ALBUM – NAPOLEONIC ERA & NOBILITY

Album titled 'Lady/ Emily/ Bathurst's/ Scrap/ Book/ 1818', comprising some 20 watercolours and 70 drawings in pencil, pen, ink and wash, c.1818-1823

Footnotes

'AN ENIGMA SUPPOSED TO BE WRITTEN BY LORD BYRON': WATERCOLOURS OF NAPOLEON AND A MENTION OF JANE AUSTEN.

This charming album was compiled by the young Lady Emily Charlotte Bathurst (1798-1877), daughter of Henry Bathurst, 3rd Earl Bathurst (1762-1834) and Lady Georgina Lennox (1765-1841) of Cirencester Park. Begun in 1818, a postscript indicates it was completed in 1823 prior to her marriage to Major-General Hon. Sir Frederick Cavendish Ponsonby in 1825. Contributors to the album reflect a complicated web of aristocratic family connections and include accomplished amateur watercolourists such as Vice Admiral Lord Mark Kerr (1776-1840), his daughter Lady Louisa Kerr (1800-1885), who later became well-known for her finely executed silhouettes, although here she offers delicate pen and ink drawings, Sir Henry Bunbury (1778-1860), son of the famous caricaturist, and members of the Lennox family. The contents reflect the English obsession with Napoleon, now safely in exile on St Helena, with several watercolours and drawings of scenes around Waterloo and at Longwood – the initials 'G.H.B.' on the latter could possibly be those of Lady Emily's mother.

An enjoyment of puzzles and parlour games is evident here, and the album is filled with clever riddles, charades and anagrams. Of particular note is the inclusion of a celebrated riddle on the letter 'H' by Catherine Maria Fanshawe, entitled "An Enigma supposed to be written by Lord Byron" and beginning "'Twas whispered in heaven, 'twas muttered in hell,/ And echo caught faintly the sound as it fell". As the title suggests these verses were often attributed to Byron: 'These lines thus first introduced were soon well-known and admired throughout the country, and from their style and curious felicity were attributed to Byron, the popular poet of the age. They afterwards crept into some foreign editions of his works, and are even at the present day often ascribed to him.' (The Rev. A.G. L'Estrange, Literary Life of the Rev. William Harness, 1871, p.101-102.). L'Estrange writes that Harness, a friend of Byron, noted that the original commenced "Twas in Heaven pronounced". Our version also has the word 'pronounced' as in the original but crossed out and replaced with 'whispered'. A playful note below the poem includes an early mention of Jane Austen but concludes that Fanshawe was indeed the author: "not by Lord Byron but by Miss Fanshawe not by Miss Fanshawe but by Miss Austen – It was by Miss Fanshawe". The name of Jane Austen had not long been in the public domain when this album was begun. Prior to her death in July 1817 her publications, although best-sellers, had not included her name on the title page and it was not until December 1817 in a biographical note by Henry Austen that she had been identified as the author of Persuasion and Northanger Abbey.

Provenance: Lady Emily Charlotte Bathurst (1798-1877); her son General Rt. Hon. Sir Henry Frederick Ponsonby (1825-1895); by descent in the Ponsonby family; private collection.