VARIOUS FRIENDSHIPS
With the publication of _Belford Regis_ there came slight periods of
rest—rest, that is, from the strenuous and wearing labour of writing
against time in the fulfilment of contracts. During these temporary
lulls in output Miss Mitford wandered about in her small garden,
watching and tending her flowers as would a mother her children. Her
especial delight was in the raising of seedlings, always a source
of keen pleasure to an enthusiastic gardener. To print a catalogue
of all her flowers would fill a large chapter, they were so many
and varied, for scarcely a letter went to any of her flower-loving
friends but it contained some request for a slip of this, or a
cutting from that plant, or else a word of thanks for a floral gift
just received. The popularity of the author of _Our Village_ was so
universal and extended to so many classes of the community that, to
quote one evidence alone, it was no rare thing to find a new rose or
a new dahlia figuring in contemporary florists’ lists as the “Miss
Mitford” or the “Our Village,” a pretty proof, as the author herself
said, “of the way in which gardeners estimate my love of flowers,
that they are constantly calling plants after me, and sending me one
of the first cuttings as presents. There is a dahlia now selling at
ten guineas a root under my name; I have not seen the flower, but
have just had one sent me (a cutting) which will of course blow in
the autumn.” A delightful fancy, this, and one which obtains to this
day, as witness any of the modern horticulturists’ lists.
It was to the culture of geraniums, however, that she principally
devoted herself, “and,” said she, “it is lucky that I do, since
they are comparatively easy to rear and manage, and do not lay one
under any tremendous obligation to receive, for I never buy any.”
She was writing to her friend, Miss Emily Jephson, in Ireland,
with whom she was in fairly regular correspondence, although Miss
Jephson had to share with Sir William Elford the long periods of
silence which betokened their mutual friend’s slavery with the pen
at the little cottage. Referring to these beloved geraniums, Miss
Mitford wrote:—“All my varieties (amounting to at least three
hundred different sorts) have been either presents, or exchanges, or
my own seedlings—chiefly exchanges; for when once one has a good
collection, that becomes an easy mode of enlarging it; and it is one
pleasant to all parties, for it is a very great pleasure to have
a flower in a friend’s garden. You, my own Emily, gave me my first
plants of the potentilla, and very often as I look at them, I think
of you.” One especially fine seedling geranium she named the “Ion,”
a floral tribute to Serjeant Talfourd’s play, upon which he was then
working.
[Illustration: A portrait of Miss Mitford in 1837.
(From Chorley’s _Authors of England_.)]
What a wonderful garden it was!—a veritable garden of friendship
wherein, as the quaint little figure in her calico sun-bonnet
pottered about, picking off dead leaves and stained petals, she
actually communed with her friends whose representatives they were.
This was a pleasure her father could not take from her, indeed, to
his credit be it recorded, it was a pleasure in which he shared.
Talfourd’s play, of which mention was made just now, was a work upon
which he devoted odd moments of leisure snatched from his busy life
of professional duties as one of the leading men of his day at the
Bar. Pope’s lines: “I left no calling for this idle trade, no duty
broke,” is the fitting motto with which he headed his Preface when
the play was published in book form, for, as he said, it was composed
for the most part on journeys while on Circuit, and afterwards
committed to paper, a process of composition which, it may be readily
conceived, extended over a lengthy period. When published it was
dedicated to his old schoolmaster, the Rev. Richard Valpy, D.D., as
“a slender token of gratitude for benefits which cannot be expressed
in words,” and in the course of the Preface there were felicitous
references to “the delightful artist,” Mr. Macready, and to the
“power and beauty” of, among others, “the play of _Rienzi_.”
In Macready’s Diary, under date March 15, 1835, is the entry:—“Forster
told me of Talfourd having completed a tragedy called _Ion_. What an
extraordinary, what an indefatigable man!” He was greatly pleased by
the kind mention of himself in the Preface, and on May 7 made this
significant entry in his Diary:—“Read Talfourd’s tragedy of _Ion_;
pleased with the opening scenes and, as I proceeded, arrested and held
by the interest of the story and the characters, as well as by the very
beautiful thoughts, and the very noble ones, with which the play is
interspersed. How delightful to read his dedication to his master and
benefactor, Dr. Valpy, and the gentle outpourings of his affectionate
heart towards his friends and associates; if one did not love, one
would envy such a use of one’s abilities.”
The play was produced on May 26, 1836, and was a great success,
Macready admitting that he had done better in the performance than he
had been able to attain for some time. May 26 was, curiously enough,
Talfourd’s birthday, and Miss Mitford was among the great host of
friends, invited to do honour to the play and its writer. She went
to town some days previous to the event and was the guest of the
Talfourds at their house at 56, Russell Square. Her letters home
to her father, whom she had left there, are full of the delights of
her visit—the dinners and the diners, among whom were the poets
Wordsworth, Rogers and Robert Browning (the last then but a young and
comparatively unknown man), Stanfield the artist, Landor, Lucas and
William Harness.
After the performance the principal actors repaired to Talfourd’s
house, there to partake of a sumptuous repast to which over fifty
people—leading lights in Art, Letters and the Sciences—sat down.
It was a great function, marked by many complimentary speeches, as
the occasion demanded. Macready, of course, shared the honours with
Talfourd, and, in a moment of exaltation, turned to Miss Mitford
and asked her whether the present occasion did not stimulate her to
write a play. It was an ill-chosen remark, for she was then at the
very height of popularity as the author of the successful _Rienzi_,
but she quickly replied, “Will you act it?” Macready did not answer,
and Harness, who was close by, chaffingly remarked to Miss Mitford,
“Aye, hold him to that.” “When I heard that _that_ was Harness, the
man who, I believe, inflicted such a deep and assassin-like wound
upon me—through _Blackwood’s Magazine_—I could not repress the
expression of indignant contempt which found its way to my face, and
over-gloomed the happy feeling that had before been there.” This was
Macready’s written comment on the incident, but how he had misjudged
Harness throughout this unpleasant affair has been dealt with by us
in a previous chapter.
Miss Mitford knew nothing of the bitterness which her innocent reply
had engendered and fully enjoyed the round of festivities to which
she was invited. On the day following the first performance of _Ion_,
her friend Mr. Kenyon called to take her to see the giraffes—they
were then being exhibited for the first time in this country at the
Zoological Gardens—and on the way suggested they should call at
Gloucester Place for a young friend of his, “a sweet young woman—a
Miss Barrett—who reads Greek as I do French, and has published some
translations from Æschylus and some most striking poems. She is a
delightful young creature; shy, and timid and modest. Nothing but
her desire to see me got her out at all, but now she is coming to us
to-morrow night also.”
This occasion marks an important event in Miss Mitford’s life—her
introduction to Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, which from that moment
grew and strengthened, a fragrant friendship which lasted through
life, much prized by both.
“She is so sweet and gentle,” wrote Miss Mitford to her father, “and
so pretty, that one looks at her as if she were some bright flower;
and she says it is like a dream that she should be talking to me,
whose works she knows by heart.”
Writing next year to her friend Mrs. Martin, Miss Barrett said of
her literary friend: “She stands higher as the authoress of _Our
Village_ than of _Rienzi_, and writes prose better than poetry, and
transcends rather in Dutch minuteness and higher finishing than in
Italian ideality and passion.”
Truth to tell, this visit to London was having the effect of
slightly exalting our gentle village author; she found herself the
very centre of attraction, every one paying her homage. Talfourd’s
house was besieged by callers—not on Talfourd—but on his guest.
Wordsworth was calling every day, chanting the praises of _Rienzi_
and the abilities of its author; the Duke of Devonshire brought her
“a splendid nosegay of lilies of the valley—a thousand flowers
without leaves,” and begged her never to come again to London
without informing him and giving him the opportunity of enjoying
a similar pleasure. Mr. and Mrs. Talfourd grew indignant; they
had not bargained for this when they invited their quaintly-clad,
old-fashioned friend from Three Mile Cross to witness the triumph
of Talfourd and _Ion_! Talfourd was jealous, positively jealous,
and openly showed it by a marked coolness towards his old friend, a
coolness which she pretended not to notice, although it hurt her very
much. “They are much displeased with Miss Mitford,” wrote Macready
of his friends the Talfourds. “She seems to be showing herself _well
up_.” “William Harness says he never saw any one received with such
a mixture of enthusiasm and respect as I have been—not even Madame
de Staël. Wordsworth, dear old man! aids it by his warm and approving
kindness”—was Miss Mitford’s report to her father.
It was arranged that she should stay in London in order to witness
the second performance of _Ion_, fixed for June 1, but on the morning
preceding this, while sitting at breakfast, Talfourd bitterly
complained of some depreciating comments on his play which he had
just read in one of the morning papers. To soothe him Miss Mitford
suggested that he need not take such things too seriously, adding
that she thought the critics had been far more favourable to his play
than to her own; at which he flamed out: “Your _Rienzi_, indeed; I
dare say not—you forget the difference!” and behaved with such scorn
and anger that his guest was shocked, packed up her boxes and fled to
William Harness. “We have had no quarrel”—was the report home—“no
coolness on _my_ part. I behaved at first with the warmest and truest
sympathy until it was chilled by his bitter scorn; and since, thank
Heaven! I have never lost my self-command—never ceased to behave to
him with the most perfect politeness. He must change very much indeed
before the old feeling will come back to me.”
[Illustration: Mary Russell Mitford.
(From a painting by John Lucas, in the National Portrait Gallery.)]
It was through Miss Mitford that William Harness was first introduced
to Talfourd, although, judging by certain circumstances which
arose from time to time, we hold the opinion that William Harness,
who demanded more from his friends than did Miss Mitford, never
really appreciated the acquaintance. Harness was for ever questioning
the other’s motives, and more than once hinted his suspicions to Miss
Mitford who at once defended the other—as was her wont. Talfourd’s
jealousy was, let us say, pardonable, but when it turned to venom,
as it did, we dare not condone. Meeting Macready one evening of the
following November, the conversation turned on Miss Mitford and a
new play she was projecting and which Mr. Forrest,[27] a rival to
Macready, was to produce. “I have no faith in her power of writing a
play, and to that opinion Talfourd subscribed to-night—concurring in
all I thought of her falsehood and baseness!” These are Macready’s
own words, but fortunately Miss Mitford died without knowledge of
them, otherwise her faith in her old idol would have been rudely
shattered. Talfourd, of whom she had ever spoken kindly; whose career
she had watched, glorying in his successes; who had himself praised
her talent for the Drama and urged her to forsake all else for it,
and now concurred in another’s disparaging references to that same
talent—“concurring in all I thought of her falsehood and baseness!”
This London visit closed with a dinner-party at Lord and Lady
Dacre’s—Lady Dacre was a relative of the Ogles and therefore
distantly connected with the Mitfords. “It is a small house, with
a round table that only holds eight,” wrote Miss Mitford, and, as
she proceeded to relate that fifty people assembled, and offers
no further explanation, we wonder how they were accommodated. The
company included Edwin Landseer, “who invited himself to come and
paint Dash”—the favourite spaniel—“Pray tell Dash.”
Mr. Kenyon was also there—he had just brought about the introduction
to Miss Barrett, and was consequently in high esteem—of whom Miss
Mitford told her friend Harness that he had written a fine poem,
“Upper Austria,” to be found in that year’s _Keepsake_, as a test
of his sanity. “From feelings of giddiness, he feared his head was
attacked. He composed these verses (_not writing them_ until the poem
of four hundred or five hundred lines was complete) as a test. It
turned out that the stomach was deranged, and he was set to rights in
no time.”
A wonderful fortnight this, with its introductions to all the
notables—“Jane Porter, Joanna Baillie, and I know not how many
other females of eminence, to say nothing of all the artists, poets,
prosers, talkers and actors of the day.”
“And now I am come home to work hard, if the people will let me;
for the swarms of visitors, and the countless packets of notes and
letters which I receive surpass belief.”
With the introduction to Miss Barrett a new correspondent was added
to the already large list with whom Miss Mitford kept in touch,
and from the middle of the year 1836 the letters between the two
friends were frequent and voluminous. The early ones from Three Mile
Cross display an amusing motherliness on the part of their writer,
containing frequent references to the necessity of cultivating
style and clearness of expression, all of which Miss Barrett took
in good part and promised to bear in mind. But in this matter of
letter-writing Miss Mitford was really expending herself too much—it
was a weakness which she could never overcome—and the consequence
was that she either neglected her work or performed it when the
household was asleep. Then, still further obstacles to a steady
output arrived in the person of the painter Lucas, who wanted to
paint another portrait of his friend, and was only put off by being
allowed to paint the Doctor, the sittings for which were given at
Bertram House, then in the occupation of Captain Gore, a genial
friend of the Mitfords. The portrait was a great success, every
one praising it. “It is as like as the looking-glass,” wrote the
delighted daughter to Miss Jephson. “Beautiful old man that he is!
and is the pleasantest likeness, the finest combination of power, and
beauty, and sweetness, and spirit, that ever you saw. Such a piece
of colour, too! The painter _used all his carmine the first day_, and
was forced to go into Reading for a fresh supply. He says that my
father’s complexion is exactly like the sunny side of a peach, and so
is his picture. Imagine how grateful I am! He has come all the way
from London to paint this picture as a present to me.”
Following Lucas, came Edmund Havell, a young and rising artist
from Reading, a lithographer of great ability. He came to paint
Dash—Landseer being unable to fulfil his promise because of an
accident. “Dash makes an excellent sitter—very grave and dignified,
and a little conscious—peeping stealthily at the portrait, as if
afraid of being thought vain if he looked at it too long.”
These were the diversions which Miss Mitford permitted herself, and
when they were over and the approach of winter caused a natural
cessation of the hosts of visitors who thronged the cottage during
the fine weather, she devoted herself with energy to a new book, to
be entitled _Country Stories_, for which Messrs. Saunders & Otley
were in negotiation.
FOOTNOTES:
[27] He was alleged to have instigated the riotous demonstration
against Macready in Boston, U.S.A., twelve years later.