with the death of sterne it might have been said that the english novel expired for the time, though of course, as donne admitted in the case of the decease of miss drury, "a kind of world" lingered in existence. indeed, plenty of novels were published and read. but they are forgotten. experience proves that nobody need waste his time over the tales of clara reeve, such as "the old english baron"; and only infinite leisure and curiosity need try to disengage the qualities from the defects of brooke's "fool of quality," while beckford's "vathek" is certainly worth notice as the ingenious and in places impressive feat of a millionaire. it is curious that the most poignant detail of the hall of eblis, the phantasms of lost souls, wandering each with his hand pressed to his heart, occurs in the mythology of an australian tribe, the euahlayi. research might discover a wilderness of forgotten novels, probably quite as good, given the conditions of the ages, as the myriads of "masterpieces," which our newspaper critics daily receive with stereotyped formul? of applause.
frances burney.
when a novelist did appear, a girl gifted with a delight in observing traits of character, and recording them from her early teens in a diary; when fanny burney came, she received such a welcome as warms the heart after all these years. frances burney (1752-1840) was born while the elibank plot for kidnapping the royal family in the interests of the king over the water was maturing, and she outlived by eight years the author of "waverley, or 'tis sixty years since".
[pg 531]
the daughter of dr. burney, a teacher and historian of music, and a friend of the great wits, johnson, burke, reynolds, garrick, and the rest, miss burney, from childhood, was observing mankind and womankind; was reading "the vicar of wakefield," and sterne, the novels of the abbé provost and of marivaux, and apparently of smollett no less than of the moral richardson. she was writing, too, in secret; but at the command of her stepmother, probably when she herself was about 16 or 17, she burned all her works, including a novel on which her first published romance, "evelina" (1778), was based, or rather out of which it was developed. we cannot estimate the merits of those "first blights," as keats says, but "the little character-monger," as johnson called her, continued to make her sketches of character in her journal and in letters to her kind old mentor, "daddy crisp," a man much older than her father, who had retired from society and the sorrows of the playwright to a hospitable country house near epsom. as the favourite and assistant of her musical and historical father, the retiring observant girl lived till, at about the age of 24, she returned to her first love, and, under great difficulties, wrote, and copied in a feigned hand, her "evelina". with secrecy enough for a jacobite conspiracy the book was conveyed to a bookseller, accepted, and published in 1778. among her burned works was "the history of caroline evelyn," a young woman of moving adventures, whose mother was a vulgar barmaid, married, for the second time, in france, to a monsieur duval. as caroline died of a broken heart, leaving a legitimate daughter, evelina, miss burney told the story of that daughter's fortunes, situated as she was between her well-born english father's kin and her barmaid frenchified mother, with her grotesque associates. the scheme had great possibilities, of which the author took full advantage; her chief successes being the members of the city family, the branghtons, their smart low-bred friend, mr. smith, and the naval captain mirvan, whose language is discreetly veiled, while his bullying of madame duval and other persons is rather more than smollettian. evelina, through all the dangers which then beset the fair at vauxhall and other resorts of the gay, reaches the haven where[pg 532] she and lord orville would be, and all ends happily, as in a novel all ought to end. there is an extraordinary wealth of characters, burke thought them too abundant. the novel set literary society on fire with delight and admiration, dr. johnson leading the chorus of praise, and miss burney was his darling, and was welcomed by mrs. thrale, reynolds, burke, garrick, mrs. montagu; even horace walpole, though he kept his head, applauded. the triumphs of fanny are recorded in her diary and letters, a contribution to history even more delightful than her "evelina". all the good fortunes that miss austen missed, or shunned, fell to miss burney, who well deserved them. her later novel, "cecilia" (1782) is not really inferior to "evelina," but it is not "the first sprightly runnings". after her years as a tiring woman of queen charlotte (whereof the record in her diary is at least on a level with her novels), her "camilla" appeared, was subscribed for by all the world and miss austen, and was censured by john thorpe in "northanger abbey". this immortal crown is hardly deserved by "camilla". the story of miss burney's marriage to that amiable émigré, the comte d'arblay, is told in macaulay's famous essay, which, again, is toned down and corrected by mr. austin dobson ("fanny burney" in "english men of letters"). but the novels themselves, and the diary, remain monuments, and not dull but delightful monuments, of social and personal history. we need not dwell on that lucrative failure, "the wanderer" (1814). miss burney had opened the way, which was later to be trodden by the lighter feet of a far greater genius, whom some men have named with shakespeare—jane austen.
mrs. radcliffe.
it is impossible to restore a faded popularity, and in a generation which sees at least two dozen new novels bloom every week, the desire to revive the taste for mrs. radcliffe's romances is a "vain hope and vision vain". none the less, mrs. radcliffe (ann ward, born in the birth year of horace walpole's "castle of otranto," 1764, and married to a mr. radcliffe in 1787), was the grandmother, as horace walpole was the great-grandfather, of the romantic school of fiction. her first tale, "the castles of athlin[pg 533] and dunbayne" (1789) is but a pioneer work: mrs. radcliffe knew nothing of the castles and manners of the mackays, sinclairs, and gunns "in the dark ages". in 1790, with "the sicilian romance," mrs. radcliffe "found herself," and opened the way for all the terrors of mr. rochester's house in "jane eyre". the remarkable phenomena of the haunted sicilian castle are not supernormal, but, till you discover that they are caused by the concealed wife of the proprietor (ferdinand, fifth marquis of mazzini), they strike terror; later they move pity. "northanger abbey" is the inspired parody of mrs. radcliffe's effects in this work, which also contains the germ of a thrilling scene in r. l. stevenson's "kidnapped". in "the romance of the forest" (1791) mrs. radcliffe struck the keynote of the novels about the valois court, which we owe to her spiritual descendants, alexandre dumas and mr. stanley weyman. to "local colour" and the historical "atmosphere," mrs. radcliffe was indifferent; but she always had a story to tell, a story new and startling; and she managed her chiaroscuro with the touch of genius. she awakened curiosity, she struck terror; she skilfully interwove the many threads of her plots; she was far from being destitute of humour; and her italian landscapes are designed after poussin and salvator rosa. "every reader," says scott, "felt her force, from the sage in his study to the family group in middle life." her "mysteries of udolpho" is hardly worthy of its reputation. but in "the italian" she anticipates the manner of hawthorne; her wicked monk, schedoni, is (as scott himself saw and said), the original of byron's giaour, and his other darkling lurid heroes; and her comic valet, paolo, who loyally follows his master into the dungeon of the inquisition, is the model of sam weller, in the fleet prison, with mr. pickwick. mrs. radcliffe's genius is not appreciated merely because she is not read. the student who gives her a fair chance is carried away by the spell of this "great enchantress"; and "the italian" is by far the best romantic novel that ever was written before scott. he applauded her with his wonted generosity, but objected to her habit of explaining away her supernormal incidents. but this was done in homage to the stupid "common sense" of her age. after her masterpiece[pg 534] "the italian," mrs. radcliffe deserted fiction; wrote "the female advocate" in defence of "woman's rights," and suffered from unhappy domestic circumstances for which she was in no way responsible. she died in 1823.
maria edgeworth.
a more fortunate and prosperous pioneer than mrs. radcliffe in the way of novel-writing was maria edgeworth. born on 1 january, 1767, at black bourton, not far from, oxford, miss edgeworth was the daughter of richard edgeworth, an irish landlord and british moralist. in the words of "hudibras" he
married his punctual dose of wives
to the number of four, and had four families. they were wonderfully harmonious, and as maria edgeworth was of the first family, and only some twenty-two years younger than her father, she was the constant companion of an energetic and intelligent man, reckoned one of the leading bores of his age, and tinctured with the ideas of his friend, the humourless mr. thomas day, author of "sandford and merton". miss edgeworth saw much of irish life, fashionable and rustic, at edgeworthstown, and very early began to write under the direction of her father, whose muse was the didactic. she wrote the stories in "the parents' assistant" for her own little brothers and sisters, to whom, as to children generally, she was devoted. the self-consciously virtuous frank is her father, idealized (we cannot believe that she consciously satirized him), and the ever-delightful rosamond is herself. modern children may rage against the cruelty of the mother of rosamond, in the tale of "the purple jar," but probably children of an earlier date were too much interested in rosamond and the jar to grieve over the heroine's lack of shoes. "lazy lawrence," "simple susan," "waste not, want not," and the rest, are all dear to persons who read them at the right age, and draw from the last-named tale an undying love of long, sound pieces of string, saved from parcels.
it seems to be a matter of ascertained fact that mr. edgeworth too often had his oar in the paper boats of his daughter's[pg 535] novels, that he altered, and transposed, and suggested, and inserted moral sentiments; and could not keep the maxims of mr. thomas day out of the memorial. miss edgeworth had abundance of humour, and would not have made sir james brook lecture to lord colambie, a total stranger, "on all ancient and modern authors on ireland from spenser" (why not from giraldus cambrensis?) "to young and beaufort". in "castle rackrent" (1800) mr. edgeworth had no hand, and it is reckoned the best of miss edgeworth's books on ireland. it is not a novel: thady, an ancient peasant, merely tells the tale of four generations of o'shaughneseys, squires who much resembled the osbaldistone family as described by diana vernon. all were greedy and reckless oppressors of their devoted tenantry, but one was more of a drunkard, another more of a litigant, another more of a cruel debauchee, and the last more of a good-natured fool, as innocent of worldly matters as leigh hunt (but not so much to his own advantage), than the rest. their wives are worthy of them. poor thady maintains his "great respect for the family" throughout, and there is a humorous pathos in his topsy-turvy code of ethics, constructed out of insanely depraved irish moral conventions of the period. the fairy belief, and the banshee, peep out in the notes: miss edgeworth was the precise reverse of mrs. radcliffe in the matter of romance. the book at once became popular, with "belinda," a very readable story of london society, and "the absentee," in which the irish characters are much better when in their own green isle than when abroad. the horrors of an estate ruled by a corrupt and cruel agent are barely credible, and the hero is a wooden if generous puppet, while lady colbrony, trying to be more english than the english, in london, is not really so amusing as similar characters in thackeray. scott, with his usual generosity, publicly asserted more than once that miss edgeworth's example led him to attempt the delineation of his own country-folks; and perhaps the happiest of weeks at abbotsford was spent during miss edgeworth's visit. in paris, edinburgh, and london she was a lioness, and enjoyed all the pleasant rewards of friendship and fame which fortune denied to miss austen. her later novels, "ormonde," "harrington," and[pg 536] "helen," were duly appreciated; in may, 1849, she ended a long, happy, and beneficent life.
charles brockden brown.
charles brockden brown (1771-1810) is commonly regarded as the first american novelist. he came at an unfortunate moment, for in the years of his activity as a romancer (1797-1801) english fiction was at a low ebb, and, uninfluenced by fielding and sterne, and neglectful of fanny burney, he followed godwin (in "caleb williams"), and adopted the mysterious effects of mrs. radcliffe. in his "wieland," the terrific and fatal agency which brings down fate, is akin to that which monsieur de saint luc used to frighten henri iii., and which chicot exposed, in dumas's novel. in "arthur mervyn," brown wrote with much vigour a realistic description of a yellow fever hospital. his friendly critics place him above mrs. radcliffe in his mastery of the truly horrid; but though his books were republished in england, they do not appear in the list of miss catherine morland in "northanger abbey". if brown were superior to the great enchantress, at least he followed the model which she had created, without the humour which affords relief in "the italian". he did not deal in italian castles and abbeys of the valois period, but cast his romances in his native philadelphia.
jane austen.
scott's first novel was finished and published in 1814. his friend, morritt of rokeby, said that before "waverley" appeared, novels were read only by ladies' maids and seamstresses. yet, eighteen or nineteen years before the birth of "waverley," novels as great in their own style as scott's, and as imperishable, had been written by a girl of 21, whose first published works of fiction came earlier than "waverley" into the world. before 1803, jane austen (born 1775) had written "northanger abbey"; before the beginning of the nineteenth century "pride and prejudice" and "sense and sensibility," were completed by her. but though a speculative publisher bought "northanger abbey" in 1803, he[pg 537] never published it, and "sense and sensibility" (1811) with "pride and prejudice" (1813), lay long neglected, like the poems of theocritus in their dark chest, before they were given to the world. they were not received, like miss burney's "evelina," with triumphant acclaims; the author was not surrounded and flattered by the wits, as was miss burney. indeed jane austen, in her lifetime, was never made a lioness. slow and all but silent approval of her genius advanced by degrees and deepened into the diapason of her ever-widening renown.
she was the daughter of a country clergyman, the rector of steventon in hampshire, much of her later life (she died at 42, in 1817) was passed at the hamlet of chawton near winchester. bath was her metropolis; she describes its pleasure and society with inimitable charm and humour in "northanger abbey," and "persuasion," published after her death, in 1818. she lived in the heart of a kind and happy family, among her nephews and nieces, brothers and sisters, with such squires, clerics, doctors, solicitors, sportsmen, naval officers, and old maids as clustered round or visited steventon and chawton. she watched them with a smiling intense observation; she winced from their mindless gregariousness; they are never out of their neighbours' houses. but she was only a very little cruel, even to the most brainless of baronets, or the stupidest of mothers, or the least well-bred of jolly good-humoured matrons, or the noisiest of children. she does show the trifling defects of spoiled children, but she was the kindest and best-beloved of aunts. meanness she does brand in the really awful characters of john dash wood and his wife; stupid pride in sir walter elliot and lady catherine de bourgh (who receives her deserts from miss elizabeth bennet), and clerical sycophancy in the immortal mr. collins. but mr. collins is so amusing that we can no more be angry with him than with mr. pecksniff. mr. woodhouse, in "emma," is next door to an idiot, and in actual life he would have been insufferable, except to the good and gentle. but the excellence of his heart, and the sweetness of his manners, cause him to be surrounded by patient and silent affection from all who know him; and not less good and fortunate is the most voluble of chatter-boxes,[pg 538] miss bates. only for a single moment is emma, the heroine, unable to hold her peace when miss bates is too intolerable; and this youthful excess is bitterly repented by the beautiful sinner. emma was extremely young when she was a snob, miss austen did not draw an angel in emma, but a good, human girl. we cannot really call miss austen severe, though we cannot but see how much she must have suffered among people so dull that a lady's recollection of the name of her dead son's naval captain is described as "one of those extraordinary bursts of mind that sometimes do happen".
less than twenty years divided miss burney's "evelina" (1778) from the composition of "northanger abbey" and "pride and prejudice". these years had brought an astonishing change. the smollettian element in miss burney's books and the horse-play have vanished; vanished has that amazing style which the fair fanny evolved. the manners of naval officers have passed from the brutal to the courtly. miss burney is antiquated, she is archaic, she belongs to another world than ours, while miss austen is perennially fresh, and sparkling with wit; she recaptures, without imitation, the humour and the ease of addison. unlike scott, she is almost never stilted: her people, as a rule, talk like men and women of this world, not like helen macgregor. "northanger abbey," which is in part meant as a quiet but delightful mockery of mrs. radcliffe's haunted abbeys, secret panels, and mysterious sounds, was written but six years after "the sicilian romance" sent a shudder through its myriad readers; and is almost of the year of "the mysteries of udolpho". the girl of the steventon rectory was already mocking "the great enchantress," and the smile outlives the shriek.
miss austen shunned the romantic—like wordsworth she might have said "the moving accident is not my trade," but her incidents move us (for example, louisa musgrove's fall off the cobb at lyme regis); and the mystery of jane fairfax's piano in "emma," is as exciting as the black curtain behind which catherine morland expected to discover the skeleton of laurentina. john thorpe said of mrs. radcliffe's novels (which he had not read), "there is some fun and nature in them" (and there is plenty[pg 539] of fun), miss austen found in them much more of fun than of nature.
it is said that she is afraid of the passions, but what can be more passionate than the constancy of anne elliot, or more ardent than the first love of marianne dashwood? all the family of the bennets are charming or diverting in their various ways; the humorous father, the foolish mother, the witty and spirited elizabeth, the gentle, beautiful jane, the pedantic mary, the colourless kitty, and lydia who might have shone in a comedy by vanbrugh. it is rather hard to believe that elizabeth could accept darcy after he, like the master of ravenswood, had told his lady that her father was not a gentleman. but then elizabeth came to see darcy's house and place in derbyshire!
if one novel is not quite so good as the rest, it is "mansfield park"; but to name it recalls mrs. norris, and the return of the heavy father as his progeny are rehearsing a dubious play from the german; and one has a tenderness for the good little heroine, and for her rather squalid kinsfolk, and for both of the naughty crawfords. "mansfield park" is a masterpiece like the rest. perhaps miss austen's heroes are not so good as her heroines; but henry crawford and frank churchill, in "emma" prove that her young men are not mere lay figures.
she never went outside of the life she knew to draw wicked dukes and the virtuous poor; she had no villains, no rebels; if she read crabbe's lurid and realistic studies of poverty and crime, she did not imitate them in prose. her characters are perfectly indifferent to public affairs, throughout the struggle with napoleon; except when the authoress cannot conceal her passionate enthusiasm for the men who fought under nelson and collingwood. but the expression is not enthusiastic in terms.
miss austen's art has the exquisite balance and limit of greek art in the best period. she knew what she could do, she did it to perfection; and, naturally, the humourless charlotte bront? thought her tame and dull. but from scott himself to macaulay and archbishop whately, nay, from the prince regent (george iv., who had a set of her novels in each of his houses), the best judges recognized the greatness of one of the six greatest english[pg 540] writers of fiction, and, a century after the publication of "pride and prejudice," she is a more popular favourite by far than in her own brief day. to judge by a miniature of miss austen, done when she was of the age when catherine morland began to give up playing cricket and baseball, her face and figure were as bright and charming as her genius. like milton's eve, miss austen is "fairest of her daughters" in art, though among them are mrs. gaskell and miss thackeray (lady ritchie).
walter scott.
the novelist.
when scott, in 1814, sought for some fly-hooks in a bureau, and found the lost first chapter of "waverley," a novel begun in 1805, prose fiction seemed to be under general contempt, was only fit for milliners, said his friend morritt of "rokeby". yet, in fact, the good novel was not left without a witness. miss edgeworth's tales of irish life and manners excited, said scott, his own wish to write of his own people, and miss edgeworth's "castle rackrent" is of 1800. jane austen had written "northanger abbey" in 1797; it remained unpublished, but "sense and sensibility" is of 1811, "pride and prejudice" of 1813; thus both were prior to "waverley". but neither, great as are their merits, attracted attention then, as miss burney's novels had done from the first; and probably the contempt of novels was one of the various causes, the chief being that "it was his humour," which made scott conceal his authorship of his prose romances.
"waverley"—in the first and long-lost chapters—is reckoned tame; but the hero's youth in peaceful rural england was deliberately designed as a quiet approach to his richly varied adventures under the white cockade. from the moment when waverley enters the village, so strange to english eyes, and the still stranger castle, of tullyveolan, he passes into the land of romance; all was, to english readers, as novel and unexpected as if edward had joined a tribe of central africa. the ancient feudal manners, lowland or highland; the learned, eccentric, brave old baron; the half idiot jester, davy gellatley; the bailie, balmawhapple;[pg 541] the clansmen, the celtic chief, fergus macivor; the survivor of the remnant, gifted gilfillan, were humorous and masterly creations, while the gallant figure of the doomed prince and his wonderful adventure, narrated with sympathy, completed the charm. the world was taken by storm, believed in flora macivor, and wept afresh over the shambles of carlisle.
written in six weeks, the romance of "guy mannering" (1815), with its pell-mell of characters from the colonel (who was thought like scott), and his lively dark-eyed daughter julia, (certainly like mrs. scott), to pleydel, meg merrilies, glossin, the bankrupt bertram laird, to dominie sampson, and dandie dinmont with his dogs, was only less popular from the first. "the antiquary" (1816) added a romance of dark complexion to a study of modern manners of the preceding decade; while "old mortality," at the end of the year, did for 1679 and the covenanters, with even greater skill, what "waverley" had done for the clans and the forty-five. "old mortality" is probably the greatest of scott's historical novels. the friends of the persecuted remnant exclaimed against historical unfairness, but the friends of the "indulged" of 1679, and of claverhouse, had as good a right to pick a quarrel.
"the black dwarf" was condemned by blackwood the publisher, and posterity has not differed from his verdict. the story had been written on a larger scale, but was truncated, said scott, to the proportions of the dwarf. in 1817 "rob roy" gave us the best of all scott's heroines, diana vernon, and the deathless andrew fairservice, and bailie nicol jarvie, and the dougal creature, with rob himself, a tower of strength; but helen, his wife, is somewhat melodramatic (as probably she actually was) and the plot, with its financial embroilment, is "only good for bringing in fine things".
it is difficult to decide between the rival excellences of "the heart of midlothian" (1818) (with another heroine, jeanie deans, as good and original in her way as diana vernon) and of "old mortality". we are apt to prefer the novel which we read last. written "in torments," and totally forgotten by scott after he had composed it, "the bride of lammermoor" has won tears[pg 542] for generations, though the doomed master is something of a lay figure, and the pathos of the old steward is better than his humour, which grows mechanical. the darkening of the omens towards the close is matched only in the "odyssey" and "njal's saga"; for, though the novel is not in the first rank, it contains much of the author's best, and could have been written by no other mortal. with "the bride" came the brief "legend of montrose," in which the great marquess is half-forgotten, for dugald dalgetty, that matchless creation, runs away with scott's fancy, happily carrying him to meet the rival marquess of argyll. confessedly scott could adhere to no predetermined plan (he tried to do so, again and again, but was conscious of failure); his characters were alive and masterful, and led him where they would, but he had never contemplated a romance in a theme above romance, the action and passion of montrose.
leaving scotland—lest the field should be overworked—for england and the middle ages, scott, in 1819, won the hearts of most boys and many men, by "ivanhoe," the crusader who returns disguised, like de wilton in "marmion". it is to be believed that scott disliked rowena at least as much as thackeray did, and was no less in love than he with rebecca. merely to think of the characters is a pleasure—gurth, wamba, locksley, de bracy, friar tuck, isaac, the abbot, while, if urfried is extremely incoherent in her pagan creed, the templar is byronic enough for the taste of that day; scott, in fact, could draw a dark byronic dare-devil before byron came into the field. "the monastery" (1820) with the white lady of avenel, and the euphuist knight, was not well received, but sir walter boldly carried on the tale in an infinitely better sequel, "the abbot," with all the charm and horror of mary stuart at loch leven, with a hero full of spirit, and a heroine worthy of him in catherine seyton.
in "kenilworth" (1821), a most audaciously anachronistic tale, scott treated queen elizabeth with a chivalry amazing in a scot; his fated heroine, amy robsart, has unusual spirit and womanliness, and his villain, varney, is his iago, while michael lambourne is a perfect sketch of the elizabethan adventurer of the baser sort.
[pg 543]
in "the pirate" (1821) scott chose the scene of his tour in the orkney islands (1814), and his hero is, like george staunton in "the heart of midlothian," rather a byronic being. minna and brenda, the two fair sisters, were immensely admired, but norna of the fitful head is much inferior to madge wildfire and meg merrilies as a seeress and a romantically eccentric being; while claude halcro and triptolemus yellowley are the least entertaining of "scott's bores".
"the fortunes of nigel" (1822) is enriched with all the wealth of scott's knowledge of elizabethan and jacobean plays and pamphlets, and the unsatisfactory hero, much the least sympathetic of scott's jeunes premiers, is redeemed by the delightful humours of gentle king jamie, by the two grim trapbois, father and daughter, by the flower of scottish serving-men, richie moniplies, and by all the life of the court, of the ordinary, and of alsatia.
in "peveril of the peak" (1823) scott is less fortunate in his treatment of english society during the popish plot, a theme which seemed "made to his hand". his charles ii. is the least excellent of his kings, and the plot is more than commonly rambling, while fenella is the feeblest of his romantic and eccentric puppets. "quentin durward," on the other hand, with the adventures of a gallant but canny scot at the perilous court of louis xi., is perhaps the best constructed of all his novels. in drawing louis xi. the author excels himself; we have not too much of leslie le balafré, the dugald dalgetty of the age; the adventures are many and exciting, and the book was welcomed eagerly in france, though at first it was scarcely appreciated at home.
"st. ronan's well" was a tale of contemporary manners, but scott was not skilled in describing the humours of a tweedside watering-place, interwoven as they are with a dark domestic tragedy, spoiled by an incongruous conclusion which was forced on the author by the prudery of james ballantyne. in "redgauntlet," scott recovered himself: the manners and characters are a little earlier than those of his own boyhood, and mingled with the adventures of the hero on the border is the last tragic appearance of that prince who, twenty years earlier, had shaken the three kingdoms with the claymores of the clans.
[pg 544]
the brief "wandering willie's tale," in "redgauntlet," is sir walter's masterpiece of humour and terror: this story he worked on very carefully, and his care was rewarded. the edinburgh lawyers, the eccentrics, nanty ewart, and the heroine of the green mantle, are worthy of their places in this great romance, made the more moving by many touches of autobiography.
"the talisman" (1825) is a brilliant tale of c?ur de lion and saladin; "the betrothed" is less appreciated than it ought to be. in 1825-1826 came the ruin of scott, entailed by that of his publisher, constable. how he bore it, how he laboured and died to redeem it, by long heavy task work at "the life of napoleon,"—by "woodstock," in which the characters of cromwell and of charles ii. in youth, are among his best creations; by "the fair maid of perth," with the great character of the timid chief, and the finale of the clan battle of perth; by "the chronicles of the canongate," and by his latest works, written with a half-palsied hand, composed by a brain in ruin, yet again and again inspired,—is a familiar story. the eyes are dimmed as these words are penned; so potent is the spell of that rich, kind genius, of that noble character, over the hearts of those who love and honour the great and good sir walter.
he created the historical novel; he opened the way in which no man or woman has followed him with such genius as his: we may say this even while we remember "esmond" and "the virginians"; "kidnapped," "catriona" and "the master of ballantrae"; "les trois mousquetaires" and "la dame de monsoreau".
after a voyage to italy, sir walter returned to abbotsford, where he died in his own house with the murmur of tweed in his ears as he passed away (september, 1832). "i say," wrote byron emphatically, "that walter scott is as nearly a thoroughly good man as a man can be, because i know it by experience to be the case."
james fenimore cooper.
james fenimore cooper (1789-1851), bearing a name dear to grateful boyhood, is even now, with hawthorne—an infinitely[pg 545] greater man—the american novelist best known on the continent of europe. in france as in england, he was the delight of the youth of men of letters; among the characters of fiction concerning whom thackeray says amo he places leather stocking with dugald dalgetty. many of us, no doubt, at about the age of 10, have made stone heads for our arrows, like the noble neolithic indian braves of cooper, and have found (like scottish savages, when flint was scarce) that slate served our purpose.
cooper was born in new jersey, and passed his childhood on his father's new settlement at otsego lake. here were real deer and real red indians, and here cooper's ply was taken. he was sent down from yale, as inappreciative of the studious habits of the pale faces. he went to sea, thus obtaining another string to his bow as a novelist; next saw service in the navy, by lake and sea; and, after a subsequent life of leisure, was stimulated by a bad english novel to vow that he could write a better,—his tale of english life, "precaution," has not had the vogue of "persuasion". cooper turned to american topics in "the spy," a story of the war of independence; scott's example may have led him to choose a recent historical topic; his knowledge of the forests and his remarkable hero, harvey birch, did the rest, and his success was assured; his work was welcomed both in france and england. then came "the pioneers," the first in composition of the five tales where leather-stocking, with his peculiar and silent laugh, leads us through forests, haunted by the mingo and other fearful wild fowl. then he turned to the sea, to paul jones, that renegade of galloway, and long tom coffin; this was the first of various novels of the navy which are to american boys what marryat's were and ought to be to our own. "the last of the mohicans," of 1826, marks the culmination of cooper's talent, and chingachgook, the great serpent, and uncas, if not the paleface heroine, are imperishable in the memory. cooper's visit to europe led him into writings which rather exacerbated the american eagle and the british lion. most of his very numerous later works are more or less polemical. he was no psychologue, his heroines are forlorn of admirers; in style he had nothing to touch r. l. stevenson; he is "cooper of the wood and wave".
[pg 546]
washington irving.
the true beginner of accomplished literature in america was washington irving, born in new york, 3 april, 1783; his father was of the old border family of the name, his mother, the daughter of an english clergyman. in his twenty-first year he visited europe; on his return, with friends named paulding, wrote light essays in a serial named "salmagundi," and, later, a burlesque "history of new york," with the humours of "diedrich knickerbocker," a book in which scott recognized gleams of sterne and swift. after the war ending in 1815, when he was under canvas, if not under fire much, he revisited england, and stayed with scott at abbotsford, of which he has left a pleasant record. in 1819 appeared his "sketch book" with the immortal story of rip van winkle, and the "legend of sleepy hollow". he had not quite shared scott's enthusiasm for the scenery about abbotsford, mainly resting for its charm on historical and legendary associations unfamiliar to him, but he gave legends to his native catskill hills, and the hudson river. his style has an addisonian felicity and kind humour; and in his "bracebridge hall" he handled old-fashioned england as if he loved it. his "tales of a traveller" (he now visited italy, france, and spain) are not, throughout, of his best work. spain and the spanish inspired his "life of columbus," which in england was deservedly popular, and the picturesque "conquest of granada," and "the alhambra." in 1829, irving became secretary of the american legation in london, and, returning, produced "astoria," to boys, at least, a delightful account of the wilds. in 1842 he went as american minister to spain, and, at home, wrote an attractive "life of mahomet". he carried into historical work the grace of his essays, and the power of visualizing characters and events. he did not write of europe as an american, with his eyes very open to the comparative merits of his own country; and he did not write of america as a european. he was at home in the past as in the present, and though in his country's literature he was a pioneer, his performance has none of the roughness of pioneering work. he had the amiability of his favourite goldsmith,[pg 547] whose biography he wrote. he died in november, 1859. if he were not a great writer, he is a delightful writer; we think of him with addison and goldsmith, without the occasional little petulancies of the author of "the vicar of wakefield". when he began his work america had no literature, when he died her chief poets and historians had given full assurance of their powers.
magazines and essayists.
magazines, critical, literary, social, and antiquarian magazines, had flourished in the later years of the eighteenth century. with the nineteenth, in 1802, appeared "the edinburgh review," critical and political, edited by francis jeffrey (born at edinburgh, 1773, died 1850). though a man of ability and of a crackling kind of cleverness, jeffrey was wholly incompetent to criticize the works of the great romantic poets, the chief glories in literature of an age so rich in the renowns of war. scott aided jeffrey at first, but partly vexed by the coxcombry of his review of "marmion," more by the pro-french tone of his whig review, the sheriff deserted the "blue and buff," and helped to found the tory "quarterly review," published by murray, and edited by the learned but crabbed and dilatory gifford. both magazines had esteemed contributors: the "edinburgh" was enlivened by the high spirits and wit of sydney smith (1771-1845), qualities not always controlled by good taste when he made merry with nonconformists—bishops, of course, were reckoned fair game—and with squires, old familiar butts of every wit. henry brougham, later lord brougham (1778-1868), was always ready to write the whole magazine, if needful; what macaulay thought of him, much later, may be read in the letters of the historian. edinburgh professors and francis horner helped. horner died young; much had been expected of him. the modern reader of the old "edinburghs" will not find in them much entertainment, except from sydney smith's gaiety and jeffrey's exhibitions of conceited incompetence as a judge of poetry. both the "edinburgh" and the "quarterly," carried political rancour into literary criticism; both dealt in insolent personal bludgeon-work. from such matter the contributions in the[pg 548] "quarterly" of southey and scott were free, and as scott dealt with topics of permanent literary and historical interest, his essays retain their value: though canning and other contributors to the "anti-jacobin" wrote for the "quarterly," their buoyant humour of parody and their high spirits did not lighten up its august pages. as the younger poets, shelley, byron, and keats, were either revolutionary or, in keats's case, supposed to be, at least, whigs and associates of whigs, the "quarterly" was more frequently disgraced by political abuse of poetical works than the "edinburgh".
"blackwood's magazine," after a few months of stagnation, came into the hands of mr. blackwood, a bookseller of sound sense and masterful character, who was practically his own editor, though he allowed john wilson (1785-1854) and john gibson lockhart (1794-1854) to play their pranks. wilson, of magdalen college, oxford, was a splendid athlete, and excelled in country sports; lockhart, of balliol, very young in 1817, was of remarkable beauty, with a strongly sarcastic pen ("the scorpion"), and as sardonic as his far-away cousin in the past, lockhart of carnwath, the manager of jacobite affairs under james viii. and iii., and the author of valuable memoirs. these two, on a night of claret and mirth, composed "the chaldee manuscript," a jape written in scriptural style on all the notables of scottish literary society. to persons who understand the allusions, it is still full of very mirthful matter, but many grave sufferers were as little amused as john knox was by a delightful parody of himself and his associates by young thomas maitland, brother of maitland of lethington, secretary of state to queen mary. thenceforth, "blackwood's," was for several years engaged in broils, which culminated in the death of john scott, then editor of "the london magazine" in which lamb often wrote. in this serial scott attacked lockhart, who went to london to fight him. scott kept advancing reasons for not meeting lockhart, who "posted" him and went home. scott then entangling himself in a dispute with lockhart's college friend, christie, put himself in the hands of horace smith of "the rejected addresses," and of mr. patmore. mr. patmore's ignorance of the laws of the[pg 549] duello made it necessary for christie (who had fired once in the air, and thereby legally ended the duel) to shoot in the direction of scott, who fell mortally wounded. the brawls of "blackwood's" were detested by sir walter scott, whose daughter lockhart had married. wilson, who had no connexion with this tragedy, was an early devotee of wordsworth's poetry, and himself wrote "the isle of palms," "the city of the plague," and two or three "kailyard" novels. his memory is best preserved by the high spirits and occasional sentiment and humour of his "noctes ambrosian?," dialogues in which the ettrick shepherd is the most conspicuous hero; not always with his own good will or to his own advantage. wilson was of a most mercurial temperament; his fiery style was apt to be too florid; his caprices of temper were unaccountable; and probably his most permanent work is found in his descriptions of nature and of sport. he was for long professor of moral philosophy in the university of edinburgh. lockhart is seen to most advantage in his immortal "life of sir walter scott," a noble union of perfect candour with passionate affection for the great man of whom he wrote. his social fastidiousness must always have been vexed by scott's intimacy with the ballantyne brothers, who, again, had been incapable of controlling scott's tendency to large expenditure; indeed, the books of the firm were in a state of chaos. the strictures on these ballantynes were a blemish in a book which, with boswell's "johnson," holds the highest place in english literary biography. it is even more in a few pieces of original verse (such as carlyle's favourite, "it is an old belief") than in the best of his "spanish ballads" that lockhart reveals the poetry within him, and the tenderness of a heart on which he laid the fetter lock of his ancient scutcheon. of his novels, as we have said, "adam blair" is by far the best. he became editor of the "quarterly review" in 1825; his death (1854) took him from a world darkened for him by many bereavements and other sorrows. his body sleeps in dryburgh abbey, "at the feet of sir walter scott".
we now turn to the great essayists of the early nineteenth century.
[pg 550]
charles lamb.
he who would write briefly of charles lamb is under this disadvantage: to open a volume of lamb's essays or letters is to remain absorbed in them, and in wondering affectionate admiration. a man is fascinated by the book, however often read before, and cannot take up the pen.
born in crown office row, in the temple (10 february, 1775), lamb was the son of the clerk of a barrister, samuel salt, a lincolnshire man; his maternal grandmother was housekeeper at the ancient house of blakesware, in herts. lamb has described these people and that place in his essays, "old benchers of the inner temple," "blakesmoor in h——shire," and his own infantile mental state (much like that of r. l. stevenson in some ways), in "witches and other night fears," while his own and coleridge's school days are commemorated in "recollections of christ's hospital," and (here he assumes the part of coleridge), in "christ's hospital five and thirty years ago". to begin the study of lamb with these essays is in part to understand him, and is wholly to fall in love with him. we see his father, with his honesty, courtesy, and courage; with his "merriest quips and conceits" and many little artistic accomplishments, "a brother of the angle, moreover," devoted to the theatre, an enthusiast for garrick, and, too early, "in the last sad state of human weakness," babbling of his boyhood. lamb inherited the "merry quips," and was an inveterate punster. the "conceits" derived from constant reading of burton and sir thomas browne, and the then neglected early dramatists, abound in his style. the love of the stage he also inherited, and constantly expresses; and, he says, "from my childhood i was extremely inquisitive about witches and witch stories," and fond of a picture in a great book on the bible "of the witch raising of samuel, which i wish i had never seen". (the present writer's childhood was dominated by the same picture.) he never laid his head on the pillow, from his fourth to his eighth year, "without an assurance which realized its own prophecy" of seeing some frightful spectres. he supposed that these imaginations might date from "our ante-mundane condition".[pg 551] they were, in fact, proofs of his imaginative genius in infancy, for any child may have the fears, yet never fancy that it sees the phantasms. conceivably the strain of madness in lamb's blood, the madness which made his sister mary slay her own mother, and affected her at frequent intervals, was also for something in his childish terrors. in later life his dreams wandered in great cities never visited by him, which he saw "with a map-like distinctness of trace, a daylight vividness of vision". he thought that "the degree of the soul's creativeness in sleep might furnish no whimsical criterion of the quantum of poetical faculty resident in the same soul waking". his verses, like "when maidens such as hester die," though exquisite, give less proof of his poetical faculty than his essay on "dream children," and on his lost love, which is perhaps the most beautiful example of his peculiar pathos.
thus, throughout his essays, lamb is constantly studying and revealing himself, his sister, his friends, with varying disguises and alterations of circumstance. in his "character of the late elia," (his pseudonym) he is his own critic. "better it is that a writer should be natural in a self-pleasing quaintness, than to affect a naturalness (so called) that should be strange to him." unnatural it would have been to him, even in the briefest note to a friend, to write in a plain forthright style, but his quaintnesses and his conceits are never obscure. elia "gave himself too little concern about what he uttered and in whose presence". that this is too true appears in the famous scene where he desired "to feel the bumps" of a very stupid comptroller of stamps, and was not to be restrained by wordsworth's mild "my dear charles!" what pranks, with his confessed "imperfect sympathy" with scots, he may have played before the avenging carlyle, no man knows. his friends "were, for the most part, persons of uncertain fortune ... a ragged regiment". "he never greatly cared for the society of what are called good people." "the impressions of infancy had burnt into him, and he resented the impertinence of manhood." passing all his best hours at a desk in the india office, he returned to his gambols when free. his essays were part of his playtime; in them he was his real self.
[pg 552]
from 1782 to 1789 he was at christ's hospital, but did not attain to the high rank of grecian, nor enter either of the universities which he loved. he continued to meet coleridge during vacations at "the salutation and cat," and contributed verses to coleridge's volume of 1796 (cottle, bristol). in 1796 befell the tragedy in his family, and henceforth the care of his sister mary (the bridget of elia) dominated his existence of unrepining self-sacrifice. in literature (in addition to the old writers), he admired burns, and wordsworth, from the first. it is more curious that burger's ballad of lenore (the death-ride) struck lamb as potently as it inspired scott, who appreciated lamb much more than he was by lamb appreciated, and in vain invited this resolute cockney to visit abbotsford. in 1797 he contributed more sonnets to a volume by coleridge and lloyd, and in 1798 published his tale "rosamund gray",
friends going up to examine it
observe a good deal of charles lamb in it
(to parody browning), it has passages of his style, quotations from his favourite old authors; one chapter is an essay in his own manner, and there is even an anticipation of "dream children". shelley praised the story highly, but lamb was not enthusiastic about shelley's poems or byron's. his "john woodvil" was intended for the stage, and the tragedy was published in 1802. it contains fine passages of verse, and a great deal of the "local colour" of the restoration; perhaps the chief merit lies in the restoration of the accents of old poetry. the farce of "mr. h." was a foredoomed failure. there is room for variety of opinion as to the suitability of the "tales from shakespeare" (much of which was executed by mary lamb), for children; but the peculiar merits of the style are beyond dispute. the same remark may be made on "the adventures of ulysses". on the other hand the notes to the "specimens of english dramatic poets" (1808) reveal lamb at his best as a critic and a master of language, while the selections are invaluable to readers who have not the time nor the taste for the perusal of the entire works of many most unequal dramatists. the book was a revelation to[pg 553] all but a few readers who, like scott, had dwelt much with marlowe, chapman, ford, webster, and the rest.
lamb "found himself" and found a public, at first small but ever increasing, when he wrote his first essays for "the london magazine" in 1820, under the name of elia. (republished as "essays of elia" in 1823.) the very names of the essays are fragrant in the memory, and the characters drawn have become household words, while the personal touches are, with lamb's delightful and fantastic letters, his best biography. in 1825, lamb retired, with a liberal pension, from the india office, and was "a freed man after thirty-three years' slavery" (see his essay "the superannuated man"). lamb's "last essays" were published in 1833, and the author did not long survive the death of his life-long friend, coleridge, in july, 1834; he passed away on 27 december, 1834. his name stands with those of addison and steele among english essayists: indeed he is much more read than they, as he was nearer to our own time, while more closely connected than they with the best literature of the great centuries which preceded the eighteenth. his self-revelations too are more serious than those of his famous predecessors, and the character revealed is more potently attractive.
leigh hunt.
born nine years after lamb (in 1784) and, like lamb and coleridge, educated at christ's hospital, leigh hunt perhaps holds, after lamb and hazlitt, the third place among the english essayists of his age. while love of literature, of wide and very miscellaneous reading in old english and italian poetry was the chief pleasure of hunt, he also took, with great vigour, a side in the politics of his age. a "friend of the people," a contemner of kings, and no sympathizer with his country in the napoleonic wars, hunt, with his brother john, started, in 1808, "the examiner," a radical weekly journal of politics and literature. in 1812 he published what the law called a libel on the prince regent, and for two years occupied prison rooms which he decorated in his own taste (leaning to roses on the wall-paper, and plaster casts), among these he received his friends. though he had a rapid perception[pg 554] of new poetic excellence, though he was the first to perceive and welcome the star of keats, and, almost alone, encouraged and applauded shelley, hunt was blind to the merits of poets who were not of his own political party. in the text and notes of his "feast of the poets" (1814), first published in "the reflector," he insulted scott, coleridge, and wordsworth,—and made "for" rhyme to "straw". when his "story of rimini" appeared (1816), it told dante's tale of paolo and francesca with a cockney jauntiness, and abounded in such epithets as "perky," "bosomy," "farmy," "winy hunt's theory was that "the harmonious freedom of our old poets"—"their freedom in continuing the sense of the heroic rhyming couplets," should be "united with the vigour of dryden". his verse was based on chaucer's, and on some examples of the seventeenth century, and his metrical example influenced shelley, while keats followed him in re-telling italian stories, and, at first, even in his affectations.
"rimini" and its author were furiously attacked, for reasons of politics, by the young tory writers in "blackwood's magazine," to whom hunt's ineradicable vanity and lack of taste lent handles. he was dubbed "king of the cockneys," and keats himself shrank from his ways and manners. he joined byron and shelley in italy in 1822; they were to work together on a journal, "the liberal," but, from the first, and especially after the death of shelley, the relations of byron with the needy and familiar hunt were intolerably unpleasant. in 1828, after byron's death, hunt avenged himself in his "lord byron and his contemporaries," a book which, as he came to see, should never have been written.
the rest of hunt's life was spent in journalism, mainly literary; his essays, often delightful reading, were republished in "men, women, and books," "imagination and fancy," "a jar of honey from mount hybla," while in his last work, "autobiography," he forgives all his enemies, among whom he had actually reckoned sir walter scott. he was the friend of dickens and carlyle. he wrote concerning carlyle's style: "how could he exculpate this style, in which he denounces so many 'shams,' of being itself a sham? of being affected, unnecessary, and ostentatious? a jargon got up to confound pretension with performance, and reproduce[pg 555] endless german talk under the guise of novelty?" here was candour: leigh hunt cultivated the virtue described as "the independence of the heart".
william hazlitt.
lamb as a man was universally beloved, except by carlyle, and as a writer he is the friend of the human race. on the other side, lamb's friend and fellow-essayist, william hazlitt, in a letter to leigh hunt, says, "i want to know why everybody has such a dislike to me". there is much pathos and a plentiful lack of humour in the question. the brief answer is that hazlitt acted as if he were trying to make himself disliked. in this he was pretty successful; he quarrelled even with lamb, but never shook lamb's constant affection. there is so much of hazlitt's self in his works that, greatly as his good qualities delight us, there are times when we can scarcely forgive his defects, and are apt to conceive a personal grudge against him.
born at maidstone on 10 april, 1778, hazlitt was the son of a distinguished nonconformist minister. after visiting america, which was not tolerant of his doctrines, the elder hazlitt returned, to england, where the son resided from 1788 to 1802. in 1798 he met coleridge preaching in a blue coat and white waistcoat. the great and peculiar merit of hazlitt's essays is his power of expressing and communicating the zest of his enjoyment of nature, human nature, preaching, juggling performances, prize-fighting, painting, fiction, sculpture, and the game of fives. in his description of the voice, the manner, the personal magic of coleridge, then in his glorious youth, hazlitt outshines himself, as he does in his criticism of cavanagh's style in the fives-court. hazlitt visited coleridge at stowey, and heard wordsworth read his "peter bell"; heard coleridge speak with contempt of gray, and with intolerance of pope, and express a dislike of dr. johnson!
these were divine days; but politics crossed the friendships of hazlitt. the others had been enthusiasts, like himself, for the french revolution, but not for napoleon, as objecting to be emancipated by a hero who subdued hereditary kings, and supplied to conquered nations his own brothers and captains to be their[pg 556] princes. hazlitt, on the other hand, rejoiced in the superb genius of napoleon as he did in that of shakespeare and in the sunlight. bonaparte he could no more keep out of his essays on poetry than mr. dick could banish "that comely head" of charles i. from his memorial. to hazlitt, wordsworth, coleridge, and other friends became anathema, as renegades; and it is when we read his odious attack on coleridge's poetry, in "the edinburgh review," that we understand "why everybody has such a dislike of me".
people who have read his "liber amoris," still more they who have studied the original letters partly published in that book, perceive other ways in which hazlitt became antipathetic to human nature. he was, in the scots phrase, "thrawn," and as he could seldom avoid exhibiting his temper in his writings, he may be and is admired for his generous qualities, and power of interpreting poetry and art, of elevating and enlivening the appreciative powers of his readers; but he can never be liked without reserve. his course of life, after he abandoned the study of metaphysics and the art of painting for the lecture-room and the pen of the ready essayist, put him too much in the way of temptation. he was too free to bring his personal and political animosities into his work, "it is such easy writing". he was also unskilled in the management of his life, and both his marriages (not to mention the unsuccessful passion of his "liber amoris") were fountains of bitterness. living in london (1812-1820), hazlitt gave his lectures on "english poetry," and "comic writers" (1818-1819). of 1817 are his "characters of shakespeare's plays," and his "round table," essays on all sorts of subjects reprinted from leigh hunt's paper "the examiner". in the work on poetry it is surprising to find him ranking ossian with homer, the bible, and dante, but when he gives his reasons it is natural to envy his powers of appreciation and enjoyment. to read him on chaucer and spenser is to desire to read spenser and chaucer themselves, so nobly does he recommend them, and shakespeare, and so on, till, over burns, he falls into a quarrel with wordsworth, and then lashes "the lake school," sniffs at scott, and discovers but "one fine passage" in "christabel". his politics prevent him from appreciating what[pg 557] is excellent in the cavalier poets, and even when writing of milton, satan suggests to him bonaparte, and he goes off full-mouthed on that trail. among the novelists he is as much at home, and as convincingly right in his criticisms, especially of richardson, as he is lost in a mist when he touches on racine and molière. over scott's novels he first breaks into a passion of admiration, and then, remembering politics, pelts the author (who never gave a thought to him) in the manner of gulliver's yahoos.
hazlitt, unhappily, lived at a time when both parties in the state carried, with inconceivable rancour and stupidity, their politics into the field of literary criticism. his "characters of shakespeare" was slandered by gifford in "the quarterly review," and he keeps telling us the sale of the book was stopped. why members of his own party did not continue to buy it, he does not ask. in "blackwood's magazine" (1817-1818) he was styled "pimply-faced hazlitt," a leader of "the cockney school," and he says that keats died of being called a cockney. in fact, these stupidities did not affect keats more than any other man of sense, while hazlitt never ceased to avenge on people perfectly innocent, and on the guilty gifford, the insults which he ought to have disregarded. for these reasons, and because he wrote so much, his essays are unequal, though when he is at his best, and he is often at his best, he is in the foremost rank of critics. he died in 1830. "well, i have had a happy life," was among his latest words, and his finest works are reflections of his happiest hours.
thomas de quincey.
an essayist whose works are probably more read than those of leigh hunt is thomas de quincey, one of the extraordinary men whose boyhood was in the eighteenth, and whose works were produced in the first half of the nineteenth century. born in manchester in 1785, and dying in edinburgh in 1859, de quincey was precisely the contemporary of hunt. his father, dying young, left his children adequately provided for, and, to judge by de quincey's autobiography, they were extraordinary children. william, the invincibly amusing, died young, and de quincey's first[pg 558] great sorrow was the death of elizabeth, when he himself was 6 and she was not 10 years of age. his description of the vision and the mysterious music which attended his visit to her as she lay dead, is one of the most remarkable and characteristic passages in his writings. sixty-nine years later, "his very last act was to throw up his arms and utter, as if with a cry of surprised recognition, 'sister! sister! sister!'" he was, indeed, a born seer; and probably other persons, if so ill-advised as to follow his example in taking quantities of laudanum, would not behold the visions which first charmed and then tormented "the english opium eater".
de quincey was a wanderer and a fugitive from his school days, at least such he became after receiving an accidental stroke on the head from a cane, which prostrated him for weeks, and quite conceivably was one cause of his eccentricities. as he has told us he ran away, quite needlessly, from school at 16 or 17, tramped, a sentimental traveller, in north wales, starved, lurked, and walked the midnight streets of london with ann, ran away from oxford (worcester college) when his papers had astonished and delighted the examiners, and, generally, flew in the face of common sense. he came into his little fortune, behaved to coleridge with the generosity of shelley, settled long near wordsworth at grasmere, made the acquaintance of john wilson (christopher north), married a country girl, and fell into the miseries of the opium eater. poverty ensued, de quincey returned to his fugitive life of lurking in london, and, in 1821, astonished the world of readers by "the confessions of an english opium eater," published in "the london magazine," for which lamb and hazlitt used to write. de quincey was acquainted with lamb, and wordsworth and coleridge he knew well. but he belonged to none of the rival sets of writers, "cockneys" or edinburgh wits; and, in his freakish moods of schoolboy-like high spirits, he wrote personal banter of his best friends, deriding coleridge's corpulence and "large expanse of cheek"; the retort, as to cheek, was obvious. in 1830 de quincey moved to edinburgh; and in lodgings there, and at a cottage near lasswade on the esk, he mainly passed the rest of his strange, industrious, eccentric life. he wrote[pg 559] alternately for blackwood's and tait's magazines: almost the whole matter of his sixteen volumes appeared originally in magazines, and was written with the wolf and the printer's boy at the door. his vast store of reading, accumulated before 1821, embraced the old english writers and the new german philosophers, magic, political economy, and the records of police trials.
that sketch for a murder with a pair of dumb-bells, by the murderer thurtell, "the same who was generally censured for murdering the late mr. weare," occurs, not only in the essay on "murder considered as one of the fine arts," but in the long essay on "style". the story of the very mysterious murder, at noon-day, of mrs. ruscombe in bristol, is very well told in "autobiographic sketches" ("the priory"). confessedly some essays, such as "dream-fugue" in "the english mail coach," are records of visions inspired by opium: "the dream knows best; and the dream, i say again, is the responsible party". these essays on the mail coach, then the marvel of rapidity of travel, offer, in miniature, the type of de quincey's style, with its sonorous poetic cadences, its quaint colloquial familiarities,—with his insatiable intellectual curiosity, and his digressiveness—he discusses the origin of the word "snob". finally the dream has its way, after the wonderful description of the laurelled coach bearing news of wellington's and blücher's victory to england, and to two lovers the sudden face of death.
de quincey, with his wide reading, with the songless poet in his nature, and with his strange freakish habits, his following a chance association of ideas far beyond the field of his essay, is, naturally, one of the most unequal of writers. his prose is, on occasion, "aureate" or ornate, in a manner which has, perhaps, had its day; and again he deals in schoolboy slang. only parts of his famous essay on jeanne d'arc are excellent: taste has moved away from, and may return to, the mystic eloquence of "the three ladies of sorrow". but in de quincey there is variety enough for all tastes, and he is perhaps especially inspiring and delightful to young readers. he died at edinburgh on 8 december, 1859.
