Recollections of past life

Front matter

Recollections of past life.

3 1924 012 501 619

Cornell University Library

Chapter II

At the Medical School. — Propensity for Travel. — Fondness for Rivers and for Islands. —First Foreign Travel.— Voyage to Iceland.— Journey to South of Europe. — Contrasts of Travel. — Ali Pasha, — Excursions in Asia Minor. — Last Visit to the United States. — Classical Researches. — Collection of Curiosities. — Dangers of Travel. — Robbed by Ali Pasha,-^ Scenes of War, — Earthquakes. — American Experiences. .,.,..... 22

Chapter. III

Social Life in Edinburgh. — Recollections of Scott, Lockhart, Jeffixy, Playfair, Dugald Stewart, and Alison. — Excursions to Ireland.— 'The Edgeworths. , . 79

Chapter IV

A Mediterranean Voyage. — Portugal. — Sicily, — Ionian Isles. — Albania. — Thessaly. — Greece. — Anecdotes of Ali Pasha. — Travels in Turkey. — Spain, — Return to England. — Celebrities of London. ...... 95

Chapter V

Visit to Germany. — Switzerland. — Italy. — Milan. — Bologna. — Florence. — Rome. — Naples, — The Bonapartes. — Murat. — The Countess Walewski, — Return of Napoleon from Elba. — Genoa. — ^Venice, — Trial of Queen Cairoline. — Journey to France, Belgium, and Holland, , . . . . . . xz6

Chapter VI

Entry on Professional Life. — Society of Spa. — Excursions. — Paris in 1848. — Professional Experience. — Success in Practice,— Prince Albert. — Created a Baronet 151

Contents,

Chapter VII

Political Experience.— United States.— Russia.— Turkey. — Mr. Canning.— King Leopold.— Napoleon III.— Guizot—Thiers. -Edward Everett.— Webster.— Clay.— Calhoun. — Bunsen. —Jefferson Davis. — Talleyrand. — Palmerston. — Cobden. — Coleridge.— Wordsworth.—Byron.— Moore.— CampbelL— Rogers. . 169

Chapter VIII

Made a Fellow of the Royal Society. — Cavendbh. — Wollaston. — Sir Humphrey Davy. —Sir Joseph, Banks. — Payne Knight. — The Club. — Homeric Scholars. — Longevity. — Sydney Smith— Macaulay.—Hallam. — Lord Holland. — Lady Holland. — 6obu£ Smidi. ......... 2x1

Chapter IX

Sir Philip Francis. — Mackintosh. — WhewelL — Malthus. — Romilly. — Erskine. — ^Joanna Eaillie.— Mrs. Somcrville. — Humboldt. — Augustus Schlegel. — Foscolo. — Blanco White. ,,,.-..,.. 336

Chapter X

Deterioration of London Society. — Periodical Literature. — Diffusion of Physical Knowledge. — London Clubs,- Increased Fastness of Living. — People walk faster than they did. <^ Religious Movements. — Famous Wits. — Canning. — Hookfaam Frere. — James Smith — The Witty Daughters of Lord North. — President Lincoln. — A Scene in the White House. ...... 257

CHAPTER XL

Reflections on Old Age.— InteUectual Habits. — Reading. — Novels. — ^The Authoi's Library. — An Evening at Berlin. — An Evening at Harvard College Observatory. — Mitchell the Astronomer. — Geology. — The Author's Subterranean Travels. 280

CHAPTER XIL

The Author's Writings. — His Narratives of Travels. — His Arrides in Reviews.— His Medical Works. — Present State of the Medical Profession. — Charlatanries. — Mesmerism. — Spirit-Rappings. — Cholera^— Duality of Mind. , , . 312

CHAPTER XIIL

The Author's Unpublished Manuscripts. — ^What is Electricity ? — What is Gravitation ? The Atlantic Telegraph. — Animal Instincts. — Self-Examinarion. — Failure of Memory. — Preservation of the Bodily Powers. — Eighty-three Yeara of Life. — Conclusion. .......... 329

RECOLLECTIONS OF PAST LIFE.

Chapter I

Some form of embodiment must be given to every narrative of life, however desultory; and though my professional life has been more variously blended with other objects and interests than is usual, I believe I may best make this the foundation of what I am about to write. I have, even from an early age, travelled much and lived much in society ; but I have never allowed these collateral interests to interfere with the objects or duties of my profession ; and, by what I regard as a singular happiness, I have been enabled so to combine these conditions that nothing has been forfeited by their conjunction.

My narrative then will follow in the track thus indicated, annexing the other incidents of Hfe to those which especially regard my professional course from its beginning to its close. Travel, as I have just stated, holds so laige a place among these incidents, that I must "necessarily give it sorhe special and commensurate place in what I write of myself But, nevertheless, here also I shall abstain from any formal narrative^ In these days of universal movement over the earth, little that I could say would be new or worthy of relation. I put aside therefore all local description and commonplaces of travelling adventure ; limiting myself mainly to those parts of my various journeys marked by any special incident, or coming into connection with persons or events remarkable in the history of the time.

It is right to say in the outset that this Memoir, as its title implies, is founded almost wholly on recollections. I have never kept a journal of the ordinary events of life, deeming this generally a profitless employment of time, and, in the case of a physician, endangering a breach of professional good faith. Excepting references to my earlier journals of travel for incidents belonging to that time, and other references for dates, all that I relate comes mainly from present memory of the past. From anecdotes pertaining to medical practice I have almost wholly abstained, under the consideration just stated.

This is all I need state in explanation of the matter and method of my narrative. I have sought to define the outline distinctly to myself, deeming this a iriatter of some moment, where my own personality enters so largely into the subject, and where much caution is needed to prevent its usurping too continually upon what I have to relate. Even under this caution, however, I cannot think it amiss, when writing in my eightythird year, to preface my narrative by a few words' touching the totality of this long life. Such general retrospect every reasonable man must needs make from time to time, even when the remnant has become thus short, and the habits of mind so deeply rooted that little of practical effect can be drawn from the retrospection.

I have much cause to say, on thus looking back upon it, that my life has been a prosperous- and happy one. But for the loss — inevitable as time goes on — of many endeared to me by the ties of family and friendship, I might fairly speak of it as untouched up to this moment by any serious misfortune. My health, with rare exceptions, has been singularly good, enabling me to maintain to this advanced age most of the habits and interests of earlier life, even those in which physical activity is chiefly concerned. Except in the single instance of a severe surgical operation, which confined me for some weeks, I have never, in more than fifty years of practice, been prevented from attending to the maladies of others by my own illness. The travels, which taken collectively form so large a portion of my life (a rough calculation would make it more than twelve years) have only once or twice been interrupted by illness ; and never marred by any serious accident, though several times menaced by the urgent danger of such.

These travels, repeated every year, while maintaining my health, have had an inexhaustible interest for me. The liberality of an excellent father, and my early professional success, saved me, even from the beginning, from those pecuniary anxieties of early life which so often for a time painfully fret the minds even of those who eventually reach professional fame and fortune. This exemption from pecuniary cares has continued to the end, and enabled me to follow my professional career, and to withdraw from it in the manner most consonant to my wishes. What may well rank higher in the scale of human blessings, my children have never been other than a source of satisfaction and happiness to me.

I may further note it as a fortunate condition in life, that, with one exception hardly worth remembrance, I have been wholly free from any personal controversy or quarrel during this long period of years — a benefit best understood by those who have themselves suffered under such social or professional turmoils. This exemption may have been due to several causes, but chiefly perhaps to those peculiar circumstances in my London practice of which I shall have occasion afterwards to speak

If I can rightly judge myself, I make this slight retrospect in no ostentatious spirit Looking around me, and to the various experience my profession has afforded, I have sometimes felt a certain vague alarm in this comparative exemption from the ills commonly besetting life ; not due to any deserts of my own, though doubtless peculiarities of personal temperament may have had their share in the result. But on these points, though serving in some sort as preface to my narrative, I have no desire to dwell further.

I was born October 27, 1788, at Knutsford, in Cheshire. If venturing to associate this insignificant fact with the history of the time, I might say that I was born on the very verge of the first "French Revolution. Of how many later revolutions of that great country has my long life made me the spectator ! — one of them, and perhaps the strangest in all its circumstances, actually in progress while I am penning this paragraph. Concerning the first ten years of my life I can say but little; nor indeed do I recollect much — perhaps less than is usual in the common memories of childhood. If this be so, it is probably owing to the multiplicity and rapid change of objects which have crowded succeeding years, erasing impressions which a quieter life might have preserved. The field of memory, large though it be in many cases, has yet its limits in all ; and the events of infancy and boyhood come back to myself dimly and without continuity — a straggling one now and then darting through the mist of years, evoked by those strange associations which link together things the most remote in the history of life.

These early years were passed in my native town of Knutsford ; with no other absence than an occasional visit to my maternal grandmother at ]JJewcastle-under- Lyne, and to her brother, Josiah Wedgwood, at Etruria. This admirable man, to whose memory a high public tribute has recently been : paid, was endeared to all around him-in domestic and social life. Even as a child I received kindnesses from him which I gladly keep in remembrance, aiid which made my Etruria visits always pleasant to me. Through him I come into family connection with his eminent grandson, Charles Darwin — a long and intimate friendship with whom I have more pleasure in recording than any mere family tie. Whatever be the fate of his doctrines, he has given to the greatest problem of Natural History a new framework and direction of research, which will ever remain a monument of his genius and persevering labours.

A year or two of this first period of life I passed at a private school at Knutsford, learning as much perhaps as such schools generally teach, but this very little. Like most boys of the same age, I had a transient fit of military ardour, fostered by attending the sword exercises of a troop of yeomanry, raised in the town at this time of threatened invasion. I have since seen much of actual military life and battle-fields in various countries, but always looking on them from without — spectator tantum — as in these early days of boyhood.

A more tranquil pleasure at this time was that of frequent visits to my paternal grandfather at the old family house of Sandlebridge, between Knutsford and Alderley. His was an admirable example of old age rendered venerable by all the gentler qualities of human nature. He was the most perfect practical optimist I have ever known. Living on and farming his own land, he put to shame the many sayings, ancient and modern, as to the querulous nature of the agricultural mind. He never could be got to complain of the change or ' distemperature of the seasons.' If a particular season was quoted to him as bad for one crop, he always vindicated it as good for another. I never visit this old and picturesque house of Sandlebridge, now belonging to me, without some remembrance of him coming to my mind, either as walking cheerfully over his fields, or tranquilly smoking his pipe in an arm-chair coeval with himself. I have added three other farms to this Cheshire property, more than doubling its extent Though visiting the place only once a year, it is pleasant to me to retain the old family farm in my own hands, confessing at the same time that my tastes and habits are little suited to the condition of a landed proprietor.*

Even in this early boyhood, certain other tastes showed themselves, which afterwards mingled largely with the incidents of life. I can recollect the pleasure I had in exploring the cc5untry round Knutsford ; visiting the little lakes or meres in this neighbourhood, and following the windings of the brook which supplies water to my Sandlebridge mill — the miniature precursor to the many great rivers whose courses I have since followed. I made myself also a frequent guide to those who came to obtain specimens of the Saxifraga Hirculus, growing on a small detached spot in a marsh close to Knutsford ; — the most southern English locality, as I believe, in which this plant has been found. Years after, when I came to look for it on the well-known place, it had wholly disappeared.

In Januaiy 1799, having entered my eleventh year, I went to Newcastle-on-Tyne, as the pupil of the Rev. W. Turner ; and in the house and under the care of this excellent man I resided four years. The love of travel,

* My cousin, Mrs. Gaskell, who knew Sandlebridge well, has pictured the place by some short but very descriptive touches in one or two of her novels.

even thus early awakened, has left on my mind several traces of this first journey, made more than seventy years ago. I remember well the interest I felt in crossing for the first time the summit of Blackstone Edge, then a long and hard horse-labour above ground, now accomplished by a few minutes of railroad tunnel underneath. Next came the sight of a tide-river and ships, also new to me ; and, a few months later, my first view of the Sea from the edge of the cliff at Tynemouth Castle, to which spot I was led blindfold, to enhance the effect of the sight by its suddenness. I attach a certain sentimental interest to this particular memory, associated as it has become with that of my numerous voyages in after years, and their various incidents of peril or enjoyment. Visiting Tynemouth a little more than a year ago, I stood for a while on the exact spot whence I thus looked on the Sea for the first time precisely seventy years before. A few days afterwards I embarked on a voyage of 5,000 miles to Jamaica. Such relations of time to events are not common in the history of a single life.

I pass rapidly over these four years of boyhood at Newcastle, marked only, as far. as I can tell, by a fair amount of bodily and mental activity. There was very little constraint upon me, quiet instruction, and a cheerful home. The knowledge I gained was perhaps somewhat vague and general, but such in kind as to give the appetite for more — an important step in every case in the process of education.

Two short courses on Chemistry and Electricity, by

Past Life. g

an itinerant lecturer here, formed my first introduction to physical science ; a very feeble foreshadowing of what these two Sciences have now become, but enough to awaken the interest I have ever since felt in their progress. The nitrous oxide {^laughing gas) had just been discovered, and the exhibition of its strange effects, at which I was often an eager spectator, mixed a little metaphysical thought, such as might occur to a boy, with the mere amusement of the spectacle. The wonder indeed is simply the same as that of common intoxication, or the innocuous phenomena of dreams ; but the familiarity of these and other kindred conditions disguises much that bears upon the deepest problems of mental philosophy.

I may notice here also my many pedestrian excursions round Newcastle, fostering the tastes which at a later time I carried with me to the more remote parts of the world, I have often amused myself by bringing into comparison events thus widely different in place, time, and degree, yet all having kindred with the same temperament of mind, passing on from boyhood into adult age. The neighbourhood of Newcastle was one singularly favourable to these juvenile propensities. The collieries, with their vast and various machinery — the Tyne, with its crowded navigation, and its then perilous opening to the sea — the chemical and other manufactures (now multiplied fourfold) which already lined its banks ; ■ — these gave objects to my youthful excursions, the same in kind as those which still especially interest me. In visiting the principal coal-mines, I descended and lo Recollections of

explored thoroughly one or two of the deepest of them — those which, under the name of Wallsend, have so long fed the London fires. My walks, often of great length, led me also to visit the great iron bridge at Sunderland, and the more picturesque structure of Tanfield-arch ; noted at that time as the two largest arches in England, now dwarfed into insignificance by the marvellous works of modern engineers. The same comparative fate has attended the old colliery horse-railways of this district, then regarded with some admiration. Among these rude wooden railroads, however, was nurtured that genius of George Stephenson which has since done so much to change the face of the world. The villages of Wylam and Newburn, where he passed all the early parts of his life, were familiar to me in my excursions ; and, comparing dates, I find I must have been often at Newburn when he was still living there as a common workman. Faber ipse fortunce sua, one may well say of this remarkable man.

One of these excursions comes to my memory as having been made in the Mayor's barge in the annual survey of the Tyne by the Mayor and Corporation of Newcastle. This was followed by a public dinner at the Mansion House, at which I was a guest — a somewhat rare festivity for a boy of fourteen. What led to my being thus honoured I do not remember, but I name it as the first of "a long series of such dinners in after life, in conformity to a usage which, while fulfilling some useful purposes, has in its frequency become rather a heavy tax on English social existence.

Past Life. ii

Another incident in the early part of my Newcastle life was a visit to Mr. George Taylor at Middleham in Durham. This I note, because here I saw, lying in his cradle, a week only after his birth, Henry Taylor, the author of the finest dramatic poem of our time. More than twenty years elapsed before I saw him again, when I had the satisfaction of aiding him in the first step of his honourable public career. Since that time our friendship has been unbroken.

In 1803, I finally left Newcastle, and went for a year

to the school of Dr. Estlin, near Bristol. Here I was

placed at once in the position of head-boy ; succeeding

as such to John Hobhouse, afterwards Lord Broughton,

who had just quitted the school. This appointment,

coming in exclusion of other boys of elder date there,

made me at first some enemies, and led to one or two

schoolboy fights ; but I kept my ground well in these

contests, and the jealousies so created speedily subsided.*

My most intimate friend here was Richard Bright,

with whom I afterwards travelled in Iceland, and who

as Dr. Bright held such high and well-merited place

in the medical world. At this school I gained more of

classical knowledge than at Newcastle, but still very

little of that exact scholarship which is reached (with

disputed advantage) at our public schools. What now

* The petty incidents of a schoolboy's life are often a whimsical miniature of greater things. In war, the fate of a campaign is sometimes decided by a single bold adventure. At this Bristol school I overcame my first difficulties by challenging two boys to fight at once. The combat, in which I should, doubtless, have been well beaten, was in some way prevented ; but such mere act of challenge saved me from all further provocations, and established my position in the school.

12 Recollectiom of

renders the reading of the Greek and Latin classics one of my greatest pleasures was an attainment of later date, and due mainly to private study. The taste was fostered by my early travels in Greece, but it has been ripening ever since ; and I do not mistake my own mind in saying that I have greater enjoyment from this source now than at any earlier period of life. To this subject, nowever, I shall have occasion to revert hereafter.

The Christmas vacation of this Bristol school I passed in London, or rather at Stoke Newington, with Dr. Aikin, a very old friend of my father. His sister, Mrs. Barbauld, who lived close to him, and his daughter, Lucy Aikin, gave a certain literary repute to this then tranquil village ; since absorbed, like so many others, into the huge mass of the metropolis. I met in small parties, at one or other of these houses, several writers of repute of that day, now almost or wholly forgotten, — the warm admirers of Mrs. Barbauld's masculine understanding and gentle feminine character. She well merited this admiration. Of the excellence of her English prose style it is enough to say that I have heard it warmly praised both by Mackintosh and Macawlay. Each specified the 'Essay on the Inconsistency of Human Expectations ' as an example of this excellence.

This was my first visit to London, and sixty-six years have since elapsed. Having known our great City through all its intermediate changes, I have some diflSculty in recalling its exact picture at that time, and the impressions made upon me. Madame de Stael's description of it as ' a: province of brick ' had not then been given ; but this was undoubtedly a description well merited at the period of my first visit to London, and in truth long afterwards. The newest and best streets (those north of Oxford Street, then terminating in open fields) were remarkable only for their unmeaning length and utter destitution of all architectural character — imputations still but partially removed. I went through most of the stg-Ais of London as they were then catalogued for strangers. It may give some idea of their comparative paucity and poverty, to say that I was shown, the bald frontage of Connaught Place as one of them. I have often sought to recall the aspect of Charing Cross, Pall Mall, Piccadilly, &c., as I first saw these great thcyroughfares ; but the memory of the old has been gradually obliterated by living for more than half a century under the growth of the new. I can better recollect the occasional shooting of the Fall at the old London Bridge in a Thames wherry, — the little dash of adventure in this according well with those propensities of character which showed themselves afterwards in more distant places and on a larger scale. The picture too is still before me of the bare and dismal fields lying outside Tyburn turnpike and Hyde Park Corner — now covered by two new cities, each rivalling many European capitals in extent and grandeur ; and in the individuality of the dwelling-houses marking at once the wealth which created them, and one of the most notable peculiarities of English domestic life. I have .known foreigners come to London, and quit it without having even seen these city creations of our own time, still augmenting rapidly under our eyes.

I am not one of those inclined to undervalue the changes which time and the growth of arts and taste have wrought in our great metropolis. I believe these changes, present or in progress, to be greater and more substantial improvements than any other city — Paris excepted — can bring into comparison ; improvement, moreover, only in small part the work of Government, but due infinitely more to the wealthy munificence of corporations, companies, and individuals. The large substitution of stucco for brick, the removal of the taxes on windows and glass, and the .increased height and ornamentation of private houses, have made a marvellous change in general aspect,; but a change so gradual that it needs a memory of the dreary colouring of the old London streets by day, and of the lurid light of their oil lamps by night, fully to appreciate it.

Much, indeed, still remains to be effected for the well-being of London as a city ; and the faults of ancient construction, as well as of climate and coal fuel, render impossible much that might be desired. But the spirit of the time (greatly embarrassed indeed at all times by the disputes so promptly evoked, on points of taste) is fully awake to the object and its fulfilment. The last ten years especially have been prolific of these improvements. Two hours now passed on the Thames between Lambeth and London Bridge, and in that circle of the City surrounding St. Paul's and the Exchange, will show some of the wonderful changes effected during this periodr-sights almost unknown indeed to those who crowd the drawing-rooms of the West End, yet better worthy of being studied than many of the objects which our Continental tourists rush impetuously, and often ignorantly, to see.

I claim a certain right to this short parenthesis from my long and intimate knowledge of London, and from my having visited at various times every single European capital — many of them so frequently as to be familiar with all that has progressively been done for their embellishment. But I have ever maintained true allegiance to our own great City, and note unwillingly that fashion for depreciating it which has grown up in these days of indiscriminate travel, when hasty impressions, often due to novelty alone, are put down and printed as deliberate judgments. After living in London some sixty years, I would willingly endorse Dr. Johnson's opinion •• as to this City ; uttered indeed when it numbered scarcely a fourth of its present population, and when individual life was less lost in the crowd of human existence than it now is. Those who depreciate what London has done for its own improvement would do well to read Gay's 'Trivia,' and mark the changes that have occurred since the date of that curious poem • — not in size alone, but in all that constitutes the true grandeur of a metropolis.*

* I recollect one of Gay's couplets, singularly applicable to the two most recent among London improvements : —

' Where common sewers a lulling murmur keep, And torrents rush from Holbom's fatal steep.'

I returned to Bristol to complete my allotted year there, and with this my very short school life came to an end. Though I cannot say that I have myself suffered by this curtailment of the conunon form of English education, and the total omission of a public school afterwards, yet I have thought it well to provide otherwise for my Sons ; and the event has justified me in doing so. It is seldom that an individual case can wisely be confronted with general usage.

When leaving Bristol, I made the journey to Knutsford wholly on foot. Setting out thus with the view of seeing Tintern Abbey only, and the valley of the Wye, the sense of pleasure in bodily prowess urged me onwards to complete the journey as a pedestrian. I refer with some interest to this trifling matter, as the early expression of a particular temperament, which has continued through a long life. Much, indeed, of the philosophy of the human mind, both practical and theoretical, lies in these inborn specialities of character, which time and events may modify, but can never wholly eradicate.

Though not yet sixteen at this time, I was called upon for some decision, conditional at least, as to my future course in life. I can scarcely now say whence the inclination came (possibly from the better promise it gavo of voyage or travel at a time when Englishmen were almost wholly excluded from Continental Europe) ; but, whatever the cause, my leaning at this period was to a mercantile life. My father yielded, though somewhat reluctantly, to this wish; and I became an articled clerk in a great Liverpool house, with the privilege reserved to me, through the friendship of a principal partner, of passing two sessions at the Glasgow University, in furtherance of my general education. These two sessions (1804-5 and 1805-6) virtually decided the course of my future life. I went back indeed to the office in Liverpool in the interval between them; but the suspicion gradually ripened into certainty, that I had greatly erred in this my first independent judgment ; and at the close of the second session at Glasgow, I sought and obtained a release from the articles which had bound me to a merchant's desk. It would be well if all mistakes in the great adventure of life could be thus early and easily retrieved.