Books: Memories of Hawthorne

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"Julian was asking Papa for a very expensive toy, and his father told
him he was very poor this year, because the Consulate had not much
business, and that it was impossible to buy him everything that struck
his fancy. Julian said no more; and when he went to bed he expressed
great condolence, and said he would not ask his father for anything if
he were so poor, but that he would give him all his own money
(amounting to five-pence halfpenny). When he lay down, his face shone
with a splendor of joy that he was able thus to make his father's
affairs assume a brighter aspect. This enormous sum of money which
Julian had he intended, at Christmas-time, to devote to buying a toy
for baby or for Una. He intended to give his all, and he could no
more. In the morning, he took an opportunity when I was not looking to
go behind his father, and silently handed him the fivepence halfpenny
over his shoulder. My attention was first attracted by hearing Mr.
Hawthorne say, 'No, I thank you, my boy; when I am starving, I will
apply to you!' I turned round, and Julian's face was deep red, and his
lips were quivering as he took back the money. I was sorry his father
did not keep it, however. I have never allowed the children to hoard
money. I think the flower of sentiment is bruised and crushed by a
strong-box; and they never yet have had any idea of money except to
use it for another's benefit or pleasure. Julian saw an advertisement
in the street of the loss of a watch, and some guineas reward. 'Oh,'
said he, 'how gladly would I find that watch, and present it to the
gentleman, and say, No reward, thank you, sir!'" My sister, who was
made quite delicate, at first, by the English climate, and acquired
from this temporary check and the position of eldest child a pathetic
nobility which struck the keynote of her character, writes from
Rockferry: "This morning of the New Year was very pleasant. It was
almost as good as any day in winter in America. I went out with Mamma
and Sweet Fern [Julian]. The snow is about half a foot deep. Julian
is out, now, playing. I packed him up very warmly indeed. I wish I
could go out in the new snow very much. Julian is making a hollow
house of snow by the rhododendron-tree." What not to do we learned
occasionally from the birds. "The little robins and a thrush and some
little sparrows have been here this morning; and the thrush was so
large that she ate up the crumbs very fast, and the other poor little
birds did not dare to come near her till she had done eating." My
father used to treat the Old and the New Year with the deepest
respect. I never knew the moments to be so immense as when, with
pitying gentleness, we silently attended the Old Year across the
ghostly threshold of midnight, and my father at last rose reverently
from his chair to open the window, through which, at that breath, the
first peals would float with new promise and remembering toll.

We children were expected to come into the presence of the grown
people and enjoy the interesting guests whom we all loved. My father
was skillful in choosing friends: they were rare, good men, and he and
they really met; their loves and interests and his were stirred by the
intercourse, as if unused muscles had been stretched. I could perceive
that my father and his best cronies glowed with refreshment. Mr.
Bennoch was a great favorite with us. He was short and fat, witty and
jovial. He was so different in style and finish from the tall, pale,
spiritual Henry Bright (whom my mother speaks of as "shining like a
star" during an inspiring sermon) that I almost went to sleep in the
unending effort to understand why God made so sharp a variety in
types. Mr. Bennoch wrote more poetry than Mr. Bright did, even, and
he took delight in breathing the same air with writers. But he himself
had no capacity more perfected than that of chuckling like a whole
brood of chickens at his own jokes as well as those of others. The
point of his joke might be obscure to us, but the chuckle never failed
to satisfy. He was a source of entire rest to the dark-browed,
deep-eyed thinker who smiled before him. The only anecdote of Mr.
Bennoch which I remember is of a Scotchman who, at an inn, was
wandering disconsolately about the parlor while his dinner was being
prepared. A distinguished traveler--Dickens, I think--was dashing off
a letter at the centre-table, describing the weather and some of the
odd fellows he had observed in his travels. "And," he wrote, "there
is in the room at the present moment a long, lank, red-headed,
empty-brained nincompoop, who looks as if he had not eaten a square
meal for a month, and is stamping about for his dinner. Now he
approaches me as I sit writing, and I hear his step pause behind my
chair. The fool is actually looking over my shoulder, and reading
these words"--A torrent of Scotch burst forth right here: "It's a lee,
sir,--it's a lee! I never read a worrd that yer wrort!" Screams from
us; while Mr. Bennoch's sudden aspect of dramatic rage was as suddenly
dropped, and he blazed once more with broad smiles, chuckling. I will
insert here a letter written by this dear friend in 1861:--

80 WOOD STREET, LONDON.

MY DEAR HAWTHORNE,--A few lines just received from Mr. Fields remind
me of my too long silence. Rest assured that you and yours are never
long out of our thoughts, and we only wish you were here in our
peaceful country, far removed from the terrible anxieties caused by
wicked and willful men on one side, and on the other permitted by the
incompetents set over you. How little you thought, when you suggested
to me the propriety of old soldiers only going into battle, that you
should have been absolutely predicting the unhappy course of events!
Do you remember adding that "a premium should be offered for men of
fourscore, as, with one foot in the grave, they would be less likely
to run away"? I observe that the "Herald" advises that "the
guillotine should be used in cropping the heads of a lot of the
officers, beginning at the city of Washington, and so make room for
the young genius with which the whole republic palpitates." . . .
Truly, my dear Hawthorne, it is a melancholy condition of things. Let
us turn to a far more agreeable subject! It is pleasant to learn that,
amid all the other troubles, your domestic anxieties have passed away
so far as the health of your family is concerned. The sturdy youth
will be almost a man, and Una quite a woman, while Rosebud will be
opening day by day in knowledge and deep interest. I hear that your
pen is busy, and that from your tower you are looking upon old England
and estimating her influences and the character of her people. Recent
experiences must modify your judgment in many ways. A romance laid in
England, painted as you only can paint, must be a great success. I
struggle on, and only wish I were worthy the respect my friends so
foolishly exhibit.

With affectionate regards to all, ever yours truly, F. BENNOCH.

On November 17, 1854, my mother writes:--"Last evening a great
package came from Mr. Milnes [Lord Houghton], and it proved to be all
his own works, and a splendid edition of Keats with a memoir by Mr.
Milnes. This elegant gift was only a return of favors, as Mr.
Hawthorne had just sent him some American books. He expended three
notes upon my husband's going to meet him at Crewe Hall, two of
entreaty and one of regret; but he declares he will have him at
Yorkshire. Mrs. Milnes is Lord Crewe's sister. The last note says:
'The books arrived safely, and alas! alone. When I get to Yorkshire,
to my own home, I shall try again for you, as I may find you in a more
ductile mood. For, seriously, it would be a great injustice--not to
yourself, but to us--if you went home without seeing something of our
domestic country life: it is really the most special thing about our
social system, and something which no other country has or ever will
have.'"

Another note from Lord Houghton is extant, saying:--

DEAR MR. HAWTHORNE,--Why did not you come to see us when you were in
London? You promised to do so, but we sought you in vain. I wanted to
see you, mainly for your own sake, and also to ask you about an
American book which has fallen into my hands. It is called "Leaves of
Grass," and the author calls himself Walt Whitman. Do you know
anything about him? I will not call it poetry, because I am unwilling
to apply that word to a work totally destitute of art; but, whatever
we call it, it is a most notable and true book. It is not written
virginibus puerisque; but as I am neither the one nor the other, I may
express my admiration of its vigorous virility and bold natural truth.
There are things in it that read like the old Greek plays. It is of
the same family as those delightful books of Thoreau's which you
introduced me to, and which are so little known and valued here.
Patmore has just published a continuation of "The Angel in the House,"
which I recommend to your attention. I am quite annoyed at having
been so long within the same four seas with you, and having seen you
so little. Mrs. Milnes begs her best remembrances. I am yours very
truly,

RICHD. MONCKTON MILNES.

16 UPPER BROOK STREET, June 30.

It is a perpetual marvel with some people why some others do not wish
to be looked at and questioned. Dinner invitations were constantly
coming in, and were very apt to be couched in tones of anxious
surprise at the difficulty of securing my father. An illustration may
be found in this little note from Mr. Procter (father of Adelaide
Procter):--

32 WEYMOUTH STREET, Tuesday morning.

DEAR MR. HAWTHORNE,--It seems almost like an idle ceremony to ask you
and Mrs. Hawthorne to dine here on Friday; but I cannot help it. I
have only just returned from a circuit in the country, and heard this
morning that you were likely to leave London in a few days. Yours
always sincerely,

B. W. PROCTER.

It was desirable to meet such people as Mr. Procter, and I have heard
enthusiastic descriptions, with which later my mother amused our quiet
days in Concord, of the intellectual pleasures that such friendships
brought, and of the sounding titles and their magnificent accessories,
with human beings involved, against whom my parents were now sometimes
thrust by the rapid tide of celebrity. But my father was never to be
found in the track of admiring social gatherings except by the deepest
scheming. In her first English letters my mother had written: "It is
said that there is nothing in Liverpool but dinners. Alas for it!"
The buzz of greeting was constant. It must have been delightful in
certain respects. She sent home one odd letter as a specimen of
hundreds of similar ones which came to my father from admirers. Yet
very soon individuals make a crowd, and the person who attracts their
attention is more nearly suffocated than the rest quite realize. His
attempts at self-preservation are not more than half understood, and,
if successful, are remembered with a dash of bitterness by the
onlookers.

To her husband in Liverpool, Mrs. Hawthorne writes:--

LONDON, September 19.

MY DEAREST,--At half past three Mrs. Russell Sturgis came in her
sumptuous barouche. We drove all through the fashionable squares and
Streets and parks, and all through Kensington, even to the real
Holland House. But Leigh Hunt's book went all out of my head when I
tried to think what he said about it. Mrs. Sturgis knows him very
well, and often visits him in his humble cottage. Oh, dear me! Such
superb squares and terraces as I saw! Mrs. Sturgis told me where Sir
E. B. Lytton, and many noted and noble persons, lived. We drove
through Mayfair, but I did not see Miss Cushman's house, I Bolton Row.
We certainly had a fine time. At five we got back, and I found the
Ambassador's card, and Miss Lane's, inviting us there this evening.

September 20. I was just hurrying off with Mr. Bright when I wrote the
two lines of post-script in my letter this morning, in answer to your
note,--so like you; so tender and kind. Since I must go away, I ought
not to have said a word; but you must ascribe what I said and say to
infinite love only; for it is only because of this that I do not look
forward with delight to a winter in Lisbon with the O'Sullivans. I
could not be happy if you made any sacrifice for me; and as our
interests are indissoluble, it would be my sacrifice, too. So I will
be good, and not distress you with more regrets. I once thought that
no power on earth should ever induce me to live without you, and
especially thought that an ocean should never roll between us. But I
am over-powered by necessity; and since my life is of importance to
you, I will not dare to neglect any means of preserving it.

This morning baby was dressed in a beautiful embroidered white frock
and blue sash, blue kid shoes, laced with blue ribbon, and blue silk
sack fastened with a blue girdle, and a hat trimmed with blue and
gray. Her long curls streamed out beneath: She was thus arrayed to
visit Portland Place and the Sturgis children. Una looked very lovely
in her summer cloud-muslin.

Mr. Bright came at twelve o'clock, bringing five or six superb
photographs of Cologne; I never saw any so splendid. Then we started
for the Crystal Palace. It has been one of the divinest days--one of
our days, like that at Stratford-on-Avon.' When we got into the cab,
however, Mr. Bright proposed to go to the Houses of Parliament first,
and then at last concluded to give up the Crystal Palace, and see the
sights of London instead. So we drove to the old St. James's Palace
Yard. But a police-officer said we could only go in on Saturday, and
then by a ticket from the Lord Chamberlain. I knew that, but supposed
Mr. Bright had some other means of gaining admittance. He had not,
nevertheless. He took us (Julian was with me) over Westminster Bridge.
. . . We went into the Photographic Exhibition of persons and places
at the Crimea, which was just like taking up groups of the army and
putting them before one's eyes. It must be of wonderful interest to
the relatives and friends of those who are there. The room was full of
fine-looking, aristocratic people. From this we drove to Kensington
Gardens; and I must say, my dear lord, that I never imagined any place
so grand and majestic, so royal and superb, as those grounds. The
trees--oh, the trees--every one of them kings, emperors, and Czars; so
tall, so rich, and the lawn beneath them so sunny-velvet green, all
made illustrious by the clearest warm sunshine, and a soft, sweet air.
The magnificent groves of trees all round; and far off in the
terminus, the towers and pinnacles of the Parliament Houses, and
Westminster Abbey towers, rise into the clear sky over the blue waters
of the Serpentine. A pretty yacht, with one white wing, slowly moved
along. Large, princely lambs grazed on the sunny lawns. I think that
thou wouldst have asked no more in the way of a park. We sat down on a
felled tree and talked awhile. I would almost give a kingdom to sit on
the tree again, with thee. Was not Mr. Bright good and lovely to
devote his only whole day in London to me? He certainly is the most
amiable and hospitable of mortals. THY DOVE.

My mother writes of Miss Bacon, who put Lord Bacon in that place in
her heart where Shakespeare should have been:--

MY DEAREST,--I have been reading Miss Bacon's manuscript this
afternoon, and it is marvelous. She reveals by her interpretation of
Lord Bacon more fully to me what I already divined dimly of the power
of Christ over nature; and it is the first word that I have found
spoken or written which is commensurate with my actual idea. I felt as
if I wanted to take this manuscript and all the others, and run off to
some profound retreat, and study it all over, and reproduce it again
with my own faculties. Oh, that I could read them with you! I almost
begin to love the pain with which I delve after the thoughts presented
in such a close and difficult handwriting.

To Miss Peabody:--

"Miss Bacon cannot speak out fairly [upon the subject of Bacon and
Shakespeare], though there is neither the Tower, the scaffold, nor the
pile of fagots to deter her. But she is a wonder and a benefactor,--
and let us not criticise her style; or rather, it is no matter whether
we did or not, so much remains for her. I did not see her. I was just
going to take Una and call upon her, when she went to Stratford.

"I hope Mr. Plumly has not forgotten his project of beneficence
[towards her]. It must be a foretaste of heaven to have money to give
away."

CHAPTER XI

ENGLISH DAYS: III

Tourist letters describe Wordsworth's house and country at Rydal:--

MY DEAR ELIZABETH,--I had a hope that when I left Rock Park I should
be clothed with wings, and be able to write letters and journal and to
draw. But I have been particularly wingless during the whole six weeks
of our absence, and have clone literally nothing but use my eyes. At
Windermere we left Una, Rose, and Nurse at a charming, homelike house,
and Mr. Hawthorne, Julian, and I went farther north. We went first to
Rydal and Grasmere, and at Grasmere Hotel, which is nearly opposite
the grave of Wordsworth, I had set my heart upon writing you a long
letter about those sacred places, especially sacred to you, the true
lover of Wordsworth. On a most superb afternoon we took an open
carriage at Lowood Hotel, where we had been staying for several days,
and drove to Grasmere Hotel, where we left our luggage and then drove
back to Rydal Water. We alighted just at the commencement of the lake,
intending to loiter and enjoy it at leisure. The lake surprised me by
its extreme smallness,--in America we should never think of calling it
a lake; but it receives dignity from the lofty hills and mountains
that embosom it, and I thought it was irreverent in Mr. Hawthorne to
say he "could carry it all away in a porringer." It has several very
small islands in it, and one rather larger, which is a heronry. The
lake and all the parks and grounds around belong to Sir Richard le
Fleming, who is Lord of the Manor and of a very ancient family in
those regions. We presently came to a fine old crag by the shore, up
which were some friendly steps; and we were entirely sure that
Wordsworth had often gone up there and looked off upon his beloved
Rydal from the summit. We went up and sat down where we knew he must
have sat, and there I could have dreamed for many hours. The gleam,
the shadow, and the peace supreme were there, and I thought with an
infinite joy how human beings have the power to consecrate the earth
by genius, heroic deeds, and even homely virtues. The gorgeous
richness of the vegetation, the fresh verdure, the living green of the
lawns and woodlands, flooded and gilded by the sunshine, made me
wonder whether the Delectable Mountain could be much more beautiful,
and made me realize deeply the poetic rapture, the noble, sustained
enthusiasm of Wordsworth in his descriptions of natural scenery. It is
only for perhaps a week in June that we in America can obtain an idea
of the magnificent richness and freshness of English scenery. How can
I find language airy and delicate enough to picture to you the fields
of harebells, tossing their lovely heads on their threadlike stems,
and bringing heaven to earth in the hue of their petals! Then the pale
golden cuckoo-buds, the yellow gorse, the stately foxglove, standing
in rows, like prismatic candelabra, all along the roadside,--and ah
me, alas!--the endless trees and vines of wild eglantine, with
blossoms of every shade of pink, from carmine to the faintest blush,
wreathing themselves about and throwing out into your face and hands
long streamers of buds and blossoms, so rarely and exquisitely lovely!
One wonders whether it can be true or whether one is dreaming on the
Enchanted Plain. I loved Wordsworth as I never could have done if I
had not been in the very place that knew him, and seen how and why he
worshiped as he did, what really seems there the perpetual Morning of
Creation.

At the right of the doorstep a superb fuchsia-tree stood, and I asked
the man to pluck me one of the jewel blossoms. But he declined to
approach so near, as he feared to disturb Mrs. Wordsworth. And he did
not introduce us into her presence, because he said Lady le Fleming
had told him never to disturb her with visitors, but only show them
the outside of the house. He said Lady le Fleming built the house and
it was hers, as well as everything else round about. But we might have
gone in, we now find, and Mrs. Wordsworth likes very much to see
people. So this intelligent man led us through the pretty gardens and
grounds, up and up and up innumerable steps in successive short
flights, through many wickets, till I began to think we could never
reach our goal. Finally we came to a spot of constant shade where was
a singularly shaped rock--a kind of slab--thrusting itself out from
the wall, in which a brass plate was inserted with an inscription by
Wordsworth, which we read. It expressed that he had pleaded for this
rock as often as he had for other natural objects.

The gardener opened a wicket, after passing the deep, shady nook, and
said, "This is Mr. Wordsworth's garden." I looked about and saw
troops of flowers, and sought for the white fox-glove, which was a
favorite of his, and found it; and the air was loaded with a fine
perfume, which I discovered to be from large beds of mignonette. In
those paths he walked and watched and tended his plants and shrubs.
Presently, after so much mounting of steps, and threading of
embowered paths and lanes of flowers, we were ushered into the grounds
immediately around the actual house. And the man first took us upon
that memorable terraced lawn, in great part made by Wordsworth's own
hands. It is circular, and the turf, like thick-piled velvet, yielding
to the feet and of delicious green--smooth and soft. Perhaps it is
thirty feet in diameter, and double, with a very high step. Beneath it
is a gravel walk, and then a hedge of thick shrubs. Julian flung
himself at full length on the velvet sward, and Mr. Hawthorne and I
sat down on the even tops of two stumps of trees, evidently intended
for seats, as one meets them everywhere, arranged for that purpose.
But how am I to tell you what I saw from them?

Wordsworth must have described it somewhere. It was his beloved view.
Richer could not have been the Vale of Cashmere. The mountains take
most picturesque forms, and after throwing against the sky bold and
grand outlines, they so softly curve down into the lovely dells that
they seemed doing homage to beauty, lordly and gentle. And far away at
the end of the valley, Windermere, Queen of the Lakes, reposed,
gleaming silvery blue. This fair, open eye completed the picture. In
that was the soul revealed. I wished I had had my sketch-book to draw
just the outlines, but was not too sorry, because I intended to go
again, and then I would have it. Now I was content to gaze alone.

The attractions of London are fully admitted by Mrs. Hawthorne, in
various letters, from which I gather these sentences:--

"At last I have found myself in London society. I suppose Ellen and
Mary [her nieces] would like to know what I wore on one occasion. I
had on a sky-blue glace silk, with three flounces, which were
embroidered with white floss, making a very silvery shine. The dress
had low neck and short sleeves; but I wore a jacket of starred blonde
with flowing sleeves; and had round me also a shawl of Madeira lace,
which, though very airy, fleecy, and cloud-looking, is warm and soft.
My headdress was pearl, in the shape of bunches of grapes and leaves,
mingled with blue ribbon, with a wreath of pearl-traced leaves round
my hair, which was rolled in coronet fashion. Was not that a pretty
dress?

"Mr. Hawthorne was invited to Monckton Millies' to a dejeuner, and met
there Macaulay, Mr. and Mrs. Browning, Lord Stanley, the Marquis of
Lansdowne, Lord Goderich, etc. He enjoyed it very much; and the
venerable old Marquis seemed bent on doing him honor and showing him
respect. He insisted upon Mr. Hawthorne's taking precedence of himself
on every occasion. It is an immense disappointment to me that we
cannot spend some months within daily reach of London, because I want
Mr. Hawthorne to take a very full draught of it. But I shall persuade
him to go up to the grim, glorious old city by himself, if possible."

My mother had been so seriously attacked by bronchitis as to endanger
her lungs, which led to a visit of six months to Lisbon and Madeira,
my father remaining at the Consulate. While in exile, she writes to
him:--

"I am all the time tumbling into fathomless reveries about going home.

"Dearest, I have an idea! Next winter, if you wish to remain in
England, and my coughing continues, I will tell you how I might do,
and be most happy and comfortable. I might remain in my chamber all
winter, and keep it at an even temperature, and exercise by means of
the portable gymnasium. I am sure the joy of your presence would be
better than any tropic or equator without you. And I hate to be the
means of your resigning from the Consulate."

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