The life and times of Laurence Sterne

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Preface

This book aims to present, within reasonable compass, the personal history of Laurence Sterne, along with some account of the numerous men and women with whom he associated at home and abroad. Hence it has been called, after an old fashion for similar biographies, "The Life and Times of Laurence Sterne".

The title-page should be sufficient warning to the reader not to expect here a series of essays on the different aspects of Sterne's humour, or elaborate comparisons between Sterne and the humourists before and since his time. Masterly disquisitions of this kind we have already from Bagehot, Traill, and Watts-Dunton, not to mention briefer critical opinions from Thackeray, Coleridge, and Carlyle, My main purpose has been biographical. The questions ever before me have been: What sort of man was Sterne? How did he conduct himself in the days of his obscurity and after he had come into his fame? What did he do and what did he say? What books did he read ? What were his pastimes ? and what were his pleasures ? Who were his friends ? and who were his enemies, if he had any? And what did they say or think of him? In a word, wherein lay the secret of the man whose speech and conduct filled the imaginations of all who knew him intimately, whether at York, London, or Paris? These questions, forsooth, would be without much interest, as Nepos once remarked in a similar case, were not Sterne the author of two books which give him a large place in modern literature, perhaps by the side of Rabelais and Cervantes. Certainly the publication of Tristram Shandy and of the Sentimental Journey must be kept in mind as the great incidents in Sterne's life. Towards them and his other works must converge all personal details. It is only because of these books that a biographer can surely count upon a curiosity to know something about the personality of him who wrote them. But if it turns out, as it will, that Tristram Shandy and the vi PREFACE

Sentimental Journey are in part autobiography, and that their author was as strange a compound of whims as are they, then new points of vantage may be gained for viewing and judging Sterne stage by stage in his career, and for presenting a final portrait of the man in relation to his works.

The materials for a life of Sterne, though not abundant, are quite adequate at most points. For his childhood, we have the memoirs which he wrote out for his daughter just before his death. For the period covering his life as Prebendary of York and Vicar of Sutton, we have a series of letters to a friend; a long letter to his uncle, amounting almost to an autobiography ; a body of anecdotes collected by one who, as a boy, tagged at his heels and listened to his jests by the fireside after supper; and a series of local pamphlets in an amusing warfare to which the Yorkshire parson contributed the chief merriment. For Sterne in his fame, we have nearly two hundred letters to various friends; many references to him in the newspapers and in contemporary memoirs and correspondence; a journal extending over six important months of the year before his death; and the observations of a French Academician, who closely watched him in and out of the Parisian salons, conversed with him on various occasions, and wrote down his impressions of the Chevalier Sterne. Finally, there are the portraits of Sterne by the great painters of the age, who invited him to their tables, studied him there under the most favourable conditions, and asked him to sit to them the next morning.

Nevertheless a life of Sterne has proved no easy task for several reasons. In the first place it has been a slow process to collect materials which lie dispersed in many books, documents, and manuscripts. True, this work had been performed to some extent by others; but the current biography of Sterne in two volumes is so untrustworthy in all details, that any reliance upon it would have meant disaster. The sketch of Sterne by Mr. Sidney Lee in the Dictionary of National Biography is admirable in those parts for which the author consulted manuscripts near at hand, but it suffers elsewhere from a repetition of old errors, which, once in print,

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seem destined to thrive forever. It would, however, be ungenerous not to acknowledge many obligations to all who have written upon Sterne since the time of Scott. Without the aid of Mr. Lee's excellent bibliography, my undertaking, difficult as it has been, would have been much more difficult. Again, the question how far Tristram Shandy and the Sentimental Journey are a rendering of actual incidents in Sterne's personal history must be always present, though it can never be quite answered; for all that a biographer can expect is corroborative evidence here and there from external sources. Whether he goes right or wrong in his inferences from such facts as are at his command, depends partly upon his judgment, and partly upon his conception of Sterne's character, which may be either true or false. No one can ever feel quite sure of himself in dealing with these apparent correspondences. He knows that incidents in Sterne's life, all the way from boyhood down to near death, are in Sterne's books; but he knows also that they are entangled with much that is extraneous. The cautious and yet very large use that I have made of Tristram Shandy and of the Sentimental Journey will appear justified, I trust, in the course of the narrative.

Moreover, Sterne's correspondence, upon which a biographer must mainly depend, has survived in a wretched condition. The early collections of his letters contain forgeries which must be sifted out. In letters for the most part genuine, passages have been suppressed and replaced by new ones. Names of correspondents and of persons mentioned within the letters are commonly indicated by an initial or two; and at times there is no clue to them at all, unless one may read a line of stars into a name. In a similar but not identical fashion, Sterne's correspondence as published in later times has been interpolated or modified in phrasing, apparently in order to make out of the humourist a man more reckless in his speech than he really was, to give piquancy, as it were, to his character, as if it needed any. Were there space here, it would be interesting to illustrate in detail how this has been done. A passage, for example, in one of the letters to the Rev. John Blake was deleted by the editor of the series, and viii PREFACE

compensation was made for the loss by inserting a phrase which does not occur anywhere in the original. In other cases, a letter in its published form may be quite at variance with the manuscript. Soon after reaching London in 1760, Sterne wrote, for instance, a gay note to Richard Berenger, master of horse to George the Third, requesting that he ride out to Leicester Fields and ask Hogarth for a frontispiece to the new edition of Tristram Shandy. The following is the letter as Sterne copied it into his Letter-Book* for preservation :

"My dear Berenger,

' ' You bid me tell you all my wants what the duce can

the man want now? what would I not give to have but ten strokes of Howgarth's witty chissel at the front of my next Edition of Tristram Shandy [the Vanity of a pretty woman in the hey-day of her Triumphs, is a Fool to the vanity of a

successful author orna me, sigh'd Swift to Pope,

unite something of yours to mine to wind us together in one

sheet down to posterity 1 will, I will; said Pope but

you dont do it enough said Swift

"Now the loosest Sketch in nature of Trim's reading the sermon to my father & my uncle Toby will content me

"I would hold out my lank purse — I would shut my eyes — & you should put your hand into it & take out what

[you] liked for it Blockhead ! this gift is not bought with

money perish thee & thy gold with thee.

"What shall we do? I would not propose a disagreeable

thing to one I so much admire, for the whole world : You

are a hard faced, impudent, honest dog prithee stop &

sans menagement, begin thus,

" 'Mr. Hogarth, my friend Shandy' but go on your

own way as I shall do mine, all my Life,

"So adieu."

After lying hidden for more than a century, the letter appeared in Mr. Percy Fitzgerald's Life of Sterne,\ expanded and ornamented to read as follows :

* Morgan Manuscripts.

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"You bid me tell you all my wants. What the Devil in Hell can a fellow want now? By the Father of the Sciences (you know his name) I would give both my ears (if I was not to lose my credit by it) for no more than ten strokes of Howgarth's witty chisel, to clap at the Front of my next Edition of Shandy. The Vanity of a Pretty Girl in the Heyday of her Roses & Lilies is a fool to that of Author of my stamp. Oft did Swift sigh to Pope in these words: 'Orna me, unite something of yours to mine, to transmit us down together hand in hand to futurity.' The loosest sketch in Nature, of Trim's reading the sermon to my Father, &c, wd do the Business, and it wd mutually illustrate his System and mine. But, my dear Shandy, with what face I would hold out my lank Purse ! I would shut my Eyes, & you should put in your hand and take out what you liked for it. Ignoramus! Fool! Blockhead! Symoniack! This Grace is not to be bought with money. Perish thee and thy Gold with thee ! What shall we do ? I have the worst face in the world to ask a favour with, & ^besides, I would not propose a disagreeable thing to one I so much admire for the whole world ;

but you can say anything you are an impudent, honest

Dog, & can 'st set a face upon a bad matter ; prithee sally out to Leicester fields, & when you have knock 'd at the door (for you must knock first) and art got in, begin thus: 'Mr. Hogarth, I have been with my friend Shandy this morning;' but go on yr own way, as I shall do mine. I esteem you, & am, my dear Mentor, Yrs most Shandascally, L. Sterne."

Two versions of the same letter differing so greatly as these, are very perplexing as well as very amusing. Did Sterne, in copying out the letter, tone it down? or has the original manuscript been expanded and vulgarised by other hands? These questions could be answered only by an inspection of the manuscript which Mr. Fitzgerald derived from a source not mentioned in his Life of Sterne. As the safer way, it has been my custom, in all doubtful cases, to quote from an autograph manuscript, even though it may not represent the letter as it actually passed through the post.

It is hardly necessary to say that I can have no motive for representing Sterne otherwise than in the habit as he x PEEFACE

lived. Had I any motive to the contrary, I should be disarmed by the humourist himself, who said famously : " If the characters of past ages and men are to be drawn at all, they should be drawn like themselves; that is with their excellencies, and with their foibles." I have not spared Sterne nor have I idealised him. That the truth might be told, whether it be for or against his character, I have examined all available manuscripts which have come to my knowledge. The largest single collection is at the British Museum, whose officers have granted me the usual privileges for having them copied or photographed. The story of Mrs. Draper's life and of her friendship with Sterne was rendered possible only by the courtesy of Lord Basing, who placed at my disposal Mrs. Draper's unpublished correspondence and other documents preserved at Hoddington. A part of the Letter-Book in which Sterne copied out letters which he particularly liked, whether his own or from his friends, has been recently acquired by J. Pierpont Morgan, Esq., who generously gave me access to it. This old book, besides containing several interesting letters which have never been published, proved the authenticity of more than thirty other letters long supposed to be forgeries. The originals or copies of one or more letters were also supplied by Mr. Alfred Huth of London, Mr. A. H. Joline of New York City, Mr. W. K. Bixby of St. Louis, Messrs. Charles Scribner's Sons and Messrs. Dodd, Mead & Co., of New York City, and Messrs. Eobson and Co. and Messrs. Henry Sotheran and Co., of London. In quoting from these and other private manuscripts, I have aimed to keep well within the bounds set by their owners. All excerpts from original letters have been printed as Sterne or Mrs. Draper wrote them, save that numerals and abbreviations have been written out in full, and occasional changes have been made in capitals and punctuation where the one or the other appeared very awkward or very obscure. In all this, I have remembered, though I could not always follow it to the letter, Sterne's injunction to his printer: "That, at your peril, you do not presume to alter or transpose one Word, nor rectify one false Spelling, nor so much as add or diminish one Comma or Tittle".

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Underlying this account of the humourist's life, especially of his life in the north, is information derived from local records and newspapers. The Institutions of the Diocese of York and the Act Book of the Dean and Chapter not only shed light upon the details of Sterne's ecclesiastical appointments, but they also serve to identify many of his friends at York. The parish book at Sutton is curious for its Shandean entries; and the memorials of deeds in the Registry Office at Northallerton reveal Sterne's dealings in land. In this connection, I have to thank especially the Rev. Canon Watson of the Minster Library, by whose aid was discovered the first edition of Sterne's Political Romance. The library contains also many local pamphlets indispensable to the biographer, and a file of the York Courant, covering nearly the entire period of Sterne's active life. I should not forget, too, for their assistance, Dr. George A. Auden, of Birmingham, Mr. A. H. Hudson, Registrar of the Diocese of York, the late T. B. Whytehead, Clerk of the Dean and Chapter, and Mr. William Brown, F.S.A., of Thirsk, with his exact knowledge of local conditions in the eighteenth century. I am indebted to Mr. W. W. Smith of Lincoln for Sterne 's appointment to St. Ives, as recorded in the Act Book of the Bishop of Lincoln, and to Mr. Edwin Abbott, Librarian of Jesus College, for all entries relative to Sterne in the college register.

It has been a part of my plan to bring together all the great portraits of Sterne and to make selections from the most interesting among the rest. Such a collection would have been impossible but for the courtesy of the owners of the original paintings. Lord Lansdowne granted permission to photograph the painting by Reynolds at Lansdowne House. It is a soberer face than that of any of the engravings after the portrait, which are really caricatures of Sterne. The Earl of Yarborough likewise gave permission to reproduce the bust in terra-cotta executed by Nollekens when Sterne* was at Rome; but at the last moment it became necessary to employ for this purpose a photograph of the marble replica at Skelton Castle. The portrait after Gainsborough has been made directly from the original painting in the Art x ii PREFACE

Galleries of the Peel Park Museum at Salford, by permission of the Corporation. This beautiful painting, in which Sterne appears dressed in the height of fashion, has never before been engraved. Nor is any engraving known to exist of the youthful portrait by Ramsay in the Hall of Jesus College, Cambridge, which is reproduced here by permission of the Master and Fellows.

No less interesting is Sterne as he appeared to a Frenchman, in the water-colour by Carmontelle, now in the collection of the Due d'Aumale at Chantilly. It has been reproduced for this book after an especially fine engraving made in 1890 by Messrs. Colnaghi and Company of London. A print of the curious caricature of Sterne by Thomas Bridges of York, the original of which is either lost or carefully kept from the public, was supplied by Dr. George A. Auden of Birmingham. To make the list complete, I should mention two other portraits of Sterne in the eighteenth century, — one by Napoleon Thomas and the other by Hopkins. The former was engraved by Ferdinand and the latter by Heath. Neither portrait, however, adds anything to our knowledge of Sterne 's appearance, for both Thomas and Hopkins were born too late to have any personal acquaintance with the humourist. In the text I have also described a second and almost unknown portrait by Reynolds. It is in no way comparable with the painter's masterpiece, and for that reason it has not been included among the illustrations of this work. The engraving of Hall-Stevenson — Sterne's other self — has been made from a photograph of a very fine portrait, which was sent me by W. H. A. Wharton, Esq., of Skelton Castle.

A descriptive bibliography of Sterne's manuscripts and published works will be found in the Appendix.

In conclusion, I have to thank Miss E. J. Hastings of London for her faithful and most intelligent aid while collecting material for this book. The proofs have been kindly read by Mr. Andrew Keogh of Yale University Library.

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I. Birth and Education 3

II. Marriage and Settlement at Sutton-on-the-Forest 36

Chapter I Bikth And Education 1713-1736

The great humourist whose life I have undertaken to relate anew, would have been amused by a serious attempt to discover him among his ancestors. Musty records preserved religiously by his Yorkshire neighbours, that they might the more readily boast the achievements of a great-grandfather, interested him, it is true, greatly; but only because they furnished matter for jest. His Tristram Shandy is, as all readers of it know, a burlesque history of a typical English family (much like Sterne's own) that gained its rank in the time of Henry the Eighth, and subsequently sank under the disgrace of flat noses and inauspicious names. The Shandys could claim in the sixteenth century,, says Sterne with near reference to himself, "no less than a dozen alchymists, ' ' whose souls passed on, a century or two later, into an archbishop, a Welsh judge, "some three or four aldermen", and eventually into a mountebank. His more ideal self, which bears the name of Parson Yorick, the humourist aptly derived in direct line from Shakespeare's Yorick of Denmark, whose "flashes of merriment were wont to set the table on a roar" far back in the days of the good King Hamlet. Despite this raillery of himself as akin to the old alchemists and court jesters, Sterne was glad enough to count among his ancestors an Archbishop of York and a succession of country gentlemen since the fifteenth century. Long annoyed by scribblers' tales about his early life and whence he came, he set down, some six months before his death, certain particulars of family history and of his boyhood for his daughter Lydia, "in case hereafter she should have a curiosity or a kinder motive to know them".

It may well be that Danish blood really flowed in Sterne's veins as well as in the imaginary Yorick 's ; for the family to which he belonged sprang from the yeomanry and minor gentry of old East Anglia— Norfolk and Suffolk— and the border shires where the Danes settled in great numbers. Thence various members of the family migrated to the north until Yorkshire became their chief home, while others settled in Ireland, establishing there a collateral branch, which included John Sterne (1624-1669), the founder of the Irish College of Physicians at Dublin, and his son, likewise named John (1660-1745), who became in turn Dean of St. Patrick's and Bishop of Clogher. The latter figures in literary history as an intimate friend of Swift and Stella, whom he entertained with profuse hospitality. The more learned of the family evidently associated their name with the old English word steam, dialectical starn to this day, signifying a starling; for as soon as they rose to rank and wealth, their arms appeared, with some variation, as ''gold, a chevron engrailed between three crosses flory sable, surmounted with a starling in proper colours for a crest". That starling, made captive, it will be remembered, was long afterwards brought into the Sentimental Journey as the motive for a pathetic discourse on the bitterness of slavery.

Laurence Sterne, the subject of this biography, was in direct descent from William Sterne, who was living towards the close of Elizabeth's reign at Crop well-Butler, a village and manor to the south of Bingham in Nottinghamshire. William Sterne was in turn lineally descended, as his arms clearly indicate, from the Sternes that had been long seated near Cambridge, first at Stapleford and afterwards at Stow-cum-Quy, whence issued also the Sternes in Ireland. Eemoter ancestry of the family points especially to the Sternes who by marriage with the Gambons came into possession of Whitwell Hall in Norfolk under the Lancastrian kings. A son of the William Sterne aforementioned, named Simon, settled at Mansfield, "a flourishing and genteel market town" some miles to the north of Cropwell-Butler, where he married Margery, daughter of Gregory Walker and widow of one Charles Cartwright. Of the marriage was born, in or near

1596, Eichard Sterne, who, becoming Archbishop of York, was the first to give distinction to the family name.

This Richard Sterne, great-grandfather of the humourist, was a man who combined shrewd intelligence with that energy necessary for making one's way in the world. As a boy "two remarkable deliverances" were related of him by the old story-tellers. He fell into a sluice which carried him beneath a mill-wheel, and tumbled from a church-steeple where he was playing at see-saw with another boy; but in both cases he escaped unharmed under the guidance of "a gracious Providence ' \ He attended the free school at Mansfield, whence he passed, at the age of fifteen, to Trinity College, Cambridge. After taking the usual degrees in arts, he was elected Fellow of Corpus Christi, and for ten years thereafter "engaged in the instruction of pupils with credit both to himself and to the college". In the meantime, both of the great universities honoured him with degrees in divinity, and he became well known among ecclesiastics — the distinction seems rather grotesque— for a summary of "the 3600 faults in our printed Bibles", a feat in line with the labours of Scaliger and other learned classical scholars of the preceding generation who had awakened wonder by the multitude of errors which they were able to discover in ancient texts. Early in 1634, the Bishop of Ely, by direction of his Majesty, appointed him Master of Jesus College. To Sterne's prestige as teacher and scholar was now added that of an able administrator. By his efforts among the fellows and other friends, funds were raised for various purposes, but especially for building "the north side of the outer court" of Jesus College, which still stands "as a monument to his name".

The young Master of Jesus — not yet forty years old — was, as might be inferred from his position, a most ardent supporter of the existing order in church and state. Archbishop Laud summoned him to London and enrolled him among his chaplains, to say nothing of other substantial honours conferred upon him: all, doubtless, with a view to having at Cambridge an adherent who could be trusted to furnish full and accurate information concerning things ecclesiastical. To King Charles and his agents who came frequently to Cambridge, Sterne was also equally loyal. In the summer of 1642, the king set up his standard at Nottingham and made ready for battle. At that juncture, Sterne joined with two other Cambridge masters in collecting and sending moneys and plate to his Majesty. Cromwell was on the watch, and though the treasure reached the king, the masters were surrounded while at prayers in their several chapels, and taken up to London; led captive, says the contemporary account, "through Bartholomew Fair, and so far as Temple Bar, and back through the city to prison in the Tower, on purpose that they might be hooted at or stoned by the rabble rout". During three years of imprisonment in various places, Sterne was subjected at times to barbarous usage, barely escaping transportation; but these were among common incidents of the Revolution, as was likewise his ejection from the mastership of Jesus College.

During this dark period Richard Sterne once stepped forth to the light to take part in a memorable scene. The Revolution was moving on swiftly. The king had been defeated at Marston Moor, and Laud was about to go the way of Strafford. Scant four days were given the archbishop to prepare for death. On Laud's petition to Parliament that one of his ancient chaplains might be sent to him to administer spiritual comfort, if he must die, Dr. Sterne was selected. Sterne was with his friend and patron during the last three days of his life, and attended him to the scaffold. After reading his last sermon and last public prayer, Laud turned toward the block, and, as he did so, he placed the manuscript in the hands of his chaplain, that the world might have true and faithful copies thereof. Liberated soon after this terrible event, Sterne passed many subsequent years in seclusion at Stevenage in Hertfordshire, where, save for a small pension from one of Laud's friends, he earned a livelihood by taking pupils. When Charles the Second returned to his own, Sterne was among the first to win preferment. A few months in his Cambridge mastership once more and three years Bishop of Carlisle, he was translated in the spring of 1664 to the archbishopric of York, where he sat until his death on June 18, 1683. His body lies buried in the chapel of St. Stephen in his own cathedral at York. To his memory his grandson Richard erected a marble monument with a canopy, beneath which half reclines a mitred figure with the head resting upon one of the hands. A fine portrait of the archbishop in his splendid robes, a mezzotint by Francis Place of York, hangs near Cranmer's over the dais in the hall of Jesus College. With eyes curiously askance, the dignified prelate looks down the hall, past Coleridge, upon the youthful portrait of his great-grandson, as if in question whether he should own him.

It would be impossible to imagine the archbishop sitting down to Gargantua or Pantagruel, the nearest approach to Tristram Shandy in those days. His face, with no trace of humour in it, looks too serious for that. As a young man, this Richard Sterne wrote Latin verses and commented upon the Psalms. Later in life he bore a hand in Brian Walton's Polyglot Bible involving nine languages, and subsequently assisted in a revision of the Book of Common Prayer. After his death appeared a Latin treatise of his on logic, with illustrations drawn mostly from the Scriptures; and to him has been long attributed, though doubtfully, the authorship of The Whole Duty of Man. While Archbishop of York, he made many friends and many enemies. To those who agreed with him "he was a man of eminent worth and abilities ". "He was", says a letter from York just after his death, "greatly respected and generally lamented. All the clergy commemorate his sweet condescensions, his free communications, faithful counsels, exemplary temperance, cheerful hospitality and bountiful charity".* On the other hand, Burnet regarded him as only "a sour, ill-tempered" ecclesiastic, who, after gaining the see of York, "minded chiefly the enriching of his family". As a politician, it is said further, he was more than ordinarily compliant in his last years to the Court and to the Duke of York ; wherefore came the suspicion that he was at heart a Papist. Baxter, who clashed with him in

* Nicolson and Burn, History of Antiquities of Westmoreland and Cumberland, II, 290 (London, 1777). In contrast, see Burnet, History of his own Times, II, 208 (London, 1818) ; and Reliquiae Baxterianae, part II, 338 (London, 1696).

debate at the Savoy Conference over a reformed liturgy, was surprised to find deceit concealed by a face that "look'd so honestly and gravely and soberly". Although these adverse opinions of two eminent divines were no doubt coloured by political and religious dislike, they nevertheless point to a truth. Richard Sterne was a conspicuous example among the clergy of the Restoration whose ideals of church dignity and ecclesiastical polity had been derived from Archbishop Laud. To the new age they appeared narrow and bigoted. Like his famous descendant, the archbishop was also irritable and hasty in temper, and prone to provoke a quarrel. Edward Rainbowe, who succeeded him at Carlisle, found the episcopal palace barely habitable and instituted a suit against him for dilapidations. While he held the see of York, Sterne certainly amassed a fortune, but not, as Burnet charges, wholly for his own benefit or that of his family. The archbishop's benefactions were numerous and liberal. From his own purse he contributed, for example, £1800 towards the rebuilding of St. Paul's Cathedral after the great fire; and some years before his death he founded, by an annual rent charge of £60 on his manors in Yorkshire, six scholarships at Cambridge—four at Jesus College and two at Corpus Christi— for natives of Nottingham and Yorkshire. One of these scholarships was to come in the course of time to the author of Tristram Shandy.