TO MARGARET TREVELYAN

October 14th, 1851.

DEAR MARGARET,- Tell me how you like Schiller's Mary Stuart. It is not one of my favorite pieces. I should put it fourth among his plays. I arrange them thus Wallenstein, William Tell, Don Carlos, Mary Stuart, the Maid of Orleans. At a great interval comes the Bride of Messina; and then, at another great interval, Fieschi. Cabal and Love I never could get through. The Robbers is a mere schoolboy rant, below serious criticism, but not without indications of mental vigor which required to be disciplined by much thought and study. But though I do not put Mary Stuart very high among Schiller's works, I think the Fotheringay scenes in the fifth act equal to anything that he ever wrote — indeed, equal to anything dramatic that has been produced in Europe since Shakespeare. I hope that you will feel the wonderful truth and beauty of that part of the play.

I cannot agree with you in admiring Sintram. There is an age at which we are disposed to think that whatever is odd and extravagant is great. At that age we are liable to be taken in by such orators as Irving, such painters as Fuseli, such plays as The Robbers, such romances as Sintram. A better time comes, when we would give all Fuseli's hobgoblins for one of Reynolds's little children, and all Sintram's dialogues with Death and the Devil for one speech of Mrs. Norris or Miss Bates. Tell me, however, as of course you will, quite truly what you think of Sintram.

I saw a description of myself yesterday in a New York paper. The writer says that I am a stout man, with hazel eyes; that I always walk with an umbrella; that I sometimes bang the umbrella against the ground; that I often dine in the coffee-room of the Trafalgar on fish; that once he saw me break a decanter there, but that I did not appear to be at all ashamed of my awkwardness, but

called for my bill as coolly as if nothing had happened. I have no recollection of such an occurrence; but, if it did take place, I do not think that it would have deprived me of my self-possession. This is fame. This is the advantage of making a figure in the world.

This has been the last week of the Great Exhibition. It makes me quite sad to think of our many, many happy walks there. To-morrow I shall go to the final ceremony, and try to hear the Bishop of London's thanksgiving, in which I shall very cordially join. This will long be remembered as a singularly happy year, of peace, plenty, good feeling, innocent pleasure, national glory of the best and purest sort.

I have bespoken a Schiller for you. It is in the binder's hands, and will be ready, I hope, before your T. B. MACAULAY.

return.

Ever yours,

-

TO MISS MACAULAY

ALBANY, June 19th, 1852.

DEAR FANNY, I have not made, and do not mean to make, the smallest move toward the people of Edinburgh. But they, to my great surprise, have found out that they treated me ill five years ago, and that they are now paying the penalty. They can get nobody to stand who is likely to do them credit; and it seemed as if they were in danger of having members who would have made them regret not only me, but Cowan. Then, without any communication with me, it was suggested by some of the most respectable citizens that the town might solve its difficulties by electing me without asking me to go down, or to give any pledges, or even any opinion, on political matters. The hint was eagerly taken up; and I am assured that the feeling in my favor is strong, and that I shall probably be at the head of the poll. All that I have been asked to do is to say that, if I am chosen on those terms, I will sit. On full consideration, I did not think that I could, consistently with my duty, decline the invitation.

To me, personally, the sacrifice is great. Though 1 shall not make a drudge of myself, and though 1 certainly shall never, in any event, accept office, the appearance of my next volumes may be postponed a year, or even two. But it seems to me to be of the highest importance that great constituent bodies should learn to respect the conscience and the honor of their representatives; should not expect slavish obedience from men of spirit and ability; and should, instead of catechising such men, and cavilling at them, repose in them a large confidence. The way in which such bodies have of late behaved has driven many excellent persons from public life, and will, unless a remedy is found, drive away many more. The conduct of Edinburgh toward me was not worse than that of several other places to their members; but it attracted more notice, and has been often mentioned, in Parliament and out of Parliament, as a flagrant instance of the caprice and perverseness of even the most intelligent bodies of electors. It is, therefore, not an unimportant nor an undesirable thing that Edinburgh should, quite spontaneously, make a very signal, I may say, an unprecedented, reparation.

Do not talk about this more than you find absolutely necessary; but treat it lightly, as I do in all companies where I hear it mentioned.

Ever yours,

T. B. MACAULAY.

TO THOMAS FLOWER ELLIS

ALBANY, December 8th, 1852.

DEAR EMPSON, - I meant dear Ellis; but my mind is full of poor Empson. He is dying. I expect every hour to hear that all is over. Poor fellow! He was a most kind, generous friend to me, and as unselfish and unenvious as yourself. Longman has just been here; sorry for Empson, and anxious about the Review. I recom

1 Mr. Empson had succeeded Mr. Napier as editor of the Edinburgh Review.

mended Cornewall Lewis; and I have little doubt that the offer will be made to him.

December 13th, 1852.

Poor Empson died with admirable fortitude and cheerfulness. I find that his wife was lately brought to bed. He spoke to her, to his friends, and to his other children with kindness, but with perfect firmness; but when the baby was put on his bed he burst into tears. Poor fel low! For my part, I feel that I should die best in the situation of Charles the First, or Louis the Sixteenth, or Montrose-I mean quite alone, surrounded by enemies, and nobody that I cared for near me. The parting is the dreadful thing. I do not wonder at Russell's saying, "The bitterness of death is past." 1

December 30th, 1852.

I am glad that you like Beaumarchais. The result was that the Goëzmans were utterly ruined: the husband forced to quit his office, the wife driven to a convent. Beaumarchais was blâmé by the Court. The effect of that blâme was very serious. It made a man legally infamous, I believe, and deprived him of many civil rights. But the public feeling was so strongly with Beaumarchais that he paraded his stigma as if it had been a mark of honor. He gave himself such airs that somebody said to him, "Monsieur, ce n'est pas assez que d'être blâmé: il faut être modeste." Do you see the whole finesse of this untranslatable mot? What a quantity of French words I have used! I suppose that the subject Frenchifies my style.2

1 The famous scene between Lord Russell and his wife is described, briefly enough, by Hume: "With a tender and decent composure they took leave of each other on the day of his execution. The bitterness of death is now past,' said he, when he turned from her."

2 Mr. Goëzman was the judge who threw Beaumarchais over, after Madame Goëzman had accepted a present from him. The unsuccessful suitor got his present back, "and those who had disappointed him probably thought that he would not, for the mere gratification of his malevolence, make public a transaction which was discreditable to himself as well as to them. They knew little of him. He soon taught them to curse the

I am disengaged all next week. Fix some day for dining with me in honor of 1853. I hope that it will be as happy a year as, in spite of some bodily suffering, 1852 has been to me. It is odd that, though time is stealing from me perceptibly my vigor and my pleasures, I am growing happier and happier. As Milnes says, it is shocking, it is scandalous, to enjoy life as I do.

ALBANY, July 11th, 1853. Haydon was exactly the

Read Haydon's memoirs. vulgar idea of a man of genius. He had all the morbid peculiarities which are supposed by fools to belong to intellectual superiority - eccentricity, jealousy, caprice, infinite disdain for other men; and yet he was as poor, commonplace a creature as any in the world. He painted signs, and gave himself more airs than if he had painted the Cartoons. ... Whether you struck him or stroked him, starved him or fed him, he snapped at your hand in just the same way. He would beg you in piteous accents to buy an acre and a half of canvas that he had spoiled. Some good-natured lord asks the price. Haydon demands a hundred guineas. His lordship gives the money out of mere charity, and is rewarded by some such entry as this in Haydon's journal: "A hundred guineas, and for such a work! I expected that, for very shame, he would have made it a thousand. But he is a mean, sordid wretch." In the meantime the purchaser is looking out for the most retired spot in his house to hide the huge daub which he has bought, for ten times its value, out of mere compas

sion.

TUNBRIDGE WELLS, July 28th, 1853.

I hope that you are looking forward to our tour. On Tuesday, the twenty-third, I shall be at the Albany, and day in which they had dared to trifle with a man of so revengeful and turbulent a spirit, of such dauntless effrontery, and of such eminent talents for controversy and satire." Macaulay's account of the Goëzman scandal, in his essay on Bacon, makes it evident that to write about Beaumarchais did not necessarily Frenchify his style.