The Life and Letters of John Gibson Lockhart
Chapter 24: Conclusion
George David Boyle to Andrew Lang, [1895 c.]
“Dear Mr. Lang,—I do
not require to dig into my memory for any particulars about J. G. Lockhart. Everything that I heard from
him, from 1844 to 1853, is so strongly impressed on my mind that I can bring
back at once the times that I met him and the utterances that he made.
Mr. Lockhart unbent himself very freely in the house
of a relation of mine, and his sayings and doings were very faithfully
chronicled. When I read, very shortly after his death, the excellent sketch of
his life and character, in the Times of December 9, 1854—a sketch
which was attributed to Dean Milman and
Lady Eastlake—I was struck
with its complete agreement with all that I had myself thought about his
character, as a critic and a man. The real love of letters, which he showed in
his conversation, gave him an especial charm. I have heard him acknowledge
freely the mistakes that had been made by critics as to Keats, Shelley, and Tennyson. From
what I have heard him say, half in fun and half in earnest, about the fierce
attacks in Blackwood upon what was thought the Cockney school, I drew the
conclusion that he greatly regretted all that had been said about
Keats; and I feel sure that
Lockhart was never guilty, as Mr. Colvin thinks in his Memoir of Keats, of ![]()
![]()
betraying his knowledge of the poet’s life to the
author of the article in Blackwood. I know, on the authority of the Rev. Thomas James, a contributor to the Quarterly,
much valued by Lockhart, that the republication of
Keats’s poetry in 1840-41 was strongly advocated
by Lockhart, who was always willing to repair injustice. I
heard him express great satisfaction that John
Sterling’s review of Tennyson, in the Quarterly, had created a great
demand on the part of the public; and I remember his strong praise of the
‘Morte
d’Arthur’ and the ‘Lord of Burleigh.’ Of
Shelley, too, and especially his Letters and Essays,
he said much that dwells in my memory. One of his pieces of advice to me was to
cultivate a catholic taste in poetry. ‘Milton, above all things, Pope, Scott, Byron, and Crabbe—I am afraid Southey is not such a favourite with you young gentlemen as
Shelley and Keats—but
“Kehama”
and “Thalaba” you ought to read, and don’t forget Wordsworth’s “Churchyard among the
Mountains.”’ I was often struck with his
magnanimity. When Macaulay’s
‘Essays’ were becoming very popular, he spoke of them with great
admiration; and when some one was running down Jeffrey, I heard Lockhart say very much
what he wrote afterwards, in a most interesting article in the Quarterly. He treated me with
extreme kindness, and asked me to make use of him if I wanted any particular
information about books. He had a very warm heart, often ![]()
| 402 | LIFE OF J. G. LOCKHART. | |
![]()
concealed by a cold, reserved manner, and my old cousin used to say to me,
‘Lockhart treats you with great kindness
on account of what your father did for him in his Edinburgh
days.’ He took great interest in the battle of the Churches in
Scotland after the Disruption. An article by Gleig on Dr. Chalmers
made him talk very freely about religious opinion in Scotland, and the attitude
taken by Walter Scott. ‘If I had to write my
“Life of
Scott” over again now, I should say more about his religious
opinions. Some people may think passages in his novels conventional and
commonplace, but he hated cant, and every word he said came from his
heart.’ One day in his own house he read me a letter, written by
Scott to a friend who had lost his wife, full of beauty; and he then added, ‘The lady was
Scott’s first love.’ I think this
letter, or a copy of it, must have been given to Lockhart
by Sir John Forbes, the son of the
banker who married the lady in question. There was an enthusiasm about
Lockhart, when he expressed his views about poems he
admired, such as I have never seen except in Matthew Arnold. It may seem strange to some to hear that the
two poems I heard him admire most were Byron’s
‘Isles of
Greece,’ and some very fine verses of Fanny Kemble’s, which he gave in the Quarterly in his review of her poems. May I venture to
mention a personal matter? He was going to take a short tour on the Continent
with ![]()
![]()
his friend Lord Robertson, and he said to me,
‘If you can come with us, I will frank you. You would hear about
Scott and Wilson to your heart’s content.’ But I was
an undergraduate at Oxford, and the kind scheme could not be thought of. I
venture, however, to think that there are not many men in
Lockhart’s position who would think of doing
such a kindness to a youth. I know that there had been from time to time grave
questions and difference of opinion between Lockhart and
the head of the firm in Albemarle Street, but Lockhart was
fond of speaking of the generous treatment many authors had had from Mr. Murray, whom he called the prince of
publishers. I have heard him say that he had often wished Sir
Walter had had more dealings with the house. The line taken by
the Quarterly as to the Oxford
Movement has been much misunderstood. Lockhart was fond of
quoting a famous sentence of Horne
Tooke’s, about Hounslow and Windsor: ‘I went a
certain way from Oxford, but I was not going to Rome.’ I should
like to say that when he was last at Rome, he wrote a warm appreciation of the
poetry of Dante, and said he had been
deepening his acquaintance, under the guidance of
Lucentini, ‘a man much to be
commended.’ Lockhart used to quote a famous
passage of Sir F. Palgrave, of the value
to be gained from ‘one dear book.’ I could write at some
length of the value to be gained from knowledge and acquaintance of one dear
man.—I am, very truly yours,
Matthew Arnold (1822-1888)
English poet and critic, son of Thomas Arnold of Rugby; he published
Culture and Anarchy (1869).
George David Boyle (1828-1901)
The son of David Boyle, Lord Shewalton (1772–1853); he was educated at Charterhouse and
Exeter College, Oxford, and was dean of Salisbury Cathedral (1880).
Frances Butler [née Kemble] (1809-1893)
English actress and writer, daughter of Charles Kemble and Maria Theresa Kemble; on a
tour to America in 1834 she was unhappily married to Pierce Butler (1807-1867).
Thomas Chalmers (1780-1847)
Scottish divine and leader of the Free Church of Scotland; he was professor of moral
philosophy at St. Andrews (1823-28) and professor of divinity at Edinburgh
(1828-43).
Sir Sidney Colvin (1845-1927)
Literary and art critic educated at Trinity College, Cambridge; he was professor of Fine
Arts, Cambridge (1873-85) and keeper of prints and drawings at the British Museum
(1883-1912).
George Crabbe (1754-1832)
English poet renowned for his couplet verse and gloomy depictions of country persons and
places; author of the
The Village (1783),
The
Parish Register (1807),
The Borough (1810), and
Tales of the Hall (1819).
Dante Alighieri (1265-1321)
Florentine poet, the author of the
Divine Comedy and other
works.
Lady Elizabeth Eastlake [née Rigby] (1809-1893)
Art critic, translator, and reviewer for the
Quarterly; she
married Sir Charles Lock Eastlake in 1849. She was related to Lady Palgrave through her
mother, Anne Palgrave.
John Stuart Hepburn- Forbes, eighth baronet (1804-1866)
The son of Sir William Forbes, seventh baronet (d. 1828); educated at Edinburgh
University, he was a political conservative who took an interest in agricultural affairs.
In 1834 he married Lady Harriet Louise Anne Kerr, daughter of William Kerr, sixth Marquess
of Lothian.
George Robert Gleig (1796-1888)
Prolific Tory writer who rose to attention with
The Subaltern,
serialized in
Blackwood's; he was appointed chaplain-general of the
forces in 1844.
Thomas James (1809-1863)
Educated at Eton, Glasgow, and at Christ Church, Oxford, he was assistant master at the
Charterhouse (1832), and rector of Theddingworth (1842); he contributed to the
Quarterly Review.
Francis Jeffrey, Lord Jeffrey (1773-1850)
Scottish barrister, Whig MP, and co-founder and editor of the
Edinburgh
Review (1802-29). As a reviewer he was the implacable foe of the Lake School of
poetry.
John Keats (1795-1821)
English poet, author of
Endymion, "The Eve of St. Agnes," and
other poems, who died of tuberculosis in Rome.
Andrew Lang (1844-1912)
Scottish man of letters, folklorist, and friend of Robert Louis Stevenson; he published
Myth, Ritual and Religion, 2 vols, (1887).
John Gibson Lockhart (1794-1854)
Editor of the
Quarterly Review (1825-1853); son-in-law of Walter
Scott and author of the
Life of Scott 5 vols (1838).
Henry Hart Milman (1791-1868)
Educated at Eton and Brasenose College, Oxford, he was a poet, historian and dean of St
Paul's (1849) who wrote for the
Quarterly Review.
John Milton (1608-1674)
English poet and controversialist; author of
Comus (1634),
Lycidas (1638),
Areopagitica (1644),
Paradise Lost (1667), and other works.
John Murray II (1778-1843)
The second John Murray began the
Quarterly Review in 1809 and
published works by Scott, Byron, Austen, Crabbe, and other literary notables.
Sir Francis Palgrave (1788-1861)
Barrister, medieval historian, and writer for the
Quarterly
Review; he was keeper of her majesty's records, 1838-61.
Alexander Pope (1688-1744)
English poet and satirist; author of
The Rape of the Lock (1714)
and
The Dunciad (1728).
Patrick Robertson [Peter] (1794-1855)
Scottish judge, poet, wit, and friend of John Wilson; familiarly known as “Peter,” in
1848 he was elected lord rector of Marischal College.
Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822)
English poet, with Byron in Switzerland in 1816; author of
Queen
Mab (1813),
The Revolt of Islam (1817),
The Cenci and
Prometheus Unbound (1820), and
Adonais (1821).
Robert Southey (1774-1843)
Poet laureate and man of letters whose contemporary reputation depended upon his prose
works, among them the
Life of Nelson, 2 vols (1813),
History of the Peninsular War, 3 vols (1823-32) and
The Doctor, 7 vols (1834-47).
John Sterling (1806-1844)
An ‘apostle’ at Cambridge, he conducted the
Athenaeum with F. D.
Maurice and contributed to
Blackwood's and the
London and Westminster Review.
Alfred Tennyson, first baron Tennyson (1809-1892)
English poet who succeeded William Wordsworth as Poet Laureate in 1850; he published
Poems, chiefly Lyrical (1830) and
Idylls of the
King (1859, 1869, 1872).
John Wilson [Christopher North] (1785-1854)
Scottish poet and Tory essayist, the chief writer for the “Noctes Ambrosianae” in
Blackwood's Magazine and professor of moral philosophy at Edinburgh
University (1820).
William Wordsworth (1770-1850)
With Coleridge, author of
Lyrical Ballads (1798), Wordsworth
survived his early unpopularity to succeed Robert Southey as poet laureate in 1843.
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine. (1817-1980). Begun as the
Edinburgh Monthly Magazine,
Blackwood's assumed the name of its proprietor, William Blackwood after the sixth
number. Blackwood was the nominal editor until 1834.
The Quarterly Review. (1809-1967). Published by John Murray, the
Quarterly was instigated by Walter
Scott as a Tory rival to the
Edinburgh Review. It was edited by
William Gifford to 1824, and by John Gibson Lockhart from 1826 to 1853.
The Times. (1785-). Founded by John Walter, The Times was edited by Thomas Barnes from 1817 to 1841. In the
romantic era it published much less literary material than its rival dailies, the
Morning Chronicle and the
Morning
Post.
