IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF SWINBURNE

New Zealand Listener, Volume 36, Issue 923, 18 April 1957, Page 6

IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF SWINBURNE

an investigation

by

WALTER

BROOKES

to England, the Editor of the New Zealand Listener told me that there was a story that when Swinburne called at the Rose and Crown on his daily walk across Putney Heath — during the last 30 years of his life, when he lived with Watts-Dunton at The Pines, Putney Hill-he had more than the one glass of beer, which he was officially allowed. There was a bottlé of Burgundy upstairs as well. Here in London was the chance to look into all this. I was living right in the heart of the Swinburne country of the -1873-1879 period, the heydey of the poet’s Bohemian life before WattsDunton had to intervene and take him away to Putney. Swinburne’s first lodgings in this area, taken in 1873, were at 12 North Crescent, just round the corner from where I lived in Gower Street, the second, taken later in the Same year, were 3 Great James Street, about a quarter of an hour’s walk away. ‘The third-and about these there is some mystery-were at 25 Guilford Street, about half way between the other two. The British Museum is conveniently near all these. Having got the addresses one evening at the Holborn Library, which keeps records of famous people who have lived in the borough, my wife and I set out for a tour of inspection. I am afraid it was a disappointing one. The whole of North Crescent was now occupied by a telephone exchange; 3 Great James Street was covered with scaffolding and in the process of being incorporated into the Barclay’s Bank building next door; and 25 Guilford Street had completely disappeared-it had been sliced off the end of its ter‘face and its place taken by a modern building with a notice "Child Health Institute." Still, from this visit and further ones, as well as inquiries, I can give some idea of these houses. I can only say that those in North Crescent were considered of some architectural interest ‘before they were demolished many time ago; before I came

years ago-this tenancy lasted less than a year, anyhow. The houses in Great James Street were built in 1721, and are quite impressive. They have obviously had a great deal of work done on them to keep them in repair, but they seem to retain their original appearance. I noticed in No. 3 that the timber in the old staircase is being taken away with each piece numbered, to be repolished and replaced. — Swinburne lived here from 1873 to 1879, when alcoholism had reduced him to such a state that some action became necessary. The authorities had forbidden him the use of the British Museum, with which his name is so closely associated, and where the bulk of his manuscripts were ultimately granted welcome admittance. His condition was desperate, and Watts-Dunton, with the consent of his family, removed him to his house, No. 2 The Pines, Putney Hill (now No. 11 Putney Hill). As I said, the address 25 Guilford Street presents a mystery. I am indebted to a member of the staff of the Holborn Library for pointing out to me in the London County Council Survey (that monumental and as yet uncompleted work which is still carrying out a task initiated by William Morris) an entry which reads under this address: "1879-1880, Algernon Charles Swinburne," but bewilderingly adds: "Swinburne moved from 3 Great James Street in 1879 to Mr Theodore Watts-Dunton’s house in Putney." The Dictionary of National Biography records the move from Great James Street, but has nothing to say about Guilford Street. The only explanation I can suggest, and I came to this conclusion in the end, is that life at The Pines, especially’in the earlier years, was not nearly so rigid as the legend makes out, and that at first lodgings may have been engaged in London (at Guilford Street)

for occasional visits. Another member of the Holborn Library staff, as it happens, lives at Putney, and said that he always had the impression that "there was a good deal of moving backwards and forwards" at first. He cannot say how he gained this impression, but he did. gain it.

Swinburnes life is just now passing beyond reliable living memory; people will tell you a lot they have heard, but they do not know where they have heard it. It may be mentioned that this terrace in Guilford Street, rather shabby now, was built in the 1790’s. The houses are of the classical late 18th century type round this district, with a basement, three floors and an attic. They are stylish examples, and it is a pity they have been neglected. It does not matter much that No. 25 is missing. There is a photograph of Nos. 25-31 in the Survey, and it is just like the others. At Putney, at The Pines, I made a most astonishing discovery. This famous house js occupied by a New Zealander, Mr Hugh Nayland Anderson, a dental surgeon formerly in prac-: tice in Wellington. His father was Dr W. Anderson, who was Director ot Education in New Zealand from 1913 to 1918,

and his grandfather was an early Canterbury settler, who arrived there

in 1850. Mrs Anderson is an Englishwoman. She invited us in when we timidly made our inquiries and said where we came from. Here we were, then, sitting in a room that must have seen many gatherings of famous literary figures. The room is still substantially as it was, though a mantelpiece that from the photograph looks as though it had been designed by- Morris. or Rossetti or one of their clan has been taken away. The view is through French windows which give on to the long narrow garden with a brick wall on either side-exceedingly attractive. The Pines is a pair of semi detached houses with a basement and three floors above it. They were built about 100 years ago in the grey brick so much used at that time-the idea often

seems to have been to imitate stone. A square tower housing the staircases runs up in the middle. There are a couple of plaques of sculpture by Rossetti in the front porch. Not a pine tree in sight; whether there ever were any I do not know. Mrs Anderson spent some time in New Zealand. "I did 12 years there," I’m afraid was the way she put it, adding that her husband was now doing his time in England. She said that they were acquiring the freehold of both houses, as they had feared that the

one next door-where, she said, Swinburne and Watts-Dunton lived for the first six months of their stay-was going to be turned into a rooming house, She went off to fetch her husband, who was doing some weekend carpentry round the place, leaving us with some. very pleasant reflections. The Pines, this historic house with great literary associations, in the hands of a New Zealander who wasn’t going to let any part of it be turned into a rooming house-a true New Zealander, too, who cquld do a job of work about the house. Nothing could be better. When they came back we mentioned how famous the place was. "Yes," said Mrs. Ancerson. "We had an American girl who is doing a thesis out here quite recently. And-I don’t know whether it is near Swinburne’s birthday or what, but a group of old men-very old men-came up and stood in front of the door one day and took off their hats and then went away." The reader may be beginning to wonder, as we did as we went round these places: . Would a ghost not rise at the strange guest’s hand? Well, we still had to go to the Rose and Crown, on the other side of Putney Heath and Wimbledon Common. It was no disappointment. An oblong brick building, about three stories, more or less (these old buildings squeeze a

good deal in under the roof), about 300 years old I was told, it stands fairly and squarely across the road from the Common, Now one of a brewery chain, it has a well-kept and prosperous look, Our haste to get here did us no good, for it was only 4.30 in the afternoon, when English pubs are closed. We had to wait another hour. I know it’s civilised and all that, but we felt impatient. However, as swrely and slowly as 9.0 a.m. comes in New Zealand came 5.30 here, and we went in through the door labelled saloon bar. The civilised aspect of it was apparent now. No nonsense about parking your wife somewhere else-we both could go into this pleasant bar, where meals and snacks were served as well as drinks. (But you are quite welcome to go in and sit down and read the paper if you wish just to do that.) This kind of thing has been objected to for New Zealand on the grounds that it would encourage drinking. No, it makes it very easy for anyone not to have a drink and yet keep company with someone who does. Why, even Swinburne was trusted to go in here. But to continue. ‘Do you know anything of Swin: burne’s connection with this pub?" I asked the boy. "No, sir. I'll enquire, sir." He turned to the older man. "The gentleman wants to know about Swinburne’s connection wth this pub," "Is this the place?" I asked, "Yes, thig is the place all right, but we don’t know much about it now, We have a picture of him somewhere." He walked over to a corner, "Oh, that’s what it is. I'd never bothered about it much," It was a Johnny Walker advertisement, with a drawing of the well-known figure of Johnny Walker talking to the shade of Swinburne. "Perhaps the Major knows something about it," said the barman. jee But the Major, who was sitting with a companion at the end of the bar, had already taken up the subject. -_-s_ _ "Old Percy ‘Lester, who used to keep the stables at ‘Roehampton, told‘ me that Swinburne used to come in here, drink one glass of beer, and go away without paying for it. He used to walk over here, you know. All the way from Putney. But he used to go away without paying for his beer."

"T think it had been paid for," I said. *The idea was to keep him from drinking too much." "Oh, was that it?" said the Major: "Yet I bet he wrote his best poetry when he was half cut," said the barman, "I must read some of his poetry some time," said the Major. "Is it any good?" asked his companion. "I’ve never heard of him." "Oh, jolly good stuff," said the Major. "So they tell me, at any rate." I tried to keep to my point, Had Swinburne had only the one glass of beer? Had he never gone upstairs for anything extra? Nobody really knew, but they did not think so. But Mr Kay would be down shortly, He lived at the pub and he was over 80. He might know. ""T wasn’t there at that time," said Mr Kay. "But I can tell you that he came in and sat down in a little bar over in that corner, No, he didn’t have anything else. Sometimes he had a roll and a bit of cheese. I'll take you and show you his chair if you like." I was duly taken out to the kitchen and allowed to sit in an old Windsor chair, Still, I felt disappointed as I came back into the bar. But something interesting was being said. "Yes," said a barmaid, who had just arrived on the scene, to the Major. "We would hear a sound like a hand being slid across the back door, and then the latch would rattle and the lock would turn. And one morning there was a glass on the counter that hadn’t been there the night before. Another night we locked every door inside and out, and in the morning the door into the bar was open and the key in it." "Sounds to me like old Kemble on a binge," said the Major. Could this morsel be for me? This wasn’t about Swinburne? I asked. "Swinburne’s ghost,". she said. "That’s what we always say." "What do you think of it?" I asked the barman, "T’ve heard them talk about it, but I don’t believe these tales." "Tales," said the barmaid. "This is no tale." r Well, I had an ending for my inquiry. Perhaps the story I was chasing was a bit muddled. Perhaps this was when Swinburne had his bottle of Burgundy.

People began to come in; it was no use following the matter up any further. I was very nisased to be shown a_ memorial copy of- The Bookman, published in June, 1909, not long after Swinburne’s death, which Mrs Anderson said "went with the house" when they took The Pines in 1952. There were many tributes to Swinburne, and two extracts, one from George Saintsbury and the other from’ George Bernard Shaw are very interesting: Professor Saintsbury: But Mr Swinburne’s poetry had another attraction less genuinely .° poetical, not more popular, but very seductive to some tastes. He was notoriously one of the most scholarly 7 posts of a literature which can boast of Milton and Gray, of Coleridge and Landor. + +.» The whole of his work was saturated, so to speak, with its own ancestry. It was never obtrusively learned: but it

had a quality which is vaguely troublesome to those who had no learning. It smelt not of the lamp but of "honey and the sea,’’ like its own laurustinus, Yet the honey was the honey of Hybla: and the sea had washed the shores, and had caught and returned the melodies, of England and of France, of Proyence and of Italy. Shaw: He was an odd phenomenon, this supporter of Dublin Castle, who was a republican and regicide when Russia was in question; always distinguished and powerful at second hand, always commonplace and futile at first hand; great on Jt ‘ insignificant on tney Hill, I never got anything from him except the musical pleasure ot reading his verse; and I could not go on yery long with that, any more an I could make my dinner off raspberry jam. But the pleasure was ve eat whilst it lasted. "RiP. I am glad Shaw admits that Swinburne was great on paper, which seems to me to be the all-important place for a writer to be great, whatever kind of figure he cuts on Putney Hill. If the criticism had been made of Sir Edmund Hillary it would, of course, be a totally cifferent ‘matter.