Thackerayana: Notes and Anecdotes

by Unknown

In such a house a portion of Thackeray's fortune might be reasonably invested. To the occupant it promised the enjoyment he was justified in anticipating, and was a solid property to bequeath his descendants when age, in its sober course, should have called him hence. But little more than a year later, to those deadened with the effects of so terrible a bereavement as their loss must have proved when they could realise its fulness, this house must have been a source of desolation. Its oppressive size, its infinitely mournful associations, the hopeful expectations with which it had been erected, the tragic manner in which the one dearest to them had there been stricken down; with all this acting on the sensibilities of unhealed grief, the building must have impressed them with peculiar aversion; and hence it may be concluded that their first desire was to leave it. The removal to a house of dimensions more suitable to their requirements involved the sacrifice of those portions of the contents of the larger mansion with which it was considered expedient to dispense; and thus Messrs. Christie, Manson, and Woods announced for sale a selection from the paintings, drawings, part of the interesting collection of curious porcelain, and such various objects of art or furniture as would otherwise have necessitated the continuance of a house as large as that at Palace Green. These valuable objects were accordingly dispersed under the hammer, March 16 and 17, 1864, and on the following day the remainder of Thackeray's library was similarly offered to public competition. To anyone familiar with Thackeray's writings, and more especially with his Lectures and Essays, this collection of books must have been both instructive and fascinating; seeing that they faithfully indicated the course of their owner's readings, and through them might be traced many an allusion or curious fact of contemporaneous manners, which, in the hands of this master of his craft, had been felicitously employed to strengthen the purpose of some passage of his own compositions.

Without converting this introduction into a catalogue of the contents of Thackeray's library it is difficult to particularise the several works found on his book-shelves. It is sufficient to note that all the authorities which have been quoted in his Essays were fitly represented; that such books, in many instances obscure and trivial in themselves, as threw any new or curious light upon persons or things—on the private and individual, as well as the public or political history of men, and of the events or writings to which their names owe notoriety, of obsolete fashions or of the changing customs of society—were as numerous as the most ardent and dilettanti of Thackeray's admirers could desire.

The present volume is devised to give a notion, necessarily restricted, of certain selections from these works, chiefly chosen with a view of further illustrating the bent of a mind, with the workings of which all who love the great novelist's writings may at once be admitted to the frankest intercourse. It has been truly said that Thackeray was 'too great to conceal anything.' The same candour is extended to his own copies of the books which told of times and company wherein his imagination delighted to dwell; for, pencil in hand, he has recorded the impressions of the moment without reserve, whether whimsical or realistic.

A collection of books of this character is doubly interesting. On the one hand were found the remnants of earlier humourists, the quaint old literary standards which became, in the hands of their owner, materials from which were derived the local colouring of the times concerning which it was his delightful fancy to construct romances, to philosophise, or to record seriously.

On the other hand, the present generation was fitly represented. To most of the writers of his own era it was an honour that a presentation copy of their literary offspring should be found in the library of the foremost author, whose friendship and open-handed kindness to the members of his profession was one of many brilliant traits of a character dignified by innumerable great qualities, and tenderly shaded by instances uncountable of generous readiness to confer benefits, and modest reticence to let the fame of his goodness go forth.

Presentation copies from his contemporaries were therefore not scarce; and whether the names of the donors were eminent, or as yet but little heard of, the creatures of their thoughts had been preserved with unvarying respect. The 'Christmas Carol,' that memorable Christmas gift which Thackeray has praised with fervour unusual even to his impetuous good-nature, was one of the books. The copy, doubly interesting from the circumstances both of its authorship and ownership, was inscribed in the well-known hand of that other great novelist of the nineteenth century, 'W. M. Thackeray, from Charles Dickens (whom he made very happy once a long way from home).' Competition was eager to secure this covetable literary memorial, which may one day become historical; it was knocked down at 25l. 10s., and rumour circulated through the press, without foundation, we believe with regret, that it had been secured for the highest personage in the State, whose desire to possess this volume would have been a royal compliment to the community of letters.

Nor were books with histories wanting. George Augustus Sala, in the introduction to his ingenious series of 'Twice Round the Clock,' published in 1862, remarks with diffidence: 'It would be a piece of sorry vanity on my part to imagine that the conception of a Day and Night in London is original. I will tell you how I came to think of the scheme of "Twice Round the Clock." Four years ago, in Paris, my then master in literature, Mr. Charles Dickens, lent me a little thin octavo volume, which I believe had been presented to him by another master of the craft, Mr. Thackeray.' A slight resemblance to this opuscule was offered in 'A View of the Transactions of London and Westminster from the Hours of Ten in the Evening till Five in the Morning,' which was secured at Thackeray's sale for forty-four shillings.

Thus, without presuming to any special privileges, we account for the selection of literary curiosities which form settings for the fragments gathered in 'Thackerayana,' The point of interest which rendered this dispersion of certain of Thackeray's books additionally attractive to us may be briefly set forth.

In looking through the pages of odd little volumes, and on the margins and fly-leaves of some of the choicest works, presentation copies or otherwise, it was noticed that pencil or pen-and-ink sketches, of faithful conceptions suggested by the texts, touched in most cases with remarkable neatness and decision, were abundantly dispersed through various series.

It is notorious that their owner's gift of dexterous sketching was marvellous; his rapid facility, in the minds of those critics who knew him intimately, was the one great impediment to any serious advancement in those branches of art which demand a lengthy probationship; and to this may be referred his implied failure, or but partial success, in the art which, to him, was of all cultivated accomplishments the most enticing. The fact has been dwelt on gravely by his friends, and was a source of regret to certain eminent artists best acquainted with his remarkable endowments.