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POETS AND NOVELISTS
POETS AND NOVELISTS
A SERIES OF LITERARY STUDIES
BY
GEORGE BARNETT SMITH
LONDON
SMITH, ELDER, & CO., 15 WATERLOO PLACE
1875
[All rights reserved]
i.
r
I INSCRIBE THIS VOLUME
TO
ROBERT BROWNING
IN REMEMBRANCE OF HIS PERSONAL KINDNESS
AND
AS A TRIBUTE TO HIS GENIUS
G. B. S.
LONDON : 1875
rro
PREFACE.
THE following Studies however defective in other re-
spects possess some claim to exhaustiveness, and con-
sequently I have ventured to hope that with many
persons they may have a permanent value. They have
been revised, and in some cases extended, from the
leading Reviews and Magazines. Notwithstanding, how-
ever, the favourable reception the Essays met with on
their original appearance, I might not now have collected
them, and endeavoured to give to them 'a local habitation
and a name,' but for the fact that I have been repeatedly
pressed to do so by numerous individuals whose tribute
(in some cases, at least) I cannot but regard as flattering
who were desirous of possessing them in a volume. I
can only trust that the public and the press will now en-
dorse their verdict. The subjects of the papers, however
imperfectly treated, are amongst the most attractive which
can be named for lovers of books. With regard to the
Essay on Thomas Love Peacock, I may be pardoned for
a
viii PREFACE.
claiming that it was the first full and substantial recog-
nition of his genius; since it appeared; an admirable
edition of his works has been issued, and I am glad
that this really remarkable writer has received a much
fuller attention than he enjoyed during his lifetime, and
even down to the last two or three years. As for the
volume generally, my end will have been answered if it
should hi any appreciable degree strengthen the taste for
our noble English Literature.
G. B. S.
CONTENTS
PAGE
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY . I
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING . 57
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK IIJ
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE . *5 l
THE BRONTES .
HENRY FIELDING . . . 251
ROBERT BUCHANAN . 37
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS . 3^5
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY
[EDINBURGH REVIEW]
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY.
THE pure humourist is one of the rarest of literary
characters. His nature is not content with detecting
foibles, nor his pen with pointing them out for derision ;
his purpose is infinitely higher and nobler. The humour-
ist must have emotions, nerves, sensibilities, and that
marvellous sympathy with human nature which enables
him to change places at will with other members of his
species. Humour does not produce the sneer of
Voltaire ; it rather smiles through the tear of Montaigne.
* True humour,' it has been wisely said, c springs not
more from the head than from the heart ; it is not con-
tempt, its essence is love ; it issues not in laughter, but
in still smiles, which lie far deeper. It is a sort of in-
verse sublimity ; exalting as it were into our affections
what is below us, while sublimity draws down into our
affections what is above us. It is, in fact, the bloom and
perfume, the purest effluence of a deep, fine, and loving
nature.' Without humour, society would exist in Ice-
B 2
POETS AND NOVELISTS.
landic snows : wit, like the winter sun, might glint upon
the icebergs, but they would not be plastic in its glance
calm, lofty, and cold they must remain. But humour
is the summer heat that generates while it smiles the
power which touches dead things and revivifies them
with its generous warmth and geniality. Wit engages
and amuses the individual intellect ; humour knits hearts
together ; is, in truth, in a broad sense, that ' touch of
nature which makes the whole world kin.' Now the
world may be regarded as being composed of three
classes, viz., those of us who laugh, those with whom we
laugh, and those at whom we laugh ; and the tenderest
solicitude is experienced by each unit of humanity lest,
through some fortuitous circumstances, he should irre-
trievably find himself a denizen of the last-named class.
To some of the first class is given the power of directing
the laugh of others, and this power is current as wit ;
when to the faculty of originating ridicule is added the
power of concentrating pity or pathos upon the subject,
this may be styled humour. But the irony must be
subjugated to the feeling. The heart must love while
the countenance may smile. It will, then, be perceived,
in view of these distinctions, how the humourist may
assert a claim in all great and essential things superior
to that which can be advanced by the wit. Humourists
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 5
are the salt of the national intellectual life. England,
who occasionally claims a questionable superiority in
some respects over other nations, may, in the growth of
genuine humour, be allowed the pre-eminence, Germany
approaching her perhaps in the nearest degree. What
other literature, since the days of Elizabeth, can show
such a roll of humourists as that which is inscribed with
the names (amongst others) of Richardson, Addison,
Steele, Prior, Gay, Smollett, Fielding, Sterne, and Gold-
smith ? Yet after the closing names of this galaxy a
dearth was witnessed like that which immediately pre-
ceded their advent. It appears as though the soil of
literature, having grown to its utmost capacity the pro-
duct of humour, demanded time for recuperating its
powers. During the past thirty or forty years another
growth sprang up, and Hood, Lamb, and other inheritors
of the marvellous gift have enriched the world with the
perfume of their lives and works. Amongst the latest
band of humourists, however, there is no name more
remarkable or more justly distinguished than that which
is now under consideration.
From the operation of various causes, the works of
Thackeray have not hitherto enjoyed a circulation com-
mensurate with their intrinsic merits. The sale of the
best of his writings in his lifetime fell far short of the
POETS AND NOVELISTS.
popular demand for the works of Scott or Dickens. But
their hold on society, and the recognition of their per-
manent value and excellence, have gone on steadily
increasing with each succeeding year, and very recently
new and complete editions of them have been issued,
which are within the reach of all readers. At this period,
then, it may be fitting to consider the life's work of this
deepest and purest of modern English satirists.
It was in these pages that the first substantial recog-
nition of the genius of the author of ' Vanity Fair ' ap-
peared : a quarter of a century has elapsed since then ;
but in the short period between that epoch in his career
and his death, a series of brilliant works issued rapidly
from his pen a pen facile to charm, to instruct, and to
reprove. These works have fully justified the terms of
praise in which we referred to his first great fiction. Yet
it would be difficult to name a writer of fiction of equal
excellence who had so little of the inventive or imagi-
native faculty. Keenness of observation and a nice
appreciation of character supplied him with all the ma-
terials of his creations. He wrote from the experience
of life, and the foibles of mankind which he satirised
were those that had fallen under his notice in the vicissi-
tudes of his own career, or might sometimes be traced in
the recesses of his own disposition. The key, therefore,
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 7
to Thackeray's works is to be found in his life ; and few
literary biographies would be more interesting, if it were
written with a just and discriminating pen. We would
venture to suggest to his accomplished daughter, who
has shown by her own writings that some at least of his
gifts have descended to her by inheritance, that she
should undertake a task which no one else can fulfil with
so natural and delicate a feeling of her father's genius.
Probably it might already have been attempted, but for
the extreme repugnance of Thackeray himself to allow
his own person to be brought before the world, or to
suffer the sanctity of private correspondence to be in-
vaded. Nobody wrote more amusing letters ; but he
wrote them not for the public. As it is, even his birth
and descent have not been correctly stated in the current
works of the day. His great-grandfather was in the
Church, once Master of Harrow, and afterwards an
Archdeacon. He had seven sons, one of whom, also
named William Makepeace Thackeray, entered the Civil
Service of India, became a Member of Council, and sat
at the Board with Warren Hastings, some of whose
minutes he signed. The son of this gentleman, and the
father of our novelist, was Richmond Thackeray, also a
Civil servant, who died, in 1816, at the early age of thirty.
Thackeray himself was born at Calcutta, in 1811, and
8 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
was sent to England when he was seven years old. On
the voyage home the vessel touched at St. Helena, where
the child saw Napoleon Bonaparte. The black servant
who attended him attributed to the ex-Emperor the most
ravenous propensities. ' He eats,' said the sable exagge-
rator, ' three sheep every day, and all the children he can
lay hands on.' The joke figured years afterwards in one
of Thackeray's sketches. This early connection with
India left its mark in his memory, and the pleasant allu-
sions to the great Ramchunder and the Bundelcund Bank
were suggested by the traditions of his own infancy, He
inherited from his father (who died when he was five
years old) a considerable fortune, part of which had
fortunately been settled on his mother, who was re-
married to Major Carmichael Smyth. The remainder
was left at his own disposal, and rendered him an object
of envy and admiration to his less fortunate contempo-
raries. The boy was sent to the Charter House, where
he remained for some years ; and here again the reader
familiar with his works may trace a multitude of allusions
to his school-days under Dr. Russell, then the master of
that school. About the year 1828 he went up to Trinity
College, Cambridge, where he was the friend and con-
temporary of Tennyson, Venables, John Mitchell Kem-
ble, Charles and Arthur Buller, John Sterling, R. Monck-
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 9
ton Mimes, and of that distinguished set of men, some of
whom had preceded him by a year or two, who formed
what was called the Society of the Apostles, though he
was not himself a member of that society. It must be
confessed that at Cambridge Thackeray gave no signs of
distinguished ability. He was chiefly known for his in-
exhaustible drollery, his love of repartee, and for his
humourous command of the pencil. But his habits were
too desultory for him to enter the lists of academic com-
petition, and, like Arthur Pendennis, he left the Univer-
sity without taking a degree. At the age of twenty-one
he entered upon London life ; he visited Weimar, which
he afterwards portrayed as the Court of Pumpernickel ;
and he was frequently in Paris, where his mother resided
since her second marriage. His fortune and position in
society seemed to permit him to indulge his tastes and
to live as a gentleman at large. But the dream was of
short duration. Within a few months he contracted a
sleeping partnership which placed his property in the
hands of a man who turned out to be insolvent, and the
fortune he relied on was lost before he had enjoyed it.
The act was one of gross imprudence, no doubt, and he
suffered bitterly for it ; but it is not true, as has some-
times been supposed, from his lively description of scenes
of folly and vice, that he lost his money by his own per-
io POETS AND NOVELISTS.
sonal extravagance. Thus, then, he found himself, at two
or three and twenty, with very reduced means, for he
had nothing to live on but the allowance his mother and
grandmother were able to make him ; with no profession,
with desultory tastes and habits, and with no definite
prospects in life before him. His first scheme was to
turn artist and to cultivate painting in the Louvre, for he
now resided chiefly with his relatives in Paris. But in
the art of design he was, in truth, no more than an ac-
complished amateur. The drawings with which he after-
wards illustrated his own books are full of expression,
humour, grace, and feeling; but they want the correct-
ness and mastery of the well-trained artist. He turned
then, with more hope, at the age of thirty, to the resources
of the pen. But it is remarkable that all his literary pro-
ductions of this, his earlier period, were anonymous ; and
his literary efforts, though not wanting in pungency and
an admirable style, were scattered in multifarious publi-
cations, and procured for him but small profit and no
fame. These years, from thirty to seven-and-thirty,
which ought to have been the brightest, were the most
cheerless of his existence. He wrote letters in the
'Times' under the signature of Manlius Pennialinus.
He wrote an article on Lord Brougham in the ' British
and Foreign Review,' which excited attention. But po-
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 11
litical writing even political sarcasm was not his forte ;
and when politics ceased to be a joke, they became to
him a bore. Amongst other experiments he accepted
the editorship of a London daily newspaper, called ' The
Constitutional and Public Ledger/ but like its name-
sake, which had been started and edited, a few years
before, by another man of great literary genius, destined
to achieve in after-life a more illustrious career this
journal lingered for ten months and then expired. The
foundation of ' Punch ' was a work after Thackeray's own
heart, and he contributed largely to the earlier numbers.
But it was not till 1841 that he really began to make his
mark in literature, under the well-known pseudonym of
Michael Angelo Titmarsh, a name in which the dream of
the artist still haunted the fancy of the humourist. In
the midst of his perplexities, with that genuine tenderness
of feeling which lay at the bottom of all his sarcasms,
Thackeray fell in love, and married a young lady who
might have sat for the portrait of his own Amelia, but
who was not better endowed than himself with the world's
goods, and much less able than himself to battle with
adverse fortune. But his domestic life was overclouded
by a greater calamity than these, and the malady of his
wife threw a permanent shadow over the best affections
of his heart, which were thenceforward devoted to his
12 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
children alone. Such was the school in which the genius
of Thackeray was educated. It was not imaginative ; it
was not spontaneous ; it was the result of a hard and
varied experience of life and the world. It left him
somewhat prone to exaggerate the follies and baseness of
mankind, but it never froze or extinguished his love and
sympathy for justice, tenderness, and truth. In 1847,
when he was six-and-thirty years of age, he braced him-
self up, for the first time, for a great and continuous
literary effort, and he came before the world, which
hitherto had known him only as a writer of jests and
magazine articles, as the author of 'Vanity Fair.' His
style, which was the result of the most careful and fasti-
dious study, had now attained a high degree of perfec-
tion. In the comparison which was naturally drawn
between himself and Dickens, then in the heyday of
popularity, it was obvious that in the command of the
English language Thackeray was incomparably the
master. His style was to the style of Dickens what marble
is to clay ; and although he never attained to the suc-
cessful vogue of his contemporary, in his lifetime, it was
evident to the critical eye that the writings of Thackeray
had in them that which no time could dim or obliterate.
With this novel, then, so surprising in its frankness
and in its knowledge of human nature, commenced a
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 13
career which could know no repression. A mine of gold
had been struck, and the nuggets were cast up freely by
the hands of the hard and honest worker. In the writing
of books admired by every hater of pretence, and the
delivery of lectures which were as new in their style and
treatment as his novels, the rest of the life of Thackeray
passed away. The last fifteen years of it were years of
success, celebrity, and comparative affluence. He had
attained a commanding position in literature and in
society, though it must be acknowledged that except in
a very small circle of intimate friends, he rarely put forth
any brilliant social qualities. How he impaled snobbery
in ' Punch ' and gave a new impetus to serial literature
by his editorship of the ' Cornhill Magazine,' are facts
too widely disseminated to be dilated upon. A most
good-natured editor, conscientious as well as kind, was
Thackeray ; but the work was not to his taste, and after
a short period he relinquished it at a large pecuniary
sacrifice. To that terrible person, the owner of a ' re-
jected contribution/ he was frequently most generous,
breaking the literary disappointment with the solace of a
bank-note in many instances. But finding it painfully
difficult to say ' No ' when it became imperative to
reject would-be contributors, he fled from the field in
despair. To a friend he said on one occasion, 'How
14 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
can I go into society with comfort ? I dined the other
day at 's, and at the table were four gentlemen
whose masterpieces of literary art I had been compelled
to decline with thanks.' So he informed his readers for
the last time that he would ' not be responsible for re-
jected communications.' On Christmas Eve, 1863, came
the event which touched the heart of Britain with a
genuine grief. The not altogether uneventful career of
one of the truest and best of men was closed. When it
was known that the author of ' Vanity Fair ' would charm
the world no longer by his truthful pictures of English
life, the grief was what we would always have it be when
a leader of the people in war, arts, or letters is stricken
down in the strife deep, general, and sincere.
Postponing for the moment a consideration of what
we conceive to be the leading characteristics of
Thackeray's genius, a certain measure of insight into the
author's mind may be gained by a glance at his works
premising that they are not taken in strict chronological
order. First, with regard to his more important novels.
The key with which he opened the door of fame was un-
doubtedly ' Vanity Fair.' Though other writings of a
less ambitious nature had previously come from his pen,
until the production of this book there was no evidence
that Thackeray would ever assume the high position in
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 15
letters now unanimously awarded to him. But here, at
any rate, was demonstrative proof that a new star had
arisen. And yet, general as was this belief, no intelligible
grounds were for a time assigned for it. The novelist
himself always regarded his first work as his best ; though
we think that in this respect he has followed the example
of Milton and other celebrated authors, and chosen as
his favourite that which is not absolutely the best, though
it may be equal to any which succeeded it. Probably
the book was one round whose pages a halo had been
thrown by various personal circumstances. But the
famous yellow covers in which the ' Novel without a
Hero ' originally appeared were not at first sought after
with much avidity. Soon, however, it became known
that a new delineator of life was at work in society, and
one whose pen was as keen as the dissecting knife of the
surgeon. An author had sprung up who dared to shame
society by a strong and manly scorn, and by proclaiming
that it ought to loathe itself in dust and ashes. The
world was not unwilling to read the reflection of its
weaknesses and its vices mirrored with so much wit,
originality, and genius. How account otherwise for the
favour which the work subsequently attained, when it
lacked as a novel many of those characteristics for which
novels are most eagerly read ? To the initial difficulty
1 6 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
of a story without a hero, the writer had voluntarily
added that of a lack of consecutiveness and complete-
ness. It was probably begun by the author not only
without a hero, but without a plot. We doubt whether
any of his novels were written on a plan. Several of them
evidently turned under his pen into something quite
different from what he had originally intended. 'The
Virginians ' completely reversed, for instance, his first
conception. But the novelist had what he considered a
greater end in view than mere plot, one which has been
well summed up by La Bruyere, who says : * Tout
fesprii d'un auteur consiste a bien definir et a bien peindre?
This sentence concisely expresses the fulfilled genius of
Thackeray. His mode of narrative consists in a series
of pictures after the manner of Hogarth, but their popu-
larity sufficiently attested their accuracy. There is no
one character in ' Vanity Fair ' which can be deemed
perfectly satisfactory not that the reader always cares
for that, preferring sometimes the most thoroughpaced
villainy (viewing authorship as a question of art) to the
most superlative virtue. Becky Sharp, the unprincipled
governess, has been as unduly detested as Amelia Sedley
has been too lavishly praised. There is nothing in the
earlier chapters to prove that Becky Sharp was naturally
and entirely unprincipled and unscrupulous, and it was
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 17
obviously the intention of the author to show that society
might justly assume a great portion of the responsibility
for the after-development of those qualities. With
certain ground to work upon, and given conditions as
adjuncts, the influence of society on natures like Becky
Sharp's would be to encrust them with selfishness and
superinduce complete hypocrisy. If heroine there be in
the novel it is this clever adventuress, and except on
some half-dozen occasions it is scarcely possible to avoid
a pity approaching to contempt for the character of
Amelia Sedley, who is intended to personify the good
element an author generally casts about to discover when
concocting a story. Captain Dobbin is overdrawn, and
one is well-nigh tempted to wish that he had a little less
virtue and a little more selfishness. While we love him
he has a tendency to make us angry. The most masterly
touches in the volume are those in which the portraits of
the Marquis of Steyne and of Sir Pitt Crawley are
sketched. The aristocracy furnish the villains and the
most contemptible specimens of the race, whilst the
excellent persons come from the ranks of the middle
class and the poor their namby-pambyism, however,
now and then reducing their claims to our regard. The
author speaks for the most part in his own person^ and
herein lies one of the principal reasons for the success of
c
1 8 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
the book. We feel the satirist at our elbow ; he is not
enveloped in thick folds in the distance ; as we read his
trenchant observations and withering sarcasms we can
almost see the glances of scorn or of pity which he would
assume when engaged in his task. Well might the world
exclaim that this was no novice who thus wrote of its
meannesses and its glory, its virtues and its vices. This
novel lifted him at once into the position of one of
the ablest writers of subjective fiction. It is especially
remarkable in connection with 'Vanity Fair' to note
the extremely little conversational matter in a tale of
this great length ; another proof that the strength of
the author lay not in the conventional groove of the
novelist, but in those other powers -of Thackeray rare
observation, an acute penetration of motives, an abhor-
rence of sham or pretence, and an entirely new and
genuine humour.
In ' Pendennis/ the next great work by Thackeray,
there is not only some approach to a consecutive plot,
but we are inclined to think finer drawing of individual
character than in its predecessor. There is not so much
brilliancy of writing, but there is a considerable advance
in the art of the novelist. With all the graphic touches
which took form in the features of Becky Sharp, Amelia
Sedley, and Captain Dobbin, there is nothing in the
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 19
earlier work to compare with the portraits of George
Warrington, Helen Pendennis, and Laura. The hero,
Arthur, is one who succumbs to the ordinary temptations
of life, and has very little attaching to him of that ro-
mance in which a hero is generally expected to be en-
shrined. Because it was so natural the book was not
regarded at first as very successful : nothing could be
truer to the original than the manner in which Arthur
Pendennis is sketched, and his love passages with Miss
Fotheringay, the actress, are naively related ; but it was
of course impossible to become inspired with the same
feelings towards him as are excited by the chivalric
heroes of Scott. A man who resorts in the morning to a
bottle of soda-water to correct the exuberant spirits of
the night before is not calculated to awaken much per-
sonal adoration. He is too fallible, and the novel-reading
community demands sinless heroes and heroines ere it
consents to raise them to the lofty pedestal accorded to
its greatest favourites. There is no exaggeration in a
single portrait to be found in ' Pendennis j ' all are true ;
are true to the minutest detail, and the author has simply
acted as the photographer to his clients he 'nothing
extenuates or sets down aught in malice.' The early
follies of Pendennis, and his University career which
was chiefly noticeable for splendid suppers and dealings
c 2
20 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
with money-lenders at a hundred per cent. are de-
scribed with no sparing pen. The case is typical of
thousands now, and is no credit to the youth of the
Universities. ' Only wild oats,' the apologists for under-
graduate extravagance remind us ; but there is no natural
necessity that this particular University crop should be
sown ; many men, worthy men too, are compelled to go
through life without the satisfaction of having ruined their
friends by their follies. The result overtook Pendennis
which righteously succeeds, or ought to succeed, to dissi-
pation and neglect of study. When the degree examina-
tions came, ' many of his own set who had not half his
brains, but a little regularity and constancy of occupation,
took high places in the honours, or passed with decent
credit. And where in the list was Pen the superb. Pen
the wit and dandy, Pen the poet and orator? Ah, where
was Pen the widow's darling and sole pride? Let us
hide our heads and shut up the page. The lists came
out ; and a dreadful rumour rushed through the Univer-
sity that Pendennis of Boniface was plucked.' Yet
though he fled from the University the widow went on
loving him still, just the same, and little Laura hugged to
her heart with a secret passion the image of the young
scapegrace. So inexplicable and so devoted is the
character, of woman ! The little oiphan paid the debts
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 21
of the dashing, clever hero. More sketches of society
with its hollowness and pretence follow this revelation,
and then we find Arthur in the modern Babylon soon to
become the friend of George Warrington, who was des-
tined to be his guide, philosopher, and friend. The
brains of our hero now became of service, and in dwell-
ing on his intellectual labour Thackeray details the secret
history of a literary hack, together with the story of the
establishment of a newspaper for 'the gentlemen of
England,' the prospectus of which was written by Captain
Shandon in Fleet Prison. Brilliant indeed were the in-
tellectual Bohemians who wrote for that witty and critical
journal. There are no more interesting or amusing
sketches in the whole of the author's novels than those
relating to this paper, and the intimate knowledge dis-
played in the details of the schemes of rival printers and
publishers was a part of the author's own dearly-bought
experience. Arthur is strangely consoled in his endea-
vours to live by the aid of literature by his uncle Major
Pendennis, who assures him that ' poetry and genius, and
that sort of thing, were devilishly disreputable' in his
time. But success waits on him, and he can afford to
smile at the eccentric officer. Were it not for the closing
pages of ' Pendennis ' we could almost feel angry with
Thackeray for challenging our interest in Arthur. But
22 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
the lesson he had to teach compensates for all disappoint-
ments. No stones are to be unnecessarily thrown at the
erring, and the shadows in Pendennis's life are to teach
others how to avoid similar errors. The unworthy often
run away with the honours. The history of Pendennis
closes with fruition for the hero, while the nobler cha-
racter, George Warrington, suffers loss. But then the
novelist justly observes :
' If the best men do not draw the great prizes in life, we
know that it has been so ordained by the Ordainer of the
lottery ; we own, and see daily, how the false and worthless
live and prosper, while the good are .called away, and the
dear and young perish untimely. We perceive in every
man's life maimed happiness, the frequent falling, the boot-
less endeavour, the struggle of right and wrong, in which
the strong often succumb and the swift fail ; we see flowers
of good blooming in foul places, as in the most lofty and
splendid fortunes, flaws of vice and meanness, and stains of
evil, and, knowing how mean the best of us is, let us give a
hand of charity to Arthur Pendennis, with all his faults and
shortcomings, who does not claim to be a hero, but only a
man and a brother.'
Passing by temporarily the lectures on the Humourists
in order to preserve the chain of novels unbroken, we
come to a work which is perhaps the most satisfactory
of all Thackeray's writings, regarding them purely in
the light of literary art. There are few productions in
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 23
the world of fiction which exhibit the finish of ' Esmond/
for the author has not only drawn his characters with
unusual skill, but delighted the reader with repeated
bursts of natural, unaffected eloquence, in language
sedulously borrowed from the age of Steele and Addison.
As regards style, indeed, 'Esmond' is an incredible
tour- de-force, and is by far the most original of all his
books. For the first time the author transplants us to
that age which afterwards became of such absorbing
interest to him that he could not tear himself away from
it ; so imbued was he altogether with the literature of
the time of Queen Anne and George I. that at last he
seemed to live in it. At his death he had another work
in contemplation whose period was fixed in the eighteenth
century. It is easy even to the uninitiated to discover
that Thackeray wrote this history of Esmond, a colonel
in the service of Her Majesty Queen Anne, thoroughly
con amore. He revelled in his theme and in the associa-
tions it brought with it. Genial, witty Dick Steele and
Mr. Joseph Addison are introduced to us, and we see
them, along with Esmond, drinking the Burgundy, which,
says Addison, 'my Lord Halifax sent me.' We are
carried through portions of Marlborough's campaigns,
and the spirit blazes with enthusiasm at the pluck which
wrought such valiant deeds, and brought undying honour
24 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
on the British arms. The avarice and ambition of the
brilliant Churchill are forgotten as the plans of his con-
summate genius are unravelled. Esmond's career with
General Webb is traced with intense interest, and the
scenes become as real to us as they undoubtedly seemed
to the author. The plot of the book is not of the
happiest description, the machinations of the Jacobites
being interwoven largely with the thread of the narrative.
The hero loves in the outset Beatrix Esmond, daughter
of a viscount, and the devotion he exhibits to the idol of
his heart and his imagination is something extraordinary
even in comparison with the loves of other heroes.
Beatrix, however, was unworthy of it: homage she would
receive, true passion she seemed incapable of returning.
Self-willed to a degree, the noble nature of such a man
as Esmond was as a sealed book to her. His gravest
feelings she treated with levity, and at length her con-
duct with the Pretender broke the spell, and threw down
from its lofty pedestal, once and for ever, the idol he had
set up. Like the marble it was beautiful to the eye ; like
the marble it was cold and insensible to the touch.
Finally, Esmond contracts a union with Beatrix's mother,
Lady Castlewood, still handsome and comparatively
young, and who had always cherished the memory of
Esmond as one whom she dearly loved in his youth.
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 25
Her affection for him had never waned. The volume
closes with their settlement on the banks of the Potomac,
in a calm and serene happiness. The autobiographer, in
describing their Virginian estate and Transatlantic life,
says : ' Our diamonds are turned into ploughs and axes
for our plantations, and into negroes, the happiest and
merriest, I think, in all this country; and the only jewel
by which my wife sets any store, and from which she
hath never parted, is that gold button she took from my
arm on the day when she visited me in prison, and which
she wore ever after, as she told me, on the tenderest
heart in the world.' In reading ' Esmond/ so cleverly is
the story told, and with such ease and truthfulness, that
the reader does not stay to note what a difficult task the
novelist has set himself in venturing to deal with a plot
more than commonly unattractive. Thackeray, however,
is nowhere the slave of a story; and in sometimes deli-
berately fighting against conventional construction and
probability, he has proved by his success in enlisting
interest and sympathy that he wielded the pen of a
master. The world can forgive its hero for not doing
what ninety-nine heroes in a hundred perform, when his
history is related with the fidelity and ability which dis-
tinguish ' Esmond.' There are more characters carefully
and vividly drawn in this book than are to be found in
26 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
the entire novels of many popular writers; and that
pungency of Thackeray's pen which cuts through indi-
vidualities as sharply and clearly as the diamond cuts
through the glass, is here in full operation. It was as
superior to its predecessor as the latter was to almost
all the novels of the time. In regard to historical por-
traiture it has never been excelled; to read it once is to
be struck with its eloquence and power ; to read it a
second time is to be impressed with its fidelity and
photographic accuracy.
Thackeray rose to the perfection of his art in fiction
in 'The Newcomes;' and it is such books as this which
show us what a fine teacher and instructor the novel may
become in the hands of genius. In the representation
of human nature this story is worthy of Richardson or
Fielding. It is the chef-d'oetivre, in our opinion, of its
author. There is not lacking that infinite sarcasm
observable in previous works, but the writer has touched
more deeply the springs of human sympathy. Within
the whole scope of fiction there is no single character
which stands out more nobly for the admiration of
readers to all time than that of Colonel Newcome.
The painter of that portrait alone might well lay claim to
an undying canvas. As faithfully and as naturally as
though limned by the hand of Sir Joshua Reynolds
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 27
himself the features of the old soldier appear before us.
Having written ' The Newcomes,' Thackeray may be
said to have shaken hands as an equal with the two or
three great masters of fiction. If it be the province of
the novelist to depict human nature as it is, it must be
conceded, at any rate, that there was nothing else left
for the author to do to entitle him to the highest honours
of his class. Nor is it a little singular too that in the
story just mentioned Thackeray has given us the best
female character which has proceeded from his fertile
brain Ethel Newcome. She comes to us as the sweet
teacher of more goodness and religion than a whole
company of preachers. We are inclined to agree with
her cousin Clive Newcome that to look into her eyes
would be almost too much for such unworthy imperfect
creatures as men, and that she is one of that rare class of
beings sent into the world occasionally to tell us that
Heaven has not altogether forgotten us. What a story
of society ' The Newcomes ' is ! First we have the
Newcome family, with Sophia Alethea, whose mission
and self-imposed duty it was ' to attend to the interests
of the enslaved negro; to awaken the benighted Hot-
tentot to a sense of the truth; to convert Jews, Turks,
Infidels, and Papists ; to arouse the indifferent and often
blasphemous mariner; to guide the washerwoman in the
28 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
right way ; to head all the public charities of her sect;
and do a thousand secret kindnesses that none knew of ;
to answer myriads of letters, pension endless ministers,
and supply their teeming wives with continuous baby
linen/ all which she did ' womanfully ' for nigh fourscore
years. Then we have the Honeymans, with the singular
story of the Rev. Charles Honeyman. Clive Newcome's
uncles occupy a large portion of the narrative, and Sir
Barnes Newcome appears and contrives to earn our
unmitigated contempt. Grey Friars looms into view,
with the hero Clive at school within its precincts. Good
James Binnie is introduced, and honest J. J. Ridley.
Electioneering contests, with all their humour, are por-
trayed, while the scheming members of society are also
flayed for their snobbery. From the heartlessness of
vampires and fools the Floracs, the Kews, &c. we
are pleased to hurry away and to light upon such pas-
sages of sweetness and beauty as this, where the Colonel
on his arrival in England from India is welcomed by his
little niece Ethel :
1 He took a little slim white hand and laid it down on his
brown palm, where it looked all the whiter ; he cleared the
grizzled moustachio from his mouth, and stooping down he
kissed the little white hand with a great deal of grace and
dignity. There was no point of resemblance, and yet a
something in the girl's look, voice, and movements, which
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 29
caused his heart to thrill, and an image out of the past to
rise up and salute him. The eyes which had brightened his
youth (and which he saw in his dreams and thoughts for
faithful years afterwards as though they looked at him out
of heaven) seemed to shine upon him after five-and-thirty
years. He remembered such a fair bending neck and
clustering hair, such a light foot and airy figure, such a slim
hand lying in his own and now parted from it with a gap
of ten thousand long days between. . . . Parting is death,
at least as far as life is concerned. A passion comes to
an end ; it is carried off in a coffin, or weeping in a post-
chaise ; it drops out of life one way or other, and the earth
clods close over it, and we see it no more. But it has been
part of our souls and it is eternal. Does a mother not love
her dead infant ? a man his lost mistress ? with the fond
wife nestling at his side, yes, with twenty children smiling
round her knee. No doubt, as the old soldier held the girl's
hand in his, the little talisman led him back to Hades, and
he saw Leonora.'
The book has its love passages in some cases sad
and miserable. Chapters of pathetic interest abound,
where the world is exhibited at its old tricks of topsy-
turvy Lady Clara loving Jack Belsize and being be-
loved madly in return, while her hand is sold to Sir
Barnes Newcome, ' society,' forsooth, blessing the bar-
gain : Clive married to Rosey Mackenzie, whom he
loves in a way, though his real devotion belongs to his
cousin, who is put into the matrimonial auction and
knocked down to an idiotic member of the peerage. As
30 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
for the marriages which 'have been arranged,' who has
not heard uttered, as our satirist asks, 'the ancient
words, " I promise to take thee," &c.> knowing them to
be untrue; and is there a bishop on the bench that has
not Amen'd the humbug in his lawn sleeves, and called
a blessing over the kneeling pair of perjurers ? ' Hypo-
crisy and humbug are succeeded by disaster in the novel.
The grand old Colonel is ruined by the failure of the
celebrated Bundelcund Bank, but when there comes in
his need a cheque from one whom he had helped in days
gone by, the bankrupt Colonel only exclaims, ' I thank
my God Almighty for this ! ' and passes on the cheque
immediately to another sufferer. The story rapidly pro-
gresses. The death of Colonel Newcome is told with a
pathos almost unequalled, and dear old Grey Friars
becomes once more the witness of a scene to be ever
held in remembrance. After this sad incident the novel
speedily ends, with the united happiness of the two chil-
dren whom the Colonel had most dearly loved. It is
one of the few books which we close with regret when we
have finished them. Genial, generous, and noble in its
sentiments, we seem almost to reach the mind of
Thackeray while perusing it. It gives us full assurance
that his mission was of far wider import than that of a
mere scourger of society. It is evidently written by a
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 31
man who loves the world, though he hates its follies.
He has scorn for its dissimulation, indignation for its
oppression, smiles for its happiness, and tears for its
woes.
In continuation of his previous novel ' Esmond,'
Thackeray returned to the historical vein in ' The Vir-
ginians,' which follows the fortunes of the Esmond family
after its migration to America. It was one of his cha-
racteristics that the creations of his art acquired so com-
plete a reality that he could not part from them, and they
continued, as it were, to live on, and reappeared in his
later works long after the fiction which had given birth to
them had come to a close. Thus his i Virginians ' grew
out of ' Esmond/ and it is one of the pleasantest of his
works. The course of true love pursues a devious way,
and the weaknesses of one character serve to set in bold
relief the heroism of others. The fairer sex have no reason
to complain of the treatment they receive at the hands
of our author, and in this story two of their species
are immortalised in a setting for which we must ever be
grateful. But while we are interested in much love we
are also admonished by much morality, though the
moralising of Thackeray on all occasions is anything but
offensive. He has the gift of so exhibiting foibles and
idiosyncrasies that there is no need for him to lash himself
32 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
into a furious state of indignation, as the manner of some
is ; that calm, sneering smile is sufficiently effectual ;
heavy, clumsy weapons or bludgeons may make much
demonstration, but it is the light, piercing touch of the
pointed steel which is the most dangerous. Thackeray
manages to find the one vulnerable point in our armour ;
he introduces the rapier of his sarcasm, and we are slain.
There is no withstanding his weapon. Surely the world
should be the better for the fearless work which this man
accomplished ! Honestly has he besought it to discard
its deceit and selfishness, and who knows but vast results
have followed the teaching of the life-long lesson ? Does
he not ask us. brother man ! to be more true to ourselves,
to our own nature ; to drop the cloak which we perpetu-
ally wear when we step forth into the world ? He would
have man walk abroad upright, strong in his own virtue,
and not ashamed to meet his fellows, as though in the
great game of life he was determined to revoke through
every trick in order to seize upon the stakes. And is it
so very inhuman to help a friend or a brother that it has
become so uncommon? Are the heavens always to
appear as brass when the cry for help is raised ? Harry
Esmond Warrington ' in his distress asked help from his
relations ; his aunt sent him a tract and her blessing ;
his uncle had business out of town, and could not, of
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 33
course, answer the poor boy's petition. . . . My Lord
and Lady Skinflint, when they consult in their bedroom
about giving their luckless nephew a helping hand, and
determine to refuse, and go down to family prayers and
meet their children and domestics, and discourse vir-
tuously before them and then remain together and talk
nose to nose what can they think of one another ? and
of the poor kinsman falling among thieves and groaning
for help unheeded? How can they go on with those
virtuous airs ? How can they dare look each other in
the face ? ' Brave writer ! these are manly words, but
the world in great part still practises the selfish principle.
It takes a long time to make it understand that a reli-
gious tract, though possibly very cheap, is not very filling
to the hungry stomach, nor does it go far in clothing the
shivering limbs. Cropping up here and there in his
sparkling leaves, such are the lessons Thackeray would
teach. In novels like ' The Virginians ' they are sub-
ordinate to the more leading purposes of the story, but
human nature has changed little since the period when
its scenes were fixed. Graphic pictures of American
scenery abound in its pages, and celebrated characters of
the reign of George II. appear on the stage. The philo-
sophy of the novel may not be profound, but it is always
plain and unmistakable. If there be any failure per-
D
34 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
ceptible, it is a failure possessed in common with the
greatest writers and dramatists, who, in attempting to
depict the men, the morals, and the manners of a pre-
ceding age, have never been able entirely to get rid of
their own.
The remaining works of fiction produced subsequently
to * The Virginians ' are somewhat slight in their con-
struction (with the exception of one to be named), but
generally exhibit great power. The exception, as regards
length and plot, is * The Adventures of Philip,' a work
worthy almost to take rank with any of those which are
more widely known, on account of its extremely realistic
pictures of life, and its depth of human interest. In the
sketches of those ' who robbed Philip, those who helped
him, and those who passed him by,' we come upon
varieties of love, passion, and duplicity drawn with won-
drous skill. The sad parts of the story are written with
indelible ink, and all through that fine nervous sensibility
which should distinguish the highest novelists is strikingly
apparent. The same remark applies to the beautiful
story of the ' Hoggarty Diamond.' Of the memoirs of
that extraordinary youth Barry Lyndon, it is scarcely
necessary to say more than that they are told with no
diminution of vigour ; all the later short stories of
Thackeray, in fact, are written in English noticeable for
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 35
its simplicity and purity. The wine is not so tart, does
not sparkle quite so much, but it is mellower, and there
is greater body in it. What could more conclusively
exhibit this than the story the author left unfinished,
' Denis Duval ' ? Here we have the last lines he ever
wrote lines which triumphantly dispose of the taunt
that Thackeray was writing himself out. Of few can it
be said that their later works exhibit a strength and
genius undimmed by time. Yet Thackeray was one of
that rare minority. The period of decadence ha not
set in with him. He had only just reached the top
of the hill, he had taken no steps on his descent,
To his powers of perception, and his possession of the
critical faculty in no small degree, ' The Roundabout
Papers/ the inimitable Paris, Irish, and Eastern
Sketches, and his imitations of contemporary authors,
bear ample testimony; while 'The Snob Papers,' bur-
lesques, and ballads, overflow with comic humour.
As regards the authorship of ballads alone, we have
no writer of vers de societ'e at the present time who
could be put into competition with him. 'Please-
man X/ is famous ; yet even Praed or Father Prout
can show nothing better than ' Peg of Limavaddy,'
'At the Church Gate,' and 'Little Billee.' Novel,
sketch, ballad, or essay, Thackeray has summed up in
D 2
36 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
great part the lessons he would inculcate in these well-
known verses :
1 O, Vanity of Vanities !
How wayward the decrees of Fate are ;
How very weak the very wise,
How very small the very great are !
'Though thrice a thousand years are past,
Since David's son the sad and splendid,
The weary King Ecclesiast,
Upon his awful tablets penned it,
' Methinks the text is never stale,
And life is every day renewing
Fresh comments on the old, old tale,
Of Folly, Fortune, Glory, Ruin.'
In noticing the various works of Thackeray thus
briefly, we have purposely left the lectures on the Four
Georges and the English Humourists till the close, as
they belong to a new and entirely distinct class of effort.
Probably this was the first occasion on which a writer
assumed the lecturer and the critic in one. Those who
were privileged to hear the author deliver his lectures in
person will remember how he took the town by storm,
and the same enthusiasm was manifested when Thackeray
went to Edinburgh and visited the principal towns in
England and America, where the whole of the intellectual
classes of the population flocked to hear him. To get
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 37
the opinions of a famous literary man on his distinguished
predecessors delivered vM voce was naturally attractive,
and the imposing form of Titmarsh with his snowy hair
has not yet passed out of the recollection of his auditors.
We heard him on the age in which he was thoroughly at
home. He had made that period in a manner his own
by an intimate knowledge of all its leading spirits, and he
appeared to strike a chord of self-satisfaction when he
said, ' I knew familiarly a lady who had been asked in
marriage by Horace Walpole, who had been patted on
the head by George I.' This immediately takes him to
the time of Johnson, Goldsmith, Steele, Pope, and Swift,
and he is happy. He then goes on to talk pleasantly of
the times and manners of the Four Georges, not sparing
the gall of satire, however, when he deems it necessary
to mix it with his ink. As a citizen of the time he thus
describes the advent of the First George, and the facts
of history but too fully justify the sweeping condemna-
tion :
' Here we are, all on our knees. Here is the Archbishop
of Canterbury prostrating himself to the head of his church,
with Kielmansegge and Schulenberg with their ruddled
cheeks grinning behind the Defender of the Faith. Here
is my Lord Duke of Marlborough kneeling, too, the greatest
warrior of all times ; he who betrayed King William be-
trayed King James I. betrayed Queen Anne betrayed
38 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
England to the French, the Elector to the Pretender, the
Pretender to the Elector ; there are my Lords Oxford and
Bolingbroke, the latter of whom has just tripped up the heels
of the former ; and if a month's more time had been allowed
him, would have had King James at Westminster/
But foolish as the foreign gentleman was, he was
astute enough to see through loyalty of this description.
The bargain with England was that she wanted a Pro-
testant puppet, and as George was not unwilling, for a
consideration, to become one, matters were arranged.
Though not without his faults, George I. had, as
Thackeray points out, the countervailing virtues of
justice, courage, and moderation. In introducing his
immediate successor, the essayist sketches a memorable
scene. An eager messenger in jack-boots, who had
ridden from London, forced his way into a bedroom in
Richmond Lodge, where the master was taking a nap
after dinner. With a strong German accent and many
oaths, the man on the bed, starting up, asked who dared
to disturb him ? ' I am Sir Robert Walpole,' said the
messenger. The awakened sleeper hated Sir Robert.
' I have the honour to announce to your Majesty, that
your royal father, King George I., died at Osnaburg, on
Saturday last, the roth instant' ' Dat is one big lief
roared out his Sacred Majesty King George II., but that
was how he came to be monarch nevertheless. The
WILLIAM: MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 39
Second George was more wrongheaded than his father,
and England was saved during many years of his reign
by the strong will of that strange mixture of courage,
dissoluteness, statesmanship, and meanness, Sir Robert
Walpole, and by the good sense and tact of Queen
Caroline. Brave the King undoubtedly was, but in and
around his court there was the old sickly air of corruption,
fed rather than suppressed by a sycophant clergy. The
trenchant words of the great satirist are not a whit too
strong in which to describe the godlessness and hypocrisy
of the period. And when the sovereign died, some of
the divines carried their cant behind the grave, and re-
ferred to their master as one too good for earth. They
had crawled in the dust before his mistresses for prefer-
ment, and having got it, must of course pay for it some-
how. Diving beneath the surface of society, Thackeray
wisely says, * It is to the middle class we must look for
the safety of England ; the working educated men, away
from Lord North's bribery in the senate ; the good
clergy not corrupted into parasites by the hope of prefer-
ment ; the tradesmen rising into manly opulence ; the
painters pursuing their gentle calling ; the men of letters
in their quiet studies ; these are the men whom we love
and like to read of in the last age.' With these classes
pure and sound, kings and puppets may sport with im-
40 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
punity ; the kingdom is safe ; it is when the middle
classes are corrupt and worthless that the foundations of
society begin to break up. Pleasant gossip of the good
but obstinate King George, the third of his name, is
vouchsafed to us, with glimpses of his pure court would
it had always remained so within whose precincts many
a battle was won over his opponents by the dogged
monarch. Then we come to the period of his terrible
malady, and in describing the closing scene of all, the
essayist breaks out into a passage of touching eloquence,
which we transcribe here as being in his most successful
vein :
1 What preacher need moralise on this story ; what words
save the simplest are requisite to tell it ? It is too terrible
for tears. The thought of such a misery smites me down in
submission before the Ruler of kings and men, the Monarch
Supreme over empires and republics, the inscrutable Dis-
penser of life, death, happiness, victory. " O brothers ! " I
said to those who heard me first in America " O, brothers
speaking the same mother tongue O comrades ! enemies
no more, let us take a mournful hand together as we stand
by this royal corpse, and call a truce to battle ! Low he
lies to whom the proudest used to kneel once, and who was
cast lower than the poorest ; dead, whom millions prayed for
in vain." Driven off the throne ; buffeted by rude hands ;
with his children in revolt ; the darling of his old age killed
before him untimely ; our Lear hangs over her breathless
lips and cries : " Cordelia, Cordelia, stay a little !"
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 41
" Vex not his ghost oh ! let him pass he hates him
That would upon the rack of this tough world
Stretch him out longer ! "
Hush ! strife and quarrel, over the solemn grave ! Sound,
trumpets, a mournful march. Fall, dark curtain, upon his
pageant, his pride, his grief, his awful tragedy.'
The lectures on the English Humourists, a subject
peculiarly adapted to the bent of Thackeray, commence
with Swift, the genius who had a life-hunt for a bishopric
and missed it. The bitterness of a generation of man-
kind seemed to be concentrated in that one spirit. We
scarcely understand him now, or if we do, then genius is
miserably weak and vulnerable in some points if strong as
adamant in others. He did not succeed, and it was his
constant habit, we are assured, to keep his birthday as a
day of mourning. Yet there are some aspects in which
we like to regard him. We admire his utter scorn at
times, his contempt for the tinsel, and the power of his
eagle eye to pierce to the heart of things. He could also
crush pretence, at once and effectually. A bumptious
young wit said to him in company, ' You must know, Mr.
Dean, that I set up for a wit ! ' 'Do you so ? ' said the
Dean. ' Take my advice and sit down again.' Thackeray
mistrusts the religion of Swift, and mentions as one of the
strongest reasons for doing so, the fact of his recommend-
ing the dissolute author of ' The Beggar's Opera ' to turn
42 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
clergyman, and look out for a seat on the bench. But
this master of irony varied so in his moods, that it
is impossible to know whether this advice was not simply
the result of that intense chagrin which possessed him,
rather than of a deliberate recklessness of the good.
That Swift suffered, mentally, more than almost any man
history takes note of may be accepted, but it was partly
due to the workings of an ' evil spirit.' It is justly said
of him that 'he goes through life, tearing, like a man
possessed of a devil. Like Abudah in the Arabian story,
he is always looking out for the Fury, and knows that
the night will come and the inevitable hag with it. What
a night, my God ! it was, what a lonely rage of long
agony what a vulture that tore the heart of that giant !
It is awful to think of the great sufferings of this great
man. Through life he always seems alone, somehow.
Goethe was so. I can't fancy Shakspeare otherwise.
The giants must live apart. The kings can have no
company. But this man suffered so ; and deserved so to
suffer. One hardly reads anywhere of such a pain.'
And this pain went through life in darkness, rage, and
misery he spent his days ; no light broke through the
starless night. The end came, and terrible is the story,
the witty, the eloquent, the gifted, the godlike in in-
tellect, the devilish in heart, Swift passed away in a state
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 43
not unlike that against which he had prayed in a letter to
Bolingbroke, when he said, ' It is time for me to have
done with the world, and so I would if I could get into a
better before I was called into the best, and not die here
in a rage, like a poisoned rat in a hole.' Excellent talk
follows this sketch gossip of Congreve and Addison,
with wise critical remarks interspersed by the author, who
may be said to have established a prescriptive right to
the age of which he wrote. Somewhat too mudh, we are
inclined to think, Thackeray made of Pope, though the
executive ability of the young poet was of the most mar-
vellous description. Poor Dick Steele, that bundle of
failings and weaknesses, has a paper all to himself, and
we rise from its perusal with our love for the kindly,
miserable sinner intensified. It was surface wickedness
with Steele entirely : his heart was tender, and his cha-
racter simple as a child's. For the genius and character
of Fielding Thackeray had of course the highest admira-
tion. Very few lines need be read before it is apparent
that the modern novelist had studied his predecessor
minutely. He quotes Gibbon's famous saying about
Fielding with intense relish. ' The successors of Charles V.
may disdain their brethren (the Fieldings) of England :
but the romance of " Tom Jones," that exquisite picture
of humour and manners, will outlive the palace of the
44 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Escurial, and the Imperial Eagle of Austria.' But here
our pleasant reminiscences of the English humourists
must end, and some observations of a general nature be
made upon the genius of him who has bequeathed to us
his thoughts and judgments on his illustrious prede-
cessors.
The first characteristic which strikes the reader of
Thackeray is unquestionably his humour. It does not
gleam forth as flashes of lightning, rare and vivid, but is
more like the ever-bubbling fountain, the perennial
spring. It is a kind of permeating force throughout all
his works works now lashed into sarcasm and anon dis
solved in pathos. It is one of the great mistakes regarding
this author that he is satirical and nothing else. No
critic who thus represents him can have either studied
his novels or caught the spirit and purpose of the man.
He is one of the best of English humourists simply be-
cause his nature is sensitive at all points. What Carlyle
has said of Jean Paul may be said of him ' In his smile
itself a touching pathos may lie hidden, a pity too deep
for tears. He is a man of feeling, in the noblest sense
of that word; for he loves all living with the heart of a
brother ; his soul rushes forth, in sympathy with gladness
and sorrow, with goodness or grandeur, over all creation.
Every gentle and generous affection, every thrill of
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 45
mercy, every glow of nobleness, awakens in his bosom a
response; nay, strikes his spirit into harmony.' It must
ever be so. But when the first satirical papers of
Thackeray were published the world had only seen one
side of his humour. The 'Snob Papers' and burles-
ques, and the memoirs of Mr. Yellowplush, gave place in
due time to a richer vein in more important works. The
sparkling Champagne was followed, as it were, by the
deep rich Burgundy. As Dickens was his superior in
the faculty of invention, so was the former eclipsed by
the greater depth of Thackeray's penetration. Truth to
life distinguishes nearly all the characters of Dickens,
those at least which belong to the lower classes; but this
truth is the obvious truth of caricature rather than of
reality : Thackeray takes us below the surface ; we travel
through the dark scenes of the human drama with him ;
he makes his notes and comments without flattery and
with astounding realism, and when we part company
from his side we wish human nature were somewhat
nobler than it is. But his wit does not preclude him
from being fair and just. He is indeed scrupulously so,
and to the erring kind and tender. It used to be said
occasionally of his works as they appeared, ' Ah, there's
the same old sneer' so ready is the world to follow the
course in which its attention is directed. Speaking of
4 6 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
the maligners of Society, he says, ' You who have ever
listened to village bells, or have walked to church as
children on sunny Sabbath mornings ; you who have
ever seen the parson's wife tending the poor man's bed-
side ; or the town clergyman threading the dirty stairs of
noxious alleys upon his sacred business ; do not raise a
shout when one of these falls away, or yell with the mob
that howls after him.' Surely these are noble words to
come from one whose intellectual current was set in the
direction of contempt ! With all his keen sense of the
ridiculous and his scathing powers of invective, there is
no one instance where for the sake of the brilliancy of
his satire he ever cast a slur upon truly philanthropic
labour, or perilled his reputation for the worship of the
pure and the good. If ever man's humour were useful
to instruct as well as to delight, it is that of Michael
Angelo Titmarsh. When he laughs we know he will do
it fairly his eye wanders round all, and neither friend
nor foe, if vulnerable, can keep out the arrows of his wit.
His position, as a humourist, is certainly that of the
equal of most of the wits of whom he has written, and
one scarcely inferior to even Swift or Sterne.
A second quality that is observable in him is his
fidelity. And to this we do not attach the restricted
meaning that the persons of his novels are faithful to
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 47
nature though that they incontestably are but the
wide import of being true to the results of life as we see
them daily. He does not allow the development of a
story to destroy the unities of character, and in this
respect he resembles the greatest of all writers. Take
an example. At the close of * The Newcomes/ instead
of preserving alive the noble Colonel to witness the
happiness of the family in its resuscitated fortunes,
Thackeray causes him to die, and that in the humblest
manner. With most novelists we could predict a very
different ending, but one not so true as Thackeray has
had the courage to adopt. Sorrow we may indulge that
the death should thus occur, but we must acknowledge
that it is more consonant with our daily experience than
any other conclusion would have been, however pleasant
as matter of fiction. The same thing is noticed in the
character of Beatrix Esmond ; we are first interested in
her ; then our faith is gradually shattered ; and, finally,
we are thoroughly disappointed by the catastrophe. The
result is contrary to that which we expected j it is 1 other
than would have been given by most writers, but it is
none the less true. Take the whole of his creations, let
the test of fidelity be applied to each, and it will be found
that the writers are very few indeed who have been so
thoroughly able to disentangle themselves from the
48 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
common method of adapting character to plot, or who
have made their individualities so distinct, and kept
them so to the end. To place him in comparison with
other authors who are distinguished for their delineation
of character as character as witnessed at certain points
or stages is unfair both to him and to them. Conver-
sations, with one, stamp individualities, and the test of
their fidelity is the absence of contradiction in the out-
ward forms of speech and action whenever the individuals
are introduced : this was the life-painting of Dickens,
for instance. With Thackeray the case is different. He
does not depend so much on the conversational or de-
scriptive recognition of character. He gives us more of
their mind or heart than of their person. He does not
tell us what they look like, but what they are ; and
through all his novels they answer to the bent and the
natural instincts we have been led to associate with them.
It is this elevated form of fidelity that we would insist
upon as preeminently to be noticed in Thackeray : and
were it on this ground alone we should not hesitate to
place him in the very first rank of novelists. In this
essential particular, in truth, he has no rival. Others
may excel him in various arts of fiction, but with this
passport, even his superiors in minor detail will accord
to him a perfect equality, if not a superiority, in the
manifestation of the cardinal principle of novel- writing.
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 49
The subjectiveness of Thackeray is another quality
which has greatly enhanced the value of his works. It
is generally admitted that subjective writers have a more
powerful influence over humanity than those of the
class styled objective. It is natural, perhaps, that the
external descriptions of circumstances or scenery should
not move us nearly so much as the life-record of a
breathing, suffering, rejoicing human being. Be his
station what it may, we are interested in every individual
of the species whose career is faithfully pictured. The
author of ' Vanity Fair ' is one of the few men who have
been able to endue their characters with being and
motion. When there were few writers who had either
the courage or the gifts to be natural, Thackeray gave a
new impetus to the world of fiction. So eminently sub-
jective are his works, that those of his friends who knew
him well are able to trace in them the successive stages
of his personal career, and to show in what manner the
incidents of his own life operated upon his novels.
There are but few occurrences in the whole series that
were not drawn either from his individual history or the
history of some one of his friends or acquaintances.
This is, doubtless, one of the most influential causes of
the reality of his stories. No stiff, formal record of
events, dispassionately told, is to be witnessed. If the
E
50 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
reader reads at all, he must perforce become interested
in his work. There probably never were novels written
in which there was so little exaggeration of colouring.
His dear Harry Fielding has been his guide, but the
author of ' Tom Jones ' has been almost outstripped by
his pupil. The latter has been able to throw away more
effectually the folds of drapery in which character has
generally been presented to us. In his model he was
happy, for, previous to Thackeray, Fielding was the most
subjective writer in the annals of fiction. One can
understand the charm which those writings exercised
over his successor, and the desire which he felt to con-
struct his novels after the fashion of which he had become
so greatly enamoured. But the pupil has the greater
claim to our regard in the fact that his work is such that
not a line of it need be excised in public reading. He
is Fielding purified. All the vivacity and the life-giving
strokes which belonged to the pencil of the earlier master
are reproduced in the younger, and the interest is also
preserved intact. But with the later age has come the
purer language, and Thackeray may be said to stand in
precisely the same relation to the nineteenth century as
Fielding stood to the eighteenth. The absence of exag-
geration in Thackeray's drawing of character is very
remarkable. Notwithstanding the multiplicity of his
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 51
personages, there are not two which in any sense
resemble each other. The faculty is very rare of being
able to transfer the lineaments of commonplace people
in such a manner as that others will care to study them.
Yet this is the result which Thackeray achieves, and
without labour. Nothing transcendental, or that which
is beyond human nature, is thrown in as a means of
bribing the reader into closer acquaintanceship. As men
passed Thackeray he observed them; as they interested
him he drew them; but in doing so he felt that to add
to the original would destroy the identity, and the conse-
quence of his consummate art is that throughout the
whole of his varied picture-gallery there is no portrait
which bears the impress of falsity or distortion. To say
the truth, and to describe what he saw before him, was
always the novelist's own boast. There could be no
nobler' ambition for any writer, but there are few who
have attained the perfect height of the standard.
Leading out of his subjectiveness, or rather being a
broader and grander development of it, we come to the
fourth great characteristic of Thackeray his humanity.
That is the crown and glory of his work. And yet this
man, who was sensitive almost beyond parallel, was
charged with having no heart! Shallow critics, who gave
E2
52 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
a surface-reading to 'Vanity Fair,' imagined they had
gauged the author, and in an off-hand manner described
him as a man of no feeling the cold, simple cynic. It
will be remembered that the same charge of having no
heart was made against Macaulay; but its baselessness
was discovered on his death, when it became known that
' the heartless ' one had for years pursued a career of
almost unexampled benevolence. So superficial are the
judgments of the world! Against Thackeray the charge
was doubly cruel; he was one of those men who are
naturally full of sensibility to a degree. Men who
understood him best knew that it cost him an effort to
subdue that part of his nature which hastened to sympa-
thise with others. Selfishness was as foreign to him as
insincerity. The man was true as the light of heaven to
the generous instincts of his nature. To veil at times
this side of his character was essential in order to give
play to that satire which kills. If his mission was to
exalt the good and the pure, it was also as decidedly his
mission to abase the false. To do this he must neces-
sarily appear severe. But who that reads him well can
fail to perceive that the eye accustomed to blaze with
scorn could also moisten with sympathy and affection ?
What man without heart could have written such passages
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 53
as that episode in the l Hoggarty Diamond ' ? Titmarsh
is describing his journey to the Fleet Prison, accompanied
by his wife :
1 There was a crowd of idlers round the door as I passed
out of it, and had I been alone I should have been ashamed
of seeing them ; but, as it was, I was only thinking of my
dear, dear wife, who was leaning trustfully on my arm, and
smiling like heaven into my face ay, and took heaven too
into the Fleet Prison with me or an angel out of heaven.
Ah ! I had loved her before, and happy it is to love when
one is hopeful and young in the midst of smiles and sun-
shine ; but be chappy, and then see what it is to be loved
by a good woman ! I declare before heaven, that of all the
joys and happy moments it has given me, that was the
crowning one that little ride, with my wife's cheek on my
shoulder, down Holborn to the prison ! Do you think I
cared for the bailiff that sat opposite ? No, by the Lord !
I kissed her and hugged her yes, and cried with her like-
wise. But before our ride was over her eyes dried up, and
she stepped blushing and happy out of the coach at the
prison-door, as if she were a princess going to the Queen's
drawing-room.'
Or is there to be found in all fiction a scene more
pathetic than the one describing the death of Colonel
Newcome? To have written that alone would have
deservedly made any man great. Though it is doubt-
less familiar to every reader, it will be impossible to
illustrate fully the human tenderness of the author with-
54 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
out quoting some portion of it here. The scene is at
Grey Friars:
' Ethel came in with a scared face to our pale group. " He
is calling for you again, dear lady," she said, going up to
Madame de Florae, who was still kneeling ; " and just now
he said he wanted Pendennis to take care of his boy. He
will not know you." She hid her tears as she spoke. She
went into the room where Clive was at the bed's foot ; the
old man within it talked on rapidly for a while ; then again
he would sigh and be still ; once more I heard him say
hurriedly : " Take care of him when I am in India ;" and
then with a heart-rending voice he called out, " Leonore,
Ldonore ! " She was kneeling by his side now. The
patient's voice sank into faint murmurs ; only a moan now
and then announced that he was not asleep. At the usual
evening hour the chapel bell began to toll, and Thomas
Newcombe's hands outside the bed feebly beat time. And
just as the last bell struck, a peculiar sweet smile shone over
his face, and he lifted up his head a little, and quickly said,
11 Adsum ! : ' and fell back. It was the word we used at school
when names were called ; and lo ! he, whose heart was as
that of a little child, had answered to his name and stood in
the presence of The Master/
The principal defect alleged against Thackeray is
that he is a mannerist. But when it is considered that
the same charge could be laid against every writer in the
roll of literature with the exception of the few imperial
intellects of the universe, it must be conceded that the
charge is of little moment. All men, save the Homers,
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 55
Shakspeares, and Goethes of the world, are mannerists.
There is not a writer of eminence living at the present
day who is not a mannerist. Tennyson, Browning, and
Carlyle are all mannerists. It is impossible to quarrel
with that which sets the stamp of individuality and origi-
nality on the productions of the intellect.
To assign Thackeray's ultimate position in literature
is a difficult task, for nothing is less certain than the per-
manence of literary attractiveness and fame ; but we
think that his works will be read and as keenly enjoyed
after the lapse of a century as they are now. Fielding
has survived longer than that period, and weightier
reasons for immortality than could be advanced in his
case might be advanced in favour of Thackeray. If his
works ceased to be read as pictures of society and de-
lineations of character, they would still retain no in-
glorious place in English literature from the singular
purity and beauty of their style. It is style even more
than matter which embalms a literary reputation. To
the faithfulness with which he spake the English tongue
we believe future generations will testify. Whatsoever
was good, honest, and true found in him a defender;
whatsoever was base, unmanly, or false shrank abashed
in his presence. A man with less pretence, less assump-
tion, less sham never existed: he revolted from appear-
56 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
ing that which he was not. His works were the reflex of
the man, and like a shaft of light, which, while it pierces
into the deepest recesses of dissimulation and vice,
smiles benignantly upon those aspirations and feelings
which are the noblest glory of humanity.
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING
[CORNHILL MAGAZINE]
ELIZABETH BARRETT BRO WNING.
WHAT are the essential attributes of the Poet's art which
cause him to be adorned with the noblest crown it is in the
power of humanity to confer ? From the period when * the
blind old man of Scio's rocky isle ' thundered that music
which was to reverberate through all time, along the
swift revolving centuries, even to our own somewhat
prosaic day, we witness an unbroken succession of kings
of song, whose thrones have been more permanent than
those of the Pharaohs and the Caesars. What allegiance
do we bear, or what sworn fealty have we kept, truer
than that which we own towards those who have touched
into activity the secret springs of our sensibility ? All
the grandeurs of birth, and dignities which have blos-
somed at the touch of monarchs, fail to move our admi-
ration as compared with the simple majesty of genius,
which has its rise in higher soil, and whose fruition is not
dependent upon the smile of human potentates. One
has somewhat bitterly said of good princes, that ail their
names might be graven within the gem of one ring. The
60 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
same cannot be said of the royal race of poets. Theirs
is not the accidental title to reverence which, with the
majority of princes, ceases with the yielding up of life.
There is nothing perishable with the poet but that clay
which has hemmed him in, and restricted the flights of
his burning and ever-aspiring spirit. His soul is im-
mortal in his verse. And he possesses the gift beyond
all others of transferring his mind and his heart into his
effusions. But a momentary consideration will demon-
strate the fact that the poet must, of necessity, have the
largest fellowship with humanity. He it is who converses
with our veritable selves, and not with our shadows ;
other men affect us at a point somewhere on the surface
by varied means, but all failing to reach the chord that
has its root in the heart's blood, and which vibrates
whenever the true singer touches his fellow-man. What
matters it whether the poet begs his bread through
opulent cities, as the godlike Homer is affirmed to have
done, or wields a powerful sceptre like that of David,
1 the sweet singer of Israel ' ? The ultimate glory of all
is the same, the difference one of degree only. Posterity
gives the crown which cannot wither. Again, the poet
appears before mankind not only as the most indepen-
dent teacher, but the most sympathetic apparently a
contradiction in terms. While the least biassed of all
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 61
teachers who instruct us, he has also the extraordinary
power of reaching to the profoundest depths of our
nature. We should regard the matter with comparative
unconcern if we witnessed the world moved from its orbit
beneath the lever of an Archimedes, provided our own
gravity were preserved; the astounding achievement
would excite little or no emotion in us ; but when the
poet gives birth to a new idea, or when he revivifies old
ones by the plastic and life-giving touch of his genius,
the world is ready with something better than its applause
it reverences and it loves. It is not our intention here
to magnify the Poet's office ; the unanimous verdict of
men, from the remotest ages, has raised him to the
highest pinnacle of fame, and in the great Valhalla of the
universe there are no dead so illustrious as those in
whom was perfected the divine melody of song. The
poet is enthroned of man by virtue of a nobility which
comes from God. His mission is to show us that to feel
nobly is to be great, and to insist, with a lofty eloquence
and in an impassioned strain, upon the importance and
sacred character of truth, beauty, and virtue. We are
not of those who restrict the scope of poetry, and con-
sider it chiefly as a refinement and a delight ; that is to
do wrong to its majestic spirit, whose wings touch the
earth, but whose glorious eyes look into Heaven.
62 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
All true poets themselves have felt that their marvel-
lous gift meant infinitely more than the mere utterance
of melodious numbers. The outer music is but the
shadow of that deeper soul-music which originated with
the apprehension of a new truth, or a new phase of
beauty. He is not a poet who does not possess this
strange insight, which distinctly marks off the real singer
from that adventitious writer who, in a happy moment,
may throw off verses which a simply cursory examination
might induce men to accept as the genuine presentment
of poetry. It was the neglect to take due account of
this matter which led the supporters of Pope to assume a
much higher ground in the famous controversy upon his
merits than his claims warranted. Soul, and not criticism,
is desiderated in poetry. The foibles of humanity are
excellent things as marks for the shafts of novelists and
satirists ; but the man who would assure us of his divine
mission in poetry takes a nobler range than that. He is
for ever in search of, and thirsting for, the beauty of the
universe, that he may interpret it to others. He brings
it to us from the humblest places and in the humblest
guises ; but his contact, while placing it before our
vision, has glorified it, and shown that within it of whose
existence we had iiever dreamed. Has Pope, or any
other man who taught us how to think in measured
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 63
cadence, and delighted us with rhyming intellectualism
ever got beyond didactic assertions, and seized that
fire which the real Prometheus of song invariably gains?
The poet has impulses, gigantic and irresistible ; he has
also love, ever operative and inextinguishable. His
rhyme is an accident ; his poetry is eternal. He finds
his divine manna everywhere ; he is the high-priest of
nature and of God. He sings not so much because it is
pleasant, or to direct attention to his own great and
wondrous ability, but because he must. While he lives,
he cannot avoid it. And the strange faculty of diving
into the mystery of things extends to everything he sees
around him. From no path where intuition can be of
avail is he shut out. In this respect poets might well
appropriate to themselves those lines of delightful old
George Herbert, who himself possessed some share of
the mystic gift :
' For us the winds do blow,
The earth doth rest, heaven move, and fountains flow;
Nothing we see, but means our good,
As our delight, or as our treasure ;
The whole is either our cupboard of food,
Or cabinet of pleasure.'
Now the main charge against the poetry of the Vic-
torian age, if we read it rightly, is this that however
64 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
admirable much of it may be as regards finish, it is in-
significant in conception. Emerson, who is unable to
find any poetic genius in his own country to satisfy him,
thus asks despairingly of England 'Shall I find my
heavenly bread in the reigning poets ? Where is great
design in modern English poetry? The English have
lost sight of the fact that poetry exists to speak the
spiritual law, and that no wealth of description or of
fancy is yet essentially new, and out of the limits of
prose, until this conviction is reached. Therefore the
grave old poets, like the Greek artists, heeded their
designs, and less considered the finish. It was their
office to lead to the divine sources, out of which all this,
and much more, readily springs ; and if this religion is
in the poetry, it raises us to some purpose, and we can
well afford some staidness, or hardness, or want of
popular tune in the verses.' To say that the standard
aimed at by this language is high, is a very inadequate
description of it. Emerson's ideal is evidently one that
is only reached every five hundred years. He would
appear to look for a Homer or an ^Eschylus with every
generation of humanity ; forgetting that we are not gods,
but only summed up into one with the fulness of time
as Shakspeare succeeds to the great ancients after the
lapse of centuries of mediocrity. But is it true that the
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 65
age has exhibited no design in poetry ? Did not Words-
worth exhibit any, in spite of his stuttering articulation
a helplessness probably partly induced by his excess of
spiritual vision ? Are Browning's grapplings with mag-
nificent subjects to be accounted altogether as failures ?
As for Tennyson, he has, it must be owned, never failed
in anything, for he has been careful not to overweight
himself. 1 He is the perfect singer of the time. Yet
he would fall under the reproach of Emerson if it be
a reproach that he gives the age what it asks for,
instead of striving after loftier ideas. Sympathising, how-
ever, to a certain extent with the position assumed by
the distinguished American essayist, we must admit that
what we want is not so much the laborious poet as the
emotional. Tennyson is undoubtedly both, but by no
means in the same degree. His melody is stately and
rich, but not overwhelming. He delights by grace, but
never swells by passion. The light of consummate art
gleams forth from all he does, but his moments of high
exaltation of soul are very rare.
The contrary is the case with regard to the poet
1 To this statement some critics, judging from their published
opinions, might object, alleging ' Queen Mary ' as an instance to
the contrary ; but while that drama is not so satisfactory as much
of Mr. Tennyson's previous work in the poetical sense, it is surely
so in the dramatic.
66 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
whose works we propose to discuss. She, at any rate,
has demonstrated what emotional poetry really means,
in contradistinction to the poetry of simple art ; and it
cannot be said, either, that she has altogether come short
in the matter of design the design which stamps the
greatest poets. Sensibility and intuition, those endow-
ments of supereminent importance to individuals whose
greatness is to grow in proportion to their understanding
and interpretation of human life, were in her united in a
degree seldom witnessed. Her history, sparse as it is in
facts as yet given to the world, is one of intense interest.
It is well known how that existence with her was almost
one long round of continuous suffering. Her retired life
sent her more closely to the companionship of the dead,
though she had naturally an eager and insatiable thirst
after knowledge. Her own sufferings could never daunt
her in the pursuit of learning, and accordingly we find
that as a scholar she was distinguished for the ripest
erudition. Her account of the Greek Christian poets
will serve to show in what direction a large portion of her
studies lay ; and it is in this work, we imagine, that we
discern what was her own ideal of the true nineteenth
century poet. ' We want the touch of Christ's hand
upon our literature,' she says, ' as it touched other dead
things ; we want the sense of the saturation of Christ's
blood upon the souls of our poets, that it may cry through
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 67
them in answer to the ceaseless wail of the Sphinx of our
humanity, expounding agony into renovation. Something
of this has been perceived in art when its glory was at
the fullest. Something of a yearning after this may be
seen among the Greek Christian poets, something which
would have been much with a stronger faculty.' This
idea recurs again and again in different forms through her
works. She yearns for poetry to be sanctified, to be
made holy. This is how it was with the grand old
Greeks, and how it should be now. It is because poetry
is losing its sense of its intimate relations to God that it
is in danger of dying out. And how is the sacredness of
poetry to be truly apprehended ? By the method which
Mrs. Browning adopted, of looking boldly into the
human heart, and reading it fearlessly and trustfully.
' Foole, saide my muse to mee, looke in thine hearte,
and write/ And poetry thus produced is that which
preserves an everlasting freshness and fragrance. The
human heart first, and Nature afterwards, were the
teachers at whose feet our poet learned the deep lessons
she subsequently transmitted to her species. By these
were fostered in her a tenderness which breathes through
all her writings, and whose spirit is mirrored therein as
the blue sky mirrors itself upon the bosom of the deep.
To her, also, it may be said that poetry brought ' its
F 2
68 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
own exceeding great reward.' In the company of the
deep-browed poets, the monarchs of all the ages, she
found consolation as well as intellectual life. With the
fellowship of yEschylus, and Pindar, and Plato, and
Sophocles, and Euripides, of the olden world, and
Chaucer, Spenser, and Shakspeare, of the modern, the
burden of existence, that would otherwise have been in-
supportable, became comparatively light with her. When
but a girl she was able to read in the original some of the
greatest masterpieces of antiquity ; and indeed almost
her first work was an excellent translation of the ' Prome-
theus ' of her great favourite amongst the poets. Her in-
troduction to and intimate acquaintance with Greek
literature was in a large measure due to the influence of
her well-appreciated and cherished tutor, Boyd, the blind
author of a work upon the Greek Fathers, to whom she
addresses some of the best of her sonnets. But though
the Greek was the language which afforded her the most
delight, her acquaintance was not confined to this, her
knowledge of the Hebrew being also most intimate,
whilst the Bible in that language was amongst her most
continuous studies. Little would men suspect in meeting
her for the first time that within that slight and spiritual
frame burned so much of the celestial fire. It was,
perhaps, in consequence of the chance introduction of
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 69
some literary question, that it was discovered how much
learning existed beneath so unpretending an exterior.
She was like those branches which hang nearest the
ground because of the prodigious crop of luscious fruit
which is not always at first apparent to the eye. The
love of knowledge, however, deep and lasting though it
remained, never subdued or modified in her that great
gift of the poet, a burning earnestness or enthusiasm.
At the end, as at the beginning of life, the flame shone
brightly. It was no flickering, artificial light, kept alive
because the poet must simulate an earnestness that is
not possessed; but it left an impress and a character
upon her work which could not be mistaken. Her song
resembled that which fable has associated with the name
of Sappho a living voice, eloquent with passion. Some-
thing of her own intensity of feeling breathes in the lines
when she speaks of
' Electric Pindar, quick as fear,
With race-dust on his cheeks, and clear
Slant startled eyes that seem to hear
The chariot rounding the last goal,
To hurtle past it in his soul.
And Sappho, with that gloriole
Of ebon hair on calmed brows
O poet-woman ! none foregoes
The leap, attaining the repose.'
70 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Had song been less to her than indissolubly bound up
with her life, one thinks she must have wavered in her
devotion to it. But in truth her appetite grew by what
it fed on, and the weakness of the body only led to a
further development of soul. We like to think of her as
accepted amongst the gods for her power over the divine
art, and yet dear in her human relations for the exercise
of a tenderness and a sympathy associated with the sex
which make home a second paradise.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning was born in London, in
the year 1809, and was the daughter of Mr. Barrett, an
English country gentleman. At a very early age she
had written much that was worthy of living, though -it
was kept from all eyes save those of her father, whom
she mentions in the first collected edition of her poems
as 'my public and my critic.' Miss Mitford has de-
scribed her as a ' slight, delicate figure, with a shower of
dark curls falling on each side of a most expressive face,
large tender eyes, richly fringed by dark eyelashes, and
a smile like a sunbeam.' She possessed a grace and
delicacy which almost defied representation. With so
perfect a mental and spiritual organisation it was not
given to her to be equally blessed in the physical.
Always frail, it was her misfortune further to endanger
her existence in 1837 by the bursting of a blood-vessel
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 71
on the lungs. The extremest care preserved her life,
though the incident was succeeded by a long period of
weakness and suffering. Two years afterwards, before
she had quite recovered, she was again assailed by mis-
fortune, experiencing the keenest anguish on witnessing
the death of her favourite brother, who was drowned at
Torquay. A long period of danger followed this cata-
strophe, and when she was at length able to be removed
to her father's house, it was only to become an invalid,
with the prospect of a life couch-ridden to its close.
For seven long years this period of seclusion lasted; but
during that time Miss Barrett devoured all the books
she could bring within her reach, and cultivated the art
which was afterwards to bring her immortality. In 1846,
that is, when she was in her thirty-seventh year, came the
principal event of her life viz., her marriage with Mr.
Browning. He bore her away to Italy, where softer
skies brought back that health which had so long for-
saken her in her native land. The union was most
felicitous, and the influence upon Mrs. Browning's genius
must have been great. On this influence, however, we
cannot now enlarge, for the husband of the author of
' Aurora Leigh ' still lives. Mrs. Browning died in Flo-
rence in 1861, after testifying, in some of the noblest
strains ever penned, her extraordinary devotion to the
land of her adoption.
72 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
One beneficial result of the comparative seclusion of
Mrs. Browning's life was the habit of introspection which
it induced, and which, fortunately for posterity, led to
the production of some of the finest subjective poetry
extant. We can understand to some extent her admira-
tion for Wordsworth, after noticing the tenor of her own
existence, which ran in somewhat similar grooves.
Where, but for the seclusion of her life, would have been
that wealth of ancient lore which, while not destroying
the freshness of her poetry, has added to it a classic grace
and a finish most admirable and remarkable ? The excel-
lent balancing of her faculties had a happy effect on
her work, which is always good in conception, however
defective it may occasionally be in expression. Her in-
tellect was keen and comprehensive, not deficient even
in masculinity ; and it was only in her theories witness,
for instance, references to social questions in her greatest
poem that she occasionally failed to exhibit that solidity
of judgment, or practicality of judgment rather, which is
generally associated with the opposite sex. As a poet
she undoubtedly looked at men and things from the
intensely personal view, in the sense, we mean, of in-
dividuality. Instead of taking a broad sweep as Dante
whom we conceive as being merged in the mighty con-
ceptions of his spirit she had rather that other gift of
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 73
the poet, of making herself, the individual, apparent in
all her writings. It is this quality which adds so greatly
to the force of her lyrical effusions indeed, without this
quality no poet had better attempt the writing of lyrics.
So far as regards this form of poetry, we understand its
force and value to be that it is an appeal from one indivi-
dual mind to another; and the most successful lyrics
have been those which have excited in us a particular,
and not a general, interest. A momentary reflection
upon the lyrics of Burns and Beranger will attest the
truth of this assertion. It was a portion of Mrs. Brown-
ing's strength and by no means an unimportant one
that she was able to achieve this result. Who will not
continually feel indebted to her for many of her shorter
poems, which have revealed so much of the human heart
in them, and awakened impulses and sensations which
have delighted and cheered the spirit? That was a
happy observation passed upon her by one critic, who
described her as Shakspeare's daughter. The same large-
heartedness which pertained to the great dramatist is
shown by the later poet. The benevolent eye looks out
on men and nature with the same imperishable love. If
the world has at any time possessed its ideal poets, she
is worthy to be counted one of them.
From her earliest years, as will, indeed, have been
74 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
discovered already, Mrs. Browning appears to have had
the passion for books a passion which is referred to
more than once in 'Aurora Leigh' and her studious
habits, as well as that of writing, were encouraged by her
father. Her early years are a reproach to any who, with
stronger health and equal opportunities, take no heed to
the storing and assimilation of knowledge. In all that
we read of her subsequent works, the value of those early
habits of insatiable study is apparent. Knowledge has
made the full mind, and the richness of the stores is not
without effect upon her original compositions. How
must her fragile frame have thrilled when, in the course
of her reading, as she says
Because the time was ripe,
I chanced upon the poets.
Doubtless, the slumbering possibilities in her nature were
touched by this, and it must have been with wonder that
the lights of the great bards first flashed across her vision :
something, it would have appeared to her, of the nature
of coming into a priceless inheritance. And the time
arrived when all that she had acquired became of real
moment to her. Let those who would despise erudition
in a poet place Mrs. Browning beside other female poets,
and see how they lose by comparison not only in that
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 75
original power in which she was undoubtedly stronger.
The poet cannot gain one fact too many; the poorest
and commonest coinage which he receives from other
mints may be transmuted into the purest gold in his
own. The best minds have recognised this, and have
laboured diligently after the perfection of knowledge,
feeling that none are so gifted, even the gods, but that
they may learn somewhat from men.
To attempt to pass in review all that Elizabeth
Barrett Browning has left as her legacy for future ages is
not our intention. We purpose, however, to examine
some of her works individually before offering any criti-
cisms of a general character upon her genius. ' A Drama
of Exile,' which was a comparatively early production, is
acknowledged to possess great sublimity in its ideas,
though the conception as a whole is asserted to be a
failure. For ourselves we were struck with the poetic
wealth which it displays, and failure as applied to it must
be taken in the comparative form. There are those
whom the majestic Milton has not satisfied by his chef-
d'ceuvre \ but the most fastidious will admit that if he has
not touched the highest heavens he has come very near
them. Of course, it is not pretended for a moment that
{fie Drama of Exile ' stands forth as magnificent a con-
ception as ' Paradise Lost,' which Mrs. Browning's poem
76 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
compels us to bring to memory, being upon the same
subject ; neither can it be said to be perfectly original,
coming after that epic : but in the later poem we find
much in point of sustained language which reminds us of
Milton's work. Milton's feet were more firmly set, and
he has the stately march of a conqueror. Mrs. Browning
can only in this work show her possibilities, not her
ultimate perfection. This is an excellent touch, due,
probably, partly to the fact that it was written by a
woman; Gabriel, addressing Lucifer, says :
' If thou hadst gazed upon the face of God
This morning for a moment, thou hadst known
That only pity fitly can chastise :
Hate but avenges.'
These lines, put into the mouth of Adam, are also ex-
quisite :
' The Highest being the Holy and the Glad,
Whoever rises must approach delight
And sanctity in the act.'
But for a passage of unfaltering eloquence, and one
instinct with true poetic fire, take the address of Adam
to Eve after the twain have left Paradise. To demon-
strate Mrs. Browning's power over blank verse, we cannot
refrain from citing a portion of it :
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 77
' Raise the majesties
Of thy disconsolate brows, O well-beloved,
And front with level eyelids the To come,
And all the dark o' the world !
******
Thy love
Shall chant itself its own beatitudes
After its own life-working. A child's kiss,
Set on thy sighing lips, shall make thee glad ;
A poor man served by thee, shall make thee rich ;
A sick man helped by thee, shall make thee strong ;
Thou shalt be served thyself by every sense
Of service which thou renderest. Such a crown
I set upon thy head, Christ witnessing
With looks of prompting love to keep thee clear
Of all reproach against the sin foregone,
From all the generations which succeed.
Thy hand, which plucked the apple, I clasp close,
Thy lips, which spake wrong counsel, I kiss close,
I bless thee in the name of Paradise,
And by the memory of Edenic joys
Forfeit and lost, by that last cypress tree
Green at the gatQ, which thrilled as we came out,
And by the blessed nightingale which threw
Its melancholy music after us,
And by the flowers, whose spirits full of smells,
Did follow softly, plucking us behind
Back to the gradual banks and vernal bowers
And fourfold river-courses By all these,
I bless thee to the contraries of these,
I bless thee to the desert and the thorns,
To the elemental change and turbulence,
78 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
And to the roar of the estranged beasts,
And to the solemn dignities of grief,
To each one of these ends, and to their END
Of Death and the Hereafter.'
It will be apparent that for one who had not yet
attained the full maturity of her powers to write like this
there must have been a great future in store. Whatever
deductions might have to be made as regards the want
of stupendousness in her conceptions, there was still
sufficient breadth in her earlier work to prove that there
were scarcely any heights to which she might not subse-
quently attain. In the chorus of Eden spirits which
comes into the ' Drama of Exile ' there is an abundance
of lyrical music and power, given in metres which have
since been most successfully adopted by other poets.
In another poem, ' The Seraphim/ we observe the
same noble moral glow which pervaded the drama to
which we have just alluded. The time of the poem is
that of the Crucifixion, and the sublime tragedy is
handled with a delicacy and at the same time a force as
nearly befitting so lofty a subject as we can well imagine.
The deep religious spirit which pervaded Mrs. Browning
led her frequently to the choice of topics in some way
connected with the great verities of the Christian religion,
in which she had a profound and intense belief, as will
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 79
have been gathered, not only from repute, but from the
attitude assumed in her works, by anyone who has made
acquaintance with them. The faults which are princi-
pally to be noted in her earliest poems are those related
to art, a knowledge of which rarely comes at the outset
to the most precocious. Before art can be exhibited,
there must not only be capacity, but work accomplished
work compared with previous work, and each stage
showing an advance upon that which went before. Al-
though Mrs. Browning was never at any period of her
career as distinguished for finish as she was for other and
more important qualities, there is yet a considerable
difference in this respect between her first effusions and
her later lyrics. Her strength and pathos, however,
generally overwhelm all other considerations in the
reader's mind, whose attention is seized and retained by
personal influence. It is the poet who does not throw
himself entirely into his creations who is mostly eminent
for finish. The value of the diamond to him consists in
the way in which it is set, and he would prefer a stone
of inferior water if it exhibited excess of polish to one
much more massive if some touches of the rough still
adhered to it. Yet, we are by no means contending that
great poets are not also great in art. We are, speaking
only of finish, which is but a portion of art, and that not
8o POETS AND NOVELISTS.
the most important. In art are combined the larger
qualities of fitness, proportion, and truth, which are the
masters of finish the world over. In all these three
points Mrs. Browning was the successful artist ; and he
who objected to her because he discovered here and
there a false rhyme or a defective line, would have lost
sight of the towering mountain ahead in stumbling over
a mole-hill. Having said thus much, let us at the same
time frankly admit that the sense of adequateness is not
strongly perceived in the lengthy poems to which we
have adverted. We discover it in the highest degree in
' Paradise Lost,' and ought, of course, to find it in all
work which is the matured result of a grand imagination
work that has attained solidity by frequent communing
with and lifelong study of the bases on which it was
grounded. So, had these poems of Mrs. Browning's
been written at a later stage the beneficial result would
have been apparent, in this one point at any rate upon
which we are insisting. The unevenness in her execution
would also have been considerably diminished, a matter
of no small importance in conceptions of that nature.
But take the poem and the drama as they stand, with all
their faults, and we repeat there is still room for a
feeling of genuine admiration over the result achieved.
Mrs. Browning's chosen field of study was the one
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 81
productive of her first work of great importance, viz. her
rendering of the ' Prometheus Bound ' of ^Eschylus. She
had most probably been incited to this work by the
companion, before mentioned, of her studies in Greek.
It is a deed of no small magnitude for a young lady to
accomplish this at all, and might well daunt even deeper
students ; but she had a profound appreciation of the old
poet, and brought her love for his sublime tragedy to
bear upon the task. It was scarcely to be expected that
she would obtain a complete success, and she herself
admitted that the translation was defective. She accord-
ingly recast it, substantially changing the form of many
passages. Though on reading it we gain the impression
that it is a considerably Anglicised Greek drama, the
vigour exhibited, and the true poetical fervour which is
thrown around it, make it very welcome. The vocabulary
of passion employed is rich and varied, whilst the rhythm
affords scope for considerable poetic effects. In this, as
in her other translations, she desired it to be understood
that her one great idea was to catch the spirit of the
original. The choruses are excellent, and possess, in
addition to much music, all the fire that it is essential
should burn in poems which have for their aim the
depicting of the ecstasies and the writhings of passion.
' A Lament for Adonis,' from Bion, is very happy and
G
82 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
full of a warm imagery, and indicates, besides, the
instinct and apprehension of the original poet.
The genius of Mrs. Browning had two sides the
lyric and the dramatic : she had little special gift for
either the idyllic or the epic. For the idyllic she was
not either sufficiently didactic or intransitively calm ; for
the epic her emotions were too keen and her sensibilities
too quick and lively. Her longest poem has nothing of
the epic about it, being in fact neither more nor less
than a series of dramatic scenes. It does not profess to
give the triumphant progress of a hero or a heroine, but
to unfold to us the inner life of its principal character.
In a word, it is an Autobiography in verse.
Considering first her lyrical capabilities for it is
really by means of these that her immortality is most
secured we are bound to say that they are of the highest
order. Campbell was a great artist, but on reading his
lyrics we are struck with the fact that they are in a large
measure the product of a skilled mind rather than of a
real singer. He has been succeeded by Tennyson in
verbal perfection ; but to our mind neither of these true
poets is the equal of Mrs. Browning in the matter of the
lyric. Yet so high is our estimate of the authors of
' Hohenlinden ' and * Locksley Hall ' that no other poets
in these later times, save Mrs. Browning and perhaps
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 83
two others, can be put into comparison with them for
real lyrical power. One of the two latter is Shelley, the
other Burns, who is the superior of Shelley, and indubi-
tably at the head of his race : and for this reason, that he
invariably put his heart into his verse. Soul, not culture,
thus gave us the best of our lyric poets. It is on the
ground assigned in regard to Burns that we should give
Mrs. Browning the next place amongst the moderns for
lyrical genius, though these two poets were as wide
asunder as the poles in all other respects. Let the reader
dispassionately compare the lyrics which have been
written by our principal singers during the past two or
three generations. He will find, we think, that the
position we have assumed is one which can be main-
tained. Shelley undoubtedly exhibits the true lyrical
fire, but his poems are not so varied as those of Mrs.
Browning ; while her pathos is deeper than his and that
of all his compeers. His imagination was, perhaps,
somewhat higher, and he soared into cloud-land more fre-
quently ; but the heart, which gave Burns his power, was
the strength of Mrs. Browning. Shelley was almost too
ethereal, too spiritual, and the consequence was that the
human was somewhat overshadowed. His sensibility
was of the keenest description, and many of his lyrics
bear testimony to the truth of his averment that
G 2
84 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
1 Most men
Are cradled into poetry by wrong ;
They learn in suffering what they teach in song.'
One cannot help thinking that Shelley's natural place in
the world would be that of a spiritualised .Spenser ; and
if that calm could have come to him which alone can
furnish the poet with the opportunity he ought to have,
there is no knowing but he might have given us a work
rich enough to justify this fancy of him. As it is, between
writhings and groanings, the paroxysms of a much -tried
spirit, he wrote those exquisite lyrics and poems, which
we should be indeed loth to lose from our literature.
Mrs. Browning had not the intense naturalness of Burns,
and though both felt acutely, yet in character and tem-
perament they had nothing in common. But, as we have
said, the mainspring of the power of both was in the
heart. They worked upon different principles and under
different circumstances. Burns was moved to joy or
sorrow by the impressions he drew from outward nature ;
Mrs. Browning, on the contrary, found that nature re-
ceived a tinge of melancholy or happiness from her own
emotions. They are thus perfect contrasts in everything
except the one great endowment of genius. And if the
word epigrammatic may be used to denote that power
which Burns had of describing an object in nature or a
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 85
human emotion, Mrs. Browning was certainly not so
epigrammatic as the northern singer. Leigh Hunt once
referred to our poet as the sister of Alfred Tennyson, but
the relation does not strike us as of the happiest. It
does not set in the proper light either relatively to the
other. In the first place, there is a good deal that is
feminine (in the best sense) about the genius of Tenny-
son, whilst occasionally there is that in Mrs. Browning's
poetry as masculine as anything to be found in the
Poet Laureate. In truth, we do not see much good in
these comparisons at all ; the happiest expression yet
given utterance to is the one previously mentioned,
which describes her as Shakspeare's daughter. We are
able to see some meaning in this ; we can feel that her
genius stands in the same relation to that of the trans-
cendent poet of the world as does a daughter to her
parent. The lesser is the true miniature representation
of the greater.
The precise order in which Mrs. Browning's lyrics
were written has never been stated, and it is not possible
to arrive at a correct chronology with regard to them by
internal evidence. The dates of several, however, are
well known : and amongst the earliest of her productions
was that entitled ' A Vision of Poets,' written in a very
attractive, though unusual metre. This vision of men of
86 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
' foreheads royal with the truth,' as beheld in the magni-
ficent temple of poetry, is one of her most successful as
well as most graphic conceptions. No words are wasted
in painting the portraits ; to each of the world-famous
men are appropriated but a few lines, yet how telling
these are !
' Shakspeare, on whose forehead climb
The crowns o' the world : O eyes sublime
With tears and laughters for all time ! '
The national poet's eminence was never more felicitously
indicated than in these simple words that is, more of
him can be grasped than pages of criticism could accom-
plish, though the poet's description is by no means
exhaustive. Other excellent touches are those devoted
to Euripides, Lucretius, ' nobler than his mood,' Goethe,
Chaucer, Milton, Schiller.
' And Burns, with pungent passionings
Set in his eyes : deep lyric springs
Are of the fire-mount's issuings.
' And poor, proud Byron, sad as grave
And salt as life ; forlornly brave,
And quiv'ring with the dart he drave.'
And the lesson it is worthy of the ' Vision.' Is it
well for the poet to be born to suffer, and to die un-
recognised and unrewarded? Verily so; he has lived
for truth and beauty scarcely two as the author tells us
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 87
and should therefore be content. His experience has
been, after all, better than that of the lower man, with
lower pains and less transporting pleasures. He will be
crowned, but crowned with no ordinary crown. His
highest glory is to know, however the end is gained.
And after death he will have two lives one in the
Beyond, and one in the Past, in the songs he has left
behind him. Thus the end of the whole matter is
reached, the conclusion being that ' Knowledge by
suffering entereth, and Life is perfected by Death.' The
lesson in some of its applications is not new ; the martyrs
to truth in whatever shape have always taught it, but
now the poet-martyrs teach it. For they are martyrs
too frequently ; and that is not martyrdom simply which
affects or destroys the body. The spirituality of Mrs.
Browning's nature shines in this poem ; she affords some
clue as to her ideal. It is a strain singularly pure and
lofty, and shows a developing imagination which augured
powerfully and well for succeeding work. Its burden is
more cheerful than that of ' The Two Voices, 7 a poem
cast in the same mould, and to which the thought of the
reader inevitably reverts while reading the ' Vision.' Its
meaning is not to be restricted alone to the class of
beings with whom it deals upon the surface, for the con-
clusion is a triumphant one for the whole of the human
POETS AND NOVELISTS.
race, whose ends of life are also made sacred by the
same method. Having read this poem, one rises with a
more hopeful heart to engage in the world's conflict
We pass on from such poems as * The Romaunt of
Margret ' and ' Isobel's Child ' with reluctance, for there
is much in them both of concentrated strength and music
which we could wish to have pointed out. Some have
chosen them as well-nigh the happiest efforts of the poet,
and they certainly are amongst the most beautiful notes
of her lyre. Even the rhymes seem to possess a melan-
choly befitting the subjects, whilst the mere repetition of
the words ' Margret, Margret,' attains to real pathos in
the cunning hands of the writer in the former poem. A
singular affection for subjects which have in them the
deepest anguish and suffering was early apparent in Mrs.
Browning. The spirit very seldom danced, though when
it did, the music was as true and fitting as the funeral
dirge, which she more frequently gives us. Wandering
amongst her poems is like standing in the forest alone,
with the wailing wind and the flying rain as the only
assurances of an existence sublimer than our own. But
the profoundest depth of our heart is reached thereby.
We would there had been no need for the lament and
the sorrow, and yet we would not have lost those mys-
terious thrills of the soul which her power has evoked-
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 89
We must follow the poet in her quest of truth, follow her
wherever she leads us, for by these means shall we
emerge out of the thick folds of darkness into the broad
light of day. This is one reason why we have such an
admiration for, and attachment to her genius. Wherever
she leads us, it is to make us better. Does she show us
the poor whom we too often oppress ? It is that we may
know wherein we have erred, and that in the future our
hands may be washed clean from oppression and cruelty.
Does she sometimes apparently darken the spirit ? It is
only to make it reflect so that it may endeavour to grope
through the mysteries of life and nature up to God.
Intellectual doubts are frequently disposed of in a very
summary method, and one which has at sundry times in
the world's history been most effective ; she sees their
lowering forms gradually attenuate and disperse before
the calm eye of Faith. Whatever of evil was rampant in
the world, this could not be crushed out of her. To her,
it was not always necessary to understand all the wrong
that she beheld; she saw it, and hated it. She has
helped men by her writings to do something towards
making an end of it. She has been a mouthpiece for
the poor and miserable ; the light of love beams on her
forehead and dwells in her eyes j the Divine feeling of
compassion has swelled in her bosom, and for this
90 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
reason, as for others, she has her place with those who
are beloved of the human race.
In proceeding to indicate what we consider some of
Mrs. Browning's most admirable lyrics, we must deci-
dedly name among the chief, ' The Rhyme of the
Duchess May.' This ballad has in it not only a quaint-
ness which conveys us back to the days of chivalry, but
a strength of expression which is generally absent in the
productions of that period. It bears unquestionably the
stamp of genius. The poet for the time has completely
forgotten herself, projecting her thoughts so far into the
subject as to realise a most intense and tragic phase of
human existence. There is the ring of melancholy in
the lines, which is deepened by the constant recurrence
of the allusion to the passing bell. The whole concep-
tion is well worked out, and the powers of the writer are
not frittered away before the close of the poem, as is too
frequently the case with lyrics of similar length. The
perfection of what is touching is reached in ' Bertha in
the Lane,' where the dying maiden tells with simple
pathos the incident which has led to her own heart's
breaking. There is nothing forced here ; indeed, the
language in some passages does not rise higher than that
of actual conversation, the only adventitious poetical aid
given to the setting of the story being that of the rhyme,
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 91
which again is well chosen. The author has wisely
avoided the slightest straining after effect, leaving the
natural pathos in the story to accomplish the end which
she desires. l Lady Geraldine's Courtship ' is a romance
which almost necessarily challenges comparison with
' Locksley Hall/ and what is strange about the two, Mrs.
Browning has, in our judgment, most truthfully drawn
the male characters, while Tennyson has been the
happier in all else in his poem. The poet who loved
Lady Geraldine has many excellences, but his vocation
has not properly imbued him with the kingly spirit, and
he fails in the strength and robustness which we should
expect. Besides, we quickly grow indignant that he
should be so slow in reading that which should have
been patent to his eyes. The character of the Earl is
well drawn, his natural dignity being admirably caught in
the few lines devoted to his limning. The old story of
love springing where it listeth, unforced and unexpected, is
once more dilated upon, and brought in this instance 'to
a satisfactory consummation. As another specimen of
the perfection of lyric art we may cite * The Romance of
the Swan's Nest,' one of the most beautiful and strangely-
attractive series of stanzas ever penned.
But let us pass on to ' The Cry of the Children,' that
noble and striking remonstrance against the greed and
92 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
oppression of mankind. Its intense pathos could surely
only spring from a woman's heart, wounded in its love
for the human by deeds enough to make the heavens
blush. We have heard something of the sorrows of the
factory children, but these lines have brought them close
to us, and compelled us to feel that the poorest and
weakest are our brethren and sisters. When was the
anguish of a young spirit grasped so clearly as in the
following lines, which are supposed to be spoken by the
little workers amongst the iron wheels those wheels
which roll on ruthlessly, scarcely giving time for rest ?
' Two words, indeed, of praying we remember,
And at midnight's hour of harm,
" Our Father," looking upward in the chamber,
We say softly, for a charm.
We know no other words except " Our Father,"
And we think that, in some pause of angels' song,
God may pluck them with the silence sweet to gather,
And hold both within His right hand, which is strong.
" Our Father ! " If He heard us, He would surely
(For they call Him good and mild)
Answer, smiling down the steep world very purely,
" Come and rest with Me, my child." '
England has cleared herself from something of the re-
proach contained in the poem from whence these lines
are taken, and by God's grace she will be, perhaps,
wholly free from stain in the (let us hope not far distant)
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 93
future. There are other poems which exhibit the same
large sympathetic heart as the one founded upon the
miseries of the factory children, such as 'Mother and
Poet/ and * The Cry of the Human,' which latter reminds
the world how many
1 Lips say, " God be pitiful,"
Who ne'er said, " God be praised !"'
She felt as did that other poet of the poor, of whom we
are proud, for all who are in any way crushed or bruised
by the pressure of society and of social distinctions, or
of social misfortunes. To be despised or to be sad was
the way to be sure of her deepest interest. This is a
trait which will serve to keep her memory green, for who
among us will willingly let die the names of our philan-
thropists those who have been genuine in the active
and written expressions of their sympathy ? One likes
to linger over the point how lofty genius steps down with
more sincerity from its high estate to acknowledge fel-
lowship with the mean and the wretched, than do the
^^/-philanthropists who consider that the claims of
humanity are met by the doling out of a pittance to any
who may appeal to their condescension. Not always,
yet very often, the great intellect is the index to the
generous and simple spirit
94 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
To mark the range of our author's powers, compare
such poems as ' A Child's Thought of God ' with those
on Napoleon, or ' Casa Guidi Windows.' How sweetly
and beautifully the first-named closes !
' God is so good, He wears a fold
Of heaven and earth across His face,
Like secrets kept, for love, untold.
' But still I feel that His embrace
Slides down by thrills, through all things made,
Through sight and sound of every place :
' As if my tender mother laid
On my shut lips her kisses' pressure,
Half waking me at night, and said,
" Who kiss'd you through the dark, dear guesser ? " '
This is better theology than the orthodox damnation
with which we were terrified in our youth by narrow-
minded bigots, who have probably ruined many a soul
by preaching that God is powerful and vindictive, instead
of God is love. We want more of the teaching which
we get in the pages of this woman-poet. Then note how
from these sweet and happy thoughts we can turn to
matter more bold and striking, as in ' The Dead Pan,'
which has a truly musical ring with it ; ' Cowper's Grave,'
an immortal tribute to a suffering singer; Crowned and
Buried,' an appreciation of the great and deathless
Napoleon; but, above all, in this class of effort, to ' Casa
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 95
Guidi Windows.' This poem exhibits Mrs. Browning in
her greatest intellectual strength. The fabric is solid and
enduring; the poem as sustained as anything which she
has written, and more perfect than her remaining longer
one. Clearly her feeling was in this work as well as her
imagination, and the combined powers have given us
something which cannot fail to live.
Everyone who knows anything at all of the poet is
familiar with her great love for Italy, one of the strongest
passions of her life. It is in this poem that she chiefly
unfolds to the world her feelings with regard to the
emancipation of that country. From the Casa Guidi
windows at Florence, her favourite city, she watched the
struggle for liberty in which Italy engaged against Austria,
and the assistance rendered towards this object by
Napoleon III., without whom probably it would nevef
have been accomplished. It was in praise of this cham-
pion that she wrote some of her most impassioned strains.
She knew the deceased Emperor at his best, when there
seemed strongly upon him an enthusiasm for the cause
which he had espoused that would be sure to go straight
to the heart of the generous and impulsive poet; and in
her utterances, therefore, she was lavish and unrestrained.
To many in England this over-warmth of feeling will
seem strange, but till we have felt all the bitterness which
96 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
she felt for a degraded nation, and have seen the con-
queror arise to lift her from the dust, we cannot say
how deep our gratitude might be to such conqueror, his
subsequent career notwithstanding. Our concern, how-
ever, is with the poems, including those entitled * Poems
before Congress,' in which Mrs. Browning set forth that
patriotism, to be true, should not be manifested in
behalf of one's own country alone. In ' Casa Guidi
Windows ' the imagery is rich and the language flowing,
worthy partners of the idea which engrossed the mind.
In the course of the poem beautiful legends of Savona-
rola and Michael Angelo are laid under contribution to
heighten the charms of the song of their country ; and
the closing pages of the poem contain an attractive
episode in relation to the poet's infant son, whom she
calls her young Florentine, he having been born in that
city. She has thus connected her native land and that
of her adoption more closely together, and claims nearer
relationship to Italy than she ever felt before, through
the link furnished in her child. It is impossible to do
more than refer to the extraordinary wealth and strength
of imagery which the poem contains; but as some justifi-
cation for the high opinion we have expressed concerning
it, we must not neglect to extract the passage in which,
as before mentioned, the poet addresses her son :
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 97
1 The sun strikes through the windows, up the floor ;
Stand out in it, my own young Florentine,
Not two years old, and let me see thee more !
It grows along thy amber curls, to shine
Brighter than elsewhere. Now, look straight before,
And fix thy brave blue English eyes on mine,
And from thy soul, which fronts the future so,
With unabashed and unabated gaze,
Teach me to hope for, what the angels know
When they smile clear as thou dost. Down God's ways,
With just alighted feet, between the snow
And snowdrops, where a little lamb may graze,
Thou hast no fear, my lamb, about the road ;
Albeit in our vain-glory we assume
That, less than we have, thou hast learnt of God.
Stand out, my blue-eyed prophet ! thou, to whom
The earliest world-day light that ever flowed,
Through Casa Guidi windows chanced to come !
Now shake the glittering nimbus of thy hair,
And be God's witness that the elemental
New springs of life are gushing everywhere.'
It is, we imagine, almost universally accepted that to
write the sonnet excellently is about the most difficult
performance in the domain of poetry. At any rate, it is
the one branch of the art least frequently successfully
achieved. It is questionable whether we have more
than three or four English poets who can be credited
with the highest execution in this respect. But to these
three or four must be added the name of Mrs. Browning.
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98 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
After Shakspeare, we should be inclined to maintain that
she is the equal of any. For proof of this, let the reader
turn to her ' Sonnets from the Portuguese,' which, under a
disguised name, are her own sonnets. To us they seem
to fulfil all the requisites of the sonnet, including strength,
imagery, sweetness, proportion or art, and massiveness.
They are certainly equal to any of Wordsworth's and
most of Milton's. The sonnet, with the great poets, has
been generally most successful when personal to them-
selves. They appear to have caught their passion and
confined it within bounds, so that the sonnet, in master
hands, becomes, as it were, ' foursquare to all the winds
that blow.' There is no weak corner all is solid and
compact.
These sonnets by Mrs. Browning bear upon them her
own very distinct individuality, and, as a means of setting
her truly before her readers, are more explanatory than
any other of her writings. Let us study them for a
moment In the first, the poet presents us with a picture
of her mind at the period when she looked for Death as
the release from a mortal imprisonment, whose shadow
was laid deeply athwart her. The sonnet is exceedingly
fine, and is as follows :
' I thought once how Theocritus had sung
Of the sweet years, the dear and wished-for years,
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 99
Who each one in a gracious hand appears
To bear a gift for mortals, old or young ;
And, as I mused it in his antique tongue,
I saw, in gradual vision through my tears,
The sweet, sad years, the melancholy years,
Those of my own life, who by turns had flung
A shadow across me. Straightway I was 'ware,
So weeping, how a mystic Shape did move
Behind me, and drew me backward by the hair ;
And a voice said in mastery, while I strove :
"Guess now who holds thee ?" " Death," I said. But there,
The silver answer rang, " Not Death, but Love ! "'
Then comes a description of love, whose powei
nothing can conquer, and which man is helpless to
destroy. Spirits ' but vow the faster for the stars.' Yet,
following on, we come to a declaration of her own un-
worthiness, on the part of the singer, to be thus dis-
covered and made blessed. The gloom is still too heavy
about her, and will not be dispersed. She is fain to
cry
1 What hast thou to do,
With looking from thy lattice lights at me,
A poor, tired, wand'ring singer, singing through
The dark, and leaning up a cypress tree ?
The chrism is on thine head, on mine, the dew,
And Death must dig the level where these agree.'
How beautiful and how pathetic are these lines! And
the strain is continued, with no diminution of sadness,
H 2
ioo POETS AND NOVELISTS.
through several succeeding sonnets. The soul has found
its counterpart, yet bids it begone; the proffered happi-
ness is too great for it; it must not be. ' Go from me ! '
is now the cry; but the spirit is evidently yielding to the
conqueror, for it adds :
' The widest land
Doom takes to part us, leaves thy heart in mine,
With pulses that beat double.'
The record of life progresses, and the great argument is
discussed, ' Can it be right to give what I can give ? '
Witness the seventh and immediately subsequent sonnets,
for their dissection of the love passion, as it thrills
through and permeates the being. Truly autobiogra-
phical, indeed, are these confessions ; the seal of genuine
experience is upon each one with its alternating hopes
and fears, and its unfolding of a woman's heart. Surely
finer subjective poetry than this was never written. The
poet speaks to us without veils, and we listen eagerly to
the revelation. From the sadness and gloom we emerge
at length into daylight ; the cypress has yielded to the
rose. Love is justified ; it asks for and gives all. Troths
are exchanged, and the singer has given up the grave for
the sake of him who is now to be her life. We then see
the plan of the whole work. First, we had the soul
expecting death, then Life revivified by Love ; then the
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING 101
grave put behind the soul ; and lastly, comes the sequel,
the marriage of those whose history has been traced in
the series of poems now about to conclude. Thus the
poet muses, as she stands midway in her existence the
past behind her, the blissful future immediately in
view :
' " My future will not copy my fair past."
I wrote that once ; and, thinking at my side
My ministering life-angel justified
The word by his appealing look upcast
To the white throne of God, I turned at last,
And there, instead, saw thee, not unallied
To angels in thy soul ! Then I, long tried
By natural ills, received the comfort fast,
While budding, at thy sight, my pilgrim's staff
Gave out green leaves, with morning dews impearled.
I seek no copy now of life's first half :
Leave here the pages with long musing curled,
And write me new my future's epigraph,
New angel mine, unhoped for in the world ! '
But to show what the wonderful depth of woman's love
is, and to reach what seems the absolute fulness of
human expression, we have the following triumphant
song at the close of this personal history we have been
examining :
' How do I love thee ? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
102 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of every day's
Most quiet need, by sun and candlelight.
I love thee freely, as men strive for Right ;
I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life ! and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after Death.'
We have thus glanced briefly through this remarkable
series of psychological poems, one of the most precious
bequests which a poet can leave us, revealing, as they do
so clearly, the inner life of the writer. After their
perusal, just as in the case of a study of Tennyson's i In
Memoriam,' we feel that we have done more towards
grasping the character of the poet than we are able to do
by an intimate acquaintance with all her other works.
The unity of the * Sonnets from the Portuguese ' is pre-
cise and definite ; no link in the chain can be with-
drawn without destroying the value of the whole. There
is no hesitancy in the utterance ; we here see Mrs.
Browning at her highest, when she has passed through
the noviciate of her art, and risen to the perfection of
song. The sonnets glow with rapture, are exquisite in
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 103
expression, and perfect in form. Taken collectively,
and in the light of the one passion which they trace,
from its inception to its culmination, we know nothing
anywhere to compare with them. Intellect and passion
are combined in an equal degree, and together fused
into wondrous music.
The love poetry from the hand which wrote thus
passionately and including compositions other than the
sonnets would in itself, and in its entirety, form a com-
plete study, for its variety, sweetness, and pathos. But
there yet remain to us some remarks on the work upon
which, chiefly, the author's fame is conceded to rest
' Aurora Leigh.' A wide diversity of opinion exists with
regard to its merits, and to the position which it ought to
occupy in modern literature. The writer herself, in
inscribing it to her cousin, described it as the most
mature of all her works, and the one into which her
* highest convictions upon Life and Art have entered/
Our own view of it is that, as a whole, it is somewhat
inconsequent ; it lacks unity, for a poem of such magni-
tude ; but even in these higher respects, though not per-
fect, it is little beneath anything produced this generation.
When we come to regard it in other aspects, however,
our praise is almost necessarily unbounded. It is a
poem which we could imagine Shakspeare dropping a
104 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
tear over for its humanity. Its intense subjectivity will
exempt its influence on men from decay. Were we not
amazed with the beauty and fulness of its poetry, we
should be struck with its philosophy. The following
lines might almost be taken as a digest of the whole
teaching of Carlyle :
' Get leave to work
In this world 'tis the best you get at all ;
For God, in cursing, gives us better gifts
Than men in benediction. God says " Sweat
For foreheads," men say " crowns," and so we are crowned,
Ay, gashed by some tormenting circle of steel
Which snaps with a secret spring. Get work, get work ;
Be sure 'tis better than what you work to get.'
The author's views on Art are set forth with some
fulness. Art, we presume, notwithstanding all the dark-
ness which has been cast around it by much speaking,
means (if we are bound to describe it as concisely as
possible) the closest and most perfect realisation of the
various forms of Truth which it is in the power of man
to attain. Some such idea as this certainly possessed
the mind of Mrs. Browning ; and it was her opinion that
that was real art which assisted in any degree to lead
back the soul to contemplate God, the supreme Artist of
the universe. Yet Art, even with her, was not the
highest, the ultimate
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 105
'Art is much, but Love is more !
O Art, my Art, thou'rt much, but Love is more !
Art symbolises heaven, but Love is God
And makes heaven.'
As a solution for many of the problems of social life
' Aurora Leigh ' must be pronounced a failure. It ex-
hibits a wonderful sensitiveness to the evils resulting
from the imperfect conditions of society, but it shows no
powers of reconstruction. Its principal attraction, after
its poetry, which stands supremely first therein, lies in
the series of pictures of human life, in its varied phases,
which it presents, and in its power of analysis of the
human heart. Sincerity is also a prominent characteristic
of the revelations which it makes ; it is an autobiography
in which nothing is kept back, and the inner workings of
a woman's heart were never more clearly transcribed.
Unevenness characterises the narrative, but daring specu-
lation and rich thought are embraced within the lines.
There are passages of poetry as lofty and impassioned
within the covers of this one book as are contained in
any single lengthy modern poem of which we have know-
ledge. From the level of occasional mediocrity we pass
on to sublime imaginative heights. In this poem we
have a vantage ground from which we survey the pano-
rama of human life, illumined by the sun of genius. To
io6 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
attempt to extract its beauties would be futile ; it is a
garden in which every flower of sweetness blooms. Its
aroma is amongst the most fragrant in literature. Or
again, to change the figure, the poem is like a mine
which yields more and more as the human digger presses
it. When he first enters into possession he beholds the
faint yellow streaks which betoken the golden treasure,
but it is the subsequent labour which brings to light the
actual El Dorado.
One grand result of Mrs. Browning's literary career
has been to disprove the assertion that women cannot
write true poetry. Such a taunt may be considered as
disposed of for ever. If we are to believe tradition,
Sappho wrote the finest lyrics the world has seen ; but
our own generation has beheld woman's genius take even
a wider range. No woman, as yet, has written a great
epic, or dramatic poetry of the highest order ; but how
restricted is the number of men who have done this !
What there is in the nature of woman, however, to forbid
her rivalling even the highest we do not know ; all we
can say is, that genius, the dower of the gods, in its most
transcendent manifestation, has, up to the present, been
bestowed upon man. It may be, nevertheless, that we
shall yet see the female complement of our great men
only, it cannot be obtained unless woman have a wider
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 107
personal sphere. Still, it is most interesting to note that,
in this nineteenth century she has demonstrated the
possibility of a future equality. What novelist, for
instance, has more conclusively made good his claim to
rank almost with the highest, than George Eliot ? How
many of our artists have excelled Rosa Bonheur in her
own special gifts ? What writer has exhibited a greater
breadth of imagination and power than Georges Sand ?
Lastly, where is the poetry which can be considered
superior to Mrs. Browning's? In poetry, fiction, and
art, at any rate, man has little supremacy to boast of for
the last forty or fifty years. We do not mean that his
genius may not have overtopped, in individual cases, that
of woman, but the difference has not be,en so perceptible
as in past ages. Woman is now more abreast of man. Her
altitude is no longer, when compared with him, that of
Mont Blanc beside Chimborazo. It is more than probable
that we shall never behold a female Homer, Plato, or
Shakspeare ; but anything short of these woman may, and
most probably will, become. Her passion is as deep, if
her ambition be not so great, as man's. As her sympathies
widen and she bears more of that burden of the world,
experience which, in its greatest depths and most
extended scope, has hitherto largely pertained to man
she will produce work which shall be as potent and
io8 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
beautiful as his, and possess the same inherent powers
of immortality.
Meanwhile, let us be just to what she has already
accomplished. A dispassionate examination of the
poems of Elizabeth Barrett Browning can, we maintain,
only lead to this result that she is the equal of any poet
of our time in genius. In particular qualities she may
appear inferior to some who could be cited, and whose
names will irresistibly suggest themselves ; but in others
she is as indubitably their superior ; and, until we can
decide who is greater, Byron or Wordsworth, Shelley or
Coleridge, Homer or Shakspeare, we care not to assign
her precise position. One thing is certain, however, her
immortality is assured she stands already crowned. As
long as one human heart throbs for another she will be
held in high esteem. Her poetry is that which refines,
chastens, and elevates. We could think that with herself,
as with one of her characters, * some grand blind Love
came down, and groped her out, and clasped her with a
kiss ; she learnt God that way.' And who were her
teachers ? Can we ask that of one who said, ' Earth's
crammed with heaven, and every common bu?h afire with
God ' ? The emerald beauty of a thousand valleys,
embroidered by the silver threads of meandering rivers ;
the grandeur of the everlasting hills with their lofty and
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. 109
majestic calm ; the terrible rolling of the restless and
unsatisfied sea ; the stars that at midnight shine, looking
down upon us like the eyes of those we love ; above all,
the whisper of God as it thrills through the human heart
these were her informers and teachers, the sources of
her eminent inspiration. She sang of all these that men
might be nobler, freer, and purer. Her apotheosis
follows of Divine right with that of all the leaders of
mankind : God endowed her, and we exalt her.
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK
[FORTNIGHTLY REVIEW]
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK.
ONE trembles to think what the world would have be-
come without its literary scourges. The soft irony of
Montaigne, the withering gaze of Voltaire, the lightning
flash of Swift, have now and again made it ashamed of
its meanness and its vanity, and have discovered the
pigmy concealed beneath the folds of the giant. There
is no power touching whose exercise the whole of man-
kind is so sensitive as that of ridicule. Man always has
objected, and always will object, to being called a fool:
how much greater, then, must his horror be at having the
fact demonstrated. Agreeing with the critic in his con-
demnation of the aphorism attributed to Shaftesbury,
that ' ridicule is the test of truth,' we must still hold that
it divides power almost equally with all other correctives
of the public taste and morals. Wit dissects and de-
stroys, but it has no creative force, is almost devoid of
enthusiasm, and is no respecter of dignities and persons.
There is much truth, however, which can in nowise come
i
114 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
within its scope ; hence it is a fallacy to call it the test of
truth. It is rather the discoverer of error. There is
something in the mental constitution of the satirist which
prevents him from taking an optimist view of things.
He is all the more useful on that account. The negative
gifts of the satirist, while not lifting him to an equality
with the being who originates, still entitle him to a high
place in the world's regard. It should be borne in mind,
too, that though it will be generally found he lacks en-
thusiasm, yet he possesses a sensitiveness as real, while
differing in quality, as that of the artist and the poet.
Thomas Love Peacock had every opportunity for
becoming the calm, contemplative cynic. His life was
long but uneventful. His fourscore years did not em-
brace ten events to be remembered even in an ordinary
life. He was born at Weymouth in 1785, and when a
little over thirty years of age, obtained a post in a public
office, as many others have done who afterwards enriched
the national literature by their works. Peacock entered
the East India House in 1818, and was Examiner, of
India correspondence from the death of James Mill in
1836 until March 1856, when he retired on a pension.
He died January 23, 1866. He was a friend of Charles
Lamb and of Shelley, for the latter of whom he acted as
executor, and his wrongs doubtless made him still more
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK. n 5
sympathetic and friendly. His hatred of oppression in
every guise is to be gathered in his novels, which breathe
of liberty of thought, speech, and action. There were
few, if any, riper scholars in his time. He was dis-
tinguished especially for his love of the Greek, Latin, and
Italian classics, in editions of which his library was extra-
ordinarily rich. It is not a little singular to find one
whose tastes were those of the recluse taking up in his
writings the burning questions of the day and mingling
in the fray of politics. His observation, however, was
most extensive ; like his learning, it seemed to embrace
all matters and topics which came to the surface of public
life. In his own political views he must have been
ardently progressive Liberal in the highest sense of the
word, and to the backbone. He would be as opposed
to a Whig job as to a Conservative monopoly. The
deep-rooted conviction he had of the rights of man, the
individual, caused him to loathe injustice in whatever
quarter it was perceived. It is impossible to read his
works and not to admire his denunciations of the base,
and his scorn of the petty, sins which are sometimes
hugged so closely. He had many pagan qualities, and
among them a pagan kind of rectitude.
As to his humour, it is exclusively his own; one never
I 2
ii6 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
meets with its precise flavour either before or after him.
Mingled sometimes with a dash of effrontery, it is very
searching, attaining its end by a kind of intellectual
travesty. To the quack and the mountebank he is a
most dangerous person, wielding a power of castigation
that is amazing. To his honour, however, it can be said
that throughout his whole works there is no demonstra-
tion of personal feeling. Considering his endowment and
the great temptation to wield the lash which invariably
accompanies it, his self-repression was very great. Prin-
ciples, not men, were the objects of his satire, and if
occasionally individuals recoiled from the smart, it only
showed how true had been his perceptions of character.
Some humourists gently play with their subjects and tease
them as a cat does a mouse; others knock them down
with a bludgeon ; whilst others again make them despise
themselves by inverting their natures, and showing them
their vanity, hollowness, and pretence. Peacock adopted
the last method with all the human excrescences he
dealt with. To rebuke incapacity in attempting to deal
with things too high for it, and to tear the glazed mask
from the hollow cheek of pretence, were the objects to
which he devoted himself. His success in doing this
warrants some reference to the means by which he ac-
complished it, and justifies us in attempting to recover
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK. 117
his name from the comparative indifference in which it
has too long lain.
The chronological order in which his works were
issued will not be strictly adhered to in the comments it
may be necessary to make upon them; in fact there
seems to be some doubt as to their order, if not of issue
at least of composition. Undoubtedly, however, the
public has been right in this instance in its association of
his most widely-known novel with the name of the author
as being intrinsically equal, if not superior, to any of the
rest. Other works may have their own special charm,
but that which is richest in the exhibition of the most
prominent gift of the author is ' Headlong Hall.' Before
the publication of this work there had been no writer
who so boldly flung himself into the arena against con-
temporary humbugs. It is infinitely refreshing to read
his straightforward, scathing denunciations, as well as his
insinuating facetiousness and inuendo, He seems to
revel in a tilt against all that the world praises as proper
and respectable. An intellectual and material epicurean-
ism pervades his pages, and when the rollicking wit
ceases to flow it is only to give time for the passing of
the bottle. We not only get ' the feast of reason and
flow of soul,' but an unswerving devotion to those
creature comforts in which the clergy first in good
n8 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
works have ever been our leaders. Mr. Headlong, the
representative of the ancient Welsh family of the Head-
longs, claiming superior antiquity to Cadwallader, con-
tracts a strange taste for a Welsh squire the taste for
books. He next desires to pass for a philosopher and a
man of taste, and comes up to Oxford to enquire for
other men of taste and philosophers ; but ' being assured
by a learned professor that there were no such things in
the University,' he proceeds to London, where he makes as
extensive an acquaintance with philosophers and dilettanti
as his ambition could desire. Several of these he invites
to Headlong Hall, and the staple of the volume is com-
posed of their doings and their discussions. The four
leading personages who sustain the brunt of the battle
are Mr. Foster, the perfectibilian, who takes the bright
view of everything ; Mr. Escot, the deteriorationist, who
takes the dark view of everything ; Mr. Jenkison, the
statu-quo-ite, who has arguments to advance on both
sides, but is nearly always in favour of allowing things to
remain as they are ; and the Rev. Dr. Gaster, a worthy
divine who can deliver a learned dissertation on the art
of stuffing a turkey, and to whom the consumption of a
bottle of port is a very slight matter. It is amusing to
note how the various class of thinkers are trotted out one
after another on their respective hobbies, and how im-
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK. 119
partial the author is in dividing his favours amongst
them. Nor is it a little singular that all the specimens of
the clergy whom Peacock has drawn are of one type ;
they are all jolly men of the world. About fifty or sixty
years ago, the time at which he wrote, the conventional
parson was very frequently of this stamp. His life was
passed between fox-hunting, card-playing, and drinking.
Since then the muscular Christian and other excellent
men have arisen. But there have also sprung up with
them men almost of a more mischievous type than the
old fox-hunter. There are too many pitiful shepherds
left who, in quiet, out-of-the-way villages make the life of
the poor a burden to them. These continually enlarge
on the duty of the labourers to keep their proper stations,
and to revere the clergy and the squirearchy the former
of whom are to provide for them their opinions and their
spiritual food, the latter their temporal comforts. Many
of the later clergy are in the eyes of sensible men little
less contemptible than the old ; the venue of our con-
tempt has been changed, that is all. But there is the
same difficulty existing now that there was in Peacock's
time, and indeed has been in all ages, the difficulty of
persuading the clergy to take one step towards reform in
any direction, till nearly all other classes have taken ten.
Progress, to them, has generally meant the destruction of
120 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
their cherished rights. The Rev. Dr. Gaster cared little
about questions which caused the thoughtful intellects of
his day great concern, but in tossing off a bumper of
Burgundy he was equal to the best. Occasionally he
had a forcible way with him, and said smart things, but
he did not profess to be so proficient in knowledge as
Mr. Panscope, ' the chemical, botanical, geological, astro-
nomical, mathematical, metaphysical, meteorological,
anatomical, physiological, galvanistical, musical, pictorial,
bibliographical, critical philosopher, who had run through
the whole circle of the sciences, and understood them all
equally well.' The author gives us the portraits of four
critics, Mr. Gall, Mr. Treacle, Mr. Nightshade, and Mr.
Mac Laurel, with accurate descriptions of their various
modes of criticism the criticism seeming at that period
to be about as deficient in vis as it generally is now; but
the happiest passages in the book are those devoted to
the speculations of the various philosophers. Two
schools of thought are presented to us in the following
few sentences:
' " I conceive," said Mr. Foster, " that men are virtuous in
proportion as they are enlightened ; and that, as every gene-
ration increases in knowledge, it also increases in virtue."
" I wish it were so," said Mr. Escot, " but to me the very re-
verse appears to be the fact. The progress of knowledge is
not general : it is confined to a chosen few of every age.
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK. 121
How far these are better than their neighbours, we may
examine by-and-by. . . . Give me the wild man of the
woods : the original, unthinking, unscientific, unlogical
savage : in him there is at least some good ; but, in a
civilised, sophisticated, cold-blooded, mechanical, calculating
slave of Mammon and the world, there is none absolutely
none. Sir, if I fall into a river, an unsophisticated man will
jump in and bring me out ; but a philosopher will look on
with the utmost calmness, and consider me in the light of a
projectile, and making a calculation of the degree of force
with which I have impinged the surface, the resistance of
the fluid, the velocity of the current, and the depth of the
water in that particular place, he will ascertain with the
greatest nicety in what part of the mud at the bottom I may
probably be found, at any given distance of time from the
moment of my first immersion ! " '
All which is rather hard both on the drowning man and
the philosopher. The plot of this novel, if novel it can
be called, is very subsidiary to the other purposes of the
author, and has nothing whatever in it of a striking sort ;
but there are scattered here and there through its pages
fine descriptions of Welsh scenery, which seems to have
possessed a peculiar charm for Peacock. His real
strength, nevertheless, lies in another direction a readi-
ness to grasp instantaneously the views and characters of
men, and a singular faculty of reproducing them in
dialogue. The entire work, ' Headlong Hall/ is a series
of portraits painted by means of opinions, some of them
122 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
carefully executed and filled in, others drawn in a few
rough but unmistakable touches. We have Miss Philo-
mela Poppyseed, the compounder of novels ; Mr. Chro-
matic; Sir Patrick Prism; Mr. Cranium; Miss Tenorina;
Lord Littlebrain, &c., whose idiosyncrasies are mostly
betrayed by their names. The author also exhibits a
remarkable power of assimilation from other writers, being
able to enforce his points with the most apposite quota-
tions from all sources, in all classes and all ages.
In * Nightmare Abbey/ another remarkable work, we
get the same brilliancy, and again meet with characters
whom we have recognised in the world. There is Mr.
Scythrop Glowry, heir to the owner of the Abbey, who
becomes ' troubled with the passion for reforming the
world/ and meditates on the practicability of reviving a
confederation of regenerators. He publishes a book on
the subject, of which only seven copies are sold ; but
that does not deter him. He proposes to his beautiful
lady-love, Miss Marionetta O'Carroll, that they should
each open a vein in the other's arm, mix their blood in a
bowl, and drink it as a sacrament of love and, in fact,
plays transcendental madman to the top of his bent.
Then we have Mr. Toobad, who prophesies that 'the
devil has come among mankind, having great wrath ; '
the Hon. Mr. Listless, with shattered nerves and a system
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK. 123
incapable of exertion ; Mr. Flosky, who considers modern
literature is a north-east wind ' a blight of the human
soul.' In the mouth of one of the characters two sen-
tences are put which are a deeper, truer comment upon
the French character than whole volumes which have
been written since. ' A Frenchman,' he says, ' is born
in harness, ready saddled, bitted, and bridled, for any
tyrant to ride. He will fawn under his rider one
moment, and throw him and kick him to death the next ;
but another adventurer springs on his back, and by dint
of whip and spur, on he goes as before.' An epitome of
the history of France since the Revolution of 1789. The
following comparison between our own * enlightened '
age and the past, delivered by Mr. Toobad, has in it
many points which might well give us pause :
' Forsooth, this is the enlightened age. Marry, how !
Did our ancestors go peeping about with dark lanterns, and
do we walk at our ease in broad sunshine ? What do we
see by it which our ancestors saw not, and which, at the
same time, is worth seeing? We see a hundred men
hanged, where they saw one. We see five hundred trans-
ported, where they saw one. We see five thousand in the
workhouse, where they saw one. We see scores of Bible
Societies, where they saw none. We see paper, where they
saw gold. We see men in stays, where they saw men in
armour. We see painted faces, where they saw healthy
ones. We see children perishing in manufactories, where
124 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
they saw them flourishing in the fields. We see prisons,
where they saw castles. We see masters, where they saw
representatives. In short, they saw true men, where we see
false knaves. They saw Milton, and we see Mr. Sackbut.'
It is impossible even to enumerate here the vast
variety of subjects which the writer touches upon. His
range is almost unlimited ; in every page there is either
an old superstition exploded or a new philosophy criti-
cised. The portraits of Shelley and Coleridge will easily
be recognised in ' Nightmare Abbey/ for in spite of
gross caricature there is also a striking amount of
vraisemblance.
In ' Crotchet Castle ' the author still writes with the
pen of wormwood and ink of gall. The motto suffi-
ciently indicates in the outset what a pungency of wit
may be expected ' Le monde est plein de fous, et qui
n'en veut pas voir, doit se tenir tout seul, et casser son
miroir.' The complacency of many people is effectually
destroyed by the way the author himself breaks the
mirrors in which they have been wont to survey their
own perfections. Possibly there may be those who
think that in this work he has overstepped the just
bounds of ridicule, and endeavoured to bring into con-
tempt persons who are really useful to their generation.
This is the conclusion to which a merely surface-reading
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK. 125
of his books would lead, and probably many would rise
from their perusal with an impression as unjust to the
writer as could well be. Because Peacock ruthlessly
condemns the pretenders of science, it is not to be sup-
posed, and will not be by the really candid judge, that
he has no sympathy with its true and earnest devotees.
A Newton would receive his homage equally with an
^Eschylus or a Homer. He only wishes to prick the
windbag ; to show upon what a very little a reputation
which the world chooses to honour is sometimes built.
It is the bubble which he desires to burst the unsound-
ness in our social and political economics he endeavours
to expose. Probably there was no one who would have
felt it more deeply than he, if he had imagined that what
he was writing would be turned from its purpose, either
wilfully or ignorantly, and the writer made to appear an
enemy of truth. It is hard, at times, to get rid of the
idea that he is laughing at all the rest of the world, which,
in any, is the surest test of folly, for the mighty wisdom
of the cachinnatory great one himself is only a river into
which the lesser streams of wisdom in others have flowed.
There is no human being who can afford to laugh at and
despise the whole race, simply because there is no human
being who is not indebted to it. But we absolve our
author at once from any. such charge as this. Having
126 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
comprehended in some degree the stand-points from
which he has shot his arrows, we are bound to confess,
not only that his aim is true, but that he has never chosen
his subjects thoughtlessly or unjustifiably. Adam Smith
lived long before him, and his principles were well esta-
blished in the public mind, and acknowledged to be in
many respects unassailable. It is not to be imagined for
a moment that either he or his true followers were
satirised in the person of the Scotch political economist
who figures in these pages. Yet, strange to say, there
have been critics who have credited him with some such
aims, and have employed their acumen in discovering
how he has transfixed this and that personage who has
hitherto been held as an authority in the branch of
literature or science to which he has devoted himself.
Nothing could be more fallacious. Peacock was a man
who was thoroughly abreast with the intellectual progress
of his time ; he was deeply interested in it, and capable
of sympathising to the full with all those men whose
solid attainments and brilliant talents have been of ser-
vice to humanity. His satire wants looking at as he
wished it to be viewed, and it will be seen clearly of
what immense value is the winnowing implement of his
ridicule. The principal character in ' Crotchet Castle '
is Mr. Mac Quedy, the Scotch political economist afore-
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK. 127
said, or Mac Q. E. D., the son of a demonstration and
certainly the way in which he is dealt with allows of no
misunderstanding. Then we have the transcendental
schools criticised in the person of Mr. Skionar, with
more of the broad farce in his delineation than is con-
spicuous in the economist, the subject affording better
scope for it. Mr. Chainmail is an antiquary, devoted to
singing the glories of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries,
whilst Mr. Crotchet, the proprietor of the Castle, is one
who has made his money in the City with neither more
nor less conscientiousness than thousands who are now
continually occupied on 'Change in the same operation.
Perhaps the best character in the book for life-like
vigour and reality is the Rev. Dr. Folliott, the exceed-
ingly vigorous Christian, who batters down the theories
of Messrs. Mac Quedy and Skionar with the force of a
sledge-hammer, and who is not unlike, in his style of
conversation, the great Johnson. When asked if he sets
no value upon ' the right principles of rent, profit, wages,
and currency,' he answers : ' Sir, my principles in these
things are to take as much as I can get, and to pay no
more than I can help. These are every man's principles,
whether they be the right principles or no. There, sir,
is political economy in a nutshell. 7 The Doctor is
wrong ; these are not every man's principles, but they
128 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
are very largely every man's practice which, notwith-
standing, amounts to very nearly the same thing. We
should fail in giving an idea of the piquancy of the
various conversations in which the several characters
take part. Peacock has written no work where the
dialogue is more brilliant. From the chapter on theories
we extract only a few sentences, which may serve to
indicate his general style :
' Mr. Crotchet ', Jun. There is one point in which philo-
sophers of all classes seem to be agreed ; that they only
want money to regenerate the world.
1 Mr. Mac Quedy. No doubt of it. Nothing is so easy as
to lay down the rules of perfect society. There wants
nothing but money to set it going. I will explain myself
fully and clearly by reading a paper (producing a large
scroll}. In the infancy of society
The Rev. Dr. Folliott. Pray, Mr. Mac Ouedy, how is it
that all gentlemen of your nation begin everything they
write with ' the infancy of society ' ?
' Mr. Mac Quedy. Eh, sir, it is the simplest way to begin
at the beginning. In the infancy of society, when Govern-
ment was invented to save a percentage ; say two and a half
per cent.
1 The Rev. Dr. Folliott I will not say any such thing.
' Mr Mac Quedy. Well, say any percentage you please.
' The Rev. Dr. Folliott. I will not say any percentage at
all.
' Mr. Mac Quedy. On the principle of the division of
labour
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK. 129
1 The Rev. Dr. Folliott. Government was invented to
spend a percentage.
' Mr. Mac Quedy. To save a percentage.
' The Rev. Dr. Folliott. No, sir, to spend a percentage :
and a good deal more than two and a half per cent. Two
hundred and fifty per cent. That is intelligible.
' Mr. Mac Quedy. " In the infancy of society "
* Mr. Toogood. Never mind the infancy of society. The
question is of society in its maturity. Here is what it should
be (producing a paper]. I have laid it down in a diagram.
' Mr. Skionar. Before we proceed to the question of
Government, we must discriminate the boundaries of sense,
understanding, and reason. Sense is a receptivity.
' Mr. Crotchet, Jun. We are proceeding too fast. Money
being all that is wanted to regenerate society, I will put into
the hands of this company a large sum for the purpose.
Now let us see how to dispose of it.'
Then follow as many plans for its disposal as there
are parties to the discussion. Dr. Folliott denies all Mr.
Mac Quedy's positions, and affirms that political economy
does no such thing as stand in the same relation to the
state as domestic economy does to the family. 'In the
family/ says the Doctor, in sentences which are appa-
rently a poser to the economist, ' there is a paterfamilias,
who regulates the distribution, and takes care that there
shall be no such thing in the household as one dying of
hunger, while another dies of surfeit. In the state it is
all hunger at one end, and all surfeit at the other.' But
K
1 30 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
we must leave the epicurean Doctor, with his easy jovial
manners, his shrewd sense, and also his many fallacies.
The end of it all is that Crotchet keeps the money in his
pocket, and the scheme for the regeneration of the world
falls to the ground.
Amongst other subjects which come under the lash
in this volume are the practices of Mr. Puffall, who
obtains sketches from Lady Clarinda, and recommends
them to the world as the work of a lady of quality, who
has made very free with the characters of her acquain-
tance. The novel appears as ' the most popular produc-
tion of the day/ but, as the novelist herself slily remarks
to a friend, ' the day ' is a very convenient phrase ; it
allows of three hundred and sixty- five 'most popular
productions ' in a year, and in leap year one more. The
purse-proud were always the aversion of Peacock, and
in this work he is again scathing in his invective upon
the greedy appetite for wealth, and the unscrupulousness
which so frequently attends its acquirement. The cha-
racter of Mr. Touch-and-go, the great banker who,
together with the contents of his till, was reported
absent one morning might do duty for many others
before and since ; he is one of the ' representative men '
forgotten by Emerson.
* Maid Marian ' is an investiture of the old story of
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK. 131
Robin Hood and Sherwood Forest with new grace and
vitality. As with all its author's works, however, it is
not destitute of a purpose, though the satire is not so ap-
parent upon the face of the story itself. The narrative
is excellently told, and we question whether there was
ever a more poetical description penned of the home of
the bold outlaw than this. It is put into the mouth of
the Friar, who, in answer to the remark of a captured
baron that he has fallen into 'fine company/ replies, ' In
the very best of company, in the high court of Nature,
and in the midst of her own nobility. Is it not so ?
This goodly grove is our palace : the oak and the beech
are its colonnade and its canopy : the sun, and the
moon, and the stars are its everlasting lamps : the grass,
and the daisy, and the primrose, and the violet are its
many-coloured floor of green, white, yellow, and blue :
the may-flower, and the woodbine, and the eglantine,
and the ivy are its decorations, its curtains, and its
tapestry : the lark, and the thrush, and the nightingale
are its unhired minstrels and musicians. Robin Hood
is king of the forest both by dignity of birth and by
virtue of his standing army : to say nothing of the free
choice of his people.' The author strikes, through the
medium of the old history, at the assumed principle in
many quarters in our own day, that Might involves Right,
K2
132 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
a matter in which there is no necessity to follow him with
a disquisition at the present moment.
A treatise might be written, with an almost number-
less catalogue of instances appended, upon authors who,
from various circumstances and considerations, have
been hurried into too rapid writing. With many minds
the mere fact of publication is a great inducement to
commit the unpardonable offence, for such it must be
regarded in the interests of the general reader. The
time came to Peacock once in his career, and at an early
stage, when the polished steel weapon was seen to be
blunted. The incisiveness which distinguishes most of
his writings is not so apparent in * Melincourt ; or, Sir
Oran Haut-ton.' Here we have less sarcasm, or rather
what we have is so largely diluted that occasionally we
doubt whether we are drawing from the same spring
which has hitherto given us such delight. The book
bears the traces of hasty composition, and altogether we
should regard it as much inferior to our author at his
best. It partakes more of the form of the ordinary
novel, but, just as much as this is the case, does it lose in
those other qualities which are generally associated with
the name of its writer. Isolated scenes and passages
may be good, but there exists a verbosity to which we
have been unaccustomed, and which we can ill brook.
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK. 133
After the feast of sparkling wines and choice viands
which he has again and again placed before us, the
palate remains comparatively unexcited and unsatiated
with this specimen of intellectual catering. The truth is
that Peacock's genius was neither of the novelistic nor
the dramatic kind, and his attempt to portray an ordinary
heroine in Anthelia Melincourt must be pronounced a
failure. Far higher success is achieved in some of the
other characters which it is easy to classify amongst the
peculiar creations of the author. Sir Telegraph Paxarett,
for instance, is a character well conceived and sustained,
with a great amount of originality in his development ;
and so is the Rev. Mr. Portpipe, whose very name is a
little idyll upon the course and character of his clerical
life. But the best of all the characters is Sir Oran Haut-
ton, and the happiest parts are those referring to political
anomalies, which are castigated con amore. There are
the boroughs of Onevote and Threevotes and Fewvotes,
with the peculiarities attendant upon each, and all
touched upon with uncommon humour. The book is
probably palling and even foolish to those who take no
pleasure in intellectual discussions and arguments, but
to the thinker who has at heart the purification of society
from all that corrupts and degrades, it will not be with-
out a special attraction. But it is writing which needs
134 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
digesting, not skimming. The assumptions of one
of the learned writers in a celebrated Quarterly are
very severely handled, the reviewer being credited with
the idea that he and those who think with him are
the only wise a fallacy by no means confined to per-
sons holding one set of opinions. We part from the
volume, nevertheless, with a decided impression of
genius veiled.
Reference has already been made to the attachment
which Peacock conceived for Welsh scenery, and another
proof of it is afforded by a later work of his, and one of
the most pleasant which has proceeded from his pen,
* The Misfortunes of Elphin.' Here we behold a vene-
rable story clothed by genius with all the reality of actual
circumstance. The result of the author's labour is per-
fectly satisfactory. The style is never involved, though
the language is now and then pedantic. The history is
fixed in the sixth century, when the nominal sovereignty
of Britain was held by Uther Pendragon. Amongst
the petty kings was Gwythno Garanhir, King of Care-
digion. This monarch was not fond of the sea, and
built a palace on the rocky banks of the Mawddach, and
also erected watchtowers which were subordinate to a
central castle commanding the sea-port of Gwythno.
In this castle dwelt Prince Seithenyn, who appears to
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK. 135
have been a sort of First Commissioner of Works to the
King. He differs in these considerable respects from
our modern First Commissioner, namely, that he drank
the profits of his office, ' and left the embankment which
was to keep out the sea to his deputies, who left it to
their assistants, who left it to itself/ Elphin, the son of
he King, informs the Commissioner to his momentary
discomfort, one day, that the embankment is rotten, and
should all be made sound, to which the latter replies :
' So I have heard some people say before, perverse
people, blind to venerable antiquity : that very unamiable
sort of people, who are in the habit of indulging their
reason. . . . There is nothing so dangerous as innova-
tion. See the waves in the equinoctial storms, dashing
and clashing, roaring and pouring, spattering and
battering, rattling and battling against it. I would not
be so presumptuous as to say I would build anything
that would stand against them half an hour ; and here
this immortal old work, which God forbid the finger of
modern mason should bring into jeopardy, this immortal
work has stood for centuries, and will stand for centuries
more, if we let it alone. It is well : it works well : let
well alone. Cupbearer, fill. It was half rotten when I
was born, and that is a conclusive reason why it should
be three parts rotten when I die.' Admirable sarcasm !
136 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
The policy of masterly inaction was very disastrous, as
of course it always is in matters social and political.
The waves beat high and effected an entrance ; the
tower fell into the surf, and the entire structure was in
danger. The inhabitants fled, whilst Seithenyn swore
that an enemy had done the deed. He leaped mto the
torrent, from which we afterwards discover he was mira-
culously saved by clinging to a barrel, whose contents had
previously cheered his inner organisation. Elphin quits
the castle, bearing with him Angharad, the lovely
daughter of Seithenyn. Then come the lamentations
of King Gwythno over his inundated lands excellent
stanzas, graphic and concentrated in expression. Thus
was the kingdom of Caredigion ruined. Prince Elphin,
who has married Angharad, is very fond of fishing, and
one day he has a miraculous draught (subsequent to a
dream on the subject), which proves to be a little child.
Its surpassing beauty causes Angharad to make the ex-
clamation, ' Taliesin ; ' ' Radiant Brow.' The found-
ling is adopted by the couple, and in after years becomes
the celebrated bard Taliesin, and marries Melanghel, the
daughter of his foster-parents. Taliesin grew up in
excellent knowledge, but the science of political economy
being then unknown, he knew nothing of ' the advan-
tage of growing rich by getting into debt and paying
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK, 137
interest.' The author further remarks, ' They had no
steam-engines, with fires as eternal as those of the nether
world, wherein the squalid many, from infancy to age,
might be turned into component portions of machinery
for the benefit of the purple-faced few. They could
neither poison the air with gas, nor the waters with its
dregs : in short, they made their money of metal, and
breathed pure air, and drank pure water like unscientific
barbarians.' In all which things there is verily much
food for reflection. The multiplication of species in a
little kingdom like England must be attended with in-
convenience and suffering to the majority. The whole-
sale system of going to the wall is inevitable : but do we
not as some compensation for using up the vital force of
the labouring class, offer them churches and chapels,
regiments of the cloth, ' intellectual ' enjoyments, and the
brilliant and splendid spectacle for their admiration of
an aristocracy which is kind enough to live on the sweat
of their brow, and in numberless cases on their absolute
degradation? Far be it from us, then, to say that we
have made no progress since the time of the Welsh bard.
But, to proceed with the story, leaving all who may
be interested in it to pursue their investigations of the
constitution of society at that happy period. Elphin
succeeds his father as king, but for certain indiscreet
138 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
boastings, as they are held, he falls into bondage to King
Maelgon, who has resolved to seize upon his wife. The
rival king attempts to take her during the absence of her
husband. But his emissaries are entrapped, and the
matter afterwards coming before the great King Arthur,
together with other vexed questions, he decides accord-
ing to his far-famed principles of equity, and an exchange
of prisoners is effected. Taliesin, who has been chiefly
instrumental in procuring this termination of affairs, is
rewarded by Elphin with his daughter's hand. We get
glimpses of Enid, Queen Gwenyvar, Sir Gawain, Sir
Tristram, and other knights and ladies familiar to the
reader of Arthurian romance ; and the volume closes
with a Grand Bardic Congress at Caer Lleon. Undoubt-
edly one of its greatest charms lies in the beauty of the
poems which are scattered through the various divisions.
They are imbued with more sublimity and tenderness
than other poems of the author which may lay claim to
be more entirely original in conception. The modern
English seems at any rate to have caught the spirit of the
old bards, if the form of expression be wanting. We
cannot reproduce here the most striking of these poems,
but the cultivated mind was rarely more forcibly ex-
hibited than in their composition.
Although travelling over a portion of the ground
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK. 139
already covered in previous novels, * Gryll Grange,' the
last work by Peacock, is one perhaps intrinsically supe-
rior to all except ' Headlong Hall.' Here he bravely
combats many abuses which we regret to say have even
yet not entirely disappeared. It may be commended to
those who would rob us of our national lands and forests,
to the poisoners of our atmosphere and our water, to the
bores in Parliament, and to the useless livers in the
world generally. Hear him on Parliament. ' The
wisdom of Parliament/ says the Rev. Dr. Opimian,
another of those clever epicurean divines of whom we
have had something already, ' is a wisdom sui generis.
It is not like any other wisdom. It is not the wisdom
of Socrates, nor the wisdom of Solomon. It is the
Wisdom of Parliament.' The excellent Doctor could
not get much farther than this in our day. But pursue
the analogy between that time and the present. ' The
Wisdom of Parliament has ordered the Science to do
something. The Wisdom does not know what nor the
Science either. But the Wisdom has empowered the
Science to spend some millions of money; and this, no
doubt, the Science will do. When the money has been
spent, it will be found that the Something has been worse
than nothing.' The term ' honourable ' is also objected
to, for ' Palestine soup is not more remote from the true
HO POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Jerusalem than many an honourable friend from public
honesty and honour.' How much golden advice is com-
pressed into the following words, the spirit lying beneath
which would save this most Christian nation from hum-
bling itself in the dust before its Creator for many cala-
mities which might have been prevented !
< Honesty would materially diminish the number of acci-
dents. High-pressure steam boilers would not scatter death
and destruction around them, if the dishonesty of avarice
did not tempt their employment where the more costly low-
pressure would ensure absolute safety. Honestly-built
houses would not come suddenly down and crush their occu-
pants. Ships, faithfully built and efficiently manned, would
not so readily strike on a lee- shore, nor go instantly to pieces
on the first touch of the ground. Honestly-made sweet-
meats would not poison children ; honestly-compounded
drugs would not poison patients. In short, the larger por-
tion of what we call accidents are crimes.'
Criticism could lend no additional force to such
language as this, or more clearly show its appropriateness
to our present year of grace. The science of panto-
pragmatics, which is described as ' a real art of talking
about an imaginary art of teaching every man his own
business/ is one that is tantalisingly gridironed, and our
system of competitive examinations was never set in a
more ridiculous light than in these pages. We have
papers which would have excluded Marlborough from
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK. 141
the army and Nelson from the navy : on other matters
hear what our author says :
* Ask the hon. member for Muckborough on what acqui-
sitions in history and mental and moral philosophy he founds
his claim of competence to make laws for the nation ? He
can only tell you that he has been chosen as the most con-
spicuous Grub among the Money-grubs of his borough to be
the representative of all that is sordid, selfish, hard-hearted,
unintellectual, and anti-patriotic, which are the distinguish-
ing qualities of the majority among them. Ask a candidate
for a clerkship what are his qualifications ? He may
answer, ' All that are requisite reading, writing, and arith-
metic.' ' Nonsense,' says the questioner ; * do you know the
number of miles in direct distance from Timbuctoo to the
top of Chimborazo ? ' ' I do not,' says the candidate. ' Then
you will not do for a clerk,' says the competitive examiner.
Does the Money-grub of Muckborough know? He does
not ; nor anything else. The clerk may be able to answer
some of the questions put to him. Money-grub could not
answer one of them. But he is very fit for a legislator.'
With which compliment to the Lower House we will
close our extracts from this trenchant book. It exhibits
Peacock at his highest, with ripened scholarship, polished
style, and a varied and profound experience.
As might be expected, the poetry of our author was
deeply impregnated with his classical spirit. The vast
weight of his learning, which he seemed to ' bear lightly
as a flower,' was exhibited in numberless erudite allusions,
142 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
whilst occasionally the foot-notes to his efforts were even
more full of a ripe scholarship than the poems themselves.
Naturally, his bent of mind led him, in his quest of sub-
jects, into the realms of romance and mythology, with
which he was in a remarkable degree familiar. One of
his most successful poems is that entitled ' Rhododaphne,
or the Thessalian Spell.' It is a poem which Coleridge
might have written. Founded on the ascription of the
power of magic to the being from whom it takes its name,
the story is worked out with eminent skill and feeling.
Anthemion, the flower of all Arcadia's youth, comes to
the festival of Love, which was celebrated in honour of
that deity every fifth year in the Temple of Love at
Thespia, a town near the foot of Mount Helicon. The
flowers he presents at the foot of the altar are suddenly
blighted. This fills him with terror. He then hears
himself addressed, and, looking up, beholds a maiden
before him with more than mortal loveliness. She gives
flowers to him, which are accepted at the altar, and so
she passes out of sight. In the second canto he is made
aware that the flower he has accepted is the fatal laurel-
rose, and he is bade to seek the stream that laves the
foot of the mountain, and there, calling on his Natal
Genius, and with averted face, he is to cast the flower
into the stream, looking not upon the running wave
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK. 143
again. By this means the magic spell now over him will
be dissolved. Immediately he has fulfilled the injunction
he hears the cry of his beloved Callirrhoe, and is not
proof against looking back ; he does so, but all becomes
still. The secret that the bright maiden who has be-
witched him is Rhododaphne is revealed in the third
canto, where she charges him with having thrown away
the flower which she gave him. He pleads its disastrous
nature ; at least so he was informed by a reverend seer,
and he is thus forcibly rebuked in lines which bear a
sting (and doubtless were intended to do so) for nine-
teenth-century sophistry.
< The world, oh youth ! deems many wise,
Who dream at noon with waking eyes,
While spectral fancy round them flings
Phantoms of unexisting things ;
Whose truth is lies, whose paths are error,
Whose gods are fiends, whose heaven is terror.'
The spell woven round Anthemion is made stronger by
the maiden's kiss, which is to be poison to all lips but
hers. He returns to his own Arcadian vale and meets
his destined bride. She flies to meet him, her eyes
imparting and reflecting pleasure, for, as the author
beautifully expresses it,
144 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
1 This is love's terrestrial treasure,
That in participation lives,
And evermore, the more it gives,
Itself abounds in fuller measure.'
But Anthemion's embrace proves, as predicted, the death
of Callirrhoe, and maddened with despair the lover flies
from the scene. Succeeding cantos are devoted to his
wanderings, and to his meeting again with the magic
maid of Thessaly. At length, for her impious spells,
Rhododaphne is slain by the arrow of Uranian Love,
and the marble palace in which she has been reclining
with Anthemion is riven asunder. By her death the spell
is removed from the latter, and once more he finds him-
self in his native vale, where he meets the risen Callirrhoe,
and the happy pair raise a marble tomb to the dead
Rhododaphne.
Such is the outline of this poem, which has many
poetic graces : it is not, however, impassioned, as lofty
poetry should be, and therefore very high rank cannot be
conceded to it. It contrasts favourably, nevertheless,
with many modern attempts to render into verse ancient
stories which would seem of themselves to suggest the
loftiest inspiration. The poetry of Peacock is neither
the poetry of sentimental namby-pambyism nor of burn-
ing passion. If he does not glow with the fire of Shelley,
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK. 145
he does not pall with the sickly maunderings of later
nerveless versifiers, whose genius has had some difficulty
in crawling through its long-clothes. While our author's
verse is liquid and musical, it is never weak and faltering.
He is able to endow his creations with some amount of
life-breathing power. It can scarcely be said that he was
happier in his poetry than his prose ; rather, indeed,
must the reverse be admitted. His intellectual and
dissecting strength was greater than his emotional. He
knew, probably, that the general reader would take no
delight in his verse ; but that mattered little to him ; he
could give him none other consequently all his work in
this direction betrays rather the thinking than the feeling
man. In only one of his volumes of verse has he dealt
after the manner of versifiers generally. The effort was
not successful. It was his first attempt in a more popular
style and scope, which style he seems afterwards to
have abandoned. The truth is that on ordinary topics
he had nothing extraordinary to say. It was when he
came to re-illume dead torches that his genius shone to
advantage. One poem in the work to which we are
referring, ' Palmyra. ' and which gives its name to the
volume is, however, in spite of what we have said,
a splendid ode upon the destruction of the magni-
ficent Oriental city. The last stanza, an adjuration to
L
146 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
bow to the will of the Deity, is finely expressed. It
reminds one forcibly of Campbell's 'Ode to the Last
Man : '
* Bow thou to Him, for He is good,
And loves the works His hands have made ;
In earth, in air, in fire, in flood,
His parent bounty shines displayed.
Bow then to Him, for He is just,
Though mortals scan His ways in vain ;
Repine not, children of the dust !
For He in mercy sends ye pain.
Bow then to Him, for He is great,
And was, ere Nature, Time, and Fate
Began their mystic flight ;
And still shall be when consummating flame
Shall plunge this universal frame
In everlasting night.
Bow then to Him, the Lord of All,
Whose nod bids empires rise and fall,
Earth, heaven, and nature's Sire !
To Him, who, matchless and alone,
Has fix'd in boundless space his throne,
Unchang'd, unchanging still, while worlds and suns expire ! '
Most of the other poems in this volume are very
inferior, and produce the impression that the writer, after
having communed with the gods, has descended to the
language of the mannikins. A poem of a more ambitious
description, entitled 'The Genius of the Thames/ besides
exhibiting a considerable infusion of the lyrical spirit,
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK. 147
breathes also of the patriotic. The pre-eminence of the
noble river is demonstrated in many smooth, flowing
lines, and the opportunity is seized to recapitulate all the
old traditions in connection with it. The beliefs in
tutelary genii are dwelt upon, and the contemplative
mind of the author has free scope for exercise. Silvery,
however, as the lines are, and beautiful frequently as are
the thoughts which give substance to them, it is not a
work likely to enhance the author's reputation in any
considerable degree. It bears traces of the study of
poets of the close of last century, not the best models,
one would think, for an author just opening on his
career. The eye of the poet for natural scenery is just
and true. Perhaps it is not sufficiently fresh. The
student has stepped from his books into the open air,
and his impressions are scholastic and polished. Legends
of the Thames valley are touched with some amount of
force, and the comparisons drawn between the state of
Britain and the old monarchies, Babylonish and others,
are vigorous and interesting. Altogether, it is just such
work as to tempt a man to perform who had a high taste
for poetic art, but it is not by any means a fair test or
gauge of his powers.
The same observations would very nearly apply to
'The Philosophy of Melancholy,' a poem marked by
L 2
148 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
graceful fancy and many touches of true poetic feeling,
but lacking in the higher imaginative power. It is im-
possible to peruse it with anything but high pleasure, yet
the judgment is tempered when we think what such
masters of the art as Milton would have made of the
same subject A pensive attractiveness doubtless
attached to these themes in the mind of the poet, but his
capability of utterance was by no means commensurate
with the fertility of his ideas.
Susceptibility, then, or that extreme sensibility which
permeates every avenue of the true poet's being, was
deficient in Peacock, and in consequence he came short
of the standard. We know the real singer when we meet
with him. He is not one who is compelled to ransack
the stores of recondite lore before he gives us the treasure
we need. He is a man whose heart is turned out
towards humanity and, whether the king on the throne
or the beggar in the street be his theme, he is able to
invest it with undying interest. He is a mirror upon
which are reflected all the complex passions of human
nature. He reads the secrets of humanity and of Nature
as one would read the pages of a book, without faltering,
and with a clear apprehension of their meaning and
import. There is no need for him to go back into past
ages to discover subjects for his muse : the records of
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK. 149
the very lives by which he is surrounded furnish him with
material as tragic as the death of Caesar. The gloom and
the glory of his own time strike as deeply into his soul as
do those of any past age. The great poet of every period
has always been the man who was able to interpret the
human life which encompassed him, and to paint it as he
beheld it. Realities are what he achieves, and these are
always recognised, transcending a thousand failures in
attempting to revivify the beings of antiquity. In the
sense, then, in which such a man as Burns, for instance,
was a poet, Peacock was none at all. Impulsiveness
was foreign to him. He had too much of the cynic and
the critic in his composition to be possessed of the divine
afflatus. His verse is ever correct and musical, not
burning and overwhelming : it is like the silvery stream
which meanders pleasantly through the meadows, and
not the roaring mountain cataract, or the tempestuous
waves which beat against the rock-bound shore.
We have left ourselves no space to speak of Peacock's
miscellaneous works, his 'Paper Money Lyrics/ his
translation of ' GF Ingannati,' a comedy performed at
Siena, in 1531, his ' Reminiscences and Correspondence
with Shelley/ &c. This is the less to be regretted, how-
ever, as these fugitive pieces are to be shortly collected,
ISO POETS AND NOVELISTS.
and republished with his more important works in a
uniform and permanent edition. 1
Sufficient ground has, we trust, been shown for turning
back to this too-long neglected author. With a chosen
few he has ever been a favourite, but to the admirers of
a vapid and invertebrate style he must necessarily remain
an abomination. To glance at the mere list of works of
fiction at the present day which seem to afford most
delight to the general reader is a disheartening operation:
it will not have been in vain if these observations on one
of the most remarkable writers of several generations
should induce, in however small a degree, a reaction.
In all those respects in which an author is of permanent
benefit to mankind the author of ' Headlong Hall ' is
worthy of occupying an eminent position. His vast
learning, his precise style, his great research, his bound-
less sarcasm, his intense abhorrence of cant, are all so
many claims upon our regard. With the ordinary
Ql
novelists he has little in common ; in most respects
he cannot be put into competition with them ; for, whilst
he has many virtues which they do not possess, he ex-
hibits few of their vices.
1 Since the above was written, as I have intimated in the Preface,
the Edition referred to has been issued.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE
{NEW QUARTERLY MAGAZINE]
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE.
AMERICAN genius is as yet in its youth. Its slumbering
forces have not had time to develop themselves. A
nation, like an individual, when first it becomes conscious
that it possesses the precious boon called life, endeavours
to gratify the selfish propensities of its existence, and
from this stage moves on gradually to the manifestation
of the higher intellectual and spiritual qualities. So
progresses the Transatlantic mind, which has not yet
culminated in the exhibition of genius of the first order,
The shrewdness of the race has already passed into a
proverb, and the world- wide reputation acquired in this
respect has latterly been almost equalled by the fame
attaching to its new school of humourists, who so singu-
larly reflect in themselves all the angularities of the
national character. In poetry, philosophy, and the
drama, however, that which has yet been accomplished
is mainly of a tentative character. The Transatlantic
Milton, Bacon, and Shakspeare have yet to be born.
Longfellow, Bryant, Whittier, Lowell, and Walt Whitman
154 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
are the only planets which burn with a noticeable degree
of brilliancy on the poetical horizon ; while of dramatists
not one has yet arisen with a clear title to the world's
regard. In philosophy, the name of Emerson at once
occurs to the mind ; but with all his excellences and in
some respects he is the most remarkable man America
has yet produced he is unable to stand alone. It is
questionable whether the world would have heard of
Emerson had it not first heard of Carlyle \ and in this
country Emerson could not have occupied that con-
spicuous position to which he can justly lay claim in his
own country. In one important pursuit only can we
cede to our Transatlantic brethren the possession of a
class of thinkers large enough to be distinctive and
that is in theology. With all their shrewdness and
great worldliness, there is a bent in the mind indubitably
theological, and the result has been the appearance of
such strong and earnest theologians as Jonathan
Edwards, Channing, and Theodore Parker names
which deserve and obtain the profoundest respect on
this side the water.
The imaginative faculty is generally the last to reach
its destined width and fulness, and nations have patiently
to await its growth for centuries. It is like the oak,
which beholds its fellow-trees of the forest grow old and
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 155
die before it attains to perfection. When it has at length
reached its full growth, it even then knows no perceptible
decay, but remains with a nation as its most permeating
and abiding influence. It is not surprising, therefore, to
find that in the literature of the imagination America
still occupies but an inferior place. She has yet to cast
her giant arms about her, to ascertain of what she is
capable, to gauge her resources, and to consolidate her
strength, before she arrives at that grand and profound
calm which is necessary for the appearance of the great
novelist and poet. As an earnest, nevertheless, of what
she will yet accomplish in this direction, we have selected
for consideration the writer whose genius is, perhaps,
universally acknowledged to be the most striking and
unique among his own countrymen, and whose works
will, without doubt, at no distant date, be cherished as
classics, just as we in England preserve men so dissimilar
as Fielding and Goldsmith.
The silentness with which genius frequently assimilates
the stores of knowledge and experience was never more
clearly exemplified than in the life of Nathaniel Haw-
thorne. The facts of his personal history are very sparse,
and those which are known are not of any special
import. He adds another example to the many, that
those men who have exercised the most permanent in-
156 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
fluence over the human race have by no means been
noisy and turbulent spirits, but just the reverse. Men of
action are the waves which break boisterously upon the
seashore : men of thought are the deep quiet under-
currents which are the veritable ocean itself. Activity
and enterprise are the fringes of time ; intellect, soul,
spirit, is Time. The world lives by the throbs of this
inner and unseen power. Yet, though it is of little con-
sequence to know what an author has done outwardly,
compared with what he has said, suffered, and felt, there
is a genuine interest attaching to the life of any who
have risen beyond the ordinary altitude, and occupied
exalted niches in the temple of Fame. That interest
finds its completest satisfaction when an author vouch-
safes to explain to us the various mental processes
through which he has passed before realising the product
which has been of so much benefit to the species. We
see, then, that not only is his work far in advance of the
average intellect, but his volitions have been deeper and
his aspirations proportionately higher. The apparent
quietude of his life has been a season of really more
rapid growth in thought and feeling than is the lot of the
ordinary mortal. The man of genius has lived cease-
lessly, not by fits and starts, and his life has been a
constant series of intellectual and spiritual surprises, each
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 157
achievement or revelation being but a landmark on that
road to perfection which he travels with unwearied feet.
When his individual experience is thus unfolded by him-
self, and the inner recesses of his spirit laid bare, the
life of the man of genius becomes a strong complemen-
tary force and element to that of his work.
On Independence Day the fourth of July, 1804 the
day which we suppose of all others would be regarded
by citizens of the United States as the most auspicious
on which to make entry into this world Nathaniel Haw-
thorne was born in the town of Salem, described as one
of the most quaint centres of life in the colony of
Massachusetts. The ancestors of the novelist were
amongst those responsible for the persecution of the
Quakers ; and one of them, Justice John Hawthorne, fre-
quently passed sentence upon witches arraigned before
him for their supposed familiarity with disembodied
spirits. The Hawthorne family declined from a state of
affluence and importance in the course of a century to
one of comparative insignificance in the social scale; and
we learn from Mr. H. A. Page's excellent memorials of
Hawthorne that his more immediate ancestors ran on for
generations in a long line of mariners and inconsiderable
merchants. Prosperity forsook them, and he who was to
shed the greatest lustre upon the name has given the fol-
158 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
lowing description of his predecessors : ' From father to
son, for above a hundred years, they followed the sea ;
a grey-headed shipmaster in each generation retiring
from the quarter-deck to the homestead, while a boy of
fourteen took the hereditary place before the mast, con-
fronting the salt spray and the gale which had blustered
against his sire and grandsire. The boy also, in due
time, passed from the forecastle to the cabin, spent a
tempestuous manhood, and returned from his world-
wanderings to grow old and die, and mingle his dust
with the natal earth.' The knowledge he gained of the
strange passages in the lives of his ancestors, coupled
with his inheritance of many of their traits, had a strong
influence on the bent of Hawthorne's mind. His own
nature was of a reflective and somewhat melancholy cast,
and its bias was probably deepened by the life he spent
with his mother after his father's death. Captain
Nathaniel Hawthorne, a bold seaman, never returned
from one of his long voyages ; and his widow, the future
novelist's mother, who appears to have been a woman of
considerable endowments, retired from the world with
her two girls and only boy, and spent the remainder of
her years in strict solitude. It is a well-ascertained fact
that a great number of men who have in every age be-
come distinguished in the world, inherited the mental
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 159
characteristics and constitution of their maternal parent,
and Hawthorne affords another example of what, by
many, is asserted to be a universal rule. We can readily
imagine the kind of influence Mrs. Hawthorne would
exercise upon her son's earlier years, with her strong
intellect ; and when it is remembered that the facts and
traditions respecting that town to which she had retired
with her family were of the most thrilling and weird de-
scription, we can almost see the mind of the son taking
its tinges of wonder, melancholy, and pathos. In Salem
was to be beheld the Witch-house, where old women had
been condemned to death by those whose piety was as
vindictive as it was severe ; and there was also to be
seen the Gallows-hill, where the hangings took place, the
restless sea moaning almost at the foot of the hill.
Besides all these reminiscences, which must have had
the strongest possible effect upon an impressionable imagi-
nation, Hawthorne, at the early age of eight, was driven
to seek much of his enjoyment in the quietude of home,
in consequence of an accident that befell him in the
cricket-field, which crippled him for some years. We
are not surprised to find that the first book he purchased
with his own money was Spenser's masterpiece, or that
his greatest favourite in all literature was ' The Pilgrim's
Progress.' The immortal ' Dreamer ' of Bedford had a
i6o POETS AND NOVELISTS.
miniature successor in the dreamer of Salem ; and there
was not a wide divergence, in some respects, in the
character of the genius of the two men. Longing for a
yet more secluded existence, Mrs. Hawthorne removed
with her family to her own property near Sebago Lake,
her son at this time being nearly eleven years of age.
Here his opening mind acquired a still more sombre
tone, though one not incompatible with the intensest
enjoyment; for speaking of this period in later years, he
recalls all its pleasures, and concludes with the reflection
that * everything is beautiful in youth, for all things are
allowed to it' This had reference to the utter freedom
from restraint which marked the life in Maine, when the
glorious pine-woods, magnificent sunsets, and absolute
solitude fed him with the true food of the poets. Three
years of close communing which he then had with
Nature were a valuable period to him, for he was able
to assimilate, undisturbed by the world, all the riches
which a seclusion in so eminently romantic a spot could
afford. At the age of sixteen (and after two years spent
in Salem at the conclusion of his residence in Maine),
Hawthorne became a scholar of Bowdoin College, where
he sufficiently distinguished himself, and had for com-
panions Longfellow, Cheever, Horatio Bridge, and
others. The closest tie of friendship he seems to have
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 161
formed, however, was with Franklin Pierce, whom he
afterwards defended from his Iraducers with that straight-
forward manliness and courage which were peculiar to
him. Graduating with honours, Hawthorne left Bowdoin
and returned to Salem in 1825, where he once more re-
sumed strict habits of retirement. But what of literary
projects meanwhile ? There are indications that he had
not been idle for several years prior to this, and an
anecdote is related of him to the effect that when he had
carefully prepared a small volume of tales for the press he
unhesitatingly burnt it, and resumed work again. How
much the world might have been saved had but other
young authors dealt thus kindly with the crude emana-
tions of their intellect ! The first work published by
Hawthorne, and issued anonymously, was never acknow-
ledged by him, though the reader is able to discover in
it certain of the like singular powers which impressed
his later work. One has remarked of this early romance,
that ' it is a dim, dreamy tale, such as a Byron-struck
youth of the time might have written, except for that
startling self-possession of style and cold analysis of
passion, rather than sympathy with it, which showe4 no
imitation, but remarkable original power.' His heart,
however, had not widened yet, to allow of its great
sympathetic capacity having full sway. The immediate
M
162 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
successors of this repudiated story were ' The Twice-told
Tales/ of which we shall speak with more fulness pre-
sently. At this juncture, it will be sufficient to observe
that two influences are distinctly traceable in them
that of the objects and the moods of nature upon a
sensitive mind, and that of a strong introspective faculty.
The criticism that would compare these stories to
BrummelPs failures we cannot understand. They are, in
fact, no failures at all ; that is, when regarded in their
proper light, and alone. An injustice is done to them
when they are compared with the riper romances from
the same hand, with which, of course, they will not bear
comparison ; but, considered by themselves, they not
only possess interest but cleverness, and a certain
amount of intuition. They have interest as indicating
the groove in which the young writer was hereafter to
acquire his fame, and they are to his ultimate produc-
tions what sketches are to completely elaborated pictures.
Hawthorne once described himself as 'the most
obscure man of letters in America,' and the definition
thanks to the slight amount of discernment possessed by
the reading public had the merit of being strictly
accurate. His first essays before the world were not suc-
cessful. Probably the total newness of his style repelled
many, who did not care to dive for what was valuable in
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 163
it, or who judged from a hasty perusal of one or two of
his sketches that a hypochondriac had arisen in litera-
ture. Some men noble writers go all through their
lives with the recognition only of a very limited circle of
admirers ; while others (of which class Hawthorne was
one) spend many years in obscurity, though they even-
tually obtain a wide celebrity. Unknown by society,
Hawthorne wrote much in a serial form, and he had a
short experience of editorship, which was as unsatis-
factory as it was brief. It appears that in 1836 he com-
menced editing the ' American Magazine of Useful
Knowledge,' published at Boston, and for which he was
to receive the not very munificent salary of six hundred
dollars per year. Conscientious and something more, he
kept on at his work, even after the proprietors became
insolvent. The magazine was supposed to be ' illustrated
in the best style,' but, as is too often the case with lavish
promises, the reality was nearer the exact opposite.
Combined with this disadvantage, Hawthorne had no
contributors to the magazine except himself, and he
wrote nearly the whole of it, filling up the interstices with
extracts, the drudgery of selecting which was also
personally performed. The issue of this could be only
one thing, resignation, and the editor took farewell of
his readers. Very few events, however, are without
M2
1 64 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
some useful or pleasant side, and Hawthorne's position
as editor had the good effect of bringing his name before
those who were likely to be of service to him. Accord-
ingly, we find that partly through his magazine connec-
tion he was able at length to get the appointment of
collector at the Custom-house at Boston. The duties
of this post he continued to discharge till 1841, when
the revolving wheel of political circumstances sent
him down, and he was again stranded without an occu-
pation.
The next passage in his life is, perhaps, of all the
most important and the most interesting. We refer to
the part which he took in an enterprise regarded as
quixotic by New York society, and which excited much
comment and animadversion. Various are the stories
which have been circulated respecting Brook Farm, the
scene destined for the exhibition, in a concrete form, of
theories which had been pretty extensively ridiculed in
the abstract. This was neither more nor less than the
establishment of a Socialist Community on the principles
of Owen and Fourier. The originators of the idea in
America were Dana, Ripley, and Pratt, though, as Mr.
Moncure Conway points out in his lucid sketch of the
movement, Emerson was largely responsible for exciting
the feeling which afterwards found expression in the
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 165
establishment of Brook Farm. With regard to the views
of the individuals who introduced this new mode of
life, they were to the following effect : * They firmly
held to the belief that the only thing needed for the
grand transformation of society was, that human beings
should be placed under new circumstances; that they
should live together on principles of commercial harmony
instead of those of competition ; and that, by a combi-
nation of material resources and labour, they should be
liberated from drudgery, and gain more leisure for the
cultivation of the intellectual and spiritual powers.'
With every sympathy for the noble aspiration which
breathes through all this, it was obvious that the time had
not arrived for the realisation of such a transcendental
project. The scheme, notwithstanding, drew together
some of the finest spirits of America, including Dwight,
W. H. Channmg, Dana, and the brothers Curtis ; whilst
the occasional visitors included Theodore Parker, Emer-
son, and Margaret Fuller. Hawthorne joined the move-
ment soon after it began ; but his residence at Brook
Farm gave rise to contradictory statements. Whether
there was ever the same intense moral inspiration at the
root of his desire to join the society which animated the
distinguished people who were its real founders, is open
to grave doubt. But, certainly, if he commenced with
1 66 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
such a feeling, he was afterwards partially disillusionised,
for we find him writing as follows in September, 1841 :
' Really, I should judge it to be twenty years since I left
Brook Farm, and I take this to be one proof that my life
there was an unnatural and unsuitable, and therefore an un-
real one. It already looks like a dream behind me. The
real Me was never an associate with the Community ; there
has been a spectral Appearance there, sounding the horn at
daybreak, and milking the cows, and hoeing potatoes, and
raking hay, toiling in the sun, and doing the honour to as-
sume my name. But the spectre was not myself. Never-
theless, it is somewhat remarkable that my hands have,
during the past summer, grown very brown and rough, inso-
much that many people persist in believing that I, after all,
was the aforesaid spectral horn-sounder, cow-milker, potato-
hoer, and hay-raker. But such people do not know a reality
from a shadow.'
This is obviously language that would not be held by
the writer towards any project for which he cherished a
deep feeling. The fact seems to be, that Hawthorne
was not permeated by such an enthusiasm, and he
doubtless joined the Community mostly with a view to
pursue the psychological studies which had so strange a
fascination for him. Here was something entirely out of
the common modes of life, brought close under his own
observation, and which he felt afforded an opportunity
for analysis that could not be passed over. As he re-
marked, ' I must observe, and think, and feel, and
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 167
content myself with catching glimpses of things which
may be wrought out hereafter.' His residence accord-
ingly, as a member of the Community, was entirely a
tentative one, he being on the outlook to see whether he
really had any call for that new and singular existence
as far as in him lay, while penetrated by the spirit of the
student of human nature rather than by that of the trans-
cendentalist. Hawthorne did his share loyally towards
making Brook Farm a success. Its founders were not
more true and staunch than he, though working from
different motives. Miss E. Peabody wrote an interesting
sketch of the movement, from which it appears that
commercial interests were by no means lost sight of. All
who took in property received stock, together with a
fixed interest thereon ; house or board was kept in
common, as the members severally desired, at the cost
of provisions purchased at wholesale or raised on the
farm. All in the Community were to labour and to be
paid at a certain rate, choosing their number of hours as
well as their kind of work. They were to pay their
board with the results of their labour, or the interest of
their stock, and to purchase whatever they might require
at cost price from the warehouses of the Community.
All labour, whether bodily or mental, was to be paid for
at the same rate of wages, and no one was to do bodily
168 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
work wholly. Intellectual improvement and social inter-
course were not to be neglected, and the Community was
also to traffic with the world at large. The members
even went so far as to offer to sell education to as many
young persons as could be domesticated in the families,
and who would enter into the common life with their
own children. If parents were too poor to pay, their
children could be educated gratuitously, on the condition
that they should work for the Community afterwards.
This programme seemed sound and liberal, and it was,
in fact, neither more or less than the ordinary conditions
of society considerably improved upon, and an air of
poetry and romance given to the whole from the fact
of the isolation of the Community from the rest of the
world. But it was not carrying out thoroughly the
principles of Robert Owen and Fourier. The Com-
munity was for a time very successful; it owned upwards
of two hundred acres of land, and at the close of two
years had accumulated thirty thousand dollars. Various
reasons are assigned for its failure, and one invidious
critic affirms that had it not been brought to an end by
other causes, 'the picnic of poets and lovely women' was
in a fair way of being broken up through female rivalries.
This statement is emphatically denied by another writer,
whose facilities for coming to a right judgment are un-
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 169
questioned, so far as the outward circumstances of the
Community were concerned. But even he has not gone
deeply enough into the matter. He affirms that the
causes of its failure were purely economical : alleging
the unsuitability of the spot for an experiment whose
basis must be necessarily agricultural. His reason is
insufficient, when we remember that for two years this
same spot had proved very fruitful and well adapted
to the end in view. Besides, it was competent for
the Community to introduce into their sphere of
labour all the mechanical improvements and appliances
which were possessed by the outer world. The apologist
for Brook Farm goes on to say that so far from its failure
being a proof of the inherent weakness of the associative
principle, he regarded the existence of the Community
for so long a time, under very unfavourable circum-
stances, as a demonstration of the great vitality there
is in the principle.. The real state of the case,
however, appears to be that the nearer the Community
approached that ideal condition desired by its most
earnest promoters, the more clearly its impending failure
became apparent. The attempted application of
Fourier's principles closely, is believed to have been the
cause of the decline of the movement. Hawthorne left
it at this time, probably foreseeing the beginning of the
1 70 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
end. Society has not yet attained to that perfection
when it can be content with a common purse ; though
we are far from alleging that the attempt to disregard
the pecuniary relations of society was the real cause
of the failure of Brook Farm. Our present concern
with the Community, however, is of a far different
nature from that of the mere anxiety to understand,
fully its fortunes and its vicissitudes. We know that
the residence of a powerful novelist there led to the
production of one of his finest works, and at the same
time one of the most remarkable and beautiful fictions
with which America has yet enriched literature. Not only
was Hawthorne repaid for his associations with Brook
Farm, but the world has been at least an equal gainer.
Hawthorne's marriage to a lady of great personal
attractions, mental and physical, to wit, Miss Sophia
Peabody, took place in 1843. If tne fervour of youth
ever leaves some men, it may be expected to have
left him at this period, for he had now arrived at the
somewhat mature age of thirty-nine. He would seem to
have been singularly free from all that care which
generally besets the youthful Benedict, regarding his
future prospects without any fear whatsoever, and not
caring to draw gloomy drafts upon the Bank of Fate.
He describes his mode of life as one of easy trust in
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 171
Providence, affected only by the varieties of the weather;
and his chief anxiety consisted in watching the progress
of his vegetables. In the retirement of his own room,
however, his brain must have been busy, for it was in the
Old Manse of Concord, where he settled after his
marriage, that there grew and gathered together those
* Mosses ' which have made the Old Manse and its
immediate vicinity one of the greenest spots on earth.
One can imagine him rambling through the orchards or
wandering by the river side in search of wild flowers, of
which he was passionately fond, and which seemed to
speak with far more natural voices to his heart than the
human voices of the busy city. But this delicious poet-
reverie could not last for ever ; however noble his
dreamings, they must come to an end. The respon-
sibilities of the condition upon which he had entered at
length made themselves felt, and he roused himself for
mental work, writing in the Old Manse many books
which satisfied the public taste. Nor was he deprived
of congenial society when he chose to enjoy it, for
within easy distance lived Emerson, Longfellow, Thoreau,
and others, who thoroughly comprehended his nature,
and with whom he could feel himself en rapport. In-
deed, when this condition could not be attained with
those into whose society he happened to be cast, Haw-
172 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
thorne was of all men the most miserable ; never exhibit-
ing his chagrin, however, because of the great gentleness
of his nature. An anecdote is related of Hawthorne by
his friend Curtis which is too admirable to be passed
over, as it affords not only a glimpse of the former's
personal appearance, but of that strange demeanour for
which he was known, and which was always respected
and understood. The occasion was an aesthetic tea
at Emerson's, during the cold winter months, with a
cheerful fire blazing upon the hearth. The narrator
proceeds :
' There were various men and women of note assembled ;
and I, who listened attentively to all the fine things that were
said, was for some time scarcely aware of a man who sat
upon the edge of the circle, a little withdrawn, his head
slightly thrown forward upon his breast, and his black eyes
clearly burning under his black brow As I drifted down
the stream of talk, this person, who sat silent as a shadow,
looked to me as Webster might have looked had he been a
poet a kind of poetic Webster. He rose and walked to the
window, and stood there quietly for a long time, watching
the dead white landscape. No appeal was made to him ;
nobody looked after him ; the conversation flowed steadily
on, as if everyone understood that his silence was to be re-
spected. It was the same thing at table. In vain the silent
man imbibed aesthetic tea. Whatever fancies it inspired did
not flower at his lips. But there was a light in his eye
which assured me nothing was lost. So supreme was his
silence, that it presently engrossed me to the exclusion of
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 173
everything else. There was very brilliant discourse ; but
this silence was much more poetic and fascinating. Fine
things were said by the philosophers : but much finer things
were implied by the dumbness of this gentleman with heavy
brows and black hair. When he presently rose and went,
Emerson, with the slow, wise smile that breaks over his
face, like day over the sky, said, " Hawthorne rides well his
horse of the night."'
Verily ! this man was after Carlyle's o\vn heart ! For
does not the Chelsea philosopher regard himself as the
Apostle of Silence, and declare that the dumbness of a
great portion of humanity would be for the infinite good of
the rest ?
From the garden of the Old Manse could be seen
the monument of a battle fought during the War of
Independence, and the occupant of the Manse has left
upon record how this fact, and the traditions associated
with the neighbourhood generally, strongly affected him.
One story was to the following effect : During the noise
of battle which agitated the district, a servant of the
clergyman who formerly occupied the Manse, ran from
his work across the intervening field to see what was
going forward. The British had retreated, and the boy,
who had a battle-axe in his hand, found two soldiers
lying upon the ground. One was a corpse, but as the
New Englander came near, the other Briton raised him-
i?4 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
self painfully upon his hands and knees and gave- a
ghastly stare into his face. 'The boy it must have
been a nervous impulse, without purpose, without
thought, and betokening a sensitive, impressible nature
rather than a hardened one the boy uplifted his axe,
and dealt the wounded soldier a fierce and fatal blow
upon the head.' Hawthorne turned over this melan-
choly incident repeatedly, following the miserable youth
by a mental process through his subsequent career, and
wondering to what depth his soul was tortured by the
blood-stain so irresistibly, but perhaps not very crimi-
nally, incurred. Many years elapsed before the story
was elaborated in the pages of the novelist, but it was
net to be expected that so graphic a detail could remain
finally neglected.
From the Old Manse, Hawthorne went to Salem,
having been appointed surveyor of the port there by
Mr. Bancroft. In less than a year after he had entered
upon his new duties, was completed the first sketch of
the most famous work by which his name is remem-
bered ; yet, strange to say, the author of * The Scarlet
Letter ' was almost indifferent to his own handiwork, and
showed no desire for its production. Fortunately, the
insight of inferior men was too keen to allow of this ex-
traordinary romance being lost. We behold in it the
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 175
greatest embodiment of remorse ever achieved. Terrible
in its gloom, the spirit of the reader asks again and
again for some relief. Even the writer of it had expe-
rienced the same feeling, but ' found it impossible to
relieve the shadow of the story with so much light as he
would gladly have thrown in.' This unmatched story
having been written, Hawthorne found himself yet once
more subjected to change. Losing his place as Custom-
house officer after three years' service, he retired to
Lenox, where his life seems to have been of a rather
more genial character than hitherto. His compositions
did not stand still either; for in addition to the 'Wonder
Book/ and 'The House of the Seven Gables/ he planned
the novel based on his experiences amongst the Commu-
nity of Brook Farm. Matters went on calmly till 1851,
when he had an attack of illness which incapacitated him
from intellectual exertion, and as the result of which he
again went to Concord to reside. Here he lived for two
years, till in 1853 he was appointed United States
Consul at Liverpool. His five years in England were
very pleasant, and many dear friends were made during
that period ; while he also found much to satisfy his
tastes in the quaint and venerable nooks and buildings
with which the old country abounds. In 1858 he quitted
England and went to reside in Italy, and one of his
1 76 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
later works well exhibits the marvellous faculty he pos-
sessed of extracting all that was best from the different
human spheres in which it was his lot to be cast. He
returned to America in 1860, and although he occasion-
ally devoted himself to literary work, the illness of
certain members of his household, coupled with various
other causes, greatly impeded his operations. Four
years more, and the end of his career was touched in the
town of Plymouth, New Hampshire. Not a little sin-
gular is it that his oft-expressed wish to die suddenly was
granted, and the exact time of his passing away was
unknown, for no spasm of pain attracted the attention of
those who were with him in his last hours.
The growth of the modern novel has been marked by
many changes and developments, but it may be said
that its psychological interest was first exhibited in a very
high degree by Hawthorne. His deep study of the soul
had scarcely been equalled before by writers of fiction.
His stories do not of course display all the gifts which
we witness in profusion in such men as Fielding and
Scott; but in their deep concentration of thought upon
the motives and the spirit of man, they stand almost
alone. Examining now these works a little more closely,
there comes first that early and disjointed collection,
entitled 'Twice-told Tales.' They possess several points
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 177
of attractiveness, first among which is that they are the
blossoms of that tree which afterwards yielded such rich
fruit. We find here in the germ those special qualities
which finally asserted themselves with great prominence.
As they severally appeared they excited little or no
interest amongst their author's countrymen ; but he has
since been amply justified for their republication. They
undoubtedly demonstrate, even in embryo, a strange
capacity for the perception and illustration of lofty spi-
ritual truths. Through the framework of the sketch is
to be seen the moving of a restless soul. Hawthorne
was always anxious to have it understood that he was
never drawing character as it had existed in real life, but
the fact seems to be unquestionable that he did discover
and use types by which he was surrounded. Whether
consciously or unconsciously it matters not, but the
result is there the characters have been reproduced,
though that was not the chief end the author had in
view. A fair description is given of these Tales by the
writer himself, when he says : ' They have the pale tint
of flowers that blossomed in too retired a shade, the
coolness of a meditative habit, which diffuses itself
through the feeling and observation of every sketch.
Instead of passion, there is sentiment ; and even in what
purport to be pictures of actual life, we have allegory,
N
178 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
not always so warmly dressed in its habiliments of flesh
and blood as to be taken into the reader's mind without
a shiver.' Those who have read the sketches will attest
the truth of these observations ; but they will scarcely be
able to agree with the succeeding remarks, that ' Whether
from lack of power, or from an unconquerable reserve,
the author's touches have often an effect of tameness :
the merriest man can hardly contrive to laugh at his
broadest humour ; the tenderest woman, one would
suppose, will hardly shed warm tears at his deepest
pathos. The book, if you would see anything in it,
requires to be read in the clear, brown twilight atmo-
sphere in which it was written ; if opened in the sunshine
it is apt to look exceedingly like a volume of blank
pages.' Hawthorne's self-depreciation and exclusive
habits of thought led him to be a little unjust here to his
readers, who are able to discover something of the moral
he would enforce in whatever mood his stories are read.
What a striking and powerful sketch is that of ' The
Minister's Black Veil/ where the subject of it is made to
go about the world shrouded, as a symbol that man is
always in a veiled condition before his God and his
fellow-man. It is founded on the original fact in con-
nection with a clergyman of New York, who had the
misfortune in youth to kill accidentally a beloved friend,
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 179
and who from that time forth kept religiously to the
resolve of hiding his face from men. One can see at a
glance how so singular a subject would commend itself
to Hawthorne, and he has absolutely made us realise the
wretched being in flesh and blood. Another sketch,
permeated, this time, with a love for humanity, and
showing how it can overcome all the prejudices of tribes
and people, is that where the Puritans take in the gentle
outcast boy, and are made to suffer for it in consequence.
Hawthorne well rebukes religious bigotry, and makes it
appear the loathsome thing it is. * A Rill from the Town
Pump ' is a well-known paper of entirely another stamp
and infused with a rich humour which is not general
amongst the sketches. We cannot but smile at the
conceit which describes the pump as the chief person of
the municipality, and also as a most admirable pattern
to its brother officers for the steady and impartial dis-
charge of its business, and the constancy with which it
stands to its post in all weathers. The search for the
1 Great Carbuncle ' has much amusement, notwith-
standing that it is open to the charge of wild extrava-
gance. This mystery of the White Mountains is an ex-
cellent illustration of the way in which Hawthorne de-
lighted to mingle facts and impossible incidents together.
N 2
i8o POETS AND NOVELISTS.
In the search for that which will never be discovered
he starts persons whom he has himself met, and all the
differing specimens of humanity which are found in the
tale were seen in actual life by the writer. His alle-
gorical genius is well displayed, for the reader is irre-
sistibly forced to arrive at the conclusion that he is
endeavouring to depict as a second and hidden purpose
the search of mankind after the perfect good which is
still in existence somewhere, but whose secret has not
yet been attained by man. In a slight sketch, headed
' The Prophetic Pictures/ the author asks, ' Could the
result of one or of all our deeds be shadowed forth or
set before us, some would call it Fate, and hurry onward,
others be swept along by their passionate desires, and
none be turned aside by the prophetic pictures.' So
intent is man upon attaining the object of his pursuit.
We cannot linger long over this repertory of interesting,
and in numbers of cases, thrilling stories all bearing
upon them a warranty of good. Some of them are weird,
like l The Snow Image,' some beautiful, and some tragic.
So far from being without a purpose, all seem to bristle
with lessons. We can say of each page that ' thoughts
and fancies gleam forth upon it, like stars at twilight, or
like violets in May ; ' but unlike those fading objects in
nature, the light and the bloom remain.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 181
Contrary, perhaps, to the general verdict, we are
almost impelled to the conclusion that the most perfect
work left by Hawthorne is the * Blithedale Romance/
This is the novel already alluded to as being founded
upon his experiences at Brook Farm, and while it does
not exhibit such a centralisation of passion in the indi-
vidual as is the case with the ' Scarlet Letter,' it manifests
qualities which are absent in the latter. Its thought and
language are superior, and as regards composition alone,
it may be pronounced a perfect work. The masterpiece
of Oliver Goldsmith is brought to mind whilst reading it,
though the two novels differ in most aspects as widely
as possible. In each, however, there is a charming
style, whose easy flow has never been excelled, while in
Hawthorne's story there is a poetic beauty which is
not to be found in the ' Vicar of Wakefield.' The draw-
ing of characters is also very satisfactory. The dramatis
personcB are few in number, but all are realised with
extraordinary vividness. In Miles Coverdale is beheld
the novelist himself, and Hawthorne's peculiarities are
touched off with a free and unbiassed hand. There is
the same half shy, retiring demeanour which charac-
terised the original, and which prevented Coverdale from
being that hearty member of the Community which his
friends desired. Hollingsworth is an individual of great
i8z POETS AND NOVELISTS.
power, and yet we are divided in mind as to whether he
most attracts or repels us. Full justice is, however,
done to his remarkable force of character, which stirred
in Zenobia so profound an admiration and love for him.
The gentle Priscilla, fragile and beautiful as a daisy,
adds to the charms of the society at Blithedale ; a per-
fect contrast, in her quietude and simplicity, to Zenobia
herself, who brings to mind the famous queen of old
whose name she bore. The novelist has thrown a tinge
of the deepest poetry, sad, and yet enthralling, round his
whole narrative. Where would have been its power had
he only given us but a dry record of the daily life at
Brook Farm? He keeps himself judicially aloof from
expressing an opinion upon those principles for whose
practical working the Community was instituted, and
simply goes thence because something is to be gained,
he imagines, by travelling out of the beaten track of the
novelist. He asserts, moreover, that his characters are
entirely fictitious, but the world generally will only
regard them so in the same light that it regards a very
faithful portrait the fictitious representation of the real
man. Identification is clear and palpable with several
of the leading individuals in the story, and his sister-in-
law has admitted the fact that his creations have not
entirely sprung from the imagination. But this fact is
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 183
one of little moment in connection with the story. It is
given to us in what form we care not to be a delight
to every succeeding generation. After the poetic halo
which envelops it, we notice the philosophy of the
romance, which gleams out in detached sentences preg-
nant with deep allusion or ripe wisdom. How truly
the author is led on to speak of the better life in man,
in connection with the project which forms the basis of
his narrative ! ' The greatest obstacle to being heroic,'
he says, ' is the doubt whether one may not be going to
prove one's self a fool ; the truest heroism is to resist the
doubt; and the profoundest wisdom, to know when it
ought to be resisted, and when to be obeyed.' Never
can it be said that Hawthorne casts a shadow over en-
thusiasm. Often, doubtless, in his own mind he had
asked the question which has puzzled most thinking men
at some period of their lives, cut bono ? but on no occa-
sion does he pour contempt either upon the ardour of
youth, or upon those deep feelings and aspirations which
survive youth, as in Hollingsworth's case, but which
have not the remotest chance of attaining their ends.
His own eye is too clear in gauging the impossible
barriers which intervene between human desire and per-
fect fruition ; and to this, we could almost believe, is to
be attributed the sadness which pervades all that he has
1 84 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
done. Come whatever else may, he must at any rate
be true to his genius ; and here lies partially the secret
why he laboured for so many years before he obtained
the popular ear. He had only the truth to tell, and it is
so difficult for that, at any time, to make way, unless
assisted by many brilliant and striking flashes of false-
hood. To Zenobia, that magnificent creature, from
whom came an influence ' such as we might suppose to
come from Eve when she was just made,' he awards the
most miserable lot of all. With so great a capacity for
reverencing all that is grand and noble in man, she sees
the love of Hollingsworth who meets every requirement
of her great and ardent nature poured upon the little
maiden who trembles in her glance, and who appears
no more than a drop of rain sparkling in the sun. What
can she do when she fails of attainment ? Even the
great purposes for which she joined the Community pale
into insignificance compared with the intensity of her
unrequited passion. She misses that union for which
Nature evidently destined her, and without which she
cannot live and breathe. All the paraphernalia of phi-
lanthropy fade away into nothingness ; she discovers that
life, after all, cannot be transformed into a common-
wealth ; it is made up of the union of two, and not of a
hundred ; her soul yearns for that portion of itself with-
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 185
out which she cannot be happy. Despair seizes upon
her spirit, and the tragedy of existence is completed by
that plunge into the dark waters which alone can bring
oblivion to her woes. The whole story is mournful and
thrilling to the last degree, and we know not whom
to pity most, the beautiful woman who so miserably
perishes, or the man Hollingsworth who so miserably
survives. In the latter, Hawthorne says he sees ' an
exemplification of the most awful truth in Bunyan's book
of such from the very gate of heaven there is a byeway
to the pit ! ' Rarely does the novelist moralise in his
stories, but he is perforce compelled to do this when
brought face to face with the final wrack and ruin which
overtakes Blithedale and its little company. ' The moral
which presents itself to my reflections ' (the author is
speaking) ' as drawn from Hollingsworth's character and
errors, is simply this that, admitting what is called
philanthropy, when adopted as a profession, to be often
useful by its energetic impulse to society at large, it is
perilous to the individual whose ruling passion, in one
exclusive channel, it thus becomes. It ruins, or is fear-
fully apt to ruin, the heart, the rich juices of which God
never meant should be pressed violently out, and dis-
pelled into alcoholic liquor, by an unnatural process, but
should render life sweet, bland, and gently beneficent,
1 86 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
and insensibly influence other hearts and other lives to
the same blessedness.' And upon the lines indicated
in this deliverance, the ' Blithedale Romance ' is con-
structed. Formulated, mapped- out benevolence was
clearly a thing for which Hawthorne had little sym-
pathy; and there are certainly many nobler modes of
rendering the philanthropic sentiment concrete than
by self-imposed exclusion from the bulk of the human
species.
The two forms of genius, the subjective and the ob-
jective, were blended in Hawthorne, the former, never-
theless, greatly predominating. A fine example of the
two styles combined is to be found in the ' House of the
Seven Gables.' This romance possesses an interest from
its general excellence rather than from any definite
distinctive trait of character or directness of purpose.
Yet the novelist had a particular end in view in the
construction of the story, namely, to show the evil con-
sequences which are entailed through the commission of
error or crime. He himself admits that he would feel it
a great gratification if the narrative should impress upon
others the folly of accumulating golden gains in order
that they should descend to posterity as an incubus and
a snare. But in a story like this, although the moral
cannot be forgotten or utterly lost sight of, it is relegated
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 187
to a secondary position. Moral truths are to be picked
out of novels as the reader passes along, but they should
never be so prominent as to obstruct the view, and shut
out those artistic merits without which any novel must
be worthless. Picturesqueness is eminently the charac-
teristic of the history of the old Pyncheon family, and
additional interest is created through its semi-legendary
character. The writer has traversed backwards for some
generations, and given a present-day interest to a bygone
age and romance. We can well understand that it cost
Hawthorne more labour than most of his other stories.
He was deeply conscious of the fact that he had under-
taken to bear a sad burden, and strenuously endeavoured
to lighten the shadows here and there. Not very suc-
cessful, however, was he in this, and the narrative stands
as another tomb of dead hopes, like so many builded by
the hand of this melancholy genius. His fondness for
the out-of-the-way, the grotesque, and the abnormal, is
appeased a little by the introduction of the mesmerist
element into the composition, which further serves to
show that he was always abreast with what was going on
in science and the world. The critic is almost deprived
of his work in regard to Hawthorne, from the fact, un-
usual with authors, that he has left behind him his own
opinions upon almost every work that he has written.
1 88 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
The judgment, for instance, that we will venture to say
any careful reader would have passed upon this work of
the * House of the Seven Gables,' viz., that in parts it is
finished with all the minuteness of a Dutch picture, has
been anticipated by the brain which conceived it ; so
that there is little left to do, except to admire his ma-
nipulation. The great difficulty which he experienced,
of avoiding too close and careful an analysis of the
human soul in its more sombre aspects, has been par-
tially, but not altogether surmounted. Phcebe Pyncheon,
however, gleams like a ray of the summer sun across the
dark pages of the story. She is a bright, loveable, and
beautiful creation, elaborated with softness and tender-
ness. As a sweet poem lingers in the brain, and its
undying music is ever present with us, so do such cha-
racters as this leave an impression on the memory and
the heart. As the author says, her ' natural tunefulness
made Phoebe seem like a bird in a shadowy tree ; or
conveyed the idea that the stream of life warbled through
her heart as a brook sometimes warbled through a
pleasant little dell. It betokened the cheeriness of an
active temperament, finding joy in its activity, and there-
fore rendering it beautiful ; it was a New England trait
the stern old stuff of Puritanism, with a gold thread in
the web.' And yet this girl, of whom her uncle said he
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 189
' never knew a human creature do her work so much like
one of God's angels as this child Phoebe does,' found the
one great happiness of her life in being a sacrifice for
others. She is a noble moral type, as near the perfection
of human nature, in her utter absence of selfishness, as it
is possible to conceive. Before we part from her, we
ought not to omit giving the author's description of
her, both on account of its being a fair specimen of
his painting of individuals, and for the portrait's own
sake :
' Out of New England it would be impossible to meet
with a person combining so many ladylike attributes with
so many others that form no necessary (if compatible) part
of the character. She shocked no canon of taste ; she was
admirably in keeping with herself, and never jarred against
surrounding circumstances. Her figure, to be sure, so small
as to be almost childlike, and so elastic that motion seemed as
easy, or easier, to it than rest, would hardly have suited one's
idea of a countess. Neither did her face, with the brown
ringlets on either side, and the slightly piquant nose, and the
wholesome bloom, the clear shade of tan, and the half-a-
dozen freckles friendly remembrancers of the April sun and
breeze precisely give us a right to call her beautiful. But
there was both lustre and depth in her eyes. She was very
pretty, as graceful as a bird, and much in the same way ; as
pleasant about the house as a gleam of sunshine falling on
the floor through a shadow of twinkling leaves, or as a ray of
firelight that dances on the wall, while evening is drawing
nigh. Instead of discussing her claim to rank amongst
190 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
ladies, it would be preferable to regard Phoebe as the example
of feminine grace and availability combined, in a state of
society, if there were any such, where ladies did not exist
There it should be woman's office to move in the midst of
practical affairs, and to gild them all, the very homeliest,
with an atmosphere of loveliness and joy.'
But this is not the only portrait drawn with realistic
power. Those of Hephzibah and Judge Pyncheon are
superior to it in force if inferior in delicacy. That pas-
sage in which the stirrings of conscience are revealed in
the Judge, is instinct with energy ; whilst the author's
own delineation of the miserable soul tinged with blood
and like a pool of stagnant water, foul with many im-
purities, beneath the show of a marble palace is amongst
the most graphic passages in this branch of literature.
The story itself, as we have seen, is concerned with retri-
bution retribution after long years. A Colonel Pyn-
cheon had sought and accomplished the destruction of
one Matthew Maule, who was executed for the crime of
witchcraft. While he had the halter about his neck, and
just before the moment of execution, Maule addressed
the Colonel, who stood calmly gazing upon the scene, in
words which were preserved through history, as well as
fireside tradition: < God,' he said, 'will give him blood
to drink ! ' The deed apparently dies, but in Judge
Pyncheon the full results are borne. That gross, sensual,
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 191
villainous life, is the answer to the original sin the re-
verberation which comes from Heaven's gate to assure
man that acts which seem to bear no consequences in
their dark folds, yield, in the far-off time, their black and
bitter fruit. In Pyncheon's fearful death is that percep-
tible reckoning for former deeds which the eye of man is
not always able to trace.
We pass from this really wonderful work to pause
before that with which Hawthorne's name has been im-
mortally associated. ' The Scarlet Letter ' has been not
inaptly described as ' the great New England epic.' In
the absence of any work of stupendous genius in America,
this definition may well be accepted ; it has no equal,
either in Transatlantic poetry or prose, for its dramatic
strength. For the accident of its form, which is very
striking, we are indebted to Hawthorne's stay at Boston.
Not without significance to mankind was his discharge of
the ordinary duties of the Custom-house officer. It is
related that one day, while searching among the old re-
cords of the Custom-house, he lighted upon a sentence
decreeing that a woman convicted of adultery should
stand on the Meeting-house steps with the letter A
marked upon her breast. The problem how to deal with
sin, in the shape of a romance, is supposed to have then
flashed upon him in full artistic form ; and the friend who
192 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
was beside him at the moment very shrewdly remarked,
' We shall hear of the letter A again.' Never, perhaps,
was so powerful a story constructed out of materials so
slight. The one prominent object of the writer seems to
burn through every line, even when he has apparently
no thought of its doing so. That great trait of Haw-
thorne's, his diving into the recesses of the human heart,
and laying it bare to the gaze of the world, finds here its
full expression. And one lesson, which seems to have
been missed hitherto in connection with the novel, is this,
that the author intended by it to illustrate and enforce
his belief in Providence. For whatever may have been
the case as regards man, his faith in the Deity was strong
enough. Not in vain is the burden laid upon poor
Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale. They are to
suffer here and to expiate their offence, but mercy is to
be granted to them hereafter that mercy which the
severe, so-called Christian code refused them on earth.
Such, we think, is the great moral Hawthorne had in
view. Is it possible ever to erase from the memory the
scene upon the scaffold, where, the minister who has suf-
fered years of torture for his sin, has at length courage
given him to make known his guilt and to bear the
punishment ? * God is merciful ! ' he cried. ' Let me
now do the will which He hath made plain before my
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 193
sight. For, Hester, I am a dying man, so let me make
haste to take my shame upon me.' Then, addressing
the people of New England in solemn and majestic
tones, he made known the burden of his woe. He iden-
tified himself as the one sinner of the world. The scarlet
letter of cloth which Hester wore was more terribly re-
presented in him, for years of remorse had printed it in
blood upon his own breast, and it was also reproduced
on his very heart. But let the author give the final
words which passed between the clergyman and his
deeply-wronged Hester words which set forth Haw-
thorne's own view of the expiation of the long past
crime :
' " Shall we not meet again ? " whispered she, bending her
face down close to his. " Shall we not spend our immortal
life together! Surely, surely, we have ransomed one
another with all this woe ! Thou lookest far into eternity
with those bright, dying eyes. Then tell me what thou
seest ! "
1 " Hush ! Hester, hush ! " said he, with tremulous solem-
nity. " The law we broke the sin here so awfully revealed !
Let these alone be in thy thoughts. I fear ! I fear ! It
may be, that, when we forgot our God when we violated
our reverence for each other's soul it was thenceforth vain
to hope that we could meet hereafter in an everlasting and
pure reunion. God knows ; and He is merciful ! He hath
proved his mercy most of all in my afflictions. By giving
me this burning torture to bear upon my breast ! By send-
o
194 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
ing yonder dark and terrible old man to keep the torture
always at red heat ! By bringing me hither to die this death
of triumphant ignominy before the people ! Had either of
these agonies been wanting, I had been lost for ever !
Praised be His name ! His will be done. Farewell !" '
Thus is taught the moral that to be true is worth
more than life ; and collaterally with this is exemplified
in Roger Chillingworth the folly of the passion of re-
venge. Little did he imagine that by the exhibition of a
sublime courage and virtue Arthur Dimmesdale would
escape him at the last, and leave him to gnash his teeth,
a disappointed man, with such a glance as he had never
before taken into the contemptible depths of his own
nature. Like the foul and noxious weed, he was up-
rooted from his very base, and cast forth to encounter
the opprobrium of the world.
In other respects the romance is noteworthy. Be-
sides its passion we have its beauty. The description of
the Custom-house is written with a minute and delicate
pencil, no strokes, however small, being omitted, which
could add to the perfection of the picture. Occasionally,
there is a humourous touch in the introduction, as when
he slyly informs us that ' neither the front nor the back
entrance of the Custom-house opens on the road to
Paradise. 7 How delightful is that touch of poetry in
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 195
which he refers to the wild rose-bush at the door of the
prison, which seemed to assure the prisoner that the deep
heart of Nature could pity and be kind to him ! The
author's fondness for allegory comes out even here, when
he goes on to observe ' This rose-bush, by a strange
chance, has been kept alive in history ; but whether it
had merely survived out of the stern old wilderness, so
long after the fall of the gigantic pines and oaks which
originally overshadowed it, or whether, as there is fair
authority for believing, it had sprung up under the foot-
steps of the sainted Ann Hutchinson, as she entered the
prison door, we shall not take upon ourselves to deter-
mine. Finding it so directly on the threshold of our
narrative, which is now about to issue from that in-
auspicious portal, we could hardly do otherwise than
pluck one of its flowers, and present it to the reader. It
may serve, let us hope, to symbolize some sweet moral
blossom, that may be found along the track, or relieve the
darkening close of a tale of human frailty and sorrow.'
But the fragrance of the rose is scarcely distinguishable
as the narrative of sad import proceeds. Surely never
was the human spirit so put upon the rack as in these
pages ; it suffers torture till the final moment which we
have rehearsed. The romance is a monograph of anguish.
In its deep, utter, and absorbing psychological interest it
o 2
196 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
stands without a peer. The beauty of Hester, and the
angelic sweetness and purity of little Pearl, are only
streaks of light which, flashing across the darkness, serve
to show the abysses of that darkness. The hell of human
suffering was never more accurately gauged, and the
thunders of conscience never reverberated with more
terrific fury and power.
Our purpose is not to consider Hawthorne's works in
strict chronological order, nor indeed is it our intention
to review them all specifically. Many of his slighter
sketches, though all tinged with the same spirit as his
larger stories, afford little scope for saying more than this
in reference to them. The ' Mosses from an Old Manse'
are valuable as indicating the class of subjects for which
he had an affection. In the introduction the wTiter
seems to be filled with a more cheerful spirit than usually
animates him, though it is a great mistake to jump at the
conclusion, as some have done, that Hawthorne was a
gloomy man. Behind all that power of dissection which
he possessed, and past the shadow which falls across his
works, was a trustful spirit one which never let loose
the anchor of faith. ' Oh, perfect day ! ' he exclaims on
one occasion, * Oh, beautiful world ! Oh, beneficent
God ! It is the promise of a blessed eternity ! for our
Creator would never have made such lovely days, and
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 197
have given us the deep hearts to enjoy them, above and
beyond all thoughts, unless we were meant to be im-
mortal. This sunshine is the golden pledge thereof. It
beams through the gates of Paradise, and shows us
glimpses far inward.' Strong, therefore, it will be seen,
was the religious instinct in Hawthorne. Looking at his
Note-book, we get some insight into his method, which
is here beheld in its rough and early stage. His first
process is to seize upon the local colouring, or upon the
naked passion. This is slightly elaborated in the short
sketches, as, for instance, the ' Mosses/ where, neverthe-
less, he gets little further than just clothing the simple
leading ideas, and it is perfected in his longest stories,
.where art has been called in to give all possible aid to
nature. The germs of a hundred stories could be found
in a few sentences culled from his Note-books. ' Our
Old Home ' and the brief romances which have been
collected since his death, call for little special mention,
for the reasons, first, that the former work has so long
been known to Englishmen, and, secondly, that the new
stories are not distinguished for their strength, though
they are very characteristic of the writer's manner.
* Transformation,' however, is a novel which cannot
be thus passed over. The idea of Donatello, the Faun-
like man, which gives so singular an interest to this work,
198 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
was most probably derived by Hawthorne from the de-
tails of the examination of Byron's dead body given by
Trelawney, in his ' Recollections of Byron and Shelley.'
' I asked Fletcher,' says the author, ' to bring me a glass
of water ; and on his leaving the room, to confirm or re-
move my doubts as to the cause of his lameness, I un-
covered the Pilgrim's feet, and was answered both his
feet were clubbed, and the legs withered to the knee ;
the form and face of an Apollo, with the feet and legs of
a sylvan Satyr.' This is a tolerably fair description of
the being whose destiny was linked with Miriam, that
remarkable character in Hawthorne's novel. We ought
also at the same time to note that a friend of Hawthorne's
asserts it was Henry Thoreau's wonderful intimacies with
animals which first suggested this being. But however
interesting its origin may be as an incident personal to
the author, it is immaterial when we come to regard the
story itself ; and those who assume that the chief attrac-
tion of the romance consists in its singular blending of
the natural and the unnatural, commit, we think, a pro-
found mistake. Its real gist lies in the revelation of the
reflex action of one human heart upon another, and in
\htfacilis dcscensus Averni of the spirit, when it has once
commenced a certain career. Is it Fate or if not, then
what is it ? which seems from the very commencement
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 199
of the narrative to be welding adamantine chains with
which to interlock Donatello and Miriam? No more
pathetic story could well be conceived, and no plainer
moral indicated, than we find here. Even the bystander
Kenyon saw clearly how these links had been forged, for
addressing the darkly beautiful Miriam, he said, ' On his
behalf, you have incurred a responsibility which you can-
not fling aside;' and then$ turning to Donatello, he
added, ' The mysterious process by which our earthly life
instructs us for another state of being, was begun for you
by her. She has rich gifts of heart and mind, a sugges-
tive power, a magnetic influence, a sympathetic know-
ledge, which, wisely and religiously exercised, are what
your condition needs. The bond betwixt you, therefore,
is a true one, and never except by Heaven's own act
should be rent asunder ! ' These words were prophetic,
for the speaker recked not of the dark secret which had
knit together indissolubly those whom he was addressing.
This inter-dependence of humanity, then, brought about
by destiny, is what is clearly taught in the novel ; and its
general leaning to fatalism is very marked. In one pas-
sage the author affirms that as the future likeness exists
in the block of marble which the sculptor takes for his
work, so does the fate of the individual man exist in the
limestone of time. Man may fancy that he carves his
200 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
own future out of the marble, but its ultimate shape was
already known before any action on his part. This is a
gloomy view to inculcate of man, that being who is gene-
rally accredited with the possession of godlike capabilities
and will. And as though to correct the impression
which may be formed, Hawthorne hastens to put himself
individually right with the reader on the matter by draw-
ing another character, whose life is to be moulded by
other influences, and to develop under the sway of other
principles. In Hilda we have at once the contrast and
the counterpart of Miriam. Not a shade of the evil
which affected the latter comes near the graceful child of
Nature, who goes singing through the world happy in
herself, trustful in God, and free as the bird to whose
music her own soul makes answer and tender response.
Besides indicating, therefore, the fondness of the author
for meddling with questions which have a great charm
for the Darwin school, we perceive that this work deals
with spiritual truths of the highest significance. Whether
or no Donatello be really the outcome, after many gene-
rations, of the progress of the Faun, the fact is well
demonstrated of the close relation each unit of humanity
bears to the other, and of the inferior fellowship which
he possesses with the lower creation. The story itself
has its triumph in the artistic sense ; while disclaiming
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 201
the intention of giving a portraiture of Italian manners
and character, the author has nevertheless been most
successful in imbuing his romance with the atmosphere
oY Southern skies. Italy, with all its beauty, its tradi-
tions, and its tragic history, was exactly the land for
Hawthorne to select in which to fix the locale of his novel.
In that country it seems almost impossible for the most
prosaic not to be moved to poetic paroxysms.
That extraordinary book, the ' Dolliver Romance,'
did not find Hawthorne a whit nearer writing the ordi-
nary novel of society. To the general romance-monger
it would have possessed no charm, had the plot been
originally suggested to him to work upon. Severely
simple to a degree, it had one leading thought only, and
that weird and strange as usual, viz., the idea of a death-
less man ! True, there is a beautiful woman in it, Panzie,
who affords a gleam of sunshine to a page surcharged
with gloom, but the bulk of the story is impregnated with
sadness, which nevertheless in the hands of the writer
possesses a resistless enchantment. The fragment beass
upon it sufficient indication of what it would have ripened
to had fortune been propitious. Old Doctor Dolliver
was to live on and on through far generations, loving
and guarding Panzie, till the world in time forgot to
measure his days and years, and began to count him
202 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
immortal. For her youth, hope, and vitality, he was to
make the exchange of wisdom and love ; and thus,
moving hand in hand, life was to be made divine for
both, and desolation thrust back into oblivion. Then,
again, in ' Septimius,' the last work from this gifted hand,
we behold the same great craving after immortality em-
bodied in the person of the hero, mingled with other
strange elements which make him not the least striking
of Hawthorne's creations. The picture of the pale
student, with his unquenchable thirst after the deep
knowledge of the mysteries of life which he has set him-
self to attain, is one that no other conceptions can
obliterate. We watch him from those early days in
which he first made love to Rose Garefield, and see how
circumstances or fate gradually make him their own, till
he, who was the most inoffensive of God's creatures by
nature, feels that irresistible impulse to shed blood which
develops in him so rapidly. Next he obtains possession
of the document which changes the whole current and
purpose of his life. His love for Rose, his love for
himself and the world, and all created things, evaporate
in the presence of a more terrible longing and burning
for knowledge. Finally, at the hand of his enemy he
learns the lesson that ' the wish of a man's inmost heart
is oftenest that by which he is ruined and made mise-
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 203
rable.' One can see what a wonderful story Hawthorne
would have made of this had he lived to complete it.
The passages which are finished are distinguished for a
full, rich style, elegant language, and well-poised sen-
tences. Altogether, it suffers little by comparison in
literary merit with the ' Blithedale Romance/ which,
from the artistic point of view, as we have already in-
timated, may be pronounced his masterpiece. Art and
passion are in both works blended in a very rare degree.
Compared with the writers of his own country, there
'is no difficulty in assigning his proper position as a
novelist to this illustrious writer. He has no equal. It
is rare to meet with his artistic qualities anywhere ; it is
rarer still to find them united to the earnestness which so
distinguished him. Whether as the result of an inheri-
tance of the old Puritan blood or no, matters little, but
in him there was apparently a sincerity truly refreshing
amongst so many writers whose gifts have been vitiated
by the lack thereof. Admirably did Russell Lowell de-
pict him when he wrote the following lines in his ' Fable
for Critics ! ' %
1 There is Hawthorne, with genius so shrinking and rare,
That you hardly at first see the strength that is there ;
A frame so robust, with a nature so sweet,
So earnest, so graceful, so solid, so fleet,
Is worth a descent from Olympus to meet ;
204 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
; Tis as if a rough oak that for ages had stood,
With his gnarled bony branches like ribs of the wood,
Should bloom, after cycles of struggle and scathe,
With a single anemone trembling and rathe ;
His strength is so tender, his wildness so meek,
That a suitable parallel sets one to seek,
He's a John Bunyan Fouque, a Puritan Tieck ;
When Nature was shaping him, clay was not granted
For making so full-sized a man as she wanted,
So, to fill out her model, a little she spared,
From some finer-grained stuff for a woman prepared.
And she could not have hit a more excellent plan
For making him fully and perfectly man.'
That Hawthorne will ever be what we call a very
popular novelist is open to much doubt. The habits of
abstraction to which he was accustomed from his boy-
hood had their influence upon his thought, which is not
always expressed in a manner adapted to the average
reader. At times he appears to be living away from the
world altogether ; and society likes now what is concrete,
something which it can handle and appraise, whether in
literature, science, or art. It has little reverence for the
conscientious worker, unless he can contrive to make a
noise about his work. This, of course, was precisely
what the writer whose claims are under discussion could
not do. He knew what conscience was, and he revered
knowledge ; but he never understood the rage for popu-
larity. The real admiration for his books, which had its
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. ' 205
root in sympathy with the intellectual and spiritual throes
of the author, was the highest reward he felt he could
receive ; for that was intelligible. He had a shrinking
from the lionising which is done on trust, that unpleasant
phase which has crept over society during the last few
years. The principle of giving the highest praise to the
man who can play the loudest on the big drum was a
hateful one to him. A silent rebuke to the fussiness of
the nineteenth century, and to its fulsome adulation of
what is unworthy, may be traced in his pages. This
man had a strong and fearless spirit, and though he
discussed questions occasionally which have been found
too high for settlement in all ages, he did so with hu-
mility and on reverent knee.
Hawthorne had unquestionably, moreover, as will
have been gathered, a strong poetic element in his
nature, sublimated by constant contact with the various
forms of sorrow. Through worldly loss he came to an
insight into spiritual truths to which he might otherwise
have been a stranger. At times he appears almost to
distrust men, but it is never really so ; he laments man's
indecision for the right, the evil growths which enwrap
his soul, and that dark veil of sin which hides from him
the smiling face of his Creator. ' Poet let us call him,'
with Longfellow ; but, greater still, an interpreter, through
206 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
whose allegories and awe-inspiring creations breathe the
soul that longs after the accomplishment of the dream of
unnumbered centuries, the brotherhood of man. The
world has been enriched by his genius, which is as a
flower whose fragrance is shed upon man, but whose
roots rest with God.
THE BRONTES
[CORNHILL MAGAZINE]
THE BRONTES.
No soil has the monopoly of Genius. Alike in the
barbaric empires of the East and the Christian nations
of the West, we behold numberless proofs and monu-
ments of that force which has been irresistible in bursting
the narrow bounds by which it was sought to be con-
fined, and which men call Genius. This power, or
adaptability, or whatever name is chosen to be given to
it, is seen to be independent of the conditions which
* affect men generally, or at least it rises superior to them ;
it is a law to itself ; in the world's darkest ages it has
endeavoured to pierce the secrets of the universe, and
has uttered language which has been the seed of wisdom
for succeeding generations. Humanity has been more
indissolubly knit together, and the gulf of time bridged
over, by a Confucius and a Bacon. Truly independent,
indeed, of the accidents of time or place, ' the light that
never was on land or sea ' to give a broad application
to Wordsworth's graphic expression beams forth upon
all ages and peoples, but in gleams as fitful as the light-
p
210 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
ning which cleaves the dense thunder-cloud. Yet the
greatest unbroken succession of the earth is this same
genius, yielding those potentialities which have operated
for the evil or the good of mankind. Wars and enthu-
siasms have been kindled by it, and dying hopes have
been revivified by its life-giving influence. It cannot
die. Its light may be obscured, but never extinguished.
Where the Divine spark exists it must become manifest,
for it is imperishable.
But our present purpose is to look at genius from a
point which possesses even more of interest than its impe-
rishability. It is to note its appearance in scenes which
it has ever favoured, and where it has always disappointed
the world. How frequently in history has it taken up its
abode in the most unpromising soil, where there seemed
no root for its rare and extraordinary growth ! Where
nature has most darkly frowned, and the sterile aspect of
her moors and hills has had a corresponding influence
upon the population, thence have sprung some of the
choicest spirits, whose lives were fragrant, and whose
memories still
Smell sweet and blossom in the dust.
Perhaps no example could be cited in illustration
which more clearly demonstrates the irrepressibility of
THE BRONTES. 211
genius than that of the remarkable trio of sisters who
were known originally as Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell.
The truly surprising vigour of their mental consti-
tutions can only be accurately gauged by a consideration
of the natural and other disadvantages which they
successfully overcame. To many persons, we suppose,
they will ever remain but a name, though one almost
synonymous with sturdy independence of character ; but
to those who more deeply study their separate individua-
lities an untold wealth of interest and profit will be
discovered. Their life's history proves that in the most
barren regions the power of genius can flourish. The
bleak, wild moorlands, with their poverty of natural
beauties, were the nursery of rich lives, whose influence
with that of all other lives to whom the Divinity has
intimately spoken still lives, and must live, for long
generations. The personal narrative, as related by Mrs.
Gaskell, is one of mingled pathos and rarity. Some of
the points in the Life of Charlotte Bronte it will be
advisable to recall to the reader's attention before the
works of the three sisters themselves are passed in re-
view. Haworth village, whose parsonage was so long
the residence of the Brontes, is in the West Riding of
Yorkshire, and situate only a few miles from three towns
of considerable importance Halifax, Bradford, and
p 2
2J2 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Keighley. The friend of Charlotte Bronte has en-
deavoured to give some idea of the appearance of the
district, but even she fails to depict it as it existed in
the early part of the present century. In addition to the
dull, monotonous stretch of moorland, with here and
there a ' beck ' or a crag, as the sole variation for the
weary eye, there was a population to be met with which
in some respects exhibited no advance whatever over
that of the Middle Ages. Nor is this scarcely to be
wondered at, for within the knowledge of the present
writer, to whom the whole locality is perfectly familiar,
there were living a few years ago individuals who had
never beheld one of the foremost powers of civilisation
the railway. Great natural shrewdness undoubtedly was
a characteristic of the inhabitants of the Riding, and in
many cases a rough kind of bonhomie was added, which,
however, was frequently made more offensive than posi-
tive rudeness. Add to this that there was very little
opportunity afforded to the poor for culture twelve,
fourteen, and sixteen hours per day being their constant
labour at the factories and the imagination will have
little left to do in forming an estimate of the exoteric
existence of the Yorkshire character. The people were,
and indeed now are, hard-fisted, but scarcely so much so
as the reader of Mrs. Gaskell would gather ; for many
THE BRONTES. 213
have a passion for personal adornment, whilst others will
spend considerable time and money in attaining pro-
ficiency in music, for which they have a natural talent
beyond that possessed by the inhabitants of any other
county in England. They are good friends and good
haters. The misers, mostly, are to be found in the type
of small manufacturers or cotton-spinners, who, bereft of
many of those graces which should adorn the human
character, set themselves with dogged persistency to the
making of ' brass,' as they term wealth. With some the
passion is carried to a lamentable, and at the same time
amusing excess. A characteristic story is told of a per-
son of this class, who was tolerably rich, and had been
seized with illness soon after taking out his policy.
When the doctor made him aware of his hopeless state,
he jumped up delighted, shouting, ' By Jingo ! I shall
do the insurance company! I always was a lucky
fellow ! ' Another trait in people much poorer in station
than those just referred to was the fixedness of their
religious principles. The doctrine of Election had firmer
root in their minds and indeed has now in those of
their successors than is found to be the case elsewhere.
The factory hands would stand at the loom till nature
yielded to consumption or to the hardness of the burdens
it was called upon to bear, but in the hour of dissolution,
214 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
as in every hour of sentient existence in the past, would
be apparent the conviction that as surely as the sun rose
in the morning, so surely were they themselves predesti-
nated to a triumphant salvation, of which it was an
impossibility they could be rifled by the combined
powers of the universe. Amidst this stern and unyield-
ing race, then, was the lot of the sisters cast, and it
would have been strange had not their genius been
directed in its moulding by such distinctive surroundings.
To understand at all the spirit of their works, it is ne-
cessary to have some preliminary knowledge of the kind
just indicated. Precocity distinguished the whole trio,
though that is not an unfailing sign of future celebrity.
When children, their answers to questions were clever
and characteristic. Emily, whose intellect was always
singularly clear, firm, and logical, when asked what
should be done with her brother Branwell, if he should
be naughty, instantly replied, 'Reason with him, and
when he won't listen to reason, whip him.' And as
another indication, of the quick ripening of faculties in
this remarkable family, it may be mentioned that Mr.
Bronte said he could converse with his daughter Maria
on all the leading questions of the day when she was
only eleven years of age. Charlotte Bronte was at an
early age familiar with all the forms of suffering and death,
THE BRONTES. 215
and her life, from its commencement to its close, may be
said to have been one prolonged endurance of agony.
Yet the grandeur of her courage must always strike us as
one of the sublimest spectacles. When a child she lost
those who were dear to her. and there were none who could
understand the vast yearnings of her nature. Then came
the stirrings of her genius, and she longed to take flight,
but her wings were weighted, and she was kept enchained
to the dull earth. A few more years, and another trouble,
almost worse than death, cast its horrible shadow over
her path. The melancholy story of her brother Branwell,
whom she loved deeply, in spite of his numberless errors
and terrible slavery to one master-passion, is matter 01
general knowledge. To his death succeeded that of Emily
Bronte, the sister whom Charlotte especially loved. To
see her drift out into the great Unknown Sea was trouble
inexpressible to that loving soul which had watched her
with fostering care, and hoped to have witnessed the
universal acknowledgment of her splendid genius. Sel-
dom was the heavy cloud lifted from the head of our
author on those dull Yorkshire hills : can it be matter of
surprise, then, that her works should bear the impress of
the character of her life ? The wonder is, that the sun
should break through at all, as it does in < Shirley,' with
beams of real geniality and cheerfulness. But the life
2i6 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
was destructive of that gentler kind of humour of which
we are sure Charlotte Bronte must have had originally
a considerable endowment. She was necessarily pro-
pelled towards the painting of what was frequently harsh,
and always peculiar and extraordinary. Her perceptions
were keen as will be admitted by the close student of
her works not only of human life, but of nature, and
what she wrote must therefore exhibit the qualities of
truth and strength. Severe discipline waited upon her
through all her history, and its results are graphically
depicted in her works, each of which deals with the
experience of some stage of her brief existence. One
almost wonders, as we follow her career, where her
happiness came from. There was no society, no wealth,
none of the common delights of life for her, whilst death
was always approaching with measured, but inevitable
steps, when not, indeed, already in the house. Doubt-
less her literary occupations yielded her at times intense
enjoyment, but she possessed, in addition, a faith in
Providence which must have been like that of a child
for simplicity and strength a faith to which many,
who boasted of their Christian excellence, were perfect
strangers, and to whom its existence in her was utterly
unsuspected.
The iron will of this truly great woman was never
THE BRONTES. 217
broken till the period came when she must yield up her
own life. Then the weakness if such it can be called
which she exhibited, arose not from any fear respecting
herself, but for the tender and faithful husband whom
she was leaving behind. Desolation, blank and utter,
overtook the father and husband when her heart ceased
to beat, such as the old parsonage had never experienced
before. Charlotte's spirit had nerved others so long as
it was with them, and the tenement of hope was not
completely shattered till she died. The picture Mrs.
Gaskell gives of the closing moments and of the funeral
is very touching. With regard to the latter it painfully
reminded her of the scene after the death of Oliver
Goldsmith. Mr. Forster thus describes it: 'The stair-
case of Brick Court is said to have been filled with
mourners, the reverse of domestic ; women without a
home, without domesticity of any kind, with no friend
but him they had come to weep for ; outcasts of that
great solitary, wicked city, to whom he had never for-
gotten to be kind and charitable.' Such would have
followed Charlotte Bronte's remains to the grave, but the
survivors wanted not the sympathy of strangers, their
grief being too keen to be assuaged. The detractors of
the writer of ' Jane Eyre ' could have had little real
understanding of her. Those who knew her best were
218 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
%
the fallen and distressed, to whose wants she had minis-
tered, and, better still, into whose bruised and dejected
souls she had poured the sweet balm of sympathy. Such
shall judge the woman ; as for her genius, that will take
care of itself ; its fruits are too genuine to be in danger
of perishing.
The novels of Charlotte Bronte were totally dissimilar
in style to all which had been previously given to the
world, and their quality was not such as to be at the first
moment attractive. Masculine in their strength, and
very largely so in the cast of thought, there could be no
wonder that the public should assume Currer Bell to be
of the sterner sex, and even persist in its delusion after
the most express assurance to the contrary. Certainly
one can sympathise with the feeling of astonishment that
' Jane Eyre ' should have been written by a woman.
What vigour there is in it compared with the novels of
another great artist, Miss Austen ! For sheer force, she
has even eclipsed her own chief of novel-writers, Sir
Walter Scott, whilst Balzac, who, as Currer Bell said,
' always left a nasty taste in her mouth,' is also out-
stripped in the delineation of passion. Many readers
were doubtless repulsed from a fair and candid perusal
of the works of Charlotte Bronte by certain adverse cri-
ticisms which had pronounced them extremely coarse.
THE BRONTES. 219
The unfairness of this charge we think it will not be
difficult to show presently. Faithful transcripts of the
life she had witnessed they certainly were ; distorted they
were not. Speaking .of fiction, the author of ' The
Curiosities of Literature ' has said ' Novels, as they
were long manufactured, form a library of illiterate authors
for illiterate readers ; but as they are created by genius,
are precious to the philosopher. They paint the cha-
racter of an individual or the manners of the age more
perfectly than any other species of composition : it is in
novels we observe, as it were passing under our own
eyes, the refined frivolity of the French, the gloomy and
disordered sensibility of the German ; and the petty in-
trigues of the modern Italian in some Venetian novels.'
We accept this as a tolerably substantial appraisement of
the role of the novelist ; but in order to be strengthened
in our opinion, let us look at what the eminent
philosopher Adam Smith said of the true novelist, and
surely no higher praise could be desired by our story-
writers. ' The poets and romance-writers who/ he says,
' best paint the refinements and delicacies of love and
friendship, and of all other private and domestic
affections, Racine and Voltaire, Richardson, Marivaux,
and Riccoboni, are in this case much better instructors
than Zeno, Chrysippus, or Epictetus.' But surely we
220 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
need not stay to argue here that the novel, when in the
hands of a true genius, can be made one of the best
instructors of the human race. It is so because there is
nothing of the abstract about it which the mind of
mankind generally abhors ; it is a record of the concrete
existence of individuals like ourselves, and must there-
fore be profitable both for amusement, interest, and
guidance. A good novelist can scarcely be appreciated
too highly. In this class we place Charlotte Bronte ;
she fulfils the requirements glanced at already in the
words of Mr. D'Israeli, and is in every respect a faithful
delineator of the scenes and persons she professes to
describe. How faithful, indeed, few can scarcely tell,
but the mass can darkly feel it on close acquaintance
with her. The charge of coarseness brought against her
works she herself indignantly repelled, but the base
notion of such a charge must have cruelly wounded her
spirit, which, though strong and brave as a lion, was yet
pure and tender as that of a child. She said, ' I trust
God will take from me whatever power of invention or
expression I may have, before He lets me become blind
to the sense of what is fitting or unfitting to be said.'
And it is on record that she was deeply grieved and
long distressed by the remark made to her on one
occasion, 'You know, you and I, Miss Bronte, have both
THE BRONTES. 221
written naughty books ! 5 Mrs. Gaskell goes so far as
to admit that there are passages in the writings of Currer
Bell which are coarse ; for ourselves, we can scarcely
understand what is meant. Roughness there is, but
indecency none, and coarseness seems to us to imply a
little more than mere roughness. Several of the
characters she has drawn are reproductions in type of
the wildest natures, and the over-refined sensibilities of
some readers are possibly shocked by their extreme
naturalness. Charlotte Bronte simply thought of paint-
ing them as they appeared, never thinking for a moment
there could be harm in laying in deep shadows where
deep shadows were required. Fielding was coarse,
Wycherley and some of the other dramatists more so,
but their examples show that coarseness is an unfortunate
epithet to apply to the writings of Currer Bell. If
applicable to them, it is totally inapplicable to her.
Her coarseness if such quality exists at all was
undetachable from her subjects. She would have
ceased to be the true delineator and the real artist she
aspired to be, had she swerved from the outlines ot
character she undertook to fill in. In truth, we need
only turn to ' Shirley ' and ' Jane Eyre ' to prove the
position that Charlotte Bronte was far beyond the
common novelist. In the former story we have
222 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
characters which for sweetness have been rarely excelled,
whilst in the latter we have a Jupiter of rugged strength
and passion. The novelist has power to go out of
herself that attribute of the great artist. It is genius
which impels, and she must obey. If the characters are
occasionally coarse, she is unconscious of it ; she is only
aware of their truth. No need for her to lop off the
distorted branches in the human forest of her delineations
in order to secure a level growth of mediocrity. She
could not if she would, and is too intent on the
manifestations of nature to do so if she could. Such
creations as please the ordinary romance-monger would
be an abhorrence to her ; it is because she exalted Art
that she could not depart from the True, with which the
former, when real, is ever in unison.
' The Professor,' which was the first work written by
Charlotte Bronte ostensibly for publication, though not
by any means her first effort in fiction (what author does
not carry the recollection of many juvenile crudities ?),
exhibits a great amount of conscious power, but also an
inability on the part of the writer to give herself free
scope. A comparison between this and succeeding
works will show how she was cramped in its composition.
The story is good, nevertheless, though numerous pub-
lishers to whom it was submitted decided otherwise. Its
THE BRONTES. 223
author has possibly hit upon the reason for its rejection,
when in the preface she says she determined to give her
hero no adventitious aid or success whatever. He was
to succeed, if he did so, by the sheer force of his own
brain and labour. 'As Adam's son he should share
Adam's doom, and drain throughout life a mixed and
moderate cup of enjoyment.' These principles were of
course unpopular ; the novel-readers of the day de-
manded something which should exhibit more of the
romantic and the heroic. Battling well, however, with
materials which were in the outset obstructive, Currer
Bell achieved a substantial success There can be no
doubt that her husband, in consenting to the publication
of the volume subsequently, did a wise act. There is
much in the work which is characteristic of its author as
she appears in her later novels, and the drawing of at
least one of the characters, Mr. Hunsden, is masterly.
Some of the materials, we are told, were afterwards used
in ' Villette ;' but if so they are carefully disguised, and the
world could very well afford to welcome the two. Pas-
sages occur in 'The Professor' which are almost startling in
their strength of passion and eloquence, and which alone
would have given to Currer Bell the stamp of originality.
All the toilsome way by which the person who gives the
title to the volume is led, is marked by the intensest
224 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
sympathy on the part of the author, and although the
reader may not be able to feel much personal enthusiasm
for the various characters, he must at once yield the point
that he is perusing the thoughts of no common mind.
The valuable knowledge which the author acquired
abroad is utilised with considerable skill, whilst she is
equally at home when she comes to delineate the York-
shire family of the Crimsworths. Her ideas of love and
marriage, afterwards so fully developed in her other
novels, are here touched upon. 'I am no Oriental/ says
the Professor : * white necks, carmine lips and cheeks,
clusters of bright curls, do not suffice for me, without
that Promethean spark, which will live after the roses
and lilies are faded, the burnished hair grown grey. In
sunshine, in prosperity, the flowers are very well ; but
how many wet days are there in life November seasons
of disaster when a man's hearth and home would be
cold, indeed, without the clear, cheering gleam of intel-
lect?' Love without the union of souls, the author
again and again insists, is a delusion, the sheen of a sum-
mer's day, and quite as fleeting. Altogether the idea ot
' The Professor ' was new, and as an indication of the
grooves in which its author's genius was afterwards to
run, we would not willingly have lost it. As a psycho-
logical study alone it was well worthy of preservation.
THE BRONTES. 225
But better and more remarkable works followed.
The reading world has very seldom been startled by such
a genuine and powerful piece of originality as ' Jane Eyre.'
One can almost gauge the feeling, after reading it, which
caused Charlotte Bronte to be such an enthusiastic
admirer of Thackeray. He, at any rate, she knew,
would appreciate her efforts, for was he not also engaged
(with even more splendid talents) in the crusade against
conventionality ? He, at least, understood her burning
words, when she affirmed that * conventionality is not
morality, self-righteousness is not religion. To attack
the first is not to assail the last. To pluck the mask
from the face of the Pharisee, is not to lift an impious
hand to the Crown of Thorns.' These words will
sufficiently show how she endeavoured to tread in the
steps of * the first social regenerator of the day,' and to
whom she inscribed the second edition of her most
widely known book. ' Jane Eyre ' is an autobiography,
and its intention is to present a plain, unbiassed
narrative of a woman's life from its commencement to a
period when it is supposed to have ceased to possess
interest to mankind generally. It is told fearlessly, and
with a burning pen. But there is no suppressio veri;
that, its author would have scorned : perhaps it would
have been better for its reception in some quarters
Q
226 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
limited in range we are happy to think if the narrator
of the story had glossed over some portions of her
heroine's history. She has chosen, however, to adhere
to stern reality, and there it is finally for us, unpleasant
and rough though it be in some of its recorded ex-
periences. The book shows the most opposite qualities
light, darkness ; beauty, deformity; strength, tender-
ness. Its pathos is of the finest quality, stirring most
deeply because it is simple and unforced. The situations
are very vivid : several scenes being depicted which it
would be impossible to eradicate from the memory after
the most extensive reading of serial literature. Even
those who regard it as coarse must admit its strange
fascination. It was a book that could afford to be
independent of criticism, and accordingly we find that,
before the reviews appeared, anxious and continuous
enquiries respecting it began to be made at the libraries.
There was not much fiction being written which fixed
the public eye, and the issue of this novel almost created
an era. Forgotten now is the savage criticism of the
reviewer who said of the author of ' Jane Eyre,' ' She
must be one who for some sufficient reason has long
forfeited the society of her sex/ whilst the work which
baffled his judgment, but earned his vituperation, still
remains, a memento of real genius which could not be
THE BRONTES. 227
suppressed. Although chiefly remarkable for its
prominent delineation of the passion of love in strong
and impulsive natures, there are many other points
which are noticeable about it, and should therefore be
mentioned. The keen observation of the writer is
manifest on almost every page. Intense realism is its
chief characteristic. The pictures are as vivid and bold
as though etched by a Rembrandt, or drawn by a
Salvator Rosa. Dickens has been almost equalled by
the description of the school at Lowood, to which
Miss Eyre was sent, and which might well be described
as Dothegirls' Hall. Here, however melancholy lot !
in addition to indifferent food, supplied in very limited
quantities, there was a good deal of threatening about
'damnation.' The hypocritical minister, Mr. Brockle-
hurst (as drawn by the author), had sometimes the worst
of it in his dealings with Jane Eyre, as, for instance, in
this : ' What is hell ? ' ' A pit full of fire/ ' What must
you do to avoid it?' The answer was a little ob-
jectionable, as the autobiographer says ' I must keep in
good health and not die.' As a corrective, she had
given to her to read * The Child's Guide,' containing 'an
account of the awfully sudden death of Martha G , a
naughty child addicted to falsehood and deceit.' Cer-
tainly if this mental pabulum, combined with the
Q2
228 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
material one of nauseous burnt porridge, was not potent
in keeping down the old Adam, it would be impossible
to mention an effectual remedy, one would think. As
the story progresses it becomes most thrilling, and we
are introduced to a character which is frequently
regarded, and not without reason, as Currer Bell's
masterpiece of powerful drawing viz., Mr. Rochester.
Strong and yet weak, a very thunderbolt for strength
and explosiveness, and yet a bundle of ordinary human
weaknesses, this individual stands forth as real and living
a portrait as is to be found existing in word-painting.
He is attractive in spite of his numerous faults, and
where is the character who more stood in need of pity ?
Picture him at Thornfield, united in wedlock to a raving
maniac, who in her paroxysms attempted his life, whilst
he, in return, saved hers that very life which was a
curse, and brought unutterable gloom to him. Then,
too, he saw the form that he loved, but could not retain,
and yet felt the movement of a wicked but ineffable
love towards her wicked, because of the tie which
bound him to the wild being who bore his name. Add
to all this that his nature was as sensitive as it was
intense, and where is the person who could not pity
Fairfax Rochester ? Behold him again after he has been
maimed in the fruitless endeavour to save the maniac
THE BRONTES. 229
from death. He describes himself as ' no better than
the old lightning-struck chestnut-tree in Thornfield
orchard ; ' but is the process of purification to be
counted as nothing which has brought about this
result ?
' Jane ! you think me an irreligious dog, I dare say ; but
my heart swells with gratitude to the beneficent God of this
earth just now. He sees not as man sees, but far clearer ;
judges not as man judges, but far more wisely. I did wrong :
I would have sullied my innocent flower breathed guilt on
its purity ; the Omnipotent snatched it from me. I, in my
stiff-necked rebellion, almost cursed the dispensation : in-
stead of bending to the decree, I defied it. Divine justice
pursued its course ; disasters came thick on me : I was
forced to pass through the valley of the shadow of death.
His chastisements are mighty, and one smote me which has
humbled me for ever. You know I was proud of my strength,
but what is it now when I must give it over to foreign guid-
ance as a child does its weakness ? Of late, Jane only
only of late I began to see and acknowledge the hand of
God in my doom. I began to experience remorse, repent-
ance ; the wish for reconcilement to my Maker. I began
sometimes to pray ; very brief prayers they were, but very
sincere.'
Verily, this is the epitome of an experience worthy
of being sympathised with, and valuable to be written.
There can be no doubt that the first and greatest
cause of the extreme vividness of the writings of Charlotte
230 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Bronte and her sisters is the fact that most of the cha-
racters depicted are as faithful copies from real life as
though an artist had sat down and limned their features.
More so : for the artist has nothing to do with psycho-
logical characteristics, which, in the case of the authors,
are as accurately described as the features. Having
fixed upon their subjects for analysis, they clung to them
like a shadow or a second self, and the very isolation by
which they were surrounded lent strength to their con-
ceptions. The characters are true to their respective
natures, and their final ends are fearlessly worked out.
Having spoken of the book which made the fame of
Charlotte Bronte, let us glance at her next most im-
portant work, and the one which we like best of all
' Shirley.' It opens with a chapter in which a vein of
humour unsuspected in Charlotte Bronte is manifested,
and we know of no other author whose sketches so much
remind us of George Eliot as does this delineation of
the three curates. The writer has completely unbent, re-
laxed from the severity which so greatly predominates
in her other works, and given play to a quiet and yet
quaint drollery which is positively irresistible. A little
further on, however, we come to more serious business ;
and the terrible machinery riots which so disastrously
retarded commercial progress at the period at which this
THE BRONTES. 231
history is fixed, afford excellent scope for those graphic
descriptions in which Currer Bell stands almost un-
rivalled. The West Riding of Yorkshire, and some parts
of Lancashire, were especially subjected to hardships and
ententes on account of these improvements and inven-
tions in manufacture, and the sketch of Robert Moore's
campaign against the bigoted factory operatives in his
employ and that of his neighbours is only a fancy one as
regards the disposition of the events. Such things were
common at the time of the Luddite riots, but in adopt-
ing these riots as the foundation of her story, the author
also took characters living in her own day and at her
own door, so to speak, hoping that they would thus pass
unrecognised. But the fact that the riots occurred thirty
years previously did not blind the people portrayed to
the knowledge that they were gazing upon their own
portraits. The Yorkes, the three curates, and Mrs.
Prior are all portraits, whilst Shirley herself is Emily
Bronte idealised, or rather what Emily would have been
had she been placed in different circumstances. Though
the book is singularly strong in individualities, there is,
further, more general merit in its writing. Its scenic
effects are beautiful ; the deep love of nature which
possessed the soul of Currer Bell is more observable here
than elsewhere. It is what we should describe as a
232 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
novel good ' all round.' It has no weak side ; it is the
most perfect piece of writing the author has left behind
her. There is not the terrible sweep of passion we see
in 'Jane Eyre ;' the roughnesses of life are smoothed down
a little, and it seems altogether more humanised and
humanising. The most opposite events are touched
upon skilfully. Who can forget, for instance, the
description of the revival in the new Wesleyan Chapel
at Briarfield, when ' Doad o' Bill's ' announced positively
that he had 'fun (found) liberty,' and the excitement
amongst the brethren was intense. Why can't these
worthy people take their religion a little more quietly ?
As our author says on this occasion, ' the roof of the
chapel did not fly off ; which speaks volumes in praise
of its solid slating.' A little further on we get another
sample of power, occurring in the description of a
female character. 'Nature made her in the mood in
which she makes her briars and thorns ; whereas for the
creation of some women she reserves the May morning
hours, when with light and dew she wooes the primrose
from the turf, and the lily from the woodmoss/ Again,
we find in this novel that although Currer Bell was not a
great poetess through the usual medium of measured
cadence, she could write fine, genuine poetry in a prose
THE BRONTES. 233
setting. Witness the following description of nature put
into the mouth of Shirley :
' I saw I now see a woman-Titan : her robe of blue air
spreads to the outskirts of the heath where yonder flock is
grazing ; a veil, white as an avalanche, sweeps from her head
to her feet, and arabesques of lightning flame on its borders.
Under her breast I see her zone, purple like that horizon ;
through its blush shines the star of evening. Her steady
eyes I cannot picture ; they are clear they are deep as
lakes they are lifted and full of worship they tremble with
the softness of love and the lustre of prayer. Her forehead
has the expanse of a cloud, and is paler than the early moon,
risen long before dark gathers ; she reclines her bosom on
the ridge of Stillbro' Moor ; her mighty hands are joined
beneath it. So kneeling, face to face she speaks with God.
That Eve is Jehovah's daughter, as Adam was his son.'
Our young poets might well covet a power of poetic
description like this. As with all true poetry, there is
not only the form but the halo. The expression, coming
as it did from the feeling, begets in us the feeling again.
Other passages of equal beauty could be culled from
' Shirley,' gems glittering here and there in a great broad
field. Nature, love, happiness, misery, loss, gain, are the
themes dilated upon, on each of which much is given
to delight, to improve, and to engender sympathy.
Charlotte Bronte exhibits a marked contrast in one
respect to the greatest female novelist at present living,
234 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
and perhaps ' Shirley ; is the clearest example of what we
mean. Her faith is unwavering faith in the Unseen.
But because He is Unseen she would teach us that that
is no reason why He should be Unknown. Neither
does she form impossible ideals. Shirley is as grand a
character in her way as Dorothea Brooke, but we can
comprehend her better. And though Shirley's soul was
deep, and she had yearnings after greatness, her hopes
were not placed beyond fruition, as in the case of
Dorothea. The former says : ' Indisputably, a great,
good, handsome man is the first of created things. I
would scorn to contend for empire with him. Shall my
left hand dispute for precedence with my right? shall
my heart quarrel with my pulse? shall my veins be
jealous of the blood which fills them ? ' Some feeling of
this kind, of course, Dorothea indulged towards Mr.
Casaubon ; but in her case the idol is shattered, whilst
Shirley obtains in the love of Louis Moore all that she
craves for. It was Dorothea's fate to be always finding
humanity fail, and created things insufficient to fill the
void in her nature. In this sense Shirley is the superior
character. Besides her love, she had a truer insight into
the means of procuring happiness. She discovered that
it must sometimes be worked for with her own hands.
Thus, then, was her nature completely rounded. With
THE BRONTES. 235
reverence to the Supreme were added his richest gift of
love and the link of benevolence to bind her to the rest
of mankind. Not so serenely beautiful as Dorothea, and
not perhaps so lofty in intellect, she is yet a more sue -
cessful character. On her forehead there is not written
failure.
If the sisters Bronte had early in life been accustomed
to mingle in society, and had not been imprisoned within
the walls of Haworth parsonage, there can be little
question that we should have had more masterly and
more general works from their hands. The skill they
exhibit in delineating life should not have been confined
to the inhabitants of those northern moors, but should
have been employed in other haunts and other scenes
likewise. Their field has been necessarily restricted,
though their genius had full play on the subjects within
their reach. But to demonstrate the capacity to turn
experience to account wherever it might be obtained, we
only need to direct the reader's attention to Charlotte
Bronte's latest work, ' Villette.' It is redolent of the
society of Brussels, where the author and her sister spent
some years of their lives. To the ordinary English reader
it is probably the most uninteresting of all the works of
Miss Bronte, as page after page is composed mostly of
French, and that sometimes difficult and idiomatic.
236 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
This doubtless operated to some extent against its
popularity with the mass of novel-readers, though the
book seems to have earned the most lavish encomiums
from the critics. It exhibits, however, the genius neither
of ' Jane Eyre ' nor of ' Shirley : ' it is, in truth, superior
to the fiction of ninety per cent, of novelists, but it
scarcely warranted the extravagant terms of praise which
were showered upon it by the reviewers. These valuable
individuals, however, were, as is too often the case un-
fortunately, wise after the event that is, they found it
tolerably safe to eulogise a new work from the hand of
one who had already established her position as amongst
the most original writers of the age. One or two
of the dramatis persona evoke sentiments of approval
an account of their originality, conspicuous amongst them
being Mr. Paul Emanuel and Miss de Bassompierre ; but
on the whole the book is disappointing, for there is no
one character whose fortunes we are anxious to follow ;
and a novel which fails to beget a personal interest must
be said to have lost its chief charm.
Emily Bronte for it is now time that we should say
something of the two other persons in this remarkable
trio was, in certain respects, the most extraordinary of
the three sisters. She has this distinction at any rate,
that she has written a book which stands as completely
THE BRONTES. 237
alone in the language as does the 4 Paradise Lost ' or the
* Pilgrim's Progress.' This of itself, setting aside subject
and construction, is no mean eminence. Emily Jane
Bronte, as is well known, was the youngest but one of
the Rev. Mr. Bronte's children, and died before she was
thirty years of age. Early in life she displayed a singularly
masculine bent of intellect, and astonished those with
whom she came in contact by her penetration, and that
settlement of character which generally only comes with
age. She went from home twice, once to school and once
to Brussels, but it was like the caging of a lioness, and her
soul yearned for the liberty of home. When in Brussels
she attracted and impressed deeply all those who came
across her, and M. Heger declared she should have been
a man, for ' her powerful reason would have deduced new
spheres of discovery from the knowledge of the old, and
her strong, imperious will would never have been
daunted by opposition or difficulty : never have given
way but with life.' On her return to Haworth she began
to lose in beauty but to gain in impressiveness of feature,
and she divided her time between homely domestic
duties, studies, and rambles. Shrinking entirely from
contact with the life which surrounded her, she gave
herself up to nature, the result being apparent in her
works, which reveal a most intimate acquaintance with
238 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
the great Mother in all her moods. Her mind was
absolutely free to all the lessons which she should teach,
and she embraced them with the most passionate longing.
1 Her native hills were far more to her than a spectacle ;
they were what she lived in, and by, as much as the wild
birds, their tenants, or as the heather, their produce.'
Her descriptions, then, of natural scenery, are what they
should be, and all they should be. Any reader of her works
must perforce acknowledge the accuracy of these observa-
tions. Her life, however, seemed to be an unprized one,
except by that sister who loved her profoundly, and who
keenly appreciated her genius as it essayed to unfold its
wings in the sun. But whilst she lived the world made no
sign of recognition of her strangely weird powers. When
illness came her indomitable will still enabled her to
present an unflinching front to sympathising friends.
She refused to see the doctor, and would not have it
that she was ill. To the last she retained an independent
spirit, and on the day of her death she arose and dressed
herself as usual. Her end reminds us of that of her
brother Branwell whose will was so strong that he
insisted on standing up to die and did actually so die.
Emily did everything for herself on that last day, but as
the hours drew on got manifestly worse, and could only
whisper in gasps. The end came when it was too late to
THE BRONTES. 239
profit by human skill. ' Wuthering Heights/ the principal
work she has left behind her, shows a massive strength
which is of the rarest description. Its power is absolutely
Titanic : from the first page to the last it reads like the
intellectual throes of a giant. It is fearful, it is true, and
perhaps one of the most unpleasant books ever written :
but we stand in amaze at the almost incredible fact that
it was written by a slim country girl who would have
passed in a crowd as an insignificant person, and who
had had little or no experience of the ways of the world.
In Heathcliff, Emily Bronte has drawn the greatest
villain extant, after lago. He has no match out of
Shakspeare. The Mephistopheles of Goethe's ' Faust '
is a person of gentlemanly proclivities compared with
Heathcliff. There is not a redeeming quality in him ;
his coarseness is very repellent ; he is a unique specimen
of the human tiger. Charlotte Bronte in her digest of
this character finds one ameliorating circumstance in his
favour, one link which connects him with humanity viz.,
his regard for one of his victims, Hareton Earnshaw.
But we cannot agree with her : his feeling towards
Earnshaw is excessively like that feline affection which
sometimes destroys its own offspring. As to his alleged
esteem for Nelly Dean, perhaps also the less said about
that the better. But ' Wuthering Heights ' is a marvellous
240 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
curiosity in letters. We challenge the world to produce
another work in which the whole atmosphere seems so
surcharged with suppressed electricity, and bound in
with the blackness of tempest and desolation. From the
time when young Heathcliff is introduced to us, ' as dark
almost as if he came from the devil,' to the last page of
the story, there is nothing but savagery and ferocity,
except when we are taken away from the persons to the
scenes of the narratives, and treated to those pictures
in which the author excels. The Heights itself, the old
north-country manor-house, is made intensely real to us,
but not more so than the central figure of the story, who,
believing himself alone one night, throws open the
lattice, and cries with terrible anguish * Cathy ! oh, my
heart's darling. Hear me this once. Catherine, at
last ! ' Then his history is recapitulated, by one who
witnessed his life in all its stages ; and in the passage
where Catherine informs her nurse that she has promised
to marry Edgar Linton, but ought not to have done so,
we get the following example of concentrated force :
' I have no more business to marry Edgar Linton than I
have to be in Heaven. But it would degrade me to marry
Heathcliff now ; so he shall never know how I love him, and
that not because he's handsome, Nelly, but because he's
more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of,
his and mine are the same ; and Linton's is as different as
THE BRONTES. 241
moonbeams from lightning, or frost from fire. . . . Who is
to separate us ? they'll meet the fate of Milo. I cannot ex-
press it ; but surely you and everybody have a notion that
there is, or should be, an existence of yours beyond you.
What were the use of my creation if I were entirely con-
tained here ? My great miseries in this world have been
HeathclifFs miseries, and I watched and felt each from the
beginning ; my great thought in living is himself. If all else
perished and he remained, 7 should continue to be ; and if
all else remained and he were annihilated, the universe
would turn to a mighty stranger ; I should not seem a part
of it. My love for Linton is like the foliage in the woods :
time will change it, I'm well aware, as winter changes the
trees. My love for Heathcliff resembles the eternal rocks
beneath : a source of little visible delight, but . necessary.
Nelly, I am Heathcliff ! He's always, always in my mind ; not
as a pleasure any more than I am always a pleasure to my-
self, but as my own being.'
Then comes Catherine's death when she asks for-
giveness for having wronged him, and HeathclifT answers,
'Kiss me again; and don't let me see your eyes! I
forgive what you have done to me. I love my murderer
but yours ! How can I?' The tale of woe proceeds;
the despairing man longing for the dead, until at last he
faces death, and being asked if he will have the minister,
replies ' I tell you I have nearly attained my Heaven ;
and that of others is altogether unvalued and uncoveted
by me.' He then sleeps beside her: the tragedy of
eighteen years is complete. A great deal has been said
242 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
on the question whether such a book as ' Wuthering
Heights' ought to be written, and Charlotte Bronte
herself felt impelled to utter some words of defence for
it. Where the mind is healthy it can do no harm ; but
there are, possibly, organisations upon whom it might
exercise a baleful influence. With regard to the drawing
of Heathcliff, Currer Bell scarcely thought the creation
of such beings justifiable, but she goes on to say that
'the writer who possesses the creative gift owns
something of which he is not always master something
that, at times, strangely wills and works for itself. 1 We
are afraid that if this opinion were pushed to its logical
issues it would be found incapable of being supported.
A multiplication of such books as ' Wuthering Heights '
without corresponding genius would be a lamentable
thing, no doubt ; yet, while we cannot defend it
altogether possibly as it stands, we should regret never
having seen it, as one of the most extraordinary and
powerful productions in the whole range of English
literature.
Anne Bronte, the youngest of the three sisters, was
unlike Charlotte and Emily in disposition and mental
constitution. She was not so vigorous, and seemed more
dependent upon the sympathy of others. These
characteristics are apparent in her works, though in her
THE BRONTES. 243
principal novel there are touches which almost remind
one of Emily. She was, nevertheless, deficient in the
energy which distinguished her sisters, and was alto-
gether frailer in body, and more tender and serene in
spirit. The devotional element in her nature was very
strong, as will be seen from a perusal of her poems. Her
sensitiveness was great, and apt to be wounded by the
bitter experiences she was called upon to endure as one
of the class of ill-treated individuals called governesses.
Some of these experiences she has commemorated in her
story * Agnes Grey,' which, however, shows no notable
powers of penetration and insight such as the world had
been accustomed to look for in the authors bearing the
cognomen of Bell. It is the most inferior of all the
works written by the sisters, though interesting in many
aspects. Possessed of a less determined will than
Emily, Anne Bronte bore her sufferings patiently, and as
the hour of dissolution approached, the terrors which
had bound her spirit were dissipated, and she- passed
away, we are assured, in a calm and triumphant - manner.
Her last verses are most beautiful in sentiment, and
worked out with considerable skill. It is a curious
question how this gentle woman, nevertheless, came to
write such a narrative as * The Tenant of Wildfell Hall/
which in some of its details is more offensive and
R 2
244 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
repulsive than the great piece de resistance of her next
elder sister. The drunken orgies of Mr. Huntingdon
and his companions cannot fail to be disgusting to the
reader, vivid though the relation may be in colour.
Most probably that portion of the story was suggested by
the sad practical acquaintance the author had been
compelled to make of the effects of the vice of drunken-
ness in her brother Branwell. The sorrow entailed by
his conduct weighed upon her deeply, and she gave
relief to her feelings by picturing the sin, with all its
hideous consequences and deformity, through the medium
of fiction. It might be that she had hope such a
revelation would be effective for good, and certainly all
who read the story cannot but be affected by that
wretched portion of it devoted to the delineation of a
drunkard. It is the strongest, the most striking part of
the volume, and the mystery of its production by such a
pure soul as Anne Bronte's can only be explained on the
hypothesis we have assumed. The love of Gilbert
Markham for the attractive and clever widow is a
delightful episode, and excellently told, and the closing
chapters go very far to redeem the unpleasantness we
were compelled to encounter in the body of the work.
As with Emily, Anne Bronte's strong point as a novelist
was in the delineation of one grand master passion from
THE BRONTES. 245
the moment when it entered into the soul to the time
when it assumed complete and undisputed possession of
it. We see this tyranny of passion in HeathclifT; we
behold the tyranny again in another direction in Mr.
Huntingdon. In both cases, however, it is finally left
with as repulsive an appearance as the graphic pencils of
the artists were able to command. No one can affirm
that vice is ever winked at : it is, on the contrary, drawn
without cloak or veil, in order that its devotees may be
ashamed, or that those who are in danger of becoming
its victims may be arrested and appalled. Such, we take
it, is the great lesson of ' The Tenant of Wildfell Hall,'
and readers, even without sympathy for the author,
would be unjust to affirm that the lesson is not taught
with sufficient distinctiveness and force. There are
some things which only need to be described to be
abhorred ; and this feeling probably led to the produc-
tion of the work just alluded to.
Of the little volume of poetry written conjointly by
Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell, and published before their
prose works, there is not much to be said, except that it
might teach a lesson to some of the poets of the present
day, that the best inspiration after all is to be derived
from contact with Nature herself. Many of these verses
are not only Wordsworthian in their simplicity of ex-
246 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
pression, but also in their reverent feeling for the Great
Teacher of all true poets. They are rills which spring
from the best source of inspiration, and, whilst they do
not lose the idiosyncrasies of their respective authors, are
all imbued with intense love of outward beauty, and
breathe of the native heath upon which they were in
most part written. The poems which bear traces of the
highest flight of imagination are undoubtedly those of
Ellis Bell. Her genius here attains a more refined
expression, without losing anything of its power. In
several instances she has surrounded an old subject with
new and delightful interest, and even where her choice
has fallen upon more sombre subjects, the originality is
so great that we are lost in admiration, and enter fully
into the theme, glad of the new thoughts even when the
old theme, per se, has no charms for us. Amongst the
many fine things which have been said of Memory,
where are there four lines which concentrate so much
regret as are found embedded in this utterance ?
' I dare not let it languish,
Dare not indulge in memory's rapturous pain;
Once drinking deep of that divinest anguish,
How could I taste the empty world again?'
This was no maundering of a simply sentimental spirit,
but the outcome of a soul that had suffered, and had not
THE BRONTES. 247
lost its strength, though a deep sorrow encompassed it,
and obscured its vision. There was not the light that
shone in the old days, and the regret that has overtaken
many a heart found a fine and truthful utterance in one
who was gifted with a power of expression beyond her
fellows. But the last lines which this wonderfully-gifted
woman ever wrote strike us as being specially note-
worthy. They are an address to the Deity : space fails
us to quote them all, but as a specimen of their strength
we may give the folluwing :
' Vain are the thousand creeds
That move men's hearts ; unutterably vain ;
Worthless as withered weeds,
Or idlest froths amid the boundless main,
To waken doubt in one
Holding so fast by Thine infinity.
* # * * *
Though earth and man were gone,
And suns and universes ceased to be,
And Thou wert left alone,
Every existence would exist in Thee.
There is not room for death,
Nor atom that His might could render void ;
Thou, Thou art Being and Breath,
And what Thou art may never be destroyed.'
We will not stay to investigate the theology of this
passage, but as a specimen of poetic vigour it is well
248 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
worthy of reprinting. The poems of Charlotte Bronte
strike us as being the least excellent in the collection.
Correct as they are in sentiment and expression, they lack
the emphasis to be perceived in those of her sisters. The
probability is that while Emily and Anne Bronte would
have attained considerable eminence as poets, Charlotte
would have wasted her powers on a branch of literature
to which she was not quite adapted. In the case of
Emily, the brief, decisive, epigrammatic form of expression
suited her genius, just as the devotional cadence suited
that of Anne, but Charlotte had better scope in a more
didactic and extended style. One spirit breathes through
the poems of Acton Bell that which animates the
trembling suppliant appealing to Heaven. They are all
a single cry couched in different, but exquisite language,
the cry of a dependent for guidance by a Sovereign
hand. The moods may differ, but the substance of the
soul's aspiration is the same, and there are few sweeter
religious poems than that which contains the last
thoughts and wishes of Acton Bell. The verses are so
well known that we refrain from reproducing them ; but
they may be taken as a good illustration of the spirit
which animated the author, and form a touching farewell
to a world in which she could never be said to have been
at home.
THE BRONTES. 249
With regard to the position which the Brontes
occupy amongst authors, we express ourselves with some
diffidence. In summing up their general merits, and
pronouncing upon their works, it must be done as a
whole, and with no singling out of particular excellences.
So, whilst Charlotte Bronte infinitely eclipses novelists of
the highest reputation in isolated qualities such as those
we have already endeavoured to point out it must be
confessed that when we speak of her as the artist it can-
not be as pertaining to the very highest rank. Her
genius is intense, but not broad, and it is breadth alone
which distinguishes the loftiest minds. But if she fails to
attain the standard of the few writers who have been
uplifted by common consent to the highest pinnacle of
fame, she is the equal of any authors of the second rank.
It is not too much to predict, in fact, that many mere-
tricious works which have been commended for public
admiration will lose in popularity, while those of which
we have been speaking will increase. It is impossible
for two of the works of Charlotte Bronte to fall out of
our literature. They have been stamped as genuine
gold and will keep continually in circulation. Works
which fail to pass this ordeal are those which are either
weak or false ; these are both strong and true. We
obtain from the author of ' Jane Eyre ; no multitude of
250 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
characters, but those we do get we become closely
familiar with and one being of veritable flesh and
blood is worth a thousand insubstantial imitations. The
novels deal with no particular forms of religious belief, or
social questions, which the author would doubtless but
have regarded as accidents of which she cared to take no
account ; and hence we may affirm that after the lapse
of fifty years her works would read as freshly as when
they first made their appearance. It was humanity she
strove to produce ; not its creeds, crotchets, or pecu-
liarities; and it is for this reason that her labour will
triumphantly stand the test of time. The inner life of a
soul is very much the same in all ages. Its hopes, its
fears, and its joys do not change with the changing
seasons and the revolving years. Ages pass away, and
those writers and writings which have only appealed to
transient phases of thought or particular changes of
society are swept away as by a resistless current, whilst
those who defy the potency of the waves are the gifted
few who have shown the genuine power of interpreting
nature, or of dealing with the passions of the human
heart.
HENRY FIELDING
[MACMILLAN'S MAGAZINE]
HENRY FIELDING.
HENRY FIELDING, upon whom we place the distinction
of being England's first great novelist, has for a cen-
tury past been the constant subject of criticism. His
surpassing merits have compelled even his most pro-
nounced foes to assign him a lofty place in the art which
he adorned. Attempts to depreciate his genius, because
the moral backbone was lacking in some of his characters,
have been repeatedly made, but with no permanent
effect upon his renown. For ourselves, we affirm at the
outset that we consider him the Shakspeare of novelists.
By this, of course, it will be understood, we do not imply
that the sum of his genius was in any way comparable
to that of the illustrious dramatist ; but that he achieved
his results in the same way. He was the great artist in
fiction because he was the great observer and interpreter
of human nature. The novel will never be able to
assume a position of equal importance with the drama,
because of its comparative defectiveness of construction.
But to such perfection as it is capable of being brought,
254 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Fielding almost attained. It is, then, for the reason
of the similarity of his method to that of Shakspeare
that we have ventured to award him the highest title
of eminence. It will be our endeavour, while not
hiding his defects, to set forth the grounds of justifica-
tion for the position we have assumed.
With that perversity which only men of the same
class or profession can exhibit towards each other, it was
the fashion with literary men of Fielding's time and
indeed for many years subsequently to compare him
unfavourably with his rival, Richardson. It is singular
how frequently individuals of professed literary acumen
are willing to accept the dicta of others in matters of
criticism. We are only just now losing the effects of this
empiricism. Some unfortunate epigram, or some warped
and fantastic judgment, has frequently been passed
upon an author by those who were supposed to be
competent judges, and the depreciatory observations
have had the same effect upon the public mind as that
of the pebble cast into the pool. The waters have been
agitated and disturbed by ever-widening circles of dis-
content, even to their utmost limits. Much laborious
effort has been required to exorcise the prejudice thus
established ; and it is just this power which a wrong
judgment possesses over the minds of men in an equivalent
HENRY FIELDING. 255
degree with a right one, which makes criticism dan-
gerous. In the hands of an incapable person it is an
engine of incalculable mischief. And the fact that now and
then this engine destroys its foolish owner is no satisfaction
for the wrong done to men of undoubted genius. The
self-righting power of criticism certainly moves slowly.
We are somewhat diffident, for example, when we find it
necessary to differ strongly from such authorities as
Dr. Johnson ; or at any rate should unquestionably
have been so had we been amongst his contemporaries.
Now that we are out of reach of his terrible voice and
his overbearing demeanour, and regarding him thus from
a safe distance, we do not find it so difficult to designate
his capacity for judging in literary matters as often shallow
and pretentious. Most people admit that his view of
Milton is far from a just and worthy one of that sublime
poet. He lacked the balance of mind, the intellectual
equipoise, which is the foundation of the critical faculty.
Consequently, with the lapse of time, his reputation in
this respect will crumble away. Even the obsequious
Boswell has ventured to insinuate that at times Johnson
was so swayed by his feelings that, when making com-
parisons between writers, he very often contradicted his
intellect by his affection ; and, while saying the utmost
he could of the inferior qualities of his personal favourite,
256 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
ignored those which were superior in the person with
whom he was ranged in comparison. Some such treat-
ment as this was meted out to Fielding when he placed
him in juxtaposition with Richardson. Let us reproduce
his criticism. ' Sir,' said he, in that pompous manner in
which we can fancy the burly old Doctor was wont to
settle the affairs of men and mundane concerns generally,
' there is all the difference in the world between characters
of nature and characters of manners ; and there is the
difference between the characters of Fielding and those
of Richardson. Characters of manners are very enter-
taining ; but they are to be understood by a more super-
ficial observer than characters of nature, when a man
must dive into the recesses of the human heart.' There
is very little in this beyond saying that there is a great
deal of difference between things which differ. Yet it is
the kind of criticism which bears a deceptive sound with
it, and acquires a reputation far in excess of its value, as
being an expression of great apparent profundity. We
shall hope to show that in his attribution of the one
method to Fielding and the other to Richardson, Dr.
Johnson came to an erroneous conclusion. For the pre-
sent his observations lend some force to what has gone
before, and it is an undoubted fact that the weakness of
Fielding's moral character had much to do with Johnson's
HENRY FIELDING. 257
estimate of him. The formidable lexicographer was of
that class of men who are almost prepared to find fault
with the sun because of the spots upon his surface.
Horace Walpole was another of the critics who
appear to have been either blinded by envy or unable to
detect the effects of true genius, for we find that he was
amongst the earliest detractors of Fielding a prominent
member of the school of depreciators which endeavoured
to humble him in the eyes of his contemporaries. It is
pleasant, however, to think that some who bear great
names have expressed the most unqualified admiration
for the novels of our author, and the opinion of one
master mind outweighs that of a hundred Walpoles.
Byron gave it as his belief that ' Fielding was the prose
Homer of human nature ; ' the far-seeing Goethe was
delighted with his art ; and Gibbon demonstrated his
literary sagacity by the following eloquent eulogium :
' Our immortal Fielding was of the younger branch of
the Earls of Denbigh, who drew their origin from the
Counts of Hapsburgh, the lineal descendants of Eltrico,
in the seventh century Dukes of Alsace. Far different
have been the fortunes of the English and German
divisions of the family of Hapsburgh ; the former, the
knights and sheriffs of Leicestershire, have slowly risen
to the dignity of a peerage ; the latter, the Emperors of
s
258 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Germany and Kings of Spain, have threatened the
liberties of the Old, and invaded the treasures of the
New World. The successors of Charles V. may disdain
their brethren of England ; but the romance of " Tom
Jones," that exquisite picture of human manners, will
outlive the palace of the Escurial, and the Imperial
Eagle of Austria,' Ornate as is Gibbon's language, it yet
contains a judgment upon Fielding which has been in
gradual process of verification since the words were
written. Most of those who have dispassionately con-
sidered Fielding's works, and compared them with the
works of his contemporaries and successors, will arrive
at a conclusion much nearer to that expressed by Gibbon
than that of the detractor, Horace Walpole. Of course,
an argument which we have previously used for another
purpose, may possibly be inverted and turned against
ourselves. It may be replied that after all criticism is
only the opinion of one man, though it is often acted
upon by the multitude : and that judgments upon
literary works attain an inordinate influence when de-
livered by individuals of acknowledged reputation.
Supposing this were to some extent true, every single
reader has the opportunity of righting the matter so far
as he is personally concerned. But what we do find
valuable about the art of criticism, notwithstanding its
HENRY FIELDING. 259
numerous and manifest imperfections, is this, that it not
unfrequently results in the deposition of much that is
unworthy, and in the exaltation of some works which
have been threatened with an undeserved obscurity. The
critic is really nothing more than a leader of men ; he is
supposed to have the capacity of leading in the right
way, and when it is found that there is no light in him,
and he is incapable of perceiving eternal Truth, we should
withdraw ourselves from his guidance. We say, then,
that while it is-necessary for a man's self-culture and in-
tellectual independence that he should not accept off-hand
the opinions of any critic, however eminent, in the bulk
and without scrutiny, yet when judgments come to us
stamped with the names of those who have devoted
themselves to the art of criticism, they should at any
rate receive candid, if searching, investigation. The
destruction of the empiricism of the critic need not
involve the destruction of the eclecticism of the art. It
must come to us as a friendly guide, and not as a
tyrant. Our own opinion of Fielding stands very little
short of the most eulogistic which has been expressed
concerning him ; but we trust we have arrived at it out
of no slavish regard for other minds.
A glance at the novelist's life is almost a necessity,
for it elucidates many points in connection with his
s 2
260 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
works which would otherwise be obscure. There has
probably been no instance where the impress of the
author's character has been more perceptible upon his
writings than that of Fielding. Some of his novels con-
fessedly contain passages from his own life, with very
little variation of detail. It will have been perceived
by the quotation from Gibbon that Fielding was of
illustrious descent, but the wealth of the family must
have flowed into another channel, for he got none or
little of it He was born on April 22, 1707, at Sharpham
Park, near Glastonbury. His father was a distinguished
soldier, having served with Marlborough at Blenheim,
and at length obtained the rank of Lieutenant-General.
Besides being grandson of an Earl of Denbigh, this
warrior was related to other noble families. The mother
of Fielding was a daughter of Judge Gold, one of whose
immediate descendants was also a baron of the Ex-
chequer. Posterity may thus rest satisfied with the
novelist's birth. Fielding, however, was not the only
one of his family who appears to have been talented in
literature. One of his sisters wrote a romance entitled
' David Simple/ and was also the author of numerous
letters, which, with the story, earned the encomiums of
her brother. We cannot, of course, now say to what
extent she may have been indebted to him in regard to
HENRY FIELDING. 261
these compositions. There is every reason to believe
that he was most accessible to advice and sympathy,
while his affection for his relatives was deep and sincere.
This in addition to a warm affection for children is
one of the redeeming traits in a character that was sub-
sequently marred by many imperfections. Having re-
ceived the earlier part of his education at home, from the
Rev. Mr. Oliver, his private tutor who is supposed to
have been laid under contribution as the original of
Parson Trulliber Fielding was sent to Eton, where he
became intimate with Fox, Lord Lyttelton, Pitt, and
others, who afterwards acquired celebrity with himself,
and at various crises in his history sustained towards him
the part of real friendship. Unlike many literary men,
whose scholastic career has been rather a fiasco than
otherwise, Fielding was most successful in his acquisition
of knowledge, and when only sixteen years of age was
acknowledged by his masters to possess a very sound
acquaintance with all the leading Greek and Latin
writers. Traces of this linguistic proficiency are again and
again beheld in his novels. From Eton he went to the
University of Leyden, where he immediately entered
upon still wider and more liberal studies ; but at the
threshold of his life the demon of misfortune which
seems to have dogged his footsteps all through his
262 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
career found him out. His university career closed
prematurely, for his father, General Fielding, had married
again, and having now two large families to keep out of
a small income, discovered that his original intention
with regard to his son must be abandoned. This could
not have been a pleasant intimation to a youth of twenty,
who had just begun to feel the expansion of his faculties,
and doubtless to be conscious that his future * might
copy his fair past ' as regards the accumulation of the
stores of knowledge. Whatever laxity of mind overtook
him in after life, the earlier years of Fielding show him
to have been enamoured of learning, and in nowise
averse to its routine. His spirit was keen and eager,
and though at twenty years of age he was somewhat
given to pleasure, he at the same time was always
desirous to excel, and never allowed his recreations and
amusements to bar his intellectual progress.
Undismayed, however, by this rebuff of fortune,
Fielding returned to London with comparatively little
depression of spirits, and even this entirely cleared off
as soon as he began to mingle in the society of the
metropolis. It was here, as we shall presently see, that
greater dangers afterwards attended him, which he was
less able to withstand than the assaults of adversity.
Fielding was especially distinguished for all those gifts
HENRY FIELDING. 263
which make a man the darling of the circle in which he
moves : and accordingly we learn that in a very few
months after his settlement in London he was an esta-
blished favourite of its great literary and dramatic lions,
Lyttelton and Garrick amongst the number. Under the
auspices of the latter he speedily commenced writing
for the stage, and at the age of twenty, as Mr. Roscoe
tells us in his excellent life of the novelist, produced his
first comedy of ' Love in several Masques.' We shall
postpone what comments we have to make upon this and
Fielding's other works till the close of our remarks on
his personal history. Necessity compelled him to turn
to the writing of comedies, for though he was supposed
to be enjoying an allowance of some 200/. per annum,
he made a joke about this income to the effect that it
was a sum which really anybody might pay who would
At this juncture some of our most brilliant wits were
writing for the stage, so that the young author might be
pardoned for the degree of nervousness he felt on entering
upon the same career. Indeed, although his genius was
not naturally that of the dramatist, the probability is
that what aptitude he really possessed for it was some-
what cramped by the circumstances in which he was
placed, and the diffidence with which he undertook a
profession that at the time enjoyed two of its keenest and
264 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
wittiest ornaments. It appears, nevertheless, that the
comedy already mentioned, and his second one of ' The
Temple Beau,' were well received, though his success
was by no means proportioned to his increasing em-
barrassments. That his efforts at comedy were well
appreciated is testified to by Lord Lyttelton's assertion,
when some one was alluding to the wits of the age, that
' Harry Fielding had more wit and humour than all the
persons they had been speaking of put together.' This
language seems to have been concurred in by others
who were continually looking out for some new thing in
that age of wit and humour. Fielding must have worked
with great rapidity, for during the nine seasons in which
he wrote for the stage, and before he attained his
thirtieth year, he had written no fewer than eighteen
pieces, reckoning both plays and farces.
It was in the midst of his unsatisfactory career in
connection with the stage unsatisfactory because of its
restlessness and its recklessness that an event occurred
which promised to change the whole tenor of his life for
ever ; and had Fielding been as strong in his will as he
was in the perception of what is right, we should now
probably have been able to write him in different
characters. In his twenty-seventh year he fell in love
with a young lady named Cradock, residing at Salisbury.
HENRY FIELDING. 265
She was possessed of both beauty and accomplishments,
but her fortune was small. Fielding, however, never
hesitated in the pursuit of an object wherein his heart
was deeply enlisted, and accordingly he married Miss
Cradock with her small fortune of fifteen hundred
pounds. The old, old passion had thus again its good
old way. Shortly after his marriage his mother died, and
Fielding became possessed of a little estate in Dorset-
shire, worth some two hundred a year. Hither he bore
his bride, and made many resolves to lead the life of a
model country gentleman. But with all his affection for
his wife and it was genuine and sincere he was led by
the example of others into great extravagance. Setting
up his coach, and living as though he could make one
pound do duty for a hundred, it can evoke no surprise
that at the end of three years he discovered all his
patrimony to be gone, and found himself faced by the
terrible spectre of absolute poverty which he himself had
raised. It is held by many that genius should never be
tried by the ordinary standpoints of thrift and virtue.
This is a position to which we can give no kind of coun-
tenance ; but what we may look at with regard to
Fielding, as some mitigation for his conduct at this
period, are those social qualities for which he was so
famous. Though they ultimately proved his pecuniary
266 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
ruin, they were marked by a generosity which cannot but
beget in us a pity for the man himself. The delights of
society were more than he could bear ; he entered into
them with a zest which completely overmastered his
aplomb, and for the time being made him their slave.
So far this was unquestionably bad ; but his case must
not be confounded with that of the essentially vicious,
with the man who never had Fielding's lofty appreciation
for the good, and never even felt the most spasmodic
striving after an ideal. To the one we can extend our
unfeigned sympathy, to the other only our unmitigated
abhorrence. As the sequel to the difficulties which
overtook Fielding, he was compelled to resume the study
of the law, which he had at one time hoped to abandon
for ever. Entering himself at the age of thirty as a
student of the Inner Temple, he at once began to work
with a will, in order to recover himself from his embar-
rassments. His devotion to his studies was most
praiseworthy, and, as he had great natural shrewdness,
there is every reason to believe that in the legal profession
he would have been most successful. But one cause or
another continually interrupted him, and whatever he
undertook through life seems to have met with a pre-
mature ending. For his failure, however, ultimately to earn
distinction at the bar, he was himself in the first instance
HENRY FIELDING. 267
responsible. He was not only called, but assiduously
went the Western circuit for two or three years, though
briefs appear to have been very scanty with him. Sud-
denly, and in consequence of an intimation that he
proposed issuing a work upon law, his practice increased
immensely, but only, we are told, to decline again as
rapidly. Meanwhile physical retribution began to
overtake him for the convivial years he had spent in
London society ; he was seized with gout, in addition to
which, his constitution was much weakened and
enfeebled ; though in justice it must be said that late
hours of study, with literary work executed under great
pressure, acted as additional causes in the general
break-up of his system. The upshot of it all was that
after ceasing the active exercise of his profession, and
writing two large volumes (a ' Digest of the Statutes at
Large '), which remained for many years unpublished, he
finally quitted the bar, and returned to literary pursuits.
As might be expected from the nature of his talents, he
contributed for a time most successfully to periodical
literature. But a period of great distress quickly came
upon him. With failing health, which interfered some-
what with the operations of his brilliant intellect, his
mind was still racked with the consciousness that his wife
and family were entirely dependent upon his exertions.
268 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Heroic he undoubtedly was under difficulties, but there
are some odds against which men cannot possibly
contend. Note, nevertheless, how the true spirit of the
man shone through all the darkness which surrounded
him at this trying moment. His biographers, one and
all, bear testimony to the native strength of his mind.
We are assured that ' when under the most discouraging
circumstances the loss of comparative fortune, of health,
of the fruits of years of successful toil ; his body lacerated
by the acutest pains, and with a family looking up to
him for immediate support he was still capable, with a
degree of fortitude almost unexampled, to produce, as it
were, extempore, a play, a farce, a pamphlet, or a news-
paper. Nay, like Cervantes, \vhom he most resembled
both in wit and genius, he could jest upon his mis-
fortunes, and make his own sufferings a source of
entertainment to the rest of the world.' He did, in fact,
at this precise period, and in the darkest hour of his
misery, indite a rhyming letter to Sir Robert Walpole,
with himself and his position for its subject ; which is
full of the most humourous allusions. One cannot help
thinking, while reading this incident, of the much later
humourist of our own time, Hood, whose experience was
almost its counterpart, with the exception of the
difference in the cause of Hood's suffering, a naturally
HENRY FIELDING. 269
frail constitution being the sole reason for his bodily
decay. Fielding was now writing because, as he ex-
pressed it, ' he had no choice but to be a hackney writer
or a hackney coachman.' This was the man who had
been the pride of London fashionables, who had doubt-
less kept a hundred tables in a roar, and whose very
enjoyment of life for its own sake was so keen as to
cause Lady Mary Wortley Montagu (his second cousin)
to say in comparing him with Steele, that ' he ought to
go on living for ever.' When writing for the stage,
Fielding was frequently obliged to pass off work which
did not satisfy his critical judgment. For this he was
now and then remonstrated with by Garrick, and he once
replied that the public were too stupid to find out where
he failed. The consensus of the pit, however, is tolerably
keen, and when the audience began on this occasion to
hiss the weak part of the comedy Fielding was astonished,
exclaiming, ' They have found it out, have they ? ' An
anecdote characteristic both of the man and his times
is told of the novelist which affords a clue to some of his
pecuniary difficulties, though it is a credit to his gene-
rosity. It appears that some parochial taxes had long
remained unpaid by Fielding, a fact which need not
greatly surprise us. At length the collector as tax-
collectors always will became rather threatening in his
270 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
aspect, and Fielding went off to Dr. Johnson, that friend-
in-need of the impecunious, to obtain the necessary sum
of money by a literary mortgage. He was returning
when he met with an old college friend who was in even
greater difficulties than himself. He took him to dinner
at a neighbouring tavern, and emptied the contents of
his pockets into his hands. Being informed on returning
home that the collector had twice called on him for the
amount, Fielding replied, ' Friendship has called for the
money, and had it; let the collector call again.' Other
anecdotes could be cited illustrating the bonhomie and
natural benevolence of the novelist's character.
It was during the period in which Fielding was most
busily employed upon his literary ventures that he
married a second time (having lost a few years before
the lady to whom it has been seen he was devotedly
attached) ; and we now find him bending to his work
with redoubled energy. But all his assiduity was in
vain, and he was compelled to announce with regret that
he could no longer continue the publication of 'The
Covent Garden Journal ' a paper he was then editing.
The mental and physical strain had been too severe, and
there were now added to his other ailments the alarming
symptoms of dropsy. The only hope held out by his
physician for the prolongation of his life was that he
HENRY FIELDING. 271
should go abroad ; and this, upon the earnest solici-
tations of his friends, Fielding consented to do. Por-
tugal having been recommended, he tore himself from his
wife and children, and set sail for Lisbon on June 26,
I754-
At this juncture, noting that Fielding makes refe-
rences to the matter in the introduction to his ' Voyage/
we may allude to him in another capacity, and one
in which the liteiary man has seldom an opportunity of
exhibiting himself. In 1748 he had been appointed
Justice of the Peace for Westminster and Middlesex, an
office which, as we learn, was then paid by fees, and was
very laborious, without being particularly reputable. As
affording some idea of the nature of the work which fell
to the accomplished Justice, we may recapitulate certain
facts narrated by himself. While preparing for a journey
to Bath, which it was hoped would result in his resto-
ration to health, there was placed upon his shoulders no
enviable piece of work. When nigh fatigued to death by
reason of several long examinations relating to five
different murders committed by gangs of street robbers,
he received a message from the Duke of Newcastle to
wait upon him the next morning upon business of great
importance. Though in the utmost distress he attended,
and found that what was desired of him was a statement
272 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
of the best plan he could devise for the suppression of
robberies and murders in the streets, offences which had
become alarmingly common. Fielding submitted a plan
that was highly approved of by the Duke, who promised
to lay it before the Privy Council. All the terms of the
proposal were complied with, one of the principal being
the depositing of 6oo/. in its author's hands. At this
small pecuniary charge he undertook to demolish the
gangs complained of, and also to put civil order in such
a state of security that it should be thenceforth impossible
for these gangs to enrol themselves in bodies and pursue
their nefarious occupations. It is interesting to note, as
demonstrating Fielding's executive ability in his new
post, that in a few weeks the whole gang of cut-throats
was entirely dispersed. But the occupation of Justice
was anything save a pleasant one, while its remuneration
was paltry in the extreme. Fielding himself says that by
refusing to make the most of his position, by composing
instead of inflaming the quarrels of porters and beggars,
by not plundering the public or the poor, and by re-
fusing to take a shilling from a man who would most
undoubtedly not have had another left, he had reduced
' an income of about 5oo/. a year of the dirtiest money
upon earth to little more than 3oo/.,' a considerable
portion of which remained with his clerk. It was
HENRY FIELDING. 273
acknowledged on all hands that Fielding made an
excellent justice, and it is moreover affirmed that his
charge to the grand jury, delivered at Westminster on
June 29, 1749, is to be regarded, for that time, as a very
able and valuable state paper. It was most lucid and
searching, as were certain legal investigations which he
subsequently made. Furthermore, it may be noted that
in a ' Proposal for the Maintenance of the Poor,' of
which he was the author, Fielding was the first to make
the recommendation of a county workhouse, in which
the different objects of industry and reformation might
be united. The paper also contained numerous sug-
gestions creditable to Fielding's magisterial sagacity,
some of which have since been carried into effect. Alto-
gether he appears to have justified the high eulogium
passed upon him in the capacity of Justice of the Peace.
The journey to Lisbon was of no avail for the
novelist; his poor, shattered constitution had already
failed beyond hope of recovery ; in fact, it is stated that
he was a dying man when he reached the port. He
lingered, however, for two months after his arrival, in
great suffering, and at length died in the Portuguese
capital on October 8, 1754, being then only in his forty-
eighth year. It is not too much to say that in that
brief span of life Fielding had exhausted both the mental
274 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
and physical energy of the seventy years' limit allotted
to humanity ; and when we consider the wearing and
excited existence he led in the metropolis, it is almost
marvellous that he should have been able to accomplish
so much intellectual labour. There is something
touching in the fate which compels a man whose genius
was so native to the soil of England, to die in a foreign
land, away not only from those he loved, but from the
scene of his literary triumphs. The last tribute of
respect paid to the novelist emanated from the Chevalier
de Meyrionnet, French Consul at Lisbon, who not only
undertook his interment, but followed his remains to the
grave, and celebrated the talents of the deceased in an
epitaph. The people of the English Factory in the city
also erected a monument to him. In Fielding's absence
from England, he was not forgotten by his friend Mr.
Allen, who, after his death, educated his children, and
bestowed pensions both upon them and their widowed
mother. This Mr-. Allen was the original of one of
Fielding's best and most satisfactory characters.
The title of honour which we have accorded to our
author at the outset may seem to need some justification
when it is remembered that De Foe and Richardson were
writers at and before the same period, and had produced
novels anterior to those of Fielding. De Foe, however,
HENRY FIELDING. 275
can scarcely be treated as the ordinary novelist, or put
into competition with the race of writers of fiction : he
was rather the fierce polemic and satiric author. In the
fictitious element he was, of course, remarkably strong ;
his art was undoubtedly good, but it was the art of the
inventor, and not the narrator. Crusoe was a real
creation, but not in the same sense as Tom Jones. - He
was a greater effort of the imagination, and excites the
faculty of wonder in us accordingly to a greater degree ;
but while Tom Jones was not a being of such strange
singularity as Crusoe, he became so realisable to the rest
of humanity that his conception must be deemed more
admirable from the novelist's point of view. Then,
again, De Foe seems to let it be understood, from the
general drift of his writings, that he meant them to have
a personal interest, that they were to be saturated by his
own individuality, that his scorn, his anger, his sorrow,
were to shine through them. His energy, his irrepressi-
bility, his misery, all combined to make him one of the
strongest writers of his age ; but he must yield the palm
to Fielding in the art of novel writing. The latter had
individuality too, but it was individuality of a higher
stamp than De Foe's. It selected human beings not from
the imagination, but from the species itself, and the
types are as unmistakably real, and more true, though
T 2
276 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
not so astounding in conception to the general con-
sciousness.
With regard to Richardson, while, as we have said,
it was the fashion at one time to extol him as the
superior of Fielding, this is a position which has now
been abandoned by the best critics. The man in
possession has necessarily always the advantage of the
man who is desirous to succeed him, and Fielding having
written one novel in imitation of his predecessor, had to
struggle for some time against that fact, which was
continually hurled against him. Richardson was evi-
dently a man of high moral principle ; indeed, he always
strikes us as a perfect compendium of innocence and the
virtues. We are willing not to see in him what others
have seen, merely the priggish moralist, but he comes
terribly near earning that character. Yet let us not be
unjust to him. His ' Pamela ' is a very original work,
and its author deserves no small meed of praise for
daring to make it a pure one in an age so strikingly
celebrated for vice. But the fact that Richardson com-
menced to write at fifty years of age, precludes the idea
of his having possessed lofty creative genius : talent may
slumber, as in his case, but genius never. In some
respects, ' Clarissa ' is a stronger novel than the one
which preceded it, but here again it is difficult to avoid
HENRY FIELDING. 277
the idea that we are in church, listening to the homilies
of the clergyman. The spiritual psychologist is at work
again ; he is flinging his code of morals at us on every
page. We could admire the strength of his virtuous
characters without the endless panegyrics upon morals to
which we are treated, but we implore in vain. The
strings of conscience were what Richardson desired to
lay hold upon, and to do this he thought it necessary to
follow both virtue and vice from their very inception, and
to write, as it were, their autobiography. How powerfully
he has done this let his characters of Clarissa and Love-
lace testify. But the permanent impression remaining is
that, in spite of his acknowledged power and Puritanical
tendencies, he is not one who loves his fellow-men so
much as one who would wish to see them made better
by the rigid exercise of those virtues to the exposition of
which he has devoted his talents. Courage, talent,
purity, all these Richardson exhibits, but little genius.
How greatly dissimilar to him was Fielding ! In-
heriting the frailties of humanity, and feeling himself
bound up with its joys and sorrows, he was gifted with a
mind incredibly rich in resource. Richardson had some
of the weaker elements of woman's nature mingled with
his own, but Fielding had its real tenderness, its com-
passion. Tripped up repeatedly by his follies, his
278 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
nature never hardened ; he was the same genial spirit as
ever. Betwixt the chariot of excess and the stool of
repentance a great portion of his time seems to have
been passed. He had the voice of mirth for those who
wished to rejoice, and the tears of sympathy for those
who were called upon to suffer. He flung no sermons
at the head of men and women overtaken in their sins,
though he never wrote one book wherein he failed to let
it be gathered that he honoured virtue and scourged
vice. He was not the kind of man to be the favourite of
Richardson. More magnanimous than the latter, though
not so severe in his morality, his knowledge of humanity
was at once wider and deeper, and he could gauge it to
its greatest depths. His invention and his naturalness
were far superior to those of Richardson. His mind was
more plastic, his wit keener, his intellect altogether of
a superior order. He had, in one word, what Richard-
son lacked, genius. In his boyhood the marvellous gift
began to develop itself, and in after years it achieved its
greatest results with the apparent ease by which the
operations of genius are often attended. In Richardson
there burned the lambent flame which neither surprises
nor destroys; in Fielding there was the veritable light-
ning of soul. These, then, are some of the reasons why
we have assigned to Fielding the right to be considered
HENRY FIELDING. 279
our first great novelist : but others will be apparent as we
proceed.
It is fair to assume that, to a very large extent, those
works which attain the widest repute must be national
in their character that is, must bear an unmistakable
impress of the national genius upon them. See how that
is borne out : Shakspeare, Bunyan, and Fielding in
England, Goethe in Germany, Voltaire in France, have
each produced individual works in their various
languages which have acquired world-wide celebrity.
And are not all those works imbued with national
characteristics ? Do we not find the strength, and at the
same time the singular nobility and elasticity of the
English mind, developed in the writings of the three
authors whom we have named ? Are not the speculative
thought and transcendentalism of Germany adequately
embodied in Goethe? Does not Voltaire sum up in
himself the force, the point, the fickleness, and the
scepticism, which lie at the core of the French character?
An English Voltaire, or a French Goethe, is a sheer
impossibility. We feel it to be so in the very nature of
things. And with respect to Fielding, he has taken root
in foreign soil because of his distinctly national character,
and yet, at the same time, cosmopolitan genius, as
genius in its highest form must always be. We have no
280 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
writer to whom we can point who excels Fielding in the
art of setting forth his characters by means of strong,
broad lights and shadows. The drawing is masterly and
accurate. And nothing deters him from telling the whole
truth. He is full of a sublime candour. His narrative
is no mere record of events, but personal history of the
most effective description. Whoever comes in the way
of his pencil must submit to the most rigorous and un-
flinching representation. However great, rich, or power-
ful, he will be drawn exactly as he is himself, the
veritable man, or, as Cromwell wished to be limned, with
the warts on his face. We are getting, through these
observations, to the secret of the success of 'Tom Jones.'
It is marked by the characteristics to which we have
been referring, and all the world has acknowledged the
truthfulness of the work. Where is the novel in exist-
ence which has reached so many corners of society ?
As it is considered, and with reason, its author's
masterpiece, we may well devote some space to its
examination. Notwithstanding its vast popularity, it is
regarded in two lights by opposing classes of readers.
The first, those who are overcome by its wonderful
power, have no eye for blemishes; the second, those
who are afraid of seeing plain truths stated in a plain
way, and men and women represented with their masks
HENRY FIELDING. 281
off, have nothing for it but terms of reproach, on the
ground of what they call its indecency. With the excep-
tion of certain phrases which are redolent of the period
at which Fielding wrote, it is one of the purest books in
our literature. Pure, we affirm, in its general tendency ;
and surely that is the way in which any work should be
regarded. If we adopt the objectionable principle of
selecting words and phrases which are obnoxious to the
sensitive ear, and from them forming an adverse opinion,
what will become of some of the finest effusions of
Chaucer and Shakspeare, whom these same purists
doubtless cherish most closely? We are inclined to
agree with the distinguished critic who asserted that the
man who read ' Tom Jones ' and declared it an
essentially evil book, must be already corrupt. Of
course, to the evil there is a ministry of evil, which can
find sustenance everywhere, degrading even good so that
it may become food for their debased natures. But to a
really healthy nature we can conceive no ill accruing
from an acquaintance with this novel. It is but fair,
however, in a matter upon which there is some difference
of opinion, to hear the author himself speak, before
delivering judgment. In dedicating 'Tom Jones' to
Lord Lyttelton, Fielding trusts that he will find in it
nothing whatever that is prejudicial to religion and
282 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
virtue ; nothing inconsistent with the strictest rules of
decency, or which could offend the chastest eye. It was
obvious that the author had little fear that he would be
charged with indecency, and he goes on to declare that
goodness and innocence had been his sincere endeavour
in writing the history. Further, besides painting virtue
in the best colours at his command, he was anxious to
convince men that their true interests lay in the pursuit
of her. What more exalted end could an author have
in his work than this ? and we are bound to affirm that,
read in the right spirit, the novel has fulfilled its writer's
original intentions. He has no scruple in laughing men
out of their follies and meannesses, for he is a satirist as
well as a romancist. But throughout the work he has
done nothing contrary to the rules which a great artist is
bound to follow. The book is indeed full of overwhelm-
ing excellences in this respect of art. Look how each
character is painted in ! There is no scamping with the
humblest individual honoured by reproduction on the
canvas. The same truthfulness to life which we find in
the portraits of Mr. Allworthy and Sophia Western we
find in the depiction of a maid or a man-servant at an
inn. With the enthusiasm which is as necessary to art
as is the air we breathe to humanity, the artist labours at
the minutest details till he brings all to perfection. Then
HENRY FIELDING. 283
the story appears rounded and complete, with no patch-
work to mar its artistic effect. Dr. Warburton gave
expression to our novelist's merits in this regard
excellently when he said : ' Monsieur de Marivaux in
France, and Mr. Fielding in England, stand the fore-
most among those who have given a faithful and chaste
copy of life and manners ; and by enriching their
romance with the best part of the comic art, may be said
to have brought it to perfection/
M. Taine, whose criticism may too often be described
as the sound of ' a rushing mighty wind,' never exhibited
his faults and his excellences more strikingly than he
does in his observations upon Fielding. Nearly always
vigorous, and endowed with a jerky, but oftentimes an
admirably epigrammatic, force, the French critic is now
and then erratic in his judgments. His eye travels faster
than his mind. He perceives, and writes what he
perceives before he has given full time for reflection.
For instance, he says in describing Fielding : ' You are
only aware of the impetuosity of the senses, the up-
welling of the blood, the effusion of tenderness, but not
of the nervous exaltation and poetic rapture. Man, such
as you conceive him, is a good buffalo ; and perhaps he
is the hero required by a people which is itself called
John Bull.' This is a smart use of a synonym, but one
284 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
incorrect both as regards what the individual novelist
supplies, and what the nation demands. The whole
gist of M. Taine's complaint against Fielding is that he
wants refinement. ' In this abundant harvest with which
you fill your arms, you have forgotten the flowers.' But
Fielding is quite as refined as Cervantes, to whom the
critic awards the possession of that excellence. Let
anyone who wishes to be convinced that Fielding
possesses refinement read the chapter in * Tom Jones '
which gives a description of Sophia, There will be found
both the poetry and the grace which M. Taine desires.
But the critic has misrepresented Fielding in other
respects. Not only has he declared the author to be
without natural refinement, but he has denied this to all
his characters. After the lapse of more than a hundred
years, the character of Sophia Western stands forth one
of the purest, sweetest, and most attractive in literature.
We seem to see the very bloom of health upon her
cheek, a bloom only equalled by the perfections of her
mind not so much intellectual perfections simply as
those other virtues and charms which make woman the
idol of man. Compare this character with those which
crowd too many of the novels of the present day. How
absurd are the latter as living representations, and stiff
as wooden puppets in the hands of their literary parents !
HENRY FIELDING. 285
Tinged with false sentiments, lacking in real femininity,
they form as great a contrast as could be imagined to the
true woman we find depicted in Sophia Western :
1 Her pure and eloquent blood
Spoke in her cheeks, and so distinctly wrought,
That one might almost say her body thought.'
This dainty conceit of Dr. Donne's exactly expresses the
most perfect heroine drawn by Fielding. In Jones him-
self, too, we may discover some traces of that refinement
which lifts a man out of the merely animal category.
The namby-pamby element was entirely absent from him,
and he was in the habit of calling a spade a spade a
habit much in vogue at the time in which his life was
fixed. We should join in the verdict delivered by Mr.
Airworthy, after he had carefully studied Jones's character,
viz., 'in balancing his faults with his perfections, the
latter seemed rather to preponderate. 5 It must not be
forgotten that Fielding never intended to depict a per-
fect hero ; he would have shuddered at the thought.
Whilst he ( would nothing extenuate, or set down aught
in malice,' he at the same time never failed to place in
full relief with not a shadow less or more than they
deserved all the characters which he took upon him-
self to delineate. Remembering this, we feel at once
how admirably he fulfilled his task in the picture of
286 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Western, the jolly, rollicking squire. Had he softened
in any degree the violence, prejudice, passion, and
boisterousness attaching to this man, its value as a
faithful picture of a Somersetshire squire would have
been utterly destroyed. He is no worse than Falstaff, and
why should we yield to the one conception the merit we
deny to the other ? But the world has within its keeping
all characters which have been truly realised, and will
not let them die. There is much of the bull in Western's
constitution ; and it is meant that there should be, for
he is typical. Fielding's power has lain principally in
supplying types. Other portraits are drawn in 'Tom
Jones ' (besides those we have named) with remarkable
skill. There is Mr. Allworthy, upon whom the author
has laboured with affectionate zeal, and who appears as
one of the most finished specimens of his class of
humanity. He has the generous heart which prompts to
benevolent deeds, and the ready hand to carry out what
that heart dictates. He is himself a strong protest
against the assertion that Fielding takes no thought of
virtue as regards its inculcation upon others, for one
instinctively feels that he is purposed by the author to be
represented as a being worthy of imitation. Precisely
the opposite lesson is intended to be taught by the
portrait of Blifil. The villainy of this character is
HENRY FIELDING. 287
singularly striking, and when the book is closed, the
reader will admit that he has followed the fortunes of but
few beings who have been rendered more despicable in
his eyes. This unredeemed scoundrel, whose meanness
is matched only by his cowardice, is flayed alive accord-
ing to his deserts. And yet the novelist has exercised
no prejudice in the matter ; he has simply turned tbe
heart inside out, and made its fetid character apparent
to the world. There is no artistic bungling, because
there has been no attempt to tamper with the character.
Fielding has allowed knavery to show itself, just as on
the same page he keeps open the way for innocence and
virtue.
The genius of Fielding was not strongly developed
until the appearance of ' Joseph Andrews, 5 which, as is
well known, preceded the publication of ' Tom Jones.'
Before the production of his first novel, the talents of
this great wit and humourist seem to have been devoted
to the hurried writing of brilliant dramatic and other
pieces, which had in them but little positive assurance of
a lasting fame. One can well understand, however,
what a flutter the launching of ' Joseph Andrews ; must
have caused in London society. The authpr's leading
idea was to write a story in imitation of the style and
manners of Cervantes ; and it was his intention therein
288 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
to set forth the folly of affectation, which he regarded as
the only true source of the ridiculous. Great vices, he
considered, were the proper objects of detestation, and
smaller faults of pity ; but affectation held its own place
aloof from both. Referring to the scope of his work, he
has the following remarks : ' Perhaps it may be objected
to me that I have, against my own rules, introduced
vices, and of a very black kind, into this work. To
which I shall answer : first, that it is very difficult to
pursue a series of human actions, and keep clear from
them. Secondly, that the vices to be found here are
rather the accidental consequences of some human
frailty or foible, than causes habitually existing in the
mind. Thirdly, that they are never set forth as the
objects of ridicule, but detestation. Fourthly, that they
are never the principal figure at that time on the scene ;
and, lastly, they never produce the intended evil.' All
which is very sound and true, but it availed him nothing;
for did not the leading characters of his novel imme-
diately strike people as strong and pronounced caricatures
of those in the novel by Richardson which had just been
all the rage ? It was in vain for him to assert that he
meant to vilify or asperse no one, or to copy characters
hitherto conceived, with the addition of considerable
burlesque colouring. Richardson himself, on reading
HENRY FIELDING. 289
through the work, felt what he described as its covert
satire keenly, and, it is said, never forgave Fielding for
this novel. The closing portion of it was held to put the
question of satiric aim beyond doubt, when Fielding
makes the lady conduct herself in such a manner that, as
one critic observes, ' she enacts the beggar on horseback
in a very superior manner.' Yet, making allowance for
whatever element of parody there may be in it, ' Joseph
Andrews ' is a remarkable book for the individuality of
its characters. We might search in vain for a more
worthy or more vividly-drawn personage than Parson
Adams. His natural goodness and simplicity of heart
endear him to us beyond measure, and must mitigate our
condemnation of his share in certain scenes which are
scarcely seemly to the cloth. This character was
evidently a favourite of Fielding's, and in his plea on
Adams's behalf to his brother-clergymen, for whom, ' when
they are worthy of their sacred order, no man can
possibly have a greater respect/ the author says : ' They
will excuse me, notwithstanding the low adventures in
which he is engaged, that I have made him a clergyman ;
since no office could have given him so many oppor-
tunities of displaying his worthy inclinations.' Of the
originality of Parson Adams there is little to say, for
criticism is disarmed; he is perfect in that respect
u
290 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Many commentators on Fielding have been unable to
discover a resemblance of even the faintest character
between ' Joseph Andrews ' and the immortal work of
Cervantes. But making allowance for the variation in
scenes and incidents, we consider that Fielding's novel
displays a great deal of the breadth of treatment pertain-
ing to the Spanish master. It is somewhat similar in
conception also, being a mock-heroic narrative, and in
it the romance and the apologue are blended in happy
proportions. The spirit of Cervantes has been caught,
while the author has avoided a professed imitation, and
several of the ludicrous catastrophes which occur in the
course of the story give full weight to the assertion that
Fielding had in his mind's eye the author of l Don
Quixote' when he wrote. The humour of Fielding's
history is rich and yet inoffensive ; it possesses not the
slightest tinge of bitterness, and is distinguished by a
remarkable mellowness. Whatever else the work de-
monstrated, or failed to demonstrate, one thing was clear
it predicted the rising of a humourist of the highest
order, and had its authorship been unknown on its first
publication, there was but one man to whom the finger
of society could point as its literary father. Of 'Tom
Jones,' the second novel written by Fielding (taking them
in the order of their appearance), we have already spoken
at length.
HENRY FIELDING. 291
The third novel from this master-mind of fiction is
one to which a peculiar interest attaches. Whilst it is
considered to be, in point of talent, inferior to the others,
it is noteworthy as being a transcript of a portion of
Fielding's family history. We refer to the story of
' Amelia.' Its fault, as a novel, seems to us to lie in the
absence of any supreme interest in the several characters
individually. They are not boldly drawn : and the fact
that the gold was not of so rich a quality as that
previously dug from the same soil, immediately induced
the detractors of Fielding to rejoice over the supposed
decay of his powers. They forgot, in their spite, that
Shakspeare only produced one 'Hamlet,' and that if
Fielding had written no other work but his crowning
novel, that alone had ensured him his place amongst the
gods. But, in truth, while * Amelia ' is not by any means
equal to its predecessors, it exhibits many graces of
style, and its pathos is deep and true. The style is not
so strong nor the humour so ceaseless, so abundant ; but
there are frequent genuine touches of passion in it, and
some scenes of truthful domestic painting. Captain
Booth is a strange mixture of weakness and fidelity : his
character is supposed, and truly, to bear some resemblance
to Fielding's own ; there was the same readiness in both
to fall a victim to their own passions, and the same deep
u 2
292 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
tenderness when they had recovered themselves. Booth
is trustful and devoted, and worships the woman of his
love. ' If I had the world/ he says, ' I was ready to lay
it at my Amelia's feet ; and so, Heaven knows, I would
ten thousand worlds.' He is not the man to inspire
admiration so much as to provoke an affectionate
interest. Herein is one of the failures of the novel : the
hero is not strong enough to occupy the centre. We
expect to do something more with a hero than condole,
laugh, or shed with him an occasional tear. He must
appeal to wider sympathies. He must be greater than
ourselves in some way, no matter what ; but never
beneath or even on a level with us. The same trait of
devotion is very conspicuous in Booth's wife Amelia, who
is supposed to be the representation of Fielding's first
wife. We can partially agree with M. Taine in his
criticism of this character when he says that Amelia is
1 a perfect English wife, an excellent cook,' so devoted
as to pardon her husband for his numerous failings, and
' always looking forward to the accoucheur.' This may
be accepted as true with regard to a great number of the
English wives of that period, though there were many of
a superior calibre, such as we could imagine Sophia
Western might make. Amelia is happy because she is
typical typical of a portion of English wives, but not by
HENRY FIELDING. 293
any means a universal type. The novel in which these
two amiable beings appear may be beautiful, but it lacks
the pith which stronger characters would have given to
it. We have to travel away from these to a subordinate
individual in the story to discover a genuine point of
interest which is a great transgression of one of the
cardinal principles of novel writing. Fielding, neverthe-
less, did not prove by this story that he had written
himself out. It is neither so brilliant nor so incisive as
his other novels, and has no concentration of force or
continuity of plot, and for these reasons it cannot be
expected to take so worthy a position ; but it is without
doubt far above mediocrity.
Incensed by the adulation paid to successful villainy,
Fielding wrote the history of ' Jonathan Wild the Great.'
In his day, more than in our own, perhaps, the world
worshipped at the shrine of success certainly of a lower
order of success nor stayed to enquire too closely into
the cause of any rapid rise of fortune, however dis-
reputably acquired. It is our general rule not to
measure a man by the inherent qualities of good which
he possesses, or by the claim which his genuine acts of
benevolence establish upon us, but by the figure he is
able to make in society, even though that gilded exterior
be a covering for much that is base and contemptible.
294 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
An income of ten thousand a year will always cover a
multitude of sins. Virtue itself has a terrible struggle to
maintain its own against it. And this insane feeling of
adulation of material success was, as we have observed,
carried still further and still lower in Fielding's day. It
went so far as to shed a halo round the head of the man
whose natural place was the felon's cell, provided he
were clever enough to evade the grasp of justice, and
preserve a bold and brilliant outward appearance. This
hollowness in the conditions of society annoyed Fielding
deeply ; he was moved to his innermost depths of
contempt by it ; and in his apology for treating the
subject of the great criminal, Jonathan Wild, he explains
the motives which led to the production of this extra-
ordinary piece of satirical writing. * Without considering
Newgate,' he remarks, ' as no other than human nature
with its mask off, which some very shameful writers have
done a thought which no price should purchase me to
entertain I think we may be excused for suspecting that
the splendid palaces of the great are often no other than
Newgate with the mask on. Nor do I know anything
which can raise an honest man's indignation higher than
that the same morals should be in one place attended
with all imaginary misery and infamy, and in the other
with the highest luxury and honour. Let any impartial
HENRY FIELDING. 295
man in his senses be asked for which of these two places
a composition of cruelty, lust, avarice, rapine, insolence,
hypocrisy, fraud, and treachery, was best fitted, surely his
answer must be certain and immediate. And yet I am
afraid all these ingredients, glossed over with wealth and
a title, have been treated with the highest respect and
veneration in the one, while one or two of them have
been condemned to the gallows in the other.' This, of
course, is the fault of society, which rarely estimates a
man for his intrinsic worth, whatever groove he moves in.
He may be as gigantic a fraud as was ever palmed off
upon the human race, but if he only manages to dazzle
the eyes of those who are beneath him on the ladder,
nothing will be whispered about his peccadilloes. Let
him make one slip, however, and lose his hold, and a
thousand gazers will rejoice in his fall, declaring that
they always knew it would come. It was to help in
destroying, therefore, the bombastic greatness of society,
that Fielding wrote his ' Jonathan Wild.' It is marked
by a singular perception of motives, and a careful dis-
section of those unworthy passions which attain so great
a sway over men. He invariably keeps one leading
point in view, viz., the proper distribution of strict
justice amongst his various characters. The hero, who
flourishes in apparent security before our eyes through
296 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
the course of the narrative, cannot escape his just doom
at the last. On the gallows he fulfils the proper ends of
his being, which was corrupt and unreformable. Field-
ing's position as magistrate undoubtedly furnished him
with many ideas for this history, which he failed not to
make the most of, though as a composition, regarded in
its entirety, it is somewhat deficient. It was written for
a special purpose ; it fulfilled that purpose admirably ;
but beyond that fact, and that it contains much of its
author's sarcastic genius, the fragment is not in any
other aspect very noticeable.
Little has been said at any time of Fielding as a
writer of verse, and yet he appears to have penned a
considerable amount of rhyme in his day. But his verse
is much inferior to his prose, his strength seeming to
evaporate under the influence of rhyme. He has not
the polish or the strength of Swift in this respect ; but he
might have made some figure as a rhymester had he ad-
hered to the Muse. What he has left behind him is
necessarily completely dwarfed by his excellence as a
writer of fiction. It will not be without interest, not-
withstanding, if we glance slightly at his attempts inverse.
In a poem on ' Liberty ' he gives vent to a noble exor-
dium upon the good which she has accomplished for the
human race, and for the progress in arts which we
HENRY FIELDING. 297
owe chiefly to her. Then comes the following apos-
trophe :
' Hail, Liberty ! boon worthy of the skies,
Like fabled Venus fair, like Pallas wise.
Through thee the citizen braves war's alarms,
Though neither bred to tight, nor paid for arms ;
Through thee the laurel crowned the victor's brow,
Who served before his country at the plough ;
Through thee (what most must to thy praise appear)
Proud senates scorn'd not to seek Virtue there. '
In form and conception the poem reminds us some-
thing of Goldsmith, being, however, in parts less pastoral
than he, but having more force. The whole concludes
with the following lines, which will stir an echoing senti-
ment probably in the mind of every reader :
* But thou, great Liberty, keep Britain free,
Nor let men use us as we use the bee ;
Let not base drones upon our honey thrive,
And suffocate the maker in his hive.'
Other poetical effusions by Fielding, while not exhibit-
ing the strength and width of view which we gain in
this poem, show considerable tenderness of feeling and
delicacy of treatment. He has a set of verses ' To
Celia,' supposed to be addressed to the lady whom he
afterwards married, and which he closes thus happily,
after descanting upon the hollowness of the world and
298 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
the sickness of heart which the knowledge of it has pro-
duced in him :
1 Ask you then, Celia, if there be
The thing I love ? My charmer, thee :
Thee more than life, than light adore,
Thou dearest, sweetest creature, more
Than wildest raptures can express,
Than I can tell, or thou canst guess.
Then though I bear a gentle mind,
Let not my hatred of mankind
Wonder within my Celia move,
Since she possesses all I love.'
Other poems could be cited which betray a lively
fancy ; and as a specimen in another vein we may repro-
duce his lines for Butler's Monument. Fielding was
moved to great indignation at the treatment of Butler
by an ungrateful court, and his sarcasm took the follow-
ing form :
' What though alive, neglected and undone,
O let thy spirit triumph in this stone !
No greater honour could men pay thy parts,
For when they give a stone they give their hearts.'
In contrast to Fielding's poems in the didactic and
sentimental vein, we may turn, lastly, to a specimen of
the humourous. When labouring under pecuniary
embarrassments, he addressed an appeal to Sir Robert
Walpole, in which, under a playful guise, he administered
HENRY FIELDING. 299
a rebuke to that great minister for his neglect. In this
rhyming missive the following stanzas occur :
' Great sir, as on each leve'e day
I still attend you still you say
" I'm busy now, to-morrow come ; "
To-morrow, sir, you're not at home ;
So says your porter, and dare I
Give such a man as he the lie ?
In imitation, sir, of you
I keep a mighty leve'e too :
Where my attendants, to their sorrow,
Are bid to come again to-morrow.
To-morrow they return no doubt,
And then, like you, sir, I'm gone out.'
In other verses the poet presses Walpole to assign
him some appointment ; he is not particular what, as will
be gathered from the following cosmopolitan choice
which he gives to the Minister :
' Suppose a Secretary o' this Isle,
Just to be doing with for a while ;
Admiral, gen'ral, judge, or bishop ;
Or I can foreign treaties dish up.
If the good genius of the nation
Should call me to negotiation,
Tuscan and French are in my head,
Latin I write, and Greek I read.
If you should ask, what pleases best ?
To get the most, and do the least.
What fittest for? You know, Pm sure,
I'm fittest for a sine-cure.'
300 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Of Fielding as a dramatist, there is, perhaps, no
necessity to say much ; and what must be said is not of
the most flattering character. His comedies are not so
suggestively indecent as those of Wycherley, but there is
a good deal of actual impurity in them. The license of
the stage, to a large extent, has been pandered to, while
the literary talent displayed is not of so high an order as
that which shines through his novels. One point should
be remembered in connection with these comedies and
farces that they were written under great pressure,
their production having been a matter of urgency with
the author. A good deal of the wit of Fielding is en-
countered, but altogether they are not equal to his fine
intellect. Smart sayings flash from the page now and
then, as in ' Don Quixote in England,' where he remarks
that ' Every woman is a beauty if you will believe her
own glass : and few if you will believe her neighbours'.'
Again : 'All men cannot do all things ; one man gets an
estate by what gets another man a halter ; ' which is a
very acute remark upon the disjointed conditions of
English life. In 'The Modern Husband,' a comedy
whose general scope must be condemned as being
worthy of the worst period of the Restoration, the fol-
lowing reflection occurs : ' Never fear your reputation
while you are rich, for gold in this world covers as many
HENRY FIELDING. 301
sins as charity in the next : so that, get a great deal and
give away a little, and you secure your happiness in both.'
A remark made by Sir Positive Trap in one of Fielding's
comedies seems to have anticipated the conduct of
society in the nineteenth century, or if not of the whole
of our present society, of more of it than we like to
admit, if whispers from its sacred circle are to be
believed : ' I hope to see the time,' said the worthy
knight, ' when a man may carry his daughter to market
with the same lawful authority as any other of his
cattle.' Of all Fielding's dramatic pieces 'Pasquin'
seems deserving of the highest praise, and it touches
pretty freely upon the political corruptions of the times.
Considered in the light of a satire alone it may be pro-
nounced very successful, showing its author as usual at
his best in the unsparing use of the lash. It is of course
difficult to say where the line should be drawn upon the
stage in regard to satire. The power of the press is not
so strong as that of personal ridicule, and it is on record
that the great Chancellor Hyde was ruined at court by
the absurd manner in which he was mimicked in farces
and comedies, an end which never would have happened
to him by mere abstract criticism. Fielding was, upon
occasion, exceedingly free in his use of this weapon of
ridicule ; and however deficient his comedies may be in
302 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
those qualities which are admitted to sustain the drama
upon the boards, there are many passages in them of un-
questioned brilliancy and power. His strong capacity
for parodying the great is demonstrated in more than one
of the comedies ; and it is but just to add the observation
that what is good and virtuous in itself is always exempt
from ridicule. He perceived the moral fitness of things
so clearly that he never transgressed propriety in this re-
spect. Shocked we may occasionally be when he repro-
duces too faithfully the follies and vices of his period,
but never through the whole of his works do we remem-
ber a single sneer at what is good, honest, or noble.
In ' A Journey from this World to the Next ' Fielding
has been the forerunner of a host of works of our own
day, of which the reading public has become unconscion-
ably weary. Undoubtedly the best of these modern
efforts to describe another world is ' Erewhon ; ' but it is
singular to find Fielding, upwards of a hundred years ago,
describing what took place in another sphere, after the
death of the supposed writer of the narrative. It shows
what little originality there is in the matter of great bold
outlines of thought in the world ; and doubtless many
things which we consider new and of great merit in our
own day have been done in ages past, and in much
superior style. We do not mean to imply in any way
HENRY FIELDING. 303
that the work we have named and other similar works
which followed it resemble in detail Fielding's c Journey,'
but simply desire to point out how early the author of
' Tom Jones ' was in the field in this very idea of describ-
ing another world, for which there appears at present to
be an unreasonable mania. His work is both curious
and interesting, and forms excellent occupation for a
quiet hour's literary relaxation.
Authors are measured in various ways ; some are
fitted for the great mass of ordinary readers alone ;
others find their devotees in a few choice intellectual
spirits ; but of few can it be said that they are favourites
of both. When we are able to affirm that this last is
the true position of a writer we have paid him the highest
tribute it is in our power to offer. It means that we are
speaking of lofty genius ; for that is really great which
can satisfy the philosopher and the peasant at the same
moment. * Hamlet ' is the product of such a mind ; so
is the ' Pilgrim's Progress,' and to these books must in-
dubitably be added the masterpiece of Fielding. It
possesses that salt of genius which will arrest dissolution.
Years roll on and only add to the imperishable character
of all such works. What novelist has delighted a greater
number of individuals than Fielding, or satisfied more
with his exquisite delineations of human nature? We
304 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
know what his influence has been over millions of un-
distinguished men ; but look for a moment at the estima-
tion in which he is held by the conspicuous descendants
of his own craft. Dickens always had the most unfeigned
admiration for him, and has described the keen relish
with which he devoured his works as a boy. This love
grew as he grew, and there was no novelist for whom
Dickens cherished such a feeling of respect for his singu-
lar power as Fielding. It is said that he took him for
his model ; but if so he has failed in catching his spirit,
notwithstanding his profound admiration ; for in truth to
us the two methods those of Fielding and Dickens
seem to differ most widely. That is a question, however,
which cannot be discussed here, and we pass it by with
the observation that Fielding's power over Dickens was
unquestionably immense. The same remark applies to
Thackeray, whose genius, far more than that of Dickens,
resembled Fielding's own. ' What/ said the author of
' Vanity Fair/ when speaking of his great predecessor in
fiction, ' an admirable gift of nature it was by which the
author of these tales was endowed, and which enabled
him to fix our interests, to waken our sympathy, to seize
upon our credulity, so that we believe in his people.
What a genius, what a vigour ! What a bright-eyed in-
telligence and observation ! What a wholesome hatred
HENRY FIELDING. 305
for meanness and knavery ! What a vast sympathy ;
what a cheerfulness ; what a manly relish of life ! What
a love of human kind ! What a poet is here, watching,
meditating, brooding, creating ! What multitudes of
truths has the man left behind him ! What generations
he has taught to laugh wisely and fairly ! ' And again,
speaking of his works as a whole ' Time and shower
have very little damaged those. The fashion and orna-
ments are, perhaps, of the architecture of that age j but
the building remains strong and lofty, and of admirable
proportions masterpieces of genius and monuments of
workmanlike skill.' Who is there who cannot subscribe
to this exalted opinion of our author, first given utterance
to in its full boldness and generosity by Gibbon, and
perpetuated by Thackeray ? Whether we regard Field-
ing in the light of an observer of human nature or as a
humourist, he has but few rivals. In the matter of the
combination of both these excellences in the garb of
fiction, we fearlessly reassert that he is entitled to the
position assigned him in the outset. He is at the
head of his race. Other novelists may show a particular
aptitude, he is the one being who has no aptitudes, for
his art is universal. The temple he has reared has no
dwarfed or stunted columns ; it is perfect and symmetri-
x
3 c6 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
cal, and of towering and magnificent dimensions. Years
have not defaced its beauty or shaken its foundations.
Another tribute to those already paid to this great
king of fiction more ephemeral, perhaps, than some,
but as sincere as any is now laid at his feet. Henry
Fielding might have been a better man, but it is impos-
sible not to love him, and to recognise shining through
him that glorious light of genius which grows not dim
with Time, but whose luminous presence is ever with us
to cheer, to reprove, to delight, and to elevate.
ROBERT BUCHANAN
[CONTEMPORARY REVIEW]
ROBERT BUCHANAN.
THAT the present age is unfavourable to the production
of the highest and most permanent forms of poetry, is an
observation which has now become almost trite ; yet it
may be doubted whether, in making it, we have ever
grasped its full weight and significance. What is the
nature, and what the extent, of the opposition offered
by an age of progress to the development of the dra-
matic and epic genius ? In the first place, rapid general
progress means that we exist in an essentially middle-
class era, which is detrimental to any thought that goes
deeper than the slight intellectual operations necessary
to procure material success ; and in the second place,
progress means restless activity, and an utter inability to
secure that calm essential to the conception and comple-
tion of works destined to survive the lapse of centuries.
Such are the positions generally assumed, we believe, in
this matter, and on the first blush they appear to have
very plausible support. Yet upon careful consideration
they must be pronounced untenable. The imperiousness
310 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
of genius will set both at defiance, for in this respect of
times and seasons genius knows no law. It is like the
wind of Heaven ; 'it bloweth where it listeth,' and neither
man nor circumstance can arrest its advancement to
ripeness and perfectibility. The facts of history, also, are
against the propositions we are combating. The times
signalised by the greatest achievements in arts and com-
merce have been those in which we have beheld the great
luminaries of thought, stretching away down from the
flourishing of the oldest poets to the Elizabethan age.
What century in the world's history was not a century of
progress ? and why should we, because the progress differs
in degree and somewhat in kind, arrive at the hasty con-
clusion that the decay of genius is in accord with the
ratio of progress ? Further, observe to what this idea
commits us. It implies, so far as England is concerned,
that the days of her intellectual supremacy are over.
The shopkeeper has come and the poet must depart.
And what is our prospect for the future ? For it must be
remembered that we are but regarded as on the threshold
of progress ; and if the present period is so unfavourable
to the exercise of the poetic faculty in its sublimest
forms, what can we look for in the next, and the next ?
We cannot believe it impossible that even now that
repose could be attained which should leave the Seer
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 311
calm and unmoved amidst the thunder and the roar of
contemporary life.
Whether or not the nineteenth century has produced
a poet of the very first rank may be an open question, to
be judged differently by different minds ; but there can
be no doubt that they are wrong who disparage it in
comparison with the two preceding centuries. Given
the brilliant Pope, the stately Dryden, and the gentle
Cowper, the eighteenth century is still far behind our
own, which has produced its Wordsworth, its Byron, and
its Shelley, not to mention our principal living poets.
Neither can Milton, solitary in his grandeur, weigh down
this latter list of names, and bear off the palm from us in
favour of the seventeenth century. Alone, he is far
greater than any of them Wordsworth most nearly ap-
proaching his altitude perhaps but he shone in the
firmament ' a lonely star.' We have to go back still ano-
ther century to come to that age which not only eclipses
the present but every other in the world's annals for the
splendour of its imaginative literature.
The mode of criticism in vogue tends to discourage
rather than assist the higher development of the poetic
faculty. And in this, to a great extent, criticism but
follows the thought of the age, which is sharp and
shallow, not broad and deep. That which cannot be
312 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
grasped by the nineteenth-century intellect without many
throes of labour, is to be thrown on one side as unsuit-
able, and missing the tendencies of the time. Literature
must be a relaxation, not a study ; the palate must be
tickled, not the whole body made strong. We are in the
transition period. We have had our Shakspeare, and
do not want another; what readers desiderate now is
mosaic-work which shall attract attention and admiration
by its finish. We do not know, but we should imagine
that even the Poet-Laureate must have at times felt
depressed by the inattentiveness, and almost positive
dislike, of the age to what is loftiest in his vocation. In-
sensibly, too, all our authors gradually bow to the in-
fluences of the period, which prove too strong for their
individual feelings and convictions in matters of art in
poetry. It is with the hope of recalling the attention of
oui best writers to the fact that if we proceed in the
same degree of decline which the past thirty years have
witnessed, our poetic literature will have been emasculated,
that we have ventured to offer these somewhat general,
but we believe necessary, observations. Mr. Matthew
Arnold asks, in one of his poems
' What shelter to grow ripe is ours ?
What leisure to grow wise?'
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 313
And then, further on in the same poem, he declares
that-*-
1 Too fast we live, too much are tried,
Too harassed to attain
Wordsworth's sweet calm, or Goethe's wide
And luminous view to gain.'
This is another reiteration of the idea we are desiring to
demolish. It is, in reality, a fallacy. If ever there was
an age when the opportunity was given to write epic
poems this is the one. Since the time that the last
great epic was penned there have been some half-dozen
events, or series of events, in civilised Europe, which
afford scope for the most inspired Seer who could arise.
These events must "naturally suggest themselves to any
person who indulges the most cursory thought as to
the rapid growths and tremendous convulsions which
have occurred in continental empires. And indepen-
dently of this, there is one period of English history
a'one the period of the sublime Milton which seems
to us to contain within it the sources of dramatic and
epic poetry such as can scarcely be found in any other
cycle of this kingdom's existence. Napoleon Buona-
parte, again the great Napoleon will undoubtedly at
some time or other, perhaps two centuries hence, attract
the first genius of the time, who will be enthralled by the
3H POETS AND NOVELISTS.
immensity of his theme in this respect, that it as clearly
marks off the age of the man by his own absorbing and
diastrous eminence as does the life of any other unit of
humanity such past age as may have been overshadowed
by the splendour of his name. There are considerations
which always prevent an immediately contemporary topic
from being made available for epic or dramatic poetry.
But why need this disconcert our living poets, who can
find so many other subjects, not quite contemporary,
which are more suitable for their pens ? Criticism would
not be altogether in vain if it could rouse the race of
our professed Seers from their lethargy. An opportunity
is within their grasp such as seldom falls to the lot of
genius. Partly with a view to estimate the work which
has already been accomplished by one of our Eng-
lish poets, and partly to indicate what he is capable
of attaining, we have selected for some comments
the collective works of one of the youngest of our
present-day singers.
Robert Buchanan has himself given us a sketch of
his own life, and has supplemented that by a paper on
what he calls ' My own Tentatives,' which is in reality
one of that most interesting class of articles which poets
can give us viz., a view of the inner life inadequate,
it may be, but still a recital of the moving springs of
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 315
their endeavours and ambitions. Mr. Buchanan is
egotistical ; but till we can find a poet who is not,
there is no necessity to be severe upon him for that.
Egotism is not a crime ; neither is it a blunder till it
becomes offensive in its manifestation, and it certainly
cannot be said to be so in the present case. The poet
is one of the few men whom we can bear to hear speak of
themselves : so much of the success of his work depends
upon the thermometer of his own feeling. The eagerness
which every person displays to learn something of the
actual life of our great writers cannot be founded alto-
gether in a morbid sensationalism. What would we give,
for instance, for the details relative to the personnel of
Homer and Shakspeare, if written by themselves ? And
the same feeling, chastened only in degree, we cherish
towards all whose works have enlightened and ele-
vated mankind. It is the tribute which ordinary hu-
manity pays to genius to that quality which stands
between them and the Almighty, elucidating the mysteries
of the latter, and gathering up for presentation to the
Unseen the woes and the hopes of man. We are dis-
posed, then, always to forgive the poet any tendency he
may exhibit towards a personal garrulity, assured that
the offence will be a thousand times condoned by the
riches he has to communicate. It is not proposed to
3i6 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
make further reference to Mr. Buchanan's life (as con-
currently related in his charming sketch of poor David
Gray) than is absolutely necessary for the exposition of
his manner in his earlier poems. But undoubtedly, we
imagine, his life had a considerable influence in mould-
ing the character of his works. When Gray was but a
boy, it appears that he made the acquaintance of Robert
Buchanan at Glasgow, and that the two spent some years
in dreaming and thinking together. At a very early period
Gray seems to have contracted a morbidly exaggerated
opinion of himself, affirming that the* dream of his life
would not be realised unless his fame were ultimately to
equal that of Wordsworth ; and he had even dared to
set up as models, which he had some hope of rivalling,
two still greater men Shakspeare and Goethe. The
danger which attended these floating ideas, if they should
assume the substantial form of disease, was quickly per-
ceived by Mr. Buchanan. But he was helpless. Another
was to solve the difficulty, and the interposition of Death
averted the great trial which would have resulted when
Gray awoke from his brilliant dreams, to find his gor-
geous castle dismantled. Early in 1860 the two young
men were brought face to face with a necessity which,
according to the temper and grit of a man, either makes
him the slave or the master of the world. Poets being
ROBERT BUCHANAN. . 317
amenable to the ordinary laws of nature, they discovered
that to live they must work. One day Gray said to his
companion, ' Bob, I'm off to London.' ' Have you funds ? '
asked Buchanan. 'Enough for one, not enough for
two,' was the response. * If you can get the money any-
how, we'll go together.' The journey was arranged, but
owing to a mistake they travelled separately, though they
arrived in London about the same time. Now began
the bitterness of existence. The sensitive Scotchman
Gray found that in the hurry of London life there were
none who turned aside to regard him as a great Seer, or
even as one who promised to become such. Accordingly,
though he received many individual kindnesses from one
or two friends, we find him writing, ' What brought me
here ? God knows, for I don't. Alone in such a place
is a horrible thing. People don't seem to understand
me. Westminster Abbey ; I was there all day yesterday.
If I live I shall be buried there so help me God ! '
The strife went on bitter indeed, as only those can
testify whose experience has been of a similar character.
The forecasting of the future, which ought to have pre-
ceded their advent, now became an absolute necessity
when it seemed of little use. There were, of course,
many positions open, but nobody willing to induct them
into possession, and after severe vicissitudes we find one
3 i 8 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
of them becoming a supernumerary at a theatre. It is
impossible to follow the melancholy story in all its de-
tails ; suffice it to state, that, after numberless trials and
buffe tings, the disease of consumption, which had been
latent in Gray, rapidly developed itself, and he was
carried off in his twenty-fourth year. After his decease,
one of the most beautiful epitaphs ever written was
found amongst his papers, penned by himself in vie?/ of
his dissolution. Mr. Buchanan appears to have cherished
for his friend one of those attachments which are an
honour to human nature, and which cannot fail to have
effect in the growth of character. In verse which de-
serves to live (viz., in the poem ' To David in Heaven '),
the survivor of these two friends endeavoured to set forth
the virtues of the dead, and at the same time to embalm
him with the spices of remembrance and affection. The
rest of Mr. Buchanan's life as regards his work is suffi-
ciently known to the public. He early gained its
ear, and has steadily maintained himself in its favour,
ripening, as poets should do, with personal experience
and observation of the world.
One result of strenuous labour and of material de-
privation is to deepen the pathos of life. And when the
individual is a poet the experience is doubly valuable to
him. A poet without pathos either natural or acquired
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 319
seems to us one who will utterly fail in reaching the
highest ends of his being. It was anguish which sub-
limated the genius of Dante and led to what is grandest
in his divine compositions. His was an example of what
we should call acquired pathos that is, the pathos
begotten in the spirit through suffering. An example of
natural pathos is to be found in Wordsworth, whose life
was singularly free from the ordinary sadnesses of huma-
nity, but who yet possessed, as it has been so beautifully
expressed, and he might have claimed for himself
' Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears/
Take the choicest spirits in our poetic record, the most
mirthful, unembarrassed, and careless of their species,
and there will be found running through all their natures
this subtle yet sweet chord of sadness, which makes
them so tender to the race, and sympathetic withal. The
poet is commissioned to feel for humanity, and without
pathos he would surely have no more to communicate
than other men. It is his real voice, and that which
makes him the sweet singer of creation.
Many years have now elapsed since Mr. George
Henry Lewes no mean judge in these and cognate
matters affirmed that Mr. Buchanan was a genuine
poet. At the time, those who guarded the gates of
320 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
literature were divided in opinion, though by far the
greater bulk of the critics and that the most competent
portion of them welcomed the new-comer as a true
singer, one who had something new to communicate. In
looking to the volume which evoked the varied opinions
now, ' Idylls and Legends of Inverburn/ one is struck
with this thought the courage of the man who should
dare to challenge the world on subjects which in them-
selves appeared to possess but few of the elements of
poetry, and whose treatment in the hands of most must
certainly result in disastrous failure ! But the fact alone
that the author was so successful in investing the simplest
themes with an interest which could not be gainsaid
appeared to us, and does now after the lapse of many years,
an undoubted proof of genius. There was not placed
before the critics a volume of verse on heroic or old-
world subjects subjects which of themselves are in-
stinct with the poetic feeling treated with all the glow
and fancy which could be thrown about them. The
facts were simple in the extreme. A youth whose
heart was large large in the sense of active poetic sym-
pathy and whose imagination was quick, took from
the lives of certain characters which had crossed his
path, or with whose inner experience he was some-
what acquainted, incidents which had apparently no
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 321
special significance whatever for other men, and said to
himself that he could draw from thence what should be a
delight and profit to the world. And he succeeded, not-
withstanding the fact that he worked in a style which had
hitherto been unappreciated, and which was remarkable for
its simplicity. The world had been accustomed to regard
poetry as a trimmed garden, discovering colour, beauty,
symmetry it seemed to have forgotten that it might also
be a forest, or an irregular hill- side, with naked rocks and
the majesty of trees. These Idylls have little in them to
recommend them to those who regard poetry simply as
the art of turning melodious periods ; but they possess
the higher qualities of imagination and the music of
natural emotion. Above all, they exhibit the first re-
quirement in a poet viz., insight, that faculty which is the
initial point in his isolation from the rest of the species.
The poems are not great in themselves, but they un-
doubtedly exhibit those qualities which, rightly fostered,
develop into greatness. The thing which was of most
importance to the writer to secure he was successful in
accomplishing ; he caused the reader to reflect, after the
reading of the poems, upon the gifts which had been ex-
hibited in their production. Let us look for a moment
at OPC or two of these Idylls. Take the story of Willie
Baird, narrated by the schoolmaster of Inverburn. Told
Y
322 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
in the simplest of blank verse, there is yet a grip about it
which enrols its author at once amongst the players on
the harp of the human heart. The old man tells of the
influence of little Willie upon his spirit, chastening and
refining it. He imagines that he has seen the face some-
where before in the beauteous life of the north ; and then
he says as the result
' Alone at nights,
I read my Bible more and Euclid less.
For, mind you, like my betters, I had been
Half-scoffer, half-believer ; on the whole,
I thought the life beyond a useless dream
Best left alone.'
Then the boy's philosophy came on, and one day he
puzzled the old schoolmaster by asking, as he clasped
his white hands round the neck of the collie Donald, ' Do
doggies gang to Heaven ? ' a question to be repeated in-
definitely without answer. It is interesting to note the
gradual return of the old man to a well-grounded faith,
engendered so beautifully, and almost consummated by
the death of Willie. The language in which the history
is unfolded is sustained, and abounds in imagery which,
if not so lofty as we find in some of Mr. Buchanan's other
works, is true and appropriate. Of a higher stamp, how-
ever, is the poem ' Poet Andrew,' which depicts the
short sad life of young Gray. The story is told by the
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 323
father of Andrew, a simple-hearted weaver, who does not
understand the gift wherewith his son is dowered. The
character of the father is drawn with great power and
individuality, and the whole poem, shining with the
tenderness which springs from a loving heart, is full of
the deepest human interest. Andrew's parents endea-
voured to teach him common-sense, and when they were
reproached for having a poet in the house, exclaimed,
' A poet ? God forbid ! ' somewhat dubious as to the full
meaning and import of their terrible possession. But at
length they discovered Andrew's printed poems, with
' Words pottle-bellied, meaningless, and strange,
That strutted up and down the printed page,
Like Bailies, made to bluster and look big '
a graphic description of what was doubtless a source ot
terror to the old man, who had never been guilty of such
a heinous offence as writing aline in his life. The youth
was grumbled at in vain for his tendencies to ruin, and
at length he left his home and went up to the great City,
where he was followed by a mother's deep love and a
father's solicitude, in spite of his apparent wrongheaded-
ness. But the dark shadow drew near the trouble that
was deeper than all others. The poet came home to die,
and the scene is depicted with a pathos which has rarely
3-4 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
been excelled for calm and yet strong simplicity. Thus
speaks the broken-hearted father :
' One Sabbath day
The last of winter, for the caller air
Was drawing sweetness from the barks of trees
When down the lane, I saw to my surprise
A snowdrop blooming underneath a birk,
And gladly plucked the flower to carry home
To Andrew.
*****
Saying nought,
Into his hand I put the year's first flower,
And turn'd awa' to hide my face ; and he
He smiled and at the smile, I knew not why,
It swam upon us, in a frosty pain,
The end was come at last, at last, and Death
Was creeping ben, his shadow on our hearts.
We gazed on Andrew, call'd him by his name
And touch'd him softly and he lay awhile,
His een upon the snow, in a dark dream,
Yet neither heard nor saw ; but suddenly,
He shook awa' the vision wi' a smile,
Raised lustrous een, still smiling, to the sky,
Next upon us, then dropt them to the flower
That trembled in his hand, and murmured low,
Like one that gladly murmurs to himseP
" Out of the Snow, the Snowdrop out of Death
Comes Life ; " then closed his eyes and made a moan,
;And never spake another word again.'
It will be admitted, we think, by the most exacting, that
an exquisiteness and also an emotional fervour dwell
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 325
about this description whicl^ are so precisely suited to
the subject as to raise it to a very lofty rank of poetry. It
would scarcely be possible to find language and thought
more happily wedded than they are here. The ' Widow
Mysie,' in the same volume, betrays qualities of quite
another stamp, exhibiting principally a strange, quaint
humour which seems to dimple every page into laughter.
Another poem, in this same volume as originally
published, but one since suppressed by Mr. Buchanan on
artistic grounds, contained imagery of the choicest de-
scription. It was entitled ' Hugh Sutherland's Pansies,'
and described the troubled life and pathetic death of the
youth who gave name to the poem. It is a pity that the
author could not have preserved by some means the
final scene, for it exhibited beauty of description of a
rare order. The following passage combines both a
tenderness and a truth in the imagery which give finish
to the poetry, and leave nothing to be desired in the way
of idyllic excellence :
* By slow degrees he grew
Cheerful and meek as dying man could be,
And as I spoke there came from far-away
The faint sweet melody of Sabbath bells.
And, "Hugh," I said, " if God the Gardener
Neglected those he rears as you have done
Your pansies and your Pansy, it were ill
3 26 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
For we who blossom in His garden. Night
And morning He is busy at His work.
He smiles to give us sunshine, and we live :
He stoops to pluck us softly, and our hearts
Trembh to see the darkness, knowing not
It is the shadow He, in stooping, casts.
He pluckt your Pansy so, and it was well.
But, Hugh, though some be beautiful and grand,
Some sickly, like yourself, and mean, and poor,
He loves them all, the Gardener loves them all ! "
Then later, when no longer he could sit
Out on the threshold, and the end was near,
We set a plate of pansies by his bed
To cheer him. " He is coming near," I said,
" Great is the garden, but the Gardener
Is coming to the corner where you bloom
So sickly ! " And he smiled and moaned, " I hear ! "
And sank upon his pillow wearily.
His hollow eyes no longer bore the light,
The darkness gathered round him as I said,
" The Gardener is standing at your side,
His shade is on you and you cannot see :
Lord, that lovest both the strong and weak,
Pluck him and wear him ! " Even as I prayed,
1 felt the shadow there and hid my face :
But when I look'd again the flower was pluck'd,
The shadow gone : the sunshine thro' the blind
Gleam'd faintly, and the widow'd woman wept.'
We are unable to point to a more distinctly poetical idea
than the one embodied in the three lines marked in
italics, and in truth there is a great suffusion of poetry
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 327
through the entire passage. The whole volume is not,
of course, written with this wealth of imagery and power
of delineation. There are many pages here and there
which are scarcely, if at all, lifted out of the level of
commonplace; but enough has been shown to demonstrate
that those critics were right who thought that a new poet
had come who had the real ring about him, and whose
further fortunes were worthy of being watched with consi-
derable interest.
Before offering some general remarks on the pecu-
liarities or characteristics of Mr. Buchanan's genius, we
will first glance very briefly at the various works which
he has written. There was a volume entitled * Under-
tones ' which preceded in publication the one we have
just dealt with. With the notable exception of the intro-
ductory poem, it deals almost exclusively with classical
subjects. While it could not appeal directly to the feel-
ings of so many people as its predecessor, there is
stamped upon it the same realistic power. There was
quite enough in the volume to cause the lovers of poetry
to wonder at the new writer, who lavishly threw about
undoubted riches in every poem. One of the best fea-
tures of the book is its workmanship, which is emi-
nently satisfactory, in truth, leaving little to be desired.
For those who wish to see what could be done by one
328 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
who was just entering upon a literary career, let them
turn to the poem ' Proteus,' and note the description of
the death of Pan. He dies because of the birth of the
infant of Bethlehem. The idea is fine, and finely
worked out. The world was again renewed with the
presence of Christ, and, as it is well expressed,
' Gladden'd by the glory of the child,
Dawn gleam'd from pole to pole.'
Then, the lines which follow are exceedingly striking.
In other poems the old-world subject is again and again
made to live in modern modes and thought. 'The
Syren ' is full of music, its rhythm being superior to that
of any other of its fellows, and the spirit is taken away
from its enclosure to the scene which the poet is en-
deavouring to depict. The gifts of the writer are here
put to excellent uses, and he is as successful, imagina-
tively, as he is in attaining his leading purpose. Of
1 Pygmalion the Sculptor,' and one or two other efforts,
something might be said, but inasmuch as the volume
was one of probation chiefly, there is perhaps no neces-
sity to delay here further. What other references should
be made to the volume can be made, either directly or
inferentially, at another juncture.
The work, however, which left no doubt in the public
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 329
mind that its author had no ordinary career before him,
was * London Poems.' It clearly shows that the poet
was possessed of this definite idea viz., to get free from
the flash and glitter which encrusted the writings of other
authors, and, in too many cases it is to be feared, blinded
their readers to the poverty of thought which lay
beneath. Mr. Buchanan's desire was to understand and
interpret humanity. That he was singularly successful in
those views of it which he has given us restricted though
they were in scope there is no possibility of denying.
Each poem is impregnated with a local truth that is
truly astonishing, and the setting is the only one adapted
to the subjects. Had he essayed to tell these stories of
the poor in the loftiest style, the probability is we should
have lost the depth of effect in the dazzle of outward
show. Their strength is proved in the very fact that
they affect us so deeply when they are cast in the very
simplest mould. The style is, indeed, sometimes bald to
simplicity. But altogether it may be conceded that the
result has justified the author's method. It was made a
reproach to Mr. Buchanan by one of his own craft that
he had chosen such humble subjects ; but surely the man
or the poet who forgets the poor forgets the paths in
which the Godhead most frequently walks ! Where can
the divinity of endurance be found so nobly developed
330 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
as in those very beings whose touch is contamination to
the curled darlings of society ? Instead of contempt, that
man is deserving of gratitude who boldly goes into the
lowest strata of society, and dares to show to the higher
world the streaks of goodness and nobility of character
which are to be traced there. Turn to the sister art of
painting, and note where the finest pathos is to be met
with. Is it in the great historical pieces to which we are
sometimes treated, or in the fashionable nonentities
who, in various guise, cover the walls of the Royal
Academy in such wondrous profusion or, lastly, is it
not rather in such pictures as Faed's 'Mitherless Bairn'?
Everyone admits at once that what is emotional is
strongest in its influence. With some such feeling as this,
coupled with the desire to demonstrate that art was not
restricted in its treatment, Mr. Buchanan probably
produced ' London Poems.' One admirable result of his
artistic skill is this that in reading the poems the poet
is absent from our thoughts, and we are able to concen-
trate our attention upon the objects presented to us.
The style, as we have before remarked, is such as not to
destroy, by superior force, the effect of the work. For
real music and the gift of embodying simple ideas in a
form which gives pleasure to the soul the lyric at the
same time being infused with the true spirit of humour
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 331
' The Starling ' deserves high commendation : it is tho-
roughly novel, clever, and original.
In the same volume we are discussing there are
poems which for strength and grasp of passion are most
graphic and remarkable, in particular ' Liz/ and ' Edward
Crowhurst.' In the first, a wretched, unfortunate girl
tells the story of her life to the parson. She is bad and
wants to die ; fine ladies are missed from the world when
they go, but not such beings as she. With terrible truth
she assures her visitor that men have the best of the
world in many ways, whilst women suffer and are beaten
down.
1 If they grow hard, go wrong, from bad t ) badder,
Why, Parson, dear, they're happier being blind :
They get no thanks for being good and kind
The better that they are, they feel the sadder ! '
A world of miserable but unimpeachable philosophy lives
in these lines, which have been always true in the history
of the race. Woman must bear the degradation, while
man goes free. A pathetic relation is that where poor
Liz tells the parson how she once went into the country
hoping to live there, and earn her bread. The air was
so clear, ' it seemed a sin to breathe it/ and she was glad
to leave it and come back to the black streets of London,
fittest for such as she.
332 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
* I would not stay out yonder if I could,
For one feels dead, and all looks pure and good
I could not bear a life so bright and still.
All that I want is sleep,
Under the flags and stones, so deep, so deep !
God won't be hard on one so mean, but He,
Perhaps, will let a tired girl slumber sound
There in the deep cold darkness underground ;
And I shall waken up in time, may be,
Better and stronger, not afraid to see
The great, still Light that folds Him round and round.'
Surely such writing as this is better than the thousand
meaningless eccentricities and tricks of style which so
often pass current as poetry. This is substantial ; it has a
living power about it which satisfies both the brain and
heart. The same remark would apply to other idylls in
the volume. * Edward Crowhurst ' is a poem bearing a
considerable resemblance to the one on David Gray in
treatment. It is told in blank verse, and has many
masterly touches upon it. 'Attorney Sneak' reminds
one in its rough humour and form of execution of some
of the poems of Browning; whilst 'Nell ' exhibits a terrible
realism rarely equalled amongst modern lyrics. Of
polish in the volume there is not enough ; what is done
is done in a broad, rough manner, as though the artist
feared he would lose the effect of his strong manipulation
if he devoted himself too much to refinement Doubt-
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 333
less there is some truth in this. At any rate, for effec-
tiveness only, this batch of poems stands almost by itself
amongst Mr. Buchanan's works.
But the work which showed the deepest insight into
the human life around him was that entitled 'North
Coast, and other Poems,' and in this volume there is one
poem which chiefly challenges attention. By ' Meg
Blane,' our author not only sustained his previous claim
to the attention of the public, but deepened his hold as
the translator of the tragic elements of modern existence
into the common language of humanity. There is a
strange mingling of weirdness and reality about the ballad
which is both fascinating and appalling. Edgar Allan
Poe has given us a thrilling picture of despair in the form
of a monologue, and though we are bound to admit that
on the score of musical effect the American poet has the
advantage, yet there are other points in which the verdict
must be decidedly in favour of the English one. In the
first place, the elements which compose the poem, while
of the plainest kind, are also more really tragic in them-
selves than those of * The Raven ' ; and in the second
place, the story is capable of appealing to a far greater
number of persons. Poe has certainly more elaboration,
more finish ; in fact, it would be impossible for the most
fastidious workman to alter his poem with advantage ;
334 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
but in this later effort the narrative (though not the soli-
tary idea, it should be borne in mind ) is more realisable.
Meg Blane, the heroine of the story or ballad, is a fisher-
woman on the north coast of Scotland. She lives in one
of the usual huts by the seashore, and has an idiot son
of some twenty years. Meg is a brave creature, and is
always ready with the lifeboat on the roughest night to
weather the storm, and go to the assistance of a crew in
danger of sinking. And yet this woman, who possessed
a heroic nobility of spirit, was not what the world would
call pure. She was not a wedded wife, but had left the
way of the just. However, she had repented sincerely,
and was no longer afraid of looking into the eyes of those
whom she met. Delicacy and strength, these were her
personal characteristics ; the former remained with her,
because her soul had recovered its uprightness before
God ; as for her strength and daring, these had been
abundantly proved by deeds which would have made
many a man turn pale. Yet when alone in the midnight
hours the real travail of her soul was manifested. She
often awoke naming an unknown name, and became
white as death on missing the object of her quest. One
of those northern storms, so majestic in their force, is de-
picted in*the first part of the poem, and during its raging,
Meg had gripped the helm and gone out to sea. As the
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 335
result of her grand courage she saved a human life ; but
now mark the terrible pathos of the story. The life she
saved was the one which had wronged her own in years
gone by ; the being she had yearned for through days
and nights of agony was given to her again ; but too late !
He was no longer hers ; deeming her dead his life had
been given to another. The stony despair of the
shattered woman, her haggard aspect, that feeling of
sorrow almost too sublime to be realised by the soul of
any other mortal, are here sought to be rendered, in lines
instinct with pathos :
' With her wild arms around him, he looked stern,
With an unwelcome burden ill at ease,
While her full heart flow'd out in words like these
" At last ! at last ! O Angus, let me greet ! :
God's good ! I ever hoped that we should meet !
Lang, lang hae I been waiting by the sea,
Waiting and waiting, praying on my knee ;
And God said I should look again on you,
And, tho' I scarce believed, God's word comes true,
And He hath put an end to my distress ! "
*******
But he was dumb, and with a pallid frown,
Twitching his fingers quick, was looking down.
" What ails thee, Angus ? " cried the woman, reading
His face with one sharp look of interceding ;
1 To greet ; Anglice, to weep.
336 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Then looking downward too, she paused apart,
With blood like water slipping through her heart,
Because she thought, " Alas, if it should be
That Angus cares no more for mine and me,
Since I am old and worn with sharp distress,
And men like pretty looks and daintiness ;
And since we parted twenty years have past,
And that is long for a man's love to last ! "
But, agonised with looking at her woe,
And bent to end her hope with one sharp blow,
The troubled man, uplifting hands, spake thus,
In rapid accents, sharp and tremulous :
" Too late, Meg Blane ! seven years ago I wed
Another woman, deeming you were dead,
And I have bairns ! " And there he paused for fear.
As when, with ghostly voices in her ear,
While in her soul, as in a little well
The silver moonlight of the Glamour fell,
She had been wont to hark of nights alone,
So she stood now, not stirring, still as stone,
While in her soul, with desolate refrain,
The words " Too late ! " rang o'er and o'er again ;
Into his face she gazed with ghastly stare ;
Then raising her wild arms into the air,
Pinching her face together in sharp fear,
She quivered to the ground without a tear,
And put her face into her hands, and thrust
Her hair between her teeth, and spat it forth like dust.'
Twenty years have passed away since her sin, and
the penalty is re-exacted. If the object of tragic poetry
be to concentrate the attention of the reader upon its
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 337
subject, it was never better attained than in the whole
division of the poem of which this is an extract, and in
the succeeding passages. The portrait of Angus Blane,
the fisherwoman's son, is also drawn in vigorous lines,
and the gradual torpor which overcame Meg's spirit is
followed with truthful delineation till the death. In the
reaping time she lay a-bed making her own shroud, and
this is the refrain she murmured night and day :
' " O bairn, when I am dead,
How shall ye keep frae harm ?
What hand will gie ye bread ?
What fire will keep ye warm ?
How shall ye dwell on earth awa' frae me ?"
" O Mither, dinna dee ! "
" O bairn, by night or day,
I hear nae sounds ava,
But voices of winds that blaw,
And the voices of sprites that say,
' Come awa ! come awa ! '
The Lord, that made the Wind and made the Sea,
Is sore on my son and me,
And I melt in His breath like snaw."
"O Mither, dinna dee!"
" O bairn, it is but closing up the een,
And lying down, never to rise again.
Many a strong man's sleeping hae I seen,
There is nae pain !
z
338 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
I'm weary, weary, and I scarce ken why ;
My summer has gone by,
And sweet were sleep, but for the sake o' thee."
"O Mither, dinna dee !"'
Now the power of this poem, of which we are only
able to afford the barest idea, consists in its isolation or
individualisation of character in the first instance, and
further in the helming into one compact and indivisible
whole both the individuals and the circumstances. And
this has been achieved with materials which in themselves
seemed unpromising. It is for this reason that Mr.
Buchanan might almost take his stand on this one poem
alone, and challenge the world upon his general capacity
as a poet. There breathes through it something of that
old vital force which has handed down to us the work
of long-past ages. It is such things as this which are
able to defy Time in its power to wreck mundane
achievements. We wish to speak with no exaggeration ;
the best criticism is that which is felt to be the most
truthful summing-up of the feeling of the greatest number,
but in this matter in hand we firmly believe that all who,
calmly and without bias, sit down to consider the poem
which we have been examining, in its high and noble
aspects towards humanity, will arrive at similar con-
clusions to those which have been expressed. We talk
of inspiration in poetry ; to us it seems there are two
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 339
kinds the inspiration of intuition, and the inspiration
of interpretation. A better example of the second form
could not be found than in ' Meg Blane.' The author
does not profess therein to have discovered any new
truths ; his poem may rather be described as a canvas
on which the inner life of his heroine is depicted, and its
emotions exposed. The titles of ' The Ballad of Judas
Iscariot ' and 'The Dead Mother' can only be indi-
cated, but the reader, on turning to the ballads, will
discover that they are full of singular power and weird-
ness.
Of ' The Drama of Kings/ the bulkiest and at the
same time the most ambitious of Mr. Buchanan's works,
we cannot, as to construction, speak in terms of such
high praise, that is, as an entirety ; but there are isolated
passages which will vie with anything he has written, and
which ought not to be allowed to die. If we can read the
genius of its author rightly, it is rather epic than dramatic
in character, and a careful perusal of his most elaborate
work only tends further to support this view. The poet
would be more successful in grasping the import of the
lives of the individuals of whom he writes than he
would in grasping the intricacies of the characters them-
selves. For this reason he would be more successful
in subduing the individualities to his own grand lead-
340 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
ing purpose than he would in placing his personages upon
the stage and allowing them to work out their own
destinies, as is required in the drama. Then, again,
whatever may be said to the contrary, in this dramatic
work the events which form its basis are of too contempo-
rary a character to be satisfactorily dealt with. 1 We do
not say this for the purpose of following in the wake of
any criticisms which may already have been passed upon
it, but it was the honest impression left upon the mind
after twice carefully reading the whole work. If Mr.
Buchanan has failed, he has only failed where no other
living author could have succeeded : even Mr. Browning
could not have hoped to have achieved a happy result
in this chosen field. Some events might possibly be
dealt with by contemporary writers, but the series of
circumstances chosen in this drama are not of that
character. And for that reason, probably, a proper meed
of justice has not been dealt to ' The Drama of Kings.'
There are parts of it, as already stated, which must not
be allowed to fall out of existence : the author has had
prescience to discover this, and in future his readers will
not be deprived of what is really valuable therein.
The subject had a great fascination for Mr. Buchanan,
1 Since the above appeared, Mr. Buchanan himself has admitted
the force of this objection.
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 341
and gave him an excellent opportunity of exhibiting those
two qualities which he has always been endeavouring to
combine in his writings with more or less success viz.,
earthliness and spirituality those two qualities which
find interpretation best perhaps in the formulas ' I
live ' and ' I love.' He is perfectly right, too, in his
opinion that the man who can see no poetry in his own
time must be very unimaginative. Our difference with
him would not be on that score. The point is, the form
of the reproduction of that poetry for the benefit of his
species. It has been said that Mr. Tennyson, of all the
poets of his time x is the one who best grapples with the in-
tellectual doubts of the age. Perfectly agreeing with that
sentiment, the Poet Laureate is yet by no means uni-
formly successful in overcoming those doubts. But what
is his method ? The union of contemporary thought with
a form of expression and choice of subject not necessarily
contemporary. His Arthurian poems find half their
strength in their power to appeal to the intellect and the
spirit of a century so remote as the nineteenth. ' The
Drama of Kings ' may be successful in accomplishing its
author's purpose of making people feel the events it
describes as he never felt them before, but it does not
make them feel in precisely the same way as they ought
to feel. The genius exhibited in the volume is great
342 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
undoubtedly, but we do not know that if Shakspeare
himself were alive he could give us portraits of Prince
Bismarck and Napoleon which would be perfectly satis-
factory from the inner-life point of view. In our judg-
ment, the man does not live at the same time with these
men who would be able to do it. We do not believe
in the absence of intellectual and spiritual bias to the
extent necessary for dramatic purposes. So that it
should be well understood that it is not Mr. Buchanan's
poetry which is at fault in this volume. It is his subject,
and his method in the treatment of it. He says that
the same method is adopted as he used in the characters
of 'Nell' and ' Meg Blane.' Granted: but the result
is different. Could Mr. Buchanan have as thoroughly
grasped Napoleon and Bismarck as he has those two
humble beings just named, he would have possessed
one element of success. But we deny that that is pos-
sible. Yet, supposing it had been done, there is then
the difficulty of his mode of presenting the characters.
The indirect, instead of the direct, dramatic mode of repre-
sentation would have best suited the quality of his genius.
And this remark naturally leads to that volume which
we regard as not only the most successful, but the most
valuable of all. and indicating the groove in which he
ought to work. 'The Book of Orm/ partly for what it
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 343
yields in itself, and more still for the promise which it
holds forth, is, in the majority of aspects, the greatest
piece of work which Mr. Buchanan has accomplished.
It is, as he himself describes it, the spiritual key to all
that he has written. When we understand it, we under-
stand what the poet means what is the task which he
has set himself. It is a mystical poem, but with a strictly
modern application. To describe it as a study in the
Ossianic manner, and to pass it over as a poem with no
reference to ourselves, but as the diversion of a man who
loves to play at mysticism, seems to us a foolish and pre-
posterous method of treating this volume. The fact
indeed is that it unfolds the ripening of a purpose which
had been foreshadowed in the very earliest writings of
the author. The same idea observable here had run
through his earlier poems, and through ' The Drama of
Kings,' though the mysticism was not so pronounced in
those previous works. But he evidently wishes to com-
bine the realism of human life with the insight of the
mystic. He believes that there is no contradiction and
no incompatibility between the two. And it is a notice-
able point, and one which should not be passed over at
the present moment, that some of the most realistic of
men for example, Swedenbcrg have also been the
purest mystics. There is no reason whatever why the
344 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
mystic should be regarded as a being far removed from
ordinary life, and with no part nor lot in the strivings and
throes of humanity. His clear eye has been in times
past, and may be again to an extent immeasurable,
serviceable in glancing into the heart of things and
discovering for us the solution of many problems which
harass and vex the spirit. It may seem to interfere with
preconceived notions that this should be the case ; but
as this is pre-eminently an age for the reversal of here-
ditary errors, this need not give us any alarm. The race
of the Celts is one of the most mystical of the species ;
but the glamour of the spirit does not involve the exclu-
sion of sympathy with the actual volitions and passions
of the human unit.
' The Book of Orm ' takes for its motto a sentence from
Bacon which well explains the author's intentions in the
construction*of his poem. It is from the prayer of the
student who begs ' that Human things may not prejudice
such as are Divine, neither that from the unlocking of
the Gates of Sense, and the kindling of a greater Natural
Light, anything of incredulity or intellectual night may
arise in our minds towards Divine Mysteries.' The book
is in nine divisions, and the whole scope of the poem
most daring and stupendous. The author has essayed a
style of poetry in which previously he had no rival, and
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 345
notwithstanding small faults of style, he has succeeded. We
do not know whether we always catch the poet's meaning,
there is so much of cloud as well as substantiality about
his song, but his speculations are grand in the extreme,
and the final result is a feeling of awe, the creation of
which would satisfy the mystic himself. ' The First Song
of the Veil' treats of the dark film which envelopes
Nature, and prevents man from seeing God's face behind
it. The Wise Men are called and asked if they can
penetrate the darkness, but they can discern no more
than others. * Twere better not to be,' they reply, for
' there is no God ! ' Then comes the weird poem intro-
ducing ' The Man and the Shadow,' the shadow intrud-
ing itself wherever the wanderer moves, and presaging
doom. The Rainbow appears in the Heavens, but the
Vision has no real consolation. He asks
' Is it indeed
A Bridge whereon fair spirits come and go ?
O Brother, didst thou glide to peace that way ?
Silent all silent dimmer, dimmer yet,
Hue by hue dying, creeping back to heaven
O let me too pass by it up to God !
Too late it fadeth, faint and far away ! '
That hope for solution of the great life-problems is lost.
The mystery deepens with the ' Songs of Corruption.'
The poet tries to picture the world without death.
346 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Humanity has cried out against Death for six thousand
years ; but in a sublime picture it is shown that Earth
would be worse than the deepest Hell but for the power
of Death. In the world without death there was no
happy (if bitter) parting, no farewell in hope of reunion.
' There was no putting tokens under pillows,
There was no dreadful beauty slowly fading
Fading like moonlight softly into darkness.
There were no churchyard paths to walk on, thinking
How near the well-beloved ones are lying.
There were no sweet green graves to sit and muse on,
Till grief should grow a summer meditation,
The shadow of the passing of an angel,
And sleeping should seem easy, and not cruel.
Nothing but wondrous parting and a blankness.'
So that the abolition of Death could afford no help to
the distressed spirit. 'The Soul and the D welling ' is,
too, a beautifully wrought division, and enlarges still
further on the awful mystery, and the hardihood of man
in desiring to see God's face when he has never looked
on the poorest soul's face in this world full of windows
with no light. The theology of many will receive a rude
shock when it is brought face to face with the * Songs of
Seeking.' The same amount of boldness of thought was
never, perhaps, witnessed in a seeker before, and the
stanzas on Doom give utterance to a thought which is
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 347
rapidly becoming prevalent, that God is not God if there
be ultimate condemnation for one soul in this wide uni-
verse. The dream of the lifting of the Veil is most
poetically treated ; but of all the divisions in the volume
that which is loftiest in thought and grandest in expres-
sion is the one entitled ' Coruiskeen Sonnets.' Mr.
Buchanan, in several of these Coruiskeen poems, has
reached a great height. What could be finer, for example,
than the following ?
' Come to green under-glooms, and in your hair
Weave nightshade, foxglove red, and rank wolfsbane,
And slumber and forget Him ; if in vain
Ye try to slumber off your sorrow there,
Arise once more and openly repair
To busy haunts where men and women sigh,
And if all things but echo back your care,
Cry out aloud, " There is no God ! " and die.
But if upon a day when all is dark,
Thou, stooping in the public ways, shalt mark
Strange luminous footprints as of feet that shine-
Follow them ! follow them ! O soul bereaven !
God had a Son He pass'd that way to heaven ;
Follow, and look upon the Face divine ! '
Wordsworth himself could scarcely have manipulated
the thought better than it is done there. The following,
also, is a magnificent sonnet, though there is not the same
ease of construction about it that we mark in the previous
POETS AND NOVELISTS.
one: observe, however, in the lines in question, how they
touch a large part of the ground occupied by * In Memo-
riam' the same thoughts must have been coursing
through the two minds : the music of Tennyson is more
bewitching, but there is a strong under-current of pathos
in these finely-measured tones :
' But He, the only One of mortal birth
Who raised the Veil and saw the Face behind,
While yet He wandered footsore on the earth,
Beheld His Father's eyes, that they were kind ;
Here in the dark I grope, confused, purblind,
I have not seen the glory and the peace,
But on the darken'd mirror of the mind
Strange glimmers fall, and shake me till they cease
Then, wondering, dazzled, on Thy name I call,
And, like a child, reach empty hands and moan,
And broken accents from my wild lips fall,
And I implore Thee in this human tone ;
If such as I can follow Him at all
Into Thy presence, 'tis by love alone.'
The capacity for high conception is best illustrated in
the final division of the volume, ' The Vision of the Man
Accurst.' It is not often that we meet with so much
clearness and daring combined. Neither the thought nor
the imagination has been trammelled. Mr. Buchanan
shows us the world after the Great Judgment, when all have
been redeemed save one man the man accurst. The
wretched spirit mocks at the Almighty from the lonely
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 349
deep. His shrieks, his revilings, his laughter, disturb the
harmony of the universe. The Lord asks if there is
anyone who will share the exile of this loathsome being,
and two respond affirmatively :
' The woman who bore him and the wife he wed
The one he slew in anger, the other he stript,
With ravenous claws, of raiment and of food.'
They went forth and conquered ; they kissed the fearful
thing's bloody hands, and the man wept. The Lord said,
* The man is saved ; let the man enter in.' Such is the
end of what is indubitably a lofty effort of the imagina-
tion. Mr. Buchanan says this poem is but the prelude
to an epic. If the epic be at all of the same character,
there is no difficulty in deciding that it will assume one
of the highest positions in contemporary poetry. All the
qualities which are admirable in poetic art find a lodg-
ment to a greater or less degree in ' The Book of Orm.'
It has simplicity, grandeur; beauty, sublimity; sweet-
ness, pathos. The word-painting to adopt a phrase for
which we have no special liking, but which is very ex-
pressive is wonderful ; whilst we witness also a felicitous
handling of all kinds of rhythm and rhyme. A surface
reading of such a volume as this is a great injustice ; it
is to be read many times, and never without a new and
singular light being thrown upon passages which seemed
350 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
hazy and meaningless before. There is also to be dis-
cerned, beneath much that is tempestuous, and apparently
the tossings of a wild and rebellious spirit, the firm pur-
pose of a soul which has not slipped its anchor.
A year or two ago a remarkable poem, entitled ' St.
Abe and his Seven Wives,' was published anonymously.
Although first issued in this country, the reviewers were
unanimous in ascribing it to an American poet, part
assigning the authorship to Lowell and part to Bret
Harte. It was a picture of Salt Lake life, as its title im-
plied, and the local colouring was so strong that any
suspicions one might cherish that the author was an
Englishman were almost imperatively laid to sleep. Yet
portions of the poem were cast in a form which led the
reader to associate with it the name of Robert Browning,
of whose hand much that had place in it was not un-
worthy. The humour was of excellent quality, and the
sense of delicacy, even with so dangerous a subject,
rarely, or indeed never outraged. It is not our intention
to go over this poem now, which will be more operative
as an exposure of the evils of Mormondom than any
more serious or pretentious book ; but we refer to it
because it has been succeeded by a work from the same
hand which betrays, we think, the author beyond the
power of contradiction. We refer to ' White Rose and
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 351
Red,' one of the most remarkable poems issued for a
considerable period. It has all the gorgeous colour of
Titian, with the breadth of Rembrandt. Anonymous
though it be, its author might stake his fame upon that
poem as lifting him to a very high place amongst his
brethren. Though an American story and all the sin-
gular local truthfulness has been attained which distin-
guished the previous poem there are signs about the
later work which, as already observed, unmistakably fix
the authorship. It is a work which would command
attention from its total dissimilarity in style to all the
poetry of the time. With a development of powers of
satire and feeling of no mean order, there is the seizure
and portrayal of nineteenth-century life in the most
realistic manner. The various metres in which the divi-
sions of the poem are composed add to the general effect
and value of the work, whilst art of a high order is ex-
hibited in the construction. The story follows the
adventures of two heroines who furnish the title for the
book one belonging to the dusky Indian race, and the
other to the New England whites. Red Rose is the type
of all that is luxuriantly beautiful and graceful, with a
semi-wildness of nature. This is a portrait of her as she
rests coiled on her warm forest couch,
' Around her brow a circlet of pure gold,
With antique letters scrolled,
352 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Burns in the sun-ray, and with gold also
Her wrists and ankles glow ;
Around her neck the threaded wild cat's teeth
Hang white as pearl, beneath
Her bosoms heave, and in the space between,
Duskly tattooed, is seen
A figure small as of a pine-bark brand
Held blazing in a hand.
Her skirt of azure, wrought with braid and thread
In quaint signs yellow and red,
Scarce reaches to her dark and dimpled knee,
Leaving it bare and free.
Below, moccasins red as blood are wound,
With gold and purple bound ;
So that red-footed like the stork she lies,
With softly shrouded eyes,
Whose brightness seems with heavy lustrous dew
To pierce the dark lids through.
Her eyelids closed, her poppied lips apart,
And her quick eager heart
Stirring her warm frame, as a bird unseen
Stirs the warm lilac-sheen,
She slumbers, and of all beneath the skies
Seemeth the last to rise.'
Is not this a finer description than any pencil could
accomplish, touching, as it does, character as well as
bodily outlines ? Another portrait, equally well drawn,
is presented to us in Eureka Hart, the gigantic white man
of the State of Maine. Red Rose comes upon him in
the woods, falls in love with him on the spot, thinking
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 353
she never beheld anything more beauteous, and he is
taken captive by a number of her tribe. The captivity,
however, which binds him stronger than the hold of the
tribe is the captivity of love. He is just an easy-going,
handsome animal, and becomes hopelessly enchained by
the beauty of Red Rose. The nuptial rites are such, we
regret to state, as would not make the marriage legitimate
in any well-regulated, civilised country, but the two
seem none the less happy in spite thereof. The passages
which immediately follow this incident betray so much of
Mr. Buchanan's spirit and manner that we wonder his
name never suggested itself as the author, to any of the
numerous critics of the poem. Eureka Hart at length
grew weary of his lot, and in proportion to the evapo-
ration of his passion grew vividly the remembrance of his
relatives far away. He persuaded Red Rose ultimately
to consent to a brief visit to his native place, just to bid
a final farewell to those he loved. He departed, leaving
behind him a paper with the writing (in his blood)
' Eureka Hart, Drowsietown, State of Maine/ The
little paper lies for ever on the woman's heart to soothe the
sad pain of parting. The Sixth Canto of the Second Pan
bears, we think, almost irresistible evidence of having
been written by the author of ' London Poems,' allowing
that the style has ripened in the interim. Did not space
A A
354 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
fail we should desire to reproduce some of the charming
passages which so truthfully depict Drowsietown, the
abode of the Harts. When Eureka arrives and settles
down there, it is not without some twinge of conscience
with regard to the splendid, impulsive creature he has
left behind. But these thoughts become fainter and
fainter as he is bewitched by Phcebe, the White Rose,
who presents a marked contrast in every particular to his
former love. Dainty, mild, and prudish, she is meant to
be a happy mother, very sober-mooded and very faithful.
The upshot is that Eureka finds himself shortly at the
altar with Phcebe, who is united to him in holy matri-
mony by Parson Pendon. And now begins the really
grand and tragical part of the story. We have had
spring, summer, and autumn painted by the poets again
and again, but winter very seldom. Let anyone who
wishes for a perfect description of the season turn to the
book devoted to the Great Snow. Never was anything
more beautifully and accurately realised, and as we read
we are sensible of the fact that there is more after all in
the cold, calm, white season than we have hitherto
imagined. During the great snowstorm Phcebe is at
home w r ondering what keeps Eureka in the town. Mean-
while, there is a foot on the snow, drawing nearer and
nearer. A low murmur is at last heard, and something
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 355
taps at the window. The door is opened, and in
staggers a woman the Red Rose with an infant at her
breast. She has been wearied with the absence of her
lover, and affection has guided her steps right away from
the haunts of her tribe to Drowsietown. Phoebe finds the
paper bearing her husband's name upon the wanderer,
but in the midst of her conflicting emotions the door
opens, and Eureka Hart walks in. The poem from this
point is full of force and pathos. The loving heart of
Phoebe conquers her anger when she beholds the death-
touch upon Red Rose, and in pitying she forgives. Her
rival dies in the arms of the conscience-stricken Eureka,
still regarding him as her godlike chief. This is the
final glimpse of her :
' See ! her hand points upward slowly,
With an awful grace and holy,
And her eyes are saying clearly,
" Master, lord, beloved so dearly,
We shall meet, with souls grown fonder,
In God's happy prairies yonder ;
Where no snow falls ; where, for ever,
Flows the shining Milky River,
On whose banks, divinely glowing,
Shapes like ours are coming, going,
In the happy star-dew moving,
Silent, smiling, loved, and loving !
Fare thee well, till then, my Master ! "
Hark, her breath comes fainter, faster,
A A 2
356 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
While, in love man cannot measure,
Kissing her white warrior's hand,
She sinks, with one great smile of pleasure
Last flash upon the blackening brand ! '
Now, although in an artistic sense some would consider
this poem to fail because of its ending, we cannot so
regard it. The author has obviously meant to exhibit to
us the fragmentary character, and utterly disappointing
nature, of human life. To say that he does not manifest
art because his work closes with a feeling of melancholy,
seems to us most inefficient criticism. The work ends
tragically, exactly as the author had intended it should
end from the first inception of the story ; though of
course the most prominent impression left on the mind is
that the poem was conceived mostly for the purpose of
developing the passion of the Red Rose. The very
realism to which the poet is devoted would be defeated
had he attempted to reconcile ideas and facts which are
seen to be in positive discord. If the poem be inartistic,
certainly one half of our pathetic literature both in
prose and verse must bear it company. But its genius
is too true to permit of such a false conclusion. The
poem is great great in truthfulness, in conception, and
in elaboration. The matter, however, in which we are
most concerned is, that though its authorship has not
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 357
been acknowledged, there are traces of workmanship
about it which point to Mr. Buchanan as its author. It
exhibits, in the first place, an amplification of one of his
strongest personal canons in poetry that the writer
should be perfectly disinterested, and free himself com-
pletely from faulty systems of ethics which are too often
accepted without due consideration. Then, again,
several of the situations in the poem, which would have
been rejected by other living poets, of sufficient standing
capable of writing it, as vulgar, have been deliberately
chosen, and successfully handled. In short, as Mr.
Buchanan desired it to be distinctly understood by his
' London Poems ' and ' Meg Blane/ we have conventiona-
lities set aside, and the human heart inverted, with all
its passions, so that the remainder of the world, as well
as the poet, might be able to witness its subtle workings.
Between Nell and Red Rose we perceive a great amount
of approximation. In both we have an out-of-the-way
creation, but from him who gave us the first it would not
be difficult to predicate the gift of the latter. Character
has been preserved in both cases, and the truth spiri-
tualised in precisely the same mode. There is no more
vulgarity in one portrait than in the other. Neither does
the poet profess to explain everything : enough for him
to dare to be true. The personal chord running through
358 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
this poem, ' White Rose and Red,' we should have
considered sufficient to identify it. Besides Tennyson
and Browning, there is no other person except Mr.
Buchanan whose work we could consider it to be, and
there are insuperable aspects which would immediately
forbid us associating the authorship with the Poet
Laureate, or the writer of ' Pippa Passes.' We shall at
some future day probably receive confirmation of the
views just expressed from the (at present) unknown
author of the work. l
Upon the prose works of Mr. Buchanan there is no
room left to enlarge, nor perhaps is there any great neces-
sity for doing so. They exhibit to a large extent the
same qualities as his labours in verse. There is the same
absolute truthfulness to the scenes he professes to de-
scribe, with a strong power of words. In the 'Land of
Lome ' we have more than one passage which for elo-
quence can vie with anything accomplished in the
measures of song. The author has found himself amongst
the beauties and the wonders of Nature in which his soul
delights, and his fancy lias been allowed to wander free
and unrestrained. The crudity which distinguished his
essays has completely disappeared, and he writes almost
1 The authorship of the poem in question has now been admitted
by Mr. Buchanan.
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 359
as freely as in his more natural element. The attractive-
ness and grandeur of Scotch scenery were but a shadow
and a name to us till we read his glowing descriptions,
but now we feel as though we also had been subject to
the terrors of the Gulf of Corryvrechan, and had beheld
the gloom and the mystery brooding over Loch Corruisk.
In making some final observations upon Mr. Bu-
chanan as one of the prominent poets of the time, there is
an excellent sign visible in his works which is most hope-
ful for the future. He is not an echo of any other poet.
Whatever may be thought of his song, or whatever posi-
tion may be assigned to it, it is perfectly original and
spontaneous. He has not sung because he has been
moved to imitation by the graces of other poets, nor for
any other reason, except the one which should always
determine the poet viz., because song was in his heart.
That is an election whose end is always inevitable more
commanding and imperious than Fate. As well try to
eliminate music from the bird as suppress the volitions
and the manifestations of the poet. It is his life to sing.
There may be false singers who for the moment contrive
to attract the public ear, but their influence is fleeting.
They can no more satisfy the world than could the sounds
which would proceed from an automaton being. The
moment it is discovered that a singer is unnatural and
360 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
that his music is a forced growth, that moment will his
power begin to decline. It is something, then, that our
author is of sufficient calibre to be able to be perfectly
independent of any of his species. He has studied
deeply at many imaginative springs, but his own well of
song is unmixed with their waters. His utterance is
growing clearer and more distinct every year. But in
addition to this originality, there is the merit of endeavour-
ing to assist in the formation of a superior school of
poetry to that which generally attracts singers of a lower
order. So far from regarding the subjects which he has
chosen as unworthy of the poet's pen, we think it re-
dounds to his credit that he has thus probed the depths
of society. All his graphic, dramatic force would have
been a mere shadow, nay lost altogether, if he had missed
the realism which is impressed on everything he has
written. The art which delineates the career "of a poor
coster-girl may be as fine and correct as that which
conceives a Hamlet : false art lies not in the subject, but
in the manner of treatment. Essential service is ren-
dered to humanity when any life is so presented to it as
to beget sympathy for the object, whilst Vice is left un-
toyed with, and appears in all its naked hideousness. In
such a way as was never before accomplished, we believe,
Mr. Buchanan has, in his London lyrics, come between
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 361
society and the degraded beings who have been the
objects of its contempt and disgust, and has acted as an
interpreter. It is poetry of this description which will
succeed in retaining its hold upon humanity. Whatever
else may die, song which is impressed with a true and
profound human interest is imperishable. 1
Again, his genius and pathos are not local. Man the
unit being mortal, but man the species being immortal,
1 Many of the observations in this paragraph would apply to
two other poets of the day, who seem scarcely to have received
sufficient credit for the work which they have achieved. I refer to
the Hon. Roden Noel and the Hon. Leicester Warren. With
regard to the former, his ' Red Flag, and other Poems,' and more
recently ' Livingstone,' would bear out my assertions. In the volume
of the ' Red Flag ' we find the poet take up topics which have
intense interest to men around us, and they are dealt with in a
vigorous and poetical manner. I was struck" greatly by the strength
and originality of many of the poems in this volume. Occasionally
the metre is rough, but the work is infused with a fine spirit, and
Mr. Noel, like Mr. Buchanan, is no imitator. Again, his ' Living-
stone ' is an admirable attempt at dealing with a contemporary sub-
ject, and the natural scenery of Africa is glowingly depicted. Mr.
Warren has, perhaps, caught more of the true classical spirit than
any other of our poets, though not to the exclusion of that of the
age in which he lives. His ' Searching the Net, and other Verses '
exhibits a keen sympathy between the writer and the subject and cir-
cumstances which he endeavours to depict. I think that in the case
of both these writers, their poetry appeals to what is best and purest,
both as regards the intellect and the spirit. We have not so many
genuine poets that we can afford to pass by, with the barest recog-
nition merely, those whom we do possess.
362 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
that which has its foundation in the essential lot of hu r
manity joy and suffering must also pass on from age
to age, gathering strength and vitality. But how is the
pathos of a life to be seized ? It cannot be done in the
attempted revivification of beings long dead, without the
aid of the finest qualities of the great poet insight,
emotion, sincerity. Given these qualities, and witness
their exercise upon contemporary subjects, and we have
at once poetry which is not only true to-day, but must
be immortally so. When we read Mr. Buchanan's
* London Poems ' we felt that they were great, if
even from their courage alone. Nothing was wanting
save those finishing touches to the marble which are no
essential part of the portrait, but which leave unoffended
the eye of the mind. The spiritualisation was complete.
His ethology, too, was accurate; there was no contra-
diction between persons individualised and their actions
owing to the perfect disinterestedness of the poet we
had the beings themselves, and not beings partially
deprived of their identity by the plastic influence of the
artist. What our author lacked in his earlier work he has
been gradually assimilating since, and has now succeeded
in getting his language and his art under the fullest
control.
In the great power, then, of appealing to universal
ROBERT BUCHANAN. 363
humanity lies Mr. Buchanan's security. * The Book of
Orm ' is an assurance that we shall yet receive from him
a loftier poem. The full richness of his genius only began
to unfold itself clearly in his latest work. A wide field in
which laurels are to be won lies before him; and his future
is within his own making. Competent critics have assured
him that he has already added to English literature
much which ought not to perish ; and in this verdict we
unhesitatingly agree. The light of Nature has been his
guide, and the human heart his study. With these still
as his greatest incentives he must unquestionably attain
an exalted position amongst the poets of the nineteenth
century. His doubts, his interrogatories, do not alarm
us. In a poet they are healthy signs, and prevent stag-
nation or deterioration. They beget hope that Light
will be seen at last. To the Seer belongs the power of
elevating the human soul, of unravelling life's mysteries,
and of piercing through many of those folds which pre-
vent man from apprehending God. This power, or this
glamour, or whatever it be, is indubitably upon Mr.
Buchanan. Let him be faithful to himself and to his
gifts, and in an age which does not promise to be rich in
lofty poetry, he will produce works which cannot fail to
be accepted as incontestably great, and worthy of the
world's preservation.
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS
[EDINBURGH REVIEW]
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS.
IN poetry and creative art the ancient world left little or
no room in which the modern could demonstrate its
superiority. Science has multiplied the appliances for the
diffusion of knowledge, and invention has achieved many
and extraordinary triumphs, but the individual mind has
not shown itself capable of higher flights of imagination
than those of the old bards. In these later centuries we
have seen but one poet capable of sustaining the mantle
of Homer. And the superiority of the ancients is equally
undoubted when we consider those slighter efforts in
verse which are confessedly of a somewhat ephemeral
character, and meant principally to embody only the
feelings of the age in which they are written. Horace
was the best writer of light lyrical verse the world
has seen, while, at the same time, he was something
much greater and higher. But regarding him in this
passing reference mainly as a poet of society, what
higher compliment can we pay to a poet of our own
time than to say that he is truly Horatian in spirit, or
3 68 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
writes with the Horatian pen ? But Horace himself was
not the father of this fugitive poetry. The Roman poet
acknowledges that Anacreon was its originator ; but
whether that be so or no, the Anthology is full of ex-
cellent examples of it, and the earliest known specimens
now in existence were left by the Greeks.
' Nee, si quid olim lusit Anacreon,
Delevit setas ; spiral adhuc amor,
Vivuntque commissi calores
fidibus puellas.'
Great proficiency was attained in all forms of song, the
amatory, the didactic, the literary and artistic, the witty
and satirical, and others. The poems themselves have
occupied the leisure of men of eminence in the modern
world, and were * favourite objects of study with Eras-
mus and his friend Sir Thomas More.' Chesterfield, it
is true, denounced the Greek epigrams in his Letters to
his son, but against his solitary testimony which in
this matter is of no particular weight is to be set that of
Cowper, Johnson, and many other men of equally op-
posite temperaments, to whom they were a solace and
a delight. Lord Neaves (himself no mean proficient in
the art of gay and gaillard rhymes) observes, in his
very graceful little volume, that ' from the time of Martial
the epigram came to be characterised generally by that
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 369
peculiar point or sting, which we now look for in a
French or English epigram, and the want of this in the
old Greek compositions doubtless led some minds to
think them tame and tasteless. The true or the best
form of the early Greek epigram does not aim at wit or
seek to produce surprise. Its purpose is to set forth
in the shortest, simplest, and plainest language, but yet
with perfect purity and even elegance of diction, some
fact or feeling of such interest as would prompt the real
or supposed speaker to record it in the form of an
epigram ; though it is true that, particularly in the later
period of epigrammatic writing, these compositions, even
among the Greeks, assumed a greater variety of aspect,
and were employed as the vehicle of satire or ridicule,
as a means of producing hilarity and mirth.' It would
be tedious to trace the gradual developments and
changes in this kind of verse from the days of the first
Greek writers to the time of Horace. The latter, how-
ever, seems to have conserved many of its best elements,
and to have added others which gave him so distinctive
a place that, even more than his predecessors in the art,
he has become a type for modern poets. His imitators
for the most part serve but to denote the painful dif-
ference there is between the founder of a style and he
who attempts to copy it. Our purpose is not to institute
B B
370 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
a comparison between the Roman poet's work and that
of his successors, but to glance at the songs of those
English writers who, taking him to a great extent as their
model, have written the verse of passing moods and
emotions, and have not attempted that higher branch
of poetry which secures the loftiest renown from pos-
terity.
What do we mean by vers de societe if, with Mr.
Locker, we must use a French phrase to denote a thing
as old as the English language ? They are the expres-
sion of common sentiment and common feeling
in graceful but familiar rhyme. Poetry of this kind
excites in us no wonder, no unwonted excitement ; but
it pleases us because, apparently without effort, it has
translated into verse the ordinary sensations of humanity,
those which change with the hour, which are again
and again renewed, and which are the property of almost
every nature. For instance, when a writer of vers de
societe gives us his impressions of female beauty, they are
usually drawn from those points of view which belong to
common aesthetics, and not from that hidden deeper
spring of beauty which has in it something of the spiritual,
and which requires the soul of the true poet rightly to
apprehend. The arch smile, the dress, the peach-like
bloom of the cheek these are the things which arrest the
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 37!
eye of the poet of society just as they are the things
which strike the vast majority of men.
He who writes of the world must mingle with the
world. The most successful and the most brilliant of the
school of authors to which we are referring have been
those who have lived largely in society ; who have
studied its movements, its caprices, and its spirit. They
have generally been men of ease aud observation, and
yet men of no settled purpose as regards the expression
of their thoughts. They have not so much sought the
muse as left the muse to come to them ; when she has
given them an apropos inspiration they have written.
The pen has served as a medium to turn a compliment,
to secure a fleeting idea, or to enshrine a random reflec-
tion. Such an end may seem trivial, but the result in the
bulk of these verses has been most valuable. What a
glance at contemporary history we obtain from the time of
Raleigh down to our own day through the aid of our minor
English poetry ! It is as trustworthy as a book of cos-
tume, with the addition of a living human interest.
Writers of fugitive verses hang, as it were, upon the
skirts of the greater poets of their own time, and all that
they do takes a tinge from them. Accordingly, we find
that the minor verse of the Elizabethan period possesses
a nobler expression and a greater sweetness than that of
B }? 2
372 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
the nineteenth century, from the fact that it was an echo
of that sublime period in English literature. The satel-
lites of Shakspeare, Spenser, and Jonson were likely to
emit a stronger radiance than those of Wordsworth,
Byron, or Tennyson. The grace of the first writers of
this humbler poesy has never been surpassed. With
every century there has been a corresponding change
between the two kinds of verse, though the age must also
be counted as a factor in the production of such general
result.
The writing of this poetry, simple as it appears, re-
quires special gifts. In the first place, terseness is an
especial requisite. To be verbose in verse which, as it
were, flies with the wind, is to fail in the first principle of
the art. The best writer of society verse is always
happiest when he is concentrated. Light verse written
in cantos unless it took the form of a humourous or
satirical narrative like ' Don Juan ' would fatigue the
reader. It is not the highest kind of genius which de-
votes itself to this work, and the verbosity which we
could tolerate, if we could not always enjoy, in the
greater writer becomes insufferable in the lesser. The
man who writes ws de soci'ete must have as decided a gift
in his own form of expression and conception as the
artist who takes a higher rank. To quote the words of
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 373
Isaac Disraeli : ' It must not be supposed that because
these productions are concise they have, therefore, the
more facility ; we must not consider the genius of a
poet diminutive because his pieces are so, nor must we call
them, as a sonnet has been called, a difficult trifle. A
circle may be very small, yet it may be as mathematically
beautiful and perfect as a larger one. To such compo-
sitions we may apply the observation of an ancient critic,
that though a little thing gives perfection, yet perfection
is not a little thing. The poet to succeed in these
hazardous pieces must be alike polished by an inter-
course with the world as with the studies of taste, to
whom labour is negligence, refinement a science, and art
a nature. Genius will not always be sufficient to impart
that grace of amenity which seems peculiar to those who
are accustomed to elegant society. . . . These produc-
tions are more the effusions of taste than genius, and it is
not sufficient that the poet is inspired by the Muse, he
must also suffer his concise pages to be polished by the
hand of the Graces.'
Steele, who himself regarded Sappho, Anacreon, and
Horace as the completest models in this range of verse,
was the author of a charming paper in his ' Guardian,'
which really exhausts the subject. * These little things,'
he says, ' do not require an elevation of thought, nor any
374 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
extraordinary capacity, nor an extensive knowledge ; but
then they demand great regularity and the utmost nicety ;
an exact purity of style, with the most easy and flowing
numbers ; an elegant and unaffected turn of wit, with one
uniform and simple design. Greater w r orks cannot well
be without some inequalities and oversights, and they
are in them pardonable ; but a song loses all its lustre
if it be not polished with the greatest accuracy. The
smallest blemish in it, like a flaw in a jewel, takes off the
whole value of it. A song is, as it were, a little image in
enamel, that requires all the nice touches of the pencil, a
gloss, and a smoothness, with those delicate finishing
strokes which would be superfluous and thrown away upon
larger figures, where the strength and boldness of a
masterly hand give all the grace.' This description of
what a song should be is extremely felicitous, and covers
the ground which we are desirous to include within the
scope of our observations. Steele considers the ancient
writers whom he names great in the art because they
pursue a single thought, whereas the moderns cram too
much into one song. Waller occasionally commits this
error, while Cowley is defective through a redundancy of
wit. The reader is dazzled by the starting of so many
trains of thought, whereas a song should be constructed
as we would construct an epigram.
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 375
The limitation to which we have committed ourselves
will forbid an examination of the claims of those who on
the Continent first cultivated the art of light versification.
But even were the scope widened it would be practically
impossible to touch upon the French and Italian writers
from the time of the Troubadours and of Ronsard down-
wards who have attained great proficiency in spontaneous
and courtly verse. The two countries named were more
prolific in a single age, perhaps, than England has been
in the course of three centuries in the production of these
writers. But besides their excellency in the construction
of songs and lyrics, the Italians perfected another style
which finds an admirable exponent in Boiardo, the author
of the ' Orlando Innamorato,' and in Berni, who is re-
membered principally for his Rifacimento of that cele-
brated work. This style is full of episode and descrip-
tion, and although the element of lightness may be often
discovered in it, it is scarcely germane to our subject
Boiardo's style was first imitated in this country within
the present century by Hookham Frere in ' Whistlecraft,'
and afterwards by Byron in 'Beppo' and 'Don Juan.'
But comic epic, or mock heroic poetry, notwithstanding
that it possesses the one feature of familiarity common
also to lighter verse, is removed from the true subject of
this enquiry. In the one we have many trains of ideas
376 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
started ; in the other we have the bending of the energies
to the complete grasping and setting forth of one leading
thought. So in familiar poetry : * Don Juan ' presents us
with a series of pictures, but real fugitive verse expends
itself in the perfection of one. The power of improvisa-
tion, which was so remarkable a feature of the Italian
poetic genius generally, and of the French at certain
spasmodic periods, has been almost wholly absent in
England. We have no parallel to the court of King
Rene, which swarmed with singers of no mean order, and
musicians of a sweet and delicate if not powerful melody.
We are a heavy and practical, in distinction from a light
and sunny race; and our accomplishments in fugitive
verse cannot for grace and elegance be ranged in com-
parison with those of France and Italy. Such as we are,
we are, however ; and we shall doubtless discover that in
other important respects our writers have the superiority
over Continental poets.
Arriving now at a consideration of some of the riches
of English literature as regards this attractive class of
poetry, let us first devote a brief space to those writers
who flourished before the time of Waller. Much of the
best verse issued from the versifiers of the sixteenth cen-
tury and the earlier portion of the seventeenth. In the
lyrics of that period we are struck with the especial beauty
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 377
and sweetness of many whose authorship is unknown.
It speaks well for the popular taste, notwithstanding, that
though the authors have long since crumbled into dust r
their work has been preserved and handed down from
generation to generation. What could be more exquisite,
for instance, than the following verses, which seem to
combine all the requisites for vers de sod'ete, and the
writer of which is still and must always remain un-
known ?
1 Since first I saw your face I resolved
To honour and renown you ;
If now I be disdained, I wish
My heart had ne'er known you.
What ? I that loved, and you that liked
Shall we begin to wrangle ?
No, no, no, my heart is fast,
And cannot disentangle !
If I admire or praise too much,
That fault you may forgive me ;
Or if my hands had strayed to touch ,
Then justly might you leave me.
I asked you leave, you bade me love,
Is't now a time to chide me ?
No, no, no, I'll love you still.
What future e'er betide me.
The sun, whose beams most glorious are,
Rejecteth no beholder ;
And thy sweet beauty, past compare,
Made my poor eyes the bolder.
378 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Where beauty moves, and wit delights,
And signs of kindness bind me,
There, oh ! there, where'er I go,
I leave my heart behind me.'
Most of these old poems touch upon the passion of
love, and in none has the thought been better conveyed
than in Ben Jonson's address to Celia, which, familiar
as it is, can never be read without delight :
* Drink to me only with thine eyes,
And I will pledge with mine ;
Or leave a kiss but in the cup
And I'll not look for wine.
The thirst that from the soul doth rise
Doth ask a drink divine ;
But might I of Jove's nectar sup,
I would not change for thine.'
A lightness and an intensity are combined here so per-
fectly as to make the gem complete. The language is
of the simplest, is free and unrestrained, and the idea
exceedingly pretty. Now and then in these earlier days
we light upon verses in which the feeling of melancholy
predominates, as in those soft and somewhat sad lines
by Carew, which would seem to have been penned
after a rebuff sustained at the hands of the cruel fair
one :
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 379
* He that loves a rosy cheek
Or a coral lip admires,
Or from star-like eyes doth seek
Fuel to maintain his fires ;
As old Time makes these decay,
So his flames must waste away.
But a smooth and steadfast mind,
Gentle thoughts, and calm desires,
Hearts with equal love combined,
Kindle never-dying fires ;
Where these are not, I despise
Lovely cheeks, or lips, or eyes/'
It would be a task to scrutinise at length the varied
lyrical treasures of the Elizabethan era, as we have
received them from the pens of Wither, Sir Henry
Wotton, Donne, Cowley, Sir Philip Sidney, Sir Robert
Ay ton, Sir Walter Raleigh, and others. Raleigh was
a master in the art of verse, though his superiority in
other respects has somewhat detracted from his fame in
this. Everybody, however, remembers his reply to
Marlowe's song of the ' Passionate Shepherd to his Love/
beginning
1 If all the world and love were young
And truth in every shepherd's tongue,
These pretty pleasures might me move
To live with thee and be thy love.'
Raleigh's poetical pieces are especially marked by con-
3 8o POETS AND NOVELISTS.
ceits often rivalling Donne in that respect. Neither
were they without strength, as indeed might well be
predicated when we consider the man. It is a question,
however, whether they have as yet been rated at their
full value. Stately and vigorous is his language, bearing
the impress of an unbending will, a will that did not
quail when the block even was in view. Many poems
which were once associated with his name have been
discovered not to be his workmanship, but those which
remain, and which have been unquestionably authenti-
cated, bear witness to the variety of his gifts. He was
certainly a writer of vers de sodete, but being naturally a
man of a grave and strong spirit, rather than a laughing
and volatile one, his verse is now and again heavy and
sententious.
In the course of reading through the earlier English
poems it is interesting to note how the ideas of a later
day are but simply the refurbishing of those of the older
men. In a set of verses supposed to be by the drama-
tist John Heywood, entitled * A Description of a most
Noble Lady/ and written before 1557, we discover the
thought which Byron gave utterance to in his monody
on Sheridan. The passage will be remembered when we
quote Heywood's lines :
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 381
' I think Nature hath lost the mould
Where she her shape did take ;
Or else I doubt if Nature could
So fair a creature make.'
Beyond all dispute, the best of the early lyric poets
is Robert Herrick, whose verses are flushed with a joyous
and tender spirit. He may be styled the Burns of his
time, and was imbued with something of the reckless soul
of the great north-countryman. Herrick was born in
Cheapside in the year 1591, and educated at Cambridge.
In 1629 he became vicar of Dean Prior, in Devonshire.
The time of the Civil War, however, found him living at
Westminster, where he resided also during the Common-
wealth. After the Restoration he came into his vicarage
again, but by this time he was an old man, and none the
better for his devotion to the convivial company to be
found in the London taverns, where he was ever one of
the gayest of the gay. He died in 1674, having left
behind him some of the sweetest word-music that we
possess. Nothing could be more delightful than these
verses on the Daffodils :
* Fair Daffodils, we weep to see
You haste away so soon :
As yet the early rising sun
Has not attained his noon.
382 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Stay, stay,
Until the hasting day
Has run
But to the even-song ;
And having prayed together, we
Will go with you along.
We have short time to stay, as you,
We have as short a spring ;
As quick a growth to meet decay
As you, or anything.
We die,
As your hours do, and dry
Away
Like to the summer's rain ;
Or as the pearls of morning dew,
Ne'er to be found again.'
Besides the grace that is inseparable from all Herrick's
compositions, we have here that sympathy with Nature
which made good his claim to the title of poet. Flowers,
music, woman, all these had their intense and several
charms for him, and, strangely enough for a middle-aged
clergyman, he was clearly an amorous and erotic poet.
There is a tinge of sensuousness about all that he does,
which sometimes exceeds the limits of a later age. But
all his poems to Julia are singular for their beauty. Take
the Night Piece addressed to her :
1 Her eyes the glowworm lend thee,
The shooting stars attend thee,
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 383
And the elves also, .
Whose little eyes glow
Like the sparks of fire, befriend thee.
No Will-o'-th'-wisp mislight thee;
Nor snake or slow-worm bite thee ;
But on, on thy way,
Not making a stay,
Since ghost there's none to affright thee.
Let not the dark thee cumber ;
What though the moon does slumber ?
The stars of the night,
Will lend thee their light
Like tapers clear, without number.
Then, Julia, let me woo thee,
Thus, thus to come unto me,
And when I shall meet
Thy silvery feet,
My soul HI pour into thee.'
The age in which Herrick lived, and in which he wrote
such verses as these, was distinguished for its poetic ex-
cellence, and its indulgence in fancy and conceit.
Another writer to whom slight reference has been made,
George Wither, was of the same school as Herrick, and
almost his equal in tenderness and delicacy of treatment.
Sir John Suckling was also a great master in the art,
though he is frequently robbed of his true honours. His
Ballad upon a Wedding is one of the most naturally-
POETS AND NOVELISTS.
expressed poems in the language. How these stanzas
make us realise the charming being whom he de-
scribes !
1 Her feet beneath her petticoat,
Like little mice, stole in and out,
As if they feared the light :
But O ! she dances such a way !
No sun upon an Easter-day
Is half so fine a sight.
Her cheeks, so rare a white was on,
No daisy makes comparison ;
Who sees them is undone ;
For streaks of red were mingled there,
Such as are on a Cath'rine pear,
The side that's next the sun.
Her lips were red ; and one was thin,
Compared to that was next her chin,
Some bee had stung it newly ;
But, Dick, her eyes so guard her face,
I durst no more upon them gaze,
Than on the sun in July.'
We have now glanced sufficiently at this early poetry
to apprehend its character by the aid of the examples
given. Its great feature is its naturalness. All its
similes and its reflections are drawn from outward
objects. The close breath of cities does not seem to
have tainted the souls of the poets, who revel in flowers,
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. . 385
and woods, and meads, which are the springs of laughter,
joy, and pathos to them.
Advancing a stage, we arrive at the minor poets of
the Restoration. While not missing a great portion of
the sweetness which belonged to their earlier brethren,
we find that their prevailing characteristic is sentiment,
sometimes degenerating into exaggeration. The age of
Charles II. being famous for its gallantry, the courtly
poets fill their pages with an extravagant homage to the
women of the day. . Now and then the adulatory ama-
tory poetry of Lovelace, Montrose, Rochester, and their
confreres affects the reader as being what the Americans
would describe as ' high falutin',' and the point of a com-
pliment is often made absurd by its prodigious un-
suitability and extravagance ; but in the verse of this
period there still remains the genuine ring of song. The
cavalier hangs his heart upon his sleeve, and talks loudly
enough about it, it is true. He is more than Cupid's
follower ; he is the little god's very humble slave. There
is a certain lightness of touch in Lovelace's ballads that
we rarely meet with elsewhere, and his lines written to
Althea from prison are ' familiar in our mouths as house-
hold words.' He reaches a loftier strain when he serenely
asserts in immortal lines that though immured between
stone walls he is nevertheless free. Sedley, justly famous
c c
386 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
for his songs, and as justly infamous for his dissolute
character, is the author of the charming lyric, ' Phillis is
my only Joy.' Buckingham was a man of a lower order
of talent than these, and yet through the adventitious
aid derived from his position at Court his pieces spread
far and wide, though nobody cares for them now. There
is no power in them, though there is sometimes a facile
execution. Dryden, it will be remembered, described
Buckingham in the character of Zimri as one who
- l In the course of one revolving moon
Was chemist, fiddler, statesman, and buffoon.'
He wrote the fashionable verses of his time from an
overweening conceit which would not suffer him to be
behind his contemporaries, and never stayed to ask him-
self whether he possessed the necessary gifts. The Earl
of Rochester had a more genuine vein ; but one cannot
avoid the impression that most of the singers of his
time had simply a parrot-like title to fame. Sackville,
Earl of Dorset, was stronger than any of those just
named, and his stirring ballad, ' To all you Ladies now
on Land/ written the night before an engagement with
the Dutch, is as widely known as any of Dibdin's songs.
Even in the navy debates of the House of Commons
during the last year some of its admirable lines were
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 387
quoted. The effeminacy which so strongly marked the
poetry of the time is completely eliminated from this
ballad, which possesses both a fine swing and epigram-
matic force.
But a poet who lived slightly anterior to those we
mentioned, the brilliant Marquis of Montrose who was
even still readier with the sword appears to have ex-
celled them all, with the exception of Lovelace that is,
in the poetry of love. He has almost dropped out of
recollection now, but the whole of the ballad from
which the following verses are extracted is of equal
merit :
' My dear and only love, I pray
That little world of thee
Be governed by no other sway
Than purest monarchy ;
For if confusion have a part,
Which virtuous souls abhor,
And hold a synod in thine heart,
I'll never love thee more.
As Alexander I will reign,
And I will reign alone ;
My thoughts did evermore disdain
A rival on my throne.
He either fears his fate too much,
Or his deserts are small,
Who dares not put it to the touch,
To gain or lose it all.
3 88 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
But if thou wilt prove faithful, then,
And constant of thy word,
I'll make thee glorious by my pen,
And famous by my sword ;
I'll serve thee in such noble ways
Was never heard before ;
I'll crown and deck thee all with bays,
And love thee more and more.'
Edmund Waller, however, has left behind him a
name more durable in connection with this class of poetry
than any other man of his century. It is to be hoped he
was more constant in his friendships than he was in his
politics. Having twanged the lyre, and beautifully too,
in praise of Cromwell, he afterwards poured forth con-
gratulatory strains for Charles II. There was no element
of greatness in his compositions ; possessing as much
sweetness as Milton, he yet was a perfect contrast to
him in all other respects. Compared with the grand old
blind poet, he was a rose beside an oak. There was
fragrance, but no stability, and he rapidly fell to pieces.
Yet even from the dried leaves of the rose, which have
been preserved, we can extract pleasant odours. His
imagination was not of a striking order, and his verse is
more distinguished for its finish than for any other
quality ; indeed in this respect he has scarcely had an
equal since. His ' Go, lovely Rose,' which we have
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 389
already had occasion to mention, and ' Lines on a
Girdle/ are the best specimens we possess of his writing,
but these are matchless in their way. Had he owned a
larger and more sincere nature we might have had in
him a great poet.
We can hardly assign a place amongst these canary-
birds to the satanic muse of Swift. He was a bird of
prey in comparison with them, and threw too much of
passion and hatred into the most playful of his verses to
be ranked with such singers. But what force and
command of language, of metre, and of rhyme ! what a
mastery of all he touched ! We prefer for our present
purpose to take him in his gentlest mood, and to trans-
cribe a few lines to Stella, which might have been written
by a man who had not betrayed another woman.
' Stella, say, what evil tongue
Reports you are no longer young ;
That Time sits with his scythe to mow
Where erst sat Cupid with his bow ;
That half your locks are turned to grey ?
I'll ne'er believe a word they say.
'Tis true, but let it not be known,
My eyes are somewhat dimmish grown :
For Nature, always in the right,
To your decay adapts my sight ;
And wrinkles undistinguished pass,
For I'm ashamed to use a glass ;
390
POETS AND NOVELISTS.
And till I see them with these eyes,
Whoever says you have them, lies.
No length of time can make you quit
Honour and virtue, sense and wit ;
Thus you may still be young to me,
While I can better hear than see.
O ne'er may Fortune show her spite,
To make me deaf, and mend my sight.'
One other name amongst the earlier minor poets
must arrest our attention before we come to those of the
nineteenth century. In alluding to Matthew Prior, we
cannot do better than quote Cowper's words upon our
whole subject. * Every man conversant with verse-
making knows, and knows by painful experience, that
the familiar style is of all styles the most difficult to
succeed in. To make verse speak the language of prose
without being prosaic, to marshal the words of it in such
an order as they might naturally take in falling from the
lips of an extemporary speaker, yet without meanness,
harmoniously, elegantly, and without seeming to displace
a syllable for the sake of the rhyme, is one of the most
arduous tasks a poet can undertake. He that could
accomplish this task was Prior. Many have imitated his
excellence in this particular, but the best copies have
fallen short of the original.' This is a generous tribute,
coming as it does from one who was himself no mean
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 391
adept in the same art. Cowper, though he has much
sense and humour, is no match for Prior in this un-
pretending kind of poetry. The French are more
exquisite than ourselves in drawing-room verses, and
there is a decided smack of their quality in Prior.
It has been remarked of him that he ' drank Burgundy
in its own vineyard.' But he was a sad, rollicking dog,
this author of ' Solomon,' and exactly after his patron,
the Earl of Dorset's, own heart. Prior rose from the
humblest rank of life to occupy a position of some im-
portance in the State. He was born at Abbot Street, in
Dorsetshire, but early removed to London with nis father,
who kept a tavern called the ' Rummer Inn,' at Charing
Cross, and it was here in the garb of a waiter that Lord
Dorset one day discovered the future poet reading
Horace. Acting the part of a generous patron, Dorset
sent the youth to St. John's, Cambridge, of which College
he afterwards became a Fellow. After leaving the
university, Prior, in conjunction with Montagu, wrote
1 The Town and Country Mouse,' which opened a path
for him to the diplomatic service. Promotion was only
a question of time, and accordingly we find that during
his somewhat chequered existence he filled the offices of
Secretary at the Hague, and at the Court of Versailles,
and Commissioner of Trade. His life was a singular
392 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
mixture of noble feeling and dissoluteness. Fickle in
the extreme, and an easy prey to the wiles of the
other sex, he was frequently reduced to the very depths
of degradation and poverty. As a writer his longer
poems have not many claims to a lasting remembrance ;
but his shorter pieces justly deserve all the fame they
have acquired. They come barely short of perfection ;
Prior strives hard after obtaining a classic grace and
just misses it. As a specimen of the finished character
of his verses we cite one of his short odes :
' The merchant, to secure his treasure,
Conveys it in a borrowed name :
Euphelia serves to grace my measure,
But Chloe is my real flame.
My softest verse, my darling lyre,
Upon Euphelia's toilet lay
When Chloe noted her desire
That I should sing, that I should play.
My lyre I tune, my voice I raise,
But with my numbers mix my sighs ;
And whilst I sing Euphelia's praise,
I fix my soul on Chloe's eyes.
Fair Chloe blushed : Euphelia frowned :
I sang, and gazed ; I played and trembled ;
And Venus to the Loves around
Remarked how ill we all dissembled.'
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 393
And thus the poet spent his time between his Chloes and
Euphelias, constant to none, but writing charmingly of
each. All his poetry has a devil-may-care air about it ;
it gives the impression that it was written by a man who
found himself in a world where there was much that
ministers to pleasure, and who meant to suck its sweets
to the uttermost. The complete absence of conscious-
ness that life had in it something nobler than animal
pleasure deprived his poetry of the high tone which
should give a flavour even to light and unpretentious
verse. Whenever Bacchus and Venus are the poet's
gods we may look for enervation in his intellectual off-
spring. That taint of scepticism in his nature of which
an eminent French critic writes and which he declares
was transferred to Voltaire, and was not of the latter's
own originating is apparent in Prior's lines to his
soul :
' Poor little, pretty, fluttering thing,
Must we no longer live together ?
And dost thou prune thy trembling wing,
To take thy flight thou know'st not whither ?
Thy humourous vein, thy pleasing folly,
Lie all neglected, all forgot :
And pensive, wavering, melancholy
Thou dread'st and hop'st thou know'st not what.'
Occasionally he had a satirical touch which was very
394 POETS AND NOVELISTS >
pointed if not great. If he could not stab with the
rapier he could prick with the needle. He describes in
one of his effusions a remedy that is worse than the
disease :
* I sent for Ratcliffe ; was so ill,
That other doctors gave me over :
He felt my pulse, prescribed his pill,
And I was likely to recover.
.
But when the wit began to wheeze,
And wine had warm'd the politician,
Cured yesterday of my disease,
I died last night of my physician.'
Mat. Prior was held in high esteem by the most com-
petent of his contemporaries, with whom he lived on
excellent terms. But the judgment upon him must be
that he faithfully represented in himself the follies of his
time. His verse is flexible, sparkling, and flowing ; at
times, but very seldom, it merits higher praise ; yet there
was no one in his own day who wrote such verse so well.
His views of woman, society, life, and pleasure were
those almost of the lowest stratum, though his power
over his art was so great that he could frequently counter-
feit sentiments of a higher order.
As we approach our own times, Winthrop Mackworth
Praed may be said to enjoy the distinction of having hit
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 395
upon a new vein of poetry, and of having been himself
its happiest explorer. Without possessing the highest
gifts of the poet, his smoothness and elegance have
earned for him his reputation. It is not a little singular
that his great ambition should have been to distinguish
himself in a very different field from that with which his
name is principally associated. He became a subor-
dinate member of Sir Robert Peel's first administration,
and an effective speaker in the House of Commons.
His career was cut short by his death from consumption,
at a moment when he was beginning to put forth broader
and more sympathetic views than those which animated
the great bulk of the Conservative party. His spirit was
keen and eager, and the great incentive to all he did
was the desire to excel. This passion mastered his
whole being ; and the momentary earnestness he
threw into every successive undertaking was probably
instrumental in undermining his constitution. Praed
takes us into another atmosphere altogether from that
in which Swift and Prior moved. Even satire had
become good-natured and love decorous. We discover
no single line which could not be read aloud in the
most fastidious circle. Praed has the sweetness of a
summer's night, and his wit represents the twinkling of
the stars. Yet, in the midst of all his gaiety, in some of
396 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
his poems a tinge of melancholy seems to indicate a
premature weariness of life :
1 1 think that very few have sighed
When Fate at last has found them,
Though bitter foes were by their side,
And barren moss around them ;
I think that some have died of drought,
And some have died of drinking ;
I think that nought is worth a thought
And I'm a fool for thinking ! '
But, again, he resumes in a more sprightly and hopeful
tone :
' I think that friars and their hoods,
Their doctrines and their maggots,
Have lighted up too many feuds,
And far too many faggots ;
I think, while zealots fast and frown,
And fight for two or seven,
That there are fifty roads to Town,
And rather more to Heaven.'
The satire of Praed always conveys the impression that
it is veiled. The poet is so vivacious, and so longs for
all men to be blithe, that he strikes rather with the back
of his sword than with its edge. There is the flash of
the blade in air, but something arrests its descent some
sudden second impulse in the spirit of him who wields it.
From a very early period in life Praed gave himself up to
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 397
the writing of light and amusing verse, and the magazine
he edited at Eton contained much that was choice and
sparkling. Macaulay had already shown that these
amusements were not unworthy of a man of genius, and
his Valentine to Lady Mary Stanhope, written after his
return from India, is a capital illustration of the style of
verse written by literary men in leisure hours. The
stately verse of the Whig historian, as we find it in the
' Lays of Ancient Rome,' is far in advance of any serious
poetry written by Praed; but, on the other hand, the
latter excelled his distinguished collaborates in the
poetry of the drawing-room. His work is all executed
with a care and minuteness which are very admirable.
He knew exactly the precise amount of seriousness to
infuse into his lines, and we are never wearied with too
much sermonising. Could there be anything better of
its kind than his portrait of ' Quince,' who stands out in
bold relief, in pure flesh and blood, with his last words
on bidding farewell to the world ?
1 My debts are paid but Nature's debt
Almost escaped my recollection ;
Tom ! we shall meet again, and yet
I cannot leave you my direction ! '
And with what fluency and whimsicality of expression he
describes his Vicar !
398 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
1 His talk was like a stream which runs
With rapid change from rock to roses ;
It slipped from politics to puns ;
It passed from Mahomet to Moses :
Beginning with the laws that keep
The planets in their radiant courses,
And ending with some precept deep
For dressing eels or shoeing horses.
*****
He did not think all mischief fair,
Although he had a knack of joking ;
He did not make himself a bear,
Although he had a taste for smoking :
And when religious sects ran mad,
He held, in spite of all his learning,
That if a man's belief is bad,
It will not be improved by burning.
And he was kind, and loved to sit
In the low hut or garnished cottage,
And praise the farmer's homely wit,
And share the widow's homelier pottage :
At his approach complaint grew mild,
And when his hand unbarred the shutter,
The clammy lips of fever smiled
The welcome which they could not utter.'
This is not poetry to move the world ; there is no vehe-
mence of passion in it, but it is true drawing in quiet lines,
and more powerful than the mere form of it will suffer to
appear. The emotional element was not over-developed
in the author or he would sometimes have been able to
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 399
give to his sketches just that complementary strength
which would have made several of them great. If he has
not the highest command over the pathetic, however, in
a certain flow of humour he is unapproachable. A
specimen of this is found in his reminiscences of the old
school-days at Eton, where he describes the school and
his school-fellows. He could throw round attachments
of this kind an indescribable charm. Another character
entitled ' The Belle of the Ball-room,' though not so
clever and clearly cut in every line, is more humourous
than ' The Vicar.' Even his love verses took a semi-
humourous form :
6 Our love was like most other loves ;
A little glow, a little shiver,
A rose-bud, and a pair of gloves,
And " Fly not yet " upon the river :
Some jealousy of some one's heir,
Some hopes of dying broken-hearted,
A miniature, a lock of hair,
The usual vows and then we parted.
We parted ; months and years rolled by ;
We met again four summers after :
Our parting was all sob and sigh ;
Our meeting was all mirth and laughter ;
For in my heart's most secret cell
There had been many other lodgers ;
And she was not the ball-room's belle,
But only Mrs. Something Rogers.'
4 oo POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Although Praed's more pretentious poems exhibit
considerable taste and the same wonderful facility for
rhyming, they are evidently not penned in his most
natural vein. Not equal to the music of higher poets they
pale still further, and are somewhat dull and heavy reading,
when compared with stanzas such as those we have been
quoting, and which have in them the sparkle and the fizz
of champagne. His serious work has a reminiscence of
the same flavour, but the spirit has fled. We are dealing
with him only as a writer of fugitive verse, for he is one
of the men who will be remembered longer for the trifles
in which he succeeded than for the greater undertakings
in which he failed. Racy, graphic, witty, and brilliant, he
was just such a poet as the society in which he moved
demanded : and, as he had a decided scintillation of
genius, he was able to endow his fancies with more per-
manence than it is usual for such verse to attain.
But Praed must not blind us to the merits of other
writers contemporary with him who are in danger of pass-
ing from recollection. Peacock the novelist, author of
' Headlong Hall ' and many other remarkable works, had
a decided gift in verse, though he seldom made use of it.
His poem of ' Love and Age ' is amongst the best of its
kind, and may well entitle him to mention here. Now
and then his contempt for preconceived notions, and the
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 401
bitterness of his soul, oozed out, as when he wrote upon
the rich and poor :
1 The poor man's sins are glaring ;
In the face of ghostly warning
He is caught in the fact
Of an overt act
Buying greens on Sunday morning.
The rich man has a cellar,
And a ready butler by him ;
The poor must steer
For his pint of beer
Where the Saint can't choose but spy him.
The rich man is invisible
In the crowd of his gay society ;
But the poor man's delight
Is a sore in the sight,
And a stench in the nose of piety.'
Yet Peacock's nature was too caustic for a writer of light
verse. A much better man in this respect was Luttrell,
whose social talents were of a high order. He had not
the genius of a Praed, but at times nevertheless showed
much happiness in expression. One could scarcely
imagine, for instance, a better or more perfect epigram
than this on the distinguished singer, Miss Tree :
* On this Tree, if a nightingale settles and sings,
The Tree will return her as good as she brings.'
D D
4 02 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Luttrell wrote a lengthy poem styled * Advice to Julia,'
which contains many witty descriptions of life in the
upper classes of society, and a most amusing description
of London fog and smoke. His ' Ampthill Park ' shows
that he possessed no mean powers of poetical description.
Of various things which he wrote may be mentioned his
verses to Lady Granville, his epigram on Moore's verses
being translated into Persian and sung in the streets of
Ispahan, and the lines still inscribed in Rogers's arbour
at Holland House. On this same arbour it will be re-
membered Lord Holland penned the pretty conceit
' Here Rogers sat, and here for ever dwell,
To me, those " Pleasures " that he sang so well.'
One of Luttrell's efforts was a tour de force in rhyming
on 'Burnham Beeches.' Some of the stanzas run as
follows :
* What though my tributary lines
Be less like Pope's than Creech's,
The theme, if not the poet, shines,
So bright are Burnham Beeches.
O'er many a dell and upland walk,
Their sylvan beauty reaches ;
Of Birnam-Wood let Scotland talk,
While we've our Burnham Beeches.
If sermons be in stones, I'll bet
Our vicar, when he preaches,
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 403
He'd find it easier far to get
A hint from Burnham Beeches.
Here bards have mused, here lovers true
Have dealt in softest speeches,
While suns declined, and, parting, threw
Their gold o'er Burnham Beeches.
O ne'er may woodman's axe resound,
Nor tempest, making breaches
In the sweet shade that cools the ground
Beneath our Burnham Beeches.
Hold ! though I'd fain be jingling on,
My power no further reaches
Again that rhyme ? enough I've done :
Farewell to Burnham Beeches.'
It would be idle to recapitulate what Moore has
accomplished in the way of light lyrical verse, seeing that
his songs are almost as widely known as the language
itself. Other poets must be passed over who do not
depend upon their lighter achievements for fame as
Pope, Cowper, Mrs. Browning, Lord Byron, Campbell,
Coleridge, Hood, Sheridan, and Rogers. Two names,
nevertheless, warrant a slight pause those of Thackeray
and Walter Savage Landor. The former has bequeathed
to us two or three pieces of light verse, exquisite of their
kind. One is ' The Cane-bottomed Chair,' whose
simple description and pathos must have touched all who
D D 2
404 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
have read it Easy, natural, and flowing, it is as good as
anything that Praed ever wrote, and has glimpses of
endowments which he did not possess. With all his
wonderful finish there was not the same width in Praed
as in Thackeray ; and had he not achieved one of the
highest reputations as a novelist, the latter would have
gained no inconsiderable place as a singer of every-day
life. Imagination was absent in him ; but humour,
satire, playfulness, tenderness, were abundant. 'The
Ballad of Bouillabaisse ' might serve as a model of most
of these qualities. Its writer shows here, as in other
poems, the wonderful attachment he felt for old things,
old places, and old faces. His riper genius loved to
dwell on characters which were simple-hearted, and
through the medium of his verse he talks to us in a
pleasanter vein than in his novels. His ' Peg of Lima-
vaddy ' has been a thousand times spoken of for its light
dancing music, in which it is unapproachable except by
Father Prout's * Bells of Shandon ;' and it has the
manifest advantage over the latter in that it possesses a
human interest, whilst Prout's lines are simply musical
almost nonsensical and nothing more. But of all
Thackeray's lyrics commend us to the one ' At the
Church Gate,' for simplicity, beauty, and sweetness :
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 405
' Although I enter not,
Yet round about the spot
Ofttimes I hover !
And near the Sacred Gate
With longing eyes I wait,
Expectant of her.
* * * *
My lady comes at last,
Timid, and stepping fast,
And hastening hither
With modest eyes downcast :
She comes she's here she's past
May Heav'n go with her.
Kneel undisturb'd, fair Saint ;
Pour out your praise or plaint
Meekly and duly :
I will not enter there,
To sully your pure prayer
With thoughts unruly.
But suffer me to pace
Round the forbidden place,
Lingering a minute,
Like outcast spirits who wait
And see through Heaven's gate
Angels within it.'
In a somewhat similar vein of refined feeling, and with
a genuine classical grace, Walter Savage Landor wrote:
1 The maid I love ne'er thought of me
Amid the scenes of gaiety ;
406 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
But when her heart or mine sank low,
Ah, then it was no longer so.
From the slant palm she raised her head,
And kissed the cheek whence youth had fled.
Angels ! some future day for this,
Give her as sweet and pure a kiss.'
There is something glowing, soft, and Oriental about
Lander's genius. He stands alone in his gifts as clearly
as any poet. Some of his minor works are worthy of a
place in the Greek anthology.
Lord Houghton is another poet who has translated
into graceful verse the impressions gained from society ;
but he possesses a stronger and a fresher air than belong
to the poets of society generally. Music and thought are
what he gives us rather than point and dashing descrip-
tion. In his quiet strains we come sometimes upon re-
flections of considerable depth, and the shadow of the
literary devotee always falls athwart his pages. We like
his utter freedom from artificiality ; his range of poetic
powers is not of the highest order, but there is scarcely a
poet who could be named who has done so uniformly
well in all themes selected for treatment. Those who
attach no merit to dealing with ordinary and every-day
subjects, might attempt to detract from Lord Houghton's
praise by affirming that he too often recurs to such
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 407
topics : but it ought to be recognised fully by this time that
it requires no ordinary gift to treat of homely things in
a successful manner. And he has the especial merit of
looking beneath the surface of things and touching the
springs of life and thought which are in the heart. On one
occasion he sings of
' A sense of an earnest will,
To help the lowly living,
And a terrible heart-thrill
If you have no power of giving :
An arm of aid to the weak,
A friendly hand to the friendless,
Kind words, so short to speak,
But whose echo is endless.'
Everyone is acquainted w r ith the song * I wandered
by the Brook Side,' which is a happy specimen of the
minor lyric ; but many others could be cited of equal
value, including the pretty pastoral verses commencing
' When long upon the scales of Fate.'
Amongst the best living writers of this kind of verse
must indisputably be placed Mr. Frederick Locker \ and
for this reason it will be well to give his work a some-
what closer inspection. There are two distinct sides to
his talent, both of which find adequate representation in
his ' London Lyrics.' In a note appended to these
lyrics, which is one of the cleverest pieces of writing in
the volume, the author has given a faithful summary of
408 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
the requirements of that branch of the poetic art to which
he is devoted. He says and his words will help to find
the clue for understanding his own claims upon us
' Light lyrical verse should be short, elegant, refined, and
fanciful, not seldom distinguished by chastened sentiment,
and often playful. The tone should not be pitched
high, and it should be idiomatic, the rhythm crisp and
sparkling, the rhyme frequent and never forced, while
the entire poem should be marked by tasteful moderation,
high finish, and completeness ; for however trivial the
subject matter may be, indeed rather in proportion to its
triviality, subordination to the rules of composition, and
perfection of execution should be strictly enforced.
Each piece cannot be expected to exhibit all these
characteristics, but the qualities of brevity and buoyancy
are essential.' But he concludes these remarks by a con-
fession that his volume may contain a few pieces which
* ought to have been consigned to the dustbin of im-
mediate oblivion.' That is possible ; we cannot com-
mend all alike. The writer of these trifles is in constant
danger of falling into triviality or childishness. But if he
amuses us we are not disposed to put butterflies on the
rack, or to ask of him more than he aspires to give. Mr.
Locker is not quite so elegant, perhaps, as his forerunner
Praed ; but he is more sprightly and humourous. Live-
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 409
liness, and what we should call the humour of surprise, are
two of his distinguishing features. These qualities shine
in the verses entitled ' Episode in the Story of a Muff/
The reader is kept on the tiptoe of expectation till the
very last line, and the revulsion of feeling then ex-
perienced is due to a very unexpected stroke of drollery.
' She's jealous ! Am I sorry ? No !
I like to see my Mabel so,
Carina mia !
Poor Puss ? That now and then she draws
Conclusions, not without a cause,
Is my idea.
We love ; and I'm prepared to prove
That jealousy is kin to love
In constant women.
My jealous Pussy cut up rough
The day before I bought her muff
With sable trimming.
These tearful darlings think to quell us
By being so divinely jealous ;
But I know better.
Hillo ! Who's that ? A damsel ! come,
I'll follow ; no, I can't, for some
One else has met her.
What fun ! He looks a lad of grace !
She holds her muff to hide her face ;
They kiss, the sly Puss !
Hillo ! Her muff it's trimmed with sable !
It's like the muff I gave to Mabel ! . . .
Good Lord, she's MY Puss / '
4 io POETS AND NOVELISTS.
A similar surprise, though not of so humourous a nature,
follows the reading of * The Old Cradle,' which is amongst
the lyrics that have deservedly become general favourites.
Mr. Locker sees the emptiness of life, and pursues like
every poet the unattainable ideal, and yet is able to
extract a modicum of enjoyment in the pursuit. The
knowledge that things ' are not (exactly) what they seem '
is not to be suffered to make him miserable. It cannot,
for instance, stop his song
1 If life an empty bubble be,
How sad for those who cannot see
The rainbow in the bubble ! '
Whatever may be the case with society in the nineteenth
century, or a large portion of it, at any rate there is no
blase air in Mr. Locker's verses. To read them makes
one cheerful, and causes us to lose the sensation of
selfishness and isolation which the individual course of life
is apt to create. To write with ease and simplicity strains
which shall touch the peasant and the peer is no small
achievement, and when the poet attains to that he needs
no other raison d'etre. Some writers have not that airy
quicksilver spirit which catches momentary impressions of
grace and beauty ; they are too cold and too severe, and
hence their works are not adapted to any mood or any
person. The true writer of occasional verse has the
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 411
advantage of his stronger intellectual brother in this
respect. He never comes amiss; his music is ever
welcome and refreshing. We do not require him to fill
us with awe, to dilate on the grandeur of nature, and to
discuss the great problems of life and mind. We ask
him to speak to us as a brother, to laugh with us as in
the family circle, and, if need be, to mourn with us as a
friend. But this poet of society do ^s not always sing
with the cap and bells on. Now and then, though very
seldom, he must draw from the fount of tears. He will
do it tenderly, but it must be done, for life is not made
up entirely of either the grave or the gay. He knows
that every man has his * skeleton in the cupboard,' and
there is nothing to be gained in blinking the fact.
Having, therefore, an unpleasant subject to encounter,
but also a most pressing one, this is how he must deal
with it :
f We hug this phantom we detest,
We rarely let it cross our portals :
It is a most exacting guest
Now, are we not afflicted mortals ?
Your neighbour, Gay, that jovial wight,
As Dives rich, and brave as Hector
Poor Gay steals twenty times a night,
On shaking knees, to see his spectre.
412 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Ah me, the world ! How fast it spins !
The beldames dance, the caldron bubbles ;
They shriek, and stir it for our sins,
And we must drain it for our troubles.
We toil, we groan ; the cry for love
Mounts upwards from the seething city,
And yet I know we have above
A Father, infinite in pity.'
And thus our poet, in his quiet and unobtrusive
manner, becomes a moral teacher. The verses we have
just quoted are from Mr. Locker's serious poems, and
may serve to correct a very prevalent but erroneous
notion respecting his poetry. He has acquired so con-
spicuous a position as a writer of vers desociete that people
are in the habit of speaking of him as though he never
wrote anything else. True, if the scope of this class of
verse be vastly widened, and in the manner we have
indicated, all he has written would come under the
definition. But if the narrow, restricted meaning be
taken, then there is a side of Mr. Locker's work which
has been completely misapprehended. He manifests a
lode of much richer quality than is ever witnessed in mere
fugitive verse. Thus in * The Widow's Mite ' there is a
vein of genuine pathos :
' A widow she had only one !
A puny and decrepit son ;
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 413
But, day and night,
Though fretful oft, and weak and small,
A loving child, he was her all
The Widow's Mite.
The Widow's Mite ay, so sustain'd,
She battled onward, nor complain'd
Though friends were fewer :
And while she toil'd for daily fare
A little crutch upon the stair
Was music to her.
I saw her then, and now I see
That, though resign'd and cheerful, she
Has sorrowed much :
She has, He gave it tenderly,
Much faith ; and carefully laid by,
A little crutch.'
One other copy of verses we must quote from Mr.
Locker before quitting this portion of his writings. ' The
unrealised Ideal ' seems to us not only to be full of a
sweet naturalness, but to catch the very echo of regret
It is not unworthy of Schiller or of Heine :
' My only love is always near,
In country or in town
I see her twinkling feet, I hear
The whisper of her gown.
She foots it ever fair and young,
Her locks are tied in haste,
And one is o'er her shoulder flung,
And hangs below her waist.
414 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
She ran before me in the meads ;
And down this world- worn track
She leads me on ; but while she leads
She never gazes back.
And yet her voice is in my dreams,
To witch me more and more ;
That wooing voice ! Ah me, it seems
Less near me than of yore.
Lightly I sped when hope was high,
And youth beguiPd the chase,
I follow, follow still ; but I
Shall never see her face.'
There is not much visible sign of deterioration in the
public taste when these and similar true and melodious
strains remain popular. In other respects Mr. Locker
has one of the best gifts which the writer of this class of
verse ought to possess viz., spontaneity. We do not
remember any of his pieces which it was in the least
tedious to read. It does not follow, however, that
verses which have apparently so spontaneous an air have
been written with ease ; on the contrary, they are often
produced with the greatest care, and very seldom given
forth to the world till they have undergone a long process
of elaboration and finish. The most exquisite lyrics of
the Poet Laureate, those which from their sweet flow
and naturalness seem to have been most readily com-
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 415
posed, are really the productions of intense and constant
effort.
Of Mr. Locker's humour we have as yet said little,
and some reference to it is almost imperative, seeing that
it permeates more than three-fourths of what he has
written. More than any writer almost he interweaves it
with some serious threads, as in the lines on ' A Human
Skull ' of which lines, it may be noted, Thackeray had
a very exalted opinion :
1 A human skull ! I bought it passing cheap !
Indeed 'twas dearer to its first employer !
I thought mortality did well to keep
Some mute memento of the Old Destroyer.
Time was, some may have prized its blooming skin ;
Her lips were woo'd, perhaps, in transport tender ;
Some may have chuck'd what was a dimpled chin,
And never had my doubt about its gender !
Did she live yesterday, or ages back ?
What colour were the eyes when bright and waking ?
And were your ringlets fair, or brown, or black,
Poor little head ! that long has done with aching ?
It may have held (to shoot some random shots)
Thy brains, Eliza Fry, or Baron Byron's ;
The wits of Nelly Gwynne, or Doctor Watts
Two quoted bards ! two philanthropic sirens ?
But this I trust is clearly understood,
If man or woman ; if adored or hated ;
Whoever own'd this skull was not so good,
Not quite so bad as many may have stated.
416 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
Who love can need no special type of Death ;
He bares his awful face too soon, too often ;
Immortelles bloom in beauty's bridal wreath,
And does not yon green elm contain a coffin ?
O true-love mine, what lines of care are these ?
The heart still lingers with its golden hours,
But fading tints are on the chestnut trees,
And where is all that lavish wealth of flowers ?
The end is near. Life lacks what once it gave,
Yet death has promises that call for praises ;
A very worthless rogue may dig the grave,
But hands unseen will dress the turf with daisies.'
Thus we get beaten out for us pure and noble thoughts
when the skilled hand turns over the old skull. These
verses are worthy of all the praise that has been bestowed
upon them, and betoken the possession of a power of
secret analysis and comparison. Mark, also, how the
writer has contrived, not to suppress the humourous
thoughts which divided his brain with those more purely
reflective, but simply to veil the humour, so that we
see it shining through the sombre substance of the
verses.
In a more spiightly vein Mr. Locker sings :
* The world's a sorry wench, akin
To all that's frail and frightful :
The world's as ugly, ay, as Sin
And almost as delightful !
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 417
The world's a merry world (pro tern.}
And some are gay, and therefore
It pleases them, but some condemn
The world they do not care for.
The world's an ugly world. Offend
Good people, how they wrangle !
The manners that they never mend,
The characters they mangle !
They eat and drink, and scheme, and plod,
And go to church on Sunday ;
And many are afraid of God
And more of Mrs. Grundy.'
To Mr. Locker, then, pertain the general excellences
of extreme naturalness, simplicity, and fine human
feeling, the last of which saturates all his poetry. Praed
had more wit and fancy, but Mr. Locker has far more
humour and pathos ; and if Praed drew some of his
inspiration from Byron and Moore, his successor has
been imbued with the sweeter and finer spirit of Words-
worth and Charles Lamb. We consequently get more of
the poet's heart in his verse.
Mr. Locker's talent is in harmony with the spirit of
the time. He lives so in the age and belongs so much
to what is best in its society that he may fairly be
remembered and quoted hereafter as a representative of
the period. His earnestness and sincerity are very marked
characteristics, and the genuineness of his song will
E E
4 i 8 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
provide against its extinction. His fancy is chaste and
selective, his wit delicate, his style polished and graceful,
and it is possible that some of his light fabrics may
outlive more stately and solid edifices.
A word remains to be said of other living writers of
this class, but there is little that merits a lengthened
detention. Just as a passing reference must suffice for
second-rate writers in generations which have recently
expired Haynes Bayly, the Hon. W. R. Spencer,
Maginn, and others so must a few sentences suffice for
their successors. Yet, as we pass them by, we must
reserve a place for the songs of Mrs. Arkwright, whose
exquisite voice still vibrates in the ear, whilst some
couplets of her composition linger in the memory.
The following lines of hers may be new to many
readers :
' I used to love the Winter cold,
And when my daily task was done
To roll the snowy ball, and hold
My crystal daggers in the sun.
How beautiful, how bright !
How soon they melt away,
Till drop by drop they vanish quite
Ah ! well a day !
And then the Spring, the smiling Spring,
The flowers, the fruit, the murmuring rill !
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 419
To chase the shadows o'er the hill
And dance within the fairy ring.
Ye flowers so bright and gay
Within the garden wall,
Ye'll meet again all smiling, all
Ah ! well a day !
Untir'd the Summer's heat to bear,
Beneath the flow'ry load to bend,
The mimic banquet to prepare,
And share it with some joyous friend !
How soon the day is done
The longest summer day !
'Tis morn 'tis noon 'tis set of sun
Ah ! well a day !'
The most promising of the younger writers of minor
verse is Mr. Austin Dobson, whose ' Vignettes in Rhyme '
betoken considerable poetic fancy, though his wit is far
inferior to that of Mr. Locker. 1 The succeeding stanzas,
which are a fair example of Mr. Dobson's style, are
taken from his poem suggested by a chapter in Mr.
Theodore Martin's ' Horace : '
1 It is but fair to Mr. Dobson to say that I regard him as some-
thing more than a writer simply of fugitive verse. There is a dis-
tinct poetic vein in his work which should lead to something more
ambitious than he has yet accomplished. He is not profound, but
graceful. His more serious verses are the best of those which he
has yet clone, and should suggest to him his metier. He may yet
prove a sweet and genial, though not a lofty and impassioned,
singer.
E E 2
420 POETS AND NOVELISTS.
1 " HORATIUS FLACCUS, B.C. 8,"
There's not a doubt about the date,
You're dead and buried :
As you remarked, the seasons roll ;
And 'cross the Styx full many a soul
Has Charon ferried,
Since, mourned of men and Muses nine,
They laid you on the Esquiline.
*****
Ours is so far-advanced an age !
Sensation tales, a classic stage,
Commodious villas !
We boast high art, an Albert Hall,
Australian meat, and men who call
Their sires gorillas !
We have a thousand things, you see,
Not dreamt in your philosophy.
*****
Science proceeds, and man stands still ;
Our " world " to-day's as good or ill,
As cultured (nearly),
As yours was, Horace ! You alone,
Unmatched, unmet, we have not known.'
The author of the ' Carols of Cockayne ' is deserving of
mention for his humour and observation he also ought to
have given us more good work than he has done ; but
the clever writer of * The Bab Ballads ' scarcely comes
under our category ; his effusions partake too much of
the character of broad farce. Mr. Calverley, again,
ENGLISH FUGITIVE POETS. 421
whose parodies are very close and really brilliant, belongs
to that school whose best exponents were James and
Horace Smith, the incomparable authors of ' Rejected
Addresses.' Mr. Mortimer Collins is a much nearer
approach to what we require, but he has by no means
done such good work as was expected of him. Lord
Lytton's ' Fables in Song ' deserve to occupy a higher
rank in poetry than such lyrics as form the basis of our
reflections. They are full of thought sometimes over-
burdened with it ; but they have a graceful facility of
versification which entitles their author to rank with many
of our cultivated poets.
The question may be asked, of what use is this
Horatian poetry? but we apprehend it will be its own
justification in the eyes of most lovers of the poetic art.
The brooklet is not so imposing as the mighty river to
which it is tributary, but its music may be as sweet and
true. Men cannot always be climbing the magnificent
passes of the Alps, but in the absence of sublime scenery
does not the trimly cut and ordered garden present many
points of attraction ? Thus, all singers have their proper
seasons and uses. The minor poets unquestionably
flourish best in seasons of national prosperity, not in
those of stirring events. They are satisfied with what
the world has to offer them, though in the best of them
422 - POETS AND NOVELISTS.
there is a strain of genuine regret, testifying that this is
not sufficient to satisfy the cravings of the soul. In all
the excellent writers of Venusian verse whom we have
named may be perceived the shade of melancholy, which
lends an additional charm to their gaiety. With the
deeper questions of the heart they very rarely inter-
meddle. If they can touch the springs of laughter and
emotion in others they receive their reward. These
poets, however, have yet something to learn : England
has its Shakspeare but not its Horace. To write
Horatian verse successfully requires all the earnestness
and devotion which the greater poet exhibits in another
field. But even these trifles are not without their use and
their chann, for they may be accepted by posterity as a
faithful commentary upon contemporaneous events, life,
and manners. Who knows but that through their aid in
some distant era the stranger in our deserted gates may
obtain some glimpses of our nineteenth-century civilisa-
tion ; just as we now, with Horace or Martial for our
friend and guide, may walk through the streets, and con-
verse with the denizens, of ancient Rome ?
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