Anthony Trollope - Autobiography of Anthony Trollope
with myself for this persistency, feeling that I was making myself
a slave to an amusement which has not after all very much to
recommend it. I have often thought that I would break myself away
from it, and "swear off," as Rip Van Winkle says. But my swearing
off has been like that of Rip Van Winkle. And now, as I think of
it coolly, I do not know but that I have been right to cling to it.
As a man grows old he wants amusement, more even than when he is
young; and then it becomes so difficult to find amusement. Reading
should, no doubt, be the delight of men's leisure hours. Had I to
choose between books and cards, I should no doubt take the books.
But I find that I can seldom read with pleasure for above an hour
and a half at a time, or more than three hours a day. As I write
this I am aware that hunting must soon be abandoned. After sixty
it is given but to few men to ride straight across country, and I
cannot bring myself to adopt any other mode of riding. I think that
without cards I should now be much at a loss. When I began to play
at the Garrick, I did so simply because I liked the society of the
men who played.
I think that I became popular among those with whom I associated.
I have long been aware of a certain weakness in my own character,
which I may call a craving for love. I have ever had a wish to be
liked by those around me,--a wish that during the first half of
my life was never gratified. In my school-days no small part of my
misery came from the envy with which I regarded the popularity of
popular boys. They seemed to me to live in a social paradise, while
the desolation of my pandemonium was complete. And afterwards,
when I was in London as a young man, I had but few friends. Among
the clerks in the Post Office I held my own fairly for the first
two or three years; but even then I regarded myself as something of
a pariah. My Irish life had been much better. I had had my wife and
children, and had been sustained by a feeling of general respect.
But even in Ireland I had in truth lived but little in society.
Our means had been sufficient for our wants, but insufficient for
entertaining others. It was not till we had settled ourselves at
Waltham that I really began to live much with others. The Garrick
Club was the first assemblage of men at which I felt myself to be
popular.
I soon became a member of other clubs. There was the Arts Club in
Hanover Square, of which I saw the opening, but from which, after
three or four years, I withdrew my name, having found that during
these three or four years I had not once entered the building.
Then I was one of the originators of the Civil Service Club--not
from judgment, but instigated to do so by others. That also I left
for the same reason. In 1864 I received the honour of being elected
by the Committee at the Athenaeum. For this I was indebted to the
kindness of Lord Stanhope; and I never was more surprised than when
I was informed of the fact. About the same time I became a member
of the Cosmopolitan, a little club that meets twice a week in
Charles Street, Berkeley Square, and supplies to all its members,
and its members' friends, tea and brandy and water without charge!
The gatherings there I used to think very delightful. One met
Jacob Omnium, Monckton Mimes, Tom Hughes, William Stirling, Henry
Reeve, Arthur Russell, Tom Taylor, and such like; and generally
a strong political element, thoroughly well mixed, gave a certain
spirit to the place. Lord Ripon, Lord Stanley, William Forster,
Lord Enfield, Lord Kimberley, George Bentinck, Vernon Harcourt,
Bromley Davenport, Knatchbull Huguessen, with many others, used to
whisper the secrets of Parliament with free tongues. Afterwards I
became a member of the Turf, which I found to be serviceable--or
the reverse--only for the playing of whist at high points.
In August, 1861, I wrote another novel for the Cornhill Magazine.
It was a short story, about one volume in length, and was called
The Struggles of Brown, Jones, and Robinson. In this I attempted a
style for which I certainly was not qualified, and to which I never
had again recourse. It was meant to be funny, was full of slang,
and was intended as a satire on the ways of trade. Still I think
that there is some good fun it it, but I have heard no one else
express such an opinion. I do not know that I ever heard any opinion
expressed on it, except by the publisher, who kindly remarked
that he did not think it was equal to my usual work. Though he had
purchased the copyright, he did not republish the story in a book
form till 1870, and then it passed into the world of letters sub
silentio. I do not know that it was ever criticised or ever read.
I received (pounds)600 for it. From that time to this I have been paid at
about that rate for my work--(pounds)600 for the quantity contained in
an ordinary novel volume, or (pounds)3000 for a long tale published in
twenty parts, which is equal in length to five such volumes. I have
occasionally, I think, received something more than this, never
I think less for any tale, except when I have published my work
anonymously. [Footnote: Since the date at which this was written
I have encountered a diminution in price.] Having said so much, I
need not further specify the prices as I mention the books as they
were written. I will, however, when I am completing this memoir,
give a list of all the sums I have received for my literary labours.
I think that Brown, Jones and Robinson was the hardest bargain I
ever sold to a publisher.
In 1861 the War of Secession had broken out in America, and from
the first I interested myself much in the question. My mother
had thirty years previously written a very popular, but, as I had
thought, a somewhat unjust book about our cousins over the water.
She had seen what was distasteful in the manners of a young people,
but had hardly recognised their energy. I had entertained for
many years an ambition to follow her footsteps there, and to write
another book. I had already paid a short visit to New York City and
State on my way home from the West Indies, but had not seen enough
then to justify me in the expression of any opinion. The breaking
out of the war did not make me think that the time was peculiarly
fit for such inquiry as I wished to make, but it did represent itself
as an occasion on which a book might be popular. I consequently
consulted the two great powers with whom I was concerned. Messrs.
Chapman & Hall, the publishers, were one power, and I had no difficulty
in arranging my affairs with them. They agreed to publish the book
on my terms, and bade me God-speed on my journey. The other power
was the Postmaster-General and Mr. Rowland Hill, the Secretary of
the Post Office. I wanted leave of absence for the unusual period
of nine months, and fearing that I should not get it by the ordinary
process of asking the Secretary, I went direct to his lordship.
"Is it on the plea of ill-health?" he asked, looking into my face,
which was then that of a very robust man. His lordship knew the
Civil Service as well as any one living, and must have seen much
of falseness and fraudulent pretence, or he could not have asked
that question. I told him that I was very well, but that I wanted
to write a book. "Had I any special ground to go upon in asking for
such indulgence?" I had, I said, done my duty well by the service.
There was a good deal of demurring, but I got my leave for nine
months,--and I knew that I had earned it. Mr. Hill attached to
the minute granting me the leave an intimation that it was to be
considered as a full equivalent for the special services rendered
by me to the department. I declined, however, to accept the grace
with such a stipulation, and it was withdrawn by the directions of
the Postmaster-General. [Footnote: During the period of my service
in the Post Office I did very much special work for which I never
asked any remuneration,--and never received any, though payments
for special services were common in the department at that time.
But if there was to be a question of such remuneration, I did not
choose that my work should be valued at the price put upon it by
Mr. Hill.]
I started for the States in August and returned in the following
May. The war was raging during the time that I was there, and the
country was full of soldiers. A part of the time I spent in Virginia,
Kentucky, and Missouri, among the troops, along the line of attack.
I visited all the States (excepting California) which had not then
seceded,--failing to make my way into the seceding States unless I
was prepared to visit them with an amount of discomfort I did not
choose to endure. I worked very hard at the task I had assigned to
myself, and did, I think, see much of the manners and institutions
of the people. Nothing struck me more than their persistence in
the ordinary pursuits of life in spite of the war which was around
them. Neither industry nor amusement seemed to meet with any check.
Schools, hospitals, and institutes were by no means neglected
because new regiments were daily required. The truth, I take it,
is that we, all of us, soon adapt ourselves to the circumstances
around us. Though three parts of London were in flames I should
no doubt expect to have my dinner served to me if I lived in the
quarter which was free from fire.
The book I wrote was very much longer than that on the West Indies,
but was also written almost without a note. It contained much
information, and, with many inaccuracies, was a true book. But it
was not well done. It is tedious and confused, and will hardly,
I think, be of future value to those who wish to make themselves
acquainted with the United States. It was published about the
middle of the war,--just at the time in which the hopes of those
who loved the South were I most buoyant, and the fears of those who
stood by the North were the strongest. But it expressed an assured
confidence--which never quavered in a page or in a line--that the
North would win. This assurance was based on the merits of the
Northern cause, on the superior strength of the Northern party,
and on a conviction that England would never recognise the South,
and that France would be guided in her policy by England. I was
right in my prophecies, and right, I think, on the grounds on which
