Letters of Edward FitzGerald to Fanny Kemble (1871-1883) Part 5

Spedding--I should think indeed it was too late for him to edit Shakespeare, if he had not gone on doing so, as it were, all his Life.

Perhaps it is too late for him to remember half, or a quarter, of his own Observations. Well then: I wish he would record what he does remember: if not an Edition of Shakespeare yet so many Notes toward an Edition. I am persuaded that no one is more competent. {45a}

You see your Americans will go too far. It was some American Professor's Note {45b} on 'the Autumn of his Bounty' which occasioned Spedding's delightful Comment some while ago, and made me remember my old wish that he should do the thing. But he will not: especially if one asks him.

Donne--Archdeacon Groome told me a Fortnight ago that he had been at Weymouth Street. Donne better, but still not his former Self.

By the by, I have got a Skeleton of my own at last: Bronchitis--which came on me a month ago--which I let go on for near three weeks--then was forced to call in a Doctor to subdue, who kept me a week indoors. And now I am told that, every Cold I catch, my Skeleton is to come out, etc.

Every N.E. wind that blows, etc. I had not been shut up indoors for some fifty-five years--since Measles at school--but I had green before my Windows, and Don Quixote for Company within. _Que voulez-vous_?

Shakespeare again. A Doctor Whalley, who wrote a Tragedy for Mrs.

Siddons (which she declined), proposed to her that she should read--'But screw your Courage to the _sticking place_,' with the appropriate action of using the Dagger. I think Mrs. Siddons good-naturedly admits there may be something in the suggestion. One reads this in the last memoir of Madame Piozzi, edited by Mr. Hayward.

_Blackbird_ v. _Nightingale_. I have always loved the first best: as being so jolly, and the Note so proper from that golden Bill of his. But one does not like to go against received opinion. Your _Oriole_ has been seen in these parts by old--very old--people: at least, a gay bird so named. But no one ever pretends to see him now.

Now have you perversely crossed the Address which you desire me to abide by: and I can't be sure of your 'Branchtown'? But I suppose that enough is clear to make my Letter reach you if it once gets across the Atlantic.

And now this uncertainty about your writing recalls to me--very absurdly--an absurd Story told me by a pious, but humorous, man, which will please you if you don't know it already.

_Scene_.--Country Church on Winter's Evening. Congregation, with the Old Hundredth ready for the Parson to give out some Dismissal Words.

_Good old Parson_, not at all meaning rhyme, 'The Light has grown so very dim, I scarce can see to read the Hymn.'

_Congregation_, taking it up: to the first half of the Old Hundredth--

'The Light has grown so very dim, I scarce can see to read the Hymn.'

(Pause, as usual: _Parson_, mildly impatient) 'I did not mean to read a Hymn; I only meant my Eyes were dim.'

_Congregation_, to second part of Old Hundredth:--

'I did not mean to read a Hymn; I only meant my Eyes were dim.'

_Parson_, out of Patience, etc.:--

'I didn't mean a Hymn at all,-- I think the Devil's in you all.'

I say, if you don't know this, it is worth your knowing, and making known over the whole Continent of America, North and South. And I am your trusty and affectionate old Beadsman (left rather deaf with that blessed Bronchitis)

E. F.G.

XIX.

LITTLE GRANGE: WOODBRIDGE, _July_ 21, [1874.]

DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,

I must write to you--for I have seen Donne, and can tell you that he looks and seems much better than I had expected, though I had been told to expect well: he was upright, well coloured, animated; I should say (_sotto voce_) better than he seemed to me two years ago. And this in spite of the new Lord Chamberlain {48a} having ousted him from his Theatrical post, wanting a younger and more active man to go and see the Plays, as well as read them. I do not think this unjust; I was told by Pollock that the dismissal was rather abrupt: but Donne did not complain of it. When does he complain? He will now, however, leave Weymouth Street, and inhabit some less costly house--not wanting indeed so large [a] one for his present household. He is shortly going with his Daughters to join the Blakesleys at Whitby. Mowbray was going off for his Holiday to Cornwall: I just heard him speaking of Freddy's present Address to his father: Blanche was much stronger, from the treatment of a Dr. Beard {48b} (I think). I was quite moved by her warm salutation when I met her, after some fifteen years' absence. All this I report from a Visit I made to Donne's own house in London. A thing I scarce ever thought to do again, you may know: but I could not bear to be close to him in London for two days without a.s.suring myself with my own Eyes how he looked. I think I observed a slight hesitation of memory: but certainly not so much as I find in myself, nor, I suppose, unusual in one's Contemporaries. My visit to London followed a visit to Edinburgh: which I have intended these thirty years, only for the purpose of seeing my dear Sir Walter's House and Home: and which I am glad to have seen, as that of Shakespeare. I had expected to find a rather c.o.c.kney Castle: but no such thing: all substantially and proportionably built, according to the Style of the Country: the Grounds well and simply laid out: the woods he planted well-grown, and that dear Tweed running and murmuring still--as on the day of his Death. {49a} I did not so much care for Melrose, and Jedburgh, {49b} though his Tomb is there--in one of the half-ruined corners. Another day I went to Trossachs, Katrine, Lomond, etc., which (as I expected) seemed much better to me in Pictures and Drop-scenes. I was but three days in Scotland, and was glad to get back to my own dull flat country, though I did worship the Pentland, Cheviot, and Eildon, Hills, more for their a.s.sociations than themselves. They are not big enough for that.

I saw little in London: the Academy Pictures even below the average, I thought: only a Picture by Millais of an old Sea Captain {49c} being read to by his Daughter which moistened my Eyes. I thought she was reading him the Bible, which he seemed half listening to, half rambling over his past Life: but I am told (I had no Catalogue) that she was reading about the North West Pa.s.sage. There were three deep of Bonnets before Miss Thompson's famous Roll Call of the Guards in the Crimea; so I did not wait till they fell away. {50a}

Yours always

E. F.G.

XX.

LOWESTOFT: _Aug._ 24, [1874.]

DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,

Your letter reached me this morning: and you see I lose no time in telling you that, as I hear from Pollock, Donne is allowed 350 pounds a year retiring Pension. So I think neither he nor his friends have any reason to complain. His successor in the office is named (I think) 'Piggott' {50b}--Pollock thinks a good choice. Lord Hertford brought the old and the new Examiners together to Dinner: and all went off well.

Perhaps Donne himself may have told you all this before now. He was to be, about this time, with the Blakesleys at Whitby or Filey. I have not heard any of these particulars from himself: nothing indeed since I saw him in London.

Pollock was puzzled by an entry in Macready's Journal--1831 or 1832--'Received Thackeray's Tragedy' with some such name as 'Retribution.' I told Pollock I was sure it was not W. M. T., who (especially at that time) had more turn to burlesque than real Tragedy: and sure that he would have told me of it then, whether accepted or rejected--as rejected it was. Pollock thought for some while that, in spite of the comic Appearance we keep up, we should each of us rise up from the Grave with a MS. Tragedy in our hands, etc. However, he has become a.s.sured it was some other Thackeray: I suppose one mentioned by Planche as a Dramatic _Dilettante_--of the same Family, I think, as W. M.

T.

Spedding has sent me the concluding Volume of his Bacon: the final summing up simple, n.o.ble, deeply pathetic--rather on Spedding's own Account than his Hero's, for whose Vindication so little has been done by the sacrifice of forty years of such a Life as Spedding's. Positively, nearly all the new matter which S. has produced makes against, rather than for, Bacon: and I do think the case would have stood better if Spedding had only argued from the old materials, and summed up his Vindication in one small Volume some thirty-five years ago.

I have been sunning myself in d.i.c.kens--even in his later and very inferior 'Mutual Friend,' and 'Great Expectations'--Very inferior to his best: but with things better than any one else's best, caricature as they may be. I really must go and worship at Gadshill, as I have worshipped at Abbotsford, though with less Reverence, to be sure. But I must look on d.i.c.kens as a mighty Benefactor to Mankind. {52}

This is shamefully bad writing of mine--very bad manners, to put any one--especially a Lady--to the trouble and pain of deciphering. I hope all about Donne is legible, for you will be glad of it. It is Lodging- house Pens and Ink that is partly to blame for this scrawl. Now, don't answer till I write you something better: but believe me ever and always yours

E. F.G.

XXI.

LOWESTOFT: _October_ 4/74.

DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,

Do, pray, write your Macready (Thackeray used to say 'Megreedy') Story to Pollock: Sir F. 59 Montagu Square. I rather think he was to be going to Press with his Megreedy about this time: but you may be sure he will deal with whatever you may confide to him discreetly and reverently. It is 'Miladi' P. who worshipped Macready: and I think I never recovered what Esteem I had with her when I told her I could not look on him as a 'Great' Actor at all. I see in Planche's Memoirs that when your Father prophesied great things of him to your Uncle J. P. K., the latter said, '_Con quello viso_?' which '_viso_' did very well however in parts not positively heroic. But one can't think of him along with Kean, who was heroic in spite of undersize. How he swelled up in Oth.e.l.lo! I remember thinking he looked almost as tall as your Father when he came to Silence that dreadful Bell.

I think you agree with me about Kean: remembering your really capital Paper--in _Macmillan_ {53a}--about Dramatic and Theatric. I often look to that Paper, which is bound up with some Essays by other Friends--Spedding among them--no bad Company. I was thinking of your Pasta story of 'feeling' the Antique, etc., {53b} when reading in my dear Ste. Beuve {53c} of my dear Madame du Deffand asking Madame de Choiseul: 'You _know_ you love me, but do you _feel_ you love me?' '_Quoi_? _vous m'aimez donc_?' she said to her secretary Wiart, when she heard him sobbing as she dictated her last letter to Walpole. {53d}

All which reminds me of one of your friends departed--Chorley--whose Memoirs one now buys from Mudie for 2_s._ 6_d._ or so. And well--_well_--worth to those who recollect him. I only knew him by Face--and Voice--at your Father's, and your Sister's: and used to think what a little waspish _Dilettante_ it was: and now I see he was something very much better indeed: and I only hope I may have Courage to face my Death as he had. d.i.c.kens loved him, who did not love Humbugs: and Chorley would have two strips of Gadshill Yew {54} put with him in his Coffin. Which again reminds me that--_a propos_ of your comments on d.i.c.kens' crimson waistcoat, etc., Thackeray told me thirty years ago, that d.i.c.kens did it, not from any idea of c.o.c.kney fashion: but from a veritable pa.s.sion for Colours--which I can well sympathize with, though I should not exhibit them on my own Person--for very good reasons. Which again reminds me of what you write about my abiding the sight of you in case you return to England next year. Oh, my dear Mrs. Kemble, you must know how wrong all that is--_tout au contraire_, in fact. Tell me a word about Chorley when next you write: you said once that Mendelssohn laughed at him: then, he ought not. How well I remember his strumming away at some Waltz in Harley or Wimpole's endless Street, while your Sister and a few other Guests went round. I thought then he looked at one as if thinking 'Do you think me then--a poor, red-headed Amateur, as Rogers does?' That old Beast! I don't scruple to say so.

I am positively looking over my everlasting Crabbe again: he naturally comes in about the Fall of the Year. Do you remember his wonderful 'October Day'? {55}