The Second Part of ‘Italy’—Rogers makes a Bonfire of both Parts. The Illustrated ‘Italy’—Cost of the Engravings—The Artists and Engravers—The Outlay and Return—The Illustrated Poems—Turner and Stothard’s Remuneration—The Balance-sheet—Letter from Wordsworth—Wordsworth, Moore, Scott, and Rogers at Hampton—Fenimore Cooper—Catherine Fanshawe—Uvedale Price—A Political Letter of Rogers’s—Death of Daniel Rogers—Lamb’s Sonnet—Samuel Rogers to his Sister-in-law—The Poet Crowe—Rogers and T. Moore—Rogers and Sir P. Francis—R. B. Haydon’s Appeal—Letters from Wordsworth—From W. Stewart Rose—Washington Irving—Samuel Rogers to his Sister in Paris—Lord St. Helens, Lord Ashburnham, Charles Lamb, Wordsworth, William Roscoe, Lord Dudley, Lord Holland and Sir Walter Scott.
The Second Part of Rogers’s ‘Italy’ was published in 1828. He had not put his name to the First Part,
which had been issued in 1822, but there had been no concealment of the authorship of the
poem. He had spoken of it to his friends, and in letters from them, which I have already
given, it is often referred to as his. When the Second Part was published he put his name
to it, and the whole poem was at once publicly recognised as
2 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
This task occupied him for the next two years. He had published
illustrations in many of the editions of his earlier poems, and he determined to issue an
illustrated edition of ‘Italy.’ The whole
poem was revised, en-
THE ILLUSTRATED ’ITALY’ | 3 |
When on her knees she fell Entering the solemn place of consecration,— |
4 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
The reception which was given to this magnificent book encouraged Rogers to bring out an edition of his poems corresponding with it. This volume not only
reproduced the artistic success of ‘Italy,’ but improved upon it. There were thirty-five drawings of
Stothard’s, thirty-three by Turner, and one by Flaxman. To these sixty-nine, were added an engraving by Daniel
Allen of a
THE ILLUSTRATED ’POEMS’ | 5 |
The adventurous boy, that asks his little share, And hies from home with many a gossip’s prayer, Turns on the neighbouring hill once more to see The dear abode of peace and privacy.— |
6 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
The prices paid for the engravings were a little less in the second volume than in the first. Goodall had thirty guineas for the view of Grantham Church, which illustrates ‘The Wake,’ as well as for ‘Greenwich Hospital,’ for ‘Vallombrosa,’ and for ‘Columbus discovering Land.’ He had twenty-five guineas each for ‘The Gipsy,’ ‘The Village Green,’ the ‘Boy at the Stile,’ and
1 In some manuscript notes by the Rev. Alexander Dyce to his copy of Rogers’s Italy, now in the library of South Kensington Museum, he says that Rogers told him: ‘I paid Turner 5l. for each of the illustrations to my two volumes, with the stipulation that the drawings should be returned to him, after they had been engraved; and the truth is, they were of little value as drawings. The engravers understand Turner perfectly, and make out his slight sketches: besides, they always submit to him the plates, which he touches and retouches, till the most beautiful effect is produced. The mere engraving of each vignette (taking one with another) cost 40l.; the whole expense of the two volumes was 15,000l.’ ‘This vignette [“The Fountain,” p. 175], by Stothard, was done from my description of what I actually saw—an Italian girl giving her little brother water to drink in the palms of her joined hands.’ ‘I never had any difficulty with Stothard and Turner about the drawings for my works. They always readily assented to whatever alterations I proposed; and sometimes I even put a figure by Stothard into one of Turner’s landscapes. The two figures in the foreground of vignette p. 151 are Stothard’s; the standing figure in vignette p. 248 is also Stothard’s.’ |
COST OF THE ENGRAVINGS | 7 |
1 ‘Apart from these adventitious charms,’ says Professor Minto in his excellent article on Rogers in the Encyclopædia Britannica, ‘Italy |
8 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
The publication of the Second Part of ‘Italy,’ which was the immediate occasion of the issue of this adorned edition of his works, brought the productive period of Rogers’s life to its close. Fifty years passed between the time at which he was writing his first essay as ‘The Scribbler’1 for ‘The Gentleman’s Magazine,’ and that at which the success of the illustrated ‘Italy’ encouraged him to undertake the illustration of his poems. He was seventy before that edition was completed, and after its issue he wrote only the address to Lord Grey. There is, indeed, in his poems as now published, another poem, entitled ‘Written in 1834,’but in the first illustrated edition the same poem, only seventeen lines long, is headed ‘Written in 1815.’ It was, in fact, written after the battle of Waterloo, and then, in 1834, rewritten so as to bring in the greater triumph of the abolition of slavery. These pieces and the lines to Lord Grenville, headed ‘Written at Dropmore, July, 1831,’ were nearly all that he produced after ‘Italy’ was published. He did much in the way of revision, but no more original work. The short poem on Strathfieldsaye was probably written on his visit to the Duke of Wellington in 1827, and the lines entitled ‘Reflections’ had been written for ‘Italy,’ but not used in that poem. Many of the notes at the
has much greater general interest than any other of Rogers’s poems, and is likely to be read for long, if only as a traveller’s companion. The style is studiously simple; the blank verse has quite an Elizabethan flavour, and abounds in happy lines; the reflexions have a keen point, and the incidental stories are told with admirable brevity and effect. Passages of prose are interspersed, wrought with the same care as the verses, and the notes are models of interesting detail concisely put.’ 1 The Early Life of Samuel Rogers, p. 53. |
WORDSWORTH | 9 |
The Second Part of ‘Italy’ was sent to Wordsworth in sheets, as the proofs came in, but no record remains of his criticisms or other observations, if any were made. He was in London with his daughter Dora in May, 1828, on a visit to Mr. Quillinan, who had been his neighbour at Rydal, of whose younger daughter Wordsworth was godfather, and for whose deceased wife he had written an epitaph. On setting out for London he wrote to Rogers a letter which further illustrates the relations between them.
‘My dear R.,—To-night I set off for Cambridge, passing by Coleorton, where I shall stay a couple of days with the Rector. My son accompanies me; being about to undertake a Curacy in a Parish adjoining that of Coleorton, near Grace Dieu, the birth-place of Beaumont the dramatist. At Cambridge I purpose to stay till the 10th or 11th of May, and then for a short, very short, visit to London, where I shall be sadly disappointed if I do not meet you. My main object is to look out for some situation, mercantile if it could be found, for my younger son. If you can serve me, pray do.
‘I have troubled you with this note to beg you would
send any further sheets of your poem, up to the 8th or so of next month, to me at Trinity Lodge,
Cambridge. Farewell. My wife and
daughter are, I trust, already at
Cambridge. My sister begs her kindest
regards. Miss
10 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
This visit of Wordsworth’s to
London was opportune. Scott was then in town, and about
the time Wordsworth was writing this letter was dining at Rogers’s, with all his own family, and Sharp, Lord John
Russell, and Jekyll. ‘The
conversation,’ says Scott in his Diary, ‘nagged as
usual, and jokes were fired like minute guns, producing an effect not much less
melancholy.’ On May 25 he puts on record a short account of one of those
great conjunctions of which Rogers’s life was fuller than that
of any other man. Imagine a day at Hampton Court with Scott,
Wordsworth, Tom Moore, and
Sam Rogers! Scott writes on May 25, 1828:
‘After a morning of letter-writing, leave-taking, papers destroying, and God knows
what trumpery, Sophia and I set out for Hampton
Court, carrying with us the following lions and lionesses: Samuel
Rogers, Tom Moore, Wordsworth,
with wife and daughter. We were very kindly and properly received by Walter and his wife, and had a very pleasant day. At
parting, Rogers gave me a gold-mounted pair of glasses, which I will
not part with in a hurry. I really like S. R., and have always found him most
friendly.’ This account of Scott’s differs curiously from
that which Moore gives in his Diary. He tells us that
Scott called for him at Rogers’s, and
the three went down together, finding the Wordsworths when they got to
Hampton. On the way down they talked of ghosts, and Rogers told
WORDSWORTH | 11 |
On the first of June the Wordsworths and Luttrell were breakfasting at Rogers’s and Moore met them. Wordsworth produced an album, and Rogers, Moore, and Luttrell wrote in it. On leaving London Wordsworth went with Coleridge for a Continental tour, taking his daughter with him. In August he returned.
‘My dear Rogers,—A note will suffice to tell you that here we are after a long and pleasant ramble upon the Rhine and through Holland and the Netherlands. On Tuesday I hope to be in London; shall drive to my old quarters in Bryanston Street, intending to stay not more than three days. Should be happy to meet you again.
‘Farewell, with kind regards from my daughter, who is [in] the room where I write,
During Wordsworth’s visit to
London in the spring, Cooper, the American novelist,
was there, and, of course, was to be seen at Rogers’s. Moore records a
breakfast at Rogers’s on the 22nd of May at which Sydney Smith came in, and told some stories of
Cooper’s touchiness. Moore
12 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘My dear Sir,—So long a time has elapsed since we
parted, that I am almost afraid to write you, though the object of my letter is
a tardy but sincere expression of the grateful recollection of all your
kindnesses when in London. I did write to you with the same in tent from
Florence early in 1829, but some circumstances have led me to infer that by an
oversight the letter was never
JAMES FENIMORE COOPER | 13 |
‘From London, as you may remember, possibly, we went to Holland, and, after a short delay in Paris, to Switzerland, where we passed the summer. In the autumn we crossed the Alps. Our stay in Italy extended to near two years, and we left it by the Tyrol for Germany. After the late revolution we came back here for the purpose of giving our girls, of whom there are four, the advantages of the masters. I regret to say that my nephew, whom you may remember, a tall stripling, and who grew into a handsome man, died of consumption in September last. Little Paul often speaks of the Pare St. Jacques, and Monsieur Rogers, and of an old woman who sold fresh milk in your neighbourhood. I do not know that you ought to be much flattered by the association, but you will at least admit that it is natural.
‘I continue, as George
III. said to Johnson, to
“scribble, scribble, scribble,” though with something less of
advantage to mankind than was the case with the great moralist. In one sense,
however, I am quite his equal, for I do as well as I can. Since I saw you I
have published three tales, and am now hard at work at a fourth. The last was on a subject connected
with Italy,
14 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘I heard through Mr.
Wilkes that the picture which I wished you to accept as a feeble
testimony of my recollection of your kindness was sent, and I hope it was not a
bad specimen of the artist’s talent, which I take to be of a very high
order. I hear he is doing wonders, and that he is attracting notice in Italy.
He is studying the figure, they tell me, with signal success. I picked up a
little picture the other day in the open streets that is generally much
esteemed. It is a female portrait of the time of Louis
XIV., of the Flemish school, we think, and certainly an original
from the hand of some eminent painter. I do not remember a dozen better
portraits, though it is something the worse for exposure and time.
JAMES FENIMORE COOPER | 15 |
‘Wonderful changes have occurred since I had the
pleasure of seeing you, but I think greater still are in store. Is not the
tendency of the present spirit obvious? and ought not your aristocracy to throw
themselves into the stream and go with the current, rather than hope to stem a
torrent that in its nature is irresistible? If your system of Government has
had its advantages in its pliable character (and it certainly has avoided many
great dangers by quietly assuming new shades of policy), it has also one great
and menacing disadvantage, that I do not see how it can resist. The
contradiction between theory and practice has left your controlling power
exposed to the unwearied and all-powerful attacks of the press, for though
treason can [not] be written against the king the aristocracy has no such
protection. The idea of defending any limited body by the press against the
assaults of the press seems a desperate experiment, for, right or wrong, there
is but one means of keeping physical force and political power asunder, and
that is the remedy of ignorance. To me at this distance it seems an inevitable
consequence of your actual social condition that both
16 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘It is curious to note the effect of the present
condition of England. When the prerogative was in the ascendant, Charles made six Dukes of his illegitimate sons
(Monmouth included), and George IV. scarce dared his progeny. Even the
first of the Hanoverian princes presumed
to make a Duchess of his mistress,
FRENCH POLITICS IN 1831 | 17 |
‘Here we have just got out of the provisoire. The furor of moderation is likely
enough, I think, to put us all back again. There is an unfortunate and material
distinction between the interests of those who rule and those who are ruled to
come in aid of the floundering measures of the ministry. The intentions of the
“juste milieu”
are obviously to make the revolution a mere change of dynasties, while the
people have believed in a change of principles. Could the different sections of
the Opposition unite, the present state of things would not endure a month.
Neither the National Guard nor the Army is any security against a great
movement, for they are more likely to go against the Government than with it.
There have been some very serious steps taken in the courts here of late which
look grave. The judges have exercised a right of sentencing prisoners that a
jury had acquitted. There is probably some show of law for the measure, but it
is a very grave and hazardous course. On the whole, I am of opinion that
King Louis Philippe’s
18 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘But I am boring you with politics, when apology for writing at all is the most material matter. Mrs. Cooper desires to be remembered to Miss Rogers and yourself, and I beg also to be mentioned to your sister. I should like exceedingly, did you not think it encroaching on your good nature, to be mentioned to Dr. and Mrs. Somerville.
‘I can tell you nothing of Parisian society, not having dined or passed an evening out of my own house in five months. Nobody comes to see me, and I go to see nobody, or next to nobody. I have a pleasant and happy fireside of my own, and am quite content. I should be very glad to see you among us. There was a report some time since that you were about to visit Paris, and I had hopes of meeting you here. Perhaps you did come, and I was ignorant of your presence, for I am so much out of the world that it might very well happen. Should you not have been, and should you in truth come, I trust you will take the trouble to send a card with your address to me, and I add my street and number not to miss the occasion of seeing you.
Going back to 1828, there are a couple of letters worth
preserving—one from Uvedale Price, who in this
year was made a baronet, and the other from Miss
Fanshawe, ‘a woman of rare wit and genius, in whose society
Scott
MISS FANSHAWE | 19 |
‘Twas whispered in heaven, ‘twas muttered in hell, And echo caught lightly the sound as it fell. |
‘Dear Mr.
Rogers,—This is a P.P.C. card, for we are purposing in less
than three weeks to traverse a little sea and much dry land (if any land be dry
in such a season) and pass the coming winter at Nice. Last winter my dear invalid used to wish herself there per wishing cap, but I call for your congratulations on
her now being sufficiently recovered to intend working her way thither by steam
and coach, and your very good wishes I depend on receiving for those I hereby
send you, together with the hope that we may all have a happy meeting next
spring in London. I have a confused recollection of your having had some
thoughts of visiting Switzerland in the course of the summer. In that case I
hope that my adieux will not follow you, for they are certainly not worth 1s. 11d., though acting as cover
to the impertinence of talking over with you, in the only way left me, your
“Italy,” Part
the Second. Really, it would
20 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘When Raphael and his
school to Florence came, Filling the land with splendour. |
MISS FANSHAWE ON ’ITALY’ | 21 |
‘I forget which poem this is in, but ’tis no solitary instance. That volume, consisting chiefly of narrative pieces and in a lower key of sentiment, I much wished had been written in prose, or interspersed with some, and now my wish is gratified. You know not your own strength in prose. It is almost an exploded art; its perfection lies in the simplicity and conciseness for which you stand unrivalled. Without the affectation of either, there is not to be found a superfluous word or sentence. All who know how to read can understand you, and all who examine style must feel the real elegance of yours. I am sure you have a virtuous horror of the slang and jargon that are now thrusting honest old English off the stage. Such overcharged epithets, such perpetual allusion to arts, sciences, and manufactures! Then, one is so palled with quotations from Shakespeare that one wishes for sumptuary laws to restrain the use of him. Some law you will desire to restrain my sputtering, but what cross fit would not be cured by your chapter on “Foreign Travel”? It is quite delicious, as Mrs. Weddell would say, and specially palatable to us vagabonds. “National Prejudices,” exactly my own thoughts on the subject, which I thank you for clothing with your own language. How this little book is liked by the world I have no means of knowing, but to one small individual it has given unmingled pleasure from the union of so much goodness and benevolence with so much talent.
‘Dover is a charming place, especially, as Gray says of Cambridge, when there is nobody in
it. Next to very good society is the comfort of no society at all, or very very
little, which is happily our case. Living close to
22 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘It is high time to bring this bavardage to a conclusion, so, with kind regards to Miss Rogers, I beg you to believe me,
The letter from Sir Uvedale Price is the last. He was in his eighty-first year, and had been a frequent visitor to Rogers, who had sometimes found him a bore. He often outstayed his welcome, and Rogers had on one occasion to get rid of him by a manoeuvre. He was a very interesting person, as his letters show. He had gone with Fox to see Voltaire at Ferney, and described the interview in a letter to Rogers, which Lord Holland borrowed and never returned. He published, in 1827, an ‘Essay on the Modern Pronunciation of the Greek and Latin Languages,’ in which he anticipates some modern changes, as he had in his essays on the Picturesque led to the reform of landscape gardening.
SIR UVEDALE PRICE’S LAST LETTER | 23 |
‘Dear Rogers,—Of all dilatory correspondents you certainly are the
most so; and if you were also the dullest, the two qualities would be well
suited to each other: as that is not exactly the case, you are the most
tantalising. Here was I week after week in constant hope and expectation; a
month passed, and then another fortnight, and at last the letter did come
within the two months. I well know how constantly your time is occupied at home
with a succession of visitors of every description, with all sorts of talents,
whom you have the enviable art of collecting about you; and I allow a great
deal for it: but I sometimes think you indulge yourself in delay, as it gives
you an opportunity of making a number of the lightest, best turned excuses
possible, and so prettily diversified, that your correspondent, though he may
not give full credit to them all, is so amused that he cannot be angry; other
parts of your letter, where my friends and acquaintance pass in review before
me, are well calculated to disarm anger; but there is one small part which, if
you perform what it seems to promise, will make ample compensation for your sin
of delay, were it ten times as great; and if you are dying to see my new walk,
I am dying to have you here and to show it you with other novelties. This new
walk, you must know, Lady Sarah took a
fancy to; it was made for her, and if you come, who knows whether she may not
show it you herself? Come therefore, even for the chance, if you have a spark
of gallantry about you;
24 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘I will not say “Nil mihi rescribas,” for I delight in your letters, and you are a man to take me at my word; but I do most strongly and earnestly say “ipse veni.”
THE GREAT MEASURE OF 1829 | 25 |
This quaint octogenarian died at Foxley in September, 1829. That year had already brought Rogers a far greater loss in his eldest brother Daniel Rogers. There is a letter written to this brother in February, 1829, in which, after speaking of some domestic matters then of painful interest in the family, Rogers says—
‘The great measure1 is doing very well, though not so well as could be wished. I asked a minister the other night why they did not get a bishop to speak for them. He said, none will—and I believe the best thing expected from them is their absence (Norwich always excepted). Ireland is said to promise them a bishop or two and two archbishops. Whether the majority will be twenty or sixty is very doubtful. The commanding majority in the Commons must however tell in the other House. The Whigs are resolved to give all the support they can, though some, and Lord Holland most of all, make very wry faces at the bill they are first to swallow.2 Plunket is come, and will speak, of course. How lucky it is, now that he is in the House when he is most wanted. His peerage was lamented six months ago—but we are poor, short-sighted beings. He and the Chancellor are to dine with me in a day or two, and that reminds me of Tom. I hope he is now doing comfortably again. My new edition is only an old one newly advertised. The last was in 1826.
‘Poor Crowe is dead—at the same age as my aunt Anne. I had a very natural and affecting letter from his
1 The Catholic Relief Bill. 2 The Bill for the Dissolution of the Catholic Association. |
26 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
A month after this letter was written Daniel Rogers died. He was two and a half years older than Sam, and had spent his life in quiet retirement as a country squire at Wassail Grove, near Hagley. I have already given his nephew Samuel Sharpe’s account of him,1 of his ‘delightful guileless simplicity,’ and of the enthusiasm with which he spoke of any of the studies which occupied his mind. The most perfect confidence existed between the three brothers, Daniel, Samuel and Henry; and Charles Lamb, who had met them together at St. James’s Place and at Highbury, spoke of them as a three-fold cord. Daniel was in his sixty-ninth year, and as Samuel Rogers himself was beginning to feel the approaches of age, he naturally felt deeply his brother’s loss. Two letters on the subject speak for themselves.
‘My dear Sir,—I have but lately learned, by letter from Mr. Moxon, the death of your brother. For the little I had seen of him, I greatly respected him. I do not even know how recent your loss may have been, and hope that I do not unseasonably present you with a few lines suggested to me this morning by the thought of
1 The Early Life of Samuel Rogers, pp. 80, 81. |
CHARLES LAMB ON DANIEL ROGERS | 27 |
‘Rogers, of
all the men that I have known
But slightly, who have died, your brother’s loss
Touched me most sensibly. There came across
My mind an image of the cordial tone
Of your fraternal meetings, where a guest
I more than once have sate; and grieve to think,
That of that threefold cord one precious link
By Death’s rude hand is sever’d from the rest.
Of our old gentry he appeared a stem;
A magistrate who, while the evil-doer
He kept in terror, could respect the poor,
And not for every trifle harass them—
As some, divine and laic, too oft do.
This man’s a private loss and public too.’
|
‘Many thanks for your kind letter and for all your kindness ever since the happy days when we had no care and a long and a bright prospect before us; when we went to the toy-shop together and played at hide-and-seek in the hay-loft at Newington Green.1 Much have we had since to be thankful for, as much, perhaps, as most people, for all must have their afflictions. But they have come fast and thick upon us of late; and yours have been the heaviest of all. That you may continue to support yourself as you have done is our earnest prayer, and if the attentions of affectionate children and the recollection
1 They were cousins. |
28 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
THE POET CROWE | 29 |
Crowe, to whose death Rogers referred in the last letter to his brother Daniel, is a true but neglected poet. He was one of the poor scholars at Winchester, whom his school sent to Oxford, where he became a Fellow of New College, and afterwards Professor of Poetry, and Public Orator, with the living of Alton Barnes, near Pewsey, in Wiltshire. His chief poem, ‘Lewesdon Hill,’ published in 1786, contains many passages which Rogers greatly admired and often repeated to his friends. One of these favourites was the conclusion of ‘Lewesdon Hill,’ where the poet, who has been contemplating the beauties of nature, is recalled to earth by seeing the villagers ‘assembling jocund in their best attire’ for the May-day feast—
Now I descend
To join the worldly crowd; perchance to talk,
To think, to act as they; then all these thoughts
That lift the expanded heart above this spot
To heavenly musing; these shall pass away
(Even as this goodly prospect from my view),
|
30 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
Hidden by near and earthy-rooted cares.
So passeth human life—our better mind
Is as a Sunday’s garment, then put on,
When we have naught to do; but at our work
We wear a worse for thrift. Of this enough,
To-morrow for severer thought, but now
To breakfast, and keep festival to-day.
|
Crowe’s blank verse is always musical and Rogers took it as a model. In preparing for his ‘Italy’ he kept by him for constant study Milton and Crowe. Like other contemporary poets, Crowe not only found a welcome at St. James’s Place, but ready aid and counsel in his transactions with publishers. He had an eye to business. Writing to Rogers in February, 1827, to ask him to negotiate with Murray for the issue of a new edition of his poems, in which he wished to include a treatise on English versification, Crowe says, ‘If he is willing to undertake the publishing I will immediately furnish more particulars, and also submit the copy to your inspection. If the part on versification could be out before the middle of April it would find a present sale in Oxford, for this reason: there are above four-score young poets who start every year for the English prize, and as I am one of the five judges to decide it, they would (many of them) buy a copy to know my doctrine on the subject. The compositions are delivered in about the beginning of May.’ Rogers conducted the negotiation with promptitude, and in a few days Crowe wrote a letter of thanks. He died in February, 1829.
For the next two or three years Rogers’s life may again be followed in Moore’s Diary. There are nearly a
ROGERS AND HIS PUBLISHER | 31 |
In this year, 1829, Moore had to be
a good deal in London. In February he was at Rogers’s looking over Lord
Byron’s letters; in May dining with him at Lord John Russell’s—‘table too full;’ and on
another day finding him ‘in a most amusing state of causticity.’
Moore made a remark about the Duke of
Wellington’s good
32 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
Here we eat, and drink, and dine, Equinoctial—keep the line. |
1 The Catholic Emancipation Bill had been carried in the Commons on the 30th of March, in the Lords on the 10th of April, and had received the Royal Assent on the 13th of April. |
LADY HOLLAND AND SIR PHILIP FRANCIS | 33 |
34 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
Rogers’s health this summer was precarious. He says in a letter to his sister Sarah, ‘I am good for little and catch cold every moment.’ But he was fully occupied with the illustrated ‘Italy,’ which was passing through the press. His memoranda of the deliveries of proofs and copies show that every part of the productive process was superintended by him with the minutest and most diligent care. A Continental journey undertaken with his sister Sarah and his niece Patty was cut short by bad health and bad weather, and when he got home he had rather a severe illness. But his attention was fully occupied, and even the interest of the political struggle was superseded by his great literary and artistic enterprise. Moore flitted occasionally through Rogers’s circle at this period as at most others, but he records little of any interest, except that on one occasion Mrs. Norton is mentioned as ‘at war all dinner time, and most amusingly, with Rogers.’
I find in Rogers’s papers a pathetic letter which suggests a painful event then far in the future.
‘Oh, Mr. Rogers, my family are absolutely in danger of wanting food. I have paid 700l. since 1827, and this does not satisfy my creditors. Do I not deserve employment and aid?
‘For God’s sake help me, and I will paint an
equivalent as soon as I begin, for any aid given me now at such
WORDSWORTH | 35 |
‘Yours faithfully, &c.,’ is added below the signature. There was some correspondence with Wordsworth this summer, of which three letters remain.
‘My dear Rogers,—I have this morning heard from Moxon, who, in communicating his new project, speaks in grateful terms of your kindness. Having written to him, I cannot forbear inquiring of you how you are and what is become of your “Italy.” My daughter (who, alas, is very poorly, recovering from a bilious fever which seized her a fortnight ago) tells me that she is longing to see the work—and that it would do more for her recovery than half the medicines she is obliged to take. It is long since we exchanged letters. I am in your debt, for I had a short note from you enclosing Lamb’s pleasing poem upon your lamented brother just before you set off for the Continent. If I am not mistaken, I heard, and I think from Lady Frederick Bentinck, that some untoward circumstance interrupted that tour. Was it so?
‘My dear sister,
you will be glad to hear, is at present quite well, but in prudence we do not
permit her to take the long walks she used to do, nor to depart from the
invalid regimen. The remainder of us are well. My daughter’s illness was the consequence of over-fatigue
while
36 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘How is Sharp in
health? When he wrote to me last he was suffering from a winter cough. He told
me, what did not at all surprise me to hear, that the sale of your “Pleasures of Memory,”
which had commanded public attention for thirty-six years, had greatly fallen
off within the last two years. “The
Edinburgh Review” tells another story, that you and Campbell (I am sorry to couple the names) are
the only bards of our day whose laurels are
WORDSWORTH | 37 |
‘What is likely to become of the Michael Angelo marble of Sir George—is it to be sold? Alas! alas! That picture of the picture gallery, is that to go also? I hope you will rescue some of these things from vulgar hands, both for their own sakes and the memory of our departed friend.’
‘Being sure, my dear Rogers, that you take a cordial interest in anything important
to me or my family, I cannot forbear letting you know that my eldest son is soon to quit that state of
single blessedness to which you have so faithfully adhered. This event has come
upon
38 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘In somewhat of a casual way I recommended in my last
my son to your thoughts, if any opportunity should occur in the wide sphere of
your acquaintance of speaking a good word in his behalf. Had I known this
delicate affair was pending, I should at that time have probably been silent
upon the subject of his professional interests. It cannot, however, be amiss
for anyone to have as many friends as possible, and I need not conceal from you
that my satisfaction would, upon this occasion, have been more unmingled had my
son had more to offer on his part. I shall merely add that if, through his
future life, you could serve him upon any occasion I should be thankful. I
regret that I am not at liberty at present
WORDSWORTH | 39 |
‘Do you know Mrs. Hemans? She is to be here to-day if winds and waves, though steamboats care little for them, did not yesterday retard her passage from Liverpool. I wish you were here (perhaps you may not) to assist us in entertaining her, for my daughter’s indisposition and other matters occupy our thoughts, and literary ladies are apt to require a good deal of attention. Pray give our kind regards to your brother and sister. We hope that you all continue to have good health. Do let me hear from you, however briefly, and believe me,
The above letter was evidently written before Rogers’s answer to the one before it. Rogers then replied, probably saying that he had relatives of his own in the Church; and Wordsworth then wrote the letter which follows.
‘I cannot sufficiently thank you, my dear Rogers, for your kind and long letter, knowing
as I do how much you dislike writing. Yet I should not have written now but to
say I was not aware that you had any such near connections in the Church; I had
presumed that your relatives by both sides were Dissenters, or I should have
been silent on the subject, being well assured that I and mine
40 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘Lord Lonsdale, to whom I mentioned my son’s intended marriage, naming (as I was at liberty to do in that case) the lady, has written to me in answer with that feeling and delicacy which mark the movements of his mind and the actions of his life. He is one of the best and most amiable of men, and I should detest myself if I could fail in gratitude for his goodness to me upon all occasions.1
‘I wish Lady Frederick’s mind were at ease on the subject of the epitaph. Upon her own ideas, and using mainly her own language, I worked at it, but the production I sent was too long and somewhat too historical, yet assuredly it wanted neither discrimination nor feeling. Would Lady F. be content to lay it aside till she comes into the North this summer, as I hope she will do. We might then lay our judgments together in conversation, and with the benefit of your suggestions and those of other friends with which she is no doubt furnished, we might be satisfied at last. Pray name this to her if you have an opportunity.
‘Your “Italy” can nowhere out of your own family be more eagerly expected than in this house. The poetry is excellent we know, and the embellishments, as they are under the guidance of your own taste, must do honor to the Arts. My daughter, alas, does not recover her strength. She has been thrown back several times by
1 On the 11th of October, 1830, Mr. Wordsworth’s eldest son, the Rev. John Wordsworth, then Rector of Moresby, was married to Isabella Christian Curwen, daughter of Henry Curwen, Esq., of Workington Hall, Cumberland, and of Curwen’s Isle, Windermere (Life, vol. ii., p. 232). |
WORDSWORTH | 41 |
‘We like Mrs. Hemans much; her conversation is what might be expected from her poetry, full of sensibility, and she enjoys the country greatly.
‘The “Somnambulist” is one of several pieces, written at a heat, which I should have much pleasure in submitting to your judgment were the Fates so favourable as that we might meet ere long. How shall I dare to tell you that the Muses and I have parted company, at least I fear so, for I have not written a verse these twelvemonths past, except a few stanzas upon my return from Ireland last autumn.
‘Dear Sir Walter, I love that man, though I can scarcely be said to have lived with him at all; but I have known him for nearly thirty years. Your account of his seizure grieved us all much. Coleridge had a dangerous attack a few weeks ago; Davy is gone. Surely these are men of power, not to be replaced should they disappear, as one has done.
‘Pray repeat our cordial remembrances to your brother and sister, and be assured, my dear Rogers, that you are thought of in this house, both by the well and the sick, with affectionate interest.
From the correspondence of this summer, much of it in response to gifts of
his ‘Italy,’ I select a few
letters, all from distinguished persons, and each letter interesting
42 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘My dear Rogers,—I am most thankful to you for your promise; for I would fain go off the stage as gracefully as I can. You are right in supposing that I contemplate the conclusion of my labours1 with mixt sensations: but mine are not worthy of being compared with those of the men with whom you have confronted me. To use an ignoble, but very exact, similitude, I resemble a solitary ennuyé, who regrets (for want of something else to do) seeing the remains of his dinner taken away, though he has not appetite enough to renew the charge. I heard a melancholy account of your last expedition on the Continent, last autumn, from Lord and Lady Holland; but it was, by your account, yet more deplorable than I had imagined it to have been. May this summer, if you meditate a flight, be more propitious to you, though we have hitherto had more dripping, I believe, than during any given month of the last summer. I received a few days ago from Fazakerley certain queries, sent to England by a Florentine lady, respecting Foscolo; and yesterday a letter from herself; from which it appears that she is collecting materials for a life of him. A life of him, moreover, has been already written by Pecchio, which is printing in Italy; but in which he reserves an appendix
1 He was then occupied with his spirited translation of the Orlando Furioso, which was published in the following year. |
WILLIAM STEWART ROSE | 43 |
‘I rejoice to hear of your labours. You are one of those who know how to use the file; and I should think that the limæ labor et mora would be entertaining to you. Pray tell Miss Rogers that I am much gratified by her kind recollection of me, and remember me to Hallam or any common friends who care for me.
‘Believe me, my dear Rogers, your faithful and much obliged,
44 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘My dear Sir,—Notwithstanding the knot you tied in your handkerchief last evening, I won’t trust you. I know you to be so beset by the choice things of this life that a tit-bit must be put to your mouth and you must be coaxed to taste it. I send you, therefore, the first volume of the “Tales of an Indian Camp.” Read anyone of the tales I have marked, or, in fact, read any tale in the volume, and if you do not feel induced to read more send back the book and I will say no more about it.
‘I am piqued to have you look into this work because I have the vanity to think I know something of your taste, and to hope that in this instance it will coincide with my own.
The letter from Rogers to his sister was addressed to her at Paris, where she was following the traces of the three days of July.
‘My dear Sarah,—I wish I had more to do than to thank you for your letter, and to say that I am just where you left me. A few minutes after you went from my door, Cuvier and Mdlle.1 called to inquire for you.
1 Mdlle. Duvaucel, Cuvier’s stepdaughter. Rogers had known her in Paris, where he used to say she fascinated everybody; and a wager was |
CHARLES THE TENTH IN EXILE | 45 |
‘What do you say to Mrs. Ottley’s, or, rather, Miss O.’s evidence on the inquest?1 You of course see “The
laid that she would fascinate even the giraffe. It really so happened. The great animal, twenty-two feet high, followed her like a lamb. (See Campbell’s Life , vol. iii., p. 68.) 1 See note, p. 46, on St. John Long. |
46 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
1St. John Long was a portrait-painter, who had discovered an infallible ointment for all complaints. The inquest of which Rogers speaks was |
’JE NE SUIS PAS ROI; JE SUIS CAPUCIN’ | 47 |
‘Etty is said to have been in the Louvre when an armed mob rushed through it. Have you seen him? Perhaps you will look at Brussels on your way home. I know nothing of Highbury, but conclude all is going on well there. Lady H. talks of giving you some commissions, but I shall not remind her on the subject, as I dare say you do not wish for any particularly. There is an excellent likeness of Charles—“Je ne suis pas Roi; je suis Capucin”—and there is a good caricature of the gens d’armes at war with the mob, and barricades between them. Pray buy them for me, if you meet with them on the Boulevard des Italiens.’
‘With many thanks, my dear Sir, for the accompanying volume.
‘“The “Chanson des Deux Cousins” is certainly excellent; besides the merit of being so wonderfully pro-
48 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘the imprisoned bird Which makes the cage its quire and sings most sweetly When most in bondage. |
My dear Rogers,—Very many thanks for the welcome testimony of your
kind remembrance are all that I can offer you in return, unless it be a remark
or two on the subjects noticed by you; for since I came here, nearly three
months ago, I have seen none but my own family; never once been at the distance
of a mile from my hall-door, nor exchanged letters, but once with Lady Spencer and the same with Lord Camden, since I last wrote to you. Though I
know not how in conscience I could have asked you to make us a visit, I should
not have been restrained by that consideration alone. But in truth we have
been, are still, and shall be for some time to come, in a state of so much
confusion and uncertainty as to put all forming of plans out of our power.
Lady Ashburnham will be again obliged
to go to town next week on account of her wrist; the use of which she is still
far from having recovered, though it is now almost six months since the injury
was sustained. And when there, she
LORD ASHBURNHAM | 49 |
‘You bid me to prepare for a review of my book. I had rather look forward to a view of yours; and this I will have by hook or by crook, long before the next number of “The Edinburgh Review” can make its appearance.1 I think that I might hazard a guess as to who is the anonymous acquaintance of ours, to whom you allude. If I am right, I know him to be in the habit of speaking favorably of me: and therefore trust that he will treat my work with indulgence. Hitherto it has escaped even the hebdomadal critique, or rather notice, of the “Literary Gazette.” When I left London, my publishers, Messrs. Payne and Foss, informed me that I was not much in request. So that, till I received yesterday your notice to brace my nerves to the encounter of a review, I was fortifying myself to endure a similar mortification to that of the late Poet Pybus, who got rid of none but his presentation copies. This was evident from the glut of waste-paper which the market experienced soon after his
1 The review appeared as the second article in the October number of the Edinburgh. Lord Ashburnham’s book consisted of a vindication of his ancestor, John Ashburnham, groom of the bedchamber to Charles the First, from the misrepresentations and aspersions of Lord Clarendon, and of John Ashburnham’s own narrative of his attendance on the King. |
50 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘si quid mea earmina possunt,
Nulla dies unquam memori vos eximet ævo.
|
‘As Qui through all its various cases
The young Grammarian slowly traces,
Declining down to Quibus;
By a like scale our poets try,
And if the first be Laureate Pye,
The last of course is Pybus.
|
‘I beg you to pardon me, or, rather, to make in my favour the law’s humane distinction between murder and manslaughter. It is not of malice prepense that, like “the sage Montaigne,” I have deviated from my purpose. It is not in imitation, or from affectation, but because it is as natural to me, as ever it was to him, to write very differently from what I had previously intended. Even more than this—I seldom read with so much perseverance as when I have seated myself at my writing desk: and am most disposed to talk when I have taken up a book.
‘Contrary, therefore, to my declared intention to
comment on the topics of your letter, I shall let you off with observing only
that, of all the changes and chances which you enumerate as having been crowded
together within the narrow compass of a few weeks, the only fact that I
contemplate with pleasure is simply the expulsion of that incorrigible
Charles the Tenth, of whom I verily
think that there is less to say in excuse than of the execrated Charles the Ninth; justification being in either
case equally out of the question. But I have no intention at
LORD ASHBURNHAM | 51 |
‘I hope that we shall meet ere long. Whenever I can hold out any temptation to you, besides my pictures, which, though as deaf as I am, will not trouble you to repeat the compliments addressed to them, I shall try to tempt you hither. My Lady would not forgive me were I to propose it to you in her absence.
‘Adieu. I can hardly see what I am now writing, but I know what I feel, that
‘My dear Rogers,—I know not whether the one of all your friends who has the most often read over and over again your poem on our beloved Italy, be the best entitled to a presentation-copy of it. But, I am sure, on that and on other accounts, the copy for which I have to thank you has not been ill-bestowed. Most especially as to what relates to Florence and its environs, with which,
‘Of all the fairest cities of the earth, |
52 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘I hope that Lady Ashburnham will have prevailed so far at least as to obtain from you the promise of a visit. Nothing would please me more; particularly if I could contrive that you might meet some whom you would like to meet; for a family-party is less inviting than a téte-à-téte. For myself, I am growing gradually, if not rapidly, more and more a poor, infirm creature; and never expect to be the inmate of any but my own house, in town or country. Nor between these will my oscillations be of a pendulum-like frequency.1
‘I hope that your health is, for the sake of your numerous friends, as well as your own, such as when we last parted at Spencer House. I wish that there were as much of selfishness in this hope as there is of sincerity in my profession of being
‘Dear Sir,—I know not what hath bewitch’d me that I have delayed acknowledging your beautiful present. But I have been very unwell and nervous of late. The poem was not new to me, tho’ I have renewed ac-
1Lord Ashburnham died within a month after writing these words. |
CHARLES LAMB: WORDSWORTH | 53 |
‘My dear Rogers,—Not according to a cunning plan of acknowledging the receipt of books before they have been read, but to let you know that your highly valued present of three copies has arrived at Rydal, I write from this place, under favor of a frank. My sister tells me that the books are charmingly got up, as the phrase is, and she speaks with her usual feeling of your kind attention; so does my daughter, now at Workington Hall, where she has been officiating as bridesmaid to the wife of her happy brother. The embellishments, my sister says, are delicious, and reflect light upon the poetry with which she was well acquainted before.
‘Lady Frederick
is here with her father and mother. She is among your true friends. Lord and Lady
L. are quite well. In a couple of days I hope to return with
Mrs. Wordsworth and Dora to Rydal. We then go to Coleorton, and so
on to Trinity Lodge, Cambridge, where
54 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘Lady Frederick begs me to say she is sorry they have not seen you in the North this year. We also had looked for you anxiously at Rydal.’
‘My dear Sir,—I had the pleasure of receiving, a
few days ago, a large paper copy of your beautiful poem on Italy, which you have had the
goodness to present for me to my son Thomas, who has availed himself of his brother Robert’s recent visit to Lancashire, to
convey it safely to my hands. I do not consider this, your obliging remembrance
of me, merely as an interesting and truly original poem, decorated with
exquisite engravings, but as a production in which the sister arts of poetry
and painting are united to produce a simultaneous effect, as brilliant jewels
are only seen to full advantage when set off by a beautiful face. The art of
engraving has hitherto aimed only to please the eye; but it may now be said to
have arrived at its highest excellence; and
ROSCOE AND PANIZZI | 55 |
‘In the state of partial seclusion from the world in
which I have lived for some time past, it is a merciful dispensation that I am
still able to enjoy my books: amongst these I may enumerate, as lately
acquired, the works of Lorenzo de’
Medici, in four vols. folio, commented upon and published by the
present Grand Duke of Tuscany, to whom I am
indebted for a present—a copy of them. I also highly value a large paper
copy of the “Landscape
Annual,” and am at present employed in illustrating a similar
copy of the translation of Lanzi’s
“History of Painting in
Italy,” which will be a splendid work; but none of these seem
to me so truly to deserve the name of a literary gem as your delightful
publication; for which I must now beg leave to offer you my most grateful
thanks. This is intended to be delivered to you by my highly valued friend
Sig. Antonio Panizzi, Professor of
the Italian language in the London University who lived some years in
Liverpool, and from whence he is just returned from visiting the numerous
friends whom he has made during his residence here. He is probably already
known to you by his literary works, particularly his edition of Bojardo and Ariosto now
publishing; in addition to which I beg leave to add my testimony, not only to
his abilities as an elegant scholar, but to his experienced worth as a sincere
friend and his character as a man. It is, therefore, with great satisfaction I
introduced him to your better acquaintance; being convinced
56 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘I am, my dear Sir, always most faithfully yours,
‘My dear Rogers,—I have been worried to death these two or three last weeks by some troublesome business in Staffordshire, which, until it was settled, almost hindered me from thinking of anything else, or I should not have left so long unacknowledged the very gratifying present I had received. The finished excellence of the works that compose this beautiful volume, and the specimens of art, in the purest taste, by which it is adorned, render it a most desirable possession even to those that acquire it in the ordinary way; but the value of it is increased tenfold when given, as I flatter myself it is, as a mark of recollection after an acquaintance of near thirty years, from a man of whose friendship one should be proud, for the qualities of his heart and understanding, even if he had never written a single line. Accept my thanks, and believe me,
This is the last letter from Lord Dudley—the J. W. Ward of earlier years—and it pleasantly shows how completely the early friendship had been restored after the alienation of 1813. Lord Dudley died on the 6th of March, 1833.
LORD HOLLAND: SIR WALTER SCOTT | 57 |
‘My dear Rogers,—I am quite sorry to hear of your being ill, and the more so as my business, my leg, and my cold prevent my having a chance of seeing you. The House of Lords knocked me up last night in spite of two admirable speeches in their different ways, of Grey and Radnor. The latter was acute and lively as usual, but patriotic and eloquent beyond anything I have ever yet heard [from] him; a speech that must do him credit and, I must selfishly add, will do the Ministers great good with the public. Young Stothard the engraver writes to me about an office he holds and the manner in which it has been awarded, and, moreover, about the late King’s order to execute a Duchy of Lancaster seal. I do not quite understand his application exactly—but pray tell me what you know of him, and give, if you have any, some information about his office.
‘My dear Sir,—I should do my sentiments towards
you, and all your kindness, great injustice did I not hasten to send you my
best thanks for your beautiful verses on Italy which [are] embellished by such beautiful specimens
of architecture as form a rare specimen of the manner in which the art of
poetry can awake the Muse of Painting. It is in every respect a bijou, and yet
more valued as the mark of your regard than either
58 | ROGERS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES |
‘My life has undergone an important change since I saw [you] for the well-remembered last time in Piccadilly, when you gave me the spy-glass, which still hangs round my neck, with which I might hope to read, not only more clearly, but with more judgment and better taste. Since that time I have felt a gradual but decisive pressure of years visiting me all at once, and, without anything like formal disease, depriving me of my power to take exercise either on foot or horseback, of which I was once so proud. It is this that makes me look at your volume with particular interest. Having resigned my official connection with the Court of Session, I had promised myself the pleasure of seeing some part of the Continent, and thought of visiting the well-sung scenes of Italy. I am now so helpless in the way of moving about that I think I must be satisfied with the admirable substitute you have so kindly sent me, which must be my consolation for not seeing with my own eyes what I can read so picturesquely described.
‘I sometimes hope I shall prick up heart of grace and come to my daughter Lockhart’s in spring weather. Sometimes I think I had best keep my madness in the background, like the suivante [confidant] of Tilburina in “The Critic.” At all events, I wish I could draw you over the Border in summer or autumn, when we could at least visit some places in that land where, though not very romantic in landscape, every valley has its battle and every stream its song.
‘Pray think of this, and God bless you. I beg my
SIR WALTER SCOTT | 59 |
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