This distinguished woman died recently at Bristol, England, at the age
of seventy-four. We shall, doubtless, soon have an authentic biography
of her, from some one to whom her papers and other materials will have
been entrusted by the brother who survives her; but, meantime, let us
yield to the tide of remembrance which her death has awakened, and
arrest, ere they float by and are lost, the scattered leaf-memories that
may recall the summers when we knew her. For the sixteen years that we
enjoyed the privilege of her friendship, her correspondence with us was
interrupted only by illness, and we hope yet to find the leisure to put
some of those high-thoughted and invaluable letters into print—true
reflex as they are of the lofty and true mind which made her fame. Our
present memoranda will be brief, with a view to that better justice to
the theme.
We first saw Miss Porter at the house of Lady S——, the sister of Lady
Franklin, a few weeks after our first arrival in London, in 1834. It was
at a large party, thronged with the scientific and literary persons who
form the society of a man like Sir John Franklin. The great navigator,
whose fate now excites so deep an interest, was present, and he was
almost the only celebrity in the room whom we did not then see for the
first time—Sir John having been in command of the English fleet in the
Mediterranean, and Lady Franklin at Athens when we chanced to be there.
The noble head and majestic frame of the fine old sailor showed in
strong relief, even among the great men who surrounded him, and we well
remember the confirmed impression, of his native dignity and superiority
of presence, which we received at that time.
A very tall lady, apparently about fifty years of age, had arrested our
attention early in the evening, and, whenever unoccupied, we found
ourself turning to observe her, with a magnetism which we could not
resist. She was dressed completely in black, with black lace upon the
neck, and black feathers drooping over the knot of her slightly grey
hair. Her person was very erect, and, though her conversation was
evidently playful with all who spoke with her, there was an exceeding
loftiness, and an air of unconscious and easy nobility, in her mien and
countenance, which was truly remarkable. She was like the ideal which
one forms of a Lady Abbess of noble blood, or of Queen Katharine. The
deference with which she was addressed was mingled invariably with an
affectionate cordiality, however, which puzzled our conjectures a
little, for it is not common to see the two feelings inspired with equal
certainty by the same presence. It chanced to be late in the evening
before we had an opportunity of enquiring the name of this lady, and,
when we heard who she was, we recognized at once that very unusual
phenomenon—a complete fitness of the outer temple to the fame whose
deathless lamp is enshrined within it. It was Jane Porter, and she
looked as one would have expected her to look, who had conjured up her
image by aid of magic, after being carried away by her enchantments of
story.
We were presented to Miss Porter by Sir John Franklin, just before the
breaking up of the party that evening, and, soon after, we were so
fortunate as to be a guest, with her, at one of those English
country-houses which are the perfection of luxury and refinement, and
where there was the opportunity to see her with her proper surroundings.
Of the impression received at that time, we have already made a slight
record, which some of our readers may remember:—
“One of the most elegant and agreeable persons I ever saw was
Miss Porter, and I think her conversation more delightful to
remember than any person’s I ever knew. A distinguished artist
told me that he remembered her when she was his beau ideal of
female beauty; but in those days she was more “fancy-rapt,” and
gave in less to the current and spirit of society. Age has made
her, if it may be so expressed, less selfish in her use of
thought, and she pours it forth like Pactolus—that gold which
is sand from others. She is still what I should call a handsome
woman, or, if that be not allowed, she is the wreck of more than
a common allotment of beauty, and looks it. Her person is
remarkably erect, her eyes and eyelids (in this latter
resembling Scott) very heavily moulded, and her smile is
beautiful. It strikes me that it always is so—where it ever
was. The smile seems to be the work of the soul.
“I have passed months under the same roof with Miss Porter, and
nothing gave me more pleasure than to find the company in that
hospitable house dwindled to a “fit audience though few,” and
gathered around the figure in deep mourning which occupied the
warmest corner of the sofa. In any vein, and _apropos_ to the
gravest and the gayest subject, her well-stored mind and memory
flowed forth in the same rich current of mingled story and
reflection, and I never saw an impatient listener beside her. I
recollect one evening a lady’s singing “Auld Robin Gray,” and
some one remarking (rather unsentimentally,) at the close,
“By-the-by what is Lady —— (the authoress of the ballad) doing
with so many carpenters? Berkeley square is quite deafened with
their hammering!” “_Apropos_ of carpenters and Lady ——,” said
Miss Porter, “this charming ballad-writer owes something to the
craft. She was better-born than provided with the gifts of
fortune, and in her younger days was once on a visit to a noble
house, when, to her dismay, a large and fashionable company
arrived who brought with them a mania for private theatricals.
Her wardrobe was very slender, barely sufficient for the
ordinary events of a week-day, and her purse contained one
solitary shilling. To leave the house was out of the question,
to feign illness as much so, and to decline taking a part was
impossible, for her talent and sprightliness were the hope of
the theatre. A part was cast for her, and, in despair, she
excused herself from the gay party bound to the country town to
make purchases of silk and satin, and shut herself up, a prey to
mortified low spirits. The character required a smart village
dress, and it certainly did not seem that it could come out of a
shilling. She sat at her window, biting her lips, and turning
over in her mind whether she could borrow of some one, when her
attention was attracted to a carpenter, who was employed in the
construction of a stage in the large hall, and who, in the court
below, was turning off from his plane broad and long shavings of
a peculiarly striped wood. It struck her that it was like
riband. The next moment she was below, and begged of the man to
give her half-a-dozen lengths as smooth as he could shave them.
He performed his task well, and depositing them in her
apartment, she set off alone on horseback to the village, and
with her single shilling succeeded in purchasing a chip hat of
the coarsest fabric. She carried it home, exultingly, trimmed it
with her pine shavings, and on the evening of the performance
appeared with a white dress, and hat and belt ribands which were
the envy of the audience. The success of her invention gave her
spirits and assurance, and she played to admiration. The sequel
will justify my first remark. She made a conquest on that night
of one of her titled auditors, whom she afterward married. You
will allow that Lady —— may afford to be tolerant of
carpenters.”
It was two years after this first meeting of Miss Porter at —— Park,
that we accepted an invitation to meet her at the house of a Baronet in
Warwickshire, and of that visit the following mention is made in
Sketches of Travel already published:—
“I remembered a promise I had nearly forgotten, that I would
reserve my visit to Stratford till I could be accompanied by
Miss J. Porter, whom I was to have the honor of meeting at my
place of destination; and promising an early acceptance of the
landlady’s invitation, I hurried on to my appointment over the
fertile hills of Warwickshire.
“I was established in one of those old Elizabethan
country-houses which with their vast parks, their self-sufficing
resources of subsistence and company, and the absolute deference
shown on all sides to the lord of the manor, give one the
impression rather of a little kingdom with a castle in its
heart, than of an abode for a gentleman subject. The house
itself (called, like most houses of this size and consequence in
Warwickshire, a ‘Court,’) was a Gothic half-castellated square,
with four round towers, and innumerable embrasures and windows;
two wings in front, probably more modern than the body of the
house, and again two long wings extending to the rear, at right
angles, and enclosing a flowery and formal parterre. There had
been a trench about it, now filled up, and at a short distance
from the house stood a polyangular and massive structure, well
calculated for defence, and intended as a stronghold for the
retreat of the family and tenants in more troubled times. One of
these rear wings enclosed a catholic chapel, for the worship of
the baronet and those of his tenants who professed the same
faith; while on the northern side, between the house and the
garden, stood a large, protestant stone church, with a turret
and spire, both chapel and church, with their clergyman and
priest, dependant on the estate, and equally favored by the
liberal and high-minded baronet. The tenantry formed two
considerable congregations, and lived and worshipped side by
side, with the most perfect harmony—an instance of _real_
Christianity, in my opinion, which the angels of heaven might
come down to see. A lovely rural grave-yard for the lord and
tenants, and a secluded lake below the garden, in which hundreds
of wild ducks swam and screamed unmolested, completed the
outward features of C—— Court.
“There are noble houses in England with a door communicating
from the dining room to the stables, that the master and his
friends may see their favorites, after dinner, without exposure
to the weather. In the place of this rather _bizarre_ luxury,
the oak-panelled and spacious dining-hall of C—— is on a level
with the organ loft of the chapel, and when the cloth is
removed, the large door between is thrown open, and the noble
instrument pours the rich and thrilling music of vespers through
the rooms. When the service is concluded, and the lights on the
altar extinguished, the blind organist (an accomplished
musician, and a tenant on the estate,) continues his voluntaries
in the dark until the hall-door informs him of the retreat of
the company to the drawing-room. There is not only refinement
and luxury in this beautiful, arrangement, but food for the soul
and heart.
“I chose my room from among the endless vacant but equally
luxurious chambers of the rambling old house; my preference
solely directed by the portrait of a nun, one of the family in
ages gone by—a picture full of melancholy beauty, which hung
opposite the window. The face was distinguished by all that in
England marks the gentlewoman of ancient and pure descent; and
while it was a woman with the more tender qualities of her sex
breathing through her features, it was still a lofty and sainted
sister, true to her cross, and sincere in her vows and
seclusion. It was the work of a master, probably Vandyke, and a
picture in which the most solitary man would find company and
communion. On the other walls, and in most of the other rooms
and corridors, were distributed portraits of the gentlemen and
soldiers of the family, most of them bearing some resemblance to
the nun, but differing, as brothers in those wild times may be
supposed to have differed, from the gentle creatures of the same
blood, nursed in the privacy of peace.”
Warwick Castle, Stratford-on-Avon, and Kenilworth, were all within the
reach of what might be called neighborhood, and our hospitable host (in
his eightieth year, and unable to accompany us,) had made the
arrangements for our visit to these places. We were to be gone three
days, but were to remain his guests in all respects. The carriage was
packed with the books which might be needed for reference, the butler of
the old Baronet was to go with us and provide post-horses and everything
we could want at inns upon the road, and, under this kind and luxurious
provision, we took seat beside Miss Porter, and visited Kenilworth,
Warwick, and Stratford, with no thought or care which need divide our
pleasure in her society. From the description of this journey (given
without mention of the above circumstances,) let us copy one more
passage:—
“I had wandered away from my companion, Miss Jane Porter, to
climb up a secret staircase in the wall, rather too difficult of
ascent for a female foot, and from my elevated position I caught
an accidental view of that distinguished lady through the arch
of a Gothic window, with a background of broken architecture and
foliage—presenting, by chance, perhaps, the most fitting and
admirable picture of the authoress of the “Scottish Chiefs,”
that a painter in his brightest hour could have fancied. Miss
Porter, with her tall and striking figure, her noble face (said
by Mr. Martin Shee to have approached nearer in its youth to his
_beau idéal_ of the female features than any other, and still
possessing the remains of uncommon beauty,) is at all times a
person whom it would be difficult to see without a feeling of
involuntary admiration. But standing, as I saw her at that
moment, motionless and erect, in the morning-dress, with dark
feathers, which she has worn since the death of her beloved and
gifted sister, her wrists folded across, her large and still
beautiful eyes fixed on a distant object in the view, and her
nobly-cast lineaments reposing in their usual calm and
benevolent tranquility, while, around and above her, lay the
material and breathed the spirit over which she had held the
first great mastery—it was a _tableau vivant_ which I was sorry
to be alone to see.
“Was she thinking of the great mind that had evoked the spirits
of the ruins she stood among—a mind in which (by Sir Walter’s
own confession) she had first bared the vein of romance which
breathed so freely for the world’s delight? where the visions
which sweep with such supernatural distinctness and rapidity
through the imagination of genius—vision of which the millionth
portion is probably scarcely communicated to the world in a
literary lifetime—were Elizabeth’s courtiers, Elizabeth’s
passions, secret hours, interviews with Leicester—were the
imprisoned king’s nights of loneliness and dread, his hopes, his
indignant, but unheeded thoughts—were all the possible
circumstances, real or imaginary, of which that proud castle
might have been the scene, thronging in those few moments of
revery through her fancy? or was her heart busy with its kindly
affections, and had the beauty and interest of the scene but
awakened a thought of one who was most wont to number with her
the sands of those brighter hours.
“Who shall say? The very question would perhaps startle the
thoughts beyond recall—so illusive are even the most angelic of
the mind’s unseen visitants?”
In another place we made the following memoranda of what we knew of her
biography, etc.:—
“Miss Porter was the daughter of a gallant English officer, who
died, leaving a widow and four children, then very young, but
three of them destined to remarkable fame, Sir Robert Ker
Porter, Jane Porter, and Anna Maria Porter. Sir Robert, as is
well known, was the celebrated historical painter, traveller in
Persia, soldier, diplomatist, and author, lately deceased. He
went to Russia with one of his great pictures when very young,
married a wealthy Russian princess, and passed his subsequent
years between the camp and diplomacy, honored and admired in
every station and relation of his life. The two girls were
playmates and neighbors of Walter Scott. Jane published her
“Scottish Chiefs,” at the age of eighteen, and became
immediately the great literary wonder of her time. Her widowed
mother, however, withdrew her immediately from society to the
seclusion of a country town, and she was little seen in the gay
world of London before several of her works had become classics.
Anna Maria, the second sister, commenced her admirable series of
novels soon after the first celebrity of Jane’s works, and they
wrote and passed the brightest years of their life together in a
cottage retreat. The two sisters were singularly beautiful. Sir
Thomas Lawrence was an unsuccessful suitor to Anna Maria, and
Jane was engaged to a young soldier who was killed in the
Peninsula. She is a woman to have but one love in a lifetime.
Her betrothed was killed when she was twenty years of age, and
she has ever since worn mourning, and remained true to his
memory. Jane is now the only survivor of the three; her
admirable mother and her sister having died some twelve or
fourteen years ago, and Sir Robert having died lately, while
revisiting England after many years’ diplomatic residence in
Venezuela.
“Miss Porter is now near seventy. She has suffered within the
last two or three years from ill health, but she is still erect,
graceful, and majestic in person and still possessed of
admirable beauty of countenance. Her large dark eyes have a
striking lambency of lustre, her smile inspires love in all who
see her, and her habit of mind, up to the time we last saw her,
(three or four years ago,) was that of _reflecting the mood of
others in conversation_, thinking never of herself, and
endeavoring only to _make others shine_, and all this with a
tact, a playfulness and simplicity, an occasional unconscious
brilliancy and penetration, which have made her, up to seventy
years of age, a most interesting, engaging, and lovely woman.
Considering the extent of her charm, over old and young, titled
and humble, masters and servants, we sincerely think we never
have seen a woman so beloved and so fascinating. She is the idol
of many different circles of very high rank, and passes her time
in yielding, month after month, to pressing invitations from the
friends who love her. The dowager queen Adelaide is one of her
warmest friends, the highest families of nobility contend for
her as a resident guest, distinguished and noble foreigners pay
court to her invariably on arriving in England, she has been
ennobled by a decree of the king of Prussia, and with all this
weight of honor on her head, you might pass weeks with her
(ignorant of her history) without suspecting her to be more than
the loveliest of women past their prime, and born but to grace a
contented mediocrity of station.”
We know nothing more to the honor of the English nobility of this day,
than that Jane Porter—such as she was—should have chosen and cherished
the greater number of her friendships from among them. Utterly incapable
of a servility or an obsequiousness as her gifted and lofty nature was
always admitted to be, she still moved in the highest sphere of rank,
with sympathies all expanded, and the imprint of congeniality, with all
around her, stamped upon countenance and mien. Yet she had mingled, more
or less, with all classes, and knew the world well. Had she found it
necessary to sacrifice the slightest shadow of purity or independence to
retain her position, or had she believed, or conjectured, that purer or
simpler natures were to be found in the ranks below, she was not one to
hesitate or compromise for an instant. But, with the intuitive
perceptions of genius, and a disposition as open as the day, she chose
this for her sphere, and lived in it as one who had no thought or need
of managements, either to belong to, or to grace it. The class of
society, in a country, with which simple and proud genius finds itself
most at home, is its superior and true nobility; and, that England’s
circles of high rank are so preferred, and so honored and brightened, by
spirits like Jane Porter, is, we think, the evidence that proves most
for England’s present civilization and glory.