Books and Authors Part 13

ii., scene 3,) at the great fire, fell down with the ruins of the houses, little injured, and was conveyed to Whitechapel Mount, where it was identified and recovered about thirty years ago.

ORIGIN OF "THE EDINBURGH REVIEW."

The _Edinburgh Review_ was first published in 1802. The plan was suggested by Sydney Smith, at a meeting of _literati_, in the fourth or fifth flat or story, in Buccleugh-place, Edinburgh, then the elevated lodging of Jeffrey. The motto humorously proposed for the new review by its projector was, "_Tenui musam meditamur avena,_"--_i.e._, "We cultivate literature upon a little oatmeal;" but this being too nearly the truth to be publicly acknowledged, the more grave dictum of "_Judex d.a.m.natur c.u.m nocens absolvitur_" was adopted from _Publius Syrus_, of whom, Sydney Smith affirms, "None of us, I am sure, ever read a single line!" Lord Byron, in his fifth edition of _English Bards and Scotch Reviewers_, refers to the reviewers as an "oat-fed phalanx."

CLEVER STATESMEN.

However great talents may command the admiration of the world, they do not generally best fit a man for the discharge of social duties. Swift remarks that "Men of great parts are often unfortunate in the management of public business, because they are apt to go out of the common road by the quickness of their imagination. This I once said to my Lord Bolingbroke, and desired he would observe, that the clerk in his office used a sort of ivory knife, with a blunt edge, to divide a sheet of paper, which never failed to cut it even, only by requiring a steady hand; whereas, if he should make one of a sharp penknife, the sharpness would make it go often out of the crease, and disfigure the paper."

THE FIRST MAGAZINE.

The _Gentleman's Magazine_ unaccountably pa.s.ses for the earliest periodical of that description; while, in fact, it was preceded nearly forty years by the _Gentleman's Journal_ of Motteux, a work much more closely resembling our modern magazines, and from which Sylva.n.u.s Urban borrowed part of his t.i.tle, and part of his motto; while on the first page of the first number of the _Gentleman's Magazine_ itself, it is stated to contain "more than any book of the _kind_ and price."

MRS. TRIMMER.

This ingenious woman was the daughter of Joshua and Sarah Kirby, and was born at Ipswich, January 6, 1741. Kirby taught George the Third, when Prince of Wales, perspective and architecture. He was also President of the Society of Artists of Great Britain, out of which grew the Royal Academy. It was the last desire of Gainsborough to be buried beside his old friend Kirby, and their tombs adjoin each other in the churchyard at Kew.

Mrs. Trimmer, when a girl, was constantly reading Milton's _Paradise Lost_; and this circ.u.mstance so pleased Dr. Johnson, that he invited her to see him, and presented her with a copy of his _Rambler_. She also repeatedly met Sir Joshua Reynolds, Dr. Gregory, Sharp, Hogarth, and Gainsborough, with all of whom her father was on terms of intimacy. Mrs.

Trimmer advocated religious education against the lat.i.tudinarian views of Joseph Lancaster. It was at her persuasion that Dr. Bell entered the field, and paved the way for the establishment of the National Society.

Mrs. Trimmer died, in her seventieth year, in 1810. She was seated at her table reading a letter, when her head sunk upon her bosom, and she "fell asleep;" and so gentle was the wafting, that she seemed for some time in a refres.h.i.+ng slumber, which her family were unwilling to interrupt.

BOSWELL'S BEAR-LEADING.

It was on a visit to the parliament house that Mr. Henry Erskine, (brother of Lord Buchan and Lord Erskine,) after being presented to Dr.

Johnson by Mr. Boswell, and having made his bow, slipped a s.h.i.+lling into Boswell's hand, whispering that it was for the sight of his _bear_.--_Sir Walter Scott._

LORD ELIBANK AND DR. JOHNSON

Lord Elibank made a happy retort on Dr. Johnson's definition of oats, as the food of horses in England, and men in Scotland. "Yes," said he, "and where else will you see _such horses, and such men_?"--_Sir Walter Scott._

RELICS OF DR. JOHNSON AT LICHFIELD.

The house in which Dr. Johnson was born, at Lichfield--where his father, it is well known, kept a small bookseller's shop, and where he was partly educated--stood on the west side of the market-place. In the centre of the market-place is a colossal statue of Johnson, seated upon a square pedestal: it is by Lucas, and was executed at the expense of the Rev. Chancellor Law, in 1838. By the side of a footpath leading from Dam-street to Stow, formerly stood a large willow, said to have been planted by Johnson. It was blown down, in 1829; but one of its shoots was preserved and planted upon the same spot: it was in the year 1848 a large tree, known in the town as "Johnson's Willow."

Mr. Lomax, who for many years kept a bookseller's shop--"The Johnson's Head," in Bird-street, Lichfield, possessed several articles that formerly belonged to Johnson, which have been handed down by a clear and indisputable owners.h.i.+p. Amongst them is his own _Book of Common Prayer_, in which are written, in pencil, the four Latin lines printed in Strahan's edition of the Doctor's Prayers. There are, also, a sacrament-book, with Johnson's wife's name in it, in his own handwriting; an autograph letter of the Doctor's to Miss Porter; two tea-spoons, an ivory tablet, and a breakfast table; a Visscher's Atlas, paged by the Doctor, and a ma.n.u.script index; Davies's _Life of Garrick_, presented to Johnson by the publisher; a walking cane; and a Dictionary of Heathen Mythology, with the Doctor's MS. corrections. His wife's wedding-ring, afterwards made into a mourning-ring; and a ma.s.sive chair, in which he customarily sat, were also in Mr Lomax's possession.

Among the few persons living in the year 1848 who ever saw Dr. Johnson, was Mr. Dyott, of Lichfield: this was seventy-four years before, or in 1774, when the Doctor and Boswell, on their tour into Wales, stopped at Ashbourne, and there visited Mr. Dyott's father, who was then residing at Ashbourne Hall.[9]

[9] "The Dyotts," notes Croker, "are a respectable and wealthy family, still residing near Lichfield. The royalist who shot Lord Brooke when a.s.saulting St. Chad's Cathedral, in Lichfield, on St. Chad's Day, was a Mr. Dyott."

COLERIDGE A SOLDIER.

After Coleridge left Cambridge, he came to London, where soon feeling himself forlorn and dest.i.tute, he enlisted as a soldier in the 15th Elliot's Light Dragoons. "On his arrival at the quarters of the regiment," says his friend and biographer, Mr. Gilman, "the general of the district inspected the recruits, and looking hard at Coleridge, with a military air, inquired 'What's your name, sir?' 'Comberbach!' (the name he had a.s.sumed.) 'What do you come here for, sir?' as if doubting whether he had any business there. 'Sir,' said Coleridge, 'for what most other persons come--to be made a soldier.' 'Do you think,' said the general, 'you can run a Frenchman through the body?' 'I do not know,'

replied Coleridge, 'as I never tried; but I'll let a Frenchman run me through the body before I'll run away.' 'That will do,' said the general, and Coleridge was turned in the ranks."

The poet made a poor dragoon, and never advanced beyond the awkward squad. He wrote letters, however, for all his comrades, and they attended to his horse and accoutrements. After four months service, (December 1793 to April 1794), the history and circ.u.mstances of Coleridge became known. He had written under his saddle, on the stable wall, a Latin sentence (Eheu! quam infortunii miserrimum est fuisse felicem!) which led to an inquiry on the part of the captain of his troop, who had more regard for the cla.s.sics than Ensign Northerton, in _Tom Jones_. Coleridge was, accordingly, discharged, and restored to his family and friends.

COBBETT'S BOYHOOD.

Perhaps, in Cobbett's voluminous writings, there is nothing so complete as the following picture of his boyish scenes and recollections: it has been well compared to the most simple and touching pa.s.sages in Richardson's _Pamela_:--

"After living within a hundred yards of Westminster Hall and the Abbey church, and the bridge, and looking from my own window into St. James's Park, all other buildings and spots appear mean and insignificant. I went to-day to see the house I formerly occupied.

How small! It is always thus: the words large and small are carried about with us in our minds, and we forget real dimensions.

The idea, such as it was received, remains during our absence from the object. When I returned to England in 1800, after an absence from the country parts of it of sixteen years, the trees, the hedges, even the parks and woods, seemed so small! It made me laugh to hear little gutters, that I could jump over, called rivers! The Thames was but 'a creek!' But when, in about a month after my arrival in London, I went to Farnham, the place of my birth, what was my surprise! Every thing was become so pitifully small! I had to cross in my postchaise the long and dreary heath of Bagshot. Then, at the end of it, to mount a hill called Hungry Hill; and from that hill I knew that I should look down into the beautiful and fertile vale of Farnham. My heart fluttered with impatience, mixed with a sort of fear, to see all the scenes of my childhood; for I had learned before the death of my father and mother. There is a hill not far from the town, called Crooksbury Hill, which rises up out of a flat in the form of a cone, and is planted with Scotch fir-trees. Here I used to take the eggs and young ones of crows and magpies. This hill was a famous object in the neighbourhood. It served as the superlative degree of height.

'As high as Crooksbury Hill,' meant with us, the utmost degree of height. Therefore, the first object my eyes sought was this hill.

I could not believe my eyes! Literally speaking, I for a moment thought the famous hill removed, and a little heap put in its stead; for I had seen in New Brunswick a single rock, or hill of solid rock, ten times as big, and four or five times as high! The post-boy, going down hill, and not a bad road, whisked me in a few minutes to the Bush Inn, from the garden of which I could see the prodigious sand hill where I had begun my gardening works. What a nothing! But now came rus.h.i.+ng into my mind all at once my pretty little garden, my little blue smock-frock, my little nailed shoes, my pretty pigeons that I used to feed out of my hands, the last kind words and tears of my gentle and tender-hearted and affectionate mother. I hastened back into the room. If I had looked a moment longer, I should have dropped. When I came to reflect, what a change! What scenes I had gone through! How altered my state! I had dined the day before at a secretary of state's, in company with Mr. Pitt, and had been waited upon by men in gaudy liveries! I had had n.o.body to a.s.sist me in the world. No teachers of any sort. n.o.body to shelter me from the consequence of bad, and n.o.body to counsel me to good behaviour. I felt proud. The distinctions of rank, birth, and wealth, all became nothing in my eyes; and from that moment (less than a month after my arrival in England), I resolved never to bend before them."

Cobbett was, for a short time, a labourer in the kitchen grounds of the Royal Gardens at Kew. King George the Third often visited the gardens to inquire after the fruits and esculents; and one day, he saw here Cobbett, then a lad, who with a few halfpence in his pocket, and Swift's _Tale of a Tub_ in his hand, had been so captivated by the wonders of the royal gardens, that he applied there for employment. The king, on perceiving the clownish boy, with his stockings tied about his legs by scarlet garters, inquired about him, and specially desired that he might be continued in his service.

COLERIDGE AN UNITARIAN PREACHER.

During his residence at Nether Stoney, Coleridge officiated as Unitarian preacher at Taunton, and afterwards at Shrewsbury. Mr. Hazlitt has described his walking ten miles on a winter day to hear Coleridge preach. "When I got there," he says, "the organ was playing the 100th psalm, and, when it was done, Mr. Coleridge rose and gave out his text:--'He departed again into a mountain himself alone.' As he gave out his text, his voice rose like a stream of rich distilled perfume; when he came to the two last words, which he p.r.o.nounced loud, deep, and distinct, it seemed to me, who was then young, as if the sounds had echoed from the bottom of the human heart, and as if that prayer might have floated in solemn silence through the universe. The idea of St.

John came into my mind, of one crying in the wilderness, who had his loins girt about, and whose food was locusts and wild honey. The preacher then launched into his subject, like an eagle dallying with the wind. The sermon was upon peace and war--upon Church and State; not their alliance, but their separation; on the spirit of the world and the spirit of Christianity; not as the same, but as opposed to one another.

He talked of those who had inscribed the cross of Christ on banners dripping with human gore! He made a poetical and pastoral excursion; and, to show the fatal effects of war, drew a striking contrast between the simple shepherd-boy driving his team a-field, or sitting under the hawthorn, piping to his flock, as though he should never be old, and the same poor country-lad crimped, kidnapped, brought into town, made drunk at an alehouse, turned into a wretched drummer-boy, with his hair sticking on end with powder and pomatum, a long cue at his back, and tricked out in the finery of the profession of blood.

"'Such were the notes our once-loved poet sung;'

and, for myself, I could not have been more delighted if I had heard the music of the spheres."