Of both first and second Carlyle had written
more vehemently to Emerson, a few weeks
before: "I got the fatal First Volume fin-
ished (in the miserablest way, after great
efforts) in October last; my head was all in
a whirl; I fled to Scotland and my Mother
for a month of rest.
more vehemently to Emerson, a few weeks
before: "I got the fatal First Volume fin-
ished (in the miserablest way, after great
efforts) in October last; my head was all in
a whirl; I fled to Scotland and my Mother
for a month of rest.
Thomas Carlyle
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? TO JANET CARLYLE
43
as a teacher of mathematics, and in 1816
went to Kirkcaldy to teach the same subject.
After an experience of literary hack work in
Edinburgh, which began when he was twenty-
three years old, he became tutor in the Buller
family. A long, strange, and ill-boding court-
ship ended, on the 17th of October, 1826, in
his marriage with Jane Baillie Welsh. She
had a small inherited estate at Craigenput-
tock, high up on the moors, and sixteen miles
from Dumfries; and there, two years after
their marriage, they went to live for six years.
In 1831 and 1832 they were merely trying
their wings in London.
"Mrs. Welsh" was Mrs. Carlyle's mother.
"Maister Cairlill" was a frequent name for
Carlyle's brother James. The family had
been living at Scotsbrig since 1826. Carlyle
was thirty-six years old, and his sister nine-
teen, when the following letter was written.
i. cablyle to janet carlyle, scotsbeio.
Ampton St. , London,
23rd January, 1832.
My dear Jenny, -- Will you put up with
the smallest of letters rather than with none
at all? I have hardly a moment, and no
paper but this thick, coarse sort.
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? 44
LETTERS OF CARLYLE
Understand always, My dear Sister, that I
love you well, and am very glad to see and
hear that you conduct yourself as you ought.
To you also, my little lassie, it is of infinite
importance how you behave: were you to get
a Kingdom, or twenty Kingdoms, it were but
a pitiful trifle compared with this, whether
you walked as God command you, and did
your duty to God and to all men. You have
a whole Life before you, to make much of or
to make little of: see you choose the better
part, my dear little sister, and make yourself
and all of us pleased with you. I will add
no more, but commend you from the heart
(as we should all do one another) to God's
keeping. May He ever bless you! I am too
late, and must not wait another minute. We
have this instant had a long letter from Mrs.
Welsh, full of kindness to our Mother and
all of you. The Cheese, &c, &c, is faithfully
commemorated as a "noble" one; Mary is
also made kind mention of. You did all very
right on that occasion. Mrs. Welsh says she
must come down to Scotsbrig and see you all.
What will you think of that? Her Father,
in the meantime, is very ill, and gives her in-
cessant labour and anxiety.
See to encourage Jean to write, and do
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? DEATH OF HIS FATHER
45
you put your hand a little to the work.
What does Maister Cairlill think of the last
letter he wrote us? Was it not a letter
among many? He is a graceless man. I
send you a portrait of one of our Chief Radi-
cals here: it is said to be very like.
I remain always, My dear Sister,
Your affectionate
T. Carlyle.
On January 24,-- Froude gives the date
wrongly as the 26th,--the day after the date
of this letter, Carlyle, still in London, heard
of the death of his father, at the age of sev-
enty-three. He wrote immediately to his mo-
ther in terms which place the letter high even
among his letters; and in less than a week he
had uttered the wail of genius that stands
first in the Reminiscences, -- a book which
has "no language but a cry. " By April he
was back again at Craigenputtock, where it
was so still that poor Mrs. Carlyle could hear
the sheep nibbling a quarter of a mile away.
Carlyle had now a new grief in the death of
Goethe, who, making of him a disciple, had
left him a teacher on his own account. The
loss of Goethe found a measurable compensa-
tion in correspondence with Mill, who had
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? 46
LETTERS OF CARLYLE
been kindled into something very like fire by
Carlyle's review of Croker's Boswell, just
published in Fraser's Magazine. It is one of
the greatest of Carlyle's briefer performances,
although written at short notice. "Carlyle,"
said his wife, "always writes well when he
writes fast. " This essay, indeed, has a high
place in the development of an idea which
may be stated as Croker's Boswell, Macaulay's
Boswell, Carlyle's Boswell, and -- Boswell.
There followed now essays on Goethe and
Ebenezer Elliott's Corn Law Rhymes (Car-
lyle's last contribution to the Edinburgh
Review), and a highly important article on
Diderot for the Foreign Quarterly. In the
autumn of 1832, Carlyle notes that the
money from the essay on Goethe has gone
in part payment of Jeffrey's loan, that Craig-
enputtock has grown too lonely even for him,
and that his literary plans demand a library.
Not only must the work on Diderot have
assured him of his ability to fuse and weld
the most stubborn materials, but it opened
his eyes to the French Revolution as a sub-
ject for his pen. Moved, then, by weariness
of the solitude a deux among the peat moss,
and by this new purpose in writing, the twain
removed to Edinburgh toward the end of
1832.
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? AT CRAIGENPUTTOCK
47
Four months of Edinburgh were enough
to convince Carlyle that here was for him no
continuing city; enough, also, to enable him
to collect and carry back to Craigenputtock
the substance of The Diamond Necklace, one
of the best of his tragi-comic pieces.
The loneliness of "the whinstone strong-
hold" on the moors was cheered in the fol-
lowing August by Emerson's memorable visit.
"We went out to walk over long hills,"
writes Emerson in English Traits, "and
looked at Criffel, then without his cap, and
down into Wordsworth's country. There we
sat down and talked of the immortality of
the soul. "
The essay on Cagliostro, written in March,
1833, was printed in Fraser's Magazine for
July and August; and Fraser agreed to pub-
lish Sartor Resartus in the next volume,
"only fining Carlyle eight guineas a sheet
for his originality. " This gadfly tax on gen-
ius; the Foreign Quarterly's refusal of The
Diamond Necklace, patently a masterpiece
though it was; Jeffrey's refusal to recom-
mend Carlyle for a professorship of astron-
omy; and, by way of climax, the defection of
one of those maids whose misdemeanors con-
tinue a servile war through so many of the
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? 48
LETTERS OF CARLYLE
Carlyle chronicles, directed Carlyle's gaze
toward what Johnson thought the fairest
prospect ever spread before a Scotchman.
Emerson had observed that "he was already
turning his eyes towards London with a
scholar's appreciation," and at last, on the
25th of February, 1834, Carlyle wrote to his
brother John: "We learned incidentally last
week that Grace, our servant, though 'with-
out fault to us,' and whom we, with all her
inertness, were nothing but purposing to
keep, had resolved on 'going home next sum-
mer. ' The cup that had long been filling ran
over with the smallest of drops. After medi-
tating on it for a few minutes, we said to one
another: 'Why not bolt out of all these sooty
despicabilities, of Kerrags and lying draggle-
tails of byre-women, and peat-moss and iso-
lation and exasperation and confusion, and
go at once to London? ' Gedacht, gethan!
Two days after we had a letter on the road
to Mrs. Austin, to look out among the
'houses to let' for us, and an advertisement
to Mac Diarmid to try for the letting of our
own. " Cattle, poultry, and various superflui-
ties, were sold. Carlyle went on ahead, and
was guided by the airy steps of Leigh Hunt,
then a dweller in Upper Cheyne Row, Chel-
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? IN LONDON
49
sea, to the house Number 5, Great Cheyne
Row, which the new tenants soon made inter-
esting to much of what was best in London
(to much, also, Mrs. Oliphant has taken pains
to say, of what was not the best), and event-
ually to the English-speaking world. The
house was not taken until Mrs. Carlyle had
inspected and approved it. A few days after
the 10th of June, the date of their installa-
tion, Carlyle wrote to his mother: "We he
safe at a bend of the river, away from all the
great roads; have air and quiet hardly infe-
rior to Craigenputtock, an outlook from the
back windows into mere leafy regions, with
here and there a red high-peaked old roof
looking through; and see nothing of London,
except by day the summits of St. Paul's Ca-
thedral and Westminster Abbey, and by night
the gleam of the great Babylon affronting
the peaceful skies. The house itself is prob-
ably the best we have ever lived in, a right
old, strong, roomy brick-house, built near
one hundred and fifty years ago, and likely
to see three races of these modern fashiona-
bles fall before it comes down. " It all sounds
like a sunny backwater, but in truth the Car-
lyles had taken a very bold plunge into the
world-sea. Their reserve of money could have
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? so
LETTERS OF CARLYLE
been, at the utmost, no more than three hun-
dred pounds; and the only personal sign of
the times for them was the fact that the
writer of Sartor -- now coming out in chap-
ters-- was thought a literary maniac, and
that Fraser feared the ruin of his magazine.
The household gods, however, once tem-
pled in Cheyne Row, were never carried back
across the Border; nor, in fact, were they,
in the half-century of life that remained to
Carlyle, removed to any other spot. Here he
caught the last glimpse of Edward Irving,
the friend of his youth; here he welcomed
Sterling, "a new young figure," the closest
friend of his middle life; and hither came to
him Froude and Ruskin, his latest followers.
At first, in the chosen habitation, it was
"desperate hope " and " bitter thrift. " The
readers of Fraser's Magazine received Sartor
each month with renewed disgust. "Sartor,"
said the publisher, "excites universal disap-
probation. " While this passionate history of
a soul, with its motive so strangely drawn
from the Holy Bible and the great, unholy
Dean, was waiting to touch the slow spirit of
the British reading public, Carlyle -- taking
counsel of his necessities, his ambition, and
his inspirations -- applied himself to the his-
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? THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 51
tory of the French Revolution. The first
volume -- as all the world knows -- was lent
in manuscript to Mill, who lent it to Mrs.
Taylor, his "veevid" and "iridescent" Ege-
ria, whose servant kindled fires with it. Car-
lyle had not been offered, as he thought he
should have been, the editorship of the new
London and Westminster Review; and Mill,
for fear of his father, did not dare even to
give him work to do for it. Carlyle himself
had refused to sell his independence to the
Times. There was thus nothing for it but to
rewrite the burnt volume, of which he had
kept no notes. With such vigor did he drive
his mind and his pen that the lost chapters
were restored by September 22, 1835. Mill
had told him of the loss on the 6th of the
preceding March. Mrs. Carlyle wrote to her
sister-in-law, Mrs. Aitken, in August: "I do
not think that the second version is, on the
whole, inferior to the first; it is a little less
vivacious, perhaps, but better thought and
put together. One chapter more brings him
to the end of his second 'first volume,' and
then we shall sing a Te Deum and get drunk;
for which, by the way, we have unusual facil-
ities at present, a friend (Mr. Wilson) having
yesterday sent us a present of a hamper (some
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? 52
LETTERS OF CABLYLE
six or seven pounds' worth) of the finest old
Madeira wine. "
Better yet than wine was an American edi-
tion of Sartor, godfathered by Emerson, to
the number of five hundred copies. This was
in April, 1836, and another edition was soon
demanded. Carlyle amused himself by quot-
ing the book, in his essay on Mirabeau, as the
work of a New England writer.
"The Doctor," mentioned in the letter to
follow, was Carlyle's brother John, who,
thanks to Jeffrey, had been for some years
traveling physician to Lady Clare. "Anne
Cook" was an Annan dale servant whom Car-
lyle brought with him on his return from
Scotsbrig, in October, 1835. Mrs. Carlyle
wrote of Anne Cook, "She amuses me every
hour of the day with her perfect incompre-
hension of everything like ceremony;" and
several of her homespun sayings became pro-
verbs in Cheyne Row. "Short," as Carlyle
uses it in writing to his sister, has apparently
the meaning often attached to it in New
England, -- " short of temper. " The whole
sentence bears a quizzing reference to the
year before, when, on the 4th of June, Car-
lyle had written: "Alick, writing to me yes-
terday, mentions among other things that you
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? THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 53
are shorted (as he phrases it) because I have
not written. . . . Do not you shorten, my
dear little Bairn, but lengthen, and know that
if you take anything amiss, it is for mere
want of seeing how it really was; that of all
delusions Satan could tempt you with, that
of wanting my brotherly affection, now and
always while we inhabit the Earth together,
is the most delusive. " And on the 23d of
December: "Do not shorten, but lengthen. " The "second volume" is, of course, the
second volume of The French Revolution.
Of both first and second Carlyle had written
more vehemently to Emerson, a few weeks
before: "I got the fatal First Volume fin-
ished (in the miserablest way, after great
efforts) in October last; my head was all in
a whirl; I fled to Scotland and my Mother
for a month of rest. Rest is nowhere for the
Son of Adam; all looked so 'spectral' to me
in my old-familiar Birthland; Hades itself
could not have seemed stranger; Annandale
also was part of the kingdom of Time. Since
November I have worked again as I could;
a second volume got wrapped up and sealed
out of my sight within the last three days.
There is but a Third now: one pull more,
and then! It seems to me, I will fly into
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? 64
LETTERS OF CARLYLE
some obscurest cranny of the world, and lie
silent there for a twelvemonth. The mind is
weary, the body is very sick; a little black
speck dances to and fro in the left eye (part
of the retina protesting against the liver, and
striking work). I cannot help it; it must
flutter and dance there, like a signal of dis-
tress, unanswered till I be done. My familiar
friends tell me farther that the Book is all
wrong, style, cramp, &c. , &c. My friends, I
answer, you are very right; but this also,
Heaven be my witness, I cannot help. -- In
such sort do I live here; all this I had to
write you, if I wrote at all. "
The contrast between such a passage and
the whole letter to his sister is but one of a
multitude of instances that show the change
in Carlyle's spirit whenever he sat down to
write to his home people.
h. cablyle to mrs. hanning, manchester.
5 Cheyne Row, Chelsea, London,
16th May, 1836.
My dear Jenny, -- Your letter has been here several weeks, a very welcome messen-
ger to us, and I did not think at the time I
should have been so long in answering it.
But I have been drawn hither and thither by
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? TO MBS. HANNING
55
many things, of late; besides, I judged that
Robert and you were happy enough of your-
selves for the present, and did not much need
any foreign aid or interruption. I need not
assure you, my dear little Jenny, of the inter-
est I took in the great enterprise you had
embarked on; of my wishes and prayers
that it might prove for the good of both.
On the whole, I can say that, to my judg-
ment, it looks all very fair and well. You
know I have all along regarded Hanning as
an uncommonly brisk, glegg little fellow since
the first time I saw him (hardly longer than
my leg, then), and prophesied handsome
things of him in the world. It is very rare
and very fortunate when two parties that have
affected each other from childhood upwards
get together in indissoluble partnership at
last. May it prove well for you, as I think
it will. You must take the good and the
ill in faithful mutual help, and, whoever or
whatever fail you, never fail one another. I
have no doubt Robert will shift his way with
all dexterity and prudence thro' that Cotton
Babylon, looking sharp about him; knowing
always, too, that " honesty is the best policy"
for all manner of men. Do thou faithfully
second him, my bairn: that will be the best
of lots for thee.
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? 56
LETTERS OF CAMLYLE
I think it possible that now and then, es-
pecially when you are left alone, the look of
so many foreign things may seem dispiriting
to you, and the huge smoke and stour of that
tumultuous Manchester (which is not unlike
the uglier parts of London) produce quite
other than a pleasant impression. But take
courage, my woman, "you will use, you will
use," and get hefted to the place, as all crea-
tures do. There are many good people in
that vast weaving - shop, many good things
among the innumerable bad. Keep snug
within your own doors, keep your own hearth
snug; by and by you will see what is worth
venturing out for. Have nothing to do with
the foolish, with the vain and ill-conducted.
Attach yourself to the well-living and sensi-
ble, to every one from whom you find there
is real benefit derivable. Thus, by degrees a
desirable little circle will form itself around
you; you will feel that Manchester is a home,
as all places under the heavenly sun here may
become for one.
In a newspaper you would notice that the
Doctor was come. Till this day, almost, there
was little else to be said about him than that
he was here and well. He has been specu-
lating and enquiring as to what he should do,
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? TO MRS. HANNING
67
and now has determined that London practice
will not do for the present; that he should
go back with his Lady and try again to get
practice there. He is gone out this moment
to make a bargain to that effect. They are
to set out for Rome again on the first of Sep-
tember; from that till the first of March the
Doctor is Lady Clare's doctor, but lives in his
own lodging at Rome; after that he is free to
do whatsoever he will: to stay there, if they
seem inviting; to return home, if otherwise.
I believe, myself, that he has decided wisely.
Till September, then, we have him amongst
us. He talks of being "off in a week or
two" for Scotland; he charged me to say
that he would see Manchester, and you, either
as he went or as he returned. It is not much
out of the way, if one go by Carlisle (or
rather, I suppose, it is directly in the way),
or even if one go by Liverpool, but I rather
think he will make for Newcastle this time;
to which place we have a steamboat direct.
This is a good season for steamboats, and a
bad one for coaches; for with latter, indeed,
what good season is there? Nothing in
the world is frightfuller to me of the travel-
ling rout, than a coach on a long journey.
It is easier by half to walk it with peas (at
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? 58
LETTERS OF CARLYLE
least boiled peas) in your shoes, were not the
time so much shorter. The Doctor looks very
well and sonsy; he seems in good health and
well to live; the only change is that his head
is getting a shade of grey (quite ahead of
mine, though I am six years older), which
does not mis-seem him, but looks very well.
We had a long speculation about going to
Scotland, too, but I doubt we must renounce
it. This summer I have finished my second
volume, but there is still the third to do, and
I must have such a tussle with it! All sum-
mer I will struggle and wrestle, but then
about the time of the gathering in of sheaves
I too shall be gathering in. Jane has gone
out to "buy a cotton gown," for the weather
is, at last, beautiful and warm. Before going
she bade me send you both her best wishes
and regards, prayers for a happy pilgrimage
together. She has been but poorly for a
good while (indeed, all the world is sick with
these east winds and perpetual changes), but
will probably be better now.
Jack and I, too, have both had our colds.
Then Anne Cook fell sick, almost danger-
ously sick for the time; but Jack was there
and gave abundant medical help; so the poor
creature is on her feet again, and a great
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? TO MRS. HANNING
59
trouble of confusion is rolled out of doors
thereby.
I am writing to our Mother this day. I
have heard nothing from that quarter since
the letter that informed me the poor little
child was dead. Jean wrote part of it her-
self, and seemed in a very composed state,
keeping her natural sorrow courageously
down. Our Mother, I believe, continues there
till Jean be ill again, and we hope happily
well. Whether there be a frank procurable
to-day I know not, but I will try. At worst
I will not wait, lest you grow impatient again
and get short. If you knew what a fizz I am
kept in with one thing and another! Write
to me when you have time to fill a sheet, --
news, descriptions of how you get on, what
you suffer and enjoy, what you do: these are
the best. I will answer. Send an old news-
paper from time to time, with two strokes on
it, if you are well. Promise, however, to
write instantly if you are ill. Then shall we
know to keep ourselves in peace.
Farewell, dear little Sister. Give our love
to our new Brother. Tell him to walk wisely
and be a credit to your choice. God be with
you both.
T. Caelyle.
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? 60
LETTERS OF CARLYLE
In Carlyle's Journal for June 1 occur these
words: --
"An eternity of life were not endurable to
any mortal. To me the thought of it were
madness even for one day. Oh! I am far
astray, wandering, lost, 'dyeing the thirsty
desert with my blood in every footprint. '
Perhaps God and His providence will be bet-
ter to me than I hope. Peace, peace! words
are idler than idle.
"I have seen Wordsworth again. I have
seen Landor, Americans, Frenchman-Cavaig-
nac the Republican. Be no word written of
them. Bubble bubble, toil and trouble. I
find emptiness and chagrin, look for nothing
else, and on the whole can reverence no ex-
isting man, and shall do well to pity all,
myself first, -- or rather, last. To work,
therefore. That will still me a little, if aught
will. "
Presently the household purse became so
shrunken that the Revolution had to be
dropped for two weeks, while Carlyle wrote
the article on Mirabeau. This -- printed
first in Mill's Review, and afterward in the
Miscellanies -- brought in about fifty pounds.
Mrs. Carlyle, meanwhile, became so ill that
it was arranged for her to go home to her
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? TO MBS. HANNING
61
mother. The voyage part of the plan, -- by steamer from Liverpool to Annan, -- which
had been merely for economy, was not carried
out. Mrs. Carlyle's Liverpool uncle, John
Welsh, paid her fare in the coach to Dum-
fries, and gave her a handsome shawl as a
present for her birthday, the 14th of July.
ID. CARLYLE TO MRS. HANNING, MANCHESTER.
Chelsea, 8th July, Friday, 1836.
Dear Jenny, -- I write you a few words
in the greatest haste, with a worthy Mr. Gib-
son even talking to me all the while; but I
must write, for there is not a post to lose,
and I think the news will not be unwelcome
to you.
Jane is getting ill again in this fiercely hot
weather, and I have persuaded her to go home
for a month to her mother. She is going
by Manchester, and you. Off some time to-
morrow (Saturday), and will be in your town,
we calculate, on Sunday, and hopes to sleep
in your house that night. This is the news.
Now we know not as yet by what coach she
will come, or at what hour and what Inn she
will arrive, but this Mr. Gibson, who has un-
dertaken to go out and search over the city
for the suitablest vehicle, and to engage a
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? 62
LETTERS OF CARLYLE
seat in that for her, will take this letter in his
pocket. He, having engaged the seat, -will
mark the name of it on the outside (where
see). I judge farther that this letter will
reach you on Saturday evening or next morn-
ing soon, so that there will be time. The
rest you will know how to do without telling.
I think Robert, if he be not altered from what
he was, will succeed in meeting the tired way-
farer as she steps out, which will be a great
comfort to her. She calculates on being at
full liberty to sit silent with you, or to sit
talking, to lie down on the bed, to do what-
soever she likes best to do, and to be in all
senses at home as in her own home. There
are few houses in England that could do as
much for her. I think she would like best
to be -- " well let alone. "
Next day, or when once right rested, Rob-
ert will conduct her to the Liverpool Railway,
and give her his " Luck by the road;" after
which she has but a little whirl, a little sail,
-- by the force of steam both ways, -- and is
at Templand or Annan. She will tell you all
our news and get all yours, so I need not add
another word. Did you get a frank that I
sent you some months ago? Did you ever
send even a newspaper since? Jane has half
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? MBS.
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? TO JANET CARLYLE
43
as a teacher of mathematics, and in 1816
went to Kirkcaldy to teach the same subject.
After an experience of literary hack work in
Edinburgh, which began when he was twenty-
three years old, he became tutor in the Buller
family. A long, strange, and ill-boding court-
ship ended, on the 17th of October, 1826, in
his marriage with Jane Baillie Welsh. She
had a small inherited estate at Craigenput-
tock, high up on the moors, and sixteen miles
from Dumfries; and there, two years after
their marriage, they went to live for six years.
In 1831 and 1832 they were merely trying
their wings in London.
"Mrs. Welsh" was Mrs. Carlyle's mother.
"Maister Cairlill" was a frequent name for
Carlyle's brother James. The family had
been living at Scotsbrig since 1826. Carlyle
was thirty-six years old, and his sister nine-
teen, when the following letter was written.
i. cablyle to janet carlyle, scotsbeio.
Ampton St. , London,
23rd January, 1832.
My dear Jenny, -- Will you put up with
the smallest of letters rather than with none
at all? I have hardly a moment, and no
paper but this thick, coarse sort.
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? 44
LETTERS OF CARLYLE
Understand always, My dear Sister, that I
love you well, and am very glad to see and
hear that you conduct yourself as you ought.
To you also, my little lassie, it is of infinite
importance how you behave: were you to get
a Kingdom, or twenty Kingdoms, it were but
a pitiful trifle compared with this, whether
you walked as God command you, and did
your duty to God and to all men. You have
a whole Life before you, to make much of or
to make little of: see you choose the better
part, my dear little sister, and make yourself
and all of us pleased with you. I will add
no more, but commend you from the heart
(as we should all do one another) to God's
keeping. May He ever bless you! I am too
late, and must not wait another minute. We
have this instant had a long letter from Mrs.
Welsh, full of kindness to our Mother and
all of you. The Cheese, &c, &c, is faithfully
commemorated as a "noble" one; Mary is
also made kind mention of. You did all very
right on that occasion. Mrs. Welsh says she
must come down to Scotsbrig and see you all.
What will you think of that? Her Father,
in the meantime, is very ill, and gives her in-
cessant labour and anxiety.
See to encourage Jean to write, and do
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? DEATH OF HIS FATHER
45
you put your hand a little to the work.
What does Maister Cairlill think of the last
letter he wrote us? Was it not a letter
among many? He is a graceless man. I
send you a portrait of one of our Chief Radi-
cals here: it is said to be very like.
I remain always, My dear Sister,
Your affectionate
T. Carlyle.
On January 24,-- Froude gives the date
wrongly as the 26th,--the day after the date
of this letter, Carlyle, still in London, heard
of the death of his father, at the age of sev-
enty-three. He wrote immediately to his mo-
ther in terms which place the letter high even
among his letters; and in less than a week he
had uttered the wail of genius that stands
first in the Reminiscences, -- a book which
has "no language but a cry. " By April he
was back again at Craigenputtock, where it
was so still that poor Mrs. Carlyle could hear
the sheep nibbling a quarter of a mile away.
Carlyle had now a new grief in the death of
Goethe, who, making of him a disciple, had
left him a teacher on his own account. The
loss of Goethe found a measurable compensa-
tion in correspondence with Mill, who had
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? 46
LETTERS OF CARLYLE
been kindled into something very like fire by
Carlyle's review of Croker's Boswell, just
published in Fraser's Magazine. It is one of
the greatest of Carlyle's briefer performances,
although written at short notice. "Carlyle,"
said his wife, "always writes well when he
writes fast. " This essay, indeed, has a high
place in the development of an idea which
may be stated as Croker's Boswell, Macaulay's
Boswell, Carlyle's Boswell, and -- Boswell.
There followed now essays on Goethe and
Ebenezer Elliott's Corn Law Rhymes (Car-
lyle's last contribution to the Edinburgh
Review), and a highly important article on
Diderot for the Foreign Quarterly. In the
autumn of 1832, Carlyle notes that the
money from the essay on Goethe has gone
in part payment of Jeffrey's loan, that Craig-
enputtock has grown too lonely even for him,
and that his literary plans demand a library.
Not only must the work on Diderot have
assured him of his ability to fuse and weld
the most stubborn materials, but it opened
his eyes to the French Revolution as a sub-
ject for his pen. Moved, then, by weariness
of the solitude a deux among the peat moss,
and by this new purpose in writing, the twain
removed to Edinburgh toward the end of
1832.
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? AT CRAIGENPUTTOCK
47
Four months of Edinburgh were enough
to convince Carlyle that here was for him no
continuing city; enough, also, to enable him
to collect and carry back to Craigenputtock
the substance of The Diamond Necklace, one
of the best of his tragi-comic pieces.
The loneliness of "the whinstone strong-
hold" on the moors was cheered in the fol-
lowing August by Emerson's memorable visit.
"We went out to walk over long hills,"
writes Emerson in English Traits, "and
looked at Criffel, then without his cap, and
down into Wordsworth's country. There we
sat down and talked of the immortality of
the soul. "
The essay on Cagliostro, written in March,
1833, was printed in Fraser's Magazine for
July and August; and Fraser agreed to pub-
lish Sartor Resartus in the next volume,
"only fining Carlyle eight guineas a sheet
for his originality. " This gadfly tax on gen-
ius; the Foreign Quarterly's refusal of The
Diamond Necklace, patently a masterpiece
though it was; Jeffrey's refusal to recom-
mend Carlyle for a professorship of astron-
omy; and, by way of climax, the defection of
one of those maids whose misdemeanors con-
tinue a servile war through so many of the
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? 48
LETTERS OF CARLYLE
Carlyle chronicles, directed Carlyle's gaze
toward what Johnson thought the fairest
prospect ever spread before a Scotchman.
Emerson had observed that "he was already
turning his eyes towards London with a
scholar's appreciation," and at last, on the
25th of February, 1834, Carlyle wrote to his
brother John: "We learned incidentally last
week that Grace, our servant, though 'with-
out fault to us,' and whom we, with all her
inertness, were nothing but purposing to
keep, had resolved on 'going home next sum-
mer. ' The cup that had long been filling ran
over with the smallest of drops. After medi-
tating on it for a few minutes, we said to one
another: 'Why not bolt out of all these sooty
despicabilities, of Kerrags and lying draggle-
tails of byre-women, and peat-moss and iso-
lation and exasperation and confusion, and
go at once to London? ' Gedacht, gethan!
Two days after we had a letter on the road
to Mrs. Austin, to look out among the
'houses to let' for us, and an advertisement
to Mac Diarmid to try for the letting of our
own. " Cattle, poultry, and various superflui-
ties, were sold. Carlyle went on ahead, and
was guided by the airy steps of Leigh Hunt,
then a dweller in Upper Cheyne Row, Chel-
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? IN LONDON
49
sea, to the house Number 5, Great Cheyne
Row, which the new tenants soon made inter-
esting to much of what was best in London
(to much, also, Mrs. Oliphant has taken pains
to say, of what was not the best), and event-
ually to the English-speaking world. The
house was not taken until Mrs. Carlyle had
inspected and approved it. A few days after
the 10th of June, the date of their installa-
tion, Carlyle wrote to his mother: "We he
safe at a bend of the river, away from all the
great roads; have air and quiet hardly infe-
rior to Craigenputtock, an outlook from the
back windows into mere leafy regions, with
here and there a red high-peaked old roof
looking through; and see nothing of London,
except by day the summits of St. Paul's Ca-
thedral and Westminster Abbey, and by night
the gleam of the great Babylon affronting
the peaceful skies. The house itself is prob-
ably the best we have ever lived in, a right
old, strong, roomy brick-house, built near
one hundred and fifty years ago, and likely
to see three races of these modern fashiona-
bles fall before it comes down. " It all sounds
like a sunny backwater, but in truth the Car-
lyles had taken a very bold plunge into the
world-sea. Their reserve of money could have
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? so
LETTERS OF CARLYLE
been, at the utmost, no more than three hun-
dred pounds; and the only personal sign of
the times for them was the fact that the
writer of Sartor -- now coming out in chap-
ters-- was thought a literary maniac, and
that Fraser feared the ruin of his magazine.
The household gods, however, once tem-
pled in Cheyne Row, were never carried back
across the Border; nor, in fact, were they,
in the half-century of life that remained to
Carlyle, removed to any other spot. Here he
caught the last glimpse of Edward Irving,
the friend of his youth; here he welcomed
Sterling, "a new young figure," the closest
friend of his middle life; and hither came to
him Froude and Ruskin, his latest followers.
At first, in the chosen habitation, it was
"desperate hope " and " bitter thrift. " The
readers of Fraser's Magazine received Sartor
each month with renewed disgust. "Sartor,"
said the publisher, "excites universal disap-
probation. " While this passionate history of
a soul, with its motive so strangely drawn
from the Holy Bible and the great, unholy
Dean, was waiting to touch the slow spirit of
the British reading public, Carlyle -- taking
counsel of his necessities, his ambition, and
his inspirations -- applied himself to the his-
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? THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 51
tory of the French Revolution. The first
volume -- as all the world knows -- was lent
in manuscript to Mill, who lent it to Mrs.
Taylor, his "veevid" and "iridescent" Ege-
ria, whose servant kindled fires with it. Car-
lyle had not been offered, as he thought he
should have been, the editorship of the new
London and Westminster Review; and Mill,
for fear of his father, did not dare even to
give him work to do for it. Carlyle himself
had refused to sell his independence to the
Times. There was thus nothing for it but to
rewrite the burnt volume, of which he had
kept no notes. With such vigor did he drive
his mind and his pen that the lost chapters
were restored by September 22, 1835. Mill
had told him of the loss on the 6th of the
preceding March. Mrs. Carlyle wrote to her
sister-in-law, Mrs. Aitken, in August: "I do
not think that the second version is, on the
whole, inferior to the first; it is a little less
vivacious, perhaps, but better thought and
put together. One chapter more brings him
to the end of his second 'first volume,' and
then we shall sing a Te Deum and get drunk;
for which, by the way, we have unusual facil-
ities at present, a friend (Mr. Wilson) having
yesterday sent us a present of a hamper (some
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? 52
LETTERS OF CABLYLE
six or seven pounds' worth) of the finest old
Madeira wine. "
Better yet than wine was an American edi-
tion of Sartor, godfathered by Emerson, to
the number of five hundred copies. This was
in April, 1836, and another edition was soon
demanded. Carlyle amused himself by quot-
ing the book, in his essay on Mirabeau, as the
work of a New England writer.
"The Doctor," mentioned in the letter to
follow, was Carlyle's brother John, who,
thanks to Jeffrey, had been for some years
traveling physician to Lady Clare. "Anne
Cook" was an Annan dale servant whom Car-
lyle brought with him on his return from
Scotsbrig, in October, 1835. Mrs. Carlyle
wrote of Anne Cook, "She amuses me every
hour of the day with her perfect incompre-
hension of everything like ceremony;" and
several of her homespun sayings became pro-
verbs in Cheyne Row. "Short," as Carlyle
uses it in writing to his sister, has apparently
the meaning often attached to it in New
England, -- " short of temper. " The whole
sentence bears a quizzing reference to the
year before, when, on the 4th of June, Car-
lyle had written: "Alick, writing to me yes-
terday, mentions among other things that you
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? THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 53
are shorted (as he phrases it) because I have
not written. . . . Do not you shorten, my
dear little Bairn, but lengthen, and know that
if you take anything amiss, it is for mere
want of seeing how it really was; that of all
delusions Satan could tempt you with, that
of wanting my brotherly affection, now and
always while we inhabit the Earth together,
is the most delusive. " And on the 23d of
December: "Do not shorten, but lengthen. " The "second volume" is, of course, the
second volume of The French Revolution.
Of both first and second Carlyle had written
more vehemently to Emerson, a few weeks
before: "I got the fatal First Volume fin-
ished (in the miserablest way, after great
efforts) in October last; my head was all in
a whirl; I fled to Scotland and my Mother
for a month of rest. Rest is nowhere for the
Son of Adam; all looked so 'spectral' to me
in my old-familiar Birthland; Hades itself
could not have seemed stranger; Annandale
also was part of the kingdom of Time. Since
November I have worked again as I could;
a second volume got wrapped up and sealed
out of my sight within the last three days.
There is but a Third now: one pull more,
and then! It seems to me, I will fly into
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? 64
LETTERS OF CARLYLE
some obscurest cranny of the world, and lie
silent there for a twelvemonth. The mind is
weary, the body is very sick; a little black
speck dances to and fro in the left eye (part
of the retina protesting against the liver, and
striking work). I cannot help it; it must
flutter and dance there, like a signal of dis-
tress, unanswered till I be done. My familiar
friends tell me farther that the Book is all
wrong, style, cramp, &c. , &c. My friends, I
answer, you are very right; but this also,
Heaven be my witness, I cannot help. -- In
such sort do I live here; all this I had to
write you, if I wrote at all. "
The contrast between such a passage and
the whole letter to his sister is but one of a
multitude of instances that show the change
in Carlyle's spirit whenever he sat down to
write to his home people.
h. cablyle to mrs. hanning, manchester.
5 Cheyne Row, Chelsea, London,
16th May, 1836.
My dear Jenny, -- Your letter has been here several weeks, a very welcome messen-
ger to us, and I did not think at the time I
should have been so long in answering it.
But I have been drawn hither and thither by
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? TO MBS. HANNING
55
many things, of late; besides, I judged that
Robert and you were happy enough of your-
selves for the present, and did not much need
any foreign aid or interruption. I need not
assure you, my dear little Jenny, of the inter-
est I took in the great enterprise you had
embarked on; of my wishes and prayers
that it might prove for the good of both.
On the whole, I can say that, to my judg-
ment, it looks all very fair and well. You
know I have all along regarded Hanning as
an uncommonly brisk, glegg little fellow since
the first time I saw him (hardly longer than
my leg, then), and prophesied handsome
things of him in the world. It is very rare
and very fortunate when two parties that have
affected each other from childhood upwards
get together in indissoluble partnership at
last. May it prove well for you, as I think
it will. You must take the good and the
ill in faithful mutual help, and, whoever or
whatever fail you, never fail one another. I
have no doubt Robert will shift his way with
all dexterity and prudence thro' that Cotton
Babylon, looking sharp about him; knowing
always, too, that " honesty is the best policy"
for all manner of men. Do thou faithfully
second him, my bairn: that will be the best
of lots for thee.
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? 56
LETTERS OF CAMLYLE
I think it possible that now and then, es-
pecially when you are left alone, the look of
so many foreign things may seem dispiriting
to you, and the huge smoke and stour of that
tumultuous Manchester (which is not unlike
the uglier parts of London) produce quite
other than a pleasant impression. But take
courage, my woman, "you will use, you will
use," and get hefted to the place, as all crea-
tures do. There are many good people in
that vast weaving - shop, many good things
among the innumerable bad. Keep snug
within your own doors, keep your own hearth
snug; by and by you will see what is worth
venturing out for. Have nothing to do with
the foolish, with the vain and ill-conducted.
Attach yourself to the well-living and sensi-
ble, to every one from whom you find there
is real benefit derivable. Thus, by degrees a
desirable little circle will form itself around
you; you will feel that Manchester is a home,
as all places under the heavenly sun here may
become for one.
In a newspaper you would notice that the
Doctor was come. Till this day, almost, there
was little else to be said about him than that
he was here and well. He has been specu-
lating and enquiring as to what he should do,
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? TO MRS. HANNING
67
and now has determined that London practice
will not do for the present; that he should
go back with his Lady and try again to get
practice there. He is gone out this moment
to make a bargain to that effect. They are
to set out for Rome again on the first of Sep-
tember; from that till the first of March the
Doctor is Lady Clare's doctor, but lives in his
own lodging at Rome; after that he is free to
do whatsoever he will: to stay there, if they
seem inviting; to return home, if otherwise.
I believe, myself, that he has decided wisely.
Till September, then, we have him amongst
us. He talks of being "off in a week or
two" for Scotland; he charged me to say
that he would see Manchester, and you, either
as he went or as he returned. It is not much
out of the way, if one go by Carlisle (or
rather, I suppose, it is directly in the way),
or even if one go by Liverpool, but I rather
think he will make for Newcastle this time;
to which place we have a steamboat direct.
This is a good season for steamboats, and a
bad one for coaches; for with latter, indeed,
what good season is there? Nothing in
the world is frightfuller to me of the travel-
ling rout, than a coach on a long journey.
It is easier by half to walk it with peas (at
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? 58
LETTERS OF CARLYLE
least boiled peas) in your shoes, were not the
time so much shorter. The Doctor looks very
well and sonsy; he seems in good health and
well to live; the only change is that his head
is getting a shade of grey (quite ahead of
mine, though I am six years older), which
does not mis-seem him, but looks very well.
We had a long speculation about going to
Scotland, too, but I doubt we must renounce
it. This summer I have finished my second
volume, but there is still the third to do, and
I must have such a tussle with it! All sum-
mer I will struggle and wrestle, but then
about the time of the gathering in of sheaves
I too shall be gathering in. Jane has gone
out to "buy a cotton gown," for the weather
is, at last, beautiful and warm. Before going
she bade me send you both her best wishes
and regards, prayers for a happy pilgrimage
together. She has been but poorly for a
good while (indeed, all the world is sick with
these east winds and perpetual changes), but
will probably be better now.
Jack and I, too, have both had our colds.
Then Anne Cook fell sick, almost danger-
ously sick for the time; but Jack was there
and gave abundant medical help; so the poor
creature is on her feet again, and a great
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? TO MRS. HANNING
59
trouble of confusion is rolled out of doors
thereby.
I am writing to our Mother this day. I
have heard nothing from that quarter since
the letter that informed me the poor little
child was dead. Jean wrote part of it her-
self, and seemed in a very composed state,
keeping her natural sorrow courageously
down. Our Mother, I believe, continues there
till Jean be ill again, and we hope happily
well. Whether there be a frank procurable
to-day I know not, but I will try. At worst
I will not wait, lest you grow impatient again
and get short. If you knew what a fizz I am
kept in with one thing and another! Write
to me when you have time to fill a sheet, --
news, descriptions of how you get on, what
you suffer and enjoy, what you do: these are
the best. I will answer. Send an old news-
paper from time to time, with two strokes on
it, if you are well. Promise, however, to
write instantly if you are ill. Then shall we
know to keep ourselves in peace.
Farewell, dear little Sister. Give our love
to our new Brother. Tell him to walk wisely
and be a credit to your choice. God be with
you both.
T. Caelyle.
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? 60
LETTERS OF CARLYLE
In Carlyle's Journal for June 1 occur these
words: --
"An eternity of life were not endurable to
any mortal. To me the thought of it were
madness even for one day. Oh! I am far
astray, wandering, lost, 'dyeing the thirsty
desert with my blood in every footprint. '
Perhaps God and His providence will be bet-
ter to me than I hope. Peace, peace! words
are idler than idle.
"I have seen Wordsworth again. I have
seen Landor, Americans, Frenchman-Cavaig-
nac the Republican. Be no word written of
them. Bubble bubble, toil and trouble. I
find emptiness and chagrin, look for nothing
else, and on the whole can reverence no ex-
isting man, and shall do well to pity all,
myself first, -- or rather, last. To work,
therefore. That will still me a little, if aught
will. "
Presently the household purse became so
shrunken that the Revolution had to be
dropped for two weeks, while Carlyle wrote
the article on Mirabeau. This -- printed
first in Mill's Review, and afterward in the
Miscellanies -- brought in about fifty pounds.
Mrs. Carlyle, meanwhile, became so ill that
it was arranged for her to go home to her
? ? Generated for (University of Chicago) on 2014-11-14 09:17 GMT / http://hdl. handle. net/2027/hvd. 32044090311788 Public Domain, Google-digitized / http://www. hathitrust. org/access_use#pd-google
? TO MBS. HANNING
61
mother. The voyage part of the plan, -- by steamer from Liverpool to Annan, -- which
had been merely for economy, was not carried
out. Mrs. Carlyle's Liverpool uncle, John
Welsh, paid her fare in the coach to Dum-
fries, and gave her a handsome shawl as a
present for her birthday, the 14th of July.
ID. CARLYLE TO MRS. HANNING, MANCHESTER.
Chelsea, 8th July, Friday, 1836.
Dear Jenny, -- I write you a few words
in the greatest haste, with a worthy Mr. Gib-
son even talking to me all the while; but I
must write, for there is not a post to lose,
and I think the news will not be unwelcome
to you.
Jane is getting ill again in this fiercely hot
weather, and I have persuaded her to go home
for a month to her mother. She is going
by Manchester, and you. Off some time to-
morrow (Saturday), and will be in your town,
we calculate, on Sunday, and hopes to sleep
in your house that night. This is the news.
Now we know not as yet by what coach she
will come, or at what hour and what Inn she
will arrive, but this Mr. Gibson, who has un-
dertaken to go out and search over the city
for the suitablest vehicle, and to engage a
? ? Generated for (University of Chicago) on 2014-11-14 09:17 GMT / http://hdl. handle. net/2027/hvd. 32044090311788 Public Domain, Google-digitized / http://www. hathitrust. org/access_use#pd-google
? 62
LETTERS OF CARLYLE
seat in that for her, will take this letter in his
pocket. He, having engaged the seat, -will
mark the name of it on the outside (where
see). I judge farther that this letter will
reach you on Saturday evening or next morn-
ing soon, so that there will be time. The
rest you will know how to do without telling.
I think Robert, if he be not altered from what
he was, will succeed in meeting the tired way-
farer as she steps out, which will be a great
comfort to her. She calculates on being at
full liberty to sit silent with you, or to sit
talking, to lie down on the bed, to do what-
soever she likes best to do, and to be in all
senses at home as in her own home. There
are few houses in England that could do as
much for her. I think she would like best
to be -- " well let alone. "
Next day, or when once right rested, Rob-
ert will conduct her to the Liverpool Railway,
and give her his " Luck by the road;" after
which she has but a little whirl, a little sail,
-- by the force of steam both ways, -- and is
at Templand or Annan. She will tell you all
our news and get all yours, so I need not add
another word. Did you get a frank that I
sent you some months ago? Did you ever
send even a newspaper since? Jane has half
? ? Generated for (University of Chicago) on 2014-11-14 09:17 GMT / http://hdl. handle. net/2027/hvd. 32044090311788 Public Domain, Google-digitized / http://www. hathitrust. org/access_use#pd-google
? MBS.
