Letters of Edward FitzGerald Volume I Part 3

So, lifted high, the Poet at his will Lets the great world flit from him, seeing all, Higher through secret splendours mounting still Self-poised, nor fears to fall,

4. Hearing apart the echoes of his fame--

This is in his best style: no fretful epithet, nor a word too much.

[CASTLE IRWELL]

MANCHESTER, _February_ 24, 1833.

DEAR ALLEN,

. . . I am fearful to boast, lest I should lose what I boast of: but I think I have achieved a victory over my evil spirits here: for they have full opportunity to come, and I often observe their approaches, but hitherto I have managed to keep them off. Lord Bacon's Essay on Friendship is wonderful for its truth: and I often feel its truth. He says that with a Friend 'a man _tosseth_ his thoughts,' an admirable saying, which one can understand, but not express otherwise. But I feel that, being alone, one's thoughts and feelings, from want of communication, become heaped up and clotted together, as it were: and so lie like undigested food heavy upon the mind: but with a friend one _tosseth_ them about, so that the air gets between them, and keeps them fresh and sweet. I know not from what metaphor Bacon took his 'tosseth,'

but it seems to me as if it was from the way haymakers toss hay, so that it does not press into a heavy lump, but is tossed about in the air, and separated, and thus kept sweet. . . .

Your most affectionate friend,

E. FITZGERALD.

_To W. B. Donne_. {22}

GELDESTONE, _Sept_. 27, [1833].

DEAR DONNE,

. . . As to my history since I have seen you, there is little to tell.

Divinity is not outraged by your not addressing me as a Reverend--I not being one. I am a very lazy fellow, who do nothing: and this I have been doing in different places ever since I saw you last. I have not been well for the last week: for I am at present rather liable to be overset by any weariness (and where can any be found that can match the effect of two Oratorios?), since for the last three months I have lived on vegetables--that is, I have given up meat. When I was talking of this to Vipan, he told me that you had once tried it, and given it up. I shall hear your account of its effect on you. The truth is, that mine is the wrong time of life to begin a change of that kind: it is either too early, or too late. But I have no doubt at all of the advantage of giving up meat: I find already much good from it, in lightness and airiness of head, whereas I was always before clouded and more or less morbid after meat. The loss of strength is to be expected: I shall keep on and see if that also will turn, and change into strength. I have almost Utopian notions about _vegetable diet_, begging pardon for making use of such a vile, Cheltenhamic, phrase. Why do you not bring up your children to it? To be sure, the chances are, that, after guarding their vegetable morals for years, they would be seduced by some roast partridge with bread sauce, and become unG.o.dly. This actually happened to the son of a Dr. Newton who wrote a book {23} about it and bred up his children to it--but all such things I will tell you when I meet you. G.o.ds! it is a pleasant notion that one is about to meet an old acquaintance in a day or two.

Believe me then your most sincere friend,

E. FITZGERALD.

Pipes--are their names ever heard with you? I have given them up, except at Cambridge. But the word has something sweet in it--Do you ever smoke?

7 SOUTHAMPTON ROW, BLOOMSBURY, [_Oct_. 25, 1833.]

DEAR DONNE,

. . . As to myself, and my diet, about which you give such excellent advice: I am still determined to give the diet I have proposed a good trial: a year's trial. I agree with you about vegetables, and soups: but my diet is chiefly _bread_: which is only a little less nourishing than flesh: and, being compact, and baked, and dry, has none of the washy, diluent effects of green vegetables. I scarcely ever touch the latter: but only pears, apples, etc. I have found no benefit yet; except, as I think, in more lightness of spirits: which is a great good. But I shall see in time.

I am living in London in the quarter of the town which I have noticed above: in a very happy bachelor-like way. Would you would come up here for a few days. I can give you bed, board, etc. Do have some business in town, please. Spedding is here: taking lessons of drawing, before he goes for good into c.u.mberland: whither, for my sake and that of all his friends, I wish he never would go: for there are few such men, as far [as] I know. He and I have been theatricalizing lately. We saw an awful Hamlet the other night--a Mr. Serle--and a very good Wolsey, in Macready: and a very bad Queen Catherine, in Mrs. Sloman, whom you must remember. I am going to-night to see Macready in Macbeth: I have seen him before in it: and I go for the sake of his two last acts, which are amazingly fine, I think. . . . I am close to the British Museum, in which I take great pleasure in reading in my rambling way. I hear of Kemble lately that he has been making some discoveries in Anglo-Saxon MSS. at Cambridge that, they say, are important to the interests of the church: and there is talk of publishing them, I believe. He is a strange fellow for that fiery industry of his: and, I am sure, deserves some steady recompense.

Tennyson has been in town for some time: he has been making fresh poems, which are finer, they say, than any he has done. But I believe he is chiefly meditating on the purging and subliming of what he has already done: and repents that he has published at all yet. It is fine to see how in each succeeding poem the smaller ornaments and fancies drop away, and leave the grand ideas single. . . .

I have lately bought a little pamphlet which is very difficult to be got, called The Songs of Innocence, written and adorned with drawings by W.

Blake (if you know his name) who was quite mad, but of a madness that was really the elements of great genius ill-sorted: in fact, a genius with a screw loose, as we used to say. I shall shew you this book when I see you: to me there is particular interest in this man's writing and drawing, from the strangeness of the const.i.tution of his mind. He was a man that used to see visions: and make drawings and paintings of Alexander the Great, Caesar, etc., who, he declared, stood before him while he drew. . .

Your very affectionate friend,

E. FITZGERALD.

7 SOUTHAMPTON ROW, _Nov._ 19, 1833.

DEAR DONNE,

Your book I got, and read through all that seemed to concern me the first day. I have doubted whether it would be most considerate to return you thanks for it, making you pay for a letter: or to leave you thankless, with a shilling more in your pocket. You see I have taken the latter [?

former], and G.o.d forgive me for it. The book is a good one, I think, as any book is, that notes down facts alone, especially about health. I wish we had diaries of the lives of half the unknown men that have lived.

Like all other men who have got a theory into their heads, I can only see things in the light of that theory; and whatever is brought to me to convince me to the contrary is only wrought and tortured to my view of the question. This lasts till a reaction is brought about by some of the usual means: as time, and love of novelty, etc. I am still very obstinate and persist in my practices. I do not think Stark is an instance of vegetable diet: consider how many things he tried grossly animal: lard, and b.u.t.ter, and fat: besides thwarting Nature in every way by eating when he wanted not to eat, and the contrary. Besides the editor says in the preface that he thinks his death was brought about as much by vexation as by the course of his diet: but I suppose the truth is that vexation could not have had so strong hold except upon a weakened body. However, altogether I do not at all admit Stark to be any instance: to be set up like a scarecrow to frighten us from the corn, etc. Last night I went to hear a man lecture at Owen of Lanark's establishment (where I had never been before), and the subject happened to be about Vegetable Diet: but it was only the termination of a former lecture, so that I suppose all the good arguments (if there were any) were gone before. Do you know anything of a book by a Doctor Lamb upon this subject? I do not feel it to be disgusting to talk of myself upon this subject, because I think there is great interest in the subject itself. So I shall say that I am just now very well: in fine spirits. I have only eaten meat once for many weeks: and that was at a party where I did not like to be singled out. Neither have I tasted wine, except two or three times. If I fail at last I shall think it a very great bore: but a.s.suredly the first cut of a leg of mutton will be some consolation for my wounded judgement: that first cut is a fine thing. So much for this. . . . Have you heard that Arthur Malkin is to be married? to a Miss Carr, with what Addison might call a pleasing fortune: or perhaps Nicholas Rowe. 'Sweet, pleasing friendship, etc. etc.' Mrs. Malkin is in high spirits about it, I hear: and I am very glad indeed. G.o.d send that you have not heard this before: for a man likes to be the first teller of a pretty piece of news. Spedding and I went to see Macready in Hamlet the other night: with which he was pretty well content, but not wholly. For my part, I have given up deciding on how Hamlet should be played: or rather have decided it shouldn't be played at all. I take pleasure in reading things I don't wholly understand; just as the old women like sermons: I think it is of a piece with an admiration of all Nature around us. I think there is a greater charm in the half meanings and glimpses of meaning that come in through Blake's wilder visions: though his difficulties arose from a very different source from Shakespeare's. But somewhat too much of this. I suspect I have found out this as an useful solution, when I am asked the meaning of any thing that I am admiring, and don't know it.

Believe me, dear Donne, to be ever your affectionate friend,

E. FITZGERALD.

FitzGerald spent the May term of 1834 at Cambridge 'rejoicing in the sunshine of James Spedding's presence.'

_To John Allen_.

WHERSTEAD LODGE, IPSWICH. {28} _June_ 31 (so) 1834.

DEAR MY JOHNNY,

I have been reading the Spectator since I have been here: and I like it very much. Don't you think it would make a nice book to publish all the papers about Sir Roger de Coverley alone, with ill.u.s.trations by Thackeray? It is a thing that is wanted: to bring that standard of the old English Gentleman forward out of the ma.s.s of little topics, and fashions, that occupy the greater part of the Spectator. Thackeray has ill.u.s.trated my Undine in about fourteen little coloured drawings--very nicely. . . .

I am here in the country in brave health: rising at six withal: and pruning of rose trees in the garden. Why don't you get up early? in the summer at least. The next time we meet in town I mean to get an artist to make me your portrait: for I often wish for it. It must be looking at me. Now write very soon: else I shall be gone: and know that I am your very true friend,

E. F. G.

GELDESTONE HALL, _Sept_. 9, [1834].

DEAR ALLEN,

I have really nothing to say, and I am ashamed to be sending this third letter all the way from here to Pembrokeshire for no earthly purpose: but I have just received yours: and you will know how very welcome all your letters are to me when you see how the perusal of this one has excited me to such an instant reply. It has indeed been a long time coming: but it is all the more delicious. Perhaps you can't imagine how wistfully I have looked for it: how, after a walk, my eyes have turned to the table, on coming into the room, to see it. Sometimes I have been tempted to be angry with you: but then I thought that I was sure you would come a hundred miles to serve me, though you were too lazy to sit down to a letter. I suppose that people who are engaged in serious ways of life, and are of well filled minds, don't think much about the interchange of letters with any anxiety: but I am an idle fellow, of a very ladylike turn of sentiment: and my friendships are more like loves, I think. Your letter found me reading the Merry Wives of Windsor too: I had been laughing aloud to myself: think of what another coat of happiness came over my former good mood. You are a dear good fellow, and I love you with all my heart and soul. The truth is I was anxious about this letter, as I really didn't know whether you were married or not--or ill--I fancied you might be anything, or anywhere. . . .

As to reading I have not done much. I am going through the Spectator: which people nowadays think a poor book: but I honour it much. What a n.o.ble kind of Journal it was! There is certaintly a good deal of what may be called '_pill_,' but there is a great deal of wisdom, I believe, only it is couched so simply that people can't believe it to be real absolute wisdom. The little book you speak of I will order and buy. I heard from Thackeray, who is just upon the point of going to France; indeed he may be there by this time. I shall miss him much. . . .

Farewell my dearest fellow: you have made me very happy to hear from you: and to know that all is so well with you. Believe me to be your ever affectionate friend,

E. FITZGERALD.

_To W. B. Donne_.

[LONDON, 17 GLOUCESTER STREET, QUEEN SQUARE].

1834.

DEAR DONNE,

. . . I have been buying two Shakespeares, a second and third Folio--the second Folio pleases me much: and I can read him with a greater zest now.

One had need of a big book to remember him by: for he is lost to the theatre: I saw Mr. Vandenhoff play Macbeth in a sad way a few nights ago: and such a set of dirty ragam.u.f.fins as the rest were could not disgrace any country barn. Manfred I have missed by some chance: and I believe 'it was all for the best' as pious people say. The Theatre is bare beyond anything I ever saw: and one begins to hope that it has touched the bottom of its badness, and will rise again. I was looking the other day at Sir W. Davenant's alteration of Macbeth: who dies, saying, 'Farewell, vain world: and that which is vainest in't, Ambition!'