sionately; and Johnson just knew the bell of | pocket, and the French Ambassador, M. De St. Clement's Church from the organ. They Guignes, renowned for his fine person and for had, however, many topics in common; and on his success in gallantry. But the great show winter nights their conversations were some of the night was the Russian ambassador, times prolonged till the fire had gone out, and Count Orloff, whose gigantic figure was all in the candles had burned away to the wicks. a blaze with jewels and in whose demeanour Burney's admiration of the powers which had the untamed ferocity of the Scythian might be produced Rasselas and The Rambler, bordered discerned through a thin varnish of French po. on idolatry. He gave a singular proof of this liteness. As he stalked about the small par at his first visit to Johnson's ill-furnished garlour, brushing the ceiling with his toupee, the ret. The master of the apartment was not at home. The enthusiastic visitor looked about for some relique which he might carry away; but he could see nothing lighter than the chairs and the fire-irons. At last he discovered an old broom, tore some bristles from the stump, wrapped them in silver paper, and departed as happy as Louis IX, when the holy nail of St. Denis was found. Johnson, on the other hand, condescended to growl out that Burney was an honest fellow, a man whom it was impossibie not to like. Garrick, too, was a frequent visitor in Poland Street and St. Martin's Lane. That wonderful actor loved the society of children, partly from good-nature, and partly from vanity. The ecstasies of mirth and terror which his gestures and play of countenance never failed to produce in a nursery, flattered him quite as much as the applause of mature critics. He often exhibited all his powers of mimicry for the amusement of the little Burneys, awed them by shuddering and crouching as if he saw a ghost, scared them by raving like a maniac in St. Luke's and then at once became an auctioneer, a chimney-sweeper, or an old woman, and made them laugh till the tears ran down their cheeks. But it would be tedious to recount the names of all the men of letters and artists whom Frances Burney had an opportunity of seeing and hearing. Colman, Twining, Harris, Baretti, Hawkesworth, Reynolds, Barry, were among those who occasionally surrounded the teatable and supper-tray at her father's modest dwelling. This was not all. The distinction which Dr. Burney had acquired as a musician, and as the historian of music, attracted to his house the most eminent musical performers of that age. The greatest Italian singers who visited England regarded him as the dispenser of fame in their art, and exerted themselves to obtain his suffrage. Pachieroti became his intimate friend. The rapacious Agujari, who sang for nobody else under fifty pounds an air, sang her best for Dr. Burney without a fee; and in the company of Dr. Burney even the haughty and eccentric Gabrielli constrained herself to behave with civility. It was thus in his power to give, with scarcely any expense, concerts equal to those of the aristocracy. On such occasions the quiet street in which he lived was blocked up by coroneted chariots, and his little drawing-room was crowded with peers, peeresses, ministers, and ambassadors. On one evening, of which we happen to have a full account, there were present Lord Mulgrave, Lord Bruce, Lord and Lady Edgecumbe, Lord Barrington from the War-Office, Lord Sandwich from the Admiralty, Lord Ashburn with his gold key dangling from his girls whispered to each other, with mingled admiration and horror, that he was the favoured lover of his august mistress; that he had borne the chief part in the revolution to which she owed her throne; and that his huge hands, now glittering with diamond rings, had given the last squeeze to the windpipe of her unfortunate husband. With such iliustrious guests as these were mingled all the most remarkable specimens of the race of lions-a kind of game which is hunted in London every spring with more than Meltonian ardour and perseverance. Bruce, who had washed down steaks cut from living oxen with water from the fountains of the Nile, came to swagger and talk about his travels. Omai lisped broken English, and made all the assembled musicians hold their ears by howl. ing Otaheitean love-songs, such as those with which Oberea charmed her Opano. She With the literary and fashionable society which occasionally met under Dr. Burney's roof, Frances can scarcely be said to have mingled. She was not a musician, and could therefore bear no part in the concerts. was shy almost to awkwardness, and scarcely ever joined in the conversation. The slightest remark from a stranger disconcerted her; and even the old friends of her father who tried to draw her out could seldom extract more than a Yes or a No. Her figure was small, her face not distinguished by beauty. She was there fore suffered to withdraw quietly to the background, and, unobserved herself, to observe all that passed. Her nearest relations were aware that she had good sense, but seemed not to have suspected, that under her demure and bashful deportment were concealed a fertile invention and a keen sense of the ridiculous. She had not. it is true, an eye for the fine shades of character. But every marked peculiarity instantly caught her notice and remained engraven on her imagination. Thus, while still a girl, she had laid up such a store of materials for fiction as few of those who mix much in the world are able to accumulate during a long life. She had watched and listened to people of every class, from princes and great cfficers of state down to artists living in garrets, and poets familiar with subterranean cook-shops. Hundreds of remarkable persons had passed in review before her, English, French, German, Italian, lords and fiddlers, deans of cathedrals, and managers of theatres, travellers leading about newly caught savages, and singing women escorted by deputy-husbands. So strong was the impression made on the mind of Frances by the society which she as in the habit of seeing and hearing, that she be gan to write little fictitious narratives as soon as she could use her pen with ease, which, as they now prefer, we have no doubt, Jack Shep pard to Von Artevelde. A man of great origi nal genius, on the other hand, a man who has attained to mastery in some high walk of art is by no means to be implicitly trusted as a judge of the performances of others. The er roneous decisions pronounced by such men are without number. It is commonly supposed that jealousy makes them unjust. But a more creditable explanation may easily be found. The very excellence of a work shows that some of the faculties of the author have been devel we have said, was not very early. Her sisters were amused by her stories. But Dr. Burney knew nothing of their existence; and in another quarter her literary propensities met with serious discouragement. When she was fifteen, her father took a second wife. The new Mrs. Burney soon found out that her daughter-inlaw was fond of scribbling, and delivered several good-natured lectures on the subject. The advice no doubt was well meant, and might have been given by the most judicious friend; for at that time, from causes to which we may hereafter advert, nothing could be more disad-oped at the expense of the rest; for it is not vantageous to a young lady than to be known as a novel-writer. Frances yielded, relinquished her favourite pursuit, and made a bonfire of all her manuscripts." given to the human intellect to expand itself widely in all directions at once, and to be at the same time gigantic and well-proportioned. Whoever becomes pre-eminent in any art, nay, She now hemmed and stitched from break-in any style of art, generally does so by devot fast to dinner with scrupulous regularity. But ing himself with intense and exclusive enthu the dinners of that time were early; and the siasm to the pursuit of one kind of excellence. afternoon was her own. Though she had given His perception of other kinds of excellence is up novel-writing, she was still fond of using therefore too often impaired. Out of his own her pen. She began to keep a diary, and she department he praises and blames at random, corresponded largely with a person who seems and is far less to be trusted than the mere con to have had the chief share in the formation of noisseur, who produces nothing, and whose her mind. This was Samuel Crisp, an old business is only to judge and enjoy. One friend of her father. His name, well known painter is distinguished by his exquisite finish near a century ago, in the most splendid cir- ing. He toils day after day to bring the veins cles of London, has long been forgotten. His of a cabbage-leaf, the folds of a lace veil, the history is, however, so interesting and instruc-wrinkles of an old woman's face, nearer and tive, that it tempts us to venture on a digression. nearer to perfection. In the time which he Long before Frances Burney was born, Mr. Crisp had made his entrance into the world with every advantage. He was well connected and well educated. His face and figure were conspicuously handsome; his manners were polished; his fortune was easy; his character was without stain; he lived in the best society; he had read much; he talked well; his taste in Literature, music, painting, architecture, sculp-ciate each other. Many persons who never ture, was held in high esteem. Nothing that the world can give seemed to be wanting to his happiness and respectability, except that he should understand the limits of his powers, and should not throw away distinctions which were within his reach, in the pursuit of distinctions which were unattainable. employs on a square foot of canvass, a master of a different order covers the walls of a palace with gods burying giants under mountains, of makes the cupola of a church alive with sera phim and martyrs. The more fervent the pas sion of each of these artists for his art, the higher the merit of each in his own line, the more unlikely it is that they will justly appre handled a pencil, probably do far rore justice to Michael Angelo than would have been done by Gerhard Douw, and far more justice to Ger hard Douw than would have been done by Michael Angelo. Wordsworth the justice which, we suspect, would never have been done by Dryden. Gray, Johnson, Richardson, Fielding, are all highly esteemed by the great body of intelligent and well-informed men. But Gray could see no merit in Rassetas; and Johnson could see no merit in the Bard. Fielding thought Richardson a solemn prig; and Richardson perpetually expressed contempt and disgust for Fielding's lowness. It is the same with literature. Thousands who have no spark of the genius of Dryden or "It is an uncontrolled truth," says Swift, Wordsworth, do to Dryden the justice which "that no man ever made an ill figure who un-has never been done by Wordsworth, and to derstood his own talents, nor a good one who mistook them." Every day brings with it fresh illustrations of this weighty saying; but the best commentary that we remember is the history of Samuel Crisp. Men like him have their proper place, and it is a most important one, in the Commonwealth of Letters. It is by the judgment of such men that the rank of authors is finally determined. It is neither to the multitude, nor to the few who are gifted with great creative genius, that we are to look for sound critical decisions. The multitude, unacquainted with the best models, are captivated by whatever stuns and dazzles them. They deserted Mrs. Siddons to run after Master Betty; and Mr. Crisp seems, as far as we can judge, to have been a man eminently qualified for the useful office of a connoisseur. His talents and knowledge fitted him to appreciate justly al most every species of intellectual superiority As an adviser he was inestimable. Nay, he might probably have held a respectable rank as a writer, if he would have confined himself to some department of literature in which no thing more than sense, taste, and reading was required. Unhappily he set his heart on be ing a great poet, wrote a tragedy in five acts on the death of Virginia, and offered it to Garrick, who was his personal friend. Garrick read it, shook his head, and expressed a doubt whether it would be wise in Mr. Crisp to stake a reputation which stood high on the success of such a piece. But the author, blinded by self-love, set in motion a machinery such as none could long resist. His intercessors were the most eloquent man and the most lovely woman of that generation. Pitt was induced to read Virginia, and to pronounce it excellent. Lady Coventry, with fingers which might have furnished a model to sculptors, forced the manuscript into the reluctant hand of the manager; and, in the year 1754, the play was brought forward. been, on the other hand, an unfeeling and un Nothing that skill or friendship could do was omitted. Garrick wrote both prologue and epilogue. The zealous friends of the author filled every box; and, by their strenuous exertions, the life of the play was prolonged during ten nights. But, though there was no clamorous reprobation, it was universally felt that the attempt had failed. When Virginia was printed, the public disappointment was even greater than at the representation. The critics, the Monthly Reviewers in particular, fell on plot, characters, and diction, without mercy, but, we fear, not without justice. We have never met with a copy of the play; but, if we may judge from the lines which are extracted in the Gen-certs in London. But he soon disappeared and tleman's Magazine, and which do not appear to have been malevolently selected, we should say that nothing but the acting of Garrick, and the partiality of the audience, could have saved so feeble and unnatural a drama from instant damnation. The ambition of the poet was still unsublued. When the London season closed, he applied himself vigorously to the work of removing blemishes. He does not seem to have suspected, what we are strongly inclined to suspect, that the whole piece was one blemish, and that the passages which were meant to be fine, vere, in truth, bursts of that tame extravagance into which writers fall, when they set themselves to be sublime and pathetic in spite of nature. He omitted, added, retouched, and flattered himself with hopes of complete success in the following year; but, in the following year, Garrick showed no disposition to bring the amended tragedy on the stage. Solicitation and remonstrance were tried in vain. Lady Coventry, drooping under that malady which seems ever to select what is loveliest for its prey, could render no assistance. The manager's language was civilly evasive, but his resolution was inflexible. Crisp had committed a great error; but he had escaped with a very slight penance. His play had not been hooted from the boards. It had, on the contrary, been better received than many very estimable performances have been -than Johnson's Irene, for example, and Goldsmith's Good-Natured Man. Had Crisp been wise, he would have thought himself happy in having purchased self-knowledge so cheap. He would have relinquished without vain repinings the hope of poetical distinction, and would have turned to the many sources of happiness which he still possessed. Had he VOL. V.-73 hid himself, with no society but his books, in his dreary hermitage. He survived his failure about thirty years. A new generation sprang up around him. No memory of his bad verses remained among men. How completely the world had lost sight of him, will appear from a single circumstance. We looked for his name in a copious Dictionary of Dramatic Authors, published while he was still alive, and we found only that Mr. Samuel Crisp, of the Custom-House, had written a play called Virginia, acted in 1754. To the last, however, the unhappy man continued to brood over the injustice of the manager and the pit, and tried to convince himself and others that he had missed the highest literary honours only be. cause he had omitted some fine passages in compliance with Garrick's judgment. Alas, for human nature! that the wounds of vanity should smart and bleed so much longer than the wounds of affection! Few people, we believe, whose nearest friends and relat. ns died in 1754, had any acute feeling of the ass in 1782. Dear sisters and favourite daughters, and brides snatched away before the honeymoon was passed, had been forgotten, or were remembered only with a tranquil regret. But Samuel Crisp was still mourning for his tra gedy like Rachael weeping for her children, and would not be comforted. "Never," such was his language twenty-eight years after his disaster, "never give up or alter a title unless it perfectly coincides with your own inward feelings. I can say this to my sorrow and my cost. But, mum!" Soon after these words were written, his life-a life which might have been eminently useful and happy-ended in the same gloom in which, during more than a quarter of a century, it had been passed. We have thought it worth while to rescue from 3 C oblivion this curious fragment of literary history. It seems to us at once ludicrous, melancholy, and full of instruction. Crisp was an old and very intimate friend of the Burneys. To them alone was confided the name of the desolate old hall in which he hid himself like a wild beast in a den. For them were reserved such remains of his humanity as had survived the failure of his play. Frances Burney he regarded as his daughter. He called her his Fannikin, and she in return called him her dear Daddy. In truth, he seems to have done much more than her real father for the development of her intellect; for though he was a bad poet, he was a scholar, a thinker, and an excellent counsellor. He was particularly fond of Dr. Burney's concerts. They had, indeed, been commenced at his suggestion, and when he visited London he constantly attended them. But when he grew old, and when gout, brought on partly by mental irritation, confined him to his retreat, he was desirous of having a glimpse of that gay and brilliant world from which he was exiled, and he pressed Fannikin to send him full accounts of her father's evening parties. A few of her letters to him have been published; and it is impossible to read them without discerning in them all the powers which afterwards produced Evelina and Cecilia, the quickness in catching every odd peculiarity of character and manner, the skill in grouping, the humour, often richly comic, sometimes even farcical. Fanny's propensity to novel-writing had for a time been kept down. It now rose up stronger than ever. The heroes and heroines of the tales which had perished in the flames, were still present to the eye of her mind. One favourite story, in particular, haunted her imagination. It was about a certain Caroline Evelyn, a beautiful damsel who made an unfortunate love match, and died, leaving an infant daughter. Frances began to imagine to herself the various scenes, tragic and comic, through which the poor motherless girl, highly connected on one side, meanly connected on the other, might have to pass. A crowd of unreal beings, good and bad, grave and ludicrous, surrounded the pretty, timid, young orphan; a coarse sea-captain; an ugly insolent fop, blazing in a superb court-dress; another fop, as ugly and as insolent, but lodged on Snow-Hill, and tricked out in second-hand finery for the Hampstead ball; an old woman, all wrinkles and rouge, flirting her fan with the air of a Miss of seventeen, and screaming in a dialect made up of vulgar French and vulgar English; a poet lean and ragged, with a broad Scottish accent. By degrees these shadows acquired stronger and stronger consistence: the impulse which urged Frances to write became irresistible; and the result was the history of Evelina. Then came, naturally enough, a wish, mingled with many fears, to appear before the public; for, timid as Frances was, and bashful, and altogether unaccustomed to hear her own praises, it is clear that she wanted neither a strong passion for distinction, nor a just confidence in her own powers. Her scheme was to become, if possible, a candidate for fame without running any risk of disgrace. She had not money to bear the expense of printing. It was therefore necessary that some book. seller should be induced to take the risk; and such a bookseller was not readily found. Dodsley refused even to look at the manuscript unless he were trusted with the name of the author. A publisher in Fleet street, named Lowndes, was more complaisant. Some correspondence took place between this person and Miss Burney, who took the name of Grafton, and desired that the letters addressed to her might be left at the Orange Coffee-House. But, before the bargain was finally struck, Fanny thought it her duty to obtain her father's consent. She told him that she had written a book, that she wished to have his permission to pub lish it anonymously, but that she hoped that he would not insist upon seeing it. What followed may serve to illustrate what we meant when we said that Dr. Burney was as bad a father as so good-hearted a man could possibly be. It never seems to have crossed his mind that Fanny was about to take a step on which the whole happiness of her life might depend, a step which might raise her to an honourable eminence, or cover her with ridicule and contempt. Several people had already been trusted, and strict concealment was therefore not to be expected. On so grave an occasion, it was surely his duty to give his best counsel to his daughter, to win her confidence, to prevent her from exposing herself if her book were a bad one, and, if it were a good one, to see that the terms which she made with the publisher were likely to be beneficial to her. Instead of this, he only stared, burst out a laughing, kissed her, gave her leave to do as she liked, and never even asked the name of her work. The contract with Lowndes was speedily concluded. Twenty pounds were given for the copyright, and were accepted by Fanny with delight. Her father's inexcusable neglect of his duty, happily, caused her no worse evil than the loss of twelve or fifteen hundred pounds. After many delays Evelina appeared in January, 1778. Poor Fanny was sick with terror, and durst hardly stir out of doors. Some days passed before any thing was heard of the book. It had, indeed, nothing but its own merits to push it into public favour. Its author was unknown. The house by which it was published was not, we believe, held in high estimation. No body of partisans had been engaged to applaud. The better class of readers expected little from a novel about a young lady's entrance into the world. There was, indeed, at that time, a disposition among the most respectable people to condemn novels generally: nor was this disposition by any means without excuse; for works of that sort were almost always silly, and very frequently wicked. Soon, however, the first faint accents of praise began to be heard. The keepers of the circulating libraries reported that everybody was asking for Evelina, and that some person had guessed Anstey to be the author. Then came a favourable notice in the London Review; then another still more favourable in the Monthly. And now the book found its way to tables which had seldom been polluted by marble-covered volumes. Scholars and statesmen who contemptuously abandoned the crowd of romances to Miss Lydia Languish and Miss Sukey Saunter, were not ashamed to own that they could not tear themselves away from Evelina. Fine carriages and rich liveries, not often seen east of Temple Bar, were attracted to the publisher's shop in Fleet street. Lowndes was daily questioned about the author, but was himself as much in the dark as any of his questioners. The mystery, however, could not remain a mystery long. It was known to brothers and sisters, aunts and cousins: and they were far too proud and too happy to be discreet. Dr. Burney wept over the book in rapture. Daddy Crisp shook his fist at Fannikin in affectionate anger at not having been admitted to her confidence. The truth was whispered to Mrs. Thrale, and then it began to spread fast. felt toward Fanny as toward a younger sis ter. With the Thrales Johnson was domesti cated. He was an old friend of Dr. Burney, but he had probably taken little notice of Dr Burney's daughters, and Fanny, we imagine had never in her life dared to speak to him, unless to ask whether he wanted a nineteenth or a twentieth cup of tea. He was charmed by her tale, and preferred it to he novels of Field. ing, to whom, indeed, he had always been grossly unjust. He did not indeed carry his partiality so far as to place Evelina by the side of Clarissa and Sir Charles Grandison; yet he said that his little favourite had done enough to have made even Richardson feel uneasy. With Johnson's cordial approbation of the book was mingled a fondness, half gallant, half paternal, for the writer; and this fondness his age and character entitled him to show without restraint. He began by putting her The book had been admired while it was hand to his lips. But soon he clasped her ascribed to men of letters long conversant in his huge arms, and implored her to be a with the world, and accustomed to composi- good girl. She was his pet, his dear love, his tion. But when it was known that a reserved, dear little Burney, his little character-monger. silent young woman had produced the best At one time, he broke forth in praise of the work of fiction that had appeared since the good taste of her caps. At another time, he death of Smollett, the acclamations were re-insisted on teaching her Latin. That, with all doubled. What she had done was, indeed, his coarseness and irritability, he was a man extraordinary. But, as usual, several reports of sterling benevolence, has long been acimproved the story till it became miraculous. knowledged. But how gentle and endearing Evelina, it was said, was the work of a girl of his deportment could be, was not known till seventeen. Incredible as this tale was, it con- the Recollections of Madame D'Arblay were tinued to be repeated down to our own time. published. Frances was too honest to confirm it. Proba- We have mentioned a few of the most emibly she was too much a woman to contradict nent of those who paid their homage to the it; and it was long before any of her detractors author of Evelina. The crowd of inferior thought of this mode of annoyance. Yet there admirers would require a catalogue as long was no want of low minds and bad hearts in as that in the second book of the Iliad. In that the generation which witnessed her first ap-catalogue would be Mrs. Cholmondeley, the pearance. There was the envious Kenrick and sayer of odd things, and Seward, much given the savage Wolcot, the asp George Steevens to yawning, and Baretti, who slew the man in and the polecat John Williams. It did not, the Haymarket, and Paoli, talking broken Enghowever, occur to them to search the parish-lish, and Langton, taller by the head than any register of Lynn, in order that they might be other member of the club, and Lady Millar, able to twit a lady with having concealed her who kept a vase wherein fools were wont to age. That truly chivalrous exploit was re- put bad verses, and Jerningham, who wrote served for a bad writer of our own time, whose verses fit to be put into the vase of Lady spite she had provoked by not furnishing him Millar, and Dr. Franklin-not, as some have with materials for a worthless edition of Bos-dreamed, the great Pennsylvania Dr. Franklin, well's Life of Johnson, some sheets of which our readers have doubtless seen round parcels of better books. who could not then have paid his respects to Miss Burney without much risk of being hanged, drawn and quartered, but Dr. Franklin the less Αΐας μέιων, οὗτι τόσος γε όσος Τελαμώνιος Αίας, ἀλλὰ πολὺ μένων. But we must return to our story. The triumph was complete. The timid and obscure girl found herself on the highest pinnacle of fame. Great men, on whom she had gazed at a distance with humble reverence, addressed her with admiration; tempted by the tenderness due to her sex and age. Burke, Windham, It would not have been surprising if such Gibbon, Reynolds, Sheridan, were among her success had turned even a strong head, and most ardent eulogists. Cumberland acknow- corrupted even a generous and affectionate naledged her merit, after his fashion, by biting ture. But, in the Diary, we can find no trace his lips and wriggling in his chair whenever of any feeling inconsistent with a truly modest her name was mentioned. But it was at Streat- and amiable disposition. There is, indeed, ham that she tasted, in the highest perfection, abundant proof that Frances enjoyed, with an the sweets of flattery, mingled with the sweets intense, though a troubled joy, the honours of friendship. Mrs. Thrale, then at the height which her genius had won; but it is equally of prosperity and popularity—with gay spirits, clear that her happiness sprang from the hap quick wit, showy, though superficial acquire-piness of her father, her sister, and her Daddy ments, pleasing though not refined manners, a Crisp. While flattered by the great, the opu singularly amiable temper, and a loving heart lent, the learned; while followed along the |