# Dictionary of National Biography, 1912 supplement/Masson, David

​MASSON, DAVID (1822–1907), biographer and editor, born at Aberdeen on 2 Doc. 1822, was son of William Masson, stonecutter in that city, and Sarah Mather, his wife. After education at the grammar school of Aberdeen (1831–5) under James Melvin [q. v.], he matriculated in October 1835 at Marischal College and Aberdeen University, and at the close of his course, in April 1839, took the first place among the Masters of Arts of his year. With the intention of qualifying for the ministry of the Church of Scotland, he proceeded to Edinburgh and spent three years (1839–42) in the divinity hall of the university, where Dr. Thomas Chalmers [q. v.] was one of his teachers; but towards the close of his curriculum, during the stir of the Disruption, he resolved not to enter the church. He returned to Aberdeen and undertook (1842–4) the editorship of a weekly journal, 'The Banner.' In the summer of 1843 he visited London for the first time as the guest of his fellow-townsman Alexander Bain [q. v. Suppl. II], and made the acquaintance of Mrs. Carlyle. In the following year, during his second visit to London, he met Thomas Carlyle [q. v.], who introduced him to the editor of 'Fraser's Magazine,' in which his first article appeared in that year. From 1844 to 1847 he was engaged in Edinburgh on the staff of W. and R. Chambers, publishers, in the preparation of their Miscellanies and Educational Series. A little book on the history of Rome, written in 1847, was published in 1848; and in the same year he brought out, anonymously, another on ancient history. Other text-books on mediæval history (1855) and modern history (1856) followed after his direct association with the firm of Chambers had come to an end.
In 1847 Masson removed to London and began to contribute to the magazines and reviews, including 'Fraser's,' the 'Quarterly,' the 'Westminster,' the 'Leader,' and the 'North British,' and to the 'Encyclopædia Britannica.' He enjoyed the friendship of the Carlyles, and enlarged his circle of literary acquaintances through his membership of 'Our Club,' where his companions included Thackeray, Douglas Jerrold, Charles Knight, Mark Lemon, Dr. Doran, Peter Cunningham, and others. In these early years of hard work he found relaxation with the corps of the London Scottish volunteers; and in 1851–2 he acted as secretary of the London Society of the Friends of Italy.
In 1853, the year of his marriage, he was appointed professor of English literature in University College, London, in succession to Arthur Clough [q. v.]; and in 1856 he published a volume of 'Essays, Biographical and Critical: Chiefly on English Poets.' This was followed in 1859 by his 'British Novelists and their Styles,' and by the first volume of an extensive 'Life of Milton, narrated in connection with the Political, Ecclesiastical, and literary History of his Time.' On the latter work (1859–80, 6 vols.) his reputation as a biographer and historian chiefly rests, and there must be few rivals in this genre in any literature so painstaking and thorough in the recovery of the setting of a great career. The book was received with general approbation, and such criticism as has suggested that the reader cannot see the poet in the crowd of contemporary interests has misjudged the author's deliberate purpose. The book remains the standard authority. To the labours of this undertaking Masson added, towards the close of 1858, the task of starting and editing a new magazine for Alexander Macmillan, the first number of which appeared on 1 Nov. 1859, two months before Thackeray inaugurated the rival 'Cornhill.' Its title, 'Macmillan's Magazine,' was 'Editor David's' suggestion, and was accepted by the publisher after a long friendly battle for the name 'The Round Table.' Shortly before the issue of the first number, Masson and Macmillan spent three days in September 1859 with Tennyson in the Isle of Wight, and on the return journey they visited Kingsley at Eversley. Masson continued to edit the 'Magazine' with success till 1867, when his place was taken by Sir George Grove [q. v. Suppl. I]. In the autumn of 1863 he undertook, in addition, the editorship of the short-lived 'Reader.' Two years later he published a volume of essays entitled 'Recent British Philosophy.'
On the death of William Edmonstoune Aytoun [q. v.] in 1865, Masson was appointed professor of rhetoric and English literature in the university of Edinburgh; and from that date to the close he resided in Edinburgh. There he completed his 'Life of Milton'; edited the works of 'Goldsmith' (1869), 'Milton' (1874), and 'De Quincey' (1889–90); wrote an exhaustive biography of 'Drummond of Hawthornden' (1873); and recast and reissued the matter of the essays of 1856, with additions, in three separate volumes entitled 'Wordsworth, Shelley, and Keats,' 'The Three Devils,' and 'Chatterton' (1874). To the ​same period belong, among other works, his volume on De Quincey for the 'English Men of Letters' series (1878), and 'Edinburgh Sketches and Memories' (1892), a reprint of magazine articles. During the thirty years of academic life in Edinburgh (1865–95), where more than 5000 students passed through his class-room, he achieved a popularity which remains a pleasant tradition in Scottish university life. From 1867 he interested himself in the movements for the 'higher education' and the medical education of women, and gave annually, under the auspices of the 'Association for the University Education of Women' (1868), a course of lectures on English literature until the admission of women to the Scottish universities. The Masson Hall, a residence for women undergraduates, erected by the committee of this association, and opened on 24 November 1897, bears his name, in recognition of his labours. From 1880 to 1899 he acted as editor of the 'Privy Council Register of Scotland,' in succession to John Hill Burton [q. v.], and contributed historical introductions or digests to each of the thirteen volumes which he supervised; and in 1886 he delivered the Rhind lectures before the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland. In 1893, on the death of William Forbes Skene [q. v.], he was appointed historiographer-royal for Scotland; and on 12 Feb. 1896 the Royal Scottish Academy elected him an honorary member and professor of ancient literature. He was an honorary graduate of the universities of Aberdeen (LL.D.), Dublin (Litt.D.), and Moscow. From 1869 to 1878 he resided at 10 Regent Terrace, Edinburgh (where he was visited by John Stuart Mill and Carlyle); and from 1882 at 58 Great King Street. His closing years were spent at Lockharton Gardens, Edinburgh. He died on the night of Sunday, 6 Oct. 1907, and was buried in the Grange cemetery, Edinburgh.
Masson's long association with Carlyle and his admiration of his friend's genius have to some extent obscured the individuality of his own work; and an alleged physical likeness, more imagined than true to fact, has encouraged the popular notion of discipleship. He was too independent in character to owe much to another, and the trait by which his authority was won — sincerity in workmanship, that 'indisputable air of truth' which is felt in everything he wrote and did — was not derived from, and hardly confirmed by, the intercourse at Chelsea. In his literary work he sometimes sacrificed the claims of art to the importunities of research; yet no sound judgment could deny the accuracy, the sanity of judgment, and the geniality of critical temper, which distinguish his work as historian and essayist. On his large circle of friends and pupils he left a lasting impression of vigorous personality and high purpose. From his prime, but especially in his later years, he was, if not the dictator, the confidant in every important literary and public enterprise, and by his broad-minded patriotism, untainted by the parochialism which he heartily condemned, was accepted by his contemporaries as the representative of what counts for best in Scottish character.
He married, on 27 Aug. 1853, Emily Rosaline, eldest daughter of Charles and Eliza Orme, at whose house in Avenue Road, Regent's Park, he had been one of a group of writers and painters (including Coventry Patmore, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Thomas Woolner, and Holman Hunt), in sympathy with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. They had one son, Orme, professor of chemistry in the university of Melbourne and F.R.S., and three daughters. Flora, editor of two posthumous works by her father, Helen (Mrs. Lovell Gulland), and Rosaline, author of several books.
Sir George Reid painted three portraits of Masson: (a) a three-quarter length in oil, presented to him by Lord Rosebery in the name of the subscribers on 23 Nov. 1897, on the occasion of his retirement (now in the possession of Professor Orme Masson); (b) a smaller canvas, in oil, commissioned by Mr. Irvine Smith for his private collection, and now in the possession of Mr. Charles Green, publisher, Edinburgh; (c) a canvas, in oil, presented by the artist to the National Portrait Gallery, Edinburgh, and there preserved. An etching (12½" X 16" ) was made by F. Huth in 1898 from the Irvine Smith canvas; and an etched portrait-sketch by William Hole appears in 'Quasi Cursores,' published in 1884, on the occasion of the tercentenary of the university of Edinburgh. Two portraits (from photographs of Masson in later life) were published in 1911: (a) in the Scottish History Society's edition of Craig's 'De Unione,' and (b) in the posthumous volume of 'Memories of Two Cities.' A marble bust by J. P. Macgillivray, R.S.A., presented by subscription to the university of Edinburgh in 1897, is less successful than the portraits by Reid and Huth.
Masson's published writings comprise: ​1. 'History of Rome' (Chambers's Educational Course), 1848. 2. 'Ancient History' (the same), 1848. 3. 'The British Museum, Historical and Descriptive' (Chambers's Instructive and Entertaining Library), 1848. 4. 'College Education and Self Education. A Lecture,' 1854. 5. 'Mediæval History' (Chambers's Educational Course), 1855. 6. 'Modern History' (the same), 1856. 7. 'Essays, Biographical and Critical: chiefly on English Poets,' 1856 (see Nos. 16, 17 and 18). 8. 'British Novelists and their Styles,' 1859. 9. 'Life of Milton, narrated in connection with the Political, Ecclesiastical, and Literary History of his Time,' vol. i. 1859; vol. ii. appeared in 1871; the sixth and last in 1880; and a new edition of the first in 1881. 10. 'Recent British Philosophy,' 1865; 3rd edit. 1877. 11. 'The State of Learning in Scotland. A Lecture,' 1866. 12. 'University Teaching for Women,' introductory lectures to the second series of lectures in Shandwick Place, 1868. 13. 'The Works of Goldsmith' (Globe edit.), 1869. 14. 'Drummond of Hawthornden,' 1873. 15. 'The Poetical Works of John Milton,' 3 vols. 1874, re-issued in 1877, 1878, 1882, 1890, and in 3 vols, in the 'Golden Treasury' series, in a separate edition in 1882, and later in the 'Eversley' series. 16. 'Wordsworth, Shelley, and Keats, and other Essays,' 1874. 17. 'The Three Devils: Luther's, Milton's, and Goethe's. With other Essays,' 1874 (new edit. 1875). 18. 'Chatterton: a story of the year 1770,' 1874; new edit. 1899; Nos. 16, 17 and 18 are reprints, with additions, of No. 7. 19. 'The Quarrel between the Earl of Manchester and Oliver Cromwell' (Camden Society), 1875. 20. Introduction to 'Three Centuries of English Poetry' (an anthology by his wife), 1876. 21. 'The Poetical Works of John Milton' (Globe edit.), 1877. 22. 'De Quincey' ('English Men of Letters' series), 1878; revised 1885. 23. 'Register of the Privy Council of Scotland,' 1st series, vols, iii.-xiv., 2nd series, vol. i. (13 vols, covering the years 1578–1627), 1880-1899. 24. 'The Vicar of Wakefield ' (Globe readings), 1883. 25. 'Carlyle personally and in his Writings. Two Lectures,' 1885. 26. 'Select Essays of De Quincey,' 1888. 27. 'The Collected Writings of Thomas De Quincey, a New and Enlarged Edition,' (14 vols.), 1889–90. 28. 'Edinburgh Sketches and Memories' (reprints of articles), 1892. 29. 'James Melvin, Rector of the Grammar School of Aberdeen,' Aberdeen, 1895 (reprinted from 'Macmillan's Magazine,' 1864). 30. 'Memories of London in the Forties,' published posthumously edited by his daughter, Flora Masson, 1908, containing reprints from 'Blackwood's' and 'Macmillan's' magazines. 31. 'Memories of Two Cities,' posthumously edited by Flora Masson, 1911. Masson also contributed the first article (on Milton) in a volume entitled 'In the Footsteps of the Poets,' published by Messrs. Isbister & Co. (n.d.).
[Autobiographic references in works, especially Nos. 25, 28, 29. and 30; Scotsman, 24 Nov. 1897 (which contains Lord Rosebery's eulogy on the occasion of the presentation of the portrait) and 8 Oct. 1907; The Times, 8 Oct. 1907; Who's Who, 1903; Carlyle's Letters, 1889; Letters of Alexander Macmillan, 1908; J. M. Barrie, An Edinburgh Eleven, 1889; Quasi Cursores, 1884; Strand Magazine, Feb. 1896 (with reproduction of a series of early photographs); arts, by Miss Flora Masson in Cornhill, Nov. 1910 and June 1911; information supplied by Miss Rosaline Masson from family papers; personal recollections.]
G. G. S.