Chapter XXI: Part 21

[Footnote 163: The miserly guardian of Cecilia, in Fanny's novel. Among the “Fragments of the journal of Charlotte Anne Burney,” appended to the “Early Diary,” occurs the following passage, written at the end of 1782. “Fanny's Cecilia came out last summer, and is as much liked and read I believe as any book ever was. She had 250 pounds for it from Payne and Cadell. Most people say she ought to have had a thousand. It is now going into the third edition, though Payne owns that they printed 2,000 at the first edition, and Lowndes told me five hundred was the common number for a novel.” (“Early Diary,” vol. ii. P. 307.)--ED.]

[Footnote 164: Richard Burke, the only son of the great Edmund. He died in 1794, before his father.--ED.]

[Footnote 165: Sir Joshua Reynolds was then in his sixtieth year; he was born in 1723.--ED.]

[Footnote 166: She copied pictures cleverly and painted portraits.--ED.]

[Footnote 167: Probably the Hon. Thomas Erskine, afterwards Lord Chancellor.--ED.]

[Footnote 168: Richard Owen Cambridge, a gentleman admired for his wit in conversation, and esteemed as an author. “He wrote a burlesque poem called 'The Scribleriad,' and was a principal contributor to the periodical paper called 'The World.'” He died in 1802, at his villa on the banks of the Thames, near Twickenham, aged eighty-five years.--ED.]

[Footnote 169: Mrs. Ord was a famous blue-stocking and giver of literary parties, and a constant friend of Fanny's--ED.]

[Footnote 170: The Rev. George Owen Cambridge, second son of Richard Owen Cambridge, whose works he edited, and whose memoir he wrote. He died at Twickenham in 1841.--ED.]

[Footnote 171: John Hoole, the translator of Tasso.--ED.]

[Footnote 172: Frances Reynolds, the miniature painter--Sir Joshua's sister--ED.]

[Footnote 173: Soame Jenyns was one of the most celebrated of the “old wits.” He was born in 1704; was for twenty-five years member of Parliament for Cambridgeshire; died in 1787. His principal works were “A Free Enquiry into the Origin of Evil,” and “A View of the Internal Evidence of the Christian Religion.” Boswell writes of him: “Jenyns was possessed of lively talents, and a style eminently pure and 'easy', and could very happily play with a light subject, either in prose or verse; but when he speculated on that most difficult and excruciating question, 'The Origin of Evil,' he ventured far beyond his depth, and, accordingly, was exposed by Johnson [in the 'Literary Magazine'], both with acute argument and brilliant wit.”--ED.]

[Footnote 174: “Memoirs of Dr. Burney,” vol. iii. p. 169.]

[Footnote 175: Hester Mulso was born in 1727; she married, in 1760, an attorney named Chapone, who died within a year of the marriage. Among the many young ladies who surrounded and corresponded with Samuel Richardson, Hester was a first favourite. The great novelist's letters to his “dear Miss Mulso” are very pleasant to read. Mrs. Chapone enjoyed considerable esteem as an authoress. Her “Letters on the Improvement of the Mind,” dedicated to Mrs. Montagu, went through several editions. We should like to praise them, but the truth must be owned--they are decidedly commonplace and “goody-goody.” Still, they are written in a spirit of tender earnestness, which raises our esteem for the writer, though it fails to reconcile us to the book. Mrs. Chapone died on Christmas-day, 1801.--ED.]

[Footnote 176: Truly said, “my dear Miss Mulso,” but if they cannot feel the wonderful charm and reality of “Clarissa” in the very first volume, they may as well leave it alone.--ED.]

[Footnote 177: In a corner of the nave of the quaint little church at Chesington is a large white marble tablet, marking the spot where Mr. Crisp lies buried. The following lines from the pen of Fanny's father inscribed on it do not, it must be confessed, exhibit the doctor's poetical talents by any means in a favourable light.

“In memory Of SAMUEL CRISP, Esq., who died April 24, 1783, aged 76.

Reader, this cold and humble spot contains
The much lamented, much rever'd remains
Of one whose wisdom, learning, taste, and sense,
Good-humour'd wit and wide benevolence
Cheer'd and enlightened all this hamlet round,
Wherever genius, worth, or want was found.
To few it is that bounteous heav'n imparts
Such depth of knowledge, and such taste in arts
Such penetration, and enchanting pow'rs
Of brit'ning social and convivial hours.
Had he, through life, been blest by nature kind
With health robust of body as of mind,
With skill to serve and charm mankind, so great
In arts, in science, letters, church, or state,
His name the nation's annals had enroll'd
And virtues to remotest ages told.”]

“C. BURNEY.”]

[Footnote 177: Mr. Gibbon, “in stepping too lightly from, or to a boat of Mr. Cambridge's, had slipt into the Thames; whence, however, he was intrepidly and immediately rescued, with no other mischief than a wet jacket, by one of that fearless, water-proof race, denominated, by Mr. Gibbon, the amphibious family of the Cambridges.” (“Memoir of Dr. Burney,” vol. ii. P. 341.)--ED.]

[Footnote 178: The “Essex Head” club, just founded by Dr. Johnson. The meetings were held thrice a week at the Essex Head, a tavern in Essex-street, Strand, kept by Samuel Greaves, an old servant of Mr. Thrale's. Among the rule's of the club, which were drawn up by Dr. Johnson, we find the following: “Every member present at the club shall spend at least sixpence; and every member who stays away shall forfeit threepence.” He ought to have added, “to be spent by the company in punch.” (See Goldsmith's delightful essay on the London clubs.)--ED.]

[Footnote 179: The Lockes, of Norbury Park, Surrey, were friends of Fanny's sister, Mrs. Phillips, and, subsequently, among the most constant and attached friends of Fanny herself.--ED.]

[Footnote 180: It must be borne in mind that the “Diary” is addressed to Fanny's sister Susan (Mrs. Phillips),--ED.]

[Footnote 181: Mrs. Locke.--ED.]

[Footnote 182: Mrs. Phillips had lately gone to live at Boulogne for the benefit of her health.--ED.]

[Footnote 183: Mrs. Phillips returned in less than a twelvemonth from Boulogne, much recovered in health, and settled with her husband and family in a house at Micklcham, at the foot of Norbury Park.]

[Footnote 184: Fanny had called upon Dr. Johnson the same day, but he was too ill to see her.--ED.]

[Footnote 185: Sunday, December 12.--ED.]

[Footnote 186: Frank Barber, Dr. Johnson's negro servant.---ED.]

[Footnote 187: Mary Bruce Strange, daughter of Sir Robert Strange, the celebrated engraver. She died, as Fanny tells us, on the same day with Dr. Johnson, December 13, 1784, aged thirty-five. The Stranges were old and very intimate friends of the Burneys--ED.]

[Footnote 188: Her brother--ED.]

[Footnote 189: “Memoirs of Dr. Burney,” vol. iii. p. 87. Fanny had, however, to assist in dressing the queen. See postea, P--345.]

[Footnote 190: The death of the Duchess dowager of Portland.]

[Footnote 191: Miss Planta was English teacher to the two eldest princesses.--ED.]

[Footnote 192: One of the governesses to the princesses.--ED.]

[Footnote 193: Georgina Mary Anne Port, grandniece of Mrs. Delany, by whom she was brought up from the age of seven until Mrs. Delany's death. She was born in 1771, and mairied, in 1789, Mr. Waddington, afterwards Lord Llanover. She was for many years on terms of friendship with Fanny, but after Madame D'Arblay's death, Lady Llanover seized the opportunity of publishing, in her edition of Mrs. Delany's Correspondence, an attack upon her former friend, of which the ill-breeding is only equalled by the inaccuracy. The view which she there takes of Fanny is justly characterised by Mr. Shuckburgh as “the lady-in-waiting's lady's-maid's view.” (See Macmillan's magazine for February, 1890.)--ED.]

[Footnote 194: Joseph Baretti, author of an Italian and English Dictionary, and other works; the friend Of JOhnson, well known to readers of Boswell. He had long been acquainted with the Burneys. Fanny writes in her “Early Diary” (March, 1773): “Mr. Baretti appears to be very facetious; he amused himself very much with Charlotte, whom he calls Churlotte, and kisses whether she will or no, always calmly saying, 'Kiss a me, Churlotte!'” Charlotte Burney was then about fourteen; she was known after this in the family as Mrs. Baretti.--ED.]

[Footnote 195: A character in “Cecilia.”--ED.]

[Footnote 196: Mrs. Phillips (Susan)--ED.]

[Footnote 197: Madame de Genlis had visited England during the spring of 1785, and made the acquaintance of Dr. Burney and his daughter Fanny. In July Fanny writes of her as “the sweetest as well as the most accomplished Frenchwoman I ever met with,” and in the same month Madame de Genlis writes to Fanny: “Je vous aime depuis l'instant ou j'ai lu Evelina et Cecilia, et le bonheur de vous entendre et de vous conneitre personellement a rendu ce sentiment aussi tendre qu'il est bien fonde.” The acquaintance, however, was not kept up.--ED.]

[Footnote 198: The famous actress, Kitty Clive. She had quitted the stage in 1760. Genest says of her, “If ever there was a true Comic Genius, Mrs. Clive was one.”---ED.]

[Footnote 199: John Henderson was by many people considered second only to Garrick, especially in Shakspearean parts. He too was lately dead, having made his last appearance on the stage on the 8th of November, 1785, within less than a month of his death.--ED.]

[Footnote 200: “Adele et Theodore, ou Lettres sur l'education” by Madame de Genlis, first published in 1782.--ED.]

[Footnote 201: We shall hear again of 'Mr. and Mrs. Hastings, and of the scandal which was caused by the lady's reception at Court. She was bought by Hastings of her former husband for 10,000 pounds. The story is briefly as follows:--

Among the fellow-passengers of Hastings on the ship which conveyed him to India in 1769, were a German portrait-painter, named Imhoff, and his wife, who were going out to Madras in the hope of bettering their circumstances. During the voyage a strong attachment sprang up between Hastings and the lady, who nursed him through an illness. The husband, it seems, had as little affection for his wife as she had for him, and was easily prevailed upon to enter into an amicable arrangement, by virtue of which Madame Imhoff instituted proceedings for divorce against him in the German courts. Pending the result, the Imhoffs continued to live together ostensibly as man and wife to avoid scandal. The proceedings--were long protracted, but a decree of divorce was finally procured in 1772, when Hastings married the lady and paid to the complaisant husband a sum, it is said, exceeding, 10,000 pounds.

The favourable reception accorded by the queen to Mrs. Hastings, when, in 1784, she returned to England as wife of the Governor-general of Bengal, passed not without public comment. Her husband, however, was in high esteem at Court from his great services, and she had an additional recommendation to the queen's favour in the friendship of Mrs. Schwellenberg, the keeper of the robes, whom she had known before her voyage to India.--ED.]

[Footnote 202: Fanny's sister Charlotte, who had mairied Clement Francis, Feb. 11, 1786. They were now settled at Aylesham, in Norfolk, where Mr. Francis was practising as a surgeon.--ED.]

[Footnote 203: Dr. Burney's daughter by his second wife--ED.]

[Footnote 204: Sir Thomas Clarges, whose wife was a dear friend of Susan Burney. Sir Thomas died in December, 1782. In the “Early Diary” he is mentioned once or twice, as a visitor at Dr. Burney's. Fanny writes of him in May, 1775, as “a young baronet, who was formerly so desperately enamoured of Miss Linley, now Mrs. Sheridan, that his friends made a point of his going abroad to recover himself: he is now just returned from italy, and I hope cured. He still retains all the schoolboy English mauvaise honte; scarce speaks but to make an answer, and is as shy as if his last residence had been at Eton instead of Paris.”--ED.]

[Footnote 205: 'Tis amazing what nonsense sensible people can write, when their heads are turned by considerations of rank and flummery!--ED.]

[Footnote 206: The wife of Warren Hastings. Fanny had made the acquaintance of Mr. and Mrs. Hastings from her friend Mr. Cambridge, some months previously. (See note [201], ante, p. 327).--ED.]

[Footnote 207: The name of the poor woman was Margaret Nicholson. She was, of course, insane, and had, a few days previously, presented a petition, which had probably been left unread at the time, but which turned out on investigation to be full of incoherent nonsense. On her examination before the Privy Council she declared that “the crown was hers, and that if she had not her rights England would be deluged with blood.” She was ultimately consigned to Bedlam.--ED.]

[Footnote 208: Fanny's bitter experience of Mrs. Schwellenberg is now commencing.--ED.]

[Footnote 209: The wife and daughter of Dr. William Heberden, an eminent physician, and author of “Medical Commentaries on the History and Cure of Disease.” Fanny had met these ladies recently at Mrs. Delany's--ED.]

[Footnote 210: “Colonel Fairly” is the name given in the “Diary” to the Hon. Stephen Digby. His first wife, Lady Lucy Strangwayes Fox, youngest daughter of Lord Ilchester, died in 1787. He married, in 1790, Miss Gunning, “Miss Fuzilier,” of the “Diary.”---ED.]

[Footnote 211: i.e. the University theatre.--ED.]

[Footnote 212: Colonel Digby, who from this time is always called Mr. Fairly instead of Colonel Fairly, in the “Diary,”--ED.]

[Footnote 213: Dr. Joseph Warton, author of the “Essay on the Genius and Writings of Pope.” He was headmaster of Winchester school--ED.]

[Footnote 214: Jacob Bryant, the distinguished classical scholar and author; born 1715; died 1804. His principal work was “A New System or an Analysis of Ancient Mythology,” published in 1774. During the last part of his life he resided at Cypenham, in Farnham Royal, near Windsor. One of Bryant's friends said of him that “he was a very good scholar, and knew all things up to Noah, but not a single thing in the world beyond the Deluge!”--ED.]

[Footnote 215: Aime Argand, inventor of the argand lamp.--ED.]

[Footnote 216: Madame de Genlis was governess to the children of the Duke D'Orleans (Philippe egalite), and, there is no doubt, his mistress. The beautiful Pamela, who married Lord Edward Fitzgerald, was generally supposed to be her daughter by the duke, but this appears to be questionable.--ED.]

[Footnote 217: William Herschel, the famous astronomer. He was the son of a German musician, and in early life followed his father's profession, which he afterwards abandoned for the study of astronomy. He received much encouragement from George III., was knighted in 1816, and died at Slough, near Windsor, in 1822. His monster telescope, mentioned in the text, was completed in 1787, and was forty feet in length.--ED.]

[Footnote 218: Maria Sophie de la Roche was a German authoress of sentimental novels, of some distinction in her day, but now chiefly remembered as the friend of Wieland and Goethe. The history of the attachment between her and Wieland is very pretty, very idyllic, and very German. Sophie was born in 1731, and the idyll commenced when she was nineteen, and Wieland only seventeen years old. It lasted some time, too, for a passion so very tender and tearful; but the fate, and, more particularly, the parents, were unpropitious, and after about three years it came to an end, the heart-broken Sophie consoling herself by marrying M. de la Roche shortly afterwards. Her friendship with Wieland, however was maintained to the end of her days, he editing the first and last productions of her pen--the “History of Fraulein von Sternheim,” published 1771, and “Melusinens Sommerabende,” 1806. Madame de la Roche died in 1807--ED.]

[Footnote 219: Madame de la Fite had, however, translated her friend's “History of Fraulein von Sternheim” into French, and the translation had been published in 1773.--ED.]

[Footnote 220: “Clelia” and “Cassandra” were celebrated heroic romances of the seventeenth century, the former (in ten volumes) written by Mdlle Scuderi, the latter by the Sieur de la Calprende. One of the most constant and tiresome characteristics of the heroes and heroines of the romances of this school, is the readiness with which they seize every opportunity of recounting, or causing their confidential attendants to recount, their adventures, usually with the utmost minuteness of detail--ED.]

[Footnote 221: See P. 434.--ED.]

[Footnote 222: Mrs. Schwellenberg found her health better in London, and was prolonging her stay there in consequence.--ED.]

[Footnote 223: The reader will scarcely need to be told that allusion is made here to the Prince of Wales, afterwards George IV.--ED.]

[Footnote 224: It is hardly worth remembering, except for Fanny's sake; however, it has the merit of brevity, and here it is.

“THE GREAT COAT.

“Thrice honour'd Robe! couldst thou espy
The form that deigns to show thy worth;
Hear the mild voice, view the arch eye,
That call thy panegyric forth;

“Wouldst thou not swell with vain delight?
With proud expansion sail along?
And deem thyself more grand and bright
Than aught that lives in ancient song,

“Than Venus' cestus, Dian's crest,
Minerva's helmet, fierce and bold,
Or all of emblem gay that dress'd
Capricious goddesses of old?

“Thee higher honours yet await:--
Haste, then, thy triumphs quick prepare,
Thy trophies spread in haughty state,
Sweep o'ei the earth, and scoff the air.

“Ah no!--retract!--retreat!--oh stay!
Learn, wiser, whence so well thou'st sped;
She whose behest produced this lay
By no false colours is misled.

“Suffice it for the buskin'd race
Plaudits by pomp and shew to win;
Those seek simplicity and grace
Whose dignity is from within.

“The cares, or joys, she soars above
That to the toilette's duties cleave;
Far other cares her bosom move,
Far other joys those cares relieve.

“The garb of state she inly scorn'd,
Glad from its trappings to be freed,
She saw thee humble, unadorn'd,
Quick of attire,--a child of speed.

“Still, then, thrice honour'd Robe! retain
Thy modest guise, thy decent ease;
Nor let thy favour prove thy bane
By turning from its fostering breeze.

“She views thee with a mental eye,
And from thee draws this moral end:--
Since hours are register'd on high,
The friend of Time is Virtue's friend.”]

For this precious production Fanny received quite as much as it was worth,--the thanks of the queen, who added, “Indeed it is very pretty--only! I don't deserve it.”---ED.]

[Footnote 225: Captain James Burney had married, on the 6th of September, 1785, Miss Sally Payne, daughter of Mr. Thomas Payne, bookseller.--ED.]

[Footnote 226: “Mr. Turbulent” is the name given in the “Diary” to the Rev. Charles de Guiffardiere, a French Protestant minister, who filled the office of French reader to the queen and princesses.--ED.]

[Footnote 227: Mrs. Delany had been for a short time indisposed.--ED.]

[Footnote 228: The queen had spoken of Mrs. Hayes as a “very pretty kind of woman,” and desired Fanny to invite her to tea.--ED.]

[Footnote 229: Herschel had discovered this planet in 1781, and named it in honour of the king.--ED.