GARDENS OF CELEBRITIES 



His tragedy of Cato had been a phenomenal success. The 

 Spectator, when it followed The Tatler, a still greater one. It 

 ventured boldly, to take a high moral and religious tone, even in 

 that age of licence, and riotous irreligion. But what need to 

 enlarge upon its merits ? Or to tell how it alternated gravity 

 with innocent mirth, and moved men to better living, by laughter 

 as well as by pathos. The Countess must have glowed with pride 

 pride in him who wooed her when she heard Addison's praises 

 passed from mouth to mouth, knowing that the choicest treasures 

 of the great writer's wit and conversation were still reserved for 

 her. Rumour says that she was arrogant, and had the pride of 

 place and birth but there must have been " something in her," 

 as we should phrase it now, or Addison would not have loved her 

 so long and faithfully. Therefore I like to think that in her 

 heart she recognized how far she was beneath him, that when she 

 opened her Spectator, as she sipped her chocolate or her bohea, a 

 little smile that was not all triumph in her conquest, but was, 

 indeed, all tenderness, nickered round her beautiful mouth, when 

 she read ; and I would fain believe that she had indeed the " pride 

 of place," but that it was her place in the heart of her so noble 

 lover. 



Addison was only forty-seven at the time of his death. As is 

 well known, he summoned his wild young stepson to his bedside 

 " to see how a Christian can die," referring to which Horace 

 Walpole sardonically remarked : " He died of brandy ! ' : In this 

 connection I may mention that the celebrated library at Holland 

 House, formerly a picture gallery, which runs across the buildings 

 from east to west, and measures 110 feet by about 17 the great 

 west window of which is shown in my illustration is the place 

 where the famous essayist was in the habit of walking his de- 

 tractors said, " with a bottle at one end and a bottle at the other." 

 I do not believe this. Addison was in failing health, though still 

 in early middle age, and if he indulged to some extent in a vice 

 unhappily very common among men of position in those days 

 every excuse should be made for him particularly if there be 

 any truth in the assertion that he and the countess whom he had 

 wooed so long, did not live happily together. "Holland House," 

 says one author, " is a large mansion, but could not contain Mr. 

 Addison, the Countess of Warwick, and one guest peace." 



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