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diff --git a/25908.txt b/25908.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..cfb6d72 --- /dev/null +++ b/25908.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2406 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Washington Irving, by Henry W. Boynton + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Washington Irving + +Author: Henry W. Boynton + +Release Date: June 26, 2008 [EBook #25908] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WASHINGTON IRVING *** + + + + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan and The Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by The +Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + + + + + + + + The Riverside Biographical Series + + NUMBER 11 + + + [Illustration: Washington Irving] + + + + WASHINGTON IRVING + + + BY + + HENRY W. BOYNTON + + + + + BOSTON AND NEW YORK + + HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY + + The Riverside Press, Cambridge + + 1901 + + + + COPYRIGHT, 1901, BY HENRY W. BOYNTON + + * * * * * + + + + +CONTENTS + + +CHAP. PAGE + + I. EARLY YEARS AND SURROUNDINGS 1 + + II. MAN ABOUT TOWN 16 + +III. MAN OF LETTERS--FIRST PERIOD 35 + + IV. MAN OF LETTERS--SECOND PERIOD 59 + + V. A PUBLIC CHARACTER 81 + + VI. THE MAN HIMSELF 105 + + * * * * * + + + + +WASHINGTON IRVING + +I + +EARLY YEARS AND SURROUNDINGS + + +Irving's name stands as the first landmark in American letters. No +other American writer has won the same sort of recognition abroad or +esteem at home as became his early in life. And he has lost very +little ground, so far as we can judge by the appeal to figures. The +copyright on his works ran out long since, and a great many editions +of Irving, cheap and costly, complete and incomplete, have been issued +from many sources. Yet his original publishers are now selling, year +by year, more of his books than ever before. There is little doubt +that his work is still widely read, and read not because it is +prescribed, but because it gives pleasure; not as the product of a +"standard author," but as the expression of a rich and engaging +personality, which has written itself like an indorsement across the +face of a young nation's literature. It is that of a man so sensitive +that the scornful finger of a child might have left him sleepless; so +kindly that nobody ever applied to him in vain for sympathy; so modest +that the smallest praise embarrassed him. His manner and tastes were +simple and unassuming. He had no great passions; the brother was +stronger in him than the lover. To these qualities, which might by +themselves belong to ineffectiveness, he added courage, firmness, +magnanimity. It was because he was such a man, and because what he was +shines on every page he wrote, that the world still warms to him. + +Not that so elusive a thing as personal charm can be neatly plotted by +the card. We love certain people because we love them; and since that +is so, everything they do is interesting to us. A great writer lives +in his books, to be sure, but we want to know what he actually did in +the flesh. Did he walk, eat, sleep, like other men? Was he as strong, +as human, as lovable as one would think? What sort of boy was he? Did +he marry a wife, and was she good enough for him? The world will never +believe that such questions are impertinent. + +There are, of course, more formal matters to be considered,--his debt +to circumstance, his place in the practical world, his influence on +the moral or intellectual or national life of his day. Some of these +themes may be touched on, even within the narrow limits of the present +sketch; not categorically, but rather by way of such suggestion and +indirection as may be consistent with a compact narrative. + + * * * * * + +One of those apparent chances which are the commonplaces of history +led William Irving from his far home in the Orkneys, married him to +Sarah Sanders, and made him the father of Washington Irving. The +Irvings--a branch of the well-known Scotch Irvines--had been for +generations the leading family on the Island of Shapinsha. Finally +they had gone threadbare, and with a fortune to seek, William Irving +chose the natural ordeal for an islander, the trial by sea. Toward the +close of the French War he had become petty officer on an armed +English packet. In New York he met Mistress Sanders, who was also +English-born, and in 1761 they were married. He must have saved money, +for at the end of the war he left the sea, and entered trade in New +York. + +William Irving and his wife were very different in up-bringing and in +temperament. He was a stern man, a strict Presbyterian, with the cold +fire of Calvin in his bones. She had been bred an Episcopalian, and +was genial and sympathetic by nature. The husband was the +master-spirit, and the children grew up under the rigid exactions of +his sect. Sunday was a long day of penance, and one of their two +half-holidays was consecrated to the cheerful uses of the catechism. +To New England ears it all has a familiar sound. When the children +grew old enough they promptly left the fold and resigned themselves +to her of Babylon and England. There were eleven of them, and +Washington was the youngest, born in New York, April 3, 1783. As a +very little child he had the honor of a pat on the head from his great +namesake, for whom he was to do an important service many years later. + +He was a perfectly normal, healthy boy. Fortunately there are no +brilliant sayings to record; he did not lisp in periods. Genius was +not written upon his brow, nor tied upon his sleeve. He had none of +the pale fervor of precocity, or the shyness of premature conceit. He +was absorbed in childish things, loved play, shirked his studies, +dreamed of a life on the ocean wave, and regarded "Robinson Crusoe" +and "Sinbad the Sailor" as the end of all literary things. The +savagery of boyhood he lacked. He was fond of playing battle, but +could not bear to see his schoolfellows publicly thrashed, according +to the amiable custom of that day. Otherwise he was all that a mother +might deplore or an uncle delight in. + +Altogether the most interesting story of his schooldays has a +dramatic setting. Addison's "Cato" was to be spouted in public by the +schoolchildren. Irving, in the part of Juba, was called a little +sooner than he expected, and came on the boards with his mouth full of +honey-cake. Speech was out of the question--_vox haesit_--there was a +momentary deadlock in his throat. The audience began to laugh, but the +prince was not to be counted out. With a skillful rotary finger he +removed the viand, and brought down the house by calmly taking up his +lines as if nothing had happened. He was then ten years old, and deep +in love with the leading lady. A year or two later he had decided to +follow the sea; but a short experiment of sleeping on the floor and +eating salt pork was too much for his enthusiasm, and at fourteen he +gave up the ship. By this time he had begun to fancy that he could +write, but there is nothing preserved which shows the least promise. + +"When I was young," he said long afterward, "I was led to think that +somehow or other everything that was pleasant was wicked." The +theatre was one of the forbidden sweets, and he naturally seized every +chance to taste it. Family prayers at nine were something of an +interruption, but he had managed a private exit by way of the roof +which got him back to the theatre in time for the after-piece. This +early liking for the stage he never outgrew. In the meantime he was +going through with the ordinary schooling of the New York boy of that +period. He learned a little Latin; he hated mathematics, and had very +little love for dull books of any sort. At sixteen his formal +education was over. Two of his elder brothers had studied at Columbia +College, and no doubt Irving might have done the same. He was too +lazy, or, to put it more gracefully, too little interested in set +tasks. Later he expressed regret for the lost chance, but the loss +cannot have been very great for him or for us. If we could imagine +that he might have gained any sort of scholarship, its effect upon his +writing would still be more than doubtful. His order of genius gains +little from bookishness. Addison was supposed to be a classical +scholar, but the "De Coverley Papers" are not a product of +scholarship, and we could better spare anything else that he wrote. + +At sixteen Irving entered a law office, and for the next five years +was understood to be studying law. He had no real aptitude for such +study, to be sure, and must have known it; certainly he learned very +little law. He had other things to be interested in. He was an eager +reader in his own way, and a handsome, well-mannered boy, already fond +of society. And I doubt if very much was expected of him in the way of +steady application, for during this whole period his health was +uncertain. More than once he had to give up study entirely, and go to +this watering-place or that for weeks or months. His family and +friends were afraid of consumption, and it was against all forecasts +that he held his own till manhood. + +In 1800 he made his first voyage up the Hudson. "A voyage to Albany +then," he wrote in 1851, "was equal to a voyage to Europe at present, +and took almost as much time." The journey was made in a sloop manned +by slaves, and commanded by a native of Albany, who spoke nothing but +Dutch. + +Two years later his brother Peter became proprietor and editor of the +New York "Morning Chronicle," for which Irving presently wrote a +series of satirical letters signed "Jonathan Oldstyle." In these +letters, his earliest work of any significance, he touches the +Addisonian string upon which his critics have harped so insistently +ever since. They are decidedly clever for a boy of nineteen, but not +cleverer than the best college work of to-day, and perhaps more +consciously imitative. The fact that they were greatly praised and +gained some vogue through copying in other journals, is rather an +indication of the unfruitfulness of the period than of their merit. +One of their greatest admirers was Charles Brockden Browne, the only +American before Irving to make a profession of writing. + +In 1804 the young amateur came of age. He was still threatened with +consumption, and his family determined to send him abroad. Nobody felt +very sanguine about his returning. As he was helped on board, the +captain eyed him dubiously and said in an undertone, "There's a chap +who will go overboard before we get across." If it had been in him to +die just then, the captain gave him plenty of time; it was six weeks +later when they landed at Bordeaux. But though the voyage had been not +over-comfortable, it did him much good. Before the end of it he was +scrambling about the vessel, and describes himself as "quite expert at +climbing to the masthead, and going out on the maintopsail yard." +Irving's body was never to be altogether tractable, but we shall hear +nothing further of the consumptive tendency. + +His early letters from abroad are full of life and spirits. He jaunted +about through France and Italy, picked up acquaintances everywhere, +and was evidently much more interested in the people he met than in +the "doing" of buildings or galleries. Evidently he was growing +stronger all the time. In the company of a little Pennsylvania doctor, +whom he had picked up in a diligence, he played several boyish pranks +in France; he kicked out an insolent porter at Montpellier, and fell +foul of a police spy at Avignon. In the main, however, he was inclined +to take things as they came. "There is nothing I dread more," he wrote +from Marseilles, "than to be taken for one of the Smellfungi of this +world. I therefore endeavor to be pleased with everything about me, +and with the masters, mistresses, and servants of the inns, +particularly when I perceive they have 'all the dispositions in the +world' to serve me; as Sterne says, 'It is enough for Heaven, and +ought to be enough for me.'" + +At that day the European traveler was not hedged in from adventure. On +the way from Genoa to Messina Irving's vessel was boarded by a +piratical picaroon. The consequences were not dreadful, but the _mise +en scene_ was all that could have been desired. The pirates had +"fierce black eyes scowling under enormous bushy eyebrows.... They +seemed to regard us with the most malignant looks, and I thought I +could perceive a sinister smile upon their countenances, as if +triumphing over us, who had fallen so easily into their hands." +Nothing could have been more satisfactory. At Termini he had a +romantic adventure with a masked Turk. At Genoa he was captivated by +the beauty of a young Italian lady. Instead of trying to make her +acquaintance, as he might easily have done, he contented himself with +stealing a handkerchief which she had dropped. Some time later it was +stolen from him. Thereupon he wrote an account of the affair to a +friend whom he had left in Genoa. The lady heard of it, as ladies +will, and sent him a lock of her hair, with a friendly hint that she +might be better admired at closer quarters. By a natural paradox of +boyish sentiment he did not return to Genoa, but had the hair put into +a locket, which he wore for years. It was later unearthed by a friend +from a pair of breeches borrowed from Irving, and made the subject of +some badinage between them. + +Both his brothers and his biographer have made the aimlessness of this +first European experience an occasion for something like reproach. His +plans were of the vaguest. Such as they were, he was willing to +sacrifice any of them for the sake of congenial companionship. After a +few weeks he left Rome hurriedly because he could not bear to be +parted from a friend who was going to Paris. He was anxious, he told +his brothers quaintly, to study various arts and sciences there. In +Paris he kept a journal for about three weeks; it records attendance +upon a single lecture in botany and seventeen theatrical performances. +Naturally his brothers could only see that he was an amiable, idle +young fellow, who had drifted into a dilettante attitude toward life, +and showed little promise of usefulness. But idling as well as +industry has to be judged by its fruits. He was in a real sense seeing +life, as he personally needed to see it, not in its passion and +mystery, but in its lighter moods of humor and sentiment. Paris +frankly seemed to him at this time the most profitable place in the +world. Two months after his arrival, he wrote airily, "You will excuse +the shortness and hastiness of this letter, for which I can only plead +as an excuse that I am a young man and in Paris." He had momentary +fancies as to a possible direction for his talents. A sudden intimacy +at Rome with Washington Allston made him think for a time of turning +painter. He was something of a dandy, and puts on record a Paris +costume of "gray coat, white embroidered vest, and colored +small-clothes." Presently he left Paris for London, where Kemble and +Mrs. Siddons seem to have pleased him more than anything else English. +Three months later he set sail for New York, and arrived in March, +1826, after an absence of nearly two years. + +Irving was now twenty-three years old. All that he had done so far was +haphazard enough. He had trifled with his schooling, loitered over his +law, read a great deal at random, seen many theatres, and made many +friends. He had escaped from the valley of the shadow, and was now +free to go on in the primrose way of much society, little literature, +and less law. For the next ten or twelve years he was to be little +more than a petted man about town. + + + + +II + +MAN ABOUT TOWN + + +At that time New York was hardly more than a big village, such as +Boston continued to be for a half-century later. Everybody (who was +anybody) knew everybody else in the friendly and informal way which +nowadays belongs to a "set." Conviviality--this dignified name of the +thing best suggests the way in which it was looked at then--was as +much a part of fashionable life in New York as in Edinburgh or London. +Into this society Irving entered with zest, flirting, dancing, +tippling with other young swaggerers according to the mode. He went +back nominally to his legal studies, but was really very little +concerned with law or gospel. Of this kind of life, "Salmagundi," the +first number of which, appeared in January, 1807, was the legitimate +outcome. It was made up of short satirical sketches of the +"Spectator" type. Irving and J. K. Paulding were the principal +contributors, but they had some assistance from William Irving and a +few others. In the course of a year twenty numbers were published at +irregular intervals, when they suddenly ceased to appear. The authors, +who wrote under fictitious names, affected from the start complete +indifference to fame or profit. Their purpose, they said with +whimsical assurance, was simply "to instruct the young, reform the +old, correct the town, and castigate the age." The audacity of the +thing caught the town; it was a decided success, and very +profitable--for the publisher. There is a mildly sophomoric flavor +about the "Salmagundi" papers, as there is about Irving's letters of +the same period. But they are full of amusing things, and worth +reading, too, for the odd side-lights they throw upon the foibles of +that old New York. + +As he grew older, Irving came to feel the shallowness of fashionable +society, but in the Salmagundi days he appears to have asked for +nothing better. He had good looks, good humor, and good manners, +showed a proper susceptibility, and knew how to turn a compliment or +write a graceful letter. No wonder he found himself welcome wherever +he went. After a visit to Philadelphia one of the ladies to whom he +had made himself agreeable wrote, "Half the people exist but in the +idea that _you_ will one day return." + +Early in the following year he had a little experience of the +practical working of ward politics, which he described in a letter to +a certain charming Mary Fairlie: "Truly, this saving one's country is +a nauseous piece of business, and if patriotism is such a dirty +virtue,--prythee, no more of it.... Such haranguing and puffing and +strutting among the little great men of the day. Such shoals of +unfledged heroes from the lower wards, who had broke away from their +mammas, and run to electioneer with a slice of bread and butter in +their hands." Irving's patriotism was not found wanting when the time +came, but he had a life-long contempt for the petty trickery of party +politics. That year he made another of his leisurely jaunts, +nominally on business, this time to Virginia. His letters record the +usual round of social gallantries, and some graver matter. Burr's +trial was on in Richmond. Irving made his acquaintance, and was +retained in some ornamental sense among his counsel. One or two +letters from Richmond show a sentimental sympathy for his client of +which the less said the better. A characteristic weakness of Irving's +was always an unreasoning fondness for the under dog. In the autumn of +1807 his father died, one of the most sincere among the "unco guid," a +man whom few people loved and everybody respected. + +Not long after the discontinuance of the Salmagundi papers a new idea +suggested itself to Irving and his brother Peter, which in its +original form does not look especially promising. It was to develop +into a really remarkable work, and to place Irving's name in a secure +place among living humorists. The "Knickerbocker History of New York" +really laid the foundation of his fame. The first plan was for a mere +burlesque of an absurd book just published, a Dr. Samuel Mitchill's +"Picture of New York." Mitchill began with the aborigines: the Irvings +began with the creation of the world. Fortunately Peter was soon +called away to Europe, and Irving was left to his own devices, which +presently took a different and more original turn. He threw out most +of the pompous erudition which belonged to the work as a burlesque, +and condensed what remained. Everything after the five introductory +chapters is his own. + +At this time he had begun to do commission business for certain New +York houses, with a genuine impulse toward steadiness and industry +which it is easy to account for. He was deep in love with the second +daughter of Mr. Hoffman, in whose office he had originally idled. He +had been for years very intimate with the family, and had ended by +making a remarkable discovery about one of them. As he was evidently +not in a position to marry, he was now setting to work with real +energy to improve his means. + +Matilda Hoffman was a girl of seventeen, pretty, amiable, and clever. +She died of quick consumption in April, 1809. It is certain that they +loved each other very much, and that Irving never forgot her. The +claim put forth by his nephew and biographer that he gave up marriage +for her sake, and was romantically scrupulous in his faithfulness to +her memory, seems hardly borne out by the facts. He was crushed for +the moment, but not heartbroken. The truth is Irving's nature was +sentimental rather than passionate. His love for Miss Hoffman appears +to have been the deepest feeling of his life, but it did not absorb +his whole nature. The first effect of her loss was to fill him with a +sort of horror--the rebellion of a young and sensitive health against +the tyranny of death. It was enough to show that the mourner was by no +means in desperate case, for extreme grief is not afraid. In after +life he never mentioned her name, and wrote of her only once. At the +same time pretty faces and the charm of womanly companionship +continued to attract him; indeed, a few years later he openly +expressed his expectation of some time marrying. That he did not was +clearly due to temper and circumstance rather than to romantic +fidelity or abnegation. In the end his susceptibility became purely +impersonal; his satisfaction in the exercise of a gentle old-school +gallantry did much to take the sting from his life-long bachelorhood. +Plainly, Irving was the sort of man who finds a grace in every +feminine presence. + +It is encouraging to find him in a few months at work again upon the +Knickerbocker history. Its appearance was cleverly heralded by a +series of preliminary advertisements, announcing the disappearance of +one Diedrich Knickerbocker, and the finding of a manuscript history by +his hand. The book was published in December, 1809, and made a +remarkable impression, in England as well as in America. Henry +Brevoort, a close friend of Irving's, in 1813 sent a copy of the +second edition to Walter Scott, who wrote at once: "I beg you to +accept my best thanks for the uncommon degree of entertainment which +I have received from the most excellently jocose History of New +York.... I have never read anything so closely resembling the style of +Dean Swift as the annals of Diedrich Knickerbocker. I have been +employed these few evenings in reading them aloud to Mrs. Scott and +two ladies who are our guests, and our sides have been absolutely sore +with laughing. I think, too, there are passages which indicate that +the author possesses powers of a different kind, and has some touches +which remind me much of Sterne." + +The work in its completed form is a history of the three Dutch +governors of New York, whom Irving uses as a stalking-horse for +purposes of satire. Everybody laughed at it except a few descendants +of the old Dutch worthies with whose names and characters he had made +free. As late as the year 1818, G. C. Verplanck, a personal friend of +Irving's, called him to account in an address before the New York +Historical Society, to which the first edition of Knickerbocker was +gravely dedicated, for "wasting the riches of his fancy on an +ungrateful theme, and his exuberant humor in a coarse caricature." One +of his brothers wrote to Irving, deprecating the attack. Irving +replied: "I have seen what Verplanck said of my work. He did me more +than justice in what he said of my mental qualifications; and he said +nothing of my work that I have not long thought of it myself.... I am +sure he wishes me well, and his own talents and acquirements are too +great to suffer him to entertain jealousy; but were I his bitterest +enemy, such an opinion have I of his integrity of mind, that I would +refer any one to him for an honest account of me, sooner than to +almost any one else." + +Soon after Knickerbocker came out, Irving went to Albany in the +fruitless pursuit of a minor court appointment. There he found his +name come not altogether pleasantly before him. "I have somehow or +another formed acquaintance with some of the good people," he wrote, +"and several of the little Yffrouws, and have even made my way and +intrenched myself strongly in the parlors of several genuine Dutch +families, who had declared utter hostility to me." One lady had said +that if she were a man she would horsewhip him; but an hour with +Irving, who had made a point of meeting her, left her resigned to be a +woman. + +Irving had now scored his first great literary success. He had proved +himself master of a fluent humorous style which might have been +applied indefinitely to the treatment of similar themes. He was +twenty-seven years old, and there was no reason why the next ten years +should not be a most fruitful period. Unfortunately, during most of +that time life was made too easy for him. He knew now that he could +write, but he had no desire to write for a living. Probably he felt +that such a course would be in some way not quite suitable for a man +of fashion. At all events, ten years passed, and middle age was at +hand before the promising author began to fulfill his promise. Not +till 1819 appeared his next literary venture, conceived in a more +serious spirit, and launched with many misgivings as the first +performance of the professional man of letters. + +He had by this time pretty much given up any notion he may have had of +living by the law. His attempts to gain civil appointments were not +successful. The brilliant younger brother must be provided for; +presently Peter and Ebenezer, who were proprietors of a fairly +prosperous hardware business, offered him a partnership, with nominal +duties and one fifth of the profits. His connection with the firm was +at first a sinecure. Later, and when the business had come to the +brink of failure, the burden fell upon him, and absorbed his whole +time and energies for nearly two years. His literary idling cannot be +said to have been due to this entanglement. In his view writing was +apparently little more than an agreeable indulgence which had brought +him some half-deserved praise, and a pleasant social recognition in +desirable quarters. One of the first results of his new connection was +a visit to Washington, ostensibly in the interests of the business. +The character of his services may be surmised from the fact that his +journey from New York to Washington, _via_ Philadelphia and +Baltimore, consumed nineteen days; and that was when the affairs of +the firm were in some straits, and supposed to be particularly in need +of representation at Washington. + +In 1812 he accepted the editorship of a periodical called "Select +Reviews," to which during the next two years he contributed various +critical and biographical articles. He found little to his liking in +the editorial and still less in the critical part of his work. "I do +not profess," he wrote, "the art and mystery of reviewing, and am not +ambitious of being wise or facetious at the expense of others." He was +never a good critic, for he was too soft-hearted, and too little in +conceit with his own judgment to give an unfavorable opinion. And this +was in the period of "slashing" criticism, when it was the proper +thing, unless an author could show good reason for being declared the +greatest man of the age, to hang, draw, and quarter him on the spot. +At about this time, Jeffrey of the "Edinburgh Review," a critic who +made the most of his prerogative, visited America. His coming was +heralded by Irving's friend Brevoort in a letter whose ludicrous +climax is worth quoting: "It is essential that Jeffrey may imbibe a +just estimate of the United States and its inhabitants.... Persuade +him to visit Washington _and by all means to see the falls of +Niagara_." Apparently Irving received the great Jeffrey with courtesy +and composure; as an equal, and not in the least as an idol to be +propitiated with gewgaws. + +It was an anxious time, the year 1813. The struggle with England had +assumed a more serious form. At last the British succeeded in entering +Washington, and destroyed most of the public buildings. Irving's +attitude had been uncompromisingly American from the outset. This act +of vandalism aroused his indignation; he promptly offered his services +to Governor Tompkins of New York, and was made an aide on his staff, +with the brevet rank of colonel. This position he held for four +months, when Governor Tompkins retired from the command. During that +time Irving showed much military zeal, and enough capacity to be +ordered to the front at Sackett's Harbor, at an important moment, with +powers of which he made creditable use. + +In the spring of 1815 he narrowly escaped sailing with Decatur on the +expedition to Algiers. It was largely by his advice that Decatur +decided to accept the command. Irving's trunks had been taken on board +the commodore's frigate when orders came from Washington delaying the +expedition. Irving was afraid that his presence might in some way +embarrass the commander, and left the ship at once. He was not to be +balked of Europe, however; he was ready to sail and the affairs of the +firm seemed to promise an easy competence. On May 25 he embarked for +Liverpool, with no very distinct plans, but with no expectation of +being long abroad. It was seventeen years before he saw America again. + +He reached Liverpool at a dramatic moment. Napoleon had fallen, and +the mail coaches were rushing through England with the news of +Waterloo. It was the sort of pageant which always roused Irving's +fancy. He was absorbed in the situation. + +His letters show that however he may have shrunk from concerning +himself with practical politics, he viewed the great _coups_ of +statecraft with the greatest interest. His sympathies are with +Bonaparte; the English were perhaps too recent enemies to be treated +quite charitably. "I have made a short visit to London," he wrote to +one of his brothers in July. "The spirits of this nation, as you may +suppose, are wonderfully elated by their successes on the Continent, +and English pride is inflated to its full distention by the idea of +having Paris at the mercy of Wellington and his army. The only thing +that annoys the honest mob is that old Louis will not cut throats and +lop off heads, and that Wellington will not blow up bridges and +monuments, and plunder palaces and galleries. As to Bonaparte, they +have disposed of him in a thousand ways; every fat-sided John Bull has +him dished up in a way to please his own palate, excepting that as yet +they have not observed the first direction in the famous receipt to +cook a turbot,--'First catchy our turbot.'" Then comes a postscript: +"The bells are ringing, and this moment news is brought that poor +Boney is a prisoner at Plymouth. _John has caught the turbot!_" + +Peter Irving was in charge of the firm's English office at Liverpool. +He was a bachelor, and Irving had to go to Birmingham, to the house of +his brother-in-law, Henry van Wart, to find an American home in +England. But he did not make his permanent escape from Liverpool so +easily. Not many months had passed before Peter fell ill, had to leave +Liverpool, and Irving was left in charge. For over eight months the +entire management of an ill-ordered establishment fell into his hands. +He seems to have made a thorough attempt to examine and arrange the +confusions of the office. He studied bookkeeping, so that he might get +some knowledge of the accounts, and otherwise busied himself in a +methodical way foreign to his habit. At last, in 1818, the best thing +possible under the circumstances happened,--the business collapsed, +and the brothers found a road out of their difficulties by way of the +bankruptcy court. It was a great relief. "For upwards of two years," +he wrote to Brevoort, "I have been bowed down in spirit, and harassed +by the most sordid cares. As yet, I trust, my mind has not lost its +elasticity, and I hope to recover some cheerful standing in the world. +Indeed, I feel very little solicitude about my own prospects. I trust +something will turn up to procure me subsistence, and am convinced, +however scanty and precarious may be my lot, I can bring myself to be +content. But I feel harassed in mind at times on behalf of my +brothers. It is a dismal thing to look round on the wrecks of such a +family connection. This is what, in spite of every exertion, will +sometimes steep my soul in bitterness." + +Irving had now fairly arrived at maturity. The experience of the last +few years had done much to sober him. He was still fond of society, +and still of a cheerful temper; but the absorbing sophomoric joy in +cakes and ale was now past and not to return. The pinch of necessity +had come at last: the world no longer offered him the life of an +elegant dawdler. He had a serious business before him,--to gain a +competency for himself and his brother. The unpractical younger +brother was to be after this the mainstay of the family fortunes. And +what especially makes this the finest moment of his life is the sudden +and clear perception that to gain this end he must depend upon the +steady and fruitful exercise of his gift for writing. It was not to be +taken up as a last resort, but as a matter of deliberate choice. +Presently he received the offer of a good position on the Navy Board +at Washington, with a salary of $2400. A few years earlier he would +have snatched at it. "Flattering as the prospect undoubtedly is which +your letters hold out," he wrote to his brother Ebenezer, "I have +concluded to decline it for various reasons.... The principal one is, +that I do not wish to undertake any situation that must involve me in +such a routine of duties as to prevent my attending to literary +pursuits." His determination was sturdy enough, but he was not then +nor afterward the master of his moods. "I have heard him say," notes +Pierre Irving, "that he was so disturbed by the responsibility he had +taken in refusing such an offer and trusting to the uncertain chances +of literary success, that for two months he could scarcely write a +line." His elder brothers were heartily disappointed by the decision. +They could not suppose that he would prove greatly more busy or +fruitful in the future than he had in the past, and up to this time, +he had done little enough. The youthful "Salmagundi" sketches, the +broad satire of the Knickerbocker History were not much for a man of +leisure to boast of at thirty-five. But they did not reckon justly +with the new seriousness which had come into his purposes. Washington +Irving was always fitful in his manner of working, often uncertain of +himself and of his work. But from this time on he had no doubt of his +calling; he had ceased to be a man about town, and become a man of +letters. + + + + +III + +MAN OF LETTERS--FIRST PERIOD + + +The appearance of the "Sketch Book," in 1819, marks the beginning of +Irving's professional life as a literary man. It was, moreover, the +first original literary work of moment by an American. Two years later +Bryant's first volume of poems was published, and Cooper's novels had +begun to appear; at this time Irving had the field to himself. Firm as +his determination was to depend upon writing for support, he was by no +means satisfied with what he was able to do. Even after the complete +"Sketch Book" had appeared, and had been met with hearty applause in +England and America, he continued to be doubtful of its merits, and +embarrassed by its reception. In sending the manuscript of the first +number to America, he wrote to his brother Ebenezer: "I have sent the +first number of a work which I hope to continue from time to time. I +send it more for the purpose of showing you what I am about, as I find +my declining the situation at Washington has given you chagrin. The +fact is, that situation would have given me barely a genteel +subsistence. It would have led to no higher situations, for I am quite +unfitted for political life. My talents are merely literary, and all +my habits of thinking, reading, etc., have been in a different +direction from that required by the active politician. It is a mistake +also to suppose I would fill an office there, and devote myself at the +same time to literature. I require much leisure, and a mind entirely +abstracted from other cares and occupations, if I would write much or +write well.... If I ever get any solid credit with the public, it must +be in the quiet and assiduous operations of my pen, under the mere +guidance of fancy or feeling.... I feel myself completely committed in +literary reputation by what I have already written; and I feel by no +means satisfied to rest my reputation on my preceding writings. I have +suffered several precious years of youth and lively imagination to +pass by unimproved, and it behooves me to make the most of what is +left. If I indeed have the means within me of establishing a +legitimate literary reputation, this is the very period of life most +auspicious for it, and I am resolved to devote a few years exclusively +to the attempt.... In fact, I consider myself at present as making a +literary experiment, in the course of which I only care to be kept in +bread and cheese. Should it not succeed--should my writings not +acquire critical applause, I am content to throw up the pen and take +to any commonplace employment. But if they should succeed, it would +repay me for a world of care and privation to be placed among the +established authors of my country, and to win the affections of my +countrymen.... Do not, I beseech you, impute my lingering in Europe to +any indifference to my own country or my friends.... I am determined +not to return home until I have sent some writings before me that +shall, if they have merit, make me return to the smiles, rather than +skulk back to the pity, of my friends." + +To Brevoort he wrote at the same time: "I have attempted no lofty +theme, nor sought to look wise and learned, which appears to be very +much the fashion among our American writers, at present. I have +preferred addressing myself to the feeling and fancy of the reader, +more than to his judgment. My writings, therefore, may appear light +and trifling in our country of philosophers and politicians; but if +they possess merit in the class of literature to which they belong, it +is all to which I aspire in the work. I seek only to blow a flute +accompaniment in the national concert, and leave others to play the +fiddle and French horn." + +The favorable reception of the "Sketch Book" not only failed to remove +his diffidence, but left him oppressed by a new sense of obligation to +the public which had lauded his work. This feeling is expressed in a +letter to Leslie, the painter, with whom he had become very intimate: +"I am glad to find the second number pleases more than the first. The +sale is very rapid, and, altogether, the success exceeds my most +sanguine expectation. Now you suppose I am all on the alert, full of +spirit and excitement. No such thing. I am just as good for nothing as +ever I was; and indeed I have been flurried and put out of my way by +these puffings. I feel something as I suppose you did when your +picture met with success--anxious to do something better, and at a +loss what to do." + +Murray, who a little later was eager to publish anything from Irving's +hand, declined to undertake the first English edition of the "Sketch +Book." Irving was afraid of some incomplete pirated edition, and +finally published the first number entirely at his own expense. Murray +was glad enough to change his mind and bring out the later numbers. +Among the many friends whom the young American had made in England was +Walter Scott. A few days spent by Irving at Abbotsford had been enough +to attach them strongly to each other. Scott had by no means outgrown +his interest in the author of the "Knickerbocker History," and Irving +found nothing that was not delightful in the great romancer's +character and way of life. "As to Scott," he wrote, "I cannot express +my delight at his character and manners. He is a sterling, +golden-hearted old worthy, full of the joyousness of youth, with an +imagination continually furnishing forth pictures, and a charming +simplicity of manner that puts you at ease with him in a moment. It +has been a constant source of pleasure to me to remark his deportment +towards his family, his neighbors, his domestics, his very dogs and +cats; everything that comes within his influence seems to catch a beam +of that sunshine that plays round his heart." Now, while the prospects +of the "Sketch Book" were still dubious, Scott offered him the +editorship of an Anti-Jacobin magazine. Irving declined it, first on +the ground of his dislike for politics, and second on account of his +irregular habits of mind. "My whole course of life has been desultory, +and I am unfitted for any periodically recurring task, or any +stipulated labor of body or mind. I have no command of my talents +such as they are, and have to watch the varyings of my mind as I would +a weathercock. Practice and training may bring me more into rule; but +at present I am as useless for regular service as one of my own +country Indians or a Don Cossack." + +In August of this year, Irving and his brother Peter left England for +the Continent. They had got no farther than Havre when their fancy was +taken with an apparent business opening for Peter, who had been idle +since the failure of the firm. A steamboat had just been put upon the +Seine, to run between Havre and Rouen. Peter should be a chief +stockholder and director; he and Washington would each put in $5000, +and between Havre and Rouen the river would presently run gold for +them. To be sure the money was yet to be found, but there were +brothers William and Ebenezer, who would no doubt be glad to help set +that little golden river flowing. Unfortunately brothers William and +Ebenezer did not approve of the scheme at all. They flatly refused to +lend brother Peter $5000, or to honor brother Washington's drafts for +the same amount. More unfortunately still, Irving had already +committed himself. All of his literary property had to be disposed of, +to provide the pledged amount, which was forthwith placed in the +little steamboat on the Seine, and never heard of more. Peter was +associated with the management, and kept busy, at least, for several +years. This was the first of a long series of business ventures which +made Irving's life uneasy. He would no sooner turn a few thousand by +writing than he must sink it in this or that absolutely safe and +immensely profitable enterprise. It was not for many years that he +learned how certainly he might count upon disastrous results from such +experiments. + +After the settlement of this affair, Irving took lodgings in Paris. +Here he met Tom Moore, and in his house more than anywhere else he +became intimate. Moore's diary makes frequent mention of him; one of +the most interesting entries records that Irving at this time wrote +in ten days one hundred and thirty pages of the "Sketch Book" size. +This was undoubtedly material for "Bracebridge Hall," the suggestion +of which had come from Moore. In the meantime the "Sketch Book" had +continued to gain ground in England. Byron admired it greatly, and its +popularity with the general public may be judged from the fact that it +was commonly attributed to Scott. Irving described himself in a letter +to Murray as leading "a 'miscellaneous' kind of life at Paris.... +Anacreon Moore is living here, and has made me a gayer fellow than I +could have wished; but I found it impossible to resist the charm of +his society." + +In July (1821) he returned to London, in poor physical condition. He +had now been tormented at intervals for several years by an eruptive +complaint which kept him from exercise, and brought on other troubles. +After his return he was bedridden for four or five months, most of +which he passed at his sister's house in Birmingham. He grew very fond +of his little nephews and nieces--particularly an urchin named +George, of whom his letters record such items as: "George has made his +appearance in a new pair of Grimaldi breeches, with pockets full as +deep as the former. To balance his ball and marbles, he has the +opposite pocket filled with a peg-top and a quantity of dry peas, so +that he can only lie comfortably on his back or belly." He was by no +means idle at this time. In January of the following year he sent the +manuscript of "Bracebridge Hall" to his brother Ebenezer with the +remark, "My health is still unrestored. This work has kept me from +getting well, and my indisposition on the other hand has retarded the +work. I have now been about five weeks in London, and have only once +been out of doors, about a month since, and that made me worse." That +single escape from the sick-room, his biographer says, was made for +the sake of persuading Murray to publish Cooper's "Spy," which had +already appeared in America. Irving's own experience was duplicated: +Murray refused to take "The Spy," but was glad to publish Cooper's +later work. He now gave Irving a thousand guineas for the English +rights in "Bracebridge Hall." It was less than he might have given, +but Irving could never be persuaded to haggle over prices. He seems to +have agreed with Peter, who wrote cheerfully, "A thousand guineas has +a golden sound." It was the amount which had been sunk in poor Peter's +steamboat, which was still making its unprofitable trips up and down +the Seine; and two hundred guineas of this thousand soon passed into +his pocket, where no doubt he found their melody even pleasanter. + +"Bracebridge Hall" was well received; and confirmed its author's +reputation, especially in England. He had only to be passive to find +himself overwhelmed with social engagements. A more liberal diet and +plenty of exercise had improved his condition, and for a month or so +after getting rid of "Bracebridge Hall," he gave himself up to the +engagements of a London season. But his ankles soon began to trouble +him again, and in July, 1822, he set out for Aix-la-Chapelle, where +he hoped to get permanent relief from his distressing complaint. He +found nothing to keep him long at Aix. The baths and waters were well +enough, but he was too dependent upon cheerful companionship to endure +life among a company of invalids. He began a leisurely round of the +Continental watering-places, staying a few weeks here and a few days +there, and gradually improving in condition. Toward the close of the +year he brought up at Dresden. + +The only touch of mystery which belongs to the story of Irving is +connected with this six months' stay at Dresden. He made many friends +there, and grew especially intimate with an English family named +Foster, a mother and two daughters. It is said--and denied--that he +would have liked to marry the youngest daughter, Emily. His biographer +insists that there was nothing in the affair but friendship. To Mrs. +Foster he wrote the only account he ever gave of his early love and +loss; and his nephew quotes the closing passage as proof that he had +no thought of marrying Emily Foster, however fond of her he may have +been: "You wonder why I am not married. I have shown you why I was not +long since. When I had sufficiently recovered from that loss, I became +involved in ruin. It was not for a man broken down in the world, to +drag down any woman to his paltry circumstances. I was too proud to +tolerate the idea of ever mending my circumstances by matrimony. My +time has now gone by; and I have growing claims upon my thoughts and +upon my means, slender and precarious as they are. I feel as if I had +already a family to think and provide for." + +But this might be the modest speech of a middle-aged lover. Years +later the written reminiscences of the two daughters unmistakably +impute the attentions of the brilliant American to something more than +friendliness. It is certain that he had a very warm feeling for +somebody or something in Dresden, which led to a temporary return of +his youthful delight in society. For his time was by no means given up +to the Fosters. He was received into the life of the little German +court, and evidently derived such pleasure as is proper to a +Republican from dancing with princesses, and acting in private +theatricals with Highnesses and Excellencies. On the whole it seems to +have been a peaceful, idle, rather trivial time of sojourn among +congenial people. He danced, he strolled, he wrote verses to little +Miss Emily; in short, he enjoyed himself as a youngish man may, +whether the muse is waiting for him, or some less high-flown customer. +"I wish I could give you a good account of my literary labors," he +wrote his sister after several months in Dresden, "but I have nothing +to report. I am merely seeing, and hearing, and my mind seems in too +crowded and confused a state to produce anything. I am getting very +familiar with the German language; and there is a lady here who is so +kind as to give me lessons every day in Italian [Mrs. Foster], which +language I have nearly forgotten, but which I am fast regaining. +Another lady is superintending my French [Miss Emily Foster], so that +if I am not acquiring ideas, I am at least acquiring a variety of +modes of expressing them when they do come." Very likely the confusion +of his mind was not lessened by the frequency of those French lessons. +There really seems to be no reason for doubting the testimony of the +elder sister's journal; "He has written. He has confessed to my +mother, as to a dear and true friend, his love for E----, and his +conviction of its utter hopelessness. He feels himself unable to +combat it. He thinks he must try, by absence, to bring more peace to +his mind.... He has almost resolved to make a tour in Silesia, which +will keep him absent for a few weeks." The tour in Silesia was +certainly made; and during the brief absence Irving wrote sundry +sentimental letters to Mrs. Foster. There are occasions when he seems +to imagine a pretty daughter looking over the admirable mother's +shoulder, and being much affected by the famous author's tenderness +for Dresden. Presently he comes back to be their escort, for they are +going home to England; and at Rotterdam the good-bys are said. They +met afterward in England, but the old intimacy was gone. + +More than thirty years after, Irving had a letter from a Mrs. Emily +Fuller, whose name he did not know. Pleasantly and discreetly it +recalled those happy Emily Foster days in Dresden. "She addresses him +because she hopes that her eldest boy Henry may have the happiness and +advantage of meeting him." Poor Irving! Her eldest boy Henry.... Well, +the sting was all gone by that time, fortunately. His reply is all +that it ought to be, and nothing more. + +Those first days in Paris were not cheerful ones for Irving. His +pleasant dream was over, and he had forgotten what to do with waking +moments. His memorandum-book records that he felt oppressed by "a +strange horror on his mind--a dread of future evil--of failure in +future literary attempts--a dismal foreboding that he could not drive +off by any effort of reason." "When I once get going again with my +pen," he wrote to Peter, "I mean to keep on steadily, until I can +scrape together enough to produce a regular income, however moderate. +We shall then be independent of the world and its chances." But he +could not manage to get going. For some time he could write nothing at +all. Fortunately, after an unprofitable month or two, he fell in with +John Howard Payne, now remembered only for his "Home, Sweet Home," but +then esteemed as an actor and dramatist. Irving had met him several +years before, and now became associated with him in some dramatic +translating and adapting. The results were nearly worthless from a +literary point of view, but served to keep him busy, and to put him +once more in the writing vein. + +For some time Murray had been pressing him hard for copy, and in the +spring of 1824 the "Tales of a Traveler" were completed and sent to +press. After the task of proof-reading came a reaction of high spirits +which expressed itself in the most amusing letter Irving ever wrote:-- + +"BRIGHTON, August 14, 1824. + + "My boat is on the shore, + And my bark is on the sea. + +"I forget how the song ends, but here I am at Brighton just on the +point of embarking for France. I have dragged myself out of London, +as a horse drags himself out of the slough, or a fly out of a +honey-pot, almost leaving a limb behind him at every tug. Not that I +have been immersed in pleasure and surrounded by sweets, but rather up +to the ears in ink and harassed by printers' devils. + +"I never have had such fagging in altering, adding, and correcting; +and I have been detained beyond all patience by the delays of the +press. Yesterday I absolutely broke away, without waiting for the last +sheets. They are to be sent after me here by mail, to be corrected +this morning, or else they must take their chance. From the time I +first started pen in hand on this work, it has been nothing but hard +driving with me. + +"I have not been able to get to Tunbridge to see the Donegals, which I +really and greatly regret. Indeed I have seen nobody except a friend +or two who had the kindness to hunt me out. Among these was Mr. Story, +and I ate a dinner there that it took me a week to digest, having been +obliged to swallow so much hard-favored nonsense from a loud-talking +baronet whose name, thank God, I forget, but who maintained Byron was +not a man of courage, and therefore his poetry was not readable. I was +really afraid he would bring John Story to the same way of thinking. + +"I went a few evenings since to see Kenney's new piece, the Alcaid. It +went off lamely, and the Alcaid is rather a bore, and comes near to be +generally thought so. Poor Kenney came to my room next evening, and I +could not believe that one night could have ruined a man so +completely. I swear to you I thought at first it was a flimsy suit of +clothes had left some bedside and walked into my room without waiting +for the owner to get up; or that it was one of those frames on which +clothiers stretch coats at their shop doors; until I perceived a thin +face sticking edgeways out of the collar of the coat like the axe in a +bundle of fasces. He was so thin, and pale, and nervous, and +exhausted--he made a dozen difficulties in getting over a spot in the +carpet, and never would have accomplished it if he had not lifted +himself over by the points in his shirt-collar. + +"I saw Rogers just as I was leaving town. I had not time to ask him +any particulars about you, and indeed he is not exactly the man from +whom I would ask news about my friends. I dined tete-a-tete with him +some time ago, and he served up his friends as he served up his fish, +with a squeeze of lemon over each. It was very piquant, but it rather +set my teeth on edge.... + +"Farewell, my dear Moore. Let me hear from you, if but a line; +particularly if my work pleases you, but don't say a word against it. +I am easily put out of humor with what I do." + +Surely no more delicious bit of nonsense was ever written than the +description of poor Kenney. Moore read it to a group of friends in the +presence of the victim--a situation which would have been too +"piquant" for Irving's taste. + +Moore had only the desired praise for the "Tales of a Traveler," but +elsewhere it did not fare so well. Irving considered it on the whole +his best work; but though it had a large sale, its reception in +England was not quite what he had hoped for; and in America it was +received by the press with something like hostility. Unfortunately +some busybody in America made it his concern to forward to Irving all +the ill-natured flings which could be gleaned from American notices of +the new book. The incident--with all its unpleasantness--was trifling +enough, but to Irving's raw sensitiveness it was torture. He was +overwhelmed with an almost ludicrous melancholy, could not write, +could not sleep, could not bear to be alone. This petty outburst of +critical spleen, backed as it evidently was by personal antagonism on +the part of a few obscure journalists, actually left him dumb for more +than a year. + +Of course the public was right in its general estimate of the "Tales +of a Traveler": they are not as good as the "Sketch Book." In kind +they are similar--that in itself would be enough to excite prejudice +against new work from an author who had been so long before the +public; but they are also undeniably inferior in quality. One or two +of the stories are distinctly morbid in tone, several give the +impression of being long drawn out. In some way the collection lacks +atmosphere; Italian scenery is painted with accuracy, but not Italian +life or character. Irving could draw the early Dutch in America, or +the mediaeval Moors in Spain, or the Englishman in England or Italy: +the modern Italian on his own soil he did not know except in his +melodramatic exterior. + +Irving had now given his brother Peter a place in his little menage. +The steamboat scheme had failed utterly, and he had from this time on +no sort of regular employment. Irving set himself cheerfully to +provide for both. His goal at this time was less fame than +fortune--"by every exertion to attain sufficient to make us both +independent for the rest of our lives." Not for many years did he come +to perceive that a life of leisure was not only impossible, but +undesirable for him, and to express it as his fondest wish that he +might "die in harness." The profits of the "Tales of a Traveler" went +the way of most of his earnings--this time to help develop a Bolivia +copper mine. + +He had been studying Spanish for a year or two, and had an increased +desire to see Spain. As a mere aid in traveling, he asked for the +nominal post of attache to the American legation at Madrid. Alexander +H. Everett, then minister to Spain, at once granted the request, and +in replying suggested a possible literary task--the translation of a +new Spanish work, Navarrete's "Voyages of Columbus," which was shortly +to make its appearance. Murray, who was then in some difficulties, did +not think favorably of the project. + +Irving went to Madrid, and by good fortune got lodgings with the +American consul Rich, who had made an extensive private collection of +documents dealing with early American history. Presently Navarrete's +work was published, and found to be "rather a mass of rich materials +for history than a history itself." This was in February, 1826. Irving +at once began to take notes and sift materials for an original history +of Columbus. For six months he worked incessantly. "Sometimes," says +his biographer, "he would write all day and until twelve at night; in +one instance his note-book shows him to have written from five in the +morning until eight at night, stopping only for meals." + + + + +IV + +MAN OF LETTERS--SECOND PERIOD + + +There is something interesting, and in a sense pathetic, in this +sudden steady diligence from the man of desultory habits, who had +never written but by whim, whose finger had always been lifted to +catch the lightest literary airs. Here, at last, was the firm trade +wind, and the satisfaction of steady and methodical progress. The +qualified success of the "Tales of a Traveler" had led him to feel +that his vein was running out. The prospect of producing a solid work +gave him keen pleasure. One cannot be always building castles in the +air; why not try a pyramid, if only a little one? Since the world is +perfectly delighted with our pretty things, very well, let us show +that we can do a sublime thing. As for history--"Whatever may be the +use of this sort of composition in itself and abstractedly," says +Walter Bagehot, "it is certainly of great use relatively and to +literary men. Consider the position of a man of that species. He sits +beside a library fire, with nice white paper, a good pen, a capital +style--every means of saying everything, but nothing to say. Of course +he is an able man; of course he has an active intellect, besides +wonderful culture: but still, one cannot always have original ideas. +Every day cannot be an era; a train of new speculation very often will +not be found: and how dull it is to make it your business to write, to +stay by yourself in a room to write, and then to have nothing to say! +It is dreary work mending seven pens, and waiting for a theory to +'turn up.' What a gain if something would happen! then one could +describe it. Something has happened, and that something is history." + +There is no doubt that Irving's early delicate sallies in literature +represent his best. In a single department of belles-lettres he had +shown mastery. During the remainder of his life he continued to work +at intervals in that field with similar felicity; and, for the rest, +to write amiably and respectably upon many topics foreign to his +natural bent. But his greatest work was done in odd moments and at a +heat; all the method in the world could not increase his real stature +by a cubit. + +A word may perhaps be said here of Irving as an historian and +biographer. Of course he could not write dully; his histories are just +as readable as Goldsmith's, and rather more veracious. But he plainly +had not the scholar's training and methods which we now demand of the +historian; nor had he the larger view of men and events in their +perspective. Generalization was beyond him. Fortunately to generalize +is only a part of the business of the historian. To catch some dim +historic figure, and give it life and color,--this power he had. And +it was evidently this which gave him the praise of such men as +Prescott and Bancroft and Motley. Washington had begun to loom vaguely +and impersonally in the mind, a mere great man, when Irving with a +touch turned him from cold bronze into flesh and blood again. + +During the years of Irving's stay abroad other American writers had +come into notice. Bryant's poetry had become well known. Cooper had +produced "The Spy," "The Pilot," "The Pioneers," and "The Last of the +Mohicans." In 1827 appeared the first volume of poems by Edgar Allan +Poe. In this year, too, Irving's diary records a meeting with +Longfellow, who was then twenty-one, and came abroad to prepare +himself for his professorship at Bowdoin. Longfellow's recollection of +the incident is worth quoting: "I had the pleasure of meeting Mr. +Irving in Spain, and found the author, whom I had loved, repeated in +the man. The same playful humor; the same touches of sentiment; the +same poetic atmosphere; and, what I admired still more, the entire +absence of all literary jealousy, of all that mean avarice of fame, +which counts what is given to another as so much taken from one's +self-- + + "'And trembling, hears in every breeze + The laurels of Miltiades.'" + +In the following summer the "History of Columbus" was finished, and +sold to Murray. It won high praise from the reviewers, especially from +Alexander H. Everett, his former diplomatic chief, and at this time +editor of the "North American Review." + +Early in the following year he made his first visit to Andalusian +Spain. In the course of his grubbing among the Columbus archives, he +had found a good deal of interesting material about the Moorish +occupancy. The beauty of the country and the grandeur of its Moorish +relics took strong hold upon him. In April, 1828, he settled in +Seville, and there the "Chronicles of the Conquest of Granada" were +written. By this time the market price of his wares had gone up very +much. There is no doubt that his historical work had increased his +temporary reputation. Murray gave him 2000 guineas for the "Conquest +of Granada;" he further offered him L1000 a year to edit a new +literary and scientific magazine, as well as L100 an article for any +contribution he might choose to make to the "London Quarterly." He +refused the first offer on the ground that he did not care to be tied +in England, the second because the "Quarterly" had always been hostile +to America. He continued to take an interest in affairs at home. +Impatient as he was of political methods, he had opinions of his own +as to candidates and measures. The election of Jackson called forth +the following comment in a letter to Mr. Everett: "I was rather sorry +when Mr. Adams was first raised to the presidency, but I am much more +so at his being displaced; for he has made a far better president than +I expected, and I am loth to see a man superseded who has filled his +station worthily. These frequent changes in our administration are +prejudicial to the country; we ought to be wary of using our power of +changing our chief magistrate when the welfare of the country does not +require it. In the present election there has, doubtless, been much +honest, warm, grateful feeling toward Jackson, but I fear much pique, +passion, and caprice as it respects Mr. Adams. + +"Since the old general was to be the man, however, I am well pleased +upon the whole that he has a great majority, as it will, for the +reasons you mention, produce a political calm in the country, and lull +those angry passions which have been exasperated during the Adams +administration, by the close contest of nearly balanced parties. As to +the old general, with all his _hickory_ characteristics, I suspect he +has good stuff in him, and will make a sagacious, independent, and +high-spirited president; and I doubt his making so high-handed a one +as many imagine." + +The "Chronicles of the Conquest of Granada" were well treated by +critics, but never very popular. The humor of the mythical Fray +Antonio's narrative was too sly and covert; the public was mystified, +and had half a notion it was being made game of. But Irving was not +yet done with Granada. Presently he went back, and in the course of a +solitary two months in the Alhambra, got together the materials for +the most characteristic work he had published since the "Tales of a +Traveler" and the strongest since the "Sketch Book." His idyllic stay +in the Alhambra was one of the pleasantest episodes of his life. When +it was cut short by his appointment as secretary of legation at +London, he made up his mind to leave the quiet breathing-spot with +real regret. One cannot help seeing from the tone of his letter to +Peter that the years have given him as much as they have taken away: +"My only horror is the bustle and turmoil of the world: how shall I +stand it after the delicious quiet and repose of the Alhambra? I had +intended, however, to quit this place before long, and, indeed, was +almost reproaching myself for protracting my sojourn, having little +better than sheer self-indulgence to plead for it; for the effect of +the climate, the air, the serenity and sweetness of the place, is +almost as seductive as that of the Castle of Indolence, and I feel at +times an impossibility of working, or of doing anything but yielding +to a mere voluptuousness of sensation." + +At London he found himself associated with congenial men, but tied so +closely to the legation that he could not even get away to visit his +sister at Birmingham. The constraint chafed him at first, but before +long his letters show him reconciled, and even interested in the +practical business of diplomacy. They complain, however, of his +growing stout. This, indeed, he had a perfect right to do. He was now +forty-seven years old, and a man of solid reputation; weighty honors +were being heaped upon him. Before leaving Spain he had been made a +member of the Spanish Royal Academy of History; and in England he had +just received a medal from the Royal Society of Literature, and the +degree of LL. D. from Oxford. His leisure for literary work was not +great in London, but he was making some progress with the Alhambra +stories, and had begun to think seriously of the "Life of Washington," +which was to hold the main place in his thoughts for the rest of his +life. + +At this time England was suffering under the double discomfort of +cholera and the Reform Bill. A letter from Irving to his brother +shows that even in the midst of his successes the popular author was +subject to moods of mental gloom, and even to business difficulties: +"The restlessness and uncertainty in which I have been kept have +disordered my mind and feelings too much for imaginative writing, and +I now doubt whether I could get the Alhambra ready in time for +Christmas.... The present state of things here completely discourages +the idea of publication of any kind. There is no knowing who among the +booksellers is safe. Those who have published most are worst off, for +in this time of public excitement nobody reads books or buys them." + +In 1831, Van Buren was nominated as Minister to the Court of St. +James, and at once took charge of his diplomatic duties. His +nomination was rejected by the Senate, however; and Irving determined +to take advantage of the incident to make his own escape from the +service, and return at last to America. + +In May, 1831, he arrived in New York. He had been a young man when he +left America; he was now leaning toward the farther verge of his +prime. In character he had refined and sobered greatly; and he had +more than fulfilled his promise of literary excellence. He had still +twenty-six years to live, and was to do much useful service in life +and letters; but he could do nothing in that time to alter his +reputation; he could merely confirm it. Irving had grown immensely, +too, in the favor of his countrymen. He was welcomed back with +extravagant effusion by his old friends and by the country at large. +He had in fact come to be regarded as one of the chief glories of +America; for he had been the first to make her a world-power in +literature. + +During those seventeen years New York had changed almost beyond +recognition in size, in appearance, in the tone of its life; but +Irving was delighted with everything and everybody. All that he had to +regret was the ordeal of a great public dinner in his honor, at which, +after a great deal of preliminary nervousness, he made the one speech +of his life. It was a good speech, but he could never be prevailed +upon to repeat the experiment. He was always at his worst in a large +company. The sight of a great number of unknown or half-known faces +confused his thoughts and clogged his tongue. His intimates knew him +for a brilliant and ready talker, full of easy fun and unaffected +sentiment. + +Not long after his return, the "Tales of the Alhambra" were published. +In the somewhat florid concert of critical praises which greeted the +book, a simple theme is dominant. Everybody felt that in these stories +Irving had come back to his own. The material was very different from +that of the "Sketch Book," yet it yielded to similar treatment. The +grace, romance, humor, of this "beautiful Spanish Sketch Book," as the +historian Prescott called it, appealed at once to an audience which +had listened somewhat coldly to the less spontaneous "Tales of a +Traveler," and had given a formal approbation to the "History of +Columbus," without finding very much Irving in it. + +A visit to Washington to clear up various odds and ends of his +diplomatic experience resulted in an interview with President Jackson, +which he reported in a letter to Peter Irving, now living alone in +Paris: "I have been most kindly received by the old general, with whom +I am much pleased as well as amused. As his admirers say, he is truly +an _old Roman_--to which I could add, _with a little dash of the +Greek_; for I suspect he is as _knowing_ as I believe he is _honest_. +I took care to put myself promptly on a fair and independent footing +with him; for, in expressing warmly and sincerely how much I had been +gratified by the unsought but most seasonable mark of confidence he +had shown me, when he hinted something about a disposition to place me +elsewhere, I let him know emphatically that I wished for nothing +more--that my whole desire was to live among my countrymen, and to +follow my usual pursuits. In fact, I am persuaded that my true course +is to be master of myself and of my time. Official station cannot add +to my happiness or respectability, and certainly would stand in the +way of my literary career." This disinclination to take office he +never got over, although he was frequently approached with offers of +place. In 1834, he was offered a nomination for Congress by the +Jackson party; in 1838, he was offered the Tammany nomination as mayor +of New York, and the secretaryship of the navy by Van Buren. And when +three years later he was given a still more important post, it was +only the evident spontaneity of the choice, and the feeling that in +taking the office he should be representing country rather than party, +which led him to accept it. + +Impatient as he was of political methods, he had opinions of his own +on specific questions, and a broad political platform which he once +stated in a letter to his old friend Kemble:-- + +"As far as I know my own mind, I am thoroughly a republican, and +attached, from complete conviction, to the institutions of my country; +but I am a republican without gall, and have no bitterness in my +creed. I have no relish for puritans either in religion or politics, +who are for pushing principles to an extreme, and for overturning +everything that stands in the way of their own zealous career. I have, +therefore, felt a strong distaste for some of those loco-foco +luminaries who of late have been urging strong and sweeping measures, +subversive of the interests of great classes of the community. Their +doctrines may be excellent in theory, but, if enforced in violent and +uncompromising opposition to all our habitudes, may produce the most +distressing effects. The best of remedies must be cautiously applied, +and suited to the state and constitution of the patient; otherwise, +what is intended to cure, may produce convulsion. The late elections +have shown that the measures proposed by Government are repugnant to +the feelings and habitudes or disastrous to the interests of great +portions of our fellow citizens. They should not, then, be forced home +with rigor. Ours is a government of compromise. We have several great +and distinct interests bound up together, which, if not separately +consulted and severally accommodated, may harass and impair each +other. A stern, inflexible, and uniform policy may do for a small +compact republic, like one of those of ancient Greece, where there is +a unity of character, habits, and interests; but a more accommodating, +discriminating, and variable policy must be observed in a vast +republic like ours, formed of a variety of states widely differing in +habits, pursuits, characters, and climes, and banded together by a few +general ties. + +"I always distrust the soundness of political councils that are +accompanied by acrimonious and disparaging attacks upon any great +class of our fellow citizens. Such are those urged to the disadvantage +of the great trading and financial classes of our country. You +yourself know, from education and experience, how important these +classes are to the prosperous conduct of the complicated affairs of +this immense empire. You yourself know, in spite of all the +commonplace cant and obloquy that has been cast upon them by political +spouters and scribblers, what general good faith and fair dealing +prevails throughout these classes." + +At this time he was studying with increasing interest the shifting +spectacle of American life. The openings of the West especially caught +his imagination, and when the chance came to travel on what was then +the frontier, the trans-Mississippi territories, he was quick to +accept it. As guest of one of the members of a commission appointed to +treat with several Indian tribes, he went as far as Fort Gibson on the +Arkansas. The literary fruits of this journey were "A Tour on the +Prairies," and "The Adventures of Captain Bonneville." + +In April, 1833, he bought the little estate of Sunnyside, near the +Sleepy Hollow which he had made famous. His first name for it was "The +Roost" (Dutch for "Rest"), which he changed for reasons which are not +recorded; possibly the little nieces who became regular inmates may +have thought the old name not dignified enough. This he regarded as +his home for the rest of his life. He set to work at once to enlarge +the old Dutch stone cottage which stood upon the place; and from this +time on he is continually "puttering" about the estate, building a +poultry-yard here, planting trees there, with the full zeal of the +rural landlord. His family letters are given to accounts of little +country doings: "The goose war is happily terminated: Mr. Jones' +squadron has left my waters, and my feathered navy now plows the +Tappan Sea in triumph. I cannot but attribute this great victory to +the valor and good conduct of the enterprising little duck, who seems +to enjoy great power and popularity among both geese and ganders, and +absolutely to be the master of the fleet.... I am happy to inform you +that, among the many other blessings brought to the cottage by the +good Mr. Lawrence is a pig of first-rate stock and lineage. It has +been duly put in possession of the palace in the rear of the barn, +where it is shown to every visitor with as much pride as if it was the +youngest child of a family. As it is of the fair sex, and in the +opinion of the best judges a pig of peerless beauty, I have named it +'Fanny.' I know it is a name which with Kate and you has a romantic +charm, and about the cottage everything, as old Mrs. Marthing says, +must be romance." This was during the vogue of Fanny Kemble. + +In this quiet retreat the next five uneventful years were passed, with +occasional excursions to New York or farther, which only served to +make the seclusion of the country home more inviting. Peter Irving +spent his last days at the Roost; and Ebenezer Irving and his family +gave up their New York house to make their home with the now famous +brother. While this arrangement greatly increased Irving's +satisfaction in life, it made heavy demands upon his purse. One cannot +be a country gentleman for nothing. The cottage had to be enlarged +repeatedly, the grounds cared for; and the mere running expenses were +a considerable matter for a man without dependable income. Irving had +by this time received a great deal of money for his books, but an +unfortunate "knack of hoping" had locked up most of it in unprofitable +land speculations. + +In 1835 the three volumes of the "Crayon Miscellanies," were +published. The "Tour on the Prairies" was especially palatable to +Americans. Edward Everett said of it, in the highly colored style of +the period: "We are proud of Mr. Irving's sketches of English life, +proud of the gorgeous canvas upon which he has gathered in so much of +the glowing imagery of Moorish times. We behold with delight his easy +and triumphant march over these beaten fields; but we glow with +rapture as we see him coming back, laden with the poetical treasures +of the primitive wilderness, rich with spoil from the uninhabited +desert." + +The second volume, containing "Abbotsford" and "Newstead Abbey," +naturally gained special praise in England; the third, "Legends of the +Conquest of Spain," had comparatively little success. + +Of "Astoria" (1836) it is hard to know what to say; on the whole, it +seems the most doubtful of his works in motive and quality. John Jacob +Astor, now an old man, was anxious to perpetuate the fame of his +commercial exploits, and was lucky enough to subsidize for this +purpose the most prominent American writer of the day. The adventures +of the various expeditions sent out to found an American trading +company on the Pacific coast are interesting; but one puts down +Irving's account of them with the feeling that it reflects rather more +credit on Mr. Astor than on the writer. The truth is, Irving, like +many less successful literary men, was constantly in need of money; +and he had begun to be in some difficulty for subjects upon which to +exercise his craft. The "Adventures of Captain Bonneville" (1837) was +also a piece of skillful book-making rather than an original creative +work; and after that nearly two years passed without his writing +anything. + +At last, toward the close of 1838, he hit upon a subject which +attracted him greatly--a "History of the Conquest of Mexico." He began +at once upon preliminary studies, and had made considerable progress +when he learned by chance that Prescott, who had recently made a name +for himself by his "Ferdinand and Isabella," was at work upon the +same subject. Irving immediately retired from the field, and conveyed +a courteous assurance to Prescott of his satisfaction in leaving the +theme to such hands. He felt this sacrifice keenly, however; the +project had appealed to him peculiarly, and he had no other in mind to +take its place. For lack of other literary work, therefore, he +presently engaged to write a monthly article for the New York +"Knickerbocker," at a salary of $2000 a year. The arrangement was just +not too irksome to continue for two years. + +It is easy to see, then, that at fifty-five Irving was pretty well +written out. In the twenty years that remained to him he produced +nothing of account except the "Life of Washington," which, like his +other works in biography and history, may be regarded as a _tour de +force_ rather than a spontaneous outcome of his genius. + + + + +V + +A PUBLIC CHARACTER + + +The data of Irving's literary achievements have been brought near a +conclusion; what remains to be said may now deal less with what he +wrote, and more with what he did and was. It is luckily unnecessary to +try for a sharply drawn distinction between his popularity as a writer +and as a man. In his home, in society, and in literature the single +charm of his personality had made him beloved in the same way. And he +had become, in the best sense of the term, a public character. For +many years his name had been better known abroad than that of any +other living American; and his reception at home after an absence of +seventeen years showed in what regard his countrymen had come to hold +him. Their pride in his success and gratitude for the new fame he had +given a country which was still felt to be on probation, can hardly +account for it; only the confidence of affection could have excused so +prolonged an absenteeism. + +His peculiar hold upon popular affection cannot be better suggested +than by the tone of a letter written by the only Englishman who during +Irving's life could pretend to rival him in his peculiar field. In +1841, Irving wrote to Dickens, expressing pleasure in his work. +Dickens replied: "There is no man in the world who could have given me +the heartfelt pleasure you have, by your kind note of the 13th of last +month. There is no living writer, and there are very few among the +dead, whose approbation I should feel so proud to earn. And with +everything you have written upon my shelves, and in my thoughts, and +in my heart of hearts, I may honestly and truly say so.... I wish I +could find in your welcome letter some hint of an intention to visit +England. I can't. I have held it at arm's length, and taken a bird's +eye view of it, after reading it a great many times, but there is no +greater encouragement in it this way than on a microscopic +inspection. I should love to go with you--as I have gone, God knows +how often--into Little Britain, and Eastcheap, and Green Arbor Court, +and Westminster Abbey. I should like to travel with you, outside the +last of the coaches, down to Bracebridge Hall. It would make my heart +glad to compare notes with you about that shabby gentleman in the +oilcloth hat and red nose, who sat in the nine-cornered back parlor of +the Masons' Arms; and about Robert Preston, and the tallow chandler's +widow, whose sitting-room is second nature to me; and about all those +delightful places and people that I used to walk about and dream of in +the daytime, when a very small and not over-particularly-taken-care-of +boy. I have a good deal to say, too, about that dashing Alonzo de +Ojeda, that you can't help being fonder of than you ought to be; and +much to hear concerning Moorish legend and poor, unhappy Boabdil. +Diedrich Knickerbocker I have worn to death in my pocket, and yet I +should show you his mutilated carcass with a joy past all +expression." + +Not long afterward Dickens visited America. Irving and he saw much of +each other, though they did not meet many times. Irving presided at a +great dinner given to Boz in New York, broke down in his introductory +speech, and otherwise endeared himself to his brother author. When +presently Dickens went back, he wrote, "I did not come to see you, for +I really have not the heart to say 'good-by' again, and felt more than +I can tell you when we shook hands last Wednesday." + +Pretty soon Irving himself was leaving America. In February, 1842, he +was startled from the home quiet of Sunnyside by a summons which he +could not disregard. Daniel Webster, then Secretary of State, had +secured his appointment as Minister to Spain. The Senate confirmed it +almost by acclamation, and letters came from various quarters urging +him to accept it. He could not doubt that the wish was general. But it +was very hard for him to leave home and America again. For some time +after accepting the post he was plunged into a dejection which seemed +laughable to himself. "The crowning honor of his life," he admitted, +had come to him, and he could only groan under it. + +"'It is hard, very hard,' he half murmured to himself, half to me; yet +he added whimsically enough, being struck with the seeming absurdity +of such a view, 'I must try to bear it. God tempers the wind to the +shorn lamb'" (P. M. Irving). + +In April he sailed from New York, and made a leisurely journey by way +of England and France, not reaching Madrid till the end of July. +Europe had lost its old charm. Many places reminded him painfully of +the favorite brother Peter who had shared his first impressions of +them, and whose loss was one of the keenest griefs of his life. "My +visit to Europe has by no means the charm of former visits," he wrote +from Paris; "scenes and objects have no longer the effect of novelty +with me. I am no longer curious to see great sights or great people, +and have been so long accustomed to a life of quiet, that I find the +turmoil of the world becomes irksome to me. Then I have a house of my +own, a little domestic world, created in a manner by my own hand, +which I have left behind, and which is continually haunting my +thoughts, and coming in contrast with the noisy, tumultuous, heartless +world in which I am called to mingle. However, I am somewhat of a +philosopher, and can accommodate myself to changes, so I shall +endeavor to resign myself to the splendor of courts and the +conversation of courtiers, comforting myself with the thought that the +time will come when I shall once more return to sweet little +Sunnyside, and be able to sit on a stone fence, and talk about +politics and rural affairs with Neighbor Forkel and Uncle Brom." + +At Madrid he very soon found himself too much occupied for the +literary work he had counted on. He had accepted the place under the +impression that his duties would not greatly interfere with the +writing of the "Life of Washington," on which he was then fairly +launched. But from the beginning he found the situation in Spain +unexpectedly absorbing. It was the usual Spanish situation, to be +sure: a designing pretender, a child monarch, a court honeycombed with +intrigue, and a people ready for anything spectacular. When Irving was +presented to the young queen, she was closely guarded. "On ascending +the grand staircase, we found the portal at the head of it, opening +into the royal suite of apartments, still bearing the marks of the +midnight attack upon the palace in October last, when an attempt was +made to get possession of the persons of the little queen and her +sister, to carry them off.... The marble casements of the doors had +been shattered in several places, and the double doors themselves +pierced all over with bullet-holes, from the musketry that played upon +them from the staircase during that eventful night. What must have +been the feelings of those poor children, on listening from their +apartment to the horrid tumult, the outcries of a furious multitude, +and the reports of fire-arms, echoing and reverberating through the +vaulted halls and spacious courts of the immense edifice, and dubious +whether their own lives were not the object of the assault!" Such an +appeal to Irving's sympathy and chivalry was enough to deprive the +situation of its quality of opera-bouffe. + +Presently an insurrection takes place in Barcelona. The regent hurries +off to quell it, and Irving's letters are full of the pomp and +circumstance of war. The regent is successful, and returns apparently +firmer than ever in power. But a few months later the trouble breaks +out again, more seriously; Madrid is placed in a state of siege, and +martial law declared. The life of the queen is thought to be in +danger, and the diplomatic corps, headed by Irving, offers its +services for her protection. Finally the regent is driven out of +power, and blows are once again succeeded by intrigue. Such, briefly, +was the character of the little drama in which the quiet American +author was to take a significant part, during his whole ministry. This +Spanish experience is fully recorded in his family letters. He was +always a voluminous letter-writer; during this period he is fairly +encyclopedic. A single letter to his sister fills thirteen closely +printed pages of his nephew's biography. His official dispatches, too, +were very full and thorough. Webster valued them particularly, and +remarked that he "always laid aside every other correspondence to read +a diplomatic dispatch from Mr. Irving." He had time, too, for many +charming chatty letters to the nieces at Sunnyside. Here is a +Thackerayish passage from one of them: "You seem to pity the poor +little queen, shut up with her sister like two princesses in a fairy +tale, in a great, grand, dreary palace, and wonder whether she would +not like to change her situation for a nice little cottage on the +Hudson? Perhaps she would, Kate, if she knew anything of the gayeties +of cottage life; if she had ever been with us at a picnic, or driven +out in the shandry-dan with the two roans, and James, in his slipshod +hat, for a coachman, or _yotted_ in the Dream, or sang in the +Tarrytown choir, or shopped at Tommy Dean's; but, poor thing! she +would not know how to set about enjoying herself. She would not think +of appearing at church without a whole train of the Miss ----s and the +Miss ----s, and the Miss ----s, as maids of honor, nor drive through +Sleepy Hollow except in a coach and six, with a cloud of dust, and a +troop of horsemen in glittering armor. So I think, Kate, we must be +content with pitying her, and leaving her in ignorance of the +comparative desolateness of her situation." + +In 1842, Irving suffered another of those petty persecutions which he +was not thick-skinned enough to endure without suffering, nor +confident enough to ignore. The charges were of the most ordinary +sort, and advanced by men of little weight: he had appropriated +material without giving due credit for it, and he had puffed his own +work. Their only claim upon our notice lies in the fact that Irving +thought it worth while to confute them at length. He was perhaps +especially sensitive to critical attacks at this time. His income from +literary property had nearly ceased. Some of his books were out of +print, and the rest were having comparatively little sale. A wave of +indifference had overtaken his public. "Everything behind me seems to +have turned to chaff and stubble," he wrote. "And if I desire any +further profits from literature, it must be by the further exercise of +my pen." It is characteristic of his modesty that he was disposed to +accept this momentary neglect as final. He planned to revise all his +works, in the hope of finding a renewed market for them later, but +evidently expected little. + +A letter to Brevoort from Bordeaux dated November, 1843, accounts for +the first break in his Madrid residence: "I am now on my way back to +my post, after between two and three months' absence. I set out in +pursuit of health, and thought a little traveling and a change of air +would 'make me my own man again'; but I was laid by the heels at Paris +by a recurrence of my malady, and have just escaped out of the +doctor's hands.... This indisposition has been a sad check upon all my +plans. I had hoped, by zealous employment of all the leisure afforded +me at Madrid, to accomplish one or two literary tasks which I have in +hand.... A year, however, has now been lost to me, and a precious +year, at my time of life. The 'Life of Washington,' and indeed all my +literary tasks, have remained suspended; and my pen has remained idle, +excepting now and then in writing a dispatch to Government, or +scrawling a letter to my family. In the mean time the income which I +used to derive from farming out my writings has died away, and my +moneyed investments yield scarce any interest.... However, thank God, +my health and with it my capacity for work are returning. I shall soon +again have pen in hand, and hope to get two or three good years of +literary labor out of myself." + +After his return to Spain he was again laid by. He was disappointed, +but not discouraged, for the self-pity of the invalid never deprived +him of his strong man's humor. "When I drive out and notice the +opening of spring, I feel sometimes almost moved to tears at the +thought that in a little while I shall again have the use of my +limbs, and be able to ramble about and enjoy these green fields and +meadows. It seems almost too great a privilege. I am afraid when I +once more sally forth and walk the streets, I shall feel like a boy +with a new coat, who thinks everybody will turn around to look at him. +'Bless my soul, how that gentleman has the use of his legs!'" A few +days after this was written, he got word that one of his friends had +just undergone a successful surgical operation. "God bless these +surgeons and dentists!" he exclaims. "May their good deeds be returned +upon them a thousand fold! May they have the felicity, in the next +world, to have successful operations performed upon them to all +eternity!" + +By this time he had come to take Spanish politics rather too +seriously. The insincerity and profligacy of the Spanish character, +the corruption of the court and state, fairly sicken him: "The last +ten or twelve years of my life," he writes, "have shown me so much of +the dark side of human nature, that I begin to have painful doubts of +my fellow men, and look back with regret to the confiding period of my +literary career, when, poor as a rat, but rich in dreams, I beheld the +world through the medium of my imagination, and was apt to believe men +as good as I wished them to be." His sense of responsibility for the +young queen oppressed him, and he looked forward impatiently to the +hour of his release. + +A year later he had gained far better health and spirits. On his +sixty-second birthday--"I caught myself bounding upstairs three steps +at a time, to the astonishment of the porter, and checked myself, +recollecting that it was not the pace befitting a minister and a man +of my years." His mental life had, however, caught the sober tone of +age. "I am now at that time of life when the mind has a stock of +recollections on which to employ itself; and though these may +sometimes be of a melancholy nature, yet it is a 'sweet-souled +melancholy,' mellowed and softened by the operation of time, and has +no bitterness in it.... When I was young, my imagination was always +in the advance, picturing out the future, and building castles in the +air; now memory comes in the place of imagination, and I look back +over the region I have traveled. Thank God, the same plastic feeling, +which used to deck all the future with the hues of fairyland, throws a +soft coloring over the past, until the very roughest places, through +which I struggled with many a heartache, lose all their asperity in +the distance." + +In July, 1846, his successor arrived, and Irving was free to leave +Europe for the last time. His services in Spain had brought nothing +but honor to himself and his country; he had earned a right to the +quiet years that followed in his favorite home nook at Sunnyside. + +Soon after his return he began to busy himself with the revised +edition of his works which he had projected in Spain. It was +disheartening to find his old publishers dubious about undertaking the +republication, and for a time the work went hard. "I am growing a sad +laggard in literature," he wrote to his nephew, "and need some one to +bolster me up occasionally. I am too ready to do anything else rather +than write." For more than a year his time was largely devoted to +overseeing an enlargement of the cottage, and a renovation of the +grounds, at Sunnyside. At last he got it all into satisfactory order. +"My own place has never been so beautiful as at present. I have made +more openings by pruning and cutting down trees, so that from the +piazza I have several charming views of the Tappan Zee and the hills +beyond, all set, as it were, in verdant flames; and I am never tired +of sitting there in my old Voltaire chair of a long summer morning +with a book in my hand, sometimes reading, sometimes musing, and +sometimes dozing, and mixing all up in a pleasant dream." As for New +York, "For my part, I dread the noise and turmoil of it, and visit it +but now and then, preferring the quiet of my country retreat; which +shows that the bustling time of life is over with me, and that I am +settling down into a sober, quiet, good-for-nothing old gentleman." + +This was all very well--for a mood. He spent the next winter in town, +moving freely in society, and "not missing a single performance" of +the opera. "One meets all one's acquaintances at the opera, and there +is much visiting from box to box, and pleasant conversation, between +the acts. The opera house is in fact the great feature of polite +society in New York, and I believe is the great attraction that keeps +me in town. Music is to me the great sweetener of existence, and I +never enjoyed it more abundantly than at present." Clearly, the old +social instinct was by no means dead in him, however he might express +himself in less buoyant moods. + +Two years after his return from Spain the house of Putnam agreed to +publish the revised edition of his works on very liberal terms--a +twelve and a half per cent. royalty. The result of the enterprise was +a surprise to author and publisher, for during the ten remaining years +of his life the royalties amounted to more than $88,000. The +arrangement brought about an immediate accession of courage and power, +and he returned with fresh zeal to the "Life of Washington." "All I +fear," he said, "is to fail in health, and fail in completing this +work at the same time. If I can only live to finish it, I would be +willing to die the next moment. I think I can make it a most +interesting book. If I had only ten years more of life! I never felt +more able to write. I might not conceive as I did in earlier days, +when I had more romance of feeling, but I could execute with more +rapidity and freedom." The consciousness of approaching age grew +stronger in him, but without weakening his capacity for enjoyment or +his turn for humorous expression. Early in 1850, George Ticknor sent +him a copy of his "History of Spanish Literature." Irving dipped into +it, liked it, and "When I have once read it through," he wrote, "I +shall keep it by me, like a Stilton cheese, to give a dig into +whenever I want a relishing morsel. I began to fear it would never +see the light in my day, or that it might fare with you as with that +good lady who went thirteen years with child, and then brought forth a +little old man, who died in the course of a month of extreme old age. +But you have produced three strapping volumes, full of life and +freshness and vigor, that will live forever." This sounds well for +Ticknor; but it needs only a glance at Irving's recorded +correspondence to see that he was inclined to overestimate the work of +others. That kind heart must needs assume the functions of a head +which was very well able to take care of itself. + +In larger matters his judgment was often colored, but seldom warped, +by feeling. The line between sentiment and common sense is clearly +drawn in his comment upon the Kossuth obsession which held New York in +1852. "I have heard and seen Kossuth both in public and private, and +he is really a noble fellow, quite the beau ideal of a poetic hero.... +He is a kind of man that you would idolize. Yet, poor fellow, he has +come here under a great mistake, and is doomed to be disappointed in +the high-wrought expectations he had formed of cooperation on the part +of our government in the affairs of his unhappy country. Admiration +and sympathy he has in abundance from individuals; but there is no +romance in councils of state or deliberative assemblies. There, cool +judgment and cautious policy must restrain and regulate the warm +impulses of feeling. I trust we are never to be carried away, by the +fascinating eloquence of this second Peter the Hermit, into schemes of +foreign interference, that would rival the wild enterprises of the +Crusades." The letter concludes in a minor strain: "It is now +half-past twelve at night, and I am sitting here scribbling in my +study, long after the family are abed and asleep--a habit I have +fallen much into of late. Indeed, I never fagged more steadily with my +pen than I do at present. I have a long task in hand, which I am +anxious to finish, that I may have a little leisure in the brief +remnant of life that is left to me. However, I have a strong +presentiment that I shall die in harness; and I am content to do so, +provided I have the cheerful exercise of intellect to the last." + +By this time some of his Western investments had begun to make +handsome returns. With an easy pocket, and a single congenial task for +his leisure, it seemed that Irving's last years were certain to be +peacefully rounded. Unfortunately his health did not hold; all his +former ailments came back upon him, and the "Life of Washington" +became an Old Man of the Sea, which one wishes heartily he might have +been rid of. A visit to Saratoga in the summer of 1852, and the +company of many pretty women, seemed for the moment to lift the years +from his shoulders. "No one seemed more unconscious of the celebrity +to which he had attained," wrote one of his Saratoga acquaintances, +long after. "In this there was not a particle of affectation. Nothing +he shrank from with greater earnestness and sincerity and (I may add) +pertinacity, than any attempt to lionize him." His name was used to +conjure with too often for his comfort. An "Irving Literary Union" had +been formed in New York. Irving's attitude toward it was amusing and +characteristic; he was always invited to attend the anniversary +meeting, always accepted, and always stayed away. + +Events abroad continued to interest him. His sister had sent an +account from Paris of the marriage of Louis Napoleon. "Louis Napoleon +and Eugenie Montijo, Emperor and Empress of France!" he wrote. "One of +whom I have had a guest at my cottage on the Hudson; the other of +whom, when a child, I have had on my knee at Granada! It seems to cap +the climax of the strange dramas of which Paris has been the theatre +during my lifetime." + +In 1855, "Wolfert's Roost" was published. Most of its contents had +figured years before in the "Knickerbocker Magazine." It is one of the +best of his miscellaneous collections, and should be better known to +the modern reader of Irving. Thereafter, his work was over, except for +the "Life of Washington," which was to appear in parts during the next +three years. Its merits were perhaps exaggerated at the time; to the +modern critic they lie chiefly in its possession of the lucid +simplicity of method without which its author could not write, and in +the life which it infuses into a cold abstraction. If this is not +Washington, it is at least a living and breathing person, whose +interest for us lies not altogether in his career. + +These closing years were sadly clouded by sleeplessness and depression +of spirits, from which at times he roused himself to bursts of his old +brilliancy and humor. A year before his death he said to one of the +innumerable inquiries about his health, "I have a streak of old age. +Pity, when we have grown old, we could not turn round and grow young +again, and die of cutting our teeth." A few months later, when he had +begun to be troubled with difficulty of breathing, he had a long and +prosy letter from a total stranger, who proposed a call. "Oh, if he +could only give me his long wind," gasped Irving, "he should be most +welcome." + +We need not follow here the rather pitiful struggle of those last +months. "I do not fear death," said he, "but I would like to go down +with all sail set." The thoughts of the gradual loss of his faculties +haunted him with curious insistency. He conceived a dislike for his +own room, could not bear to be alone, and hung with pathetic eagerness +to the companionship of the few whom he held dearest. His fear was +groundless. To the end his mind remained clear; and on the 29th of +November, 1859, he "went down with all sail set." + + + + +VI + +THE MAN HIMSELF + + +One is tempted to ask himself, in concluding a review of this man's +life and work, what it was that he peculiarly stood for; what new kind +of excellence he brought into being, and how far it survived him. +Oddly enough, the accident of his birthplace is made at once his chief +merit, and the subtle derogation of that merit; he is the first +distinguished name in American letters, and he is "the American +Addison." From the outset one who wishes to study his work is hampered +by the fact of place. One must be always considering solemnly, +"Although he was an American, he succeeded in doing this," or, +"Because he was an American, he might have done that," till one is +fairly inclined to wish that his English parents had not happened to +marry and settle in New York. As a matter of fact, there are few +writers against whom the point of nationality may be pushed with less +pertinence. + +It is plain that earlier American writing interests us only in a local +and guarded sense. The critical microscope discovers certain merits; +but the least shifting of the eye-piece throws the object out of +field. We value what these men wrote because of what they did as +Americans, or stood for in American life. Of Irving and a few later +writers this is not true. And our regard for them may lead us to +suspect that from the literary point of view, it is better to be great +than American; or at least that there is no formula to express the +ratio between a writer's Americanism and his literary power. The +historian esteems a flavor of nationality in literature; to the lover +of pure letters, it is only a superior sort of local color. Irving's +distinction is that he was the first prophet of pure letters in +America. This is to speak thickly; and it will not help matters +greatly to say that the mark of pure letters is style. The application +of that foggy term to such a writer as Irving is likely to be +particularly unfair; it has not been spared him. He has had more +praise for his style than for anything else; indeed, it has been +commonly suggested that there is little else to praise him for. This +is, of course, a survival of the old notion that style is a sort of +achievement in decorative art; that fine feathers may do much for the +literary bird, at least. The style of a writer like Irving--a mere +loiterer in the field of letters--is at best a creditable product of +artifice. To him even so much credit has not been always allowed; the +clever imitator of Addison--or, as some sager say, of Goldsmith--has +not even invented a manner; he has borrowed one. + +Fortunately, novelty of form is a very different thing from literary +excellence. Irving wrote like a well-bred Englishman, brought up in +the sound traditions of the days of good Queen Anne. Whatever local +merit his work may have, belongs to theme rather than to treatment. +Its delicate humor is as far as possible from what has come to be +known as American humor. His only conscious Americanism in motive--to +speak of him merely as an artist--was to show England that "an +American could write decent English." At that time, it seems, +Englishmen considered this to be a good thing for an American to do; +and the poet Campbell's remark was thought to be high praise: that +Washington Irving had "added clarity to the English tongue." This was +a service of which the language just then stood sadly in need. There +are always men ready enough to make English turbid, to wreak their +ingenuity upon oddities of phrase and diction. At that moment, +certainly, the anxious courtier of words was not so much needed as the +easy autocrat, whose style, however cavalier, should have grace and +firmness and clarity to commend it. When Irving began to express +himself, there was very little straightforward simple writing being +done, either in America or in England. The stuffed buckram of +Johnsonese had been succeeded by the mincing hifalutin of Mrs. Anne +Radcliffe and her like. It is at least to Irving's credit that his +taste led him back half a century to the comparative simplicity and +purity of the prim Augustan style. But it is odd that it should have +been for this acquired manner that the world thought it liked him +while he lived, and has chiefly praised him since he died. + +But after all, as was said of Milton in a different connection, Irving +has worn "the garb, but not the clothes, of the ancients." His kinship +to them in temper of thought and feeling was closer than his +resemblance in manner. Like Addison and Goldsmith, he wins his +audience through sheer charm of personality. To open one of his books +is like meeting a congenial stranger. You like his looks at first +glance, you feel somehow that he likes yours; and while you may be +hesitating about advances, he is at your side, and there is nothing +more to be said. You do not care whether he is American or English, +you are not particular what he talks about, but you do not willingly +part with him. + +The charm of creative genius is less the charm of mind than of +feeling. And it is to feeling refined and colored by temperament, that +the more delicate modes of belles-lettres owe their whole power. That +is, a writer in this sort is admirable as he subdues language and +subordinates thought to his own temper, not as he gives elegant +utterance to thought or feeling in their abstracted and general +estate. Through a surface artificiality of style, which is far more +marked in his earliest work, and from which at times he quite escapes, +Irving's personality shines clearly. He has so employed a conventional +medium as to make it serve his original purposes. He possessed, to be +sure, a faculty of strong vernacular speech, which is little suggested +in his to-be-published writing, or even in his private letters. The +Oregon embroilment had led certain British journals into gross speech +about America. Irving was much disturbed. What he wrote was, "A +rancorous prejudice against us has been diligently inculcated of late +years by the British press, and it is daily producing its fruits of +bitterness." What he said was: "Bulwer,"--then English minister to +Spain,--"I should deplore exceedingly a war with England, for depend +upon it, if we must come to blows, it will be serious work for both. +You might break our head at first, but by Heaven! we would break your +back in the end!" + +But one need not write in the vernacular to be sincere and effective; +personality may utter itself through different media, whether in +different tongues or in distinct strata of the same tongue. Just now +we have a bent toward colloquialism on paper; it was not the bent of +Irving's day. + +As far as the external features of his style are concerned, he has had +praise enough, and more than enough. Clearness, ease, a certain Gallic +grace it has; the ink flows readily, the thing says itself without +crabbedness or constraint. On the other hand this ready writer is +often conventional; a set phrase contents him, why should he labor to +escape the usual formula? He knew nothing of the struggle or the +reward of the artist in words, who wrestles for the exact _nuance_, +and will not let a sentence go till he has obtained its blessing. +Consequently he is never finicking in his phraseology, and seldom +final. The subtle artfulness of Stevenson is beyond him; but he has a +rarer quality--that subtler artlessness which has belonged in some +measure to all the greater writers of sentiment. It is a quality +independent of the mechanics of writing; whether the author echoes the +syntax of Addison or the diction of Goldsmith is an indifferent +question. All that we know is that, through his use of words or in +spite of it, a new melody has come into being, a golden _motif_ which +is to ring in the world's ears nobody knows how long. + +It seems idle to say of such a man that because he does not concern +himself with "the mystery of existence," and "the solemn eternities," +he has nothing to say. Surely the simple-souled artist may leave such +matters for the philosophers and theologians to deal with. Surely his +"message" is as significant as theirs. Irving is admirable not mainly +because he "wrote beautifully," but because he said something which +no one else could say: he uttered the most meaning of all +messages--himself. And if literature is really a criticism of life, +such a message from such a man has, it would seem, dignity enough. + +Evidently Irving, like Goldsmith and Oliver Wendell Holmes, owed his +amazing influence largely to his cheerful and wholesome +this-worldliness. He was a sentimentalist, but obviously different in +spirit from the two great English writers of sentiment who were most +nearly his contemporaries. Thackeray is sophisticated; fortune's +buffets have left him still a tender interest in life, but pity rather +than hopefulness gives color to his mood. Dickens's sentiment seldom +rings perfectly true; too often it is sharped to flippancy, or flatted +to mawkishness. The tone of Irving, in sentiment or in humor, is the +clear and even utterance of a healthy nature. It was a period of +sickly sentimentalism in which he began to write; men drew tears +frequently and mechanically then, as they drew corks. The +sentimentalist passed easily from broad mirth to unwinking pathos. +Fortunately that weakest mood of sentiment without humor came seldom +to Irving; he wrote only one "History of Margaret Nicholson." + +It was his nature to be achingly considerate of others, so that he was +a better friend than critic; and he was as careful of their good +opinion as of their comfort. Always doubtful what treatment his work +would meet, and even what it deserved, he would ask his friends to say +nothing about it, unless they liked it. "One condemning whisper," said +one of them, "sounded louder in his ear than the plaudits of +thousands." Socially, on the other hand, he never had the least doubt +of himself. The tastes and manner of a gentleman did not need to be +acquired; there was no question of his fitness for any society. During +his whole career, thrown as he was into the choicest company of two +continents, there was evidently not the least suspicion of +embarrassment or awkwardness in his quiet bearing. + +He was in the largest sense of the word a generous man; and even in +the smaller sense his generosity has distinction and significance. +Addison we know to have been a little on the hither side of +open-handedness. Goldsmith was by his own satirical confession the +"good-natured man," to whom giving was a conscious indulgence. Irving +was simply not aware that he gave; to share his best was a natural +function. And it is our sense of this, of being admitted as a matter +of course to share in all that he is and has, which largely explains +his delightfulness as man and author. + +Citizen of the world as he was in his literary character, in practical +life his Americanism was real and potent. He deplored the War of 1812 +and the war with Mexico, but believed firmly that it was no man's duty +to go back of the government's decision. In the conduct of his mission +to Spain he showed the utmost steadiness, loyalty, and self-possession +in many trying situations. He was, in short, a valuable citizen, to +whom honors came unsought, and who, out of office, and not desirous of +political power, was trusted by all parties, and tempted by none. The +mere existence of such a figure, calm, simple, incorruptible, honored +wherever he was known, and known prominently throughout Europe, was a +valuable stay to the young republic in that purgatorial first half of +the nineteenth century. + +One fact about him will perhaps bear emphasis; that with all his +gentlenesses he was strong and firm and full of spirit. He was +susceptible to advice, yet nobody ever forced him to do a thing that +was against his mind or conscience. That he was amiable, congenial, +companionable--we do not forget these traits of his; we should +remember, too, that he never faced an emergency to which he did not +prove himself equal. His personal hold upon his contemporaries was +plainly due to the fact that their confidence in him as a man was as +perfect as their delight in him as an artist. What he did was, after +all, only a little part of what he was. + + * * * * * + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Washington Irving, by Henry W. 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