Tuesday, December 7th [1813]
Went to bed, and slept dreamlessly, but not refreshingly. Awoke, and up an hour before being called; but dawdled three hours in dressing. When one subtracts from life infancy (which is vegetation),—sleep, eating, and swilling—buttoning and unbuttoning—how much remains of downright existence? The summer of a dormouse.
Redde the papers and
tea
-ed and soda-watered, and found out that the fire was badly lighted. Lord Glenbervie wants me to go to Brighton—um!
This morning, a very pretty billet from the Stael about meeting her at Ld. H.'s to-morrow. She has written, I dare say, twenty such this morning to different people, all equally flattering to each. So much the better for her and those who believe all she wishes them, or they wish to believe. She has been pleased to be pleased with my slight eulogy in the note annexed to
The Bride
. This is to be accounted for in several ways,—firstly, all women like all, or any, praise; secondly, this was unexpected, because I have never courted her; and,
thirdly
, as Scrub
says, those who have been all their lives regularly praised, by regular critics, like a little variety, and are glad when any one goes out of his way to say a civil thing; and, fourthly, she is a very good-natured creature, which is the best reason, after all, and, perhaps, the only one.
A knock—knocks single and double. Bland called. He says Dutch society (he has been in Holland) is second-hand French; but the women are like women every where else. This is a bore: I should like to see them a little
un
like; but that can't be expected.
Went out—came home—this, that, and the other— and "all is vanity, saith the preacher," and so say I, as part of his congregation.
Talking
of vanity, whose praise do I prefer? Why, Mrs. Inchbald's
, and that of the Americans. The first, because her
Simple Story
and
Nature and Art
are, to me,
true
to their
titles
; and, consequently, her short note to Rogers about
The Giaour
delighted me more than any thing, except the
Edinburgh Review
. I like the Americans, because
I
happened to be in
Asia
, while the
English Bards, and Scotch Reviewers
were redde in
America
. If I
could
have had a speech against the
Slave Trade in Africa
, and an epitaph on a dog in
Europe
(i.e. in the
Morning Post
), my
vertex sublimis
would certainly have displaced stars enough to overthrow the Newtonian system.
Footnote 1:
The reference is only to the form of the sentence. "Scrub," in
The Beaux' Stratagem
(act iv. se. 2), says,
"First, it must be a plot, because there's a woman in't; secondly, it must be a plot, because there's a priest in't; thirdly, it must be a plot, because there's French gold in't; and fourthly, it must be a plot, because I don't know what to make on't."
Footnote 2:
Elizabeth Simpson (1753-1821), daughter of a Suffolk farmer, married (1772) Joseph Inchbald, actor and portrait-painter. Actress, dramatist, and novelist, she was one of the most attractive women of the day. Winning in manner, quick in repartee, an admirable teller of stories, she always gathered all the men round her chair.
"It was vain," said Mrs. Shelley, "for any other woman to attempt to gain attention."
Miss Edgeworth wished to see her first among living celebrities; her charm fascinated Sheridan, and overcame the prejudice of Lamb; even Peter Pindar wrote verse in her praise. From the age of eighteen she was wooed on and off the stage, where her slight stammer hindered her complete success; but no breath of scandal tarnished her name. Had John Kemble, the hero of
A Simple Story
, proposed to her, she probably would have married him. Mrs. Butler records that her uncle John once asked the actress, when matrimony was the subject of green-room conversation, "Well, Mrs. Inchbald, would you have had me?" "Dear heart," said the stammering beauty, turning her sunny face up at him," I'd have j-j-j-jumped at you." Mrs. Inchbald's
Simple Story
(1791) wears a more modern air than any previously written novel. Her dramatic experience stood her in good stead. "Dorriforth," the priest, educated, like Kemble, at Douay, impressed himself upon Macaulay's mind as the true type of the Roman Catholic peer.
Nature and Art
(1796) was written when Mrs. Inchbald was most under the influence of the French Revolution. Of two boys who come to London to seek their fortunes, Nature makes one a musician, and Art raises the other into a dean. The trial and condemnation of "Agnes" perhaps suggested to Lytton the scene in
Paul Clifford
, where "Brandon" condemns his own son.
Footnote 3:
Horace,
Odes
, I. i. 36.
