Chapter II: Part 2

Though I can't answer for _June_, I am really meditating a small trip to Wiltshire _before_ June; mainly to see the daughters of my old George Crabbe who are settled at Bradford on Avon, and want very much that I should see how happily they live on very small means indeed. And I must own I am the more tempted to go abroad because there is preparation for a Marriage in my Family (a Niece--but not one of my Norfolk Nieces) which is to be at my Brother's near here; and there will be a Levee of People, who drop in here, etc. This may blow over, however.

Now I ought to be ashamed of this long Letter: don't you make me so by answering it.

Ever yours, E. F. G.

_To George Crabbe_.

WOODBRIDGE, _June_ 8/63.

MY DEAR GEORGE,

Your sister wrote me a very kind Letter to tell of her safe Return home. I must repeat to you very sincerely that I never recollect to have passed a pleasanter week. As far as Company went, it was like Old Times at Bredfield; and the Oak-trees were divine! I never expected to care so very much for Trees, nor for your flat Country: but I really feel as one who has bathed in Verdure. I suppose Town-living makes one alive to such a Change.

I spent a long Day with Thompson: {40} and much liked the painted Roof. On Thursday I went to Lynn: which I took a Fancy to: the odd old Houses: the Quay: the really grand Inn (Duke's Head, in the Market place) and the civil, Norfolk-talking, People. I went to Hunstanton, which is rather dreary: one could see the Country at Sandringham was good. I enquired fruitlessly about those Sandringham Pictures, etc.: even the Auctioneer, whom I found in the Bar of the Inn, could tell nothing of where they had gone.

_To W. B. Donne_.

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE. _Sat. July_ 18/63.

MY DEAR DONNE,

. . . I can hardly tell you whether I am much pleased with my new Boat; for I hardly know myself. She is (as I doubted would be from the first) rather awkward in our narrow River; but then she was to be a good Sea- boat; and I don't know but she is; and will be better in all ways when we have got her in proper trim. Yesterday we gave her what they call '_a tuning_' in a rather heavy swell round Orford Ness: and she did well without a reef, etc. But, now all is got, I don't any the more want to go far away by Sea, any more than by Land; having no Curiosity left for other Places, and glad to get back to my own Chair and Bed after three or four Days' Absence. So long as I get on the Sea from time to time, it is much the same to me whether off Aldbro' or Penzance. And I find I can't sleep so well on board as I used to do thirty years ago: and not to get one's Sleep, you know, indisposes one more or less for the Day. However, we talk of Dover, Folkestone, Holland, etc., which will give one's sleeping Talents a _tuning_.

_To George Crabbe_.

WOODBRIDGE, _July_ 19, [1863].

MY DEAR GEORGE,

You tell me the Romney is at Gardner's: but where is Gardner's? And what was the Price of the Portrait? Laurence said well about Romney that, as compared to Sir Joshua and Gainsboro', his Pictures looked tinted, rather than painted; the colour of the Cheek (for instance) rather superficially laid on, as rouge, rather than ingrained, and mantling like Blood from below. Laurence had seen those at last year's Exhibition: I have not seen near so many. I remember one that seemed to me capital at Lord Bute's in Bedfordshire.

I came home yesterday from a short Cruise to Yarmouth, etc., where some people were interested in the Channel Fleet. But I could take no interest in Steam Ships and Iron Rams.

WOODBRIDGE, _August_ 4, [1863].

MY DEAR GEORGE,

I have at last done my Holland: you won't be surprised to hear that I did it in two days, and was too glad to rush home on the first pretence, after (as usual) seeing nothing I cared the least about. The Country itself I had seen long before in Dutch Pictures, and between Beccles and Norwich: the Towns I had seen in Picturesque Annuals, Drop Scenes, etc.

But the Pictures--the Pictures--themselves?

Well, you know how I am sure to mismanage: but you will hardly believe, even of me, that I never saw what was most worth seeing, the Hague Gallery! But so it was: had I been by myself, I should have gone off directly (after landing at Rotterdam) to that: but Mr. Manby was with me: and he thought best to see about Rotterdam first: which was last Thursday, at whose earliest Dawn we arrived. So we tore about in an open Cab: saw nothing: the Gallery not worth a visit: and at night I was half dead with weariness. Then again on Friday I, by myself, should have started for the Hague: but as Amsterdam was also to be done, we thought best to go there (as furthest) first. So we went: tore about the town in a Cab as before: and I raced through the Museum seeing (I must say) little better than what I have seen over and over again in England. I couldn't admire the Night-watch much: Van der Helst's very good Picture seemed to me to have been cleaned: I thought the Rembrandt Burgomasters worth all the rest put together. But I certainly looked very flimsily at all.

Well, all this done, away we went to the Hague: arriving there just as the Museum closed for that day; next Day (Saturday) it was not to be open at all (I having proposed to wait in case it should), and on Sunday only from 12 to 2. Hearing all this, in Rage and Despair I tore back to Rotterdam: and on Saturday Morning got the Boat out of the muddy Canal in which she lay and tore back down the Maas, etc., so as to reach dear old Bawdsey shortly after Sunday's Sunrise. Oh, my Delight when I heard them call out 'Orford Lights!' as the Boat was plunging over the Swell.

All this is very stupid, really wrong: but you are not surprised at it in me. One reason however of my Disgust was, that we (in our Boat) were shut up (as I said) in the Canal, where I couldn't breathe. I begged Mr. Manby to let me take him to an Inn: he would stick to his Ship, he said: and I didn't like to leave him. Then it was Murray who misled me about the Hague Gallery: he knew nothing about its being shut on Saturdays. Then again we neither of us knew a word of Dutch: and I was surprised how little was known of English in return.

But I shall say no more. I think it is the last foreign Travel I shall ever undertake; unless I should go with you to see the Dresden Madonna: to which there is one less impediment now Holland is not to be gone through. . . . I am the Colour of a Lobster with Sea-faring: and my Eyes smart: so Good-Bye. Let me hear of you. Ever yours E. F. G.

Oh dear!--Rembrandt's Dissection--where and how did I miss that?

_To E. B. Cowell_.

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE. _Aug._ 5/63.

MY DEAR COWELL,

I don't hear from you: I rather think you are deterred by those _Birds_ which I asked you to print (in my last Letter) with some Correction, etc., of your own: and which you have not found Time or Inclination to get done. But don't let anything of this sort prevent your writing to me now and then: no one can be more utterly indifferent than I am whether these Birds are printed or not: and I suppose I distinctly told you _not_ to put yourself to any Trouble. Indeed I dare say I should only be bored with the Copies when they were printed: for I don't know a Soul here who would care for the Thing if it were ten times as well done as I have done it: nor do I care for Translation or Original, myself. Oh dear, when I do look into Homer, Dante, and Virgil, AEschylus, Shakespeare, etc., those Orientals look--silly! Don't resent my saying so. _Don't_ they? I am now a good [deal] about in a new Boat I have built, and thought (as Johnson took Cocker's Arithmetic with him on travel, because he shouldn't exhaust it) so I would take Dante and Homer with me, instead of Mudie's Books, which I read through directly. I took Dante by way of slow Digestion: not having looked at him for some years: but I am glad to find I relish him as much as ever: he atones with the Sea; as you know does the Odyssey--these are the Men!

I am just returned in my Ship from Holland--where I stayed--two days!--and was so glad to rush away home after being imprisoned in a sluggish un- sweet Canal in Rotterdam: and after tearing about to Amsterdam, the Hague, etc., to see things which were neither new nor remarkable to me though I had never seen them before--except in Pictures, which represent to you the Places as well as if you went there, without the trouble of going. I am sure wiser men, with keener _out_sight and _in_sight would see what no Pictures could give: but this I know is always the case with me: this is my last Voyage abroad, I believe: unless I go to see Raffaelle's Madonna at Dresden, which no other Picture can represent than itself: unless Dante's Beatrice.

I don't think you ever told me if you had got, or read, Spedding's two first volumes of Bacon. My opinion is not the least altered of the Case: and (as I anticipated) Spedding has brooded over his Egg so long he has rather addled it. Thompson told me that the very Papers he adduces to clear Bacon in Essex's Business, rather go against him: I haven't seen any Notice of the Book in any Review but Fraser: where Donne (of course) was convinced, etc., and I hear that even the wise old Spedding is _mortified_ that he has awakened so little Interest for his Hero. You know his Mortification would not be on _his own_ score. His last Letter to me (some months ago) seemed to indicate that he could scarce lift up his Pen to go on--he had as yet, he said, written nothing of volumes 3 and 4. But I suppose he _will_ in time. I say this Life of his wasted on a vain work is a Tragedy pathetic as Antigone or Iphigenia. Of Tennyson I hear but little: and I have ceased to look forward to any future Work of his. Thackeray seems dumb as a gorged Blackbird too: all growing old!

I have lost my sister Kerrich, the only one of my family I much cared for, or who much cared for me.

But (not to dwell on what cannot be helped, and to which my talking of all growing old led me) I see in last week's Athenaeum great Praise of a new Volume of Poems by Jean Ingelow. The Reviewer talks of a 'new Poet,' etc., quite unaware that some dozen years ago the 'new Poet' published a Volume (as you may remember) with as distinct Indications of sweet, fresh, and original Genius as anything he adduces from this second Volume. I remember writing a sort of Review, when about you at Bramford, which I sent to Mitford, to try and give the Book a little move: but Mitford had just quitted the Gentleman's Magazine, and I tore up my Paper. Your Elizabeth knows (I think) all about this Lady: who, I suppose, is connected with Lincolnshire: for the Reviewer speaks of some of the Poems as relating to that Coast--Shipwrecks, etc. I was told that Tennyson was writing a sort of Lincolnshire Idyll: I will bet on Miss Ingelow now: he should never have left his old County, and gone up to be suffocated by London Adulation. He has lost that which caused the long roll of the Lincolnshire Wave to reverberate in the measure of Locksley Hall. Don't believe that I rejoice like a Dastard in what I believe to be the Decay of a Great Man: my sorrow has been so much about it that (for one reason) I have the less cared to meet him of late years, having nothing to say in sincere praise. Nor do I mean that his Decay is all owing to London, etc. He is growing old: and I don't believe much in the Fine Arts thriving on an old Tree: I can't think Milton's Paradise Lost so good as his Allegro, etc.; one feels the strain of the Pump all through: only Shakespeare--the exception to all rule--struck out Macbeth at past fifty. {47a}

By the way, there is a new--and the best--edition {47b} of _Him_ coming out: edited by two men (Fellows) of Cambridge. Just the Text, with the various readings of Folio and Quartos: scarce any notes: but suggestions of Alteration from Pope, Theobald, Coleridge, etc., and--Spedding; who (as I told him twenty years ago) should have done the work these men are doing. He also says they are well doing about _half_ what is wanted to be done. He should--for he could--have done all; and one Frontispiece Portrait would have served for Author and Editor.

Come--here is a long Letter--and (as I read it over) with more _Go_ than usually attends my old Pen now. Let it inspire you to answer: never mind _the Birds_:--which really suggests to me one of Dante's beautiful lines which made me _cry_ the other Day at Sea.

Mentre che gli occhi per la fronda verde
Ficcava io cosi, come far suole
Chi dietro all' uccellin la vita perde,
Lo piu che Padre mi dicea, etc. {48a}

_To W. B. Donne_.

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE. _October_ 4/63.

MY DEAR DONNE,

Very rude of me not to have acknowledged your Tauchnitz {48b} before: but I have been almost living in my Ship ever since: and I supposed also that you were abroad in Norfolk. I pitied you undergoing those dreadful Oratorios: I never heard one that was not tiresome, and in part ludicrous. Such subjects are scarce fitted for Catgut. Even Magnus Handel--even Messiah. He (Handel) was a good old Pagan at heart, and (till he had to yield to the fashionable Piety of England) stuck to Opera, and Cantatas, such as Acis and Galatea, Milton's Penseroso, Alexander's Feast, etc., where he could revel and plunge and frolic without being tied down to Orthodoxy. And these are (to my mind) his really great works: these, and his Coronation Anthems, where Human Pomp is to be accompanied and illustrated

Now for Tauchnitz; somehow, that which you sent me is not the thing: I don't like it half so well as my little Tauchnitz stereotype Sophocles of 1827. The Euripides you send bears date 1846: and is certainly not so clear to my eyes as 1827. Never mind: don't trouble yourself further: I shall light upon what I want one of these Days. It is wonderful how _The Sea_ brought up this Appetite for Greek: it likes to be called [Greek text] and [Greek text] better than the wretched word '_Sea_,' I am sure: and the Greeks (especially AEschylus--after Homer) are full of Seafaring Sounds and Allusions. I think the Murmur of the AEgean (if that is their Sea) wrought itself into their Language. How is it the Islandic (which I read is our Mother Tongue) was not more Poluphloisboi-ic?

Sophocles has almost shaken my Allegiance to AEschylus. Oh, those two OEdipuses! but then that Agamemnon! Well: one shall be the Handel and 'tother the Haydn; one the Michel Angelo, and 'tother the Raffaelle, of Tragedy. As to the famous Prometheus, I think, as I always thought, it is somewhat over-rated for Sublimity; I can't see much in the far famed Conception of the Hero's Character: and I doubt (_rest wanting_).

_To S. Laurence_.

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Jan._ 7/64.

DEAR LAURENCE,

. . . I want to know about your two Portraits of Thackeray: the first one (which I think Smith and Elder have) I know by the Print: I want to know about one you last did (some two years ago?) whether you think it as good and characteristic: and also who has it. Frederic Tennyson sent me a Photograph of W. M. T. old, white, massive, and melancholy, sitting in his Library.

I am surprized almost to find how much I am thinking of him: so little as I had seen him for the last ten years; not once for the last five. I had been told--by you, for one--that he was spoiled. I am glad therefore that I have scarce seen him since he was 'old Thackeray.' I keep reading his Newcomes of nights, and as it were hear him saying so much in it; and it seems to me as if he might be coming up my Stairs, and about to come (singing) into my Room, as in old Charlotte Street, etc., thirty years ago. {50}

_To George Crabbe_.

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Jan._ 12/64.

MY DEAR GEORGE,

. . . Have we exchanged a word about Thackeray since his Death? I am quite surprised to see how I sit moping about him: to be sure, I keep reading his Books. Oh, the Newcomes are fine! And now I have got hold of Pendennis, and seem to like that much more than when I first read it. I keep hearing him say so much of it; and really think I shall hear his Step up the Stairs to this Lodging as in old Charlotte Street thirty years ago. Really, a great Figure has sunk under Earth.

_To W. H. Thompson_.

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Jan._ 23/64.

MY DEAR THOMPSON,

You see I return with your other troubles of Term time. Only when you have ten spare minutes let me know how you are, etc. . . . I have almost wondered at myself how much occupied I have been thinking of Thackeray; so little as I had seen of him for the last ten years, and my Interest in him a little gone from hearing he had become somewhat spoiled: which also some of his later writings hinted to me of themselves. But his Letters, and former works, bring me back the old Thackeray. . . . I had never read Pendennis and the Newcomes since their first appearance till this last month. They are wonderful; Fielding's seems to me coarse work in comparison. I have indeed been thinking of little this last month but of these Books and their Author. Of his Letters to me I have only kept some Dozen, just to mark the different Epochs of our Acquaintance.

_To E. B. Cowell_.

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Jan._ 31/64.

MY DEAR COWELL,

I have only Today got your Letter: have been walking out by myself in the Seckford Almshouse Garden till 9 p.m. in a sharp Frost--with Orion stalking over the South before me--(do you know him in India? I forget) have come in--drunk a glass of Porter; and am minded to answer you before I get to Bed. Perhaps the Porter will leave me stranded, however, before I get to the End of my Letter.

Before this reaches you--probably before I write it--you will have heard of Thackeray's sudden Death. It was told me as I was walking alone in those same Seckford Gardens on Christmas-day Night; by a Corn-merchant--one George Manby--(do you remember him?) who came on purpose to tell me--and to wish me in other respects a Happy Christmas. I have thought little else than of W. M. T. ever since--what with reading over his Books, and the few Letters I had kept of his; and thinking over our five and thirty years' Acquaintance as I sit alone by my Fire these long Nights. I had seen very little of him for these last ten years; _nothing_ for the last five; he did not care to write; and people told me he was become a little spoiled: by London praise, and some consequent Egotism. But he was a very fine Fellow. His Books are wonderful: Pendennis; Vanity Fair; and the Newcomes; to which compared Fielding's seems to me coarse work. I don't know yet how his two daughters are left provided for; the Papers say well. He had built and furnished a fine House at 7 or 8000 pounds cost; which is as good a Property for them to let or sell as any other, I suppose; and the Copyright of his Books must also be a good Property: always supposing he had not encumbered all these by anticipation.

I was not at all well myself for three months; but either the Doctor's Stuff, or the sharp clear weather, or both, have set me up pretty much as I was before. I have nothing to tell, as usual, of People or Places; for I have scarce stirred from this Place since my little Ship was laid up in the middle of October. Donne writes sometimes; I see an article of his about the Antonines advertised in the present Edinburgh; but that you know is out of my Line. His second son, Mowbray, is lately married to a Daughter (I don't know which) of Mrs. Salmon's; widow of a former Rector here, whom your Elizabeth will remember all about, I dare say.

This time ten years I was lodging at Oxford, reading Persian with you. I doubt I shall never do so again; I am too lazy to turn Dictionaries over now; and indeed had some while ceased to expect much to turn up from them. You are quite right, as a Scholar, to work out the Mine; but you admit that nothing is likely to come out of such Value as from the Greek, Latin, and English, which we have ready to our hands. Did I tell you how pleased I had been with Sophocles and AEschylus in my Boat this Summer?

I dare say you are quite right about my 'Birds': indeed I think I had always told you that my Version was of no _public_ use; I only wanted a few Copies for private use; and I wanted you to add a short Account, and a few Notes; in which I am shy of trusting my own Irish Accuracy. But you have plenty of better work, and _this_ is quite as well left.

Miss Ingelow's second volume isn't half so good as her first, to my thinking; more ambitious, with a twang of Tennyson. I can't add to the List you have sent of Elizabeth's Poems.

Maria C[harlesworth] was staying with my Brother at Boulge in the Autumn, and sent a very kind message to me; I now am sorry I did not see her; but I keep out of the way of the _Company_ at Boulge, though I am glad to see my Brother here. So I wish I had asked her to take the Trouble to come and see me in my Den. Alas! if ever you do come back, you will have to come and see me; for I really go nowhere now. Frederic Tennyson came to me for a few Days, and talked of you two: he was looking very well; and was grand and kind as before. I hear little of Alfred. Spedding's Bacon seems to hang fire; they say he is disheartened at the little Interest, and less Conviction, that his two first volumes carried; Thompson told me they had only convinced _him_ the other way; and that _Ellis_ had long given up Bacon's Defence before he died.

Now my sheet is filled on the strength of my own Glass of Porter--all at a heat. So Good Bye: ever yours, E. F. G.

_To S. Laurence_.

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _April_ 23/64.

DEAR LAURENCE,

I only got home last Night, from Wiltshire, where I had been to see Miss Crabbe, daughter of the old Vicar whom you remember. I found your two Letters: and then your Box. When I had unscrewed the last Screw, it was as if a Coffin's Lid were raised; there was the Dead Man. {55} I took him up to my Bedroom; and when morning came, he was there--reading; alive, and yet dead. I am perfectly satisfied with it on the whole; indeed, could only have suggested a very, very, slight alteration, if any. . .

As I passed through London, I saw that wonderful Collection of Rubbish, the late Bishop of Ely's Pictures; but I fell desperately in Love with a Sir Joshua, a young Lady in white with a blue Sash, and a sweet blue Sky over her sweet, noble, Head; far above Gainsboro' in its Air and Expression. I see in the Papers that it went for 165 pounds; which, if I thought well to give so much for any Picture, I could almost have given, by some means, for such a delightful Work.

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE. _April_ 27/64.

DEAR LAURENCE,

. . . I will send back the Gainsboro' copy {56a} at once; I think the Original must be one of the happiest of the Painter's; while he had Vandyke in his Eye, with whom he was to go to Heaven. {56b} I will not argue how far he was superior to Reynolds in Colour; but in the Air of Dignity and Gentility (in the better Sense) he was surely inferior; it must be so, from the Difference of Character in the two men. Madame D'Arblay (Miss Burney) relates how one day when she was dining with Sir Joshua at Richmond, she chanced to see him looking at her in a peculiar way; she said to him, 'I know what you are thinking about.' 'Ay,' he said, 'you may come and sit to me now whenever you please.' They had often met; but he at last caught _the_ phase of her which was best; but I don't think it ever went to Canvas. I don't think Gainsboro' could have painted the lovely portrait at the Bishop of Ely's, slight as it was; Sir Joshua was by much the finer Gentleman; indeed Gainsboro' was a Scamp.

* * * * *

In the summer of 1864 FitzGerald bought a small farmhouse in the outskirts of Woodbridge, which he afterwards converted into Little Grange.

_To George Crabbe_.

WOODBRIDGE: _July_ 31/64.

MY DEAR GEORGE,

I returned yesterday from a Ten Days' Cruise to the Sussex Coast: which was pleasant enough. To-morrow I talk of Lowestoft and Yarmouth.

. . . Read Newman's Apologia pro Vita Sua, something of a very different order [from the 'Dean's English'], deeply interesting; pathetic, eloquent, and, I think, sincere: sincere, in not being conscious of all the steps he took in reaching his present Place.

_To E. B. Cowell_.

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Aug._ 31, [1864].

MY DEAR COWELL,

. . . I hope you don't think I have forgotten you. Your visit gave me a sad sort of Pleasure, dashed with the Memory of other Days; I now see so few People, and those all of the common sort, with whom I never talk of our old Subjects; so I get in some measure unfitted for such converse, and am almost saddened with the remembrance of an old contrast when it comes. And there is something besides; a Shadow of Death: but I won't talk of such things: only believe I don't forget you, nor wish to be forgotten by you. Indeed, your kindness touched me.

I have been reading Juvenal with Translation, etc., in my Boat. Nearly the best things seem to me what one may call Epistles, rather than Satires: VIII. To Ponticus: XI. To Persicus: and XII. XIII. and XIV to several others: and, in these, leaving out the directly satirical Parts. Satires III and X, like Horace's Poems, are prostituted by Parliamentary and vulgar use, and should lie by for a while. One sees Lucretius, I think, in many parts; but Juvenal can't rise to Lucretius, who is, after all, the true sublime Satirist of poor Man, and of something deeper than his Corruptions and Vices: and he looks on all, too, with 'a Countenance more in Sorrow than in Anger.' By the way, I want you to tell me the name and Title of that Essay on Lucretius {58} which you said was enlarged and reprinted by the Author from the original Cambridge and Oxford Essays. I want much to get it.

There is a fine Passage in Juvenal's 6th Satire on Women: beginning line 634, 'Fingimus haec, etc.' to 650: but (as I think) leaving out lines 639, 640; because one _can_ understand without them, and they jingle sadly with their one vowel ending. I mention this because it occurs in a Satire which, from its Subject, you may perhaps have little cared for.

Another Book I have had is Wesley's Journal, which I used to read, but gave away my Copy--to you? or Robert Groome {59a} was it? If you don't know it, do know it; it is curious to think of this Diary of his running almost coevally with Walpole's Letter-Diary; the two men born and dying too within a few years of one another, and with such different Lives to record. And it is remarkable to read pure, unaffected, and undying, English, while Addison and Johnson are tainted with a Style, which all the world imitated! Remember me to all. Ever yours E. F. G.

'Sed genus humanum damnat caligo Futuri'--a Lucretian line from Juvenal. {59b}

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Nov._ 11/64.

MY DEAR COWELL,

Let me hear of you whenever you have something to tell of yourself: or indeed whenever you have a few spare minutes, and happen, to think--of me. I don't forget you: and 'out of sight' is not 'out of mind' with you, and three or four more in the World. I hope you see Donne at times: and you must look out for old Spedding, that melancholy Ruin of the 19th Century, with his half-white-washed Bacon. Perhaps you will see another Ruin--the Author of Enoch Arden. Compare that with the Spontaneous _Go_ of Palace of Art, Mort d'Arthur, Gardener's Daughter, Locksley Hall, Will Waterproof, Sleeping Palace, Talking Oak, and indeed, one may say, all the two volumes of 1842. As to Maud, I think it the best Poem, as a whole, after 1842.

To come down to very little, from once great, Things--I don't know if it's your coming home, or my being better this Winter, or what: but I have caught up a long ago begun Version of my dear old _Magico_, and have so recast it that scarce a Plank remains of the original! Pretty impudence: and yet all done to conciliate English, or modern, Sympathy. This I sha'n't publish: so say (pray!) nothing of it at all--remember--only I shall print some Copies for you and one or two more: and you and Elizabeth will like it a great deal too much. There is really very great Skill in the Adaptation, and Remodelling of it. By the bye, would you translate _Demonio_, _Lucifer_, or _Satan_? One of the two I take. I cut out all the precioso very ingeniously: and give all the Mountain-moving, etc., in the second Act without Stage direction, so as it may seem to pass only in the dazzled Eyes, or Fantasy, of Cyprian. All this is really a very difficult Job to me; not worth the Candle, I dare say: only that you two will be pleased. I also increase the religious Element in the Drama; and make Cyprian outwit the Devil more cleverly than he now does; for the Devil was certainly too clever to be caught in his own Art. _That_ was very good Fun for an Autodafe Audience, however.

But please say nothing of this to any one. I should like to take up the Vida es Sueno too in the same manner; but these plays are more difficult than all the others put together: and I have no spur now.

How would you translate Pliny's 'Quisquis est Deus, et quacumque in parte, totus est Sensus, totus Visus, totus Auditus, totus Animae, totus Animi, totus Sui?' {61}

This Passage is alluded to by Calderon; but, in the manner of our old Playwrights, I quote it in the Latin and translate. I want to know by you if I have done it sufficiently; and I don't send you mine, in order that you may send me your Version freely.

Now, Good Bye: I suppose it's this rainy Day that draws out this, with several other Letters, that had waited some while to be written.

Yours ever E. F. G.

_To R. C. Trench_.

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _February_ 25/65.

MY DEAR LORD,

Edward Cowell's return to England {62a} set him and me talking of old Studies together, left off since he went to India. And I took up three sketched out Dramas, two of Calderon, {62b} and have licked the two Calderons into some sort of shape of my own, without referring to the Original. One of them goes by this Post to your Grace; and when I tell you the other is no other than your own 'Life's a Dream,' you won't wonder at my sending the present one on Trial, both done as they are in the same lawless, perhaps impudent, way. I know you would not care who did these things, so long as they were well done; but one doesn't wish to meddle, and in so free-and-easy a way, with a Great Man's Masterpieces, and utterly fail: especially when two much better men have been before one. One excuse is, that Shelley and Dr. Trench only took parts of these plays, not caring surely--who can?--for the underplot and buffoonery which stands most in the way of the tragic Dramas. Yet I think it is as a whole, that is, the whole main Story, that these Plays are capital; and therefore I have tried to present that whole, leaving out the rest, or nearly so; and altogether the Thing has become so altered one way or another that I am afraid of it now it's done, and only send you one Play (the other indeed is not done printing: neither to be published), which will be enough if it is an absurd Attempt. For the Vida is not so good even, I doubt: dealing more in the Heroics, etc.

I tell Donne he is too partial a Friend; so is Cowell: Spedding, I think, wouldn't care. So, as you were very kind about the other Plays, and love Calderon (which I doubt argues against me), I send you _my_ Magician.

You will not mind if I blunder in addressing you; in which I steered a middle course between the modes Donne told me; and so, probably, come to the Ground!

_To John Allen_.

MARKET HILL: IPSWICH. {63} _April_ 10/65.

MY DEAR ALLEN,

I was much obliged to you for your former Letters; and now send you the second Play. This I don't suppose you'll like as well as the first: perhaps not at all; it is rather 'Ercles vein' I doubt. I wish to know however from you what you do think of it; because if it seem to you at all preposterous, I shall not send it to some others: but leave them with the first, which really does please those I wished it to please, with its fine Story and Moral. If you like what I now send, I will send you a Copy of Both stitched together, and another copy to your Cousin: and indeed to any one else you think might be pleased with it.

I am indulging in the expensive amusement of Building, though not on a very large scale. It _is_ very pleasant, certainly, to see one's little Gables and Chimnies mount into Air and occupy a Place in the Landscape.

There is a duller Memoir than the 'Lady of Quality,' Miss Lucy Aitken's Letters, etc. You will find the Private Life of an Eastern Queen a good little Book. I have now got Carlyle's two last volumes of Frederick: of which I have only read the latter Part; I don't know whether I can read through the Wars and Battles, which are said to be very fine.

The piece of Literature I really could benefit Posterity with, I do believe, is an edition of that wonderful and aggravating Clarissa Harlowe; and this I would effect with a pair of Scissors only. It would not be a bit too long as it is, if it were all equally good; but pedantry comes in, and might, I think, be cleared away, leaving the remainder one of _the great_, _original_, _Works of the World_! in this Line. Lovelace is the wonderful character, for Wit: and there is some grand Tragedy too. And nobody reads it! Ever yours,

E. F. G.

_To Mrs. Cowell_.

[1865].

MY DEAR LADY,

I answer you thus directly because I would stick in a Bit of a Letter from Thompson of Cambridge: which relates to a question I asked him weeks ago, as I told E. B. C. I would.

You must not think I was in a hurry to have my Play praised: I was really fearful of its being bombastic. You are so enthusiastic in your old and kind Regards and Memories that I can scarce rely on you for a cool Judgment in the matter. But I gather from E. B. C. that he was not struck with what I doubted: and I am very glad, at any rate, that you are very well pleased, both of you.

E. B. C. is quite right about obscurity of Phrase: which is inexcusable unless where the Passion of the Speakers makes such utterance natural. This is very often not the case in the Plays, I know: and the Language, as he says, becomes obscure from elaborate Brevity.

What you tell of the Music in the Air at your Father's Death--Oh, how Frederic Tennyson would open all his Eyes at this! For he lives in a World of Spirits--Swedenborg's World, which you would not approve; which I cannot sympathize with: but yet I admire the Titanic old Soul so resolutely blind to the Philosophy of the Day.

Oh, I think England would be much better for E. B. C. and you: but I can't say anything against what he thinks the Duty chalked out for him. I don't believe the English Rule will hold in India: but, meanwhile, a good Man may think he must do what Good he can there, come what may of it. There is also Good to be done in England!

The Wind is still very 'stingy' though the Sun shines, and though it blows from the West. So we are all better at our homes for the present.

Ever yours, E. F. G.

_To W. B. Donne_.

RAMSGATE: _August_ 27, [1865].

MY DEAR DONNE,

Your letter found me here, where I have been a week cruising about with my old Brother Peter. To morrow we leave--for Calais, as we propose; just to touch French Soil, and drink a Bottle of French Wine in the old Town: then home again to Woodbridge as fast as we may. For thither goes William Airy, partly in hopes of meeting me: he says he is much shaken by the dangerous illness he had this last Spring: and thinks, truly enough, that our chances of meeting in this World sensibly diminish.

You must not talk of my kindness to you at Lowestoft: when all the good is on your side, going out of your way to see me. Really it makes me ashamed.

Together with your Letter, I found a very kind one from Mrs. Kemble, who took the trouble to write only to tell me how well she liked the Plays. I know that Good Nature would not affect her Judgment (which I very honestly think too favourable), but it was Good Nature made her write to tell me.

Don't forget to sound Murray at some good opportunity about a Selection from Crabbe. Of course he won't let me do it, though I could do it better than any he would be likely to employ: for you know I rely on my Appreciation of what others do, not on what I can do myself.

The 'Parcel' you write of has not been sent me here: but I shall find it when I return, and will write to you again. I puzzle my Brains to remember what the '_Conscript_' is.

I have been reading, and reducing to one volume from two (_more meo_), a trashy Book, 'Bernard's Recollections of the Stage,' with some good recollections of the Old Actors, up to Macklin and Garrick. But, of all people's, one can't trust Actors' Stories. In 'Lethe,' where your Garrick figures in Sir Geoffrey, also figured Woodward, as 'The Fine Gentleman'; so I think, at least, is the Title of a very capital mezzotint I have of him in Character,

Oh! famous is your Story of Lord Chatham and the Bishops; {68} be sure you set it afloat again in print.

You don't tell me if Trench be recovered: but I shall conclude from your Silence that, at any rate, he is not now seriously ill.

Now I hear my good Brother come in from Morning Mass, and we shall have Breakfast. He is really capital to sail about with. I read your letter yesterday while sitting out on a Bench with her--his Wife--a brave Woman, of the O'Dowd sort; and she wanted to know all about you and yours. We like Ramsgate very much: genial air: pleasant Country: good Harbour, Piers, etc.: and the Company, though overflowing, not showy, nor vulgar: but seemingly come to make the most of a Holiday. I am surprized how little of the Cockney, in its worse aspect, is to be seen.

_To E. B. Cowell_.

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Septr._ 5/65.

MY DEAR COWELL,

Let me hear of you: I don't forget, though I don't see, you. Nor am I so wrapt up in my Ship as not to have many a day on which I should be very glad to dispense with her and have you over here: but I can't well make sure what day: sometimes I ask one man to go, sometimes another, and so all is cut up. Besides I was away six weeks in all at Lowestoft; then a fortnight at Ramsgate, Dover, Calais, etc. When the apple [Greek text] {69a}--then my Ship will be laid up, and one more Summer of mine departed, and then I hope you will come over to talk over many things.

Read Lady Duff Gordon's Letters from Egypt: which you won't like, because of some latitude in Religious thought, and also because of some vulgar _slang_, such as Schoolboys, and American Women use, and it is now the bad fashion for even English Ladies to adopt. But the Book is worth reading notwithstanding this, and making allowance for a Lady or Gentleman seeing all rose-colour in a new Pet or Plaything. On sending the Book back to the Library this morning I quote out of it something about Oriental Poetry which you may know well enough but I was not so conscious of. In a Love-song where the Lover declines a Physician for the wound which _the Wind_ (Love) has caused, he says 'For only _he_ who has hurt can cure me.' 'N.B. The masculine pronoun is always used instead of the feminine in Poetry, out of decorum: sometimes even in conversation.' {69b} (It being as forbidden to talk of women as to see them, etc.)

I was very pleased with Calais, which remains the 'vieille France' of my Childhood.

Donne came to see me for a Day at Lowestoft, the same 'vieil Donne' also of my Boyhood.

Ever yours, E. F. G.

_To John Allen_.

MARKETHILL: WOODBRIDGE. _Nov._ 1/65.

MY DEAR ALLEN,

Let me hear how you and yours are: it is now a long [time] since we exchanged Letters. G. Crabbe wrote me you were corresponding with a very different person: the Editor of the Times. I never see that nor any other Paper but the good old Athenaeum. G. Crabbe also said you were at the Norwich Congress. Then why didn't you come here? He said the Bishop of Oxford, whom he had never met before, met him at Lord Walsingham's, and shook him so cordially by the hand, and pressed him so for a visit to Oxford, that he (G. C.) rather thought he (Sam) deserved the Epithet usually added to his Name. Perhaps, however, the Bishop _did_ feel for a Grandson of the Poet.

I have no more to tell you of myself this past Summer than for so many Summers past. Only sailing about, Lowestoft, Ramsgate, Dover, Calais, etc. I was very pleased indeed with Calais; just as I remember it forty years ago except for the Soldiers' Uniform.

Duncan wrote me not a very cheerful Letter some while ago: he was unwell, of Cold and rheumatism, I think. Of other Friends I know nothing: but am going to write my annual Letters to them. What a State of things to come to! How one used to wonder, hearing our predecessors talk in that way, something! But I don't think our successors wonder if we talk so; for they seem to begin Life with indifference, instead of ending it.

My house is not yet finished: two rooms have taken about five months: which is not slow for Woodbridge. To day I have been catching Cold in looking at some Trees planted--'factura Nepotibus umbram.'

Now this precious Letter can't go to-night for want of Envelope; and in half an hour two Merchants are coming to eat Oysters and drink Burton ale. I would rather be alone, and smoke my own pipe in peace over one of Trollope's delightful Novels, 'Can you forgive her?'

Now, my dear Allen, here is enough of me, for your sake as well as mine. But let me hear something from you. All good Remembrances to the Wife and those of your Children who remember yours ever, E. F. G.

[WOODBRIDGE] _Decr._ 3/65.

MY DEAR ALLEN,

I enclose you two prints which may amuse you to look at and keep.

I have a wonderful Museum of such scraps of Portrait; about once a year a Man sends me a Portfolio of such things. But my chief Article is Murderers; and I am now having a Newgate Calendar from London. I don't ever wish to see and hear these things tried; but, when they are in print, I like to sit in Court then, and see the Judges, Counsel, Prisoners, Crowd: hear the Lawyers' Objections, the Murmur in the Court, etc.

The Charge is prepared; the Lawyers are met,
The Judges are rang'd, a terrible show.

De Soyres came here the other Day, and we were talking of you; he said you had invited Newman to your house. A brave thing, if you did. I think his Apology very noble; and himself quite honest, so far as he can see himself. The Passage in No. 7 of the Apology where he describes the State of the World as wholly irreflective of its Creator unless you turn--to Popery--is very grand.

Now I probably sha'n't write to you again before Christmas: so let me wish you and Mrs. Allen and your Family a Happy time of it.

Ever yours, E. F. G.

I was very disappointed in Miss Berry's Correspondence; one sees a Woman of Sense, Taste, Good Breeding, and I suppose, Good Looks; but what more, to make three great Volumes of! Compare her with Trench's Mother. And with all her perpetual travels to improve health and spirits (which lasted perfectly well to near ninety) one would have been more interested if there were one single intimation of caring about any Body but herself, helping one poor Person, etc.

I don't know if she or Mrs. Delany is dullest.

_To W. H. Thompson_.

WOODBRIDGE: _March_ 15/66.

MY DEAR THOMPSON,

To-day's Post brings me a Letter from Robert Groome, which tells me (on 'Times' authority) that you are Master of Trinity. Judging by your last Letter, I suppose this was unexpected by yourself: I have no means of knowing whether it was expected by others beside those who voted you to the Honour. For I had heard nothing further of the whole matter, even of Whewell's accident, than you yourself told me. Well, at our time of Life, any very vehement Congratulations are, I suppose, irrelevant on both sides. But I am very sure I do congratulate you heartily, if you are yourself gratified. Whether you are glad of the Post itself or not, you must, I think, be gratified with the Confidence in your Scholarship and Character which has made your Society elect you. And so far one may unreservedly congratulate you. . . .

To-day I was looking at the Carpenters, etc., carrying away Chips, etc., of a Tree I had cut down: and, coming home, read--

[Greek text] {74}--

Whose Line?--Certainly not of

Yours ever sincerely, E. F. G.

_To John Allen_.

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE, _March_ 19 [1866].

MY DEAR ALLEN,

You shall hear a very little about me; and you shall tell me a very little about yourself? I forget when I last wrote to you, or heard from you: I suppose, about the end of Autumn. Here have I been ever since, without stirring further than Ipswich: and seeing nobody you know except R. Groome once. He wrote me the other day to announce that Thompson was Master of Trinity; an Honour quite unexpected by Thompson himself, I conclude, seeing that he himself had written to me only a Fortnight before, telling me of Whewell's Disaster, and sincerely hoping for his Recovery, from a Dread of a new King Log or King Stork, he said. He also said something of coming here at Easter: which now, I suppose, he won't be able to do. I have written to congratulate him in a sober way on his Honours; for, at our Time of Life, I think exultation would be unseasonable on either side. He will make a magnanimous Master, I believe; doing all the Honours of his Station well, if he have health.

Spedding wrote me a kind long Letter some while ago. Duncan tells me Cameron has had a slight Paralysis. Death seems to rise like a Wall against one now whichever way one looks. When I read Boswell and other Memoirs now, what presses on me most is--All these people who talked and acted so busily are gone. It is said that when Talma advanced upon the Stage his Thought on facing the Audience was, that they were all soon to be Nothing.

I bought Croker's Boswell; which I find good to refer to, but not to read; so hashed up it is with interpolations. Besides, one feels somehow that a bad Fellow like Croker mars the Good Company he introduces. One should stop with Malone, who was a good Gentleman: only rather too loyal to Johnson, and so unjust to any who dared hint a fault in him. Yet _they_ were right. Madame D'Arblay, who was also so vext with Mrs. Piozzi, admits that she had a hard time with Johnson in his last two years; so irritable and violent he became that she says People would not ask _him_ when they invited all the rest of the Party.

Why, my Paper is done, talking about these dead and gone whom you and I have only known in Print; and yet as well so as most we know in person. I really find my Society in such Books; all the People seem humming about me. But now let me hear of you, Allen: and of Wife and Family.

Ever yours, E. F. G.

_To W. H. Thompson_.

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE. [_March_, 1866.]

MY DEAR THOMPSON,

I should write 'My dear Master' but I don't know if you are yet installed. However, I suppose my Letter, so addressed, will find you and not the Old Lion now stalking in the Shades. . . .

In burning up a heap of old Letters, which one's Executors and Heirs would make little of, I came upon several of Morton's from Italy: so good in Parts that I have copied those Parts into a Blank Book. When he was in his money Troubles I did the same from many other of his Letters, and Thackeray asked Blackwood to give ten pounds for them for his Magazine. But we heard no more of them.