Lansdowne, built after the model of the temple of Lysicrates at Athens, and which now serves as a chapel to the cemetery, in which he lies entombed in a massive granite sarcophagus. Of Vathek Landor spoke in his usual extravagant style of eulogy, and of its author he said, "I doubt whether any man, except Shakspeare, has afforded so much delight, if we open our hearts to receive it." Other less noted celebrities still paraded Milsom street, or sauntered through the Victoria Park, and avoided the pump-room and the baths. To such societies Landor was a welcome acquisition, and he generally made himself agreeable to it. But he could say a rude thing when he pleased. The Literary Club invited him to become a member, and he replied by asking who the Litererary Club were, and by asserting that there were not three literary men besides himself in Bath. would break off in the middle of some witty criticism, some extravagant political heresy, to say a few words of caressing Italian to the little animal that lay beneath his chair with front paws stretched out, and sharp face resting upon them, and small ears restlessly moving to catch the first signal that the visit was at an end. But on hearing these kind words he would rush out to leap into his master's lap, barking madly in the ecstasy of his joy. "I shall never survive thee, carissimo," Landor would say; and while Pomero barked out a similar promise, his master would turn to those around him, and say: "I do not intend to live after him. If he dies, I shall take poison." Alas! it was Pomero who was poisoned, by some malignant rascal. Landor felt the loss acutely, and it was not until after he returned to Florence that he would console himself by getting another Pomero. His morning calls used to be events to the friends he visited. His favorite subjects of conversation were politics and literature, and the former was a more frequent topic than the latter. He used to enounce the most outré opinions; and when some sentiment more extravagant than the rest had excited the laughter of his audience, he would sit silent until they had finished laughing, then he would begin to shake, then to laugh aloud, piano at first, but with crescendo steadily advancing to the loudest fortissimo; whereupon Pomero would spring out from his lair, leap into his master's lap, add his bark to Landor's roar, until the mingled volume of sounds would swell from the room into the sleepy streets, and astonish, if not scandalize, the somewhat torpid Bathonians who might be passing by. To those who knew Landor, Dickens's portrait of him as Mr. Boythorn in Bleak House would seem a more faithful, and at the same time more friendly, likeness than the same author's portrait of Leigh Hunt in the same book, who is there represented under the character of Harold Skimpole. To those who saw Landor as he climbed the Bath streets, it would not have occurred that he was the rich Signor Inglese, who had inhabited the palace of the Medici, and purchased Michael Angelo's famous villa at Fiesole. It was not, as Beau Brummell used to say, that he did not dress well, but that he did not dress at all. Clad, indeed, he was; but as regards dress in its highest sense, he, the artist, the worshiper of all beauty, knew nothing. He would wear a hat whose black had become brown, a coat whose surface had become shining, trousers that were certainly meant by their maker for legs of lesser length and girth than those of the well-proportioned "Gebir Landor," as Coleridge used to call him. He carried at all seasons a gingham umbrella, (alpacca had not then learned to flatter its owner that it looked like silk,) and thus he would toil sturdily up the steep streets somewhat slowly, with back somewhat bent, but still with gait wonderfully steady for a man who would never again see his seventieth year. One attendant he had, a native of Florence, the most faithful, the most cherished attendant that ever poet Landor was a republican, but, in spite and scholar was blessed with. This was of his denunciation of kings and queens, a black-eyed, sharp-faced, long-haired he was no democrat. "I would cut off Pomeranian dog of purest breed. The the head of every sovereign in Europe," affection between "Pomero" and his he would say, "except Queen Victoria ; master was beautiful to see. Landor and I would spare her, because she is a lady." Yet he was no admirer of mob rule. His republicanism was of the Miltonic and the Platonic type. He thought highly of the Venetian Republic. He composed pæans in English, Latin, and Greek, upon Louis Napoleon when he became President of the Republic. After the coup d'état, there was no invective too fierce, no denunciation too tremendous, for his old Bath friend. So that the new made emperor himself expressed concern and astonishment at the bitterness of Landor's wrath. There was one old resident of Bath, gone to his rest now these fourteen years, with whom Landor was accustomed especially to debate on the perjury of their common friend. Worthy disciples of Harmodius and Aristogeiton, whom they both admired, they would say the one to the other, "Why did we not kill him when he was here?" and Landor would add, "I wish to God we had!" He greatly scandalized even those who knew him best, and made allowances for his exaggerations, when he published in a newspaper his proposal to pension the widow of the man who should assassinate Napoleon, and might suffer death in consequence. What sort of language he used of his wished-for victim in the Examiner and some other papers which used to insert his most outrageous effusions, may be gathered from the following specimen: "Hast thou forgotten, thou more vile Rather than fall among the brave? Disdain'd to hurl thee to thy grave? Up Boulogne's proud columnar hill? For what?-To be a traitor still." After this it will scarcely be believed that Landor came to address Napoleon as one of the wisest and greatest of sovereigns. The Anglo-French alliance in 1854 completely altered his ideas. The revolution of 1848 had raised up idols for Landor's homage; some of whom, like Pio Nono, he afterwards trampled under foot with every mark of ignominy. The Russian war gave him new heroes to reverence, and new wretches to execrate. With Landor, all men were either angels or devils. Every one was bad or good in the superlative degree. He was madly enthusiastic about the war. He considered Nicholas, the "Tzar," as he used to call him, a fiend incarnate. He swallowed all the huge canards of the Morning Advertiser about the Prince Consort, and was quite ready to send His Royal Highness to the Tower, and from thence to the scaffold. For Lord Aberdeen he had the utmost contempt. It was a Parliament of mediocrities, he declared ; "and," he added, "I doubt whether in the last three centuries the world ever contained so few eminent men as at present, literary or political. "The vales shall be exalted, and the hills laid low," is come to pass. There is a wide and verdant surface of well irrigated plain, but not a cedar nor an oak in sight." He made, however, two exceptions to his strictures; one in favor of Mr. Gladstone, of whom he said, "Never had England so able and so honest a Chancellor of the Exchequer;" and the other in favor of the man whom, but a few months before, he had vilified in the above quoted lines. Now he says of the latter that he is "the wisest and most consistent of rulers, who may acquire a far more glorious name in history than the proudest and mightiest of his predecessors. His title may be the Napoleon of Peace." Landor had forgotten all about December 2nd, 1851 he remembered only March 12th, 1854, and that Napoleon had allied himself with Victoria to annihilate Russia, and to rescue the Turks, whom he declared to be the finest gentlemen in Europe. "Neither of us can expect to see the termination of the present war; I should rather say, of the series of wars inevitably coming,"-he makes Jonas Pottinger write to Ephraim Maplebury, in the Letters of an American. If Landor had had the conduct of the war, his presentiment would probably have been fulfilled. He declared that Russia must be deprived of all that she had taken; that a Kingdom of Poland, stretching from the Baltic to the Euxine, from the Vistula to the Dnieper, must be established; that Austria must be despoiled of Hungary and Lombardy, and be left with only "a dinner-table, a whisttable, and a billiard-table." He deemed all this work not only practicable, but easy. He had a truly British contempt | these latter days, "waxing exceeding great toward the south, and toward the east, and toward the pleasant land." He did not know that there was a statesman quietly tilling his rice fields, and waiting for the time when his dream would be fulfilled, and he should become the minister of a united Italy. He little thought that the heir to one of the most ancient and one of the smallest kingdoms of Europe would become the sovereign of the newest, and well nigh the noblest. It was Italy that felt the first shock of the revolution which, seventeen years ago, made It may be readily imagined that Lan- every throne in Europe vibrate; and dor took a warm interest in the affairs of Landor, on hearing of it, at once took Italy. No politician so keen as he could his pen in hand, and wrote for the pecuhave failed to do so. Moreover, his long niary benefit of the widows and orphans residence of about thirty years in that of the insurgents who had fallen at Mascountry made him feel himself half an sina his "Imaginary Conversations of Italian. "It is worth all that remains of King Carlo Alberto and the Duchess life to have lived one year in Italy," is Belgiojoso, on the affairs and prospects the sentiment which he puts in the mouth of Italy." Extravagant as Landor's of one of his conversationalists, and dreams generally were, they fell very far which, at the time he wrote, expressed short of the reality in this instance. He his own ideas. He had not, indeed, that had little faith in Carlo Alberto, he had high opinion of the Italians which he a hundred times more in Pio Nono. He had of the Poles. He did not suppose describe the Princess Belgiojoso (that that Italy would ever play such a part in admirable woman who raised a troop of Europe as he assigned to Poland. The two hundred horse, and led them herself latter he described as "the natural barrier against the Austrians, and to whom he of civilization against barbarism, of free- addressed some spirited lines) as urging dom against despotism." All that ever the King of Piedmont to take a decisive was Poland must again be Poland, and step. "Italians," she 66 says, are supemuch more. Power, predominating pow-rior to all the nations round about. It er, is necessary to her for the advantage is supposed that your majesty is ambiof Europe. She must be looked up to tious of being King of Lombardy. Supas an impregnable outwork, protecting posing it practicable, do you imagine the the nascent liberties of the world. To people of Turin will be contented to see Italy he ascribed no such high position. the seat of government transferred to Perhaps it was long residence in Italy Milan, or that the rich and noble and anwhich made him less hopeful of her fu- cient families of Milan will submit to beture. If so, a much shorter residence in come the footstools of the Turinese?" Poland would have dispelled his dream How well Landor understood the local of a great Polish kingdom "extending jealousies which hitherto had prevented from the Euxine to the Baltic, from the common action among the States of Italy! Vistula to the Dnieper." However that How little he foresaw that astonishing may be, Landor does not seem to have revolution which would suppress all these ever contemplated the possibility of an jealousies; and for the love of a common Italian kingdom. Italy was, to his mind, Italy induce the Piedmontese themselves a geographical expression only. He had in their own chief city to vote for its degpassed the greater part of his life in the radation, and for the removal of the seat little Florentine capital, or in towns like of government from the capital where, Pisa, Lucca, Venice, with occasional vis- from time immemorial, the kings of the its to Rome and to Naples; and he had ancient house of Savoy had held their not noticed the small sub-Alpine king- court! Twelve years ago, Landor wrote dom of Piedmont, that "little horn" of of Italy in January, 1853: "Gloomy as droops the present day, It must have eased his bed of death to know that "dead Italy" had been raised to newness of life. About the year 1849, Landor moved from St. James's Square, Bath, to No. 3, River Street, in the same city, and there he remained during the rest of his residence in the Queen of the West. It was a somewhat dingy abode for one who had been accustomed to reside in the palace of the Medici, and among the groves that Horace frequented. It overlooked a sort of square, in whose roadway the grass grew thick among the stones. He did not rent the whole house; but every room that he occupied, and the staircase, was covered from floor to roof with paintings. In these, as in his much larger collection at Florence, he took great delight. He endeavored to find in the gilt frames a substitute for the sunlight of Italy; and he used to say that English artists would never be able to do without such frames, by reason of the absence of that sunlight. As with most other collectors, one way to win his favor was to praise his pictures. It is probable that he was often deceived when he made a purchase. It would be more correct to say, that he deceived himself. He would enter a picture dealer's shop, and if he saw anything which pleased him, he would order it, and often find an illustrious parentage for it to which the seller had not aspired. He cared not to know the history of the work. It was enough for him that he believed it to be a master's, and he was ready to place his own judgment against that of all the world. "That is a Paul Verenese, that a Gaspar Poussin, and this is a Nicholas Poussin," he would say to his visitors. They had but his word for it. He deemed this quite sufficient. It is probable that Landor thought more highly of his taste as a connoisseur than of his ability as an author. To question the authenticity of his pictures was to incur his abiding displeasure. He himself was the first to speak about his unpopularity as a writer. "I suppose there are some half dozen persons in England who possess my books, and, perhaps, three are capable of understanding them." And yet Landor did not despise fame. He never forgot a compliment, and he generally returned it with compound interest. It was generally possible to find the origin of his panegyrics in the flattery of those whom he eulogized. He was seriously angry when some one in his presence spoke slightingly of the works of G. P. R. James; and he extolled that novelist to an extent that would have been suitable only for Scott. James he had probably known at Venice; at all events James had praised Landor, and Landor repaid him a thousand per cent. Bulwer, who spoke of him in his Last Days of Pompei as his learned friend, and Dickens, who dedicated one of his novels to him, were remembered in like manner. He remembered his literary detractors equally well. The flippant N. P. Willis, with whom he had a personal quarrel about the loss of some manuscripts which the American wished the Englishman to read, took his revenge by speaking of Landor, in one of his poems describing London society, as "Savage Landor, wanting soap and sand." And Savage Landor fulfilled his patronymic, or matronymic, rather. Byron spoke of him as "deep-mouthed Baotian Savage Landor;" and Landor gave Byron a good deal more than he brought. "Byron was not att Byron; one small part Bore the impression of a human heart." And again, and, sharper still, the following lines sent with a copy of his own poems : "Little volume, warm with wishes, Change she wants not, self-concenter'd, Literature's gin-places." Landor's praise, however, was not always given in exchange. He often gave it as a free gift to men to whom the gift was very valuable. There is nothing more generous in the annals of modern criticism than his review in the Morning Advertiser of a volume of poems written by a then unknown mechanic, but whose works have now, probably, thousands of readers who never heard of Gebir or Count | such intimate friendship as the following Julian. The critique is well worth quot- lines imply: ing. be attributed to an over-heated partiality. "I purpose to review the works of no ordinary poet-Gerald Massey. It appears that his station in life is obscure, and his fortunes far from prosperous. Such also was the condition of Keats, to whom he bears in many features of his genius a marvelous resemblance. Keats has found patrons now he is in his grave. May Massey find them on this side of it! I have not the honor (for honor I should think it) to know him personally; and, therefore, if I should err in my judgment of his merits, the cause of my blindness will not I am thought to be more addicted to the ancients than to the moderns-wrongfully; for I never, since I was able to compare, preferred the best of them to Shakspeare and Milton. And at the present time I am trying to recollect any ode, Latin or Greek, more graceful than one in page 24." (This was, Ah, 'tis like a tale of olden!" which Landor did not know was very similar to a poem by L. E. L.) "The reader of this criticism will, I hope, test its accuracy by the perusal of a duodecimo which contains a larger quantity of good poetry than threescore ostentatious volumes by eminent hands.' I feel almost as much of pleasure in bringing it farther out into public notice, as I should of pride if I had written one of its pages. Here is such poetry as the generous Laureate will read with approbation, as Jeffrey would have tossed aside with derision, and as Gifford would have torn to pieces with despair. Can anything more or better be said for it ?" This last sentence is thoroughly Landor's; for he had not forgotten the strictures of the Edinburgh and the Quarterly thirty years before. He was always generous to the new race of poets and writers who were rising around him. He did not believe that the former days were altogether better than these. While he praised Wordsworth, Coleridge, Southey, Moore, Campbell, and the other men who were young when he was young, he could see something admirable in writers so different from each other as Ebenezer Elliott, Aubrey De Vere, Margaret Fuller d'Ossoli, Eliot Warburton, Eliza Lynn, Mrs. Gaskell, Charles Dickens, and "Festus" Bailey. To all of these, verses more or less flattering, but all sincere, are to be found addressed in the Last Fruit of an Old Tree. For Alfred Tennyson he felt something more than admiration with him he had "I entreat you, Alfred Tennyson, Come and share my haunch of venison. Good, but better when you share it. At the time that Landor wrote so generously of Gerald Massey, he was in his eightieth year. He was still hale and hearty, but an octogenarian must respicere finem, and he hoped to end his days in Bath. He wrote the following lines, addressed "To Bath." "The snows have fallen since my eyes were closed There seemed no reason why the residue of his days should not be spent in his favorite English city. He had gathered round him a circle of friends, who, if their names have "not been heard of half a mile from home," were able to appreciate his published writings, and his clever talk. Even for those who were not able he had a liking. He delighted to scandalize them by his political or religious extravagances; and, next best to seeing the kindling eye of an intelligent listener, was seeing the lengthening face of a horrified one. From time to time he would run up to London, from which Bath is but three hours distant. Here he would spend a few weeks among his literary friends, the men of the present generation, who were babes or unborn when he was marching under Blake; or the friends of his own age, Rogers, Kenyon, Crabbe, Robinson, whom he declared to be the best talker that ever lived, and who, of that generation, alas! alone survives him, to tell of the time when he and Goethe used to discourse together. When at home in Bath, Landor received visits from men he loved and honored,-John Forster, Charles Dickens, Sir William Napier, who had a seat in the neighborhood,— |
