* * * * *

[Sidenote: Type of her face.]

The face was one of a group of four, ... all of the same spiritual

family, and with a curious interdependence of likeness. These four

are Dante, Savonarola, Cardinal Newman and herself.... In the group

of which George Eliot was one, there is the same straight wall of

brow; the droop of the powerful nose; mobile lips, touched with strong

passion kept resolutely under control; a square jaw, which would make

the face stern were it not counteracted by the sweet smile of lips and

eye.

We can hardly hope that posterity will ever know her from likenesses

as those who had the honor of her acquaintance knew her in life. The

two or three portraits that exist, though valuable, give but a very

imperfect presentment. The mere shape of the head would be the despair

of any painter. It was so grand and massive that it would scarcely be

possible to represent it without giving the idea of disproportion to

the frame, of which no one ever thought for a moment when they saw her,

although it was a surprise, when she stood up, to see that, after all,

she was but a little fragile woman who bore this weight of brow and

brain.

C. KEGAN PAUL: ‘George Eliot.’

* * * * *

[Sidenote: Her appearance described.]

[Sidenote: Conversation.]

... Her face, instead of beauty, possessed a sweet benignity, and

at times flashed into absolute brilliancy. She was older than I had

imagined, for her hair, once fair, was gray, and unmistakable lines

of care and thought were on the low, broad brow.... Dressed in black

velvet, with point lace on her hair, and repeated at throat and wrists,

she made me think at once of Romola and Dorothea Brooke.... She talked

as she wrote; in descriptive passages, with the same sort of humor, and

the same manner of linking events by analogy and inference.

[Sidenote: Her surroundings.]

The walls were covered with pictures. I remember Guido’s Aurora,

Michael Angelo’s prophets, Raphael’s sibyls, while all about were

sketches, landscapes and crayon drawings, gifts from the most famous

living painters, many of whom are friends of the house. A grand piano,

open and covered with music, indicated recent and continual use.

MRS. ANNIE DOWNS: ‘A Visit to George Eliot.’ _The Congregationalist_,

May 28th, 1879.

* * * * *

[Sidenote: Account of a visit to George Eliot.]

[Sidenote: Her gracious welcome.]

[Sidenote: Her voice.]

No one who had ever seen her could mistake the large head (her brain

must be heavier than most men’s) covered with a mass of rich auburn

hair. At first I thought her tall; for one could not think that such

a head could rest on an ordinary woman’s shoulders. But, as she rose

up, her figure appeared but of medium height. She received me very

kindly. In seeing, for the first time, one to whom we owed so many

happy hours, it was impossible to feel towards her as a stranger. All

distance was removed by her courtesy. Her manners are very sweet,

because very simple, and free from affectation. To me her welcome

was the more grateful as that of one woman to another. There is a

sort of freemasonry among women, by which they understand at once

those with whom they have any intellectual sympathy. A few words, and

all reserve was gone. “Come, sit by me on this sofa,” she said; and

instantly, seated side by side, we were deep in conversation. It is in

such intimacy that one feels the magnetism of a large mind informed

by a true woman’s heart; then, as the soul shines through the face,

one perceives its intellectual beauty. No portrait can give the full

expression of the eye, any more than of the voice. Looking into that

clear, calm eye, one sees a transparent nature, a soul of goodness and

truth, an impression which is deepened as you listen to her soft and

gentle tones. A low voice is said to be an excellent thing in woman.

It is a special charm of the most finely-cultured English ladies. But

never did a sweeter voice fascinate a listener--so soft and low, that

one must almost bend to hear.

[Sidenote: Conversation.]

[Sidenote: Tact.]

[Sidenote: Earnestness.]

... I should do her great injustice, if I gave the impression that

there was in her conversation any attempt at display. There is no wish

to “shine.” She is above that affectation of brilliancy which is often

mere flippancy. Nor does she seek to attract homage and admiration. On

the contrary, she is very averse to speak of herself, or even to hear

the heart-felt praise of others. She does not engross the conversation,

but is more eager to listen than to talk. She has that delicate

tact--which is one of the fine arts among women--to make others talk,

suggesting topics the most rich and fruitful, and by a word drawing

the conversation into a channel where it may flow with a broad, free

current. Thus she makes you forget the celebrated author, and think

only of the refined and highly-cultivated woman. You do not feel awed

by her genius, but only quickened by it, as something that calls out

all that is better and truer. While there is no attempt to impress you

with her intellectual superiority, you feel naturally elevated into a

higher sphere. The conversation of itself floats upward into a region

above the commonplace. The small-talk of ordinary society would seem an

impertinence. There is a singular earnestness about her, as if those

mild eyes looked deep into the great, sad, awful truths of existence.

To her, life is a serious reality, and the gift of genius a grave

responsibility.

MRS. HENRY M. FIELD: ‘Home Sketches in France, and other Papers.’ New

York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1875.

* * * * *

[Sidenote: The character of Casaubon.]

[Sidenote: A confession.]

Mr. Lewes and she were one day good-humoredly recounting the mistaken

effusiveness of a too-sympathizing friend, who insisted on assuming

that Mr. Casaubon was a portrait of Mr. Lewes, and on condoling

with the sad experience which had taught the gifted authoress of

‘Middlemarch’ to depict that gloomy man. And there was indeed something

ludicrous in the contrast between the dreary pedant of the novel and

the gay self-content of the living _savant_ who stood acting his vivid

anecdotes before our eyes. “But from whom, then,” said a friend,

turning to Mrs. Lewes, “did you draw Casaubon?” With a humorous

solemnity, which was quite in earnest, nevertheless, she pointed to her

own heart. She went on to say--and this we could well believe--that

there was one character, that of Rosamond Vincy, which she had

found it hard to sustain; such complacency of egoism being alien to

her own habits of mind. But she laid no claim to any such natural

magnanimity as could avert Casaubon’s temptations of jealous vanity,

of bitter resentment. No trace of these faults was ever manifest in

her conversation. But much of her moral weight was derived from the

impression which her friends received that she had not been by any

means without her full share of faulty tendencies to begin with, but

that she had upbuilt with strenuous pains a resolute virtue--what Plato

calls _an iron sense of truth and right_--to which others also, however

faulty, by effort might attain.

F. W. H. MYERS: ‘George Eliot.’

* * * * *

[Sidenote: Anecdote of her parting with Tennyson.]

She never tired of the lovely scenery about Witley, and the great

expanse of view obtainable from the tops of the many hills. It was

on one of her drives in that neighborhood that a characteristic

conversation took place between her and one of the greatest English

poets, whom she met as he was taking a walk. Even that short interval

enabled them to get into somewhat deep conversation on evolution; and

as the poet afterward related it to a companion on the same spot, he

said, “Here was where I said good-bye to George Eliot; and as she went

down the hill, I said, ‘Well, good-bye, you and your molecules,’ and

she said to me, ‘I am quite content with my molecules.’” A trifling

anecdote, perhaps, but to those who will read between the lines, not

other than characteristic of both speakers.

C. KEGAN PAUL: ‘George Eliot.’

* * * * *

[Sidenote: George Eliot’s reading aloud.]

We generally began our reading at Witley with some chapters of the

Bible, which was a very precious and sacred book to her, not only

from early associations, but also from the profound conviction of

its importance in the development of the religious life of man. She

particularly enjoyed reading aloud some of the finest chapters of

Isaiah, Jeremiah, and St. Paul’s Epistles. With a naturally rich,

deep voice, rendered completely flexible by constant practice; with

the keenest perception of the requirements of emphasis, and with the

most subtile modulations of tone, her reading threw a glamour over

indifferent writing, and gave to the greatest writings fresh meanings

and beauty. The Bible and our elder English poets best suited the

organ-like tones of her voice, which required, for their full effect,

a certain solemnity and majesty of rhythm. Her reading of Milton was

especially fine; and I shall never forget four great lines of the

‘Samson Agonistes’ to which it did perfect justice--

“But what more oft in nations grown corrupt,

And by their vices brought to servitude,

Than to love bondage more than liberty,

Bondage with ease than strenuous liberty.”

The delighted conviction of justice in the thought--the sense of

perfect accord between thought, language, and rhythm--stimulated the

voice of the reader to find the exactly right tone. Such reading

requires for its perfection a rare union of intellectual, moral,

and physical qualities. It cannot be imitated. It is an art, like

singing--a personal possession that dies with the possessor, and leaves

nothing behind except a memory.

J. W. CROSS: ‘George Eliot’s Life.’

* * * * *

[Sidenote: Intense mental vitality.]

Nothing was more remarkable in the last period of her life than her

intense mental vitality, which failing health did not seem in the least

to impair. She possessed in an eminent degree that power which has led

to success in so many directions--which is ascribed both to Newton and

to Napoleon--of keeping her mind unceasingly at the stretch without

conscious fatigue. She would cease to read or to ponder when other

duties called her, but never (as it seemed) because she herself felt

tired. Even in so complex an effort as a visit to a picture-gallery

implies, she could continue for hours at the same pitch of earnest

interest, and outweary strong men.

F. W. H. MYERS: ‘George Eliot.’

* * * * *

[Sidenote: Her great stores of reading.]

Her memory held securely her great stores of reading. Even of light

books her recollections were always crisp, definite, and vivid. On

our way home from Venice, after my illness, we were reading French

novels of Cherbuliez, Alphonse Daudet, Gustave Droz, George Sand.

Most of these books she had read years before, and I was astonished

to find what clear-cut, accurate impressions had been retained, not

only of all the principal characters, but also of all the subsidiary

personages--even their names were generally remembered. But, on the

other hand, her verbal memory was not always to be depended on. She

never could trust herself to write a quotation without verifying it.

[Sidenote: Wide culture: languages.]

[Sidenote: Mathematics.]

In foreign languages George Eliot had an experience more unusual among

women than among men. With a complete literary and scholarly knowledge

of French, German, Italian, and Spanish, she _spoke_ all four languages

with difficulty, though accurately and grammatically; but the mimetic

power of catching intonation and accent was wanting. Greek and Latin

she could read with thorough delight to herself; and Hebrew was a

favorite study to the end of her life. In her younger days, especially

at Geneva, inspired by Professor de la Rive’s lectures, she had been

greatly interested in mathematical studies. At one time she applied

herself heartily and with keen enjoyment to geometry, and she thought

that she might have attained to some excellence in that branch if

she had been able to pursue it. In later days the map of the heavens

lay constantly on her table at Witley, and she longed for deeper

astronomical knowledge. She had a passion for the stars; and one of the

things to which we looked forward on returning to London was a possible

visit to Greenwich Observatory, as she had never looked through a great

telescope of the first-class.

[Sidenote: Botany.]

Her knowledge of wild-flowers gave a fresh interest each day to our

walks in the Surrey lanes, as every hedgerow is full of wonders--to

“those who know;” but she would, I think, have disclaimed for herself

real botanical knowledge, except of an elementary sort.

[Sidenote: Self-distrust.]

This wide and varied culture was accompanied with an unaffected

distrust of her own knowledge, with the sense of how little she really

knew, compared with what it was possible for her to have known, in the

world. Her standard was always abnormally high--it was the standard of

an expert.

[Sidenote: A religious mind.]

Her many-sidedness makes it exceedingly difficult to ascertain, either

from her books or from the closest personal intimacy, what her exact

relation was to any existing religious creed or to any political

party. Yet George Eliot’s was emphatically a religious mind. My

own impression is that her whole soul was so imbued with, and her

imagination was so fired by, the scientific spirit of the age--by

the constant rapid development of ideas in the Western world--that

she could not conceive that there was, as yet, any religious formula

sufficient, nor any known political system likely to be final. She had

great hope for the future, in the improvement of human nature by the

gradual development of the affections and the sympathetic emotions, and

“by the slow, stupendous teaching of the world’s events,” rather than

by means of legislative enactments.

[Sidenote: Views on the status of women.]

She was keenly anxious to redress injustices to women, and to raise

their general status in the community. This, she thought, could be best

effected by women improving their work--ceasing to be amateurs. But it

was one of the most distinctly marked traits in her character that she

particularly disliked everything generally associated with the idea of

a “masculine woman.” She was, and as a woman she wished to be, above

all things, feminine--“so delicate with her needle, and an admirable

musician.”

[Sidenote: Interest in higher education.]

[Sidenote: The end of all life.]

George Eliot was deeply interested in the higher education of women,

... and was among the earliest contributors to Girton College.... The

danger she was alive to in the system of collegiate education was

the possible weakening of the bonds of family affection and family

duties. In her view, the family life holds the roots of all that

is best in our mortal lot; and she always felt that it is far too

ruthlessly sacrificed in the case of English _men_ by their public

school and university education, and that much more is such a result

to be deprecated in the case of women. But, the absolute good being

unattainable in our mixed condition of things, those women especially

who are obliged to earn their own living must do their best with the

opportunities at their command, as “they cannot live with posterity,”

when a more perfect system may prevail. Therefore, George Eliot wished

Godspeed to the women’s colleges. It was often in her mind and on her

lips that the only worthy end of all learning, of all science, of all

life, in fact, is, that human beings should love one another better.

Culture merely for culture’s sake can never be anything but a sapless

root, capable of producing at best a shrivelled branch.

[Sidenote: A meliorist.]

In her general attitude toward life George Eliot was neither optimist

nor pessimist. She held to the middle term, which she invented for

herself, of “meliorist.” She was cheered by the hope and by the belief

in gradual improvement of the mass; for in her view each individual

must find the better part of happiness in helping another. She often

thought it wisest not to raise too ambitious an ideal, especially

for young people, but to impress on ordinary natures the immense

possibilities of making a small home circle brighter and better. Few

are born to do the great work of the world, but all are born to this.

And to the natures capable of the larger effort the field of usefulness

will constantly widen.

J. W. CROSS: ‘George Eliot’s Life.’

LIST OF WORKS QUOTED IN VOL. II.

ARNOLD.--Mixed Essays, by Matthew Arnold. New York: Macmillan & Co.,

1883. (Quoted on George Sand.)

_Atlantic Monthly._--Anonymous Article on Mrs. Browning, September,

1881. English Authors in Florence, by Kate Field, December, 1864.

(Quoted on George Eliot.)

_Blackwood’s Magazine._--Article on George Eliot, February, 1881.

BLIND.--George Eliot, by Mathilde Blind (Famous Women Series). Boston:

Roberts Bros., 1883.

BRAY.--Phases of Opinion and Experience during a Long Life, by Charles

Bray. London: Longmans & Co., 1885. (Quoted on George Eliot.)

BRONTË.--Wuthering Heights, by Emily Brontë, with biographical preface

by Charlotte Brontë. London: Smith, Elder & Co., 1850. (Quoted on Emily

Brontë.)

BROWNING.--Letters to R. H. Horne, by E. B. Browning; with prefatory

memoir by R. H. Stoddard. New York: James Miller, 1877. (Quoted also

for H. Martineau and George Sand.)

----.--Last Poems, with memorial preface, by Theodore Tilton. New York:

James Miller, 1862.

_Century Magazine._--George Eliot, by F. W. H. Myers, November, 1881;

George Eliot’s County, by Rose G. Kingsley, July, 1885; Zweibak, or

Notes of a Professional Exile, February, 1886. (Quoted on Geo. Eliot

and H. Martineau.)

CHORLEY.--Autobiography, Memoir and Letters, by Henry F. Chorley.

London: Bentley, 1873. (Quoted on E. B. Browning.)

_Congregationalist._--A Visit to George Eliot, by Mrs. Annie Downs, May

28th, 1879.

COLERIDGE.--Memoir and Letters, by Sara Coleridge, edited by her

daughter. New York: Harper & Bros., 1874. (Quoted on E. B. Browning.)

Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872.

Boston: James R. Osgood & Co., 1883. (Quoted on Harriet Martineau and

Margaret Fuller.)

The same.--Supplementary Letters. Boston: Ticknor & Co., 1886.

CROSS.--George Eliot’s Life, by J. W. Cross. New York: Harper & Bros.,

1885. (Quoted also for H. Martineau, Charlotte Brontë and E. B.

Browning.)

EMERSON, R. W., CHANNING, W. H., and CLARKE, J. F.--Memoirs of Margaret

Fuller Ossoli. Boston: Roberts Bros., 1874. (Quoted also for George

Sand.)

FIELD.--Home Sketches in France, etc., by Mrs. H. M. Field. New York:

G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1875. (Quoted on George Eliot.)

FORSTER.--Walter Savage Landor, a Biography, by John Forster. Boston:

Fields, Osgood & Co., 1869. (Quoted on E. B. Browning.)

FOX.--Memoirs of Old Friends, by Caroline Fox. Philadelphia: J. B.

Lippincott & Co., 1882. (Quoted on H. Martineau.)

FROUDE.--Thomas Carlyle: a History of his Life in London, by J.

A. Froude. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1884. (Quoted on H.

Martineau and Margaret Fuller.)

----.--Editor, Letters and Memorials of Jane Welsh Carlyle. New York:

Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1883. (Quoted on H. Martineau.)

GASKELL.--Life of Charlotte Brontë, by Elizabeth C. Gaskell. London:

Smith, Elder & Co., 1857. (Quoted also on H. Martineau and George Sand.)

HALL.--Retrospect of a Long Life, by S. C. Hall. New York: D. Appleton

& Co., 1883. (Quoted on H. Martineau.)

_Harper’s Magazine._--Article on the English Lakes, by Moncure D.

Conway, January, 1881. (Quoted on H. Martineau.) George Eliot, by C.

Kegan Paul, May, 1881. Last Words from George Eliot, by Elizabeth

Stuart Phelps, March, 1882. Remarks on Margaret Fuller, by G. W.

Curtis, in Easy Chair, March, 1882.

HAWTHORNE.--Nathaniel Hawthorne and His Wife: a Biography, by Julian

Hawthorne. Boston: James R. Osgood & Co., 1885. (Quoted on Harriet

Martineau and Margaret Fuller.)

HAWTHORNE.--Passages from the English Note-books of Nathaniel

Hawthorne. Boston: James R. Osgood & Co., 1873. (Quoted on Harriet

Martineau and Mrs. Browning.)

----.--Passages from the French and Italian Note-books of Nathaniel

Hawthorne. Boston: James R. Osgood & Co., 1872. (Quoted on Mrs.

Browning.)

HILLARD.--Six Months in Italy, by George S. Hillard. Boston: James R.

Osgood & Co., 1871. (Quoted on Mrs. Browning.)

HOWE.--Margaret Fuller, by Julia Ward Howe. (Famous Women Series.)

Boston: Roberts Bros., 1883.

HUNT.--Correspondence of Leigh Hunt, edited by his son. London: Smith,

Elder & Co., 1862. (Quoted on Mrs. Browning.)

KEMBLE.--Records of Later Life, by Frances Ann Kemble. New York: Henry

Holt & Co., 1882. (Quoted on Harriet Martineau.)

_Lady’s Repository._--A Visit to Charlotte Brontë, by George S.

Phillips, September, 1872. New York: Nelson & Phillips.

MACREADY.--Reminiscences and Selections from his Diaries and Letters,

by W. C. Macready. Edited by Sir F. Pollock, Bart. New York: Macmillan

& Co., 1875. (Quoted on Harriet Martineau.)

MARTINEAU.--Autobiography of Harriet Martineau, with Memorial by Maria

Weston Chapman. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1887. (Quoted also on

Charlotte Brontë, Margaret Fuller and Mrs. Browning.)

MITFORD.--Recollections of a Literary Life, by Mary Russell Mitford.

New York: Harper & Bros., 1852. (Quoted on Mrs. Browning.)

MILLER.--Harriet Martineau, by Mrs. Fenwick Miller. (Famous Women

Series.) Boston: Roberts Bros., 1885.

PAYN.--Some Literary Recollections, by James Payn. New York: Harper &

Bros., 1884. (Quoted on Harriet Martineau.)

_Record of the Year._--(New York: G. W. Carleton.) September, 1876.

Selection from Paul Vevay on George Sand.

REID.--Charlotte Brontë, A Monograph, by T. Wemyss Reid. New York:

Scribner, Armstrong & Co., 1877.

ROBINSON.--Emily Brontë, by A. Mary F. Robinson. (Famous Women Series.)

Boston: Robert Bros., 1883.

_Scribner’s Monthly._--Charlotte Brontë, by Ellen Nussey; also Note in

The Old Cabinet, by R. W. Gilder, 1871.

SWINBURNE.--A Note on Charlotte Brontë, by A. C. Swinburne. London:

Chatto & Windus, 1877.

STEDMAN.--Victorian Poets, by E. C. Stedman. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin

& Co., 1881. (Quoted on Mrs. Browning.)

TAYLOR.--At Home and Abroad, by Bayard Taylor. (Second Series.) New

York: G. P. Putnam, 1862.

_Temple Bar._--A Week with George Eliot, February, 1885. George Sand,

April, 1885.

THACKERAY.--Roundabout Papers, by William M. Thackeray. London: Chatto

& Windus, 1863. (Quoted on Charlotte Brontë.)

THOMAS.--George Sand, by Bertha Thomas. (Famous Women Series.) Boston:

Roberts Bros., 1883.

WHITTIER.--Complete Poems, by John G. Whittier. Boston: J. R. Osgood &

Co., 1873.

Transcriber’s Notes

Punctuation errors have been corrected.

A couple of instances of repeated words were fixed.

Page 26: An inconsistency in reference to Martineau’s lower lip was

corrected.

Page 51: “Wherepon the wicked lord” changed to “Whereupon the wicked

lord”

Page 95: “of his own fireside” changed to “of her own fireside”

Page 97: “Rihard Hengist Horne” changed to “Richard Hengist Horne”

Page 118: “Portugese Sonnets” changed to “Portuguese Sonnets”

Page 200: “haze, color” changed to “hazel color”

Page 206: “No easy getting sight” changed to “Not easy getting sight”

Page 220: “which as evident” changed to “which was evident”

Page 224: “just occacasion” changed to “just occasion”

Page 246: “aud subsequently translated” changed to “and subsequently

translated”