Transcribed from the 1901 Macmillan and Co. edition by David Price, email
ccx074@pglaf.org
LETTERS OF EDWARD FITZGERALD
IN TWO VOLUMES
VOL. II
London
MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
NEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
1901
_All rights reserved_
_First Edition_ 1894. _Reprinted_ 1901
{The "Little Grange," Woodbridge: p0.jpg}
LETTERS OF EDWARD FITZGERALD
_To E. B. Cowell_.
88 GT. PORTLAND ST., LONDON,
_Jan._ 13/59.
MY DEAR COWELL,
I have been here some five weeks: but before my Letter reaches you shall
probably have slid back into the Country somewhere. This is my old
Lodging, but new numbered. I have been almost alone here: having seen
even Spedding and Donne but two or three times. They are well and go on
as before. Spedding has got out the seventh volume of Bacon, I believe:
with Capital Prefaces to Henry VII., etc. But I have not yet seen it.
After vol. viii. (I think) there is to be a Pause: till Spedding has set
the Letters to his Mind. Then we shall see what he can make of his
Blackamoor. . . .
I am almost ashamed to write to you, so much have I forsaken Persian, and
even all good Books of late. There is no one now to 'prick the Sides of
my Intent'; Vaulting Ambition having long failed to do so! I took my
Omar from Fraser [? Parker], as I saw he didn't care for it; and also I
want to enlarge it to near as much again, of such Matter as he would not
dare to put in Fraser. If I print it, I shall do the impudence of
quoting your Account of Omar, and your Apology for his Freethinking: it
is not wholly my Apology, but you introduced him to me, and your excuse
extends to that which you have not ventured to quote, and I do. I like
your Apology extremely also, allowing its Point of View. I doubt you
will repent of ever having showed me the Book. I should like well to
have the Lithograph Copy of Omar which you tell of in your Note. My
Translation has its merit: but it misses a main one in Omar, which I will
leave you to find out. The Latin Versions, if they were corrected into
decent Latin, would be very much better. . . . I have forgotten to write
out for you a little Quatrain which Binning found written in Persepolis;
the Persian Tourists having the same propensity as English to write their
Names and Sentiments on their national Monuments. {2}
* * * * *
In the early part of 1859 his friend William Browne was terribly injured
by his horse falling upon him and lingered in great agony for several
weeks.
_To W. B. Donne_.
GOLDINGTON, BEDFORD.
_March_ 26 [1859].
MY DEAR DONNE,
Your folks told you on what Errand I left your house so abruptly. I was
not allowed to see W. B. the day I came: nor yesterday till 3 p.m.; when,
poor fellow, he tried to write a line to me, like a child's! and I went,
and saw, no longer the gay Lad, nor the healthy Man, I had known: but a
wreck of all that: a Face like Charles I. (after decapitation almost)
above the Clothes: and the poor shattered Body underneath lying as it had
lain eight weeks; such a case as the Doctor says he had never known.
Instead of the light utterance of other days too, came the slow painful
syllables in a far lower Key: and when the old familiar words, 'Old
Fellow--Fitz'--etc., came forth, so spoken, I broke down too in spite of
foregone Resolution.
They thought he'd die last Night: but this Morning he is a little better:
but no hope. He has spoken of me in the Night, and (if he wishes) I
shall go again, provided his Wife and Doctor approve. But it agitates
him: and Tears he could not wipe away came to his Eyes. The poor Wife
bears up wonderfully.
_To E. B. Cowell_.
GELDESTONE HALL, BECCLES.
_April_ 27 [1859]
MY DEAR COWELL,
Above is the Address you had better direct to in future. I have had a
great Loss. W. Browne was fallen upon and half crushed by his horse near
three months ago: and though the Doctors kept giving hopes while he lay
patiently for two months in a condition no one else could have borne for
a Fortnight, at last they could do no more, nor Nature neither: and he
sunk. I went to see him before he died--the comely spirited Boy I had
known first seven and twenty years ago lying all shattered and Death in
his Face and Voice. . . .
Well, this is so: and there is no more to be said about it. It is one of
the things that reconcile me to my own stupid Decline of Life--to the
crazy state of the world--Well--no more about it.
I sent you poor old Omar who has _his_ kind of Consolation for all these
Things. I doubt you will regret you ever introduced him to me. And yet
you would have me print the original, with many worse things than I have
translated. The Bird Epic might be finished at once: but 'cui bono?' No
one cares for such things: and there are doubtless so many better things
to care about. I hardly know why I print any of these things, which
nobody buys; and I scarce now see the few I give them to. But when one
has done one's best, and is sure that that best is better than so many
will take pains to do, though far from the best that _might be done_, one
likes to make an end of the matter by Print. I suppose very few People
have ever taken such Pains in Translation as I have: though certainly not
to be literal. But at all Cost, a Thing must _live_: with a transfusion
of one's own worse Life if one can't retain the Original's better. Better
a live Sparrow than a stuffed Eagle. I shall be very well pleased to see
the new MS. of Omar. I shall _one day_ (if I live) print the 'Birds,'
and a strange experiment on old Calderon's two great Plays; and then shut
up Shop in the Poetic Line. Adieu: Give my love to the Lady: and believe
me yours very truly E. F. G.
You see where those Persepolitan Verses {5} come from. I wonder you were
not startled with the metre, though maimed a bit.
_To T. Carlyle_.
GELDESTONE HALL, BECCLES.
_June_ 20/59.
DEAR CARLYLE,
Very soon after I called and saw Mrs. Carlyle I got a violent cold, which
(being neglected) flew to my Ears, and settled into such a Deafness I
couldn't hear the Postman knock nor the Omnibus roll. When I began
(after more than a Month) to begin recovering of this (though still so
deaf as to determine not to be a Bore to any one else) I heard from
Bedford that my poor W. Browne (who got you a Horse some fifteen years
ago) had been fallen on and crushed all through the middle Body by one of
his own: and I then kept expecting every Postman's knock was to announce
his Death. He kept on however in a shattered Condition which the Doctors
told me scarce any one else would have borne a Week; kept on for near two
Months, and then gave up his honest Ghost. I went to bid him Farewell:
and then came here (an Address you remember), only going to Lowestoft (on
the Sea) to entertain my old George Crabbe's two Daughters, who, now
living inland, are glad of a sight of the old German Sea, and also
perhaps of poor Me. I return to Lowestoft (for a few days only)
to-morrow, and shall perhaps see the Steam of your Ship passing the
Shore. I have always been wanting to sail to Scotland: but my old Fellow-
traveller is gone! His Accident was the more vexatious as quite
unnecessary--so to say--returning quietly from Hunting. But there's no
use talking of it. Your Destinies and Silences have settled it.
I really had wished to go and see Mrs. Carlyle again: I won't say you,
because I don't think in your heart you care to be disturbed; and I am
glad to believe that, with all your Pains, you are better than any of us,
I do think. You don't care what one thinks of your Books: you know I
love so many: I don't care so much for Frederick so far as he's gone: I
suppose you don't neither. I was thinking of you the other Day reading
in Aubrey's Wiltshire how he heard Cromwell one Day at Dinner (I think)
at Hampton Court say that Devonshire showed the best Farming of any Part
of England he had been in. Did you know all the Dawson Turner Letters?
I see Spedding directs your Letter: which is nearly all I see of his MS.:
though he would let me see enough of it if there were a good Turn to be
done.
Please to give my best Remembrances to Mrs. Carlyle, and believe me yours
sincerely,
EDWARD FITZGERALD.
_To Mrs. Charles Allen_.
LOWESTOFT, _October_ 16/59.
MY DEAR MRS. ALLEN,
In passing through London a week ago I found a very kind letter from you
directed to my London Lodging. This will explain why it has not been
sooner answered. As I do not know _your_ Address, I take the Opportunity
of enclosing my Reply to John Allen, of whom I have not heard since May.
I have been in these Suffolk and Norfolk Parts ever since I left London
in March to see my poor Lad die in Bedford. The Lad I first met in the
Tenby Lodging house twenty-seven years ago--not sixteen then--and now
broken to pieces and scarce conscious, after two months such suffering as
the Doctor told me scarce any one would have borne for a Fortnight. They
never told him it was all over with him until [within] ten Days of Death:
though every one else seem'd to _know_ it must be so--and he did not wish
to die yet.
I won't write more of a Matter that you can have but little Interest in,
and that I am as well not thinking about. I came here partly to see his
Widow, and so (as I hope) to avoid having to go to Bedford for the
Present. She, though a wretchedly sickly woman, and within two months of
her confinement when he died, has somehow weathered it all beyond
Expectation. She has her children to attend to, and be her comfort in
turn: and though having lost what most she loved yet has something to
love still, and to be beloved by. There are worse Conditions than that.
I am not going to be long here: but hope to winter somewhere in Suffolk
(London very distasteful now)--But here again:--my good Hostess with whom
I have lodged in Suffolk is dead too: and I must wait till _that_
Household settles down a little.
If it ever gives you pleasure to write to me, it gives me real Pleasure
to hear of you: and I am sincerely grateful for your kind Remembrance of
me.
'Geldestone Hall--Beccles' or 'Farlingay Hall, Woodbridge,' are pretty
sure Addresses. Please to remember me kindly to your Husband and believe
me
Yours very sincerely,
EDWD FITZGERALD.
BATH HOUSE, LOWESTOFT.
_October_ 26 [1859].
DEAR MRS. ALLEN,
I must thank you for your so kind Letter, and kind Invitation. But if I
was but five Days with my old College Friend after twelve years' Promise,
and then didn't go just on to Teignmouth to see my Sister, and her
Family, I must not talk of going elsewhere--even to Prees--where John is
always good enough to be asking me: even in a Letter To day received.
By the way, Last Saturday at Norwich while I was gazing into a Shop, a
Woman's Voice said, 'How d' ye do, Mr. FitzGerald?' I looked up: a young
Woman too, whom (of course) I didn't know. 'You don't remember me,
Andalusia Allen that was!' Now Mrs. Day. I had not seen her since '52,
a Girl of, I suppose, twelve, playing some Character in a Family Play.
John's Letter too tells me of his son going to College.
But Tenby--I don't remember a pleasanter Place. I can now hear the Band
on the Steamer as it left the little Pier for Bristol, the Steamer that
brought me and the poor Boy now in his Grave to that Boardinghouse. It
was such weather as now howls about this Lodging when one of those poor
starved Players was drowned on the Sands, and was carried past our
Windows after Dinner: I often remember the dull Trot of Men up the windy
Street, and our running to the Window, and the dead Head, hair, and
Shoulders hurried past. That was Tragedy, poor Fellow, whatever Parts he
had played before.
I think you remember me with Kindness because accidentally associated
with your old Freestone in those pleasant Days, that also were among the
last of your Sister's Life. Her too I can see, with her China-rose
complexion: in the Lilac Gown she wore.
I keep on here from Week to week, partly because no other Place offers:
but I almost doubt if I shall be here beyond next week. Not in this
Lodging anyhow: which is wretchedly 'rafty' and cold; lets the Rain in
when it Rains: and the Dust of the Shore when it drives: as both have
been doing by turns all Yesterday and To day. I was cursing all this as
I was shivering here by myself last Night: and in the Morning I hear of
three Wrecks off the Sands, and indeed meet five shipwreckt Men with a
Troop of Sailors as I walk out before Breakfast. Oh Dear!
Please remember me to your 'Gude Man' and believe me yours truly,
E. F. G.
Pray do excuse all this Blotting: my Paper _won't_ dry To day.
_To W. H. Thompson_.
10 MARINE TERRACE, LOWESTOFT.
_Nov._ 27, 1859.
MY DEAR THOMPSON,
After a Fortnight's Visit to my Sister's (where I caught Cold which flew
at once to my Ears, and there hangs) I returned hither, as the nearest
Place to go to, and here shall be till Christmas at all Events. I wish
to avoid London this winter: and indeed seem almost to have done with it,
except for a Day's Business or Sightseeing every now and then. Often
should I like to roam about old Cambridge, and hear St. Mary's Chimes at
Midnight--but--but! This Place of course is dull enough: but here's the
Old Sea (a dirty Dutch one, to be sure) and Sands, and Sailors, a very
fine Race of Men, far superior to those in Regent Street. Also the
Dutchmen (an ugly set whom I can't help liking for old Neighbours) come
over in their broad Bottoms and take in Water at a Creek along the Shore.
But I believe the East winds get very fierce after Christmas, when the
Sea has cooled down. You won't come here, to be sure: or I should be
very glad to smoke a Cigar, and have a Chat: and would take care to have
a Fire in your Bedroom this time: a Negligence I was very sorry for in
London.
I read, or was told, they wouldn't let old Alfred's Bust into your
Trinity. They are right, I think, to let no one in there (as it should
be in Westminster Abbey) till a Hundred Years are past; when, after too
much Admiration (perhaps) and then a Reaction of undue Dis-esteem, Men
have settled into some steady Opinion on the subject: supposing always
that the Hero survives so long, which of itself goes so far to decide the
Question. No doubt A. T. will do _that_.
_To W. F. Pollock_.
10 MARINE TERRACE,
LOWESTOFT.
_Febr._ 23/60.
MY DEAR POLLOCK,
'Me voila ici' still! having weathered it out so long. No bad Place, I
assure you, though you who are accustomed to Pall Mall, Clubs, etc.,
wouldn't like it. Mudie finds one out easily: and the London Library
too: and altogether I can't complain of not getting such drowsy Books as
I want. Hakluyt lasted a long while: then came Captain Cook, whom I
hadn't read since I was a Boy, and whom I was very glad to see again. But
he soon evaporates in his large Type Quartos. I can hardly manage
Emerson Tennent's Ceylon: a very dry Catalogue Raisonnee of the Place. A
little Essay of De Quincey's gave me a better Idea of it (as I suppose)
in some twenty or thirty pages. Anyhow, I prefer Lowestoft, considering
the Snakes, Sand-leaches, Mosquitos, etc. I suppose Russell's Indian
Diary is over-coloured: but I feel sure it's true in the Main: and he has
the Art to make one feel in the thick of it; quite enough in the Thick,
however. Sir C. Napier came here to try and get the Beachmen to enlist
in the Naval Reserve. Not one would go: they won't give up their
Independence: and so really half starve here during Winter. Then Spring
comes and they go and catch the Herrings which, if left alone, would
multiply by Millions by Autumn: and so kill their Golden Goose. They are
a strange set of Fellows. I think a Law ought to be made against their
Spring Fishing: more important, for their own sakes, than Game Laws.
I laid out half a crown on your Fraser {13}: and liked much of it very
much: especially the Beginning about the Advantage the Novelist has over
the Play-writer. A little too much always about Miss Austen, whom yet I
think quite capital in a Circle I have found quite unendurable to walk
in. Thackeray's first Number was famous, I thought: his own little
Roundabout Paper so pleasant: but the Second Number, I say, lets the
Cockney in already: about Hogarth: Lewes is vulgar: and I don't think one
can care much for Thackeray's Novel. He is always talking so of himself,
too. I have been very glad to find I could take to a Novel again, in
Trollope's Barchester Towers, etc.: not perfect, like Miss Austen: but
then so much wider Scope: and perfect enough to make me feel I know the
People though caricatured or carelessly drawn. I doubt if you can read
my writing here: or whether it will be worth your Pains to do so. If you
can, or can not, one Day write me a Line, which I will read. I suppose
when the Fields and Hedges begin to grow green I shall move a little
further inland to be among them.
_To Mrs. Charles Allen_.
FARLINGAY: WOODBRIDGE,
_June_ 2/60.
DEAR MRS. ALLEN,
Your kind Note has reacht me here after a Fortnight's abode at my old
Lodgings in London. In London I have not been for more than a year,
unless passing through it in September, and have no thought of going up
at present. I don't think you were there last Spring, were you? Or
perhaps I was gone before you arrived, as I generally used to get off as
soon as it began to fill, and the Country to become amiable. Here at
last we have the 'May' coming out: there it is on some Thorns before my
Windows, and the Tower of Woodbridge Church beyond: and beyond that some
low Hills that stretch with Furze and Broom to the Seaside, about ten
miles off.
I am of course glad of so good a Report of John Allen. I have long been
thinking of writing to him: among other things to give his Wife a Drawing
Laurence made of him for me some four and twenty years ago: in full
Canonicals--very serious--I think a capital Likeness on the whole, and
one that I take pleasure to look at. But I think his Wife and Children
have more title to it: and one never can tell what will become of one's
Things when one's dead. This same Drawing is now in London (I hope: for,
if not, it's lost) and you should see it if you had a mind. For you
don't seem to find your way to Frees any more than I do: I should go if
there weren't a large Family. Mrs. John is always very kind to me. I do
think it is very kind of you too to remember and write to me: at any rate
I do answer Letters, which many better Men don't.
Please to remember me to your Husband: and believe me unforgetful of the
Good old Days, and of you, and yours,
EDWARD FITZGERALD.
FARLINGAY: WOODBRIDGE,
_Septr._ 9/60.
MY DEAR MRS. ALLEN,
It is very kind of you to write to me. Ah! how I can fancy the
Stillness, and the Colour, of your pretty Tenby!--now eight and twenty
years since seen! But I can't summon Resolution to go to it: and daily
get worse and worse at moving any where, a common Fate as we grow older.
Your Note came in an Enclosure from your Cousin John, who seems to
flourish with Wife and Children. It is Children who keep alive one's
Interest in Life: that is to say, if one happens to like one's Children.
I have had to stay with me the two sons of my poor Friend killed last
year: he whom I first made Acquaintance with at your very Tenby. As I
haven't found Courage to go to their Country, their Mother would have
them come here, and I took them to _our_ Seaside; not a beautiful Coast
like yours--no Rocks, no Sands, and few Trees--but yet liked because
remembered by me as long as I can remember. Anyhow, there are Ships,
Boats, and Sailors: and the Boys were well pleased with all that. The
place we went to is _called Aldborough_: _spelt_ Aldeburgh: and is the
Birth place of the Poet Crabbe, who also has _Daguerrotyped_ much of the
Character of the Place in his Poems. You send me some Lines about the
Sea: what if I return you four of his?
Still as I gaze upon the Sea I find
Its waves an Image of my restless mind:
_Here_ Thought on Thought: _there_ Wave on Wave succeeds,
Their Produce--idle Thought and idle Weeds!
Adieu: please to remember me to your Husband: and believe me yours ever
very sincerely,
EDWARD FITZGERALD.
_To George Crabbe_.
MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE,
_Decr._ 28/60.
MY DEAR GEORGE,
. . . I forgot to tell you I really ran to London three weeks ago: by the
morning Express, and was too glad to rush back by the Evening Ditto. I
went up for a Business I of course did not accomplish: did not call on,
or see, a Friend: couldn't get into the National Gallery: and didn't care
a straw for Holman Hunt's Picture. No doubt, there is Thought and Care
in it: but what an outcome of several Years and sold for several
Thousands! What Man with the Elements of a Great Painter could come out
with such a costive Thing after so long waiting! Think of the Acres of
Canvas Titian or Reynolds would have covered with grand Outlines and deep
Colours in the Time it has taken to niggle this Miniature! The Christ
seemed to me only a wayward Boy: the Jews, Jews no doubt: the Temple I
dare say very correct in its Detail: but think of even Rembrandt's Woman
in Adultery at the National Gallery; a much smaller Picture, but how much
vaster in Space and Feeling! Hunt's Picture stifled me with its
Littleness. I think Ruskin must see what his System has led to.
I have just got Lady Waterford's 'Babes in the Wood,' which are well
enough, pretty in Colour: only, why has she made so bad a Portrait of one
of her chief Performers, whose Likeness is so easily got at, the Robin
Redbreast? This Lady Waterford was at Gillingham this Summer: and my
Sister Eleanor said (as Thackeray had done) she was something almost to
worship for unaffected Dignity.
MARKET-HILL, WOODBRIDGE.
_Whit-Monday_ [_May_ 20, 1861].
MY DEAR GEORGE,
. . . I take pleasure in my new little Boat: and last week went with her
to Aldbro'; and she '_behaved_' very well both going and returning;
though, to be sure, there was not much to try her Temper. I am so glad
of this fine Whit-Monday, when so many Holiday-makers will enjoy
_their_selves, and so many others make a little money by their Enjoyment.
Our 'Rifles' are going to march to Grundisburgh, _manuring_ and
_skrimmaging_ as they go, and also (as the Captain {18} hopes)
recruiting. He is a right good little Fellow, I do believe. It is a
shame the Gentry hereabout are so indifferent in the Matter: they
subscribe next to nothing: and give absolutely nothing in the way of
Entertainment or Attention to the Corps. But we are split up into the
pettiest possible Squirarchy, who want to make the utmost of their little
territory: cut down all the Trees, level all the old Violet Banks, and
stop up all the Footways they can. The old pleasant way from Hasketon to
Bredfield is now a Desert. I was walking it yesterday and had the
pleasure of breaking down and through some Bushes and Hurdles put to
block up a fallen Stile. I thought what your Father would have said of
it all. And really it is the sad ugliness of our once pleasant Fields
that half drives me to the Water where the Power of the Squirarchy stops!
_To E. B. Cowell_.
MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE:
_May_ 22/61.
MY DEAR COWELL,
I receive two Books, via Geldestone, from you: Khold-i-barin (including a
Lecture of your own) and 'Promises of Christianity': I think directed in
your Wife's hand. The Lecture was, I doubt not, very well adapted to its
purpose: the other two Publications I must look at by and bye. I can't
tell you how indolent I have become about Books: some Travels and
Biographies from Mudie are nearly all I read now. Then, I have only been
in London some dozen hours these two years past: my last Expedition was
this winter for five hours: when I ran home here like a beaten Dog. So I
have little to tell you of Friends as of Books. Spedding hammers away at
his Bacon (impudently forestalled by H. Dixon's Book). Carlyle is not so
up to work as of old (I hear). Indeed, he wrote me he was ill last
Summer, and obliged to cut Frederick and be off to Scotland and Idleness:
the Doctors warned him of Congestion of Brain: a warning he scorned. But
what more likely? The last account I had of Alfred Tennyson from Mrs. A.
was a good one. Frederic T. is settled at Jersey. I cannot make up my
mind to go to see any of these good, noble men: I only hope they believe
I do not forget, or cease to regard them.
My chief Amusement in Life is Boating, on River and Sea. The Country
about here is the Cemetery of so many of my oldest Friends: and the petty
race of Squires who have succeeded only use the Earth for an
_Investment_: cut down every old Tree: level every Violet Bank: and make
the old Country of my Youth hideous to me in my Decline. There are fewer
Birds to be heard, as fewer Trees for them to resort to. So I get to the
Water: where Friends are not buried nor Pathways stopt up: but all is, as
the Poets say, as Creation's Dawn beheld. I am happiest going in my
little Boat round the Coast to Aldbro', with some Bottled Porter and some
Bread and Cheese, and some good rough Soul who works the Boat and chews
his Tobacco in peace. An Aldbro' Sailor talking of my Boat said--'She go
like a Wiolin, she do!' What a pretty Conceit, is it not? As the Bow
slides over the Strings in a liquid Tune. Another man was talking
yesterday of a great Storm: 'and, in a moment, all as calm as a Clock.'
By the bye, Forby reasons that our Suffolk third person singular 'It go,
etc.,' is probably right as being the old Icelandic form. Why should the
3rd p. sing. be the only one that varies. And in the auxiliaries _May_,
_Shall_, _Can_, etc., there _is_ no change for the 3rd pers. I incline
to the Suffolk because of its avoiding a hiss.
_To George Crabbe_.
MARKET-HILL, WOODBRIDGE.
_June_ 4/61.
MY DEAR GEORGE,
Let me know when you come into these Parts, and be sure I shall be glad
to entertain you as well as I can if you come while I am here. Nor am I
likely to be away further than Aldbro', so far as I see. I do meditate
crossing one fine Day to Holland: to see the Hague, Paul Potter, and some
Rembrandt at Rotterdam. This, however, is not to be done in my little
Boat: but in some Trader from Ipswich. I also talk of a cruise to
Edinburgh in one of their Schooners. But both these Excursions I reserve
for such hot weather as may make a retreat from the Town agreeable. I
make no advances to Farlingay, because (as yet) we have not had any such
Heat as to bake the Houses here: and, beside, I am glad to be by the
River. It is strange how sad the Country has become to me. I went
inland to see Acton's Curiosities before the Auction: and was quite glad
to get back to the little Town again. I am quite clear I must live the
remainder of my Life in a Town: but a little one, and with a strip of
Garden to saunter in. . . .
I go sometimes to see the Rifles drill, and shoot at their Target, and
have got John {22} to ask them up to Boulge to practise some day: I must
insinuate that he should offer them some Beer when they get there. It is
a shame the Squires do nothing in the matter: take no Interest: offer no
Encouragement, beyond a Pound or two in Money. And who are those who
have most interest at stake in case of Rifles being really wanted? But I
am quite assured that this Country is dying, as other Countries die, as
Trees die, atop first. The lower Limbs are making all haste to follow. . . .
By the bye, don't let me forget to ask you to bring with you my Persian
Dictionary in case you come into these Parts. I read very very little:
and get very desultory: but when Winter comes again must take to some
dull Study to keep from Suicide, I suppose. The River, the Sea, etc.,
serve to divert one now.
Adieu. These long Letters prove one's Idleness.
_To R. C. Trench_. {23a}
MARKET-HILL, WOODBRIDGE.
_July_ 3/61.
DEAR DOCTOR TRENCH,
Thank you sincerely for the delightful little Journal {23b} which I had
from you yesterday, and only wished to be a dozen times as long. The
beautiful note at p. 73 speaks of much yet unprinted! It is a pity Mrs.
Kemble had not read p. 79. I thought in the Night of 'the subdued Voice
of Good Sense' and 'The Eye that invites you to look into it.' I doubt I
can read, more or less attentively, most personal Memoirs: but I am
equally sure of the superiority of this, in its Shrewdness, Humour,
natural Taste, and Good Breeding. One is sorry for the account of Lord
Nelson: but one cannot doubt it. It was at the time when he was
intoxicated, I suppose, with Glory and Lady Hamilton. What your Mother
says of the Dresden Madonna reminds me of what Tennyson once said: that
the Attitude of The Child was that of a Man: but perhaps not the less
right for all that. As to the Countenance, he said that scarce any Man's
Face could look so grave and rapt as a Baby's could at times. He once
said of his own Child's, 'He was a whole hour this morning worshipping
the Sunshine playing on the Bedpost.' He never writes Letters or
Journals: but I hope People will be found to remember some of the things
he has said as naturally as your Mother wrote them. {24}
_To W. H. Thompson_.
MARKET-HILL, WOODBRIDGE.
_July_ 15/61.
MY DEAR THOMPSON,
I was very glad to hear of you again. You need never take it to
Conscience, not answering my Letters, further than that I really do want
to hear you are well, and where you are, and what doing, from time to
time. I have absolutely nothing to tell about myself, not having moved
from this place since I last wrote, unless to our Sea coast at Aldbro',
whither I run, or sail, from time to time to idle with the Sailors in
their Boats or on their Beach. I love their childish ways: but they too
degenerate. As to reading, my Studies have lain chiefly in some back
Volumes of the New Monthly Magazine and some French Memoirs. Trench was
good enough to send me a little unpublished Journal by his Mother: a very
pretty thing indeed. I suppose he did this in return for one or two
Papers on Oriental Literature which Cowell had sent me from India, and
which I thought might interest Trench. I am very glad to hear old
Spedding is really getting _his_ Share of Bacon into Print: I doubt if it
will be half as good as the '_Evenings_,' where Spedding was in the
_Passion_ which is wanted to fill his Sail for any longer Voyage.
I have not seen his Paper on English Hexameters {25} which you tell me
of: but I will now contrive to do so. I, however, believe in them: and I
think the ever-recurring attempts that way show there is some ground for
such belief. To be sure, the Philosopher's Stone, and the Quadrature of
the Circle, have had at least as many Followers. . . .
It was finding some Bits of Letters and Poems of old Alfred's that made
me wish to restore those I gave you to the number, as marking a by-gone
time to me. That they will not so much do to you, who did not happen to
save them from the Fire when the Volumes of 1842 were printing. But I
would waive that if you found it good or possible to lay them up in
Trinity Library in the Closet with Milton's! Otherwise, I would still
look at them now and then for the few years I suppose I have to live. . . .
This is a terribly long Letter: but, if it be legible sufficiently, will
perhaps do as if I were spinning it in talk under the walls of the
Cathedral. I dare not now even talk of going any visits: I can truly say
I wish you could drop in here some Summer Day and take a Float with me on
our dull River, which does lead to THE SEA some ten miles off. . .
You must think I have become very nautical, by all this: haul away at
ropes, swear, dance Hornpipes, etc. But it is not so: I simply sit in
Boat or Vessel as in a moving Chair, dispensing a little Grog and Shag to
those who do the work.
_To E. B. Cowell_.
MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE.
_December_ 7/61.
MY DEAR COWELL,
. . . I shall look directly for the passages in Omar and Hafiz which you
refer to and clear up, though I scarce ever see the Persian Character
now. I suppose you would think it a dangerous thing to edit Omar: else,
who so proper? Nay, are you not the only Man to do it? And he certainly
is worth good re-editing. I thought him from the first the most
remarkable of the Persian Poets: and you keep finding out in him
Evidences of logical Fancy which I had not dreamed of. I dare say these
logical Riddles are not his best: but they are yet evidences of a
Strength of mind which our Persian Friends rarely exhibit, I think. I
always said about Cowley, Donne, etc., whom Johnson calls the
metaphysical Poets, that their very Quibbles of Fancy showed a power of
Logic which could follow Fancy through such remote Analogies. This is
the case with Calderon's Conceits also. I doubt I have given but a very
one-sided version of Omar: but what I do only comes up as a Bubble to the
Surface, and breaks: whereas you, with exact Scholarship, might make a
lasting impression of such an Author. So I say of Jelaluddin, whom you
need not edit in Persian, perhaps, unless in selections, which would be
very good work: but you should certainly translate for us some such
selections exactly in the way in which you did that apologue of Azrael.
{27} I don't know the value of the Indian Philosophy, etc., which you
tell me is a fitter exercise for the Reason: but I am sure that you
should give us some of the Persian I now speak of, which you can do all
so easily to yourself; yes, as a holiday recreation, you say, to your
Indian Studies. As to India being 'your Place,' it may be: but as to
your being lost in England, that could not be. You know I do not
flatter. . . .
I declare I should like to go to India as well as any where: and I
believe it might be the best thing for me to do. But, always slow at
getting under way as I have been all my Life, what is to be done with one
after fifty! I am sure there is no longer any great pleasure living in
this Country, so tost with perpetual Alarms as it is. One Day we are all
in Arms about France. To-day we are doubting if To-morrow we may not be
at War to the Knife with America! I say still, as I used, we have too
much Property, Honour, etc., on our Hands: our outward Limbs go on
lengthening while our central Heart beats weaklier: I say, as I used, we
should give up something before it is forced from us. The World, I
think, may justly resent our being and interfering all over the Globe.
Once more I say, would we were a little, peaceful, unambitious, trading,
Nation, like--the Dutch! . . .
Adieu, My Dear Cowell; once more, Adieu. I doubt if you can read what I
have written. Do not forget my Love to your Wife. I wonder if we are
ever to meet again: you would be most disappointed if we were!
_To W. H. Thompson_.
MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE.
_Dec._ 9/61.
MY DEAR THOMPSON,
The MS. came safe to hand yesterday, thank you: and came out of its
Envelope like a Ray of Old Times to my Eyes. I wish I had secured more
leaves from that old '_Butcher's Book_' torn up in old Spedding's Rooms
in 1842 when the Press went to work with, I think, the Last of old
Alfred's Best. But that, I am told, is only a 'Crotchet.' However, had
I taken some more of the Pages that went into the Fire, after serving in
part for Pipe-lights, I might have enriched others with that which AT
{29} himself would scarce have grudged, jealous as he is of such sort of
Curiosity.
I have seen no more of Tannhauser than the Athenaeum showed me; and
certainly do not want to see more. One wonders that Men of some Genius
(as I suppose these are) should so disguise it in Imitation: but, if they
be very young men, this is the natural course, is it not? By and by they
may find their own Footing.
As to my own Peccadilloes in Verse, which never pretend to be original,
this is the story of _Rubaiyat_. I had translated them partly for
Cowell: young Parker asked me some years ago for something for Fraser,
and I gave him the less wicked of these to use if he chose. He kept them
for two years without using: and as I saw he did'nt want them I printed
some copies with Quaritch; and, keeping some for myself, gave him the
rest. Cowell, to whom I sent a Copy, was naturally alarmed at it; he
being a very religious Man: nor have I given any other Copy but to George
Borrow, to whom I had once lent the Persian, and to old Donne when he was
down here the other Day, to whom I was showing a Passage in another Book
which brought my old Omar up.
(end of letter lost.)
MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE.
_March_ 19/62.
MY DEAR THOMPSON,
Thanks for your Letter in the middle of graver occupations. It will give
me very great pleasure if you will come here: but not if you only do so
out of kindness; I mean, if you have no other call of Business or
Pleasure to yourself. For I don't deserve--
You should have sent me some Photograph. I hate them nearly all: but S.
Rice {30} was very good. I wonder you don't turn out well: I suppose,
too black, is it? It is generally florid people, I think, who fail: yet,
strange to say, my Brother Peter has come quite handsome in the Process.
. . .
I am all for a little Flattery in Portraits: that is, so far as, I think,
the Painter or Sculptor should try at something more agreeable than
anything he sees sitting to him: when People look either bored, or
smirking: he should give the best possible Aspect which the Features
before him _might_ wear, even if the Artist had not seen that Aspect.
Especially when he works for Friends or Kinsfolk: for even the plainest
face has looked handsome to them at some happy moment, and just such we
like to have perpetuated.
Now, I really do feel ashamed when you ask about my Persian Translations,
though they are all very well: only very little affairs. I really have
not the face to send to Milnes direct: but I send you four Copies which I
have found in a Drawer here to do as you will with. This will save
Milnes, or any one else, the bore of writing to me to acknowledge it.
My old Boat has been altered, I hope not spoiled; and I shall soon be
preparing for the Water--and Mud. I don't think one can reckon on warm
weather till after the Longest Day: but if you should come before, it
will surely be warm enough to walk, or drive, if not to sail; and Leaves
will be green, if the Tide should be out.
You would almost think I wanted to repay you in Compliment if I told you
I regarded even your hasty Letters as excellent in all respects. I do,
however: but I do not wish you to write one when you are busy or
disinclined.
MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE.
_Sept._ 29/62.
MY DEAR THOMPSON,
'What Cheer, ho!' I somehow fancy that a Line of Nonsense will catch you
before you leave Ely: and yet, now I come to think, you will have left
Ely, probably, and will be returning in another Fortnight to Cambridge
for the Term. Well, I will direct to Cambridge then; and my Note shall
await you there, and you need not answer it till some very happy hour of
Leisure and Inclination. As to Inclination, indeed, I don't think you
will ever have much of that, toward writing such Letters, I mean; what
sensible Man after forty has? You have done so much more (in my Eyes,
and perhaps so much less in your own) coming all this way to see me! I
did wonder at the Goodness of that. I suppose Spedding didn't tell you
that I wrote to him to say so. It was very unlucky I was out when you
came: I have often thought of that with vexation.
Well, I have gone on Boating, etc., just the same ever since. And just
now I have been applying to Spring Rice to use his Influence to get a
larger Buoy laid at the mouth of our River; across which lies a vile Bar
of shifting Sand, and such a little Bit of a Buoy to mark it that we
often almost miss it going in and out, and are in danger of running on
the Shoal; which would break the Boat to Pieces if not drown us. Here is
a fine Piece of Information to a Canon of Ely and Professor of Greek at
Cambridge!
Spring Rice does not speak well, I think, of his health; not at all well;
and his Handwriting looks shaky. What a Loyal Kind Heart it is!
_To W. B. Donne_.
MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE,
_Nov._ 28/62.
MY DEAR DONNE,
I talk indignantly against others bothering you, and do worse than all
myself, I think, what with Bookbindings, Dressing-gowns, etc. (N.B. You
know that the last is only in case when you are going your Rounds to St.
James, etc.) Now I have a little Query to make: which, not being even so
much out of your way, won't I hope trouble you. I remember Thompson
telling me that, from what he had read and seen of Grecian Geography, he
almost thought Clytemnestra's famous Account of the Line of Signal Fires
from Troy to Mycenae to be possible (I mean you know in the Agamemnon).
At least this is what _I believe_ he said: I must not assert from a not
very accurate Memory anything that would compromise a Greek Professor: I
am so ignorant of Geography, ancient as well as modern, I don't know
exactly, or at all, the Points of the Beacons so enumerated: and
Lempriere, the only Classic I have to refer to, doesn't help me in what I
want. Will you turn to the passage, and tell me _what_, and _where_,
are:
1. The [Greek text]--
2. The [Greek text]--
3. The [Greek text].
_What_, _where_, and _why_, so called? The rest I know, or can find in
Dictionary, and Map. But for these--
Lempriere
Is no-where;
Liddell and Scott
Don't help me a jot:
When I'm off, Donnegan
Don't help me _on again_.--
So I'm obliged to resort to old _Donne again_!
Rhyme and Epigram quite worthy of the German.
_To W. H. Thompson_.
Fragment of a Letter written in Nov. 1862.
I took down a Juvenal to look for a Passage about the Loaded Waggon
rolling through the Roman Streets. {34} I couldn't find it. Do you know
where it is? Not that you need answer this Question, which only comes in
as if I were talking to you. I remember asking you whence AEschylus made
his Agamemnon speak of Ulysses as unwilling at first to go on the Trojan
Expedition. I see Paley refers it to some Poem called the Cypria quoted
by Proclus. I was asking Donne the other Day as to some of the names of
the Beacon-places in Clytemnestra's famous Speech: and I then said I
_believed_--but only _believed_, as an inaccurate Man, not wishing to
implicate others--that you, Thompson, had once told me that you thought
the Chain of Fires _might_ have passed from Troy to Mycenae in the way
described--_just possibly_ MIGHT, I think--I assure you I took care not
to commit your Credit by my uncertain Memory, whatever it was you said
was only in a casual way over a Cigar. Are you for [Greek text]? {35a} a
point I don't care a straw about; so don't answer this neither.
No, I didn't go to the Exhibition: which, I know, looks like Affectation:
but was honest Incuriosity and Indolence.
. . . On looking over Juvenal for the Lines I wanted I was amused at the
prosaic Truth of one I didn't want:
Intolerabilius nihil est quam femina dives. {35b}
_To George Crabbe_.
_Dec._ 20, 1862.
MY DEAR GEORGE,
. . . I have been, and am, reading Borrow's 'Wild Wales,' which _I_ like
well, because I can hear him talking it. But I don't know if others will
like it: anyhow there is too much of the same thing. Then what is meant
for the plainest record of Conversation, etc., has such Phrases as 'Marry
come up,' etc., which mar the sense of Authenticity. Then, no one
writing better English than Borrow in general, there is the vile
_Individual_--_Person_--and _Locality_ always cropping up: and even this
vulgar Young Ladyism, 'The Scenery was beautiful _to a Degree_.' _What_
Degree? When did this vile Phrase arise?
_To W. H. Thompson_.
_Good Friday_, 1863.
MY DEAR THOMPSON,
Pray never feel ashamed of not answering my Letters so long as you do
write twice a year, to let me know you live and thrive. As much oftener
as you please: but you are only to be ashamed of not doing that. For
that I really want of all who have been very kind and very constant
('_loyal_' is the word that even Emperors now use of themselves) for so
many years. This I say in all sincerity.
Now, while you talk of being ashamed of not writing, I am rather ashamed
of writing so much to you. Partly because I really have so little to
say; and also because saying that little too often puts you to the shame
you speak of. You say my Letters are pleasant, however: and they will be
so far pleasant if they assure you that I like talking to you in that
way: bad as I am at more direct communication. I can tell you your
letters are very pleasant to me; you at least have always something to
tell of your half-year's Life: and you tell it so wholesomely, I always
say in so capital a Style, as makes me regret you have not written some
of your better Knowledge for the Public. I suppose (as I have heard)
that your Lectures {37} are excellent in this way; I can say I should
like very much to attend a course of them, on the Greek Plays, or on
Plato. I dare say you are right about an Apprenticeship in Red Tape
being necessary to make a Man of Business: but is it too late in Life for
you to buckle to and screw yourself up to condense some of your Lectures
and scholarly Lore into a Book? By 'too late in Life' I mean too late to
take Heart to do it.
I am sure you won't believe that I am _scratching_ you in return for any
scratchings from your hands. We are both too old, too sensible, and too
independent, I think, for that sort of thing.
As to my going to Ely in June, I don't know yet what to say; for I have
been Fool enough to order a Boat to be building which will cost me 350
pounds, and she talks of being launched in the very first week of June,
and I have engaged for some short trips in her as soon as she is afloat.
I begin to feel tired of her already; I felt I should when I was
persuaded to order her: and that is the Folly of it. They say it is a
very bad Thing to do Nothing: but I am sure that is not the case with
those who are born to Blunder; I always find that I have to repent of
what I have done, not what I have left undone; and poor W. Browne used to
say it was better even to repent of what [was] undone than done. You
know how glad I should be if you came here: but I haven't the Face to ask
it, especially after that misfit last Summer; which was not my fault
however.
I always look upon old Spedding's as one of the most wasted Lives I know:
and he is a wise Man! Twenty years ago I told him that he should knock
old Bacon off; I don't mean give him up, but wind him up at far less
sacrifice of Time and Labour; and edit Shakespeare. I think it _would_
have been worth his Life to have done those two; and I am always
persuaded his Bacon would have been better if done more at a heat. I
shall certainly buy the new Shakespeare you tell me of, if the Volumes
aren't bulky; which destroys my pleasure in the use of a Book.
I have had my share of Influenza: even this Woodbridge, with all its
capital Air and self-contented Stupidity (which you know is very
conducive to long Life) has been wheezing and coughing all the very mild
winter; and the Bell of the Tower opposite my Room has been tolling
oftener than I ever remember.
Though I can't answer for _June_, I am really meditating a small trip to
Wiltshire _before_ June; mainly to see the daughters of my old George
Crabbe who are settled at Bradford on Avon, and want very much that I
should see how happily they live on very small means indeed. And I must
own I am the more tempted to go abroad because there is preparation for a
Marriage in my Family (a Niece--but not one of my Norfolk Nieces) which
is to be at my Brother's near here; and there will be a Levee of People,
who drop in here, etc. This may blow over, however.
Now I ought to be ashamed of this long Letter: don't you make me so by
answering it.
Ever yours, E. F. G.
_To George Crabbe_.
WOODBRIDGE, _June_ 8/63.
MY DEAR GEORGE,
Your sister wrote me a very kind Letter to tell of her safe Return home.
I must repeat to you very sincerely that I never recollect to have passed
a pleasanter week. As far as Company went, it was like Old Times at
Bredfield; and the Oak-trees were divine! I never expected to care so
very much for Trees, nor for your flat Country: but I really feel as one
who has bathed in Verdure. I suppose Town-living makes one alive to such
a Change.
I spent a long Day with Thompson: {40} and much liked the painted Roof.
On Thursday I went to Lynn: which I took a Fancy to: the odd old Houses:
the Quay: the really grand Inn (Duke's Head, in the Market place) and the
civil, Norfolk-talking, People. I went to Hunstanton, which is rather
dreary: one could see the Country at Sandringham was good. I enquired
fruitlessly about those Sandringham Pictures, etc.: even the Auctioneer,
whom I found in the Bar of the Inn, could tell nothing of where they had
gone.
_To W. B. Donne_.
MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE.
_Sat. July_ 18/63.
MY DEAR DONNE,
. . . I can hardly tell you whether I am much pleased with my new Boat;
for I hardly know myself. She is (as I doubted would be from the first)
rather awkward in our narrow River; but then she was to be a good Sea-
boat; and I don't know but she is; and will be better in all ways when we
have got her in proper trim. Yesterday we gave her what they call '_a
tuning_' in a rather heavy swell round Orford Ness: and she did well
without a reef, etc. But, now all is got, I don't any the more want to
go far away by Sea, any more than by Land; having no Curiosity left for
other Places, and glad to get back to my own Chair and Bed after three or
four Days' Absence. So long as I get on the Sea from time to time, it is
much the same to me whether off Aldbro' or Penzance. And I find I can't
sleep so well on board as I used to do thirty years ago: and not to get
one's Sleep, you know, indisposes one more or less for the Day. However,
we talk of Dover, Folkestone, Holland, etc., which will give one's
sleeping Talents a _tuning_.