Autobiography of Anthony Trollope

Home > Fiction > Autobiography of Anthony Trollope > Page 13
Autobiography of Anthony Trollope Page 13

by Anthony Trollope


  for residence, the gentlemen so sent were sometimes more conspicuous

  for want of income than for official zeal and ability. Hence the

  stables had become Augean. I was also instructed to carry out in

  some of the islands a plan for giving up this postal authority to

  the island Governor, and in others to propose some such plan. I

  was then to go on to Cuba, to make a postal treaty with the Spanish

  authorities, and to Panama for the same purpose with the Government

  of New Grenada. All this work I performed to my satisfaction, and

  I hope to that of my masters in St. Martin's le Grand.

  But the trip is at the present moment of importance to my subject,

  as having enabled me to write that which, on the whole, I regard

  as the best book that has come from my pen. It is short, and, I

  think I may venture to say, amusing, useful, and true. As soon as

  I had learned from the secretary at the General Post Office that

  this journey would be required, I proposed the book to Messrs.

  Chapman & Hall, demanding (pounds)250 for a single volume. The contract

  was made without any difficulty, and when I returned home the work

  was complete in my desk. I began it on board the ship in which I

  left Kingston, Jamaica, for Cuba,--and from week to week I carried

  it on as I went. From Cuba I made my way to St. Thomas, and through

  the island down to Demerara, then back to St. Thomas,--which is

  the starting-point for all places in that part of the globe,--to

  Santa Martha, Carthagena, Aspinwall, over the Isthmus to Panama, up

  the Pacific to a little harbour on the coast of Costa Rica, thence

  across Central America, through Costa Rica, and down the Nicaragua

  river to the Mosquito coast, and after that home by Bermuda and New

  York. Should any one want further details of the voyage, are they

  not written in my book? The fact memorable to me now is that I

  never made a single note while writing or preparing it. Preparation,

  indeed, there was none. The descriptions and opinions came hot

  on to the paper from their causes. I will not say that this is the

  best way of writing a book intended to give accurate information.

  But it is the best way of producing to the eye of the reader, and

  to his ear, that which the eye of the writer has seen and his ear

  heard. There are two kinds of confidence which a reader may have

  in his author,--which two kinds the reader who wishes to use his

  reading well should carefully discriminate. There is a confidence

  in facts and a confidence in vision. The one man tells you accurately

  what has been. The other suggests to you what may, or perhaps what

  must have been, or what ought to have been. The former require simple

  faith. The latter calls upon you to judge for yourself, and form

  your own conclusions. The former does not intend to be prescient,

  nor the latter accurate. Research is the weapon used by the former;

  observation by the latter. Either may be false,--wilfully false; as

  also may either be steadfastly true. As to that, the reader must

  judge for himself. But the man who writes currente calamo, who

  works with a rapidity which will not admit of accuracy, may be as

  true, and in one sense as trustworthy, as he who bases every word

  upon a rock of facts. I have written very much as I have, travelled

  about; and though I have been very inaccurate, I have always

  written the exact truth as I saw it ;--and I have, I think, drawn

  my pictures correctly.

  The view I took of the relative position in the West Indies

  of black men and white men was the view of the Times newspaper at

  that period; and there appeared three articles in that journal, one

  closely after another, which made the fortune of the book. Had it

  been very bad, I suppose its fortune could not have been made for

  it even by the Times newspaper. I afterwards became acquainted with

  the writer of those articles, the contributor himself informing me

  that he had written them. I told him that he had done me a greater

  service than can often be done by one man to another, but that I was

  under no obligation to him. I do not think that he saw the matter

  quite in the same light.

  I am aware that by that criticism I was much raised in my position

  as an author. Whether such lifting up by such means is good or bad

  for literature is a question which I hope to discuss in a future

  chapter. But the result was immediate to me, for I at once went to

  Chapman & Hall and successfully demanded (pounds)600 for my next novel.

  CHAPTER VIII THE "CORNHILL MAGAZINE" AND "FRAMLEY PARSONAGE"

  Soon after my return from the West Indies I was enabled to change

  my district in Ireland for one in England. For some time past my

  official work had been of a special nature, taking me out of my

  own district; but through all that, Dublin had been my home, and

  there my wife and children had lived. I had often sighed to return

  to England,--with a silly longing. My life in England for twenty-six

  years from the time of my birth to the day on which I left it, had

  been wretched. I had been poor, friendless, and joyless. In Ireland

  it had constantly been happy. I had achieved the respect of all

  with whom I was concerned, I had made for myself a comfortable

  home, and I had enjoyed many pleasures. Hunting itself was a great

  delight to me; and now, as I contemplated a move to England, and a

  house in the neighbourhood of London, I felt that hunting must be

  abandoned. [Footnote: It was not abandoned till sixteen more years

  had passed away.] Nevertheless I thought that a man who could

  write books ought not to live in Ireland,--ought to live within

  the reach of the publishers, the clubs, and the dinner-parties of

  the metropolis. So I made my request at headquarters, and with some

  little difficulty got myself appointed to the Eastern District of

  England,--which comprised Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk, Cambridgeshire,

  Huntingdonshire, and the greater part of Hertfordshire.

  At this time I did not stand very well with the dominant interest

  at the General Post Office. My old friend Colonel Maberly had

  been, some time since, squeezed into, and his place was filled by

  Mr. Rowland Hill, the originator of the penny post. With him I never

  had any sympathy, nor he with me. In figures and facts he was most

  accurate, but I never came across any one who so little understood

  the ways of men,--unless it was his brother Frederic. To the two

  brothers the servants of the Post Office,--men numerous enough to

  have formed a large army in old days,--were so many machines who

  could be counted on for their exact work without deviation, as

  wheels may be counted on, which are kept going always at the same

  pace and always by the same power. Rowland Hill was an industrious

  public servant, anxious for the good of his country; but he was

  a hard taskmaster, and one who would, I think, have put the great

  department with which he was concerned altogether out of gear by

  his hardness, had he not been at last controlled. He was the Chief

  Secretary, my brother-in-law--who afterwards succeeded him--camer />
  next to him, and Mr. Hill's brother was the Junior Secretary. In

  the natural course of things, I had not, from my position, anything

  to do with the management of affairs;--but from time to time I found

  myself more or less mixed up in it. I was known to be a thoroughly

  efficient public servant; I am sure I may say so much of myself

  without fear of contradiction from any one who has known the Post

  Office;--I was very fond of the department, and when matters came

  to be considered, I generally had an opinion of my own. I have

  no doubt that I often made myself very disagreeable. I know that I

  sometimes tried to do so. But I could hold my own because I knew

  my business and was useful. I had given official offence by the

  publication of The Three Clerks. I afterwards gave greater offence

  by a lecture on The Civil Service which I delivered in one of the

  large rooms at the General Post Office to the clerks there. On this

  occasion, the Postmaster-General, with whom personally I enjoyed

  friendly terms, sent for me and told me that Mr. Hill had told him

  that I ought to be dismissed. When I asked his lordship whether

  he was prepared to dismiss me, he only laughed. The threat was

  no threat to me, as I knew myself to be too good to be treated in

  that fashion. The lecture had been permitted, and I had disobeyed

  no order. In the lecture which I delivered, there was nothing

  to bring me to shame,--but it advocated the doctrine that a civil

  servant is only a servant as far as his contract goes, and that he

  is beyond that entitled to be as free a man in politics, as free in

  his general pursuits, and as free in opinion, as those who are in

  open professions and open trades. All this is very nearly admitted

  now, but it certainly was not admitted then. At that time no one

  in the Post Office could even vote for a Member of Parliament.

  Through my whole official life I did my best to improve the style

  of official writing. I have written, I should think, some thousands

  of reports,--many of them necessarily very long; some of them

  dealing with subjects so absurd as to allow a touch of burlesque;

  some few in which a spark of indignation or a slight glow of pathos

  might find an entrance. I have taken infinite pains with these

  reports, habituating myself always to write them in the form in

  which they should be sent,--without a copy. It is by writing thus

  that a man can throw on to his paper the exact feeling with which

  his mind is impressed at the moment. A rough copy, or that which

  is called a draft, is written in order that it may be touched and

  altered and put upon stilts. The waste of time, moreover, in such

  an operation, is terrible. If a man knows his craft with his pen,

  he will have learned to write without the necessity of changing

  his words or the form of his sentences. I had learned so to write

  my reports that they who read them should know what it was that I

  meant them to understand. But I do not think that they were regarded

  with favour. I have heard horror expressed because the old forms

  were disregarded and language used which had no savour of red-tape.

  During the whole of this work in the Post Office it was my principle

  always to obey authority in everything instantly, but never to allow

  my mouth to be closed as to the expression of my opinion. They who

  had the ordering of me very often did not know the work as I knew

  it,--could not tell as I could what would be the effect of this

  or that change. When carrying out instructions which I knew should

  not have been given, I never scrupled to point out the fatuity of

  the improper order in the strongest language that I could decently

  employ. I have revelled in these official correspondences, and look

  back to some of them as the greatest delights of my life. But I am

  not sure that they were so delightful to others.

  I succeeded, however, in getting the English district,--which

  could hardly have been refused to me,--and prepared to change our

  residence towards the end of 1859. At the time I was writing Castle

  Richmond, the novel which I had sold to Messrs. Chapman & Hall

  for (pounds)600. But there arose at this time a certain literary project

  which probably had a great effect upon my career. Whilst travelling

  on postal service abroad or riding over the rural districts

  in England, or arranging the mails in Ireland,--and such for the

  last eighteen years had now been my life,--I had no opportunity

  of becoming acquainted with the literary life in London. It was

  probably some feeling of this which had made me anxious to move

  my penates back to England. But even in Ireland, where I was still

  living in October, 1859, I had heard of the Cornhill Magazine, which

  was to come out on the 1st of January, 1860, under the editorship

  of Thackeray.

  I had at this time written from time to time certain short stories,

  which had been published in different periodicals, and which in due

  time were republished under the name of Tales of All Countries. On

  the 23d of October, 1859, I wrote to Thackeray, whom I had, I think,

  never then seen, offering to send him for the magazine certain of

  these stories. In reply to this I received two letters,--one from

  Messrs. Smith & Elder, the proprietors of the Cornhill, dated 26th

  of October, and the other from the editor, written two days later.

  That from Mr. Thackeray was as follows:--

  "36 ONSLOW SQUARE, S. W.

  October 28th.

  "MY DEAR MR. TROLLOPE,--Smith & Elder have sent you their proposals;

  and the business part done, let me come to the pleasure, and say

  how very glad indeed I shall be to have you as a co-operator in

  our new magazine. And looking over the annexed programme, you will

  see whether you can't help us in many other ways besides tale-telling.

  Whatever a man knows about life and its doings, that let us hear

  about. You must have tossed a good deal about the world, and have

  countless sketches in your memory and your portfolio. Please

  to think if you can furbish up any of these besides a novel. When

  events occur, and you have a good lively tale, bear us in mind. One

  of our chief objects in this magazine is the getting out of novel

  spinning, and back into the world. Don't understand me to disparage

  our craft, especially YOUR wares. I often say I am like the

  pastrycook, and don't care for tarts, but prefer bread and cheese;

  but the public love the tarts (luckily for us), and we must bake and

  sell them. There was quite an excitement in my family one evening

  when Paterfamilias (who goes to sleep on a novel almost always

  when he tries it after dinner) came up-stairs into the drawing-room

  wide awake and calling for the second volume of The Three Clerks.

  I hope the Cornhill Magazine will have as pleasant a story. And

  the Chapmans, if they are the honest men I take them to be, I've no

  doubt have told you with what sincere liking your works have been

  read by yours very faithfully,

  "W. M. THACKERAY."

  This was very pleasant, and so was the letter from Smith & Elderr />
  offering me (pounds)1000 for the copyright of a three-volume novel, to

  come out in the new magazine,--on condition that the first portion

  of it should be in their hands by December 12th. There was much in

  all this that astonished me;--in the first place the price, which

  was more than double what I had yet received, and nearly double

  that which I was about to receive from Messrs. Chapman & Hall.

  Then there was the suddenness of the call. It was already the end

  of October, and a portion of the work was required to be in the

  printer's hands within six weeks. Castle Richmond was indeed half

  written, but that was sold to Chapman. And it had already been

  a principle with me in my art, that no part of a novel should

  be published till the entire story was completed. I knew, from

  what I read from month to month, that this hurried publication of

  incompleted work was frequently, I might perhaps say always, adopted

  by the leading novelists of the day. That such has been the case,

  is proved by the fact that Dickens, Thackeray, and Mrs. Gaskell

  died with unfinished novels, of which portions had been already

  published. I had not yet entered upon the system of publishing

  novels in parts, and therefore had never been tempted. But I was

  aware that an artist should keep in his hand the power of fitting

  the beginning of his work to the end. No doubt it is his first

  duty to fit the end to the beginning, and he will endeavour to do

  so. But he should still keep in his hands the power of remedying

  any defect in this respect.

  "Servetur ad imum

  Qualis ab incepto processerit,"

  should be kept in view as to every character and every string of

  action. Your Achilles should all through, from beginning to end,

  be "impatient, fiery, ruthless, keen." Your Achilles, such as he

  is, will probably keep up his character. But your Davus also should

  be always Davus, and that is more difficult. The rustic driving his

  pigs to market cannot always make them travel by the exact path

  which he has intended for them. When some young lady at the end

  of a story cannot be made quite perfect in her conduct, that vivid

  description of angelic purity with which you laid the first lines

  of her portrait should be slightly toned down. I had felt that the

 

‹ Prev