Travelling Lear
Edward Lear's Journals. A Selection Edited by Herbert van Thal. (Barker. 21s.) EDWARD LEAR'S reputation as a versifier is secure ; his place as a water-colourist in the great tradition is almost established ; what chance is there now of his making a come-back as an author ? The question is asked by this reprinting of extracts from his journals, and the answer seems to be that Lear the writer was good but not outstanding. He was gifted with almost all the qualities that are essential for the happy traveller—patience, curiosity, courage, tolerance, good health. Only wealth was lacking, and he managed to make this asset appear less important than it really is. Lear always travelled with a purpose in view, which was to paint, and to this single purpose he subordinated the incidental pleasures of travel —just as, when his books were published, it was the pictures that mattered most, the narrative being mainly a background to set them off.
The countries which Lear chose for his travels were (are, indeed) remote and picturesque ; an Englishman is still a comparative rarity in Calabria, Albania, Petra or even Corsica. It is really remarkable to think of this diffident bearded Englishman setting off on horse or mule into these desolate and turbulent regions, armed only with paints and brushes. Happily he belonged to an age when eccentricity and not espionage was usually accepted as the explanation for this sort of behaviour ; as it was, he more than once escaped death only narrowly, but today he would be certain of imprisonment or worse.
It is natural to read these journals with an ear cocked for the felicities of language which make Lear's limericks and nonsense- rhymes works of genius. The echo is caught now and then, though not as often as one hopes. Reference, for example, to " a horrid old man of Avlona " is the obvious germ of a limerick (never developed, as far as I know), and this scene with an Albanian Gov- ernor is clearly from the same pen that wrote The Story of the Seven Families : " At first Ali Bey said little, but soon became immensely loquac-
ious, asking numerous questions about Stamboul, and a few about Franks in general—the different species of whom he was not very well informed. At length, when the conversation was flagging, he was moved to discourse about ships that went without sails, and coaches that were impelled without horses ; and to please him I drew a steamboat and a railway carriage ; on which he asked if they made any noise ; and I replied by imitating both the inventions
in question in the best manner I could think Tik-tok, tik-tok, tik-tok, tokka, tokka, tokka, tokka, tokka—tok ' (crescendo), and ' Squish-squash, squish-squash, squish-squash, thump-bump '—for the land and sea engines respectively—a noisy novelty which so intensely delighted Ali Bey, that he fairly threw himself back on the divan, and laughed as 1 never saw Turk laugh before."
It is pleasant to have Lear back in print in any form, though the present compendium is at best a poor substitute for the originals. The original text has been reduced to about a half ; the pictures have almost totally disappeared, and there are no maps. A worthier memorial would have been to reproduce one of the original journals in as nearly similar form to the original as was possible.
EDWARD HODGKIN.
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