The Story of the House of Cassell/Part 1, Chapter 5

CHAPTER V

JOHN CASSELL AND LORD BROUGHAM AND OTHERS

Among the many great Englishmen who admired and encouraged Cassell's work Lord Brougham was chief. There was unquestionably a deep natural sympathy between this venerable aristocrat, who had so long been the English champion of education for the masses, and this working man who had become the leading propagator of the means of popular education. Brougham was not only the leader in the movement that led to the establishment of the University of London; in another sphere he was the begetter of that first of "mechanics' institutes," the Birkbeck. He was inevitably drawn to make the acquaintance of the man who had conceived and brought forth the " Popular Educator." They acquired a mutual liking and respect.

Brougham, though he had long retired from political life, and, past seventy years of age, was living mostly in his villa at Cannes, lost no opportunity when in England of praising his friend and advertising his enterprise. Speaking in Liverpool in October, 1858, at a meeting of the National Association for the Promotion of Social Science, he commended the "Popular Educator," and went on:

"Of one individual, John Cassell, who has taken a leading part—perhaps the most important part—in these proceedings it is fit to mention the name because he was himself a working man, who rose by his industry from a most humble station, has constantly lived with the working classes, and has the most complete knowledge of their habits and their tastes from daily unreserved intercourse with them. The variety of works which he has prepared and published is very great, and their circulation very extraordinary. The prices which he gives to secure the best assistance of literary men and of artists do the greatest credit to his liberality, but also to his good sense, as his remarkable success proves. He has given considerable sums by way of premium for the production of works by competition, in some cases as much as £100 and £200. It would be endless to enumerate the works which he and others have brought out upon this plan. One very remarkable publication of this class is the literature by working men (the Working Man's Friend), or essays on every variety of subject by working men, proving undeniably the benefits which they have derived from their studies, and also proving that they have not been distracted for one hour from their daily toil. That those works have encouraged a taste for reading among thousands who never read before, and have afforded the means of gratifying it, cannot be denied."

Brougham watched with close attention every effort to spread learning among working men and carefully observed its results. Whenever there occurred a striking example of successful self-education he used it to illustrate his general educational theory. In the speech just quoted he mentioned a tract on "Capital," written by a working man. No student of economic science at the English, "nay, at any of the Scotch universities, where it is more cultivated," could have produced, he said, "a better-reasoned tract, or one showing more entire acquaintance with its principles."

The working man in this instance was John Plummer, an obscure inhabitant of a Midland manufacturing town. Born of parents who were stay-makers struggling with poverty in the East End of London, he caught a fever in his early childhood which made him deaf and lame. The cripple, who could not share their games or hear their cries, was contemptuously neglected by the neighbouring children. He solaced the loneliness of his boyhood with what smattered reading he could get, and in his teens contrived to join an art school in Spitalfields and obtain some tuition in designing. The family moved to Kettering, where he became a factory "hand." But his love of reading did not leave him. He continued to devour every available book, and borrowed papers from a friendly newsvendor. Then he began to write short articles in the local Press on Trade Unionism, Sanitation, the Cotton Famine, and the like topical subjects, and occasionally broke into poetry on others.

His economic "tract" was dedicated to Lord Brougham. Plummer, of course, had not expected any public allusion to it. When, picking up the Times in his newsvendor's shop, he read Brougham's speech, he was, as he said, "so astonished" that he could hardly believe his senses. "Had I," his rhetorical question ran, "the deaf, lame, neglected boy, the humble toiler, won the approbation of one of our greatest men?" He certainly had, and Brougham's notice was exceedingly useful to him. He was soon able to leave the factory and earn a living with his pen. A poem in a Midland paper took Cassell's fancy, and Plummer was given a place on the staff at La Belle Sauvage. Thence he went to edit a newspaper at Sydney, where he "prospered exceedingly."

Brougham and Cassell met at the Liverpool Congress of the British Association in the same year (1858). The occasion is described by Cassell in a letter to his daughter, then at school in Paris—one of the very few of his letters, by the way, that have been preserved:

"I received a letter from Lord Brougham previous to leaving town, saying he was desirous of seeing me as soon as possible. I therefore met his lordship at the Edge Hill platform, where the tickets were taken, and from thence I came down with him to the Liverpool Station. I was anxious to get to Mamma; I therefore appointed to meet his lordship on this (Monday) morning. But before I could well reach 50, Mount Pleasant, Mr. Brown's carriage drove up. Mr. Brown is the member for South Lancashire, and the gentleman with whom Lord Brougham is staying. Nothing would do but I must go to Mr. B.'s for dinner. I stepped into the carriage and away we went. I spent a couple of hours with Lord Brougham before dinner, and then we met Lord John Russell. In the drawing-room were Lady John Russell and two of their daughters. The Hon. Miss Russell and I had a long chat together about Switzerland, Chamounix, etc. On Tuesday there was a magnificent assemblage to hear Lord Brougham on 'Popular Literature.' I sent you a Times, in which is contained the address of Lord B. You would see, if you have perused the address, how kindly he spoke of your papa and his efforts in the cause of cheap literature. . . . On Thursday there were sittings of the sections, and going out of one court into another we met Lord Brougham. 'Is this Mrs. Cassell?' he inquired, and shook hands very warmly. ... In the evening we went to the meeting of the working classes in the amphitheatre. The meeting was a magnificent one. Lords Brougham, Shaftesbury, Carlisle, and Sandon spoke. . . . . Friday more meetings. Took part in the discussion on the paper duty. . . . On Saturday attended a meeting for the distribution of prizes to successful candidates for the Oxford examinations. Lord Carlisle, W. E. Gladstone, and the Bishop of Chester spoke."

Of the Brougham correspondence little remains, but the following two letters show that the old statesman's ruling passion obsessed him in France as well as in England:

"Rue de Rivoli, Paris, 1858.

"My dear Mr. Cassell,—I am very happy to find that there is an anxious desire here among some of the most distinguished of my colleagues of the Academy to learn something of our popular literature. They have been much struck with the details given in the Liverpool address, and are bent on carrying forward the plan, and putting an end to the very bad publications here—some very idle and full of horrors, ghost stories, etc., but some also of a very immoral tendency. This seems to me a most important matter, and I have undertaken to obtain for them as complete a set as you can let me have, or can procure, of all the cheap publications. I don't grudge any expense for so great an object. Therefore pray do this: Have the whole packed in a box or boxes, and sent directly to me at this hotel, and in case I am gone before the box or boxes arrive, they will be taken immediately to the Institute (Academy), where those who are going to proceed upon them will receive them safe, and communicate with me on their operations.—Yours truly,

Brougham."

"Cannes.

"My dear Mr. C,—I cannot tell you how much I was grieved and distressed yesterday at being prevented from having the great pleasure of passing the evening with you, although I was here alone. But the shock I had received made me fit company for no one but myself, and not very fit for that.

"I went down to the lodge at our gate this morning in hopes of shaking hands with you as you passed. But the coach had gone before I got down. I met Dr. W. afterwards, and learnt from him that you were to go on to-morrow to Paris, and he gave me your address there.

"I have to beg a favour of you. We have not here a copy of the Illustrated Bible, and I wish you could send me one by railway parcel, and one to my excellent friend Mr. Woolfield. His address is T. H. Woolfield, Villa Victoria, Cannes. Of course, he and I will thankfully pay the carriage of these copies, and if you happen to have them at Paris, so much the better.

"Excuse all this trouble, and believe me—Ever most truly yours,

H. Brougham."

Brougham's last letter to his friend was of a different sort. It is interesting for its reference to the venerable lawyer and politician who survived into the third decade of the twentieth century as the Earl of Halsbury:

"4, Grafton Street.

"6th July, 1863.

"Dear Mr. Cassell,—I write this for the purpose of introducing to you my excellent friend Mrs. Lees Brown. She is daughter of the late learned and honest Dr. Giffard, formerly Editor of the Standard newspaper, a man highly esteemed by all scholars and by the members of the great Conservative party, to which he belonged. His daughter is governess in our family, and we have the greatest esteem for her. Her brother is an eminent lawyer, and well known in the courts where he practises.

"I am sure your kindness towards me will induce you to give her a favourable reception.—Believe me, most sincerely yours,

H. Brougham."

Not Lord Brougham alone, but all the public men who were concerned for progressive politics, had learned in the 'fifties to look upon Cassell as a friend and ally. Cobden has already been included in the list of his supporters in the Temperance campaign. A letter of this later period indicates the far wider scope that Cassell's interests and activities had now assumed:

"Midhurst.

"17th April, 1857.

"My dear Sir,—I am much obliged by your kind letter. It will give me great pleasure to meet you when in town. At present, however, I am tempted by the state of my health (which, however, is improving) to profit by the congé given me by the electors of Huddersfield and take a little rural rest and quietness. By the way, too much has been made of my defeat there. My good friends made a mistake in launching me. A strong local man was already in possession of the field, and the contest turned less on popular politics than on social influence, and the jealousies and rivalries of parties which formerly acted together. The place was too small for carrying an election by the influence of the Mayors. Nearly all the beershops and public-houses went against me. So did the Catholics, and all the Tories—the Catholics on the pretence that I was brought out by the Evangelical Dissenters. But the fact is I was too late, and had no chance from the first, and, truth to say, was not a good candidate for any new constituency—I mean where I had not had previous opportunities of taking root.

"All my difficulty has arisen from the blunder of my own zealous friends in electing me, whilst I was a thousand miles away, for the West Riding, as well as Stockport, and then bullying me against my will to give up my snug borough where I had a safe seat for life and taking the largest county constituency, well knowing I should not continue to hold it after Free Trade was settled. If I had been allowed to remain at Stockport my root-hold would have been so firm that no passing party breeze could have disturbed me. However, it suits me, on domestic and personal grounds, to be out of the House for the present.

"There is, I think, a tendency to Toryism in the country just now, owing to our long-continued prosperity. Politics are really very much a 'matter of victuals,' and people have always grown indifferent to public matters in proportion as they are well fed. I rely on the newspaper press, now for the first time really free, giving a more intellectual tone to our political life.

"I am much obliged to you for the perusal of the enclosed. I have often observed some very candid and able articles in the B. Journal upon questions in which I have been in most quarters greatly misrepresented. I am glad to know to whom I am indebted for them.

"The allusion in Mr. Thos. Crossland's letter was to an old pamphlet of mine published twenty-two years ago in opposition to the Russophobia of that day, in which I showed that Poland had fallen from her own inherent vices and misgovernment, and that the mass of the people were better treated by their conquerors than they had been by their own aristocratic rulers. Of course, I took care to guard myself from being supposed to justify Russia and the other partitionists. On the contrary, although showing that Poland had brought her extinction on herself by her own internal corruptions, I said I did not justify the instrument, or, as I called it, her 'hangmen.'

"However, this fine discrimination was too much for Crossland (an old Free Trade colleague of mine now acting with the Tories), who, I expect, wrote this letter whilst under the inspiration of something much stronger than your ordinary potations. The obvious answer to his accusation, if it needed a defence, is, Why did he elect me for the West Riding and allow me to sit for ten years as its member, and why did he follow me as his chief during the League agitation, if I had committed such an outrage on his sense of justice towards Poland ten years previously? They must have been terribly in want of a fit and proper man among themselves. However, these things are not worth notice.—Believe me, very truly yours,

"R. Cobden."

There is one note from John Bright which, though merely an answer to Cassell's request for a photograph, is characteristic:

"Llandudno.

"24th September, 1857.

"My dear Sir,—I have no portrait here, and indeed I don't know that I have one at all that my friends approve of. My sister, Mrs. Lucas, 3, St. Edmund's Terrace, North Gate, Regent's Park, has one which some like, and if you like it, I daresay she would lend it to you. I am weary of sitting for portraits, and of seeing myself in the newspapers in letter-press—at the same time I must thank you for your kind feeling towards me. If you don't like the photograph, you had better defer the matter to some future time.

"I hope your illustrated paper is doing well. The Penny Press is generally succeeding and extending. The Manchester Examiner and the Star are the best of them, I think.—Yours very truly,

John Bright."

Lord Shaftesbury was another correspondent whose letters to Cassell on minor points of business provided some entertaining self-revelation. Cassell had written to him asking him to adjudicate upon essays on Sanitary Reform for which prizes had been offered. Shaftesbury's reply shows both his attention to detail and his readiness to administer salutary advice on small provocation:

"St. Giles' House.

"21st December, 1858.

"Dear Mr. Cassell,—Your project is most laudable, and, judging by the success of the Sabbath Essays, will be well received and well executed.

"I should be very happy, had I full leisure, to act as adjudicator in the proposed essay on Sanitary (why do we write 'Sanatory'?) Reform, but I fear much the large influx of competitors, and the consequent inadequacy of my attention.

"If, however, the whole mass on that subject underwent a previous revision, and the numbers for final decision were reduced to a few, I could, I think, undertake the office.

"I have taken the liberty of suggesting one or two alterations in your prospectus. It should be drawn with care.—Your faithful servant,

Shaftesbury."

"28th May, 1864.

"Dear Mr. Cassell,—You have sent me two very beautiful books, the Pilgrim's Progress and the volume of Family Prayer.

"But I must thank you more for the kind words you have written in them than for the works themselves.

"I feel deeply the attention you have shown me on this and on other occasions. Let me assure you that I prize very highly the esteem and friendship of a good, honest Englishman like yourself.—Yours very truly,

Shaftesbury."