The Book-Hunter - John Hill Burton (13 ebook reader .TXT) 📗

Dr Burton was always much interested in the Christmas-tree, and used to contribute largely to it what he called trash—i.e., cheap fancy articles, if he happened to be in London before Christmas-time, or money if he did not. His mode of visiting poor people was peculiar. He no sooner heard of any plan of benevolence towards them than he was determined it should be immediately carried out, and utterly impatient of all preparations. He chose to carry a basket, the heavier the better, but would on no account enter a cottage, still less speak to an inmate. He preferred such expeditions in the dark, that he might successfully hide himself outside while his wife went in to distribute his bounty.

On the 8th of January 1881 a recurrence of the former symptoms again obliged him to take to bed. On the 8th of February he was able to rise and go down to the library.

On the 8th of March he again became ill, and towards the end of that month had an alarming attack of bronchitis and congestion of the lungs. Slight hope was entertained of his recovery for some days, but this illness appeared a turning-point, and by the 8th of April he was able to come down-stairs. No more 8ths were marked by disaster or recovery till again the 8th of August.

During the summer Dr Burton appeared to have recovered completely. He wrote several articles for 'Blackwood's Magazine,' and took regular walks, first with his wife, and, when his walking power improved so as to exceed hers, with his son. He also began to edit the literary remains of the late Mr Edward Ellice, to whom he was joint literary executor along with Mrs Ellice.

At the time of the General Assembly Dr Burton had the pleasure of seeing once more his valued friend, the Rev. James White, minister of Methlick. This gentleman had been his schoolfellow at the Grammar School in Aberdeen. The two old friends spent a pleasant summer evening together at Morton. On the Saturday before his own death Dr Burton learned that of Mr White. "Ah! so Jamie White's gone," he said, "and without the catalogues." The last part of his sentence referred to old class lists in which Joannes Burton and Jacobus White's names appear next each other. They believed themselves the last survivors of their Grammar School class.

On Tuesday, 2d August, he walked into Edinburgh and out again as usual, though his family drove in at the same time that he walked, and drove out again also at the same time, in the hope that he would avail himself of a seat in the pony-carriage, at least for part of the way. His aversion to driving clung to him. He did not appear fatigued, declared himself the better for the walk, and even next day still boasted of the advantage which he thought he always gained from a long walk. On Thursday, 4th August, he became very hoarse, and complained of sore throat. On Friday these complaints were better. On Saturday, 6th, he slept almost the whole day, rousing himself to take food when required, and always intending to rise, but as the shades of evening fell announcing his intention of "making a day of it," and being very active and down in good time next day.

On Sunday, 7th, he did come down as early as usual, and did not complain, but appeared languid, lying on the sofa the greater part of the day,—a thing he had never done before. He read and talked as usual. He sat at table with his family at dinner for the last time. It was observed that he looked ill, so ill that his wife resolved to send for the doctor as soon as possible next day, which was Monday, again the 8th, of August. The night had passed quietly, but on the doctor's arrival he pronounced the case very grave. The lungs were much congested, and the heart's action weak. The day brought no aggravation of the symptoms; again the night was quiet.

On Tuesday, 9th August, there was a slight improvement, which continued throughout the night.

On Wednesday, 10th, the improvement seemed more marked till about ten a.m. About that time a change in the countenance was observed. On the doctor's visit about twelve he pronounced the case all but hopeless, and five hours later life was extinct. Consciousness remained till almost the last moment. The illness was attended by no bodily pain, little even of uneasiness, and the mind was calm and placid throughout.

Since the beginning of illness, nine months before, the natural irritability, or impatience of temper, had been diminishing. Dr Burton was by no means, as all his friends seemed to suppose, a fretful or unreasonable invalid. With but few exceptions he was gentle and grateful to his attendants, especially to his wife. He was perfectly aware of his own condition, though never directly told it. His friend Mr Belcombe, the clergyman of the Episcopal Chapel at Morningside, called for him on Tuesday, 9th August, was received by him with pleasure, and spent some time with him. Dr Burton had been brought up an Episcopalian, and continued attached to the Moderate party in that Church through life.

It can hardly be expected that the writer should offer a critical estimate of one so lately dead, and so nearly related to her. In the preceding sketch she has endeavoured to inform the public on all particulars in which they might be supposed interested in the life of a man who served them during life with considerable acceptance. His voluminous works may speak for themselves, or find a more competent exponent than the present writer. She has endeavoured to give a picture of himself.

John Hill Burton can never have been handsome, and he so determinedly neglected his person as to increase its natural defects. His greatest mental defect was an almost entire want of imagination. From this cause the characters of those nearest and dearest to him remained to his life's end a sealed book.

He was fond of talking, and still fonder of writing, about character; but even his liveliest pictures, such as that of De Quincey the opium-eater, are but a collection of external habits or peculiarities, not necessarily bearing at all on the real nature—the inner man. His was the sort of mind which more naturally classifies than individualises, in this agreeing with the late Mr Buckle, who appreciated Dr Burton's historical labours, and was in his turn appreciated by him. To both, individual character seemed a small subject not worth study.

The characters of women, especially, were by Dr Burton all placed in the same category. He conceived of them all as baby-worshippers, flower-lovers, &c.—all alike.

Dr Burton was excessively kind-hearted within the limits placed by this great want. To any sorrow or suffering which he could understand he craved with characteristic impatience to carry immediate relief; and the greatest enjoyment of his life, especially of its later years, was to give pleasure to children, poor people, or the lower animals. Many humble folks will remember the bunches of flowers he thrust silently into their hands, and the refreshment he never failed to press on their acceptance in his own peculiar manner.

He was liberal of money to a fault. He never refused any application even from a street beggar. He quite allowed that these ought not to be encouraged, but he urged that the municipality ought to take charge of them, and prevent their appealing to the compassion of the public, who could not, as he said, be expected to perform the disagreeable task of disciplining vagrants at the wages of a penny a case. No printer's devil or other chance messenger failed to receive his sixpence or shilling, besides a comfortable meal. It was his constant custom to ask his sons if any of their wants were unsupplied, if they required money for furnishing their workshop or laboratory, or for any of their studies or amusements. It is but just to them to add that the question was almost always answered in the negative.

Many of the "motley crew" along with whom Dr Burton received his education fell into difficulties in the course of their lives. An application from one of them always met with a prompt response. To send double the amount asked on such occasions was his rule, if money was the object desired. In his earlier life he would also spare no trouble in endeavouring to help these unfortunates to help themselves. As he grew old he was less zealous, probably from being less sanguine of success, in this service.

On Saturday the 13th of August the mortal remains of John Hill Burton were laid beside those of his infant child in the lovely little churchyard of Dalmeny. It had been at first intended that he should be buried in the Dean Cemetery, where his mother and his first wife were interred, and where his valued friend William Brodie[22] had erected a beautiful monument over their graves; but after orders had been given to this effect, his wife became strongly possessed by the wish to carry out his repeatedly expressed injunction to have him laid in Dalmeny.

KATHARINE BURTON.

Morton, 20th September 1881.

Dalmeny Church

Dalmeny Church.

A Nook in the Author's Library.

A Nook in the Author's Library

decorative illustration

Of the Title under which the contents of the following pages are ranged I have no better justification to offer than that it appeared to suit their discursive tenor. If they laid any claim to a scientific character, or professed to contain an exposition of any established department of knowledge, it might have been their privilege to appear under a title of Greek derivation, with all the dignities and immunities conceded by immemorial deference to this stamp of scientific rank. I not only, however, consider my own trifles unworthy of such a dignity, but am inclined to strip it from other productions which might appear to have a more appropriate claim to it. No doubt, the ductile inflections and wonderful facilities for decomposition and reconstruction make Greek an excellent vehicle of scientific precision, and the use of a dead language saves your nomenclature from being confounded with your common talk. The use of a Greek derivative gives notice that you are scientific. If you speak of an acanthopterygian, it is plain that you are not discussing perch in reference to its roasting or boiling merits; and if you make an allusion to monomyarian malacology, it will not naturally be supposed to have reference to the cooking of oyster sauce.

Like many other meritorious things, however, Greek nomenclature is much abused. The very reverence it is held in—the strong disinclination on the part of the public to question the accuracy of anything stated under the shadow of a Greek name, or to doubt the infallibility of the man who does it—makes this kind of nomenclature the frequent protector of fallacies and quackeries. It is an instrument for silencing inquiry and handing over the judgment to implicit belief. Get the passive student once into palæozoology, and he takes your other hard names—your ichthyodorulite, trogontherium, lepidodendron, and bothrodendron—for granted, contemplating them, indeed, with a kind of religious awe or devotional reverence. If it be a question whether a term is categorematic, or is of a quite opposite description, and ought to be described as suncategorematic, one may take up a very absolute positive position without finding many people prepared to assail it.

Antiquarianism, which used to be an easy-going slipshod sort of pursuit, has sought this all-powerful protection, and called itself Archæology. An obliterated manuscript written over