Letters to "Ivy" from the first Earl of Dudley;

Contents

PASE

CHAPTER

I. Staeting Life 15

Introduction

Helen d'Arcy Stewart, the ' Ivy ' to whom John William Ward, afterwards created Earl of Dudley, addressed these letters, was bom on March 13, 1765, and was the third daughter of the Hon. George Cranstoun, and sister of George Cranstoun Lord Corehouse, and of the Countess Purgstall, both intimate friends of Sir Walter Scott. Her mother was Maria, daughter of Thomas Brisbane, of Brisbane in Ayrshire.

Though the least beautiful of a family in which beauty was hereditary, Helen Cranstoun is described as having been ' stately and handsome,' and as having ' the best essence of beauty, expression, a bright eye beaming with intelligence, a manner the most distinguished, yet soft, feminine, and singularly winning.'

Even as a girl she seems to have attracted much notice by the charm of her manner and the brilliancy of her mind. She was devoted to poetry, and herself wrote verses which were highly praised, not only by admiring friends and relations, but by men of literary distinction who were strangers to her. It was said of her poems that they ' must remind every friend who knew her of her graceful taste and sensibility, of her quick perception of humour, of her playful wit.' ^ It was, moreover, to this gift of poetry that her marriage to Dugald Stewart, the

^ Edinburgh Evening Courant, August 9, 1838.

B great philosopher of Edinbm-gh, is said to have been due. One of her poems was accidentally shown by her cousin, Lord Lothian, to Mr. Stewart, who was at that time his private tutor and unknown to fame. ' The philosopher was so enraptured with the perusal, and so warm in his commendations, that authoress and critic fell in love by Scotch second sight before their fii-st, and in due time were made one.' ^ The marriage took place on July 26, 1790, the age of the bride being twenty-five, and that of the bridegroom thirty-seven. The marriage was a perfectly happy one on both sides. The young wife ' doted with a love-match devotion ' on her reserved and rugged philosopher. Her husband, who had the highest opinion of his wife's judgment, submitted all his writings to her. ' She was his habitual and confidential companion during his studies, and he never considered a piece of his composition to be finished until she had reviewed it. He himself said that, although she did not probably understand the abstract points of his philosophy so well as he did himself, yet when he had once made out a truth into an intelligible shape, she helped him to illustrate it by a play of fancy and of feeling which could only come from a woman's mind.' ^ But she was free from the slightest tinge of pedantry ; there was no display of learning in her conversation. In one of his letters to the Bishop of LlandafF Lord Dudley says of her : ' She has as much knowledge, miderstanding, and wit as would set up three foreign ladies as first-rate talkers in their respective drawing-rooms, but she is almost as desirous to conceal as they are to display their talents.' A woman endowed with such gifts and charm naturally attracted a large circle of devoted friends, and as the wife of Dugald Stewart, whose literary reputation, after his marriage, soon rose to the highest rank, she was able to make her house in Edinburgh the resort of all those who were best worth knowing in the Scottish metropolis when it was really a metropolis of intellectual power. Hers was the house to which strangers most eagerly sought

^ Quarterly Revieio, vol. Ixvii. p. 88, note.

^ Edinburgh Evening Courant, August 9, 1838.

introduction, and it has been said that, when ' at the zenith of her life, it may be doubted if a person departing from Scotland could have carried a stronger recommendation into the intellectual world of England or America than a letter of introduction from Mrs. Dugald Stewart.' ^

A glimpse of the Dugald Stewarts in Edinburgh, when both were at the height of their reputation, is afforded us by Maria Edgeworth, who paid them a visit there in March 1803. Writing to her aunt, Mrs. Ruxton, Miss Edgeworth says : ' Mr. and Mrs. Stewart surpassed all that I had expected, and I had expected much. Mr. Stewart is said to be naturally or habitually grave and reserved, but towards us he has broken through his habits or his nature, and I never conversed with any one with whom I was more at ease. . . . Mrs. Stewart has been for years wishing in vain for the pleasure of hearing one of her husband's lectures. She is just the sort of woman you would like, that you would love. I do think it is impossible to know her without loving her ; indeed, she has been so kind to Henry ^ that it would be doubly impossible (an Irish impossibility) to us. Yet you know people do not always love because they have received obligations. It is an additional proof of her merit, and of her powers of pleasing, that she makes those who are under obligations to her forget that they are bound to be grateful, and only remember that they think her good and agreeable.' '

This first impression of Mrs. Stewart upon Miss Edgeworth lasted through life. Fifteen years later they met again at Bowood, and Miss Edgeworth writes : ' This moment Mrs. Dugald Stewart, who was out walking, has come in— the same dear woman ! ' * And again in 1823, after Mr. Stewart's retirement. Miss Edgeworth paid them a visit at Kinneil House, Linlithgowshire, the ' old but whitewashed castle-mansion ' which had been lent them as a home by the Duke of Hamilton. Mrs. Stewart's character is thus summed up, by one who evi-

' Edinburgh Evening Courant, August 9, 1838.

' Miss Edgeworth's half-brother.

' Life of Maria JEdgeworth, by Augustus Hare, vol. i. p. 135.

* Hare's Life of Miss Edgeworth, vol. i. p. 254.

B 2 dently knew her well, in an obituary notice in the ' Edinburgh Evening Courant ' of August 9, 1838 : ' To the last she was remarkable for a winning gentleness of manner — a meekness more impressive than austerity — by which, during her whole life, she had exercised gi-eater influence on those around her than others could do by an assumption of dignity.'

Of her husband, the philosopher, it is not necessary to say much, as his name and his writings are known all over the civilised world. Apart, however, from his great powers as a thinker and writer, his extraordinary influence as a tutor and lectui-er upon the rising generation of men who were afterwards to play leading parts in history is worthy of notice.

He was presented to the Chair of Moral Philosophy at Edinburgh University in 1785, and very soon began to make his name known and his influence felt throughout the whole kingdom. But it was not merely as a writer on philosophical subjects that he came to be recognised as the greatest living authority ; as a lectui'er he gained such reputation as to attract to his classes numbers not only of his own countrymen, but also of young Englishmen of high position and with great future prospects, who, owing to the disturbed state of the Continent and the long continuance of warfare, were unable to complete their education in what was considered in those days the most approved style — viz. by making ' the grand tour.' Dugald Stewart may fairly be said to have founded a school for rising statesmen and judges in Edinburgh. Among those who attended his lectures were Brougham, Jeffrey, Henry Cockburn, Francis Horner, Lord Henry Petty (afterwards Lord Lansdowne), Lord Palmerston, Douglas Kinnaird, Lord Webb Seymour, Sydney Smith, Henry Erskine, Lord John B-usseU, Lord Ashburton, and Sir Archibald Alison. Lord Cockburn, in his ' Memorials,' has left a description of the impression which Stewart's lectures made upon him. He says : ' To me his lectures were like the opening of the heavens. I felt that I had a soul. His noble views, unfolded in glorious sentences, elevated me into a higher world. I was as much excited and charmed as any man of cultivated taste would be who, after being ignorant of their existence, was admitted to all the glories of Milton and Cicero and Shakespeare. They changed my whole natiire. In short, Dugald Stewart was one of the greatest of didactic orators. Had he lived in ancient times, his memory would have descended to us as that of one of the finest of the old eloquent sages. But his lot was better cast. Flourishing in an age which requires all the dignity of morals to counteract the tendencies of physical pursuits and political convulsion, he has exalted the character of his country and his generation. No intelligent pupil of his ever ceased to respect philosophy, or was ever false to his principles without feeling the crime aggravated by the recollection of the morality that Stewart had taught him.' ^

The intense admiration which Dugald Stewart inspired in the minds of his pupils is further shown in the following lines addressed to him by Lord John Russell during a visit to Kinneil

To distant orbs a guide amid the night, To nearer worlds a source of life and light, Each sun, resplendent on its proper throne, Gilds other systems and supports its own. Thus we see Stewart, on his fame reclined, Enlighten all the Universe of mind ; To some for wonder, some for joy appear. Admired when distant, and beloved when near. 'Twas he gave laws to fancy, grace to thought. Taught virtue's laws, and practised what he taught.

Such was the ' guide, philosopher, and friend ' under whose charge and in whose house John William Ward was placed when he went to Edinburgh in the winter of 1797-8. To a boy so sensitive and impressionable as Ward — one whose life had up to that time been most dreary and solitary — this change of surroundings must have been, in Lord Cockburn's words, ' like the opening of the heavens.' He must have felt for the first time that he ' had a soul ' when, after years of solitude and neglect, he found himself thus suddenly transplanted into a

' See Lord Cockburn's Memorials, pp. 22, 23.

^ See Walpole's Life of Lord John Russell, vol. i. p. 57.

new life, sitting at the feet of such a master as Professor Stewart, \vith so charming, clever, and sympathetic a woman as Mrs. Stewart taking the place of a mother to him, and suiTOunded by SO brilliant and attractive a set of companions of his own age, tastes, and rank of life as were gathered together in the city which then justly deserved its title of the ' Modern Athens.'

For Ward's boyhood had been a most unhappy one. He was the only son of William, third Viscount Dudley and Ward, his mother being a daughter of Godfrey Bosvile, of Thorpe and Gunthwaite in Yorkshire. He was born on August 9, 1781, and was therefore more than sixteen years younger than Mrs. Stewart. His father is described by the author of the article on Lord Dudley in the ' Quarterly Review ' ^ as ' One of those ordinary mortals on whom capricious fortune takes a pleasure in lavishing worldly advantages. The obscure existence of the old lord was passed in the society of those who, like himself, preferred port wine and fiddling to the pursuits either of politics or literature. His companions, generally selected from grades beneath his own, were chiefly remarkable for that convenient obsequiousness which noblemen and gentlemen of large landed estates delight to honour. The viscountess, a beauty in her youth, took refuge in later life in cards and strong waters.'

It is stated by the same authority that Lord and Lady Dudley's conduct towards their only son was ' from the cradle marked by want of parental affection.' Instead of sending him to a public school, he was educated by various private tutors, constantly changed by his father, was denied any companions of his own age, all sports and amusements, and was subjected to a severe course of unremitting study. On one occasion only, we are told, did one of these tutors — more sensible than the rest — thinking that such incessant study was bad for his pupil, venture to give him a holiday, and send him out for a day's hunting. Unluckily the news of this terrible piece of idling reached Lord Dudley's ears, and the one tutor who might have been of use was promptly dismissed.

1 Vol. IxTii. p. 84.

Eventually a house was taken at Paddington, where the unhappy boy was placed under the charge of a fellow of New College, Oxford. Here he must have passed a most dreary and imeventful existence until the happy day came for his release. To quote again from the same article in the ' Quarterly ' : —

' The solitary boy, without brothers, sisters, or playfellows of his own age, became a man in habits while yet a child. Associating with his elders and with those in authority over him, he grew up in a constitutional distrust of his own powers, in an habitual reliance for guidance and support on other men's minds, though not possessed of one tithe of his own good qualities or talents. He never completely shook off the idolatrous prejudice or prestige of his young inexperience ; the habit remained when the moral conviction was gone. It was in this micongenial atmosphere that he contracted a tinge of formality which, natural and decorous in pedagogues, is held among men of the world to savour of priggism.'

His only other near relation — ^his uncle on the mother's side — 'never took the smallest interest in me, or showed me the smallest kindness.' ' Ward's sensitive nature must have felt bitterly this neglect on the part of those most nearly related to him, and the more so because his disposition was warm and affectionate, and much in need of sympathy ; but, with the exception of the remark just quoted about his imcle, there is not one word of complaint in any of his letters — either those to Mrs. Stewart, or those published by Bishop Copleston. On the contrary, his allusions to his father are always expressive of respect and gratitude for his liberality in money matters. After his father's death he was devoted in his attentions to his mother.

This constant study, and want of congenial society, amusement, and exercise, tended no doubt to increase the malady of the brain (due to some organic malformation) from which he suffered more or less all his life, and which embittered his whole existence. As the writer of the article in the ' Quarterly Review ' well puts it, ' his tale was that of an Eastern fable,

^ See Lord Dudley' a Letters to the Bishop of Llandaff, Letter I., P.S.

where the fairy showers over the cradle of the new-born infant blessings without stint which are converted into curses, through the annexation of one fatal condition by some malevolent genius. He was born to rank, title, and unbounded affluence ; his person and manner were agreeable ; his intellect, of the highest order, was coupled with an industry, a thirst for knowledge, which might have shamed the poor student whose bread must be earned by the sweat of his brow. . . .

' His taste was refined to fastidiousness ; his memory was wax to receive and marble to retain ; his powers of illustration have seldom been rivalled ; the results of his deep reading were parcelled out in such nice order that everything was forthcoming without effort or ostentation at the exact moment when it was wanted. Fulfilling Lord Bacon's grand recipe — his reading made him full, his -imting exact. His wit was prompt, sparkling, and epigrammatic ; it was playful and indulgent, not, however, from weakness ; it was the giant's strength which could afford to be generous. To all these qualities of the head were superadded a gentle and affectionate disposition, a freedom from pride and vanity, a simplicity of habits and tastes — in a word, all the sterling features of that noblest of creations — a real English gentleman. . . .

' His intellect might be compared to a delicate piece of mechanism, in which by some accident one small pivot is insecure, not indeed sufficient at first materially to derange the operation, yet ever and anon indicated under increased action by slight jarrings. To this physical cause must be attributed those oddities and imperfections which caught and amused the random glance of unreflecting silliness, but fixed and delighted the evil eye of conscious yet jealous inferiority.

' Lord Dudley felt acutely these small weaknesses, which no misconduct of his own had occasioned, and which no effort of his own could alleviate.'

A sketch of Lord Dudley's character has also been left to us by one who had the best of opportunities for forming a judgment, and whose judgment is in itself of the highest authority. Lord Brougham, who had been Ward's companion as a lad at Edinburgh, and had kept up an intimate friendship with him throughout their parliamentary careers, and for whom Ward always writes in terms of admiration, thus writes of his old friend in the 'Edinburgh Review'' of April 1838 : —

' The late Lord Dudley, better known for the greater part of the present century as John William Ward, was certainly one of the most remarkable men that have appeared in this century ; and when the adventitious gifts which fortune bestowed upon him, in union with extraordinary powers of mind, are regarded, we may well affirm that a more cruel fate has hardly ever blighted such singular expectations as the world had a good right to indulge in liim. Born to an immense and unencumbered fortune, with none of the trammels which a numerous body of relations too often impose as more than a counterpoise for any power and influence that such a connection is calculated to confer, this eminent person entered public life with the most perfect independence that ever rising statesman enjoyed. But Natm-e had been still more lavish of her gifts than Fortune. He possessed one of the most acute and vigorous understandings that any man was ever armed with. His quickness was not accompanied with the least temerity ; on the contrary, he was as sure as the slowest of mankind. His wit was of the brightest order, combining with the liveliest perception of remote resemblances and mere distinctions — the peculiar attribute of wit properly so called — all that nice relish of the ludicrous, especially in character, out of which perfect humour is engendered. His powers of reasoning, though never cultivated in the walks of the stricter sciences, were admirable ; and the tuition of Dugald Stewart had well supplied the defects of an Oxford education in all that concerned metaphysical lore. To a prodigious memory he added a lively imagination, even in matters unconnected with the merriment of humour, and the playfulness of wit. And it was none of the least enviable of his great qualities that, in union with all these endowments, and in spite of that fortune and station usually so inimical of laborious pursuits, he possessed the faculty of intense application ; passing his life by preference in a study, and having acquired the habits of unremitting intellectual labour as completely as if he had been born a poor man, by necessity become a student, gifted with a slow understanding, and at once devoid of fancy and of acuteness.

'This distinguished man had early become a consummate classical scholar. The taste which habitually evolving the remains of ancient genius had refined to the most exquisite pitch, and even rendered so fastidious as to impede his own exertions, was subsequently enlarged and variegated by his marvellous facility of acquiring modern languages. Nor was there a great writer from Homer to Dante, and from Dante to Byron, with whose productions he was not perfectly familiar. His acquaintance with the records of history, and with the principles of political as well as moral and metaphysical science, was extensive and profound. . . .

' All this was well kno^vn when he entered public life, and vast expectations were raised of his success. Nor can it be said with any truth that these were disappointed.'

Great, however, as were the gifts which Nature had bestowed upon him, it is more than probable that they would have been wasted and barren of result had it not been for the influence over him of Professor and Mrs. Stewart during his stay in Edinburgh. The effect of the influence of the professor was to make him realise the moral responsibility imposed upon him by Nature in return for her gifts of wealth and wisdom, and to overcome his inherent reserve and reluctance to take a leading

to

part in public affairs. But, great though Dugald Stewart's influence undoubtedly was, it is probable that that of Mrs. Stewart — the ' Ivy ' of his letters — must have been even more beneficial to him.

Ward was evidently a man who deeply needed sympathy, and especially a woman's sympathy — one to whom he could pomout his heart and his thoughts, and to whom he could look for comfort and advice. Such a woman he found to perfection in Mrs. Stewart. She was sufficiently his senior in point of years for him to be guided by her experience of the world, and yet not too much so for his intense admiration for her to be untinged with a certain element of romance. In his earUest letters from Oxford he writes to her as to one who had supplied the place of a mother to him ; she is his ' dearest mama ' ; then, as a young man entering upon public life, the ' mama ' is dropped, and the tinge of romance becomes more apparent in the pet name of ' Ivy.' In his later letters this form of address also disappears, but his expressions of devotion when they occur show that his love for his divinity remained as strong as ever, though the tone is no longer that of a boyish lover, but of one writing to an old and very dear friend. This love and respect were unbounded, and continued to the end. The writer of the article in the ' Quarterly Review,' who must have been an intimate fi'iend of both, tells us : ' ' Often have we seen him, when she was stricken in years, seated near her for whole evenings, clasping her hand in both of his. Into her faithful ear he pomred his hopes and fears, and unbosomed his inner soul ; with her he maintained a constant correspondence to the last.'

It is this correspondence — or rather such portion of it as survives — which is now presented for the first time to the public. It had been assumed that the whole collection of Lord Dudley's letters was destroyed by Mrs. Stewart when on her death-bed. The writer in the ' Quarterly,' in referring to these letters, goes on to say : —

' That series of his letters was, we doubt not, the most valuable as well as the most extensive ; but it is said to be no more. She burnt the whole, we are told, when dying herself. She would not trust the holocaust to accident, neither would she deprive herself of a sad pleasure in reading over the expressions of a whole existence devoted to her, until she felt distinctly that the last days of her own drew near.'

Fortunately this statement has proved to be incorrect. Mrs. Stewart may have destroyed some of the letters, but a large portion — some of them originals, others as copies only — still sm-vives, and came into my possession some twelve years ago on the death of a relative, a lady who had been brought up as a

1 Page 89.

child in the house of Mr. and Mrs. Stewart, and to whom their daughter Maria — often alluded to in terms of admiration by Lord Dudley in these letters — bequeathed most of her possessions. For many years they remained unnoticed, hidden away in old drawers in a house in the country, which was only lived in for a few months in each year. It was only in the early part of the present year (1904), that, when clearing out cupboards and drawers preparatory to letting the house, curiosity led me to examine the contents of three volumes of manuscripts, which proved to contain full copies of the letters. Further search led to the discovery of one bundle of the originals — only a small portion, however, of the whole — but though I failed to find the remainder, there can be no doubt that they were in existence long after the death of Maria Stewart, for the copies are in the handwriting of the sister (now dead) of the lady to whom Maria left them. A perusal of the letters led to the conclusion that they were well worthy of being made public (with the exception only of a very few passages of a quite private nature), not only on account of the natural charm of their style, and the insight they afford into the sayings and doings of most of the leading actors in an interesting period of history and society, but also as being a true and sincere record of the thoughts and feelings of a very remarkable man, written spontaneously to one from whom he was sure of sympathy and had nothing to conceal. To read these letters is almost as if one heard Lord Dudley pouring his heart out in conversation to her who shared in all his fears and aspirations in the manner just quoted. It is this spontaneity which gives them their special charm.

Unluckily most of the letters were either undated — a ' vile, careless habit,' as Lord Dudley himself calls it in one of them — or else only bore the day of the month or week, and in copying them no attempt had been made to arrange them in order of time. It has been necessary, therefore, to trust to the internal evidence contained in the letters themselves in order to get them into chronological order, and the date, where missing, has been inserted in brackets wherever possible, though in two or three instances it must remain uncertain.

Lord Dudley has been introduced to the pubHc before this as a letter writer. But his letters to his old friend and college tutor, Copleston (afterwards Bishop of LlandafF), are of a very different nature from those contained in this volume. They were published by Copleston in 1840, and at once raised great expectations which it cannot be said were fulfilled. The letters certainly did not reveal Lord Dudley's real and lovable character in the least, and those who had known and loved him seem to have severely criticised the Bishop's want of discretion in making them public. This is shown by an epigram, attributed to Croker, which appeared at the time : ^ —

Than the first Martyr's Dudley's fate

Still harder must be owned ; Stephen was only stoned to death,

Ward has been Ooplestoned.

This was certainly hard luck upon the man of whom no less an authority than Madame de Stael had said that ' he was the only man in England who really understood the art of conversation.' ^

The dullness and disappointing nature of the letters to Copleston is easily accounted for. They were, as was pointed out in the notice of them in the ' Quarterly Review,' the compositions of a pupil nervously sensitive of criticism, wi-iting to his tutor and literary superior, and consequently wanting in ease and freedom of style. They read almost like exercises, and contain apologies for ' incorrect expressions,' and for ' slowness and unreadiness of composition,' clearly showing that the writer was mistrustful of himself, and not writing at his ease. The author of the article in the ' Quarterly ' says that this is no mere conjecture of his own, for he speaks to having seen many notes and letters written by Lord Dudley to 'male friends of less lofty station and character than the Bishop,' and of them he says they were, ' comparatively speaking, " rien, pas meme academicien," but their nothingness set this shy, nervous

1 See Crabb Robinson's Diary, vol. i. p. 456.

^ See Life of Maria Edgeworth, by Augustus Hare, vol. i. p. 239, correspondent at his ease. Notwithstanding we feel that his letters to Mrs. Dugald Stewart must have been far superior still. The false pride which conceals weakness is disarmed by the certainty of a woman's sympathy.'

It is for the public now to decide whether this critic was riffht.

Chapter I Starting Life

Aftek taking leave of Edinburgh and the Dugald Stewarts, Ward was sent to Oxford, where he matriculated — at Oriel College— on October 17, 1799.i

From various expressions in his letters, some of which it has not been thought worth while to include here, he does not appear to have formed a very high opinion of the course of education as it then existed at Oxford, nor of the mode of life at the University generally, and at Oriel CoUege in particular. While there, however, he formed a very warm attachment combined with respect for his college tutor, the distinguished Dr. Edward Copleston, who afterwards became Dean of St. Paul's and Bishop of Llandaff. This friendship continued unbroken throughout Ward's life, and was evinced by the long series of letters, the publication of a portion of which by the Bishop has been referred to already.