Transcribed from the 1902 Macmillan and Co. edition by David Price, email
ccx074@pglaf.org
LETTERS
OF
EDWARD FITZGERALD
TO
FANNY KEMBLE
1871-1883
EDITED BY
WILLIAM ALDIS WRIGHT
London
MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
NEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
1902
_All rights reserved_
_First Edition_ 1895
_Second Edition_ 1902
{Edward FitzGerald. From a photograph by Mess. Cade & Wight, Ipswich:
pi.jpg}
Of the letters which are contained in the present volume, the first
eighty-five were in the possession of the late Mr. George Bentley, who
took great interest in their publication in _The Temple Bar Magazine_,
and was in correspondence with the Editor until within a short time of
his death. The remainder were placed in the Editor's hands by Mrs.
Kemble in 1883, and of these some were printed in whole or in part in
FitzGerald's Letters and Literary Remains, which first appeared in 1889.
TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE,
20_th_ _June_ 1895.
{Frances Anne Kemble. Engraved by J. G. Stodart from the original
painting by Sully in the possession of the Hon. Mrs. Leigh: pii.jpg}
LETTERS OF EDWARD FITZGERALD TO FANNY KEMBLE
1871-1883
'Letters . . . such as are written from wise men, are, of all the words
of man, in my judgment the best.'--BACON.
The following letters, addressed by Edward FitzGerald to his life-long
friend Fanny Kemble, form an almost continuous series, from the middle of
1871 to within three weeks of his death in 1883. They are printed as
nearly as possible as he wrote them, preserving his peculiarities of
punctuation and his use of capital letters, although in this he is not
always consistent. In writing to me in 1873 he said, 'I love the old
Capitals for Nouns.' It has been a task of some difficulty to arrange
the letters in their proper order, in consequence of many of them being
either not dated at all or only imperfectly dated; but I hope I have
succeeded in giving them, approximately at least, in their true sequence.
The notes which are added are mainly for the purpose of explaining
allusions, and among them will be found extracts from other letters in my
possession which have not been published. The references to the printed
'Letters' are to the separate edition in the Eversley Series, 2 vols.
(Macmillans, 1894).
In a letter to Mr. Arthur Malkin, October 15, 1854 ('Further Records,'
ii. 193), Mrs. Kemble enunciates her laws of correspondence, to which
frequent reference is made in the present series as the laws of the Medes
and Persians: 'You bid me not answer your letter, but I have certain
_organic laws_ of correspondence from which nothing short of a miracle
causes me to depart; as, for instance, I never write till I am written
to, I always write when I am written to, and I make a point of always
returning the same amount of paper I receive, as you may convince
yourself by observing that I send you two sheets of note-paper and Mary
Anne only half one, though I have nothing more to say to you, and I have
to her.'
WILLIAM ALDIS WRIGHT.
_January_ 1895.
I.
WOODBRIDGE, _July_ 4, [1871.]
DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,
I asked Donne to tell you, if he found opportunity, that some two months
ago I wrote you a letter, but found it so empty and dull that I would not
send it to extort the Reply which you feel bound to give. I should have
written to tell you so myself; but I heard from Donne of the Wedding soon
about to be, and I would not intrude then. Now that is over {3a}--I hope
to the satisfaction of you all--and I will say my little say, and you
will have to Reply, according to your own Law of Mede and Persian.
It is a shame that one should only have oneself to talk about; and yet
that is all I have; so it shall be short. If you will but tell me of
yourself, who have read, and seen, and done, so much more, you will find
much more matter for your pen, and also for my entertainment.
Well, I have sold my dear little Ship, {3b} because I could not employ my
Eyes with reading in her Cabin, where I had nothing else to do. I think
those Eyes began to get better directly I had written to agree to the
Man's proposal. Anyhow, the thing is done; and so now I betake myself to
a Boat, whether on this River here, or on the Sea at the Mouth of it.
Books you see I have nothing to say about. The Boy who came to read to
me made such blundering Work that I was forced to confine him to a
Newspaper, where his Blunders were often as entertaining as the Text
which he mistook. We had 'hangarues' in the French Assembly, and, on one
occasion, 'ironclad Laughter from the Extreme Left.' Once again, at the
conclusion of the London news, 'Consolations closed at 91, ex Div.'--And
so on. You know how illiterate People will jump at a Word they don't
know, and twist it in[to] some word they are familiar with. I was
telling some of these Blunders to a very quiet Clergyman here some while
ago, and he assured me that a poor Woman, reading the Bible to his
Mother, read off glibly, 'Stand at a Gate and swallow a Candle.' I
believe this was no Joke of his: whether it were or not, here you have it
for what you may think it worth.
I should be glad to hear that you think Donne looking and seeming well.
Archdeacon Groome, who saw him lately, thought he looked very jaded:
which I could not wonder at. Donne, however, writes as if in good
Spirits--brave Man as he is--and I hope you will be able to tell me that
he is not so much amiss. He said that he was to be at the Wedding.
You will tell me too how long you remain in England; I fancy, till
Winter: and then you will go to Rome again, with its new Dynasty
installed in it. I fancy I should not like that so well as the old; but
I suppose it's better for the Country.
I see my Namesake (Percy) Fitzgerald advertizes a Book about the Kembles.
That I shall manage to get sight of. He made far too long work of
Garrick. I should have thought the Booksellers did not find that pay,
judging by the price to which Garrick soon came down. Half of it would
have been enough.
Now I am going for a Sail on the famous River Deben, to pass by the same
fields of green Wheat, Barley, Rye, and Beet-root, and come back to the
same Dinner. Positively the only new thing we have in Woodbridge is a
Waxen Bust (Lady, of course) at the little Hairdresser's opposite. She
turns slowly round, to our wonder and delight; and I caught the little
Barber the other day in the very Act of winding her up to run her daily
Stage of Duty. Well; she has not got to answer Letters, as poor Mrs.
Kemble must do to hers always sincerely
E. F.G.
II.
WOODBRIDGE. NOVr. 2/71.
DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,
Is it better not to write at all than only write to plead that one has
nothing to say? Yet I don't like to let the year get so close to an end
without reminding you of me, to whom you have been always so good in the
matter of replying to my letters, as in other ways.
If I can tell you nothing of myself: no Books read because of no Eyes to
read them: no travel from home because of my little Ship being vanished:
no friends seen, except Donne, who came here with Valentia for two
days--_you_ can fill a sheet like this, I know, with some account of
yourself and your Doings: and I shall be very glad to hear that all is
well with you. Donne said he believed you were in Ireland when he was
here; and he spoke of your being very well when he had last seen you;
also telling me he thought you were to stay in England this winter. By
the by, I also heard of Mrs. Wister being at Cambridge; not Donne told me
this, but Mr. Wright, the Bursar of Trinity: and every one who speaks of
her says she is a very delightful Lady. Donne himself seemed very well,
and in very good Spirits, in spite of all his domestic troubles. What
Courage, and Good Temper, and Self-sacrifice! Valentia (whom I had not
seen these dozen years) seemed a very sensible, unaffected Woman.
I would almost bet that you have not read my Namesake's Life of your
Namesakes, which I must borrow another pair of Eyes for one day. My Boy-
reader gave me a little taste of it from the Athenaeum; as also of Mr.
Harness' Memoirs, {6} which I must get at.
This is a sorry sight {7} of a Letter:--do not trouble yourself to write
a better--that you must, in spite of yourself--but write to me a little
about yourself; which is a matter of great Interest to yours always
E. F.G.
III.
[_Nov._ 1871.]
DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,
I ought to be much obliged to you for answering my last letter with an
uneasy hand, as you did. So I do thank you: and really wish that you
would not reply to this under any such pain: but how do I know but that
very pain will make you more determined to reply? I must only beg you
not to do so: and thus wash _my_ hands of any responsibilities in the
matter.
And what will you say when I tell you that I can hardly pity one who
suffers from Gout; though I would undoubtedly prefer that you should be
free from that, or any other ailment. But I have always heard that Gout
exempts one from many other miseries which Flesh is heir to: at any rate,
it almost always leaves the Head clear: and that is so much! My Mother,
who suffered a good deal, used often to say how she was kept awake of
nights by the Pain in her feet, or hands, but felt so clear aloft that
she made Night pass even agreeably away with her reflections and
recollections.
And you have your recollections and Reflections which you are gathering
into Shape, you say, in a Memoir of your own Life. And you are good
enough to say that you would read it to me if I--were good enough to
invite you to my House here some Summer Day! I doubt that Donne has
given you too flattering an account of my house, and me: you know he is
pleased with every one and everything: I know it also, and therefore no
longer dissuade him from spending his time and money in a flying Visit
here in the course of his Visits to other East Anglian friends and
Kinsmen. But I feel a little all the while as if I were taking all, and
giving nothing in return: I mean, about Books, People, etc., with which a
dozen years discontinuance of Society, and, latterly, incompetent Eyes,
have left me in the lurch. If you indeed will come and read your Memoir
to me, I shall be entitled to be a Listener only: and you shall have my
Chateau all to yourself for as long as you please: only do not expect me
to be quite what Donne may represent.
It is disgusting to talk so much about oneself: but I really think it is
better to say so much on this occasion. If you consider my
circumstances, you will perhaps see that I am not talking unreasonably: I
am sure, not with sham humility: and that I am yours always and sincerely
E. F.G.
P.S. I should not myself have written so soon again, but to apprise you
of a brace of Pheasants I have sent you. Pray do not write expressly to
acknowledge them:--only tell me if they don't come. I know you thank me.
{9}
IV.
[27 _Feb._, 1872.]
DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,
Had I anything pleasant to write to you, or better Eyes to write it with,
you would have heard from me before this. An old Story, by way of
Apology--to one who wants no such Apology, too. Therefore, true though
it be there is enough of it.
I hear from Mowbray Donne that you were at his Father's Lectures, {10a}
and looking yourself. So that is all right. Are your Daughters--or one
of them--still with you? I do not think you have been to see the
Thanksgiving Procession, {10b} for which our Bells are even now
ringing--the old Peal which I have known these--sixty years almost--though
at that time it reached my Eyes (_sic_) through a Nursery window about
two miles off. From that window I remember seeing my Father with another
Squire {10c} passing over the Lawn with their little pack of Harriers--an
almost obliterated Slide of the old Magic Lantern. My Mother used to
come up sometimes, and we Children were not much comforted. She was a
remarkable woman, as you said in a former letter: and as I constantly
believe in outward Beauty as an Index of a Beautiful Soul within, I used
sometimes to wonder what feature in her fine face betrayed what was not
so good in her Character. I think (as usual) the Lips: there was a twist
of Mischief about them now and then, like that in--the Tail of a
Cat!--otherwise so smooth and amiable. I think she admired your Mother
as much as any one she knew, or had known.
And (I see by the Athenaeum) Mr. Chorley is dead, {11} whom I used to see
at your Father's and Sister's houses. Born in 1808 they say: so, one
year older than yours truly E. F.G.--who, however, is going to live
through another page of Letter-paper. I think he was a capital Musical
Critic, though he condemned Piccolomini, who was the last Singer I heard
of Genius, Passion, and a Voice that told both. I am told she was no
Singer: but that went some way to make amends. Chorley, too, though an
irritable, nervous creature, as his outside expressed, was kind and
affectionate to Family and Friend, I always heard. But I think the
Angels must take care to keep in tune when he gets among them.
This is a wretched piece of Letter to extort the Answer which you feel
bound to give. But I somehow wished to write: and not to write about
myself; and so have only left room to say--to repeat--that I am yours
ever sincerely
E. F.G.
V.
[1872.]
DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,
I set off with a Letter to you, though I do not very well know how I am
to go on with it. But my Reader has been so disturbed by a Mouse in the
room that I have dismissed him--9.30 p.m.--and he has been reading (so
far as he could get on) Hawthorne's Notes of Italian Travel: which
interest me very much indeed, as being the Notes of a Man of Genius who
will think for himself independently of Murray &c. And then his Account
of Rome has made me think of you more than once. We have indeed left off
to-night at Radicofani: but, as my Boy is frightened away by the Mouse, I
fancy I will write to you before I take my one Pipe--which were better
left alone, considering that it gives but half an hour's rather pleasant
musing at the expense of a troubled night. Is it not more foolish then
to persist in doing this than being frightened at a Mouse? This is not a
mere fancy of the Boy--who is not a Fool, nor a 'Betty,' and is seventeen
years old: he inherits his terror from his Mother, he says: positively he
has been in a cold Sweat because of this poor little thing in the room:
and yet he is the son of a Butcher here. So I sent him home, and write
to you instead of hearing him read Hawthorne. He is to bring some
poisoned Wheat for the Mouse to-morrow.
Another Book he read me also made me think of you: Harness: whom I
remember to have seen once or twice at your Father's years ago. The
Memoir of him (which is a poor thing) still makes one like--nay,
love--him--as a kindly, intelligent, man. I think his latter letters
very pleasant indeed.
I do not know if you are in London or in your 'Villeggiatura' {13a} in
Kent. Donne must decide that for me. Even my Garden and Fields and
Shrubs are more flourishing than I have yet seen them at this time of
Year: and with you all is in fuller bloom, whether you be in Kent or
Middlesex. Are you going on with your Memoir? Pray read Hawthorne. I
dare say you do not quite forget Shakespeare now and then: dear old
Harness, reading him to the last!
Pray do you read Annie Thackeray's new Story {13b} in Cornhill? She
wrote me that she had taken great pains with it, and so thought it might
not be so good as what she took less pains with. I doated on her Village
on the Cliff, but did not care for what I had read of hers since: and
this new Story I have not seen! And pray do you doat on George Eliot?
Here are a few questions suggested for you to answer--as answer I know
you will. It is almost a Shame to put you to it by such a piece of
inanity as this letter. But it is written: it is 10 p.m. A Pipe--and
then to Bed--with what Appetite for Sleep one may.
And I am yours sincerely always
E. F.G.
VI.
WOODBRIDGE: _June_ 6, [1872].
DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,
Some little while ago I saw in a London Book Catalogue 'Smiles and
Tears--a Comedy by Mrs. C. Kemble'--I had a curiosity to see this: and so
bought it. Do you know it?--Would you like to have it? It seems to be
ingeniously contrived, and of easy and natural Dialogue: of the half
sentimental kind of Comedy, as Comedies then were (1815) with a
serious--very serious--element in it--taken from your Mother's Friend's,
Mrs. Opie's (what a sentence!) story of 'Father and Daughter'--the
seduced Daughter, who finds her distracted Father writing her name on a
Coffin he has drawn on the Wall of his Cell--All ends happily in the
Play, however, whatever may be the upshot of the Novel. But an odd thing
is, that this poor Girl's name is 'Fitz Harding'--and the Character was
played by Miss Foote: whether before, or after, her seduction by Colonel
Berkeley I know not. The Father was played by Young.
Sir Frederick Pollock has been to see me here for two days, {15} and put
me up to much that was going on in the civilized World. He was very
agreeable indeed: and I believe his Visit did him good. What are you
going to do with your Summer? Surely never came Summer with more
Verdure: and I somehow think we shall have more rain to keep the Verdure
up, than for the last few years we have had.
I am quite sure of the merit of George Eliot, and (I should have thought)
of a kind that would suit me. But I have not as yet found an Appetite
for her. I have begun taking the Cornhill that I may read Annie
Thackeray--but I have not found Appetite for her as yet. Is it that one
recoils from making so many new Acquaintances in Novels, and retreats
upon one's Old Friends, in Shakespeare, Cervantes, and Sir Walter? Oh, I
read the last as you have lately been reading--the Scotch Novels, I mean:
I believe I should not care for the Ivanhoes, Kenilworths, etc., any
more. But Jeanie Deans, the Antiquary, etc., I shall be theirs as long
as I am yours sincerely
E. F.G.
VII.
WOODBRIDGE: _August_ 9, [1872].
DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,
I think I shall hear from you once again before you go abroad. To Rome!
My Brother Peter also is going to winter there: but you would not have
much in common with him, I think, so I say nothing of an Acquaintance
between you.
I have been having Frederick Tennyson with me down here. {16a} He has
come to England (from Jersey where his home now is) partly on Business,
and partly to bring over a deaf old Gentleman who has discovered the
Original Mystery of Free-masonry, by means of Spiritualism. The
Freemasons have for Ages been ignorant, it seems, of the very Secret
which all their Emblems and Signs refer to: and the question is, if they
care enough for their own Mystery to buy it of this ancient Gentleman. If
they do not, he will shame them by Publishing it to all the world.
Frederick Tennyson, who has long been a Swedenborgian, a Spiritualist,
and is now even himself a Medium, is quite grand and sincere in this as
in all else: with the Faith of a Gigantic Child--pathetic and yet
humorous to consider and consort with.
I went to Sydenham for two days to visit the Brother I began telling you
of: and, at a hasty visit to the Royal Academy, caught a glimpse of Annie
Thackeray: {16b} who had first caught a glimpse of me, and ran away from
her Party to seize the hands of her Father's old friend. I did not know
her at first: was half overset by her cordial welcome when she told me
who she was; and made a blundering business of it altogether. So much
so, that I could not but write afterwards to apologize to her: and she
returned as kind an Answer as she had given a Greeting: telling me that
my chance Apparition had been to her as 'A message from Papa.' It was
really something to have been of so much importance.
I keep intending to go out somewhere--if for no other reason than that my
rooms here may be cleaned! which they will have it should be done once a
year. Perhaps I may have to go to my old Field of Naseby, where Carlyle
wants me to erect a Stone over the spot where I dug up some remains of
those who were slain there over two hundred years ago, for the purpose of
satisfying him in his Cromwell History. This has been a fixed purpose of
his these twenty years: I thought it had dropped from his head: but it
cropped up again this Spring, and I do not like to neglect such wishes.
Ever yours
E. F.G.
VIII.
_April_ 22, [1873.]
DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,
One last word about what you call my 'Half-invitation' to Woodbridge. In
one sense it is so; but not in the sense you imagine.
I never do invite any of my oldest Friends to come and see me, am almost
distressed at their proposing to do so. If they take me in their way to,
or from, elsewhere (as Donne in his Norfolk Circuit) it is another
matter.
But I have built a pleasant house just outside the Town, where I never
live myself, but keep it mainly for some Nieces who come there for two or
three months in the Summer: and, when they are not there, for any Friends
who like to come, for the Benefit of fresh Air and Verdure, _plus_ the
company of their Host. An Artist and his Wife have stayed there for some
weeks for the last two years; and Donne and Valentia were to have come,
but that they went abroad instead.
And so, while I should even deprecate a Lady like you coming thus far
only for my sake, who ought rather to go and ask Admission at your Door,
I should be glad if you liked to come to my house for the double purpose
aforesaid.
My Nieces have hitherto come to me from July to September or October.
Since I wrote to you, they have proposed to come on May 21; though it may
be somewhat later, as suits the health of the Invalid--who lives on small
means with her elder Sister, who is her Guardian Angel. I am sure that
no friend of mine--and least of all you--would dissent from my making
them my first consideration. I never ask them in Winter, when I think
they are better in a Town: which Town has, since their Father's Death,
been Lowestoft, where I see them from time to time. Their other six
sisters (one only married) live elsewhere: all loving one another,
notwithstanding.
Well: I have told you all I meant by my 'Half-Invitation.' These N.E.
winds are less inviting than I to these parts; but I and my House would
be very glad to entertain you to our best up to the End of May, if you
really liked to see Woodbridge as well as yours always truly
E. F.G.
P.S.--You tell me that, once returned to America, you think you will not
return ever again to England. But you will--if only to revisit those at
Kenilworth--yes, and the blind Lady you are soon going to see in Ireland
{19a}--and two or three more in England beside--yes, and old England
itself, 'with all her faults.'
By the by:--Some while ago {19b} Carlyle sent me a Letter from an
American gentleman named Norton (once of the N. American Review, C. says,
and a most amiable, intelligent Gentleman)--whose Letter enclosed one
from Ruskin, which had been entrusted to another American Gentleman named
Burne Jones--who kept it in a Desk ten years, and at last forwarded it as
aforesaid--to me! The Note (of Ruskin's) is about one of the Persian
Translations: almost childish, as that Man of Genius is apt to be in his
Likes as well as Dislikes. I dare say he has forgotten all about
Translator and Original long before this. I wrote to thank Mr. Norton
for
(_Letter unfinished_.)
IX.
[1873.]
DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,
It is scarce fair to assail you on your return to England with another
Letter so close on that to which you have only just answered--you who
_will_ answer! I wish you would consider this Letter of mine an Answer
(as it really is) to that last of yours; and before long I will write
again and call on you then for a Reply.
What inspires me now is, that, about the time you were writing to me
about Burns and Beranger, I was thinking of them 'which was the Greater
Genius?'--I can't say; but, with all my Admiration for about a Score of
the Frenchman's almost perfect Songs, I would give all of them up for a
Score of Burns' Couplets, Stanzas, or single Lines scattered among those
quite _im_perfect Lyrics of his. Beranger, no doubt, was The _Artist_;
which still is not the highest Genius--witness Shakespeare, Dante,
AEschylus, Calderon, to the contrary. Burns assuredly had more _Passion_
than the Frenchman; which is not Genius either, but a great Part of the
Lyric Poet still. What Beranger might have been, if born and bred among
Banks, Braes, and Mountains, I cannot tell: Burns had that advantage over
him. And then the Highland Mary to love, amid the heather, as compared
to Lise the Grisette in a Parisian Suburb! Some of the old French
Virelays and _Vaux-de-vire_ come much nearer the Wild Notes of Burns, and
go to one's heart like his; Beranger never gets so far as that, I think.
One knows he will come round to his pretty _refrain_ with perfect grace;
if he were more Inspired he couldn't.
'My Love is like the red, red, Rose
That's newly sprung in June,
My Love is like the Melody
That's sweetly play'd in tune.'
and he will love his Love,
'Till a' the Seas gang Dry'
Yes--Till a' the Seas gang dry, my Dear. And then comes some weaker
stuff about Rocks melting in the Sun. All Imperfect; but that red, red
Rose has burned itself into one's silly Soul in spite of all. Do you
know that one of Burns' few almost perfect stanzas was perfect till he
added two Syllables to each alternate Line to fit it to the lovely Music
which almost excuses such a dilution of the Verse?
'Ye Banks and Braes o' bonnie Doon,
How can ye bloom (so fresh) so fair?
Ye little Birds how can ye sing,
And I so (weary) full of care!
Thou'lt break my heart, thou little Bird,
That sings (singest so) upon the Thorn:
Thou minds me of departed days
That never shall return
(Departed never to) return.'
Now I shall tell you two things which my last Quotation has recalled to
me.
Some thirty years ago A. Tennyson went over Burns' Ground in Dumfries.
When he was one day by Doon-side--'I can't tell how it was, Fitz, but I
fell into a Passion of Tears'--And A. T. not given to the melting mood at
all.
No. 2. My friend old Childs of the romantic town of Bungay (if you can
believe in it!) told me that one day he started outside the Coach in
company with a poor Woman who had just lost Husband or Child. She talked
of her Loss and Sorrow with some Resignation; till the Coach happened to
pull up by a roadside Inn. A 'little Bird' was singing somewhere; the
poor Woman then broke into Tears, and said--'I could bear anything but
that.' I dare say she had never even heard of Burns: but he had heard
the little Bird that he knew would go to all Hearts in Sorrow.
Beranger's Morals are Virtue as compared to what have followed him in
France. Yet I am afraid he partly led the way. Burns' very _Passion_
half excused him; so far from its being Refinement which Burke thought
deprived Vice of half its Mischief!
Here is a Sermon for you, you see, which you did not compound for: nor I
neither when I began my Letter. But I think I have told you the two
Stories aforesaid which will almost deprive my sermon of half its
Dulness. And I am now going to transcribe you a _Vau-de-vire_ of old
Olivier de Basselin, {23a} which will show you something of that which I
miss in Beranger. But I think I had better write it on a separate Paper.
Till which, what think you of these lines of Clement Marot on the Death
of some French Princess who desired to be buried among the Poor? {23b}
[P.S.--These also must go on the Fly-leaf: being too long, Alexandrine,
for these Pages.]
What a Letter! But if you are still at your Vicarage, you can read it in
the Intervals of Church. I was surprised at your coming so early from
Italy: the famous Holy Week there is now, I suppose, somewhat shorn of
its Glory.--If you were not so sincere I should think you were
persiflaging me about the Photo, as applied to myself, and yourself. Some
years ago I said--and now say--I wanted one of you; and if this letter
were not so long, would tell you a little how to sit. Which you would
not attend to; but I should be all the same, your long-winded
Friend
E. F.G.
X.
WOODBRIDGE, _May_ 1, [1873.]
DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,
I am very glad that you will be Photographed: though not by the Ipswich
Man who did me, there are no doubt many much better in London.
Of course the whole Figure is best, if it can be artistically arranged.
But certainly the safe plan is to venture as little as possible when an
Artist's hand cannot harmonize the Lines and the Lights, as in a Picture.
And as the Face is the Chief Object, I say the safest thing is to sit for
the Face, neck, and Shoulders only. By this, one not only avoids any
conflict about Arms and Hands (which generally disturb the Photo), but
also the Lines and Lights of Chair, Table, etc.
For the same reason, I vote for nothing but a plain Background, like a
Curtain, or sober-coloured Wall.
I think also that there should be no White in the Dress, which is apt to
be too positive for the Face. Nothing nearer White than such material as
(I think) Brussels Lace (?) of a yellowish or even dirty hue; of which
there may be a Fringe between Dress and Skin. I have advised Men Friends
to sit in a--dirty Shirt!
I think a three-quarter face is better that a Full; for one reason, that
I think the Sitter feels more at ease looking somewhat away, rather than
direct at the luminous Machine. This will suit you, who have a finely
turned Head, which is finely placed on Neck and Shoulders. But, as your
Eyes are fine also, don't let them be turned too much aside, nor at all
downcast: but simply looking as to a Door or Window a little on one side.
Lastly (!) I advise sitting in a lightly clouded Day; not in a bright
Sunlight at all.
You will think that I am preaching my own Photo to you. And it is true
that, though I did not sit with any one of these rules in my head; but
just as I got out of a Cab, etc., yet the success of the Thing made me
consider afterward why it succeeded; and I have now read you my Lecture
on the Subject. Pray do not forgo your Intention--nay, your Promise, as
I regard it--to sit, and send me the result. {25}
Here has been a bevy of Letters, and long ones, from me, you see. I
don't know if it is reasonable that one should feel it so much easier to
write to a Friend in England than to the same Friend abroad; but so it
is, with me at least. I suppose that a Letter directed to Stoneleigh
will find you before you leave--for America!--and even after that. But I
shall not feel the same confidence and ease in transcribing for you
pretty Norman Songs, or gossiping about them as I have done when my
Letters were only to travel to Kenilworth: which very place--which very
name of a Place--makes the English world akin. I suppose you have been
at Stratford before this--an event in one's Life. It was not the Town
itself--or even the Church--that touched me most: but the old Footpaths
over the Fields which He must have crossed three Centuries ago.
Spedding tells me he is nearing Land with his Bacon. And one begins to
think Macready a Great Man amid the Dwarfs that now occupy his Place.
Ever yours sincerely
E. F.G.
XI.
_September_ 18/73.
DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,
I have not forgotten you at all, all these months--What a Consolation to
you! But I felt I had nothing to send among the Alps after you: I have
been nowhere but for two Days to the Field of Naseby in Northamptonshire,
where I went to identify the spot where I dug up the Dead for Carlyle
thirty years ago. I went; saw; made sure; and now--the Trustees of the
Estate won't let us put up the Memorial stone we proposed to put up; they
approve (we hear) neither of the Stone, nor the Inscription; both as
plain and innocent as a Milestone, says Carlyle, and indeed much of the
same Nature. This Decision of the foolish Trustees I only had some ten
days ago: posted it to Carlyle who answered from Dumfries; and his Answer
shows that he is in full vigour, though (as ever since I have known him)
he protests that Travelling has utterly discomfited him, and he will move
no more. But it is very silly of these Trustees. {28a}
And, as I have been nowhere, I have seen no one; nor read anything but
the Tichborne Trial, and some of my old Books--among them Walpole,
Wesley, and Johnson (Boswell, I mean), three very different men whose
Lives extend over the same times, and whose diverse ways of looking at
the world they lived in make a curious study. I wish some one would
write a good Paper on this subject; I don't mean to hint that I am the
man; on the contrary, I couldn't at all; but I could supply some [one]
else with some material that he would not care to hunt up in the Books
perhaps.
Well: all this being all, I had no heart to write--to the Alps! And now
I remember well you told me you [were] coming back to England--for a
little while--a little while--and then to the New World for ever--which I
don't believe! {28b} Oh no! you will come back in spite of yourself,
depend upon it--and yet I doubt that my saying so will be one little
reason why you will not! But do let me hear of you first: and believe me
ever yours
E. F.G.
XII.
[WOODBRIDGE, 1873.]
DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,
You must attribute this third Letter to an '_Idee_' that has come into my
head relating to those Memoirs of yourself which you say you are at some
loss to dispose of. I can easily understand that your Children, born and
bred (I think) in another World, would not take so much interest in them
as some of your old Friends who make part of your Recollections: as you
yourself occupy much of theirs. But then they are _old_ Friends; and are
not their Children, Executors and Assigns, as little to be depended on as
your own Kith and Kin? Well; I bethink me of one of your old Friends'
Children whom I could reckon upon for you, as I would for myself: Mowbray
Donne: the Son of one who you know loves you of old, and inheriting all
his Father's Loyalty to his Father's Friends. I am quite convinced that
he is to be perfectly depended upon in all respects for this purpose; for
his Love, his Honour, and his Intelligence. I should then make him one
day read the Memoirs to me--for I can't be assured of my own Eyes
interpreting your MS. without so much difficulty as would disturb one's
Enjoyment, or Appreciation, of such a Memoir. Unless indeed you should
one day come down yourself to my Chateau in dull Woodbridge, and there
read it over, and talk it over.
Well; this is what I seriously advise, always supposing that you have
decided not to print and publish the Memoir during your Life. No doubt
you could make money of it, beside 'bolting up' {30} such Accident as the
Future comprehends. The latter would, I know, be the only recommendation
to you.
I don't think you will do at all as I advise you. But I nevertheless
advise you as I should myself in case I had such a Record as you have to
leave behind me.--
Now once more for French Songs. When I was in Paris in 1830, just before
that Revolution, I stopped one Evening on the Boulevards by the Madeleine
to listen to a Man who was singing to his Barrel-organ. Several passing
'Blouses' had stopped also: not only to listen, but to join in the Songs,
having bought little '_Libretti_' of the words from the Musician. I
bought one too; for, I suppose, the smallest French Coin; and assisted in
the Song which the Man called out beforehand (as they do Hymns at
Church), and of which I enclose you the poor little Copy. '_Le Bon
Pasteur_, s'il vous plait'--I suppose the Circumstances: the 'beau
temps,' the pleasant Boulevards, the then so amiable People, all
contributed to the effect this Song had upon me; anyhow, it has
constantly revisited my memory for these forty-three years; and I was
thinking, the other day, touched me more than any of Beranger's most
beautiful Things. This, however, may be only one of 'Old Fitz's'
Crotchets, as Tennyson and others would call them. {31}
I have been trying again at another Great _Artist's_ work which I never
could care for at all, Goethe's _Faust_, in Hayward's Prose Translation;
Eighth Edition. Hayward quotes from Goethe himself, that, though of
course much of a Poem must evaporate in a Prose Translation, yet the
Essence must remain. Well; I distinguish as little of that Essential
Poetry in the Faust now as when I first read it--longer ago than '_Le Bon
Pasteur_,' and in other subsequent Attempts. I was tempted to think this
was some Defect--great Defect--in myself: but a Note at the end of the
Volume informs me that a much greater Wit than I was in the same
plight--even Coleridge; who admires the perfect German Diction, the
Songs, Choruses, etc. (which are such parts as cannot be translated into
Prose); he also praises Margaret and Mephistopheles; but thinks Faust
himself dull, and great part of the Drama flat and tiresome; and the
whole Thing not a self-evolving Whole, but an unconnected Series of
Scenes: all which are parts that can be judged of from Translation, by
Goethe's own Authority. I find a great want of Invention and Imagination
both in the Events and Characters.
Gervinus' Theory of Hamlet is very staking. Perhaps Shakespeare himself
would have admitted, without ever having expressly designed, it. I
always said with regard to the Explanation of Hamlet's Madness or Sanity,
that Shakespeare himself might not have known the Truth any more than we
understand the seeming Discords we see in People we know best.
Shakespeare intuitively imagined, and portrayed, the Man without being
able to give a reason--_perhaps_--I believe in Genius doing this: and
remain your Inexhaustible Correspondent
E. F.G.
Excuse this very bad writing, which I have gone over 'with the pen of
Correction,' and would have wholly re-written if my Eyes were not
be-glared with the Sun on the River. You need only read the first part
about Donne.
XIII.
[1873.]
DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,
Had you but written your Dublin Address in full, I should have caught you
before you left. As you did not, I follow your Directions, and enclose
to Coutts.
You see which of the three Photos I prefer--and very much prefer--by the
two which I return: I am very much obliged to you indeed for taking all
the Trouble; and the Photo I have retained is very satisfactory to me in
every respect: as I believe you will find it to be to such other Friends
as you would give a Copy to. I can fancy that this Photo is a fair one;
I mean, a fair Likeness: one of the full Faces was nearly as good to me,
but for the darkness of the Lips--that common default in these things--but
the other dark Fullface is very unfair indeed. You must give Copies to
dear old Donne, and to one or two others, and I should like to hear from
you [before you] leave England which they prefer.
It was indeed so unlike your obstinate habit of Reply--this last
exception--that I thought you must be ill; and I was really thinking of
writing to Mr. Leigh to ask about you--I have been ailing myself with
some form of Rheumatism--whether Lumbago, Sciatica, or what not--which
has made my rising up and sitting down especially uncomfortable; Country
Doctor quite incompetent, etc. But the Heavenly Doctor, Phoebus, seems
more efficient--especially now he has brought the Wind out of N.E.
I had meant to send you the Air of the Bon Pasteur when I sent the words:
I never heard it but that once, but I find that the version you send me
is almost identical with my Recollection of it. There is little merit in
the Tune, except the pleasant resort to the Major at the two last Verses.
I can now hear the Organist's _burr_ at the closing 'Benira.'
I happened the other day on some poor little Verses {34a} which poor
Haydon found of his poor Wife's writing in the midst of the Distress from
which he extricated himself so suddenly. And I felt how these poor
Verses touched me far more than any of Beranger's--though scarcely more
than many of Burns'. I know that the Story which they involve appeals
more to one's heart than the Frenchman does; but I am also sure that his
perfect _Art_ injures, and not assists, the utterance of Nature. I
transcribe these poor Verses for you, as you may not have the Book at
hand, and yet I think you will thank me for recalling them to you. I
find them in a MS. Book I have which I call 'Half Hours with the Worst
Authors,' {34b} and if People would believe that I know what is good for
them in these matters, the Book would make a very good one for the
Public. But if People don't see as I do by themselves, they wouldn't any
the more for my telling them, not having any Name to bid their Attention.
So my Bad Authors must be left to my Heirs and Assigns; as your Good
Memoirs!
On second Thoughts, I shall (in spite of your Directions) keep two of the
Photos: returning you only the hateful dark one. That is, I shall keep
the twain, unless you desire me to return you one of them. Anyhow, do
write to me before you go quite away, and believe me always yours
E. F.G.
XIV.
WOODBRIDGE: _Novr._ 18/73.
DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,
I should have written to you before, but that I was waiting for some
account, for better or worse, of our friend Donne; who has been seriously
ill this Fortnight and more. I don't know what his original Ailment was,
unless a Cold; but the Effect has been to leave him so weak, that even
now the Doctor fears for any Relapse which he might not be strong enough
to bear. He had been for a Visit to friends in the West of England: and
became ill directly he returned to London. You may think it odd I don't
know what was his Illness; but Mowbray, who has told me all I know, did
not tell me that: and so I did not ask, as I could do no good by knowing.
Perhaps it is simply a Decay, or Collapse, of Body, or Nerves--or even
Mind:--a Catastrophe which I never thought unlikely with Donne, who has
toiled and suffered so much, for others rather than for himself; and
keeping all his Suffering to himself. He wrote me a letter about himself
a week ago; cheerful, and telling me of Books he read: so as no one would
guess he was so ill; but a Letter from Mowbray by the same Post told me
he was still in a precarious Condition. I had wished to tell you that he
was better, if not well: but I may wait some time for that: and so I will
write now:--with the Promise that I will write again directly there is
anything else to tell.
Here my Reader comes to give me an Instalment of Tichborne: so I shall
shut up, perhaps till To-morrow.
The Lord Chief Justice and Co. have just decided to adjourn the Trial for
ten Days, till Witnesses arrive from your side of the Atlantic. My
Reader has just adjourned to some Cake and Porter--I tell him not to
hurry--while I go on with this Letter. To tell you that, I might almost
have well adjourned writing 'sine die' (can you construe?), for I don't
think I have more to tell you now. Only that I am reading--Crabbe! And
I want you to tell me if he is read on that side of the Atlantic from
which we are expecting Tichborne Witnesses.
(Reader finishes Cake and Porter: and we now adjourn to 'All the Year
Round.')
10 p.m. 'All the Year Round' read--part of it--and Reader departed.
Pray do tell me if any one reads Crabbe in America; nobody does here, you
know, but myself; who bore about it. Does Mrs. Wister, who reads many
things? Does Mrs. Kemble, now she has the Atlantic between her and the
old Country?
'Over the Forth I look to the North,
But what is the North and its Hielands to me?
The North and the East gie small ease to my breast,
The far foreign land and the wide rolling Sea.' {37}
I think that last line will bring the Tears into Mrs. Kemble's Eyes--which
I can't find in the Photograph she sent me. Yet they are not
extinguisht, surely?
I read in some Athenaeum that A. Tennyson was changing his Publisher
again: and some one told me that it was in consequence of the resigning
Publisher having lost money by his contract with the Poet; which was, to
pay him 1000 pounds per Quarter for the exclusive sale of his Poems. It
was a Woodbridge _Literati_ who told me this, having read it in a Paper
called 'The Publisher.' More I know not.
A little more such stuff I might write: but I think here is enough of it.
For this Night, anyhow: so I shall lick the Ink from my Pen; and smoke
one Pipe, not forgetting you while I do so; and if nothing turns up To-
morrow, here is my Letter done, and I remaining yours always sincerely
E. F.G.
XV.
WOODBRIDGE: _Nov._ 24, [1873].
DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,
A note from Mowbray to-day says 'I think I can report the Father really
on the road to recovery.'
So, as I think you will be as glad to know this as I am, I write again
over the Atlantic. And, after all, you mayn't be over the Atlantic, but
in London itself! Donne would have told me: but I don't like to trouble
him with Questions, or writing of any sort. If you be in London, you
will hear somehow of all this matter: if in America, my Letter won't go
in vain.
Mowbray wrote me some while ago of the Death of your Sister's Son in the
Hunting-field. {38} Mowbray said, aged thirty, I think: I had no idea,
so old: born when I was with Thackeray in Coram Street--(_Jorum_ Street,
he called it) where I remember Mrs. Sartoris coming in her Brougham to
bid him to Dinner, 1843.
I wrote to Annie Thackeray yesterday: politely telling her I couldn't
relish her Old Kensington a quarter as much as her Village on the Cliff:
which, however, I doat on. I still purpose to read Miss Evans: but my
Instincts are against her--I mean, her Books.
What have you done with your Memoirs? Pollock is about to edit
Macready's. And Chorley--have you read him? I shall devour him in
time--that is, when Mudie will let me.
I wonder if there are Water-cresses in America, as there are on my tea-
table while I write?
What do you think of these two lines which Crabbe didn't print?
'The shapeless purpose of a Soul that feels,
And half suppresses Wrath, {39} and half reveals.'
My little bit of Good News about our Friend is the only reason and
Apology for this Letter from
Yours ever and always
E. F.G.
XVI.
LOWESTOFT: _Febr._ 10/74.
DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,
A Letter to be written to you from the room I have written to you before
in: but my Letter must wait till I return to Woodbridge, where your
Address is on record. I have thought several times of writing to you
since this Year began; but I have been in a muddle--leaving my old
Markethill Lodgings, and vacillating between my own rather lonely
Chateau, and this Place, where some Nieces are. I had wished to tell you
what I know of our dear Donne: who Mowbray says gets on still. I suppose
he will never be so strong again. Laurence wrote me that he had met him
in the Streets, looking thinner (!) with (as it were) keener Eyes. That
is a Portrait Painter's observation: probably a just one. Laurence has
been painting for me a Copy of Pickersgill's Portrait of Crabbe--but I am
afraid has made some muddle of it, according to his wont. I asked for a
Sketch: he _will_ elaborate--and spoil. Instead of copying the Colours
he sees and could simply match on his Palette, he _will_ puzzle himself
as to whether the Eyebrows were once sandy, though now gray; and wants to
compare Pickersgill's Portrait with Phillips'--which I particularly
wished to be left out of account. Laurence is a dear little fellow--a
Gentleman--Spedding said, 'made of Nature's very finest Clay.' {40} So
he is: but the most obstinate little man--'incorrigible,' Richmond called
him; and so he wearies out those who wish most to serve and employ him;
and so has spoiled his own Fortune.
Do you read in America of Holman Hunt's famous new Picture of 'The Shadow
of Death,' which he has been some seven Years painting--in Jerusalem, and
now exhibits under theatrical Lights and accompaniments? This does not
induce me to believe in H. Hunt more than heretofore: which is--not at
all. Raffaelle, Mozart, Shakespeare, did not take all that time about a
work, nor brought it forth to the world with so much Pomp and
Circumstance.
Do you know Sainte Beuve's Causeries? I think one of the most delightful
Books--a Volume of which I brought here, and makes me now write of it to
you. It is a Book worth having--worth buying--for you can read it more
than once, and twice. And I have taken up Don Quixote again: more
Evergreen still; in Spanish, as it must be read, I doubt.
Here is a Sheet of Paper already filled, with matters very little worthy
of sending over the Atlantic. But you will be glad of the Donne news, at
any rate. Do tell me ever so little of yourself in return.
Now my Eyes have had enough of this vile steel pen; and so have yours, I
should think: and I will mix a Glass of poor Sherry and Water, and fill a
Pipe, and think of you while I smoke it. Think of me sometimes as
Yours always sincerely,
E. F.G.
P.S. I shall venture this Letter with no further Address than I remember
now.
XVII.
LITTLE GRANGE: WOODBRIDGE, _May_ 2/74.
DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,