Memoir and Letters of Francis W. Newman Part 16

It will be remembered that the Crimean War broke up the Coalition Ministry which Lord Aberdeen had formed. This was due to the fact that the motion for enquiry into the state of our soldiers before Sebastopol was carried by a great majority against the Government. Lord Aberdeen resigned when this happened, and Lord Palmerston came into office, with Mr. Gladstone as Chancellor of the Exchequer. Then, when Palmerston acceded to the demand that a committee of enquiry should be appointed, Gladstone, who had opposed it before, thought he ought not to remain in the Cabinet which had now agreed to have the enquiry made. So he gave up office, but still helped the Government generally until after Orsini's attempt in 1858, upon Napoleon III's life. Perhaps it is necessary to recall here that Gladstone had taken up the cause of the prisoners--especially political prisoners-- in the prisons of Naples in 1851. He spoke strongly on the terrible cruelties which were perpetrated there. In _this_ effort to help forward an enquiry Gladstone threw himself most heartily.

"I send you to-day a Latin Grammar which I have found on my shelves. By the _binder's_ ticket 'Penrith' I infer it to be Harry's. I hope I may congratulate him.... I never met Gladstone. He was a hero of mine for about a year. I hoped great things of him. After the letters on Naples and his Chancellorship of the Exchequer, I thought he had worked clear of the errors of his youth and was 'the coming man.' But in the Russian war his intense party spirit and endless mistakes have lowered his ...

intellectual discernments.

"I am, ever yours heartily,

"F. W. Newman."

In December of this year Newman writes word that he has been working hard at Arabic for some time, because he has undertaken to teach a friend modern Arabic. He is again staying at Hastings, where he had been so constantly.

"20 White Rock Place, Hastings, "_30th Dec._, 1858.

"My dear Nicholson,

"I am strangely thrown anew into sympathy with _your_ studies. I have been working really hard at Arabic for some time--and why, do you think?

Because I had the temerity to undertake (for philological reasons) to teach a friend modern Arabic. I could not have been so rash or so foolish as to undertake to teach ancient Arabic; yet I am almost driven on learning the ancient by the number of questions which have kept arising.... I have been looking up all my old MSS., and am surprised at the extent of my former attainments, very much indeed of which I had forgotten. But words come back to me with a pleasant rapidity, and I am delighted to find how much I have exaggerated to myself the gap between old and new Arabic."

With this letter those belonging to the year 1858 come to an end.

With 1859 begin Newman's criticisms on the policy and unscrupulous methods of Louis Napoleon.

The latter had made himself absolute ruler of France in 1851. Later on he annexed Savoy and Nice. In his campaign in Lombardy against Austria he was a.s.sisted by Great Britain. In May, when this letter following was written, Napoleon's Manifesto had just been published in the London papers of 4th May:--

"10 Circus Road, S. John's Wood, "_5th May_, 1859.

"I dare say you read Louis Napoleon's Manifesto in yesterday's papers. I wonder what you think of it. I find myself at variance with most of my friends, and with nearly all the newspapers _that I see_; but the _Morning Chronicle_ and the _Daily News_, of which I have only seen _one_ article for a long time back, appeared to be maintaining what I hold. That we ought to be strictly neutral (not armed and threatening neutrals) seems to be an axiom; but at the same time I look at the crisis with much hope and little or no fear. To declaim against L. N.'s treachery is only a way of playing into the wrong hands, i.e. supporting Austria. He has pledged himself to expel her from Italy and not to seek dominion in Italy for France. If he fails he shatters his own power in Paris: so much the better, I suppose. If he succeeds, Italy is a certain gainer, and Europe through Italy. I say a certain gainer, because the existing oppression (testified by Gladstone and Clarendon) rests upon the aid of Austria, and is far worse than war, and worse than a transitory dictatorship of France; and the mischief of Austria has been that her power has been confirmed by European diplomacy; but if France proves treacherous, it will be against the protest of Europe, and her rule _cannot_ be permanent. Besides, L. N.

must almost of necessity give some aggrandizement to Sardinia. Lombardy, Tuscany, and Parma seem inevitably to rush into Victor Emmanuel's arms, if not also Venice, if the Confederates are victorious. Hence a stout power is interposed between France and Southern Italy. And is it not stupid to think that because L. N. is a bad, unscrupulous man, therefore he covets nothing but _territory_? He covets _stability_ and the glory of liberating Italy; and acting with heroic moderation is the obvious way of winning to his side republicans in France and the diplomatists of Europe. _If_ he acts thus, I think his dynasty will be permanent; if not, not, or hardly.

The Papists already hate him, and he already distrusts them...."

It is impossible to read many letters of Newman's and not recognize the unfailing unselfishness with which he constantly gives up his own plans of seeing his friends, in order that his wife may go to those places for which she has a special affection. Not infrequently he gives up a journey much farther afield for the purpose of pursuing antiquarian researches because he knows how great would be her ennui were she to accompany him, and he is ever full of a tender concern that she shall suffer no unnecessary discomfort or trouble.

"_13th July_, 1859.

"My dear Nicholson,

"I had really hoped we might spend a few days at Penrith and have a chance of seeing you, for my wife talked seriously of Keswick and the neighbourhood. But when she began to remember in detail the climate of the Lakes, her courage broke down, and she said there was nothing did us good but the seaside, and especially the coast of Wales. So now we are starting for Carmarthen, Cardigan, Aberayron, Aberystwith, etc., a weary distance from Penrith.

"I told you I had undertaken the daring task of teaching modern Arabic (somehow) to a young lady. My lessons began in October (the second week), and ended with the second week of March, being broken by Christmas. About a fortnight ago she sent me a written exercise, in which I corrected a few grammatical faults, and then copied it out to transmit it to you, with my translation into English. I should like you to see a specimen of my _Roman_ (?) character, and also to hear what you think of the capacity and power of the modern language as compared with the ancient.... I hope you are hitherto well satisfied with Italian affairs. The pamphlet of Napoleon III on Italy shows that in 1857 he definitely proposed to Austria a scheme for the total secularization of the Papacy. I now feel sure he will not stop at that. It also advocates a federation of all Italy--a wonderful proposal from a French ruler. No democrat would have proposed that."

In September he writes from Aberystwith, and relates how he is busy translating _Robinson Crusoe_ from the Arabic.

"I am constantly reminded of you by the study which I have been rather closely pursuing here for nearly eight weeks, viz. the reading of _Robinson Crusoe_ in Arabic. It is to me often difficult from several causes: (1) It is not pointed, nor even the _Teshdied_ added; (2) I could not bring Golin's with me, and the dictionaries which I have are very imperfect; (3) the writer has most arbitrarily changed the details of Robinson's story, and makes it often incoherent and stupidly impossible; so that neither does the original help me much, nor can I rest on internal congruity to help me out."

It should perhaps be remembered here that the Arabs had a great contempt for the Grecian and Roman languages. Their own language was only printed in ancient cla.s.sical form, of which the Koran is the most famous example, and the characters and symbols proceeded from right to left. In its most ancient form it is named "Kufic." There are only symbols for sixteen out of its twenty-eight consonants. Certain of our own words own patronymity from the Arabic languages--words such as algebra, alcohol, zenith, nadir, etc. These show clearly that the language did influence early intellectual European culture in no small degree.

To go on with the letter:--

"I am greatly encouraged by my success in understanding it" [the story of _Robinson Crusoe_ in Arabic], "for it is a far more ambitious style and on far more various topics than I have ever before encountered; and when I get my Golin's I expect to get to the bottom of many words that puzzle me, though others are probably modern developments, especially quadrilaterals and words belonging to special arts. But there is a religious formula which recurs many times, every word of which is easy, and yet the whole of it is to me unintelligible. I suspect it is elliptical and allusive, and it occurs to me that it may be familiar to you; if so, I know you will have pleasure in explaining it to me. Whenever Robinson falls into distress and betakes himself to prayer, I meet these words:--

[Arabic]

and then follows the matter of sorrow. I also three times meet [Arabic] at the end of a sentence, where the meaning seems to be _et alia ejusdem generis_. I suppose it is an abridgment by initial letters. Can you help me to a solution? We have stuck here" [at Aberystwith] "longer than we intended; in fact, we should have left nearly a week ago, only that Mrs.

N. caught a sharp cold, and the weather became suddenly so severe that I have feared to let her travel.... Probably, like all the world and his wife, you are yourself just now absent from home.... Do you not with me see that the Italians already are showing how vast a benefit L. N. has brought them? It is only the beginning of a vast revolution.

"I am, ever your true friend,

"F. W. Newman."

CHAPTER IX

LETTERS TO DR. NICHOLSON

In 1860 Sardinia, because it happened to possess the clever, far-seeing Count Cavour, had "dreamed against a distant goal"--the goal when his king should be made King of Italy, instead of only Sardinia. He only had to wait one year before his wish was attained. Victor Emmanuel, son of Charles Albert, King of Sardinia, was in 1861 proclaimed King of Italy, and nine years later he was head of the whole united nation. This is briefly touched on in Newman's first letter to Dr. Nicholson in January, 1860. He also spoke in strong praise of a book of Mrs. Beecher Stowe which he and his wife (then staying at Hastings to see the new year in, as they did the year before as well) were reading together. Mrs. Beecher Stowe was, of course, best known by her _Uncle Tom's Cabin_, perhaps the most popular American novel ever written. _The Minister's Wooing_ was published in 1859.

[Ill.u.s.trations: 20 WHITE ROCK PLACE, HASTINGS 1A CARLISLE PARADE, HASTINGS WHERE FRANCIS NEWMAN OFTEN STAYED, IN 1860 AND EARLIER From Photos taken in 1909 by Valentine Edgar Sieveking]

"1A Carlisle Parade, Hastings, _4th Jan_., 1860.

"My dear Nicholson,

"A Happy New Year to you all! We are here, in the same lodgings as a year ago, having begun and ended the year in them. We have begun this year with hopes for the future brightly contrasted to anything for ten years back.

For this, among men, I thank, first of all, Cavour and Victor Emmanuel, and secondly, Louis Napoleon. The hatred which the last incurs with the Austrian party and the Ultramontanists is, I think, a fair measure of his services and tendencies.

"I cannot get any solution from any of my books of certain difficulties in the Arabic phraseology of _Robinson Crusoe_, [Footnote: Hiawatha and Robinson Crusoe were very much used for Latin translations at the college by Newman.] and I want to ask your help; but I do not like to do so until I learn that it would not encroach too much on your leisure.