His veneration for royalty amounted in | day the accursed bell still rang; the truth to idolatry. It can be compared Queen was still to be dressed for the only to the grovelling superstition of morning at seven, and to be dressed those Syrian devotees who made their for the day at noon, and to be unchildren pass through the fire to Mo-dressed at midnight. loch. When he induced his daughter But there had arisen, in literary and to accept the place of keeper of the fashionable society, a general feeling robes, he entertained, as she tells us, of compassion for Miss Burney, and of a hope that some worldly advantage indignation against both her father or other, not set down in the contract and the Queen. "Is it possible," said of service, would be the result of her a great French lady to the Doctor, connection with the Court. What ad-"that your daughter is in a situation vantage he expected we do not know, where she is never allowed a holiday ?" nor did he probably know himself. Horace Walpole wrote to Frances, to But, whatever he expected, he certainly express his sympathy. Boswell, boilgot nothing. Miss Burney had been ing over with goodnatured rage, almost hired for board, lodging, and two hun- forced an entrance into the palace to dred a year. Board, lodging, and two see her. "My dear ma'am, why do bundred a year, she had duly received. you stay? It won't do, ma'am; you We have looked carefully through the must resign. We can put up with it Diary, in the hope of finding some trace no longer. Some very violent meaof those extraordinary benefactions on sures, I assure you, will be taken. We which the Doctor reckoned. But we shall address Dr. Burney in a body." can discover only a promise, never Burke and Reynolds, though less noisy, performed, of a gown: and for this were zealous in the same cause. Windpromise Miss Burney was expected ham spoke to Dr. Burney; but found to return thanks, such as might have him still irresolute. "I will set the suited the beggar with whom Saint club upon him," cried Windham; Martin, in the legend, divided his "Miss Burney has some very true cloak. The experience of four years admirers there, and I am sure they was, however, insufficient to dispel the will eagerly assist." Indeed the Burillusion which had taken possession of ney family seem to have been apprethe Doctor's mind; and between the hensive that some public affront such dear father and the sweet Queen, there as the Doctor's unpardonable folly, to seemed to be little doubt that some use the mildest term, had richly deday or other Frances would drop down served, would be put upon him. The a corpse. Six months had elapsed medical men spoke out, and plainly since the interview between the parent told him that his daughter must resign and the daughter. The resignation or die. was not sent in. The sufferer grew At last paternal affection, medical worse and worse. She took bark; but authority, and the voice of all London it soon ceased to produce a beneficial crying shame, triumphed over Dr. Bureffect. She was stimulated with wine; ney's love of courts. He determined she was soothed with opium; but in that Frances should write a letter of vain. Her breath began to fail. The resignation. It was with difficulty that, whisper that she was in a decline though her life was at stake, she musspread through the Court. The pains tered spirit to put the paper into the in her side became so severe that she Queen's hands. "I could not," so was forced to crawl from the card-runs the Diary, summon courage to table of the old Fury to whom she was present my memorial: my heart always tethered, three or four times in an failed me from seeing the Queen's enevening for the purpose of taking tire freedom from such an expectation. hartshorn. Had she been a negro For though I was frequently so ill in slave, a humane planter would have her presence that I could hardly stand, excused her from work. But her Ma- I saw she concluded me, while life re jesty showed no mercy. Thrice a mained, inevitably hers."

66

At last with a trembling hand the weak and languishing and painful a paper was delivered. Then came the state of health. As the time or storm. Juno, as in the Æneid, dele- separation approached, the Queen's cor gated the work of vengeance to Alecto. diality rather diminished, and traces of The Queen was calm and gentle; but internal displeasure appeared someMadame Schwellenberg raved like a times, arising from an opinion I ought maniac in the incurable ward of Bed- rather to have struggled on, live or lam! Such insolence! Such ingrati- die, than to quit her. Yet I am sure tude! Such folly! Would Miss Bur- she saw how poor was my own chance, ney bring utter destruction on herself except by a change in the mode of and her family? Would she throw life, and at least ceased to wonder, away the inestimable advantage of though she could not approve." Sweet royal protection? Would she part Queen! What noble candour, to adwith privileges which, once relin- mit that the undutifulness of people, quished, could never be regained? It who did not think the honour of adwas idle to talk of health and life. If justing her tuckers worth the sacrifice people could not live in the palace, the of their own lives, was, though highly best thing that could befall them was criminal, not altogether unnatural! to die in it. The resignation was not We perfectly understand her Maaccepted. The language of the medi-jesty's contempt for the lives of others cal men became stronger and stronger. where her own pleasure was concerned. Dr. Burney's parental fears were fully But what pleasure she can have found roused; and he explicitly declared, in having Miss Burney about her, it is in a letter meant to be shown to the not so easy to comprehend. That Miss Queen, that his daughter must retire. Burney was an eminently skilful keeper The Schwellenberg raged like a wild of the robes is not very probable. Few cat. "A scene almost horrible en- women, indeed, had paid less attention sued," says Miss Burney. "She was to dress. Now and then, in the course too much enraged for disguise, and of five years, she had been asked to uttered the most furious expressions of read aloud or to write a copy of verses. indignant contempt at our proceedings. But better readers might easily have I am sure she would gladly have con- been found: and her verses were worse fined us both in the Bastille, had Eng- than even the Poet Laureate's Birthday land such a misery, as a fit place to Odes. Perhaps that economy, which bring us to ourselves, from a daring so which was among her Majesty's most outrageous against imperial wishes." conspicuous virtues, had something to This passage deserves notice, as being do with her conduct on this occasion. the only one in the Diary, so far as we Miss Burney had never hinted that she have observed, which shows Miss Bur- expected a retiring pension; and inney to have been aware that she was deed would gladly have given the little a native of a free country, that she that she had for freedom. But her could not be pressed for a waiting maid Majesty knew what the public thought, against her will, and that she had just and what became her own dignity. She as good a right to live, if she chose, in could not for very shame suffer a woman Saint Martin's Street, as Queen Char- of distinguished genius, who had quitlotte had to live at Saint James's. ted a lucrative career to wait on her, who had served her faithfully for a pittance during five years, and whose constitution had been impaired by labour and watching, to leave the Court without some mark of royal liberality. George the Third, who, on all occasions where Miss Burney was concerned, seems to have behaved like an honest, goodnatured gentleman, felt this, and said plainly that she was entitled to a pro

The Queen promised that, after the next birthday, Miss Burney should be set at liberty. But the promise was ill kept; and her Majesty showed displeasure at being reminded of it. At length Frances was informed that in a fortnight her attendance should cease. "I heard this," she says, "with a fearfal presentiment I should surely never go through another fortnight, in so

Then the prison was opened, and Frances was free once more. Johnson, as Burke observed, might have added a striking page to his poem on the Vanity of Human Wishes, if he had lived to see his little Burney as she went into the palace and as she came out of it.

vision. At length, in return for all the royalists of the first emigration than the misery which she had undergone, Petion or Marat. But such a woman and for the health which she had sacri- as Miss Burney could not long resist ficed, an annuity of one hundred pounds the fascination of that remarkable sowas granted to her, dependent on the ciety. She had lived with Johnson Queen's pleasure. and Windham, with Mrs. Montague and Mrs. Thrale. Yet she was forced to own that she had never heard conversation before. The most animated eloquence, the keenest observation, the most sparkling wit, the most courtly grace, were united to charm her. For Madame de Staël was there, and M. de Talleyrand. There too was M. de Narbonne, a noble representative of French aristocracy; and with M. de Narbonne was his friend and follower General D'Arblay, an honourable and amiable man, with a handsome person, frank soldierlike manners, and some taste for letters.

The pleasures, so long untasted, of liberty, of friendship, of domestic affection, were almost too acute for her shattered frame. But happy days and tranquil nights soon restored the health which the Queen's toilette and Madame Schwellenberg's cardtable had impaired. Kind and anxious faces sur- The prejudices which Frances had rounded the invalid. Conversation conceived against the constitutional the most polished and brilliant revived royalists of France rapidly vanished. her spirits. Travelling was recom- She listened with rapture to Talleymended to her; and she rambled by rand and Madame de Staël, joined with easy journeys from cathedral to cathe- M. D'Arblay in execrating the Jacodral, and from watering place to water-bins and in weeping for the unhappy ing place. She crossed the New Forest, Bourbons, took French lessons from and visited Stonehenge and Wilton, the him, fell in love with him, and married cliffs of Lyme, and the beautiful valley him on no better provision than a preof Sidmouth. Thence she journeyed by carious annuity of one hundred pounds. Powderham Castle, and by the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey to Bath, and from Bath, when the winter was approaching, returned well and cheerful to London. There she visited her old dungeon, and found her successor already far on the way to the grave, and kept to strict duty, from morning till midnight, with a sprained ankle and a nervous fever.

At this time England swarmed with French exiles, driven from their country by the Revolution. A colony of these refugees settled at Juniper Hall, in Surrey, not far from Norbury Park, where Mr. Lock, an intimate friend of the Burney family, resided. Frances visited Norbury, and was introduced to the strangers. She had strong prejudices against them; for her Toryism was far beyond, we do not say that of Mr. Pitt, but that of Mr. Reeves; and the inmates of Juniper Hall were all attached to the constitution of 1791, and were therefore more detested by

Here the Diary stops for the present. We will, therefore, bring our narrative to a speedy close, by rapidly recounting the most important events which we know to have befallen Madame D'Arblay during the latter part of her life.

In the year

M. D'Arblay's fortune had perished in the general wreck of the French Revolution; and in a foreign country his talents, whatever they may have been, could scarcely make him rich. The task of providing for the family devolved on his wife. 1796, she published by subscription her third novel, Camilla. It was impatiently expected by the public; and the sum which she obtained for it was, we believe, greater than ever at that time been received for a novel. We have heard that she cleared more than three thousand guineas. But we give this merely as a rumour. Camilla, however, never attained popu

larity like that which Evelina and Cecilia had enjoyed; and it must be allowed that there was a perceptible falling off, not indeed in humour or in power of portraying character, but in grace and in purity of style.

We have heard that, about this time, a tragedy by Madame D'Arblay was performed without success. We do not know whether it was ever printed; nor indeed have we had time to make any researches into its history or merits. During the short truce which followed the treaty of Amiens, M. D'Arblay visited France. Lauriston and La Fayette represented his claims to the French government, and obtained a promise that he should be reinstated in his military rank. M. D'Arblay, however, insisted that he should never be required to serve against the countrymen of his wife. The First Consul, of course, would not hear of such a condition, and ordered the general's commission to be instantly revoked.

He went into the Church, and it was thought likely that he would attain high eminence as a preacher; but he died before his mother. All that we have heard of him leads us to believe that he was a son as such a mother deserved to have. In 1832, Madame D'Arblay published the Memoirs of her father; and on the sixth of January, 1840, she died in her eighty-eighth year.

We now turn from the life of Madame D'Arblay to her writings. There can, we apprehend, be little difference of opinion as to the nature of her merit, whatever differences may exist as to its degree. She was emphatically what Johnson called her, a character-monger. It was in the exhibition of human passions and whims that her strength lay; and in this department of art she had, we think, very distinguished skill.

But, in order that we may, according to our duty as kings at arms, versed in the laws of literary precedence, marshal her to the exact seat to which she is entitled, we must carry our examination somewhat further.

Madame D'Arblay joined her husband at Paris, a short time before the war of 1803 broke out, and remained in France ten years, cut off from almost There is, in one respect, a remarkall intercourse with the land of her able analogy between the faces and birth. At length, when Napoleon was the minds of men. No two faces are on his march to Moscow, she with alike; and yet very few faces deviate great difficulty obtained from his mi- very widely from the common standnisters permission to visit her own ard. Among the eighteen hundred country, in company with her son, who thousand human beings who inhabit was a native of England. She re- London, there is not one who could be turned in time to receive the last bless-taken by his acquaintance for another; ing of her father, who died in his yet we may walk from Paddington to eighty-seventh year. In 1814 she Mile End without seeing one person published her last novel, the Wan- in whom any feature is so overcharged derer, a book which no judicious friend to her memory will attempt to draw from the oblivion into which it has justly fallen. In the same year her son Alexander was sent to Cambridge. He obtained an honourable place among the wranglers of his year, and was It is the same with the characters of elected a fellow of Christ's College. men. Here, too, the variety passes all But his reputation at the University enumeration. But the cases in which was higher than might be inferred from the deviation from the common standhis success in academical contests. ard is striking and grotesque, are very His French education had not fitted few. In one mind avarice predomihim for the examinations of the Senate nates; in another, pride; in a third, House; but, in pure mathematics, we love of pleasure; just as in one counhave been assured by some of his com- tenance the nose is the most marked petitors that he had very few equals. feature, while in others the chief ex

that we turn round to stare at it. An infinite number of varieties lies between limits which are not very far asunder. The specimens which pass those limits on either side, form a very small minority.

pression lies in the brow, or in the lines of the mouth. But there are very few countenances in which nose, brow, and mouth do not contribute, though in unequal degrees, to the general effect; and so there are very few characters in which one overgrown propensity makes all others utterly insignificant.

It is evident that a portrait painter, who was able only to represent faces and figures such as those which we pay money to see at fairs, would not, however spirited his execution might be, take rank among the highest artists. He must always be placed below those who have skill to seize peculiarities which do not amount to deformity. The slighter those peculiarities, the greater is the merit of the limner who can catch them and transfer them to his canvass. To paint Daniel Lambert or the living skeleton, the pig faced lady or the Siamese twins, so that nobody can mistake them, is an exploit within the reach of a signpainter. A thirdrate artist might give us the squint of Wilkes, and the depressed nose and protuberant cheeks of Gibbon. It would require a much higher degree of skill to paint two such men as Mr. Canning and Sir Thomas Lawrence, so that nobody who had ever seen them could for a moment hesitate to assign each picture to its original. Here the mere caricaturist would be quite at fault. He would find in neither face any thing on which he could lay hold for the purpose of making a distinction. Two ample bald foreheads, two regular profiles, two full faces of the same oval form, would baffle his art; and he would be reduced to the miserable shift of writing their names at the foot of his picture. Yet there was a great difference; and a person who had seen them once would no more have mistaken one of them for the other than he would have mistaken Mr. Pitt for Mr. Fox. But the difference lay in delicate lincaments and shades, reserved for pencils of a rare order.

some strange peculiarity, a stammer or a lisp, a Northumbrian burr or an Irish brogue, a stoop or a shuffle. "If a man," said Johnson, "hops ou one leg, Foote can hop on one leg." Garrick, on the other hand, could seize those differences of manner and pronunciation, which, though highly characteristic, are yet too slight to be described. Foote, we have no doubt, could have made the Haymarket theatre shake with laughter by imitating a conversation between a Scotchman and a Somersetshireman. But Garrick could have imitated a conversation between two fashionable men, both models of the best breeding, Lord Chesterfield, for example, and Lord Albemarle, so that no person could doubt which was which, although no person could say that, in any point, either Lord Chesterfield or Lord Albemarle spoke or moved otherwise than in conformity with the usages of the best society.

The same distinction is found in the drama and in fictitious narrative. Highest among those who have exhibited human nature by means of dialogue, stands Shakspeare. His variety is like the variety of nature, endless diversity, scarcely any monstrosity. The characters of which he has given us an impression, as vivid as that which we receive from the characters of our own associates, are to be reckoned by scores. Yet in all these scores hardly one character is to be found which deviates widely from the common standard, and which we should call very eccentric if we met it in real life. The silly notion that every man has one ruling passion, and that this clue, once known, unravels all the mysteries of his conduct, finds no countenance in the plays of Shakspeare. There man appears as he is, made up of a crowd of passions, which contend for the mastery over him, and govern him in turn. What is Hamlet's ruling passion? Or Othello's? Or Harry the Fifth's? Or Wolsey's? Or Lear's? Or Shylock's? Or Benedick's? Or This distinction runs through all the Macbeth's? Or that of Cassius? Or imitative arts. Foote's mimicry was that of Falconbridge? But we might exquisitely ludicrous, but it was all go on for ever. Take a single excaricature. He could take off only | ample, Shylock. Is he so eager for