The Bard of the Beggars

This thought provoking title was sometimes used by Elliott to describe himself according to Elliott's friend Spencer T. Hall. The following article is based on the conversations between the two men & includes a letter from Elliott to Hall. The article also has an amusing anecdote about Elliott and Robert Nicoll, the Scottish poet who tragically died aged twenty three.

Writing under the pseudonym "Sherwood Forester," Spencer Timothy Hall's book "Biographical Sketches of Remarkable People" appeared in 1873 & contained sketches of about 30 people including James Montgomery and of course Ebenezer Elliott. Hall was an interesting soul writing poetry, biography, travel and on medical matters; he was also an expert on mesmerism & phrenology touring the country giving lectures & demonstrations. On the invitation of James Montgomery, Hall moved to Sheffield and became joint editor of Montgomery's newspaper The Iris; to which Elliott often submitted poems. Hall moved to a cottage at Ecclesall & later lived at the Hollis Hospital, Whirlow, which had been founded in 1703 as a home for poor widows.

Hall had first heard of the Corn Law Rhymer through a regional newspaper which very surprisingly gave coverage to the radical poet despite the newpaper's conservative outlook & its readership of wealthy farmers & squires, who would have detested the Bard of the Beggars. Later on, Hall visited Elliott several times, so although Hall's book was published well after Elliott's death, it makes an interesting & contemporary account of the Corn Law Rhymer's life style.

Hall first met Elliott in 1836 at the latter's Gibraltar Street warehouse where Hall and "the Laureate of Labour" were soon swapping news of Thomas Lister, the Quaker, and Charles Pemberton (who is featured in Hall's book). Given Hall's interest in phrenology, it is unsurprising to see a very long description of Elliott's appearance; which description reveals among other things that the poet wears a suit at the warehouse - quite a surprise.  "A slender form ... clad in a black suit of decent, but most simple cut, a pair of eye-glasses suspended from his neck."  The 55 year old poet would need to wear glasses after years of reading and writing by cand light.

After this first meeting, a correspondence between the two friends ensued; the full text of one letter appearing below:-

Sheffield, 7th April, 1838.

Dear Sir, - I feel highly honoured by your letter of the third instant, and equally hurt by your apology for writing it. Such an apology would be wrong if I were a god; but I am only a very ordinary man, precisely what any honest man may be, if he chuses. What are my claims to be worshipped? With a wish to be useful, I have expressed in rhyme thoughts that are not good enough for prose. Yet you apologise for addressing to me a letter which any man might be proud to receive.

Pemberton is now, I believe, about to sail from Gibralter to Malta. He is better, he says, almost well, but his hoarseness remains. If he stays abroad, he may live long; but if he returns he will die of consumption, like poor Robert Nicol, and many, many others; best of the best.

My family being very large, and not altogether out of harm's way - it was my wish to get invitations to lecture in London, Bristol, Birmingham, Manchester,Lliverpool, Edinburgh, and Glasgow, that I might see, before I die, Paris, Brussels, Amsterdam, Hamburgh, Wales, Cumberland, and Scotland, without expence. But I fear I have delivered my last lecture. I have for some time been visited by sudden breathlessness, as if a valve closed at the bottom of my throat. The symptoms usually follow, in a few hours, excitement of any kind, and especially painful excitement. I find nothing painful in lecturing but the sense of my ignorance and inefficiency. I am seriously warned, however, that I must refrain from public speaking and all excitement, unless I mean to be hanged without a rope. I passed the night after my last lecture in a state bordering on agony.

In sending your poems to the magazines you have adopted the right plan. Had I done so at first, I could have got into notice thirty years before I did.

What I said of Robert Nicol in my last lecture will apply to poor Millhouse, and many others, best of the best. I will try to quote it from memory: "Robert Nicol! who was he? Is he, then, already forgotten? Why should you remember a poor man's broken-hearted son? Robert Nicol, soon after the publication of a small volume of his poems - some of the finest ever written by a mere youth - became editor of the 'Leeds Times,' the circulation of which paper he nearly trebled in a few months. But in this country, 'the labour of the poor is his life.' Robert Nicol is another instance of self-sacrifice to duty - or, rather, to the death struggle of competition, caused by laws which limit the food of the nation, whose numbers they cannot limit. Unstained and pure, at the age of twenty-three, died Scotland's second Burns; happy in this, that without having been, like St. Paul, 'a blasphemer, a persecutor and injurious,' he chose the right path. And when the Terrible Angel said to his youth, 'Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer?  hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?' he could and did answer, 'By the grace of God I am what I am.' But do not the tears run down the widow's cheeks? And is not her cry against them who caused him to fail? Yess! 'for it is a truth worthy of all acceptation,' that Robert Nicol is another victim added to the thousands who are not dead but gone before, to witness against the most merciless." I had hoped some of our newspapers would have quoted these words, but was disappointed.

When shall we two meet again, mind to mind?

                                                                            I am, dear sir, yours very truly,

                                                                                                                        EBENEZER ELLIOTT.

Several points arise from Elliott's letter. The polite tone is noticeable and the stress on the fact that Elliott sees himself as "only a very ordinary man." Whose poetry is not all that good. Despite these misgivings, Elliott would wish to be invited to give lectures all over the country. So the humble poet nevertheless believes he has something of value to say to the world, but the businessman is too careful to do this out of his own pocket! The statement about being breathless after his last lecture may suggest a heart condition: excitement & stress were to be avoided at all costs in the future - though Elliott was to live another ten years after writing this letter. The mention of Robert Nicoll shows what high regard Elliott had for the Scottish poet; elsewhere Elliott gives the opinion: "Burns at his age had done nothing like him." There is a strong suggestion from the letter that Elliott believed that those who promoted the Corn Laws were the cause of Nicoll's death and the death of thousands more. At the end of this article, there is an interesting story about Elliott & Nicoll.

In 1838 Hall established a magazine called the "Sherwood Forester" against the advice of Elliott. "Your magazine, I am afraid, will never pay. No local magazine ever did." The advice was clearly proffered by letter as Hall did not meet Elliott again until the spring of 1839 when he visited Elliott at his Upperthorpe house, which is still in existence.

At this meeting in 1839, Elliott very proudly announced that he was treating his guest to a good dinner of "a fine calf's head;" this was accompanied by shrewd and caustic advice from the Rhymer. Hall then reveals that "without any personal acquaintance" with the man, Elliott had sent "a liberal sum of money to a poor  dying poet in another part of the kingdom." Further insights into Elliott follow as he discusses Hall's writing. "But you are not artistic enough, you should give yourself more time. You write as the calf sucks.  All my own poems, like Pope's translations, were written nine times over." What comes over is that Elliott is shrewd and down to earth, but meticulous in re-writing his own poetry. While Elliott goes on to laugh at phrenology, Hall has a suspicion that Elliott has a little hidden belief in the subject. During their discussion on the merits of phrenology, Elliott robustly and amusingly proclaims: "Then there is James Montgomery - no fool! - and yet his head is half a turnip!" Elliott is clearly mocking phrenology in his typical no-nonsense way.

While examining Elliott's character and style, Hall also remarks that with the world wide reputation  of still being a working artisan or mechanic, he was really dwelling at Sheffield in suburban gentility. Certainly his Upperthorpe home was a smart villa and there was a pleasant lifestyle to go with it. "There can be no doubt, however, that Elliott had roughed it." Referring to Elliott's bankruptcy and the hard times experienced.

We know little of Mrs. Elliott: so Hall's description is worth noting: "a fine, tall, golden-haired, matronly lady, with more precision of manner than the poet."  She is described as  freely the joining in the conversation and making piquant observations. Nor was she afraid to upbraid her husband, although affectionately: "Dear Ebby, I am surprised you say that" she challenged him on one occasion noted by Hall.

In 1840 Hall again dined at Upperthorpe.  Afterwards that they arranged to meet at Elliott's favorite spot, the Rivelin, a stream celebrated by the Poet of the Poor in his poem "Ribbledin." The two men failed to meet up, however, which was a pity since Elliott carried with him "a bottle of fine sparkling ale" for their  refreshment. 

By 1841 Hall had moved to Sheffield and the meetings with Elliott became more frequent - a mixture of fireside chats and rambles in the countryside. We learn from these that Frank, the bard's son, was a capable young man who could write beautiful poetry but who was very critical of himself and had no confidence in his work. In addition, Hall noted that Frank was prone to uttering  pungent but ludicrous remarks.  A strange mixture! One of their walks took them  along the banks of the River Don and then up the steep climb to the top of Shirecliffe. On the way Elliott was able to name all the flowers they saw and called the celandine "Wordsworth's flower." He revealed that he was "by no means an enthusiastic admirer of Wordsworth, whose writings he regarded as generally too wordy and diffuse."

We know that James Montgomery & Elliott were never close friends; Hall, in his book, states the two poets had great respect for each other, but were "exceedingly dissimilar. Montgomery, orthodox in his theology, circumspect in his language, diffident almost to timidity, and shrinking as much as duty would let him from anything that could incur censure. Elliott, on the other hand, bold in his condemnation of what he chose to regard as cant .... often saying things the most outré, and even coarse, as if in defiance of all politeness, and in contempt of all approval .... yet yearning for distinction and fame." An interesting summing of the two friends. Elliott is not entirely the genial host we have seen earlier, coming over perhaps as truculent. This view is reinforced by Hall remarking that there were rumours of marital discord prompted by the loud shouting sometimes overheard by neighbours. But then none of us are perfect.

Of course Elliott was frequently uncompromising and outspoken, as happened when Hall commented favourably on the aristocracy. The Poet of the Poor jumped up, paced up & down and stormed: "You! and why should you be one of their apologists? What have they not done? Have they not taxed the very light? Would they not like to box up the sunshine, that they may deal it out in pennyworths? and bad measure they would make you! Would they not like to catch the very rain from heaven and put their own price on you on every drop?" This is vintage Elliott getting carried away over a pet topic without any respect to his guests.

There is more food for thought in Hall's sketch of the Rhymer. Elliott had, says Hall, an unfortunate habit of sometimes breaking out into language worse than "calling a spade a spade." This is something we did not know about the Corn Law Rhymer. Hall reports that once when Elliott was addressing a cowd of 15,000 people in Sheffield's Paradise Square, he let slip a word not usually spoken among polite people. Elliott deeply regretted this and never forgot his indiscretion. Shame we don't know whether he was being vulgar or actually swearing. Perhaps in striving for effect, his tongue was ahead of his brain!

It is well known that in 1839 Elliott was blackballed at the Sheffield Literary & Philosophical Society when nominated as a proprietor. For the first time, Hall reveals the reason for the blackball -  it was Elliott's tendency to use intemperate language.

The last time that Hall and Elliott met was in late 1840 or maybe January 1841. Hall was invited to join Elliott for "some oysters and a glass of ale" in Sheffield High Street. Again signs of good living for the poet. After this conviviality, the two men spent a happy afternoon chatting together at Hollis Hospital where Hall resided.

Earlier in this article we learned that Elliott was a huge admirer of Robert Nicoll, the Scottish poet (1814-37) who died of consumption aged twenty three. Sometimes referred to as "the Scottish Keats," Nicoll was into radical politics making speeches & giving lectures on current topics including the Corn Laws. Like the Corn Law Rhymer. Nicoll also submitted articles to Tait's Edinburgh Review. Just like Elliott. So there was lots of common ground.

Samuel Smiles, author of the classic "Self Help," regales us with an interesting anecdote about Elliott and Nicoll. Elliott was in Leeds to give a course of lectures at the Leeds Literary Institute, while Nicoll was at that time editor of the Leeds Times. Naturally Elliott proposed while he was in Leeds to make the acquaintance of the young man he admired so much and politely sent him a note requesting a meeting. After finishing a lecture Elliott returned to his inn late at night & was very upset to find a reply from Nicoll saying that he was dying of consumption & that he was returning to Scotland early the next day in order to be nursed by his family. On the morrow, Elliott rushed round to see Nicoll but missed him by five minutes. Elliott then charged off to the railway station where he arrived one minute before the Scotland train was due to depart. Elliott then tells a poignant story: "he was pointed out to me in one of the carriages, seated, I believe, between his wife and his mother. I stood on the step of the carriage and told him my name. He gasped - they all three wept, but I heard not his voice." At that moment, the train started to move - and the Bard of the Beggars had to jump for it! What a sad little tale.

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