the detriment of the "Biography" of his sister. I am desirous to be anything rather than a hostile critic of the memoir. Mrs. Gaskell was an intimate friend of my family, and her husband at one time my father's colleague in the ministry. I admire "Mary Barton " and her other novels greatly. Toward her memory I have the kindest feeling; but Fiat justitia! and I must say what I can in favor of my old friend. LEIGH HUNT AND HIS FAMILY. had, wrapped in his dressing-gown, surrounded by attentive young ladies who adored him; one or more of them-I have seen two-gently smoothing his long locks in most irritating fashion to others sometimes, while all hung upon his flowing periods, sparkling with that graceful wit and airiness for which he was so famous. Often would he relate his memories of Williams, Shelley-never but once did I hear him mention Lord Byron, and that was to me only-Charles Lamb, and others, with pleasant voice and impressive manner. But he was curiously eccentric even when in his best moods. He would take his exact number of constitutional strides backward and forward at exactly the same hour daily so many made a mile, and not one more or less would he take or give; another turn would have been destruction. Yet in the throes of composition he forgot all about this, and paced back and forward sometimes unceasingly. I MADE many valuable, or invaluable, acquaintances in the world of art and letters. Leigh Hunt, most of his family, and many of his friends and relatives, were among these: a remarkable family they were indeed. Leigh Hunt, the gentle poet and stern reformer, he who passed imprisoned a year of triumph-nominally on account of his political writings, really because he had dubbed the "first gentleman in Europe" a "fat Adonis of fifty”—was now sixty-six years old. It was at the time of his portrait being taken-that one with the long white hair and tall white collars, the frontispiece which adorns his later works, "Kensington" and "Beaumont and Fletcher." Slim, and perfectly upright; his handsome, pale, oval face almost without a wrinkle; his long white locks falling to his shoulders, over those immense shirt-collars, which, had they been but starched, would have ended his days long before by cutting his throat. He was a perfect picture of sensitive refinement. I see him striding back-week or so of indulgence, he would have brought ward and forward up and down his "old Court suburb" study, his dressing-gown, although 'tis evening, flying out behind him, dictating his flowing periods (it was "Beaumont and Fletcher" then) to his too willing factotum, amanuensis, friend, son, and servant, Vincent. Poor Vincent! you doated upon your father, and surely you gave your life for him. But Leigh Hunt saw not the weary air, the haggard look, heard not the deadly cough, so absorbed was he in his occupation. And Vincent met his look brightly always, showing more eagerness to go on than his father. Yes! Leigh Hunt did sometimes say, "But you'll be getting tired, my boy," only to be met by a ready, “Oh no, pa! let's go on." And on they went. How do I know so much? I have seen and heard it often, for I had access at all times to the house where lived Leigh Hunt, his wife, and the two youngest children, all four dead long ago. At other times, on other evenings, Leigh Hunt would be more sociable, although he always accepted and gave familiar companionship in a semi-royal sort of way. He liked, on these occasions, to sit in a large and very easy chair he People who lead sedentary lives are no doubt often eccentric, especially at the age of sixty-six, but few are so remarkable in better things as to attract so much attention to their weaknesses. His most remarkable piece of oddity was in his eating, especially his suppers. He would "take a fancy,” and indulged freely night after night in a thoroughly indigestible supper of anything which accident or circumstance might have suggested, from corned beef to Welsh rarebit or Scotch porridge, recommending it eagerly as the most wholesome of eatable things; then after a on a fit of indigestion, upon which he would abuse the innocent, if indigestible, cause of his illness, "up hill and down dale." When better he would adopt something else, with similar "praise, blame, and result." The following interviews are given as nearly verbatim as I can remember them after this lapse of time. Call the time Wednesday evening at nine P. M. Scene, the drawing-room at Kensington: Leigh Hunt seated by himself at table; on table, white cloth and tray; on the tray, three eggs boiled hard, salt butter, pepper, and bread. To him enter myself. Leigh Hunt loq.: Ha, how are you? I am eating my supper, you see. Do you eat supper? If you do, take my advice, and have regularly every night, at nine o'clock precisely, three eggs boiled hard, with bread and butter. I have had them now every evening for five nights, and there is not, I assure you, anything more wholesome for supper. One sleeps so soundly, too," etc. Next scene, Friday, time and circumstances as before, save that the condiment under present consideration is a Welsh rarebit, with mustard, etc. I enter. Hunt to me: "Ha, how are you? Have you seen Vincent? I am just getting supper, you see. Do you ever eat supper? If you do, I pray you, never take boiled eggs; they are, without any exception, the most indigestible, nightmare-producing, etc. They have nearly killed me. No; the lightest and most palatable supper I have ever taken is a Welsh rarebit with some Scotch ale. This is the second day I have taken it, and I do assure you," etc. On Monday next it would be liver and bacon, or what you will. His longest love in my time was his old love, dried fruit, bread, and water-his Italian memory. Leigh Hunt's inability to appreciate the comparative value of moneys was well known. It was real, not affected. I have seen it myself more than once. For that, his conversation, and his brilliant touch on the piano, was he best known socially. I am a stanch admirer of Dickens, but I can not waver in my belief that Leigh Hunt was the model of "Horace Skimpole," at least until that lightsome individual began to exhibit his darker shades. The similarity is too marked in more things than can be mentioned here. I know that Dickens denied this, and that there is nothing more to be said; but the very first time I read the very first number of "Bleak House," which describes Skimpole, I said, "There is Leigh Hunt!" Who does not know of the money uselessness, the splendid touch on the piano, especially in little sparkling things, as, 'Come unto these yellow sands," a great favorite of his-the hot-house peaches on the table, and the bailiffs outside? As to the money, I think it is Mr. G. H. Lewes who told the story of Leigh Hunt being unable to pay a debt of three shillings and sixpence because he had but half-crowns and shillings in his possession. But I have a better story than that, at least as good a one, happening partly in my own hearing, and I can therefore vouch for its truth. During the greater part of Vincent's last illness he was staying with me, a little way out of town down the river, and his father came from time to time to see him. One afternoon Leigh Hunt drove up to the door in a hansom. I met him at the door, where he was beaming benevolently at the cabman, who was beaming too. Says Leigh Hunt after the usual salutations, "Fine fellow that!" I ask how, for neither man, cab, horse, nor harness seemed particularly "fine." "Well," says Leigh Hunt, "I found him returning from Hammersmith, and he said as an empty he would take me for half fare" (the whole fare was about three shillings), "so I told him to drive on. He drove nicely and steadily, and now when I asked him his fare, he left it to my honor. You know nothing could be fairer than that, so I said I was sorry to say that I had only two half-sovereigns in my pocket, would one of them do? I could give him that, and if not enough he could call at so-and-so, or I could borrow it from you. Oh, that would do, he said; he would not trouble you. He took it, thanked me, and was getting on to his cab when I stopped him to say that I was pleased with him, and that I should be returning about nine to-night, when, if he liked, he might come for me and receive the same fare back. He said he would, but now he has driven away so suddenly as you opened the door that I hardly know what to think." Mrs. Leigh Hunt kept her room almost entirely in those her latter days. She had become very stout, and disliked any exertion. Banting would have helped her had she known of the system. Thornton Leigh Hunt, the eldest son, to whom, when four years old, Leigh Hunt wrote a sonnet, was, when I knew him, editing or subediting the "Spectator," and agitating for the establishment of the "Leader." He then lived at Hammersmith, at the large house in the Square. It had till lately been a ladies' boarding-school, and had in the basement a very large room, the dining- or school-room of old days. Here Thornton kept open house every Sunday evening, with unlimited bread-and-cheese and beer. Here he weekly collected much and varied talent. How time has altered it all! Thornton was small, thin, blackavised, wild-looking, with retroussé nose, decidedly ugly-decidedly insinuating, too, receiving more attention from the fair than was at all good for him. He had a wife and family of pretty children. Thornton was an advanced politician, a Chartist and an Owenite in opinion, a safe anchor for banished refugees, a very hard worker, and much beloved by his children. But the main peculiarity of this man, descended from such a father, with such brothers, and surrounded by an atmosphere of brilliancy, was that he had no touch of wit or humor in his composition. The only two jokes I ever heard him attempt were the two dreariest that I ever have heard. Here they are choose the worst: "Eh? you want to succeed? Go and buy some and suck it, then." Why am I like that cab? Because we are both on the earth." Leigh Hunt's eldest daughter had just died of consumption when I knew them first. She had the reputation of having been a beauty, and was the wife of Mr. John Gliddon, whose sister was Thornton's wife. I was much grieved to hear of the death of Mrs. Thornton Hunt recently. Mild, kind, gentle, good, let me say so much to her memory. My especial remembrance, among many of the dear lady, is of the ludicrous, however. I had been hastily summoned from my chambers to take Mrs. Thornton Hunt and another to the theatre, where G. H. Lewes had placed a box at their disposal to see a new piece of his. When we came out, the night was wild, though fine; half a gale was blowing. The Hammersmith omnibus was full. I was not allowed to take a cab-the ladies would walk! We walked and walked. The wind was very hard upon us, and our progress, at the close of an hour, but little; and now we could not get a cab. From fun of fighting with the gale, our mirth had long changed into a silent struggle. Wearied at last, Mrs. Thornton Hunt suddenly exclaimed, "Oh dear, let us turn round and walk backward," by which she meant beating a retreat to some of her friends' hospitalities; but the absurdity of the idea, coupled with exhaustion and growing despair, so excited our risible sensibilities, that we stood there laughing long ere we could turn and walk anywhere. A return cab relieved us then. Then there was a son twice married, who appeared rarely at his father's or brother's homes. I saw him but seldom. Henry Leigh Hunt came next-handsome, careless, witty, good-natured Henry! Henry had a splendid tenor voice, the qualities of which he exhibited but seldom. Not so reserved was his fascinating little sister Julia, of whom presently; and the best of them all, poor Vincent! I wonder if Vincent ever said no? His heart for his father's work never failed him; but he grew sick and ill, and, when his cold attacked his chest obstinately, he came to stay with me at Peckham. Then inflammation set in, and he went patiently through the weary round of hot applications, poultices, etc. He got better and returned home. I saw him into an omnibus. The night was chilly, but he had no overcoat and would not take mine. There was a drizzling rain, and he rushed headlong to his fate to oblige an omnibus cad. He traveled those three or four miles outside, giving up his place to a washerwoman, stronger than the horses that drew them very likely. He arrived at home coughing and shivering. It was long before he had an opportunity of obliging any one again out of doors; and when, months later, he ventured out again, his doom had gone forth. Yet through all that last summer-time he worked with his father at " Beaumont and Fletcher," without a word of complaint. Nor was that all, for he resigned himself when work was over to the wayward moods of his pretty sister Julia, and allowed himself to be carried off to this party or that theatre when bed only was his fitting place. This was while the summer lasted; toward autumn he came to stay with me again, and then he went home to die. Poor fellow! if ever there was a simple, purehearted soul, he was one! Julia, with her sparkling black eyes and glorious soprano, must be mentioned now. She knew how to modulate that voice into such passion, tenderness, grief, or anger, as it is rarely in the power of even a consummate actress to do. Little in stature, her every action was easy and graceful. What a prima donna she would have made! She and Henry would sometimes, out of very wildness, dress like street singers, and, going to the fashionable quarters of London, sing favorite opera-songs. Seldom had they long commenced before windows would be opened and loungers would listen to them. They would often be asked to come in, and were sometimes recognized. Julia had a good temper and an easy, rapid flow of wit. Altogether, she was one of the most dangerous coquettes of her day. But her day is done, and night come. The extraordinary variety of character in the Leigh Hunt family was a common subject of wonder to their friends. In mind and appearance they were singularly dissimilar. Among the distinguished visitors who frequented Thornton Hunt's house on his Sunday evenings was George H. Lewes, actor, editor, and author. A sort of untamed lion he was in my day, sturdy, well set up, with a mop of curly, brown-colored hair, worn long. He had a lionlike trick of shaking his mane—head, I meanwhen the hair would fall round his face, over his collar and shoulders. Then he would throw his head well back with a vigorous jerk, and show a row of strong white teeth in a well-formed mouth, a broad forehead, and well-developed intellectual organs. I can see him now, standing just so at the piano, rolling out some jolly song, with powerful voice and good enunciation. Then would come a love-song, Julia accompanying him the while with easy grace, her eyes flashing from one to another of her brother's guests, especially transfixing the bewildered foreigners, whom she slaughtered wholesale. For myself, I liked George H. Lewes best as a raconteur. His stories were always amusing. He certainly accompanied them with boisterous laughter; but, if that be a fault, the laughter was deserved, and came at the right time and place. Among his choicest anecdotes were many of Charles Mathews, then in the heyday of fame and embarrassment. Lewes wrote several of Mathews's best pieces, among them the best, as I think, namely, "The Game of Speculation," and a startling novelty of eight acts, which, however, did not "go" well, being too long, although there was a real fountain, and a real man tossed into it during a grand stage quarrel. Lewes would tell how, having "cornered" Mathews, and insisted upon having at least some of his money owing to him for this or that comedy, the actor would keep him so amused that, after half an hour of convulsion, he would leave him oblivious of money, and with promises of an early dinner to concert some new subject. Lewes undertook higher work than this, too, into which it is not my present intention to inquire. In his lighter writings he always cleaves, I think, to his old leaven, the stage. And he is gone, too (February, 1879). My last night in a London theatre was passed with him and Albert Smith, the latter met accidentally. They both looked strong and healthy men, and both applauded heartily—as, indeed, I have often noticed, to their honor, all men or women connected with any branch of "the profession do. But Albert Smith died early, and Lewes all too soon. I WORDSWORTH. REMEMBER hearing Lord Macaulay say, after Wordsworth's death, when subscriptions were being collected to found a memorial of him, that ten years earlier more money could have been raised in Cambridge alone to do honor to Wordsworth than was now raised all through the country. Lord Macaulay had, as we know, his own heightened and telling way of putting things, and we must always make allowance for it. But probably it is true that Wordsworth has never, either before or since, been so accepted and popular, so established in possession of the minds of all who profess to care for poetry, as he was between the years 1830 and 1840, and at Cambridge. From the very first, no doubt, he had his believers and witnesses. But I have myself heard him say that, for he knew not how many years, his poetry had never brought him in enough to buy his shoe-strings. The poetryreading public was very slow to recognize him, and was very easily drawn away from him. Scott effaced him with this public, Byron effaced him. The death of Byron seemed, however, to make an opening for Wordsworth. Scott, who had for some time ceased to produce poetry himself, and stood before the public as a great novelist; Scott, too genuine himself not to feel the profound genuineness of Wordsworth, and with an instinctive recognition of his firm hold on nature and of his local truth, always admired him sincerely, and praised him generously. The influence of Coleridge upon young men of ability was then powerful, and was still gathering strength; this influence told entirely in favor of Wordsworth's poetry. Cambridge was a place where Coleridge's influence had great action, and where Wordsworth's poetry, therefore, flourished especially. But even among the general public its sale grew large, the eminence of its author was widely recognized, and Rydal Mount became an object of pilgrimage. I remember Wordsworth relating how one of the pilgrims, a clergyman, asked him if he had ever written anything besides the "Guide to the Lakes." Yes, he answered modestly, he had written verses. Not every pilgrim was a reader, but the vogue was established, and the stream of pilgrims came. Mr. Tennyson's decisive appearance dates from 1842. One can not say that he effaced Wordsworth as Scott and Byron had effaced him. The poetry of Wordsworth had been so long before the public, the suffrage of good judges was so steady and so strong in its favor, that by 1842 the verdict of posterity, one may almost say, had been already pronounced, and Wordsworth's English fame was secure. But the vogue, the ear and applause of the great body of poetryreaders, never quite thoroughly perhaps his, he gradually lost more and more, and Mr. Tennyson gained them. Mr. Tennyson drew to himself, and away from Wordsworth, the poetry-reading public and the new generations. Even in 1852, when Wordsworth died, this diminution of popularity was visible, and occasioned the remark of Lord Macaulay which I quoted at starting. The diminution has continued. The influence of Coleridge has waned; Wordsworth's poetry can no longer draw succor from this ally. The poetry has not, however, wanted eulogists; and it may be said to have brought its eulogists luck, for almost every one who has praised Wordsworth's poetry has praised it well. But the public has remained cold, or at least undetermined. The abundance of Mr. Palgrave's fine and skillfully chosen specimens of Wordsworth, in "The Golden Treasury," surprised many readers, and even gave offense to some. To tenth-rate critics and compilers, for whom any violent shock to the public taste would be a temerity not to be risked, it is still quite permissible to speak of Wordsworth's poetry, not only with ignorance, but with impertinence. On the Continent he is almost unknown. I can not think, then, that Wordsworth has up to this time at all obtained his deserts. "Glory," said M. Rénan the other day—“glory, after all, is the thing which has the best chance of not being altogether vanity." And when M. Rénan presents himself to the French Academy-the only authentic dispensers, he says, of glory, of "this grand light"-he presents himself supported by M. Victor Hugo, his "dear and illustrious master," a poet irradiated with it-a poet "whose genius has throughout our century struck the hour for us, has given body to every one of our dreams, wings to every one of our thoughts." Yet probably not twenty people in that magnificent assemblage, all coruscating with the beams of the "grand light," had ever even heard of Wordsworth's name. Wordsworth was a homely man, and would certainly never have thought of talking of glory as that which, after all, has the best chance of not being altogether vanity. And it is quite impossible for us to esteem recognition by the French Academy, or by the French nation, or by any single institution or nation, as so decisive a title to glory as M. Rénan supposes it. Yet we may well allow to him, after these reserves, that few things are less vain than real glory. Let us conceive of the whole group of civilized nations as being, for intellectual and spiritual purposes, one great confederation, bound to a joint action and working toward a common result; a confederation whose members have a due knowledge both of the past, out of which they all proceed, and of one another. This was the ideal of Goethe, and it is an ideal which will impose itself upon the thoughts of our modern societies more and more. Then to be recognized by the verdict of such a confederation as a master, or even as seriously and eminently worthy, in one's own line of intellectual or spiritual activity, is indeed glory—a glory which it would be difficult to rate too highly. For what could be more beneficent, more salutary? The world is forwarded by having its attention fixed on the best things; and here is a tribunal, free from all suspicion of national and provincial partiality, putting a stamp on the best things, and recommending them for general honor and acceptance. A nation, again, is furthered by recognition of its real gifts and successes; it is encouraged to develop them further. And here is an honest verdict, telling us which of our supposed successes are really, in the judgment of the great impartial world, and not in our own private judgment only, successes, and which are not. It is so easy to feel pride and satisfaction in one's own things, so hard to make sure that one is right in feeling it! We have a great empire. But so had Nebuchadnezzar. We extol the “unrivaled happiness" of our national civiliza tion. But then comes a candid friend, and remarks that our upper class is materialized, our middle class vulgarized, and our lower class brutalized. We are proud of our painting, our music. But we find that in the judgment of other people our painting is questionable, and our music nonexistent. We are proud of our men of science. And here it turns out that the world is with us; we find that in the judgment of other people, too, Newton among the dead, and Mr. Darwin among the living, hold as high a place as they hold in our national opinion. Finally, we are proud of our poets and poetry. Now, poetry is nothing less than the most perfect speech of man, that in which he comes nearest to being able to utter the truth. It is no small thing, therefore, to succeed eminently in poetry. And so much is required for duly estimating success here, that about poetry it is perhaps hardest to arrive at a sure general verdict, and takes longest. Meanwhile, our own conviction of the superiority of our national poets is not decisive, is almost certain to be mingled, as we see constantly in the English eulogy of Shakespeare, with much of provincial infatuation. And we know what was the opinion current among our neighbors the French, people of taste, acuteness, and quick literary tact, not a hundred years ago, about our great poets. The old "Biographie Universelle " notices the pretension of the English to a place for their poets among the chief poets of the world, and says that this is a pretension which to no one but an Englishman can ever seem admissible. And the scornful, disparaging things said by foreigners about Shakespeare and Milton, and about our national over-estimate of them, have been often quoted, and will be in every one's remembrance. A great change has taken place, and Shakespeare is now generally recognized, even in France, as one of the greatest of poets. Yes, some antiGallican cynic will say, the French rank him with Corneille and Victor Hugo! But let me have the pleasure of quoting a sentence about Shakespeare, which I met with by accident not long ago in the "Correspondant," a French review which not a dozen people, I suppose, look at. The writer is praising Shakespeare's prose. With Shakespeare, he says, "prose comes in whenever the subject, being more familiar, is unsuited to the majestic English iambic." And he goes on: "Shakespeare is the king of poetic rhythm and style, as well as the king of the realm of thought. Along with his dazzling prose, Shakespeare has succeeded in giving us the most varied, the most harmonious verse, which has ever sounded upon the human ear since the verse of the Greeks." M. Henry Cochin, the writer of this sentence, deserves our gratitude for it; it would not be |