TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: Volume II is available as Project Gutenberg ebook
number 49845.
WILLIAM COBBETT.
A BIOGRAPHY.
VOL. I.
LONDON:
GILBERT AND RIVINGTON, PRINTERS,
ST. JOHN’S SQUARE.
[Illustration: _J. R. Smith pinxit._
_F. Bartolozzi R.A. sculpsit._
MR. WILLIAM COBBETT.]
WILLIAM COBBETT:
_A BIOGRAPHY_.
BY EDWARD SMITH.
IN TWO VOLUMES.
VOL. I.
London:
SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON, SEARLE, & RIVINGTON,
CROWN BUILDINGS, 188, FLEET STREET.
1878.
[_All rights reserved._]
“It is not by his faults, but by his excellences, that we
measure a great man.”
G. H. LEWES (_On Actors, &c._).
“Fear never but you shall be consistent in whatever variety of
actions, so that they be each honest and natural in their hour.
For of one will, the actions will be harmonious, however unlike
they seem.”
R. W. EMERSON (_Essay on Self-reliance_).
“My good blade carves the casques of men,
My tough lance thrusteth sure,
My strength is as the strength of ten,
Because my heart is pure!”
TENNYSON (_Sir Galahad_).
NOTE.
The following pages need no Preface, with regard to their subject.
I am unwilling, however, to let the work go forth to the public without
a renewed word of thanks, to those who have given me any sort of
encouragement or assistance. My acknowledgments are especially due to
the venerable daughter of Mr. James Swann, for the use of some letters;
to the author of the “Handbook of Fictitious Names,” without whose apt
teaching in the art of Bibliography, the work might have wanted the
interesting appendix; to Mr. Job Swain, one of the last survivors of
Cobbett’s personal friends, for some reminiscences; and to Mr. Ellis
Yarnall, of Philadelphia, for copies of several letters, and for some
suggestions which have enabled the author to throw additional light on
the “Porcupine” days.
E. S.
London: _November, 1878_.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
CHAPTER I.
1762-1784.
“I LOOKED BACK WITH PRIDE TO MY WAGGON-DRIVING GRANDFATHER” 1
CHAPTER II.
1784-1791.
“WHEN I HAD THE HONOUR TO WEAR A RED COAT” 30
CHAPTER III.
1792.
“I HAVE ALWAYS SHOWN MY ENMITY TO EVERY SPECIES OF PUBLIC
FRAUD OR ROBBERY” 56
CHAPTER IV.
1793-1794.
“I LIVED IN PHILADELPHIA” 94
CHAPTER V.
1794-1795.
“HEARING MY COUNTRY ATTACKED, I BECAME HER DEFENDER THROUGH
THICK AND THIN” 107
CHAPTER VI.
1796-1797.
“PETER PORCUPINE, AT YOUR SERVICE!” 146
CHAPTER VII.
1797-1799.
“AT LAST GOT THE BETTER OF ALL DIFFIDENCE IN MY OWN
CAPACITY” 180
CHAPTER VIII.
1799-1800.
“WHEN I LEFT THEM I CERTAINLY DID SHAKE THE DUST OFF
MY SHOES” 197
CHAPTER IX.
1794-1800.
“MY FAME HAD PRECEDED ME” 231
CHAPTER X.
1800.
“I RESOLVED NEVER TO BEND BEFORE THEM” 247
CHAPTER XI.
1800-1801.
“I TOOK THE LEAD, IN SINGING THE PRAISES OF PITT” 267
CHAPTER XII.
1802.
“THE THOUGHTS OF THE NATION ARE LIKE A CORK IN THE MIDDLE
OF THE OCEAN” 284
CHAPTER XIII.
1803-1805.
“I SAW THINGS IN ANOTHER LIGHT” 308
WILLIAM COBBETT: A BIOGRAPHY.
CHAPTER I.
“I LOOKED BACK WITH PRIDE TO MY WAGGON-DRIVING GRANDFATHER.”
William Cobbett was born in the parish of Farnham, in the county of
Surrey, on the 9th of March, 1762.
* * * * *
The town of Farnham is a hop-garden. It had, in olden days, one of the
most important corn-markets in the south of England. Before that, it
was a great clothing mart; and, early in Parliamentary history, was
called upon to send representatives to the “Collective Wisdom.” But,
at last, the mercantile spirit proper, as was the case with many towns
in Surrey, Kent, and Sussex, fled from Farnham; granaries took the
place of workshops; and manufactures declined. With the extinction
of the iron-furnaces of the Weald expired the once-flourishing trade
of the south of England; and agriculture became the staple pursuit of
the still-prosperous people, all over the fertile country which lies
between the Thames and the English Channel. Corn-fields took the place
of extensive sheep and cattle pastures; new grazing-downs succeeded to
the burnt-up forests, whilst hops took the pick of the land, upon which
they throve in a hitherto-unexampled manner. And Farnham, with its
deep, rich, light-brown soil, found itself with a title to give to the
best hops grown in England.
So Farnham is, to this day, a big hop-garden. In spite of a
railway-station and 10,000 inhabitants, and the proximity of a
garrison, the impression is, all around, the same. You enter the town
from London, and the first church you come to is nearly surrounded with
vines; the last building, at the other end of the long street, is an
oast-house. You may take a lodging down by the river-side, and find a
forest of hop-poles immediately outside your window, in the morning;
or taking stand on any elevation, you will see all the uplands around,
either in their luxuriant summer dress of vine, or else, so many square
miles of poles placed tent-wise, taking their winter rest, looking
like nothing so much as the encampment of a monstrous army.
They must have been clever enough in their generation, who planted
and built hereabouts nearly two thousand years ago; but he who did
the most on behalf of this part of Surrey was he who planted a small
field of hops on the upland towards Crondell, somewhere about the year
1600. By the middle of the eighteenth century the hops of Farnham were
already distinguished--“always at the top of the market;” and the
agricultural writers of that day wax eloquent over the praises of the
pleasing, fertile vale, and its “hazel-coloured,” loamy soil, and the
yearly-increasing number of acres given up to hop-culture. Arthur Young
calls the district between Farnham and Alton the finest in England.
The scenery around Farnham is not, in itself, unique; so far, that any
well-cultivated English river-valley is like almost any other, with its
low hills crowned along their summits with the evidences of prosperous
farming. But, from the top of one of these eminences, the eye soon
discovers certain characteristics, which compel a deep impression upon
the mind of singularity and beauty. The best view is, perhaps, to be
obtained from Hungry Hill, near Aldershot; the most prominent object
being Crooksbury Hill, rising from above the woods of Moor Park and
Waverley Abbey. A very odd-looking hill, covered with tall Scotch firs,
the like of which it would be difficult to name; a wide expanse of
sandy heath, now partly cultivated, stretches for many miles beyond,
until broken up into a tumultuous range of heath-clad hills; and
these, again, succeeded by the distant blue outlines of the Sussex and
Hampshire downs. The river Wey courses down the vale, passing through
the lower part of Farnham town; and after spinning merrily through the
meadows and hop-fields below, bends abruptly round in the direction of
Guildford.
The inhabitants of this district, one hundred years ago, were almost
out of the great World. The turnpike-road to Winchester and the
south-west bounded their earthly aims; upon it was situated the weekly
goal for the produce of their farms; and along it was, at a toilsome
distance, either the great metropolis at one end, or Portsmouth and her
marines at the other. With strong native prejudices, and a character
for inflexible honesty, the farmers (generally speaking) lived remote,
“equal enemies to improvements in agriculture and to relaxations in
morals;” the smallest occupiers sharing the hardest toil with their
labourers.
Before the great scarcity and dearness set in, in the last quarter of
the century--when the clocks and the brass kettles began to disappear
from the parlours, and the visions of general pauperism began to
appear--the spirit of the peasantry in the remoter parts of Surrey
was high and independent--chill penury was then uncommon with the
able-bodied. In the receipt of only seven or eight shillings a week of
average money wages, such was the cheapness of food, and so light were
the burdens which Prudence had to bear, that the labourer was healthy,
cheerful, and contented; whilst he could often explain clearly enough,
from his own observation and reflection, the merits or demerits of the
different systems and practice upon the neighbouring farms.
Of this class was the grandfather of William Cobbett.
“With respect to my ancestors, I shall go no further back than
my grandfather, and for this plain reason, that I never heard
talk of any prior to him. He was a day-labourer, and I have
heard my father say, that he worked for one farmer from the day
of his marriage to that of his death, upwards of forty years.
He died before I was born, but I have often slept beneath the
same roof that had sheltered him, and where his widow dwelt
for several years after his death. It was a little thatched
cottage with a garden before the door. It had but two windows;
a damson-tree shaded one, and a clump of filberts the other.
Here I and my brothers went every Christmas and Whitsuntide, to
spend a week or two, and torment the poor old woman with our
noise and dilapidations. She used to give us milk and bread
for breakfast, an apple-pudding for our dinner, and a piece of
bread and cheese for supper. Her fire was made of turf, cut
from the neighbouring heath, and her evening light was a rush
dipped in grease.”
George Cobbett, son of this old couple, appears to have much improved
his condition in life; and he lived to see all his boys gradually
rising in the world. WILLIAM was the third (out of four), and he gives
vivid sketches of their daily course of existence.
“My father, when I was born, was a farmer. The reader will
easily believe, from the poverty of his parents, that he had
received no very brilliant education: he was, however, learned,
for a man in his rank of life. When a little boy, he drove
the plough for twopence a day, and these his earnings were
appropriated to the expenses of an evening school. What a
village schoolmaster could be expected to teach, he had learnt,
and had besides considerably improved himself in several
branches of the mathematics. He understood land surveying
well, and was often chosen to draw the plans of disputed
territory: in short, he had the reputation of possessing
experience and understanding, which never fails, in England,
to give a man, in a country place, some little weight with his
neighbours. He was honest, industrious, and frugal; it was not,
therefore, wonderful, that he should be situated in a good
farm, and happy in a wife of his own rank, like him, beloved
and respected.
“So much for my ancestors, from whom, if I derive no honour, I
derive no shame.
“A father like ours, it will be readily supposed, did not
suffer us to eat the bread of idleness. I do not remember the
time when I did not earn my living. My first occupation was
driving the small birds from the turnip seed, and the rooks
from the peas. When I first trudged a-field, with my wooden
bottle and my satchel swung over my shoulders, I was hardly
able to climb the gates and stiles, and, at the close of the
day, to reach home was a task of infinite difficulty. My next
employment was weeding wheat, and leading a single horse at
harrowing barley. Hoeing peas followed, and hence I arrived at
the honour of joining the reapers in harvest, driving the team
and holding the plough. We were all of us strong and laborious,
and my father used to boast, that he had four boys, the eldest
of whom was but fifteen years old, who did as much work as any
three men in the parish of Farnham. Honest pride, and happy
days!…”
“I have some faint recollection of going to school to an old
woman, who, I believe, did not succeed in teaching me my
letters. In the winter evenings my father taught us all to
read and write, and gave us a pretty tolerable knowledge of
arithmetic. Grammar he did not perfectly understand himself,
and therefore his endeavours to teach us that, necessarily
failed; for, though he thought he understood it, and though he
made us get the rules by heart, we learnt nothing at all of the
principles.”
No, the book-learning was not to come yet. That was to be left until
the little world of his birthplace had become too small to hold him.
Nearly sixty years after these simple times, Mr. Cobbett is riding in
the neighbourhood, accompanied by one of his sons, and the two go out
of their way to visit the spot where he received “the rudiments of his
education.”
“There is a little hop-garden in which I used to work when
from eight to ten years old; from which I have scores of times
run to follow the hounds, leaving the hoe to do the best that
it could to destroy the weeds; but the most interesting thing
was a sand-hill, which goes from a part of the heath down to
the rivulet. As a due mixture of pleasure with toil, I with
two brothers, used occasionally to disport ourselves, as the
lawyers call it, at this sand-hill. One diversion was this: we
used to go to the top of the hill, which was steeper than the
roof of a house; one used to draw his arms out of the sleeves
of his smock-frock, and lay himself down with his arms by
his sides; and then the others, one at head and the other at
feet, sent him rolling down the hill like a barrel or a log
of wood. By the time he got to the bottom, his hair, eyes,
ears, nose, and mouth, were all full of this loose sand; then
the others took their turn; and at every roll, there was a
monstrous spell of laughter. I had often told my sons of this
while they were very little, and I now took one of them to see
the spot. But, that was not all. This was the spot where I was
receiving my education; and this was the sort of education;
and I am perfectly satisfied that if I had not received such
an education, or something very much like it; that, if I had
been brought up a milksop, with a nursery-maid everlastingly at
my heels, I should have been at this day as great a fool, as
inefficient a mortal, as any of those frivolous idiots that are
turned out from Winchester and Westminster School, or from any
of those dens of dunces called colleges and universities. It is
impossible to say how much I owe to that sand-hill; and I went
to return it my thanks for the ability which it probably gave
me to be one of the greatest terrors, to one of the greatest
and most powerful bodies of knaves and fools, that ever were
permitted to afflict this or any other country.”
In such manner the merry, sturdy, little life went on. At tying
hop-poles, or scaring birds, almost as soon as he could barely stand,
a trifling share was given to the family efforts; whilst the vigorous,
healthy senses were already open to the keenest enjoyment of nature,
and to the unexpected moments of fun which enter into the days of
boyhood. Look at this, for example (written at nearly seventy years of
age).
“When I was a very little boy, I was, in the barley-sowing
season, going along by the side of a field, near Waverley
Abbey; the primroses and blue-bells bespangling the banks on
both sides of me; a thousand linnets singing in a spreading oak
over my head; while the jingle of the traces, and the whistling
of the plough-boys saluted my ear from over the hedge; and, as
it were to snatch me from the enchantment, the hounds, at that
instant, having started a hare in the hanger on the other side
of the field, came up scampering over it in full cry, taking me
after them many a mile. I was not more than eight years old;
but this particular scene has presented itself to my mind many
times every year from that day to this. I always enjoy it over
again, &c.”
Cobbett’s political writings, during his whole career, were largely
illustrated by the incidents and occurrences of his life. This was the
line taken by his own peculiar egotism, and we are indebted to it for
numerous pictures similar to the above. Of this particular period there
is only space here for the following capital story:--
“When I was a boy, a huntsman named George Bradley, who was
huntsman to Mr. Smither, of Hale, very wantonly gave me a cut
with his whip, because I jumped in amongst the dogs, pulled a
hare from them, and got her scut, upon a little common, called
Seal Common, near Waverley Abbey. I was only about eight years
old; but my mind was so strongly imbued with the principles of
natural justice, that I did not rest satisfied with the mere
calling of names, of which, however, I gave Mr. George Bradley
a plenty. I sought to inflict a just punishment upon him; and,
as I had not the means of proceeding by force, I proceeded by
cunning in the manner that I am presently going to describe.
I had not then read the Bible, much less had I read GROTIUS
and PUFFENDORF; I, therefore, did not know that God and man
had declared, that it was laudable to combat tyranny by either
force or fraud; but, though I did not know what tyranny meant,
reason and a sense of justice taught me that Bradley had been
guilty of tyranny towards me; and the native resources of my
mind, together with my resolution, made me inflict justice on
him in the following manner:--Hounds (hare-hounds at least)
will follow the trail of a red herring as eagerly as that of
a hare, and rather more so, the scent being stronger and more
unbroken. I waited till Bradley and his pack were trailing for
a hare in the neighbourhood of that same Seal Common. They were
pretty sure to find in the space of half an hour, and the hare
was pretty sure to go up the common and over the hill to the
south. I placed myself ready with a red herring at the end of
a string, in a dry field, and near a hard path, along which,
or near to which, I was pretty sure the hare would go. I waited
a long while; the sun was getting high, the scent bad; but,
by and by, I heard the view-halloo and full cry. I squatted
down in the fern, and my heart bounded with the prospect of
inflicting justice, when I saw my lady come skipping by, going
off towards Pepperharrow; that is to say, to the south. In a
moment, I clapped down my herring, went off at a right angle
towards the west, climbed up a steep bank very soon, where
the horsemen, such as they were, could not follow; then on I
went over the roughest part of the common that I could find,
till I got to the pales of Moor Park, over which I went, there
being holes at the bottom for the letting in of the hares. That
part of the park was covered with short heath; and I gave some
twirls about to amuse Mr. Bradley for half-an-hour. Then off
I went, and down a hanger at last, to the bottom of which no
horseman could get without riding round a quarter of a mile. At
the bottom of the hanger was an alder moor, in a swamp. There
my herring ceased to perform its service. The river is pretty
rapid, I tossed it in, that it might go back to the sea, and
relate to its brethren the exploits of the land. I washed my
hands in the water of the moor; and took a turn, and stood at
the top of the hanger to witness the winding up of the day’s
sport, which terminated a little before dusk in one of the
dark days of November. After overrunning the scent a hundred
times, after an hour’s puzzling in the dry field, after all the
doubles and all the turns that the sea-borne hare had given
them, down came the whole _posse_ to the swamp; the huntsman
went round a mill-head not far off, and tried the other side of
the river: ‘_No! d-- her, where can she be?_’ And thus, amidst
conjectures, disputations, mutual blamings, and swearings a
plenty, they concluded, some of them half-leg deep in dirt, and
going soaking home at the end of a drizzling day.”
The little life, that was destined to be such a cruel thorn in the
sides of Authority, was very near being summarily extinguished about
this time; on occasion of William getting out of his depth while
bathing in the river Wey, and from which he was “pulled out by the
foot, which happened to stick up above the water.”
By the time of his reaching ten or eleven years of age he is already
getting useful, in his way, and he takes his turn with his brothers
of going the annual visit to Weyhill Fair with their father. The fair
at Weyhill, though still considerable, is not what it was then; the
hop-growers now run off to Worcester, or Burton-on-Trent; but in those
days, long before the railways, Weyhill in October was the grand centre
for sheep, hops, &c. There the yearly hirings took place, and there
the bucolic gathering from all the neighbouring counties had an annual
dissipation. We shall presently see that it was at one of these trips
Cobbett made his first acquaintance with American politics. But the
following incident--which has often been told, but cannot on that
account be omitted here--presents his first recorded look-out upon life.
“At eleven years of age, my employment was clipping of
box-edgings and weeding beds of flowers in the garden of the
Bishop of Winchester, at the Castle of Farnham, my native town.
I had always been fond of beautiful gardens; and a gardener,
who had just come from the King’s Gardens at Kew, gave such
a description as made me instantly resolve to work in these
gardens. The next morning, without saying a word to any one,
off I set, with no clothes except those upon my back, and
with thirteen halfpence in my pocket. I found that I must go
to Richmond, and I accordingly went on, from place to place,
inquiring my way thither. A long day (it was in June) brought
me to Richmond in the afternoon. Two pennyworth of bread and
cheese, and a pennyworth of small beer, which I had on the
road, and one halfpenny that I had lost somehow or other, left
threepence in my pocket. With this for my whole fortune, I was
trudging through Richmond, in my blue smock-frock, and my red
garters tied under my knees, when, staring about me, my eye
fell upon a little book in a bookseller’s window. ‘TALE OF A
TUB,’ price 3_d._ The title was so odd, that my curiosity was
excited. I had the 3_d._, but then I could have no supper. In
I went, and got the little book, which I was so impatient to
read, that I got over into a field, at the upper corner of
Kew Gardens, where there stood a haystack. On the shady side
of this, I sat down to read. The book was so different from
anything that I had ever read before; it was something so new
to my mind, that, though I could not at all understand some of
it, it delighted me beyond description; and it produced what
I have always considered a birth of intellect. I read on till
it was dark, without any thought about supper or bed. When I
could see no longer, I put my little book in my pocket, and
tumbled down by the side of the stack, where I slept till the
birds in Kew Gardens awaked me in the morning; when off I
started to Kew, reading my little book. The singularity of my
dress, the simplicity of my manner, my confident and lively
air, and, doubtless, his own compassion besides, induced the
gardener, who was a Scotchman, I remember, to give me victuals,
find me lodgings, and set me to work. And it was during the
period that I was at Kew, that the present King (Geo. IV.), and
two of his brothers laughed at the oddness of my dress, while
I was sweeping the grass-plat round the foot of the pagoda.
The gardener, seeing me fond of books, lent me some gardening
books to read; but these I could not relish after my ‘Tale of a
Tub,’ which I carried about with me wherever I went; and when
I, at about twenty [24] years old, lost it in a box that fell
overboard in the Bay of Fundy, in North America, the loss gave
me greater pain then I have ever felt at losing thousands of
pounds.”
How long the employment at Kew lasted, and how he got home again,
does not appear. The life at Farnham was probably resumed before
the approach of winter; for, either the year before this, or that
immediately succeeding, he mentions being sent down from Farnham to
Steeple Langford, in Wiltshire, with a horse; remaining at the latter
place “from the month of June till the fall of the year.”
Cobbett must have been about fourteen years of age at the time alluded
to in the following incident:--
“My father used to take one of us with him every year to
the great hop-fair at Weyhill. The fair was held at Old
Michaelmastide, and the journey was to us a sort of reward
for the labours of the summer. It happened to be my turn to
go thither the very year that Long Island was taken by the
British. A great company of hop-merchants and farmers were
just sitting down to supper as the post arrived, bringing in
the ‘Extraordinary Gazette,’ which announced the victory. A
hop-factor from London took the paper, placed his chair upon
the table, and began to read with an audible voice. He was
opposed, a dispute ensued, and my father retired, taking me by
the hand, to another apartment, where we supped with about a
dozen others of the same sentiments. Here Washington’s health,
and success to the Americans, were repeatedly toasted, and this
was the first time, as far as I can recollect, that I ever
heard the General’s name mentioned. Little did I then dream
that I should ever see the man, and still less that I should
hear some of his own countrymen reviling and execrating him.”
Although we have learned, not only to look with complacency upon
the results of the attempt to coerce the Colonies, but, also, to
wonder that there could have ever been English statesmen so deluded
as to expect anything but disaster from the contest; it has not been
sufficiently observed, that the immediate effect was the partial ruin
of the labouring poor in this country; that it is from that period that
their prosperity has declined, and their comforts have become fewer and
fewer. And what is more, before their impoverishment made it obvious
to everybody, the common people and the tradesmen showed, by their
abhorrence of the war, that they were, for once, gifted with a truer
political sagacity than their precious rulers; and that there must have
been some vague general anticipation of the consequences to them, and
to their families. Prices rose, whilst wages remained stationary; and,
from the very outset, the privations of the poor were aggravated to an
intense degree. But from that date arose the thirst of the labouring
classes for political information, which has since resulted in their
possessing so general a share in representation.
So, down at quiet Farnham, the people had hitherto been, “like the rest
of the country people in England,” neither knowing nor thinking much
about politics. The “shouts of victory or the murmurs at a defeat,”
would now and then break in upon their tranquillity for a moment; but
after the American war had continued for a short time, the people began
to be a little better acquainted with subjects of that kind. Cobbett
says, that opinions were pretty equally divided concerning the war,
at first; whilst there grew up a good deal of pretty warm discussion,
sometimes:--
“My father was a partisan of the Americans: he used frequently
to dispute on the subject with the gardener of a nobleman
who lived near us. This was generally done with good humour,
over a pot of our best ale; yet the disputants sometimes grew
warm, and gave way to language that could not fail to attract
our attention. My father was worsted, without doubt, as he
had for antagonist a shrewd and sensible old Scotchman, far
his superior in political knowledge; but he pleaded before a
partial audience: we thought there was but one wise man in the
world, and that that one was our father. He who pleaded the
cause of the Americans had an advantage too, with young minds:
he had only to represent the King’s troops as sent to cut the
throats of a people, our friends and relations, merely because
they would not submit to oppression, and his cause was gained.”
Old George Cobbett remained a staunch American in politics; but, as to
whether he was right or wrong, his son admits that he never, at that
period, formed any opinion. His own notions were those of his father,
which would have been as warmly entertained if they had been all on
the other side. The short autobiography of which the above forms a
part, was written during the early part of his pamphleteering career
in the United States; at which time he found it necessary to explain
that he had not been nursed in the lap of aristocracy, and that he did
not imbibe his then “principles or prejudices from those who were the
advocates of blind submission.” The story of this pamphlet will come in
its proper place, when its author was upwards of thirty years of age.
* * * * *
Here we have, then, probably as much as we shall ever know, of William
Cobbett’s early years. The utter obscurity of his father’s social
status is, of itself, sufficient reason why there were no admiring
friends to detect precocity, and to record its achievements: until
the age of twenty his life was made up of the ordinary occupations of
a country lad. Fairs, cricket-matches, and hare-hunts filled up the
joyous periods of recreation; and it was not till the year 1782, that
an incident occurred, which, bringing him into the bustling activity
of town-life, had the same effect upon him, that a similar change of
scene has had upon many an ardent, healthy spirit; and which estranged
him from the sequestered vale of life, for ever.
There can be little doubt, however, that a very great mental stimulus
was acquired by the trip to Kew, and the reading of Swift’s wonderful
satire.[1] The poor ploughboy, very probably, read and reread the
laughable story of Peter and Martin hundreds of times without
understanding the real drift of it; but there was enough in the book,
with its entertaining accounts of grotesque fashions and weak-minded
characters, to furnish such an impressionable spirit as Cobbett’s with
an inexhaustible store of odd ideas concerning the world outside him.
Readers of his works will notice his frequent quotation of Swift: “The
celebrated Dean of St. Patrick somewhere observes, &c., &c.” is the
opening sentence of the autobiographical sketch; and the “Political
Register,” in after-years, continued to manifest evidences of the
source and character of Cobbett’s early reading. Cobbett’s literary
style, however, was not exactly that of Dean Swift; of which the
former’s ignorance, and even contempt, of Latinity is sufficient
explanation. But his alternations of sweetness and acrimony,--his
ever-ready images,--the picturesque manner of his describing individual
characters,--his constant tendency to satire,--cannot but be ascribed,
in great measure, to the little book whose loss “cost him greater pain
than losing thousands of pounds.”
So there is, now, some difference. A head and shoulders above the
average of his mates, his mind is, likewise, on a higher level. Not so
high, but as yet to be infinitely dark as to any purpose: a healthy
spirit in a healthy body, there stood, working as hard and as cheerily
as ever; but ready for the first impulse--which impulse came, in no
uncommon way; in no more romantic style than that which sets a ball
rolling, upon the impact of the foot.
“Towards the autumn of 1782, I went to visit a relation who
lived in the neighbourhood of Portsmouth. From the top of
Portsdown, I, for the first time, beheld the sea, and no sooner
did I behold it than I wished to be a sailor. I could never
account for this sudden impulse, nor can I now. Almost all
English boys feel the same inclination: it would seem that,
like young ducks, instinct leads them to rush on the bosom of
the water.
“But it was not the sea alone that I saw; the grand fleet
was riding at anchor at Spithead. I had heard of the wooden
walls of Old England; I had formed my ideas of a ship and of a
fleet, but what I now beheld so far surpassed what I had ever
been able to form a conception of, that I stood lost between
astonishment and admiration. I had heard talk of the glorious
deeds of our admirals and sailors, of the defeat of the Spanish
Armada, and of all those memorable combats that good and true
Englishmen never fail to relate to their children about a
hundred times a year. The brave Rodney’s victories over our
natural enemies, the French and Spaniards, had long been the
theme of our praise, and the burthen of our songs. The sight of
the fleet brought all these into my mind; in confused order,
it is true, but with irresistible force. My heart was inflated
with national pride. The sailors were my countrymen, the fleet
belonged to my country, and surely I had my part in it, and
all its honours; yet, these honours I had not earned; I took
to myself a sort of reproach for possessing what I had no
right to, and resolved to have a just claim by sharing in the
hardships and the dangers.
“I arrived at my uncle’s late in the evening, with my mind full
of my sea-faring project. Though I had walked thirty miles
during the day, and consequently was well wearied, I slept not
a moment. It was no sooner daylight than I arose and walked
down towards the old castle on the beach at Spithead. For a
sixpence given to an invalid I got permission to go upon the
battlements; here I had a closer view of the fleet, and at
every look my impatience to be on board increased. In short, I
went from the Castle to Portsmouth, got into a boat, and was in
a few minutes on board the ‘Pegasus’ man-of-war, commanded by
the Right Honourable George Berkeley, brother to the Earl of
Berkeley.
“The Captain had more compassion than is generally met with in
men of his profession; he represented to me the toils I must
undergo, and the punishment that the least disobedience or
neglect would subject me to. He persuaded me to return home,
and I remember he concluded his advice with telling me, that
it was better to be led to church in a halter, to be tied to
a girl that I did not like, than to be tied to the gang-way,
or, as the sailors call it, married to Miss Roper. From the
conclusion of this wholesome counsel, I perceived that the
captain thought I had eloped on account of a bastard.
“I in vain attempted to convince Captain Berkeley,[2] that
choice alone had led me to the sea; he sent me on shore, and
I at last quitted Portsmouth, but not before I had applied to
the Port-Admiral, Evans, to get my name enrolled among those
who were destined for the service. I was, in some sort, obliged
to acquaint the Admiral with what had passed on board the
‘Pegasus,’ in consequence of which my request was refused,
and I happily escaped, sorely against my will, from the most
toilsome and perilous profession in the world.
“I returned once more to the plough, but I was spoiled for a
farmer. I had, before my Portsmouth adventure, never known
any other ambition than that of surpassing my brothers in the
different labours of the field, but it was quite otherwise now;
I sighed for a sight of the world; the little island of Britain
seemed too small a compass for me. The things in which I had
taken the most delight were neglected; the singing of the birds
grew insipid, and even the heart-cheering cry of the hounds,
after which I formerly used to fly from my work, bound o’er the
fields, and dash through the brakes and coppices, was heard
with the most torpid indifference. Still, however, I remained
at home till the following spring, when I quitted it, perhaps
for ever.
“It was on the 6th of May, 1783, that I, like Don Quixote,
sallied forth to seek adventures. I was dressed in my holiday
clothes, in order to accompany two or three lasses to Guildford
Fair. They were to assemble at a house about three miles from
my home, where I was to attend them; but, unfortunately for me,
I had to cross the London turnpike-road. The stage-coach had
just turned the summit of a hill and was rattling down towards
me at a merry rate. The notion of going to London never entered
my mind till this very moment, yet the step was completely
determined on, before the coach came to the spot where I stood.
Up I got, and was in London about nine o’clock in the evening.
“It was by mere accident that I had money enough to defray
the expenses of this day. Being rigged out for the fair, I
had three or four crown and half-crown pieces (which most
certainly I did not intend to spend), besides a few shillings
and halfpence. This my little all, which I had been years in
amassing, melted away like snow before the sun, when touched
by the fingers of the innkeepers and their waiters. In short,
when I arrived at Ludgate Hill, and had paid my fare, I had but
about half-a-crown in my pocket.
“By a commencement of that good luck, which has hitherto
attended me through all the situations in which fortune has
placed me, I was preserved from ruin. A gentleman, who was one
of the passengers in the stage, fell into conversation with
me at dinner, and he soon learnt that I was going I knew not
whither nor for what. This gentleman was a hop-merchant in the
borough of Southwark, and, upon closer inquiry, it appeared
that he had often dealt with my father at Wey Hill. He knew the
danger I was in; he was himself a father, and he felt for my
parents. His house became my home, he wrote to my father, and
endeavoured to prevail on me to obey his orders, which were
to return immediately home. I am ashamed to say that I was
disobedient. It was the first time I had ever been so, and I
have repented of it from that moment to this. Willingly would I
have returned, but pride would not suffer me to do it. I feared
the scoffs of my acquaintances more than the real evils that
threatened me.
“My generous preserver, finding my obstinacy not to be
overcome, began to look out for an employment for me. He
was preparing an advertisement for the newspaper, when an
acquaintance of his, an attorney, called in to see him. He
related my adventure to this gentleman, whose name was Holland,
and who, happening to want an understrapping quill-driver, did
me the honour to take me into his service, and the next day saw
me perched upon a great high stool, in an obscure chamber in
Gray’s Inn, endeavouring to decipher the crabbed draughts of my
employer.
“I could write a good plain hand, but I could not read the
pot-hooks and hangers of Mr. Holland. He was a month in
learning me to copy without almost continual assistance, and
even then I was of but little use to him; for, besides that I
wrote a snail’s pace, my want of knowledge in orthography gave
him infinite trouble: so that for the first two months I was a
dead weight upon his hands. Time, however, rendered me useful,
and Mr. Holland was pleased to tell me that he was very well
satisfied with me, just at the very moment when I began to grow
extremely dissatisfied with him.
“No part of my life has been totally unattended with pleasure,
except the eight or nine months I passed in Gray’s Inn. The
office (for so the dungeon, where I wrote, was called) was so
dark, that on cloudy days, we were obliged to burn candles.
I worked like a galley-slave from five in the morning till
eight or nine at night, and sometimes all night long. How many
quarrels have I assisted to foment and perpetuate between those
poor innocent fellows, John Doe and Richard Roe! How many
times (God forgive me!) have I set them to assault each other
with guns, swords, staves, and pitch-forks, and then brought
them to answer for their misdeeds before our sovereign Lord
the King seated in his Court of Westminster? When I think of
the saids and soforths, and the counts of tautology that I
scribbled over; when I think of those sheets of seventy-two
words, and those lines two inches apart, my brain turns.
Gracious Heaven! if I am doomed to be wretched, bury me beneath
Iceland snows, and let me feed on blubber; stretch me under the
burning line and deny me thy propitious dews; nay, if it be thy
will, suffocate me with the infected and pestilential air of a
democratic club-room; but save me, O save me from the desk of a
pettifogging attorney!
“Mr. Holland was but little in the chambers himself. He always
went out to dinner, while I was left to be provided for by the
_laundress_, as he called her. Those gentlemen of the law, who
have resided in the inns of court in London, know very well
what a _laundress_ means. Ours was, I believe, the oldest and
ugliest of the officious sisterhood. She had age and experience
enough to be Lady Abbess of all the nuns in all the convents of
Irish-Town. It would be wronging the witch of Endor to compare
her to this hag, who was the only creature that deigned to
enter into conversation with me. All except the name, I was
in prison, and this Weird Sister was my keeper. Our chambers
were to me, what the subterraneous cavern was to Gil Blas: his
description of the Dame Leonarda exactly suited my Laundress;
nor were the professions, or rather the practice, of our
masters altogether dissimilar.
“I never quitted this gloomy recess except on Sundays, when
I usually took a walk to St. James’s Park, to feast my eyes
with the sight of the trees, the grass, and the water. In one
of these walks I happened to cast my eye on an advertisement,
inviting all loyal young men, who had a mind to gain riches
and glory, to repair to a certain rendezvous, where they might
enter into his Majesty’s marine service, and have the peculiar
happiness and honour of being enrolled in the Chatham Division.
I was not ignorant enough to be the dupe of this morsel of
military bombast; but a change was what I wanted; besides, I
knew that marines went to sea, and my desire to be on that
element had rather increased than diminished by my being penned
up in London. In short, I resolved to join this glorious
corps; and, to avoid all possibility of being discovered by my
friends, I went down to Chatham, and enlisted into the marines
as I thought, but the next morning I found myself before a
captain of a marching regiment. There was no retreating: I had
taken a shilling to drink his Majesty’s health, and his further
bounty was ready for my reception.
“When I told the captain (who was an Irishman, and who has
since been an excellent friend to me) that I thought myself
engaged in the marines: ‘By Jasus, my lad,’ said he, ‘and you
have had a narrow escape.’ He told me that the regiment into
which I had been so happy as to enlist was one of the oldest
and boldest in the whole army, and that it was at that moment
serving in that fine, flourishing, and plentiful country,
Nova Scotia. He dwelt long on the beauties and riches of this
terrestrial Paradise, and dismissed me, perfectly enchanted
with the prospect of a voyage thither.”
FOOTNOTES
[1] It is a noteworthy circumstance that Moor Park and “my
grandmother’s cottage” should be almost within hail of each other; for
it was among these very scenes that Swift spent some of his earliest
and best years--a nice little item for any ingenious believer in
“affinities.”
When Cobbett wrote “The Life and Adventures of Peter Porcupine,” he was
not aware of this coincidence, otherwise his humour would have happily
played around the topic.
[2] Afterwards Admiral Sir George Berkeley. He entered the navy at
twelve years of age, and saw a good deal of service, including the
glorious 1st of June. Died 1818, æt. sixty-five.