Delphi Complete Works of Ann Radcliffe (Illustrated) (348 page)

It is curious that several years after this tale was written, Mrs. Radcliffe, having forgotten many of the incidents, perused it with nearly the same interest as if it had been the production of a stranger. It was again laid aside; and in the latter part of life she repeated the experiment, but it did not absorb her attention as before, the former perusal having stamped the contents on her memory.

Secluded as Mrs. Radcliffe was from the world, she was tremblingly alive to every circumstance which could, by the remotest possibility, raise an inference injurious to the personal character she valued far above literary fame; and, as nothing could induce her to appear before the public in any sort of contention, every thing of this nature preyed long upon her mind. She was much affected by a passage of Miss Seward’s correspondence, which seemed, to her apprehensive feelings, to convey an imputation that she had allowed the dramas afterwards avowed by Miss Baillie to be attributed to her pen. Miss Seward in one of her letters dated May 21, 1799, after mentioning the plays, gave the following quotation from a letter of “her literary friend and correspondent Mrs. Jackson”— “Before their author was known, I observed so much of the power and defects of Mrs. Radcliffe’s compositions in these dramas, as to believe them her’s, and I hear she owns them. Mrs. Radcliffe, in whatever she writes, attentive solely to the end, is not sufficiently attentive to observe probability in the means she uses to attain it. She bends her plan — or, if it will not bend, she breaks it, to her catastrophe, by making it grow out of the preceding events. Still she always takes hold of the reader’s feeling’, and effects her purpose boldly if not regularly. Her descriptive talent, used to satiety in her novels, is here employed with more temperance, and consequently to better purpose.”

The imputation thus conveyed was, perhaps, implicitly removed by two letters of a few months later date; in one of which Miss Seward, speaking of the Plays on the Passions, says, “My literary friends now assert that they are not Mrs. Radcliffe’s and in the other, “The literary world now asserts, that the Plays on the Passions are not Mrs. Radcliffe’s for, if Mrs. Radcliffe had really owned them, it is scarcely probable the literary world could so soon have discredited her acknowledgment, while the real author remained unknown. This implied vindication from a charge, which perhaps no one ever regarded, was not sufficient for Mrs. Radcliffe’s delicate sense of propriety and honour. She made inquiries after Mrs. Jackson, the lady mentioned as Miss Seward’s informant, in order that she might trace out the origin of her rumour. Haying learned that Mrs. Jackson, after residing at Bath, had removed to Edinburgh, she requested Mr. Davies, of the firm of Cadell and Davies, who had ample opportunities of procuring information respecting the literary society of Edinburgh, to ascertain if Mrs. Jackson was still in that city. In the result of these inquiries it appeared, that the lady, to whom the report was ascribed, had left Edinburgh; that her residence was unknown; and that she was not even supposed to be living. Under these circumstances, Mrs. Radcliffe was obliged to leave her vindication (as, in truth, she safely might) to the tenor of her whole literary course; for no one ever felt, or expressed, more repugnance to factitious praise, or more strenuously declined to avail herself of the warmth of private regard in softening the rigour of criticism. The prayer of the poet, O grant an honest fame, or grant me none!” was the language of all her actions. She even took pains to prevent some, who, she knew, were desirous of expressing their sense of her genius, from writing eulogies on her works, as she could not endure the conscious degradation of being exalted even by the genial quackery of friendship. It is scarcely necessary now to assert, that the supposition of her having laid claim to the authorship of the Plays on the Passions, or voluntarily endured the ascription of those powerful compositions to her pen, was utterly groundless. Rich as these works are in passion, and richer in fancy, they could not tempt the author of the Mysteries of Udolpho, even if she had not been restrained by any higher feeling than pride, to claim them — not because they would have been unworthy of her, if she had written them, but because the secret sense of merited reputation must alone have created a distaste for eulogies which she did not deserve. Anxious as Mrs. Radcliffe was to repel the suggestion, she felt that, as she could not discover its author, it would not become her to intrude on Miss Baillie a denial of the report, which she had not sanctioned; and the same susceptible delicacy, which made her feel it so deeply, compelled her to bear it in silence. The subject, which was always painful to her, is rather now alluded to as an instance of the singular apprehensiveness of her moral sense, than as at all required for the vindication of her character.

Another circumstance, of a more trivial nature, gave her uneasiness, though in a less degree. In one of the published letters of the late Mrs. Carter, was a passage of a eulogistic nature, alluding to her works; and to this a note was appended by the editor, showing that “Mrs. Carter had no personal acquaintance with Mrs. Radcliffe.” This statement was literally true; but to her sensitive nature it seemed to bear the construction, that the excellent lady referred to would have avoided her acquaintance. The fact, indeed, was exactly the reverse; for, in the spring of 1799, Mrs. Carter sent to Mrs. Radcliffe a letter of introduction from a lady of high respectability at Bath, and proposed by note to wait on her on the following day; but Mrs. Radcliffe, being engaged to leave town in the morning with her husband, whose health required country air, was obliged respectfully to decline the intended honour. The correspondence appeared in the Annual Biography for 18£4, with a short Memoir of Mrs. Radcliffe; and produced from Dr. Pennington, the writer of the note, a most handsome letter, in which he earnestly disclaimed even the slightest idea of disrespect to Mrs. Radcliffe, stating that he was not aware of the little correspondence, or he would have mentioned it with pleasure. Dr. Pennington also avows, not merely with candour, but cordially, the admiration and personal respect, with which Mrs. Carter thought and spoke of Mrs. Radcliffe.

With more reason, Mrs. Radcliffe was amazed at an absurd report, that, haunted by the images of fear, with which she had thrilled her readers, she had sunk into a state of mental alienation. A more unphilosophical foundation for an untruth was never imagined; for it is obvious, that through all her works she holds entire mastery over the terrors which she employs, and even sedulously prepares the means of explaining them by natural causes. It seems, however, that the authoress of a Tour through England, in noticing the Duke of Rutland’s venerable and romantic seat, called Haddon House, asserted that it was there that Mrs. Radcliffe acquired her taste for castles and ancient buildings, and proceeded to lament that she had, for many years, fallen into a state of insanity, and was under confinement in Derbyshire: — the fact being, not only that the main assertion was false, but that all its accompaniments were destitute of foundation; — for Mrs. Radcliffe was only in Derbyshire on two occasions, for a few days each, after her marriage, and never saw Haddon House at all. This report, the falsehood of which might have been ascertained by the authoress, on a reference to her own publisher, was copied in a larger work of more recent date; and to complete the fiction, a plate and description of Haddon House, as the scene of Mrs. Radcliffe’s early impressions, were annexed by way of illustration. It also supplied materials for poetry; as in an “ Ode to Terror,” with other effusions, published by a clergyman in 1810, Mrs. Radcliffe is bemoaned, as having died in that species of mental derangement called “the horrors.” Some of these rumours reached her; but she could not endure the thought of writing in the newspapers that she was not insane; and, at last, learned to smile at the pity of those, who thought her in confinement, and the charity of others, who had kindly permitted her to find a release in death from her supposed intellectual sufferings.

While the fate of the authoress of Udolpho was thus considered by the world as sealed, she was enjoying her wonted recreations and studies, with entire relish. As, however, curiosity was satiated with exploring all the finest country within
100 miles
of London, and she became more attached to the comforts of home, she contracted the sphere of her excursions. Instead of making journeys of length, Mr and Mrs. Radcliffe hired a carriage for the summer months, in which they were accustomed to make frequent trips to beautiful spots in the neighbourhood of London, where they dined and spent the day at some good inn, and returned in the evening. Esher, Stanmore, Richmond, Southgate, and Harrow, were their favourite places of resort, especially the latter, where they chose the room, not the largest, but which commands the richest prospect, and where Crawley Wood, near Ashridge, could be often distinctly seen. Mrs. Radcliffe also was much attached to St. Alban’s, the antiquities of which she explored with unwearied zeal, and the historical dignity of which she has vindicated in her longest poem. From 1812 to 1815 inclusive, she passed much time at Windsor and its neighbourhood, and formed an intimate acquaintance with all the recesses of its forest.

“She knew each lane, and every alley green,

Dingle or bushy dell of those old woods,

And every bosky bower from side to side.”

She often vividly described the beautiful spots of this regal domain. There was scarcely a tree of importance, with the peculiar form of which she was not familiar, and the varieties of whose aspect in light and shade she could not picture in words. With reference to their age and to the analogy she fancied to the lines of monarchs, with which they might be coeval, she described the trees separately as Plantagenet oaks, Tudor beeches, or Stuart elms. At this time, she expressed her feelings in verse, rather than in prose, and the reader will find them chronicled in several of her poems. One night-scene on the terrace, however, deserves to be inserted; and may be compared with the descriptions of castellated heights, which abound in her novels.

“We stood in the shade on the north terrace, where a platform projects over the precipice, and beheld a picture perfect in its kind. The massy tower at the end of the east terrace stood up high in shade; but immediately from behind it the moonlight spread, and showed the flat line of wall at the end of that terrace, with the figure of a sentinel moving against the light, as well as a profile of the dark precipice below. Beyond, it, was the park and a vast distance, in the faint light, which spread over the turf, touched the avenues, and gave fine contrast to the deep shades of the wooded precipice, on which we stood, and to the whole line of buildings, which rise on the north terrace. Above this high dark line the stars appeared with a very sublime effect. No sound but the faint clinking of the soldier’s accoutrements, as he paced on watch, and the remote voices of people turning the end of the east terrace, appearing for a moment in the light there and vanishing. In a high window of the tower a light. Why is it so sublime to stand at the foot of a dark tower, and look up its height to the sky and the stars?

“What particularly strikes at Windsor is the length of terrace in the east, thus seen by moonlight; the massy towers, four in perspective; the lights and shades of the park below, the obscure distance beyond them, the low and wide horizon, which you seem to look upon, the grandeur of the heavenly arch, which appears to spring from it, and the multitude of stars, which are visible in so vast and uninterrupted a view. Then the north terrace stretching and finally turning away from them towards the west, where high dark towers crown it. It was on this terrace, surely, that Shakspeare received the first hint of the time for the appearance of his ghost. —

‘Last night of all,

‘When yon same star that westward from the Pole

Had made his course to illume that part of heaven

Where now it burns, Marcellus and myself,

The bell then beating one— ‘“

From inclination, Mrs. Radcliffe was minutely attentive to her household affairs, probably thinking with Schiller, that, after all, one of the best enjoyments of life arises from the exact performance of some mechanical duty. Although by no means disposed to parsimony, she kept an exact account of daily disbursements, until a very short time before her death. Much of her leisure was spent in reading the literary productions of the day, especially poetry and novels. Of the latter works she always spoke with an entire freedom from jealousy, and devoured the earlier Scotch novels with all the avidity of youth, although she felt deeply a slighting expression in “Waverley,” towards herself, which the author might have spared. Sir Walter Scott has, however, made ample amends to her reputation by his elaborate criticism prefixed to Ballantine’s edition of her romances. To music she was passionately attached, and sang herself with exquisite taste, though her voice, remarkably sweet, was limited in compass. At the Opera she was a frequent visitor, and on her return home would sit up singing over the airs she had heard, which her quickness of ear enabled her to catch, till a late hour. She was peculiarly affected by sacred music, and occasionally went to the oratorios, when they afforded her the opportunity of listening to the compositions of Handel. She sometimes, though more rarely, accompanied Mr. Radcliffe to the theatres; and was a warm admirer of Mrs. Siddons, whom she recollected at Bath, when herself was young. She used to speak with much pleasure of having seen this great actress, before the commencement of her splendid career in London, going to Church with her little son Henry, and was struck by her exceeding dignity and grace. When she visited the theatre, Mrs. Radcliffe generally sat in the pit, partly because her health required warm clothing, and partly because, in that situation, she felt more withdrawn from the observation she disliked. She was fond of listening to any good verbal sounds, and would often desire to hear passages from the Latin and Greek classics, requiring at intervals the most literal translations, that could be given, however much the version might lose in elegance by the exactness.