James Frederick Ferrier

by Elizabeth Sanderson Haldane

Such was the Germany into which Ferrier came in 1834. He did not, so far as we can hear, enter deeply into its social life; he visited it as a traveller, rather than as a student, and his stay in it was brief. Considering the shortness of his time there, and the circumstances of his visit, the impression that it made upon him is all the more remarkable, for it was an impression that lasted and was evident throughout all his after life. Since his day, indeed, it would be difficult to say how many young Scotsmen have been impressed in a similar way by a few months' residence at a University town in Germany. For partly owing to Ferrier's own efforts, and perhaps even more owing to the 'boom'—to use a vulgarism—brought about by Carlyle's writings, and by his first making known the marvels of German literature to the ordinary English-speaking public, who had never learned the language or tried to understand its recent history, the old traditional literary alliance between Scotland and France appeared for the time being to have broken down in favour of a similar association with its rival country, Germany. The work of Goethe was at last appreciated, nothing was now too favourable to say about its merits; philosophy was suddenly discovered to have its home in Germany, and there alone; our insularity in keeping to our antiquated methods—dryasdust, we were told, as the old ones of the schools, and perhaps as edifying—was vigorously denounced. Theology, which had hitherto found complete support from the philosophic system which acted as her handmaid, and was only tolerated as such, was naturally affected in like manner by the change; and to her credit be it said, that instead of with averted eyes looking elsewhere, as might easily have been done, she determined to face the worst, and wisely asked the question whether in her department too she had not something she could learn from a sister country across the sea. Hence a great change was brought about in the mental attitude of Scotland; but we anticipate.

Ferrier, after leaving Heidelberg, paid a short visit to Leipzig, and then for a few weeks took up his abode at Berlin. From Leipzig he writes to Miss Wilson again: 'How do you like an epistola dated from this great emporium of taste and letters, this culminating point of Germanism, where waggons jostle philosophy, and tobacco-impregnated air is articulated into divinest music? It is fair-time, and I did not arrive, as one usually does, a day behind it, but on the very day it commenced. It will last, I believe, some weeks, and during that time all business is done on the open streets, which are lined on each side with large wooden booths, and are swarming with men and merchandise of every description and from every quarter of the world. It very much resembles a Ladies' Sale in the Assembly Rooms (what I never saw), only the ladies here are frequently Jews with fierce beards, and have always a pipe in their mouths when not eating or drinking. As you walk along you will find the order of the day to be somewhat as follows. You first come to pipes, then shawls, then nails, then pipes, pipes again, pipes, gingerbread, dolls, then pipes, bridles, spurs, pipes, books, warming-pans, pipes, china, writing-desks, pipes again, pipes, pipes, pipes, nothing but pipes—the very pen will write nothing but pipes. Pipes, you see, decidedly carry it. I wonder they don't erect public tobacco-smoke works, lay pipes for it along the streets, and smoke away—a city at a time. Private families might take it in as we do gas!'

Ferrier appears to have spent a week at Frankfort before reaching his destination at Leipzig. He describes his journey there: 'At Frankfort I saw nothing worthy of note except a divine statue of Ariadne riding on a leopard. After lumbering along for two nights and two days in a clumsy diligence, I reached Leipzig two days ago. I thought that by the way I might perhaps see something worthy of mention, and accordingly sometimes put my head out of the window to look. But no—the trees, for instance, had all to a man planted their heads in the earth, and were growing with their legs upwards, just as they do with us; and as for the natives, they, on the contrary, had each of them filled a flower-pot, called a skull, full of earth, put their heads in it, and were growing downwards, just as the same animal does in our country; and on coming to one's recollection in the morning in a German diligence you find yourself surrounded by the same drowsy, idiotical, glazed, stained, and gummy complement of faces which might have accompanied you into Carlisle on an autumn morning after a night of travel in His Majesty's mail coach.'

Berlin impressed Ferrier by its imposing public buildings and general aspect of prosperity. It had, of course, long before reached a position of importance under the great Frederick's government, though not the importance or the size that it afterwards attained. Still, it was the centre of attraction for all classes throughout Prussia, and possessed a cultivated society in which the middle-class element was to all appearances predominant. Ferrier writes of the town: 'Of the inside of the buildings and what is to be seen there I have nothing yet to say, but their external aspect is most magnificent. Palaces, churches, mosque-like structures, spires and domes and towers all standing together, but with large spaces and fine open drives between, so that all are seen to the greatest possible advantage, conspire to form a most glorious city. At this moment a fountain which I can see from my window is playing in the middle of the square. A jet d'eau indeed!! It may do very well for a Frenchman to call it that, but we must call it a perfect volcano of water. A huge column goes hissing up as high as a steeple, with the speed and force of a rocket, and comes down in thunder, and little rainbows are flitting about in the showery spray. It being Sunday, every thing and person is gayer than usual. Bands are playing and soldiers are parading all through the town; everything, indeed, is military, and yet little is foppish—a statement which to English ears will sound like a direct contradiction.'

Our traveller had been given letters to certain Berlin Professors from young Blackie, afterwards Professor of Greek in Edinburgh University, who had just translated Goethe's Faust into the English tongue. 'I went about half an hour ago to call upon a sort of Professor here to whom I had a letter and a Faust to present from Blackie—found him ill and confined to bed—was admitted, however, very well received, and shall call again when I think there is a chance of his being better. I have still another Professor to call on with a letter and book from Blackie, and there my acquaintance with the society of Berlin is likely to terminate.' One other introduction to Ferrier on this expedition to Germany is mentioned in a note from his aunt, Miss Susan Ferrier, the only letter to her nephew that has apparently been preserved: whether or not he availed himself of the offer, history does not record. It runs as follows:—

'Edinr., 1st August.

'I could not get a letter to Lord Corehouse's German sister (Countess Purgstall), as it seems she is in bad health, and not fit to entertain vagabonds; but I enclose a very kind one from my friend, Mrs. Erskine, to the ambassadress at Munich, and if you don't go there you may send it by post, as it will be welcome at any time on its own account.'

It was, as has been said, only about three years previously to this visit that Hegel had passed away at Berlin, and one wonders whether Ferrier first began to interest himself in his writings at this time, and whether he visited the graveyard near the city gate where Hegel lies, close to his great predecessor Fichte. One would almost think this last was so from the exact description given in his short biography of Hegel; and it is significant that on his return he brought with him a medallion and a photograph of the great philosopher. This would seem to indicate that his thoughts were already tending in the direction of Hegelian metaphysics, but how far this was so we cannot tell. Certainly the knowledge of the German language acquired by Ferrier during this visit to the country proved most valuable to him, and enabled him to study its philosophy at a time when translations were practically non-existent, and few had learned to read it. That knowledge must indeed have been tolerably complete, for in 1851, when Sir Edward Bulwer (afterwards Lord Lytton) was about to republish his translation of Schiller's Ballads, he corresponded with Ferrier regarding the accuracy and exactness of his work. He afterwards, in the preface to the volume, acknowledges the great services Ferrier had rendered; and in dedicating the book to him, speaks of the debt of gratitude he owes to one whose 'critical judgment and skill in detecting the finer shades of meaning in the original' had been so useful. Ferrier likewise has the credit, accorded him by De Quincey, of having corrected several errors in all the English translations of Faust then extant—errors which were not merely literary inaccuracies, but which also detracted from the vital sense of the original. As to Lord Lytton, Ferrier must at this time have been interested in his writings; for in a letter to Miss Wilson, he advises her to read Bulwer's Pilgrims of the Rhine if she wishes for a description of the scenery, and speaks of the high esteem with which he was regarded by the Germans.

It was in 1837 that Ferrier married the young lady with whom he had so long corresponded. The marriage was in all respects a happy one. Mrs. Ferrier's gifts and graces, inherited from her father, will not soon be forgotten, either in St. Andrews where she lived so long, or in Edinburgh, the later home of her widowhood. One whose spirits were less gay might have found a husband whose interests were so completely in his work—and that a work in which she could not share—difficult to deal with; but she possessed understanding to appreciate that work, as well as humour, and could accommodate herself to the circumstances in which she found herself; while he, on his part, entered into the gaiety on occasion with the best. A friend and student of the St. Andrews' days writes of Ferrier: 'He married his cousin Margaret, Professor's Wilson's daughter, and I don't doubt that a shorthand report of their courtship would have been better worth reading than nine hundred and ninety-nine out of every thousand courtships, for she had wit as well as beauty, and he was capable of appreciating both. No more charming woman have I ever seen or heard making game of mankind in general, and in particular of pedants and hypocrites. She would even laugh at her husband on occasion, but it was dangerous for any volunteer to try to help her in that sport. A finer-looking couple I have never seen.[5]

During her infancy Edinburgh had become Mrs. Ferrier's home, though she made frequent visits to Westmorland, of whose dialect she had a complete command. The courtship, however, had been for the most part carried on at the picturesque old house of Gorton, where 'Christopher North' was temporarily residing, and which, situated as it is overlooking the lovely glen made immortal by the name of Hawthornden, in view of Roslin Chapel, and surrounded by old-fashioned walks and gardens, must have been an ideal spot for a romantic couple like the Ferriers to roam in. Another friend writes of Wilson's later home at Elleray: 'In his hospitable house, where the wits of Blackwood gathered at intervals and visited individually in season and out of season, his daughter saw strange men of genius, such as few young ladies had the fortune to see, and heard talk such as hardly another has the fortune to hear. Lockhart, with his caricatures and his incisive sarcasm, was an intimate of the house. The Ettrick Shepherd, with his plaid and homely Doric, broke in occasionally, as did also De Quincey, generally towards midnight, when he used to sit pouring forth his finely-balanced, graceful sentences far on among the small hours of the morning. There were students, too, year after year, many of them not undistinguished, and some of whom had, we doubt not, ideas of their own regarding the flashing hazel eyes of their eloquent Professor's eldest daughter.' But her cousin was her choice, though wealth offered no attraction, and neither side had reason to regret the marriage of affection.