II
It is with this feeling that I attempt to say something of a man, the most eminent of a period at which the government of England was passing, imperceptibly perhaps, but not slowly, from the hands of an exclusive but enlightened aristocracy, into those of a middle class, of which the mind, the energy, and the ambition had been gradually developed, under the mixed influences of a war which had called forth the resources, and of a peace which had tried the prosperity, of our country;—a middle class which was growing up with an improved and extended education, amidst stirring debates as to the height to which the voice of public opinion should be allowed to raise itself, and the latitude that should be given, in a singularly mixed constitution, to its more democratic parts.
Mr. Canning was born on the 11th of April, 1770, and belonged to an old and respectable family originally resident in Warwickshire.110 A branch of it, obtaining a grant of the manor of Garvagh, settled in Ireland in the reign of James I., and from this branch Mr. Canning descended; but the misfortunes of his parents placed him in a situation below that which might have been expected from his birth.
His father, the eldest of three sons—George, Paul, and Stratford—was disinherited for marrying a young lady (Miss Costello) without fortune; and having some taste for literature, but doing nothing at the bar, he died amidst the difficulties incidental to idle habits and elegant tastes.
Mrs. Canning, left without resources, attempted the stage, but she had no great talents for the theatrical profession, and never rose above the rank of a middling actress. Her son thus fell under the care of his uncle, Mr. Stratford Canning, a highly respectable merchant, and an old Whig, much in the confidence of the leaders of the Whig party and possessing considerable influence with them. A small inheritance of 200l. or 300l. a year sufficed for the expenses of a liberal education, and after passing through the regular ordeal of a private school, young Canning was sent to Eton, and subsequently to Christ Church, Oxford. At Eton no boy ever left behind him so many brilliant recollections. Gay and high-spirited as a companion, clever and laborious as a student, he obtained a following from his character, and a reputation from his various successes. This reputation was the greater from the schoolboy’s triumphs not being merely those of school. Known and distinguished as “George Canning,” he was yet more known and distinguished as the correspondent of “Gregory Griffin;”—such being the name adopted by the fictitious editor of the Microcosm, a publication in the style of the Spectator, and carried on solely by Eton lads. In this publication, the graver prose of the young orator was incorrect and inferior to that of one or two other juvenile contributors, but some of his lighter productions were singularly graceful, and it would be difficult to find anything of its kind superior to a satirical commentary upon the epic merits of an old ballad:
“The queen of hearts
She made some tarts
All on a summer’s day,” &c111
“I cannot leave this line,” says the witty commentator, “without remarking, that one of the Scribleri, a descendant of the famous Martinus, has expressed his suspicions of the text being corrupted here, and proposes, instead of ‘All on,’ reading ‘Alone,’ alleging, in the favour of this alteration, the effect of solitude in raising the passions. But Hiccius Doctius, a High Dutch commentator, one nevertheless well versed in British literature, in a note of his usual length and learning, has confuted the arguments of Scriblerus. In support of the present reading, he quotes a passage from a poem written about the same period with our author’s, by the celebrated Johannes Pastor (most commonly known as Jack Shepherd), entitled, ‘An Elegiac Epistle to the Turnkey of Newgate,’ wherein the gentleman declares, that, rather indeed in compliance with an old custom than to gratify any particular wish of his own, he is going
“‘All hanged for to be
Upon that fatal Tyburn tree.’
“Now, as nothing throws greater light on an author than the concurrence of a contemporary writer, I am inclined to be of Hiccius’ opinion, and to consider the ‘All’ as an elegant expletive, or, as he more aptly phrases it, ‘elegans expletivum.’”
The other articles to which the boyish talent of the lad, destined to be so famous, may lay claim, are designated in the will of the supposed editor, Mr. Griffin (contained in the concluding number of the Microcosm), which, amongst special bequests assigns to “Mr. George Canning, now of the college of Eton, all my papers, essays, &c., signed B.”