Arbuthnotiana

Arbuthnotiana: The Story of the St. Alb-ns Ghost (1712) A Catalogue of Dr. Arbuthnot"s Library (1779).

by Anonymous.

INTRODUCTION

The two pieces here reproduced have long been unavailable; their connections with Arbuthnot are rather complex. _The Story of the St.

Alb-ns Ghost_ has been ambiguously a.s.sociated with Arbuthnot since the year of its first publication, but it does not seem to have been reprinted since the nineteenth century when editors regularly included it among the minor works of Swift. Whoever wrote it, the _Story_ is a lively and effective Tory squib, whose narrative vigor can carry even the twentieth-century reader over the occasional topical obscurities. _A Catalogue of the ... Library of ... Dr. Arbuthnot_ has never been reprinted at all, and appears to be unknown by scholars who have thus far written about Arbuthnot.

_The Story of the St. Alb-ns Ghost_, the first piece included, has always been of doubtful authorship, and must for the present so continue. Two days after the _Story_ first appeared, Swift tantalizingly wrote to Stella: "I went to Ld Mashams to night, & Lady Masham made me read to her a pretty 2 penny Pamphlet calld the St Albans Ghost. I thought I had writt it my self; so did they, but I did not" (22 February 1712). Whoever wrote it, the _Story_ succeeded: it was pirated within a week, and had reached its third regular "edition" within three weeks of the first; it appeared in a fifth and apparently final edition on 19 July 1712.[1] Now just during these same months Arbuthnot was producing his first political satires, five pamphlets later gathered under the t.i.tle _History of John Bull_. He published the first of these 4 March 1712 and the last 31 July 1712.[2] There are several thematic and methodological connections between _The Story of The St. Alb-ns Ghost_ and the John Bull pamphlets: as Tory propaganda pieces, they attack leading Whigs and make the usual suggestions about irreligion, moral turpitude and misuse of public funds. Furthermore, they do so by means of vigorous if sometimes difficult reductive allegories which mock the victims by presenting them as farcical figures from low life. The connection as well as the difficulties must have appeared quite early, for some enterprising publisher (presumably Curll)[3] soon brought out _A Complete Key to the Three Parts of Law is a Bottomless-Pit, and the Story of the St. Alban"s Ghost_. Although the exact date of this is not known, it must lie between the _termini_ 17 April and 9 May 1712, the dates of the third and fourth parts respectively of John Bull.

Furthermore, a "Second Edition Corrected" of the Key appeared before the publication of pamphlet four. (The last pages of these two Keys, concerning the _Story of the St. Alb-ns Ghost_, are reproduced in the Appendix.) The Key ran through two further editions as _A Complete Key to the Four Parts of Law is a Bottomless-Pit, and the Story of the St.

Alban"s Ghost_, presumably before 31 July 1712, and came to a fifth (seemingly last) edition with a more general t.i.tle referring to "all Parts" of John Bull, and still including the _Story_.

While the Keys by a.s.sociation suggest Arbuthnot as author, the only other contemporary doc.u.ment attributes the _Story_ to a different physician and wit: the so-called _Miscellaneous Works of Dr. William Wagstaffe_ (London, 1726) reprint the fourth edition of the Story. Now the _Miscellaneous Works_ were printed some five months after the death of Dr. Wagstaffe and more than three months after that of the supposed editor Dr. Levett;[4] it is possible that the contents are in part erroneous. In any case, Arbuthnot, Wagstaffe and Swift remain the possible authors with whom scholars must deal until some further evidence is forthcoming. Roscoe interprets Swift"s ambiguous remarks in the _Journal to Stella_ as an indirect acknowledgement, and Dilke goes one step further in a.s.suming that the so-called _Miscellaneous Works of Dr. Wagstaffe_ are a mystification, a means for Swift to pa.s.s off works which he did not wish to include in the _Miscellanies_ with Pope. Sir Walter Scott thinks that the _Story_ is probably a collaboration between Arbuthnot and Swift, "judging from the style"; Professor Herbert Davis dissociates Wagstaffe material generally from the writings of Swift, but does not specifically mention the _Story_; however, "Mr. Granger thought St. Alban"s Ghost, attributed to Dr. Wagstaffe, was [Arbuthnot"s]."[5]

Although recent scholars seem to agree in selecting Wagstaffe as author of the _Story_, the evidence of the 1726 _Works_ is implicitly contradicted by the Keys. I have made two separate attempts to solve the question of authorship, neither of which has been fully satisfactory.

The first of these, a computerized test based on the methods of Professor Louis T. Milic for distinguishing works by Swift from works by other authors, has given inconclusive results. In this test the _Story_ was the chief unknown, and was compared with samples of similar length from Swift, Arbuthnot, Wagstaffe and, as a control, Mrs. Manley, who wrote politically keyed narratives but has never been a.s.sociated with the _Story_. The _Story_ turned out to be fairly similar to all four authors in the number of different three-word patterns (D), and unlike all of them in number of Introductory Connectives (IC), where Wagstaffe stood the highest, and the _Story_ by far the lowest. In the proportion of Verbals (VB) the _Story_ and Wagstaffe were fairly close together and different from the other authors tested, who cl.u.s.tered near the Swift figures. Thus the test tends to exclude Swift, Arbuthnot and Mrs. Manley as possible authors, but does not encourage a full confidence in replacing them with Wagstaffe. (It also tends to show that some of the other pieces included in the so-called _Miscellaneous Works of Dr.

Wagstaffe_ differ considerably in the usages tested both from one another and from the patterns established by the signed works of Dr.

Walstaffe.)[6]

My second attempt was based on textual changes among editions of the _Story_. In the second edition there are three small changes from the first; the third and fourth editions seem to be line-for-line reprints of the second. (The "sham, Imperfect Sort" introduces a large number of variants, mainly errors.) In the fifth edition, however, somebody has altered the typography: many past forms of verbs are altered. Thus at the bottom of p. 3 _unbody"d_ becomes _unbodyed_, _carry"d_ and _deliver"d_ become _carryed_, _delivered_. The task of editing is not complete; particularly near the end of the fifth edition many verbs still carry the apostrophe of the earlier editions. The date of the attempt suggests that Swift"s _Proposal for Correcting, Improving and Ascertaining the English Tongue_ (first published 17 May 1712, a week after the fourth edition of the _Story_) could have provided the motivation, and also that Swift himself could not have been the person who made the changes. A study of a few contemporaries shows that Swift himself tried to eliminate the apostrophes from the _Conduct of the Allies_, first published 27 November 1711, and from other works published after that date, but not from works published before that date. Oldisworth, apparently under the instructions of Swift, tried to do the same during the first few months of the _Examiner_, vol. 2 (beginning 6 December 1711), but by the time he reached volume 3, Oldisworth had apparently given up the struggle against unwilling printers. Arbuthnot, Roper and Manley are not very interested in the matter, and neither are other pamphleteers published by Morphew during the months immediately following Swift"s _Proposal_. The items included in the so-called _Miscellaneous Works of Dr. Wagstaffe_, on the other hand, fall into three groups chronologically: those which precede Swift"s _Proposal_, and include many apostrophied verb forms; those which immediately follow Swift"s _Proposal_, and include abnormally few apostrophied verb forms; the two "late" pieces (1715, 1719), which are back to the proportion of apostrophied verbs to be found in the early items. If Pseudo-Wagstaffe was indeed a single writer, then he followed the same pattern as Oldisworth, but began later and continued longer to use verbs with an _-ed_ ending. Since the genuine signed prose works of Dr. Wagstaffe come "late" (1717, 1721) and have a fairly large (i.e., normal) number of apostrophied verbs, there is no evidence here as to whether or not Pseudo-Wagstaffe is Wagstaffe; at least there is no contradiction. In the light of these facts, we can see that neither Swift nor Arbuthnot is a probable author of the _Story_; Swift would presumably have altered verb typography in the first and all editions, and Arbuthnot would not have altered it at all.[7] In these two projects on authorship we find that authors other than Wagstaffe tend to be eliminated, but that Wagstaffe himself is not strongly confirmed. The authorship remains as problematic as before, and the _Story_ may as well for this century continue with the Arbuthnotiana, as it did during the nineteenth with the Swiftiana.

The device of using a ghost story as vehicle for political satire was by 1712 a well-established one. Elias F. Mengel Jr. refers to "the "ghost"

convention, so popular in the Restoration,"[8] and an important poem of Queen Anne"s reign shows some similarities with and perhaps provided a model for the _Story_. In _Moderation Display"d_ (London, 1705) the recently deceased second Earl of Sunderland rises from h.e.l.l to confound his guilty Whig companions. Tonson (Bibliopolo) is the most terrified, and as in the _Story_ Wharton (Clodio) is so wicked that he is not frightened at all. The _Story_, however, is both more subtle and more flexible than most other satiric "ghost" narratives. It compresses the actual apparition into the last quarter of the narrative, despite the perhaps deliberately misleading t.i.tle. Nearly half of the _Story_ deals with previous events; much of the rest is machinery, introduction of seemingly irrelevant details with a mischievous verisimilitude which actually advances the main satiric aims. The opening paragraph, for example, first denounces Roman Catholic superst.i.tion, a denunciation which almost every Englishman could join, and then turns the fire toward "Our Sectarists." The war on heterodoxy continues in the references to Dr. Garth, the Whig poet and physician noted for his scepticism in religion, to William Whiston who during the winter of 1711-1712 was transcribing doc.u.ments and writing elaborate treatises to uphold his view that Christian churches and theologians had all been essentially heretical since the time of Athanasius, and to the Reverend and Honourable Lumley Lloyd, a low-church minister whose sermons attracted at least two Tory satires.[9] None of these men belongs in the narrative, and only Garth was even remotely connected with the Marlboroughs, but all of them were Whigs, and in various ways serve to "demonstrate" that Whigs must be false brethren to the Church of England.

This charge, although a cliche of Tory satires, is here made indirect and witty, as are the staple charges against the Duke and d.u.c.h.ess of Marlborough. Whereas, however, the wickedness of nonconformity had been attacked for decades, the Duke of Marlborough had been a.s.sociated with the Whigs for a relatively short time. As late as 1706 Wagstaffe could generously declare that "_Woodstock"s_ too little" a reward (_Ramelies, a Poem_), but since Swift"s "Bill of British Ingrat.i.tude" in the _Examiner_ (17 November 1710) the Tory press had begun to say that the rewards were too many and too great. The _Story_ repeats the charge that Avaro and Haggite "grew Richer than their Mistress" (p. 11), together with the ridiculous insinuations of cowardice and incompetence found constantly reiterated in the second volume of _Examiners_. The d.u.c.h.ess of Marlborough attracted ma.s.sive satire earlier than her husband, in such books as _The Secret History of Queen Zarah_ (London, 1705),[10]

and her habit of saying "Lawrd" with an affected drawl is mentioned in _The Secret History of Arlus and Odolphus_ (n.p., 1710), pp. 21, 22, 23.

Although not so frequent as attacks on the Duke and d.u.c.h.ess of Marlborough, attacks on Mrs. Jennings the mother of the d.u.c.h.ess had already been made, and indeed the _Story_ relies for part of its effect on the fact that Mrs. Jennings is already a.s.sociated with witchcraft. In _Memoirs of Europe_ (London, 1710)[10] for example, she inherits a familiar spirit from Sir Kenelm Digby, there reported the real father of the d.u.c.h.ess (II, 44-46). In _Oliver"s Pocket Looking-Gla.s.s_ (n.p., 1711) Mrs. Jennings appears as "the famous Mother Shipton, who by the Power and Influence of her Magick Art, had plac"d a Daughter in the same Station at Court [i.e., Maid of Honour] with _Meretricia_ [Arabella Churchill] ..." (p. 21). Because the author of the Story a.s.sumes that previous Tory allegations are well-known, he is free to perform elegant variations or to allude indirectly. a.s.suming the fact of witchcraft allows him to heap up an ambiguous burlesque of popular superst.i.tion which is in part entertainment and in part reb.u.t.tal of recent Whig sneers at Tory credulity during the Jane Wenham witch trial.[11] Here as throughout the pamphlet, the author demonstrates the virtuosity which even Swift commends. Since Swift praises few pamphlets except those written by himself and Arbuthnot (or occasionally Mrs. Manley), the _Story_ enters a fairly select company. It is the only Pseudo-Wagstaffe piece mentioned by name in the _Journal to Stella_, the only one found worthy to stand beside the productions of Swift and Arbuthnot.[12]

The second doc.u.ment reproduced claims to be _A Catalogue of the Capital and Well-Known Library of Books, of the Late Celebrated Dr. Arbuthnot_.

To the extent that the claim is true, the _Catalogue_ will be important for studies of the Scriblerian Club generally, since Arbuthnot is the member with the greatest reputation for learning. Although the contents of a man"s library do not correspond exactly with the contents of his mind, scholars can discover a good deal about the intellectual methods of Dr. Arbuthnot by examining the books which he owned. Until now this has not been possible; the _Catalogue_ is a recent acquisition of the British Museum, not so much as mentioned in books thus far published about Arbuthnot. For several reasons, however, the doc.u.ment must be used with caution. First of all, the compilers list a total of 2525 volumes, but they itemize only 1639,[13] and even then often give inadequate information. Furthermore, a xerox copy of the Sale Book records of the auction, very kindly sent to me by the present Messrs. Christie, Manson and Woods, shows that almost a quarter of the lots (items 53-65, 243-245, 276-372, 426), or 999 volumes, belonged not to the Arbuthnot estate but to other owners. Finally, Dr. Arbuthnot died in 1735, whereas the auction was not held until December 1779, about three and a half months after the death of his bachelor son George. Of the books belonging to the Arbuthnot estate, almost 20% were printed after 1735, and belonged not to the father but to the son, or perhaps in some cases to the daughter Anne, who lived with her brother.[14] The legal books are likely all to have been George Arbuthnot"s, and presumably some of the other books printed before 1735 also. Despite these obscurities, the Catalogue throws a good deal of new light upon the most learned Scriblerian--and upon his family.

Dr. Arbuthnot seems to have bought relatively few antiquarian books; about 20% of the itemized volumes belonging to his estate come before 1691, the year when he first went to London. In selecting these older works Arbuthnot has shown a catholic taste and linguistic ability: he bought grammars and dictionaries, besides works on medicine and science, literature, history and religion, written in English, French, Italian, Latin and Greek, plus a solitary Hebrew Bible (item 234); his copy of Udall"s _Key to the Holy Tongue_ is dated 1693 (item 183). Less than a quarter of these earlier books are in English. The sole "cradle" date of the catalogue, 1495 for _Rosa Anglica_ (item 417), may be a misprint: editions of 1492 and 1595, among others, have been previously recorded, but none for 1495.[15]

When compared with the antiquarian books, the list of t.i.tles from the Arbuthnot estate either dated or first published after the death of Dr.

Arbuthnot reveals a number of differences. English is the predominant language of the late group, with French a poor second. There is another Hebrew Bible (253), a Spanish Cervantes (25), an Italian Machiavelli (96), but no Greek book at all, and astonishingly only two Latin: a dictionary (89) and a Horace (147); Cicero appears in a French translation (26). In part, of course, the shift in languages accompanies the general decline of humanistic learning in the eighteenth century, but it also strengthens our knowledge of Dr. Arbuthnot"s erudition.

Although apparently not interested in science, George Arbuthnot read widely, however, in other areas (see for example 10, 15, 49, 158, 160, 168, 170, 254, 271). Similarly, the books from outside the Arbuthnot estate are less learned than those of Arbuthnot. They do include two Greek testaments (290, 310) and some recent scientific works (e.g. 314, *349), but lack the great Greek writers whom Arbuthnot collected, such as Plato (125), Aristotle (126), Herodotus (385) or Aristophanes (387).

Whereas Arbuthnot read Newton"s treatises (81, 85, 197, 217), one of the other owners read Algarotti"s simplification (*312).

The subjects of the books in the Arbuthnot estate can be variously divided. By sheer number of t.i.tles, literature is the most important subject, closely followed by science (including medicine as the biggest sub-group), and then by history. In number of volumes, however, the historical section is considerably larger than the literary, and science comes third. Books on geography and travel, philosophical treatises, grammars and dictionaries, even a work on astrology (109), attest to the breadth of Arbuthnot"s interests. A few works in the fine arts are listed, somewhat surprisingly only two of them on music (32, 373). The military item (391) may come from the Doctor"s brother George, who was in the army, or it may represent another aspect of the general interest in all human affairs. There is a fairly large number of religious works, including books by Eusebius and Sozomen (127), Spotswood (380), Huet (383), Charles Leslie (251), Leibniz (141), Tillotson (395) and Jeremy Taylor (3,394). The elaborately bound Greek Septuagint (272) and Greek New Testament (273) must be the ones which Arbuthnot specified in his will (the only books there mentioned), calling them "the Gift of my late Royal Mistress Queen Anne."[16] As the _Catalogue_ does not describe any other fine bindings, the other books seem to have been bought for use rather than for show.

A study of the duplications among the books in the Arbuthnot estate reinforces the opinion that the books were bought for use. The only items appearing three times are the works of Pope (76, 180) and Pope"s _Iliad_ (11, 77, 242). Since two of the former were published after the death of Arbuthnot, and must have belonged to the Arbuthnot children, perhaps the extra _Iliads_ were equally the property of Arbuthnot"s heirs. The duplicates of Moliere (21, 135), Prideaux (50, 379), and Veneroni (90, *229) could also have belonged to the children. However, the bulk of the duplications seem to involve obtaining a later edition or a necessary text, and thus to have a scholarly rationale. For example, the two editions of Eustachius are dated 1714, 1728 (115, 259), those of Livy are dated 1578, 1708 (7, 386), while both sets of Sennertus seem to be broken (406, 407).

Not surprisingly, Arbuthnot owned a number of satirical works. In addition to Pope and Moliere, already mentioned, he owned Petronius (9), Juvenal and Persius (230), Terence (231), Plautus (232), Boileau (98), Gay (79) and Swift"s _Tale of a Tub_ (178). He presumably bought or was given other works by Swift, but no others are itemized; perhaps some were in the "Large parcel of pamphlets" (1). George Arbuthnot added a copy of _The Four Last Years of Queen Anne_ (173), not published until 1758.

Although literature bulks large among Arbuthnot"s books, English poetry is not very conspicuous. According to some of the dates, Arbuthnot may have developed his interest in English poetry rather late in life.

Although he owned a 1611 Spenser (423), he did not buy the listed Chaucer (110) until 1721. Pope may have inspired the urge to acquire Milton (80, 185), but there seems to be no literary reason for wanting a Milton in French (184). Some other member of the family was, however, sufficiently interested in Milton to buy Newton"s edition in 1749 (78).

The minor poets listed are also late in date (72, 187). The only Dryden is the translation of Virgil (16), which could represent an interest in cla.s.sical just as much as in English poetry. There are, however, two copies of Prior"s _Poems_ in the large paper edition (106, 252). As the compilers of the _Catalogue_ have left many volumes unspecified, there must have been other poetic works, but the listed sample is rather small.

Characteristically uninterested in his personal fame, Arbuthnot kept no copies of his own writings except the reissued _Tables of Ancient Coins_ (84, 193), a.s.sociated with a favorite son. The reader revealed by this library is the same Arbuthnot whom his contemporaries admired: witty, yet thoughtful and religious; deeply learned, yet modest. His children, although less learned than the father, continued to buy books on current topics, particularly literature, history and travel. Aged over seventy, George Arbuthnot was still ingesting such materials as Laughton"s _History of Ancient Egypt_ (168) and Raynal"s comprehensive history of colonialism (10). Despite the obscurity of the word "more" under which the compilers listed half of the total volumes, even the sample of the library is a welcome addition to our knowledge about Dr. Arbuthnot.

University of Victoria

NOTES TO THE INTRODUCTION

[1] See advertis.e.m.e.nts in the _Evening Post_, 19, 21, 26 February, 13 March 1712; and in the _Post-Boy_, 10 May and 19 July 1712.

The research necessary for the present publication was supported by a grant from the University of Victoria and by a Leave Fellowship from the Canada Council.

[2] The dates given by Professor H. Teerink in _The History of John Bull for the first time faithfully re-issued from the original pamphlets_ (Amsterdam, 1925), pp. 6-7, are drawn from dates in the Examiner, a weekly newspaper. Three of these dates are correct, and the other two are close, but can be corrected by consulting papers published more often. The first pamphlet seems to have appeared on 4 March 1712 (see _Post-Boy_ of that date), and the third may have appeared on 16 April 1712 (see the _Daily Courant_ of 16 and 17 April; the _Post-Boy_, however, agrees with the _Examiner_ on the date 17 April).

[3] Although no publisher is named on the t.i.tle page of the Keys, the fifth edition is advertised among "New Pamphlets Printed for E. Curll"

on the back of the half-t.i.tle page to _The Tunbridge-Miscellany: Consisting of Poems, &c. Written at Tunbridge-Wells this Summer. By Several Hands_ (London, 1712).

[4] Wagstaffe died 5 May 1726, Levett 2 July 1726; the _Miscellaneous Works_ were published on about 18 October 1726. Dr. Norman Moore in his account of Wagstaffe has shown that the "life" in the _Miscellaneous Works_ is substantially correct, and has suggested that Dr. Levett wrote it; see Moore, _History of St. Bartholomew"s Hospital_ (London, 1918), II, 523-529.

[5] Thomas Roscoe, ed., _The Works of Jonathan Swift_ (London, 1850), I, 529; [C.W. Dilke], "Dean Swift and the Scriblerians v. Dr. Wagstaffe,"

_Notes and Queries_, 3d ser., I, 381-384; Sir Walter Scott, ed., _The Works of Swift_, 2d ed. (London, 1883), V, 414; Herbert Davis, "Introduction," Prose Works of Swift, VIII, xiv-xv; Mark n.o.ble, _A Biographical History of England, From the Revolution to the end of George I"s Reign_ (London, 1806), III, 367-368. Vinton A. Dearing in his "Jonathan Swift or William Wagstaffe?" _HLB_, VII (1953), 121-130, makes a survey of previous discussions, and concludes that Wagstaffe wrote all the pieces in the _Miscellaneous Works_. See also the article cited in footnote 6.

[6] "Words and Numbers: A Quant.i.tative Approach to Swift and some Understrappers," _Computers and the Humanities_, IV (1970), 289-304.

This article has been reprinted with minor revisions in Roy Wisbey, ed., _The Computer in Literary and Linguistic Research_ (Cambridge, 1971), pp. 129-147.

[7] The question of verb typography will be further studied in a future article.

[8] _Poems on Affairs of State: Augustan Satirical Verse_, II (New Haven, 1965), 217.

[9] _Tint for Taunt. The Manager Managed: or the Exemplary MODERATION and MODESTY, of a Whig Low-Church-Preacher discovered, from his own Mouth_ (London, 1710); _and Punch turn"d Critick, in a Letter to the Honourable and (some time ago) Worshipful Rector of Covent-Garden. With some Wooden Remarks on his Sermon_ (n.p., 1712). Neither squib is of much literary value, but the second acquires some interest by being a.s.sociated with the _Story of the St. Alb-ns Ghost_ and a third edition of _A Learned Comment on Tom Thumb_ (an earlier Pseudo-Wagstaffe piece) in the advertising column of _Examiner_, vol. II, no. 13 (28 February 1712).

[10] Reproduced in _The Novels of Mary Delariviere Manley_, intro. by P.

Koster (Gainesville, Fla., 1971), 2 vols.

[11] Jane Wenham was sentenced 4 March 1712. White Kennet lists a number of pamphlets on both sides in _The Wisdom of Looking Backwards_ (London, 1715), pp. 203-205, but does not mention the _Story_. The _Protestant Post-Boy_ has a series of articles, stemming from the trial, on the improbability of witchcraft (3, 5, 8, 12 April 1712), but predictably ignores the _Story_.

[12] Dr. Moore, however, seems to include the _Story_ in his condemnation of all the Pseudo-Wagstaffe pieces except the _Comment upon ... Tom Thumb_ (now reproduced in Augustan Reprint no. 63) as "abusive, coa.r.s.e, or dull" (_History of St. Bartholomew"s Hospital_, II, 526).

[13] Mr. Allan Trumpour wrote a sorting program which provided the statistics here and below; Mr. James Carley and Mrs. Edna c.o.x both gave considerable help in preparing the contents of the _Catalogue_ for computer sorting.

[14] For biographical information see G.A. Aitken, _The Life and Works of John Arbuthnot_ (Oxford, 1892), pp. 159-161.