Life and Literary Remains of L. E. L.

Volume 1

LIFE

AND

LITERARY REMAINS

OF

L. E. L.

BY LAMAN BLANCHARD.

IN TWO VOLUMES.

VOL. I.

It is a weary and a bitter hour, When first the real disturbs the poet's world, And he distrusts the future. Not for that Should cold despondency weigh down the soul, It is a glorious gift, bright Poetry, And should be thankfully and nobly used. Let it look up to Heaven!"— L. E. L.

PHILADELPHIA: LEA & BLANCHARD ............ 1841.

T. K. & P. G. COLLINS, PRINTERS.

Contents

Introduction | 3

Memoir and Letters | 7

1802-1815 | 10

1815-1824 | 26

1824-1830 | 37

1830-1834 | 66

1835-1837 | 104

1837-1838 | 139

Introduction

INTRODUCTION.

The following sketch of the literary and personal life of L. E. L. has been executed in fulfilment of a pledge given to her long before she meditated leaving England, and renewed immediately previous to her departure. I should not otherwise have presumed to attempt anything of the kind. A few years ago, when England had just lost one of her ablest writers, she thus expressed herself in a letter replying to my suggestion that she should review his works—"I almost fear to praise such a man; but comfort myself with thinking that though few can raise the carved marble over a great author's remains, all may throw a flower on his grave."

When supplying me with some materials for a slight sketch of her life, published in the "New Monthly Magazine," she wrote thus: "These, I believe, are all the facts I can give you at present. Feelings are but poor substitutes in a memoir—else what a life would mine be… But these are for a later biography, which I shall also entrust to you."

The suddenness of her death prevented her from making the necessary preparations for that later biography. Her design, however, has been accomplished, as far as possible. Much of what was essential to its accomplishment, has been supplied by the anxious care of her family, and the grateful zeal of some of her personal friends. To them, the writer's thanks are here given for enabling him, at least partially, to fulfil his obligations to the object of their common regard.

What is now submitted to the public, could not well have been written earlier. The interval between her death, and the publication of these volumes, has not been idly spent by those whose duty it was to investigate the circumstances under which she died. The hope of entirely elucidating all that was mysterious in her fate, forbade an earlier effort to relieve that public anxiety, which was evidence equally of pity for her misfortunes, and appreciation of her worth.

L. B.

Of the writings of L. E. L. that appear in these volumes, none have been published before but the "Subjects for Pictures, &c." and the mottos to some of the chapters of "Ethel Churchill," which had been previously uncollected. Two or three of the essays on the "Female Characters of Scott" had been printed in an incomplete state. The rest are entirely new. In addition to the letters and poems that are interwoven with the memoir, the tragedy of "Castruccio Castrucani" is published for the first time.

Opening to Memoir and Letters

MEMOIR,

&c. &c.

All the information relative to the family of L. E. L. that may be requisite as introductory to a record of her life, may be gathered without recurring to a remoter period than the commencement of the eighteenth century. The Landons appear to have been at that time settled at Crednall, in Herefordshire, where they enjoyed some landed property, in the possession of which they flourished until about the period of the South Sea mania, when one of them, Sir William Landon, Knt., concluded a series of enterprises, by which the circumstances of the family had been materially advanced, with some less prosperous speculations, whose issue involved the total loss of the patrimonial estates. Of the next generation, thus left to "sink or swim," as fortune willed it, some kept afloat, and the church seems to have been their ark of safety. One of Sir William's descendants, the great-grandfather of L. E. L., abundantly repaid the succour thus afforded to him, by a zealous and devout championship of the church against "all dissenters" in that day: as is apparent from a tablet on the north wall of the chancel in the church of Tedstone Delamere, near Bromyard, Herefordshire. The inscription runs thus:—"The Rev. John Landon, rector of Nursted and Ilsted, in Kent, died June 3d, 1777, aged 77. His religious principles and literary abilities were evident from what he did and wrote in vindication of the religion he professed, to the utter confutation of all dissenters."

Of the writings of this faithful servant of the church we know nothing whatever; but as the first of the Landons whose "literary abilities" were signalised, or at all events, of whose exercise of them any record remains, his name must be here held worthy of honoring remembrance. The tablet was probably erected by his son, the Rev. John Landon, who had been presented, upwards of thirty years before (in 1749), to the rectory of Tedstone Delamere, and who held that living, to his own honor and the advantage of his parishioners, until 1782. And it may be mentioned that a green and flourishing token of the age and respectability of this family, is still visible in the church above referred to; for there, we believe to this day, is to be seen, round the tomb of one of the Landons, a fresh and luxuriant growth of hazels, thriving within the walls of the old edifice.

Severe injuries, occasioned by a fall from his horse, rendered the latter years of the rector of Tedstone painful to himself, and perhaps less profitable to his family than they might otherwise have been; for about the period of his death (the living being his own), the advowson, together with Tedstone-court and estate, was sold, and a family consisting of eight children were left with very little but their own exertions and a respectable name, to depend upon for their advancement in the world.

The eldest of the sons was John Landon, the father of L. E. L. For him, perhaps, the quiet and unvarying life of a country clergyman would have possessed few charms, even had the fortune of his father and grandfather, the gift of a living, awaited him at the outset of life. At an early age his active and enterprising disposition seemed to point to the sea as the profession best suited to his tastes, and, while yet very young, to sea he went. Of two voyages that he made, the first was to the south coast of Africa—to that country on whose western shores, in after years, a being, who employed to the most virtuous ends, and with generous devotion, the life she drew from him, was destined to find a grave. Thence the young voyager returned in safety; and, with the same promises of success in his career, he sailed subsequently to Jamaica. But the death of his friend and patron, Admiral Bowyer, cast (it may be supposed) a cloud over his sea-prospects, and blighted the hopes that had sprung out of his adoption of a naval profession.

In the meantime his brother, Whittington (the second of the sons of the Rev. John Landon), had made rapid advancement at Oxford. Acquiring the favour and patronage of the Duke of Portland, his career at Worcester college, of which he was Provost for more than thirty years, was accompanied by distinguished fortune in the church, and his course of prosperity was crowned in due season by his appointment to the valuable deanery of Exeter, which he held until his recent decease, in January, 1839. Through the influential connections of the younger brother, better prospects at home were opened to the elder; and at length, through the means of a mutual friend, Mr. Chur , an introduction was obtained to the respectable and prosperous house of Adair, the army-agent, in Pall Mall. John Landon was speedily established in the lucrative business of an army-agency, becoming a partner in the house, and at no distant date the possessor of considerable property.

Thus settled in life, Mr. Landon married, and with his wife (Catharine Jane Bishop, a lady of Welsh extraction), took up his residence in Hans-place, Chelsea. There, in the house which is now No. 25, their daughter, Letitia Elizabeth Landon, was born, on the 14th of August, 1802. She was the eldest of three children; one, a girl, died in her thirteenth year; the other still survives, the attached brother, and long the inseparable companion of L. E. L.—the Rev. Whittington Henry Landon, M. A.

1802-1815

1802 to 1815.

It is remarkable that the greater portion of L. E. L.'s existence was passed on the spot where she was born. From Hans-place and its neighbourhood she was seldom absent, and then not for any great length of time: until within a year or two of her death she had there found her home; not, indeed, in the house of her birth, but generally close by. Taken occasionally, during the earlier years of childhood, into the country, it was to Hans-place she returned; here some of her school-time was passed; when her parents removed, she yet clung to the old spot, and as her own mistress,

chose the same scene for her residence. When one series of inmates quitted it, she still resided there with their successors, returning continually, after every wandering, "like a blackbird to his bush."

L. E. L. was a reader almost in her cradle, and a writer, if the term may be employed when the mechanical aids to authorship were wanting, before she had been many years out of it. Her first efforts in learning were indicative of acute intellect; and the uses to which she invariably turned the rewards of her quickness and diligence already implied the presence of those admirable qualities, which afterwards characterised her private life. Need we here say to any that ever knew her, that we mean the ardour of her affections, and the unreserved generosity of her nature. It is not less because it is believed that the public would desire to know all that can be related about the earliest years of one who has interested and delighted them so long, than because it is certain that some of the most trivial and childish circumstances will serve to exhibit those qualities of the intellect and the heart—that to these pages are transferred such anecdotes of her infancy as the fond recollections of her first friends have treasured up and supplied.

She was taught to read by an invalid friend and neighbor, who amused herself by scattering the letters of the alphabet over the carpet, and making her little pupil pick them up as they were named. The principle of rewards was adopted solely, and these rewards, as they were won, were as regularly brought to her brother. That living relative who was her only playmate and companion, relates, in a letter from which we write—"If she came home without a reward, she went up stairs with her nurse, of whom she was particularly fond, to be comforted; but when she brought her reward with her, she never failed to display it in the drawing-room, and then share it with me. She must," he adds, "have been very quick at that early age, for she seldom came empty-handed, and I soon began to look for the hour of her return, for which I had such very good reasons."

When in her sixth year she was sent to a school kept by Miss Rowden,* at No. 22, Hans-place—the house in which she afterwards resided for several years as a boarder. It seems to have been appropriated to such purposes from the time it was built; nor was L. E. L. the first who drank at the "well of English" within its walls. Miss Mitford, we believe, was educated there, and Lady Caroline Lamb was an inmate for a time. Here the little pupil's powers were so highly appreciated, that Miss Rowden presented her with a frock of her own working; it was long regarded as a robe of grace. One only complaint of misconduct in "the clever little child" was ever made, but this was a frequent one, and the fault was strikingly characteristic. Nothing could make L. E. L. walk quietly in the ranks with other children. The family residing near, she was sure to espy one of them, or a servant, or her nurse, and dart away she would. "On one of these occasions," says her brother, "and it is the second trait that I vividly call to remembrance, her nurse had purposely thrown herself in the way of the school and brought home her charge. My sister, on her arrival, wanted me to descend from a magnificent rocking-horse on which I chanced to be mounted, and on my refusal to surrender, she threw a tambourine at me; it struck me on the face and brought me to the ground. The hurt was worse than she imagined it to be at the moment, but it brought out her natural disposition—for she petted me more than ever, and I had every thing my own way a long time after. Indeed it was the luckiest hit for me ever made in the nursery."

At this school L. E. L. remained only a few months. Hitherto she had not been absent from London but on short visits to a place called Coventry-farm, on the borders of Hertfordshire, in which her father had speculated deeply, confiding the superintendence of the project to the care of a brother. This was, in fact, the source of his subsequent embarrassments. Now, when the young student was scarcely seven years old, the family removed to Trevor-park, East Barnet, where the care of her instruction was undertaken by her cousin, Miss Landon, whose zeal and guidance were repaid with the most constant acknowledgment of her worth. Some passages of a letter from this lady, in which she recalls the hours long past that were beneficially devoted to the interests of her charge, will happily exhibit the spirit of the modest and admiring teacher, while they strikingly exemplify the progress and character of the pupil. "In very many instances," says the writer, "in endeavouring to teach, I have myself been taught, the extraordinary memory and genius of the learner soon leaving the humble abilities of the teacher far behind. Any experienced person used to instruction would have smiled at hearing us. When I asked Letitia any question relating either to history, geography, grammar—to Plutarch's Lives, or to any book we had been reading, I was pretty certain her answers would be perfectly correct: still, not exactly recollecting, and unwilling she should find out just then that I was less learned than herself, I used thus to question her:—'Are you quite certain?' 'Oh yes, quite!' 'You feel sure you are correct?' 'Yes, very sure.' 'Well then, to be perfectly right, bring the book and let us look over it again.' I never knew her to be wrong. * * * At so early an age as this, she would occupy an hour or two of the evening amusing her father and mother with accounts of the wonderful castles she had built in her imagination; and when, rambling in the garden in fair weather, she had taken with her, as a companion, a long stick, which she called her measuring stick; she was asked, 'What that was for?' her answer would be, 'Oh, don't speak to me, I have such a delightful thought in my head.' And on she would go talking to herself. There was a little world of happiness within her; and even then, the genius afterwards developed was constantly struggling to break forth."

The works read at this period were precisely those that happened to be at hand, or were most readily procurable. The list opens, of course, with grammars and catechisms, glances at geography, Rollin's Ancient History, Hume and Smollett; then come Plutarch's Lives, the Fables of Gay and Æsop, Life of Josephus, Montesquieu's Spirit of the Laws, Dobson's Life of Petrarch, and many others, more or less adapted to the young reader. "I always," remarks the thoughtful cousin, "made it my particular care never to allow of her reading any novels, knowing it would only weaken her mind, and give it a distaste for more serious reading." Nevertheless, this restriction was somewhat less effective than it was intended to be; for he who shared in L. E. L.'s sports and pastimes, permitted or surreptitious, has a clear impression, that during the days of childhood, not less than from a hundred to a hundred and fifty volumes of the Poets and Novelists (Cooke's edition!) were all read through, forbidden though they were.

Books, and books only, whatever could be procured, were her delight from the first moment that she could read. Her capacity for acquiring knowledge was remarkable. The two masters from whom she received French lessons found the task of instructing her a new kind of pleasure; not only were her exercises always ready and correct, but she seemed to meet her teachers half-way, and if told one word, knew another as though by intuition. Yet, it must be admitted, that to the rule "whatever she attempted, she thoroughly mastered," there were two exceptions; the future poetess excelled neither in music, of which she, nevertheless, understood the very soul, nor in an art which, throughout her life, she incessantly practised—penmanship. Her cousin states that, "although Letitia's kind and accomplished friend, Miss Bissett, spared no pains during several years, to impart the same brilliant touch and execution she herself possessed, the attempt to make her proficient in music was vain. "Yet" (she adds) "music seemed to charm and inspire her; for hours she would sit writing upon her slate while any one played or sang." As for her proficiency in penmanship, her brother graphically pictures the fruitless effort. "Learning to write," he says, "was a source of extreme trouble to her, and of frequent imprisonment to me. (This we shall explain presently.) A kind old gentleman who witnessed this distress, and who never believed that any fault whatever rested with her, undertook to teach her himself.—And the copy-book was ruled, and his spectacles were rubbed, and his knife prepared to make the best pen possible; but it would not do; a broad nib and a fine nib, a hard pen and a soft pen, all failed, for in each case it was still a pen. At last he gave the task up in despair; he shook his head mournfully and said, 'No, your dear little fingers are too straight;' gave her a forgiving kiss, told her she was 'a dab at pothooks,' took up his hat, walked out, and never renewed his attempt."

To explain the foregoing allusion to the "imprisonment" of the young brother and playmate on his sister's account, it is necessary to introduce an anecdote, and to quote a remark of his, which, in its application to her, was as strictly true in her maturer years as in her childhood. "It was," he observes, "no easy thing to subdue her will, except through her affections." Hence, possibly, the adoption of a discipline that formed part of the educational system at Trevor-park, of punishing the one when the other deserved it! When either was "in disgrace"—that was the term used—the unoffending party was locked up in a dark closet, and, says Mr. Landon, "this effectually secured obedience and attention." He adds, with his usual recollection of the kindness of his sister—"On these occasions, the nurse, who had no notion of any such discipline, or, indeed, of any at all with either of us, always pushed under the door apples, sweetmeats, or roasted chestnuts; these she invariably saved, when locked up on my account, and gave me when she came out."

Difficult as it may be for grateful remembrance to avoid exaggeration, there is no partiality in the assertion, that even at the age we are speaking of, she would endure anything, and give up anything. She was encouraged, and grew, year by year, in these habits of fortitude and self-denial. We have another anecdote illustrative of the same feeling, and recorded in a similar spirit. Her devotedness to reading was only equalled by the readiness with which she acquired whatever she chose to commit to memory, and the accuracy with which she retained whatever she had once learned. Mr. Landon remembers one instance of this quickness. "I had petitioned my father for three shillings, when he offered me, by way of compromise, a new eighteenpenny-piece if I would learn and repeat to him the ballad—

'Gentle river, gentle river, Lo! thy streams are stained with gore,' &c.

But as this same ballad was some thirty verses long, and the payment inadequate, I struck for the three shillings, and would learn no ballad for less. I was in disgrace accordingly. Without saying a word, my sister went out, came back in a very short time, and repeated the ballad for me—asked for the three shillings—got them, and a kiss or two besides. She then persuaded me to learn it, teaching it me verse by verse. I forget whether I ever said it; but I do not forget that she gave me the three shillings."

The spirit thus manifested found food in the subjects her reading embraced; and even the favorite pastimes of the brother and sister assumed a similar colour, and had their origin in the same associations. We do not allude to those amusements, which were continued, as opportunity offered, long after the brother had made his first appearance at school; amusements calculated to shock the rapt and romantic, if, being believers in fiction, they were not often incredulous as to fact—the amusements, in short, of donkey-riding and racing, resorted to daily—of trap-ball, hoop, and bow-and-arrow, practised continually—even to the acquisition of an extraordinary degree of expertness, especially in the latter art. No; what we would particularise as the favourite pastime of the children, what may be characterised as their first ambition, was "to be Spartans." Mr. Landon says, "There could be no greater reproach between us than to call each other 'Sybarite,' and this long before I knew why; as far (he adds) as Plutarch's Lives enabled her to comprehend Spartan maxims, she aimed at carrying them out—thieving alone excepted—and that, as her father told her, only because we were not in an enemy's country." And it is related by her cousin, that she would often give any dainty she was about to eat to some poor child who came to the gate, observing, as she turned away, "I would rather be a Spartan than a Sybarite."

One of the exploits of the young Spartans deserves, by way of specimen, to be recorded. For some wanton or heedless trespass, they had both one day been turned out of the garden. Their rage was so great that they hardly knew at first how to compass their revenge upon the gardener. "But, my sister," proceeds our authority on this grave matter, "proposed a rather curious method of taking vengeance. 'I tell you what—we'll make him a public character! but as I did not know what that was, I thought it better to get our war-arrows (headed with nails instead of lead), and attack him on the spot. She was too much of a Spartan not at once to assent to the plan, and in another minute or two poor Joseph was stuck all over with arrows, for my sister, especially, was very expert. I shall never forget the man running at us, with his spade before his face; a charge which, as our weapons were not very 'Spartan,' ended the engagement at once. He took us both prisoners, and the punishment he inflicted was not without some tincture of retributive justice; for he tossed us upon the top of a quickset hedge, and there left us. After some furious crying, we found we were not much hurt. I remember, amidst my trouble, inquiring if she had read of any Spartans who had been served as we were?—an idea that instantly converted her tears to laughter, as she said, 'Very like Spartans, indeed!' In about half an hour the gardener came, accepted our promises, and lifted us down."

This gardener is the hero of another story, which must be related, as it introduces the little L. E. L. in the character of a preceptor. "He was almost thirty years old," says Mr. Landon, "had not the slightest acquaintance with the alphabet, but was anxious to learn. My sister, assisted by me, taught him first his letters, then to spell, to read, and at last, to write. It was at the spelling-stage that we were most amused. We used to pick out the 'hard words' for his lessons, and it was our delight to laugh at his extraordinary mistakes, some of which were, no doubt, intentional ones, designed to make fun for us. When I went to school, at eight years of age, he became Letitia's pupil solely. He carried a small dictionary, her gift, in his hat, and would con over a word while at work, and then append to one of us for the meaning; the explanation generally increasing his difficulty, because it brought more words with it. The dictionary was, with him, the one book needful; he was convinced that if he could but master that, all others would be perfectly easy. Such were the difficulties under which he persevered in the paths of useful knowledge! His name was Joseph Chambers; he lived with us many years, and only left when there was no longer any service for him. He subsequently obtained a 'milk-walk,' at Brompton, where, being enabled to rely on his own book-keeping, he made some little money, and is now landlord of a quiet hostelry at Barnet. He ever retained a very grateful regard for the memory of his little governess." The reader, who might happen to stop at Mr. Chambers's inn at Barnet, would, no doubt, obtain a verification of this narrative of the original joyousness of the young improvisatrice.

But we must not pass by the childish days of L. E. L., over the records of which we have not, it is hoped, lingered too long, without a glance at certain habits that were more peculiar to herself, and lay at the root of those literary aspirations which, long before the years of womanhood, indicated the workings of more than a woman's mind, and gave to poetry and romance a store of premature and unexpected treasures. Her genius seems to have sprung up

"Just as the grass grows that sows itself."

We have already seen her, in her cousin's description, pushing what she called her "measuring stick" before her, as she took her daily walk in the garden, and deprecating interruption because she had a "beautiful thought" in her head. And this picture may be filled up by the recollections of her brother, who has known her to be pacing up and down the lime-walk for hours in this way—sometimes talking aloud, sometimes repeating verses, oftener in silent thought—the result of all which exercises would be, at night, a long story, or an account of her intended travels, to which he, more especially, had to listen. And listen he did, patiently for some time; but at last, perhaps he got tired, or annoyed at losing his only playfellow in so unaccountable a way: for a bargain was struck between the children, to the effect that on one day he was to listen while she talked, and on the next she was to adopt his amusements. "On her days," runs the reminiscence, "I had to undergo either the account of 'her island,' that is, of what she would do as another Robinson Crusoe, or some fairy tale or verse of her own composition; or perhaps the battle scene from the 'Lady of the Lake,' for the whole of that poem I think she knew by heart." The listener's patience, after a time, appears to have failed again, for a fresh stipulation was made that the something, whatever it might be, which was to fall from the lips of the eloquent young child, was not to be repeated "more than twice or three times at the most."

L. E. L. has alluded, in some verses on the death of Sir Walter Scott, to the time and scene thus recalled by Mr. Landon.

How well I can recall the time When first I turn'd thy page; The green boughs closed above my head, A natural hermitage. * * * * * I peopled all the walks and shades With images of thine; The lime-tree was a lady's bower, The yew-tree was a shrine: Almost I deem'd each sunbeam shone O'er banner, spear, and morion.

Her kind instructress also speaks of the ease and rapidity with which, at this time, she used to per the task of writing themes upon given subjects. As soon as she could write, or rather make those pothooks which were afterwards to become the uncouth interpreters of such graceful meanings, "you would always," says the lady just alluded to, "see her with her slate; when not reading or talking it was her constant companion, morning, noon, and night; she invariably took it with her into her room when she retired to rest, though rest she could not always—for if any thought struck her in the night, it was written down, and I believe she as often wrote without a light as with one."

The date of the "first effort of her literary genius," is not known, but it is certain she was "very young," and the subject was the adventures of her cousin Captain Landon, who had then just returned from America. As she wrote she exhibited passages for approval. Much time was devoted to this: but the results have not been preserved. One of her very earliest pieces was a sketch (published years afterwards) of the character of Sir John Doyle, written after perusing an account of the Peninsular War. Her mind was wonderfully moved by the recital of any great or good action; her countenance, always strikingly expressive, would lighten up even in childhood as she read; and so early was her character formed that she not only seemed then, but really was, capable of any exertion or any self-sacrifice. Not less singular was her capacity of judging the characters of persons; while yet a mere child her penetration in this respect was frequently remarked; and though at the time they would often say "Letitia, you are wrong," the truth of the opinions she had expressed was as often confirmed by experience.