The Life And Letters Of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 1

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I have had a most agreeable letter from my darling old Mrs. Clifford;
she sent me a curiosity--a worked muslin cap, which cost sixpence, done
in tambour stitch, by a steam-engine. Mrs. Clifford tells me that Mrs.
Hannah More was lately at Dawlish, and excited more curiosity there, and
engrossed more attention, than any of the distinguished personages who
were there, not excepting the Prince of Orange. The gentleman from whom
she drew _Caelebs_ was there, but most of those who saw him did him the
justice to declare that he was a much more agreeable man than Caelebs. If
you have any curiosity to know his name, I can tell you that--young Mr.
Harford, of Blaise Castle.

_Feb. 1810._

My father has just had a letter from your good friend Sir Rupert George,
who desires to be affectionately remembered to you and my uncle. His
letter is in answer to one my father wrote to him about his clear and
honourable evidence on this Walcheren business. Sir Rupert says: "I must
confess I feel vain in receiving commendations from such a quarter. The
situation in which I was placed was perfectly new to me, and I had no
rule for the government of my conduct but the one which has, I trust,
governed all my actions through life--to speak the truth, and fear not.
Allow me on this occasion to repeat to you an expression of the late
Mrs. Delany's to me a few years before she died: 'The Georges, I knew,
would always prosper, from their integrity of conduct. Don't call this
flattery: I am too old to flatter any one, particularly a grand-nephew;
and to convince you of my sincerity, I will add--for which, perhaps, you
will not thank me--that there is not an ounce of wit in the whole
family.'"

"Oh how my sister would like to see this letter of Sir Rupert's!" said
my father; and straightway he told, very much to Sophy and Lucy's
edification, the history of his dividing with sister Peg the first peach
he ever had in his life.

_March 2._

Have you any commands to Iceland? My young friend Mr. Holland proposes
going there from Edinburgh in April. Sir George Mackenzie is the chief
mover of the expedition.

This epigram or epitaph was written by Lord I-don't-know-who, upon
_Doctor_ Addington--Pitt's Addington--in old French:

Cy dessous reposant
Le sieur Addington git:
Politique soi-disant,
Medecin malgre lui.

_March 19._

The other day we had a visit from a Mrs. Coffy--no relation, she says,
to your Mrs. Coffy. She looked exactly like one of the pictures of the
old London Cries. She came to tell us that she had been at Verdun, and
had seen Lovell. From her description of the place and of him, we had no
doubt she had actually seen him. She came over to Ireland to prove that
some man who is a prisoner at Verdun, and who is a life in a lease, is
not dead, but "all alive, ho!" and my father certified for her that he
believed she had been there. She knew nothing of Lovell but that he was
well, and fat, and a very merry gentleman two years ago. She had been
taken by a French privateer as she was going to see her sons in Jersey,
and left Verdun at a quarter of an hour's notice, as the women were
allowed to come home, and she had not time to tell this to Lovell, or
get a letter from him to his friends. She was, as Kitty said, "a comical
body," but very entertaining, and acted a woman chopping bread and
selling _un liv'--deux liv'--trois liv'--Ah, bon, bon_, as well as Molly
Coffy [Footnote: Mrs. Molly Coffy, for fifty years Mrs. Ruxton's
housekeeper.] herself acted the elephant. She was children's maid to Mr.
Estwick, and Mr. Estwick is, my father says, son to a Mr. Estwick who
used to be your partner and admirer at Bath in former times!!

_To_ C. SNEYD EDGEWORTH, IN LONDON.

EDGEWORTHSTOWN, _April 1810._

I do not like Lord Byron's _English Bards and Scotch Reviewers_, though,
as my father says, the lines are very strong, and worthy of Pope and
_The Dunciad._ But I was so much prejudiced against the whole by the
first lines I opened upon about the "paralytic muse" of the man who had
been his guardian, and is his relation, and to whom he had dedicated his
first poems, that I could not relish his wit. He may have great talents,
but I am sure he has neither a great nor good mind; and I feel dislike
and disgust for his Lordship.

_To_ MISS RUXTON.

EDGEWORTHSTOWN, _May 1810._

Now I have to announce the safe arrival of my aunts and Honora in good
looks and good spirits. My father went to Dublin to meet them. I am
sorry he did not see the Count de Salis, [Footnote: The Count de Salis,
just then going to be married to Miss Foster, daughter of Mr.
Edgeworth's old friend and schoolfellow, the Bishop of Clogher.] but he
was much pleased with Harriet Foster, which I am glad of; for I love
her.

To MRS. RUXTON.

EDGEWORTHSTOWN, _June 21, 1810._

When shall we two meet again? This is a question which occurs to me much
oftener than even you think, and it always comes into my mind when I am
in any society I peculiarly like, or when I am reading any book
particularly suited to my taste and feelings; and now it comes _a
propos_ to the Bishop of Meath and Mrs. O'Beirne and _The Lady of the
Lake._ By great good fortune, and by the good-nature of Lady Charlotte
Rawdon, we had _The Lady of the Lake_ to read just when the O'Beirnes
were with us. A most delightful reading we had; my father, the Bishop,
and Mr. Jephson reading it aloud alternately. It is a charming poem: a
most interesting story, generous, finely-drawn characters, and in many
parts the finest poetry. But for an old prepossession--an unconquerable
prepossession--in favour of the old minstrel, I think I should prefer
this to either the _Lay_ or _Marmion._ Our pleasure in reading it was
increased by the sympathy and enthusiasm of the guests.

Have you read, or tried to read, Mademoiselle de l'Espinasse's three
volumes of Letters? and have you read Madame du Deffand? [Footnote: The
blind friend and correspondent of Horace Walpole.] Some of the letters
in her collection are very entertaining; those of the Duchesse de
Choiseul, the Comte de Broglie, Sir James Macdonald, and a few of Madame
du Deffand's: the others are full of _fade_ compliments and tiresome
trifling, but altogether curious as a picture of that profligate,
heartless, brilliant, and _ennuyed_ society. There is in these letters,
I think, a stronger picture of _ennui_ than in Alfieri's _Life._ Was his
passion for the Countess of Albany, or for horses, or for pure Tuscan,
the strongest? or did not he love NOTORIETY better than all three?

_Sept._ 1810.

Sir Thomas and Lady Ackland spent a day here: he is nephew to my friend
Mrs. Charles Hoare. He says he is twenty-three, but he looks like
eighteen.

To MISS RUXTON.

_Oct. 1810._

We have had a visit from Captain Pakenham, the Admiral's son, this week:
I like him. I was particularly pleased with his respectful manner to my
father. He has some of his father's quickness of repartee, but with his
_own_ manner--no affectation of his father's style. We were talking of a
Mrs. ----. "What," said I, "is she alive still? The last time I saw her
she seemed as if she had lived that one day longer by particular
desire."--"I am sure, then," said Captain Pakenham, in a slow, gentle
voice,--"I am sure, then, I cannot tell at _whose desire._"

I have been hard at work at Mrs. Leadbeater: I fear my notes are
rubbish.

* * * * *

Mrs. Edgeworth writes:

Mrs. Leadbeater, the Quaker lady who lived at Ballitore, whose father
had been tutor to Edmund Burke, and whose Letters have been published,
wrote to Maria this year, asking her advice about a book she had
written, _Cottage Dialogues_, and sent the MS. to her. Mr. Edgeworth
was so much pleased with it, that Maria offered, at Mr. Edgeworth's
suggestion, to add a few notes to give her name to the book; and it was
published by Johnson's successor with great success.

Mr. Edgeworth, Maria, and I went this autumn to Kilkenny to see the
amateur theatricals, with which we were much delighted. Mr. Edgeworth,
who remembered Garrick, said he never saw such tragic acting as Mr.
Rothe, in _Othello_: how true to nature it was, appeared from the
observation of our servant, Pat Newman, who had never seen a play
before, when Mr. Edgeworth asked him if he did not pity the poor woman
smothered in bed: "It was a pity of her, but I declare I pitied the man
the most." The town was full to overflowing, but we were most hospitably
received, though our friends the O'Beirnes were their guests, by Doctor
and Mrs. Butler. He had been a friend of Mr. Edgeworth's when he lived
in the county of Longford, and she had been, when Miss Rothwell, a
Dublin acquaintance of mine. This visit to Kilkenny was rich in
recollections for Maria: the incomparable acting, the number of
celebrated people there assembled, the supper in the great gallery of
old grand Kilkenny Castle, the superb hospitality, the number of
beautiful women and witty men, the gaiety, the spirit, and the
brilliancy of the whole, could have been seen nowhere else.

MISS EDGEWORTH _to_ MISS RUXTON.

EDGEWORTHSTOWN, _Nov. 1810._

We are to set out for Dublin on the 13th, to hear Davy's Lectures. Lord
Fingal was so kind as to come here yesterday with Lady Teresa Dease, and
he told me that my uncle is gone to Dublin. Tell me everything about it
clearly. Honora, Fanny, and William go with us.

* * * * *

Mrs. Edgeworth interpolates:

We spent a few weeks in Dublin. Davy's Lectures not only opened a new
world of knowledge to ourselves and to our young people, but were
especially gratifying to Mr. Edgeworth and Maria, confirming, by the
eloquence, ingenuity, and philosophy which they displayed, the high idea
they had so early formed of Mr. Davy's powers.

MARIA EDGEWORTH _to_ MISS RUXTON.

EDGEWORTHSTOWN, _April 1811._

I think Hardy's _Life of Lord Charlemont_ interesting, and many parts
written in a beautiful style; but I don't think he gives a clear,
well-proportioned history of the times. There is a want of _keeping_ and
perspective in it. The pipe of the man smoking out of the window is as
high as the house. Mr. Hardy is more a portrait than a history painter.

If you have any curiosity to know the names of the writers of some of
the articles in the _Edinburgh Review_, I can tell you, having had
to-day, from my literary intelligencer, Mr. Holland, two huge sheets,
very entertaining and sensible. Jeffrey wrote the article on
Parliamentary Reform and that on the Curse of Kehama, Sydney Smith that
on Toleration, and Malthus that on Bullion; and if you have any
curiosity, I can also tell you those in the _Quarterly_, among whom
Canning is one. Thank my aunt for her information about Walter Scott; my
father will write immediately to ask him here. I wish we lived in an old
castle, and had millions of old legends for him. Have you seen
Campbell's poem of _O'Connor's Child_? it is beautiful. In many parts I
think it is superior to Scott.

_May-day._

This being May-day, one of the wettest I have ever seen, I have been
regaled, not with garlands of May flowers, but with the _legal_
pleasures of the season; I have heard of nothing but _giving notices to
quit, taking possession, ejectments, flittings_, etc. What do you think
of a tenant who took one of the nice new houses in this town, and left
it with every lock torn off the doors, and with a large stone, such as
John Langan could not lift, driven actually through the boarded floor of
the parlour? The brute, however, is rich, and if he does not die of
whisky before the law can get its hand into his pocket, he will pay for
this waste.

I have had another [Footnote: No less than five letters were received by
Miss Edgeworth at different times, from different young people, asking
for a description of the dresses in the "Contrast."] odd letter signed
by three young ladies--Clarissa Craven, Rachel Biddle, and Eliza Finch,
who, after sundry compliments in very pretty language, and with all the
appearance of seriousness, beg that I will do them the favour to satisfy
the curiosity they feel about the wedding dresses of the Frankland
family in the "Contrast." I have answered in a way that will stand for
either jest or earnest; I have said that, at a sale of Admiral Tipsey's
smuggled goods, Mrs. Hungerford bought French cambric muslin wedding
gowns for the brides, the collars trimmed in the most becoming manner,
as a Monmouth milliner assured me, with Valenciennes lace, from Admiral
Tipsey's spoils. I have given all the particulars of the bridegrooms'
accoutrements, and signed myself the young ladies' "obedient servant and
perhaps _dupe._"

I am going on with "Patronage," and wish I could show it to you. _Do_
get _O'Connor's Child_, Campbell's beautiful poem.

Last Saturday there was the most violent storm of thunder and lightning
I ever saw in Ireland, and once I thought I felt the ground shake under
me, for which thought I was at the time laughed to scorn; but I find
that at the same time the shock of an earthquake was felt _in the
country, which shook Lissard House to its foundations._ I tell it to you
in the very words in which it was told to me by Sneyd, who had it from
Councillor Cummin. A man was certainly killed by the lightning near
Finac, _for_ the said councillor was knocked up at six o'clock in the
morning, _to know_ if there was to be a coroner's inquest.

_To_ MRS. RUXTON.

EDGEWORTHSTOWN, _Aug. 30, 1811._

I have written a little play for our present large juvenile audience,
[Footnote: Mrs. Beddoes and her three children were now at
Edgeworthstown.] not for them to act, but to hear; I read it out last
night, and it was liked. The scene is in Ireland, and the title "The
Absentee." When will you let me read it to you? I would rather read it
to you up in a garret than to the most brilliant audience in
Christendom.

Anna's children are very affectionate. Henry is beautiful, and the most
graceful creature I ever saw. The eight children are as happy together
as the day is long, and give no sort of trouble.

What book do you think Buonaparte was reading at the siege of
Acre?--_Madame de Stael sur l'influence des Passions_! His opinion of
her and of her works has wonderfully changed since then. He does not
follow Mazarin's wise maxim, "Let them _talk_ provided they let me
_act._" He may yet find the recoil of that press, with which he meddles
so incautiously, more dangerous than those cannon of which he well knows
the management.

_Note Physical and Economical_

I am informed from high authority, that if you give Glauber's salts to
hens, they will lay eggs as fast as you please!

* * * * *

_To_ MISS RUXTON.

EDGEWORTHSTOWN, _October 1811._

Davy spent a day here last week, and was as usual full of entertainment
and information of various kinds. He is gone to Connemara, I believe, to
fish, for he is a little mad about fishing; and very ungrateful it is of
me to say so, for he sent to us from Boyle the finest trout! and a trout
of Davy's catching is, I presume, worth ten trouts caught by vulgar
mortals. Sneyd went with him to Boyle, saw Lord Lorton's fine place, and
spent a pleasant day. Two of Mr. Davy's fishing friends have since
called upon us: Mr. Solly, a great mineralogist, and Mr. Children, a man
of Kent.

I am working away at "Patronage," but cannot at all come up to my idea
of what it should be.

_To_ MRS. MARY SNEYD.

ARDBRACCAN HOUSE, _Nov. 1811._

Nothing worthy of note occurred on our journey to Pakenham Hall, where
we found to our surprise dear Lady Longford and Lord Longford, who had
come an hour before on one of his flying visits, and a whole tribe of
merry laughing children, Stewarts and Hamiltons. Lady Longford showed us
a picture of Lady Wellington and her children; they are beautiful, and
she says very like--Lady Wellington is not like: it is absurd to attempt
to draw Lady Wellington's face; she has no _face_, it is all
countenance. My father and Lady Elizabeth played at cribbage, and I was
looking on: they counted so quickly fifteen two, fifteen four, that I
was never able to keep up with them, and made a sorry figure. Worse
again at some genealogies and intermarriages, which Lady Elizabeth
undertook to explain to me, till at last she threw her arms flat down on
each side in indignant despair, and exclaimed, "Well! you are the
stupidest creature alive!"

When Lord Longford came in I escaped from cribbage and heard many
entertaining things: one was of his meeting a man in the mail coach, who
looked as if he was gouty, and seemed as if he could not stir without
great difficulty, and never without the assistance of a companion, who
never moved an inch from him. At last Lord Longford discovered that this
_gentleman's_ gouty overalls covered _fetters_; that he was a malefactor
in irons, and his companion a Bow Street officer, who treated his
prisoner with the greatest politeness. "Give me leave, sir--excuse
me--one on your arm and one on mine, and then we are sure we can't leave
one another."

A worse travelling companion this than the bear, whom Lord Longford
found one morning in the coach when day dawned, opposite to him--the
gentleman in the fur cloak, as he had all night supposed him to be!

* * * * *

A second series of _Tales of Fashionable Life_ appeared in 1812. Of
these "The Absentee" was a masterpiece, and contains one scene which
Macaulay declared to be the best thing written of its kind since the
opening of the twenty-second book of the _Odyssey._ Yet Mrs. Edgeworth
tells that the greater part of "The Absentee" was "written under the
torture of the toothache; it was only by keeping her mouth full of some
strong lotion that Maria could allay the pain, and yet, though in this
state of suffering, she never wrote with more spirit and rapidity." Mr.
Edgeworth advised the conclusion to be a Letter from Larry, the
postillion: he wrote one, and she wrote another; he much preferred hers,
which is the admirable finale to "The Absentee."

* * * * *

MARIA EDGEWORTH _to_ MISS MARGARET RUXTON.

EDGEWORTHSTOWN, _July 20, 1812._

I am heartily obliged to my dear Sophy--never mind, you need not turn to
the direction, it _is_ to Margaret, my dear, though it begins with
thanks to Sophy--for being in such haste to relieve my mind from the
agony it was in that _Fashionable Tales_ should reach my aunt. I cannot
by any form of words express how delighted I am that you are none of you
angry with me, and that my uncle and aunt are pleased with what they
have read of "The Absentee." I long to hear whether their favour
continues to the end and extends to the catastrophe, that dangerous rock
upon which poor authors, even after a prosperous voyage, are wrecked,
sometimes while their friends are actually hailing them from the shore.
I have the _Rosamond_ vase [Footnote: A glass vase which Miss Edgeworth
painted for Mrs. Ruxton, in brown, from Flaxman's designs for the
_Odyssey._] madness so strong upon me, that I am out of my dear bed
regularly at half-past seven in the morning, and never find it more than
half an hour till breakfast time, so happy am I daubing. On one side I
have Ulysses longing to taste Circe's cakes, but saying, "No, thank
you," like a very good boy: and on the other side I have him just come
home, and the old nurse washing his feet, and his queen fast asleep in
her chair by a lamp, which I hope will not set her on fire, though it
is, in spite of my best endeavours, so much out of the perpendicular
that nothing but a miracle can keep it from falling on Penelope's crown.

Little Pakenham is going on bravely (not two months old), and I am just
_beginning_ to write again, and am _in_ "Patronage," and have corrected
all the faults you pointed out to me; and Susan, who was a fool, is now
Rosamond and a wit.

I suppose you have heard various _jeux d'esprit_ on the marriage of Sir
Humphry Davy and Mrs. Apreece? I scarcely think any of them worth
copying: the best _idea_ is stolen from the _bon mot_ on Sir John Carr,
"The Traveller be_k_nighted."

"When Mr. Davy concluded his last Lecture by saying that we were but in
the _Dawn_ of Science, he probably did not expect to be so soon
be_k_nighted."

I forget the lines: the following I recollect better:--

To the famed widow vainly bow
Church, Army, Bar, and Navy;
Says she, I dare not take a vow,
But I will take my Davy.

Another my father thinks is better:

Too many men have often seen
Their talents underrated;
But Davy owns that his have been
Duly _Appreec_iated.

_Aug 22._

I enclose a copy of Lovell's letter, which will give my dear aunt
exquisite pleasure. His request to my father to pass him over, a
prisoner and of precarious health, and make his next brother his heir,
shows that if he has suffered he has at least had an opportunity of
showing what he is. We shall do all we can to get at Talleyrand or some
friend for his exchange. How happy Lady Wellington must be at this
glorious victory. Had you in your paper an account of her _running_ as
fast as she could to Lord Bury at Lord Bathurst's when he alighted, to
learn the first news of her husband! _Vive l'enthousiasme_! Without it
characters may be very snug and comfortable in the world, but there is a
degree of happiness which they will never taste, and of which they have
no more idea than an oyster can have.

_To_ MRS. EDGEWORTH.

BLACK CASTLE, _Oct. 1812._

After a most delightful journey with Mr. and Mrs. Henry Hamilton,
laughing, singing, and talking, we dined with them. [Footnote: Mr. and
Mrs. Hamilton were paying a visit at Edgeworthstown, when the papers
announced Mr. Sadler's intention of crossing the Channel in a balloon
from Dublin. Mr. Edgeworth proposed to Mr. Hamilton that they should go
to Dublin together to see the ascent, and he and Mr. and Mrs. Hamilton,
Maria, Sneyd, William, and two little sisters formed the party.] Dear
old Mr. Sackville Hamilton dined with us, fresh from London:
intellectual and corporeal dainties in abundance. The first morning was
spent in cursing Mr. Sadler for not going up, and in seeing the Dublin
Society House. A charming picture of Mr. Foster, by Beachey, with plans
in his hand, looking full of thought and starting into life and action.
Spent an hour looking over the books of prints in the library--Fanny
particularly pleased with a Houbracken: Harriet with Daniel's Indian
Antiquities: my father with Sir Christopher Wren's and Inigo Jones's
designs. After dinner Richard Ruxton came in, and said my aunt and uncle
had thoughts of coming up to see the balloon. In the evening at
Astley's. The second day to see the elephant: how I pitied this noble
animal, cooped up under the command of a scarcely human creature, who
had not half as much reason as himself. Went on to see the Panorama of
Edinburgh: I never saw a sight that pleased me more; Edinburgh was
before me--Princes Street and George Street--the Castle--the bridge over
dry land where the woman met us and said, "Poor little things they be."
At first a mistiness, like what there is in nature over a city before
the sun breaks out; then the sun shining on the buildings, trees, and
mountains.

Thursday morning, to our inexpressible joy, was fine, and the flag, the
signal that Sadler would ascend, was, to the joy of thousands, flying
from the top of Nelson's Pillar. Dressed quickly--breakfasted I don't
know how--job coach punctual: crowds in motion even at nine o'clock in
the streets: tide flowing all one way to Belvidere Gardens, lent by the
proprietor for the occasion: called at Sneyd's lodgings in Anne Street:
he and William gone: drove on; when we came near Belvidere such strings
of carriages, such crowds of people on the road and on the raised
footpath, there was no stirring: troops lined the road at each side:
guard with officers at each entrance to prevent mischief; but
unfortunately there were only two entrances, not nearly enough for such
a confluence of people. Most imprudently we and several others got out
of our carriages upon the raised footpath, in hopes of getting
immediately at the garden door, which was within two yards of us, but
nothing I ever felt was equal to the pressure of the crowd: they closed
over our little heads, I thought we must have been flattened, and the
breath squeezed out of our bodies. My father held Harriet fast, I behind
him held Fanny with such a grasp! and dragged her on with a force I did
not know I possessed. I really thought your children would never see you
again with all their bones whole, and I cannot tell you what I suffered
for ten minutes. My father, quite pale, calling with a stentor voice to
the sentinels. A fat woman nearly separated me from Fanny. My father
fairly kicked off the terrace a man who was intent upon nothing but an
odious bag of cakes which he held close to his breast, swearing and
pushing. Before us were Mrs. Smyley and Mr. Smyley, with a lady he was
protecting. Unable to protect anybody, he looked more frightened than if
he had lost a hundred causes: the lady continually saying, "Let me back!
let me back! if I could once get to my carriage!"

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