Part 15

From what I have read of his sonnets in his first edition, the vehicle of expression which such composition should formulate was beyond his reach. Above all other forms it demands the philosophic imagination, which scarcely any poet has enjoyed, because its possessors revert to science, as being within their compass, and as subject to higher reward. In Rossetti’s sonnet the expression of the thought rises no higher than its first statement, it has no grand climacteric. His imagination, in fact, was introspective rather than retrospective, and was scarcely prospective at all.

Rossetti was a charming companion: he spoke well and freely on all subjects, literary and artistic, and with much knowledge of contemporary writings. His studio was a favourite resort of men whose names were on title pages, to whom he showed the work he had in progress; and, to his intimate friends, he would sometimes read a poem in a rich and sonorous voice. He had a very just mind. When an author was discussed, whatever might be said against him, he would insist on his merits being remembered. From rivalship and its jealousies he was absolutely free, and his hospitality was without limit. Above all, he was ready at all times to serve a friend, and to exert his influence to that end.

Interesting as Rossetti must always be to a large section of society, I have not considered myself justified in entering at any length on his domestic life, intimately as at one time it was mixed up with my own. Still, without impropriety, I may rest lightly on it, in such manner as to contribute some touches towards the picture of a man whose influence on art will last longer than the canvas on which his ideas are so brilliantly spread. I, therefore, propose to myself the task of narrating my visits to him, in Perthshire, and afterwards at Kelmscott, and at Bognor.

One morning I visited him at Cheyne Walk, when I saw that the restlessness of the past night had pursued him into daytime. Qualifying his request with an expression of great regard, he asked me not to stay. His medical attendants were consulting in another room: I joined them there, and told them that my house at Roehampton was open to Rossetti if they decided that he needed change.

On the same evening, in company with his brother and Mr. Madox Brown, he came to Roehampton, and I remember well his saying, as he sat in my quiet drawing-room, that he was enjoying what he had so long ceased to feel, and that was peace. He sat up late in conversation with his brother on various family matters, but his night was the most troubled one that he had hitherto passed through. The next day he was visited by his mother, and other members of his family, his medical attendant from town preceding them. Miss Rossetti, the gifted author of “The Shadow of Dante,” and her brother, took a walk with me in Richmond Park, while the mother remained with her son.

Mr. Madox Brown joined us later, and the party left the invalid in the evening.

But when the mind is restless, a sick man imagines there is relief to be found in change, and, after a few days, Rossetti returned to town, not to his own house, but to that of Madox Brown, where I saw him again, his restlessness unrelieved.

He had a good friend in Mr. Graham, the member for Glasgow. That gentleman rented two sporting seats in Perthshire, and he placed them at the disposal of Rossetti, who then went to Scotland. But he soon moved from one of these mansions to Stobbs Castle, the other, a place belonging to Lady Willouby de Eresby. While there he felt the want of my assistance, and urgently requested that I would leave without delay. I had a garden-party for the next day from London; this I left to my housekeeper and sons to conduct, and went by the next train.

W. B. Scott and Madox Brown, two faithful friends, were at the castle, ministering to their brother artist. My son George, who had finished his terms at Oxford, and had no present engagement, was there too, and I found all so far satisfactory that Rossetti was contented, enjoying the quiet which was not to be found in his own home.

Stobbs Hall is an ancient inheritance of the Drummonds, a solitude on the heights over-reaching the Tay, with a parapet wall and a Dutch garden, in which is a sundial erected on masonry, which might have been there before the invention of clocks. Below and to the right is a fine reach of the river; on the opposite side is a vast plain of cornfield, planted at intervals, and stretching on northwards to the forest and Grampian hills. On that side, the lords Mansfield enjoy the salmon fisheries; their lands extending eastward to Scone Palace. The two families take it by turns to fish both sides of the river.

Any one wishing to read an account of this scenery in poetic form, can turn to a sonnet called “Rest,” in “New Symbols.”

Scott and Brown soon left the castle, a place with not too much furnished accommodation. Over the mantelpiece, in the one sitting-room, hung a framed set of verses by Drummond, the Scotch poet.

It was not very long before Rossetti’s occupation of the place came to a close. He was fast improving in health; he took long walks, but without any enjoyment of the scenery which was made romantic by water-fall and splashed leaves, ever fresh, the elastic boughs bending under the weight of a torrent. So far recovered, he desired to remain in Perthshire, but still craved for the utmost solitude. In search of such a home I took the train to Perth, visited St. Andrews, returned to Perth, and proceeded to Crieff, where I remained for some days and scoured the environs. At last it occurred to me to call on the leading practitioner, Dr. Gairdner, and was directed by him to a farm-house two or three miles from the town, on the river side. The house had every requirement, and was kept by a lady-farmer, whose manner and person had every agreeable trait. On this, I telegraphed to Rossetti and my son to follow me at once to Crieff, and at the right time I met them at the station there, and we drove to the new home.

It was a pleasant spot, with a walk into Crieff by the river-side, down to a wilderness of waters. There was plenty of mountain scenery in view, with pine forest to the summits, and lake not remote; not to forget the sky-threading mists and the abundance of water from above. Descriptive of this aspect is my sonnet called “Unrest.” Rossetti rapidly improved in health, stumping his way over long areas of path and road, with his thick stick in hand, but holding no intercourse with Nature. It was not long before he summoned his assistant, with the implements of his art, and he was once more happy.

At this time he made a chalk drawing of me, and one of my son.

The first of these was reproduced in a volume of sonnets, called by me, “The New Day.”

The portrait of George was somewhat peculiar; the neck was outstretched, and the expression was heightened by the face being free of hair, which elicited from Latham one of his quaint remarks. He gazed at it for some time with his head like a connoisseur’s on one side; then said, “Yes, a South American slave-driver, who had returned to Portugal to be shaved.”

There are very few male portraits by Rossetti: the only three others are one of Mr. Stillman; one of a youth, in his large picture of Dante’s Dream; and one of Theodore Watts, which is a very good one, but more vivacious than the original, and there is more of the military air than was ever assumed by that peaceful citizen, which makes him look at least a lieutenant-colonel.

As a domestic trait, I would mention that Rossetti was very hearty at all times over his meals. He would wear out three knives and forks to my one; and to me, whose breakfast seldom exceeded one cup of coffee, his plate of bacon, surrounded by eggs that overlapped the rim, was amazing. I may further truly say that he, not being a believer in physiological things, did not regard tea as possessing the attributes of Totality.

While at this farm residence, he read with great eagerness and delight the newly published life of Edmund Kean.

By a careful treatment of him I procured him good nights, effecting this object chiefly by remaining at his bedside and draining my memory of every anecdote I had ever heard, and relating to him every amusing incident that I had encountered during life in my intercourse with the world.

Finding him so well recovered, I left him in the hands of his assistant and of my son, after an absence of many weeks.

Towards the end of the year—it was 1872—Rossetti, with my son, left Scotland and proceeded to Kelmscott Manorhouse, which he tenanted with his friend Mr. Morris. I visited him there, and found him in good health and spirits, after a journey spent, as I heard, with great joviality, the travellers taking a third-class carriage to themselves. He was already settled down to his art in a pleasant studio, loving to talk while he painted; at other times deep in the works of Dumas. In the afternoon he took vigorous walks in the meadows which one after another stretch out in front of the mansion.

The next day we went over the house and grounds. It is an old place, with its seven or rather twelve gables—such a sample of antiquity as you don’t meet with often. The windows are square casements with stone mullions, and the walls very thick. The garden has its yew-tree hedges, cut into fantastic shapes. The river is flooded like a lake, so that old Thames don’t know itself again. It is a most primitive village that surrounds the place—a few scattered free-stone habitations, some ivy-covered. There are no neighbours to interfere with the liberty of the subject.

George was a good boatman, and he often rowed me up the river, which half-way was spanned by an elegant arched bridge, and bounded further on by a weir. The scenery was very satisfying: on the left bank one overlooked a gay meadow, the cattle crowding to the bank to stare us out of sight; on the other side were lofty trees, while in midstream we had often to cut our way through islands of weed. The memory of this and of a later visit to the place was embodied in a poem, which I called “Reminiscence,” in which the scenery lives.

I found opportunities of talking with Rossetti about Mr. Theodore Watts, whose acquaintance I wished him to make more fully, for I had already introduced them to each other. While leading a country life Watts had not only acquired a knowledge of books, but had written poetry, and had thought out many literary problems for himself.

The Manorhouse was adequately furnished, but some exquisite chalk drawings, one especially, of female heads, gave it a charm. I thought that no one ever could paint a woman’s eyes like Rossetti. There was a softness, a delicacy, a life, a soul in them, never seen elsewhere but in living beings, and that how rarely!

Rossetti was unwilling to separate himself from George, and I consented to his retaining him as his secretary, for such a one was very necessary to him at that time.

I saw Mr. Morris at Kelmscott, and afterwards in society; he was inscrutable then, and has since been inscrutability in his career. W. B. Scott was also there, and when I left it was with him. Like his countrymen, he practised an exemplary carefulness in money matters, a habit which makes every Scotchman well off. In the train he counted his money with the dry remark, “One does not save anything by making a visit to a friend!”

A letter from my son George, dated December 19, 1875, written at Aldwich Lodge, Bognor, begins by a rejoicing to hear that I had accepted Rossetti’s invitation to spend Christmas with him at the seaside.

I sometimes look at the bottom of an antique silver snuff-box, a reservoir more than two hundred years old, the lid of elephant’s tooth, and I read—

“T. G. H., from D. G. R., 1875.”

A memorial to me of better things than an old-fashioned Christmas gathering.

And I use this snuff-reservoir every day; it affords me nasal recreation.

Snuff-taking did not go out with the pigtails, but it is on the wane; it has given way to smoking: and diminished is the number of gifts, such graceful objects for monarchs to present to men like myself—if they did but know me!—of platinum or golden boxes set in diamonds. And would you know the reason of my persistence in taking snuff? It not only wakes up that torpor so prevalent between the nose and the brain, making the wings of an idea uncurl like those of a new-born butterfly, but while others sneeze, and run at the eyes and nose, my schneiderian membrane is impervious to weather, or, to be explicit, I never take cold in my head.

Bath was my tarrying-place when Rossetti’s invitation came to me, and I went to Bognor. The great poet-painter occupied a commodious villa and grounds in a lane, west of the town, and near to the roughest bit of beach on the Sussex coast.

Rossetti had packed his house. Mrs. Rossetti, the mother; Miss Maria and Miss Christina, the sisters; Misses Polidori, who were the aunts; and Watts, who was the friend, were there, together with my sons, Edmund and Henry, for the festive week. The villa had good rooms; upstairs was a gallery with bedchambers on both sides, and ending in a large apartment which became a studio. There Rossetti worked, and liked to be read to while he improved his canvas, till the afternoon, when he took a violent walk over the boulders by the sea, towards Selsey Bay, among the ruined wooden groynes which had become seaweed gardens, hideous of aspect, as if invented and laid out by fish made man.

I walked with Rossetti daily over this penal shore, reflecting on absent pleasure, he unconscious of present pain. He talked but little while his feet crunched the boulders, and took no heed of the aspects of the scene, but seemed to be stamping health out of what was left unused for the six days’ creation.

Mrs. Rossetti was a sweet lady, and Christina, who still lives, a higher poet than her brother, is of the noblest brand. The family, one and all, are almost purely Italian. The father, a poet, was a Neapolitan; the mother was a Tuscan, with some Scotch blood. Rossetti may be regarded, not as English, but as one of those powerful leavens with which the genius of one country sometimes ferments that of another, to give it a new vitality.

Watts, who was now on terms of brotherly intimacy with him, bore him through any passing difficulties that needed only better guidance than his own.

That holiday was made cheerful, less perhaps by the host himself than by his guests. In truth, I saw regretfully that Rossetti was much unstrung; as so many do, even when in health, he got tired of his visitors, and ere long the party dispersed.

LVII.

Circumstances brought me into intimate association with Mr. Noble, a most excellent and useful sculptor. He was employed in producing a recumbent statue of Lord Ripon. This memorial figure was placed in Nocton church, the more welcome there since the structure, a design of Gilbert Scott, was due to Lady Ripon’s bounty. He also made a fine bust of the deceased earl, all of which work was done by order of his devoted countess, whose name and the date of whose death are inscribed on the tomb beneath his.

During the lifetime of the good Lady Ripon, I spent several weeks from year to year during the summer at Nocton Hall, by her wish, having some of my family with me, and, on one occasion, the boy Lord Goderich. During these visits I looked well over the estate and reported my observations, or any suggestions for changes, with Lord de Grey’s approval.

The climate of the eastern country, from my experience in East Anglia, and later in Lincolnshire, I pronounce the best in England during the warm season, when the air is well “cooked” by the sun. I once wrote to Lady Ripon from Nocton, that it was as if cod-liver oil was floating in the air. But I must say that in the early months of the year, when the east wind is “raw,” the climate is not fit for a pet dog.

This very summer of ’91, when rain has turned all our houses in the south and west into arks, and ourselves into Noahs, I have said to friends, some going to the Isle of Wight, others still farther into the wet lands towards the Atlantic, “Go eastward as far as you can away from the rain; go to Aldeburgh; go to Cromer; go to Lowestoft; go to Mablesthorpe, where wind and rain part company before reaching so far.” They abided by my advice; and while the millions on the west side were soaked through, those on the east had not a wet day once a week, and, departing in sickly condition, came back in health too good to last!

Ask the people on the west and on the east of Scotland what sort of weather they have had in any summer. When I was in Perthshire for six weeks, it rained pretty well every day; and as I left by the train I saw the September harvest between Crieff and Perth cut and afloat on the meadows.

A fearful loss of oats! I had a friend that very same season living on the coast of Fifeshire. It was a lady. She informed me that all was sunshine, scarce a drop of rain, during the period I speak of.

Why should Egypt be said to monopolize all the dry weather!

“Madeline and other Poems” appeared not long after Rossetti’s volume. I kept myself clear of all models and other modes of thought—a fact recognized by every writer that reviewed my book. Rossetti was the first to say this, which he did in the Academy, the generosity of which proceeding cannot be too strongly put forward when one recollects that his own poems were in the hands of the critics at the same time. He read the poem before publication, and from what he wrote to me I learned that the metre itself in “Madeline” had a great charm for him.

I became known to Theodore Watts about the time “Madeline” came out. He was then comparatively young, and had formed for himself, in the country, certain poetic tenets which twenty years of experience have since greatly enlarged. He did not then think that “Madeline” had the elements of success within it. In intellect, in isolated quotable passages, according to his view, it abounded; for the rest it came strange to him.

Twenty years of experience and change of feeling affects us all; we become _blasé_ for better or worse; authors in whom we revelled go stale; others, that we found it hard to bite at, seem to yield a light that was but a spark before. The change is in ourselves.

Not many months ago, after the publication of “The New Day,” Watts was with me, and said, “I have been reading ‘Madeline’ again; for sheer originality, both of conception and of treatment, I consider that it stands alone.”

I do not intend to submit this sentence to him for further consideration; it was once in his mouth, and thence it issued!

LVIII.

I may tell the origin of “Madeline” in a brief sentence. I had framed and delivered a lecture, scientifically treated, on “Sleep, Dreams, Sleep-walking, Sleep-talking and the Mesmeric State,” which last I explained by the facts of hypnotism. It was many years after this that I conceived the idea of conducting a character, in metre, through all these states of the human soul, and “Madeline” became that character.

Dr. Marston said, and I think truly, that the poem had too much machinery—a mistake which I have now corrected by erasure, in case an edition of the work should ever be required.

Watts is a man of many rich endowments; he has a fine poetic faculty, logical, yet warm; with an imagination not introspective only, but one that ranges over nature, and which might be called circumspective. His sonnets will bear the analysis to which I have submitted Shakespeare, Coleridge, and Wordsworth, in a previous page.

Watts is now one of our most esteemed critics.

I had a close acquaintance with Harrison Ainsworth among novelistic editors; he tried to obtain for me the separate publication of “Valdarno,” and, failing, wrote me his confident belief that it must be resuscitated one day.

Ainsworth was a manly and handsome-looking person. His romances gave great pleasure to the readers of his time, which showed how willing people are to live others’ lives without the penalties, though they would very firmly decline living their own over again, without the experience they had too late acquired.

I suppose, in reading every novel, one tastes of all the vices and virtues that have ever been indulged in. One likes to be great and generous vicariously; one even enjoys the sufferings of the wicked at second hand, and to commit even murder on the like terms.

We have all the character, in _substrata_, not only of the savage, but of the wild beast, of the vulture, of the shark, of the boa constrictor, of the clawed crab, of the animalcule itself. Some feel this, some are wholly unconscious of it until it is accidentally roused, some possess it only in a state of inanimate suppression.

A novel founded on vulture life would have a great run. It should dwell on the domestic virtues of the bird, and show how it held an appointment under Providence to follow in the wake of armies.

One of the finest novels I have read of late years is that of Mr. Eden, entitled “George Donnington,” a work replete with experiences, sympathetic in character, in purpose wise; less a fiction than a narrative of true Russian life, and written with as firm a hand as was ever trained for literary success.

Though I could wish to have done with the “strange eventful history” of a life, thus lived over again, I must not rush on too fast, but must revert to “Parables and Tales.”

The publisher of “Madeline” asked me to add four more poems to “Old Souls,” and the three others of the same metre, for an illustrated work; accordingly, I gave him “Mother and Child,” “The Blind Boy,” “The Cripple,” and “Old Morality.”

One morning at Cheyne Walk I read “The Cripple” to Rossetti and Hüffer, and saw them both in tears.

I had written “The Blind Boy” before the new volume was contemplated, and I sent it to Rossetti. In answer he wrote to me, saying that he was on the point of going out when it reached him, but that he stayed in to read it, and was so impressed on doing so, that he at once sat down and wrote to Mr. John Morley, advising its insertion in the _Fortnightly Review_. But Morley had recently printed in that vehicle a long poem of W. B. Scott’s, and had thereupon resolved never to admit again another verse of any author whatsoever.

When “Parables and Tales” appeared Rossetti selected the _Fortnightly_ for his review of the new volume. He never wrote any reviews except of my poems. All the notices I ever received of my writings were by strangers, except those kindly given of them by Rossetti and his brother: that is all I owe to friendship.

At this time I was personally free from professional engagements. Lady Ripon was no more, greatly to my sorrow, so I went for a few weeks to Bath.

It was a great pleasure to me when staying in that beautiful and healthful city to visit the grave of Beckford, the wonderful author of “Vatec.”

The cemetery and tomb of Beckford would have been a scene for Volney, though it is not a ruin, unless it be regarded as one of human vanity. “Vatec” is monument enough without a sarcophagus of polished porphyry, and a tower lined with the same costly stone.

A medical friend of Mr. Beckford’s told me some curious details respecting that gentleman’s will. He had sunk his remaining property in an annuity, with the exception of a unique collection of pictures and statues valued at £100,000, destined for Hamilton Palace, his daughter’s home. The result is one of many instances which show how little influence the dead exercise over the living.