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3. 1874–82: “My reputation is much sounder than my bank account”
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3 1874–82 “My reputation is much sounder than my bank account” If the years in bucolic Concord between 1860 and his father’s death in 1864 were among the most pleasant of Julian’s life, his vagabond years in jolly old England between 1874 and 1882 were among the most difficult. He reminisced most often in his anecdotage not about his childhood or his studies at Harvard and Dresden but about his eight grueling years in and around London. His brood continued to grow, with the births of Gwendolen in 1877, Beatrix in 1879, Fred in 1880, and Gladys in 1881. He published three novels; a travel book; a barrelful of short fiction, familiar essays, and book reviews; and some of his earliest journalism. But he was usually penniless, living hand to mouth or on the charity of others, an increasingly hardscribble existence. He rented a villa in St. John’s Wood, a “pretty and unpretending” neighborhood three miles north of St. Paul’s, for six weeks while he scouted for a house he could afford.1 There he was an ear-witness to a catastrophe a mile away on Regent’s Canal early in the morning of October 2, 1874. A barge hauling gunpowder and petroleum exploded near Macclesfield Bridge, killing the crew, demolishing the bridge, and damaging dozens of houses. Ever alert to literary possibilities, Julian sold a short article about the devastation to the New York Tribune for fifty dollars.2 He reconnected with Francis Bennoch, Nathaniel’s friend from Liverpool, who welcomed him to London as a father would greet a son. “For years, I met him almost daily,”Julian recalled,“and, outside of my own family circle, no one contributed so much as he did to make those years worth living.” Bennoch amassed and lost several fortunes during his life, though at this time he lived in a mansion on Tavistock Square. After reading Idolatry in manuscript, he was convinced that Julian was a genius and praised it without stint: “There is stuff enough in it to make a whole library of ordinary Romances—Bressant was great. Idolatry is ten times greater.”3 72 part ii: the hack Julian and Minne eventually found a house in Twickenham,“a delightful English suburb of trees, hedges, meadows, and quiet streets”where Alexander Pope and Horace Walpole had resided in the eighteenth century.4 The village was located on the Thames, six miles from the botanical garden at Kew, twelve miles south of Waterloo Station. The house was situated on a cul-de-sac “so that there is no noise of passing carriages to annoy Julian,” Minne reported. It was spacious, with room for the entire family plus servants .The ground floor contained“a good-sized drawing room, dining room and study, kitchen, scullery, larders, &c. Upstairs are four large rooms, for nurseries and bedrooms,” and “in the attic are four rooms.” Best of all, the house was available for nominal rent—merely the cost of taxes: £55, or $275, per year. On November 12 the family moved into Ways End, as Julian christened it—“partly because it was at the end of the way, and partly because Wayside was the name of our house in Concord”—and lived there for the next four years.5 They were initially forced to rent furniture. They had sent their belongings from Dresden, but they had been impounded by the shipping company Julian Hawthorne at his house in Twickenham. (Courtesy of the Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley [72/236 vol. 3, 105].) [44.222.149.13] Project MUSE (2024-03-19 11:06 GMT) chapter 3: 1874–82 73 until Julian could pay the freight bill. While they may have leased a house in Twickenham, the family lived on “Grub Street.” As early as October 1874, Julian tried to pick Bennoch’s deep pockets. He solicited “a loan of one thousand dollars for a year or two years” so that he might “put it at interest” and “allow my other investments to accumulate undisturbed.” At the end of two years, he would be £250 ahead; in other words, he wanted to claim as his own the dividends on money that belonged to Bennoch. As collateral Julian offered Bennoch a picture by the Italian baroque painter Sassoferrato, claiming it was worth £3000. “You are the only man in England that I know of to whom I can apply,” he pleaded.6 Bennoch declined the opportunity. Julian’s first journal entry for...