The Life of John Sterling

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John's relation to his Father, when one saw John here, was altogether
frank, joyful and amiable: he ignored the _Times_ thunder for most
part, coldly taking the Anonymous for non-extant; spoke of it
floutingly, if he spoke at all: indeed a pleasant half-bantering
dialect was the common one between Father and Son; and they,
especially with the gentle, simple-hearted, just-minded Mother for
treble-voice between them, made a very pretty glee-harmony together.

So had it lasted, ever since poor John's voyagings began; his Father's
house standing always as a fixed sunny islet with safe harbor for him.
So it could not always last. This sunny islet was now also to break
and go down: so many firm islets, fixed pillars in his fluctuating
world, pillar after pillar, were to break and go down; till swiftly
all, so to speak, were sunk in the dark waters, and he with them! Our
little History is now hastening to a close.

In the beginning of 1843 news reached us that Sterling had, in his too
reckless way, encountered a dangerous accident: maids, in the room
where he was, were lifting a heavy table; he, seeing them in
difficulty, had snatched at the burden; heaved it away,--but had
broken a blood-vessel by the business; and was now, after extensive
hemorrhage, lying dangerously ill. The doctors hoped the worst was
over; but the case was evidently serious. In the same days, too, his
Mother had been seized here by some painful disease, which from its
continuance grew alarming. Sad omens for Edward Sterling, who by this
time had as good as ceased writing or working in the _Times_, having
comfortably winded up his affairs there; and was looking forward to a
freer idle life befitting his advanced years henceforth. Fatal
eclipse had fallen over that household of his; never to be lifted off
again till all darkened into night.

By dint of watchful nursing, John Sterling got on foot once more: but
his Mother did not recover, quite the contrary. Her case too grew
very questionable. Disease of the heart, said the medical men at
last; not immediately, not perhaps for a length of years, dangerous to
life, said they; but without hope of cure. The poor lady suffered
much; and, though affecting hope always, grew weaker and weaker. John
ran up to Town in March; I saw him, on the morrow or next day after,
in his own room at Knightsbridge: he had caught fresh cold overnight,
the servant having left his window up, but I was charged to say
nothing of it, not to flutter the already troubled house: he was
going home again that very day, and nothing ill would come of it. We
understood the family at Falmouth, his Wife being now near her
confinement again, could at any rate comport with no long absence. He
was cheerful, even rudely merry; himself pale and ill, his poor
Mother's cough audible occasionally through the wall. Very kind, too,
and gracefully affectionate; but I observed a certain grimness in his
mood of mind, and under his light laughter lay something unusual,
something stern, as if already dimmed in the coming shadows of Fate.
"Yes, yes, you are a good man: but I understand they mean to appoint
you to Rhadamanthus's post, which has been vacant for some time; and
you will see how you like that!" This was one of the things he said;
a strange effulgence of wild drollery flashing through the ice of
earnest pain and sorrow. He looked paler than usual: almost for the
first time, I had myself a twinge of misgiving as to his own health;
for hitherto I had been used to blame as much as pity his fits of
dangerous illness, and would often angrily remonstrate with him that
he might have excellent health, would he but take reasonable care of
himself, and learn the art of sitting still. Alas, as if he _could_
learn it; as if Nature had not laid her ban on him even there, and
said in smiles and frowns manifoldly, "No, that thou shalt not learn!"

He went that day; he never saw his good true Mother more. Very
shortly afterwards, in spite of doctors' prophecies, and affectionate
illusions, she grew alarmingly and soon hopelessly worse. Here are
his last two Letters to her:--

"_To Mrs. Sterling, Knightsbridge, London_.
"FALMOUTH 8th April, 1843.

"DEAREST MOTHER,--I could do you no good, but it would be the greatest
comfort to me if I could be near you. Nothing would detain me but
Susan's condition. I feel that until her confinement is over, I ought
to remain here,--unless you wished me to go to you; in which case she
would be the first to send me off. Happily she is doing as well as
possible, and seems even to gain strength every day. She sends her
love to you.

"The children are all doing well. I rode with Edward to-day through
some of the pleasant lanes in the neighborhood; and was delighted, as
I have often been at the same season, to see the primroses under every
hedge. It is pleasant to think that the Maker of them can make other
flowers for the gardens of his other mansions. We have here a
softness in the air, a smoothness of the clouds, and a mild sunshine,
that combine in lovely peace with the first green of spring and the
mellow whiteness of the sails upon the quiet sea. The whole aspect of
the world is full of a quiet harmony, that influences even one's
bodily frame, and seems to make one's very limbs aware of something
living, good and immortal in all around us. Knowing how you suffer,
and how weak you are, anything is a blessing to me that helps me to
rise out of confusion and grief into the sense of God and joy. I
could not indeed but feel how much happier I should have been, this
morning, had you been with me, and delighting as you would have done
in all the little as well as the large beauty of the world. But it
was still a satisfaction to feel how much I owe to you of the power of
perceiving meaning, reality and sweetness in all healthful life. And
thus I could fancy that you were still near me; and that I could see
you, as I have so often seen you, looking with earnest eyes at wayside
flowers.

"I would rather not have written what must recall your thoughts to
your present sufferings: but, dear Mother, I wrote only what I felt;
and perhaps you would rather have it so, than that I should try to
find other topics. I still hope to be with you before long.
Meanwhile and always, God bless you, is the prayer of

"Your affectionate son,
"JOHN STERLING."

_To the same_.
"FALMOUTH, 12th April, 1843.

"DEAREST MOTHER,--I have just received my Father's Letter; which gives
me at least the comfort of believing that you do not suffer very much
pain. That your mind has remained so clear and strong, is an infinite
blessing.

"I do not know anything in the world that would make up to me at all
for wanting the recollection of the days I spent with you lately, when
I was amazed at the freshness and life of all your thoughts. It
brought back far-distant years, in the strangest, most peaceful way.
I felt myself walking with you in Greenwich Park, and on the seashore
at Sandgate; almost even I seemed a baby, with you bending over me.
Dear Mother, there is surely something uniting us that cannot perish.
I seem so sure of a love which shall last and reunite us, that even
the remembrance, painful as that is, of all my own follies and ill
tempers, cannot shake this faith. When I think of you, and know how
you feel towards me, and have felt for every moment of almost forty
years, it would be too dark to believe that we shall never meet again.
It was from you that I first learnt to think, to feel, to imagine, to
believe; and these powers, which cannot be extinguished, will one day
enter anew into communion with you. I have bought it very dear by the
prospect of losing you in this world,--but since you have been so ill,
everything has seemed to me holier, loftier and more lasting, more
full of hope and final joy.

"It would be a very great happiness to see you once more even here;
but I do not know if that will be granted to me. But for Susan's
state, I should not hesitate an instant; as it is, my duty seems to be
to remain, and I have no right to repine. There is no sacrifice that
she would not make for me, and it would be too cruel to endanger her
by mere anxiety on my account. Nothing can exceed her sympathy with
my sorrow. But she cannot know, no one can, the recollections of all
you have been and done for me; which now are the most sacred and
deepest, as well as most beautiful, thoughts that abide with me. May
God bless you, dearest Mother. It is much to believe that He feels
for you all that you have ever felt for your children.

"JOHN STERLING."

A day or two after this, "on Good Friday, 1843," his Wife got happily
through her confinement, bringing him, he writes, "a stout little
girl, who and the Mother are doing as well as possible." The little
girl still lives and does well; but for the Mother there was another
lot. Till the Monday following she too did altogether well, he
affectionately watching her; but in the course of that day, some
change for the worse was noticed, though nothing to alarm either the
doctors or him; he watched by her bedside all night, still without
alarm; but sent again in the morning, Tuesday morning, for the
doctors,--Who did not seem able to make much of the symptoms. She
appeared weak and low, but made no particular complaint. The London
post meanwhile was announced; Sterling went into another room to learn
what tidings of his Mother it brought him. Returning speedily with a
face which in vain strove to be calm, his Wife asked, How at
Knightsbridge? "My Mother is dead," answered Sterling; "died on
Sunday: She is gone." "Poor old man! " murmured the other, thinking
of old Edward Sterling now left alone in the world; and these were her
own last words: in two hours more she too was dead. In two hours
Mother and Wife were suddenly both snatched away from him.

"It came with awful suddenness! " writes he to his Clifton friend.
"Still for a short time I had my Susan: but I soon saw that the
medical men were in terror; and almost within half an hour of that
fatal Knightsbridge news, I began to suspect our own pressing danger.
I received her last breath upon my lips. Her mind was much sunk, and
her perceptions slow; but a few minutes before the last, she must have
caught the idea of dissolution; and signed that I should kiss her.
She faltered painfully, 'Yes! yes!'--returned with fervency the
pressure of my lips; and in a few moments her eyes began to fix, her
pulse to cease. She too is gone from me!" It was Tuesday morning,
April 18th, 1843. His Mother had died on the Sunday before.

He had loved his excellent kind Mother, as he ought and well might:
in that good heart, in all the wanderings of his own, there had ever
been a shrine of warm pity, of mother's love and blessed soft
affections for him; and now it was closed in the Eternities
forevermore. His poor Life-partner too, his other self, who had
faithfully attended him so long in all his pilgrimings, cheerily
footing the heavy tortuous ways along with him, can follow him no
farther; sinks now at his side: "The rest of your pilgrimings alone,
O Friend,--adieu, adieu!" She too is forever hidden from his eyes;
and he stands, on the sudden, very solitary amid the tumult of fallen
and falling things. "My little baby girl is doing well; poor little
wreck cast upon the sea-beach of life. My children require me tenfold
now. What I shall do, is all confusion and darkness."

The younger Mrs. Sterling was a true good woman; loyal-hearted,
willing to do well, and struggling wonderfully to do it amid her
languors and infirmities; rescuing, in many ways, with beautiful
female heroism and adroitness, what of fertility their uncertain,
wandering, unfertile way of life still left possible, and cheerily
making the most of it. A genial, pious and harmonious fund of
character was in her; and withal an indolent, half-unconscious force
of intellect, and justness and delicacy of perception, which the
casual acquaintance scarcely gave her credit for. Sterling much
respected her decision in matters literary; often altering and
modifying where her feeling clearly went against him; and in verses
especially trusting to her ear, which was excellent, while he knew his
own to be worth little. I remember her melodious rich plaintive tone
of voice; and an exceedingly bright smile which she sometimes had,
effulgent with sunny gayety and true humor, among other fine
qualities.

Sterling has lost much in these two hours; how much that has long been
can never again be for him! Twice in one morning, so to speak, has a
mighty wind smitten the corners of his house; and much lies in dismal
ruins round him.

CHAPTER VI.
VENTNOR: DEATH.

In this sudden avalanche of sorrows Sterling, weak and worn as we have
seen, bore up manfully, and with pious valor fronted what had come
upon him. He was not a man to yield to vain wailings, or make
repinings at the unalterable: here was enough to be long mourned
over; but here, for the moment, was very much imperatively requiring
to be done. That evening, he called his children round him; spoke
words of religious admonition and affection to them; said, "He must
now be a Mother as well as Father to them." On the evening of the
funeral, writes Mr. Hare, he bade them good-night, adding these words,
"If I am taken from you, God will take care of you." He had six
children left to his charge, two of them infants; and a dark outlook
ahead of them and him. The good Mrs. Maurice, the children's young
Aunt, present at this time and often afterwards till all ended, was a
great consolation.

Falmouth, it may be supposed, had grown a sorrowful place to him,
peopled with haggard memories in his weak state; and now again, as had
been usual with him, change of place suggested itself as a desirable
alleviation;--and indeed, in some sort, as a necessity. He has
"friends here," he admits to himself, "whose kindness is beyond all
price, all description;" but his little children, if anything befell
him, have no relative within two hundred miles. He is now sole
watcher over them; and his very life is so precarious; nay, at any
rate, it would appear, he has to leave Falmouth every spring, or run
the hazard of worse. Once more, what is to be done? Once more,--and
now, as it turned out, for the last time.

A still gentler climate, greater proximity to London, where his
Brother Anthony now was and most of his friends and interests were:
these considerations recommended Ventnor, in the beautiful
Southeastern corner of the Isle of Wight; where on inquiry an eligible
house was found for sale. The house and its surrounding piece of
ground, improvable both, were purchased; he removed thither in June of
this year 1843; and set about improvements and adjustments on a frank
scale. By the decease of his Mother, he had become rich in money; his
share of the West-India properties having now fallen to him, which,
added to his former incomings, made a revenue he could consider ample
and abundant. Falmouth friends looked lovingly towards him, promising
occasional visits; old Herstmonceux, which he often spoke of
revisiting but never did, was not far off; and London, with all its
resources and remembrances, was now again accessible. He resumed his
work; and had hopes of again achieving something.

The Poem of _Coeur-de-Lion_ has been already mentioned, and the wider
form and aim it had got since he first took it in hand. It was above
a year before the date of these tragedies and changes, that he had
sent me a Canto, or couple of Cantos, of _Coeur-de-Lion_; loyally
again demanding my opinion, harsh as it had often been on that side.
This time I felt right glad to answer in another tone: "That here was
real felicity and ingenuity, on the prescribed conditions; a
decisively rhythmic quality in this composition; thought and
phraseology actually _dancing_, after a sort. What the plan and scope
of the Work might be, he had not said, and I could not judge; but here
was a light opulence of airy fancy, picturesque conception, vigorous
delineation, all marching on as with cheerful drum and fife, if
without more rich and complicated forms of melody: if a man _would_
write in metre, this sure enough was the way to try doing it." For
such encouragement from that stinted quarter, Sterling, I doubt not,
was very thankful; and of course it might co-operate with the
inspirations from his Naples Tour to further him a little in this his
now chief task in the way of Poetry; a thought which, among my many
almost pathetic remembrances of contradictions to his Poetic tendency,
is pleasant for me.

But, on the whole, it was no matter. With or without encouragement,
he was resolute to persevere in Poetry, and did persevere. When I
think now of his modest, quiet steadfastness in this business of
Poetry; how, in spite of friend and foe, he silently persisted,
without wavering, in the form of utterance he had chosen for himself;
and to what length he carried it, and vindicated himself against us
all;--his character comes out in a new light to me, with more of a
certain central inflexibility and noble silent resolution than I had
elsewhere noticed in it. This summer, moved by natural feelings,
which were sanctioned, too, and in a sort sanctified to him, by the
remembered counsel of his late Wife, he printed the _Tragedy of
Strafford_. But there was in the public no contradiction to the hard
vote I had given about it: the little Book fell dead-born; and
Sterling had again to take his disappointment;--which it must be owned
he cheerfully did; and, resolute to try it again and ever again, went
along with his _Coeur-de-Lion_, as if the public had been all with
him. An honorable capacity to stand single against the whole world;
such as all men need, from time to time! After all, who knows
whether, in his overclouded, broken, flighty way of life, incapable of
long hard drudgery, and so shut out from the solid forms of Prose,
this Poetic Form, which he could well learn as he could all forms, was
not the suitablest for him?

This work of _Coeur-de-Lion_ he prosecuted steadfastly in his new
home; and indeed employed on it henceforth all the available days that
were left him in this world. As was already said, he did not live to
complete it; but some eight Cantos, three or four of which I know to
possess high worth, were finished, before Death intervened, and there
he had to leave it. Perhaps it will yet be given to the public; and
in that case be better received than the others were, by men of
judgment; and serve to put Sterling's Poetic pretensions on a much
truer footing. I can say, that to readers who do prefer a poetic
diet, this ought to be welcome: if you can contrive to love the thing
which is still called "poetry" in these days, here is a decidedly
superior article in that kind,--richer than one of a hundred that you
smilingly consume.

In this same month of June, 1843, while the house at Ventnor was
getting ready, Sterling was again in London for a few days. Of course
at Knightsbridge, now fallen under such sad change, many private
matters needed to be settled by his Father and Brother and him.
Captain Anthony, now minded to remove with his family to London and
quit the military way of life, had agreed to purchase the big family
house, which he still occupies; the old man, now rid of that
encumbrance, retired to a smaller establishment of his own; came
ultimately to be Anthony's guest, and spent his last days so. He was
much lamed and broken, the half of his old life suddenly torn
away;--and other losses, which he yet knew not of, lay close ahead of
him. In a year or two, the rugged old man, borne down by these
pressures, quite gave way; sank into paralytic and other infirmities;
and was released from life's sorrows, under his son Anthony's roof, in
the fall of 1847.--The house in Knightsbridge was, at the time we now
speak of, empty except of servants; Anthony having returned to Dublin,
I suppose to conclude his affairs there, prior to removal. John
lodged in a Hotel.

We had our fair share of his company in this visit, as in all the past
ones; but the intercourse, I recollect, was dim and broken, a
disastrous shadow hanging over it, not to be cleared away by effort.
Two American gentlemen, acquaintances also of mine, had been
recommended to him, by Emerson most likely: one morning Sterling
appeared here with a strenuous proposal that we should come to
Knightsbridge, and dine with him and them. Objections, general
dissuasions were not wanting: The empty dark house, such needless
trouble, and the like;--but he answered in his quizzing way, "Nature
herself prompts you, when a stranger comes, to give him a dinner.
There are servants yonder; it is all easy; come; both of you are bound
to come." And accordingly we went. I remember it as one of the
saddest dinners; though Sterling talked copiously, and our friends,
Theodore Parker one of them, were pleasant and distinguished men. All
was so haggard in one's memory, and half consciously in one's
anticipations; sad, as if one had been dining in a will, in the crypt
of a mausoleum. Our conversation was waste and logical, I forget
quite on what, not joyful and harmoniously effusive: Sterling's
silent sadness was painfully apparent through the bright mask he had
bound himself to wear. Withal one could notice now, as on his last
visit, a certain sternness of mood, unknown in better days; as if
strange gorgon-faces of earnest Destiny were more and more rising
round him, and the time for sport were past. He looked always
hurried, abrupt, even beyond wont; and indeed was, I suppose,
overwhelmed in details of business.

One evening, I remember, he came down hither, designing to have a
freer talk with us. We were all sad enough; and strove rather to
avoid speaking of what might make us sadder. Before any true talk had
been got into, an interruption occurred, some unwelcome arrival;
Sterling abruptly rose; gave me the signal to rise; and we unpolitely
walked away, adjourning to his Hotel, which I recollect was in the
Strand, near Hungerford Market; some ancient comfortable
quaint-looking place, off the street; where, in a good warm queer old
room, the remainder of our colloquy was duly finished. We spoke of
Cromwell, among other things which I have now forgotten; on which
subject Sterling was trenchant, positive, and in some essential points
wrong,--as I said I would convince him some day. "Well, well!"
answered he, with a shake of the head.--We parted before long; bedtime
for invalids being come: he escorted me down certain carpeted
backstairs, and would not be forbidden: we took leave under the dim
skies;--and alas, little as I then dreamt of it, this, so far as I can
calculate, must have been the last time I ever saw him in the world.
Softly as a common evening, the last of the evenings had passed away,
and no other would come for me forevermore.

Through the summer he was occupied with fitting up his new residence,
selecting governesses, servants; earnestly endeavoring to set his
house in order, on the new footing it had now assumed. Extensive
improvements in his garden and grounds, in which he took due interest
to the last, were also going on. His Brother, and Mr. Maurice his
brother-in-law,--especially Mrs. Maurice the kind sister, faithfully
endeavoring to be as a mother to her poor little nieces,--were
occasionally with him. All hours available for labor on his literary
tasks, he employed, almost exclusively I believe, on _Coeur-de-Lion_;
with what energy, the progress he had made in that Work, and in the
art of Poetic composition generally, amid so many sore impediments,
best testifies. I perceive, his life in general lay heavier on him
than it had done before; his mood of mind is grown more
sombre;--indeed the very solitude of this Ventnor as a place, not to
speak of other solitudes, must have been new and depressing. But he
admits no hypochondria, now or ever; occasionally, though rarely, even
flashes of a kind of wild gayety break through. He works steadily at
his task, with all the strength left him; endures the past as he may,
and makes gallant front against the world. "I am going on quietly
here, rather than happily," writes he to his friend Newman; "sometimes
quite helpless, not from distinct illness, but from sad thoughts and a
ghastly dreaminess. The heart is gone out of my life. My children,
however, are doing well; and the place is cheerful and mild."

From Letters of this period I might select some melancholy enough; but
will prefer to give the following one (nearly the last I can give), as
indicative of a less usual temper:--

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