Oldalképek
PDF
ePub

Mr. Yorke had most incomparable talents, and virtues; but he had the defect (and general society were the sufferers) of reserve, inherent, and constitutional. It was often called pride, and was accompanied (as in studious men it often is) by fits of absence. But I have seen him in company with his friend, and I never passed a more enlightened, or a happier hour.

By a miracle of good fortune, I possess more than fifty letters of Mr. WRAY to his illustrious friend, in his own hand, entrusted by the Earl of Hardwicke to me. They commence in 1740, and are closed in 1769. They are models of epistolary eloquence: wit, and learning, taste, and good sense, command his pen by turns. There is a kind of chastened familiarity in them, which gives them a peculiar charm. He is never oppressed by the difference of rank, or by the deep, and moral sense of obligations, on the one hand, or guilty of unbecoming liberties, on the other hand, though with an attached, and zealous admirer of his talents, and virtues, but superior in rank, and at an early period of their friendship his patron.

Amongst the Letters of 1740 and 1741, there is one so lively, in its comic features, and so pointed at the commencement of their friendship, that, with Lord Hardwicke's permission, who is the owner of it, I shall here copy it.

"DEAR SIR,

Queen's College, Cambridge,
Jan. 8, 1741.

"Nothing has flattered me so agreeably as that "confidence, and intimacy you treat me with, after "an acquaintance so lately made; though I rather fancy I fix the æra of it too low. I had heard of

[ocr errors]

your extraordinary qualities from all my Cam"bridge friends, and was much at your service be"fore ever I saw you; and G. R.* and H. C.*, I "reckon, had puffed my humour to you:

*He often speaks of his friends Rooke and Coventry; to whom, therefore, I apprehend, these initials refer.-G. R. was Dr.

George

"Virgilius, post hunc Varius dixere quid essem*. so that, without antedating my patent, I may law"fully take my seat amongst your old friends. But "this may be carried much higher, beyond all positive " institution, quite into the original fitness of things: "Certè est quod me tibi temperat astrum.—

[ocr errors]

"Our dispositions are suited to each other. The ease, " and fire, you write with, is very oddly joined with "an appetite for being criticised; and my attention to "minute particulars qualifies me to find fault with pieces that are the most correct. You, most unlike "an author, distrust your own judgment; and I, like a true critic, am peremptory in my decisions. If you emulate Gracchus, I take myself to be no bad "Licinus ; and have my pitch-pipe always ready to " take you down a note or two. Imagine yourself a play-wright, then I sweep your stage; or, if you are "considered as a preacher, I ring the bell, and "sometimes, perhaps, furnish a text.

66

"But the relation between us, I allow, is only to "last while you are at leisure illudere chartis, and are diverting yourself in the porticos of Athens, " and the gardens of Susat. When you leave this fairy land, and settle in Britain, I resign my censorship. I wait upon you to the door of the house, con"signing you to the judgment of the publick, and "the correction, if you should want it, of the orators.

[ocr errors]

"Thus far had I written as an apology for "the unmerciful licence I took with your last PhiGeorge-Henry Rooke, afterwards Master of Christ's College, and a writer in the Athenian Letters.-Coventry was the author of the Dialogues of Philemon and Hydaspes. He was an admirable scholar, and a very accomplished man. Two of the Athenian Letters are by him.

* It may here be observed, that Mr. WRAY was very fond of quoting Latin verses from classical authors, to enliven or embellish his own style of thought, by carrying it back to the Augustan age; and one does not wonder that he is fond of it, because it is fond of him.

†This alludes to the "Athenian Letters."

Part of the local in the correspondence between Athens and Persia

[ocr errors]

losopher

"losopher; and was going on to the Cambridge "Gazette, when I received the favour of your second, "and found my friend Mr. Charles had exhausted "the only article of consequence. That iniquum "certamen, ubi ego verberando, &c. between me and "Madam M. has indeed engrossed all the specula"tions of this place. The affair of Dormer and Pul"teney was but a type of it. The General could "never be so tragical as our heroine, nor was the "member of Parliament half so arch as your humble "servant. There was a design of putting us under arrest, with a beadle at each of our doors; but the "Vice-chancellor, being accidentally a man of the

66

world, took our parole of honour, and we travelled "all over the town, representing our case at every tea"table; you will easily imagine what advantage the "thunder of my eloquence gave me. I made Miss "F.C. speak, and the Rector of Drayton stare. The 66 personages you would name for mediators were my "avowed advocates, and, assisted by my little friend, "who is an absolute dragoon, and can fight as well "on foot as on horseback, turned the Monday night's "roar so strongly in my favour, that

"Ready stood two precious drops,

"Each in their crystal sluice.

"But I forbear: I must not triumph; we are very good friends, and on Sunday, a thick piece of bread and butter was ordered for me in the presence of "Lord Dupplin, and Mr. Townshend.

"Quid voveat dulci nutricula majus alumno?

[ocr errors]

"The abovesaid Honourable and Right Honour"able, a Vice-chancellor of our own, Dr. Simpson§-a new Master of Magdalen still more ortho"dox, Roderick's cousin, Abbot||,—and statutable

[ocr errors]

* Alluding to one of the " Athenian Letters." †The celebrated Charles Yorke.

I am not Antiquary enough to elucidate this passage. § Edmund Sympson, LL. D. Master of Trinity Hall. Edward Abbot, M. A. of Emanuel College; Master of Mag

dalen College 1740-1746.

[ocr errors][merged small]

"stuffing at Christmas,-will, I trust, be some excuse "for my delay in answering you. Besides, as you "candidly observe, by sending Mr. Charles, I sent you more than I had to say.

[ocr errors]

"If your Philosopher be at all improved, it is "owing to him. All I did was to raise a few doubts, " and objections. He most readily entered into the spirit of them, and presented immediately the "thought, or expression I was looking for;

[ocr errors]

"Nor could I burn so fast as he could build.

"The compliments you transmit from the Ladies "make me so proud, that I can scarce deign to sub"scribe myself your humble servant, D. W."

At a period a little prior to these dates, in 1738 or 1739, Mr. WRAY was on a summer visit in Devonshire to his fellow-traveller in Italy, Mr. King, who had then inherited the title and property of the Chancellor. This Peer had acquired by marriage Yartie-house in Devonshire, at which mansion Mr. WRAY was the guest.

From thence he wrote a lively, ingenious, and amusing poem, in English verse, to his friend Mr. Wollaston of Charter-house Square, father to the venerable Divine of that name at Chiselhurst, as well as to the late Dr. Charlton Wollaston, who was one of the most admired physicians in his day, and sure of distinguished eminence, if he had not been cut off by a fever in his youth.

Mr. WRAY'S Correspondent, and bosom friend was the son of a parent who would have immortalized the name by his Treatise on the Religion of Nature, if he had left no other children behind him.

But I do not believe, the moral, and the literary world ever contemplated more exemplary worth, and learning than have appeared in this family, and appear in it still..

* This alludes to a passage in the " Athenian Letters." † He had an ample share in the "Athenian Letters."

To

To the son of the philosopher this poem of Mr. WRAY is addressed; and I shall extract from it passages which give a portrait of the writer's comic spirit, as well as a bird's-eye view of his youth, and of its habits. The poem is preserved by Mr. Wollaston of Chiselhurst in Mr. WRAY's hand. It is dated Fartie, near Membury, September 4. (no year.) "Ille velut fidis arcana sodalibus olim

"Credebat libris: neque si malè cesserat usquam
"Decurrens alid, neque si benè, quo fit ut omnis
"Votivá pateat veluti descripta tabelld
"Vita.-

*

"Augustus, master of the globe,
One day did thus his Horace jobe † :
"Mecenas, Lollius, all our cronies,
"Have each a part in your Sermones :
"Less blooming will your ivy shew
"If round my laurel it should grow?"

In such a case what could be said?

The bard went home, and scratch'd his head 1,
And bit his nails ‡, and wak'd his genius;

To this we owe "Cum tot sustineas." §

Now, dearest Frank, though we suppose,
In peace, and war, in verse, and prose,
Our worships not of size to mate
The foresaid Prince, and Laureate;
Yet matters are between us just as

They were 'twixt Horace and Augustus.

* Those who are conversant in our changes of style must have observed how these expletives have been dropped of late years in verse, and prose.

† A word in social use for scolding, but not received into dictionaries.

This was the habit of the author himself; and my father alludes to it in his dialogue with him.

§ First line of Hor. Ep. lib. 2. ep. 1.

Shall

« ElőzőTovább »