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Table of Contents

BIRTH AND PARENTAGE OF AGNES STRICKLAND—CHILDHOOD—EARLY LOVE OF READING—FIRST ATTEMPTS AT VERSE—THEATRICALS—FIRST INTRODUCTION TO NOVELS—NORWICH—MONODY ON DEATH OF PRINCESS CHARLOTTE—METRICAL ROMANCES.

Agnes Strickland, the historian of the Queens of England and of Great Britain, was the second surviving daughter of Thomas Strickland, Esq. of Reydon Hall, Suffolk—her birth, which took place on August 19, 1796, having been preceded by that of her sister Elizabeth, the future associate of her literary labours. Both children were remarkably precocious, for neither could remember learning to read, though their greatest pleasures were derived from books far beyond the general capacity of infant minds. Though much attached to each other, the dispositions of the sisters were essentially different. Elizabeth was thoughtful beyond her years, and was never much of a child, while Agnes was fond of play, and as frolicsome as most young creatures are at her age. Indeed TRUTHFULNESS IN CHILDHOOD. the youthful mother of Agnes found the high-spirited little girl very difficult to manage; but though addicted to mischievous pranks, Agnes was remarkably truthful and honest, her faults springing from an open temper and active habits. In her father’s eyes her honourable avowal of faults for which she was sure to be punished, atoned for their delinquency, though troublesome and inconvenient to her mother.

There was one person, however, who could always bring the little rebel to contrition by appeals to her religious feelings. This person was an elderly widowed gentlewoman, who had lost all her property in the great fire that consumed a part of eastern London, and to whom Mr Strickland gave a home, as she had been brought up with his first wife. Perhaps the meek beauty of the Christian character was never better exemplified than in Mrs Harrison—a blessing to the young matron, to whose increasing family she proved a tender but self-constituted nurse. Though all shared her love, the little Agnes was regarded by her with extreme tenderness. It was from “dear Annie” Agnes learned the simple and sublime truths of the Gospel, which her friend brought forward to correct her faults; and while she wiped away the tears of the little rebel, who was indignant at receiving the justly incurred punishment, she made her acknowledge that it was just. Agnes profited so well by the religious instructions she received, that when Dr Middleton, afterwards Bishop of Calcutta, saw this child of seven years, he was astonished at her understanding and Scriptural knowledge.

Mr Strickland, who took charge of his elder daughters’ education, did not permit them the use of books of amusement, unless these were of a superior order, and were calculated to form their minds and morals; nor did he allow them to choose for themselves from the SHAKESPEARE BY STEALTH. stores of his own library. This restriction was in part lessened by a volume of Shakespeare falling by accident into his young daughters’ hands, and exciting their lively enthusiasm, Agnes declaring that she would never read any other book in her leisure hours; but Elizabeth, less imaginative, was more reasonable in her admiration of our immortal bard. They both, however, committed the finest passages of ‘Julius Cæsar’ to memory. But Agnes could not keep their acquisition from her father, who was too much pleased and surprised at the fruits of their disobedience to give them the reproof they expected to receive. He gave them leave to read Shakespeare in future, considering that their infant innocence would prevent them from receiving injury from those loose passages which the coarse manners of the age in which they were written had not only tolerated, but probably admired.

Pope’s ‘Homer’ succeeded Shakespeare in the estimation of Agnes, who learned many of the books of the ‘Iliad’ by heart.^[1] She was passionately fond of poetry, and readily committed to memory what she admired; but from her father she derived her preference for history and biography. She read and re-read the two mighty folios of Rapin’s ‘History of England,’ translated by Tindal, and improved by his learned notes; and, strange to say, from that dull source she derived her historic inspiration, and was perhaps the first young girl who ever perused it without compulsion.

Harrison’s ‘Survey of London’ was also a favourite book. Plutarch’s ‘Lives’ gave her great delight, and perhaps turned her thoughts afterwards to the composition of biographical history. Elizabeth shared all her studies, but not her amusements. She was more FIRST POEM. womanly in all her actions; and while Agnes played with a doll, Elizabeth was studying the higher branches of arithmetic with her father. Mr Strickland wished to make his clever eldest girls mathematicians, and for some time had a hope that Elizabeth would realise his expectations. But the very mention of algebra frightened Agnes. Her lively imagination and passionate love for poetry unfitted her for scientific pursuits, though in her amusements the child betrayed the future historian. She was clever at cutting out paper, and her paper puppets represented the Court of Edward III., and through her mouth made speeches in Parliament, fought battles, and conquered kingdoms. As the fragments caused some inconvenience to the housemaid, the ingenious constructor sometimes had the mortification of finding the product of her labours destroyed by one who had no respect for the tiny representatives of King, Lords, and Commons.

As her years increased, Agnes began to consider the possibility of writing a poem herself—an historical one, of which the mighty Baron Bigod, who had defied the warlike first Edward to his face, was to be the hero.

She employed her leisure hours for some weeks in this premature poetical composition, keeping her literary labours a secret even from her sister Elizabeth, till the first canto was completed, when she brought her poem to her father with all the pride of a young author, her eager looks and sparkling eyes seeming to demand his admiration. To the infinite surprise and mortification of the author of twelve years, her poem, instead of pleasing her father, found in him a very severe critic. He pronounced it to be deficient in originality and merit, and advised her to give up verse-making till she was better acquainted with fine English poetry. He bestowed no praise to the luckless poem, but gave it a complete cutting up. The affection and veneration JACOBITE PRINCIPLES. Agnes felt for her beloved parent alone checked her tears. She promised to obey him; and in after-life was grateful to him for his wise and judicious criticism on her juvenile performance, though no harsh critique on her later works ever gave her so much pain as his had done. He rewarded her docility by putting the works of Milton, Gray, and Collins into her hands, the perusal of which inclined her to consign her immature attempt to the flames.

Agnes, after this discouragement, exchanged her literary work for that of the needle, in which she greatly excelled. She was fond of flowers, and took pleasure in cultivating them; but for reading she had an absolute passion. Books of mere amusement were interdicted; but as their father employed his daughters in reading history and biography to him, and discussed the events or lives of celebrated men with them, the want of lighter literature was hardly felt.

Notwithstanding their filial veneration for their father the two girls did not share his opinions in all things. Both imbibed the principles of their ancestors in regard to the Stuart kings, and were Jacobites, and so remained all their lives. Mr Strickland was a great admirer of William III., and of the revolution he effected. But the change must have taken place whether James II. had been dethroned by his son-in-law or not, since no free Protestant country could have borne his unconstitutional innovations on its laws and customs.

The Strickland family owed their education entirely to their parents. The neighbourhood possessed no masters for feminine accomplishments. An eccentric music-master was indeed procured from a distant town, under whose instructions Agnes promised to excel, till she gave up music for literature. The village of Reydon was an agricultural one, and afforded the young ladies REYDON THEATRICALS. of the Hall no companions: thus they were thrown upon their own resources entirely for recreation. Agnes, who had never seen a play in her life, resolved, with the aid of her four younger sisters, to act some scenes from Shakespeare, and selected the second part of ‘Henry VI.’ for their début. As they all had good memories, she did not find much difficulty in drilling her youthful company. Agnes, who, like her warlike ancestors, was a strict Lancastrian, could not induce Elizabeth to join her, for she was a stanch Yorkist, and they sometimes fell out while discussing those ancient politics. This new amusement lasted a whole winter, till Agnes, struck with the poetical beauty of Clarence’s dream, resolved, with the assistance of her next sister, to perform the murder scene in ‘Richard III.’—she herself taking the part of the doomed prince, while Sarah was to play the part of a good listener in Brackenbury, and also to take that of the first nameless villain. The scene came off very well till the entrance of the murderers, whose arch blooming juvenile faces did not accord with their evil intentions towards the hapless prisoner. A mistimed fit of risibility on their part overcame the gravity of the death-doomed Clarence, and the scene ended not in a tragedy but a comedy. Hitherto the juvenile performers had found in their kind parents a very favourable audience, but the ridiculous termination of this tragic scene made them discourage all private theatricals for the future.

Up to this time romances and novels were almost unknown to Agnes Strickland, till a visit to a married friend of her mother’s, residing in a country town, opened for her a new source of amusement in the contents of a circulating library—a better chosen one, too, than a rural district usually afforded. She read with much pleasure the works of Anna Maria and Jane Porter, Miss Edgeworth, the ‘Simple Story’ of Mrs Inchbald, and other A GOOD OMEN. works of merit, with immense delight. But the contents of the circulating library were not the sole attractions to Agnes in this first visit from home. Her friend had a baby, she passionately loved little children, and was much pleased if she could persuade the nurse to let her carry the infant about the garden. One morning she had taken the baby and was walking by the side of the river Blythe, whose sluggish waters bounded the garden, when a swarm of bees suddenly settled upon her and the infant. In this emergency Agnes did not lose her presence of mind; she stood still, though in great fear lest her charge should awake and buffet the intruders. Fortunately the swarm departed as suddenly as they came, recrossing the river in their search for a new habitation. To her great surprise the old nurse, who had witnessed the alarming incident, congratulated her—not upon her escape, however, but on the great good luck the lighting of the swarm upon her and the child would bring to both in later years. This classic superstition is naturalised in Suffolk—a singular one left by the Romans. Agnes, we may be sure, considered herself more fortunate in escaping the stings of her unwelcome visitors than in the prediction of the old woman.

Soon after Agnes Strickland’s return from her visit unforeseen difficulties compelled Mr Strickland to reside in the fine old city of Norwich, the capital of East Anglia and seat of its bishopric. The misconduct of a near relation of his wife, in whose business he had invested the chief part of his property, compelled him to leave Reydon during a portion of the year. As he possessed a house in Norwich, part of the family accompanied him, while the rest of the little flock remained with their mother. Notwithstanding the loss he had sustained, the change had its advantages for his children. There was an excellent classical school for the REVIVAL OF POETIC TALENT. boys, and the girls formed friendships and acquired the tone of society—advantages which were incompatible with the insulated situation of Reydon. There were fine libraries, too, from which they could obtain choice works on every subject. The pleasant walks in the vicinity, the noble cathedral, and fine old castle with its historical recollections, made their occasional visits to Norwich very agreeable to them.

But did the poetic talent always remain dormant in the bosom of Agnes Strickland? No, it did not. It suddenly broke forth upon her reading the account of the battle of Leipsic and the heroic death of the brave Prince Poniatowsky, in some impromptu lines whispered to her beloved confidant, Elizabeth. These verses have been preserved as they were written down by her sister. They evince considerable genius, but are not without the faults usually found in the compositions of youthful poets.

Change of place inducing new habits, prevented Agnes Strickland from giving her time to poetical composition till the great public calamity of the death of the Princess Charlotte of Wales revived the neglected talent. The Monody upon the decease of the presumptive heiress of the British empire originated from a depth of feeling which found vent in a poem which virtually opened the literary career of the future author of the ‘Lives of the Queens of England.’ A younger sister with difficulty prevailed upon her to show them to an accomplished literary friend of her father. He carried them to Mr Bacon, the editor of the ‘Norwich Mercury,’ who admired and published them in his journal. These verses excited some attention, but are now reprinted for the first time. No name being affixed to the Monody, the literary career of Agnes Strickland opened anonymously, though destined to give the unknown author a European reputation:— FIRST APPEARANCE IN PRINT.

Monody upon the Death of the Princess Charlotte of Wales.

Chill Autumn’s blast hath swept away

The smiling gifts of Summer’s sky;

Each floweret fades beneath its sway,

And darkly sad, and witheringly,

They droop to earth and die.

A keener chill, a wilder blast,

O’er England’s brightest prospects passed,

And heavy was the mournful hour

When sunk in death her Royal Flower.

Oh fast the general tear-drops flow,

And long shall fall through many a year.

Mourn, Britain, mourn with bitter woe;

Thy cherished hopes, so bright, so dear,

Are crushed beneath the blow.

The Deity’s chastising hand

Hath deeply struck the guilty land;

The stern and deadly shaft of Fate

Has left us dark and desolate.

The morning sun which rose so bright

And promised joy for future years,

No longer glads our eager sight—

That glorious dawn is quenched in night,

And vainly flow our tears.

The cherished beam is early set,

Sad Claremont’s bowers are desolate,

And every cheek is pale and wet;

And lengthening years shall pass away,

Yet Britain still will mourn that day.

In vain arose the general prayer

That sought the nation’s Grace to save.

So young, so virtuous, and so fair—

E’en Death’s stern hand we thought might spare

Such victim from the grave.

A mother’s anguish racked her frame,

But Heaven denied a mother’s name,—

Not hers, with dying tenderness,

Her Britain’s future king to bless.

PLEASURE OF HER PARENTS.

No smiling infant met her sight,

Repaying each maternal pain;

For ne’er to view the morning’s light,

His eyes were closed in endless night—

Her life was given in vain.

Perchance it had been sweet to give

Her life to bid her infant live:

To bless him with her dying breath,

Had softened e’en the pangs of death.

Mysterious are the ways of Fate,

Inscrutable and awful still;

And man is weak, and God is great,

And lowly in this mortal state

We bow us to His will.

Yes, we must humbly, meekly bow

To that Great Hand that willed the blow—

For He who gives may take away;

And blessed be His name for aye.

As Lord Byron’s magnificent stanzas to the memory of this amiable young princess were not then written, the lines just quoted will bear a comparison, by no means to their disadvantage, with the many poems which the national calamity called forth.^[2]

Agnes Strickland sent the paper containing the Monody on the Princess Charlotte of Wales to Reydon without avowing her authorship of it; and she was highly gratified by the praises given to her little poem by her parents and sisters, who were astonished and delighted when she acknowledged it to be her own. Indeed she had suffered so severely from fever that autumn, that POEM OF MATILDA. all mental exertion would have been forbidden for fear of ill consequences. From that early period of her existence poetry became a sort of inner life to Agnes, who gave up music, in which she promised to excel, for this absorbing pursuit, which, warmed and encouraged by parental praise, allowed her full liberty to follow the bent of her genius. After producing many minor pieces possessing considerable poetic merit, she determined to write a poem of some length—a metrical romance, to be called ‘Matilda,’ which, when completed, was to be read to her father, who had returned to his Norfolk home accompanied by his eldest daughter. In Elizabeth, Agnes possessed a judicious critic as well as an affectionate sister, whose fine taste, extensive reading, and judgment in literary compositions, were extremely useful to the youthful poet. No idea of publication entered her mind; nor was it fame that she was seeking, but the approbation of her father, for which alone she was striving.

Elizabeth and Jane kept her secret faithfully, and we must now suppose the poet of twenty years, with her two sisters, seated by her father’s side, to read the poem—alas! the last she was ever to recite to him. His delight and astonishment were long and fondly remembered by Agnes Strickland in later days, when her literary career had numbered her with the historians of her country, and the public had awarded her the meed of general praise. No popularity ever gave her such pure and unmixed pleasure as his approval.^[3]

She commenced her next poem, entitled ‘Worcester Field; or, The Cavalier,’ the same spring. Her own JACOBITE SENTIMENTS. ancestors had been warm partisans of Charles I., to whom they had been devotedly loyal. She had inherited their devotion to the house of Stuart, and detested the bold usurper, whose vast talents had left nothing in the annals of his country but the memory of his successful crime, and no acquisitions but the island of Jamaica, stolen from the Spaniards in a time of peace, and the town of Dunkirk.

[1]	This was Sir Isaac Newton’s subscription copy, Mr Strickland’s first wife being the great-niece of that illustrious man.

[2]

It is a singular historic fact that the royal children who were the nearest in succession to the British throne were females—the Dukes of Clarence and Kent having no male offspring born to them; for the sceptre of the mightiest throne in the universe was destined to be wielded by the gentle hand of a lady, in the person of our own royal and merciful Queen Victoria, in whose reign not a single drop of blood has been shed for high treason—a fact almost unparalleled in the history of this country, or indeed in any other.

[3]

The poem entitled ‘Matilda’—with a longer one, the subject of which is the Wars of the Roses—remains still in MS., the taste of the public for metrical romance having been satiated with poetry in that style. Both these poems possess considerable merit; but the fame of Agnes Strickland was destined to accrue from her prose, to which she had not turned her attention at that time.