, and who was all the more
determined to marry a man of genius. She had hesitated between Irving
and Carlyle, and, whatever came of it, there can be no doubt that she
was right in preferring the somewhat uncouth and extremely undeveloped
tutor who had taught her several things,--whether love in the proper
sense was among them or not will always be a moot point. The _Edinburgh
Review_ was kind to Carlyle after its fashion, and he wrote for it; but
Jeffrey, though very well disposed both to Carlyle and to his wife,
could not endure the changes which soon came on his style, and might
have addressed the celebrated query which, as mentioned, just at the
same time he addressed in delighted surprise to Macaulay, "Where did you
get that style," to Carlyle in the identical words but with a very
different meaning. Even had it been different, it was impossible that
Carlyle should serve anywhere or any one; and his mind, not an early
ripening one, was even yet, at the age of thirty-two, in a very
unorganised condition. He resolved to retire to his wife's farm of
Craigenputtock in Nithsdale; and Mrs. Carlyle had the almost
unparalleled heroism to consent to this. For it must be remembered that
her husband, with the exception of the revenue of a few essays, was
living on her means, that he undertook no professional duties, and that
in the farmhouse she had to perform those of a servant as well as those
of a wife. Whatever other opinions may be passed on this episode of
Carlyle's life, which lasted from 1828 to 1834, there can be no doubt
that it "made" him. He did much positive work there, including all his
best purely literary essays. There he wrote _Sartor Resartus_, his
manifesto and proclamation, a wild book which, to its eternal honour,
_Fraser's Magazine_ accepted, probably under the influence of Lockhart,
with whom, strangely different as they were, Carlyle was always on good,
though never on intimate terms. There too was written great part of the
earlier form of the _French Revolution_. But the greatest thing that he
did at Craigenputtock was the thorough fermentation, clearing, and
settling of himself. When he went there, at nearly thirty-three, it was
more uncertain what would come of him than it is in the case of many a
man when he leaves the University at three and twenty. When he left it,
at close on his fortieth year, the drama of his literary life was
complete, though only a few lines of it were written.

That drama la