Visits and Sketches at Home and Abroad with Tales and Miscellanies Now First Collected Vol. III (of 3)   By: Anna Jameson (1794-1860)

VOL. III.

VISITS AND SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD

WITH TALES AND MISCELLANIES NOW FIRST COLLECTED.

BY MRS. JAMESON,

AUTHOR OF "THE CHARACTERISTICS OF WOMEN," "LIVES OF CELEBRATED FEMALE SOVEREIGNS," &c.

IN THREE VOLUMES.

VOL. III.

SECOND EDITION.

LONDON SAUNDERS AND OTLEY, CONDUIT STREET. 1835.

LONDON: IBOTSON AND PALMER, PRINTERS, SAVOY STREET, STRAND.

CONTENTS OF VOL. III.

PAGE

Sketch of Mrs. Siddons 3 Sketch of Fanny Kemble 49 The False One 93 Halloran the Pedlar 177 The Indian Mother 231 Much Coin, Much Care 263

VOL. III.

Page 42, line 5, for the full stop read a comma, and for she had read having.

59, 4, for cannot read could not.

MRS. SIDDONS.

[The following little sketch was written a few days after the death of Mrs. Siddons, and was called forth by certain paragraphs which appeared in the daily papers. A misapprehension of the real character of this remarkable woman, which I know to exist in the minds of many who admired and venerated her talents, has induced me to enlarge the first very slight sketch, into a more finished but still inadequate portrait. I have spared no pains to verify the truth of my own conception by testimony of every kind that was attainable. I have penned every word as if I had been in that great final court where the thoughts of all hearts are manifested; and those who best knew the individual I have attempted to delineate bear witness to the fidelity of the portrait, as far as it goes. I must be permitted to add, that in this and the succeeding sketch I have not only been inspired by the wish to do justice to individual virtue and talent, I wished to impress and illustrate that important truth, that a gifted woman may pursue a public vocation, yet preserve the purity and maintain the dignity of her sex that there is no prejudice which will not shrink away before moral energy, and no profession which may not be made compatible with the respect due to us as women, the cultivation of every feminine virtue, and the practice of every private duty. I might here multiply examples and exceptions, and discuss causes and results; but it is a consideration I reserve for another opportunity.]

MRS. SIDDONS

" Implora pace! " She, who upon earth ruled the souls and senses of men, as the moon rules the surge of waters; the acknowledged and liege empress of all the realms of illusion; the crowned queen; the throned muse; the sceptred shadow of departed genius, majesty, and beauty, supplicates Peace!

What unhallowed work has been going forward in some of the daily papers since this illustrious creature has been laid in her quiet unostentatious grave! ay, even before her poor remains were cold! What pains have been taken to cater trifling scandal for the blind, heartless, gossip loving vulgar! and to throw round the memory of a woman, whose private life was as irreproachable as her public career was glorious, some ridiculous or unamiable association which should tend to unsphere her from her throne in our imagination, and degrade from her towering pride of place, the heroine of Shakspeare, and the Muse of Tragedy!