uselessly; and still a stranger to her home, she died, leaving her
daughter, now a beautiful girl of twenty, and marvellously like what
her mother was when she married.
The husband, unaware of the death of his wife, himself came to lay
him for the last beneath his own roof-tree, and still his one cry
was, "Jane will return." It seemed as if he could not pass in peace
from this world's rack until it was accomplished--when, lo! a miracle
came to pass; for the daughter arrived one evening with a letter from
her mother, written when she was dying, and asking her husband's
forgiveness, and the light still beamed from the beacon window.
The old man was only semi-conscious, and mistaking his child for her
mother, with a strong voice cried out, "I knew you'd come back," and
died in the moment of the joy of her supposed return.
By a curious coincidence, since writing this true story, which was
told to me in 1865, some of the incidents, in an altered form, have
found a place in Mr. Ian Maclaren's popular book, "Beside the Bonnie
Brier Bush." It would be interesting to know from whence he drew his
inspiration, and whether his story should perchance trace back to a
common ancestor in mine.
* * * * *
A few years ago Mr. Walter Hamilton published, in six volumes, the most
complete collection of English parodies ever brought together. Amongst
others, he gave a vast number upon the well-known poem by Charles Wolfe
of "Not a drum was heard." Page after page is covered with them, upon
every possible subject; but the following one, written by an "American
cousin" many years ago, and which was not accessible to Mr. Hamilton,
is perhaps worth repeating and preserving. He called it "The Mosquito
Hunt," and it runs as follows, if my memory serves me faithfully, I
having no written note of it:--
"Not a sound was heard, but a horrible hum,
As around our chamber we hurried,
In search of the insect whose trumpet and drum
Our delectable slumber had worried.
We sought for him darkly at dead of night,
Our coverlet carefully turning,
By the shine of the moonbeam's misty light,
And our candle dimly burning.
About an hour had seemed to elapse,
Ere we met with the wretch that had bit us;
And raising our shoe, gave some terrible slaps,
Which made the mosquito's quietus.
Quickly and gladly we turned from the dead,
And left him all smash'd and gory;
We blew out the candle, and popped into bed,
And determined to tell you the story!"
Chat No. 14.
"_The welcome news is in the letter found,
The carrier's not commissioned to expound:
It speaks itself._"
--Dryden.
A pleasant hour may perhaps be passed in searching through the
family autograph-box in the book-room. Its contents are varied and
far-fetched. A capital series of letters from that best and most genial
of correspondents, James Payn, are there to puzzle, by their very
difficult calligraphy, the would-be reader. Mr. Payn, a dear friend
to Foxwold, is now a great invalid, and a brave sufferer, keeping,
despite his pain, the same bright spirit, the same brilliant wit,
and delighting with the same enchanting conversation. Out of all his
work, there is nothing so beautiful as his lay-sermons, published in
a small volume called "Some Private Views;" and but a little while
since he wrote, on his invalid couch, a most affecting study, called
"The Backwater of Life;" it has only up to the present time appeared
in the _Cornhill Magazine_, but will doubtless be soon collected with
other work in a more permanent form. It is a pathetic picture of how
suffering may be relieved by wit, wisdom, and courage.
As Mr. Leslie Stephen well says in his brother's life, "For such
literature the British public has shown a considerable avidity ever
since the days of Addison. In spite of occasional disavowals, it
really loves a sermon, and is glad to hear preachers who are not bound
by the proprieties of the religious pulpit. Some essayists, like
Johnson, have been as solemn as the true clerical performer, and some
have diverged into the humorous with Charles Lamb, or the cynical with
Hazlitt."[2]
In Mr. Payn's lay-sermons we have the humour and the pathos, the tears
being very close to the laughter; and they reflect in a peculiarly
strong manner the tender wit and delicate fancy of their author.
But to return to our autograph-box. Here we find letters from such
varied authors as Josef Israels, the Dutch painter, Hubert Herkomer, W.
B. Richmond, Mrs. Carlyle, Wilkie Collins, Dean Stanley, and a host of
other interesting people. Perhaps a few extracts, where judicious and
inoffensive, may give an interest to this especial chat.
The late Mrs. Charles Fox of Trebah was in herself, both socially and
intellectually, a very remarkable woman. Born in the Lake Country, and
belonging to the Society of Friends, she formed, as a girl, many happy
friendships with the Wordsworths, the Southeys, the Coleridges, and
all that charmed circle of intellect, every scrap of whose sayings and
doings are so full of interest, and so dearly cherished.
These friendships she continued to preserve after her marriage, and
when she had exchanged her lovely lake home for an equally beautiful
and interesting one on the Cornish coast, first at Perran and
afterwards at Trebah.
One of her special friendships was with Hartley Coleridge, who indited
several of his sonnets to his beautiful young friend.
The subjoined letter gives a pleasant picture of his friendly
correspondence, and has not been included in the published papers by
his brother, the Rev. Derwent Coleridge, who edited his remains.
"Dear Sarah,
If a stranger to the fold
Of happy innocents, where thou art one,
May so address thee by a name he loves,
Both for a mother's and a sister's sake,
And surely loves it not the less for thine.
Dear Sarah, strange it needs must seem to thee
That I should choose the quaint disguise of verse,
And, like a mimic masquer, come before thee
To tell my simple tale of country news,
Or,--sooth to tell thee,--I have nought to tell
But what a most intelligencing gossip
Would hardly mention on her morning rounds:
Things that a newspaper would not record
In the dead-blank recess of Parliament.
Yet so it is,--my thoughts are so confused,
My memory is so wild a wilderness,
I need the order of the measured line
To help me, whensoe'er I would attempt
To methodise the random notices
Of purblind observation. Easier far
The minuet step of slippery sliding verse,
Than the strong stately walk of steadfast prose.
Since you have left us, many a beauteous change
Hath Nature wrought on the eternal hills;
And not an hour hath past that hath not done
Its work of beauty. When December winds,
Hungry and fell, were chasing the dry leaves,
Shrill o'er the valley at the dead of night,
'Twas sweet, for watchers such as I, to mark
How bright, how very bright, the stars would shine
Through the deep rifts of congregated clouds;
How very distant seemed the azure sky;
And when at morn the lazy, weeping fog,
Long lingering, loath to leave the slumbrous lake,
Whitened, diffusive, as the rising sun
Shed on the western hills his rosiest beams,
I thought of thee, and thought our peaceful vale
Had lost one heart that could have felt its peace,
One eye that saw its beauties, and one soul
That made its peace and beauty all her own.
One morn there was a kindly boon of heaven,
That made the leafless woods so beautiful,
It was sore pity that one spirit lives,
That owns the presence of Eternal God
In all the world of Nature and of Mind,
Who did not see it. Low the vapour hung
On the flat fields, and streak'd with level layers
The lower regions of the mountainous round;
But every summit, and the lovely line
Of mountain tops, stood in the pale blue sky
Boldly defined. The cloudless sun dispelled
The hazy masses, and a lucid veil
But softened every charm it not concealed.
Then every tree that climbs the steep fell-side--
Young oak, yet laden with sere foliage;
Larch, springing upwards, with its spikey top
And spiney garb of horizontal boughs;
The veteran ash, strong-knotted, wreathed and twined,
As if some Dæmon dwelt within its trunk,
And shot forth branches, serpent-like; uprear'd
The holly and the yew, that never fade
And never smile; these, and whate'er beside,
Or stubborn stump, or thin-arm'd underwood,
Clothe the bleak strong girth of Silverhow
(You know the place, and every stream and brook
Is known to you) by ministry of Frost,
Were turned to shapes of Orient adamant,
As if the whitest crystals, new endow'd
With vital or with vegetative power,
Had burst from earth, to mimic every form
Of curious beauty that the earth could boast,
Or, like a tossing sea of curly plumes,
Frozen in an instant----"
"So much for verse, which, being execrably bad, cannot be excused,
except by friendship, therefore is the fitter for a friendly
epistle. There's logic for you! In fact, my dear lady, I am so
much delighted, not to say flattered, by your wish that I should
write to you, that I can't help being rather silly. It will be
a sad loss to me when your excellent mother leaves Grasmere;
and to-morrow my friend Archer and I dine at Dale End, for our
farewell. But so it must be. I am always happy to hear anything of
your little ones, who are such very sweet creatures that one might
almost think it a pity they should ever grow up to be big women,
and know only better than they do now. Among all the anecdotes
of childhood that have been recorded, I never heard of one so
characteristic as Jenny-Kitty's wish to inform Lord Dunstanville
of the miseries of the negroes. Bless its little soul! I am truly
sorry to hear that you have been suffering bodily illness, though
I know that it cannot disturb the serenity of your mind. I hope
little Derwent did not disturb you with his crown; I am told he is
a lovely little wretch, and you say he has eyes like mine. I hope
he will see his way better with them. Derwent has never answered
my letter, but I complain not; I dare say he has more than enough
to do.[3] Thank you kindly for your kindness to him and his lady.
I hope the friendship of Friends will not obstruct his rising in
the Church, and that he will consult his own interest prudently,
paying court to the powers that be, yet never so far committing
himself as to miss an opportunity of ingratiating himself with
the powers that may be. Let him not utter, far less write, any
sentence that will not bear a twofold interpretation! For the
present let his liberality go no further than a very liberal
explanation of the words consistency and gratitude may carry
him; let him always be honest when it is his interest to be so,
and sometimes when it may appear not to be so; and never be a
knave under a deanery or a rectory of five thousand a year! My
best remembrances to your husband, and kisses for Juliet and
Jenny-Kitty, though she did say she liked Mr. Barber far better
than me. I can't say I agree with her in that particular, having a
weak partiality for
Your affectionate friend,
Hartley Coleridge."
Another friend of the Fox family was the late John Bright, and the
following letter to the now well-known Caroline Fox of Penjerrick will
be read with interest:--
Torquay, 10 _mo._ 13, 1868.
"My dear Friend,
I hope the 'one cloud' has passed away. I was much pleased with
the earnestness and feeling of the poem, and wished to ask thee
for a copy of it, but was afraid to give thee the trouble of
writing it out for me.
"For myself, I have endeavoured only to speak when I have had
something to say which it seemed to me ought to be said, and I did
not feel that the sentiment of the poem condemned me.
"We had a pleasant visit to Kynance Cove. It is a charming
place, and we were delighted with it. We went on through Helston
to Penzance: the day following we visited the Logan Rock and the
Land's End, and in the afternoon the celebrated Mount--the weather
all we could wish for. We were greatly pleased with the Mount,
and I shall not read 'Lycidas' with less interest now that I have
seen the place of the 'great vision.' We found the hotel to which
you kindly directed us perfect in all respects. On Friday we came
from Penzance to Truro, and posted to St. Columb, where we spent a
night at Mr. Northy's--the day and night were very wet. Next day
we posted to Tintagel, and back to Launceston, taking the train
there for Torquay.
"We were pressed for time at Tintagel, but were pleased with what
we saw.
"Here, we are in a land of beauty and of summer, the beauty beyond
my expectation, and the climate like that of Nice. Yesterday we
drove round to see the sights, and W. Pengelly and Mr. Vivian
went with us to Kent's Cavern, Anstey's Cove, and the round of
exquisite views. We are at Cash's Hotel, but visit our friend
Susan Midgley in the day and evening. To-morrow we start for
Street, to stay a day or two with my daughter Helen, and are to
spend Sunday at Bath. We have seen much and enjoyed much in our
excursion, but we shall remember nothing with more pleasure than
your kindness and our stay at Penjerrick.
"Elizabeth joins me in kind and affectionate remembrance of you,
and in the hope that thy dear father did not suffer from the 'long
hours' to which my talk subjected him. When we get back to our
bleak region and home of cold and smoke, we shall often think of
your pleasant retreat, and of the wonderful gardens at Penjerrick.
Believe me,
Always sincerely thy friend,
John Bright."
_To_ Caroline Fox,
Penjerrick, Falmouth.
There are few men whose every uttered word is regarded with greater
respect and interest than Mr. Ruskin. It is well known that he has
always been a wide and careful collector of minerals, gems, and fine
specimens of the art and nature world. One of his various agents,
through whom at one time he made many such purchases, both for himself
and his Oxford and Sheffield museums, was Mr. Bryce Wright, the
mineralogist, and to him are addressed the following five letters:--
Brantwood, Coniston, Lancashire,
_22nd May '81_.
"My dear Wright,
I am very greatly obliged to you for letting me see these opals,
quite unexampled, as you rightly say, from that locality--but
from that locality _I_ never buy--my kind is the opal formed in
pores and cavities, throughout the mass of that compact brown
jasper--this, which is merely a superficial crust of jelly on the
surface of a nasty brown sandstone, I do not myself value in the
least. I wish you could get at some of the geology of the two
sorts, but I suppose everything is kept close by the diggers and
the Jews at present.
"As for the cameos, the best of the two, 'supposed' (by whom?) to
represent Isis, represents neither Egyptian nor Oxonian Isis, but
only an ill-made French woman of the town bathing at Boulogne, and
the other is only a 'Minerve' of the Halles, a _petroleuse_ in a
mob-cap, sulphur-fire colour.
"I don't depreciate what I want to buy, as you know well, but it
is not safe to send me things in the set way 'supposed' to be
this or that! If you ever get any more nice little cranes, or
cockatoos, looking like what they're supposed to be meant for,
they shall at least be returned with compliments.
"I send back the box by to-day's rail; put down all expenses to my
account, as I am always amused and interested by a parcel from you.
"You needn't print this letter as an advertisement, unless you
like!
Ever faithfully yours,
J. Ruskin."
Brantwood, _23rd May_.
"My dear Wright,
The silver's safe here, and I want to buy it for Sheffield, but
the price seems to me awful. It must always be attached to it
at the museum, and I fear great displeasure from the public for
giving you such a price. What is there in the specimen to make it
so valuable? I have not anything like it, nor do I recollect its
like (or I shouldn't want it), but if so rare, why does not the
British Museum take it.
Ever truly yours,
J. Ruskin."
Brantwood, _Wednesday_.
"My dear Wright,
I am very glad of your long and interesting letter, and can
perfectly understand all your difficulties, and have always
observed your activity and attention to your business with much
sympathy, but of late certainly I have been frightened at your
prices, and, before I saw the golds, was rather uneasy at having
so soon to pay for them. But you are quite right in your estimate
of the interest and value of the collection, and I hope to be
able to be of considerable service to you yet, though I fear it
cannot be in buying specimens at seventy guineas, unless there is
something to be shown for the money, like that great native silver!
"I have really not been able to examine the red ones yet--the
golds alone were more than I could judge of till I got a quiet
hour this morning. I might possibly offer to change some of the
locally interesting ones for a proustite, but I can't afford any
more cash just now.
Ever very heartily yours,
J. Ruskin."
Brantwood,
_3rd Nov. or 4th (?), Friday_.
"Dear Wright,
My telegram will, I hope, enable you to act with promptness about
the golds, which will be of extreme value to me; and its short
saying about the proustites will, I hope, not be construed by you
as meaning that I will buy them also. You don't really suppose
that you are to be paid interest of money on minerals, merely
because they have lain long in your hands.
"If I sold my old arm-chair, which has got the rickets, would
you expect the purchaser to pay me forty years' interest on the
original price? Your proustite may perhaps be as good as ever
it was, but it is not worth more to me or Sheffield because you
have had either the enjoyment or the care of it longer than you
expected!
"But I am really very seriously obliged by the _sight_ of it, with
the others, and perhaps may make an effort to lump some of the new
ones with the gold in an estimate of large purchase. I think the
gold, by your description, must be a great credit to Sheffield and
to me; perhaps I mayn't be able to part with it!
Ever faithfully yours,
J. Ruskin."
Herne Hill, S.E., _6 May '84_.
"My dear Bryce,
I can't resist this tourmaline, and have carried it off with me.
For you and Regent Street it's not monstrous in price neither; but
I must send you back your (pink!) apatite. I wish I'd come to see
you, but have been laid up all the time I've been here--just got
to the pictures, and that's all.
Yours always,
(much to my damage!)
J. R."
FOOTNOTES:
[2] "Life of Sir T. FitzJames Stephen," by his Brother, Leslie Stephen.
Smith, Elder & Co., 1895.
[3] The Rev. Derwent Coleridge was at the time keeping a school at
Helston, which was within an easy distance of Perran, where Mrs. Fox
was at this time living.
Chat No. 15.
"_Scarcely she knew, that she was great or fair,
Or wise beyond what other women are._"
--Dryden.
An oval picture that hangs opposite Sheridan's portrait is a fine
presentment of the Marquis de Ségur, by Vanloo.
The Marquis was born in 1724, and eventually became a marshal of
France, and minister of war to Louis XVI. After his royal master's
execution he fell into very low water, and it was only by his calm
intrepidity in very trying circumstances that he escaped the
guillotine. His memoirs have from time to time appeared, generally
under the authority of some of his descendants. This interesting
portrait belonged to the family of de Ségur, and was parted with by the
present head of the house to the late Mrs. Lyne Stephens, who gave it
to us.
The history of this admirable woman is deeply interesting in every
detail. She was the daughter of Colonel Duvernay, a member of a good
old French family, who was ruined by the French Revolution of 1785.
Born at Versailles in the year 1812, her father had the child named
Yolande Marie Louise; and she was educated at the Conservatoire in
Paris, where they soon discovered her wonderful talent for dancing.
This art was encouraged, developed, and trained to the uttermost; and
when, in due time, she appeared upon the ballet stage, she took the
town by storm, and at once came to the foremost rank as the well-known
Mademoiselle Duvernay, rivalling, if not excelling, the two Ellsslers,
Cerito, and Taglioni.
She made wide the fame of the Cachucha dance, which was specially
rearranged for her; and the world was immediately deluged with her
portraits, some good, some bad, many very apocryphal, and many very
indifferent.
In one of W. M. Thackeray's wonderful "Roundabout Papers," which
perhaps contain some of the most beautiful work he ever gave us, he
thus recalls, in a semi-playful, semi-pathetic tone, his recollections
of the great _danseuse_. "In William IV.'s time, when I think of
Duvernay dancing in as the Bayadère, I say it was a vision of
loveliness such as mortal eyes can't see nowadays. How well I remember
the tune to which she used to appear! Kaled used to say to the Sultan,
'My lord, a troop of those dancing and singing girls called Bayadères
approaches,' and to the clash of cymbals and the thumping of my heart,
in she used to dance! There has never been anything like it--never."
After a few years of brilliant successes she retired from the stage
she had done so much to grace and dignify, and married the late Mr.
Stephens Lyne Stephens, who in those days, and after his good old
father's death, was considered one of the richest commoners in England.
He died in 1860, after a far too short, but intensely happy, married
life; and having no children, left his widow, as far as was in his
power, complete mistress of his large fortune. They were both devoted
to art, and being very acute connoisseurs, had collected a superb
quantity of the best pictures, the rarest old French furniture, and the
finest china.
The bulk of these remarkable collections was dispersed at Christie's
in a nine-days'-wonder sale in 1895, and proved the great attraction
of the season, buyers from Paris, New York, Vienna, and Berlin eagerly
competing with London for the best things.
Some of the more remarkable prices are here noted, as being of
permanent interest to the art-loving world, and testifying how little
hard times can affect the sale of a really fine and genuine collection.
As a rule, the prices obtained were very far in excess of those paid
for the various objects, in many cases reaching four and five times
their original cost.
A pair of Mandarin vases sold for 1070 guineas. The beautiful Sèvres
oviform vase, given by Louis XV. to the Marquis de Montcalm, 1900
guineas. A pair of Sèvres blue and gold Jardinières, 5-1/4 inches high,
1900 guineas. A clock by Berthoud, 1000 guineas. A small upright Louis
XVI. secretaire, 800 guineas. Another rather like it, 960 guineas. A
marble bust of Louis XIV., 567 guineas. Three Sèvres oviform vases,
from Lord Pembroke's collection, 5000 guineas. A single oviform
Sèvres vase, 760 guineas. A pair of Sèvres vases, 1050 guineas. A
very beautiful Sedan chair, in Italian work of the sixteenth century,
600 guineas. A clock by Causard, 720 guineas. A Louis XV. upright
secretaire, 1320 guineas. "Dogs and Gamekeeper," painted by Troyon,
2850 guineas. "The Infanta," a full-length portrait by Velasquez, 4300
guineas. A bust of the Infanta, also by Velasquez, 770 guineas. "Faith
presenting the Eucharist," a splendid work by Murillo, 2350 guineas.
"The Prince of Orange Hunting," by Cuyp, 2000 guineas. "The Village
Inn," by Van Ostade, 1660 guineas. A fine specimen of Terburg's work,
1950 guineas. A portrait by Madame Vigée le Brun, 2250 guineas.
A lovely portrait by Nattier, 3900 guineas. Watteau's celebrated
picture of "La Gamme d'Amour," 3350 guineas. A pair of small Lancret's
Illustrations to La Fontaine brought respectively 1300 guineas and 1050
guineas. Drouais' superb portrait of Madame du Barry, 690 guineas; and
a small head of a girl by Greuze sold for 710 guineas.
Small pieces of china of no remarkable merit, but bearing a greatly
enhanced value from belonging to this celebrated collection, obtained
wonderful prices. For example:--
A Sang-de Boeuf Crackle vase, 12-1/2 inches high, 280 guineas. A
pair of china Kylins, 360 guineas. A circular Pesaro dish, 155
guineas. A pair of Sèvres dark blue oviform vases, 1000 guineas.
Three Sèvres vases, 1520 guineas. Two small panels of old French
tapestry, 285 guineas. Another pair, 710 guineas. A circular
Sèvres bowl, 13 inches in diameter, 300 guineas.
The ormolu ornaments of the time of Louis XIV. brought great sums; for
instance--
An ormolu inkstand sold for 72 guineas. A pair of wall lights, 102
guineas. A pair of ormolu candlesticks, 400 guineas. Another pair,
500 guineas. A pair of ormolu andirons, 220 guineas.