A Short Sketch of English Literature: From Chaucer to the Present Time [2nd ed. Compiled from English Sources. Reprint 2020] 9783112350607, 9783112350591

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A SHORT SKETCH OF

ENGLISH LITERATURE FROM CHAUCER TO THE PRESENT TIME

COMPILED FROM ENGLISH SOURCES

BY

EL. MANN.

SECOND EDITION.

BONN, EDUARD WEBER'S VERLAG. (JULIUS FLITTNER.)

1893.

Preface. In the not probable event that this book should ever come before English critics, I feel bound to give an account of its origin and its raison d'être. Having lived in England for a number of years, and having imbibed there a deep love and veneration for the Literature of the English nation, I wished, on my return to Germany, to spread among my own nation the knowledge I had gathered, but found many obstacles in my way. The books on English literature accessible to me were either far too difficult for German learners who, with the literature, had to master the English tongue; or they were insufficient; so that I had to create my own material in setting forth an account of English literature, which should interest in plain, easy language. Not trusting my own power over the English tongue, I compiled the lives of the authors from English books of literature, periodicals, newspapers; in fact, did as some of my betters have done before me: "je prenais mon bien où je le trouvais", and, want it to be understood, once for all, that of this book nothing belongs to m e except the collecting it into a whole. As it will never make its way into England, I hope I have harmed no one, m y wish being to spread the knowledge of that grand and beautiful English literature as far as ever I can, and to promote thereby a right understanding of the genius of a mighty nation I have a peculiar regard for.

Contents. Chaucer and his Contemporaries

Page 1—7

The 15 th Century and the First Half of the 16 th Century

7—8

The Elizabethan Period (including the reign of J a m e s I . and that of Charles I. to the outbreak of the Civil War). 1 5 5 8 - 1 6 4 2 The Period of the 1642-1660 The Period of 1660—1702

the

Civil W a r and

the

9-40

Commonwealth 40—50

Restoration

and

the

Revolution 50—57

First Half of the 18 th Century. The Period of the Artificial School in the reign of Queen Anne and George I. 1702—1727

57—69

T h e Novelists of the 18 th Century

69—81

Second Half of the 18 th Century. The Dawn of Romantic Poetry

81—101

The 19 th Century. Poets

101—141

Prose Writers

141—165

Addenda

165—166

Index

167—176

Errata. 35, 1. 52, 1. 58, 1. 64, 1. 64, 1. p. 139,1.

read Elizabeth 39 instead of Eizabeth „ and und 24 affection „ affaction 30 » 1675 5 1671 „ whithersoever 15 withersoever „ Old. Cld 39

Origin of the English Language and Literature.

1

Geoffrey Chaucer (1340—1400). " T h e F a t h e r of E n g l i s h P o e t r y " . In order to understand why Chaucer, who lived at the close of the 14th century, was called the "Father of English Poetry" we need to go back to the early history of England, where we shall find the reason in the fact that England passed through the hands of many masters. The earliest inhabitants of Britain were called Kelts. In the year B. C. 55 Julius Caesar invaded Britain, and the Romans kept possession of the greater part of it until A. D. 409, when they withdrew their forces from the island. During the dominion of the Romans the Britons had lost their power of self-defence, so much that they could not repel the Picts and Scots, inhabitants of the independent north, who poured over the "Wall". They therefore applied for help to the Angles and Saxons, two tribes between Germany and Denmark, who not only drove back these invaders, but took possession of the country for themselves. They, of course, spoke a language akin to the German and Dutch, and although the Danes also afterwards entered the land in large numbers, there was not much change in the language, the Danish being closely allied to the Anglo-Saxon tongue. The first period of English literature is naturally termed the Anglo-Saxon period 449—1066. The most important prose writers of this period, were the Saxon Chroniclers and King Alfred; the poets Csedmon and Cynewulf and the unknown singer of Beowulf, who noted down the events of their time. The monks wrote mostly in Latin. In the year 1066 another great change passed over England. Edward the Confessor (1042—1066), the last Saxon king, having died childless, William the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy, pretending to have a lawful claim Mann, Sketch.

1

2

Origin of the English Language and Literature.

to the throne, came over with his Normans and after the battle of Hastings or Senlac in Sussex, made himself master of England. Although of the same stock as the Anglo-Saxons, the Normans had been settled in France long enough (since 912) to speak the French 'tongue, which they introduced into Britain. For a long time after the Conquest, the two nations were sworn enemies although living in the same country. The conquerors trampled on the Anglo-Saxons, took their property and despised them. The Saxons continued to speak their own language; but Norman-French was spoken by the nobles, and in courts-of-law. In course of time this breach was healed; the two nations had to live together, and be on terms of intimacy; consequently by degrees the two languages, the Saxon and Norman, were united into one, the English language. This is called in English literature the Norman Period 1066—1362. The Normans introduced many new subjects of literature into England, of which the most popular were the originally British legends of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table, which consisted of six principal tales. I. The Romance of San Greal, the cup our Lord used in the Last Supper, and in which Joseph of Arimathea caught the blood (sang real) shed on the cross. Joseph is said to have brought it to Britain, and the loss of it is the great misfortune of the nation. II. Merlin is the second tale. It describes the fiendprophet himself, and the birth and exploits of Arthur. III. The Romance of Sir Lancelot du Lake is the history of one who is the pattern of knighthood and yet lives in deadly sin. (Guinevere.) IV. The Quest of the San Greal describes the wanderings of the Knights of the Round Table and the successful search by one of them for the Holy Vessel, though amid so much sinfulness that the discovery is fruitless. V. The Morte d'Arthur gives the history of the death of Arthur amid wild and supernatural horrors, and tells of the retirement of the surviving Knights to convents, where they mourn over the sin and ruin of their race.

Geoffrey Chaucer.

3

VI. Tristan gives a repetition of some previous tales with added beauties. From the time of Edward III. (1327—1377), the union may be said to have been completed, and although some poets wrote in French, some in Latin, yet there was only one language spoken — the English, (of course in many dialects, and very different from its present shape); and Chaucer being the first great poet who gave form and stability to the English tongue, is, on that account, called "the Father of English poetry". Geoffrey Chaucer was born, as he tells us, in London, probably in 1340. Of his parentage nothing is known. Some say, he was of noble birth, others that he himself or his father was a merchant. That Chaucer was educated at a University is a fact, but whether at Oxford or Cambridge is doubtful. He is said to have entered the Temple as a law-student; at all events we find him at an early age in the public service and in confidential intimacy with men of high rank. His chief patron was John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, who, late in life, contracted a marriage with the sister of the poet's wife. Chaucer served in the great army which Edward III. led into France and was taken prisoner, but was released at the peace of Bretigny in 1360. He was employed as joint-envoy to the Duke of Genoa, and, while in Italy, probably made the acquaintance of Petrarch. (Francesco Petrarca 1304—1374.) He was appointed clerk of the King's works at Westminster, where it is probable that he ended his days. He was buried in Westminster Abbey, in Poets' Corner, the first of that long array of poets who lie there. The poet's wife was Philippa de Roet, maid of honour to Edward IH.'s wife, Queen Philippa. Chaucer has written many poems, the earlier of which were composed under the influence of French poetry; in his later metrical compositions we find the influence of the Italian poets becoming strong, but in the Canterbury Tales, his greatest and most original work, he shook off all foreign influence. The style of these tales and the subjects of them were no doubt suggested by the Decameron of Boccaccio {1313—1375). Boccaccio, who died twenty-five years before

4

Canterbury Tales.

Chaucer, placed the scene of his Decameron in a garden,, to which seven fashionable ladies had retired with three fashionable gentlemen to escape the plague which de vastated Florence in 1348. They shut themselves up in a beautiful villa on the Arno, and amused themselves byeach relating a tale after dinner. The purpose of the storytellers was to. help each other to stifle any sympathies they might have had for the terrible griefs of their friends and neighbours who were dying a few miles away. Ten days form the period of their sojourn in the villa, and we have thus a hundred stories. Though Chaucer adopted the framework of the Decameron for his Canterbury Tales, they have a more pleasing origin. A company of pilgrims, consisting of twentynine "sundry folk", meet accidentally at the Tabard Inn, Southwark*). The poet himself is one of the party. They are all bent on a pilgrimage to the shrine of Thomas ii Becket in the cathedral of Canterbury**). The goodly company, assembled in a manner so natural in those days of pilgrimages and of difficult and dangerous roads, agree to travel together; and at supper, Harry Bailey, the jolly landlord, proposes to accompany the party and serve as a guide, having, as he says, often travelled the road before, and, at the same time, suggests that they may much enliven the tediousness of the journey by relating stories as they ride. He is to be accepted by the whole party as a kind of judge or umpire, by whose decision everyone is to abide. As the journey to Canterbury occupies one day and the return another, the plan of the whole work, had Chaucer completed it, would have comprised the adventures on the outward journey, the arrival at Canterbury, a description, in all probability, of the splendid religious ceremonies *) Until the other day, this famous old hostel was still standing in that part of London. **) Thomas a Becket, archbishop of Canterbury, who opposed King Henry II. (1154—1189) in every possible manner, was murdered at the altar of Canterbury cathedral by four of Henry's courtiers. Henry II. did penance at the tomb of Becket, who was canonized after his death. His body was removed to a magnificent shrine, and pilgrimages to his tomb were frequently performed.

Geoffrey Chaucer.

5

and the visits to the numerous shrines and relics in the cathedral, the return to London, the farewell supper at the Tabard, and dissolution of the pleasant company, which would separate as naturally as they had assembled. Harry Bailey proposes that each pilgrim should relate one tale on the journey out, and one more on the way home; and that on the return of the party to London, he who should be adjudged to have related the best and most amusing •story, should sup at the common cost. Chaucer has not finished his design; there are only twenty-four tales, and here the work is broken off. In the Prologue, the poet gives us an exquisite description not only of the person and character, but of the manners, dress, and horse of each member of the party. The pilgrims are of all ranks and classes of society. We have — 1. A Knight, a mirror of chivalry, one who loved truth and honour, freedom and courtesy; and although in war he was as bold as a lion, in peace he was "as meek as is a maid; "And never yet no villainy he said "In all his life, unto no manner wight; "He was a very perfect, gentle Knight." 2. His son, a gallant young Squire, with "curled locks as they were laid in press." Besides being brave, he was fond of rich attire, for — "Embroidered was he, as it were a mead "All full of fresh(e) flowers, white and red, "Singing he was or floyting all the day, "He was as fresh as is the month of May; . . . "Well could he sit his horse, and fair(e) ride. "He could songes make and well endite, "Juste and eke dance, and well pourtray and write. "Courteous he was, lowly and serviceable, "And carve before his father at the table." 3. A yeoman, their attendant on horseback. 4. A prioress, a lady of rank, whose name was Madame Eglantine, and who was taught all manner of good breeding for — "At meat(e) was she well ytaught withal, "She let no morsel from her lippes fall,

6

Canterbury Tales.

" N e wet her fingers in her sauce deep. " W e l l could she carry a morsel and well keep "That no drop ne fell upon her breast. " I n courtesy was set full much her leste " H e r overlippe wiped she so clean, "That in her cuppe was no farthing seen " O f grease, when she drunken had her draught." 5. A jolly Monk, passionately fond of hunting and good cheer; he rode a dainty, well-caparisoned horse, — " A n d when he rode, men might his bridle hear, "Jingling in a whistling wind, as clear " A n d eke as loud as doth the chapel-bell "His head was bald and shone as any glass, " A n d eke his face as he had been anointed." 6. A Franklin, or country gentleman. Epicurus' own son, who kept open table, and in whose house it "snowed of meat and drink". 7. A Clerk of Oxford, whose horse was "as lean as is a rake and he was not right fat", one who spent on books all the money he could collect, and "gladly would he learn and gladly teach". 8. A Pardoner, or seller of indulgences, "brimful of pardons come from Eome all hot". 9. A poor Parson of a town, rich in holy thought and work, who set his parishioners the example, that "first he wrought and afterwards he taught". 10. A Ploughman, the parson's brother, who loved God best and his neighbour as himself. Besides these, there are several priests and monks, five wealthy tradesmen, a doctor of physic whose "study was but little of the Bible", and the W i f e of Bath, rich and forward in her speech. The tales are all in verse, with the exception of two. Chaucer borrowed the subjects of his stories from the legends of the Chroniclers, from the fabliaux of the Provençal poets and from a delightful old book, a large collection of stories, written in Latin and known as the "Gesta Romanorum" [the Deeds of the Romans], also from the early Italian writers, Dante, Petrarch, Boccaccio. Perhaps the most pathetic of all the stories is that of patient Griselda,

Wycliffe; Gower. — The 15 th Century.

7

the model and heroine of wifely patience and obedience, narrated b y the Clerk of Oxford, and which Chaucer most likely took from Petrarch's Latin translation of the last tale in the Decameron. Chaucer also wrote many minor poems. The contemporary and perhaps the friend of Chaucer, John W y c l i f f e (1324—1384), translated the Bible from the Latin Vulgate into English. He is one of the earliest reformers, — though modern Protestants repudiate some of his tenets, — and his doctrines were afterwards taught b y John Huss and Jerome of Prague in Bohemia. The unsettled state of the literary language of England at this time cannot be better illustrated than b y mentioning the writings of John G o w e r , who died in 1408. He wrote three great works, one in Latin, the Vox Clamantis, one in French, Speculum Meditantis, and one in English, the Confessio Amantis; nor is he the only author of this time, who wrote in three different languages. T h e 15th C e n t u r y . The century that followed upon Chaucer's death was the most unproductive in English literature. In the beginn i n g of the century the struggles between the Lollards (the disciples of Wycliffe), and the Church disturbed the land, and from 1455—1485, the wars of the Roses deprived it of all tranquillity. Although there were many poets, hardly a name among them is worth remembering, unless we except that of John Lydgate, a monk of Bury-St-Edmunds, Suffolk, (about 1430), who produced a number of compositions of different kinds. He rhymed history, ballads and legends, made May-games for Aldermen, mummeries for the Lord Mayor, and wrote satirical ballads on the follies of the day. If few valuable books were written during the century, much interest was taken in literature in various parts of the country, and towards the end of the century several important events took place, which prepared the way for the brilliant literary period of the reign of Queen Elizabeth. First, in or about 1477, the introduction of the art of printing into England b y William Caxton (1412—1492);

Wycliffe; Gower. — The 15 th Century.

7

the model and heroine of wifely patience and obedience, narrated b y the Clerk of Oxford, and which Chaucer most likely took from Petrarch's Latin translation of the last tale in the Decameron. Chaucer also wrote many minor poems. The contemporary and perhaps the friend of Chaucer, John W y c l i f f e (1324—1384), translated the Bible from the Latin Vulgate into English. He is one of the earliest reformers, — though modern Protestants repudiate some of his tenets, — and his doctrines were afterwards taught b y John Huss and Jerome of Prague in Bohemia. The unsettled state of the literary language of England at this time cannot be better illustrated than b y mentioning the writings of John G o w e r , who died in 1408. He wrote three great works, one in Latin, the Vox Clamantis, one in French, Speculum Meditantis, and one in English, the Confessio Amantis; nor is he the only author of this time, who wrote in three different languages. T h e 15th C e n t u r y . The century that followed upon Chaucer's death was the most unproductive in English literature. In the beginn i n g of the century the struggles between the Lollards (the disciples of Wycliffe), and the Church disturbed the land, and from 1455—1485, the wars of the Roses deprived it of all tranquillity. Although there were many poets, hardly a name among them is worth remembering, unless we except that of John Lydgate, a monk of Bury-St-Edmunds, Suffolk, (about 1430), who produced a number of compositions of different kinds. He rhymed history, ballads and legends, made May-games for Aldermen, mummeries for the Lord Mayor, and wrote satirical ballads on the follies of the day. If few valuable books were written during the century, much interest was taken in literature in various parts of the country, and towards the end of the century several important events took place, which prepared the way for the brilliant literary period of the reign of Queen Elizabeth. First, in or about 1477, the introduction of the art of printing into England b y William Caxton (1412—1492);

8

The First Half of the 16 th Century.

secondly, a change in philosophy; thirdly, the progress of the Reformation; and lastly, in 1453, the conquest of Constantinople by the Turks, when fugitive scholars carried the study of the Greek classical authors from Constantinople to Italy, and gave the impulse to what is known in Europe as the Renascence, or Revival of Letters. Many Englishmen went to Italy to study the old Greek writers, and printing helped these men, on their return to England, to spread their English translations of the Classics. Some of these scholars taught Greek at the universities, others introduced new models of style and metre. T h e F i r s t H a l f of t h e 16th C e n t u r y . A new era in English literature was opened by two noblemen, Sir Thomas Wyatt the Elder (1503—1541) and Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey (1516—1547). One of them had studied in Italy, and they are regarded as the first really modern English poets. They imitated Italian models, and refined the ruggedness of English poetry. Surrey, who was the greater artist of the two, enriched English poetry in a twofold way; he introduced the sonnet, and the ten-syllabled unrhymed line, called blank verse, which was afterwards made the proper metre of the drama. Two learned men belong to the early part of the 16th century; Roger Ascham (1515—1568), the author of the Schoolmaster and Sir Thomas More (1480—1535), who, in 1530, succeeded the great Cardinal Wolsey as Lord Chancellor. More was the friend of Erasmus (1467—1536) and, for some time, of Henry VIII. himself, until he refused to acknowledge the king as Head of the Church, when he was beheaded for high treason. The most famous book More wrote was Utopia, in which he described an imaginary commonwealth, in the imaginary island of Utopia. The book was written in Latin. The Bible was for the first time translated from the original Hebrew and Greek, the New Testament in 1525 by W i l l i a m Tyndale (burnt in Flanders in 1536) and the whole Bible in 1535 by Miles Coverdale. These versions have fixed the English language once for all.

The Elizabethan Period.

9

The Elizabethan Period. 1558—1642 (including the reign of James I., and that of Charles I., to the outbreak of the Civil War.) This period which includes the reign of James I. and partly that of Charles I., extends over a much greater space than the reign of Queen Elizabeth proper. As it was the most brilliant in English literature, its influence continued to be felt for a long time. The drama constituted its chief literary feature; and its close is contemporary with the outbreak of the Civil War.' It contains the noblest names of English literature, those of Spenser, Shakspeare, Hooker, Bacon, besides a host of others who have almost been overlooked in the crowd. The reign of Elizabeth was also one of important political activity and the time of great discoveries, and counted as many heroes as poets, and not seldom, both these characters were united in the same person, as in the case of Sir Philip Sidney (1554—1586). A f a r greater poet, Edmund Spenser (1553—1599), the author of the Fcerie Queene (Fairy Queen), was a native of London. He was descended from a good family, though not rich, and received his education at the university of Cambridge. When he left the university, he resided for some time in the north of England, and there published his first poem, " T h e Shepherd's Calendar", a series of pastorals, divided into twelve parts or months. A friend, (Mr. Gabriel Harvey), persuaded him to return to London a n d introduced him to Sir Philip Sidney, himself a poet a n d one of the greatest ornaments of the brilliant court of Elizabeth. Sidney, in his turn, recommended the poet to Dudley, Earl of Leicester (his uncle) the favourite of Elizabeth, and after a long delay, he received a grant of forfeited land in the county of Cork, Ireland. He removed to his new abode, Kilcolman Castle, which was surrounded b y fine scenery, and here he married his beloved wife, Elizabeth, wrote his great poem the Fcerie Queene and received the visit of a brother poet, Sir Walter Raleigh — famous as a soldier, a sailor, a statesman, a poet and an historian, and no less known for his tragic death. The three first books of the Fcerie Queene published in 1590 and dedicated to Queen Elizabeth, were most en-

10

Edmund Spenser.

thusiastically received. Elizabeth, though not generally liberal, settled a permanent pension on the poet. "All this," her prime - minister Lord Burleigh is said to have exclaimed, "for a song?" "Then give him what is reason" rejoined her majesty. Burleigh, who was no admirer of poets and poetry, chose to forget the order of the Queen, until (it is said), she was at last reminded of it by Spenser in the following petition: "I was promised on a time "To have reason for my rhyme; "From that time unto this season, "I received nor rhyme nor reason: — " upon which the pension was paid. Spenser published several shorter poems and in 1596 three more books of the Fcerie Queene. The Irish, who burned to revenge themselves upon the English, rose up in rebellion. Kilcolman Castle was burnt, one of Spenser's children is said to have perished in the flames; the Poet fled to London, poor and heartbroken, and not long after died in want; he was, however, buried with great pomp in Westminster Abbey, near the tomb of Chaucer. The Fcerie Queene is an allegorical epic poem; the title is somewhat deceptive, as the Faerie Queene presides not over Fairy-Land, but over the land of chivalry. The poem was intended to consist of twelve books, but only six remain. Each of these is divided into twelve cantos and is devoted to the adventures of a particular knight, who personifies a certain virtue, as Holiness, Temperance, Courtesy. In a letter to his friend Raleigh, which Spenser appended to the volume, he explained the nature of the poem, saying: "that it is an Allegory written to fashion a gentleman or noble person in virtuous and noble discipline", and that he had chosen Prince Arthur for his hero. "The method of a poet" Spenser continues to say in his letter "is not such as of an historian; for he relates affairs orderly as they were done, accounting as well the times as the actions, but a poet thrusts into the midst, even where it most concerns him, and then referring to the things past, and foretelling things to come, makes a pleasing analysis

Faerie Queene.

11

of them all. The beginning therefore of my history, if it were to be told by an historian, should be the twelfth book which is the last, where I devise that the Faerie Queene kept her annual feast 12 days, upon which 12 days the occasions of the 12 several adventures happened, which being undertaken by 12 several Knights are in these 12 books severally handled. The first was this: In the beginning of the feast, there presented himself a tall, clownish young man, who, falling before the queen of fairies desired a boon (as the manner then was), which during the feast she might not refuse; which was that he might have the achievement of any adventure, which during that feast might happen. That being granted, he rested him on the floor, unfit through his rusticity for a better place. Soon after entered a fair Lady, in mourning weeds, riding on a white ass, with a Dwarf behind her leading a warlike steed, that bore the arms of a Knight, and his spear in the Dwarf"s hand. She, falling before the queen of fairies, complained that her father and mother, an ancient King and Queen, had been by a huge Dragon many years shut up in a brazen castle and therefore besought the Faerie Queene to assign her some one of her knights to take upon him that exploit. Presently that clownish person upstarting, desired that adventure, whereat the Queen much wondering and the Lady much gainsaying, yet he earnestly requested his desire. In the end the Lady told him, that unless that armour which she had brought would serve him (that is the armour of a Christian man, specified by St. Paul; VI. Ephesians 13—17) he could not succeed in that enterprise; which being forthwith put upon him, he seemed the goodliest man in all that company and was well liked of the Lady; and eftsoons taking on him knighthood and mounting the strange courser, he went forth with her of that adventure, where begins the first book: "A gentle knight wa& pricking on the plain." — The first book relates the expedition of the Red Cross Knight, who is the allegorical representation of Holiness, while his mistress Una represents true Religion, and the adventures of the Knight shadow forth the triumph of Holiness over Heresy.

12

The Dawn and Progress

The second book recounts the adventures of Sir Guyon or Temperance; the third those of Britomartis, a female champion or Chastity; the fourth book contains the legends of Cambell and Triamond, allegorising Friendship; the fifth the legend of Artegall or Justice; the sixth that of Sir Calidore or Courtesy. The principal defect of the Fcerie Queene is want of unity, which involves loss of interest in the story; we lose sight of Arthur, the nominal hero, and follow the adventures of each separate knight. Another defect is the monotony of the characters and of the adventures, the latter generally consisting of combats between knights and monsters, giants or wicked enchanters, in which the knights generally come off victorious. On the other hand, Spenser is the most luxurious and melodious of all poets. His creation of scenes and objects is as infinite as it is varied and beautiful, and his language most sweet and harmonious. The Fcerie Queene is written in the so-called Spenserian stanza, based upon the eight-lined Ottava Rima, to which Spenser added a ninth line, being of twelve, instead of, as in the others, ten syllables. Of the several minor poems Spenser has written, may be mentioned his beautiful Epithalamium or Marriage-song on his own nuptials with ^the fair Elizabeth". The Dawn and P r o g r e s s of the Drama. It is possible to trace the first dim dawning of the stage to the custom of a very remote period of representing in a rude dramatic form, legends of the lives of the saints and striking episodes of Bible history, •— which received the name of Mysteries or Miracles. The circumstance that these Miracle-plays were performed in French, is a proof that they were imported from France; but, in fact, Mysteries abound in the early literature of all the Western Countries of Europe. These plays were composed and acted by monks, the cathedral was transformed for the occasion into a theatre, the stage was a kind of graduated platform in three divisions rising one over the other, representing Heaven, Earth and Hell, and placed near the altar; the

of the Drama.

13

costumes were furnished by the splendid contents of the vestry of the church. As it was absolutely necessary to introduce some comic element to attract and amuse the common people, the Devil generally played the part of the clown or jester, and Vice was associated with him to be beaten and cudgelled. When the Mysteries had been in use for more than three centuries and had gone through many stages, another form of the Drama was substituted for them, entitled Moralities. The subjects of this kind of drama were no longer purely religious; instead of the Deity, Saints and Angels personified Morals; Virtue, Good Counsel, Repentance, Pride and the like were introduced upon the stage. The action was in general exceedingly simple, and, as the tone of these Moralities was grave and doctrinal, the Devil and Vice had to be retained to make mirth for the multitude. When people grew tired of the Moralities, because they stirred no human sympathy, historical characters celebrated for some particular virtue or vice were introduced,, and when the Reformation began to occupy the hearts of men, the Moralities were used to support the Protestant or Roman side. Real men and women were shown under the thin cloak of its allegorical characters; the vices and follies of the time were displayed, and the stage was becoming a living power. The transition from the Morality to the regular drama was marked by the Interlude, a kind of play which stands midway between them. It differed from the Morality in that most of its characters were drawn from real life. They were very fashionable at the time of Henry VIII. John Heywood, who was supported at his court, was a prolific writer of Interludes. One of his pieces is called the Four Ps. A Palmer (pilgrim to the Holy Land etc.), a Pardoner (seller of pardons or indulgences), a Pothicary (Apothecary) and a Pedlar, who are the only characters, have a dispute as to who shall tell the grossest falsehood. An accidental assertion of the Palmer, that he never saw a woman out of patience in his life, takes the others off

14

The First Stage of the Regular Drama.

their guard, all of whom declare it to be the greatest lie they ever heard, and thus the dispute is settled amidst much merriment. Meanwhile, the revival of learning had made men familiar with the ancient classic drama. A large number of pieces written upon the models of authors in the Latin language, were performed at the Universities and, not unfrequently, before the Sovereign. In 1551 the first stage of the regular drama begins with the first comedy written in the English language, Ralph Royster Doyster, by Nicholas Udall. The hero is a young fop, who imagines every woman to be in love with him, and who gets into all sorts of absurd and humiliating scrapes. This was followed about fourteen years later by Gammer Gurton's Needle, by Bishop Still. The plot of this •comedy turns upon the sudden loss of a needle with which Gammer Gurton has been mending a garment of her man Hodge, a loss comparatively serious when needles were rare and costly. The whole intrigue consists in the search after the unfortunate needle, which is at last discovered by Hodge himself on suddenly sitting down. The first English drama Gorboduc or Ferrex and Porrex written by Thomas Sackville, Lord Buckhurst, andThomas Norton, was acted in 1562 before Queen Elizabeth by the gentlemen of the Inner Temple. The subject of this piece is taken from the annals of the old chroniclers. It is written in blank verse (blank verse, as was said before, was first introduced by Lord Surrey, who was beheaded in 1547 by order of Henry VIII., under a false and absurd charge), consists of five acts, and observes some of the rules of the classic drama, by introducing, for instance, a chorus at the beginning of each act. The thirty years that elapsed between the publication of Gorboduc, (1562) and the age of Shakspeare, showed a great improvement in the drama, and may be called its second stage. There were a number of dramatists who not only wrote for the stage, but who were performers at the same time. Some of the most important of these forerunners of Shakspeare are George Peele (1558—1598), who wrote several historical plays, the first that were written

Forerunners of Shakspeare.

15

in the English language; Thomas Kid, who lived about the same time, particularly known for his powerful play: The Spanish Drama; Thomas Nash (1567—1600), who amused the town with his fierce attacks upon Gabriel Harvey (Spenser's friend) and on the Puritans; Robert Greene (1560—1592), who wrote satires as well as dramas. Greene, like most of his brother poets, lived a dissipated life, and came to an untimely, miserable end. His best piece is Oeorge-a-Oreen, the name of an old English legendary hero. These dramatists were the first in whose hands the play of human passion and action is expressed with any true dramatic effect. They made their characters act on, and draw out one another in the several scenes, but they had no power of making a plot, or of working out their plays, scene by scene, to a natural conclusion. In one word, they lacked art, and their characters are neither natural nor simple, though the poetry may be good. But by far the most powerful genius among the dramatists, who immediately preceded Shakspeare was Christopher Marlowe (1563—1593). Born at Canterbury and educated at Cambridge, he, on leaving the university, joined a troop of actors, and is recorded to have broken his leg upon the stage. His mode of life was remarkable for vice, and his career was as short as it was disgraceful; he was stabbed in a scuffle in a low public house. Marlowe has written but eight dramas; his first, Tamburlaine, contains a good deal of bombast, but, at the same time, it has passages of great power. Marlowe's best works are, incontestably, the dramas Edward II. and Faustus. The latter is founded upon the very same popular legend that Goethe adopted as the groundwork of his tragedy; but the point of view taken by Marlowe is far simpler than that of Goethe; and the English drama contains no trace of the profound self-questioning of the German hero, and of the extraordinary creation of Mephistopheles. The witch element, which reigns so wildly and picturesquely in the German poem, is here entirely absent. But, on the other hand, there is certainly no passage in the tragedy of Goethe in which terror, despair and remorse are painted with such a powerful hand, as in the great closing scene

16

Shakspeare.

of Marlowe's piece; when Faustus, after the twenty-four years of pleasure which were stipulated in his pact with the Evil One, is waiting for the inevitable arrival of the fiend to claim his bargain. This is truly dramatic, and is assuredly one of the most impressive scenes that ever was placed upon the stage. The tragedy of Edicard II., which was the last of Marlowe's dramas, showed that, in some departments of his art, particularly in that of moving terror and pity, he might, had he lived, have become no insignificant rival of Shakspeare himself. Actors and

Theatres.

The actors used to wander from place to place, performing where they could get audiences. In order to protect them from being treated as vagabonds, persons of rank took some of these strolling actors under their immediate patronage, authorizing them to wear their liveries and badges with an allowance of wages; thence they styled themselves: the Queen's Servants, the Earl of Leicester's Servants and so forth. The first standing theatres, the Theatre and the Curtain, were built in London about 1576; the form of the building was derived from the courtyards of inns, three sides of which were occupied by balconies. There was at first little or no scenery, and the female parts were acted by boys or young men. Very frequently actors were also writers of plays. W i l l i a m Shakspeare (1564—1616). The life of William Shakspeare, the greatest of all dramatists, is involved in much obscurity and very little is known of him with certainty. He was born in Stratford-onAvon in Warwickshire in April 1564, it is said on the 23 rd the anniversary of St. George, the tutelar saint of England. There have been endless theories, old and new, affirmations and contradictions as to the worldly calling of John Shakspeare the poet's father. He is said to have been a glover, a butcher and also a dealer in wool, but it is not unlikely that he was a moderate landed proprietor cultivating his own soil, and selling the products of his

Elizabethan Drama.

17

farm. The poet's mother, Mary Arden, was descended from an old family and possessed some property of her own. By degrees John Shakspeare rose to be Bailiff and chief Alderman of Stratford; he had six children, of whom William was the eldest. It is generally believed that during the boyhood and youth of the poet, John Shakspeare gradually descended to a condition of comparative poverty, and that he was even obliged to take his son William from the free Grammar School of Stratford in order to help him in his business. There is a blank in the poet's history for some years; he is said to have spent some time in a lawyer's office, which may be true, as he was very familiar with legal phrases and illustrations; according to another authority, he held the occupation of a schoolmaster in the country. Whatever his training or his occupations may have been, his works prove sufficiently that, at least, he must have read the book of nature and the hearts of men; and from the frequent allusions in his dramas to classic history and to the mythology of the ancients, and from the general tenor of his works, it is certain that he had, by no means, lost his time. The next step in his life which is known with any certainty was a very imprudent one. In 1582, when not fully eighteen years old, he married Anne Hathaway, who was twenty-six years of age. The marriage neither bettered his circumstances nor his position in life. There were three children born to W. Shakspeare; Susan, his favourite daughter and twins, Judith and Hamnet*). There are several facts which seem to point to the conclusion that his married life was not a satisfactory one. When he left Stratford for London, where he spent a number of years, his family was left behind, but he fre*) The boy died young; Judith married Thomas Quiny, a vintner (wine-seller in Stratford) and had three boys (Shakspeare, Richard and Thomas) who died young. Susan (who married Dr. John Hall) had one daughter Elizabeth, who died childless, after having been married twice (first to Mr. Thomas Nash who died in April 1647, and then to Sir John Barnard of Abington, Northamptonshire, where she died in 1670). Mann, Sketch.

2

18

Elizabethan Drama.

quently returned to Stratford, paying short visits and arranging his affairs in that place. The reason for his removal from his native town is stated differently; one story current is that he had been led into deer-stealing by some riotous companions and that, in order to avoid being prosecuted by Sir Thomas Lucy of Charlecote, whose property he had invaded, he secretly left his native town for London, where he arrived in deep poverty and embraced the occupation of a player. Most likely Shakspeare had, from his youth, been an admirer of plays and actors. Various companies had visited Stratford at different times, and had performed there for. the amusement of its inhabitants. The greatest tragic actor of the day, Richard Burbage, was a Warwickshire man, and Thomas Greene a distinguished member of the Globe, then the first theatre in London, was a native of Stratford, and most likely a kinsman of Shakspeare's; one or the other of them may have induced him to repair to London and try his fortune there. He actually joined the company of the Globe in 1586, first as an actor, but soon he became an arranger of old plays and subsequently a writer of original ones. Three years after his arrival in London, we find him enrolled among the shareholders of the Globe. His connection with the theatre continued from 1586 to his retirement in 1611, a period of 25 years. It is between these dates that most of the thirty-seven dramas which compose his works were written*). During his stay in London, Shakspeare's worldly prosperity seems to have gone on steadily increasing, and he appears to have been very wise and prudent in the management of his affairs. When he became known through his plays, his society was courted by men of rank, one of whom, Lord Southampton, is said to have presented him *) The Globe was on Bankside in Southwark, for the convenience of access by water, but mainly to place it out of the jurisdiction of the Corporation of London, which at that time was deeply tinged with Puritanical doctrines. The same company had the privilege of having another playhouse, Blackfriars, within the precincts of London, which was roofed in and served as a winter playhouse.

Shakspeare.

19

with a thousand guineas as a mark of his admiration. Whether this be true or not, Shakspeare saw himself enabled to gratify a Jong cherished wish. He purchased in his native town New Place, a handsome landed estate, and in 1613 he retired to Stratford, still visiting London at times and writing for the stage. In 1616 he died prematurely at the age of 52. He is said to have increased a previous indisposition by a merry meeting with two brother poets, Ben Jonson and Michael Drayton. He was interred in Stratford-on-Avon, but there is a monument erected to him in Poets' Corner, Westminster Abbey. The works written by Shakspeare consist of two narrative poems or epics on classical subjects; The Rape of Lucrece and Venus and Adonis; of a book of sonnets, 154 in all, and of 37 dramas. His two epics are most likely youthful productions; his sonnets contain fine passages but are not easily understood. Shakspeare's entire career of authorship extends over twenty years and upwards, from 1588 to 1612. The division of the century roughly marks a division in the literary career of Shakspeare. About 1601, his genius began to seek new ways. Whatever the cause may have been, whether it was connected with Essex' fall, or due to some great personal grief, the histories and joyous comedies then ceased to be created, and a series of heart-searching tragedies was commenced. Each of the decades which together make up the twenty years of Shakspeare's authorship, is itself clearly divisible into two shorter periods, making four in all. First Period — from about 1588 to 1596; years of dramatic apprenticeship. (This period has been called: "In the workshop.") Second Period (1596—1602); the period of the English historical plays, and the mirthful and joyous comedies. (This period has been designated: "In the world".) Third Period (1602 — 1608); the period of grave or bitter comedies, and of the great tragedies. (To this period the name: "Out of the depths" has been applied.) Last period (1608—1612 or 1613) the period of ro-

20

Elizabethan Drama.

mantic plays, which are at once grave and glad, serene and beautiful. (This last period has been styled: "On the heights".) If we call Titus Andronicus (1588—90) and the First Part of Henry VI. (1590—91) Pre-Shakspearian plays, because he most likely only revised them, the following plays have been assigned to the first period. First Period (1588—96). Early Comedies. Love's Labour's Lost (1590) which is full of a young man's thought, wit and satire, a comedy of oddities. The Comedy of Errors (1591) a farcical play; the subject is the mistakes of identity which arise from the likeness of twin-born children. Two Gentlemen of Verona (1592—93) may be called a play of love and friendship, with their mutual relations. A Midsummer Night's Dream (1593—94) in which three different elements: the classic legend, the mediaeval fairy-land and the clownish life of the English mechanic of Shakspeare's time are mingled in fantastic beauty. Early Histories. The Second and Third Parts of Henry VI. (1591—92). The character of Richard, Duke of Gloucester in these plays was recognized by Shakspeare as so well adapted to dramatic purposes that he wrote Richard III. (1593); the play may be said to be the exhibition of the one central character of Richard I I I ; all subordinate characters are created that he may wreak his will upon them. Middle Histories. Richard II. (1594). The interest of the play centres in two connected things — the personal contrast between Richard II. and Henry IV., the falling and the rising kings; the misgovernment of the one inviting and almost justifying the usurpation of the other. King John (1595). The unprincipled character of the king, the excessive grief of Lady Constance for her son, and the sweetness of the young prince constitute the chief interest of the play.

Shakspeare.

21

Early Tragedy. Romeo and Juliet (1591 or 1596—97) is, in its beauty, its passion and its defects, characteristically a young man's tragedy. Venus and Adonis, and the Rape of Lucrece, two epic poems, belong to this period, though to two different parts of it. Second Period (1596—1602).] Middle Comedies. The Merchant of Venice (1596) in which Shakspeare .had reached entire mastery over his art by combining the tragic and the comic element. The interest of the drama centres in the development of the characters of Portia and Shylock, Bassanio and Antonio. Two plays of The Taming of the Shrew. (1597?) rough and The Merry Wives of Windsor (1598?) boisterous mirth. Three comedies romantic and refined; Much Ado about Nothing, (1598) there is a touch of As You Like It. (1599) sadness in "As You Twelfth Night. (1600—1601) Like It", in the melancholy of Jaques. Later Histories. The two parts of Henry IV. (1597—98) which, with "the Merry Wives of Windsor, may be called the comedies of Falstaff. Henry V. (1599) a splendid dramatic song immortalizing Shakspeare's favourite king. Third Period (1602—1608). This period contains Shakspeare's deepest and most heart-searching plays. Later Comedies. All's Well that Ends Well (1601—1602) Three serious, Measure for Measure (1603) contains dark, almost tragi-comeIsabella, one of Shakspeare's highest dies, in which conceptions of the female character an evil world Troilus and Cressida (1605?) is pictured.

22

Elizabethan Drama.

Tragedies. In Julius Ccesar (1601) and Hamlet (1602), we see the failure in practical affairsof two men, Brutus and Hamlet, who are called to the performance of great actions, hut who are disqualified, the former for acting wisely, the latter for acting energetically. The bonds of life are broken; in Othello (1604), the bonds which unite husband and wife; King Lear (1605), the bonds between parent and child; Macbeth (1606), the bonds of kinship, and of the loyalty of the subject. In Antony and Cleopatra (1607), Antony through selfindulgencc, and Coriolanus (1608), through passionate haughtiness, dissolve the bonds which unite them to their country. Timon of Athens (1607—1608) the man-hater, severs himself from humanity itself. Fourth Period. The transition from the dark and gloomy tragedies to the serenity of Shakspeare's last plays is most remarkable. From the plays concerned with the violent breaking of bonds, we suddenly pass to a group of plays which are all concerned with the knitting together of human bonds, the reunion of parted kindred, the forgiveness of enemies, the reconciliation of husband and wife, of child with father, of friend to friend. In Pericles (1608), which may not be altogether by Shakspeare, Pericles recovers his lost wife and child. Cymbeline (1609), in which the generous Imogen forgives the suspicions of her husband. In The Tempest (1610), Prospero forgives the offences of his ambitious brother, and in Winter's Tale (1610—11), the jealous husband is reunited to his innocent wife and child, whom he had believed dead. Henry VIII. (1613) belongs to this period and is said, not to be by Shakspeare alone.

Shakspeare.

23

That Shakspeare was the greatest dramatist of his and all other ages has long been universally acknowledged. A well-known Shakspeare critic has justly said of him, "that he possesses a power of depicting the characters of men in all their various shades, such as no writer ever possessed; that his works abound with such strokes of wisdom, tenderness, pathos, fancy and humour as must still be pronounced unrivalled. He had a mind reflecting ages past and present, all the people that ever lived are there. There was no "respect of persons" with him. His genius shone equally on the evil and on the good, on the wise and the foolish, the monarch and the beggar. All corners of the earth, kings, queens and states, maids, matrons, nay the secrets of the grave, are hardly hid from his searching glance. He was like the genius of humanity, changing places with all of us at pleasure, and playing with our purposes as with his own. He turned the globe round for his amusement, and surveyed the generations of men and the individuals as they passed with their different concerns, passions, follies, vices, virtues, actions and motives —• as well those they knew, as those they did not know or acknowledge to themselves. The dreams of childhood, the ravings of despair, were the toys of his fancy. The world of spirits lay open to him as well; airy beings waited at his call, and came at his bidding." The plots of Shakspeare's dramas were nearly all borrowed, some from novels and romances, others from legendary tales, and some from older plays. The plots of his comedies are mostly of Italian origin; some may be traced to the Oesta Romanorum. In his Roman subjects, he followed Sir Thomas North's translation of Plutarch's Lives. His English historical plays are chiefly taken from Holinshed's Chronicle; they begin with the reign of King John, and end with that of Henry VIII. Of these ten chronicle plays which Shakspeare composed from the annals of his country, eight are devoted to one great period, and that period is thus illustrated with extraordinary completeness. It is the time between the reigns of Richard II. and Eichard III. comprehending the intermediate reigns of Henry IV., Henry V., Henry VI. and the fourth and fifth

24

Elizabethan Drama.

Edwards. The subject of this era is the great civil conflict between the two branches of the Plantagenet family; the Houses of Lancaster and York. These eight plays constitute in truth one splendid drama, and the subject of it may be described as the decline and fall of the Plantagenet dynasty. The two historical plays which stand detached from this series : King John and Henry VIII. may be brought into relation with it by considering King John as a kind of prologue to the series, in as much as it represents an ealier period with all the varied elements of the early mediaeval times, and, on the other hand, by regarding Henry VIII. as an epilogue representing the beginning of the new political and social condition of England in modern times. A r g u m e n t of King John. King John (1199—1216), after the decease of his brother Richard, Cœur de Lion, who died childless, took prossesion of the throne to the prejudice of his nephew, Prince Arthur Plantagenet, son of an elder brother, Geoffrey. Prince Arthur, with his mother, the Lady Constance, had taken refuge with Philip II., king of France (1180—1223), who had promised to assist Arthur in recovering England ; but no sooner did John invade France with an army, than the fickle Philip broke his word to Arthur by entering into a league with King John, who carried Arthur captive to England, where he had him put to death. The excessive grief of Constance for her son, the sweetness of the young prince, the unprincipled character of King John, finely contrasted by the manly straightforwardness of his faithful nephew and follower, Philip Faulconbridge and the crafty Legate, Cardinal Pandulph, constitute the chief interest of the play. A r g u m e n t of Richard II. In Richard II. (1377—99), the drama is confined to the last year out of the twenty-two during which Richard occupied the throne. In order therefore to understand the play, we must take a short retrospective view of the whole of his reign. When Edward III. died, his grandson, then a boy of eleven years, succeeded him. He had three paternal

Shakspeare.

25

uncles, the Dukes of Lancaster, Y o r k and Gloucester, whose interference with government matters caused Richard much uneasiness. T h e lower class of the people were in a state of revolt which broke out into what was called Wat T y l e r ' s rebellion. The young k i n g showed himself fearless and quenched the insurrection. But this was the only instance of heroism the k i n g ever manifested. He g a v e himself up to unworthy favourites and to a career of prodigality and despotic pride. The discontented nobility confederated against the k i n g with the Duke of Gloucester as their leader. The k i n g had not courage enough to meet his foes openly, the Duke of Gloucester was secretly hurried to Calais and there died suddenly. It is at this point that the drama of Richard II. is brought before us. T h e play opens with a quarrel between the king's own cousin Henry Bolingbroke, son to John of Gaunt, "time-honoured Lancaster", and Thomas Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk, who accuse each other of high treason before the king. Their quarrel is to be decided b y single combat at Coventry (Warwick). When every thing is ready for the combat, Richard prevents it (by throwing down his warder). He banishes Norfolk for life, his cousin Bolingbroke (of whose popularity he is jealous) for six years. When this quarrel is settled, and Bolingbroke out of the way, Richard goes on headlong in his old career. The pomp of his court having swallowed up his resources, he extorts money b y unlawful means. In the meantime John of Gaunt had died, not without having warned the king from his deathbed that his misrule would lead him to perdition. No sooner is he dead than the king seizes upon his estates. This act of robbery brings b a c k Henry Bolingbroke from his exile to claim his patrimony. He lands at Ravenspur in Yorkshire, whilst Richard had gone to Ireland to quell a rebellion there. The discontented nobles flock to Henry, whose army is soon large enough to encounter, fight and defeat the king. Richard's misfortune is the turning-point in his character; morally, the k i n g is to be sunk no lower, but now, with great truth, and the large charity of a great poet's heart, Shakspeare raises him up again, not indeed to the

26

Elizabethan Drama.

loftiness of a hero, but to our sympathy and pity. His energy had long ago been squandered and he needs must yield to his fate; but the hardness of his heart is softened, his dead conscience brought to life, and all the better elements in his character called up by his sad but just chastisement, From the field of battle he is hurried to Westminster Hall, there to resign his throne to his cousin Henry Bolingbroke; and in the deposition scene, in which each word the king utters hides a tear, we see the misery of the heart of a fallen king, who has brought hard but just punishment upon himself, and who is laid lower than the ground. From Westminster, Richard is carried away to Pontefract Castle, Yorkshire, to his untimely and violent death. A r g u m e n t of Henry

IV.

(1399—1413) (in two parts).

With that remarkable significancy which Shakspeare gives to the opening of his plays, he indicates, in the very first lines, the character of the reign, when he introduces King Henry IV. saying: "So shaken as we are, so wan with care, Find we a time for frighted peace to pant?" When Bolingbroke had taken his seat on the throne as King Henry IV., he found it neither a quiet nor an easy one. His nobles, who had assisted him in dethroning Richard, kept fresh in their memories that it was with their help the king had ascended the throne. More powerful than any of these proud noblemen was the family of the Percys, the Earls of Northumberland. Young H e n r y Percy, or Hotspur as he is generally called, had acquired in his border warfare against the Scots, an indomitable bravery and, at the same time, great confidence in his own personal prowess. After having defeated the great Douglas, Hotspur refused to deliver to the k i n g the prisoners taken in the fight. When Henry showed his displeasure at this r the Percys entered into a league with Glendower, the selfstyled Prince of Wales, and with Edmund Mortimer, E a r l of March, who being descended from Lionel, Duke of Clarence, second son of Edward III., had a better claim to the throne than the king himself.

Shakspeare.

27

The rebellion ended with the overthrow of the rebels. Hotspur, the brave, the fiery, the proud, whom we cannot choose but love and admire, was slain at the battle of Shrewsbury in 1403. Henry was allowed once more to feel secure on his throne, at least to outward appearance; for in his fine soliloquy on sleep, he bewails that "sleep, gentle sleep, nature's soft nurse" has deserted his kingly couch to court the "poorest of his many thousand subjects", thus revealing by his words that his nights were as uneasy as his days. "The two parts of Henry IV. vary largely from the rest of the Chronicle plays inasmuch as they contain a, large proportion of the comic element of life. As the scenes change, we behold the interior of the palace, with all the business, anxieties and perplexities of the realm; or the castles of the nobles, where the dark game of conspiracy or the bolder work of rebellion is preparing, and then we turn to see the frolic and revelry of a London tavern, with the matchless wit of one of Shakspeare's most remarkable creations sparkling through the profligacy of the place. We are now at Windsor with the king, or at Bangor with the insurgent nobles, and then we are a t the Boar's Head Tavern with Falstaff and his gay companions. We see Henry IV. in his palace growing wan and careworn with the troubles of his government, becoming an old man in mid-life; and then we see Falstaff fat, and doubtless growing fatter as he "takes his ease at his inn" — an old man, but with a boyish flow of frolic and spirits; indulging his inexhaustible wit by making merriment for himself and the heir apparent." "The link of association between the serious and the comic parts of these plays is to be found in the character of him, who is the Prince Henry of the Palace, and the Prince Hal of his boon companions in the tavern; — for we meet him in both places, more at home, however, in the places of his amusement than in the place of his r a n k . " Prince Henry, however, is not a depraved man, and Shakspeare brings before us, from the very outset, the thoughtful element in his character, which, by his seemingly loose behaviour, might be overshadowed and dark-

28

Elizabethan Drama.

ened awhile, like the sun by clouds and vapours, but which by aid of his own moral strength will be sure to dispel those mists and vapours, bursting forth like a sun in his natural beauty and power — a wonder to the astonished world. A r g u m e n t of Henry

V.

Of the many kings whom Shakspeare has placed in imperishable individuality before us, Henry Y . was manifestly the favourite of the poet's heart, and in the multitude of the characters of all kinds which he has portrayed or created, probably no subject was more congenial to him. than the whole career of Henry V. from his first introduction as Prince of Wales. As before mentioned, from the very beginning, Shakspeare pointed out the undercurrent of real deep feeling in the Prince's heart. When the rebellion of the Percys called Prince Henry into action, he, for the first time, showed himself a hero and a prince; for to him the victory of the battle of Shrewsbury was due. At his father's death being left king of England, he severed himself with one manly effort from his old companions, giving up his life and energies to the duties of his high rank. The great work of his reign was his wars with France. He revived the old claim put forth by Edward III., to the throne of France on account of his being descended through his mother (Isabella) from Philip IV. of France (1285—1314). France was at the time plunged into great disorders through the lunacy of its monarch, Charles VI. (1380—1422). The opportunity seeming favourable, Henry V. declared war, and carried his army into France. The English fought and won the battle of Agincourt in 1415, and this battle is the subject of the drama. Shakspeare shows the popular character of Henry, who is the soul and idol of his army, and who, sharing every hardship and danger with his soldiers, animates them by his kind words full of wisdom. The address to his noblemen on the eve of the battle of Agincourt is one of the many outbursts of his generous, brave heart. Intending this drama as a kind of triumphal song,

2»

Shakspeare.

Shakspeare has carried it, not as usual to the monarch'» death, but to his marriage to Katherine of France, daughter of Charles VI. A r g u m e n t of Henry

VI.

(1422—1461).

The three parts of Henry VI. are so manifestly inferior to the rest of the chronicle plays, that Shakspeare's authorship of them has been questioned. Henry VI., a mere infant at the time of his father's death, was crowned king of France in Paris, and king of England in London, and died the most wretched of beings in the Tower. The subject of the three dramas may be divided intotwo parts. First: the reverses of the English in France during the minority of Henry VI., and their final expulsion from French soil through the instrumentality of the heroic maiden, Joan of Arc; and second: the outbreak of the Warsof the Roses in England (1455—1485) which ended in the final overthrow of the House of Lancaster, and the death of Henry VI. and his young son Edward. "The character of Henry VI. in whose gentle heart patience was so engrafted that he never asked vengeance or punishment for the many injuries committed against him, always accepting them as punishment for his own or his forefathers' sins, is well sustained; then we have Warwick, the king-maker, and Margaret the unwomanly queen, who, perhaps, may have been forced into her masculine demeanour by her husband's weakness." A r g u m e n t of Richard

III.

(1483—85).

One of the worst of the many evil consequences of a Civil War is, that it hardens the hearts and minds of men and makes them lose the horror of scenes of violence and bloodshed. There had sprung up in the family of York one man who was much worse than the times he lived in r though these were bad enough, and this man was Richard III., commonly called the Crook-backed. He was brother to Edward IV., also a wicked man, who, though valiant in war r was cruel in peace and given to degrading pleasures. Shakspeare's Richard III. founded on historical and tradi-

30

Elizabethan Drama.

tional report, is one of the masterpieces of his inventive genius, all cut in one piece; the more is the pity that his subject should have been of such bad stuff. With the usual felicity of the opening of Shakspeare's dramas, Richard III., then only Duke of Gloucester, is introduced soliloquizing. He feels himself, by reason of his deformity, kept aloof from the rest of mankind and resolves to take his revenge by using his mental capacity as an instrument to cut his way to the throne through violence and bloodshed. It was owing to his insinuations that Edward IV. caused their brother, the Duke of Clarence, to be killed, and when, soon after, Edward IV. died, Kichard did not hesitate to murder his young nephews and proclaim himself king of England. His short reign was a succession of cruelties; he committed misdeeds out ot love of wickedness, but died the death of a hero, falling in the battle of Bosworth Field. A r g u m e n t of Henry

VIII.

(1509—1547).

In Henry VIII th's time, a great change had come over the country. The monarchy was no longer swayed by the powerful feudal nobles, but by a tyrannical king. The king himself was controlled by the policy of Cardinal Wolsey, a man of low birth, who had risen to be more powerful than even Warwick, the king-maker, had been in his proudest days. It has been said that Henry VIII. is a sort of historical masque, or show-play. Though there may be some truth in that, yet the play is eminently tragic. Its tragic scenes are chiefly made up of a succession of changes from grandeur to degradation. First, the Duke of Buckingham, a prince of the royal blood, who could not endure to bow to the tyrannical pride of Cardinal Wolsey, fell a victim to the cardinal's resentment. The next in the series is Catherine of Arragon, Queen of England, and daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella of Castile, for upwards of twenty years Henry's faithful consort, and one of Shakspeare's most felicitously drawn female characters. Her just pride in refusing to make room for Anne Boleyn, her bitter anguish and sorrow, her loneliness in a foreign land, and the womanly fortitude with which

Shakspeare.

31

she encounters her fate, which nevertheless breaks her heart and hastens her to her grave, move the reader's heart to condole with her and her sorrow. The next of these sublime reverses is the downfall of Wolsey. Queen Catherine had warned him: "Take heed, for heaven's sake, take heed, lest at once "The burden of my sorrow fall upon ye" — and so it was when he opposed the king's marriage with Anne Boleyn. In the days of his power, Wolsey had been odious in his pride, but, after his fall, he became purified by the fire of affliction. His misfortunes had shown him the vanity and hollowness of success, and he had never felt so truly happy as when he came to hate the vainglory and pomp of this world. With those pathetic words: "O Cromwell, Cromwell, "Had I but served my God with half the zeal "I serv'd my king, he would not in mine age "Have left me naked to mine enemies" — he vanishes from our sympathizing eyes to find an early grave in Leicester Abbey (1530). The drama ends with the coronation of Anne Boleyn, and the baptism of her daughter, Elizabeth*). The age of Elizabeth and James I. produced a concourse of dramatic authors, the like of which is seen nowhere else in literary history. In the general style of their writing, the dramatists of this period bear a strong family resemblance to Shakspeare, and some of his peculiar merits are found scattered among his fellow-dramatists. Thus, pathos hardly less touching than that of Shakspeare may be found in the dramas of Ford, animation and dignity in the dialogues of Beaumont and Fletcher, deep tragic emotion in the sombre scenes of Webster, moral elevation in the graceful plays of Massinger, but in Shakspeare alone, we find the most opposite qualities of the poet, the observer and the philosopher, united. *) For the plots of Shakspeare's other dramas read Lamb's Tales from Shakspeare ; for a short but excellent study on the whole ol' Shakspeare's works see the Shakspeare primer by Mr. Edward Dowden LLD. (London. Macmillan & Co.) from which the dates and arrangements of Shakspeare's dramas are adopted.

32

Ben Jonson.

The second place among the dramatic authors of this period is given to Shakspeare's friend, the learned Ben Jonson (1573—1637). His career like that of most of his brother poets of the period was full of strange vicissitudes. Ben Jonson was born in Westminster. His father was a clergyman in narrow circumstances; his mother, being left a widow, married a bricklayer, who took young Ben from school, and put him to his own employment. The boy escaped, enlisted as a soldier, served for some time in the Low Countries, and is said to have distinguished himself by his courage. At the age of twenty, however, we find him in London, an actor and a married man. It is hardly possible that he should have passed some time at the University of Cambridge, as is often related, but wherever he may have got his learning, he had it, and was fond of displaying it. His first piece, Every Man in his Humour, failed in the first representation. It is reported that Shakspeare gave him advice, as to how he should alter and improve the play. On being brought out a second time at the Globe theatre, the drama met with triumphant success. From that time Ben Jonson's literary reputation was established, and in quick succession he produced many dramas, though of unequal merit. His irascible disposition led him into frequent quarrels and disputes with his brother poets and twice into danger of life and limb. The close of his life was embittered by poverty and bodily suffering, which he is said to have caused by his too great fondness for sack. His love of conviviality he shared with his brother poets and other prominent men of the time. Sir Walter Raleigh (1552—1618) founded a club, known to all posterity as the Mermaid Club in Friday Street, at which Shakspeare, Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher, Seidell, Cotton, Carew, Martin, Donne, and other poets exercised themselves with "wit-combats" more bright and genial than their wine. Other favourite haunts of these brilliant men were the Old Devil Tavern (Temple Bar) and the Falcon Tavern (Bankside, Southwark). Jonson's comedies and tragedies are seventeen in

33

Elizabethan Drama.

number, and his masques and other court entertainments fifty-two. Of his comedies the best are: Every Man in his Humour, Volpone or the Fox, Ihe Silent Woman, The Alchemist. The general effect of Jonson's plays, though satisfactory to the reason, is hard and defective to the taste. His mind was singularly deficient in what is called humanity. He loved to dwell rather upon the eccentricities and monstrosities of human nature, than upon those universal features with which all can sympathize. Though he has too often devoted his great powers to the delineation of those oddities and absurdities which were then called humours, yet some of his characters are truly comic: thus the admirable type of a cowardly braggart in Bobadil (Every Man in his Humour) will always preserve its merit. From the wealth of illustration in his plays, drawn from men as well as from books, his comedies form a study eminently substantial. The want of tenderness and delicacy in Jonson will be especially perceived in the harsh and unamiable characters which he has given to his female personages. It may be said that there is hardly one female character in all his dramas which is represented in a graceful or attractive light, while a great many of them are absolutely repulsive from their coarseness and their vices. In the masques and court entertainments, Jonson appears quite another man. Every thing that the richest and most delicate invention could supply, aided by extensive, elegant and recondite reading, is lavished upon these courtly compliments. The same gracefulness stamps the lyrical poems with which Jonson has interspersed his plays. Ben Jonson was buried in Westminster Abbey. On his tombstone in Poets' Corner are these words; — u O rare Ben Jonson." "Masques were dramatic representations made for a festive occasion with a reference to the person and the occasion. Their personages were allegorical. They admitted of dialogue, music, singing and dancing, combined by the use of some ingenious fable into a whole. The}- were made and performed for the court and the houses of the nobles, and the scenery was as gorgeous and varied as the scenery of the playhouse proper was poor and unchanging" — Inigo Jones made the scenery for Jonson's plays, but in the end they quarrelled. Mann, Sketch.

3

34

Beaumont. Fletcher, etc.

Francis Beaumont (1586—1616).

John Fletcher

(1576—1625). In Beaumont and Fletcher, we have two young men of genius and good birth, living together ten years, and writing in union a series of thirty-eight plays, the joint production of the two, besides the fourteen which are said to have been written by Fletcher alone. Such joint authorship was not uncommon in that age, though known only in the history of the drama. The genius of Beaumont is said to have been more correct and more strongly inclined to tragedy, while Fletcher's was rather distinguished b y gaiety and comic humour. Philaster, The Maid's Tragedy, The Two Noble Kinsmen, in which Shakspeare is said to have assisted them, are among their best tragedies. The Knight of the Burning Pestle is one of their richest and most popular comedies. There is variety, luxuriance and romantic elevation in their tragedies, gay, animated spirit pervades their comedies, but unfortunately much that is objectionable taints both. The Faithful Shepherdess, written by Fletcher alone, and one of his best comedies, (an imitation in part of the Pastor Fido of Guarini) suggested to Milton the plan of his Comus. Philip Massinger (1584—1640). While Beaumont and Fletcher were in the height of their fame, another dramatist appeared, even superior to them in tragedy. Of the personal history of Philip Massinger little is known. His education was good and even learned, but his life appears to have been an uninterrupted succession of struggle, disappointment and distress, and was cut off by a fatal termination. He was found dead in his bed in his house at Bankside, Southwark. In the parish register the only note is: "Philip Massinger, a stranger". We possess titles of thirty-seven plays written b y Massinger, of which only eighteen are now extant. His best tragedies are: The Fatal Dowry, The Unnatural Combat, The Duke of Milan. A New Way to Pay Old Debts has kept possession of the stage. The qualities which distinguish this noble writer are an extraordinary dignity and elevation of moral sentiment, a singular power of delineating the sorrows of pure and lofty minds exposed

Elizabethan Drama.

35

to unmerited suffering, cast down but not humiliated by misfortune: — the reflection of his own unhappy fate. •Genuine humour or sprightliness he had none. John Ford (1586—1639). John Ford may be called the great painter of unhappy love. His finest tragedies are: The Broken Heart, Chaste and Noble, The Lady's Trial. Ford, like the other great dramatists of that era of giants, never shrank from dealing with the darkest, the most mysterious enigmas of our moral nature. John Webster (1582—1652?). Not the least powerful genius among the Shakspearian dramatists of the second order is John Webster, whose tragedies abound in terror and sorrow. His literary physiognomy bears a strong resemblance to the dark, bitter and woful expression which pervades the portraits of Dante (1265-—1321). The subjects of most of his dramas are borrowed from the black annals of Italy in the Middle Ages. The Duchess of Malfi and The White Devil are among his best dramas. George Chapman, Thomas Dekker, Thomas Middleton, John Marston are all remarkable for their fertility and luxuriance. George Chapman (1557—1634) may he remembered as the translator of Homer, and he has embodied much of his classical lore in his dramas. The name of Middleton has been kept alive on a conjecture that his play, The Witch, furnished Shakspeare with the witchcraft scenery in Macbeth. Nor ought the works of Taylor, Tourneur, Rowley, Broome and Thomas Heywood to be overlooked. Tourneur has some resemblance to the gloomy genius of Webster, while Broome, who was originally Ben Jonson's domestic servant, attained considerable success upon the stage and is remarkable for the immense number of pieces he wrote alone or with others. Thomas Heywood (not to be confounded with his namesake John Heywood, one of the earliest dramatic writers and author of the Interlude The four Ps) wrote A Woman Killed with Kindness, one of the most touching pieces of the period. The dramatic era of Eizabeth, James I. and Charles I. now draws to a close. On the 22 nd of August 1642, the

36

Prose Writers of

Civil W a r broke out, and in September of the same y e a r , the Puritans being in the ascendency, the Long Parliament issued an ordinance "suppressing public stage-plays throughout the kingdom during these calamitous times"; and so the theatres were closed until they were revived after the Restoration with totally different tendencies, moral as well as literary. T h e P r o s e W r i t e r s of t h e

Period.

A few words must be bestowed on the writers of historical chronicles. Those of Raphael Holinshed — died in 1580 — have obtained an additional fame f o r having furnished to Shakspeare the materials for his legendary as well as historical dramas. John S t o w and W i l l i a m Harrison were his coadjutors. John Lyly, born about 1554, was the author of the once highly fashionable book, Euphues and his England. Though not without some genius and elegance, Lyly tainted the speech of the court, the aristocracy, and even to a considerable degree literature itself, with a peculiar kind of affected and high-flown language, which is known in literature b y the name of Euphuism. Sir Walter Scott has introduced a caricature of this style in the character of Sir Piercie Shafton in the Monastery. Sir Philip Sidney (1554—1586) united in his person almost all the qualities that give splendour to a character — nobility of birth, beauty of person, bravery, generosity, learning and courtesy. He is said to have been one of the candidates for the crown of Poland, then vacant, but Elizabeth opposed the project, saying: "She could not brook to lose the jewel of her court." Sidney joined the army, under the great Earl of Leicester, the poet's uncle, which was sent over to the Netherlands, to assist the Dutch in their struggles against the oppression of the Spaniards. At the early age of thirtytwo, he received a mortal wound in a skirmish near Zutphen in Guelderland, when his generous character was manifested by an incident, which will never be forgotten in the history of humanity. Being overcome with thirst

the Elizabethan Period.

37

from excessive bleeding, he called for water, which was at last procured. At the moment he was lifting it to his mouth a poor soldier, desperately wounded, was carried past, and fixed his eyes eagerly upon the cup. Sidney, observing this, instantly delivered the water to him, saying: "Thy necessity is yet greater than mine." Sidney's contributions to the literature of his time -consist of a small collection of sonnets, written in elegant language; of a pastoral romance, entitled Arcadia, written in language slightly tinged with Euphuism, and a short critical work, written in a different style, A Defence of Poetry, the first piece of intellectual literary criticism in the language. Sir Walter Raleigh (1552—1618) born of an honourable family in Devonshire, was distinguished as a soldier, a sailor, a courtier, an adventurous colonizer of barbarous countries, a poet and an historian. Early in life Raleigh spent many years in foreign wars, and in 1580, was serviceable to Queen Elizabeth in quelling a rebellion in Ireland. He conducted several nautical expeditions of importance, some of which were designed for the colonization of Virginia, and upon which he spent 40,000 pounds. When, in 1588, the safety of England was threatened by the Invincible Armada, Raleigh assisted in obtaining a signal victory over the Spaniards. On the accession of James I., his troubles began. With apparent injustice, he was charged with having joined a plot to set the king's cousin, Lady Arabella Stuart, on the throne, and committed to the Tower, where he remained for nearly thirteen years. Part of this time he spent in the composition of his principal work, entitled The History of the World, brought down to the end of the second Macedonian War, B, C. 170. The portions which refer to the history of Rome and Greece are much admired; a deep tinge of melancholy pervades the pages of the book. After his long imprisonment, he was allowed by the king to proceed upon an expedition to South America, in which he failed. On his return to England, he was executed upon his former sentence. "This is a sharp medicine,

38

Bacon.

but a sound cure for all diseases," lie said, when he felt the axe that was to strike the mortal blow. Francis Bacon (1561—1626) the great philosopher, was the son of Sir Nicholas Bacon, an eminent statesman, Keeper of the Great Seal, and nephew of Lord Burleigh, Queen Elizabeth's prime minister. He was born in 1561, received a careful education, and is said, even as a boy, to have shown indications of that inquiring spirit which led him to investigate the laws of nature. At the age of sixteen he had finished his studies at Cambridge, where he had shown great dislike to the philosophy of Aristotle. He then travelled on the continent, but his father's unexpected death compelled him to return to England, and being a younger son, to enter on some profession. He soon became eminent as an advocate and found a warm protector in the Earl of Essex, Queen Elizabeth's unfortunate favourite, who presented him with a considerable estate, but whom Bacon deserted when accused of high treason. Bacon then attached himself to James' favourite, George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, and rose rapidly. He was made Lord Chancellor, created Baron Verulam, and, not long after, Viscount St. Albans. Bacon's taste for magnificence in houses, gardens, trains of domestics, was far above his means. To better his circumstances he married, when advanced in age, Alice Barnham, the daughter of a London Alderman, who brought him a considerable fortune but neither children nor happiness. In order to escape from his perpetual embarrassments, he accepted large bribes for the deplorable purpose of perverting justice. He was at last impeached, and hi» accusations inquired into before the House of Lords. He pleaded guilty to three-and-twenty charges, was deposed, expelled from court, fined £40,000, and imprisoned in the Tower. The king remitted every part of this sentence, but Bacon was a broken-hearted man, and for five years longer struggled with pecuniary difficulties. He died in 1626. Bacon wrote upon history, law, the advancement of learning and upon nearly all matters relating to the cultivation of the mind. His writings which extend to ten volumes, he ultimately combined into one great work:

Hooker.

39

The Instauration of the Sciences. He divides human learning into three great parts: philosophy, history and poetry, respectively referring them to reason, memory and imagination. He explains his method of employing the intellectual faculties for the acquiring of knowledge, as the ascertaining, in the first place, of facts and then reasoning upon them towards conclusions. This method is called the inductive, "a posteriori" method, in opposition to the longestablished deductive or "a priori" method, called "a priori", because in it the etablishment of a theory is "prior" to its application in practice. Bacon's aim in all his study was to improve the lot of man, and lessen his burden. His great work was planned at the age of 26, when he Was a law-student, and it was prosecuted under the pressure of many heavy duties. Bacon also published a volume of Essays, short papers on an immense variety of subjects, which are still universally studied; and in them appears, in a more appreciable manner, the wonderful union of depth and variety which characterizes Bacon. " N o author was so concise as he, and in his mode of writing, there is that remarkable quality which gives to Shakspeare such a strongly marked individuality: a combination of the intellectual and the imaginative, the closest reasoning expressed in the boldest metaphor." Bacon's life is an illustration of the melancholy truth that genius and profound knowledge are not always coupled with moral excellence, and most likely the consciousness of his shortcomings made him write down in his will: " M y name and memory I leave to foreign nations, and to mine own country after some time is passed over." Another great prose writer of the period, although in a different department, was Richard Hooker (1553—1600) the champion of the Anglican Church. This Church, which, at the Reformation, took up a middle position between the opposite extremes, represented by the Romish communion and the Calvinistic sect, had first been exposed to hostilities and persecution at the hands of the Papal party, and was hardly established as the official religion of the

40

Poets of the Civil War

state, when the Puritans began to attack her from a directly contrary point of view. For a long time this controversy, in which even Bacon, and particularly Thomas Nash took part, was chiefly carried on in pamphlets, until Richard Hooker in his great work, The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, undertook to investigate and define the fundamental principles upon which the Anglican Churchsystem is founded. But though the immediate object of this book is to vindicate the limited character of the Reformation of the Anglican Church, Hooker has dug deeper and built his theory upon the basis on which are founded all law, all obedience and all right, political as well as religious. The book contains close reasoning in a clear, vigorous and often musical style, and has become a standard work. A description of the life and of the simple childlike character of the learned man has been given to the world by Izaak Walton, himself a charming writer, and author of the Complete Angler. T h e P o e t s of the C i v i l W a r a n d the C o m m o n w e a l t h . The Metaphysical Poets. The great political events which agitated England during the middle of the 17 th century, — the Civil War, the Commonwealth, the Protectorate, — were not without influence on the numerous poets of the period. We have traced the decline of the drama of Elizabeth down to the date of the Civil War. All poetry suffered in the same way after the reign of James I.: it became fantastic and overwrought in thought. There was a class of writers who, on account of their peculiarities, have been called metaphysical poets, though perhaps fantastic might be a more satisfactory term. These poets appealed to the reason rather than to the imagination, and were distinguished by want of simplicity and by pedantic learning. They delighted in far-fetched images; yoking the most heterogeneous ideas together, and ransacking art and nature for illustrations; they preferred to astonish and amaze their readers rather than give them pleasure. Owing to these

40

Poets of the Civil War

state, when the Puritans began to attack her from a directly contrary point of view. For a long time this controversy, in which even Bacon, and particularly Thomas Nash took part, was chiefly carried on in pamphlets, until Richard Hooker in his great work, The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, undertook to investigate and define the fundamental principles upon which the Anglican Churchsystem is founded. But though the immediate object of this book is to vindicate the limited character of the Reformation of the Anglican Church, Hooker has dug deeper and built his theory upon the basis on which are founded all law, all obedience and all right, political as well as religious. The book contains close reasoning in a clear, vigorous and often musical style, and has become a standard work. A description of the life and of the simple childlike character of the learned man has been given to the world by Izaak Walton, himself a charming writer, and author of the Complete Angler. T h e P o e t s of the C i v i l W a r a n d the C o m m o n w e a l t h . The Metaphysical Poets. The great political events which agitated England during the middle of the 17 th century, — the Civil War, the Commonwealth, the Protectorate, — were not without influence on the numerous poets of the period. We have traced the decline of the drama of Elizabeth down to the date of the Civil War. All poetry suffered in the same way after the reign of James I.: it became fantastic and overwrought in thought. There was a class of writers who, on account of their peculiarities, have been called metaphysical poets, though perhaps fantastic might be a more satisfactory term. These poets appealed to the reason rather than to the imagination, and were distinguished by want of simplicity and by pedantic learning. They delighted in far-fetched images; yoking the most heterogeneous ideas together, and ransacking art and nature for illustrations; they preferred to astonish and amaze their readers rather than give them pleasure. Owing to these

and the Commonwealth.

41

peculiarities, they had much to do with generating the artificial manner of the classical writers of the reign of Queen Anne. The poets of the time of Elizabeth, however they might differ from each other, were filled with one spirit: the love of England and the Queen. This unity of spirit in poetry became less and less after the Queen's death. The strife in politics grew so intense that England ceased to be united and the poets, too, though not so strongly as other classes, were separated into sections, so that we have Puritan poets and Royalist singers. George Wither (1588—1667) is generally considered the best of the Puritan poets. He was a follower of Cromwell; he fought in his army, and had to undergo long persecution and imprisonment. Many of his pieces are truly poetical, but too often spoilt by the mannerism of his class and time; he goes far out of his way to find ingenious conceits and unexpected turns. The Shepherd's Hunting is among his best works. Of the Royalist poets we have a longer list of names: W i l l i a m Carew, Sir John Suckling, who composed the graceful Ballad, On a Wedding Day, Colonel Lovelace and Robert Herrick display in their lyrics, a special royalist and court character. Their poems are, for the most part, light, pleasant, short songs and epigrams on the passing interests of the day, on the charms of the court beauties, on a lock of hair, a dress, on all the fleeting forms of fleeting love. Here and there we find a pure or pathetic song, and there are few of them which time has selected that do not possess a gay or gentle grace. As the Civil War deepened, the special court poetry died, and the songs became songs of battle and marching, and devoted and violent loyalty. These have been lately collected under the title of the Songs of the Cavaliers. The most popular poet of the time, and unquestionably one of the leading characters in the literary and political history of England during the Civil War, was Edmund Waller (1605—1687) of an ancient and wealthy family in Buckinghamshire. In politics, he is chiefly remembered as

42

Sir William Davenant.

a brilliant wit and a time-serving politician, who changed sides unscrupulously. His versification is smooth and flowing, if not deep; his amatory poetry is gay, easy and brilliant. The world is indebted to him for some very happy turns and repartees, as in the passage where he laments the cruelty of his much-flattered lady-love, Saccharissa (Lady Dorothy Sidney), and boasts that his disappointment as a lover had given him immortality as a poet, making the following happy allusion to the fable of Apollo and Daphne: — " I caught at love and filled m y arm with b a y s . " And, again, when Charles II. complained to him that his panegyric on Cromwell surpassed the verses with which he had complimented him on his return from exile, his quick answer was: "Poets, Sire, succeed better in fiction than in truth." In his verses on Old Age and Death he has struck a deeper chord: " T h e seas are quiet when the winds give o'er; "So calm are we when passions are no more; " F o r then we know how vain it was to boast "Of fleeting things too certain to be lost. "Clouds of affection from our younger eyes "Conceal that emptiness which age descries. " T h e soul's dark cottage, battered and decayed, "Lets in new light through chinks that time has made, "Stronger by weakness, wiser men become, "As they draw near to their eternal home. "Leaving the old, both worlds at once they view, " T h a t stand upon the threshold of the new." Sir W i l l i a m Davenant (1605—1668) who, too, combined the author and politician, is perhaps chiefly interesting as being connected with the revival of the theatre after the eclipse it had suffered during the Puritan rule. He was himself a most prolific w r i t e r ; he composed tragedies for the newly opened theatres, and a long heroic romance, Gondibert, now scarcely ever read. Davenant was an ardent Royalist; on the fall of Charles I., he was confined in the Tower and in danger of

Milton.

43

his life, and is said to have been released by the interposition of Milton, after which he retired to France until the Restoration brought him back. John Milton (1608—1674). Above all the poets of the century, and in the whole range of poetry inferior only to Shakspeare, was John Milton. It has been the custom to speak of him as the poet of the Puritans, forming with George Wither and Andrew Marvell a small, but select band; but this distinction is unjust, for although his prose writing was wholly devoted to the cause of religious freedom and republicanism, as a poet he stands alone, and for sublimity, grandeur and imagination combined, he is second to no other poet, whether ancient or modern. John Milton was born (at the Spread Eagle) in Bread Street, London, Dec. 9 th, 1608. He was descended from an ancient Oxfordshire family of Eoman Catholic persuasion r which had lost their lands during the civil conflict of the Eoses. The poet's father was disinherited on forsaking the communion of his ancestors, and had recourse f o r support to the profession of a scrivener. Milton had the rare advantage of an education specially training him f o r the career of letters. His father, himself an accomplished scholar, had him first instructed at home under the care of Thomas Young, a Puritan minister ot great worth and learning, for whom the poet preserved great veneration, JTrom a child, Milton showed signs of his future greatness, and his zeal equalled his rare natural capacities. He wentto St. Paul's School, and, at the age of fifteen, entered Christ's College, Cambridge, already eminently skilled in the Latin tongue and otherwise an accomplished scholar, M i l t o n ' s F i r s t P e r i o d (1625—1642). His literary career may be said to begin with hisentrance into Cambridge, as during his residence at the University (where he was nicknamed "the lady" from his beauty, delicate taste and morality) he wrote a number of pieces in verse; among them a sonnet On Arriving at the Age of Twenty Three; A Song on a May Morning; a n d

44

Milton.

chief and foremost the Ode on the Nativity of Christ, beginning thus: "It was the winter wild, "While the heaven-born child "All meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies; "Nature in awe to him "Had dofPd her gaudy trim "With her great Master so to sympathize: "It was no season then for her "To wanton with the sun, her lusty paramour." Milton's father had acquired a considerable fortune, a n d purchased an estate at Horton, a Buckinghamshire village, near Windsor, and here, after leaving the University, the poet spent the greater part of the next five years of his life, giving full play to all the powers of his fine intellect, and finding relaxation in composition and music, -a passionate love for which he had inherited from his father. In this rural retirement Milton spent the happiest time of his life, and here he wrote the more graceful, fanciful and eloquent of his poems. Among these is the exquisite Masque of Comus, which was performed at Ludlow Castle, in the presence of the Earl of Bridgewater, the President of Wales. His daughter, Lady Alice Egerton, and his two sons had lost their way in Heywood Forest, and the lady was separated from her brothers for some time; out of this simple incident Milton created the most lovely pastoral drama of Comus. The characters are few, consisting of the lady, the two brothers, Comus, a wicked enchanter, and the attendant spirit, disguised as a shepherd. T h e general character of this play Milton undoubtedly borrowed from Fletcher's Faithful Shepherdess. The other productions of this period of retirement are Arcades; Lycidas, the elegy on his friend King, who was drowned on a voyage to Ireland; and the two descriptive master-pieces, L Allegro and 11 Penseroso. In the former the poet describes the impression made on a man of a cheerful temperament by the open country, its various amusements and occupations; in the latter almost the same objects are viewed by a serious, meditative and studious man. The j o y of the cheerful man is temperate, and the melancholy

45-

Milton.

of the thoughtful man without gloom, and the descriptions of the various and varying moods of both are exquisite. In 1638, the poet's mother having died, Milton set out on a European tour. He proceeded by Paris, which seems to have had few charms for him, to Italy where he was much attracted by the language and classical associations. He was everywhere admitted to the society of the most learned men, and is said to have had intercourse with Galileo (1564—1642), then a prisoner of the Inquisition. He was about to visit Sicily and Greece, when the news of the differences between the king and his Parliament, just then threatening an outbreak, induced him to return home, as he disdained "to be diverting himself in security abroad, while his countrymen were contending" for their rights." Second Period

(1642—1660).

On his return Milton began a new life; out of art he was carried into politics, out of poetry into prose: and this is the second period of his literary career. During twenty years, from 1640 to 1660, he supported the cause of freedom by his writings, and was a most eloquent but vehement, and at times, even furious writer ot pamphlets against Episcopacy and in favour of freedom of thought. The finest of his many prose works are his Areopagitica or Speech for the Liberty of Unlicensed Printing; the Defence of the People of England and On Education. In 1643 Milton was married to Mary Powell, daughter of a ruined gentleman of Royalist sympathies. The bride's father owed the elder Milton large sums of money, which he was unable to repay otherwise than by agreeing to a hastily-formed marriage between the children. The bride was soon disgusted with the austerity of her puritanical home, and, under pretence of a visit to her relations, left Milton and refused to return to the gloom of his house. Milton seriously contemplated a divorce from her, whom he no longer regarded as his w i f e ; this at last brought her back to a sense of her duty, and Milton not only forgave her fully, but afforded shelter and protection to her family after the triumph of the Republican party.

46

Milton.

Three daughters were born to them, but it is doubtful it their married life ever was a happy one. In 1649, Milton received the appointment of Latin Secretary to the Council of State, being undoubtedly the most elegant classic scholar in the nation. In 1652 his wife died, leaving him with a young family, his solitude being rendered more painful by the rapid advance of blindness. His eyes had been weak from his youth, lie had always overstrained them, but he proudly attributed his total blindness to having overtasked his eyes in the defence of truth and liberty. In this helpless state Milton soon formed another .alliance (1656). His second wife, Catherine, daughter of Captain Woodcock, an ardent Republican, he seems to have fondly loved, but, after a short union, she was taken from his side. T h i r d P e r i o d (1660—1674). With the Restoration begins the third period of the great poet's life. He was discharged from his office of Latin Secretary and retired into poverty, blindness and political persecution, which last, however, ended with a short imprisonment. It is said and readily believed that, on this occasion, Sir William Davenant paid a debt of gratitude by interposing in his favour and obtaining his release. From this period till his death he lived in close retirement (in Artillery Walk, near Bunhill Fields), busily occupied in the composition of his great Christian epics: Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained. Milton was unlucky in his daughters, whose education seems to have been sadly neglected, and, on the advice of his medical friend, he entered on his third marriage with Elizabeth Minshull, whom he often employed as amanuensis. This place, however, was for some time occupied by a young Quaker, Thomas Ellwood, whose ardent desire for learning Milton tried to satisfy, and who showed his gratitude by obtaining for his master a pleasant little cottage at Chalfont in Bucks, as a place of refuge from the plague which raged in London in 1665. It was on Ellwood S suggestion that Milton wrote Paradise Regained.

Milton.

47

The last of Milton's works was the tragedy of Samson Agonistes constructed according to the strictest rules of the Greek classic drama. Samson, in his blindness, is called on to make sport for the Philistines and overthrows them in the end. In the character of the hero, in his blindness, his sufferings, his resignation to the will of God, Milton has embodied bis own fate. In 1674 Milton died and was buried next his father, in St. Giles' Church, Cripplegate. There is a monument erected to his memory in Westminster Abbey. It has been customary to compare Milton with Dante. They were not unlike in their personal history. Both had been disappointed in their public life and private attachments. In Dante, this experience had produced bitterness; in Milton, the strength of his mind and the confidence of his religious faith overcame every calamity. Of the poet's two great blank-verse epics, Paradise Lost is the better. Its character is sublimity and loftiness. It is divided into twelve books and opens with the awaking of the rebel angels in Hell after their fall from Heaven. The consultation of their chiefs as to how they might carry on war with God, the ordaining of the plan of Salvation, Satan's voyage to the earth, the description of Eden and its gentle tenants and of their pure and happy lives fill the first four books. The next four books contain the archangel Raphael's story of the war in Heaven, the fall of Satan, and the creation of the world. The last four books describe the temptation and the fall of Man, the vision shown by Michael to Adam of the future, and of the redemption of Man by Christ, and the expulsion from Paradise. Eve's Complaint. "Must I thus leave thee, Paradise? thus leave "Thee native soil! These happy walks and shades, "Fit haunts of Gods? Where I had hoped to spend, "Quiet, though sad, the respite of that day, "That must be mortal to us both." The interest collects round the character of Satan at first, but he grows more and more mean as the poem goes on, and seems to fall a second time, losing all his original

48

Prose Writers of the Civil War

brightness after his temptation of Eve. Indeed this second degradation of Satan after he has not only sinned himself but made innocence sin, and beaten back in himself the last remains of good, is one of the finest motives in the poem. At last all thought and emotion centre round Adam and Eve, until the closing lines leave us with their lonely image on our minds: — "Some natural tears they dropt, but wiped them soon: "The world was all before them, where to choose "Their place of rest and Providence their guide. "They, hand in hand, with wandering step and slow "Through Eden took their solitary w a y . " T h e P r o s e W r i t e r s of the C i v i l W a r a n d t h e Commonwealth. During this period prose literature grew into greater excellence, and took up a greater variety of subjects. The painting of character was begun by Sir T. Overbury, a kind of writing which later took the form of biography, as in Thomas Fuller's Worthies of England. Theological writings of great excellence and literary merit were produced by witty, quaint, old Thomas Fuller (1608—1661) in his Church History of Britain and by the melodious Jeremy Taylor (1613—1667), (often called the Spenser of the Theologians) in his Holy Living and Holy Dying. Both these divines belonged to the party of the King. Puritanical theology is represented by Richard Baxter (1615—1691) in his Saints' Everlasting Rest. A chief place among the prose writers of this period belongs to humble John Bunyan (1628—1688) whose life and works, however, like those of Milton and Butler, extend into the period of the Restoration. He was born at Elstow, near Bedford. His father was a tinker, and the son in his youth, followed the same lowly calling, travelling for many years about the country in the usual gipsy-life. He has represented himself as being at this time sunk in profligacy and wickedness, but very likely he exaggerated his vices, the worst of which appear to have been a habit of swearing, a taste for ale-drinking, and the then usual pastimes of bell-ringing, playing, at hockey and tip-cat.

and the Commonwealth. — Bunyan.

49

After long and severe internal religious struggles, which ended in a deadly illness, Bunyan professed conversion, and joined the sect of the Baptists. He soon became a noted preacher. The country being convulsed by the Civil War, Bunyan, too, had entered the army and enlisted on the Royalist side. When he left the army in 1644 he married, himself very young, a poor but virtuous young woman. His wife, however, brought him two books The Plain Man's Pathway to Heaven and The Practice of Piety. During the Commonwealth Bunyan had not been disturbed in his preaching, but at the time of the Restoration the Government began to persecute with severity the Dissenting sects, and Bunyan, as a leading man among the Baptists, was convicted of holding conventicles, and imprisoned for upwards of twelve years in the jail of Bedford. During his long confinement he supported himself by making tagged laces, and gained the veneration of his companions by the saintliness of his deportment, and by the fervour of his exhortations. Though in prison he enjoyed the society of his family, and particularly of his darling little blind daughter Mary; and here he composed his immortal Pilgrim's Progress. On his liberation, he gained such a lead among the Baptists, that they popularly styled him "Bishop Bunyan". He went round the country, settling the quarrels, relieving the wants and confirming the faith of his brethren. He had just come from one of these journeys, — to reconcile a father and a son — when he caught the fever which brought his life to a premature end. The works of Bunyan are numerous, but only a few among them command a more general interest. His Grace Abounding in the Chief of Sinners contains Bunyan's religious autobiography, in which he has minutely and characteristically portrayed his own early spiritual history. The best of his writings, as well as the best of its kind -— the Allegory — is the Pilgrim's Progress. (Bishop Patrick's much less known Parable of the Pilgrim stands perhaps next to it, in that age, for perfection as an allegory.) The Pilgrim's Progress narrates the struggles, experiences, Mann, Sketch.

4

50

Period of the Restoration

and trials of a Christian — the Mr. Christian of this allegory — in his passage from a life of sin to everlasting felicity. All the adventures of his travels, the scenes he visits, the dangers he encounters, the enemies he combats, the friends and fellow-pilgrims he meets on his road, are described with such life-like truth and vivacity and such powerful imagination, that the reader sympathizes with these shadowy personages as with real human beings. When we open the book, we see Christian with a burden on his back, and in a distressed state of mind, because the book, which he holds in his hand, tells him the city he lives in is to be destroyed by fire. This induces him to leave home in order to "flee from the wrath to come" and to get rid of his burden. He stops at the Interpreter's House on his way to the Cross and the Sepulchre ; at the latter place he gets rid of his burden. He then travels on to Palace Beautiful, from thence descends into the Valley of Humiliation, where he encounters the foul fiend Apollyon, and reaches the city of Vanity Fair, where his friend Faithful is put to death. His road then leads him and his new friend Hope through By-path Meadow to Doubting Castle, the stronghold of Giant Despair. After their escape from that dangerous place, they pass on to the Delectable Mountains and finally to the river of Death, which Christian and Hope have to wade through. T h e P e r i o d of t h e R e s t o r a t i o n a n d t h e R e v o l u t i o n (1660—1702.) The Period of French Influence. With the Restoration of Charles II. a reaction set in in politics, morals and literature. The king and his gay courtiers brought back from France polite and engaging manners, a taste for refinement, but, at the same time, an utter contempt of virtue. The Puritans, while in the ascendant, besides shutting the theatres, had, with an iron hand, put down every amusement to which the people had been attached from time out of mind. If they had been content with purifying and cultivating the stage, they would have conferred a lasting benefit on the nation, but by de-

50

Period of the Restoration

and trials of a Christian — the Mr. Christian of this allegory — in his passage from a life of sin to everlasting felicity. All the adventures of his travels, the scenes he visits, the dangers he encounters, the enemies he combats, the friends and fellow-pilgrims he meets on his road, are described with such life-like truth and vivacity and such powerful imagination, that the reader sympathizes with these shadowy personages as with real human beings. When we open the book, we see Christian with a burden on his back, and in a distressed state of mind, because the book, which he holds in his hand, tells him the city he lives in is to be destroyed by fire. This induces him to leave home in order to "flee from the wrath to come" and to get rid of his burden. He stops at the Interpreter's House on his way to the Cross and the Sepulchre ; at the latter place he gets rid of his burden. He then travels on to Palace Beautiful, from thence descends into the Valley of Humiliation, where he encounters the foul fiend Apollyon, and reaches the city of Vanity Fair, where his friend Faithful is put to death. His road then leads him and his new friend Hope through By-path Meadow to Doubting Castle, the stronghold of Giant Despair. After their escape from that dangerous place, they pass on to the Delectable Mountains and finally to the river of Death, which Christian and Hope have to wade through. T h e P e r i o d of t h e R e s t o r a t i o n a n d t h e R e v o l u t i o n (1660—1702.) The Period of French Influence. With the Restoration of Charles II. a reaction set in in politics, morals and literature. The king and his gay courtiers brought back from France polite and engaging manners, a taste for refinement, but, at the same time, an utter contempt of virtue. The Puritans, while in the ascendant, besides shutting the theatres, had, with an iron hand, put down every amusement to which the people had been attached from time out of mind. If they had been content with purifying and cultivating the stage, they would have conferred a lasting benefit on the nation, but by de-

and the Revolution.

51

nouncing all public recreations, they provoked a reaction in the taste and manners of the people; the over-austerity of one period naturally led to the degeneration of the succeeding age. Soon after the Restoration two theatres were re-opened; one under the direction of Sir William Davenant, which, in compliment to the Duke of York, was called the Duke's; the other establishment was patronized by Charles II. and called the King's. A new splendour was thrown round the performances. The female characters began to be regularly personated by women. Rich dresses, beautifully painted scenes, and fine decorations added to the attraction of the drama. The influence of the literature of France was seen in a twofold way. The tragedies, like their French models, were written in rhyme, and, like these, had little truth or nature in them; they affected a tone of romantic enthusiasm and superhuman elevation, far removed from nature and common sense. The comedies were degenerate in a different way. They were framed after the model of the Spanish comic drama, and adapted to the taste of the king and his courtiers as exhibiting a variety of complicated intrigues, disguises etc.; but although witty and exciting, they were highly objectionable; every virtue was held up to ridicule, as if amusement could only be obtained by obliterating all moral feeling. John Dryden (1631—1700) is the representative as well as the greatest poet of this period. He was a native of Oldwinkle in Northamptonshire, and by birth and education, a gentleman. His marriage with Lady Elizabeth Howard, unsatisfactory though it was, gave him access to the highest society. He was poor however, and practised literature as a profession, and though possessed of genius, was weak enough to comply with the taste of the time. He entered on his literary career as a Puritan, and wrote some elegiac verses on the death of the Protector. Two years later he celebrated the return of Charles H. in a poem called Astrcea Redux (1660) (Equity brought back). Necessity and the taste of the court and the public drove him to the drama; he wrote many

52

Dry den.

tragedies and comedies, the former pompous, declamatory, the latter, sad to say, flattering the tastes of a bad court, all showing that his genius did not lie that way. He struck out his real vein, when he began to write his polemic, but especially his satirical poems. Annus Mirabilis appeared in 1667, a poem on the inglorious war with Holland and the Great Fire of London, and this poem was the first to show that his genius lay in his power of clear reasoning expressed with entire ease in flowing verse. In 1668, he succeeded Sir William Davenant as poetlaureate, and in 1681, produced his greatest work Absalomand Achitophel a satire (in mockery of the Popish Plot, and the Exclusion Bill) on the leading statesmen. It is a portrait gallery of all the principal men of the time, and a history of the political movements of these years. The plot of the satire is taken from the Old Testament, the rebellion of Absalom against King David, his father (2 Sam. XV.), and Old Testament names denote the leading men of the corrupt court. Monmouth was Absalom; Shaftesbury,. Achitophel; Charles was David; Cromwell, Saul; the Duke of Buckingham figured as Zimri, Titus Oates as Corah, the Eoman Catholics were Jebusites, the Dissenters, Levites. The character of George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham (son of the favourite of James I. und Charles I.), against whom the poet had a special grudge, for bringing out a farce, called Ihe Rehearsal (1671), in which Dryden and his heroic dramas were held up to ridicule, is described in the following lines: "A man so various that he seemed to be "Not one but all mankind's epitome; "Stiff in opinions, always in the wrong, "Was everything by starts, and nothing long, "But, in the course of one revolving moon, "Was chemist, fiddler, statesman and buffoon. "Then all for women, painting, rhyming, drinking, "Besides ten thousand freaks that died in thinking." The character of the Earl of Shaftesbury (the Ashley of the Cabal Ministry) as Achitophel was given thus: "Of these" (the traitors) "the false Achitophel was first "A name to all succeeding ages curst:

Dryden.

53

"For close designs and crooked counsels fit, "Sagacious, bold, and turbulent of wit; "Restless, unfixed in principles and place; "In power unpleased, impatient in disgrace" . . . On the accession of James II., Dryden became a Roman Catholic, and to justify this step, wrote The Hind and the Panther (1687); the milk-white Hind personifying the Church of Rome, the spotted Panther the Church of England. The Revolution of 1688 brought with it Dryden's evil days. He lost his Poet Laureateship, and then necessity called forth his energies, which were not diminished by age. He modernised Chaucer, translated Virgil's ¿Eneid and produced his famous Ode on St. Cecilia's Day or Alexander's Feast (1697). Pope, who was a great admirer of Dryden, lias characterized his poetry in a few well-known lines: — "Waller was smooth, but Dryden taught to join "The varying verse, the full-resounding line, "The long majestic march and energy divine." Dryden's prose is spirited and concise. His grave is near Chaucer's, in Poets' Corner. There were besides Dryden a number of dramatists who belonged to the age of the Restoration and the Revolution, whose works bear the characteristic marks of the time. Their tragedies are unnatural, pompous and tedious, and their comedies, although abounding in witty dialogue and lively incident, are most sadly objectionable. Tlie evils sown broad-cast by these dramatists were not left unrebuked. Jeremy Collier, a non-juring clergyman, in a pamphlet called A Short View of the Immorality and Prof aneness of the English Stage assailed with u n s p a r i n g

vigour the whole of the dramatists, beginning with Dryden, and it is owing to his courage and outspoken remonstrance that a gradual improvement took place in almost all the departments of literature*). *) Non-jurors were clergymen, and many temporal peers, who refused to take the oath of allegiance to the new government after the Revolution. They were Archbishop Sancroft, and those bishops who had been tried with him in 1688 for refusing to read from the pulpit the Declaration of Indulgence, besides 400 elergymen, all of whom were ejected from their livings in 1691.

54

Prose Writers of the Restoration T h e P r o s e W r i t e r s of t h e P e r i o d o f t h e R e s t o r a t i o n a n d the R e v o l u t i o n .

The age of Charles II. was rich in prose writersEdward Hyde, E a r l of Clarendon (1608—1674) occupies a foremost place. He was a faithful though moderate adherent of Charles I., accompanied Charles II. into exile, and at the Restoration was made Chancellor. By the marriage of his daughter Anne with the Duke of York, he became grandfather to two queens of England, Mary, wife of William III., and Anne. But at length his favour with the king declined, as well as his popularity, and in order to avoid impeachment he went into exile. He passed the remainder of his life at Rouen, where he wrote the history of the struggles he had witnessed. The style of his History of the Great Rebellion is full of dignity; he excels in the delineation of character, and is more free from partiality than could be anticipated. The memoirs of John Evelyn (1620—1706) and Samuel Pepys (1632—1703) give minute accounts of the state of society at their time, of the corruption of the court, and of the two great public calamities that visited the metropolis, the Plague in 1665, and the Great Fire in 1666. Both these authors must be studied by those who wish to form a correct idea of the reign of Charles II. The Diary. of Pepys is undoubtedly the most curious specimen of its kind. Bishop Burnet (1643—1715) author of the History of the Reformation, one of the most thoroughly digested works of the period, wrote a History of his Own Times, which is extremely valuable for many of its facts and for the cool shrewdness with which he described the state of things about him. Among the many theologians of this period may be mentioned the names of South, Tillotson and Barrow,, whose writings were able and learned. First among the philosophers in point of time stands Thomas Hobbes (1588—1679), In politics he held that men ought to be governed in a most despotic manner, which theory he incorporated in his great work the Leviathan. In philosophy he taught that thinking was a

and Revolution. — Locke.

55

merely mechanical process, that men were influenced by selfish interests only, thus ignoring the influence of the moral elements and of the affections. He was, however, a clear and precise thinker. John Locke (1632—1704) the great metaphysical writer was born in Leicestershire and educated at Westminster School and Christchurch College, Oxford. Displeased with the prevailing method of teaching philosophy, he applied to this branch of knowledge that experimental or inductive method of which Bacon had been the apostle. Locke intended preparing for the medical profession, but relinquished his design on account of delicate health. Through a long period of his life he attached himself both to the domestic circle, and to the political fortunes of that great statesman, the Earl of Shaftesbury, undertaking first the education of the son, and afterwards of the grandson of the Chancellor. When Shaftesbury brought in the Exclusion Bill, which was to deprive James II. of the right of succession to the throne, on the ground of his evident sympathies with the Roman Catholic Communion, a furious agitation forced him to take refuge in Holland, whither Locke accompanied him, and where he published his Letters on Toleration (1689 and 1690), advocating the same principles of freedom of speech and printing which Milton had defended in his Areopagitica. The Revolution of 1688 finally restored Locke to his country, and he became a prominent defender of civil and religious liberty. Locke died at Oates in Essex, the seat of his friend Sir J . Masham. In his character he offers a perfect type of the good man, the patriotic citizen, and the philosophical investigator. Locke's greatest work is his Essay on the Human Understanding (1690), the chief peculiarity of which is that it rejects the doctrine which presumes men to have ideas born with them to be in time developed. Locke holds that all our simple ideas are derived from sensation and reflection. He has also written an excellent Essay on Education (1693), and a treatise On the Conduct of the Understanding. The most striking feature of all Locke's philosophical

56

Newton.

works is the extreme clearness, plainness and simplicity of his language, which is always such as to be intelligible to an average understanding. Sir Isaac Newton (1642—1727) holds, by universal consent, the highest rank among the natural philosophers of ancient or modern times. He was born at Woolsthorpe in Lincolnshire, and entered Trinity College, Cambridge, within the quiet walls of which he spent the greater part of his life. To the unrivalled genius and sagacity of Newton the world is still indebted for a variety of splendid discoveries in natural philosophy and mathematics, among which stands first his discovery of the law of gravitation, which he showed to affect the vast orbs which revolve round the sun, not less than the smallest object on our globe. The work in which he explained his system was written in Latin and appeared in 1687 under the title of Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy. To Newton we likewise owe extensive discoveries in optics, by which the aspect of that science was so entirely changed that he may justly be termed its founder. His optical researches he gave to the world in his treatise On the Reflections, Refractions, Inflections, and Colours of Light. He also wrote Some Observations on the Prophecies of Daniel and the Apocalypse of St. John. Newton's character was the type of those virtues which ought to distinguish the scholar, the philosopher and the patriot. His modesty was as great as his genius, and he invariably ascribed the attainment of his discoveries rather to patient attention than to any unusual capacity of intellect. "To myself", he said, "I seem to have been as a child playing on the sea-shore, while the immense ocean of truth lay unexplored before me." Newton was knighted by Queen Anne.- He died in 1727, when his body was conveyed to Westminster Abbey, the pall being borne by the Lord Chancellor, two dukes and three earls. A delightful prose writer of the time is honest Izaak Walton (1593—1683) of modest rank and yet the companion of many learned men. He wrote the biographies of five persons, all distinguished for their virtues and learning. That of Richard Hooker ranks highest. He is

The Eighteenth Century.

57

best known by his work The Complete Angler, a treatise on his favourite art of fishing, which is written with a sweet simplicity and love of nature, and gives a close description of the rural beauties of England. The E i g h t e e n t h

Century.

The Writers of the Artificial School in the reign of •Queen Anne (1702—14) and of George I. (1714—27) also called The

S e c o n d C l a s s i c a l or A u g u s t a n P e r i o d English L i t e r a t u r e .

of

The period of twelve years which comprise the reign oi Queen Anne, is commonly styled the Augustan era of English literature, on account of its supposed resemblance in intellectual opulence to the reign of the Emperor Augustus. This opinion has not been confirmed in the present age; good sense, and a correct and polished style distinguish the prose writers, a felicity in painting artificial life and of reasoning in verse characterize the poets; but they were neither remarkable for fancy and pathos, nor for originality of thought. They deserve, however, real praise in that they corrected the indecency of the vicious school introduced •at the Restoration. Poetry, prose and satire are represented by the three foremost writers of the period, Pope, Addison and Swift. When Dryden was an old man, and at the height of his fame, Alexander Pope (1688—1744), then a boy of twelve or thereabouts, persuaded some friends to take him to Will's Coffee-house, where Dryden, as "glorious John", presided over the wits and geniuses of the day, to obtain a glance of the great poet; a circumstance which he was ever after fond of relating. Even at this early age Pope was a poet, as he has said of himself: — "As yet a child, nor yet a fool to fame, "I lisp'd in numbers, for the numbers came". . Born in London, he claimed to have come of gentle blood although his father was a tradesman, who retired to a. small estate at Binfield near Windsor, where the poet, a sickly boy, was brought up under his father's eye, in the

58

The Augustan Period. — Pope.

Roman Catholic persuasion. From his 12 th y e a r he devoted his time to self-instruction and the study of literature. I n 1711 he published his Essay on Criticism, unquestionably the finest piece of reasoning poetry in the language. He soon became famous, and his friendship was courted b y men of wit and men of rank. The Essay was followed b y the Rape of the Lock, (1711 and 1714) a mock heroic poem, a little masterpiece of its kind. The theft of a 'ringlet of a lady. Miss Arabella Fermor, b y her lover Lord Petre produced this poem, The silly trick having led to a coolness between the families, Pope set to work, inspired b y the wish to reconcile the estranged lovers b y a hearty laugh. The Rape of the Lock is the best specimen of the mock heroic poem in the English language. The machinery, or introduction of supernatural beings into the action of the plot, Pope took from the Rosicrucian doctrines that the four, then so-called, elements are filled with sylphs, gnomes, nymphs and salamanders. One of his greatest and most lucrative literary works was his Translation of Homer (1725) in which he was aided b y two brother-poets. He is said to have cleared about £ 9000 by this work, and although it is of great literary merit, the criticism of Bentley, the great classical scholar, characterizes it in a few words — "It is a pretty poem, Mr. Pope, but you must not call it Homer." By this time Pope had become a comparatively wealthy m a n ; he purchased a villa at Twickenham, beautifully situated on the banks of the Thames, and retired to it with his widowed mother, to whom he invariably showed the most devoted affaction. Here he spent the rest of his life, devoting himself to literature and adorning his grounds with supposed taste. His hospitality was sought b y all the illustrious men of his time, statesmen and orators as well as men of letters, Pope, though capable of ardent friendship, was of an irritable and jealous disposition, which must be partly ascribed to a sickly and deformed frame. Being weak enough to attack and throw ridicule upon authors less able and fortunate than himself, his attacks were naturally r e t u r n e d : in order to crush his adversaries with one blow, he wrote his satirical poem,

Swift.

59-

The Dunciad (1728), denouncing as dunces or blockheads all those who had dared to dispute his poetical supremacy. Whatever literary merit The Dunciad may contain, it did not proceed from a generous mind. Pope's best work is his Essay on Man (1732) an argumentative poem of latitudinarian tendency. Pope is not a poet of the highest order; he is a master of the language and the art of rhyming, but seldom warms or inspires his readers; he is not "a soother and elevator of the human soul." The last years of the poet's life were embittered by increased illness, the death of his mother, and the loss or alienation of friends. The most original writer of this period is Jonathan Swift (1667—1745); he occupied a foremost place both in literature and politics. He was born at Dublin of English parents. Soon after his birth his father died in embarrassed circumstances, leaving him from his earliest years a dependant on the charity of distant relations. At the age of 21, he entered the household of Sir W. Temple, a, statesman and author, as a sort of secretary. His proud heart smarted under the miseries of dependence, and he strove hard to escape from them. He entered the Church, and, on Temple's death (1700), obtained a small living in Ireland, returning occasionally to England, where, through his former connection with Temple, he was known to the leading Whig statesmen. His wit and powerful sarcasm, which he directed in innumerable pamphlets against the Tories, made him a most welcome ally of the other party. Being anxious, however, to be preferred to a good living in England, and finding that his new political friends left his wish unheeded, he turned his back upon them and began to write against them with even greater vehemence than that with which he had assailed the Tories, From these new allies he was ambitious enough to hope for an English bishopric, but he only obtained the Deanery of St. Patrick's at Dublin. And now he became the most popular man in Ireland, on publishing a series of able, anonymous letters, signed "M. B. Drapier", to shield the Irish against unjust measures on the part of the English ministry.

€0

The Augustan Period.

Swift's greatest work The Travels of Gulliver was brought out in 1726, and was received with undivided admiration. Like all his writings it was a satire upon the men and things of the day, but the history is still read with interest, though the satire has lost its point. It is written in the character of a plain, unaffected, honest shipsurgeon, who describes the strange scenes and adventures through which he passes; and it is the simple, straightforward, prosaic good faith that gives the charm to the book. It consists of four parts or voyages: in the first, Gulliver visits the country of Lilliput, the inhabitants of which were about six inches in stature, and where all the houses, trees, ships, and animals were in exact proportion to the diminutive human beings. The second voyage is to Brobdingnag, a country of enormous giants, about sixty feet in height, and here Gulliver plays the same part that the insect-like Lilliputians had played to him. The satire goes on deepening as it advances; playful and amusing in the scenes of Lilliput — which by the way has ever been a favourite book with the young — it grows blacker and more bitter at every step. Another satire, the Tale of a Tub reflects on the Eoman Catholic, the Lutheran and the Calvinistic Churches. In his poems Swift has retained his low and colloquial style; his heart was not tuned to the purer and loftier strains of poetry. The account of Swift's life would be incomplete without mentioning two unhappy women, who both loved this cold, selfish, bitter man, and both of whom he rendered miserable. With one of them, Esther Johnson, the Stella -of his letters, he had been connected ever since his residence with Sir William Temple; she followed him with her guardian, Mrs. Dingley, to Ireland, and although he is said to have married her secretly, he never acknowledged her as his wife. Another lady, known by the name of Vanessa, but whose real name was Hester Vanhomrigh, fell in love with him when he was an old man, followed him to Ireland, and died of a broken heart when she found out his relation to Stella. Swift was afflicted with insanity for the last four years of his life.

Addison.

61

Joseph Addison (1672—1719). T o the third of the great luminaries of the period, Joseph Addison, England is indebted for cultivating a new and peculiar kind of literature, which consisted in short essays on men and manners, published periodically, and which were destined to exert a powerful and most beneficial influence on the manners and intellectual development of society. Although the honour of originating this branch of literature is due to Daniel Defoe, it was brought to highest perfection by Addison and his friend Sir Richard Steele. Indeed the fame of Addison rests rather on his prose writings than on his poetry; it was the latter, however, that first gave him distinction. Joseph Addison, the son of a clergyman, was born at Milston in Wiltshire. He was educated at the Charterhouse, where he contracted that intimacy with Steele which lasted through life. At the age of fifteen, he went to Oxford where he distinguished himself by the regularity of his conduct and by his Latin poetry. The statesmen of Queen Anne's time imitated those of the age of Augustus by making themselves patrons of men of genius. One of them, Lord Somers, to whom young Addison dedicated a poem, became one of his steadiest patrons, and in 1699 procured for him a pension of £ 300 a year to enable him to make a tour in Italy. The death of William III. deprived Addison of his pension; he returned from the Continent to London, poor in purse, but bearing this change of fortune with that dignified patience and quiet reserve which made his character so estimable. He did not long continue unnoticed; the great victories of Marlborough on the continent which culminated in the battle of HOchstedt (Blenheim 1704) were to be celebrated in verse, and Addison undertook the task, entitling his poem The Campaign. It so pleased the minister that Addison was rewarded with a place in a public office (he succeeded John Locke in the office of Commissioner of Appeals), and from this moment the career of Addison was a successful and brilliant one; he was appointed to several high posts (Under-Secretary of State and Chief

62

Periodicals; The Tatler,

Secretary for Ireland) both lucrative and honourable, but he never was distinguished for ready business talent. Addison was in Ireland when, in 1709, his friend Sir E. Steele began the publication of the Tatler, a small sheet which appeared three times a week at the cost of I d ; each number containing a short essay, the rest of the paper being filled up with news and advertisements. The popularity of this kind of journal was instant and immense; no tea-table, no coffee-house was without it. The Tatler continued about two years when it was remodelled into the far more celebrated and successful Spectator. The latter appeared every day and after reaching 555 numbers was discontinued for a short time, after which it was resumed in 1714 and extended to about 80 numbers more. A third journal, the Guardian, was commenced in 1713 and reached 175 numbers but was much inferior to the Spectator both in talent and success. Steele was obliged to have the help of some brother authors; Swift and others contributed to the paper, but the most constant and powerful aid was supplied by Addison. In these papers Addison first displayed that exquisite humour, refined observation and knowledge of the world, which form his most distinguished characteristics, and as an essayist he left all his contemporaries far behind. "Before the Tatler and Spectator, if the writers for the stage are excepted, England had no masters of common life; there were many books to teach men their more important duties and to settle opinions in philosophy and politics, but a judge of propriety was yet wanting to teach the minuter decencies and inferior duties, to regulate the practice of daily conversation, to correct those defects which are rather ridiculous than criminal, to tell men when to speak or to be silent, how to refuse or how to accept. For this purpose nothing was more proper than the publication of those short periodicals, which men might read, not as study but as amusement; and it is said by Addison that these papers had a perceptible influenee upon the conversation of that time, and taught the frolicsome and the g a y to unite merriment with decency. Being published, too, at a time when two political parties were agitating

Spectator, Guardian.

63

the nation, these periodicals had a great effect in directing party spirit into quieter channels." • In the course of the work, several fictitious persons, the members of a Club, are introduced in the Spectator, consisting of representatives of the chief classes of town and rural society. We have Sir Andrew Freeport as the type of the merchants, Captain Sentry of the soldier, Will Honeycombe of the men of fashion and pleasure, and, above all, the exquisitely-drawn character of Sir Roger de Coverley, the old-fashioned country gentleman, Addison's own masterpiece. The papers of Addison are marked in the Spectator by one of the letters in the name of Clio —• the muse of History; in the Guardian, by a hand. Steele adopted the name of Isaac Bickerstaff, which Swift had made familiar by his ridicule of Partridge, the almanac-maker. In 1713, Addison brought out his tragedy of Cato, which was loudly applauded, both by the Whigs, who looked on it as a satire on the Tories, and by the Tories, to show that the satire was unfelt. It is, however, of inferior literary merit: though it adheres to the "rules of the Unities", it is wanting in interest. In the year 1716, Addison married the Countess Dowager of Warwick. He is said to have first known her by becoming tutor to her son. When his influence increased the lady was persuaded to marry him, but the marriage did not add to his happiness, it neither "found nor made them equal". She always remembered her own rank, and treated with very little ceremony the tutor of her son. Addison has been charged with a fondness for wine; it is said that when he had suffered any vexation from the Countess, he withdrew to Button's coffee-house and the society of friends, where, when warmed into confidence, his conversation appears to have been so delightful that the greatest wits sat rapt and charmed to listen to him. In 1719, Addison died at Holland House. He is said to have sent for his profligate step-son when on his death-bed, to whom he gave his last admonitions, adding: "I have sent for you, that you may see how a Christian can die". Before taking leave of this amiable author, it is well

64

Sir Richard Steele.

to remember what Samuel Johnson (1709—1784) has said of him: "Whoever wishes to attain an English style, familiar but not coarse, and elegant but not ostentatious, must give his days and nights to the volumes of Addison." Sir Richard Steele (1671—1729) was of English parentage but born in Dublin. His father held the office of Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, the Duke of Ormond, and through Ormond's influence he was placed in the Charterhouse, London. There he found Addison, three years older than himself, and an intimacy was formed between them which is one of the most memorable in literature. Steele always regarded Addison with respect appreaching to veneration. "Through the school and through the world," as Thackeray has said "withersoever his strange fortune led this erring, wayward, affectionate creature, Joseph Addison was always his headboy." They were together at Oxford, which Steele left without taking a degree. Steele then took it into his head to enlist in the Horse-Guards, although he knew that his only rich relative would disinherit him for doing so. He soon became a favourite with his superiors and at last was promoted to the rank of Captain. He then plunged into the fashionable follies of Town, at the same time acquiring that knowledge of life and character which proved so serviceable to him when he exchanged the sword for the pen. In the midst of his wild extravagance he wrote a religious treatise, entitled The Christian Hero as an expiation for his irregularities, but his passions were strong and he had so much of the Irish impressionableness that his life was spent in sinning and repenting, in getting into scrapes, and in making projects of reformation which a total want of prudence and self-control prevented him from executing. Turning to play-writing he produced, in 1702, The Funeral or Grief á la Mode, in 1703 The Tender Husband, in 1704 The Lying Lover, the last of which proved too grave a comedy for the public taste. In 1709, Steele began the publication of the Tatler in which he aimed at high objects — "to expose the false arts of life, to pull off the disguises of cunning vanity

65

Matthew Prior.

and affectation, and to recommend a general simplicity in our dress, our discourse, and our behaviour." That the careless and jovial "Dick Steele" should set about such a task is only another illustration of the contradictions and incongruities in his character, but proves, at the same time, that he was not wanting in good qualities, and that he had a high admiration of virtue in the abstract. Of his ally, Addison, he said: "I fared like a distressed prince, who calls in a powerful neighbour to his aid. I was undone by my auxiliary; when I had once called him in, I could not subsist without dependence on him." Arbuthnot, Pope, Berkeley, Budgell, Hughes, Swift, were the other contributors to the three periodicals edited by Steele. It was not till 1722 that he brought out another comedy, The Conscious Lovers — his best play. Steele was now a popular and fashionable man upon Town. The Whig minister Harley conferred upon him the office of Gazetteer and Gentleman-Usher to Prince George. He entered into political life, obtained a seat in Parliament and was knighted in the reign of George I. Though he realised considerable sums by his writings and by his places under government, and married, for the second time, a lady of fortune in South Wales, Mrs. Scurlock, the "dear Prue" of his letters, he was always in pecuniary difficulties. The letters to his wife show that he was familiar with duns, bailiffs, with misery, folly and repentance. After dissipating more than one fortune and committing all kinds of extravagant follies, he died in poverty, and almost forgotten by his contemporaries, at Caermarthen in Wales. As an essayist Steele is remarkable for the vivacity and ease of his composition. He tried all subjects, was a humourist, a satirist, a critic, and a story teller. His pictures of life and society have the stamp of reality. His elevated conception of the female character has justly been remarked as distinguishing him from most of the writers of his age. His gallantry to women was a pure and chivalrous devotion. Matthew Prior (1664—1721). There were other poets Mann, Sketch.

g

66

John Gay.

in the reign of Queen Anne and George I. whose names are still remembered, but who rank much beneath Pope. Matthew Prior was of low birth and owed his education to the liberality of the Earl of Dorset, through whose influence he was appointed in succession secretary of several embassies, and resided in Holland and France. He first joined the Whigs, afterwards went over to the Tories and at the close of his political career was ordered into custody by the Whigs on a charge of high treason and remained two years in confinement. Prior was matchless for his tales and light occasional verses, and his animated, tender love-songs. He possessed the art of graceful and fluent versification in a great degree. One of his earliest poems was The Story of the City and the Country Mouse (1687), written in conjunction with the Honourable Charles Montagu, in ridicule of Drvden's Hind and Panther. He was the most natural of the artificial poets, a seeming paradox, yet as true as the old maxim, that the perfection of art is the art of concealing it. John Gay (1688—1732). The name of John Gay is one of the most attractive among the many poets and wits of the Augustan period. He was one of those easy, amiable, good-natured men, whom everybody likes. He entered life in a humble station, as a silk mercer's shopman, but not liking his business, he took to writing, and was favoured by men of rank. He published his Shepherd's Week in six Pastorals (1714), and, somewhat later, his more interesting Trivia or the Art of Walking the Streets of London (1715). Gay was wishing for public employment and sighing after court favour, but neither wish was to be realised. He wrote Fables designed for the special improvement of the Duke of Cumberland (son of George II., nicknamed the Butcher for his cruelty in Scotland after the battle of Culloden 1746). Gay produced several dramatic works, principally of a comic nature and interspersed with songs, for the composition of which he had a great talent. His Beggar's Opera (1727) was written at the suggestion of Swift, and is still popular for its music. It supplanted for a time the Italian

Lady Mary Wortley Montagu.

67

opera in London and originated the English opera. The Beggar's Opera, seeking to make rogues attractive cannot be recommended for its moral tendency. Gay lost the greater part of the fortune he had acquired in the South Sea Bubble, 1720, and was received into the house of the Duke and Duchess of Queensberry, with whom he spent the remainder of his life. His death forced tears even from the eyes of the hard and cynical Swift, and filled Pope with sorrow, who has characterised him as — "Of manners gentle, of affections mild, "In wit, a man, simplicity, a child." Lady Mary Wortley Montagu (1690—1762). The gallery of famous wits and authors of the period of the artificial writers would be incomplete without assigning a place to Lady Mary Montagu, one of the most brilliant letter-writers that England has produced. She was the daughter of the Duke of Kingston, and celebrated, even from her childhood (as Lady Mary Pierrepont), for the vivacity of her intellect, her precocious attainments and great beauty. Her education had been far more extensive and solid than was in her time usually given to women, and in youth she was a close student and indefatigable reader. She was early introduced to the company of the reigning poets and wits. In 1712, she married Mr. Edward Wortley Montagu, a grave and gloomy diplomatist, with whose character the sprightly, airy woman of fashion and literature could have nothing in common. She accompanied her husband on his embassy to the court of Constantinople, and described her travels over Europe and the East in those delightful letters to her friends, which have given her in English literature a place resembling that of Madame de Sevigne in the literature of France. Lady Mary was the first traveller who gave a familiar, picturesque and animated account of Oriental society. She returned from her travels in 1718, and, by the advice of Pope, settled at Twickenham. The rival wits did not long continue friends. Pope seems to have entertained, or perhaps imagined he entertained, for Lady Mary a passion warmer than friendship. On one

68

Augustan Period.

occasion he is said to have made her a tender declaration, •which threw the lady into an immoderate fit of laughter, and made the sensitive poet ever afterwards her implacable enemy. In 1739, her health having declined, she separated with mutual consent from her husband, again went abroad, and resided in Italy (at Lovere in the Venetian territory) and thence continued her correspondence with the members of her family and other friends. On Mr. Montagu's death in 1760, Lady Mary was prevailed upon by her only daughter, Lady Bute, to return to England, where she died in the following year. Her family life, not only in relation to her husband, but still more so with regard to her only son, was uncomfortable and unhappy. The career of the latter from his boyhood was such as to justify a supposition of madness; after a life of folly and vice, he died an apostate to Mohammedanism. Lady Mary was perhaps, in some degree, indemnified for the pain her son's conduct gave her by the affection of her daughter, for whom she probably felt as much tenderness as her cold, unimpressionable heart had to bestow, and to whom some of her liveliest and most amusing letters are addressed. Admirable common sense, observation, vivacity, extensive reading without a trace of pedantry, and a pleasant tinge of half playful sarcasm, are the qualities which distinguish her correspondence. The style is perfection, it combines the simplicity and natural elegance of the high-bred lady with the ease of the thorough woman of the world, although the moral tone of the letters is far from high. "The differences between Lady Mary Montagu's letters and those of Mad. de Sevigne are no less striking than the resemblances. In Lady Mary there is no trace of that intense and even morbid maternal affection which breathes through every line addressed to Madame de Grignan; nor is there any of that cringing worship of the court which seems to pervade everything written in the superficial atmosphere that surrounded Louis XIV. In wit, animation and the power of hitting off, by a few felicitous touches, a character or a scene, it is difficult to assign the palm of superiority; Lady Montagu was unquestionably a woman

The Great Novelists.

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of far higher intellectual endowments and of a much wider literary development. She can reason and draw inferences, where Mad. de Sevigné can only gossip, though it must be allowed that her gossip is agreeable. The successful introduction of inoculation for the smallpox is mainly to be ascribed to the intelligence and courage of Lady Mary Montagu, who not only was bold enough to try the experiment upon her own child, but with admirable constancy resisted the furious opposition of bigotry and ignorance against the innovation." The Great

Novelists.

Prose fiction is a comparatively modern product of English literature, Fictitious narratives delineating the manners, characters and incidents of common life had been produced ; but they had first appeared, as is the case with all types of literature, in a poetical form, such as the Canterbury Tales in England, and the rhymed narratives of chivalry which were poured forth with inexhaustible fertility by the Trouvères of the Middle Ages. In course of time, the same subjects were remodelled and reproduced in prose, particularly in Spain and France, and were given to the world either as knight-errantry romances or as the long pompous narratives of the time of Louis XIII. and Louis XIY., — Le Grand Cyrus, Astrée, La Princesse de {Jlèves, — all of tiresome length and written in a bombastic style. The absurdities and exaggerations of this kind of story naturally produced a reaction, and Spain furnished the best caricature in Cervantes' Don Quixote, 1604; in France these fictionswere ridiculed by Scarron(1610—1660), the first husband of Mademoiselle d'Aubigné, eventually Mad. de Maintenon, in his Roman Comique. The first original romance worthy of notice in England is the Arcadia of Sir Philip Sidney, and, in a philosophic form of the same kind of writing, the Utopia of Sir Thomas More and the New Atlantis (unfinished) of Bacon; but the exclusive employment of prose narrative as a means to reproduce the passions, characters and events of real, every-day life was first brought to perfection

70

Defoe.

towards the middle of the 18th century by a number of contemporaneous writers. The first of these, Daniel Defoe, has been called the father and founder of the English Novel. Daniel Defoe (1661—1731) was not professionally an author. Sprung from a tradesman's family, in politics Whig and in religion Puritan, he himself became a tradesman and tried his fortune in several branches, but never with success. He was an ardent pamphleteer, but his best work, and the one which has kept a permanent place in literature is his universally known Robinson Crusoe (1719), founded on the authentic narrative of Alexander Selkirk, a Scottish sailor who had been marooned, as the term is, or left on the uninhabited island of Juan Fernandez, where he passed several years in complete solitude. The great interest of Robinson Crusoe arises from the simplicity and probability of the events and the skill with which the author identifies himself with the character of his hero, whom he has represented as a commonplace man, without any out-of-the-way endowments. In this as well as in all his other writings Defoe displays such an air of truth, that, for instance, his Memoirs of a Cavalier and his Journal of the Great Plague have been cited by men of science and of rank as authentic narratives. When we remember that Defoe's mercantile speculations were so unfortunate that he says in one of his poems — "Thirteen times have I been rich and poor;" — that he had to provide for a large family to which he was tenderly attached and, moreover, had to struggle with broken health, we are all the more inclined to admire his genius and never-failing fertility. Defoe was pilloried for his treatise uThe Shortest Way with, the Dissenters"; Pope alluded to this circumstance in the Dunciad — "Earless on high stood unabashed Defoe." If we consider Robinson Crusoe as the tale of a single individual, whereas the Novel must have a plot to the working out of which the characters and events contribute, we must regard Samuel Richardson as the real founder of

Richardson.

71

the English Novel. The life of Richardson (1689—1761) offers few salient incidents. He was an industrious printer, who raised himself to comparative opulence. He retired to a pleasant country house, at Parson's Green, near London, where he devoted himself to literary employment, surrounded by a set of female worshippers who fed his vanity by praise and adulation. The works of Richardson are three in number. Pamela, which appeared in 1740, is the story of a poor, but beautiful and innocent country girl, who has to make her way through the world and is beset by many evils, over which she triumphs in the end. Clarissa Harlowe, Richardson's best work, is a most pathetic story of a young lady who is exposed to the treachery of a man of splendid talents and dazzling qualities, but totally devoid of honourable principle. In the last work ot this trilogy, Sir Charles Ghrandison, Richardson intended to give an ideal portrait of a man who should combine moral perfection with the accomplishments of a man of r a n k ; but the author was, from rank and position, totally unacquainted with the real manners and modes of feeling prevalent in the fashionable world, and so he hit completely beside the mark. Richardson has chosen the epistolary style for his novels, which is attended with great disadvantages and has been greatly censured by critics; but this style was flitted to his peculiar genius. His novels are of great length and on that account are now seldom read; he is happiest in the delineation of excellent female characters and so repaid the sex for their favour. Henry Fielding (1707—1754). Another great name among the novelists of this period is that of Henry Fielding, often regarded as the greatest novelist that England has produced. In his personal character, as well as in his literary career, he was the exact opposite of Richardson. He was descended from the illustrious house of Denbigh (itself an offshoot from the house of Hapsburg) and distantly connected with Lady Mary Montagu. His father was a general in the army, a man of fashion, ruined by his extravagance; and so his son was early familiar with

72

Fielding.

embarrassments. In his twentieth year his studies were cut short through the death of his father. Being entirely dependent on his own resources, he began writing for the stage, and produced a considerable number of pieces, but his talent was in no way adapted to the theatre. His birth and brilliancy gave him entrance into high society, and he succeeded in finding a wife of great beauty and excellence, and some fortune; but he quickly squandered the fortune and after many vain attempts to get some lucrative employment, he was made Justice of the Peace for Westminster and Middlesex, an office then paid by fees and very laborious without being very reputable. At last he struck out that vein of humorous writing in which he stands unrivalled. His first novel was Joseph Andrews-, this was, in some sense, intended as a parody upon Pamela. Tom Jones (1749) has been pronounced by critics, not only Fielding's best novel, but the best of all English novels, on account of the artful conduct of its plot and the immense variety, truth and humour of its characters and incidents. Fielding's characters, even those he wished to make attractive, are generally found to be tinged with much coarseness and vulgarity. Fielding's standard, whether of grace or morality, was not a very high one, but the time when he wrote was remarkable for the low tone of manners and sentiment — perhaps the lowest that ever prevailed in England; for it was precisely a juncture when the romantic spirit of the old chivalric manners was extinguished, and before the modern standard of refinement was introduced. Amelia was the last work of fiction Fielding gave to the world. The character of Amelia was drawn from Fielding's wife, and the frailties of her husband, Captain Booth, most likely reproduced the author's own shortcomings and backslidings. He ultimately retired to Lisbon for the benefit of his health, and died there in 1754. Tobias George Smollett (1721—1771). Between the publication of Joseph Andrews (1742) and Tom Jones (1749) a new novelist appeared, very different from Richardson

Smollett.

73

or Fielding. Tobias George Smollett was descended from an ancient and respectable family in Scotland. Failing in his attempt to bring out a drama he had written, he entered the naval service as a surgeon's mate on board a man-of-war. Here he had the opportunity of studying the oddities of sea-characters which he afterwards so well reproduced in his fictions, and of learning by experience the atrocious cruelty, corruption and incompetency which then reigned in the naval administration. After residing for some time in the West Indies, he returned to London, and ultimately gave himself up to the career of a writer and politician. His first work of fiction was Roderick Random (1748) which contained part of the author's own experiences in life, a work of stronger humour even than Tom Jones. His next fictitious work was Peregrine Pickle. In his novels he relied for success, rather on a lively series of grotesque adventures and broad humour than on a well-laid plot or deep analysis of character. Incessant labour and continued agitation had broken down Smollett's health, and he was, like Fielding, obliged to try the effect of a warmer climate. He resided a short time at Leghorn, and there, in spite of exhaustion and sufferings, the dying genius gave forth its most pleasing flash of humour. This was the novel of Humphrey Clinker, the most cordial, comic and laughable of them all. Like Fielding, he died and was buried in a foreign land. In the structure of his fictions Smollett is manifestly inferior to both Richardson and Fielding, yet his books are eminently amusing. The reader's attention is kept awake by a lively succession of events, though the writer is careless about maintaining the consistency of his characters. His heroes have little to attract our sympathy, being generally hard, impudent, selfish and ungrateful adventurers, but in the subordinate persons, especially in those of grotesque but faithful followers, Smollett shows a great warmth of sentiment. His novels give a true idea of the state of the country and the manners of his time. Smollett's best verses are his Tears of Scotland, which breathe the patriotic indignation of a generous mind,

74

Sterne.

horror-struck at the cruelties inflicted by order of tbe Duke of Cumberland after the battle of Culloden in 1746 (vide Gay p. 66). Laurence Sterne (1713—1768). Next in order of time and genius to Fielding and Smollett, and not inferior in conception of rich, eccentric, comic characters, was Laurence Sterne, the witty, pathetic and sentimental author of Tristrav Shandy. He was great-grandson to Richard Sterne, chaplain to Archbishop Laud, whom he attended on the scaffold (1645); after the Restoration the chaplain was made Archbishop of York. The poet's father was an officer in Ireland ; the poet was born in the barracks of Dublin and, for the first ten years of his life, followed his father on his march from place to place ; and to his recollection of military life we owe the freshest and most original parts of Sterne's writings. With the assistance of a relative, he went through the ordinary course of a school and university education, and after a five years' residence at Cambridge, took Holy Orders. Through his uncle's influence, he got the living of Sutton and a prebendal stall in the cathedral of York, and, after his marriage, through his wife's connections, added the living of Stillington to his other benefices. He lived nearly twenty years at Sutton, reading, painting, fiddling and shooting, interrupted by occasional quarrels with his brethren of the cloth, with whom he was no favourite, till, in 1759, the publication of the first two volumes of Tristram. Shandy raised him to the summit of popularity. The appearance in the following year of two more volumes of the same novel made Sterne still more the fashion. David Garrick said of him, — "He degenerated in London society like an ill-transplanted shrub; the incense of the great spoiled his head, and their ragouts his stomach. He grew sickly and proud, an invalid in body and mind." He made two tours on the Continent to France and Italy, where he collected the materials which he embodied in his Sentimental Journey (1768). He also published Sermons — clever, but most odd, and not without wholesale plagiarisms. He died as he had wished, alone and friendless in a lodging-house, in Bond Street, attended by

Miscellaneous Writers.

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a hired nurse. His wife and daughter, Lydia, lived apart from him in a convent in France. Sterne's character was eccentric, marked by strange inconsistency; he was a fanciful, vain, self-indulgent humourist, masking caprice and harshness under a pretence of extreme sensibility. Neither his conduct nor his writings became his clerical character. Tristram Shandy, though nominally a romance in the biographical form, is but a bundle of episodes and digressions, strung together without any attempt at order. The story is, in reality, nothing more than a vehicle for satire on a great variety of subjects. Most of these satirical strokes are introduced without any regard to connection, either with the principal story or with each other. The author having no determinate end in view, runs from object to object; in fact, the book is a perpetual series of disappointments, relieved, however, by humour and pathos, with that great power -— found only in the greatest humourists — of combining the ludicrous and the pathetic. The most prominent persons of the fiction are Walter Shandy, the father of the supposed hero, who himself never makes his appearance, the hero's mother, his uncle Toby Shandy, a veteran officer, his servant Corporal Trim, and several subordinate characters. Oliver Goldsmith (1728—1774). Though not exclusively a writer of prose-fiction, Oliver (Noll) Goldsmith, the author of the ever-popular novel, The Vicar of Wakefield, may here find a place. He was born at Pallas in the county of Longford, Leinster, Ireland. He was the sixth of a family of nine children, and his father was a poor curate, who eked out the scanty funds he derived from his calling by cultivating some rented land. By the aid of a benevolent uncle, Mr. Contarini, of Italian descent, Oliver was enabled to enter the university of Dublin in the humble quality of sizar. At college Goldsmith was thoughtless and irregular, always in want and disobedient to authority, though from his youth he ever had a warm heart, a ready sympathy with all sufferers, and a charity which but too often outran his means. When he left the university, his father

7G

Goldsmith.

was dead; he idled away two years among his relations, then tried the law, and finished by studying medicine in Edinburgh, removing with insufficient means to the university of Leyden. In 1755, he set off on a continental pedestrian tour, provided, it is said, with a guinea in his pocket, one shirt to his back and in his hand a flute, by playing on which he earned occasionally a night's lodging and food. It was while wandering in Switzerland, that he sketched the plan of his poem 1 he Traveller, which afterwards formed the commencement of his fame. He returned to London poor and improvident, without friends; and his career, during eight years, was a succession of struggles with famine, sometimes as a chemist's shopman, sometimes as an usher in a boarding school, or as a practitioner of medicine among the poorest people, and more frequently as a wretchedly-paid bookseller's hack. At last he gave himself up to literature and lived solely by his versatile pen, trying every kind of composition — poetry, prose-fiction, history, criticism — adorning every thing he touched and giving it that stamp of ease, grace, and tenderness, and a certain vein of pensive, philosophic reflection which are the characteristics of his writings. In 1764 appeared his Traveller which was immediately received with universal applause, and of which his friend, Dr. Sam. Johnson said, that there had not been so fine a poem since Pope's time. Soon after (1766), he published his exquisite novel the Vicar of Wakefield. From this period Goldsmith's career was one of unbroken literary success; he now emerged from obscurity, his friendship was sought by men of letters and artists, wits and statesmen *). *) Goldsmith was a zealous member of the celebrated Literary Club, also called Johnson's club, founded in 1764 by Dr. Johnson, and Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723—1792) the famous portrait painter. Edmund Burke, author, orator and statesman, Thomas Gainsborough (1737—1788) the celebrated landscape and portrait painter, David Garrick (1716—1779), the great actor, James Boswell, the biographer of Johnson, Edward Gibbon, the historian, Thomas Percy, afterwards Bishop of Carlisle, collector of the Reliques of English Poetry, were among its early members. The opinion formed by the club of a new work was speedily

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His works brought him in large sums; difficulty and distress, however, still clung to him, poetry "had found him poor and she kept him so". From heedless profusion and extravagance, chiefly in dress, and from a benevolence which knew no limits while his funds lasted, Goldsmith was scarcely ever free from debt. The gaming table also presented irresistible attractions. Thus he was forced to write incessantly; he produced historical works, Histories oi Rome, of England, distinguished by their extreme superficiality and lack of research, no less than by enchanting grace of style. In 1770 appeared his Deserted Village, a companion poem to the Traveller, and even more exquisitely graceful. He also wrote two comedies The Goodnatured Man, and She Stoops to Conquer; the latter is still occasionally acted. In 1774, his brilliant and feverish career was terminated ; his disease was aggravated by disquietude of mind, arising from the disorder in his affairs. He was buried in the church-yard of the Temple, and a monument was erected to his memory in Westminster Abbey, for which his friend Samuel Johnson wrote a Latin inscription. The Vicar of Wakefield, in spite of the great inconsistency of its plot, will ever remain one of those rare gems which no length of time can tarnish. The gentle humour embodied in the simple Dr. Primrose, the delicate contrast of character exhibited in the other personages, the atmosphere of simplicity, naturalness and cheerfulness which envelopes all the scenes and incidents, will contribute to make this story a classic for all times. A great part of the charm of the novel consists in the art of writing the author has displayed in it. The style, always easy, transparent, harmonious and expressive, remains for ever in the reader's memory. Finally, the humour of the book is all good-humour, there is scarcely a touch of ill-nature, of even satire, in it from beginning to end. Samuel Johnson has well characterized his friend Goldsmith in his epitaph — "as a ruler of our affections, and mover alike of our laughter and our tears, as gentle as he is prevailing." known all over London, and had great influence. The Club still exists.

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Samuel Johnson.

As a poet, Goldsmith is one of the pioneers who broke down the artificial barriers which had been erected against a natural literature. Foremost among his poems stand The Traveller and The Deserted Village. The plan of The Traveller is natural and simple. The poet has reached some Alpine height, whence he looks down on the kingdoms below. He views the scene with delight, but sighs to think that human happiness is so rare. "Is there no spot" he asks "where true happiness can be found?" Natives of many countries are summoned and each praises his own, and so the poet concludes that the degree of happiness will be about the same in all nations. In The Deserted Village "sweet Auburn", the poet has embodied many of his personal recollections. The present desolation of the place strikes the heart more painfully after the lovely pictures of vanished joy set before us. The soft features of the landscape, the evening sports of "the village train", the various sounds of life rising from the cottage homes, the venerable figure of the meek but earnest country-preacher, the buzzing school and the pedantic school-master, the white-washed ale-house with its "parlour splendours", attract by turns our pleased attention, as we peruse the poem; and not the least touching is the poet's yearning to return to the place of his childhood "to die at home at last". Perhaps the most striking figure in the social and literary history of the latter half of the 18 th century is that of Samuel Johnson (1709—1784). His career was eminently that of a man of letters, and the slow and laborious efforts by which, in spite of every obstacle, personal as well as material, he raised himself to the highest intellectual supremacy, present a spectacle equally instructive to others and honourable to himself. He was born at Lichfield in Staffordshire, where the cathedral now possesses a monument erected to him; his father was a learned but struggling bookseller; and Samuel exhibited, from his very childhood, the same singular union of mental power and constitutional indolence, ambition and hypochondriacal gloom, which distinguished him through life. He was dis-

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figured ancl half-blinded by a scrofulous disorder, which detracted from a presence otherwise naturally imposing, and which, at the same time, afflicted him with strange involuntary contortions, reacting upon his mind and temper and making him sombre, despondent and irritable. In the various humble schools where he received his early education, he invariably took the first place. He entered Pembroke College, Oxford, where he remained for about three years, and was remarkable for the roughness and uncouthness of his manners, and no less for his wit and insubordination, as well as for that sturdy spirit of independence which made him reject with indignation any offer of assistance. Misfortune in his father's trade compelled him to leave the University without a degree and, his father dying soon after, he was left penniless. He was for a short time an usher in a school, but being by person and nature utterly unfit for such a situation, he set up a school for himself, marrying at the same time a widow, Mrs. Porter, old enough to be his mother, and who was neither wealthy, prepossessing nor intellectually endowed, but to whom he was sincerely attached. After an unsuccessful career of a year and a half, Johnson travelled to London in company with David Garrick, one of his pupils, carrying with him the unfinished manuscript of his tragedy Irene. Without fortune, without friends, of singularly uncouth and forbidding exterior, Johnson entered upon the career of a bookseller's hack or literary drudge, and, as an obscure labourer for the press, he furnished criticisms, prefaces, translations, in short, all kinds of humble literary work. During this miserable portion of his career, when he dined in a cellar upon the meanest fare and when his ragged coat and torn shoes made him ashamed to appear at the table of his publisher, he retained all his native dignity of mind and severe honesty of principle. There is something affecting in the picture of this great and noble scholar labouring on through toil and distress which would have crushed most men, and which, though it roughened his manners, only intensified his humanity.

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Samuel Johnson.

He first attracted attention in 1738, by the publication of his satire, entitled London, a reproduction of the third satire of Juvenal. His next publication was the Life of Savage, a most unhappy poet, whom Johnson had known well and with whom he had often wandered supperless and homeless about the streets of London at midnight. During the eight years extending from 1747 to 1755, Johnson was engaged in the execution of his laborious undertaking, his great Dictionary of the English Language, which long occupied the place in England of the Dictionary of the Academy in France. Owing to Johnson's ignorance of the Teutonic tongues the etymological part of the work is of no value, but the accurate and comprehensive definitions, and, above all, the interesting quotations added to exemplify the different senses of the words, which are either some striking passages of poetry and eloquence, or some historical fact or scientific distinction, render it a book of lasting practical worth. Johnson's greatest prose work, the Lives of the Poets (1779—1781), combines great vigour of thought with happiness of illustration. The plan is defective, as the lives of the earlier poets are altogether omitted, and, on the other hand, are given the lives of poets not worth remembering. His criticism, too, is not free from prejudice. Johnson also carried on alone two periodicals, the Idler and the Rambler which want the ease, grace, pleasantry, knowledge of the world and variety, which gave such charm to the Tatler and Spectator. The serious and somewhat pedantic style of the work was ill calculated for general readers, and it was no favourite with the public. The author's use of hard, long-tailed words in — osity and — ation was a common complaint, yet his style often rose into passages of grandeur and beauty; and his inculcation of moral and religious duty was earnest and impressive. The species of periodical essay-writing may be said to terminate with the Rambler. Soon after the accession of George IH., in 1762, when Johnson had reached the age of 53, he was gratified with a government pension of £ 300 a year, and now found himself, for the first time in his life, placed above want,

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and enabled to indulge, not only his constitutional indolence, but that noble charity and benevolence which transformed his dwelling into a sort of asylum for helpless indigence. In spite of his own poverty, he had maintained u n d e r his roof a strange assembly of pensioners on his bounty; such were Anna Williams, a blind poetess; Mrs. Dumoulins, and Levett, a sort of humble practitioner of medicine among the most miserable classes of London; and a thousand anecdotes are related of the generosity of Johnson to these inmates, with whose quarrels and repinings he bore, and over whom he watched with unrelaxing kindness. After a long illness, during part of which he entertained the most gloomy apprehensions, his mind grew serene, and he died full of that faith which he had so vigorously defended and inculcated. The life of Johnson would be incomplete without mentioning his biographer J a m e s B o s w e l l (1740—1795), a young Scottish advocate, whose Life of Johnson is the most interesting account imaginable of a literary career and a literary epoch. Although Boswell belonged to a nation which Johnson regarded with unreasonable aversion, and though he was vain and conceited, his sincere admiration for Johnson established a lasting friendship between these two dissimilar characters and Boswell has produced not only the most life-like portrait of the person, manners and conversation of Johnson, but has given so admirable a picture of the society amid which he played so brilliant a part, that its members seem to speak, walk and think, as it were, in our presence. Boswell evidently possessed considerable dramatic power to have rendered his portraits and dialogues so animated and varied. It is a remarkable fact that while the works of Johnson are becoming less and less familiar to modern readers, his life, as related b y Boswell, is constantly increasing in popularity. T h e D a w n of R o m a n t i c

Poetry.

Towards the middle of the 18 th century a great revolution in literature took place. Up to this time the inMann, Sketch.

(J

Dawn of Romantic Poetry.

81

and enabled to indulge, not only his constitutional indolence, but that noble charity and benevolence which transformed his dwelling into a sort of asylum for helpless indigence. In spite of his own poverty, he had maintained u n d e r his roof a strange assembly of pensioners on his bounty; such were Anna Williams, a blind poetess; Mrs. Dumoulins, and Levett, a sort of humble practitioner of medicine among the most miserable classes of London; and a thousand anecdotes are related of the generosity of Johnson to these inmates, with whose quarrels and repinings he bore, and over whom he watched with unrelaxing kindness. After a long illness, during part of which he entertained the most gloomy apprehensions, his mind grew serene, and he died full of that faith which he had so vigorously defended and inculcated. The life of Johnson would be incomplete without mentioning his biographer J a m e s B o s w e l l (1740—1795), a young Scottish advocate, whose Life of Johnson is the most interesting account imaginable of a literary career and a literary epoch. Although Boswell belonged to a nation which Johnson regarded with unreasonable aversion, and though he was vain and conceited, his sincere admiration for Johnson established a lasting friendship between these two dissimilar characters and Boswell has produced not only the most life-like portrait of the person, manners and conversation of Johnson, but has given so admirable a picture of the society amid which he played so brilliant a part, that its members seem to speak, walk and think, as it were, in our presence. Boswell evidently possessed considerable dramatic power to have rendered his portraits and dialogues so animated and varied. It is a remarkable fact that while the works of Johnson are becoming less and less familiar to modern readers, his life, as related b y Boswell, is constantly increasing in popularity. T h e D a w n of R o m a n t i c

Poetry.

Towards the middle of the 18 th century a great revolution in literature took place. Up to this time the inMann, Sketch.

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Thomson.

fluence of the artificial writers had been more or less felt; they had been imitated and repeated until these imitations had outlived the taste of the public for artificial subjects and artistic forms. Under the influence of this weariness, the poets began to seek for new materials; and turning their attention to early poets, felt their freshness and naturalness as distinguished from the artificial and critical verse of the writers of the Augustan period. It is generally allowed that the disposition of the poets to depart from the polished and formal style owed its rise in no small degree to the several collections of old poetry. The narrative ballad and the narrative romance now struck their roots afresh in English poetry. Poets began to seek among the ruder times of history for wild, natural stories of human life; and were thus imperceptibly led to a love of nature herself. Natural scenery had been hitherto only used as a background to the picture of human life, real or artificial. It now began to hold a larger place in poetry, and, after a time, increased so much, as to oecupy a distinct place of its own. The first poem exclusively devoted to the description of scenes from nature appeared while Pope was still alive. It was called The Seasons and was written by James Thomson (1700—1748). The poet was born in a retired village near Kelso, in the county of Roxburgh. In his eighteenth year Thomson was sent to Edinburgh College. His father dying soon after, he travelled to London, like Smollett, to try his fortune in a literary career, and carrying with him the unfinished sketch of his poem of Winter. His countryman, Mallet, who enjoyed some authority as a critic, assisted him in finding some employment as a tutor to a young nobleman, and encouraged him to publish his poem, which was received with great favour, and was kindly welcomed by Pope. In time Thomson added Summer, Spring and Autumn, and so completed the cycle of The Seasons. He travelled for some time on the Continent; on his return he received some easy office from the Lord Chancellor Talbot, which assisted him in obtaining independence. After some reverses, fortune smiled on him again; he lived in

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•comparative opulence at Kew Lane, near Richmond, in rural retirement, cultivating his garden, indulging in his natural indolence, and growing, as some friend said of him, "more fat than bard beseem'd." He died unexpectedly and prematurely of a fever caught on a boating excursion on the Thames. He was buried in Richmond church without an inscription, but a monument has been erected to him in the Poets' Corner of Westminster Abbey. The Seasons, consisting of the four detached poems dedicated to Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter, must be •considered as the corner-stone of Thomson's literary fame. The poem gives a general, and at the same time a minute description of all the phenomena of nature during an English year. He has watched every fleeting smile or frown on the ever-changing face of nature, but he has watched it, as Johnson finely observed, "with the eye which nature only bestows on a poet — the eye that distinguishes, in every thing presented to its view, whatever there is on which imagination can delight to rest, and with a mind that at once comprehends the vast and attends to the minute." Thomson is especially happy in sketching the habits of birds and domestic animals, and his poem breathes throughout a warm benevolence and a deep sense of the majesty and goodness of God. Not unfrequently the poem is spoilt with false ornament. The language is in the highest degree florid and luxuriant, and sometimes may be charged with filling the ear more than the mind. Thomson produced five tragedies between 1729 and 1745, one of which, Sophonisba is remembered for one line which condemned the play "0, Sophonisba, Sophonisba 0!" It gave occasion to a waggish parody: — "0, Jemmy Thomson, Jemmy Thomson 0!" which, for a while, resounded through the town. They are none of them worthy of his name, though free from the moral defects of the previous age. In point of literary finish, Thomson's latest poem, The Castle of Indolence, is superior to The Seasons. To this poem he brought not only the full nature, but the perfect

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art, of the poet. The materials of this exquisite composition are derived originally from Tasso, but he was more immediately indebted for them to the Faerie Qtieene, the style, metre, manner and genius of which he caught most happily. It is an allegory of the enchanted "Land of Drowsihead", in which the unhappy Victims of Indolence find themselves hopeless captives, and their deliverance from durance by the Knight Industry, whose pedigree and training are given in an exact imitation of Spenser's manner, is relieved with occasional touches of a sly and pleasant humour. Thomson is the author of the deservedly popular lyric song: Rule Britannia, from the masque of Alfred, written in conjunction with Mr. Mallet. Two poets, Collins and Gray, belonging to the same school, are distinguished in lyrical poetry — a species of composition of which the chief peculiarities are energy of sentiment, fire and vivacity of expression, and a modulated melodiousness of measure adapting it for music. The history of W i l l i a m Collins (1721—1759) is brief but painful. He was a native of Chichester, where his father was a hatter and alderman. He received a learned education at Winchester and Oxford. When he left the University he repaired to London, a literary adventurer with many projects in his head and little money in his pocket. His learning was extensive, but he wanted steadiness of purpose and application. He published some odes that attracted no attention. He sank under this disappointment and the pressure of debts, and became still more indolent and dissipated. About this time he inherited £ 2000; he paid his debts, but was not able to enjoy the rest of his fortune; he fell into a nervous insanity, and after lingering for five years in this melancholy state, died at Chichester, tended by his sister. After his death, his odes began to be appreciated without any adventitious aid to bring them into notice, and are now acknowledged to be among the best of their kind in the language. They charm by their figurative

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language and description, the simplicity and beauty of their dialogues and sentiment, and their melodious versification. His most commonly quoted lyric is the ode entitled The .Passions, in which Fear, Rage, Pity, Joy, Hope, Melancholy and other abstract qualities are successively introduced trying their skill on different musical instruments. Their respective choice of these, and the manner in which each Passion acquits itself is v e r y ingeniously conceived. Some of his smaller and less ambitious lyrics, -as the Verses to the Memory of Thomson, the Dirge in dymbeline, and the fine verses, How sleep the brave, will be sure of lasting fame. Thomson knew Collins and loved him, and it is supposed he gave a sketch of his character in one of the •stanzas of the Castle of Indolence: — "Of all the gentle tenants of that place "There was a man of special grave remark; " A certain tender gloom o'erspread his face, "Pensive not sad, in thought involved not dark; " T e n thousand glorious systems would he build, " T e n thousand great ideas filled his mind, "But with the clouds they fled and left no trace behind." Thomas Gray (1716—1771) Collins' contemporary and fellow-poet, was also a lonely man, the painful domestic •circumstances of his youth having given him a tinge of melancholy and pensive reflection, which can be traced in his life as well as in his poetry. His father was a money-scrivener — the same occupation as that carried on by Milton's father — a respectable •citizen, but a harsh husband, who alienated a tender, amiable wife's affection. She separated from him and to her unremitting exertions, Gray was indebted for a learned education, first at Eton, then at Cambridge. Having formed a friendship with Horace Walpole, son of the Prime Minister, he was induced to accompany him in his travels on the Continent; but being of dissimilar dispositions, they quarrelled and parted. Walpole generously took all the blame on himself, but perhaps Johnson was right in surmising that Gray, conscious of his own superiority, m a y

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Gray.

have been apt to watch his own dignity with fervour and punctilious jealousy, and in his association with superiors to exact that attention which they refused to pay voluntarily. When Gray returned to England, he took up his abode at Cambridge, where, with short intervals, he spent the remainder of his life, without having any liking for the place. On his father's death he received a small fortune which was enough for his wants, and henceforth devoted himself entirely to study. "History, criticism, metaphysics, morals, politics" says one of his friends, the Rev. Mr. Temple, "made a principal part of his studies, and he had a fine taste in painting, prints and architecture". Moreover, he had studied the Greek poets with such intense devotion, and their spirit and essence seem to have sunk so deep into his mind, that they gave a peculiar character to his own composition. Gray's first public appearance as a poet was made in 1747, when his Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College was puplished. Four years after, his Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard appeared and at once rose into universal favour. His poems were far from numerous, but all have that exquisite finish, for which he stands almost alone in literature. He wrote, among other poems, two great Pindaric odes the Progress of Poesy and The Bard, (the latter is founded on a tradition current in Wales, that Edward the First, after having completed the conquest of that country, ordered all the Bards who fell into his hands, to be put to death) besides his beautiful Ode to Adversity. Gray was appointed professor of Modern History in the University, but partly from ill health, partly from indolence, he never performed the functions of that chair. He was seized with sudden illness and died in the 55 th year of his age. He appears not to have been popular among his colleagues; he was nice, reserved and proud — a haughty scholar, but not void of kind and human feeling. The Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard is a masterpiece from beginning to end. The thoughts, indeed, are obvious enough, but the dignity with which they are expressed, the immense range of allusion and description

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with which they are illustrated, and the finished grace of the language and versification in which they are embodied, give to the work something of that perfection of design and execution which we see in an antique statue. The poems of Collins and Gray are consummate examples of perfectly English work, wrought in the spirit of classic art. The refined workmanship of these poets, their manner of blending natural feeling and natural scenery, their studious care in the choice of words, are worthy of special study. W i l l i a m Cowper (1731—1800). Among the poets who illustrate that love of the natural which sprang up towards the middle of the 18 th century, none has become more familiar, nor more universally beloved, than William Cowper. The story of his life is singularly sad. He belonged emphatically to the aristocracy of England; his father, Dr. Cowper, a chaplain of George II., was a nephew of the Lord Chancellor Cowper; his mother was allied to some of the noblest families and descended by four different lines from Henry II. The poet was born at Great Berkhampstead at his father's rectory, in Hertfordshire. In his sixth year he lost his mother, whose tender and affectionate love he remembered and cherished through life, and whom he has immortalized, when smitten with age and mental infirmity, in those touching lines, On Receiving my Mother's Picture. His mind in childhood exhibited that gentleness, timidity and diffidence which ripened into such bitter fruits in his after-life. After his mother's death, the sensitive boy of six years was sent to a boarding-school, at Market Street in Hertfordshire, where the tyranny of a senior school-fellow held the timid and home-sick boy in complete subjection. From this place he was removed to Westminster School, where, as he says, he "served a seven years' apprenticeship to the classics". Being intended for the law, he entered an attorney's office at eighteen, with the future Lord Chancellor Thurlow for his fellow-clerk. He never made the law a study; in the attorney's office he and Thurlow were "constantly employed from morning till night in giggling and making giggle". When called to

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the Bar in 1754, he lived for some time an idle, agreeable life, in his Temple chambers, writing gay verses, commingling with the wits of the Nonsense Club, which consisted nearly altogether of Westminster men. The death of his father roused him from this, the happiest time of his life. His patrimony was small, he was now thirty-two, and almost "unprovided with an aim". In this crisis, a friend procured for him the situation of Clerk of the Journals to the House of Lords. Now occurred the first terrible development of the disease, so often manisfested in the nervous frame of those gifted with the "divine soul", which, while sluir.bering beneath an external surface of gaiety or even of wild jollity, rages like a volcano in the mind's inner depths. The idea of making a public appearance, and, above all, the horror of passing an examination to test his fitness for the post, drove him to despair and an attempt at suicide. This attempt failed, but his reason had given way, and the next eighteen months of his life were spent at an asylum. His mental disease took the form of a deep religious melancholy. Possessing a small income .and assisted by his friends, he spent the rest of liis days in privacy, first at Huntingdon, in the parsonage of Mr. Unwin; and when he died soon after, Cowper went to live at Olney in Buckinghamshire with the widow, who had the tenderest friendship for him and who never forsook him, though his attacks of madness thrice returned. In the intervals of his attacks lie amused his mind with the taming of hares, the construction of bird-cages, gardening, and composing poetry. This happy change was increased by the presence of Lady Austen, a woman of a cheerful, accomplished mind, whose conservation had a salutary influence on him. It was through her suggestion that he wrote the immortal story of John Gilpin, and she started in him the first idea of his greatest work The Task. A slight shade of jealousy on the part of Mrs. Unwin caused, it is said, this memorable friendship to be dissolved. Cowper was fifty years old when he published his first poems, but he never again relinquished the occupation ; he now set himself the task of translating Homer.

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In the meanwhile, the poet and Mrs. Unwin liad removed to Weston, a beautiful village near Olney; here he enjoyed the intercourse of his cousin, Lady Hesketh, a woman of refined and fascinating manners, and of the Throckmorton family, the proprietors of Weston. His malady, however, returned upon him with full force, and Mrs. Unwin being now rendered helpless by palsy, the task of nursing her fell upon the poor, dejected poet. In 1796, Mrs. Unwin died. The poet's mind remained clouded, until in 1800 death released him from his sorrows. The Task (1784), Cowper's great poem, is written in six books, which are entitled: The Sofa, The Time-Piece, The Garden, The Winter Evening, The Winter Morning, The Winter Walk at Noon. His aim was to keep up in his poetry a natural and colloquial style, and he is the declared enemy of all pomp of diction. His pictures of life and nature, whether of rural scenery or indoor-life, have seldom been surpassed for truth and picturesqueness. Of all English poets, Cowper is essentially the painter of domestic life; the quiet home-circle of middle English society, the tea-table, the newspaper and the hearth, have derived from him a beauty and dignity which other men have failed to communicate to the proudest scenes of camps and courts. Nor is his humour the least attractive of his many qualities. Many of his shorter songs are elegant and full of humour. His beautiful lines, On Receiving my Mother's Picture, will ever be read with delight. His comic ballad, John Gilpin (1782), is a general favourite with the young. His last verses, The Castaioay, leave a sad impression on the mind of the reader. Cowper's Letters must be mentioned as some of the best in English literature; naturalness and a sweet delicate humour play throughout these charming compositions, like golden sunlight on a clear stream. In his Translation of Homer, he aimed at avoiding Pope's artificial, smooth style, but made his version harsh and rugged, without approaching nearer to the true character of the original. The middle of the 18 th century was remarkable for

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Poetical Forgeries.

several nearly contemporaneous attempts at literary frauds, viz. the poetical forgeries of Macpherson, Chatterton and Ireland. James Macpherson (1738—1796) has attracted more attention than the other two, and has, in some sort, survived them. He was a Scotchman of humble origin and bred as a country schoolmaster. He claimed to have come into possession of some fragments of ancient Gaelic poetry, collected in the Highlands of Scotland. He was encouraged to publish them, and at their appearance they attracted general attention, and a subscription was raised to enable him to search for more material in the Highlands. The result of his research was Fingal, an ancient epic poem, together with several other poems, professedly translated from the original of Ossian, the son of Fingal, a Gaelic prince of the third century. Fingal was at first received enthusiastically, but soon gave ground to a most vehement literary controversy. The Highlanders, eager for the honour of their country, maintained the authenticity of these poems, and asserted that the name of Ossian, the supposed author, together with many persons, descriptions and events, which are mentioned in the poems, had been familiar to them as the legends of their childhood. The English critics, on the other hand, among whom Dr. Johnson occupied a foremost place, doubted the possibility of the existence, in the third and fourth centuries, of such chivalrous feelings and sentiments as Fingal describes, or even of any written literature at all. Macpherson might have settled the dispute at once by producing the originals, but this he perseveringly refused to do, nor was there, after his death, among his papers a single line that might throw any light upon this mysterious affair. The wild imagery of Ossian and its sensational language made the poem long popular throughout Europe; in a bad Italian translation it formed the favourite reading of Napoleon I., and, in some countries, there still lingers the conviction that it is genuine poetry. Macpherson acquired a handsome fortune and erected

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an elegant villa in his native village, where he spent the last years of his life in ease. Thomas Chatterton (1752—1770). The career of Thomas Chatterton, "the marvellous boy that perished in his pride" was neither so long nor so successful as Macpherson's. He was the son of a schoolmaster at Bristol and lost his father early, so that he had only a charityschool education; yet he gave early signs of rare intellectual powers. He was indeed a precocious genius, for at the age of eleven he produced verses which surpass every other juvenile production of any poet. He was passionately fond of black-letter, heraldry and English antiquities; and though he prosecuted those studies under the most disadvantageous circumstances, such was his unwearied zeal that he deeply imbibed the spirit of a past age. He came before the world with writings which he alleged to have discovered in a coffer preserved in the muniment room of the old church of St. Mary Redcliffer and passed them off as the poems of a monk Rowley, who, he pretended, had lived in the 15th century. He produced his forgeries gradually, usually taking advantage of some public occurrence having some relation to them and therefore likely to give them an interest. These poems were of great variety and unquestionable merit, and though suspicion was at last roused with regard to their genuineness, it was thought impossible that such works should be produced by an uneducated boy, without aid and apparent motive. Burning with literary ambition, Chatterton repaired to London to gain subsistence as an author, and when every attempt failed, he ended his life, at the age of 17 years and 9 months, by taking a dose of arsenic. He left a mother and a sister to whom he was warmly attached, and whom he supported as long as his means lasted. The citizens of Bristol have erected a monument to their native poet. William Henry Ireland (1777—1835) wishing to gratify his father, who was a dealer in scarce books, prints, etc. in his morbid desire to possess some scrap of Shakspeare's own hand-writing, manufactured a number of docu-

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Scottish Poets: King- James I.

ments which he pretended to have accidentally met with at the house of a gentleman of fortune. These his father published under the title Miscellaneous Papers and Legal Instruments under the Hand and Seal of William Shakspeare. He also produced a play, Vortigem, as belonging to Shakspeare, but on its being acted the imposture became manifest to the audience. The younger Ireland made a public confession of liis forgeries in his Authentic Account of the Shakspeare Manuscripts, in which he vindicated his father from wilful participation in the fraud. Scottish Poets. In casting a retrospective glance at the history of literature in Scotland, our attention will be arrested by a group of poets who flourished in the 15 th century, the century which, in English literary history, was the most unproductive. A foremost place among these Scotch poets may be assigned to King James I. (1394—1437) who ascended the Scottish throne in 1423. He wrote, among others, a long poem, called the King's Quhair or Book, which gives a description of his long confinement in Windsor Castle and of the attachment he formed, while there, for the lady who, afterwards, became his wife. King James has been called the Scottish Chaucer. William Dunbar (1460—1520) the great satirist, is best known for his Dance of the Seven Deadly Sins. His Golden Targe and The Thistle and the Rose are poems of an allegorical kind. Gavin Douglas, bishop of Dunkeld (1474—1522), wrote the Palace of Honour and translated the sEneid. Sir David Lindsay (end of 15 th century to about 1567) was the author of a satire, which he called The Three Estates. Then for upwards of two centuries no great poet made his appearance in Scotland, although there is no lack, during that time, of Scottish songs and ballads by unknown or forgotten authors, which form one of the finest collections of that kind of literature. Since the transference of the court to London, the Scottish dialect had fallen into disuse among men of rank and fashion, but it still lived

Fergusson, Ramsay, Burns.

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in the mouths of the people and in a line of songs and ballads — "springing up like wild flowers from their hearts"; the authors of these in many instances being nameless. The middle of the 18 th century produced two poets Robert Fergusson, the poet of Scottish city life, and, a greater, Allan Ramsay (1686—1758), the author of the Gentle Shepherd, a tender picture of Scottish count] y life and love among the poor. Robert Burns (1759—1796). One of the fellowworkers with Cowper in bringing poetry into the channels of truth and nature, and the most popular author of modern Scotland, Robert Burns, was a native of the liamlet of Alloway in Ayrshire, and son of a peasant farmer of the humbler class. Burns' father was a hardworking man, and Robert grew up among a virtuous and religious household's struggles with poverty and toil. He received what education was to be got at a village school, but after he was eleven years old, his father kept him at home to take part in the labour of his farm, on which, as he says himself, he worked like a galley-slave. Thus helping his parents, he yet grasped at every opportunity to improve himself by the perusal of the few books within his reach — the Spectator, Pope and Allan Ramsay — and collecting old songs and ballads from his mother and an old female domestic. It is impossible to contemplate the life of Burns at this time without a strong feeling of admiration and respect. His manly character, his love of his country, of the simple peasantry around him, his warm and true heart, elevate him in our esteem as much as the native force and beauty of his poetry. The true elements of poetry were in his life, as in his writings. From his youth his passions were unusually strong; they raged, he himself says, "like so many devils" till quenched in the stream of verse; and then he would pour forth with exquisite sensibility, tenderness and vigour, the lyrics which have made his name for ever immortal. But a nature like his was not equal to a life of continued hardship and severe prudence. The circumstances of the family became still worse after the death of the elder Burns. A speculation of having a farm

94

Scottish Poets.

of his own failing, the poet gave up in despair, and contemplated emigrating to the West Indies. In order to raise the funds for the voyage, he was induced to publish a collection of his poems (1786), (printed at Kilmarnock), the popularity of which was so instantaneous and universal that, with his natural impulsiveness, he abandoned his plan a n d repaired to Edinburgh. He was received with unbounded applause among the highly cultivated society of "the northern Athens", and for a time became the wonder and idol of the day, soon to be cast into cold neglect. He cleared from £ 500 to £ 900 from a second edition of his poems; with this he retired to the farm of Ellisland on the Nith in Dumfriesshire, with his wife (formerly Miss Armour — Bonnie Jean), Edinburgh life perhaps had unfitted him for regular, everyday duties; the farm again proved a failure; his irregularities took a strong hold upon him; he removed to Dumfries, where he obtained a humble appointment in the Excise service. Meanwhile his health was undermined, and his career was drawing to a close. Sickness, utter poverty, the "proud man's contumely" and the bitter dregs of those dissipated habits to which his ardent, passionate nature was but too prone, cast heavy clouds upon the closing scenes of his short, pathetic life. He died at Dumfries in J u l y , 1796. In Burns, the highest and apparently most incompatible qualities were united to a degree which is very rarely met with: the most exquisite tenderness, the broadest and the most refined humour, the most delicate and yet most powerful perception of natural beauty, the highest finish a n d the easiest negligence of style. His writings are chiefly lyric, consisting of songs of inimitable excellence, but he has also produced works either of a narrative or satirical character, and in some the lyric element is combined with the descriptive. The longest and most remarkable of his poems is Tam o'Shanter, a tale of popular witch-superstition, which displays more various powers than any of his other productions, beginning with low, comic humour and Bacchanalian revelry, and ranging through the various styles of

Burns.

95

the descriptive, the terrible, the supernatural, and the ludicrous. The poem reads as if it were composed in one transport of inspiration, before the bard had time to cool or slacken in his fervour. Another inimitable poem,_ half narrative, but set thick with glorious songs, is The Jolly Beggars. The Dialogue between the Twa Dogs is an elaborate comparison between the relative degree of virtue and happiness granted to the rich and to the poor. Burns declares the balance to be pretty even. His description of the joys and consolations of the poor man's lot is perhaps even more beautiful in this poem than in the more generally popular Cotter's Saturday Night. His songs, properly so called, are numerous and generally of great beauty, some exceedingly fine; many are songs of patriotism, but most of love; intensity of feeling, picturesqueness of expression and admirable melody are their distinguishing qualities. In most of them, there is the finest union of personal sentiment with the most complete assimilation of the poet's mind to the loveliness of external nature, as in The Banks O'Doon. The Banks O'Doon. "Ye banks and braes o' bonnie Doon, "How can ye bloom sae fresh and fair! "How can ye chant, ye little birds, "And I sae weary, fu' o' care! "Thou'lt break my heart, thou warbling bird, "That wantons thro' the flowering thorn: "Thou minds me o' departed joys, "Departed — never to return. "Thou'lt break my heart, thou bonnie bird, "That sings beside thy mate, "For sae I sat, and sae 1 sang, "And wist na o' my fate. "Aft hae I rov'd by bonnie Doon, "To see the rose and woodbine twine; "And ilka bird sang o' its luve, "And fondly sae did I o' mine.

96

The Drama of the 18th Century.

"Wi' lightsome heart I pu'd a rose, "Fu' sweet upon its thorny tree; "And my fause luver stole the rose, "But ah! he left the thorn wi' me." — The Drama. In tracing the drama from the middle of the 18 th century, when it had become dull in the hands of Addison, Thomson and Johnson, to the end of the 18 th and beginning of the 19 th century, the chief names to be noted are those of Goldsmith, Garrick and Sheridan. We have already named Goldsmith, whose two comedies, The GoocL-Natured Man and She Stoops to Conquer, are still remembered. The latter is still acted; it is founded on the ridiculous incident of two travelling parties mistaking a gentleman's house for an inn, an adventure which is said to have occurred to Goldsmith himself. David Garrick (1716—1779), the greatest performer on the English stage since the days of Burbage and Alleyn, was also a theatrical manager, and in this capacity, deserves praise for having banished from the stage many pieces of unwholesome tendencies. He wrote several comedies, of which The Lying Valet and Miss in her Teens are the best. Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1751—1816) who is considered the best dramatist of this period, was certainly one of the most remarkable figures in its social, political and intellectual life. He was endowed by nature, in a degree little inferior to Burke, with the talents of an orator. His colloquial repartees and witticism made him the darling of society. His whole life, both in Parliament and in the world, was a succession of extravagance and imprudence; and the ingenious shifts by which he endeavoured to stave off his embarrassments, and the jokes with which he disarmed even his angriest creditors, would of themselves furnish matter for a most amusing jest-book. He died in hopeless distress, yet was buried with princely pomp. St. Patrick's, The Rivals, and The Duenna are his earlier plays; of these The Rivals, (1775) is the best. He had evidently copied some of the characters from Humphrey Clinker, above all Mrs. Malaprop, whose prototype is the

Historians — Hume.

97

Mrs. Winifred Jenkins of Humphrey Clinker, and whose mistakes in talking have become as familiar as household words. Her simile: — "as headstrong as an allegory on the banks of the Nile", is one of the happiest. In 1777, Sheridan published two more plays, The Trip to Scarborough and The School for Scandal. The last-named comedy is said to surpass any other in plot, character, incident and wit. It was most carefully prepared by the author, who moulded and remoulded most of the passages before publication. The characters in this play are taken from Fielding with all their faults; the careless, wild young man is generous and fascinating, while seriousness and gravity are united to hypocrisy. His later play, The Critic, is a farce in which are introduced rehearsals of plays, which gives the author an opportunity of criticizing dramatists, actors and managers. His greatest achievement as an orator he made during the progress of the impeachment of Warren Hastings (1788—1795). Historians. David Hume (1711—1776) was descended from an old Scottish family; he tried law and commerce and abandoned both, his dearest ambition being irresistibly set upon literary fame. He published philosophical works, A Treatise of Human Nature and Essays, Moral and Philosophical. Some time later, his Treatise of Human Nature reappeared remodelled under the title Inquiry concerning Human Understanding (1748). Hume's ethical system makes the virtue of actions depend entirely on utility. All this time Hume lived in very narrow circumstances. With a view to the promotion of his studies he accepted the office of librarian to the Faculty of Advocates at Edinburgh, for which, however, he received no salary. He now turned his attention to history, and, in 1754, published the first volume of his History of England, which was so much attacked for excusing the political crimes and follies of the Stuarts, that Hume planned leaving his native country for ever. He remained, however, to publish five more volumes of the History and by degrees rose in fame and wealth. He accepted the situation of Mann, Sketch.

7

98

Robertson.

Under-Secretary of State which he held for two years, and returned to his native city, Edinburgh, on an income of a thousand a year. The Histoi~y of England is not an historical authority, but it is an elegant and interesting narrative. Hume was constantly and carefully revising it in point of style, but was too indolent to be exact, or to sift truth from tradition; moreover, he was too indifferent to sympathize warmly with any party and too sceptical to trace the destinies of a nation to the providence of a Higher Power. Smollett, the novelist, had likewise written a History of England to the year 1765. The portion of this work, from the Revolution to the death of George II., is usually printed as a continuation of Hume. Smollett's style is fluent, but the work, likewise, abounds in error. William Robertson (1721—1793), also a Scotchman, was born at Borthwick, not far from the capital, and was bred to the profession of a clergyman, and in this calling evinced more than common eloquence. In 1759, he took the reading world by surprise by publishing a History of Scotland. Hardly any first work was more successful; the author was nominated one of his Majesty's chaplainsin-ordinary for Scotland, and was successively made Principal of the University of Edinburgh and Historiographer for Scotland. Robertson's History of Scotland deals chiefly with the history, character and misfortunes of Mary, Queen of Scots, and though he is not among her indiscriminate admirers, his aim was to awaken the sympathy of the reader strongly on her behalf. In 1769, appeared his second and greatest work The History of Charles V. and, eight years later, a History of America. Robertson never attained to the graceful ease and variety of Hume's style; his diction is stately, and somewhat open to Cowper's charge of "pomp and strut", but he masters his details with great skill and places them in a luminous order, which leads alike to perspicuity and a philosophic estimate of cause and result. His works, too, are not free from historical inaccuracies. Edward Gibbon (1737—1794), a greater historian than either Hume or Robertson, was born of wealthy parents

Gibbon.

99

at Putney near London. He was a sickly boy, in consequence of which his education was a desultory one; he was a devourer of books, chiefly on history, and spent a short time at Oxford, idly and unprofitably. At the University he became a convert to the Church of Rome, whereupon his father sent him to Lausanne, to the house of a Protestant pastor. Although he returned to the Protestant Church, the change was a mere matter of form; at heart he was an unbeliever. At Lausanne, however, he began to lead a studious life, a habit which he seldom relinquished. After his return to England he became a captain of the Hampshire militia. In 1764 he visited Rome; it was here that he conceived the first idea of the historical work which was to make him famous. "As I sat musing", he said "amidst the ruins of the Capitol, while the barefooted friars were singing vespers in the temple of Jupiter, the idea of writing the Decline and Fall of the City first started to my mind." The first volume of his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire appeared in 1776, the second and third followed in 1781; he then retired to Lausanne where he finished the three additional volumes in 1788. In 1793 he returned to England, and died soon after. "The conception of the whole subject of Gibbon's grand historical work is as poetical as a great picture. Rome, eastern and western, is painted in the centre, slowly dying like a lion. Around it he pictured all the nations and hordes that wrought its ruin, told their story from the beginning, and the result on themselves and the world of their victories over Rome. This picturesque plot he elaborated in the most masterly manner, calling to his aid all knowledge, ancient and modern, and a lofty, if sometimes pompous, style. Yet he was a great sceptic, and whenever he found an opportunity, he attacked Christianity in an indirect, sneering manner." The completion of this great work, the author has described in the following passage: — "It was on the day, or rather night, of the 27 th of June 1787, between the hours of eleven and twelve, that I wrote the last line of the last page in a summer-house in my garden. After laying down

100

Theologians — Butler, Paley.

my pen, I took several turns in a berceau, or covered walk of acacias, which commands a prospect of the country, the lake and the mountains. The air was temperate, the sky was serene, the silver orb of the moon was reflected from the waters, and all nature was silent. I will not dissemble the first emotions of joy on the recovery of my freedom, and perhaps the establishment of my fame. But my pride was soon humbled, and a sober melancholy was spread over my mind, by the idea that I had taken an everlasting leave of an old and agreeable companion, and that, whatever might be the future date of my History, the life of the Historian must be short and precarious." Theologians. The most prominent theologians of the 18 th century are Bishop Butler and William Paley. Bishop Butler (1692—1752), one of the great defenders of revealed religion, was likewise a deep thinker and acute reasoner. In order to place revealed religion on the basis of philosophy he wrote his great work Analogy of Religion, Natural and Revealed, to the Constitution and Course of Nature (for shortness' sake called Butler's Analogy) "reasoning from that part of the divine proceedings which comes under our view in the daily business of life, to that larger and more comprehensive part of these proceedings which is beyond our view, and which religion reveals." He argues "that the different changes which the human body as well as some of the lower animals undergo from their origin to their maturity, guarantee a further development into a spiritual body after death." All Butler's arguments on natural and revealed religion are marked by profound thought and sagacity, but the closeness of his reasoning makes demands upon the intellect and attention of the reader, which only the few are competent to give. To the general student, William Paley (1743—1805), is more accessible from the rare art he had of popularizing abstruse learning, and offering, in homely language, a system of practical, philosophical theology. His works are Elements of Moral and Political Philosophy (1785), Horoe PaulincB (1790),.

The Nineteenth Century.

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View of the Evidences of Christianity (1794), Natural Theology (1803). T h e 19th C e n t u r y . The R o m a n t i c School. The revolution in poetry, which had begun towards the middle of the 18 th century, was carried still further by the poets of the first part of the 19 th century, who are known as the poets of the Romantic School. They aimed at freedom in thought, in style and expression, and preferred taking their subjects from the romantic past of their own country to borrowing them from ancient classical history or legend. It is generally admitted that the publication, in 1765, of a collection of old English ballads by BishopPercy ofCarlisle(1728—1811), known asBeliques of Ancient English Poetry, aided, in no small degree, in directing the taste of the poets back to nature, simplicity and true passion, and to the appreciation of early English poetry. Their influence on all poetry subsequent to their publication has most readily been acknowledged by the poets themselves. The Collection contains a variety of ballads which had long been in the possession of the people. Some of the finest among them, as The Ballad of Chevy-Chase and The Battle of Otterbourne and others belong to the "North-Countree", and are illustrative of the Borderwarfare which was carried on for centuries between England and Scotland. But besides these, Percy gave specimens of songs and lyrics of later times, even including the period of the Civil War and the Restoration, accompanying the whole with learned notes, the result of his antiquarian researches. Sir Walter Scott (1771 — 1832), the poet who belonged emphatically to the Romantic School, the son of a Writer to the Signet, was born in Edinburgh. By both parents he was distantly connected with some of those old Border families, whose deeds and character were to become immortal through his genius. On account of a malady which caused lameness in young Walter, he was placed, at different times, under the charge of relations in and near Kelso, in the south-east of Scotland, and here, amidst beautiful scenery full of legendary traditions, he first be-

The Nineteenth Century.

101

View of the Evidences of Christianity (1794), Natural Theology (1803). T h e 19th C e n t u r y . The R o m a n t i c School. The revolution in poetry, which had begun towards the middle of the 18 th century, was carried still further by the poets of the first part of the 19 th century, who are known as the poets of the Romantic School. They aimed at freedom in thought, in style and expression, and preferred taking their subjects from the romantic past of their own country to borrowing them from ancient classical history or legend. It is generally admitted that the publication, in 1765, of a collection of old English ballads by BishopPercy ofCarlisle(1728—1811), known asBeliques of Ancient English Poetry, aided, in no small degree, in directing the taste of the poets back to nature, simplicity and true passion, and to the appreciation of early English poetry. Their influence on all poetry subsequent to their publication has most readily been acknowledged by the poets themselves. The Collection contains a variety of ballads which had long been in the possession of the people. Some of the finest among them, as The Ballad of Chevy-Chase and The Battle of Otterbourne and others belong to the "North-Countree", and are illustrative of the Borderwarfare which was carried on for centuries between England and Scotland. But besides these, Percy gave specimens of songs and lyrics of later times, even including the period of the Civil War and the Restoration, accompanying the whole with learned notes, the result of his antiquarian researches. Sir Walter Scott (1771 — 1832), the poet who belonged emphatically to the Romantic School, the son of a Writer to the Signet, was born in Edinburgh. By both parents he was distantly connected with some of those old Border families, whose deeds and character were to become immortal through his genius. On account of a malady which caused lameness in young Walter, he was placed, at different times, under the charge of relations in and near Kelso, in the south-east of Scotland, and here, amidst beautiful scenery full of legendary traditions, he first be-

102

Sir Walter Scott.

came acquainted with Percy's Reliques, which, most likely, gave his genius the true bent. But neither at the High School nor at the University of Edinburgh did he display any shining abilities. He was a devourer of those hooks that lay out of the province of schoolmasters an'd professors. Notwithstanding his lameness he was passionately fond of athletic sports, and a favourite among his companions as a jovial, amiable teller of stories possessed of a most tenacious memory. His father destined him for the Bar (his office-training and his father's character are reproduced in Redgauntlet), but he had little taste for his profession; his sympathies lay in another direction. He occupied himself with collecting Border-Ballads, obtaining, at the same time, a slight knowledge of the modern languages. A taste for German literature had been introduced by Henry Mackenzie, author of the Man of Feeling. Following the impulse given, Scott translated several ballads of Burger's; — The Erl King and Goetz of the Iron Hand by Goethe, which were his first publications. In 1797, Scott married Charlotte Charpentier, a lady of French extraction and great beauty, who possessed a moderate fortune of her own. Scott resided with his bride at Lasswade near Edinburgh; his lighter vanities were all blown away, he gave himself up to severe study and a busy life. In 1799, he obtained the appointment of SheriffDeputy of Selkirkshire with £ 300 a year, and removed, for the summer months, with his family to Ashestiel on the banks of his beloved Tweed. In 1802 appeared his Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, which was to do for Scotland what Percy's Reliques had done for England. It was a collection of original ballads mixed, where there was a gap in them, with his own productions and accompanied by learned notes. In 1805 appeared The Lay of the Last Minstrel, the first of his original poems, a picture of the wild Border-life of by-gone days, illustrating the habits and superstitions of former centuries. The theme and the style were so original, the enthusiasm of the poet was so real and earnest, that the public were carried away by it, and Scott's fame was established at once.

The Romantic School.

103

In 1806, he was appointed one of the principal Clerks of the Court of Session, which gave him the prospect of £ 800 a year. About the same time he unluckily entered into partnership with James Ballantyne, a printing and publishing firm in Edinburgh, which, however, was kept a secret. Fame and fortune smiled upon Scott. His house was never free from visitors; and by rising early and applying himself assiduously to his literary work during the morning hours, he was able to give up the rest of the day to the duties of hospitality and those country pursuits, which were so congenial to his heart. In 1808, he published another of his metrical tales, Marmion: A Tale of Flodden Field, his greatest poetical work, which carried the applause of the public to even a higher pitch. The Lady of the Lake, published in 1810, transported the enchanted reading world from the Lowlands to the beautiful Highlands of Scotland, into a new field and among unknown regions. Money flowing in from all sides, Scott began to realise his most ardent wish of becoming a land-owner. He purchased great tracts of land and began to build a beautiful mansion near the banks of the Tweed, the well-known Abbotsford, where he exercised an unbounded hospitality, "doing the honours for all Scotland". But Scott had reached the culminating point of his poetical fame in the Lady of the Lake; other metrical tales, Rokéby (1812), The Bridal of Triermain (1813), The Lord of the Isles (1815), Harold the Dauntless (1817), had not the same success; the public became tired of his style and turned their attention and admiration towards a new genius; Byron was making his appearance. Scott neither complained nor despaired; with his usual good sense and cheerfulness he abandoned poetry to launch into a new career, in which he found no equal. In 1814 appeared anonymously a novel, Waverley or 'Tis 60 Years Since, a tale of the rising in Scotland in 1745, in favour of Charles Edward, the Young Pretender, in which he united the historical with the familiar, pathos with humour. This novel was received with great applause, as were all the succeeding ones from the same pen, published as Waverley Novels. Year after year brought fresh

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Sir Walter Scott.

novels and fresh laurels. In 1820, Scott was made a Baronet by George IV., and, from that period until 1826, were Scott's halcyon days. Abbotsford, "that romance in stone and lime", and centre of hospitality, was settled on his eldest son (Scott had four children, two sons and two daughters) on his marrying an heiress. But this happy state of things was not to last. In 1826, the firm of Ballantyne broke down and involved Scott in its ruin; his wealth had been illusory, and he was found to owe £ 117,000. Stunned but resolute, he formed the gigantic plan of paying off this enormous debt by the labour of his pen; and deprived of the comforts to which he was accustomed, and amid family bereavement (his wife died in 1827), he published work after work, and in a few years had nearly reached the goal. But his health and intellect broke down under the burden of work and grief. He was sent to Italy to recruit his strength; it was too late and he hurried home to die in the old familiar place. It was on the 21st of September 1832, that Walter Scott breathed his last in the presence of his four children. "It was a beautiful day, so warm that every window was wide open, and so perfectly still that the sound of all others delicious to his ears — the gentle ripple of the Tweed over its pebbles — was distinctly audible as his children knelt round his bed, and his eldest son kissed and closed his eyes." Scott lies buried in the beautiful ruins of Dryburgh Abbey by the side of his wife. The romantic narrative poems of Scott form an epoch in the history of modern literature. In their subjects, their versification and their treatment, they were a novelty and an innovation, the success of which was as remarkable as their execution was brilliant. The material was derived from the legends and exploits of mediaeval chivalry, and the persons were borrowed partly from history, partly from imagination. Scott showed a power somewhat akin to that displayed by Shakspeare, in combining into one harmonious whole, actions borrowed partly from true history, and partly filled up from fictitious invention The theatre of his action was often placed in that picturesque Border region which spoke so powerfully to his heart, with whose ro-

Poems.

The Lay of the Last Minstrel, Marmion.

105

mantic legends he was so wonderfully familiar, and which furnished, from the inexhaustible stores of his memory, such a mass of striking incident and vivid detail. The Lay of the Last Minstrel is a weird Border story of the 16th century, related by an old minstrel, the last of his race, to the Duchess of Buccleuch and Monmouth, and gives a finished picture of stirring feudal times, introducing the tourney, the battle, and the attack of a castle. It consists of 6 cantos, which are bound together by some kind of framing — beautiful in itself and most appropriately introducing the cantos, — and contains in the opening lines: — "The way was long, the wind was cold, The minstrel was infirm and old," — etc. the fine description of the old Harper. Canto the second is ushered in by the picturesque description of Melrose Abbey. Canto the fifth opens with the well-known lines on the memory of the Bard, and canto the sixth with the stanza on the Love of Country. Marmion: A Tale of Flodden Field, again is laid in the 16 th century. It is a story of the enmity between England and Scotland which led, in 1513, to the battle of Flodden Field, in which the Scottish king James IV. was slain. The same faithful painting of feudal times as given in the Lay, is seen in Marmion, where it reaches its climax in the inimitable description of the battle of Flodden. Marmion, too, is divided into 6 cantos: The Castle (mark the warlike ring of the opening stanzas), the Convent, the Hostel or Inn, the Camp, the Court, the Battle. Marmion, a brave but unscrupulous English knight, is on his way to Scotland in order to negotiate with the Scottish king. In his train there is a disguised nun, whom he had induced to escape from her convent; he now has grown tired of her and, in order to be free to marry a rich heiress, gives her up to the Prioress of St. Hilda's convent at Whitby, and thus causes her to be immured. Marmion, meanwhile, proceeds to Scotland, surveys the Scottish camp and is most hospitably entertained by the gallant and chivalrous James IV.; but the negotiations failing, the battle of Flodden ensues, in which Marmion falls as an expiation

106

The Lady of the Lake, etc.

for his treacherous conduct towards the unfortunate nun r Constance. (Scott has been criticized for the strange oversight of making Marmion guilty of so unknightly a crime as that of forging documents). In The Lady of the Lake, Scott entered upon new ground; he laid the scene of his tale in the most beautiful part of the romantic Highlands and among the wild mountaineers. The poem opens with a most spirited description of a stag-hunt, which brings the disguised Scottish king, James V., suddenly upon the banks of Loch Katrine, and thus furnishes occasion for the deservedly famous description of the beautiful scenery of that loch, which, once seen, dwells for ever in the memory. We are introduced to Highland bards and superstitions, to Highland feuds and battle scenes and to the court of the King. The graceful tenderness of Ellen Douglas, the "Lady of the Lake", contrasts finely with the sterner and gloomier characters of the piece. It was, at the time, the most popular of Scott's poems. Rokeby is a tale of the English Cavaliers and Roundheads. The Lord of the Isles introduces a most spirited description of the Battle of Bannockburn (1314) and a graphic picture of the grand, lonely scenery of the West Highlands. Some of Scott's lyrical pieces, either detached or introduced in his long poems, deserve attention. We now turn from Scott's poetry to his prose fictions, generally known under the name of Waverley Novels. These fictions can only be compared with the dramas of Shakspeare as presenting an endless variety of original characters, scenes, historical situations and adventures. They are marked by the same universal and genial sympathies with men of all ranks, from the highest to the lowest, the same combination of pathos and humour, the same unselfishness in the author's losing sight of himself and never personally entering into his own creations; but, at the same time, it must be said that the highest intellectual traits of Shakspeare, his imagination and his profound insight of the heart, were not approached by Scott. The Waverley Novels, 29 in number, may be divided into historical novels and those founded principally upon private life, or family

Waverley Novels.

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legend, while some of these are also slightly connected with historical events. The historical novels, 17 in number, extend from the 11th to the 18th century; 7 belong to Scottish, 7 to English, and 3 to Continental History. Scottish History. 14th century, published The Fair Maid of Perth Castle Dangerous „ „ „ The Monastery 16th „ „ The Abbot » 17th „ „ The Legend of Montrose „ „ „ Old Mortality 18th „ „ Waverley

1828 1831 1820 1820 1819 1816 1814

English History. The Talisman 12 th century, published 182i> Ivanhoe „ 181» The Betrothed „ 1825 1821 Kenilworth (reign of Elizabeth) 16 th 18 22 The Fortunes of Nigel (James I.) 17 th 1826 "Woodstock (Civil War) „ 1823 Peveril of the Peak (Charles II.) „ Continental History. Count Robert of Paris 11 th century, published 1831 Quentin Durward 15 th „ „ 1823 Anne of Geierstein „ ,, ,, 1829 Private Life Guy Mannering publ.1815 The Antiquary „ 1816 The Black Dwarf 1816 Rob Roy 1817 The Heart of Midlothian 1818 The Bride of Lammermoor 1819 A History of Scotland Grandfather and the Life of 1827 to 1830.

and Mixed. The Pirate publ.1821 St. Ronan's Well „ 1823 Redgauntlet „ 1824 The Surgeon's Daughter „ 1827 The Two Drovers „ 1827 The Highland Widow,, 1827 known as the Tales of a Napoleon were written from

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The Abbot, Old Mortality. Scottish History.

The Fair Maid of Perth is a story of the reign of the weak and unfortunate king Robert III., (1390—1406) whose eldest son was treacherously killed by the orders of his uncle, and whose second son, James, was taken prisoner b y Henry IV. of England. The story deals chiefly with the feud and deadly combat between two Highland clans. Castle Dangerous was one of Scott's last novels, written after he had suffered from repeated paralytic attacks. The Monastery and its sequel The Abbot give, the former a picture of the rise of the Reformation and the ensuing religious quarrels in Scotland, the latter the history of Mary, Queen of Scots, during her confinement at Lochleven Castle and her subsequent escape (1567—68). The character of Mary predominates throughout the story in all the grace and attractiveness of its charms and its misfortunes. The White Lady of Avenel figures in the Monastery. The Legend of Montrose describes the efforts of the Duke of Montrose to uphold the cause of the Stuarts in Scotland (1645—50). It contains one of Scott's most amusing characters, that of Captain Dugald Dalgetty, pedant and soldier, who had served his apprenticeship under Gustavus Adolphus "the Lion of the North and the bulwark of the Protestant Faith." Old Mortality is by some considered Scott's greatest achievement. It gives a powerful picture of the struggles of the Covenanters in Scotland, which ended so disastrously for them in the battle of Bothwell Bridge (1679). The two classes of actors, the brave and dissolute Cavaliers and the resolute and cruelly treated Covenanters are contrasted with masterly skill. Although Scott's sympathies were with the former, yet his genius did full justice to the heroism of the Covenanters. In the vast variety of characters which take part in the action, we see a truly Shakspearian wealth of invention. Mixing in the action we see the fanatic preachers; the soldier of fortune, Sergeant Bothwell; Major Morton; the cavalier Claverhouse,

Waverley, Ivanhoe.

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the fanatical and gloomy covenanter Burleigh, and last but not least — old Lady Margaret Bellenden of Tillietudlem Castle, who never tired of calling to memory the day when "his most sacred Majesty, King Charles II., partook of his disjune at Tillietudlem Castle". The intermingling of domestic scenes and low rustic humour with the stormy events of the religious conflict gives great additional effect to the gloomier passages of the tale. Waverley, the first of Scott's novels and the one which gave the name to the whole series, is a story of the rising of the Scots, in 1745, in favour of Charles Edward, the Young Pretender, known in Jacobite songs as the Young Chevalier The mixture in Waverley of the historical with the familiar is one of its great attractions. The character of Charles Edward in all its attractiveness and weakness; the difficulties he had to overcome in trying to conciliate the two conflicting elements in his little army, the Highlanders and the Lowlanders of Scotland ; the character of the noble old Scottish Baron of Bradwardine and the description of his household, contrasted with that of the fiery Highland chieftain, Fergus Mac-Ivor, are represented with a masterly pen; and all this flows naturally into the main action of the romantic campaign of Charles Edward. The narrative contains some very fine descriptions of the picturesque scenery of the Scottish Highlands. English History. The first two novels taken from English history belong to the reign of Richard the Lion-hearted (1189—1199). The Talisman takes us to Palestine, where we see Richard in the pride of his valour quarrelling with his allies Philip of France and Leopold of Austria. In Ivanhoe, one of Scott's grandest novels, we are carried back to England, at the time when the country was groaning under the tyranny of the Regent Prince John, and ere the fusion of the two hostile races, the Normans and the Saxons, was yet completed. In this most stirring picture we see the suppressed Saxons and are introduced to the most graphically described household of their chief, the noble Cedric; then we are taken to the baronial strong-

a io

Kenilworth, Fortunes of Nigel.

holds of the lawless Norman nobles, and are called upon, to pity the persecuted Jewish race as shown in the fate of Isaac the Jew and his gentle daughter Rebecca. To make the picture of the time complete, we have a large element of the outlawed in Robin Hood and his merrymen; and, last but not least, King Richard himself returning to his country under the disguise of Le Noir Fainéant. The Betrothed, a tale of the Welsh border warfare between the wild Kelts and the Norman frontier garrison, is far less attractive than the two last-named novels. Kenilworth, perhaps Scott's best known novel, paints with great vigour the age of Elizabeth. The Lion-Queen is drawn with masterly strokes; her favourite Leicester can boast of the love of two women : he has won the affection of his proud queen as well as the devoted love of his deluded young wife, lovely Amy Robsart. Round the central figure of Elizabeth we find the great men of her dazzling court, Spenser, Leicester, Raleigh; and Shakspeare in the background. The grand revels at Kenilworth, held in honour of Elizabeth's visit at the castle of her favourite, which the boy Shakspeare may have witnessed, and which are said to have inspired him with the well-known passage in Midsummer Night's Dream, are conjured up with all the art of the magician. In The Fortunes of Nigel the scene is laid in London during the reign of James I. The fulness and variety of the details show how closely Scott had studied the annals of this period, particularly those relating to the city and the court of London. In the motley crowd we see the needy Scotsmen who came pouring into London with King James ; the profligate courtiers, no longer men of the stamp of the Elizabethan heroes; the citizens hating yet attempting to imitate the nobles; not forgetting the quarrelsome apprentices with their clubs at hand, ready on all occasions to make use of them; but none of all Scott's historical likenesses is more faithful, more justly drawn, or more richly coloured than the portrait of the poor, proud, pedantic King James I. of England. The action of Woodstock is placed after the defeat of Charles II. at Worcester (Sept. 3 r d 1651). Cromwell and

Quentin Durward, Guy Mannering.

Ill

Charles both appear in action; the interest, however, is concentrated upon the noble figure of the chivalrous old royalist, Sir Henry Lee. In Peveril of the Peak, belonging to the time of Charles II. and his profligate court, we have two well-contrasted characters, that of the old Cavalier Peveril, and of the gloomy, moody republican, Major Bridgenorth. Of the tales from Continental History, that of Quentin Durward leaves its two companion novels far behind. The revival of the manners of the time of Louis XI., the striking scenes at his castle of Plessis-lfcs-Tours, the faithful delineation of the hypocritical, crafty, perfidious French king and of the hasty Charles the Bold of Burgundy, of their rivalries and quarrels, have given a certain impulse in France towards a closer study of the history of those times. Scott's historical novels, interesting though most of them are, do not throw into shade those that belong more or less purely to family history. In Guy Mannering we have the interesting old gipsy, Meg Merrilies, whose character, though ideal, never in the least oversteps the bounds of probability. Scott's truly artistic fellow-feeling with the general sentiments of his race is shown in the redeeming qualities with which he invests even the more abandoned among his personages, as Dirk Hatteraick, the smuggler, and even Glossin himself. Apart from the pleasure which we derive from the characters and the story, we are carried .away by the graphic descriptions of Scottish life and scenery. The mixture of the serious and the humorous, the romantic and the familiar are peculiarly characteristic of the genius of Scott. Dominie Sampson, the schoolmaster, is a creation worthy of the greatest humourist that ever wrote. The Antiquary is another novel of familiar Scottish life, introducing the character of the antiquary Oldbuck, the old bachelor, who, repulsive and attractive at the same time, is most happily and humorously conceived; so are his humble dependants, Caxon, the barber, and Edie Ochiltree, the wandering Gaberlunzie. The scene of danger and escape of Sir Arthur Wardour and his daughter, when jieai'ly overwhelmed by the tide, is one of the most highly •wrought in fiction, and the funeral of the young fisherman,

112

Rob Roy, Heart of Midlothian.

no less than the grief of his surviving father, move t h e reader with compassion. In Rob Roy we have the wild and picturesque life of the Highlands and the exquisitely drawn Glasgow citizen, Baillie Nicol Jarvie. It is a kind of Lady of the Lake in prose. In The Heart of Midlothian the interest is concentrated on the sufferings of a humble peasant family; the reader's sympathy being principally enlisted in favour of the heroic Jeanie Deans and the weary journey she undertakes to London to beg her unhappy sister's life from the queen of George II. The Pirate takes us to new regions; we are introduced to the wild, simple, half-Scandinavian life in the Orkneys. The two sisters, Minna and Brenda, are amongst Scott's most graceful female characters. 1 he Bride of Lammermoor is the most tragic of Scott's romances. The action has been compared to that of Greek tragedy. Cruel and irresistible destiny overshadows the horizon, and the attractive, impoverished Master of Ravenswood and the girl he loves are hurried onward to their doom by the uncontrolled force of a pitiless fatality. Redgauntlet is the only novel in which Scott has adopted the epistolary form of narrative. The letters between the two friends Alan Fairford and Darsie Latimer are very well contrasted. In the portions supposed to be written b y Alan Fairford, the young Edinburgh advocate, we find m a n y charming recollections of the author's early life. The old Writer, Alan's father, is most likely a true portrait of Scott's own father. The story is full of interesting adventures and personages; among the latter the Quaker and his sister and the blind old fiddler are not the least so. And here we take leave of the great good man, having mentioned but a small part of the many and varied enjoyments he offers his readers. Scott's chief historical works are Tales of a Grandfather, History of Scotland, and the Life of Napoleon I. George Gordon, Lord B y r o n (1788—1824). In the earlier years of this century, the genius of B y r o n broke

Lord Byron.

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forth like a meteor, and Walter Scott, whose poetical star had already been on the decline, retreated into the realm of prose fiction where he had no equal. George Gordon, Lord Byron, was born in London. His father was Capt. John Byron and his mother Catherine Gordon of Gight, an Aberdeenshire heiress. Her fortune was soon squandered by her profligate husband, who finally left her and died on the Continent. Mrs. Byron returned to her native home, there to live as well as she could on £ 130 a year. She was a woman of violent and capricious passions, by turns spoiling and ill-treating her son, who, although wayward, was ardently affectionate. His great beauty was marred by a lameness in his right foot. By the death of his eccentric grand-uncle in 1798, young George, not to the advantage of the development of his character, succeeded to the family honours and estates at the age of eleven. At Harrow and, later, at Trinity College, Cambridge, he became notorious for the irregularities of his conduct and for his contempt for academical discipline. He was a greedy, though desultory reader, and his imagination appears to have been especially attracted by Oriental history and travels. In 1803, when in his vacation, he fell in love with Mary Chaworth, a young heiress of great beauty, who, however, saw nothing in the boy to engage her sympathy. The sad story of this boyish love we find embodied in his Dream. In 1807 appeared his first volume of poetry (printed at Newark) under the title of Hours of Idleness, by Lord Byron, a Minor. Although youthful essays only, they had not deserved the severe criticism they were attacked with in the Edinburgh Review, understood to have been written by Lord Brougham. The young poet replied in bitter language in his English Bards and Scotch Reviewers. Restless, misanthropic and satiated with gaieties, Byron went in 1809 on a continental tour to Portugal, Spain, Greece and Asia Minor. He returned to bury his mother and to publish the result of his travels — the first two cantos of Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, — in 1812. They took the public by storm and carried the enthusiasm for his poetry to a pitch of which we now have Mann, Sketcb.

8

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L o r d Byron.

no idea. "I awoke" says the author, "one morning and found myself famous." In rapid succession followed a series of eastern tales — The Giaour (1813), The Bride of Abydos, The Corsair (1814) and Lara. His reputation was at its height; he was the idol of London society, as Burns had, for a short time, been the lion of the fickle fashionables of Edinburgh. About this time, (1815) he married Miss Milbanke, a lady of great expectations; but the union was an unhappy one, and domestic disagreements were embittered by the poet's improvidence and debts. After the birth of a daughter, Ada, subsequently Countess Lovelace, Lady Byron left her husband, never to return to him. Byron himself declared that he never knew the reason of his wife's deserting him. Society sided with his wife and threw him off; his affairs were ruined and this time, (1816) lie left England in real bitterness of heart and for ever. Bearing the outward mask of proud indifference and gaiety, he traversed Belgium and Switzerland and resided for a number of years in various parts of Italy. While on his travels, he produced the last two cantos (four in all) of Childe Harold; The Prisoner of Chillón, Manfred, Maseppa, his tragedies of Marino Faliero, Sardanapalus, The Two Foscari, Werner, Cain, The Deformed Transformed. His life while in Italy seems to have been a degrading one, but a better sphere was opening up for the exertion of his energies. The Greek insurrection of 1821 had roused the sympathies of all Europe, and Byron generously determined to devote himself and his fortune to Hellenic liberty. On arriving at Missolonghi, he found only discord and confusion. In three months he had done much by his influence and money to introduce order, when his life was cut off by fever in April 1824. His death was mourned by the Greeks as a national calamity, and no less so in England. His body was brought home, and reposes on the estate of his ancestors in the family vault at Hueknall, near Newstead in Nottinghamshire. The poetry of Byron may be generally described as a representation of his own turbid feelings; for the peculiarities of his mind are deeply imprinted on his work.

Childe Harold.

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T h e reader never loses sight of the poet. In all his greater poems, men and even women are pictures of himself, and there are but two chief personages in them — a man in whom unbridled passions have desolated and hardened the heart, but who still gives forth flashes of light at moments of strong emotion; and a man who despises mankind whom he nevertheless rules by the very force of that contempt, — sceptical and despairing, yet yielding at rare intervals to the softer feelings with an intensity proportioned to the rarity with which he gives way to them. The woman of Byron is the woman of the East, devoted and loving, but a true Oriental in unintelligence and — if need be — in ferocity. These elements of character, meagre and unnatural as they are, are brought before us with such force and intensity, and framed in such brilliant and picturesque surroundings, that the reader, particularly the young and inexperienced, loses sight of these contradictions; and there is a time when all of us have thought the sombre, haughty, mysterious heroes of Byron the very ideal of all that is noble and admirable. His great poem, Childe Harold, in which he revived the Spenserian stanza, is a series of gloomy but intensely poetical monologues put into the mouth of a satiated voluptuary, who takes refuge from his disenchantment of pleasure in the contemplation of lovely or historical scenes of travel. The first canto principally describes Portugal and Spain, with pictures of the great battles in which those countries, aided by the English, shook off the yoke -of Napoleon. The second canto takes us to Greece, Albania, the iEgean Archipelago, and, in it, Byron for the first time .showed his power of representing Oriental scenery and manners. In the third canto, which is perhaps the finest, Belgium, Switzerland and the Rhine give opportunities for splendid descriptions of scenery. This canto also contains the grand description of the battle of Waterloo and the poem addressed to the Draehenfels. In the fourth canto, the reader is carried through the most picturesque scenes of Italy — Venice, Ferrara, Flo-

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Thomas Moore.

rence, Rome; and not only the immortal dead, but the monuments of painting and sculpture, are described with a masterly hand. The canto ends with the glorious address to the Ocean. Byron failed in his dramas; he had not the power of going out of himself, which a successful dramatist must possess. That dark and moody figure "with defiance on his brow and misery in his heart" haunts us through all his dramas. Cain and Manfred are the most powerful of them. If we consider Byron as a poet, we must declare him one of the greatest; if as a moralist, we cannot hide the fact that his influence may be, and has been, pernicious. Thomas Moore (1779—1852), the friend and biographer of Lord Byron, was a native of Dublin and the son of humble parents of Roman Catholic persuasion. The harsh treatment of the Irish roused young Moore's ardour, and he only narrowly escaped being involved in rebellion. After a university education at Dublin, he repaired to London, with little money in his purse, nominally to enter himself as a student of the Middle Temple, but virtually intent on trying his fortune as a poet. He had a translation of Anacreon's Odes with him, and, more lucky than many of his brother-poets, found a kind friend in Lord Moira, who obtained for him permission to dedicate the work to the Prince of Wales (afterwards George IV.). The work was well received, and immediately introduced Moore into that gay and fashionable society of which he remained all his life a somewhat too assiduous frequenter and for which his sparkling wit, great conversational talents, and musical skill, so well fitted him, rendering him the spoilt child of popularity and success. In 1803, he obtained an office in the Bermudas, the duties of which he executed by deputy, but his substitute proving unfaithful, Moore became, at a later time (1818) involved in heavy liabilities, yet nobly rejected the offered aid of friends, resolving to redeem them with his pen. About 1810, Moore challenged Byron for an attack upon him in his English Bards and Scotch Reviewers. The quarrel, however, led to an intimacy which ripened into friendship, on the part of Moore at least, and on Byron's

Lalla Eookh.

11T

part, as far as he was able to entertain such feeling; as at a later time of life he himself said, that he had never felt the emotion of friendship towards any, except Lord Clare and perhaps little Moore. (The stature of Moore was unusually diminutive; he was the smallest of men, without being deformed.) In 1811, Moore married Miss Bessy Dikes, a young Irish actress, who proved a sensible and devoted wife to him. He now abandoned all hope of support from his great friends, and retired to the country to work for himself and to be as happy as love, literature and liberty could make him. Nevertheless in his various retreats he was always found in the neighbourhood and society of the wealthy and the noble, for, as Byron said of him "little Tommy dearly loves a lord." In 1813 appeared the first of his Irish Melodies, a collection of about 120 lyrics adapted to Irish national airs of great beauty and some of them of great antiquity. These Melodies are undoubtedly the keystone of the author's fame. Patriotism, love, conviviality, form the subject-matter of these lyrics. They are remarkable for their felicitous expression, their sweet musical flow and tender feeling, while flashes of genial wit and humour add to their attractiveness and force; but they do not reach the fervour of Burns' national songs; Moore had not, like Burns, the power of stirring the heart from its very foundation. Moore composed other similar lyrics, about 70 in number, under the name of National Songs. In 1817 appeared his most elaborate work Lalla Rookh, an eastern romance, which is constructed on the principle followed by Boccaccio in his Decameron and frequently imitated. It consists of four stories in verse, the narrative connecting the tales is in prose. Lalla Rookh is a beautiful Oriental princess, who travels from Delhi to Bucharia, to the king of which country she is to be married. For her amusement when stopping for her night's repose, a young Bucharian poet, Feramorz, is introduced, who sings to the accompaniment of his national kitar four separate poems of a narrative character. The princess becomes gradually enamoured of the interesting young

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The Lake Poets.

bard, but her growing misery vanishes when, on her arrival at her new home, she recognises in her future husband the musician who had won her love. The four poems are: The Veiled Prophet, Paradise and the Peri, The Fire Worshipper and The Light of the Harem. Of these the simplest

and best is Paradise and the Peri. It describes the efforts of an exiled spirit to regain admission into Heaven; she offers successively the last drop of blood of a patriot, the last sigh of a devoted lover, and the tear of a repentant sinner: the last opens to her the gates of Paradise. The manners, language and scenery of the Orient are reproduced with great truth, vividness and luxuriousness. The Loves of the Angels is the name of another Oriental tale Moore wrote; it is based upon a passage in Genesis (VI., 3) in which the sons of God are said to have become enamoured of the daughters of men. In 1818, Moore travelled on the Continent obtaining in Paris materials for a metrical satire, The Fudge Family in Paris, which went through five editions in a fortnight. Moore was author of many political satires, which are free from bitterness and malignity; he introduced instead a tone of good society, an elegance and playfulness which gave them a permanent value. Of the three biographies he wrote, that of Lord Byron is the best and the mostinteresting. His later years were clouded by insanity, duringwhich his wife tended him with the most devoted care; his three children had gone before him. The Lake Poets. The influence of the French Revolution of 1789 in its infancy, with its theories of natural rights that belonged to every man, and according to which all men were equally free and brethren, was strongly reflected by a group of young English poets — Wordsworth, Coleridge and Southey. Of these Wordsworth has become the most remarkable, but all of them exchanged their revolutionary ideas for calmer ones when they saw the Revolution ultimately end in the Reign of Terror and the tyranny of Napoleon I. William Wordsworth (1770—1850) was born at

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Cockermouth, in Cumberland, and spent his youth among the grand and lonely scenery of the English Lakes. He was educated at a good grammar-school at Hawkshead, in the very centre of charming scenery and as the schoolboys were lodged with dames in the village, they were left entirely free to ramble about hill and dale as they liked, and the impressions produced on Wordsworth by the surrounding scenery were never obliterated from his mind. He lost his parents at an early age, and was educated by his uncles, but neither at Hawkshead nor at St. John's College, Cambridge, did he distinguish himself, his apathy being a source of vexation to his uncles. In 1791, he took his degree and resided for more than a year in France, showing such active sympathy with the Girondists that he but narrowly escaped imprisonment on their downfall. When he returned to England he published his first poems, which were unfavourably received, except by his intimate friend and admirer Coleridge. His uncles were desirous he should choose a profession, but just then a friend, Raisley Calvert, left him a small legacy, which enabled him to realise the great wish of his heart — to devote himself entirely to poetry and to live with his sister Dorothy, who became his constant companion and whose influence on his life and poetry is incalculable. For some time he lived in retirement in the south of England, in Dorset and Somerset, to be near Coleridge, in conjunction with whom he published Lyrical Ballads, in order to raise the necessary funds for a journey to Germany whither they proceeded in 1798, Wordsworth and his sister residing for about six months at Goslar in the Harz. On his return to England, he settled down among his native mountains at Grasmere, which after some time he left for Allan Bank, and that residence for Rydal Mount, all in the region of his much-loved mountains and lakes; and here he remained until the day of his death. In 1802 a new increase of wealth, which with singular good fortune several times in his life arrived at the very moment he was needing it, enabled him to marry Mary Hutchinson, a lady of remarkable sweetness of temper, on whom he wrote in the third year of his married life:

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Wordsworth.

"She was a phantom of delight." With the exception of several tours to Scotland, which form an epoch in his literary career, his life continued one of seclusion and monotony. Wordsworth's theory about poetry was, that its subjects should be taken from among the commonest things and be written in the simplest style; and, as of old, the Puritans had done in political and domestic life, so he, at first, went too far in his disdain of the ornaments of poetry, by running into an almost ridiculous extreme of simplicity, both in the selection of his subjects and in his treatment of them, and drew down on himself a perfect storm of disdain and ridicule. This he heard unruffled, because he knew that he was right in the main, and that time only was needed to show it. Wordsworth was the poet of Nature and Man; no poet has ever been so intimate with nature as he. To him, there was a soul in all nature which had powers of its own, desires, feelings and thoughts of its own; and by these it gave education, impulse, comfort and joy to the man who opened his heart to receive them? and from receiving these impressions into the mind and reflecting on them, and adding thoughts and feelings of bis own, a complete harmony between Nature and Man was to arise. Through his love to Nature, Wordsworth was led to honour Man. The shepherds of the Lake hills, and the dalesmen seemed to him part of the scenery in which they lived, and when the hopes he had formed for mankind from the French Revolution broke down, his sister Dorothy led him back to his early love of nature and of the simple herdsmen among the glens. His poems are arranged by himself as: — Referring to the Period of Childhood; Founded on the Affections; Of the Fancy; Of the Imagination; Proceeding from Sentiment and Reflection. Contrary to his own theory, many of his poems treat of the loftiest subjects and to a thinking reader his Tintem Abbey, The Happy Warrior, Lines written on the Immor-

Coleridge.

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tality of the Soul, and many more, will always have an undiminished charm. His Sonnets are among the finest in the English language. Wordsworth's great poem, The Excursion (1814), is a portion of a greater philosophical poem, which however was never published. The Excursion presents a group of beautiful and profound thoughts and of splendid descriptions united by a slight narrative, resulting from the poet's accidentally meeting a Scotch pedlar, the "grey-headed Wanderer", whose peculiar education had made him a moralist, a philosopher and a Christian. They are joined by other personages, and the poem consists chiefly of a semi-dramatic exchange of argument and sentiment among the characters. The main moral seems to be to justify the ways of God to man, and to encourage the hopes of the wretched beyond the grave. Wordsworth wrote one narrative poem, The White Doe of Rylstone (1815). The incidents are of a mournful kind, turning chiefly on the complete ruin of a Northcountry family in the Rising of the North in 1569, in favour of Mary, Queen of Scots. The later years of Wordsworth's life were gladdened by his increasing fame, by academic honours bestowed upon him by the Universities of Oxford and Durham, by his appointment to the office of Poet-Laureate on the death of his friend Southey in 1843, and by a pension from the crown of £ 300 per annum. In 1847 he had the misfortune to lose his only daughter Dorothy, the wife of Mr. Quillinan, who was worthy of her sire. Wordsworth died on the 23 rd of April 1850, and is interred by the side of his daughter in the beautiful church-yard of Grasmere. Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772—1834), the friend of Wordsworth, is also reckoned among the Lake poets, although his poetry differs widely from that of his friend. Coleridge was the son of the vicar of Ottery St. Mary in Devonshire; and being left an orphan at an early age, he was educated at Christ's Hospital, where he had Charles Lamb as a fellow-pupil. Here he dreamed away his time, reading incessantly books of every kind, which unfitted

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The Lake Poets.

him for steady school-work. At Cambridge his study was as desultory as it had been at school; he became a great admirer of the French Revolution. He left the University, and as a means of subsistence enlisted in a regiment of dragoons under the name of Comberbach. A Latin sentence written by him on the stable wall led to a release from this position. He then repaired to Bristol where, in company with Southey the poet, and several other enthusiastic young men he formed the plan of emigrating to the banks of the American Susquehanna, there to found a Pantisocracy or model republic. The scheme fell through for want of money; Coleridge turned to literature, and soon added to his difficulties by an early marriage. His wife, Sarah Fricker, was one of three Bristol sisters, another of whom Southey married as imprudently; the third was married to their friend Lovell, who died soon after. It was after Coleridge's marriage that Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy came to reside near him in the south of England, and that they published the Lyrical Ballads. Coleridge's share in them was small, and his views of poetry differed from those of his friend. In 1798, the kindness of the Wedgwoods of Staffordshire enabled Coleridge to visit Germany (Ratzeburg and Gottingen) where he resided for fourteen months, studying the language and philosophy of Germany; the translation of Schiller's Wallenstein was the fruit of his sojourn. Upon his return to England, he took up his abode at the Lakes for about ten years, during which time he visited Malta. By this time his political and religious views had undergone an entire change; the Unitarian free-thinker had become a believer in Christianity, and his revolutionary visions had fled. His natural sloth and dreaminess were increased by the destructive habit of laudanum-drinking. Various efforts at hard work dissolved into vapour and vanished. He left Southey to take care of his wife and children, and finally in 1815, placed himself, for the cure of his unfortunate habit, under the charge of Mr. Gillman a surgeon of Highgate. The roof of the hospitable surgeon sheltered Coleridge for the remaining 19 years of his life, and here the poet

Ancient Mariner, Christabel.

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used for hours to pour out his wonderful talk, delighting troops of admirers by the miracles of his conversation. Epitaph written by himself the winter preceding his death. "Stop, Christian passer-by! Stop, child of God! "And read with gentle breast. Beneath this sod "A poet lies, or that which once seemed he — "O, lift a thought in prayer for S. T. C! "That he, who many a year, with toil of breath, "Found death in life, may here find life in death! "Mercy for praise — to be forgiven for fame, "He asked and hoped through Christ — do thou the same." The literary character of Coleridge resembles some vast but unfinished palace; all is gigantic, beautiful and rich, but nothing is complete, nothing compact, and his intellect is to be estimated rather by that of which it was capable, which it contemplated and suggested, than b y what it achieved. He was a divine, a critic and a philosopher, as well as a poet; he was a deep thinker, had genius and learning; and yet most of his works are fragments only. The poems by which Coleridge is best known are the Ancient Mariner (1798) and the unfinished Christabel (1816). The former is a poem in the simple, picturesque style of the old ballad. The tale — told to a spell-bound wedding guest by an old sailor with grey beard, glittering eyes and long brown skinny hands — enchains us with a strange and mystic power. The shooting of the albatross, that came through the snowy fog to cheer the crew, the red blistering calm that fell upon the sea, the skeleton ship with its phantom dicers driving across the sun in view of the thirst-scorched seamen, the lonely life of the guilty mariner on the rolling sea amid the corpses of his shipmates, the springing up of good thoughts at the sight of the beautiful water-snakes, the final deliverance from the doomed vessel, — are among the pictures that flit before us as we read, shadows all, but touched with weird light and colour, as from another world. Christabel, by the advice of Byron, given to the world in 1816 in its unfinished state, is a tale of strange witchcraft. A sweet, innocent girl, praying for her lover's safety

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Southey.

beneath a huge oak-tree outside the castle-gate, under the dim moonlight of an April sky, is startled by the appearance of a witch, disguised as a richly-clad beauty in distress. The gentle Christabel asks the wanderer into the castle, the disguise is there laid aside; some horrible shape smites the poor hospitable maid into a trance, and the blinking glance of the witch's small, dull, snake-like eyes, shot suddenly at the shuddering victim, clouds the innocent blue of her eye with a passive imitation of the same hateful look. Among his fine early poems are an Ode to the Departing Year, the Ode on France, his love-song of Genevieve and a Hymn before Sunrise in the Vale of Chamouni. His later poems were more matured and most beautiful ; A Day Dream, Youth and Age, Love, Hope and Patience in Education are exquisite pieces. Coleridge wrote two Dramas — Remorse and Zapolya — the latter founded on the Winter's Tale; but he had no power of true dramatic creation. What is most beautiful in the dramas is all purely descriptive, and in no sense advances the action or exhibits human passion. And yet, although he was so unsuccessful in creating emotions of a theatrical kind himself, he was the most consummate critic of the dramatic productions of others. He has done more than any other man to bring to its full appreciation the genius of Shakspeare, and to show that he not only was the greatest genius, but also the greatest artist that ever lived. Robert Southey (1774—1843) the son of a respectable linen-draper of Bristol, was educated for the Church by the liberality of an uncle, but having adopted Republican and Unitarian principles, he disqualified himself alike for the Church or any official employment. He fell in with Lovell and Coleridge and warmly entered into their scheme of founding a republic in America. The marriages of these three young men to the three Miss Frickers (Southey's wife's name was Edith) put an end to their revolutionary schemes. Southey married his wife on the very day he set off with an uncle to Lisbon, whither this relative took him in order to break off an apparently hopeless engagement. On his return to England he studied for the law,

Curse of Kehama.

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"but this employment not being congenial to his mind, he settled down to literature on an annuity of £ 160 which he received from a college friend, Mr. Wynn, until 1807, when he relinquished it on obtaining a pension from Government oí £ 200. He ultimately followed Coleridge to the Lakes and settled down at Greta Hall, near Keswick on Derwentwater, to a laborious life of incessant study and voluminous authorship. Lovell having died some time before, Southey took his widow under his roof, which also afforded shelter to Coleridge's wife and children. His early productions Wat Tyler (1794) and Joan of Arc (1796) are full of his republican and Socinian principles, but like Coleridge and Wordsworth he forsook those theories, and from being a sceptic and a republican, he became a firm believer in Christianity and a steady supporter of the English constitution. In 1801 appeared the first of a series of great poems intended to illustrate various systems of mythology. It was called Thálába, the Destroyer, and is a tale of Arabian mythology, describing the perils and ultimate triumph of an Arabian hero, who fights with and conquers the powers of the Evil One. In 1805 he published Madoc, a poem founded on a Welsh story, and in 1810 appeared his greatest work, the Curse of Kehama. "The story is founded upon the Hindoo mythology, the most gigantic, cumbrous and extravagant system of idolatry to which temples were ever erected. The scene is alternately laid in the terrestrial paradise, under the sea, in the heaven of heavens, and in hell itself. The persons and adventures are too supernatural, too completely out of the reach of human sympathy to please the general reader, although there occur fine passages in the work — as that apostrophe to Love, which, though often quoted, can never be read without emotion: — "They sin who tell us Love can die. "With life all other passions fly, "All others are but vanity. "In Heaven Ambition cannot dwell, "Nor Avarice in the vaults of hell;

126

Life of Nelson.

"Earthly, these passions are of the earth, "They perish where they have their birth. "But Love is indestructible, "Its holy flame for ever burneth, "From heaven it came, to heaven returneth. "Too oft on earth a troubled guest, "At times deceived, at times oppressed, "It here is tried and purified, "Then hath in heaven its perfect rest: "It soweth here with toil and eare, "But the harvest-time of Love is there. "Oh! when a mother meets on high "The babe she lost in infancy, "Hath she not then, for pains and fears, "The day of woe, the watchful night, "For all her sorrows, all her tears, "An over-payment of delight?" In 1814 Southey published Roderick, the Last of the Goths, of a much more modest and credible character than its predecessor. In 1813 Southey accepted the Poet-Laureateship. He composed some court poetry, one of which pieces, The Vision of Judgment (1821), was satirized by Byron in another Vision of Judgment for the absurdity of the metre and the extravagant flattery of the poem. Southey's poetry has always been duly appreciated by poetical students and critical readers, but by the public at large it has been neglected. The reason of this may be found both in the subjects of his poetry and in his manner of treating them. His fictions are supernatural and have no hold on human affections. His images are too remote, too fanciful and often too learned. To relish his poetry, considerable previous reading and research are required, and this is a task which only the few can undertake. Southey's prose works are very numerous and valuable on account of their learning, but his Life of Nelson (1813) rose into instant favour and may be considered as one of the standard English biographies. Its merit consists in the clearness and beautiful simplicity of its style and its lucid arrangement of facts, omitting all that is unimportant or strictly technical. A Life of Wesley,

Campbell.

127

the celebrated founder of the Methodists, is also highly interesting. For many years Southey continued his ceaseless round of study and composition. He was offered a baronetcy and a seat in Parliament, both of which he prudently declined. But his application was too constant and uninterrupted; he forgot his own maxim "that frequent change of air is of all things that which most conduces to joyous health and long life." About 1834 Mrs. Southey's mind gave way, she lingered for three years and died. Anxiety and too constant a strain upon his intellect had injured the poet's health. He married, not long after his wife's death, Caroline Bowles, the poetess, with whom he had been well acquainted for upwards of 20 years. Although she foresaw the ruin of his mind, she gave up an independent situation, and was his faithful attendant during the three years his intellect was clouded. He would wander among his old associates, his books, and fondle them like a child. Death released him in 1843; he left his children £12,000 and one of the most valuable private libraries in the kingdom. Southey is interred in the church-yard of Crossthwaite, near Keswick, and in the church there is a marble monument to his memory, a full-length recumbent figure. Thomas Campbell (1777—1844) was descended from a good Highland family of Argyleshire. He was born at Glasgow and although his father had been unsuccessful in business, he was able to give his son a university education in his native town. As a very young student he was distinguished for his Greek scholarship. In 1799 when he was only 22 years old, he published his first poem, The Pleasures of Hope, which was received with a burst of welcome, as hearty as that which, six years later, was given to the Lay of the Last Minstrel. It captivated its readers by its varying melodies, its polished style, and the vein of generous and lofty sentiment which seemed to sanctify the entire poem. Campbell settled in London as a literary man and at intervals published some lyrics, as Hohenlinden (1802), Ye Mariners of England, The Battle of the Baltic. In 1809, he

128

Shelley.

produced a long narrative poem, his Pennsylvanian tale of Gertrude of Wyoming and, later, O'Connor's Child, the most passionate and Theodoric, the purest of his longer poems. "The genius and taste of Campbell recall to mind those of Gray. He displays the same delicacy and purity of sentiment, equal picturesqueness and elevation of imagery, and the style of both is choice and select." Campbell married Matilda Sinclair, his cousin; one of his sons died, the other went mad. After his wife's death he travelled much and died at Boulogne, but was buried in Westminster Abbey. Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822). The life of Shelley presents many points of similarity with that of Byron. There was a similar title to wealth and honours, the same boyhood of fierce passions, an unhappy training, an early manhood of blighted domestic affection — blighted by his own folly and crime, and a spirit of revolt against all religious and social claims. In his school-days his sensitive mind suffered from harsh usage of masters and the fagging allowed at Eton. He was a devourer of books, and filled his mind with the sceptical arguments against Christianity, and was finally expelled from Oxford and renounced by his family on account of his atheistic principles. He then contracted an imprudent marriage with Harriet Westbrook, a handsome girl, his inferior in rank, who had brought to him his sisters' pocket-money when he was without resources. The marriage proved unhappy, the young people had not known each other well, they lived in poverty and moved about a good deal until 1814, when Shelley forsook his wife. She returned to her father with her two children, and two years later drowned herself i n the Serpentine. Her father refused to give up the two children to Shelley, and had this step justified by a decision of the Court of Chancery. Shelley now married Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, daughter of the celebrated author of William Caleb and of Mary Wollstonecraft, author of the Vindication of the Rights of Women. Through his father's death, he was for ever relieved from pecuniary difficulties. He repaired to Italy for his health, where he met with Byron, and chiefly

Keats.

129

resided in Rome. He met with an early death by the upsetting of his boat in the Gulf of Spezzia. His ashes lie beneath the walls of Rome; "Cor cordium" (Heart of Hearts) is written on his tomb. Shelley's earliest poem, Queen Mab, was produced when he was twenty-one years old; it is a wild poem with beautiful descriptions. All Shelley's poems suffer from a certain vagueness; he was all his life a visionary, his mind was ever filled with glorious but unreal phantoms of the possible perfectibility of mankind. He traced the misery of man to all government and all social institutions and not to our own unrestrained passions. The finest, as it is the completest and most distinct of his poems, is Alastor or The Spirit of Solitude (1816), in which he describes the sufferings of a character like his own, with the highest aspirations for mankind, driven to solitude, despair and an untimely grave by the ingratitude of his fellow-men, who are incapable of understanding and sympathizing with him. The Revolt of Islam, The Witch of Atlas and Hellas belong, more or less, to the same class as Queen Mah, warring against all religious and human institutions. Prometheus Unbound is dramatic in form. In Adonais (1821), Shelley has given a poetical and touching lament on the early death of the poet Keats. His lyrics are fine, though not always easily understood. The Sensitive Plant, To a Skylark, Ode to the West-Wind, The Cloud, To Music, ("I pant for the music which is divine") and many more, form together the most sensitive and the most musical, but the least tangible lyrical poetry the language possesses. John Keats (1796—1821). John Keats was a young poet of low birth, and, although apprenticed to a surgeon, he devoted most of his time to the cultivation of his poetical talent, which was conspicuous from an early age. He chose for his poems subjects from the Greek mythology, which rendered them less popular, but he has treated the mythology in an entirely new way, giving the Pagan deities passions and affections like our own, which though highly purified and idealized, are yet in perfect accordance with their native scenery and the golden atmosphere of primeval existence. Maun, Sketch.

9

130

Endymion, Hyperion.

In 1818, he published his first poem Endymion, a poetic romance, which displayed the untrained luxuriousness of a young poet's imagination. It was attacked with great severity in the Quarterly Review).* The Review wounded the susceptibility of the young poet and is said to have hastened his death, but erroneously, as consumption, of which he died, was in the family, and as his health was already weakened by attendance upon a dying brother. Keats profited by the criticism of the Quarterly; in another mythological poem, Hyperion (1820), he corrected his tendencies to exaggeration, and his genius was further displayed in the poems of Lamia, Isabella and I he Eve of St. Agnes. But most readers prefer those poems which are taken from Greek mythology, in which the antique grace and passages of intense beauty cannot fail to charm every reader. One line from Endymion has become a household word: — "A thing of beauty is a joy for ever." Keats repaired to Rome for the recovery of his health accompanied by a friend, Mr. Severn, a painter, who attended on him to his end. He is buried in the romantic Protestant cemetery of that city under a turf covered with violets and daisies. It was said of Endymion most truly, "that no book could more aptly be used as a test to determine whether a reader has a genuine love for poetry: his works have no interest of story, no insight into human nature, no clear sequence of thought; they are the rapturous voice of youthful fancy, luxuriating in a world of beautiful unrealities. His poems will be welcome companions of those who love *) The Edinburgh Review appeared in 1802; it was a Whig paper and wrapt in a pasteboard cover ol" buft' and blue. Sydney Smith, Brougham, Jeffrey were its founders. Macaulay published his Essays in it. The Quarterly Review, a Tory paper,"was started in 1809. John Gibson Lockhart, W. Scott's son-in-law and biographer, was editor of the Quarterly from 1825 to 1853. Blackwood's Magazine first appeared in 1817 to serve as an organ of Toryism in Scotland. It was distinguished by the ability of its purely literary articles, as well as by the violence of its political sentiments. John Wilson and Lockhart wrote for it. The Westminster Review, a Radical periodical, appeared in 1824.

Leigh Hunt, Thomas Hood.

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to escape out of the strife of commonplace into the haven of solitude and imagination". Leigh Hunt (1784—1859). Leigh Hunt's name is closely connected with those of Byron, Shelley, Keats; he was from an early age a literary man, and the joint-editor of a periodical called The Examiner. In 1812, he was sentenced to two year's imprisonment for a libel against the Prince Regent. These two years were perhaps the pleasantest of his life; he had the talent to convert his rooms and a little plot of ground in front of them into a perfect paradise; and what with the frequent visits from his friends, among whom he also numbered Hazlitt, Moore and Lamb, and what with his books, he spent the time of his confinement cheerfully. On leaving prison he published his Story of Rimini, an Italian tale in verse, containing beautiful passages. In 1822, Hunt went to Italy to reside near Byron and to aid him in publishing a periodical, The Liberal. The periodical was unsuccessful, and his connection with Byron ended in mutual disappointment and disgust. It was unfortunate that Leigh Hunt, after his return to England, should have published a work, Lord Byron and Some of his Contemporaries, in which he vented his angry feelings and which was construed into ingratitude, as Hunt was indebted to Byron in a pecuniary sense. Leigh Hunt has written much in prose and in rhyme, and although he may have had some peculiarities in the style and manner of his writings, neither the originality of his genius, nor his claim to the title of a true poet can be disputed. Into whatever he has written, he has put a living soul, and much of what he has written is brilliant either with wit or humour, or with tenderness and beauty. Ihe Toion, Ihe Streets of the Metropolis, The London Journal are most interesting prose reading. Thomas Hood (1798—1845) stands very high among the poets of the second order. He was born in London, though of Scotch ancestry, and was educated for business. His health beginning to fail, he was sent to his father's relations in Dundee, where he, for the first time, appeared as a contributor to some periodical. On his return to

132

Felicia Hemans.

London, he was put as an apprentice to an engraver, and profited enough b y the art to be able to illustrate his own productions. About the year 1820 he adopted literature as a profession; he became a contributor to several periodicals and sub-editor of the London Magazine. He was associated with the brilliant circle who then contributed to the magazine, among whom were Hazlitt, Lamb, the Smiths, De Quincey and Reynolds. Hood soon became a most popular writer, but in the midst of his success a firm failed which involved him in its losses. Hood, like Scott, paid off the debt b y the labour of his pen; but his health was injured by over-exertion and the uncertainties incidental to authorship. Shortly before his death, Government relieved him with a small pension. Hood is chiefly known as a comic poet and a humourist. He possessed, in a most remarkable degree, the power of perceiving the ridiculous and the odd. The most original figure in Hood's verse was the use he made of puns — a figure generally too contemptible for literature, but which, in Hood's hands, became the basis of genuine humour and often of the purest pathos; for beneath the g a y ripple of fun and frolic, there flowed an undercurrent of sadness as deep and solemn as that of the melancholy Jaques. Sometimes his pieces are a succession of puns, amusing b y the strangeness of the relations which they suggest, as in the Tale of a Trumpet and Miss Kilmansegg and her Precious Leg; sometimes his muse is deeply pathetic, as in the Song of the Shirt, The Bridge of Sighs, The Lady's Dream, 2 he Death-Bed. Hood's most distinctive mark was the thorough humanity of his thoughts and expressions. His works have been collected into four volumes: Poems, Poems of Wit and Humour, Hood's Own or Laughter from Year to Tear and Whims and Oddities in Prose and Verse. Hood's prose writings are inferior to his poetry. Up the Rhine is a satire on the absurdities of English travellers. Felicia Dorothea Hemans (1793—1835). Female authorship in England is of comparatively modern date. There were v e r y f e w female writers in the 17 th century

Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

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and the beginning of the 18th century; but towards the end of that century and in the beginning of our own, the literature of England presents the names of many women in many branches of literature; and it is pleasing to say that the tone of the literature of British female authors is almost invariably wholesome. Mrs. Hemans has been acknowledged to stand high among the English poetesses. Her maiden name was Browne, and she was born at Liverpool. The failure of her father in trade caused the retirement ol the family into Wales, and the poetess received her first impressions from the beautiful scenery in Denbighshire. From a child she wrote poetry; she published her first verses at the age of fifteen. At eighteen, she married Capt. Hemans, but her marriage proved unhappy; after some time her husband took up his abode in Italy, leaving her to take care of five boys; and without any formal deed of separation, they never met again. Mrs. Hemans continued her literary labours; she produced a tragedy, The Vespers of Palermo (March 30 th 1282). Her best poem, the Forest Sanctuary appeared in 1826, followed by Records of Woman, Lays of Leisure Hours, National Lyrics, Songs of the Affections. Mrs. Hemans was fortunate in gaining two prizes for two of her poems, Dartmoor and William Wallace. She died prematurely in Dublin, whither she had gone to be near her brother; she was a kind, amiable, benevolent woman. Mrs. Hemans, like not a few modern poets, was most fortunate in her minor poems, and those will perhaps go down to posterity. Her poetry, which is extremely delicate, harmonious, but monotonously melancholy, is more for the ear and the fancy than for the heart and the intellect; in fact, as Sir W.Scott characterizes it "it has too many flowers for the fruit." The Graves of a Household, The Homes of England, The Voice of Spring, The Better Land, are some of her most popular songs. She has been most admired and imitated in America. Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1809—1861). The highest place among modern poetesses must be assigned to Mrs. Browning. Although a native of London, she spent

134

Aurora Leigh.

her early years at her father's country seat in Herefordshire, in sight of the Malvern Hills. She was a precocious child, studying hard and writing poetry from her 10th year. Her first poem, the Essay on Mind, was published before she was 20. Her next publication was a translation of the Prometheus Bound (1833) of iEschylus, for she pursued the study of the classical languages, besides occupying herself with writing poetry. In 1836 a personal calamity happened to her; she burst a blood-vessel in the lungsr and was sent to the mild climate of Torquay, and, while there, a fatal event took place, which cast a deep gloom over her for many years. Her favourite brother was drowned in her sight, close to the shore, by the upsetting of a boat. The event nearly killed her, and when she was at length able to be removed to London, she lived the solitary life of an invalid, reading and studying with untiring zeal. She published the Drama of Exile, a kind of sequel to Paradise Lost. The work is of unequal merit, the scheme is imperfectly developed, and the verse is often harsh and unmusical. Other works were The Vision of Poetsr J he Rhyme of the Duchess May, Bertha in the Lane, — which reminds one of Tennyson's May Queen. Lady Geraldine's Courtship; a Romance of the Age, is the story of a peasantpoet who falls in love with an earl's daughter and, to the honour of poesy, he obtains the hand of the fair one. In 1846, her health being improved, she became the wife of a kindred spirit — Robert Browning, the poet, and followed him to Pisa and Florence. Among her larger works is the poem of Aurora Leigh, a novel in blank verse, which she herself considered the most mature of all her works; it is full of her worst faults, though it contains great beauty of thought. In all her works, she is at her best, when she uses the language and expresses the thoughts of ordinary men; but when she withraws herself to contemplate her own being and analyze her own sensations, she is often obscure and sometimes quite unintelligible. She witnessed the Revolution of 1848 in Florence, which gave rise to another poem, the Casa Guidi Windows, full of the warmest sympathies for the liberties of the Italians. Some of her smaller poems are beautiful, as the Verses

Lord Tennyson.

135

on Cowper's Grave, and The Cry of the Children, which latter is a pathetic and impassioned pleading for the children of the poor, who toil in mines and factories, and which stands as a counterpart to Hood's Song of the Shirt. She also published a collection of sonnets, so-called translations from the Portuguese, the first of which is very fine: — "I thought once how Theocritus had sung "Of the sweet years, the dear and wished-for years, "Who each one, in a gracious hand, appears "To bear a gift for mortals, old and young; "And as I mused it, in his antique tongue, "I saw, in gradual vision through my tears, "The sweet, sad years, the melancholy years, "Those of my own life, who by turns had flung "A shadow across me. Straightway I was 'ware, "So weeping, how a mystic Shape did move "Behind me, and drew me backward by the hair, "And a voice said in mastery, while I strove: "Guess now who holds thee?" "Death!" I said. But there "The silver answer rang: "Not Death, but Love." Mrs. Browning died at Florence in 1861 and lies in the land of song and sunshine, like Keats and Shelley. Alfred Tennyson (1809—1892), the youngest of three brothers, all more or less endowed with poetical talent, was the son of a Lincolnshire clergyman. Alfred Tennyson, Poet-Laureate after Wordsworth (1850), rose gradually into fame, and is now almost universally acknowledged the greatest English poet of the latter half of the 19 th century. He published his first poems in 1830, and in 1833 issued a second volume, which, although it contained many poems that have since been highly applauded, was at the time of its appearance severely dealt with by the critics. The poet was now silent for nine years, but in 1842 appeared two volumes, containing reprints of some of the former poems, together with many new ones, including those that have since been regarded as the finest productions of his pen. They cover a wide field; some are fragments of legendary and chivalrous story, as Morte d'Arthur and Godiva; some pathetic, as The May Queen and Dora; some are songs or stories of love, as The Miller's Daughter, The

136

The Princess, In Memoriam.

Gardener's Daughter, and the much-praised Locksley Hall. The last is the most finished among these poems and full of passionate grandeur and intensity of feeling. "The lover of Locksley Hall is a high-minded, ardent youth, full of lofty aspiration. His love for his cousin Amy is at first returned, but she turns false, and after a tumult of conflicting passions — indignation, grief, self-reproach and despair — the lover finds relief in glowing visions of future enterprise and the world's progress." Shortly before his death, Lord Tennyson added a sequel calling it Locksley Hall, Sixty Years After. In the opening verses the now aged lover of the first poem finds himself at Locksley Hall again, and we learn that his faithless cousin died with her first child, and that her husband, now lying dead in Locksley Hall, has spent those sixty years of widowhood in doing good to those around him. The hero of the poem confesses honestly that "youthful jealousy is a liar" and that his former rival was a "worthier soul" than he is; besides, he himself has found consolation in a happy married life with an ideal wife. The poet has not forsaken his habit of moralising on the signs of the times; his views of the wild seething of our restless times are rather desponding, yet a glimmer of hope breaks forth. The poem concludes with the poet's advice to his grandson, containing much ripe wisdom of life — "Follow Light and do the Right — for man can half control his doom." In 1847 he published a long poem, The Princess, a Medley, the story of a strong-minded princess, who at first refuses to marry, but is conquered while tending the sick and wounded. Some of the intervening lyrics are very melodious. His next publication created a great sensation. In 1850 appeared a volume of 130 short poems, entitled In Memoriam, all devoted to the memory of a beloved college friend, who died suddenly at Vienna—Arthur Henry Hallam, the elder son of the historian, and engaged to Tennyson's sister. The minute delineation of his personal sorrow has been thought unmanly; yet the poet clothes his subject in all the shades of imagination and intellect; he describes, reasons, and allegorizes, and finally his grief subsides in the calm hope of meeting his friend in Heaven.

Idylls of the King.

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Five years later he published a new poem, Maud, and, in 1859, Idylls of the King. The subject is taken from among the old Welsh legends of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table, who held their court at Camelot by Caerleon, in Monmouthshire. These scattered legends were collected in the 12 th century by the chronicler Geoffrey of Monmouth, and again bound together in a newer form in the reign of Edward IV., by Sir Thomas Malory. It is known that Milton was much attracted by the subject, and at one time intended to make it the theme of a great national epic. The Idylls of the King consist of four detached poems; "the first contains the story of Enid, ridigg in her faded silk before her cruel lord; Elaine is the name of the heroine of the second book; it contains the tcagic story of the unrequited love of the innocent heroine for the matchlessly handsome, but guilty Sir Lancelot du Lake; Vivien, in the third book, is the treacherous beauty, another Delilah, who casts her spells round the old wizard Merlin, to shear him of his strength; and lastly Guinevere, Arthur's guilty queen, we see lying in an agony of remorse at the feet of Arthur, her tear-wet face crushed close to the convent floor, and her dark dishevelled hair almost hiding her, while the noble forgiveness of the injured king and his sad farewell pierce her guilty soul." Other poems belong to the same subject as the Morte d'Arthur, The Holy (¡frail, Sir Galahad, &c. Tennyson exchanged his early seat amid the fens and morasses of Lincolnshire, characteristic descriptions of which are often reproduced in his early poems, for a quiet house at Farringford near Freshwater Bay in the Isle of Wight, amid some of the loveliest scenery England can boast of; he died, however, at Aldworth, his Surrey country-seat. His later poems, in their descriptive parts, have taken their colouring from the beautiful scenery around him. He continued writing and publishing poems, Enoch Arden among others. He has published the following dramas, Mary Tudor, Harold, The Falcon, The Cup, Becket, The Promise of May, The Foresters, Robin Hood and Maid Marian, but the drama is not the kind of composition he is at home in.

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Browning - .

Tennyson seems to embrace the whole range of humanity; in his pages "legendary history, fairy fiction, Greek poetry, and trees endowed with human speech, blend in the procession with Egyptian fanatics, English ladies, peasant girls, artists, lawyers, farmers — in fact, a tolerably complete representation of the miscellaneous public of the present day; while the forms vary from epic fragments to the homeliest dialogue, from the simple utterance of emotion in a song to the highest allegory of a terrible and profound law of life." Akbar's Dream, and Other Poems is a posthumous work. Robert Browning (1812—1889) is generally admitted to share with Tennyson the foremost rank among modern poets; but he was longer than the Laureate in achieving his position. He chose a different sphere from Tennyson, and entered upon his poetical career as a dramatist; yet although his dramas were put upon the stage, they were too subtle and full of thought to become popular. It is on his later poems that his fame more securely rests. Among the most pleasing of his writings are Paracelsus (1835), remarkable for its philosophical meaning, and Men and IFomew,'delightful pictures of Italian art and scenery. As a voluntary exile from his native land for upwards of twenty years, he became thoroughly acquainted with Italian life and manners, his familiar knowledge of which he has embodied in a long poem The Ring and the Book, which forms a drama of twelve books. The Book is the record of a Roman murder-case, which the poet found on an old bookstall in Florence, while The Ring represents the leading aim and spirit of the poem — "that nothing is less demonstrable than matters of fact, no intellectual task so difficult as the sifting of evidence, and nothing more insufficient than the judgments that are lightly passed on current events." The work affords undeniable evidence of intellectual power, spiritual insight and earnest purpose. Though Browning's aims are high and generous, the effect of even his best performances is often marred by obscurity and by eccentricities of both style and expression. Robert Browning is the author of the dirge, Evelyn Hope.

American Poets. — Longfellow. American

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Poets.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807—1882) was born at Portland, in Maine. His family came originally from England; the first Longfellow emigrated from Hampshire to America about 1670. On his mother's side he is a descendant of John Alden, who came over with the Pilgrim Fathers in the Mayflower, in 1621, and who was the first man that landed at Plymouth, Massachusetts. The poet received a careful education and, when only nineteen years old, was appointed Professor of Modern Languages in his Alma Mater. He went abroad and, in order to qualify himself for the office, devoted more than three years to the study of the literatures of France, Italy, Spain, Germany, Holland and England, in their native climes. In 1829 he assumed the duties of his office, and two years later, he married. He had not occupied his chair six years, when, by the resignation of George Ticknor, author of the History of Spanish Literature, a vacancy occurred in the faculty of Harvard College, and Longfellow was elected Professor of Belles-Lettres. In 1835, he visited Europe for a second time to reinvigorate his knowledge of European literature. During this journey he lost his wife in Holland. In 1842 the poet paid a third visit to Europe, and passed the summer of that year at Boppard on the Rhine. In 1854 he retired to the undisturbed enjoyment of literary leisure, residing in Craigie House, Cambridge, the head-quarters of General Washington after the battle of Bunker's Hill in 1775. Longfellow, who has long been a popular poet in Europe as well as in America, came first before the public as an author by contributing poems and essays to American periodicals. He is best known for his short lyrics, sentimental, narrative, descriptive, which show refined taste, and breathe throughout a high tone of morality. In all his works he looks rather upon the artistic elements in the world; he avoids the sight of the deformed, the harrowing and the foul. Some of his most admired lyrics are The Psalm of Life, Excelsior, The Cld Clock on the Stair, The

140

Poe, Bryant.

Reaper and the i lowers, Ihe Bridge. His longer poems are The Golden Legend, a vivid picture of monkish life in the middle ages; its irregular metre and obscure narration are in fine harmony with the spirit of the poem, which bears a strong resemblance in character and plot to Goethe's Faust; Evangeline, a tale of Acadia (or, as it is now called, Nova Scotia) is founded on a painful occurrence, — the eviction of a whole village by order of the English government, which took place in the early period of British colonization in the northern part of America about 1713. It is written in hexameter verse, as well as another long poem of Longfellow's, The Courtship of Miles Standish, a narrative of the landing of the Pilgrim Fathers in America. The Song of Hiawatha, the most poetical of Longfellow's works, is an ode in a novel but charming verse, descriptive of the Saturnian age of the native race of North America. In the majestic scenery of the prairie and the forest, the author finds full scope for his fine gift for imaginative description. Longfellow's prose works include Hyperion, Kavanagh and Outre Mer; the first of these is the most popular. He died in 1882 full of age and honours. Edgar Allan Poe (1809—1849) was a native of Baltimore. His parents, strolling actors, died when he was young, and he was adopted and liberally educated by a benevolent Virginian planter, Mr. Allan, but all attempts to settle him respectably in life failed; he remained restless and ungovernable. His peculiar poem, The Raven, and his weird prose stories, have conferred on him a distinction to which his life does not seem to entitle him. Annabel Lee is a beautiful and tender lament for his wife. He died in a hospital, October 7 th, 1849. W i l l i a m Cullen Bryant (1794—1878), who divides the crown of American poetry with Longfellow, was born at Cummington, in Massachusetts, where his father practised as a physician. With a precocity, rivalled only b y that of Chatterton, he published in his 14 th year a political satire, The Embargo, which found many admirers. He studied for the law and was admitted to the bar, but soon devoted himself to journalism. He became a con-

Prose Literature of the 19 th Century.

141

tributor to the North American Review, and in 1816 published in it a poem in blank verse, Thanatopsis, (a view of death) which was praised by the American critics as the unrivalled production of a youth of twenty. Other pieces of verse followed, but did not meet with the same success, and he seemed in danger of being quickly forgotten, when he rose into real fame by the issue, in 1821, of his poem, The Ages, a survey of the experience of mankind. It is on this volume of verses, sweet and melodious, though wanting the highest qualities of inspiration, that the future celebrity of W. C. Bryant as a poet will have to rest. As a journalist his influence was very great; he laboured hard during his long life to diffuse a love of art among all classes in the United States. To extend his knowledge of art and educate the taste of his children, he came to Europe in 1834 with his whole family, remaining in Italy for a considerable time. He repeated his visit to Europe in 1845 and again in 1849. The incidents of these journeys were reprinted from the journal in which they originally appeared, under the title of Letters of a Traveller, which found many readers. He died of sun-stroke in June, 1878. P r o s e L i t e r a t u r e of t h e 19th C e n t u r y . The early years of this century were years of conflict and excitement. England fought for the liberties of Europe and, at times also, had to ward off dangers that threatened herself. The literature of the first part of the century was chiefly made up of poetry, and was, in some kind, a reflection of the prevalent tone of the age; it is marked by intense feeling, passion and emotion, and a large amount of the best poetry must be referred to the early part of the present century. In the Victorian age, the prose element has predominated. The long enjoyment of peace has facilitated inquiries into all the branches of art and science. In no department of literature has Europe made greater progress during the present century than in that of history. A new impulse was given to the study of ancient history by the publication of the first volume of Niebuhr's Roman History. This remarkable work taught scholars to test the value of original authorities, to enter into the spirit of anti-

142

Thomas Arnold, History of Rome.

quity, and to think and feel as the Romans felt and thought. His leading theory was that the commonly received history of the early centuries of Eome was in great part fabulous, founded on popular songs or lays chanted at the Roman banquets, and he made it his task to disentangle the truth contained in these ballads from the alloy of fiction. Gradually followers and disciples of this theory arose in England; one of the most enthusiastic of Niebuhr's admirers was Dr. Thomas Arnold, (1795—1842) the well-known and popular head-master of Rugby School. His History of Rome was a popular exhibition of Niebuhr's views; it is written in clear masculine English and reflects the amiable qualities of its author; it was broken off by his death, at the end of the Second Punic War. Besides being known as an author, Arnold has made himself a lasting name by his untiring zeal in bringing about a reformation in public schools, particularly that of Rugby. He had purchased Fox How, a small property in Westmoreland, on the beautiful river Rothay, where he spent his vacations; he was preparing to return thither, when a sudden death, caused by spasms of the heart, closed his useful and disinterested career. Thomas Babington, Lord Macaulay, (1800—1859) the most illustrious writer on modern history, was the descendant of a Scottish family of ministers, but born at Rothley Temple, in Leicestershire. The father of the historian, Zachary Macaulay, was associated with Wilberforce and Clarkson in their labours for the abolition of the slave-trade, which was decreed by the British legislature in 1807. Macaulay, who, from a boy, gave evidence of unusual talents, and who was possessed of a most retentive memory, graduated at Cambridge with great distinction, and in 1824, was called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn. In 1825 he contributed to the Edinburgh Review an article on Milton, which may be regarded as the starting-point of his literary career; it was the first of his brilliant series of Essays. Soon after, he commenced his parliamentary career, whichhe abandoned on being sentto India, from 1834 to 1838, as legal adviser to the Supreme Council at Calcutta, where

Lord Macaulay.

Essays.

143

he was placed at the head of the commission for the reform of East-India Legislature. These circumstances led him to the study of Indian history and affairs, and furnished him with materials for his two best essays, viz. those on Lord Clive and Warren Hastings. After his return to Europe he published, in 1842, his Essays in a collected form; besides the three already mentioned, the book contains articles on Bacon, Bunyan, Sam. Johnson, Burleigh, Hampden, Sir William Temple, Addison, von Ranke, Leigh Hunt, Frederick the Great, the War of Succession in Spain, and others, thus embracing a vast range of subjects. The reading and knowledge of the essayist are immense; in every department of learning, in questions of politics, history, philosophy, he seems equally at home; in fact the resources of his memory and learning seem inexhaustible. In 1840 Macaulay became member for Edinburgh, was appointed Paymaster-General to the Forces with a seat in the Cabinet, but when, in 1847, he lost his seat for Edinburgh, he devoted his time mainly to the great work, on which he had already been labouring for many years. In 1848 appeared the first two volumes of The History of England from the Accession of James II. " I purpose to write the History of England from the accession of James II, down to a time which is within the memory of men still living", are the opening words of the first chapter. As it is, he has only brought the work down to the death of William III., covering a space of seventeen years only; it consists of four volumes, which were published during his life-time, and of the imperfect one which appeared after his death. No historical work in modern times has excited the same amount of interest and admiration as Lord Macaulay's History of England. Before the second portion was ready, eleven large editions of the first had been disposed of. Its fascinating style, its portraits of historical personages, brought before us in life and action, its description of political events, and of the progress of society, contributed to make the work irresistible. "The first chapter of the first volume contains a rapid but masterly review ef earlier English history, becoming

144

History of England.

more detailed and picturesque on reaching the period of which Cromwell is the central figure. The second chapter gives the disappointing reign of Charles II. The third gives a most graphic description of old England in the days of the Stuarts; it shows us the country and the country-squire at his own seat and in London, introduces us to the literary gossips at Will's coffee-house, carries us in a Flying Coach at the "wonderful rate of forty miles a day" along muddy roads infested with highway-men; in short, conducts us through all phases of society. From novels, plays, pictures, maps, poems, diaries, letters, and a hundred other such sources, he collected his materials with indefatigable industry. After this brilliant overture, which terminates with the death of Charles II., we are introduced to the drama of which William III. is the hero, and the establishment of representative government the final event". The most splendid passages of the history are the rebellion of Monmouth 1685, the trial of the Seven Bishops 1688, the Battle of the Boyne 1690, the Massacre of Glencoe 1692, etc. The charm of Macaulay's writing depends in a great measure on his style, the characteristics of which are vigour, animation, copiousness, clearness and, above all, sound English. "It may be safely said that he has not written a single sentence which is not as clear as it can be, that he has never employed a stilted or unmeaning phrase, that he has never clothed his meaning in words, which can convey to the reader any other sense than that he desired they should bear. His sentences are never complicated, one may read a sentence twice to judge of its full force, never to comprehend its meaning." It must be added that Macaulay's views were not unbiassed, that he was at times inaccurate and given to exaggeration, and that his style borders on mannerism. Macaulay has also written poetry. In his Lays of Ancient Rome (1842) he adopted the theory of Niebuhr; and, identifying himself with the plebeians and tribunes, he makes them chant the martial stories of Horatius Codes, The Battle of the Lake Regillus, Virginius, and The Prophecy of Capys. There are two earlier poems of his, The Armada, a Fragment, and the Battle of Ivry.

145

Hallam, Lingard.

In 1857, he was raised to the peerage as a fitting tribute to his eminent literary merit; his health, however, had begun to fail; and in December 1859, just after he had been entertaining a Christmas party at his own house in Kensington, he suddenly expired. His Life and Letters, by his nephew, Mr. G. 0. Trevelyan, is one of the best biographies of the present time. Henry Hallam, (1778—1859) a fellow-labourer with Macaulay in the field of historical research, was the only son of a Dean of Wells. He received his education at Eton and Oxford, and afterwards settled permanently in London. He practised at the bar for a few years, but having an ample income, which was augmented by his appointment as one of the Commissioners of Audit, he withdrew from the profession of the law, and devoted himself entirely to literature. He was one of the early contributors to the Edinburgh Review; but the vast extent of his learning and research was unknown until 1818, when he published his View of the State of Europe during the Middle Ages, which showed that he possessed all the patience of an antiquary, and the spirit and sagacity of a philosopher. He next published in 1827, The Constitutional History of England from the Accession of Henry VII. to the Death of George II., pronounced to be the best and most impartial book of its kind. In 1837 followed an Introduction to the Literature of Europe in the 15th, 16th and 17th Centuries, a work which is remarkable for the profound knowledge of the language and literature of each nation. All these publications have taken rank as standard works. Hallam's later years were saddened by the loss of his two sons, the elder of whom, Arthur, formed the subject of Tennyson's In Memoriam; he died in 1833, his brother in 1850. Dr. John Lingard (1771—1851), the Roman Catholic historian of England, wrote a History of England from the Invasion by the Romans, which is brought down to the abdication of James II. Dr. Lingard claims the merit of having collected his materials from original historians and records. On all political questions he adheres to a rigid impartiality, which partly forsakes him when he treats of Mann, Sketch.

10

146

Palgrave, Alison, Froude.

the English Reformation and Reformers. Although his work has taken its place among the most valuable national histories, it gives no comprehensive view of society, no profound reflection on human character, and for this reason fails to rank in the highest place. Different periods of English history have obtained particular attention from more or less careful investigators. Early English History has found a learned and faithful interpreter in Sir F r a n c i s P a l g r a v e (1788—1861), who in 1832, was knighted for his contributions to constitutional and parliamentary history. Among his best works are A History of the Anglo-Saxons, Rise and Progress of the English Commonwealth, (meaning an independent community, not the Commonwealth of the 17 th century), and The History of Normandy and England, of which the Norman Conquest is the central subject. Sir Archibald A l i s o n (1792—1867) wrote The History of Europe from the commencement of the French Revolution to the Restoration of the Bourbons. A still living historian, Mr. J a m e s Anthony F r o u d e , born 1818, has treated a large portion of the 16 th century in a new light. His History of England from the fall of Wolsey (1529) to the death of Elizabeth, though a work of great ability, is conceived in the spirit of a special pleader, the object of the author being to vindicate the character of Henry VIII., and to depict the actual condition, the contentment and loyalty of the people during his reign. The earlier volumes are remarkable for minute and exact illustrations of industrial and social life in the Tudor period. The struggles between those two able and ambitious Queens — Mary and Elizabeth, — are set forth with uncommon dramatical power. Italian history has found an able painter in W i l l i a m R o s c o e ( 1 7 5 3 — 1 8 3 1 ) , born at Liverpool, the son of humble parents. He worked his way, unaided, to eminence in literature. His Life of Lorenzo de Medici, called the Magnificent (1448—1492) made him at once one of the popular writers of the day. A second great work on the history of Italy, The Life and Pontificate of Leo X. (1475—1521) did not experience the same success as the Life of Lorenzo,

Grote. — American Historians.

147

owing to the difficulty of treating the history of the Reformation to the satisfaction of either Protestants or Papists, Roscoe, after some training for the bar, finally became a banker in Liverpool, where he was an active promoter of all the institutions for literary and scientific purposes, effecting by word and deed his favourite theory of a union of commercial and intellectual pursuits. The bank with which Roscoe was connected failed, and his collections consisting of prints and drawings, but chiefly of valuable books, were scattered to the winds. The attention of late directed to Greek history has produced several histories of Greece. Bishop Thirlwall's (1797—1875) scholarly History of Greece, written from an anti-democratic point of view has lately been somewhat eclipsed by George Grote's (1794—1871) elaborate, philosophical work of the same name and subject. The great purpose of the historian is to penetrate the inner life of the Greeks, to realise their views and feelings, and to portray their social, moral and religious condition, and not to judge them by an English standard. The sympathies of the writer throughout the entire narrative are enlisted on the side of the Athenian democracy. American Historians. William Hickling Prescott (1796—1859), the celebrated American historian, pursued his studies under adverse circumstances; while at college he had the misfortune to lose, by an accident, the sight of one eye, by which the other was sympathetically affected. After a few years of travel on the continent of Europe, Prescott returned to America and settled in Boston, engaged a reader whom he taught Spanish, and to whom he dictated his works. He selected the history of Spain as his special field of research, and opened his series of historical works with the History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella (published 1837), which was equally well received on both sides of the Atlantic. This first work was followed at intervals by the Conquest of Mexico (1843), the Conquest of Peru (1847), and the History of Philip II. To some extent, Prescott fell into the error of Robertson in palliating the enormous cruelties

148

Bancroft, Ticknor, Motley.

that marked the career of the Spanish conquerors; but he is more careful in citing his authorities, in order, as he says, "to put the reader in a position to judge for himself, and thus for revising and, if need be, reversing the judgments of the historian." Prescott realised great sums by his books. He died of a shock of paralysis. G e o r g e B a n c r o f t (1800—1891), an historian and statesman, has written a History of the Colonisation of the United States in ten vols. Bancroft studied at Gottingen; he was for three years minister for the States at the British Court and, latterly, American ambassador at the Court of Berlin. The work contains much information obtained from manuscripts and unpublished sources. His style is energetic, although somewhat stilted; his democratic prejudices are sometimes unnecessarily brought forward, still the history is fairly candid and genial in tone. He added two supplementary volumes, relating the foundation of the United States Constitution. G e o r g e T i c k n o r ( 1 7 9 1 — 1 8 7 1 ) , born at Boston, preceded Longfellow in the chair of Modern Literature at Harvard. He wrote a History of Spanish Literature, to which he is said to have devoted thirty years, and which for learning, sound criticism, and literary merit ranks with the highest works of its class. John Lothrop Motley (1814—1877) holds a high place among modern historians for his History of the Dutch Republic and a History of the United Netherlands. Motley has brought deep research and conscientious study to his great works. English Miscellaneous Prose

Writers.

This class of writers contains the names of not a few authors who have written on a variety of subjects from a critical, satirical, humorous or didactic point of view. A great part of the miscellaneous literature has been written in the form of essays, and consists chiefly of criticism on poetry, past and present. These writings were, in a great many cases, at first distributed among periodicals, reviews and magazines, and afterwards published again in a col-

Miscellaneous Writers — Sydney Smith.

149

lected form. A great many of these writers, however, produced literary work of a more connected kind. We will begin this branch of literature with one of the writers who started the Edinburgh Review, the most prominent of whom were Sydney Smith, Jeffrey, and Henry, Lord Brougham. Sydney Smith (1769—1845) was the son of an English gentleman, impoverished through his extravagance, and of a French mother. He received his education at Winchester and Oxford, entered the Church, and was sent with a young Englishman to Weimar; but Germany becoming the seat of war, the young curate and his pupil repaired to Edinburgh, where the former resided for five years. He became acquainted with other young men of ambition and high aspirations; the principles of the French Revolution had captivated most people, and society was in an excited and disquieted state. These young men, being dissatisfied with the state of things generally, planned setting up a Review, wherein they boldly and fearlessly advocated their own views on political, as well as on literary topics. Smith was appointed editor, but soon after having edited the first number he left Edinburgh, and the editorship of the Review fell into the hands of Jeffrey and Brougham. Smith returned to England, and settled in London, where he became popular as a preacher and as a most witty and a eloquent man in society, and an able lecturer on literary subjects, though the liberality of his views rendered him obnoxious to the party in power. When in Yorkshire, where he had obtained a living, he wrote a highly amusing and powerful political tract entitled Letters on the Subject of the Roman Catholics, to my Brother Abraham, who lives in the Country, by Peter Plymley (1808); the most masterly ironical letters on political subjects that had appeared since Swift. Although Smith had the wit and energy of Swift, he had none of his coarseness or cynicism; his inexhaustible humour, however, was a powerful ally in impressing his clear and logical argument. Smith was a practical man, and, in every situation of life, he knew how to make the most of what offered itself for others as well as for himself; he con-

150

Lamb, Tales from Shakspeare.

stantly endeavoured to fight against evils, to correct abuses, conquer religious intolerance, and to expose cant and hypocrisy. He was a fine representative of the intellectual Englishman, manly, fearless and independent. Charles Lamb (1775—1834), essayist, humourist and critic, was born in London in humble circumstances, and educated at Christ's Hospital (the Blue-coat School), the fellow-scholar of Coleridge, whose boyhood he recalls in these pathetic words "Come back into my memory, like as thou wert wont to be in the day-spring of thy fancies, with hope like a fiery column before thee — the dark pillar not yet turned — Samuel Taylor Coleridge — Logician, Metaphysician, Bard!" Lamb was destined for the Church, but an impediment in his speech proved an insurmountable barrier. He obtained, instead, an appointment in the East India Company's office. There was a taint of hereditary madness in the family; Charles himself had been confined in an asylum for six weeks; in the year 1790 his sister Mary, in a fit of insanity, stabbed her mother to death with a knife snatched from the dinner-table. She was placed in a private asylum, and even after her reason was completely restored, kept in confinement until the death of her father. Charles, then 22 years old, released her and engaged himself solemnly never to forsake her; he kept his word, gave up all thoughts of ever marrying, and although her malady recurred at times, he never left her side. Amid his drudgeries at the desk for many hours a day, Lamb found means to fill his mind with the spirit and essence of the old writers, particularly of Shakspeare and his contemporaries. He first appeared as an author in conjunction with his friend Coleridge, and in 1801 published John Woodville, a drama in the manner and style of the Elizabethan dramatists, which however was ruthlessly ridiculed in the Edinburgh Eeview. A second piece, Mr. H, was acted for one night only, and Lamb himself consoled his friends with a century of puns for the wreck of his dramatic hopes. In 1807, he published a series of tales founded on the plays of Shakspeare, in the composition of which he had been aided by his sister. They

Specimens of the old English Dramatists.

151

were dedicated to young readers, especially to girls precluded from the reading of the dramas themselves, to serve as an introduction to them, and in the preface he expressed a wish that the plays themselves, when read by his young readers in riper years, might prove to them — "enrichers of the fancy, strengtheners of virtue, a withdrawing from all selfish and mercenary thoughts, a lesson of all sweet land honourable thoughts and actions, to teach courtesy, benignity, generosity, humanity: for of examples, teaching these virtues, his pages are full." The following year he published Specimens of the Old English Dramatists zoith Notes; and in these he evinced his intimate familiarity with the dramatists of the Elizabethan period, as well as his critical taste. But his full and most original powers were enclosed in his Essays of Elia and E liana, which were at first scattered among the numbers of the London Magazine. In these he found a field to show his various reading, nice observation, his original thought and fancies, his poetical conceptions, and his inimitable quaint humour and pathos. His recollections of his London life, to which he was most devotedly attached, furnished him with materials for a great many essays; and even the humblest subject was embellished when touched by his hand. It is hardly possible to describe these Essays in such a way, as to make their character understood by those who have not read them. Among them are several little narratives, generally visions and parables, one of them named Dream-Children, another Child-Angel, written with almost feminine grace and tenderness. In 1825, Lamb was enabled to retire from the drudgery of his situation and to go home "for ever", as he wrote to Wordsworth, henceforth indulging himself in his literary pursuits and enjoying the friendship of men like Coleridge, Wordsworth, Southey, Rogers, Hazlitt and many others whose tastes were congenial with his own. In 1830 he published a small volume of poetry, entitled Album Verses, but he had the feeling rather than the accomplishments of a poet. In 1834, while taking his daily walk, he stumbled against a stone, fell and slightly injured his face; erysipelas came on and caused his death. He

152

De Quince}', Hazlitt.

was buried amidst the tears and regrets of a circle of warmly attached friends. His sister survived him till 1847. Thomas De Quincey (1785—1859). Of all the miscellaneous writers of this century, De Quincey is the greatest master of English prose. He was a native of Manchester, and having lost his father early, he ran away from the Manchester grammar-school to escape its severe discipline. He was allowed to spend his time in Wales on a very small allowance, which exposed him to all manner of hardships, and thus undermined his health. When his friends received him again, he studied at Oxford, and, there, to alleviate acute bodily pain, he tried the effect of opium and fell a victim to opium-eating. When he was advanced in life, he published in the London Magazine, his Confessions of an Opium-Eater (1822), which was followed by numerous other papers on a variety of subjects. He himself has said that it is characteristic of an opium-eater never to finish anything; and, though he was equal to the highest mental undertakings, he dissipated his faculties on short articles, And even these want firmness of grasp; on the slightest provocation he turns aside from his subject, introducing matter not in the least connected with it. The only thing he ever finished was the structure of his sentences, which are models of perfect workmanship. De Quincey's works have been collected into fourteen volumes, which he divides into three classes, 1) those whose chief purpose is to amuse and interest, 2) essays of a critical, speculative or philosophical character, 3) papers belonging to a class which may be called prose-poetry. To this last belongs his Suspiria de Profundis, remarkable for pathos and eloquence. De Quincey lived for many years at Grasmere; towards the latter part of his life he removed to Glasgow and Edinburgh. He gradually cured himself of opiumeating, but the effects of it had shattered his health. William Hazlitt (1778—1830), another critical essayist, was the son of a Unitarian minister. He studied theology, but forsook it and became a painter. Finding that his appreciative faculties outweighed his creative power, he relinquished painting, yet retained all through life a keen

Isaac D'Israeli.

153

eye for its charms. Like his friend Lamb, he was a great admirer of the early and more particularly the Elizabethan writers, and contributed much towards reviving the study of the old authors by writing Essays on the Characters in Shakspeare's Plays, and by giving lectures on the literature of the Elizabethan Age. Hazlitt was also an original thinker; yet he had felt more than he had reflected, and could paint emotions better than he could unfold principles. His greatest work was a Life of Napoleon, in four volumes (1828). His last work was the Conversations of James NoHhcote, Esq. R. A. (1830). Hazlitt was fond of paradox and easily led away by it. Isaac D'Israeli (1766—1848). A representative man of another class of miscellaneous writers, Isaac D'Israeli, was the descendant of a Jewish family exiled from Spain to Venice, towards the middle of the 15 th century, and which came to England towards the middle of the 18 th century. From -early youth Isaac showed a decided inclination for study; and, as nothing could induce him to embrace a mercantile career, he was at length allowed to follow the bent of his genius, which lay altogether in the direction of antiquarian research. The fruits of his studies were his well-known book Curiosities of Literature, which though not without errors, almost stands foremost in its class; and this with other of his works of a similar character, as Amenities of Literature, Quarrels of Authors, Calamities of Authors, have done much to diffuse a literary taste. D'Israeli was a high Tory, and in his characters of James I. and Charles I. he has sought to vindicate the memory of these kings from the odium which has been accumulated upon them. Although struck with blindness, he continued to publish, being aided in his work by an only daughter. His ablest work perhaps is The Literary Character, or the History of Men of Genius drawn from their oxen Feelings and Confessions. It was a favourite with Byron "often a consolation, and always a pleasure." Isaac D'Israeli was the father of the late great statesman, Lord Beaconsfleld (1804—1881), himself also a talented maintainer of conservative, or rather, Tory views, and also a brilliant novelist. Indeed Vivian Grey, Contarini Fleming,

154

Lockhart, Life of Scott.

and Coningsby, by the younger Disraeli (Lord Beaconsfield), are become as famous books as anything written by the father. John Gibson Lockhart (1794—1854) is best known as the editor of the Quarterly Review and the biographer of his father-in-law, Sir Walter Scott. He was the son of a Scottish minister in the county of Lanark, and received his education at Glasgow University, being elected one of the two students whom Glasgow sends annually to Oxford by virtue of an endowment, named Snell Bursaries. At both universities he was an assiduous student, and at Oxford took a first class in classics. Although he was called to the bar, he soon forsook the legal profession to devote himself chiefly to literature. In 1820 he married Sophia, the eldest daughter of Sir Walter Scott, who possessed much of the conversational talent, the unaffected good humour and liveliness of her father. It was for their son, Littlejohn, that Scott composed his History of Scotland known as Tales of a

Gh'andfather.

On the establishment of Blackwood's Magazine, in 1817, the organ of Toryism in Scotland, Lockhart became one of its principal contributors, as well as its ablest. Between this time and 1826, when he went to London as editor of the Quarterly Review, he published four novels. Valerius, a Roman Story (3 vols.) of the time of Trajan (98—117) and of the persecution of the Christians is the best of the four. Adam Blair gives the story of a Scottish minister. Reginald Dalton is the most elaborate of his novels; the scene is laid in England, it gives a full account of college life at Oxford, apparently drawn from life. Matthew Wald is inferior to its predecessors. On the death of Sir Walter Scott, Lockhart was left his sole literary executor, and the result of this trust was his well-known Life of Scott (1837—39). It is the nearest approach in fulness of detail, literary importance and general interest to Boswell's Life of Johnson. It is fully worthy of the subject, fair and impartial; Scott is presented to the world exactly as he was in life, without either suppressions or misstatements that could alter the essential

Carlyle.

155

features in the life of a man alike worthy of our love and our admiration. The diary and letters of Scott are interwoven with the story of his life in that finished, graceful style of which Lockhart was a thorough master. Among other biographies he wrote a Life of Burns in the same candid, sympathetic manner; he also published metrical translations of the historical and romantic ballads of Spain. In 1843 Lockhart received a pension of ¿6400 a year through Sir Robert Peel; he survived all the family of Sir Walter Scott and his own two sons. His daughter was married to Mr. Hope Scott of Abbotsford, and at Abbotsford Lockhart died in 1854. Thomas Carlyle (1795—1882). Of all the prose writers of the present age, none possesses a more strongly marked individuality, than Thomas Carlyle, the friend and admirer of Goethe and of German literature and thought. Born in the parish of Ecclefechan in Dumfriesshire, the son of an honest stonemason, Carlyle received a good education, and was sent to the university of Edinburgh to prepare for the Presbyterian ministry. While there, his views changed, he found that he could not conscientiously become a clergyman, having set his whole heart on a literary career; and until he could adopt it as a calling, he took a situation as mathematical teacher in a school in Fifeshire. Carlyle first appeared as an author in the Edinburgh Encyclopaedia, for which he wrote several biographies. His next works were a Life of Schiller (1823), and a translation of Goethe's Wilhelm Meister. He had a decided predilection for German thought and language and in the course of time adopted a peculiarity of style, emphatic, wilful, full of extraordinary construction and uncouth language. This has been popularly regarded as his Germanism. There can be no doubt that his style is peculiar, and something of it may have been borrowed from the German; but his mind was a strongly original one, and he would have thought and expressed himself in a way of his own, if nothing German had ever been heard of by him. The peculiarity of his diction is rather to be attributed to his Northern origin. His earnestness, grim humour, queer, half-sarcastic, half-sympathetic fun are quite Scotch.

156

Sartor Resartus, French Revolution.

A hearty love of truth, and a loyal conformity to the laws of nature, and common-sense seem to constitute the germ of Carlyle's philosophy. He abhors all sham, his heroes are men of action, champions for truth and against conventionalities. Whatever falls short of his ideal, he treats with pitiless indignation. There are a few pithy maxims which are constantly coming up in his writings. Silence, according to him, is more expressive than speech. Action is more dignified than thought. Duty is more imperative than happiness, and the true precept of life is not, "Know thyself," but "Know what thou canst work at." In 1825, Carlyle married a wealthy lady and retired with her to Craigenputtoch, a lonely estate in his own county, an oasis in the midst of barren moors, of which and of his life there, he has given a most attractive picture in a letter to Goethe. In this lonely nook he wrote, among other works, a most sympathetic Life of Burns, doing full justice to the true manhood of the unfortunate genius. Sartor Resartus (the Patcher Repatched), which appeared in Fraser's Magazine in 1833—34, professes to be a review of a German treatise on dress, but in reality illustrates the transcendental philosophy of Fichte. The year 1837 is the central point in Carlyle's literary life, for then appeared The French Revolution, a History, which is not only the author's ablest book, but one of the most remarkable of the age. Never before in English historical literature had there been witnessed such a combination of individuality of view and treatment, picturesque sketches of scene and incident, quaint and graphic delineation of character and thrilling pathos, alternating with grim humour and satire. Another remarkable work is the Letters and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell, with Elucidations (1845). This work aims at establishing the character of the Protector on original evidence, making him speak from the dead past with his own voice and pen, while Carlyle's elucidations are brilliant specimens of his historic style. In the meantime Carlyle had removed to London, residing chiefly in Chelsea, and devoting his time to literary pursuits. The person and history of Frederick the Great

Novelists — Cooper, Marryat.

157

furnished him with material for another great historical work, History of Frederick II., called Frederick the Great (1865), choosing him for a hero because, as he said, that soldier-king was a reality and had nothing of the hypocrite. We possess from the pen of Carlyle a graphic portrait of Coleridge in his retreat in Highgate Hill, London. Carlyle died in 1882, at his London home after a brief illness. Novelists. The excellence of Sir Walter Scott's novels had the effect of elevating the reputation of that department of fiction, and of inducing many authors of distinguished quality to cultivate it. Among those novelists who were in full activity when Scott died, the first deserving special notice is James Fenimore Cooper (1789—1851), the distinguished American novelist, who has obtained great celebrity all over Europe for his pictures of sea-life, but especially for the descriptions of wild Indian manners and scenery of his native America. The best known among his numerous works of fiction are The Spy, The Prairie, The Last of the Mohicans, The Red Rover, The Water Witch etc. Capt. Marryat (1792—1848) was especially at home at sea, and invested the ship and its crew with an absorbing interest. Though occasionally a little awkward on land, he evinced an intimate acquaintance with all the inmates of a ship from the admiral down to the common tar. His Peter Simple, Jacob Faithful, Frank Mildmay, Mr. Midshipman Easy, Poor Jack, have been the delight of a whole generation of youthful readers. Edward Bulwer, Lord Lytton (1805—1872) is a rare example of literary fecundity and versatility. He wrote, besides other literary productions, poetry and dramas, a long list of novels. His first set, including Pelham (1827) were fashionable. His second among which Rienzi (massacred 1354) stands prominent, were romantic. His next, of which Ernest Maltravers is a specimen, were sentimental; then came several historical fictions headed by the Last of the Barons. Towards the close of his life, he changed his manner altogether, and The Caxtons, My Novel and What will he do with itf are novels of modern so-

158

Bulwer Lytton, Jane Austen.

ciety. In these latter fictions, Bulwer has attained a more pleasing style and tone, which furnish an agreeable contrast to the unhealthy moral temperament of some of his early books; yet the tone of all of them is too high-pitched for real life, though each of them being kept in the same key throughout has a reality of its own. The novel is that branch of literature in which women have written much, and, in not a few cases, with great success. Ann Radcliffe (1764—1823) was one of the earliest female novelists. She achieved her great popularity by introducing the romantic and the terrible in her fictions. Haunted castles, fierce thunderstorms, persecuted females, mysterious beings are scattered freely through her novels. Development of character is not Mrs. Radcliffe's forte; she excelled, however, in descriptive scenery. The Romance of the Forest, The Mysteries of Udolpho, The Italian, are considered her best works. Maria Edgeworth (1767—1849) has written a large number of stories and novels of a moral and educational character and illustrative of Irish life. She knew how to render her stories interesting, as well as instructive to her young readers through rich humour, pathetic tenderness and admirable sound sense. Sir Walter Scott, with whom she was on terms of friendship, has acknowledged that to her descriptions of Irish characters and manners we are indebted, in a great measure, for the Waverley Novels, as the perusal of Miss Edgeworth's tales led him first to think, that something similar might be attempted for his own country. Several of her stories for the young, as Frank, Harry and Lucy and others are combined under the general heading of Early Lessons. The Parent's Assistant is another work of a similar kind. Miss Edgeworth also published six volumes of Tales of Fashionable Life of which The Absentee is considered the best. In private life she practised the virtues she tried to inculcate in her stories. Jane Austen (1775—1817) gives, in her novels, plain representations of the higher middle-class society of her time. Her plots are exceedingly simple, and she depends

Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre.

159

for her effect upon no surprising adventures, nothing sensational. The great charm of her fictions lies in their truth and simplicity, in the natural development of her characters, and the clear daylight of nature as reflected in domestic life. Scenes of variety and sorrowful truth, as well as of vivacity and humour are her genial element. She is also quite at home in describing the mistakes in the education of young ladies and in delicate ridicule of female foibles and vanities; and a finer moral lesson cannot be found than the distress of the Bertram family in Mansfield Park, arising from the vanity and callousness of the two daughters, who had been taught nothing but accomplishments. Sense and Sensibility (1811), Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mansfield Park (1814) and Emma (1816) appeared during her lifetime, Northanger Abbey and Persuasion after her death. Miss Austen's stories, perhaps from their very contrast to the highly sensational novels of our day, enjoy a constantly increasing popularity, shown in the numerous editions issued of them. Charlotte Bronte "Currer Bell" (1816—1855) was one of three sisters, all endowed with remarkable power. Her father was a poor clergyman, the incumbent of the small living of Haworth, a straggling village, bordering on the lonely Yorkshire moors. The children were brought up in a singular manner; they were kept on vegetable diet and clothed in the meanest garments, and after the early death of their mother, much left to themselves and to the busy intellectual life they kept up among themselves. After various unsuccessful attempts at earning an independent livelihood, the three sisters published their poems under the names of Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell, and, although they were not much thought of, continued their authorship by writing novels. In 1847 Charlotte Bronte, under the nom-de-plume of Currer Bell, brought out her novel Jane Eyre, which took the reading world by storm and reached three editions within a twelvemonth. The novel depicts the strong, self-reliant, racy and individual characters which still linger in the North; and this individuality of the character of the people, and the scenery of Yorkshire constitute the attraction and the value of the novel. It is the story of

160

George Eliot.

an orphan, poor and friendless, who enters as governess the house of a rich man whose love she wins, but to whom she is only united after many trials. The freshness and reality of the story gave it great success. Much of Charlotte's own history, down to her small figure and plain face, is embodied in the story of the heroine. The authorship had been kept secret. Her two sisters died, to the intense grief of Charlotte, who was now left alone with her aged father. She continued publishing. Her next novel Shirley (1849) is another picture of Yorkshire life, fresh and vigorous as the former, which was well received. Villette (1853) contains her experiences at the school at Brussels. This was her last work. She married her father's curate, Mr. Nicholls, but only a few months of a happy wedded life were allotted to her; she died in 1855, in the 39 th year of her age. Her first work, The Professor, has been published since; it is inferior to the three firstnamed novels. A friend of the novelist, Mrs. Gaskell, has written a Life of Charlotte BronVi, which has all the interest of romance. Mrs. Gaskell was herself an authoress, and has done for Manchester town life what her friend had done for Yorkshire country life, in depicting the condition of the manufacturing classes of the Lancashire towns. Her novel Mary Barton, a tale of Manchester life, is a faithful and painfully interesting picture of the society of the manufacturing capital. Mrs. Gaskell has written besides, The Moorland Cottage, Ruth, North and South etc. She had almost finished Wives and Daughters when death overtook her. George Eliot (1820—1881), the greatest of the female novelists, whose real name was Marian Evans, was born at Nuneaton, in Warwickshire, and first attracted the notice of the reading public by her Scenes of Clerical Life (1858), appearing in the Westminster Review, of which she was joint-editor. Yet her earliest productions lay in another direction; they were translations of German works on the metaphysics of religion. It is, however, on her fictions that her fame in English literature will rest. They may be classed in two sets; to the first belong Scenes of

Adam Bede, Romola.

161

Clerical Life, Adam Bede (1859), The Mill on the Floss (1860), Silas Marner (1861), Felix Holt (1866). In these "novels of memory" as they have been termed, George Eliot painted the experiences of her youth. Her father was a land-surveyor, and she had an opportunity of coming into contact with all classes of provincial society ; and, far from thinking life in the country dull, monotonous and commonplace, it was given to her to understand that men are the same everywhere, actuated by the same impulses, obeying the same laws; and that to read aright the history of men, wherever they may have been placed by circumstances, is the true vocation of the poet or the novelist. There is a great depth of earnestness displayed in her fictions ; it is essentially the inner life of her heroes and heroines she has brought to light, and it need therefore not surprise us to find religion to be a leading motive of her novels. Throughout these stories, the incidents and tone have a tragic ring about them; generally speaking, they all treat of the influence of adverse circumstances on the inner life of the actors, and the moral which seems to be the outcome of her novels may be pronounced in these words: "Love is not the essential of life; duty is, and selfforgetfulness and subordination of self to the social life." These principles which are implied in her former novels are directly taught in her last two — Middlemarch (1872), and Daniel Deronda (1876). The reflective or scientific side of these later works has seriously injured their effectiveness, nor has she been successful in awakening a general interest in the history of modern Judaism introduced in Daniel Deronda. George Eliot has given a fine background to her works by picturesque descriptions of the rich scenery of the Midland counties, and, like all minds of superior order, she had the gift of combining two extremes in life; the tragic and the comic element. JRomola (1863) stands by itself; it is a romance of mediaeval Italy. The central figure is the martyr Savonarola; here, too, we have the calls of stern duty and the weakness of self-pleasing placed the one over against the other, and the heroic purpose heroically carried through in contrast with good intentions marred by inherent weakness. Mann, Sketch.

H

162

Dickens. Pickwick Papers.

Adam Bede is almost universally considered the best of George Eliot's novels. There remain to be named her two poems, The Spanish Gypsy (1868), The Legend of Jubal (1874), and a series of short, philosophical essays, Impressions of Theophrastus Such, which, however, are much inferior to her best prose fictions. George Eliot was perhaps one of the most accomplished women of her time, owing her intellectual excellence entirely to her own training; she was a great linguist, widely learned in science and philosophy, well acquainted with history, and familiar with all the questions of the day. Some thirty or forty years ago the novel-reading public divided its admiration between two great novelists, Charles Dickens and William Makepeace Thackeray. Charles Dickens (1812—1870), though not born in London, was educated there, and from his youth became familiar with its humbler inhabitants and their fortunes in a degree seldom attained by any author before or after him. Having known sorrow and poverty in his youth, he, at last, entered upon the occupation of a parliamentary reporter, at the same time contributing sketches of London life to several periodicals. With the publication, in 1836, of the unrivalled Pickwick Papers, Dickens took rank as an original writer of fiction. The Pickwick Papers appeared in monthly numbers, illustrated by his friends Seymour and Hablot Browne, who signed himself Phiz, describing with inexhaustible fun the adventures and misadventures of a party of Cockney sportsmen. The monthly numbers were devoured by thousands, as soon as they appeared. The somewhat eccentric but warm-hearted Mr. Pickwick, the ever-gallant and corpulent Mr. Tupman, the poetical Mr. Snodgrass, Mr. Winkle the sportsman, and not to leave out, by any means, Mr. Pickwick's man, the unabashed, ready-handed and ready-witted Samuel Weller and the rotund old coachman, Samuel's father, with all their humours and oddities have charmed, and, no doubt, will charm thousands of readers. After the publication of the Pickwick Papers, novel after novel came from the ready pen of the author. Nicholas

Thackeray.

163

Nickleby (1838), in which Dickens exposed the effects of the private school system; Oliver Twist (1838), a story of a life spent among the outcasts of London; The Old Curiosity Shop (1840), Martin Chuzzlemt (1844), which contains the reminiscences of the author's journey to America, Dombey and Son (1848), David Copperfldd (1850), are among his best known novels. For five consecutive years, Dickens annually published a Christmas story. The first, the Christmas Carol was followed, in 1844, by the Cricket on the Hearth, and in the three successive years by The Chimes, The Battle of Life, The Haunted House. Dickens' novels are marked by a large-hearted goodwill towards all men, but especially towards the sorrowstricken, the deformed, the low and the humble; the pathos of the narrative being set off by a never-failing flow of humour. Many, also, were the abuses these novels exposed to public censure, thereby causing them 'to be reformed. In his later works, there is greater desire for violent effect and a leaning towards sentimentality. Dickens was an accomplished actor, and often displayed his histrionic talents at private theatricals, and for many years before his death gave public "Readings" from his own works. Late in life he was separated from his wife, "the dearest girl on earth" of his early youth, though they had a family of seven children. The Life of Charles Dickens has been written by his friend, John Forster, in 3 vols, to which are now added The Letters of Charles Dickens, edited by his sister-in-law and his eldest daughter. William Makepeace Thackeray (1811—1863), was born at Calcutta, his father being in the Civil Service of the East India Company. The boy Thackeray was sent to England for education, which he received at the Charterhouse (Addison and Steele's school), and at Trinity College, Cambridge, where, however, he did not stay to take a degree. Being heir to a considerable fortune, he followed his artistic leanings, travelled on the Continent and studied art for several years, chiefly in Paris and for some time (1830—31) at Weimar. After his return to England, the loss of his fortune forced him to turn to literature as a

164

Vanity Fair, Esmond.

profession. He contributed papers to several periodicals, chiefly to Fraser's Magazine under the names of Michael Angelo Titmarsh, and George Fitz-Boodle, Esquire. His sketches were 'written with great ease, and were full of sarcasm and knowledge of the world, but were little appreciated by the general reader. He was more than 30 years of age when (1846—48} the book appeared, which assigned him a foremost place among the writers of fiction of the day. A novel, ultimately entitled Vanity Fair, was published in monthly parts, and every month added to the author's popularity. It is a tale of modern society, and in it Thackeray laid open its vices, its shams and hypocrisies. The heroine of the story, Becky Sharp, a poor friendless governess, in her desire to push and scheme her way into fashionable society, never scruples as to the means she uses to attain her end; she is a fascinating, plotting intriguer, the impersonation of intellect without virtue. Over against her figures the sweet, amiable, silly Amelia, representing virtue without intellect. Pictures of Continental life mingle with London scenes, and the interest of the tale is heightened by its being connected with history, giving an animated description of Brussels on the eve of the battles of Quatre Bras and Waterloo. Vanity Fair is a very clever novel, but would be a more satisfactory one from an artistic and ethical point of view, need the reader not follow the heroine on her downward career. Other novels followed; 1 he History of Arthur Pendennis in 1850. In 1851 Thackeray appeared as a lecturer; his subject was The English Humourists of the 18 th Century. Thackeray was particularly at home in the history and literature of the 18 th century. These lectures were printed, and will be read with profit as an introduction to his next, and by some appreciated as his best novel, Esmond (1852), illustrating life in the days of "good Queen Anne". Historical events and characters are freely introduced; Marlborough and his victories in the War of the Spanish Succession, also the Old Pretender (the Chevalier de St. George) are brought upon the stage; likewise the poets and wits of the day. Henry Esmond, who relates the story of his life, is a disinterested

Kingsley. — Addenda.

165

and high-minded gentleman and Lady Castlewood a sweet woman, very unlike her daughter Beatrix, who is really only another Becky Sharp in another sphere of life. Most critics have held up to censure the hero's transplanting his unrequited affection from the consummate coquette Beatrix to her loveable mother, because she is older than Henry. The Virginians (1859) is a sequel to Esmond. Thackeray originated a new periodical, The Comhill Magazine, in which appeared another of his novels, The Adventures of Philip. The History of the Four Georges was a second set of lectures delivered, like the former, both in England and America. Thackeray has been accused of cynicism; however, in unflinchingly laying bare the shams of society, he has shown his veneration for what is pure and honest in life. His manner, if not mannerism, of moralizing on his characters in his novels is not to every reader's taste. Thackeray died suddenly in 1863; deep affliction had blighted his married life; in 1839 his wife became irrecoverably insane. The Rev. Charles Kingsley(1819—1875) wroteHypatia (1853), a masterly picture of the early Christian era, and many more works of fiction, which all testify to his large mind and warm heart. His Life and Letters (by his wife) form a most agreeable biography. It is impossible, within the limits of this work, to allot a larger space to the numerous, nay innumerable novels, some good, some bad and some indifferent, which appear and disappear on the literary horizon; as, in fact, of writing novels there seems to be no end. Addenda. By the death of Robert Browning and Alfred, Lord Tennyson, England was bereft of her two greatest poets, and although the void may not be filled up at once, there is no lack of poets of greater or lesser merits; in most cases, it is scarcely fair to award them a place in the ranks of literature as their poetry is of too recent date. Matthew Arnold (1822—1888), son of the great Rugby Head-Master holds a high place as poet, essayist and critic.

166

Addenda.

Among the living poets may be named William Morris (born 1834), author of the Death of Jason and The Earthly Paradise; Theodore Watts, known as the author of The Burden of the Armada, which gives a full dramatic picture of the great struggle between the fleets of England and Spain, the Ode to Mother Carey's Chicken, and other poems and Sonnets. L e w i s Morris (born 1833), author of The Epic of Hades and Songs of Two Worlds Coventry Patmore (born 1823), author of The Unknown Eros and the earlier better-known Angel in the House; Sir Edwin Arnold (born 1832), who has taken the subjects of his poems from the East. He is best known by his Light of Asia. Miss Christina Rossetti (born 1830), one of a highly gifted family, sister of the poet and artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti, has written a number of poems, many sonnets amongst them, chiefly of a devotional kind. Among historians stand the names of John Richard Green (1837—1883), author of the deservedly popular and unrivalled Short History of the English People; Edward Augustus Freeman (1823—1892) author of The Histonj of the Norman Conquest of England; W i l l i a m E. H. L e c k y (born 1838), whose History of European Morals and History of England in the 18 th Century show much calm judgment; and we may conclude with Justin Mc. Carthy's (born 1830) delightfully written History of Our Own Times. Professor Ruskin (born 1819) has created an art literature in England, and has written on art and artists. His Stones of Venice, Modern Painters and The Seven Lamps of Architecture are among his numerous volumes on art. Mrs. Jameson (1797—1860), has chosen similar themes in her Sacred and Legendary Art, Sketches of the History of Christian Art. Charles Darwin (1809—1882), the great natural philosopher, has all but revolutionized natural science. Among his best known works are the Journal of a Voyage round the World, The Origin of Species and The Descent of Man.

I n d e x . Abbot (tie) 107. Abbotsford 103. 104. Absalom and Achitophel 52. Absentee (the) 158. Actors 16. Adam Bede 161. 162. Adam Blair 154. Addison (Joseph) 61—64. 143. Adonais 129. JEneid (transl. of = Douglas) 92. » ( » „ = Dryden) 53. Ages (the) 141. Akbar's Dream 138. Alastor 129. Album "Verses 151. Alchemist (the) 33. Alexander's Feast 53. Alfred (King) 1. Alfred (Masque of) 84. Alison (Sir Archibald) 146. Allegro L' 44. Alleyn 96. All's Well that Ends Well 21. Amelia 72. Amenities of Literature 153. America (Hist, of = Robertson) 98. American Historians 147—148. American Poets 139—141. Anacreon's Odes (transl. of) 116. Analogy of Religion 100. Ancient Mariner (the) 123. Angel in the House (the) 166. Angler (the Complete) 40. 57. Angles 1. Anglo-Saxon 1. Anglo-Saxons (History of the) 146. Annabel Lee 140. Annus Mirabilis 52. Antiquary (the) 107. 111. Antony and Cleopatra 22. Arbuthnot 65. Arcadia 37. 69. Arden (Mary) 17. Areopagitica 45. 55. Armada 144. Arnold (Dr. Thomas) 142. „ (Sir Edwin) 166. „ (Matthew) 165. Arthur (King) 2. Artificial School 57. Ascham (Roger) 8. Ashestiel 102. Astrsea Redux 51.

Astree 69. As You Like It 21. Augustan Period 57. Aurora Leigh 134. Austen (Jane) 158—159. Authentic Account of the Shakspeare Manuscripts 92. Bacon (Sir Francis) 9. 38—39. 55. Ballad of Chevy Chase 101. Ballantyne (James) 103. 104. Bancroft (George) 148. Banks o'Doon 95. Bard (the) 86. Barrow 54. Battle of the Baltic 127. „ „ Ivry 144. „ „ Life 163. „ „ Otterbourne 101. Baxter (Richard) 48. Beaconsfield (Lord) 153. Beaumont 34. Becket 137. Beggar's Opera 66. Beowulf 1. Berkeley 65. Bertha in the Lane 134. Betrothed (the) 107. 110. Better Land (the) 133. Bickerstaff (Isaac = Steele) 63. Bobadil 33. Boccaccio 3. 6. 117. Boswell (James) 81. Bridal of Triermain 103. Bride of Abydos 114. „ „ Lammermoor 107. 112. Bridge (the) 140. Bridge of Sighs 132. Broken Heart (the) 35. Bronte (Charlotte) 159—160. „ ( „ Life of) 160. Broome 35. Brougham (Lord) 149. Browne (Hablot) 162. Browning (Mrs. E. B.) 133—135. „ (Robert) 134. 138. Bryant (W. C.) 140—141. Budgell 65. Bunyan (John) 48—50. Burbage (Richard) 18. Burden of the Armada 166. Bttrger 102. Bnrnet (Bishop) 54. Burns (Robert) 93—96.

168 Burns (Life of = by Carlyle) 156. „ ( „ „ = b y Lockhart) 155. Butler (Bishop) 100. Button's Coffee-house 63. Byron (G. G. Lord) 103. 112—116. Byron and some of his Contemporaries 131. Caedmon 1. Cain 114. Calamities of Authors 153. Campaign (the) 61. Campbell (Thomas) 127—128. Canterbury Tales 3—7. 69. Carew (William) 41. Carlyle (Thomas) 155—157. Casa Guidi Windows 134. Castaway (the) 89. Castle Dangerous 107. 108. Castle of Indolence 85. Cato 63. Cavaliers (Songs of) 41. Caxton 7. C ax tons (the) 157. Cervantes 69. Chapman (George) 35. Charles Grandison (Sir) 71. Charles Y. (History of) 98. Charpentier (Charlotte) 102. 104. Chaste and Noble 35. Chatterton (Thomas) 91. Chaucer 1. 3—7. Chevy-Chase (ballad of) 101. Childe Harold's Pilgrimage 113. 114. 115—116. Chimes (the) 163. Christabel 123—124. Christian Art (Sketches of the History of) 166. Christian Hero (the) 64. Christmas Carol 163. Church History of Britain 48. Civil War 40. Clarendon (Earl of) 54. Clarissa Harlowe 71. Classical Period (2nd) 57. Clinker (Humphrey) 73. 96. Clio 63. Cloud (the) 129. Coleridge 121—124. 150. 157. Collier (Jeremy) 53. Collins (William) 84—85. Colonization of the United States (History of) 148.

Comedy of Errors 20. Commonwealth 40. Complete Angler 40. 57. Comus 44. Conduct of the Understanding 55. Confessio Amantis 7. Confessions of anOpium-Eater 152. Coningsby 154. Conquest of England (Norman) 166. „ „ Mexico 147. „ Peru 147. Conscious Lovers (the) 65. Constitutional History of England 145. Contarini Fleming 153. Conversations of J. Northcote Esq. R. A. 153. Cooper (James Fenimore) 157. Coriolanus 22. Cornhill Magazine 165. Corsair (the) 114. Cotter's Saturday Night 95. Courtship of Miles Standish 140. Coverdale (Miles) 8. Cowper (William) 87—89. 98. Craigenputtoch 156. Cricket on the Hearth 163. Critic (the) 97. Criticism (Essay on) 58. Cry of the Children (the) 135. Culloden (Battle of) 66. Cumberland (Duke of) 66. Cup (the) 137. Curiosities of Literature 153. Curse of Keliama 125. Cymbeline 22. Cynewulf 1. Dance of the Seven Deadly Sins 92. Danes 1. Daniel Deronda 161. Dante 6. 35. 47. Dartmoor 133. Darwin (Charles) 166. Davenant (Sir W.) 43. 46. 51. 52. David Copperfield 163. Day Dream (a) 124. Death of Jason 166. Death-Bed (the) 132. Decameron 3. 117. Decl. and Fall of the Rom. Emp. 99. Defence of Poetry (a) 37. Defence of the People of England 45.

169 Defoe (Daniel) 61. 70. Deformed Transformed 114. Dekker (Thomas) 35. De Quincey (Thomas) 152. Descent of Man 166. Deserted Village (the) 77. 78. Dialogue between the TwaDogs 95. Diary (Pepys') 54. Dickens (Charles) 162—163. „ ( „ Letters of) 163. „ ( „ Life of) 163. Dictionary of the Engl. Lang. 80. Dirge in Cymbeline 85. Disraeli (Benjamin) 153. D'Israeli (Isaac) 153—154. Dombey and Son 163. Don Quixote 69. Dora 135. Douglas (Gavin) 92. Drama of Exile 134. Drapier (M. B.) 59. Dream (Byron's) 113. Dryden (John) 51—53. 57. Duchess of Malfi 35. Duenna (the) 96. Duke of Milan (the) 34. Dunbar (William) 92. Dunciad (the) 59. Dutch Republic (History of) 148. Early Lessons 158. Earthly Paradise 166. Ecclesiastical Polity (Laws of) 40. Edgeworth (Maria) 158. Education (Love, Hope and Patience in) 124. Education (on) 45. (Essay on) 55. „ Edward II. (drama) 15. 16. „ III. 3. „ the Confessor 1. Elaine 137. Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard 86. Elements ofMor.andPolit.Phil.100. Eliot (George) 160—162. Elizabethan Period (the) 9. Ellwood (Thomas) 46. Embargo (the) 140. Emma 159. Endymion 130. England (Hist, of = Froude) 146. , (History of = Hume) 97.

England (History of the 18 th Century = Lecky) 166. „ (Hist. of=Lingard) 145. „ (History of = Macaulay 143-144. „ (History of = Smollett)98. English Bards and Scotch Reviewers 113. 116. English Humourists 164. Enid 137. Enoch Arden 137. Epithalamium 12. Epic of Hades 166. Erasmus 8. Erl-King (the) 102. Ernest Maltravers 157. Esmond 164. Essay on Criticism 58. „ Education 55. „ „ „ the Human Understanding 55. „ „ Man 59. „ „ Mind 134. Essays (Bacon) 39. „ Moral and Philosophical (Hume) 97. Essays (Macaulay) 143. „ of Elia and Eliana 151. „ on the Characters of Shakspeare's Plays 153. Euphues and his England 36. Europe (History of = Alison) 146. European Morals (History of) 166. Evangeline 140. Evelyn (John) 54. Evelyn Hope 138. Eve of St. Agnes 130. Every Man in his Humour 32. 33. Evidences of Christianity 101. Examiner (the) 131. Excelsior 139. Exclusion Bill 52. 55. Excursion (the) 121. Fables (Gay's) 66. Faerie Queene 9—12. 84. Fair Maid of Perth 107. 108. Faithful Shepherdess (the) 34.44. Falcon (the) 137. Fatal Dowry (the) 34. Faust 140. Faustus 15—16. Felix Holt 161.

170 Ferdinand and Isabella (History of the Reign of) 147. Fergusson (Robert) 93. Ferrex and Porrex 14. Fielding (Henry) 71—72. 73. 97. Fingal 90. Fire (Great) 54. Fire Worshipper 118 Fletcher 32. 34. Ford 31. 35. Forest Sanctuary (the) 133. Foresters (the) 137. Fortunes of Nigel (the) 107. 110. Four Georges (History of) 165. Four P's. 13. Frank 158. Frank Mildmay 157. Frederick the Great (Hist, of) 157. Freeman (Edward A.) 166. French Revolution 156. Fricker (the Misses) 122. 124. Froude (James A.) 146. Fudge Family in Paris (the) 118. Fuller (Thomas) 48. Funeral, or Grief a la Mode 64. Galahad (Sir) 137. Galileo 45. Gammer Gurton's Needle 14. Gardener's Daughter (the) 136. Garrick (David) 96. Gaskell (Mrs.) 160. Gaunt (John of) 3. Gay (John) 66—67. Genevieve 124. Gentle Shepherd (the) 93. Geoffrey of Monmouth 137. George-a-Green 15. Gertrude of Wyoming 128. Gesta Romanorum 6. 23. Giaour (the) 114. Gibbon (Edward) 98—100. Globe (theatre) 18. Godiva 135. Godwin (Mary Wollstonecraft) 128. Goethe 15. 102. Goetz 102. Golden Legend (the) 140. Golden Targe 92. Goldsmith (Oliver) 75—78. 96. Gondibert 42. Good-Natured Man (the) 77. 96. Gorboduc 14. Gower (John) 7.

Grace Abounding etc. 49. Grand Cyrus 69. Graves of a Household 133. Gray (Thomas) 85—87. Great Rebellion (History of) 54. Greece (History of = Grote) 147 „ (History o f = Thirlwall) 147. Green (John Richard) 166. Greene (Robert) 15. „ (Thomas) 18. Grote (George) 147. Guardian 62. Guarini 34. Guinevere 137. Gulliver's Travels 60. Guy Mannering 107. 111. Hallam (Henry) 145. Hamlet 22. Happy Warrior (the) 120. Harley 65. Harold 137. Harold the Dauntless 103. Harrison (William) 36. Harry and Lucy 158. Hastings (Warren) 97. 143. Hathaway (Anne) 17. Haunted House (the) 163. Hazlitt (William) 152—153. Heart of Midlothian 107. 112. Hellas 129. Hemans (F. D.) 132—133. Henry IV. 21. 23. 26—28. „ V. 21. 23. 2 8 - 2 9 . „ VI. (First Part) 20. „ (2 nd and 3 nd) 20. 29. „ VIII. 22. 3 0 - 3 1 . Herrick (Robert) 41. Hey wood (John) 13. 35. „ (Thomas) 35. Hiawatha (Song of) 140. Hind and the Panther (the) 53. 66. History of America 98. „ „ Charles V. 98. „ „ England (Froude) 146. „ r (short) the English People (Green) 166. „ „ England (Hume) 97. „ „ England (in the 18 th century = Lecky) 166. „ „ England (Lingard) 145. „ „ „ (Macaulay) 143-144. „ „ „ (Smollett) 98.

171 History of European Morals 166. „ „ Frederick the Gr. 157. „ the Four Georges 165. „ „ „ the Norman Conquest of England 166. „ „ Scotl. (Robertson) 98. a „ Scotl. (Scott) 107. 112. „ „ Our Own Times (Mc Carthy) 166. „ the World 37. „ Hobbes (Thomas) 54. HOchstedt 61. Hohenlinden 127. Holinshed (Chronicles) 23. 36. Holland House 63. Holy Dying 48. „ Grail (the) 137. „ Living 48. Homer (transl. of == Chapman) 35. ( „ „ = Cowper) 89 „ n ( » » = Pope) 58. Homes of England (the) 133. Hood (Thomas) 131—132. Hooker 9. 39—40. 56. Honour (Palace of) 92. Horse Paulinse 100. Hours of Idleness 113. Howard (Henry) 8. „ (Lady Elizabeth) 51. Hughes 65. Human Nature (a Treatise of) 97. „ Understanding (on) 55. Hume (David) 97—98. Humphrey Clinker 73. 96. Hunt (Leigh) 131. Huss 7. Hyde (Edward) 54. Hymn before Sunrise in the Vale of Chamouni 124. Hypatia 165. Hyperion (Keats) 130. „ (Longfellow) 140. Idler (the) 80. Idylls of the King 137. II Penseroso 44. Impressions of Theophr. Such 162. In Memoriam 136. 145. Inquiry concerning the Human Understanding 97. Instauration of the Sciences 39. Interludes 13. Indroduction to the Literature of Europe 145.

Ireland (W. H.) 91—92. Irene 79. Irish Melodies 117. Isabella 130. Italian (the) 158. Ivanhoe 107. 109. Ivry (battle of) 144. Jacob Faithful 157. James I. 92. Jameson (Mrs.) 166. Jane Eyre 159. Jason (Death of) 166. Jean (Bonnie) 94. Jeffrey 149. Jenkins (Mrs. Winifred) 97 Jerome of Prague 7. Joan of Arc 125. John (King) 20. 24. John Gilpin 88. 89. John Woodville 150. Johnson (Esther) 60. (Samuel) 64. 78—81. 96. „ „ (Life of) 81. Johnson's Club 76. Jolly Beggars (the) 95. Jonson (Ben) 32—33. Joseph Andrews 72. Journal of the Great Plague 70. „ „ a Voyage etc. 166. Julius Caesar 22. Kavanagh 140. Keats (John) 129—131. Kelts 1. Kenilworth 107. 110. Kid (Thomas) 15. Kingsley (Rev. Charles) 165. King's Quhair 92. Knight of the Burning Pestle 34. Lady's Dream (the) 132. Lady Geraldine's Courtship 134. Lady's Trial (the) 35. Lady of the Lake 103. 106. 112. Lake Poets 118—127. Lalla Rookh 117. Lamb (Charles) 150—152. „ (Mary) 150. 152. Lamia 130. Lancelot du Lake 137. „ „ „ (Romance of) 2. Lara 114. Last of the Barons 157. „ „ „ Mohicans 157. Lay of L. Minstrel 102.105.127.

172 Lays of Ancient Rome 144. „ „ Leisure Hours 133. Lear (King) 22. Lecky (W. E. H.) 166. Legend of Jubal 162. Legend of Montrose 107. 108. Leo X . (Life and Pontif. of) 146. Letters (Cowper's) 89. „ of Charles Dickens 163. „ on the Rom. Caths. 149. „ and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell 156. „ of a Traveller 141. „ on Toleration 55. Leviathan 54. Liberal (the) 131. Life of Burns (Carlyle) 156. „ „ „ (Lockhart) 155. „ „ C. Bronte 160. „ ,, C. Dickens 163. „ „ Johnson (Boswell) 81. „ „ Napoleon (Hazlitt) 153. „ „ „ (Scott) 107. „ „ Nelson (Southey) 126. „ „ Schiller (Carlyle) 155. „ „ Scott (Lockhart) 154. „ „ Wesley (Southey) 126. „ and Letters of C.Kingsley 165. „ „ „ „ Macaulay 145. Light of the Harem 118. „ „ Asia (the) 166. Lindsay (Sir David) 92. Lingard (Dr. John) 145—146. Literary Character of Men of Genius 153. „ Club 76. Lives of the Poets 80. Locke (John) 55—56. Lockhart (J. G.) 154—155. Locksley Hall 136. „ „ 60 Years after 136. Lollards 7. London (a Satire) 80. „ Journal (the) 131. Longfellow (Henry W.) 139—140. Lord of the Isles 106. Lorenzo de Medici (Life of) 146. Lovelace (Col.) 41. Love's Labour's Lost 20. Loves of the Angels (the) 118. Lucrece (Rape of) 19. 21. Lycidas 44. Lydgate (John) 7.

Lying Lover (the) 64. „ Valet (the) 96. Lyly (John) 36. Lyrical Ballads 119. 122. Lytton (Edward Bulwer) 157—158. Macaulay (Th. B.) 142—145. Macbeth 22. Mc. Carthy (Justin) 166. Mackenzie (Henry) 102. Macpherson (James) 90—91. Madoc 125. Maid's Tragedy (the) 34. Maintenon (Mad. de) 69. Malaprop (Mrs.) 96. Malory (Sir Thomas) 137. Man (Essay on) 59. „ of Feeling 102. Manfred 114. 116. Mansfield Park 159. Marino Faliero 114. Marlowe (Christopher) 15—16. Marinion 103. 105. Marryat (Captain) 157. Marston (John) 35. Martin Cliuzzlewit 163. Marvell (Andrew) 43. Mary Barton 160. „ Tudor 137. Masques 33. Massinger (Philip) 31. 3 4 - 3 5 . Matthew Wald 154. Maud 137. May Queen (the) 135. Mazeppa 114. Measure for Measure 21. Memoirs of a Cavalier 70. Men and Women 138. Merchant of Venice 21. Merlin 2. Mermaid Club 32. Merry Wives of Windsor 21. Metaphysical Poets 40. Middlemarch 161. Middleton (Thomas) 35. Midshipman Easy 157. Midsummer Night's Dream 2 0 . 1 1 0 . Milbanke (Miss) 114. Miller's Daughter (the) 135. Mill on the Floss 161. Milton (John) 43—48. „ First Period 43—45. „ Second „ 45—46. „ Third „ 46—48.

173 Minshull (Elizabeth) 46. Minstrelsy of the Scot. Border 102. Miracle Plays 12. Miscel. Papers and Leg. Instru. under Hand and Seal of W. Shakspeare 92. Miss in her Teens 96. Miss Kilmansegg 132. Mr. H. 150. Modern Painters 166. Monastery (the) 107. 108. Montagu (Edw. Wortley) 67. „ (Lady M. W.) 67—69. Moore (Thomas) 116—118. Moorland Cottage (the) 160. Moralities 13. More (Sir Thomas) 8. 69. Morris (Lewis) 166. „ (William) 166. Morte d'Arthur 2. 137. Motley (John L.) 148. Much Ado About Nothing 21. My Novel 157. Mysteries 12. B of Udolpho 158. Napoleon (life of = Hazlitt) 153. ( „ „ = Scott) 107. Nash (Thomas) 15. National Lyrics (Hemans) 133. „ Songs (Moore) 117. Natural Theology 101. Nelson (Life of) 126. New Atlantis 69. New Place 19. Newton (Sir Isaac) 56. New Way to Pay Old Debts 34. Nicholas Nickleby 163. Niebuhr 141. Non-jurors 53. Nonsense Club 88. Norman Conquest of England (History of) 166. Norman Period 2. Normandy and Engl. (Hist of) 146. Normans 2. North (Sir Thomas) 23. North and South 160. Northanger Abbey 159. Norton (Thomas) 14. Observations on the Prophecies of Daniel and the Apocalypse 56. O'Connor's Child 128. Ode to Adversity 86.

Ode to the Departing Year 124. „ on a Distant Prospect of Eton College 86. „ France 124. „ „ „ the Nativity of Christ 44. „ „ St. Cecilia's Day 53. „ to the West-Wind 129. „ „ Mother Carey's Chicken 166. Old Age and Death 42. „ Clock on the Stair (the) 139. „ Curiosity Shop 163. „ English Dramatists (Specimens of) 151. „ Mortality 107. 108—109. O. Cromwell (Letters etc.) 156. Oliver Twist 163. On Arriving at the Age of 23. 43. „ Education 45. „ the Immortality of the Soul (Lines written) 120. „ Rec. my Mother's Picture 89. „ a Wedding-Day 41. Origin of Species 166. Ossian 90. Othello 22. Otterbourne (battle of) 101. Our Own Times (History of = Mc. Carthy) 166. Outre Mer 140. Overbury (Sir Thomas) 48. Own Times (Burnet, Hist, of his) 54. Palace of Honour 92. Paley (William) 100. Palgrave (Sir Francis) 146. Pamela 71. Parable of the Pilgrim 49. Paracelsus 138. Paradise Lost 47—48. 134. Regained 46. „ „ and the Peri 118. Parent's Assistant 158. Partridge 63. Passions (the) 85. Pastor Fido 34. Patmore (Coventry) 166. Patrick (Bishop) 49. Peele (George) 14. Pelham 157. Pendennis 164. Penseroso (II) 44. Pepys (Samuel) 54. Percy 76. 101.

174 Peregrine Pickle 73. Pericles 22. Persuasion 159. Peter Simple 157. Petrarch 3. 6. Peveril of the Peak 107. 111. Philaster 34. Philip (Adventures of) 165. Philip XI. (History of) 147. Philippa de Roet 3. Phiz 162. Pickwick Papers 162. Picts 1. Pierrepont (Lady Mary) 67. Pilgrim's Progress 49—50. Pirate 107. 112. Plague 54. . „ (Journal of the Great) 70. Plain Man's Pathway to Heaven (the) 49. Pleasures of Hope 127. Poe (Edgar Allan) 140. Poor J a c k 157. Pope (A.) 53. 57—59. 67. 82. Porter (Mrs.) 79. Powell (Mary) 45. Practice of Piety (the) 49. Prairie (the) 157. Prescott (W. H.) 147—148. Pride and Prejudice 159. Princess (the) 136. Princesse do Cleves 69. Principles of Nat. Philosophy 56. Prior (Matthew) 65—66. Prisoner of Chillon 114. Professor (the) 160. Progress of Poesy 86. Prometheus Bound (transl. of) 134. v Unbound 129. Promise of May 137. Prue 65. Psalm of Life 139. Quarrels of Authors 153. Queen Mab 129. Quentin Durward 107. 111. Quillinan (Dorothy) 121. Quincey (Thomas De) 152. Radcliffe (Ann) 158. Raleigh 9. 32. 37—38. Ralph Royster Doyster 14. Rambler (the) 80. Ramsay (Allan) 93. Rape of Lucrece 19. 21.

Rape of the Lock 58. Raven (the) 140. Reaper and the Flowers (the) 140. Records of Woman 133. Redgauntlet 107. 112. Red Rover (the) 157. Reflections, Refractions, Inflections and Colours of Light (on the) 56. Reformation (Hist, of = Burnet) 54. Reginald Dalton 154. Rehearsal (the) 52. Reliques of English Poetry 76. 101. Remorse 124. Renascence 8. Restoration 54. Reviews 130. Revolt of Islam 129. Revolution 54. Rhyme of the Duchess May 134. Richard II. 20. 24—26. „ I I I . 20. 29—30. Richardson (Samuel) 71. Rienzi 157. Ring and the Book (the) 138. Rise and Progress of the English Commonwealth 146. Robertson (William) 98. Robinson Crusoe 70. Robin Hood and Maid Marian 137. Rob Roy 107 112. Roderick, the Last oftheGoths 126. „ Random 73. Rokeby 103. 106. Romance of the Forest 158. Roman Comique 69. Roman History 141. Romantic Poetry (The Dawn of) 81. „ School 101. Rome (History of) 142. Romeo and Juliet 21. Romola 161. Roscoe (William) 146—147. Roses (Wars of the) 7. Rossetti (Christina) 166. Rowley 35. Rule Britannia 84. Ruskin (John) 166. Ruth 160. Saccharissa 42. Sackville (Thomas) 14. Sacred and Legendary Art 166. Saints' Everlasting Rest 48. Samson Agonistes 47.

San Greal (Quest of) 2. „ „ (Romance of) 2. Sardanapalus 114. Sartor Resartus 156. Savage (Life of) 80. Saxon Chroniclers 1. Saxons 1. Scarron 69. Scenes of Clerical Life 160. Schiller (Life of = Carlyle) 155. School for Scandal 97. Scotland (Robertson Hist, of) 98. „ (Scott, Hist, of) 107.112. Scots 1. Scott (Sir Walter) 101—112. „ (SirW. L i f e = L o c k h a r t ) 154. Scurlock (Mrs.) 65. Seasons (the) 82. 83. Sense and Sensibility 159. Sensitive Plant 129. Sentimental Journey 74. Sermons 74. Seven Lamps of Architecture 166. Severn (Mr.) 130. Sevigne (Mad. de) 68. 69. Seymour 162. Shakspeare 16—31. 104. 110. Shakspeare First Period 20. „ Second „ 21. Third „ 21—22. „ Fourth „ 22. Shelley (P. B.) 1 2 8 - 1 2 9 . Shepherd's Calendar 9. „ Hunting (the) 41. „ Week 66. Sheridan (R. B.) 96—97. She Stoops to Conquer 77. Shirley 160. Shortest Way with Dissenters 70. Short View of the Immorality and Profaneness of the Engl. Stage 53. Sidney (Sir Philip) 9. 36—37. 69. Silas Marner 161. Silent Woman (the) 33. Sketches of Hist, of Christ. Art.166. Smith (Sydney) 149—150. Smollet (T. G.) 72—74. 98. Songs of the Affections 133. „ „ „ Cavaliers 41. „ „ Two Worlds 166. Song of Hiawatha 140. „ on a May Morning 43. „ of the Shirt 132. 135.

Sonnets (Wordsworth) 121. Sophonisba 83. South 54. Southey (Robert) 124—127. South Sea Bubble 67. Spanish Drama (the) 15. „ Gypsy 162. „ Literature (History of) 148. Spectator 62. 63. 93. Speculum Meditantis 7. Spenser 9 —12. Spy (the) 157. Steele (Richard) 64—65. Stella 60. Sterne (Laurence) 74—75. Still (Bishop) 14. Stones of Venice 166. Story of City and Country Mouse66. Story of Rimini 131. Stow (John) 36. St. Patrick's 96. Stratford 16. Streets of the Metropolis (the) 131. Suckling (Sir John) 41. Surrey (Earl of) 8. 14. Suspiria de Profundis 152. Swift (Jonathan) 59—60. 62. Tabard Inn 4. Tale of a Trumpet 132. „ „ , Tub 60. Tales of Fashionable Life 158. „ „ a Grandfather 107. 112. „ from Shakspeare 150—151. Talisman (the) 107. 109. Tamburlaine 15. Taming of the Shrew 21. Tam o'Shanter 94—95. Task (the) 88. 89. Tatler 62. Taylor 35. „ (Jeremy) 48. Tears of Scotland 73. Tempest (the) 22. Temple (Sir William) 59. Tender Husband (the) 64. Tennyson (Alfred) 135—138. Thackeray (W. M.) 163—165. Thalaba 125. Thanatopsis 141. Theatres 16. Theodoric 128. Thirlwall (Bishop) 147. Thistle and the Rose (the) 92.

176 Thomas à Becket 4. Vindic. of Eights of Women 128Thomson (James) 82—84. 96. Virgil 53. Virginians (the) 165. Three Estates (the) 92. Vision of Judgment (the) 126. Ticknor (George) 139. 148. Tillotson 54. „ „ Poets (the) 134. Timon of Athens 22. Vivian Grey 153. Tintern Abbey 120. Vivien 137. Titmarsh (Michael Angelo) 164. Voice of Spring (the) 133. Titus Andronicus 20. Volpone or the Fox 33. Vortigern 92. To a Skylark 129. Vox Clamantis 7. Toleration (Letters on) 55. Wallenstein (translation of) 122, Tom Jones 72. Waller (Edmund) 41—42. To Music 129. Walton (Izaak) 40. 56—57. Tourneur 35. Warren Hastings 97. Town (the) 131. Traveller (the) 76. 77. 78. „ „ (Essay on) 143. Treatise of Hum. Nature(Hume)97. Warwick (CountessDowager of) 63. Trevelyan (G. O.) 145. Water Witch (the) 157. Trip to Scarborough 97. Wat Tyler 125. Tristan 3. Watts (Theodore) 166. Tristram Shandy 74. 75. Waverley 107. 109. Trivia 66. „ Novels 106. Webster 31. 35. Troilus and Cressida 21. Werner 114. Trouvères 69. Twelfth Night 21. Wesley (life of) 126. Westbrook (Harriet) 128. Two Foscari (the) 114. What will he do with it? 157. „ Gentlemçn of Verona 20. White Devil (the) 35. „ Noble Kinsmen (the) 34. Tyndale (William) 8. „ Doe of Rylstone 121. Udall (Nicholas) 14. Wilhelm Meister (transi, of) 155. William Caleb 128. Understanding (Conduct of the) 55. United Netherlands (Hist, of) 148. „ Wallace 133. Unknown Eros (the) 166. Winifred Jenkins (Mrs.) 97. Unnatural Combat (the) 34. Winter's Tale (the) 22. Up the Rhine 132. Witch (the) 35. Utopia 8. 69. „ of Atlas (the) 129. Valerius 154. Wither (George) 41. Vanessa 60. Wives and Daughters 160. Vanhomrigh (Hester) 60. Woman Killed with etc. 35. Woodcock (Catherine) 46. Vanity Fair 164. Woodstock 107. 110. » (City of) 50. Wordsworth (William) 118—121. Veiled Prophet (the) 118. Worthies of England 48. Venus and Adonis 19. 21. Wyatt (Sir Thomas) 8. Verses on Cowper's Grave 135. Wycliffe 7. „ to Mem. of Thomson 85. Vespers of Palermo (the) 133. Ye Mariners of England 127. Vicar of Wakefield 75. 76. 77. Young (Thomas) 43. View of the State of Europe Youth and Age 124. during the Middle Ages 145. Zapolya 124. Villette 160. The End. Bonn: printed by Charles Georgi.