Curiosities of Literature Volume Iii Part 10

_Economy._

While Shenstone was rearing hazels and hawthorns, opening vistas, and winding waters;

And having shown them where to stray, Threw little pebbles in their way;

while he was pulling down hovels and cowhouses, to compose mottos and inscriptions for garden-seats and urns; while he had so finely obscured with a tender gloom the grove of Virgil, and thrown over, "in the midst of a plantation of yew, a bridge of one arch, built of a dusty-coloured stone, and simple even to rudeness,"[58] and invoked Oberon in some Arcadian scene,

Where in cool grot and mossy cell The tripping fauns and fairies dwell;

the solitary magician, who had raised all these wonders, was, in reality, an unfortunate poet, the tenant of a dilapidated farm-house, where the winds pa.s.sed through, and the rains lodged, often taking refuge in his own kitchen--

Far from all resort of mirth, Save the cricket on the hearth!

In a letter[59] of the disconsolate founder of landscape gardening, our author paints his situation with all its misery--lamenting that his house is not fit to receive "polite friends, were they so disposed;" and resolved to banish all others, he proceeds:

"But I make it a certain rule, 'arcere profanum vulgus.' Persons who will despise you for the want of a good set of chairs, or an uncouth fire-shovel, at the same time that they can't taste any excellence in a mind that overlooks those things; with whom it is in vain that your mind is furnished, if the walls are naked; indeed one loses much of one's acquisitions in virtue by an hour's converse with such as judge of merit by money--yet I am now and then impelled by the social pa.s.sion to sit half an hour in my kitchen."

But the solicitude of friends and the fate of Somerville, a neighbour and a poet, often compelled Shenstone to start amidst his reveries; and thus he has preserved his feelings and his irresolutions. Reflecting on the death of Somerville, he writes--

"To be forced to drink himself into pains of the body, in order to get rid of the pains of the mind, is a misery which I can well conceive, because I may, without vanity, esteem myself his equal in point of economy, and consequently ought to have an eye on his misfortunes--(as you kindly hinted to me about twelve o'clock, at the Feathers.)--I should retrench--I will--but you shall not see me--I will not let you know that I took it in good part--I will do it at solitary times as I may."

Such were the calamities of "great taste" with "little fortune;" but in the case of Shenstone, these were combined with the other calamity of "mediocrity of genius."

Here, then, at the Leasowes, with occasional trips to town in pursuit of fame, which perpetually eluded his grasp; in the correspondence of a few delicate minds, whose admiration was subst.i.tuted for more genuine celebrity; composing diatribes against economy and taste, while his income was diminis.h.i.+ng every year; our neglected author grew daily more indolent and sedentary, and withdrawing himself entirely into his own hermitage, moaned and despaired in an Arcadian solitude.[60] The cries and the "secret sorrows" of Shenstone have come down to us--those of his brothers have not always! And shall dull men, because they have minds cold and obscure, like a Lapland year which has no summer, be permitted to exult over this cla.s.s of men of sensibility and taste, but of moderate genius and without fortune? The pa.s.sions and emotions of the heart are facts and dates only to those who possess them.

To what a melancholy state was our author reduced, when he thus addressed his friend:--

"I suppose you have been informed that my fever was in a great measure hypochondriacal, and left my nerves so extremely sensible, that even on no very interesting subjects, I could readily _think myself into a vertigo_; I had almost said an _epilepsy_; for surely I was oftentimes near it."

The features of this sad portrait are more particularly made out in another place.

"Now I am come home from a visit, every little uneasiness is sufficient to introduce my whole train of melancholy considerations, and to make me utterly dissatisfied with the life I now lead, and the life which I foresee I shall lead. I am angry and envious, and dejected and frantic, and disregard all present things, just as becomes a madman to do. I am infinitely pleased (though it is a gloomy joy) with the application of Dr. Swift's complaint, 'that he is forced to die in a rage, like a poisoned rat in a hole.' My soul is no more fitted to the figure I make, than a cable rope to a cambric needle; I cannot bear to see the advantages alienated, which I think I could deserve and relish so much more than those that have them."

There are other testimonies in his entire correspondence. Whenever forsaken by his company he describes the horrors around him, delivered up "to winter, silence, and reflection;" ever foreseeing himself "returning to the same series of melancholy hours." His frame shattered by the whole train of hypochondriacal symptoms, there was nothing to cheer the querulous author, who with half the consciousness of genius, lived neglected and unpatronised. His elegant mind had not the force, by his productions, to draw the celebrity he sighed after, to his hermitage.

Shenstone was so anxious for his literary character, that he contemplated on the posthumous fame which he might derive from the publication of his letters: see Letter lxxix., _On hearing his letters to Mr. Whistler were destroyed_; the act of a merchant, his brother, who being a _very sensible_ man, as Graves describes, yet with the _stupidity_ of a Goth, destroyed _the whole correspondence of Shenstone, for "its sentimental intercourse_."--Shenstone bitterly regrets the loss, and says, "I would have given more money for the letters than it is allowable for me to mention with decency. I look upon my letters as some of my _chefs-d'oeuvre_--they are the history of my mind for these twenty years past." This, with the loss of Cowley's correspondence, should have been preserved in the article, "of Suppressors and Dilapidators of Ma.n.u.scripts."

Towards the close of life, when his spirits were exhausted, and "the silly clue of hopes and expectations," as he termed them, was undone, the notice of some persons of rank began to reach him. Shenstone, however, deeply colours the variable state of his own mind--"Recovering from a nervous fever, as I have since discovered by many concurrent symptoms, I seem to antic.i.p.ate a little of that 'vernal delight' which Milton mentions and thinks

----able to chase All sadness but despair--

at least I begin to resume my silly clue of hopes and expectations."

In a former letter he had, however, given them up: "I begin to wean myself from all hopes and expectations whatever. I feed my wild-ducks, and I water my carnations. Happy enough if I could extinguish my ambition quite, to indulge the desire of being something more beneficial in my sphere.--Perhaps some few other circ.u.mstances would want also to be adjusted."

What were these "hopes and expectations," from which sometimes he weans himself, and which are perpetually revived, and are attributed to "an ambition he cannot extinguish"? This article has been written in vain, if the reader has not already perceived, that they had haunted him in early life; sickening his spirit after the possession of a poetical celebrity, unattainable by his genius; some expectations too he might have cherished from the talent he possessed for political studies, in which Graves confidently says, that "he would have made no inconsiderable figure, if he had had a sufficient motive for applying his mind to them." Shenstone has left several proofs of this talent.[61]

But his master-pa.s.sion for literary fame had produced little more than anxieties and disappointments; and when he indulged his pastoral fancy in a beautiful creation on his grounds, it consumed the estate which it adorned. Johnson forcibly expressed his situation: "His death was probably hastened by his anxieties. He was a lamp that spent its oil in blazing. It is said, that if he had lived a little longer, he would have been a.s.sisted by a pension."

FOOTNOTES:

[53] This once-celebrated abode of the poet is situated at Hales-Owen, Shrops.h.i.+re.

[54] This we learn from Dr. Nash's History of Worcesters.h.i.+re.

[55] While at college he printed, without his name, a small volume of verses, with this t.i.tle, "Poems upon various Occasions, written for the Entertainment of the Author, and printed for the Amus.e.m.e.nt of a few Friends, prejudiced in his Favour." Oxford, 1737.

12mo.--Nash's "History of Worcesters.h.i.+re," vol. i. p. 528.

I find this notice of it in W. Lowndes's Catalogue; 4433 Shenstone (W.) Poems, 3_l._ 13_s._ 6_d._--(Shenstone took uncommon pains to suppress this book, by collecting and destroying copies wherever he met with them.)--In, Longman's Bibliotheca Anglo-Poetica, it is valued at 15_l. Oxf_. 1737. Mr. Harris informs me, that about the year 1770, Fletcher, the bookseller, at Oxford, had many copies of this first edition, which he sold at _Eighteen pence_ each. These prices are amusing! The prices of books are connected with their history.

[56] On this subject Graves makes a very useful observation. "In this decision the happiness of Mr. Shenstone was materially concerned. Whether he determined wisely or not, people of taste and people of worldly prudence will probably be of very different opinions. I somewhat suspect, that 'people of worldly prudence' are not half the fools that 'people of taste' insist they are."

[57] Shenstone's farm was surrounded by winding walks, decorated with vases and statues, varied by wood and water, and occasionally embracing fine views over Frankley and Clent Hills, and the country about Cradley, Dudley, Rawley, and the intermediate places. Some of his vases were inscribed to the memory of relatives and friends. One had a Latin inscription to his cousin Maria, another was dedicated to Somerville his poet-friend. In different parts of his domain he constructed buildings at once useful and ornamental, destined to serve farm-purposes, but to be also grateful to the eye. A Chinese bridge led to a temple beside a lake, and near was a seat inscribed with the popular Shrops.h.i.+re toast to "all friends round the Wrekin,"

the spot commanding a distant view of the hill so named. A wild path through a small wood led to an ingeniously constructed root-house, beside which a rivulet ran which helped to form the lake already mentioned; on its banks was a dedicatory urn to the _Genio Loci_.

The general effect of the whole place was highly praised in the poet's time. It was neglected at his death; and its description is now but a record of the past.

[58] Wheatley, on "Modern Gardening," p. 172. Edition 5th.

[59] In "Hull's Collection," vol. ii. letter ii.

[60] Graves was supposed to have glanced at his friend Shenstone in his novel of "_Columella_; or, the Distressed Anch.o.r.et." The aim of this work is to convey all the moral instruction I could wish to offer here to youthful genius. It is written to show the consequence of a person of education and talents retiring to solitude and indolence in the vigour of youth. Nichols's "Literary Anecdotes,"

vol. iii. p. 134. Nash's "History of Worcesters.h.i.+re," vol. i. p.

528.

[61] See his "Letters" xl. and xli., and more particularly xlii. and xliii., with a new theory of political principles.

SECRET HISTORY OF THE BUILDING OF BLENHEIM.

The secret history of this national edifice derives importance from its nature, and the remarkable characters involved in the unparalleled transaction. The great architect, when obstructed in the progress of his work by the irregular payments of the workmen, appears to have practised one of his own comic plots to put the debts on the hero himself; while the duke, who had it much at heart to inhabit the palace of his fame, but tutored into wariness under the vigilant and fierce eye of Atossa,[62] would neither approve nor disapprove, silently looked on in hope and in grief, from year to year, as the work proceeded, or as it was left at a stand. At length we find this _comedie larmoyante_ wound up by the d.u.c.h.ess herself, in an attempt utterly to ruin the enraged and insulted architect![63]

Perhaps this was the first time that it had ever been resolved in parliament to raise a public monument of glory and grat.i.tude--to an individual! The novelty of the attempt may serve as the only excuse for the loose arrangements which followed after parliament had approved of the design, without voting any specific supply for the purpose! The queen always issued the orders at her own expense, and commanded expedition; and while Anne lived, the expenses of the building were included in her majesty's debts, as belonging to the civil list sanctioned by parliament.[64]

When George the First came to the throne, the parliament declared the debt to be the debt of the queen, and the king granted a privy seal as for other debts. The crown and the parliament had hitherto proceeded in perfect union respecting this national edifice. However, I find that the workmen were greatly in arrears; for when George the First ascended the throne, they gladly accepted a _third_ part of their several debts!

The great architect found himself amidst inextricable difficulties. With the fertile invention which amuses in his comedies, he contrived an extraordinary scheme, by which he proposed to make the duke himself responsible for the building of Blenheim!

However much the duke longed to see the magnificent edifice concluded, he showed the same calm intrepidity in the building of Blenheim as he had in its field of action. Aware that if he himself gave any order, or suggested any alteration, he might be involved in the expense of the building, he was never to be circ.u.mvented--never to be surprised into a spontaneous emotion of pleasure or disapprobation; on no occasion, he declares, had he even entered into conversation with the architect (though his friend) or with any one acting under his orders, about Blenheim House! Such impenetrable prudence on all sides had often blunted the subdolous ingenuity of the architect and plotter of comedies!

In the absence of the duke, when abroad in 1705, Sir John contrived to obtain from Lord G.o.dolphin, the friend and relative of the Duke of Marlborough, and probably his agent in some of his concerns, a warrant, const.i.tuting Vanbrugh _surveyor, with power of contracting on the behalf of the Duke of Marlborough_. How he prevailed on Lord G.o.dolphin to get this appointment does not appear--his lords.h.i.+p probably conceived it was useful, and might a.s.sist in expediting the great work, the favourite object of the hero. This warrant, however, Vanbrugh kept entirely to himself; he never mentioned to the duke that he was in possession of any such power; nor, on his return, did he claim to have it renewed.

The building proceeded with the same delays, and the payments with the same irregularity; the veteran now foresaw what happened, that he should never be the inhabitant of his own house! The public money issued from the Treasury was never to be depended on; and after 1712, the duke took the building upon himself, for the purpose of accommodating the workmen.

They had hitherto received what was called "crown pay," which was high wages and uncertain payment--and they now gladly abated a third of their prices. But though the duke had undertaken to pay the workmen, this could make no alteration in the claims on the Treasury. Blenheim was to be built _for_ Marlborough, not _by_ him; it was a monument raised by the nation to their hero, not a palace to be built by their mutual contributions.

Whether Marlborough found that his own million might be slowly injured while the Treasury remained still obdurate, or that the architect was still more and more involved, I cannot tell; but in 1715, the workmen appear to have struck, and the old delays and stand-still again renewed.