Chapter VII (2)

The day for Fieschi's death was purposely kept secret; and he was executed at a remote quarter of the town. But the scene on the morning when his execution did not take place was never forgotten by the young English artist.

It was carnival time, and the rumour had pretty generally been carried abroad that the culprit was to die on that day. A friend who accompanied Thackeray came many miles through the mud and dark, in order to be 'in at the death.' They set out before light, floundering through the muddy Champs Elysées, where were many others bent upon the same errand. They passed by the Concert of Musard, then held in the Rue St. Honoré; and round this, in the wet, a number of coaches were collected: the ball was just up; and a crowd of people, in hideous masquerade, drunk, tired, dirty, dressed in horrible old frippery and daubed with filthy rouge, were trooping out of the place; tipsy women and men, shrieking, jabbering, gesticulating, as Frenchmen will do; parties swaggering, staggering forwards, arm in arm, reeling to and fro across the street, and yelling songs in chorus. Hundreds of these were bound for the show, and the two friends thought themselves lucky in finding a vehicle to the execution place, at the Barrière d'Enfer. As they crossed the river, and entered the Rue d'Enfer, crowds of students, black workmen, and more drunken devils from carnival balls, were filling it; and on the grand place there were thousands of these assembled, looking out for Fieschi and his _cortége_. They waited, but no throat-cutting that morning; no august spectacle of satisfied justice; and the eager spectators were obliged to return, disappointed of the expected breakfast of blood.

The other attempt was equally unfortunate. The same friend accompanied him, but they arrived too late on the ground to be present at the execution of Lacénaire and his co-mate in murder, Avril. But as they came to the spot (a gloomy round space, within the barrier--three roads led to it--and, outside, they saw the wine-shops and restaurateurs of the barrier looking gay and inviting), they only found, in the midst of it, a little pool of ice, just partially tinged with red. Two or three idle street boys were dancing and stamping about this pool; and when the Englishmen asked one of them whether the execution had taken place, he began dancing more madly than ever, and shrieked out with a loud fantastical theatrical voice, '_Venez tous, Messieurs et Dames; voyez ici le sang du monstre Lacénaire et de son compagnon le traître Avril_;' and straightway all the other gamins screamed out the words in chorus, and took hands and danced round the little puddle.

Thackeray returned to London in March 1836, and resided for a few months in the house of his step-father, Major Henry Carmichael Smyth. The principal object of his return was to concert with the Major, who was a gentleman of some literary attainments, a project for starting a daily newspaper. The time was believed to be remarkably opportune for the new journal; the old oppressive newspaper stamp being about to be repealed, and a penny stamp, giving the privilege of a free transmission through the post, to be substituted. Their project was to form a small joint-stock company, to be called the Metropolitan Newspaper Company, with a capital of 60,000_l._, in shares of 10_l._ each. The Major, as chief proprietor, became chairman of the new company; Laman Blanchard was appointed editor, Douglas Jerrold the dramatic critic, and Thackeray the Paris correspondent. An old and respectable, though decaying journal, entitled the 'Public Ledger,' was purchased by the company; and on September 15, the first day of the reduced stamp duty, the newspaper was started with the title of the 'Constitutional and Public Ledger.' The politics of the paper were ultra-liberal. Its programme was entire freedom of the press, extension of popular suffrage, vote by ballot, shortening of duration of parliaments, equality of civil rights and religious liberty. A number of the most eminent of the advanced party, including Mr. Grote, Sir William Molesworth, Mr. Joseph Hume, and Colonel Thompson, publicly advertised their intention to support the new journal, and to promote its circulation. Thackeray's Paris letters, signed 'T. T.,' commenced on September 24, and were continued at intervals until the spring of the following year. They present little worth notice. At that time the chatty correspondent who discourses upon all things save the subject of his letter was a thing unknown. Bare facts, such as the telegraph-wire now brings us, with here and there a _soupçon_ of philosophical reflection, were the utmost that the readers of newspapers in those days demanded of the useful individual who kept watch in the capital of civilisation for events of interest. Generally, however, the letters are characterised by a strong distaste for the Government of July, and by an ardent liberalism which had but slightly cooled down when, at the Oxford election in 1857, he declared himself an uncompromising advocate of vote by ballot. Writing from Paris on October 8, he says: 'We are luckily too strong to dread much from open hostility, or to be bullied back into Toryism by our neighbours; but if Radicalism be a sin in their eyes, it exists, thank God! not merely across the Alps, but across the Channel.' The new journal, however, was far from prosperous. After enlarging its size and raising its price from fourpence-halfpenny to fivepence, it gradually declined in circulation. The last number appeared on July 1, 1837, bearing black borders for the death of the king. 'We can estimate, therefore,' says the dying speech of the 'Constitutional,' 'the feelings of the gentleman who once walked at his own funeral,' and the editor, or perhaps his late Paris correspondent, adds: 'The adverse circumstances have been various. In the philosophy of ill-luck it may be laid down as a principle that every point of discouragement tends to one common centre of defeat. When the Fates do concur in one discomfiture their unanimity is wonderful. So has it happened in the case of the "Constitutional." In the first place, a delay of some months, consequent upon the postponement of the newspaper stamp reduction, operated on the minds of many who were originally parties to the enterprise; in the next, the majority of those who remained faithful were wholly inexperienced in the art and mystery of the practical working of an important daily journal; in the third, and consequent upon the other two, there was the want of those abundant means, and of that wise application of resources, without which no efficient organ of the interests of any class of men--to say nothing of the interests of that first and greatest class whose welfare has been our dearest aim and most constant object--can be successfully established. Then came further misgivings on the part of friends, and the delusive undertakings of friends in disguise.' The venture proved in every way a disastrous one. Although nominally supported by a joint-stock company, the burden of the undertaking really rested upon the original promoters, of whom Major Smyth was the principal, while his step-son, Thackeray, also lost nearly all that remained of his fortune.

It was shortly after the failure of the 'Constitutional' that Thackeray married in Paris a Miss Shaw, sister of the Captain Shaw, an Indian officer, who was one of the mourners at his funeral, an Irish lady of good family, who bore him two daughters, the elder of whom first gave, during her illustrious father's life-time, indications of inheriting his talents, in the remarkable story of 'Elizabeth,' written by her, and published in the 'Cornhill Magazine.' In 1837 he left Paris with his family, and resided for two years in Great Coram Street, London, when he began to devote himself seriously to literary labour, adding, we believe, occasional work as an illustrator. We are told that he contributed some papers to the 'Times' during the late Mr. Barnes's editorship--an article on 'Fielding' among them. He is believed to have been connected with two literary papers of his time--the 'Torch,' edited by Felix Fax, Esq., and the 'Parthenon,' which must not be confounded with a literary journal with the same name recently existing. The 'Torch,' which was started on August 26, 1837, ran only for six months, and was immediately succeeded by the 'Parthenon,' which had a longer existence. In neither paper, however, is it possible to trace any sign of that shrewd criticism and that overflowing humour which distinguish the papers in 'Fraser.' For the latter publication he laboured assiduously, and it was at this time that the 'Yellowplush Papers' appeared, with occasional notices of the Exhibitions of Paintings in London. Among his writings of this period (1837-1840) we also find 'Stubbs's Calendar, or the Fatal Boots,' contributed to his friend Cruikshank's 'Comic Almanack' for 1839, and since included in the 'Miscellanies;' 'Catherine, by Ikey Solomons, jun.,' a long continuous story, founded on the crime of Catherine Hayes, the celebrated murderess of the last century, and intended to ridicule the novels of the school of Jack Sheppard, and illustrated with outline cartoons by the author; 'Cartouche' and 'Poinsonnet,' two stories, and 'Epistles to the Literati.' In 1839 he visited Paris again, at the request of the proprietor of 'Fraser,' in order to write an account of the French Exhibition of Paintings, which appeared in the December number.

On his return he devoted himself to writing the 'Shabby Genteel Story,' which was begun in 'Fraser' for June, and continued in the numbers for July, August, and October, when it stopped unfinished at the ninth chapter. The story of this strange failure is a mournful one. While busily engaged in working out this affecting story, a dark shadow descended upon his household, making all the associations of that time painful to him for ever. The terrible truth, long suspected, that the chosen partner of his good and evil fortunes could never participate in the success for which he had toiled, became confirmed. The mental disease which had attacked his wife rapidly developed itself, until the hopes which had sustained those to whom she was most dear were wholly extinguished. Thackeray was not one of those who love to parade their domestic sorrows before the world. No explanation of his omission to complete his story was given to his readers; but, years afterwards, in reprinting it in his 'Miscellanies,' he hinted at the circumstances which had paralyzed his hand, and rendered him incapable of ever resuming the thread of his story, with a touching suggestiveness for those who knew the facts. The tale was interrupted, he said, 'at a sad period of the writer's own life.' When the republication of the 'Miscellanies' was announced, it was his intention to complete the little story--but the colours were long since dry, the artist's hand had changed. It 'was best,' he said, 'to leave the sketch as it was when first designed seventeen years ago. The memory of the past is renewed as he looks at it.'[9]

It was in 1840 that Thackeray contributed to the 'Westminster' a kindly and appreciative article upon the productions of his friend George Cruikshank, illustrated--an unusual thing for the great organ of the philosophers of the school of Bentham, J. Mill, and Sir W. Molesworth--with numerous specimens of the comic sketches of the subject of the paper. His defence of Cruikshank from the cavils of those who loved to dwell upon his defects as a draughtsman is full of sound criticism, and his claim for his friend as something far greater, a man endowed with that rarest of all faculties, the power to create, is inspired by a generous enthusiasm which lends a life and spirit to the paper not often found in a critical review. This long paper, signed with the Greek letter Theta, is little known, but Thackeray frequently referred to it as a labour in which he had felt a peculiar pleasure.

In the summer of 1840 Thackeray collected some of his original sketches inserted in 'Fraser' and other periodicals, English and foreign, and republished them under the title of the 'Paris Sketch Book.' This work is interesting as the first independent publication of the author, but of its contents few things are now remembered. The dedicatory letter prefixed, however, is peculiarly characteristic of the writer. It relates to a circumstance which had occurred to him some time previously in Paris. The old days when money was abundant, and loitering among the pictures of the Paris galleries could be indulged in without remorse, had gone. The _res angusta domi_ with which genius has so often been disturbed in its day-dreams began to be familiar to him. The unfortunate failure of the 'Constitutional'--a loss which he, years afterwards, occasionally referred to as a foolish commercial speculation on which he had ventured in his youth--had absorbed the whole of his patrimony. At such a time a temporary difficulty in meeting a creditor's demand was not uncommon. On one such occasion, a M. Aretz, a tailor in the Rue Richelieu, who had for some time supplied him with coats and trousers, presented him with a small account for those articles, and was met with a statement from his debtor that an immediate settlement of the bill would be extremely inconvenient to him. To Titmarsh's astonishment the reply of his creditor was, 'Mon Dieu, sir, let not that annoy you. If you want money, as a gentleman often does in a strange country, I have a thousand-franc note at my house which is quite at your service.' The generous offer was accepted. The coin which, in proof of the tailor's esteem for his customer, was advanced without any interest, was duly repaid together with the account; but the circumstance could not be forgotten. The person obliged felt how becoming it was to acknowledge and praise virtue, as he slily said, wherever he might find it, and to point it out for the admiration and example of his fellow-men. Accordingly, he determined to dedicate his first book to the generous tailor, giving at full length his name and address. In the dedicatory letter, he accordingly alludes to this anecdote, adding--

'History or experience, sir, makes us acquainted with so
few actions that can be compared to yours; a kindness like
yours, from a stranger and a tailor, seems to me so
astonishing, that you must pardon me for thus making your
virtue public, and acquainting the English nation with
your merit and your name. Let me add, sir, that you live
on the first floor; that your clothes and fit are
excellent, and your charges moderate and just; and, as a
humble tribute of my admiration, permit me to lay these
volumes at your feet.

'Your obliged, faithful servant,
'M. A. TITMARSH.'

A second edition of the 'Paris Sketch Book' was announced by the publisher, Macrone--the same publisher who had a few years before given to the world the 'Sketches by Boz,' the first of Dickens' publications; but the second edition was probably only one of those conventional fictions with which the spirits of young authors are sustained. Though containing many flashes of the Titmarsh humour, many eloquent passages, and much interesting reading of a light kind, the public took but a passing interest in it. Years after, in quoting its title, the author good-humouredly remarked, in a parenthesis, that some copies, he believed, might still be found unsold at the publisher's; but the book was forgotten and most of its contents were rejected by the writer when preparing his selected miscellanies for the press. A similar couple of volumes, published by Cunningham in 1841, under the title of 'Comic Tales and Sketches, edited and illustrated by Mr. Michael Angelo Titmarsh,' and an independent republication, also in two volumes, of the 'Yellowplush Papers,' from 'Fraser,' were somewhat more successful. The former contained 'Major Gahagan' and the 'Bedford-row Conspiracy,' reprinted from the 'New Monthly;' 'Stubbs's Calendar, or the Fatal Boots,' from Cruikshank's 'Comic Almanack;' some amusing criticisms on the 'Sea Captain,' and 'Lady Charlotte Bury's Diary,' and other papers from 'Fraser.' The illustrations to the volumes were tinted etchings of a somewhat more careful character than those unfinished artistic drolleries in which he generally indulged. A brace of portraits of Dr. Lardner and Bulwer may be reckoned in the great humourist's happiest caricature vein.

In December 1840 he again visited Paris, and remained there until the summer of the following year. He was in that city on the memorable occasion of the second funeral of Napoleon, or the ceremony of conveying the remains of that great warrior, of whom, as a child, he had obtained a living glimpse, to their last resting-place at the Hôtel des Invalides. An account of that ceremony, in the form of a letter to Miss Smith, was published by Macrone. It was a small square pamphlet, chiefly memorable now as containing at the end his remarkable poem of the 'Chronicle of the Drum.' About this time he advertised, as preparing for immediate publication, a book entitled 'Dinner Reminiscences, or the Young Gourmandiser's Guide at Paris, by Mr. M. A. Titmarsh.' It was to be issued by Hugh Cunningham, the publisher, of St. Martin's Place, Trafalgar Square, but we believe was never published.

It was in the September number of 'Fraser,' for 1841, that he commenced his story of the 'History of Samuel Titmarsh, and the Great Hoggarty Diamond,' which, though it failed to achieve an extraordinary popularity, first convinced that select few who judge for themselves in matters of literature and art, of the great power and promise of the unknown 'Titmarsh.' Carlyle, in his 'Life of John Sterling,' quotes the following remarkable passage from a letter of the latter to his mother, written at this period:--'I have seen no new books, but am reading your last. I got hold of the two first numbers of the "Hoggarty Diamond," and read them with extreme delight. What is there better in Fielding or Goldsmith? The man is a true genius, and with quiet and comfort might produce masterpieces that would last as long as any we have, and delight millions of unborn readers. There is more truth and nature in one of these papers than in all ----'s novels put together.' 'Thackeray (adds Carlyle), always a close friend of the Sterling House, will observe that this is dated 1841, not 1851, and will have his own reflections on the matter.' The 'Hoggarty Diamond' was continued in the numbers for October and November, and completed in December 1841. In the number for June of the following year, 'Fitzboodle's Confessions' were commenced, and were continued at intervals down to the end of 1843. The 'Irish Sketch Book,' in two volumes, detailing an Irish tour, was also published in the latter year. The 'Sketch Book' did not at the time attract much attention. The 'Luck of Barry Lyndon,' by many considered the most original of his writings, was begun and finished at No. 88, St. James Street, previously known as the Conservative Club, where at this time he occupied chambers. The first part appeared in 'Fraser' for January 1844, and was continued regularly every month, till its completion in the December number. He was engaged a short time before this as assistant editor of the 'Examiner' newspaper, to which journal he contributed numerous articles; and among his papers in 'Fraser' and other magazines of the same period, we find, 'Memorials of Gourmandising;' 'Pictorial Rhapsodies on the Exhibitions of Paintings;' 'Bluebeard's Ghost;' a satirical article on Grant's 'Paris and the Parisians;' a 'Review of a Box of Novels' (already quoted from); 'Little Travels and Roadside Sketches' (chiefly in Belgium); 'The _Partie Fine_, by Lancelot Wagstaff'--a comic story, with a sequel entitled 'Arabella, or the Moral of the _Partie Fine_;' 'Carmen Lilliense;' 'Picture Gossip;' more comic sketches, with the titles of 'The Chest of Cigars, by Lancelot Wagstaff;' 'Bob Robinson's First Love;' and 'Barmecide Banquets,' and an admirable satirical review entitled 'A Gossip about Christmas Books.'

The 'Carmen Lilliense' will be well remembered by the readers of the 'Miscellanies,' published in 1857, in which it was included. Thackeray was in the north of France and in Belgium about the period when it is dated (2nd September, 1843); and the ballad describes a real accident which befell him, though doubtless somewhat heightened in effect. It tells how, leaving Paris with only twenty pounds in his pocket, for a trip in Belgium, he arrived at Antwerp, where, feeling for his purse, he found it had vanished with the entire amount of his little treasure. Some rascal on the road had picked his pocket, and nothing was left but to borrow ten guineas of a friend whom he met, and to write a note to England addressed to 'Grandmamma,' for whom we may probably read some other member of the Titmarsh family. The ten guineas, however, were soon gone, and the sensitive Titmarsh found himself in a position of great delicacy. What was to be done? 'To stealing,' says the ballad, 'he could never come.' To pawn his watch he felt himself 'too genteel;' besides, he had left his watch at home, which at once put an end to any debates on this point. There was nothing to do but to wait for the remittance, and beguile the time with a poetical description of his woes. The guests around him ask for their bills. Titmarsh is in agonies. The landlord regards him as a 'Lord Anglais,' serves him with the best of meat and drink, and is proud of his patronage. A sense of being a kind of impostor weighs upon him. The landlord's eye became painful to look at. Opposite is a dismal building--the prison-house of Lille, where, by a summary process, familiar to French law, foreigners who run in debt without the means of paying may be lodged. He is almost tempted to go into the old Flemish church and invoke the saints there after the fashion of the country. One of their pictures on the walls becomes, in his imagination, like the picture of 'Grandmamma,' with a smile upon its countenance. Delightful dream! and one of good omen. He returns to his hotel, and there to his relief finds the long-expected letter, in the well-known hand, addressed to 'Mr. M. A. Titmarsh, Lille.' He obtains the means of redeeming his credit, bids farewell to his host without any exposure, takes the diligence, and is restored to his home that evening. Such are the humorous exaggerations with which he depicts his temporary troubles at Lille, in the shape of a ballad, originally intended, we believe, for the amusement of his family, but finally inserted in 'Fraser.'

It was in July 1844 that Thackeray started on a tour in the East--the result of a hasty invitation, and of a present of a free pass from a friend connected with the Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company. His sudden departure, upon less than thirty-six hours' notice, is pleasantly detailed in the preface to his book, published at Christmas, 1845, with the title of 'Notes of a Journey from Cornhill to Grand Cairo by way of Lisbon, Athens, Constantinople, and Jerusalem: performed in the steamers of the Peninsular and Oriental Company. By M. A. Titmarsh, author of the "Irish Sketch Book," &c.'

The book was illustrated with coloured drawings by the author, treating, in a not exaggerated vein of fun, the peculiarities of the daily life of the East. The little book was well received, and in the reviews of it there is evidence of the growing interest of the public in the writer. For the first time it presented him to his readers in his true name, for though the 'Titmarsh' fiction is preserved on the title-page, the prefatory matter is signed 'W. M. Thackeray.'

'"Who is Titmarsh?" says one of his critics at this time. Such is the ejaculatory formula in which public curiosity gives vent to its ignorant impatience of pseudonymous renown. "Who is Michael Angelo Titmarsh?" Such is the note of interrogation which has been heard at intervals these several seasons back, among groups of elderly loungers in that row of clubs, Pall Mall; from fairy lips, as the light wheels whirled along the row called "Rotten;" and oft amid keen-eyed men in that grandfather of rows which the children of literature call Paternoster....

'This problem has been variously and conflictingly solved, as in the parallel case of the grim old _stat nominis umbra_. There is a hint in both instances of some mysterious connection with the remote regions of Bengal, and an erect old pigtail of the E.I.C.S. boasts in the "horizontal" jungle off Hanover Square, of having had the dubious advantage of his personal acquaintanceship in Upper India, where his I O U's were signed Major Goliah Gahagan; and several specimens of that documentary character, in good preservation, he offers at a low figure to amateurs.'

The foundation in 1841 of a weekly periodical, serving as a vehicle for the circulation of the lighter papers of humourists, had unquestionably an important influence in the development of his talents and fame. From an early date he was connected with 'Punch,' at first as the 'Fat Contributor,' and soon after as the author of 'Jeames's Diary' and the 'Snob Papers.' If satire could do aught to check the pride of the vulgar upstart, or shame social hypocrisy into truth and simplicity, these writings would accomplish the task. In fact, Thackeray's name was now becoming known, and people began to distinguish and enquire for his contributions; his illustrations in 'Punch' being as funny as his articles were. The series called 'Jeames's Diary' caused great amusement and no little flutter in high polite circles, for the deposition from the throne of railwaydom of the famous original of 'Jeames de la Pluche' had hardly then begun, though it was probably accelerated by the universal titters of recognition which welcomed the weekly accounts of the changing fortunes of 'Jeames.'

FOOTNOTES:

[6] Both the 'new and old Bayleys' are treated to a roasting in the _Comic Magazine_; and we get an earlier glimpse of these worthies, for whom the young writer evidently entertained but scanty respect, in _Fraser_ for 1831, where, in the November number, Oliver Yorke is supposed to hold a levee, at which the prominent celebrities are presented to Regina's editor on various pretences--'Old Bayley, on being sent to France,' and 'Young Bayley, after Four Years in the West Indies,' on his arrival to present a copy of the 'Songs of Almack's.' This young gentleman came over to the 'London World' in a 'National Omnibus:' his appearance excited some curiosity.

[7] He had certainly seen Sydney Smith. A quaint half-caricature outline sketch of the latter was contributed by 'Titmarsh' to _Fraser's Magazine_, at an early period of his connection with that journal.

[8] _Edinburgh Evening Courant_, Jan. 5, 1864.

[9] _Miscellanies_, vol. iv. p. 324.