Up to the date of going to press I have been unable to trace this portrait, and it is, of course, possible, that in spite of Posh’s vivid recollection, Dr. Aldis Wright’s impression may be the right one.
A letter to Laurence of August 2nd, 1870, corroborates Posh to the extent of proving that the painter had certainly seen the fisherman. On that date FitzGerald wrote (Letters, II, 118, Eversley Edition):—
“. . . The Lugger is now preparing in the Harbour beside me; the Captain here, there, and everywhere; with a word for no one but on business; the other side of the Man you saw looking for Birds’ Nests: all things in their season. I am sure the Man is fit to be King of a Kingdom as well as of a Lugger. . . .
“I declare, you and I have seen A Man! Have we not? Made in the mould of what Humanity should be, Body and Soul, a poor Fisherman. The proud Fellow had better have kept me for a Partner in some of his responsibilities. But no; he must rule alone, as is right he should too. . . .”
Yes. It would certainly have been better for Posh if he had kept his “guv’nor” for a partner. But the “squalls,” the occasional beer bouts (or “settin’ ins,” as they call them in East Anglia), had excited the spirit of independence of my gentleman. Possibly FitzGerald himself had, by too open a display of his admiration for his partner, this typical longshoreman, contributed to the personal self-satisfaction which must have been at the bottom of the man’s reasons for wishing to be free of one who had befriended him so delicately and so generously. Posh himself admits, or rather boasts, that the “break” was owing to his own action. From first to last it seems that FitzGerald, the cultured gentleman, the scholar, the poet
of perfect language and profound philosophy, regarded Posh as almost more than man—certainly as more than average man—and there can be no greater token of the sweet simplicity of the scholar.
CHAPTER XV
A DROP O’ BARE
In September, 1870 (which would be just before the home voyage began and after the Northern voyage was over), Posh seems to have “celebrated” more than his whilome partner and then mortgagee thought proper. On the 8th of the month FitzGerald wrote to Mr. Spalding (Two Suffolk Friends, p. 119):—
“. . . I had a letter from Posh yesterday, telling me he was sorry we had not ‘parted Friends.’ That he had been indeed ‘a little the worse for Drink’—which means being at a Public-house half the Day, and having to sleep it off the remainder: having been duly warned by his Father at Noon that all had been ready for sailing 2 hours before, and all the other Luggers gone. As Posh could walk, I suppose he only acknowledges a little Drink; but, judging by what followed on that little Drink, I wish he had simply acknowledged his Fault. He begs me to write: if I do so I must speak very plainly to him: that, with all his noble Qualities, I doubt I can never again have Confidence in his Promise to break this one bad Habit, seeing that He has broken it so soon, when there was no occasion or excuse: unless it were the thought of leaving his Wife so ill at home. The Man is so beyond others, as I think, that I have come to feel that I must not condemn him by general rule; nevertheless, if he ask me, I can refer him to no other. I must send him back his own written Promise of Sobriety, signed only a month before he broke it so needlessly: and I must even tell him that I know not yet if he can be left with the Mortgage as we settled it in May. . . .
“P.S.—I enclose Posh’s letter, and the answer I propose to give to it. I am sure it makes me sad and ashamed to be setting up for Judge on a much nobler Creature than myself. . . . I had thought of returning him his written Promise as worthless: desiring back my direction to my Heirs that he should keep on the Lugger in case of my Death. . . . I think Posh ought to be made to feel this severely: and, as his Wife is better I do not mind making him feel it if I can. On the other hand, I do not wish to drive Him, by Despair, into the very fault which I have so tried to cure him of. . . .”
His mother did not try to excuse him at all: his father would not even see him go off. She merely told me parenthetically, “I tell him he seem to do it when the Governor is here.”
If FitzGerald had not set poor Posh (for in a way I am sorry for the old fellow) on a pedestal, he would have understood that to a longshoreman or herring fisher who drinks