The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1883-04-02
The Late John Richard Green.

alone with his books, avoiding all games
and spending the play hours in company
with Gibbon and Hume, thus forming
and developing his extraordinary pow
er of rapid and omniverous read
ing. At fifteen he had learned as
much as the school could teach him, and
he passed the next three years with private
tutors. TWAS by the advice of one of these
that he entered for scholarship at Jesus
College--one of the two or three scholarships
at that time open to Englishmen at the
Welsh College. 1t was an unfortunate step,
for Green never felt at home there; and
having early taken a dislike to the college,
he declined to read for any sort of honors.
Meantime, he read widely, chiefly historical
subjects, and while yet an undergraduate he
contributed to the Oxford Chronicle re-
markable series of papers on 'Oxford in the
Eighteenth Century," which were afterward
reprinted. Immature as they are they show
signs of the same qualities for which the
writer was afterward celebrated-the power
of seizing the essential features of past
epoch and presenting it in wildly pictori-
al way. 1t seems, indeed, to have been
through the historical studies which had
led to his writing these papers that he was
brought across the only man in Oxford who
at that early date appreciated him-Arthur
Stanley, then professor of ecclesiastical his
tory 1t was partially owing to SANKEY'S
influence that, Immediately after taking his
degree in 1860, he was ordained to become
curate of st. Barnabas's, King square, i. G.
Here he remained two years, dividing his
time between the watchmakers of that poor
and populous parish and the reading room
| of the British Museum. In 1862 Bishop
| Tait--who from this time to the very end of
| his life entertained towards him a very
| warm neutrality-suspicious. him to a sole
| charge in Hoxton and presently to the vic
arage of ST. Philips, Stephney. He brought
| this parish into high state of efficiency,
| and IL doing so wore out most of the little
strength he had; for, as was Often said of
him, his mind was too large for his body;
and oae 9f shstiYialft'r0f' moderation in work
For, besides his parish duties-duties made
| Infinitely arduous by the visitation of chole-
ra in the year lS6S-he still read immensely
1 Soon after the cholera time, Mr. Green re-
signed his living, and DIR. TAFT, then arch
bishop, appointed him to the post of Lam
beth librarian, in succession to Professor
/ Stubs.
Heuceforward he took no more clerical
work, partly because his health could not
bear it, and partly because he had begun to
feel the intellectual difficulties of his posi-
ton He lived for a long time the life OF
journalist-for the work of Lambeth made
| small demands upon his time--whlle at the
same time collecting and throwing into shape
the materials for his projected history. In
/ 1870, after severe attack of illness, he was
| for the first time ordered to the south by DR..
| Andrew Clark, the devoted friend to whose
/ care he may be said to owe many years of
| life. But, spite of these compulsory swim
| ter flittings,n as he called them in one of his
| sprightly occasional papers, the History
went on; and three or four years after it APP
peared under the name of "a Short History
of the English People, Its success was in
Simultaneous. twas closely printed, bulky
little volume, not at all one of which the
outward form would tempt idle people; but
| everybody bought and read it, and for
| long time the critics could find no language
/ strong enough in which to praise
| book which treated the old famil-
| lar theme in q manner so new. so
| original and so full of genius What at
| once surprised and charmed the reader was
| to find in this book both an amount of knowl-
edge which, as one reviewer said, s'would
| have sufieed 10 furnish forth a stately libra
| ry work in eight or ten volumes. and COM
preheDsiveness of view, a novelty of method,
| power of bringing together all the scat
| tered elements of history so as to make the
| past start into life, together with a freshness
| of style of which no historian since Macau-
| lay had given an example. Presently, in
| deed, some voices were heard on the other
/ side, and it was pointed out by one or two
| dry-as-dust reviewers that the 500 pages con-
| tanned good many slips in detail-dates
| wrongly given, names wrongly spelled, and
| such like errors. These points have their inn
| portanee, as nobody admitted more readily
/ than Mr.. Green; and had he been in better
health, or had he been little less impatient
| to get his cherished volume out before the
world, they would have been corrected. At
| tacks differently directed were made also
| from other quarters. The Quarterly Re-
view, taking alarm at what it thought the
too democratic turn given to our history,
spoke seriously against the book; the au-
/ riIur on rne article being the late Professor
| Brewer. learned historian and staunch
| Conservative, among whose posthumously
/ collected essays it was reprinted. But while
history continues to be written, people will
| continue to differ about its political aspect;
| and it is as vain to expect complete agree
| ment as to the origin of parliaments and
| the character of Cromwell as about the
| burning questions of our own day. Ger
/ taiulv the public verdict has vindicaied aim
| against his critics, whether those who at
| tackled his details or his principles Up to
| the present time some S., 900 copies of the
| book have been sold in England-the later
issues. of course, containing very many
corrections of the small inaccuracies which
| were at first charged against him-and in
| the United States, where he was appreciat-
ed from the first, the sale has been very
| large indeed. The demand still continues,
| we believe, to be perfectly steady and regu-
lar; and, indeed, it is difficult to imagine
any revolution in opinion or advance in
knowledge which will relegate the "Short
| History to the class of superseded books.
| During the summer Of 1881 he was ex-
| tremely i'll. In the autumn he went to
| Aentone, and there rallied wonderfully;
| while so great had been his energy that he
was able, year ago, TO publish the remark
/ able volume on the beginnings Of English
| history, which be reviewed in these columns
| al the time. This book, called THE Max
| ing of England appealed to a somewhat
| different audience from that which had
| delighted In the ''Short Historv:' for
| while its essential excellence lay in the in
| sight which it showed into the real life Of
the past, it was more professedly learn
ed than the other volume had been, and
| amply indicated the writer's claim 10
place In the forefront, not only OF literature,
but OF historical scholarship. II has been
attacked by one school Of historians on The
ground that, in discussing questions of race,
Mr.. Green pays too little attention to the
anthropological evidence which, according
to some of these writer's, upsets his theory
OF the determination of the Celts by the
English. Possibly this objection may be
tenable; but III is certainly not universally
admitted by those who ought to know.
And whether on this side Mr. Green fails or
not, there can be no question about the ex-
traordinary knowledge which this book re-
veals, both Of primitive English institutions
and, to still greater extent, Of the physical
features Of the country. His descriptions
of the forests and the roads, Of primeval Lon
don and of the most ancient seats Of En-
glisli industry, are wonderful pictures, as
unimpeachable as they are original. And
this book, as we said, was written when he
was In almost the last stage Of weakness.