Read Ebook: Letters of Edward FitzGerald in Two Volumes. Vol. 2 by FitzGerald Edward Wright William Aldis Editor

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Ever faithfully yours, dear F., T. CARLYLE.

MY DEAR MASTER,

But what a fine vigorous Letter from the old Man! When I was walking my Garden yesterday at about 11 a.m. I thought to myself 'the Master will have had this Letter at Breakfast; and a thought of it will cross him tandis que le Predicateur de Ste Marie soit en plein Discours, etc.' . . .

DEAR MISS BIDDELL,

I am sending you a Treat. The old Athenaeum told me there was a Paper by 'Mr. Carlyle' in this month's Magazine; and never did I lay out half-a- crown better. And you shall have the Benefit of it, if you will. Why, Carlyle's Wine, so far from weak evaporation, is only grown better by Age: losing some of its former fierceness, and grown mellow without losing Strength. It seems to me that a Child might read and relish this Paper, while it would puzzle any other Man to write such a one. I think I must write to T. C. to felicitate him on this truly 'Green Old Age.' Oh, it was good too to read it here, with the old Sea rolling in from that North: and as I looked up from the Book, there was a Norwegian Barque beating Southward, close to the Shore, and nearly all Sail set. Read--Read! you will, you must, be pleased; and write to tell me so.

This Place suits me, I think, at this time of year: there is Life about me: and that old Sea is always talking to one, telling its ancient Story.

DEAR MISS BIDDELL,

I ran over for one day to Woodbridge, to pay Bills, etc. But somehow I was glad to get back here. The little lodging is more to my liking than my own bigger rooms and staircases: and this cheerful Town better than my yet barren Garden. One little Aconite however looked up at me: Mr. Churchyard used to call them 'New Year's Gifts.'

MY DEAR COWELL,

. . . I hope you have read, and liked, the Paper on the old Kings of Norway in last Fraser. I bought it because the Athenaeum told me it was Carlyle's; others said it was an Imitation of him: but his it must be, if for no other reason than that the Imitator, you know, always exaggerates his Master: whereas in this Paper Carlyle is softened down from his old Self, mellowed like old Wine. Pray read, and tell me you think so too. It is quite delightful, whoever did it. I was on the point of writing a Line to tell him of my own delight: but have not done so. . . .

I have failed in another attempt at Gil Blas. I believe I see its easy Grace, humour, etc. But it is too thin a Wine for me: all sparkling with little adventures, but no one to care about; no Colour, no Breadth, like my dear Don; whom I shall resort to forthwith.

MY DEAR POLLOCK,

You will scarce thank me for a letter in pencil: perhaps you would thank me less if I used the steel pen, which is my other resource. You could very well dispense with a Letter altogether: and yet I believe it is pleasant to get one when abroad.

I dare say I may have told you what Tennyson said of the Sistine Child, which he then knew only by Engraving. He first thought the Expression of his Face almost too solemn, even for the Christ within. But some time after, when A. T. was married, and had a Son, he told me that Raffaelle was all right: that no Man's face was so solemn as a Child's, full of Wonder. He said one morning that he watched his Babe 'worshipping the Sunbeam on the Bedpost and Curtain.' I risk telling you this again for the sake of the Holy Ground you are now standing on.

Which reminds me also of a remark of Beranger's not out of place. He says God forgot to give Raffaelle to Greece, and made a 'joli cadeau' of him to the Church of Rome.

DEAR MRS. THOMPSON,

It is very good of you to write to me, so many others as, I know, you must have to write to. I can tell you but little in return for the Story of your Summer Travel: but what little I have to say shall be said at once. As to Travel, I have got no further than Norfolk, and am rather sorry I did not go further North, to the Scottish Border, at any rate. But now it is too late. I have contented myself with my Boat on the River here: with my Garden, Pigeons, Ducks, etc.; a great Philosopher indeed! But I have not been well all the summer; unsteady in head and feet; the Beginning of the End, I suppose; and if the End won't be too long spinning out, one cannot complain of its coming too soon. . . .

I have this Summer made the Acquaintance of a great Lady, with whom I have become perfectly intimate, through her Letters, Madame de Sevigne. I had hitherto kept aloof from her, because of that eternal Daughter of hers; but 'it's all Truth and Daylight,' as Kitty Clive said of Mrs. Siddons. Her Letters from Brittany are best of all, not those from Paris, for she loved the Country, dear Creature; and now I want to go and visit her 'Rochers,' but never shall.

MY DEAR COWELL,

. . . I told Elizabeth, I think, all I had to write about Arthur C. I had a letter from him a few days ago, hoping to see me in London, where I thought I might be going about this time, and where I would not go without giving him notice to meet me, poor lad. As yet however I cannot screw my Courage to go up: I have no Curiosity about what is to be seen or heard there; my Day is done. I have not been very well all this Summer, and fancy that I begin to 'smell the Ground,' as Sailors say of the Ship that slackens speed as the Water shallows under her. I can't say I have much care for long Life: but still less for long Death: I mean a lingering one.

Did you ever read Madame de Sevigne? I never did till this summer, rather repelled by her perpetual harping on her Daughter. But it is all genuine, and the same intense Feeling expressed in a hundred natural yet graceful ways: and beside all this such good Sense, good Feeling, Humour, Love of Books and Country Life, as makes her certainly the Queen of all Letter writers.

MY DEAR SIR,

Mr. Carlyle's Niece has sent me a Card from you, asking for a Copy of an Agamemnon: taken--I must not say, translated--from AEschylus. It was not meant for Greek Scholars, like yourself, but for those who do not know the original, which it very much misrepresents. I think it is my friend Mrs. Kemble who has made it a little known on your wide Continent. As you have taken the trouble to enquire for it all across the Atlantic, beside giving me reason before to confide in your friendly reception of it, I post you one along with this letter. I can fancy you might find some to be interested in it who do not know the original: more interested than in more faithful Translations of more ability. But there I will leave it: only begging that you will not make any trouble of acknowledging so small a Gift.

Some eighty of Carlyle's Friends and Admirers have been presenting him with a Gold Medal of himself, and an Address of Congratulation on his 80th Birthday. I should not have supposed that either Medal or Address would be much to his Taste: but, as more important People than myself joined in the Thing, I did not think it became me to demur. But I shall not the less write him my half-yearly Letter of Good Hopes and Good Wishes. He seems to have been well and happy in our pretty County of Kent during the Summer.

P.S. I am doing an odd thing in bethinking me of sending you two Calderon Plays, which my friend Mrs. Kemble has spoken of also in your Country. So you might one day hear of them: and, if you liked what came before, wish to see them. So here they are, for better or worse; and, at any rate, one Note of Thanks will do for both, and you can read as little as you please of either. All these things have been done partly as an amusement in a lonely life: partly to give some sort of idea of the originals to friends who knew them not: and printed, because I can only dress my best when seeing myself in Type, in the same way as I can scarce read others unless in such a form. I suppose there was some Vanity in it all: but really, if I had that strong, I might have done like Crabbe's Bachelor--

I might have made a Book, but that my Pride In the not making was more gratified.

Do you read more of Crabbe than we his Countrymen?

DEAR MISS AITKEN,

It is a fact that the night before last I thought I would write my half- yearly Enquiry about your Uncle: and at Noon came your Note. I judge from it that he is well. I think he will thrash me even now.

I must say I scarce knew what to do when asked to join in that Birthday Address. I did not know whether it would be agreeable to your Uncle: and of course I could not ask him. So I asked Spedding and Pollock, and found they were of the Party: so it did not become me to hesitate. I hope we were not all amiss.

But as to Agamemnon the King: I shall certainly send Mr. Norton a Copy, as he has taken the trouble to send across the Atlantic for it. But as to Mr. Carlyle, 'c'est une autre affaire.' It was not meant for any Greek Scholar, and only for a few not Greek, who I thought would be interested, as they have been, in my curious Version. Among these was Mrs. Kemble, who I suppose it is has praised it in a way that somehow gains ground in America. But your Uncle--a few years ago he would have been perhaps a little irritated with it; and now would not, I feel sure, care to spend his Eyes over its sixty or seventy pages. He would even now think--but in Pity now--how much better one might have spent one's time than in such Dilettanteism. So tell him not quite to break his heart if I don't put him to the Trial: but still believe me his, and, if you will allow me, yours sincerely,

E. FITZGERALD.

Thank you for the paragraph about Shelley. Somehow I don't believe the Story, in spite of Trelawney's Authority. Let them produce the Confessor who is reported to tell the Story; otherwise one does not need any more than such a Squall as we have late had in these Seas, and yet more sudden, I believe, in those, to account for the Disaster.

I believe I told you that my Captain Newson and his Nephew, my trusty Jack, went in the Snow to the Norfolk Coast, by Cromer, to find Newson's Boy. They found him, what remained of him, in a Barn there: brought him home through the Snow by Rail thus far: and through the Snow by Boat to Felixstow, where he is to lie among his Brothers and Sisters, to the Peace of his Father's Heart.

MY DEAR LAURENCE,

. . . I cannot get on with Books about the Daily Life which I find rather insufferable in practice about me. I never could read Miss Austen, nor the famous George Eliot. Give me People, Places, and Things, which I don't and can't see; Antiquaries, Jeanie Deans, Dalgettys, etc. . . . As to Thackeray's, they are terrible; I really look at them on the shelf, and am half afraid to touch them. He, you know, could go deeper into the Springs of Common Action than these Ladies: wonderful he is, but not Delightful, which one thirsts for as one gets old and dry.

MY DEAR SIR,

. . . I suppose you may see one of the Carlyle Medallions: and you can judge better of the Likeness than I, who have not been to Chelsea, and hardly out of Suffolk, these fifteen years and more. I dare say it is like him: but his Profile is not his best phase. In two notes dictated by him since that Business he has not adverted to it: I think he must be a little ashamed of it, though it would not do to say so in return, I suppose. And yet I think he might have declined the Honours of a Life of 'Heroism.' I have no doubt he would have played a Brave Man's Part if called on; but, meanwhile, he has only sat pretty comfortably at Chelsea, scolding all the world for not being Heroic, and not always very precise in telling them how. He has, however, been so far heroic, as to be always independent, whether of Wealth, Rank, and Coteries of all sorts: nay, apt to fly in the face of some who courted him. I suppose he is changed, or subdued, at eighty: but up to the last ten years he seemed to me just the same as when I first knew him five and thirty years ago. What a Fortune he might have made by showing himself about as a Lecturer, as Thackeray and Dickens did; I don't mean they did it for Vanity: but to make money: and that to spend generously. Carlyle did indeed lecture near forty years ago before he was a Lion to be shown, and when he had but few Readers. I heard his 'Heroes' which now seems to me one of his best Books. He looked very handsome then, with his black hair, fine Eyes, and a sort of crucified Expression.

MY DEAR SIR,

I will not look on the Book you have sent me as any Return for the Booklet I sent you, but as a free and kindly Gift. I really don't know that you could have sent me a better. I have read it with more continuous attention and gratification than I now usually feel, and always well disposed to say Grace after reading.

Spenser I never could get on with, and shall still content myself with such delightful Quotations from him as one lights upon here and there: the last from Mr. Lowell.

Then, old 'Daddy Wordsworth,' as he was sometimes called, I am afraid, from my Christening, he is now, I suppose, passing under the Eclipse consequent on the Glory which followed his obscure Rise. I remember fifty years ago at our Cambridge, when the Battle was fighting for him by the Few against the Many of us who only laughed at 'Louisa in the Shade,' etc. His Brother was then Master of Trinity College; like all Wordsworths pompous and priggish. He used to drawl out the Chapel responses so that we called him the 'Meeserable Sinner' and his brother the 'Meeserable Poet.' Poor fun enough: but I never can forgive the Lakers all who first despised, and then patronized 'Walter Scott,' as they loftily called him: and He, dear, noble, Fellow, thought they were quite justified. Well, your Emerson has done him far more Justice than his own Countryman Carlyle, who won't allow him to be a Hero in any way, but sets up such a cantankerous narrow-minded Bigot as John Knox in his stead. I did go to worship at Abbotsford, as to Stratford on Avon: and saw that it was good to have so done. If you, if Mr. Lowell, have not lately read it, pray read Lockhart's account of his Journey to Douglas Dale on July 18 or 19, 1831. It is a piece of Tragedy, even to the muttering Thunder, like the Lammermuir, which does not look very small beside Peter Bell and Co.

My dear Sir, this is a desperate Letter; and that last Sentence will lead to another dirty little Story about my Daddy: to which you must listen or I should feel like the Fine Lady in one of Vanbrugh's Plays, 'Oh my God, that you won't listen to a Woman of Quality when her Heart is bursting with Malice!' And perhaps you on the other Side of the Great Water may be amused with a little of your old Granny's Gossip.

Well then: about 1826, or 7, Professor Airy and his Brother William called on the Daddy at Rydal. In the course of Conversation Daddy mentioned that sometimes when genteel Parties came to visit him, he contrived to slip out of the room, and down the garden walk to where 'The Party's' travelling Carriage stood. This Carriage he would look into to see what Books they carried with them: and he observed it was generally 'WALTER SCOTT'S.' It was Airy's Brother who told me this. It is this conceit that diminishes Wordsworth's stature among us, in spite of the mountain Mists he lived among. Also, a little stinginess; not like Sir Walter in that! I remember Hartley Coleridge telling us at Ambleside how Professor Wilson and some one else stole a Leg of Mutton from Wordsworth's Larder for the fun of the Thing.

Here then is a long Letter of old world Gossip from the old Home. I hope it won't tire you out: it need not, you know.

. . . If you go to Brittany you must go to my dear Sevigne's 'Rochers.' If I had the 'Go' in me, I should get there this Summer too: as to Abbotsford and Stratford. She has been my Companion here; quite alive in the Room with me. I sometimes lament I did not know her before: but perhaps such an Acquaintance comes in best to cheer one toward the End.

MY DEAR SIR,

We have also Memoirs of Godwin, very dry, I think; indeed with very little worth reading, except two or three Letters of dear Charles Lamb, 'Saint Charles,' as Thackeray once called him, while looking at one of his half-mad Letters, and remember his Devotion to that quite mad Sister. I must say I think his Letters infinitely better than his Essays; and Patmore says his Conversation, when just enough animated by Gin and Water, was better than either: which I believe too. Procter said he was far beyond the Coleridges, Wordsworths, Southeys, etc. And I am afraid I believe that also.

I am afraid too this is a long letter nearly about my own Likes and Dislikes. 'The Great Twalmley's.' But I began only thinking about Wordsworth. Pray do believe that I do not wish you to write unless you care to answer on that score. And now for the Garden and the Don: always in a common old Spanish Edition. Their coarse prints always make him look more of the Gentleman than the better Artists of other Countries have hitherto done.

Carlyle, I hear, is pretty well, though somewhat shrunk: scolding away at Darwin, The Turk, etc.

MY DEAR SIR,

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