Memoirs of James Robert Hope-Scott Part 22

_The Right Rev. Dr. Hamilton (Bishop of Salisbury) to J. R. Hope-Scott, Esq., Q.C._

33 Grosvenor Street: March 13, 1869.

My dearly loved Friend,--I have received your note, _non sine multis lachrymis_, and though I am too weak to write or answer myself, I must dictate a few words of thankfulness to it. Few trials of my life I have felt with such keenness as my separation from two such friends, from whom I have learnt so much, and whom I have loved and love so dearly as Manning and yourself. Perhaps this feeling for you both has helped to prevent my doing that which it has been my daily aim not to do, namely, to hinder either by word or deed that object which I venture to say is as dear to me as to you--the reunion of Christendom. May G.o.d forgive me anything which has led me to lose sight of this in all my ministrations! Nothing, however, would tend more to forward this than a just and charitable estimate of the claims of the Church of England on the part of the authorities of your communion. I have dictated these few words, and my chaplain, Liddon, has written them exactly as I have dictated them, and I beg you to receive them as a legacy of affection and deep respect from your old brother-Fellow.

W. K. SARUM.

_J. R. Hope-Scott, Esq., Q. C. to the Rev. Canon Liddon_.

Villa Favart, Hyeres: March 17, 1869.

My dear Sir,--Accept my grateful thanks for the letter which you added to that of my very dear friend the Bishop. To him I do not write, for it is plain that he should make no exertion that can be avoided; but I trust to your kindness to a.s.sure him that I was indeed deeply moved--more than I can well say--both by his love for me and by his sufferings, and that my prayers, and those of others far more worthy than myself, are offered to G.o.d for him.

Yours very truly,

JAMES R. HOPE-SCOTT.

And another twelvemonth had not been completed before Mr. Hope-Scott's attached friend and familiar neighbour of many years (both in London and at Hyeres), Serjeant Bellasis, was visibly nearing his departure. [Footnote: He lingered till January 24, 1873.] The following letters witness, in a most touching manner, to their mutual affection, and to that of Dr. Newman for them both:--

_The Very Rev, Dr. Newman to J. R. Hope-Scott, Esq., Q.C._

The Oratory: March 3, '70.

My dear Hope-Scott,--After writing a conversational letter to Bellasis yesterday, I heard at night so sad an account, which I had not antic.i.p.ated, of his pain and his weakness and want of sleep, that I not only was distressed that it had gone, and felt that it would hara.s.s him to receive a second letter so soon, and, as he would antic.i.p.ate, as unseasonable as the former. Therefore I enclose with this a few lines to him, which you can let him have when you think right.

I do not undervalue the seriousness of your first letter about him, and have had him constantly in my mind; but I did not contemplate his pain, or his sudden decline. I thought it would be a long business, but now I find that the complaint is making its way.

What a severe blow it must be to you! but to me, in my own way, it is very great too, though in a different way; for, though I am not in his constant society as you are, he has long been _pars magna_ of this place, and he has, by his various acts of friendship through a succession of years, created for himself a presence in my thoughts, so that the thought of being without him carries with it the sense of a void, to which it is difficult to a.s.sign a limit. Three aequales I shall have lost--Badeley, H. Bowden, and Bellasis; and such losses seem to say that I have no business here myself.

It is the penalty of living to lose the great props of life. What a melancholy prospect for his poor boys! When you have an opportunity, say everything kind from me to Mrs. Bellasis. I shall, I trust, say two ma.s.ses a week for him. He is on our prayer lists. What a vanity is life! how it crumbles under one's touch!

I hope you are getting strong, and that this does not weigh too heavily on you....

Ever yours affectionately,

JOHN H. NEWMAN.

_J. R. Hope-Scott, Esq., Q.C. to the Very Rev. Dr. Newman_.

Hotel d'Orient, Hyeres, Var, France:

March 6, '70.

Dear F. Newman,--I received yours yesterday evening, but withhold the enclosure for Bellasis, as I think it might do him harm. [After giving a somewhat better account of his friend's health:]

Ma.s.ses and prayers I am sure he has many, and I know how grateful he is for your deep interest in him.... Should he be able to get out, I hope for more progress: but, with slight exceptions, he has now been confined to the house for weeks. However, his patience helps his greatly, and when, as lately he has often been, free from pain, his cheerfulness revives, and with it his interest in the works he has undertaken, and the subjects which have long interested him.

I am sure that the dedication of your new work [the 'Grammar of a.s.sent'] to him affects him, as that of your poems did Badeley, in a very soothing way.

Few have such extensive means of testifying to their friendships as you have.

Yours affectionately,

JAMES E. HOPE-SCOTT.

Repeated griefs of this kind would not be without their effect on Mr. Hope- Scott's own already failing health. By 1870 the physicians p.r.o.nounced that there was functional, though not organic, disease of the heart, the valve losing its power to close. He spoke of this himself to a near relative at the time, adding that he had immediately asked whether he might expect the end to come suddenly; but had been told that in all probability it would not, and that he would have warning of its approach. He now began to talk of retiring, and did take the first step, by giving up a certain number of causes. But he said to a professional friend: 'I own I dread giving up; it is almost like the excitement of racing, and the reaction would be so strong, life so flat, when such an interest is lost, and the stimulus over.' Before this happened, meeting another friend in the street, who had wisely retreated in time, Mr. Hope-Scott asked him how he got on? 'Oh, very well; I fall back on my old cla.s.sics--don't you do the same?' 'Oh no,'

replied Mr. Hope-Scott; 'when I go to the country, I find it indispensable to allow my mind to lie entirely fallow. I live in the open air, go on planting, and do no mental work whatever.'

This was the state of things when he had suddenly to meet a new sorrow, and the last. A son, indeed (James Fitzalan), was born to him on December 18, 1870, thus replacing the long wished-for blessing which had been given and withdrawn; but Lady Victoria's health had for years been enfeebled, a fever came on, and, after lingering for a time between life and death, she expired at Norfolk House on December 20, aged only thirty, leaving three little girls, besides the newly born babe. It happened on this occasion, as so often in Mr. Hope-Scott's life, that he had persuaded himself that things would be as he wished they should. He never believed that Lady Victoria was dying, though she was in her agony, and had been senseless for ten days; nay, he could hardly be made to think it, even at the last moment; and this time he never recovered the shock. The morning after the funeral [Footnote: Lady Victoria Hope-Scott was laid beside her father and her two infant children in the vault at Arundel Castle.] he said that he considered he had had a warning that night--the disease had made a stride.

He had never contemplated surviving his wife, and had made all arrangements on the supposition that he was to die before her. On the very night that followed he altered his will. He sent for his confidential clerk, destroyed quant.i.ties of papers, and, in short, evidently considered himself a dying man. He now definitively retired from his profession, and, though he survived for more than two years, what remains to be told is little more than the story of a last illness.

The years 1871 and 1872, indeed, pa.s.sed tranquilly enough, as if there was a lull and a silence after the storm. Mr. Hope-Scott resided chiefly at Abbotsford, and devoted part of his leisure in the first year to preparing an edition (the Centenary) of the Abridgment of Lockhart's 'Life of Scott.'

[Footnote: _The Life of Sir Walter Scott, Earl., abridged from the larger work_, by J. C. Lockhart, with a Prefatory Letter by James R. Hope- Scott, Esq., Q.C. Edinburgh: Adam & Charles Black, 1871.] He also thought that it was time for the larger 'Life' to be revised, and the extracts from letters to be compared with the originals, &c., and actually began the task after the republication of the Abridgment, but, I believe, very soon gave it up. He dedicated the Abridgment to Mr. Gladstone, whose letter in reply to his proposal to do so is subjoined:--

_The Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone, M.P. to J. R. Hope-Scott, Esq., Q.C._

11 Carlton House Terrace, S.W.

March 25, '71.

My dear Hope-Scott,--...I learn with pleasure that you now find yourself able to make the effort necessary for applying yourself to what I trust you will find a healthful and genial employment.

You offer me a double temptation, to which I yield with but too much readiness. I am glad of anything which a.s.sociates my name with yours; and I feel it a great honour to be marked out in the public view by your selection of me as a loyal admirer of Scott, towards whom, both as writer and as man, I cannot help entertaining feelings, perhaps (though this is saying much) even bordering upon excess.

Honesty binds me to wish you would do better for your purpose, but if you do not think any other plan desirable, I accept your proposal with thanks.

Believe me

Affectionately yours,

W. E. GLADSTONE.

J. R. Hope-Scott, Esq., Q.C.

From the letter of dedication, which I should have been glad, if s.p.a.ce had permitted, to give as a whole, I subjoin the opening and closing paragraphs, with notices (inclusive of some critical remarks) of the deeply interesting pages which intervene:--

_J. R. Hope-Scott, Esq., Q.C. to the Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone, M.P._

Arundel Castle: April 10, 1871.

My dear Gladstone,--Although our friendship has endured for many years, and has survived great changes, it is not on account of my affection for you that I have desired to connect these pages with your name. It is because from you, more than from any one else who is now alive, I have received a.s.surances of that strong and deep admiration of Walter Scott, both as an author and as a man, which I have long felt myself, and which I heartily agree with you in wishing to extend and perpetuate. On my part, such a desire might on other grounds be natural; on yours it can only spring from the conviction, which I know you to entertain, that both the writings and the personal history of that extraordinary man, while affording entertainment of the purest kind, and supplying stores of information which can nowhere else be so pleasantly acquired, have in them a great deal which no student of human nature ought to neglect, and much also which those who engage in the struggle of life with high purposes--men who are prepared to work earnestly and endure n.o.bly--cannot pa.s.s without loss.

[After quoting pa.s.sages from Mr. Gladstone's letters to himself, showing the hold which Walter Scott had over his friend's mind, Mr. Hope-Scott states his reasons for abandoning his original idea of having a new Life written, and for preferring to publish an Abridgment of it, and the Abridgment by Lockhart himself:--]

A work of art in writing is subject to the same rules as one in painting or in architecture. Those who seek to represent it in a reduced form must, above all things, study its proportions, and make their reduction equal over all its parts. But, in the case of written compositions, there are no mechanical appliances as there are in painting and architecture, for varying the scale; and there is, moreover, a greater difficulty in catching the leading principle of the design, and thus establishing the starting- point for the process which is to follow. Hence, an abridgment by the author himself must necessarily be the best--indeed, the only true abridgment of what he has intended in his larger work; and I deem it very fortunate that Cadell's influence overcame Lockhart's repugnance to the task....

There is [however] an abiding reason why Scott's personal history should not be too freely generalised, and an abstract notion be subst.i.tuted for the real man.... In Scott, if in any man, what was remarkable was the sustained and continuous power of his character. It is to be traced in the smallest things as well as in the greatest; in his daily habits as much as in his public actions; in his fancies and follies as well as in his best and wisest doings. Everywhere we find the same power of imagination, and the same energy of will; and, though it has been said that no man is a hero to his _valet-de-chambre_, I am satisfied that Scott's most familiar attendants never doubted his greatness, or looked upon him with less respect than those who judged him as he stood forth amidst the homage of the world. In dealing with such a character, it is hardly necessary to say that the omission of details becomes, after a certain point, a serious injury to the truth of the whole portrait; and if any man should object that this volume is not short enough, I should be tempted to answer, that if he reads by foot-rule, he had better not think of studying, in any shape, the life of Walter Scott.

[In what follows, Mr. Hope-Scott speaks of 'the depth and tenderness of feeling which Lockhart, in daily life, so often hid under an almost fierce reserve,' and regards it as matter of thankfulness that he was spared the suffering he would have felt in the death of his only daughter, 'whose singular likeness to her mother must have continually recalled to him both the features and the character of her of whom he wrote' those touching words in the original Life which Mr. Hope-Scott quotes, with evident application to his own bereavement, to which he makes a short and sad reference. He concludes:--]