Chapter 12

Yours sincerelyG. P. R. James.

Yours sincerely

G. P. R. James.

Everybody seems to have written affectionately to Charles Ollier, the publisher—Lamb, Hunt, Keats, Shelley, and a host of others. His son, Edmund, ‘beheld Charles Lamb with infantile eyes and sat in poor Mary Lamb’s lap.’[67]James writes to the elder Ollier, from the Chateau du Buisson, Garumbourg,prèsEvreux, on August 7, 1829:

“My dear Mr. Ollier.

I take advantage of a friend’s departure for London, to write to you though I have nothing to say. I havedone so much of my new book as I permit myself to do per diem and having nothing else to do my vilecacoethes scribendiprompts me to indite this epistle to your manifest trouble and annoyance. My father informs me you have been ill and calls your complaint ‘nothing but Dis-pep-sia.’ I hope and trust however that you have no such long word in your stomach, but if you have, nothing can be so good for it as crossing the water and visiting a friend in France. One of my visitors lately brought me over about twenty newspapers and also the information that my unfortunateAdrahad never made her appearance. Incontinent, I fell into one of my accustomed fits of passion which was greatly increased by finding that in none of the twenty journals was any advertisement or mention whatever ofRichelieuwhich together with the news that about four and twenty people had asked forRichelieuand could not get it in England, Scotland or Ireland, made me write instantly to Mr. Bentley a very flaming letter about printingAdra&c. &c. &c. I had written to Mr. Colburn sometime ago without his doing me thehonorto answer me, and therefore I write not there again. I have since received an answer from Mr. R. Bentley and all has gone right. But I am most profanely ignorant of all news and therefore will beg you to answer me the following Qys. if you can.

HasRichelieubeen reviewed in the New Monthly? Has it ever been advertised? Does the sale proceed as successfully as when I left London? Will you see that its first success does not make Mr. Colburn relax in his efforts in its favor? Will you manage the reviewing of Adra and take care that it be sent to and noticed by as many publications as possible? Will you see that the list of persons to whom I desired it to be sent and which I left in Burlington street be attended to? Will you let me know whether there be anything in which I can in any way serve or pleasure you? I am sincere and ever yours.

G. P. R. James.

This letter dated at Maxpoffle, near Melrose, Roxburghshire, 14th June 1832, is addressed to Allan Cunningham.

My Dear Sir:

When you were in this country last year, I told you not to forget me; and you promised that you would not; yet I doubt not that when you see the signature to this, memory will have much ado to call up the person who writes. Nevertheless I cannot forbear—even at the distance of time which has since elapsed, and the distance of space which intervenes—from telling you how much delighted I have been with your Maid of Elnar. I have not seen the whole; but various passages in various reviews, have shown me so much surpassing beauty, that I do not wait even till I have been delighted with the whole, to tell you how great has been the pleasure I have felt from a part.

I do not know very well how or why, but I have been lately sickening of poetry; and though once as great a dreamer as ever felt the sweet music of imagination in his heart of hearts, within the last four or five years I have found it all flat, stale, and unprofitable; and began to fancy myself a devout adorer of dull prose. I thank you then for showing me that there is still such a thing as poetry; and it would not at all surprise me to feel myself—after reading the Maid of Elnar through—taking the top of the wave, and going over every poet again from Chaucer to Byron. Can you tell me what it is that causes such a strange revolution in tastes? I declare for the last five years since the Byron mania was upon me, I have looked upon poetry as the most sappy, senseless misapplication of good words, that ever the whimsical folly of the universal fool, mankind, devised. A spark or two of the old faggot was rekindled in my heart about six weeks ago, by hearing a sonnet of Wordsworth’s read aloud; and that I believe induced me to read the extracts from your book; and now I am all ablaze. What I like in the various scattered passages of the Maid of Elnar, would be endlessto tell without writing a review; but there is something throughout the whole which has enchanted me—a mingling of the fine spirit of old chivalry, with the sweet home feeling of calm happy nature that is something newer than even Spenser. As Oliver Cromwell used to say, I would say something—Ay verily—but I won’t for fear you should think me exaggerating and therefore I will bid you farewell. It is natural of course for me to hate you; for every author is bound to detest any other person who writes what is good. I would therefore fain pay you that compliment, but your book will not let me; and I must beg you to believe me

Ever yours most trulyG. P. R. James.

Ever yours most truly

G. P. R. James.

I send this to your Bookseller, because I do not know where else to send it; and I pay it, because many a good wholesome letter which has been addressed to the care of mine, has never reached me for want of that precaution on the part of my correspondents. Before the letter reaches you, I shall have got and read the whole book; and by heaven, if the rest does not come up to the extracts, I shall either lampoon you or your critics.

Another letter to Cunningham follows:

Maxpoffle Near Melrose Roxburghshire17th May 1833.

Maxpoffle Near Melrose Roxburghshire

17th May 1833.

My Dear Friend,

To show you how little the fault that you notice is attributable to myself, I have only to tell you that I could not get a copy ofMary of Burgundytill three days after you had received it and my sister in law writes to Mrs. James, by the post that brought your letter, that although she had ordered the book through her own bookseller, she has not yet been able to get it, while friends of hers have obtained it at the circulatinglibraries. Not having lived in London for many years, I am quite unacquainted with all the ins and outs of these affairs and do not even know who is the Editor of the Athenæum; but I think it somewhat hard measure on his part to make an author pay for the sins of his Bookseller and very different indeed from the usual liberal spirit that I have seen in his paper.

However, I never courted a Journalist in my life and although I know that I have suffered greatly on this account, yet I shall pursue the same plan; and only by endeavoring to make my works better than they have been, force all honest writers to give them their due share whatever it may be. At the same time I will endeavour as far as in me lies to prevent any such instances of neglect as those of which you complain taking place for the future, especially in regard to a paper which deserves so well of the public. Having done so, whatever be the result the Editor must “tak his wull o’t, as the cat did o’ the haggis.” I never reply to criticism unless it be very absurd which is not likely to be the case with his; so let him “pour on, I will endure.”

In regard to theString of PearlsI not only begged a copy to be sent to you before any one else; I wrote you a long letter to be sent with it; but this is only one out of the many shameful pieces of negligence which Mr. Bentley has shown in my affairs.

I trust that the Editor of the Athenæum got a copy ofMary of Burgundyindependent of that sent to you for I wish it clearly to be understood that I send you my leather and prunella, as a man for whom I have a high admiration and esteem, and not at all as a critic. When you get them, review them yourself, let others review, praise, abuse them, or let others abuse them as you find need; but still receive them as a mark of regard from me; and be sure that nothing you can say of them will diminish that regard. Whenever I have any one of them for which I wish a little lenity I will write you a note with it and tax your friendship upon the occasion;but still exculpate me in your own generous mind and plead my exculpation to others, of all intriguing to gain undue celebrity for my works or of dabbling with literary coteries. I give in to my bookseller a list of my friends—amongst whom your name stands high and I leave all the rest to him. For theString of PearlsIwasanxious both because it was given to a charity and because I was afraid the Publisher might lose by it; but this as far as I can remember is the only book for which I ever asked a review.

Thanks however, many thanks, for your critique in the Athenæum which is calculated to do my book much good and is much more favorable than it deserves. Of your light censure I will speak to you when we meet which I am happy to say will be soon—at least I trust soon. On the twenty-eighth we leave this place for London on our way to Germany and Italy. My liver and stomach have become so deranged of late that I find it necessary to put myself under the hands of a physician whose prescription is an agreeable one. “Take the waters of Ems for two seasons and spend the intermediate time in traveling through Italy.” This plan I am about to pursue, and in our way we shall spend a month in London when I will find you out.

The country round us is lovely at present. After a cold lingering spring, summer has set in, in all its radiance and the world has burst at once into green beauty. You cannot fancy how lovely the Cheviots looked yesterday evening, as Mrs. James and I rode over the shoulder of the Eildons. The sky was full of the broken fragments of a past thunder storm and the lights and shadows were soft, superb and dreamlike. I know I may rave about beautiful scenery to you without fear or compunction for the Maid of Elnar made me know that you love it as well as

My Dear Allan,Ever yours truly,G. P. R. James.

My Dear Allan,

Ever yours truly,

G. P. R. James.

P. S.—I have not yet got your last volume but if itbe as good as its predecessors you will have no occasion to whip your Genius.

He writes again to Cunningham:

10 July, 1835.1 Lloyds Place, Blackheath.

10 July, 1835.

1 Lloyds Place, Blackheath.

My Dear Friend:

A thousand thanks for your kind letter and all the kind things it contains. I am glad that you like my friend the Gipsey, because your approval is worth much and though I think it tolerable myself, yet I have attributed a great part of its success to the name. In answer to the question you put, I do not think he was drowned; but I do not know with certainty. I have told all I do know and farther this deponent sayeth not. I have long been thinking of writing to you to tell you that the name of Chaucer appears in the Scroop and Grosvenor roll in the year 1386 but all that I dare say you know. The best sketch of the real events of Chaucer’s life is certainly that in Sir H. Nicholas’ comments on that roll, Vol. II., page 404, wherein he probably states all that can be learned with certainty of his life and proceedings. I tell you all this, although I dare say you are already acquainted with it because you asked me if I found any thing concerning our poet to let you know. TheBlack Princecomes on but slowly. So much examination and research is necessary that it is a most laborious and very expensive work. It has already cost me in journeys, transcriptions, books, MSS., &c., many hundred pounds without at all calculating my individual labour and do you know, my dear Allan, what I expect as my reward. Clear loss; and two or three reviews written by ignorant blockheads upon a subject they do not understand, for the purpose of damning a work which throws some new light upon English History. I am very much out of spirits in regard to historical literature and though I would willingly devote my time and even my money to elucidate the dark points of our own history yet encouragement from the public is small andfrom the Government does not exist, so that I lay down the pen in despair of ever seeing English history any thing but what it is—a farrago of falsehoods and hypotheses covered over with the tinsel of specious reasoning from wrong data. And so you tell Lord Melbourne when you see him. But to speak of a personage, you are more likely to see namely Mr. Chantry. There is a bust which I wish him very much to see and wish you would take a look at it first as I have not seen the original myself. I have a cast of it given me by my Banker at Florence, to whom the original belongs, and if the head be equal to the cast it is the most beautiful antique I have ever seen. It is to be seen at Mr. Brown’s in University Street, Gower Streetmarble works. Ask to see the antique head belonging to Mr. Johnstone and write me but three lines to tell me what you think of it. He paid, I believe, two hundred pounds for it and would take I believe three or four. If it be as I think, it (pedestal and all) is worth double.

Yours ever with best Compliments to your family

G. P. R. James

Excuse a scrawl but I am not very well.

1 Lloyds Place, Blackheath5th Decr 1835

1 Lloyds Place, Blackheath

5th Decr 1835

My Dear Allan,—I have sent you a book and have ten times the pleasure in sending you one now that ever I had, because I hear you have detached yourself from all reviews. Heaven be praised therefor; for now you can sit down quietly by your own ingle nook and pick out all that is good—if there be any—in my One in a Thousand and palate it all, without the prospect, the damning prospect, of a broad sheet and small print before your eyes, and without wracking your honest brain to find out any small glimmerings of wit and wisdom in your friend’s book in order to set it forth as fairly as may be to the carping world.

By the way, I thought you were honest and true; and yet you have deceived me wofully. You promised to come down to Blackheath and you have not appeared.I have been writing night and day or I should have presented myself to call you to account. Will you come down even yet, and take a family dinner with me? Any Sunday at five you will be sure to find me but if you come on another day, let me have a day’s notice by post, lest I be engaged, which would be a great disappointment to

Yours ever truly,G. P. R. James

Yours ever truly,

G. P. R. James

He always wrote frankly and freely to Cunningham. This letter deals withAttila.

The Cottage, Great Marlow, Bucks,15th April 1837

The Cottage, Great Marlow, Bucks,

15th April 1837

My Dear Allan,

Many thanks for your letter and kind words uponAttila. I do believe that he is a good fellow, at all events he is very successful in society and though there are not as you well know twenty people in London who know who Attila was, he is as well received, I understand, as if he had the entrée. Conjectures as to who Attila was are various in the wellinformed circlesof the Metropolis, and ever since the book was advertised two principal opinions have prevailed, some people maintaining that He, Attila, was Platoff; others asserting that he was a Lady, first cousin to Boru the Backswoodsman, and the heroine of a romance by Chateaubriand. This may look like a joke, but I can assure you, it is a fact and that out of one hundred people of the highest rank in Europe you will not find five who know who Attila was; setting aside the groveling animals who, as the Duke of Somerset says,addictthemselves to Literature.

I am very sorry to hear you say that these well informed and enlightened times have not done justice to your romances. I’ll tell you one great fault they have, which is probably that which prevents the world from liking them as much as it should do: they have too much poetry in them, Allan, one and all fromMichaelScott to Lord Roldan. But you must not expect to succeed in all walks of art. You are a lyric poet and a biographer; how can you expect that the critics would ever let you come near romances. No, no; they feel it their bounden duty to smother all such efforts of your genius and they fulfil that duty with laudable zeal. Did you see how the Athenæum attempted to dribble its small beer venom uponAttila. If you have not, read that sweet and gramatical (sic) article, when you will find that because a man has succeeded in one style of writing he cannot succeed in another, and apply the critics dictum to yourself. One half of this world is made up of idiocy, insanity, humbug, and peculation, and the other half (very nearly) of envy, hatred, malice, and all uncharitableness.

Yours ever trulyG. P. R. James

Yours ever truly

G. P. R. James

This letter is directed to “Charles Ollier, Esq., Richard Bentley, Esq., New Burlington street, London.”

Fair Oak Lodge, Petersfield,Hants, 25th December, 1837.

Fair Oak Lodge, Petersfield,

Hants, 25th December, 1837.

My Dear Ollier:

Mr. Bentley I think usually gives me six copies of a work such as Louis XIV. I have already had one copy of the two first volumes for the Duke of Sussex, and you will very much oblige me by having the copies sent to the following persons with my compliments written in the front leaf and dated Fair Oak Lodge, Petersfield. Lord John Russell, Wilton Crescent; S. M. Phillipps, Esq., Home Office; The Marquis Conyngham, Dudley House, Park Lane; The Lady Polwarth, 9 John Street, Berkeley Square; and also one to G. P. R. James, Fair Oak Lodge, which will make the six copies. I must also have another copy sent to my friend Seymour as soon as you can, addressed as follows: “Sir G. Hamilton Seymour, G. C. H. Brussels, In the care of the Under Secretary of State F. O. Downing Street.” For this last I will pay as soon as you let me know what is the price. Mr. Bentley charges me forthe copy; I should like it to be accompanied by a copy ofHenry Masterton, the small edition of which by the [way] I have not received any copies and should like some. Pray let me know what Mr. B. chargesmefor Louis per copy as there are several other friends to whom I should like to give it, but as Sancho would say I must not stretch my feet beyond the length of my sheet.

Yours ever,G. P. R. James.

Yours ever,

G. P. R. James.

P. S. I am anxious to get on with the two last volumes, but I suppose it is the merry season which prevents my having any proofs as yet.

A letter to Alaric Watts refers to the Boundary Question pamphlet:

Fair Oak Lodge, Petersfield, Hants,9th April, 1839.

Fair Oak Lodge, Petersfield, Hants,

9th April, 1839.

My Dear Watts,

I write you ten lines in the greatest bustle that ever man was in to tell you that the death of poor Sir Charles Paget turns me out of my house. This is not of necessity indeed, for I have a lease of it for some time yet unexpired, but Lady Paget sent to ask if I would let her come in again and I felt not in my heart to refuse the widow under such circumstances. I go before the first of May, but I do sincerely wish that between this and then I may have the pleasure of seeing you here. I think that you will believe me to be a sincere man; a tolerably bitter enemy as long as I think there is cause for enmity, a very pertinacious friend when I do like. From this place we go to London, or rather to Brompton, Mrs. James’s sister who is in town for the winter, having lent her her house there, for a short time. It is called the Hermitage and is nearly opposite Trevor Square, which perhaps you may know. Do not suffer yourself or Mrs. Watts to fancy that it will put us to any inconvenience to receive you here if you can manage it, as I assure you it will not. I sell all my horses by auction on the 25th and you couldhelp to bid them up. After we quit the Hermitage, we have not the slightest idea where we shall go but there at least I trust to see you if you cannot leave your weighty employments ere then. I was delighted with your parthian shots, which were exquisitely truly aimed and though the arrows were not poisoned by your hand, the corruption of the flesh in which they have stuck, depend upon it, will produce gangrene. You were made for a reviewer: only you are honest. How was it else that I escaped even when we did not fully understand each other?

I have told the booksellers to send you a little pamphlet on the American Boundary question. It is merely a brief and unpretending summary of the early history of that bone of contention, only worth your looking into as a saving of time.

Pray let me hear from you a few words and believe me with Mrs. James’s and my own best Compliments to Mrs. Watts.

Yours everG. P. R. James

Yours ever

G. P. R. James

P. S. I am making a little collection of my works in their new edition for Mrs. Watts’s book-case and I sendRichelieuwith this. It is odd Bulwer should have just published a play under the same title when the third edition of mine had been announced for months. I have not seen his, but I should like to compare the two.

Alaric A. Watts EsqreCrane CourtFleet Street2 Verulam Place Hastings10th January 1840

Alaric A. Watts EsqreCrane CourtFleet Street

Alaric A. Watts Esqre

Crane Court

Fleet Street

2 Verulam Place Hastings10th January 1840

2 Verulam Place Hastings

10th January 1840

My Dear Allan,

It is very grievous to me to hear that you have been suffering and it would be as grievous to hearthe howif I were not quite sure that at your age and with temperance in all things such as yours, the enemy—if so we can venture to call him—will pass away and leaveyou, perhaps more useful, but not less comfortable for many a long year. Within my own recollection this has happened to many that I still know in health and vigor but while any vestige remains of the disease it always leaves a despondency as its footprint which makes us look upon the attack as worse than it really has been. Though a successful man, I know—I am sure,—you have been an anxious man; and there is nothing has so great a tendency to produce all kind of nervous affections as anxiety. I trust however that you have now no cause for any kind of anxiety butthatregarding your health, and that it will soon regain its tone. Pray my good friend take exercise, not of a violent or fatiguing nature, but frequent and tranquilly, and remember that anything which hurries the circulation is very detrimental. You will also find everything that sits heavy or cold upon the stomach also bad for you; I know, for I have seen much mischief done by even a small quantity of the cold sorts of fruit. It gives me great pleasure to hear you like my books. You are one of those who can understand and appreciate the plan which I have laid down for myself in writing them. If I chose to hazard thoughts and speculations that might do evil, to run a tilt at virtue and honor, to sport with good feelings and to arouse bad ones, the field being far wider, the materials more ample, I might perhaps be more brilliant and witty, but I would rather build a greek temple or a gothic church than the palace of Versailles with all its frog’s statues and marbles. If the books give you entertainment, you are soon likely to have another for there is one now in the press called the “King’s Highway” but which is not quite so Jack Sheppardish as the name implies. With our best regards to all yours believe me ever

Yours trulyG. P. R. James

Yours truly

G. P. R. James

Allan Cunningham EsqreBelgrave PlacePimlico

Allan Cunningham Esqre

Belgrave Place

Pimlico

I do not know to whom this letter was written.

Hotel de L’Europe, Brussels,30th July, ’40.

Hotel de L’Europe, Brussels,

30th July, ’40.

My Dear Sir,

The grief and anxiety I have suffered have brought upon me an intermittent fever and various concomitant evils amongst which has been an affection of the face and eyes. Had this not been the case I should have written to you ere I left England, although it has cost me a great effort to write to any one. I am now a good deal better and will immediately correct the proofs I have received; but for the future will you tell Mr. Shaw to send the proofs in as large a mass as possible, addressed as follows and given in to the French diligence office, à Monsieur G. P. JameschezM: C. A. Fries, Heidelberg en Basle,aux soins deMessrs. Eschenauer Cie, Strasburg, Via Paris,Pressé.

This is a somewhat long address, but if it be not followed and the proofs be sent by Rotterdam I shall never get one half of them till two or three years after, for such was the case with many proofs ofEdwd. the Black Prince.

Any letter for me you had better direct at once to me “aux soins deSir G. Hamilton Seymour, G. C. H. Brussels.” When I am a little better I will write you a longer letter telling you all our movements and also what progress I have made in my plan for stopping continental piracy; in which if you will give me your assistance and influence I do not despair of succeeding although the Government will do nothing. I have already made some way for I can talk without using my eyes.

Yours ever faithfullyG. P. R. James.

Yours ever faithfully

G. P. R. James.

This letter was written to McGlashan, in Lever’s care, at Brussels:

The Shrubbery, Walmer,2nd August, 41.

The Shrubbery, Walmer,

2nd August, 41.

My Dear Sir,—

I did not write to you as I had full occupation for every minute and of a kind that could not be neglected. The same will be the case for the next three weeks, as I am just concluding a new work which I can of course lay aside for no other undertaking till it is finished. It will give me very great pleasure to see you here on your way back from Brussels and we can talk over the whole of my plan but as to having even one number completed that is quite out of the question as in order to accomplish it I should be obliged to lay aside a work which had reached the beginning of the last volume before you made up your mind and to do so would be highly disadvantageous to both books. I can tell you quite sufficient however regarding the first two numbers to answer your views as to illustrations.

Pray give my best wishes to Dr. Lever and tell him that we are all going on well; though for the last fortnight I have had no small anxiety upon my shoulders regarding Mrs. James and the baby.

Believe me to beDear SirYours faithfullyG. P. R. James.

Believe me to be

Dear Sir

Yours faithfully

G. P. R. James.

On May 17, 1842, he wrote to Mr. Bretton:

“*** I am very glad you were pleased with what I said at the Literary Fund dinner. I could have said a great deal more upon the same subject and opened my views for the benefit of the arts in this country, including literature of course, as one of the noblest branches of art—but the hour was so late that I made my speech as short as possible and yet perhaps it was too long.*** I think if I can bring the great body of literary men to act with me, especially the much neglected and highly deserving writers for the daily and weekly press, I shall be enabled to open a new prospectfor literature. Should you have any oportunity (sic) of hinting that such are my wishes and hopes, pray do: for this is no transient idea, but a fixed and long meditated purpose which, however inadequate may be my own powers to carry it out, may produce great things by the aid of more powerful minds than that of

Yours very faithfullyG. P. R. James.

The name of the person to whom the following letter was written is not given:

The Oaks nr. Walmer Kent22nd Augt. 1844

The Oaks nr. Walmer Kent

22nd Augt. 1844

Sir:

I have been either absent from home or unwell since your letter arrived or I should have answered it sooner. I do not exactly understand the sort of use you desire to make of theLife of Edward the Black Princewritten by myself. Of course I can have no possible objection to your making as long quotations from it as you like, or to your grounding your own statements upon those which it contains which I think you may rely upon with full confidence; but if it was your purpose to make the projected Work a mere sort of Abridgement of mine, I am sorry to say I cannot give you the permission you desire, however much I might personally wish to do so, as Messrs. Longman published a Second Edition of it not long ago, a part of which remains unsold and I could not venture, of course to interfere with their sale. They could not of course object to any quotations you might think fit to make or any reasonable use of the facts stated, as I cannot but think that each historian has a full right to employ the information collected by all his predecessors.

I have the honor to be,SirYour most obedt. ServantG. P. R. James

I have the honor to be,

Sir

Your most obedt. Servant

G. P. R. James

The Shrubbery Walmer Kent

1st June 1847

My Dear Worthington,

I received your letter yesterday and would have answered it immediately; but we are in the midst of an election business here. I am not a candidate; and, disgusted with public men, had resolved not to take any part on behalf of others; but I have been led on and when once in the business go on, as you know, heart and hand.

Let me hear a little more about the Ecclesiastical History Society. I am a churchman you know, but far from Puseyitical and I should not like to be mixed up with any legends except such as Ehrenstein or any Saints except St. Mary le bonne.

I am glad to hear that you have moved your dwelling; for Pancras was so completely out of my beat that it was impossible for me to get there when in town. Indeed during my visits to that famed city of London I always put myself in mind of an American orator’s description of himself when he said “I am a right down regler Steam Engine, I go slick off right ahead and never stop till I get to the tarnation back of nothing at all.”

I shall be delighted to see you and Mr. Christmas here any time you can come and will with a great deal of pleasure board and educate you but as to lodging you I am unable for what with babies, nurses, and one thing or another I can hardly lodge myself. I do not propose to be in London for some days or I should rather say weeks, as I was there very lately.

As to Marylebone, any body may propose me for any where and I will be the representative of any body of men always provided nevertheless that I do not spend a penny and maintain my own principles to the end of the chapter. I am not yet inscribable in thedictionnaire des Girouettes; but I trust soon to be for it seems to methat the Jim Crow system is the only one that succeeds in England.

Believe me with best regards to all your household

Yours trulyG. P. R. James

Yours truly

G. P. R. James

In a letter dated April 1, 1849, and addressed to Mr. Davison, he says:

“I understand you have got a potato. Can you spare half of it, for we have not that. But to speak seriously, which is not my wont, Mrs. James has heard from Mrs. H. that on your farm there are some capital praties, and as we have been languishing for some of the jewels for the last month without being able to get anything edible or digestible, if this rumor of yourrichesis correct, will you spare a sack or two to a poor man in want, and what will be the cost of the same, delivered in Farnham safe, sound and in good condition—wind and weather permitting. The truth is I have no horse to send for them; and neither cow nor calf have learned to draw yet. I have had no time to teach them, or to buy a horse either. I wish any one else had half my work and I half of theirs—I’d take it and give a premium.”

How busy he was after his arrival in America may be seen from a letter dated October 27, 1850:

“I fear that it would be quite impossible for me to rewrite the first four numbers of the tale you speak of. Applications for lectures have come in so rapidly that I have not one single evening vacant and the evening would be the only time which I could devote to such a purpose as all my mornings must be given up to the fulfilment of my engagements with England and to traveling from place to place. You may easily imagine how much I am occupied when I tell you that during the whole month I am about to stay in Boston, there is not one night which has not its lecture fixed there or at some place in the neighborhood. The delay in Londonhowever, of which I had not heard till I received your letters is favorable, as it will enable me to get the proofs over in good time. The four parts are in type, I understand, and I have written over two thumping letters to the printers scolding them for not sending the proof as they are bound by contract to do. One of these letters was posted three weeks ago, so that we may expect the proofs in a week or ten days. In regard to the name, it is certainly curious that one name should have been taken three times but I do not see how it is possible for me to alter it now when it is announced in London. I was not at all aware that any work had before appeared under a similar title, but you could head itJames’sstory without a name in the Magazine, but if any other title is given it must be by yourselves and not by

“Yours faithfully,“G. P. R. James.”

“Yours faithfully,

“G. P. R. James.”

Soon after his arrival in America he appears to have become involved in some trouble with publishers. He writes from New York on October 24, 1850, to Ollier:

*** “Send no more sheets to Mr. Law till you hear from me again. My eyes have been opened since my arrival here. Four times the sum now paid can be obtained from Messrs. Harper, and negotiations are going on with them in which they must not have the advantage of having the sheets. You shall not lose by any new arrangement—of that you may trust to the word of one who has I think never failed you.”

He adds, in a postscript: “Tell him [Mr. Newby] I have been shamefully imposed upon by false statements of the sale here and if I had taken his advice I should have been some hundreds of pounds richer.”

On October 5, 1851, he writes from Stockbridge to Ollier:

“I have not written to you earlier because I wantedto find the treaty with Russia in regard to Copyright, and also to see the head of a great German house here in America so as to put you in the way of negotiating for the sale of my next book in Germany. But I have been too lame to leave my own house for anything but a morning drive. I am so far better that I can now walk out for a mile or two, but my right hand and arm remain very painful. However, I think I shall be able to go to New York in ten days and will write to you from that place.*** I am anxious to dedicate the first book I write to my own satisfaction, to Lord Charles Clinton. He is one of the noblest-minded men I ever met with—all truth and honor and straightforwardness. If you see him will you ask him for me whether he has any objection. The Fate is highly popular here—considered the best book I ever wrote—by the critics at least. The whole of the first chapter was read in the Supreme Court the other day before Chief JusticeShawto prove what was the state of England in the reign of James II. So says the ‘N. Y. Evening Post’ and I suppose it is true. I wish I had you here with me to see the splendor of an American autumn in the most lovely scene. The landscape is all on fire with the coloring of the foliage and yet so harmoniously blended are the tints, from the brightest crimson to the deep green of the pines that the effect is that of a continuous sunset. Mountains, forests, lakes, streams are all in a glow round.”

A letter to Ollier, written at Stockbridge on March 22, 1852, deals with some financial matters and then proceeds:

“I am glad to hear what you say ofRevenge—though the title is not one I would myself have chosen, there being a tale of that name in the book of the Passions. I think it is a good book, better in conception than in execution perhaps. Your comparison of Richardson and Johnson with myself and you will not hold. Youare scantily remunerated for much trouble. Johnson had done nothing that I can remember for Richardson. As to Richardson’s parsimony towards the great, good man, you explain it all in one word. The former was rich. Do you remember the fine poem of Gaffer Grey—Holcrofft’s I believe—

‘The poor man alone,To the poor man’s moan,Of his morsel a morsel will give Gaffer Grey.’

‘The poor man alone,

To the poor man’s moan,

Of his morsel a morsel will give Gaffer Grey.’

“But this rule is not without splendid exceptions, of which I will one day give you an instance, which I think will touch you much. At present I am writing in great haste in the grey of the morning with snow all around me, the thermometer at 18, and my hand nearly frozen. Verily, we have here to pay for the hot summer and gorgeous autumn in the cold silver coinage of winter.”

Another letter of his written from Winchester, Virginia, November 6, 1853, to Ollier, has some interest. He writes thus:

“My Dear Ollier: Long before the arrival of your kind letter, which reached me only two days ago, I had directed Messrs. Harper to send me a revise of the first page ofTiconderoga, in order to transmit it to you for the correction of errors which had crept into the Ms. through the stupidity of the drunken beast who wrote it under my dictation. Harpers have never sent the revise, but I think it better to write at once in order to have one correction and one alteration made, which must be effected even at the cost of a cancel of the page—which of course I will pay for. The very first sentence should have inverted commas before it. These have been omitted in the copy left here, as well as the words ‘so he wrote’ or something tantamount, inserted at the end of the first clause of that sentence.***

I cannot feel that an appointment of any smallvalue, to the dearest and most unhealthy city in the United States (with the exception of New Orleans) is altogether what I had a right to hope for or expect. You must recollect that I never asked for the consulate of Virginia, where there is neither society for my family, resources or companionship for myself, nor education to be procured for my little boy—where I am surrounded by swamps and marsh miasma, eaten up by mosquitoes and black flies, and baked under an atmosphere of molten brass, with the thermometer in the shade at 103—where every article of first necessity, with the exception of meat, is sixty per cent. dearer than in London—where the only literature is the ledger, and the arts only illustrated in the slave market.

I hesitated for weeks ere I accepted; and only did so at length upon the assurances given that this was to be a step to something better, and upon the conviction that I was killing myself by excessive literary labors. Forgive me for speaking somewhat bitterly; but I feel I have not been well used. You have known me more than thirty years, and during that time I do not think you ever before heard a complaint issue from my lips. I am not a habitual grumbler; but ‘the galled jade will wince.’

I am very grateful to Scott for his kind efforts, and perhaps they may be successful; for Lord Clarendon, who is I believe a perfect gentleman himself, when he comes to consider the society in which I have been accustomed to move, my character, my habits of thought, and the sort of place which Norfolk is—if he knows anything about it—must see that I am not in my proper position there. He has no cause of enmity or ill will towards me, and my worst enemy could not wish me a more unpleasant position. If I thought that I was serving my country there better than I could elsewhere, I would remain without asking for a change; but the exact reverse is the case. The slave dealers have got up a sort of outcry against me—I believe because under Lord Clarendon’s own orders I have successfully prosecuted several cases of kidnapping negroes from the West Indies—andthe consequence is that not a fortnight passes but an attempt is made to burn my house down. The respectable inhabitants of Norfolk are indignant at this treatment of a stranger, and the authorities have offered a reward of three hundred dollars for the apprehension of the offenders; but nothing has proved successful. This outcry is altogether unjust and unreasonable; for I have been perfectly silent upon the question of slavery since I have been here, judging that I had no business to meddle with the institutions of a foreign country in any way. But I will not suffer any men, when I can prevent or punish it, to reduce to slavery British subjects without chastisement.

You will be sorry to hear that this last year in Norfolk has been very injurious to my health; and I am just now recovering from a sharp attack of the fever and ague peculiar to this climate. It seized me just as I set out for the West—the great, the extraordinary West. Quinine had no effect upon it, but I learned a remedy in Wisconsin which has cured the disease entirely though I am still very weak.***

He seems to have been tormented by ill health during all his period of residence at Norfolk. He writes to Ollier:

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