In 1816 the wandering and unsettled ways of the poet were calmed and
harmonized in the home of the Gillmans at Highgate, where the remainder
of his days, nearly twenty years, were passed in entire quiet and
comparative happiness. Mr. Gillman was a surgeon; and it is understood
that Coleridge went to reside with him chiefly to be under his
surveillance, to break himself of the fearful habit he had contracted of
opium-eating,--a habit that grievously impaired his mind, engendered
self-reproach, and embittered the best years of his life.[D] He was the
guest and the beloved friend as well as the patient of Mr. Gillman; and
the devoted attachment of that excellent man and his estimable wife
supplied the calm contentment and seraphic peace, such as might have
been the dream of the poet and the hope of the man. Honored be the name
and reverenced the memory of this true friend! He died on the 1st of
June, 1837, having arranged to publish a life of Coleridge, of which he
produced but the first volume.[E]
Coleridge's habit of taking opium was no secret. In 1816 it must have
reached a fearful pitch. It had produced "during many years an
accumulation of bodily suffering that wasted the frame, poisoned the
sources of enjoyment, and entailed an intolerable mental load that
scarcely knew cessation"; the poet himself called it "the accursed
drug." In 1814 Cottle wrote him a strong protest against this terrible
and ruinous habit, entreating him to renounce it. Coleridge said in
reply, "You have poured oil into the raw and festering wound of an old
friend, Cottle, but it is oil of vitriol!" He accounts for the "accursed
habit" by stating that he had taken to it first to obtain relief from
intense bodily suffering; and he seriously contemplated entering a
private insane asylum as the surest means of its removal. His remorse
was terrible and perpetual; he was "rolling rudderless," "the wreck of
what he once was," "wretched, helpless, and hopeless."
He revealed this "dominion" to De Quincey "with a deep expression of
horror at the hideous bondage." It was this "conspiracy of himself
against himself" that was the poison of his life. He describes it with
frantic pathos as "the scourge, the curse, the one almighty blight,
which had desolated his life," the thief
"to steal
From my own nature all the natural man."
The habit was, it would seem, commenced in 1802; and if Mr. Cottle is to
be credited, in 1814 he had been long accustomed to take "from two
quarts of laudanum in a week to a pint a day." He did, however,
ultimately conquer it.
It was during his residence with Mr. Gillman that I knew Coleridge. He
had arranged to write for "The Amulet"; and circumstances warranted my
often seeing him,--a privilege of which I gladly availed myself. In this
home at Highgate, where all even of his whims were studied with
affectionate and attentive care, he preferred the quiet of home
influences to the excitements of society; and although I more than once
met there his friend Charles Lamb, and other noteworthy men, I usually
found him, to my delight, alone. There he cultivated flowers, fed his
pensioners, the birds, and wooed the little children who gambolled on
the heath, where he took his daily walks.
It is a beautiful view,--such as can be rarely seen out of
England,--that which the poet had from the window of his bed-chamber.
Underneath, a valley, rich in "Patrician trees," divides the hill of
Highgate from that of Hampstead; the tower of the old church at
Hampstead rises above a thick wood,--a dense forest it seems, although
here and there a graceful villa stands out from among the dark green
drapery that infolds it. It was easy to imagine the poet often
contrasting this scene with that of "Brockan's sov'ran height," where no
"finer influence of friend or child" had greeted him, and exclaiming,--
"O thou Queen!
Thou delegated Deity of Earth,
O dear, dear England!"
And what a wonderful change there is in the scene, when the pilgrim to
this shrine at Highgate leaves the garden and walks a few steps beyond
the elm avenue that still fronts the house!
Forty years have brought houses all about the heath, and shut in the
prospect; but from any ascent you may see regal Windsor on one side and
Gravesend on the other,--twenty miles of view, look which way you will.
But when the poet dwelt there, all London was within ken, a few yards
from his door.
The house has undergone some changes, but the garden is much as it was
when I used to find the poet feeding his birds there: it has the same
wall--moss-covered now--that overhangs the dell; a shady tree-walk
shelters it from sun and rain,--it was the poet's walk at midday; a
venerable climber, the Glycenas, was no doubt planted by the poet's
hand: it was new to England when the poet was old, and what more likely
than that his friends would have bidden him plant it where it has since
flourished forty years or more?
I was fortunate in sharing some of the regard of Mr. and Mrs. Gillman;
after the poet's death, they gave me his inkstand, (a plain inkstand of
wood,) which is before me as I write, and a myrtle on which his eyes
were fixed as he died. It is now an aged and gnarled tree in our
conservatory.[F]
One of the very few letters of Coleridge I have preserved I transcribe,
as it illustrates his goodness of heart and willingness to put himself
to inconvenience for others.
"DEAR SIR,"--it runs,--"I received some five days ago a letter
depicting the distress and urgent want of a widow and a sister,
with whom, during the husband's lifetime, I was for two or
three years a housemate; and yesterday the poor lady came up
herself, almost clamorously soliciting me, not, indeed, to
assist her from my own purse,--for she was previously assured
that there was nothing therein,--but to exert myself to collect
the sum of twenty pounds, which would save her from God knows
what. On this hopeless task,--for perhaps never man whose name
had been so often in print for praise or reprobation had so few
intimates as myself,--when I recollected that before I left
Highgate for the seaside you had been so kind as to intimate
that you considered some trifle due to me,--whatever it be, it
will go some way to eke out the sum which I have with a sick
heart been all this day trotting about to make up, guinea by
guinea. You will do me a real service, (for my health
perceptibly sinks under this unaccustomed flurry of my
spirits,) if you could make it convenient to inclose to me,
however small the sum may be, if it amount to a bank-note of
any denomination, directed 'Grove, Highgate,' where I am, and
expect to be any time for the next eight months. In the mean
time, believe me
"Yours obliged,
"S. T. COLERIDGE.
"4th December, 1828."
I find also, at the back of one of his manuscripts, the following poem,
which I believe to be unpublished; for I cannot trace it in any edition
of his collected works.