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LETTERS 1850-1859 34. To Mary Anne Dyson

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• 35. To Mary Anne Dyson

LETTERS 1850-1859 34. To Mary Anne Dyson MS location unknown. Printed in Coleridge, Life 170-172 Otterbourne May 4, 1850 My dear Driver I don't mean to send this till to-morrow, but my head is so full of Sir Guy Morville that I must write it to get him out in order to go to Emmeline1 and in the first place I must tell you that after meditating on him all the way home, I explained him to mamma after tea, and when she heard him described, she said 'Like Mr. Hurrell Froude,'2 Which I hope is a sign that I have got the right sow by the ear, as far as knowing what you mean. Now, then, how will this sort of plot do - Mr. Dashwood, a good honest common-place sort of squire, is connected with the Morvilles by marrying Miss Edmonstone, a second cousin of theirs, her nephew Martyn Edmonstone being the heir-at-law to Sir Guy. The story should begin with the news coming to the Dashwoods of the sudden death of old Sir Guy, whereupon all would begin talking, and telling old stories about old Sir Guy's faults and repentance, and Mr. Dashwood and Martyn having to go to the funeral, and bring back young Guy with them. They don't know much about him, Martyn the most, and I think there should be some instances of wild escapades of fun together with a tremendous temper, the very vice of the house of Morville. I think a fiery temper would be the thing that would chiefly leave on Guy's mind the impression that he was and must be good for nothing, and though he may have it really under most noted control, it may now and then show awful flashes before he can curb it in, so as to be just what smaller minds cannot understand. Well, Mr. Dashwood finds him very much overwhelmed by the loss of his grandfather, and brings him home; then comes what we settled, how Mrs. Dashwood, who is to be superior to her husband, gets into his confidence and he is quite unreserved with her; how he finds himself enjoying the lively family too much, and curbs himself sometimes in an odd sudden way which is now and then misunderstood and gives offence; how Martyn Edmonstone, from having seen him in his boyhood, never trusts him, and looks upon him as a young tiger's whelp sure to break out some time or other, and cannot bear the sort of admiration in which the young ladies hold him. Martyn should before, I think, have been their great hero, and find his nose a little put out of joint, especially with Laura, his favourite, and the beauty whom Guy first took to; he should not in the least know that he is jealous and invidious, but think it is all brotherly interest in his cousins. Then, just as Guy has found out his real love, Amabel, it should somehow happen that Martyn sees him at Oxford or somewhere under some violent provocation, where he really does struggle and gain a glorious victory over himself, but Martyn only sees the first flash of anger, and misrepresents it first to himself and then to the Dashwoods, in a sort of all-sincerity. Then comes a great cloud between Guy and Amabel and all her family, and when he finds out it is Martyn's fault, it must be a marvellous effort by which he prevents himself from calling him to account for it, at the same time blaming himself too much in his own penitent spirit to exculpate himself to the Dashwoods as much as most people would have done. At last must come a sort of clearance, not so far that Martyn at all retracts, but only that it blows over, and he gets on his former terms with the family; Amabel and her mother thoroughly understand him, Mr. Dashwood forgets his doubts, and the marriage comes all right, and they are only so wondrously happy that he fears it, and she is sure it cannot last. They go abroad for their wedding tour, and at some small place where Sisters of Mercy don't grow, they hear of an English gentleman desperately ill of an infectious fever. It must be just a sort of case in which Guy would think it only common humanity to go and nurse him, whereas other people would think it immense generosity, more especially as it turns out to be Martyn Edmonstone, whom he has never seen since the days of the slandering. So he nurses him till he begins to recover, and then catches it himself, and is quite convinced from the first that he shall die, in the same spirit as Prince Henry was so glad not to be king.1 Then of course it is all cleared up, and Martyn (who shall be his heir after all) shall come and see him, and enter into all that he would have had him do, and not only do him full justice but very nearly worship him, and Amabel shall behave gloriously, and understand her husband enough to feel with him like a certain book of Fouqué's, Death is Life, and when her father and mother and Laura come to her, just as it is all over, they can only wonder at her, and I think if in some remoter distance Martyn and Laura should marry, it would be a very good instance of what it is to be too good for this world, and what to be just good enough for it. I should like to know what you think of all this. 35. To Mary Anne Dyson MS location unknown. Printed in Coleridge, Life, 172-3] [18 May 18502] Saturday My dear Driver The first thing I did when I opened your letter this morning was to laugh, it was so exactly what I had been thinking about before I was up, as far as regards Guy's character, for what I had been planning was to make the encounter with Martyn happen at Oxford, whither Martyn has volunteered to go to hunt up the supposed debts of Guy's. I mean Guy to have hazel eyes which when he is angry grow dark in the middle and flash (a traditional feature in the wicked ancestor), and when Martyn comes to his rooms with all these unjust suspicions and kind exhortations to confess and moralisings, it is almost beyond bearing, and he speaks in his tremendous tone of suppressed passion, and flashes with these eyes, and they part quite in a quarrel, Guy proudly refusing all explanation. Then he repents, comes to Martyn's inn next morning, tries to make it up, but, as you say, Martyn fancies it is for fear of his making further discoveries, and is very ungracious, perhaps rather disappointed at the excellent character all the dons give of his cousin. Guy is comforted by his humility though it is not accepted - I think his contrition should have the 'princely heart of innocence'1 following it. But whether this would be more effective if Martyn interfered with the estate I don't know, perhaps it might considering what is to happen afterwards, and Martyn's remorse; but then, on the other hand, would it not hurt Guy more to think his cousin had been giving that grudging sort of character of him to the people at Oxford, and so be more of a trial? I had been devising his lonely vacation already, when he goes to Morville alone missing his grandfather a good deal, and fancying all sorts of things about the ghost and his destiny whenever he passes the ghost's portrait, and writing verses and thoughts, making in short a grand communing with his own mind which is a steadying of him. He contemplates the living there alone,without Amabel, without much of the pleasures he has taken to, and sets his face to think it the safest way, and to give up happiness if he may but escape sin, and then his chief wish is that the Edmonstones should understand him, and Martyn, whom all this time he more than half admires, should be cordially his friend. Then he takes heart and soul to his people, finds cottages wanting repair, etc., and writes to Mr. Edmonstone about it. Luckily Mr. Edmonstone has just, though Guy did not know it, taken model cottages for a hobby, so he goes into an ecstasy, sends Guy a dozen plans once a week, and asks him to come to them the next vacation. And then it is all right. Oh further, Mr. Edmonstone has the unlucky custom of showing his letters to whoever is by, and so, as he had shown Guy's letters to Martyn, he shows Guy a letter written by Martyn on hearing of his engagement to Amabel, one of Martyn's grand letters of good advice to his uncle, against being hasty about it, calling on him to observe that the question about the money has never been explained, and saying that he considers it as a great risk to give her to a man with Guy's temper, etc. etc. At this, what Guy does is to give one of his eye flashes, which he cannot help, and say with a sort of smile, 'You should not show one such letters, Mr. Edmonstone.' Then in that meeting which he sought in Switzerland, his eyes do not even flash, showing that the temper is conquered as well as the outward demonstration. I think Mr. Edmonstone must be so inconsistent a man that the cottages really reconcile him to Guy, and he takes it all for granted and returns of himself to his former opinion of him when Martyn is not there to poison his ear, and Charles is saying all in favour of Guy; it would be quite as probable and more entertaining. I like your idea particularly of Martyn's softening being the one thing wanting to Guy's happiness, which is found at last, and I think it should be poetical justice on Martyn that his illness should leave his head so weak and incapable of thought that he feels himself quite unable to be of the least use to Amabel in her husband's illness, not even able to write a note or give an order for her, instead of making arrangements better than any one else. Yes, Laura's faith in him never fails, nor has it any reason to do so, she only admired Guy as a novelty just at first, but never thought him really equal to Martyn, whose judicious arrangements seem to her unparalleled, and Charles is always laughing at her for this. I have found out what the offence was that made Guy bang the door. Martyn had been advising him to read with a tutor, the curate I suppose, to prepare for Oxford, which would have been all very well if Martyn had not proceeded to disparage Guy's former education, which nettled him. He tells Mrs. Edmonstone that 'Martyn had been giving him some good advice which he had been unreasonable enough not to take in good part,' and Charles tells him 'he knows what Martyn's good advice is.' But Martyn is surprised, and something between pleased and disappointed, when Guy acts upon this same advice forthwith, and speaks to Mr. Edmonstone about the curate. Also I think the suspecting him of gaming is a particularly cruel suspicion, because it is notorious among the Edmonstones that old Sir Guy had made him take a vow against it, and he will never even play at billiards even in their house, though not by any means thinking them wrong for other people. I fancy Guy a man who would cry over a story, and have all sorts of expressions he was not conscious of flitting over his face. I shall not send this till Monday, not because I think you will be like Mr. Edmonstone and show it to John Coleridge1, but because I think you must want to rest from Guy on Whit Sunday at least, and so do I. 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