Letters of Edward FitzGerald in Two Volumes
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Edward FitzGerald >> Letters of Edward FitzGerald in Two Volumes
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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.
I have the usual Story to tell of myself: middling well: still here,
pottering about my House, in which I expect an invalid Niece; and
preparing for my Ship in June. William Airy talks of coming to me soon.
I am daily expecting the Death of a Sister in law, a right good Creature,
who I thought would outlive me a dozen years, and should rejoice if she
could. Things look serious about one. If one only could escape easily
and at once! For _I_ think the Fun is over: but that should not be. May
you flourish in your high Place, my dear Master (now I say) for this long
while.
[_June_, 1866.]
MY DEAR THOMPSON,
I won't say that I should have gone to Ely under any Circumstances,
though it is the last Place I have been to stay at with a Friend: three
years ago! And all my Stays there were very pleasant indeed: and I do
not the less thank you for all your Constancy and Kindness. But one is
got down yet deeper in one's Way of Life: of which enough has been said.
William Airy was to have come here about this time: and him I am obliged
to put off because another old Fellow Collegian, Duncan, {77} who has
scarce stirred from his Dorsetshire Parsonage these twenty years, was
seized with a Passion to see me just once more, he says: and he is now
with me: a Hypochondriack Man, nervous, and restless, with a vast deal of
uncouth Humour. . . .
My Ship is afloat, with a new Irish Ensign; but I have scarce been about
with her yet owing to 'Mr. Wesley's Troubles.' {78a}
Only yesterday I took down my little Tauchnitz Sophocles to carry to Sea
with me; and made Duncan here read--
[Greek text], {78b} etc.
and began to blubber a little at
[Greek text], etc.
in the other Great Play. {78c} The Elgin Marbles, and something more,
began to pass before my Eyes.
I believe I write all this knowing you are at Ely: where I suppose you
are more at Leisure than on your Throne in Trinity. But no doubt your
Tyranny follows you there too; post Equitem and all.
_To E. B. Cowell_.
WOODBRIDGE: Friday
[_June_, 1866].
MY DEAR COWELL,
I got your new Address from your Brother a Fortnight ago. You don't
write to me for the very good reason that you have so much to do: I don't
write to you because I have nothing to do, and so nothing to tell you of.
My idle reading all goes down to a few Memoirs and such things: I am not
got down to Miss Braddon and Mrs. Wood yet, and I believe never shall:
not that I think this a merit: for it would show more Elasticity of Mind
to find out and make something out of the Genius in them. But it is too
late for me to try and retrace the 'Salle des pas perdus' of years; I
have not been very well, and more and more 'smell the Mould above the
Rose' as Hood wrote of himself. But I don't want to talk of this.
You are very good to talk of sparing a Day for me when you come down. I
will be sure to be at home any Day, or Days, next week. I can give you
Bed and Board as you know: and a Boat Sail on the River if you like. Why
I don't go over to you I have written and spoken of enough--all I can, if
not satisfactorily: only don't think it is indolence, Neglect, or
Distaste for you, or any of yours. . . .
I haven't, I think, taken in your Sanskrit morsel as yet, for I am called
about this morning on some Furniture Errands: and yet I want to post this
Letter To-day that you may have it this week.
I still think I shall take a Tauchnitz Sophocles with me to Sea, once
more to read the two OEdipuses, and Philoctetes; perhaps more carefully
than before; perhaps not! It is stupid not to get up those three noble
Pieces as well as one can.
I have not yet done my house: and, when I write of Furniture, it is
because I want to get so much ready as will suffice for an Invalid Niece
who wishes to come with her Maid by the End of June, or the Beginning of
July. Your old opposite Neighbour Mason is my Apollo in these matters: I
find him a very clever Fellow, and so well inclined to me that every one
else says he can scarce make money of what he sells me. He has _humour_
too.
I think you and Elizabeth should one day come and stay in this new House,
which will be really very pleasant. As far as I am concerned, I sha'n't
have much to do with it, I believe; but some one will inherit, and--sell
it!
I want you to choose a Lot of my Things to be bequeathed you: Books,
Pictures, Furniture. You mustn't think I prematurely deck myself in
Sables for my own Funeral; but it happens that I sent the rough Draft of
a Will to my Lawyer only three days ago.
My Brother John so much wants a Copy of Elizabeth's Verses to my Sister
Isabella in other Days.
This time twenty years you were going to me at Boulge Cottage: this time
ten years you were preparing for India.
Adieu, Love to the Lady.
Ever yours, E. F. G.
_To W. H. Thompson_.
LOWESTOFT: _July_ 27 [1866].
MY DEAR THOMPSON,
Your welcome Letter was forwarded to me here To day.
I feel sure that the Lady I once saw at the Deanery is all you say; and
you believe of me, as I believe of myself, that I don't deal in
Compliment, unless under very strong Compulsion. I suppose, as Master of
Trinity you could not do otherwise than marry, and so keep due State and
Hospitality there: and I do think you could not have found one fitter to
share, and do, the honours. And if (as I also suppose) there is Love, or
Liking, or strong Sympathy, or what not? why, all looks well. Be it so!
I had not heard of Spedding's entering into genteel House-keeping till
your Letter told me of it. I suppose he will be a willing Victim to his
Kinsfolk.
A clerical Brother in law of mine has lost his own whole Fortune in four
of these Companies which have gone to smash. Nor his own only. For,
having, when he married my Sister, insisted on having half her Income
tied to him by Settlement, _that_ half lies under Peril from the 'Calls'
made upon him as Shareholder.
At Genus Humanum damnat Caligo Futuri.
So I, trusting in my Builder's Honesty, have a Bill sent in about one
third bigger than it should be.
All which rather amuses me, on the whole, though I spit out a Word now
and then: and indeed am getting a Surveyor to overhaul the Builder: a
hopeless Process, I believe all the while.
Meanwhile, I go about in my little Ship, where I do think I have two
honest Fellows to deal with.
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