It may be contended of Lewis Carroll (as of all the Victorian
writers), that he lived in the “golden age” in respect of opportunity
for literary achievement. In his day, life flowed on smoothly and
uneventfully for the great majority of people. Our fathers laboured and
loved, or did the reverse, with a freedom from worry and responsibility
that may not have been very stimulating, but must have been decidedly
comfortable. Those were the days when “gaunt tragedy,” transpontine
melodrama, and “crescendos” of horror and gloom were more popular than
humour; indeed, thoughtful people turned towards them as a relief and
“inspiration” when compared with the uneventful and prosaic tenor of
life. It says much, therefore, for Lewis Carroll’s unique genius that
he was able to achieve immediate fame in an altogether different medium.
It must be admitted that the argument that his love for children was
partial, inasmuch as boys were excluded from it, rests upon a great
deal of truth. Though essentially a manly man himself, who did not
fear to use his fists at school against attempted aggression by other
boys, or in defence of the weak, he has left it on record that he did
not understand boys, and felt shy in their presence, while the only
literary tribute he paid to boy-nature was in his creation of “Bruno.”
Nor has the compiler of this volume been able to discover any record of
friendship between him and a small member of his own sex.
The fact that he had eight sisters and only two brothers may have
contributed something to this partiality, which, however, is a very
natural one. Nearly all normal men prefer little girls to little
boys, just as most women would prefer to make a pet of one of the
latter, rather than of a miniature specimen of their own adorable sex.
Is it not proverbial that the small daughter is “daddy’s darling,”
and the small son mother’s? And if Lewis Carroll has typified this
characteristic in his idealistic “Alice,” has not a famous woman writer
on the other side of the Atlantic made equivalent representation in her
“Little Lord Fauntleroy”?
In his natural preference for the feminine side of humanity it is
remarkable that Lewis Carroll apparently never had a love affair. He
does not seem to have had any flirtations even, although he must have
known many charming young ladies whose friendship he had first gained
as children. How emphatic was his resolve to maintain his bachelor
freedom may be gathered from the following extract from a letter,
written when he was fifty-two years old, to an old college friend: “So
you have been for twelve years a married man, while I am still a lonely
old bachelor! And mean to keep so for the matter of that. College life
is by no means an unmixed misery, though married life has no doubt
many charms to which I am a stranger.”
Mr. Dodgson died at Guildford on January 14, 1898, following a few
days’ illness from influenza, which had attacked him at his sister’s
house, “The Chestnuts,” where, in accordance with his usual custom, he
had gone to spend Christmas. He was hard at work at the time upon the
second volume of his “Symbolic Logic.”
He was buried in the old portion of Guildford Cemetery, and on June
14th of the present year the writer of these notes and his wife visited
the spot. A plain white cross and a triple pediment, “erected in loving
memory by his brothers and sisters,” record that--
CHARLES LUTWIDGE DODGSON
(LEWIS CARROLL)
Fell asleep, January 14, 1898,
Age 65 years,
together with the following inscriptions, singularly appropriate to one
whose whole life was one of service:
“Where I am, there shall also My servant be.”
“His servants shall serve Him.”
“Father, in Thy gracious keeping
Leave we now Thy servant sleeping.”
A grave as modest and unpretentious as the man himself, surmounted by
no “immortelles,” or other examples of the undertaker’s art, as was the
case, at the time of our visit, with adjacent graves. Nature, however,
has paid a more graceful tribute than any which could be made by the
hand of man. A drooping and beautiful yew tree stands sentinel at the
head of the tomb, its foliage sheltering it lovingly from storms and
heat, and its trunk entwined with little heart-shaped ivy leaves, just
as the genius sleeping there attracted the hearts of little children a
generation ago and his works will continue to do for all time.
On the other side the white blossoms of a verdant syringa were
scattering themselves across the foot of the grave as if in votive
offering to the white spirit which once tenanted the mortal reliquiæ
within it.
The cemetery is beautifully situated on the slopes of that famous and
picturesque Surrey hill known as “The Hog’s Back,” and though the
steep and toilsome ascent must be very trying to mourners who make it
on foot, of such travail is your true pilgrimage made. Few if any of
the people of Guildford make it for the purpose of visiting the last
resting-place of Lewis Carroll, however. Indeed, it seems extremely
improbable that more than a tiny minority of them are aware that he is
buried there.
Three local ladies of whom we made enquiries in the cemetery
were astonished when we informed them that it contained the last
resting-place of the author of “Alice in Wonderland,” and listened with
the greatest interest to a discursive and aged sexton whom we contrived
to “unearth,” who had not only buried him, but had been acquainted with
him in life. He told us that not many people visited the grave, but
those that did were nearly all Americans! How surprised some of these
Transatlantic enthusiasts must be when they find that “The Chestnuts,”
where Lewis Carroll died and spent so much of his time during the
last twenty years or so of his life, is without the usual plaque to
distinguish it as a habitation of the Great!
They do these things better in Copenhagen, where, it seems, a Hans
Christian Andersen Memorial Park has been planned, which is to contain
statues of the Danish author’s most charming characters, set among
leafy bowers and flower gardens, the latter to be tended by teams of
children from the various Council Schools.
Besides, such a memorial plaque on “The Chestnuts” would be a very
small tribute materially, and yet as a mark of spiritual recognition it
would be sufficient. Assuredly Lewis Carroll would not wish for more,
for the fact that his works will never be forgotten he would consider
remembrance enough.
All the same, there is something fine and exultant in the feeling
which inspires people to pay reverence to one who by achieving honour
and fame himself has brought honour and fame to his country, whether
the “departed” be symbolical of “collective achievement,” as in the
case of the “unknown soldier,” or whether he be a great poet, writer,
inventor, scientist, general, king or president, or even a politician
or commercial magnate.