Nelson's Lady Hamilton

by Meynell, Esther

  " You ask me, my dear Friend, if I am going on more Expeditions ? And, even if I was to forfeit your friendship, which is dearer to me than all the world, I can tell you nothing. For, I go out; if I see the Enemy, and can get at them, it is my duty : and you would naturally hate me if I kept back one moment. I long to pay them, for their tricks t' other day, the debt of a drubbing, which, surely, I'll pay : but when, where, or how, it is impossible, your own good sense must tell you, for me or mortal man to say."

  At this time he was very anxious about one of

  LADY HAMILTON

  GEORGE ROMNEY

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  his young officers, Commander Edward Parker, who was specially dear to him, and who had been seriously—and as it later proved, fatally—wounded in the unsuccessful boat attack on Boulogne. In September, Sir William and Lady Hamilton came to Deal for a fortnight, and during this time Nelson and Emma were constantly at the bedside of poor young Parker, of whom Nelson said characteristically, " He is my child, for I found him in distress." Parker rallied for a time, but on the 2Oth of September he became rapidly worse, and on the same day Lady Hamilton had returned to London. These two events weighed heavily on Nelson's spirits. " I came on board, but no Emma," he told her. " No, no, my heart will break. I am in silent distraction. . . . My dearest wife, how can I bear our separation ? Good God, what a change! I am so low that I cannot hold up my head." A few days later Parker died. " It was, they tell me," said Nelson, " a happy release; but I cannot bring myself to say I am glad he is gone; it would be a lie, for I am grieved almost to death."

  Nelson was himself very much out of health, and angry at being kept so long at his cold and unsatisfactory post, away from the comforts of home and the presence of Emma. He refused to believe that Lord St. Vincent and Sir Thomas Troubridge (who was then at the Admiralty) kept him at sea for public reasons; he thought,

  in the distemper of his mind, that it was t< prevent his being with Lady Hamilton. Againsl his old friend and comrade-in-arms, Troubridge, he was particularly bitter; perhaps because Troubridge, with characteristic courage and honesty, had ventured to protest earlier against Lad 1 Hamilton's undue influence. To Emma he wrote, at the beginning of October: " Troubridge has so completely prevented my mentioning any body's service, that I am become a cypher, and he has gained a victory over Nelson's spirit. Captain Somerville, has been begging me to intercede with the Admiralty again; but I have been so rebuffed, that my spirits are gone, and the great Troubridge has what we call cowed the spirits of Nelson; but I shall never forget it." Even Troubridge's kind suggestions were twisted into scorn. " I have a letter from Troubridge, recommending me to wear flannel shirts. Does he care for me ? No ; but never mind." Again, " Troubridge writes me, that as the weather is set in fine again, he hopes I shall get walks on shore. He is, I suppose, laughing at me; but, never mind."

  Thus Nelson, like " poor Brutus—with himself at war, forgot the shows of love to other

  men."

  But after the preliminaries to the Peace of Amiens were signed there was no longer any reason, real or imaginary, why Nelson should not

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  return to his friends. "Only two days more," he writes to Lady Hamilton, on the 2Oth of October, " the Admiralty could, with any conscience, keep me here; not that I think they have had any conscience. I dare say, Master Troubridge is grown fat. I know I am grown lean with my complaint, which, but for their indifference about my health, would never have happened ; or, at least, I should have got well long ago in a warm room, with a good fire, and sincere friends." He might well pine for a fire, for he suffered greatly from the bitter weather, and wrote to Emma on the very day before he left his flagship : " I am literally starving with cold; but my heart is warm."

  This time when he went ashore it was not to the Hamiltons' house in Piccadilly, but to a home of his own. Even before the Battle of the Baltic he had been discussing with Emma the possibility and the advantages of such a project, and it was in Emmas hands that he left the whole business; she was to find a house for him, buy it, and furnish it to their joint liking. This she did with all the capability she displayed in the practical affairs of life. Merton Place, in Surrey, was the house chosen, and for the few years that remained to him on earth, " dear, dear 1 Merton" was to Nelson the centre of his happiness, the ideal country home for which the heart of a sea-sick sailor was always longing.

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  Almost all that made Merton has now vanished—swallowed up by the bricks and mortar of encroaching London. But when Nelson bought it, the place was in the midst of green fields and pleasant woods ; a stream ran through the grounds which he and Emma christened "The Nile." The house itself was spacious, comfortable, plain. The grounds were extensive and stocked with all sorts of farm creatures by Emma. " I expect, that all animals will increase where you are/' Nelson told her in one of his letters, "for I never expect that you will suffer any to be killed." In another letter he declares, " I am sure, you have as fine a taste in laying out the land, as you have in music." In his eyes Emma could do everything—and nothing ill.

  Sir William Hamilton was inclined to joke the admiral about his implicit faith in Emma.

  " We have now inhabited your Lordship's premises for some days/' he wrote, "and I can now speak with some certainty. I have lived with our dear Emma several years, I know her merit, have a great opinion of the head and heart God Almighty has been pleased to give her, but a seaman alone could have given a fine woman full power to choose and fit up a residence for him, without seeing it himself. You are in luck, for on my conscience, I verily believe that a place so suitable to your views could not have been found and at so cheap a rate. For, if you

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  stay away three days longer, I do not think you can have any wish but you will find compleated here. And then the bargain was fortunately struck three days before an idea of peace got about. Now, every estate in this neighbourhood has increased in value, ... I never saw so many conveniences united in so small a compass. You have nothing but to come and to enjoy immediately. You have a good mile of pleasant dry walk around your farm. It would make you laugh to see Emma and her mother fitting up pigstyes and hencoops, and already the Canal is enlivened with ducks, and the cock is strutting with his hen about the walks."

  Even before he had seen the home that Emma had chosen and arranged for him, Nelson's thoughts were constantly occupied in picturing it and the woman who was its presiding genius : " I assure you, my dear friend, that I had rather read and hear all your little story of a white hen getting into a tree, an anecdote of Fatima, or hear you call—' Cupidy ! Cupidy !' than any speech I shall hear in parliament; because I know, although you can adapt your language and manners to a child, yet that you can also thunder forth such a torrent of eloquence, that corruption and infamy would sink before your voice, in however exalted a situation it might be placed,"—another allusion to the Prince of Wales episode which had made such a deep impression

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  on Nelson's mind. He told her that she was to be " Lady Paramount of all the territories and waters of Merton."

  At Merton, Nelson meant to begin a new and happier life with his beloved Emma and with Sir William Hamilton, though the old diplomat was only a figure in the background; indispensable, in a way, because he gave the curious household a veneer of propriety; cherished aftet a fashion and affectionately regarded by the twc who had so seriously wronged him, but a negli gible quantity in the thoughts of his wife anc of Nelson, and never seriously considered in their scheme of things. This came naturally enough to P Emma, who, all her life, had defiec ordinary standards of conduct; but Nelson was the son of a clergyman, and had been brought up in a different atmosphere. So in his nev home—the first real home he had ever had on English soil—he wished that everything should be good and seemly. The essential blot, the real wrong, he could not or would not remove ; but with that curi
ous moral perversion of which the human mind is capable he asked Emma the question, which, seen truly, is really pathetic, " Have we a nice church at Merton ? We will set an example of goodness to the under parishioners."

  When at length he reached Merton he found it all his hopes had pictured, and soon his

  •

  "MEDITATION"

  ENGRAVED BY S. 1'HII.LIPS FROM A DRAWING BY R. WESTAI.L, R. A.

  relations were gathered round his hospitable hearth. Lady Hamilton wrote to Mrs. William Nelson within a week or two of the admiral's arrival—

  " He has been very, very happy since he arrived, and Charlotte [Nelson's niece] has been very attentive to him. Indeed we all make it our constant business to make him happy. Sir William is fonder than ever, and we manage very well in regard to our establishment, pay share and share alike, so it comes easy to booth partys. . . . We were all at church, and Charlotte turned over the prayers for her uncle. As to Sir William, they are the greatest friends in the world. ... Sir William and Charlotte caught 3 large pike. She helps him and milord with their great coats on; so now I have nothing to do."

  This is an idyllic picture of country peace and an united household. The impression is further heightened by a simple old-world letter from Nelson's father to Lady Hamilton, written in January, 1802—

  "MADAM, —Your polite congratulations upon the entrance of a new year, I return seven-fold to you, and the whole of the party now under the hospitable roof of Merton Place. Time is a sacred deposit committed to our trust; and, hereafter, we must account for the use we have

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  made of it. To me, a large portion of this treasure has already been granted, even seventy-nine years. The complaint my dear son has felt is, I know, very, very painful: and can be removed, only, with much care and caution; not venturing, without a thick covering, both head and feet, even to admire your parterres of snowdrops, which now appear in all their splendour. The white robe which January wears, bespangled with ice, is handsome to look at; but we must not approach too near her. I shall be very glad to know the Lord of Merton is recovered. I am, Madam, your most humble servant. EDM. NELSON"

  Just before Nelson first came to Merton he wrote to Emma, begging that he might not be " annoyed " on his arrival with visitors and strangers; " it is retirement with my friends, that I wish for/ 7 That was a genuine expression of his wishes and feelings ; all his life he was well content with the dinner of herbs where love is— but not so Emma. In the simple old Edgware Row days, when one man's approval had made up the sum of her happiness, she had found content in small things ; but Italy and the atmosphere of a Court had spoiled her. She had grown to like a lavish show, an exuberant and expensive hospitality. Nelson had assured her, in the blindness of his heart, during the purchase

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  and preparation of Merton, "You will make us rich with your economies." But economy and Emma—after her early days—were barely on speaking terms. Like most women, she enjoyed

  'i planning and contriving something out of nothing,

  ;!and she was always ready to work with her hands; but any saving she effected thereby was erased by some lavish expenditure soon afterwards. At Merton, in Nelson's name, she kept a most liberal table, as the heavy weekly bills show, and she was not satisfied lest many guests

  ] graced the well-provided board. So expenses grew, and the quiet country home became as full of noise and society as any town house. Nelson yielded his wishes to hers without a murmur— apparently all was well so long as the " Lady Paramount" was happy.

  But Sir William was not so well pleased. Old age had crept fast upon him; he began to feel that his days were numbered, and he wished to spend the few remaining to him in the ways and pursuits for which he most cared. "It is but reasonable," he wrote to his nephew, Charles

  j Greville, in January, 1802, " after having fagged all my life, that my last days should pass off comfortably and quietly." The reasonableness of this desire Emma apparently could not see : she was so wrapped up in herself and in Nelson, she was so eminently satisfied with the large and easy way of living at Merton, that she ignored

  her husband's growing dissatisfaction. At last Sir William was driven to put the case before her in writing, which he did with great restraint and kind feeling ; nevertheless, the document is illuminating, and it is particularly interesting as being practically the last time in which the old diplomatist emerges from the background to which he had been tacitly relegated by his wife and his " best friend "—

  " I have passed the last 40 years of my life in the hurry and bustle that must necessarily be ! attendant on a publick character. I am arrived at the age when some repose is really necessary, and I promised myself a quiet home, and altho' I was sensible, and said so when I married, that I shou'd be superannuated when my wife wou'd be in her full beauty and vigour of youth. That time is arrived, and we must make the best of it for the comfort of both parties. Unfortunately our tastes as to the manner of living are very different. I by no means wish to live in solitary retreat, but to have seldom less than 12 or 14 at table, and those varying continually, is coming back to what was become so irksome to rne in Italy during the latter years of my residence in that country. I have no connections out of my own family. I have no complaint to make, but I feel that the whole attention of my wife is given to Lord N. and his interest at Merton. I well know the purity of Lord N.'s friendship for

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  JEmma and me, and I know how very uncomfortable it wou'd make his Lp., our best friend, if a jseparation shou'd take place, and am therefore determined to do all in my power to prevent such an extremity, which wou'd be essentially detri-mental to all parties, but wou'd be more sensibly felt by our dear friend than by us. Provided that our expences in housekeeping do not en-|:rease beyond measure (of which I must own I isee some danger), I am willing to go upon our (present footing; but as I cannot expect to live many years, every moment to me is precious, and jl hope I may be allow'd sometimes to be my own jmaster, and pass my time according to my own inclination, either by going my fishing parties on the Thames or by going to London to attend the JMuseum, R. Society, the Tuesday Club, and jAuctions of pictures. I mean to have a light lariot or post chaise by the month, that I may ike use of it in London and run backwards and rards to Merton or to Sheppertdn, etc. This my plan, and we might go on very well, but am fully determined not to have more of the silly altercations that happen but too often reen us and embitter the present moments :ceedingly. If realy one cannot live comfort->ly together, a wise and well concerted separation preferable; but I think, considering the pro-ibility of my not troubling any party long in tis world, the best for us all wou ; d be to bear

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  those ills we have rather than flie to those we know not of. I have fairly stated what I have on my mind. There is no time for nonsense or trifling. I know and admire your talents and many excellent qualities, but I am not blind to your defects, and confess having many myself; therefore let us bear and forbear for God's sake/'

  A sensitive woman would have been arrest by the kindly moderation of this statement. But though "sensibility"—in the eighteenth-century use of the word—was one of Emma Hamilton's most marked characteristics, sensitiveness was not. It seems probable, from subsequent doings at Merton, that Sir William's protest was little heeded. Some idea of the mode of life there may be gathered from the account of a visit paid by Lord Minto about this time. " The whole establishment and way of life are such as to make me angry, as well as melancholy," he told his wife; " but I cannot alter it, and I do not think myself obliged, or at liberty, to quarrel with him for his weakness, though nothing shall evei induce me to give the smallest countenance tc Lady Hamilton." He was convinced that Emmc looked ultimately to surviving the two " impediments" (it is Nelson's own ruthless word) to hej marriage with the admiral. Minto admitted tha she was " in high looks, but more immense thai ever. The love she make
s to Nelson is not onl 1

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  ridiculous, but disgusting: not only the rooms, but the whole house, staircase and all, are covered with nothing but pictures of her and him, of all sizes and sorts, and representations of his naval actions, coats-of-arms, pieces of plate in his honour, the flag-staff of L!Orient, etc.—an excess of vanity which counteracts its own purpose. If it was Lady Hamilton's house there might be a pretence for it; to make his own house a mere looking-glass to view himself all day is bad taste."

  Lord Minto ignores, or is ignorant of, the fact that practically it was Lady Hamilton's own house. She had furnished and arranged it; she had made it speak Nelson on every wall. How much all this was Emma's doing and how little the admiral's may be gathered from an account of Nelson in private life, written by one of his nephews:—

  " Lord Nelson in private life was remarkable >r a demeanour quiet, sedate, and unobtrusive, ixious to give pleasure to every one about him, listinguishing each in turn by some act of kind-Less, and chiefly those who seemed to require it lost. During his few intervals of leisure, in a itle knot of relations and friends, he delighted quiet conversation, through which occasionally in an undercurrent of pleasantry, not unmixed with caustic wit. At his table he was least heard among the company, and so far from being the

  hero of his own tale, I never heard him voluntarily refer to any of the great actions of his life."

  But though the admiral might be silent, there was little chance of his actions being forgotten while Emma was present. She still shone as " Patroness of the Navy " to the younger officers of the Service. Lieutenant Parsons relates how she helped him to his Commission after the Peace of Amiens, when he found himself stranded on half-pay, with no chance of promotion. As a last resource he went to Merton. When he arrived there he found Nelson in an irritable humour, declaring that he was " pestered to death by young gentlemen, his former shipmates." This was disconcerting, but Tom Allen, Nelson's old sailor-servant, "went in search of an able auxiliary, who entered the study, in the most pleasing shape—that of a lovely and graceful woman ; and, with her usual fascinating and playful manner, declared, 'His Lordship must serve me/ His countenance, which, until now, had been a thundercloud, brightened; and Lady Hamilton was the sun that lightened our hemisphere. She, with that ready wit possessed by the fair sex alone, set aside his scruples of asking a favour of the first Admiralty Lord, by dictating a strong certificate, which, under her direction, he wrote, * Now, my young friend/ said her ladyship, with that irresistible smile which gave such expression oi sweetness to her lovely countenance, 'obey m)