“Sir William Fawcet, the successor of Lord Townshend, was
one of the most honourable of men; and he is worthy of
particular notice, from the credit that his nomination
did to the government of this country. He was friendly,
benevolent, patient, and even humble; which rarely
indeed is the case with men exalted from an inferior
condition to professional honours, and dignity of
station, such as never could have entered into their
expectations when they began their career. Sir William is
said to have opened his military life in the ranks; but
by his bravery, diligence, and zeal in the service, as
well as by his integrity, temper, and prudent conduct,
to have mounted entirely by merit to the summit of
his profession; regularly acquiring the good-will and
favour of his superior officers, till he obtained that
of the Commander in chief;[77] through whose liberal
recommendation he rose to the countenance and patronage
of his Majesty himself.
“He was as firm in probity and honour as in courage. I
never knew a man of more amiable simplicity, or more
steady temper. Madame Geoffrin, of Paris, used to say of
the Baron d’Holbech, that he was _simplement simple_.
If such a phrase could be naturalized in English, it
would exactly suit Sir William Fawcet: and the suavity
of manners he acquired by frequenting the court, though
late in life, was certainly extraordinary. Marbles and
metals very difficultly receive a polish after being
long neglected, and exposed to corrosion; but when the
intrinsic value is solid, the external, sooner or later,
always manifests affinity.”
In a memorandum of 1805, is this paragraph:
“Lady Bruce,—after I had nearly transcribed two huge
folio volumes of music, or, rather, on music, Sala’s
Regole di Contrapunto, which I thought Lady Bruce had
only lent me, and which I had therefore returned; sends
me them back, telling me she had brought them from
Naples purposely to put them into my possession, and
only wishing they were more worth my acceptance. What
ill usage!—The books, indeed, tell me nothing I did not
know, and are nothing, with all their value, to me,
compared to her ladyship’s goodness and kindness. They
are, nevertheless, the best digested course of study
on counterpoint that have, perhaps, ever been written;
and my collection of books on music would be incomplete
without them.”
* * * * *
The severe disappointments, with their aggravating circumstances, that
repeatedly had deprived Dr. Burney of the first post of nominal honour
in his profession, which the whole musical world, not only of his own
country, but of Europe, would have voted to be his due, were now, from
the Doctor’s advanced stage in life, closing, without further struggle,
into inevitable submission.
Yet his many friends to whom this history was familiar, and who knew
that the approbation of the King, from the earliest time that the
Doctor had been made known to His Majesty, had invariably been in his
favour, could not acquiesce in this resignation; and suggested amongst
themselves the propriety of presenting Dr. Burney to the King, as a fit
object for the next vacancy that might occur, in the literary line, for
a pension to a man of letters. And, upon the death of Mrs. Murphy, Mr.
Crewe endeavoured to begin a canvass.
But an audience with the King, at that moment, from various illnesses
and calamities, was so little attainable, that no application had been
found feasible: weeks, months again rolled away without the effort; and
nothing, certainly, could be so unexpected, so utterly unlooked for,
in the course of things, as that Dr. Burney, the most zealous adherent
to government principles, and the most decided enemy to democratic
doctrines, should finally receive all the remuneration he ever attained
for his elaborate workings in that art, which, of all others, was the
avowed favourite of his King, under the administration of the great
chief of opposition, Charles Fox.[78]
So, however, it was; for when, in the year 1806, that renowned orator
of liberty, found himself suddenly, and, by the premature death of Mr.
Pitt, almost unavoidably raised to the head of the state, Mrs. Crewe
started a claim for Dr. Burney.
Mr. Windham was instant and animated in supporting it. Mr. Fox, with
his accustomed grace, where he had a favour to bestow, gave it his
ready countenance; the King’s Sign Manual was granted with alacrity of
approbation; and the faithful, invaluable LADY CREWE, while
her own new honours were freshly ornamenting her brow, had the cordial
happiness of announcing to her unsoliciting and no longer expecting old
friend, his participation in the new turn of the tide.
It was Lord Grenville, however, who was the immediately apparent agent
in this gift of the Crown; though Charles Fox, there can be no doubt,
had a real share of pleasure in propitiating such a reward to a friend
and favourite of Lord and Lady Crewe; to settle whose long withheld
title was amongst the first official acts of his friendship upon coming
into power.
The pension accorded was £300 per annum, and the pleasure caused by
this benevolent royal act amongst the innumerable friends of the man
of four-score—for such, now, was Dr. Burney—was great almost to
exultation. And, in truth, so little had his financial address kept
pace with his mental abilities, that, previously to this grant, he had
found it necessary, in relinquishing the practice of his profession,
to relinquish his carriage.
Such news, of course, was not trusted to the post of Paris; and
it was long after its date, ere it reached the Parisian captives.
Nevertheless, in this same month of May, 1806, Dr. Burney, the
octogenaire, as he now called himself, confided, upon other subjects,
to a passing opportunity, a long letter to Paris; written in a strong
and firm round hand; the following pages from which, evince his
unaltered disposition to cultivate his natural gaiety with his social
spirit of kindness:
“TO MADAME D’ARBLAY.
* * “I have so much to say, that I hardly know where to
begin. * * *
“At the close of this last summer, I took it into my head
that the air, water, rocks, woods, fine prospects, and
delightful rides on the Downs, at Bristol Hotwells, and
in their vicinity, would do my cough good, and enable me
to bear the ensuing winter more heroically than I have
done what have preceded it; for since the Influenza of
1804, I have dreaded cold, and night air, as much as
they are dreaded by a trembling Italian greyhound. Do
you remember Frisk, the pretty little slim dog we had,
as successor to Mr. Garrick’s favourite pet, Phill?
who always pestered Garrick to let him lick his hands
and his fingers,—till Garrick, though provoked, could
not, in the comic playfulness of his character, help
caressing him again, even while exclaiming, when the
animal fawned upon him: ‘What dost follow me for,
eh,—Slobber-chaps?—Tenderness without ideas!’ Well, as
chill am I now as that poor puppy, Frisk,—though not
quite as tender, nor yet, I trust, as void of ideas.
“Well, to the Hotwells at Bristol I went; and took with
me Fanny Phillips. And we both took Evelina, as many of
its best scenes are at the Wells and at Bath. However we
devoured it so eagerly on the journey, that we had only
half a volume left when we arrived at No. 7, on Vincent’s
Parade; where we were sumptuously lodged; and Fanny
Phillip’s maid went to market; and our landlady dressed
our dinners; and, as I had my carriage, and horses, and
servant, we did very well: except that we were too late
in the season, for we had not above three balmy days in
our whole month’s residence.
“I liked little Evelina full as well as ever; and I have
always thought it the best—that is, the most near to
perfection of your excellent penmanships. There are none
of those heart-rending scenes which tear one to pieces
in the last volumes of Cecilia and Camilla. They always
make me melancholy for a week. But, for all that, Fanny
Phillips and I proposed going through the whole while
at Bristol, for our social reading. However, it was not
possible; for we could never procure the first volume
of Cecilia from any of the Libraries. It was always, as
the Italians say of the English when they vainly try for
admission, ‘_Sempre_ not at home!’
“I made an excursion to the city of Wells for one day
and night, to see its admirable cathedral. The Bishop,
Dr. Beadon, is an old musical acquaintance of mine, of
thirty years’ standing. He wished me to have remained
a week with him. And I should have liked it very
well,—‘ma!—ma!—ma!’—as the Italians say, I have no weeks
to spare!”
The health and spirits of Dr. Burney were now so good, that he seized
another opportunity for writing again, in the same month, to his truly
grateful daughter:
_“12th October._
“My Dear Fanny,
“Do you remember a letter of thanks which I received from
Rousseau for a present of music which I sent him, with a
printed copy of The Cunning Man, that I had Englishized
from his _Divan du Village_? I thought myself the most
fortunate of beings, in 1770, to have obtained an hour’s
conversation with him; for he was then more difficult of
access than ever, especially to the English, being out of
humour with the whole nation, from resentment of Horace
Walpole’s forged letter from the King of Prussia; and he
had determined, he said, never to read or write again!
Guy, the famous bookseller, was the only person he then
admitted; and it was through the sagacious good offices
of this truly eminent book-man, urged by my friends,
Count d’Holbach, Diderot, &c., that the interview I so
ardently aspired at was procured for me. Well, this
letter from the great Jean Jacques, which I had not seen
these twenty years, I have lately found in a cover from
Lord Harcourt, to whom I had lent it, when his lordship
was preparing a list of all Rousseau’s works, for the
benefit of his widow; which, however, he left to find
another editor, when Madame Rousseau relinquished her
celebrated name, to become the wife of some ordinary
man. Lord Harcourt then returned my letter, and, upon
a recent review of it, I was quite struck with the
politeness and condescension with which Jean Jacques had
accepted my little offering, at a time when he refused
all assistance, nay, all courtesy, from the first persons
both of England and France. I am now writing in bed, and
have not the original to quote; but, as far as I can
remember, he concludes his letter with the following
flattering lines:
“‘The works, Sir, which you have presented me, will often
call to my remembrance the pleasure I had in seeing and
hearing you; and will augment my regret at my not being
able sometimes to renew that pleasure. I entreat you,
Sir, to accept my humble salutations.
“‘JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU.’
“I give you this in English, not daring, by memory, to
quote J. J. Rousseau. It was directed to M. Burney, in
London; and, I believe, under cover to Lord Harcourt,
who always was his open protector. But is it not
extraordinary, my dear Fanny, that the most flattering
letters I have received should be from Dr. Johnson and J.
J. Rousseau? I can account for it in no other way than
from my always treating them with openness and frankness,
yet with that regard and reverence which their great
literary powers inspired. Much as I loved and respected
the good and great Dr. Johnson, I saw his prejudices and
severity of character. Nor was I blind to Rousseau’s
eccentricities, principles, and paradoxes in all things
but music; in which his taste and views, particularly in
dramatic music, were admirable; and supported with more
wit, reason, and refinement, than by any writer on the
subject, in any language which I am able to read. But
as I had no means to correct the prejudices of the one,
nor the principles of the other of these extraordinary
persons, was I to shun and detest the whole man because
of his peccant parts? Ancient and modern poets and sages,
philosophers and moralists, subscribe to the axiom,
_humanum est errare_, and yet, every individual, whatever
be his virtues, science, or talents, is treated, if his
frailties are discovered, as if the characteristic of
human nature were perfection, and the least diminution
from it were unnatural and unpardonable! God bless you,
my dear Fanny. Write soon, and long, I entreat.”
In this same, to Dr. Burney, memorable year, 1806, he had the agreeable
surprise of a first invitation from Mr. West, President of the Royal
Academy, to the annual dinner given by its directors to the most
munificent patrons, capital artists, distinguished judges, or eminent
men of letters of the day, for the purpose of assembling them to a
private and undisturbed view of the works prepared for forming the
exhibition of the current year.
By that grand painter, and delightful man of letters, Sir Joshua
Reynolds, Dr. Burney, from the time of their first happy intimacy, had
regularly been included in the annual invitations; but Mr. West was
unacquainted, personally, with the Doctor, and had, of course, his own
set and friends to oblige. What led to this late compliment, after a
chasm of fourteen years, does not appear; but the remembrance occurred
at a moment of revived exertion, and the Doctor accepted it with
exceeding satisfaction. Nevertheless, the opening of the account which
he has left in his journal of this classic entertainment, is far from
gay:
“My sight was now,” he says, “become so feeble, that I
knew nobody who did not first accost me; and my hearing
so impaired, that it was with difficulty I caught what
was said to me by any of my neighbours, except those
immediately to my right or my left.
“At the Royal Academy this year, I was placed near my
son Dr. Charles, and Loutherbourg, who served me as a
nomenclature, and I was happily in the midst of many old
as well as new friends and acquaintance; particularly the
Bishops of Durham,[79] Winchester,[80] and London,[81]
and Sir George Beaumont.
“I went early into several small apartments, previously
to entering the great room; and luckily, in the first I
entered I came upon Sir George Beaumont, who most kindly,
politely, and with cordial courtesy, accompanied me
during the whole review; always, with unerring judgment,
pointing out what was most worth stopping to examine. He
was enthusiastically fond of Wilkie’s famous piece.
“Mr. Windham here came forward in the highest spirits.
I never saw him more animated, even when conversing
with favourite females. I eagerly made up to him with
my thanks, both to himself and Mrs. Windham, for their
zeal and activity in my affairs.[82] ‘Yes, yes,’ cried he
gaily, ‘in zeal we all vied one with another.’
“It had rained torrents all day; but I had promised, not
expecting the continuance of such weather, to go from the
exhibition to the opera, to join Lord and Lady Bruce;
who wanted to make a convert of me to their favourite
singer, Grassini; but in descending the endless stairs,
I was joined by my benevolent neighbour, the Bishop of
Winchester; who, perceiving how cautiously I made my way,
seized my arm, and insisted on conducting me; and when
he heard my opera engagement, he dauntlessly, though
laughingly, ordered away my carriage himself, and helped
me into his own; promising absolution for my failure to
Lady Bruce, but protesting he could not, and would not,
suffer me to go any whither such a desperate night, from
home; whither he drove me full gallop, setting me down
at Chelsea College, in his way to Winchester House. More
kind and cheerful benevolence never entered man’s heart,
than is lodged in this good prelate’s.”
1807.
In the ensuing year, 1807, the diary of the Doctor contains the
following narration of the Countess of Mount Edgecumbe:
“_December 21._—I have lost my oldest and most partial
musical friend, the Countess Dowager of Mount Edgecumbe,
relict of the third Lord and first Earl, and mother
of the present Earl. She was daughter of Dr. John
Gilbert, Archbishop of York. I knew and was known to
her when she was Miss Gilbert, and at the head of lady
musicians. She was always of the Italian school, and
spoke both Italian and French well and fluently: she was
one of the great patronesses of Giardini and Mengotti,
in their days of renown; and generously never ceased
serving and supporting them when they were superseded by
newer rivals. She was a correspondent in Italian with
Martinelli. She played with great force and precision
all the best modern compositions of the times; and in
so high and spirited a style, that no other lady, or
hardly professor, in England, durst attempt them. She
kept her box at the opera till very late in life: and
then, when, from the bustle and noise of entry and exit,
she relinquished it, she still sustained her own private
study and practice on the harpsichord. And, to the very
last, when told of any musical phenomena, vocal or
instrumental, she was curious and eager to hear them at
private or subscription concerts. She went to Tunbridge
Wells last summer, when her frame was extremely impaired,
and her faculties no longer of their original brightness.
Previously to setting out, she honoured me, in as
infirm and decayed a state as herself, with a visit;
condescendingly clambering up my flight of stairs to
nearly the summit of Chelsea Hospital, protesting, with
her old and very agreeable liveliness, that the exertion
did her nothing but good: and then, almost on her knees,
beseeching me to go also to Tunbridge Wells, as she was
sure its waters would be highly beneficial to me. I was
then, however, so unwell and feeble, that I feared going
even to Bulstrode. I could not, therefore, satisfy this
kind and noble lady with the least prospect of following
her, and partaking of her offered hospitality.
“Daughter of so eminent a divine, she had been brought up
with a firm belief and veneration in religion; and she
was persuaded that all the calamities of the war were
inflicted upon us as the scourge of our iniquities, for
our admission of jacobinical principles at the opening
of the French Revolution. It was a very remarkable
circumstance, that pulsation stopped, and her heart
ceased to beat, three days before she expired.”
About this period, also, or somewhat later, Dr. Burney had to lament
the loss of his constant and respectable friend, Mrs. Ord; which,
though not of a sort to prey upon his feelings, like those privations
that bereaved him of the objects of his taste, as well as connexion,
caused yet a considerable breach in his habits of friendly intercourse,
and of such enlivening parties and projects, as constitute the major,
though not the higher portion of our rotatory comforts.
The whole tenor of the life of Mrs. Ord, and of her minutest as well
as most important actions, was under the concentrated guidance of a
laudable ambition to merit general esteem. And so sagely directed were
her movements for the attainment of their object, that she was one of
those few beings whom censure passed by as unimpeachable.
She was sincerely attached to Dr. Burney and his family, and was
sincerely lamented by all to whom her worth and virtues were known.
* * * * *
Towards the close of this year, 1807, Dr. Burney had an infliction
which nearly robbed him of his long-tried, and hitherto almost
invulnerable force of mind, for bearing the rude assaults of
misfortune: this was a paralytic stroke, which, in casting his left
hand into a state of torpor, threw his heart, head, and nerves into
one of ceaseless agitation, from an unremitting expectance of abrupt
dissolution.
His absent daughter was spared from participating in the pain of this
terrifying interval; and the despotic difficulty so often repined at of
foreign correspondence, might here have seemed a benediction, had it
been to political rigidity alone that she had been indebted for this
exemption from availless anguish: but her generous father had made it
his first care to prohibit, and peremptorily, all parts of his house
from sending any communication, any hint whatsoever of his apprehensive
state to Paris: and his exhortation, with the same earnestness, though
not the same authority, was spread to every writing class of friend or
acquaintance.
His own account of this trying event, written in the following year, in
answer to his daughter’s alarm at his silence, will shew the full and
surprising return of his spirits and health upon his recovery:
“TO MADAME D’ARBLAY.
“_Nov. 12th, 1808._
“My dear Fanny,
“The complaints made, in one of the two short notes which
I have received, of letters never answered, Old Charles
returns—as his account of family affairs he finds has
never reached you. Indeed, for these last two or three
years, I have had nothing _good_ to say of _own self_;
and I peremptorily charged all the rest of the family to
say nothing _bad_ on the subject of health: for I never
understood the kindness of alarming distant friends with
accounts of severe illness,—as we may be either recovered
or dead before the information reaches them.
* * * * *
“I wrote you an account of my excursion to Bristol
Hotwells: but I had not been returned to Chelsea more
than three days, before I had an alarming seizure in my
left hand, which neither heat, friction, nor medicines
could subdue. It felt perfectly asleep; in a state of
immoveable torpor. My medical friends would not tell me
what this obstinate numbness was; but I discovered by
their prescriptions, and advice as to regimen, that it
was neither more nor less than a paralytic affection;
and, near Christmas, it was pronounced to be a Bath case.
On Christmas eve, I set out for that City, extremely
weak and dispirited: the roads terrible, and almost
incessant torrents of rain all the way. I was five days
on the journey; I took Fanny Phillips with me, and we had
excellent apartments on the South Parade, which is always
warm when any sun shines. I put myself under the care of
Dr. Parry, who, having resided, and practised physic at
Bath more than forty years, must, _cæteris paribus_, know
the virtues and vices of Bath waters better than the most
renowned physicians in London. To give them fair play, I
remained three months in this City; and I found my hand
much more alive, and my general health very considerably
amended. But, I caught so violent a fresh cold in my
journey home, that it was called what the French style a
_Fluxion de poitrine_, and I was immediately confined to
my bed at Chelsea, and unable to eat, sleep, or speak.
Strict starvation was then ordered; but softened off into
fish and asparagus as soon as possible, by our wise
and good Æsculapius, Sir Walter Farquhar: and now I am
allowed poultry and game, under certain restrictions,
and find myself tolerably well again. All this tedious
account of _own self_ should still have been suppressed,
but that I feared it might reach you by some other means,
and give you greater alarm; I determined, therefore, to
tell you the truth, the whole truth, &c., with my own
paw: being able, at the same time, to write you that,
cough excepted, which returns with cold weather, I
passed last summer more free from complaint than I have
passed any for many preceding years. And now it is time
to say something of your other kindred, whose names you
languish, you say, to see.
* * * * *
“I have forgotten to mention that, during my invalidity
at Bath, I had an unexpected visit from your _ci-devant_
Streatham friend, of whom I had lost sight for more
than ten years. When her name was sent in, I was much
surprised, but desired she might be asked to follow it:
and I received her as an old friend with whom I had spent
much time very happily, and never wished to quarrel. She
still looks well, but is grave, and seems to be turned
into candour itself: though she still says good things,
and writes admirable notes, and, I am told, letters. We
shook hands very cordially; and avoided any allusion to
our long separation and its cause. Her _caro sposo_ still
lives; but is such an object, from the gout, that the
account of his sufferings made me pity him sincerely. He
wished, she told me, to see his old friend; and, _un beau
matin_, I could not refuse compliance with this wish. I
found him in great pain, but very glad to see me. The old
rancour, or ill-will, excited by our desire to impede the
marriage, is totally worn away. Indeed, it never could
have existed, but from _her_ imprudence in betraying to
him that proof of our friendship for _her_, which ought
never to have been regarded as spleen against _him_, who,
certainly, nobody could blame for accepting a gay rich
widow.—What could a man do better?[83]”
* * * * *
It is well worthy of notice, and greatly in favour of the Bath waters
for paralytic affections, that Dr. Burney never had a return of his
alarming seizure of the hand; and never to the end of his life, which
was yet prolonged several years, had any other paralytic attack.
It was during this residence at Bath that Dr. Burney made his last
will; in which, after settling his various legacies, he left his two
eldest daughters, Esther and Frances, his residuary legatees; and
nominated his sons, Captain James Burney and Dr. Charles Burney, his
executors.