Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay, vol 1, George Otto Trevelyan [whitelam books TXT] 📗

seasons, and which discusses over its breakfast table at home the decisions arrived at on the previous afternoon in the Council-room of Simla or Calcutta. In those rural parsonages and middle-class households where service in our Eastern territories now presents itself in the light of a probable and desirable destiny for a promising son, those same territories were forty years ago regarded as an obscure and distant region of disease and death. A girl who had seen no country more foreign than Wales, and crossed no water broader and more tempestuous than the Mersey, looked forward to a voyage which (as she subsequently learned by melancholy experience), might extend over six weary months, with an anxiety that can hardly be imagined by us who spend only half as many weeks on the journey between Dover and Bombay. A separation from beloved relations under such conditions was a separation indeed; and, if Macaulay and his sister could have foreseen how much of what they left at their departure they would fail to find on their return, it is a question whether any earthly consideration could have induced them to quit their native shore. But Hannah’s sense of duty was too strong for these doubts and tremors; and, happily, (for on the whole her resolution was a fortunate one,) she resolved to accompany her brother in an expatriation which he never would have faced without her. With a mind set at ease by a knowledge of her intention, he came down to Liverpool as soon as the Session was at an end; and carried her off on a jaunt to Edinburgh, in a postchaise furnished with Horace Walpole’s letters for their common reading, and Smollett’s collected works for his own. Before October he was back at the Board of Control; and his letters recommenced, as frequent and rather more serious and businesslike than of old.

London: October 5, 1833

Dear Hannah,—Life goes on so quietly here, or rather stands so still, that I have nothing, or next to nothing, to say. At the Athenaeum I now and then fall in with some person passing through town on his way to the Continent or to Brighton. The other day I met Sharp, and had a long talk with him about everything and everybody,—metaphysics, poetry, politics, scenery, and painting.

One thing I have observed in Sharp, which is quite peculiar to him among town-wits and diners-out. He never talks scandal. If he can say nothing good of a man, he holds his tongue. I do not, of course, mean that in confidential communication about politics he does not speak freely of public men; but about the foibles of private individuals I do not believe that, much as I have talked with him, I ever heard him utter one word. I passed three or four hours very agreeably in his company at the club.

I have also seen Kenny for an hour or two. I do not know that I ever mentioned Kenny to you. When London is overflowing, I meet such numbers of people that I cannot remember half their names.

This is the time at which every acquaintance, however slight, attracts some degree of attention. In the desert island, even poor Poll was something of a companion to Robinson Crusoe. Kenny is a writer of a class which, in our time, is at the very bottom of the literary scale. He is a dramatist. Most of the farces, and three-act plays, which have succeeded during the last eight or ten years, are, I am told, from his pen. Heaven knows that, if they are the farces and plays which I have seen, they do him but little honour. However, this man is one of our great comic writers. He has the merit, such as it is, of hitting the very bad taste of our modern audiences better than any other person who has stooped to that degrading work. We had a good deal of literary chat; and I thought him a clever shrewd fellow.

My father is poorly; not that anything very serious is the matter with him; but he has a cold, and is in low spirits.

Ever yours

T. B. M.

London: October 14, 1833

Dear Hannah,—I have just finished my article on Horace Walpole.

This is one of the happy moments of my life; a stupid task performed; a weight taken off my mind. I should be quite joyous if I had only you to read it to. But to Napier it must go forthwith; and, as soon as I have finished this letter, I shall put it into the general post with my own fair hands. I was up at four this morning to put the last touch to it. I often differ with the majority about other people’s writings, and still oftener about my own; and therefore I may very likely be mistaken; but I think that this article will be a hit. We shall see. Nothing ever cost me more pains than the first half; I never wrote anything so flowingly as the latter half; and I like the latter half the best. I have laid it on Walpole so unsparingly that I shall not be surprised if Miss Berry should cut me. You know she was Walpole’s favourite in her youth. Neither am I sure that Lord and Lady Holland will be well pleased. But they ought to be obliged to me; for I refrained for their sake from laying a hand, which has been thought to be not a light one, on that old rogue the first Lord Holland. [Lord Holland, once upon a time, speaking to Macaulay of his grandfather, said: “He had that temper which kind folks have been pleased to say belongs to my family; but he shared the fault that belonged to that school of statesmen, an utter disbelief in public virtue.”]

Charles Grant is still at Paris; ill, he says. I never knew a man who wanted setting to rights so often. He goes as badly as your watch.

My father is at me again to provide for P—. What on earth have I to do with P—? The relationship is one which none but Scotchmen would recognise. The lad is such a fool that he would utterly disgrace my recommendation. And, as if to make the thing more provoking, his sisters say that he must be provided for in England, for that they cannot think of parting with him. This, to be sure, matters little; for there is at present just as little chance of getting anything in India as in England.

But what strange folly this is which meets me in every quarter; people wanting posts in the army, the navy, the public offices, and saying that, if they cannot find such posts, they must starve! How do all the rest of mankind live? If I had not happened to be engaged in politics, and if my father had not been connected, by very extraordinary circumstances, with public men, I should never have dreamed of having places. Why cannot P— be apprenticed to some hatter or tailor? He may do well in such a business; he will do detestably ill as a clerk in my office. He may come to make good coats; he will never, I am sure, write good despatches. There is nothing truer than Poor Richard’s say: “We are taxed twice as heavily by our pride as by the state.” The curse of England is the obstinate determination of the middle classes to make their sons what they call gentlemen. So we are overrun by clergymen without livings; lawyers without briefs; physicians without patients; authors without readers; clerks soliciting employment, who might have thriven, and been above the world, as bakers, watchmakers, or innkeepers. The next time my father speaks to me about P—, I will offer to subscribe twenty guineas towards making a pastry-cook of him. He had a sweet tooth when he was a child.

So you are reading Burnet! Did you begin from the beginning? What do you think of the old fellow? He was always a great favourite of mine; honest, though careless; a strong party man on the right side, yet with much kind feeling towards his opponents, and even towards his personal enemies. He is to me a most entertaining writer; far superior to Clarendon in the art of amusing, though of course far Clarendon’s inferior in discernment, and in dignity and correctness of style. Do you know, by the bye, Clarendon’s life of himself? I like it, the part after the Restoration at least, better than his great History.

I am very quiet; rise at seven or half-past; read Spanish till ten; breakfast; walk to my office; stay there till four; take a long walk, dine towards seven; and am in bed before eleven. I am going through Don Quixote again, and admire it more than ever. It is certainly the best novel in the world, beyond all comparison.

Ever yours

T. B. M.

To Hannah M. Macaulay.

London: October 21, 1833.

My dear Sister,—Grant is here at last, and we have had a very long talk about matters both public and private. The Government would support my appointment; but he expects violent opposition from the Company. He mentioned my name to the Chairs, and they were furious. They know that I have been against them through the whole course of the negotiations which resulted in the India Bill. They put their opposition on the ground of my youth,—a very flattering objection to a man who this week completes his thirty-third year. They spoke very highly of me in other respects; but they seemed quite obstinate.

The question now is whether their opposition will be supported by the other Directors. If it should be so, I have advised Grant most strongly to withdraw my name, to put up some other man, and then to fight the battle to the utmost. We shall be suspected of jobbing if we proceed to extremities on behalf of one of ourselves; but we can do what we like, if it is in favour of some person whom we cannot be suspected of supporting from interested motives. From the extreme unreasonableness and pertinacity which are discernible in every communication that we receive from the India House at present, I am inclined to think that I have no chance of being chosen by them, without a dispute in which I should not wish the Government to engage for such a purpose. Lord Grey says that I have a right to their support if I ask for it; but that, for the sake of his administration generally, he is very adverse to my going. I do not think that I shall go.

However, a few days will decide the matter.

I have heard from Napier. He praises my article on Walpole in terms absolutely extravagant. He says that it is the best that I ever wrote; and, entre nous, I am not very far from agreeing with him. I am impatient to have your opinion. No flattery pleases me so much as domestic flattery. You will have the Number within the week.

Ever yours

T. B. M

To Macvey Napier, Esq.

London: October 21, 1833.

Dear Napier,—I am glad to learn that you like my article. I like it myself; which is not much my habit. Very likely the public, which has often been kinder to my performances than I was, may on this, as on other occasions, differ from me in opinion. If the paper has any merit, it owes it to the delay of which you must, I am sure, have complained very bitterly in your heart. I was so thoroughly dissatisfied with the article, as it stood at first, that I completely re-wrote it; altered the whole arrangement; left out ten or twelve pages in one part; and added twice as many in another. I never wrote anything so