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The Journal to Stella

J >> Jonathan Swift >> The Journal to Stella



This etext was produced by Les Bowler, St. Ives, Dorset.

THE JOURNAL TO STELLA
by JONATHAN SWIFT.

With preface, introduction and notes by George A. Aitken.

[Numbers thus [5] refer to the Notes at the end, which are arranged by
"Introduction" or by "Letter 'number'".]



PREFACE



The history of the publication of the Journal to Stella is somewhat curious.
On Swift's death twenty-five of the letters, forming the closing portion of
the series, fell into the hands of Dr. Lyon, a clergyman who had been in
charge of Swift for some years. The letters passed to a man named Wilkes, who
sold them for publication. They accordingly appeared in 1766 in the tenth
volume of Dr. Hawkesworth's quarto edition of Swift's works; but the editor
made many changes in the text, including a suppression of most of the "little
language." The publishers, however, fortunately for us, were public-spirited
enough to give the manuscripts (with one exception) to the British Museum,
where, after many years, they were examined by John Forster, who printed in
his unfinished "Life of Swift" numerous passages from the originals, showing
the manner in which the text had been tampered with by Hawkesworth. Swift
himself, too, in his later years, obliterated many words and sentences in the
letters, and Forster was able to restore not a few of these omissions. His
zeal, however, sometimes led him to make guesses at words which are quite
undecipherable. Besides Forster's work, I have had the benefit of the careful
collation made by Mr. Ryland for his edition of 1897. Where these authorities
differ I have usually found myself in agreement with Mr. Ryland, but I have
felt justified in accepting some of Forster's readings which were rejected by
him as uncertain; and the examination of the manuscripts has enabled me to
make some additions and corrections of my own. Swift's writing is extremely
small, and abounds in abbreviations. The difficulty of arriving at the true
reading is therefore considerable, apart from the erasures.

The remainder of the Journal, consisting of the first forty letters, was
published in 1768 by Deane Swift, Dr. Swift's second cousin. These letters
had been given to Mrs. Whiteway in 1788, and by her to her son-in-law, Deane
Swift. The originals have been lost, with the exception of the first, which,
by some accident, is in the British Museum; but it is evident that Deane Swift
took even greater liberties with the text than Hawkesworth. He substituted
for "Ppt" the word "Stella," a name which Swift seems not to have used until
some years later; he adopted the name "Presto" for Swift, and in other ways
tried to give a greater literary finish to the letters. The whole of the
correspondence was first brought together, under the title of the "Journal to
Stella", in Sheridan's edition of 1784.

Previous editions of the Journal have been but slightly annotated. Swift's
letters abound with allusions to people of all classes with whom he came in
contact in London, and to others known to Esther Johnson in Ireland; and a
large proportion of these persons have been passed over in discreet silence by
Sir Walter Scott and others. The task of the annotator has, of course, been
made easier of late years by the publication of contemporary journals and
letters, and of useful works of reference dealing with Parliament, the Army,
the Church, the Civil Service, and the like, besides the invaluable Dictionary
of National Biography. I have also been assisted by a collection of MS. notes
kindly placed at my disposal by Mr. Thomas Seccombe. I have aimed at brevity
and relevance, but it is hoped that the reader will find all the information
that is necessary. Here and there a name has baffled research, but I have
been able to give definite particulars of a very large number of people--
noblemen and ladies in society in London or Dublin, Members of Parliament,
doctors, clergymen, Government officials, and others who have hitherto been
but names to the reader of the Journal. I have corrected a good many errors
in the older notes, but in dealing with so large a number of persons, some of
whom it is difficult to identify, I cannot hope that I myself have escaped
pitfalls.

G. A. A.



INTRODUCTION.

When Swift began to write the letters known as the Journal to Stella, he was
forty-two years of age, and Esther Johnson twenty-nine. Perhaps the most
useful introduction to the correspondence will be a brief setting forth of
what is known of their friendship from Stella's childhood, the more specially
as the question has been obscured by many assertions and theories resting on a
very slender basis of fact.

Jonathan Swift, born in 1667 after his father's death, was educated by his
uncle Godwin, and after a not very successful career at Trinity College,
Dublin, went to stay with his mother, Abigail Erick, at Leicester. Mrs. Swift
feared that her son would fall in love with a girl named Betty Jones, but, as
Swift told a friend, he had had experience enough "not to think of marriage
till I settle my fortune in the world, which I am sure will not be in some
years; and even then, I am so hard to please that I suppose I shall put it off
to the other world." Soon afterwards an opening for Swift presented itself.
Sir William Temple, now living in retirement at Moor Park, near Farnham, had
been, like his father, Master of the Irish Rolls, and had thus become
acquainted with Swift's uncle Godwin. Moreover, Lady Temple was related to
Mrs. Swift, as Lord Orrery tells us. Thanks to these facts, the application
to Sir William Temple was successful, and Swift went to live at Moor Park
before the end of 1689. There he read to Temple, wrote for him, and kept his
accounts, and growing into confidence with his employer, "was often trusted
with matters of great importance." The story--afterwards improved upon by
Lord Macaulay--that Swift received only 20 pounds and his board, and was not
allowed to sit at table with his master, is wholly untrustworthy. Within
three years of their first intercourse, Temple had introduced his secretary to
William the Third, and sent him to London to urge the King to consent to a
bill for triennial Parliaments.

When Swift took up his residence at Moor Park he found there a little girl of
eight, daughter of a merchant named Edward Johnson, who had died young. Swift
says that Esther Johnson was born on March 18, 1681; in the parish register of
Richmond,[1] which shows that she was baptized on March 20, 1680-81, her name
is given as Hester; but she signed her will "Esther," the name by which she
was always known. Swift says, "Her father was a younger brother of a good
family in Nottinghamshire, her mother of a lower degree; and indeed she had
little to boast in her birth." Mrs. Johnson had two children, Esther and Ann,
and lived at Moor Park as companion to Lady Giffard, Temple's widowed sister.
Another member of the household, afterwards to be Esther's constant companion,
was Rebecca Dingley, a relative of the Temple family.[2] She was a year or
two older than Swift.

The lonely young man of twenty-two was both playfellow and teacher of the
delicate child of eight. How he taught her to write has been charmingly
brought before us in the painting exhibited by Miss Dicksee at the Royal
Academy a few years ago; he advised her what books to read, and instructed
her, as he says, "in the principles of honour and virtue, from which she never
swerved in any one action or moment of her life."

By 1694 Swift had grown tired of his position, and finding that Temple, who
valued his services, was slow in finding him preferment, he left Moor Park in
order to carry out his resolve to go into the Church. He was ordained, and
obtained the prebend of Kilroot, near Belfast, where he carried on a
flirtation with a Miss Waring, whom he called Varina. But in May 1696 Temple
made proposals which induced Swift to return to Moor Park, where he was
employed in preparing Temple's memoirs and correspondence for publication, and
in supporting the side taken by Temple in the Letters of Phalaris controversy
by writing The Battle of the Books, which was, however, not published until
1704. On his return to Temple's house, Swift found his old playmate grown
from a sickly child into a girl of fifteen, in perfect health. She came, he
says, to be "looked upon as one of the most beautiful, graceful, and agreeable
young women in London, only a little too fat. Her hair was blacker than a
raven, and every feature of her face in perfection."

On his death in January 1699, Temple left a will,[3] dated 1694, directing the
payment of 20 pounds each, with half a year's wages, to Bridget Johnson "and
all my other servants"; and leaving a lease of some land in Monistown, County
Wicklow, to Esther Johnson, "servant to my sister Giffard." By a codicil of
February 1698, Temple left 100 pounds to "Mr. Jonathan Swift, now living with
me." It may be added that by her will of 1722, proved in the following year,
Lady Giffard gave 20 pounds to Mrs. Moss--Mrs. Bridget Johnson, who had
married Richard Mose or Moss, Lady Giffard's steward. The will proceeds: "To
Mrs. Hester (sic) Johnson I give 10 pounds, with the 100 pounds I put into the
Exchequer for her life and my own, and declare the 100 pounds to be hers which
I am told is there in my name upon the survivorship, and for which she has
constantly sent over her certificate and received the interest. I give her
besides my two little silver candlesticks."

Temple left in Swift's hands the task of publishing his posthumous works, a
duty which afterwards led to a quarrel with Lady Giffard and other members of
the family. Many years later Swift told Lord Palmerston that he stopped at
Moor Park solely for the benefit of Temple's conversation and advice, and the
opportunity of pursuing his studies. At Temple's death he was "as far to seek
as ever." In the summer of 1699, however, he was offered and accepted the
post of secretary and chaplain to the Earl of Berkeley, one of the Lords
Justices, but when he reached Ireland he found that the secretaryship had been
given to another. He soon, however, obtained the living of Laracor, Agher,
and Rathbeggan, and the prebend of Dunlavin in St. Patrick's Cathedral,
Dublin. The total value of these preferments was about 230 pounds a year, an
income which Miss Waring seems to have thought enough to justify him in
marrying. Swift's reply to the lady whom he had "singled out at first from
the rest of women" could only have been written with the intention of breaking
off the connection, and accordingly we hear no more of poor Varina.

At Laracor, a mile or two from Trim, and twenty miles from Dublin, Swift
ministered to a congregation of about fifteen persons, and had abundant
leisure for cultivating his garden, making a canal (after the Dutch fashion of
Moor Park), planting willows, and rebuilding the vicarage. As chaplain to
Lord Berkeley, he spent much of his time in Dublin. He was on intimate terms
with Lady Berkeley and her daughters, one of whom is best known by her married
name of Lady Betty Germaine; and through them he had access to the fashionable
society of Dublin. When Lord Berkeley returned to England in April 1701,
Swift, after taking his Doctor's degree at Dublin, went with him, and soon
afterwards published, anonymously, a political pamphlet, A Discourse on the
Contests and Dissentions in Athens and Rome. When he returned to Ireland in
September he was accompanied by Stella--to give Esther Johnson the name by
which she is best known--and her friend Mrs. Dingley. Stella's fortune was
about 1500 pounds, and the property Temple had left her was in County Wicklow.
Swift, very much for his "own satisfaction, who had few friends or
acquaintance in Ireland," persuaded Stella--now twenty years old--that living
was cheaper there than in England, and that a better return was obtainable on
money. The ladies took his advice, and made Ireland their home. At first
they felt themselves strangers in Dublin; "the adventure looked so like a
frolic," Swift says, "the censure held for some time as if there were a secret
history in such a removal: which however soon blew off by her excellent
conduct." Swift took every step that was possible to avoid scandal. When he
was away, the ladies occupied his rooms; when he returned, they went into
their own lodgings. When he was absent, they often stopped at the vicarage at
Laracor, but if he were there, they moved to Trim, where they visited the
vicar, Dr. Raymond, or lived in lodgings in the town or neighbourhood. Swift
was never with Stella except in the presence of a third person, and in 1726 he
said that he had not seen her in a morning "these dozen years, except once or
twice in a journey."

During a visit to England in the winter of 1703-4 we find Swift in
correspondence with the Rev. William Tisdall, a Dublin incumbent whom he had
formerly known at Belfast. Tisdall was on friendly terms with Stella and Mrs.
Dingley, and Swift sent messages to them through him. "Pray put them upon
reading," he wrote, "and be always teaching something to Mrs. Johnson, because
she is good at comprehending, remembering and retaining." But the
correspondence soon took a different turn. Tisdall paid his addresses to
Stella, and charged Swift with opposing his suit. Tisdall's letters are
missing, but Swift's reply of April 20, 1704, puts things sufficiently
clearly. "My conjecture is," he says, "that you think I obstructed your
inclinations to please my own, and that my intentions were the same with
yours. In answer to all which I will, upon my conscience and honour, tell you
the naked truth. First, I think I have said to you before that, if my
fortunes and humour served me to think of that state, I should certainly,
among all persons upon earth, make your choice; because I never saw that
person whose conversation I entirely valued but hers; this was the utmost I
ever gave way to. And secondly, I must assure you sincerely that this regard
of mine never once entered into my head to be an impediment to you." He had
thought Tisdall not rich enough to marry; "but the objection of your fortune
being removed, I declare I have no other; nor shall any consideration of my
own misfortune, in losing so good a friend and companion as her, prevail on
me, against her interest and settlement in the world, since it is held so
necessary and convenient a thing for ladies to marry, and that time takes off
from the lustre of virgins in all other eyes but mine. I appeal to my letters
to herself whether I was your friend or not in the whole concern, though the
part I designed to act in it was purely passive." He had even thought "it
could not be decently broken," without disadvantage to the lady's credit,
since he supposed it was known to the town; and he had always spoken of her in
a manner far from discouraging. Though he knew many ladies of rank, he had
"nowhere met with an humour, a wit, or conversation so agreeable, a better
portion of good sense, or a truer judgment of men or things." He envied
Tisdall his prudence and temper, and love of peace and settlement, "the
reverse of which has been the great uneasiness of my life, and is likely to
continue so."

This letter has been quoted at some length because of its great importance.
It is obviously capable of various interpretations, and some, like Dr.
Johnson, have concluded that Swift was resolved to keep Stella in his power,
and therefore prevented an advantageous match by making unreasonable demands.
I cannot see any ground for this interpretation, though it is probable that
Tisdall's appearance as a suitor was sufficiently annoying. There is no
evidence that Stella viewed Tisdall's proposal with any favour, unless it can
be held to be furnished by Swift's belief that the town thought--rightly or
wrongly--that there was an engagement. In any case, there could be no mistake
in future with regard to Swift's attitude towards Stella. She was dearer to
him than anyone else, and his feeling for her would not change, but for
marriage he had neither fortune nor humour. Tisdall consoled himself by
marrying another lady two years afterwards; and though for a long time Swift
entertained for him feelings of dislike, in later life their relations
improved, and Tisdall was one of the witnesses to Swift's will.

The Tale of a Tub was published in 1704, and Swift was soon in constant
intercourse with Addison and the other wits. While he was in England in 1705,
Stella and Mrs. Dingley made a short visit to London. This and a similar
visit in 1708 are the only occasions on which Stella is known to have left
Ireland after taking up her residence in that country. Swift's influence over
women was always very striking. Most of the toasts of the day were his
friends, and he insisted that any lady of wit and quality who desired his
acquaintance should make the first advances. This, he says--writing in 1730--
had been an established rule for over twenty years. In 1708 a dispute on this
question with one toast, Mrs. Long, was referred for settlement to Ginckel
Vanhomrigh, the son of the house where it was proposed that the meeting should
take place; and by the decision--which was in Swift's favour--"Mrs. Vanhomrigh
and her fair daughter Hessy" were forbidden to aid Mrs. Long in her
disobedience for the future. This is the first that we hear of Hester or
Esther Vanhomrigh, who was afterwards to play so marked a part in the story of
Swift's life. Born on February 14, 1690, she was now eighteen. Her father,
Bartholomew Vanhomrigh, a Dublin merchant of Dutch origin, had died in 1703,
leaving his wife a fortune of some sixteen thousand pounds. On the income
from this money Mrs. Vanhomrigh, with her two daughters, Hester and Mary, were
able to mix in fashionable society in London. Swift was introduced to them by
Sir Andrew Fountaine early in 1708, but evidently Stella did not make their
acquaintance, nor indeed hear much, if anything, of them until the time of the
Journal.

Swift's visit to London in 1707-9 had for its object the obtaining for the
Irish Church of the surrender by the Crown of the First-Fruits and Twentieths,
which brought in about 2500 pounds a year. Nothing came of Swift's interviews
with the Whig statesmen, and after many disappointments he returned to Laracor
(June 1709), and conversed with none but Stella and her card-playing friends,
and Addison, now secretary to Lord Wharton.[4] Next year came the fall of the
Whigs, and a request to Swift from the Irish bishops that he would renew the
application for the First-Fruits, in the hope that there would be greater
success with the Tories. Swift reached London in September 1710, and began
the series of letters, giving details of the events of each day, which now
form the Journal to Stella. "I will write something every day to MD," he
says, "and make it a sort of journal; and when it is full I will send it,
whether MD writes or no; and so that will be pretty; and I shall always be in
conversation with MD, and MD with Presto." It is interesting to note that by
way of caution these letters were usually addressed to Mrs. Dingley, and not
to Stella.

The story of Swift's growing intimacy with the Tory leaders, of the success of
his mission, of the increasing coolness towards older acquaintances, and of
his services to the Government, can best be read in the Journal itself. In
the meantime the intimacy with the Vanhomrighs grew rapidly. They were near
neighbours of Swift's, and in a few weeks after his arrival in town we find
frequent allusions to the dinners at their house (where he kept his best gown
and periwig), sometimes with the explanation that he went there "out of mere
listlessness," or because it was wet, or because another engagement had broken
down. Only thrice does he mention the "eldest daughter": once on her
birthday; once on the occasion of a trick played him, when he received a
message that she was suddenly very ill ("I rattled off the daughter"); and
once to state that she was come of age, and was going to Ireland to look after
her fortune. There is evidence that "Miss Essy," or Vanessa, to give her the
name by which she will always be known, was in correspondence with Swift in
July 1710--while he was still in Ireland--and in the spring of 1711;[5] and
early in 1711 Stella seems to have expressed surprise at Swift's intimacy with
the family, for in February he replied, "You say they are of no consequence;
why, they keep as good female company as I do male; I see all the drabs of
quality at this end of the town with them." In the autumn Swift seems to have
thought that Vanessa was keeping company with a certain Hatton, but Mrs. Long-
-possibly meaning to give him a warning hint--remarked that if this were so
"she is not the girl I took her for; but to me she seems melancholy."

In 1712 occasional letters took the place of the daily journal to "MD," but
there is no change in the affectionate style in which Swift wrote. In the
spring he had a long illness, which affected him, indeed, throughout the year.
Other reasons which he gives for the falling off in his correspondence are his
numerous business engagements, and the hope of being able to send some good
news of an appointment for himself. There is only one letter to Stella
between July 19 and September 15, and Dr. Birkbeck Hill argues that the poem
"Cadenus and Vanessa" was composed at that time.[6] If this be so, it must
have been altered next year, because it was not until 1713 that Swift was made
a Dean. Writing on April 19, 1726, Swift said that the poem "was written at
Windsor near fourteen years ago, and dated: it was a task performed on a
frolic among some ladies, and she it was addressed to died some time ago in
Dublin, and on her death the copy shewn by her executor." Several copies were
in circulation, and he was indifferent what was done with it; it was "only a
cavalier business," and if those who would not give allowances were malicious,
it was only what he had long expected.

From this letter it would appear that this remarkable poem was written in the
summer of 1712; whereas the title-page of the pamphlet says it was "written at
Windsor, 1713." Swift visited Windsor in both years, but he had more leisure
in 1712, and we know that Vanessa was also at Windsor in that year. In that
year, too, he was forty-four, the age mentioned in the poem. Neither Swift
nor Vanessa forgot this intercourse: years afterwards Swift wrote to her, "Go
over the scenes of Windsor. . . . Cad thinks often of these"; and again,
"Remember the indisposition at Windsor." We know that this poem was revised
in 1719, when in all probability Swift added the lines to which most exception
can be taken. Cadenus was to be Vanessa's instructor:--

"His conduct might have made him styled
A father, and the nymph his child."

He had "grown old in politics and wit," and "in every scene had kept his
heart," so that he now "understood not what was love." But he had written
much, and Vanessa admired his wit. Cadenus found that her thoughts wandered--

"Though she seemed to listen more
To all he spoke than e'er before."

When she confessed her love, he was filled with "shame, disappointment, guilt,
surprise." He had aimed only at cultivating the mind, and had hardly known
whether she was young or old. But he was flattered, and though he could not
give her love, he offered her friendship, "with gratitude, respect, esteem."
Vanessa took him at his word, and said she would now be tutor, though he was
not apt to learn:--

"But what success Vanessa met
Is to the world a secret yet.
Whether the nymph to please her swain
Talks in a high romantic strain;
Or whether he at last descends
To act with less seraphic ends;
Or, to compound the business, whether
They temper love and books together,
Must never to mankind be told,
Nor shall the conscious Muse unfold."

Such is the poem as we now have it, written, it must be remembered, for
Vanessa's private perusal. It is to be regretted, for her own sake, that she
did not destroy it.

Swift received the reward of his services to the Government--the Deanery of
St. Patrick's, Dublin--in April 1713. Disappointed at what he regarded as
exile, he left London in June. Vanessa immediately began to send him letters
which brought home to him the extent of her passion; and she hinted at
jealousy in the words, "If you are very happy, it is ill-natured of you not to
tell me so, except 'tis what is inconsistent with my own." In his reply Swift
dwelt upon the dreariness of his surroundings at Laracor, and reminded her
that he had said he would endeavour to forget everything in England, and would
write as seldom as he could.

Swift was back again in the political strife in London in September, taking
Oxford's part in the quarrel between that statesman and Bolingbroke. On the
fall of the Tories at the death of Queen Anne, he saw that all was over, and
retired to Ireland, not to return again for twelve years. In the meantime the
intimacy with Vanessa had been renewed. Her mother had died, leaving debts,
and she pressed Swift for advice in the management of her affairs. When she
suggested coming to Ireland, where she had property, he told her that if she
took this step he would "see her very seldom." However, she took up her abode
at Celbridge, only a few miles from Dublin. Swift gave her many cautions, out
of "the perfect esteem and friendship" he felt for her, but he often visited
her. She was dissatisfied, however, begging him to speak kindly, and at least
to counterfeit his former indulgent friendship. "What can be wrong," she
wrote, "in seeing and advising an unhappy young woman? You cannot but know
that your frowns make my life unsupportable." Sometimes he treated the matter
lightly; sometimes he showed annoyance; sometimes he assured her of his esteem
and love, but urged her not to make herself or him "unhappy by imaginations."
He was uniformly unsuccessful in stopping Vanessa's importunity. He
endeavoured, she said, by severities to force her from him; she knew she was
the cause of uneasy reflections to him; but nothing would lessen her
"inexpressible passion."

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