My Life as an Author

by Martin Farquhar Tupper

It is not for me to recall here much about the inevitable hospitalities of an old country house, to which a not unkindly host often invited English and foreign friends, whom something to do with authorship had made celebrities. Do I not pleasantly remember the jolly haymaking, when old Jerdan, calling out, "More hay, more hay!" covered Grace Greenwood with a haycock overturned, and had greeted a sculptor guest appropriately and wittily enough with "Here we are, Durham, all mustered!" the "we" being besides others, Camilla Toulmin, George Godwin, and Francis Bennoch? Do I not remember how much surprised we were at the melodies whereof an old piano was capable when touched by Otto Goldsmidt? Can I forget, also, how marvellously a young Canadian, Joseph Macdougall, of Ottawa, extemporised on the same piano as only a genius can (Mr. Assher was another), and sent me afterwards, as a memory, a vast volume of American photographs, whereof he had munificently prepaid the enormous sum of £6, 18s. for postage? And was not our village stirred to its depths by the visit to Albury House of two black gentlemen and a blue,—all in evening dress?

It was President Roberts of Monrovia, attended by his secretary and chief minister; for they came cordially to return thanks to one who had helped a little in slave emancipation, under the influences of Elliott Cresson, Dr. Hodgkin Garrison, and others,—and, moreover, had given a gold medal for African literature, biennially to be competed for by emancipated slaves;—whereof I have heard very little, since (by the volunteered assistance of Mr. Taylor, the seal engraver) I gave it many years ago: the medal was as large as a crown piece. President Benson, also of Liberia, a magnificent ebon specimen of humanity, visited me with his staff, not long before his lamented death—it was said, by murder.

Let me add now a word of kindly memory for some good friends long gone to a better world, but once welcome guests at Albury. There was Benjamin Nightingale, the enthusiastic antiquary; there was his fidus Achates, Akerman, secretary to the Numismatic, whom I greatly pleased by enabling him to catch a trout near my carriage gate; there was Chief Baron Pollok, head of the Noviomagians: the eloquent Edwards Lester of America, whose speech at a Literary Fund dinner to which I had treated him was hailed by Hallam, Dickens, and others on the spot as the speech of the Society: and the Warrens of Troy, N.Y., about whose casual visit this singular thing happened. For the first and only time in life I had had the strange luck to catch at Netley Pond three perch of nearly a pound each, and a fine trout of about two: I little knew then the final cause thereof: in those days we could not easily get fish in the country, unless indeed we caught it: now my eminent Transatlantic stranger friends came on a Friday, and proved to be Roman Catholics: could any piscatorial luck have been more timely?

When a few days after I told of my sport to a neighbour (it was Captain Russell of the Cleveland family), a great angler, he, of course, without imputation of my veracity, hinted that he wished I might have such luck again, as he would then come and dine with me. I answered at once, "Come to-morrow, and see what I may have caught." He did,—and I produced from the same old mill-head a three-pound trout,—to his astonishment, as it had been my own to have caught it. I have never had such luck before or since, though always a zealous angler in an unprofessional way.

Let me not forget here also the beautiful "Albury Waltz," composed in my drawing-room by Miss Armstrong, and published—it must be twenty years ago now—by Robert Cocks, New Burlington Street: wherein by request I originated the idea of song words for the dancers. This singing as you danced has been often done since, but I suppose no one then thought of it but myself since King David. I need say little more about Albury visitors:—for many years there were plenty of them,—but if one put down a tenth part of what even the faithless memory of old age still retains, there would be no end to such inexhaustible recordings.

And here is an Alburian anecdote which may amuse, as illustrative of the mental calibre of some of those myriads of untutored rustics whom our partisan governors have made politically equal with the wisest in the land. Three young friends came to spend a day with us, and for fun brought in their pockets the absurd noses popular at Epsom races. We came upon some turf-diggers, and my visitors mounted their masks to mystify them. The clodpoles looked scared and very quiet, till I went up to one of them who knew me,—of course I was in my natural physiognomy,—and I said to him, "My friend, these are foreigners:" and the poor ignoramus staring at those portentous noses said seriously, "Ees, I sees they be." Clearly he thought all "furriners" were so featured.

Another specimen of agricultural intelligence is this: A labourer in my field one day said to me, "Master, please to tell me where Jerusalem is, because me and my mates have been disputing about it, and I says as its in Ireland, because the Romans goes there!" He meant the Roman Catholics! and he might have heard also that St. John's Pat-mos was in fact an Irish bog, Pat's-moss: many of our legislative constituency being found to believe that.

But not only is the common labourer thus dense: take these two instances of country guests at my table. One whom I had asked to meet two Americans told me of his disappointment at not finding them—red men! And another (this time a provincial parson) wanted me to expostulate with my friend Hatchard (afterwards Bishop of Mauritius) because he meditated in his philanthropy giving a drinking fountain to Guildford. "Only think, a drinking fountain! surely you cannot approve?" The poor man supposed it was one of those pumping apparatuses for spirits presided over by barmaids! It is manifest that the schoolmaster was not so much abroad a few years ago as he has been since board schools have arisen.

Amongst other specialities of ancient Albury House, which has 1561 on a weathercock and 1701 on a kitchen wing, is the same peculiarity which Tennyson told me at Farringford vexes him in his own less ancient dwelling,—and which Pindar of old declared to be the privilege of poets. We are, and have been for generations, a very house-hive of bees: the whole front of two gables has them under its oak floors and panelled walls throughout,—and when guests sleep in certain rooms they have to be forewarned that the groans at midnight are not those of perturbed spirits, but the hum and bustle of multitudinous bees. We cannot drive them away, nor destroy them utterly,—as often has been attempted; and if we did, the worry would be only worsened, as in that case hornets would come and succeed to the sweet heritage of bee-dom. When the stuccoed front of our house was demolished, to show the oaken pattern (but it had to be re-roughcast to keep out the weather), there were pailsful of honey carried off by the labourers, of course not without wounds and strife: but in ordinary times it is a strange fact that our bees never sting their hosts; be careful only to remain quiet, and there is no war between man and bee. Two years ago a great comb was built outside an eaveboard, probably because there was no room for more comb inside. It is curious that it should have survived two hard winters. Is not all this apposite, as suited (let Pindar and Tennyson bear witness) to a poet's home?

In this zoological connection (for bees are zoa) let me record that there is a legend of a fox having been killed in our drawing-room (on the ground-floor with French windows) during some tenancy in my absence,—only fancy the havoc of such a strife! but all had been cleared up before our return. Also, it is memorable (and I saw it myself) that a hard-pressed stag from Sir Gilbert Heathcote's hunt took refuge in our harness-room,—to the extreme horror of a gardener's boy, who thought it was a mad donkey,—and no wonder, for as those brave barbarian sportsmen get the antlers sawn off for fear of wounds to themselves or their nobler dogs, the poor scared creature with its uncrowned head and loppity ears is very donkey-like.