LORD  BYRON  and  his  TIMES
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Passages of a Working Life during Half a Century
Chapter XII
INTRODUCTION & INDEXES
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Preface
Contents Vol. I
Prelude 1
Prelude 2
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Chapter V
Chapter VI
Chapter VII
Chapter VIII
Chapter IX
Chapter X
Contents Vol. II
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Chapter V
Chapter VI
Chapter VII
Chapter VIII
Chapter IX
Chapter X
Chapter XI
‣ Chapter XII
Chapter XIII
Chapter XIV
Chapter XV
Note to Chapter XV
Contents Vol. III
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Chapter V
Chapter VI
Chapter VII
Chapter VIII
Note to Chapter VIII
Chapter IX
Note to Chapter IX
Chapter X
Chapter XI
Chapter XII
Chapter XIII
Note to Chapter XIII
Chapter XIV
Index of Persons
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CHAPTER XII.

NEXT to the “Cyclopaedia” in the costliness of its production, if not in intrinsic importance, was the “Gallery of Portraits,” which I published under the superintendence of the Society. It was issued in monthly numbers at half-a-crown each number, containing three portraits with biographies. The object of the publication was to present likenesses of those eminent men of modern times who have given the greatest impulse to their age. In the selection of subjects for portraiture, the Committee was occupied from the beginning of 1832 (the first number being published in May), to the midsummer of 1834. Their occupation was of a most pleasant and improving kind, for there was scarcely a name suggested that did not involve some discussion upon the merits of those proposed to be represented, or some statement of the sources from which authentic portraits might be obtained. In this latter respect the influence of the Society, or that of its individual members, was most valuable, by securing the admission of copyists to Royal Galleries and private collections. British and Foreign statesmen, warriors, divines, men of science and letters, artists, were thus assigned their due honour in a work, which was essentially different in its plan from the “Portraits of Illustrious Personages of Great Britain,” by
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Edmund Lodge, Norroy King of Arms. Interesting as much of Mr. Lodge’s information was in its genealogical and antiquarian features, the book was not what it professed to be, “A Gallery of the Illustrious Dead”—“A Collection of Portraits and Lives of British Worthies.” It was a collection of kings and queens, of noble lords and ladies and officers of state. It was, with very few exceptions, not a gallery of the intellectually illustrious. Of the chief glories of our nation—the poets, historians, philosophers, divines, of the inventors and discoverers in physical and abstract science, of our most distinguished artists, there was not one in this “Gallery of the Illustrious Dead,” unless he could claim a place there by some titular or official distinction. Very different was the range of the gallery which I considered it an honour to publish, and the large expenses of which I cheerfully bore until the work became remunerative. The merit of suggesting it, and of most assiduously labouring to carry it worthily forward, is due to Mr. Bellenden Ker. The superintendence of the engravings was confided to Mr. Lupton, a mezzotinto engraver of the first eminence. Mr. Arthur Malkin was the editor of the biographies. These are all distinguished for careful research and an unpretending style. A few of the lives were written by his personal friends, amongst whom was Arthur H. Hallam—the A H. H. of Tennyson’s “In Memoriam”—who died in 1833. From De Quincey I obtained a spirited memoir of Milton; and it was to me a matter of regret, that its length was so out of proportion to the general character of the work, that some curtailment was absolutely necessary.

The 13th of August, 1836, was a remarkable day
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in the annals of the press of this country, for on that day two Acts of Parliament received the Royal Assent, which materially influenced all the commercial arrangements for rendering knowledge, political or literary, more accessible to the bulk of the people. The first of these (c. 52), was to reduce the duties on first-class paper from three-pence per pound to three-halfpence, so that the former tax of three-halfpence upon second-class paper should apply to paper of all descriptions. The second of these (c. 76), was to reduce the stamp on newspapers from fourpence to a penny. I have previously mentioned (page 180), a debate in the House of Commons, on the 22nd of May, 1834, upon a motion for the repeal of the newspaper stamp duties. I had at that time learnt something of the desire of several members of the government, including Lord Brougham and Lord Althorp, that these duties should be wholly repealed. Had that been the case, a difficulty would have arisen as to the transmission of unstamped newspapers by post. In a letter to Lord Althorp, I suggested that a penny stamped frank should be issued by the government. Mr. M. D. Hill, in the debate which I have mentioned, described the nature of this suggestion. In the “Companion to the Newspaper,” for June the 1st, 1834, there appeared a paper of considerable length “prepared several months ago for the information of some official personages who took a strong interest in the question of the repeal of the stamp duties on newspapers.” In that paper it is said, “In order to allow the unstamped papers to pass through the Post-office, it is proposed that franks should be sold (say by the vendors of stamps), at a penny each. It
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will be necessary to make the postage payable by the person sending the paper; for otherwise, a great many papers, especially the very low-priced ones, would be refused by persons to whom they were addressed. It is obvious that a direct payment to the Post-office, by the transmitter of the paper, would be highly inconvenient, if not impossible. Mr. Knight’s plan of a stamped frank obviates the difficulty; and it would facilitate the transmission of all printed sheets under a certain weight.” It has always been to me a matter of honest pride that this suggestion contributed, in however small a degree, to the efficient working of the magnificent system of penny-postage. Mr. Rowland Hill, in his celebrated pamphlet on Post-office Reform, published in 1837, says, “A few years ago, when the expediency of entirely abolishing the newspaper stamp, and allowing newspapers to pass through the Post-office for one penny each, was under consideration, it was proposed by Mr. Charles Knight, the publisher, that the postage on newspapers might be collected by selling stamped wrappers at one penny each. Availing myself of this excellent suggestion, I propose the following arrangement:—Let stamped covers and sheets of paper be supplied to the public from the Stamp-office, or Post-office, as may be most convenient, and sold at such a price as to include the postage: letters so stamped, might be put into the letter-box as at present.”

In 1836, my views, as to the total repeal of the Stamp Duty on Newspapers, were considerably altered from those of 1834, when, in suggesting a plan for the circulation of unstamped newspapers, I had adopted the opinion that the stamp, except as a
Ch. XII.] THE SECOND EPOCH. 251
postage payment, was injurious. I was apprehensive, as I was before the removal of the stamp in 1855, that cheap newspapers would involve the degradation of journalism. I did not draw sound conclusions from my own experience. I did not believe that Penny Papers would be as innoxious as Penny Magazines and Penny Cyclopædias, and go on making readers, till the great body of those who read would prefer sound nutriment to the garbage which was offered them in the days of high taxation. As in most cases, my own interest gave a colour, I suppose, to my opinions. From the time when William Henry Ord was a contributor to “The Etonian,” to the time when he was a Member of Parliament and a Lord of the Treasury, I had some degree of intimacy, almost amounting to friendship, with this amiable and accomplished man. In 1836, in his official position, he had devoted himself to the great measure of the consolidation of the various Stamp Acts. The mass of obscure and confused enactments was to be swept away, and some intelligible fiscal measure was to be substituted. Mr. Ord devoted himself to the herculean task of preparing the way for the proposition which was brought forward by Mr. Spring Rice, then Chancellor of the Exchequer. The labour killed him. In the spring of 1836, I frequently saw him. We had many conversations on the subject of the Newspaper Stamp Duties and the Paper Duty. I fancied that if the government consented to abolish the Newspaper Stamp, they would retain the high Paper Duty. Mr. Ord and I came to the opinion that the safest and the best course would be to lower both imposts. I wrote a pamphlet advocating this policy, which was circu-
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lated amongst members of both Houses. Whether it had any effect upon the settlement of the question is not for me to judge. At any rate, the reduction of the Paper Duty was to me a matter of vital importance; and when that boon to the publishers of cheap books came into operation in the autumn, I felt that I had shaken off much of the insupportable weight of the “Old Man of the Sea,” and went forward with the words of Milton in my heart:
“To-morrow to fresh fields and pastures new.”

In 1835, Mr. Bellenden Ker having returned from a continental tour, gave me some numbers of a work then publishing in Germany, the “Bilder Bibel.” An idea had once been entertained of the Useful Knowledge Society publishing a Bible—an illustrated one; but the notion was given up as impracticable, and not in accordance with the principle upon which the Society was established. Mr. Ker’s present revived the project in my mind. Such a publication, in which Art should be employed to delight the young, and learning should not be wanting, offered a strong temptation to my individual enterprise. But the difficulty was to find a fit editor—one who held sound opinions upon the great cardinal points of religion, but who would at the same time content himself with furnishing an ample commentary on such passages as are connected with the History, Geography, Natural History, and Antiquities of the Sacred Scriptures. Thus to limit the objects of the work was to make it acceptable to all denominations of Christians. I had several conversations on this matter with a very learned and liberal divine; but he could not see his course clearly, in
Ch. XII.] THE SECOND EPOCH. 253
avoiding theological questions. I often thought of dividing the labour; and with this view I proposed to Mr. Kitto to furnish notes upon such subjects as had come under his observation during his travels and sojourn in the East. This task he gladly undertook. In a few weeks he came to me and said—in that guttural voice to which I had now become accustomed—“I will undertake it all.” We had a little merriment over the boldness of the proposal; but I found that he was perfectly in earnest. As a matter of prudence I proposed that he should complete the book of Genesis, and after that we could determine upon the future course of proceeding. He accomplished this to my complete satisfaction. The enthusiasm with which he entered upon the task was to me an earnest that he could well be trusted to carry it through faithfully. I released him from all other employments; and so, at the beginning of 1836, the first number of “The Pictorial Bible” was issued. In hitting upon the word “Pictorial” I felt that I was rather daring in the employment of a term which the Dictionaries pronounced as “not in use.” It has now been rendered familiar by frequent employment. I could not have easily found any other word that would have conveyed the intention to present wood-engravings of the scriptural designs of great painters; of landscape scenes; of costume; of zoology and botany; of the remains of ancient architecture. “The Pictorial Bible” was completed in two years and a half. To me it was profitable, costly as were the wood-cuts. The profit was doubly welcome from the fact, that after having paid Mr. Kitto, during the progress of publication, 250l. a-year, I was enabled, upon the completion of the book, to
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present him with a sum which seemed to him a little fortune. A letter which Mr. Kitto wrote to me, as the work was proceeding, has been published by his biographer: “I cannot begin any observations respecting ‘The Pictorial Bible,’ without stating how highly I have been gratified and interested in the occupation it has afforded. It has been of infinite advantage as an exercise to my own mind. It has afforded me an opportunity of bringing nearly all my resources into play; my old biblical studies, the observations of travel, and even the very miscellaneous character of my reading, have all been highly useful to me in this undertaking. The venerable character of the work on which I have laboured, the responsibility of annotation, and the extent in which such labour is likely to have influence, are also circumstances which have greatly gratified, in a very definite manner, that desire of usefulness, which has, I may say, been a strong principle of action with me, and which owes its origin, I think, to the desire I was early led to entertain of finding whether the most adverse circumstances (including the privation of intellectual nourishment) must necessarily operate in excluding me from the hope of filling a useful place in society. The question was, whether I should hang a dead weight upon society, or take a place among its active men. I have struggled for the latter alternative, and it will be a proud thing for me if I am enabled to realise it. I venture to hope that I shall: and to you I am, in the most eminent degree, indebted for the opportunities, assistance, and encouragement you have always afforded me in my endeavours after this object.”*

* Life of John Kitto, D.D., by John Eadie, D.D., 1857, p. 304.

Ch. XII.] THE SECOND EPOCH. 255

My project of a “Pictorial Bible” was derived from Germany. But the “Bilder Bibel,” a coarse and inelegant publication for the humbler classes, was the child of the “Biblia Pauperum” of the days of block-printing. The Bible of the poor was, like the Mysteries of the days before the drama, one of the means by which the Roman Church made its pageants and superstitions stand in the place of true religion. At the great festival at Mayence, in 1837, in honour of Gutenburg, the first printer, I was one of the crowd in the cathedral, where the Bishop of Mayence performed High Mass. The first Bible printed by Gutenburg was displayed. What a field for reflection was here opened! The first Bible, in connexion with the imposing pageantries of Romanism—the Bible, in great part a sealed book to the body of the people—the service of God in a tongue unknown to the larger number of worshippers; but that first Bible, the germ of millions of Bibles that have spread the light of Christianity throughout all the habitable globe! When I considered that I was perhaps assisting in England, however humbly, to diffuse this light, I felt that new adaptations of the old instruments for advancing the great work of civilisation would arise, and again arise,—that the pen and the pencil would always create the fitting modes for reaching the minds of all—but that the cheapening of the means of knowledge had been for four centuries, and would always be, the one great principle which would never be laid aside.

Of the ceremonies attending the inauguration of the statue of Gutenburg, on the 14th of August, I saw very little. On my way thither, in company with my eldest daughter and her husband, I had
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been bitten in the leg by a dog in an inn-yard at Ghent. We were detained at Brussels for a day by the ridiculous formalities attending the “visé”’ of our passports, without which we could not proceed. Here I fell into the hands of a physician, whose surgical skill consisted in saying “Ce n’est rien,” and sending me to travel on with a camphor lotion. At Mayence, on the morning of the festival, I painfully crept out of bed with a leg greatly inflamed, saw the ceremony in the cathedral, and then travelled back to Cologne by slow stages. Here, in a river-side inn, I passed three or four sleepless nights, for the people were marching about with music and torches, and the cry of “Gutenburg, Gutenburg,” came upon my ears till I was weary of the name. Fortunately I here met with a skilful Prussian surgeon; the inflammation was reduced. I know not that I ever felt more satisfied with medical treatment than when the kind doctor said to mine host, “Bring a bottle of the best wine in your cellar, and to-morrow you may wish my patient a good journey.”

Upon the completion of the “Pictorial Bible,” I embarked somewhat boldly in other illustrated works. That field was then almost exclusively my own. “Palestine” was the title of a new work undertaken by Mr. Kitto. It embraced the history of the Jews from the most remote ages to the period of their dispersion, and the physical geography and the natural history of the Holy Land. The editor of the “Pictorial Bible” had now found his true vocation, and he continued to labour upon biblical subjects for me and for other publishers to the end of his life. Some of the circumstances of that most interesting life have already been glanced at by me. They have been
Ch. XII.] THE SECOND EPOCH. 257
detailed by himself with a sincerity at once manly and modest in his little volume “The Lost Senses.” He has there told how on a day of 1817—“the last of twelve years of hearing and the first of twenty-eight years of deafness”—having ascended to the top of a ladder, and being in the act of stepping from it on to a roof which his father was slating, he lost his footing and fell backward into the paved court below. Very touching is his retrospect of that one moment of time which wrought in him a greater change of condition than any sudden loss of wealth or honours ever made in the state of man. He says, “Wealth may be recovered, and new honours won, or happiness may be secured without them; but there is no recovery, no adequate compensation, for such a loss as was on that day sustained. The wealth of sweet and pleasurable sounds with which the Almighty has filled the world,—of sounds modulated by affection, sympathy, and earnestness—can be appreciated only by one who has so long been thus poor indeed in the want of them, and who for so many weary years has sat in utter silence amid the busy hum of populous cities, the music of the woods and mountains, and, more than all, of the voices sweeter than music, which are in the winter season heard around the domestic hearth.”

But John Kitto had his compensations in a future position of honour to himself, which brought with it the feeling that it had been won by earnest labour for the benefit of his fellow-men.

“The Thousand and One Nights”—commonly known as the “Arabian Nights’ Entertainments”—was a new translation from authentic Arabic originals, by Mr. Edward Lane. To those who knew that most
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popular book, which we had derived from the French translations,—it might in some cases be said from the inventions of Galland,—the changes in Mr. Lane’s work from the familiar inaccuracies of “genii” to “jin,” and of “divan” to “dewaun,” with fifty others of the same character, must have proved a stumbling block. Loud, too, was the complaint that Aladdin and his Lamp and the Forty Thieves were not to be found in these volumes. But there was here to be found, not a feeble and uncharacteristic style diluted out of affected French, but a bold and simple rendering of Eastern modes of expression, often reminding us of our translation of the Bible. During the progress of this work I had opportunities of cultivating Mr. Lane’s acquaintance. From long residence in Cairo, his habits were those of the Orientalist, which he could scarcely lay aside even when he brought the accomplishments of an English gentleman into the best society of London. Soon after his return from the East, I sat next to him at a dinner-table when he whispered to me, “I cannot endure these chairs. I will tuck my legs under me and then I shall be comfortable.” However repellant to desultory readers might have been Mr. Lane’s version, it was soon discovered that no other “Arabian Nights” would meet the wants of those who really desired to understand Oriental customs and forms of speech, and was worthy of the admiration of educated persons. But its instant popularity, as well as its permanent utility, was commanded by the designs of William Harvey—the most faithful as well as the most beautiful interpreters of the scenery and costume of the stories. The artist worked with the assistance of the author’s mind, and the result
Ch. XII.] THE SECOND EPOCH. 259
was to produce an illustrated book which is almost without a rival.

The “Pictorial History of England” occupied seven years in a regular monthly course of publication. It bore upon its title-page that it was produced “By George L. Craik and Charles MacFarlane, assisted by other Contributors.” Four out of its eight volumes carried the narrative to the conclusion of the reign of George the Second. The other four volumes comprised only the reign of George the Third. This disproportion was fatal to the success which might have been anticipated if the whole work had been confined within as reasonable limits as the narrative of eighteen centuries, which preceded that of the latter half century. Mr. MacFarlane had undertaken the larger department of civil and military history. The history of religion, of literature, and of commerce, could not have been better confided than to Mr. Craik. In his history of the constitution he was occasionally assisted by Mr. Andrew Bisset, who has recently given an evidence that his characteristic views upon historical questions are unchanged. Sir Henry Ellis, my old and valued friend, lent some aid to the literature of the Saxon Period. The subject of the Arts was in the hands of an eminent architect, Mr. Edward Poynter, whose various accomplishments extended beyond the range of his own profession. Mr. Weir, who subsequently became the Editor of the “Daily News,” wrote some graphic chapters on manners in the time of the third George. But upon Mr. MacFarlane rested the chief burden of this elaborate work. In the early half of its chronological divisions the subsidiary chapters rendered the historical narrative less difficult for one
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writer to manage. For the work, like that of Dr. Henry, was broken up into separate divisions. I came subsequently to the conviction that this was not the true plan upon which a history of England ought to be conducted. “It may be convenient to a writer to treat of a period under distinct heads, such as those adopted by Dr. Henry—Civil and Military; Ecclesiastical; Constitution; Learning; Arts; Commerce; Manners;—but such an arrangement necessarily involves a large amount of prolixity and repetition. The intervals, also, at which the several divisions occur in works so conducted are much too long; for, in a century and a half, or two centuries, social changes are usually so great, that the Laws, Learning, Arts, and Customs at the beginning of such a period have little in common with those of its conclusion.”* What was convenient to one writer was a far greater convenience in a history upon which many writers were employed. The plan worked well to the end of the fourth volume. Mr. MacFarlane had a considerable power of narration. He dealt more with military than with civil history, and in this his merit was conspicuous, for, by nature or by study, he had acquired a very competent notion of the military art. Upon paper he “could set an army in the field,” and “the division of a battle” well understood. But in other respects he had not the prime quality of the historian, impartiality. He was essentially a partizan. He did not run riot upon vexed questions of past times. He was moderate in his estimate of the virtues of Charles the First,

* “Popular History of England.” By Charles Knight. Vol. I. Introduction.

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and would not have broken a lance in maintaining the purity of Mary Queen of Scots. But when he came to the French Revolution, then he was for “whole volumes in folio,” that he might dwell upon its countless abominations, and say no word about the mighty changes which it was destined to produce upon the condition of the mass of society. He was a most agreeable companion, and an affectionate though not a safe friend. Had I been less attached to him I might, at all risks, have stopped the publication after the disproportion of the latter volumes had been manifested. But it is difficult for a publisher to adopt such a course in a serial work, even if his interest called upon him to be despotic. He is in the hands of others; and he must assent to their completion of the task which they had begun. To go on is dangerous; but to halt midway would be destruction.

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