Of the Memoirs of Dr. Burney, it is not necessary to say much more than has already been said. Although, as we have seen, Southey could praise them warmly, — to be sure, he was acknowledging a complimentary copy, — Macaulay declares that they were received with “a cry of disgust,” which a later writer converts into “a scream of derision.” Yet is must nevertheless be admitted that they contain much in the way of letters, documents, and anecdote which the student cannot well neglect; and it should be observed that it is in the connecting passages that the writer’s “peculiar rhetoric” is most manifest. The curious expedients she adopts to avoid using the personal pronoun; and the catenated phrases to which Croker objected, and which he unkindly emphasised by hyphens (e.g. “the yet very handsome though no longer in her bloom, Mrs. Stephen Allen,” “the sudden, at the moment, though from lingering illnesses often previously expected death, of Mrs. Burney”), — are certainly amusing; as is also the nebulous magniloquence of passages like the following, not, it may be added, an exceptional specimen:— “This sharp infliction, however, though it ill recompensed his ethereal flight, by no means checked his literary ambition; and the ardour which was cooled for gazing at the stars, soon seemed doubly re-animated for the music of the spheres.” But what is more extraordinary than these utterances is, that Mme. D’Arblay seems herself to have had no suspicion of their extravagance, since we find her, even after the publication of The Wanderer, gravely enjoining her son to avoid overstrained expression, not to labour to embellish his thoughts, and above all, to “be natural.”[94]
Happily for her readers, the Diary — to which we now come — is not written in the pernicious style of the Memoirs of Dr. Burney. Even in those parts of it which were composed after Cecilia and Camilla, it is still clear, fluent, and unaffected. Now and then, perhaps, — as in the quotation on Burke’s oratory at , — there is a sense of effort; but in general, the manner is delightful. Why Macaulay, who praised the Diary so much, did not praise it more, — did not, in fact, place it high above Mme. D’Arblay’s efforts as a novelist, — is hard to comprehend. It has all the graphic picturesqueness, all the dramatic interest, all the objective characterisation, all the happy faculty of “making her descriptions alive” (as “Daddy” Crisp had said), — which constitute the charm of the best passages in Evelina. But it has the further advantage that it is true; and that it deals with real people. King George and Queen Charlotte, Mrs. Schwellenberg and M. de Guiffardière, Johnson and Reynolds, Burke and Garrick, Sheridan, Cumberland, Mrs. Thrale, Mrs. Delany, Omai and Count Orloff — stand before us in their habits as they lived, and we know them more intimately than Mr. Briggs, believe in them more implicitly than in Captain Mirvan, and laugh at them more honestly than at “Madam French.” The Diary of Mme. D’Arblay deserves to rank with the great diaries of literature. It is nothing that it is egotistical, for egotism is of its essence: it is nothing that it is minute, its minuteness enforces the impression. It gives us a gallery of portraits which speak and move; and a picture of society which we recognise as substantially true to life.
[70] Edinburgh Review, January 1843, lxxvi. 557.
[71] Sir Joshua Reynolds died on the 23rd February following.
[72] One of the tickets given to her by the Queen is preserved by Archdeacon Burney of Surbiton.
[73] In an article in the Academy for 15th April, 1871, on the Maclise Gallery in Fraser’s Magazine.
[74] Cecilia, it may be mentioned, had been translated at Neuchâtel in 1783.
[75] He was, indeed, a better poet than Fanny herself, to judge from some graceful vers d’occasion, printed in the Diary, which he addressed to her on her birthday. The quatrain he placed under her portrait is not so happy.
[76] The Girlhood of Maria Josepha Holroyd (Lady Stanley of Alderley), 1897, 2nd edn. p-30. Mrs. Barrett (Diary and Letters, 1892, iv. 476) puts the income “for a considerable time” at about £125, so that it must have been supplemented in some way.
[77] Abdolonime is a gardener of Sidon in a five act comedy by M. de Fontenelle.
[78] Mr. E. S. Shuckburgh, in Macmillan’s Magazine for February, 1890, p-98.
[79] Mrs. Ellis thought she detected in Camilla a shaft aimed at the philandering Colonel. “They [men] are not like us, Lavinia. They think themselves free, if they have made no verbal profession; though they may have pledged themselves by looks, by actions, by attentions, and by manners, a thousand, and a thousand times” (Camilla, 1796, iv. 42-3).
[80] Lamb’s sonnet was first published in the Morning Chronicle, 13th July, 1820, upon the appearance of Sarah Burney’s tale of Country Neighbours. The author is indebted for knowledge of this poem to the courtesy of Mr. E. V. Lucas, at p-3, vol. v., of whose very valuable edition of Lamb’s works it is printed. Lamb also addressed a sonnet to Martin Charles Burney, Admiral Burney’s son. It is prefixed to vol. ii. of his Works, 1818. Martin Burney, a barrister, and a dear friend of Lamb, is also mentioned in Elia’s “Detached Thoughts on Books and Reading.” His mother is thought to have been “Mrs. Battle.”
[81] For reasons connected with the future tenancy of the house, Mr. Locke’s offer of a site in Norbury Park itself had finally been declined.
[82] The house, Camilla Lacey, still exists; but altered and enlarged. When Thorne wrote his Environs of London in 1876, it belonged to Mr. J. L. Wylie, and contained many interesting Burney relics. It is now in possession of Mr. Wylie’s nephew, Mr. F. Leverton Harris, M.P. for Tynemouth.
[83] In “A Burney Friendship” (Side-Lights on the Georgian Period, by George Paston, 1902, p-32), there is an interesting extract from one of Mme. D’Arblay’s letters describing the young Alexandre’s triumphs at “the principal école of Passy.”
[84] Moore’s Life of Lord Byron, 1844, 147. Moore corrects this in a note. But it shows that Johnson’s alleged revision of Cecilia must have been current as a rumour long before Macaulay asserted it upon internal evidence in 1843.
[85] The arrangement was, that she was to receive £1500 in three payments, spread over a year and a half. If 8000 copies were sold she was to have £3000.
[86] She never used this title — as she says in an unpublished letter, dated 26 June, 1827, to her nephew, Dr. C. P. Burney, where she adds to her signature, “otherwise La Comtesse Veuve Piochard D’Arblay”— “because I have had no Fortune to meet it, and because my Son relinquished his hereditary claims of succession — though he might, upon certain conditions, resume them — on becoming a Clergyman of the Church of England. But I have never disclaimed my Rights, as I owe them to no Honours of my own, but to a Partnership in those which belonged to the revered Husband who, for twenty-four years, made the grateful Happiness of my Life.”
[87] In the previous year Mme. D’Arblay had lost her brother Charles. James, the Admiral, survived to 1821.
[88] See ante, .
[89] Journal of Sir Walter Scott, 1891, i. 308-9. Rogers’ Table Talk, 1858, , adds a detail of the first visit. Mme. D’Arblay had not heard that Scott was lame; and, seeing him limp, hoped he had not met with an accident. He answered, “An accident, Madam, nearly as old as my birth.”
[90] Ibid., ii. 190.
[91] Table Talk of Samuel Rogers, 1856, 179-80.
[92] “It was not hard fagging that produced such a work as Evelina” — wrote “Daddy” Crisp in 1779— “it was the ebullition of true sterling genius — you wrote it because you could not help it — it came, and so you put it down on paper.” (Diary and Letters, 1892, i. 178.)
[93] These expressions are from Cowper’s Progress of Error, written in 1780-1.
[94] Diary and Letters, 1892, iv. 339.
JUNIPER HALL by Constance Hill
A RENDEZVOUS OF CERTAIN ILLUSTRIOUS PERSONAGES DURING THE FRENCH REVOLUTION, INCLUDING ALEXANDRE D’ARBLAY AND FANNY BURNEY
CONTENTS
PREFACE
CHAPTER I. A PASTORAL PRELUDE
CHAPTER II. A KING AND HIS PEOPLE
CHAPTER III. THE BURSTING OF A STORM
CHAPTER IV. FUGITIVES
CHAPTER V. A HAVEN OF REFUGE
CHAPTER VI. AN ENGLISH WELCOME
CHAPTER VII. JUNIPÈRE
CHAPTER VIII. THE AUTHORESS OF “EVELINA”
CHAPTER IX. KING’S DEFENCE
CHAPTER X. AN EVENING AT NORBURY PARK
CHAPTER XI. A KING’S DEATH
CHAPTER XII. A FRENCH LADY OF LETTERS
CHAPTER XIII. A CYNICAL CRITIC
CHAPTER XIV. A GROWING ATTACHMENT
CHAPTER XV. “DADDY CRISP’S” HOME
CHAPTER XVI. A PERPLEXING QUESTION
CHAPTER XVII. A MARRIAGE
CHAPTER XVIII. A “TERRIBLE COUP”
CHAPTER XIX. THE BOOKHAMITE RECLUSES
CHAPTER XX. A GLIMPSE OF THE GAY WORLD
CHAPTER XXl. THE “GRAND OUVRAGE”
CHAPTER XXII. ON THE TERRACE AT WINDSOR
CHAPTER XXIII. THE NEW HOME
CHAPTER XXIV. VISITORS AT CAMILLA COTTAGE
CHAPTER XXV. A ROYAL GUEST IN MICKLEHAM
PREFACE
IN a beautiful part of Surrey there stands a house famous as the resort of some distinguished French émigrés, who, during the Reign of Terror, had escaped from the guillotine.
This house, known as “Juniper Hall,” is situated between the village of Mickleham and Burfordbridge. Within its walls there met together, a little more than a century ago, a group of singularly interesting persons, both French and English.
The French colony consisted of leading members of the Constitutional party, who had made great personal sacrifices in the cause of reform, and who had now suddenly fallen from power with the fall of their king; while among their English neighbours were the relatives of our authoress, Fanny Burney, and after a while Fanny Burney herself.
The letters of Miss Burney and of her sister, Mrs. Phillips, written during this period, reproduce the charming conversation and polished manners of this French “salon” on English soil, whose members, it has been remarked, [Page vi] united “toute la vigueur de la liberté et toute la grâce de la politesse ancienne.”
Out of this intercourse of French and English the love-affair between Fanny Burney and M. d’Arblay arose, which, resulting as it did in their marriage, gives a special interest to the émigrés’ sojourn in Mickleham.
By the kindness of members of the Burney family and others valuable original matter has been put into our hands, including unpublished letters by Fanny, and by her father, Dr. Burney, by Edmund Burke, Arthur Young, and other persons. Permission has also been given for the reproduction of interesting portraits and of contemporary sketches.
The literary reader will of necessity remark sundry lapses in grammar in the letters of Fanny Burney - which are surprising as coming from an authoress of her experience. But the freshness and spontaneity of her letters shine, perhaps, all the brighter from our feeling that nothing has been changed or corrected by an after-thought.
The portrait of Fanny Burney, given in this book, is now published for the first time. It is reproduced from the picture in the possession of Colonel Burney, which he inherited from his grandfather, Richard Allen Burney, who was a nephew and contemporary of the authoress. It is one of two portraits painted by Fanny’s cousin, [Page vii] Edward Burney; the other being the well-known portrait prefixed to the “Diary and Letters.”
The portrait of M. d’Arblay is a reproduction of the original crayon drawing now in the possession of Mr. Leverton Harris, M. P., of “Camilla Lacey,” to whose kindness we also owe the permission to make use of other objects of interest in the Burney-parlour.
The portrait of Mr. Lock, of Norbury Park, is reproduced from a pencil drawing made by Edward Burney from the original portrait in oils by Sir Thomas Lawrence. This drawing is in all probability the sketch that used to hang on the walls of the cottage at Bookham, and which is spoken of by Madame d’Arblay as “dearest Mr. Lock, our founder’s portrait.”
To Lord Wallscourt, the great-grandson of Mr. and Mrs. Lock, we are indebted for permission to reproduce the beautiful portrait of Mrs. Lock, by Downman.
The picture of Juniper Hall is engraved from a watercolour drawing, by Dibdin, in the possession of Dr. Symes Thompson. It was taken many years before the house underwent any alteration.
The best portraits of the émigrés have been sought out by us in Paris, Versailles, and elsewhere, and we have obtained contemporary prints of the prison of the Abbaye and of the Place de Grève, scenes connected with their imprisonment [Page viii] or escape; while in the neighbourhood of Mickleham numerous sketches have been made of places where their intercourse with the Burney family and others took place.
Among the books from which material has chiefly been drawn are the “Diary and Letters of Madame d’Arblay,” edited by her niece; the “Memoir of Dr. Burney,” by Madame d’Arblay; the “Memoires de Malouet,” and, for its autobiographical portions, Madame de Staël’s “Considérations sur les principaux Evénémens de la Revolution Française.”
We should like to take this opportunity of thanking all who have assisted in the production of this book; whether by allowing us to visit their interesting houses or providing us with fresh material and portraits. Among them we would especially mention the name of Archdeacon Burney, a grand-nephew of the authoress, whose important collection has been generously put at our disposal.
The subject of this work has been found by the writer to be interesting and inspiring to a high degree. It is hoped that the reader may find it so also.
CONSTANCE HILL.
GROVE COTTAGE, FROGNAL
HAMPSTEAD,
October 1903.
CHAPTER I. A PASTORAL PRELUDE
IT is a summer’s afternoon. A Surrey valley lies before us, silent in the warm, sleepy sunshine. A lark is singing over head, and the air is filled with the scent of hay. The lazy Mole winds slowly beneath its vault of spreading boughs and its fringe of white hemlock and red campion. Above the river rise the wooded slopes of Norbury Park, while, on the further side of the valley, towers Box Hill, its patches of chalky cliff catching the rays of the western sun.
In old times the pilgrims, on their way to Canterbury, trod this ground. They came over the North Downs, and, descending into the valley through a dip in the hills, crossed the Mole by a foot-bridge which bore the name of Pray-bridge. A field hard by is still known as Pray-meadow. The ruins of a chapel, on the slope of the Downs, mark the pilgrims’ halting-station, and give the names to Chapel Lane and Chapel Croft.
We fancy we see the long motley procession, with its pack-horses and mules, slowly moving across the valley and ascending the hill on the
RIVER MOLE
further side. As the pilgrims pass out of sight, another vision arises, and we see here, in this same valley among its green lanes and sunny pastures, foreign faces and foreign figures, and we listen to a foreign tongue! Who can these strangers be? Their rapid utterance and eager gesticulations, combined with their airs of courtly elegance, can surely belong to but one nation? Yes, they are French; but what has brought them to our shores?
A great turmoil is surging beyond the Channel; the French Revolution, so nobly begun, has now entered upon its dark and tragic stage and all good men and true, thrust out of power, are being hunted down like wild beasts. It is some of these very persons who, just escaped from the guillotine, have sought safety and shelter in our peaceful valley - and, as our eyes rest upon the woods of Norbury Park, we rejoice to think of the hearty welcome given by its owner to these strangers. We think, too, of the no less hearty welcome given by the dwellers in a modest cottage at the foot of that park - the near relatives of our authoress, Fanny Burney.
It is a circumstance to strike the imagination - this little colony of émigrés, with their high sounding names, famous as statesmen, as orators, or as writers - dropped down, as if from the skies, on to this quiet country side! We seem to hear the echo of their brilliant talk, coming across a space of more than a hundred years. We catch the words of
eloquence of Madame de Staël and the cynical jests of Talleyrand, and can distinguish the voices of Narbonne and of Matthieu de Montmorenci, of Malouet, of Jaucourt, of Lally-Tollendal, of the Princesse d’Hénin, of Madame de Broglie, of Madame de la Châtre, of Girardin and of General d’Arblay.
Complete Works of Frances Burney Page 711