LETTERS OF EDWARD FITZGERALD

IN TWO VOLUMESVOL. II

LondonMACMILLAN AND CO. , LIMITEDNEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

1901

_All rights reserved_

_First Edition_ 1894. _Reprinted_ 1901

{The "Little Grange, " Woodbridge: p0. Jpg}

LETTERS OF EDWARD FITZGERALD

_To E. B. Cowell_. 

88 GT. PORTLAND ST. , LONDON, _Jan. _ 13/59. 

MY DEAR COWELL, I have been here some five weeks: but before my Letter reaches you shallprobably have slid back into the Country somewhere. This is my oldLodging, but new numbered. I have been almost alone here: having seeneven Spedding and Donne but two or three times. They are well and go onas before. Spedding has got out the seventh volume of Bacon, I believe:with Capital Prefaces to Henry VII. , etc. But I have not yet seen it. After vol. Viii. (I think) there is to be a Pause: till Spedding has setthe Letters to his Mind. Then we shall see what he can make of hisBlackamoor. . . . 

I am almost ashamed to write to you, so much have I forsaken Persian, andeven all good Books of late. There is no one now to 'prick the Sides ofmy Intent'; Vaulting Ambition having long failed to do so! I took myOmar from Fraser [? Parker], as I saw he didn't care for it; and also Iwant to enlarge it to near as much again, of such Matter as he would notdare to put in Fraser. If I print it, I shall do the impudence ofquoting your Account of Omar, and your Apology for his Freethinking: itis not wholly my Apology, but you introduced him to me, and your excuseextends to that which you have not ventured to quote, and I do. I likeyour Apology extremely also, allowing its Point of View. I doubt youwill repent of ever having showed me the Book. I should like well tohave the Lithograph Copy of Omar which you tell of in your Note. MyTranslation has its merit: but it misses a main one in Omar, which I willleave you to find out. The Latin Versions, if they were corrected intodecent Latin, would be very much better. . . . I have forgotten to writeout for you a little Quatrain which Binning found written in Persepolis;the Persian Tourists having the same propensity as English to write theirNames and Sentiments on their national Monuments. {2}

* * * * *

In the early part of 1859 his friend William Browne was terribly injuredby his horse falling upon him and lingered in great agony for severalweeks. 

_To W. B. Donne_. 

GOLDINGTON, BEDFORD. _March_ 26 [1859]. 

MY DEAR DONNE, Your folks told you on what Errand I left your house so abruptly. I wasnot allowed to see W. B. The day I came: nor yesterday till 3 p. M. ; when, poor fellow, he tried to write a line to me, like a child's! and I went, and saw, no longer the gay Lad, nor the healthy Man, I had known: but awreck of all that: a Face like Charles I. (after decapitation almost)above the Clothes: and the poor shattered Body underneath lying as it hadlain eight weeks; such a case as the Doctor says he had never known. Instead of the light utterance of other days too, came the slow painfulsyllables in a far lower Key: and when the old familiar words, 'OldFellow--Fitz'--etc. , came forth, so spoken, I broke down too in spite offoregone Resolution. 

They thought he'd die last Night: but this Morning he is a little better:but no hope. He has spoken of me in the Night, and (if he wishes) Ishall go again, provided his Wife and Doctor approve. But it agitateshim: and Tears he could not wipe away came to his Eyes. The poor Wifebears up wonderfully. 

_To E. B. Cowell_. 

GELDESTONE HALL, BECCLES. _April_ 27 [1859]

MY DEAR COWELL, Above is the Address you had better direct to in future. I have had agreat Loss. W. Browne was fallen upon and half crushed by his horse nearthree months ago: and though the Doctors kept giving hopes while he laypatiently for two months in a condition no one else could have borne fora Fortnight, at last they could do no more, nor Nature neither: and hesunk. I went to see him before he died--the comely spirited Boy I hadknown first seven and twenty years ago lying all shattered and Death inhis Face and Voice. . . . 

Well, this is so: and there is no more to be said about it. It is one ofthe things that reconcile me to my own stupid Decline of Life--to thecrazy state of the world--Well--no more about it. 

I sent you poor old Omar who has _his_ kind of Consolation for all theseThings. I doubt you will regret you ever introduced him to me. And yetyou would have me print the original, with many worse things than I havetranslated. The Bird Epic might be finished at once: but 'cui bono?' Noone cares for such things: and there are doubtless so many better thingsto care about. I hardly know why I print any of these things, whichnobody buys; and I scarce now see the few I give them to. But when onehas done one's best, and is sure that that best is better than so manywill take pains to do, though far from the best that _might be done_, onelikes to make an end of the matter by Print. I suppose very few Peoplehave ever taken such Pains in Translation as I have: though certainly notto be literal. But at all Cost, a Thing must _live_: with a transfusionof one's own worse Life if one can't retain the Original's better. Bettera live Sparrow than a stuffed Eagle. I shall be very well pleased to seethe new MS. Of Omar. I shall _one day_ (if I live) print the 'Birds, 'and a strange experiment on old Calderon's two great Plays; and then shutup Shop in the Poetic Line. Adieu: Give my love to the Lady: and believeme yours very truly E. F. G. 

You see where those Persepolitan Verses {5} come from. I wonder you werenot startled with the metre, though maimed a bit. 

_To T. Carlyle_. 

GELDESTONE HALL, BECCLES. _June_ 20/59. 

DEAR CARLYLE, Very soon after I called and saw Mrs. Carlyle I got a violent cold, which(being neglected) flew to my Ears, and settled into such a Deafness Icouldn't hear the Postman knock nor the Omnibus roll. When I began(after more than a Month) to begin recovering of this (though still sodeaf as to determine not to be a Bore to any one else) I heard fromBedford that my poor W. Browne (who got you a Horse some fifteen yearsago) had been fallen on and crushed all through the middle Body by one ofhis own: and I then kept expecting every Postman's knock was to announcehis Death. He kept on however in a shattered Condition which the Doctorstold me scarce any one else would have borne a Week; kept on for near twoMonths, and then gave up his honest Ghost. I went to bid him Farewell:and then came here (an Address you remember), only going to Lowestoft (onthe Sea) to entertain my old George Crabbe's two Daughters, who, nowliving inland, are glad of a sight of the old German Sea, and alsoperhaps of poor Me. I return to Lowestoft (for a few days only)to-morrow, and shall perhaps see the Steam of your Ship passing theShore. I have always been wanting to sail to Scotland: but my old Fellow-traveller is gone! His Accident was the more vexatious as quiteunnecessary--so to say--returning quietly from Hunting. But there's nouse talking of it. Your Destinies and Silences have settled it. 

I really had wished to go and see Mrs. Carlyle again: I won't say you, because I don't think in your heart you care to be disturbed; and I amglad to believe that, with all your Pains, you are better than any of us, I do think. You don't care what one thinks of your Books: you know Ilove so many: I don't care so much for Frederick so far as he's gone: Isuppose you don't neither. I was thinking of you the other Day readingin Aubrey's Wiltshire how he heard Cromwell one Day at Dinner (I think)at Hampton Court say that Devonshire showed the best Farming of any Partof England he had been in. Did you know all the Dawson Turner Letters?

I see Spedding directs your Letter: which is nearly all I see of his MS. :though he would let me see enough of it if there were a good Turn to bedone. 

Please to give my best Remembrances to Mrs. Carlyle, and believe me yourssincerely, EDWARD FITZGERALD. 

_To Mrs. Charles Allen_. 

LOWESTOFT, _October_ 16/59. 

MY DEAR MRS. ALLEN, In passing through London a week ago I found a very kind letter from youdirected to my London Lodging. This will explain why it has not beensooner answered. As I do not know _your_ Address, I take the Opportunityof enclosing my Reply to John Allen, of whom I have not heard since May. 

I have been in these Suffolk and Norfolk Parts ever since I left Londonin March to see my poor Lad die in Bedford. The Lad I first met in theTenby Lodging house twenty-seven years ago--not sixteen then--and nowbroken to pieces and scarce conscious, after two months such suffering asthe Doctor told me scarce any one would have borne for a Fortnight. Theynever told him it was all over with him until [within] ten Days of Death:though every one else seem'd to _know_ it must be so--and he did not wishto die yet. 

I won't write more of a Matter that you can have but little Interest in, and that I am as well not thinking about. I came here partly to see hisWidow, and so (as I hope) to avoid having to go to Bedford for thePresent. She, though a wretchedly sickly woman, and within two months ofher confinement when he died, has somehow weathered it all beyondExpectation. She has her children to attend to, and be her comfort inturn: and though having lost what most she loved yet has something tolove still, and to be beloved by. There are worse Conditions than that. 

I am not going to be long here: but hope to winter somewhere in Suffolk(London very distasteful now)--But here again:--my good Hostess with whomI have lodged in Suffolk is dead too: and I must wait till _that_Household settles down a little. 

If it ever gives you pleasure to write to me, it gives me real Pleasureto hear of you: and I am sincerely grateful for your kind Remembrance ofme. 

'Geldestone Hall--Beccles' or 'Farlingay Hall, Woodbridge, ' are prettysure Addresses. Please to remember me kindly to your Husband and believeme

Yours very sincerely, EDWD FITZGERALD. 

BATH HOUSE, LOWESTOFT. _October_ 26 [1859]. 

DEAR MRS. ALLEN, I must thank you for your so kind Letter, and kind Invitation. But if Iwas but five Days with my old College Friend after twelve years' Promise, and then didn't go just on to Teignmouth to see my Sister, and herFamily, I must not talk of going elsewhere--even to Prees--where John isalways good enough to be asking me: even in a Letter To day received. 

By the way, Last Saturday at Norwich while I was gazing into a Shop, aWoman's Voice said, 'How d' ye do, Mr. FitzGerald?' I looked up: a youngWoman too, whom (of course) I didn't know. 'You don't remember me, Andalusia Allen that was!' Now Mrs. Day. I had not seen her since '52, a Girl of, I suppose, twelve, playing some Character in a Family Play. John's Letter too tells me of his son going to College. 

But Tenby--I don't remember a pleasanter Place. I can now hear the Bandon the Steamer as it left the little Pier for Bristol, the Steamer thatbrought me and the poor Boy now in his Grave to that Boardinghouse. Itwas such weather as now howls about this Lodging when one of those poorstarved Players was drowned on the Sands, and was carried past ourWindows after Dinner: I often remember the dull Trot of Men up the windyStreet, and our running to the Window, and the dead Head, hair, andShoulders hurried past. That was Tragedy, poor Fellow, whatever Parts hehad played before. 

I think you remember me with Kindness because accidentally associatedwith your old Freestone in those pleasant Days, that also were among thelast of your Sister's Life. Her too I can see, with her China-rosecomplexion: in the Lilac Gown she wore. 

I keep on here from Week to week, partly because no other Place offers:but I almost doubt if I shall be here beyond next week. Not in thisLodging anyhow: which is wretchedly 'rafty' and cold; lets the Rain inwhen it Rains: and the Dust of the Shore when it drives: as both havebeen doing by turns all Yesterday and To day. I was cursing all this asI was shivering here by myself last Night: and in the Morning I hear ofthree Wrecks off the Sands, and indeed meet five shipwreckt Men with aTroop of Sailors as I walk out before Breakfast. Oh Dear!

Please remember me to your 'Gude Man' and believe me yours truly, E. F. G. 

Pray do excuse all this Blotting: my Paper _won't_ dry To day. 

_To W. H. Thompson_. 

10 MARINE TERRACE, LOWESTOFT. _Nov. _ 27, 1859. 

MY DEAR THOMPSON, After a Fortnight's Visit to my Sister's (where I caught Cold which flewat once to my Ears, and there hangs) I returned hither, as the nearestPlace to go to, and here shall be till Christmas at all Events. I wishto avoid London this winter: and indeed seem almost to have done with it, except for a Day's Business or Sightseeing every now and then. Oftenshould I like to roam about old Cambridge, and hear St. Mary's Chimes atMidnight--but--but! This Place of course is dull enough: but here's theOld Sea (a dirty Dutch one, to be sure) and Sands, and Sailors, a veryfine Race of Men, far superior to those in Regent Street. Also theDutchmen (an ugly set whom I can't help liking for old Neighbours) comeover in their broad Bottoms and take in Water at a Creek along the Shore. But I believe the East winds get very fierce after Christmas, when theSea has cooled down. You won't come here, to be sure: or I should bevery glad to smoke a Cigar, and have a Chat: and would take care to havea Fire in your Bedroom this time: a Negligence I was very sorry for inLondon. 

I read, or was told, they wouldn't let old Alfred's Bust into yourTrinity. They are right, I think, to let no one in there (as it shouldbe in Westminster Abbey) till a Hundred Years are past; when, after toomuch Admiration (perhaps) and then a Reaction of undue Dis-esteem, Menhave settled into some steady Opinion on the subject: supposing alwaysthat the Hero survives so long, which of itself goes so far to decide theQuestion. No doubt A. T. Will do _that_. 

_To W. F. Pollock_. 

10 MARINE TERRACE, LOWESTOFT. _Febr. _ 23/60. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, 'Me voila ici' still! having weathered it out so long. No bad Place, Iassure you, though you who are accustomed to Pall Mall, Clubs, etc. , wouldn't like it. Mudie finds one out easily: and the London Librarytoo: and altogether I can't complain of not getting such drowsy Books asI want. Hakluyt lasted a long while: then came Captain Cook, whom Ihadn't read since I was a Boy, and whom I was very glad to see again. Buthe soon evaporates in his large Type Quartos. I can hardly manageEmerson Tennent's Ceylon: a very dry Catalogue Raisonnee of the Place. Alittle Essay of De Quincey's gave me a better Idea of it (as I suppose)in some twenty or thirty pages. Anyhow, I prefer Lowestoft, consideringthe Snakes, Sand-leaches, Mosquitos, etc. I suppose Russell's IndianDiary is over-coloured: but I feel sure it's true in the Main: and he hasthe Art to make one feel in the thick of it; quite enough in the Thick, however. Sir C. Napier came here to try and get the Beachmen to enlistin the Naval Reserve. Not one would go: they won't give up theirIndependence: and so really half starve here during Winter. Then Springcomes and they go and catch the Herrings which, if left alone, wouldmultiply by Millions by Autumn: and so kill their Golden Goose. They area strange set of Fellows. I think a Law ought to be made against theirSpring Fishing: more important, for their own sakes, than Game Laws. 

I laid out half a crown on your Fraser {13}: and liked much of it verymuch: especially the Beginning about the Advantage the Novelist has overthe Play-writer. A little too much always about Miss Austen, whom yet Ithink quite capital in a Circle I have found quite unendurable to walkin. Thackeray's first Number was famous, I thought: his own littleRoundabout Paper so pleasant: but the Second Number, I say, lets theCockney in already: about Hogarth: Lewes is vulgar: and I don't think onecan care much for Thackeray's Novel. He is always talking so of himself, too. I have been very glad to find I could take to a Novel again, inTrollope's Barchester Towers, etc. : not perfect, like Miss Austen: butthen so much wider Scope: and perfect enough to make me feel I know thePeople though caricatured or carelessly drawn. I doubt if you can readmy writing here: or whether it will be worth your Pains to do so. If youcan, or can not, one Day write me a Line, which I will read. I supposewhen the Fields and Hedges begin to grow green I shall move a littlefurther inland to be among them. 

_To Mrs. Charles Allen_. 

FARLINGAY: WOODBRIDGE, _June_ 2/60. 

DEAR MRS. ALLEN, Your kind Note has reacht me here after a Fortnight's abode at my oldLodgings in London. In London I have not been for more than a year, unless passing through it in September, and have no thought of going upat present. I don't think you were there last Spring, were you? Orperhaps I was gone before you arrived, as I generally used to get off assoon as it began to fill, and the Country to become amiable. Here atlast we have the 'May' coming out: there it is on some Thorns before myWindows, and the Tower of Woodbridge Church beyond: and beyond that somelow Hills that stretch with Furze and Broom to the Seaside, about tenmiles off. 

I am of course glad of so good a Report of John Allen. I have long beenthinking of writing to him: among other things to give his Wife a DrawingLaurence made of him for me some four and twenty years ago: in fullCanonicals--very serious--I think a capital Likeness on the whole, andone that I take pleasure to look at. But I think his Wife and Childrenhave more title to it: and one never can tell what will become of one'sThings when one's dead. This same Drawing is now in London (I hope: for, if not, it's lost) and you should see it if you had a mind. For youdon't seem to find your way to Frees any more than I do: I should go ifthere weren't a large Family. Mrs. John is always very kind to me. I dothink it is very kind of you too to remember and write to me: at any rateI do answer Letters, which many better Men don't. 

Please to remember me to your Husband: and believe me unforgetful of theGood old Days, and of you, and yours, EDWARD FITZGERALD. 

FARLINGAY: WOODBRIDGE, _Septr. _ 9/60. 

MY DEAR MRS. ALLEN, It is very kind of you to write to me. Ah! how I can fancy theStillness, and the Colour, of your pretty Tenby!--now eight and twentyyears since seen! But I can't summon Resolution to go to it: and dailyget worse and worse at moving any where, a common Fate as we grow older. 

Your Note came in an Enclosure from your Cousin John, who seems toflourish with Wife and Children. It is Children who keep alive one'sInterest in Life: that is to say, if one happens to like one's Children. 

I have had to stay with me the two sons of my poor Friend killed lastyear: he whom I first made Acquaintance with at your very Tenby. As Ihaven't found Courage to go to their Country, their Mother would havethem come here, and I took them to _our_ Seaside; not a beautiful Coastlike yours--no Rocks, no Sands, and few Trees--but yet liked becauseremembered by me as long as I can remember. Anyhow, there are Ships, Boats, and Sailors: and the Boys were well pleased with all that. Theplace we went to is _called Aldborough_: _spelt_ Aldeburgh: and is theBirth place of the Poet Crabbe, who also has _Daguerrotyped_ much of theCharacter of the Place in his Poems. You send me some Lines about theSea: what if I return you four of his?

 Still as I gaze upon the Sea I find Its waves an Image of my restless mind: _Here_ Thought on Thought: _there_ Wave on Wave succeeds, Their Produce--idle Thought and idle Weeds!

Adieu: please to remember me to your Husband: and believe me yours eververy sincerely, EDWARD FITZGERALD. 

_To George Crabbe_. 

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE, _Decr. _ 28/60. 

MY DEAR GEORGE, . . . I forgot to tell you I really ran to London three weeks ago: by themorning Express, and was too glad to rush back by the Evening Ditto. Iwent up for a Business I of course did not accomplish: did not call on, or see, a Friend: couldn't get into the National Gallery: and didn't carea straw for Holman Hunt's Picture. No doubt, there is Thought and Carein it: but what an outcome of several Years and sold for severalThousands! What Man with the Elements of a Great Painter could come outwith such a costive Thing after so long waiting! Think of the Acres ofCanvas Titian or Reynolds would have covered with grand Outlines and deepColours in the Time it has taken to niggle this Miniature! The Christseemed to me only a wayward Boy: the Jews, Jews no doubt: the Temple Idare say very correct in its Detail: but think of even Rembrandt's Womanin Adultery at the National Gallery; a much smaller Picture, but how muchvaster in Space and Feeling! Hunt's Picture stifled me with itsLittleness. I think Ruskin must see what his System has led to. 

I have just got Lady Waterford's 'Babes in the Wood, ' which are wellenough, pretty in Colour: only, why has she made so bad a Portrait of oneof her chief Performers, whose Likeness is so easily got at, the RobinRedbreast? This Lady Waterford was at Gillingham this Summer: and mySister Eleanor said (as Thackeray had done) she was something almost toworship for unaffected Dignity. 

MARKET-HILL, WOODBRIDGE. _Whit-Monday_ [_May_ 20, 1861]. 

MY DEAR GEORGE, . . . I take pleasure in my new little Boat: and last week went with herto Aldbro'; and she '_behaved_' very well both going and returning;though, to be sure, there was not much to try her Temper. I am so gladof this fine Whit-Monday, when so many Holiday-makers will enjoy_their_selves, and so many others make a little money by their Enjoyment. Our 'Rifles' are going to march to Grundisburgh, _manuring_ and_skrimmaging_ as they go, and also (as the Captain {18} hopes)recruiting. He is a right good little Fellow, I do believe. It is ashame the Gentry hereabout are so indifferent in the Matter: theysubscribe next to nothing: and give absolutely nothing in the way ofEntertainment or Attention to the Corps. But we are split up into thepettiest possible Squirarchy, who want to make the utmost of their littleterritory: cut down all the Trees, level all the old Violet Banks, andstop up all the Footways they can. The old pleasant way from Hasketon toBredfield is now a Desert. I was walking it yesterday and had thepleasure of breaking down and through some Bushes and Hurdles put toblock up a fallen Stile. I thought what your Father would have said ofit all. And really it is the sad ugliness of our once pleasant Fieldsthat half drives me to the Water where the Power of the Squirarchy stops!

_To E. B. Cowell_. 

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE:_May_ 22/61. 

MY DEAR COWELL, I receive two Books, via Geldestone, from you: Khold-i-barin (including aLecture of your own) and 'Promises of Christianity': I think directed inyour Wife's hand. The Lecture was, I doubt not, very well adapted to itspurpose: the other two Publications I must look at by and bye. I can'ttell you how indolent I have become about Books: some Travels andBiographies from Mudie are nearly all I read now. Then, I have only beenin London some dozen hours these two years past: my last Expedition wasthis winter for five hours: when I ran home here like a beaten Dog. So Ihave little to tell you of Friends as of Books. Spedding hammers away athis Bacon (impudently forestalled by H. Dixon's Book). Carlyle is not soup to work as of old (I hear). Indeed, he wrote me he was ill lastSummer, and obliged to cut Frederick and be off to Scotland and Idleness:the Doctors warned him of Congestion of Brain: a warning he scorned. Butwhat more likely? The last account I had of Alfred Tennyson from Mrs. A. Was a good one. Frederic T. Is settled at Jersey. I cannot make up mymind to go to see any of these good, noble men: I only hope they believeI do not forget, or cease to regard them. 

My chief Amusement in Life is Boating, on River and Sea. The Countryabout here is the Cemetery of so many of my oldest Friends: and the pettyrace of Squires who have succeeded only use the Earth for an_Investment_: cut down every old Tree: level every Violet Bank: and makethe old Country of my Youth hideous to me in my Decline. There are fewerBirds to be heard, as fewer Trees for them to resort to. So I get to theWater: where Friends are not buried nor Pathways stopt up: but all is, asthe Poets say, as Creation's Dawn beheld. I am happiest going in mylittle Boat round the Coast to Aldbro', with some Bottled Porter and someBread and Cheese, and some good rough Soul who works the Boat and chewshis Tobacco in peace. An Aldbro' Sailor talking of my Boat said--'She golike a Wiolin, she do!' What a pretty Conceit, is it not? As the Bowslides over the Strings in a liquid Tune. Another man was talkingyesterday of a great Storm: 'and, in a moment, all as calm as a Clock. '

By the bye, Forby reasons that our Suffolk third person singular 'It go, etc. , ' is probably right as being the old Icelandic form. Why should the3rd p. Sing. Be the only one that varies. And in the auxiliaries _May_, _Shall_, _Can_, etc. , there _is_ no change for the 3rd pers. I inclineto the Suffolk because of its avoiding a hiss. 

_To George Crabbe_. 

MARKET-HILL, WOODBRIDGE. _June_ 4/61. 

MY DEAR GEORGE, Let me know when you come into these Parts, and be sure I shall be gladto entertain you as well as I can if you come while I am here. Nor am Ilikely to be away further than Aldbro', so far as I see. I do meditatecrossing one fine Day to Holland: to see the Hague, Paul Potter, and someRembrandt at Rotterdam. This, however, is not to be done in my littleBoat: but in some Trader from Ipswich. I also talk of a cruise toEdinburgh in one of their Schooners. But both these Excursions I reservefor such hot weather as may make a retreat from the Town agreeable. Imake no advances to Farlingay, because (as yet) we have not had any suchHeat as to bake the Houses here: and, beside, I am glad to be by theRiver. It is strange how sad the Country has become to me. I wentinland to see Acton's Curiosities before the Auction: and was quite gladto get back to the little Town again. I am quite clear I must live theremainder of my Life in a Town: but a little one, and with a strip ofGarden to saunter in. . . . 

I go sometimes to see the Rifles drill, and shoot at their Target, andhave got John {22} to ask them up to Boulge to practise some day: I mustinsinuate that he should offer them some Beer when they get there. It isa shame the Squires do nothing in the matter: take no Interest: offer noEncouragement, beyond a Pound or two in Money. And who are those whohave most interest at stake in case of Rifles being really wanted? But Iam quite assured that this Country is dying, as other Countries die, asTrees die, atop first. The lower Limbs are making all haste to follow. . . . 

By the bye, don't let me forget to ask you to bring with you my PersianDictionary in case you come into these Parts. I read very very little:and get very desultory: but when Winter comes again must take to somedull Study to keep from Suicide, I suppose. The River, the Sea, etc. , serve to divert one now. 

Adieu. These long Letters prove one's Idleness. 

_To R. C. Trench_. {23a}

MARKET-HILL, WOODBRIDGE. _July_ 3/61. 

DEAR DOCTOR TRENCH, Thank you sincerely for the delightful little Journal {23b} which I hadfrom you yesterday, and only wished to be a dozen times as long. Thebeautiful note at p. 73 speaks of much yet unprinted! It is a pity Mrs. Kemble had not read p. 79. I thought in the Night of 'the subdued Voiceof Good Sense' and 'The Eye that invites you to look into it. ' I doubt Ican read, more or less attentively, most personal Memoirs: but I amequally sure of the superiority of this, in its Shrewdness, Humour, natural Taste, and Good Breeding. One is sorry for the account of LordNelson: but one cannot doubt it. It was at the time when he wasintoxicated, I suppose, with Glory and Lady Hamilton. What your Mothersays of the Dresden Madonna reminds me of what Tennyson once said: thatthe Attitude of The Child was that of a Man: but perhaps not the lessright for all that. As to the Countenance, he said that scarce any Man'sFace could look so grave and rapt as a Baby's could at times. He oncesaid of his own Child's, 'He was a whole hour this morning worshippingthe Sunshine playing on the Bedpost. ' He never writes Letters orJournals: but I hope People will be found to remember some of the thingshe has said as naturally as your Mother wrote them. {24}

_To W. H. Thompson_. 

MARKET-HILL, WOODBRIDGE. _July_ 15/61. 

MY DEAR THOMPSON, I was very glad to hear of you again. You need never take it toConscience, not answering my Letters, further than that I really do wantto hear you are well, and where you are, and what doing, from time totime. I have absolutely nothing to tell about myself, not having movedfrom this place since I last wrote, unless to our Sea coast at Aldbro', whither I run, or sail, from time to time to idle with the Sailors intheir Boats or on their Beach. I love their childish ways: but they toodegenerate. As to reading, my Studies have lain chiefly in some backVolumes of the New Monthly Magazine and some French Memoirs. Trench wasgood enough to send me a little unpublished Journal by his Mother: a verypretty thing indeed. I suppose he did this in return for one or twoPapers on Oriental Literature which Cowell had sent me from India, andwhich I thought might interest Trench. I am very glad to hear oldSpedding is really getting _his_ Share of Bacon into Print: I doubt if itwill be half as good as the '_Evenings_, ' where Spedding was in the_Passion_ which is wanted to fill his Sail for any longer Voyage. 

I have not seen his Paper on English Hexameters {25} which you tell meof: but I will now contrive to do so. I, however, believe in them: and Ithink the ever-recurring attempts that way show there is some ground forsuch belief. To be sure, the Philosopher's Stone, and the Quadrature ofthe Circle, have had at least as many Followers. . . . 

It was finding some Bits of Letters and Poems of old Alfred's that mademe wish to restore those I gave you to the number, as marking a by-gonetime to me. That they will not so much do to you, who did not happen tosave them from the Fire when the Volumes of 1842 were printing. But Iwould waive that if you found it good or possible to lay them up inTrinity Library in the Closet with Milton's! Otherwise, I would stilllook at them now and then for the few years I suppose I have to live. . . . 

This is a terribly long Letter: but, if it be legible sufficiently, willperhaps do as if I were spinning it in talk under the walls of theCathedral. I dare not now even talk of going any visits: I can truly sayI wish you could drop in here some Summer Day and take a Float with me onour dull River, which does lead to THE SEA some ten miles off. . . 

You must think I have become very nautical, by all this: haul away atropes, swear, dance Hornpipes, etc. But it is not so: I simply sit inBoat or Vessel as in a moving Chair, dispensing a little Grog and Shag tothose who do the work. 

_To E. B. Cowell_. 

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE. _December_ 7/61. 

MY DEAR COWELL, . . . I shall look directly for the passages in Omar and Hafiz which yourefer to and clear up, though I scarce ever see the Persian Characternow. I suppose you would think it a dangerous thing to edit Omar: else, who so proper? Nay, are you not the only Man to do it? And he certainlyis worth good re-editing. I thought him from the first the mostremarkable of the Persian Poets: and you keep finding out in himEvidences of logical Fancy which I had not dreamed of. I dare say theselogical Riddles are not his best: but they are yet evidences of aStrength of mind which our Persian Friends rarely exhibit, I think. Ialways said about Cowley, Donne, etc. , whom Johnson calls themetaphysical Poets, that their very Quibbles of Fancy showed a power ofLogic which could follow Fancy through such remote Analogies. This isthe case with Calderon's Conceits also. I doubt I have given but a veryone-sided version of Omar: but what I do only comes up as a Bubble to theSurface, and breaks: whereas you, with exact Scholarship, might make alasting impression of such an Author. So I say of Jelaluddin, whom youneed not edit in Persian, perhaps, unless in selections, which would bevery good work: but you should certainly translate for us some suchselections exactly in the way in which you did that apologue of Azrael. {27} I don't know the value of the Indian Philosophy, etc. , which youtell me is a fitter exercise for the Reason: but I am sure that youshould give us some of the Persian I now speak of, which you can do allso easily to yourself; yes, as a holiday recreation, you say, to yourIndian Studies. As to India being 'your Place, ' it may be: but as toyour being lost in England, that could not be. You know I do notflatter. . . . 

I declare I should like to go to India as well as any where: and Ibelieve it might be the best thing for me to do. But, always slow atgetting under way as I have been all my Life, what is to be done with oneafter fifty! I am sure there is no longer any great pleasure living inthis Country, so tost with perpetual Alarms as it is. One Day we are allin Arms about France. To-day we are doubting if To-morrow we may not beat War to the Knife with America! I say still, as I used, we have toomuch Property, Honour, etc. , on our Hands: our outward Limbs go onlengthening while our central Heart beats weaklier: I say, as I used, weshould give up something before it is forced from us. The World, Ithink, may justly resent our being and interfering all over the Globe. Once more I say, would we were a little, peaceful, unambitious, trading, Nation, like--the Dutch! . . . 

Adieu, My Dear Cowell; once more, Adieu. I doubt if you can read what Ihave written. Do not forget my Love to your Wife. I wonder if we areever to meet again: you would be most disappointed if we were!

_To W. H. Thompson_. 

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE. _Dec. _ 9/61. 

MY DEAR THOMPSON, The MS. Came safe to hand yesterday, thank you: and came out of itsEnvelope like a Ray of Old Times to my Eyes. I wish I had secured moreleaves from that old '_Butcher's Book_' torn up in old Spedding's Roomsin 1842 when the Press went to work with, I think, the Last of oldAlfred's Best. But that, I am told, is only a 'Crotchet. ' However, hadI taken some more of the Pages that went into the Fire, after serving inpart for Pipe-lights, I might have enriched others with that which AT{29} himself would scarce have grudged, jealous as he is of such sort ofCuriosity. 

I have seen no more of Tannhauser than the Athenaeum showed me; andcertainly do not want to see more. One wonders that Men of some Genius(as I suppose these are) should so disguise it in Imitation: but, if theybe very young men, this is the natural course, is it not? By and by theymay find their own Footing. 

As to my own Peccadilloes in Verse, which never pretend to be original, this is the story of _Rubaiyat_. I had translated them partly forCowell: young Parker asked me some years ago for something for Fraser, and I gave him the less wicked of these to use if he chose. He kept themfor two years without using: and as I saw he did'nt want them I printedsome copies with Quaritch; and, keeping some for myself, gave him therest. Cowell, to whom I sent a Copy, was naturally alarmed at it; hebeing a very religious Man: nor have I given any other Copy but to GeorgeBorrow, to whom I had once lent the Persian, and to old Donne when he wasdown here the other Day, to whom I was showing a Passage in another Bookwhich brought my old Omar up. 

(end of letter lost. )

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE. _March_ 19/62. 

MY DEAR THOMPSON, Thanks for your Letter in the middle of graver occupations. It will giveme very great pleasure if you will come here: but not if you only do soout of kindness; I mean, if you have no other call of Business orPleasure to yourself. For I don't deserve--

You should have sent me some Photograph. I hate them nearly all: but S. Rice {30} was very good. I wonder you don't turn out well: I suppose, too black, is it? It is generally florid people, I think, who fail: yet, strange to say, my Brother Peter has come quite handsome in the Process. . . . 

I am all for a little Flattery in Portraits: that is, so far as, I think, the Painter or Sculptor should try at something more agreeable thananything he sees sitting to him: when People look either bored, orsmirking: he should give the best possible Aspect which the Featuresbefore him _might_ wear, even if the Artist had not seen that Aspect. Especially when he works for Friends or Kinsfolk: for even the plainestface has looked handsome to them at some happy moment, and just such welike to have perpetuated. 

Now, I really do feel ashamed when you ask about my Persian Translations, though they are all very well: only very little affairs. I really havenot the face to send to Milnes direct: but I send you four Copies which Ihave found in a Drawer here to do as you will with. This will saveMilnes, or any one else, the bore of writing to me to acknowledge it. 

My old Boat has been altered, I hope not spoiled; and I shall soon bepreparing for the Water--and Mud. I don't think one can reckon on warmweather till after the Longest Day: but if you should come before, itwill surely be warm enough to walk, or drive, if not to sail; and Leaveswill be green, if the Tide should be out. 

You would almost think I wanted to repay you in Compliment if I told youI regarded even your hasty Letters as excellent in all respects. I do, however: but I do not wish you to write one when you are busy ordisinclined. 

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE. _Sept. _ 29/62. 

MY DEAR THOMPSON, 'What Cheer, ho!' I somehow fancy that a Line of Nonsense will catch youbefore you leave Ely: and yet, now I come to think, you will have leftEly, probably, and will be returning in another Fortnight to Cambridgefor the Term. Well, I will direct to Cambridge then; and my Note shallawait you there, and you need not answer it till some very happy hour ofLeisure and Inclination. As to Inclination, indeed, I don't think youwill ever have much of that, toward writing such Letters, I mean; whatsensible Man after forty has? You have done so much more (in my Eyes, and perhaps so much less in your own) coming all this way to see me! Idid wonder at the Goodness of that. I suppose Spedding didn't tell youthat I wrote to him to say so. It was very unlucky I was out when youcame: I have often thought of that with vexation. 

Well, I have gone on Boating, etc. , just the same ever since. And justnow I have been applying to Spring Rice to use his Influence to get alarger Buoy laid at the mouth of our River; across which lies a vile Barof shifting Sand, and such a little Bit of a Buoy to mark it that weoften almost miss it going in and out, and are in danger of running onthe Shoal; which would break the Boat to Pieces if not drown us. Here isa fine Piece of Information to a Canon of Ely and Professor of Greek atCambridge!

Spring Rice does not speak well, I think, of his health; not at all well;and his Handwriting looks shaky. What a Loyal Kind Heart it is!

_To W. B. Donne_. 

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE, _Nov. _ 28/62. 

MY DEAR DONNE, I talk indignantly against others bothering you, and do worse than allmyself, I think, what with Bookbindings, Dressing-gowns, etc. (N. B. Youknow that the last is only in case when you are going your Rounds to St. James, etc. ) Now I have a little Query to make: which, not being even somuch out of your way, won't I hope trouble you. I remember Thompsontelling me that, from what he had read and seen of Grecian Geography, healmost thought Clytemnestra's famous Account of the Line of Signal Firesfrom Troy to Mycenae to be possible (I mean you know in the Agamemnon). At least this is what _I believe_ he said: I must not assert from a notvery accurate Memory anything that would compromise a Greek Professor: Iam so ignorant of Geography, ancient as well as modern, I don't knowexactly, or at all, the Points of the Beacons so enumerated: andLempriere, the only Classic I have to refer to, doesn't help me in what Iwant. Will you turn to the passage, and tell me _what_, and _where_, are:

1. The [Greek text]--

2. The [Greek text]--

3. The [Greek text]. 

_What_, _where_, and _why_, so called? The rest I know, or can find inDictionary, and Map. But for these--

 Lempriere Is no-where; Liddell and Scott Don't help me a jot: When I'm off, Donnegan Don't help me _on again_. -- So I'm obliged to resort to old _Donne again_!

Rhyme and Epigram quite worthy of the German. 

_To W. H. Thompson_. 

Fragment of a Letter written in Nov. 1862. 

I took down a Juvenal to look for a Passage about the Loaded Waggonrolling through the Roman Streets. {34} I couldn't find it. Do you knowwhere it is? Not that you need answer this Question, which only comes inas if I were talking to you. I remember asking you whence AEschylus madehis Agamemnon speak of Ulysses as unwilling at first to go on the TrojanExpedition. I see Paley refers it to some Poem called the Cypria quotedby Proclus. I was asking Donne the other Day as to some of the names ofthe Beacon-places in Clytemnestra's famous Speech: and I then said I_believed_--but only _believed_, as an inaccurate Man, not wishing toimplicate others--that you, Thompson, had once told me that you thoughtthe Chain of Fires _might_ have passed from Troy to Mycenae in the waydescribed--_just possibly_ MIGHT, I think--I assure you I took care notto commit your Credit by my uncertain Memory, whatever it was you saidwas only in a casual way over a Cigar. Are you for [Greek text]? {35a} apoint I don't care a straw about; so don't answer this neither. 

No, I didn't go to the Exhibition: which, I know, looks like Affectation:but was honest Incuriosity and Indolence. 

. . . On looking over Juvenal for the Lines I wanted I was amused at theprosaic Truth of one I didn't want:

 Intolerabilius nihil est quam femina dives. {35b}

_To George Crabbe_. 

_Dec. _ 20, 1862. 

MY DEAR GEORGE, . . . I have been, and am, reading Borrow's 'Wild Wales, ' which _I_ likewell, because I can hear him talking it. But I don't know if others willlike it: anyhow there is too much of the same thing. Then what is meantfor the plainest record of Conversation, etc. , has such Phrases as 'Marrycome up, ' etc. , which mar the sense of Authenticity. Then, no onewriting better English than Borrow in general, there is the vile_Individual_--_Person_--and _Locality_ always cropping up: and even thisvulgar Young Ladyism, 'The Scenery was beautiful _to a Degree_. ' _What_Degree? When did this vile Phrase arise?

_To W. H. Thompson_. 

_Good Friday_, 1863. 

MY DEAR THOMPSON, Pray never feel ashamed of not answering my Letters so long as you dowrite twice a year, to let me know you live and thrive. As much ofteneras you please: but you are only to be ashamed of not doing that. Forthat I really want of all who have been very kind and very constant('_loyal_' is the word that even Emperors now use of themselves) for somany years. This I say in all sincerity. 

Now, while you talk of being ashamed of not writing, I am rather ashamedof writing so much to you. Partly because I really have so little tosay; and also because saying that little too often puts you to the shameyou speak of. You say my Letters are pleasant, however: and they will beso far pleasant if they assure you that I like talking to you in thatway: bad as I am at more direct communication. I can tell you yourletters are very pleasant to me; you at least have always something totell of your half-year's Life: and you tell it so wholesomely, I alwayssay in so capital a Style, as makes me regret you have not written someof your better Knowledge for the Public. I suppose (as I have heard)that your Lectures {37} are excellent in this way; I can say I shouldlike very much to attend a course of them, on the Greek Plays, or onPlato. I dare say you are right about an Apprenticeship in Red Tapebeing necessary to make a Man of Business: but is it too late in Life foryou to buckle to and screw yourself up to condense some of your Lecturesand scholarly Lore into a Book? By 'too late in Life' I mean too late totake Heart to do it. 

I am sure you won't believe that I am _scratching_ you in return for anyscratchings from your hands. We are both too old, too sensible, and tooindependent, I think, for that sort of thing. 

As to my going to Ely in June, I don't know yet what to say; for I havebeen Fool enough to order a Boat to be building which will cost me 350pounds, and she talks of being launched in the very first week of June, and I have engaged for some short trips in her as soon as she is afloat. I begin to feel tired of her already; I felt I should when I waspersuaded to order her: and that is the Folly of it. They say it is avery bad Thing to do Nothing: but I am sure that is not the case withthose who are born to Blunder; I always find that I have to repent ofwhat I have done, not what I have left undone; and poor W. Browne used tosay it was better even to repent of what [was] undone than done. Youknow how glad I should be if you came here: but I haven't the Face to askit, especially after that misfit last Summer; which was not my faulthowever. 

I always look upon old Spedding's as one of the most wasted Lives I know:and he is a wise Man! Twenty years ago I told him that he should knockold Bacon off; I don't mean give him up, but wind him up at far lesssacrifice of Time and Labour; and edit Shakespeare. I think it _would_have been worth his Life to have done those two; and I am alwayspersuaded his Bacon would have been better if done more at a heat. Ishall certainly buy the new Shakespeare you tell me of, if the Volumesaren't bulky; which destroys my pleasure in the use of a Book. 

I have had my share of Influenza: even this Woodbridge, with all itscapital Air and self-contented Stupidity (which you know is veryconducive to long Life) has been wheezing and coughing all the very mildwinter; and the Bell of the Tower opposite my Room has been tollingoftener than I ever remember. 

Though I can't answer for _June_, I am really meditating a small trip toWiltshire _before_ June; mainly to see the daughters of my old GeorgeCrabbe who are settled at Bradford on Avon, and want very much that Ishould see how happily they live on very small means indeed. And I mustown I am the more tempted to go abroad because there is preparation for aMarriage in my Family (a Niece--but not one of my Norfolk Nieces) whichis to be at my Brother's near here; and there will be a Levee of People, who drop in here, etc. This may blow over, however. 

Now I ought to be ashamed of this long Letter: don't you make me so byanswering it. 

Ever yours, E. F. G. 

_To George Crabbe_. 

WOODBRIDGE, _June_ 8/63. 

MY DEAR GEORGE, Your sister wrote me a very kind Letter to tell of her safe Return home. I must repeat to you very sincerely that I never recollect to have passeda pleasanter week. As far as Company went, it was like Old Times atBredfield; and the Oak-trees were divine! I never expected to care sovery much for Trees, nor for your flat Country: but I really feel as onewho has bathed in Verdure. I suppose Town-living makes one alive to sucha Change. 

I spent a long Day with Thompson: {40} and much liked the painted Roof. On Thursday I went to Lynn: which I took a Fancy to: the odd old Houses:the Quay: the really grand Inn (Duke's Head, in the Market place) and thecivil, Norfolk-talking, People. I went to Hunstanton, which is ratherdreary: one could see the Country at Sandringham was good. I enquiredfruitlessly about those Sandringham Pictures, etc. : even the Auctioneer, whom I found in the Bar of the Inn, could tell nothing of where they hadgone. 

_To W. B. Donne_. 

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE. _Sat. July_ 18/63. 

MY DEAR DONNE, . . . I can hardly tell you whether I am much pleased with my new Boat;for I hardly know myself. She is (as I doubted would be from the first)rather awkward in our narrow River; but then she was to be a good Sea-boat; and I don't know but she is; and will be better in all ways when wehave got her in proper trim. Yesterday we gave her what they call '_atuning_' in a rather heavy swell round Orford Ness: and she did wellwithout a reef, etc. But, now all is got, I don't any the more want togo far away by Sea, any more than by Land; having no Curiosity left forother Places, and glad to get back to my own Chair and Bed after three orfour Days' Absence. So long as I get on the Sea from time to time, it ismuch the same to me whether off Aldbro' or Penzance. And I find I can'tsleep so well on board as I used to do thirty years ago: and not to getone's Sleep, you know, indisposes one more or less for the Day. However, we talk of Dover, Folkestone, Holland, etc. , which will give one'ssleeping Talents a _tuning_. 

_To George Crabbe_. 

WOODBRIDGE, _July_ 19, [1863]. 

MY DEAR GEORGE, You tell me the Romney is at Gardner's: but where is Gardner's? And whatwas the Price of the Portrait? Laurence said well about Romney that, ascompared to Sir Joshua and Gainsboro', his Pictures looked tinted, ratherthan painted; the colour of the Cheek (for instance) rather superficiallylaid on, as rouge, rather than ingrained, and mantling like Blood frombelow. Laurence had seen those at last year's Exhibition: I have notseen near so many. I remember one that seemed to me capital at LordBute's in Bedfordshire. 

I came home yesterday from a short Cruise to Yarmouth, etc. , where somepeople were interested in the Channel Fleet. But I could take nointerest in Steam Ships and Iron Rams. 

WOODBRIDGE, _August_ 4, [1863]. 

MY DEAR GEORGE, I have at last done my Holland: you won't be surprised to hear that I didit in two days, and was too glad to rush home on the first pretence, after (as usual) seeing nothing I cared the least about. The Countryitself I had seen long before in Dutch Pictures, and between Beccles andNorwich: the Towns I had seen in Picturesque Annuals, Drop Scenes, etc. 

But the Pictures--the Pictures--themselves?

Well, you know how I am sure to mismanage: but you will hardly believe, even of me, that I never saw what was most worth seeing, the HagueGallery! But so it was: had I been by myself, I should have gone offdirectly (after landing at Rotterdam) to that: but Mr. Manby was with me:and he thought best to see about Rotterdam first: which was lastThursday, at whose earliest Dawn we arrived. So we tore about in an openCab: saw nothing: the Gallery not worth a visit: and at night I was halfdead with weariness. Then again on Friday I, by myself, should havestarted for the Hague: but as Amsterdam was also to be done, we thoughtbest to go there (as furthest) first. So we went: tore about the town ina Cab as before: and I raced through the Museum seeing (I must say)little better than what I have seen over and over again in England. Icouldn't admire the Night-watch much: Van der Helst's very good Pictureseemed to me to have been cleaned: I thought the Rembrandt Burgomastersworth all the rest put together. But I certainly looked very flimsily atall. 

Well, all this done, away we went to the Hague: arriving there just asthe Museum closed for that day; next Day (Saturday) it was not to be openat all (I having proposed to wait in case it should), and on Sunday onlyfrom 12 to 2. Hearing all this, in Rage and Despair I tore back toRotterdam: and on Saturday Morning got the Boat out of the muddy Canal inwhich she lay and tore back down the Maas, etc. , so as to reach dear oldBawdsey shortly after Sunday's Sunrise. Oh, my Delight when I heard themcall out 'Orford Lights!' as the Boat was plunging over the Swell. 

All this is very stupid, really wrong: but you are not surprised at it inme. One reason however of my Disgust was, that we (in our Boat) wereshut up (as I said) in the Canal, where I couldn't breathe. I begged Mr. Manby to let me take him to an Inn: he would stick to his Ship, he said:and I didn't like to leave him. Then it was Murray who misled me aboutthe Hague Gallery: he knew nothing about its being shut on Saturdays. Then again we neither of us knew a word of Dutch: and I was surprised howlittle was known of English in return. 

But I shall say no more. I think it is the last foreign Travel I shallever undertake; unless I should go with you to see the Dresden Madonna:to which there is one less impediment now Holland is not to be gonethrough. . . . I am the Colour of a Lobster with Sea-faring: and my Eyessmart: so Good-Bye. Let me hear of you. Ever yours E. F. G. 

Oh dear!--Rembrandt's Dissection--where and how did I miss that?

_To E. B. Cowell_. 

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE. _Aug. _ 5/63. 

MY DEAR COWELL, I don't hear from you: I rather think you are deterred by those _Birds_which I asked you to print (in my last Letter) with some Correction, etc. , of your own: and which you have not found Time or Inclination toget done. But don't let anything of this sort prevent your writing to menow and then: no one can be more utterly indifferent than I am whetherthese Birds are printed or not: and I suppose I distinctly told you _not_to put yourself to any Trouble. Indeed I dare say I should only be boredwith the Copies when they were printed: for I don't know a Soul here whowould care for the Thing if it were ten times as well done as I have doneit: nor do I care for Translation or Original, myself. Oh dear, when Ido look into Homer, Dante, and Virgil, AEschylus, Shakespeare, etc. , those Orientals look--silly! Don't resent my saying so. _Don't_ they? Iam now a good [deal] about in a new Boat I have built, and thought (asJohnson took Cocker's Arithmetic with him on travel, because he shouldn'texhaust it) so I would take Dante and Homer with me, instead of Mudie'sBooks, which I read through directly. I took Dante by way of slowDigestion: not having looked at him for some years: but I am glad to findI relish him as much as ever: he atones with the Sea; as you know doesthe Odyssey--these are the Men!

I am just returned in my Ship from Holland--where I stayed--two days!--andwas so glad to rush away home after being imprisoned in a sluggish un-sweet Canal in Rotterdam: and after tearing about to Amsterdam, theHague, etc. , to see things which were neither new nor remarkable to methough I had never seen them before--except in Pictures, which representto you the Places as well as if you went there, without the trouble ofgoing. I am sure wiser men, with keener _out_sight and _in_sight wouldsee what no Pictures could give: but this I know is always the case withme: this is my last Voyage abroad, I believe: unless I go to seeRaffaelle's Madonna at Dresden, which no other Picture can represent thanitself: unless Dante's Beatrice. 

I don't think you ever told me if you had got, or read, Spedding's twofirst volumes of Bacon. My opinion is not the least altered of the Case:and (as I anticipated) Spedding has brooded over his Egg so long he hasrather addled it. Thompson told me that the very Papers he adduces toclear Bacon in Essex's Business, rather go against him: I haven't seenany Notice of the Book in any Review but Fraser: where Donne (of course)was convinced, etc. , and I hear that even the wise old Spedding is_mortified_ that he has awakened so little Interest for his Hero. Youknow his Mortification would not be on _his own_ score. His last Letterto me (some months ago) seemed to indicate that he could scarce lift uphis Pen to go on--he had as yet, he said, written nothing of volumes 3and 4. But I suppose he _will_ in time. I say this Life of his wastedon a vain work is a Tragedy pathetic as Antigone or Iphigenia. OfTennyson I hear but little: and I have ceased to look forward to anyfuture Work of his. Thackeray seems dumb as a gorged Blackbird too: allgrowing old!

I have lost my sister Kerrich, the only one of my family I much caredfor, or who much cared for me. 

But (not to dwell on what cannot be helped, and to which my talking ofall growing old led me) I see in last week's Athenaeum great Praise of anew Volume of Poems by Jean Ingelow. The Reviewer talks of a 'new Poet, 'etc. , quite unaware that some dozen years ago the 'new Poet' published aVolume (as you may remember) with as distinct Indications of sweet, fresh, and original Genius as anything he adduces from this secondVolume. I remember writing a sort of Review, when about you at Bramford, which I sent to Mitford, to try and give the Book a little move: butMitford had just quitted the Gentleman's Magazine, and I tore up myPaper. Your Elizabeth knows (I think) all about this Lady: who, Isuppose, is connected with Lincolnshire: for the Reviewer speaks of someof the Poems as relating to that Coast--Shipwrecks, etc. I was told thatTennyson was writing a sort of Lincolnshire Idyll: I will bet on MissIngelow now: he should never have left his old County, and gone up to besuffocated by London Adulation. He has lost that which caused the longroll of the Lincolnshire Wave to reverberate in the measure of LocksleyHall. Don't believe that I rejoice like a Dastard in what I believe tobe the Decay of a Great Man: my sorrow has been so much about it that(for one reason) I have the less cared to meet him of late years, havingnothing to say in sincere praise. Nor do I mean that his Decay is allowing to London, etc. He is growing old: and I don't believe much in theFine Arts thriving on an old Tree: I can't think Milton's Paradise Lostso good as his Allegro, etc. ; one feels the strain of the Pump allthrough: only Shakespeare--the exception to all rule--struck out Macbethat past fifty. {47a}

By the way, there is a new--and the best--edition {47b} of _Him_ comingout: edited by two men (Fellows) of Cambridge. Just the Text, with thevarious readings of Folio and Quartos: scarce any notes: but suggestionsof Alteration from Pope, Theobald, Coleridge, etc. , and--Spedding; who(as I told him twenty years ago) should have done the work these men aredoing. He also says they are well doing about _half_ what is wanted tobe done. He should--for he could--have done all; and one FrontispiecePortrait would have served for Author and Editor. 

Come--here is a long Letter--and (as I read it over) with more _Go_ thanusually attends my old Pen now. Let it inspire you to answer: never mind_the Birds_:--which really suggests to me one of Dante's beautiful lineswhich made me _cry_ the other Day at Sea. 

 Mentre che gli occhi per la fronda verde Ficcava io cosi, come far suole Chi dietro all' uccellin la vita perde, Lo piu che Padre mi dicea, etc. {48a}

_To W. B. Donne_. 

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE. _October_ 4/63. 

MY DEAR DONNE, Very rude of me not to have acknowledged your Tauchnitz {48b} before: butI have been almost living in my Ship ever since: and I supposed also thatyou were abroad in Norfolk. I pitied you undergoing those dreadfulOratorios: I never heard one that was not tiresome, and in partludicrous. Such subjects are scarce fitted for Catgut. Even MagnusHandel--even Messiah. He (Handel) was a good old Pagan at heart, and(till he had to yield to the fashionable Piety of England) stuck toOpera, and Cantatas, such as Acis and Galatea, Milton's Penseroso, Alexander's Feast, etc. , where he could revel and plunge and frolicwithout being tied down to Orthodoxy. And these are (to my mind) hisreally great works: these, and his Coronation Anthems, where Human Pompis to be accompanied and illustrated

Now for Tauchnitz; somehow, that which you sent me is not the thing: Idon't like it half so well as my little Tauchnitz stereotype Sophocles of1827. The Euripides you send bears date 1846: and is certainly not soclear to my eyes as 1827. Never mind: don't trouble yourself further: Ishall light upon what I want one of these Days. It is wonderful how _TheSea_ brought up this Appetite for Greek: it likes to be called [Greektext] and [Greek text] better than the wretched word '_Sea_, ' I am sure:and the Greeks (especially AEschylus--after Homer) are full of SeafaringSounds and Allusions. I think the Murmur of the AEgean (if that is theirSea) wrought itself into their Language. How is it the Islandic (which Iread is our Mother Tongue) was not more Poluphloisboi-ic?

Sophocles has almost shaken my Allegiance to AEschylus. Oh, those twoOEdipuses! but then that Agamemnon! Well: one shall be the Handel and'tother the Haydn; one the Michel Angelo, and 'tother the Raffaelle, ofTragedy. As to the famous Prometheus, I think, as I always thought, itis somewhat over-rated for Sublimity; I can't see much in the far famedConception of the Hero's Character: and I doubt (_rest wanting_). 

_To S. Laurence_. 

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Jan. _ 7/64. 

DEAR LAURENCE, . . . I want to know about your two Portraits of Thackeray: the first one(which I think Smith and Elder have) I know by the Print: I want to knowabout one you last did (some two years ago?) whether you think it as goodand characteristic: and also who has it. Frederic Tennyson sent me aPhotograph of W. M. T. Old, white, massive, and melancholy, sitting inhis Library. 

I am surprized almost to find how much I am thinking of him: so little asI had seen him for the last ten years; not once for the last five. I hadbeen told--by you, for one--that he was spoiled. I am glad thereforethat I have scarce seen him since he was 'old Thackeray. ' I keep readinghis Newcomes of nights, and as it were hear him saying so much in it; andit seems to me as if he might be coming up my Stairs, and about to come(singing) into my Room, as in old Charlotte Street, etc. , thirty yearsago. {50}

_To George Crabbe_. 

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Jan. _ 12/64. 

MY DEAR GEORGE, . . . Have we exchanged a word about Thackeray since his Death? I amquite surprised to see how I sit moping about him: to be sure, I keepreading his Books. Oh, the Newcomes are fine! And now I have got holdof Pendennis, and seem to like that much more than when I first read it. I keep hearing him say so much of it; and really think I shall hear hisStep up the Stairs to this Lodging as in old Charlotte Street thirtyyears ago. Really, a great Figure has sunk under Earth. 

_To W. H. Thompson_. 

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Jan. _ 23/64. 

MY DEAR THOMPSON, You see I return with your other troubles of Term time. Only when youhave ten spare minutes let me know how you are, etc. . . . I have almostwondered at myself how much occupied I have been thinking of Thackeray;so little as I had seen of him for the last ten years, and my Interest inhim a little gone from hearing he had become somewhat spoiled: which alsosome of his later writings hinted to me of themselves. But his Letters, and former works, bring me back the old Thackeray. . . . I had neverread Pendennis and the Newcomes since their first appearance till thislast month. They are wonderful; Fielding's seems to me coarse work incomparison. I have indeed been thinking of little this last month but ofthese Books and their Author. Of his Letters to me I have only kept someDozen, just to mark the different Epochs of our Acquaintance. 

_To E. B. Cowell_. 

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Jan. _ 31/64. 

MY DEAR COWELL, I have only Today got your Letter: have been walking out by myself in theSeckford Almshouse Garden till 9 p. M. In a sharp Frost--with Orionstalking over the South before me--(do you know him in India? I forget)have come in--drunk a glass of Porter; and am minded to answer you beforeI get to Bed. Perhaps the Porter will leave me stranded, however, beforeI get to the End of my Letter. 

Before this reaches you--probably before I write it--you will have heardof Thackeray's sudden Death. It was told me as I was walking alone inthose same Seckford Gardens on Christmas-day Night; by aCorn-merchant--one George Manby--(do you remember him?) who came onpurpose to tell me--and to wish me in other respects a Happy Christmas. Ihave thought little else than of W. M. T. Ever since--what with readingover his Books, and the few Letters I had kept of his; and thinking overour five and thirty years' Acquaintance as I sit alone by my Fire theselong Nights. I had seen very little of him for these last ten years;_nothing_ for the last five; he did not care to write; and people told mehe was become a little spoiled: by London praise, and some consequentEgotism. But he was a very fine Fellow. His Books are wonderful:Pendennis; Vanity Fair; and the Newcomes; to which compared Fielding'sseems to me coarse work. I don't know yet how his two daughters are leftprovided for; the Papers say well. He had built and furnished a fineHouse at 7 or 8000 pounds cost; which is as good a Property for them tolet or sell as any other, I suppose; and the Copyright of his Books mustalso be a good Property: always supposing he had not encumbered all theseby anticipation. 

I was not at all well myself for three months; but either the Doctor'sStuff, or the sharp clear weather, or both, have set me up pretty much asI was before. I have nothing to tell, as usual, of People or Places; forI have scarce stirred from this Place since my little Ship was laid up inthe middle of October. Donne writes sometimes; I see an article of hisabout the Antonines advertised in the present Edinburgh; but that youknow is out of my Line. His second son, Mowbray, is lately married to aDaughter (I don't know which) of Mrs. Salmon's; widow of a former Rectorhere, whom your Elizabeth will remember all about, I dare say. 

This time ten years I was lodging at Oxford, reading Persian with you. Idoubt I shall never do so again; I am too lazy to turn Dictionaries overnow; and indeed had some while ceased to expect much to turn up fromthem. You are quite right, as a Scholar, to work out the Mine; but youadmit that nothing is likely to come out of such Value as from the Greek, Latin, and English, which we have ready to our hands. Did I tell you howpleased I had been with Sophocles and AEschylus in my Boat this Summer?

I dare say you are quite right about my 'Birds': indeed I think I hadalways told you that my Version was of no _public_ use; I only wanted afew Copies for private use; and I wanted you to add a short Account, anda few Notes; in which I am shy of trusting my own Irish Accuracy. Butyou have plenty of better work, and _this_ is quite as well left. 

Miss Ingelow's second volume isn't half so good as her first, to mythinking; more ambitious, with a twang of Tennyson. I can't add to theList you have sent of Elizabeth's Poems. 

Maria C[harlesworth] was staying with my Brother at Boulge in the Autumn, and sent a very kind message to me; I now am sorry I did not see her; butI keep out of the way of the _Company_ at Boulge, though I am glad to seemy Brother here. So I wish I had asked her to take the Trouble to comeand see me in my Den. Alas! if ever you do come back, you will have tocome and see me; for I really go nowhere now. Frederic Tennyson came tome for a few Days, and talked of you two: he was looking very well; andwas grand and kind as before. I hear little of Alfred. Spedding's Baconseems to hang fire; they say he is disheartened at the little Interest, and less Conviction, that his two first volumes carried; Thompson told methey had only convinced _him_ the other way; and that _Ellis_ had longgiven up Bacon's Defence before he died. 

Now my sheet is filled on the strength of my own Glass of Porter--all ata heat. So Good Bye: ever yours, E. F. G. 

_To S. Laurence_. 

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _April_ 23/64. 

DEAR LAURENCE, I only got home last Night, from Wiltshire, where I had been to see MissCrabbe, daughter of the old Vicar whom you remember. I found your twoLetters: and then your Box. When I had unscrewed the last Screw, it wasas if a Coffin's Lid were raised; there was the Dead Man. {55} I tookhim up to my Bedroom; and when morning came, he was there--reading;alive, and yet dead. I am perfectly satisfied with it on the whole;indeed, could only have suggested a very, very, slight alteration, ifany. . . 

As I passed through London, I saw that wonderful Collection of Rubbish, the late Bishop of Ely's Pictures; but I fell desperately in Love with aSir Joshua, a young Lady in white with a blue Sash, and a sweet blue Skyover her sweet, noble, Head; far above Gainsboro' in its Air andExpression. I see in the Papers that it went for 165 pounds; which, if Ithought well to give so much for any Picture, I could almost have given, by some means, for such a delightful Work. 

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE. _April_ 27/64. 

DEAR LAURENCE, . . . I will send back the Gainsboro' copy {56a} at once; I think theOriginal must be one of the happiest of the Painter's; while he hadVandyke in his Eye, with whom he was to go to Heaven. {56b} I will notargue how far he was superior to Reynolds in Colour; but in the Air ofDignity and Gentility (in the better Sense) he was surely inferior; itmust be so, from the Difference of Character in the two men. MadameD'Arblay (Miss Burney) relates how one day when she was dining with SirJoshua at Richmond, she chanced to see him looking at her in a peculiarway; she said to him, 'I know what you are thinking about. ' 'Ay, ' hesaid, 'you may come and sit to me now whenever you please. ' They hadoften met; but he at last caught _the_ phase of her which was best; but Idon't think it ever went to Canvas. I don't think Gainsboro' could havepainted the lovely portrait at the Bishop of Ely's, slight as it was; SirJoshua was by much the finer Gentleman; indeed Gainsboro' was a Scamp. 

* * * * *

In the summer of 1864 FitzGerald bought a small farmhouse in theoutskirts of Woodbridge, which he afterwards converted into LittleGrange. 

_To George Crabbe_. 

WOODBRIDGE: _July_ 31/64. 

MY DEAR GEORGE, I returned yesterday from a Ten Days' Cruise to the Sussex Coast: whichwas pleasant enough. To-morrow I talk of Lowestoft and Yarmouth. 

. . . Read Newman's Apologia pro Vita Sua, something of a very differentorder [from the 'Dean's English'], deeply interesting; pathetic, eloquent, and, I think, sincere: sincere, in not being conscious of allthe steps he took in reaching his present Place. 

_To E. B. Cowell_. 

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Aug. _ 31, [1864]. 

MY DEAR COWELL, . . . I hope you don't think I have forgotten you. Your visit gave me asad sort of Pleasure, dashed with the Memory of other Days; I now see sofew People, and those all of the common sort, with whom I never talk ofour old Subjects; so I get in some measure unfitted for such converse, and am almost saddened with the remembrance of an old contrast when itcomes. And there is something besides; a Shadow of Death: but I won'ttalk of such things: only believe I don't forget you, nor wish to beforgotten by you. Indeed, your kindness touched me. 

I have been reading Juvenal with Translation, etc. , in my Boat. Nearlythe best things seem to me what one may call Epistles, rather thanSatires: VIII. To Ponticus: XI. To Persicus: and XII. XIII. And XIV toseveral others: and, in these, leaving out the directly satirical Parts. Satires III and X, like Horace's Poems, are prostituted by Parliamentaryand vulgar use, and should lie by for a while. One sees Lucretius, Ithink, in many parts; but Juvenal can't rise to Lucretius, who is, afterall, the true sublime Satirist of poor Man, and of something deeper thanhis Corruptions and Vices: and he looks on all, too, with 'a Countenancemore in Sorrow than in Anger. ' By the way, I want you to tell me thename and Title of that Essay on Lucretius {58} which you said wasenlarged and reprinted by the Author from the original Cambridge andOxford Essays. I want much to get it. 

There is a fine Passage in Juvenal's 6th Satire on Women: beginning line634, 'Fingimus haec, etc. ' to 650: but (as I think) leaving out lines639, 640; because one _can_ understand without them, and they jinglesadly with their one vowel ending. I mention this because it occurs in aSatire which, from its Subject, you may perhaps have little cared for. 

Another Book I have had is Wesley's Journal, which I used to read, butgave away my Copy--to you? or Robert Groome {59a} was it? If you don'tknow it, do know it; it is curious to think of this Diary of his runningalmost coevally with Walpole's Letter-Diary; the two men born and dyingtoo within a few years of one another, and with such different Lives torecord. And it is remarkable to read pure, unaffected, and undying, English, while Addison and Johnson are tainted with a Style, which allthe world imitated! Remember me to all. Ever yours E. F. G. 

'Sed genus humanum damnat caligo Futuri'--a Lucretian line from Juvenal. {59b}

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Nov. _ 11/64. 

MY DEAR COWELL, Let me hear of you whenever you have something to tell of yourself: orindeed whenever you have a few spare minutes, and happen, to think--ofme. I don't forget you: and 'out of sight' is not 'out of mind' withyou, and three or four more in the World. I hope you see Donne at times:and you must look out for old Spedding, that melancholy Ruin of the 19thCentury, with his half-white-washed Bacon. Perhaps you will see anotherRuin--the Author of Enoch Arden. Compare that with the Spontaneous _Go_of Palace of Art, Mort d'Arthur, Gardener's Daughter, Locksley Hall, WillWaterproof, Sleeping Palace, Talking Oak, and indeed, one may say, allthe two volumes of 1842. As to Maud, I think it the best Poem, as awhole, after 1842. 

To come down to very little, from once great, Things--I don't know ifit's your coming home, or my being better this Winter, or what: but Ihave caught up a long ago begun Version of my dear old _Magico_, and haveso recast it that scarce a Plank remains of the original! Prettyimpudence: and yet all done to conciliate English, or modern, Sympathy. This I sha'n't publish: so say (pray!) nothing of it at all--remember--onlyI shall print some Copies for you and one or two more: and you andElizabeth will like it a great deal too much. There is really very greatSkill in the Adaptation, and Remodelling of it. By the bye, would youtranslate _Demonio_, _Lucifer_, or _Satan_? One of the two I take. Icut out all the precioso very ingeniously: and give all theMountain-moving, etc. , in the second Act without Stage direction, so asit may seem to pass only in the dazzled Eyes, or Fantasy, of Cyprian. Allthis is really a very difficult Job to me; not worth the Candle, I daresay: only that you two will be pleased. I also increase the religiousElement in the Drama; and make Cyprian outwit the Devil more cleverlythan he now does; for the Devil was certainly too clever to be caught inhis own Art. _That_ was very good Fun for an Autodafe Audience, however. 

But please say nothing of this to any one. I should like to take up theVida es Sueno too in the same manner; but these plays are more difficultthan all the others put together: and I have no spur now. 

How would you translate Pliny's 'Quisquis est Deus, et quacumque inparte, totus est Sensus, totus Visus, totus Auditus, totus Animae, totusAnimi, totus Sui?' {61}

This Passage is alluded to by Calderon; but, in the manner of our oldPlaywrights, I quote it in the Latin and translate. I want to know byyou if I have done it sufficiently; and I don't send you mine, in orderthat you may send me your Version freely. 

Now, Good Bye: I suppose it's this rainy Day that draws out this, withseveral other Letters, that had waited some while to be written. 

Yours ever E. F. G. 

_To R. C. Trench_. 

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _February_ 25/65. 

MY DEAR LORD, Edward Cowell's return to England {62a} set him and me talking of oldStudies together, left off since he went to India. And I took up threesketched out Dramas, two of Calderon, {62b} and have licked the twoCalderons into some sort of shape of my own, without referring to theOriginal. One of them goes by this Post to your Grace; and when I tellyou the other is no other than your own 'Life's a Dream, ' you won'twonder at my sending the present one on Trial, both done as they are inthe same lawless, perhaps impudent, way. I know you would not care whodid these things, so long as they were well done; but one doesn't wish tomeddle, and in so free-and-easy a way, with a Great Man's Masterpieces, and utterly fail: especially when two much better men have been beforeone. One excuse is, that Shelley and Dr. Trench only took parts of theseplays, not caring surely--who can?--for the underplot and buffoonerywhich stands most in the way of the tragic Dramas. Yet I think it is asa whole, that is, the whole main Story, that these Plays are capital; andtherefore I have tried to present that whole, leaving out the rest, ornearly so; and altogether the Thing has become so altered one way oranother that I am afraid of it now it's done, and only send you one Play(the other indeed is not done printing: neither to be published), whichwill be enough if it is an absurd Attempt. For the Vida is not so goodeven, I doubt: dealing more in the Heroics, etc. 

I tell Donne he is too partial a Friend; so is Cowell: Spedding, I think, wouldn't care. So, as you were very kind about the other Plays, and loveCalderon (which I doubt argues against me), I send you _my_ Magician. 

You will not mind if I blunder in addressing you; in which I steered amiddle course between the modes Donne told me; and so, probably, come tothe Ground!

_To John Allen_. 

MARKET HILL: IPSWICH. {63}_April_ 10/65. 

MY DEAR ALLEN, I was much obliged to you for your former Letters; and now send you thesecond Play. This I don't suppose you'll like as well as the first:perhaps not at all; it is rather 'Ercles vein' I doubt. I wish to knowhowever from you what you do think of it; because if it seem to you atall preposterous, I shall not send it to some others: but leave them withthe first, which really does please those I wished it to please, with itsfine Story and Moral. If you like what I now send, I will send you aCopy of Both stitched together, and another copy to your Cousin: andindeed to any one else you think might be pleased with it. 

I am indulging in the expensive amusement of Building, though not on avery large scale. It _is_ very pleasant, certainly, to see one's littleGables and Chimnies mount into Air and occupy a Place in the Landscape. 

There is a duller Memoir than the 'Lady of Quality, ' Miss Lucy Aitken'sLetters, etc. You will find the Private Life of an Eastern Queen a goodlittle Book. I have now got Carlyle's two last volumes of Frederick: ofwhich I have only read the latter Part; I don't know whether I can readthrough the Wars and Battles, which are said to be very fine. 

The piece of Literature I really could benefit Posterity with, I dobelieve, is an edition of that wonderful and aggravating ClarissaHarlowe; and this I would effect with a pair of Scissors only. It wouldnot be a bit too long as it is, if it were all equally good; but pedantrycomes in, and might, I think, be cleared away, leaving the remainder oneof _the great_, _original_, _Works of the World_! in this Line. Lovelaceis the wonderful character, for Wit: and there is some grand Tragedy too. And nobody reads it! Ever yours, E. F. G. 

_To Mrs. Cowell_. 

[1865]. 

MY DEAR LADY, I answer you thus directly because I would stick in a Bit of a Letterfrom Thompson of Cambridge: which relates to a question I asked him weeksago, as I told E. B. C. I would. 

You must not think I was in a hurry to have my Play praised: I was reallyfearful of its being bombastic. You are so enthusiastic in your old andkind Regards and Memories that I can scarce rely on you for a coolJudgment in the matter. But I gather from E. B. C. That he was notstruck with what I doubted: and I am very glad, at any rate, that you arevery well pleased, both of you. 

E. B. C. Is quite right about obscurity of Phrase: which is inexcusableunless where the Passion of the Speakers makes such utterance natural. This is very often not the case in the Plays, I know: and the Language, as he says, becomes obscure from elaborate Brevity. 

What you tell of the Music in the Air at your Father's Death--Oh, howFrederic Tennyson would open all his Eyes at this! For he lives in aWorld of Spirits--Swedenborg's World, which you would not approve; whichI cannot sympathize with: but yet I admire the Titanic old Soul soresolutely blind to the Philosophy of the Day. 

Oh, I think England would be much better for E. B. C. And you: but Ican't say anything against what he thinks the Duty chalked out for him. Idon't believe the English Rule will hold in India: but, meanwhile, a goodMan may think he must do what Good he can there, come what may of it. There is also Good to be done in England!

The Wind is still very 'stingy' though the Sun shines, and though itblows from the West. So we are all better at our homes for the present. 

Ever yours, E. F. G. 

_To W. B. Donne_. 

RAMSGATE: _August_ 27, [1865]. 

MY DEAR DONNE, Your letter found me here, where I have been a week cruising about withmy old Brother Peter. To morrow we leave--for Calais, as we propose;just to touch French Soil, and drink a Bottle of French Wine in the oldTown: then home again to Woodbridge as fast as we may. For thither goesWilliam Airy, partly in hopes of meeting me: he says he is much shaken bythe dangerous illness he had this last Spring: and thinks, truly enough, that our chances of meeting in this World sensibly diminish. 

You must not talk of my kindness to you at Lowestoft: when all the goodis on your side, going out of your way to see me. Really it makes meashamed. 

Together with your Letter, I found a very kind one from Mrs. Kemble, whotook the trouble to write only to tell me how well she liked the Plays. Iknow that Good Nature would not affect her Judgment (which I veryhonestly think too favourable), but it was Good Nature made her write totell me. 

Don't forget to sound Murray at some good opportunity about a Selectionfrom Crabbe. Of course he won't let me do it, though I could do itbetter than any he would be likely to employ: for you know I rely on myAppreciation of what others do, not on what I can do myself. 

The 'Parcel' you write of has not been sent me here: but I shall find itwhen I return, and will write to you again. I puzzle my Brains toremember what the '_Conscript_' is. 

I have been reading, and reducing to one volume from two (_more meo_), atrashy Book, 'Bernard's Recollections of the Stage, ' with some goodrecollections of the Old Actors, up to Macklin and Garrick. But, of allpeople's, one can't trust Actors' Stories. In 'Lethe, ' where yourGarrick figures in Sir Geoffrey, also figured Woodward, as 'The FineGentleman'; so I think, at least, is the Title of a very capitalmezzotint I have of him in Character, Oh! famous is your Story of Lord Chatham and the Bishops; {68} be sureyou set it afloat again in print. 

You don't tell me if Trench be recovered: but I shall conclude from yourSilence that, at any rate, he is not now seriously ill. 

Now I hear my good Brother come in from Morning Mass, and we shall haveBreakfast. He is really capital to sail about with. I read your letteryesterday while sitting out on a Bench with her--his Wife--a brave Woman, of the O'Dowd sort; and she wanted to know all about you and yours. Welike Ramsgate very much: genial air: pleasant Country: good Harbour, Piers, etc. : and the Company, though overflowing, not showy, nor vulgar:but seemingly come to make the most of a Holiday. I am surprized howlittle of the Cockney, in its worse aspect, is to be seen. 

_To E. B. Cowell_. 

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Septr. _ 5/65. 

MY DEAR COWELL, Let me hear of you: I don't forget, though I don't see, you. Nor am I sowrapt up in my Ship as not to have many a day on which I should be veryglad to dispense with her and have you over here: but I can't well makesure what day: sometimes I ask one man to go, sometimes another, and soall is cut up. Besides I was away six weeks in all at Lowestoft; then afortnight at Ramsgate, Dover, Calais, etc. When the apple [Greek text]{69a}--then my Ship will be laid up, and one more Summer of minedeparted, and then I hope you will come over to talk over many things. 

Read Lady Duff Gordon's Letters from Egypt: which you won't like, becauseof some latitude in Religious thought, and also because of some vulgar_slang_, such as Schoolboys, and American Women use, and it is now thebad fashion for even English Ladies to adopt. But the Book is worthreading notwithstanding this, and making allowance for a Lady orGentleman seeing all rose-colour in a new Pet or Plaything. On sendingthe Book back to the Library this morning I quote out of it somethingabout Oriental Poetry which you may know well enough but I was not soconscious of. In a Love-song where the Lover declines a Physician forthe wound which _the Wind_ (Love) has caused, he says 'For only _he_ whohas hurt can cure me. ' 'N. B. The masculine pronoun is always usedinstead of the feminine in Poetry, out of decorum: sometimes even inconversation. ' {69b} (It being as forbidden to talk of women as to seethem, etc. )

I was very pleased with Calais, which remains the 'vieille France' of myChildhood. 

Donne came to see me for a Day at Lowestoft, the same 'vieil Donne' alsoof my Boyhood. 

Ever yours, E. F. G. 

_To John Allen_. 

MARKETHILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Nov. _ 1/65. 

MY DEAR ALLEN, Let me hear how you and yours are: it is now a long [time] since weexchanged Letters. G. Crabbe wrote me you were corresponding with a verydifferent person: the Editor of the Times. I never see that nor anyother Paper but the good old Athenaeum. G. Crabbe also said you were atthe Norwich Congress. Then why didn't you come here? He said the Bishopof Oxford, whom he had never met before, met him at Lord Walsingham's, and shook him so cordially by the hand, and pressed him so for a visit toOxford, that he (G. C. ) rather thought he (Sam) deserved the Epithetusually added to his Name. Perhaps, however, the Bishop _did_ feel for aGrandson of the Poet. 

I have no more to tell you of myself this past Summer than for so manySummers past. Only sailing about, Lowestoft, Ramsgate, Dover, Calais, etc. I was very pleased indeed with Calais; just as I remember it fortyyears ago except for the Soldiers' Uniform. 

Duncan wrote me not a very cheerful Letter some while ago: he was unwell, of Cold and rheumatism, I think. Of other Friends I know nothing: but amgoing to write my annual Letters to them. What a State of things to cometo! How one used to wonder, hearing our predecessors talk in that way, something! But I don't think our successors wonder if we talk so; forthey seem to begin Life with indifference, instead of ending it. 

My house is not yet finished: two rooms have taken about five months:which is not slow for Woodbridge. To day I have been catching Cold inlooking at some Trees planted--'factura Nepotibus umbram. '

Now this precious Letter can't go to-night for want of Envelope; and inhalf an hour two Merchants are coming to eat Oysters and drink Burtonale. I would rather be alone, and smoke my own pipe in peace over one ofTrollope's delightful Novels, 'Can you forgive her?'

Now, my dear Allen, here is enough of me, for your sake as well as mine. But let me hear something from you. All good Remembrances to the Wifeand those of your Children who remember yours ever, E. F. G. 

[WOODBRIDGE]_Decr. _ 3/65. 

MY DEAR ALLEN, I enclose you two prints which may amuse you to look at and keep. 

I have a wonderful Museum of such scraps of Portrait; about once a year aMan sends me a Portfolio of such things. But my chief Article isMurderers; and I am now having a Newgate Calendar from London. I don'tever wish to see and hear these things tried; but, when they are inprint, I like to sit in Court then, and see the Judges, Counsel, Prisoners, Crowd: hear the Lawyers' Objections, the Murmur in the Court, etc. 

 The Charge is prepared; the Lawyers are met, The Judges are rang'd, a terrible show. 

De Soyres came here the other Day, and we were talking of you; he saidyou had invited Newman to your house. A brave thing, if you did. Ithink his Apology very noble; and himself quite honest, so far as he cansee himself. The Passage in No. 7 of the Apology where he describes theState of the World as wholly irreflective of its Creator unless youturn--to Popery--is very grand. 

Now I probably sha'n't write to you again before Christmas: so let mewish you and Mrs. Allen and your Family a Happy time of it. 

Ever yours, E. F. G. 

I was very disappointed in Miss Berry's Correspondence; one sees a Womanof Sense, Taste, Good Breeding, and I suppose, Good Looks; but what more, to make three great Volumes of! Compare her with Trench's Mother. Andwith all her perpetual travels to improve health and spirits (whichlasted perfectly well to near ninety) one would have been more interestedif there were one single intimation of caring about any Body but herself, helping one poor Person, etc. 

I don't know if she or Mrs. Delany is dullest. 

_To W. H. Thompson_. 

WOODBRIDGE: _March_ 15/66. 

MY DEAR THOMPSON, To-day's Post brings me a Letter from Robert Groome, which tells me (on'Times' authority) that you are Master of Trinity. Judging by your lastLetter, I suppose this was unexpected by yourself: I have no means ofknowing whether it was expected by others beside those who voted you tothe Honour. For I had heard nothing further of the whole matter, even ofWhewell's accident, than you yourself told me. Well, at our time ofLife, any very vehement Congratulations are, I suppose, irrelevant onboth sides. But I am very sure I do congratulate you heartily, if youare yourself gratified. Whether you are glad of the Post itself or not, you must, I think, be gratified with the Confidence in your Scholarshipand Character which has made your Society elect you. And so far one mayunreservedly congratulate you. . . . 

To-day I was looking at the Carpenters, etc. , carrying away Chips, etc. , of a Tree I had cut down: and, coming home, read--

 [Greek text] {74}--

Whose Line?--Certainly not of

Yours ever sincerely, E. F. G. 

_To John Allen_. 

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE, _March_ 19 [1866]. 

MY DEAR ALLEN, You shall hear a very little about me; and you shall tell me a verylittle about yourself? I forget when I last wrote to you, or heard fromyou: I suppose, about the end of Autumn. Here have I been ever since, without stirring further than Ipswich: and seeing nobody you know exceptR. Groome once. He wrote me the other day to announce that Thompson wasMaster of Trinity; an Honour quite unexpected by Thompson himself, Iconclude, seeing that he himself had written to me only a Fortnightbefore, telling me of Whewell's Disaster, and sincerely hoping for hisRecovery, from a Dread of a new King Log or King Stork, he said. He alsosaid something of coming here at Easter: which now, I suppose, he won'tbe able to do. I have written to congratulate him in a sober way on hisHonours; for, at our Time of Life, I think exultation would beunseasonable on either side. He will make a magnanimous Master, Ibelieve; doing all the Honours of his Station well, if he have health. 

Spedding wrote me a kind long Letter some while ago. Duncan tells meCameron has had a slight Paralysis. Death seems to rise like a Wallagainst one now whichever way one looks. When I read Boswell and otherMemoirs now, what presses on me most is--All these people who talked andacted so busily are gone. It is said that when Talma advanced upon theStage his Thought on facing the Audience was, that they were all soon tobe Nothing. 

I bought Croker's Boswell; which I find good to refer to, but not toread; so hashed up it is with interpolations. Besides, one feels somehowthat a bad Fellow like Croker mars the Good Company he introduces. Oneshould stop with Malone, who was a good Gentleman: only rather too loyalto Johnson, and so unjust to any who dared hint a fault in him. Yet_they_ were right. Madame D'Arblay, who was also so vext with Mrs. Piozzi, admits that she had a hard time with Johnson in his last twoyears; so irritable and violent he became that she says People would notask _him_ when they invited all the rest of the Party. 

Why, my Paper is done, talking about these dead and gone whom you and Ihave only known in Print; and yet as well so as most we know in person. Ireally find my Society in such Books; all the People seem humming aboutme. But now let me hear of you, Allen: and of Wife and Family. 

Ever yours, E. F. G. 

_To W. H. Thompson_. 

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE. [_March_, 1866. ]

MY DEAR THOMPSON, I should write 'My dear Master' but I don't know if you are yetinstalled. However, I suppose my Letter, so addressed, will find you andnot the Old Lion now stalking in the Shades. . . . 

In burning up a heap of old Letters, which one's Executors and Heirswould make little of, I came upon several of Morton's from Italy: so goodin Parts that I have copied those Parts into a Blank Book. When he wasin his money Troubles I did the same from many other of his Letters, andThackeray asked Blackwood to give ten pounds for them for his Magazine. But we heard no more of them. 

I have the usual Story to tell of myself: middling well: still here, pottering about my House, in which I expect an invalid Niece; andpreparing for my Ship in June. William Airy talks of coming to me soon. I am daily expecting the Death of a Sister in law, a right good Creature, who I thought would outlive me a dozen years, and should rejoice if shecould. Things look serious about one. If one only could escape easilyand at once! For _I_ think the Fun is over: but that should not be. Mayyou flourish in your high Place, my dear Master (now I say) for this longwhile. 

[_June_, 1866. ]

MY DEAR THOMPSON, I won't say that I should have gone to Ely under any Circumstances, though it is the last Place I have been to stay at with a Friend: threeyears ago! And all my Stays there were very pleasant indeed: and I donot the less thank you for all your Constancy and Kindness. But one isgot down yet deeper in one's Way of Life: of which enough has been said. 

William Airy was to have come here about this time: and him I am obligedto put off because another old Fellow Collegian, Duncan, {77} who hasscarce stirred from his Dorsetshire Parsonage these twenty years, wasseized with a Passion to see me just once more, he says: and he is nowwith me: a Hypochondriack Man, nervous, and restless, with a vast deal ofuncouth Humour. . . . 

My Ship is afloat, with a new Irish Ensign; but I have scarce been aboutwith her yet owing to 'Mr. Wesley's Troubles. ' {78a}

Only yesterday I took down my little Tauchnitz Sophocles to carry to Seawith me; and made Duncan here read--

 [Greek text], {78b} etc. 

and began to blubber a little at

 [Greek text], etc. 

in the other Great Play. {78c} The Elgin Marbles, and something more, began to pass before my Eyes. 

I believe I write all this knowing you are at Ely: where I suppose youare more at Leisure than on your Throne in Trinity. But no doubt yourTyranny follows you there too; post Equitem and all. 

_To E. B. Cowell_. 

WOODBRIDGE: Friday[_June_, 1866]. 

MY DEAR COWELL, I got your new Address from your Brother a Fortnight ago. You don'twrite to me for the very good reason that you have so much to do: I don'twrite to you because I have nothing to do, and so nothing to tell you of. My idle reading all goes down to a few Memoirs and such things: I am notgot down to Miss Braddon and Mrs. Wood yet, and I believe never shall:not that I think this a merit: for it would show more Elasticity of Mindto find out and make something out of the Genius in them. But it is toolate for me to try and retrace the 'Salle des pas perdus' of years; Ihave not been very well, and more and more 'smell the Mould above theRose' as Hood wrote of himself. But I don't want to talk of this. 

You are very good to talk of sparing a Day for me when you come down. Iwill be sure to be at home any Day, or Days, next week. I can give youBed and Board as you know: and a Boat Sail on the River if you like. WhyI don't go over to you I have written and spoken of enough--all I can, ifnot satisfactorily: only don't think it is indolence, Neglect, orDistaste for you, or any of yours. . . . 

I haven't, I think, taken in your Sanskrit morsel as yet, for I am calledabout this morning on some Furniture Errands: and yet I want to post thisLetter To-day that you may have it this week. 

I still think I shall take a Tauchnitz Sophocles with me to Sea, oncemore to read the two OEdipuses, and Philoctetes; perhaps more carefullythan before; perhaps not! It is stupid not to get up those three noblePieces as well as one can. 

I have not yet done my house: and, when I write of Furniture, it isbecause I want to get so much ready as will suffice for an Invalid Niecewho wishes to come with her Maid by the End of June, or the Beginning ofJuly. Your old opposite Neighbour Mason is my Apollo in these matters: Ifind him a very clever Fellow, and so well inclined to me that every oneelse says he can scarce make money of what he sells me. He has _humour_too. 

I think you and Elizabeth should one day come and stay in this new House, which will be really very pleasant. As far as I am concerned, I sha'n'thave much to do with it, I believe; but some one will inherit, and--sellit!

I want you to choose a Lot of my Things to be bequeathed you: Books, Pictures, Furniture. You mustn't think I prematurely deck myself inSables for my own Funeral; but it happens that I sent the rough Draft ofa Will to my Lawyer only three days ago. 

My Brother John so much wants a Copy of Elizabeth's Verses to my SisterIsabella in other Days. 

This time twenty years you were going to me at Boulge Cottage: this timeten years you were preparing for India. 

Adieu, Love to the Lady. 

Ever yours, E. F. G. 

_To W. H. Thompson_. 

LOWESTOFT: _July_ 27 [1866]. 

MY DEAR THOMPSON, Your welcome Letter was forwarded to me here To day. 

I feel sure that the Lady I once saw at the Deanery is all you say; andyou believe of me, as I believe of myself, that I don't deal inCompliment, unless under very strong Compulsion. I suppose, as Master ofTrinity you could not do otherwise than marry, and so keep due State andHospitality there: and I do think you could not have found one fitter toshare, and do, the honours. And if (as I also suppose) there is Love, orLiking, or strong Sympathy, or what not? why, all looks well. Be it so!

I had not heard of Spedding's entering into genteel House-keeping tillyour Letter told me of it. I suppose he will be a willing Victim to hisKinsfolk. 

A clerical Brother in law of mine has lost his own whole Fortune in fourof these Companies which have gone to smash. Nor his own only. For, having, when he married my Sister, insisted on having half her Incometied to him by Settlement, _that_ half lies under Peril from the 'Calls'made upon him as Shareholder. 

 At Genus Humanum damnat Caligo Futuri. 

So I, trusting in my Builder's Honesty, have a Bill sent in about onethird bigger than it should be. 

All which rather amuses me, on the whole, though I spit out a Word nowand then: and indeed am getting a Surveyor to overhaul the Builder: ahopeless Process, I believe all the while. 

Meanwhile, I go about in my little Ship, where I do think I have twohonest Fellows to deal with. 

We have just been boarding a Woodbridge Vessel that we met in theseRoads, and drinking a Bottle of Blackstrap round with the Crew. 

With me just at present is my Brother Peter, for whose Wife (a capitalIrishwoman, of the Mrs. O'Dowd Type) my Paper is edged with Black. Noone could be a better Husband than he; no one more attentive and anxiousduring her last Illness, more than a year long; and, now all is over, Inever saw him in better Health or Spirits. Men are not inconsolable forelderly Wives; as Sir Walter Scott, who was not given to causticAphorisms, observed long ago. 

When I was sailing about the Isle of Wight, Dorsetshire, etc. , I read mydear old Sophocles again (sometimes omitting the nonsense-verse Choruses)and thought how much I should have liked to have them commented along inone of your Lectures. All that is now over with you: but you will lookinto the Text now and then. I have now got Munro's Lucretius on boardagain. Why is it that I never can take up with Horace--so sensible, elegant, agreeable, and sometimes even grand?

Some one gave me the July Number of the Cornhill to read the 'Loss of theLondon' in; and very well worth reading it is. But there is also theBeginning of a Story that I am sure must be by Annie Thackeray--capitaland wonderful. I forget the name. 

Now I won't finish this Second Sheet--all with such Scraps as theforegoing. But do believe how sincerely and truly I wish you well inyour new Venture. And so I will shut up, my dear Thompson, for thepresent. No man can have more reason to wish you a good Return for yourlong generous Kindness than your old Friend, E. F. G. 

_To E. B. Cowell_. 

WOODBRIDGE: _August_ 13/66. 

MY DEAR COWELL, I think you have given me up as a bad Job: and I can't blame you. I havebeen expecting to hear of you in these parts: though, had it been so, Idoubt if I should have been here to meet you. For the last six weeks Ihave scarce been at home; what with sailing to the Isle of Wight, NorfolkCoast, staying at Lowestoft, etc. And now I am just off again to thelatter place, having only returned here on Saturday. Nor can I say whenI shall be back here for any long while: the Kerriches are at Lowestoft;and I have yet one or two more Sea-trips to make before October consignsme once more to Cold, Indoor Solitude, Melancholy, and Illhealth. 

My Companion on board has been Sophocles, as he was three years ago, Ifind. I am even now going to hunt up some one-volume Virgil to take withme. Horace I never can care about, in spite of his Good Sense, Elegance, and occasional Force. He never made my Eyes wet as Virgil does. 

When I was about Cromer Coast, I was reading Windham's Diary: well worthreading, as one of the most honest; but with little else in it than that. You would scarcely guess from it that he was a man of any Genius, as yetI suppose he was. 

Somehow I fancy you must be travelling abroad! Else surely I should haveheard something of you. Well: I must anyhow enclose this Letter, ordirect it, to your Mother's or Brother's at Ipswich. Do let me hear ofyourself and Elizabeth, and believe that I do not forget you, nor ceaseto be

Yours very sincerelyEDWARD FITZGERALD. 

LOWESTOFT: _August_ 19/66. 

MY DEAR COWELL, I don't wish you to think I am in Woodbridge all this while since yourNote came. It was forwarded to me here, where I have been since I wroteto you a week ago. The fact is, I had promised to return on finding thatthe Kerriches were to be here. So, here I am: living on board my littleShip: sometimes taking them out for a Sail: sometimes accompanying themin a walk. In other respects, I am very fond of this Place, which I haveknown and frequented these forty years; till the last three years incompany with my Sister Kerrich, who has helped to endear it to me. Ibelieve I shall be here, off and on, some while longer; as my BrotherPeter (who has lately lost a capital Wife) is coming to sail about withme. Should I be at Woodbridge for some days I will let you know. 

Do you see 'Squire Allenby, ' as the folks at Felixtow Ferry call him? Ifso, ask him why he doesn't sometimes sail here with his ship; he wouldlike it, I fancy: and everybody seems to like him. 

Only yesterday I finished reading the Electra. Before that, Ajax; whichis well worth re-reading too. I am sorry to find I have only Antigoneleft of all the precious Seven; a lucid Constellation indeed! I supposeI must try Euripides after this; some few of his Plays. 

This time ten years--a month ago--we were all lounging about in thehayfield before your Mother's House at Rushmere. I do not forget thesethings: nor cease to remember them with a sincere, sad, and affectionateinterest: the very sincerity of which prevents me from attempting torecreate them. This I wish you and yours, who have been so kind to me, to believe. 

I am going to run again to the Coast of Norfolk--as far as Wells--towander about Holkham, if the Weather permit. We have had too much Windand Wet to make such excursions agreeable: for, when one reached thePlaces by Sea, the Rain prevented one's going about on Shore to lookabout. But now that there has been rather a better look-out of Weatherfor the last few Days, and that--

 [Greek text]-- {86}

I shall try again for two or three Days. How do you translate [Greektext] here?

Ever yours, E. F. G. 

LOWESTOFT still! _Septr. _ 4 [1866]. 

MY DEAR COWELL, Still here, you see! Till the end of last week I had my Kerrich peoplehere; I am now expecting my Brother Peter again: he has lately lost hiscapital Wife, and flies about between Ireland and England for Company andDiversion of Thought. I am also expecting Mowbray Donne over fromYarmouth this week. 

I wonder if you ever would come over here, and either Bed and Board in mylittle Ship, or on Shore? Anyhow, do write me a line to tell me aboutyourself--yourselves--and do not think I am indifferent to you. 

I have been reading Euripides (in my way) but, as heretofore do not takegreatly to him. He is always prosy, whereas (except in the matter offuneral Lamentations, Condolence, etc. , which I suppose the GreekAudience expected--as I suppose they also expected the little sententioustruism at the end of every Speech), except in these respects, Sophoclesalways goes ahead, and makes his Dialogue act in driving on the Play. Healways makes the most of his Story too: Euripides not often. Aremarkable instance of this is in his Heraclidae (one of the betterPlays, I think), where Macaria is to be sacrificed for the common good:but one hears no more of her: and a fine opportunity is lost when Jocasta{87a} insults Eurystheus whom they have conquered, and is never told thatthat Conquest is at the cost of her Grand-daughter's Life--a piece ofIrony which Sophocles would not have forgotten, I think. I have not yetread over Rhesus, Hippolytus, Medea, Ion, or the Iphigenias; altogether, the Phoenissae is the best of those I have read; the interview betweenJocasta and her two sons, before the Battle, very good. There is reallyHumour and Comedy in the Servant's Account of Hercules' conviviality inAdmetus' House of Mourning. I thought the story of the Bacchae poorlytold: but some good descriptive passages. 

In the midst of Euripides, I was seized with a Passion to return toSophocles, and read the two OEdipuses again. Oh, how immeasurablysuperior! In dramatic Construction, Dialogue, and all! How can theycall Euripides [Greek text], {87b} putting a few passages of his againstwhole Dramas of the other, who also can show sentence for sentence moremoving than any Euripides wrote. 

But I want to read these Plays once with some very accurate Guide, oralor printed. I mean Sophocles; I don't care to be accurate with theother. Can you recommend any Edition--not too German? I should write toThompson about it; but I suppose he is busy with Marriage coming on. Imean, the present Master of Trinity, who is engaged to the widow of DeanPeacock; a very capital Lady to preside as Queen of Trinity Lodge. 

I have also been visiting dear old Virgil; his Georgics, and the 6th and8th Books of the AEneid. I could now take them up and read them bothagain. Pray look at lines 407-415 of Book VIII--the poor Matron kindlingher early fire--so Georgic! so Virgilian! so unsuited, ordisproportionate, to the Thing it illustrates. 

Here is a long Letter--of the old Sort, I suppose. All these Books comeback to me with Summer and the Sea: in another Month all will be gonetogether!--I look with Terror toward Winter, though I have not toencounter one, at any rate, of the three Giants which old Mrs. Bloomfieldsaid were coming upon her--Winter, Want, and Sickness. {88}

Pray remember me, in spite of all practical Forgetfulness, to Wife andFriends. 

Ever yours, E. F. G. 

_To F. Tennyson_. 

WOODBRIDGE: _Jan. _ 29/67. 

MY DEAR FREDERIC, Let me hear from you one Day. I would send you my MS. Book of Morton'sLetters: but I scarce know if the Post would carry it to you; though notso very big: and I am still less sure that you would ever return it tome. And what odds if you didn't? It might as well die in yourPossession as in mine. 

In answer to my yearly Letter to Alfred and Co. I heard (from Mrs. ) thatthey were about to leave Freshwater, frightened away by Hero-worshippers, etc. , and were going to a Solitude called Greyshott Hall, Haslemere;which, I am told, is in Hants. Whether they go to settle there I don'tknow. Lucretius' Death is thought to be too free-spoken for Publication, I believe; not so much in a religious, as an amatory, point of View. Ishould believe Lucretius more likely to have expedited his Departurebecause of Weariness of Life and Despair of the System, than because ofany Love-philtre. I wrote also my yearly Letter to Carlyle, begging mycompliments to his Wife: who, he replies, died, in a very tragical way, last April. I have since heard that the Papers reported all theCircumstances. So, if one lives so much out of the World as I do, itseems better to give up that Ghost altogether. Old Spedding has writtena Pamphlet about 'Authors and Publishers'; showing up, or striving toshow up, the Publishers' system. He adduces his own Edition of Bacon asa sample of their mismanagement, in respect of too bulky Volumes, etc. But, as he says, Macaulay and Alison are still bulkier; yet they sell. The truth is that a solemnly-inaugurated new Edition of all Bacon was notwanted. The Philosophy is surely superseded; not a Wilderness ofSpeddings can give men a new interest in the Politics and Letters. TheEssays will no doubt always be in request, like Shakespeare. But I amperhaps not a proper Judge of these high matters. How should I? who havejust, to my great sorrow, finished 'The Woman in White' for the thirdtime, once every last three Winters. I wish Sir Percival Clyde's Deathwere a little less of the minor Theatre sort; then I would swallow allthe rest as a wonderful Caricature, better than so many a sober Portrait. I really think of having a Herring-lugger I am building named 'MarianHalcombe, ' the brave Girl in the Story. Yes, a Herring-lugger; which isto pay for the money she costs unless she goes to the Bottom: and whichmeanwhile amuses me to consult about with my Sea-folks. I go toLowestoft now and then, by way of salutary Change: and there smoke a Pipeevery night with a delightful Chap, who is to be Captain. I have been, up to this time, better than for the last two winters: but feel a Worm inmy head now and then, for all that. You will say, only a Maggot. Well;we shall see. When I go to Lowestoft, I take Montaigne with me; verycomfortable Company. One of his Consolations for _The Stone_ is, that itmakes one less unwilling to part with Life. Oh, you think that it didn'tneed much Wisdom to suggest that? Please yourself, Ma'am. January, justgone! February, only twenty-eight Days: then March with Light till sixp. M. : then April with a blush of Green on the Whitethorn hedge: then May, Cuckoos, Nightingales, etc. ; then June, Ship launched, and nothing butShip till November, which is only just gone. The Story of our Lives fromYear to Year. This is a poor letter: but I won't set The Worm fretting. Let me hear how you are: and don't be two months before you do so. 

_To W. B. Donne_. 

WOODBRIDGE: _Febr. _ 15 [1867]. 

MY DEAR DONNE, I came home yesterday from a week's Stay at Lowestoft. As to theAthenaeum, {91} I would bet that the last Sentence was tacked on by theEditor: for it in some measure contradicts the earlier part of theArticle. 

When your letter was put into my hands, I happened to be readingMontaigne, L. II. Ch. 8, De l'Art de Conferer, where at the end he refersto Tacitus; the only Book, he says, he had read consecutively for an hourtogether for ten years. He does not say very much: but the Remarks ofsuch a Man are worth many Cartloads of German Theory of Character, Ithink: their Philology I don't meddle with. I know that Cowell hasdiscovered they are all wrong in their Sanskrit. Montaigne never doubtsTacitus' facts: but doubts his Inferences; well, if I were sure of hisFacts, I would leave others to draw their Inferences. I mean, if I wereCommentator, certainly: and I think if I were Historian too. Nothing ismore wonderful to me than seeing such Men as Spedding, Carlyle, and Isuppose Froude, straining Fact to Theory as they do, while ascatter-headed Paddy like myself can keep clear. But then so does theMob of Readers. Well, but I believe in the Vox Populi of two hundredYears: still more, of two thousand. And, whether we be right or wrong, we prevail: so, however much wiser are the Builders of Theory, theirLabour is but lost who build: they can't reason away Richard's Hump, norCromwell's Ambition, nor Henry's Love of a new Wife, nor Tiberius'beastliness. Of course, they had all their Gleams of Goodness: but we ofthe Mob, if we have any Theory at all, have that which all Mankind haveseen and felt, and know as surely as Day-light; that Power will tempt andspoil the Best. 

Well, but what is all this Lecture to you for? Why, I think you ratherturn to the re-actionary Party about these old Heroes. So I say, howeverright you may be, leave us, the many-headed, if not the wise-headed, togo our way, only making the Text of Tacitus as clear for us to flounderabout in as you can. That, anyhow, must be the first Thing. Somethingof the manners and customs of the Times we want also: some Lights fromother contemporary Authors also: and then, 'Gentlemen, you will nowconsider your Verdict, and please yourselves. '

Can't you act on Spedding's Advice and have your Prolegomena separate, ifconsiderable in size? I don't doubt its Goodness: but you know how, whenone wants to take a Volume of an Author on Travel, Ship-board, etc. , howangry one is with the Life, Commentary, etc. , which takes up half thefirst volume. This we don't complain of in George III. Because he is nota Classic, and your Athenaeum Critic admits that yours is the best Partof the Business by far. 

_To E. B. Cowell_. 

'_Scandal_'; LOWESTOFT, _June_ 17 [1867]. 

MY DEAR COWELL, I wrote to Elizabeth, I think, to congratulate you both on the result ofthe Election: I have since had your Letter: you will not want me torepeat what, without my ever having written or said, you will know that Ifeel. I wrote to Thompson on the subject, and have had a very kindLetter from him. 

Now you will live at Cambridge among the Learned; but, I repeat, youwould rather live among the Ignorant. However, your Path is cut out foryou: and, to be sure, it is a more useful and proper one for you than thecool sequestered one which one might like to travel. 

I am here in my little Ship--cool and sequestered enough, to be sure--withno Company but my Crew of Two, and my other--Captain of the Lugger now a-building: a Fellow I never tire of studying--If he _should_ turn outknave, I shall have done with all Faith in my own Judgment: and if heshould go to the Bottom of the Sea in the Lugger--I sha'n't cry for theLugger. 

Well, but I have other Company too--Don Quixote--the 4th Part: wherethose Snobs, the Duke and Duchess--(how vulgar Great Folks then, as now!)make a Fool and Butt of him. Cervantes should have had more respect forhis own Creation: but, I suppose, finding that all the Great Snobs couldonly _laugh_ at the earlier part, he thought he had better humour them. This very morning I read the very verses you admired to me twenty yearsago--

 Ven muerte tan escondida, etc. 

They are quoted ironically in Part IV. Lib. VII. Ch. 38. 

Ever yours, E. F. G. 

WOODBRIDGE: _Oct. _ 12 [1867]. 

MY DEAR COWELL, When you have leisure you will let me know of your being settled atCambridge? I also want to have your exact Address because I want to sendyou the Dryden and Crabbe's Life I promised you. At present you are busywith your Inaugural Address, I suppose; beside that you feel scarce athome yet in your new Quarters. 

Mr. Allenby told me on Wednesday that Mrs. Charlesworth was really upagain, and even got to Cambridge. Please to remember me to her, and toall your Party. 

My Ship is still afloat: but I have scarce used her during the last coldweather. I was indeed almost made ill sleeping two nights in that coldCabin. I may, however, run to Lowestoft and back; but by the end of nextweek I suppose she (the Ship) will be laid up in the Mud; my Men willhave eaten the Michaelmas Goose which I always regale them with onshutting up shop; and I may come home to my Fire here to read 'The Womanin White' and play at Patience:--which (I mean the Game at Cards socalled) I now do by myself for an hour or two every night. Perhaps oldMontaigne may drop in to chat with and comfort me: but Sophocles, DonQuixote, and Boccaccio--I think I must leave them with their Halo of Seaand Sunshine about them. I have, however, found the second volume ofSophocles; and may perhaps return to look for Ajax and Deianeira. 

Adieu: E. F. G. 

_To W. F. Pollock_. 

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _October_ 28 [1867], Now, MY DEAR POLLOCK, I have put on a new Goose-quill Nib, on purpose to write my best MS. Toyou. But the new Nib has very little to say for me: the old Story:dodging about in my Ship for these last five months: indeed during allthat time not having lain, I believe, for three consecutive Nights inChristian Sheets. But now all that is over: this very day is my littleShip being dismantled, and to-morrow will she go up to her middle in mud, and here am I anchored to my old Desk for the Winter; and beginning, asusual, by writing to my Friends, to tell them what little there is totell of myself, and asking them to tell what they can of themselves inreturn. I shall even fire a shot at old Spedding; who would not answermy last Letters at all: innocent as they were, I am sure: and askingdefinite Questions, which he once told me he required if I wanted anyAnswer. I suppose he is now in Cumberland. What _is_ become of Bacon?Are you one of the Converted, who go the whole Hog?

Thompson--no, I mean the Master of Trinity--has replied to my half-yearlyEnquiries in a very kind Letter. He tells me that my friend EdwardCowell has pleased all the Audience he had with an inaugural Lectureabout Sanskrit. {97a} Also, that there is such an Article in theQuarterly about the Talmud {97b} as has not been seen (so fine anArticle, I mean) for years. I have had Don Quixote, Boccaccio, and mydear Sophocles (once more) for company on board: the first of these sodelightful, that I got to love the very Dictionary in which I had to lookout the words: yes, and often the same words over and over again. TheBook really seemed to me the most delightful of all Books: Boccaccio, delightful too, but millions of miles behind; in fact, a whole Planetaway. 

_To W. A. Wright_. 

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE. _Dec. _ 11 [1867]. 

DEAR SIR, When Robert Groome was with me a month ago, I was speaking to him ofhaving found some Bacon in Montaigne: and R. G. Told me that you hadobserved the same, and were indeed collecting some instances; I think, quotations from Seneca, so employed as to prove that Bacon had them fromthe Frenchman. It has been the fashion of late to scoff at Seneca; whomsuch men as Bacon and Montaigne quoted: perhaps not Seneca's own, butcribbed from some Greek which would have been admired by those who scoffat the Latin. 

I had not noticed this Seneca coincidence: but I had observed a fewpassages of Montaigne's own, which seemed to me to have got into Bacon'sEssays. I dare say I couldn't light upon all these now; but, having beenturning over Essai 9, Lib. III. De la Vanite, I find one sentence whichcomes to the point: 'Car parfois c'est bien choisir de ne choisir pas. 'In the same Essay is a piece of King Lear, perhaps; 'De ce mesme papierou il vient d'escrire l'arrest de condemnation contre un Adultere, leJuge en desrobe un lopin pour en faire un poulet a la femme de soncompaignon. ' One doesn't talk of such things as of plagiarisms, ofcourse; as if Bacon and Shakespeare couldn't have said much better thingsthemselves; only for the pleasure of tracing where they read, and whatthey were struck by. I see that 'L'Appetit vient en mangeant' is in thesame Essay. 

If I light some other day on the other passages, I will take the libertyof telling you. You see I have already taken the liberty of writing to aman, not unknown to me in several ways, but with whom I have not thepleasure of being acquainted personally. Perhaps I may have thatpleasure one of these days; we are both connected with the same town ofBeccles, and may come together. I hope so. 

But I have also another reason for writing to you. Your 'Master' wroteme word the other day, among other things, that you as well as he wishedfor my own noble works in your Library. I quite understand that this ison the ground of my being a Trinity man. But then one should have donesomething worthy of ever so little a niche in Trinity Library; and that Ido know is not my case. I have several times told the Master what Ithink, and know, of my small Escapades in print; nice little things, someof them, which may interest a few people (mostly friends, or throughfriends) for a few years. But I am always a little ashamed of havingmade my leisure and idleness the means of putting myself forward inprint, when really so many much better people keep silent, having otherwork to do. This is, I know, my sincere feeling on the subject. However, as I think some of the Translations I have done are all I can dare toshow, and as it would be making too much fuss to wait for any furtherasking on the subject, I will send them if you think good one of thesedays all done up together; the Spanish, at least, which are, I think, allof a size. Will you tell the Master so if you happen to see him andmention the subject? Allow me to end by writing myself yours sincerely, EDWARD FITZGERALD. 

_To E. B. Cowell_. 

12 MARINE TERRACE, LOWESTOFT. _Dec. _ 28 [1867]. 

MY DEAR COWELL, . . . I don't think I told you about Garcin de Tassy. He sent me (as nodoubt he sent you) his annual Oration. I wrote to thank him: and said Ihad been lately busy with another countryman of his, Mons. Nicolas, withhis Omar Khayyam. On which De Tassy writes back by return of post to ask'Where I got my Copy of Nicolas? He had not been able to get one in allParis!' So I wrote to Quaritch: who told me the Book was to be had ofMaisonneuve, or any Oriental Bookseller in Paris; but that probably theShopman did not understand, when '_Les Rubaiyat d'Omar_, etc. , ' wereasked for, that it meant '_Les Quatrains_, etc. ' This (which I doubt notis the solution of the Mystery) I wrote to Garcin: at the same timeoffering one of my two Copies. By return of Post comes a frankacceptance of one of the Copies; and his own Translation of Attar's Birdsby way of equivalent. [Greek text]. Well, as I got these Birds just asI was starting here, I brought them with me, and looked them over. Here, at Lowestoft, in this same row of houses, two doors off, I was writingout the Translation I made in the Winter of 1859. I have scarce lookedat Original or Translation since. But I was struck by this; that eightyears had made little or no alteration in my idea of the matter: itseemed to me that I really had brought in nearly all worth remembering, and had really condensed the whole into a much compacter Image than theoriginal. This is what I think I can do, with such discursive things:such as all the Oriental things I have seen are. I remember you thoughtthat I had lost the Apologues towards the close; but I believe I wasright in excluding them, as the narrative grew dramatic and neared theCatastrophe. Also, it is much better to glance at the dangers of theValley when the Birds are in it, than to let the Leader recount thembefore: which is not good policy, morally or dramatically. When I sayall this, you need not suppose that I am vindicating the Translation as aPiece of Verse. I remember thinking it from the first ratherdisagreeable than not: though with some good parts. Jam satis. 

There is a pretty story, which seems as if it really happened (p. 201 ofDe Tassy's Translation, referring to v. 3581 of the original), of the Boyfalling into a well, and on being taken out senseless, the Father askinghim to say but a word; and then, but one word more: which the Boy saysand dies. And at p. 256, Translation (v. 4620), I read, 'Lorsque Nizamul-mulk fut a l'agonie, il dit: "O mon Dieu, je m'en vais entre les mainsdu vent. "' Here is our Omar in his Friend's mouth, is it not?

I have come here to wind up accounts for our Herring-lugger: much againstus, as the season has been a bad one. My dear Captain, who looks in hisCottage like King Alfred in the Story, was rather saddened by all this, as he had prophesied better things. I tell him that if he is but what Ithink him--and surely my sixty years of considering men will not sodeceive me at last!--I would rather lose money with him than gain it withothers. Indeed I never proposed Gain, as you may imagine: but only tohave some Interest with this dear Fellow. Happy New Year to you Both!

I wish you would have Semelet's Gulistan which I have. You know I nevercared for Sadi. 

_To W. F. Pollock_. 

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Jan_: 9/68. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, I saw advertised in my old Athenaeum a Review {102} of Richardson'sNovels in the January Cornhill. So I bought it: and began to think youmight have written it: but was not so assured as I went on. It ishowever very good, in my opinion, whoever did it: though I don't think itdoes all justice to the interminable Original. When the Writer talks ofGrandison and Clarissa being the two Characters--oh, Lovelace himselfshould have made the third: if unnatural (as the Reviewer says), yet notthe less wonderful: quite beyond and above anything in Fielding. Whetheryou wrote the article or not, I know you are one of the few who have readthe Book. The Reviewer admits that it might be abridged; I am convincedof that, and have done it for my own satisfaction: but you thought thiswas not to be done. So here is internal proof that you didn't write whatThackeray used to call the '_Hurticle_, ' or that you have changed yourmind on that score. But you haven't. But I know better, Lord bless you:and am sure I could (with a pair of Scissors) launch old Richardsonagain: we shouldn't go off the stocks easy (pardon nautical metaphors), but stick by the way, amid the jeers of Reviewers who had never read theoriginal: but we should float at last. Only I don't want to spend a lotof money to be hooted at, without having time to wait for the floating. 

I have spent lots of money on my Herring-lugger, which has made but apoor Season. So now we are going (like wise men) to lay out a lot morefor Mackerel; and my Captain (a dear Fellow) is got ill, which is muchworst of all: so hey for 1868! Which is wishing you better luck nexttime, Sir, etc. 

Spedding at last found and sent me his delightful little Paper aboutTwelfth Night. I was glad to be set right about Viola: but I think hemakes too much of the whole play, 'finest of Comedies, ' etc. It seems tome quite a light, slight, sketch--for Twelfth Night--What you will, etc. What else does the Name mean? Have I uttered these Impieties! No more!Nameless as shameless. 

_To E. B. Cowell_. 

WOODBRIDGE: _May_ 28/68. 

MY DEAR COWELL, I was just about to post you your own Calcutta Review when your Lettercame, asking about some Euphranors. Oh yes! I have a Lot of them:returned from Parker's when they were going to dissolve their House; Iwould not be at the Bother of any further negociation with any otherBookseller, about half a dozen little Books which so few wanted: so hadthem all sent here. I will therefore send you six copies. I hadsupposed that you didn't like the second Edition so well as the first:and had a suspicion myself that, though I improved it in some respects, Ihad done more harm than good: and so I have never had courage to lookinto it since I sent it to you at Oxford. Perhaps Tennyson {104} onlypraised the first Edition and I don't know where to lay my hands on that. I wonder he should have thought twice about it. Not but I think theTruth is told: only, a Truth every one knows! And told in a shape ofDialogue really something Platonic: but I doubt rather affectedly too. However, such as it is, I send it you. I remember being anxious about ittwenty years ago, because I thought it was the Truth (as if my telling itcould mend the matter!): and I cannot but think that the Generation thathas grown up in these twenty years has not profited by the Fifty ThousandCopies of this great work!

I am sorry to trouble you about Macmillan; I should not have done so hadI kept my Copy with your corrections as well as my own. As Lamb said ofhimself, so I say; that I never had any Luck with printing: I certainlydon't mean that I have had much cause to complain: but, for instance, Iknow that Livy and Napier, put into good Verse, are just worth a cornerin one of the swarm of Shilling Monthlies. {105}

'Locksley Hall' is far more like Lucretius than the last Verses put intohis mouth by A. T. But, once get a Name in England, and you may doanything. But I dare say that wise men too, like Spedding, will be ofthe same mind with the Times Critic. (I have not seen him. ) What doesThompson say? You, I, and John Allen, are among the few, I do say, who, having a good natural Insight, maintain it undimmed by public, orprivate, Regards. 

P. S. Having consulted my Landlord, I find that I can pay carriage allthrough to Cambridge. Therefore it is that I send you, not only your ownBook, and my own, but also one of the genteel copies of Boswell'sJohnson; and Wesley's Journal: both of which I gave you, only never sent!Now they shall go. Wesley, you will find pleasant to dip into, I think:of course, there is much sameness; and I think you will allow someabsurdity among so much wise and good. I am almost sorry that I have notnoted down on the fly-leaf some of the more remarkable Entries, as I havein my own Copy. If you have not read the little Autobiography ofWesley's Disciple, John Nelson, give a shilling for it. It seems to mesomething wonderful to read these Books, written in a Style that cannotalter, because natural; while the Model Writers, Addison, Johnson, etc. , have had their Day. Dryden holds, I think: he did not set up for a ModelProse man. Sir T. Browne's Style is natural to him, one feels. 

FELIXTOW FERRY: _July_ 25 [1868. ]

MY DEAR COWELL, I found your Letter on reaching Woodbridge yesterday; where you see I didnot stay long. In fact I only left Lowestoft partly to avoid a VolunteerCamp there which filled the Town with People and Bustle: and partly thatmy Captain might see his Wife: who cannot last _very_ much longer Ithink: scarcely through Autumn, surely. She goes about, nurses herchildren, etc. , but grows visibly thinner, weaker, and more ailing. 

If the Wind changes (now directly in our Teeth) I shall sail back toLowestoft to-morrow. Thompson and Mrs. T. Propose to be at the RoyalHotel there till Wednesday, and we wish, I believe, to see each otheragain. Sailing did not agree with his bilious temperament: and he seemedto me injudicious in his hours of Exercise, Dinner, etc. But he, andshe, should know best. I like her very much: head and heart rightfeminine of the best, it seemed to me: and her experience of the World, and the Wits, not having injured either. 

I only wanted Macmillan to return the Verses {107} if he wouldn't usethem, because of my having no corrected Copy of them. 

I see in the last Athenaeum a new '_and revised_' Edition of Clarissaadvertised. I suppose this 'revised' does not mean 'abridged, ' withoutwhich the Book will _not_ permanently make way, as I believe. That, youknow, I wanted to do: could do: and nearly have done;--But that, and myCrabbe, I must leave for my Executors and Heirs to consign toLumber-room, or fire. 

Pray let me hear of your movements, especially such as tend hitherward. About September--Alas!--I think we shall be a good Deal here, or atWoodbridge; probably not so much before that time. 

Ever yours and Lady's, E. F. G. 

WOODBRIDGE: _March_ 1/69. 

MY DEAR COWELL, . . . My Lugger Captain has just left me to go on his Mackerel Voyage tothe Western Coast; and I don't know when I shall see him again. Justafter he went, a muffled bell from the Church here began to toll forsomebody's death: it sounded like a Bell under the sea. He sat listeningto the Hymn played by the Church chimes last evening, and said he couldhear it all as if in Lowestoft Church when he was a Boy, 'Jesus ourDeliverer!' You can't think what a grand, tender, Soul this is, lodgedin a suitable carcase. 

_To Mrs. W. H. Thompson_. 

[1869. ]

DEAR MRS. THOMPSON, (I must get a new Pen for you--which doesn't promise to act as well asthe old one--Try another. )

Dear Mrs. Thompson--Mistress of Trinity--(this does better)--

I am both sorry, and glad, that you wrote me the Letter you have writtento me: sorry, because I think it was an effort to you, disabled as youare; and glad, I need not say why. 

I despatched Spedding's letter to your Master yesterday; I daresay youhave read it: for there was nothing extraordinary wicked in it. But, heto talk of _my_ perversity! . . . 

My Sir Joshua is a darling. A pretty young Woman ('Girl' I won't callher) sitting with a turtle-dove in her lap, while its mate is supposed tobe flying down to it from the window. I say 'supposed, ' for Sir J. Whodidn't know much of the drawing of Birds, any more than of Men and Women, has made a thing like a stuffed Bird clawing down like a Parrot. Butthen, the Colour, the Dove-colour, subdued so as to carry off the richertints of the dear Girl's dress; and she, too, pensive, not sentimental: aLady, as her Painter was a Gentleman. Faded as it is in the face (theLake, which he would use, having partially flown), it is one of the mostbeautiful things of his I have seen: more varied in colour; not thesimple cream-white dress he was fond of, but with a light gold-threadedScarf, a blue sash, a green chair, etc. . . . 

I was rather taken aback by the Master's having discovered my last--yes, and bona-fide my last--translation in the volume I sent to your Library. I thought it would slip in unobserved, and I should have given all mylittle contributions to my old College, without after-reckoning. Had Iknown you as the Wife of any but the 'quondam' Greek Professor, I shouldvery likely have sent it to you: since it was meant for those who mightwish for some insight into a Play {109} which I must think they canscarcely have been tempted into before by any previous Translation. Itremains to be much better done; but if Women of Sense and Taste, and Menof Sense and Taste (who don't know Greek) can read, and be interested insuch a glimpse as I give them of the Original, they must be content, andnot look the Horse too close in the mouth, till a better comes to hand. 

My Lugger has had (along with her neighbours) such a Season hitherto ofWinds as no one remembers. We made 450 pounds in the North Sea; and(just for fun) I did wish to realize 5 pounds in my Pocket. But myCaptain would take it all to pay Bills. But if he makes another 400pounds this Home Voyage! Oh, then we shall have money in our Pockets. Ido wish this. For the anxiety about all these People's lives has been somuch more to me than all the amusement I have got from the Business, thatI think I will draw out of it if I can see my Captain sufficiently firmon his legs to carry it on alone. True, there will then be the same riskto him and his ten men, but they don't care; only I sit here listening tothe Winds in the Chimney, and always thinking of the Eleven hanging at myown fingers' ends. 

This Letter is all desperately about me and mine, Translations and Ships. And now I am going to walk in _my_ Garden: and feed _my_ Captain's Ponywith white Carrots; and in the Evening have _my_ Lad come and read for anhour and a half (he stumbles at every third word, and gets dreadfullytired, and so do I; but I renovate him with Cake and Sweet Wine), and Ican't just now smoke the Pipe nor drink the Grog. 'These are myTroubles, Mr. Wesley;' {110} but I am still the Master's and Mistress'loyal Servant, EDWARD FITZGERALD. 

_To E. B. Cowell_. 

WOODBRIDGE: Tuesday, [28 _Dec. _ 1869. ]

MY DEAR COWELL, Your Letter to day was a real pleasure--nay, a comfort--to me. For I hadbegun to think that, for whatever reason, you had dropt me; and I knownot one of all my friends whom I could less afford to lose. 

You anticipate rightly all I think of the new Idylls. {111} I had boughtthe Book at Lowestoft: and when I returned here for Christmas found thatA. T. 's Publisher had sent me a Copy. As I suppose this was done by A. T. 's order, I have written to acknowledge the Gift, and to tell himsomething, if not all, of what I think of them. I do not tell him that Ithink his hand weakened; but I tell him (what is very true) that, thoughthe main Myth of King Arthur's Dynasty in Britain has a certain Grandeurin my Eyes, the several legendary fragments of it never did much interestme; excepting the _Morte_, which I suppose most interested him also, ashe took it up first of all. I am not sure if such a Romance as Arthur'sis not best told in the artless old English in which it was told toArthur's artless successors four hundred years ago; or dished up anew insomething of a Ballad Style like his own Lady of Shalott, rather thanelaborated into a modern Epic form. I never cared, however, for _any_chivalric Epic; neither Tasso, nor Spenser, nor even Ariosto, whose Epichas a sort of Ballad-humour in it; Don Quixote is the only one of allthis sort I have ever cared for. 

I certainly wish that Alfred had devoted his diminished powers totranslating Sophocles, or AEschylus, as I fancy a Poet should do--_one_work, at any rate--of his great Predecessors. But Pegasus won't beharnessed. 

From which I descend to my own humble feet. I will send you some copiesof Calderon when I have uncloseted and corrected them. As to Agamemnon, I bound up a Copy of him in the other Translations I sent to TrinityLibrary--not very wisely, I doubt; but I thought the Book would just beput up on its shelf, and I had given all I was asked for, or ever couldbe asked for. The Master, however, wrote me that it came to his Eyes, and I dare say he thought I had best have let AEschylus alone. MyVersion was not intended for those who know the Original; but, by hook orby crook, to interest some who do not. The _Shape_ I have wrought thePlay into is good, I think: the Dialogue good also: but the Choruses(though well contrived for the progress of the Story) are very false toAEschylus; and anyhow want the hand of a Poet. Mine, as I said, are onlya sort of 'Entr' acte' Music, which would be better supplied by Musicitself. 

I will send you in a day or two my Christmas Gossip for the East Anglian, where I am more at home. But you have heard me tell it all before. 

It is too late to wish you a good Christmas--(I wonder how you passed it, mine was solitary and dull enough) but you know I wish you all the Goodthe New Year can bring. Love to Elizabeth; do not be so long withoutwriting again, if only half a dozen lines, to yours and hers sincerely, E. F. G. 

_To S. Laurence_. 

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Jan. _ 13/70. 

MY DEAR LAURENCE, Can you tell me (in a line) how I should treat some old Pictures of minewhich have somehow got rusty with the mixt damp and then fires (Isuppose) of my new house, which, after being built at near double itsproper cost, is just what I do not want, according to the usage of theBallyblunder Family, of which I am a very legitimate offshoot?

If you were down here, I think I should make you take a life-size OilSketch of the Head and Shoulders of my Captain of the Lugger. You see bythe enclosed that these are neither of them of a bad sort: and the Man'sSoul is every way as well proportioned, missing in nothing that maybecome A Man, as I believe. He and I will, I doubt, part Company; wellas he likes me, which is perhaps as well as a sailor cares for any onebut Wife and Children: he likes to be, what he is born to be, his ownsole Master, of himself, and of other men. So now I have got him a fairstart, I think he will carry on the Lugger alone: I shall miss my Hobby, which is no doubt the last I shall ride in this world: but I shall alsoget eased of some Anxiety about the lives of a Crew for which I now feelresponsible. And this last has been a Year of great Anxiety in thisrespect. 

I had to run to London for one day about my Eyes (which, you see by myMS. , are not in prime order at all) and saw a Sir Joshua at a Framer'swindow, and brought it down. The face faded, but elegant and lady-likealways; the dress in colour quite Venetian. It was in Leicester Square;I can't think how all the world of Virtuosos kept passing and would notgive twenty pounds for it. But you don't rate Sir Joshua in comparisonwith Gainsboro'. 

WOODBRIDGE: _Jan. _ 20/70. 

MY DEAR LAURENCE, . . . My Captain lives at Lowestoft, and is there at present: he also inanxiety about his Wife who was brought to bed the very same day myLandlady died, and (as a letter from him this morning tells me) has ahard time of it. I should certainly like a large Oil-sketch, likeThackeray's, done in your most hasty, and worst, style, to hang up withThackeray and Tennyson, with whom he shares a certain Grandeur of Souland Body. As you guess, the colouring is (when the Man is all well) asfine as his form: the finest Saxon type: with that complexion whichMontaigne calls 'vif, male, et flamboyant'; blue eyes; and strictlyauburn hair, that any woman might sigh to possess. He says it is comingoff, as it sometimes does from those who are constantly wearing the closehot Sou'westers. We must see what can be done about a Sketch. 

LOWESTOFT, _February_ 27 [1870]. 

MY DEAR LAURENCE, . . . I came here a few days ago, for the benefit of my old Doctor, TheSea, and my Captain's Company, which is as good. He has not yet got hisnew Lugger home; but will do so this week, I hope; and then the way forus will be somewhat clearer. 

If you sketch in a head, you might send it down to me to look at, so as Imight be able to guess if there were any likelihood in that way ofproceeding. Merely the Lines of Feature indicated, even by Chalk, mightdo. As I told you, the Head is of the large type, or size, the properCapital of a six foot Body, of the broad dimensions you see in thePhotograph. The fine shape of the Nose, less than Roman, and more thanGreek, scarce appears in the Photograph; the Eye, and its delicateEyelash, of course will remain to be made out; and I think you excel inthe Eye. 

When I get home (which I shall do this week) I will send you two littlePapers about the Sea words and Phrases used hereabout, {116a} for whichthis Man (quite unconsciously) is my main Authority. You will see inthem a little of his simplicity of Soul; but not the Justice of Thought, Tenderness of Nature, and all the other good Gifts which make him aGentleman of Nature's grandest Type. 

SUFFOLK HOTEL, LOWESTOFT, _August_ 2/70. 

DEAR LAURENCE, . . . The Lugger is now preparing in the Harbour beside me; the Captainhere, there, and everywhere; with a word for no one but on business; theother side of the Man you saw looking for Birds' Nests; all things intheir season. I am sure the Man is fit to be King of a Kingdom as wellas of a Lugger. To-day he gives the customary Dinner to his Crew beforestarting, and my own two men go to it; and I am asked too: but will notspoil the Fun. 

I declare, you and I have seen A Man! Have we not? Made in the mould ofwhat Humanity should be, Body and Soul, a poor Fisherman. The proudFellow had better have kept me for a Partner in some of hisresponsibilities. {116b} But no; he must rule alone, as is right heshould too. 

I date from the Inn where my Letters are addressed; but I write in thelittle Ship which I live in. My Nieces are now here; in the town, Imean; and my friend Cowell and his Wife; so I have more company than allthe rest of the year. I try to shut my Eyes and Ears against all tidingsof this damnable War, seeing that I can do no good to others bydistressing myself. 

_To W. F. Pollock_. 

BRIDGEWOOD, _Nov. _ 1, [1870]. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, I must say that my savageness against France goes no further than wishingthat the new and gay part of Paris were battered down; not the poorworking part, no, nor any of the People destroyed. But I wish ornamentalParis down, because then I think the French would be kept quiet till theyhad rebuilt it. For what would France be without a splendid Palace? Ishould not wish any such Catastrophe, however, if Paris were now as Iremember it: with a lot of old historic houses in it, old Gardens, etc. , which I am told are now made away with. Only Notre Dame, the Tuileries, and perhaps the beautiful gilt Dome of the Invalides do I care for. Theyare historical and beautiful too. 

But I believe it would be a good thing if the rest of Europe would takepossession of France itself, and rule it for better or worse, leaving theFrench themselves to amuse and enlighten the world by their Books, Plays, Songs, Bon Mots, and all the Arts and Sciences which they are soingenious in. They can do all things but manage themselves and live atpeace with others: and they should themselves be glad to have theirvolatile Spirits kept in order by the Good Sense and Honesty which otherNations certainly abound in more than themselves. {118a}

I see what I think very good remarks about them in old Palmerston'sPapers quoted in my Athenaeum. {118b} He was just the Man they wanted, Ithink. 

WOODBRIDGE, _Nov. _ 15, [1870]. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, . . . Ah, I should like to hear Fidelio again, often as I have heard it. I do not find so much 'Melody' in it as you do: understanding by Melodythat which asserts itself independently of Harmony, as Mozart's Airs do. I miss it especially in Leonora's Hope song. But, what with the storyitself, and the Passion and Power of the Music it is set to, the Opera isone of those that one can hear repeated as often as any. 

If any one ever would take a good suggestion from me, you might suggestto Mr. Sullivan, or some competent Musician, to adapt that Epilogue partof Tennyson's King Arthur, beginning--

 And so to bed; where yet in sleep I seem'd To sail with Arthur, etc. 

down to

 And War shall be no more--

to adapt this, I say, to the Music of that grand last Scene in Fidelio:Sullivan & Co. Supplying the introductory Recitative; beginning dreamily, and increasing, crescendo, up to where the Poet begins to 'feel the truthand Stir of Day'; till Beethoven's pompous March should begin, and theChorus, with 'Arthur is come, etc. '; the chief Voices raising the wordsaloft (as they do in Fidelio), and the Chorus thundering in upon them. Itis very grand in Fidelio: and I am persuaded might have a grand effect inthis Poem. But no one will do it, of course; especially in these Dayswhen War is so far from being no more!

I want to hear Cherubini's Medea, which I dare say I should find masterlyand dull. I quite agree with you about the Italians: Mozart the onlyexception; who is all in all. 

WOODBRIDGE, _Dec. _ 5/70. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, . . . Had not Sunday followed Saturday I was a little tempted to run upto hear Cherubini's Medea, which I saw advertised for the Night. But Ibelieve I should feel strange at a Play now: and probably should not havesat the Opera half out. So you have a good Play, {120} and that wellacted, at last, on English Boards! At the old Haymarket, I think: thepleasantest of all the Theatres (for size and Decoration) that Iremember; yes, and for the Listons and Vestrises that I remember there inthe days of their Glory. Vestris, in what was called a 'Pamela Hat' witha red feather; and, again, singing 'Cherry Ripe, ' one of the Dozenimmortal English Tunes. That was in 'Paul Pry. ' Poor Plays they were, to be sure: but the Players were good and handsome, and--oneself wasyoung--1822-3! There was Macready's Virginius at old Covent Garden, anevent never to be forgotten. 

One Date leads to another. In talking one day about different Quotationswhich get abroad without people always knowing whence they are derived, Icould have sworn that I remember Spring Rice mentioning one that hehimself had invented, and had been amused at seeing quoted here andthere--

 Coldly correct and critically dull. 

Now only last night I happened to see the Line quoted in the Preface toFrederick Reynolds' (the Playwright's) stupid Memoirs, published in 1827;some time before Spring Rice would have thought of such things, Isuppose. . . . 

What Plays Reynolds' were, which made George III. Laugh so, and put 500pounds apiece into the writer's Pocket! But then there were Lewis, Quick, Kemble, Edwin, Parsons, Palmer, Mrs. Jordan, etc. To act them. 

WOODBRIDGE, _Jan. _ 22, [1871]. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, My acquaintance with Spanish, as with other Literature, is almostconfined to its Fiction; and of that I have read nothing to care aboutexcept Don Quixote and Calderon. The first is well worth learningSpanish for. When I began reading the Language more than twenty yearsago, with Cowell who taught me nearly all I know, I tried some of theother Dramatists, Tirso de Molina, Lope de Vega, Moratin, etc. , but couldtake but little interest in them. All Calderon's, I think, havesomething beautiful in them: and about a score of them altogether bearreading again, and will be remembered if read but once. But Don Quixoteis _the_ Book, as you know; to be fully read, I believe, in no languagebut its own, though delightful in any. You know as well as I thatSpanish History has a good name; Mariana's for one: and one makes surethat the Language, at any rate, must be suitable to relate great Thingswith. But I do not meddle with History. 

There are very good Selections from the Spanish Dramas published in goodlarge-type Octavo by Don Ochoa, printed (I think) by Baudry, in Paris. There is one volume of Calderon; one of Lope, I believe: and one or twomade up of other Playwrights. These Books are very easily got at anyforeign Bookseller's. 

An Artist {122a} to whom I have lent my house for a while has beenteaching me 'Spanish Dominoes, ' a very good Game. He, and I, and theCaptain whose Photo I sent you (did I not?) had a grand bout with it theother day. If I went about in Company again I think I should do as oldRossini did, carry a Box of Dominoes, or pack of Cards, which I thinkwould set Conversation at ease by giving people something easy to dobeside conversing. I say Rossini did this; but I only know of his doingit once, at Trouville, where F. Hiller met him, who has published theConversations they had together. 

Did you lead the very curious Paper in the Cornhill, {122b} a year back, I think, concerning the vext question of Mozart's Requiem? It is curiousas a piece of Evidence, irrespective of any musical Interest. Evidence, I believe, would compel a Law Court to decide that the Requiem wasmainly, not Mozart's, but his pupil Sussmayer's. And perhaps the LawCourt might justly so decide, if by 'mainly' one understood the moretechnical business of filling up the ideas suggested by the Master. Butthen those ideas are just everything; and no Court of Musical Equity butwould decide, against all other Evidence, that those ideas were Mozart's. It is known that he was instructing Sussmayer, almost with his lastbreath, about some drum accompaniments to the Requiem; and I have nodoubt, hummed over the subjects, or melodies, of all. 

_To W. H. Thompson_. 

WOODBRIDGE, _Feb. _ 1, [1871], MY DEAR MASTER, The Gorgias duly came last week, thank you: and I write rather earlierthan I should otherwise have done to satisfy you on that point. Otherwise, I say, I should have waited awhile till I had gone over allthe Notes more carefully, with some of the sweet-looking Text belongingto them; which would have taken some time, as my Eyes have not been ingood trim of late, whether from the Snow on the Ground, and the murky Airall about one, or because of the Eyes themselves being two years olderthan when they got hurt by Paraffin. 

The Introduction I have read twice, and find it quite excellentlywritten. Surely I miss some--ay, more than some--of the Proof you sentme two years ago; some of the Argument to prove the relation between thisDialogue and the Republic, and consequently of the Date that must beassigned to it. All that interested me then as it does now, and I wouldrather have seen the Introduction all the longer by it. Perhaps, however, I am confounding my remembrances of the Date question (which ofcourse follows from the matter) with the Phaedrus Introduction. 

Then as to what I have seen of the Notes: they seem to me as good as canbe. I do not read modern Scholars, and therefore do not know howgenerally the Style of English Note-writing may be [different] from thatof the Latin one was used to. But your Notes, I know, seem excellent tome; I mean, in the Style of them (for of the Scholarship I am not aproper Judge); totally without pedantry of any sort, whether of solvingunnecessary difficulties, carping at other Critics, etc. , but plainlydetermined to explain what needs explanation in the shortest, clearest, way, and in a Style which is most of all suited to the purpose, 'familiarbut by no means vulgar, ' such as we have known in such cases, whether inLatin or English. My Quotation reminds me of yours: how sparingly, andalways just to the point, introduced; Polus 'gambolling' from the Theme:old Wordsworth's Robin Hood, etc. And the paraphrases you give of theGreek are so just the thing. I have not read Vaughan's (?) Translationof the Republic; which I am told is good. But this I know that I nevermet with any readable Translation of Plato. Whewell's was intolerable. You should have translated--(that is, paraphrased, for however far somePeople may err on this score, rushing in where Scholars fear to tread) aTranslation must be Paraphrase to be readable; and especially in theseDialogues where the familiar Grace of the Narrative and Conversation isso charming a vehicle of the Philosophy. If people will conscientiouslytranslate [Greek text] 'Oh most excellent man, ' when perhaps 'My goodFellow' was the thing meant, and 'By the Dog!' and so on, why, it is notEnglish talk, and probably not Greek either. I say you should have, orshould translate one or two Dialogues to show how they should be done; ifno longer than the Lysis, or one of those small and sweet ones which Ibelieve the Germans disclaim for Plato's. 

'The Dog' however does need a Note, as I suppose that, howeverfar-fetched Olympiodorus' suggestion, this was an Oath familiar toSocrates alone, and which he took up for some, perhaps whimsical, reason. It is not to be found (is it?) in Aristophanes, where I suppose all thecommon Oaths come in; but then again I wonder that, if it were Socrates'Oath, it did not find its way into the Clouds, or perhaps into thecriminal Charge against Socrates, as being a sort of mystical or scoffingBlasphemy. 

I am afraid I tire you more with my Letter than you tired me with yourIntroduction, a good deal. And you see, to your cost, that my MS. Doesnot argue much pleasure in the act of writing. But I would say my littlesay; which perhaps is all wrong. . . . 

One of your Phrases I think truly delightful, about the Treasure to besometimes found in a weak Vessel like Proclus. That I think is veryPlatonic; all the more for such things coming only now and then, whichmakes them tell. Modern Books lose by being over-crowded with goodthings. 

* * * * *

In the course of this year 1871, FitzGerald parted with his little yachtthe Scandal, so called, he said, because it was the staple product ofWoodbridge, and on September 4 he wrote to me:--

WOODBRIDGE: _Septr. _ 4/71. 

'I run over to Lowestoft occasionally for a few days, but do not abidethere long: no longer having my dear little Ship for company. I saw herthere looking very smart under her new owner ten days ago, and I felt soat home when I was once more on her Deck that--Well: I content myselfwith sailing on the river Deben, looking at the Crops as they grow green, yellow, russet, and are finally carried away in the red and blue Waggonswith the sorrel horse. '

_To W. F. Pollock_. 

[1871]. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, . . . A night or two ago I was reading old Thackeray's Roundabouts; and(sign of a good book) heard him talking to me. I wonder at his being sofretted by what was said of him as some of these Papers show that he was:very unlike his old self, surely. Perhaps Ill Health (which Johnson saidmade every one a Scoundrel) had something to do with this. I don't meanthat W. M. T. Went this length: but in this one respect he was not sogood as he used to be. 

Annie Thackeray in her yearly letter wrote that she had heard from Mrs. A. T. That the Laureate was still suffering. I judge from your Letterthat he is better. . . . I never heard any of his coadjutor Sullivan'sMusic. Is there a Tune, or originally melodious phrase, in any of it?That is what I always missed in Mendelssohn, except in two or three ofhis youthful Pieces; Fingal and Midsummer Night's Dream overtures, andMeeresstille. Chorley {127} mentions as a great instance of M. 'scandour, that when some of his Worshippers were sneering at Donizetti's'Figlia, ' M. Silenced them by saying 'Do you [know] I should like to havewritten it myself. ' If he meant that he ever could have written it if hehad pleased, he ought to have had his nose tweaked. 

I have been reading Sir Walter's Pirate again, and am very glad to findhow much I like it--that is speaking far below the mark--I may say how Iwonder and delight in it. I am rejoiced to find that this is so; and Iam quite sure that it is not owing to my old prejudice, but to theintrinsic merit and beauty of the Book itself. With all its faults ofdetail, often mere carelessness, what a broad Shakespearian Daylight overit all, and all with no Effort, and--a lot else that one may be contentedto feel without having to write an Essay about. They won't beat SirWalter in a hurry (I mean of course his earlier, Northern, Novels), andhe was such a fine Fellow that I really don't believe any one would wishto cast him in the Shade. {128}

_To T. Carlyle_. 

WOODBRIDGE, _Dec. _ 20, [1871]. 

DEAR CARLYLE, Do not be alarmed at another Letter from me this year. It will need noanswer: and is only written to tell you that I have not wholly neglectedthe wish you expressed in your last about the Naseby stone. I wasreading, some months ago, your letters about our Naseby exploits in 1842:as also one which you wrote in 1855 (I think) about that Stone, giving mean Inscription for it. And it was not wholly my fault that your wisheswere not then fulfilled, though perhaps I was wanting in due energy aboutthe matter. Thus, however, it was; that when you wrote in 1855, we hadjust sold Naseby to the Trustees of Lord Clifden: and, as there was somehitch in the Business (Lord Carlisle being one of the Trustees), I wastold I had better not put in my oar. So the matter dropt. Since thenLord Clifden is dead: and I do not know if the Estate belongs to hisFamily. But, on receiving your last Letter, I wrote to the Lawyers whohad managed for Lord Clifden to know about it: but up to this hour I havehad no answer. Thus much I have done. If I get the Lawyer's and Agent'sconsent, I should be very glad indeed to have the stone cut, andlettered, as you wished. But whether I should pluck up spirit to gomyself and set it up on the proper spot, I am not so sure; and I cannotbe sure that any one else could do it for me. Those who were with mewhen I dug up the bones are dead, or gone; and I suppose the Plough haslong ago obliterated the traces of sepulture, in these days of improvedAgriculture; and perhaps even the Tradition is lost from the Memory ofthe Generation that has sprung up since I, and the old Parson, and theScotch Tenant, turned up the ground. You will think me very base tohesitate about such a little feat as a Journey into Northamptonshire forthis purpose. But you know that one does not generally grow more activein Travel as one gets older: and I have been a bad Traveller all my life. So I will promise nothing that I am not sure of doing. Only, if youcontinue to desire this strongly, when next Summer comes, I will resolveupon it if I can. 

These Naseby Letters of yours--they are all yours I have preserved, because (as in the case of Tennyson and Thackeray) I would not leaveanything of private personal history behind me, lest it should fall intosome unscrupulous hand. Even these Naseby letters--would you wish themreturned to you? Only in case you should desire this, trouble yourselfto answer me now. 

_To W. F. Pollock_. 

WOODBRIDGE, _Dec. _ 24, [1871]

MY DEAR POLLOCK, . . . The Pirate is, I know, not one of Scott's best: the Women, Minna, Brenda, Norna, are poor theatrical figures. But Magnus and Jack Bunceand Claud Halcro (though the latter rather wearisome) are substantialenough: how wholesomely they swear! and no one ever thinks of blamingScott for it. There is a passage where the Company at Burgh Westra aresummoned by Magnus to go down to the Shore to see the Boats go off to theDeep Sea fishing, and 'they followed his stately step to the Shore as theHerd of Deer follows the leading Stag, with all manner of respectfulObservance. ' This, coming in at the close of the preceding unaffectedNarrative is to me like Homer, whom Scott really resembles in thesimplicity and ease of his Story. This is far more poetical in my Eyesthan all the Effort of ---, ---, etc. And which of them has written sucha Lyric as 'Farewell to Northmaven'? I finished the Book with Sadness;thinking I might never read it again. . . . 

P. S. Can't you send me your Paper about the Novelists? As to which isthe best of all I can't say: that Richardson (with all his twaddle) isbetter than Fielding, I am quite certain. There is nothing at allcomparable to Lovelace in all Fielding, whose Characters are common andvulgar types; of Squires, Ostlers, Lady's maids, etc. , very easily drawn. I am equally sure that Miss Austen cannot be third, any more than firstor second: I think you were rather drawn away by a fashion when you puther there: and really old Spedding seems to me to have been the Stag whomso many followed in that fashion. She is capital as far as she goes: butshe never goes out of the Parlour; if but Magnus Troil, or Jack Bunce, oreven one of Fielding's Brutes, would but dash in upon the Gentility andswear a round Oath or two! I must think the 'Woman in White, ' with herCount Fosco, far beyond all that. Cowell constantly reads Miss Austen atnight after his Sanskrit Philology is done: it composes him, like Gruel:or like Paisiello's Music, which Napoleon liked above all other, becausehe said it didn't interrupt his Thoughts. 

WOODBRIDGE, _Dec. _ 29 [1871]. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, If you come here, come some very fine weather, when we look at our bestinland, and you may take charge of my Boat on the River. I doubt I didmy Eyes damage this Summer by steering in the Sun, and peering out forthe Beacons that mark the Channel; but your Eyes are proof against this, and I shall resign the command to you, as you wrote that you liked it atClovelly. . . . 

I had thought Beauty was the main object of the Arts: but these people, not having Genius, I suppose, to create any new forms of that, haverecourse to the Ugly, and find their Worshippers in plenty. In Poetry, Music, and Painting, it seems to me the same. And people think all thisfiner than Mozart, Raffaelle, and Tennyson--as he _was_--but he neverceases to be noble and pure. There was a fine passage quoted from hisLast Idyll: about a Wave spending itself away on a long sandy Shore: thatwas Lincolnshire, I know. 

Carlyle has written to remind me of putting up a Stone on the spot inNaseby field where I dug up the Dead for him thirty years ago. I willgladly have the Stone cut, and the Inscription he made for it engraved:but will I go again to Northamptonshire to see it set up? And perhapsthe people there have forgotten all about the place, now that a wholeGeneration has passed away, and improved Farming has passed the Ploughover the Ground. But we shall see. 

_To W. A. Wright_. 

WOODBRIDGE, _Jan. _ 20/72. 

By way of flourishing my Eyes, I have been looking into Andrew Marvell, an old favourite of mine, who led the way for Dryden in Verse, and Swiftin Prose, and was a much better fellow than the last, at any rate. 

Two of his lines in the Poem on 'Appleton House, ' with its Gardens, Grounds, etc. , run:

 But most the _Hewel's_ wonders are, Who here has the Holtseltster's care. 

The '_Hewel_' being evidently the Woodpecker, who, by tapping the Trees, etc. , does the work of one who measures and gauges Timber; here, rightlyor wrongly, called '_Holtseltster_. ' 'Holt' one knows: but what is'seltster'? I do not find either this word or 'Hewel' in Bailey orHalliwell. But 'Hewel' may be a form of 'Yaffil, ' which I read in somePaper that Tennyson had used for the Woodpecker in his Last Tournament. {133}

This reminded me that Tennyson once said to me, some thirty years ago, ormore, in talking of Marvell's 'Coy Mistress, ' where it breaks in--

 But at my back I always hear Time's winged chariot hurrying near, etc. 

'_That_ strikes me as Sublime, I can hardly tell why. Of course, thispartly depends on its place in the Poem. 

Apropos of the Woodpecker, a Clergyman near here was telling ourBookseller Loder, that, in one of his Parishioners' Cottages, he observeda dried Woodpecker hung up to the Ceiling indoors; and was told that italways pointed with its Bill to the Quarter whence the Wind blew. 

_To Miss Anna Biddell_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _Feb. _ 22, [1872]. 

. . . I have lost the Boy who read to me so long and so profitably: andnow have another; a much better Scholar, but not half so agreeable oramusing a Reader as his Predecessor. We go through Tichborne withoutmissing a Syllable, and, when Tichborne is not long enough, we take toLothair! which has entertained me well. So far as I know of the matter, his pictures of the manners of English High Life are good: Lothairhimself I do not care for, nor for the more romantic parts, Theodora, etc. Altogether the Book is like a pleasant Magic Lantern: when it isover, I shall forget it: and shall want to return to what I do notforget, some of Thackeray's monumental Figures of 'pauvre et tristeHumanite, ' as old Napoleon called it: Humanity in its Depths, not in itssuperficial Appearances. 

_To W. F. Pollock_. 

THE OLD PLACE, _Feb. _ 25/72. 

. . . Aldis Wright must be right about 'sear' {135a}--French _serre_ hesays. What a pity that Spedding has not employed some of the forty yearshe has lost in washing his Blackamoor in helping an Edition ofShakespeare, though not in the way of these minute archaeologicQuestions! I never heard him read a page but he threw some new Lightupon it. When you see him pray tell him I do not write to him, because Ijudge from experience that it is a labour to him to answer, unless itwere to do me any service I asked of him except to tell me of himself. 

My heart leaped when the Boy read me the Attorney General's Quotationfrom A. T. {135b}

_From T. Carlyle_. 

CHELSEA, 15, _June_, 1872. 

DEAR FITZGERALD, I am glad that you are astir on the Naseby-Monument question; and thatthe auspices are so favourable. This welcome 'Agent, ' so willing andbeneficent, will contrive, I hope, to spare you a good deal of thetrouble, --except indeed that of seeing with your own eyes that the Stoneis put in its right place, and the number of 'yards rearward' is exactlygiven. 

I think the Inscription will do; and as to the shape, etc. , of themonument, I have nothing to advise, --except that I think it ought to beof the most perfect _simplicity_, and should {136} go direct to itsobject and punctually stop there. A small block of Portlandstone--(Portland excels all stones in the world for durability andcapacity for taking an exact inscription)--block of Portland stone ofsize to contain the words and allow itself to be sunk firmly in theground; to me it could have no other good quality whatever; and I shouldnot care if the stone on three sides of it were squared with the hammermerely, and only _polished_ on its front or fourth side where the lettersare to be. 

In short I wish _you_ my dear friend to take charge of this pious act inall its details; considering me to be loyally passive to whatever youdecide on respecting it. If on those terms you will let me bear half theexpense and flatter myself that in this easy way I have gone halves withyou in this small altogether genuine piece of patriotism, I shall beextremely obliged to you. 

Pollock has told you an altogether flattering tale about my strength, asit is nearly impossible for any person still on his feet to be morecompletely useless. 

Yours ever truly, T. CARLYLE. 

J. A. Froude (just come to walk with me) _scripsit_. 

_To W. F. Pollock_. 

WOODBRIDGE, _June_ 16, [1872]. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, Some forty years ago there was a set of Lithograph Outlines from Hayter'sSketches of Pasta in Medea: caricature things, though done in earnest bya Man who had none of the Genius of the Model he admired. Looking atthem now people who never saw the Original will wonder perhaps that Talmaand Mrs. Siddons should have said that they might go to learn of Her: andindeed it was only the Living Genius and Passion of the Woman herselfthat could have inspired and exalted, and enlarged her very incompletePerson (as it did her Voice) into the Grandeur, as well as the _Niobe_Pathos, of her Action and Utterance. All the nobler features of Humanityshe had indeed: finely shaped Head, Neck, Bust, and Arms: all finelyrelated to one another: the superior Features too of the Face fine: Eyes, Eyebrows--I remember Trelawny saying they reminded him of those in theEast--the Nose not so fine: but the whole Face 'homogeneous' as Lavatercalls it, and capable of all expression, from Tragedy to Farce. For Ihave seen her in the 'Prova d' un' Opera Seria, ' where no one, I believe, admired her but myself, except Thomas Moore, whose Journal long afterpublished revealed to me one who thought, --yes, and _knew_--as I did. Well, these Lithographs are as mere Skeleton Outlines of the livingWoman, but I suppose the only things now to give an Idea of her, I havebeen a dozen years looking out for a Copy. 

I think I love the Haymarket as much as any part of London because of theLittle Theatre where Vestris used to sing 'Cherry Ripe' in her prime: and(soon after) because of the old Bills on the opposite Colonnade: 'MEDEAIN CORINTO. Medea, _Signora Pasta_. ' You know what she said, to theConfusion of all aesthetic People, one of whom said to her, 'sans doutevous avez beaucoup etudie l'Antique?' 'Peut-etre je l'ai beaucoupsenti. '

MY DEAR POLLOCK, I have remembered, since last writing to you, that the Hayter Sketcheswere published by Dickenson of Bond Street, about 1825-6, I fancy. Ihave tried to get them, and all but succeeded two years ago. I am afraidthey would give you and Miss Bateman the impression that Pasta played theVirago: which was not so at all. Her scene with her Children was amongthe finest of all: and it was well known at the time how deeply she feltit. But I suppose the stronger Situations offered better opportunitiesfor the pencil, such a pencil as Hayter's. I used to admire as much asanything her Attitude and Air as she stood at the side of the Stage whenJason's Bridal Procession came on: motionless, with one finger in hergolden girdle: a habit which (I heard) she inherited from Grassini. Thefinest thing to me in Pasta's Semiramide was her simple Action oftouching Arsace's Shoulder when she chose him for husband. She wasalways dignified in the midst of her Passion: never scolded as herCaricature Grisi did. And I remember her curbing her Arsace's redundantAction by taking hold of her (Arsace's) hands, Arsace being played byBrambilla, who was (I think) Pasta's Niece. {139a}

WOODBRIDGE, _July_ 4/72. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, I like your Fraser Paper very much, and recognised some points we hadtalked of together, {139b} but nothing that I can claim as my own. Isuppose that I think on these points as very many educated men do think;I mean as to Principles of Art. I am not sure I understand your word'Imagination' as opposed to realistic (d---d word) detail at p. 26, but Isuppose I suppose I know what is meant, nevertheless, and agree withthat. Is the Prophet of p. 24 _Gurlyle_? {139c} I think so. The finehead of him which figures as Frontispiece to the People's Edition ofSartor made me think of a sad Old Prophet; so that I bought the Book forthe Portrait only. 

The 'Brown Umbrella' pleased me greatly. 

Well; and I thought there were other Papers in Fraser which made me thinkthat, on the whole, I would take in Fraser rather than the Cornhill whichyou advised. Perhaps I am just now out of tune for Novels; whether thatbe so or not, I don't get an Appetite for Annie Thackeray's {140} fromthe two Numbers I have had. 

And here is Spedding's vol. Vi. Which leaves me much where it found meabout Bacon: but though I scarce care for him, I can read old Spedding'spleading for him for ever; that is, old Spedding's simple statement ofthe case, as he sees it. The Ralegh Business is quite delightful, betterthan Old Kensington. 

Then I have bought 3 vols of the '_Ladies Magazine_' for 1750-3 by'Jasper Goodwill' who died at Vol. Iv. It contains the Trials andExecutions (16 men at a time) of the time; _Miss Blandy_ above all; andsuch delightful Essays, Poems, and Enigmas, for _Ladies_! The Allegoriesare in the Rasselas style, all Oriental. The Essays 'of all the Virtueswhich adorn, etc. ' Then Anecdotes of the Day: as of a Country woman inSt. James' Park taking on because she cannot go home till she has kissedthe King's hand: one of the Park keepers tells one of the Pages, whotells the King, who has the Woman in to kiss his hand, and take somemoney beside. One wonders there weren't heaps of such loyal Subjects. 

Mowbray Donne wrote me that he sent you the Fragments I had saved andtranscribed of Morton's Letters; the best part having been lost byBlackwood's People thirty years ago, as I believe I told you. But don'tyou think what remains capital? I wish you would get them put into someMagazine, just for the sake of some of our Day getting them in Print. Youmight just put a word of Preface as to the Author: an Irish Gentleman, ofEstate and Fortune (which of course went the Irish way), who was Scholar, Artist, Newspaper Correspondent, etc. A dozen lines would tell all thatis wanted, naming no names. It might be called 'Fragments of Letters byan "Ill-starred" or "Unlucky" Man of Genius, ' etc. As S. M. Was:'Unlucky' being still used in Suffolk, with something of Ancient Greekmeaning. See if you cannot get this done, will you? For I think many ofS. M. 's friends would be glad of it: and the general Public assuredly notthe worse. Some of the names would need some correction, I think: andthe Letters to be put in order of Time. {141a} 'Do it!' as Julia in theHunchback says. 

[1872. ]

MY DEAR POLLOCK, I went to London at the end of last week, on my way to Sydenham, where mysecond Brother is staying, whom I had not seen these six years, nor hisWife. . . . On Saturday I went to the Academy, for little else but tosee Millais, and to disagree with you about him! I thought his threeWomen and his Highlanders brave pictures, which you think also; butbraver than you think them. The Women looked alive: the right Eye somuch smaller than the left in the Figure looking at you that I suppose itwas so in the original, so that I should have chosen one of the otherSisters for the position. I could not see any analogy between thePicture and Sir Joshua's Graces, except that there were Three. Nor couldI think the Highlanders in the Landscape vulgar; they seemed to me incharacter with the Landscape. Both Pictures want tone, which may meanGlazing: wanting which they may last the longer, and sober down ofthemselves without the danger of cracking by any transparent Colour laidover them. 

I scarce looked at anything else, not having much time. Just as I wasgoing out, who should come up to me but Annie Thackeray, who took myhands as really glad to see her Father's old friend. I am sure she was;and I was taken aback somehow; and, out of sheer awkwardness, began totell her that I didn't care for her new Novel! And then, after she hadleft her Party to come to me, I ran off! It is true, I had to be back atSydenham: but it would have been better to forgo all that: and so Ireflected when I had got halfway down Piccadilly: and so ran back, andwent into the Academy again: but could not find A. T. She told me shewas going to Normandy this week: and I have been so vext with myself thatI have written to tell her something of what I have told you. It wasvery stupid indeed. 

WOODBRIDGE: _November_ 1, [1872]. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, The Spectator, as also the Athenaeum, somewhat over-praise Gareth, Ithink: but I am glad they do so. . . . The Poem seems to me scarce moreworthy of what A. T. Was born to do than the other Idylls; but you willalmost think it is out of contradiction that I like it better: except, ofcourse, the original Morte. The Story of this young Knight, who cansubmit and conquer and do all the Devoir of Chivalry, interests me muchmore than the Enids, Lily Maids, etc. Of former Volumes. But Time_is_--Time _was_--to have done with the whole Concern: pure and noble asall is, and in parts more beautiful than any one else can do. . . . 

Rain--Rain--Rain! What will become of poor Italy? I think we ought tosubscribe for her. Did you read of one French Caricature of the Popeleaving Rome with the Holy Ghost in a Bird Cage?

WOODBRIDGE, _Nov. _ 20. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, I am glad the Rogers Verses {144} gratified you. I forget where I sawthem quoted, some ten years ago; but as I had long wished for themmyself, and thought others might wish for them also, I got them reprintedhere in the form I sent you. . . . I have no compunction at all inreviving this Satire upon the old Banker, whom it is only paying off inhis own Coin. Spedding (of course) used to deny that R. Deserved his illReputation: but I never heard any one else deny it. All his littlemalignities, unless the epigram on Ward be his, are dead along with hislittle sentimentalities; while Byron's Scourge hangs over his Memory. Theonly one who, so far as I have seen, has given any idea of his littlecavilling style, is Mrs. Trench in her Letters; her excellent Letters, sofar as I can see and judge, next best to Walpole and Cowper in ourLanguage. . . . 

I have bought Regnard, of the old Moliere times, very good; and (what isalways odd to me) as French as the French of To-day: I mean, in point ofLanguage. 

[_Nov. _ 1872. ]

MY DEAR POLLOCK, In a late Box of books which I had from Mudie were Macmillan and Fraser, for 1869-1870. And in one of these--I am nearly sure, Macmillan--is anArticle called 'Objects of Art' {145} which treats very well, I think, onthe subject you and I talked of at Whitsun. . . . 

My new Reader . . . Has been reading to me Fields' 'Yesterdays withAuthors, ' Hawthorne, Dickens, Thackeray. The latter seems to me aCaricature: the Dickens has one wonderful bit about Macready in 1869, which ought not to have been printed during his Life, but which I willcopy out for you if you have not seen it. Hawthorne seems to me the mostof a Man of Genius America has produced in the way of Imagination: yet Ihave never found an Appetite for his Books. Frederic Tennyson sent meVictor Hugo's 'Toilers of the Sea, ' which he admires, I suppose; but Ican't get up an Appetite for that neither. I think the Scenes being laidin the Channel Islands may have something to do with old Frederic'sLiking. . . . 

The Daily News only tells me of Crisises in France, Floods in Italy, Insubordination of London Policemen, and Desertion from the British Army. So I take refuge in other Topics. Do look for 'Objects of Art' amongthem. 

Which are you for

 Noi leggiavamo } or } un giorno per diletto? {146a} Noi leggevamo }

WOODBRIDGE: _Nov. _ 28 [1872]. 

'Multae Epistolae pertransibunt et augebitur Scientia. ' Our one Man ofBooks down here, Brooke, {146b} had told me that the old Editions on thewhole favoured 'legg_ia_vamo. ' Now I shall tell him that the Germanshave decided on 'leggevamo. ' But Brooke quotes one Copy (1502) whichreads 'leggev_am_, ' which I had also wished for, to get rid of a fifth(and superfluous) _o_ in the line. I suppose such a plural is asallowable as

 Noi andav_am_ per lo solingo Piano, etc. 

What is all this erudite Enquiry about? I was talking with Edwards onenight of this passage, and of this line in particular, which came into myhead as a motto for a Device {146c} we were talking of; and hence allthis precious fuss. 

But I want to tell you what I forgot in my last letter; what Dickenshimself says of his 'Holyday Romance' in a letter to Fields. 

 _July_ 25, 1867. 

 'I hope the Americans will see the joke of Holyday Romance. The writing seems to me so much like Children's, that dull folk (on _any_ side of _any_ water) might perhaps rate it accordingly. I should like to be beside you when you read it, and particularly when you read the Pirate's Story. It made me laugh to that extent that my people here thought I was out of my wits: until I gave it to them to read, when they did likewise. '

One thinks, what a delightful thing to be such an Author! Yet he died ofhis work, I suppose. 

WOODBRIDGE, _Jan_, 5/73. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, I don't know that I have anything to tell you, except a Story which Ihave already written to Donne and to Mrs. Kemble, all the way to Rome, out of a French Book. {147} I just now forget the name, and it is goneback to Mudie. About 1783, or a little later, a young _Danseur_ of theFrench Opera falls in love with a young _Danseuse_ of the same. She, however, takes up with a 'Militaire, ' who indeed commands the Guard whoare on Service at the Opera. The poor Danseur gets mad with jealousy:attacks the Militaire on his post; who just bids his Soldiers tie thepoor Lad to a Column, without further Injury. The Lad, though otherwiseunhurt, falls ill of Shame and Jealousy; and dies, after bequeathing hisSkeleton to the Doctor attached to the Opera, with an understanding thatthe said Skeleton is to be kept in the Doctor's Room at the Opera. Somehow, this Skeleton keeps its place through Revolutions, and Changesof Dynasty: and re-appears on the Scene when some Diablerie is on foot, as in Freischutz; where, says the Book, it still produces a certaineffect. I forgot to say that the _Subject_ wished to be in that Doctor'sRoom in order that he might still be near his Beloved when she danced. 

Now, is not this a capital piece of French all over?

In Sophie Gay's 'Salons de Paris' {148} I read that when Madlle Contat(the Predecessor of Mars) was learning under Preville and his Wife forthe Stage, she gesticulated too much, as Novices do. So the Previllesconfined her Arms like '_une Momie_' she says, and then set her off witha Scene. So long as no great Passion, or Business, was needed, she feltpretty comfortable, she says: but when the Dialogue grew hot, then shecould not help trying to get her hands free; and _that_, as the Previllestold her, sufficiently told her when Action should begin, and not tillthen, whether in Grave or Comic. This anecdote (told by Contat herself)has almost an exact counterpart in Mrs. Siddons' practice: who recitedeven Lear's Curse with her hands and arms close to her side like anEgyptian Figure, and Sir Walter Scott, {149a} who heard her, said nothingcould be more terrible. . . . 

The Egyptian Mummy reminds me of a clever, dashing, Book we are readingon the subject, by Mr. Zincke, Vicar of a Village {149b} near Ipswich. Did you know, or do you believe, that the Mummy was wrapt up into itsChrysalis Shape as an Emblem of Future Existence; wrapt up, too, inbandages all inscribed with ritualistic directions for its intermediatestage, which was not one of total Sleep? I supposed that this might be apiece of ingenious Fancy: but Cowell, who has been over to see me, saysit is probable. 

I have brought my Eyes by careful nursing into sufficient strength toread Moliere, and Montaigne, and two or three more of my old 'Standards'with all my old Relish. But I must not presume on this; and ought tospare your Eyes as well as my own in respect of this letter. 

WOODBRIDGE, _Jan. _ /73. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, I have not been reading so much of my Gossip lately, to send you a goodlittle Bit of, which I think may do you a good turn now and then. Give alook at 'Egypt of the Pharaohs' by Zincke, Vicar of a Parish nearWoodbridge; the Book is written in a light, dashing (but not Cockneypert) way, easily looked over. There is a supposed Soliloquy of anEnglish Labourer (called 'Hodge') as contrasted with the Arab, which iscapital. 

Do you know Taschereau's Life of Moliere? I have only got that prefixedto a common Edition of 1730. But even this is a delightful serio-comicDrama. I see that H. Heine says the French are all born Actors: whichalways makes me wonder why they care so for the Theatre. Heine too, Ifind, speaks of V. Hugo's Worship of Ugliness; of which I find so much in--- and other modern Artists, Literary, Musical, or Graphic. . . . 

What, you tell me, Palgrave said about me, I should have thought none buta very partial Friend, like Donne, would ever have thought of saying. ButI'll say no more on that head. Only that, as regards the littleDialogue, {150} I think it is a very pretty thing in Form, and with somevery pretty parts in it. But when I read it two or three years ago, there was, I am sure, some over-smart writing, and some clumsy wording;insomuch that, really liking the rest, I cut out about a sheet, andsubstituted another, and made a few corrections with a Pen in whatremained, though plenty more might be made, little as the Book is. Well;as you like this little Fellow, and I think he is worth liking, up to aPoint, I shall send you a Copy of these amended Sheets. 

[_March_ 1873. ]

MY DEAR POLLOCK, 7. 15 p. M. After a stroll in mine own Garden, under the moon--shoeskicked off--Slippers and Dressing Gown on--A Pinch of Snuff--and hey fora Letter--to my only London Correspondent!

And to London have I been since my last Letter: and have seen the OldMasters; and finished them off by such a Symphony as was worthy of thebest of them, two Acts of Mozart's 'Cosi. ' You wrote me that you had'assisted' at that also: the Singing, as you know, was inferior: but theMusic itself! Between the Acts a Man sang a song of Verdi's: which was astrange Contrast, to be sure: one of Verdi's heavy Airs, however: for hehas a true Genius of his own, though not Mozart's. Well: I did not likeeven Mozart's two Bravuras for the Ladies: a bad Despina for one: but therest was fit for--Raffaelle, whose Christ in the Garden I had beenlooking at a little before. I had thought Titian's Cornaro, and a Man inBlack, by a Column, worth nearly all the rest of the Gallery till I sawthe Raffaelle: and I couldn't let that go with the others. All LordRadnor's Pictures were new to me, and nearly all very fine. The Vandykesdelightful: Rubens' Daniel, though all by his own hand, not half so goodas a Return from Hunting, which perhaps was not: the Sir Joshuas notfirst rate, I think, except a small life Figure of a Sir W. Molesworth inUniform: the Gainsboro's scratchy and superficial, _I_ thought: theRomneys better, _I_ thought. Two fine Cromes: Ditto Turners: and--I willmake an End of my Catalogue Raisonnee. . . . 

I suppose you never read Beranger's Letters: there are four thick Volumesof these, of which I have as yet only seen the Second and Third: and theyare well worth reading. They make one love Beranger: partly because (oddenough) he is so little of a Frenchman in Character, French as his Worksare. He hated Paris, Plays, Novels, Journals, Critics, etc. , hated beingmonstered himself as a Great Man, as he proved by flying from it; seemsto me to take a just measure of himself and others, and to be moderate inhis Political as well as Literary Opinions. 

I am hoping for Forster's second volume of Dickens in Mudie's forthcomingBox. Meanwhile, my Boy (whom I momently expect) reads me Trollope's 'Heknew he was right, ' the opening of which I think very fine: but whichseems to be trailing off into 'longueur' as I fancy Trollope is apt todo. But he 'has a world of his own, ' as Tennyson said of Crabbe. 

_March_ 30/73. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, . . . You have never told me how you thought him [Spedding] looking, etc. , though you told me that your Boy Maurice went to sit with him. Itreally reminds me of some happy Athenian lad who was privileged to bewith Socrates. Some Plato should put down the Conversation. 

I have just finished the second volume of Forster's Dickens: and stillhave no reason not to rejoice in the Man Dickens. And surely Forsterdoes his part well; but I can fancy that some other Correspondent buthimself should be drawn in as Dickens' Life goes on, and thickens withAcquaintances. 

We in the Country are having the best of it just now, I think, in thesefine Days, though we have nothing to show so gay as Covent Garden Market. I am thinking of my Boat on the River. . . . 

You say I did not date my last letter: I can date this: for it is myBirthday. {153} This it was that made me resolve to send you the Photos. Hey for my 65th year! I think I shall plunge into a Yellow Scratch Wigto keep my head warm for the Remainder of my Days. 

* * * * *

In September 1863 Mr. Ruskin addressed a letter to 'The Translator of theRubaiyat of Omar, ' which he entrusted to Mrs. Burne Jones, who after aninterval of nearly ten years handed it to Mr. Charles Eliot Norton, Professor of the History of Fine Art in Harvard University. By him itwas transmitted to Carlyle, who sent it to FitzGerald, with the letterwhich follows, of which the signature alone is in his own handwriting. 

* * * * *

CHELSEA, 14 _April_, 1873. 

DEAR FITZGERALD, Mr. Norton, the writer of that note, is a distinguished American(co-editor for a long time of the North American Review), an extremelyamiable, intelligent and worthy man; with whom I have had some pleasantwalks, dialogues and other communications, of late months;--in the courseof which he brought to my knowledge, for the first time, your notable_Omar Khayyam_, and insisted on giving me a copy from the third edition, which I now possess, and duly prize. From him too, by carefulcross-questioning, I identified, beyond dispute, the hidden 'Fitzgerald, 'the Translator;--and indeed found that his complete silence, and uniquemodesty in regard to said meritorious and successful performance, wassimply a feature of my own _Edward F. _! The translation is excellent;the Book itself a kind of jewel in its way. I do Norton's missionwithout the least delay, as you perceive. Ruskin's message to you passesthrough my hands sealed. I am ever your affectionate

T. CARLYLE. 

_Carlyle to Norton_. 

5 CHEYNE ROW, CHELSEA, 18 _April_ 1873. 

DEAR NORTON, It is possible Fitzgerald may have written to you; but whether or not Iwill send you his letter to myself, as a slight emblem and memorial ofthe peaceable, affectionate, and ultra modest man, and his innocent _farniente_ life, --and the connexion (were there nothing more) of Omar, theMahometan Blackguard, and Oliver Cromwell, the EnglishPuritan!--discharging you completely, at the same time, from everreturning me this letter, or taking any notice of it, except a smallsilent one. 

_FitzGerald to Carlyle_. 

(Enclosed in the preceding. )

[15 _April_ 1873. ]

MY DEAR CARLYLE, Thank you for enclosing Mr. Norton's Letter: and will you thank him forhis enclosure of Mr. Ruskin's? It is lucky for both R. And me that youdid not read his Note; a sudden fit of Fancy, I suppose, which he issubject to. But as it was kindly meant on his part, I have written tothank him. Rather late in the Day; for his Letter (which Mr. Nortonthinks may have lain a year or two in his Friend's Desk) is datedSeptember 1863. 

Which makes me think of our old Naseby Plans, so long talked of, andundone. I have made one more effort since I last wrote to you; bywriting to the Lawyer, as well as to the Agent, of the Estate; tointercede with the Trustees thereof, whose permission seems to benecessary. But neither Agent nor Lawyer have yet answered. I feel surethat you believe that I do honestly wish this thing to be done; the planof the Stone, and Inscription, both settled: the exact site ascertainedby some who were with me when I dug for you: so as we can even specifythe so many 'yards to the rear' which you stipulated for: only I believewe must write 'to the East--or Eastward'--in lieu of 'to the rear. ' Butfor this Change we must have your Permission as well as from the Trusteestheirs. 

I am glad to hear from Mr. Norton's Letter to you that you hold well, through all the Wet and Cold we have had for the last six months. OurChurch Bell here has been tolling for one and another of us veryconstantly. I get out on the River in my Boat, and dabble about my fiveacres of Ground just outside the Town. Sometimes I have thought youmight come to my pleasant home, where I never live, but where you shouldbe treated with better fare than you had at Farlingay: where I did notlike to disturb the Hostess' Economy. But I may say this: you would notcome; nor could I press you to do so. But I remain yours sincerely, Iassure you, E. F. G. 

P. S. Perhaps I had better write a word of thanks to Mr. Norton myself:which I will do. I suppose he may be found at the address he gives. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

WOODBRIDGE, _April_ 17/73. 

DEAR SIR, Two days ago Mr. Carlyle sent me your Note, enclosing one from Mr. Ruskin'to the Translator of Omar Khayyam. ' You will be a little surprized tohear that Mr. Ruskin's Note is dated September 1863: all but ten yearsago! I dare say he has forgotten all about it long before this: however, I write him a Note of Thanks for the good, too good, messages he sent me;better late than never; supposing that he will not be startled and boredby my Acknowledgments of a forgotten Favor rather than gratified. It isreally a funny little Episode in the Ten years' Dream. I had askedCarlyle to thank you also for such trouble as you have taken in thematter. But, as your Note to him carries your Address, I think I may aswell thank you for myself. I am very glad to gather from your Note thatCarlyle is well, and able to walk, as well as talk, with a congenialCompanion. Indeed, he speaks of such agreeable conversation with you inthe Message he appends to your Letter. For which thanking you once more, allow me to write myself yours sincerely, EDWARD FITZGERALD. 

_To W. F. Pollock_. 

[5 _May_, 1873. ]

DEAR POLLOCK, . . . I see that you were one of those who were at Macready's Funeral. I, too, feel as if I had lost a Friend, though I scarce knew him but on theStage. But there I knew him as Virginius very well, when I was a Boy(about 1821), and when Miss Foote was his Daughter. Jackson's Drawing ofhim in that Character is among the best of such Portraits, surely. Ithink I shall have a word about M. From Mrs. Kemble, with whom I havebeen corresponding a little since her return to England. She has latelybeen staying with her Son-in-Law, Mr. Leigh, at Stoneleigh Vicarage, nearKenilworth. In the Autumn she says she will go to America, never toreturn to England. But I tell her she will return. . . . 

My Eyes have been leaving me in the lurch again: partly perhaps fromtaxing them with a little more Reading: partly from going on the Water, and straining after our River Beacons, in hot Sun and East Wind; partlyalso, and _main partly_ I doubt, from growing so much older and the worsefor wear. I am afraid this very Letter will be troublesome to you toread: but I must write at a Gallop if at all. . . . 

[1873. ]

MY DEAR POLLOCK, . . . This is Sunday Night: 10 p. M. And what is the Evening Servicewhich I have been listening to? The 'Eustace Diamonds': which interestme almost as much as Tichborne. I really give the best proof I can ofthe Interest I take in Trollope's Novels, by constantly breaking out intoArgument with the Reader (who never replies) about what is said and doneby the People in the several Novels. I say 'No, no! She must have knownshe was lying!' 'He couldn't have been such a Fool! etc. '

[1873. ]

MY DEAR POLLOCK, . . . I am very shy of 'The Greatest Poem, ' The Greatest Picture, Symphony, etc. , but one single thing I always was assured of: that 'TheSchool' was the best Comedy in the English Language. Not wittier thanCongreve, etc. , but with Human Character that one likes in it; Charles, both Teazles, Sir Oliver, etc. Whereas the Congreve School inspires nosympathy with the People: who are Manners not Men, you know. Voila desuffisamment perore a ce sujet-la. . . . I set my Reader last night onbeginning The Mill on the Floss. I couldn't take to it more than toothers I have tried to read by the Greatest Novelist of the Day: but Iwill go on a little further. Oh for some more brave Trollope; who I amsure conceals a much profounder observation than these Dreadful Dennersof Romance under his lightsome and sketchy touch, as Gainboro compared toDenner. 

[_July_ 1873. ]

MY DEAR POLLOCK, Thank you for the Fraser, and your Paper in it: which I relished verymuch for its Humour, Discrimination, and easy style; like all you write. Perhaps I should not agree with you about all the Pictures: but you donot give me any great desire to put that to the test. 

Max Muller's Darwin Paper reminded me of an Observation in Bacon's Sylva;{160} that Apes and Monkeys, with Organs of Speech so much like Man'shave never been taught to speak an Articulate word: whereas Parrots andStarlings, with organs so unlike Man's, are easily taught to do so. Doyou know if Darwin, or any of his Followers, or Antagonists, advert tothis?

I have been a wonderful Journey--for me--even to Naseby inNorthamptonshire; to authenticate the spot where I dug up some bones ofthose slain there, for Gurlyle thirty years ago. We are to put up aStone there to record the fact, if we can get leave of the present Ownersof the Field; a permission, one would think, easy enough to obtain; but Ihave been more than a Year trying to obtain it, notwithstanding; and donot know that I am nearer the point after all. The Owner is a Minor: andthree Trustees must sanction the thing for him; and these three Trusteesare all great People, all living in different parts of England; and, Isuppose, forgetful of such a little matter, though their Estate-agent, and Lawyer, represented it to them long ago. 

I stayed at Cambridge some three hours on my way, so as to look at someof the Old, and New, Buildings, which I had not seen these dozen yearsand more. The Hall of Trinity looked to me very fine; and Sir Joshua'sDuke of Gloucester the most beautiful thing in it. I looked into theChapel, where they were at work: the Roof seemed to me being overdone:and Roubiliac's Newton is now nowhere, between the Statues of Bacon andBarrow which are executed on a larger scale. {161} And what doesSpedding say to Macaulay in that Company? I never saw Cambridge soempty, but not the less pleasant. 

[1873. ]

MY DEAR POLLOCK, Two or three years ago I had three or four of my Master-pieces done uptogether for admiring Friends. It has occurred to me to send you one ofthese instead of the single Dialogue which I was looking in the Box for. I think you have seen, or had, all the things but the last, {162} whichis the most impudent of all. It was, however, not meant for Scholars:mainly for Mrs. Kemble: but as I can't read myself, nor expect others ofmy age to read a long MS. I had it printed by a cheap friend (to thebane of other Friends), and here it is. You will see by the notice thatAEschylus is left 'nowhere, ' and why; a modest proviso. Still I thinkthe Story is well compacted: the Dialogue good, (with one single littleoriginality; of riding into Rhyme as Passion grows) and the Choruses(mostly 'rot' quoad Poetry) still serving to carry on the subject of theStory in the way of Inter-act. Try one or two Women with a dose of itone day; not Lady Pollock, who knows better. . . . When I look over thelittle Prose Dialogue, I see lots that might be weeded. I wonder at oneword which is already crossed--'_Emergency_. ' 'An Emergency!' I thinkBlake could have made a Picture of it as he did of the Flea. Somethingof the same disgusting Shape too. . . . Blake seems to me to have finethings: but as by random, like those of a Child, or a Madman, of Genius. Is there one good whole Piece, of ever so few lines? . . . 

What do you think of a French saying quoted by Heine, that when 'Le bonDieu' gets rather bored in Heaven, he opens the windows, and takes a lookat the Boulevards? Heine's account of the Cholera in France iswonderful. 

[1873. ]

MY DEAR POLLOCK, I am wondering in what Idiom you will one day answer my last. {163a}Meanwhile, I have to thank you for Lady Pollock's Article on AmericanLiterature: which I like, as all of hers. Only, I cannot understand herAdmiration of Emerson's 'Humble Bee'; which, without her Comment, Ishould have taken for a Burlesque on Barry Cornwall, or some of thatLondon School. Surely, that 'Animated Torrid Zone' without which 'All isMartyrdom, ' etc. , is rather out of Proportion. I wish she had been ableto tell us that ten copies of Crabbe sold in America for one in England:rather than Philip of Artevelde. Perhaps Crabbe does too. What do youand Miladi think of these two Lines of his which returned to me the otherday? Talking of poor Vagrants, etc. , Whom Law condemns, and Justice with a Sigh Pursuing, shakes her Sword, and passes by. {163b}

There are heaps of such things lying hid in the tangle of Crabbe'scareless verse; and yet such things, you know, are not the best of him, the distressing Old Man! Who would expect such a Prettyness as this ofhim?

 As of fair Virgins dancing in a round, Each binds the others, and herself is bound--{163c}

so the several Callings and Duties of Men in Civilized Life, etc. Come!If Lady Pollock will write the Reason of all this, I will supply her witha Lot of it without her having the trouble of looking through all theeight volumes for it. I really can do little more than like, or dislike, Dr. Fell, without a further Reason: which is none at all, though it maybe a very good one. So I distinguish _Phil_-osophers, and_Fell_-osophers; which is rather a small piece of Wit. And I don't likethe Humble Bee; and won't like the Humble Bee, in spite of all the goodreasons Miladi gives why I should; and so tell her: and tell her toforgive hers and yours always, E. F. G. 

_To W. B. Donne_. 

ALDE COTTAGE, ALDEBURGH. _August_ 18, [1873]. 

MY DEAR DONNE, There being a change of servants in Market Hill, Woodbridge, I came herefor a week, bringing Tacitus {164} in my Pocket. You know I don'tpretend to judge of History: I can only say that you tell the Story ofTacitus' own Life, and of what he has to tell of others, very readablyindeed to my Thinking: and so far I think my Thinking is to be relied on. Some of the Translations from T. By your other hands read so well alsothat I have wished to get at the original. But I really want an Editionsuch as you promised to begin upon. Thirty years ago I thought I couldmake out these Latins and Greeks sufficiently well for my own purpose; Ido not think so now; and want good help of other men's Scholarship, andalso of better Eyes than my own. 

I am not sure if you were ever at this place: I fancy you once were. Itis duller even than it used to be: because of even the Fishing havingalmost died away. But the Sea and the Shore remain the same; as to Nero, in that famous passage {165} I remember you pointed out to me: not quiteso sad to me as to him, but not very lively. I have brought a volume ortwo of Walpole's Letters by way of amusement. I wish you were here; andI will wait here if you care to come. Might not the Sea Air do you good?

_To T. Carlyle_. 

WOODBRIDGE, _Septr. _ 8/73. 

MY DEAR CARLYLE, Enclosed is the Naseby Lawyer's answer on behalf of the Naseby Trustees. I think it will seem marvellous in your Eyes, as it does in mine. 

You will see that I had suggested whether moving the _Obelisk_, the'foolish Obelisk, ' might not be accomplished in case The Stone wererejected. You see also that my Lawyer offers his mediation in the matterif wished. I cannot believe the Trustees would listen to this Scheme anymore than to the other. Nor do I suppose you would be satisfied with thefoolish Obelisk's Inscription, which warns Kings not to exceed their justPrerogative, nor Subjects [to swerve from] their lawful Obedience, etc. , but does not say that it stands on the very spot where the Ashes of theDead told of the final Struggle. 

I say, I do not suppose any good will come of this second Application. The Trouble is nothing to me; but I will not trouble this Lawyer, Agent, etc. , till I hear from you that you wish me to do so. I suppose you arenow away from Chelsea; I hope among your own old places in the North. ForI think, and I find, that as one grows old one returns to one's oldhaunts. However, my letter will reach you sooner or later, I dare say:and, if one may judge from what has passed, there will be no hurry in anyfuture Decision of the 'Three Incomprehensibles. '

I have nothing to tell of myself; having been nowhere but to that Naseby. I am among my old haunts: so have not to travel. But I shall be veryglad to hear that you are the better for having done so; and remain yourancient Bedesman, E. F. G. 

_From T. Carlyle_. 

THE HILL, DUMFRIES, N. B. 13 _Sep. _, 1873. 

DEAR FITZGERALD, There is something at once pathetic and ridiculous and altogethermiserable and contemptible in the fact you at last announce that by onecaprice and another of human folly perversity and general length of ear, our poor little enterprize is definitively forbidden to us. Alas, ourpoor little 'inscription, ' so far as I remember it, was not more criminalthan that of a number on a milestone; in fact the whole adventure waslike that of setting up an authentic _milestone_ in a tract of country(spiritual and physical) mournfully in want of measurement; that was_our_ highly innocent offer had the unfortunate Rulers of the Element inthat quarter been able to perceive it at all! Well; since they haven't, one thing at least is clear, that our attempt is finished, and that fromthis hour we will devoutly give it up. That of shifting the now existingpyramid from Naseby village and rebuilding it on Broadmoor seems to meentirely inadmissible;--and in fact unless _you_ yourself should resolve, which I don't counsel, on marking, by way of foot-note, on the nowexisting pyramid, accurately how many yards off and in what direction thereal battle ground lies from it, there is nothing visible to me which canwithout ridiculous impropriety be done. 

The trouble and bother you have had with all this, which I know are verygreat, cannot be repaid you, dear old friend, except by my piousthankfulness, which I can well assure you shall not be wanting. Butactual _money_, much or little, which the surrounding blockheadsconnected with this matter have first and last cost you, this I dorequest that you will accurately sum up that I may pay the half of it, asis my clear debt and right. This I do still expect from you; after which_Finis_ upon this matter for ever and a day. . . . 

Good be ever with you, dear FitzGerald, I am and remain Yours truly(_Signed_) T. CARLYLE. 

_To W. F. Pollock_. 

[16 _Dec. _ 1873. ]

. . . What do you think I am reading? Voltaire's 'Pucelle': the Epic hewas fitted for. It is poor in Invention, I think: but wonderful for easyWit, and the Verse much more agreeable to me than the regularly rhymedAlexandrines. I think Byron was indebted to it in his Vision ofJudgment, and Juan: his best works. There are fine things too: as whenGrisbourdon suddenly slain tells his Story to the Devils in Hell where heunexpectedly makes his Appearance, Et tout l'Enfer en rit d'assez bon coeur. 

This is nearer the Sublime, I fancy, than anything in the Henriade. Andone Canto ends:

 J'ai dans mon temps possede des maitresses, Et j'aime encore a retrouver mon coeur--

is very pretty in the old Sinner. . . . 

I am engaged in preparing to depart from these dear Rooms where I havebeen thirteen years, and don't know yet where I am going. {169}

_To John Allen_. 

GRANGE FARM: WOODBRIDGE_Febr_: 21/74. 

MY DEAR ALLEN, While I was reading a volume of Ste. Beuve at Lowestoft a Fortnight ago, I wondered if you got on with him; j'avais envie de vous ecrire unepetite Lettre a ce sujet: but I let it go by. Now your Letter comes; andI will write: only a little about S. B. However, only that: the Volume Ihad with me was vol. III. Of my Edition (I don't know if yours is thesame), and I thought you [would] like _all_ of three Causeries in it:Rousseau, Frederick the Great, and Daguesseau: the rest you might not somuch care for: nor I neither. 

Hare's Spain was agreeable to hear read: I have forgot all about it. His'Memorials' were insufferably tiresome to me. You don't speak ofTichborne, which I never tire of: only wondering that the Lord ChiefJustice sets so much Brains to work against so foolish a Bird. {170} TheSpectator on Carlyle is very good, I think. As to Politics I scarcemeddle with them. I have been glad to revert to Don Quixote, which Iread easily enough in the Spanish: it is so delightful that I don'tgrudge looking into a Dictionary for the words I forget. It won't do inEnglish; or _has not done_ as yet: the English colloquial is not theSpanish do. It struck me oddly that--of all things in the world!--SirThomas Browne's Language might suit. 

They now sell at the Railway Stalls Milnes' Life of Keats for half acrown, as well worth the money as any Book. I would send you a Copy ifyou liked: as I bought three or four to give away. 

You may see that I have changed my Address: obliged to leave the Lodgingwhere I had been thirteen years: and to come here to my own house, whileanother Lodging is getting ready, which I doubt I shall not inhabit, asit will entail Housekeeping on me. But I like to keep my house for myNieces: it is not my fault they do not make it their home. 

Ever yours, E. F. G. 

_To S. Laurence_. 

GRANGE FARM, WOODBRIDGE. _February_ 26/74. 

MY DEAR LAURENCE, . . . I am not very solicitous about the Likeness {171} as I might be ofsome dear Friend; but I was willing to have a Portrait of the Poet whom Iam afraid I read more than any other of late and with whose Family (asyou know) I am kindly connected. The other Portrait, which you wanted tosee, and I hope have not seen, is by Phillips; and just represents what Ileast wanted, Crabbe's company look; whereas Pickersgill represents theThinker. So I fancy, at least. 

LITTLE GRANGE, WOODBRIDGE. [_July_ 4/74. ]

MY DEAR LAURENCE, . . . I am (for a wonder) going out on a few days' visit. . . . And, once out, I meditate a run to Edinburgh, only to see where Sir WalterScott lived and wrote about. But as I have meditated this greatEnterprize for these thirty years, it may perhaps now end again inmeditation only. . . . 

I am just finishing Forster's Dickens: very good, I think: only, he hasno very nice perception of Character, I think, or chooses not to let hisreaders into it. But there is enough to show that Dickens was a verynoble fellow as well as a very wonderful one. . . . I, for one, worshipDickens, in spite of Carlyle and the Critics: and wish to see hisGadshill as I wished to see Shakespeare's Stratford and Scott'sAbbotsford. One must love the Man for that. 

_To W. F. Pollock_. 

LITTLE GRANGE, WOODBRIDGE. _July_ 23, [1874]. 

But I did get to Abbotsford, and was rejoiced to find it was not at allCockney, not a Castle, but only in the half-castellated style of heaps ofother houses in Scotland; the Grounds simply and broadly laid out beforethe windows, down to a field, down to the Tweed, with the woods which heleft so little, now well aloft and flourishing, and I was glad. I couldnot find my way to Maida's Grave in the Garden, with its false Quantity, Ad januam Domini, etc. 

which the Whigs and Critics taunted Scott with, and Lockhart had done it. 'You know I don't care a curse about what I write'; nor about what wasimputed to him. In this, surely like Shakespeare: as also in otherrespects. I will worship him, in spite of Gurlyle, who sent me an uglyAutotype of Knox whom I was to worship instead. 

Then I went to see Jedburgh {172} Abbey, in a half ruined corner of whichhe lies entombed--Lockhart beside him--a beautiful place, with his ownTweed still running close by, and his Eildon Hills looking on. The manwho drove me about showed me a hill which Sir Walter was very fond ofvisiting, from which he could see over the Border, etc. This hill isbetween Abbotsford and Jedburgh: {173} and when his Coach horses, whodrew his Hearse, got there, to that hill, they could scarce be got on. 

My mission to Scotland was done; but some civil pleasant people, whom Imet at Abbotsford, made me go with them (under Cook's guidance) to theTrossachs, Katrine, Lomond, etc. , which I did not care at all about; butit only took a day. After which, I came in a day to London, rather gladto be in my old flat land again, with a sight of my old Sea as we camealong. 

And in London I went to see my dear old Donne, because of wishing toassure myself, with my own eyes, of his condition; and I can safely sayhe looked better than before his Illness, near two years ago. He had ahealthy colour; was erect, alert, and with his old humour, and interestin our old topics. . . . 

I looked in at the Academy, as poor a show as ever I had seen, I thought;only Millais attracted me: a Boy with a red Sash: and that old Seamanwith his half-dreaming Eyes while the Lassie reads to him. I had noCatalogue: and so thought the Book was--The Bible--to which she wasdrawing his thoughts, while the sea-breeze through the open Windowwhispered of his old Life to him. But I was told afterwards (at Donne'sindeed) that it was some account of a N. W. Passage she was reading. TheRoll Call I could not see, for a three deep file of worshippers beforeit: I only saw the 'hairy Cap' as Thackeray in his Ballad, {174} and Isupposed one would see all in a Print as well as in the Picture. But thePhoto of Miss Thompson herself gives me a very favourable impression ofher. It really looks, in face and dress, like some of Sir Joshua'sWomen. . . . 

Another Miss Austen! Of course under Spedding's Auspices, the Father ofEvil. 

_From W. H. Thompson to W. A. Wright_. 

On 17 July 1883, shortly after FitzGerald's death, the late Master ofTrinity wrote to me from Harrogate, 'As regards FitzGerald's letters, Ihave preserved a good many, which I will look through when we return toCollege. I have a long letter from Carlyle to him, which F. Gave me. Itis a Carlylesque etude on Spedding, written from dictation by his niece, but signed by the man himself in a breaking hand. The thing is to mymind more characteristic of T. Carlyle than of James Spedding--that"victorious man" as C. Calls him. He seems unaware of one distinguishingfeature of J. S. 's mind--its subtlety of perception--and the excellenceof his English style escapes his critic, whose notices on that subject bythe bye would not necessarily command assent. '

_From Thomas Carlyle_. 

5 CHEYNE ROW, CHELSEA6 _Nov. _ 1874. 

DEAR FITZGERALD, Thanks for your kind little Letter. I am very glad to learn that you areso cheerful and well, entering the winter under such favourable omens. Ilingered in Scotland, latterly against my will, for about six weeks: thescenes there never can cease to be impressive to me; indeed as natural inlate visits they are far too impressive, and I have to wander there likea solitary ghost among the graves of those that are gone from me, sad, sad, and I always think while there, ought not this visit to be the last?

But surely I am well pleased with your kind affection for the Land, especially for Edinburgh and the scenes about it. By all means go againto Edinburgh (tho' the old city is so shorn of its old grim beauty and isbecome a place of Highland shawls and railway shriekeries); worshipScott, withal, as vastly superior to the common run of authors, andindeed grown now an affectingly _tragic_ man. Don't forget Burns eitherand Ayrshire and the West next time you go; there are admirableantiquities and sceneries in those parts, leading back (Whithorn forexample, _Whitterne_ or _candida casa_) to the days of St. Cuthbert; notto speak of Dumfries with Sweetheart Abbey and the brooks and hills acertain friend of yours first opened his eyes to in this astonishingworld. 

I am what is called very well here after my return, worn weak as acobweb, but without bodily ailment except the yearly increasing inabilityto digest food; my mind, too, if usually mournful instead of joyful, isseldom or never to be called miserable, and the steady gazing into thegreat unknown, which is near and comes nearer every day, ought to furnishabundant employment to the serious soul. I read, too; that is myhappiest state, when I can get _good books_, which indeed I more and morerarely can. 

Like yourself I have gone through _Spedding_, seven long long volumes, not skipping except where I had got the sense with me, and generallyreading all of Bacon's own that was there: I confess to you I found it amost creditable and even surprising Book, offering the most perfect andcomplete image both of Bacon and of Spedding, and distinguished as thehugest and faithfullest bit of literary navvy work I have ever met within this generation. Bacon is washed clean down to the natural skin; andtruly he is not nor ever was unlovely to me; a man of no culpability tospeak of; of an opulent and even magnificent intellect, but all in themagnificent prose vein. Nothing or almost nothing of the 'melodieseternal' to be traced in him. Spedding's Book will last as long as thereis any earnest memory held of Bacon, or of the age of James VI. , uponwhom as upon every stirring man in his epoch Spedding has shed newveritable illumination; in almost the whole of which I perfectlycoincided with Spedding. In effect I walked up to the worthy man'shouse, whom I see but little, to tell him all this; and that being amiss, I drove up, Spedding having by request called here and missed me, but hitherto we have not met; and Spedding I doubt not could contrive todispense with my eulogy. There is a grim strength in Spedding, quietly, very quietly invincible, which I did not quite know of till this Book;and in all ways I could congratulate the indefatigably patient, placidlyinvincible and victorious Spedding. 

Adieu, dear F. I wish you a right quiet and healthy winter, and beg tobe kept in memory as now probably your oldest friend. 

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

_To W. H. Thompson_. 

[9 _Nov. _ 1874. ]

MY DEAR MASTER, I think there can be no criminal breach of Confidence in your taking aCopy, if you will, of C[arlyle]'s Letter. Indeed, you are welcome tokeep it:--there was but one Person else I wished to show it to, and she(a _She_) can do very well without it. I sent it to you directly I gotit, because I thought you would be as pleased as I was with C. 's encomiumon Spedding, which will console him (if he needs Consolation) for theobduracy of the World at large, myself among the number. I can indeedfully assent to Carlyle's Admiration of Spedding's History of the_Times_, as well as of the Hero who lived in them. But the Questionstill remains--was it worth forty years of such a Life as Spedding's towrite even so good an Account of a few, not the most critical, Years ofEnglish History, and to leave Bacon (I think) a little less well off thanwhen S. Began washing him: I mean in the eyes of candid and sensible men, who simply supposed before that Bacon was no better than the Men of hisTime, and now J. S. Has proved it. I have no doubt that Carlyle takes upthe Cudgels because he thinks the World is now going the other way. IfSpedding's Book had been praised by the Critics--Oh Lord!

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

If Lord Houghton be with you pray thank him for the first _ebauche_ ofHyperion he sent me. Surely no one can doubt which was the first Sketch. 

_To Miss Anna Biddell_. 

12 MARINE TERRACE, LOWESTOFT. _Jan. _ 18/75. 

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 byAge: losing some of its former fierceness, and grown mellow withoutlosing Strength. It seems to me that a Child might read and relish thisPaper, while it would puzzle any other Man to write such a one. I thinkI 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 (which also has notsunk into Decrepitude) rolling in from that North: and as I looked upfrom the Book, there was a Norwegian Barque beating Southward, close tothe Shore, and nearly all Sail set. Read--Read! you will, you must, bepleased; and write to tell me so. 

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

LOWESTOFT. _Febr. _ 2/75. 

DEAR MISS BIDDELL, I am _so_ glad (as the Gushingtons say) that you like the Carlyle. Ihave ordered the second Number and will send it to you when I have readit. Some People, I believe, hesitate in their Belief of its being T. C. Or one of his School: I don't for a moment: if for no other reason thanthat an Imitator always exaggerates his Model: whereas this Paper, wesee, _un_exaggerates the Master himself: as one would wish at his time ofLife. . . . 

I ran over for one day to Woodbridge, to pay Bills, etc. But somehow Iwas glad to get back here. The little lodging is more to my liking thanmy own bigger rooms and staircases: and this cheerful Town better (atthis Season) than my yet barren Garden. One little Aconite howeverlooked up at me: Mr. Churchyard (in his elegant way) used to call them'New Year's Gifts. '

_To E. B. Cowell_. 

12 MARINE TERRACE, LOWESTOFT. _Feb. _ 2/75. 

MY DEAR COWELL, . . . I hope you have read, and liked, the Paper on the old Kings ofNorway in last Fraser. I bought it because the Athenaeum told me it wasCarlyle's; others said it was an Imitation of him: but his it must be, iffor no other reason than that the Imitator, you know, always exaggerateshis Master: whereas in this Paper Carlyle is softened down from his oldSelf, 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 aLine 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 easyGrace, humour, etc. But it is (like La Fontaine) too thin a Wine for me:all sparkling with little adventures, but no one to care about; noColour, no Breadth, like my dear Don; whom I shall resort to forthwith. 

_To W. F. Pollock_. 

LOWESTOFT, _Sept. _ 22, [1878]. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, You will scarce thank me for a letter in pencil: perhaps you would thankme less if I used the steel pen, which is my other resource. You couldvery well dispense with a Letter altogether: and yet I believe it ispleasant 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 ofhis Face (as also the Attitude) almost too solemn, even for the Christwithin. But some time after, when A. T. Was married, and had a Son, hetold me that Raffaelle was all right: that no Man's face was so solemn asa 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 youthis 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. Hesays God forgot to give Raffaelle to Greece, and made a 'joli cadeau' ofhim to the Church of Rome. 

I brought here some Volumes of Lever's 'Cornelius O'Dowd' Essays, verymuch better reading than Addison, I think. Also some of Sainte Beuve'sbetter than either. A sentence in O'Dowd reminded me of your Distrust ofCivil Service Examinations: 'You could not find a worse Pointer than thePoodle which would pick you out all the letters of the Alphabet. ' And isnot this pretty good of the World we live in? 'You ask me if I am goingto "_The Masquerade_. " I am at it: Circumspice!'

So I pick out and point to other Men's Game, this Sunday Morning, whenthe Sun makes the Sea shine, and a strong head wind drives the Ships withshortened Sail across it. Last night I was with some Sailors at the Inn:some one came in who said there was a Schooner with five feet water inher in the Roads: and off they went to see if anything beside water couldbe got out of her. But, as you say, one mustn't be epigrammatic andclever. Just before Grog and Pipe, the Band had played some GermanWaltzes, a bit of Verdi, Rossini's 'Cujus animam, ' and a capital Sailors'Tramp-chorus from Wagner, all delightful to me, on the Pier: how muchbetter than all the dreary oratorios going on all the week at Norwich;Elijah, St. Peter, St. Paul, Eli, etc. There will be an Oratorio forevery Saint and Prophet; which reminds me of my last Story. Voltaire hadan especial grudge against Habakkuk. Some one proved to him that he hadmisrepresented facts in Habakkuk's history. 'C'est egal, ' says V. , 'Habakkuk etait capable de tout. ' Cornewall Lewis, who (like most otherWhigs) had no Humour, yet tells this: I wonder if it will reach Dresden. 

_To Mrs. W. H. Thompson_. 

LITTLE GRANGE, WOODBRIDGE. _Sept. _ 23, [1875]. 

DEAR MRS. THOMPSON, It is very good of you to write to me, so many others as, I know, youmust have to write to. I can tell you but little in return for the Storyof your Summer Travel: but what little I have to say shall be said atonce. As to Travel, I have got no further than Norfolk, and am rathersorry 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 theRiver here: with my Garden, Pigeons, Ducks, etc. ; a great Philosopherindeed! But (to make an end of oneself) I have not been well all thesummer; 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 itscoming too soon. . . . 

I had a kindly Letter from Carlyle some days ago: he was summering atsome place near Bromley in Kent, lent him by a Lady Derby; once, he says, Lady Salisbury, which I don't understand. He had also the use of aPhaeton and Pony; which latter he calls '_Shenstone_' from a partialityto stopping at every Inn door. Carlyle had been a little touched inrevisiting Eltham, and remembering Frank Edgeworth who resided thereforty years ago 'with a little Spanish Wife, but no pupils. ' Carlylewould name him with a sort of sneer in the Life of Sterling; {184} couldnot see that any such notice was more than needless, just afterEdgeworth's Death. This is all a little Scotch indelicacy to otherpeople's feelings. But now Time and his own Mortality soften him. Ihave been looking over his Letters to me about Cromwell: the amazingperseverance and accuracy of the Man, who writes so passionately! In aletter of about 1845 or 6 he says he has burned at least six attempts atCromwell's Life: and finally falls back on sorting and elucidating theLetters, as a sure Groundwork. . . . 

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

_To E. B. Cowell_. 

[1875. ]

MY DEAR COWELL, . . . I told Elizabeth, I think, all I had to write about Arthur C. Ihad a letter from him a few days ago, hoping to see me in London, where Ithought I might be going about this time, and where I would not gowithout giving him notice to meet me, poor lad. As yet however I cannotscrew my Courage to go up: I have no Curiosity about what is to be seenor heard there; my Day is done. I have not been very well all thisSummer, and fancy that I begin to 'smell the Ground, ' as Sailors say ofthe Ship that slackens speed as the Water shallows under her. I can'tsay I have much care for long Life: but still less for long Death: I meana 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 allgenuine, and the same intense Feeling expressed in a hundred natural yetgraceful ways: and beside all this such good Sense, good Feeling, Humour, Love of Books and Country Life, as makes her certainly the Queen of allLetter writers. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

LITTLE GRANGE, WOODBRIDGE, SUFFOLK. (_Post Mark Dec. _ 8. ) _Dec. _ 9/75. 

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

Some eighty of Carlyle's Friends and Admirers have been presenting himwith a Gold Medal of himself, and an Address of Congratulation on his80th Birthday. I should not have supposed that either Medal or Addresswould be much to his Taste: but, as more important People than myselfjoined in the Thing, I did not think it became me to demur. But I shallnot the less write him my half-yearly Letter of Good Hopes and GoodWishes. He seems to have been well and happy in our pretty County ofKent during the Summer. 

Believe me, with Thanks for the Interest you have taken in my _Libretti_, yours sincerely, E. FITZGERALD. 

P. S. I am doing an odd thing in bethinking me of sending you twoCalderon Plays, which my friend Mrs. Kemble has spoken of also in yourCountry. So you might one day hear of them: and, if you liked what camebefore, wish to see them. So here they are, for better or worse; and, atany rate, one Note of Thanks (which I doubt you will feel bound to write)will do for both, and you can read as little as you please of either. Allthese 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 knewthem not: and printed, because (like many others, I suppose) I can onlydress my best when seeing myself in Type, in the same way as I can scarceread others unless in such a form. I suppose there was some Vanity in itall: but really, if I had that strong, I might have done (consideringwhat little I can do) like Crabbe's Bachelor--

 I might have made a Book, but that my Pride In the not making was more gratified. {187}

Do you read more of Crabbe than we his Countrymen?

_To Miss Aitken_. {188a}

WOODBRIDGE. _Dec. _ 9/75. 

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 judgefrom it that he is well. I think he will thrash me (as Bentley said{188b}) even now. 

I must say I scarce knew what to do when asked to join in that BirthdayAddress. I did not know whether it would be agreeable to your Uncle: andof course I could not ask him. So I asked Spedding and Pollock, andfound they were of the Party: so it did not become me to hesitate. Ihope 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 asto Mr. Carlyle, 'c'est une autre affaire. ' It was not meant for anyGreek Scholar, and only for a few not Greek, who I thought would beinterested, as they have been, in my curious Version. Among these wasMrs. Kemble, who I suppose it is has praised it in a way that somehowgains ground in America. But your Uncle--a few years ago he would havebeen 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 evennow think--but in Pity now--how much better one might have spent one'stime (though not very much was spent) than in such Dilettanteism. Sotell 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. 

_Fragment of a Letter to Miss Biddell_. 

_Dec. _ 1875. 

Thank you for the paragraph about Shelley. Somehow I don't believe theStory, {189} in spite of Trelawney's Authority. Let them produce theConfessor who is reported to tell the Story; otherwise one does not needany more than such a Squall as we have late had in these Seas, and yetmore sudden, I believe, in those, to account for the Disaster. 

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

_To S. Laurence_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _Dec. _ 30/75. 

MY DEAR LAURENCE, . . . I cannot get on with Books about the Daily Life which I find ratherinsufferable in practice about me. I never could read Miss Austen, nor(later) 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 theshelf, and am half afraid to touch them. He, you know, could go deeperinto the Springs of Common Action than these Ladies: wonderful he is, butnot Delightful, which one thirsts for as one gets old and dry. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

LITTLE GRANGE, WOODBRIDGE. _Jan. _ 23/76. 

MY DEAR SIR, . . . I suppose you may see one of the Carlyle Medallions: and you canjudge better of the Likeness than I, who have not been to Chelsea, andhardly out of Suffolk, these fifteen years and more. I dare say it islike him: but his Profile is not his best phase. In two notes dictatedby him since that Business he has not adverted to it: I think he must bea little ashamed of it, though it would not do to say so in return, Isuppose. 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 ifcalled on; but, meanwhile, he has only sat pretty comfortably at Chelsea, scolding all the world for not being Heroic, and not always very precisein telling them how. He has, however, been so far heroic, as to bealways 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 ischanged, or subdued, at eighty: but up to the last ten years he seemed tome just the same as when I first knew him five and thirty years ago. Whata Fortune he might have made by showing himself about as a Lecturer, asThackeray and Dickens did; I don't mean they did it for Vanity: but tomake money: and that to spend generously. Carlyle did indeed lecturenear forty years ago before he was a Lion to be shown, and when he hadbut few Readers. I heard his 'Heroes' which now seems to me one of hisbest Books. He looked very handsome then, with his black hair, fineEyes, and a sort of crucified Expression. 

I know of course (in Books) several of those you name in your Letter:Longfellow, whom I may say I love, and so (I see) can't call him_Mister_: and Emerson whom I admire, for I don't feel that I know thePhilosopher so well as the Poet: and Mr. Lowell's 'Among my Books' isamong mine. I also have always much liked, I think rather loved, O. W. Holmes. I scarce know why I could never take to that man of true Genius, Hawthorne. There is a little of my Confession of Faith about yourCountrymen, and I should say mine, if I were not more Irish than English. 

[WOODBRIDGE. _Feb. _ 7/76. ]

MY DEAR SIR, I will not look on the Book you have sent me as any Return for theBooklet I sent you, but as a free and kindly Gift. I really don't knowthat you could have sent me a better. I have read it with morecontinuous attention and gratification than I now usually feel, andalways (as Lamb suggested) well disposed to say Grace after reading. 

Seeing what Mr. Lowell has done for Dante, Rousseau, etc. , one does notwish him to be limited in his Subjects: but I do wish he would do forEnglish Writers what Ste. Beuve has done for French. Mr. Lowell so fargoes along with him as to give so much of each Writer's Life as mayillustrate his Writings; he has more Humour (in which alone I fancy S. B. Somewhat wanting), more extensive Reading, I suppose; and a power ofmetaphorical Illustration which (if I may say so) seems to me to wantonly a little reserve in its use: as was the case perhaps with Hazlitt. But Mr. Lowell is not biassed by Hazlitt's--(by anybody's, so far as Isee)--party or personal prejudices; and altogether seems to me the manmost fitted to do this Good Work, where it has not (as with Carlyle'sJohnson) been done, for good and all, before. Of course, one only wantsthe Great Men, in their kind: Chaucer, Pope (Dryden being done {193}), and perhaps some of the 'minora sidera' clustered together, as Hazlitthas done them. Perhaps all this will come forth in some future Serieseven now gathering in Mr. Lowell's Head. However that may be, thispresent Series will make me return to some whom I have not lately lookedup. Dante's face I have not seen these ten years: only his Back on myBook Shelf. What Mr. Lowell says of him recalled to me what Tennysonsaid to me some thirty-five or forty years ago. We were stopping beforea shop in Regent Street where were two Figures of Dante and Goethe. I (Isuppose) said, 'What is there in old Dante's Face that is missing inGoethe's?' And Tennyson (whose Profile then had certainly a remarkablelikeness to Dante's) said: 'The Divine. ' Then Milton; I don't think I'veread him these forty years; the whole Scheme of the Poem, and certainParts of it, looming as grand as anything in my Memory; but I never couldread ten lines together without stumbling at some Pedantry that tipped meat once out of Paradise, or even Hell, into the Schoolroom, worse thaneither. Tennyson again used to say that the two grandest of all Simileswere those of the Ships hanging in the Air, and 'the Gunpowder one, 'which he used slowly and grimly to enact, in the Days that are no more. He certainly then thought Milton the sublimest of all the Gang; hisDiction modelled on Virgil, as perhaps Dante's. 

Spenser I never could get on with, and (spite of Mr. Lowell's good word)shall still content myself with such delightful Quotations from him asone 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 Eclipseconsequent on the Glory which followed his obscure Rise. I rememberfifty years ago at our Cambridge, when the Battle was fighting for him bythe Few against the Many of us who only laughed at 'Louisa in the Shade, 'etc. His Brother was then Master of Trinity College; like allWordsworths (unless the drowned Sailor) pompous and priggish. He used todrawl out the Chapel responses so that we called him the 'MeeserableSinner' and his brother the 'Meeserable Poet. ' Poor fun enough: but Inever 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 farmore Justice than his own Countryman Carlyle, who won't allow him to be aHero in any way, but sets up such a cantankerous narrow-minded Bigot asJohn Knox in his stead. I did go to worship at Abbotsford, as toStratford on Avon: and saw that it was good to have so done. If you, ifMr. Lowell, have not lately read it, pray read Lockhart's account of hisJourney to Douglas Dale on (I think) July 18 or 19, 1831. It is a pieceof Tragedy, even to the muttering Thunder, like the Lammermuir, whichdoes not look very small beside Peter Bell and Co. 

My dear Sir, this is a desperate Letter; and that last Sentence will leadto another dirty little Story about my Daddy: to which you must listen orI 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 burstingwith Malice!' And perhaps you on the other Side of the Great Water maybe amused with a little of your old Granny's Gossip. 

Well then: about 1826, or 7, Professor Airy (now our Astronomer Royal)and his Brother William called on the Daddy at Rydal. In the course ofConversation Daddy mentioned that sometimes when genteel Parties came tovisit him, he contrived to slip out of the room, and down the garden walkto where 'The Party's' travelling Carriage stood. This Carriage he wouldlook into to see what Books they carried with them: and he observed itwas generally 'WALTER SCOTT'S. ' It was Airy's Brother (a very veraciousman, and an Admirer of Wordsworth, but, to be sure, more of Sir Walter)who told me this. It is this conceit that diminishes Wordsworth'sstature among us, in spite of the mountain Mists he lived among. Also, alittle stinginess; not like Sir Walter in that! I remember HartleyColeridge telling us at Ambleside how Professor Wilson and some one else(H. C. Himself perhaps) stole a Leg of Mutton from Wordsworth's Larderfor the fun of the Thing. 

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

P. S. By way of something better from the old World, I post you Hazlitt'sown Copy of his English Poets, with a few of his marks for anotherEdition in it. If you like to keep it, pray do: if you like better togive it to Hazlitt's successor, Mr. Lowell, do that from yourself. 

_To Mrs. Cowell_. 

12 MARINE TERRACE, LOWESTOFT. _April_ 8/76. 

. . . 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 toAbbotsford and Stratford. She has been my Companion here; quite alive inthe Room with me. I sometimes lament I did not know her before: butperhaps such an Acquaintance comes in best to cheer one toward the End. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

LITTLE GRANGE, WOODBRIDGE. _June_ 10 {196}, [1876]. 

MY DEAR SIR, I don't know that I should trouble you so soon again--(only, don'ttrouble yourself to answer for form's sake only)--but that there is agood deal of Wordsworth in the late Memoir of Haydon by his Son. Allthis you might like to see; as also Mr. Lowell. And do you, or he, knowof some dozen very good Letters of Wordsworth's addressed to a Mr. Gillies who published them in what he calls the Life of a LiteraryVeteran some thirty years ago, {197} I think? This Book, of scarce anyvalue except for those few Letters, and a few Notices of Sir WalterScott, all good, is now not very common, I think. If you or Mr. Lowellwould like to have a Copy, I can send you one, through Quaritch, if notper Post: I have the Letters separately bound up from another Copy oflong ago. There is also a favorable account of a meeting betweenWordsworth and Foscolo in an otherwise rather valueless Memoir of Bewickthe Painter. I tell you of all this Wordsworth, because you have, Ithink, a more religious regard for him than we on this side the water: heis not so much honoured in his own Country, I mean, his Poetry. I, forone, feel all his lofty aspiration, and occasional Inspiration, but Icannot say that, on the whole, he makes much of it; his little pastoralpieces seem to me his best: less than a Quarter of him. But I may bewrong. 

I am very much obliged to you for wishing me to see Mr. Ticknor's Life, etc. I hope to make sure of that through our Briareus-handed Mudie; andhave marked the Book for my next Order. For I suppose that it finds itsway to English Publishers, or Librarians. I remember his SpanishLiterature coming out, and being for a long time in the hands of myfriend Professor Cowell, who taught me what I know of Spanish. Only aweek ago I began my dear Don Quixote over again; as welcome and fresh asthe Flowers of May. The Second Part is my favorite, in spite of whatLamb and Coleridge (I think) say; when, as old Hallam says, Cervantes hasfallen in Love with the Hero whom he began by ridiculing. When thisLetter is done I shall get out into my Garden with him, Sunday though itbe. 

We have also Memoirs of Godwin, very dry, I think; indeed with verylittle worth reading, except two or three Letters of dear Charles Lamb, 'Saint Charles, ' as Thackeray once called him, while looking at one ofhis half-mad Letters, and remember[ing] his Devotion to that quite madSister. I must say I think his Letters infinitely better than hisEssays; and Patmore says his Conversation, when just enough animated byGin and Water, was better than either: which I believe too. Procter saidhe was far beyond the Coleridges, Wordsworths, Southeys, etc. And I amafraid I believe that also. 

I am afraid too this is a long letter nearly [all] about my own Likes andDislikes. 'The Great Twalmley's. ' {198} But I began only thinking aboutWordsworth. Pray do believe that I do not wish you to write unless youcare to answer on that score. And now for the Garden and the Don: alwaysin a common old Spanish Edition. Their coarse prints always make himlook more of the Gentleman than the better Artists of other Countrieshave hitherto done. 

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

LITTLE GRANGE, WOODBRIDGE, _Septr. _ 10/76. 

MY DEAR SIR, When your Letter reached me a few days ago I looked up Gillies: and foundthe Wordsworth Letters so good, kindly, sincere, and modest, that Ithought you and Mr. Lowell should have the Volume they are in at once. Soit travels by Post along with this Letter. The other two volumes shallgo one day in some parcel of Quaritch's if he will do me that Courtesy;but there is, I think, little you would care for, unless a little more of'Walter Scott's' generosity and kindness to Gillies in the midst of hisown Ruin; a stretch of Goodness that Wordsworth would not, I think, havereached. However, these Letters of his make me think I ought to feelmore filially to my Daddy: I must dip myself again in Mr. Lowell'sexcellent Account of him with a more reverent Spirit. Do you rememberthe fine Picture that Haydon gives of him sitting with his grey head inthe free Benches of some London Church? {199} I wonder that more of suchLetters as these to Gillies are not preserved or produced; perhaps Mr. Lowell will make use of them on some future occasion; some new Edition, perhaps, of his last volume. I can assure you and him that I read thatvolume with that Interest and Pleasure that made me sure I should oftenreturn to it: as indeed I did more than once till--lent out to threeseveral Friends! It is now in the hands of a very civilized, well-lettered, and agreeable Archdeacon, {200} of this District. 

I bought Mr. Ticknor's Memoirs in an Edition published, I hope with dueLicence, by Sampson Low. What a just, sincere, kindly, modest Man hetoo! With more shrewd perception of the many fine folks he mixed withthan he cared to indulge in or set down on Paper, I fancy: judging fromsome sketchy touches of Macaulay, Talfourd, Bulwer, etc. His account ofhis Lord Fitzwilliam's is surely very creditable to English Nobility. Macaulay's Memoirs were less interesting to me; though I quite believe inhim as a brave, honest, affectionate man, as well (of course) as a verypowerful one. It is wonderful how he, Hallam and Mackintosh could roarand bawl at one another over such Questions as Which is the GreatestPoet? Which is the greatest Work of that Greatest Poet? etc. , like Boysat some Debating Society. 

You can imagine the little dull Country town on whose Border I live; ourone merit is an Estuary that brings up Tidings of the Sea twice in thetwenty-four hours, and on which I sail in my Boat whenever I can. 

I must add a P. S. To say that having written my half-yearly Letter toCarlyle, just to ask how he was, etc. , I hear from his Niece that he hasbeen to his own Dumfries, has driven a great deal about the Country: buthas returned to Chelsea very weak, she says, though not in any way ill. He has even ceased to care about Books; but, since his Return, has begunto interest himself in them a little again. In short, his own Chelsea isthe best Place for him. 

Another reason for this other half Sheet is--that--Yes! I wish very muchfor your Translation of the Vita Nuova, which I did read in a slovenly(slovenly with Dante!) way twenty or thirty years ago, but which I didnot at all understand. I should know much more about it now with you andMr. Lowell. 

I could without 'roaring' persuade you about Don Quixote, I think; if Iwere to roar over the Atlantic as to 'Which is the best of the Two Parts'in the style of Macaulay & Co. 'Oh for a Pot of Ale, etc. , ' rather thansuch Alarums. Better dull Woodbridge! What bothered me in Londonwas--all the Clever People going wrong with such clever Reasons for sodoing which I couldn't confute. I will send an original Omar if I findone. 

_To E. B. Cowell_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _October_ 5/76. 

MY DEAR COWELL, . . . I bought Clemencin's Quixote after all: but have looked little intohim as yet, as I had finished my last Reading of the Don before he came . . . I fear his Notes are more than one wants about errors, orinaccuracies of Style, etc. Cervantes had some of the noble carelessnessof Shakespeare, Scott, etc. , as about Sancho's stolen Dicky. {202} Butwhy should Clemencin, and his Predecessors, decide that Cervantes changedthe title of his second Part from 'Hidalgo' to 'Caballero' fromnegligence? Why should he not have intended the change for reasons ofhis own? Anyhow, they should have printed the Title as he printed it, and pointed out what they thought the oversight in a Note. This makesone think they may have altered other things also: which perhaps I shallsee when I begin another Reading: which (if I live) won't be very faroff. I think I almost inspired Alfred Tennyson (who suddenly came here aFortnight ago) to begin on the Spanish. Yes: A. T. Called one day, afternear twenty years' separation, and we were in a moment as if we had beentogether all that while. He had his son Hallam with him: whom I likedmuch: unaffected and unpretentious: so attentive to his Father, with ahumorous sense of his Character as well as a loving and respectful. Itwas good to see them together. We went one day down the Orwell and backagain by Steamer: but the weather was not very propitious. Altogether, Ithink we were all pleased with our meeting. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _Novr. _ 8/76. 

MY DEAR SIR, 'Vita Nuova' reached me safe, and 'siempre verde, ' untarnished by itsVoyage. I am afraid I liked your account of it more than itself: I mean, I was more interested: I suppose it is too mystical for me. So I feltwhen I tried to read it in the original twenty years ago: and I fear Imust despair of relishing it as I ought now I have your Version of it, which, it seems to me, must be so good. I don't think you needed tobring in Rossetti, still less Theodore Martin, to bear Witness, or to putyour Work in any other Light than its own. 

After once more going through my Don Quixote ('siempre verde' too, ifever Book was), I returned to another of the Evergreens, Boccaccio, whichI found by a Pencil mark at the Volume's end I had last read on board thelittle Ship I then had, nine years ago. And I have shut out the accursed'Eastern Question' by reading the Stories, as the 'lieta Brigata' shutout the Plague by telling them. Perhaps Mr. Lowell will give usBoccaccio one day, and Cervantes? And many more, whom Ste. Beuve hasleft to be done by him. I fancy Boccaccio must be read in his Italian, as Cervantes in his Spanish: the Language fitting either 'like a Glove'as we say. Boccaccio's Humour in his Country People, Friars, Scolds, etc. , is capital: as well, of course, as the easy Grace and Tenderness ofother Parts. One thinks that no one who had well read him and DonQuixote would ever write with a strain again, as is the curse of nearlyall modern Literature. I know that 'Easy Writing is d---d hard Reading. 'Of course the Man must be a Man of Genius to take his Ease: but, if hebe, let him take it. I suppose that such as Dante, and Milton, and myDaddy, took it far from easy: well, they dwell apart in the Empyrean; butfor Human Delight, Shakespeare, Cervantes, Boccaccio, and Scott!

Tennyson (a Man of Genius, who, I think, has crippled his growth by over-elaboration) came suddenly upon me here six weeks ago: and, many years asit was since we had met, there seemed not a Day's Interval between. Helooked very well; and very happy; having with him his eldest Son, a verynice Fellow, who took all care of 'Papa, ' as I was glad to hear him say, not 'Governor' as the Phrase now is. One Evening he was in a Stewbecause of some nasty Paragraph in a Newspaper about his not allowing Mr. Longfellow to quote from his Poems. And he wrote a Note to Mr. L. Atonce in this room, and his Son carried it off to the Post that sameNight, just in time. So my House is so far become a Palace, being thePlace of a Despatch from one Poet to the other, all over that Atlantic!

We never had the trees in Leaf so long as this Year: they are only justrusty before my window, this Nov. 8. So I thought they would die of mereOld Age: but last night came a Frost, which will hasten their End. Isuppose yours have been dying in all their Glory as usual. 

You must understand that this Letter is to acknowledge the Vita Nuova(which, by the by, I think ought to be the Title on the Title page aswell as outside), so do not feel obliged to reply, but believe me yourstruly, E. F. G. 

_To Miss Anna Biddell_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _Saturday_, _Nov. _ 76. 

. . . You spoke once of even trying Walpole's Letters; capital as theyare to me, I can't be sure they would much interest, even if they did notrather disgust, you: the Man and his Times are such as you might not carefor at all, though there are such men as his, and such Times too, in theworld about us now. If you will have the Book on your return home, Iwill send you a three-volume Collection of his Letters: that is, not aThird part of all his collected Letters: but perhaps the best part, andquite enough for a Beginning. I can scarce imagine better Christmasfare: but I can't, I say, guess how you would relish it. N. B. It is notgross or coarse: but you would not like the man, so satirical, selfish, and frivolous, you would think. But I think I could show you that he hada very loving Heart for a few, and a very firm, just, understanding underall his Wit and Fun. Even Carlyle has admitted that he was about theclearest-sighted Man of his time. 

_To John Allen_. 

LOWESTOFT. _Decr. _ 9/76. 

MY DEAR ALLEN, It was stupid of me not to tell you that I did not want Contemporaryback. It had been sent me by Tennyson or his son Hallam (for I can'tdistinguish their MS. Now), that I might see that A. S. Battle fragment:{206} which is remarkable in its way, I doubt not. I see by the Athenaeumthat A. T. Is bringing out another Poem--another Drama, I think--asindeed he hinted to me during his flying visit to Woodbridge. He shouldrest on his Oars, or ship them for good now, I think: and I was audaciousto tell him as much. But he has so many Worshippers who tell himotherwise. I think he might have stopped after 1842, leaving Princesses, Ardens, Idylls, etc. , all unborn; all except The Northern Farmer, whichmakes me cry. . . . 

I dare say there are many as good, if not better, Arctic accounts than'Under the Northern Lights, ' but it was pleasant as read out to me by therather intelligent Lad who now serves me with Eyes for two hours of aNight at Woodbridge. . . . I am, you see at old Quarters: but am soonreturning to Woodbridge to make some Christmas Arrangements. Will Peaceand Good Will be our Song this year? Pray that it be so. 

_To Miss Thackeray_. 

LITTLE GRANGE, WOODBRIDGE. _Decr. _ 12, 1876. 

DEAR ANNIE THACKERAY, Messrs. Smith and Elder very politely gave me leave to print, and may bepublish, three Stanzas of your Father's 'Ho, pretty Page, ' adapted (underproper direction) to an old Cambridge Tune, which he and I have sungtogether, tho' not to these fine Words, as you may guess. I asked thisof Messrs. Smith and Elder, because I thought they had the Copyright. ButI did not mean to publish them unless with your Approval: only to print afew Copies for friends. And I will stop even that, if you don't choose. Please to tell me in half a dozen words as directly as you can. 

The Words, you know, are so delightful (stanzas one, two, and the last), and the old Tune of 'Troll, troll, the bonny brown Bowl' so pretty, and(with some addition) so appropriate, I think, that I fancied othersbeside Friends might like to have them together. But, if you don'tapprove, the whole thing shall be quashed. Which I ought to have askedbefore: but I thought your Publishers' sanction might include yours. Please, I say, to say Yes or No as soon as you can. 

I have been reading the two Series of 'Hours in a Library' with realdelight. Some of them I had read before in Cornhill, but all togethernow: delighted, I say, to find all I can so heartily concur and believein put into a shape that I could not have wrought out for myself. Ithink I could have suggested a very little about Crabbe, in whom I amvery much up: and one word about Clarissa. {208} But God send me manymore Hours in a Library in which I may shut myself up from this accursedEast among other things. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

LITTLE GRANGE, WOODBRIDGE. _Dec. _ 22/76. [Post mark _Dec. _ 21. ]

MY DEAR SIR, . . . In the last Atlantic Monthly was, as you know, an Ode by Mr. Lowell; lofty in Thought and Expression: too uniformly lofty, I think, for Ode. Do you, would Mr. Lowell, agree? I should not say so, did Inot admire the work very much. You are very good to speak of sending mehis new Volume: but why should you? My old Athenaeum will tell me of ithere, and I will be sure to get it. 

You see --- has come out with another Heroic Poem! And the Athenaeumtalks of it as a Great Work, etc. , with (it seems to me) the false Gallopin all the Quotations. It seems to me strange that ---, ---, and ---, should go on pouring out Poem after Poem, as if such haste could prosperwith any but First-rate Men: and I suppose they hardly reckon themselveswith the very First. I feel sure that Gray's Elegy, pieced and patchedtogether so laboriously, by a Man of almost as little Genius as abundantTaste, will outlive all these hasty Abortions. And yet there are plentyof faults in that Elegy too, resulting from the very Elaboration whichyet makes it live. So I think. 

I have been reading with real satisfaction, and delight, Mr. L. Stephen'sHours in a Library: only, as I have told his Sister in law, I should haveliked to put in a word or two for Crabbe. I think I could furnish L. S. With many Epigrams, of a very subtle sort, from Crabbe: and severalparagraphs, if not pages, of comic humour as light as Moliere. Bothwhich L. S. Seems to doubt in what he calls 'our excellent Crabbe, ' whowas not so 'excellent' (in the goody sense) as L. S. Seems to intimate. But then Crabbe is my Great Gun. He will outlive ---, --- and Co. Inspite of his Carelessness. So think I again. 

His Son, Vicar of a Parish near here, and very like the Father in face, was a great Friend of mine. He detested Poetry (sc. Verse), and Ibelieve had never read his Father through till some twenty years ago whenI lent him the Book. Yet I used to tell him he threw out sparks now andthen. As one day when we were talking of some Squires who cut down Trees(which all magnanimous Men respect and love), my old Vicar cried out 'How_scan_dalously they misuse the Globe!' He was a very noble, courageous, generous Man, and worshipped his Father in his way. I always thought Icould hear this Son in that fine passage which closes the Tales of theHall, when the Elder Brother surprises the Younger by the gift of thatHouse and Domain which are to keep them close Neighbours for ever. 

 Here on that lawn your Boys and Girls shall run, And gambol, when the daily task is done; From yonder Window shall their Mother view The happy tribe, and smile at all they do: While you, more gravely hiding your Delight, _Shall cry_--'_O_, _childish_!'--_and enjoy the Sight_. 

By way of pendant to this, pray read the concluding lines of the long, ill-told, Story of 'Smugglers and Poachers. ' Or shall I fill up myLetter with them? This is a sad Picture to match that sunny one. 

 As men may children at their sports behold, And smile to see them, tho' unmoved and cold, Smile at the recollected Games, and then Depart, and mix in the Affairs of men; So Rachel looks upon the World, and sees It can no longer pain, no longer please: But just detain the passing Thought; just cause A little smile of Pity, or Applause-- And then the recollected Soul repairs Her slumbering Hope, and heeds her own Affairs. 

I wish some American Publisher would publish my Edition of Tales of theHall, edited by means of Scissors and Paste, with a few words of plainProse to bridge over whole tracts of bad Verse; not meaning to improvethe original, but to seduce hasty Readers to study it. 

What a Letter, my dear Sir! But you encourage me to tattle over theAtlantic by your not feeling bound to answer. You are a busy man, and Iquite an idle one, but yours sincerely, E. FITZGERALD. 

Carlyle's Niece writes me that he is 'fairly well. '

Ecce iterum! That mention of Crabbe reminds me of meeting two AmericanGentlemen at an Inn in Lichfield, some thirty years ago. One of them wasunwell, or feeble, and the other tended him very tenderly: and both werevery gentlemanly and well-read. They had come to see the EnglishCathedrals, and spoke together (it was in the common Room) of Places andNames I knew very well. So that I took the Liberty of telling themsomething of some matters they were speaking of. Among others, this veryCrabbe: and I told them, if ever they came Suffolk way, I would introducethem to the Poet's son. I suppose I gave them my Address: but I had togo away next morning before they were down: and never heard of themagain. 

I sometimes wonder if this eternal Crabbe is relished in America (I amnot looking to my Edition, which would be a hopeless loss anywhere): hecertainly is little read in his own Country. And I fancy America likesmore abstract matter than Crabbe's homespun. Excuse AEtat. 68. 

Yes, 'Gillies arise! etc. ' But I remember one who used to say he nevergot farther with another of the Daddy's Sonnets than--

 Clarkson! It was an obstinate hill to climb, etc. 

English Sonnets, like English Terza Rima, want, I think, the doublerhyme. 

_To S. Laurence_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _Jan. _ 15/77. 

MY DEAR LAURENCE, Then I sent you the Greek instead of the Persian whom you asked for? Thetwo are the same size and binding: so of course I sent the wrong one. ButI will send the right one directly: and you need not make a trouble ofacknowledging it: I know you will thank me, and I think you will feel asort of 'triste Plaisir' in it, as others beside myself have felt. It isa desperate sort of thing, unfortunately at the bottom of all thinkingmen's minds; but made Music of. . . . I shall soon be going to old uglyLowestoft again to be with Nephews and Nieces. The Great Man . . . Isyet there: commanding a Crew of those who prefer being his Men to havingcommand of their own. And they are right; for the man is Royal, tho'with the faults of ancient Vikings. . . . His Glory is somewhat marred;but he looks every inch a King in his Lugger now. At home (when he isthere, and not at the Tavern) he sits among his Dogs, Cats, Birds, etc. , always with a great Dog following abroad, and aboard. This is altogetherthe Greatest Man I have known. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _February_ 1/77. 

MY DEAR SIR, I really only write now to prevent your doing so in acknowledgment ofThackeray's Song {213} which I sent you, and you perhaps knew thehandwriting of the Address. Pray don't write about such a thing, so soonafter the very kind Letter I have just had from you. Why I sent you theSong I can hardly tell, not knowing if you care for Thackeray or Music:but that must be as it is; only, do not, pray, write expressly about it. 

The Song is what it pretends to be: the words speak for themselves; verybeautiful, I think: the Tune is one which Thackeray and I knew atCollege, belonging to some rather free Cavalier words, Troll, troll, the bonny brown Bowl, with four bars interpolated to let in the Page. I have so sung it(without a Voice) to myself these dozen years, since his Death, and so Ihave got the words decently arranged, in case others should like them aswell as myself. Voila tout!

I thought, after I had written my last, that I ought not to have saidanything of an American Publisher of Crabbe, as it might (as it has done)set you on thinking how to provide one for me. I spoke of America, knowing that no one in England would do such a thing, and not knowing ifCrabbe were more read in your Country than in his own. Some years ago Igot some one to ask Murray if he would publish a Selection from allCrabbe's Poems: as has been done of Wordsworth and others. But Murray(to whom Crabbe's collected Works have always been a loss) would notmeddle. . . . You shall one day see my 'Tales of the Hall, ' when I canget it decently arranged, and written out (what is to be written), andthen you shall judge of what chance it has of success. I want neitherany profit, whether of money, or reputation: I only want to have Crabberead more than he is. Women and young People never will like him, Ithink: but I believe every thinking man will like him more as he growsolder; see if this be not so with yourself and your friends. YourMother's Recollection of him is, I am sure, the just one: Crabbe nevershowed himself in Company, unless to a very close and experiencedobserver: his Company manner was exactly the reverse of his Books:almost, as Moore says, '_doucereux_'; the apologetic politeness of theold School over-done, as by one who was not born to it. But Campbellobserved his 'shrewd Vigilance' awake under all his 'politesse, ' and JohnMurray said that Crabbe said uncommon things in so common a way that theyescaped recognition. It appears, I think, that he not only said, butwrote, such things: even to such Readers as Mr. Stephen; who can see verylittle Humour, and no Epigram, in him. I will engage to find plenty ofboth. I think Mr. Stephen could hardly have read the later Books: viz. , Tales of the Hall, and the Posthumous Poems: which, though careless andincomplete, contain Crabbe's most mature Self, I think. Enough of himfor the present: and altogether enough, unless I wish to become a'seccatore' by my repeated, long, letters. . . . 

Mr. Lowell was good enough to send me his Odes, and I have written toacknowledge them with many thanks and a few observations, not meant toinstruct such a Man, but just to show that I had read with Attention, asI did. I think I had much the same to say of them as I said to you: andso I won't say it again. I think it is a mistake to rely on the reading, or recitation, for an Effect which ought to speak for itself in anycapable Reader's Head. Tennyson, with the grand Voice he had (I fancy itis somewhat weakened now) could make sonorous music of such a beginningto an Ode as

 Bury the Great Duke!

The Thought is simple and massy enough: but where is a Vowel? Drydenopened better:

 'Twas at the royal Feast o'er Persia won. 

But Mr. Lowell's Odes, which do not fail in the Vowel, are noble inThought, with a good Organ roll in the music, which perhaps he thinksmore fitted to Subject and occasion. 

_To Mrs. Cowell_. 

12 MARINE TERRACE, LOWESTOFT. _March_ 11/77. 

. . . I scarce like your taking any pains about my Works, whether inVerse, Prose, or Music. I never see any Paper but my old Athenaeum, which, by the way, now tells me of some Lady's Edition of Omar which isto discover all my Errors and Perversions. So this will very likely turnthe little Wind that blew my little Skiff on. Or the Critic whoincautiously helped that may avenge himself on Agamemnon King, as hepleases. If the Pall Mall Critic knew Greek, I am rather surprised heshould have vouchsafed even so much praise as the words you quoted. ButI certainly have found that those few whom I meant it for, not Greekscholars, have been more interested in it than I expected. Not you, Ithink, who, though you judge only too favourably of all I do, are notfond of such Subjects. 

I have here two Volumes of my dear Sevigne's Letters lately discovered atDijon; and I am writing out for my own use a Dictionary of the DramatisPersons figuring in her Correspondence, whom I am always forgetting andconfounding. 

* * * * *

In May 1877 his old boatman West died and FitzGerald wrote to ProfessorCowell, 'I have not had heart to go on our river since the death of myold Companion West, with whom I had traversed reach after reach for thesedozen years. I am almost as averse to them now as Peter Grimes. {217} Sonow I content myself with the River Side. '

_To W. A. Wright_. 

LITTLE GRANGE, WOODBRIDGE. _June_ 23/77. 

MY DEAR WRIGHT, . . . I have been regaling myself, in my unscholarly way, with Mr. Munro's admirable Lucretius. Surely, it must be one of the mostadmirable Editions of a Classic ever made! I don't understand the Latinpunctuation, but I dare say there is good reason for it. The EnglishTranslation reads very fine to me: I think I should have thought soindependent of the original: all except the dry theoretic System, which Imust say I do all but skip in the Latin. Yet I venerate the earnestnessof the man, and the power with which he makes some music even from hishardest Atoms; a very different Didactic from Virgil, whose Georgics, _quoad_ Georgics, are what every man, woman, and child, must have known;but, his Teaching apart, no one loves him better than I do. I forget ifLucretius is in Dante: he should have been the Guide thro' Hell: butperhaps he was too deep in it to get out for a Holiday. That is a verynoble Poussin Landscape, v. 1370-8 'Inque dies magis, etc. '

I had always observed that mournful '_Nequicquam_' which comes to throwcold water on us after a little glow of Hope. When Tennyson went with meto Harwich, I was pointing out an old Collier rolling by to the tune of

 Trudit agens magnam magno molimine navem. [iv. 902. ]

That word '_Magnus_' rules in Lucretius as much as 'Nequicquam. ' I wasrejoiced to meet Tennyson quoted in the notes too, and my old Montaignewho discourses so on the text of

 Pascit amore avidos inhians in te, Dea, visus. [i. 36. ]

Ask Mr. Munro, when he reprints, to quote old Montaigne's Version of

 Nam verae voces tum demum, etc. [iii. 57. ]

'A ce dernier rolle de la Mort, et de nous, il n'y a plus que feindre, ilfaut parler Francais; il faut montrer ce qu'il y a de bon et de net dansle fond du pot. ' {219a} And tell him (damn my impudence!) I don't likemy old Fathers '_dancing_' under the yellow and ferruginous awnings. {219b} . . . 

There is a coincidence with Bacon in verses 1026-9 of Book II. (Lucretius, I mean). 

_To John Allen_. 

MY DEAR ARCHDEACON, I have little else to send you in reply to your letter (which I believehowever was in reply to one of mine) except the enclosed from Notes andQueries: which I think you will like to read, and to return to me. 

I think I will send you (when I can lay hand on it) two volumes of someone's Memorials of Wesley's Family: which you can look over, if you donot read, and return to me also. I wonder at your writing to me that Igave you his Journal so long as thirty years ago. I scarce knew that Iwas so constant in my Affections: and yet I think I do _not_ change inliterary cases. Pray read Southey's Life of him again: it does not tellall, I think, which might be told of Wesley's own character from his ownMouth: but then it errs on the right side: it does not presumptuouslyguess at Qualities and Motives which are not to be found in Wesley:unlike Carlyle and the modern Historians, Southey, I think, cannot bewrong by keeping so much within the bounds of Conjecture: Conjectureabout any other Man's Soul and Motives!

_To FitzEdward Hall_. {220a}

WOODBRIDGE: _June_ 24 [1877]. 

MY DEAR SIR, I have run through your _Ability_ {220b} again, since I sent it toWright: but as I before said (I believe) am not a competent Critic. Iknow that I coincide (unless I misconstrue) with your Canons laid down atpp. 162, etc. I am for all words that are smooth, or strong, (as themeaning requires) which have proved their worth by general admission intothe Language. '_Reliable_' is, what '_trustworthy_' is not, good currentcoin for general use, though '_trustworthy_' may be good too foroccasional emphasis. 

I remember old Hudson Gurney cavilling a little at '_realize_' as Iinnocently used the word in a Memoir of my old Bernard Barton near thirtyyears ago: this word I have also seen branded as American; let Americafurnish us with more such words; better than what our 'old English'pedants supply, with their '_Fore-word_' for 'Preface, ' '_Folk-lore_, 'and other such conglomerate consonants. Odd, that a Lawyer (Sugden)should have lubricated '_Hand-book_' by a sort of Persian process into'Handy-book'!

I remember, years ago, thinking I must rebel against English by using'_impitiable_' for 'incapable of Pity. ' Yet I suppose that, according toAlford & Co. , I was justified, though 'pitiable' is, I think always usedof the thing pitied, not the Pitier. But I should defer to customaryusage rather than to any particular whim of my own; only that it happenedto come handy at the time, and I did not, and do not, much care. 

But is not usage against your use of '_imitable_' at p. 100, meaning what_ought not_, not what _cannot_, be imitated? 'Non imitabile fulmen, 'etc. , and, negatively, '_inimitable_'?

'_Vengeable_' with its host of Authorities surprised, and gratified, me. 

Johnson, you say (p. 34) called '_uncomeatable_' a low corrupt word:rather, as you well say, 'a permissible colloquialism. ' Yes; like oldJohnson's own '_Clubable_' by which he designated some Good sociableFellow. 

'_Party_' has good Authority (from Shakespeare himself, as we know), andis a handy word we ought not to dismiss: better than the d---d'_Individual_' which should only be used in philosophic or scientificdiscrimination. Still, Crabbe, in his fine Opium-inspired 'World ofDreams' should not recall his beloved as '_that dear Party_. '

Other adjectives beside those that 'exit in _able_' are cavilled at. '_Fadeless_'; what is '_a Fade_'? Why not 'unfading'? Yet there is adifference between what has not as yet faded, and what _cannot_ fade. AndI shall become very '_tiresome_, ' though I don't know of any '_tire_' butof a Waggon wheel; and remain yours truly. 

E. FITZGERALD. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _August_ 21/77. 

MY DEAR SIR, You have doubtless heard from Mr. Lowell since he got to Spain: he mayhave mentioned that unaccomplished visit to me which he was to haveundertaken at your Desire. I doubt the two letters I wrote to be givenhim in London (through Quaritch) did not reach him: only the first whichsaid my house was full of Nieces, so as I must lodge him (as I did ourLaureate) at the Inn: but the second Letter was to say that I hadHouseroom, and would meet him at the Train any day and hour. He wrote tome the day before he left for Paris to say that he had never intended todo more than just run down for the Day, shake hands, and away! That Ihad an Instinct against: that one half-day's meeting of twoSeptuagenarians (I believe), to see one another's face for that once, 'But here, upon that Bank and Shoal of Time and' then, 'jump the Life tocome' as well as the Life before. No: I say I am glad he did not dothat: but I had my house all ready to entertain him as best I could; andhad even planned a little Visit to our neighbouring Coast, where are theVillage remains of a once large Town devoured by the Sea: and, yetundevoured (except by Henry VIII. ), the grey walls of a Grey Friars'Priory, beside which they used to walk, under such Sunsets as illuminethem still. This pathetic Ruin, still remaining by the Sea, would (Ifeel sure) have been more to one from the New Atlantis than all Londoncan show: but I should have liked better had Mr. Lowell seen it onreturning to America, rather than going to Spain, where the yet older andmore splendid Moors would soon have effaced the memory of our poorDunwich. If you have a Map of England, look for it on the Eastern Coast. If Mr. Lowell should return this way, and return in the proper Season forsuch cold Climate as ours, he shall see it: and so shall you, if youwill, under like conditions; including a reasonable and available degreeof Health in myself to do the honours. . . . 

I live down in such a Corner of this little Country that I see scarce anyone but my Woodbridge Fellow-townsmen, and learn but little from suchFriends as could tell me of the World beyond. But the English do notgenerally love Letter writing: and very few of us like it the more as weget older. So I have but little to say that deserves an Answer from you:but please to write me a little: a word about Mr. Lowell, whom you havedoubtless heard from. [One politeness I had prepared for him here was, to show him some sentences in his Books which I did not like!] Whichalso leads me to say that some one sent me a number of your American'Nation' with a Review of my redoubtable Agamemnon: written by a superiorhand, and, I think, quite discriminating in its distribution of Blame andPraise: though I will not say the Praise was not more than deserved; butit was where deserved, I think. 

_To J. R. Lowell_. {224}

WOODBRIDGE. _August_ 26/77. 

MY DEAR SIR, I ought scarce to trouble you amid your diplomatic cares and dignities. But I will, so far as to say I hope you had my second letter before youleft London: saying that my house was emptied of Nieces, and I was readyto receive you for as long as you would. Indeed, I chiefly flinched atthe thought of your taking the trouble to come down only for a Day: whichmeans, less than half a Day: a sort of meeting that seems a mockery inthe lives of two men, one of whom I know by Register to be close onSeventy. I do indeed deprecate any one coming down out of his way: but, if he come, I would rather he did so for such time as would allow of somepalpable Acquaintance. And I meant to take you to no other sight thanthe bare grey walls of an old Grey Friars' Priory near the Sea; and Iproposed to make myself further agreeable by showing you three or twopassages in your Books that I do not like amid all the rest which I likeso much: and had even meant to give you a very small thirty year oldDialogue of my own, which one of your 'Study Windows' reminded me of. Allthis I meant; and, any how, wrote to say that I and my house were ready. And there is enough of the matter. You are busied with other and greaterthings. Nor must you think yourself called on to answer this letter atall. 

When you were to start for Spain, I was thinking what a hot time of ityou would have there: in Madrid too, I suppose, worst of all, I haveheard. But you have Titian and Velasquez to refresh you. Cervantes toois not far. We have here (some two or three years old) a Book 'UntroddenSpain'; unaffectedly and pleasantly written by some Clergyman, Rose, wholived chiefly among the mining folk. But there is a Chapter in Vol. 2entitled '[_El_]_ Pajaro_, ' and giving account of a day's sport with[Pedro the Barber] who carries a Decoy Bird, which is as another Chapterto Don Quixote. Ah! I look at him on my Shelf, and know that I can takehim down when I will, and that I shall do so many a time before 1878 if Ilive. . . . 

Tell me something of the Spanish Drama, Lope, or Calderon. I think youcould get one acted by Virtue of your Office. 

WOODBRIDGE. [_October_, 1877. ]

MY DEAR SIR--(which I will exchange for your own name if you will set meExample). 

You see I write to you; but do not expect any answer from the midst ofall your Business. But I have lately been re-reading--(at that same oldDunwich, too)--those Essays of yours on which you wished to see my'Adversaria. ' These are too few and insignificant to specify by Letter:when you return to English-speaking World, you shall, if you please, seemy Copy, or Copies, marked with a Query at such places as I stumbled at. Were not the whole so really admirable, both in Thought and Diction, Ishould not stumble at such Straws; such Straws as you can easily blowaway if you should ever care to do so. Only, pray understand (what Ireally mean) that, in all my remarks, I do not pretend to the level of anoriginal Writer like yourself: only as a Reader of Taste, which is a verydifferent thing you know, however useful now and then in the Service ofGenius. I am accredited with the Aphorism, 'Taste is the Feminine ofGenius. ' However that may be, I have some confidence in my own. And, asI have read these Essays of yours more than once and again, and withincreasing Satisfaction, so I believe will other men long after me; notas Literary Essays only, but comprehending very much beside of Human andDivine, all treated with such a very full and universal Faculty, both inThought and Word, that I really do not know where to match in any work ofthe kind. I could make comparisons with the best: but I don't likecomparisons. But I think your Work will last, as I think of very fewBooks indeed. You are yet two good years from sixty (Mr. Norton tellsme), and have yet at least a dozen more of Dryden's later harvest: praymake good use of it: Cervantes, at any rate, I think to live to read, though one of your great merits is, not being in a hurry: and so yourwork completes itself. But I nearer seventy than you sixty. . . . 

You should get Dryden's Prefaces published separately in America, withyour own remarks on them, and also Johnson's very fine praise: in whichhe praises Dryden for those unexpected turns in which he himself is sodeficient. But pray love old Johnson, a little more than I think you do. We have, you may know, a rather clumsy Edition of this Dryden Prose infour 8vo volumes by Malone; the first volume all Life and a few Letters. I have bought some three or four Copies of this work, more or less worsefor wear, to give away: one extra Copy, much the worse for wear, on aback shelf now, waiting its destination. No English Publisher, Isuppose, would do this work, unless under some great name: perhaps underyours, if your own Country were not the fitter place. As in the case ofyour Essays, I don't pretend to say which is finest: but I think that tome Dryden's Prose, _quoad_ Prose, is the finest Style of all. So Gray, Ibelieve, thought: that man of Taste, very far removed, perhaps as far asfeminine from masculine, from the Man he admired. 

Your Wordsworth should introduce any future Edition of him, as I thinksome of Ste. Beuve's Essays do some of his men. He rarely, you know, gets beyond French. 

Now, as I see my Paper draws short, I turn from your Works to those of'The Great Twalmley, ' viz. : the Dialogue I mentioned, and you ask for. Ireally got it out: but, on reading it again after many years, was so muchdisappointed even in the little I expected that I won't send it to you, or any one more. It is only eighty 12 mo pages, and about twenty toolong, and the rest over-pointed (Oh Cervantes!), and all somewhatantiquated. But the Form of it is pretty: and the little Narrative part:and one day I may strike out, etc. , and make you a present of a prettyToy. But it won't do now. 

I have at last bid Adieu to poor old Dunwich: the Robin singing in theIvy that hangs on those old Priory walls. A month ago I wrote to askCarlyle's Niece about her Uncle, and telling her of this Priory, and howher Uncle would once have called me Dilettante; all which she read him;he only said 'Poor, Poor old Priory!' She says he is very well, andabusing V. Hugo's 'Miserables. ' I have been reading his Cromwell, andnot abusing it. You tell all the Truth about him. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _October_ 28/77. 

MY DEAR SIR ('_Norton_' I will write in my next if you will anticipate meby a reciprocal Familiarity). 

I wish I had some English Life, Woodbridge, or other, to send you: butWoodbridge, I sometimes say, is as Pompeii, in that respect; and I knowlittle of the World beyond but what a stray Newspaper tells me. So Imust get back to my Friends on the Shelf. 

Thence I lately took down Mr. Lowell's (I have proposed to _un-mister_him too), Lowell's Essays, and carried them with me to that old Dunwich, which I suppose I shall see no more this year. Robin Redbreast--have youhim?--was piping in the Ivy along the Walls; and, under them, Blackberries ripening from stems which those old Grey Friars picked from. And I had the Essays abroad, and within doors; and marked with a Querysome words, or sentences, which I stumbled at: which I should not havestumbled at had all the rest not been such capital Reading. I reallybelieve I know not, on the whole, any such Essays, of that kind: and thata very comprehensive kind, both in Subject, and Treatment. I think hesettles many Questions that every one discusses: and on which a FinalVerdict is what we now want. I believe the Books will endure: and thatis why I want a few blemishes, as I presume to think them, removed: andthe Author is to see my Pencil marks, when he returns to England, or toher 'Gigantic Daughter of the West. ' I hope he will live to write manymore such Books: Cervantes, first of all!

I have also been reading Carlyle's Cromwell: which I think will lastalso, and so carry along with it many of his more perishable tirades. Idon't know indeed if his is the Final Verdict on Oliver: or on so many ofthe subordinate Characters whom he sketches in so confidently. A shrewdMan is he; but it is not so easy to judge of men by a few stray hints ofthem in Books. A quaint instance of this Carlyle himself supplied mewith, in his total misapprehension of his hitherto unseen Correspondent'Squire, ' who burned the Cromwell Diary. I was the intelligent Friendwho interviewed Squire; as unlike as might be in Age, Person, andCharacter, to the Man Carlyle had prefigured from his Letters. One day Iwill send you the little Correspondence between T. C. And his intelligentFriend, as rather a Curiosity in Historical Acumen. 

I, Dryasdust, want to know if the Moon, the 'Harvest' Moon, too, really'waded through the Clouds' on the night before Dunbar Battle. She makesso good a Figure in the Scene that I wish the Almanack to authorize herPresence. Carlyle is, I believe, generally accurate in these as insublunary matters, but I had just found him writing of Orion looking downon Paris on August 9, when Orion is hardly up before Sunrise. . . . 

And you have been so near where once I lived as Wherstead! in whichParish my Family resided from about 1822 to 1835, at a large Square Houseon the hill opposite to the Vicarage. I know no more of Mr. Zincke thanhis Books, which are very good, I think: there is a bit concerning Hodgethe English Labourer's inward thoughts as he works in a ditch through aWinter's Day, that is--a piece of Shakespeare. It is one of my fewrecital pieces: and I was quoting it the other day to two People, whowondered they had never observed it in the Book it came from, which is'Egypt under the Pharaohs, ' {231} I think. 

WOODBRIDGE. _February_ 14/78. 

MY DEAR SIR, It is so long since I have heard from you that, in spite of knowing howinopportunely an idle Letter may reach any one amid any sorrows, or muchbusiness, I venture one, you see: but whether it be a trouble to lead ornot, do not feel bound to answer it except in the fewest words, in caseyou are any way indisposed. You have--a family: you had an aged Mother, when last I heard from you: room enough for anxieties and sorrows!

I had your printed Report on Olympia, which I do not pretend to be aJudge [of]. I lent it to one who thinks he returned it, but certainlydid not: and I wanted to lend it to another much more competent Judge, very much interested in the Subject, Edward Cowell, a Brother Professorof yours at our Cambridge: the most learned man there, I believe, and themost amiable and delightful, I believe, also. He came here to see me amonth ago: and I had one more search for the Pamphlet which I knew was nolonger 'penes me, ' which he much wished to see. Will you send me anotherCopy for him: if not to 'Professor Cowell, Cambridge, England' direct?

I have been rubbing up a little Latin from some Criticisms andElucidations of Catullus, by H. Munro, who edited Lucretius so capitallythat even German Scholars, I am told, accept it with a respect which theyaccord to very few English. Do you know it in America? If not, do. TheText and capital English prose Translation in vol. I; and Notes in vol. II: all admirable, it seems to me, though I do not understand his EnglishPunctuation. I do not follow all Lucretius' Atoms, etc. : but other partsare as fine to me as any Poet has done. Catullus I have never taken muchto: though some of him too is as fine as anything else in its way, Ithink. So I have read through this Book of Munro's, only 240 pages, notcommenting on the best of the Poems, but on those which most neededElucidation; which are many of them the least interesting, and even mostdisagreeable. Like your Olympia, I don't understand much: but what I dounderstand is so good that I feel sure the rest (and that is the largerand perhaps more important part) is as good for those it is intended for. 

Just as I shut up Catullus, I opened Keats' Love Letters just published;and really felt no shock of change between the one Poet and the other. This Book will doubtless have been in America long before my Letterreaches it. Mr. Lowell, who justly writes (in his Keats) that there ismuch in a Name, will wish Keats' mistress went by some other than 'FannyBrawne, ' which I cannot digest. 

And Mr. Lowell himself? I do not like to write to him amid hisdiplomatic avocations; if I did, I should perhaps tell him that I did notlike the style of his 'Moosehead Journal, ' which has been sent me by Iknow not whom. I hope he is getting on with his Cervantes; which I knowI shall like, if it be at all of the same Complexion as his other twoVolumes, which I still think are best of their kind. 

WOODBRIDGE. _February_ 20/78. 

MY DEAR NORTON!

If Packet follows Packet duly, you will have received ere this a letter Iwrote you, and posted, a few hours before yours reached me. You willhave seen that I guessed at some Shadow as of Illness in your household:no wonderful conjecture in this World in any case; still less where aLife of eighty years is concerned. It is in vain to wish well: but Iwish the best. 

Your mention of your Mother reminded me of another Eighty years that Ihad forgotten to tell you of--Carlyle. I wrote to enquire about him ofhis Niece a month ago: he had been very poorly, she said, but was himselfagain; only going in Carriage, not on foot, for his daily Exercise: wraptup in furry Dressing-gown, and wondering that any one else complained ofCold. He kept on reading assiduously, sometimes till past midnight, inspite of all endeavours to get him to bed. 'Qu'est ce que cela fait sije m'amuse?' as old Voltaire said on like occasions. 

I have got down the Doudan {234} you recommended me: but have not yetbegun with him. Pepys' Diary and Sir Walter, read to me for two hours ofa night, have made those two hours almost the best of the twenty-four forall these winter months. That Eve of Preston Battle, with the oldBaron's Prayers to his Troop! He is tiresome afterwards, I know, withhis Bootjack. But Sir Walter for ever! What a fine Picture would thatmake of Evan Dhu's entrance into Tully Veolan Breakfast Hall, with amessage from his Chief; he standing erect in his Tartan, while the Baronkeeps his State, and pretty Rose at the Table. There is a subject forone of your Artists. Another very pretty one (I thought the other Day)would be that of the child Keats keeping guard with a drawn sword at hissick Mother's Chamber door. Millais might do it over here: but I don'tknow him. . . . 

I will send you Carlyle's Squire correspondence, which you will keep toyourself and Lowell: you being Carlyle's personal friend as well asmyself. Not that there is anything that should not be further divulged:but one must respect private Letters. Carlyle's proves a droll instanceof even so shrewd a man wholly mistaking a man's character from hisLetters: had now that Letter been two hundred years old! and nointelligent Friend to set C. Right by ocular Demonstration. 

_To J. R. Lowell_. 

LITTLE GRANGE, WOODBRIDGE. _February_ 28/78. 

MY DEAR SIR, I ventured to send you Keats' Love Letters to Miss--_Brawne_! a name inwhich there is much, as you say of his, and other names. . . . Well, Ithought you might--must--wish to see these Letters, and, may be, not getthem so readily in Spain. So I made bold. The Letters, I doubt not, aregenuine: whether rightly or wrongly published I can't say: only I, forone, am glad of them. I had just been hammering out some Notes onCatullus, by our Cambridge Munro, Editor of Lucretius, which you ought tohave; English Notes to both, and the Prose Version of Lucretius quitereadable by itself. Well, when Keats came, I scarce felt a change fromCatullus: both such fiery Souls as wore out their Bodies early; and I caneven imagine Keats writing such filthy Libels against any one he had aspite against, even Armitage Brown, had Keats lived two thousand yearsago. . . . 

I had a kind letter lately from Mr. Norton: and have just posted him someCarlyle letters about that Squire business. If you return to Americabefore very long you will find them there. How long is your officialStay in Spain? Limited, or Unlimited? By the bye of Carlyle, I heardfrom his Niece some weeks ago that he had been poorly: but when shewrote, himself again: only taking his daily walk in a Carriage, andsitting up till past Midnight with his Books, in spite of Warnings toBed. As old Voltaire said to his Niece on like occasion, 'Qu'est ce quecela fait si je m'amuse?' I have from Mudie a sensible dull Book ofLetters from a Miss Wynn: with this one good thing in it. She has beento visit Carlyle in 1845: he has just been to visit Bishop Thirlwall inWales, and duly attended Morning Chapel, as a Bishop's Guest should. 'Itwas very well done; it was like so many Souls pouring in through all theDoors to offer their orisons to God who sent them on Earth. We were nolonger Men, and had nothing to do with Men's usages; and, after it wasover, all those Souls seemed to disperse again silent into Space. Andnot till we all met afterward in the common Room, came the HumanGreetings and Civilities. ' {237} This is, I think, a little piece worthsending to Madrid; I am sure, the best I have to offer. 

I have had read to me of nights some of Sir Walter's Scotch Novels;Waverley, Rob, Midlothian, now the Antiquary: eking them out as charilyas I may. For I feel, in parting with each, as parting with an oldFriend whom I may never see again. Plenty of dull, and even some bad, Iknow: but parts so admirable, and the Whole so delightful. It iswonderful how he sows the seed of his Story from the very beginning, andin what seems barren ground: but all comes up in due course, and there isthe whole beautiful Story at last. I think all this Fore-cast is to beread in Scott's shrewd, humorous, Face: as one sees it in Chantrey'sBust; and as he seems meditating on his Edinburgh Monument. I feel awish to see that, and Abbotsford again; taking a look at Dunbar by theway: but I suppose I shall get no further than Dunwich. 

Some one (not you) sent me your Moosehead Journal: but I told Mr. NortonI should tell you, if I wrote, that I did not like the Style of it atall; all 'too clever by half. ' Do you not say so yourself afterCervantes, Scott, Montaigne, etc. ? I don't know I ought to say all thisto you: but you can well afford to be told it by one of far moreauthority than yours most sincerely, E. FITZGERALD. 

_To W. A. Wright_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _March_ 3/78. 

MY DEAR WRIGHT, . . . You may infer that I have been reading--yes, and with greatInterest, however little Scholarship--your Fellow-Collegian's new Book ofNotes, etc. {238} And just as I had done my best with his Catullus, cameto hand the Love-Letters of a kindred Spirit, Keats; whose peevishJealousy might, two thousand years ago, have made him as bitter andindecent against his friend Armitage Brown, as Catullus against Caesar. But in him too Malice was not stronger than Love, any more than inCatullus; not only of the Lesbia-Brawne, but of the Fraternal, kind. Keats sighs after 'Poor Tom' as well as he whose 'Frater ave atque vale'continues sighing down to these times. (I hope I don't misquote, moreHibernorum. )

That is a fine Figure of old Caesar entertaining his Lampooner at theFeast. And I have often thought what a pretty picture, for Millais todo, of the Child Keats keeping guard outside his sick Mother's Chamberwith a drawn Sword. If Catullus, however, were only _Fescennining_, his'Malice' was not against Caesar, but against the Nemesis that might elsebe revenged on him--eh? But I don't understand how Suetonius, or thosehe wrote for, could have forgotten, though for party purposes they mayhave ignored, the nature and humour of that _Fescennine_ which is knownto Scholars two thousand years after. How very learned, and probably allwrong, have I become, since becoming interested in this Book!

WOODBRIDGE. _March_ 21 [1878]. 

MY DEAR WRIGHT, . . . The Enclosed only adds a little to the little Paper of _Data_:{239} you may care to add so much in better MS. Than mine to the leaves Isent you. Those leaves were more intended for such an Edition of theLetters in batches, as now edited; and, as many of them are privateright, _so_ edited they must continue for some time, I suppose. 

An odd coincidence happened only yesterday about them. I was looking toLamb's Letter to Manning of Feb. 26, 1808, where he extols Braham, theSinger, who (he says) led his Spirit 'as the Boys follow Tom the Piper. 'I had not thought who Tom was: rather acquiesced in some idea of the'pied Piper of Hamelin'; and, not half an hour after, chancing to takedown Browne's Britannia's Pastorals, {240a} found Tom against theMaypole, with a ring of Dancers about him. I suppose Tom survived in'_Folk lore_' . . . Till dear Lamb's time: but how he, a Cockney, knew ofit, I don't know. 

I was looking for Keats (when I happened on Browne) to find the passageyou quote {240b}: but (of course) I could not find the Book I wanted. Norcan I construe him any more than so much of Shakespeare: whether from thenegligent hurry of both (Johnson says Shakespeare often contented himselfwith a halfborn expression), or from some Printer's error. The meaningis clear enough to me, if I conjecture the context right; and more so toyou, I dare say. The passage is one of those bad ones, except the firstline, which he afterwards repeated, mutatis mutandis, The leaves That _tremble_ round a Nightingale, {240c}

and is one of those which justly incensed the Quarterly, and which K. Himself knew were bad: but he must throw off the Poem red hot, and couldnot alter. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _April_ 4, 1878. 

MY DEAR NORTON, I wish you would not impose on yourself to write me a Letter; which yousay is 'in your head. ' You have Literary work, and a Family to enjoywith you what spare time your Professional Studies leave you. Whereas Ihave nothing of any sort that I am engaged to do: all alone for monthstogether: taking up such Books as I please; and rather liking to writeLetters to my Friends, whom I now only communicate with by such means. And very few of my oldest Friends, here in England, care to answer me, though I know from no want of Regard: but I know that few sensible men, who have their own occupations, care to write Letters unless on somespecial purpose; and I now rarely get more than one yearly Letter fromeach. Seeing which, indeed, I now rarely trouble them for more. So praybe at ease in this respect: you have written to me, as I to you, morethan has passed between myself and my fifty years old Friends for someyears past. I have had two notes from you quite lately: one to tell methat Squire reached you; and another that he was on his way back here. Iwas in no hurry for him, knowing that, if he got safe into your hands, hewould continue there as safe as in my own. I also had your other twoCopies of Olympia: one of which I sent to Cowell, who is always too busyto write to me, except about twice a year, in his Holydays. 

I am quite content to take History as you do, that is, as theSquire-Carlyle presents it to us; not looking the Gift Horse in theMouth. Also, I am sure you are quite right about the Keats' Letters. Ihope I should have revolted from the Book had anything in it detractedfrom the man: but all seemed to me in his favour, and therefore I did notfeel I did wrong in having the secret of that heart opened to me. I hopeMr. Lowell will not resent my thinking he might so far sympathize withme. In fact, could he, could you, resist taking up, and reading, theLetters, however doubtful their publication might have seemed to yourConscience?

Now I enclose you a little work of mine {242} which I hope does noirreverence to the Man it talks of. It is meant quite otherwise. Ioften got puzzled, in reading Lamb's Letters, about some Data in his Lifeto which the Letters referred: so I drew up the enclosed for my ownbehoof, and then thought that others might be glad of it also. If I setdown his Miseries, and the one Failing for which those Miseries are sucha Justification, I only set down what has been long and publickly known, and what, except in a Noodle's eyes, must enhance the dear Fellow'scharacter, instead of lessening it. 'Saint Charles!' said Thackeray tome thirty years ago, putting one of C. L. 's letters {243} to hisforehead; and old Wordsworth said of him: 'If there be a Good Man, Charles Lamb is one. '

I have been interested in the Memoir and Letters of C. Sumner: athoroughly sincere, able, and (I should think) affectionate man to a few;without Humour, I suppose, or much artistic Feeling. You might like tolook over a slight, and probably partial, Memoir of A. De Musset, by hisBrother, who (whether well or ill) leaves out the Absinthe, which isgenerally supposed to have shortened the Life of that man of Genius. Think of Clarissa being one of his favourite Books; he could not endurethe modern Parisian Romance. It reminded me of our Tennyson (who hassome likeness, 'mutatis mutandis' of French Morals, Absinthe, etc. , tothe Frenchman)--of his once saying to me of Clarissa, 'I love thoselarge, still, Books. '

I parted from Doudan with regret; that is, from two volumes of him; all Ihad: but I think I see four quoted. That is pretty, his writing to hisBrother, who is dwelling (1870-1) in some fortified Town, on whoseramparts, now mounted with cannon, 'I used to gather Violets. ' And Icannot forget what he says to a Friend at that crisis, 'Engage in somelong course of Study to drown Trouble in:' and he quotes Ste. Beuvesaying, one long Summer Day in the Country, 'Lisons tout Madame deSevigne. ' You may have to advise me to some such course before long. Iwill avoid speaking, or, so far as I can, thinking, of what I cannotprevent, or alter. You say you like my Letters: which I say is likingwhat comes from this old Country, more yours than mine. I have heardthat some of your People would even secure a Brick, or Stone, from someold Church here to imbed in some new Church a-building over the Atlantic. Plenty of such materials might be had, for this foolish People arerestoring, and rebuilding, old Village Churches that have grown togetherin their Fields for Centuries. Only yesterday I wrote to decline helpingsuch a work on a poor little Church I remember these sixty years. Well, you like my Letters; I think there is too much of this one; but I willend, as I believe I began, in praying you not to be at any trouble inanswering it, or any other, from

Yours sincerely, E. F. G. 

Pray read the Scene at Mrs. MacCandlish's Inn when Colonel Manneringreturns from India to Ellangowan. It is Shakespeare. 

WOODBRIDGE. _April_ 16/1878. 

Only a word; to say that yesterday came Squire-Carlyle from you: and akind long letter from Mr. Lowell: and--and the first Nightingale, whosang in my Garden the same song as in Shakespeare's days: and, before theDay had closed, Dandie Dinmont came into my room on his visit to youngBertram in Portanferry Gaol-house. 

_To J. R. Lowell_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _April_ 17/78. 

MY DEAR (SIR ---)--(LOWELL)?

Your letter reached me just after hearing this year's first Nightingalein my Garden: both very welcome. I am very glad you did not feel boundto answer me before; I should not write otherwise to you or to some veryold Friends who, like most sensible men as they grow older, dislike allunnecessary writing more and more. So that I scarce remind them ofmyself more than once a year now. I shall feel sure of your good Willtoward me whether you write or not; as I do of theirs. 

Mr. Norton thinks, as a Gentleman should, that Keats' Letters should nothave been published. I hope I should not have bought them, had I notgathered from the Reviews that they were not derogatory to him. Youknow, I suppose, that she of whom K. Wrote about to others so warmly, hisCharmian, was not Fanny Brawne. Some years ago Lord Houghton wrote me itwas: but he is a busy man of the World, though really a very good Fellow:indeed, he did not deserve your _skit_ about his 'Finsbury Circusgentility, ' which I dare say you have forgotten. I have not seen him, any more than much older and dearer friends, for these twenty years:never indeed was very intimate with him; but always found him a goodnatured, unaffected, man. He sent me a printed Copy of the first draughtof the opening of Keats' Hyperion; very different from the final one: ifyou wished, I would manage to send it to you, quarto size as it is. Thisnow reminds me that I will ask his Lordship why it was not published (asI suppose it was not). For it ought to be. He said he did not know ifit were not the second draught rather than the first. But he couldhardly have doubted if he gave his thoughts to it, I think. . . . 

I want you to do De Quincey; certainly a very remarkable Figure inLiterature, and not yet decisively drawn, as you could do it. There is aMemoir of him by one Page, showing a good deal of his familiar, andFamily, Life: all amiable: perhaps the frailties omitted. It is curious, his regard to Language even when writing (as quite naturally he does) tohis Daughter, 'I was disturbed last night at finding no natural, orspontaneous, opening--how barbarous by the way, is this collision of_ings_--find_ing_--open_ing_, etc. ' And some other instances. 

I cannot understand why I have not yet taken to Hawthorne, a Man of realGenius, and that of a kind which I thought I could relish. I will haveanother Shot. His Notes of Travel seemed to me very shrewd, original, and sincere. Charles Sumner, of so different a Genius, also appears tome very truthful, and, I still fancy, strongly attached to the few hemight care for. I am sorry he got a wrong idea of Sir Walter from LordBrougham, and the Whigs, who always hated Scott. Indeed (as I wellremember) it was a point of Faith with them that Scott had not writtenthe Novels, till the Catastrophe discovered him: on which they changedtheir Cry into a denunciation of his having written them only for money, 'Scott's weak point, ' Sumner quotes from Brougham. As if Scott lovedMoney for anything else than to spend it: not only on Lands and House(which I maintain were simply those of a Scotch Gentleman) but to helpany poor Devil that applied to him. Then that old Toad Rogers must tellSumner that Manzoni's 'Sposi' were worth any ten of Scott's; yes, afterScott's Diary spoke of 'I really like Rogers, etc. , ' and such moderateexpressions of regard as Scott felt for him and his Breakfast of LondonWits. 

Here am I running over to Chapter II. You will be surfeited, like yourCaptain, if not on Turtles' Eggs. But you can eat me at intervals, youknow, or not at all. Only you will certainly read my last Great Work, {247} which I enclose, drawn up first for my own benefit, in readingLamb's Letters, as now printed in batches to his several Correspondents;and so I thought others than myself might be glad of a few Data to referthe letters to. Pollock calls my Paper 'Cotelette d'Agneau a la minute. '

As to my little Dialogue, I can't send it: so pretty in Form, I think, and with some such pretty parts: but then some odious smart writing, which I had forgotten till I looked it over again before sending to you. But I will send you the Calderon which you already like. 

And, if you would send me any samples of Spanish, send me some Playbill(of the old Drama, if now played), or some public Advertisement, orNewspaper; this is what I should really like. As to Books, I dare sayQuaritch has pretty well ferreted them out of Spain. Give a look, if youcan, at a Memoir of Alfred de Musset written by his Brother. Makingallowance for French morals, and Absinthe (which latter is not mentionedin the Book) Alfred appears to me a fine Fellow, very un-French in somerespects. He did not at all relish the new Romantic School, beginningwith V. Hugo, and now alive in --- and Co. --(what I call The _Gurgoyle_School of Art, whether in Poetry, Painting, or Music)--he detested themodern 'feuilleton' Novel, and read Clarissa! . . . Many years before A. De M. Died he had a bad, long, illness, and was attended by a Sister ofCharity. When she left she gave him a Pen with 'Pensez a vos promesses'worked about in coloured silks: as also a little worsted 'Amphore' shehad knitted at his Bed side. When he came to die, some seventeen yearsafter, he had these two little things put with him in his Coffin. 

WOODBRIDGE. _May_ 1878. 

Ecce iterum--Crispin! I think you will soon call me '_Les_FitzGerald_s_' as Madame de Sevigne called her too officious friend'_Les_ Hacqueville_s_. ' However, I will risk that in sending you a Copyof that first Draught of an opening to Hyperion. I have got it from thatFinsbury Circus Houghton, who gave me the first Copy, which I keep: soyou shall have this, if you please; I know no one more worthy of it; andindeed I told Lord H. I wanted it for you; so you see he bears no malice. He is in truth a very good natured fellow. . . . 

Well, to leave that, he writes me that he had the original MS. : it wasstolen from him. Fortunately, a friend of his (Edmund Lushington) hadtaken a MS. Copy, and from that was printed what I send you. Thecorrections are from Lushington. I do not understand why Lord H. Doesnot publish it. He says he has just written to Bendizzy to do somethingfrom the state purse for an aged Sister of Keats, now surviving in greatPoverty. Her name is 'Fanny. ' Ben might do much worse: some say he isabout worse, now: I do not know; I cannot help: and I distress myself aslittle as I can. 'Lisons tout Madame de Sevigne, ' said Ste. Beuve oneday to some Friends in the Country; and Doudan (whom Mr. Norton admires, as I do) bids a Friend take that advice in 1871. One may be glad of ithere in England ere 1879. 

A short while ago we were reading the xith Chapter of Guy Mannering, where Colonel Mannering returns to Ellangowan after seventeen years. Along gap in a Story, Scott says: but scarcely so in Life, to any one wholooks back so far. And, at the end of the Novel, we found a pencil noteof mine, 'Finished 10. 30 p. M. Tuesday Decr. 17/1861. ' Not on thisaccount, but on account of its excellence, pray do read the Chapter ifyou can get the Book: it is altogether admirable--Cervantes--Shakespeare. I mean that Chapter of the Colonel's return to Mrs. MacCandlish's Inn atKippletringan. 

We are now reading 'Among the Spanish People, ' by the Mr. Rose who wrote'Untrodden Spain'; a really honest, good-hearted, fellow, I think: withsome sentimentality amid his Manhood, and (I suppose) rather too rose-coloured in his Estimate of the People he has long lived among. But hecan't help recalling Don Quixote. He has a really delightful account ofa Visit he pays to a _pueblo_ he calls Banos up the Sierra Morena: onewould expect Don and Sancho there, by one of the old Houses with Armsover the Door. Pray get hold of this Book also if you can: else 'lesHacquevilles' will have to buy it second hand from Mudie and send--'Coalsto Newcastle. '

With Keats I shall send you an Athenaeum with a rather humorous accountof a Cockney squabble about whether Shelley called his Lark an'_un_-bodied, ' or '_em_-bodied, ' Spirit. I really forget which way wassettled by MS. Shelley is now the rage in Cockayne; but he is toounsubstantial for me. 

It is now hot here: I suppose something [like] February in Andalusia. Doyou find Madrid Climate as bad as Rose and others describe it? He hasalso a very pleasant [chapter] about the Lavanderas of the Manzanares. What delightful words!

_To W. A. Wright_. 

[1878. ]

On looking into my dear old Montaigne, I find a passage which may haverustled in Shakespeare's head while doing Othello: it is about thepleasures of Military Life in the Chapter 'De l'Experience' beginning 'Iln'est occupation plaisante comme la militaire, etc. ' in course of whichoccurs in Florio, 'The courageous _minde-stirring_ harmonic of warlikemusic, etc. ' What a funny thing is that closing Apostrophe toArtillery--but this is not AEsthetic. 

Bacon's appropriation you know of C'est bien choisir de ne choisir pas'(De la Vanite, I _think_). 

WOODBRIDGE. _June_ 11, [1878]

MY DEAR WRIGHT, If you do not remember the passage in Bacon's Essays {251} about 'not todecide, etc. ' I must have fancied it. I am glad you recognize theOthello bit of Montaigne. You know, as I know, the nonsense of talkingof Shakespeare stealing such things: one is simply pleased at finding hisfootsteps in the Books he read, just as one is in walking over the fieldshe walked about Stratford and seeing the Flowers, and hearing the Birds, he heard and saw, and told of. My Canon is, there is no plagiarism whenhe who adopts has proved that he could originate what he adopts, and agreat deal more: which certainly absolves Shakespeare from any suchCharge--even 'The Cloud capt Towers, etc. ' That Passage in Othello aboutthe Propontic and the Hellespont, was, I have read, an afterthought, after reading some Travel: and, like so many Afterthoughts, I must think, a Blunder: breaking the Torrent of Passion with a piece of NaturalHistory. One observes it particularly when acted: the actor down on hisKnees, etc. Were I to act Othello (there'd be many a Bellow

 From Pit, Boxes, etc. , on that occasion) {252}

I should leave out the passage. . . . 

An answer from Carlyle's Niece to my half-yearly enquiry tells me that heis well, and hardy, and reading Goethe which he never tires of: glancingover Reviews which he calls 'Floods of Nonsense, ' etc. I sent themGroome's 'Only Darter, ' which I think so good that I shall get him to letme print it for others beside those of the Ipswich Journal: it seems tome a beautiful Suffolk 'Idyll' (why not _Ei_dyll?) and so it seemed tothose at Chelsea. By the by, I will send you their Note, if Groomereturns it to me. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

_July_ 2/78. 

MY DEAR NORTON, You wrote me a very kind Invitation--to your own home--in America! Butit is all too late for that; more on account of habit than time of life:I will not repeat what I feel sure I have told you before on thatsubject. You will be more interested by the enclosed note: of which thisis the simple Story. Some three weeks ago I wrote my half-yearly note ofenquiry to Carlyle's Niece; he was, she said, quite well; walking by theriver before Breakfast: driving out of an Afternoon: constantly reading:just then reading Goethe of whom he never tired: and glancing overMagazines and Reviews which he called 'Floods of Nonsense, Cataracts ofTwaddle, ' etc. I had sent him the enclosed paper, {253} written by aSuffolk Archdeacon for his Son's East Anglian Notes and Queries: and nowreprinted, with his permission, by me, for the benefit of others, yourself among the number. Can you make out the lingo, and see what Ithink the pretty Idyll it tells of? If I were in America, at your home, I would recite it to you; nay, were the Telephone prepared across theAtlantic! Well: it was sent, as I say, to Carlyle: who, by what hisNiece replied, I suppose liked it too. And, by way of return, I suppose, he sends me a Volume of Norway Kings and Knox: which I was very glad tohave, not only as a token of his Good Will, but also because Knox was, Ibelieve, the only one of his works I had not read. And I was obliged toconfess to him in my acknowledgment of his kindly Present, that Irelished these two children of his old Age as much as any of his morefiery Manhood. I had previously asked if he knew anything of JohnWesley's Journal, which I was then re-perusing; as he his Goethe: yes, heknew that Wesley too, and 'thought as I did about it' his Niece said; andin reply to my Question if he knew anything of two 'mountains' (asEnglish people called hills a hundred years ago) which Wesley says werecalled 'The Peas' at Dunbar {254}--why, here is his Answer: evincing theyoung Blood in the old Man still. 

Wesley's Journal is very well worth reading, and having; not only as anoutline of his own singular character, but of the conditions of England, Ireland, and Scotland, in the last Century. Voila par exemple un Livredont Monsr Lowell pourrait faire une jolie critique, s'il en voudrait, mais il s'occupe de plus grandes choses, du Calderon, du Cervantes. Ialways wish to run on in bad French: but my friends would not care toread it. But pray make acquaintance with this Wesley; if you cannot finda copy in America, I will send you one from here: I believe I have givenit to half a dozen Friends. Had I any interest with Publishers, I wouldget them to reprint parts of it, as of my old Crabbe, who still sticks inmy Throat. 

I have taken that single little Lodging at Dunwich for the next threemonths, and shall soon be under those Priory Walls again. But the poorlittle 'Dunwich Rose, ' brought by those monks from the North Country, will have passed, after the hot weather we are at last having. Writewhen you will, and not till then; I believe in your friendly regard, with, or without, a Letter to assure me of it. 

WOODBRIDGE. _October_ 15/78. 

MY DEAR NORTON, . . . I got little more than a Fortnight at that old Dunwich; for myLandlady took seriously ill, and finally died: and the Friend {255a} whomI went to meet there became so seriously ill also as to be obliged toreturn to London before August was over. So then I went to an ugly place{255b} on the sea shore also, some fifteen miles off the old Priory; andthere was with some Nephews and Nieces, trying to read the Novels from aCirculating Library with indifferent Success. And now here am I at homeonce more; getting my Garden, if not my House, in order; and here I shallbe probably all Winter, except for a few days visit to that sick Friendin London, if he desires it. . . . 

We too have been having a Fortnight of delightful weather, so as one hasbeen able to sit abroad all the Day. And now, that Spirit which Tennysonsung of in one of his early Poems is heard, as it were, walking andtalking to himself among the decaying flower-beds. This Season (such aswe have been enjoying)--my old Crabbe sings of it too, in a very patheticway to me: for it always seems to me an Image of the Decline of Lifealso. 

 It was a Day ere yet the Autumn closed, When Earth before her Winter's War reposed; When from the Garden as we look'd above, No Cloud was seen, and nothing seem'd to move; [When the wide River was a silver Sheet, And upon Ocean slept the unanchored fleet;] {256a} When the wing'd Insect settled in our sight, And waited wind to recommence its flight. {256b}

You see I cross out two lines which, fine as they are, go beyond theGarden: but I am not sure if I place them aright. The two last lines youwill feel, I think: for I suppose some such Insect is in America too. (You must not mind Crabbe's self-contradiction about 'nothing moving. ') . . . 

I have two Letters I want to send Lowell: but I do not like writing as ifto extort answers from him. You see Carlyle's Note within: I do not wantit back, thank you. Good night: for Night it is: and my Reader iscoming. We look forward to The Lammermoor, and Old Mortality beforelong. I made another vain attempt on George Eliot at Lowestoft, Middlemarch. 

_To J. R. Lowell_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _Octr. _ 17/78. 

MY DEAR SIR, I scarce like to write to you again because of seeming to exact a Letter. I do not wish that at all, pray believe it: I don't think letter-writingmen are much worth. What puts me up to writing just now is, the enclosedtwo Letters by other men; one of them relating to yourself; the other tothe Spain you are now in. I sent Frederic Tennyson, eldest Brother ofthe Laureate, your Study Windows: and now you see what he says about it. He is a Poet too, as indeed all the Brethren more or less are; and is _aPoet_: only with (I think) a somewhat monotonous Lyre. But a very nobleMan in all respects, and one whose good opinion is worth having, howeverlittle you read, or care for, opinion about yourself, one way or other. Ido not say that I agree with all he says: but here is his Letter. I amgoing to send him a Volume of yours 'Among my Books, ' which I know is amaturer work than the Windows; and you know what I think of it. 

The other Letter, or piece of Letter, is from our Professor Cowell, andhas surely a good Suggestion concerning a Spanish Dictionary. You mightput some Spanish Scholar on the scent. And so much about my two Letters. 

I was but little at my old Dunwich this Summer, for my Landlady fellsick, and died: and the Friend I went to be with was obliged to leave; Idoubt his Brain is becoming another Ruin to be associated with that oldPriory wall, already so pathetic to me. So here am I back again at myold Desk for all the Winter, I suppose, with my old Crabbe once more openbefore me, disembowelled too; for I positively meditate a Volume made upof 'Readings' from his Tales of the Hall, that is, all his better Verseconnected with as few words of my own Prose as will connect itintelligibly together. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _Decr. _ 15/78. 

MY DEAR NORTON, You are very good to ask for my _OEdipodes_, etc. And when I can findEyes as well as Courage to copy out a '_brouillon_, ' I will see what canbe done. Only, you and Professor Goodwin must not feel any way bound toprint them, even if you both approved of them; and that is not at allcertain. How would you two Scholars approve of two whole Scenes omittedin either OEdipus (as I know to be the case), and the Choephori {259a}reduced almost to an Act? So that would be, I doubt. Then, as you know, Sophocles does not strike Fire out of the Flint, as old AEschylus does;and though my Sophocles has lain by me (lookt at now and then) these tenyears, I was then a dozen years older than when Agamemnon haunted me, until I laid his Ghost so far as I myself was concerned. By the way, Isee that Dr. Kennedy, Professor of Greek at our Cambridge, has publisheda Translation of Agamemnon in 'rhythmic English. ' So, at any rate, Ihave been the cause of waking up two great men (Browning and Kennedy) anda minor Third (I forget his name) {259b} to the Trial, if it were onlyfor the purpose of extinguishing my rash attempt. However that may be, Icannot say my attempt on Sophocles would please you and my AmericanPatrons (in England I have none) so well as AEschylus; indeed I only seein what I remember to have done, good English, and fair Verse, beyond thechief merit of shaping the Plays to modern Taste by the very excisionswhich Scholars will most deprecate. However, you shall see, one day. . . . 

I want to send you a very little volume by Charles Tennyson, long agopublished: too modest to make a noise: worth not only all me, but all ---, ---, & Co. Put together. Three such little volumes have appeared, butjust appeared; like Violets, I say: to be overlooked by the 'maddingCrowd, ' but I believe to smell sweet and blossom when all the gaudyGrowths now in fashion are faded and gone. He ought to be known inAmerica--everywhere; is he?

_To J. R. Lowell_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _Decr. _ 19/78. 

MY DEAR SIR, I am writing to you because you say you like to hear from me. I daresay, a Letter from your home, or mine, is acceptable in Madrid, which, bythe by, if Travellers' Stories be true, must be terrible this winter: andI always try to stuff my Letters with all I can about other people moreor less worth hearing of. But for that I have but little to say, certainly nothing worth your keeping. But if you like me to write, nomatter why. I wish I could find you a short Letter written to me thistime last year by C. Merivale, Dean of Ely, Roman Historian; a man ofinfinite dry humour, and quaint fancy. I have put it away in some safeplace where (of course) I can't find it. Perhaps the like may happen toyourself now and then. I tell him that some one should pick up his Table-talk and Letter-talk: for he of course would not do it himself. I haveknown him from College days, fifty years ago; but have never read hisHistory: never having read any History but Herodotus, I believe. But Ishould like you to see how an English Dean and Roman Historian can writein spite of Toga and Canonicals. 

_December_ 22. 

I left off when my Reader came to finish The Bride of Lammermoor; aswonderful to me as ever. O, the Austens, Eliots, and even Thackerays, won't eclipse Sir Walter for long. 

To come down rather a little from him, my Calderon, which you speakof--very many beside myself, with as much fair Dramatic Spirit, knowledgeof good English and English Verse, would do quite as well as you think Ido, if they would not hamper themselves with Forms of Verse, and Thought, irreconcilable with English Language and English Ways of Thinking. I ampersuaded that, to keep Life in the Work (as Drama must) the Translator(however inferior to his Original) must re-cast that original into hisown Likeness, more or less: the less like his original, so much theworse: but still, the live Dog better than the dead Lion; in Drama, Isay. As to Epic, is not Cary still the best Dante? Cowper and Pope wereboth Men of Genius, out of my Sphere; but whose Homer still holds itsown? The elaborately exact, or the 'teacup-time' Parody? Is notFairfax' Tasso good? I never read Harington's Ariosto, English orItalian. Another shot have I made at Faust in Bayard Taylor's Version:but I do not even get on with him as with Hayward, hampered as he(Taylor) is with his allegiance to original metres, etc. His Notes I wasinterested in: but I shall die ungoethed, I doubt, so far as Poetry goes:I always believe he was Philosopher and Critic. 

But, harking back to Calderon, surely you have seen the 'Magico' printedfrom the Duc d'Osuna's original MS. , with many variations from the textas we have it. This volume is edited, in French, by 'Alfred MorelFatio, ' printed at 'Heilbronn' (wherever that is), and to be bought of'M. Murillo, Calle de Alcala, Num. 18, Madrid. ' It contains a Facsimileof the old Boy's MS. I will send you my Copy if there be 'no Coal inNewcastle. '

_To C. E. Norton_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _May_ 18/79. 

MY DEAR NORTON, It is over six months, I believe, since we exchanged a letter; mine thelast shot: which I mention only because that has been my reason for notwriting again till I should hear from you that all was well enough withyou and yours to justify my writing an idle letter. You have spoken ofan aged Mother:--if your Winter has been such as ours! And not over yet, as scarce a leaf on the trees, and a N. E. Wind blowing Cold, Cough, Bronchitis, etc. , and the confounded Bell of a neighbouring Churchannouncing a Death, day after day. I certainly never remember so long, and so mortal a Winter: among young as well as old. Among the latter, Ihave just lost my elder, and only surviving Brother. But I shall closethis Bill of Mortality before turning over the leaf. 

Well: it is Mr. Clarke's pamphlet which has encouraged me to 'take up thepen, ' for I think it was you who sent it to me. All I am qualified tosay about it is, that it is very well and earnestly written; but on aSubject, like your own Olympia, that I am no Judge of. I think offorwarding it to Cowell at our Cambridge, who is a Judge of Everything, Ithink, while pretending to Nothing. . . . 

This reminds me of all the pains he bestowed on me five and twenty yearsago; of which the result is one final Edition of Omar and Jami. . . . Omar remains as he was; Jami (Salaman) is cut down to two-thirds of hisformer proportion, and very much improved, I think. It is still in awrong key: Verse of Miltonic strain, unlike the simple Eastern; Iremember trying that at first, but could not succeed. So there is littlebut the Allegory itself (not a bad one), and now condensed into a veryfair Bird's Eye view; quite enough for any Allegory, I think. . . . 

And--(this Letter is to be all about myself)--by this post I send you myHandbook of Crabbe's Tales of the Hall, of which I am so doubtful that Ido not yet care to publish it. I wished to draw a few readers to a Bookwhich nobody reads, by an Abstract of the most readable Parts connectedwith as little of my Prose as would tell the story of much prosaic Verse, but that very amount of prosy Verse may help to soak the story into themind (as Richardson, etc. ) in a way that my more readable Abstract doesnot. So it may only serve to remind any one of a Book--which he neverread! The Original must be more obsolete in America than here inEngland; however, I should like to know what you make of it: and you seethat you may tell me very plainly, for it is not as an Author, but onlyas Author's Showman that I appear. 

It is rather shameful to take another Sheet because of almost filling thefirst with myself. And I have but little to tell in it. Carlyle I havenot heard of for these six months: nor Tennyson: I must write to hear howthey have weathered this mortal Winter. Tennyson's elder, not eldest, Brother Charles is dead: and I was writing only yesterday to persuadeSpedding to insist on Macmillan publishing a complete edition of Charles'Sonnets: graceful, tender, beautiful, and quite original, little things. Two thirds of them would be enough: but no one can select in such a case, you know. I have been reading again your Hawthorne's Journal in Englandwhen he was Consul here; this I have: I cannot get his 'Our old Home, 'nor his Foreign Notes: can you send me any small, handy, Edition of thesetwo last? I delight in them because of their fearless Truthfulness aswell as for their Genius. I have just taken down his Novels, orRomances, to read again, and try to relish more than I have yet done; butI feel sure the fault must be with me, as I feel about Goethe, who is yetas sealed a Book to me as ever. . . . I have (alas!) got through all SirWalter's Scotch Novels this winter, even venturing further on Kenilworth:which is wonderful for Plot: and one scene, Elizabeth reconciling herRival Earls at Greenwich, seeming to me as good as Shakespeare's HenryVIII. , which is mainly Fletcher's, I am told. I have heard nothing ofMr. Lowell since I heard of you, and do think that I will pitch him aCrabbe into the midst of Madrid, if he be still there. (N. B. Some ofCrabbe is not in the Text but from MS. First (and best) readings printedin the Son's edition. )

The Nightingale is now telling me that he is not dead. 

_To J. R. Lowell_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _May_ 20/79. 

MY DEAR SIR, By this post I send you a bit of a Book, in which you see that I onlyplay very second Fiddle. It is not published yet, as I wait for a fewfriends to tell me if it be worth publishing, or better kept amongourselves, who know Crabbe as well as myself. You could tell me betterthan any one, only that I doubt if any Transatlantic Man can care, evenif he knows of a Writer whose Books are all but unread by his ownCountrymen, so obsolete has become his Subject (in this Book) as well ashis way of treating it. So I think I may exonerate you from giving anopinion, and will only send it to you for such amusement as it may affordyou in your Exile. I fancied I could make a pleasant Abstract of a muchtoo long and clumsy Book, and draw a few Readers to the well-nighforgotten Author. But, on looking over my little work, I doubt that myshort and readable Handybook will not leave any such impression as thelong, rather un-readable, original; mere length having, you know, theinherent Virtue of soaking it in: so as my Book will scarce do but as areminder of the original, which nobody reads! . . . 

Voila assez sur ce sujet la. I think that you will one day give us anaccount of your Spanish Consulship, as Hawthorne did of his English: anoble Book which I have just been reading over again. His 'Our old Home'is out of print here; and I have asked Mr. Norton to send me any handyEdition of it, as also of the Italian Journal, my Copies having been lentout past recovery. I am going to begin again with his Scarlet Letter andSeven Gables; which (oddly to myself) I did not take to. And yet I thinkthey are not out of my line, or reach, I ought to say. 

We have had such a long, and mortal Winter as never do I remember in myseventy years, which struck 70 on March 31 last. I have just lost aBrother--75. Proximus ardet, etc. But I escaped through all these sevenmonths Winter, till a week or ten days ago, when a South Wind andSunshine came for a Day, and one expatiated abroad, and then down comes aNorth Easter, etc. I was like the Soldier in Crabbe's Old Bachelor (nowwith you), who compares himself to the Soldier stricken by a random Shot, when resting on his Arms, etc. {267} So Cold, Cough, Bronchitis, etc. And To-day Sunshine again, and Ruisenor (do you know him?) in my Shrubsonly just be-greening, and I am a Butterfly again. I have heard nothingof Carlyles, Tennysons, etc. , save that the latter had written someBallad about Lucknow. I shall be glad to hear a word of yourself, Calderon, and Don Quixote, the latter of whom [Greek text] from myBookshelf. Yes, yes, I am soon coming. 

WOODBRIDGE. _June_ 13/79. 

MY DEAR SIR, I had just written a Letter to Tennyson, a thing I had not done these twoyears, when one was brought to me with what I thought his Subscription, which I have not seen for twice two years, I suppose. Well, but theLetter was from you. I ought not to write again so quick: but you know Inever exact a Reply: especially as you never will answer what I ask you, which I rather admire too. To be sure you have so much filled yourLetter with my Crabbe that you have told me nothing of yourself, Calderon, and Cervantes, both of whom, I suppose, are fermenting, andmaturing, in your head. Cowell says he will come to this coast thisSummer with Don Quixote that we may read him together: so, if you shouldcome, you will find yourself at home. I have said all I can say aboutyour taking any such trouble as coming down here only to shake hands withme, as you talk of. I never make any sort of 'hospitality' to the fewwho ever do come this way, but just put a fowl in the Pot (as DonQuixote's _ama_ might do), and hire a Shandrydan for a Drive, or a Boaton the river, and 'There you are, ' as one of Dickens' pleasant youngfellows says. But I never can ask any one to come, and out of his way, to see me, a very ancient, and solitary, Bird indeed. But you know allabout it. 'Parlons d'autres choses, ' as Sevigne says. 

I was curious to know what an American, and of your Quality, would say ofCrabbe. The manner and topics (Whig, Tory, etc. ) are almost obsolete inthis country, though I remember them well: how then must they appear toyou and yours? The 'Ceremoniousness' you speak of is overdone forCrabbe's time: he overdid it in his familiar intercourse, so as todisappoint everybody who expected 'Nature's sternest Poet, ' etc. ; but hewas all the while observing. I know not why he persists in his Thee andThou, which certainly Country Squires did not talk of, except for anoccasional Joke, at the time his Poem dates from, 1819: and I warned myReaders in that stillborn Preface to change that form into simple 'You. 'If this Book leaves a melancholy impression on you, what then would allhis others? Leslie Stephen says his Humour is heavy (Qy is not hisTragedy?), and wonders how Miss Austen could admire him as it appears shedid; and you discern a relation between her and him. I find plenty ofgrave humour in this Book: in the Spinster, the Bachelor, the Widow, etc. All which I pointed out (in the still-born) to L. S. . . . He says toothat Crabbe is 'incapable of Epigram, ' which also you do not agree in;Epigrams more of Humour than Wit; sometimes only hinted, as in those twolast lines of that disagreeable, and rather incomprehensible Sir OwenDale. I think he will do in the land of Cervantes still. 

When my Copy of Tennyson's Lover's Tale comes home I will send it to you. . . . As to Gray--Ah, to think of that little Elegy inscribed among theStars, while ---, --- & Co. , are blazing away with their Fireworks herebelow. I always think that there is more Genius in most of the threevolume Novels than in Gray: but by the most exquisite Taste, andindefatigable lubrication, he made of his own few thoughts, and many ofother men's, a something which we all love to keep ever about us. {270} Ido not think his scarcity of work was from Design: he had but a little tosay, I believe, and took his time to say it. . . . 

Only think of old Carlyle, who was very feeble indeed during the winter, having read through all Shakespeare to himself during these latter Springmonths. So his Niece writes me. I do not hear of his doing the like byhis Goethe. 

I had another shot at your Hawthorne, a Man of fifty times Gray's Genius, but I could not take to him. Painfully microscopic and elaborate ondismal subjects, I still thought: but I am quite ready to admit that (asin Goethe's case) the fault lies in me. I think I have a good feelingfor such things; but 'non omnia possumus, etc. ;' some Screw loose. 'C'estegal. ' That is a serviceable word for so much. 

Now have I any more that turns up for this wonderful Letter? I shouldput it in, for I do think it might amuse you in Madrid. But nothing doesturn up this Evening. Tea, and a Walk on our River bank, and then, whatdo you think? An hour's reading (to me) of a very celebrated Murderwhich I remember just thirty years ago at Norwich: then 'Ten minutes'Refreshment'; and then, Nicholas Nickleby! Then one Pipe: and then toBed. Yours sincerely, E. F. G. 

This Letter shall sleep a night too before Travelling. Next Morning. Revenons a notre Crabbe. 'Principles and Pew' very bad. 'The Flowers, etc. , cut by busy hands, etc. , ' are, or were, common on the leaden roofsof old Houses, Churches, etc. I made him stop at 'Till the Does venturedon our Solitude, ' {271} without adding '_We were so still_!'--which isquite 'de trop. ' You will see by the enclosed prefatory Notice what Ihave done in the matter, as little as I could in doing what was to bedone. My own Copy is full of improvements. Yes, for any Poetaster mayimprove three-fourths of the careless old Fellow's Verse: but it wouldpuzzle a Poet to improve the better part. I think that Crabbe differsfrom Pope in this thing for one: that he aims at Truth, not at Wit, inhis Epigram. How almost graceful he can sometimes be too!

 What we beheld in Love's perspective Glass Has pass'd away--one Sigh! and let it pass. {272}

LOWESTOFT. _August_ 20/79. 

MY DEAR SIR, Mr. Norton wrote me that you had been detained in Spain by Mrs. Lowell'ssevere, nay, dangerous, illness; a very great affliction to you. Iventure a bit of a Letter, which you are not to answer, even by a word;no, not even read further than now you have got, unless a better day hasdawned on you, and unless you feel wholly at liberty to write. I shouldbe very glad to hear, in ever so few words, that your anxiety was over. 

I do not think I shall make a long letter of this; for I do not think ofmuch that can amuse you in the least, even if you should be open to suchsort of amusement as I could give you. I am come here to be a month withmy friend Cowell; he and I are reading the Second Part of Don Quixotetogether, as we used to read together thirty years ago; he always theTeacher, and I the Pupil, although he is quite unaware of that Relationbetween us; indeed, rather reverses it. It so happens that he is not sowell acquainted with this Second Part as with the First; indeed not sowell with the Story of it as I, but then he is so much a better Scholarin all ways that he lights up passages of the Book in a way that is allnew to me. Some of the strange words reminded me again of his wish for aSpanish Dictionary in the style of Littre's French: he would assuredly bethe Man to do it, but he has his Sanskrit Professorship to mind. 

There is a Book rather worth reading called 'On Foot through Spain';{273} meaning, as much of Spain as extends from St. Sebastian on the Bayof Biscay to Barcelona on the Mediterranean; with a good deal ofCervantesque Ventas, Carreteros, etc. , in it. There is an account of theObsequies of PAU PI (Basque?) on the last Day of Carnival at Saragossa, which reminded me of the 'Cortes de Muerte, ' etc. Hawthorne (whoseadmirable Italian Journal I brought with me here) says that originallythe Italian Carnival ended with somewhat of the same BurlesqueCeremonial, but was thought to mimic too Graciosoly that of the Church. Ibelieve the Moccoli, etc. , are a remainder of it. 

'Eso alla se ha de entender, respondio Sancho, con los _que nacieron enlas malvas_' (II. C. 4), made my Master jump at once to Job XXX. 4. 

I cannot but suppose that you are gradually gathering materials for someEssay on Spanish Literature, and it is a rare Quality in these days to bein no hurry about such work, but to wait till one can do it thoroughly;as is the case with you. I suppose you know Lope: of whom I have read, and now shall read, nothing: even Cowell, who has read some, is not muchinterested in him. He delights in Calderon, of whom he has one thickVolume here, and still finds many obscure passages to clear up. He wastelling me of one about Madrid, {274} which (as you are now there) I mustquote by way of filling up this Second Sheet of Letter. But, to do this, I must wait till I have been with him for our morning's reading, so as Imay give it you Chapter and Verse. 

P. S. Here is my Professor's MS. Note for you, which I told him I wantedto send. We have been reading Chapters 14-15 of Don Quixote, SecondPart. Do you know why Carrasco finds an _Algebrista_ for his hurts? Whythe Moorish _Aljebro_ = the setting of Fractions, etc. So said my dearPundit at once. Ah! you would like to be with us, for the sake of him, rather than of yours sincerely E. F. G. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

LOWESTOFT. _Sept. _ 3/79. 

MY DEAR NORTON, I must write you a few lines, on my knee (not, on my knees, however), inreturn for your kind letter. As to my thinking you could be'importunate' in asking again for my two Sophocles Abstracts, you mustknow that such importunity cannot but be grateful. I am only ratherashamed that you should have to repeat it. I laid the Plays by afterlooking them over some months ago, meaning to wait till another year toclear up some parts, if not all. Thus do my little works arrive at suchform as they result in, good or bad; so as, however I may be blamed forthe liberties I take with the Great, I cannot be accused of over haste indoing so, though blamed I may be for rashness in meddling with them atall. Anyhow, I would not send you any but a fair MS. If I sent MS. Atall; and may perhaps print it in a small way, not to publish, but so asto ensure a final Revision, such as will also be more fitting for you toread. It is positively the last of my Works! having been by me thesedozen years, I believe, occasionally looked at. So much for that. 

Now, you would like to be here along with me and my delightful Cowell, when we read the Second Part of Don Quixote together of a morning. Thiswe have been doing for three weeks; and shall continue to do for some tendays more, I suppose: and then he will be returning to his Cambridge. Ifwe read very continuously we should be almost through the Book by thistime: but, as you may imagine we play as well as work; some passage inthe dear Book leads Cowell off into Sanskrit, Persian, or Goody TwoShoes, for all comes within the compass of his Memory and Application. Job came in to the help of Sancho a few days ago: and the DuennaRodriguez' age brought up a story Cowell recollected of an old Lady whopersisted in remaining at 50; till being told (by his Mother) that shecould not be elected to a Charity because of not being 64, she said 'Shethought she could manage it'; and the Professor shakes with Laughter notloud but deep, from the centre. . . . 

Pray read in our Athenaeum some letters of Severn's about Keats, full ofLove and intelligent Admiration, all the better for coming straight fromthe heart without any style at all. If I thought that Mr. Lowell wouldnot find these Athenaeums somewhere in Madrid, I would send them to him, as I would also to you in a like predicament. . . . 

This letter has run on further than I expected: and I am now going to seeSancho off to his Island, under convoy of my Professor. 

_To S. Laurence_. 

11 MARINE TERRACE, LOWESTOFT. _Septr. _ 22/79. 

MY DEAR LAURENCE, Your letter found me here this morning: here, where I have now been nearsix weeks, for a month of which Edward Cowell and his Wife were myneighbours; and we had two or three hours of Don Quixote's company of amorning, and only ourselves for company at night. They are gone, however; and I might have gone to my own home also, but that some Nephewsand Nieces wished to see a little more of me; and I thought also thatLowestoft would be more amusing than Woodbridge to a young London Clerk, a Nephew of the Cowells, who comes to me for a short Holyday, when he canget away from his Desk. But early in October I shall be back at my oldroutine, stale enough. I think that, as a general rule, people shoulddie at 70. 

Yes: though Edwards was comparatively a Friend of late growth--he, andhis brave wife--they encountered me down in my own country here, and wesomehow suited one another; and I feel sad thinking of the pleasant daysat Dunwich, which the Tide now rolling up here will soon reach. {277} . . . 

I am here re-reading Forster's Life of Dickens, which seems to me a verygood Book, though people say, I believe, there is too much Forster in it. At any rate, there is enough to show the wonderful Daemonic Dickens: aspure an instance of Genius as ever lived; and, it seems to me, a Man Ican love also. 

_Sentence from a Letter written to Prof. Norton Feb. _ 22/80. 

'I cannot yet get the 2nd Part (Coloneus) to fit as I wish to the first:finding (what I never doubted) that nothing is less true than Goethe'ssaying that these two Plays and Antigone must be read in Sequence, as aTrilogy. '

_To C. E. Norton_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _March_ 4, 1880. 

MY DEAR NORTON, Herewith you will receive, I suppose, Part I. Of OEdipus, which I foundon my return here after a week's absence. I really hope you will likeit, after taking the trouble more than once to ask for it: only(according to my laudable rule of Give or Take in such cases) say no moreof it to me than to point out anything amendable: for which, you see, Ileave a wide margin, for my own behoof as well as my reader's. And againI will say that I wish you would keep it wholly to yourself: and, aboveall, not let a word about it cross the Atlantic. I will not send a Copyeven to Professor Goodwin, to whom you can show yours, if he shouldhappen to mention the subject; nor will I send one to Mrs. Kemble, theonly other whom I had thought of. In short, you, my dear Sir, are theonly Depository of this precious Document, which I would have you keep asthough it were very precious indeed. 

You will see at once that it is not even a Paraphrase, but an Adaptation, of the Original: not as more adapted to an Athenian Audience 400 yearsB. C. But to a merely English Reader 1800 years A. D. Some dropt stitchesin the Story, not considered by the old Genius of those days, I have, Ithink, 'taken up, ' as any little Dramatist of these Days can do: thoughthe fundamental absurdity of the Plot (equal to Tom Jones according toColeridge!) remains; namely, that OEdipus, after so many years reigningin Thebes as to have a Family about him, should apparently never haveheard of Laius' murder till the Play begins. One acceptable thing I havedone, I think, omitting very much rhetorical fuss about the poor man'sFatality, which I leave for the Action itself to discover; as also a gooddeal of that rhetorical Scolding, which, I think, becomes tiresome evenin its Greek: as the Scene between OEdipus and Creon after Tiresias: andequally unreasonable. The Choruses which I believe are thought fine byScholars, I have left to old Potter to supply, as I was hopeless ofmaking anything of them; pasting, you see, his 'Finale' over that which Ihad tried. 

I believe that I must leave Part II. For the present, being ratherwearied with the present stupendous Effort, at AEtat. 71. If I liveanother year, and am still free from the ills incident to my Time, I willmake an end of it, and of all my Doings in that way. 

_To Charles Keene_. {280a}

_Friday_. 

MY DEAR KEENE, . . . Beckford's Hunting is an old friend of mine: excellently written;such a relief (like Wesley and the religious men) to the Essayist styleof the time. Do not fail to read the capital Squire's Letter inrecommendation of a Stable-man, dated from Great Addington, Northants, 1734: of which some little is omitted after Edition I. ; which edition hasalso a Letter from Beckford's Huntsman about a wicked 'Daufter, ' whollyomitted. This first Edition is a pretty small 4to 1781, with aFrontispiece by Cipriani! . . . 

If you come down this Spring, but not before May, I will show you some ofthese things in a Book {280b} I have, which I might call 'Half Hours withthe Worst Authors, ' and very fine things by them. It would be the verybest Book of the sort ever published, if published; but no one wouldthink so but myself, and perhaps you, and half a dozen more. If my Eyeshold out I will copy a delightful bit by way of return for your Ballad. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

_May_ 1, 1880. 

MY DEAR NORTON, I must thank you for the Crabbe Review {281} you sent me, though, had itbeen your own writing, I should probably not tell you how very good Ithink it. I am somewhat disappointed that Mr. Woodberry dismissesCrabbe's 'Trials at Humour' as summarily as Mr. Leslie Stephen does; itwas mainly for the Humour's sake that I made my little work: Humour soevident to me in so many of the Tales (and Conversations), and which Imeant to try and get a hearing for in the short Preface I had written incase the Book had been published. I thought these Tales showed the'stern Painter' softened by his Grand Climacteric, removed from the gloomand sadness of his early associations, and looking to the Follies ratherthan to the Vices of Men, and treating them often in something of aMoliere way, only with some pathetic humour mixt, so as these Tales werealmost the only one of his Works which left an agreeable impressionbehind them. But if so good a Judge as Mr. Woodberry does not see allthis, I certainly could not have persuaded John Bull to see it: andperhaps am wrong myself in seeing what is not there. I doubt not thatMr. Woodberry is quite right in what he says of Crabbe not havingImagination to draw that Soul from Nature of which he enumerates thephenomena: but he at any rate does so enumerate and select them as tosuggest something more to his Reader, something more than mere cataloguecould suggest. He may go yet further in such a description, as thatother Autumnal one in 'Delay has Danger, ' beginning--

 Early he rose, and look'd with many a sigh, On the red Light that fill'd the Eastern sky, etc. 

Where, as he says, the Decay and gloom of Nature seem reflected in--nay, as it were, to take a reflection from--the Hero's troubled Soul. In theAutumn Scene which Mr. Woodberry quotes, {282} and contrasts with thoseof other more imaginative Poets, would not a more imaginativerepresentation of the scene have been out of character with the EnglishCountry Squire who sees and reflects on it? As would have been moreevident if Mr. W. Had quoted a line or two further--

 While the dead foliage dropt from loftier trees The Squire beheld not with his wonted ease, But to his own reflections made reply, And said aloud--'Yes, doubtless we must die. '

 [Greek text]--

This Dramatic Picture touches me more than Mr. Arnold. 

One thing more I will say, that I do not know where old Wordsworthcondemned Crabbe as un-poetical (except in the truly 'priggish' candlecase) though I doubt not that Mr. Woodberry does know. We all know thatof Crabbe's 'Village' one passage was one of the first that struck youngWordsworth: and when Crabbe's son was editing his Father's Poems in 1834, old Wordsworth wrote to him that, because of their combined Truth andPoetry, those Poems would last as long at least as any that had beenwritten since, including Wordsworth's own. And Wordsworth was toohonest, as well as too exclusive, to write so much even to a Son of thedead Poet, without meaning all he said. 

I should not have written all this were it not that I think so much ofMr. Woodberry's Paper; but I doubt I could not persuade him to think moreof my old Man than he sees good to think for himself. I rejoice that hethinks even so well of the Poet: even if his modified Praise does notinduce others to try and think likewise. The verses he quotes--

 Where is that virtue which the generous boy, etc. {283}

made my heart glow--yes, even out at my Eyes--though so familiar to me. Only in my private Copy, instead of

 When Vice had triumph--_who his tear bestow'd_ On injured merit--

in place of that '_bestowed Tear_, ' I cannot help reading

 When Vice and Insolence in triumph rode, etc. 

which is, of course, only for myself, and you, it seems: for I nevermentioned that, and some scores of such impudencies. 

_To R. C. Trench_. 

LITTLE GRANGE, WOODBRIDGE. _May_ 9/80. 

MY DEAR LORD, You are old enough, like myself, to remember People reading and talkingof Crabbe. I know not if you did so yourself; but you know that no one, unless as old as ourselves, does so now. As he has always been one of myApollos, in spite of so many a cracked string, I wanted to get a fewothers to listen a little as I did; and so printed the Volume which Isend you: printed it, not by way of improving, or superseding, theoriginal, but to entice some to read the original in all its length, and(one must say) uncouth and wearisome '_longueurs_' and want of what isnow called 'Art. ' These Tales are perhaps as open to that charge as anyof his; and, moreover, not principally made up of that 'sternest' stuffwhich Byron celebrated as being most characteristic of him. When writingthese Tales, the Poet had reached his Grand Climacteric, and liked tolook on somewhat of the sunnier side of things; more on the Comedy thanthe Tragedy of Human Life: and hence these Tales are, with all theirfaults, the one work of his which leaves me (ten years past my GrandClimacteric also) with a pleasant Impression. So I tried to make othersthink; but I was told by Friends whose Judgment I could trust that noPublic would listen to me. . . . And so I paid for my printing, and keptmy Book to be given away to some few as old as myself, and brought up insomewhat of another Fashion than what now reigns. And so I now takeheart to send it to you whose Poems and Writings prove that you belong toanother, and, as I think, far better School, whether you care for Crabbeor not. I dare say you will feel bound to acknowledge the Book; but praydo so, if at all, by a simple acknowledgment of its receipt; I mean, sofar as I am concerned in it: any word about Crabbe I shall be very gladto have if you care to write it; but I always maintain it best to saynothing, unless to find fault, with what is sent to one in this BookLine. And so to be done by. 

_To Lord Houghton_. {285a}

WOODBRIDGE. _May_ 10_th_ 1880. {285b}

DEAR LORD HOUGHTON, I think I have sent you a yearly letter of some sort or other for severalyears, so it has come upon me once again. I have nothing to ask of youexcept how you are. I should just like to know that, including 'yours'in you. Just a very few words will suffice, and I daresay you have notime for more. I have so much time that it is evident I have nothing totell, except that I have just entered upon a military career in so far ashaving become much interested in the battle of Waterloo, which I justremember a year after it was fought, when a solemn anniversary took placein a neighbouring parish where I was born, and the village carpenter cameto my father to borrow a pair of Wellington boots for the lower limbs ofa stuffed effigy of Buonaparte, which was hung on a gibbet, and guns andpistols were discharged at him, while we and the parson of the parish satin a tent where we had beef and plum pudding and loyal toasts. To thishour I remember the smell of the new-cut hay in the meadow as we went inour best summer clothes to the ceremony. But now I am trying tounderstand whether the Guards or the 52nd Regiment deserved most creditfor _ecraseing_ the Imperial Guard. {286} Here is a fine subject toaddress you on in the year 1880! Let it go for nothing; but just tell mehow you are, and believe me, with some feeling of old, if not very closeintimacy, Yours sincerely, EDWARD FITZGERALD. 

_To R. C. Trench_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _May_ 18/80. 

MY DEAR LORD, I should have sent a line before now to thank you for your Calderon, hadI not waited for some tidings of Donne from Mowbray, to whom I wrote somedays ago. Not hearing from him, I suppose that he is out holyday-makingsomewhere; and therefore I will delay no longer. 

You gave me your Calderon when it first came out, now some five andtwenty years ago! I am always glad to know that it, or any of yourwritings, Prose or Verse, still flourish--which I think not many othersof the kind will do after the Generation they are born in. I rememberthat you regretted having tried the asonante, and you now decide thatProse is best for English Translation. It may be so; in a great degreeit must be so; but I think the experiment might yet be tried; namely, theshort trochaic line, regardless of an assonant that will not speak in ourthin vowels, but looped up at intervals with a strong monosyllabic rhyme, without which the English trochaic, assonant or not, is apt to fray out, or run away too watery-like without some such interruption; I mean whenrunning to any considerable length, as I should think would be the casein Longfellow's Hiawatha; which I have not however seen since itappeared. Were I a dozen years younger I might try this with Calderonwhich I think I have found to succeed in some much shorter flights: butit is too late now, and you may think it well that it is so, with one whotakes such great liberties with great Poets, himself pretending to belittle more than a Versifier. I know not how it is with you who arereally a Poet; and perhaps you may think I am as wrong about my trocheeas about my iambic. 

As for the modern Poetry, I have cared for none of the last thirty years, not even Tennyson, except in parts: pure, lofty and noble as he alwaysis. Much less can I endure the _Gurgoyle_ school (I call it) begun, Isuppose, by V. Hugo. . . . I do think you will find something betterthan that in the discarded Crabbe; whose writings Wordsworth (not givento compliment any man on any occasion) wrote to Crabbe's Son and Editorwould continue as long at least as any Poetry written since, on accountof its mingled 'Truth and Poetry. ' And this includes Wordsworth's own. So I must think my old Crabbe will come up again, though never to bepopular. 

This reminds me that just after I had written to you, Crabbe's Grandson, one of the best, most amiable, and most agreeable, of my friends, paid mea two days' Visit, and told me that a Nephew of yours was learning tofarm with a Steward of Lord Walsingham at Merton in Norfolk, GeorgeCrabbe's own parish; I mean the living George, who spoke of your Nephewas a very gentlemanly young man indeed. I think _he_ will not gainsaywhat I write to you of his 'Parson. '

Your kind Letter has encouraged me to write all this. I felt somehesitation in addressing you again after an interval of some fifteenyears, I think; and now I think I shall venture on writing to you onceagain before another year be gone, if we both live to see 1881 in, andout. 

_To Charles Keene_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _Sunday_. 

MY DEAR KEENE, Your Letter reached me yesterday when I was just finishing my Sevigne; Imean, reading it over. I have plenty of Notes for an IntroductoryArgument and List of Dramatis Personae, and a clue to the course of herLetters, so as to set a new reader off on the right tack, with someprevious acquaintance with the People and Places she lives among. But Ishrink from trying to put such Notes into shape; all writing alwaysdistasteful to me, and now very difficult, at seventy odd. Some suchIntroduction would be very useful: people being in general puzzled withPersons, Dates, etc. , if not revolted by the eternal, though quitesincere, fuss about her Daughter, which the Eye gradually learns to skimover, and get to the fun. I felt a pang when arriving at--

 Ci git Marie de Rabutin-Chantal Marquise de Sevigne Decedee le 18 Avril 1696

still to be found, I believe, on a Tablet in the Church of Grignan inProvence. I have been half minded to run over to Brittany just to seeLes Rochers; but a French 'Murray' informed me that the present ownerwill not let it be seen by Strangers attracted by all those 'paperasses, 'as he calls her Letters. Probably I should not have gone in any casewhen it came to proof. . . . 

I did not forget Waterloo Day. Just as I and my Reader Boy were goinginto the Pantry for some _grub_, I thought of young Ensign Leeke, not 18, who carried the Colours of that famous 52nd which gave the 'coup degrace' to the Imperial Guard about 8 p. M. And then marched to Rossomme, seeing the Battle was won: and the Colour-serjeant found some bread insome French Soldier's knapsack, and brought a bit to his Ensign, 'Youmust want a bit, Sir, and I am sure you have deserved it. ' That was aCompliment worth having!

I have, like you, always have, and from a Child had, a mysterious feelingabout that 'Sizewell Gap. ' There were reports of kegs of Hollands foundunder the Altar Cloth of Theberton Church near by: and we Children lookedwith awe on the 'Revenue Cutters' which passed Aldbro', especiallyremembering one that went down with all hands, 'The Ranger. '

They have half spoilt Aldbro'; but now that Dunwich is crossed out frommy visiting Book by the loss of that fine fellow, {290} whom this time ofyear especially reminds me of, I must return to Aldbro' now and then. Whycan't you go there with me? I say no more of your coming here, for youought to be assured that you would be welcome at any time; but I never doask any busy, or otherwise engaged man to come. . . . 

Here is a good Warwickshire word--'I _sheered_ my Eyes round the room. 'So good, that it explains itself. 

WHITE LION, ALDEBURGH. _July_ 7/80. 

MY DEAR KEENE, I shall worry you with Letters: here is one, however, which will call forno answer. It is written indeed in acknowledgement of your packet ofDrawings, received by me yesterday at Woodbridge. 

My rule concerning Books is, that Giver and Taker (each in his turn)should just say nothing. As I am not an Artist (though a very greatAuthor) I will say that Four of your Drawings seemed capital to me: Icannot remember the Roundabouts which they initialed: except two: 1. Thelazy idle Boy, which you note as not being used; I suppose, from notbeing considered sufficiently appropriate to the Essay (which I forget), but which I thought altogether good; and the old Man, with a look ofEdwards! 2. Little Boy in Black, very pretty: 3. (I forget the Essay)People looking at Pictures: one of them, the principal, surely arecollection of W. M. T. Himself. Then 4. There was a bawling Boy:subject forgotten. I looked at them many times through the forenoon: andcame away here at 2 p. M. 

I do not suppose, or wish, that you should make over to me all theseDrawings, which I suppose are the originals from which the Wood was cut. I say I do not 'wish, ' because I am in my 72nd year: and I now give awayrather than accept. But I wished for one at least of your hand; for itsown sake, and as a remembrance, for what short time is left me, of onewhom I can sincerely say I regard greatly for himself, as also for thoseDunwich days in which I first became known to him. 'Viola qui est dit. '

And I wish you were here, not for your own sake, for it is dull enough. No Sun, no Ship, a perpetual drizzle; and to me the melancholy of anotherAldbro' of years gone by. Out of that window there 'le petit' Churchyardsketched Thorpe headland under an angry Sunset of Oct. 55 which heraldeda memorable Gale that washed up a poor Woman with a Babe in her arms: andold Mitford had them buried with an inscribed Stone in the oldChurchyard, peopled with dead 'Mariners'; and Inscription and Stone arenow gone. Yesterday I got out in a Boat, drizzly as it was: but to-daythere is too much Sea to put off. I am to be home by the week's end, ifnot before. The melancholy of Slaughden last night, with the same Sloopssticking sidelong in the mud as sixty years ago! And I the venerableRemembrancer. 

MY DEAR KEENE, I ought to have acknowledged the receipt of your Paris map, which isexcellent; so that, eyes permitting, I can follow my Sevigne about fromher Rue St. Catherine over the Seine to the Faubourg St. Germain quitedistinctly. These cold East winds, however, coming so suddenly after theheat, put those Eyes of mine in a pickle, so as I am obliged to let themlie fallow, looking only at the blessed Green of the Trees before myWindow, or on my Quarterdeck. {293} My two Nieces are with me, so that Ileave all the house to them, except my one Room downstairs, which servesfor Parlour, Bedroom and all. And it does very well for me; reminding meof my former Cabin life in my little Ship 'd'autrefois. ' . . . 

Do not you forget (as you will) to tell Mr. Millais one day of the prettySubject I told you; little Keats standing sentry before his sick Mother'sDoor with a drawn sword; in his Shirt it might be, with some RembrandtishLight and Shade. The Story is to be found at the beginning of LordHoughton's Life. 

Also, for any Painter you know of what they call the 'Genre' School:

Sevigne and the 'de Villars' looking through the keyhole at Mignardpainting Madame de Fontevrauld (Rochechouart) while the Abbe Tetu talksto her (Letter of Sept. 6, 1675). It might be done in two compartments, with the wall slipt between, so as to show both Parties, as one has seenon the Stage. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _Nov. _ 3, 1880. 

MY DEAR NORTON, . . . With all your knowledge, and all the use you can make of it, Iwonder that you can think twice of such things as I can offer you inreturn for what you send me: but I take you at your word, and shallperhaps send you the last half of OEdipus, if I can prepare him for thePrinter; a rather hard business to me now, when turned of seventy, andreminded by some intimations about the Heart that I am not likely toexceed the time which those of my Family have stopped going at. But thisis no great Regret to me. 

I have sent you a better Book than any I can send you of my own: or ofany one else's in the way of Verse, I think: the Sonnets of AlfredTennyson's Brother Charles. Two thirds of them I do not care for: butthere is scarce one without some fine thought or expression: some of themquite beautiful to me: all pure, true, and original. I think you inAmerica may like these leaves from the Life of a quiet LincolnshireParson. 

. . . We have had the Leaves green unusually late this year, I think: butso I have thought often before, I am told. The last few nights havebrought Frost, however: and changed the countenance of all. A Blackbird(have you him as the 'ousel'?) whom I kept alive, I think, through lasthard winter by a saucer of Bread and Milk, has come to look for it again. 

_To Miss Anna Biddell_. 

_Nov. _ 30, 1880. 

One day I went into the Abbey at 3. 5 p. M. While a beautiful anthem wasbeautifully sung, and then the prayers and collects, not less beautiful, well intoned on one single note by the Minister. And when I looked upand about me, I thought that Abbey a wonderful structure for Monkeys tohave raised. The last night, Mesdames Kemble and Edwards had each ofthem company, so I went into my old Opera House in the Haymarket, where Iremembered the very place where Pasta stood as Medea on the Stage, andRubini singing his return to his Betrothed in the Puritani, and Taglionifloating everywhere about: and the several Boxes in which sat the severalRanks and Beauties of forty and fifty years ago: my Mother's Box on thethird Tier, in which I often figured as a Specimen of both. The Audienceall changed much for the worse, I thought: and Opera and Singers also;only one of them who could sing at all, and she sang very well indeed;Trebelli, her name. The opera by a Frenchman on the Wagner plan:excellent instrumentation, but not one new or melodious idea through thewhole. 

_To W. H. Thompson_. 

LITTLEGRANGE: WOODBRIDGE. _Decr. _ 15 [1880]. 

MY DEAR MASTER, I have not written to you this very long while, simply because I did notwish to trouble you: Aldis Wright will tell you that I have not neglectedto enquire about you. I drew him out of Jerusalem Chamber for fiveminutes three weeks ago: this I did to ask primarily about Mr. Furness onbehalf of Mrs. Kemble: but also I asked about you, and was told you werestill improving, and prepared to abide the winter here. I saw nobody inLondon except my two Widows, my dear old Donne, and some coeval SuffolkFriends. I was half tempted to jump into a Bus and just leave my name atCarlyle's Door! But I did not. I should of course have asked and heardhow he was: which I can find no one now to tell me. For his Niece has aChild, if only one, to attend to, and I do not like to trouble. I heardfrom vague Information in London that he is almost confined to his house. 

I have myself been somewhat bothered at times for the last three monthswith pains and heaviness about the Heart: which I knew from a Doctor wasunsettled five years ago. I shall not at all complain if it takes theusual course, only wishing to avoid _Angina_, or some such form of theDisease. My Family get on gaily enough till seventy, and then generallyfounder after turning the corner. 

I hope you know Charles Tennyson's Sonnets; three times too many, andsome rather puerile: but scarce one but with something good in Thought orExpression: all original: and some delightful: I think, to live withAlfred's, and no one else's. Old Fred might have made one of ThreeBrothers, I think, could he have compressed himself into something ofSonnet Compass: but he couldn't. He says, Charles makes one regard andlove little things more than any other Poet. 

My Nephew De Soyres seems to have made a good Edition of Pascal'sLetters: I should have thought they had been quite well enough editedbefore; and yet a more 'exhaustive' Edition is to follow the House thatJack built, he tells us. 

Groome had proposed a month ago that he would visit me about this time:but I have heard no more of him: and am always afraid to write, for fearof those poor Eyes of his. 

I was very glad to meet Merivale on Lowestoft Pier for some days. Mrs. M. Writes to me of an enlarged Photo of him whose Negative will bedestroyed in a month unless subscribed for by Friends, etc. 'Will I askFriends, etc. ' No: I will not do that, though I will take a copy ifwanted to complete a number: though, if it be life size, having no whereto hang it up: my own Mother, by Sir T. Lawrence, being put away in acupboard for want of room. 

Now, my dear Master, I want neither you nor the Mistress to reply to thisLetter: but please to believe me, both of you, yours as ever sincerely

E. FITZ. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _February_ 20, 1881. 

MY DEAR NORTON, . . . I have little to say about Carlyle, but that my heart did followhim to Ecclefechan, from which place I have, or had, several lettersdated by him. I think it was fine that he should anticipate allWestminster Abbey honours, and determine to be laid where he was born, among his own kindred, and with all the simple and dignified obsequies of(I suppose) his own old Puritan Church. The Care of his PosthumousMemory will be left in good hands, I believe, if in those of Mr. Froude. His Niece, who had not answered a Note of Enquiry I wrote her some twomonths ago, answered it a few days after his Death: she had told him, shesaid, of my letter, and he said, 'You must answer that. '

_To Mrs. Kemble_. 

[_March_, 1881]. 

MY DEAR LADY, It was very, very good and kind of you to write to me about Spedding. Yes: Aldis Wright had apprised me of the matter just after it happened, he happening to be in London at the time; and but two days after theaccident heard that Spedding was quite calm, and even cheerful; onlyanxious that Wright himself should not be kept waiting for somecommunication that S. Had promised him! Whether to live, or to die, hewill be Socrates still. 

Directly that I heard from Wright, I wrote to Mowbray Donne to send mejust a Post Card daily, if he or his Wife could, with but one or twowords on it, 'Better, ' 'Less well, ' or whatever it might be. Thismorning I hear that all is going on even better than could be expected, according to Miss Spedding. But I suppose the Crisis, which you tell meof, is not yet come; and I have always a terror of that French Adage, 'Monsieur se porte mal--Monsieur se porte mieux--Monsieur est--!' Ah, you know, or you guess, the rest. 

My dear old Spedding, though I have not seen him these twenty years andmore, and probably should never see again; but he lives, his old Self, inmy heart of hearts; and all I hear of him does but embellish therecollection of him, if it could be embellished; for he is but the samethat he was from a Boy, all that is best in Heart and Head, a man thatwould be incredible had one not known him. 

I certainly should have gone up to London, even with Eyes that willscarce face the lamps of Woodbridge, not to see him, but to hear thefirst intelligence I could about him. But I rely on the Post-card forbut a Night's delay. Laurence, Mowbray tells me, had been to see him, and found him as calm as had been reported by Wright. But the Doctorshad said that he should be kept as quiet as possible. 

I think, from what Mowbray also says, that you may have seen our otherold friend Donne in somewhat worse plight than usual because of his beingmuch shocked at this accident. He would feel it indeed!--as you do. 

I had even thought of writing to tell you all this, but could not butsuppose that you were more likely to know of it than myself; thoughsometimes one is greatly mistaken with these 'of course you knows, etc. 'But you have known it all: and have very kindly written of it to me, whomyou might also have supposed already informed of it: but you took thetrouble to write, not relying on 'of course you know, etc. '

I have thought lately that I ought to make some enquiry about ArthurMalkin, who was always very kind to me. I had meant to send him myCrabbe, who was a great favourite of his Father's, 'an excellentCompanion for Old Age' he told--Donne, I think. But I do not know if Iever did send him the Book; and now, judging by what you tell me, it istoo late to do so, unless for Compliment. 

The Sun, I see, has put my Fire out, for which I only thank him, and willgo to look for him himself in my Garden, only with a Green Shade over myEyes. I must get to London to see you before you move away toLeamington; when I can bear Sun or Lamp without odious blue glasses, etc. I dare to think those Eyes are better, though not Sun-proof. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _March_ 13, [1881]. 

MY DEAR NORTON, I send you along with this Letter Part II. Of OEdipus, with somecorrections or suggestions which I have been obliged to make in Pencil, because of the Paper blotting under the lightest Penwork. And, alongwith it, a preliminary Letter, which I believe I told you of also, addressed to your Initial: for I did not wish to compromise you even withyourself in such a Business. I know you will like it probably more thanit deserves, and excuse its inroads on the Original, though you may, andprobably will, think I might better have left it alone, or followed itmore faithfully. As to those Students you tell me of who are meditating, or by this time may have accomplisht, their Representation, they couldonly look on me as a Blasphemer. . . . 

It seems almost wrong or unreasonable of me to be talking thus of myselfand my little Doings, when not only Carlyle has departed from us, butone, not so illustrious in Genius, but certainly not less wise, my dearold Friend of sixty years, James Spedding: {302} whose name you will knowas connected with Lord Bacon. To re-edit his Works, which did not wantany such re-edition, and to vindicate his Character which could not becleared, did this Spedding sacrifice forty years which he might well havegiven to accomplish much greater things; Shakespeare, for one. ButSpedding had no sort of Ambition, and liked to be kept at one long workwhich he knew would not glorify himself. He was the wisest man I haveknown: not the less so for plenty of the Boy in him; a great sense ofHumour, a Socrates in Life and in Death, which he faced with all Serenityso long as Consciousness lasted. I suppose something of him will reachAmerica, I mean, of his Death, run over by a Cab and dying in St. George's Hospital to which he was taken, and from which he could not beremoved home alive. I believe that had Carlyle been alive, and but aswell as he was three months ago, he would have insisted on being carriedto the Hospital to see his Friend, whom he respected as he did fewothers. I have just got the Carlyle Reminiscences, which will take mesome little time to read, impatient as I may be to read them. What Ihave read is of a stuff we can scarce find in any other Autobiographer:whether his Editor Froude has done quite well in publishing them as theyare, and so soon, is another matter. Carlyle's Niece thinks, not quite. She sent me a Pipe her Uncle had used, for Memorial. I had asked her forthe Bowl, and an Inch of stem, of one of the Clay Pipes such as I hadsmoked with him under that little old Pear Tree in his Chelsea gardenmany an Evening. But she sent me a small Meerschaum which Lady Ashburtonhad given him, and which he used when from home. 

_To S. Laurence_. 

_March_ 13/81. 

MY DEAR LAURENCE, It was very very good of you to think of writing to me at all on thisoccasion: {303} much more, writing to me so fully, almost more fully thanI dared at first to read: though all so delicately and as you alwayswrite. It is over! I shall not write about it. He was all you say. 

So I turn to myself! And that is only to say that I am much as usual:here all alone for the last six months, except a two days visit to Londonin November to see Mrs. Kemble, who is now removed from Westminster toMarshall Thompson's Hotel Cavendish Square: and Mrs. Edwards who isnaturally better and happier than a year ago, but who says she nevershould be happy unless always at work. And that work is taking offimpressions of yet another--and I believe last--batch of her lateHusband's Etchings. I saw and heard nothing else than these two Ladies:and some old Nurseys at St. John's Wood: and dear Donne, who was infirmerthan when I had seen him before, and, I hear, is infirmer still than whenI saw him last. 

By the by, I began to think my own Eyes, which were blazed away byParaffin some dozen years ago, were going out of me just beforeChristmas. So for the two dreary months which followed I could scarceread or write. And as yet I am obliged to use them tenderly: only tooglad to find that they are better; and not quite going (as I hope) yet. Ithink they will light me out of this world with care. On March 31 Ishall enter on my seventy-third year: and none of my Family reaches overseventy-five. 

When I was in London I was all but tempted to jump into a Cab and justknock at Carlyle's door, and ask after him, and give my card, and--runaway. . . . 

The cold wind will not leave us, and my Crocuses do not like it. Still Imanage to sit on one of those Benches you may remember under the lee sideof the hedge, and still my seventy-third year approaches. 

_To Miss Anna Biddell_. 

_March_ 1881. 

I can only say of Carlyle what you say; except that I do not find thestyle 'tiresome' any more than I did his Talk: which it is, only put onPaper, quite fresh, from an Individual Man of Genius, unlike almost allAutobiographic Memoirs. I doubt not that he wrote it by way of someEmployment, as well as (in his Wife's case) some relief to his Feelings. . . . 

I did not know that I should feel Spedding's Loss as I do, after aninterval of more than twenty years [since] meeting him. But I knew thatI could always get the Word I wanted of him by Letter, and also that fromtime to time I should meet with some of his wise and delightful Papers insome Quarter or other. He talked of Shakespeare, I am told, when hisMind wandered. I wake almost every morning feeling as if I had lostsomething, as one does in a Dream: and truly enough, I have lost _him_. 'Matthew is in his Grave, etc. '

_To Mrs. Kemble_. 

[20 _March_, 1881. ]

MY DEAR LADY, I have let the Full Moon pass because I thought you had written to me solately, and so kindly, about our lost Spedding, that I would not call onyou so soon again. Of him I will say nothing except that his Death hasmade me recall very many passages in his Life in which I was partlyconcerned. In particular, staying at his Cumberland Home along withTennyson in the May of 1835. 'Voila bien longtemps de ca!' His Fatherand Mother were both alive: he, a wise man, who mounted his Cob afterBreakfast and was at his Farm till Dinner at two; then away again tillTea: after which he sat reading by a shaded lamp: saying very little, butalways courteous and quite content with any company his Son might bringto the house, so long as they let him go his way: which indeed he wouldhave gone whether they let him or no. But he had seen enough of Poetsnot to like them or their Trade: Shelley, for a time living among theLakes: Coleridge at Southey's (whom perhaps he had a respect for--SoutheyI mean); and Wordsworth whom I do not think he valued. He was ratherjealous of 'Jem, ' who might have done available service in the world, hethought, giving himself up to such Dreamers; and sitting up with Tennysonconning over the Morte d'Arthur, Lord of Burleigh, and other things whichhelped to make up the two volumes of 1842. So I always associate thatArthur Idyll with Basanthwaite Lake, under Skiddaw. Mrs. Spedding was asensible, motherly Lady, with whom I used to play Chess of a Night. Andthere was an old Friend of hers, Miss Bristowe, who always reminded me ofMiss La Creevy if you know of such a Person in Nickleby. 

At the end of May we went to lodge for a week at Windermere, whereWordsworth's new volume of Yarrow Revisited reached us. W. Was then athis home: but Tennyson would not go to visit him: and of course I didnot: nor even saw him. 

You have, I suppose, the Carlyle Reminiscences: of which I will saynothing except that much as we outsiders gain by them, I think that, onthe whole, they had better have been kept unpublished, for some while atleast. 

_To W. F. Pollock_. 

[1881. ]

MY DEAR POLLOCK, Thank you for your kind Letter; which I forwarded, with its enclosure, toThompson, as you desired. 

If Spedding's Letters, or parts of them, would not suit the Public, theywould surely be a very welcome treasure to his Friends. Two or threepages of Biography would be enough to introduce them to those who knewhim less long and less intimately than ourselves: and all who read wouldbe the better, and the happier, for reading them. 

I am rather surprised to find how much I dwell upon the thought of him, considering that I had not refreshed my Memory with the sight or sound ofhim for more than twenty years. But all the past (before that) comesupon me: I cannot help thinking of him while I wake; and when I do wakefrom Sleep, I have a feeling of something lost, as in a Dream, and it isJ. S. I suppose that Carlyle amused himself, after just losing his Wife, with the Records he has left: what he says of her seems a sort ofpenitential glorification: what of others, just enough in general: but inneither case to be made public, and so immediately after his Decease. . . . I keep wondering what J. S. Would have said on the matter: but Icannot ask him now, as I might have done a month ago. . . . 

Dear old Jem! His Loss makes one's Life more dreary, and 'en revanche'the end of it less regretful. 

_To Mrs. Alfred Tennyson_. {308a}

WOODBRIDGE: _March_ 22, [1881]. 

MY DEAR MRS. TENNYSON, It is very, very [good] of you to write to me, even to remember me. Ihave told you before why I did not write to any other of your Party, as Imight occasionally wish to do for the sake of asking about you all: thetask of answering my Letter was always left to you: and I did not chooseto put you to that trouble. Laurence had written me some account of hisVisit to St. George's: all Patience: only somewhat wishful to be at home:somewhat weary with lying without Book, or even Watch, for company. Whata Man! as in Life so in Death, which, as Montaigne says, proves what isat the bottom of the Vessel. {308b} I had not seen him for more thantwenty years, and should never have seen him again, unless in the Street, where Cabs were crossing! He did not want to see me; he wanted nothing, I think: but I was always thinking of him, and should have done till myown Life's end, I know. I only wrote to him about twice a year: he onlycared to answer when one put some definite Question to him: and I hadusually as little to ask as to tell. I was thinking that, but for thatCab, I might even now be asking him what I was to think of his CousinFroude's Carlyle Reminiscences. I see but one Quotation in the Book, which is 'of the Days that are no more, ' which clung to him when hisSorrow came, as it will to many and many who will come after him. 

I certainly hope that some pious and judicious hand will gather, andchoose from our dear Spedding's Letters: no fear of indelicatepersonality with him, you know: and many things which all the world wouldbe the wiser and better for. Archdeacon Allen sent me the other day aLetter about Darwin's Philosophy, so wise, so true, so far as I couldjudge, and, though written off, all fit to go as it was into Print, anddo all the World good. {309} . . . 

It was fine too of Carlyle ordering to be laid among his own homelyKindred in the Village of his Birth: without Question of WestminsterAbbey. So think I, at least. And dear J. S. At Mirehouse where yourHusband and I stayed, very near upon fifty years ago, in 1835 it was, inthe month of May, when the Daffodil was out in a field before the house, as I see them, though not in such force, owing to cold winds, before mywindow now. Does A. T. Remember them?

_To Mrs. Kemble_. 

[_April_, 1881. ]

MY DEAR MRS. KEMBLE, Somewhat before my usual time, you see; but Easter comes, and I shall beglad to hear if you keep it in London, or elsewhere. Elsewhere there hasbeen no inducement to go until To-day: when the Wind though yet East hasturned to the Southern side of it; one can walk without any wrapper; andI dare to fancy we have turned the corner of Winter at last. People talkof changed Seasons: only yesterday I was reading in my dear old Sevigne, how she was with the Duke and Duchess of Chaulnes at their Chateau ofChaulnes in Picardy all but two hundred years ago: that is in 1689: andthe green has not as yet ventured to shew its 'nez' nor a Nightingale tosing. You see that I have returned to her as for some Spring Music, atany rate. As for the Birds, I have nothing but a Robin who seems ratherpleased when I sit down on a Bench under an old Ivied Pollard, where Isuppose he has a Nest, poor little Fellow. But we have terribleSuperstitions about him here; no less than that he always kills hisParents if he can: my young Reader is quite determined on this head: andthere lately has been a Paper in some Magazine to the same effect. 

My dear old Spedding sent me back to old Wordsworth too, who sings (hisbest songs I think) about the Mountains and Lakes they were bothassociated with: and with a quiet feeling he sings that somehow comeshome to me more now than ever it did before. 

As to Carlyle, I thought on my first reading that he must have been_egare_ at the time of writing: a condition which I well remember sayingto Spedding long ago that one of his temperament might likely fall into. And now I see that Mrs. Oliphant hints at something of the sort. Hers Ithink an admirable Paper: {311} better than has yet been written, or (Ibelieve) is likely to be written by any one else. . . . I must thinkCarlyle's judgments mostly, or mainly, true; but that he must have 'losthis head' if not when he recorded them, yet when he left them in anyone's hands to decide on their publication. Especially when not aboutPublic Men, but about their Families. It is slaying the Innocent withthe Guilty. But of all this you have doubtless heard in London more thanenough. 'Pauvre et triste Humanite!' One's heart opens again to him atthe last: sitting alone in the middle of her Room. 'I want to die. ' 'Iwant--a Mother. ' 'Ah mamma Letizia!' Napoleon is said to have murmuredas he lay. By way of pendant to this recurs to me the Story that whenDucis was wretched his Mother would lay his head on her Bosom--'Ah, monhomme! mon pauvre homme!' . . . 

And now I have written more than enough for yourself and me: whose Eyesmay be the worse for it to-morrow. I still go about in Blue Glasses, andflinch from Lamp and Candle. Pray let me know about your own Eyes, andyour own Self; and believe me always sincerely yours

LITTLEGRANGE. _May_ 8, [1881]. 

If still at Leamington, you look upon a sight which I used to like well;that is, the blue Avon (as in this weather it will be) roaming throughbuttercup meadows all the way to Warwick; unless those meadows are allbuilt over since I was there some forty years ago. . . . 

I am got back to my Sevigne! who somehow returns to me in Spring; freshas the Flowers. These latter have done but badly this Spring: cut off orwithered by the Cold: and now parched up by this blazing Sun and dryWind. 

_From another Letter in the same year_. 

It has been what we call down here 'smurring' rather than raining, allday long, and I think that Flower and Herb already show their gratitude. My Blackbird (I think it is the same I have tried to keep alive duringthe Winter) seems also to have 'wetted his Whistle, ' and what they callthe 'Cuckoo's mate' with a rather harsh scissor note announces that hisPartner may be on the wing to these Latitudes. You will hear of him atMr W. Shakespeare's, it may be. {313} There must be Violets, white andblue, somewhere about where he lies, I think. They are generally foundin a Churchyard, where also (the Hunters used to say) a Hare: for thesame reason of comparative security I suppose. 

_To Miss S. F. Spedding_. 

LITTLE GRANGE, WOODBRIDGE. _July /81_. 

. . . As I am so very little known to yourself, or your Mother, I did notchoose to trouble you with any of my own feelings about your Uncle'sDeath. But I am not sorry to take this opportunity of saying, and, Iknow, truly, there was no one I loved and honoured more; that, though Ihad not seen him for more than twenty years, I was always thinking of himall the while: always feeling that I could apply to him for a wise word Ineeded for myself; always knowing that I might light upon some wiser wordthan any one else's in some Review, etc. , and _now_ always thinking Ihave lost all that. I say that I have not known, no, nor heard of, anymortal so prepared to step unchanged into the better world we arepromised--Intellect, and Heart, and such an outer Man to them as Iremember. 

WOODBRIDGE: _July_ 31, [1881]. 

. . . I rejoice to hear of a Collection, or Reprint, of his stray works. . . . I used to say he wrote 'Virgilian Prose. ' One only of his I didnot care for; but that, I doubt not, was because of the subject, not ofthe treatment: his own printed Report of a Speech he made in what wascalled the 'Quinquaginta Club' Debating Society (not the Union) atCambridge about the year 1831. This Speech his Father got him to recalland recompose in Print; wishing always that his Son should turn hisfaculties to such public Topics rather than to the Poets, of whom he hadseen enough in Cumberland not to have much regard for: Shelley, for one, at one time stalking about the mountains, with Pistols, and other suchVagaries. I do not think he was much an Admirer of Wordsworth (I don'tknow about Southey), and I well remember that when I was at M_e_rehouse(as Miss Bristowe would have us call it) with A. Tennyson in 1835, Mr. Spedding grudged his Son's giving up much time and thought toconsultations about Morte d'Arthur's, Lords of Burleigh, etc. , which werethen in MS. He more than once questioned me, who was sometimes presentat the meetings: 'Well, Mr. F. , and what is it? Mr. Tennyson reads, andJem criticizes:--is that it?' etc. This, while I might be playing Chesswith dear Mrs. Spedding, in May, while the Daffodils were dancing outsidethe Hall door. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _August_ 5/81. 

MY DEAR NORTON, I am sorry that you felt bound to write me so fully about the Play when, as you tell me, you had so much other work on your hands. Any how, donot trouble yourself to write more. If you think my Version does aswell, or better, without any introduction, why, tear that out; all, except (if you like the Verse well enough to adopt it) the first sentenceof Dedication to yourself: adding your full name and Collegiate Honourswhenever you care so to do. 

Your account of your Harvard original in the Atlantic Monthly was quitewell fitted for its purpose: a general account of it for the generalreader, without going into particulars which only the Scholar wouldappreciate. 

I believe I told you that thirty years ago at least I advised ourTrinity's Master, then only Greek Professor, to do the like with one ofthe Greek Tragedies, in what they call their Senate-house, well fittedfor such a purpose. But our Cambridge is too well fed, and slow to stir;and I not important enough to set it a-going. 

By the way, I have been there for two days; not having seen the place forthose same thirty years, except in passing through some ten years ago toNaseby Field, for the purpose of doing Carlyle's will in setting up amemorial Stone with his Inscription upon it. But the present owners ofthe Place would not consent: and so that simple thing came to nothing. 

Well, I went again, as I say, to Cambridge a month ago; not in my way toNaseby, but to my friend George Crabbe's (Grandson of my Poet) inNorfolk. I went because it was Vacation time, and no one I knew upexcept Cowell and Aldis Wright. Cowell, married, lives in pleasantlodging with trees before and behind, on the skirts of the town; Wright, in 'Neville's Court, ' one side of which is the Library, all of Wren'sdesign, and (I think) very good. I felt at home in the rooms there, walled with Books, large, and cool: and I was lionized over some thingsnew to me, and some that I was glad to see again. Now I am back again, without any design to move; not even to my old haunts on our neighbouringSea-coast. The inland Verdure suits my Eyes better than glowing sand andpebble: and I suppose that every year I grow less and less desirous ofmoving. 

I will scarce touch upon the Carlyle Chapter: except to say that I amsorry Froude printed the Reminiscences; at any rate, printed them beforethe Life which he has begun so excellently in the 'Nineteenth Century'for July. I think one can surely see there that Carlyle might becomesomewhat crazed, whether by intense meditation or Dyspepsy or both:especially as one sees that his dear good Mother was so afflicted. Buthow beautiful is the Story of that home, and the Company of Ladstravelling on foot to Edinburgh; and the monies which he sends home forthe paternal farm: and the butter and cheese which the Farm returns tohim. Ah! it is from such training that strength comes, not fromluxurious fare, easy chairs, cigars, Pall Mall Clubs, etc. It has allmade me think of a very little Dialogue {317} I once wrote on the matter, thirty years ago and more, which I really think of putting into shapeagain: and, if I do, will send it to you, by way of picture of what ourCambridge was in what I think were better days than now. I see thelittle tract is overdone and in some respects in bad taste as it is. Now, do not ask for this, nor mention it as if it were of any importancewhatsoever: it is not, but if pruned, etc. , just a pretty thing, whichyour Cambridge shall see if I can return to it. 

By the by, I had meant to send you an emendation of a passage in myTyrannus which you found fault with. I mean where OEdipus, after puttingout his eyes, talks of seeing those in Hades he does not wish to see. Iknew it was not Greek: but I thought that a note would be necessary toexplain what the Greek was: and I confess I do not care enough for theirMythology for that. But, if you please, the passage (as I remember it)might run:

 Eyes, etc. , Which, having seen such things, henceforth, he said, Should never by the light of day behold Those whom he loved, nor in the after-dark Of Hades, those he loathed, to look upon. 

All this has run me into a third _screed_, you see: a word we used atSchool, only calling it '_screet_'--'I say, do lend me a screet ofpaper, ' meaning, a quarter of a foolscap sheet. 

WOODBRIDGE. _Jan. _ 18/82. 

MY DEAR NORTON, At last I took heart, and Eyes, to return to the OEdipus of this timelast year; and have left none of your objections unattended to, if notall complied with. Not but that you may be quite as right in objectingas I in leaving things as they were: but as I believe I said (right orwrong) a little obscurity seems to me not amiss in certain places, provided enough is left clear, I mean in matter of Grammar, etc. But Isee that you have good reason to object in other cases: and, on lookingat the Play again, I also discover more, too many perhaps to have heartor Eyes to devote to their rectification. The Paper on which the secondPart is printed will not endure Ink, which also daunts me: nevertheless, I send you a Copy pencilled, rather than references and alterationswritten by way of Letter: I hope the least trouble to you of eitherAlternative. . . . 

I scarcely know what I have written, but I know it must be bad MS. ; allwhich I ought in good manners to rectify, or re-write. I think you inAmerica think more of Calligraphy than we here do: a really politeaccomplishment, I always maintain: and yet 'deteriora sequor. ' But youknow that my eyes are not very active: and now my hand is less thanusually so, possessed as I am with a Devil of a Chill (in spite, or inconsequence, of warm wet weather) attended with something of Bronchitis, I think. . . . 

I forget if I told you in my last of my surprising communication with theSpanish Ambassador who sent me the Calderon medal, I doubt not at Mr. Lowell's instance. But I think I must have told you. Cowell came overto me here on Monday: he, to whom a Medal is far more due than to me;always reading, and teaching, Calderon at Cambridge now (as he did to methirty years ago), in spite of all his Sanskrit Duties. I wish I couldsend him to you across the Atlantic, as easily as Arbuthnot once bid Pope'toss Johnny Gay' to him over the Thames. Cowell is greatly delightedwith Ford's '_Gatherings in Spain_, ' a Supplement to his SpanishHandbook, and in which he finds, as I did, a supplement to Don Quixotealso. If you have not read, and cannot find, the Book, I will toss itover the Atlantic to you, a clean new Copy, if that be yet procurable, ormy own second-hand one in default of a new. . . . 

_To Mrs. Kemble_. 

[_Jan. _ 1882. ]

I see my poor little Aconites--'New Year's Gifts'--still surviving in theGarden-plot before my window: 'still surviving, ' I say, because of theirhaving been out for near a month agone. I believe that Messrs. Daffodil, Crocus and Snowdrop are putting in appearance above ground, but (oldCoward) I have not put my own old Nose out of doors to look for them. Iread (Eyes permitting) the Correspondence between Goethe and Schiller(translated) from 1798 to 1806, extremely interesting to me, though I donot understand, and generally skip, the more purely AEsthetic Parts:which is the Part of Hamlet, I suppose. But in other respects, two suchmen so freely discussing together their own, and each other's, worksinterest me greatly. At night, we have the Fortunes of Nigel; a littleof it, and not every night: for the reason that I do not wish to eat myCake too soon. The last night but one I sent my Reader to see Macbethplayed by a little Shakespearian company at a Lecture Hall here. Hebrought me one new Reading; suggested, I doubt not by himself, from aremembrance of Macbeth's tyrannical ways: 'Hang out our _Gallows_ on theoutward walls. ' Nevertheless, the Boy took great Interest in the Play, and I like to encourage him in Shakespeare rather than in the NegroMelodists. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _Jan. _ 25/82. 

MY DEAR NORTON, I forgot in my last letter to beg you not to write for the mere purposeof acknowledging the revised OEdipus who was to travel along with it. Youknow that I am glad to hear from you at any time when you are at leisure, not otherwise; and I shall take for granted that you think my alterationsare improvements, so far as they go. And that is enough. 

I herewith enclose you a sort of Choral Epilogue for the second Part, which you can stick in or not as you will. I cannot say much for it: butit came together in my head after last writing to you, while I was pacingup and down a Landing-place in my house, to which I have been confinedfor the last ten days by a Bronchial Cold. But for which I should havebeen last week in London for the purpose of seeing a very dear old, coaevally old, Friend, {322} who has been gradually declining in Body andMind for the last three years. 

Yours always sincerelyLITTLEGRANGE. 

_To W. A. Wright_. 

_Friday_ [24 _February_ 1882]. 

MY DEAR WRIGHT, I went to London this day week: saw my poor Donne (rather better than Ihad expected to find him--but all declining) three times: and camehome--glad to come home!--on Monday. Mrs. Kemble, Edwards (Keene at thelatter Lady's) and my old Nursey friends, all I saw beside, in the humanway, save Streetfarers, Cabmen, etc. The Shops seemed all stale to me:the only Exhibition I went to (Old Masters) ditto. So I suppose that Ihave lost my Appetite for all but dull Woodbridge Life. I have not lostmy Cold--nor all its bronchial symptoms; but may do so--as I get a littleolder. 

Tennyson was in London, I heard: but in some grand Locality of EatonSquare; so I did not venture down to him. But a day scarcely passeswithout my thinking of him, in one way or other. 

Browning told Mrs. Kemble he knew there was 'a grotesque side' to hisSociety, etc. , but he could not refuse the kind solicitations of hisFriends, Furnivall and Co. Mrs. K. Had been asked to join: but declined, because of her somewhat admiring him; nay, much admiring what he mighthave done. 

I enclose a note from Keene which appeals to you: I suppose that his'fastous' means 'festuous, ' or what is now called in Music 'Pompous. 'Charles' 'plump bass' is good. {323}

You had a bad cold when last you wrote: so you can tell me, if youplease, that you have shaken it off, as your Seniors cannot so easily do. Let me know, of course, how the Master is, and give him my Love. Does heknow of Musurus Pasha's Translation of Dante's Inferno into Modern Greek?I was so much interested in it from the Academy that I bought; and, sofar as I have seen through uncut leaves, do not repent of having done so. 

The Academy also announced that an MS. Account of Carlyle's Visit toIreland in 1849 was in Froude's hands for the Press. As T. C. Stayedsome, if not the greater part of his time there at the country house ofmy Uncle's Widow, I can only hope that he did not jot down much to offendher surviving Children. Perhaps not: for they were, and are, all of them(Mother dead) quite unpretending people, and T. C. Himself not then sosavage as after his Wife's death. From Froude no mercy of reticence canbe expected. 

You left here Rabisha {324a} and Groome's Book of Tracts {324b}: unlessyou will be coming this way before long, I will send them to you. 

You did not say whether you would undertake to look over Borrow's Booksand MSS. , and I write his Step-daughter to that effect. But I hope youwill find it not inconvenient or unpleasant so to do: and am yours always

LITTLEGRANGE. 

My Boy went to Macbeth at our Lecture Hall. What do you say to hisreading 'Hang out our Gallows on the outward Walls'?

_To H. Schutz Wilson_. 

[1 _March_, 1882. ]

MY DEAR SIR, I must thank you sincerely for your thoughts about Salaman, in which Irecognize a good will toward the Translator, as well as liking for hiswork. 

Of course your praise could not but help that on: but I scarce think thatit is of a kind to profit so far by any review as to make it worth theexpense of Time and Talent you might bestow upon it. In Omar's case itwas different: he sang, in an acceptable way it seems, of what all menfeel in their hearts, but had not had exprest in verse before: Jami tellsof what everybody knows, under cover of a not very skilful Allegory. Ihave undoubtedly improved the whole by boiling it down to about a Quarterof its original size; and there are many pretty things in it, though theblank Verse is too Miltonic for Oriental style. 

All this considered, why did I ever meddle with it? Why, it was thefirst Persian Poem I read, with my friend Edward Cowell, near on fortyyears ago: and I was so well pleased with it then (and now think italmost the best of the Persian Poems I have read or heard about), that Ipublished my Version of it in 1856 (I think) with Parker of the Strand. When Parker disappeared, my unsold Copies, many more than of the sold, were returned to me; some of which, if not all, I gave to littleQuaritch, who, I believe, trumpeted them off to some little profit: and Ithought no more of them. 

But some six or seven years ago that Sheikh of mine, Edward Cowell, wholiked the Version better than any one else, wished it to be reprinted. SoI took it in hand, boiled it down to three-fourths of what it originallywas, and (as you see) clapt it on the back of Omar, where I stillbelieved it would hang somewhat of a dead weight; but that was Quaritch'slook-out, not mine. I have never heard of any notice taken of it, butjust now from you: and I believe that, say what you would, people wouldrather have the old Sinner alone. Therefore it is that I write all thisto you. I doubt not that any of your Editors would accept an Articlefrom you on the Subject, but I believe also they would much prefer one onmany another Subject: and so probably with the Public whom you write for. 

Thus 'liberavi animam meam' for your behoof, as I am rightly bound to doin return for your Goodwill to me. 

As to the publication of my name, I believe I could well dispense withit, were it other and better than it is. But I have some unpleasantassociations with it: not the least of them being that it was borne, Christian and Surname, by a man who left College just when I went there. {326} . . . What has become of him I know not: but he, among othercauses, has made me dislike my name, and made me sign myself (half infun, of course), to my friends, as now I do to you, sincerely yours

(THE LAIRD OF) LITTLEGRANGE, where I date from. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

_March_ 7, [1882]. 

MY DEAR NORTON, You will receive by Post a volume of Translation of Dante's Inferno byMusurus Pasha into Modern Greek. I was so much interested in a quotationfrom it in our 'Academy' that I bought it for myself, and subsequentlythought that a copy might be acceptable to you, loving both Greek andDante as you do. Had not I bidden the London Publishers to send itdirect to you, I should have written your name and my own on thefly-leaf. But you can do this for us both. 

I have not as yet read much of it: for my Eyes are impatient of the Greekletter; but the Language comes out before me as the worthiestrepresentative of the Italian: provided it be pronounced as we havelearned to pronounce it, not as the modern Greek man is said to do. Ialways maintain that a Language is apt to sound better from a Foreigner, who idealises the pronunciation. As to the structure of the language, Idoubt that I may prefer the modern to the ancient because of beingcleared of many [Greek text], etc. , particles. I think I shall send aCopy to Professor Goodwin. This is nearly all that I have to send acrossthe Atlantic to-day, which reminds me that I have just been quoting (in alittle thing {327} I may send you), The fleecy Star that bears Andromeda far off Atlantic Seas. 

What a Line!

. . . It is, I think, worth your while to look at Dean Stanley's Volumeof Bishop Thirlwall's Letters; nay, even Dean Perowne's earlier volume, if but to show how the pedantic Boy grew into the large-hearted Man, andeven Bishop: but, from the first, always sincere, just, and notpretentious. I remember him at Cambridge: he, Fellow and Tutor, and Iundergraduate: and he took a little fancy to me, I think. 

_To Hallam Tennyson_. {328}

WOODBRIDGE. _May_ 28 [1882]. 

MY DEAR HALLAM, I believe I ought to be ashamed of reviving the little thing whichaccompanies this Letter. My excuse must be that I have often been asktfor a copy when I had no more to give; and a visit to Cambridge lastsummer, to the old familiar places, if not faces, made me take it up oncemore and turn it into what you now see. I should certainly not send acopy to you, or yours, but for what relates to your Father in it. He didnot object, so far as I know, to what I said of him, though not by name, in a former Edition; but there is more of him in this, though still notby name, nor, as you see, intended for Publication. All of this you canread to him, if you please, at pp. 25 and 56. I do not ask him to saythat he approves of what is said, or meant to be said, in his honour; andI only ask you to tell me if he disapproves of its going any further. Iowed you a letter in return for the kind one you sent me; and, if I donot hear from you to the contrary, I shall take silence, if not forconsent, at least not for prohibition. I really did, and do, wish myfirst, which is also my last, little work to record, for a few years atleast, my love and admiration of that dear old Fellow, my old Friend. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _June_ 9/82. 

MY DEAR NORTON, I told you, I think, but I scarce know when, that I would send you a verylittle Tract of mine written forty years ago; and reformed into itspresent shape in consequence of copies being askt for when I had none togive. So a few days at Cambridge last Summer, among the old places, though not faces, set me off. 'Et voila qui est fait, ' and posted to youalong with this Letter, together with a Copy for Professor Goodwin. Thefirst and last of my little works: and I do think a pretty specimen of'chisell'd Cherry-stone. ' Having which opinion myself, I more than everdeprecate any word of praise from any to whom I send it. Nay, I evenassume beforehand that you will like it too: and Professor Goodwin also(so do not let him write): as my little tribute to my own old Cambridgesent to you in your new. I think I shall send it to Mr. Lowell too. Soyou see that I need no compliment, no, nor even acknowledgment of it. . . . 

And now here is enough written. And yet I will enclose some prettyVerses, {330a} some twenty years old, which I sent to 'Temple Bar, ' whichrepaid me (as I deserved) with a dozen copies. And I am always trulyyours

LITTLEGRANGE THE LAIRD. 

Longfellow and Emerson! {330b}

WOODBRIDGE. _July_ 13/82. 

MY DEAR NORTON, Here is a speedy reply to your kind Letter. For I wish to say at oncethat when Froude has done what he wants with my Carlyle Papers, you shallhave them to do the like. He thought (as I anticipated) that he coulduse but two or three of the Letters, as you will also guess from thescheme and compass of his Biography, as given in the Letter which Ienclose along with this; but, as I bade him use what he saw good, andkeep the Papers as long as convenient to him, I cannot as yet ask him, how much, nor how long. When I think I may properly do so, I will: andshall be very glad that you should have them under like conditions. Youknow that they chiefly concern Naseby, which might do for an Episode, orseparate Item, in your Book, though not for Froude's; I should also thinkthe Letters about that Squire business would be well to clear somewhatup: but that can scarcely be done unless by vindicating Squire's honestyat the expense of his sanity: and, as I have no reason to suppose but heis yet alive, I know not how this can be decently done. Froude says hecannot see his way into the truth further than Carlyle's printed Articleon the subject goes: but I think Carlyle must have told him hisconviction (whatever it was) some time during their long acquaintance. Perhaps, however, he was too sick of what he thought an unimportantcontroversy to endure any more talk about it. I am convinced, as fromthe first, that Squire's story was true; and the fragments of Cromwell'sdespatches genuine, though (as Critics pointed out) partially misquotedby a scatter-brained fellow, ignorant of the subject, and of the Writer. 

_To Mrs. Kemble_. 

[_August_ 1882]. 

MY DEAR MRS. KEMBLE, I have let the Full Moon go by, and very well she looked too, over theSea by which I am now staying. Not at Lowestoft; but at the oldextinguished Borough of Aldeburgh, to which as to other 'premiers Amours'I revert: where more than sixty years ago I first saw, and first felt, the Sea; where I have lodged in half the houses since; and where I have asort of traditional acquaintance with half the population: Clare Cottageis where I write from; two little rooms, enough for me; a poor civilwoman pleased to have me in them. . . . 

The Carlyle 'Reminiscences' had long indisposed me from taking up theBiography. But when I began, and as I went on with that, I found it oneof the most interesting of Books: and the result is that I not onlyadmire and respect Carlyle more than ever I did: but even love him, whichI never thought of before. For he loved his Family, as well as for solong helped to maintain them out of very slender earnings of his own;and, so far as these two volumes show me, he loved his wife also, whilehe put her to the work which he had been used to see his own Mother andSisters fulfil, and which was suitable to the way of Life which he hadbeen used to. His indifference to her sufferings seems to me ratherbecause of Blindness than Neglect; and I think his Biographer has been alittle too hard upon him on the Score of selfish disregard of her. 

ALDEBURGH. _Sept. _ 1. [1882]. 

MY DEAR MRS. KEMBLE, Still by the Sea, from which I saw The Harvest Moon rise for her threenights' Fullness. And to-day is so wet that I shall try and pay you myplenilunal due, not much to your satisfaction; for the Wet really getsinto one's Brain and Spirits, and I have as little to write of as everany Full Moon ever brought me. And yet, if I accomplish my letter, and'take it to the Barber's' where I sadly want to go, and after beingwrought on by him, post my letter, why, you will, by your Laws, beobliged to answer it. Perhaps you may have a little to tell me ofyourself in requital for the very little you have to hear of me. 

I have made a new Acquaintance here. Professor Fawcett (PostmasterGeneral, I am told) married a daughter of one Newson Garrett of thisPlace, who is also Father of your Doctor Anderson. Well, the Professor(who was utterly blinded by the Discharge of his Father's Gun some twentyor five and twenty years ago) came to this Lodging to call on AldisWright; and, when Wright was gone, called on me, and also came and smokeda Pipe one night here. A thoroughly unaffected, unpretending, man: somodest indeed that I was ashamed afterwards to think how I had haranguedhim all the Evening, instead of getting him to instruct me. But I wouldnot ask him about his Parliamentary Shop: and I should not haveunderstood his Political Economy: and I believe he was very glad to betalked to instead, about some of those he knew, and some whom I hadknown. And, as we were both in Crabbe's Borough, we talked of him: theProfessor, who had never read a word, I believe, about him, or of him, was pleased to hear a little; and I advised him to buy the Life writtenby Crabbe's Son; and I would give him my abstract of the Tales of theHall, by way of giving him a taste of the Poet's self. 

Yes; you must read Froude's Carlyle above all things, and tell me if youdo not feel as I do about it. . . . I regret that I did not know whatthe Book tells us while Carlyle was alive; that I might have loved him aswell as admired him. But Carlyle never spoke of himself in that way. Inever heard him advert to his Works and his Fame, except one day hehappened to mention 'About the time when Men began to talk of me. '

WOODBRIDGE. _Oct. _ 17, [1882]. 

MY DEAR MRS. KEMBLE, I suppose that you are returned from the Loire by this time; but as I amnot sure that you have returned to the 'Hotel des Deux Mondes' whence youdated your last, I make bold once more to trouble Coutts with adding yourAddress to my Letter. I think I shall have it from yourself not longafter. I shall like to hear a word about my old France, dear to me fromchildish associations, and in particular of the Loire, endeared to me bySevigne; for I never saw the glimmer of its waters myself. . . . 

It seems to me (but I believe it seems so every year) that our trees keeptheir leaves very long; I suppose, because of no severe frosts or windsup to this time. And my garden still shows some Geranium, Salvia, Nasturtium, Great Convolvulus, and that grand African Marigold whoseColour is so comfortable to us Spanish-like Paddies. I have also a dearOleander which even now has a score of blossoms on it, and touches thetop of my little Green-house; having been sent me when 'haut comme ca, 'as Marquis Somebody used to say in the days of Louis XIV. Don't you lovethe Oleander? So clean in its leaves and stem, as so beautiful in itsflower; loving to stand in water which it drinks up so fast. I ratherworship mine. 

_To W. F. Pollock_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _October_ 20/82. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, Pray let me hear how you and yours are after your Summer Holyday. I havebeen no further for mine than Aldeburgh, an hour's Rail distance fromhere: there I got out boating, etc. , and I think became the more heartyin consequence: but my Bosom friend Bronchitis puts in a reminder everynow and then, and, I suppose, will come out of his Closet, or Chest, whenWinter sets in. . . . 

When I was at Aldeburgh, Professor Fawcett . . . Came to see Aldis Wrightwho was with me there for a Day. When Wright was gone, the Professorcame to smoke a Pipe (in his case a Cigar) with me. What a brave, unpretending Fellow! I should never have guessed that a notable man inany way. 'Brave' too I say because of his cheerful Blindness; for whichI should never have forgiven my Father and his Gun. To see him stalkingalong the Beach, regardless of Pebble and Boulder, though with some oneby his side to prevent his going quite to Sea! He was on the Eve ofstarting for Scotland--to fish--in the dear Tweed, I think; though hescarce seemed to know much of Sir Walter. 

_To S. Laurence_. 

LITTLEGRANGE, WOODBRIDGE. _Nov. _ 8/82. 

MY DEAR LAURENCE, It is long since I have heard from you: which means, long since I havewritten to you. But do not impute this to as long forgetfulness on mypart. My days and years go on one so like another: I see and hear no newthing or person; and to tell you that I go for a month or a week to ourbarren coast, which is all the travel I have to tell of, you can imagineall that as easily as my stay at home, with the old Pictures about me, and often the old Books to read. I went indeed to London last Februaryfor the sole purpose of seeing our Donne: and glad am I to have done soas I heard it gave him a little pleasure. That is a closed Book now. HisDeath {337} was not unexpected, and even not to be deprecated, as youknow; but I certainly never remember a year of such havock among myfriends as this: if not by Death itself, by Death's preliminary work andwarning. . . . I wonder to find myself no worse dealt with than byBronchitis, bad enough, which came upon me last Christmas, hung upon meall Spring, Summer, and Autumn; and though comparatively dormant for thelast three wet weeks (perhaps from repeated doses of Sea Air) givesoccasional Signs that it is not dead, but, on the contrary, will revivewith Winter. Let me hear at least how you have been, and how are; Ishall not grudge your being all well. 

Aldis Wright has sent me a very fine Photo of Spedding done from one ofMrs. Cameron's of which a copy is at Trinity Lodge. It is so fine that Iscarce know if it gives me more pleasure or pain to look at it. Insomuchthat I keep it in a drawer, not yet able to make up my mind to have itframed and so hung up before me. 

My good old Housekeeper has been (along with so many more) very ill, bedded for five or six weeks; only now able to get about again. I havethis morning been scolding her for sending away a woman who came to doher work, without consulting me beforehand: she makes out that the womanwanted to go: I find the woman is very ready to return. 'These are mytroubles, Mr. Wesley, ' as a Gentleman said to him when the Footman hadput too much coal on the fire. 

_To W. F. Pollock_. 

WOODBRIDGE. [1882. ]

MY DEAR POLLOCK, . . . The Book which has really, and deeply, interested me, and quiteagainst Expectation, is Froude's Carlyle Biography; which has (quitecontrary to expectation also) not only made me honour Carlyle more, buteven love him, which I had never taken into account before. In theBiography, Froude seems to me to treat his man with Candour and Justice:even a little too severe in attributing to systematic Selfishness whatseems to me rather unreflecting neglect, Carlyle's relations to his Wife, whom, so far as we read, he loved. Of his Love for his own Family, hisGenerosity to them, and his own sturdy refusal of help from others, onecannot doubt. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _Dec. _ 20, [1882]. 

MY DEAR NORTON, . . . You may have read somewhere of an 'Ajax' at our Cambridge overhere. Thirty years ago did I tell the Greek Professor (now Master ofTrinity), 'Have a Greek Tragedy in (what you call) your Senate-house. 'But I was not sufficiently important to stir up the 'Dons. ' Cowellinvited me to see and hear 'Ajax'; but I remained here, content to snuffat it from the Athenaeum of England, not of Attica. And on the very daythat Ajax fretted his hour on the stage, my two old Housekeepers werecelebrating their Fiftieth, or Golden, wedding over a Bottle of Port winein the adjoining room, though in that happier Catastrophe I did notfurther join. 

Now, to end with myself; I have hitherto escaped any severe assault frommy 'Bosom-Enemy, ' Bronchitis, though he occasionally intimates that he isall safe in his Closet, and will reappear with the Butterflies, I daresay. 'Dici Beatus' let no one in this country boast till May be over. 

 What you put off, and what you put on, Never change till May be gone, says an old Suffolk Proverb concerning our Clothing. Five of my friendlycontemporaries have been struck with Paralysis during this 1882: and heream I with only Bronchitis to complain of. 

WOODBRIDGE. _March_ 7/83. 

MY DEAR NORTON, I wrote to you some little while before Christmas, praying you, amongother things, not to put yourself to the trouble of sending me yourEmerson-Carlyle Correspondence, inasmuch as I could easily get it overhere; and, by way of answer, your two Volumes reached me yesterday, safeand sound from over the Atlantic. I had not time (a strange accidentwith me) to acknowledge the receipt of them yesterday: but make all speedto do so, with all gratitude, to-day. As you are simply the Editor ofthe Book, I may tell you something of my thoughts on it by and by. Idoubt not that I shall find Emerson's Letters the more interesting, because the newer, to me. The Portrait at the head of Vol. II. Assuresme that one will find only what is good in them. 

. . . I was glad to find from Mozley's Oriel Reminiscences that Newmanhad been an admirer of my old Crabbe; and Mr. L. Stephen has very kindlywritten out for me a passage from some late work, or Lecture, of Newman'sown, in which he says that, after fifty years, he read 'Richard's Storyof his Boyhood, ' in the Tales of the Hall, with the same delight as onits first appearance, and he considers that a Poem which thus pleases inAge as it pleased in Youth must be called (in the 'accidental' sense ofthe word, logically speaking) 'Classical. '

I owe this Courtesy on Mr. Stephen's part to my having sent him a littlePreface to my Crabbe, in which I contested Mr. Stephen's judgment as toCrabbe's Humour: and I did not choose to publish this without apprizinghim, whom I know so far as he is connected with the Thackerays. Hereplied very kindly, and sent me the Newman quotation I tell you of. TheCrabbe is the same I sent you some years ago: left in sheets, except thefew Copies I sent to friends. And now I have tacked to it a littleIntroduction, and sent forty copies to lie on Quaritch's counter: for Ido not suppose they will get further. And no great harm done if theystay where they are. . . . 

One day you must write, and tell me how you and yours have fared throughthis winter. It has been a very mild, even, a warm, one over here; and Ifor my part have not yet had much to complain of in point of health thusfar; no, not even though winter has come at last in Snow and Storm forthe last three days. I do not know if we are yet come to the worst, soterrible a Gale has been predicted, I am told, for the middle of March. Yesterday morning I distinctly heard the sea moaning some dozen milesaway; and to-day, why, the enclosed little scrap, {342} enclosed to me, will tell you what it was about, on my very old Crabbe's shore. It (theSea) will assuredly cut off his old Borough from the Slaughden River-quaywhere he went to work, and whence he sailed in the 'Unity' Smack (one ofwhose Crew is still alive) on his first adventure to London. But allthis can but little interest you, considering that we in England (exceptsome few in this Eastern corner of it) scarce know more of Crabbe and hiswhere about than by name. 

_To W. F. Pollock_. 

[_Easter_, 1883]. 

MY DEAR POLLOCK, . . . Professor Norton sent me his Carlyle-Emerson--all to the credit ofall parties, I think. I must tell the Professor that in my opinion heshould have omitted some personal observations which are all fair in aprivate letter; as about Tennyson being of a 'gloomy' turn (which youknow is not so), Thackeray's 'enormous appetite' ditto; and such mentionof Richard Milnes as a 'Robin Redbreast, ' etc. ; which may be less untrue, though not more proper to be published of a clever, useful, and amiableman, now living. 

_To C. E. Norton_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _May_ 12/83. 

MY DEAR NORTON, Your Emerson-Carlyle of course interested me very much, as I believe alarge public also. I had most to learn of Emerson, and that all good:but Carlyle came out in somewhat of a new light to me also. Now we havehim in his Jane's letters, as we had seen something of him before in theReminiscences: but a yet more tragic Story; so tragic that I know not ifit ought not to have been withheld from the Public: assuredly, it seemsto me, ought to have been but half of the whole that now is. But I donot the less recognize Carlyle for more admirable than before--if for noother reason than his thus furnishing the world with weapons againsthimself which the World in general is glad to turn against him. . . . 

And, by way of finishing what I have to say on Carlyle for the present, Iwill tell you that I had to go up to our huge, hideous, London a weekago, on disagreeable business; which Business, however, I got over intime for me to run to Chelsea before I returned home at Evening. Iwanted to see the Statue on the Chelsea Embankment which I had not yetseen: and the old No. 5 of Cheyne Row, which I had not seen for five andtwenty years. The Statue I thought very good, though looking somewhatsmall and ill set-off by its dingy surroundings. And No. 5 (now 24), which had cost her so much of her Life, one may say, to make habitablefor him, now all neglected, unswept, ungarnished, uninhabited

'TO LET'

I cannot get it out of my head, the tarnished Scene of the Tragedy (onemust call it) there enacted. 

Well, I was glad to get away from it, and the London of which it was asmall part, and get down here to my own dull home, and by no means sorrynot to be a Genius at such a Cost. 'Parlons d'autres choses. '

I got our Woodbridge Bookseller to enquire for your Mr. Child's Ballad-book; but could only hear, and indeed be shown a specimen, of a largeQuarto Edition, _de luxe_ I believe, and would not meddle with that. Ido not love any unwieldy Book, even a Dictionary; and I believe that I amcontented enough with such Knowledge as I have of the old Ballads in manya handy Edition. Not but I admire Mr. Child for such an undertaking ashis; but I think his Book will be more for Great Libraries, Public orPrivate, than for my scanty Shelves at my age of seventy-five. I havealready given away to Friends all that I had of any rarity or value, especially if over octavo. 

By the way there was one good observation, I think, in Mrs. Oliphant'ssuperficial, or hasty, History of English 18th Century Literature, viz. , that when the Beatties, Blacks, and other recognized Poets of the Daywere all writing in a 'classical' way, and tried to persuade Burns to dothe like, it was certain Old Ladies who wrote so many of the Ballads, which, many of them, have passed as ancient, 'Sir Patrick Spence' forone, I think. 

Our Spring flowers have been almost all spoilt by Winter weather, and theTrees before my window only just now beginning to

 Stand in a mist of Green, as Tennyson sings. Let us hope their Verdure, late arrayed, will lastthe longer. I continue pretty well, with occasional reminders fromBronchitis, who is my established Brownie. 

_To S. Laurence_. 

WOODBRIDGE. _Tuesday_, [_June_ 12, 1883]. 

MY DEAR LAURENCE, It is very kind of you to remember one who does so little to remind youof himself. Your drawing of Allen always seemed to me excellent, forwhich reason it was that I thought his Wife should have it, as being theRecord of her husband in his younger days. So of the portrait ofTennyson which I gave his Wife. Not that I did not value them myself, but because I did value them, as the most agreeable Portraits I knew ofthe two men; and, for that very reason, presented them to those whom theywere naturally dearer to than even to myself. I have never liked anyPortrait of Tennyson since he grew a Beard; Allen, I suppose, has keptout of that. 

If I do not write, it is because I have absolutely nothing to tell youthat you have not known for the last twenty years. Here I live still, reading, and being read to, part of my time; walking abroad three or fourtimes a day, or night, in spite of wakening a Bronchitis, which haslodged like the household 'Brownie' within; pottering about my Garden (asI have just been doing) and snipping off dead Roses like Miss Tox; andnow and then a visit to the neighbouring Seaside, and a splash to Sea inone of the Boats. I never see a new Picture, nor hear a note of Musicexcept when I drum out some old Tune in Winter on an Organ, which mightalmost be carried about the Streets with a handle to turn, and a Monkeyon the top of it. So I go on, living a life far too comfortable ascompared with that of better, and wiser men: but ever expecting a reversein health such as my seventy-five years are subject to. What a tragedyis that of ---! So brisk, bright, good, a little woman, who seemed madeto live! And now the Doctors allot her but two years longer at most, andher friends think that a year will see the End! and poor ---, tender, true, and brave! His letters to me are quite fine in telling about it. Mrs. Kemble wrote me word some two or three months ago that he waslooking very old: no wonder. I am told that she keeps up her Spirits thebetter of the two. Ah, Providence might have spared 'pauvre et tristeHumanite' that Trial, together with a few others which (one would think)would have made no difference to its Supremacy. 'Voila ma petiteprotestation respectueuse a la Providence, ' as Madame de Sevigne says. 

To-morrow I am going (for my one annual Visit) to G. Crabbe's, where I amto meet his Sisters, and talk over old Bredfield Vicarage days. Two ofmy eight Nieces are now with me here in my house, for a two months'visit, I suppose and hope. And I think this is all I have to tell you of

Yours ever sincerelyE. F. G. 

* * * * *

This was in all probability the last letter FitzGerald ever wrote. Onthe following day, Wednesday, June 13, he went to pay his annual visit atMerton Rectory. On Friday the 15th I received from Mr. Crabbe theannouncement of his peaceful end: 'I grieve to have to tell you that ourdear friend Edward FitzGerald died here this morning [June 14]. He camelast evening to pay his usual visit with my sisters, but did not seem inhis usual spirits, and did not eat anything. . . . At ten he said hewould go to bed. I went up with him. . . . At a quarter to eight Itapped at his door to ask how he was, and getting no answer went in andfound him as if sleeping peacefully but quite dead. A very noblecharacter has passed away. ' On the following Tuesday, June 19, he wasburied in the little churchyard of Boulge, and the stone which marks hisgrave bears the simple inscription 'Edward FitzGerald, Born 31 March1809, Died 14 June 1883. It is He that hath made us and not weourselves. '

For some time before his death he seems to have had a foreboding that theend was not far distant. In one of the last conversations I had withhim, certainly during my last visit at Easter 1883, he spoke of hismother's death, in its suddenness very like his own, and at the same age. 'We none of us get beyond seventy-five, ' he said. At this age his eldestbrother had died, four years before. And in a letter to one of hisnieces, after speaking of the fatal malady by which the wife of a dearfriend was attacked, he added, 'It seems strange to me to be so seeminglyalert--certainly, alive--amid such fatalities with younger and strongerpeople. But, even while I say so, the hair may break, and the suspendedSword fall. If it would but do so at once, and effectually!' Sixteendays later his wish was fulfilled. 

INDEX TO LETTERS

_To_ MISS AITKEN, 188

_To_ JOHN ALLEN, 63*, 70-72*, 74, 169*, 206, 219

_To_ MRS. CHARLES ALLEN, 7-9*, 14-16*

_To_ MISS ANNA BIDDELL, 134, 178, 179, 189, 205, 295, 304

_From_ CARLYLE, 135, 154, 155, 167, 175*

_To_ CARLYLE, 5, 128, 155, 165

_To_ E. B. COWELL, 1, 4*, 19*, 26, 44*, 52*, 57, 59*, 68*, 78*, 83-86*, 93-95*, 99, 103, 106*, 107, 111*, 128 _note_, 180, 185, 202, 270 _note_, 322 _note_

_To_ MRS. COWELL, 65*, 196, 216

_To_ GEORGE CRABBE, 17, 18, 21, 35, 39, 41, 42, 51, 57, 208 _note_

_To_ W. E. CROWFOOT, 118 _note_

_From_ W. B. DONNE, 169 _note_

_To_ W. B. DONNE, 3, 33, 40, 48, 66, 91, 164

_To_ FITZEDWARD HALL, 220*

_To_ LORD HOUGHTON, 285*

_To_ CHARLES KEENE, 280, 289-293

_To_ MRS. KEMBLE, 298, 305, 310-312, 320, 332-335

_To_ S. LAURENCE, 50, 55, 56, 113-116, 171, 190, 212, 277, 303, 337, 346

_To_ J. R. LOWELL, 224-226, 235, 245-249, 257, 260, 261, 266-272

_To_ C. E. NORTON, 157, 186, 190-192, 196-199, 203, 208, 213, 222, 229-234, 241-244, 253-255, 258, 262, 275, 278, 281, 294, 298, 301, 315-318, 321, 327, 329, 330, 339, 340, 343

_To_ W. F. POLLOCK, 12, 96, 102, 117-121, 127, 130-132, 135, 137-152, 158-163, 168, 172, 181, 307, 336, 338, 342

_To_ MISS S. F. SPEDDING, 313, 314

_To_ FREDERIC TENNYSON, 89

_To_ HALLAM (now LORD) TENNYSON, 328

_To_ MRS. ALFRED (now the DOWAGER LADY) TENNYSON, 308

_To_ MISS THACKERAY, 141 _note_, 207

_From_ W. H. THOMPSON, 174*

_To_ W. H. THOMPSON, 11, 24, 28-31, 34, 36*, 51, 73, 76, 77, 80*, 123, 177*, 296*

_To_ MRS. W. H. THOMPSON, 108, 183

_To_ R. C. TRENCH, 23, 62, 284, 287

_To_ H. SCHUTZ WILSON, 324

_To_ W. A. WRIGHT, 97, 126, 133, 217, 238, 239, 251, 322*

_The asterisks indicate the letters which are here printed for the firsttime_. 

INDEX

ACADEMY (Royal), Exhibition of, i. 39

Acis and Galatea, i. 101, 102, 239

Aconites, 'New Year's Gifts, ' ii. 180, 320

AEschylus, the geography of the Agamemnon, ii. 33-35; FitzGerald'stranslation of the Agamemnon, 109, 112, 162, 186, 188, 216; reviewed inthe Nation, 224; Dr. Kennedy's translation, 259

Airy (William), at school with FitzGerald, i. 2; visits him atWoodbridge, ii. 66

Aitken (Lucy), her letters, ii. 64

Aldeburgh, ii. 290-292, 332; storm at, 342

Allegro and Penseroso, i. 153, 166

Allen (Anne), i. 72

--(Dr. ), i. 79

--John, at Cambridge with FitzGerald, i. 2; letters to, 4, 5, etc. ; hisportrait by Laurence, ii. 15, 346

--(Mary), i. 70, 72, 73

Allenby (Mrs. ), i. 155

Arnold (Dr. ), his visit to Naseby with Carlyle, i. 125, 126, 132; hisLife, 181

Art, objects of, article in Fraser, ii. 145

Arthur (King), the myth of, not suitable for an epic poem, ii. . 111

Attar's Mantic uttair, i. 311, 312, 314-317, 319, 320, 342

Ausonius, i. 205 _note_

Austen (Miss), ii. 13, 131, 174; FitzGerald could not read her novels, 190

Austin (Mrs. ), characteristics of Goethe, i. 53

Azael the Prodigal, i. 268

BACON, Essay of Friendship, i. 21; of Masques, 153; Sylva, ii. 160

Balfe, ballad by, i. 178

Barton (Bernard), his poems, i. 105; his visit to Peel, 203; his portraitby Laurence, 215, 225, 234; his death, 243, 246; edition of his Lettersand Poems with Memoir by FitzGerald, 246, 251, 252, 308

--(Lucy), afterwards Mrs. Edward FitzGerald, i. 50 _note_, 158, 186, 215, 216, 246, 249, 310, 326

Bassano, i. 186

Bath, i. 288

Beaumont (Sir G. ), i. 165

Beauty the main object of the Arts, ii. 132

Beauty Bob, FitzGerald's parrot, i. 159

Beckford (Peter), Essays on Hunting, ii. 280

--(W. ), i. 288

Beethoven, i. 57, 103, 113, 195, 200, 277, 290, ii. 118, 119, his Life byMoscheles, i. 112

Beranger, his Letters, ii. 152, quoted 181

Berry (Miss), her correspondence, ii. 73

Bewick, his Life contains an account of a meeting of Wordsworth andFoscolo, ii. 197

Blake, Songs of Innocence, i. 25

Bletsoe, i. 61; the Falcon Inn, 74

Bloomfield (Mrs. ), mother of the poet, a saying of hers quoted, ii. 88

Boccaccio, ii. 203, 204

Bodham (Mrs. ), i. 190

Borrow (George), i. 317, 334, 342; his Romany Rye, 331; Wild Wales, ii. 35

Bosherston, i. 337

Boswell's Life of Johnson, Croker's edition of, ii. 75

Boughton, pictures at, i. 56

Boulge Hall, his father's seat, i. 38, 75; 'Malebolge, ' 79 _note_

Brambelli, i. 194

Bredfield House, i. 1, 63, 64

Brooke (F. C. ), ii. 146

Browne (W. ), Britannia's Pastorals, ii. 240

Browne (W. K. ), i. 55, 123, 167; his marriage, 168, 185; first meetsFitzGerald at Tenby, 338; ii. 8, 10; his fatal accident 2-4, 6, 8

Browning Society (the), ii. 323

Brydges (Sir Egerton), i. 87

Burke's Letters, i. 182

Burnet (John), on Painting, i. 147

Burnet's History, i. 68

Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy, i. 139; Carlyle's style influenced by, _ib. _

Busbequius, i. 230

Byron's Verses on Rogers, ii. 144

CALDERON, translations from, i. 281, 282, 323, 346, 347; ii. 60, 112, 261; edition of the Magico, 262; his lines about Madrid, 274;unfavourably noticed in the Athenaeum, i. 284; Trench's translation from307; ii. 287; the Calderon medal sent to FitzGerald, 319

Campion (J. S. ), On Foot in Spain, ii. 273

Carew quoted, i. 12, 13

Carlyle (Mrs. ), her letters, ii. 343

--(T. ), his French Revolution, i. 50; reviewed by Spedding, 73;Miscellanies, 65; Hero Worship, 82, 85; Sartor Resartus, 123; Cromwell, 126, etc, 187, 190, 196, 207; his account of the battle of Naseby, 205;writes on Ireland in the Examiner, 239, 253; his saying about Dickens, 251; his Latter Day Pamphlets, 258; at Malvern 272; at Firlingay withFitzGerald, 295; at Croydon, 302; reading Voltaire, 302; his Frederic theGreat, ii. 7, 64; Mrs. Carlyle's death, 89; Letters on Naseby, 128; onOmar Khayyam, 154, 155; article in Fraser, 178-180; staying near Bromley, 183; his letters to FitzGerald about Cromwell, 184; Medal and Addresspresented to him on his eightieth birthday, 186; his Lectures on HeroWorship, 191; his visit to Dumfries, 201; reads Victor Hugo, 229; tillpast midnight at his books, 234, 236; his visit to Thirlwall, 237;reading Goethe, 253; sends FitzGerald his Norway Kings and Knox, 254;reads Shakespeare through to himself, 270; buried at Ecclefechan, 298, 309; his Reminiscences, 302, 304, 308, 311, 317; his visit to Ireland, 323; Biography, 332, 334, 339; correspondence with Emerson, 340, 342

Castle Ashby, pictures at, i. 121

Catullus, ii. 232, 233, 238, 239

Charlesworth (Miss E. ), afterwards Mrs. E. B. Cowell, i. 156, 160, 174;her poems, ii. 54

--(Miss M. ), ii. 54

Cherubini's Medea, ii. 119

Child (Professor), his English Ballads, ii. 344

Childs (Charles), of Bungay, i. 265

Chorley's Musical Recollections, ii. 127

Churchyard (T. ), a solicitor at Woodbridge, and an amateur artist, i. 94, 117, 133, 147, 148, 159, 190, 192, 2l6, 221, 243; calls the winterAconites 'New Year's Gifts', ii. 180; his sketch of Thorpe headland byAldeburgh, 292

Clarissa Harlowe, i. 108; ii. 64, 107, 208; a favourite with Alfred deMusset, 243, 248

Clarke (E. W. ), i. 114

Claude, i. 54

Clive (Kitty), her saying of Mrs. Siddons, ii. 184

Clora, verses to, i. 15, 19

Coleridge, Life by De Quincey, i. 32

Collins (Wilkie), The Woman in White, ii. 90, 95, 131

Constable (J. ), pictures by, i. 76-78, 100, 104, 106, 117, 159; Life byLeslie, 165

Contat (Mademoiselle), ii. 148

Cookson (Dr. W. ), a correspondent of Carlyle's, i. 156, 157; his death, 161

Coverley, Sir Roger de, suggested illustrations of, by Thackeray, i. 29, 39

Cowell (E. B. ), his translations from Hafiz, i. 205, 294, 304, 306, 332;paper on the Mesnavi, 232; goes up to Oxford, 261; article on Calderon inthe Westminster Review, 284, 307; his Pracrit Grammar, 286; his OxfordEssay, 307; appointed Professor of History at the Presidency College, Calcutta 309; his translation of Azrael, ii. 27; visits FitzGerald on hisreturn to England, 57; elected Sanskrit Professor at Cambridge, 93; hisInaugural Lecture, 95, 97; visits FitzGerald at Woodbridge, 232; hissuggestion for a Spanish Dictionary on the plan of Littre, 258, 273; atLowestoft with FitzGerald reading Don Quixote, 272, 274-277

Cowley, ii. 26

Crabbe (Rev. George), the poet, hears Wesley preach at Lowestoft, i. 292;quoted, ii. 17, 163, 187, 210, 211, 256, 272; selections from his poems, 67, 211, 214, 258, 281; portraits of him, 171; FitzGerald's admirationfor, 210, 215; readings from, 264, 266; his humour, 209, 269, 281; hisepigrammatic power, 270, 272; article on him in the Atlantic Monthly, 281

--(Rev. George), Vicar of Bredfield, i. 39, 187, 260, 262, 265, 266, 274, 286, 296, 297; ii. 210; reads D' Israeli's Coningsby, i. 174; Whewell'sPlurality of Worlds, 293; his illness, 334; and death, 340

--(Rev. George), Rector of Merton, his account of FitzGerald, i. 148, 149

Crome, i. 117, 191

Cromwell, i. 137; his Lincolnshire campaign, 154; miniature copied byLaurence, 198; the Squire Letters, 213

DANTE, his portrait by Giotto, i. 90, 93; like Homer atones with the sea, ii. 45; quoted, 48, 146; translated into Modern Greek by Musurus Pasha, 323, 327

D'Arblay (Madame), anecdote of, ii. 56; on Johnson's later years, 75

Darien Song (the), i. 100

Davenant's alteration of Macbeth, i. 31

De Quincey, life of Coleridge, i. 32; paper on Southey, etc. , in Tait'sMagazine, 65; on Wordsworth, 199; proposed to Lowell as the subject foran Essay, ii. 246

De Soyres (the Rev. John), FitzGerald's nephew, his edition of Pascal'sLetters, ii. 297

Deutsch (Emanuel), his article on the Talmud in the Quarterly, ii. 97

Dickens (C. ), Master Humphrey's Clock, i. 66; Dombey and Son, 238; DavidCopperfield, 251, 255; Holyday Romance, ii. 147; his Life by Forster, 153, 171, 277; FitzGerald's admiration for, 172, 278

D'Israeli's Lothair, ii. 134

Don Giovanni, i. 58, 195

Donne (John), sermons, i. 42; poems, ii. 26

--(W. B. ), at school with FitzGerald, i. 2; FitzGerald's affection forhim, 22 _note_; article on Hallam, 80; writes in the British and ForeignReview, 84; engaged upon a History of Rome, 97, 99, 115; his Address tothe Norwich Athenaeum, 204; removes to Bury, 207; his portrait byLaurence, 259; articles on Pepys, 260; Deputy Licenser of Plays, 268;succeeds Kemble as Licenser of Plays, 323; writes on Calderon in Fraser, _ib. _; on the Antonines in the Edinburgh, ii. 53; his story of LordChatham and the Bishops, 68; article in the Athenaeum on his edition ofthe Correspondence of George III. And Lord North, 91; his proposededition of Tacitus, 93; his account of Tacitus in Ancient Classics forEnglish Readers, 164; his declining health, 322; his death, 337

Donne (W. Mowbray), ii. 53

Don Quixote, ii. 94, 95, 97, 170, 198, 199, 201-204, 268, 272, 274

Doudan, ii. 234, 243, 249

Dryden, ii. 216; his Prefaces, 227; his prose style, 228

Duncan (Francis), i. 222, 223; ii. 71; stays with FitzGerald atWoodbridge, 77

Dunwich, ruins of the Grey Friars' Monastery, ii. 223, 225, 228, 229, 255, 258, 277

Dysart (Louisa, Countess of), portrait of, by Sir Joshua Reynolds, i. 56

EASTLAKE (C. L. ), i. 39; his translation of Goethe's Theory of Colours, 67, 80

Edgeworth (F. ), i. 31, 88; his wife and sister-in-law, 36; living atEltham, 43; article on Pindar, 80; mentioned, 142, 144; his death, 210;mentioned in Carlyle's Life of Stirling, ii. 184

--(Miss), i. 88-90, 144

Edwards (Edwin), ii. 122, 146; his illness, 255, 258; and death, 277

--(Mrs. ), ii. 303

Eliot (George), The Mill on the Floss, ii. 159; not admired byFitzGerald, 190, 257

Elliott (Ebenezer), Posthumous Poems, i. 255, 256

Emerson (R. W. ), Representative Men, i. 256; on Scott, ii. 194; hisdeath, 330; correspondence with Carlyle, 340, 342, 343

English Gentry (the), i. 68

Eothen, i. 189

Etty (W. ), picture of the Bridge of Sighs, i. 39; 'Aaron, ' 239; 'John theBaptist, ' _ib. _

Euphranor, i. 211, 266, 267; ii. 103, 150, 228, 317, 328, 329; praised byTennyson, ii. 104

Euripides, ii. 48, 49, 85, 87

Evans (R. W. ), i. 73

FAIRES (Mrs. ), FitzGerald's housekeeper at Boulge Cottage, i. 149, 159

Fidelio, ii. 118

Fields' Yesterdays with Authors, ii. 145

FitzGerald, Edward, born at Bredfield, i. 1; goes to Paris, _ib. _; toschool at Bury St. Edmunds, 2; to Trinity College, Cambridge, _ib. _; tookhis degree, 3; at Southampton, 5; at Naseby, _ib. _; earliest attempt atverse, 5-9; visits Salisbury, 10; and Bemerton, _ib. _; at Tenby, 11, 46, 69, 70; his Paradise, a collection of English verse, 12; readsShakespeare's Sonnets, 14; adopts a vegetable diet, 22; living in London, 24; sees Shakespeare's Hamlet, 24, 28; Henry VIII. , 24; Macbeth, 25, 31;with Spedding at Cambridge, 28; living at Wherstead Lodge, _ib. _; hisfriendships like loves, 30; reading The Merry Wives of Windsor, _ib. _;and the Spectator, _ib. _; with Spedding and Tennyson at Mirehouse, 33;ii. 305, 310, 315; at Ambleside, i. 33; his father removes to Boulge, 38, 39; reading Aristophanes, 44, 47; his cottage at Boulge, 47, 48; readingPlutarch's Lives, _ib. _, and Lyell's Geology, _ib. _; his marriage withMiss Barton, 50 _note_; stays in Bedfordshire, 52, 61, 67; at Lowestoftwith W. Browne, 55; reading Pindar, 56; Tacitus, 60; Homer, 64; at hisuncle Peter Purcell's at Halverstown, 62; reads Burnet, 68; Herodotus, 71; regrets his want of scholarship, _ib. _; grows bald, _ib. _; makes Tarwater, 72; reads Newman's sermons, 73; buys a picture by Constable, 76;stays at Edgeworthstown, 88; at Naseby, 90; reads Livy, 97; invited tolecture at Ipswich, 97, 99; his opinion of his own verses, 105; firstmeets Carlyle, 125; his excavations at Naseby, and correspondence withCarlyle, 126, etc. ; reads Virgil's Georgics, 134; in Ireland, 141-143;his cottage at Boulge, 150; visits Carlyle, 159, 169; his life at Boulge, 164, 176, 180; visits W. B. Donne, 173; makes an abstract of the OldCuriosity Shop for children, 174; at Leamington, 175; at Cambridge, 210;reads Thucydides, 214, 228, 233, 248; his interview with William Squire, 216-220; at Exeter, 220; reads Homer, 228; contributes notes to Selden'sTable Talk, 231; his father's death, 278; translations from Calderon, 281; studies Persian, 282, 285, 286; at Farlingay, 287, 294; at Bath, 287; at Oxford, 290; Carlyle stays with him at Farlingay, 295; translatesJami's Salaman and Absal, 304, 306; reading Hafiz, 311; and Attar'sMantic uttair, i. 311; which he translates, 312, 313, etc. ; ii. 44, 100;reading AEschylus, i. 324, 325; thinks of translating the Trilogy, 330;at Gorlestone, 331; reading Omar Khayyam, 332, 335; his epitome ofAttar's Mantic uttair, 342, 348; his translations from Omar Khayyamoffered to Fraser's Magazine, 345, 348; ii. 2, 29; translates Calderon'sMighty Magician, i. 346; ii. 60; and Vida es Sueno, i. 347; ii. 5, 61, 62; collects a Vocabulary of rustic English, i. 347; prints histranslation of Omar, ii. 2, 4, 29; stays at Aldeburgh, 16; gives afragment of Tennyson's MS. To Thompson, 25; who returns it, 28; his newboat, 37, 40, 45; at Merton with George Crabbe, 39; at Ely, _ib. _; goesto Holland, 42; reads Dante and Homer, 45, 48; the sea brings up hisappetite for Greek, 49; buys Little Grange, 57; sends his translation ofthe Mighty Magician to Trench, 62; and of Vida es Sueno to ArchdeaconAllen, 63; proposes a Selection from Crabbe, 67; carries Sophocles to seawith him, 78, 79, 82, 83, 85; makes his will, 80; does not care forHorace, 82, 83; reads Euripides, 86, 87; The Woman in White, 90, 95; hisHerring-lugger, 90, 94, 101, 103, 109; reads Don Quixote, 94, 95, 97, 170; and Boccaccio, 95, 97; his Lugger Captain, 94, 101, 103, 106, 107, 110, 113-116, 213; his Sea Words and Phrases, 116; proposes to adapt themusic of Fidelio to Tennyson's King Arthur, 119; his acquaintance withSpanish, 121; gives up his yacht, The Scandal, 126; reads Scott, 128;cannot read George Eliot, 159, 190; goes to Naseby about the monument, 160; reports his failure to Carlyle, 165; goes to Abbotsford, 172, 194;makes the acquaintance of Madame de Sevigne, 184, 185; begins to 'smellthe ground, ' 185; sends the Agamemnon and two Calderon plays to ProfessorNorton, 186, 187; death of his old boatman, 217; reads Munro's Lucretius, _ib. _; Carlyle's Cromwell, 229, 230; at Dunwich, 255; his Readings fromCrabbe, 264, 266; his Half Hours with the Worst Authors, 280; sends hisReadings from Crabbe to Trench, 284; does not care for modern poetry, 288; his Quarter-deck, 293; is troubled with pains about the heart, 296;sends Professor Norton Part II. Of OEdipus, 301; has Carlyle's Meerschaumas a relic, 303; spends two days at Cambridge, 316; receives the Calderonmedal, 319; reads the Fortunes of Nigel, 321; at Aldeburgh, 332; readsCarlyle's Biography, 332, 334, 339; meets Professor Fawcett, 333, 336;his last letter, 346; dies at Merton, 348; and is buried at Boulge, _ib. _

FitzGerald (Isabella), FitzGerald's sister, i. 73, 161

--(John Purcell), FitzGerald's eldest brother, his wife's illness, i. 35, 48; mentioned, 50; his death, ii. 263, 267

--(Lusia or Andalusia), Mrs. De Soyres, FitzGerald's sister, i. 95; hermarriage, 174; her home in Somersetshire, 222

--(Mary Frances), FitzGerald's mother, i. I; her portrait by Sir ThomasLawrence, ii. 297

--(Peter), brother of Edward, ii. 66; his wife, 68; her illness, 77; anddeath, 82, 85, 86

Fletcher, quoted, i. 16, 17

Ford (Richard), Gatherings in Spain, ii. 320

Forster's Life of Dickens, ii. 153, 277

Foscolo, ii. 197

Franco-German War (the), ii. 117

Freestone, the Allens' house at, i. 69-71, 337; ii. 10

French character, change in, ii. 118 _note_

French Revolution, i. 235

Frere (Mrs. ), i. 58

GAINSBOROUGH Fight, i. 161, 162

--(T. ), the Watering Place, i. 78, 95; picture attributed to, 94, 95;'the Goldsmith of Painters, ' 95; his method, 147; copy by Laurence of hisportrait of Dupont, ii. 56; his saying on his deathbed, _ib. _

Gasker (Athanasius), Library of Useless Knowledge, i. 114

Gay (Sophie), Salons de Paris, ii. 148

Geldart (Joseph), i. 173, 243

Geldestone Hall, the residence of Fitz-Gerald's sister, Mrs. Kerrich, i. 3, etc. 

Generals (The Two), ii. 105, 107

Gil Blas, ii. 180

Gillies, his Life of a Literary Veteran, contains letters of Wordsworthand notices of Scott, ii. 197, 199

Goethe, Characteristics of, i. 53; Theory of Colours, 67; Tennyson'ssaying of him, ii. 193; translation of Faust, 262; FitzGerald believed inhim as philosopher and critic, not as poet, _ib. _; his theory that thetwo OEdipuses and Antigone were a Trilogy, 278

Goethe and Schiller, correspondence of, ii. 320

Gordon (Lady Duff), her Letters from Egypt, ii. 69

Gray's Ode on a distant prospect of Eton College, i. 63; his Elegy, ii, 209, 270; his opinion of Dryden's prose, 228

Griffin (Gerald), The Collegians, i. 90

Groome (J. H. ), i. 260

--(R. H. ), Archdeacon of Suffolk, ii. 59, 73, 97, 200, 253

Gurgoyle School of Art (the), ii. 248

HAFIZ, i. 205, 294, 304, 306, 311, 319, 320, 322

Half Hours with the Worst Authors, ii. 280

Ham, i. 275

Hampton Court, i. 276

Handel, i. 101-103, 111, 112, 153, 166, 183, 200, 265, 266, 290; ii. 49

Hare (A. J. C. ), his Spain, ii. 169; Memorials _ib. _

--(J. C. And A. W. ), Guesses at Truth, i. 53

Harrington's Oceana, i. 140

Hatifi, i. 329, 348

Hawthorne (Nathaniel), ii. 145; a man of true genius, 191, 246, 265, 271;his Journal in England, 265; a noble book, 267; FitzGerald does not taketo him, 105, 246, 271; his Italian Journal, 273

Haydon (B. R. ), Memoir by his son, contains notices of Wordsworth, ii. 197, 199

Haymarket Theatre (the), associated with Vestris, ii. 120, 138; Pasta, 138, 295; and Rubini, 295

Hazlitt (W. ), his English Poets, ii. 196

Heine (H. ), ii. 150, 162

Helmingham Hall, i. 56

Herodotus, i. 71, 73

Holmes (O. W. ), ii. 191

Hugo (Victor), Toilers of the Sea, ii. 145, 150; his Miserables, 229

Hullah, i. 243

Hunt (Holman), his Christ in the Temple, ii. 17

--(Leigh), selections by, i. 179

Hypocrite (the), i. 254

INGELOW (Jean), ii. 46, 47, 54

JAMI'S Salaman and Absal, i. 304, 306, 312, 317, 318; new edition ofFitzGerald's version, ii. 263, 324; the first Persian poem read byFitzGerald, 325

Jelaleddin, i. 312, 317, 319; ii. 27

Jenney (Mr. ), the owner of Bredfield House, i. 63, 64, 96, 106

Johnson's lines on Levett quoted, i. 124; his bookcase, 196

Juvenal, ii. 34, 35, 58, 59

KEATS' Letters and Poems, i. 246; his Hyperion, ii. 178, 246, 249; hisLove Letters, 233, 235, 238, 245; subject for picture from K. , 235, 239, 293; his sister, 249; Severn's letters about him, 276

Keene (C. S. ), sends a packet of his drawings to FitzGerald, ii. 291; andan old map of Paris, 293; recommends North's Memoir of Music, 323

Kemble (Charles), i. 44

--(J. M. ), at school with FitzGerald, i. 2; recites Hotspur's speech, _ib. _, working on Anglo Saxon MSS. At Cambridge, 25; article in theBritish and Foreign Review, 80, 84

--(Mrs. Fanny), her opinion of the translations from Calderon, ii. 67, 187; makes the Agamemnon known in America, 186, 188; declines to join theBrowning Society, 323

Kerrich (Mrs), FitzGerald's favourite sister, her death, ii. 46

--(Walter), FitzGerald's nephew, married, i. 335

LADIES MAGAZINE, ii. 140

Lamb (Charles), Album Verses, i. 32; Essays in the London Magazine, 143;Letters, ii. 198, 240; FitzGerald's Data of his life, 239, 242, 247

Landor (W. S. ), i. 288, 289

Laurence (S. ), Spedding's description of, i. 75 _note_, his opinion ofGainsborough, 95; his portraits of Wilkinson, 167, 170; Coningham, 166, 171; Barton, 215, 225, 234; Tennyson, 242, 243; Donne, 259; studies theVenetian secret of colour, 243; his portrait of Archdeacon Allen, ii. 15;his opinion of Romney's portraits, 41; his portraits of Thackeray, 50, 55; asked by FitzGerald to copy Pickersgill's portrait of Crabbe, 171

Le Desert, i. 194

Lever (C. ), his Cornelius O'Dowd, ii. 181

Lewis (G. Cornewall), ii. 183

Lily (Lyly or Lilly) quoted, i. 15

Lind (Jenny), i. 224, 237, 239

Longfellow, ii. 191; his death, 330

Longus, i. 211

Louis Philippe, i. 59

Louvre, the, i. 4

Lowell (J. R. ), Among my Books, ii. 191, 192, 199, 203; his Odes, 208, 215; his Essays, 222, 223, 226, 227, 229, 230; proposed to visitFitzGerald, 224, 225; his Moosehead Journal, 233; Mrs. Lowell's illness, 272

Lowestoft, the beachmen decline to join the Naval Reserve, ii. 13

Lucretius, ii. 58; Professor Sellar's article on, _ib. _, Munro's edition, 82, 217-219; quoted, 218; coincidence with Bacon, 219

Lushington (Franklin), i. 291

Luton, pictures at, i. 74

Lyell's Geology, i. 229

MACAULAY's Memoirs, ii. 200

Macnish (Dr. ), lines on Milton, i. 65

Macready as Wolsey, i. 24; as Macbeth, 24, 25; as Hamlet, 28; his revivalof Acis and Galatea, 102; as Virginius, ii. 120, 158; his funeral, 158

Malkin (Arthur), his marriage, i. 27

--(Dr. ), master of Bury School, his opinion of Crabbe, ii. 300

Manfred, i. 31

Martial, i. 229, 230

Martineau (Miss), cured by mesmerism, i. 179

Marvell (Andrew), quoted, ii. 133, 134

Matthews (Rev. T. R. ), of Bedford, i. 122, 160, 169; his death, 197

Maurice (F. D. ), his Introductory Lecture, i. 139; the Kingdom of Christ, _ib. _

Mazzinghi, (T. J. ), i. 14

Mendelssohn, new Symphony by, i. 120; his Midsummer Night's Dream, 177, 237; Elijah, 237; Fingal's Cave, _ib. _; his opinion of Donizetti, ii. 127

Merivale (C. ), Dean of Ely, his marriage, i. 264; History of Rome, _ib. _;ii. 260; meets FitzGerald at Lowestoft, 297

Meyerbeer, i. 277

Millais, ii. 142, 173, 293

Milnes (R. M. ), Lord Houghton, i. 114; ii. 245, 249

Moliere, his Life by Taschereau, ii. 150

Montagu (Basil), Selections from Jeremy Taylor, etc. I. 34; Life ofBacon, 42; a saying of his recorded, 151

Montaigne, ii. 91, 92, 95, 97, 98; traces of him in Shakespeare andBacon, 251

Montgomery (James), quoted, i. 185

--(Robert), i. 169

Moor (Major), i. 89; his death, 235; his Oriental Fragments, 308

Moore (Morris), i. 166, 175, 210, 239; his controversy with Eastlake, 225

--(T. ), his Memoirs, i. 286

Morland, picture by, i. 192

Morton (Savile), i, 58, 59, 77, 81, 83, 85, 88, 93, 101, 104, 118, 121, 123, 150, 170, 177, 181, 188, 202, 239; a selection of his Letters sentto Blackwood's Magazine but not published, ii. 76, 141; others collectedby FitzGerald, 76, 89, 141

Moxon (E. ) his Sonnets, i. 87

Mozart, i. 195, 200, 277; ii. 119; his Requiem, 122, 123; his Cosi, 151

Mozley's Reminiscences of Oriel, ii. 341

Muller (Max), Essay on Comparative Mythology, i. 309; on Darwin, ii. 160

Munro (H. A. J. ), his edition of Lucretius, ii. 82, 217-219; hisCriticisms and Elucidations of Catullus, 232, 236, 238

Musset (Alfred de), ii. 243, 248

NASEBY, i. 5, 75

--battle of, i. 91, 125; FitzGerald's excavations, 126, etc. , 206; ii. 129; Carlyle's proposed inscription for a pillar, i. 301; ii. 128, 132, 135, 136

Nelson (John), his Autobiography, ii. 105:

--(Lord), ii. 23

Newman (J. H. ), his Sermons, i. 73; his Apologia, ii. 57, 72; an admirerof Crabbe, 341

Newson, captain of FitzGerald's yacht, his son drowned off Cromer, ii. 189

Newton, Roubiliac's statue of, ii. 161; suggested inscription for, _ib. _

--(Dr. ), a writer on Vegetable Regimen, i. 23 _note_

--(Rev. J. ), his journal, i. 41

--(Napoleon), i. 311, 312, 321, 329; his death, 332

Niebuhr, i. 97

Nizami, i. 300, 317

Nonnus, i. 211

Northcote, picture by, i. 99, 101

Norton (Professor C. E. ), ii. 153; his translation of Dante's Vita Nuova, 201, 203, 205; his Report on Olympia, 232, 233

Nursey (Perry), a Suffolk artist, i. 63, 72

OLIPHANT (Mrs. ), her History of English Eighteenth Century Literature, ii. 345

Omar Khayyam, i. 320, 332-334, 343; ii. 26, 27, 325; transcript byFitzGerald sent to Garcin de Tassy, i. 325; MS. Sent him from Calcutta byProf. Cowell, 334, 336 edition by Nicolas; ii. 100; new edition ofFitzGerald's version, 263, 326

Opie, picture by, i. 107, 110

Ouse, the, i. 61, 68, 74, 168, 185

PAISIELLO'S Music liked by Napoleon, ii. 131

Pascal's Letters, ii. 297

Pasta, ii. 137; in Medea, 138; in Semiramide, 139

Paul Veronese, i. 38, 107

Pembroke, siege of, i. 18

Pepys' Diary, ii. 234

Piozzi (Mrs. ), sale of her house at Streatham, i. 196

Plagiarism, ii. 252

Pliny's Letters, i. 230

Poetry in relation to morals, i. 37

Pollock (Lady), her article on American Literature, ii. 163

--(W. F. ), his marriage, i. 153; his article on British Novelists inFraser, ii. 13

Polonius, i. 273

Portraits should be flattered, ii. 30

Poussin's Orion, i. 221

Poussins (the two), i. 54

RAFFAELLE (or Raphael), i. 38, 54; ii. 151

'Ranger (The), ' loss of, ii. 290

Regnard, ii. 145

Reliable, ii. 220

Rembrandt, i. 54

Repeal, i. 141, 142

Reynolds (F. ), ii. 120, 121

--(Sir Joshua), pictures by, i. 192; ii. 56, 57, 108, 114, 151

Richardson, his Novels reviewed in the Cornhill, ii. 102; superior toFielding, 131

Rogers (S. ), ii. 144; depreciates Scott, 247

Romney, Life by Hayley, i. 124; his portraits, ii. 41

Roqueplan, ii. 147

Rose (H. J. ), Untrodden Spain, ii. 225; Among the Spanish People, 250

Rossini, ii. 122

Rubens, i. 38, 54, 147; ii. 151

Rubini, ii. 295

Rushworth's Collections, i. 199

Ruskin (J. ), his letter to the Translator of Omar Khayyam, ii. 153

SADI'S Bostan, i. 344

Ste. Beuve, ii. 169, 228; his saying of Madame de Sevigne, 244, 249

Schlegel (A. W. V. ), his History of Literature, i. 92

Schutz (Mrs. ), i. 44, 45, 49, 59, 174

Science, poetry of, i. 229

Scott (Sir Walter), The Pirate, ii. 128, 130, 131; FitzGerald's love for, 190, 235, 237, 261; depreciated by the Lake Poets and Carlyle, 194;appreciated by Emerson, _ib. _; his Journey to Douglas Dale, _ib. _;subjects for pictures from, 235; Guy Mannering, 244, 245, 250; hated bythe Whigs, 247; The Bride of Lammermoor, 261; Kenilworth, 265

Sea Words and Phrases, ii. 116

Selden's Table Talk, FitzGerald's notes on, i. 231

Sellar (Professor), his article on Lucretius, ii. 58

Selwyn's Correspondence, i. 196

Seneca, i. 151, 182

Severn, his letters about Keats, ii. 276

Sevigne (Mad. De), ii. 184, 185, 196, 217, 310, 312; FitzGerald'sDictionary of the Dramatis Personae in her letters, 217, 289; Ste. Beuve's saying of, 244, 249; subject for a picture from, 293

Shakespeare, his Sonnets, i. 14; FitzGerald buys the second and thirdFolios, 31; Othello, ii. 251, 252

--(the Cambridge), ii. 47

Shelley, reviewed in the Edinburgh, i. 62; Trelawny's story of his death, ii. 189; disputed reading in, 250; too unsubstantial for FitzGerald, 251

Sheridan's School for Scandal the best comedy in the language, ii. 159

Siddons (Mrs. ), ii. 137, 149

Sizewell Gap, ii. 290

Smith (Horace), i. 97

Sonnets, FitzGerald's indifference to, i. 84, 87; ii. 212

Sophocles, the Antigone of, i. 186, 188; FitzGerald's admiration for, ii. 85; his superiority to Euripides, 86, 87; translation of the twoOEdipuses, 258, 275, 278, 279, 301, 315, 318, 319, 321; the OEdipusTyrannus played at Harvard, 316; the Ajax at Cambridge, 339

Sophocles and AEschylus compared, i. 240; ii. 49, 259

Southey, Life of Cowper by, i. 40, 42; his Life and Letters, 256

Southey (Mrs. ), Caroline Bowles, i. 97

Spedding (James), at school with FitzGerald, i. 2; living in Lincoln'sInn Fields, 43; reviews Carlyle's French Revolution in the Edinburgh, 73;mentioned, 76, 114, 115, 138, 164, 167, 177, 207, 228, 239, 272, 276; ii. 38, 152, 174; his portrait by Laurence, i. 77; his forehead, 77, 78, 83, 116; his character, 193, 257; ii. 299, 302, 308; Evenings with aReviewer, i. 241; ii. 25; at Bramford with the Cowells, i. 262; hisarticle on Euphranor, 266; death of his niece, 291; his edition of Bacon, 310, 322; ii. 1, 25, 55; forestalled by Hepworth Dixon, 20; paper onEnglish hexameters, 25; FitzGerald's regret at his life wasted on Bacon, 38, 45, 46; should have edited Shakespeare, 38, 48, 135; his pamphlet onAuthors and Publishers, 89; article on Twelfth Night, 103; Carlyle'sletter on him, 175; his accident, 298; and death, 301, 303, 305, 307;FitzGerald suggests a collection of his letters, 307, 309; Mrs. Cameron'sportrait of him, 338

Spenser, ii. 194

Spinoza, i. 204, 205, 209

Sprenger's Catalogue, i. 342

Spring Rice (Hon. S. ), ii. 30, 32

Squirarchy, ii. 19, 20, 22

Squire Letters (the), i. 213, 216-220, 231; ii. 230, 235, 241, 242, 244, 331

Stephen (Leslie), review of Richardson's Novels in the Cornhill, ii. 102;his Hours in a Library, 208, 209; on Crabbe's want of humour, 341

Sterling (John), i. 43

Stobaeus, i. 122, 123

Strawberry Hill, i. 276

Suicide, i. 257

Sumner (Charles), Memoir and Letters of, ii. 243, 247

TACITUS, i. 60; ii. 164, 165

Talma, ii. 75

Tannhauser, ii. 29

Tassy (Garcin de), i. 324, 325, 327; his edition of the Mantic, 325, 330, 342; ii. 100; his paper on Omar, i. 329, 343, 345

Taste the Feminine of Genius, i. 255; ii. 226

Taylor (Jeremy), i. 34, 35, 42, 44

--(Tom), Diogenes and his Lantern, i. 254

Tenby, i. 338

Tennant (R. J. ), at Blackheath, i. 43; candidate for a school atCambridge, _ib. _

Tennyson (A. ), a contemporary of FitzGerald's at Cambridge, i. 3; hisMariana, 9; and Lady of Shalott, 10; his new volume, 17; the Dream ofFair Women, 20; fresh poems, 25; at Mirehouse and Ambleside withFitzGerald, 33; ii. 305-307, 310; in London, i. 51, 81; at Leamington, Stratford, and Kenilworth with FitzGerald, 68; preparing for the press, 93, 113; edition of his poems, 1842, 115, 119; undergoing the water cure, 151; staying at Park House, 176, 224; at Carlyle's, 181; In Memoriam, 187, 250, 263, 273; mentioned, 168, 190, 192, 277; new poem, 194; in theIsle of Wight, 207; The Princess, 237, 246, 249, 250, 253, 254; hisportrait by Laurence, 242, 243; ii. 346; his opinion of Thackeray'sPendennis, i. 244; in chambers in Lincoln's Inn Fields, 250, 253, 254;his marriage, 263; at Twickenham, 285; goes to the Isle of Wight, 286, 287; King Arthur, 311; his saying of Hafiz, 320; his bust not at firstadmitted into Trinity College Library, ii. 12; his saying of the DresdenMadonna, 23, 181; FitzGerald regrets that he left Lincolnshire, 47; hisMaud, 60; at Greyshott Hall, Haslemere, 89; his Death of Lucretius, 89;Locksley Hall, 105; The Holy Grail, 111; his Gareth and Lynette, 143; hissaying of Crabbe, 152; of Dante and Goethe, 193; of Milton's similes andhis diction, 193; visits FitzGerald at Woodbridge, 202, 204; The NorthernFarmer, 206; Ode on the Funeral of the Duke of Wellington, 216; Ballad onLucknow, 267

Tennyson (Charles), his poems, ii. 259, 264, 294, 297; his death, 264

--(Frederic), his account of Cicero's villa, i. 123; urged to publish hispoems, 164, 250, 258, 264; their publication, 285, 289; with FitzGeraldat Woodbridge, ii. 55; lives in a World of Spirits, 65; FitzGerald sendshim Lowell's Study Windows, 257

Tennyson (Hallam, now Lord), his Song of Brunanburh, ii. 206

--(Septimus), i. 152

Thackeray (Miss), afterwards Mrs. Richmond Ritchie, her story in theCornhill, ii. 82; her Old Kensington, 140; meets FitzGerald at the RoyalAcademy Exhibition, 143

--(W. M. ), at Cambridge with FitzGerald, i. 2; in Paris, 3, 38;mentioned, 17, 30, 77, 116, 125, 158, 257, 311; illustrated Undine forFitzGerald, 29; his Paris Sketch Book, 73; his second Funeral ofNapoleon, 79; his Irish Sketch Book, 141; contributes to Punch, 163; goesto the East, 177; at Malta, 181; writes in Fraser's Magazine, 193;Journal from Cornhill to Grand Cairo, 202; Mrs. Perkins's Ball, 214;Vanity Fair, 238, 244; ii. 53; Pendennis, i. 244, 250, 255; ii. 51-53;his illness, i. 250; Lectures on the Humourists, 272; Esmond, 275, 276;goes to America, 279; letter of farewell to FitzGerald, 280; TheNewcomes, 288; ii. 50, 51; Lectures on the Georges, i. 317; edits theCornhill Magazine, ii. 13; his death, 50, etc. ; his Roundabout Papers, 127; describes Humanity in its depths, 135, 190; his saying of Lamb, 198, 243; his song, 'Ho, Pretty Page, ' set to music by FitzGerald, 207, 213

Thirlwall (Bishop), i. 73; his Letters, ii. 328

Thompson (W. H. ), at Cambridge with FitzGerald, i. 2, 79; at the watercure, 264; his letters, ii. 37; appointed Master of Trinity, 73, 74; hismarriage, 81, 88; his edition of Plato's Gorgias, 123-126

Tichborne Trial (the), ii. 134, 135, 159, 170

Ticknor's Memoirs, ii. 197, 200; his Spanish Literature, 198

Titian, pictures by, i. 107, 108, 141; ii. 151

Tom the Piper, ii. 240

Trench (Mrs. ), her Journal, ii. 23, 24, 144

--(R. C. ), i. 43; his Sabbation, 54; Study of Words, 274; his translationof Calderon's Life's a Dream, 307; ii. 287

Trinity College, Cambridge, the Hall, ii. 161; the Chapel, _ib. _

Trollope (Anthony), his Barchester Towers, ii. 14; Can you forgive her?71; He knows he was right, 152; the Eustace Diamonds, 159

Turner (Dawson), i. 198

Twalmley, The Great, ii. 198, 228

VANDENHOFF, as Macbeth, i. 31; as Iago, 43; in the Antigone, 188

Vandyke, ii. 151

Vaughan (Henry), Silex Scintillans, i. 46

Venables (G. S. ), i. 257

Verdi, ii. 151

Vestiges of Creation, i. 186, 187

Vestris (Madame), ii. 120, 138

Virgil, his Georgics, i. 134; FitzGerald's love for, ii. 83, 88, 218

Voltaire's Pucelle, ii. 168; his saying of Habakkuk, 182

Volunteer Rifles, ii. 18, 22

WALPOLE (Horace), i. 276; his Letters, ii. 205; Carlyle's opinion of him, 206

Warburton (Bishop), Letters quoted, i. 52

--(Eliot), i. 189

Waterford's (Lady), Babes in the Wood, ii. 18

Waterloo, Battle of, ii. 286, 290

--Gallery, i. 63

Wesley's Journal, i. 292; ii. 59, 219, 254; story from, 110; Memorials ofhis Family, 219; Southey's Life of, 220

Westminster Abbey, ii. 295

Wherstead, i. 28; ii. 231

White (James), i. 201

Wilkie (David), i. 39

Wilkinson (Mrs. ), Jane FitzGerald, E. FitzGerald's sister, i. 147, 167, 170

--(Rev. J. B. ), portrait by Laurence, i. 167, 170

Williams-Wynn (Miss), Memorials, ii. 237

Windham's Diary, ii. 84

Winsby Fight, i. 155, 160

Woburn Abbey, pictures at, i. 56

Woodberry (G. E. ), his article on Crabbe in the Atlantic Monthly, ii. 281

Wordsworth (Dr. C. ), Master of Trinity, ii. 194

--(W. ), i. 18; and Tennyson, 36, 37; his Sonnets, 84, 87, 88; mentioned, ii. 194, 195, 197; Lowell's account of him, 199; his opinion of Crabbe, 283, 288

Wotton (Sir H. ), quoted, i. 15

XENOPHON, i. 240

ZINCKE (Rev. Foster Barbam), ii. 149, 150, 231

Zoolus, account of, by Capt. Allen Gardiner, i. 64

THE END

_Printed by_ R. & R. CLARK, LIMITED, _Edinburgh_

Footnotes:

{2} See note on Omar Khayyam, stanza xviii. 

{5} See p. 2. 

{13} Article on 'British Novelists' in Fraser's Magazine, Jan. 1860. 

{18} Major Rolla Rouse of Melton. 

{22} His brother. 

{23a} Dean of Westminster and afterwards Archbishop of Dublin. 

{23b} Journal of Mrs. Trench, not then published. 

{24} In 1872 he wrote to me: 'I hope that others have remembered andmade note of A. T. 's sayings--which hit the nail on the head. Had Icontinued to be with him, I would have risked being called another Bozzyby the thankless World; and have often looked in vain for a Note Book Ihad made of such things. '

And again in 1876: 'He _said_, and I dare say, _says_ things to beremembered: decisive Verdicts; which I hope some one makes note of: postme memoranda. '

{25} In Fraser's Magazine for June 1861, 'On Translating Homer. '

{27} Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society for 1860, pp 1-17; publishedin 1861. 

{29} [In the book the AT is a symbol made of a capital A, with a small Tinside it with the bar of the T in the same position as the bar in theA. --D. P. ]

{30} The Hon Stephen Spring Rice. 

{34} Sat. III. 254. 

{35a} Hermann's conjecture on Agam. 819. 

{35b} Sat. VI. 460. 

{37} As Greek Professor. 

{40} At Ely

{47a} ? Forty. 

{47b} The Cambridge Shakespeare. 

{48a} Purgatorio, xxiii. 

{48b} Euripides. 

{50} Thackeray died 24 Dec. 1863. 

{55} A copy by Laurence of his portrait of Thackeray. 

{56a} Gainsborough's sketch of Dupont which Laurence copied. 

{56b} Gainsborough, when dying, whispered to Reynolds, 'We are all goingto heaven, and Vandyke is of the party. '

{58} By Professor Sellar in the Oxford Essays for 1855: reprinted in hisRoman Poets of the Republic, 1863. 

{59a} Late Archdeacon of Suffolk. 

{59b} VI. 556. 

{61} Pliny, Hist. Nat. Ii. 5. FitzGerald quotes only a part of thepassage in the first scene of The Mighty Magician. 

{62a} In June 1864. 

{62b} The third was probably the Agamemnon. 

{63} So by mistake for Woodbridge. 

{68} Probably, as I am informed by Mr. Mowbray Donne, 'that when LordChatham met any Bishops he bowed so low that you could see the peak ofhis nose between his legs. '

{69a} Sappho, Fr. Xlvi. (Gaisford). 

{69b} P. 308. 

{74} Quoted by the Scholiast on Theocritus, V. 65, and to be found inthe editions of the Paroemiographi Graeci by Gaisford and Leutsch. 

{77} Francis Duncan, Rector of West Chelborough. 

{78a} See note, p. 110. 

{78b} OEd. Tyr. 1076. 

{78c} OEd. Col. 607. 

{86} Sophocles, Ajax 674, 5. 

{87a} Not Jocasta, but Alcmene. 

{87b} Arist. Poet. 13, 10. 

{88} Her son, the Suffolk Poet, says that in the decline of her life she'observed to a relative with peculiar emphasis, that "to meet Winter, OldAge, and Poverty, was like meeting three great giants. "' For 'Sickness'FitzGerald at first had written 'Old Age. '

{91} Article in the Athenaeum of 2nd Feb. 1867 on Donne's edition of theCorrespondence of George III. And Lord North. 

{97a} Delivered 23rd Oct. 1867. 

{97b} By Emanuel Deutsch. 

{102} By Leslie Stephen. 

{104} Who said that the description of the boat race with whichEuphranor ends was one of the most beautiful pieces of English prose. 

{105} Referring to The Two Generals, Letters and Literary Remains, vol. Ii. P. 483. 

{107} See p. 105. 

{109} The Agamemnon. 

{110} FitzGerald frequently referred to a story from Wesley's Journal, which he quotes in Polonius, p. LXX. 'A gentleman of large fortune, while we were seriously conversing, ordered a servant to throw some coalson the fire. A puff of smoke came out. He threw himself back in hischair, and cried out, "O Mr. Wesley, these are the crosses I meet withevery day!"'

{111} The Holy Grail. 

{116a} Printed in the East Anglian Notes and Queries for 1869 and 1870. 

{116b} The partnership was dissolved in June 1870. 

{118a} Ten years before, Nov. 2, 1860, FitzGerald wrote to his oldfriend, the late Mr. W. E. Crowfoot of Beccles: 'I have been reading withinterest some French Memoirs towards the end of the last century: whenthe French were a cheerful, ingenious, witty, trifling people; they hadnot yet tasted of the Blood of the Revolution, which really seems to meto have altered their character. The modern French Novels exhibitVengeance as a moving Virtue: even toward one another: can we supposethey think less well of it towards us? In this respect they are reallythe most barbarous People of Europe. 

{118b} 29 Oct. 1870. 

{120} Gilbert's Palace of Truth. 

{122a} Edwin Edwards. 

{122b} Cornhill, June 1870. 'A Clever Forgery, ' by Dr. W. Pole. 

{127} Thirty Years' Musical Recollections, vol. I. P. 162. 

{128} In 1879 he wrote to Professor Cowell, 'O, Sir Walter will fly overall their heads "come aquila" still!'

{133} Not 'Yaffil' but 'yaffingale. '

{135a} In Hamlet, ii. 2. 337, 'Whose lungs are tickle o' the sear. '

{135b} 'Read rascal in the motions of his back, And scoundrel in the supple-sliding knee. '--_Sea Dreams_. 

{136} Thus far written in pencil by Carlyle himself. The rest of theletter except the signature and postscript is in Mr. Froude's hand. 

{139a} This appears to be a mistake. 

{139b} At Whitsuntide. 

{139c} As Thackeray used to call Carlyle. 

{140} Old Kensington. 

{141a} In 1873 he wrote to Miss Thackeray, 'Only yesterday I lighted upon some mention of your Father in the Letters of that mad man of Genius Morton, who came to a sudden and terrible end in Paris not long after. He was a good deal in Coram Street, and no one admired your Father more, nor made so sure of his '_doing something_' at last, so early as 1842. A Letter of Jan. 22/45 says: "I hear of Thackeray at Rome. Once there, depend upon it, he will stay there some time. There is something glutinous in the soil of Rome, that, like the sweet Dew that lies on the lime-leaf, ensnares the Butterfly Traveller's foot. " Which is not so bad, is it? And again, still in England, and harping on Rome, whose mere name, he says, "moves the handle of the Pump of Tears in him" (one of his grotesque fancies), he suddenly bethinks him (Feb. 4/45). "This is the last day of Carnival, Thackeray is walking down the Corso with his hands in his Breeches pockets: stopping to look at some little Child. At night, millions of Moccoletti, dasht about with endless Shouts and Laughter, etc. "'

{144} Byron's verses on Rogers. 

{145} In Fraser's Magazine, May 1870. 

{146a} Inferno, Canto V. 127. 

{146b} F. C. Brooke of Ufford. 

{146c} Probably a frontispiece to Omar Khayyam which was never used. 

{147} Roqueplan, La Vie Parisienne. 

{148} Salons Celebres, p. 97, ed. 1882. 

{149a} Q. Rev. No. LXVII. P. 216. 

{149b} Wherstead. 

{150} Euphranor. 

{153} 31st March, when the letter was probably finished. 

{160} Cent. III. Section 238. 

{161} In June 1871 he wrote to me, 'One Improvement I persist inrecommending for your Chapel: but no one will do it. Instead ofLucretius' line (which might apply to Shakespeare, etc. ) at the foot ofNewton's Statue, you should put the first words of Bacon's Novum Organum, (Homo) 'Naturae Minister et Interpres': which eminently becomes Newton, as he stands, with his Prism; and connects him with his great CambridgePredecessor, who now (I believe) sits in the Ante-Chapel along with him. '

{162} Agamemnon. 

{163a} Written in French, 22 July 1873. 

{163b} The Family of Love, vol. Viii p. 43. 

{163c} Ibid. P. 40. 

{164} Tacitus, by W. B. Donne, in Ancient Classics for English Readers, 1873. 

{165} Ann. XIV. 10. 

{169} In January 1874, Donne wrote to Thompson, 'You probably know thatour friend E. F. G. Has been turned out of his long inhabited lodgings bya widow weighing at least fourteen stone, who is soon to espouse, andsure to rule over, his landlord, who weighs at most nine stone--"imparcongressus. " "Ordinary men and Christians" would occupy a new andcommodious house which they have built, and which, in this case, youdoubtless have seen. But the FitzGeralds are not _ordinary_ men, however_Christian_ they may be, and our friend is now looking for an alien homefor himself, his books, pictures, and other "rich moveables. "'

{170} See Midsummer Night's Dream, iii. I. 137. 

{171} A copy of Pickersgill's portrait of Crabbe. 

{172} Dryburgh. 

{173} Dryburgh. 

{174} See the Chronicle of the Drum. 

{184} Chapter IV. 

{187} Tales of the Hall. Book X. (vol. Vi. P. 246). 

{188a} Carlyle's niece, now Mrs. Alexander Carlyle. 

{188b} To his nephew Tom, meaning that he should outlive him. Letter ofJeremiah Markland (Bowyer's Miscellaneous Tracts, ed. Nichols, p. 521). 

{189} That his boat was intentionally run down by a felucca. 

{193} Among my Books. First series. 

{196} June 10, 1876, was a Saturday. Perhaps the letter was finished onSunday. 

{197} In 1851. Wordsworth's Letters are in the second volume, pp. 145-173. 

{198} Boswell's Johnson, VIII. 183. 

{199} Haydon's Memoirs, III. 199. 

{200} Archdeacon Groome, Rector of Monk Soham, Suffolk. 

{202} Suffolk for 'donkey. '

{206} The Song of Brunanburh by Hallam Tennyson. Contemporary Review, Nov. 1876. 

{208} In 1863 he wrote to George Crabbe, --

 'I am now reading Clarissa Harlowe, for about the fifth time: I dare say you wouldn't have patience to read it once: indeed the first time is the most trying. It is a very wonderful, and quite original, and unique, Book: but almost intolerable from its Length and Sentimentality. '

{213} See p. 207. 

{217} In Crabbe's Borough. 

{219a} _Essais_, i. 18. 

{219b} Lucr. Iv. 76-80. 

{220a} Formerly Professor of Sanskrit in King's College, London. 

{220b} On English Adjectives in -able, with special reference toreliable, 1877. 

{224} The Hon. J. R. Lowell, formerly United States Minister at theCourts of Madrid and St. James'. 

{231} Chap. Xlv. 

{234} Melanges et Lettres. 

{237} Memorials of Charlotte Williams-Wynn, p. 59. 

{238} Criticisms, and Elucidations of Catullus, by H. A. J. Munro. 

{239} Of Lamb's Life, mentioned in the following letter. 

{240a} Book II. Song 2. 

{240b} Endymion, i. 26, etc. 

{240c} FitzGerald's memory was at fault here. The lines are fromTennyson's Gardener's Daughter. 

{242} Charles Lamb. A calendar of his life in four pages. 

{243} That to Bernard Barton about Mitford's vases, December 1, 1824. 

{247} A calendar of Charles Lamb's Life. 

{251} Not in the Essays but in the Colours of Good and Evil, 4: 'For ashe sayth well, _Not to resolve is to resolve_. '

{252} See Lamb's Verses to Ayrton (Letters, ed. Ainger, II. 2). 

{253} The Only Darter, A Suffolk Clergyman's Reminiscence. Written inthe Suffolk Dialect by Archdeacon Groome under the name of John Dutfen. 

{254} Wesley's Journal, 30 May 1786, and 22 May 1788. 

{255a} Edwin Edwards. 

{255b} Lowestoft. 

{256a} These two lines are crossed out. 

{256b} Tales of the Hall, Book XI. Vol. Vi. , p. 284, quoted from memory. 

{259a} This was never finished. 

{259b} Lord Carnarvon. 

{267} Tales of the Hall, Book X. 

{270} A year before, FitzGerald wrote to Professor Cowell:

 'I was trying yesterday to recover Gray's Elegy, as you had been doing down here at Christmas, with shut Eyes. But I had to return to the Book: and am far from perfect yet: though I leave out several Stanzas; reserving one of the most beautiful which Gray omitted. Plenty of faults still: but one doats on almost every line, every line being a Proverb now. '

{271} Tales of the Hall, Book XIV. (vol. Vii. P. 89). 

{272} Tales of the Hall, Book XIV. (vol. Vii. P. 89). 

{273} On Foot in Spain, by J. S. Campion, 1879. 

{274} From Calderon's _Cada uno para si_, the seven lines beginning'Bien dijo uno, que su planta' (Comedias, ed. Keil, iv. 731). 

{277} Edwards died on Sept. 15. 'Those two and their little Dunwich inSummer were among my Pleasures; and will be, I doubt, among my Regrets. 'So he wrote me at the end of 1877. 

{280a} C. K. Of Punch. 

{280b} Now in my possession. 

{281} In the Atlantic Monthly for May 1880, 'A Neglected Poet, ' by G. E. Woodberry. 

{282} Tales of the Hall, Book IV. Vol. Vi. P. 71. 

{283} Tales of the Hall, Book III. Vol. Vi. P. 61. 

{285a} From the Life of Lord Houghton, by Mr. Wemyss Reid, ii. 406, andby his kind permission inserted here. 

{285b} Printed 1881. 

{286} FitzGerald was reading Lord Seaton's Regiment (the 52nd LightInfantry) at the Battle of Waterloo, by the Rev. W. Leeke, who as EnsignLeeke carried the colours of the regiment on the 18th of June. 

{290} Edwin Edwards. 

{293} A sheltered path in the field next his garden, where he walked forhours together. 

{302} Spedding died on March 9. 

{303} The death of Spedding. 

{308a} Now (1893) the Dowager Lady Tennyson. 

{308b} See p. 219. 

{309} Printed in the Life of Archdeacon Allen, by Prebendary Grier, pp. 35-37. 

{311} In Macmillan's Magazine for April 1881. 

{313} Mrs. Kemble was at Leamington. 

{317} Euphranor. 

{322} Nearly two years before, 21st March 1880, Fitzgerald wrote toProfessor Cowell: 'My dear Donne (who also was one object of my going)seemed to me feebler in Body and Mind than when I saw him in October: Ineed not say, the same Gentleman. Mrs. Kemble says that he, more thanany one she has known, is the man to do what Boccaccio's Hero of theFalcon did. ' This was said, Mrs. Kemble informs me, by her sister Mrs. Sartoris. 

{323} Keene recommended FitzGerald to read Roger North's Memoir ofMusic. 'You will see in North, ' he says, 'that Old Rowley was a bit of amusician and sang "a plump Bass. " Can't you hear him?' His question tome was about the meaning of the word 'fastously, ' which is not a musicalterm, but described the conduct of an Italian violinist, Nicolai Matteis, who gave himself airs, 'and behaved fastously' or haughtily. Barrow usesboth 'fastuous' and 'fastuously. '

{324a} The Whole Body of Cookery Dissected, published in 1682. 

{324b} A volume of 17th century pamphlets, containing among othersHowell's Dodona's Grove, given me by Archdeacon Groome. 

{326} Edward Marlborough FitzGerald. 

{327} Euphranor, referred to in the following letters. 

{328} Now (1893) Lord Tennyson. 

{330a} Virgil's Garden, printed in Temple Bar for April, 1882. 

{330b} Longfellow died 26th March, and Emerson 27th April, 1882. 

{337} 20 June, 1882. 

{342} A newspaper cutting: 'ALDEBURGH. THE STORM. On Tuesday eveningthe tide ran over the Promenade, in many places the river and seameeting. The cattle are all sent inland, and all the houses at Slaughdenare evacuated. '