But we were talking about De Quincey. Yesterday was by no means a
day wasted, for we got our amiable friend Franklin Abbott into our
clutches, made him take a note of _Reminiscences of the English Lake
Poets_ (in the Everyman Series, we repeat) and insisted to him that
for a man of genteel tastes this is one of the most entertaining
works ever printed. And also by mere chance, which so often disposes
the bright fragments of life into a ruddy and high-spirited pattern,
we stopped in at a bookshop on Church Street just to say howdy to the
eccentric Raymond Halsey. Happening to remark that it is now just a
hundred years since the _Confessions of an English Opium-Eater_ was
published, Raymond disappeared with a rabbit-like scuttling motion; was
heard digging among shelves at the rear, and returned with the smile of
one who thinks he foresees a sale. It was a first edition of the _Opium
Eater_ with the magical imprint of Taylor & Hessey. Was there ever a
more sacred name among publishers? We don’t need to remind you they
were Keats’s publishers, too. “Only fifty dollars,” said Raymond, but
it was lunch time and we had to leave.
In the dark rear chamber of a Cedar Street tavern, in that corner
underneath the photographs of the “Cheshire Cheese,” something happened
that seemed to us almost as pretty as anything published by the
vanished Taylor & Hessey. Frank spied an old friend of his, a fellow
Pittsburger, and the latter halted at our table on his way out. We
complimented him upon the fine bronze patina of his countenance, to
which he replied that he had been salmon fishing. “You know,” he said,
“there are only three salmon-flies that I care a continental for,” and
from his pocket he drew a small pink envelope. With a tender hand he
slid its contents onto the board. “There they are,” he said. His voice
seemed to change. “Dusty Miller, Durham Ranger, and Jock Scott.” The
little feathery trinkets, glowing with dainty treacheries, lay there
on the ale-bleached wood. Certainly it seemed to us there was poetry
in that moment. “I go to Bingham, Maine,” he said, “and drive eighteen
miles up the Kennebec.” (A small postern door opened gently upon
another world.) “Old So-and-so is waiting at the station. He’s always
there. I could leave to-night; he’d be sure to be there when the train
got in.”
We had a perfectly vivid picture of old So-and-so waiting at the
Bingham station. Yes, we could see him. Then the postern door closed,
gently but definitely, with that strong pneumatic piston that is
attached to all our doors.
We were saying, however, that De Quincey’s _Reminiscences of the Lake
Poets_ caused great indignation among the Grasmere coterie. This was
due not to any malice in De Quincey’s manner of writing, which was
affectionate and admiring throughout. It was due to something far more
painful than malice--the calm, detailed, candid, and minute dissection
of their lives. There was truly something astoundingly clinical in this
microscopy. For instance, to take the case of Wordsworth’s household,
these are some of the comments De Quincey makes:
(1) That Mrs. Wordsworth--whose charm and simplicity he
adores--was cross-eyed.
(2) That Dorothy--Wordsworth’s sister--was a fervid and noble
character, but stammered and was ungraceful.
(3) That Wordsworth’s appearance grew less attractive with
advancing age.
(4) That his legs were very ill-shapen and “were pointedly
condemned by all female connoisseurs in legs.” And that his
shoulders were drooping and narrow.
(5) “The mouth, and the whole circumjacencies of the mouth,
composed the strongest feature in Wordsworth’s face.” In fact,
they reminded De Quincey of Milton.
(6) That he aged very rapidly--when thirty-nine he was taken to
be over sixty.
(7) That his brother John, a sea captain, had lost his ship
while drunk.
(8) That Wordsworth cannot have been amiable as a child.
(9) That the only time Wordsworth was drunk was as an
undergraduate at Cambridge on visiting the rooms once occupied
by Milton.
(10) That he had not the temperament ever to be an attractive
wooer, and that it was “perplexing” that he had ever married.
(11) That he had had astonishing good luck in financial matters.
(12) That the Wordsworth menage was excessively plain and
severe in simplicity.
(13) That Wordsworth and Southey did not really like each other.
(14) That Wordsworth treated books very barbarously, and used
to cut the pages with a butter-smeared knife.
(15) That Wordsworth’s library was meagre and insignificant
compared to Southey’s.
These are only a few of De Quincey’s remarks, digested to their naked
gist; by which they lose all the amusing complexity of comment wherein
they are folded. But the précis will suffice to show that, whether
consciously or not, they were exactly calculated to wound, with very
deep incision, the most delicate sensibilities of an austere, somewhat
humourless and extremely self-regarding man.