HANNAH MORE.* ONE of the liveliest, and in some ways
the most interesting, of the "Eminent Women Series," has been contributed by Miss Yonge, in her Life of Hannah More. Besides a clever and vivid sketch of an original character, we have a curious picture of that England so near to us and yet so far off,—the England of the beginning of this century and the end of the last. To write in so small a space, and yet effectively, the story of a long life, lived from 1745 to 1833, with bright slight touches showing the changes of the times, the gradual evolution of one world from another, and the gradual development of a character which went on changing with the times, and deepening to the close, requires a gift for realising, seeing, and understanding the successive surroundings of a single figure, their influence on it, and its effect on them, which we only wish were universal among biographers.
Miss Yonge begins by defending Hannah More against the imputation of being merely a narrow-minded Methodist, a prejudice strengthened by Sydney Smith, who ought to have known better, in his Edinburgh review of Coelebs. She did not, as he says that she did, " belong to a trumpery faction degrading the human understanding to the trash and folly of Methodism." " Her excellence and devotion have, in a manner, obscured her fame, and the many who are inclined to take her as an impersonation of what is impertinently called goodi- nese,' have no idea of her talents, or of the society she enjoyed. The friend of Garrick, Horace Walpole, and Johnson was no narrow-minded woman absorbed in village gossip." She belonged to an old Puritan family of Norfolk, and no doubt her ancestors may be responsible for the strong religions tendency which showed itself as she advanced into middle life, and which made her one of the most distinguished pioneers of the civilisation and practical Christianity of the present • Hannah More. By Charlotte M. Tong',. "Eminent Women Series." London : W. H. Allen and Co. 1888. day. What would they say and do, we wonder, the people who sneer at Hannah More for Methodism, if they found themselves living in such a district as the Cheddar of her time ? We are very much mistaken if they would not at least wish to follow in her steps.
In her young days, however, Hannah had no idea of all the hard philanthropic work in store for her. A young, pretty, demonstrative woman, with a great deal of cleverness and brightness, she was introduced by Sir Joshua Reynolds's sister into the best literary society of London, and became extremely popular. Among her first friends were Garrick and his wife, Dr. Johnson, Burke, Mrs. Montagu, Percy of the Reliques ; later, she became intimate with Mrs. Boscawen, Mrs. Vesey, and the other ladies of the Bas Bleu society. She was petted, teased, and joked with by Johnson, whom she appears to have flattered rather too much, but that was the fashion of the time. She wrote poems which were much admired in their day, but to us, we must confess, are quite unreadable, from their utter artificiality,—Sir Eldred, for instance, which Johnson thought much finer than any old ballad discovered by Percy, and which Garrick read so movingly, " to select audiences," that even the poet herself was reduced to tears. She also wrote two or three plays, which were acted in London with some success. But perhaps her best-known poetical work is the Sacred Dramas, published about 1780 ; a book which " has gone through nineteen editions, though the author soon wrote,—` The word sacred is a damper to the dramas. It is tying a millstone round the neck of sensibility, which will drown them both together." This fear does not seem to have been realised, for all the Bishops and the literary people went into raptures over these dramas, which were considered equally elegant and religious. " Indeed, Mrs. Trimmer wrote that they excited in her much the same devotional sentiment as the Scriptures themselves !"
One of the oddest and most characteristic experiences of Hannah More's earlier literary life was the story of " Lactilla." This object of interest appeared at Bristol, where Hannah and her sisters lived, for she only spent the winters in London among her friends :- " It was in the course of this summer that the sisters learnt from their cook that the milkwoman, Anne Yearsley, who called for the kitchen refuse of their large household, was in great distress, and, moreover, was given to writing poetry. On investi- gation, it turned out that the woman, in spite of great poverty and a large family, had read various poems, and written verses good enough to excite vehement enthusiasm in the ladies ; who not only believed in her wonderful genius, but endowed her with
all imaginable virtues Hannah went to work, correcting and arranging Yearsley's poems for the press, and writing letters about Lactilla ' to all her friends, who became fired with the same enthusiasm, so that Mrs. Montagu wrote,—` What force of imagination ! What harmony of numbers! In Pagan times, one could have supposed Apollo had fallen in love with her rosy cheek, snatched her to the top of Mount Par- nassus, given her a glass of his best Helicon, and ordered the Nine Muses to attend her call !' In thirteen months Hannah had written about a thousand letters on her behalf, and collected £000 for her, which was to be invested for her benefit. But notice and success had turned the poor woman's head She thought herself wronged by not having the whole sum placed in her hands, and even spread a report that Miss More was purchasing an estate for herself with it."
Mrs. " Lactilla " afterwards set up a circulating library at the Hot Wells ; but her ingratitude left her kind patroness a sadder and a wiser woman.
To us, in spite of the great names of Johnson and Garrick, and in spite of the undeniable cleverness of much of Hannah's writing, both verse and prose, inspired by their atmosphere— Johnson called The Bas Bleu " a very great performance "- the latter years of her life, with their hard practical work, are far more interesting.
" Miss Hannah More, something must be done for Cheddar !" In these words Wilberforce, after a visit to that wild district, pointed out to Hannah the real work of her life. This was in 1789. Cheddar and the Mendip Hills were then inhabited by an almost savage race, either the roughest sort of miners, or people plunged in frightful poverty. There were no schools ; the clergy " never dreamt of residence in so savage a district," a constable dared not execute a warrant, the farmers declared that "religion would be the rain of agriculture." Hannah and her sister Patty, however, were not terrified by all these obstacles. They set to work ; they made friends with obstinate farmers, and more easily with the wild people themselves ; they conquered, as far as possible, the opposition of the clergy —the hardest task of all, and the most unpleasant—they founded Sunday-schools, and " gradually the work extended over an area of fifteen miles, and finally of twenty-eight, so that the summer Sundays of Hannah and Patty were like those of a modern Colonial clergyman during the thirty most active years of their lives. They generally rode, on account of the bad roads, to one or other of their villages in regular rotation, to assist in the teaching." It was after beginning this work that Hannah and Patty wrote their tracts, chiefly in rhyme, which had an immense run, and were read alike by rich and poor. But it was not all success. Besides being accused of Methodism, Hannah was suspected of teaching " French principles," and was violently attacked by the curate of Blagdon, who wrote pamphlets against her. The Anti-Jacobin Review took up the question, and " disgraced itself," as Miss Yonge truly says, by joining in the absurd cry that Hannah More was a Calvinist and revolutionary. But we have not space to go further into this subject, and will only say that the chapters relating to the work at Cheddar are singularly curious and interesting, vividly showing what were the trials of a pioneer in these things.
One is glad to think that all the persecutions and dis- appointments were bravely borne by Hannah's cheerful spirit. It was after this that she wrote Ccelebs and several other books ; and we have to think of her as a delightful old lady with many friends, among them the little Lord Macaulay, talking in " printed words " at seven years old. She outlived all her sisters, and at eighty-three moved from her old home, Barley Wood, to a house at Clifton, where she died at eighty- eight, happy and playful, and writing verses nearly to the last. Many of her views on life and literature seem to us now narrow and unsatisfying, but this, of course, is very much the fault of the times she lived in ; and there are few women whose influence has been, on the whole, more strongly felt for good. We will end by quoting part of a pretty description of Hannah More in her old age, in a private letter from a visitor about the year 1825 :— " I was much struck by the air of affectionate kindness with which the old lady welcomed us to Barley Wood. There was something of courtliness about it, at the same time the courtliness of the Mettle cour, which one reads of and seldom meets. Her dress was of light-green Venetian silk, a yellow, richly embroidered crape shawl covered her shoulders, and a pretty net cap, tied under her chin with white satin ribbon, completed her costume. Her figure is engagingly petite ; but to have any idea of the expression of her countenance you must imagine the small, withered face of a woman in her seventy-seventh year ; and imagine also (shaded, but not obscured, by long, perfectly white eyelashes), eyes dark, brilliant, flashing, and penetrating, sparkling from object to object with all the fire and energy of youth, and sending welcome on all around. . . . . I bade her adieu with regret, for I never had the good fortune to meet with so perfect a relic of a well- spent life. The spirit within was as warm and cheerful as if the blood of eighteen instead of eighty coursed in her veins. She is indeed a woman who has lived to good purpose."
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