Part 8

Miss Palmer came forward to receive her with warm greeting cordiality; but she rapidly hastened onward to shake hands with Sir Joshua. He was now all but quite blind. He had a green bandage over one eye, and the other was shaded by a green half bonnet. He was playing at cards with Mr. William Burke, and some others. He attempted to rise, to welcome a long-lost favourite; but found himself too weak. He was even affectingly kind to her, but serious almost to melancholy. “I am very glad indeed,” he emphatically said, though in a meek voice, and with a dejected accent, “to see you again! and I wish I could see you better! But I have only one eye now,—and hardly that!”

She was extremely touched; and knew not how to express either her concern for his altered situation since they had last met, or her joy at being with him again; or her gratitude for the earnest exertions he had made to spur Dr. Burney to the step that had been taken.

The Doctor, perceiving the emotion she both felt and caused, hurried her away. And once more only she ever saw the English Raphael again. And then he was still more deeply depressed; though Miss Palmer good-humouredly drew a smile from him, by gaily exclaiming, “Do pray, now, uncle, ask Miss Burney to write another book directly! for we have almost finished Cecilia again—and this is our sixth reading of it!”

The little occupation, Miss Palmer said, of which Sir Joshua was then capable, was carefully dusting the paintings in his picture gallery, and placing them in different points of view.

This passed at the conclusion of 1791; on the February of the following year, this friend, equally amiable and eminent, was no more!

Dr. Burney, extremely unwell at that period himself, could not attend the funeral; which, under the direction of Mr. Burke, the chief executor, was conducted with the splendour due to the genius, and suitable to the fortune of the departed. Dr. Charles Burney was invited in the place of his father, and attended at the obsequies for both.

In the retirement of this mournful interval of personal sickness and mental dejection, Dr. Burney composed the following elegy to the memory of Sir Joshua.

“Farewell, farewell, illustrious friend! Sent here thy art, and men, to mend; Farewell, dear friend!—in vain I try To think of thee without a sigh! If in life’s long and active round Thy equal I so rarely found, How, in my few remaining days, While nature rapidly decays, Can hope persuade, in flattering strain, Thy niche will e’er be fill’d again? Thy loss is not to art alone, Which placed thee on Apelles’ throne; Society has lost still more, Which both the good and wise deplore; Thy friends dispers’d, of joy bereft, No stand, no central point have left; For when fate cut thy vital thread, And number’d thee among the dead; To all who had seen thee give a glow Wherever wit and wisdom flow; Who, at thy hospitable board Had seen thee lov’d, rever’d, ador’d; Who knew thy comprehensive mind, Thy zeal for worth of every kind; Who, in thy Aristippan bowers, Forgot thy pencil’s magic powers,—

To these, the nation’s light and pride, Of wit the source, of taste the guide, From all the heart most precious deems, Thy loss an amputation seems.”

MR. HAYES.

Another last separation, long menacing, yet truly grievous to the Doctor, was now almost momentarily impending. His good, gay-hearted, and talented old friend, Mr. Hayes, had had a new paralytic seizure, which, in the words of Dr. Burney, “deprived him of the use of one side, and greatly affected his speech, eyes, and ears; though his faculties were still as good and as sound as his heart.”

This account had been addressed, the preceding year, to George Earl of Orford, by desire of the poor invalid.

Pitiable as was this species of existence, Mr. Hayes long lingered in it, with a patience and cheerfulness that kept him still open to the kind offices, as well as to the compassion of his friends: and Dr. Burney held a regular correspondence with Lord Orford upon this subject, till it ceased from a calamitous catastrophe; not such as was daily expected to the ancient invalid, though then bed-ridden, and past eighty years of age, but to the Earl himself, from an attack of insanity.

EARL OF ORFORD.

This was a new grief. Lord Orford had been not only an early patron, but a familiar friend of the Doctor’s during the whole of his sojourn in Norfolk.

This truly liberal, though, as has been acknowledged, not faultless nobleman, attached himself to all that was literary or scientific that came within reach of his kindness at Haughton Hall; yet without suffering this intellectual hospitality to abridge any of the magnificence of the calls of fair kindred aristocracy, which belonged to his rank and fortune. His high appreciation of Mr. Bewley has been already mentioned; and his value of the innate, though unvarnished worth of Mr. Hayes, sprang from the same genuine sense of intrinsic merit.

Nearly in the meridian of his life, Lord Orford had been afflicted with a seizure of madness, occasioned by an unreflecting application of some repelling plaster or lotion to an eruption on the forehead, that had broken out just before one of the birthdays of the King,[23] upon which, as his lordship was then first Lord of the Bedchamber in waiting, his attendance at St. James’s had seemed indispensable.

This terrible malady, after repeated partial recoveries and disappointing relapses, had appeared to be finally cured by the same gifted medical man who blessedly had restored his Sovereign to the nation, Dr. Willis. Lord Orford, from that happy lucid interval, resided chiefly at Ereswell, his favourite villa. And here, once more, Dr. Burney had had the cordial pleasure of passing a few days with this noble friend; who delighted to resort to that retirement from the grandeur and tumult of Haughton Hall.

It had been nineteen years since they had met; and the flow of conversation, from endless reminiscences, kept them up nearly all the first night of this visit. And Dr. Burney declared that he had then found his lordship’s head as clear, his heart as kind, and his converse as pleasing, as at any period of their early intercourse.

Lord Orford, since his revival, had acquired a knowledge, at once profound and feeling, of the French Revolution—the only topic which those who had either hearts or heads could, at that time, discuss. And he animatedly asserted that never before had any country, or any epoch, produced, in one and the same nation, contrasts so striking of atrocious, unheard-of guilt, and consummate, intrepid virtue; warmly adding, as he adverted to the emigrants then pouring into England, that the detestation excited by the murderous and sacrilegious revolutionary oppressors, ought universally to instigate respect as well as commiseration for their guiltless fugitive victims.

The relapse, by which, not three weeks after this meeting, the Earl again lost his senses, had two current reports for its cause: the first of which gave it to a fall from his horse; the second to the sudden death of Mrs. Turk, his erst lovely Patty; “to whom,” says the Doctor, in a letter, after his Ereswell visit, that was addressed to Mrs. Phillips, “he was more attached than ever, from her faithful and affectionate attendance upon him during the long season of his insanity; though, at this time, she was become a fat and rather coarse old woman.”

Dr. Burney was of opinion that to both these circumstances, since one of them quickly followed the other, this last fatal seizure might be owing. Its prompt termination left the good, infirm, and far older Mr. Hayes a sorrowing, but not a long survivor.

Dr. Burney mourned for both; for Lord Orford with true concern—for Mr. Hayes with lasting regret.

Mr. Hayes bequeathed to Dr. Burney a finely chosen and beautifully bound collection of books, among which were several works of great price and rarity; to which was joined a valuable case of coins and medals. And the Doctor’s eldest son, Captain Burney, who from a boy had been known and loved by Mr. Hayes, was worthily named, by that excellent friend, his general heir and residuary legatee.

In speaking of this last event in a letter to Mrs. Phillips, the Doctor says: “I have been so melancholy as to be unwilling to communicate my _lâcheté_ to you, who, I hope, are in better spirits. The death of my worthy and affectionate friend, Hayes, though I gain a charming collection of books by it, fills me with sorrow every time I look at them. Thirty years ago, such a bequest would have made me mad with joy; but now, alas! my literary curiosity and wants lie in a smaller compass. I was already in possession of the best books he has left me, though in worn editions and worse bindings; and as for the rest, my gain is merely nominal: for our books have been so much in common during more than thirty years, that his were mine and mine were his, as much as our own. We had only to stretch out our hands a little further, when we wanted what were distant. How much harder is such a friend to find than such books, scarce, and really valuable as are many of them!”

* * * * *

MR. BURKE.

Upon the publication of the celebrated Treatise of Mr. Burke on the opening of the French Revolution, Dr. Burney had felt re-wakened all his first unqualified admiration of its author, from a full conviction that error, wholly free from malevolence, had impelled alike his violence in the prosecution of Mr. Hastings, and his assertions upon the incurability of the malady of the King: while a patriotism, superior to all party feeling, and above all considerations but the love of his country, had inspired every sentence of the immortal orator in his new work.

The Doctor had interchanged some billets with Mr. Burke upon this occasion; and once or twice they had met; but only in large companies. This the Doctor lamented to Mrs. Crewe; who promised that, if he would spend three or four days at her Hampstead little villa, she would engage for his passing one of them with Mr. Burke; though she should make, she added, her own terms; namely, “that you are accompanied, Mr. Doctor, by Miss Burney.”

Gladly the invitation and the condition were accepted; and the Editor hopes to be pardoned, if again she spare herself the toil of re-committing to paper an account of this meeting, by copying one written at the moment to her sister Susanna. Egotistic in part it must inevitably be; yet not, she trusts, offensively; as it contains various genuine traits of Mr. Burke in society, that in no graver manner than in a familiar epistle could have been detailed.

“TO MRS. PHILLIPS.

“At length, my Susan, the re-meeting, so long suspended, with Mr. Burke, has taken place. Our dearest father was enchanted at the prospect of spending so many hours with him; and of pouring forth again and again the rapturous delight with which he reads, and studies, and admires, the sublime new composition of this great statesman.

“But—my satisfaction, my dear Susan, with all my native enthusiasm for Mr. Burke, was not so unmingled. If such a meeting, after my long illness, and long seclusion, joined to my knowledge of his kind interest in them, had taken place speedily after that on Richmond Hill, at Sir Joshua Reynolds’; where I beheld him with an admiration that seemed akin to enchantment; and that portrayed him all bright intelligence and gentle amenity;——instead of succeeding to the scenes of Westminster Hall; where I saw him furious to accuse,—implacable not to listen—and insane to vanquish! his respiration troubled, his features nearly distorted, and his countenance haggard with baneful animosity; while his voice, echoing up to the vaulted roof in tremendous execrations, poisoned the heated air with unheard-of crimes!—Oh! but for that more recent recollection, his sight, and the expectation of his kindness, would have given me once again a joy almost ecstatic.[24]

“But now, from this double reminiscence, my mind, my ideas—disturbed as much as delighted—were in a sort of chaos; they could coalesce neither with pleasure nor with pain.

“Our dear father was saved all such conflicting perplexity, as he never attended the trial; and how faint are the impressions of report, compared with those that are produced by what we experience or witness! He was not, therefore, like me, harassed by the continual inward question: ‘Shall I see once more that noble physiognomy that, erst, so fascinated my fancy? or, am I doomed to behold how completely ’tis expression, not feature, that stamps the human countenance upon human view?’

“The little villa at Hampstead is small, but commodious. We were received by Mrs. Crewe with great kindness, which you will easily believe was the last thing to surprise us. Her son[25] was with her; a silent and reserved, but, I think, sensible young man, though looking—so blooming is she still—rather like her brother than her son. He is preparing to go to China with Lord Macartney. Her daughter[26] we had ourselves brought from town, where she had been on a visit to the lovely Emily Ogilvie,[27] at the Duchess Dowager of Leinster’s. She, Miss Crewe, is become an intelligent and amiable adolescent; but so modest, that I never heard her uncourted voice.

“Mr. Burke was not yet arrived; but young Burke, who, when I lived in the midst of things, was almost always at my side, like my shadow, wherever we met, though never obstrusively, was the first person I saw. I felt very glad to renew our old acquaintance; but I soon perceived a strangeness in his bow, that marked a decided change from fervent amity to cold civility.

“This hurt me much for this very estimable young man; but alarmed me ten thousand times more for his father, whose benevolent personal partiality—blame him as I may for one or two public acts—I could not forfeit without the acutest mortification, pain, and sorrow.

“But it now oppressively occurred to me, that perhaps young Mr. Burke, studiously as in whatever is political I always keep in the back ground, had discovered my antipathy to the state trial: for though I felt satisfied that Mr. Windham, to whom so openly I had revealed it, had held sacred, as he had promised, my secret—for how could honour and Mr. Windham be separated?—young Burke, who was always in the manager’s box, must unavoidably have observed how frequently Mr. Windham came to converse with me from the Great Chamberlain’s; and might even, perhaps, have so been placed, at times, in the House of Commons’ partition, as to overhear my unrestrained wishes for the failure of the prosecution, from my belief in its injustice—and if so, how greatly must he have been offended for his reverenced father! to whom, also, he might, perhaps, have made known my sentiments!

“This idea demolished in a moment all my hope of pleasure in the visit! and I became more uncomfortable than I can describe.

“Our dear Father did not perceive my disturbance. Always wisely alive to the present moment, he was occupied exclusively with young Mr. Crewe, at the motion of our fair hostess; who, after naming Lord Macartney’s embassy, said: ‘Come, Dr. Burney, you, who know every thing, come and tell us all about China.’

“Soon after entered Mrs. Burke, who revived in me some better hopes; for she was just the same as I have always seen her; soft, serene, reasonable, sensible, and obliging; and we met, I think, upon just as good terms as if so many years had not parted us.

“Next appeared—for all the family inhabit, at present, some spot at Hampstead—Mr. Richard Burke; that original, humorous, flashing, and entertaining brother of THE Burke; whom we have so often met, but whom we have never liked, or, at least, understood well enough to associate with for himself; nor yet liked ill enough to shirk when we have met him with others. From him I could develop nothing of my great point of inquietude, _i.e._ how I stood with his great brother; for I had put myself into a place, in my old way, in the back ground, with Miss Crewe; Miss French, a lively niece of Mr. Burke’s; and a very pleasing Miss Townshend; and Mr. R. Burke did not recollect, or, probably, see me. But my father, immediately leaving young Crewe, and Lord Macartney, and the whole empire of China in the lurch, darted forward to expatiate with Mr. Richard upon his brother’s noble Essay.

“At length—Mr. Burke himself was announced, and made his appearance; accompanied by the tall, keen-eyed Mr. Elliot, one of the Twelve Managers of the Impeachment; and a favourite friend of Mr. Windham’s.

“The moment Mr. Burke had paid his devoirs to Mrs. Crewe, he turned round to shake hands, with an air the most cordial, with my father; who, proud of his alacrity, accepted the greeting with evident delight.

“I thought this the happiest chance for obtaining his notice, and I arose, though with a strong inward tremor, and ventured to make him a curtesy; but where was I, my dear Susan, when he returned me the most distant bow, without speaking or advancing?—though never yet had I seen him, that he had not made up to me with eager, nay, kind vivacity! nor been anywhere seated, that he had not taken a place next mine!

“Grieved I felt—O how grieved and mortified! not only at the loss of so noble a friend, but at the thought of having given pain and offence to one from whom I had received so much favour, and to whom I owed so much honour! and who, till those two deadly blights to his fair fame, the unsubstantiated charges against Mr. Hastings, and the baneful denunciation of the King’s incurability, had appeared to me of a nature as exalted in purity of feeling as in energy of genius.

“While I hesitated,—all sad within—whether to retire to my retreat in the back ground, or to abide where I stood, obviously seeking to move his returning kindness, Mrs. Crewe suddenly said, ‘I don’t think I have introduced Mr. Elliot to Miss Burney?’

“Mr. Elliot and I were certainly no strangers to each other’s faces, so often I had seen him in the Manager’s box, whence so often he must have seen me in the Great Chamberlain’s; but a slight bow and curtesy had hardly time to be exchanged between us—for the moment I was named, imagine my joy, my Susan, my infinite joy, to find that Mr. Burke had not recollected me! He is more near-sighted, considerably, even than my father or myself. ‘Miss Burney!’ in a tone of vivacity and surprise, he now exclaimed, coming instantly, courteously, and smilingly forward, and taking my willing hand, ‘and I did not see—did not know you!’ And then, again, imagine my increasing joy, after this false alarm, to hear him utter words that were all sweetness and amiability, upon his pleasure on our re-meeting!

“I had so mournfully given up all hope of such sounds, that I was almost re-organized by the sudden transition from dejection to delight; and I felt a glow the most vivid tingle in my cheeks and my whole face. Mr. Burke, not aware of the emotion he himself had caused, from not having distinguished me before its operation, took the colour for re-established health, and the air of gaiety for regenerated vigour; and began to pour forth the most fervent expressions of satisfaction at my restoration. ‘You look,’ cried he, still affectionately holding my hand, while benignly he fixed his investigating eyes upon my face, ‘quite—_renewed!_—_revived!_—in short, _disengaged!_ You seemed, when I conversed with you last, at the trial, quite——.’ He paused for a word, and then finished with, ‘quite _altered!_—I never saw such a change for the better!’

“Ah, Mr. Burke, thought I, this is simply a mistake from judging by your own feelings. I seemed altered for the worse at the trial, because I there looked coldly and distantly from distaste and disapprobation; and I here look changed for the better, because I here meet you with the re-kindling animation of my first devotion to your incomparable genius. For never, my dear Susan, can I believe Mr. Burke to be either wilfully or consciously wrong. I am persuaded, on the contrary, that his intentions are always pure; and that the two fatal transgressions which despoiled him of his supremacy of perfection, were both the wayward produce of that unaccountable and inexplicable occasional warp, which, in some or other unexpected instance, is sure, sooner or later, to betray an Hibernian origin; even in the most transcendant geniuses that spring from the land of Erin.

“Mrs. Crewe now made me take a seat by her side on the sofa; but, perceiving the earnestness with which Mr. Burke was talking to me—and the gratification he was giving to his hearer,—she smilingly rose, and left him her own place; which, with a little bow, he very composedly took. He then entered into a most animated conversation, of which while I had the chief address, young Mr. Crewe was the chief object; as it was upon Lord Macartney, the Chinese expedition, and two Chinese youths who were to accompany it. These he described with a most amusing minuteness of detail: and then spoke of the extent of the undertaking in high, and perhaps fanciful terms; but with allusions and anecdotes intermixed, so full of general information and brilliant ideas, as, happily, to enchain again my charmed attention into a return of my first enthusiasm—and with it a sensation of pleasure, that made the rest of the day delicious.

“My father soon afterwards joined us, and politics took the lead. Mr. Burke then spoke eloquently indeed; but with a vehemence that banished the graces, though it redoubled his energies. The French Revolution, he said, which began by legalizing injustice; and which, by rapid steps, had proceeded to every species of despotism, except owning a despot; was now menacing all mankind, and all the universe, with a diabolical concussion of all principle and order.

“My father, you will be very sure, heartily concurred in his opinions, and participated in his terrors. I assented tacitly to all that he addressed to me against the revolutionary horrors; but I was tacit without assent to his fears for stout old England. Surely, with such a warning before us, we cannot fall into similar atrocities. We have, besides, so little, comparatively, to redress! One speech he then made, that I thought he meant to be explanatory of his own conduct, and apparent change in cutting Mr. Fox; as well as in the sentiments he has divulged in his late book in disfavour of democracy: or rather, perhaps, I ought to say of republicanism.

“After expatiating copiously and energetically upon the present pending dangers to even English liberty and property, and to all organized government, from so neighbouring a contagion of havoc and novelty, he abruptly exclaimed: ‘This it is,—the hovering in the air of this tremendous mischief, that has made me an abettor and supporter of courts and kings! Monarchs are Necessary! If we would preserve peace and prosperity, we must preserve Monarchs! We must all put our shoulders to the work: aye, and stoutly, too!—’