LITTLE ARTHUR'S HISTORY

Press, Volume LXXII, Issue 21808, 13 June 1936, Page 17

LITTLE ARTHUR'S HISTORY

Victorian school books are treasured in a few New Zealand homes. They are quaintly instructive; but their lasting charm lies more in their manner and method than in their material. It is so also with a pre-Victorian school book. Lady Callcott’s “Little Arthur’s History of England,” which was first published in August, 1835, in two small volumes with six “embellishments in wood.” We are told of these embellishments by Mr C. E. Lawrence, who has now edited a century edition with extra illustrations and chapters, bringing the story up to the accession of King Edward VIII. The first edition, says the editor, was so successful that 700 copies were promptly sold; in 1837 a second edition in one volume was published and impressions have been taken many times since, so that the book has gone through 70 editions, more than 800,000 copies in the century. Only one of the original “embellishments in wood” remains; it is a thunderous glimpse of the Battle of Hastings, with a savage looking horse rearing above bodies, while one brave raises his bow and arrow against the onslaught. The other embellishments were redrawn before the book had gone through many editions. We may regret the loss of pictures as full of interest as the Hastings one, but we must be thankful for what we have —-a generous 40 realistic views of kings being stabbed by mild-looking servants, young princesses modestly refusing crowns, Angles who have faces beautifully patterned to look as we might exjbect angels to look, almost the same faces above bodies clothed in princely day-wear to represent the little Princes sleeping in the Tower while the wicked ones creep upon them. An Adventurous Life In this century ed-ion we are given a sketch of Lady Callcott’s life. She was born Maria Dundas, near Cockermouth in Cumberland, in 1775; the place is famous for its ruined castle where Mary, Queen of Scots, was imprisoned in 1568. Lady Callcott omits this tit bit of home gossip from her book. The young Maria was carefully educated and had for friends the poets Rogers and Campbell, and the artist Thomas Lawrence. Her father was a rearadmiral, and with him she set off at the age of 23 for far parts of the world. She first visited India and later South America; she knew many parts of Europe and strange lands in Asia, -n India she met a Captain of the Royal Navy, Thomas Graham, and married him. For some years Maria lived in retirement with her husband; she acted as reader for the publishing house of John Murray, and read numbers of the new books as they appeared. In 1821 she and her husband, who was given command of H.M-S. Doris, sailed for South America. After many delays they reached Brazil just, at the outbreak of civil war; the voyage continued and in a particularly bad storm off the South American coast the ageing captain died. His widow remained in South America for some time, went home to England, and soon returned to Brazil to be governess to Don Pedro’s daughter. After that Emperor’s short period in power Maria Graham returned to England and four years later married Augustus W. Callcott, R.A. This artist was soon knighted and his wife published her best known work with the name Lady Callcott. She wrote many interesting letters, and was obviously a person of charm and importance. The Author’s Object “Though I have not the happiness to be a mother,” says the author in her preface to the first edition, “my love of Children has led me to think a good deal about them, their amusements and their lessons.” It is interesting to note the use of the capital for Children and the small m for mother. The little history, she goes on, was written for a real little Arthur; she endeavoured to write it nearly as she would tell it to an intelligent child. There is a gentle hint given here: “I could wish that the mother or governess who may put this little book into the hands of her pupils, would read each chapter before she gives it to a child, that she may be ready with answers to such questions as the chapter may suggest,” Her object in writing the book, Lady Callcott says, was to cultivate patriotism. “Let no one fear, that to cultivate patriotism, is to make men illiberal in feeling towards mankind in general. Is any man the worse for being a good son, or brother, or father, or husband? I am indeed persuaded that the wellgrounded love of our own country, is the best security for that enlightened philanthropy which is aimed at as the perfection of moral education. If ‘Little Arthur’s History’ should happily lay the foundations of patriotism in one single

A Pageant of Innocence (■rtciALLT wmrrTwr job tm fmm)

[By JEAN STEVENSON]

Englishman, my wishes wfll b* answered, my best hopes fulfilled. This does not seem much; most authors hope for more. But see how Lady Callcott points her ■ lesson, from chapter to chapter; now she is praising the intelligence of the early Britons, now the virtues and energy of some “clever and very handsome” king—she is particularly fond of these adjectives—now the sincere work of some prelate, the advertising of some “brave andhandsome” soldier or explorer, and now the good work of a man like Simon de Montfort or the wise action of such a king as Canute—who proved to his foolish men that flattery was a bad and untrue thing and that his duty was to be king of the land and not of the tides. Historical Method The early Britons are dismissed in two pages; surely no other historian has had the gift of condensation quite as markedly as Lady Callcott; she gives two pages to the Britons, and two to the troubles of Ireland in Tudor times. Yet she will make the most of a theme if it is to her liking: Conversion to Christianity is a good subject and has four pages (one of them is fairly taken up with the picture of the gentle Gregory, who had such a good memory, and the little angel-faced Angles); asides on the evils of Ambition and Cruelty and Passion take up a good deal of space here and there. The character of William the Conqueror: “He weis cruel and passionate; he took money and lands from everyone who offended him; and, as I have told you, vexed the English, and indeed all the poor, very much. And this is being a tyrant, rather than a king. He had a very good wife, whose name was Matilda, but his sons were more like him than like their mother.” A good advertisement for the undoubted virtues of our forefathers is found in the statement about the schools the Romans established in our land: “The little Britons were allowed to go to these schools as well as the little Romans; and as the Britons were very intelligent, you may think how soon they Jecirned to read and write, and how glad their mothers and fathers were to find them so improved.” When Lady Callcott is not very sure about anything she honestly says so; and if she is stumped she equally honestly says “I have forgotten.” It is difficult to imagine such phrases in Mr John Richard Green or any of our other ordinarily stodgy historians. But then it is equally difficult to imagine such historians giving 'us pleasant sidelights on the beauty or otherwise of the lesser queens of history, or confident statements as to the nature of God, or pleasant finishing sentences such as this one: “But I should never have done, if I were to tell you all the changes that were made in desir old England by the Normans.” End of chapter cames easily after such a statement. The feelings of the writer are in no way hidden. “At last,” she mourns, “I could almost cry when I tell you of it—the beautiful, and clever, and very unhappy Queen of Scots was ordered to be beheaded! This is a very bad thing and I cannot make any excuse for Elizabeth.” The murder of the little Princes in the Tower and the farewell of Charles I. to his children are only two of many other very touching passages. But with her consistent use of the adjectives “clever and beautiful” or “clever and handsome” when she is pleased, and “wicked and cruel” when she is displeased, with generous use of “very” throughout, Lady Callcott manages to keep her story balanced. There is no doubt left about who was bad and who was good for England. We ctve to thank this author for some of her very interesting accounts of the origins of several quaint customs, for her clear denunciation of evil things such as Ambition, Pride, Greed, and Flattery—and worse evils are not given names but are lumped together as “bad things”— and for her courageous decisions about the actions of statesmen and kings. There is the story of the murder of Edward the Martyr who was stabbed by a servant while the bad Queen Elfrida stood by to see that the deed was properly done. The young King was sitting on his hunting horse drinking his flagon of wine; trustfully he was accepting the hospitality of his stepmother while she was plotting his death. This in itself was a bad thing; but it gave rise to the useful custom followed by the gentlemen of old; while one raised the wine cup to his lips his neighbour pledged himself to guard the life of the drinker. But if I were to quote all the interesting and clever things Lady Callcott has written I should never have done; “so I shall say nothing more about them.” (Ch. xxii. England Under the Danes).