AUTOGRAPHS.
We have the pleasure of resuming these innate illustrations of genius. Some of the present specimens are copied from the plate appended to the Edinburgh Literary Journal, whence the page in No. 478 of the Mirror was taken. First is
LEIGH HUNT.—Leigh Hunt’s writing is a good deal like the man: it is constrainedly easy, with an affectation of ornament, yet withal a good hand. The signature is copied from a letter written to a friend in Edinburgh, in 1820; and as one part of this letter is curious and interesting, we have pleasure in presenting it to our readers. We are inclined to believe that there are many good points about Leigh Hunt. We like the spirit of the following extract from his letter:—
“And this reminds me to tell you, that I am not the author of the book called the Scottish Fiddle, which I have barely seen. The name alone, if you had known me, would have convinced you that I could not have been the author. I had made quite mistakes enough about Sir Walter, not to have to answer for this too. I took him for a mere courtier and political bigot. When I read his novels, which I did very lately, at one large glut (with the exception of the Black Dwarf, which I read before), I found that when he spoke so charitably of the mistakes of kings and bigots, he spoke out of an abundance of knowledge, instead of narrowness, and that he could look with a kind eye also at the mistakes of the people. If I still think he has too great a leaning to the former, and that his humanity is a little too much embittered with spleen, I can still see and respect the vast difference between the spirit which I formerly thought I saw in him, and the little lurking contempts and misanthropies of a naturally wise and kind man, whose blood perhaps has been somewhat saddened by the united force of thinking and sickliness. He wishes us all so well that he is angry at not finding us better. His works occupy the best part of some book-shelves always before me, where they continually fill me with admiration for the author’s genius, and with regret for my petty mistakes about it.”—Edinburgh Literary Journal.
J. SINCLAIR—the signature of the venerable Sir John Sinclair, Bart., who has written and edited upwards of 25 useful works.
CAROLINE NORTON—the Honourable Mrs. Norton, author of the “Sorrows of Rosalie,” the “Undying One,” &c., and grand-daughter of the late Mr. Thomas Sheridan. This signature is from a superb portrait in a recent Number of the New Monthly Magazine: a lovelier and more intellectual head and front we never beheld.
B.R. HAYDON—peculiarly characteristic of the writer’s style of painting—large and bold. Whoever has seen his Napoleon, just opened for exhibition, must, we think, acknowledge the above identity. In our next Number we intend to notice the above triumph of art.
ALARIC A. WATTS—an elegant hand, worthy of the editor of the most elegant of the Annuals: this, however, is not Mr. Watts’s ordinary signature.
J. MONTGOMERY.—This hand is far more redundant in ornament than one would have expected from so gentle and talented a Quaker; but the Quaker has been lost in the poet, as an old grey wall is concealed under a luxuriant mantling of ivy. The autograph now engraved is copied from the signature attached to the original of his beautiful poem on Night, beginning—“Night is the time for rest.”—Edinburgh Literary Journ.
CH. MAURICE DE TALLEYRAND—whose life will hereafter be traced throughout a volume of the history of the last and present century. His age is 77. This signature is copied from the Frontispiece to the last edition to the Court and Camp of Bonaparte, in the Family Library, which is a fine portrait of Talleyrand, engraved by Finden, from a picture by Girard.
H. MACKENZIE—author of the Man of Feeling, &c. He died during the past year, in Edinburgh.