Chapter V: Front Matter (5)

Soon afterwards she astonished her friends by marrying General D'Arblay, a French officer and a gentleman, although very poor. As the pair had an income of only one hundred pounds, this seems a perilously rash act for a woman over forty. Fortunately the match proved a very happy one, and the situation stimulated Madame D'Arblay to renewed authorship. 'Camilla,' her third novel, was sold by subscription, and was a very remunerative piece of work. But from a critical point of view it was a failure; and being written in a heavy pedantic style, is quite deficient in her early charm. With the proceeds she built a modest home, Camilla Cottage. Later the family moved to France, where her husband died and where her only son received his early education. When he was nearly ready for an English university she returned to England, and passed her tranquil age among her friends until she died at eighty-eight.

What Fanny Burney did in all unconsciousness was to establish fiction upon a new basis. She may be said to have created the family novel. Fielding, Smollett, and Sterne had bequeathed their legacy impregnated with objectionable qualities, in spite of strength and charm; they were read rather secretly, and tabooed for women. On the other hand, the followers of Richardson were too didactic to be readable. Fanny Burney proved that entertaining tales, unweighted by heavy moralizing, may be written, adapted to young and old. Her sketches of life were witty, sincere, and vigorous, yet always moral in tone. 'Evelina,' the work of an innocent, frank girl, could be read by any one.

A still greater source of her success was her robust and abounding, though sometimes rather broad and cheap, fun. In her time decent novels were apt to be appallingly serious in tone, and not infrequently stupid; humor in spite of Addison still connoted much coarseness and obtrusive sexuality, and in fiction had to be sought in the novels written for men only. As humor is the deadly foe to sentimentalism and hysterics, the Richardson school were equally averse to it on further grounds. Fanny Burney produced novels fit for women's and family reading, yet full of humor of a masculine vigor--and it must be added, with something of masculine unsensitiveness. There is little fineness to most of it; some is mere horseplay, some is extravagant farce: but it is deep and genuine, it supplied an exigent want, and deserved its welcome. De Morgan says it was like introducing dresses of glaring red and yellow and other crude colors into a country where every one had previously dressed in drab--a great relief, but not art. This is hard measure, however: some of her character-drawing is almost as richly humorous and valid as Jane Austen's own.

Fanny Burney undoubtedly did much to augment the new respect for woman's intellectual ability, and was a stimulus to the brilliant group which succeeded her. Miss Ferrier, Maria Edgeworth, and Jane Austen all owe her something of their inspiration and more of their welcome.

EVELINA'S LETTER TO THE REV. MR. VILLARS

From 'Evelina'

Holborn, June 17th

Yesterday Mr. Smith carried his point of making a party for Vauxhall, consisting of Madame Duval, M. Du Bois, all the Branghtons, Mr. Brown, himself,--and me!--for I find all endeavors vain to escape anything which these people desire I should not.

There were twenty disputes previous to our setting out; first as to the _time_ of our going: Mr. Branghton, his son, and young Brown, were for six o'clock, and all the ladies and Mr. Smith were for eight;--the latter, however, conquered. Then as to the _way_ we should go: some were for a boat, others for a coach, and Mr. Branghton himself was for walking; but the boat at length was decided upon. Indeed, this was the only part of the expedition that was agreeable to me; for the Thames was delightfully pleasant.

The garden is very pretty, but too formal; I should have been better pleased had it consisted less of straight walks, where

"Grove nods at grove, each alley has its brother."

The trees, the numerous lights, and the company in the circle round the orchestra make a most brilliant and gay appearance; and had I been with a party less disagreeable to me, I should have thought it a place formed for animation and pleasure. There was a concert, in the course of which a hautbois concerto was so charmingly played that I could have thought myself upon enchanted ground, had I had spirits more gentle to associate with. The hautbois in the open air is heavenly.

Mr. Smith endeavored to attach himself to me, with such officious assiduity and impertinent freedom that he quite sickened me. Indeed, M. Du Bois was the only man of the party to whom, voluntarily, I ever addressed myself. He is civil and respectful, and I have found nobody else so since I left Howard Grove. His English is very bad; but I prefer it to speaking French myself, which I dare not venture to do. I converse with him frequently, both to disengage myself from others and to oblige Madame Duval, who is always pleased when he is attended to.

As we were walking about the orchestra, I heard a bell ring; and in a moment Mr. Smith, flying up to me, caught my hand, and with a motion too quick to be resisted, ran away with me many yards before I had breath to ask his meaning; though I struggled as well as I could to get from him. At last, however, I insisted upon stopping. "Stopping, ma'am!" cried he, "why, we must run on, or we shall lose the cascade!"

And then again he hurried me away, mixing with a crowd of people, all running with so much velocity that I could not imagine what had raised such an alarm. We were soon followed by the rest of the party; and my surprise and ignorance proved a source of diversion to them all which was not exhausted the whole evening. Young Branghton, in particular, laughed till he could hardly stand.

The scene of the cascade I thought extremely pretty, and the general effect striking and lively.

But this was not the only surprise which was to divert them at my expense; for they led me about the garden purposely to enjoy my first sight of various other deceptions.

About ten o'clock, Mr. Smith having chosen a _box_ in a very conspicuous place, we all went to supper. Much fault was found with everything that was ordered, though not a morsel of anything was left, and the dearness of the provisions, with conjectures upon what profit was made by them, supplied discourse during the whole meal.

When wine and cyder were brought, Mr. Smith said, "Now let's enjoy ourselves; now is the time, or never. Well, ma'am, and how do you like Vauxhall?"

"Like it!" cried young Branghton; "why, how can she help liking it? She has never seen such a place before, that I'll answer for."

"For my part," said Miss Branghton, "I like it because it is not vulgar."

"This must have been a fine treat for you, Miss," said Mr. Branghton; "why, I suppose you was never so happy in all your life before?"

I endeavored to express my satisfaction with some pleasure; yet I believe they were much amazed at my coldness.

"Miss ought to stay in town till the last night," said young Branghton; "and then, it's my belief, she'd say something to it! Why, Lord, it's the best night of any; there's always a riot,--and there the folks run about,--and then there's such squealing and squalling!--and there, all the lamps are broke,--and the women run skimper-scamper--I declare, I would not take five guineas to miss the last night!"

I was very glad when they all grew tired of sitting, and called for the waiter to pay the bill. The Miss Branghtons said they would walk on while the gentlemen settled the account, and asked me to accompany them; which however I declined.

"You girls may do as you please," said Madame Duval, "but as to me, I promise you, I sha'n't go nowhere without the gentlemen."

"No more, I suppose, will my _cousin_," said Miss Branghton, looking reproachfully towards Mr. Smith.

This reflection, which I feared would flatter his vanity, made me most unfortunately request Madame Duval's permission to attend them. She granted it; and away we went, having promised to meet in the room.

To the room, therefore, I would immediately have gone: but the sisters agreed that they would first have a _little pleasure_; and they tittered and talked so loud that they attracted universal notice.

"Lord, Polly," said the eldest, "suppose we were to take a turn in the dark walks?"

"Ay, do," answered she; "and then we'll hide ourselves, and then Mr. Brown will think we are lost."

I remonstrated very warmly against this plan, telling them it would endanger our missing the rest of the party all the evening.

"O dear," cried Miss Branghton, "I thought how uneasy Miss would be, without a beau!"

This impertinence I did not think worth answering; and quite by compulsion I followed them down a long alley, in which there was hardly any light.

By the time we came near the end, a large party of gentlemen, apparently very riotous, and who were hallooing, leaning on one another, and laughing immoderately, seemed to rush suddenly from behind some trees, and meeting us face to face, put their arms at their sides and formed a kind of circle, which first stopped our proceeding and then our retreating, for we were presently entirely enclosed. The Miss Branghtons screamed aloud, and I was frightened exceedingly; our screams were answered with bursts of laughter, and for some minutes we were kept prisoners, till at last one of them, rudely seizing hold of me, said I was a pretty little creature.

Terrified to death, I struggled with such vehemence to disengage myself from him that I succeeded, in spite of his efforts to detain me: and immediately, and with a swiftness which fear only could have given me, I flew rather than ran up the walk, hoping to secure my safety by returning to the lights and company we had so foolishly left; but before I could possibly accomplish my purpose, I was met by another party of men, one of whom placed himself directly in my way, calling out, "Whither so fast, my love?"--so that I could only have proceeded by running into his arms.

In a moment both my hands, by different persons, were caught hold of, and one of them, in a most familiar manner, desired when I ran next to accompany me in a race; while the rest of the party stood still and laughed. I was almost distracted with terror, and so breathless with running that I could not speak; till another, advancing, said I was as handsome as an angel, and desired to be of the party. I then just articulated, "For Heaven's sake, gentlemen, let me pass!"

Another, then rushing suddenly forward, exclaimed, "Heaven and earth! what voice is that?"

"The voice of the prettiest little actress I have seen this age," answered one of my persecutors.

"No,--no,--no,--" I _panted_ out, "I am no actress--pray let me go,--pray let me pass--"

"By all that's sacred," cried the same voice, which I then knew for Sir Clement Willoughby's, "'tis herself!"

A MAN OF THE TON

From 'Cecilia'

At the door of the Pantheon they were joined by Mr. Arnott and Sir Robert Floyer, whom Cecilia now saw with added aversion; they entered the great room during the second act of the concert, to which, as no one of the party but herself had any desire to listen, no sort of attention was paid; the ladies entertaining themselves as if no orchestra was in the room, and the gentlemen, with an equal disregard to it, struggling for a place by the fire, about which they continued hovering till the music was over.

Soon after they were seated, Mr. Meadows, sauntering towards them, whispered something to Mrs. Mears, who, immediately rising, introduced him to Cecilia; after which, the place next to her being vacant, he cast himself upon it, and lolling as much at his ease as his situation would permit, began something like a conversation with her.

"Have you been long in town, ma'am?"

"No, sir."

"This is not your first winter?"

"Of being in town, it is."

"Then you have something new to see; oh charming! how I envy you!--Are you pleased with the Pantheon?"

"Very much; I have seen no building at all equal to it."

"You have not been abroad. Traveling is the ruin of all happiness! There's no looking at a building here after seeing Italy."

"Does all happiness, then, depend upon sight of buildings?" said Cecilia, when, turning towards her companion, she perceived him yawning, with such evident inattention to her answer that, not choosing to interrupt his reverie, she turned her head another way.

For some minutes he took no notice of this; and then, as if suddenly recollecting himself, he called out hastily, "I beg your pardon, ma'am, you were saying something?"

"No, sir; nothing worth repeating."

"Oh, pray don't punish me so severely as not to let me hear it!"

Cecilia, though merely not to seem offended at his negligence, was then beginning an answer, when looking at him as she spoke, she perceived that he was biting his nails with so absent an air that he appeared not to know he had asked any question. She therefore broke off, and left him to his cogitation.

Some time after, he addressed her again, saying, "Don't you find this place extremely tiresome, ma'am?"

"Yes, sir," said she half laughing, "it is indeed not very entertaining!"

"Nothing is entertaining," answered he, "for two minutes together. Things are so little different one from another, that there is no making pleasure out of anything. We go the same dull round forever; nothing new, no variety! all the same thing over again! Are you fond of public places, ma'am?"

"Yes, sir, _soberly_, as Lady Grace says."

"Then I envy you extremely, for you have some amusement always in your own power. How desirable that is!"

"And have you not the same resources?"

"Oh no! I am tired to death! tired of everything! I would give the universe for a disposition less difficult to please. Yet, after all, what is there to give pleasure? When one has seen one thing, one has seen everything. Oh, 'tis heavy work! Don't you find it so, ma'am?"

This speech was ended with so violent a fit of yawning that Cecilia would not trouble herself to answer it: but her silence as before passed unnoticed, exciting neither question nor comment.

A long pause now succeeded, which he broke at last by saying, as he writhed himself about upon his seat, "These forms would be much more agreeable if there were backs to them. 'Tis intolerable to be forced to sit like a schoolboy. The first study of life is ease. There is indeed no other study that pays the trouble of attainment. Don't you think so, ma'am?"

"But may not even that," said Cecilia, "by so much study become labor?"

"I am vastly happy you think so."

"Sir?"

"I beg your pardon, ma'am, but I thought you said--I really beg your pardon, but I was thinking of something else."

"You did very right, sir," said Cecilia, laughing, "for what I said by no means merited any attention."

"Will you do me the favor to repeat it?" cried he, taking out his glass to examine some lady at a distance.

"Oh no," said Cecilia, "that would be trying your patience too severely."

"These glasses shew one nothing but defects," said he; "I am sorry they were ever invented. They are the ruin of all beauty; no complexion can stand them. I believe that solo will never be over! I hate a solo; it sinks, it depresses me intolerably."

"You will presently, sir," said Cecilia, looking at the bill of the concert, "have a full piece; and that I hope will revive you."

"A full piece! oh, insupportable! it stuns, it fatigues, it overpowers me beyond endurance! no taste in it, no delicacy, no room for the smallest feeling."

"Perhaps, then, you are only fond of singing?"

"I should be, if I could hear it; but we are now so miserably off in voices, that I hardly ever attempt to listen to a song, without fancying myself deaf from the feebleness of the performers. I hate everything that requires attention. Nothing gives pleasure that does not force its own way."

"You only, then, like loud voices, and great powers?"

"Oh, worse and worse!--no, nothing is so disgusting to me. All my amazement is that these people think it worth while to give concerts at all--one is sick to death of music."

"Nay," cried Cecilia, "if it gives no pleasure, at least it takes none away; for, far from being any impediment to conversation, I think everybody talks more during the performance than between the acts. And what is there better you could substitute in its place?"

Cecilia, receiving no answer to this question, again looked round to see if she had been heard; when she observed her new acquaintance, with a very thoughtful air, had turned from her to fix his eyes upon the statue of Britannia.

Very soon after, he hastily arose, and seeming entirely to forget that he had spoken to her, very abruptly walked away.

Mr. Gosport, who was advancing to Cecilia and had watched part of this scene, stopped him as he was retreating, and said, "Why, Meadows, how's this? are you caught at last?"

"Oh, worn to death! worn to a thread!" cried he, stretching himself and yawning; "I have been talking with a young lady to entertain her! oh, such heavy work! I would not go through it again for millions!"

"What, have you talked yourself out of breath?"

"No; but the effort! the effort!--Oh, it has unhinged me for a fortnight!--Entertaining a young lady!--one had better be a galley-slave at once!"

"Well, but did she not pay your toils? She is surely a sweet creature."

"Nothing can pay one for such insufferable exertion! though she's well enough, too--better than the common run--but shy, quite too shy; no drawing her out."

"I thought that was to your taste. You commonly hate much volubility. How have I heard you bemoan yourself when attacked by Miss Larolles!"

"Larolles! Oh, distraction! she talks me into a fever in two minutes. But so it is for ever! nothing but extremes to be met with! common girls are too forward, this lady is too reserved--always some fault! always some drawback! nothing ever perfect!"

"Nay, nay," cried Mr. Gosport, "you do not know her; she is perfect enough, in all conscience."

"Better not know her then," answered he, again yawning, "for she cannot be pleasing. Nothing perfect is natural,--I hate everything out of nature."

MISS BURNEY'S FRIENDS

From the 'Letters'

But Dr. Johnson's approbation!--it almost crazed me with agreeable surprise--it gave me such a flight of spirits that I danced a jig to Mr. Crisp, without any preparation, music, or explanation--to his no small amazement and diversion. I left him, however, to make his own comments upon my friskiness, without affording him the smallest assistance.

Susan also writes me word that when my father went last to Streatham, Dr. Johnson was not there, but Mrs. Thrale told him that when he gave her the first volume of 'Evelina,' which she had lent him, he said, "Why, madam, why, what a charming book you lent me!" and eagerly inquired for the rest. He was particularly pleased with the snow-hill scenes, and said that Mr. Smith's vulgar gentility was admirably portrayed; and when Sir Clement joins them, he said there was a shade of character prodigiously well marked. Well may it be said, that the greatest minds are ever the most candid to the inferior set! I think I should love Dr. Johnson for such lenity to a poor mere worm in literature, even if I were not myself the identical grub he has obliged.

Susan has sent me a little note which has really been less pleasant to me, because it has alarmed me for my future concealment. It is from Mrs. Williams, an exceeding pretty poetess, who has the misfortune to be blind, but who has, to make some amends, the honor of residing in the house of Dr. Johnson; for though he lives almost wholly at Streatham, he always keeps his apartments in town, and this lady acts as mistress of his house.

JULY 25.

"Mrs. Williams sends compliments to Dr. Burney, and begs he will
intercede with Miss Burney to do her the favor to lend her the
reading of 'Evelina.'"

Though I am frightened at this affair, I am by no means insensible to the honor which I receive from the certainty that Dr. Johnson must have spoken very well of the book, to have induced Mrs. Williams to send to our house for it.

I now come to last Saturday evening, when my beloved father came to Chesington, in full health, charming spirits, and all kindness, openness, and entertainment.

In his way hither he had stopped at Streatham, and he settled with Mrs. Thrale that he would call on her again in his way to town, and carry me with him! and Mrs. Thrale said, "We all long to know her."

I have been in a kind of twitter ever since, for there seems something very formidable in the idea of appearing as an authoress! I ever dreaded it, as it is a title which must raise more expectations than I have any chance of answering. Yet I am highly flattered by her invitation, and highly delighted in the prospect of being introduced to the Streatham society.

She sent me some very serious advice to write for the theatre, as she says I so naturally run into conversations that 'Evelina' absolutely and plainly points out that path to me; and she hinted how much she should be pleased to be "honored with my confidence."

My dear father communicated this intelligence, and a great deal more, with a pleasure that almost surpassed that with which I heard it, and he seems quite eager for me to make another attempt. He desired to take upon himself the communication to my Daddy Crisp; and as it is now in so many hands that it is possible accident might discover it to him, I readily consented.

Sunday evening, as I was going into my father's room, I heard him say, "The variety of characters--the variety of scenes--and the language--why, she has had very little education but what she has given herself--less than any of the others!" and Mr. Crisp exclaimed, "Wonderful!--it's wonderful!"

I now found what was going forward, and therefore deemed it most fitting to decamp.

About an hour after, as I was passing through the hall, I met my daddy [Crisp]. His face was all animation and archness; he doubled his fist at me and would have stopped me, but I ran past him into the parlor.

Before supper, however, I again met him, and he would not suffer me to escape; he caught both my hands and looked as if he would have looked me through, and then exclaimed, "Why, you little hussy--you young devil!--ain't you ashamed to look me in the face, you _Evelina_, you! Why, what a dance have you led me about it! Young friend, indeed! O you little hussy, what tricks have you served me!"

I was obliged to allow of his running on with these gentle appellations for I know not how long, ere he could sufficiently compose himself, after his great surprise, to ask or hear any particulars; and then he broke out every three instants with exclamations of astonishment at how I had found time to write so much unsuspected, and how and where I had picked up such various materials; and not a few times did he with me, as he had with my father, exclaim "Wonderful!"

He has since made me read him all my letters upon this subject. He said Lowndes would have made an estate had he given me L1000 for it, and that he ought not to have given less! "You have nothing to do now," continued he, "but to take your pen in hand; for your fame and reputation are made, and any bookseller will snap at what you write."

I then told him that I could not but really and unaffectedly regret that the affair was spread to Mrs. Williams and her friends.

"Pho," said he: "if those who are proper judges think it right that it should be known, why should you trouble yourself about it? You have not spread it, there can no imputation of vanity fall to your share, and it cannot come out more to your honor than through such a channel as Mrs. Thrale."

* * * * *

LONDON, AUGUST.--I have now to write an account of the most consequential day I have spent since my birth; namely, my Streatham visit.

Our journey to Streatham was the least pleasant part of the day, for the roads were dreadfully dusty, and I was really in the fidgets from thinking what my reception might be, and from fearing they would expect a less awkward and backward kind of person than I was sure they would find.

Mr. Thrale's house is white, and very pleasantly situated in a fine paddock. Mrs. Thrale was strolling about, and came to us as we got out of the chaise.

She then received me, taking both my hands, and with mixed politeness and cordiality welcoming me to Streatham. She led me into the house, and addressed herself almost wholly for a few minutes to my father, as if to give me an assurance she did not mean to regard me as a show, or to distress or frighten me by drawing me out. Afterwards she took me up stairs, and showed me the house, and said she had very much wished to see me at Streatham; and should always think herself much obliged to Dr. Burney for his goodness in bringing me, which she looked upon as a very great favor.

But though we were some time together, and though she was so very civil, she did not _hint_ at my book, and I love her much more than ever for her delicacy in avoiding a subject which she could not but see would have greatly embarrassed me.

When we returned to the music-room, we found Miss Thrale was with my father. Miss Thrale is a very fine girl, about fourteen years of age, but cold and reserved, though full of knowledge and intelligence.

Soon after, Mrs. Thrale took me to the library; she talked a little while upon common topics, and then at last she mentioned 'Evelina.'

"Yesterday at supper," said she, "we talked it all over, and discussed all your characters; but Dr. Johnson's favorite is Mr. Smith. He declares the fine gentleman _manque_ was never better drawn, and he acted him all the evening, saying 'he was all for the ladies!' He repeated whole scenes by heart. I declare I was astonished at him. Oh, you can't imagine how much he is pleased with the book; he 'could not get rid of the rogue,' he told me. But was it not droll," said she, "that I should recommend it to Dr. Burney? and tease him so innocently to read it?"

I now prevailed upon Mrs. Thrale to let me amuse myself, and she went to dress. I then prowled about to choose some book, and I saw upon the reading-table 'Evelina.' I had just fixed upon a new translation of Cicero's Laelius, when the library door was opened, and Mr. Seward entered. I instantly put away my book because I dreaded being thought studious and affected. He offered his services to find anything for me, and then in the same breath ran on to speak of the book with which I had myself "favored the world"!

The exact words he began with I cannot recollect, for I was actually confounded by the attack; and his abrupt manner of letting me know he was _au fait_ equally astonished and provoked me. How different from the delicacy of Mr. and Mrs. Thrale!

When we were summoned to dinner, Mrs. Thrale made my father and me sit on each side of her. I said that I hoped I did not take Dr. Johnson's place;--for he had not yet appeared.

"No," answered Mrs. Thrale, "he will sit by you, which I am sure will give him great pleasure."

Soon after we were seated, this great man entered. I have so true a veneration for him, that the very sight of him inspires me with delight and reverence, notwithstanding the cruel infirmities to which he is subject; for he has almost perpetual convulsive movements, either of his hands, lips, feet, or knees, and sometimes of all together.

Mrs. Thrale introduced me to him, and he took his place. We had a noble dinner, and a most elegant dessert. Dr. Johnson, in the middle of dinner, asked Mrs. Thrale what was in some little pies that were near him.

"Mutton," answered she, "so I don't ask you to eat any, because I know you despise it!"

"No, madam, no," cried he; "I despise nothing that is good of its sort; but I am too proud now to eat of it. Sitting by Miss Burney makes me very proud to-day!"

"Miss Burney," said Mrs. Thrale, laughing, "you must take great care of your heart if Dr. Johnson attacks it; for I assure you he is not often successless."

"What's that you say, madam?" cried he; "are you making mischief between the young lady and me already?"

A little while after he drank Miss Thrale's health and mine, and then added:--

"'Tis a terrible thing that we cannot wish young ladies well without wishing them to become old women!"

"But some people," said Mr. Seward, "are old and young at the same time, for they wear so well that they never look old."

"No, sir, no," cried the doctor, laughing; "that never yet was: you might as well say they are at the same time tall and short."

ROBERT BURNS

(1759-1796)

BY RICHARD HENRY STODDARD

There have been, there are, and there always will be, poets concerning whose lives it is not necessary that the world should know anything in order to understand their poetry; and there have been, there are, and there always will be, other poets concerning whose lives it is necessary that the world should know all there is to be known, before it can begin to understand their poetry. The difference between these two classes of poets is the difference between a company of accomplished actors, who by virtue of their training and practice are able to project themselves into imaginary characters on the public stage, and the originals of these characters in private personal life; or to put it in other words, the difference between art and nature. It is the privilege of art to dispense with explanations and extenuations; for if it be true to itself it is sufficient in itself, and anything added to it or taken from it is an impertinence or a deformity. When we read 'Hamlet' and 'Lear,' or 'As You Like It' and 'Much Ado About Nothing,' we do not ask ourselves what Shakespeare meant by them,--why some scenes were written in verse and other scenes in prose,--for it is not of Shakespeare that we are thinking as we read, but of his characters, for whom we feel that he is no more responsible than we are, since they move, live, and have their being in a world of their own, above the smoke and stir of this dim spot which men call Earth,--the world of pure, perfect, poetic art. If Shakespeare was conscious of himself when he wrote, he succeeded in concealing himself so thoroughly that it is impossible to discover him in his writing,--as impossible as it is not to discover other poets in their writings; for whatever is absent from the choir of British song, the note of personality is always present there. A low laugh in the gracious mouth of Chaucer, a harsh rebuke on the stern lips of Milton, a modish sneer in the smile of Pope,--it was now a stifled complaint, now an amorous ditty, and now a riotous shout with Burns, who was as much a poet through his personality as through his genius. He put his life into his song; and not to know what his life was, is not to know what his song is,--why it was a consolation to him while he lived, and why after his death it made his--

"One of the few, the immortal names,
That were not born to die."

Early in the last half of the eighteenth century a staid and worthy man, named William Burness (as the name Burns was then spelled), a native of Kincardineshire, emigrated to Ayrshire in pursuit of a livelihood. He hired himself as a gardener to the laird of Fairlie, and later to a Mr. Crawford of Doonside, and at length took a lease of seven acres of land on his own account at Alloway on the banks of the Doon. He built a clay cottage there with his own hands, and to this little cottage, in December 1757, he brought a wife, the eldest daughter of a farmer of Carrick. There was a disparity in their ages, for he was about thirty-six and she some eight or nine years younger; and a disparity in their education, for he was an intelligent reader and lover of books, while she, though she had been taught as a child to read the Bible and to repeat the Psalms, was not able to write her name. She had a great respect for her husband, whose occupation was now that of a nurseryman. A little more than a year after their marriage, on the 25th of January, 1759, she bore him a son who was christened Robert, who was followed, as time went on, by brothers and sisters; and before many years were over, what with the guidman, the guidwife, and the bonny bairns, there was not much spare room in the little clay biggin at Alloway.

Poor as they were, the social condition of this Scottish family was superior to the social condition of most English families in the same walk of rustic life; this superiority resulting from certain virtues inherent in the national character,--the virtues of simple appetites and frugal habits, of patience and courage in adversity, and best of all, in affectionate hearts, reverential minds, and a thirst for knowledge which only books could supply. William Burness inherited respect for education from his father, who in his young manhood was instrumental in building a schoolhouse on his farm at Clockenhill. Accordingly, when his son Robert was in his sixth year he sent him to a little school at Alloway Mill, about a mile from his cottage; and not long after he took the lead in hiring a young teacher named Murdoch to instruct him and his younger brother Gilbert at some place near at hand. Their school-books consisted of the Shorter Catechism, the Bible, the spelling-book, and Fisher's 'English Grammar.' Robert was a better scholar than Gilbert, especially in grammar, in which he acquired some proficiency. The only book which he is known to have read outside of his primitive curriculum was a 'Life of Hannibal,' which was loaned him by his teacher. When he was seven the family removed to a small upland farm called Mount Oliphant, about two miles from Alloway, to and from which the boys plodded daily in pursuit of learning. At the end of two years the teacher obtained a better situation in Carrick; the school was broken up, and from that time onward William Burness took upon himself the education of his lads and lassies, whom he treated as if they were men and women, conversing with them on serious topics as they accompanied him in his labors on the farm, and borrowing for their edification, from a Book Society in Ayr, solid works like Derham's 'Physico- and Astro-Theology' and Ray's 'Wisdom of God in the Creation.' This course of heavy reading was lightened by the 'History of Sir William Wallace,' which was loaned to Robert by a blacksmith named Kilpatrick, and which forced a hot flood of Scottish feeling through his boyish veins. His next literary benefactor was a brother of his mother, who while living for a time with the family had learned some arithmetic by their winter evening's candle. He went one day into a bookseller's shop in Ayr to purchase a Ready Reckoner and a Complete Letter-Writer, but procured by mistake in place of the latter a small collection of 'Letters by Eminent Wits,' which proved of more advantage (or disadvantage) to his nephew than to himself, for it inspired the lad with a desire to excel in epistolary writing. Not long after this Robert's early tutor Murdoch returned to Ayr, and lent him Pope's Works; a bookish friend of his father's obtained for him the reading of two volumes of Richardson's 'Pamela' and another friendly soul the reading of Smollett's 'Ferdinand Count Fathom,' and 'Peregrine Pickle.' The book which most delighted him, however, was a collection of English songs called 'The Lark.'

Mount Oliphant taxed the industry and endurance of William Burness to the utmost; and what with the sterility of the soil, which was the poorest in the parish, and the loss of cattle by accidents and disease, it was with great difficulty that he managed to support his family. They lived so sparingly that butcher's meat was for years a stranger in the house, and they labored, children and all, from morning to night. Robert, at the age of thirteen, assisted in threshing the crop of corn, and at fifteen he was the principal laborer on the farm, for they could not afford a hired hand. That he was constantly afflicted with a dull headache in the evenings was not to be wondered at; nor that the sight and thought of his gray-haired father, who was turned fifty, should depress his spirits and impart a tinge of gloom to his musings. It was under circumstances like these that he composed his first song, the inspiration of which was a daughter of the blacksmith who had loaned him the 'History of Sir William Wallace.' It was the custom of the country to couple a man and woman together in the labors of harvest; and on this occasion his partner was Nelly Kilpatrick, with whom, boy-like,--for he was in his seventeenth year and she a year younger,--he liked to lurk behind the rest of the hands when they returned from their labors in the evening, and who made his pulse beat furiously when he fingered over her little hand to pick out the cruel nettle-stings and thistles. She sang sweetly, and among her songs there was one which was said to be composed by a small laird's son about one of his father's maids, with whom he was in love; and Robert saw no reason why he should not rhyme as well as he, for the author had no more school-craft than himself. Writing of this song a few years later, he called it puerile and silly; and his verdict as a poetical one was correct. Still, considered as a song, this artless effusion possessed one merit of which he himself was probably not conscious: it was inspired by his feeling and not by his reading, by the warmth and purity of his love of Nelly Kilpatrick, and not by his admiration of any amorous ditty in his collection of English songs. It was a poor thing, but it was certainly his own, and nowhere more so than in its recognition of the womanly personality of its heroine:--

"And then there's something in her gait
Gars ony dress look weel."

This touch of nature, which no modish artist would have attempted, marked the hand of one who painted from the life.

William Burness struggled along for twelve years at Mount Oliphant, and then removed to Lochlea, in the parish of Tarbolton. Here he rented a larger farm, the soil of which promised a surer maintenance for himself and the hostages he had given to Fortune. And there these loving hostages began to put away childish things, and to become men and women. They were cheerful, in spite of the frugality which their poverty imposed upon them; and were merry in their simple homely way, singing and dancing among themselves and among their friendly neighbors. Their hearts expanded in the healthy air about them, particularly the heart of Robert, which turned to thoughts of love,--not lightly, as in his boyish fancy for Nelly Kilpatrick, but seriously, as beseemed a man; for he was now in his nineteenth year, and as conscious of what he was to woman as of what woman was to him. A born lover, and a born poet, he discovered himself and his song at Tarbolton. The custom of the country and the time sanctioned a freedom of manners, and a frequency of meeting on the part of rustic amorists, of which he was not slow to avail himself. The love affairs of the Scottish peasantry are thus described by one of his biographers:--"The young farmer or plowman, after his day of exhausting toil, would proceed to the home of his mistress, one, two, three, or more miles distant, there signal her to the door, and then the pair would seat themselves in the barn for an hour or two's conversation." Burns practiced this mode of courtship, which was the only one open to him, and among the only women whom he knew at Tarbolton. "He made no distinction between the farmer's own daughters and those who acted as his servants, the fact after all being that the servants were often themselves the daughters of farmers, and only sent to be the hirelings of others because their services were not needed at home." We should remember this habit of the Scottish peasantry if we wish to understand the early songs of Burns; for they were suggested by it, and vitalized by it, as much as by his impassioned genius. He painted what he saw; he sang what he felt. We have a glimpse of him in one of his winter courtships in 'My Nanie, O'; another and warmer glimpse of him in one of his summer courtships in 'The Rigs o' Barley'; and another and livelier glimpse of him in one of his mocking moods in 'Tibbie, I hae seen the day.' But he was more than the lover which these songs revealed: he was a man of sound understanding and fine, active intelligence, gifted with ready humor and a keen sense of wit. If he had been other than he was, he might and probably would have been elated by his poetic powers, of which he must have been aware; but being what he was, he was content to enjoy them and to exercise them modestly, and at such scanty intervals as his daily duties afforded. He composed his songs as he went about his work, plowing, sowing, reaping; crooning them as he strode along the fields, and correcting them in his head as the hours dragged on, until night came, and he could write them down in his little room by the light of his solitary candle. He had no illusions about himself: he was the son of a poor farmer, who, do what he might, was never prosperous; and poverty was his portion. His apprehension, which was justified by the misfortunes of the family at Mount Oliphant, was confirmed by their dark continuance at Tarbolton, where he saw his honored father, bowed with years of toil, grow older and feebler day by day, dying of consumption before his eyes. The end came on February 13th, 1784; and a day or two afterwards the humble coffin of William Burness, arranged between two leading horses placed after each other, and followed by relations and neighbors on horseback, was borne to Alloway and buried in the old kirkyard.

The funeral over, the family removed to Mossgiel, in the parish of Mauchline, where, at Martinmas, Robert and Gilbert had rented another farm. Having no means of their own, they and their sisters were obliged to rank as creditors of their dead father for the arrears of wages due them as laborers at Lochlea; and it was with these arrears, which they succeeded in wresting from their old landlord or his factor, that they stocked the new farm. The change was a beneficial one for all the family, who were now for the first time in their lives provided with a comfortable dwelling; and everything considered, especially so for their head,--which Robert, who was now in his twenty-sixth year, virtually became. He realized the gravity of the responsibility which rested upon him, and rightly judging that industry alone would not enable him to support it, resolved to work with the brains of others as well as his own hard hands. He read farming books, he calculated crops, he attended markets, but all to no purpose; for like his father before him, however much he may have deserved success, he could not command it. What he could and did command however was the admiration of his fellows, who were quick to perceive and ready to acknowledge his superiority. There was that about him which impressed them,--something in his temperament or talent, in his personality or character, which removed him from the roll of common men. What seemed to distinguish him most was the charm of his conversation, which, remarkable as it was for fluency and force, for originality and brilliancy, was quite as remarkable for good sense and good feeling. Grave or gay, as the occasion suggested and the spirit moved him, he spoke as with authority and was listened to with rapt attention. His company was sought, and go where he would he was everywhere welcomed as a good fellow. He had the art of making friends; and though they were not always of the kind that his well-wishers could have desired, they were the best of their kind in and about Mauchline. What he saw in some of them, other than the pleasure they felt in his society, it is hard to say; but whatever it was, he liked it and the conviviality to which it led,--which, occasionally coarsened by stories that set the table in a roar, was ever and anon refined by songs that filled his eyes with tears. His life was a hard one,--a succession of dull, monotonous, laborious days, haunted by anxiety and harassed by petty, irritating cares,--but he faced it cheerfully, manfully, and wrestled with it triumphantly, for he compelled it to forge the weapons with which he conquered it. He sang like a boy at Lochlea; he wrote like a man at Mossgiel. The first poetical note that he struck there was a personal one, and commemorative of his regard for two rustic rhymers, David Sillar and John Lapraik, to whom he addressed several Epistles,--a form of composition which he found in Ferguson and Ramsay, and of which he was enamored. That he thoroughly enjoyed the impulse which suggested and dictated these Epistles was evident from the spirit with which they were written. In the first of the two, which he addressed to Sillar, he discovered and disclosed for the first time the distinctive individuality of his genius. It was a charming and touching piece of writing; charming as a delineation of his character, and touching as a confession of his creed,--the patient philosophy of the poor. As his social horizon was enlarged, his mental vision was sharpened; and before long, other interests than those which concerned himself and his poetical friends excited his sympathies and stimulated his powers. It was a period of theological squabbles, and he plunged into them at once, partly no doubt because there was a theological strain in his blood, but largely because they furnished opportunities for the riotous exercise of his wit. He paid his disrespects to the fomenters of this holy brawl in 'The Twa Herds,' and he pilloried an old person who was obnoxious to him, in that savage satire on sanctimonious hypocrisy, 'Holy Willy's Prayer.' Always a poet, he was more, much more than a poet. He was a student of man,--of all sorts of men; caring much, as a student, for the baser sort which reveled in Poosie Nansie's dram-shop, and which he celebrated in 'The Jolly Beggars'; but caring more, as a man, for the better sort which languished in huts where poor men lodged, and of which he was the voice of lamentation in 'Man was Made to Mourn.' He was a student of manners, which he painted with a sure hand, his masterpiece being that reverential reproduction of the family life at Lochlea,--'The Cotter's Saturday Night.' He was a student of nature,--his love of which was conspicuous in his poetry, flushing his words with picturesque phrases and flooding his lines with the feeling of outdoor life. He was a student of animal life,--a lover of horses and dogs, observant of their habits and careful of their comfort. He felt for the little mouse which his plowshare turned out of its nest, and he pitied the poor hare which the unskillful fowler could only wound. The commoners of earth and air were dear to him; and the flower beside his path, the gowan wet with dew, was precious in his eyes. His heart was large, his mind was comprehensive, and his temper singularly sweet and sunny.

Such was Robert Burns at Mossgiel, and a very likable person he was. But all the while there was another Robert Burns at Mossgiel, and he was not quite so likable. He had a strange fascination for women, and a strange disregard of the consequences of this fascination. This curious combination of contradictory traits was an unfortunate one, as a young woman of Mauchline was destined to learn. She was the daughter of a mason, and her name was Jean Armour. He met her on a race day at a house of entertainment which must have been popular, since it contained a dancing-hall, admission to which was free, any man being privileged to invite to it any woman whom he fancied and for whose diversion he was willing to disburse a penny to the fiddler. He was accompanied on this occasion by his dog, who insisted on following him into the hall and persisted in keeping at his heels while he danced,--a proof of its fidelity which created considerable amusement, and which its master turned to his personal account by saying he wished he could get any of the lasses to like him as well as his dog. Jean heard his remark, and not long afterwards, as he was passing through the washing-green where she was bleaching clothes (from which she begged him to call off his troublesome follower), she reminded him of it by asking him if he had yet got any of the lasses to like him as well as did his dog? He got one there and then; for from that hour Jean was attached to him and he to Jean. He was reticent about his conquest, concealing it from his closest friends, and even from his dearest foe, the Muse; but however reticent, his conquest was not to be concealed, for Jean one day discovered that she was with child. What he felt when this calamity was made known to him we know not, for he kept his own counsel. What he wished his friends to feel, if they could and would, we may divine from a poem which he wrote about this time,--an address to the rigidly righteous, into whose minds he sought to instill the charity of which he and Jean were sorely in need:--

"Then gently scan your brother man,
Still gentler sister woman;
Though they may gang a kennin' wrang
To step aside is human:

"One point must still be greatly dark,
The moving why they do it;
And just as lamely can ye mark
How far perhaps they rue it."