A few friends have erected this humble and perishable monument.”
Hutton attempts to give the epitaph in full but makes an unaccountable error in substituting “heads” for “hearts.” It is another illustration of the ill will of the fates that even on his tombstone his name should be inscribed incorrectly. “Rainford” is doubtless the mistake of the Italian who prepared the monument.[[35]]
Mr. J. A. Hamilton, in the Dictionary of National Biography, says: “An epitaph, in terms of somewhat extravagant eulogy, was written by Walter Savage Landor.” The epitaph, which I copied word for word, scarcely deserves Mr. Hamilton’s censure. Surely there is nothing extravagant about it. I regret that in such a valuable work as the Dictionary, the account of James is so slight, perfunctory, and in many respects inaccurate. It could have been made much better, and it is in marked contrast with most of the biographical sketches included in that admirable compendium.
Mr. Hamilton sums up in a careless and indifferent way the literary career of James. “Flimsy and melodramatic as James’s romances are, they were highly popular. The historical setting is for the most part laboriously accurate, and though the characters are without life, the moral tone is irreproachable; there is a pleasant spice of adventure about the plots, and the style is clear and correct. The writer’s grandiloquence and artificiality are cleverly parodied by Thackeray in ‘Barbazure, by G. P. R. Jeames, Esq., &c.,’ in ‘Novels by Eminent Hands,’ and the conventional sameness of the opening of his novels, ‘so admirable for terseness,’ is effectively burlesqued in ‘The Book of Snobs,’ chap. ii. and xvi.” It is the old story: Thackeray made fun of him, and so—away with him! Yet there was a time when everybody read James and few read Thackeray. I venture to assert that the romances are neither flimsy nor melodramatic, unless Scott’s romances are flimsy and melodramatic. I find no grandiloquence in them.
Probably the best and most authoritative sketch of his life is contained in the preface which he wrote for the collected edition of his novels, published, in twenty-one volumes, in 1844–1849. Of course this includes no account of the last ten years of his career. The number of volumes he gave to the world was enormous, as may be seen from the list of his works compiled from the Dictionary and from Allibone’s laboriously minute record.[[36]] They tell of his untiring industry; evidently he loved to write for the sake of writing. His books brought him a goodly income, but although he seems to have had a small fortune at one time, he was generally poor; careless about his expenditure; ever ready and willing to give aid to those who needed it, particularly to his literary brethren; a noble, honest Christian gentleman, devoid of selfishness; a good husband and father, simple and direct in his ways, charitable, open-hearted, deserving of the esteem and affection of all who knew him. It was said of him by a writer who deplored “the fatal facility” of the novels, that “there is a soul of true goodness in them—no maudlin affectation of virtue, but a manly rectitude of aim which they derive directly from the heart of the writer. His enthusiastic nature is visibly impressed upon his productions. They are full of his own frank and generous impulses—impulses so honorable to him in private life. Out of his books, there is no man more sincerely beloved. Had he not even been a distinguished author, his active sympathy in the cause of letters would have secured to him the attachment and respect of his contemporaries.”
His activity was by no means limited to the field of prose fiction. In poetry, he produced The Ruined City in 1828; Blanche of Navarre, a five act play, in 1839, and Camaralzaman, a “fairy drama” in three acts, in 1848. My “first edition” of Blanche of Navarre, a pamphlet of ninety-eight pages, with a dedication to Talfourd,—until it came into my hands. After an existence of sixty-six years, unvexed by the paper-knife, and in that “unopened” condition so dear to the heart of a collector—does not disclose any good reason for its creation. The finale of Act III is an example of its “lofty poetic tone”—
“Don John (pointing to the gallery).
We have spectators there! A lady points!
Let us go succour her!
Don Ferdinand (stopping him).