Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 44.djvu/158

 The official duties of the India House delayed the completion and publication of ‘Maid Marian’ until 1822, and the delay occasioned its being taken for an imitation of ‘Ivanhoe,’ although its composition had, in fact, preceded Scott's novel. It was almost immediately dramatised by Planché.

Peacock's life from this period is almost devoid of any but official and literary incidents. He displayed great ability in business and in the drafting of official papers. In 1829 he began to devote attention to steam navigation, and drew up a valuable memorandum for General Chesney's Euphrates expedition, which was praised both by Chesney and Lord Ellenborough. He opposed the employment of steamers on the Red Sea, but this was probably in deference to the supposed interests of the company. In 1839 and 1840 war steamers were constructed under his superintendence which doubled the Cape, and took an honourable part in the Chinese war. He frequently appeared as the company's champion before parliamentary committees, especially in 1834, when he resisted James Silk Buckingham's claim to compensation for his expulsion from the East Indies, and in 1836, when he defeated the attack of the Liverpool merchants and Cheshire manufacturers upon the Indian salt monopoly. In the latter year Peacock succeeded James Mill as chief examiner, holding this post until 1856, when he retired in favour of John Stuart Mill [q. v.]

Despite his absorption in official labours, he produced in 1829 the delightful tale of ‘The Misfortunes of Elphin,’ founded upon Welsh traditions, and in 1831 ‘Crotchet Castle,’ perhaps the most brilliant of his writings. The death of his mother in 1833 greatly shook him; he said himself that he never wrote anything with interest afterwards. In 1837 appeared his lightsome ‘Paper Money Lyrics and other Poems’ (only one hundred copies printed), but this was ‘written in the winter of 1825–6, during the prevalence of an influenza to which the beautiful fabric of paper-credit is periodically subject.’ Towards the period of his retirement from the India office he began to contribute to ‘Fraser's Magazine,’ and in that periodical appeared his entertaining and scholarly ‘Horæ Dramaticæ,’ and his reminiscences of Shelley. Shelley's admirers were annoyed at their apparent coldness, and not without reason; but want of personal knowledge disabled them from taking Peacock's idiosyncrasies into due account, and there could be no question of the extreme value of the appendix of Shelley's letters which he added in 1860. In the same year he gave a remarkable instance of vigour by the publication in ‘Fraser’ of ‘Gryll Grange,’ his last novel. The exuberant humour of his former works is indeed wanting, but the book is delightful from its stores of anecdote and erudition, and unintentionally most amusing through the author's inveterate prejudices and pugnacious hostility to every modern innovation. The last products of his pen were two translations, ‘Gl' Ingannati. The Deceived:’ a comedy, performed at Siena in 1851; and ‘Ælia Lælia Crispis,’ of which a limited edition was circulated in 1862. He died at Halliford on 23 Jan. 1866. His wife had died in 1852. Only one of his four children, a son, survived him, and he for less than a year; but he left several grandchildren.

Peacock's character is well delineated in few words by Sir Edward Strachey: ‘A kind-hearted, genial, friendly man, who loved to share his enjoyment of life with all around him, and self-indulgent without being selfish.’ He is a rare instance of a man improved by prosperity; an element of pedantry and illiberality in his earlier writings gradually disappears in genial sunshine, although, with the advance of age, obstinate prejudice takes its place, good humoured, but unamenable to argument. The vigour of his mind is abundantly proved by his successful transaction of the uncongenial commercial and financial business of the East India Company; and his novels, their quaint prejudices apart, are almost as remarkable for their good sense as for their wit. But for this penetrating sagacity, constantly brought to bear upon the affairs of life, they would seem mere humorous extravaganzas, being farcical rather than comic, and almost entirely devoid of plot and character. They overflow with merriment from end to end, though the humour is frequently too recondite to be generally appreciated, and their style is perfect. They owe much of their charm to the simple and melodious lyrics with which they are interspersed, a striking contrast to the frigid artificiality of Peacock's more ambitious attempts in poetry. As a critic, he was sensible and sound, but neither possessed nor appreciated the power of his contemporaries, Shelley and Keats, to reanimate classical myths by infusion of the modern spirit. His works have been edited by Sir Henry Cole in 1873, and by the present writer in 1891; neither edition is entirely complete. Four of the novels—‘Headlong Hall,’ ‘Nightmare Abbey,’ ‘Maid Marian,’ and ‘Crotchet Castle’—form vol. lvii. of Bentley's ‘Standard Novels,’ published in 1837. A photographic portrait, representing him in old age, is inserted in both editions of his works, and