Chapter 13

Miss Seward, after stating that professional generosity distinguished Dr. Darwin's medical practice at Lichfield, farther says, that "diligently also did he attend to the health of the poor in that city, and afterwards at Derby, and supplied their necessities by food, and all sorts of charitable assistance. In each of those towns, _his_ was the cheerful board of almost open-housed hospitality, without extravagance or pride; deeming ever the first unjust, the latter unmanly. Generosity, wit and science, were his household gods."[93] She again states that when he removed from Lichfield to Derby, "his renown, as a physician, still increased as time rolled on, and his mortal life declined from its noon. Patients resorted to him more and more, from every part of the kingdom, and often from the continent. All ranks, all orders of society, all religions, leaned upon his power to ameliorate disease, and to prolong existence. The rigid and sternly pious, who had attempted to renounce his aid, from a superstition that no blessing would attend the prescriptions of a sceptic, sacrificed, after a time, their superstitious scruples to their involuntary consciousness of his mighty skill." Mr. Mathias, though he severely criticizes some of Dr. Darwin's works, yet he justly calls him "this very ingenious man, and most excellent physician, for such he undoubtedly was."

From scattered passages in Miss Seward's Life of him, one can easily trace the delight he took (notwithstanding his immense professional engagements,) in the scenery of nature and gardens;--witness his frequent admiration of the tangled glen and luxuriant landscape at _Belmont_, its sombre and pathless woods, impressing us with a sense of solemn seclusion, like the solitudes of _Tinian_, or _Juan Fernandes_, with its "silent and unsullied stream," which the admirable lines he addresses to the youthful owner of that spot so purely and temperately allude to:--

O, friend to peace and virtue, ever flows For thee my silent and unsullied stream, Pure and untainted as thy blameless life! Let no gay converse lead thy steps astray, To mix my chaste wave with immodest wine, Nor with the poisonous cup, which Chemia's hand Deals (fell enchantress!) to the sons of folly! So shall young Health thy daily walks attend, Weave for thy hoary brow the vernal flower Of cheerfulness, and with his nervous arm Arrest th' inexorable scythe of Time.

So early, and indeed throughout his whole life, did Dr. Darwin enforce the happy consequences of temperance and sobriety; from his conviction of the pernicious effects of all kinds of intemperance on the youthful constitution. He had an absolute horror of spirits of all sorts, however diluted. Pure water was, throughout the greater part of his temperate life, his favourite beverage. He has been severely censured (no doubt very justly so), for some of his religious prejudices. Old Walter Mapes, the jovial canon of Salisbury, precentor of Lincoln, and arch-deacon of Oxford, in the eleventh century, considered _water_ as fit only for _heretics_.

One may again trace his fondness for the rich scenery of nature, when he in 1777 purchased a wild umbrageous valley near Lichfield, with its mossy fountain of the purest water. This spot he fondly cultivated. The botanic skill displayed by him on this spot, did not escape the searching eye of Mr. Loudon, for in p. 807 of his Encyclop. of Gardening, he pays a deserved compliment to him.[94] Miss Seward wrote some lines on this favoured valley, and these are part of them:

O! may no ruder step these bowers profane, No midnight wassailers deface the plain; And when the tempests of the wintry day Blow golden autumn's varied leaves away, Winds of the north, restrain your icy gales, Nor chill the bosom of these hallow'd vales.

His attachment to gardens, induced him to honour the memory of Mr. Mason, by lines once intended for his monument; and he was suggesting improvements at the priory at Derby (and which he had just described the last morning of his life in a sprightly letter to a friend), when the fatal signal was given, and a few hours after, on the 18th of April, 1802, and in his sixty-ninth year, he sunk into his chair and expired. "Thus in one hour (says his affectionate biographer) was extinguished that vital light, which the preceding hour had shone in flattering brightness, promising duration; (such is often _the cunning flattery of nature_), that light, which through half a century, had diffused its radiance and its warmth so widely; that light in which penury had been cheered, in which science had expanded; to whose orb poetry had brought all her images; before whose influence disease had continually retreated, and death so often "turned aside his levelled dart!"[95] That Dr. Darwin, as to his religious principles or prejudices, displayed great errors of judgment in his _Zoonomia_, there can be no doubt. An eminent champion of Christianity, truly observed, that Dr. Darwin "was acquainted with more links in the chain of _second_ causes, than had probably been known to any individual, who went before him; but that he dwelt so much, and so _exclusively_ on second causes, that he too generally seems to have forgotten that there is a first." For these errors he must long since have been called to his account, before one who can appreciate those errors better than we can. Though the _Accusing Spirit_ must have blushed when he gave them in, yet, let us hope, that the _Recording Angel_, out of mercy to his humane heart, and his many good and valuable qualities, may have blotted them out for ever.

REV. WILLIAM GILPIN, who, as Mr. Dallaway, in his Observations on the Arts, observes, "possesses unquestionably the happy faculty to paint with words;" and who farther highly compliments him in his supplementary chapter on Modern Gardening, annexed to his enriched edition of Mr. Walpole's Anecdotes. The Topographer says he "describes with the language of a master, the artless scenes of uncultivated nature." Mr. Walpole in his postscript to his Catalogue of Engravers, after premising, that it might, perhaps, be worth while "to melt down this volume and new cast it," pays this tribute to him: "Were I of authority sufficient to name my successor, or could prevail on him to condescend to accept an office which he could execute with more taste and ability; from whose hands could the public receive so much information and pleasure as from the author of the _Essay on Prints_, and from the _Tours_, &c.? And when was the public ever instructed by the pen and pencil at once, with equal excellence in the style of both, but by Mr. Gilpin?"

Had Mr. Gilpin written nothing more than his "Lectures on the Catechism," that alone would have conferred on him the name of a meritorious writer. His allusion to Plato, his reflections on the Last Judgment, his animated address to youth, and his conclusion of his sixteenth lecture, must strike deep into the heart of every reader. His "Sermons preached to a Country Congregation," prove him a pious, charitable, and valuable man.[96]

The glowing imagery of his style, when viewing the beautiful scenery in many parts of England, and some of the vast and magnificent ones of Scotland, is fraught with many fervid charms. Still we are forced to join Mr. Mathias, in the remonstrance he so justly makes as to the jargonic conceit of some of his language. Mr. Gilpin's first work on picturesque beauty, was his Observations on the River Wye, made in the year 1770. He afterwards published:

Forest Scenery--Picturesque Beauties of the Highlands--Mountains of Cumberland and Westmoreland--Western parts of England--Cambridge, Norfolk, Suffolk and Essex--Hampshire, Sussex and Kent. Three Essays, on Picturesque Beauty, on Picturesque Travel, and on Sketching Landscape, to which is added, a poem on Landscape Painting. A full account of his numerous works may be seen in Watts's Bibl. Brit. A complete list of them is also given by Mr. Nichols, in vol. i. of his Illustrations, with a brief memoir. Mr. Johnson also gives a list of such of his works as relate to picturesque scenery, with their titles at large. His portrait was painted by Walton, and engraved in metz by Clint.

JAMES ANDERSON published the following works; and I have given the price of such of them as appeared in the late Mr. Harding's Agricultural Catalogue:--

1. The Bee, or Literary Intelligencer, 18 vols. 8vo. _Edinb._ 1791.

2. Recreations in Agriculture, Natural History, Arts and Miscellaneous Literature, 6 vols. 8vo. _Lond._ 3_l._ 10s.

3. Essays relating to Agriculture and Rural Affairs, 3 vols. 8vo. 1_l._ 7s.

4. Practical Treatise on draining Bogs, 8vo. 6s.

5. Practical Treatise on Peat Moss, 8vo. 5s.

6. On Lime as a Cement and Manure, 8vo. 2s. 6d.

7. An Account of the different kinds of Sheep found in the Russian Dominions, and amongst the Tartar Hordes, 8vo. 6s.

8. Investigation of the Causes of Scarcity of 1800. 8vo. 2s. 6d.

9. Miscellaneous Thoughts on Planting Timber Trees, chiefly for the climate of Scotland, by Agricola, 8vo. _Edinb._ 1777.

10. Description of a Patent Hot-house, 1804. 12mo. 5s.

In "Public Characters of 1800 and 1801," a portrait is given of him, a list of his works, and it thus speaks of him: "The manners of this ingenious and very useful man were plain and frank, an indication of an honest and good heart. He was benevolent and generous, a tender parent, and a warm friend, and very highly respected in the circle of his acquaintance." There is a portrait of him, painted by Anderson, and engraved by Ridley. A copy is given in the Mirror, (published by Vernon and Hood), of Nov. 1799. Another is given in the Gentleman's Magazine. He died at West Ham, Essex, in 1808, aged 69. Mr. Lysons, in the Supplement to his Environs of London, gives a few particulars of him.

HORACE WALPOLE. He was the youngest son of Sir Robert Walpole, who so long guided the destinies of England, and whose attractive and benevolent private life, seems to have fully merited the praise of Pope's elegant muse:

_Seen him I have; but in his happier hour Of social pleasure,--ill exchang'd for power-- Seen him uncumber'd with the venal tribe, Smile without art, and win without a bribe._

The best portraits of this intelligent and acute writer, Horace Walpole, are the portrait in Mr. Dallaway's richly decorated edition of the Anecdotes of Painting, from Sir Joshua Reynolds, and that in Mr. Cadell's Contemporary Portraits, from Lawrence. Dance also drew him. Another portrait is prefixed to the ninth volume of his works, in 4to. 1825, from a picture in the possession of the Marquis of Hertford. There is another portrait, engraved by Pariset, from Falconot. Mr. Walpole died in March, 1797, at his favourite seat at Strawberry-hill, at the age of eighty. His manners were highly polished, from his having, during the course of a long life, frequented the first societies. His conversation abounded with interesting anecdote and playful wit. Felicity of narration, and liveliness of expression, mark his graceful pen. The Prince de Ligne (a perfect judge) thus speaks of his _History of the Modern Taste in Gardening_:--"Je n'en admire pas moins l'eloquence, et la profondeur, de son ouvrage sur les jardins." Mr. Walpole himself says:--"We have given the true model of gardening to the world: let other countries mimic or corrupt our taste; but let it reign here on its verdant throne, original by its elegant simplicity, and proud of no other art than that of softening nature's harshnesses, and copying her graceful touch."

Sir U. Price, in vol. i. p. 18 of his Essays, pays high respect to Mr. Walpole, and differs from him "with great deference and reluctance." He observes:--"I can hardly think it necessary to make any excuse for calling Lord Orford, Mr. Walpole; it is the name by which he is best known in the literary world, and to which his writings have given a celebrity much beyond what any hereditary honour can bestow." Mr. Johnson observes:--"To his sketch of the improvements introduced by Bridgman and Kent, and those garden artists, their immediate successors, we may afford the best praise; he appears to be a faithful, and is, an eloquent annalist." It is impossible to pass by this tribute, without reminding my reader, that Mr. Johnson's own review of our ornamental gardening, is energetic and luminous; as is indeed the whole of his comprehensive general review of gardening, from the earliest period, down to the close of the last century.

THE HON. DAINES BARRINGTON. He devoted himself to literary pursuits; was a profound antiquary, and a truly worthy man. He died in 1800, aged 73, at his chambers in the Temple, and was buried in the Temple church. The attractive improvements in the gardens there, may be said to have originated with him. He possibly looked on them as classic ground; for in these gardens, the proud Somerset vowed to dye their white rose to a bloody red, and Warwick prophesied that their brawl

----in the Temple garden, Shall send, between the red rose and the white, A thousand souls to death and deadly night.

He published,

1. Observations on the more Ancient Statutes, 4to. To the 5th edition of which, in 1796, is prefixed his portrait.

2. The Naturalist's Calendar, 8vo.

3. A translation of Orosius, ascribed to Alfred, with notes, 8vo.

4. Tracts on the probability of reaching the North Pole, 4to.

5. In vol. vii. of the Archæologia, is his paper On the Progress of Gardening. It was printed as a separate tract by Mr. Nichols, price 1s. 6d.

6. Miscellanies on various subjects, 4to.

Mr. Nichols, in his Life of Bowyer, calls him "a man of amiable character, polite, communicative and liberal;" and in the fifth volume of his Illustrations of the Literary History of the Eighteenth Century, he gives a neatly engraved portrait of Mr. Barrington, and some memorials or letters of his. Mr. Boswell ("the cheerful, the pleasant, the inimitable biographer of his illustrious friend"), thus relates Dr. Johnson's wish to become acquainted with Mr. Barrington:--"Soon after he had published his excellent Observations on the Statutes, Johnson waited on that worthy and learned gentleman, and having told him his name, courteously said, 'I have read your book, Sir, with great pleasure, and wish to be better known to you.' Thus began an acquaintance which was continued with mutual regard as long as Johnson lived." John Harris, Esq. the learned author of Philological Enquiries, thus speaks of Mr. Barrington's Observations on the Statutes:--"a valuable work, concerning which it is difficult to decide, whether it is more entertaining or more instructive."

JOSEPH CRADOCK, Esq. whose "Village Memoirs" display his fine taste in landscape gardening. This feeling and generous-minded man, whose gentle manners, polite learning, and excellent talents, entitled him to an acquaintance with the first characters of the age, died in 1826, at the great age of eighty-five. This classical scholar and polished gentleman, who had (as a correspondent observes in the Gentleman's Magazine for January, 1827) "the habit of enlivening and embellishing every thing which he said with a certain lightning of eye and honied tone of voice," shone in the first literary circles, and ranked as his intimate and valued friends (among many other enlightened persons), David Garrick, and Warburton, Hurd, Johnson, Goldsmith, Percy, and Parr. Dr. Johnson called him "a very pleasing gentleman." Indeed, he appears from every account to have been in all respects an amiable and accomplished person. He had the honour of being selected to dance a minuet with the most graceful of all dancers, Mrs. Garrick, at the Stratford Jubilee. It was to Mr. Cradock, that Dr. Farmer addressed his unanswerable Essay on the Learning of Shakspeare. In acts of humanity and kindness, he was surpassed by few. Pope's line of _the gay conscience of a life well spent_, might well have been applied to Mr. Cradock. When in Leicestershire, "he was respected by people of all parties for his worth, and idolized by the poor for his benevolence." This honest and honourable man, depicted his own mind in the concluding part of his inscription, for the banks of the lake he formed in his romantic and picturesque grounds, in that county:--

_Here on the bank Pomona's blossoms glow, And finny myriads sparkle from below; Here let the mind at peaceful anchor rest, And heaven's own sunshine cheer the guiltless breast._[97]

In 1773 he partly took his "Zobeide" from an unfinished tragedy by Voltaire. On sending a copy to Ferney, the enlightened veteran thus concluded his answer: "You have done too much honour to an old sick man of eighty. I am, with the most sincere esteem and gratitude,

"Sir, your obedient servant, "VOLTAIRE."[98]

I cannot refrain from adding a short extract from the above quoted magazine, as it brings to one's memory another much esteemed and worthy man:--"Here, perhaps, it may be allowable to allude to the sincere attachment between Mr. Cradock, and his old friend Mr. Nichols. For very many years Mr. Nichols had been accustomed to pay Mr. Cradock an annual visit at Gumley Hall; but on Mr. Cradock settling in London, the intercourse became incessant, and we doubt not that the daily correspondence which took place between them, contributed to cheer the latter days of these two veterans in literature. They had both of them in early life enjoyed the flattering distinction of an intimacy with the same eminent characters; and to hear the different anecdotes elicited in their animated conversations respecting Johnson and others, was indeed an intellectual treat of no ordinary description. Mr. Cradock and Mr. Nichols possessed a similarity in taste and judgment. They were both endowed with peculiar quickness of comprehension, and with powers and accuracy of memory rarely equalled." One may say of the liberal minded Mr. Nichols, what Mr. Murphy said of Dr. Johnson, that his love of literature was a passion that stuck to his last stand. The works of Mr. Cradock have, since his decease, been published by Mr. J. B. Nichols, in 4 vols. 8vo. They contain his Essay on Gardening and Village Memoirs. They are enriched by a miniature portrait of him, by Hone, in 1764, when Mr. Cradock was in his prime of life, in his twenty-second year, and when his piercing eyes and intelligent countenance, were thought to have resembled those of Mr. Garrick. There is also a profile shade of Mr. Cradock, taken of him only a month before his decease. In the above quoted magazine, is a copy of this profile, with a memoir.

SIR JOSEPH BANKS. There is a fine portrait of him by Russel, engraved by Collyer. In Mr. Cadell's Contemporary Portraits is another fine one, from the pencil of Lawrence. His portrait is preserved by the Horticultural Society of London, and in the British Museum is his bust, chiselled and presented by the Hon. Mrs. Damer. A good copy of the engraving by Collyer is in the European Magazine for Feb. 1795, and from the memoir there given I select the following:

"If to support the dignity of the first literary society in the world, and by firmness and candour to conciliate the regard of its members; if rejecting the allurements of dissipation, to explore sciences unknown, and to cultivate the most manly qualities of the human heart; if to dispense a princely fortune in the enlargement of science, the encouragement of genius, and the alleviation of distress, be circumstances which entitle any one to a more than ordinary share of respect, few will dispute the claim of the person whose portrait ornaments the present magazine.... In short, he is entitled to every praise that science, liberality, and intelligence can bestow on their most distinguished favourites."

Dr. Pulteney, in his handsome dedication of his Sketches on the progress of Botany, to Sir Joseph, thus alludes to his voyage with Cook:--"To whom could a work of this nature with so much propriety be addressed, as to him who had not only relinquished, for a series of years, all the allurements that a polished nation could display to opulence; but had exposed himself to numberless perils, and the repeated risk of life itself, that he might attain higher degrees of that knowledge, which these sketches are intended to communicate."

The Academy of Sciences at Dijon, in their "Notice sur Sir Jos. Banks," thus apostrophizes his memory:--"Ombre de Banks! apparois en ce lieu consacré au culte des sciences et des lettres; viens occuper la place que t'y conservent les muses, accepter les couronnes qu'elles-mêmes t'ont tressées! viens recevoir le tribut de nos sentimens, témoignage sincère de notre douleur et de not regrets; et par le souvenir de tes vertus, viens enflammer nos coeurs de cet amour pour le bien, qui fut le mobile de toutes tes actions!"[99]

Mr. Johnson, in his History of English Gardening, justly calls him "This universal patron of the arts and sciences. Natural history was the favourite of his scientific studies, and every part of it was enriched by his researches." He again hails him as "a munificent friend of science and literature." The name of Banks will always be associated with that of Solander, the favourite pupil of Linnæus, and with that of the immortal Cook. De Lille closes his _Jardins_ with a most generous and animated invocation to the memory of this intrepid navigator.

WILLIAM FALCONER. The portrait of this eminent physician of Bath, is engraved by Fitler, from a painting by Daniel, of Bath, in 1791. It is prefixed to his "Influence of the Passions upon Disorders." He died in August, 1824, at the age of eighty-one. He published,

1. Essay on the Preservation of the Health of Persons employed in Agriculture, 1s. Bath, 1789.

2. Miscellaneous Tracts relating to Natural History; selected from the principal writers of antiquity. 1793. 4to.

3. Remarks on the Influence of Climate, Situation, Nature of Country, &c. The Encyclop. of Gardening calls this "a most interesting work." A writer in the New Monthly Mag. says "it displays an almost unlimited extent of learning and research."

4. An Historical View of the Taste for Gardening and Laying out Grounds among the Nations of Antiquity. 8vo. 1s. 6d. 1783. _Dilly._

A list of his other works (nearly twenty in number), may be seen in the Dictionary of Living Authors, or in vol. xii. of the New Monthly Mag.; which last work says that the late Lord Thurlow, at whose table he was almost a constant guest, declared that "he never saw such a man; that he knew every thing, and knew it better than any one else." Neither this last publication, nor Dr. Watts in his Bibl. Brit. mention Dr. Falconer's Historical View of the Taste for Gardening.

WILLIAM CURTIS. This honest, much-esteemed, and inoffensive man, though so deservedly eminent as a botanist, published only the following work on horticulture:--"Directions for Cultivating the Crambe Maritima, or Sea-kale for the Use of the Table." A new edition, enlarged, with three engravings. 2s. 6d. Mr. Loudon says, that this pamphlet has done more to recommend the culture of _sea-kale_ and diffuse the knowledge of it, than all his predecessors. Nearly three pages of the Encyclopædia are enriched with the result of all that has appeared on the cultivation of this vegetable by English, Scotch, or French writers.