CHAPTER III CONCERNING LITERARY MEN AND MAKERS OF HISTORY
For such a small area the island can boast a surprising number of literary associations. That which remains pre-eminently the first is the long residence of Tennyson at Farringford, near Freshwater; this lasted for more than half his life, though in the end the poet was so worried by those tourists who wished to "see" him, in the same simple style they went to see Carisbrooke or the Zoo, that he built himself a new home near Haslemere, and thither retreated during that part of the year when he would be most likely to be pestered in the island. There is no doubt that, though he was morbidly sensitive to public notice, he would have greatly missed it had the incense not been offered him, and he certainly did not discourage attention by his bizarre habit of dressing, which made even those who did not know him by reputation turn to stare at him in the street. Keats is another in the first rank of poets which the island can claim. He wrote part of Endymion while on a visit to Carisbrooke, and Lamia in a cottage at Shanklin; the part where this cottage stood was renamed, in his honour, Keats' Green.
At the back of the island is Brixton, called Brighstone, where formerly Bishop Ken and Samuel Wilberforce were rectors. The former was here from July, 1667, to April, 1669, and here composed his famous hymns, while Wilberforce wrote his Agathos under the shelter of the same trees.
Another association which must be classified here, though in reality it contains very little of the real "literary" essence in the true sense of that much-abused word, is that of Legh Richmond, curate of Brading in 1809. He wrote the Annals of the Poor, of which the best known is The Dairyman's Daughter. Why his very mediocre performances should have travelled far and wide over the world, and been translated into numerous languages, is one of the mysteries attaching to books. These writings were merely little tracts written for edification, and without the smallest literary flavour. Yet they are still remembered, and have in the aggregate sold in thousands. The grave of Elizabeth Wallridge, the prototype of the dairyman's daughter, is one of the show spots on the island, and the coaches from Ryde to Carisbrooke make a détour to permit passengers to visit the churchyard at Arreton where it is. Her cottage is also pointed out to wondering visitors, who probably have never heard her name, and go away with the vaguest notion as to what it is all about.
Miss Elizabeth Sewell, a prolific writer for girls in the early part of the nineteenth century, lived near Shanklin. Her Amy Herbert was much beloved of girls two generations ago, but would now be considered insufferably tedious.
Fielding's account of his landing at Ryde has often been quoted, and, though he was only a visitor, and not a resident, is worth considering. He came by water from Rotherhithe to the island, a voyage that took fifteen days, and he records in his journal: "This day our ladies went ashore at Ryde, and drank their afternoon tea at an alehouse there with great satisfaction; here they were regaled with fresh cream, to which they had been strangers since they left the Downs." The ladies were his wife and daughter and a friend. Fielding himself was at the time very infirm, and there was "between the sea and the land at low water an impassable gulf, if I may so call it, of deep mud, which could neither be traversed by walking or swimming." There were great difficulties. At length, "after being hoisted into a small boat, and being rowed near the shore, I was taken up by two sailors, who waded with me through the mud, and placed me in a chair on the land, whence they conveyed me afterwards a mile further, and brought me to a house." Here the accommodation seems to have been most primitive, and the author's description of it is in much detail. Though Newport was a town when Ryde was a mere collection of huts, the latter now outnumbers the former in residents, and is a fine, large, clean town, with a good pier and handsome shops.
Dr. Arnold of Rugby was born at West Cowes, and a tablet marks the house; but his early education was carried on by an aunt in East Cowes, with which he is more closely associated; for even after he became a schoolboy at Winchester his holidays were passed in the island. He speaks of his father's house at Slatwoods, East Cowes, as the "only home of his childhood."
