The hole was then filled up – and what had once been Howard was seen of man no more. A small pyramid was raised above the spot, instead of the sun-dial which he had himself suggested; and the casual traveler in Prussian Tartary is still attracted to the place as to one of the holiest shrines of which this earth can boast.
Words can not depict the profound sensation which the arrival of this mournful news produced in England. The death-shaft cut the withes which had kept his reputation down. All at once the nation awoke to a full consciousness of his colossal fame and his transcendent virtues. Howard was now – history. Envy and jealousy were past: rivalry had ended on the brink of the grave. Death alone sets a man on fair terms with society. The death of a great man is always a calamity; but it is only when a country loses one of its illustrious children in a distant land, and under peculiar circumstances, that the full measure of the national calamity is felt. They who can recollect the wild and deep sensation of pity and regret which the arrival of the news of Byron's death at Missolonghi produced in England, can alone conceive of any thing like the state of the public mind on the first announcement of the close of a career still more useful and more glorious. Every possible mark of honor – public and private – was paid to the memory of Howard. All orders of men vied with each other in heaping honors upon his name. The court, the press, parliament, the bar, the pulpit, and the stage – each in its different fashion – paid the well-earned tribute of respect. The intelligence of his demise was publicly announced in the official Gazette – a distinction never before accorded to a private individual. The muses sang his virtues with innumerable voices; the churches echoed with his praise; the senate and the judgment-seat resounded with the tribute to his merits; and even at the theatres, his character was exhibited in imaginary scenes, and a monody on his death was delivered from the foot lights.
Nor was a more enduring memorial wanting. The long dormant Committee of the Howardian fund was resuscitated, and the sculptor Bacon was employed to make a full length marble statue of the Philanthropist. At that time it was in contemplation to make St. Paul's serve the double purpose of a cathedral and a Walhalla; and this design was inaugurated by placing there, as the first great worthy of England, the statue of John Howard. It stands immediately on the right hand of the choir-screen; it is a handsome figure, tolerably faithful, and is illustrated by emblems of his noble deeds, and by the following inscription: "This extraordinary man had the fortune to be honored, while living, in the manner which his virtues deserved; he received the thanks of both houses of the British and Irish Parliaments, for his eminent services rendered to his country and to mankind. Our national prisons and hospitals, improved upon the suggestion of his wisdom, bear testimony to the solidity of his judgment, and to the estimation in which he was held. In every part of the civilized world, which he traversed to reduce the sum of human misery – from the throne to the dungeon – his name was mentioned with respect, gratitude, and admiration. His modesty alone defeated various efforts that were made during his life to erect this statue, which the public has now consecrated to his memory. He was born at Hackney, in the county of Middlesex, September 2, 1726. The early part of his life he spent in retirement, residing principally upon his paternal estate at Cardington, in Bedfordshire; for which county he served the office of sheriff in the year 1763. He expired at Cherson, in Russian Tartary, on the 20th of January, 1790, a victim to the perilous and benevolent attempt to ascertain the cause of, and find an efficacious remedy for the plague. He trod an open but unfrequented path to immortality in the ardent but unintermitted exercise of Christian charity: may this tribute to his fame excite an emulation of his truly glorious achievements!"
A SKETCH OF MY CHILDHOOD
Once having begun, it followed naturally that the war should deepen in bitterness. Wounds that wrote memorials in the flesh, insults that rankled in the heart – these were not features of the case likely to be forgotten by our enemies, and far less by my fiery brother. I, for my part, entered not into any of the passions that war may be supposed to kindle, except only the chronic passion of anxiety. Fear it was not; for experience had taught me that, under the random firing of our undisciplined enemies, the chances were not many of being wounded; but the uncertainties that beset every conflict, as regarded my power to maintain the requisite connection with my brother, and the absolute darkness that brooded over that last worst contingency – the case of being captured, and carried off to Gath as a trophy won from Israel – these were penalties attached to the war that ran too violently into the current of my constitutional despondency, ever to give way under any casual elation of success. Success we really had at times —often in skirmishes; and once, at least, as the reader will find to his mortification, if he is wicked enough to take the side of the Philistines, a most smashing victory in a pitched battle. But even then, and while the hurrahs were yet ascending from our jubilating lips, the freezing memento came back to my heart of that deadly depression which, duly at the coming round of the morning and evening watches, traveled with me like my shadow on our approach to the memorable bridge. A bridge of sighs2 too surely it was for me; and even for my brother it formed an object of fierce yet anxious jealousy, that he could not always disguise, as we first came in sight of it: for, if it happened to be occupied in strength, there was an end of all hope that we could attempt the passage; and that was a fortunate solution of the affair, as it imposed no evil beyond a circuit; which, at least, enjoyed the blessing of peace, although the sarcastic public might choose to call it inglorious. Even this shade of ignominy, however, my brother contrived to color favorably, by calling us – that is, me and himself – "a corps of observation;" and he condescendingly explained to me, that although making "a lateral movement," he had his eye upon the enemy, and "might yet come round upon his left flank in a way that wouldn't perhaps prove very agreeable." This, from the nature of the ground, never happened. We crossed the river out of sight from the enemy's position; and my brother's vengeance, being reserved until he came round into the rear of Philistia, from which a good retreat was always open to Greenhay; naturally discharged itself in triple deluges of stones. On this line of policy there was, therefore, no cause for anxiety; but the common case was, that the numbers might not be such as to justify this caution, and yet quite enough for mischief. For my brother, however, stung and carried headlong into hostility by the martial instincts of his nature, the uneasiness of doubt or insecurity was swallowed up by his joy in the anticipation of victory, or even of contest; while to myself, whose exultation was purely official and ceremonial, as due by loyalty and legal process from a cadet of the belligerent house, no such compensation existed. The enemy was no enemy in my eyes; his affronts were but retaliations; and his insults were so inapplicable to my unworthy self, being of a calibre exclusively meant for the use of my brother, that from me they recoiled, one and all, as cannon-shot from cotton bags.
This inordinate pugnacity of my brother, this rabid appetite for trials of prowess, had, indeed, forced itself into display on the very first interview I ever had with him. On the night of his return from Louth, an artisan, employed in the decorations of Greenhay, had entered into conversation with him upon the pre-eminence of Lancashire among the provinces of England. According to him, the county of Lancaster (to translate his meaning into Roman phrase) was the prerogative tribe of England. And really I am disposed to think that it still is such, mongrelized as it has long been by Cambrian and Hibernian immigrations. There is not on earth such another focus of burning energy. Among other things, the man had magnified the county as containing (which it then did) by very much the largest remnant of old Roman Catholic families – families that were loyal to the back-bone (in those days a crowning honor); that were of the ancient faith, and of the most ancient English blood; none of your upstart, dissenting terræ filii, but men that might have shaken hands with Cœur de Lion, or at least come of ancestors that had. "And, in short, young gentleman," he concluded, "the whole county, not this part, or that part, but take it as you find it, north and south, is a very tall county."
What it was exactly that he meant by tall, I can not say. From the intense predominance in Lancashire of old genuine mother English, it is probable that he meant stout-hearted, for that was the old acceptation of the word tall, and not (as it is now understood) high in stature. "A tall ship" meant a stout and sea-worthy ship; "a tall man," meant a man that was