The regularity with which the accounts are kept is only equalled by the remarkable steadiness of his expenditure; the first and third years showing an outlay of exactly 17. 25. each, whilst the second and fourth each run to precisely 27. Perhaps 7s. 6d. I had given me more not sett down it will be most interesting to examine the because layd out againe In Tokens. four years side by side. us. The next page or two are filled with desultory memoranda of small sums received in the form of “tips," and ending up with these two statements: 0 6 The additional expenses are unnoteworthy | value of money in those days would now with the exception of "A Key to a Pen," be quite sufficiently large to enable him to which certainly arouses curiosity; the do so, and some time within the next three price of the key was one shilling, but its years he wooed and won his bride. Of size, shape, and use remain a mystery to the nature of that wooing one would gladly learn a little more, for even with the help of a decided love-letter written to his mistress within six months of their marriage we cannot divine much. How this letter (probably only one amongst many of a like of its original writer, to be placed by him nature) ever fell again into the hands in the pocket of the little account-book, low and stained with age, and worn with we are unable to say; but there it is, yelmuch folding and refolding. It is written on the thin, rough, iarge square note-paper of the period, sealed with a monogram and elaborately addressed on the back: This being Septr ye 29th 1699 I find I have spent this first half of my time on my own charges 067. 4s. ood. Spent on my own acct in ye 7 years 197. 15s. 9d. One is tempted to speculate as to what form his greater extravagance during the second half of his time took, but on this point the book is silent. The apprenticeship ended in the early part of 1703, but John apparently stayed on in the same business for several years afterwards at a weekly wage of 51. That this did not constitute his entire income is clear from a page of his diary, which records: "Father recd of Jos. Atkins for my rent Dew at Lady Day 1701, 167l. 135. 00d., taxes being Deducted;" and again, after more references to Jos. Atkins: "Recd of my tenant in all 647. 175. being 2 years rent due att Michaelmas 1703." We do not find any references either in the diary or the accounts to the time when the young man began to think of taking to himself a wife, but his income at the high For Mrs. Lydia Durrant att Kent By Stone Crouch Bag : The letter is so short and so quaint that I transcribe the whole. I gladly embrace ys first opportunity to tell you dearest Mdm yt I arrived Safe in towne ys evening with a great deal of ease both to my horse & self; The Roads I found much Thanks be to God pretty favourable, My better than by way of Tunbridge & Weather greatest trouble was to think ye nearer I was from yr Dear Self. to my journeys End, yt I was still ye farther Do me so much Justice Mdm as to believe yt it is impossible for me to have any interest or concern nearer my heart then you & I am sorry so great a truth and Mdm yr most humble admirer pd for hatt 2 Kills Beere Wife for house. Nov. 18th. Shoes 95., house 27. Months Rent, Board, & Servts wages to Michms Pd wife for house 4102 206 TON 6 15 1Ο 2 6 I I об 3 16 2522 6 ΙΟ 8888; 8888 8 8 8 0 0 8 6 6 ΤΟ 6 12 12 2 3 II 106 12 00 March 12th 1705-6 Fetter Lane. "My greatest trouble was to think the nearer I was to my journeys End, that I was still the farther from your Dear Self," that is a very prettily turned sentence, and yet with a ring about it which sounds straight from the heart. Throughout the whole letter, indeed, there is a delightful simplicity and homeliness which even the stilted phraseology of the period cannot quite spoil, and which tempts us to think that when the "melancholy distance (of some thirty miles) no longer kept the lovers apart, John may possibly have greeted his lady just a little more warmly than with that respectful touch of her hand which was all that epistolary conventions allowed him to propose to himself. At any rate his suit prospered, for in the midale of his pocket-book we come across On the next page we have a reference two pages of diary pure and simple which to Sarah's wages, which were 27. 3s., but show us that just five months after his as no dates are given we are unable to letter the wished for opportunity of show-decide whether this represents three or ing his "true affection was granted by six months' hire. his marriage with Mistress Lydia Durrant in September of the same year. Immediately following this record of his entrance "into ye holy state of Matrimony, Sept. 4, 1706," we have the beginning of his household accounts. On the credit side they run as follows: We now begin to notice that besides "wife for house," there is another entry of " wife for self," which occurs pretty often, "wife " receiving from two to three pounds at once, and finally she receives five pounds for her "occassions," a mysterious allusion which is perhaps explained by a reference later on to "Parson and Clark, 135. 3d.," and "Cradle and Baskitt, IIS. 6d." Turning to the "Diary" we have the simple record of the birth, and o sad to say the death, of his first child: My Dear first child was born ye 23rd of June, 1707, about 10 in ye forenoon. Christened by ye name of Eliz. ye 25 of ye same month, & dyed ye 19th of July following about 11 at night, & lyes in ye vault in St Voster's, Londn. Thus in February, 1716, we read: "Pd Nurse Patch fifteen Pounds twelve shillings in full for nursing and boarding my Daughter to the 20th of this Instant February." And again, in February, 1720, the child and nurse were evidently sent With the birth of the child the house- on a long visit to Huntingdon to Grandhold expenses increase, and we find in mother Payne: "Pd Mother Febry y addition to "House 27." further expenses, 16th, 1720, Thirty seaven Pounds fourwhich are noted down as "extraordinary,' "teen shillings & 6d. in full for Butter, Inbut soon cease to be looked upon as any. thing but ordinary. The household seems to have been kept up on a fairly large scale, for we have mention of a "Kate" and a "Betsy "who also receive wages as well as " Sarah;" but it is evident from the other side of the page that the wife's father lived with the young people and kept his own man servant, paying them for board two sums of 47. 10s. within the twelve months. Items for wine and beer are very common, one brewer's bill for six months being ten pounds. It is difficult to guess what became of the money allowed for "House," since the master paid servants' wages, and bills for wine, beer, coals, groceries, house linen, butcher, butterman, and taxes. His wife's allowance also was very liberal, and at various times he pays for the following items besides: "For Wife's Scarf, 27. 10s. od.; Wife's Callico, 17. 7s.; Wife's Silk, 67. 10s. ood.; Wife, for tippet, 41. 6s. ood.;" in fact, according to his own showing, he appears to have given his wife ample means of providing both for the house and herself, and then to have paid all her bills as well. terest, Child, and Maide's board and wages and all accts." After November, 1709, there are no more regular house accounts, and the little book is used principally for jotting "down moneys received and larger sums paid out to his mother and sisters. The shop also ceases to be mentioned, and we have numerous entries of rents paid by tenants in Huntingdon; indeed it would seem that soon after the death of his wife's father, which occurred in June, 1709, John Payne left London and went down to manage his estates in Huntingdon, where he seems to have been in possession of about 1,000l. per annum in landed property, chiefly consisting of small farms let to tenants at from 20%. to 50l. per annum. Out of this property, however, he has to pay quarterly dividends to his mother and sister Anna, though their income, like that of most widows and unmarried daughters of the time, was very small and could form no great burden on the estate. At what period John Payne again left his country house to mix once more in London business life, whether he was personally connected with the bank or only lent his money and his name, or whether indeed he ever was one of the founders or left that honor to his son John, is all a matter of conjecture, yet one closes the quaint little old book with feelings of regret, and would fain follow its owner a little further. The last date is 1726, when he must still have been a comparatively young man. Under date October, 1708, we come across evidence of the arrival of another child to replace the one too soon lost. This time "Parson and Clark" head the list, receiving 13s. 3d.; “Gossiping money" comes to 17. 2s. 6d. ; "Coates for child, 1. 15. 6d.; "Midwife and Nurse, 31. 4s. 6d.," and the diary says: My second child John was born Oct 13th, 1708, & was baptised ye Sabbath Day following by W. Benjn. Ibbatt. There is still another record of the birth of a daughter, who, like the first, lived but a few days. My daughter Ann was born Novr ye 12th, 1709, & Dyed ye 19th Ditto. After this the regular accounts stop, as does also the diary, but from stray notes scattered through the book there would appear to have been born yet another daughter who survived infancy, but whose health must have given cause for anxiety. ALICE POLLARD. From The Fortnightly Review. IBSEN'S SOCIAL DRAMAS. So long ago that the most patient chronicler of the unimportant must have forgotten the fact, I published in the pages of the Fortnightly Review a study of the work of the Norwegian poet, Henrik Ibsen, up to the year 1874, a study which was afterwards reprinted in enlarged form as part of a certain volume. I mention this here Rhyme," and from that day to this he has used it only in short copies of verses. The announcement of his complete divorce reached me in a letter from which I will here translate a few words. He had told me of the preparation he was making for a new play-the same which afterwards appeared as "Samfundets Stötter " merely to absolve myself from the duty of ing at, and who sees nothing but what is examining in the very briefest way the "improper" in Guy de Maupassant, will early writings of the poet. At the time not be able to put up with Ibsen. There the article I speak of appeared, the name is no doubt that he takes his literary of Ibsen was absolutely unrecognized in analysis and his moral curiosity very this country; it is a pleasure to me to "hard." He has no conception of literaknow that it was I who first introduced it ture as an anodyne, and like all converts, to English readers a very poor and in- he is a more zealous enemy of æsthetic adequate interpreter, but still the first. and formal beauty in literature than those That name is now widely admired in En- who have never been adepts in touching gland, and has long passed beyond any "the tender stops of various quills." Ibneed of emphatic recommendation. All sen's new departure was marked by the Europe admits that it is one of the great-rejection of verse as a vehicle. The latest est in contemporary literature, and by of his historical plays, his "Kejser og degrees, even here, its possessor is be- Galilæer " (Emperor and Galilean), a vast coming studied and popularized. ten-act tragedy as long as Dryden's "ConIt is the more convenient to take for quest of Granada," was written in prose, granted the work of Henrik Ibsen pre- and marks the transition. Ibsen had vious to 1874, because what he has pub-"grown weary of his long-loved mistress, lished since that year has been exclusively of a peculiar class, and that a class in which he had scarcely made any previous essays. The political comedy of "De Unges Forbund" (The Young Men's Union), which appeared as long ago as 1869, has a little of the character of Ibsen's later social dramas, but not very much. All the rest of his early workhis astounding tours de force in dramatic rhyme, his saga-tragedies, his historical dramas, his lyrics, although in all of these the careful critic traces the elements of There is one point which I must discuss his later and more highly developed man- with you. You think my new drama ought neris distinguished, to a startling de- to be written in verse, and that it will gain an gree, from his social prose dramas, by a advantage if it is. Here I must simply contotal difference of form and tone. The tradict you; for the piece is, as you will find, work by which we judge him to-day is an developed in the most realistic way possible. unbroken series of seven plays, all deal-The illusion I wish to produce is that of truth ing with contemporary life in Norway, all inspired by the same intensely modern spirit, all rigorously divested of every thing ideal, lyrical, or conventional, whether in form or spirit. These seven dramas are, at present, Ibsen's claim to be considered as a European imaginative writer of the first class. By the side of their strenuous originality and actuality, the lovely creations of his youth fade into comparative unimportance. These were in the tradition of poetry; those are either masterpieces of a new sort of writing or they are failures. Ibsen, be it admitted, for the sake of the gentle reader, is not a poet to the taste of every one. The school of critics now flourishing amongst us, to whom what is serious in literature is eminently distasteful, and who claim of modern writing that it should be light, amusing, romantic, and unreal, will find Ibsen much too imposing. The critic who is bored with Tolstoi, who cannot understand what Howells is aim and I ventured, with plentiful lack of judgment as the event proved, to beg that it might be in verse. Dr. Ibsen replied, itself; I want to produce upon the reader the impression that what he is reading is actually taking place before him. If I were to use verse, I should by so doing be stultifying my own intention and the object which I placed before me. The variety of everyday and unimportant characters, which I have intentionally introduced into the piece, would be effaced (udviskede) and blended into one another, if I had allowed them all to converse in a rhythmic movement. We are no longer living in the time of Shakespeare, and among sculptors there is beginning to be a discussion whether statuary ought not to be painted with lively colors. Much can be said for and against such a practice. I myself would not have the Venus of Milos painted, but I would rather see a negro's head carved in black marble than in white. On the whole, my feeling is that literary form ought to be in relation to the amount of ideality which is spread over indeed, a tragedy in the old-world signification the representation. My new drama is not, of the word, but what I have tried to depict in it is human beings, and for that very reason I have not allowed them to talk "the language of the gods." This severely realistic conception of what dramatic form should be, a conception which sounded oddly at first on the lips of a poet who had written impas sioned five-act plays entirely in elaborate rhymed measures, was in strict harmony with the mental and moral tone of the author in this his new departure. Dr. Georg Brandes, in his interesting volume, "Det Moderne Gjennembruds Mænd," has given us some valuable particulars regarding Ibsen's political and philosophical experiences at this crisis of his life. During the Franco-German war, it would seem that his sentiment with regard to life and history underwent a complete revolution. He woke up to see, or to think he saw, that we were living in the last scene of the last act of a long drama; that all which politics, morals, literature were giving us was but the last and driest crumbs swept up from under the table of eighteenth-century revolution; that "Liberty, equality, and fraternity" was played out as a motto, and had come to mean the direct opposite of what it meant to "the late lamented Guillotine." He saw, or thought he saw, politicians wasting their energies on local and superficial revolutions, not perceiving that all things were making ready for a universal revolt of the spirit of men. A few months later, in the following sentences, he anticipated, with a very surprising exactitude, recent utterances of Tolstoi. Ibsen wrote thus to Georg Brandes : -- The hypocrisy of society and the brutality of personal egotism - these were the principal outward signs of that inward but universal malady which he saw the world sinking beneath. It was with no thought of reforming society, with no zeal of the missionary or the philanthropist, that he started on his new series of studies. He would spend the few years left to him before the political agony of Europe in noting down, with an accuracy hitherto unparalleled, the symptoms of her disorder. But with him always, since 1870, there has remained, pre-eminent among his political convictions, this belief that the State is the natural enemy of the individual. Always an exile from his own country, he had settled in Dresden, rejoicing in the freedom of a small and uninfluential government. But in 1875, when Saxony became more and more identified with the vaunting glory and greatness of the empire, he fled again. In a letter to me at that time he says: "I must go. In April I shall flit to Munich, and see if I can settle there for two or three years. I fancy that all spiritual life breathes with greater fulness and comfort there than here in north Germany, where the State and politics have drafted all the strength of the people into their service, and have arrested all genuine interests." Always this bogey of the State, paralyzing individual action, driving the poet through the cities of Europe to avoid the iron clangor of its colossal system of wheels. The State is the curse of the individual. Such was, briefly, the mood, as a literHow has the national strength of Prussia been purchased? By the sinking of the indiary artist and as a political moralist, in vidual in a political and geographical formula. which Ibsen started upon the creation of ... The State must go! That will be a rev- his remarkable series of dramas. To olution which will find me on its side. Un- enumerate them-and this must now be dermine the idea of the State, set up in its done is to enumerate the entire pubplace spontaneous action, and the idea that lished work of twelve years. Courted and spiritual relationship is the only thing that flattered as he has been, tempted by the makes for unity, and you will start the ele- results of his immense prosperity to bend ments of a liberty which will be something to slighter and less arduous work, Ibsen worth possessing. has never, during this long period of final maturity, resigned for a moment his idea of diagnosing, in a series of sternly realistic dramas, the disease of which this poor weary world of ours, according to his theory, is expiring. At present these plays are seven in number, issued in the winters of the years successively named. First came "Samfundets Stötter" (The Pillars of Society), in 1877; then “Et Dukkehjem" (A Doll's House), in 1879; "Gengangere (Ghosts), in 1881; "En Foikefiende " (An Enemy of the People), in 1882; “Vildanden " (The Wild Duck), in 1884; "Rosmersholm " (the name of an It was in such a mood as this that Ibsen received news of the Paris Commune with extreme disgust, regarding this cari cature of his ideal as likely to delay the realization of his genuine desire through at least a generation. To await the new revolution, as religious mystics await the solemn Second Advent, was now useless. The hope of the immediate future had sunk behind the Seine, and Ibsen turned from watching the horizon to diagnose the symptoms of that mortal moral disease of which, as it appeared to him, Europe was fast advancing towards social death. |