Part XIa
Time Traveling With R.E. Prindle
I have been
having trouble finding a way into this chapter.
Three efforts have been thrown aside; perhaps the fourth will
succeed. I have been successful in
finding a copy of The Youthful Impostor and added Vo. I of The Modern
Literature of France. The latter is
available under the title Georges Sand.
A couple of quotes from those may possibly be a good lead in.
A preliminary
quote is from David De Leon’s introduction to his translation of volume fifteen
of Mystere’s du Peuple, Eugene Sue’s The Executioner’s Knife or Joan of Arc: A
Tale of the Inquisition. De Leon:
Whether one will be satisfied with nothing but a scientific diagnosis in psychology, or a less ponderous and infinitely more lyric presentation of certain mental phenomena will do for him, whether the credit of history insists on strict chronology or whether he prizes in matters canonical the rigid presentation of dogma or a whether the tragic fruits of theocracy offer a more attractive starting point for his contemplation- whichever case may be (the career and novels of George Reynolds…) will gratify his intellectual cravings on all three heads.
Of course I
have substituted Reynolds for De Leon’s quote
of Sue. He pretty well covers the
approach I am taking. The smooth or
turbulent waters of a rolling river are what is meant by canonical waters,
while the real history lies beneath the shining or muddy waters in the hidden
river bed. With Reynolds it is necessary to penetrate the
river’s surface and search beneath to understand the depth of Reynold’s
thought.
Up to this
time Reynolds has escaped the biographer’s pen.
Fortunately for us Reynolds has left some pretty transparent clues in
his writing making them fairly accessible auto-biography, more especially in the
novels of his apprenticeship before embarking mid-stream as he began the
fullness of his career with The Mysteries Of London. Two novels stand out in auto-biographical
detail. The first is The Youthful
Impostor first composed when he was eighteen in 1832 and edited before
publication in 1835. The completely
rewritten version of 1847 retitled The Parricide bears small relation to the
first published version. The second work
is his Modern Literature of France published in 1839 when he was twenty-five. The latter is non-fiction. In it he says in the introduction speaking
directly to the reader p. XVII
The literature of France previous to the Revolution of 1830 resembled that of England at the present day; inasmuch as a moral lesson were taught through the medium of almost impossible fiction. Now the French author paints the truth in all its nudity; and this development of the secrets of Nature shocks the English reader, because he is not yet accustomed to so novel a style. To depict truth, in all its bearings, consistently with nature, is a difficult task; and he who attempts it muse occasionally exhibit deformities which disgust the timid mind. A glance at life in all its phases, cannot be attended with very satisfactory results; and while the age surveys much to please, it must also be prepared to view much that will be abhorrent to the virtuous imagination. The strict conventual usages of English society prevent the introduction of highly coloured pictures into works of fiction; and thus, in an English book which professes to be a history of man or of the world, the narrative is but half told. In France the whole tale is given at once; and the young men, and young females do not there enter upon life with minds so circumscribed and narrow that the work of initiation becomes an expensive and ruinous task. We do not become robbers because we read of thefts; nor does a female prove incontinent on account of her knowledge that such a failing exists. The pilot should be made aware of rocks and quicksands, that he may know how to avoid them; it is ridiculous to suffer him to roam on a vast ocean without having previously consulted the maps and charts which can alone warn him of peril. Such is the reasoning of French writers, who moreover carry their system to such a an extent, that they cannot hesitate to represent vice triumphant, and virtue leveled with the dust, for they assert that the former incredibly prospers, and the other languishes without support; whereas the English author points to a difficult moral in his fiction.
One might
say that Reynolds plan of literature was formed in France while his five years
there were the most significant and formative in his life. Whether he witnessed the three important days
of the July Revolution that unseated Charles X is not important, what is
important is that their import coalesced his own political outlook. Thus when he returned to England in 1836 it
was in full revolutionary mode and remained so promoting the Revolution of 1848
by any and all means at his disposal. He
directed his revolutionary effort toward ’48 by his involvement in the Chartist
Movement in which he was ultimately successful.
Coming from France where he believed that the July Revolution swept away
ancient ways be violence, belief in violence offended the English agitators who
believe evolutionary tactics the better approach. They belittled his contributions and diminished
him personally. Notwithstanding his vision of Chartism triumphed changing
English society and he should be rehabilitated and acknowledged as such.
Secondly the
quote displays perfectly Reynolds’ literary ideals to present reality starkly
as he saw it. I do not agree with many
of his conclusions and in observing his usages do not necessarily endorse them
in their entirety. Time has proven many
of his observations fatuous and against human nature. To ignore them is to misunderstand his
import. He is almost always going
against the grain. Especially compared
to Dickens and Ainsworth.
The French
literature he discusses was prior to the effusion of the Forties, which was
astonishing. In his critique he is
referring to the theatrical or poetic works of Dumas and Victor Hugo. He apparently was an ardent theatre goer.
The
tremendous events of the fifty years preceding 1830 were brought to a head in
the July Revolution of France and the Reform Act of 1832 in England. The political and belated explosion in France
in 1789 was only less significant compared to the Industrial Revolution of
England and the subsequent economic reorganization. When the Napoleonic era ended modern society had
been reorganized emerged complete.
Once again,
Reynolds was keenly aware of changing customs and mores. This vision was held up starkly to him when
he set foot in France shortly after the July Revolution. One should also note this was after the
cholera epidemic of the same year. To
quote him again: The +*-Modern
Literature of France pp. XIII-XIV:
The literature of France since the July Revolution of 1830 is quite distinct from that under the fallen dynasty. A sudden impulse was given to the minds of men by the successful struggle for freedom which hurled the improvident Charles from his royal seat; and all aims—all views—and all interests underwent a vast change. Ages of progressive but peaceful reform couldn’t have accomplished so much, in reference to the opinions and tastes of a mighty nation, as those three days of revolution and civil war. The march of civilization was hurried over centuries; and as if France had suddenly leapt from an old into a new epoch without passing through the minutes, the hours, and the days which mark the lapse of time, she divested herself of the grotesque and gothic apparel, and assumed an attire which at first astounded and awed herself. And then men began to congratulate each other upon the change of garb; and now that they are accustomed to see and admire it, they look upon their rejected garments as characteristic of antiquity, and not as things that were in vogue only a few years since.
As a
Chartist, other Chartists who were more evolutionarily minded disliked Reynolds
because he was known for wanting drastic results by violent revolutionary means
Reynolds retorts, p. XVI:
It is a matter of speculation whether the Reform Act (of 1832 in England) would have been even now (1839) conceded to the people of this country, if it had not been found necessary to keep pace as much as possible with the giant strides made by the French. Certainly a change has taken place in the literature of England since the passing of the Reform itself as well as that of France since the three days of July.
The change
in literature in England was led by Edward Bulwer Lytton, William Harrison Ainsley,
perhaps Charles Dickens, by Reynolds himself and quite probably writers like
Pierce Egan and the Penny Blood and Dreadful writers as developments in
printing and paper made ever cheaper editions possible making books of all
qualities affordable to the rising literacy among the underclasses. Indeed by the 1850s, John Dicks, Reynolds printer
and partner, would make available the complete Shakespeare for pennies. Of course, the type was so small they are virtually
unreadable except to the most dedicated.
All of these
writers were reformers, writing especially about the harsh penal laws.
The core
attitudes of Reynolds remained unchanged from his introduction into France. It was in France that a very young eighteen
year old wrote his first book, The Youthful Impostor.
-II-
Reynolds
incorporates his entire life into his novels so this might be the right time to
assemble a chronology of his life. For
those who may have read my earlier chapters this account may seem familiar but
it incorporates much new material, better organization and deeper thinking. Or so I think.
While George’s
first novel, The Young Impostor was first composed in 1832 when he was eighteen
the book was not to published until 1835 when he was twenty-one. There was some touching up for the 1835
version as he includes a chapter head quote from W. Harrison Ainsworth’s Rookwood
that was only published in 1832 and couldn’t have been read for his original
manuscript. He also chapter headed a
quote from Bulwer-Lytton’s 1830 novel Paul Clifford. That novel was definitely an influence on The
Youthful Impostor. The Youthful Impostor
is highly autobiographical so we can
form an almost biographical account of his early years. By the way the 1847 rewrite of the Impostor,
The Parricide, bears almost no resemblance to the earlier version. It can read as an independent novel and not
his best.
George was
born July 20, 1814. His father, a naval post-Captain
commanded a cruiser during the Napoleonic wars.
Born in Sandwich, Kent of the Cinq Ports, the family was moved to the island
of Guernsey when George was two. Six
years later the family returned to Kent and its capital Canterbury. Reynolds has indelible memories of all this so
references to his early life crop up frequently in his works.
Returning to
1822, at the age of eight he was saddened by the death of his father thus
making him an orphan. Orphans figure
prominently in his works. His mother died eight years later depriving him of
both parents leaving him on his own at fifteen under the guardianship of his
father’s best friend Duncan McArthur, hence George’s third name. He passed under that man’s guardianship after
his father’s death. His mother was not
his guardian.
His
relationship with McArthur, if we judge from his writing, was not a happy one. There are other references but in 1854
writing in his novel, The Rye House Plot, which by the way is a superb novel,
George had this to say about his guardian:
Rye House Plot, p. 63,
This guardian of mine was a man of stern disposition; and I loved him not.
I think we
can apply the quote to Duncan McArthur.
He, himself, was an old Navy man, a surgeon. From the age of eight to sometime at the age
of thirteen George attended a school in Ashford, a few miles from Canterbury
which were happy years for him as he idolized his schoolmaster. Then, as George styles it, at the tender age
of thirteen he
was placed
in the Sandhurst Military Academy in Berkshire.
Thirteen would indeed had been tender to have been thrown in with older
boys of sixteen or eighteen and even young men heading into their twenties. Tom Brown’s School Days at Rugby by Thomas
Hughes at roughly this time shows how difficult George’s situation probably
was. He was impoverished while probably
the majority of the cadets were from titled families having plenty of money. So from thirteen to sixteen when George was either
removed or removed himself the years must have been unpleasant. The Youthful Impostor covers those years.
George’s
mother died in March of 1830 when he was fifteen. He left the academy shortly after his
sixteenth birthday in September. He left
for France at the end of 1830, a greenhorn of sixteen. A sitting duck for sharpers one might say.
The question
then is how much money did he have. Dick
Collins think nothing but I think he had to have much more so I accept his
statement to the adjudicator at his 1848 bankruptcy hearing when George told
him that he had had seven thousand pounds.
Where did they come from?
In The Rye
House plot he discusses such an issue like this. His character General Oliphant is speaking.
“Eighteen years ago, when I was a youth under twenty, I embarked with my uncle,
Mr. Oliphant, on board a vessel bound for a Spanish port where he had some
mercantile business to transact, he being engaged in commercial enterprises. Mr. Oliphant was my +
guardian, my
parents having died when I was very young.
I must observe that Mr. Oliphant being a man of reserved and stern
disposition had kept me in the most perfect state of ignorance as to my own
affairs; and although I had reason to believe that my parents had left some
little property, which I should inherit on obtaining my majority, I had not the
smallest conception of what amount or value it might be or what nature it was nor
where situated or deposited.
As it turned
out the inheritance was a couple thousand pounds payable at twenty-one. This coincides with Dick Collins researches
in George’s finances. So, I think we can
believe that George is describing his own situation in the above quote. While it is generally thought that George
inherited twelve thousand pounds when his mother died, we can I think dismiss
the account. Where, then, did George get
seven thousand pounds. If The Young
Impostor is as autobiographical as I think it is then George was involved in a substantial
swindle and fled England in somewhat of a hurry at the end of 1830.
George does
not often write about his military life but he does in YI and the Rye House
Plot. The cadets were given a fair amount of liberty and traveled from the
barracks to London frequently. This was
George’s first acquaintance with London and it was overwhelming.
In Chapter
VI of the Parricide a rewrite of The YI Reynolds quotes this verse:
Houses, churches, mix’d together
Streets unpleasant in all weather,
Prisons, palaces contiguous,
Gaudy things enough to tempt you
Showy outsides, insides empty,
Baubles, trades, mechanic arts,
Coaches, wheelbarrows, and carts,
-
This is London! How do ye like it?
Sometime
then at thirteen and fourteen he had his first introduction to the Big City in
company with other cadets on the town.
Breathtaking and terrifying. And
that was my impression of London too. I’m
sure he was stunned by his first vision as I was a hundred seventy years later.
He frequently mentions the Hounslow barracks. Highwaymen infested the highways from
Hounslow to London and also in the vicinity of Bagshot.
Reynolds
with little money in his pocket traveled from Sandhurst to London and back many
times apparently following at times through Bagshot and Hounslow.
Now, as a
young cadet, he has himself returning from London late one night when he is
accosted by two highwaymen. Naturally he had little money and was being
harassed accordingly when a third party appeared who dispersed the robbers and
rescued him. It would seem apparent that
as the robbers worked in parties of three that the third party also a robber
who intervened for another reason.
Reynolds names him as Arnold. Having read the story and reviewing it, it
should be apparent that Arnold thought he had found a use for the young cadet
and he and, actually the other two, were contemplating some large scale swindle
but needed a naïve young man to complete the ensemble as bait. George may very probably have been that young
man.
Reynolds has
James, his character, and Arnold dupe a Jewish usurer named Mr. Nathanial. The amount George mentions was seven thousand
pounds. This may be a coincidence or it
may be where his seven thousand pounds came from when he absconded to France at
the end of 1830.
It may have
been at this time that Long’s Hotel became familiar to the young orphan. Long’s was apparently London’s most luxurious
hotel at the time. Reynolds is almost
breathless when he mentions the name. Long’s
figures prominently in his pre 1844 works. Most often with criminal acts. And
indeed, Reynold’s is familiar with endless hotel scams.
According to
Collins there is some question as to young George’s integrity and George
himself from time to time mentions that he has redeemed his youthful crimes,
while swindles are frequently performed in his novels. That’s not proof of course but such a swindle
would have provided the seven thousand pounds he said he had plus an incentive
to leave England just ahead of the Bow Street Runners. At any rate we know that he showed up in
France at the end of 1830 and we’ll take his word that he had seven thousand
pounds.
If George
was associated with this ‘Arnold’ who was part of the criminal underworld he
must have been inducted into that society in some capacity. In that capacity he would have learned
something of criminal ways of which he seems to be fairly familiar and
according to Collins he did do some prison time while he went through a
bankruptcy just before returning to England from France.
If I am
correct, then George benefited by his and ‘Arnold’s’ swindle and absconded to
France. Collins also records that he was
arrested in Calais for playing with loaded dice. In Mysteries of London, first series, George
gives a detailed description with diagrams of how to load dice. Of course, that may have been taken from a
manual.
So, at the
beginning of 1831 George landed in France where he would remain until 1836.
From Calais he went straight to Paris where he remained either residing at
Meurice’s Hotel or hanging around the
environs as
may be indicated by his book of Pickwick Abroad. When he married he resided in different
places as Collins’ research accords.
Evidence
indicates that he did explore areas of France.
At one point he laments never have been to Belgium, the closest he came
was four miles from the border. Since
one can only write about what is stored in one’s mind and one’s experience it
follows that Reynolds must have been at the places he writes about or had read
about them. As he frequently writes
about Italy one does question his presence there. In his book Wagner, the Wehr Wolf his descriptions
of Florence don’t seem to ring true so he may be working from from written
accounts or pure imagination although his descriptions do resonate with the
Italian period in Dumas’ The Count of Monte Cristo. Otherwise he may have traveled about quite a
bit.
As a green,
but initiated, sixteen year old in 1831, perhaps with money, he would have been
prey to various spongers and swindlers.
It is difficult to envision a sixteen year old boy brazening his way
through a foreign capital but he very obviously did for five years. One imagines his first six months must have
been intense orientation. Yet he says
that he completed The YI in 1832 and had been able to obtain a copy of
Bulwer-Lytton’s Paul Clifford, read it and incorporated it in his first novel. We’re talking of a bit of a phenom here. He must have gravitated into journalistic and
literary circles, possible theatrical, very quickly in his career, and he is
merely a boy not attaining his majority until the year before he left France. I find this fairly astonishing.
He says he
wrote The Young Impostor in 1832 so he must have been considering the story
from his very landing in France if not before.
As an eighteen year old It could only portray his experience up to that
year. The novel itself in excellent and
precocious for an eighteen year old; nor was it ignored. The copy I have is a reprint of an 1836 US edition published by E. L. Cary and A. Hart
of Philadelphia. Thus within a year of
its French publication it was published across the Atlantic. Why a Philadelphia company would appropriate
an unproven title by an unknown author isn’t clear to me.
According to
Collins within these two years he also met, courted and married his wife
Susannah Pierson. (Collins say that Pierson
is the correct spelling not Pearson.) She
was apparently moving in literary circles as Collins describes her as a writer. She would later, in the 1850s, write a novel
titled Gretna, which is available.
Gretna refers to Gretna Green across the Scottish border where those
wishing to elope repaired to. In 1745 a
law was passed forbidding underage couples to marry without parental permission
so that couples flew to Gretna Green for their nuptials. I was something like
going to Las Vegas. It’s a good story.
In The YI A Pearson
who was unmarried, while having a fairy
like persona, not unlike Huon of Bordeaux, took him under his wing and instructed
him in seedy practice. Whether he was
related to Susannah isn’t known. So, by
eighteen George was married and remained so until his wife died in 1854. He apparently never remarried.
According to
all the references to books George makes in his writing he was reading
voraciously. Here may be an appropriate
time to discuss aspects of the literary situation in England and France during
the thirties and forties.
The base for the writers in both England and
France was the novels of Walter Scott and the Gothic novelists along with Byron.
I would say that all the English and French writers were inspired by Scott. Scott died in 1832 at the young age of 61 thus
missing the joy of seeing his influence on succeeding authors, except for William
Harrison Ainsworth. Ainsworth who
published his Rookwood in 1832. That book
is almost an homage to Scott but lacks Scotts consummate style, complexity and
depth. Ainsworth followed that up in
1835 with Crichton and then began an outburst of historical novels from 1839
with Jack Sheppard and a dozen more in quick succession through about 1845. At that time Reynolds was quiescent but he
read all the titles and they influenced him greatly.
Of course
Charles Dickens began his career in the late thirties and turned out a few
titles in the forties. Dickens wasn’t
that prolific but he made the most lasting impression of the novelists of the
era. It is needless to say that he made
his impression on Reynolds. George
despised Dickens as a lightweight, and Dickens novels are lightweights. For me they are unreadable.
Lastly comes
Edward Bulwer-Lytton. He was an
important writer for his period and has survived into the present as an
occultist. His novel The Coming Race is
a must read for any esotericist. The
idea of it seized H.G. Wells mind and he used it for his excellent novel The Food
of the Gods. Bulwers’ Rienzi and The
Last Days Of Pompei may still have a readership. He’s not a particularly good writer
however. His opening line for Paul
Clifford ‘It was a dark and stormy night’ for some reason is found hilarious by
a certain type of reader. A contest is
held each year to see if anyone can match this imagined terrible sentence. Reynolds uses it occasionally in his books. Bulwer maintained a fair reputation at least
up to the 1950s while Reynolds was heavily influenced by him. And of course Byron. George even attempted ‘A Sequel To Don Juan’
but he was no Byron. He did get it
published and it did find readers.
Fortunately Byron was dead by that time and unable to the show the
umbrage that Dickens did.
And then
there are the magnificent French writers of the Forties and into the Fifties. The incomparable Alexander Dumas, pere
inspired by Walter Scott began turning out his French historical novels in
machine gun style, writing so fast that he had multiple serialized novels being
published at one time. And what
novels! Few novels can compare to The
Three Musketeers or The Count of Monte Cristo.
And, of course, Dumas is popular to this day.
At the same
time Honore de Balzac was publishing his Human Comedy collection of novels. Strangely compelling, Balzac’s brain had an
odd construction. Love him but I always
wonder: Why am I reading this? Balzac
too is read widely today. My favorite
story in the novella The Girl With The Golden Eyes.
Victor Hugo,
also widely read today, is not a favorite of mind. I will concede that Notre Dame de Paris – The
Hunchback of Notre Dame in the US, is compelling and could possibly be a great
book. The US title switches the focus of
the book from the architectural edifice of Notre Dame to the character of
Quasimodo, the Hunchback. The movies
were essential to changing the emphasis from the edifice to the Hunchback. Les Miserables is an OK read but doesn’t
impress me. Hugo was a Communist and in his
novel 1793 actually advocates murdering all the Royalists because they would
never accept the New Order. Don’t go
away because you read that; it’s just my opinion.
And then we
come to the incredible Eugene Sue. Not
quite as prolific as Dumas but a non-stop writer. Not quite as concentrated as Dumas, his style
is more diffuse but always interesting.
His two key works, neither widely read today are The Mysteries of Paris
and the Wandering Jew. Both are terrific
books and very long. Both books were
models for Reynolds Mysteries of Paris.
The Wandering Jew may have resonated especially with him because it
takes place in 1830, the year of the July Revolution and the cholera epidemic.
And now I am
going to go out on a limb and suggest that another key influence might have
been the American Edgar Allen Poe. While
Poe didn’t have that many pages to his credit, he was a prolific writer of
short stories and the short stories are amazing. Mind boggling. Inventive.
Concentrated. They would be very
difficult to top. They crossed the
Atlantic quickly and were received with open arms in France and England. I may be reaching but I find evidences of Poe
in his story of Grand Manoir in his Master Timothy’s Bookcase and we are going
to look more closely at that shortly.
And, of
course his mind is obsessed with the works of the Marquis de Sade. He must have read De Sade’s two great studies
Justine and Juliette shortly after arriving in Paris. De Sade believed that following virtue would
lead to an unhappy life while pursuing vice would lead to worldly success. The
contrast of vice and virtue then informs almost all his works, but he wishes to
reverse De Sade’s conclusions.
To really
understand Reynold’s, one must be familiar with these authors. But he was so influenced by his wide reading
that I’m sure these authors are just the tip of the iceberg.
In Pickwick
Abroad George is familiar with all the sights of Paris. He must have at least visited all the prisons
and insane asylums both in France and England.
We get tours of many. Of course
George was very interested in psychology.
While Phrenology and Physiognomy may not be considered psychology, they
are. Phrenology, an idea of the German,
Franz Gall, was a crude attempt at brain anatomy and if risible today it was
more because of the misuse by ununderstanding users than Gall’s idea itself
that led to its discreditization. The
notion was made on the right idea, different
areas of the brain control different functions,
it’s a moot point today but Gall deserves more credit that he gets, Reynolds
entertains an interest in both ideas, especially physiognomy He was apparently a great reader of facial
expressions.
Apropos of
that, a very interesting novel is the novel Master Timothy’s bookcase published
in 1840.
-III-
Master
Timothy’s Bookcase is very serious and it is a major book. Interestingly the book begins in Kent, then
follows Reynold’s career to Berkshire and London and then to France while
ending with his return to England ending in the shire of Kent.
As Reynolds
was only twenty-six in 1840 his mental acuity is actually astonishing. He had what one might call a four octave mind. Reynolds quite often resorts to supernatural
or, perhaps, proto-scientific elements.
In this book the hero Edmund Mortimer is the seventh son so-to-speak of
a family founded six generation earlier.
The ‘genius’ of the family appears to each member and offers them the
approach to life that they think will make them contented and happy. They choose wealth, success et al. and all
end up unhappy. Edmund Mortimer chooses
Universal Knowledge. This choice, of
course, reflects Reynolds ruling passion.
George, himself, seeks Universal Knowledge and does a good job of
it. However, even he at only twenty-six,
he realizes that universal knowledge does not lead to happiness as knowing all
displays mankind at its worst.
The more
Mortimer, and we may assume Reynolds, learns about human nature, the more
disgusted he becomes and regrets his choice.
His peregrinations take him through several adventures and episodes.
The ‘Genius’
then gives Mortimer a supernatural bookcase that only he can see and is always
with him. Whenever Mortimer is perplexed
by a situation concerning the motivations or activities of the participants he he
turns to the bookcase that provides him with a manuscript that explains the true
situation all its manifestations he has only to ask. However, his bookcase cannot predict the
future.
Mortimer’s
uncanny ability to know the complete past history of people he has only just
met will have consequences because he can produce no evidence as to how he
acquired the knowledge. This becomes
clear in the episode of the Marquis Delaroche.
Without going into inessential details in this very clever story the
Marquis neglects the wife of his dead brother whose fortune had been entrusted
to him. Mortimer becomes acquainted with
Athalie d’Estival, her name and confronts the Marquis Delaroche, to whom he is
a complete stranger, attempting to shame him into supporting his sister-in-law.
The Marquis
is old and the epitome of deviousness.
When Mortimer butts into the Marquis’ life and proves to him that he has
misappropriated his brother’s inheritance the Marquis sets Mortimer up. He opens his safe, leaving the door open, and
gives Mortimer a casket containing his wealth refusing to give a proper written
authorization for Mortimer to be in possession of the casket and expels
Mortimer from his house. Immediately
then, with his safe left open the Marquis commits suicide by slashing his
throat. His servant accosts Mortimer
leaving the house with the casket under his cloak and assumes the Mortimer
stole it. The dead body is then
discovered and circumstantial evidence indicates Mortimer to be both a murderer
and thief.
Reynolds
thoroughly dislikes the authority of circumstantial evidence, and with good
reason, so this story gives him an opportunity to display its fallaciousness.
Because of
his ability to know personal details of other people’s lives Mortimer’s friends
consider him not only eccentric but insane.
This is confirmed to the judge when he interrogates Mortimer. I will quote a passage because it indicates
Reynolds brilliance and knowledge of psychology at only twenty-six years of
age.
The Judge of Instruction commenced the usual system of catechizing; and for some time our hero replied with calmness and precision to the various question put to him. But at length, as those questions gradually touched more nearly on the dread event itself, he became confused- his ideas were no longer defined and distributed in their proper cells in his imagination, but were collected into one heterogeneous and unintelligible mass; and, yielding to the impulse of those sentiments which were uppermost in his mind, he commenced a long exculpatory harangue, the principle subject of which was his race. The Judge listened patiently for some time, and at length shrugged up his shoulders to imply his utter ignorance of the meaning of the prisoner’s speech. At length, exhausted by the long flow of verbiage in which he had indulged, Sir Edmund sank upon a seat, almost unconscious of what he had been saying and where he was.
That’s a
pretty acute description of a state of mind.
Reynolds was deeply interested in psychological studies. One must bear in mind that this period was the
beginning of the great opening of the European mind. I doubt if there were many who could have
reproduced that analysis. The
description of the whole interview is masterful and that at only twenty-six.
In any event
Mortimer was convicted of murder, declared insane, and committed to the Bicetre
insanity wing. George was familiar with,
at
least,
the outside of the building, this massive Bicetre structure housing criminals,
the insane and others.
It seems
obvious that George toured all these insane asylums and prisons. He was up on recent developments of the
treatment of the insane. He was aware of
Dr. Phillippe Pinel who had very recently begun the humane treatment of the
mentally afflicted.
The people of
the time were placed under unbearable distress and hardship, especially women. One reads of the women that Dr. Jean Martin
Charcot at the Salpetriere of Paris in the 1860s, 70s and 80s treated and their
mental sufferings were appalling. Their history of abuse was incredible. Nor were all asylums as enlightened as those
of Drs. Pinel and Charcot and, remember, these were pioneers.
Whether
George’s description of the Bicetre is accurate is beyond me to determine, he
does however tell an interesting story of one of the inmates. The story sounds like it may have been true,
but, read on: Mortimer has been declared
guilty but insane. Committed to the Bicetre
insane wing he domiciled with three other monomaniacs. The three stories are actual psychological
evaluations of the inmates. The one the
interests us most is the first. The
story is a Frankenstein type.
The first was an old man of sixty-five with long grey hair flowing from the back part of his head, the crown and regions of the temples being completely bald. He was short in stature, stooping in gait, and possessed of a countenance eminently calculated to afford a high opinion of his intellectual powers, he was however a monomaniac of no uncommon description. Bred to the medical profession, he had given, when at an early age, the most unequivocal proofs of a vigorous and fertile imagination. He first obtained attention towards the singularity of his conceptions by disputing the rights of the Englishman, Dr. Harvey, to the honour of having first discovered the circulation of the blood. He maintained that Harvey merely revived the doctrine, and that it was known to the ancients. This opinion he founded upon the following passage in Plato: - “The heart is the centre or knot of the blood vessels, the spring or fountain of the blood, which is carried impetuously round; the blood is the food of the flesh; and for the process of nourishment the body is laid out in canals, which is like those drawn down through gardens, that the blood may be conveyed as from a fountain, to every part of the previous system.”
William
Harvey published his treatise on the circulation of the blood in Frankfurt
Germany in 1628. He did not come out of
the blue as others were working on the same problem. Even he was assailed by skeptics and for a
time lost reputation. I have no doubt
that Harvey had read Plato and unless his memory was defective he probably
retained an impression of Plato’s statements.
But to the
point, Plato’s description is prescient.
He understood the matter which he explained in literary, not scientific,
terms so the imprisoned doctor was essentially right that Harvey could not
claim to be the first to understand the role of the heart in the circulation of
the blood. He was the first known
physician to describe the issue completely in scientific detail or nearly
completely.
The young physician was laughed at for venturing to contradict a popular belief, and was assailed by the English press for attempting to deprive an Englishman of the initiative honour of the discovery. He was looked upon as an enthusiast, and lost all the patronage he had first obtained by his abilities. Being possessed of a competency, he did not regret this circumstance in a pecuniary point of view; but his pride was deeply wounded, and he resolved to accomplish some great feat which should compel the world to accord him those laurels which had hitherto been refused. He was deeply skilled in the science of anatomy; and his intimate acquaintance with the human frame led him to fashion two beautiful anatomical bodies in wax. The one was a perfect representation of the form of man, with all the muscles and nerves laid bare; and the second; which took to pieces, was the image of a female in the last stages of gestation. These models were applauded as specimens of art, but obtained no praise as evidences of Anatomical skill. Again disappointed and disgusted at the coldness of a world that knew not how to appreciate the merits of his labours, the physician urged by the perpetual contemplation of his wax models and considering himself to be sufficiently practiced in the minutiae of the human frame by the manufacture of these representations of life, resolved in attempting a more sublime task. His elevated imagination aimed at nothing less than the fabrication of an animate being! For weeks- for months- for years in the solemn silence of a chamber fitted up for the purpose, and into which he never permitted a soul to enter, did the enthusiast study his project, without being fully aware of the way in which he should commence it. At length his intellect became so far affected by his strange meditations, that he felt convinced in his own mind that his experience could never be sufficient to encompass his lofty aim, unless he examined the fountains of life in the bosom of an expiring human being. Dead to all other feeling save the morbid one which urged him on to this study, he calmly resolved to choose some victim as a model for his projected work. He one night issued forth into the streets of Paris, in the midst of a horrible winter and accosted a young man whom, by his condition he supposed to be homeless and starving. He was right in his conjecture, and with kind words he enticed the unsuspecting mendicant home. He gave him food, and then caused him to imbibe a cup of generous wine, in which he had previously infused a powerful narcotic. The mendicant fell into a deep stupor; and the physician without a single sentiment of compunction hastened to perform his diabolical operation upon the lethargic victim. He bled him in the jugular vein; and, while the poor young man’s life was ebbing away, the anatomical speculator proceeded to hack away, with his unsparing knife, at those parts which he wished to lay open and examine at his own brutal leisure. In his hurry to accomplish his mysterious designs, he had forgotten to make fast the door to his study; and the curiosity of his old housekeeper led to the detection of his crime. The woman excited an alarm in the house; and his atrocious deed, with all its circumstances, was exposed. He was tried for the murder, and was condemned as a monomaniac to perpetual imprisonment in the Bicetre. At that time Mortimer became acquainted with this singular individual, he had been an inmate of the prison for upwards of thirty years, and never lost an opportunity of declaring that, if he were provided with the proper implements and materials, he would form a human being, far more complete, and less liable to organic derangement than man.
I consider
that quote quite astounding writing and the template for numerous horror films
in the twentieth century. One wonders if
Reynolds had experienced this situation while he could not possibly have. His residence in France doesn’t leave time,
however this story must be based on real events that he either read about or
was told. Throughout his way to 1851
which is all I can attest to at this time Reynolds returns frequently to stories
of physicians of which he seems to have intimate knowledge of his various
descriptions. Of course, his namesake,
Duncan McArthur was a physician and if Dick Collins was right did operate on
cadavers as fresh as he could get. It is
a small step from that to imagine a doctor working on live specimens but still
the psychological description of the man in Bicetre is so complete and
convincing that Reynolds was a very accomplished at the age of twenty-six.
He wrote
circles around Bulwer-Lytton, Ainsworth and Dickens, his contemporaries while
being far more accomplished than writers who followed him like Trollope and Willkie
Collins as accomplished as these writers and their fellows were. They all must have been influenced by him to
some degree.
Certainly
Dickens and Ainsworth were, as he by them, but the quality of his mind is much
deeper and more highly developed.
Ainsworth who began an amazing sequence of historical novels in the
early forties when Reynolds was quiescent tried to explore historical topics in
a deep way but his mind was a little light, he takes a more academic
style. A comparison between the two can
be found in Reynolds 1854 novel The Rye House Plot.
Both
Ainsworth and Dickens gravitated toward George’s style in their later
works. Reading Ainsworth’s South Sea
Bubble written in the 1860s is very close to his style.
George, of
course was influenced by all three writers, among many, Bulwer-Lytton,
Ainsworth and Dickens. Ainsworth who had
a literary salon in the late forties and through the fifties excluded Reynolds
from his coterie. He and Dickens were
tight and getting Dickens and Reynolds into the same room would have been
hazardous.
While Ainsworth’s
Rookwood and Jack Sheppard were favorites of George and Dickens interestingly
all three were in decline. The social
conditions that had produced them had disappeared and a new crop of writers
responding to new conditions replaced them.
For my own tastes I prefer these Late Georgian to early Victorian authors
to what followed.
There is a
charm in the three and the sporting novels of R.S Surtees and Captain Marryat
and the rest, William Makepeace Thackery, who can forget him, that is lacking as the epoch changed. Still we see a certain loss of innocence as
advancing knowledge turned the world more serious and complex. The greatest of historians and histories,
Edward Gibbons and the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire couldn’t have been
written in the same way after Darwin’s Origin of Species. Maybe the big change occurred even earlier in
Prince Albert’s Crystal Palace Exhibition of 1851. The exhibition of all those machines and
advance screamed: Hello to the Brave New
World, as brave or maybe even braver than Aldous Huxley’s. Exhibitions became the rage until the great
Columbian Expo of Chicago crowned the whole movement. What could ever top that? Nothing.
Fade to modernity.
To return to
George Reynolds. As I say, it was almost
a tragedy that Reynold’s titled Master Timothy’s Bookcase after Dickens’ Master
Humphrey’s Clock. The Magic Lantern Of
The World, the subtitle, would have been much better. The Bookcase is very readable both as a novel
and as a collection of stories with a great deal of philosophical matter
pertinent to understanding the mind of Reynolds himself. As Dick Collins say, there is much
autobiographical material in the novels and Bookcase is full of it.
End of Part
XIa, Part XIb follows.
