| 312 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
SAY was the French authority
on political economy at this period; he was answered by Mr. S. Gray. Campbell warmly contended for the theory of Malthus. Day after day, calling upon
Campbell, political economy came first upon the carpet; then
followed Place on Godwin. Light
literature was forgotten; poetry reposed on his library shelves; the Hebrew lexicon lay
unopened; his favourite Greek was neglected. Godwin,
Malthus, Booth, and
Place, were the burdens of the conversation.
Here, too, the premises, on which many of the arguments on all sides had been founded,
were, to a certain extent,
| MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 313 |
The topic, which for a time was thus warmly discussed, became in turn exhausted; but it was not easy to get Campbell to keep in remembrance the true aim of the work he controled.
One day a paper was given him in town upon a subject, treated with
exceeding dryness. I observed that it was too uninteresting. He replied, “I cannot
help it now I have got it; I promised its insertion.” This article was
entitled “The Republic of Plato;”
it was afterwards sent to the printer. Campbell was
so sensitive, and had spoken so strongly upon the article and its merits, that to raise
further objections, after what he had said, would have offended him. The result was a note
from Mr. Colburn, to whom there were
| 314 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
“Send me back the printed thing about Anacreon, which I left just now—it is from an infernal begging parson.”
He was exceedingly good-natured, and reluctant to give a denial to his friends, he disliked it, and spoke too often without reflection. This pressing contributions personally is at least ill-mannered: it was then too prevalent; and, in the present day, is far more a subject of annoyance than it was twenty years ago. It is in some respects an insult, since it implies that the article is thus safely placed beyond examination.
| MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 315 |
On one occasion I called, and found the poet with two or three articles before him, writing to those who had sent them to him. “It is a shame for me to give you these,” he said; “they are sent to me by a man I know: I ought to read and send them back myself—you have enough to return.” I took the note he had written, in order to seal up the papers while he was writing a letter. I found they did not belong to the party to whom he had been writing. The note itself will serve to show how long and painstaking the poet was in inditing that which, if extended beyond three or four lines, it would have occupied a clerk a week to write and attach to all the monthly trifles received for the publication, if each had been returned with an epistle.
“One of the most unpleasant parts of my duty as an editor, is
being sometimes obliged to return their contributions to literary men for whom I
entertain a high general respect. It is with much sincerity that I have to thank you
for your former pieces, as well as the offer of the present. As you have done me the
honour of submitting them to me, you will also possibly excuse my frankness in saying
that I do not think them quite as interesting as the preceding, and that I
| 316 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
“I have kept your MSS. to await your pleasure on this subject. If it be quite agreeable to let me publish those only, I shall be much obliged to you: but if it be of any consequence that they should be published together or not at all, I will return you the manuscript entire.”
I remarked that he had taken too much pains; that merely stating they were unsuitable, would be enough. “I thought something of the kind, too,” replied the poet, “but I did not know where to stop.”
Sometimes, despite every precaution, writers sent to him directly, and he could not make out to what subject their letters bore relation. Then he would feel irritable and annoyed, in a way almost inconceivable. He would interrupt his immediate studies to write a note to myself, who was living not a hundred yards off, and it was most probable should be certain to see him. If I happened to be out, and he got no reply, he was impatient until he saw me.
“My good friend, can you tell me anything about this pestilent
fellow, who is claiming some nonsense or another he had sent to me, he says: perhaps
you have got the article. I think I re-
| MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 317 |
I generally put an end to his queries by begging the application, carrying it off, and if I had the article, returning it, or applying to the writer for a particular description, which would enable me to ransack the poet’s study in search of it.
Continual hints to prevent dry articles coming to him, made from myself,
would sometimes, I imagined from my tenacity upon that point, make him oppose the
introduction of any particularly light. I had mentioned to him an article of the latter
character, with an eulogy upon it. We had a conversation about one of the driest
description, which he had got a friend to write some time before, and which I thought
unsuitable. I bore too hardly, perhaps, in my opinion—harder than usual. The next
morning I got a message from him, sent as if on second thoughts, that as I had argued
against his article, that for which I had spoken should fare no better. “I have
been thinking, since yesterday, about the article on the ‘Heat
of the Weather,’ and I have too much confidence in your candour and
friendship to hesitate in communicating to you, after all, my doubts if it will exactly
suit. It is an
| 318 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
Goristiza, a distinguished Spaniard in the
diplomatic service of Mexico, to which ho had rendered great benefits, was introduced to
Campbell by Blaguiere or myself, I forget which. Campbell had not
read much of Spanish literature, giving a preference to that of Germany. He was much
pleased at picking up, in conversation from a living writer of such high merit, information
upon points of a general nature, in relation to the writings of some of those Spanish
authors who were known to him more by repute than perusal. Blanco White was a melancholy man, whose studies were principally directed
to the more abstruse writings of his countrymen. Goristiza was a man
of the world, well read in the whole circle of Spanish literature, of easy manners, and
rather vivacious temperament. He became an exile under Ferdinand
VII. With small pecu-
| MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 319 |
* November 13, 1790. His mother was Donna Maria del Rosaria Cepada, celebrated for her descent from Santa Teresa de Jesus, so noted for her writings and virtues. Born in Avila, 1515, died 1582. |
| 320 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
| MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 321 |
One series of Goristiza’s papers treated of the Spanish theatre, and, being written by the successor of the distinguished Moratin, were well worthy of note, as the best authority in the English language for the later Spanish stage.
It was seldom the poet amused himself by turning punster, and when he happened to make the attempt, he generally endeavoured to manufacture his puns of the species better characterized by absurdity than wit. A little circumlocution in their character was sure to be discoverable. When he removed to Upper Seymour Street, West, those who knew his house must have observed that it adjoined an, archway leading to some mews. He had promised certain verses of his own on a particular day, and true to appointment, brought them over himself. No sooner was he seated than he said, taking the lines from his pocket,—
“These are the last I shall bring you.”
“How so?”
“You must supply yourself; you are twice as good a poet as I am.”
| 322 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
“I don’t comprehend.”
“Why, I have only one muse, and you have two.”
It was singular enough, almost in the sight of his house, but in Lower Frederick Street, Connaught Place, mine should also have had a mews, not only adjoining my house as in his own case, but there was a second nearly opposite eastward in the same street. I accused him of having been the twelvemonths during which I had lived in the same place in concocting the pun, or he would have promulgated it before, which he stoutly denied.
He was greatly attached to Glasgow, and had passed his happy youthful hours there. His early associations were all with it, and yet he had worked hard, so that its recollection, he said, had a mixture of toil and enjoyment; it was a city to him “flowing with syllogisms and ale.”
Irving, the celebrated Scotch preacher, called upon him one day, for what purpose he could not conjecture, as he thought that strange being never quite compos mentis, while all London was running after his rabid sermons.
“What can he want with me,” said Campbell; “a discussion upon divinity with a backslider like myself would be as idle as talking of fluxions to Sir William Curtis.”
The renowned preacher had merely called to
| MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 323 |
“Were you not alarmed, Mrs. Campbell, to see the wild-looking being come into the drawing-room? he might make a convert of your husband.”
“O, no,” she replied, “he is inconvertible.”
Never insensible to female beauty, and fond of the society of women, it was singular that Campbell, the poet of sentiment and imagery, should have written little or nothing breathing of ardent affection. It is doubtful whether he ever experienced love in its intensity; whether a subdued feeling of attachment, an almost feminine tenderness of regard did not with him occupy the place of strong amatory passion. In his works there is an artificial rather than a natural dealing with the attachment to the sex. There is the mild and beneficent sunshine with little warmth.
“Were I but an Asiatic!” he exclaimed one evening at a rout, where there were a number of lovely women.
“Why, Campbell?”
“Because so many beautiful women make one think of the advantages of a faith that sanctions polygamy,” he replied, laughing.
He once heard a lady arguing strongly against
| 324 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
“She only argues as she feels,” said the poet, “anthropomorphism is natural where mortal man is most in estimation.”
It was necessary to witness the poet when he was busy in his study, or taken up with literary composition, in order to judge of the weight the task seemed to impose upon him. He sought retirement for the work of composition, and would sit, then stand, then sit again, quite restless with his labour.
Unless when he had previously signified to Mrs. Campbell his desire to remain perfectly uninterrupted by any person
whatever, which was seldom understood in regard to myself, I entered his study. If I saw
him busy, I took a chair and a book until his more immediate occupation was concluded. In
the meanwhile he would continue his work, now sitting, now walking up and down the room,
sometimes with his pipe—for out of his study he rarely smoked—as if he wanted
something stimulating to continue his task. Now he would stop to indite a sentence, or walk
leisurely to his books for a reference, his library, when he lived in Seymour Street, being
tolerably large. In a morning, when he could not smoke, I have again and again seen him
uncover a tobacco-box, which generally stood upon his table, and taking
| MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 325 |
He sometimes copied his prose manuscript, but fully as often sent it to
press as it was first written out. It was different with his poetry, which he generally
wrote out in a very fair, neat hand. From his habit of rendering his sentences perfect as
he proceeded, he was long in their completion. There were times when he wrote as the ideas
arose, in a considerable hurry, and then his manuscript was hurried and nearly
unintelligible;—this was more particularly the case when he wrote under
indisposition. He would sometimes take it into his head to rule black-lead lines on paper
for the purpose of copying out his poetry, but this was by no means a uniform rule, but
rather the result of a momentary fancy, since he could hardly be said to act by a fixed
rule in anything connected with his literary composition. Procrastination was too common;
he would promise his work by such a time if I would come and
| 326 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
It was perfectly easy to proceed in such a business with the poet when
his peculiarities were understood. To put him out of his way even slightly was an effectual
obstacle to the fulfilment of the intended duty. His appointments were generally kept with
punctuality, which might seem anomalous with his habits in literary labour, to which he
could only be got to adhere fitfully and by starts, sometimes he could not be got to attend
to the simplest thing, and would delay it by all sorts of petty devices; but he was not the
less exemplary in intention when he chanced to fail. He reflected that he put another
person to inconvenience by any lapse of the kind, and no man was more considerate about
annoying others. Whenever he chanced to cause inconvenience to another it arose out of that
habit of abstraction
| MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 327 |
His editorship was not at all calculated to spur him to literary exertion. He had acquired as much fame as he could well expect to obtain; he had a conviction that he should not be able to excel his former efforts, and that the chance of any accession of reputation was very problematical; his pecuniary cravings were satisfied by the emolument, for he was not at all inclined to look at literature as a means of amassing wealth, well knowing that in this country intellect has no chance of gaining more than a daily competency, it being esteemed a very secondary thing in the sight of the multitude. He was satisfied with an income sufficient for his moderate wants, and preferred as much of the indolence of a literary life at he could contrive to maintain, nor did age change this feeling for a better.
“I wish you would make my husband write novels like Sir Walter Scott,” said Mrs. Campbell to myself.
“Why Mrs. Campbell? I do not think he would make a good hand at that kind of writing.”
“Because you know that Lady Scott says to her husband when she wants a new dress—‘Watty, my dear, you must write a new novel, for I want another dress!’”
| 328 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
“Scott is rich, my dear; I am but a poor poet, here lies the difference,” Campbell replied.
“Why then, my dear, you must write a new poem in place of a novel.”
The “Memoirs of the
Baillies of Surviswood” were published about this time, and were in some
degree connected with the history of Scotland. Campbell wrote a notice of the work himself and much commended, having carefully perused it. He
remarked on the singular union of opinion among the leading characters in the support of
civil and religious liberty, commending their devotedness to the cause they had espoused,
while in their fates and fortunes there was such a striking diversity, the one falling a
martyr to the despotism of the government; the other, after many perils succeeding as an
instrument with others in overturning the tyranny of the Stuarts, and seeing a better order
of things established. Campbell here noticed more particularly the
mistake of Warton and Bowles, who both imagined that in the well known lines, entitled
“Mr. Pope’s Welcome from
Greece,” written by Gay upon
Pope having completed the translation of the
Iliad, Lord
Chief Justice Mansfield was intended by “the sweet tongued
Murray,” whereas the Murray
really intended, was the authoress of the “Memoirs of the
Baillies,” whose daughter, Lady
| MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 329 |
Scott wondered that Campbell, who was possessed of so much genius of the highest character, did
not do more. It was hardly possible for one of a temperament so entirely different to
account for the conduct of the poet in this respect. Scott was a man
of exceedingly strong constitutional endurance. He felt none of the shrinking delicacy
which accompanies a bodily frame attuned to the most exquisite vibrations—sensitive
beyond belief, and exceedingly regardful of a literary reputation, already secured, as he
was well aware, upon a permanent basis. This is no imaginary conclusion. It was not, as
Scott supposed, that the poet was afraid of the “shadow
his own fame cast before him.” Such a circumstance would not account for the
degree of negligence he showed in his specimens of the poets, nor for lapses of a similar
character that occurred in other works from his pen. He was by nature one, whose muse was
propitious only at her own pleasure, on some casual impulse, some unforeseen
| 330 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
There was a species of caprice, rather, perhaps, irresolution in the conduct of the poet at times, not at all inconsistent with the character sometimes ascribed to genius. He would start of a sudden into the country for the sake of a temporary solitude. He wrote me one day,
“I want to be alone for a short time, there is no being by oneself in London. I am going off to Sydenham in the first instance, there I shall be until Thursday” (this was Monday). “I wish my address to be kept a profound secret—you shall hear when I go to plant myself in other quarters.”
He once set out, but altered his mind on the way, and went somewhere
into Kent, writing to Mrs. Campbell, to her
surprise, from a place near Canterbury, and soon after came back to town, his letter not
preceding him more than twenty-four hours. He would sometimes go on a visit from which he
anticipated much pleasure, get tired in a couple of days, and want an excuse to return,
when he never failed to write to me and
| MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 331 |
“I believe I must leave you to correct this dull essay on the London College, yet if I could have a re-proof it would be desirable. I have left you my address with General Dyer. If any paper or letter comes to you for me, with a coronet seal and a card enclosed, have the goodness to send it for me to ——, office, Whitehall. Any other forward to Sir Thomas Dyer’s, or retain at your pleasure. Only send for me back imperatively* by the first of the month, for I wish myself back already.”
He visited Earl Spencer at Althorp, and complained that after breakfast the company dispersed, his lordship and others to shoot until the dinner hour. He had the library to himself, but he could not study there as at home, and wished
* Underlined to show how I was to understand it. |
| 332 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
The nervous susceptibility of the poet was very great, and excited in a degree unpleasant to himself by slight things. He had great latent pride, and with it, much false reserve. Angry warmth or violence of language in another, rendered him immediately unfit for business or company. A party, of which the poet was one, visiting Foscolo, a discussion arose on a trivial subject, in which the Italian, exhibiting his native warmth because he was opposed in argument by one or two of his countrymen, used to the vociferous manner of the south, who would not give way to their host, Campbell sat in the most uncomfortable state; I never saw his nervous system more affected. He did not utter a word when addressed by the angry Italian, and quickly rose and went away.
| MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 333 |
“Poor Foscolo,” said he, “what a passionate man—he has unhinged me. Who would believe he wrote ‘The Sepulchres?’”
Campbell never, I believe, saw him again. He soon afterwards removed into Surrey, having got into pecuniary difficulties by his imprudences in building near the Regent’s Park, and in a year or two after he died. Often would Campbell repeat the splendid lines of the spectre fight seen from off the Isle of Eubœa, by mariners on mentioning this great name of modern Italy. They are in his “Sepulchres.” Campbell said they were the noblest in modern poetry; adding, that the idea of bringing down the battles of past ages in that way was a happy thought, but that the description was even nobler than the idea. This is the English:—
|
“——They who sail
Since by Eubœa, have beheld the sparks
Of armour-smiting brands emblaze the shores,
Far through the dusky midnight; seen the pyres
Vomit their crimson vapours: the grey gleam
Of spectre warriors striding to the fight;
And hearken’d in the silence to the chafing
And tumult of the phalanx, and the blast
Of answering trumpets, and the brazen tread
Of charging horse upon the loaded plain,
Wailings, and hymns, and chanting of the Parcæ!”
|
Campbell, a few literary friends, and myself,
| 334 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
At one of these the delight of the poet was great at hearing from little Dundas Cochrane, some of his travelling adventures in Siberia and Kamschatka.
“And what sort of things are the women, Cochrane? is it true they are without noses, or flatten them to a level with their faces, that they live on fish, eat train-oil, and wear seal-skin petticoats?”
Cochrane replied, “That he should be happy to introduce the poet to his wife, who was of that country, he might then judge for himself—that as travellers were thought miracle-mongers, his statement that the Kamschatkans really possessed noses might not be credited.”
Campbell availed himself of the introduction, to a fresh-coloured, well-looking, almost lady-like female, had she but been pallid and sickly enough, who completely changed his notions about the females of that frigid climate.
Cochrane complained of Dr. Lyal who had
| MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 335 |
“How?” said Campbell.
“Why,” replied Cochrane, “the Review kept very quiet about the food that some of poor Lieutenant Hood’s companions partook of in their extremity in the frozen north-west of America—food the flesh of their own kind. That they would tell nothing about, but abused me for saying salt-fish was welcome fare.”
“That is because the reviewers have never kept a long fast,” observed Campbell.
“But we fast hard who travel over deserts,” said Cochrane, “the reviewer would have us like the dandy guards of St. James’s, despise starvation upon a rump-steak.”
Then came questions from Campbell
about the Tungusians and Irtchucks, and what Russia might make out of them, for he was fond
of listening to travellers, and particular in his inquiries
| 336 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
One day, having exhausted Mrs. Campbell’s patience by remaining late in the afternoon, and all but two or three of the company having dispersed, a walk in Hyde Park was proposed by those who remained. I returned to take a family dinner with the poet, when Mrs. Campbell said Mr. Brougham had been there.
“Well, Mrs. Campbell, and what news did Mr. Brougham bring?”
“Harry Brougham,” as she styled him in those days, “mentioned nothing new, he was as usual, himself.”
How justly did that word depict the history of the man—every shade
of his character. How well women, too, discriminate character. That little word depicted
the past, existing, and future man, from his rise to his decadence; from his abandonment of
the West India planters and the cause of slavery, obnoxious to popularity, and then pirouetting, down to his forsaking the
| MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 337 |
Captain Dundas Cochrane wrote on the advantages of attempting a north-east passage round America. This plan was subsequently followed by government very closely, in the expedition of Captain Beechy, and Cochrane’s idea of a double expedition was so far carried out. He was an energetic little man, capable of bearing great hardship. He died in 1826, at Valentia, on the pestilential coast of South America. Campbell and myself set out one day to call upon him, as we understood, at his address in Baker Street. The drawing-room doors were flung open, Campbell entered first, catching a figure on a sofa, “Captain Cochrane?”
“My name is Cochrane, sir.”
“I beg pardon, you are not the gentleman; we are in search of Captain Cochrane of the navy.”
“Oh! not at all,” replied the stranger, with great good nature,“ you are looking for my cousin, who lives not far off” (I think it was in Montague Street).
Away we went, and on knocking at the door, Campbell said, “I won’t go up until I know
| 338 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
A stranger, rising deliberately from his chair, said, “I am Captain Cochrane, at your service.”
I begged pardon for my mistake, and mentioned how I had been directed, and less confused than Campbell had been, I added, “I wanted the Kamschatkan traveller.”
“Oh,” he replied, “there is no end of the Cochranes; you want my relative, Dundas Cochrane. You will find him no great way from, here.”
He then handed me the right address, and we wished each other good morning. When I came down to Campbell, and told him what had occurred, he laughed heartily, and said he had begun to think the Kamschatkans had conferred upon the captain the gift of ubiquity. On meeting Cochrane afterwards, he would ask how many places he now lodged in together, for the name of Cochrane must be “legion.”
Lady Morgan became a contributor to the periodical work
which was making so much noise in the world. Her first contribution was entitled, I think,
“Absenteeism,” but it
did not bear her name. It was a paper which carried a close relationship to those sound
patriotic sentiments, and
| MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 339 |
Banim, author of the “O’Hara Tales” and other works, which at that
time were much read, was an unassuming, generous-hearted man, of simple manners, and great
capability of friendship. His genius may have been rated higher than it merited, but the
virtues of his heart never. One of his first papers was entitled “Digressions in the two Exhibition Rooms,”
bespeaking a feeling for, and some knowledge of, art. In them he gave an account of
Wilkie and his artistic resources, which were in
keeping with the character of that noted artist. He accounted satisfactorily for some of
the painter’s anachronisms, if they may be so called, particularly in the Rent Day picture, where there is a cupboard no one present can
reach, and a clock it will require a ladder to wind up. Campbell was much pleased with him as an unassuming agreeable man, though
in literature there was not any similarity of feeling between them. The world was
comparatively new to the Irishman. I recollect one curious circumstance relative to society
in Ireland, which forcibly struck Campbell, and certainly must strike
everybody now more forcibly. The poet had invited Banim to take coffee
and spend the evening. He
| 340 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
| MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 341 |
Campbell received an offer of the Professorship of English at Wilna, under the Russian government, in the early part of his literary career, just after his marriage. This he declined on the reflection how decidedly he had spoken and written against Russia, in favour of Polish freedom.
It was singular that just before the last effort of the Poles to achieve
their independence, Prince Adam Czartorisky, then
viceroy of Poland, under Russia, wrote to Campbell,
requesting he would recommend some one to hold the professorship of the English language in
the university of Warsaw. It was a proof of his kindly feeling and friendship towards
myself, “that waving the great loss and inconvenience our parting would be to
himself, he could not suffer it to interfere a moment in tendering to me what I might
consider a personal advantage.” I had fortunately, two
| 342 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
| ≪ PREV |
