I have thought that it might be more convenient to the reader to have
the letters contained in the foregoing chapter all together, and have
not interrupted them therefore to speak of any of the events which
were meantime happening in my own life.
But during the period which the letters cover the two greatest sorrows
of my life had fallen upon me--I had lost first my mother, then my
wife.
The bereavement, however, was very different in the two cases. If my
mother had died a dozen years earlier I should have felt the loss as
the end of all things to me--as leaving me desolate and causing a void
which nothing could ever fill. But when she died at eighty-three she
had lived her life, upon the whole a very happy one, to the happiness
of which I had (and have) the satisfaction of believing I largely
contributed.
It is very common for a mother and daughter to live during many years
of life together in as close companionship as I lived with my mother,
but it is not common for a son to do so. During many years, and many,
many journeyings, and more _tête-à-tête_ walks, and yet more of
_tête-à-tête_ home hours, we were inseparable companions and friends.
I can truly say that, from the time when we put our horses together on
my return from Birmingham to the time of my marriage, she was all in
all to me! During some four or five days in the early time of our
residence at Florence I thought I was going to lose her, and I can
never forget the blank wretchedness of the prospect that seemed to be
before me.
She had a very serious illness, and was, as I had subsequently
reason to believe, very mistakenly treated. She was attended by a
practitioner of the old school, who had at that time the leading
practice in Florence. He was a very good fellow, and an admirable
whist player; and I do not think the members of our little colony
drew a sufficiently sharp line of division between his social and his
professional qualifications. He was, as I have said, essentially a man
of the (even then) old school, and retained the old-fashioned general
practitioners phraseology. I remember his once mortally disgusting an
unhappy dyspeptic old lady by asking her, "Do we go to our dinner with
glee?" As if the poor soul had ever done anything with glee!
This gentleman had bled my mother, and had appointed another bleeding
for the evening. I believe she would assuredly have died if that had
been done, and I attribute to Lord Holland the saving of her. Her
doctor had very wrongly resisted the calling in of other English
advice, professional jealousy, and indeed enmity, running high just
then among us. Lord Holland came to the house just in the nick of
time; and over-ruling authoritatively all the difficulties raised by
the Esculapius in possession of the field, insisted on at once sending
his own medical attendant. The result was the immediate administration
of port wine instead of phlebotomy, and the patient's rapid recovery.
My mother was at the time far past taking any part in the discussion
of the medical measures to be adopted in her case. But I am not
without a suspicion that she too, if she could have been consulted,
would have sided with phlebotomy and whist, as against modern practice
unrelieved by any such alleviation. For the phlebotomist had been a
constant attendant at her Friday night whist-table; and as it was she
lost him, for he naturally was offended at her recovery under rival
hands.
What my mother _was_ I have already said enough to show, as far as
my imperfect words can show it, in divers passages of these
reminiscences. She was the happiest natured person I ever knew--happy
in the intense power of enjoyment, happier still in the conscious
exercise of the power of making others happy; and this continued to
be the case till nearly the end. During the last few years the bright
lamp began to grow dim and gradually sink into the socket. She
suffered but little physically, but she lost her memory, and then
gradually more and more the powers of her mind generally. I have often
thought that this perishing of the mind before the exceptionally
healthy and well-constituted physical frame, in which it was housed,
may have been due to the tremendous strain to which she was subjected
during those terrible months at Bruges, when she was watching the
dying bed of a much-loved son during the day, and, dieted on green tea
and laudanum, was writing fiction most part of the night. The cause,
if such were the case, would have preceded the effect by some forty
years; but whether it is on the cards to suppose that such an effect
may have been produced after such a length of time, I have not
physiological knowledge enough to tell.
She was, I think, to an exceptional degree surrounded by very many
friends, mostly women, but including many men, at every period of her
life. But the circumstances of it caused the world of her intimates
during her youth, her middle life, and her old age, to be to a great
degree peopled by different figures.
She was during all her life full of, and fond of, fun; had an
exquisite sense of humour; and at all times valued her friends and
acquaintances more exclusively, I think, than most people do, for
their intrinsic qualities, mainly those of heart, and, not so much
perhaps intellect, accurately speaking, as brightness. There is a
passage in my brother's _Autobiography_ which grates upon my mind,
and, I think, very signally fails to hit the mark.
He writes (vol. i. p. 28):--"She loved society, affecting a somewhat
Liberal _rôle_, and professing an emotional dislike to tyrants, which
sprung from the wrongs of would-be regicides and the poverty of
patriot exiles. An Italian marquis who had escaped with only a second
shirt from the clutches of some archduke whom he had wished to
exterminate, or a French _prolétaire_ with distant ideas of
sacrificing himself to the cause of liberty, were always welcome to
the modest hospitality of her house. In after years, when marquises of
another caste had been gracious to her, she became a strong Tory, and
thought that archduchesses were sweet. But with her, politics were
always an affair of the heart, as indeed were all her convictions. Of
reasoning from causes I think that she knew nothing."
Now there is hardly a word of this in which Anthony is not more
or less mistaken; and that simply because he had not adequate
opportunities for close observation. The affection which subsisted
between my mother and my brother Anthony was from the beginning to the
end of their lives as tender and as warm as ever existed between a
mother and son. Indeed I remember that in the old days of our youth
we used to consider Anthony the Benjamin. But from the time that he
became a clerk in the Post Office to her death, he and my mother were
never together but as visitors during the limited period of a visit.
From the time that I resigned my position at Birmingham to the time
of her death, I was uninterruptedly an inmate of her house, or she of
mine. And I think that I knew her, as few sons know their mothers.
No regicide, would-be or other, ever darkened her doors. No French
_prolétaire_, or other French political refugee was ever among her
guests. She never was acquainted with any Italian marquis who had
escaped in any degree of distress from poverty. With General Pepe she
was intimate for years. But of him the world knows enough to perceive
that my brother cannot have alluded to him. And I recollect no other
marquis. It is very true that in the old Keppel Street and Harrow days
several Italian exiles, and I think some Spaniards, used to be her
occasional guests. This had come to pass by means of her intimacy with
Lady Dyer, the wife and subsequently widow of Sir Thomas Dyer, whose
years of foreign service had interested him and her in many such
persons. The friends of her friend were her friends. They were not
such by virtue of their political position and ideas. Though it is no
doubt true, that caring little about politics, and in a jesting way
(how jesting many a memorial of fun between her and Lady Dyer, and
Miss Gabell, the daughter of Dr. Gabell of Winchester, is still extant
in my hands to prove;) the general tone of the house was "Liberal."
But nothing can be farther from the truth than the idea that my mother
was led to become a Tory by the "graciousness" of any "marquises" or
great folks of any kind. I am inclined to think that there was _one_
great personage, whose (not graciousness, but) intellectual influence
_did_ impel her mind in a Conservative direction. And this was
Metternich. She had more talk with him than her book on Vienna would
lead a reader to suppose; and very far more of his mind and influence
reached her through the medium of the Princess.
To how great a degree this is likely to have been the case may be in
some measure perceived from a letter which the Princess addressed to
my mother shortly after she had left Vienna. She preserved it among a
few others, which she specially valued, and I transcribe it from the
original now before me.
* * * * *
"Vous ne pourriez croire, chère Madame Trollope, combien le portrait
que vous avez chargé le Baron Hügel de me remettre m'a fait de
plaisir!
"Il y a longtemps que je cachais au fonds de mon coeur le désir de
posséder votre portrait, qui, interressant pour le monde, est devenu
précieux pour moi, puisque j'ai le plaisir de vous connaître telle
que vous êtes, bonne, simple, bienveillante, et loin de tout ce qui
effroie et eloigne des reputations litéraires. Je remercie M. Hervieu
de Tavoir fait aussi ressemblant. Et je vous assure, chère Madame
Trollope, que rien ne pouvait me toucher aussi vivement et me faire
autant de plaisir que ce souvenir venant de vous, qui me rappelera
sans cesse les bons moments que j'ai eu la satisfaction de passer avec
vous et qui resteront à jamais chères à ma mémoire.
"MELANIE, PRINCESSE DE METTERNICH."
* * * * *
I think that the hours passed by the Princess and my mother
_tête-à-tête_, save for the presence of the artist occupied by his
work during the painting of the Princess Melanie's portrait for
my mother, were mainly the cause of the real intimacy of mind and
affection which grew up between them--though, of course, the painting
of the portrait shows that a considerable intimacy had previously
arisen. And it had been arranged that the portrait of my mother, which
was the occasion of the above letter, should be exchanged for that of
the Princess. But there had been no time amid the whirl of the Vienna
gaieties to get it executed. It was, therefore, sent from England by
Baron Hügel when he called on my mother, on visiting this country
shortly after her return from Austria.
It occurs to me here to mention a circumstance which was, I think,
the first thing to begin--not the acquaintance but--the intimacy in
question; and which may be related as possessing an interest not
confined to either of the ladies in question.
The Archduchess Sophie had graciously intimated her desire that my
mother should be presented to her, and an evening had been named
for the purpose. But a few days before--just three, if I remember
rightly--my mother caught a cold, which resulted in erysipelas,
causing her head to become swollen to nearly double its usual size!
Great was the dismay of the ladies who had arranged the meeting with
the Archduchess, chief among whom had been the Princess Melanie.
She came to my mother, and insisted upon sending to her an old
homoeopathic physician, who was her own medical attendant, and had
been Hahnemann's favourite pupil. He came, saw his patient, and
was told that what he had to do was to make her presentable by the
following Friday! He shook his head, said the time was too short--but
he would do his best. And the desired object was _fully_ attained.
I have no doubt that my mother returned from her Vienna visit a more
strongly convinced Conservative in politics than she had hitherto
been. And it does not seem to me that the modification of her
opinions in that direction, which was doubtless largely operated by
conversation with the great Conservative statesman and his _alter
ego_, the Princess, needs to be in any degree attributed to the
"graciousness" of people in high position either male or female. Is
it not very intelligible and very likely that such opinions, so set
forth, as she from day to day heard them, should have honestly and
legitimately influenced her own?
But I think that I should be speaking, if perhaps presumptuously, yet
truly, if I were to add that there was also one very far from great
personage, whose influence in the same direction was greater than even
that of Prince Metternich or of any other great folks whatever; and
that was the son in daily and almost hourly communion and conversation
with whom she lived. I also had begun life as a "Liberal," and was
such in the days when Mr. Gladstone was a high Tory. But my mind had
long been travelling in an inverse direction to his. And far too large
a number of my contemporaries distinguished and undistinguished have
been moving in the same direction for it to be at all necessary to
say that most assuredly my slowly maturing convictions were neither
generated nor fostered by any "graciousness" or other influence of
dukes or duchesses or great people of any sort.
That my mother's political ideas were in no degree "an affair of the
heart," I will not say, and by no means regret not being able to say.
But I cannot but assert that it is a great mistake to say that they
were uninfluenced by "reasoning from causes," or that the movement
of her mind in this respect was in any degree whatever due to the
caresses which my brother imagines to have caused it.
She was not a great or careful preserver of papers and letters, or
I might have been able to print here very many communications from
persons in whom the world feels an interest. Among her early and very
dear friends was Mary Mitford.
I have a very vivid remembrance of the appearance of Mary Russell
Mitford as I used to see her on the occasions of my visits to Reading,
where my grandfather's second wife and then widow was residing. She
was not corpulent, but her figure gave one the idea of almost cubical
solidity. She had a round and red full moon sort of face, from the
ample forehead above which the hair was all dragged back and stowed
away under a small and close-fitting cap, which surrounding her face
increased the effect of full-blown rotundity. But the grey eye and
even the little snub nose were full of drollery and humour, and the
lines about the generally somewhat closely shut mouth indicated
unmistakable intellectual power. There is a singular resemblance
between her handwriting and that of my mother. Very numerous letters
must have passed between them. But of all these I have been able to
find but four.
On the 3rd of April, 1832, she writes from the "Three Mile Cross," so
familiar to many readers, as follows:--
* * * * *
"My dear Mrs. Trollope,--I thank you most sincerely for your very
delightful book, as well as for its great kindness towards me; and I
wish you joy from the bottom of my heart of the splendid success which
has not merely attended but awaited its career--a happy and I trust
certain augury of your literary good fortune in every line which you
may pursue. I assure you that my political prejudices are by no
means shocked at your dislike of Republicanism. I was always a very
aristocratic Whig, and since these reforming days am well-nigh become
a staunch Tory, for pretty nearly the same reason that converted
you--a dislike to mobs in action.... Refinement follows wealth,
but not often closely, as witness the parvenu people even in dear
England.... I heard of your plunge into the Backwoods first from Mr.
Owen himself, with whom I foregathered three years ago in London,
and of whom you have given so very true and graphic a picture. What
extraordinary mildness and plausibility that man possesses! I
never before saw an instance of actual wildness--madness of theory
accompanied by such suavity and soberness of manner. Did you see my
friend, Miss Sedgwick? Her letters show a large and amiable mind, and
a little niece of nine years old, who generally writes in them, has
a style very unusual in so young a girl, and yet most youthful and
natural too.... Can you tell me if Mr. Flint be the author of _George
Mason, or the Young Backwoodsman_? I think that he is; and whether
the name of a young satirical writer be Sams or Sands? Your answering
these questions will stead me much, and I am sure that you will answer
them if you can.
"Now to your kind questions. I am getting ready a fifth and last
volume of _Our Village_ as fast as I can, though with pain and
difficulty, having hurt my left hand so much by a fall from an
open carriage that it affects the right, and makes writing very
uncomfortable to me. And I am in a most perplexed state about my
opera, not knowing whether it will be produced this season or not, in
consequence of Captain Polhill and his singers having parted. This
would not have happened had my coadjutor the composer kept to his
time. And I have still hopes that when the opera be [shall, omitted
probably] taken in (the music is even now not finished), a sense of
interest will bring the parties together again. I hope that it may,
for it will not only be a tremendous hit for all of us, but it will
take me to London and give me the pleasure of a peep at you, a
happiness to which I look forward very anxiously. I know Mr. Tom, and
like him of all things, as everybody who knows him must, and I hear
that his sisters are charming. God bless you, my dear friend. My
father joins me in every good wish, and
"I am ever most affectionately yours,
"M.R. MITFORD."
* * * * *
A few weeks later she writes a very long letter almost entirely filled
with a discussion of the desirability or non-desirability of writing
in this, that, and the other "annual" or magazine. Most of those she
alludes to are dead, and there is no interest in preserving her mainly
unfavourable remarks concerning them and their editors and publishers.
One sentence, however, is so singularly and amusingly suggestive
of change in men and women and things, that I must give it. After
reviewing a great number of the leading monthlies she says "as for
Fraser's and Blackwood's, they are hardly such as a lady likes to
write for"!
After advising my mother to stick to writing novels, she says, "I have
not a doubt that that is by far the most profitable branch of the
literary profession. If ever I be bold enough to try that arduous
path, I shall endeavour to come as near as I can to Miss Austen, my
idol. You are very good about my opera. I am sorry to tell you, and
you will be sorry to hear, that the composer has disappointed me,
that the music is not even yet ready, and that the piece is therefore
necessarily delayed till next season. I am very sorry for this on
account of the money, and because I have many friends in and near
town, yourself amongst the rest, whom I was desirous to see. But
I suppose it will be for the good of the opera to wait till the
beginning of a season. It is to be produced with extraordinary
splendour, and will, I think, be a tremendous hit. I hope also to have
a tragedy out at nearly the same time in the autumn, and _then_ I
trust we shall meet, and I shall see your dear girls.
"How glad I am to find that you partake of my great aversion to the
sort of puffery belonging to literature. I hate it! and always did,
and love you all the better for partaking of my feeling on the
subject. I believe that with me it is pride that revolts at the trash.
And then it is so false; the people are so clearly flattering to be
flattered. Oh, I hate it!!!
"Make my kindest regards [_sic_] and accept my father's.
"Ever most faithfully and affectionately yours,
"M.R. MITFORD.
"P.S.--I suppose my book will be out in about a month. I shall desire
Whittaker to send you a copy. It is the fifth and last volume."
* * * * *
The following interesting letter, franked by her friend Talfourd, and
shown only by the post-mark to have been posted on the 20th of June,
1836, is apparently only part of a letter, for it is written upon one
page, and the two "turnovers" only; and begins abruptly:--
* * * * *
"My being in London this year seems very uncertain, although if Mr.
Sergeant Talfourd's _Ion_ be played, as I believe it will, for Mr.
Macready's benefit, I shall hardly be able to resist the temptation of
going up for a very few days to be present upon that occasion. But
I scarcely ever stir. I am not strong, and am subject to a painful
complaint, which renders the service of a maid indispensable not only
to my comfort but to my health; and that, besides the expense, has an
appearance of fuss and finery, to which I have a great objection, and
to which indeed I have from station no claim. My father, too, hates to
be left even for a day. And splendid old man as he is in his healthful
and vigorous age, I cannot but recollect that he is seventy-five, and
that he is my only tie upon earth--the only relation (except, indeed,
a few very distant cousins, Russells, Greys, Ogles, and Deans, whom I
am too proud and too poor to hook on upon), my only relation in the
wide world. This is a desolate view of things; but it explains a
degree of clinging to that one most precious parent which people can
hardly comprehend. You can scarcely imagine how fine an old man he is;
how clear of head and warm of heart. He almost wept over your letter
to-day, and reads your book with singular delight and satisfaction,
in spite of the difference in politics. He feels strongly, and so, I
assure you, do I, your kind mention of me and my poor writings--a sort
of testimony always gratifying, but doubly so when the distinguished
writer is a dear friend. Even in this desolation, your success--that
of your last work [_Paris and the Parisians_] especially must be
satisfactory to you. I have no doubt that two volumes on Italy will
prove equally delightful to your readers, whilst the journey will be
the best possible remedy for all that you have suffered in spirits and
health.
"I am attempting a novel, for which Messieurs Saunders and Ottley have
agreed to give 700_l_. It is to be ready some time in September--I
mean the MS.--and I am most anxious upon every account to make it as
good as possible, one very great reason being the fair, candid, and
liberal conduct of the intended publishers. I shall do my very best.
Shall I, do you think, succeed? I take for granted that our loss is
your gain, and that you see Mr. Milman and his charming wife, who
will, I am sure, sympathise most sincerely in your present[1]
affliction.
[Footnote 1: Mr. Milman had resigned recently the incumbency of a
parish in Reading. My mother's affliction alluded to was the death of
her youngest daughter, Emily.]
"Adieu, my dear friend. I am tying myself up from letter-writing until
I have finished my novel. While I cannot but hope for one line from
you to say that you are recovering. Letters to me may always be
inclosed to Mr. Sergeant Talfourd, M.P., 2, Elm Court, Temple. Even if
he be on circuit, they will reach me after a short delay. God bless
you all. My father joins heartily in this prayer, with
"Your faithful and affectionate,
"M.R. MITFORD."
* * * * *
The next, and last which I have found, is entirely undated, but
post-marked 20th April, 1837.
* * * * *
"MY DEAR FRIEND,--I don't know when a trifle has pleased me so much as
the coincidence which set us a-writing to each other just at the same
time. I have all the north-country superstition flowing through my
veins, and do really believe in the exploded doctrine of sympathies.
That is to say, I believe in all _genial_ superstitions, and don't
like this steam-packet railway world of ours, which puts aside with so
much scorn that which for certain Shakespeare and Ben Jonson held for
true. I am charmed at your own account of yourself and your doings.
Mr. Edward Kenyon--(whose brother, John Kenyon, of Harley Place, the
most delightful man in London--of course you know him--is my especial
friend)--Mr. Edward Kenyon, who lives chiefly at Vienna, although,
I believe, in great retirement, spending 200_l_. upon himself, and
giving away 2,000_l_.--Mr. Edward Kenyon spoke of you to me as having
such opportunities of knowing both the city and the country as rarely
befell even a resident, and what you say of the peasantry gives me a
strong desire to see your book.
"A happy subject is in my mind, a great thing, especially for you
whose descriptions are so graphic. The thing that would interest me
in Austria, and for the maintenance of which one almost pardons (not
quite) their retaining that other old-fashioned thing, the State
prisons, is their having kept up in their splendour those grand old
monasteries, which are swept away now in Spain and Portugal. I have
a passion for Gothic architecture, and a leaning towards the
magnificence of the old religion, the foster-mother of all that is
finest and highest in art, and if I have such a thing as a literary
project, it is to write a romance, of which Reading Abbey in its
primal magnificence should form a part, not the least about forms
of faith, understand, but as an element of the picturesque, and as
embodying a very grand and influential part of bygone days. At present
I have just finished (since writing _Country Stories_, which people
seem so good as to like) writing all the prose (except one story about
the fashionable subject of Egyptian magicians, furnished to me by your
admirer, Henry Chorley; I wish you had seen him taking off his hat to
the walls as I showed him your father's old residence at Heckfield),
all the prose of the most splendid of the annuals, Finden's
_Tableaux_, of which my longest and best story--a Young Pretender
story--I have been obliged to omit in consequence of not calculating
on the length of my poetical contributors. But my poetry, especially
that by that wonderful young creature Miss Barrett, Mr. Kenyon, and
Mr. Procter, is certainly such as has seldom before been seen in an
annual, and joined with Finden's magnificent engravings ought to make
an attractive work.
"I am now going to my novel, if it please God to grant me health. For
the last two months I have only once crossed the outer threshold, and,
indeed, I have never been a day well since the united effects of the
tragedy and the influenza ... [word destroyed by the seal]. What will
become of that poor play is in the womb of time. But its being by
universal admission a far more striking drama than _Rienzi_, and by
very far the best thing I ever wrote, it follows almost of course,
that it will share the fate of its predecessor, and be tossed about
the theatres for three or four years to come. Of course I should be
only too happy that it should be brought out at Covent Garden under
the united auspices of Mr. Macready and Mr. Bartley.[1] But I am in
constitution and in feeling a much older person than you, my dear
friend, as well as in look, however the acknowledgment of age (I
am 48) may stand between us; and belonging to a most sanguine and
confiding person, I am of course as prone to anticipate all probable
evil as he is to forestall impossible good. He, my dear father, is,
I thank Heaven, splendidly well. He speaks of you always with much
delight, is charmed with your writings, and I do hope that you will
come to Reading and give him as well as me the great pleasure of
seeing you at our poor cottage by the roadside. You would like my
flower-garden. It is really a flower-garden becoming a duchess. People
are so good in ministering to this, my only amusement. And the effect
is heightened by passing through a labourer's cottage to get at it,
for such our poor hut literally is.
[Footnote 1: This gentleman was an old and highly valued friend of my
mother.]
"You have heard, I suppose, that Mr. Wordsworth's eldest son, who
married a daughter of Mr. Curwen, has lost nearly, if not quite, all
of his wife's portion by the sea flowing in upon the mine, and has now
nothing left but a living of 200_l._ given him by his father-in-law.
So are we all touched in turn.
"I have written to the Sedgwicks for the scarlet lilies mentioned by
Miss Martineau in her American book. Did you happen to see them in
their glory? of course they would flourish here; and having sent them
primroses, cowslips, ivy, and many other English wild flowers, which
took Theodore Sedgwick's fancy, I have a right to the return. How glad
I am to hear the good you tell me of my friend Tom. His fortune seems
now assured. My father's kindest regards.
"Ever my dear friend,
"Very faithfully yours,
"M.R. MITFORD.
"P.S.--Mr. Carey, the translator of Dante, has just been here. He
says that he visited Cowper's residence at Olney lately, and that his
garden room, which suggested mine, is incredibly small, and not
near so pretty. Come and see. You know, of course, that the 'Modern
Antiques' in _Our Village_ were Theodosia and Frances Hill, sisters of
Joseph Hill, cousins and friends of poor Cowper."
* * * * *
What the "good" was by which my "fortune was assured" I am unable
to guess. But I am sure of the sincerity of the writer's rejoicing
thereat.
Mary Mitford was a genuinely warm-hearted woman, and much of her talk
would probably be stigmatised by the young gentlemen of the present
generation, who consider the moral temperature of a fish to be "good
form," as "gush." How old Landor, who "gushed" from cradle to grave,
would have massacred and rended in his wrath such talkers! Mary
Mitford's "gush" was sincere at all events. But there is a
"hall-mark," for those who can decipher it, "without which none is
genuine."
A considerable intimacy grew up between my mother and the author of
_Highways and Byeways_ during the latter part of his residence in
England, and subsequently, when returning from Boston on leave, he
visited Florence and Rome. Many letters passed between them after
his establishment as British Consul at Boston, some characteristic
selections from which will, I doubt not, be acceptable to many
readers.
The following was written on the envelope enclosing a very long letter
from Mrs. Grattan, and was written, I think, in 1840:--
* * * * *
"I cannot avoid squeezing in a few words more just as the ship is on
the point of sailing or steaming away for England ... 'The President'
has been a fatal title this spring. Poor Harrison, a good and honest
man, died in a month after he was elected, and this fine ship, about
which we have been at this side of the Atlantic so painfully excited
ever since March, is, I fear, gone down with its gallant captain
(Roberts, with whom we crossed the Atlantic in the _British Queen_)
and poor Power, whom the public cannot afford to lose.
"Since I wrote my letter three days ago--pardon the boldly original
topic--the weather has mended considerably. Tell Tom that every tree
is also striving to turn over a new leaf, and it is well for you that
I have not another to turn too. God bless you.
"T.C.G."
* * * * *
I beg to observe that the exhortation addressed to me had no moral
significance, but was the writer's characteristic mode of exciting me
to new scribblements.
The following, also written on the envelope enclosing a letter from
Mrs. Grattan, is dated the 30th of July, 1840:--
* * * * *
"I cannot let the envelope go quite a blank, though I cannot quite
make it a prize ... In literature I have done nothing but write a
preface and notes for two new editions of the old _Highways and
Byeways_, and a short sketchy article in this month's number of the
_North American Review_ on the present state of Ireland. I am going to
follow it up in the next number in reference to the state of the Irish
in America, and I hope I shall thus do some good to a subject I have
much at heart. I have had various applications to deliver lectures at
Lyceums, &c, and to preside at public meetings for various objects.
All this I have declined. I have been very much before the public at
dinners for various purposes, and have refused many invitations to
several neighbouring cities. I must now draw back a little. I think I
have hitherto done good to the cause of peace and friendship between
the countries. But I know these continued public appearances will
expose me to envy, hatred, and malice. I hope to do something
historical by and by, and perhaps an occasional article in the _North
American Review_. But anything like light writing I never can again
turn to."
* * * * *
From a very long letter written on the 13th of May, 1841, I will give
a, few extracts:--
* * * * *
"MY DEAR AND VALUED FRIEND,--Your letter from Penryth [_sic_] without
date, but bearing the ominous post-mark, 'April 1st,' has completely
made a fool of me, in that sense which implies that nothing else can
excuse a grey head and a seared heart for thinking and feeling that
there are such things in the world as affection and sincerity. Being
fond of flying in the face of reason, and despising experience,
whenever they lay down general rules, I am resolved to believe in
exceptions, to delight in instances, and to be quite satisfied that I
have 'troops of friends'--you being one of the troopers--no matter how
few others there may be, or where they are to be found.
"You really must imagine how glad we were to see your handwriting
again, and I may say also, how surprised; for it passeth our
understanding to discover how you _make_ time for any correspondence
at all. We have followed all your literary doings step by step since
we left Europe, and we never cease wondering at your fertility and
rejoicing at your success. But I am grieved to think that all this is
at the cost of your comfort. Or is it that you wrote in a querulous
mood, when you said those sharp things about your grey goose quill.
Surely composition must be pleasant to you. No one who writes so fast
and so well can find it actually irksome. I am aware that people
sometimes think they find it so. But we may deceive ourselves on the
dark as well as on the bright side of our road, and more easily,
because it _is_ the dark. That is to say, we may not only cheat
ourselves with false hopes of good, but with false notions of
evil, which proves, if it proves anything just now, that you are
considerably mistaken when you fancy writing to be a bore, and that I
know infinitely better than you do what you like or dislike."
It is rather singular to find a literary _workman_ talking in this
style. Grattan was not a fertile writer, and, I must suppose, was
never a very industrious one. But he surely must have known that talk
about the pleasures of "composition" was wholly beside the mark.
_That_ may be, often is, pleasant enough, and if the thoughts could
be telephoned from the brain to the types it would all be mighty
agreeable; and the world would be very considerably more overwhelmed
with authorship than it is. It is the "grey goose quill" work, the
necessity for incarnating the creatures of the brain in black and
white, that is the world's protection from this avalanche. And I for
one do not understand how anybody who, eschewing the sunshine and
the fields and the song of birds, or the enjoyment of other people's
brain-work, has glued himself to his desk for long hours, can say
or imagine that his task is, or has been, aught else than hard and
distasteful work, demanding unrelaxing self-denial and industry. And
however fine the frenzy in which the poet's eye may roll while he
builds the lofty line, the work of putting some thousands of them on
the paper when built must be as irksome to him as the penny-a-liner's
task is to _him_--more so, in that the mind of the latter does not
need to be forcibly and painfully restrained from rushing on to the
new pastures which invite it, and curbed to the pack-horse pace of the
quill-driving process.
"You must not," he continues, "allow yourself to be, or even to fancy
that you are tired or tormented, or worn out. Work the mine to the
last. Pump up every drop out of the well. Put money i' thy purse; and
add story after story to that structure of fame, which will enable you
to do as much to that house by the lake side, where I _will_ hope to
see you yet."
* * * * *
He then goes on to speak at considerable length of the society of
Boston, praising it much, yet saying that it is made more charming to
a visitor than to a permanent resident. "In this it differs," he says,
"from almost all the countries I have lived in in Europe, except
Holland."
Speaking of a visit to Washington during the inauguration of General
Harrison, which seems to have delighted him much, he says he travelled
back with a family, "at least with the master and mistress of it,
of whom I must tell you something. Mr. Paige is a merchant, and
brother-in-law of Mr. Webster; Mrs. Paige a niece of Judge Story. From
this double connection with two of the first men in the country their
family associations are particularly agreeable. Mrs. Paige is one of
three sisters, all very handsome, spirited, and full of talent. One is
married to Mr. Webster's eldest son. Another, Mrs. Joy, has for her
husband an idle gentleman, a rare thing in this place. Mrs. Paige was
in Europe two years ago with Mr. and Mrs. Webster senior (the latter
by the bye is a _most_ charming person) and had the advantage of
seeing society in England and France in its best aspect, and is one
who can compare as well as see ... Among the men [of the Boston
society] are Dr. Chinning, a prophet in our country, a pamphleteer
in his own; Bancroft, _the_ historian of America, a man of superior
talents and great agreeability, but a black sheep in society, on
account of his Van Buren politics, against whom the white sheep of the
Whig party will not rub themselves; Prescott, the author of _Ferdinand
and Isabella_, a handsome, half blind shunner of the vanities of the
world, with some others, who read and write a good deal, and no one
the wiser for it. Edward Everett is in Italy, where you will surely
meet him [we saw a good deal of him]. He is rather formal than
cold, if all I hear whispered of him be true; of elegant taste in
literature, though not of easy manners, and altogether an admirable
specimen of an American orator and scholar. At Cambridge, three miles
off, we have Judge Story, of the Supreme Court, eloquent, deeply
learned, garrulous, lively, amiable, excellent in all and every way
that a mortal can be. He is decidedly the gem of this western world.
Mr. Webster is now settled at Washington, though here at this moment
on a visit to Mrs. Paige. Among our neighbouring notabilities is John
Quincy Adams, an ex-President of the United States, ex-Minister at
half the courts in Europe, and now at seventy-five, a simple Member of
Congress, hard as a piece of granite, and cold as a lump of ice."
Speaking of his having very frequently appeared at public meetings
during the first year of his Consulship, and of his having since that
refrained from such appearances, he continues: "I was doubtful as to
the way my being so much _en evidence_ might be relished _at home_. Of
late public matters have been on so ticklish a footing, that all the
less a British functionary was seen the better.
"In literature I have done nothing barring a couple of articles on
Ireland and the Irish in America, a subject I have much at heart.
But much as I feel for them and with them, I refused dining with my
countrymen on St. Patrick's Day because they had the _gaucherie_ (of
which I had previous notice), to turn the festive meeting into a
political one, by giving 'O'Connell and success to repeal' as one of
their 'regular' toasts, and by leaving out the Queen's health, which
they gave when I dined with them last year."
Then after detailed notices of the movements of his sons, he goes on:
"We have many plans in perspective, Niagara, Canada, Halifax, the
mountains, the springs, the sea; the result of which you shall know as
soon as we receive a true and faithful account of your adventures in
just as many pages as you can afford; but Tom must in the meantime
send me a long letter ... Tell Tom I have half resolved to give up
punning and take to repartee. A young fellow said to me the other day,
'Ah! Mr. Consul (as I am always called), I wish I could discover a
new pleasure.' 'Try virtue!' was my reply. A pompous ex-Governor said
swaggeringly to me at the last dinner party at which I assisted,
'Well, Mr. Consul, I suppose you Europeans think us semi-civilised
here in America?' 'Almost!' said I. Now ask Tom if that was not pretty
considerable smart. But assure him at the same time, it is nothing at
all to what I _could_ do in the way of impertinence! Need I say how
truly and affectionately we all love you?
"T.C. GRATTAN."
* * * * *
I wrote back that I would enter the lists with him in the matter of
impertinence; and as a sample told him that I thought he had better
return to the punning.
I could, I doubt not, find among my mother's papers some further
letters that might be worth printing or quoting. But my waning space
warns me that I must not indulge myself with doing so.