MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 201 |
THE fault of the new work, unavoidable under an editorship that
consisted in a negative, and not a positive, realization of the duty, was that it wanted an
identification with, or a reflection from some strong mind. The change of form, and the
name of Campbell, gave the work a valuable impetus,
and much changed the condition of that kind of periodical literature. It must of necessity
have furnished a striking contrast to the old magazines. It must have
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MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 203 |
Of this he had no notion, if some may think he had. He never attempted,
wisely never attempted, what everyone who knew him well, knew he had not the enduring
energy to sustain through half-a-dozen numbers. The poet all through avoided discussion,
however slight. I doubt too, whether, in composing his beautiful verses, he ever felt
pleasure after the period of youthful anticipation was past, and with it the enthusiastic
hope of that period of life. Regarding poetical composition as a labour, it cannot be
supposed he could ever have contemplated with aught but horror the heavy work of a
magazine, in which, to produce an impression for high purposes, he should become an
animating spirit. It was impossible he could follow up such an aim, or feel that enthusiasm
in the task which is essential to every man so placed to balance the drudgery. It
204 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 205 |
The poet removed his lodgings in town from Margaret Street to No. 30,
Foley Place, about the commencement of 1822, still keeping his house
206 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 207 |
Quoth the South to the North, “In your comfortless sky
Not a nightingale sings:”—“True,” the North made reply;
“But your nightingales’ warblings I envy you not,
|
“There is my impromptu, and you imagined I was not equal to
making one? “Now then the lines should be put upon paper,” I
rejoined, and he immediately wrote down the words with a title, “Impromptu by Thomas Campbell.” The original as thus written down I have
had in my possession from that hour, nor was there ever a copy made of it. I carried it
off, saying, “This is mine, which I shall keep as a curiosity, a memento of the
meeting.” It affords a pleasing evidence of that kindly feeling which
distinguished Campbell, although from his reserve it
was too seldom ascribed to him, or was only perceived in exercise upon isolated occasions.
With him the feeling was ever present, however latent, and appearing suddenly though not
habitually observable, was the more striking. With his charitable feelings it was the same
kind of impulsive action as in other cases. Thus of some picture of suffering related to
him he would form an exaggerated idea, fancy it greater than the reality, draw from
imagination
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Augustus William Schlegel visited England, and while
here received an invitation to dine at Colburn’s, in Conduit Street. A few friends were-invited to meet him.
Of the party, besides Campbell, were Felix Bodin, to whom Thiers owes so much of his good fortune; Edward
Blaquiere, who perished in an untimely manner at sea, and I forget who more.
Incidentally th subject led to verbal exclamations among the different nations of Europe.
In the course of these remarks, Schlegel observed how much the
language of England had received in the way of accession since the time of Queen Elizabeth, and that we continued to import new words
from all parts of the globe as we imported merchandise. There was no foretelling where it
would end. The English was now one of the most copious of modern languages. It was to be
feared it would soon be corrupted. Journalism, too often in the hands of men not adequate
by education to their duties, nor endowed with a single literary feeling, tended to
increase the mischief, from such individuals having no preference as to words, adopting in
the
MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 209 |
“Stay, my friend,” said Campbell, “hurrah is an old English exclamation.”
“Not so very old,” replied Schlegel.
“Oh, yes,” said several voices at once.
“It is not as old as Shakspeare’s time,” said Schlegel; “it is not as old as Elizabeth.”
Blaquiere, in his thoughtless way, said he was certain it was older. Campbell declared the same. Bodin was silent.
“Might it not mean originally a noise, a storm, and be from the French houragan?”
“We never borrowed the word from the cutthroat Cossacks,” said Campbell; “we have only
210 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
“Borrowed or not of the Cossacks,” rejoined Schlegel, “you will not find it in your old writers, neither in Shakspeare, nor in Shakspeare’s time. It must have been introduced since. I am better qualified than any one present to judge of such minutiæ in the poet. I know every word he has used. His translation into German cost me years of hard study.”
Some one remarked that the word “huzza” was in Shakspeare, and that “hurrah” was, perhaps, originally a provincial corruption of the word as old as Elizabeth.
“Huzza is not in Shakspeare either,” said Schlegel, with emphasis.
Campbell, rather stimulated by Schlegel’s positiveness, and without a wary consideration of the question, acting, too, as he always did, under the impulse of momentary bias rather than cool reflection, said to Schlegel:—
“My friend, you are wrong. I am quite clear the word is in Shakspeare. We never borrowed it of those Russians. We were never enough in their good company to steal it of them. Besides, I recollect the word in a number of old songs.”
“That may be,” replied Schlegel, with pertinacious confidence; “I do not believe the word
was
MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 211 |
“It cannot be so,” said Campbell, supported in his opinion by the rest of the company.
“You are all wrong,” rejoined Schlegel, with renewed confidence; “I am a foreigner, and much more likely to have noticed such niceties in the language than you are, who are fellow natives with the poet.”
Campbell still insisted upon his opinion being correct, others offered the never-failing resource of their countrymen in such dilemmas, to settle the question, right or wrong, by a bet. Schlegel took it up, offering to wager a breakfast at Brunet’s hotel, where he was staying, that he was correct, and his offer was accepted.
It is needless to say, this distinguished critic was right, and all the rest of the party wrong. Neither “hurrah” nor “huzza” occur in Shakspeare; tolerable evidence the words came in after the era of Elizabeth.
Schlegel was grievously disappointed upon this
journey to England, in the reception he met with on the part of the East India Company. His
object was to obtain its patronage towards the publication of some valuable Sanscrit
translations, very important as a key to Sanscrit literature, but
212 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
“He should return with an altered idea of the honourable directors.”
“But remember,” said Campbell, “this occurred forty or fifty years ago! They are wiser now!”
“Yes,” said one of the party, “because it is known the coins would now be worth more than the gold if put up for sale.”
Schlegel was a most instructive and entertaining
companion upon literary topics, of which the extent of his knowledge and his accuracy were
surprising, and yet he showed nothing of the
MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 213 |
Lord of fat E’sham or of Lincoln Fen. |
Campbell was puzzled during his editorship by an
anonymous contributor, who continued to send
papers for several years, the subjects being generally light and agreeably treated. The
first was entitled “Le Cavalier
Seul,” the second upon “Epicurism.” Remittances were sent to an
address on the Surrey side of the Thames, in the Borough. The incognito was maintained to
the last, and during the correspondence, the unknown went by the cognomen of “Our
friend over the water.” The hand-writing was clear, large, less
214 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
Many were the conjectures who “the friend over the water” could be. The part of Surrey so near the Thames gave in those days the idea of a cockney Bœotia. No signature was at first adopted to the articles, but after a time they were subscribed W. E. “Who can he be? some one in the King’s Bench, or the Rules, from the locality whence the articles come; perhaps an individual resident in Surrey or Kent, who gives a Borough address because he is far from town, merely out of convenience.” These queries of the curious were answered by observing that the party need not in that case conceal his name, nor require the remittances for his articles to be enclosed to another person. At length it was assumed, through a suspicious incident, that these last were the production of a learned, ingenious, liberal-minded scholar and gentleman, whose seat in Buckinghamshire, connected with a name revered in history, was that from whence the “distant spires and antique towers” of Eton were once so exciting to the genius of Gray.*
* It is not less extraordinary than true, that the papers here alluded to were written by a lady, who still kept her incognito, but related the circumstance, years afterwards, by letter to the present writer. |
MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 215 |
It was singular, that during ten years the magazine was under Campbell’s editorship, the universities never supplied, from the great numbers that must have lived within their precincts, one single contributor worthy of notice; a proof that the study of two dead languages, and hearing a few college lectures, did little for a writer until he had mingled with the world and studied men as well as books.
There was a clergyman in Devonshire, who contributed some very superior poetry to the early numbers. Few and far between, as all literary persons in town well know, are contributions of the slightest value received from the country. The poetry alluded to was beautiful; the writer was the Rev. Mr. Johns. One day that I had gone to take coffee with Campbell, Mrs. Campbell put into my hand a letter which her husband had that day received, and bade her keep for me, as it belonged to our joint labours. Handing it over, she remarked what a neat hand it was, and that it was poetry. “Read the verses,” said Campbell, “let us hear what they are about.” I read on until a stanza occurred, in which, after the allusion to a storm, the returned tranquillity of the ocean was beautifully described.
“Beautiful,” said the poet, “beautiful,
indeed! Read it again—that is poetry!” He would
hear
216 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
Ah though it ne’er had man beguiled, Or never would beguile him more. |
The stanzas were called “The Maid of Orkney.” Campbell was
in general reserved in his opinions, and sparing in his praises in such cases, even when
approving. Thus, of Byron’s poetry he said,
“It is great—great—it makes him truly great; he has not so much
greatness in himself.” It struck me at the time, that the two lines bear a
MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 217 |
Thus making allusion to poetry, Sotheby, in his translation of the “Danaæ of Simonides,” gave the work the best
translation of this beautiful fragment ever made into English. Among the poetry, too, were
Campbell’s own charming “Lines to the Rainbow,” which rank
among his best things, as his attempt at humour in the “Friars of Dijon” must rank as one of his worst.
It was in vain he attempted light or humorous articles, and not the less singular that the
manner of his telling a light story was so good. A letter, entitled “Reflections on a Plum Pudding,”
published anonymously, was Campbell’s own, another proof of his
want of talent for that kind of literature. There was no point in the article, unless it
lay in the joke that a cat of praiseworthy “humour” was
called “laudable pus,” borrowing a term from the
surgery. “The Lover to his
Mistress,” the “Maid’s
Remonstrance,” “Roland,” and “Absence,” were not up to par. In the “Lines of
the Lover,” there occurs the pleasing simile of the “waves of time
washing away the impressions of memory.” The opera in which the “Maid’s Re-
218 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 219 |
The first year of the publication being completed, Campbell seemed at a loss what he should say to the public
in a preface. He began by an indirect excuse for the avoidance of a stronger expression of
political opinion in the work, evidently from the apprehension that the friends of the
political party to which he belonged required something of the kind to account for the
omission. It happened opportunely that Mr. Everitt,
of the United States of America, had made some remarks upon an article inserted in the
second number of the magazine, “On
the complaints in America against the British Press,” written by Mr. W. H. Curran. This supplied matter for the larger
part. The poet had no idea of looking over the published numbers for the preceding
twelvemonth, summing up at the year’s end the merits and deficiencies of the past, as
it would have occurred to one accustomed to similar publications to do, promising
improvements in future, and palliating faults. He made the preface an answer to
Everitt, and stated that “he inserted the article without
reflection.” This he did as the shortest mode of getting rid of the matter,
dreading far more than the inference that would be
220 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 221 |
The case of the unfortunate Queen
Caroline happened about the time of the commencement
222 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
During the next year of the poet’s editorship fresh contributions
from new writers filled its
MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 223 |
224 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
* With a letter in February, 1857, ended a friendly intercourse of thirty-four years between W. H. Curran and the present writer. In the character of the writing there was that unsteadiness which marks debility. A few months more, and he ceased to exist. He inherited, not the wit, but many more than the virtues of his eloquent and celebrated father, and lived and died more honoured by the good. His talents were of the highest order, and his disposition peculiarly amiable. Between 1820 and 1830, on a fine day, we used sometimes to walk to Chalk Farm, then a good house of entertainment, and take a steak and glass of wine, and much of the conversation on those occasions is still fresh in the writer’s memory. In his last communication he stated how well he remembered them. |
MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 225 |
The song, beginning,
“Men of England who inherit Rights that cost your sires their blood!” |
226 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
“Have you had no note from me putting off the verses until to-morrow?”
“None.”
“I have written you; but no matter. How did you arrive so late?”
I explained every thing, and expressed a hope that my delay had insured the perfect completion of the verses.
“They are not quite completed,” said Campbell, “I am finishing the last stanza; but the dinner is ready, I will complete them afterwards.”
“No, no, before dinner, if you please.”
“My good friend, the dinner is ready.”
“Then I won’t eat a particle until I have the verses—that is positive.”
“You do not mean it?
“I do indeed; I fear we shall be late as it is.”
Away walked Campbell to his study,
and in less
MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 227 |
“Now,” said he, “I will read them.”
He read them accordingly with effect, and then gave them to me. When I had them in my pocket we sat down to dinner.
We chatted over the wine until the moon was high in the heaven, talking of Sydenham, the occasional social meeting of choice spirits there, the freaks of Hook, and the good sayings of the “Authors of the Rejected Addresses.” There was no conveyance back to town. Campbell wished me to remain the night, but I declined his invitation, set off late, and walked on towards the reservoir nearly in front of his house. Supposing I did not see it, he called out to me from his door to take care of my footsteps. It was the last time I ever heard the poet’s voice from the residence which to himself had been the source of so many pleasing recollections. I walked to town, and arrived on a brilliant summer morning, in the solitude of the metropolitan streets, with the verses safe in my possession.
228 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
On arriving I found the following note at my house, evidently written to gain another day:
“To-morrow you shall have the verses, some ten stanzas of four lines.”
The song comprised seven stanzas of four lines. I am persuaded that the poet had worked hard to finish them to his own mind in the time. He did not always change his language for the better. Thus in the lines now referred to, he wrote, and the fourth stanza was printed as follows, from the copy at Sydenham:
“What are monuments of bravery
Where no public virtue blooms?
What avail in lands of slavery,
Trophied temples, arches, tombs?”
|
This stanza he altered in his collected poems thus:
“What are monuments of bravery
Where no public virtues bloom?
What avail in lands of slavery,
Trophied temples, arch and tomb?”
|
Had “temples” been singular in place of plural the reading
might have been better for the sake of having “public virtue” plural, but it is
hard to discover the difference between “no public virtue,” that is, “no
one public virtue,” and “no public virtues,” while the last line gives
the
MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 229 |
In his fine stanzas to Kemble he altered the line
“That where supernal light is given,” |
“That when supernal light is given,” |
In the “Lines on receiving a seal with the Campbell crest from K. M. before her Marriage,” the three first stanzas were printed,
“This wax returns not back more fair
An image of the gift you send,
Than graved in memory’s thoughts I bear
Your well-defined worth, my friend.
|
“We are not friends of yesterday,
I think you know me not a little,
But poets’ hearts are apt, they say,
To be impressible and brittle.
|
“Well, should fair faith my heart condemn
To lose your virtues’ fair impress,
Your type is still the sealing gem,
And mine the waxen brittleness.”
|
This was altered as follows:
230 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
“The wax returns not back more fair
The impression of the gift you send,
Than stamp’d upon my thoughts I bear
The image of your worth my friend.
|
“We are not friends of yesterday,
But poets’ fancies are a little
Disposed to heat and cool (they say),
By turns impressible and brittle.
|
“Well, should its frailty e’er condemn
My heart to prize or please you less,
Your type is still the leading gem,
And mine the waxen brittleness.”
|
In regard to the lines in the eighth stanza, in which the name “Maccallin More” had been written, Campbell, being absent from town, asked me to revise the proof during his absence, which I told him I would do. It was remarkable, as showing upon what he was doubtful, and how little attention he paid to some points, as when he made tropical productions grow on the shores of the Susquehanna in his “Gertrude.” He left the proof, and a note, which closed as follows:
“I am not sure about the orthography of ‘Maccallin More,’ but, by looking at Scott’s ballad, called ‘Lord Roland,’ it will be found, I dare say, exactly spelt. My own idea is, that it should be ‘Maccallin’—I don’t know!”
MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 231 |
I found he was in error, and that the proper way of spelling the name was as it now stands in his works, “Macaillan Mor,” and so I caused it to be printed.
His opinion of Scott was, as with
everybody besides, high indeed, although they differed greatly in politics. It was singular
that both should have been, as much perhaps by hereditary feelings as natural inclination,
politically opposed to each other. Scott was said to have imbibed his
Jacobitish tendencies from having spent some time in his boyhood with the
Stewarts of Appin, of whom his father was the confidential friend.
The Campbells were, on the other hand, knit to the
Argyle standard in political opinion, and opposed to the
Jacobites, or the section of the Tories that were devoted to the
Stuarts, so denominated in opposition to the “revolution
Tories,” who supported William III. Those who are
most gifted with talent are not always above the predilections of early life, and both
Scott and Campbell were
thus influenced. Sensible of this, and of his own predisposition,
Campbell never expressed towards Scott any
feeling but that of kindness and admiration, except upon one occasion, at a time when both
were in the full flush of public regard. This feeling on the part of
Campbell might have been fully justifiable by the treatment
232 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
MEMOIRS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL. | 233 |
At these things the poet expressed his regret. Afterwards, when he heard that the king had shown peculiar attention to the Duke of Argyle, and that Scott was then observed to take marked notice of the duke also, and that it had been altogether a subject of notice in Scotland, he again spoke of the pity it was that Scott should have shown such a feeling. “Let Scott have a political bias,” said Campbell, “we all have it; but why carry the enmity towards a whole race? If an old Duke of Argyle were opposed to the Jacobites, why retort the feeling upon the present generation? When the Stuarts are extinct, why should their friends, on the strength of tradition, be inimical to the descendants of their opponents, who are guiltless of treason against those whose memory is only honoured upon the faith of others. Scotland owed a debt of gratitude to the Argyle family, and to the Covenanters too, worth all the Stuarts, for the freedom they were the means of working out by their uncompromising resistance to tyranny. However, Scott is too good and great a man to differ with on such a topic. History tells the truth, and every day that passes, proclaims, through the progress of knowledge, that the cause of the Stuarts gets weaker, and their name more detestable as we advance in political freedom.”
234 | LITERARY REMINISCENCES AND |
It was remarked to him that Scott called the chief of the Campbells “McCullum More,” in place of “Mac Macaillan Mor,” or “the son of Malcolm,” in the place of “the son of Colin,” which was not accidental. In “Waverley” the name was used correctly, as well as in the “Lady of the Lake.” “No matter, let Scott call us what he likes,” said Campbell, “only let him not paint historical facts partially; but, in exchange for the pleasure his wonderful imagination gives to the world, let him not visit the sins of the fathers upon the children.”
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