Chapter 10

The article in the 'Quarterly Review' had the immediate effect of making John Clare the lion of the day. Rossini set one of his songs to music; Madame Vestris recited others before crowded audiences at Covent Garden, and the chief talk of London for the season was about the verses of the 'Northamptonshire peasant.' His fame descended to Northamptonshire itself, and far into the misty realm of the fen-bound regions. The Right Honourable Charles William, Viscount Milton, was somewhat startled on the waves of this fame reaching Milton Park. The idea that for one five-pound note he might have secured part of this high renown to himself, figuring in the 'Quarterly Review' as a noble patron of literature, and protector of heaven-horn genius slumbering in obscurity, made him feel intensely vexed with himself. Reflecting upon the subject, it struck his lordship that it would be best to take Clare still under his protection, in view of new editions open to dedication. Full of this idea, a messenger was despatched at once to Helpston, with a gracious order that the poet should present himself on the following morning before the noble Viscount. John Clare, remembering but too keenly the past, was unwilling to obey his lordship's command; but the tears of his father and mother made him change his resolution. Consequently, on the morning appointed, a Sunday, he went to Milton Park, and having had the honour of lunching with the footmen in the kitchen, was ushered into the presence of his lordship. Viscount Milton was exceedingly affable, took Clare by the hand, sat him down on a stool, and at once explained to him why his letter respecting the dedication of the poems had not been answered. His lordship had been excessively busy at the time, making preparations for a journey, and in the hurry of these labours had unfortunately forgotten to send a reply. Now her ladyship entered the room, in turn addressing the poet. After questioning him on all points, birth, parentage, weekly income, religion, moral feelings, and state of health, Clare was finally asked whether he had found already a patron. His vacant look expressed that he did not know even the meaning of the word patron. To the plainer question, whether some nobleman or gentleman of the neighbourhood had promised him anything, Clare truthfully replied in the negative. There was nobody who had made offers of assistance, except Mr. Edward Drury, bookseller, of Stamford; and his promises, John was sorry to say, were rather vague. Thereupon the noble viscount warned Clare to be on his guard against all publishers and booksellers; not explaining, however, how to protect himself, or how to do without them. Meanwhile the Earl Fitzwilliam had entered the room, and added his voice to that of his son in a warning against booksellers. After a little more conversation, Lord Milton put his hand in his pocket, and withdrawing a quantity of gold, threw it into Clare's lap. John was humbled and confused beyond measure. His first impulse was to return the money instantaneously; but a moment's thought convinced him that this would be excessively rude, and he contented himself, therefore, with a feeble protest against his lordship's kindness. He now left, making an awkward bow, his pockets heavy under the weight of gold, and his brain heavier under a feeling of deep humiliation, akin to shame. However, this feeling was dispelled in the fresh outer air. He thought of his poor father and mother at home, and the comfort all his gold would bring them; and getting almost joyful at the thought, sat down at the roadside to count his golden sovereigns. There were seventeen pieces, all bright and new, fresh from the Mint. Clare had not had so much money in his possession in all his life, and he got frightened almost in looking at the glittering treasure before him. To secure it well, he took off his neck-tie, wrapped the sovereigns in it, and ran home as fast as his legs would carry him. There were happy faces that night in the little cottage at Helpston.

John Clare's invitation to Milton Park created much astonishment in the village; but the wonder increased when, a few days after, another liveried messenger inquired his way to Clare's dwelling. The new envoy was of far more gorgeous aspect than the former one, being the representative of the greatest lord in the county, the most noble the Marquis of Exeter. His lordship had seen the 'Quarterly Review,' as well as Viscount Milton; and his lordship had learnt, moreover, that Clare had been called to Milton Park, for purposes easily imagined. The chief of the elder line of the Cecils thereupon determined not to be outdone by his petty Whig rivals, the Fitzwilliams, with which object in view he summoned the poet in his turn. The gorgeous scarlet messenger who arrived at Helpston, to the wonderment of the whole village, brought a letter from the Hon. Mr. Pierrepont, brother-in-law of the marquis, desiring Clare to make his appearance on the following morning, precisely at eleven o'clock, at Burghley Hall. To this summons there was no opposition on the part of Clare, for to resist the will of the Marquis of Exeter, within twenty miles of Stamford, was deemed nothing less than treason by any inhabitant of the district. John was ready to go to Burghley Hall the next morning; but it rained heavily, and the cobbler had not returned the shoes entrusted to him for mending. Could John present himself without shoes on a rainy morning, before the most noble the Marquis of Exeter? That was the question gravely debated between Parker Clare, his wife, and his son. It was decided that John could not go without shoes; and the village cobbler refusing to return his trust, because engaged in threshing, the important visit to Burghley Hall had to be postponed till the day after. John went quite early, trembling inwardly to show himself before the great lord, whose very valet was looked upon in the country as a man of high estate. His fears increased a thousandfold when arrived at the gate of the palatial residence, and being told, on giving his name to the porter, that he ought to have come the day before. On Clare making his excuse on account of the state of the weather, the high functionary got very angry. 'The weather?' he exclaimed, excitedly; 'you mean to say that you have not obeyed his lordship's commands simply because it was a wet day! I tell you, you ought to have come if it rained knives and forks.' This frightened Clare beyond measure; he turned round upon his heels and was about running away, when he was stopped by a footman. The arrival of Clare had just been announced to the marquis, and there was an order to admit him instantaneously to the presence of his lordship. So the tall footman, without further ceremony, took Clare by the arm, and hurried him up a marble staircase, through innumerable passages, and a maze of halls and corridors which quite bewildered the poor poet. The sound of his heavy hob-nailed shoes on the polished floor made him tremble, no less than the sight of his mud-bespattered garments among all the splendid upholstery, through which the gorgeous lackey was guiding his steps. At last, after a transit through painted halls which seemed endless, Clare stood before the noble marquis. His lordship received the humble visitor in a quiet, unaffected manner; and the mind of the poet was relieved of an immense burthen when he found the great lord to be a decidedly amiable and cheerful young man of his own age, with manners pleasantly contrasting with those of the aristocratic porter at the gate, and the splendid footman who had shown him the way. The marquis, with great tact, questioned Clare as to his antecedents; asked to see some of his manuscript verses--which the Hon. Mr. Pierrepont, in his summons, had ordered him to bring--and, having inspected these, informed the astonished poet that he would grant him an annuity of fifteen guineas for life. John Clare scarcely believed his own ears; the announcement of this liberality came so unexpected, and appeared to him so extraordinary, that he did not know what to say, or how to express his thanks. Quitting his lordship in utter confusion, he felt almost giddy on finding himself in the hall outside. There were immense passages stretching away to right and left, leading into unknown realms of magnificence, into which the poor poet was trembling to venture. The marquis, who, with great politeness, had accompanied his visitor to the door, on seeing his embarrassment undertook the part of guide, leading Clare to the outskirts of the palatial labyrinth, and here handing him over to a valet, with instructions to let his guest partake of the common dinner in the servants' hall. It was the third dinner in the hall of noble patrons to which Clare was ushered--clearly showing that, however much differing on other subjects, the admirers of high literature in Northamptonshire held that the true place of a rural poet was among the footmen and kitchen-maids.

NEW SIGHTS AND NEW FRIENDS.

The great liberality of the Marquis of Exeter enabled Clare to carry out, without further delay, the wish of his heart, and to make 'Patty' his wife. Her parents, under the circumstances, had given up all their old opposition, and were not only willing, but most anxious, that Clare should cement his unhappy connexion with their daughter by the sacred ties of marriage. The due preparations were made accordingly, and on the 16th of March, 1820, John Clare and Martha Turner became man and wife. The event stands registered as follows in the records of Great Casterton Church:--

'John Clare of the Parish of Helpston Bachelor and Martha Turner of this Parish Spinster were married in this Church by banns this 16th day of March in the year one thousand eight hundred and twenty by me Richard Lucas.'

And underneath:--

'This marriage was solemnized between us,

JOHN CLARE

her

MARTHA+TURNER

mark.'

Little more than a month after the wedding, a child was born to Clare; a little girl, baptized Anna Maria. Mrs. Clare for a while remained at her father's house; but as soon as she was able to move, went to live with her husband, at the humble dwelling of his parents at Helpston, which, though scarcely large enough to contain the aged couple, had now to accommodate two families. Yet Clare felt happy in this narrow cottage, for, humble as it was, it presented to him a thousand cherished associations, and now became dearer than ever to his heart, as sheltering not only his beloved parents, but his dear wife and child. All his life long the Helpston cottage was to Clare his 'home of homes.'

Before removing with his young wife to his native village, the poet had to go through some exciting adventures in a journey to London. When one day at the house of Mr. Gilchrist, at Stamford, there arrived a letter from Mr. John Taylor, speaking in high terms of the success of the 'Poems of Rural Life,' which brought about the question, addressed to Clare: 'Should you like to go with me on a short visit to London?' John Clare was delighted at the idea, and eagerly expressed his wish to go; whereupon it was arranged that he and Mr. Gilchrist should set out on the journey at the end of a week. Patty cried when the news was brought to her; and old Parker Clare and his wife cried still more. In a few hours, the report spread like wildfire through Helpston that John Clare was going to London. There was but one man in the village who had ever been to the big town far away, and his account of it had filled the hearts of all the Helpston people with terror. This man, an old farm-labourer called James Burridge, as soon as he heard of Clare's intention to undertake the dreaded journey, hurried up to entreat him to abandon the plan. To enforce his advice, he gave a vivid description of the horrors awaiting the unwary traveller in the great metropolis, and the fearful dangers that beset his path on every side. One half the houses of London, he said, were inhabited by swindlers, thieves, and murderers, and a good part of the other half by their helpers and confederates, all on the look-out for the good people from the country. To catch their victims with the greater certainty, there were trap-doors in the pavement of the most frequented streets, which, when touched, let the wayfarer down into a deep cellar, and into a kettle of boiling water, surrounded by cut-throats who made all escape from the kettle impossible. The assassins, having killed the unhappy victim, and taken all his property, to the very shirt on his back, finally--culmination of horrors!--sold the body to the doctors. Such was the account which James Burridge gave of London, with the effect of striking terror into the hearts of his hearers. Parker Clare and his wife, with bitter tears, entreated their son not to leave them; and John himself, though slightly incredulous about some of the items in the tales of his friend Burridge, began to be seriously alarmed. But he was ashamed to confess his fears to Mr. Gilchrist; the more so, as a mere casual mentioning of the street-traps and the kettles of boiling water produced immoderate laughter. He therefore made his mind up to start on his dangerous journey like a hero. After bidding solemn farewell to wife and parents, and dressing, by the advice of James Burridge, in his worst clothes, to be the less a mark for thieves and cut-throats, John Clare very early one morning in April, 1820, started for Stamford, and having met Mr. Gilchrist took his seat precisely at seven o'clock in the 'Regent,' a famous four-horse coach, warranted to take passengers in thirteen hours to London. There was little talk on the road; John Clare had enough to do to look out of the window, marvelling at all the new sights open to his eyes. Thus the travellers passed through Stilton, Huntingdon, St. Neot's, Temsford, and Biggleswade, until at last, soon after dusk, the fiery glow of the horizon announced the neighbourhood of the big city. On being told that they were about to enter London, Clare became much excited; but there was time for the excitement to cool, for more than two hours elapsed before the heavy coach rumbled from the soft high road up to the hard-paved streets. At last, at nine o'clock in the evening, the 'Regent' stopped in front of the 'George and Blue Boar,' in Holborn, and John Clare alighted, utterly bewildered with all that he had seen during the day in the greatest journey he had ever made in his life.

Mr. Gilchrist took his friend to the house of his brother-in-law, a German named Burkhardt, proprietor of a jeweller's and watchmaker's shop in the Strand. Herr Burkhardt, a well-to-do tradesman, with a rubicund face and an inexhaustible stock of good humour, was excessively fond of showing strangers the sights of London; and his guests had no sooner arrived, than he wanted to take them to Covent Garden theatre. John Clare was very anxious to go, on hearing that Madam Vestris was reciting one of his poems at this place of entertainment; but finding that Octavius Gilchrist was disinclined to rise from his comfortable armchair, and with secret apprehension of the trap-doors and vessels of boiling water, he declared himself likewise in favour of the arm-chair, with hot whiskey and water. Worthy Herr Burkhardt had his full share of satisfaction the next day, when he had the pleasure of taking his brother-in-law and friend to Westminster Abbey, the Tower, Smithfield market, Newgate, and Vauxhall Gardens. John Clare was not so much astonished as disappointed with all that his eyes beheld in the great metropolis. Standing upon Westminster Bridge, he compared the River Thames with Whittlesea Mere, and found it wanting; the sight of the Tower, of Newgate, and of Smithfield, engendered not the least admiration; and as for the Poet's Corner in the Abbey, he loudly declared that he could see no poetry whatever about it. But what hurt the feelings of Herr Burkhardt most of all, was the utter contempt Clare showed for the delights of Vauxhall. The tinsel and the oil-lamps, the wooden bowers and paper flowers, struck Clare as perfectly absurd, and he expressed his astonishment that people should go and stare at such childish things, with a world of wonder and of beauty lying all around it in the green fields. The worthy jeweller of the Strand was amazed, and privately confided to his brother-in-law that he thought his companion, 'a very stupid man from the country.'

John Clare stayed a week in London, and during the whole of this time felt painfully uncomfortable in his threadbare suit of labourer's clothes, patched top and bottom, with leather baffles and gaiters to match. He fancied, when walking along the streets, that everybody was staring and laughing at his smock frock; and the sound of his heavy hob-nailed shoes startled him whenever he entered a house. What made things worse was, that Mr. Gilchrist wanted to draw him into many fine places and among high and wealthy people, for whose company Clare felt an instinctive dislike. He knew that they could not look upon him otherwise than in the light of a rustic curiosity, and being unwilling to play the part of a newly-discovered monkey or hippopotamus, he absolutely refused to go to parties and meetings to which he had been invited. However, a few of the visits were indispensable, such as presentation to Messrs. Taylor and Hessey, and their friends. Mr. John Taylor, on meeting Clare, perceived at once that one reason of his excessive reluctance to show himself was his scant stock of clothing, and mentioning the matter with great frankness, he offered him a suitable dress. But Clare refused to take anything, except an ancient overcoat somewhat too large for him, but useful as hiding his whole figure from the top of the head down to the heels. In this brigand-like mantle he henceforth made all his visits, unwilling to take it off even at dinner, and in rooms hot to suffocation.

It made a deep impression upon Clare that, with all his awkwardness, homely speech, and ragged clothes, he was, for the first time in his life, treated as an equal by Mr. Taylor's friends, and other gentlemen whom he visited at London. The example of his patrons in the country, who, after praising his talents in the drawing-room, sent him down to the kitchen for his dinner, had already pauperized him to such an extent that he was quite startled when Mr. Taylor, on his second visit to the shop in Fleet Street, asked him to meet several men of rank and talent, among them Lord Radstock, at dinner the same evening. He would gladly have declined, but was not allowed to do so, being told that it would be a thorough breach of good manners to refuse to see his friends, the admirers of his poems. Clare went, with much fear and trembling; but came to be at ease before long. He sat next to Lord Radstock, and this gentleman, with an extreme tact and knowledge of character, at once succeeded in gaining his whole confidence. It proved the beginning of a friendship which lasted for years, and spread its influence over Clare's whole life. William Waldegrave, Baron Radstock, Admiral of the Red, was a gentleman much known at this period in the literary and artistic circles of London. A younger son of the third Earl of Waldegrave, born in 1758, he was bred to the naval profession, became a captain at the age of eighteen, and commander of a fine frigate soon after, so that the way to fame and distinction was marked out for him clearly and forcibly. But not content to be lifted in the world solely by reason of birth, he, from an early age, devoted himself to independent pursuits, and became a scholar and a poet even before he was a captain in the Royal Navy. The scientific and literary tastes of the young nobleman were greatly fostered by his marriage, in 1785, with the second daughter of David Van Lennep, chief of the Dutch factory at Smyrna, a lady of most genial disposition and an education very superior to her age. William Waldegrave was appointed admiral in 1794; distinguishing himself at the naval fight off Cape Lagos, in 1797; and having been advanced, three years after, to the dignity of Baron Radstock, of Castletown, Queen's County, quietly settled with his family in London, to give himself entirely up to his favourite studies and pursuits. On the appearance of Clare's poems, he at once felt greatly interested in the author, and being acquainted with Mr. John Taylor, heard of his arrival in London, and arranged to meet him at dinner. So it came that John Clare, in his smock frock, leather gaiters, and brigand mantle, found himself sitting at the right hand of the Right Honourable Lord Radstock, son of an earl, and admiral in the Royal Navy.

Lord Radstock's simple, sailor-like speech, distant alike from condescension and studious politeness, had the effect of at once opening the pent-up affections of John Clare. For the first time since his arrival in London, he found somebody to whom he could speak in full confidence, and he did so to his heart's desire, prattling like a child about trees and flowers, fields and meadows, birds and sunshine, and not at all disguising his dislike to the big town in which he now found himself. As the dinner went on, Clare became still more communicative, tenderly encouraged by the sympathising friend at his side. He spoke of his struggles, his aims, and aspirations; his burning desire to soar upward on the wings of poetry, and his constant battling for the barest necessities of life, the mere daily bread. Lord Radstock was deeply touched; he had seen many authors, writers of prose and of verse, in the course of his life, but never such a poet as this. Clare did not in the least complain of his existence; he merely described it, in simple, graphic utterance, the truth of which was stamped on every word and look. The admiral, before meeting John Clare, had admired him as a poet; he now began to feel far deeper admiration for him as a man. He told him in a few kind and affectionate words, speaking as a father would to his son, that he intended to be his friend, and Clare warmly shook the hand offered to him. It was late at night when the party broke up at Mr. Taylor's, and Lord Radstock and John Clare were the last to leave the house together.