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diff --git a/old/53898-0.txt b/old/53898-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 5bad248..0000000 --- a/old/53898-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,5166 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Thomas Campbell, by J. Cuthbert Hadden - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world 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. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: Thomas Campbell - Famous Scots Series - -Author: J. Cuthbert Hadden - -Release Date: January 5, 2017 [EBook #53898] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THOMAS CAMPBELL *** - - - - -Produced by Charlene Taylor and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - - - - - - - - - -THOMAS CAMPBELL - -[Illustration] - - - - -FAMOUS SCOTS SERIES - - -_The following Volumes are now ready_:-- - - THOMAS CARLYLE. By HECTOR C. MACPHERSON. - ALLAN RAMSAY. By OLIPHANT SMEATON. - HUGH MILLER. By W. KEITH LEASK. - JOHN KNOX. By A. TAYLOR INNES. - ROBERT BURNS. By GABRIEL SETOUN. - THE BALLADISTS. By JOHN GEDDIE. - RICHARD CAMERON. By Professor HERKLESS. - SIR JAMES Y. SIMPSON. By EVE BLANTYRE SIMPSON. - THOMAS CHALMERS. By Professor W. GARDEN BLAIKIE. - JAMES BOSWELL. By W. KEITH LEASK. - TOBIAS SMOLLETT. By OLIPHANT SMEATON. - FLETCHER OF SALTOUN. By G. W. T. OMOND. - THE “BLACKWOOD” GROUP. By Sir GEORGE DOUGLAS. - NORMAN MACLEOD. By JOHN WELLWOOD. - SIR WALTER SCOTT. By Professor SAINTSBURY. - KIRKCALDY OF GRANGE. By LOUIS A. BARBÉ. - ROBERT FERGUSSON. By A. B. GROSART. - JAMES THOMSON. By WILLIAM BAYNE. - MUNGO PARK. By T. BANKS MACLACHLAN. - DAVID HUME. By Professor CALDERWOOD. - WILLIAM DUNBAR. By OLIPHANT SMEATON. - SIR WILLIAM WALLACE. By Professor MURISON. - ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON. By MARGARET MOYES BLACK. - THOMAS REID. By Professor CAMPBELL FRASER. - POLLOK AND AYTOUN. By ROSALINE MASSON. - ADAM SMITH. By HECTOR C. MACPHERSON. - ANDREW MELVILLE. By WILLIAM MORISON. - JAMES FREDERICK FERRIER. By E. S. HALDANE. - KING ROBERT THE BRUCE. By A. F. MURISON. - JAMES HOGG. By Sir GEORGE DOUGLAS. - THOMAS CAMPBELL. By J. CUTHBERT HADDEN. - - -[Illustration: - - THOMAS - CAMPBELL - - BY - J. CUTHBERT - HADDEN - - FAMOUS - SCOTS - SERIES - - PUBLISHED BY - OLIPHANT ANDERSON - & FERRIER·EDINBVRGH - AND LONDON -] - - The designs and ornaments of this volume are by Mr Joseph Brown, and - the printing from the press of Messrs Turnbull & Spears, Edinburgh. - - To - - MY WIFE - - WHO, BY HER QUIET HELPFULNESS AND - FAIR COMPANIONSHIP, LIGHTENS FOR ME THE - BURDENS OF THE LITERARY LIFE, - I DEDICATE THIS BOOK - - - - -PREFACE - - -Reviewing Beattie’s Life of Campbell in the _Quarterly_ in 1849, Lockhart -expressed the hope that no one would ever tell Campbell’s story without -making due acknowledgment to ‘the best stay of his declining period.’ He -would be a bold man who would think of doing so. As well might one expect -to write a life of Johnson without the aid of Boswell as expect to tell -Campbell’s story without reference to Dr Beattie. In addition to my -acknowledgments to him, I have to express my indebtedness to Mr Cyrus -Redding’s ‘Reminiscences of Thomas Campbell,’ which, though badly put -together, yet contain a mass of valuable information about the poet, -especially in his more intimate relations. For the rest I have made -considerable use of Campbell’s correspondence, and have, I trust, -acquainted myself with all the more important references made to him in -contemporary records, and in the writings of those who knew him. To -several of my personal friends, particularly to Mr G. H. Ely, I am obliged -for hints and helpful suggestions, which I gratefully acknowledge. - - J. C. H. - -EDINBURGH, _October 1899_. - - - - -CONTENTS - - - PAGE - - CHAPTER I - - ANCESTRY--BIRTH--SCHOOLDAYS 9 - - CHAPTER II - - COLLEGE AND HIGHLAND TUTORSHIPS 20 - - CHAPTER III - - ‘THE PLEASURES OF HOPE’ 36 - - CHAPTER IV - - CONTINENTAL TRAVELS 51 - - CHAPTER V - - WANDERINGS--MARRIAGE--SETTLEMENT IN LONDON 66 - - CHAPTER VI - - POETICAL WORK AND PROSE BOOKMAKING 85 - - CHAPTER VII - - LECTURES AND TRAVELS 99 - - CHAPTER VIII - - CLOSING YEARS 122 - - CHAPTER IX - - PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS AND PLACE AS A POET 141 - - - - -THOMAS CAMPBELL - - - - -CHAPTER I - -ANCESTRY--BIRTH--SCHOOLDAYS - - -The Campbells, as everybody knows, can claim an incredibly long descent. -There is a Clan Campbell Society, the chairman of which declared some -years ago that he possessed a pedigree carrying the family back to the -year 420, and no doubt there are enthusiasts who can trace it to at least -the time of the Flood. The poet was not particular about his pedigree, but -the biographer of a Campbell would be doing less than justice to his -subject if he denied him that ell of genealogy which Lockhart deemed the -due of every man who glories in being a Scot. - -In the present case, fortunately for the biographer, there is -authoritative assistance at hand. The poet’s uncle, Robert Campbell, a -political writer under Walpole’s administration, made a special study of -the genealogy of the Campbells; and in his ‘Life of the most illustrious -Prince John, Duke of Argyll,’ he has traced for us the descent of that -particular branch of the Clan to which the poet’s family belonged. The -descent may be stated in a few words. Archibald Campbell, lord and knight -of Lochawe, was grandson of Sir Neil, Chief of the Clan, and a celebrated -contemporary of Robert the Bruce. He died in 1360, leaving three sons, -from one of whom, Iver, sprang the Campbells in whom we are now -interested. They were known as the Campbells of Kirnan, an estate lying -in the pastoral vale of Glassary, in Argyllshire, with which, through many -generations, they became identified as lairds and heritors, ‘supporters of -the Reformation and elders in the Church.’ In a privately printed work -dealing with the Clan Iver, the late Principal Campbell of Aberdeen, who -was distantly related to the poet, gives a slightly different account of -the origin of the Kirnan Campbells, but the matter need not be dwelt upon -here. There is a suggestion, scouted by Principal Campbell, that the poet -believed himself to be remotely connected with the great ducal house of -Argyll. In some lines written ‘On receiving a Seal with the Campbell -Crest,’ he speaks of himself as having been blown, a scattered leaf from -the feudal tree, ‘in Fortune’s mutability’; and even Lady Charlotte -Campbell, a daughter of the ‘illustrious Prince John,’ hails him as a -clansman of her race, exclaiming ‘How proudly do I call thee one of mine!’ - -These, however, are speculations for the antiquary rather than for the -biographer. They are interesting enough in their way, but the writer of a -small volume like the present cannot afford to be discursive; and so, -leaving the arid regions of genealogy, we may be content to begin with the -poet’s grandfather, Archibald Campbell. He was the last to reside on the -family estate of Kirnan. Late in life he had taken a second wife, a -daughter of Stewart, the laird of Ascog. Before her marriage the lady had -lived much in the Lowlands, and now she said she could not live in the -Highlands: the solitude preyed upon her health and spirits. Hence it came -about that the laird of Kirnan set up house in an old mansion in the -Trunkmaker’s Row, off the Canongate of Edinburgh, where the poet’s father, -the youngest of three sons, was born in 1710. - -Beyond the interesting fact that he was educated under the care of Robert -Wodrow, the celebrated historian and preacher, from whose teaching he -drew the strict religious principles which regulated his life, we hear -nothing of the earlier years of Alexander Campbell. He went to America, -and was in business for some time at Falmouth, in Virginia. There he met -with the son of a Glasgow merchant, another Campbell, to whom he was quite -unrelated, and together the two returned to Scotland to start in Glasgow -as Virginia traders. The new firm at first prospered in a high degree, for -Glasgow about the middle of the eighteenth century was just touching the -culminating point of her commerce with the American colonies. Even as -early as 1735 the Glasgow merchants had fifteen large vessels engaged in -the tobacco trade alone. But the outbreak of the American War in 1775 put -a speedy end to the city’s success in this direction. ‘Some of the -Virginia lords,’ says Dr Strang, ‘ere long retired from the trade, and -others of them were ultimately ruined. Business for a time was in fact -paralysed, and a universal cry of distress was heard throughout the town.’ - -Of course the Campbell firm suffered with the rest. Beattie, who had -access to the books, declares that Alexander Campbell’s personal loss -could not have been less than twenty thousand pounds. Whatever the sum -was, it represented practically the whole of Campbell’s savings. This was -a serious blow to a man of sixty-five, with ten surviving children and an -eleventh child expected. He set himself to retrieve his fortunes as best -he could, but he never recovered his position; and we are told that his -family henceforward had to be brought up on an income--partly derived from -boarders--that barely sufficed to purchase the common necessaries of life. -It was, however, in these days of declining fortunes that the family was -destined to receive its most notable member. The eleventh and last child, -anticipated perhaps with misgiving, was Thomas Campbell, who was born on -the 27th of July 1777, his father being then sixty-seven, and his mother -some twenty-five years less.[1] - -It will be well to say here all that needs farther to be said about the -poet’s parents. Alexander Campbell belonged to a Scottish type now all but -extinct--stolid, meditative, somewhat dour, fond of theology and the -abstract sciences: leading the family devotions in extempore prayer; -regarding the Sunday sermon as essential to salvation, and less concerned -about the amount of his income than about his honour and integrity. As his -son puts it: - - Truth, standing on her solid square, from youth - He worshipped--stern, uncompromising truth. - -That he was a man of character and intelligence is clear from the fact -that he numbered among his intimates such distinguished men as Adam Smith -and Dr Thomas Reid, the successive occupants of the Moral Philosophy Chair -at Glasgow. When Reid published his ‘Inquiry into the Human Mind,’ he gave -a copy to Alexander Campbell, who read it and said he was edified by it. -‘I am glad you are pleased with it,’ remarked Reid; ‘there are now at -least two men in Glasgow who understand my work--Alexander Campbell and -myself.’ He had the saving grace of humour, too, this old Virginia trader, -though, from a specimen given, it was apparently not of a very brilliant -kind. Some of the boys were discussing the best colours for a new suit of -clothes. ‘Lads,’ said the father, whose propensity for punning not even -chagrin at the law’s delays could suppress, ‘lads, if you wish to get a -lasting suit, get one like mine. I have a suit in the Court of Chancery -which has lasted thirty years, and I think it will never wear out.’ The -worthy man lived to the patriarchal age of ninety-one, dying in -Edinburgh--whither he had retired with his household three years -before--in 1801. In his last days ‘my son Thomas’ was the main theme of -his conversation. - -Alexander Campbell had not married until he reached his forty-sixth year, -and then he chose the young sister of his partner, an energetic girl of -twenty-one. It must have been from her that the son drew his poetic -strain. She is spoken of as ‘an admirable manager and a clever woman,’ -and, what is of more interest, ‘a person of much taste and refinement.’ -She brought to the home the poetry in counterpoise to her husband’s -philosophy. Like Leigh Hunt’s mother, she was ‘fond of music, and a gentle -singer in her way’: her poet son, as we shall find, was also fond of -music, sang a little, and was, in his earlier years at least, devoted to -the flute. To her children she was certainly not over-indulgent; indeed -she is said to have been ‘unnecessarily severe or even harsh’; but the -mother of so large a family, with ordinary cares enhanced by the necessity -for practising petty economies, would have been an angel if she had always -been sweet and gracious. Between her and her youngest boy there seems to -have been a particular affection, and when he began to make some stir in -the world, no one was more elated with pardonable pride than she. There is -a story told of her having asked a shopman to address a parcel to ‘Mrs -Campbell, mother of the author of “The Pleasures of Hope.”’ She survived -her husband for eleven years, and died in Edinburgh in 1812, at the age of -seventy-six. - -The house in which Campbell and his family resided at the time of the -poet’s birth, was a little to the west of High Street near the foot of -Balmanno Brae, and in the line of the present George Street. Beattie, -writing in 1849, speaks of it as having long since disappeared under the -march of civic improvement, and as a matter of fact it was demolished in -1794 when George Street was opened up. The Glasgow of 1777 was of course a -very different place from what it is to-day--very different from what it -was when Defoe could describe it as ‘one of the cleanest, most beautiful, -and best-built cities of Great Britain’; when Smollett, himself a Glasgow -youth, saw in it ‘one of the prettiest towns in Europe.’ In 1777 Glasgow -was only laying the foundations of her commercial prosperity. She had, it -is true, established her tobacco trade with the American plantations, and -her sugar trade with the West Indies, but her character as the seat of an -ancient Church and University had not been materially altered thereby. - -Even in 1773, when Johnson, on his way back from the Hebrides, had a look -round her sights, he found learning ‘an object of wide importance, and the -habit of application much more general than in the neighbouring University -of Edinburgh.’ Trade and letters still joined hands, so that Gibbon could -not inappropriately speak of Glasgow as ‘the literary and commercial -city,’ and one might still walk her streets without at every corner being -‘nosed,’ to use De Quincey’s phrase, by something which reminded him of -‘that detestable commerce.’ Whether Glasgow was altogether a meet nurse -for a poetic child may perhaps be doubted. The time came when Campbell -himself thought she was not. The town, said he, has ‘a cold, raw, -wretchedly wet climate, the very nursery of sore throats and chest -diseases.’ Redding once chaffed him about it. ‘Did you ever see Wapping on -a drizzling, wet, spring day?’ he asked in reply. ‘That is just the -appearance of Glasgow for three parts of the year.’ But Glasgow was not so -bad as yet. She was still surrounded by the cornfields and the hedgerows -and the orchards of Lanarkshire, her few streets practically within a -stone’s throw of the Cathedral and the College. - -The youngest of their family, the son of the father’s old age, Thomas -Campbell was naturally thought much of by his parents. He had been -baptized by, and indeed named after, Dr Thomas Reid, and the old Virginia -merchant is said to have had a presentiment that he would in some way or -other do honour to his name and country. What proud father has not thought -the same? That he was regarded as a precocious child goes without saying. -We are told that he uttered quaint, old-fashioned remarks which were ‘much -too wise for his little curly head’; and he was of so inquisitive a -turn--but then all children are inquisitive--that he found amusement and -information in everything that fell in his way. A sister, nineteen years -his senior, taught him his letters; and in 1785 he was handed over to the -care of David Allison, the scholarly master of the Grammar School. Allison -was a rigid disciplinarian of the good old type, who seems to have whipped -the dead languages into his pupils with all the energy of Gil Blas’ -master. Campbell remained under him for four years. He began his studies -in such earnest that he made himself ill, and had to be removed to a -cottage at Cathcart, where for six weeks he was nursed by an aged -‘webster’ and his wife. - -No doubt the little holiday had its influence at the time; it certainly -had its influence in later life when, after a visit to the ‘green waving -woods on the margin of Cart,’ he wrote his not unpleasing stanzas on this -scene of his early youth. In any case he left the country cottage rather -reluctantly, and returned to his lessons at the Grammar School. He does -not appear to have been a particularly industrious student. He had -certainly an ambition to excel, and he was invariably at the top of his -class; but he made progress rather by fits and starts than by steady, -laborious plodding. In this respect, of course, he was only like a great -many more celebrities who have been dunces in the schoolroom. Not that -Campbell was in any sense a dunce. He was especially enamoured of the -classics; so much so, indeed, that, as Beattie gravely certifies, he -‘could declaim with great fluency at the evening fireside in the language -of Greece and Rome’; and some of the translations which he made for -Allison were considered good enough to be printed by the enthusiastic -biographer. His love for Greek, in particular, was the subject of much -remark, both then and afterwards. Redding says he could repeat thirty or -forty Greek verses applicable to any subject that might be under -discussion. Beattie, again, tells that Greek was his ‘pride and solace’ -all through life; and there is good authority for saying that, even after -he had made a name as a poet, he wished to be considered a Greek scholar -first and a poet afterwards. That he was quite sincere in the matter may -be gathered from the circumstance of his having in his last days given his -niece a series of daily lessons in the language of Homer, ‘all in the -Greek character and written with his own hand.’ Nevertheless, as a -Grecian, the classical world can as well do without Thomas Campbell as the -Principal at Louvain, in ‘The Vicar of Wakefield,’ found that he could do -without Greek itself. - -With all his enthusiasm for the classics, Campbell does not seem to have -been anything less of a boy than his fellows at the Grammar School. He -loved Greek, but he loved games too. There are tales of stone fights with -the Shettleston urchins, such as Scott has described in his story of -Green-breeks, and of strawberry raids in suburban gardens which for days -afterwards made him restive under the pious literature prescribed by his -father. That he was indeed a very boy is shown by at least one amusing -anecdote. His mother had a cousin, an old bedridden lady, about whose -frail tenure of life she felt much anxiety. Every morning she would send -either Tom or his brother Daniel to ask ‘how Mrs Simpson was to-day.’ One -day Tom wanted to go on a blackberry expedition; his mother wanted him to -inquire, as usual, about ‘this deil of an auld wife that would neither die -nor get better.’ Daniel suggested that there was no need to go: ‘just say -that she’s better or worse.’ The boys continued to report in this way for -weeks and months, but finding that an unfavourable bulletin only sent them -back earlier next morning, they agreed that the old lady should get -better. One day Tom announced that Mrs Simpson had quite recovered--and a -few hours later the funeral invitation arrived! Campbell, in telling the -story long after, says he was much less pained by the cuffing he received -from his mother than by a few words from his father. The old man ‘never -raised a hand to us, and I would advise all fathers who would have their -children to love their memory to follow his example.’ The wisdom is not -Solomonic, but that Campbell set much store by it is quite evident from -the frequent reference which he makes in later life to his father’s -sparing of the rod. - -Meanwhile he was giving indication of his literary bent in the manner -usual with youngsters. The ‘magic of nature,’ to quote his own words, had -first ‘breathed on his mind’ during his six weeks in the country, and the -result was a ‘Poem on the Seasons,’ in which the conventional expression -of the obvious runs through some hundred lines or more. A year later, that -is to say in 1788, he wrote an elegy ‘On the death of a favourite parrot,’ -of which one can only remark that it will at least bear comparison with -the reputed tribute of Master Samuel Johnson to his duck. Strange to say -among the last things which Campbell wrote were some lines on a parrot, so -that any one who is interested enough can make a critical comparison -between his elegiac poems in youth and age. - -But Campbell was doing better things than calling upon Melpomene, the -queen of tears, to attend his ‘dirge of woe’ on account of poor Poll. Mr -Allison was in the habit of prescribing translations from the classics -into English, which might be either in prose or in verse, as his pupils -thought fit. Campbell chose verse. He made translations from Anacreon, -from Virgil, from Horace, and from other Greek and Latin writers, all with -a fair measure of success, considering his years. Indeed these verse -translations are much superior to his original efforts of the same and -even of later date. Beattie, who saw the manuscripts, remarked upon the -almost total absence of punctuation in them all. It seems that Campbell -regarded the art of pointing as one of the mysteries, to which for many -years he paid as little attention as if he had been an eighteenth century -lawyer’s clerk. Even as late as ‘Theodoric’ (1824), he had to ask a -literary friend to look after the punctuation in the proofs. - -There was, however, no printer’s convenience to study in these early days; -and the verse translations, punctuated or not, served their purpose, not -only in bringing prizes to the young student, but in contributing towards -the acquirement of that facility in verse-making which helped to lay the -foundation of his future fame. The provoking thing was that his father did -not approve of making verses. Like Jack Lofty, he thought poetry ‘a pretty -thing enough’ for one’s wives and daughters, but not for men who have to -make their living in the world; and he would much rather have seen his son -writing in the sober prose of his beloved Doddridge and Sherlock than -after the manner of Dryden and Pope. ‘Many a sheet of nonsense have I -beside me,’ wrote Campbell in 1794, ‘insomuch that when my father comes -into my room, he tells me I would be much better reading Locke than -scribbling so.’ But Campbell believed that he had been born a poet, and -although he did not entirely ignore his father’s favourites, he kept -thumbing his Milton and other models, and informed the parent--actually in -verse too!--that while philosophers and sages are not without their -influence on the stream of life, it is after all the poet who - - Refines its fountain springs, - The nobler passions of the soul. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -COLLEGE AND HIGHLAND TUTORSHIPS - - -When Campbell said farewell to the Grammar School prior to entering his -name at College, it was observed of him that no boy of his age had ever -left more esteemed by his classfellows or with better prospects at the -University. His first College session began in October 1791. At that time -the University was located in the High Street, the classic Molendinar, as -yet uncovered, finding a way to the Clyde through its park and gardens. -Johnson thought it was ‘without a sufficient share in the magnificence of -the place’; and not unlikely the scarlet gowns worn by the students were -in Campbell’s day pretty much what they were when Wesley reported them -‘very dirty, some very ragged, and all of coarse cloth.’ But there must -have been something very pleasant about the quaint old world life which -was then lived in and around the College Squares. Close upon four hundred -students used to gather about the time-honoured courts, the windows of the -professors’ houses looking down upon them from the north side; and the -memories of many generations must have gone some little way to atone for -the lack of ‘magnificence’ so much deplored by the great Cham of -literature. - -The list of professors in 1791, when Campbell entered, did not include any -name of outstanding note. His father’s old friend, Dr Reid, now a veteran -of eighty-one, had retired, though he was still living in the Professors’ -Court, and had been succeeded by Professor Arthur, a scholar of -respectable ability and varied acquirements, for whom Campbell expressed -a sincere admiration. The Greek class was taught by Professor Young, a -character of the Christopher North and John Stuart Blackie type, ‘a -strangely beautiful and radiant figure in the then grave and solemn group -of Glasgow professors.’ William Richardson filled the Humanity--in other -words the Latin--Chair, and filled it with some distinction too, in his -curled wig, lace ruffles, knee breeches and silk stockings. Richardson was -not of those who combine plain living with high thinking. Dining out was -his passion. It is told of him that one evening, when the turtle soup was -unusually fine, he exclaimed, after repeated helpings, ‘I know there is -gout in every spoonful, but I can’t resist it.’ For all this, he was a -good scholar and an expert teacher, enjoying some repute as one of -Mackenzie’s coadjutors in _The Mirror_; a poet, too, and the author of one -or two books which were read in their day. The Logic class was in the -hands of Professor Jardine, ‘the philosophic Jardine,’ as Campbell calls -him--‘a most worthy, honest man, neither proud nor partial.’ Campbell says -he could not boast of deriving any great advantage from Jardine’s class, -but he ‘found its employment very agreeable’ nevertheless, and he seems to -have honestly liked the professor. The Law Chair was occupied by Professor -Millar, a violent democrat, who, in the dark days of Toryism, ‘did much in -Glasgow to inoculate Jeffrey and the academic Liberals with zealous views -of progress.’ Campbell regarded him as the ablest of all the professors; -and although he was not a regular student of law, he attended some of the -lectures, and was inclined to credit Millar with influencing his views on -what he termed the ascendency of freedom. - -Such were the men under whose direction the poet completed his education. -Of fellow-students with whom he was intimate it is not necessary to say -much. Perhaps the best known was Hamilton Paul, a jovial youth with a -talent for verse, who afterwards, when minister of Broughton, narrowly -escaped censure from the Church courts for an attempt to palliate the -shortcomings of Burns by indiscreet allusions to his own clerical -brethren. Paul and Campbell were frequently rivals in competing for -academical rewards offered for the best compositions in verse, and in one -case at least Campbell was beaten. It was Paul who founded the College -Debating Club, which usually met in his lodgings and occasionally -continued its debates till midnight; and in some published recollections -of the Club’s doings he bears testimony to Campbell’s great fluency as a -speaker. Another fellow-student was Gregory Watt, a son of the famous -engineer. Campbell described him as ‘unparalleled in his early talent for -eloquence,’ as literally the most beautiful youth he had ever seen; and he -declared afterwards that if Watt had lived he must have made a brilliant -figure in the House of Commons. Then there was James Thomson, a kindred -genius, known familiarly as the ‘Doctor,’ with whom he formed a life-long -friendship, and to whom some of the most intimate of his letters are -addressed. It was to the order of this early friend that two marble busts -of the poet were executed by Bailey, one of which he presented to Glasgow -University; and it was he who also commissioned the well-known portrait by -Sir Thomas Lawrence, which accompanies most editions of Campbell’s works. -Unfortunately, Campbell just missed Jeffrey, the ‘great little man,’ who -spent two happy years (1788-1790) at the old College, and, like Campbell -himself, was subsequently made its Lord Rector. - -Campbell’s career at the University, allowing for certain differences of -detail, was very much what it had been at the Grammar School. That is to -say, he fought shy of drudgery, put on a spurt now and again, -distinguished himself in the classics, wrote verse, and indulged freely -in the customary frolics of the typical student. He confessed in after -life that he was much more inclined to sport than study; and although he -admitted having carried away one or two prizes, he admitted also that he -was idle in some of the classes. The fact remains notwithstanding, that he -constantly outstripped his competitors, who, as Beattie has it, steadily -plodded on in the rear, ‘the very personifications of industry.’ In his -first year he took one prize for Latin and another for some English -verses, besides securing a bursary on Archbishop Leighton’s foundation. -Next session he had more academical honours. In the Logic class he -received the eighth prize for ‘the best composition on various subjects,’ -and was made an examiner of the exercises sent in by the other students of -the class--certainly a high compliment to a youth of his years. One of the -essays, on the subject of Sympathy, is printed by Beattie with the -Professor’s note appended. From this note it appears that the occult art -of pointing was not the only matter which required the attention of the -student. Professor Jardine might have passed over the amazing statement -that ‘God has implanted in our nature an emotion of pleasure on -contemplating the sufferings of a fellow-creature’; but it was impossible -that he should overlook such spellings as ‘agreable,’ ‘sympathyze,’ and -‘persuits.’ Still, ‘upon the whole,’ said Jardine, ‘the exercise is good, -and entitles the author to much commendation.’ - -The Professor’s verdict may be taken as a type of Campbell’s whole career -at College: it was a case of ‘much commendation’ all through. At the close -of his third session he was awarded a prize for a poetical ‘Essay on the -Origin of Evil,’ which, if we are to credit his own statement, gave him a -celebrity throughout the entire city, from the High Church down to the -bottom of the Saltmarket. The students, who spoke of him as the Pope of -Glasgow, even talked of it over their oysters at Lucky MacAlpine’s in the -Trongate. In the Greek class he took the first prize for a rendering of -certain passages from the ‘Clouds’ of Aristophanes, which Professor Young -declared to be the best essay that had ever been given in by a student at -the University. This was not bad for a youth of fifteen. Hamilton Paul -says that Campbell carried everything before him in the matter of his -‘unrivalled translations,’ until his fellow-students began to regard him -as a prodigy, and copy him as a model. In Galt’s Autobiography there is a -story--he heads it ‘A Twopenny Effusion’--to the effect that the students -bore the cost of printing an Ossianic poem of Campbell’s which was hawked -about at twopence; but as Galt erroneously says that Campbell published -‘The Pleasures of Hope’ by subscription, we may regard the story as at -least doubtful. Campbell called Galt a ‘dirty blackguard’ for retailing -it. - -But it was not alone by his proficiency in the classics that Campbell -compelled attention. At this time he showed a turn for satire, of which he -never afterwards gave much evidence, and his lampoons upon characters in -the College and elsewhere were the theme of constant merriment in the -quadrangle. Beattie has a good deal to say about these effusions, but if -we may judge by a sample which Redding has preserved, their cleverness was -better than their taste. It was legitimate enough, perhaps, to rail at the -length of an elderly city parson’s sermons, to make fun of his -oft-recurring phrase, ‘the good old-way’; but the worthy man, about to -marry a young wife, could hardly be expected to relish this kind of thing: - - So for another Shunamite - He hunts the city day by day, - To warm his chilly veins at night - In the good old way. - -Adam Smith contended that it was the duty of a poet to write like a -gentleman. If as a student Campbell had always written like a gentleman, -there would have been less of that posthumous resentment of which his -biographer complains. Nevertheless, his popularity as a playful wit must -have been very pleasant to him at the time. ‘What’s Tom Campbell been -saying?’ was a common exclamation among the students as they gathered of -mornings round the stove in the Logic classroom. And Tom Campbell, if he -had been saying nothing of particular note, would take his pencil and -write an impromptu on the white-washed wall. Presently a ring would be -formed round it, ‘and the wit and words passing from lip to lip generally -threw the class into a roar of laughter.’ It is but right to say, however, -that these impromptus were invariably produced with a view to something -else than praise. The stove was usually encircled by a body of stout, -rollicking Irish students, and Campbell found that the only sure means of -getting near it was by ‘drafting the fire-worshippers’--in other words, by -making them give warmth in exchange for wit. One cold December morning it -was whispered that a libel on old Ireland had been perpetrated on the -wall. The Irishmen rushed forth in a body, and while they read, _apropos_ -of a passage they had just been studying in the class-- - - Vos, Hiberni, collocatis, - Summum bonum in--potatoes, - -the young satirist had taken the best place at the stove! - -Campbell’s third session at the University was eventful in several -respects. To begin with, it was then--in the spring of 1793--that he made -that first visit to Edinburgh to which he so often referred afterwards. It -was a time of intense political excitement. ‘The French Revolution,’ to -quote the poet’s words, ‘had everywhere lighted up the contending spirits -of democracy and aristocracy’; and being, in his own estimation, a -competent judge of politics, Campbell became a pronounced democrat. Muir -and Gerald were about to stand their trial for high treason at Edinburgh, -and Campbell ‘longed insufferably’ to see them--to see Muir especially, of -whose accomplishments he had heard a ‘magnificent account.’ He had an aunt -in Edinburgh ready to welcome him; and so, with a crown piece in his -pocket, he started for the capital, doing the forty-two miles on foot. -Next morning found him in court. The trial was, he says, an era in his -life. ‘Hitherto I had never known what public eloquence was, and I am sure -the Justiciary Scotch lords did not help me to a conception of it, -speaking, as they did, bad arguments in broad Scotch. But the Lord -Advocate’s speech was good--the speeches of Laing and Gillies were better; -and Gerald’s speech annihilated the remembrances of all the eloquence that -had ever been heard within the walls of that house.’ In the opinion of -eminent English lawyers Gerald had not really been guilty of sedition, and -certainly Muir never uttered a sentence in favour of reform stronger than -Pitt himself had uttered. Nevertheless, in spite of their solemn protests -and their fervent appeals to the jury, they were both sentenced to -transportation, and were sent in irons to the hulks. - -The trial and its sequel made a deep impression on the young democrat. -When he returned to Glasgow he could think and speak of nothing else. His -old gaiety had quite deserted him, and instead of frolics and -flute-playing and ‘auld farrant stories’ by the fireside, there were -tirades about ‘the miserable prospects of society, the corrupt state of -modern legislature, the glory of ancient republics, and the wisdom of -Solon and Lycurgus.’ Never, surely, was any philosopher of fifteen so -harassed by political cares and apprehensions. But the gloomy fit did not -last long. Campbell had to think of making a living for himself, and he -began by casting about for something to fill up his college vacations. - -It does not appear that he went to the University with any definite object -in view, but the question of a profession had long since become a pressing -consideration. Naturally he looked first towards the Church, but his -father, unlike the majority of Scots parents about that time, did not -encourage him in the notion of wagging his head in a pulpit; and so, after -toying with theology--he studied Hebrew and wrote a hymn--he turned his -attention in other directions. He thought of law, and spent some time in -the office of a city solicitor. Then he thought of business, and filled up -a summer recess in the counting-house of a Glasgow merchant, ‘busily -employed at book-keeping and endeavouring to improve this hand of mine.’ -Next he tried medicine, but had to give it up because he could not bear to -witness the surgical operations. Finally he fell back on the last resource -of the University man without a profession, and became a tutor. According -to Dr Holmes, the natural end of the tutor is to die of starvation. -Campbell’s dread was that he would die of dulness: he had engaged to go to -the farthest end of the Isle of Mull-- - - Where the Atlantic wave - Pours in among the stormy Hebrides. - -It turned out to be not quite so bad as he anticipated, though, in truth, -the reality proved much less pleasant than the retrospect. In the meantime -he had a very sprightly journey from Glasgow in the company of Joseph -Finlayson, an old classfellow who was also going to taste the bitterness -of a Highland tutorship. The pair started on the 18th of May 1795. At -Greenock they spent a long evening on the quay, ‘for economy’s sake,’ and -distinguished themselves by saving a boy from drowning. Campbell thought -it pretty hard that two such heroes should go supperless to bed; so they -repaired to the inn, ate--according to their own account--dish after dish -of beefsteaks, and drank tankards of ale that set them both singing and -reciting poetry like mad minstrels of the olden time. Next day, leaving -their trunks to be sent by land to Inverary, they crossed the Firth of -Clyde to Argyllshire, the jolliest boys in the whole world. Campbell says -he had still a half-belief in Ossian, and an Ossianic interest in the -Gaelic people; but this did not reconcile him to the Highland beds, in -which ‘it was not safe to lay yourself down without being troubled with -cutaneous sensations next morning.’ Nor did the bill of fare at the -Highland inns please the travellers any better. It lacked variety. -Everywhere it was ‘Skatan agas, spuntat agas, usquebaugh’--herrings and -potatoes and whisky. But the roaring streams, and the primroses, and the -‘chanting cuckoos’ made up for all the discomfort. Campbell, as he -expresses it, felt a soul in every muscle of his body, and his mind was -filled with the thought that he was now going to earn his bread by his own -labour. - -The two young fellows parted at Inverary, and Campbell went on by way of -Oban to Mull, reaching his destination after losing himself several times -on the island, the entire length of which he says he traversed. His -engagement was with a distant relative of his own, a Mrs Campbell, a -‘worthy, sensible widow lady,’ who treated him with thoughtful sympathy -and consideration. What kind of tutor he made does not appear, but he -evidently had the best intentions and a humane regard for his pupils. ‘I -never beat them,’ he remarks, ‘remembering how much I loved my father for -having never beaten me.’ - -We know very little about this part of Campbell’s career beyond what is -told in his own letters. He expected to find in Mull ‘a calm retreat for -study and the Muses,’ and he was not disappointed. At first, naturally -enough, he felt very dejected. The house of Sunipol, where he taught, is -on the northern shore of the island, from which a magnificent prospect of -thirteen of the Hebrides group, including Staffa and Iona, can be -obtained. The scenery, on Campbell’s own admission, is ‘marked by -sublimity and the wild majesty of nature,’ but unhappily in bad -weather--and there is not much good weather in Mull--the island is ‘only -fit for the haunts of the damned.’ There was plenty to feed the fancy of a -poet; and yet, ‘God wot,’ says Campbell, ‘I was better pleased to look on -the kirk steeples and whinstone causeways of Glasgow than on all the -eagles and wild deer of the Highlands.’ His trunk was some days late in -arriving, and as there was no writing paper in the island he was driven to -the expedient of scribbling his thoughts on the wall of his room! However, -he soon got reconciled to his forlorn condition; nay, in time he ‘blessed -the wild delight of solitude.’ He diverted himself by botanising, by -shooting wild geese, and, poet like, by rowing about in the moonlight; and -we hear of an excursion to Staffa and Iona which filled him with hitherto -unexperienced emotions of pleasure. - -There is even a whisper of a little love affair. A certain Caroline -Fraser, a daughter of the minister of Inverary, came to visit at Sunipol. -She was, according to Beattie, who knew her, a girl of ‘radiant beauty,’ -and Campbell, being himself well-favoured in the matter of looks--he is -described at this time as ‘a fair and beautiful boy, with pleasant and -winning manners and a mild and cheerful disposition’--it was only natural -that the pair should draw together. It was to this lady that the poem in -two parts, bearing her Christian name, was addressed. The first part, -beginning ‘I’ll bid the hyacinth to blow,’ was written in Mull; the -second, ‘Gem of the crimson-coloured even,’ in the following year, when -the young tutor was frequently able to avail himself of the hospitality of -the ‘adorable Miss Caroline’s’ family. Verses were also addressed to ‘A -Rural Beauty in Mull,’ but there is nothing to show that the ‘young Maria’ -thus celebrated was anything more than a poetic creation. Of what may be -called serious work during the course of the Mull tutorship we do not hear -much. An Elegy, written in low spirits soon after he landed, was highly -praised by Dr Anderson, the editor of the ‘British Poets,’ who predicted -from it that the author would become a great poet; but Campbell showed -himself a better critic when he characterised it as ‘very humdrum indeed.’ -Many of his leisure hours were filled up with translations of his -favourite classics, notably with what he calls his old comedy of the -‘Clouds’ of Aristophanes, but of these it is unnecessary to speak. The -real effect of the Mull residence upon his poetic product was not felt -until later. It might be too much to say that ‘Lord Ullin’s Daughter,’ -‘Lochiel,’ and ‘Glenara’ would never have been written but for the -author’s sojourn in the Highlands, but the imagery of these and other -pieces is clearly traceable to the promptings of island solitude; and much -as Campbell disliked his isolation at the time, it undoubtedly proved of -the greatest poetic service to him. Meanwhile, after five months of the -wilderness, the exile became irksome, and he returned to Glasgow, glad to -behold the kirk steeples and to feel his feet not on the ‘bent’ of Mull, -but on the pavement of his native city. - -Campbell now entered on his last session at the University. There is no -detailed account of his studies this session, but he remarks himself, in -his high-flown style, that the winter was one in which his mind advanced -to a more expansive desire of knowledge than he had ever before -experienced. He mentions especially the lectures of Professor Millar on -Heineccius and on Roman Law. ‘To say that Millar gave me _liberal_ -opinions would be understating the obligation which I either owed, or -imagined I owed to him. He did more. He made investigations into the -principles of justice and the rights and interests of society so -captivating to me that I formed opinions for myself and became an -emancipated lover of truth.’ The impulse which Millar’s lectures gave to -his mind continued long after he heard them. At the time, they seem to -have turned his thoughts very seriously towards the law as a profession. -‘Poetry itself, in my love of jurisprudence and history,’ he says, ‘was -almost forgotten. At that period, had I possessed but a few hundred pounds -to have subsisted upon studying law, I believe I should have bid adieu to -the Muses and gone to the Bar; but I had no choice in the matter.’ As it -was, the Muses during this session, and for some time after, appear to -have received but scant attention. For a whole year he wrote nothing but -the lines on Miss Broderick which still retain a place among his published -works, and the two poems which gained him his parting prizes at the -University. The latter were, it is assumed, sketched out in Mull. One was -a translation from the ‘Choephoroe,’ the other of a Chorus in the ‘Medea’ -of Euripides, the only prize piece which he afterwards included among his -printed poems. - -During the whole of this last session at the University he supported -himself by private tuition. Among other pupils he had the future Lord -Cunninghame of the Court of Session, who indeed boarded with the Campbell -family in order to have the benefit of reading Greek with the son. -Cunninghame says that Campbell left on his mind a deep impression, not -merely of his abilities as a classical scholar, but of the elevation and -purity of his sentiments. He read much in Demosthenes and Cicero, and -enlarged on their eloquence and the grandeur of their views. It was by -these ancient models that he tested the oratory of the moderns. He would -repeat with the greatest enthusiasm the most impassioned passages of Lord -Chatham’s speeches on behalf of American freedom, and Burke’s declamation -against Warren Hastings was often on his lips. He was firmly convinced at -this time that the rulers of the universe were in league against mankind, -but he looked forward with some hope to the joyful day when the wrongs of -society would be vindicated, and freedom again assume the ascendant. Lord -Cunninghame draws a charming picture of the fireside politicians, with -Campbell at their head, discussing the French Revolution, and defending -their ultra-liberal opinions against the assaults of outsiders. For his -age the poet probably took the world and the powers that be much too -seriously; but his early political leanings are not without a certain -significance in view of his after interest in the cause of liberty. - -His last session at the University ended, Campbell, in June 1796, returned -to Argyllshire, again as a tutor. This time his engagement was at Downie, -near Lochgilphead. The house stood in a secluded spot on the shore of that -great arm of the sea known as the Sound of Jura. The view to be obtained -from its neighbourhood made a wonderful combination of sea and mountain -scenery; but, like Sunipol, the place was altogether too dull for the -city-bred youth. Campbell speaks of himself as living the life of a poor -starling, caged in by rocks and seas from the haunts of man; as ‘lying -dormant in a solitary nook of the world, where there is nothing to chase -the spleen,’ and where the people ‘seem to moulder away in sluggishness -and deplorable ignorance.’ Still, it was not quite so bad as Mull. For one -thing, Inverary was comparatively near, and Hamilton Paul was there, as -well as the adorable Caroline, to whose charms Paul, as appears from a -poetical tribute, had also succumbed. Campbell, we may be sure, was -oftener at Inverary than his letters show, for the ‘Hebe of the West’ -clearly had magnetic powers of a quite unusual kind. - -Paul has a lively account of the last day he spent with his friend at -Inverary. It was the occasion of a ‘frugal dinner,’ when two old college -companions joined the tutors around the table at the Inverary Arms. -‘Never,’ says Paul, ‘did schoolboy enjoy an unexpected holiday more than -Campbell. He danced, sang, and capered, half frantic with joy. Had he been -only invested with the philabeg, he would have exhibited a striking -resemblance to little Donald, leaping and dancing at a Highland wedding.’ -The company had a delightful afternoon together, and on the way home -Campbell worked himself up into a state of ecstacy. He ‘recited poetry of -his own composition--some of which has never been printed--and then, after -a moment’s pause, addressed me: “Paul, you and I must go in search of -adventures. If you will personate Roderick Random, I will go through the -world with you as Strap.” “Yes, Tom,” said I, “I perceive what is to be -the result: you are to be a poet by profession.”’ - -Campbell’s greatest difficulty at present was to settle upon any -profession; but if his penchant for reciting poetry in the open air could -have made him a poet, then indeed was his title clear. He told Scott some -years after this that he repeated the ‘Cadzow Castle’ verses so often, -stamping and shaking his head ferociously, while walking along the North -Bridge of Edinburgh, that all the coachmen knew him by tongue, and quizzed -him as he passed. The habit was mad enough in Edinburgh; in the Highlands -it evidently suggested something like lunacy. His successor in the -tutorship says that in Campbell’s frequent walks along the shore he was -often observed by the natives to be ‘in a state of high and rapturous -excitement,’ of the cause and tendency of which they formed very strange -and inconsistent ideas. - -If the simple natives had suspected that the tutor was in love, they -might, without knowing their Shakespeare, have paid less heed to these -manifestations. Campbell had told Paul some time before that a poet should -have only his muse for mistress; but it was easier to preach the precept -than to practise it. It is in a letter to his friend Thomson that we first -hear of this amourette. Speaking of a temporary brightening of his -prospects, he says: ‘To console me still further (but Thomson, I challenge -your secrecy by all our former friendship), my evening walks are sometimes -accompanied by _one_ who, for a twelvemonth past, has won my purest but -most ardent affection. - - “Dear, precious name! rest ever unreveal’d, - Nor pass these lips in holy silence seal’d.” - -You may well imagine how the consoling words of such a person warm my -heart into ecstacy of a most delightful kind. I say no more at present; -and, my friend, I rely on your secrecy.’ Campbell’s secret has been kept, -for the identity of this particular Amanda has never been disclosed. Can -it have been the adorable Caroline herself? Whoever she was, she had, if -we may trust Beattie, a very favourable influence in promoting Campbell’s -appeals to the muse. Defeated in all other prospects, he took refuge in -‘the enchanted garden of love,’ and, in the interchange of mutual -affection, found compensation for all his disappointments. - -But Campbell had his duties as a tutor to attend to. His pupil was the -future Sir William Napier of Milliken, a great-great-grandson of the -celebrated Napier of Merchiston. He was now about eight years old, and was -living with his mother at Downie, his grandfather’s estate. His father, -Colonel Napier, returned from the West Indies shortly after Campbell -entered on his engagement. Campbell describes him as ‘a most agreeable -gentleman, with all the mildness of a scholar and the majesty of a British -Grenadier.’ The Colonel took an eager interest in the tutor’s welfare, and -did all he could to settle him in some permanent employment. ‘He has,’ -says Campbell to Thomson, ‘been active to consult, to advise, to recommend -me, with warmth and success, and that to friends of the first rank.’ With -a local physician he united to obtain for him a favourable situation in -the office of a leading Edinburgh lawyer, but unfortunately a combination -of circumstances baffled the poet’s aims in this direction; and, the term -of his engagement having expired, he returned once more to Glasgow, in a -state of the greatest concern about his future. ‘I will,’ he declared, -with that unnecessary rhetoric to which he was prone, ‘I will maintain my -independence by lessening my wants, if I should live upon a barren -heath.’ - - - - -CHAPTER III - -‘THE PLEASURES OF HOPE’ - - -Campbell was now at his wit’s end about a profession. With whatever -intention he had gone to the University, he had at last become alive to -the stern fact that the University had done nothing for him in regard to a -livelihood. ‘What,’ he wanted to know, ‘have all these academical honours -procured for me?’ He was dissatisfied with himself for his admitted lack -of resource; he was dissatisfied with his friends for their apathetic -indifference. But something had clearly to be done, and after sundry -ineffectual efforts to reach a solid standing ground, he again turned his -attention to the law. ‘That is the line which he means to pursue,’ wrote -his sister Elizabeth, ‘and what I think nature has just fitted him for. He -is a fine public speaker and I have no doubt will make a figure at the -Bar.’ His idea now was to combine law with literature. Let him once get -into a lawyer’s office and he would have no fear of working his way -without the expense of entrance fees. He would write for the leading -periodicals and establish a magazine. He had, besides, one or two -translations from the classics nearly ready for the press, and for these -surely some publisher, he told himself, would be willing to pay. - -In this optimistic mood he went off to Edinburgh, the home of literature -and law, where he arrived in May, 1797. His old pupil, Lord Cunninghame, -was now preparing for the Bar, and to him Campbell applied for aid in -finding employment. The employment was found, not in a law office--for -Campbell had no regular training as a law clerk to recommend him--but in -the Register House, where the University honours’ man was set to the -humble tasks of a copying clerk. A few weeks of extract making proved -enough for him, and he threw up the situation for one slightly more -comfortable, though not much better as to pay, in the office of a Mr Bain -Whytt. There he remained, sucking sustenance through a quill, until Dr -Anderson brought him forth to put him on the road to renown. - -Campbell was introduced to Anderson by Mr Hugh Park, then a teacher in -Glasgow, who had roused an interest in the poetical clerk by showing a -copy of the elegy written in Mull. Miss Anderson was present at the first -meeting, and Beattie subsequently obtained from her some recollections of -the occasion. She remarked specially upon Campbell’s good looks. His face, -she said, was beautiful, and ‘the pensive air which hung so gracefully -over his youthful features gave a melancholy interest to his manner which -was extremely touching.’ This description, it may be observed, is in part -corroborated from other quarters. The Rev. Dr Wardlaw, who had been one of -Campbell’s classfellows at Glasgow, said that though he was comparatively -small in stature his features were handsome and prepossessing, and were -characterised by an intelligent animation and a cheerful openness all the -more noticeable that they gave place when he was not pleased to ‘a gravity -approaching to sternness.’ Another friend speaks of him as an ardent, -enthusiastic boy, much younger in appearance than in years. Unfortunately -there is no portrait of him at this early age. - -Dr Anderson took a fervent interest in the pensive youth. He knew -everybody worth knowing, and through him Campbell soon found his way into -the best literary society of the capital. Scott, Jeffrey, Dugald Stewart, -Lord Brougham, Henry Mackenzie, the ‘Man of Feeling,’ George Thomson, the -correspondent of Burns--these and others, in addition to the friends he -had made on former visits, were now or later among the circle of his -acquaintances. At a private house he met that ‘pompous ass,’ the Earl of -Buchan, and apparently had the bad manners to quiz him upon his oddities. -It was at this time, too, that he was introduced to John Leyden, with whom -he afterwards so notoriously fell out. There are two explanations of the -quarrel. According to the first, Leyden had spread a report that, in -despair at his prospects, Campbell was seen one day rushing frantically -along Princes Street on the way to destroy himself. This foolish story was -revived after Campbell’s death; very likely it was quite unfounded. The -other version of the affair is to the effect that Campbell, by his -association with certain infidel youths who had started a publication -called the _Clerical Review_, allowed it to be inferred that some of his -intimate friends, including Anderson and Leyden, were in sympathy with the -unsettling tendencies of the new journal. There was no reason why anybody -should draw such an inference; and, in any case, the explanation is -unsatisfactory inasmuch as the quarrel was evidently of Campbell’s, not of -Leyden’s making. Whatever be the solution--and it is not a matter of -importance--there was certainly no love lost between Leyden and his -somewhat prim junior. Campbell seldom mentions Leyden’s name without a -sneer. In a letter of 1803 he says: ‘London has been visited in one month -by John Leyden and the influenza. They are both raging with great -violence.’ And again--the versatile Borderer had just taken a surgeon’s -diploma--‘Leyden has gone at last to diminish the population of India.’ -Nevertheless, as we shall learn later on, Campbell knew very well how to -value the critical opinion of John Leyden--when it was in his favour. - -But Dr Anderson did more for Campbell than present him to his literary -circle. Campbell, though he proclaimed his dislike of another tutorship, -had expressed his willingness to accept almost any kind of literary work. -Anderson accordingly introduced him to Mundell, the publisher, and the -result was an offer of twenty guineas for an abridged edition of Bryan -Edwards’ ‘West Indies.’ This was not only Campbell’s first undertaking for -the press, but the first of his many pieces of literary task-work. He was -now anticipating very much the later experience of Carlyle, who also tried -the law in Edinburgh, and became a bookseller’s hack when that ‘bog-pool -of disgust’ proved impossible. But there the parallel ends. - -Campbell went back to Glasgow, walking the distance as usual, to finish -his abridgment. His mind was still exercised about the future. Anything in -the law beyond the most laborious plodding he had seen to be quite out of -his reach. ‘I have fairly tried the business of an attorney,’ he wrote, -‘and upon my conscience it is the most accursed of all professions. Such -meanness, such toil, such contemptible modes of peculation were never -moulded into one profession… It is true there are many emoluments; but I -declare to God that I can hardly spend with a safe conscience the little -sum I made during my residence in Edinburgh.’ This, of course, is not to -be taken seriously: it is merely the petulant cry of a spoilt and -conceited youth. Campbell confessed afterwards that at this time fame was -everything to him. So far as at present appeared he was as likely to -achieve fame as to extract sunbeams from cucumbers, and when he miscalled -the lawyers as rogues and vagabonds he was only giving voice to his -chagrin. - -But youth is not easily dismayed. It was at this moment that, having saved -a little money, Campbell gaily proposed to start a magazine. He invited -some of his college familiars to join with him, declaring that he would -undertake, if need be, three-fourths of the letter-press himself. ‘We -shall,’ he remarked, ‘set all the magazine scribblers at defiance--nay, -hold them even in profound contempt.’ But his friends were not so sanguine -about sharing the favours of a ‘discerning public,’ and the magazine -project, like so many other projects, fell to the ground. It shows the -desperate frame of mind into which Campbell had sunk, that, in spite of -his recent ‘malediction upon the law and all its branches,’ he still -professed himself an amateur of the Bar. He tells Anderson that his -leisure hours are employed on Godwin and the ‘Corpus Juris.’ The latter he -had always regarded as a somniferous volume, but now he finds that there -is something really amusing as well as improving in the book. It certainly -does not seem a suitable work for stimulating the imagination of a poet, -but Campbell was only playing with circumstances after all. Even yet he -may have had some idea that the ‘Corpus Juris’ would prove professionally -useful. - -In the meantime he went on with his abridgment, and wrote a few verses. -Among the latter was ‘The Wounded Hussar,’ a lyric suggested by an -incident in one of the recent battles on the Danube. This ballad, now -entirely forgotten, attained an extraordinary popularity. It had been -published only a few weeks when all Glasgow was ringing with it. -Subsequently it found its way to London, where it was sung on the streets -and encored in the theatres. It seemed as if the fame for which the author -hungered was to be his at last, but curiously enough, in this case he -would have none of it. ‘That accursed song,’ he would say, and forbid his -friends to mention ‘The Wounded Hussar’ again in his presence. About this -time also he wrote his ‘Lines on revisiting Cathcart,’ besides a ‘Dirge of -Wallace,’ which he sensibly excluded from his collected works as being too -rhapsodical, though it was often printed against his wish in the Galignani -editions. - -Having finished his work for Mundell, Campbell returned to Edinburgh in -the autumn of 1797. What his plans now were is not very clear, though from -the fact that he spoke to his parents about following him when his -circumstances permitted, it is evident that he had made up his mind to -reside permanently in the capital. At present his prospects were as gloomy -as ever. Mundell had promised him some employment for the winter, and a -further slight engagement on a contemplated geographical work seemed -probable. At the best, however, these were but feeble supports; the -booksellers--who, he enquired, could depend on _them_? Some time before -this he had, as we have seen, tried medicine and surgery and failed; now, -as a sort of forlorn hope, he again betook himself to the study of -chemistry and anatomy. That, too, was soon abandoned, and he fell back -once more on the _dernier resort_ of a tutorship. By and by his younger -brother Robert sent him a pressing invitation to come out to Virginia, and -he decided to quit Scotland in the spring of 1798. But here again his -design was defeated; his elder brother in Demerara wisely interposed his -experienced advice against it, and Campbell’s oft-expressed desire to see -the land of Washington was never realised. - -In all these shifting plans and projects one discerns thus early what -proved the chief defect in Campbell’s character--that irresolution and -that caprice which were so largely to blame for many of the vexations and -disappointments of his later life. No doubt to some extent his friends -were responsible for his unsteadiness of purpose. He was the Benjamin of -his family, petted and pampered, applauded for his little clevernesses, -and encouraged in his belief that he had been cut out for something great. -Had he been alone in the world, and absolutely penniless, he would have -had to exert himself to some purpose. As it was, he never stuck at an -honest calling long enough to know what he could do at it; but having -tried many things perfunctorily, and failed in them, he at length derived -inspiration from his empty pocket, braced himself to what after all was -most congenial to him, and in a sense, like Silas Wegg, ‘dropped into -poetry.’ - -Speaking afterwards of this period, he says: ‘I lived in the Scottish -metropolis by instructing pupils in Greek and Latin. In that vocation I -made a comfortable livelihood as long as I was industrious. But “The -Pleasures of Hope” came over me. I took long walks about Arthur’s Seat, -conning over my own (as I thought) magnificent lines; and as my “Pleasures -of Hope” got on, my pupils fell off.’ Here we have the first intimation -that Campbell was actually working upon the poem by which he made his -grand entry on the stage of public life. But the subject had engaged his -thoughts long before this. So far back as 1795, when slaving as a tutor in -Mull, he had asked his friend Hamilton Paul to send him ‘some lines -consolatory to a hermit.’ Paul replied with a set of verses on ‘The -Pleasures of Solitude,’ adding: ‘We have now three “Pleasures” by -first-rate men of genius--“The Pleasures of Imagination,” “The Pleasures -of Memory,” and “The Pleasures of Solitude.” Let us cherish “The Pleasures -of Hope” that we may soon meet in _Alma Mater_.’ - -The subject thus playfully suggested dwelt in Campbell’s mind; and -although there is nothing to show that he at once began the composition of -the poem, there is every reason to believe that some parts of it had been -at least drafted during his two periods of exile in the Highlands. At any -rate, in his ‘dusky lodging’ in Rose Street he now set to work upon it in -earnest; and by the close of 1798 it was being shown to his private circle -as practically ready for the press. Campbell’s intention appears to have -been to publish it by subscription, and on that understanding a friend -gave him £15 to pay for the printing. Dr Anderson, however, intervened; -and after he had discussed the merits of the poem with Mundell, the latter -bought the entire copyright, as the note of agreement has it, ‘for two -hundred copies of the book in quires.’ This would mean something over £50, -the volume having been published at six shillings. At the time Campbell -probably thought the bargain fair enough, but he naturally took a -different view of the case after some thousands of copies of the poem had -been sold. It was, he said towards the end of his life, worth an annuity -of £200, but he added that he must not forget how for two or three years -the publishers gave him £50 for every new edition. When we recall the fact -that for ‘Paradise Lost’ Milton got exactly £10, we must regard Campbell -as having been unusually well paid. - -After being subjected to a great deal of correction, mainly at the -instigation of Anderson, to whom it was dedicated, ‘The Pleasures of Hope’ -was published on the 29th of April, 1799, when the poet was twenty-one -years and nine months old. It had been announced as in the press some time -before, and there was now a brisk demand for copies, four editions being -called for in the first year. So early a success had only a near parallel -in the case of Byron, who awoke to find himself famous at twenty-four. The -author, it was remarked, had suddenly emerged like a star from his -obscurity, and had thrown a brilliant light over the literary horizon of -his country. His poem was quoted as ‘an epitome of sound morals, -inculcating by lofty examples the practice of every domestic virtue, and -conveying the most instructive lessons in the most harmonious language.’ -One critic said it gave fair promise of his rivalling some of the greatest -poets of modern times; another critic commended it for its sublimity of -conception, its boldness of imagery, its vigour of language and its -manliness of sentiment. And so they swelled the chorus, to the same tune -of extravagant eulogy. - -Much of the success of the poem was no doubt due to the circumstance that -it touched with such sympathy on the burning questions of the hour. If, as -Stevenson remarks, the poet is to speak efficaciously, he must say what is -already in his hearer’s mind. This Campbell did, as perhaps no English -poet had done before. The French Revolution, the partition of Poland, the -abolition of negro-slavery--these had set the passion for freedom burning -in many breasts, and ‘The Pleasures of Hope’ gave at once vigorous and -feeling expression to the doctrine of the universal brotherhood of man. -Moreover, the moment was favourable in that there were so few rivals in -the field. Burns had been dead for three years, and Rogers might now be -said to stand alone in the front rank. Crabbe, suffering under domestic -sorrow, had been all but silent since his ‘Village’ appeared in 1783; -Cowper was sunk in hopeless insanity. Neither Wordsworth nor Coleridge, -both older than Campbell, had secured a following; Scott had printed but a -few translations from the German. Byron was at school, Moore at college; -Hogg had not spoken, and Southey’s fame was still to make. There could -hardly have been a stronger case of the _felix opportunitate_. - -It is not easy at this time of day to approach ‘The Pleasures of Hope’ -without a want of sympathy, if not an absolute prejudice, resulting from a -whole century of poetical development. The ideals, the standards of -Campbell’s day, have wholly altered; were indeed passing away even in his -own time. The little volume of ‘Lyrical Ballads,’ published only a few -months before Campbell’s poem, sounded, as it has been expressed, the -clarion-call of the new poetry. The manner thus introduced by Wordsworth -and Coleridge completely changed the critical standpoint; and it is -perfectly safe to say that any poem which appeared to-day with the opening -line of ‘The Pleasures of Hope’--‘At summer eve, when heaven’s _ethereal -bow_‘--would meet with very severe treatment at the hands of the critics, -if indeed the critics condescended to notice it at all. - -Further, too much stress must not be laid on the fact, already referred -to, and always so carefully stated by the school editors, that the poem -met with a phenomenal success on its first appearance. In literature -popularity bears no strict proportion to merit. Neither Keats nor Shelley -nor Wordsworth was ever ‘popular’; of ‘The Christian,’ we are given to -understand, a hundred copies were sold for every one of ‘Richard Feverel.’ -The popularity of ‘The Pleasures of Hope’ might easily have been foretold -by any one reading it before publication, not for any poetic excellence it -possessed--though it was not without poetic excellence--but because it -accorded so well with the prevalent moods and opinions of a large section -of the public at the time. Given certain vulgar ideas, the power of fluent -and forcible expression, and no great depth of thought or subtlety of -imagination, and the breath of popular applause may generally be counted -upon. - -In poets youth, when not a virtue, is at least an extenuating -circumstance. Campbell was very young when he wrote ‘The Pleasures of -Hope.’ At an age when an Englishman is midway in his University course, -and perhaps thinking of competing for the Newdigate, Campbell had finished -his college career, won all the possible honours, and got himself accepted -at his own valuation as ‘demnition clever.’ He was only a boy, a clever -boy, with boyish enthusiasms, boyish crudities of thought, and, it must be -confessed, a boyish weakness for fine-sounding words. His poem was not the -spontaneous fruit of his imagination. There was no inward compulsion to -poetic utterance as in the case of other poets who wrote at an equally -early age. The clever boy was moping, without definite aims, when his -friend’s suggestion conjured up a vision of Thomas Campbell admitted to -the company of Mark Akenside and Samuel Rogers. True, these names were -not the brightest in the poetical galaxy, and it might perhaps have been -better for Campbell if he had schooled himself by a diligent study of -Milton and Spenser. But there was the goal, and there was the motive, and -he set about his poem. - -Undoubtedly he made the most of what could easily have proved a barren -theme. The construction of the poem is certainly loose; part does not -follow part in any inevitable order. But in a didactic poem this is -perhaps an advantage, for, with all its defects, one can read ‘The -Pleasures of Hope’ without the fatigue that accompanies a reading of ‘The -Pleasures of Imagination.’ To analyse the poem would be superfluous. It -faithfully reflected the common thought of the time, and assuredly does -not, as Beattie said it did, give illumination to ‘every succeeding age.’ -It will be sufficient to point out a few of its literary qualities with a -view to an appreciation of Campbell’s place as a poet. - -And first it must be remarked that Campbell was subdued to the vicious -theory of a poetical diction. To him a rainbow was an ‘ethereal bow,’ a -musket a ‘glittering tube,’ a star a ‘pensile orb,’ a cottage a ‘rustic -dome.’ It was a principle with him and his school that the ordinary name -of a thing, the natural way of saying a thing, must necessarily be -unpoetic. This comes out equally in his letters. When he refers to a -railway train it is as ‘a chariot of fire.’ Instead of saying: ‘I went to -the club with his Lordship,’ he must say: ‘Thither with his Lordship I -accordingly repaired.’ When he wishes to speak of a thing being ‘changed’ -into another, he says it is ‘transported to the identity of’ that other -thing. In ‘The Pleasures of Hope’ this characteristic was no doubt due in -some cases to the exigence of rhyme, which probably accounts also for the -so-called obscurity of certain of his lines. For he is not really obscure; -his stream is too shallow for obscurity. On that point it is curious to -note how even Wordsworth was misled. Perhaps it may be worth while to -quote what he says: - - Campbell’s ‘Pleasures of Hope’ has been strangely overrated. Its - fine words and sounding lines please the generality of readers, who - never stop to ask themselves the meaning of a passage. The lines-- - - Where Andes, giant of the western star, - With meteor standard to the wind unfurled, - Looks from his throne of clouds o’er half the world, - - are sheer nonsense--nothing more than a poetical indigestion. What - has a giant to do with a star? What is a meteor standard? But it is - useless to inquire what such stuff means. Once at my house Professor - Wilson, having spoken of these lines with great admiration, a very - sensible and accomplished lady, who happened to be present, begged - him to explain to her their meaning. He was extremely indignant, and - taking down ‘The Pleasures of Hope’ from a shelf, read the lines - aloud, and declared they were splendid. ‘Well, sir,’ said the lady, - ‘but _what do they mean_?’ Dashing down the book on the floor, he - exclaimed in his broad Scotch accent, ‘I’ll be daumed if I can - tell.’ - -The explanation is, however, simple enough. Campbell obviously meant -‘firmament’ or ‘hemisphere,’ but wanting a rhyme to ‘afar,’ he put the -part for the whole, and said ‘western star.’ This is not exactly -obscurity; but for the fact that Campbell was always so careful to polish -his verse we should call it clumsiness. - -In his management of the heroic couplet, Campbell was eminently -successful. With the monosyllabic rhyme the lines naturally end rather -monotonously with a snap as it were: _enjambement_ is not frequent; the -verse has nothing of that freedom and fluidity in which Chaucer and Keats -are sworn brothers. But Campbell varies the position of the pause more -frequently than Pope, and he actually excels Pope in respect of rhyme; -for, with all his correctness, Pope was an indifferent rhymster. Apart -from his imperfect rhymes, which are sufficiently numerous, one finds in -Pope whole blocks of six or eight lines ending in intolerable assonances. -Campbell is never guilty of this fault; and even in the smaller sin of -harping over much on the same rhyme, he is no worse than Pope. Further, he -is very deft in ‘suiting the sound to the sense.’ Many lines might be -quoted which are full of such music as springs from a varied succession of -vowel sounds linked by alliterative consonants. In bringing sounding names -into his verse, too, he is as expert as Goldsmith himself. Oonalaska, -Seriswattee, Kosciusko--these are names to conjure with. And if ‘rapture’ -does duty too often for ardent emotion of all kinds, if ‘tumultuous’ comes -too trippingly off the pen when an epithet is required--well, let us -remember again that he was very young. The poem was at least a credit to -his years. Vigour, variety, pleasant description, sincere rhetoric, -youthful fervour and high spirits account in the main for its popularity. -Its concrete illustrations, its little _genre_ scenes, saved it from the -fate of most didactic poems on abstract themes. The homely interior, the -returned wanderer, the cradle, the faithful dog--these appealed to the -average man; and the political allusions struck the right note for the -times. But who reads it now? - -Before the publication of ‘The Pleasures of Hope’ Campbell was practically -a nonentity; after that event he became a literary lion. His experience -was that of Burns over again on a smaller scale; indeed some of the -distinguished men who had hailed Burns’ arrival in the capital were still -alive to give their acclamations to Campbell, whom they may not unlikely -have regarded as a possible successor. Scott invited him to dinner and -proposed his health amid a strong muster of his literary friends. Dr -Gregory--whose name has survived in connection with what Stevenson calls -‘our good old Scotch medicine’--discovered his poem on Mundell’s counter -fresh from the printer, and at once sought him out. Everybody wanted to -meet him; and invitations poured in upon him until, like Sterne after the -publication of ‘Tristram Shandy,’ he found himself deep in social -engagements for months ahead. How he bore it all we have no means of -knowing. Thirty years later he speaks of himself as being at this time ‘a -young, shrinking, bashful creature,’ though he is honest enough to add -that he had a very high opinion of himself and his powers. Probably the -right measure of his timidity was taken by the lady who described him as -‘swaggering about’ in a Suwarrow jacket. - -With the exception of ‘Gilderoy,’ Campbell does not seem to have written -anything during the remainder of 1799. He conceived the idea of a poem on -‘the patriot Tell,’ but notwithstanding that the subject must have been -exactly to his liking he never utilised it. Another idea which occurred to -him also failed of fruition, although references continue to be made to it -in his correspondence for some time. This was a poem to be called ‘The -Queen of the North,’ in which--with Edinburgh as the _locale_--such themes -as the independence of Scotland and the achievements of her great men were -to be employed to revive the old spirit of freedom. In the meantime, while -these projects were passing through his mind, a new edition of ‘The -Pleasures of Hope’ had been called for, and with Mundell’s additional -payment of £50 in his pocket, Campbell decided to make a tour in Germany. - -The objects to be gained by this pilgrimage were perfectly plain to him. -He would acquire another language, and he would enlarge his views of -society. In the conversation of his travelled friends he could detect the -advantages of intercourse with the foreigner, and in travelling, as they -had travelled, he hoped to rid himself of the imputation that -‘home-keeping youths have ever homely wits.’ In spite of his recent poetic -performance, he felt that he was still a raw youth, who would make but a -poor figure in a company of London wits; and although he expected to be -stared at for his awkwardness and ridiculed for his broken German, yet, to -be ‘uncaged from the insipid scenes of life,’ to ‘see the wonders of the -world abroad,’ to make first-hand acquaintance with that literature, so -prominently represented by Goethe, which was then rising like a star on -the intellectual world--all this he regarded as a compensation for greater -evils than his friends could suggest or his fears imagine. - -For one must not forget that the contemplated tour was not without some -risks. The year 1800 was not exactly the time that one who valued above -all things his personal comfort, perhaps even his personal liberty, would -have chosen for a continental holiday. The long wars of the French -Revolution had been in progress for some time, and Napoleon had just begun -to make himself famous. England was at war with France; France was at war -with Austria, and Russia had formed a coalition with Sweden and Denmark -against England. In short, Europe was at the time in such a state of -military unrest that no one knew what a day or an hour might bring forth. -But Campbell, living at home at ease, thought very lightly of the hazards -of war. He was tired of his ‘dully sluggardised’ existence, without -definite aim or ambition; and so, in the beginning of June, he walked down -to Leith, and, with a sheaf of introductions in his pocket, set sail for -Hamburg. - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -CONTINENTAL TRAVELS - - -Campbell’s intention had been to proceed from Harwich after a week’s visit -to London, but, on mature reflection, he decided that the ‘modern Babel’ -must wait. Some months later he realised that he had made a mistake. ‘It -is a sad want not to be able to tell foreigners anything of London,’ he -then wrote; ‘I have blushed for shame when the ladies asked me questions -about it.’ This, however, was a point he had not foreseen, and his -immediate reasons for delaying the London visit were both frank and -amusing. On the eve of his departure he explains to Thomson that he had -resisted the seductions of the great city because his finances were not -equal to both London and Germany, and Germany he would on no account -forego. Moreover, he knew his own nature too well. New sights and new -acquaintances would have dismissed the little industry he possessed, and -would have soon reduced him to the fettered state of a bookseller’s fag. -There was still another consideration. He was not fitted for shining in a -London company just yet. When he had added to the number of his books, he -might think of making his _debût_, but for the present he would not run -the risk of ridicule on account of his northern brogue and his ‘braw -Scotch boos.’ And then comes this curious announcement: ‘In reality my -fixed intention on returning from Germany is to set up a course of -lectures on the _Belles Lettres_. I had some thoughts of lecturing in -Edinburgh, but cannot think of remaining any longer in one place. If -London should not offer encouragement, I mean to try Dublin. I think this -a respectable profession, as the showman of the bear and monkey said when -he gave his name to the commissioners of the income tax as an “itinerant -lecturer on natural history.”’ The last sentence suggests--though it is -impossible to be sure, for Campbell’s jokes were rather heavy-handed--that -he threw out this idea in jest. If he was serious, it is another -indication of his habit of easily adopting new professions, of which we -may learn more in the sequel. - -Campbell had a cordial reception from the British residents in Hamburg. He -met Klopstock, and presented him with a copy of ‘The Pleasures of Hope.’ -He describes the poet as ‘a mild, civil old man,’ one of the first really -great men in the world of letters he ever knew, and adds that his only -intercourse with him was in Latin, with which language he made his way -tolerably well among the French and Germans, and still better among the -Hungarians. How long he remained in Hamburg is not certain: as we shall -see presently, he had arrived at Ratisbon in time to witness the startling -military events of July. The political excitement was now at its height. -Several of the Bavarian towns were in the hands of the French, and the -upper valley of the Danube was under military government. ‘Everything -here,’ says Campbell, writing soon after his arrival, ‘is whisper, -surmise, and suspense. If war breaks out, the bridge over the Danube is -expected to be blown up. You may guess what a devil of a splutter -twenty-four large arches will make flying miles high in the air and coming -down like falling planets to crush the town!… Ratisbon will be shivered to -atoms; and as no warning is expected, the inhabitants may be buried under -the ruins.’ - -To be thus plunged, as it were, into the thick of the fray was hardly a -pleasant experience for the British pilgrim. The richest fields of Europe -desolated by contending troops; peasants driven from their homes to -starve and beg in the streets; horses dying of hunger, and men dying of -their wounds--such were the ‘dreadful novelties’ that Campbell had come -from Edinburgh to see. He describes the whole thing very vividly in -letters to his eldest brother. The following refers particularly to the -action which gave the French possession of Ratisbon. He says: - - I got down to the seat of war some weeks before the summer - armistice, and indulged in what you call the criminal curiosity of - witnessing blood and desolation. Never shall time efface from my - memory the recollection of that hour of astonishment when I stood - with the good monks of St James’ to overlook a charge of Klenau’s - cavalry upon the French under Grenier. We saw the fire given and - returned, and heard distinctly the sound of French _pas de charge_ - collecting the lines to attack in close column. After three hours - awaiting the issue of a severe action, a park of artillery was - opened just beneath the walls of the monastery, and several drivers - that were stationed there to convey the wounded in spring waggons - were killed in our sight. - -In some notes relating to the same period he remarks that, in point of -impressions, this formed the most important epoch in his life; but he adds -that his recollections of seeing men strewn dead on the field, or what was -worse, seeing them dying, were so horrible, that he studiously endeavoured -to banish them from his memory. - -There were, however, scenes of peace as well as of war. Some Hamburg -friends had given him letters of introduction to the venerable Abbot -Arbuthnot, of the Benedictine Scots College, under whose protection it was -believed that he would have special opportunities for study and -observation; and the hospitality of the monks now ‘amused’ him, as he puts -it, into such tranquillity as was possible in that perilous time. The -‘splendour and sublimity’ of the Catholic Church service, notably the -music, also affected him with all the attraction of novelty. But these -things were at best only alleviations. Campbell had already begun to -suffer from Johnson’s demon of hypochondria, and when the novelty of his -surroundings had worn off, he felt himself in the worst imaginable plight -of the stranger in a strange land. The following programme of his day’s -doings affords a hint of his wretchedness: - - I rise at seven--thanks to the flies that forbid me to sleep--and - after returning thanks to God for prolonging my miserable existence - at Ratisbon, I put on a pair of boots and pantaloons, and study with - open windows, and half-naked, till ten o’clock. I then chew a crust - of bread, and eat a plum for breakfast. At 11 my - _parlez-vous-Français_ steps in with his formal periwig and still - more formal bow. I chatter a jargon of Latin and French to him--for - he has no English--and study again from 12 till 1: dine and read - English or Greek till 2, and then take an afternoon walk. Under a - burning sun I then expose my feeble carcase in a walk round the - cursed walls, or traverse the wood where the Rothmantels or ‘Red - Cloaks’ and Hussars amused us at cut-and-thrust before the city was - taken. Sometimes I venture to the heights where the last kick-up was - seen, when the poor Austrians were driven across the Danube. The - Convent I seldom visit: we always get upon politics, and that is a - cursed subject. - -So indeed it seemed. It was, however, Campbell’s own fault. The -brotherhood of the Schotten Kirche[2] had welcomed him very heartily on -his arrival; but they were Jacobites, and he was so indiscreet as to make -open avowal of his Republican opinions. The result was unpleasant enough. -One of the monks denounced him for his political heresies; others regarded -him with ill-concealed suspicion and distrust. A countryman of his own, -who bore the conventual name of Father Boniface, had recommended him to an -unsuitable lodging at the house of a friend, and Campbell complained that -he had been robbed there. Father Boniface met the complaint with abuse, -and ‘spoke to me once or twice,’ says Campbell, ‘in a manner rather -strange.’ One night the Father dogged him into the refectory and attacked -him with the most blackguardly scurrility. ‘I never,’ writes Campbell, -‘found myself so completely carried away by indignation. I flew at the -scoundrel and would have soon rewarded his insolence had not the others -interposed.’ After an experience like this, it was only natural that he -should declaim against the ‘lazy, loathsome, ignorant, ill-bred’ monks, -whose society he had at first found so agreeable! The only one for whom he -entertained a lasting regard was Dr Arbuthnot, whom he describes as ‘the -most commanding figure he ever beheld,’ and to whom he unmistakably -alludes in ‘The Ritter Bann,’ one of his later poems. - -Being unable either to advance or retreat, and not knowing what to do with -himself amid the gloom and excitement caused by the presence of two -hostile armies, Campbell appears to have sunk into something like blank -despair. ‘Oh, God!’ he exclaims in a letter, ‘when the dull dusk of -evening comes on, when the melancholy bell calls to vespers, I find myself -a poor solitary being, dumb from the want of heart to speak, and deaf to -all that is said from a want of interest to hear.’ About the future he -feels an insecurity and a dread which baffle all his efforts to form a -scheme or resolution. Low-minded people suspect him, and debate about his -character, and wonder what he can be doing in Ratisbon. He cannot settle -himself to literary work of any kind. He sits down resolved to compose in -spite of uncertainty and uneasiness, and looks helplessly for hours -together at the paper before him. - -Campbell’s letters of this period make indeed most doleful reading. They -are addressed, for the most part, to John Richardson, a young Edinburgh -lawyer who enjoyed familiar intercourse with Scott and other _dii -majores_ of the capital. Richardson had promised to join him in Germany, -and when Campbell is not voicing his woes, he is planning schemes for -Richardson and himself when at length they are free to start on a tour. -With economy he thinks they might visit every corner of Germany, travel -three thousand miles, stop at convenient stages for a few days at a time, -and be ‘masters of all the geographical knowledge worth learning’ for £30 -a-piece. They will require nothing in the way of baggage but ‘a stick -fitted as an umbrella--a nice contrivance very common here--with a fine -Holland shirt in one pocket, our stockings and silk breeches in the other, -and a few cravats wrapped in clean paper in the crowns of our hats.’ At -country inns they can have bed and supper for half-a-crown, coffee for -sixpence, and bread and beer for twopence. As for books, Campbell will -always manage to carry enough in his pockets for evening amusement; but -Richardson must ‘bring, for God’s sake, Shakespeare and a few British -classics.’ A striking idea occurs to him in one of his sportive moods. -‘Without degrading our characters in the least, we might have some -articles from Britain and dispose of them to immense advantage. The -merchants here are greedy and blind to their interests: they sell little -because they sell so high. Their general profit is two hundred per cent.’ -The spectacle of Thomas Campbell hawking British goods round the German -Empire would have been sufficiently diverting; but of course it was only -another of his ponderous pleasantries. - -Nevertheless, there was good reason for his being anxious about making a -little money. His funds were fast giving out, and at present he did not -quite see how he was to replenish his purse. He makes constant complaint -about the uncertainty of remittances, and in one letter strikes his hand -on his ‘sad heart’ as he thinks of himself starving far from home and -friends. However, matters mended a little for a time: his spirits revived, -he found himself able to work again; and the armistice having been -renewed, he made various interesting excursions into the interior, getting -as far as Munich, and returning by the valley of the Iser. ‘I remember,’ -he says, speaking of these excursions in a letter quoted by Washington -Irving, ‘I remember how little I valued the art of painting before I got -into the heart of such impressive scenes; but in Germany I would have -given anything to have possessed an art capable of conveying ideas -inaccessible to speech and writing. Some particular scenes were indeed -rather overcharged with that degree of the terrific which oversteps the -sublime; and I own my flesh yet creeps at the recollection of -spring-waggons and hospitals. But the sight of Ingolstadt in ruins or -Hohenlinden covered with fire, seven miles in circumference, were -spectacles never to be forgotten.’ - -The reference to Hohenlinden here is somewhat puzzling. According to -Beattie, Campbell left Ratisbon in the beginning of October, and went by -way of Leipsic to Altona, where he remained until his return to England. -He was certainly at Altona in the beginning of November, for his letters -then begin to date from thence. But the battle of Hohenlinden was not -fought until the 3rd of December, and it is therefore clear that Campbell, -unless he made a journey of which we have no trace, could not have seen -Hohenlinden ‘covered with fire.’ Beattie suggests that in the passage just -quoted Hohenlinden may be a slip for Landshut on the Iser, Leipheim, near -Gunzberg, or Donauwert, where battles and conflagrations took place during -the summer campaign, the effects of which Campbell may have witnessed -after his arrival on the Danube. He says that he often heard the poet -refer to ‘the sight of Ingolstadt in ruins,’ but he never once heard him -describe the field of Hohenlinden. Of course if he visited Munich at the -time mentioned he may have made a cursory survey of the village; but -until after the battle, travellers never thought of going out of their way -to see Hohenlinden. It is a pity that there should be any dubiety upon -this matter, for our interest in Campbell’s stirring lines would have been -heightened by the knowledge that he had been an eye-witness of the events -which they describe. - -The armistice which had been renewed at Hohenlinden on the 28th of -September was for forty-five days. As the time for its termination -approached Campbell thought it wise, in view of a resumption of -hostilities, to secure his passports, and escape from Ratisbon. There was -another determining point: his funds were now almost exhausted, and he -wanted to be nearer home. He decided to go to Hamburg, whence, if -remittances did not arrive, he could take passage for Leith. Of his -journey from Ratisbon we hear practically nothing, though in one of his -letters he gives an indication of his route by mentioning such towns as -Nuremberg, Bamberg, Weimar, Jena, Leipsic, Halle, Brunswick, and -Lunenburg. In his previous journey to Ratisbon in July he seems to have -followed the course of the Elbe to Dresden, and thence proceeded through -Zwickau, Bayreuth, and Amberg to the seat of war on the Danube; so that -now he was, as he says, ‘master of all to be seen’ in a very considerable -part of the country. - -When he reached Hamburg he found a letter awaiting him from Richardson -announcing that a ‘blessed double edition’ of ‘The Pleasures of Hope’ had -been thrown off, thus entitling him to £50, according to the understanding -with Mundell. Relieved of all his pecuniary anxiety in this unexpected -fashion, Campbell resolved to remain abroad for the winter. He took up his -quarters at Altona, a town near Hamburg, which he describes as the -pleasantest place in all Germany. His letters begin to show a more -cheerful spirit. He has the prospect of ‘useful and agreeable -acquaintance, and a winter of useful activity,’ and his portfolio, -hitherto a chaos, is soon to be filled with ‘monsters and wonders -sufficient to match the pages of Bruce himself.’ One of the new -acquaintances promised to prove of substantial advantage to him. A -gentleman of family preparing for a tour along the lower Danube, required -a travelling companion, and having been introduced to Campbell, he offered -him £100 a year to accompany him and direct his studies. There was to be -nothing like a formal tutorship; the poet was merely to make himself a -‘respectable friend and useful companion.’ Campbell professed to be at -this time, like Burns, sorely touchable on the score of independence, but -a man who has to content himself, as Campbell had now to do, with two -meals a day, must find it convenient to swallow his pride occasionally; -and Campbell, after a great deal of epistolary fuss about it, accepted the -gentleman’s offer. - -Unfortunately the agreement was never carried out. Beattie’s curt -intimation is that ‘sudden and important changes’ took place in the views -and circumstances of the anticipated patron. We get, however, an inkling -of the real state of the case from a letter of Campbell’s to Dr Anderson, -written from London some months later--a letter which does equal honour to -the poet’s kind-heartedness and modesty. Speaking of his well-intentioned -friend he says: - - That valuable and high-spirited young man was humbled--after a - struggle which concealed misfortunes--to reveal his situation and in - sickness to receive assistance from one whose advancement and - re-establishment in life he had planned but a few weeks before, when - no reverse of fortune was dreaded. His situation required more than - my resources were adequate to impart, but still it prevented his - feelings being deeply wounded by addressing strangers. I did not - regret my own share of the hardships, but I acknowledge that in - those days of darkness and distress I had hardly spirit to write a - single letter. I have often left the sick-bed of my friend for a - room of my own which wanted the heat of a fire in the month of - January, and on the borders of Denmark. - -The failure of this enterprise was obviously a great disappointment to -Campbell. The prospects of the tour had seemed to him peculiarly enticing, -and he never ceased to deplore the necessity which led to its being -abandoned. - -Another acquaintance made at this time happily bore some fruit. A certain -Anthony M’Cann, ‘a brave United Irishman,’ had, with other unfortunate -fellow-countrymen who were engaged in the Rebellion of 1798, taken refuge -on the banks of the Elbe. Campbell fell in with him and his fellow exiles, -and passed a good part of his leisure in their society. The literary -result was that pathetic if somewhat overrated song, ‘The Exile of Erin,’ -which Campbell wrote after one evening finding Tony M’Cann more than -usually depressed. Many years later an absurd claim to the authorship of -this song was raised on behalf of an Irishman named Nugent, whose sister -swore to having seen it in her brother’s handwriting before the date of -Campbell’s continental visit. Campbell was naturally pained by the -accusation, but he produced irrefragable proofs of his title to the song; -and although the charge of plagiarism was revived after his death, there -is not the slightest ground for doubting his authorship. The subject is -fully dealt with by Beattie, but to discuss it nowadays would be -altogether superfluous. - -Before leaving home, Campbell had entered into an agreement with Mr Perry -of the _Morning Chronicle_ to send him something for his columns, and ‘The -Exile of Erin’ was published by him on the 28th of January 1801. In a -prefatory note the author expressed the hope that the song might induce -Parliament to ‘extend their benevolence to those unfortunate men, whom -delusion and error have doomed to exile, but who sigh for a return to -their native homes.’ Campbell’s sympathy with the Irish exiles appears to -have been as strong as his sympathy with the Poles. He adopted as his seal -a shamrock with the motto ‘Erin-go-Bragh,’ and his enthusiasm was so -flamboyant that on his arrival in Edinburgh he was actually in some danger -of being imprisoned for conspiring with General Moreau in Austria and with -the Irish in Hamburg to land a French army in Ireland! Campbell might well -be astonished at the idea of ‘a boy like me’ conspiring against the -British Empire. Subsequently he made valiant efforts to obtain leave for -M’Cann to return home. These efforts were unsuccessful, but he lived to -see the exile established in Hamburg, through a fortunate marriage, as one -of its wealthiest citizens. - -During his residence at Altona, Campbell, when not engaged in composition, -seems to have busied himself chiefly in trying to plumb the depths of -German philosophy. He says--and he is ‘almost ashamed to confess it’--that -for twelve consecutive weeks he did nothing but study Kant. Distrusting -his own imperfect acquaintance with German, he took a disciple of the -master through his philosophy, but found nothing to reward the labour. His -metaphysics, he remarked, were mere innovations upon the received meaning -of words, and conveyed no more instruction than the writings of Duns -Scotus or Thomas Aquinas. Of German philosophy in general Campbell -entertained a very poor opinion. The language in his view was much richer -in the field of _Belles Lettres_; and he claimed to have got more good -from reading Schiller, Wieland, and Bürger than from any of the severer -studies which he undertook at this time. Wieland he regarded with especial -favour: he could not conceive ‘a more perfect poet.’ Of Goethe and -Lessing, strangely enough, he makes practically no mention. - -These details about Campbell’s doings are gathered mainly from his -letters to Richardson. He was still looking forward eagerly to the arrival -of his friend; and when he wrote it was generally with the object of -keeping his enthusiasm awake by glowing descriptions of Hungary, which he -characterised as a ‘poetical paradise,’ the country ‘worthy of our best -research,’ all the rest of Germany being only so much ‘vulgar knowledge.’ -Campbell’s well-laid schemes were, however, destined to be upset, and in a -way which he evidently never anticipated. A great political crisis was at -hand. England had determined to detach Denmark from the coalition by force -of arms, and on the 12th of March the British fleet left Yarmouth Roads -for the Sound. Altona being on the Danish shore was no longer eligible as -a residence for English subjects, and Campbell, having already had more -than enough of the pomp and circumstance of war, resolved to return home. -He took a berth in the _Royal George_, bound for Leith, and the vessel -dropped slowly down the river to Gluckstadt, in front of the Danish -batteries. The passage proved very tedious, and in the end, instead of -getting to Leith, the _Royal George_ was spied by a Danish privateer and -chased into Yarmouth. This was early in April, and on the 7th of the month -Campbell arrived in London, where, through the good graces of Perry, he -was at once made free of the best literary society of the day. - -In connection with the continental sojourn thus hurriedly terminated, it -remains now to consider the literary product of the nine months’ absence -from home. Like many another poet, Campbell will be remembered, if he is -remembered at all, by his shorter pieces; and it is interesting to note -that of these the best were written or at any rate conceived on alien -soil. The ‘Exile of Erin’ has already been mentioned. ‘Hohenlinden’ did -not appear until 1802, but there is every reason for believing that it was -at least outlined shortly after the date of the occurrences which it so -vividly pictures. Galt tells an amusing story of its rejection by a -Greenock newspaper as not being ‘up to the editor’s standard’; but it took -the fancy of Sir Walter Scott. When Washington Irving was at Abbotsford in -1817, Scott observed to him: ‘And there’s that glorious little poem, too, -of “Hohenlinden”; after he [Campbell] had written it he did not seem to -think much of it, but considered some of it d--d drum and trumpet lines. I -got him to recite it to me, and I believe that the delight I felt and -expressed had an effect in inducing him to print it.’ The anecdote related -by Scott in connection with Leyden is well-known. Campbell and Leyden, as -we have seen, had quarrelled. When Scott repeated ‘Hohenlinden’ to Leyden, -the latter said: ‘Dash it, man, tell the fellow I hate him, but, dash it, -he has written the finest verses that have been published these fifty -years.’ Scott did not fail to deliver the message. ‘Tell Leyden,’ said -Campbell, ‘that I detest him, but that I know the value of his critical -approbation.’ - -Curiously enough, Carlyle, quoting in 1814 a poem of Leyden’s on the -victory of Wellington at Assaye, remarks that ‘if there is anything in -existence that surpasses this it must be “Hohenlinden”--but what’s like -“Hohenlinden”?’ Leyden’s verses in truth read somewhat tamely, but -Carlyle’s criticism of poetry was not to be depended upon, especially at -this early date, when he preferred Campbell to either Byron or Scott. His -impassioned liking for ‘Hohenlinden’ was, however, well justified by its -merits. It has been described as the only representation of a modern -battle which possesses either interest or sublimity. Sublimity is a word -of which we are not particularly fond in these days, perhaps because it -was so freely used by critics a hundred years ago. We prefer simplicity; -and it is surely the simplicity of ‘Hohenlinden’ which mainly accounts -for its effect. Each stanza is a picture--not a finished etching, but -rather an ‘impression’; no delicate shades of colour, but broad strokes of -red and black on white. No word is wasted, no scene is elaborated; and if -what is depicted is all pretty obvious--well, blood is red, and gunpowder -is sulphurous, and there is little room for invention. To call it great -art would be absurd; it is excellent scene-painting. - -Next to ‘Hohenlinden’ among the pieces of this period must be placed ‘Ye -Mariners of England’ and ‘The Soldier’s Dream.’ The first was written at -Altona when rumours of England’s intention to break up the coalition began -to spread. It was printed by Perry above the signature of ‘Amator Patriæ,’ -with an intimation that it was avowedly an imitation of the seventeenth -century sea-song, ‘Ye Mariners of England,’ which Campbell used to sing at -musical soirees in Edinburgh. It is one of the most stirring of his war -pieces. ‘The Soldier’s Dream,’ beginning ‘Our bugles sang truce,’ was not -given to the public until the spring of 1804, but it is generally believed -to have been written at Altona, and in any case it was inspired by the -events which the poet witnessed during his residence at Ratisbon. Several -other pieces were composed or revised at this time, but they are of little -importance. Byron declared that the ‘Lines on leaving a Scene in Bavaria’ -were ‘perfectly magnificent,’ but the praise is grotesquely extravagant. -The lines certainly bear traces of genuine feeling, but the piece as a -whole is obscure and unfinished. - -The famous ‘Battle of the Baltic’ was not published until 1809, but as it -was suggested to Campbell by the sight of the Danish batteries as he -sailed past them on his way home from Hamburg, it will be convenient to -deal with it here. The subject of the poem is known in history as the -Battle of Copenhagen, which was fought on the 2nd of April 1801. Campbell -sent a first draft of it to Scott in 1805. This draft consisted of -twenty-seven stanzas, while the published version has only eight. It has -been remarked that if the original form had been adhered to, ‘The Battle -of the Baltic’ might have become a popular ballad for a time and then been -forgotten, whereas, in its condensed form, it is one of the finest and -most enduring war-songs in the language. Its metre, which the _Edinburgh -Review_ thought ‘strange and unfortunate,’ is really one of its merits. -The lines of unequal length relieve it of monotony; the sharp, short final -line of each stanza being indeed an excellent invention. The poem has -defects in plenty, which have been often enough pointed out: not a stanza -would pass muster to-day; but it would be ungracious to criticise too -severely one of the few vigorous battle pieces we have. - - - - -CHAPTER V - -WANDERINGS--MARRIAGE--SETTLEMENT IN LONDON - - -During his sojourn on the Continent Campbell had suffered incredible -hardships, hardships such as he hesitated to divulge even to his friends. -Now he was to experience an agreeable change--a transition from ‘the -tedium of cold and gloomy evenings, unconsoled by the comforts of life, -and from the barbarity of savages (where an Englishman was not sure of his -life) to the elegant society of London and pleasures of every -description.’ He appears to have landed with little more than the -Scotsman’s proverbial half-crown in his pocket, but Perry, a Scot like -himself, proved the friend in need. ‘I will be all that you could wish me -to be,’ he said, and he kept his word. Calling upon him one day, Campbell -was shown a letter from Lord Holland, inviting him to dine at the King of -Clubs, a survival of the institution where Johnson used to lay down his -little senate laws. ‘Thither with his lordship,’ says Campbell, writing in -1837, ‘I accordingly repaired, and it was an era in my life. There I met, -in all their glory and feather, Mackintosh, Rogers, the Smiths, Sydney, -and others. In the retrospect of a long life I know no man whose acuteness -of intellect gave me a higher idea of human nature than Mackintosh; and -without disparaging his benevolence--for he had an excellent heart--I may -say that I never saw a man who so reconciled me to hereditary aristocracy -like the benignant Lord Holland.’ Of Lady Holland, Campbell had an equally -high opinion. She was, he said, a ‘formidable woman, cleverer by several -degrees than Buonaparte,’ whose name, it is interesting to note, occurs -again and again in his letters. - -Among the other friends he made at this time were Dr Burney and Sir John -Moore, Mrs Inchbald and Mrs Barbauld, J. P. Kemble, and Mrs Siddons. From -a man so notoriously proud and reserved as Kemble he says he looked for -little notice; but Kemble’s behaviour at their first meeting undeceived -him. ‘He spoke with me in another room, and, with a grace more enchanting -than the favour itself, presented me with the freedom of Drury Lane -Theatre. His manner was so expressive of dignified benevolence that I -thought myself transported to the identity of Horatio, with my friend -Hamlet giving me a welcome.’ Kemble’s condescending kindness he -ill-requited in 1817 with a set of wordy, inflated ‘valedictory stanzas,’ -in which he displayed all his poetical apparatus of ‘conscious bosoms,’ -‘classic dome,’ ‘supernal light,’ and so forth. Mrs Siddons he describes -as a woman of the first order, who sang some airs of her own composition -with incomparable sweetness. In Rogers he found ‘one of the most refined -characters, whose manners and writing may be said to correspond.’ -Everybody and everything, in fact, delighted him; the pains of the past -were forgotten, and the future began to look brighter than it had ever -done before. - -Unfortunately, just as he had got into this happy state of mind, he was -startled by the news of his father’s death. He had heard nothing of the -old man’s illness, and bitterly reproached himself for having left him in -his last days. It was, however, some comfort to him to learn that Dr -Anderson had watched at his bedside, and, when all was over, had seen his -remains laid reverently in the cemetery of St John’s Chapel. He died as he -had lived, pious and placid, full of religious hope as of years. Campbell -went home to console his mother and sisters, and to set their affairs in -order. His father’s annuity from the Glasgow Merchants’ Society died with -him; the sisters were good-looking but valetudinarian, and Campbell could -only promise that if a new edition of ‘The Pleasures of Hope’ succeeded he -would furnish a house in which they might keep boarders and teach school. -Once in the house, he told them, they would have to trust in Providence. - -The prospect certainly did not look promising, either for Campbell or his -dependents. A thousand subscribers were required to make an edition of -‘The Pleasures of Hope’ safe and profitable, and as that number was not to -be obtained in the north, Campbell was advised to go to London to canvass -a larger public. Meanwhile he had to make both ends meet, and in default -of precise information we must surmise that he turned out a deal of -joyless, uncongenial work. Nor, with all his industry, did he succeed in -relieving his straitened circumstances. The whole year was one of great -privation, when the common necessaries of life were being sold at an -exorbitant price, and ‘meal-mob’ rioters were parading the streets and -breaking into the bakers’ shops. People who had much more substantial -resources than Campbell felt the temporary embarrassment. What Campbell -should have done it would not be easy to say; what he did do it would be -quite easy to censure. In spite of all his fine friends, for all the -lavish promises of Perry and others, he was misguided enough to borrow -money--on ‘Judaic terms’--with, of course, the inevitable result. Beattie -does not mention the sum borrowed, but he says it was nearly doubled by -enormous interest, and could only be repaid by excessive application. -Campbell was always notoriously careless in money matters, and even the -concern he naturally felt as a devoted son and brother can hardly excuse -the imprudence with which he added to his obligations at this period. But -prudence, as Coleridge once pointed out, is not usually a plant of poetic -growth. - -In the midst of all his cares and anxieties, Campbell found some solace in -the society of such literary and other friends as the Rev. Archibald -Alison--the ‘Man of Taste’--Professor Dugald Stewart, Lord Jeffrey, Dr -Anderson, and the family of Grahames, of whom the author of ‘The Sabbath’ -was the best known member. The fact of his having been at the seat of war -gave his conversation a peculiar interest, and his pilgrimage generally -was regarded as a subject of no little curiosity. His old pupil, Lord -Cunninghame, remarks upon the change which his continental visit had -evidently effected in his view of public affairs and the accepted order of -things at home. Whatever youthful, hot-headed Republican notions he may -have indulged before he went abroad, we gather that he had come back -considerably sobered down, and now he deigned to express--he was still -very young!--a decided preference for the British Constitution. - -But literature was after all of more importance to him than politics. Such -plans as he had formed at this time he freely discussed with Sir Walter -Scott, from whom he received much encouragement and good advice. Lord -Minto was another friend who proved of value. Minto had just returned from -Vienna, where he had been acting as Envoy Extraordinary, and with the view -perhaps of hearing his version of recent events in Germany, he invited the -poet to his house at Castle Minto, some forty-five miles from Edinburgh. -The visit turned out in every way agreeable, and when Campbell left, it -was with the understanding that he would join Lord Minto in London in the -course of the parliamentary session. A London visit promised many -advantages, among them the opportunity of securing subscribers for the new -edition of ‘The Pleasures of Hope,’ and Campbell returned to Edinburgh to -make his preparations. He travelled overland, spending a few days in -Liverpool with Currie, the biographer of Burns, and while there convulsing -his friends by the nervousness he displayed on horseback. When he reached -London he found that Minto had prepared a ‘poet’s room’ for him at his -house in Hanover Square, and there he took up his residence for the -season, giving, it is understood, occasional service as secretary in -return for the hospitality. - -He says he found Minto’s conversation very instructive, but Minto was a -Tory of the Burke school, which Campbell regarded as inimical to political -progress. Campbell naïvely remarks in one of his letters that at an early -period of their acquaintance they had a discussion on the subject of -politics, when he thought of giving Minto his political confession of -faith. If it should not meet with Minto’s approval, then the intimacy -might end. Campbell does not appear to have rehearsed his whole political -creed, but he went so far as to tell Minto that he was a Republican, and -that his opinion of the practicability of a Republican form of government -had not been materially affected by all that had happened in the French -Revolution. Lord Minto was much too sensible a man to disturb himself -about the political views of his overweening young guest, which, with a -gentle sarcasm apparently unobserved by the poet, he set down as ‘candid -errors of judgment.’ Still, there must have been some lively debates -around the table now and again. The correspondence makes special mention -of Touissant, the negro chieftain of San Domingo, as a subject of frequent -wrangling. Campbell looked upon Touissant as a second Kosciusko, while -Minto could only dwell upon the horrors that were likely to follow upon -his achievements in the cause of so-called freedom. - -But these heated discussions were confined mainly to the morning hours. -Campbell’s chief concerns lay in other directions. Lord Minto left him -very much master of his own time, and his literary friendships were now -revived and extended at Perry’s table, at the King of Clubs, and -elsewhere. Minto introduced him to Wyndham, whom he describes as ‘a Moloch -among the fallen war-makers,’ to Lord Malmesbury and Lord Pelham--‘plain, -affable men’--and to others. He met Malthus, whose theories he cordially -supported, and found him ‘most ingenious and pleasant, very sensible and -good.’ He was much flattered by the friendly notice of Mrs Siddons, and -when the Kembles admitted him to their family circle, he announced in a -burst of flunkeyism that he had attained the acme of his ambitions. With -Telford the engineer, one of his Edinburgh patrons, and a genuine if not -very judicious lover of poetry, he spent many of his leisure hours. -Telford was intimate with the Secretary of State, and in one of his -letters he hints to Alison that he may take some steps to direct the -Minister’s practical attention to the ‘young Pope.’ - -Whether Telford carried out his intention does not appear; but at any rate -there was no patronising of the young Pope, who continued to occupy his -poet’s room, and presently began to tell his friends in the north that he -ardently longed to get away from his present scene of ‘hurry and -absurdity,’ to the refined and select society of Edinburgh. Many young -fellows in his position would have counted themselves lucky at being -housed in such distinguished quarters; but Campbell was in a low state of -health at the time, and that doubtless accounted for his aggravated fits -of despondency. In any case he had his wish about returning to Edinburgh. -At the close of the parliamentary session Minto started for Scotland, -taking Campbell with him, and by the end of June he had exchanged his -poet’s room for the much humbler abode of his mother and sisters in Alison -Square. - -During this second visit to London he seems to have written very little, -but what he did write has retained at least a certain school-book -popularity. There was ‘Hohenlinden,’ finished at this time, and of which -we have already spoken, and there was ‘Lochiel’s Warning,’ a ‘furious war -prophecy,’ in the composition of which he says he became greatly agitated -and excited. ‘Lochiel,’ like ‘Hohenlinden,’ had been intended for the new -edition of his poems, but, at the unexplained request of his friends, both -pieces were printed anonymously and dedicated to Alison. Both had run the -gauntlet of private criticism before being submitted to the public. When -the rough draft of ‘Lochiel’ was handed to Minto--who with Currie and -other friends criticised several successive drafts--he made some objection -to the ‘vulgarity’ of hanging, and this objection was supported later on -when the manuscript was passed about in Edinburgh. But Campbell was -determined to show how his hero might swing with sufficient dignity in a -good cause; and his objectors were silenced when he demonstrated to them -that Lochiel had a brother who actually suffered death by means of the -rope. - -Of course his friends were not all so hypercritical as Minto. When he read -‘Lochiel’ to Mrs Dugald Stewart, she laid her hand on his head with the -remark that it would bear another wreath of laurel yet. Campbell said this -made a stronger impression upon him than if she had spoken in a strain of -the loftiest laudation; nay, he declared it to have been one of the -principal incidents in his life that gave him confidence in his own -powers. Telford was even more enthusiastic. ‘I am absolutely vain of -Thomas Campbell,’ he says in a letter to Alison. ‘There never was anything -like him--he is the very spirit of Parnassus. Have you seen his “Lochiel”? -He will surpass everything ancient or modern--your Pindars, your Drydens, -and your Grays. I expect nothing short of a Scotch Milton, a Shakespeare, -or something more than either.’ - -To transcribe such stuff is really a tax on the biographer’s patience. It -was in this atmosphere of foolish adulation that Campbell spent those very -years when a young man most needs the tonic air of rigorous criticism. -Such coddling and cossetting never yet made a poet. Nothing that Campbell -ever did justifies a panegyric like that just quoted; least of all is it -justified by ‘Lochiel’s Warning,’ a bit of first-rate fustian which would -assuredly be forgotten but for its ‘Coming events cast their shadows -before,’ and a certain rhetorical fluency, which--with its convenient -length--make it a favourite with teachers of elocution. Campbell told -Minto that he was tempted to throw the poem away in vexation at his -inability to perfect it, and Scott himself had to insist on his retaining -what were considered its finest lines. A writer, above all a poet, ought -surely to _know_--as Tennyson, as Stevenson knew--when he has done a good -thing; when he does _not_ know, his friends are ill-advised in keeping his -effusions from the flames. Scott, with his usual generosity, called the -idea of the line quoted above a ‘noble thought, nobly expressed.’ The -thought is Schiller’s; and whatever ‘nobility’ there may be in the -expression is spoilt in a great measure by the jingle of the first line of -the couplet-- - - ’Tis the sunset of life _gives me mystical lore_. - -Even if this were not the case, its cachet of nobility could hardly -survive the ridiculous story told by Beattie. Campbell, according to this -circumstantial tale, was at Minto. He had gone early to bed and was -reflecting on the Wizard’s warning when he fell asleep. During the night -he suddenly awoke repeating: ‘Events to come cast their shadows before.’ -It was the very image for which he had been waiting a week. - - He rang the bell more than once with increased force. At last, - surprised and annoyed by so unseasonable a peal, the servant - appeared. The poet was sitting with one foot on the bed and the - other on the floor, with an air of mixed impatience and inspiration. - ‘Sir, are you ill?’ inquired the servant. ‘Ill! never better in my - life. Leave the candle and oblige me with a cup of tea as soon as - possible.’ He then started to his feet, seized hold of the pen, and - wrote down the ‘happy thought,’ but as he wrote changed the words - ‘events to come’ into ‘coming events,’ as it now stands in the text. - -This is not exactly a case of _mons parturit murem_; it is more like the -woman in the parable who beat up all her friends to rejoice with her in -the discovery of her trinket; still more like the proud bantam who -disturbs the whole neighbourhood for joy that a chick has been egged into -the world. It would be difficult indeed to find a more striking example of -much ado about nothing. - -Sometime during the month of August Campbell had an intimation from Lord -Minto that he was coming to Edinburgh, and would expect the poet to -accompany him when he went south. Minto came, and Campbell left with him. -In a letter to Scott Campbell says he must make the stay a short one, -because he has arranged to take lessons in drawing from Nasmyth, but of -that scheme nothing further is heard. Redding avers that Campbell could -not use a pencil in the delineation of the simplest natural object, and -instances an attempt to draw a cat which looked very like a crocodile. On -the way to Minto the party halted at Melrose to allow Campbell to inspect -the Abbey, with which he says he was pleased to enthusiasm. Scotland in -the eleventh century, he exclaims sarcastically, could erect the Abbey of -Melrose, and in the nineteenth could not finish the College of Edinburgh. -He comments upon the fine, wild, yet light outline of its architecture, -and says his mind was filled with romance at beholding ‘in the very form -and ornaments of the pile, proofs of its forest origin that lead us back -to the darkest of Gothic ages.’ When they arrived at Minto they were -welcomed by Scott, among other visitors; and Campbell retired early to -spend the evening with Hawkins’ Life of Johnson, in which he found ‘some -valuable stuff in the midst of superabundant nonsense.’ - -On the whole, he does not seem to have been very happy at Minto during -this visit. Lord Minto’s politeness, he tells Alison, only twitches him -with the sin of ingratitude for not being more contented under his -hospitable roof. But a lord’s house, fashionable strangers, -luxuriously-furnished saloons, and winding galleries where he can hardly -find his own room, make him as wretched as he can be, ‘without being a -_tutor_.’ Everyone, it is true, treats him civilly; the servants are -assiduous in setting him right when he loses his way; but degraded as he -is to a state of second childhood in this ‘new world,’ it would be -insulting his fallen dignity to smile hysterically and pretend to be -happy. All of which is sheer fudge--nothing more than the splenetic -utterance of an _enfant gaté_. - -Happily, Campbell had business at home, and there was no reason why he -should sit by the waters of Minto and sigh when he thought of Edinburgh. -The new edition of his poems was now in the press, and he returned to the -capital to revise the proofs. While he was thus engaged, other work of a -less agreeable kind divided his attention. An Edinburgh bookseller had -commissioned him to prepare ‘The Annals of Great Britain,’ a sort of -continuation of Smollett, which he contracted to finish in three volumes -octavo, at £100 per volume. The work was to be ‘anonymous and consequently -inglorious’--a labour, in fact, ‘little superior to compilation, and more -connected with profit than reputation.’ It was a distinct drop for the -author of ‘The Pleasures of Hope,’ and he knew it. Indeed, such was his -sensitiveness on the point that he bound his employer to secrecy, and -tried to hide the fact from even his most intimate friends. One cannot -help comparing this behaviour with that of Tennyson; Campbell falling, -even in his own estimation, below his very moderate level, deliberately -doing work of which he was ashamed; Tennyson, perhaps going to the other -extreme, sacrificing his worldly happiness and, it is to be feared, in -part the health of the woman he loved, to the pursuit of his ideals. But -Tennyson was a poet. - -‘The Annals of Great Britain’ was not published until some years after -this, but the book may be dismissed at once. It was little more than a dry -catalogue of events chronologically arranged, a mere piece of journeyman’s -work done to turn a penny, without accuracy of information or the -slightest regard for style. Campbell told Minto that the publisher did not -desire that he should make the work more than passable, and it is barely -passable. It is quite forgotten now; indeed, a writer in _Fraser’s -Magazine_ for November 1844 declares that even then the most intelligent -bookseller in London was unaware of its existence. Redding says that the -author’s own library was innocent of a copy. - -While Campbell was hammering away at this perfunctory performance in -Edinburgh, some whisper of honours and independence awaiting him in London -seems to have reached his ears. It was only a whisper, but the time had -clearly come when he must make up his mind once for all about the future. -By his own admission, poetry had now deserted him; he had lost both the -faculty and the inclination for writing it. Dull prose, he saw, must -henceforward be his stand-by. As a market for dull prose, London -undoubtedly ranked before Edinburgh; and so he took the plunge, though he -had no fixed engagement in London, no actual business there except to -superintend the printing of his poems. It was a bold venture, but in the -end it probably turned out as well as any other venture would have done. - -On the way south he was again the guest of Currie at Liverpool, where he -remained ‘drinking with this one and dining with that one’ for ten days. -Then he visited the pottery district of Staffordshire, where an old -college friend was employed. It was his first real experience of the -‘chaos of smoke,’ and he did not like it. The country, he remarked, for -all its furnaces, was not a ‘hot-bed of letters,’ though he had met with a -character who enjoyed a reputation for learning by carrying a Greek -Testament to church. The people were a heavy, plodding, unrefined race, -but they had good hearts, and what was just as important, they gave good -dinners. ‘These honest folks showed me all the symptoms of their affection -that could be represented by the symbols of meat and drink, and if ale, -wine, bacon, and pudding could have made up a stranger’s paradise I should -have found it among the Potteries.’ One untoward thing happened: Campbell -lost his wig. For it should have been mentioned that just before he left -Edinburgh, finding that his hair was getting alarmingly thin, he had -adopted the peruke, which he continued to wear for the rest of his life. A -bewigged poet of twenty-five must have been a somewhat singular spectacle -in those days, but Campbell made up for the antiquated head-gear by a -notable spruceness in other ways. He wore a blue coat with bright, gilt -buttons, a white waistcoat and cravat, buff nankeens and white stockings, -with shoes and silver buckles--a perfect scheme of colour. - -In this gay attire, though ‘agonised’ by the want of his wig, he arrived -in London on the 7th of March (1802). Telford at once took charge of him -by making him his guest at the Salopian Hotel, Charing Cross. Of Telford’s -admiration for Campbell as a poet we have already learnt something; his -opinion of Campbell as a man was apparently not quite so enthusiastic. -Nothing is recorded of Campbell’s conduct during the former visits to -London, but what are we to infer from the fact that Telford and Alison now -united to ‘advise and remonstrate with the young poet, at a moment when he -was again surrounded by all the seductive allurements of a great capital’? -Alison sent him a letter of paternal counsel for the regulation of his -life and studies; and Telford confided to Alison that he had asked -Campbell to live with him in order to have him constantly in check. If -Campbell really had any leaning towards social or other extravagances, it -was promptly counteracted by an event of which we shall have to speak -presently. - -Meanwhile, Telford does not appear to have helped him much by introducing -him to ‘all sorts of novelty.’ In fact, if we may believe himself, -Campbell did not take at all kindly to London and its ways. Life there is -‘absolutely a burning fever’; he hates its unnatural and crowded society; -it robs him of both health and composure. He cannot settle himself to -anything; he has one eternal round of invitations, and has got into a -style of living which suits neither his purse nor his inclination. Sleep -has become a stranger to him; every morning finds him with a headache. -Study and composition are out of the question. He sits ‘under the -ear-crashing influence of ten thousand chariot wheels’; when night comes -on he has no solace but his pipe, and he drops into bed like an old sinner -dropping into the grave. - -Campbell was very likely homesick, but his correspondence and the evidence -of his intimates put it beyond doubt that he was not cut out for society. -Indeed he expressly admits it himself. Fashionable folks, he exclaims in -one of his letters, have a slang of talk among themselves as -unintelligible to ordinary mortals as the lingo of the gipsies, and -perhaps not so amusing if one did understand it. A man of his lowly -breeding feels in their company something of what Burke calls proud -humility, or rather humble contempt. As for conversation with these -minions of _le beau monde_, he says it is not worth courting since their -minds are not so much filled as dilated. This was another of Campbell’s -many foolish utterances of the kind. It must have been made in a fit of -spleen, for Campbell, like Burns, could dinner very comfortably with a -lord when the meeting was likely to favour his own interests. - -Johnson declared of Charing Cross that the full tide of human existence -was there, but Campbell had nothing of Johnson’s affection for the -streets. He objected to the noise because it made conversation impossible, -or at least difficult. Hence it was that, ‘the roaring vortex’ having -proved unendurable to him, he now changed his quarters to a dingy den of -his own at 61 South Molton Street. Here he went on preparing the ‘Annals’ -and the new edition of his poems, toiling with the stolid regularity of -the mill-horse for ten hours a day. The new edition of the poems was -published in the beginning of June, when his spirits had sunk to ‘the very -ground-floor of despondency.’ It was a handsome quarto, and the printing, -in the author’s opinion, was so well done that, except one splendid book -from Paris, dedicated to ‘that villain Buonaparte,’ there was nothing -finer in Europe. It was really the seventh edition of ‘The Pleasures of -Hope,’ but it contained several engravings and some altogether new pieces, -among which, in addition to ‘Lochiel’ and ‘Hohenlinden,’ were the once -bepraised ‘Lines on Visiting a Scene in Argyllshire’ (the old family -estate of Kirnan), and ‘The Beech Tree’s Petition.’ - -In the course of some pleasantry at the house of Rogers, Campbell once -remarked that marriage in nine cases out of ten looks like madness. His -own case was clearly not the tenth, at any rate from a prudential point -of view. The sale of his new volume had given a temporary fillip to his -exchequer, and with the proverbial rashness of his class, he began to -think of taking a wife. His reasons were certainly more substantial than -his finances. He says that without a home of his own he found it -impossible to keep to his work. When he lived alone in lodgings he became -so melancholy that for whole days together he did nothing, and could not -even stir out of doors. In the company of a certain lady he had found for -the first time in his life a ‘perpetual serenity of mind,’ and now he was -determined to hazard everything for such a prize. It was a big hazard, and -he foresaw the objections. His infatuation, he remarks to Currie, will -inevitably set many an empty head a-shaking. But happiness and prosperity -do not, in his view, depend upon frigid maxims; and the strong motive he -will now have to exertion he regards as ‘worth uncounted thousands’ for -encountering the ills of existence. - -The lady for whom Campbell thus braved the uncertain future was a daughter -of his maternal cousin, Mr Robert Sinclair, who had been a wealthy -Greenock merchant and magistrate, and was now, after having suffered some -financial reverses, living retired in London. She bore ‘the romantic name -of Matilda,’ and is described by Campbell as a beautiful, lively, and -lady-like woman, who could make the best cup of Mocha in the world. -Beattie remarks upon the Spanish cast of her features: her complexion was -dark, her figure spare, graceful, and below the middle height, and when -she smiled her eyes gave an expression of tender melancholy to her face. -Like Campbell, she had been abroad, and it is said that at the Paris Opera -she attracted great attention in her favourite head-dress of turban and -feathers. The Turkish Ambassador, who was in a neighbouring box, declared -that he had seen nothing so beautiful in Europe. We have learned that -Campbell himself was handsome, but Mr Sinclair naturally did not regard -good looks as a guarantee of an assured income, and he stoutly opposed the -match. The prospective husband was not, however, to be put off by talk -about the precarious profits of literature. When was he likely to be in a -better position to marry? He had few or no debts; the subscriptions to his -quarto were still coming in; the ‘Annals’ was to bring him £300; and at -that very moment he had a fifty pound note in his desk. - -Mr Sinclair remained unmoved by this recital of wealth, but finding that -his daughter’s health was suffering, he waived his objections, and -arrangements were made for the marriage to take place at once. Campbell -now adopted every means in his power to make money. He wrote to his friend -Richardson, requesting him to take prompt measures for levying -contributions among the Edinburgh booksellers, the stockholders of the new -edition. ‘In the name of Providence,’ he demands in desperation, ‘how much -can you scrape out of my books in Edinburgh? If you can dispose of a -hundred volumes at fifteen shillings each, it will raise me £75. I shall -require £25 to bring me down to Scotland … and under £50 I cannot furnish -a house, which, at all events, I am determined to do.’ This request was -made only nine days before the marriage, which was celebrated at St -Margaret’s, Westminster, on the 10th of October 1803--not September, as -Beattie and Campbell himself have it. After a short honeymoon trip, the -pair returned to town and settled down in Pimlico, where the father-in-law -had considerately furnished a suite of rooms for them. - -Campbell’s idea had been to make his home in some ‘cottage retreat’ near -Edinburgh. He did not want society or callers; he wanted to be sober and -industrious; therefore he would live in the country if he should have to -go ten miles in search of a box. He dwells lovingly on this prospect in -letters to his friends; but although he did not abandon the notion for -some time, it never came to anything. As a matter of fact, his new -responsibilities led to engagements which practically chained him to -London; to say nothing of the circumstance that he had joined the -Volunteers, in view of the threatened invasion of which he sung. Moreover, -he had got into some trouble with his Edinburgh publisher, and probably he -felt that his presence in or near the capital would only add to his -personal annoyance. How different his after life might have been had he -carried out his original intention, it is useless to speculate. - -As it was, he had not been long married when financial difficulties began -to bear heavily upon him. He started badly by borrowing money from one of -his sisters; later on he borrowed £55 from Currie; and finally he had to -ask a loan of £50 from Scott. A man of really independent spirit, such as -Campbell professed to be, would have felt all this very galling, but there -is nothing to indicate that Campbell experienced more than a momentary -sense of shame at the position in which he had placed himself. By and by -we find him confessing to Currie that he doubted whether he had ever been -a poet at all, so grovelling and so parsimonious had he become: ‘I have -grown a great scrub, you would hardly believe how avaricious.’ To explain -the necessity for these unpoetic borrowings would be somewhat difficult. -It certainly did not arise from idleness or want of work. Campbell was -constantly being offered literary employment, and he had by this time -formed a profitable engagement with _The Star_. In November he describes -himself as an exceedingly busy man, habitually contented, and working -twelve hours a day for those depending on him. ‘I am scribble, scribble, -scribbling for that monosyllable which cannot be wanted--bread, not fame.’ -But the scribbling, it may be presumed, did not furnish him with much -ready cash, and the current household expenses had to be provided for. By -this time there were debts, too. Bensley, the printer, pressed him for a -bill of £100; he owed one bookseller £30, and he had an account of £25 for -his Volunteer uniform and accoutrements, which were to have cost -originally only £10. - -Campbell seldom writes a letter without referring to these sordid -concerns; but, on the other hand, he just as often speaks of his -newly-found felicity by his own fireside. Never, he says, did a more -contented couple sit in their Lilliputian parlour. Matilda sews beside him -all day, and except to receive such visitors as cannot be denied, they -remain without interruption at their respective tasks. In course of time -the Lilliputian parlour was brightened by a new arrival. The poet’s first -child, Thomas Telford--so called in compliment to the engineer, who -afterwards paid for it in a handsome legacy--was born on July 1st, 1804. -In notifying Currie of the event he grows quite eloquent over the ‘little -inestimable accession’ to his happiness, and asserts his belief that -‘lovelier babe was never smiled upon by the light of heaven.’ In view of -what occurred later, the following reads somewhat pathetically: ‘Oh that I -were sure he would live to the days when I could take him on my knee and -feel the strong plumpness of childhood waxing into vigorous youth! My poor -boy! shall I have the ecstacy of teaching him thoughts, and knowledge, and -reciprocity of love to me? It is bold to venture into futurity so far. At -present his lovely little face is a comfort to me.’ Well was it for Thomas -Campbell that the future of his boy lay only in his imagination! - -In the meantime, having begun to give hostages to fortune, he felt that he -must make still greater efforts towards securing a settled income. This -year he had been offered a lucrative professorship in the University of -Wilna, but although he declared his readiness to take any situation that -offered certain support, he hesitated about the offer because of the -decided way in which he had spoken against Russia in ‘The Pleasures of -Hope.’ He had no fancy for being sent to Siberia, and so, after carefully -considering the matter, he declined to go to Wilna. It was at this time -that, under the feeling of his responsibility as a parent, he conceived -the idea of his ‘Specimens of the British Poets.’ He desired to haul in -from the bookselling tribe as many engagements as possible, of such a kind -as would cost little labour and bring in a big profit. The ‘Specimens,’ he -thought, would answer to that description; and he suggests to Currie that -some Liverpool bookseller might embark £500 in the undertaking and make -£1000. Find the man, he says, in effect, to Currie. Although Currie should -ruin him by the undertaking, it would only be ruining a bookseller, and -doing a benefit to a friend! That was one way in which Campbell proposed -to meet his increased responsibilities. Another way was by removing his -residence to the suburbs. At Pimlico, visitors, as he expresses it, -haunted him like fiends and ate up his time like moths. To escape them, as -well as to be out of the reach of ‘family interference’ (this was rather -ungracious after the father-in-law’s furnishing!), he took a house at -Sydenham, and in the November of 1804 he was ‘safe at last in his _dulce -domum_.’ - - - - -CHAPTER VI - -POETICAL WORK AND PROSE BOOKMAKING - - -In 1804 Sydenham was a country village so primitive in its arrangements -that its water was brought on carts, and cost two shillings a barrel. It -had a common upon which the matter-of-fact Matilda thought she might keep -pigs, and a lovely country, still untouched by the hand of the -jerry-builder, lay all around it. ‘I have,’ says Campbell, describing his -situation, ‘a whole field to expatiate over undisturbed: none of your -hedged roads and London out-of-town villages about me, but “ample space -(_sic_) and verge enough” to compose a whole tragedy unmolested.’ The -house, which he had leased for twenty-one years at an annual rent of forty -guineas, consisted of six rooms, with an attic storey which he converted -into a working ‘den’ for himself. Altogether it was a charming home for a -literary man, and Campbell ought to have been contented and happy. His -London friends came to see him on Sundays, and among his neighbours he -found many sincere friends, notwithstanding Lockhart’s superfine sneers -about ‘suburban blue-stockings, weary wives, idle widows, and involuntary -nuns.’ - -Unhappily, the old moodiness and discontent returned upon him. He had -work, but work which he despised. He was fairly paid, but though Mrs -Campbell was a ‘notable economist,’ there was always apparently some -difficulty in getting the financial belt to meet. Campbell himself was, as -we have learned, hopelessly incapable in money matters; indeed, he -affirmed that he was usually ready to shoot himself when he came to the -subject of cash accounts. He had settled at Sydenham with his nose just -above water. Currie had advanced him £55, and Gregory Watt, his early -college friend, who died about this time, had left him a legacy of £100; -but the furnishing and the flitting had swallowed it all up, and a ‘Judaic -loan’ besides. His main source of income at this date was from the quarto -edition of his poems, and the sale of that was beginning to flag. It is -true he had his four guineas a week from the _Star_; but out of this he -had to pay for a conveyance to take him to town daily. We must remember, -besides, that he had two establishments to provide for, his mother’s at -Edinburgh, as well as his own at Sydenham; and in those times, when war -prices ruled, the cost of living was excessively high. But all this does -not quite explain the perpetual trouble about money--does not explain how -it should have been necessary for Lady Holland to send a ‘munificent -present’ to save him from a debtor’s lodging in the King’s Bench. - -Campbell was not the man to bear poverty in uncomplaining silence. His -letters of this period are filled with plaints, whinings, regrets, -implicit accusations against Providence of dealing unfairly with one who -had been made for so much better things. He chafes at the necessity for -yoking himself to the irksome tasks of the literary drudge, tasks that -require little more than the labour of penmanship. He deplores that his -Helicon has dried up; he has no poetry in his brain, he tells Scott, and -inspiration is a stranger to him from extreme apprehension about the -future. The only art now left to him, he sadly confesses, is the art of -sitting for so many hours a day at his desk. - -The result of all this work and worry and disappointment was soon seen on -his health. His anxiety to be up in the morning kept him awake at night, -and he became a victim to insomnia. He sought relief in laudanum, which, -while procuring him sleep, only increased his constitutional tendency to -mope. He began to think he was dying, and even wished himself dead. There -is something, he remarked to Richardson in 1805, in one’s internal -sensations that tells more certainly of disorder than the diagnosis of the -doctors, and those sensations he was undoubtedly conscious of feeling. The -thought of the consummation comforted him rather than otherwise, though he -shuddered at the ‘dreadful and melancholy idea’ of leaving his wife and -family unprovided for--‘as it is not impossible they may soon be.’ Of -course things were not nearly so bad as this. Campbell was certainly not -well, and his financial affairs, thanks mainly to his own mismanagement, -were not in a prosperous state; but his ailments and embarrassments were -clearly aggravated by his morbid imagination. It was nothing more serious -than a case of liver and _amour propre_. If, like Scott after the great -crash, he had cheerfully and resolutely confronted his circumstances, the -ailments and embarrassments, if they had not vanished entirely, would -infallibly have assumed a less threatening aspect. But that, after all, is -only to say that Thomas Campbell should have been--not Thomas Campbell but -somebody else. - -He would require to be indeed an enthusiastic biographer who should write -with any zest of Campbell’s literary labours during these years. Great -writers have often enough been great hacks, but seldom has a man of -Campbell’s poetical promise descended to such dull drudgery as that to -which he had now betaken himself. He continued to toil at the ‘Annals’; he -wrote papers for the _Philosophical Magazine_, he translated foreign -correspondence for the _Star_, and, in brief, gave himself up almost -entirely to the ‘inglorious employment’ of anonymous writing and -compilation. He wrote on every imaginable subject, including even -agriculture, on the knowledge of which he says he was more than once -complimented by farmers, though Lockhart cruelly remarks that he probably -could not tell barley from lavender. Politics, too, he tried, but therein -was found wanting. He had no real acquaintance with the political -questions of the time, nor did he possess the journalistic faculty in any -degree. Before he finally left the _Morning Chronicle_, his connection -with which had continued, he was doing little but writing pieces to fill -up the poets’ corner, and even these were sometimes so poor that Perry -declined to insert them. - -What Campbell always wanted--what indeed he made no secret of wanting--was -some project which would mean light labour and long returns. Early in 1806 -he had become acquainted with John Murray, the publisher, at whose -literary parties he was afterwards a frequent guest, and the possibilities -of the connection had at once presented themselves. The first hint of -these possibilities is revealed in some correspondence which now took -place about a new journal that Murray evidently intended Campbell to edit. -The details of the scheme were being discussed when there was some talk -about an _Athenæum_ being started, and Campbell pleads with Murray not to -be discouraged by the beat of the rival’s drum. ‘Supposing,’ he exclaims, -‘we had an hundred _Athenæums_ to confront us, is it not worth our while -to make a great effort?’ The correspondence certainly shows that Campbell -was anxious enough to make the effort; but the proposal dropped entirely -out of sight, and he had to set his brains to work in the evolution of -other schemes. - -Several ideas occurred to him. He thought of translating a ‘tolerable -poem,’ French or German, of from six to ten thousand lines, and he begged -Scott to advise him about the choice. He cogitated upon a collection of -Irish music, but found that Moore had anticipated him. He had considerable -correspondence with Scott and others about the proposed ‘Specimens of the -British Poets,’ in which project Scott and he had, unknown to each other, -coincided, but that too had to be given up, at any rate for the present. -This scheme, as Lockhart tells us, was first suggested by Scott to -Constable, who heartily supported it. By and by it was discovered that -Cadell & Davies and some other London publishers had a similar plan on -foot, and were now, after having failed with Sir James Mackintosh, -negotiating with Campbell about the biographical introductions. Scott -proposed that the Edinburgh and London houses should join hands in the -venture, and that the editorial duties should be divided between himself -and Campbell. To this both Cadell and Campbell readily assented, but the -design as originally sketched ultimately fell to the ground, because the -booksellers declined to admit certain works upon which the editors -insisted. - -Such, in brief, is the history of the undertaking which was to have united -in one ‘superb work’ the names of Scott and Campbell. It is unnecessary to -dwell further on it, unless, perhaps, to note that Campbell’s notoriously -rabid opinions of publishers seem to have had their origin in the -negotiations. Everybody has heard how he once toasted Napoleon because he -had ordered a bookseller to be shot! The booksellers, he remarks to Scott, -are the greatest ravens on earth, liberal enough as booksellers go, but -still ‘ravens, croakers, suckers of innocent blood and living men’s -brains.’ They ‘pledge one another in authors’ skulls, the publisher always -taking the lion’s share.’ Dependence upon these ‘cunning ones’ he finds to -be so humiliating--they are so prone to insult all but the prosperous and -independent--that he secretly determines to have in future as little to do -with them as possible. He is no match for them: they know the low state of -his finances, and take advantage of him accordingly. Murray is ‘a very -excellent and gentleman-like man--albeit a bookseller--the only gentleman, -except Constable, in the trade.’ And much more to the same effect. There -was really nothing in the correspondence about the ‘Specimens’ which -should have led Campbell thus to traduce a body of men upon whom he was so -dependent, and by whom, with hardly a single exception, he was always -honourably and even generously treated. He asked too much for his -work--£1000 was his figure--the booksellers thought they could not afford -so much, and they said so. It was Campbell himself who was at fault. He -took absurdly high ground--boasted, in fact, of taking high ground--and -talked of £1000 as quite a perquisite. In short, he had as little personal -justification for libelling the booksellers as Byron had for comparing -them with Barabbas. - -Defeated in his design for the British poets, Campbell now went about -whimpering that he had no hopes of an agreeable undertaking, unless Scott -could hit upon some plan which would admit of their joining hands in the -editorship. Longman & Rees had engaged him to edit a small collection of -specimens of Scottish poetry, with a glossary and notices of two or three -lives, but that he regarded as ‘a most pitiful thing.’ Scott had no -suggestion to make, and Campbell, fretting over his prospects and his -frustrated hopes--or as Beattie hints, neglecting his food--again fell -ill. A second son, whom he named Alison, after his old Edinburgh friend, -had been born to him in June 1805, but the jubilation over the event was -short-lived. He became, in fact, more moody and disconsolate than ever. He -described himself as a wreck, and looked forward to his sleepless nights -being ‘quieted soon and everlastingly.’ Even the daily journey to town -proved too much for him, and he took a temporary lodging in Pimlico, going -to Sydenham only on Sundays. By and by he recovered himself a little. -Medical skill did something, but improved finances did more. In a letter -to Scott, dated October 2, 1805, we find this curt but pregnant -postscript: ‘His Majesty has been pleased to confer a pension of £200 a -year upon me. GOD SAVE THE KING.’ Campbell says the ‘bountiful allowance’ -was obtained through several influences, but he mentions Charles Fox (who -liked him because he was ‘so right about Virgil’), Lord Holland and Lord -Minto as being specially active in the matter. - -It was insinuated that the pension came as a reward for writing a series -of newspaper articles in defence of the Grenville administration, but this -was certainly not the case. Campbell was no political writer, no -‘scribbler for a party.’ Among his many faults it cannot be laid to his -charge that he sold his principles for pay. In 1824, mercenary as he was, -he declined £100 a year from a certain society because to take the money -meant ‘canting and time-serving.’ We need therefore have no hesitation in -accepting his assurance that he received the present grant ‘purely and -exclusively as an act of literary patronage.’ There is perhaps a suspicion -of the _poseur_ in his palaver about the ‘mortification’ which his pride -had suffered in the matter, but beyond that, there seems to be no reason -for casting doubts on his political honesty. - -The new accession of fortune was not princely, but it must have helped -Campbell very considerably. Deducting office fees, duties, etc., the -allowance amounted to something like £168 per annum, and that sum he -enjoyed for close upon forty years. He says that his physicians--who were -surely Job’s comforters all--told him he must regard it as the only -barrier between him and premature dissolution; and he speaks about making -it ‘do’ in the cheapest corner of England. His friends, however, were by -this time thoroughly alive to the necessity, which indeed should never -have existed, of doing something to put his finances on a satisfactory -basis, and to this end the publication of another subscription edition of -his poems was arranged. Campbell indulged in his usual idle talk about -‘mortification’ at having again to ask support in this way, but his -friends wisely kept the matter in their own hands and paid no heed to his -maunderings. - -At the same time some impatience was not unnaturally being felt with -Campbell. Francis Horner, a judicious acquaintance upon whom he afterwards -wrote an unfinished elegy, was giving himself no end of trouble over the -new edition, and this is the way he writes to Richardson. Speaking of a -permanent fund as a motive to economy he says: - - You must teach him [Campbell] to consider this subscription as an - exertion which cannot with propriety, nor even perhaps with success, - be tried another time; and that from this time he must look forward - to a plan of income and expense wholly depending upon himself and - most strictly adjusted. He gets four guineas a week for translating - foreign gazettes at the _Star_ office; it is not quite the best - employment for a man of genius, but it occupies him only four hours - of the morning, and the payment ought to go a great length in - defraying his annual expenses. You will be able to convey to - Campbell these views of his situation and others that will easily - occur to you: none of _us_ are entitled to use so much freedom with - him. - -One can read a good deal between the lines here. Campbell, as he mildly -puts it himself, was never ‘over head and ears in love with working’; he -preferred his friends to work for him. Some years before this he looked to -them to get him a Government situation, ‘unshackled by conditional -service’; and even now, with his pension running, and much as he prated -about his pride, he ‘trusts in God’ that it will be followed up by an -appointment of ‘some emolument’ in one of the Government offices. It was -clearly an object with him to have his affairs made easy by outsiders. Nor -was this all. There is no doubt that he had, temporarily at least, given -way to convivial habits which his well-wishers could not but regard with -regret. He admits as much himself, and Beattie only seeks to hide the fact -by speaking in his solemn, periphrastic way about ‘the social pleasures of -the evening’ and a ‘too-easy compliance’ with the solicitations of -company. In these circumstances, it was only natural that Campbell’s -friends should desire to impress upon him the necessity of guiding his -affairs with greater circumspection so as to depend more upon himself. -Meanwhile they went on collecting subscribers’ names for the new edition, -and Campbell returned to Sydenham to continue his work on the ‘Annals’ and -think about something less irksome and more remunerative. - -It was at this juncture that Murray considerately came to his aid. Though -the original scheme of the British Poets had fallen through, Campbell had -by no means given up the idea of a work of the kind; and now, having -discussed the plan with Murray, it was arranged between them that the -undertaking should go on. Murray was naturally anxious that Scott’s name -should be connected with the editorship, but Scott, although he at first -agreed to co-operate, ultimately found it necessary to restrict himself to -works more exclusively his own, and Campbell was accordingly left to -proceed alone. - -In the summer of 1807 his labours were interrupted by a visit to the Isle -of Wight. His old complaint had returned, and he was advised to try a -change of air and scene. He left London in the beginning of June, but the -change did not prove successful. The demon of insomnia still haunted him, -and the _ennui_ of the place became so intolerable that he was driven to -act as reader to the ladies in the boarding-house where he stayed! What, -he cries, must Siberia be when Ryde is so bad! By August he was at -Sydenham again, only to find his ‘abhorred sleeplessness returning fast -and inveterately.’ He had written very little poetry for some time, and -such as he did write--the tribute to Sir John Moore, for example--is, like -the Greek mentioned by Pallet, not worth repeating. He was now engaged -almost solely upon ‘Gertrude of Wyoming,’ but his head was ‘constantly -confused,’ and the poem was often laid aside for weeks at a time. Still, -the manuscript advanced, and by Christmas the greater part of it was -complete enough for reading to a private circle of friends. - -‘Gertrude’ finally appeared, after a long process of polishing, alteration -and addition, in April 1809. Some time before its publication Campbell -wrote that he had no fear as to its reception; only let him have it out, -and, like Sterne, he cared not a curse what the critics might say. The -critics were in the main favourable. Jeffrey had already seen the proofs, -and had written a long letter to the author, pointing out certain -‘dangerous faults,’ but commending the poem for its ‘great beauty and -great tenderness and fancy’; and on the same day that the poem was -published, the _Edinburgh Review_ appeared with an article in which the -editor rejoiced ‘once more to see a polished and pathetic poem in the old -style of English pathos and poetry.’ Its merits, he said, ‘consist chiefly -in the feeling and tenderness of the whole delineation, and the taste and -delicacy with which all the subordinate parts are made to contribute to -the general effect.’ At the same time he found the story confused, some -passages were unintelligible, and there was a laborious effort at emphasis -and condensation which had led to ‘constraint and obscurity of the -diction.’ The _Quarterly_ reviewer, none other than Sir Walter Scott, was -more severe upon its blemishes. He complained of the ‘indistinctness’ of -the narrative, of the numerous blanks which were left to be filled up by -the imagination of the reader, of its occasional ambiguity and -abruptness. Its excellences were, however, generously admitted; and in -fact, on the whole, the _Quarterly_ said as much in its favour as could be -expected. In those days party spirit led to incredible freaks of literary -criticism; and it was only Scott’s magnanimity that could have allowed him -to forgive Campbell’s Whig politics for the sake of his poetry. Curiously -enough, considering their intimacy, Campbell did not know that Scott was -his reviewer, though he was not very wide of the mark when he spoke of the -writer as ‘a candid and sensible man,’ who ‘reviews like a gentleman, a -Christian, and a scholar.’ Of other contemporary criticisms we need not -speak. The poet’s friends were of course blindly eulogistic. Alison was -‘delighted and conquered,’ and Telford, with his characteristic bombast, -anticipated such applause from the public as would drive the author -frantic! - -‘Gertrude,’ as has more than once been pointed out, was the first poem of -any length by a British writer the scene of which was laid in America, and -in it Campbell is the first European to introduce his readers to the -romance of the virgin forests and Red Indian warriors. The subject may -have occurred to him when transcribing a passage in his own ‘Annals,’ in -which reference is made to the massacre of Wyoming, although there is -possibly something in Beattie’s suggestion that he got the idea from -reading Lafontaine’s story of ‘Barneck and Saldorf,’ published in 1804. -Campbell, however, as we know, had a keen personal interest in America. -His father had lived there; three of his brothers were there now. ‘If I -were not a Scotsman,’ he once remarked, ‘I should like to be an American.’ -No doubt the scenery of Pennsylvania had been often described to him in -letters from the other side. - -But these are points that do not greatly concern us now. Nor is it -necessary to enter into any minute criticism of the poem. Campbell himself -preferred it to ‘The Pleasures of Hope’ (‘I mean,’ he said, ‘to ground my -claims to future notice on it’), while Hazlitt regarded it as his -‘principal performance.’ With neither opinion does the popular verdict -agree. Perhaps it may be that while ‘Gertrude’ is, as Lockhart said, a -more equal and better sustained effort than ‘The Pleasures of Hope,’ it -contains fewer passages which bear detaching from the context. For one -thing the poet had a story to tell in ‘Gertrude,’ and he was eminently -unskilled in the management of poetic narrative. ‘I was always,’ he -remarks to Scott, ‘a dead bad hand at telling a story.’ In ‘Gertrude’ he -cannot keep to his story; the construction of the entire poem is loose and -incoherent. Even the love scenes, which, as Hazlitt says, breathe a balmy -voluptuousness of sentiment, are generally broken off in the middle. Then -he was unwise in adopting the Spenserian stanza. It was quite alien to his -style; even Thomson, living long before the romantic revival, managed it -more sympathetically than Campbell. The necessities of the rhyme led -Campbell to invert his sentences unduly, to tag his lines for the mere -sake of the rhyme, and to use affected archaisms with a quite -extraordinary clumsiness. Anything more unlike the sweet, easy, graceful -compactness of Spenser could scarcely be imagined. - -Nor are the characters of the poem altogether successful; indeed, with the -single exception of the Indian, they are mere shadows. Gertrude herself -makes a pretty portrait; but as Hazlitt has remarked, she cannot for a -moment compare with Wordsworth’s Ruth, the true infant of the woods and -child-nature. Brant, again, who so warmly espoused the cause of the -Mohawks during the War of the American Revolution, is but a faint reality. -Campbell fancied that he had drawn a true picture of the partisan, but as -Brant’s son afterwards proved to him, the picture was purely imaginary. -The main function of the Indian chief is apparently to give local colour -to the poem, though it must be allowed that he stands out boldly among its -other characters. Hazlitt comments upon his erratic appearances, remarking -that he vanishes and comes back, after long intervals, in the nick of -time, without any known reason but the convenience of the author and the -astonishment of the reader. On the other hand, the death-song of the -savage which closes the poem, is one of the best things that the author -ever wrote. - -Byron declared that ‘Gertrude’ was notoriously full of grossly false -scenery; that it had ‘no more locality with Pennsylvania than with -Penmanmaur.’ But that was an obvious exaggeration. There is better ground -for the complaint about Campbell’s errors in natural history as exhibited -in the poem--about his having conferred on Pennsylvania the aloe and the -palm, the flamingo and the panther. The probability is that he knew as -much about natural history as Goldsmith, whose friends declared that he -could not tell the difference between any two sorts of barndoor fowl until -they had been cooked. Once in the _New Monthly_, when a contributor spoke -of the rarity of seeing the cuckoo, Campbell added a correcting note to -say that he had himself ‘seen whole fields _blue_ with cuckoos’! But even -Shakespeare has lions in the forest of Arden, and Goldsmith makes the -tiger howl in North America. There is no need to insist upon absolute -accuracy in such matters. One would gladly notice instead the real merits -of the poem, which, however, are not so readily discovered. Hazlitt spoke -enthusiastically of passages of so rare and ripe a beauty that they exceed -all praise. But we have changed our poetical point of view since Hazlitt’s -day; and the most that can now be said for ‘Gertrude,’ is that it is a -third-rate poem containing a few first-rate lines. It is practically dead, -and can never be called back to life. - -‘Gertrude’ was favourably received by the public, and particularly by the -Whig party, to whose leaders Campbell was personally known, and with most -of whom he was closely intimate. It was edited in America by Washington -Irving in 1810, and was highly praised on the other side--a fact which at -least suggests that its local scenery was not so false as Byron declared -it to be. The first edition was a quarto; a second in 12mo was called for -within the year. The quarto edition included some of the better known -short pieces, such as ‘Ye Mariners,’ ‘The Battle of the Baltic,’ -‘Lochiel,’ ‘Lord Ullin’s Daughter,’ and ‘Glenara,’ the latter founded on a -wild and romantic story of which Joanna Baillie afterwards made use in her -‘Family Legend.’ The second edition contained the once-familiar -‘O’Connor’s Child,’ a rather touching piece suggested by the flower -popularly known as ‘Love Lies Bleeding.’ Many years after this--in -1836--the Dublin people desired to give Campbell a public dinner as the -author of ‘O’Connor’s Child’ and ‘The Exile of Erin,’ but Campbell never -set foot on the Emerald Isle. - - - - -CHAPTER VII - -LECTURES AND TRAVELS - - -Having got ‘Gertrude’ off his hands, Campbell returned to his literary -carpentering. He was now in his thirty-third year, and had produced the -two long poems and the short pieces upon which his fame, such as it is, -rests. Were it not for his lines on ‘The Last Man,’ it would have been -much better for his reputation had he never again put pen to paper. It was -a remark of Scott’s that he had broken out at once, like the Irish rebels, -a hundred thousand strong. But unfortunately he had no sustaining power; -he could not keep up the attack. His imaginative faculty, never robust, -decayed much earlier than that of any other poet who ever gave like -promise; and we have the sorry spectacle of a man still under forty living -in the shadow of a reputation made when he was little more than out of his -teens. - -One says it regretfully, but it is the sober truth that Campbell became -now a greater hack than ever. He declared in the frankest possible manner -that he did not mean to think of poetry any more; he meant to make money, -a desire which was very near his heart all along. He had been working -fourteen hours a day for some time, but the weak flesh began to complain, -and four hours had to be cut off. In 1810 he lost his youngest child, -Alison, and overwhelmed himself with grief. Before he had recovered from -the shock his mother passed away in Edinburgh. She had been suffering from -paralysis, and so far as we can learn Campbell had nothing more touching -to say of her death than to express his ‘sincere acquiescence’ in the -dispensation of Providence. - -One or two little incidents helped to revive his spirits after the -snapping of these sacred ties. He had been presented to the Princess of -Wales by Lady Charlotte Campbell, who thoughtfully, as he tells a -correspondent--but why thoughtfully?--kept the Princess from making an -‘irruption’ into his house. The Princess summoned him to Blackheath, where -he had the felicity of dancing a reel with her, and thus ‘attained the -summit of human elevation.’ An onlooker remarked upon this performance -that Campbell had ‘the neat national trip,’ but we have no other evidence -of his dancing accomplishments. Campbell was delighted with himself; but -he soon discovered that his good luck in making a royal acquaintance might -prove embarrassing. He had unthinkingly remarked to the Princess that he -loved operas to distraction. ‘Then why don’t you go to them?’ she -inquired. Campbell made some excuse about the expense, and next day a -ticket for the season arrived. ‘God help me!’ he says, in recounting the -incident, ‘this _is_ loving operas to distraction. I shall be obliged to -live in London a month to attend the opera-house--all for telling one -little fib.’ - -As a matter of fact, Campbell had now something more serious to think -about than attending the Opera. He had been engaged, at his own -suggestion, to give a course of lectures on Poetry at the Royal -Institution, the fee to be one hundred guineas for the course. When Scott -heard of the undertaking he expressed the hope that Campbell would read -with fire and feeling, and not attempt to correct his Scots accent. But -Campbell did not agree with Scott on the latter point. He tells Alison -that he has taken great pains with his voice and pronunciation, and has -laboured hard to get rid of his Caledonianisms. Sydney Smith, he says, -patronised him more than he liked about the lectures, and gave him what, -in Campbell’s case, was clearly a wise hint against joking. In truth he -seems to have had more than enough of advice from his friends, but he went -his own way, and he was amply justified by the result. - -The first lecture, delivered on the 24th of April 1812, proved a great -success. According to a contemporary account, the hall was crowded, and -the ‘eloquent illustrations’ of the lecturer received the warmest praise. -Campbell says his own expectations were more than realised, though he had -been so far from a state of composure that he playfully threatened to -divorce his wife if she attended! At the close of the lecture -distinguished listeners pressed around him with compliments. ‘Byron, who -has now come out so splendidly, told me he heard Bland the poet say, “I -have had more _portable_ ideas given me in the last quarter of an hour -than I ever imbibed in the same portion of time.” Archdeacon Nares -fidgetted about and said: “that’s new; at least quite new to _me_.”’ And -so on. Campbell’s friends were less critical than kind. The modern reader -of his lectures will not find anything so new as Nares found, nor anything -so very portable as Bland carried away. The lectures form a sort of -chronological, though necessarily imperfect, sketch of the whole history -of poetry, from that of the Bible down to the songs of Burns. The scheme -was magnificent, but it was too vast for one man, especially for a man of -Campbell’s flighty humour, and he broke away from it before he had well -begun. What he has to say about Hebrew and Greek verse is of some value, -but generally speaking the thought and the criticism are quite -commonplace. Madame de Staël, it is true, told Campbell that, with the -exception of Burke’s writings there was nothing in English so striking as -these lectures. But then it was Madame de Staël who solemnly declared that -she had read a certain part of ‘The Pleasures of Hope’ twenty times, and -always with the pleasure of the first reading! She must have known how -well praise agreed with the poet. A second course of lectures was -delivered at the same institution in 1813, but of these it is not -necessary to say more than that, in the conventional language of the day, -they were ‘applauded to the echo.’ - -Towards the close of 1813 Campbell’s health got ‘sadly crazy’ again, and -he went to Brighton for sea bathing. There he soon found his lost -appetite: the fish, he wrote, was delicious, and the library quite a -pleasant lounge with the added luxury of music. He called upon Disraeli, -‘a good modest man,’ and was invited to dine with him. He was also -introduced to the venerable Herschel and his son, the one ‘a great, -simple, good old man,’ the other ‘a prodigy in science and fond of poetry, -but very unassuming.’ The astronomer seemed to him like ‘a supernatural -intelligence,’ and when he parted with him he felt ‘elevated and -overcome.’ In such lofty language does Campbell intimate his very simple -pleasures and experiences. - -But the Brighton holiday was only the prelude to one much longer and much -more interesting. During the short-lived peace of 1802 Campbell had often -expressed a wish to visit the scenes of the Revolution and above all the -Louvre; and now that the abdication of Buonaparte, the capture of Paris, -and the presence of the allied armies had drawn thousands of English -subjects to the French capital, he resolved to carry out the -long-cherished plan. On the 26th of August 1814, he was writing from -Dieppe, where one of the rabble called after him: ‘Va-t’-en Anglais! vous -cherchez nous faire perir de faim.’ On the way to Paris he halted for two -days at Rouen, where he found his brother Daniel--‘poor as ever’--with -whom he had parted at Hamburg in 1800. Landing in Paris, he met Mrs -Siddons, and in her company visited the Louvre and the Elysian Fields, -which he held to be as contemptible in comparison to Hyde Park and the -Green Park as the French public squares and buildings are superior to -those of London. - -At the Louvre, where he spent four hours daily, he grandiloquently says he -was struck dumb with emotion, his heart palpitated, and his eyes filled -with tears at the sight of that ‘immortal youth,’ the Belvidere Apollo. -Next to the Louvre in interest, he mentions the Jardin des Plantes, ‘a -sight worth travelling to see.’ The Pantheon he describes as ‘a -magnificent place,’ adding that the vaults of Voltaire and Rousseau are -the only cleanly things he has seen in Paris; so neat and tidy that they -remind him rather of a comfortable English pantry than of anything of an -awe-inspiring nature. Versailles is ‘very splendid indeed,’ but the palace -is ‘not large enough for the basis, and the trees are clipped with -horrible formality.’ He is not lost in admiration of the French women. -‘There are two sorts of them--the aquiline, or rather nut-cracker faces, -and the broad faces; both are ugly.’ On the other hand, he finds that the -handsomest Englishmen are inferior to the really handsome Frenchmen. The -Englishman always looks very John Bullish; and nothing that the French say -flatters him so much as when they declare that they would not take him for -_un Anglois_. The Opera he describes as ‘a set of silly things, but with -some exquisite music’; the French acting in tragedy he does not relish, -but their comic acting is perfection. Of notable people whom he met he -mentions the elder Schlegel, Humboldt, Cuvier, Denon the Egyptian -traveller--‘a very pleasing person’--and the Duke of Wellington. To the -latter he was introduced merely as ‘Mr Campbell,’ and the Duke afterwards -told Madame de Staël that he ‘thought it was one of the thousands of that -name from the same country; he did not know it was _the_ Thomas.’ Schlegel -he describes as a very uncommon man, learned and ingenious, but a -visionary and a mystic. He and Humboldt, ‘after much entreaty,’ made him -repeat ‘Lochiel.’ When Schlegel came to England, he was generally -Campbell’s guest, and the two, notwithstanding that their characters and -tastes were so dissimilar, appear to have entertained a sincere regard for -each other. - -After a two months’ stay in Paris, Campbell returned to England, with, as -Beattie pompously phrases it, a rich and varied fund of materials for -reflection. He found his work much in arrear, and had just begun to make -some headway with it when the unlooked-for intelligence reached him that -by the death of his Highland cousin, MacArthur Stewart of Ascog, he had -fallen heir to a legacy of nearly £5000. The will described him as ‘author -of “The Pleasures of Hope”‘; but it was not for the honours of authorship -that he was rewarded. ‘Little Tommy, the poet,’ said the testator, ‘ought -to have a legacy because he was so kind as to give his mother sixty pounds -yearly out of his income.’ - -Stewart died at the end of March 1815, and by the middle of April Campbell -was in Edinburgh--whither he had gone to look after his interests--feeling -‘as blythe as if the devil were dead.’ After seeing his old friends in the -capital, he went to Kinniel on a visit to Dugald Stewart, and then, taking -the Canal boat from Falkirk, set out for Glasgow, where he made a round of -his relations. He spent a very happy time altogether, and when he returned -to Sydenham, it was, as he thought, to look out on a future of prosperity -and comparative ease. A few days after his arrival, Waterloo decided the -fate of Europe, and for a time he did nothing but speak and write of the -prodigies of British valour performed on that field. Some tributary -stanzas written to the tune of ‘The British Grenadiers’ show that while he -did not fancy being taken for an Englishman in Paris, he was very proud to -appear as a John Bull jingo at home. - -Under his improved prospects he seems to have had some difficulty in -settling down to his old literary tasks. We hear of him working again at -the eternal ‘Specimens,’ but otherwise his pen seems to have lain idle. -The American heir was coming over in August to take possession of the -Ascog estates; and Campbell hoped to reap some additional pecuniary -advantages for himself and his sisters. The heir was a cousin of the poet -and a brother of the Attorney-General for Virginia. Beattie suggests that -if Campbell’s elder brother had been aware of the law which rendered -aliens to the Crown of Great Britain incapable of inheriting entailed -property, and had made up his title as the nearest heir, he might have -been proprietor of the old estates, which were afterwards sold for -£78,000. But no such luck was to befall the Campbell family. The heir came -into possession, and neither Campbell nor his sisters benefited further by -his stroke of fortune. Campbell reported that he was an amiable gentleman, -but, so far as he could see, was not inclined to be generous. Very likely -he considered that Campbell had been well provided for already. At any -rate the poet had to content himself, as he might well do, with his -pension and his legacy and continue his literary cobbling as before. - -His interests now became somewhat more varied. His surviving son had been -sent to school, but having had to be removed on account of his health, -Campbell set to teach the boy himself. He got up at six every morning and -by seven was hammering Greek and Latin into the youth’s head. It was all -nonsense, he declared, but in his son’s interests he dared not act up to -his theory, which was to leave Greek and Latin, and instruct him in ‘other -things.’ In Campbell’s view it was a vestige of barbarism that ‘learning’ -only means, in its common acceptation, a knowledge of the dead languages -and mathematics. Later on he speaks of his intention to drill the lad in -‘epistolary habits,’ but this intention he was, alas! never able to -realise. - -While the Greek and Latin lessons were going on, some of Campbell’s -friends were busy with plans for his benefit. Scott, avowedly anxious to -have his personal society, proposed that he should allow himself to be -engineered--it was a delicate matter of supplanting an inefficient -professor--into the Rhetoric Chair in Edinburgh University. The post was a -tempting one, worth from £400 to £500 a year; but nothing is left to show -how Campbell took the suggestion. In 1834 he was again urged to appear as -a candidate for an Edinburgh professorship, but declined because he -expected to live only ten years longer, and it would take him half that -time to prepare his lectures. It is not unlikely that he would have -regarded the present proposal with favour, but his thoughts were -immediately turned in a different direction by the disinterested action of -another friend. The Royal Institution had just been opened in Liverpool, -and Roscoe was anxious that Campbell should give a dozen lectures there. -Some preliminary hitch occurred about the fee, but this was got over, and -Campbell ultimately drew no less a sum than £340 from the course. -Considering that the lectures were practically those already delivered at -the Royal Institution of London, he might compliment himself on being -remarkably well paid; yet it is said that when he was afterwards pressed -to deliver a second course at Liverpool, presumably on the same terms, he -declined. - -Campbell made his appearance in Liverpool at the end of October 1818. The -lecture-room, wrote one of the listeners some thirty years later, was -‘crowded by the _élite_ of the neighbourhood.’ The lecturer’s prose ‘was -declared to be more poetic than his poetry; his glowing imagination gave a -double charm to those passages from the poets which he cited as -illustrations. The effect and animation of his eye, his figure, his -voice, in reciting these passages are still vividly remembered.’ From -Liverpool he went on to Birmingham, where he received £100 for repeating -the lectures there. At Birmingham ‘it pleased fate that Thomas should take -the measles,’ and Campbell himself had to get blisters applied to his -chest to relieve his breathing. Under the circumstances he could not be -expected to visit much; but he was introduced to Miss Edgeworth, who -captivated him by the unassuming simplicity of her manner, and he ‘met -L--d [Lloyd], the quondam partner of L--b [Lamb] in poetry--an innocent -creature, but imagines everybody dead.’ He called upon Gregory Watt’s -father--_the_ James Watt--with whom, though he was then eighty-three, he -says he spent one of the most amusing days he ever had with a man of -science and a stranger to his own pursuits. - -Suggestions had reached him from Glasgow and Edinburgh that he should -deliver his lectures in these towns, but although, with his usual -facility, he had come to think that lecturing was likely to be his -_metier_, at present he literally had not a voice to exert without -imminent hazard. And there was another danger. ‘I know well,’ he says, -‘what would happen from the hospitality of Glasgow or Edinburgh… I should -enjoy the hospitality to the prejudice of my health. For though I now -abstain habitually from even the ordinary indulgence in eating and taking -wine, yet the excitement of speaking always hurts me.’ And so, partly to -avoid the conviviality which Dickens and Thackeray enjoyed later as -lecturers in Edinburgh and Glasgow, Campbell declined the invitations from -the north, and went home to Sydenham. - -While he was absent on this literary tour, the long-delayed ‘Specimens of -the British Poets’--Miss Mitford makes very merry over the time spent on -the work--had at length been published in seven octavo volumes. It proved -only a moderate success. The plan was well conceived, but Campbell -committed the initial mistake of deciding to print, not the best specimens -of his authors, but only such pieces mainly as had not been printed by -Ellis and by Headley. Of Sir Philip Sidney, for example, he says: ‘Mr -Ellis has exhausted the best specimens of his poetry; I have only offered -a few short ones.’ The absurdity of this procedure need not be pointed -out. People do not go to a book of specimens for examples of a writer in -his second-best manner. They want the cream of a poet, not, as Campbell -has too often given them, the skimmed milk of his genius. - -But the work was faulty on other grounds. Its biographical and -bibliographical information was notoriously incorrect and imperfect. -Campbell had no taste for the drudgery of antiquarian research: not in his -line, he boldly announced, was the labour of trying to discover the number -of Milton’s house in Bunhill Fields. His facts as a natural consequence -were never to be depended upon. In the ‘Specimens’ the inaccuracies are -more than usually abundant, and would, even if the work were otherwise -satisfactory, entirely discount its value. ‘Read Campbell’s Poets,’ said -Byron in his Journal; ‘marked the errors of Tom for correction.’ Again: -‘Came home--read. Corrected Tom Campbell’s slips of the pen.’ Some of -Tom’s errors were, no doubt, mere slips; but more were clearly -attributable to ignorance and laziness. If, for example, he had been at -the trouble to take his Shakespeare from the shelf he would never have -been guilty of such a misquotation as the following: - - To gild refined gold, to paint the _lily_, - _To throw a perfume on_ the violet. - -The work absolutely bristles with errors of this kind. Of the introductory -essay and the prefatory notices of the various writers it is possible to -speak somewhat more favourably. The essay, though written in an affected -style, is still worth reading, especially the portions dealing with Milton -and Pope. The lives, again, are marked by a fair appreciation of the -powers of the respective poets, from the point of view of the old school; -and although there is nothing subtle in the criticisms, there is welcome -evidence of that sympathetic spirit which loves poetry for its own sake. -This is the most that can be said for a work which Lockhart unaccountably -eulogised as ‘not unworthy to be handed down with the classical verse of -its author.’ No second edition of it was called for before 1841, when -Campbell had some difference with Murray about its revision. Murray’s -original agreement with Campbell had been for £500, but when the work was -completed he doubled that sum and added books to the value of £200 which -Campbell had borrowed. This munificent generosity Campbell rewarded by -refusing to correct his own errors, though he was offered a handsome sum -to do so; and the result was that he had to submit to the ‘Specimens’ -being silently revised by another hand. The incident, which is not a -little damaging to Campbell’s character, proves again that Campbell was -treated by the booksellers far more liberally than he deserved. - -Having disposed of the ‘Specimens,’ he was free to look about for other -work. At the beginning of 1820 he tells a friend that he has a new poem on -the anvil, with several small ones lying by, and only waits until he has -enough for a volume to publish them. He is to lecture again at the Royal -Institution in the Spring, and as both his fellow-lecturers have been -knighted, he thinks it not unlikely that he will be knighted too. On the -whole he was in excellent spirits; and the necessity for unremitting toil -having been removed, he began to arrange for a holiday. This time he -decided to revisit Germany, and having let his house furnished for a year, -and concluded his lecture course, he embarked with his family for Holland -in the end of May. - -Landing at Rotterdam, with the view of which from the Maas he was ‘much -captivated,’ he proceeded by the Hague and Leyden to Haarlem, where he was -‘transported’ with the famous organ in the Cathedral. From Amsterdam he -wrote to say that the faces of the people were as unromantic as the face -of their country, but he was pleased to see their houses ‘so painted and -cleaned’ that poverty could have no possible terrors for them. At Bonn he -renewed his acquaintance with Schlegel, who on this occasion bored him -sadly. Schlegel, it seems, was ludicrously fond of showing off his -English. He thought he understood English politics, too, and pestered -Campbell with his crude speculations about England’s impending bankruptcy -and the misery of her lower orders. ‘I had no notion,’ says Campbell, -‘that a great man could ever grow so wearisome.’ - -Leaving his son, now in his sixteenth year, with Professor Kapp, who was -to board and instruct him for £5 a month, he went to Frankfort, visiting -on the way the Rolandseck, where he wrote his ‘Roland the Brave.’ At -Frankfort he had daily lessons in German from a Carthusian monk, who was -rather surprised at his strange plan of overcoming the difficulties of the -language by dint of Greek. At Ratisbon he revived many memories. Of the -twelve monks whom he had known at the Scots College in 1800, only two were -now alive; but their successors were ‘very liberal of their beer, and it -is by no means contemptible.’ When he got to Vienna--where he read Hebrew -with a Jewish poet named Cohen--he found that his fame had preceded him. -His arrival was publicly announced, translations of ‘Ye Mariners’ and the -Kirnan ‘Lines’ appeared in one of the leading journals, and invitations -showered in upon him from the best people in the capital. He met a large -number of the Polish nobility, who crowded about him with affectionate -zeal. He forgot all his sorrows listening to the organ in St Stephen’s. -The theatres he found tiresome. The actors indeed were good, but what -could they make of such a language? From Vienna he returned to Bonn -through Bavaria. He was now impatient to be home; and, having transferred -his son to the care of Dr Meyer, he bade farewell to his friends, and was -in London by the end of November. - -Before leaving for the Continent he had entered into an agreement with -Colburn for editing the _New Monthly Magazine_ for three years, from -January 1821. He was to have £500 per annum, and was to furnish annually -six contributions in prose and six in verse. Campbell had not shown any -special fitness for the duties of an editor, but he knew the value of his -own name, which, indeed, was probably the reason of Colburn’s applying to -him. He had, as Patmore says, the most extensive and the most unquestioned -reputation of the writers of the day, and the proprietor’s judgment was -soon proved by the unprecedented popularity of the magazine. Campbell -certainly showed some zeal at the start. He got together a very efficient -staff of contributors, with Mr Cyrus Redding as his sub-editor. Moreover, -in order to be near the office he decided to exchange his Sydenham house -for one in town, and he took private lodgings in Margaret Street until a -permanent residence could be found. There, shutting himself up from -outside society, he ‘received and consulted with his friends, cultivated -acquaintance with literary men of all parties, answered correspondents, -pretended to read contributions, wrote new and revised old papers, and, in -short, identified his own reputation and interests with those of the -magazine.’ The _New Monthly_, for the time being, became the record of his -literary life. - -With all this show of work, Campbell, by every account, proved a very -unsatisfactory editor, though no more unsatisfactory than Bulwer Lytton -and Theodore Hook who succeeded him. Allowing for the probable -exaggeration of his own importance as sub-editor, there is enough in -Redding’s reminiscences to show that he found his position difficult -enough. Campbell had so little acquaintance with periodical literature -that he declares he never saw a number of the _New Monthly_ until Colburn -put one into his hands! He gave no attention to the topics of the day, and -his knowledge of current literature was so limited that contributors often -foisted on him articles which they had furtively abstracted from -contemporary writers. Of method he had none. His papers lay about in -hopeless confusion, and if he wanted to get rid of them for the time, he -would jumble them into a heap, or cram them into a drawer. Articles sent -by contributors would be placed over his books on the shelves, slip down -behind and lie forgotten. He always shied at the perusal of manuscripts, -and he kept the printer continually waiting for ‘copy.’ Talfourd says he -would balance contending epithets for a fortnight, and stop the press for -a week to determine the value of a comma. In short, he was the very worst -imaginable kind of editor, especially from the contributor’s point of -view. Nevertheless, he soon drew a strong brigade of writers around -him--among them Hazlitt, Talfourd, Horace Smith, and Henry Roscoe--and -placing implicit confidence in their work, he made his editorship a snug -sinecure. ‘Tom Campbell,’ said Scott, ‘had much in his power. A man at the -head of a magazine may do much for young men, but Campbell did nothing, -more from indolence, I fancy, than disinclination or a bad heart.’ That -was the true word; Campbell, to use the expressive term of his countrymen, -simply could not be ‘fashed.’ - -While things were proceeding thus in the editorial sanctum a painful -crisis was approaching in Campbell’s domestic affairs. He had not long -returned from the Continent when reports of his son began to give him -uneasiness. Thomas, he says, talks of going to sea, which indicates that -he is not disposed to do much good on land. Early in the spring of 1821 -the youth turned up in London. He had been transferred from Bonn to -Amiens, but disliking the place and the people, he had run away from his -instructor. Campbell was greatly affected by his unexpected arrival, but -Tony M’Cann, who was in the house, proposed to celebrate the event by -killing the fatted calf! In the autumn the boy was sent to a school at -Poplar, at a cost to his father of £120 per annum, but he had not been -many weeks there when symptoms, the meaning of which had hitherto been -mistaken, became so pronounced that he had to be removed to an asylum. It -is a distressing subject, and there is no need to go into details. Young -Campbell was ultimately placed under the care of Dr Matthew Allen at High -Beech, Essex. There he chiefly remained until three months after his -father’s death in 1844, when he was liberated by the verdict of a jury -declaring him to be of sound mind. The taint of insanity clearly came from -the mother’s side. One of her sisters had been deranged for many years -before her death; and indeed it has been hinted that Mrs Campbell herself -suffered from some ‘mental alienation’ during her last days. A writer in -Hogg’s _Weekly Instructor_ for April 12, 1845, expressly says so. He seems -to have known Campbell, but his statement, so far as can be ascertained, -is uncorroborated. - -In 1822 Campbell removed to a small house of his own at 10 West Seymour -Street--a ‘beautiful creation,’ with ‘the most amiable curtains, the -sweetest of carpets, the most accomplished chairs, and a highly -interesting set of tongs and fenders.’ Here he wrote one of his best -things and one of his worst. ‘The Last Man’ was published in the _New -Monthly_ in 1823. Gilfillan calls it the most Christian of all Campbell’s -strains. It is, in fact, one of the most striking of his shorter -productions. The same idea was used by Byron in his ‘Darkness,’ and this -led to some controversy as to which of the two poets had been guilty of -stealing from the other. Campbell maintained that he had many years before -mentioned to Byron his intention of writing the poem, and there is no -reason to doubt his word. Of course the idea of one man, the last of his -race, remaining when all else has been destroyed, is quite an obvious one; -and in any case Campbell treated it in a manner altogether different from -Byron, of whose daring misanthropy he was completely innocent. - -It has been said that at West Seymour Street Campbell also wrote one of -his worst poems. This was his ‘Theodric,’ not ‘Theodoric,’ as it is -constantly mis-spelled. He seems to have been engaged on it early in 1823; -but he confesses that so far from being in a poetic mood he is barely -competent for the dull duty of editorship. It is well to remember this in -judging the poem. He had begun it at a time when horrible dreams of his -son being tortured by asylum attendants disturbed his rest; he had -finished it with the obstreperous youth temporarily at home--outrageous, -dogged, and disagreeable, ‘excessively anxious to convince us how very -cordially he hates both his mother and me.’ He knew that ‘Theodric’ had -faults, but he regarded these as so little detrimental that he believed -when it recovered from the first buzz of criticism it would attain a -steady popularity. It appeared in November 1824, but the popularity which -Campbell anticipated never came to it. ‘I am very glad,’ he says, ‘that -Jeffrey is going to review me, for I think _he_ has the stuff in him to -understand “Theodric.”’ But neither Jeffrey nor anybody else understood -‘Theodric’; certainly nobody appreciated it. The wits at Holland House -disowned it; the _Quarterly_ called it ‘an unworthy publication’; and -friend joined foe in the chorus of condemnation. An anonymous punster -referred to it as the ‘odd trick’ of the season; and its excessively -overdone alliterations (such as ‘Heights browsed by the bounding -bouquetin’) were made the subject of scornful hilarity. The poem, in -truth, was a sad failure, and the universal censure with which it met was -thoroughly deserved. Campbell had ‘attempted to imitate the natural -simplicity and homely familiarity of the style of Crabbe and Wordsworth,’ -and had only succeeded in becoming elaborately tame and feeble. - -Just before the publication of ‘Theodric,’ he had paid a short visit to -Cheltenham for his health’s sake; now he went to Lord Spencer’s at -Althorp, ‘a most beautiful Castle of Indolence,’ tempted by the hope of -seeing books which he could not see elsewhere. He really wanted to study, -yet he capriciously complained that after breakfast the company, including -his Lordship, went off to shoot and left him alone! In short, he was no -sooner at Althorp than he wished himself home again. - -When he returned to town, in January 1825, it was to take part in what he -afterwards called the only important event in his career. This was the -founding of the London University, the idea of which he appears to have -conceived during his recent intercourse with the Professors of Bonn. The -scheme was discussed at various private and public conferences during the -spring and summer, and the financial basis of the undertaking being -apparently assured, Campbell proceeded to Berlin in September to ascertain -how far the University there might serve as a model for London. He spent a -week in the Prussian capital, which he compares unfavourably with London -in everything but cookery, and came away with ‘every piece of information -respecting the University,’ and every book he wished for. At Hamburg he -was given a public dinner by eighty English residents, and was driven -about the town by his old _protégé_, the ‘Exile of Erin.’ Back in London, -he appeared at a meeting in support of the Western Literary and Scientific -Institution, and in an eloquent speech declared that if his plan of a -Metropolitan University succeeded he would ask for no other epitaph on his -grave than to be celebrated as one of its originators. The plan, -fortunately, did succeed, and although Lord Brougham, to serve his own -political ambitions, tried to rob him of the honour, there cannot be a -doubt that it rightly belongs to Campbell. Moreover, King’s College would -never have existed but for the London University, so that Campbell, as he -used to remark, did a double good. - -Meanwhile, at the beginning of 1826, he was interesting himself in certain -domestic affairs. He was having a spacious study constructed, and he -proposed to treat himself to a new carpet and some elegant leather chairs. -Every volume was to be removed from the drawing-room; and henceforth he -was to smoke in a garret, not in his study. His fancy also rioted by -anticipation in ‘a geranium-coloured paper with gold leaves to harmonise -with the glory of my gilded and red-bound books.’ But there his purse and -his vanity were at loggerheads. While the masons were hammering in the -house, the Glasgow students had decided to ask Campbell to allow himself -to be put forward as their Lord Rector. At first he complied, but as the -time approached he began to waver in his decision. He was not well, his -son’s malady distressed him, and his pecuniary affairs--thanks in a great -measure to his own reckless extravagance--were again in deep water. -Writing on November 6 (1826) he says: ‘I got in bills on Saturday morning -for the making up of my new house, treble the amount expected; and also -confirmation of an acquaintance being bankrupt, for whom I had advanced -the deposits on three shares in the London University. I could not now -accept the Rectorship if it were at my option. If I travelled it must be -on borrowed money. Friends I have in plenty who would lend, but I fear -debt as I do the bitterness of death.’ This seemed decisive enough, and -yet nine days later the Principal of Glasgow University was announcing to -him that he had been elected Lord Rector by the unanimous vote of the four -‘nations.’ - -The rival candidates were Mr Canning and Sir Thomas Brisbane, and the -contest had proved more than usually exciting, from the fact that all the -professors except Millar and Jardine were opposed to Campbell on the not -very solid ground of ‘political distrust.’ Some enemy even sought to -damage his cause by circulating a report that his mother had been ‘a -washerwoman in the Goosedubs of Glasgow.’ Wilson, referring in the ‘Noctes -Ambrosianæ’ to this incident, remarked that in England such baseness would -be held incredible; but Wilson forgot that the fight was practically a -political one, and in politics any stick is, or was, good enough to beat a -dog with. Campbell’s triumph was, however, all the greater that it was -achieved under such conditions; and we can easily imagine the glow of -pride with which he went down to Glasgow in the succeeding April (1827). - -He landed on the 9th of the month, after a journey which he had cause to -remember from the circumstance that Matilda brought ‘seventy parcels of -baggage,’ and on the 12th he delivered his inaugural address in the old -College Hall. There is abundant evidence of his high spirits in an -incident recorded by Allan Cunningham. Snow lay on the ground at the time, -and when Campbell reached the College Green he found the students pelting -each other. ‘The poet ran into the ranks, threw several snowballs with -unerring aim, then, summoning the scholars around him in the Hall, -delivered a speech replete with philosophy and eloquence.’ The snowballing -was not very dignified perhaps, but it was strictly in character, and must -have added immensely to Campbell’s popularity with the ‘darling boys’ of -his Alma Mater. The Rectorial address was received with intense -enthusiasm. One listener describes it as elegant and highly poetical, and -says that it was delivered with great ease and dignity. Another, a -student, writes: ‘To say we applauded is to say nothing. We evinced every -symptom of respect and admiration, from the loftiest tribute, even our -tears--drawn forth by his eloquent recollections of olden times--down to -escorting him with boisterous noise along the public streets.’ - -Campbell remained in Glasgow until the 1st of May, banqueting with the -Professors and the Senatus (who, by the way, created him an LL.D., a title -which he never used), hearing explanations by the Faculty, and coaching -himself up in University ordinances and finance. For Campbell filled the -Rectorial office in no sinecure fashion. Perhaps, as Redding says, he made -more of the post than it was worth, out of a little harmless vanity and -somewhat of local attachment. But at any rate he did not spare himself. He -got his inaugural address printed, and sent every student a copy of it, -inscribed with his autograph. He wrote a series of Letters on the Epochs -of Greek and Roman Literature, which, after running through the _New -Monthly_, he presented to the students in volume form. He investigated the -rights of the students too, and secured them many advantages of which they -had been unjustly deprived. All these duties he performed in person, thus -involving several special journeys to Glasgow; so that, on the whole, it -may safely be said that he conducted himself like a model Lord Rector. - -The result was seen in his re-election, not only for a second but for a -third term, which was almost unprecedented, and indeed was said to be -contrary to the statutes and usage of the University. His popularity with -the students all through was very great. They founded a Campbell Club in -his honour; commissioned a full-length portrait by Sir Thomas Lawrence; -and presented him with a silver punch-bowl, which figures in his will as -one of his ‘jewels.’ When he was elected for the third time they went wild -with delight. Campbell was staying with his cousin, Mr Gray, in Great -Clyde Street, a few paces from the river. There the students gathered to -the number of fourteen hundred, and a speech being called for, Campbell -appeared at the window. ‘Students,’ he said, ‘sooner shall that -river’--pointing to the Clyde--‘cease to flow into the sea, than I, while -I live, will forget the honour this day done to me.’ There is but one step -from the sublime to the ridiculous. At this stage an old washerwoman -passing on the outskirts of the crowd was arrested by the sight of what -she conceived to be a lunatic speaking from a window. ‘Puir man!’ she -remarked to a student, ‘can his freends no tak’ him in?’ A royal time it -must have been for the poet in Glasgow altogether. He was naturally much -attached to the city, and although he complains of feeling melancholy -while walking about his old haunts, yet it was a melancholy not without -alleviations. The Rectorship had been ‘a sunburst of popular favour,’ the -‘crowning honour’ of his life; and as for Glasgow itself, why it flowed -with ‘syllogisms and ale.’ - -The third year of Campbell’s Rectorship expired in the autumn of 1829, but -meanwhile, in May 1828, he had lost his wife. Mrs Campbell had been ailing -for some time, and his anxiety on her account darkens all the -correspondence of the period. For several months he acted both as -housekeeper and sick-nurse, and seldom crossed his door except to get -something for the invalid. Mrs Campbell’s death was an irreparable loss to -him. She had been an affectionate, even a childishly adoring wife (she -used to take visitors upstairs on tiptoe to show the poet ‘in a moment of -inspiration’!) and it does not surprise us to read of the bereaved husband -relieving his feelings with tears at the sight of a trinket or a knot of -ribbon that belonged to her. Mrs Campbell had tributes from many -quarters. Redding said that no praise could be too high for her good -management and her general conduct in domestic life. Mrs Grant of Laggan, -writing of Campbell’s pecuniary embarrassments, remarked that ‘his good, -gentle, patient little wife was so frugal, so sweet-tempered, that she -might have disarmed poverty of half its evils.’ It was maliciously hinted -in Scotland that she lived unhappily with her husband, but upon that point -we may safely accept the testimony of Redding. ‘I never,’ he says, ‘found -Mrs Campbell out of temper. I never saw a remote symptom of disagreement, -though I entered the poet’s house for years at all times, without -ceremony. I believe the tale to be wholly a fiction.’ - -Mrs Campbell’s death sent the poet out into the world and into company -very different from that with which he had been used to associate. Redding -makes touching reference to the change at his fireside. The recollection -of Mrs Campbell’s uniform cheerfulness and hospitality, the sight of her -tea-table without her presence, her vacant chair, that inexpressible lack -of something which long custom had made like second nature--these things -gave to Campbell’s home a melancholy colouring which his old friends never -cared to contemplate. ‘Man,’ says Lytton, ‘may have a splendid palace, a -comfortable lodging, nay, even a pleasant house, but man has no home where -the home has no mistress.’ Henceforward Campbell had practically no home. -He moved about from house to house, always seeking the comfort which he -never found, his books and his papers and his general belongings getting -ever into a greater state of confusion for want of the hand that had so -quietly and skilfully ordered his domestic affairs. - -The literary product of these years of bereavement and the Glasgow -Rectorship was naturally very slight. Indeed the letters to the students, -already mentioned, formed almost the only writings of any importance. In -concert with the elder students he projected a Classical Encyclopædia, but -for some unexplained reason the project was allowed to drop. The victory -of Navarino in October 1827 produced some stanzas which he not inaptly -called ‘a rumble-tumble concern,’ and the ‘Lines to Julia M----,’ as well -as the short lyric, ‘When Love came first to Earth,’ seem to have been -written in 1829. It was, however, an essentially barren period, unmarked -by a single piece above the average of the third-rate writer. - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - -CLOSING YEARS - - -Some time just before the expiration of his Rectorship at Glasgow in 1829, -Campbell changed his residence from Seymour Street to Middle Scotland -Yard, where he furnished on such a grand scale that he had to mortgage a -prospective edition of his poems to pay the bill. In connection with this -change there were hints of a second marriage--hints which continued to be -whispered about for many a day, to Campbell’s evident annoyance. He -declared that there was no foundation for the report, that it was ‘the -baseless fabric of a vision’; yet we are assured by Beattie that he took -his new house at the suggestion of ‘an amiable and accomplished friend -deeply interested in his welfare, and destined, as he fondly imagined, to -restore him to the happiness of married life.’ Who the amiable lady was we -are not told; nor is anything said as to why the engagement fell through. -The presumption is that Campbell changed his mind, and did not want to -have the matter discussed. - -At this time a suitable marriage would certainly have been no act of -madness, for Campbell was clearly feeling himself more than usually -lonesome. Indeed, it was with the avowed object of mitigating his forlorn -condition that he established the Literary Union, a social club over which -he presided till he finally left London in 1843. The burden of work and -removal had again thrown him into a wretched state of health, and in -September (1829) he writes to say that he is doing next to nothing apart -from the _New Monthly_. Protracted study exhausts him, and he dare not -take wine, which is the only reviving stimulus left. Starvation alone -alleviates his distress: a hearty meal means an agony of suffering; -therefore he stints himself at table, and loses flesh daily. - -So the beginning of 1830 found him. His friend Sir Thomas Lawrence had -just died, and although he was profoundly ignorant of the technique of -art, and had even a limited appreciation of pictures and painting, he -boldly undertook to write the artist’s life. He set to the work in a -comically serious fashion. He had a printed notice sent to his friends and -fastened to the door of his study, intimating his desire to be left -undisturbed till the book was finished. These notices--for Campbell issued -them regularly--were the subject of much merriment among his -acquaintances. It was an announcement of the kind that drew from Hook the -jest about Campbell having been safely delivered of a couplet. In the -present case the ruse apparently did not answer, for in a week or two he -fled to the country. He seems to have spent a good deal of time over the -Life, but nothing ever came of his labours. Colburn insisted on having the -book in a few months, and Campbell, declaring that he could ‘get no -materials,’ petulantly threw it aside. - -This was in December 1830. By that time Campbell had severed his -connection with the _New Monthly_. Colburn had parted with Redding in -October, and the editor’s difficulties were in consequence greatly -increased. He went out of town, and in his absence an attack on his old -friend, Dr Glennie of Dulwich, was inadvertently passed by Redding’s -successor, Mr S. C. Hall. Campbell does not explicitly say that this -incident was the cause of his resignation, but as he mentions interminable -scrapes and threatened law-suits, we may safely assume that it was. At any -rate he said good-bye to Colburn in no amiable mood. Colburn had a bill -of £700 against him, partly for books and partly for the expense of the -current unsold edition of his poems. How was he to discharge such a debt? -The difficulty was temporarily met by an agreement with Cochrane, the -publisher, whereby the latter was to pay the £700 in return for Campbell’s -undertaking the editorship of a new venture, to be called _The -Metropolitan Magazine_, and for two hundred unsold copies of his poems in -Colburn’s hands. Unluckily, Cochrane could not make up the £700, and -Campbell, in order to satisfy Colburn, had to stake the rent of his house -and sell off his poems at such price as they would bring. At the close of -1830 he went into lodgings, and instead of settling down, as he had hoped, -to enjoy a kind of mild _otium cum dignitate_, he had perforce to resume -his seat on the thorny cushion of the editorial chair. When he left the -_New Monthly_, Redding asked him, ‘What about the reduced finances?’ -‘Devil take the finances,’ said he; ‘it is something to be free if a man -has but a shirt and a carpet bag.’ His soreness of heart at having to sell -his liberty again may thus be imagined. - -Campbell’s connection with the _Metropolitan Magazine_ proved anything but -agreeable. True, things went smoothly enough for a time. In the autumn he -felt himself ten inches taller because he had got a third share in the -property. The share cost him £500, and he had to borrow the money from -Rogers, for whose security--though Rogers generously declined any -security--he insured his life and pledged his library and house furniture. -But the concern turned out to be a bubble, and Campbell suffered agonies -of suspense about his money. He got it back in the long run, and it was -returned to Rogers. But this was only the beginning of his troubles. At -the request of Captain Chamier, one of the proprietors, he continued in -the editorship, but the magazine passed through many vicissitudes. When -it came into the hands of his old friend Captain Marryat, Campbell wanted -to cut connection with it entirely, and was prevailed upon to remain only -by Marryat promising to relieve him of the correspondence. Shortly after -this, Marryat offered the editorship to Moore who, however, declined to -supplant Campbell, and so joined the staff merely as a contributor. -Campbell presently reported that ‘we go on in very good heart.’ But these -conditions did not last. Campbell found that he could not work comfortably -under Marryat--who was just about to give the magazine a swing with his -‘Peter Simple’--and he threw up the editorship, which in point of fact he -had held only in name. He seems to have left everything to his sub-editor. -He seldom examined a manuscript unless it came from one of his friends; -nor did he give by his contributions--nine short pieces of verse--anything -like value for the money he received. His editorship, in short, was purely -ornamental. - -But it is necessary to retrace our steps. Just after taking on the -_Metropolitan_ in 1831, Campbell fixed upon a quiet residence at St -Leonard’s which he now used as an occasional retreat from the bustle of -London. We hear of him strolling with complacent pride on the beach while -the band played ‘The Campbells are Comin’’ and ‘Ye Mariners of England.’ -He tells his sister that refined female society had become of great -consequence to him, and that he found it concentrated here. He had no -pressing engagements, and accordingly had written more verses than he had -done for many years within the same time. His ‘Lines on the View from St -Leonards,’ published first in the _Metropolitan_, were well-known, though -they are now forgotten. A visit to one of the paper mills at Maidstone in -July 1831 was made to inquire about the price of paper for an edition of -‘The Pleasures of Hope’ which Turner had promised to illustrate. Campbell -had a little joke with the manager at the mills. ‘I am a paper-stainer,’ -he said, and then he explained that he stained with author’s ink, after -which the manager became ‘intensely disdainful.’ At Stoke, near Bakewell, -whither he had gone to see Mrs Arkwright, a daughter of Stephen Kemble, he -heard Chevalier Neukomm play the organ. This, he says, was as great an era -in his sensations as when he first beheld the Belvidere Apollo. In the -music he imagined that he heard his dead Alison speaking to him from -heaven, and when he could listen no longer he slipped out to the -churchyard, where he ‘gave way to almost convulsive sensations.’ Some -years later he met Neukomm again, and at his request turned a part of the -Book of Job--the ‘sublime text’ of which he often extolled--into verse for -an oratorio. The effort appears as a ‘fragment’ in his works, and Neukomm -is said to have composed the music, though no mention of such an oratorio -is made in any of the biographical notices of the composer. - -We come now to an important episode in the life of Campbell--an episode -which for long engaged almost his sole attention. His interest in the -cause of Poland had already been strikingly expressed in ‘The Pleasures of -Hope.’ It was an interest which, as his friend Dr Madden puts it, had all -the strength of a passion, all the fervour of patriotism. Poland was his -idol. ‘He wrote for it, he worked for it, he sold his literary labour for -it; he used his influence with all persons of eminence in political life -of his acquaintance in favour of it; and, when it was lost, in favour of -those brave defenders of it who had survived its fall. He threw himself -heart and soul into the cause; he identified all his feelings, nay, his -very being with it.’ The names of Czartoryski and Niemeiewitz were never -off his lips. A tale of a distressed Pole was his greeting to friends when -they met; a subscription the chorus of his song. In fact, he was quite mad -on the subject, as mad as ever Byron was about Greece, or Boswell about -Corsica. - -What roused him first was the fall of Warsaw, by the news of which he was -so affected that Madden feared for his life or his reason. He began very -practically by subscribing £100 to the Warsaw Hospital Fund, ‘a mighty sum -for a poor poet,’ as he says in an unpublished letter. He had written some -‘Lines on Poland’ for the _Metropolitan_, and these, along with the Lines -on St Leonards, he proposed to publish in a _brochure_, by which he -expected to raise £50 more. The number of exiles in London gradually -increased. Many of them were starving. Campbell constituted himself their -guardian, appealed urgently for money on their behalf, and subsequently, -early in 1831, founded a Polish Association with the object of relieving -distress and distributing literature calculated to arouse public sympathy -on the matter. - -Of this Association he was appointed chairman. The duties proved anything -but light. In June 1832 he writes that he has a heavy correspondence to -keep up, both with friends at home and with foreigners. He has letters in -French, German, and even Latin to write, and these afford him nothing like -a sinecure. There was also a monthly journal called _Polonia_ to edit; -besides which the German question--another and the same with the -Polish--involved him in much vexatious correspondence with the patriots of -the Fatherland. At this date he was constantly working from seven in the -morning till midnight; he even changed his dinner hour to two o’clock to -have a longer afternoon for his beloved Poles. It was impossible that such -a strain could last; and at length, in May 1833, he withdrew from the -Association as having become too arduous and exciting for his health. Thus -closed a part of his career which was as honourable to him as anything he -ever did, and upon which he looked back with feelings of sad pleasure. -His zeal was perhaps a little ill-regulated, but his sincerity and his -active practical efforts on behalf of many brave, unfortunate men bore the -impress of a noble and a generous nature. The Poles showed their gratitude -in many touching ways; and we have his own express declaration that only -once in his life did he experience anything at all like their warm-hearted -recognition of his services on their behalf. - -During the whole of this distracted period Campbell had all but completely -forsaken his own proper business. He had, of course, continued to edit the -_Metropolitan_, and his random contributions to that journal must have -filled up some time, but from the fall of Warsaw in March 1831 to his -ceasing connection with the Polish Association in May 1833 his interests -were centred entirely on the affairs of the exiles. Even the agitation -about the Reform Bill had passed almost unheeded, though he was among -those who celebrated the passing of the Bill by dining with the Lord Mayor -at the Guildhall, on which occasion he remarked that the turtle soup -tasted as if it had already felt the beneficent effects of Reform. From -Glasgow had come in 1832 an appeal that he would allow himself to be -nominated as a candidate for Parliament, but he declined the honour -because a seat in the House would entail a life of ‘dreadful hardship,’ -and cut up his literary occupation. - -The only work of any note which he did while actively interested in the -Poles was the Life of Mrs Siddons. He finished the book, at the end of -1832, in one volume, but the ‘tyrant booksellers’ would not look at it -until he had expanded it into two volumes. It was at length published in -June 1834. Few words need be wasted over it. Mrs Siddons, of whom he -entertained an extravagantly high opinion, had entrusted him with what he -loftily termed the ‘sacred duty’ of writing her life, but he was -thoroughly unfitted for such a commission, and it is the simple truth that -no man of even average ability ever produced a worse biography. The -_Quarterly_ called it ‘an abuse of biography,’ and its author ‘the worst -theatrical historian we have ever had.’ It is full of the grossest -blunders, and some of its expressions are turgid and nonsensical beyond -belief. Thus of Mrs Pritchard we read that she ‘electrified the house with -disappointment,’ a statement upon which the _Quarterly_ remarked: ‘This, -we suppose, is what the philosophers call negative electricity.’ The thing -was rendered additionally absurd by the noise which Campbell had made -about the writing of the book. He talked about it and wrote about it to -everybody, as if it were to be the _magnum opus_ of his life. From this -the public and his friends naturally formed great expectations, and when -they found they had been deluded they covered Campbell with ridicule. - -With the money which the publication of this wretched book brought him -Campbell now afforded himself a long break. He conceived the idea of a -classical pilgrimage in Italy as likely not only to benefit his health but -to furnish him with materials for a new poem. A change in the tide of his -affairs carried him however to Paris, and he never set eyes on the sunny -land. He arrived in the French capital in July, when the weather was so -hot that he told the Parisians their _beau climat_ was fit only for -devils. He was eagerly welcomed by many of the Polish exiles, who gave -him, what he did not dislike, a grand dinner, at which Prince Czartoryski -proclaimed him ‘the pleader, the champion, the zealous and unwearied -apostle of our holy cause.’ He heard Louis Philippe deliver his address to -the Peers and Deputies, and made a ‘dispassionate enquiry’ into the -characteristics of French beauty, which resulted in the conviction that -the French ladies have no beauty at all! He began work on a Geography of -Classical History, rising every morning with the sun, and studying for -twelve hours a day. Presently some French friends interested him in the -recent conquest and colonisation of Algiers, and, with his characteristic -caprice, he decided to go there at once and write a book on the colony. - -He landed in Algiers on the 18th of September (1834) to find Captain St -Palais translating his poems for publication. ‘Prancing gloriously’ on an -Arabian barb, he felt as if he had dropt into a new planet. The vegetation -gave him ecstatic delight, and he was greatly elated when he discovered -some ruins unmentioned by previous travellers. As usual he began to harass -himself about money, but the announcement opportunely arrived that Telford -had left him £1000, and he resolved to go on with his tour. He covered the -entire coast from Bona to Oran, and penetrated as far as Mascara, seventy -miles into the interior. For several nights he slept under the tents of -the Arabs, and he made much of hearing a lion roar in his ‘native savage -freedom.’ But all this, and a great deal more, may be read in his ‘Letters -from the South,’ an informative and even lively work in two volumes, which -appeared originally in the _New Monthly_. Campbell’s account of Algerian -scenery is so glowingly eloquent that if unforeseen objects had not -diverted his attention, the African tour would probably have formed the -subject of a new poem. As it was, the tour remained poetically barren, -save for some lines on a dead eagle and a _jeu d’esprit_ written for the -British Consul’s children. - -Campbell was back in Paris in May 1835, and after ‘a long and gracious -audience’ with Louis Philippe, he returned to London to tell more stories -than Tom Coryatt, and enjoy a temporary fame as an African traveller. The -tour seems, however, to have done him harm rather than good. Redding says -he was astonished at the change in his appearance. He looked a dozen years -older; he was in unusually low spirits, and he kept harping upon his -disordered constitution. From this date onwards the record of his career -is not worth dwelling upon in any detail. He suffered greatly from spells -of ill-health; he shifted fitfully from one residence to another; he -visited this place and that place; and with constant cackle about his busy -pen, did almost nothing. Under these circumstances the briefest summary of -the remaining years of his life will suffice. - -Upon his return from Paris in 1835 he settled down at York Chambers, St -James’ Street, where he prepared his ‘Letters from the South’ and arranged -about the new edition of his poems to be illustrated by Turner. In May -1836 he started for Scotland, where he remained for four months, spending, -he says, the happiest time he had ever spent in the land of his fathers. -On former visits he had always been hurried and haunted by the necessity -of sending manuscripts or proofs to London; but now he was his own master. -At Glasgow he dined with the Campbell Club, and got over the function -‘very well,’ having left Professor Wilson and other choice spirits to -prolong the carousal into the small hours. _Apropos_, a story is told of -Wilson and Campbell which is too good to be missed. The poet’s cousin, Mr -Gray, had a bewitchingly pretty maid, who had set Campbell--so he -says--dreaming about the heroines of romance. The day after the dinner, -Wilson, with other members of the Club, called at the house while the Gray -family were absent. ‘I rang to get refreshment for them,’ says Campbell, -‘and fair Margaret brought it in. The Professor looked at her with so much -admiration that I told him in Latin to contain his raptures, and he did -so; but rose and walked round the room like a lion pacing his cage. Before -parting he said, “Cawmel, that might be your ain Gertrude. Could not you -just ring and get me a sight of that vision of beauty again?” “No, no,” I -told him, “get you gone, you Moral Philosophy loon, and give my best -respects to your wife and daughters.”’ As a set-off to this, it may be -recorded that Campbell was sadly dismayed at seeing so many of the -Glasgow ‘bonnie lassies’ going about with bare feet. ‘I am constantly,’ he -says, ‘preaching against this national disgrace to my countrymen. It is a -barbarism so unlike, so unworthy of, the otherwise civilised character of -the commonality, which is the most intelligent in Europe; and it is a -disgrace unpalliated by poverty in Glasgow, where the industrious are -exceedingly well-off.’ The Club dinner was followed by a meeting of the -Polish Association, at which Campbell gave a forty-five minutes’ speech -that, by his own report, caused quite a sensation. He went to hear his old -College chum, Dr Wardlaw, preach, and afterwards compared him with -Chalmers. Chalmers, he said, ‘carries his audience by storm, but Wardlaw -is a reasoning and well-informed person,’ a double-edged compliment to the -more famous divine which Campbell probably did not see. - -After a trip to the Highlands--one result of which was his ‘Lines to Ben -Lomond,’ published shortly after in the _Scenic Annual_--he went to -Edinburgh, where, on the 5th of August, he was made a freeman and was -fêted like a prince. The Paisley Council and bailies, as he humorously -tells, refused him a like honour; they bestowed it on Wilson, who was an -inveterate Tory, and denied it to Campbell because he was a Whig. -Nevertheless, Campbell, taking no offence, went to Paisley to the dinner, -and Wilson and he spent a merry time at the races afterwards, Campbell -being, indeed, so ‘prodigiously interested’ as to have an even £50 on one -of the events! - -Returning to London in October, he was back in Scotland again in the -summer of 1837. There was a printers’ centenary festival in the capital in -July, and nobody could be got to take the chair ‘because it was a -three-and-sixpenny _soirée_.’ This roused Campbell’s democratic blood, and -he immediately offered to fill the breach. ‘Delta’ proposed his health, -and the audience got their hearts out by singing ‘Ye Mariners of -England.’ Before the year ended he had again changed his residence. This -time it was to ‘spacious chambers’ in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, which, -ignoring all the teachings of experience, he furnished so expensively that -he had to undertake a new piece of hack work to cover the cost. The -account of his difficulty with an Irish charwoman who sought to help him -in arranging his books is at once amusing and pathetic. She understood, he -says, neither Greek nor Latin, so that when he ordered her to bring such -and such a volume of Athenæus or Fabricius she could only grunt like one -of her native pigs. What did Campbell expect? Redding has a dreary picture -of the disorder in which he found him one afternoon shortly after this. -The rooms were in a state of extraordinary confusion. The breakfast things -were still on the table, a coat was on one chair and a dressing-gown on -another; pyramids of books were heaped on the floor, and papers lay -scattered about in endless disarray. It was indeed a sad change from the -neatness which had prevailed in Mrs Campbell’s time. - -About this date the illustrated edition of his poems was published, and he -found himself in some perplexity over the disposal of the drawings, for -which he had paid Turner £550. He had been assured that Turner’s drawings -were like banknotes, which would always bring their original price, but -when he offered them for £300 no one would look at them, and Turner -himself subsequently bought them for two hundred guineas. Of this -illustrated edition two thousand five hundred copies went off within a -twelvemonth; while of an edition on shorter paper the same number was sold -in eleven months in Scotland alone. Those were happy days for poets! - -At the close of this year (1837) the _Scenic Annual_ appeared, containing -four pieces of Campbell’s own, notably his ‘Cora Linn, or The Falls of -Clyde,’ which he had written while in Glasgow the previous summer. -Evidently he had some doubts about the dignity of accepting the editorship -of this work, which was issued by Colburn merely to use up some old -plates. ‘You will hear me much abused,’ he says, ‘but as I get £200 for -writing a sheet or two of paper it will take a deal of abuse to mount up -to that sum.’ One cannot help recalling how Scott scorned to write for the -_Keepsake_, but Scott’s ideas of self-respect were very different from -those of Campbell. In January 1838 Campbell intimates that he is busy on a -popular edition of Shakespeare for Moxon. Needless to say, it was a -good-for-nothing production. It is, however, a point in his favour that he -had the grace to be ashamed of it. He said he had done it hurriedly, -though with the right feeling. ‘What a glorious fellow Shakespeare must -have been!’ he exclaimed, when talking about the book. ‘Walter Scott was -fine, but had a worldly twist. Shakespeare must have been just the man to -live with.’ This hint at Scott’s worldliness is sufficiently amusing, to -say the least, in view of Campbell’s own sordid ambitions. - -On the 10th of March he tells how he has been corresponding with the -Queen. He had got his poems and his ‘Letters from the South’ bound with as -much gilt as would have covered the Lord Mayor’s coach--the bill was -£6--and having sent the volumes to Windsor, they were, as such things -always are, ‘graciously accepted.’ For an avowed democrat Campbell made an -unaccountable outcry about this ‘honour,’ which produced nothing more -substantial than an autograph portrait of Her Majesty. In truth, with all -his good sense, he could be very foolish on occasion. He was one of the -spectators at the coronation of the Queen in Westminster Abbey this -year--later on he was presented at Court by the Duke of Argyll--and he -declares that she conducted herself so well during the long and fatiguing -ceremony, that he ‘shed tears many times.’ Why anyone should shed tears -because a royal lady behaves herself becomingly would have been a puzzle -for Lord Dundreary. But Campbell was given to blubbering on every -conceivable and inconceivable pretext. Once when he went to visit Mrs -Siddons he was ‘overcome, even to tears, by the whole meeting’; and we -hear of him crying like a child when drawing up some papers on behalf of -the despoiled Poles. What tears are ‘manly, sir, manly,’ as Fred Bayham -has it, may sometimes be difficult to decide, but there can be no question -about the unmanly character of much of Campbell’s snivelling. - -In July he paid another visit to Scotland, this time in connection with -family affairs. Mrs Dugald Stewart died while he was in Edinburgh, and one -more link binding him to the past was broken. Returning to his lonely -chambers, he reports himself as working from six in the morning till -midnight, a treadmill business which he unblushingly admits to be due to -sheer avarice. ‘The money! the money!’ he exclaims; ‘the thought of -parting with it is _unthinkable_, and pounds sterling are to me “dear as -the ruddy drops that warm my heart.”’ He calls himself spendthrift--as -wretched and regular a miser as ever kept money in an old stocking; and -finds an excuse for himself only in the fact that he is getting more -interested in public charities. His principal literary work was now a Life -of Petrarch. Archdeacon Coxe had left a biography uncompleted, and -Campbell agreed to finish it for £200. He found it, however, so stupid -that he decided to write a Life of Petrarch himself, though he frankly -allowed that until quite recently he had something like an aversion to -Petrarch because of the monotony of his amatory sonnets, and his wild, -semi-insane passion for Laura. He had nothing but pity for a man who could -be in love for twenty years with a woman who was a wife and a prolific -mother to boot. The Life of Petrarch occupied him until the spring of -1840. It was a sorry performance, and may be dismissed without further -remark. Campbell had neither the sympathy with the Italian poet nor the -intimate knowledge of his life and work which were requisite in his -biographer, and the book is simply what he called it himself--a mere piece -of manufacture. - -Very little of importance had happened while he was engaged on this -production. There were visits to Brighton and to Ramsgate in search of -health; and another link had been severed by the death of Alison, his -‘mind’s father.’ He had projected a small edition of his poems as a -resource for his closing years, and in November 1839 Moxon had thrown off -ten thousand copies in double column, to be sold at two shillings each. Of -original lyrical work nothing of any note was produced, the pieces -including ‘My Child Sweetheart,’ ‘Moonlight,’ and ‘The Parrot.’ In -September 1840 he was at Chatham for the launch of a couple of warships, -when he made a speech and wrote his lines on ‘The Launch of a First-rate.’ -Campbell had a patriotic partiality for the navy, and liked to hear about -the exploits of seamen, but his speech on this occasion was a great deal -better than the verses which followed it. - -Feeling more than ever the cheerlessness of his chambers, he now made -another expensive change of residence. He longed for the comforts of a -_home_, and with his niece, Margaret, the daughter of his deceased -brother, Alexander Campbell, whom he brought from Glasgow to superintend -his domestic arrangements, he leased the house No. 8 Victoria Square, -Pimlico, about which he spoke to everybody as a child speaks about a new -toy. He removed in the spring of 1841; but he had not been long in -occupation when he fell ill and went off suddenly to Wiesbaden. Beattie -says he would not abide strictly by regimen, and to his other complaints -was now added an attack of rheumatism. At Wiesbaden he met Hallam, the -historian, ‘a most excellent man, of great acuteness and of immense -research in reading,’ but no other notability seems to have crossed his -path. He benefited greatly by the waters and baths, and at Ems even -managed to write the ballad of ‘The Child and Hind,’ the story of which, -printed in a Wiesbaden paper, plagued him so that he could not help -rhyming. This piece was obviously meant as an imitation of the old ballad, -but it is as little successful as such imitations usually are. - -Reaching London once more, he sat down contented--for the time being--at -his own fireside; and in November he writes of his intention to live now -as a gentleman poet. He was highly pleased with his niece. She was -‘well-principled and amiable,’ a ‘nice, comfortable housekeeper,’ and a -‘tolerable musician.’ Some people jeered at her for her scruples about -going to the play, but Campbell allowed nothing to be said in her hearing -that might alarm her pious feelings. He taught her French and Greek, -engaged the best masters for her general education, and spared no expense -in books. His affectionate feelings towards her are well expressed in the -lines beginning ‘Our friendship’s not a stream to dry,’ and a more -tangible token of his regard was shown at his death, when he left her -nearly the whole of his property. - -He had now been busy for some time with ‘The Pilgrim of Glencoe,’ and the -poem was published, with other short pieces, in February 1842. It fell -still-born from the press. Some zealous admirer said it ought to have been -as good as a bill at sight, but alack! the bill was found to be -unnegotiable. The publisher made strenuous exertions to obtain a hearing -for the poem, but all to no purpose. The public would not be roused from -their indifference, and ‘The Pilgrim of Glencoe’ sunk at once into the -shades of oblivion. - -Campbell was manifestly unprepared for such a reverse. He had expected a -quick and profitable return from the book, and had entered into heavy -responsibilities, which now threatened his independence. One cannot help -remarking again upon the mystery of these continued money difficulties. -There was no reason why Campbell should be everlastingly in financial -straits. He had his pension, he had been uncommonly lucky in the matter of -legacies, he enjoyed property to the extent of £200 a year, and the -profits of his work besides. There ought now to have been less cause than -ever for pleading poverty. That there were difficulties is, however, -abundantly evident, from the fact that he precipitately resolved to -dispose of his house and retire to some retreat where he could live -cheaply and await the advances of old age. London, he protested, was no -longer the place for him. His friends, too, observed that his constitution -was visibly failing: he walked with a feeble step, and his face wore an -expression of languor and anxiety. - -Under these disquieting conditions he made his will, and began to look -about for the ‘remote corner.’ In the meantime he was preparing still -another edition of his collected poems, which he intended to publish by -subscription. He says that for several years past the sale of his books -had been steadily going down, so that his poems, which had yielded him on -an average £500 per annum, would not now bring him much more than a tenth -of that amount. By keeping the book in his own hands he expected to make a -goodly sum. But the experiment failed. The subscriptions dribbled in only -at rare intervals, and some money having come to him from the death of his -eldest and only surviving sister in March 1843, as well as a little legacy -from Mr A’Becket, the new edition, like its predecessors, passed into the -hands of Mr Moxon. The volume was a handsome one of four hundred pages, -with fifty-six vignettes by leading artists. It had a not inconsiderable -sale, and brought a substantial addition to Campbell’s exchequer. - -Unhappily he had neither health nor spirits to enjoy his improved -fortunes. He had outlived all his own family; he was getting more and more -depressed, more and more feeble. To leave London seemed ill-advised, but -he was determined upon it, and having made excursions to Brittany and -elsewhere in search of a place of retirement, he at length fixed on -Boulogne.[3] There he arrived with his niece in July 1843. Redding saw him -just before leaving and found him in good humour, though he appeared weak -and looked far older than he was. He had sold a thousand volumes from his -library, and injudiciously spent £500 on the purchase of an annuity, -because he dreaded that he might run through the principal. Boulogne -proved not uncongenial to his tastes--a gay place with many public -amusements, the Opera and the ‘Comedie,’ as well as concerts and races. -But he was never able to derive any pleasure from it. Even the books he -had brought from London were never placed on their shelves. - -He had still some work which he intended doing, particularly a treatise on -ancient geography, but ‘incurable indolence’ overcame him, and he resigned -himself to the arm-chair. He complained of weakness, and felt a gradually -increasing disinclination for any kind of exertion. In March 1844 Beattie -received from him the last letter he ever wrote. A rapid decay of bodily -strength had set in, and he never rallied. He had frequently told Beattie, -his ‘kind, dear physician,’ that if he ever fell seriously ill care should -be taken to acquaint him with the fact. Beattie was accordingly summoned -to Boulogne, but his services were unavailing, except in so far as he -could make the closing days easier for the patient. When the end came, on -the 15th of June, it came peacefully, so peacefully that those who were -watching by the bedside hardly knew when the spirit had fled. - -Thus died Thomas Campbell, the last of all his long family, ‘a lonely -hermit in the vale of years.’ There was a story that a representative of -the Glasgow Cemetery Company had waited on the poor enfeebled poet about a -year before his death to beg his body for their new cemetery. However this -may have been--and one would prefer not to believe the story--when -Campbell wrote his ‘Field Flowers’ it seems clear that he contemplated a -grave by the Clyde. Redding says: ‘He often spoke of our going down -together to visit the scenery, and of his preference for it as a last -resting-place.’ But the field-flowers, ‘earth’s cultur’less buds,’ were -not to bloom on his grave. His body was brought to England, and on the 3rd -of July was laid with great pomp in the Poets’ Corner of Westminster -Abbey, where a fine statue now marks his tomb. A deputation of Poles -attended, and as the coffin was lowered a handful of earth from the grave -of Kosciusko was scattered over the lid. It was a simple but touching -tribute. Two points struck his intimate friends when they read the -inscription on the coffin lid. He was described as LL.D., a distinction he -detested, and as ‘Author of “The Pleasures of Hope,”’ which he detested -too. - - - - -CHAPTER IX - -PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS AND PLACE AS A POET - - -Something of Campbell’s person and character will have already been -gathered from the foregoing pages. His friends unite in praise of his eyes -and his generally handsome appearance as a young man. Lockhart says that -the eyes had a dark mixture of fire and softness which Lawrence’s pencil -alone could reproduce. Patmore speaks of his ‘oval, perfectly regular’ -features, to which his eyes and his bland smile gave an expression such as -the moonlight gives to a summer landscape. The thinness of the lips is -commented upon by several writers; and it is even said that Chantrey -declined to execute a bust because the mouth could never look well in -marble. Gilfillan observes that there was nothing false about him but his -hair: ‘he wore a wig, and his whiskers were dyed’--to match the wig! Most -of his acquaintances remark on the wig, which in his palmy days was ‘true -to the last curl of studious perfection’; Lockhart alone declares that it -impaired his appearance because his choice of colour was abominable. -Byron’s picture of him as he appeared at Holland House in 1813 has often -been quoted: ‘Campbell looks well, seems pleased and dressed to sprucery. -A blue coat becomes him; so does his new wig. He really looked as if -Apollo had sent him a birthday suit or a wedding garment, and was witty -and lively.’ - -But the completest and most consistent description is to be found in Leigh -Hunt’s Autobiography. Hunt says: ‘His skull was sharply cut and fine, with -plenty, according to the phrenologists, both of the reflective and -amative organs… His face and person were rather of a small scale; his -features regular, his eye lively and penetrating; and when he spoke -dimples played about his mouth, which, nevertheless, had something -restrained and close in it. Some gentle puritan strain seemed to have -crossed the breed and to have left a stamp on his face, such as we often -see in the female Scotch face rather than on the male.’ After Mrs -Campbell’s death in 1828 he lost something of his old finical neatness, -but he continued to the last to be ‘curious in waistcoats and buttons.’ -Madden speaks of him in his later years as ‘an elderly gentleman in a -curly wig, with a blue coat and brass buttons, very like an ancient -mariner out of uniform and his natural element.’ Before he left London for -Boulogne, he would be seen in the streets with an umbrella tucked under -his arm, his boots and trousers all dust and dirt, ‘a perfect picture of -mental and bodily imbecility.’ - -The best portrait of Campbell is the well-known one by Sir Thomas -Lawrence, engraved in most editions of his works. It was painted when he -was about forty years of age, and represents him very much as Byron -described him. Redding, who had good means of judging, says that, barring -the lips, which were too thick, it was ‘the perfection of resemblance.’ -Campbell was somewhat vain of his appearance, and would never have asked, -like Cromwell, to be painted warts and all. He had, in particular, a sort -of feminine objection to an artist making him look old. Late in life he -sat to Park, the sculptor, when his desire to be reproduced _en beau_ made -him decline to take off his wig. Park made a very successful bust, but -Campbell disliked it just because of its extreme truthfulness. In the -Westminster Abbey statue by Marshall, the features, according to those who -knew him, are preserved with happy fidelity, though the attitude is -somewhat theatrical, and we get the notion of a much taller and more -athletic figure. - -Campbell’s social habits have been variously described. There can be no -doubt that occasionally he took too much wine; so did most people at that -time. Beattie makes a long story about it, pleading this and that in -extenuation, but there is no need to enlarge on the matter now. It was -merely, as Campbell said himself, a case of being unable to resist ‘such -good fellows.’ He was never a solitary drinker, like De Quincey with his -opium. When he was left a widower he went more into company than he had -done before; and apart from his special temptations, there was the fact -that with his excitable temperament his last defences were carried before -a colder man’s outworks. Moreover, he found that wine gave an edge to his -wit, and hence he may often have passed the conventional bounds in the -mere endeavour to promote the hilarity of his friends. - -His other indulgences seem to have been quite innocent. Hunt hints at his -love of a good dinner, which indeed has been seen from his letters. He was -almost as fond of the pipe as Tennyson, and he had even been known to chew -tobacco when he found it inconvenient to smoke. He liked music, though he -knew no more about the theory of the art than Scott. The national songs of -his country specially appealed to him; and he was severe upon Dr Burney, -the musical historian, because he had not done justice to the old English -composers. He played the flute--how wonderfully flute-playing has gone out -of fashion!--and could ‘strike in now and then with a solo.’ His early -‘vain little weak passion’ to have ‘a fine characteristic, manly voice’ -was never realised, but with such voice as he had, he often gratified his -friends in a Scots song or in his own ‘Exile of Erin.’ ‘The Marseillaise’ -was his favourite air, and when on his deathbed he several times asked his -niece to play it. - -But Campbell gave himself very little time for recreation and social -enjoyment. Most of his waking hours were spent in his study, where he -dawdled unconscionably over the lightest of tasks. As a rule he attempted -verse only when in the mood. He told George Thomson, who had asked him for -some lyrics, that if he sat on purpose to write a song he felt sure it -would be a failure. On the other hand, he sat down to produce prose with -the clock-work regularity of Anthony Trollope. He wrote very slowly, and -would often recast a whole piece out of sheer caprice, the second version -being not seldom inferior to the first. Several of his friends speak of -his practice of adding pencil lines to unruled paper for making -transcripts of his verse. His habits of study were erratic and desultory. -He could not fix his thoughts for any length of time; yet he always -pretended to be prodigiously busy. Even the minutes necessary for shaving -he grudged: a man, he said, might learn a language in the time given to -the razor. Scott wondered that he did so little considering the number of -years he devoted to literature. But the reason is plain: he did not know -how to economise his time. His imagination was active enough, but it was -ill-regulated and flighty, and his incapacity for protracted exertion led -to the abandonment of many well-conceived designs. This instability, this -restless, wayward irresolution, was the weak point in his character. He -would start of a sudden into the country in order to be alone, and he -would be back in London next day. He would arrange visits in eager -anticipation of enjoyment, and when he arrived at his destination would -ask to be immediately recalled on urgent editorial business! ‘There is -something about me,’ he truly said, ‘that lacks strength in brushing -against the world, and battling out the evil day.’ And he was right when -he named himself ‘procrastination Tom.’ - -Campbell was not, in the usual sense of the term, a society man. He liked -the company of ladies, especially when they were pretty, but ‘talking -women’ he detested. Even Madame de Staël he disparaged because she was -fond of showing off. For the ‘high gentry,’ to use his own words, he had -an ‘unconquerable aversion.’ To retain their acquaintance, he said, meant -a life of idleness, dressing, and attendance on their parties. He censured -his own countrymen for their snobbish deference to the great, citing an -instance of Scott having become painfully obsequious in a company when -some unknown lordling arrived. Anything like formality, above all the idea -of being invited out for other than a social and friendly object, made him -silent and even morose. ‘They asked me to show me,’ he observed of a -certain function; ‘I will never dine there again.’ Lockhart, writing of -this phase of his character, says there was no reason why he should not -have been attentive to persons vastly his superiors who had any sort of -claim upon him; no reason why he should not have enjoyed, and profited -largely by enjoying, ‘the calm contemplation of that grand spectacle -denominated the upper world.’ As a society star, Lockhart is perhaps to be -excused for not sympathising with the position. Campbell had his bread to -make by his own industry, and he could not possibly fill his hours with -forenoon calls and nightly levees. But more than that, he was not formed, -either by habit or by mode of thinking, for the conventional round of -social life. A man who puts his knife in the salt-cellar--as, according to -Lady Morgan, Campbell once did at an aristocratic table--is not made for -associating with the ‘high gentry.’ The ‘upper world’ may indeed be, as -Lockhart says it is, ‘the best of theatres, the acting incomparably the -first, the actresses the prettiest.’ But Campbell seems always to have -felt as much out of place there as a country cousin would feel in a -greenroom. Various references in his letters suggest that he was troubled -with a nervous self-consciousness, the bourgeois suspicion that his -‘betters’ were laughing in their sleeve at him, and the natural result was -_gaucherie_ and sometimes incivility. But among his equals he was another -man. Hunt tells of one great day at Sydenham--a specimen, no doubt, of -many such days--when Theodore Hook came to dinner and amused the company -with some extempore drollery about a piece of village gossip in which -Campbell and a certain lady were concerned. Campbell enjoyed the fun -immensely, and ‘having drunk a little more wine than usual,’ he suddenly -took off his wig and dashed it at Hook’s head, exclaiming: ‘You dog! I’ll -throw my laurels at you.’ Little wonder that one who thus mingled vanity -with horse-play was not quite at home among duchesses! - -No two authorities agree as to Campbell’s powers as a talker, but the -truth would seem to be that he shone only at his own table or among his -intimates, and even then, as already hinted, only when stimulated by wine. -He was indeed too reserved to be quite successful as a conversationalist. -One of his friends said he knew a great deal but was seldom in the mood to -tell what he knew. He ‘trifled in his table-talk, and you might sound him -about his contemporaries to very little purpose.’ As early as the year -1800 he remarked that he would always hide his emotions and personal -feelings from the world at large, and although we come upon an occasional -burst of confidence in his letters, he may be said to have kept up his -reserve to the end. Madden called him ‘a most _shivery_ person’ in the -presence of strangers; Tennyson said he was a very brilliant talker in a -_tête-a-tête_. According to an American admirer, he was quite commonplace -unless when excited; Lockhart found him witty only when he had taken wine. -Lytton was disappointed with him on such occasions as he met him in -general society, but spoke of an evening at his house when Campbell led -the conversation with the most sparkling talk he had ever heard. Nothing, -he said, could equal ‘the riotous affluence of wit, of humour, of fancy’ -that Campbell poured forth. - -To this may be added a second quotation from Leigh Hunt, which will serve -to bring out some other points. Hunt writes: - - Those who knew Mr Campbell only as the author of ‘Gertrude of - Wyoming’ and ‘The Pleasures of Hope’ would not have suspected him to - be a merry companion overflowing with humour and anecdote, and - anything but fastidious. Those Scotch poets have always something in - reserve … I know but of one fault he had, besides an extreme - cautiousness in his writings, and that one was national--a matter of - words, and amply overpaid by a stream of conversation, lively, - piquant, and liberal, not the less interesting for occasionally - betraying an intimacy with pain, and for a high and somewhat - overstrained tone of voice, like a man speaking with suspended - breath, and in the habit of subduing his feelings. No man felt more - kindly towards his fellow-creatures, or took less credit for it. - When he indulged in doubt and sarcasm, and spoke contemptuously of - things in general, he did it, partly, no doubt, out of actual - dissatisfaction, but more perhaps than he suspected out of a fear of - being thought weak and sensitive; which is a blind that the best men - commonly practise. He professed to be hopeless and sarcastic, and - took pains all the while to set up a University. - -He seems to have had a very good opinion of his own powers as a talker, -and apparently he sometimes failed from sheer over-anxiety to shine. At -Holland House he used to set himself up against Sydney Smith. Of one visit -he says: ‘I was determined I should make as many good jokes and speak as -much as himself; and so I did, for though I was dressed at the -dinner-table much like a barber’s clerk, I arrogated greatly, talked -quizzically, metaphorically. Sydney said a few good things; I said many.’ - -This is, of course, all flummery, whether Campbell was really serious in -his assertion or not. Whatever wit he may have shown on rare occasions, he -was not, like Sydney Smith, naturally witty. As a writer his _forte_ lay -in the didactic and rhetorical, and when he attempted to move in a lighter -step he became ridiculous. ‘There never was a man,’ says Redding, ‘who had -less of the comic in his character than Campbell.’ Some of his friends -aver that he often had fits of punning, but such of his puns as have -survived do not lead us to believe that he can ever have been very -successful in that most mechanical form of wit. ‘I have only one muse and -you two, so you must be the better poet,’ he once said to Redding; the -explanation being that Campbell’s house had one mews while Redding’s house -had two. At another time Redding having complained that he could not get -into his desk for his cash because he had lost the key, Campbell replied: -‘Never mind, if nothing better turns up you are sure of a post among the -_lack-keys_.’ When Hazlitt published ‘The New Pygmalion’ he declared that -the title ought to have been ‘Hogmalion’; and he told a friend that the -East was the place to write books on chronology because it was the country -of _dates_. These are specimens of Campbell’s puns, from which it will be -gathered that humour was certainly not one of his endowments. - -Nowhere does this lack of real humour come out more clearly than in his -letters, which are plain and ponderous almost to the verge of boredom. -There is nothing in them of that ever-glowing necessity of brain and blood -which makes the letters of Scott and Byron, for example, so humanly -interesting. He has no lightness like Walpole, no quiet whimsicality like -Cowper, no sidelights on literature and life like Stevenson. Lockhart’s -apology for him is that, chained so fast to the dreary tasks of -compilation, he could not be expected to have a stock of pleasantry for a -copious correspondence. But none of the brilliant letter-writers can be -suspected of having kept a choice vintage of epistolary Falernian in -carefully sealed bottles. A man’s individuality expresses itself in his -letters as naturally as a fountain flows. The truth is that Campbell was -too reserved, or too artificial, or both, to make a good letter-writer. - -By all accounts he had not the best of tempers; indeed he admitted that to -many people he had been ‘irritable, petulant, and overbearing.’ Of -personal quarrels, however, he had very few; and although he said that he -had been several times on the point of sending challenges, he was not once -concerned in a duel. His chivalry led him to take the then bold step of -defending Lady Byron’s character against the strictures of her husband, -and when the press abused him he regarded it as a compliment. Of his -kind-heartedness there are many proofs, apart from the generous way in -which he dealt with his widowed mother and his sisters. No man was more -ready to perform a good deed. His charities were varied and widespread. He -held the view that in tales of distress one can never believe too much, -and naturally he was often imposed upon. When he was in the country he -seldom wrote without some confidential communication in the way of -largess, often in a pecuniary form. On one occasion he sent Redding a -couple of pounds for a poor unfortunate whom he had been trying to -reclaim. He made strenuous efforts to get the child of a couple who had -been condemned to death adopted by some kindly person; and there is a -story of him weeding out hundreds of volumes from his library to help a -penniless widow to stock a little book shop. When subscriptions were being -asked for a memorial to Lord Holland, he excused himself by saying that he -must give all he could spare to the Mendicity Society. - -At the same time, in money matters he was almost criminally careless. The -British Consul at Algiers said that his servant might have cheated him to -any extent. He disliked making calculations of cash received or paid -away, and there were times when he knew nothing of the real state of his -finances. He would profess to be in great distress about money when, as a -matter of fact, he had a roll of bank notes in his pocket. In 1841 -Beattie, while he was absent at Wiesbaden, found in an old slipper at the -bottom of a cupboard in his house a large number of notes twisted into the -form of ‘white paper matches.’ When reproached with this piece of -imprudence Campbell, admitting that the security was ‘slippery,’ remarked -that ‘it must have happened after putting on my night-cap.’ At certain -periods of his life, notably after his wife’s death, he was positively -miserly, but even then he had his wayward fits of generosity. He would -throw away pounds one day, and the next day grudge sixpences. Very often -he forgot what he had spent or given in charity, but he never forgot what -he owed. - -One of the most charming traits in his character was his love for -children. As he put it in his ‘Child Sweetheart,’ he held it a religious -duty - - To love and worship children’s beauty. - They’ve least the taint of earthly clod-- - They’re freshest from the hand of God. - -He could not bear to see a child crossed, to hear it cry, or have it kept -reluctantly to books. Once at St Leonards he drew a little crowd around -him on the street while trying to soothe a sick baby. What he called -‘infantile female beauty’ especially attracted him: ‘_he_-children,’ he -said, not very elegantly, ‘are never in beauty to be compared with _she_ -ones.’ He saw a remarkably pretty little girl in the Park, and was -afterwards so haunted by the vision that he actually inserted an -advertisement in the _Morning Chronicle_ with the view of making her -acquaintance. Hoaxes were the natural result. One reply directed him to -the house of an old maid--‘a wretch who,’ as he used to say with peevish -humour, ‘had never heard of either me or my poetry.’ Campbell was a man of -sixty when this incident occurred. His friends not unreasonably suspected -his sanity; but he was only putting into practice the theory which he -propounded in the lines just quoted. - -Politically Campbell was a Whig of the Whigs, with rancorous prejudices -which sometimes led him into unpleasant scrapes. On the question of -Freedom he held very pronounced opinions. He was called the bard of Hope, -but he was the bard of Liberty too. He abhorred despotism of all kinds. -‘Let us never think of outliving our liberty,’ he once wrote. The -emancipation of the negroes he termed ‘a great and glorious measure.’ He -does not seem to have been a perfervid Scot, though he speaks of something -offending his tartan nationality. We are told that he never spared the -disadvantages of his country’s climate, nor the foibles of the Lowlanders, -whatever these may have been; but just as Johnson loved to gird at -Garrick, though allowing no one else to censure him, so Campbell would not -permit his native country to be attacked by another. He once rejected an -otherwise suitable paper for the _New Monthly_ because something which the -writer had said about Edinburgh did not meet with his approval. - -Of his religious views very little is to be learnt, certainly nothing from -his poems. Beattie says that as a young man he suffered great anxiety on -the subject of religion, and spent much time in its investigation before -he arrived at ‘satisfactory conclusions.’ What these conclusions were does -not exactly appear. Redding expressly affirms that he was sceptical, -adding that he was very cautious in discussing religious subjects with -strangers. His freedom from bigotry was generally remarked: he condemned -every form of intolerance, and never cared to ask a man what his creed -was. He told his nephew Robert, who seems to have had some misgivings on -the point, that he could get no harm by attending a Roman Catholic Church. -‘God listens to human prayers wherever they are offered up.’ The Catholics -might be mistaken, but persecution was not a necessary part of their -system; and if it were, did not Calvin and the Kirk of Geneva, ‘which is -the mother of the Scotch Kirk,’ get Servetus burnt alive for being a -heretic? Campbell himself seldom went to church in London, but when he was -in Scotland he did as the Scots did, and heroically sat out the sermon. It -is clear that his countrymen, of whose rigid righteousness he had many -good stories, did not regard him as heterodox, otherwise the General -Assembly would never have asked him, as they did in 1808, to make a new -metrical version of the Psalms ‘for the benefit of the congregations.’ Nor -is it certain that he was really sceptical, though it is very likely that -he hesitated upon some points of dogma. It is, however, only in his later -years that we get any indication of his religious sensibility, and then -only of the vaguest kind. When Mrs Campbell died he exclaimed, as if he -had doubted the fact before, ‘There _must_ be a God; that is evident; -there must be an all-powerful, inscrutable God.’ Again, when speaking of -the sufferings of the Poles, he remarked: ‘There _is_ a Supreme Judge, and -in another world there will be rewards and punishments.’ But we are not -justified in forming any conclusion about his settled religious -convictions from emotional outbursts resulting from special circumstances -and in the shadow of the tomb. In all likelihood he paid the conventional -observance to religion, and, if he thought about doctrines at all, took -care not to shock his family and prejudice his popularity with any -expression of heterodoxy. - -Campbell’s literary pasturage does not appear to have been very wide or -very rich. Robert Carruthers, of Inverness, who wrote an interesting -account of some mornings spent with him, says his library was not -extensive. There were one or two good editions of the classics, a set of -the ‘Biographie Universelle,’ some of the French, Italian, and German -authors, the Edinburgh Encyclopædia, and several standard English works, -none very modern. Apparently he made no attempt to keep abreast of current -literature; he stuck by his old favourites, and would often be found -poring over Homer or Euripides. In his early days Milton, Thomson, Gray, -and Goldsmith were his idols among the poets. Goldsmith, it was said, he -could never read without shedding tears, another instance of his tendency -to snivel. Thomson’s ‘Castle of Indolence’ is frequently mentioned with -approbation in his letters--‘it is a glorious poem,’ he said to -Carruthers--and seems, indeed, to have been to some extent the model of -his ‘Gertrude.’ Allan Ramsay he called one of his prime favourites, but, -strange to say, he does not appear to have regarded Burns with any special -enthusiasm. Certainly he told the poet’s son that Burns was the -Shakespeare of Scotland, and ‘Tam-o’-Shanter’ a masterpiece; but, on the -other hand, he contended--unaccountably enough, for surely Burns’ -nationality was the very fount of his inspiration--that Burns was ‘the -most un-Scotsman-like Scotsman that ever existed’; and in conversation he -was known to have denounced his own countrymen for their extravagant -adulation of the Ayrshire poet. - -Campbell had something of Southey’s amiable weakness for minor bards, and -would often praise work which he must have known to be of poor quality. He -thought very highly of James Montgomery of Sheffield; and he once called -Mrs Hemans ‘the most elegant poetess that England has produced.’ He had no -great admiration for the Lake School of poets. He declared that while -doing some good in freeing writers from profitless and custom-ridden -rules, they went too far by substituting licentiousness for wholesome -freedom. For Coleridge’s poetry he evinced an especial distaste, due -partly, no doubt, to the fact that Coleridge had attacked ‘The Pleasures -of Hope’ in his lectures. Of his criticism he spoke more favourably, but -maintained that he had borrowed many of his ideas from Schlegel. In French -poetry his favourite was Racine, whose tenderness, he said, was unequalled -even by Shakespeare. But perhaps of all the poets his darling was Pope, -whom he defended in a manner described by Byron as ‘glorious.’ The ‘Rape -of the Lock’ he held to be unsurpassed. Of three American -writers--Channing, Irving and Bryant--he had the highest opinion. The -first he considered ‘superior as a prose writer to every other living -author,’ a statement at which we can only raise our eyebrows. Among the -novelists he specially extolled Smollett and Fielding. To the latter he -says he never did justice in his youth, but shortly before his death he -wrote that he had come to ‘venerate’ him, and to regard him as the better -philosopher of the two, the truer painter of life. All this shows no -exceptional critical discernment; and Sydney Smith was no less happy in -his phrase than usual when he said that Campbell’s mind had ‘rolled over’ -a large field. A rolling stone gathers no moss. But that is more than -Smith could have meant. - -And now what, it must be asked, is Campbell’s place as a poet? Before -trying to answer the question it is necessary to understand exactly what -we mean by it. If a poet’s place depends on the extent to which he is -read, then Campbell has no place, or almost none. He is not read, save by -school-children for examinations. Milton and many another, it might be -said, are in the same case; but there is a difference. Milton will always -remain a supreme model, or at least a suggestive fount of inspiration; and -the lover of poetry can be sure of never turning to him without some -pleasure, some gain. But Campbell’s pages are not turned to by the lover -of poetry for solace or refreshment, for inspiration or guidance. As -Horace Walpole said of two poems by writers to whom Campbell owed -something--Akenside and Thomson--‘the age has done approving these poems, -and has forgot them.’ What is this but to say that the poems in the main -are lacking in the one essential--the _poetic_? The well-spring of poetry -was not vouchsafed to Campbell. He worked from the outside, not from the -depths of his own spirit. He spoke of having a poem ‘on the stocks,’ of -beating out a poem ‘on the anvil.’ By these words does he not stand, -before the highest tribunal, condemned? We read of him polishing and -polishing until what little of original idea there was must have been -almost refined away. We never hear of him bringing forth his thoughts with -pain and travail. His letters are full of complaints about his vein being -dried up, of his mind being too much cumbered with mundane concerns to -have leisure for poetry; but we never once get a hint of any real -misgiving as to his powers. ‘There is no greater sin,’ said Keats, ‘than -to flatter oneself with the idea of being a great poet… How comfortable a -thing it is to feel that such a crime must bring its own penalty, that if -one be a self-deluder, accounts must be balanced!’ - -Time has brought in its revenges for Campbell. His poems enshrine no great -thoughts, engender no consummate expression. Felicities, prettinesses, -harmonies of a sort one may find; respectabilities, vigour, patriotic and -liberal sentiments declaimed with gusto. But these do not raise him above -the level of a third-rate poet. His war songs will keep him alive, and -that after all is no mean praise. - - - - -FOOTNOTES - - -[1] It may be convenient to set down in a note a list of Campbell’s -brothers and sisters, with dates of birth and death. The details are from -the family Bible: Mary, 1757-1843; Isabella, 1758-1837; Archibald, -1760-1830; Alexander, 1761-1826; John, 1763-1806; Elizabeth, 1765-1829; -Daniel, 1767-1767; Robert, 1768-1807; James, 1770-1783; Daniel, 1773-? -Archibald and Robert went to Virginia, and John to Demerara. - -[2] As these sheets are passing through the press, Mr W. K. Leask reminds -me of Aytoun’s visit to the Scottish Monastery as recorded in the ‘Lays of -the Scottish Cavaliers.’ And of course the reference in ‘Redgauntlet’ is -well known. - -[3] Since these lines were written, a memorial tablet has been placed on -the house in the Rue St Jean where Campbell resided. The tablet describes -him as ‘the celebrated English poet.’ Was he not, then, a Famous Scot? - - - - -INDEX - - - Algiers, Campbell’s visit to, 130. - - Altona, Campbell at, 58. - - Anderson, Dr Robert, 30, 37, 43, 67. - - _Annals of Great Britain, The_, 75. - - - _Battle of the Baltic, The_, 64. - - Boulogne, Campbell settles at, 139. - - - Campbell, Alexander, poet’s father, 10-13, 67. - - ----, Alison, poet’s son, 90, 99. - - ----, Archibald, poet’s grandfather, 10. - - ----, Margaret, poet’s niece, 136, 137. - - ----, Mrs, poet’s mother, 13, 99. - - ----, Mrs, poet’s wife, 80, 113, 119. - - Campbell, Thomas, ancestry, 9; - birth, 11; - at Grammar School, 15; - his love for the classics, 16; - first verses, 17, 18; - at Glasgow University, 20-32; - his professors, 20; - his fellow-students, 21; - early turn for satire, 24; - first visit to Edinburgh, 25; - becomes a tutor, 27, 32; - falls in love, 29, 34; - second visit to Edinburgh, 36; - becomes a clerk, 37; - is introduced to literary society of capital, 37; - his first literary commission, 39; - ‘Pleasures of Hope’ published, 43; - Continental travels, 51-62; - first visit to London, 62, 66; - returns to Edinburgh, 68; - visits Dr Currie at Liverpool, 70; - settles in London, 77; - his marriage, 81; - first child born, 83; - takes up house at Sydenham, 85; - his opinion of publishers, 89; - gets a Government pension, 91; - his ‘Gertrude of Wyoming’ published, 94; - introduced to Princess of Wales, 100; - lectures at Royal Institution, 100; - visits Paris, 102; - lectures at Liverpool and Birmingham, 106, 107; - visits Holland and Germany, 109; - founds London University, 115; - elected Lord Rector Glasgow University, 117; - active interest in Polish cause, 126; - visits Algiers, 130; - settles at Boulogne, 139; - his death, 139; - his appearance, 29, 37, 141; - social habits, 143; - not a society man, 78, 145; - as a conversationalist, 146; - his letters, 148; - his temper, chivalry, kind-heartedness, 149; - love of children, 150; - politics, 151; - religious views, 151; - literary tastes, 152; - place as a poet, 154. - - Campbell, Thomas Telford, poet’s son, 83, 105, 112. - - _Child and the Hind, The_, 137. - - _Cora Linn_, 133. - - Currie, Dr, 70, 77, 84. - - - _Exile of Erin, The_, 60. - - - _Gertrude of Wyoming_, 94. - - Glasgow in Campbell’s young days, 14. - - Glasgow University, Campbell Lord Rector of, 116. - - _Glenara_, 98. - - - Hamburg, Campbell in, 52, 58, 115. - - _Hohenlinden_, 57, 62. - - Holland, Lord and Lady, 66. - - - Kant’s Philosophy, Campbell on, 61. - - Kemble, J. P., 67, 71. - - Klopstock, 52. - - - _Last Man, The_, 113. - - Lawrence, Sir Thomas, Campbell’s projected Life of, 123. - - _Letters from the South_, 130. - - Leyden, John, 38, 63. - - _Lines on leaving a Scene in Bavaria_, 64. - - Literary Union (The) founded, 122. - - _Lochiel’s Warning_, 72. - - London University founded by Campbell, 115. - - - M’Cann, Tony (‘Exile of Erin’), 60. - - Mackintosh, Sir James, 66. - - Marryat, Captain, 125. - - Melrose Abbey, Campbell on, 75. - - _Metropolitan Magazine_, Campbell’s editorship of, 125. - - Minto, Lord, 69. - - Murray, John, publisher, 88, 93. - - - Napoleon, Campbell on, 67, 79. - - Neukomm Chevalier, 126. - - _New Monthly Magazine_, Campbell’s editorship of, 111, 123. - - - _O’Connor’s Child_, 98. - - - Paul, Hamilton, 21, 32. - - Petrarch, Campbell’s Life of, 135. - - _Pilgrim of Glencoe, The_, 137. - - _Pleasures of Hope, The_, 42-48. - - Poland, Campbell’s interest in, 126. - - - Ratisbon, Campbell at, 53, 110. - - Redding, Cyrus, 111. - - Reid, Dr Thomas, 12, 15. - - Richardson, John, 55. - - Rogers, Samuel, 67. - - - _Scenic Annual_, 133. - - Schlegel, A. W., 103, 110. - - Scottish Monastery, Ratisbon, 53, 54. - - Shakespeare, Campbell’s edition of, 134. - - Siddons, Mrs, 67; - Campbell’s Life of, 128. - - _Soldier’s Dream, The_, 64. - - _Specimens of the British Poets_, 84, 89, 93, 107. - - _St Leonards, Lines on the View from_, 125. - - - Telford, Thomas, 71, 72, 77, 83, 130. - - _Theodric_, 114. - - Turner’s drawings for ‘Pleasures of Hope,’ 133. - - - Watt, Gregory, 22, 86. - - _Wounded Hussar, The_, 40. - - - _Ye Mariners of England_, 64. - - - - -OPINIONS OF THE PRESS ON THE “FAMOUS SCOTS” SERIES. - - -Of THOMAS CARLYLE, by H. C. MACPHERSON, - -The _Literary World_ says:-- - - “One of the very best little books on Carlyle yet written, far - out-weighing in value some more pretentious works with which we are - familiar.” - -Of ALLAN RAMSAY, by OLIPHANT SMEATON, - -The _Scotsman_ says:-- - - “It is not a patchwork picture, but one in which the writer, taking - genuine interest in his subject, and bestowing conscientious pains - on his task, has his materials well in hand, and has used them to - produce a portrait that is both lifelike and well balanced.” - -Of HUGH MILLER, by W. KEITH LEASK, - -The _Expository Times_ says:-- - - “It is a right good book and a right true biography… There is a very - fine sense of Hugh Miller’s greatness as a man and a Scotsman; there - is also a fine choice of language in making it ours.” - -Of JOHN KNOX, by A. TAYLOR INNES, - -Mr Hay Fleming in the _Bookman_ says:-- - - “A masterly delineation of those stirring times in Scotland, and of - that famous Scot who helped so much to shape them.” - -Of ROBERT BURNS, by GABRIEL SETOUN, - -The _New Age_ says:-- - - “It is the best thing on Burns we have yet had, almost as good as - Carlyle’s Essay and the pamphlet published by Dr Nichol of Glasgow.” - -Of THE BALLADISTS, by JOHN GEDDIE, - -The _Spectator_ says:-- - - “The author has certainly made a contribution of remarkable value to - the literary history of Scotland. We do not know of a book in which - the subject has been treated with deeper sympathy or out of a fuller - knowledge.” - -Of RICHARD CAMERON, by Professor HERKLESS, - -The _Dundee Courier_ says:-- - - “In selecting Professor Herkless to prepare this addition to the - ‘Famous Scots Series’ of books, the publishers have made an - excellent choice. The vigorous, manly style adopted is exactly - suited to the subject, and Richard Cameron is presented to the - reader in a manner as interesting as it is impressive… Professor - Herkless has done remarkably well, and the portrait he has so - cleverly delineated of one of Scotland’s most cherished heroes is - one that will never fade.” - -Of SIR JAMES YOUNG SIMPSON, by EVE BLANTYRE SIMPSON, - -The _Daily Chronicle_ says:-- - - “It is indeed long since we have read such a charmingly-written - biography as this little Life of the most typical and ‘Famous Scot’ - that his countrymen have been proud of since the time of Sir Walter… - There is not a dull, irrelevant, or superfluous page in all Miss - Simpson’s booklet, and she has performed the biographer’s chief - duty--that of selection--with consummate skill and judgment.” - -Of THOMAS CHALMERS, by W. GARDEN BLAIKIE, - -The _Spectator_ says:-- - - “The most notable feature of Professor Blaikie’s book--and none - could be more commendable--is its perfect balance and proportion. In - other words, justice is done equally to the private and to the - public life of Chalmers, if possible greater justice than has been - done by Mrs Oliphant.” - -Of JAMES BOSWELL, by W. KEITH LEASK, - -The _Morning Leader_ says:-- - - “Mr W. K. Leask has approached the biographer of Johnson in the only - possible way by which a really interesting book could have been - arrived at--by way of the open mind… The defence of Boswell in the - concluding chapter of his delightful study is one of the finest and - most convincing passages that have recently appeared in the field of - British biography.” - -Of TOBIAS SMOLLETT, by OLIPHANT SMEATON, - -The _Weekly Scotsman_ says:-- - - “The book is written in a crisp and lively style… The picture of the - great novelist is complete and lifelike. Not only does Mr Smeaton - give a scholarly sketch and estimate of Smollett’s literary career, - he constantly keeps the reader in conscious touch and sympathy with - his personality, and produces a portrait of the man as a man which - is not likely to be readily forgotten.” - -Of FLETCHER OF SALTOUN, by W. G. T. OMOND, - -The _Leeds Mercury_ says:-- - - “Unmistakably the most interesting and complete story of the life of - Fletcher of Saltoun that has yet appeared. Mr Omond has had many - facilities placed at his disposal, and of these he has made - excellent use.” - -Of THE BLACKWOOD GROUP, by Sir GEORGE DOUGLAS, - -The _Weekly Citizen_ says:-- - - “It need not be said that to everyone interested in the literature - of the first half of the century, and especially to every Scotsman - so interested, ‘The Blackwood Group’ is a phrase abounding in - promise. And really Sir George Douglas fulfils the promise he - tacitly makes in his title. He is intimately acquainted not only - with the books of the different members of the ‘group,’ but also - with their environment, social and otherwise. Besides, he writes - with sympathy as well as knowledge.” - -Of NORMAN MACLEOD, by JOHN WELLWOOD, - -The _Star_ says:-- - - “A worthy addition to the ‘Famous Scots Series’ is that of Norman - Macleod, the renowned minister of the Barony in Glasgow, and a man - as typical of everything generous and broadminded in the State - Church in Scotland as Thomas Guthrie was in the Free Churches. The - biography is the work of John Wellwood, who has approached it with - proper appreciation of the robustness of the subject.” - -Of SIR WALTER SCOTT, by GEORGE SAINTSBURY, - -The _Pall Mall Gazette_ says:-- - - “Mr Saintsbury’s miniature is a gem of its kind… Mr Saintsbury’s - critique of the Waverley Novels will, I venture to think, despite - all that has been written upon them, discover fresh beauties for - their admirers.” - -Of KIRKCALDY OF GRANGE, by LOUIS A. BARBÉ, - -The _Scotsman_ says:-- - - “Mr Barbé’s sketch sticks close to the facts of his life, and these - are sought out from the best sources and are arranged with much - judgment, and on the whole with an impartial mind.” - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Thomas Campbell, by J. 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