Butler’s thoughts on the wing

Press, 3 August 1985, Page 20

Butler’s thoughts on the wing

The Note-Books of Samuel Butter: Volume 1 (1874-1883). Edited by Hans-Peter Breuer. University Press of America, 1984. 386 pp. Introduction, end-notes and index. (Reviewed by Peter Mating)

This is volume one of the first complete edition of Butler’s NoteBooks. Selections from the Note-Books have been published by each of Butler’s literary executors: Festing Jones in 1912, A. T. Bartholomew in 1930 and 1934, and Sir Geoffrey Keynes and Brian Hill in 1951. The original six volumes of Notes are in the Butler Collection, Chapin Library, Williams College, Massachusetts, with copies in the British Library and the St. John’s College Library, Cambridge. Publication of a complete edition is a literary event of importance, the degree depending on the estimate of Butler’s current literary standing which at present appears nowhere higher than in the United States. Butler had his reasons for everything he did and in the case of his Notes it was because “one’s thoughts fly so fast that one must shoot them; it is no use trying to put salt on their tails.” Breuer, in publishing the Notes complete and in chronological order, runs slap into the problems foreseen by Festing Jones who wrote in the preface to his 1912 edition: “I thought of publishing the books just as they stand, but too many of the entries are of no general interest and too many are of a kind that must wait if they are ever to be published. In addition to these objections the confusion is very great ... This confusion has a charm, but it is a charm that would not, I fear, survive in print and, personally, I find that it makes the books distracting for continuous reading. Moreover they were not intended to be published as they stand, they were intended for his own private use as a quarry from which to take material for his writing

Breuer was no doubt aware of this, and has attempted to relieve the tedium of the higgledy-piggledy confusion of the notes by supplying copious annotations. Here he has cast his net widely and interestingly, but

not always accurately. To give two examples: Note 69 is entitled, “From a New Zealand note book of mine now destroyed” and was written at Mesopotamia in April, 1861, while Haast was staying there during the course of his geological exploration of the Rangitata valley. Breuer lists Haast as “John Francis Julius von Haast (later Sir John) (1824-87).” This should read Johann Franz Julius von Haast (later Sir Julius) (1822-87). Again in Note 363 Butler refers to a Miss Buckley , “now Mrs Fisher.” Breuer tells us that “Butler had known her husband, Dr Thomas Fisher, a medical practitioner, in New Zealand where he owned a sheep station. (The Grampian Hills) some twenty miles below Butler’s Mesopotamia.” In fact Dr Fisher bought the Grampian Hills station in the McKenzie country after Butler had left New Zealand. Besides factual errors of this nature there are fairly numerous misprints and an annoying habit of many of the lines of print to run in slalom fashion across the page. But there is much of interest to be found in Breuer’s edition. Butler’s notes range from pure fahtasy to grave

fihilosophy with, to my mind, some of he more delightful being anecdotal. For example, Note 293: “Duke of Wellington’s Funeral. His boots were hung over his charger and the charger with the boots formed part of the procession. A little girl seeing this from a window said, ‘Mamma, when we die is there nothing left of us but our boots?” "Or again, Note 370: “Wild hot water. A young student at Heatherley’s once asked me if New Zealand was not the place where the hot water grows wild.” Or Note 387: “Silence. There is none so impressive as that of a hushed multitude.”

Most of the notes relating to New Zealand have been quoted at one time or another, but I found one which is new to me. It is Note 72: “My Neighbour Jimmy Rawle in New Zealand (for though he lived nearly twenty miles off he was almost my nearest neighbour) was urged by Tripp to get married — Tripp having lately got married himself. Rawle said, No, he should die like a pumpkin. ‘Why so,’ said Tripp. ‘Full of seed’ was the answer.” Rawle as Breuer states was at the time shepherd in charge of Tripp and Acland’s Mt Possession Station.

An analysis of the frequency with Which topics recur in Butler’s Notes is of interest. It appears from the subject index that Butler discusses himself 61 times, Festing-Jones 45 times, Charles Darwin 40, Handel 38, art 31, Reginald Worsley 26, “Life and Habit” 24, Christ 23 and God 20 times. Breuer prefaces this edition with a 48 page essay which embodies much thoughtful scholarship, and conclusions with which one may of may not agree, but which certainly add to the ever growing volume of opinion on Samuel Butler who remains, as always a Victorian enigma.

•Footnote: “The Notebooks of Samuel Butler, Volume I” is available from: The University Press of America, 4720 Boston Way, Lanham, Maryland 20706, United States of America. The price is $U524.50. The editor reports that Volume II is expected to appear in 1987. The whole edition wiH run to five volumes.