A Book of Sibyls: Miss Barbauld, Miss Edgeworth, Mrs Opie, Miss Austen. Anne Thackeray Ritchie
quietly in a window. An old lady comes in to read the news; but she has forgotten her spectacles, and soon goes away. Here, instead of asking for 'Vice Versâ,' or Ouida's last novel, you instinctively mention 'Plays of the Passions,' Miss Burney's 'Evelina,' or some such novels; and Mrs. Barbauld's works are also in their place. When I asked for them, two pretty old Quaker volumes were put into my hands, with shabby grey bindings, with fine paper and broad margins, such as Mr. Ruskin would approve. Of all the inhabitants of this bookshelf Mrs. Barbauld is one of the most appropriate. It is but a few minutes' walk from the library in Heath Street to the old corner house in Church Row where she lived for a time, near a hundred years ago, and all round about are the scenes of much of her life, of her friendships and interests. Here lived her friends and neighbours; here to Church Row came her pupils and admirers, and, later still, to the pretty old house on Rosslyn Hill. As for Church Row, as most people know, it is an avenue of Dutch red-faced houses, leading demurely to the old church tower, that stands guarding its graves in the flowery churchyard. As we came up the quiet place, the sweet windy drone of the organ swelled across the blossoms of the spring, which were lighting up every shabby corner and hillside garden. Through this pleasant confusion of past and present, of spring-time scattering blossoms upon the graves, of old ivy walks and iron bars imprisoning past memories, with fragrant fumes of lilac and of elder, one could picture to oneself, as in a waking dream, two figures advancing from the corner house with the ivy walls—distinct, sedate—passing under the old doorway. I could almost see the lady, carefully dressed in many fine muslin folds and frills with hooped silk skirts, indeed, but slight and graceful in her quick advance, with blue eyes, with delicate sharp features, and a dazzling skin. As for the gentleman, I pictured him a dapper figure, with dark eyes, dressed in black, as befitted a minister even of dissenting views. The lady came forward, looking amused by my scrutiny, somewhat shy I thought—was she going to speak? And by the same token it seemed to me the gentleman was about to interrupt her. But Margaret, my young companion, laughed and opened an umbrella, or a cock crew, or some door banged, and the fleeting visions of fancy disappeared.
Many well-authenticated ghost stories describe the apparition of bygone persons, and lo! when the figure vanishes, a letter is left behind! Some such experience seemed to be mine when, on my return, I found a packet of letters on the hall table—letters not addressed to me, but to some unknown Miss Belsham, and signed and sealed by Mrs. Barbauld's hand. They had been sent for me to read by the kindness of some ladies now living at Hampstead, who afterwards showed me the portrait of the lady, who began the world as Miss Betsy Belsham and who ended her career as Mrs. Kenrick. It is an oval miniature, belonging to the times of powder and of puff, representing not a handsome, but an animated countenance, with laughter and spirit in the expression; the mouth is large, the eyes are dark, the nose is short. This was the confidante of Mrs. Barbauld's early days, the faithful friend of her latter sorrows. The letters, kept by 'Betsy' with faithful conscientious care for many years, give the story of a whole lifetime with unconscious fidelity. The gaiety of youth, its impatience, its exuberance, and sometimes bad taste; the wider, quieter feelings of later life; the courage of sorrowful times; long friendship deepening the tender and faithful memories of age, when there is so little left to say, so much to feel—all these things are there.
II.
Mrs. Barbauld was a schoolmistress, and a schoolmaster's wife and daughter. Her father was Dr. John Aikin, D.D.; her mother was Miss Jane Jennings, of a good Northamptonshire family—scholastic also. Dr. Aikin brought his wife home to Knibworth, in Leicestershire, where he opened a school which became very successful in time. Mrs. Barbauld, their eldest child, was born here in 1743, and was christened Anna Lætitia, after some lady of high degree belonging to her mother's family. Two or three years later came a son. It was a quiet home, deep hidden in the secluded rural place; and the little household lived its own tranquil life far away from the storms and battles and great events that were stirring the world. Dr. Aikin kept school; Mrs. Aikin ruled her household with capacity, and not without some sternness, according to the custom of the time. It appears that late in life the good lady was distressed by the backwardness of her grandchildren at four or five years old. 'I once, indeed, knew a little girl,' so wrote Mrs. Aikin of her daughter, 'who was as eager to learn as her instructor could be to teach her, and who at two years old could read sentences and little stories, in her wise book, roundly and without spelling, and in half a year or more could read as well as most women; but I never knew such another, and I believe I never shall.' It was fortunate that no great harm came of this premature forcing, although it is difficult to say what its absence might not have done for Mrs. Barbauld. One can fancy the little assiduous girl, industrious, impulsive, interested in everything—in all life and all nature—drinking in, on every side, learning, eagerly wondering, listening to all around with bright and ready wit. There is a pretty little story told by Mrs. Ellis in her book about Mrs. Barbauld, how one day, when Dr. Aikin and a friend 'were conversing on the passions,' the Doctor observes that joy cannot have place in a state of perfect felicity, since it supposes an accession of happiness.
'I think you are mistaken, papa,' says a little voice from the opposite side of the table.
'Why so, my child?' says the Doctor.
'Because in the chapter I read to you this morning, in the Testament, it is said that "there is more joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth than over ninety and nine just persons that need no repentance."'
Besides her English Testament and her early reading, the little girl was taught by her mother to do as little daughters did in those days, to obey a somewhat austere rule, to drop curtsies in the right place, to make beds, to preserve fruits. The father, after demur, but surely not without some paternal pride in her proficiency, taught the child Latin and French and Italian, and something of Greek, and gave her an acquaintance with English literature. One can imagine little Nancy with her fair head bending over her lessons, or, when playing time had come, perhaps a little lonely and listening to the distant voices of the schoolboys at their games. The mother, fearing she might acquire rough and boisterous manners, strictly forbade any communication with the schoolboys. Sometimes in after days, speaking of these early times and of the constraint of many bygone rules and regulations, Mrs. Barbauld used to attribute to this early formal training something of the hesitation and shyness which troubled her and never entirely wore off. She does not seem to have been in any great harmony with her mother. One could imagine a fanciful and high-spirited child, timid and dutiful, and yet strong-willed, secretly rebelling against the rigid order of her home, and feeling lonely for want of liberty and companionship. It was true she had birds and beasts and plants for her playfellows, but she was of a gregarious and sociable nature, and she was unconsciously longing for something more, and perhaps feeling a want in her early life which no silent company can supply.
She was about fifteen when a great event took place. Her father was appointed classical tutor to the Warrington Academy, and thither the little family removed. We read that the Warrington Academy was a Dissenting college started by very eminent and periwigged personages, whose silhouettes Mrs. Barbauld herself afterwards cut out in sticking-plaster, and whose names are to this day remembered and held in just esteem. They were people of simple living and high thinking, they belonged to a class holding then a higher place than now in the world's esteem, that of Dissenting ministers. The Dissenting ministers were fairly well paid and faithfully followed by their congregations. The college was started under the auspices of distinguished members of the community, Lord Willoughby of Parham, the last Presbyterian lord, being patron. Among the masters were to be found the well-known names of Dr. Doddridge; of Gilbert Wakefield, the reformer and uncompromising martyr; of Dr. Taylor, of Norwich, the Hebrew scholar; of Dr. Priestley, the chemical analyst and patriot, and enterprising theologian, who left England and settled in America for conscience and liberty's sake.
Many other people, neither students nor professors, used to come to Warrington, and chief among them in later years good John Howard with MSS. for his friend Dr. Aikin to correct for the press. Now for the first time Mrs. Barbauld (Miss Aikin she was then) saw something of real life, of men and manners. It was not likely that she looked back with any lingering regret to Knibworth, or would have willingly returned thither. A story in one of her memoirs gives an amusing picture of the manners of a young country lady of that day. Mr. Haines, a rich farmer from Knibworth, who had been greatly struck by Miss Aikin,