The International Weekly Miscellany, Volume I. No. 8 | Page 8

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CAMPBELL AND WASHINGTON IRVING.
The Editor of _The Albion_, in noticing the republication by the
Harpers of the very interesting Life and Letters of Thomas Campbell,
by Dr. Beattie, has the following observations upon Mr. Irving's
introductory letter:
"WASHINGTON IRVING, at the request of the publishers, contributed
a very interesting letter to themselves, directing public notice to the
value of this edition. He pays also a hearty and deserved tribute, not
only to the genius of Campbell, but to his many excellencies and kindly
specialities of character. The author of "Hohenlinden," and the "Battle
of the Baltic" stands in need of no man's praise as a lyric poet--but this
sort of testimony to his private worth is grateful and well-timed. Here is
an interesting passage from Mr. Irving's introductory communication.
He is alluding to Campbell's fame and position, when he himself first
made Campbell's acquaintance in England.
"'I had considered the early productions of Campbell as brilliant
indications of a genius yet to be developed, and trusted that, during the
long interval which had elapsed, he had been preparing something to
fulfill the public expectation; I was greatly disappointed, therefore, to
find that, as yet, he had contemplated no great and sustained effort. My
disappointment in this respect was shared by others, who took the same
interest in his fame, and entertained the same idea of his capacity.
'There he is cooped up in Sydenham,' said a great Edinburgh critic to
me, 'simmering his brains to serve up a little dish of poetry, instead of
pouring out a whole caldron.'
"'Scott, too, who took a cordial delight in Campbell's poetry, expressed
himself to the same effect. 'What a pity is it,' said he to me 'that
Campbell does not give full sweep to his genius. He has wings that
would bear him up to the skies, and he does now and then spread them
grandly, but folds them up again and resumes his perch, as if afraid to
launch away. The fact is, he is a bugbear to himself. The brightness of
his early success is a detriment to all his future efforts. He is afraid of
the shadow that his own fame casts before him.'
"'Little was Scott aware at the time that he, in truth, was a 'bugbear' to
Campbell. This I infer from an observation of Mrs. Campbell's in reply
to an expression of regret on my part that her husband did not attempt
something on a grand Scale. 'It is unfortunate for Campbell,' said she,

'that he lives in the same age with Scott and Byron.' I asked why. 'Oh,'
said she, 'they write so much and so rapidly. Now Campbell writes
slowly, and it takes him some time to get under way; and just as he has
fairly begun, out comes one of their poems, that sets the world agog
and quite daunts him, so that he throws by his pen in despair.'
"'I pointed out the essential difference in their kinds of poetry, and the
qualities which insured perpetuity to that of her husband. 'You can't
persuade Campbell of that,' said she. 'He is apt to undervalue his own
works, and to consider his own lights put out, whenever they come
blazing out with their great torches.'
"'I repeated the conversation to Scott sometime afterward, and it drew
forth a characteristic comment. 'Pooh!' said he, good-humoredly, 'how
can Campbell mistake the matter so much. Poetry goes by quality, not
by bulk. My poems are mere cairngorms, wrought up, perhaps, with a
cunning hand, and may pass well in the market as long as cairngorms
are the fashion; but they are mere Scotch pebbles after all; now Tom
Campbell's are real diamonds, and diamonds of the first water.'"
"The foregoing is new to us, and full of a double interest. It is followed,
however, by a statement, that needs a word of explanation. Mr. Irving
says:
"'I have not time at present to furnish personal anecdotes of my
intercourse with Campbell, neither does it afford any of a striking
nature. Though extending over a number of years, it was never very
intimate. His residence in the country, and my own long intervals of
absence on the continent, rendered our meetings few and far between.
To tell the truth, I was not much drawn to Campbell, having taken up a
wrong notion concerning him, from seeing him at times when his mind
was ill at ease, and preyed upon by secret griefs. I thought him
disposed to be querulous and captious, and had heard his apparent
discontent attributed to jealous repining at the success of his poetical
contemporaries. In a word, I knew little of him but what might be
learned in the casual intercourse of general society; whereas it required
the close communion of confidential friendship,