rel="nofollow" href="#ulink_0a3670e8-a235-5026-8a84-022642c1419c">SIGN PAINTERS IN THEIR PRIME.
AN ENCOURAGEMENT TO FRANKNESS.
NOTE.
THIS collection of anecdotes, illustrative sketches, and memorabilia generally, relating to the ever fresh and interesting subject of Books and Authors, is not presented as complete, nor even as containing all the choice material of its kind. The field from which one may gather is so wide and fertile, that any collection warranting such a claim would far exceed the compass of many volumes, much less of this little book. It has been sought to offer, in an acceptable and convenient form, some of the more remarkable or interesting literary facts or incidents with which one individual, in a somewhat extended reading, has been struck; some of the passages which he has admired; some of the anecdotes and jests that have amused him and may amuse others; some of the reminiscences that it has most pleased him to dwell upon. For no very great portion of the contents of this volume, is the claim to originality of subject-matter advanced. The collection, however, is submitted with some confidence that it may be found as interesting, as accurate, and as much guided by good taste, as it has been endeavoured to make it.
BOOKS AND AUTHORS.
CURIOUS FACTS AND CHARACTERISTIC SKETCHES.
THE FINDING OF JOHN EVELYN’S MS. DIARY AT WOTTON.
THE MS. Diary, or “Kalendarium,” of the celebrated John Evelyn lay among the family papers at Wotton, in Surrey, from the period of his death, in 1706, until their rare interest and value were discovered in the following singular manner.
The library at Wotton is rich in curious books, with notes in John Evelyn’s handwriting, as well as papers on various subjects, and transcripts of letters by the philosopher, who appears never to have employed an amanuensis. The arrangement of these treasures was, many years since, entrusted to the late Mr. Upcott, of the London Institution, who made a complete catalogue of the collection.
One afternoon, as Lady Evelyn and a female companion were seated in one of the fine old apartments of Wotton, making feather tippets, her ladyship pleasantly observed to Mr. Upcott, “You may think this feather-work a strange way of passing time: it is, however, my hobby; and I dare say you, too, Mr. Upcott, have your hobby.” The librarian replied that his favourite pursuit was the collection of the autographs of eminent persons. Lady Evelyn remarked, that in all probability the MSS. of “Sylva” Evelyn would afford Mr. Upcott some amusement. His reply may be well imagined. The bell was rung, and a servant desired to bring the papers from a lumber-room of the old mansion; and from one of the baskets so produced was brought to light the manuscript Diary of John Evelyn—one of the most finished specimens of autobiography in the whole compass of English literature.
The publication of the Diary, with a selection of familiar letters, and private correspondence, was entrusted to Mr. William Bray, F.S.A.; and the last sheets of the MS., with a dedication to Lady Evelyn, were actually in the hands of the printer at the hour of her death. The work appeared in 1818; and a volume of Miscellaneous Papers, by Evelyn, was subsequently published, under Mr. Upcott’s editorial superintendence.
Wotton House, though situate in the angle of two valleys, is actually on part of Leith Hill, the rise from thence being very gradual. Evelyn’s “Diary” contains a pen-and-ink sketch of the mansion as it appeared in 1653.
FAMILIES OF LITERARY MEN.
A Quarterly Reviewer, in discussing an objection to the Copyright Bill of Mr. Sergeant Talfourd, which was taken by Sir Edward Sugden, gives some curious particulars of the progeny of literary men. “We are not,” says the writer, “going to speculate about the causes of the fact; but a fact it is, that men distinguished for extraordinary intellectual power of any sort rarely leave more than a very brief line of progeny behind them. Men of genius have scarcely ever done so; men of imaginative genius, we might say, almost never. With the one exception of the noble Surrey, we cannot, at this moment, point out a representative in the male line, even so far down as the third generation, of any English poet; and we believe the case is the same in France. The blood of beings of that order can seldom be traced far down, even in the female line. With the exception of Surrey and Spenser, we are not aware of any great English author of at all remote date, from whose body any living person claims to be descended. There is no real English poet prior to the middle of the eighteenth century; and we believe no great author of any sort, except Clarendon and Shaftesbury, of whose blood we have any inheritance amongst us. Chaucer’s only son died childless; Shakspeare’s line expired in his daughter’s only daughter. None of the other dramatists of that age left any progeny; nor Raleigh, nor Bacon, nor Cowley, nor Butler. The grand-daughter of Milton was the last of his blood. Newton, Locke, Pope, Swift, Arbuthnot, Hume, Gibbon, Cowper, Gray, Walpole, Cavendish (and we might greatly extend the list), never married. Neither Bolingbroke, nor Addison, nor Warburton, nor Johnson, nor Burke, transmitted their blood. One of the arguments against a perpetuity in literary property is, that it would be founding another noblesse. Neither jealous aristocracy nor envious Jacobinism need be under such alarm. When a human race has produced its ‘bright, consummate flower’ in this kind, it seems commonly to be near its end.”
THE BLUE-STOCKING CLUB.
Towards the close of the last century, there met at Mrs. Montague’s a literary assembly, called “The Blue-Stocking Club,” in consequence of one of the most admired of the members, Mr. Benjamin Stillingfleet, always wearing blue stockings. The appellation soon became general as a name for pedantic or ridiculous literary ladies. Hannah More wrote a volume in verse, entitled The Bas Bleu: or Conversation. It proceeds on the mistake of a foreigner, who, hearing of the Blue-Stocking Club, translated it literally Bas Bleu. Johnson styled this poem “a great performance.” The following couplets have been quoted, and remembered, as terse and pointed:—
“In men this blunder still you find,
All think their little set mankind.”
“Small habits well pursued betimes,
May reach the dignity of crimes.”
DR. JOHNSON AND HANNAH MORE.
