WILLIAM SHARP (FIONA MACLEOD) A MEMOIR COMPILED BY HIS WIFE ELIZABETH A. SHARP - ELIZABETH A. SHARP (phonics reader TXT) 📗

at peace. Looking at his serene face on the day ere the coffin

lid enclosed it, where something lovelier than mortal sleep subtly

dwelt, there was one at least of his friends who forgot all sorrow in

a great gladness for the blind poet—now no longer blind, if he be not

overwhelmed in a sleep beyond our ken. At such a moment the infinite

satisfaction of Death seems beautiful largess for the turmoil of a few

‘dark disastrous years.’”

 

The Spring of 1887 brought a more kindly condition of circumstances

to us, in the form of good steady work. Mr. Eric Robertson had then

been selected to fill the vacant chair of Literature and Logic at the

University of Lahore, and, on accepting, he suggested to Mr. Joseph

Henderson that William Sharp should be his successor as Editor of the

“Literary Chair” in _The Young Folk’s Paper_—the boys’ weekly paper for

which Robert Louis Stevenson had written his “Treasure Island.” “The

Literary Olympic” was a portion of the paper devoted to the efforts in

prose and verse of the Young Folk who wished to exercise their budding

literary talents. Their papers were examined, criticised; a few of the

most meritorious were printed, prefaced by an article of criticism and

instruction written by their Editor and critic. The work itself was

congenial; and the interest was heightened by the fact that it put

us into touch with the youth of all classes, in England, Scotland,

and Ireland, in town and country, alike. Several of the popular

novelists and essayists of to-day received the chief early training

in the “Olympic.” Many were the confidential personal letters to the

unknown editor, who was imagined by one or two young aspirants to be

white-haired and venerable. This work, moreover, could be done at home,

by us both; and it brought a reliable income, a condition of security

hitherto unknown to us, which proved an excellent tonic to the delicate

Editor.

 

In August a letter came from Mr. Theodore Watts-Dunton suggesting the

possibility that an original poem, _The Ode to Mother Carey’s Chicken_

contributed to my little anthology _Sea-Music_, should be re-printed in

_The Young Folk’s Paper_:

 

“I do especially want it to be read by boys,” he wrote, “who would

understand and appreciate it thoroughly.” The poem appeared; and

drew forth an appreciative letter from a young blacksmith who had

sent contributions to “The Literary Olympic.” Mr. Watts-Dunton’s

acknowledgment to the “Editor” was thus expressed:

 

“I have seen the poem in the paper and am much gratified to be enabled

to speak, thus, to thousands of the boys of Great Britain, the

finest—by far the finest—boys in the world as I always think. It was a

friendly act on your part and the preliminary remarks are most kind and

touching.

 

“I sincerely hope that your indisposition has, by this time, left you,

and shall be glad to get a line to say that it has. The young man’s

letter is most interesting. What pleases me most is the manly pride he

takes in his business. A blacksmith is almost the only artisan whose

occupation is tinged with the older romance as Gabriel[2] often used

to say. I love still to watch them at the forge—the sparks flying

round them. I hope he may not forsake such a calling for the literary

struggle.”

 

       *       *       *       *       *

 

In the early part of the year “The Sport of Chance” had run serially

through _The People’s Friend_. Its success incited the author to write

a sensational boys’ story for _The Young Folk’s Paper_; and accordingly

in the Xmas number of that weekly appeared the first installment of

“Under the Banner of St. James,” a tale of the conquest of Peru. This

story was followed at intervals by others such as “The Secret of the

Seven Fountains,” “Jack Noel’s Legacy,” “The Red Riders.” Although the

weaving of these sensational plots was a great enjoyment to the writer

of them, he at no time regarded them as other than useful pot-boilers.

 

A letter written about this time to the American poet E. C. Stedman

led to a life-long friendship with him of so genial a nature that, on

becoming personally acquainted in New York two years later, the older

poet laughingly declared that he adopted the younger man from across

the seas as his “English son.”

 

In an article on “British Song” in _The Victorian Poets_, the Scottish

poet was referred to as a Colonial. He wrote to the author to point

out the mistake “since you are so kindly going to do me the honour of

mention in your forthcoming supplementary work, I should not like to be

misrepresented.”

 

In replying Mr. Stedman explained that no great harm has been done:

 

 

Something in your work made me suspect that, despite your Australian

tone, etc., you did not hail (as we Yankees say) from the Colonies.

So you will find in my new vol. of _Victorian Poets_ that I do not

place you with the Colonial poets, but just preceding them, and I have

a reference to your Rosetti volume. The limited space afforded by my

supplementary chapter has made my references to the new men altogether

too brief and inadequate. Of this I am seriously aware, but trust that

you and others will take into consideration the scope and aim of the

chapter. You see I have learned that “The Human Inheritance” is scarce!

Of course I shall value greatly a copy from the author’s hands. And I

count among the two pleasant things connected with my prose work—my

earlier and natural metier being that of a poet—such letters as yours,

which put me into agreeable relations with distant comrades-in-arms.

 

Beginning, as you have, with the opening of a new literary period,

and with what you have already done, I am sure you have a fine career

before you—that will extend long after your American Reviewer has

ceased to watch and profit by its course.

 

  Very sincerely yours,

  EDMUND C. STEDMAN.

 

A few months later Mr. Stedman wrote again:

 

 

  NEW YORK, March 27, 1888.

 

  MY DEAR SHARP,

 

Let me thank you heartily, if somewhat tardily, for your very handsome

and magnanimous review of the _Victorian Poets_. It breathes the

spirit of fairness—and even generosity—throughout. You have been more

than “a little blind” to my faults, and to my virtues most open-eyed

and “very kind” indeed. I am sufficiently sure of my own _purpose_ to

believe that you _have_ ground for perceiving that the spirit of my

major criticisms is _essential_, rather than merely “technical.” I

look more to the breadth and imagination of the poet than to minute

details—though a stickler for natural melody and the lasting canons

of art. The real value of the book lies, of course, in the chapters

on some of the elder poets. You are quite right in pointing out

the impossibility of correct proportion in the details of the last

chapter. It is added to give more completeness to the work as a whole.

For the same reason, the earlier chapters on “The General Choir”

were originally introduced; but in them I knew my ground better, and

could point out with more assurance the tendencies of the various

“groups.” But I write merely to say that I am heartily satisfied

with your criticism, and grateful for it; and that I often read your

other reviews with advantage—and shall watch your career, already so

fruitful, with great interest. A man who comes down to first principles

and looks at things broadly, as you are doing, is sure in the end to be

a man of mark.

 

  Very faithfully yours,

  EDMUND C. STEDMAN.

 

       *       *       *       *       *

 

One desirable result of this good fortune was a change of residence

to a higher part of the town, where the air was purer, and access to

green fields easier. To this end in the Spring of 1887 we took a little

house for three years in Goldhurst Terrace, South Hampstead. As it was

numbered 17_a_, much annoyance was caused as our letters frequently

were delivered at No. 17. A name therefore had to be found, and we

dubbed our new home _Wescam_, a name made up of the initials of my

husband, myself and our friend Mrs. Caird whose town house was within

two minutes’ walk of us. There was a sunny study for the invalid on the

ground floor, to obviate as much as possible the need of going up and

down stairs. The immediate improvement in his health from the higher

air and new conditions was so marked that we had every reason to hope

it would before many months be practically re-established.

 

The most important undertaking after the long illness was the monograph

on Shelley written for _Great Writers’ Series_ (Walter Scott) and

published in the autumn of 1887. It was a work of love, for Shelley

had been the inspiring genius of his youth, the chief influence in his

verse till he knew Rossetti. He was in sympathy with much of Shelley’s

thought: with his hatred of rigid conventionality, of the tyranny of

social laws; with his antagonism to existing marriage and divorce laws,

with his belief in the sanctity of passion when called forth by high

and true emotion. He exclaimed that

 

“It is my main endeavour in this short life of Shelley to avoid all

misstatement and exaggeration; to give as real a narrative of his life

from the most reliable sources as lies within my power; to recount

without detailed criticism and as simply and concisely as practicable,

the record of his poetic achievements. To this end I shall chiefly rely

on anecdote and explanatory detail, or poems and passages noteworthy

for their autobiographical or idiosyncratic value, and on indisputable

facts.”

 

He proposed merely to give a condensation of all really important

material; and based his monograph mainly on Professor Dowden’s

memorable work (then recently published). Many statements written by

William Sharp about Shelley may be quoted as autobiographic of himself.

For instance: “From early childhood he was a mentally restless child.

Trifles unnoticed by most children seem to have made keen and permanent

impression on him—the sound of wind, the leafy whisper of trees,

running water. The imaginative faculties came so early into play, that

the unconscious desire to create resulted in the invention of weird

tales sometimes based on remote fact in the experience of more or less

weird hallucinations.”

 

Or again: “The fire of his mind for ever consuming his excitable body,

his swift and ardent emotions, his over keen susceptibilities all

combined to increase the frailty of his physical health.” Or this in

particular: “He did not outgrow his tendency to invest every new and

sympathetic correspondent (and I would add, friend) with lives of ideal

splendour.”

 

And in explanation of each idealization appearing to him “as the

type of that ideal Beauty which had haunted his imagination from

early boyhood,” he adds: “No fellow mortal could have satisfied the

desire of his heart. Perhaps this almost fantastic yearning for the

unattainable—this desire of the moth for the star—is the heritage of

many of us. It is a longing that shall be insatiable even in death.”

With Shelley he might have said of himself: “I think one is always in

love with something or other; the error—and I confess it is not easy

for spirits cased in flesh and blood to avoid it—consists in seeking

in a mortal image the likeness of what is, perhaps, eternal.”

 

From the many letters the biographer received after the publication of

his book I select three:

 

 

  BRASENOSE COLLEGE, Nov. 23d.

 

  MY DEAR SHARP,

 

I am reading your short life of Shelley with great pleasure and profit.

Many thanks for your kindness in sending it. It seems to me that with a

full, nay! an enthusiastic, appreciation of Shelley and his work, you

unite a shrewdness and good sense rare in those who have treated this

subject. And then your book is pleasant and effective, in contrast to a

French book on Shelley of which I read reluctantly a good deal lately.

Your book leaves a very definite image on the brain.

 

  With sincere kind regards,

  Very truly yours,

  WALTER PATER.

 

 

  CIMIEZ, PRÈS NICE.

  22d Dec., 1887.

 

  MY DEAR FRIEND,

 

I wonder how it is with you now, whether you are better, which I

sincerely hope, and already in the Isle of Wight? but I suppose you

will only go after Christmas. To-day it is so cold here that I wonder

what it must be like with you; there is snow on the mountains behind

the house and the sea looks iron-gray and ungenial.

 

I never told you I think how much I liked your “Shelley,” which I think

gives a very succinct and fair statement of the poet’s life and works.

It is just what is wanted by the public at large, and I thought your

remarks on Shelley’s relations with Harriet exceedingly sympathetic and

to the point; as well as what you say touching his married life with

Mary; the passage on page