyard of old St. Chad's, I saw the
rooks flocking homeward to the great tree-tops not far away, and heard
their many querulous, sagacious, humorous croakings, while over the
distance, borne upon the mild and fragrant evening breeze, floated the
solemn note of a warning bell from the minster tower, as the shadows
deepened and the night came down. Scenes like this sink deep into the
heart, and memory keeps them forever.