MR. JESSE'S WORKS.*
WE must own to a certain feeling of surprise at this formid- able undertaking of a new edition of Mr. J. H. Jesse's works. The present instalment contains fourteen volumes ; there is to be a second of sixteen next year. We fancy that the world has been fairly well content for some years with a moderate supply of these writings. One book only seems to have reached a third edition, and two others a second. All Mr. Jesse's works occupy less than a single page of the British Museum catalogue. Mr. Jesse was an industrious writer; very careful, as we learn from Mr. Tinsley's newly published Recollections, about the correction of his proofs. But we should not have put him in the rank of authors who attain, a quarter of a century.after death, to the honour of a library edition. But if there is anything to be certainly learnt from a long acquaintance with books, it is that the ways of the reading public are absolutely inscrutable. The edition now before us is not introduced by any prefatory note, and has not, we imagine, been subjected to any editorial revision. Some brief notice of the author and a chronology of his books might surely have been given. As for editing, we can easily • English Hisgorkai Memoirs By John lineage Jens. Polls L.T. London : John 0. Nimmo. Vs de. net.] understand why that has not been attempted. An editor who should take his office seriously would find himself overwhelmed with -work in dealing with these books. Mr. Jesse, whatever his qualifications, had little of the historical temper. His collecting net was widely cast and had a small mesh, and gathered in a great quantity of objects, some of which were of doubtful value. The task of sorting them would have been a very serious matter. Still, something might have been done. There is a note, for instance, in the "Memorials of London," p. 295, which called for correction, perhaps we should say erasure. Mr. Jesse has been commenting on,,the paucity of Eton poets. He can remember but three,—Waller, Gray, and Shelley. But, he adds in a note, "when the above was written, the author had forgotten the name of Alfred Tennyson, who was his schoolfellow at Eton." Of what mistakes, one cannot but think, may not the man have been capable who could make so amazing a statement !
The fourteen volumes now published are made up of "Memoirs of the Court of England during the Reign of the Stuarts, including the Protectorate," in six volumes; a con- tinuation carrying on the narrative "from the Revolution of 1688 to the death of George IL," in four; "Memoirs of the Pretenders and their Adherents," in three; and a volume of "Literary and Historical Memorials of London." We shall begin by frankly stating our opinion that much of the very miscellaneous matter here collected might have been omitted with advantage. The memoirs of a Court are not likely to be edifying reading, and we must expect a considerable amount of offence when the central figures of the scene are the Stuarts and the first two Georges. But Mr. Jesse might have drawn the line short of much that he puts into his pages. He details at length scandals for which there is no evidence. There is a foolish tale, for instance, about Prince Henry (eldest son of James I.) having entertained a passion for the notorious Lady Essex. Mr. Jesse begins by quoting from Sir Charles Cornwallis (the Prince's attendant) that "he never could discover the slightest inclina- tion on the Prince's part to any particular beauty." That should have been enough. Cornwallis says, indeed, that there were reports—it would have been a miracle if there had not been—and on the strength of the anonymous Aulicus Coguinarim we are told that "there is good reason to believe that he was an unsuccessful rival, &c." Then the hideous scandals which implicated the King in the death of his son are dwelt upon, and we are left with a half-impression that the writer believes them. The chief argument seems to be that the King forbade the wearing of mourning. That is sufficiently accounted for by the morbid dread which James felt for any- thing that reminded him of death. Another offence is the printing of revolting epigrams by Lord Dorset. In fact, a necessary evil has been unnecessarily aggravated. The quali- ties of the historian we do not expect to find in Mr. Jesse's work. He often writes as a partisan, but he is not a thoroughgoing partisan. He seems to write on the impulse of the time. He inveighs, for instance, against the bar- barities exercised in putting down and punishing the Jacobite rising of 1745, without remembering, it would seem, the atrocities committed by the dominant party in the days of Claverhouse, and that not in dealing with armed rebels, but with helpless women and children. He repeats the foolish charges made against James II.'s daughters, and talks as if he had inherited the creed of the Nonjnrors. James, we take it, had no rights after he was dispossessed of the throne by the decision of the nation, though many good people believed that he had. As for Mary, it is difficult to say how she could have acted otherwise than she did. But, of course, for any really philosophical estimate of character and motive we must look elsewhere.
That there is plenty of entertaining reading in these volumes need hardly be said. Of their absolute value, apart from any qualities brought to his work by their author, it is difficult to judge. Much has been done in bringing the reader in contact with original authorities during the years that have passed since these books were first published. Still, the function of the raconteur is not abolished, and Mr. Jesse had many of the qualities which enable a man to fulfil it with success. And he sometimes, also, supplies the student with materials which he might otherwise have missed. In the third volume of the "Pretenders," for instance, he gives a a number of original letters from adherents of the Government in the '45. They throw a good deal of light on the situation. Here is an interesting little passage which reminds us of recent events. "I have the pleasure to tell you," writes Mr Gabriel Napier to the Lord Advocate, "that the hundred men that I promised arms and ammunition for are of more service to the Government in keeping guard at proper places, and seizing suspected persons, than as many foot of the regular troops, for they know the country passes and fords, &c." That is a thing about which the authorities seem always to need a reminder.
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