Online Library of Liberty: Harriet Martineau's Autobiography
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
The Online Library of Liberty A Project Of Liberty Fund, Inc. Harriet Martineau, Harriet Martineau’s Autobiography, vol. 2 and Memorials of Harriet Martineau [1855] The Online Library Of Liberty This E-Book (PDF format) is published by Liberty Fund, Inc., a private, non-profit, educational foundation established in 1960 to encourage study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals. 2010 was the 50th anniversary year of the founding of Liberty Fund. It is part of the Online Library of Liberty web site http://oll.libertyfund.org, which was established in 2004 in order to further the educational goals of Liberty Fund, Inc. To find out more about the author or title, to use the site's powerful search engine, to see other titles in other formats (HTML, facsimile PDF), or to make use of the hundreds of essays, educational aids, and study guides, please visit the OLL web site. This title is also part of the Portable Library of Liberty DVD which contains over 1,000 books and quotes about liberty and power, and is available free of charge upon request. The cuneiform inscription that appears in the logo and serves as a design element in all Liberty Fund books and web sites is the earliest-known written appearance of the word “freedom” (amagi), or “liberty.” It is taken from a clay document written about 2300 B.C. in the Sumerian city-state of Lagash, in present day Iraq. To find out more about Liberty Fund, Inc., or the Online Library of Liberty Project, please contact the Director at [email protected]. LIBERTY FUND, INC. 8335 Allison Pointe Trail, Suite 300 Indianapolis, Indiana 46250-1684 Online Library of Liberty: Harriet Martineau’s Autobiography, vol. 2 and Memorials of Harriet Martineau Edition Used: Harriet Martineau’s Autobiography and Memorials of Harriet Martineau, ed. Maria Weston Chapman (Boston: James R. Osgood & Co., 1877). 2 vols. Vol. 2. Author: Harriet Martineau Author: Maria Weston Chapman About This Title: Thinking she was close to death Martineau wrote her autobiography in 1855 but lived for another 20 years. She recounts her activities in various mid-19th century reform movements, her struggle to become a professional writer, and her work in popularizing the ideas of free market political economy. Vol. 2 also contains memorials of HM by Chapman. PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011) 2 http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/2012 Online Library of Liberty: Harriet Martineau’s Autobiography, vol. 2 and Memorials of Harriet Martineau About Liberty Fund: Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals. Copyright Information: The text is in the public domain. Fair Use Statement: This material is put online to further the educational goals of Liberty Fund, Inc. Unless otherwise stated in the Copyright Information section above, this material may be used freely for educational and academic purposes. It may not be used in any way for profit. PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011) 3 http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/2012 Online Library of Liberty: Harriet Martineau’s Autobiography, vol. 2 and Memorials of Harriet Martineau Table Of Contents Harriet Martineau’s Autobiography. Sixth Period. Section IV. Section V. Section VI. Section VII. Section VIII. Section IX. Memorials. Introduction. Infancy. Youth. Womanhood. Fame. Foreign Life,—western. Consequences of Foreign Life, — Without. Consequences of Foreign Life, — Within. Consequences,—to Life Passive. Foreign Life, — Eastern. Home. Philosophy. The Life Sorrow. Work. Fresh Foreign Intercourse. Conversations. Waiting For Death. Self-estimate, and Other. Survivorship. Harriet Martineau 1850 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. PAGE PORTRAIT OF HARRIET MARTINEAU. 1850Frontispiece THE KNOLI, Ambleside. 1856 102 PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011) 4 http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/2012 Online Library of Liberty: Harriet Martineau’s Autobiography, vol. 2 and Memorials of Harriet Martineau [Back to Table of Contents] HARRIET MARTINEAU’S AUTOBIOGRAPHY. SIXTH PERIOD. SECTION IV. The same mail which brought back my M. S. from Mr. Murray brought the news of the flight of Louis Philippe. My petty interests seemed unworthy of mention, even to myself, in the same day with that event. Mine were re-arranged in three days, while the affairs of the Continent became more exciting from hour to hour. Towards the end of March, when my book was finished, and nearly ready for publication, letters came in, in increasing numbers, appealing to me for help, in one form or another, for or against popular interests, so far as they were supposed to be represented by Chartism. Of these letters, one was from the wife of a Cabinet Minister, an old acquaintance, who was in a terrible panic about Feargus O’Connor and the threatened Chartist outbreak of the tenth of April, then approaching. She told me that she wrote under her husband’s sanction, to ask me, now that they saw my book was advertised for publication, to use my power over the working-classes, to bring them to reason, &c., &c. The letter was all one tremor in regard to the Chartists, and flattery to myself. I replied that I had no influence, as far as I knew, with the Chartists; and that, as a matter of fact, I agreed with them in some points of doctrine while thinking them sadly mistaken in others, and in their proposed course of action. I told her that I had seen something in the newspapers which had made me think of going to London: and that if I did go, I would endeavour to see as many political leaders (in and out of parliament) as possible, and would, if she pleased, write her an account of what should seem to me the state of things, and the best to be done, by myself and others. It was an advertisement in the newspapers which had made me think of going; — the advertisement of a new periodical to be issued by Mr. Knight, called “The Voice of the People.” It was pointed out to me by several of my friends, as full of promise in such hands at such a time. The day after my letter to Lady — was sent, I heard from Mr. Knight. He desired to see me so earnestly that he said, if I could not go to town, he would come to me, — ill as he could just then spare the time: or, he would come and fetch me, if I wished it. Of course, I went immediately; and I helped to the extent Mr. Knight wished, in his new periodical. But I saw immediately, as he did, that the thing would never do. The Whig touch perished it at once. The Whig officials set it up, and wished to dictate and control its management in a way which no literary man could have endured, if their ideas and feelings had been as good as possible. But the poverty and perverseness of their ideas, and the insolence of their feelings were precisely what might be expected by all who really knew that remarkably vulgar class of men. They proposed to lecture the working-classes, who were by far the wiser party of the two, in a jejune, coaxing, dull, religious-tract sort of tone, and criticised and deprecated every thing like vigour, and a manly and genial tone of address in the new publication, while trying to push in, as contributors, effete and exhausted writers, and friends of their own who knew about as much of the working-classes of England as of those of Turkey. Of course, the scheme was a complete and immediate failure. PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011) 5 http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/2012 Online Library of Liberty: Harriet Martineau’s Autobiography, vol. 2 and Memorials of Harriet Martineau On the insertion of an article by a Conservative Whig, (which was certainly enough to account for the catastrophe,) the sale fell to almost nothing at all; and Mr. Knight, who had before stood his ground manfully against the patrons of the scheme, threw up the business. Meantime, the tenth of April arrived (while I was near London) and passed in the way which we all remember. Lady — wrote to me in a strain of exultation, as vulgar, to say the least, as Feargus O’Connor’s behaviour, about the escape of the government. She told of O’Connor’s whimpering because his toes were trodden on; and was as insolent in her triumph about a result which was purely a citizen work as she had been abject when in fear that the Chartists would hold the metropolis. I felt the more obliged to write the promised letter, when I had seen several leading politicians of the liberal party; and I did it when I came home. I did it carefully; and I submitted my letter to two ladies who were judges of manners, as well as of politics; and they gave it their sanction, — one of them copying it, with entire approbation. Lady —’s reply was one of such insolence as precluded my writing to her again. She spoke of the “lower classes” (she herself being a commoner by birth) as comprising all below the peerage; so that she classed together the merchants and manufacturers with “cottagers” and even paupers; and, knowing me to be a manufacturer’s daughter, she wrote of that class as low, and spoke of having been once obliged to pass a week in the house of a manufacturer, where the governess was maltreated with the tyranny which marks low people. My two consultees reddened with indignation at the personal insolence to myself; which I had overlooked in my disgust at the wrong to my “order,” and to the “cottagers” with whom she classed us.