417 



CUABBE, GEORGE. 



CRAIG, JOHN. 



413 



Crabbe, wlieu they met on terras of equality ; " I diil uot hesitate for 

 a moment." Thin provided with money he embarked on board a 

 sloop at Aldborough, and, working his way, arrived in London in 

 April 1780. 



He took lodgings near the Exchange, and set about authorship with 

 vigour. He projected the publication of a prose work, entitled ' A 

 Plan for the Examination of our Moral and Religious Opinions ;' but 

 thought it expedient, before publishing this, to make himself known 

 by a poem. Two poems, prepared with thia view, were rejected by 

 the booksellers to whom they were offered. He now published, on 

 his own account, a poein entitled ' The Candidate ;' but almost imme- 

 diately after it appeared the publisher failed, and all hopes of profit 

 from this attempt were thus taken away. His stock of money mean- 

 while had gradually disappeared, and he was reduced to great distress. 

 Ha had been advised at Aldborough to apply for assistance to Lord 

 North : he did so, and received none. He then applied to Lord 

 Shelburne and Lord Thurlow, inclosing some of his poems to both ; 

 but these applications were equally unsuccessful with the former. At 

 last, and not till after he had been threatened with arrest, he bethought 

 himself of Burke. The letter which he addressed to Burko is a beautiful 

 piece of writing, simple, dignified, and pathetic. " The night after I 

 delivered my letter at hi* door," he told Mr. Lockhart some years after, 

 " I was iu such a state of agitation, that I walked Westminster bridge 

 backwards and forwards uutil daylight." Burke immediately appointed 

 a time at which he would see Crabbe ; he received him with great 

 kindness, and encouraged him to -show him all his compositions. 

 Having selected the ' Library ' and the ' Village,' and having suggested 

 in them many alterations which Cmbbe assented to, he took these 

 poems himself to Mr. Dodsley. The 'Library' was in consequence 

 published in 1731. But Burke's attention did not s,top here. He 

 assisted him with money, and gave him a room at Beaconsfield, where 

 he was treated in every way as one of the family ; he introduced him 

 to Fox, Sir Joshua Reynolds, Lord Thurlow, and other distinguished 

 friends ; and having advised Crabbe to think of entering the church, 

 towards which he found him by no means disinclined, he exerted all 

 his influence to get him ordained. His conduct towards Crabbe is 

 indeed a brilliant chapter iu the history of Burke. 



Crabbe was admitted to deacon's orders in December 1781 by Dr. 

 Tonge, bishop of Norwich, and was ordained a priest in August of the 

 year following. He commenced his clerical Ufa as curate of his native 

 town. Shortly after he obtained, through Burke's influence, the 

 situation of domestic chaplain to the Duke of Rutland, and resided in 

 consequence at Uelvotr Caitle. The ' Village ' appeared in 1783, having 

 been revised by Dr. Johnson : its success was great, and Crabbe's 

 reputation was uow fully established. In the same year Lor 1 Thurlow, 

 who had taken a previous opportunity of apologising for his first 

 repulse of Crabbe, presented him with two small livings in Dorsetshire, 

 telling him, as he gave them, that ' he was as like Parson Adams as 

 twelve to the dozen." Crabbe uow married Kits Sarah Elmy, tlie 

 object of his first love. The Duke of Rutland had been in the mean- 

 time appointed lord lieu tenant of Ireland. Crabbe did not accompany 

 him to Ireland, but apartments in Belvoir Castle were assigned to the 

 young married couple. In 1785 Crabbe took the neighbouring curacy 

 of Strathern, and removed from the castle to the parsonage of that 

 parish. 



Cribbe published the 'Newspaper' in 1735. He did not come 

 forward a.g.tiu as an author until 1807, when after au interval of 

 twenty-two years appeared the ' Pari-h Register.' He resided in the 

 meanwhile successively at Strathern, at Muston iu Leicestershire 

 (L'ird Thurlow having in 17S9, at the Duchess of Rutland's earnest 

 request, exchanged his two small livings iu Dorsetshire for those of 

 .\i u.ituii and AlBugton, both situated iu the Vale of Bilvoir) ; from 

 1792 to 1796 at Parhain iu Suffolk, taking charge of the neighbouring 

 curacies of Sweffiing and Great Glemham; thon in Great Gletnhani 

 Hall, a h >use belonging to Mr. Dudley North, his early benefactor ; 

 uutil at last, in 1805, he returned to his rectory at Muston. Though 

 during this long period Crabbe published no poetry, he was not idle. 

 He studied botany, which bad always been a favourite pursuit, with 

 great ardour ; and wrote au essay on botany in English, which he was 

 on the point of publishing when, yielding to the remonstrances of a 

 vice-master of Trinity College, CambriJge, against degrading the science 

 by treating it in a modem tongue, he consigned his manuscript to the 

 Maines. He also pursued entomology and geology. He taught himself 

 Ki-'-ii'ili and Italian, and superintended the education of his sons. He 

 wa* lso, according to hU son's account, continually writing; and 

 j; hit compositions during this period were three novels, which, 

 upon bis wife's suggesting that the tales would have been better in 

 ver'e, he consigned to the same fate with the essay on botany. 



Together with ' The Parish Register ' there appeared, in 1807, ' Sir 

 Eustace Grey ' and other smaller pieces, and a reprint of his earlier 

 poems; the object of the publication being to enable him to send bis 

 xecond oa to Cambridge. Three yeais after ho published 'The 

 i^h.' In 1813 he sustained a heavy affliction iu the loss of his 

 wife; and it WM a fortunate circumstance, at a time when every scene 

 at SIuMon would excite a painful remembrance, that the Duke of 

 Rutland, the son of hi* former patron, gave him the living of Trow- 

 bridge in Wiltshire. The incumbency of Croxton near Bslvoir was 

 added shortly after. 



The remainder of C'rabbe's days were, with the exception of occa- 

 sional visits to his friends iu London aad elsewhere, parsed at Trow- 

 bridge, where his conscientious discharge of his duties and his amiable 

 character gained for him the love of all his parishioners. When iu 

 London he was much courted by those among the great who are 

 studious to derive distinction from the patronage of literary men : 

 and he made the acquaintance of most of those who, during his 

 retirement, had earned for themselves fame in his own vocation 

 Rogers, Moore, Campbell, Wordsworth, Southey, aud Sir Walter Scott. 

 His 'Tales of the Hall" were published iu 1S19 by Mr. Murray, who 

 gave him SQOOZ. for them and the remaining copyright of his previous 

 poems. In the autumn of 1822 he visited Sir \Valter Scott at Edin- 

 burgh. From 1823 there was a perceptible change iu his health, and 

 though his mind retained its wonted cheerfulness, his strength of 

 body gradually declined. He died on the 3rd of February 1S32, iu 

 his seventy-eighth year. The shops iu Trovcbridge were closed as soon 

 as his death was known, and again on the day of his funeral ; and a 

 subscription was immediately set on foot among his parishioners for a 

 monument to their departed rector, which has sincj been placed in 

 Trowbridge church. 



The moral character of Crabbe is an almost perfect model. It* 

 greatest fault was an excess of gentleness. Rising from A very low 

 situation in life, he came to associate much with those whom the 

 world sets up for worship ; but, under circumstances whose corrupting 

 influence few have withstood, he never lost that habit of self-dependence 

 without which there is neither dignity nor happiness. Joined with 

 an indifference to factitious distinctions, was an absence of nil pride 

 occasioned by his own intellectual eminence. He was meek, observant 

 of merit in others, and eager to impart to those who were, as he had 

 been, distressed, a share of the advantages which his own good fortune 

 had procured for him. As a husband, father, aud friend, he was 

 without reproach. His son's account of the manner in which his days 

 were p .seed at the parsonage presents a delightful picture of domestic 

 happiness. 



The distinguishing excellences of Crabbe's poetry are simplicity, 

 pathos, force, and truth in describing character. He has said himself 

 that all his characters were taken from persons whom he had seen and 

 known. Observing these closely, and specifying each trait and minute 

 circumstance, he presents his readers with representations not of 

 classes of men, but of individuals. It is the minute accuracy of these 

 representations that constitutes their charm. Who can forget Isaac 

 Ashford ? The celebrated descriptions of the parish workhouse, and 

 of the " disputatious crew " of thieves and smugglers iu ' The Parish. 

 Register,' show the same faculty of minute observation, and have tho 

 same charm of faithful delineation. There ara also in his poems some 

 good descriptions of natural scenery, for instance, at the commence- 

 ment of 'The Village;' but then it is only scenery of tke sort for 

 which what Jeffrey called his " Chinese accuracy " is fitted. Crabbe 

 had little inventive power. Viewing him moreover not merely as a 

 poet whosa business is to please, but as one possessing powers which 

 it is his duty to employ for the improvement of his fellow men and 

 the increase of social happiness, it may be fairly objected to him that 

 he has seldom gone beyond the representation of existing evil, or 

 taught how the poor, of whom he is emphatically called the poet, 

 may be made wiser, and better, and happier. 



An edition of Crabbe's poems in 8 vols. was published by Murray 

 in 1834. The eighth volume consists of a collection of tales in verse, 

 then published lor the first time, which will not add much to the 

 author's reputation. The ' Life ' by his sou, the Rev. George Crabbe, 

 a very pleasing piece of filial biography, occupies the first volume. 



CRABTREE, WILLIAM. [See Hounox, JBRH.MIAII, as very nearly 

 all that is known of Crabtrea arises from the correspondence of tho 

 two.] 



CKAIG, JOHN, born in 1511, was educated at St. Andrews, Scot- 

 land, and then became a tutor in England to the children of Lord 

 Dacrc. Returning to his native country when the two kingdoms were 

 involved in war, he entered the Dominican order, but was shortly 

 afterwards imprisoned on a suspicion of heresy. On regaining his 

 liberty, he went into England again, thence to France, and finally to 

 Rome, where his talents recommenced him to the notice of Cardinal 

 Pole, under whose direction he entered the Dominican order at 

 Bologna. Hera he becama entrusted with the education of the novices, 

 and was also employed in various ecclesiastic missions throughout tho 

 continent ; aud for his important services was rewarded by the appoiut- 

 ment of rector to one of the schools of the order. Having afterwards 

 become a convert to the opinions of Calvin, he was seized, aud accused 

 of heresy, then sent to Rome, where, after an imprisonment of nine 

 months, he was summoned to stand his trial before the court of 

 Inquisition. Here he made a bold confession of his faith, and, beiu^ 

 accordingly convicted, was condemned to be burnt. 



It happened however that on the night previous to the day on 

 which this sentence was to be put iu execution, the pope died, and 

 the populace rejoicing to ba free from his yoke, rose iu a tumultuous 

 manner, and broke opeu the prisons. Craig came forth from his cell, 

 and Bed to Vienna, whence, after remaining there a short tiuie.he was 

 dismissed by the emperor with letters of siifu-concluct, under the pro- 

 tection of which he passed through Germany into England, and thenoe 

 to Scotland, where ho arrived soon after the establishment of the 



