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Leader (1850-1860), 5th May 1860, Edition 1 of 2, Page 423, Untitled Article

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    • MALONE, THE SHAKSPERIAX COMMENTATOR.*
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      Untitled Article

      THERE is little excuse for the man who writes a dull biography . The most uneventful life may be invested with an interest , if the writer have'bnt ordinary sympathy with humanity ; aiid if he have not , lie had £ elter let his task alone . Edmoml Malone , scholar , ¦ editor and critic , was not , perhaps , a very promising- subject for a memoir , but it promised something-. The reader might expect fresh pictures of that literary society which comprised John-son , Sir Joshua , Burke , the Wartons , Isa-ic Heed , George Steevens , and a host of others , whose names still linger about ' C > vent Garden and the courts of Fleet Street—new contracts of the hard laborious scholar and the social man—more curiosities of literary warfare , such as Shaksperian critics only know how to wajre . Little of these thhvs , however , will he find in Sir James Prior ' s book . It is shi' -ular , indeed , after going through the pages of the memoir , to find how little it contains of real flesh and blood . The world does

      scant justice to mwi of Malone ' s class , obstinately persisting- in believing' them to be all mere Dryasdusts , fellows whose hearts sire j shrunken and colourless as the ancient papers and parchments which they love to pore over . Sir James Prior will not , in this c ; i-e at least , have helped to destroy the prejudice . A gentleman with a irotlier a" < l father his hero certainly is . He has . also otner relatives ¦ and iViends ; but the chief attributes of the gentleman here pre- j sentod to us nre prefaces and marginal notes , parochial resistors and legal records , scarce copies and cJiliones pn ' nrijivs , new readings ami felicitous emendations . We do not say that this is altogether

      the author ' s fault . It is possible that the " books , papers , and ; memoranda" which famished Sir James with the materials for ; writing- the private life of Malohe would yield nothing better ; but ; in tins case , the reader may ask , why write a , life of Edinond Malone ? " ' i The story Of llalone ' s lifeis soon told ^ IIe was born niDtioisn ,- nnthe : 4 th of October , 17-11 , being the son of Kdmond M . ilone . a conspicuous man at the Irish bur , and his wife the daughter , of a "London mer- , -chant , named Collier . . The future editor studied at Trinity College . ; Dublin—was destined for the Bar—removed to London , and entered of the Inner Templd in 1703 : became introduced to Johnson— _ made a tour on the continent—returned to Dublin to pursue the

      authors . to which the Irish barrister was now about to be . \ y « : ddcd ; for life . His correspondents discourse , far less of men than of bonks j and manuscript !? : < mo conveys to him the awful- intelligence of the I destinv of a learned friend ' s books . " the ship in which they were j embarked" having " foundered oil ' . Beechy Head , " and " all his ! first editions gone ' to the bottom ! " What wonder that the writer j avoided the danger of si 11 miti-climax by omit ting to say ^ whether any huninn lives were also . sacrificed ? This , with the mention of the various publications put firth'by Muloue , positively " makes all the history , " unless we exec ;)! that / event whii-h gives to the close ( if all biographies such a . torrihlo sameness—the . death of its hero , wltiih took place , on the 25 th May , 1 S 1 . 2 . Malone ' s life must have had more of romance in it than hero ¦

      | youn" Pretender , in short , did not dunce sit Avignon on August lb , " isimnly because he did not . get away and naive ju Paris till October , iind aid not go to Avi . ru » n tili Ions ; after . Here , again , we find , the old story of Lord ( Kford ' s letter to the Duke of Marl borough , which led , as is alleged , t . ) the suspension of procjeding .-i against the former , und which has again and again been shown to be inconsistent with proved f . icis : and , among a score of blunders and iib-itird mis-statements concerning Lady Mary . Montagu , we have the remarkable piece of information -that on her deathbed she . gave seventeen liirge volumes in manuscript of her letters , memoirs , and no . M'is , to the clergyman who attended her , with an injunction to publish them , " but that L : » ly Bute , to prevent , this , " prevailed on her husband " to yive the clergyman a good Crown living ; and

      that . " for tliis bribe he broke his trust . " This was , no doubt , tile va- ' un story llonling about -in ¦ MiiIoiio ' h days ; but , Sir James Prior ouMit to have known that the true version has been before the w . M-ld ever since IXilhiway ' s edition of Lady Montagu ' s works m ] 8 () : * . He may there , or ' in any of the numerous editions since published , see . that- tin-re is scarcely one particular in which he has not ridiculously exaggerated and misrepresented the whole story . Some of tho ' uncedotes are new to us . and one or two may bo worlh quoting . Here . is a now paragraph of Walpolimm :- — " Air lock ofX . nburv P-. wk , wMl known for hi * collection of pictures , hter oi |

      BtiituoB , &e ., win n Mutual «<>••• On hU tivirnnx * withtlie daug hudy » oluiul > , wlio hud lioet . very gulltuit , iloi-. ico Vnlyu lu Himl very lit *;> l » iW ' Tnen everybody's daughter is married to nobody h Ron . ¦ Here , too , is an anecdote of . Johnson , which represents the sturdy lexicographer in tin entirely iiow character : — " Johneon . itMi . poarfl , was willing to chnnge ' tlio air of Holt Court for that of » Hiihurliiiii palace . Ho thorolWe . applied lor h rotrciU , wheio J " v « r .. l parties ,, f hi .. 1 moan * , and of * omo puLlio claims turn the r eyes with similar ivx , » , ! ct ., tl .. n « "I ui .. li .., < ali . ; uie . Ho l .-. l .-d «»•« l' «« ' wi' »» J \« ' knowludKu ol' hid MujoHty is doubtful . The folluwu . tf u tlio luttor at «]) pl » - outioii ami reply : —

      ^*^ w ¦ ^ - * m m \* > i in ^^ III Mill' ll <* * \ j ll ** » i » m * * * ' m ** ¦ - » ,..--.----. .-appears . A jmrsuit which led him away from a moncy-miikin ^ profession , recompensed him for the loss of l /; ie lady with I hi ? "thick , letfs , " as well as " ' Jl-iss 11 -, " and en-Tossed his dnily thoughts throughout a lou « , « - life . in n deyree which to men of the world w . -meil like si » me kIi-jui ^ s inadnc- < s , could not , have been so " harsh or cnibbud " as ( hill souls believe . JMalont ; wus one of th . s earliest (> f that school of lilentry nutifjuiiries who sought , with something like painstaking accur . icy , ' for facts not only literary but biographical , concerning tho writers of tlm pnst . We say . " fur . . s . ou . ioDiiuy ., like j accuracy , " because the character which he enjovo I in his -lifetime I

      for this quality must now receive Koine abatement by comparison with the higher utaudnrd of editorship and literary research which , bus since grown up .. Nowhere is this truth in ore- conspicuous than in the number of anecdotes , Popiana , Mnloninna , itc , from Muloue ' s luanuNcriptH , which Sir Junics Prior has incorporated with his work , nnd \ yhich , though welcoaiu us enlivening n » otherwise dull book , must bo read with caMtio ' u . They abound , indeed , " in errors and

      mispractice of the law , but soon showed a d .-cided preference to contri- - buting- articles to the newspapers , and corre-spondintr on literary subjects with his friends Ciietwood and Sxithwcll , andL' » rd Charlemont , the patron of Uurke—and -finally blossomed out an editor in ' a new collection of Goldsmith ' s works , published in Dublin . His ! father and mother both died about this period ; ami his ' uncle , Anthony "Maione also dying , left his ' estate at Karonst-owu and ¦ elsewhere to KdmoiuVs elder brother , afterwanls Lord Sundering ; j and now , " IiavJny none whose wishes it was necessary to consult , " j ¦ "Kilmonil > elurhecrn 3 TTjP 7 ml ! 5 n ^ Steevens , and men of his class—to plunge into the buttle of Shaksperiiin criticism then raging , and to set up as professional editor , . annotator , and critic , in which characters he is well known to tlie j world . There is , indeed , some mysterious talk of a '' Miss B— " ! a . nd a lady with " thick legs ; " but beyond those strong tokens of , materiiil existence here and there brought forward , the ladies might , be inerelv allegorical iiiruies representing that ardent s ! udy ol old '

      fitatements , so glaring that it is iucivdiUle that his biographer could have published them , as he has . in nearly every case , without remark . Sir James Prior more than once dwells up > n Malone ' s accuracy , and quotes in the outset of his narrative one of his letters , in which lie jusMy says , " Give mo but lime , place , and names , and the genuineness or falsehood of any story may b ? easily ascertained . " Tested , however , i : i this way , wliat becomes of P . ipisiu-a , Maloniana , and of half the stones with which Sir James Prior has filled out his book ? ¦ . » Scarcely loss unjustifiable is the way in which he has reproduced , from Malone ' s rough memoranda , stories which have , since Malone ' s time , been ren . lered familiar to every reader . Why should we be confidentially let into the secret of how Sir Spencer Compton ( Lord " Wilmington ) being- unable to draw up the first speech of King ¦ bbb ¦ ¦

      » ^*««» J * ^ ^^ / ^^ ^^ fr I * George the . Second , called in the aid of Sir Jloberfc Walpole , and so lost liis post , which Walpole then regained , when we have long had the whole story in Horace Wai pole ' s well-known " Reminiscences ?" What can now be more absurd than starting a disquisition upon Junius with the remark , that "It has long- been a question who was the author of the letters which appeared under the signature of ' Juniu * . ' i « 1700 awl 1770 , " and then unfolding the absurd theory that Jiniias was Burke ' s -friend , Samuel Dyer ? What reader has not already met with the anecdote of Thomson justifying- his not o-ettiiv out of bed till middaV on the ground that he " had no

      | | mol-ih-c / '" Who has not heard that " Sir Joshua R-yni ^ ds once saw Popo . ' ' and t ' Viat it was at an auction of books or pictures ? Why , the hist popular edition of Pope ' s works has , we think , an enu ' ravinif representing-the auction-room , Sir Joshua , and the poet . Again . - why should we be told in 1 . S 00 , as a piece of curious intellruciu ' c , that " Swift made several observations on the margin of Burnett " s History of his own Time , " that Lord Onslow had another copy ' filled with * . remarks of his father the Speaker "— -with the additional observation , " they are short , he says , bnt very pointed and characteristic , " &e . Everybody who has read Burnett knows

      | | •' that'both Swift ' s and Speaker Onslow ' s remarks have been long printed with the " History , " in the form of marginal notes . Surely it Ls too hite in tlie-day to be told that " Mr . Walpole remembered " Pope ' s Patty Biount . ¦ " * . winking- to Mr . Bethell ' s , in Arlington Streefe , alter Pope ' s death , with her petticoats fucked tip like a sempstress ;" for what ' reader interested in the literary life of the last century does not remenber WalpoieVimmifcable description , in his letters , _ of Pope ' s Patty Blount , in her pattens on a rainy day , with nothing - of her beauty ' remaining but ' '• her blue eyes , " going up to visit " blameles- ; 'Beth-ell , " who was ill " at the end of the street ?" . We could qtiote a score of such cases of stale anecdotes given as " new : but the number of those which , though , " new , " are " not true , "

      is unfortunately no less . Take one or two . Maione , in a letter from Avignon , now published , gives the following anecdote ot that town : — " ' . Vvi'Mion is verv f . ir fi-om beina ; a place one would wish to settle in . It has mi sort «» f " tr . ide or business , no public entertiiiunicnts , and i 3 besides sin old , stva ^ Vu ^ , u-ly town .- It was reiul . ; i-od f . imou . s tor some tiirc-by tl-e resi > lcnc-J of tiie <> 1 1 Pretender , atnliii the y-.-. u- Ii 4 u his son ¦ retired thither after the rebellion . 'He lived very-magnificently , but so void of " rutitude . or even common decency , na to « ivo a { jrand ball , at which -he da-ncci ; at the very time he well knew his party , Lords J 3 al" -nn ^ rrmr ^ rntHvtht > TtU ^ ri ^ w ^ iM-U ^ 4 i ^ theiiUiJ 4 U ^^ , , This is ; r grave chargj against the young PreteiuU-r , who , whatever he may afier . vards liave sunk to , was at this time a fine , dashing fellow , " of really mutily qualities . Fortunately , this is one of those cases in which " time , place , and names " enable us to test the story , and pronounce it decidedly spurious ; fin- Kilinnllock and the brave Baluiarino weiv executed On the . IStli of August , 17-JMi , at the tijno when Charles Ed vard was still a wanderer and a fugitive . The

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      May 5 , ¦ 1 SC . 0 . J The Leader ami Saturday Analyst . 423

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      a penny pickwick . Shnll we , his elders tnen , have no more . black S iith our jugged hare ? Shall there be , m fact , because ye are virtuous , O ve Vegetarians , O ye Anti-to mccomsts , O ye xeetotallaw , m )" mure beef and mutton , uo more birds -eye ana ,, caven-• dish / no more "( Jakes and Ale ? " *

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      * Life ofJMniaml Union ? , F . Ut » v of $ h < tl'si > v « ro . AVith Si / leutiorm i ' rmix lus Manuscript Anecdotes . Uy . ^ ir . fA . Miid J ' ujoit . London : yniith , Elder , uud Co . p .

      Malone, The Shaksperiax Commentator.*

      M-VLOVE . THE SHAKSPERIAX COMMEXTATOB .. *

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), May 5, 1860, page 423, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2346/page/11/