| R. PLUMER WARD. | 105 |
The “Pictures of the World” were now published, and various allusions to them will be found in the letters contained in the present section.
I may here be allowed (à propos
to some of these allusions) to state, once for all, my firm conviction that the singularly
diffident and deprecatory tone and terms in which Mr.
Ward was accustomed to respond to those testimonies of admiration which his
writings called forth, whether in the form of public criticisms from strangers, or private
expressions of personal feeling from friends and acquaintance, were strictly sincere. Not
that he ever felt or exhibited any disposition unduly to depreciate the character and
tendency of those writings. But he was not seldom stricken with a sort of childlike
astonishment at the effect which certain por-
| 106 | R. PLUMER WARD. |
In some of those pleasing and characteristic letters of Mr. Ward to his cultivated friends, Lady Mulgrave, Mrs. Austen, &c., which form so interesting and valuable a portion of Mr. Phipps’s book, the views I have just expressed are so fully confirmed, that I am tempted to cite one or two brief passages. The following declaration (in a letter to Lady Mulgrave) in reference to “Tremaine,” his first and most successful work, may be accepted as the strictest and most literal truth:—
“The success has been not merely beyond
| R. PLUMER WARD. | 107 |
In a subsequent letter to Mrs. Austen, he says:—
“You must no longer accuse me of ungraciousness in my reception of
what I was most sincere in thinking I owed to your friendship rather than your justice;
though, if just, you know how few opinions I think so valuable as your own. But indeed,
indeed, it is no more than true that when I look into myself, and see the nothingness
of which I am composed; how totally wanting I am in science, and how neglectful my long
life has been of duty, as well as of everything that required energy and self-denial;
the truth, that I am a gross imposition, instead of deserving the opinion you tell me
such men as Professor Wilson award me, flashes
upon me, spite of all the kind manner in which you relate it. However, he is so little
of an imposition himself, that I cannot but be greatly
| 108 | R. PLUMER WARD. |
The allusion in the opening paragraph of the following letter is to the same subject referred to in the closing letter of the last section—namely, the “very tempting” one of treating of his own “Life and Times.” The remainder relates to “Pictures of the World,” then just published:—
“It is not because I was insensible to either the
importance or the extreme of your kind and partial judgment of me, which appear
in your last letter, that I did not immediately answer it. Yet I could only
thank you for it, which I most sincerely do, confessing most unaffectedly my
unworthiness of what you are so good as to attribute to me. Though I know something, I know so little in comparison of what there
is to know, and which others know so much better, that though I might feel much
interest in the task you recommend, I am afraid I should
| R. PLUMER WARD. | 109 |
“Where does your kindness end? I discover it in the warm and elegant (would I could say deserved) tribute which I read in the ——. No one else either thinks or could write so of me.
“What else has been written, if anything, I absolutely am ignorant in this closed-up nook; so if you can enlighten me by sending me any papers, pray do. Observe, I mean enlighten either for good or for evil; for, though I don’t desire, I can bear to be abused. I am rather surprised that the —— (the only weekly paper I take) has not yet attacked the ‘Pictures’ or the ‘Reviewer Reviewed.’
“Should you have heard anything about it (the latter), and whether it has reached Edinburgh, I should be glad to know, under cover, if you please, to Sir George Anson, at this place. En attendant.
| 110 | R. PLUMER WARD. |
In the following letter the allusions all through are still to “Pictures of the World.” Nothing would be more shallow and more unjust than to attribute these allusions, and the almost useless anxiety which some of them imply, to what is called personal vanity, of which few men had so little as Mr. Ward; though he had an unusual amount of that which is apt to be mistaken for it, namely, a strong desire to stand well in the opinion of those whom he esteemed, and a sincere pleasure in being the medium of giving pleasure to others.
“My dear Patmore,—I have just seen the —— ——, and, notwithstanding your denial (if it is one) of the warm and eloquent review of a certain work in it, am persuaded that nobody now alive could have partiality enough to me (to say nothing of the glowing and forcible style), to write such honouring things but yourself.
“There! I have come to the point at once, and deny it if you can.
| R. PLUMER WARD. | 111 |
“Well, much as I have been gratified by it, I don’t know that it has made me much more your debtor, simply because I was so much so already for a thousand acts of kindness and proofs of good opinion.
“What pleases me most in this review is the handsome and forcible manner in which you vindicate my claim (laughed at by the flippant and very shallow ——) to be something more than a writer of novels of fashionable life. I cannot say I am much flattered to be so considered, and, in short, pretend to be an essayist, only in another form. I am, therefore, the more obliged to you.
“The —— —— disappointed me.
Not because I expected approbation, for I looked for the contrary, and was
surprised at the favour shown. My surprise was at the want of ability in it as
a criticism; at bad grammar in language, and at a strange, nay, gross mistake
as to the moral of ‘Sterling.’ Fr it says, that, because ‘Sterling’ fails in achieving what, with his
abilities and opportunities, he might have accomplished, Mr.
Ward’s moral fails too. Why, the very moral is, that,
notwithstanding ability and
| 112 | R. PLUMER WARD. |
“How far more correctly has the —— —— seized this, whoever may be the author. That it is you, however, unless you positively deny it more unambiguously than by saying, that, because you think it is the best of the critiques, it cannot be you, I must continue to opine.
“Pray put the matter frankly out of doubt, and so no more at present from your obliged friend,
The passage referring to Sir Robert Peel, in the following letter, suggests a regret that two men whose political careers had begun nearly about the same period,* and had run parallel to each other for several years, should, after a long separation, have missed meeting when the one had reached the highest point of political, and the other of literary, eminence. Had the meeting sought by Sir
* Sir Robert (then Mr.) Peel was Under-Secretary-at-War in the Percival Administration, Mr. Ward having been successively a Lord of the Admiralty and Clerk of the Ordnance in the same. |
| R. PLUMER WARD. | 113 |
“My dear Patmore,—I have been ungratefully faulty in not sooner answering your last kind letter (I am afraid even to look at the date), nor will I make things worse by the only cause, not excuse, I can assign for it—too much leisure, and consequent procrastination. In short,
“‘I blush and am confounded to appear Before thy presence, Cato.’ |
“By the bye, were you ever called Cato before? * * *
“I shall be quite sorry to come to town, though it may
give me an opportunity of seeing the few friends I have not survived in the
world, you among the best of them. My deafness, however, and the hours I am
obliged
| 114 | R. PLUMER WARD. |
“I could sometimes wish it otherwise, as I did lately, when Peel asked me for a few days to Drayton, to meet some of our old political friends, which I felt forced to decline on account of my being a bore from my infirmity [his deafness]. I mention it, however, chiefly to add his amusing mode of invitation. He said he was glad to see, as I had quitted politics, that I had betaken myself to literature, adding, ‘tam Marti, quam Mercurio,’—‘by which,’ said he, ‘you see, I suppose Mars had a seat at a military board, perhaps the Ordnance.’
“Now pray tell me what was the ill-usage or discouragement which, in one of your letters, you said the Tories had given you? Peel’s name made me recollect this. All I can say is, that if they disgusted you, they were uncommon fools for their pains.
“You talk of reviewers, and well. I have
| R. PLUMER WARD. | 115 |
“By the way, have you ever happened to hear more of the pamphlet? It got to Edinburgh; for Lord Rosebery (my wife’s cousin) wrote word he had been reading it after the review. Do you recollect whether one was sent to Lord Lonsdale? If not, pray order one to him. He wrote me about the essay, and said it had disturbed all his views about the character of the Revolutionists of 1688; and thought I had a great deal of courage not to fear the hornets of the present day. I think, however, I pride myself upon it, and, having just read the essay again, own (though I am not a proper judge) that I value it as a work, and think it may in time be valued by the sober part of the world as much as ‘Tremaine.’
“So much for self-deceit. * * *
“Pour moi, I necessarily read and write a great deal—both chiefly concerning the great subject ‘Human Life,’ which may possibly produce more fruit.
| 116 | R. PLUMER WARD. |
“I find the ‘Pictures’ more spoken of, and read much here. My real studies, however, are biblical, in which, with ten thousand differences with the orthodox, I venture to hope I can satisfy myself.
“Adieu. Pray write to me, notwithstanding I don’t deserve it. But tell me what you are about, and answer me in respect to your wishes as to ——. Meantime, believe that I am,
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