| 218 | LAMAN BLANCHARD. |
The following letter relates to a review which Blanchard wrote in the New Monthly Magazine of my son’s Poems, when they were published as a volume some months afterwards:—
“Dear Patmore,—That you so feel about the New Monthly Magazine is most gratifying to me. * * * *
“—— spoke kindly, yet as if some tiff with you were in the way, and he despaired of my pleasing all parties, which was the condition on which I was to have the two or three pages—afterwards extended, by special note, to three and a half, with a desire that I would take to the twenty-eighth of the month, rather than hurry or spoil it. * *
“I took care, under the circumstances, to
| LAMAN BLANCHARD. | 219 |
“You may tell Coventry that I have, for the first time, been reading Miss Barrett’s poems—one at least—and am raving about her. I thought her a pretender—God forgive me! Pray give my sincere regards to Mrs. Patmore.
My son had been speaking to him about Miss
Barrett’s (now Mrs.
Browning’s) poetry at our last meeting. That exclamation—(“God
forgive me!”)—is as beautiful and expressive in itself as it is characteristic of the
writer; for Blanchard had a love and
| 220 | LAMAN BLANCHARD. |
Even his own little volume—or rather the memory of it—though he attached anything but a high and exaggerated value to it, was worn like a secret talisman about his heart, to charm away the demon of Reality, to whose service he felt himself bound, body and soul.
And it must be observed here, with a view to what I have noted above, that with all his happy art of adapting himself to the circumstances and exigencies of his worldly position, they never ceased to press upon him; for his power of escaping them was an art, not the result of natural temperament; so that when real trials and troubles came he (alas!) sank beneath them.
The two following letters must be allowed to speak for themselves:—
“My dear Patmore,—When your
note came I had just written to you, stating my
| LAMAN BLANCHARD. | 221 |
“I do hope you are not allowing it to have more than its natural momentary effect on you. Injury it cannot do, except to your own feelings, which I allow for being ten times stronger of course than if you were ostensibly the person assailed.”
| 222 | LAMAN BLANCHARD. |
“Dear Patmore,—There is reason to conclude I believe that —— is not the actual writer. Who is I have not yet learned, but he will get preciously slated for his pains. I was with Hunt and Procter last night, whose feelings on the subject are very strong, and seems quite indisposed to let the thing pass. I understood that he quite intends to notice it—and is considering how best to do so. —— tells me he means to scarify the wretch—I think, in ‘Punch.’ It has excited great indignation among us all.
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