William Godwin: his Friends and Contemporaries
Ch. VII. 1806-1811
William Godwin to Mary Jane Godwin, 18 May 1811
“My Dearest Love,—Saturday
was my great and terrible day, and I was compelled to look about me, to see how
it could be provided for. I had less than £20 remaining in my drawer. I sent
Joseph to Lambert and Macmillan: no answer from either: Lambert
not at home. Bradley then undertook the expedition to
Mercu and Jabart: he preferred Friday to Saturday: I therefore desired
him to take Lambert on the way. This time I was
successful: the good creature sent me £100, and at six in the evening
Macmillan sent me £50, having, as you remember,
brought me the other £50 on Tuesday last. This was something, but as there is
no sweet without its sour, about the same time came a note from Hume desiring he might have £40 on Monday.
“After dinner Fanny told me she was sure she had seen Mr and Miss
Lamb walking arm-in-arm at a distance in the street. I could not
be easy till I had ascertained the truth of this intelligence, and I hastened
to the Temple. It was so: they were not at home; gone to the play: but their
Jane told me that her mistress came home on Tuesday
the 7th of May. Lamb returned my visit at breakfast this
morning. To return to business.
“I began to cast about how I was to comply with
Hume’s request. I was still
short for my bills—£30 and £40 are ![]()
| PECUNIARY DIFFICULTIES. | 183 |
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£70. I had, however, Place’s bill in my possession, but who
was to discount it? I thought perhaps Toulmin would do it,
I looked upon my list of discounters. By some oversight I had omitted to put
the name to the discounter of one of Hume’s bills. I thought by studying my journal I should
be able to find it. I was unsuccessful. In the midst of this, however, my eye
caught a bill of £140 of Place, that fell due next Friday.
I had carefully put this out of my mind in the midst of the embarrassments of
the present week, and had wholly forgotten it. Perhaps I never felt a more
terrible sensation in my life, than when it thus returned to me. Lambert’s and Macmillan’s money had made me cheerful: I walked erect in
my little sally to the Temple: I flung about my arms. with the air of a man who
felt himself heart-whole. The moment I saw the £140 I felt a cold swelling in
the inside of my throat—a sensation I am subject to in terrible situations—and
my head ached in the most discomfortable manner. I had just been puzzling how I
could discount the £100 I had by me: what was I to do with £140 beside? If
Turner had not come in just then, I
think I should have gone mad; as it was, the morsel of meat I put in my mouth
at supper stuck in my throat. My ultimate determination was, that I had no
resource but to write to Norwich.
“This morning, however, the first thing I did was to
send a note to Place, to state the
circumstances, and to ask whether he must have the money to a day. He
immediately came to me by way of answer, and told me he could wait till the
30th: a glorious reprieve!
“. . . . The post of to-day brought me £100 upon the
house of Baring. It comes from the great American manager,
with directions for me to furnish books, according to certain rules he lays
down, at the rate of £100 per annum—this £100 being the earnest for the first
year. His letter is a very kind one: I daresay he takes this step with a view
to serve me in a certain degree: at any rate never did windfall come more
opportunely. I need not tell you that Theobald or anybody
will discount a bill, when accepted, on the house of Baring. . . .
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“. . . . Take care of yourself. Remember that you
have gone to the place where you are in search of repose. The money and the
time will be worse than thrown away if this is not the purchase. . . . . Tell
Mary that, in spite of unfavourable
appearances, I have still faith that she will become a wise and, what is more,
a good and a happy woman. . . . . I have just been into the next room to ask
the children if they have any messages. They are both anxious to hear from you.
Jane says she hopes you stuck on the
Goodwin sands, and that the sailors frightened you a little.
Clara Mary Jane Clairmont (1798-1879)
The illegitimate daughter of the second Mrs. William Godwin; she was part of the Shelley
household in Italy and the mother of Byron's daughter Allegra, afterwards working as a
governess in Russia.
Fanny Imlay Godwin (1794-1816)
The daughter of Mary Wollstonecraft and Gilbert Imlay; she lived in the Godwin household
and died a suicide.
Joseph Godwin (d. 1825)
The younger brother of William Godwin; he married in 1776, worked as a business agent in
London, and died in debtor's prison.
Joseph Hume (1767-1844)
A clerk in the Victualling Office at Somerset House; he was a translator of Dante and
friend of Godwin, Lamb, Hazlitt, and Henry Crabb Robinson.
Joseph Hume (1777-1855)
After service in India he became a radical MP for Weymouth (1812), Aberdeen (1818-30,
1842-55), Middlesex (1830-37), and Kilkenny (1837-41); he was an associate of John Cam
Hobhouse and a member of the London Greek Committee. Maria Edgeworth: “Don't like him
much; attacks all things and persons, never listens, has no judgment.”
Charles Lamb [Elia] (1775-1834)
English essayist and boyhood friend of Coleridge at Christ's Hospital; author of
Essays of Elia published in the
London
Magazine (collected 1823, 1833) and other works.
Mary Anne Lamb (1764-1847)
Sister of Charles Lamb with whom she wrote Tales from Shakespeare (1807). She lived with
her brother, having killed their mother in a temporary fit of insanity.
John Lambert (1816 fl.)
He was the printer of the
Morning Chronicle (1793-1810).
B. McMillan (1830 fl.)
Of Bow-Street, Covent Garden, “Printer in Ordinary to His Majesty”; he did
work for the Godwins' Juvenile Library and printed Shelley's
Revolt of
Islam.
Francis Place (1771-1854)
A prosperous London tailor and political radical associated with Burdett and Hobhouse; he
wrote for the
Westminster Review.
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley [née Godwin] (1797-1851)
English novelist, daughter of William Godwin and Mary Wollstonecaft, and the second wife
of Percy Bysshe Shelley. She is the author of
Frankenstein (1818)
and
The Last Man (1835) and the editor of Shelley's works
(1839-40).
Benjamin Tabart (1767-1833)
London bookseller and owner of a circulating library; he published
Tabart's Juvenile Library.
Thomas Turner (1836 fl.)
Of Binfield in Berkshire; he was a London attorney and friend of William Godwin who in
1812 married Cornelia de Boinville.
