Nothing yet had publicly transpired, with certainty or authority, relative to the projects of Mrs. Thrale, who had now been nearly a year at Bath; though nothing was left unreported, or unasserted, with respect to her proceedings. Nevertheless, how far Dr. Johnson was himself informed, or was ignorant on the subject, neither Dr. Burney nor his daughter could tell; and each equally feared to learn.
Scarcely an instant, however, was the latter left alone in Bolt Court, ere she saw the justice of her long apprehensions; for while she planned speaking upon some topic that might have a chance to catch the attention of the Doctor, a sudden change from kind tranquility to strong austerity took place in his altered countenance; and, startled and affrighted, she held her peace.
A silence almost awful succeeded, though, previously to Dr. Burney’s absence, the gayest discourse had been reciprocated.
The Doctor, then see-sawing violently in his chair, as usual when he was big with any powerful emotion whether of pleasure or of pain, seemed deeply moved;, but without looking at her, or speaking, he intently fixed his eyes upon the fire; while his panic-struck visitor, filled with dismay at the storm which she saw gathering over the character and conduct of one still dear to her very heart, from the furrowed front, the laborious heaving of the ponderous chest, and the roll of the large penetrating, wrathful eye of her honoured, but just then, terrific host, sate mute, motionless, and sad; tremblingly awaiting a mentally demolishing thunderbolt.
Thus passed a few minutes, in which she scarcely dared breathe; while the respiration of the Doctor, on the contrary, was of asthmatic force and loudness; then, suddenly turning to her, with an air of mingled wrath and woe, he hoarsely ejaculated: “Piozzi!”,
He evidently meant to say more; but the effort with which he articulated that name robbed him of any voice for amplification, and his whole frame grew tremulously convulsed.
His guest, appalled, could not speak; but he soon discerned that it was grief from coincidence, not distrust from opposition of sentiment, that caused her taciturnity.
This perception calmed him, and he then exhibited a face “in sorrow more than anger.” His see-sawing abated of its velocity, and, again fixing his looks upon the fire, he fell into pensive rumination.
From time to time, nevertheless, he impressively glanced upon her his full fraught eye, that told, had its expression been developed, whole volumes of his regret, his disappointment, his astonished indignancy; but, now and then, it also spoke so clearly and so kindly, that he found her sight and her stay soothing to his disturbance, that she felt as if confidentially communing with him, although they exchanged not a word.
At length, and with great agitation, he broke forth with: “She cares for no one! You, only — You, she loves still! — but no one — and nothing else! —— You she still loves — —”
A half smile now, though of no very gay character, softened a little the severity of his features, while he tried to resume some cheerfulness in adding: “As she loves her little finger!”
It was plain by this burlesque, or, perhaps, playfully literal comparison, that he meant now, and tried, to dissipate the solemnity of his concern.
The hint was taken; his guest started another subject; and this he resumed no more. He saw how distressing was the theme to a hearer whom he ever wished to please, not distress; and he named Mrs. Thrale no more. Common topics took place, till they were rejoined by Dr. Burney, whom then, and indeed always, he likewise he spared upon this subject.
Appendix: Extracts from the Journals of Susan and Charlotte Burney
“I have such a thing to tell you, said he [my father] “about poor Fan” ——
“Dear sir, what?” and I immediately suppos’d he had spoke to Mrs. Thrale.
“Why to-night, we were sitting at tea —— only Johnson, Mrs. Thrale and me— “Madam,” cried Johnson -see sawing on his chair— “Mrs. Chol’mley was talking to me last night of a new novel, which she says has a very uncommon share of merit — Evelina — She says she has not been so much entertained this great while as in reading it — and that she shall go all over London in order to discover the author” —
“Good G —— d” cried Mrs. Thrale— “why somebody else mentioned that book to me — Lady Westcote it was I believe — The modest writer of Evelina, she talk’d to me of.”
“Mrs. Chol’mley says she never met so much modesty with so much merit before in any literary performance,” said Johnson. “Why” said I, quite coony and innocently— “Somebody recommended it to me too — I read a little of it, which indeed seem’d to be above the common place works of this kind.”
“Well,” said Mrs. Thrale— “I”ll get it certainly.” “It will do’ said I, “for your time of confinement I think.”
“You must have it Madam,” cried Johnson,— “for Mrs. Chol’mley says she shall keep it on her table the whole summer, that everybody that knows her may see it — for she says everybody ought to read it!” ——
A tolerably agreeable conversation this, methinks —— It took away my breath, and made me skip about like a mad creature — What effect it may have on you I know not — But I think it will occasion you no less consternation than you received from the Monthly Review —
“And how did you feel sir?” cried I to my father.
“Feel? Why I liked it, of all things! — and I wanted somebody else to introduce the book there too — — “Twas just what I wish’d — I am sure Mrs. Thrale will be pleased with it.”
Place: Leicester Fields.
Place: Chesington, Sunday, Aug. 1, 1779.
We arrived at Streatham at a very little past e!even. As a place, it surpassed all my expectations. The avenue to the house, plantations, &c. are beautiful; worthy of the charming inhabitants. It is a little Paradise, I think. Cattle, poultry, dogs, all running freely about, without annoying each other. Sam opened the chaise-door, and told my father breakfast was not quite over, and I had no sooner got out than Mr. Thrale appeared at a window close to the door, — and, indeed, my dear Fanny, you did not tell me anything about him which I did not find entirely just. With regard to his reception of me, it was particularly polite. I followed my father into the library, which was much such a room as I expected; — a most charming one. There sat Mrs. Thrale and Dr. Johnson, the latter finishing his breakfast upon peaches. Mrs. Thrale immediately rose to meet me very sweetly, and to welcome me to Streatham. Dr. Johnson, too, rose. “How do, dear lady?” My father told him it was not his Miss — but another of his own bantlings. Dr. Johnson, however, looked at me with great kindness, and not at all in a discouraging manner. . . . Dr. Johnson interrupted Mrs. Thrale by telling my father Mrs. Thrale had desired Mr. Potter to translate some verses for him, which he, (Dr. J.) had before undertaken to do. “How so?” said my father. “Why Mr. Potter?” “Nay, Sir, I don’t know. It was: Mrs. Thrale’s fancy.” Mrs. Thrale said she would go and fetch them. As soon as she was gone, Dr. Johnson invited me to take her seat, which was next to him. “Come, come here, my litt!e dear,” said he, with great kindness, and took my hand as I sat down, I took then courage to deliver your respects. “Aye. — Why don’t she come among us?” said he. I said you were confined by a sick sister, but that you were very sorry to be away. “A rogue!” said he, laughing. “She don’t mind me!” And then I up and spoke vast fine about you, for Dr. Johnson looked so kind, and so good-humour’d I was not afraid of the sound of my voice. Mr. Thrale then came in, — and, by the way, during my whole visit look’d at me with so much curiosity, tho’ he behaved with the utmost politeness, that I could not help thinking all the time of his having said he had not had fair play about that Miss Susan. I am sorry he had heard me puff’d; however, kinder and more flattering attention could not be paid me from all quarters than I received. Dr. Johnson insisted upon my eating one of his peaches, and, when I had eat it, took a great deal of pains to persuade me to take another. “No,” said Mr. Thrale, “they’re good for nothing. Miss Burney must have some better than them.”
However, I was humble. They did for me. Miss Thrale came in: coldly civil as usual, — but was very chatty with me, for her, before I went away.
Then came back Mrs. Thrale, with the verses, which she had been copying out. I rose, and took a seat next Miss Thrale. However, she made me return to that next Dr. Johnson, that he might hear what I had to say. “But, if I have nothing to say, Ma”am?” said I— “Oh, never fear,” said she, laughing, “I”ll warrant you”ll find something to talk about.” The verses were then given to my father. After he had read the first stanza, “Why, these are none of Potter’s!” said he, “these are worse than Potter! They beat him at his own weapons.” Dr. Johnson and Mrs. Thrale laugh’d very much, and the verses proved to be the former’s, and vere composed, in a comical humour, the evening before, in derision of Potter. They are admirable, you will see them at Streatham, and perhaps procure a copy, which my father could not do. Dr. Johnson is afraid of having them spread about as some other verses were he wrote in the same way to redicule [sic] poor Dr. Percy; but Mrs. Thrale advised my father to make you attack Dr. Johnson about them, “for she can do what she pleases with him.”. . .
My father then played over some songs from the Olimpiade during which Dr. Johnson came in. He had a book in his hand, and wanted to shew some passage to my father, but seeing him engaged, stopt close to me, who was standing near the piano-forte. He put his arm round me, and smiling very good- humouredly, said, “Now you don’t expect that I shall ever love you so well as I do your sister?”— “Oh, no, Sir,” said I— “I have no such hopes — I am not so presumptuous.”— “I am glad you are so modest,” said he, laughing, — and so encouraged by his good humour, (and he kept see-sawing me backwards and forwards in his arms, as if he had taken me for you) that I told him I must make an interest with him through you. He again said he was glad I was so modest, and added— “but I believe you’re a good little creature — I think one should love you, too, if one did but know you!” There’s for you! — I assure you I shall set this little conversation down among my first honours. It put me in good humour and spirits for the rest of the day. After this Mr. Thrale came in, and some very good conversation went about concerning Count Manucci, Mr. and Mrs. Pepys, and I don’t know who besides. . .
When we were to go, Dr. Johnson comically repeated his “Don’t expect me to love you so well as your sister,” but added, as I left the room, a very good-natured farewell— “Goodbye, my little love.” He [Garrick] took off Dr. Johnson most admirably. Indeed, I enjoyed-it doubly from having been in his company; his see-saw, his pawing, his very look, and his voice! My cot! what an astonishing thing it is he [Garrick] has not a good ear for music! He took him off in a speech (that has stuck in his gizzard ever since some friendly person was so obliging as to repeat it to him). Indeed, I should much wonder if it did not, for it would have been a severe speech if it had been said upon who it would, much more upon Garrick, indeed I think it must have been exaggerated, or if not, that it was a very severe, ill- natured, unjust thing. “Yes, yes, Davy has some convivial pleasantries in him; but ’tis a futile Fellow.” A little while after he took him off in one of his own convivial pleasantries. “No, Sir; I”m for the musick of the ancients, it has been corrupted so.”
The gentlemen were so kind and considerate as to divert themselves by making a fire skreen to the whole room — Dr. Johnson, made them all make off, for when nobody would have imagined he had known the gentlemen were in the room, he said that “if he was not ashamed he would keep the fire from the ladies too,” — this reproof (for a reproof it certainly was, altho’ given in a very comical dry way) was productive of a scene as good as a comedy, for Mr. Suard tumbled on to the sopha directly, Mr. Thrale on to a chair, Mr. Davenant sneaked off the premises seemingly in as great a fright and as much confounded as if he had done any bad action, and Mr. Gruel, being left solus was obliged to stalk off in spight of his teeth, and it was pretty evidently against the grain. During one of the duets, Piozzi, fatigued I suppose with being encircled with strangers and having nobody to converse with, regaled himself with a short nap.
Dr. Johnson was immensely smart, for him, — for he had not only a very decent tidy suit of cloathes on, but his hands, face, and linnen were clean, and he treated us with his worsted wig which Mr. Thrale made him a present of, because it scarce ever got out of curl, and he generally diverts himself with laying [sic] down just after he has got a fresh wig on.
The Biographies
Portrait of Frances d’Arblay (Fanny Burney) by Edward Francisco Burney, c. 1785
Bolton Street, London — Burney’s home in Mayfair
The plaque commemorating Burney’s residence at Bolton Street
FANNY BURNEY by Austin Dobson
CONTENTS
PREFACE
CHAPTER I. THE BURNEY FAMILY
CHAPTER II. NO. 1, ST. MARTIN’S STREET
CHAPTER III. THE STORY OF EVELINA
CHAPTER IV. THE SUCCESSFUL AUTHOR
CHAPTER V. CECILIA — AND AFTER
CHAPTER VI. THE QUEEN’S DRESSER
CHAPTER VII. HALF A LIFETIME
PREFACE
The main sources for this memoir of Frances or Fanny Burney, — afterwards Madame D’Arblay, — in addition to her novels, the literature of the period, and the works specified in the footnotes, are as follows: —
1. Memoirs of Dr. Burney, arranged from his own Manuscript, from Family Papers, and from Personal Recollections. By his Daughter, Madame D’Arblay. In Three Volumes. London: Moxon,
1832.
2. Diary and Letters of Madame D’Arblay, Author of “Evelina,” “Cecilia,” etc. Edited by her Niece. [In Seven Volumes.] London: Colburn, 1842-46. [The edition here used is Swan Sonnenschein’s four volume issue of 1892.]
3. The Early Diary of Frances Burney 1768-1778. With a Selection from her Correspondence, and from the Journals of her Sisters Susan and Charlotte Burney. Edited by Annie Raine Ellis. In Two Volumes. London: George Bell and Sons, 1889.
I am indebted to the kindness of Archdeacon Burney, Vicar of St. Mark’s, Surbiton, for access to his unique extra-illustrated copy of the Diary and Letters of 1842-6, which contains, among other interesting MSS., the originals of Mrs. Thrale’s letter mentioned at page 86 of this volume, and of Burke’s letter mentioned at page 124. Archdeacon Burney is the possessor of Edward Burney’s portrait of his cousin (page 88); of the Reynolds portraits of Dr. Burney and Garrick from the Thrale Gallery (page 94); of a very fine portrait of Dr. Charles Burney by Lawrence; and of a group by Hudson of Hetty Burney, her husband, Charles Rousseau Burney, and her husband’s father, Richard Burney of Worcester.
I am also indebted to Mrs. Chappel of East Orchard, Shaftesbury, granddaughter of Mrs. Barrett, the editor of the Diary and Letters, for valuable information as to Burney relics in her possession.
A. D. 75, EATON RISE, EALING, W.,
September 18, 1903.
CHAPTER I. THE BURNEY FAMILY
In the second half of the seventeenth century, there lived at the village of Great Hanwood, four miles from Shrewsbury, a country gentleman of a good estate, named James Macburney. In later life, he was land-steward to the Earl of Ashburnham; and he rented or possessed a house in the Privy Garden at Whitehall. Tradition traces his family to Scotland, whence it was said to have arrived with James I. However this may be, — and the point was not regarded as of much importance by his descendants, — James Macburney married his Shropshire rector’s daughter; begat a son; and in due time, became a widower. The son — also James Macburney — was educated at Westminster School under the redoubtable Dr. Busby. Then, taking to art, he worked as a pupil of the “eminent Face Painter,” Michael Dahl. About 1697, at the age of nineteen, he ran away with Rebecca Ellis, an actress in Giffard’s Company, and younger than himself. Thereupon his irate father disinherited him, and in further token of his displeasure, took to wife his own cook, by whom he had another son called Joseph, who, as soon as he arrived at man’s estate, removed all
possible difficulties in regard to the succession by dissipating the property. Having effected this with much promptitude, he settled down contentedly as a Norfolk dancing master. Meanwhile, his elder half-brother, — who, though lacking in discretion, had many pleasing gifts (he was, in particular, an accomplished violin-player), — being left, by the death of his actress-wife, with a numerous family, wedded, for the second time, a beautiful young lady of Shropshire, Mistress (i.e. Miss) Ann Cooper. Miss Cooper was currently reported to have rejected Wycherley the dramatist, who, it may be remembered, like the elder Macburney, was desirous of disappointing his natural heir. Miss Cooper had some money; but James Macburney’s second marriage increased the number of his children. The youngest members of his family were twins, Susannah (who died early), and Charles, afterwards the well-known historian of music, and the father of Fanny Burney. Like his predecessors, he was born Macburney, but the “Mac” was subsequently dropped.
Not long after Charles Burney’s birth, which took place on the 12th April 1726, in Raven Street, Shrewsbury (a name probably derived from the famous Raven Inn once familiar to Farquhar and “Serjeant Kite”), James Burney, as we may now call his father, settled at Chester as a portrait painter, leaving his little son at nurse in Condover, a village near Shrewsbury. Here, with an affectionate foster mother, Charles Burney throve apace, until he was transferred to the Chester Grammar School. At this date his natural gifts were sufficiently manifest to enable him at a pinch to act as deputy for the Cathedral organist. Subsequently, he became the pupil of his half-brother, James, the organist of St. Mary’s Church at Shrewsbury. Then, being again in Chester when the famous Dr. Augustine Arne was passing through the town on his return from Ireland to London, he was fortunate enough to be taken as that master’s apprentice. This was in August 1744, when he was eighteen, pleasant-mannered, intelligent, very musical, very versatile, and — as he continued to be through life — an indefatigable worker. From Arne he did not learn much except to copy music, and to drudge in the Drury Lane Orchestra, which Arne conducted; and, although he had an elder brother in London, he was left greatly to his own devices. But his abilities and personal charm brought him many friends. He was frequently at the house in Scotland Yard of Arne’s sister, Mrs. Cibber, the foremost tragic actress of her day; and here he made acquaintance with many notabilities. Handel was often among the visitors, playing intricate fugues and overtures with his pudgy fingers upon the harpsichord; and Garrick, with the wonderful eyes; and Garrick’s surly old rival, the bon-vivant, James Quin; and Mason; and Thomson the poet of The Seasons.
Complete Works of Frances Burney Page 693
