1»* Digitized by the'lnternet Archive in 2012 with funding from Duke University Libraries http://archive.org/details/menwomenbookssel21hunt UlWL ttlud-7 i jEtai 86 , • ■I .',::■>■ \. \ ; .. MEN, WOMEN, AND BOOKS; A SELECTION OF SKETCHES, ESSAYS, AND CBITICAL MEMOIES, FROM HIS UNCOLLECTED PROSE WRITINGS, BT LEIGH HUNT. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON: SMITH, ELDER AND CO., 65, CORNHILL. 1847. m London: Printed by Stewart and Murray, Old Bailey. P E E E A C E. For the power to make the greater part of this selection from his uncollected prose writings, the Author has to thank the proprietors of the Edin- burgh and Westminster Reviews, of the New Monthly Magazine, of Tait, and Ainsworth, and the Monthly Chronicle. The courtesy which he experienced from all these gentlemen, and the instant cordiality of those with whom he was best acquainted, merit his warmest acknowledgments. He has little to add, except that he has taken the opportunity of making a few corrections ; and that he hopes the sincerity with which he writes everything, grave or gay, will procure him the usual indulgence for the defects that remain. The title of the book, though a peculiar, is not a < IV PREFACE. forced one. The reader will see that "Women," upon their own grounds, form an essential portion of its contents ; and the word suggested itself as soon as the book was thought of. The name of the heroine might almost as well have been omitted, when a critic was giving an account of the history of " Angelica and Medoro." Should anything else in the impulsive portions of those essays which were written when he was young, appear a little out of the pale of recognised manners, in point of style and animal spirits, the new reader will be good enough to understand, what old ones have long been aware of, and grown kind to, — namely, that the writer comes of a tropical race ; and that what might have been affectation in a colder blood, was only enthusiasm in a warm one. He is not conscious, however, of having suffered anything to remain, to which a reasonable critic could object. He has pruned a few passages, in order that he might not seem to take undue advantage of an extempore or anonymous allowance; and in later years, particularly when seated on the critical bench, he has been pleased, and perhaps profited, in conforming himself to the customs of " the court.'' But had he attempted to alter the general spirit PREFACE. v of liis writings, he would have belied the love of truth that is in him, and- even shown himself un- grateful to public warrant. With regard to the engraved portrait of himself, from the masterly sketch of Mr. Severn, his pub- lishers will allow him to say, that it makes its appearance only in compliance with their urgent wishes. The period of life at which it was taken, corresponds with that of the greater part of the volume. A work of a staider nature is in prepara- tion, a contemporary portrait in which will duly present the Author as the battered senior which he is. Meantime, if the collection of articles now published shall be found to contain a less amount of gravity or reflection than may have been looked for from a man of his years, he hopes that the comparatively youthful face at the beginning of it may help to excuse the deficiency. Not that he has abated a jot of those cheerful and hopeful opinions, in the diffusion of which he has now been occupied for nearly thirty years of a life passed in combined struggle and studiousness : or if there is anything which consoles him for those short-comings either in life or writings, which most men of any decent powers of reflection are bound VI PREFACE. to discover in themselves as they grow old, and of which he has acquired an abundant perception, it is the consciousness, not merely of having been con- sistent in opinion (which might have been bigotry), or of having lived to see his political opinions triumph (which was good luck), or even of hav- ing outlived misconstruction and enmity (though the goodwill of generous enemies is inexpressibly dear to him), but of having done his best to re- commend that belief in good, that cheerfulness in endeavour, that discernment of universal beauty, that brotherly consideration for mistake and circum- stance, and that repose on the happy destiny of the whole human race, which appear to him not only the healthiest and most animating principles of action, but the only truly religious homage to Him that made us all. Let adversity be allowed the comfort of these reflections ; and may all who allow them, expe- rience the writer's cheerfulness, with none of the troubles that have rendered it almost his only possession. Kensington, May 1st, 1847. CONTENTS. i. FICTION AND MATTER OE EACT. Sympathies of these two supposed incompatible things. — Mistake of Newton. — Poets not liable to such mistakes. — Ealse alarm about Science becoming the ruin of Poetry. — Imagination not to be limited by second causes. — Apologue on the press. . 1 II. THE INSIDE OE AN OMNIBUS. Elevation of society by this species of vehicle. — Metamorphosis of Dr. Johnson into an Omnibus. — His dialogue thereon with Boswell. — Various passengers in Omnibuses. — Intense inti- macy with the face of the man opposite you. — Boys and young ladies. — Old gentlemen unable to pull up the glass. — Young gentlemen embarrassed with eating an orange. — Exhibition of characters and tempers. — Ladies obliged to sit on gentlemen's laps. — Last passengers at night 12 III. THE DAY OE THE DISASTERS OE CAREINGTON BLUNDELL, ESQUIRE. Description of a penurious independent gentleman, fond of in- vitations and the great. — He takes his way to a " dining out." —His calamities on the road. — And on his return. . . 30 Vlll CONTENTS. IV. A VISIT TO THE ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. The collection there at the time of the visit. — A tiger broke loose. - — Mild anthropophagy of the bear. — The elephant the Dr. Johnson of animals. — Giraffes. — Monkeys. — Parrots. — Eagles. — Mysteries of animal thonght. — Is it just in human beings to make prisons of this kind ? 59 V. A MAN INTRODUCED TO HIS ANCESTORS. Astonishing amount of a man's ancestors at the twentieth remove. — The variety of ranks as great as the multitude. — Bodily and mental characteristics inherited. — What it becomes a man to consider as the result 90 VI. A NOVEL PARTY. Spiritual creations more real than corporeal ones. — A party com- posed of the heroes and heroines of novels. — Mr. Moses Prim- rose, who has resolved not to be cheated, is delighted with some information given him by Mr. Peregrine Pickle. — Conversation of the author with the celebrated Pamela. — Arrivals of the rest of the company. — The party found to consist of four smaller parties. — Characters of them. — Character of Mr. Abraham Adams. — Pamela's distress at her brother's want of breeding. — Settlement together of Lovelace and Clarissa. — Desmond's "Waverley asks after the Antiquary's Waverley. — His surprise at the coincidence of the adventure on the sea-shore. — Mis- understanding between Mrs. Slipslop and Mrs. Clinker. — The ladies criticized while putting on their cloaks 96 VII. BEDS AND BED-ROOMS. Intrinsical nature of bed. — Advantage of people in bed over people that are " up." — Dialogue with a person " up." — Eeathcr-beds, curtains. &c. — Idea of a perfect bed-room.— CONTENTS. IX Custom half the secret of content. — Bed-room in a cottage. — Bed at sea. — Beds in presses and alcoves. — Anecdotes of beds. — The bed of Morpheus in Spenser 114 VIII. THE WORLD OP BOOKS. Difficulty of proving that a man is not actually in a distant place, by dint of being there in imagination. — Visit of that kind to Scotland. — Suggestion of a Book-Geography ; of Maps, in which none but poetical or otherwise intellectually-associated places are set down. — Scottish, English, French, and Italian items for such maps. — Local literizations of Rousseau and Wordsworth objected to. — Actual enrichment of the commonest places by intellectual associations. . , 129 IX. JACK ABBOTT'S BREAKFAST. Animal spirits. — A Dominie Sampson drawn from the life. — Many things fall out between the (breakfast) cup and the lip. — A magistrate drawn from the life. — Is breakfast ever to be taken, or is it not ? — The question answered 142 x. ON SEEING A PIGEON MAKE LOVE. French intermixture of prose and verse. — Courtship of Pigeons. — A word in pity for rakes. — Story of one baffled. — Instinctive sameness of the conduct of the lower animals questioned. — Pope's opinion respecting instinct and reason. — Human Im- provability. — Fitness of some of the lower animals for going to heaven not less conceivable than that of some others. — Doves at Maiano. — Ovid's Bird-Elysium 176 XI. THE MONTH OF MAY. Might not the May-holidays be restored ? — Melancholy remnant of them.— Recollections of a May-morning in Italy, . . 191 X CONTENTS. XII. THE GIULI TRE. Specimen of Sonnets written on this subject by the. Abate Casti 201 XIII. A FEW REMARKS ON THE RARE VICE CALLED LYING. Impossibility of finding a liar in England. — Lying, nevertheless, allowed and organized as a mutual accommodation, except in the case of voters at elections. — Reason of this, a wish to have all the lies on one. side. — The right of lying arrogated by the rich as a privilege. — Vindication, nevertheless, of the rich as human beings. — Social root of apparently unsocial feelings. — Conventional liars not liars out of the pale of conventionality. — Falsehood sometimes told for the sake of truth and good.— Einal appeal to the consciences of anti-ballotmen. . . 214 XIV. CRITICISM ON EEMALE BEAUTY. I. — HAIR, FOREHEAD. Eault-finding of the old style of criticism ridiculed. — Painting with the pen. — Ugliness of beauty without feeling. — The hand of the poisoner. — Hair. — Under what circumstances it is allowable to use artificial helps to beauty. — Red and golden hair. — Hair of Lucretia Borgia. — Forehead 226 II. — EXES, EYEBROWS, KOSE. Eyes. — Eyebrows. — Frowning without frowning. — Eyebrows meeting. — Shape of head, face, ears, and cheeks. — Ear-rings. — Nose.— A perplexity to the critics. — Question of aquiline noses. — Angels never painted with them 244- III. — MOUTH, CHIN, TEETH, BOSOM. Mouth and chin. — Mouth the part of the face the least able conceal the expression of temper, &c. — Handsome smiles CONTENTS. XI plain faces. — Teeth. — Dimples. — Neck and shoulders. — Per- fection of shape. — Bosom. — Caution against the misconstruc- tions of the coarse-minded 206 IV. — HAND, ARM, "WALK, VOICE. Hand and arm. — Italian epithet "Morbida." — Figure. — Carriage, &c. — Perils of fashion. — Vice of Tight-lacing. — Hips. — Legs and feet. — Walk. — Carriage of Boman and Italian women.-— That of English preferred. — Voice ditto. — Beasonwhythe most beautiful women are in general not the most charming. 273 XV. OF DECEASED STATESMEN WHO HAVE WRITTEN VEBSES. Universality of poetry, and consequent good effect of a taste for it. • — The greater the statesman, the more universal his mind.-— Almost all great British Statesmen have written verses. — Specimen of verses by Wyatt, by Essex, by Sackville, Baleigh, Marvell, Peterborough, and Lord Holland. . . . . 2S6 XVI. FEMALE SOVEREIGNS OF ENGLAND. Beal character of Lady Jane Grey. — Excuses for " Bloody Mary." — Elizabeth, when young. — Anne and the Duchess of Marl- borough. — Accession of her present Majesty 304 MEN, WOMEN, AND BOOKS. FICTION AND MATTER OF FACT. " There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy." Shakspeahe. Sympathies of these two supposed incompatible things. — Mistake of Newton. — Poets not liable to such mistakes. — False alarm about Science becoming the ruin of Poetry. — Imagination not to be limited by second causes. — Apologue on the Press. A passion for these two things is supposed to be incompatible. It is certainly not ; and the suppo- sition is founded on an ignorance of the nature of the human mind, and the very sympathies of the two strangers. Mathematical truth is not the only truth in the world. An unpoetical logician is not the only philosopher. Locke had no taste for fiction : he thought Blackmore as great a genius as VOL. I. B 2 FICTION AND MATTER OF FACT. Homer ; but this was a conclusion he could never have come to, if he had known his premises. Newton considered poetry as on a par with "in- genious nonsense ; " which was an error as great as if he had ranked himself with Tom D'Urfey, or made the apex of a triangle equal to the base of it. Newton has had good for evil returned him by " a greater than himself;" for the eye of imagination sees farther than the glasses of astronomy. I should say that the poets had praised their scorner too much, illustrious as he is, if it were not delight- ful to see that there is at least one faculty in the world which knows how to do justice to all the rest. Of all the universal privileges of poetry, this is one of the most peculiar, and marks her for what she is. The mathematician, the schoolman, the wit, the statesman, and the soldier, may all be blind to the merits of poetry, and of one another ; but the poet, by the privilege which he possesses of recognising every species of truth, is aware of the merits of mathematics, of learning, of wit, of politics, and of generalship. He is great in his own art, and he is great in his appreciation of that of others. And this is most remarkable in proportion as he is a 'poetical poet — a high lover of fiction. Milton brought the visible and the invisible together " on the top of Piesole," to pay homage to Galileo; and the Tuscan deserved it, for he had an insight into the world of imagination. I cannot but fancy the shade of Newton blushing to reflect that, among FICTION AND MATTER OF FACT. 6 the many tilings which he professed to know not, poetry was omitted, of which he knew nothing. Great as he was, he indeed saw nothing in the face of nature but its lines and colours ; not the lines and colours of passion and sentiment included, but only squares and their distances, and the anatomy of the rainbow. He thought the earth a glorious planet ; he knew it better than any one else, in its connexion with other planets ; and yet half the beauty of them all, that which sympathy bestows and imagination colours, was to him a blank. He took space to be the sensorium of the Deity (so noble a fancy could be struck out of the involuntary encounter between his intense sense of a mystery and the imagination he despised !) and yet this very fancy was but an escape from the horror of a vacuum, and a substitu- tion of the mere consciousness of existence for the thoughts and images with which a poet would have accompanied it. He imagined the form of the house, and the presence of the builder ; but the life and the variety, the paintings, the imagery, and the music, — the loves and the joys, the whole riches of the place, the whole riches in the distance, the creations heaped upon creation, and the particular as well as aggregate consciousness of all this in the great mind of whose presence he was conscious, — to all this his want of imagination rendered him insen- sible. The Fairy Queen was to him a trifle; the dreams of Shakspeare " ingenious nonsense." But courts were something, and so were the fashions b 2 4 FICTION AND MATTER OF PACT. there. When the name of the Deity was mentioned, he took off his hat ! * There are two worlds ; the world that we can measure with line and rule, and the world that we feel with our hearts and imaginations. To be sen- sible of the truth of only one of these, is to know truth but by halves. Milton said, that he " dared be known to think Spenser a better teacher than Scotus or Aquinas." He did not say than Plato or Pythagoras, who understood the two spheres within our reach. Both of these, and Milton himself, were as great lovers of physical and political truth as any men ; but they knew that it was not all ; they felt much beyond, and they made experiments upon more. It is doubted by the critics, whether Chau- cer's delight in the handling of fictions, or in the detection and scrutiny of a piece of truth, was the greater. Chaucer was a conscientious Reformer, which is a man who has a passion for truth ; and so * Sir Isaac Newton rejected the doctrine of the Trinity, because he could not reconcile it to his arithmetic. The " French Prophets," not being cognisable by the mathematics, were very near having him for a proselyte. His strength and his weakness were hardly equal in this distinction : but one of them, at least, serves to show how more than conventional his understanding was inclined to be, when taken out of its only faculty ; and I do not presume to think that any criticism of mine can be thought even invidious against it. I do not deny the sun, because I deny that the sun has a right to deny the universe. I am writing upon Matter of Fact now myself, and Matter of Fact will have me say what I do. FICTION AND MATTER OF FACT. 5 was Milton. So, in his way, was Ariosto himself, and indeed most great poets ; part of the very- perfection of their art, which is veri-similitude, being closely connected with their sense of truth in all things. But it is not necessary to be great, in order to possess a reasonable variety of perception. That nobody may despair of being able to indulge the two passions together, I can answer for them by my own experience. I can pass, with as much pleasure as ever, from the reading of one of Hume's Essays to that of the Arabian Nights, and vice versa ; and I think, the longer I live, the closer, if possible, will the union grow.* The roads are found to approach nearer, in proportion as we advance upon either ; and they both terminate in the same prospect. I am far from meaning that there is nothing real in either road. The path of matter of fact is as solid as ever ; but they who do not see the reality of the other, keep but a blind and prone beating upon their own surface. To drop the metaphor, matter of fact is our perception of the grosser and more external shapes of truth ; fiction repre- sents the residuum and the mystqjy. To love * It has done so. This Essay was written in the year 1824 ; and within the last few years I have had the pleasure of reading (besides poets) three different histories of Philosophy, histories of Rome and England, some of the philosophy of Hume himself, much of Abraham Tucker's, all the novels of Fielding and Smollett (including Gil Bias), Mr. Lane's Arabian Nights, Don Quixote, a heap of English Memoirs, and the whole of the romances of Mrs. Radcliffe. FICTION AND MATTER OF FACT. matter of fact is to have a lively sense of the visible and immediate ; to love fiction is to have as lively a sense of the possible and the remote. Now these two senses, if they exist at all, are of necessity as real, the one as the other. The only proof of either is in our perception. To a blind man, the most visible colours no more exist, than the hues of a fairy tale to a man destitute of fancy. To a man fancy, who sheds tears over a tale, the chair in which he sits has no truer existence in its way, than the story that moves him. His being touched is his proof in both instances. But, says the mechanical understanding, modern discoveries have acquainted us with the cause of lightning and thunder, of the nature of optical delu- sions, and fifty other apparent wonders ; and there- fore there is no more to be feigned about them. Fancy has done with them, at least with their causes ; and witches and will-o'-the-wisps being abolished, poetry is at a stand. The strong glass of science has put an end to the assumptions of fiction. This is a favourite remark with a pretty numerous set of writer^; and it is a very desperate one. It looks like reasoning ; and by a singular exercise of the very faculty which it asserts the death of, many persons take the look of an argument for the proof of it. Certainly, no observation can militate more strongly against existing matter of fact ; and this is the reason why it is made. The mechanical writers of verse find that it is no longer so easy to be taken FICTION AND MATTER OF FACT. 7 for poets, because fancy and imagination are more than usually in request : so they would have their revenge, by asserting, that poetry is no longer to be written. When an understanding of this description is told, that thunder is caused by a collision of clouds, and that lightning is a well known result of electricity, there may be an end, if he pleases, of his poetry with him. He may, if he thinks fit, or if he cannot help it, no longer see anything in the lightning but the escape of a subtle fluid, or hear anything more noble in the thunder than the crack of a bladder of water. Much good may his ignorance do him. But it is not so with understandings of a loftier or a more popular kind. The wonder of children, and the lofty speculations of the wise, meet alike on a point, higher than he can attain to, and look over the threshold of the world. Mechanical knowledge is a great and a glorious tool in the hands of man, and will change the globe. But it will still leave untouched the invisible sphere above and about us ; still leave us all the great and, all the gentle objects of poetry, — the heavens and the human heart, the regions of genii and fairies, the fanciful or passionate images that come to us from the seas, and from the flowers, and all that we behold. It is, in fact, remarkable, that the growth of science, and the re-appearance of a more poetical kind of poetry, have accompanied one another. Whatever may be the difference of opinion as to the 8 FICTION AND MATTER OP FACT. extent to which our modern poets have carried then- success, their inclinations cannot be doubted. How is it, that poetical impulse has taken this turn in a generation pronounced to be so mechanical? Whence has arisen among us this exceeding fond- ness for the fictions of the East, for solitary and fanciful reveries, for the wild taste of the Germans (themselves more scientific and wild than ever,) and even for a new and more primitive use of the old Pagan mythology, so long and so mechanically abused by the Chloes and Venuses of the French ? Politics may be thought a very unlikely cause for poetry, and it is so with mere politicians ; yet poli- tics, pushed further than common, have been the cause of the new and greater impetus given to the sympathies Of imagination ; for the more we know of any one ground of knowledge, the further we see into the general domains of intellect, if we are not mere slaves of the soil. A little philosophy, says Bacon, takes men away from religion ; a greater brings them round to it. This is the case with the reasoning faculty and poetry. We reason to a certain point, and are content with the discoveries of second causes. We reason farther, and find ourselves in the same airy depths as of old. The imagination recognises its ancient field, and begins ranging about at will, doubly bent upon liberty, because of the trammels with which it has been threatened. Take the following Apologue. — During a won- derful period of the world, the kings of the earth FICTION AND MATTER OF FACT. a leagued themselves together to destroy all opposi- tion ; to root out, if they could, the very thoughts of mankind. Inquisition was made for blood. The ears of the grovelling lay in wait for every murmur. On a sudden, during this great hour of danger, there arose in a hundred parts of the world, a cry, to which the cry of the Blatant Beast was a whisper. It proceeded from the wonderful multiplication of an extraordinary creature, which had already turned the cheeks of the tyrants pallid. It groaned and it grew loud : it spoke with a hundred tongues ; it grew fervidly on the ear, like the noise of millions of wheels. And the sound of millions of wheels was in it, together with other marvellous and awful noises. There was the sharpening of swords, the braying of trumpets, the neighing of war-horses, the laughter of solemn voices, the rushing by of lights, the movement of impatient feet, a tread as if the world were coming. And ever and anon there were pauses with " a still small voice," which made a trembling in the night time. But still the glow- ing sound of the wheels renewed itself; gathering early towards the morning. And when you came up to one of these creatures, you saw, with fear and reverence, its mighty conformation, being like wheels indeed, and a great vapour. And ever and anon the vapour boiled, and the wheels went rolling, and the creature threw out of its mouth visible words, that fell into the air by millions, and spoke to the utter- most parts of the earth. And the nations (for it 10 FICTION AND MATTER OP FACT. was a loving though a fearful creature) fed upon its words like the air they breathed : and the monarchs paused, for they knew their masters. This is Printing by Steam. — It will be said that it is an allegory, and that all allegories are but fictions, and flat ones. I am far from producing it as a specimen of the poetical power now in existence. Allegory itself is out of fashion, though it was a favourite exercise of our old poets, when the public were familiar with shows and spectacles. But alle- gory is the readiest shape into which imagination can turn a thing mechanical ; and in the one before us is contained the mechanical truth and the spiritual truth of that very matter of fact thing called a Printing Press : each of them as true as the other, or neither could take place. A business of screws and iron wheels is, or appears to be, a very common-place matter ; but not so the will of the hand that sets them in motion; not so the operations of the mind that directs them what to utter. We are satisfied respecting the one by science ; but what is it that renders us sensible of the wonders of the other, and their connection with the great mysteries of nature? Thought — Fancy — Imagination. What signifies to her the talk about electricity, and suction, and gravitation, and alembics, and fifty other mechanical operations of the marvellous 1 This is but the bone and muscle of wonder. Soul, and not body, is her pursuit ; the first cause, not the second ; the whole effect, not a FICTION AND MATTER OF FACT. 11 part of it ; the will, r the invention, the marvel itself. As long as this lies hidden, she still fancies what agents for it she pleases. The science of atmo- spherical phenomena hinders not her angels from "playing in the plighted clouds." The analysis of a bottle of salt water does not prevent her from " tak- ing the wings of the morning, and remaining in the uttermost parts of the sea." You must prove to her first, that you understand the simple elements, when decomposed ; the reason that brings them together ; the power that puts them in action ; the relations which they have to a thousand things besides our- selves and our wants ; the necessity of all this perpetual motion ; the understanding that looks out of the eye ; love, joy, sorrow, death and life, the future, the universe, the whole invisible abyss. Till you' know all this, and can plant the dry sticks of your reason, as trophies of possession, in every quarter of space, how shall you oust her from her dominion? 12 THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. THE INSIDE OE AN OMNIBUS. Elevation of society by this species of vehicle. — Metamorphosis of Dr. Johnson into an Omnibus. — His dialogue thereon with BoswelL — Various passengers in Omnibuses. — Intense inti- macy with the face of the man opposite you. — Boys and young ladies.-^ Old gentlemen unable to pull up the glass. — Young gentlemen embarrassed with eating an orange. — Exhibition of characters and tempers. — Ladies obliged to sit on gentlemen 's laps. — Last passengers at night. Enough has been said, in this quick and graphic age, respecting coachmen and cabmen, and con- ductors, and horses, and all the exterior phenomena of things vehicular ; but we are not aware that an " article" has yet been devoted to the subject before us. Come, then, our old friend Truth ! do what thou canst for us. If thou dost not, we know, that with all our trying, we can do nothing for ourselves. Men will have nothing to do with our representations, though we paint for them the prettiest girl in the world, — unlike ! By the invention of the Omnibus, all the World keeps its coach! — And with what cheapness! And THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. 13 to how much social advantage ! No " plague with servants ;" — no expense for liveries ; — no coach- makers' and horse-doctors' bills ; — no keeping one's fellow-creatures waiting for us in the cold night- time and rain, while the dance is going down the room, or another hour is spent in bidding good-bye, and lingering over the comfortable fire. We have no occasion to think of it at all till we want it ; and then it either comes to one's door, or you go forth, and in a few minutes see it hulling up the street, — the man-of-war among coaches, — the whale's back in the metropolitan flood, — while the driver is beheld sitting, super-eminent, like the guide of the elephant on his neck. We cannot say much for the beauty of the omni- bus ; but there is a certain might of utility in its very bulk, which supersedes the necessity of beauty, as in the case of the whale itself, or in the idea that we entertain of Dr. Johnson, who shouldered porters as he went, and " laughed like a rhinoceros." Virgil metamorphosed ships into sea-nymphs. The Doctor, by a process not more violent, might be supposed transformed into a vehicle for his favourite London streets ; and, if so, he would undoubtedly have anti- cipated the date of the present invention, and become an omnibus. His mouth seems to utter the word. Boswell (in Elysium). "Sir, if you were living now, and were to be turned into a coach, what sort of coach would you become ?' Johnson (rolling about, and laughing with bland 14 THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. contempt). " Sir, in parliamentary language, you are ' frivolous and vexatious ;' but the frivolity surmounts the vexatiousness." Boswell (tenderly). " Nay, sir, but to oblige an humble, and, I hope, not altogether undeserving friend." Johnson. " Sir, where reply is obvious, inter- rogation is disgusting. Nay, sir (seeing the tears in BosweWs eyes), I would not be harsh or uncomplying ; but do you not see the case at once ? I should for- merly have chosen to be a bishop's carriage perhaps, or a chancellor's, or any respectable lord's." Boswell (smiling). " Except a lord mayor's." Johnson (angrily). " And why, sir, should I not have been a lord mayor's ? What have I done, that it should be doubted whether I would countenance the dignity of integrity and the universality of commerce ? " Boswell (in confusion). " Sir, I beg pardon ; but to confess the truth, I was thinking of Mr. Wilkes." Johnson. " And why, sir, think of Mr. Wilkes, when the smaller idea should be merged into the greater ? when the great office itself is concerned, and not the pettiness of an exception ? Besides, sir, Wilkes, though a rascal and a Whig, was a gentle- man in manners, as well as birth (looking sternly at Botwell). He would not have made such a remark. — To be sure (relenting a little, and looking arch) he got drunk sometimes." Boswell (interrupting). " Dear sir! — " THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. 15 • Johnson. " Neither was he scrupulous in his admiration of beauty." Boswell. " Dearest sir ! — " Johnson. " Though whatsoever the frenzy of his inebriation, or the vagrancy of his nocturnal revels, he would hardly have mistaken an oyster- woman for a Hebe. Well, well, sir, let us be mutually considerate. Let us be decent. To cut this matter short, sir, I should be an omnibus" Boswell (with grateful earnestness). " May I presume, dear sir, to inquire the reason?" Johnson. " Sir, I should not be a cart. That would be low. Neither should I aspire to be the triumphant chariot of an Alexander, or the funeral car of a Napoleon. Posthumous knowledge has corrected those sympathies with ambition. A gig is pert ; a curricle coxcombical ; and the steam- car- riage is too violent, perturbed, and migratory: Sir, the omnibus for me. It suits with my past state and my present ; with the humanities I have retained, and with those which I have acquired. Sir, it even makes me beg pardon for what I have said of Wilkes. Mors omnibus communis. Like death, it is common to all, and gathers them into its friendly bosom. It is decent, deliberate, and unpretending; no respector of persons ; a king has been known to ride in it; # and opposite the king may have sat a republican weaver." * So it has been said of Louis Philippe, during his " citizen- king " days. 16 THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. Boswell. " But you would choose, sir, to be a London omnibus, rather than a Parisian one, or even a Litchfield ?" Johnson (with bland indulgence). " Surely, sir ; and to go up the Strand and Fleet-street, and occa- sionally to stop at the Mitre. And, sir, I would not be driven by everybody, though I can now tolerate everybody. I would have a humane and respectable driver ; an elderly man, sir ; — and my windows should be taken care of, that the people might not catch cold." Here Boswell, begging a thousand pardons, with shrugged shoulders, lifted eyebrows, and hands spread out in deprecation of offence, bursts, nevertheless, into an incontrollable fit of laughter, at the idea of the solemn and illustrious Johnson converted into an omnibus. And the Doctor, though a little angry at first, recollects his Elysian experiences, and at length contributes to a roar worthy of the inextinguishable laughter of the gods in Homer. Johnson (subsiding into a human measure of jovi- ality). " Sir, it was ludicrous enough, if you consider it as a man ; but if you consider it as a child, or as a divine person (to speak in the language of our new friend, Plato), the subject will be invested with the mild gravity of an impartial universality. I see, however, that it will take many more draughts of Lethe, before you, Boswell, can get the fumes of the old tavern wine out of your head ; so let us consult your capabilities, and return to human measures of THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. 17 discourse; — let us have reason once more, sir; — sir (for I see you wish me to say it), let us be good mortal jolly dogs, and have t' other bottle." Vanish the ever pleasant shades of Johnson and Boswell, and enter the omnibus in its own proper person. — If a morning omnibus, it is full of clerks and merchants ; if a noon, of chance fares ; if a night, of returning citizens and fathers of families ; if a midnight, of play-goers, and gentlemen lax with stiff glasses of brandy-and-water. Being one of the chance fares, we enter an omni- bus which has yet no other inside passenger ; and having no book with us, we make intense acquain- tance with two objects : the one being the heel of an outside passenger's boot, who is sitting on the coach-top ; and the other, that universally studied bit of literature, which is inscribed at the further end of every such vehicle, and which purports, that it is under the royal and charming jurisdiction of the young lady now reigning over us, V, B. by whom it is permitted to carry " twelve inside -pas- sengers, and no more ; " — thus showing extreme consideration on her Majesty's part, and that she will not have the sides of her loving subjects squeezed together like figs. Enter a precise personage, probably a Methodist, certainly " well off," who seats himself right in the midway of his side of the Omnibus ; that is to say, vol. i. c 18 THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. at equal distances between the two extremities; because it is the spot in which you least feel the inconvenience of the motion. He is a man who seldom makes a remark, or takes notice of what is going forward, unless a payment is to be resisted, or the entrance of a passenger beyond the lawful number. Now and then he hems, and adjusts a glove ; or wipes a little dust off one of the cuffs of his coat. In leaps a youngster, and seats himself close at the door, in order to be ready to leap out again. Item, a maid-servant, flustered with the fear of being too late, and reddening furthermore betwixt awkwardness, and the resentment of it, at not being quite sure where to seat herself. A jerk of the Omnibus pitches her against the precisian, and makes both her and the youngster laugh. Enter a young lady, in colours and big ear-rings, and excessively flounced and ringleted, and seats herself opposite the maid-servant, who beholds her with admiration, but secretly thinks herself hand- somer, and what a pity it is she was not a lady herself, to become the ringlets and flounces better. Enter two more young ladies, in white, who pass to the other end in order to be out of the way of the knees and boots of those who quit. They whisper and giggle much, and are quizzing the young lady in the reds and ringlets ; who, for her part (though she knows it, and could squeeze all THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. 19 their bonnets together for rage), looks as firm and unconcerned as a statue. Enter a dandy, too handsome to he quizzed ; and then a man with a bundle, who is agreeably surprised with the gentlemanly toleration of the dandy, and unaware of the secret disgust of the Methodist. Item, an old gentleman ; then, a very fat man ; then, two fat elderly women, one of whom is very angry at the incommodious presence of her counter- parts, while the other, full of good humour, is com- forted by it. The youngster has in the mean time gone to sit on the coach-top, in order to make room ; and we set off to the place of our destination. What an intense intimacy we get with the face, neckcloth, waistcoat, and watch-chain of the man who sits opposite us ! Who is he ? What is his name ? Is his care a great care, — an affliction ? Is his look [of cheerfulness real ? At length he looks at ourselves, asking himself, no doubt, similar ques- tions; and, as it is less pleasant to be scrutinized than to scrutinize, we now set him the example of turning the eyes another way. How unpleasant it must be to the very fat man to be so gazed at! Think, if he sat as close to us in a private room, in a chair ! How he would get up, and walk away ! But here, sit he must, and have his portrait taken by our memories. We sigh for his plethora, with a breath almost as piteous as his wheezing. And he has a sensible face withal, and has, perhaps, acquired a painful amount of intellectual as well as physical c 2 20 THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. knowledge, from the melancholy that has succeeded to his joviality. Fat men always appear to be " good fellows," unless there is some manifest proof to the contrary ; so we wish, for his sake, that every body in this world could do just as he pleased, and die of a very dropsy of delight. Exeunt our fat friend, and the more ill-humoured of the two fat women ; and enter, in their places, two young mothers, — one with a good-humoured child, a female ; the other with a great, handsome, red-cheeked wilful boy, all flounce and hat and feathers, and red legs, who is eating a bun, and who seems resolved that the other child, who does nothing but look at it, shall not partake a morsel. His mother, who " snubs" him one instant, and lets him have his way the next, has been a spoiled child herself, and is doing her best to learn to repent the sorrow she caused her own mother, by the time she is a dozen years older. The elderly gentle- man compliments the boy on his likeness to his mamma, who laughs and says he is " very polite." As to the young gentleman, he fancies he is asked for a piece of his bun, and falls a kicking ; and the young lady in the ringlets tosses her head. Exit the Methodist, and enter an affable man ; who, having protested it is very cold, and lamented a stoppage, and vented the original remark that you gain nothing by an omnibus in point of time, sub- sides into an elegant silence ; but he is fastened upon by the man with the bundle, who, encouraged THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. 21 by his apparent good-nature, tells him, in an under tone, some anecdotes relative to his own experience of omnibuses ; which the affable gentleman endures with a variety of assenting exclamations, intended quite as much to stop as to encourage, not one of which succeeds ; such as " Ah" — " Oh" — " Indeed" — " Pre- cisely"— "I dare say"— "I see"— "Really?"— "Very likely;" — jerking the top of his stick occasionally against his mouth as he speaks, and nobody pitying him. Meantime the good-humoured fat woman having expressed a wish to have a window closed which the ill-humoured one had taken upon her to open, and the two young ladies in the corner giving their assent, but none of the three being able to pull it up, the elderly gentleman, in an ardour of gallantry, anxious to show his pleasing combination of strength and tenderness, exclaims, "Permit me;" and jumping up, cannot do it at all. The window cruelly sticks fast. It only brings up all the blood into his face with the mingled shame and incompetence of the endeavour. He is a conscientious kind of incapable, however, is the elderly gentleman ; so he calls in the conductor, who does it in an instant. " He knows the trick," says the elderly gentleman. " It 's only a little bit new," says the conductor ; who hates to be called in. Exeunt elderly and the maid-servant, and enter an unreflecting young gentleman who has bought an orange, and must needs eat it immediately. He 22 THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. accordingly begins by peeling it, and is first made aware of the delicacy of his position by the giggle- ment of the two young ladies, and his doubt where he shall throw the peel. He is " in for it," however, and must proceed ; so being unable to divide the orange into its segments, he ventures upon a great liquid bite, which resounds through the omnibus, and covers the whole of the lower part of his face with pip and drip. The young lady with the ring- lets is right before him. The two other young ladies stuff their handkerchiefs into their mouths, and he, into his own mouth, the whole of the rest of the fruit, " sloshy" and too big, with desperation in his heart, and the tears in his eyes. Never will he eat an orange again in an omnibus. He doubts whether he shall even venture upon one at all in the presence of his friends, the Miss Wilkinsons. Enter, at various times, an irascible gentleman, who is constantly threatening to go out; a long- legged dragoon, at whose advent the young ladies are smit with sudden gravity and apparent objec- tion ; a young sailor, with a face innocent of every thing but a pride in his slops, who says his mother does not like his going to sea ; a gentleman with a book, which we long to ask him to let us look at ; a man with a dog, which embitters the feet and an- kles of a sharp-visaged old lady, and completes her horror by getting on the empty seat next her, and looking out of the window ; divers bankers' clerks and tradesmen, who think of nothing but the bills THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. 23 in their pockets ; two estranged friends, ignoring each other ; a pompous fellow, who suddenly looks modest and bewitched, having detected a baro- net in the corner ; a botanist with his tin her- barium ; a young married couple, assuming a right to be fond in public ; another from the coun- try, who exalt all the rest of the passengers in self-opinion by betraying the amazing fact, that they have never before seen Piccadilly ; a foot- man, intensely clean in his habiliments, and very respectful, for his hat subdues him, as well as the strange feeling of sitting inside ; four boys going to school, very pudding-faced, and not know- ing how to behave (one pulls a string and top half- way out of his pocket, and all reply to questions in monosyllables) ; a person with a constant smile on his face, having just cheated another in a bargain ; close to him a very melancholy person, going to see a daughter on her deathbed, and not hearing a single one of the cheater's happy remarks ; a French lady, looking at once amiable and worldly, — hard, as it were, in the midst of her softness, or soft in the midst of her hardness, — which you will, — probably an actress, or a teacher ; two immense- whiskered Italians, uttering their delicious language with a precision which shows that they are singers ; a man in a smock-frock, who, by his sitting on the edge of the seat, and perpetually watching his time to go out, seems to make a constant apology for his presence ; ditto, a man with some huge mysterious 24 THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. accompaniment of mechanism, or implement of trade, too big to be lawfully carried inside ; a pedant or a fop, ostentatious of some ancient or foreign language, or talking of a lord ; all sorts of people talking of the weather, and the harvest, and the Queen, and the last bit of news ; in short, every description of age, rank, temper, occupation, ap- pearance, life, character, and behaviour, from the thorough gentleman who quietly gives himself a lift out of the rain, secure in his easy unaffected manner, and his accommodating good-breeding, down to the blackguard who attempts to thrust his opinion down the throat of his neighbour, or keeps his leg thrust out across the door-way, or lets his umbrella drip against a sick child. Tempers, are exhibited most at night, because people by that time have dined and drunk, and finished their labours, and because the act of going home serves to bring out the domestic habit. You do not then, indeed, so often see the happy fatigue, delighted with the sudden opportunity of rest ; nor the anxious look, as if it feared its journey's end; nor the bustling one, eager to get there. The seats are most commonly reckoned upon, and more allow- ance is made for delays ; though some passengers make a point of always being in a state of indigna- tion and ill-treatment, and express an impatience to get home, as if their house were a paradise (which is assuredly what it is not, to those who expect them there). But at night, tongues are loosened, THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. 25 wills and pleasures more freely expressed, and faces rendered less bashful by the comparative darkness. It is then that the jovial "old boy" lets out the secret of his having dined somewhere, perhaps at some Company's feast in Goldsmiths' or Stationers' Hall ; and it is with difficulty he hinders himself from singing. Then the arbitrary or the purse-proud are wrathful if they are not driven up to the identical inch of curb-stone, fronting their door. Then the incontinent nature, heedless of anything but its own satisfaction, snores in its corner ; then politicians are loud ; and gay fellows gallant, especially if they are old and ugly ; and lovers, who seem unconscious of one another's presence, are intensely the reverse. Then also the pickpocket is luckiest at his circum- ventions ; and the lady, about to pay her fare, sud- denly misses her reticule. Chiefly now also, six- pences, nay, purses, are missed in the straw, and lights are brought to look for it, and the conductor is in an agonizing perplexity whether to pronounce the loser an impudent cheat, or to love him for being an innocent and a ninny. Finally, now is the time when selfishness and generosity are most exhibited. It rains, and the coach is full; a lady applies for admittance ; a gentleman offers to go outside ; and, according to the natures of the various passengers, he is despised or respected accordingly. It rains hor- ribly ; a " young woman " applies for admittance ; the coach is overstocked already ; a crapulous fellow who has been allowed to come in by special favour, 26 THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. protests against the exercise of the like charity to a female (we have seen it!), and is secretly detested by the least generous ; a similar gentleman to the above, offers to take the applicant on his knee, if she has no objection; and she enters accordingly, and sits. — Is she pretty ? — Is she ugly ? — Above all, is she good-humoured ? A question of some con- cern, even to the least interested of knee-givers. On the other hand, is the gentleman young or old, pleasant or disagreeable ; a real gentleman, or only a formal " old frump," who has hardly a right to be civil? At length the parties get a look at one another, the gentleman first, the young woman sud- denly from under her bonnet. — Ought she to have looked at all? — And what is the particular retro- spective expression which she instinctively chooses out of many, when she has looked? It is a nice question, varying according to circumstances. — " Making room " for a fair interloper is no such dilemma as that; though we may be allowed to think, that the pleasure is greatly enhanced by the pleasantness of the countenance. It is astonishing how much grace is put, even into the tip of an elbow, by the turn of an eye. There is a reflection which all omnibus passengers are agreed upon, and which every one of them perhaps has made, without exception, in the course of their intellectual reciprocities ; which is, that omnibuses are " very convenient ;" — " an astonishing accommodation to the public;" — not quick, — save THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. 27 little time (as aforesaid), — and the conductors are very tiresome; but a most useful invention, and wonderfully cheap. There are also certain things which almost all omnibus passengers do; such as help ladies to and fro ; gradually get nearer to the door whenever a vacant seat occurs, so as to force the new comer further up than he likes ; and all people stumble, forward or sideways, when they first come in, and the coach sets off before they are seated. Among the pleasures, are seeing the highly satisfied faces of persons suddenly relieved from a long walk ; being able to read a book ; and, occasionally, observing one of a congenial sort in the hands of a fellow passenger. Among the evils, are dirty boots and wetting umbrellas ; broken panes of glass in bad weather, afflicting the napes of the necks of invalids ; and fellows who endeavour to convenience themselves at every body's expense, by taking up as much room as possible, and who pre- tend to alter their oblique position when remonstrated with, without really doing it. Item, cramps in the leg, when thrusting it excessively backwards under- neath the seat, in making way for a new comer, — the patient thrusting it forth again with an agonized vivacity, that sets the man opposite him laughing. Item, cruel treadings upon corns, the whole being of the old lady or gentleman seeming to be mashed into the burning foot, and the sufferer looking in an ecstacy of tormented doubt whether to be decently quiet or murderously vociferous, — the inflictor, mean- 28 THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. while, thinking it sufficient to say " Very sorry" in an indifferent tone of voice, and taking his seat with an air of luxurious complacency. Among the plea- sures also, particularly in going home at night, must not he forgotten the having the omnibus finally to yourself, re-adjusting yourself in a corner betwixt slumbering and waking, and throwing up your feet on the seat opposite ; though as the will becomes piqued in proportion to its luxuries, you always regret that the seats are not wider, and that you cannot treat your hat, on cold nights, as freely as if it were a night-cap. The last lingerers on these occasions (with the exception of play-goers), are apt to be staid suburb- dwelling citizens, — sitters with hands crossed upon their walking-sticks, — men of parcels and eatables, breakers of last baskets of oranges, chuckling over their bargains. There 's one in the corner, sleeping, — the last of the dwellers in Paddington. To deposit him at his door is the sole remaining task of the conductor. He wakes up; hands forth a bag of apples,— a tongue, — a bonnet, and four pairs of ladies' shoes. A most considerate spouse and "Papa" is he, and a most worthy and flourishing hosier. Venerable is his lax throat in his bit of white neckcloth (he has never taken to black) ; but jovially also he shakes his wrinkles, if you talk of the stationer's widow, or the last city feast. " Don't drop them ladies' shoes, Tom," says he, chuckling ; " they '11 be worn out before their time." THE INSIDE OF AN OMNIBUS. 29 " Wery expensive, I believe, sir, them 'ere kind o' shoes," says Tom. " Very ; — oh, sadly. And no better than paper. But men well to do in the world, can't live as cheap as poor ones." Tom thinks this a very odd proposition ; but it does not disconcert him. Nothing disconcerts a conductor, except a passenger without a sixpence. " True, sir," says Tom ; " it 's a hard case to be forced to spend one's money ; but then you know — I beg pardon" (with a tone of modest deference and secret contempt), "it's much harder, as they say, where there 's none to spend." "Hah! Ha, ha! Why, yes, eh?" returns the old gentleman, again chuckling ; " so there 's your sixpence, Tom, and good-night." " Good-night, sir." And up jumps Tom on the coach-box, where he amuses the driver with an account of the dirt which the hosier has got from the coach- wheel without his knowing it ; and off they go to a far less good supper, but, it must be added, a much better sleep, than the rich old citizen. 30 THE DAY OF THE DISASTERS OF THE DAY OP THE DISASTEKS OF CAEEING- TON BLUNDELL, ESQUIBE. Description of a penurious independent gentleman, fond of invitations and the great. — He takes his way to a " dining out." — His calamities on the road. — And on his return. Carfington Blundell, Esquire, aged six-and- thirty,but apparently a dozen years older, was a spare, well-dressed, sickly-looking, dry sort of leisurely individual, of respectable birth, very small income, and no abilities. He was the younger son of the younger son of a younger brother ; and not being able to marry a fortune (which once, they say, nearly made him die for love), and steering clear, with a pro- voking philosophy, of the corkscrew curls and pretty staircase perplexities of the young ladies of lodging-houses, contrived to live in London upon the rent of half a dozen cottages in Berkshire. Having, in fact, no imagination, Carfington Blun- dell, Esquire, had no sympathies, except with the wants and wishes of that interesting personage, Car- fington Blundell, Esquire — of whom he always bore CARFINGTON BLUNDELL, ESQUIRE. 31 about with him as lively an image in his brain as it was possible for it to possess, and with whom, when other people were of the least consequence to his inclinations, he was astonished that the whole world did not hasten to sympathize. On every other occasion, the only thing which he had to do with his fellow-creatures, all and every of them, was, he thought, to leave them alone ; — an excellent principle, as far as concerns their own wish to be so left, but not quite so much so in the reverse instances ; such, for example, as when they have fallen into ditches, or want to be paid their bills, or have a turn for delicate attentions, or under any other circumstances which induce people to suppose that you might as well do to them as you would be done by. Mr. Blundell, it is true, was a regular payer of his bills; and though, agreeably to that absorption of himself in the one interesting idea above mentioned, he was not famous for paying delicate attentions, except where he took a fancy to having them paid to himself; yet, provided the morning was not very cold or muddy, and he had a stick with him for the individual to lay hold of, and could reckon upon using it without soiling his shoes, or straining his muscles, the probability is, that he might have helped a man out of a ditch. As people, however, are not in the habit of falling into ditches, especially about Regent-street, and as it was not easy to conjecture in what other instances Mr. Blundell might have deemed it fitting to evince a sense of the 32 THE DAY OF THE DISASTERS OF existence of anything but his own coat and waist- coat, muffins, mutton cutlet, and bed, certain it is, that the sympathies of others were anything but lively towards himself; and they would have been less so, if the only other intense idea which he had in his head, to-wit, that of his birth and connexions (which he pretty freely overrated), had not in- stinctively led him to hit upon the precise class of acquaintances, to whom his insipidity could have been welcome. These acquaintances, with whom he dined fre- quently (and breakfasted too), were rich men, of a grade a good deal lower than himself; and to such of these as had not " unexpectedly left town," he gave a sort of a quiet, particular, just-enough kind of a lodging-house dinner once a year, the shoe-black in gloves assisting the deputy under-waiter from the tavern. The friends out of town he paid with regrets at their " lamented absence ;" and the whole of them he would have thought amply recompensed, even without his giving into this fond notion of the neces- sity of a dinner on his part, by the fact of his eating their good things, and talking of his fifth cousin the Marquis ; a personage, by the way, who never heard of him. He did, indeed, once contrive to pick up the Marquis's glove at the opera, and to intimate at the same time that his name was Blun- dell ; upon which the noble lord, staring somewhat, but good-humouredly smiling withal, said, " Much obliged to you, Mr. Bungle." As to his positive CARFINGTON BLUNDELL, ESQUIRE. 33 insipidity over the hock and pine-apples of his friends, Mr. Blundell never dreamt of such a thing; and if he happened to sit next to any wit, or other lion of the day, who seemed of consequence enough to conrpete with the merits of his presence, he thought it amply set off by his taste in having had such an- cestors, and indeed in simply being that identical Mr. Blundell, who, in having no merits at all, was gifted by the kind providence of nature with a pro- portionate sense of his enjoying a superabundance of them. To complete the idea of him in the reader's mind, his manners were gentlemanly, except that they betrayed now and then too nice a sense of his habiliments. His hat he always held in the best way adapted to keep it in shape ; and a footman coming once too softly into a room where he was waiting during a call, detected him in the act of dusting his boots with an extra coloured handker- chief, which he always carried about with him for that purpose. He calculated, that with allowance for changes in the weather, it saved him a good four months' coach-hire. Such was the accomplished individual, who, in the month of May, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and twenty-seven, and in a " fashion- able dress of the first water" (as Sir Phelim called it), issued forth from his lodgings near St. James's, drawing the air through his teeth with an elegant indifference, coughing slightly at intervals out of VOL. I. D 34 THE DAY OF THE DISASTERS OF emotion, and, to say the truth, as happy as coat and hat, hunger, a dinner-party, and a fine day could make him. Had the weather been in the smallest degree rainy, or the mansion for which he was bound at any distance, the spectators were to understand that he would have come in, his own carriage, or at least that he intended to call a coach; but as the day was so very fine, and he kept looking at every door that he passed, as though each were the one he was about to knock at, the conclusion to be drawn was, that having but a little way to go, and possess- ing a high taste for superiority to appearances, it was his pleasure to go on foot. Vulgar wealth might be always making out its case. Dukes and he could afford to dispense with pretension. The day was beautiful, the sky blue, the air a zephyr, the ground in that perfect state for walking (a day or two before dust) when there is a sort of dry moisture in the earth, and people in the country prefer the road to the path. The house at which our hero was going to dine, was midway between the west end and the north-east ; and he had just got half-way, and was in a very quiet street, when in the " measureless content " of his anticipations, he thought he would indulge his eyesight with one or two of those personal ornaments, the presence of which, on leaving the house, he always ascertained with sundry pattings of his waistcoat and coat pockets. Having, therefore, again assured himself that he had duly got his two pocket-handkerchiefs CARFINGTON BLUNDELL,, ESQUIRE. 35 his ring, his shirt-pin, his snuff-box, his watch, and his purse under his watch, he first took off a glove that he might behold the ring ; and then, with the ungloved hand, he took out the snuff-box, in order that he might as delicately contemplate the snuff- box. Now the snuff-box was an ancient but costly snuff-box, once the possession of his grandmother, who had it from her uncle, whose arms, flaming in or and gules, were upon the lid ; and inside the lid was a most ingeniously contrived portrait of the uncle's lady, in a shepherdess's hat and powdered toupee, looking, or to be supposed to be looking, into an actual bit of looking-glass. Carfington Blundell, Esquire, in a transport of ease, hope, and ancestral elegance, and with that expression of countenance, the insipidity of which is bound to be in proportion to the inward rapture, took a pinch out of this hereditary amenity, and was in the act of giving a glance at his grand-aunt before he closed the lid, when a strange, respectably- dressed person, who seemed to be going somewhere in a great hurry, suddenly dashed against him ; and, uttering the words, " With pleasure," dipped his lingers into the box, and sent it, as Carfington thought, half-way across the street. Intense was the indignation, but at the same time highly considerate the movement, of Mr. Blundell ; who seeing the " impertinent beast " turn a corner, and hearing the sound of empty metal dancing over d 2 36 THE DAY OF THE DISASTERS OF the street, naturally judged it better to secure the box, than derange his propriety further by an idle pursuit. Contenting himself, therefore, with send- ing an ejaculation after the vagabond to the pur- pose just quoted, and fixing his eye upon the af- fecting moveable now stationary, he delicately step- ped off the pavement towards it, with inward congratulation upon its not being muddy, when imagine his dismay and petrifaction, on lifting up, not the identical box, but one of the commonest order ! To be brief, it was of pewter ; and upon the lid of it, with after-dinner fork, was scratched a question, which, in the immediate state of Mr. Blundell's sensations, almost appeared to have a supernatural meaning ; to-wit, " How 's your mother ? " Had it been possible for a man of the delicacy of Mr. Blundell's life and proportions to give chace to a thief, or had he felt it of the least use to raise a hue and cry in a gentlemanly tone of voice — or, indeed, in any voice not incompatible with his cha- racter — doubtless he would have done so with in- conceivable swiftness ; but, as it was, he stood as if thunderstruck ; and, in an instant, there were a dozen persons about him, all saying — " What is it ? " " Which ? " " Who ? " Mr. Blundell, in his first emotions, hardly knew "what it was" himself: the "which" did not puzzle him quite so much, as often as he looked upon the snuff-box ; but the " who " he was totally CARFINGTON BLUNDELL, ESQUIBE. 37 at a loss to conjecture ; and so were his con- dolers. " What — was it that chap as run agin you," said one, " jist as I was coming in at t 'other end of the street ? Lord love you ! you might as well run arter last year. He 's a mile off by this time." " If the gentleman '11 give me a shilling," said a boy, " I'll run arter him." " Get out, you young dog," said the first speaker ; " d 'ye think the gentleman 's a fool ? " " It is a circumstance," said Mr. Blundell, grate- ful for this question, and attempting a breathless smile, " which — might have — surprised — any body." " What sort of a man was it ? " emphatically in- quired a judicious-looking person, jerking his face into Mr. Blundell's, and then bending his ear close to his, as though he were deaf. " I— declare," said Mr. Blundell, " that I can — hardly say, the thing was so very unexpected ; but — from the glimpse I had of him, I should — really say — he looked like a gentleman — (here Mr. Blun- dell lifted up his eyebrows,) — not indeed a perfect gentleman." " I dare say not, sir," returned the judicious- looking person. " What is all this ? " inquired a loud individual, elbowing his way through. " A gentleman been robbed," said the boy., " by another gentleman." " Another gentleman ? " 38 THE DAY OF THE DISASTERS OF " Yes ; not a perfect gentleman, he says ; but highly respectable." Here, to the equal surprise and grief of the suf- ferer, the crowd laughed and began joking with one another. None but the judicious-looking, deaf in- dividual, seemed to keep his countenance. " Well," quoth the loud man, " here 's a police- man coming at the end of the street ; the gentleman had better apply to him." " Yes, sir," said the deaf friend, " that 's your re- source, and God bless you with it ! " So saying, he grasped Mr. Blundell's hand with a familiarity more sympathizing than respectful ; and treading at the same time upon his toes in the most horrible manner, begged his pardon, and went away. Mr. Blundell stooped down, partly to rub his toes, and partly to hide his confusion, and the policeman came up. The matter was explained to the policeman, all the while he was hearing the suf- ferer, by a dozen voices, and the question was put, " What sort of a man was it ? " " Here is a gentleman," said Mr. Blundell, " who saw him." The policeman looked about for the witness, but nobody answered; and it was discovered, that all the first speakers had vanished, — loud man, boy, and all. " Have you lost anything else, sir 1 " inquired the policeman. " Bless me ! " said Mr. Blundell, turning very red, CARFINGTON BLUNDELL, ESQUIRE. 39 and feeling his pockets, " I really — positively I do fear — that " " You can remember, sir, what you had with you when you came out?" " One handkerchief," continued Mr. Blundell, " has certainly gone ; and " " Your watch is safe," returned the policeman, " for it is hanging out of your waistcoat. Very lucky you fastened it. Have you got your purse, sir?" " The purse was under the watch," breathed Mr. [Blundell ; " therefore I have no doubt that — but I regret to say — that I do not — feel my ring." A laugh, and cries of " too bad." " A man shook your hand, sir," said the police- man ; " did you not feel it then?" " I did not, indeed," replied Mr. Blundell ; " I felt nothing but the severity of the squeeze." " And you had a brooch, I perceive." The brooch was gone too. " Why don't you run arter him," cried a very little boy in an extremely high and loud voice, which set the crowd in a roar. The policeman, as speedily as he could, dispersed the crowd, and accompanied Mr. Blundell part of his way ; whither the latter knew not, for he walked along as if he had taken too much wine. Indeed, he already doubted whether he should proceed to recruit himself at his friend's table, or avoid the shame of telling his story, and return home. The 40 THE DAY OF THE DISASTERS OF policeman helped to allay his confusion a little by- condolence, by promises of search, and accounts of daring robberies practised upon the most knowing ; and our hero, in the gratitude of his heart, would have given him his card ; but he now found that his pocket-book was gone ! His companion rubbed his face to conceal a smile, and received with great respect an oral communication of the address. Mr. Blundell, to show that his spirit as a gentleman was not subdued, told him there was half-a-crown for him on his calling. Alone, and meditative, and astonished, and, as it were, half undone, Mr. Blundell continued his journey towards the dinner, having made up his mind, that as his watch-chain was still apparent, and had the watch attached to it, and as the disorder of his nerves, if not quite got rid of, might easily be referred to delicacy of health, he would refresh his spirits with some of that excellent port, which always made him feel twice the man he was. Nor was this judicious conclusion prevented, but rather irritated and enforced, by one of those sudden showers, which in this fickle climate are apt to come pouring down in the midst of the finest weather, especially upon the heels of April. This, to be sure, was a tremendous one ; though, by diverting our hero's chagrin, and putting him upon his mettle, it only made him gather up his determination, and look extremely counter-active and frowning. Would to Heaven his nerves had been as braced up as his- CARFINGTON BLUNDELL, ESQUIRE. 41 face ! The gutters were suddenly a torrent ; the pavement a dancing wash ; the wind a whirlwind ; the women all turned into distressed Venuses de Medici. Everybody got up in door-ways, or called a coach. Unfortunately no coach was to he had. The hacks went by, insolently taking no notice. Mr. Blundell's determination was put to a nonplus. The very door-ways in the street where he was, being of that modern, skimping, inhospitable, penny- saving, done-by- contract order, so unlike the good old projecting ones with pediments and ample thresholds, denied security even to his thin and shrinking person. His pumps were speedily as wet through as if they had been made of paper ; and what rendered this ruin of his hopes the more pro- voking, was, that the sunshine suddenly burst forth again, as powerful as the rain which had interrupted it. A coach, however, he now thought, would be forthcoming ; and it would at least take him home again ; while the rain, and " the previous inability to get one," would furnish a good excuse for returning. But no coach was to be had so speedily, and meantime his feet were wet, and there was danger of cold. "As I am wet," thought Mr. Blundell, sighing, " a little motion, at all events, is best. It would be better, considering I am so, not to stop at all, nor perhaps get into a coach ; but then how am I to get home in these shoes, and this highly even- ing dress ? I shall be a sight. I shall have those 42 THE DAY OF THE DISASTERS OF cursed little boys after me. Perhaps I shall again be hustled." Bewildered with contending emotions of shame, grief, disappointment, anger, nay hunger, and the sympathy between his present pumps and departed elegancies, our hero picked his way as delicately as he could along the curb-stones ; and, turning a corner, had the pleasure of seeing a hackney-coach slowly moving in the distance, and the man holding forth his whip to the pedestrians, evidently dis- engaged. The back of it, to be sure, was towards him, and the street long, and narrow, and very muddy. But no matter. An object 's an object ;— a little more mud could not signify : our light-footed suiFerer began running. Now runners, unfortunately, are not always pre- pared for corners ; especially when their anxiety has an object right before it, and the haste is in propor- tion. Mr. Blundell, almost before he was aware of it, found himself in the middle of a flock of sheep. There was a hackney-coach also in the way; the dog was yelping, and leaping hither and thither ; and the drover, in a very loud state of mind, hooting, whistling, swearing, and tossing up his arms. Mr. Blundell, it is certain, could not have got into a position less congenial to his self-possession, or more calculated to commit his graces in the eyes of the unpropitiated. And the sheep, instead of sympathizing with him, as in their own distress they might (poetically) be supposed to do, positively CARFINGTON BLUNDELL, ESQUIRE. 43 seemed in the league to distress his stockings, and not at all to consider even his higher garment. They ran against him ; they bolted at him ; they leaped at him ; or if they seemed to avoid him, it was only to brush him with muddier sides, and to let in upon his weakened forces the frightful earnest- ness of the dog, and the inconsiderate, if not some- what suspicious, circumambiences of the coachman's whip. Mr. Blundell suddenly disappeared. He fell down, and the sheep began jumping over him ! The spectators, I am sorry to say, were in an ecstacy. You know, observant reader, the way in which sheep carry themselves on abrupt and saltatory occasions ; how they follow one another with a sort of spurious and involuntary energy; what a pre- tended air of determination they have ; how they really have it, as far as example induces, and fear propels them ; with what a heavy kind of lightness they take the leap ; how brittle in the legs, lump- ish in the body, and insignificant in the face ; how they seem to quiver with apprehension, while they are bold in act ; and with what a provoking and massy springiness they brush by you, if you happen to be in the way, as though they wouldn't avoid the terrors of your presence, if possible, — or rather, as if they would avoid it with all their hearts, but insulted you out of a desperation of inability. Baas intermix their pensive objections with the hurry, and 44 THE DAY OF THE DISASTERS OF a sound of feet as of water. Then, ever and anon, come the fiercer leaps, the conglomerating circuits, the dorsal visitations, the yelps and tongue-lollings of the dog, lean and earnest minister of compulsion ; and loud, and dominant over all, exult the no less yelping orders of the drover, — indefinite, it is true, but expressive, — rustical cogencies of oo and ou, the intelligible jargon of the Cory don or Thyrsis of Chalk-Ditch, who cometh, final and humane, with a bit of candle in his hat, a spike at the end of his stick, and a hoarseness full of pastoral catarrh and juniper. Thrice (as the poets say) did Carfington Blun- dell, Esquire, raise his unhappy head out of the melee, hatless and mudded ; thrice did the spectators shout; and thrice did he sink back from the shout and the sheep, in calamitous acquiescence. " Lie still, you fool! " said the hackney-coachman, " and they '11 jump easy." "Jump easy!" Heavens! how strange are the vicissitudes of human affairs. To think of Mr. Blun- dell only but yesterday, or this evening rather, — nay, not an hour ago, — his day fine, his hopes im- mense, his whole life lapped up, as it were, in cotton and lavender, his success elegant, his evening about to be spent in a room full of admirers ; and now, his very prosperity is to consist in lying still in the mud, and letting sheep jump over him ! Then to be called a " fool :" — " Lie still, you fool" CARFINGTON BLUNDELL, ESQUIRE. 45 Mr. Blundell could not stand it any longer (as the Irishman said) ; so he rose up just in time to secure a kick from the last sheep, and emerged amidst a roar of congratulation. He got as quickly as possible into a shop, which luckily communicated with a back street; and, as things generally mend when they reach their worst (such at least was the consolatory reflection which our hero's excess of suffering was glad to seize hold of), a hackney-coach was standing close to him, empty, and disengaged. It has just let a gen- tleman down next door. Our hero breathed a great breath, returned his handkerchief into his pocket (which had been made a sop of to no purpose), and uttering the word " accident" and giving rapid orders where to drive to, was hastening to hide himself from fate and the little boys within the vehicle, when, to his intense amazement, the coachman stopped him. " Hollo ! " quoth the Jarveian mystery ; " what are you arter 1 " " Going to get in," said Blundell. " I 'm bless 'd if you do," said the coachman. " How, fellow ! Not get in ?" cried Mr. Blundell, irritated that so mean an obstacle should present itself to his great wants. " What's your coach for, sir, if it isn't to accommodate gentlemen; — to ac- commodate any body, I may say ? " Now it happened, that the coachman, besides having had his eye caught by another fare, was a 46 THE DAY OF THE DISASTERS OF very irritable coachman, given to repenting or being out of temper all day, for the drinking he solaced himself with over night ; and he didn't choose to be called " fellow," especially by an in- dividual with a sort of dancing-master appearance, with his hat jammed in, his silk stockings untimely, and his whole very equivocal man all over mud. So jerking him aside with his elbow, and then turn- ing about, with the steps behind him, and facing the unhappy Blundell, he [thus, with a terrible slowness of articulation, bespoke him, the counte- nances of both getting redder as he spoke : — " And do you think now, — Master ' Fellow,' or Fiddler, or Mudlark, — or whatsomever else you call yourself, — that I'm going to have the new seats and lining o' my coach dirtied so as not to be fit to be seen, by such a trumpery beast, as you are?" " It is for light sorrows to speak," saith the philosopher ; " great ones are struck dumb." Mr. Blundell was struck dumb ; dumber than ever he had conceived it possible for a gentleman to be struck. It is little to say that he felt as if heaven and earth had come together. There was no heaven and earth ; nothing but space and silence. Mr. Blun- dell's world was annihilated. Alas ! it was restored to him by a shout from the " cursed little boys." Mr. Blundell mechanically turned away, and began retracing his steps home- ward, half conscious, and all a spectacle ; the little CARFINGTON BLUNDELL, ESQUIRE. 47 boys following and preceding him, just leaving a hollow space for his advances, and looking back, as they jogged, in his face. He turned into a shop, and begged to be allowed to wait a little in the back parlour. He was humanely accommodated with soap and water, and a cloth ; and partly out of shame at returning through the gazes of the shopmen, he stayed there long enough to get rid of his tormentors. No great-coat, however, was to be had ; no shoes that fitted ; no stockings ; and though he was no longer in his worst and wettest condition, he could not gather up courage enough to send for another coach. In the very idea of a coachman he beheld something that upturned all his previous existence : — a visitation — a Gorgon — a hypochon- dria. " Don't talk to me like a death's head," said Falstaff to Doll Tearsheet, when she reminded him of his age. Mr. Blundell would have said, " Don't talk to me like a hackney-coachman." The death's head and cross-bones were superseded in his ima- gination by an old hat, wisp of hay, and arms akimbo. Our hero had washed his hands and face, had set his beaver to rights, had effaced (as he thought) the worst part of his stains, and succeeded in ex- changing his boot-pocket-handkerchief for a cleaner one ; with which, alternately concealing his face as if he had a toothache, or holding it carelessly before his habiliments, he was fain, now that the day was declining, to see if he could not pick his way 48 THE DAY OF THE DISASTERS OF home again, not quite intolerably. It was a deli- cate emergency : but experience having somewhat rallied his forces, and gifted him with that sudden world of reflection which is produced by adversity, he bethought himself, not only that he must yield, like all other great men, to necessity, but that he was a personage fitted for nice and ultimate con- trivances. He was of opinion, that although the passengers, if they chose to look at him, could not but be aware that he had sustained a mischance common to the meanest, yet, in consideration of his air and manners, perhaps they would not choose to look at him very much ; or if they did, their surprise would be divided between pity for his mishap, and admiration of his superiority to it. Certainly the passengers who met him did look a good deal. He could not but see it, though he saw as little as he could help. How those who came behind him looked, it would have been a needless cruelty to himself to ascertain ; so he never turned his head. No little boys thought it worth their while to follow his steps, which was a great comfort ; though whenever any observers of that class met him, strange and most disrespectful were their grins and ejaculations. " Here's a Guy!" was the most innocent of their salutes. A drunken sailor startled him, with asking how the land lay about "Tower Ditch?" And an old Irishwoman, in ex- planation of his appearance to the wondering eyes of her companions, defined him to be one that was so CARFINGTON BLUNDELL, ESQUIRE. 49 fond of " crame o' the valley," that he must needs he " roulling in it." Had " cabs " been then, Mr. Blundell would unquestionably have made a compromise with his horror of charioteers, and on the strength of the mitigated defacements of his presence have risked a summons to the whip. As it was, he averted his look from every hackney-coach, and congratulated himself as he began nearing home — home, sweet even to the most insipid of the Blundells, and never so sweet as now, though the first thoughts of return- ing to it had been accompanied with agonies of mortification. " In a few minutes," thought he, " I shall be seen no more for the day (oh ! strange felicity for a dandy !) ; in a few minutes I shall be in other clothes, other shoes, and another train of feelings — not the happiest of men, perhaps, retro- spectively, but how blest in the instant and by com- parison! In a few minutes all will be silence, security, dryness. I shall be in my arm-chair, in my slippers — shall have a fire ; and I will have a mutton- cutlet, hot — and refresh myself with a bottle of the wine my friend Mimpin sent me." Alas ! what are the hopes of man, even when he concludes that things must alter for the better, seeing that they are at their worst ? How is he to be quite sure, even after he has been under sheep in a gutter, that things have been at their worst? — that his cup of calamity, full as it seemed, is not to be succeeded by, or wonderfully expanded into, a still larger cup, VOL. I. E 50 THE DAY OF THE DISASTERS OF with a remaining draught of bitterness, amazing, not to have been thought of, making the sick throat shudder, and the heart convulse ? Scarcely had the sweet images of the mutton- cutlet and wine risen in prospect upon the tired soul of our hero, than he approached the corner of the street round which he was to turn into his own ; and scarcely had he experienced that inward transport, that chuckle of the heart, with which tired homesters are in the habit of turning those corners, — in short, scarcely had his entire person manifested itself round the corner, and his eyes lifted themselves up to behold the side of the blessed threshold, than he heard, or rather was saluted and drowned with a roar of voices the most huge, the most unexpected, the most terrific, the most weighty, the most world- like, the most grave yet merry, the most intensely stupifying, that it would have been possible for Sancho himself to conceive, after all his experience with Don Quixote. It now struck Mr. Blundell that, with a half- conscious, half-unconscious eye, he had seen people running towards the point which he had just at- tained, and others looking out of their windows ; but as they did not look at him, and every one passed him without attention, how was he to dream of what was going forward ; much more, that it had any relation to himself 1 Frightful discovery ! which he was destined speedily to make, though not on the instant. CARFINGTON BLUNDELL, ESQUIRE. 51 The crowd (for almost the whole street was one dense population) seemed in an agony of delight. They roared, they shrieked, they screamed, they writhed, they bent themselves double, they threw about their arms, they seemed as if they would have gone into fits. Mr. Blundell's bewilderment was so complete, that he walked soberly along, steadied by the very amazement ; and as he advanced, they at once, as in a dream, appeared to him both to make way for him, and to advance towards him ; to make way in the particular, but advance in the mass ; to admit him with respect, and overwhelm him with familiarity. " In the name of Heaven!" thought he, " what can it all be ? It is impossible the crowd can have any connexion with me in the Jirst instance. I could not have brought them here ; and my appear- ance, though unpleasant, and perhaps somewhat ludicrous, cannot account for such a perfect mass and conspiracy of astonishment. What is it ?" And all the way he advanced, did Mr. Blundell's eyes, and manner, and whole person, exhibit a sort of visible echo to this internal question of his — What is it ? The house was about three-quarters of the way up the street, which was not a long one ; and it stood on the same side on which our unfortunate pedes- trian had turned. As he approached the denser part of the crowd, words began to develope themselves to his ear — e 2 52 THE DAY OF THE DISASTERS OF " Well, this beats all ! " " Well, of all the sights ! " " Why it 's the man himself, the very man, poor devil!" "Look at his face!" "What the devil can he have been at?" " Look at the pianoforte man — he 's coming up ! " Blundell mechanically pursued his path, mystified to the last depths of astonishment, and scarcely seeing what he saw. Go forward he felt that he must ; to turn back was not only useless, but he experienced the very fascination of terror and ne- cessity. He would have proceeded to his lodgings, had Death himself stood in the door-way. Mean- time up comes this aforesaid mystery, the pianoforte man. " Here 's a pretty business you 've been getting us into," said this amazing stranger. "What business?" ejaculated Mr. Blundell. " What business ? Why, all this here d d business — all this blackguard crowd — and my mas- ter's ruined pianoforte. A pretty jobation I shall get ; and I should like to know what for, and who 's to pay me?" " In the name of God ! " said our hero, " what is it?" " Why, don't you see what it is ? — a hoax, and be d d to it. It 's a mercy I wasn't dashed to pieces when these rascals tipped over the pianoforte ; and there it lies, with three of its legs smashed and a corner split. I should like to know what I 'm to have for the trouble?" CARFINGTON BLUNDELL, ESQUIRE. 53 " And I," said the upholsterer's man. " And I," said the glass-man. " And this here coffin," said the undertaker. There had been a hoax, sure enough ; and a tre- mendous hoax it was. A plentiful space before the door was strewed with hay, poxes, and baskets. There stood the coffin, upright, like a mummy ; and here lay the pianoforte, a dumb and shattered discord. Mr. Blundell had now arrived at his door, but did not even think of going in ; that is to say, not instantly. He mechanically stopped, as if to say or do something : for something was plainly expected of him ; but what it was he knew not, except that he mechanically put his hand towards his purse, and as mechanically withdrew it. The crowd all the while seemed to concentrate their forces towards him, — all laughing, murmur- ing, staring — all eager, and pressing on one another ; yet leaving a clear way for the gentleman, his tradesmen, and his goods. What was to be done ? Mr. Blundell drew a sigh from the bottom of his heart, as though it were his last sigh or his last sixpence ; yet he drew forth no sixpence. Extremes met, as usual. The consummation of distress pro- duced calmness and reflection. " You must plainly perceive, gentlemen," said our hero, " that it could be no fault of mine." " I don't know that," said the pianoforte man. 54 THE DAY OF THE DISASTERS OF The crowd laughed at the man's rage, and at once cheered him on, and provoked him against them- selves. He seemed as if he did not know which he should run at first, — his involuntary customer, or the " cursed little boys." " Zounds, sir ! " said the man, " you oughtn't to have been hoaxed." " Oh ! oh ! " said the parliamentary crowd. " I mean," continued he, " that none but some d -d disagreeable chap, or infernal fool, is ever treated in this here manner." "Oh! oh!" reiterated the bystanders. "Come, that 's better than the last." " Which is the biggest fool 1 " exclaimed a boy, in that altitude of voice which is the most sovereign of provocations to grown ears. The man ran at the boy, first making a gesture to our hero, as much as to say, " I '11 be with you again presently." The crowd hustled the man back ; — the undertaker had seized the opportunity of repeating that he " hoped his honour would con- sider his trouble ;" — the glass-man and the uphol- sterer were on each side of him ; — and suddenly the heavy shout recommenced, for a new victim had turned the corner, — a stranger to what was taking place, — a man with some sort of milliner's or florist's box. The crowd doated on his face. First, he turned the corner with the usual look of indif- ferent hurry ; then he began to have an inquiring expression, but without the least intimation that the CARFINGTON BLUNDELL, ESQUIRE. 55 catastrophe applied to himself; then the stare became wider, and a little doubtful; and then he stopped short, as if to reconnoitre — at which the laugh was prodigious. But the new-comer was wise ; for he asked what was the matter, of the first person he came up with ; and learning how the case stood, had energy enough to compound with one more hearty laugh, in preference to a series of mor- tifications. He fairly turned back, pursued by a roar ; and, oh ! how he loved the corner, as he went round it ! Every hair at the back of his head had seemed to tingle with consciousness and annoyance. He felt as if he saw with his shoulder-blades ; — as if he was face to face at the back of his hat. At length, the misery and perplexity of Mr. Blundell reached a climax so insurmountable, that he would have taken out his second and (as he thought) remaining pocket-handkerchief, if even that consolation had been left him; for the tears came into his eyes. .But it was gone ! The hand- kerchief, however, itself, did not distress him. " Nothing could touch him further." He wiped his eyes with the ends of the fingers of his gloves, and stood mute, — a perplexity to the perplexed, — a pity even to the " little boys." Now tears are very critical things, and must be cautiously shed, especially in critical ages. In a private way, provided you have locked the door, and lost three children, you may be supposed to shed a few without detriment to your dignity ; and in the 56 THE DAY OF THE DISASTEKS OF heroical ages, the magnitude and candour of passion permitted tears openly, the feelings then being supposed to be equally strong in all respects, and a man to have as much right to weep as a woman. But how lucky was it for poor Blundell that no brother dandy saw him! His tormentors did not know whether to pity or despise him. The piano- forte man, with an oath, was going to move off; but, on looking again at his broken instrument, remained, and urged compensation. The others ex- pressed their sorrow, but repeated, that they hoped his honour would consider them ; and they repeated it the more, because his tears raised expectations of the money which he would be weak enough to disburse. Alas ! they did not know that the dislike of dis- bursement, and the total absence of all sympathy with others in our weeping hero (in this as in other respects, very different from the tear-shedding Achilles), was the cause of all which they and he were at this moment enduring ; for it was the inabi- lity to bring out his money which kept Mr. Blundell lingering outside his lodging, when he might have taken his claimants into it ; and it was the jovial irascibility of an acquaintance of his, which, in disgust at his evasion of dinner-givings, and his repeatedly shirking his part of the score at some entertainments at which he pretended to consider himself a guest, had brought this astounding cala- mity to his door. Happily for these "last infirmities" of a mind CARFINGTON BLUNDELL, ESQUIRE. 57 which certainly could not "be called " noble," there are hearts so full of natural sympathy, that the very greatest proofs of the want of it will but produce, in certain extremities, a pity which takes the want itself for a claim and a misfortune ; and this sym- pathy now descended to Mr. Blundell's aid, like another goddess from heaven, in a shape not un- worthy of it, — to-wit, that of the pretty daughter of his landlord, a little buxom thing, less handsome than good-natured, and with a heart that might have served to cut up into cordial bosoms for half a dozen fine ladies. She had once nursed our hero in sickness, and to say the truth, had not been disin- clined to fall in love with him, and be made " a lady," half out of pure pity at his fever, had he given her the slightest encouragement ; but she might as well have hoped to find a heart in an empty coat. However, a thoroughly good nature never entirely loses a sort of gratitude to the object that has called forth so sweet a feeling as that of love, even though it turn out unworthy, or the affections (as in our heroine's case) be transferred elsewhere; and accordingly, in sudden bonnet and shawl, and with a face blushing partly from shame, and partly from anger at the crowd, forth came the vision of pretty, plump little Miss Widgeon (Mrs. Burrowes " as is to be"), and tapping Mr. Blundell on the shoulder, and begging the " other gentlemen" to walk in, said, in a voice not to be resisted, " Hadn't you better settle this matter in-doors> 58 CARFINGTON BLUNDELL, ESQUIRE. Mr. Blundell? I dare say it can be done very easily." Blundell has gone in, dear reader ; the other gen- tlemen have gone in; the crowd are slowly dis- lodging ; Miss Widgeon, aided partly by the generosity of her nature, partly by the science of lodging-house economy, and partly by the sense and manhood of Mr. William Burrowes, then pre- sent, a strapping young citizen from Tower-hill, takes upon herself that ascendency of the moment over Mr. Blundell due to a superior nature, and settles the very illegitimate claims of the goods-and- chattel bringers to the satisfaction of all parties, yea, even of Mr. Blundell himself. The balm of the immediate relief was irresistible, even though he saw a few of his shillings departing. What he felt next morning, when he woke, this history sayeth not ; for we like to leave off, according to the Italian recommendation, with a bocca dolce, a sweet mouth ; and with whose mouth, even though it was not always grammatical, can the imagination be left in better company than with that of the sweet-hearted and generous little Polly Widgeon ? A VISIT TO THE ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 59 A YISIT TO THE ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS * The collection there at the time of the visit. — A tiger broke loose. — Mild anthropophagy of the bear. — The elephant the Dr. Johnson of animals. — Giraffes. — Monkeys. — Parrots. — Eagles. — Mysteries of animal thought. — Is it just in human beings to make prisons of this kind ? We went to the Zoological Gardens the other day, for the first time, to see our old friends " the wild beasts" (grim intimates of boyhood), and enjoy their lift in the world from their lodgings in Towers and Exeter Changes, where they had no air, and where an elephant wore boots, because the rats gnawed his feet ! The first thing that struck us, next to the beauty of the Gardens, and the pleasant thought that such flowery places were now prepared for creatures whom we lately thrust into mere dens and dust-holes, was the quantity of life and energy they displayed. What motion ! — what strength ! — what elegance ! What prodigious chattering, and bril- * In the year 1835. 60 A VISIT TO THE liant colours, in the maccaws and parrakeets ! What fresh, clean, and youthful salience in the lynx! What a variety of dogs, all honest fellows appa- rently, of the true dog kind; and how bounding, how intelligent, how fit to guard our doors and our children, and scamper all over the country ! And then the Persian greyhound ! — How like a patrician dog (better even than Landseer's), and made as if expressly to wait upon a Persian prince : its graceful slenderness, darkness, and long silken ears, matching his gentlemanly figure, and well-dressed beard ! We have life enough, daily, round about us — amazing, if we did but think of it; but our indif- ference is a part of our health. The blood spins in us too quickly to let us think too much. This sudden exhibition of life, in shapes to which we are unaccustomed, reminds us of the wonderful and ever- renewing vitality of all things. Those animals look as fresh, and strong, and beautiful, as if they were born in a new beginning of the world. Men in cities hardly look as much! — and horses dragging hackney-coaches are not happy specimens. But the horse in the new carriage is one, if we considered it. The leaves and flowers in the nursery-gardens exhibit the same untiring renewal of life. The sun- beam, in the thick of St. Giles's, comes as straight and young as ever from the godlike orb that looks at us from a distance of millions of miles, out of the depths of millions of ages. But the sun is a visitor as good-natured as it is great, and therefore we do ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 61 not think too much even of the sunbeam. This bounding creature in its cage is not a common sight ; so it comes freshly and wonderfully upon us. What brilliancy in its eyes ! What impetuous vigour in its leap ! What fearlessness of knocks and blows ! And how pleasant to think it is on the other side of its bars ! What a sensation would ensue, if that pretty-coated creature, which eats a cake so good- naturedly, were suddenly out of its cage, and the cry were heard — "A tiger loose!" — "A panther!" — " A lion ! " What a rush and screaming of all the ladies to the gates ! — and of gentlemen too ! How the human voices, and those of the parrakeets would go shrieking to heaven together ! Fancy the bear suddenly jumping off his pole upon the cake-shop ! A tiger let loose at day-time would not be so bad as at night. Perhaps he would be most frightened himself. There was an account of one that got loose in Piccadilly, and slunk down into a cellar, where he was quietly taken; but at night, just before feeding, it might not be so pleasant. Newspapers tell us of a lion which got out of one of the travelling- caravans in the country, and, after lurking about the hedges, tore a labourer that he met, in full daylight. Nervous people in imaginative states of the biliary vessels — timid gentlemen taking easy rides — old ladies too comfortable in their homes and arm-chairs — must sometimes feel misgivings while making their circuit of the Regent's Park, after reading news of this description. Fancy yourself coming 62 A VISIT TO THE home from the play or opera, humming " Deh vieni, non tardar," or, " Meet me by moonlight alone ;" and, as you are turning a corner in Wim- pole-street, meeting a tiger ! What should you say ? You would find yourself pouring forth a pretty set of Rabelaesque excla- mations : — " Eh— Oh— Oh Lord !— Hollo !— Help !— Help ! — Murder ! — Tigers ! — U — u — u — u — u — u ! — My God ! — Policeman /" Enter Policeman. Policeman. — " Good God ! — A gentleman with a tiger !" [Exit Policeman. In one of Moliere's exquisite extravaganzas between his acts, is a scene betwixt a man and a bear, who has caught him in its arms. The man tries every expedient he can think of to make the bear considerate ; and, among others, flatters him in the most excessive manner, calling him, at last, his Royal Highness. The bear, however, whom we are to fancy all this while on its hind legs, looking the man with horrible indifference in the face, and dancing him from side to side in its heavy shuffle, is not at all to be diverted from his dining purposes ; and he is about to act accordingly, when hunters come up and take off his attention. Up springs the man into a tree ; and with the cruelty of mortified vanity (to think of all the base adulation he has been pouring forth) the first words he utters respecting his Royal Highness are " Shoot him." ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 63 Not without its drollery, though real, is a story of a bear in one of the northern expeditions. Two men, a mate, and a carpenter, had landed somewhere to cut wood, or look for provisions; and one of them was stooping down, when he thought some shipmate had followed him, who was getting, boy- like, on his shoulders. " Be quiet," said he ; " get down." The unknown did not get down ; and the man, looking up as he stooped, saw the carpenter staring at him in horror. "Oh, mate!" exclaimed the carpenter, "it's a hear /" Think what the man must have felt, when he heard this explanation of the weight on his shoulders ! No tragedy, however, ensued. Pleasant enough are such stories, so ending. But of all deaths, that by a wild beast must be one of the most horrible. There is action, indeed, to diminish the horror ; but frightful must be the unexpectedness — the unnaturalness — the clawing and growling — the hideous and impracticable fellow-creature, looking one in the face, struggling with us, mingling his breath with ours — tearing away scalp or shoulder- blade. To return, however, to our Gardens. The next thing that struck us was the quiet ; and in connexion with this, the creatures' accommodation of themselves to circumstances, and the human-like sort of intercourse into which they get with their visitors. With wild beasts we associate the ideas of constant rage and assault. On reflection, we recollect that this is not bound to 64 A VISIT TO THE be the case ; that travellers pass deserts in day-time, and neither hear nor see them ; and that it is at night they are to be looked for in true wild-beast condition, and then only if wild with hunger. It is no very extraordinary matter, therefore, to find them quiet by day, especially when we consider how their wants are attended to ; and yet we cannot but think it strange that they should be so put, as they are, into an unnatural condition, under bars and bolts. More of this, however, presently. Let us look at them as making friends with us, receiving our buns and biscuits, and being as close to us (by permission of those same bars) as dogs and cats. This is a very different position of things from the respectful distance kept in the African sands or in the jungle ! We are afraid it breeds contempt in some of the spectators, or at least indifference ; and that people do not always find the pleasure they expected. We could not help admiring one visitor the other day, who hastened from den to den, and from beast to bird, twirling an umbrella, and giving little self-complacent stops at each, not longer than if he were turning over some common-place book of prints. "Hah!" he seemed to be saying to himself, " this is the panther, is it 1 Hm — Panther. What says the label here ? ' Hysena Capensis.' Hm — Hyaena — ah! a thing untameable. 'Grisly Bear.' Hah ! — grisly — hm. Very like. Boa — ' Tiger Boa' — ah ! — Boa in a box — Hm, — Sleeping, I suppose. Very different from seeing him squeeze ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 65 somebody. Hm. Well ! I think it will rain. Terrible thing that — spoil my hat." Perhaps, how- ever, we are doing the gentleman injustice, and he was only giving a glance, preparatory to a longer inspection. When a pleasure is great and multi- tudinous, one is apt to run it all over hastily in the first instance ; as in an exhibition of paintings, or with a parcel of books. It is curious to find one's-self (literally) hand and glove with a bear ; giving him buns, and watching his face, like a schoolboy's, to see how he likes them. A reflection rises — " If it were not for those bars, perhaps he would be eating me." Yet how mild they and his food render him. We scrutinize his countenance and manners at leisure, and are amused with his apparently indolent yet active lumpishness, his heavy kind of intelligence (which will do nothing more than is necessary), his almost hand-like use of his long, awkward-looking toes, and the fur which he wears clumsily about him like a watchman's great-coat. The darker bears look, somehow, the more natural ; at least to those whose imaginations have not grown up amidst polar nar- ratives. The white bear in these Gardens has a horrible mixed look of innocence and cruelty. A Roman tyrant kept a bear as one of his execu- tioners, and called it " Innocence." We could imagine it to have had just such a face. From that smooth, unimpressible aspect there is no appeal. He has no ill-will to you ; only he is fond of your VOL. I. f 66 A VISIT TO THE flesh, and would eat you up as meekly as you would sup milk, or swallow a custard. Imagine his arms around you, and your fate depending upon what you could say to him, like the man in Moliere. You feel that you might as well talk to a devouring statue, or to the sign of the Bear in Piccadilly, or to a guillotine, or to the cloak of Nessus, or to your own great-coat (to ask it to be not so heavy), or to the smooth-faced wife of an ogre, hungry and deaf, and one that did not understand your language. Another curious sensation arises from being so tranquil yourself, and slow in your movements, while you are close to creatures so full of emotion and action. And you know not whether to be more pleased or disappointed at seeing some of them look so harmless, and others so small. On calling your recollections together, you may know, as matters of fact, that lynxes and wolves are no bigger ; but you have willingly made them otherwise, as they appear to you in the books of your childhood ; and it seems an anti- climax to find a wolf no bigger than a dog, and a lynx than a large cat. The lynx in these Gardens is a beautiful, bounding creature. You know him at once by his ears, if not by his eyes ; yet he does not strike you like the lynx you have read of. You are obliged to animate your respect for him, by considering him under the title of " cat- o'-mountain ;" " The owl is abroad, the bat and the toad, And so is the cat-o'-mountain." ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 67 Alas ! poor cat-o'-mountain is not abroad here, in the proper sense ; he is " abroad and at home," and yet neither. You see him by daylight, without the proper fire in his eyes. You do not meet him in a mountain-pass, but in a poor closet in Mary-le-bone ; where he jumps about like a common cat, begging for something to eat. Let him look as he may, he does not look so well as in a book. We saw no lion. Whether there is any or not, at present, we cannot say. I believe there is. But friends get talking, and one of them moves away, and carries off the rest ; and so things are passed by. We did not even see the rhinoceros ; or the beaver, which would not come out (if there) ; or the seal (which we particularly wished to see, having a respect for seals and their affections : — there is one species in particular, remarkable for the mobility of its expression, which we should like to get acquainted with; but this is not the one in the Garden cata- logue). The lioness was asleep, as all well-behaved wild beasts ought to be at that hour ; and another, or a tigress (we forget which), pained the beholder by walking incessantly to and fro, uttering little moans. She seemed incapable of the philosophy of her fellow- captives. The dogs are an interesting sight, particularly the Persian greyhounds already men- tioned, and the St. Bernard dogs, famous for their utility and courage. But it was a melancholy thing to see one of these friends of the traveller barking and bounding incessantly for pieces of biscuit, and p 2 68 A VISIT TO THE jerked back by the chain round his neck. It seemed an ill return for the Alpine services of his family. The boa in his box was asleep. He is handsomely spotted : but the box formed a sorry contrast in the imagination with his native woods. He seemed to be in terrible want of " air and exercise." Is not the box unconscionably small and confined ? Could not a snake-safe be contrived, of good handsome dimensions ? There is no reason why a serpent should not be made as comfortable as possible, even though he would make no more bones of us that we do of an oyster. The squirrels are better off, and are great fa- vourites, being natural crackers of nuts ; but could no trees be contrived for them to climb, and grass for their feet? It is unpleasant to see them so much on the ground. The elephant would seem to be more comfortably situated than most. He has water to bathe in, mud to stick in, and an area many times bigger than himself for his circuit. Very interesting is it to see him throw bits of mud over himself, and to see, and hear him, suck the water up in his trunk and then discharge it into his great red throat ; in which he also receives, with sage amenity, the biscuits of the ladies. Certainly, the more one considers an ele- phant, the more he makes good his claim to be considered the Doctor Johnson of the brute creation. He is huge, potent, sapient, susceptible of tender impressions ; is a good fellow ; likes as much water ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 69 as the other did tea; gets on at a great uncouth rate when he walks ; and though perhaps less irri- table and melancholy, can take a witty revenge ; as witness the famous story of the tailor that pricked him, and whom he drenched with ditch water. If he were suddenly gifted with speech, and we asked him whether he liked his imprisonment, the first words he would utter would unquestionably be — " Why, no, sir." Nor is it to be doubted, when going to dinner, that he would echo the bland sentiment of our illus- trious countryman on a like occasion, " Sir, I like to dine." If asked his opinion of his keeper, he would say, " Why, sir, Hipkins is, upon the whole, ' a good fellow,' — like myself, sir, {smiling), — but not quite so considerate ; he knows I love him, and presumes a little too much upon my forbearance. He teazes mc for the amusement of the bystanders. Sir, Hipkins takes the display of allowance for the merit of ascendancy." This is what the elephant manifestly thought on the present occasion ; for the keeper set a little dog at him, less to the amusement of the bystanders than he fancied; and the noble beast, after butting the cur out of the way, and taking care to spare him as he advanced (for one tread of his foot would have smashed the little pertinacious wretch as flat as a pancake), suddenly made a stop and, in rebuke of both of them, uttered a high indignant scream, much resembling a score of cracked trumpets. Enter the three lady-like and most curious 70 A VISIT TO THE giraffes, probably called forth by the noise ; which they took, however, with great calmness. On in- spection, their faces express insipidity and indif- ference more than anything else — at least the one that we looked at did ; but they are interesting from their novelty, and from a singular look of clean- liness, delicacy, and refinement, mixed with a certain gaucherie, arising from their long, poking necks, and the disparity of length between their fore and hind legs. They look like young ladies of animals, natu- rally not ungraceful, but with bad habits. Their necks are not on a line with their fore legs, perpen- dicular and held up ; nor yet arched like horses' necks; but make a feeble looking, obtuse angle, completely answering to the word " poking." The legs come up so close to the necks, that in front they appear to have no bodies; the back slopes like a hill, producing the singular disparity between the legs; and the whole animal, being slender, light- coloured, and very gentle, gives you an idea of delicacy amounting to the fragile. The legs look as if a stick would break them in two, like glass. Add to this, a slow and uncouth lifting of the legs, as they walk, as if stepping over gutters ; and the effect is just such as has been described, — the stran- gest mixture in the world of elegance and uncouth- ness. The people in charge of them seemed to be constantly curry-combing them after a gentle fashion, for extreme cleanliness is necessary to their health ; and the novelty of the spectacle is completed by the ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 71 appearance of M. Thibaut in his Arab dress and beard, — the Frenchman who brought them over* The one we spoke of, moving its lips, but not the expression of its countenance, helped itself to a mouthful of feathers out of a lady's bonnet, as it stooped over the rails. The sight of new creatures like these throws one upon conjectures as to the reasons why nature calls them into existence. The conjectures are not very likely to discover anything ; but nature allows their indulgence. All one can suppose is, that, besides helping to keep down the mutual superfluity of animal or vegetable life, and enabling the great conditions of death and reproduction to be fulfilled' their own portion of life is a variety of the pleasure- able, which could exist only under that particular form. We are to conclude, that if the giraffe, the elephant, the lion, &c, &c, were not formed in that especial manner, they could neither perform, the purposes required of them in the general scheme of creation, nor realize certain amounts of pleasurable sensation peculiar to each species. Happiness can only be added, or at least is only added, to the general stock, under that shape. And thus we can very well imagine new shapes of happiness called into being ; just as others appear to have been worn out, or done with, as in the mammoth and other antediluvian creatures. If we can conceive no end of space, why should we conceive an end of new creations, whatever our poor little bounds of histori- 72 A VISIT TO THE cal time might appear to argue to the contrary ? What are a few thousands of years ? What would be millions 1 Not a twinkle in the eye of eternity. To return, however, to our first proposition, — human beings, brutes, fish, insects, serpents, vegetables, appear to be all varieties of pleasurable or pleasure- giving vitality, necessary to the harmony and com- pleteness of the music of this state of being ; the worst discords of which (by our impulses to that end) seem destined to be done away, leaving only so much contrast as shall add another heavenly orb to the spheres. (Permit at least this dream by the roadside of creation. Who can contemplate its marvellousness and beauty, and not think his best thoughts on the subject?) We forgot to mention the porcupine. It is very curious, and realizes a dream, yet not the most romantic part of it. The real porcupine is not so good a thing as it is in an old book ; for it doesn't shoot. Oh, books ! you are truly a world by your- selves, and a "real world" too, as the poet has called you, for you make us feel ; and what can any reality do more?* Heaven made you, as it did the other world. Books were contemplated by Pro- vidence, as well as other matters of fact. — In the * Books are a real world, Round which, with tendrils strong as flesh and blood, Our pastime and our happiness may grow." WoRDSWORTH. A passage often quoted — it cannot be too often. ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 73 time of Claudian, the mere sight of this animal seems to have been enough to convince people of its powers of warfare. At least it convinced the poet. The darts were before his eyes ; and he took the showman's word for the use which could be made of them ; only, it seems, the cunning porcupine was not " lavish of his weapons," nor chose to part with them, unless his life was in danger. He was very cautious, says the poet, how he got in a pas- sion. He contented himself with threats. " Additur armis Calliditas, parcusque sui timor, iraque nunquam Prodiga telorum, caute contenta minari, Nee nisi servandse jactus impendere vitae." De Hystrice. The rattling of the prickles described by Claudian is still to be heard, when the creature is angry ; at least so the naturalists tell us ; and it is added, that they " occasionally fall off, particularly in autumn ;" but it has no power of " shooting them at its pur- suers."* The dromedary looked very uncomfortable. His coat was half gone, as if from disease: and he appeared to sit down on the earth for the purpose of screening as much of his barenness as he could, and of getting warmth. But there was that in- vincible look of patience in the face, which is so affecting, and which creates so much respect in whatever face it be found. Animals luckily have * Gore's Translation of Blumenbach, p. 49. 74 A VISIT TO THE no affectation. What you see in their faces is genuine ; though you may over-rate it, or do the reverse. When the lion looks angry, nobody be- lieves he is feigning. When the dog looks affec- tionate, who doubts him ? But the monkeys — What a curious interest they create, — half-amusing, half-painful! The reflection forced upon one's vanity is inevitable — " They are very like men." Oh, quam simillima turpissima bestia nobis ! Oh, how like us is that most vile of hrutes ! The way in which they receive a nut in their hands, compose themselves with a sort of bustling nonchalance to crack it, and then look about for more with that little, withered, winking, half-human face, is startling. The hand in particular mortifies one, it looks so very unbrute-like, and yet at the same time is so small, so skinny, so like something elvish and unnatural. No wonder it has been thought in some countries that monkeys could speak, but avoided it for fear of being set to work. In their roomy cages here they look like a set of half-human pigmy schoolboys withered into caricatures of a certain class of labourers, but having neither work nor want, — nothing to do but to leap out, or sit still, or play with, or plague one another. Classes of two very gallant nations have been thought like mon- keys ; and it ought not to mortify them, any more than the general resemblance to man should mortify ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 75 the human species. The mortification in the latter instance is undoubtedly felt, but it tells more against the man than the monkey. To the monkey it is, in fact, " a lift ;" and that is the reason why the man resents it. We wish to stand alone in the creation, and not to be approached by any other animal, especially by one so insignificant, — so little " respectable" on the score of size and power. We would rather be resembled by lions and tigers. It is curious to observe, that in British heraldry there are but three coats of arms which have monkeys for supporters. One is the Duke of Leinster's (owing, it is said, to a monkey having carried off a Fitzgerald in a time of clanger to the house-top, and safely brought him back). The others belong to the houses of Digby and St. John. Lions, tigers, eagles, all sorts of ferocious animals, are in abundance. This is natural enough, con- sidering that this kind of honour originated in feudal times ; but the mind (without losing its just con- sideration for circumstances past or present, and all the strength, as well as weakness, which they include) has yet to learn the proper respect for qualities unconnected with brute force and power ; and it will do so in good time : it is doing so now, and therefore one may remark, without too much chance of rebuke, that as all nations, indeed all individuals, according to some, have been said to be like different classes of the lower creation (English- men like mastiffs or bull-dogs, Italians like ante- 76 A VISIT TO THE lopes, &c), so it ought not to be counted the most humiliating of such similitudes, when certain na- tions, or particular portions of a nation, especially of those that for wit and courage rank among the foremost, are called to mind by expressions in the faces of a tribe of animals, remarkable not only for that circumstance, but for their superiority to others in shrewdness, in vivacity, in mode of life, nay, in the affections ; for most touching stories have been told of the attachments of monkeys to one another, and to the human race too, and particularly of their behaviour when their companions or young ones have been killed. What ought to mortify us in the likeness of brutes to men is the anger to which we see them subject, — the revenge, the greediness, and other low passions. But these they have in common with most animals. Their shrewdness and their sympathies they share with few. And there is a residuum of mystery in them, as in all things, which should lead us to cultivate as much regard for them as we can, thus turning what is unknown to us to good instead of evil. It is impossible to look with much reflection at any animal, especially one of this apparently half-thinking class, and not con- sider that he probably partakes far more of our own thoughts and feelings than we are aware of, just as he manifestly partakes of our senses; nay, that he may add to this community of being, faculties or perceptions, which we are unable to conceive. We may construe what we see of the manifestation of ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 77 the animal's feelings into something good or other- wise, as it happens ; perhaps our conjectures may he altogether wrong, hut we cannot be wrong in making the best of them, — in getting as much pleasure from them as possible, and giving as much advantage to our fellow-creatures. On the present occasion, as we stood watching these strange beings, marvelling at their eatings, their faces, and at the prodigious jumps they took from pillar to post, careless of thumps that seemed as if they would have dislocated their limbs, we observed one of them sitting by another with his arm round his neck, precisely as a schoolboy will sit with his friend ; and rapidly grinning at a third, as if to keep him off. The grin consisted of that incessant and apparently malignant retraction of the lips over the teeth, which looks as if it were every instant going to say something, and break forth into threat and abuse. The monkey that was thus kept off, leaped up every now and then towards the parties (who were sitting on a shelf), and gave a smart slap of the hand to the protecting individual, or received one instead. We did not know enough of their habits to judge whether it was play or warfare ; whether the assailant wished to injure the one that seemed protected, or whether the protector wrongly or rightly kept him away, from jealousy or from sport. At length the prohibited individual was allowed quietly to make one of the trio ; and there he sat, nestling himself against the protege, and so 78 A YISIT TO THE remained as long as we saw them. The probability therefore was, that it was all sport and good humour, and that the whole trio were excellent friends. Nations of a very different sort from Africans ha"ve seen such a likeness between men and mon- keys, that the Hindoos have a celebrated monkey- general (Hanuman), who cuts a figure in their mythology and their plays, and was a friend of the god Rama* Young readers (nor old ones, who have wit or good spirits enough to remain young) need not be reminded of the monkey in " Philip Quarll;" nor of him that became secretary to a sultan in the " Arabian Nights." After all, let nobody suppose that it is the intention of these remarks to push the analogy between the two classes further than is warrantable, or to lessen the real amount of the immeasurable distance between them. But anything that looks like humanity on the part of the poor little creature need not be undervalued for all that, or merely because we pay it the involuntary compliment of a mortified jea- lousy. And as to its face, there is unquestionably a look of reflection in it, and of care too, which ought not to be disrespected. Its worst feature is the inefficient nose, arguing, it would seem, an infirmity of purpose to any strong endeavour (if such argu- * Wilson's " Select Specimens of the Theatre of the Hindus." For an account of a festival in honour of Kama, in which his monkey-friend is conspicuous, see "Bishop Heber's Journal," chap. xiii. ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 79 inents are derivable from such things) ; and yet, as if to show her love of comedy, and render the class a riddle for alternate seriousness and laughter, Na- ture has produced a species of ape, ludicrous for the length of this very feature.* Nature has made levity as well as gravity ; and really seems inclined, now and then, to play a bit of farce in her own person, as the gods did on Mount Olympus with Vulcan — " When unextinguished laughter shook the skies." Fit neighbours for the monkeys are the parrakeets — themselves, in some respects, a kind of monkey- bird — with claws which they use like hands, a faculty of imitation in voice, and something in the voice so like speech and articulation, that one almost fancies the guttural murmuring about to break out into words, and say something. But what colours! — What blazes of red and gold, of green, blue, and all sorts of the purest splendours! How must those reds and blues look, when thronging and shining amidst the amber tops of their trees, under a tropical sun ! And for whose eyes are those colours made % Hardly for man's — for man does not see a hundred- millionth part of them, nor perhaps would choose to live in a condition for seeing them, at least not in their true state ; unless, indeed, he should come to * The Slmia Rostrata—" long-nosed ape." " It is simia, hut not sima" says Blumenbach, "being remarkable for its long proboscis-like nose." 80 A VISIT TO THE like their screaming in the woods, for the same reason that we like the cawing of rooks. Meantime they would appear to be made for their own. " Why not?" asks somebody. True, but we are not accus- tomed to consider them in that light, or as made for any other purpose than for some distinction or attraction of sex. In nothing, however, does Nature seem to take more delight than in colours ; and perhaps (to guess reverently, not profanely) these gorgeous hues are intended for the pleasure of some unknown class of spiritual eyes, upon which no kind of beauty is lost, as it is too often upon man's. It is impossible to picture to one's-self the countless beauties of nature, the myriads of paintings, animal, vegetable, and mineral, with which earth, air, and seas are thronged, and fancy them all made for no eyes but man's. Neither is it easy to suppose that other animals have eyes, and yet look upon these riches of the eyesight with no feeling of admiration analogous to our own. The peacock's expansion of his plumage, and the apparent pride he takes in it, force us to believe otherwise in his particular case ; and yet, with our tendency to put the worst or least handsome construction on what our inferior fellow- creatures do, we attribute to pride, jealousy, and other degrading passions, what may really be attri- butable to something better ; nor may it be pride in the peacock, which induces him to display his beauty, but some handsomer joy in the beauty itself. You may call every man who dresses well a ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 81 coxconib — but it is possible lie is not so. He may- do it for the same reason that he dresses his room well with pictures, or loves to see his wife well- dressed. He may be such an admirer of the beau- tiful in all things, that he cannot omit a sense of it even in his own attire. Raphael is understood to have been an elegant dresser ; and it has been con- jectured from a sonnet of Shakspeare's (No. 146) thatjie was one. Yet who could suppose Shaks- peare a coxcomb? much less proud! He had too much to be proud of in petty eyes, to be so in his own — standing, as he did, a wise and kind atom, but still an atom, in the midst of the overwhelming mag- nificence of nature and the mysteries of worlds. The same attention to dress is recorded of the grave philosopher, Aristotle ; and the story of Plato's carpet, and of the " greater pride" with which Diogenes trampled upon it, is well known. Now, inasmuch as pride is an attribute of narrowness of spirit and want of knowledge, the lower animals may undoubtedly be subject to it, — though still to be proud of a colour, and of external beauty, would imply an association of ideas more subtle than we are accustomed to attribute to them ; and proud or not, there appears great reason to believe, that conscious of these colours and beauties they are. If so, the eyes of a crowd of parrakeets and maccaws, assembled in the place before us, must have a constant feast. Does their talk mean to say any- thing of this ? Is it divided between an admiration VOL. I. g 82 A VISIT TO THE of one another, and their dinner ? For, assuredly, they do talk of something or other, from morning till night, like a roomful of French milliners ; and apparently, they ought to be as fond of colours, and of their own appearance. These lively and brilliant creatures seem the happiest in the Gardens, next to the ducks and sparrows ; the latter of whom, by the way, are in exquisite luck here, having a rich set of neighbours brought them, without partaking of their imprisonment. It would be delightful to see them committing their thefts upon cage and pan, if it were not for the creatures caged. And the poor eagles and vultures ! The very instinct of this epithet shows what an unnatural state they must have been brought to. Think of eagles being commiserated, and called " poor ! " It is monstrous to see any creature in a cage, far more any winged creature, and most of all, such as are accustomed to soar through the vault of heaven, and have the world under their eye. Look at the eyes of these birds here, these eagles and vultures ! How strangely clouded now seems that grand and stormy depression of the eyelid, drawn with that sidelong air of tightness, fierceness, and threat, as if by the brush of some mighty painter. That is an eye for the clouds and the subject-earth, not for a miserable hen-coop. And see, poor flagging wretches! how they stand on their perches, each at a little distance from one another, in poor stationary exhibition, eagles all of a row /—quiet, impaired, scrubby ; almost ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 83 motionless ! Are these the sovereign creatures de- scribed by the Buffons and Mudies, by the Wilsons of ornithology and poetry, by Spenser, by Homer ? Is this the eagle of Pindar, heaving his moist back in sleep upon the sceptre of Jove, under the influ- ence of the music of the gods?* Is this the bird of the English poet, " Soaring through his wide empire of the air, To weather his broad vans ? " Wonderful and admirable is the quietness, the philosophy, or whatever you choose to call it, with which all the creatures in this place, the birds in particular, submit themselves to their destiny. They do not howl and cry, brutes though they be ; they do not endeavour to tear their chains up, or beat * Gray's translation, " Perching on the sceptred hand," &c, is very fine ; but he has omitted this exquisite epithet of the eagle's sleep, moist (vypov), so full of the depth of rest and luxury. Gilbert West's version of the passage has merit, but he wanted gusto enough to venture on this epithet. Cary (thanks to his Dantesque studies !) has not dishonoured it. " Jove's eagle on the sceptre slumbers, Possest by thy enchanting numbers ; On either side, his rapid wing Drops, intranced, the feather'd king ; Black vapour o'er his curved head Sealing his eyelids, sweetly shed, Upheaving his moist back he lies. Held down by thrilling harmonies." Cart's Pindar, p. 62. G 2 84 A VISIT TO THE down their dens ; they find the contest hopeless, and they handsomely and wisely give it up. It is true, their wants are attended to as far as possible, and they have none of the more intolerable wants of self-love and wounded vanity — no vindictiveness seemingly, nor the love of pure obstinate opposition, and of seeing whose will can get the day. If they cannot have liberty, they will not disgrace captivity. But then what a loss to them is that of liberty ! It is thought by some, that all which they care for is their food ; and that, having plenty of this, they must be comfortable. But feeding, though a plea- sure of life, is not the end of it ; it is only one of its pleasurable supports. Or grant it even to be one of the ends of life, as indeed it may be considered by reason of its being a pleasure, more especially with some animals (not excepting some human ones), still, consider what a far greater portion of existence is passed by all creatures in the exercise of their other faculties, and in some form of motion; so much so, that even food would seem not so much an object of the exercise, as a means of it — life itself being motion in pulse and thought. Then think of how much of the very spirit of their existence all imprisoned creatures are deprived. The truth is, that if a man has happened, by the circumstances of his life, to feel and endure much — to enjoy much, and to know what it is to be deprived of enjoyment — and, above all, to know what this very want of liberty is — this confinement ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 85 for a long time to one spot — the sight of these Gardens ends in making him more melancholy than comfortable. Hating to interfere with other people's pleasures, or to seem to pretend to be wiser or better than our neighbours (especially when speaking, as circumstances sometimes render expedient, in our own name), we did not well know how to get this truth out of our lips, till seeing the interesting arti- cle in the " Quarterly Review" on the same subject, and finding the writer confessing that he could never pass by these eagles " without a pang," we felt that we might protest against the whole business of captivity with the less hazard of a charge of immodesty and self-opinion.* Let us not be understood as imply- ing blame against any one. We have the greatest respect for the persons and motives of gentlemen * " But we must bend our steps to the eagle-house, and we confess we never pass it by without a pang. Eagles, laemergyers, condors, creatures of the element, born to soar over Alps and Andes, in helpless, hopeless imprisonment. Observe the upper glance of that golden eagle, — ay, look upon that glorious orb — it shines wooingly : how impossible is it to annihilate hope ! — he spreads his ample wings, springs towards the fountain of light, strikes the netting, and flaps heavily down : — ' Lasciate ogni speranza, voi ch 'entrate.' We know not what their wor- ships would say or do to us, if we were to work our wicked will; but we never see these unfortunates without an in- describable longing to break their bonds, and let the whole bevy of these ' Souls made of fire and children of the eun' wander free." 86 A VISIT TO THE who compose the Zoological Society, and who have (as already hinted) given a prodigious lift in the scale of comfort to creatures hitherto worse dealt with in shows and menageries. Their zeal in behalf of the general interests of knowledge and humanity is, we have no doubt, fervid ; and their plea, in the present instance, is obvious, and (unless Parlia- ment chose to answer it) unanswerable. If they did not take charge of animals for exhibition, others would, and would do it badly; and the old system would return. There would be no such handsome prisons for them any longer as the Marylebone and Surrey gardens. Granted. We are only restoring the principle to its element, or pushing the abstract defence of the whole system to its utmost, and trying whether it would stand the test of a final judgment, if action were free, and prohibition could be secured. And why could it not ? Why can we have acts of Parliament in favour of other extension of good treatment to the brute creation, and not one against their tormenting imprisonment ? At all events, we may ask meantime, and perhaps not uselessly even for present purposes, whether a great people, under a still finer aspect of knowledge and civilization than at present, would think themselves warranted in keeping any set of fellow-creatures in a state of endless captivity — their faculties contradicted, their very lives, for the most part, turned into lingering deaths 1 Every now and then the lions, and other animals in these places, disappear. They die off ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 87 from some malady or other, either of inactivity, or of some other contradiction to their natures, or from the soil or climate. The "Quarterly Review" thinks that the London clay is pernicious to the collection in Marylebone Gardens. The Surrey collection, though the smaller, is the healthier. But how long do the animals last there ? Or is captivity a good thing for them anywhere ? The main arguments in favour of such collections are, that they increase the stock of knowledge, en- courage kindly feelings towards the lowei creation, and tend to substitute rational for irrational amuse- ments. They who object to them are warned, fur- thermore, how they render the imagination over- nice and sensitive, or make worse what cannot be helped ; and something is occasionally added re- specting the perplexed question of good and evil, and the ordinances of Providence. We have not room to repeat what has been often said in answer to reasonings of this description, which, in truth, are but so many beggings of the question, all of them to be set aside till the first doubts of the manliest and most honest conscientiousness be disposed of. Providence is to be reverenced at all times, and its mysteries to be brought in, humbly, when man comes to the end of his own humble endeavours ; but till then it is not his business to play with the awful edge-tools of a right of providential force, and its mixture of apparent evil. He must do what his conscience tells him, all kindly, and nothing (where 00 A VISIT TO THE he can help it) with a mixture of unkindness ; and thus I know not how a conscientious naturalist, set- ting aside the argument that others will do worse, could allow himself, if nations were to come to such a pitch of refinement as above stated, to do the evil of imprisoning and withering away the lives of his fellow animals, in order that some problematical good might come. A paragraph in the newspapers the other day, speaking of a lion that died after three years' incar- ceration (one in four of its whole life), said, that the Zoological Society have " never been able to keep any of the larger carnivora longer than that time ; they have lost (it adds) nine lions since January 1832." It is not easy to reconcile this statement with others which tells us of tens and twenties of years passed by lions and other beasts under the like circumstances. Imprisonments of that dura- tion have been known in the Tower and other places — jails far less favourable, one would think, to the lives of the inmates, than these open and flowery spots. The Society's catalogue informs us, that the grisly bear in their possession " was brought to England upwards of twenty years since by the Hudson's Bay Company," and that it remained in the Tower till the accession of his present Majesty. And their harpy eagle was caught in 1822. Long life in a prison, however, is a very different thing from natural life out of it. At all events, on the principle of doing the very ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 89 best possible, would it not be desirable, nay, is it not imperative on societies possessed of funds, to enlarge even the better accommodation they have pro- vided, to give elephants and giraffes still greater ranges ; and, above all, to supply far better dens to the lions and tigers, &c. ? For dens they still are, of the narrowest description.* * Since the date of these remarks, the improvements here desired, we understand, have taken place. The main objection, however, remains to be answered. 90 A MAN INTRODUCED TO A MAN INTRODUCED TO HIS ANCESTORS. Astonishing amount of a man's ancestors at the twentieth remove. — The variety of ranks as great as the multitude. — Bodily and mental characteristics inherited. — What it becomes a man to consider as the result. Happening to read the other evening some observa- tions respecting the geometrical ratio of descent, by which it appears that a man has, at the twentieth remove, one million forty-eight thousand Jive hundred and seventy-six ancestors in the lineal degree^- grand- fathers and grandmothers, — I dropped into a reverie, during which I thought I stood by myself at one end of an immense public place, the other being occupied with a huge motley assembly, whose faces were all turned towards me. I had lost my ordinary sense of individuality, and fancied that my name was Manson. At this multitudinous gaze, I felt the sort of confusion which is natural to a modest man, and which almost makes us believe that we have been guilty of some crime without knowing it. But what HIS ANCESTORS. 91 was my astonishment, when a Master of the Cere- monies issued forth, and saluting me by the title of his great-grandson, introduced me to the assembly in the manner and form following : — May it please your Majesties and his Holiness the Pope ; My Lord Cardinals, may it please your most reverend and illustrious Eminences ; May it please your graces, my lord Dukes ; My Lords, and Ladies, and Lady Abbesses ; Sir Charles, give me leave ; Sir Thomas also, Sir John, Sir Nicholas, Sir William, Sir Owen, Sir Hugh, &c. Right worshipful the several courts of Aldermen ; Mesdames, the Married Ladies ; Mesdames, the Nuns and other Maiden Ladies ; — Messieurs Manson, Womanson, Jones, Hervey, Smith, Merryweather, Hipkins, Jackson, Johnson, Jephson, Damant, Delavigne, De la Bleterie, Macpherson, Scott, O'Bryan, O' Shaughnessy, O'Halloran, Clut- terbuck, Brown, White, Black, Lindygreen, Southey, Pip, Trip, Chedorlaomer (who the devil, thought I, is he?), Morandi, Moroni, Ventura, Mazarin, D'Orsay, Puckering, Pickering, Haddon, Somerset, Kent, Franklin, Hunter, Le Fevre, Le Roi (more French !) Du Val (a highwayman, by all that's gentlemanly !) Howard, Cavendish, Russell, Argentine, Gustafson, Olafson, Bras-de-feu, Sweyn, Hacho and Tycho, Price, Lloyd, Llewellyn, Hanno, Hiram, &c. and all you intermediate gentlemen, reverend and otherwise, 92 A MAN INTRODUCED TO with your infinite sons, nephews, uncles, grand- fathers, and all kinds of relations ; — Then, you, sergeants and corporals, and other pretty fellows ; — You footmen there, and coachmen younger than your wigs, — You gypsies, pedlars, criminals, Botany-Bay men, old Romans, informers, and other vagabonds, — Gentlemen and ladies, one and all s — i Allow me to introduce to you, your descendant, Mr. Manson. Mr. Manson, your Ancestors. What a sensation ! I made the most innumerable kind of bow I could think of, and was saluted with a noise like that of a hundred oceans. Presently I was in the midst ot the uproar, which became like a fair of the human race. Dreams pay as little attention to ceremony, as the world of which they are supposed to form a part. The gentleman usher was the only person who retained a regard for it. Pope Innocent himself was but one of the crowd. I saw him elbowed and laughing among a parcel of lawyers. It was the same with the dukes and the princes. One of the kings was familiarly addressed by a lord of the bed- chamber, as Tom Wildman ; and a little French page had a queen much older than himself by the arm, whom he introduced to me as his daughter. I discerned very plainly my immediate ancestors the HIS ANCESTORS. 93 Mansons, but could not get near enough to speak to them, by reason of a motley crowd, who, with all imaginable kindness, seemed as if they would have torn me to pieces. " This is my arm," said one, " as sure as fate ;" at the same time seizing me by the wrist. *' The Franklin shoulder," cried another. A gay fellow pushing up to me, and giving me a lively shake, exclaimed, " The family mouth, by the Lord Harry ! and the eye — there's a bit of my father in the eye." — " A very little bit, please your honour," said a gipsy, a real gipsy, thrusting in her brown face: "all the rest's mine, Kitty Lee's, and the eyebrows are Johnny Faw's to a hair." — " The right leg is my property, however," returned the beau : I'll swear to the calf." — "Mais — but — notta to de autre calf" added a ludicrous voice, half gruff and half polite, belonging to a fantastic-looking person, whom I found to be a dancing-master. I did not care for the gipsy ; but to owe my left leg to a dancing-master was not quite so pleasant, especially as, like Mr. Brummel's, it happens to be my favourite leg. Besides, I cannot dance. However, the truth must out. My left leg is more of a man's than my right, and yet it certainly originated with Mons. Fauxpas. He came over from France in the train of the Duke of Buckingham. The rest of me went in the same manner. A Catholic priest was rejoiced at the sight of my head of hair, though by no means remarkable but for quantity ; but it seems he never expected to see it again since he received the tonsure. 94 A MAN INTRODUCED TO A little coquette of quality laid claim to my nose, and a more romantic young lady to my chin. I could not say my soul was my own. I was claimed not only by the Mansons, but by a little timid boy, a bold patriot, a moper, a merry-andrew, a coxcomb, a hermit, a voluptuary, a water-drinker, a Greek of the name of Pythias, a freethinker, a religionist, a book- worm, a simpleton, a beggar, a philosopher, a trium- phant cosmopolite, a trembling father, a hack-author, an old soldier dying with harness on his back. " Well," said I, looking at this agreeable mixture of claimants, " at any rate my vices are not my own/ 5 " And how many virtues ? " cried they in a stern voice. " Gentlemen," said I, " if you had waited, you would have seen that I could give up one as well as the other ; that is to say, as far as either can be given up by a nature that partakes of ye all. I see very plainly, that all which a descendant no better than myself has to do, is neither to boast of his virtues, nor pretend exemption from his vices, nor be over- come with his misfortunes ; but solely to regard the great mixture of all as gathered together in his person, and to try what he can do with it for the honour of those who preceded him, and the good of those that come after. At this I thought the whole enormous assembly put on a very earnest but affectionate face; which was a fine sight. A noble humility was in the looks HIS ANCESTORS. 95 of the best. Tears, not without dignity, stood in the eyes of the worst. " It is late for me," added I ; " I can do little. But I will tell this vision to the younger and stouter ; they perhaps may do more." " Go and tell it," answered the multitude. — But the noise was so loud, that I awoke, and found my little child crowing in my ear. 96 A NOVEL PARTY. A NOVEL PAETY. — Hie ingentem comitum affluxisse novorum Invenio admirans numerum. Virgil. O the pleasure that attends Such Sowings in of novel friends ! Spiritual creations more real than corporeal. — A party composed of the heroes and heroines of novels. — Mr. Moses Primrose, who has resolved not to be cheated, is delighted with some information given him hy Mr. Peregrine Pickle. — Conversa- tion of the author with the celebrated Pamela. — Arrivals of the rest of the company. — The party found to consist of four smaller parties. — Characters of them. — Character of Mr. Abraham Adams. — Pamela's distress at her brother's want of breeding. — Settlement together of Lovelace and Clarissa. — Desmond's Waver ley asks after the Antiquary's Waverley. — His surprise at the coincidence of the adventure on the sea- shore. — Misunderstanding between Mrs. Slipslop and Mrs. Clinker. — The ladies criticized while putting on their cloaks. When people speak of the creations of poets and novelists, they are accustomed to think that they are only using a form of speech. We fancy that no- thing can be created which is not visible ; — that a A NOVEL PARTY. 97 being must be as palpable as Dick or Thomas, before we can take him for granted; and that nobody really exists, who will not die like the rest of us, and be forgotten. But as we have no other certainty of the existence of the grossest bodies, than by their power to resist or act upon us, — as all which Hipkins has to show for his entity is his power to consume a barrel of oysters, and the only proof which Tomkins can bring of his not being a figment is his capacity of receiving a punch in the stomach, — I beg leave to ask the candid reader, how he can prove to me that all the heroes and heroines that have made him hope, fear, admire, hate, love, shed tears, and laugh till his sides were ready to burst, in novels and poems, are not in possession of as perfect credentials of their existence as the fattest of us ? Common physical palpability is only a proof of mortality. The par- ticles that crowd and club together to form such obvious compounds as Tomson and Jackson, and to be able to resist death for a little while, are fretted a,way by a law of their very resistance ; but the immortal people in Pope and Fielding, the deathless generations in Chaucer, in Shakspeare, in Goldsmith, in Sterne, and Le Sage, and Cervantes, — acquain- tances and friends who remain for ever the same, whom we meet at a thousand turns, and know as well as we do our own kindred, though we never set gross corporeal eyes on them, — what is the amount of the actual effective existence of millions of Jacksons and Tomkinses compared with theirs ? Are we as VOL. I. h 98 A NOVEL PARTY. intimate, I wish to know, with our aunt, as we are with Miss Western ? Could we not speak to the character of Tom Jones in any court in Christendom ? Are not scores of clergymen continually passing away in this transitory world, gone and forgotten, while Parson Adams remains as stout and hearty as ever ? But why need I waste my time in asking ques- tions ? I have lately had the pleasure of seeing a whole party of these immortal acquaintances of ours assembled at once. It was on the 15th of February in the present year. I was sitting by my fire-side ; and, being in the humour to have more company than I could procure, I put on my Wishing-cap, and found myself in a new little world that hovers about England, like the Flying Island of Gulliver. The place immediately about me resembled a common drawing-room at the West end of the town, and a pretty large evening party were already assembled, waiting for more arrivals. A stranger would have taken them for masqueraders. Some of the gentle- men wore toupees, others only powder, others their own plain head of hair. Some had swords by their sides, others none. Here were beaux in the modern coat and waistcoat, or habiliments little different. There stood coats stuck out with buckram, and legs with stockings above the knees. The appearance of the ladies presented an equal variety. Some wore hoops, others plain petticoats. The heads of many were built up with prodigious edifices of hair and ribbon ; others had their curls flowing down their A NOVEL PARTY. 99 necks ; some were in common shoes, others in a kind of slippered stilts. In short, not to keep the reader any longer upon trifles, the company consisted of the immortal though familiar creatures I speak of, the heroes and heroines of the wonderful persons who have lived among us, called Novelists. Judge of my delight when I found myself among a set of old acquaintances, whom I had never ex- pected to see in this manner. Conceive how I felt, when I discovered that the gentleman and lady I was sitting next to, were Captain and Mrs. Booth ; and that another couple on my left, very brilliant and decorous, were no less people than Sir Charles and my Lady Grandison ! In the centre were Mr. and Mrs. Roderick Random ; Lieutenant Thomas Bowling, of the Royal Navy ; Mr. Morgan, a Welch gentleman ; Mr. and Mrs. Peregrine Pickle ; Mr. Fathom, a methodist — (a very ill-looking fellow) — • Sir George Paradyne, and Mr. Hermsprong; Mr. Desmond, with his friend Waverley, (a relation of the more famous Waverley) ; a young gentleman whose Christian name was Henry — (I forget the other, but Mr. Cumberland knows) and Mr., formerly Serjeant Atkinson, with his wife, who both sat next to Captain and Mrs. Booth. There were also some lords whose names I cannot immediately call to mind ; a lady of rank, who had once been a Beggar-girl ; and other persons too numerous to mention. In a corner, very modest and pleasing, sat Lady Harold, better known as Miss Louisa Mildmay, with her husband, Sir h 2 100 A NOVEL PARTY. Robert. From the mixed nature of the company, a spectator might have concluded that these immortal ladies and gentlemen were free from the ordinary passions of created beings ; but 1 soon observed that it was otherwise. I found that some of the persons already assembled had arrived at this plebeian hour out of an ostentation of humility ; and that the others, who came later, were influenced by the usual variety of causes. The next arrival — (conceive how my heart ex- panded at the sight) — consisted of the Rev. Dr. Primrose, Vicar of Wakefield, with his family, and the Miss Flamboroughs ; the latter red and staring with delight. The Doctor apologized for not being sooner; but Mrs. Primrose said she was sure the gentlefolks would excuse him, knowing that people accustomed to good society were never in a flurry on such occasions. Her husband would have made some remark on this ; but seeing that she was pre- pared to appeal to her " son, the Squire," who flat- tered and made her his butt, and that Sir William Thornhill and both the young married ladies would be in pain, he forbore. The Vicar made haste to pay his respects to Sir Charles and Lady Grandison, who treated him with great distinction, Sir Charles taking him by the hand, and calling him his te good and worthy friend." I observed that Mr. Moses Primrose had acquired something of a collected and cautious look, as if determined never to be cheated again. He happened to seat himself next to Pere- A NOVEL PARTY. 101 grine Pickle, who informed him, to his equal surprise and delight, that Captain Booth had written a refutation of Materialism. He added, that the Captain did not choose at present to be openly talked of as the author, though he did not mind being com- plimented upon it in an obscure and ingenious way. I noticed, after this, that a game of cross purposes was going on between Booth and Moses, which often forced a blush from the Captain's lady. It was with much curiosity I recognised the defect in the latter's nose. I did not find it at all in the way when I looked at her lips. It appeared to me even to excite a kind of pity, by no means injurious to the most physical admiration ; but I did not say this to Lady Grandison, who asked my opinion on the subject. Booth was a fine strapping fellow, though he had not much in his face. When Mr. and Mrs. Booby (the famous Pamela) afterwards came in, he attracted so much attention from the latter, that upon her asking me, with a sort of pitying smile, what I thought of him, I ventured to say, in a pun, that I looked upon him as a very good " Booth for the Fair ;'' upon which, to my astonishment, she blushed as red as scarlet, and told me that her dear Mr. B. did not approve of such speeches. My pun was a mere pun, and meant little; certainly nothing to the disadvantage of the sentimental part of the sex, for whom I thought him by no means a finished com- panion. But there is no knowing these precise people. 102 A NOVEL PARTY. But I anticipate the order of the arrivals. The Primroses were followed by Sir Launcelot Greaves and his lady, Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Jones, Mr. and Miss Western, and my Lady Bellaston. Then came Miss Monimia (I forget her name) who married out of the old Manor House ; then Mr. and Mrs. Hum- phrey Clinker (I believe I should rather say Bramble) with old Matthew himself, and Mrs. Lismahago ; and then a whole world of Aunt Selbys, and Grand- mamma Selbys, and Miss Howes, and Mr. Harlowes, though I observed neither Clarissa nor Lovelace. I made some inquiries about them afterwards, which the reader shall hear. Enter Mr. John Buncle, escorting five ladies, whom he had been taking to an evening lecture. Tom Gollogher was behind them, very merry. Then came my Lord and Lady Orville (Evelina), Mr. and Mrs. Delville (Cecilia), Camilla (I forget her surname) with a large party of Mandleberts, Clarendels, Arlberys, Orkbornes, Marglands, and Dubsters, not omitting the eternal Mrs. Mitten. Mrs. Booby and husband came last, accompanied by my Lady Booby, Mr. Joseph Andrews and bride, and the Rev. Mr. Adams, for whom Mrs. B. made a sort of apology, by informing us that there was no necessity to make any, — Mr. Adams being an honour to the cloth. Fanny seated herself by Sophia Wes- tern (that was) with whom I found she was intimate ; and a lovelier pair of blooming, unaffected creatures, whose good-nature stood them instead of wit, I never A NOVEL PARTY. 103 beheld. But I must discuss the beauties of the ladies by-and-by. An excuse was sent by Mr. Tristram Shandy for his Uncle Tobias, saying that they were confined at home, and unfit for company, which made me very sorry, for I would rather have seen the divine old invalid than any man in the room, not excepting Parson Adams. I suspect he knew nothing of the invitation. Corporal Trim brought the letter; a very honest, pathetic fellow, who dropped a tear. He also gave a kiss, as he went out, to one of the maid-servants. The Rev. Mr. Yorick, friend of the Shandy family, sent his servant La Fleur to wait on us ; a brisk, active youth, who naturalized himself among us by adoring the ladies all round. The poor lad manifested his admiration by various grimaces, that forced the Miss Flamboroughs to stuff their hand- kerchiefs in their mouths. Our other attendants were Strap, Tom Pipes, Partridge, and two or three more, some of them in livery, and others not, as became their respective ranks. The refreshments were under the care of Mrs. Slipslop ; but underwent, as they came up, a jealous revision from Mrs. Lis- mahago, and Mrs. Humphrey Clinker, who, luckily for her, differed considerably with one another, or none would have been worth eating. I have omitted to observe that the meeting was of the same nature with assemblies in country towns, where all the inhabitants, of any importance, are in the habit of coming together for the public advantage, 104 A NOVEL PARTY. and being amiable and censorious. There the Sir Charles Grandison of the place meets the Tom Jones and the Mrs. Humphrey Clinker. There the Lady Bellaston interchanges courtesies and contempt with the Miss Marglands ; and all the Dubsters in their new yellow gloves, with all the Delvilles. Having thus taken care of our probabilities (or verisimilitude, as the critics call it) to which, in our highest flights, we are much attached, we proceed with our narrative. We forgot to mention, that Mrs. Honour, the famous waiting-maid of Sophia Western, was not present. Nothing could induce her to figure as a servant, where that " infected upstart," as she called her, Mrs. Humphrey Clinker, fidgeted about as a gentlewoman. The conversation soon became very entertaining, particularly in the hands of the Grandisons and Harlowes, who, though we could perceive they were not so admired by the rest of the company as by one another, interested us in spite of ourselves by the longest and yet most curious gossip in the world. Sir Charles did not talk so much as the others ; indeed he seemed to be a little baffled and thrust off the pinnacle of his superiority in this very mixed society ; but he was thought a prodigious fine gentle- man by the gravest of us, and was really a good- natured one. His female friends, who were eternally repeating and deprecating their own praises, were pronounced by Hermsprong, as well as Peregrine A NOVEL PARTY. 105 Pickle, to be the greatest coxcombs under the sun. The latter said something about Pamela and Covent- Garden which we do not choose to repeat. The consciousness of doing their duty, however, mixed as it might be with these vain mistakes, gave a certain tranquillity of character to the faces of some of this party, which Peregrine, and some others about him, might have envied. At the same time, we must do the justice to Peregrine to say, that although (to speak plainly) he had not a little of the blackguard in him, he displayed some generous qualities. We cannot say much for his wit and talents, which are so extolled by the historian ; nor even for those of his friend, Roderick Random, though he carries some good qualities still further. Roderick's conversation had the vice of coarseness, to the great delight of Squire Western, who said he had more spirit than Tom himself. Tom did not care for a little freedom, but the sort of conversation to which Roderick and his friends were inclined, disgusted him ; and, before women, astonished him. He did not, therefore, very well fall in with this society, though his wit and views of things were, upon the whole, pretty much on a par with theirs. In person and manners he beat them hollow. Sophia nevertheless took very kindly to Emily Gauntlett and Narcissa, two ladies rather insipid. We observed that the company might be divided into four different sorts. One was Sir Charles Grandison's and party; another, the Pickles and 106 A NOVEL PARTY. Joneses ; a third, the Lord Orvilles, Evelinas, and Cecilias, with the young lady from the old Manor House ; and a fourth, the Hermsprongs, Desmonds, and others, including a gentleman we have forgotten to mention, Mr. Hugh Trevor. In this last were some persons whose names we ought to have remem- bered, for an account of whom we must refer to Mrs. Inchbald. The first of these parties were for carrying all the established conventional virtues to a high pitch of dignity ; so much so, as to be thinking too much of the dignity, while they fancied they were absorbed in the virtue. They were very clever and amusing, and we verily believe could have given an interest to a history of every grain of sand on the sea-shore; but their garrulity and vanity, united, rendered other conversation a refreshment. The second were a parcel of wild, but not ill-natured young fellows, all very ready to fall in with what the others thought and recommended, and to forget it the next moment, especially as their teachers laid themselves open to ridicule. It must be added, that their very inferiority in some respects gave them a more general taste of humanity, particularly Tom Jones ; who was as pleasant, unaffected a fellow, and upon the whole perhaps as virtuous, in his way, as could be expected of a sprightly blood educated in the ordinary fashion. The Camillas and Evelinas were extremely entertaining, and told us a number of stories that made us die with laughter. Their fault consisted in talking too much about lords and A NOVEL PARTY. 107 pawnbrokers. Miss Monimia, too, from the old Manor House, ridiculed vulgarity a little too much to be polite. The most puzzling people in the room were the Desmonds and Hugh Trevors, who had come up since a late revolution in our sphere. They got into a controversy with the Grandisons, and [reduced them sadly to their precedents and authorities. The conclusion of the company seemed to be, that if the world were to be made different from what it is, the change would be effected rather by the philosophies of these gentlemen than the seraphics of the other party ; but the general opinion was, that it would be altered by neither, and that in the mean time, "variety was charming;" a sentiment which the Vicar of Wakefield took care to explain to his wife. But how are we forgetting ourselves? We have left out, in our divisions, a fifth set, the most delight- ful of all, one of whom is a whole body of humanity in himself; to-wit, Mr. Abraham Adams, and all whom he loves. We omit his title of Reverend; not because he is not so, but because titles are things exclusive, and our old friend belongs to the whole world. Bear witness, spirit of everything that is true, that, with the exception of one or two persons, only to be produced in these latter times, we love such a man as Abraham Adams better than all the characters in all the histories of the world, orthodox or not orthodox. We hold him to be only inferior to a Shakspeare ; and only then, because the latter 108 A NOVEL PARTY. joins the height of wisdom intellectual to his wisdom cordial. He should have been Shakspeare's chaplain, and played at bowls with him. What a sound heart, — and a fist to stand by it ! This is better than Sir Charles's fencing, without which his polite person — (virtue included) — would often have been in an awkward way. What disinterestedness ! What feel- ing ! What real modesty ! What a harmless spice of vanity, — Nature's kind gift, — the comfort we all treasure more or less about us, to keep ourselves in heart with ourselves ? In fine, what a regret of his iEschylus ! and a delicious forgetting that he could not see to read if he had had it ! Angels should be painted with periwigs, to look like him. We con- fess, we prefer Fanny to Joseph Andrews, which will be pardoned us; but the lad is a good lad; and if poor Molly at the inn has forgiven him (which she ought to do, all things considered), we will forgive him ourselves, on the score of my Lady Booby. It is more than my Lady has done, though she takes a pride in patronizing the "innocent creatures," as she calls them. We are afraid, from what we saw this evening, that poor Joseph is not as well as he would be with his sister Pamela. When the refresh- ments came in, we observed her blush at his handing a plate of sandwiches to Mr. Adams. She called him to her in a whisper ; and asked him, whether he had forgotten that there was a footman in the room ? The arrival of the refreshments divided our com- A NOVEL PARTY. 109 pany into a variety of small ones. The ladies got more together ; and the wines and jellies diffused a benevolent spirit among us all. We forgot our controversies, and were earnest only in the putting of cakes. John Buncle, however, stood talking and eating at a great rate with one of the philosophers. Somebody asked after Lovelace and Clarissa : for the reader need not be told, that it is only in a fictitious sense that these personages are said to have died. They cannot die, being immortal. It seems that Lovelace and Clarissa live in a neighbouring quarter, called Romance ; a very grave place, where few of the company visited. We were surprised to hear that they lived in the same house ; that Lovelace had found out he had a liking for virtue in her own shape as well as Clarissa's, and that Clarissa thought she might as well forget herself so far as to en- courage the man not to make a rascal and a madman of himself. This, at least, is the way that Tom Gollogher put it : for Tom undertook to be pro- found on the subject, and very much startled us by his observations. He made an application of a line in Milton, about Adam and Eve, which the more serious among us thought profane, and which indeed we are afraid of repeating : but Tom's good nature was so evident, as well as his wish to make the best of a bad case, that we chose to lay the more equi- vocal part of his logic to the account of his " wild way ;" and for all that we saw to the contrary, he was a greater favourite with the ladies than ever. 110 A NOVEL PARTY. Desmond's friend Waverley asked us after his cele- brated namesake. We told him he was going on very well, and was very like his relation ; a compli- ment which Mr. Waverley acknowledged by a bow. We related to him the sea-side adventure of Wa- verley's friend, the Antiquary ; at which the other exclaimed, " Good God ! how like an adventure which happened to a friend of our acquaintance? only see what coincidences will take place ! " He asked us if the Antiquary had never noticed the resemblance, and was surprised to hear that he had not. " I should not wonder at it," said he, " if the incident had been well known ; but these Antiqua- ries, the best of them, have strange grudging humours, and I will tell him of it," added he, " when I see him." Mr. Waverley anticipated with great delight the society of his namesake with his numerous friends, though he did not seem to expect much from the female part of them, Before we broke up, tragical doings were likely to have occurred between the housekeeper and Mrs. Humphrey Clinker. Mrs. Slipslop sent up a mes- sage apologizing for some of the jellies. She ex- pressed a fear — (which was correctly delivered by an impudent young rogue of a messenger) — that " the superfluency of the sugar would take away the tastality of the jellies, and render them quite in- noxious." (If the reader thinks this account over- charged, we have to inform him that he will fall into the error of the audience about the pig.) Mrs. A NOVEL PARTY. Ill Humphrey was indignant at this "infected nonsense," as she called it ; and she was fidgeting out of the room to scold the rhetorician, when her husband called her back, telling her that it was beneath the dignity of a rational soul like hers to fret itself with such matters. Winifred's blood began to rise at the first part of this observation ; but the words, " like hers," induced her to sit down, and content herself with an answer to the message. Peregrine Pickle, who was sorry to see affairs end so quietly, persuaded her, however, to put her message in writing; and Mrs.' Slipslop would have inevitably been roused and brought up stairs, had not Sir Charles condescended to interfere. The answer was as follows : — " Mrs. Slibberslop, — Hit Bing beneath the diggingit of a rasher and sole, to cumfabberrate with sich parsons, I Desire that you wil send up sum geallies Fit for a cristum and a gentile wommun to Heat. We ar awl astonied Att yure nig- gling gents. The geallys ar Shamful." Peregrine begged her to add a word of advice respecting the " pompous apology ;" upon which she concluded thus : — " A nuthur tim doant Send up sich pumpers and Polly jeers and stuf ; and so no moar at present from " Yure wel wisker, " Winifred Ceineeir." When the ladies had put on their cloaks, and were waiting for their carriages, we could not but remark how well Sophia Western — (we like to call her by 112 A NOVEL PARTY. her good old name) — looked in any dress and po- sition. She was all ease and goodnature, and had a charming shape. Lady Grandison "was a regular beauty ; but did not become a cloak. She was best in full dress. Pamela was a little soft-looking thing, who seemed " as if butter would not melt in her mouth." But she had something in the corner of her eye, which told you that you had better take care how you behaved yourself. She would look all round her at every man in the room, and hardly one of them be the wiser. Pamela was not so splendidly dressed as her friend Lady Grandison ; but her clothes were as costly. The Miss Howes, Lady G.'s, and others of that class, were loud, bright- eyed, raw-boned people, who tossed on their cloaks without assistance, or commanded your help with a sarcasm. Camilla, Cecilia, and Evelina, were all very handsome and agreeable. We prefer, from what we recollect of them, Camilla and Evelina ; but they say Cecilia is the most interesting. Louisa Mildmay might have been taken for a pale beauty ; but her paleness was not natural to her, and she was resuming her colour. Her figure was luxuriant ; and her eyes, we thought, had a depth in them beyond those of any person's in the room. We did not see much in Narcissa and Emilia Gauntlett, but they were both good jolly damsels enough. Of Amelia we have spoken already. We have a recollection that Herrn- sprong's wife (a Miss Campionet) was a pleasant girl; but somehow she had got out of our sight. A NOVEL PARTY. 113 The daughters of the Vicar of Wakefield were fine girls, especially Sophia ; for whom, being of her lover Sir William's age, we felt a particular ten- derness. VOL. I. 114 BEDS AND BEDROOMS. BEDS AND BEDEOOMS. Intrinsical nature of bed. — Advantage of people in bed over people that are " up." — Dialogue with a person " up." — Feather-beds, curtains, 8fc. — Idea of a perfect bed-room. — Custom half the secret of content. — Bed-room in a cottage. — Bed at sea.- — Beds in presses and alcoves. — Anecdotes of beds. — The bed of Morpheus in Spenser. We have written elsewhere* of "sleep," and of " dreams," and of " getting up on cold mornings," and divers other matters connected with bed ; but, unless we had written volumes on that one subject, it would be hard indeed if we could not find fresh matter to speak of, connected with the bed itself, and the room which it inhabits. We involuntarily use a verb with a human sense, — "inhabits;" for of all goods and chattels, this surely contracts a kind of humanity from the warmth so often given to it by the comfortable soul within. Its pillows — as a philosophic punster might observe — have something in them " next to the human cheek." " Home is home," says the good proverb, " how- * In the " Indicator." BEDS AND BEDROOMS. 115 ever homely." Equally certain are we, that bed is bed, however bedly. (We have a regard for this bit of parody on the old saying, because we made Charles Lamb laugh one night with it, when we were coming away with him out of a friend's house.) Bed is the home of home ; the innermost part of the content. It is sweet within sweet; a nut in the nut; within the snuggest nest, a snugger nest ; my retreat from the publicity of my privacy ; my room within my room, walled (if I please) with curtains ; a box, a separation, a snug corner, such as children love when they play at " house ;" the place where I draw a direct line between me and my cares ; where I enter upon a new existence, free, yet well invested ; reposing, but full of power ; where the act of lying down, and pulling the clothes over one's head, seems to exclude matters that have to do with us when dressed and on our legs; where, though in repose, one is never more conscious of one's activity, divested of those hampering weeds ; where a leg is not a lump of boot and stocking, but a real leg, clear, natural, fleshy, delighting to thrust itself hither and thither ; and lo ! so recreating itself, it comes in contact with another ; to-wit, one's own. One should hardly guess as much, did it remain eternally divorced from its companion, — alienated and altered into leather and prunella. Of more legs we speak not. The bed we are at this moment presenting to our imagination, is a bachelor's ; for we must be cautious how we touch upon others. A married man may, i 2 116 BEDS AND BEDROOMS. to be sure, condescend, if lie pleases, for the trifle's sake, to taste of the poor bachelor's satisfaction. He has only to go to bed an hour before his wife. Or the lady may do as much vice versa. And herein we can fancy one gratification, even of the bachelor or spinster order, beyond what a bachelor or spinster can often be presumed to realize ; which is, the pleasure of being in bed at your ease, united with the highest kind of advantage over the person that is up. Let us not be misunderstood. The sense of this advantage is not of the malignant kind. You do not enjoy yourself because others are in misery; but, because your pleasure at the moment being very much in your bed, and it not being the other's pleasure to come to bed so soon (which you rather wonder at), you are at liberty to make what con- clusions you please as to the superior nature of your condition. And there is this consideration besides ; namely, that you being in bed, and others up, all cares and attentions naturally fall to the portion of those individuals ; so that you are at once the master of your own repose and of their activity. A bachelor, however, may enjoy a good deal of this. He may have kindred in the house, or servants, or the man and woman that keep the lodging ; and from his reflections on all or either of these persons, he may derive no little satisfaction. It is a lordly thing to consider, that others are sitting up, and nobly doing some duty or other with sleepy eyes, while ourselves are exquisitely shutting ours ; they BEDS AND BEDEOOMS. 117 being also ready to answer one's bell, bring us our white wine whey, or lamp, or what not, or even to go out in spite of the rain for some fruit, should we fancy it, or for a doctor in case we should be ill, or to answer some question for the mere pleasure of answering it. "Who's there?" "Me, sir; Mrs. Jones." " Oh, I beg your pardon, Mrs. Jones ; I merely rang to know if you were up." " Dear me, yes, sir, and likely to be this hour." (Aside and happy) — " Poor soul !" "It's Mr. Jones's club-night, sir." (" Poor woman ! Capital pillow this ! ") " And it 's a full hour's walk from the Jolly Gar- deners." (" Poor Jones ! Very easy mattress.) Aloud — Bless me, that's a bad business; and it rains, doesn't it, Mrs. Jones?" " A vile rain, sir, with an east wind." " (Poor Jones ! Delicious curtains these !) Couldn't the servant sit up, and let Mr. Jones mi " Lord, sir, we 're both of us sitting up ; for I 'm frighted out of my wits, sitting alone ; and Mr. Jones wouldn't be pleased if I didn't see him in myself." " (Poor woman !) Good-night, Mrs. Jones : pray don't stand any longer at that cold door." " Do you want anything, sir ?" 118 BEDS AND BEDROOMS. " Nothing, I thank you. I am very comfortable. What o'clock is it?" " Just going one, sir." " (Poor creature ! — Poor Susan ! — Poor Jones !) Whew goes the wind ; patter go the windows ; rumble goes a coach ; to sleep go I." This is pretty ; — but a wife, instead of the woman of the house, — a wife up, and going about like one's guardian-angel ; we also loving her well, and having entreated her not to sit up, only she is forced to do so for this half hour, — either we know nothing of bliss itself, or the variety — merely as a variety — the having a whole bed for half an hour, merely as a change from that other super-human elysian state — the seeing even a little pain borne so beautifully by the " partner of one's existence," whom of course we love the better for it, and cannot but rejoice in seeing gifted with such an opportunity of showing herself to advantage — all this, if we mistake not (owing to our present bachelor hallucination), must be a sublimation of satisfaction unknown to sojourn- ers at large, who are but too often accused, with justice, of having more room than they know what to do with. A bed, to be perfectly comfortable, should be warm, clean, well made, and of a reasonable soft- ness. People differ as to the amount of the softness. The general opinion seems to be in favour 01 feather-beds. To ourselves (if the fact must be publicly torn out of us by a candour trying to the BEDS AND BEDROOMS. 119 sense of our nothingness) a feather-bed is a Slough of Despond. When we are in the depths of it, we long to be on the heights. When we get on the heights, down they go with us, and turn into depths. The feathers hamper us, obstruct, irritate, suffocate. We lose the sense of repose and independence, and feel ourselves in the hands of a soft lubberly giant. The pleasure of being " tucked up," we can better understand ; but it likes us not. What we require is, that the limbs should be as free as possible from obstruction. We desire to go counter to all that we endure when up and about. W"e must have nothing constrained about us; — must be able to thrust arms and legs whithersoever we please. That the bed should be well and delicately tucked up, pleaseth us ; but only that we may have the greater satisfaction in disengaging the clothes on each side with a turn of the foot, and so giving freedom to our borders. Upon my resting body, Lie lightly, gentle clothes. Warmth, cleanliness, and ease being secured, it is of minor importance what sort of bed we lie in, whether it has curtains, or a canopy, or even legs. We can lie on the floor for that matter, provided the palliasse be of decent thickness. The floor itself then becomes a part of the great field of rest in which we expatiate. There is nothing to bound our right of incumbency ; we can gather the clothes about us, and roll on the floor if we please. Much greater 120 BEDS AND BEDROOMS. philosophy does it take, on the other hand, to make us go up half a dozen steps to our bed, — to climb up to such lofty absurdities as are shown in old houses for the beds of James's and Charles's time ; thrones rather, and canopies for Prester John ; — edifices of beds, where we make a show of the privatest and humblest of our pleasures; contrivances for the magnificent breaking of our necks; or, if we are not to die that way, three-piled hyperboles of beds to engulf us, like a slough on the top of a moun- tain. Fine curtains disgust us by the same uneasy contradiction. We do not mean handsome ones of a reasonable kind ; but velvet, and such like cumbrous clouds, lording it over the sweet idea of rest, and forcing us to think of the most out-of-door preten- sions. And we hate gilding, and coronets (not having any), and imperial eagles, and flews de lis, and all other conspiracies to put out the natural man in us, and deprive the poor great human being of the sweet privilege of being on a level with his reposing fellow-creatures. We are not sure that we could patronize Cupids, gilt torches, doves and gar- lands, &c. Flowery curtains we like; but the Cupids and gilt torches are particular. We are not the fonder of them for being the taste in France. Curtains, paperings, plates and dishes, every thing in that country, babbles, not of green fields, as with us, which is pretty, but of gallantry and la belle passion. The French (when they are not afraid of being thought afraid) are a good-natured people; BEDS AND BEDROOMS. 121 and they are much wiser in this good-nature, than if they took to " heavy wet," and to being sulky. But in these amatory matters they seem to us never to make out the proper case. There is something ever too cold, or too meretricious, probably both ; for these extremes are too apt to meet. Cupids and torches might be well enough, provided we could be secure that none but eyes of good taste would see them ; but how are they or we to look, when every idle servant, or the glazier, or the landlord, or the man that comes to look at the house when it is to be let, is to gape about him, and make an impertinence of our loves and graces ? But we forget our solitary condition. — We should almost equally dislike the most gorgeous and the most sorry bedroom, did not the former stand the greater chance of cleanliness. The Duke of Buck- ingham, " gallant and gay," in one of the state beds of Cliefden's " proud alcove," or reckless and drunk in " the worst inn's worst room," behind his " Tape-tied curtains never meant to draw," is, to our mind, in no such difference of condition as the poet makes him out. And his company were much like one another in both cases. Nay, that is not true either; for it would have been difficult to pick up such an abomination from a village ale- house as the Countess of Shrewsbury, — a woman, ugly all over with a hard heart. Commend us (for a climate like ours) to a bed-chamber of the middle 122 BEDS AND BEDROOMS. order, such as it was set out about a hundred years hack, and may still he seen in the houses of some old families ; the room of moderate size; the four- post bedstead neatly and plentifully, but not richly, draperied ; the chairs draperied also, down to the ground ; a drapery over the toilet ; the carpet, a good old Turkey or Brussels, not covering the floor, and easily to be taken up and shaken ; the wardrobe and drawers of old shining oak, walnut, or mahogany ; a few cabinet pictures, as exquisite as you please ; the windows with seats, and look- ing upon some green place; two or three small shelves of books ; and the drawers, when they are opened, redolent of lavender and clean linen. We dislike the cut-and-dry look of modern fashions ; the cane chairs, formal-patterned carpets, and flimsy rooms. Modern times (or till very lately they were so) are all for lightness, and cheap sufficiency, and what is considered a Grecian elegance. They realize only*an insipid or gaudy anatomy of things, a cold pretension, and houses that will tumble upon the heads of our grand-children. But these mat- ters, like others, are gradually improving. If our bedroom is to be perfect, it should face the east, to rouse us pleasantly with the morning sun ; and in case we should be tempted to lie too long in so sweet a nest, there should be a happy family of birds at the windows, to salute our rise with songs. It is a good thing, however, to reflect, that custom is half the secret of content. The reason why we BEDS AND BEDROOMS. 123 like a hard bed is, that we were brought up at a public school, without any luxuries ; and, to this day, we like just such a sort of bed as we had there. We could find a satisfaction in having the identical kind of rug over our sheets ; and sheets, too, of no greater fineness. And the same reason makes us prefer a coarse towel to a fine one, and a gown, of some sort, to a coat ; with a pocket in the same place as the one in which we used to put our mar- bles and tops, and our pocket editions of Gray and Collins. We have since slept in houses of all sorts — in rich houses and in poor, in cottages, in taverns and inns and public-houses, in palaces (what at least the Italians call such), and on board ship ; yea, in bivouacs — -just enough to taste the extremest hard- ness of the bed military ; and for the only contri- vance utterly to vitiate our night's rest, commend us to the bed of down. That, and the wooden bed of the guard-house, disputed the palm. Habit does the same with kings and popes. Frederick the Second preferred lying in a little tent-bed, such as Voltaire found him in at their first interview, shivering with an ague; and we learn from Horace Wal- pole's Letters, that the good Pope, Benedict the Fourteenth, lay upon one no better (the palliasse, most probably, of his convent) by the side of the gor- geous canopy prepared for his rank. In truth, luxuriate as we may in this our at-difierent-times- written article (wherein the indulgences and specu- lations, though true at the moment, are of many 124 BEDS AND BEDROOMS. years chance-preservation on paper, and therefore may crave excuse if they look a little ultra nice and fanciful, beyond the want of experience), we should be heartily ashamed of ourselves at our present time of life, if we could not sleep happily in any bed (down and mud always excepted), provided only it had enough clothes to keep us warm, ancf were as clean and decent as honest poverty could make it. We talk of fine chambers, and luxurious con- trasts of sitters up ; but our secret passion is for a homely room in a cottage, with perfect quiet, a book or two, and a sprig of rosemary in the win- dow ; not the book or two for the purpose of read- ing in bed, — (having once received a startling lesson that way, and not choosing to burn down the vil- lage,) — but in order that we may see them in the window the first thing in the morning, together with the trees of which they discourse. Add to this, a watch-dog at a distance, and a moaning wind, no matter how " melancholy," provided it does not blow a tempest (for though nature does nothing but for good, the particular suffering some- times presses upon the imagination), and we drop to sleep in a transport of comfort. Compare such a bed as this with one that we have seen during a storm of fifty-six hours' duration at sea, the occu- pant (the mate of the vessel) with his hands wet, black, blistered, and smarting with the cold, and the very bed (a hole in a corner) as wet as his hands ! And the common sailors had worse ! And yet the BEDS AND BEDROOMS. 125 worst of all, shut out from wet and cold as they were, but not having work like the seamen to occupy the mind, were the cribs of a parcel of chil- dren tossing about in all this tempest, and the bed of their parents on the cabin floor. — With these recollections (as the whole vessel got safe), we some- times think we could find it in our hearts to relish even a feather-bed. A very large bedroom in an old country-house is not pleasant, where the candle shows you the dark- ness at the other end of it, and you begin to think it possible for houses to be haunted. And as little comfortable is the bed with a great dusty canopy, such as they say the Highland laird mistook for the bed itself, and mounted at top of, while he put his servant into the sheets, thinking that the loftier stratum was the place of grandeur. Sometimes these canopies are domed, and adorned with plumes, which give them a funereal look; and a nervous gentleman, who, while getting into bed, is hardly sure that a hand will not thrust itself out beneath the valance and catch him by the ankle, does not feel quite so bold in it as the French general, who, when threatened by some sheeted ghosts, told them to make the best of their way off, or he would give them a sound thrashing. On the other hand, unless warranted by necessity and good-humour, which can reconcile anything, it is very disagreeable to see sofa-bedsteads and press-bedsteads in " stived-up " little rooms, half sitting-room and half chamber. 126 BEDS AND BEDROOMS They look as if they never could be aired. For a similar reason, an Englishman cannot like the French beds that shut up into alcoves in the wall. We do not object to a custom merely because it is foreign ; nor is it unreasonable, or indeed otherwise than agreeable, that a bedroom of good dimensions should include a partial bit of a sitting-room or boudoir ; but in that case, and indeed in all cases, it should be kept scrupulously neat and clean. Order in a house first manifests itself in the room which the housewife inhabits ; and every sentiment of the heart, as well as of the external graces, demands that a very reverence and religion of neatness should be there exhibited; not formality — not a want of snugness, — but all with evidences that the esteem of a life is preferred to the slatternliness of the moment, and that two hearts are always reigning together in that apartment, though one person alone should be visible. It is very proper that bedrooms, which can afford it, should be adorned with pictures, with flowers by day-time, (they are not wholesome at night,) and, if possible, with sculpture. We are among those who believe, with the old romance of Heliodorus, that, under circumstances which affect the earliest periods of existence, familiar objects are not without their influence upon the imagination. Besides, it is wholesome to live in the kindly and tranquil atmo- sphere of the arts ; and few, even of the right- minded, turn to half the account they might do the BEDS AND BEDROOMS. 127 innumerable beauties which Heaven has lavished upon the world, both in art and nature. Better hang a wild rose over the toilet, than nothing. The eye that looks in the glass will see there something besides itself; and it will acquire something of a religious right to respect itself, in thinking by how many objects in the creation the bloom of beauty is shared. The most sordidly ridiculous anecdote we remem- ber of a bed-chamber, is one in the life of Elwes, the rich miser, who, asking a visitor one morning how he had rested, and being told that he could not escape from the rain which came through the roof of the apartment, till he had found out one par- ticular corner in which to stow the truckle-bed, said, laughingly, and without any sense of shame, " Ah ! what ! you found it out, did you ? Ah ! that 's a nice corner, isn't it?" This, however, is surpassed in dramatic effect, by the story of two ministers of state, in the last century, who were seen one day, by a sudden visitor, furiously discussing some great question out of two separate beds in one room, by day-time, their arms and bodies thrust forward towards each other out of the clothes, and the ges- ticulation going on accordingly. If our memory does not deceive us, one of them was Lord Chatham. He had the gout, and his colleague coming in to see him, and the weather being very cold, and no fire in the room, the noble earl had persuaded his visitor to get into the other bed. The most ghastly bed- 128 BEDS AND BEDROOMS. chamber story, in real life (next to some actually- mortal ones), is that of a lady who dreamt that her servant-maid was coming into the room to murder her. She rose in the bed with the horror of the dream in her face ; and sitting up thus appalled, en- countered, in the opening door, the sight of the no less horrified face of the maid- servant, coming in with a light to do what her mistress apprehended. To give this article the termination fittest for it, such as leaves the reader with the most comprehensive sense upon him of profound rest, and of whatsoever conduces to lull and secure it, we shall conclude with a divine passage of Spenser, in which he com- bines, with the most poetical fiction, the most fami- liar feeling of truth. Morpheus, the god of sleep, has an impossible bed somewhere, on the borders of the sea, — on the shore of " the world of waters wide and deep," by which its curtains are washed. Observe how this fictitious bed is made real by every collateral circumstance. " And more to lulle him in his slumber soft, A trickling streame, from high rock tumbling downe, And ever-drizzling raine upon the loft, Mixed with a murmuring winde, much like the sowne Of swarming bees, did cast him in a swowne. No other noise, nor people's troublous cries As still are wont t' annoy the walled towne, Might there be heard ; — but carelesse quiet lyes, Wrapt in eternal silence — farre from enemyes." Faerie Queene, Book I. canto i. stanza 41. THE WORLD OF BOOKS. ] 29 THE WOELD OF BOOKS. Difficulty of proving that a man is not actually in a distant place, by dint of being there in imagination. — Visit of that kind to Scotland. — Suggestion of a Book-Geography ; of Maps, in which none but poetical or otherwise intellectually- associated places are set down. — Scottish, English, French, and Italian items for such maps. — Local literizations of Rousseau and Wordsworth objected to. — Actual enrichment of the commonest places by intellectual associations. TO THE EDITOR OF TAIT's MAGAZINE. Sir, — To write in your Magazine makes me feel as if I, at length, had the pleasure of being personally in Scotland, a gratification which I have not yet enjoyed in any other way. I dive into my channel of communication, like another Alpheus, and re- appear in the shop of Mr. Tait ; not pursuing, I trust, anything fugitive, but behaving very unlike a river-god, and helping to bring forth an Edinburgh periodical. Nor will you, sir, who enter so much into the interests of your fellow- creatures, and know so well vol. I. K 130 THE WORLD OF BOOKS. of what their faculties are capable, look upon this kind of presence as a thing so purely unreal as it might be supposed. Our strongest proofs of the existence of anything amounts but to a proportionate belief to that effect; and it would puzzle a wise man, though not a fool, to prove to himself that I was not, in some spiritual measure, in any place where I chose to pitch my imagination. I notice this me- taphysical subtlety, merely, in the first place, to baulk your friend the Pechler, should he think it a settled thing that a man cannot be in two places at once (which would be a very green assumption of his); and secondly, the better to impress a conviction which I have, — that I know Scotland very well, and have been there many times. Whether we go to another country on these oc- casions, in the manner of a thing spiritual, our souls being pitched out of ourselves like rockets or meteors; or whether the country comes to us, and our large souls are inhabited by it for the time being, upon the principle of the greater including the less, — the mind of man being a far more capacious thing than any set of square miles, — I shall leave the curious to determine ; but if I am not intimate with the very best parts of Scotland, and have not seen them a thousand times, then do I know nothing of Burns, or Allan Ramsay, or Walter Scott, or Smollett, or Ossian, or James the First, or Fifth, or snoods, or cockernonies, or gloamin', or birks and burnies, or plaids, bonnets, and phillabegs, or John Knox, or Queen Mary, or THE WORLD OF BOOKS. 131 the Canongate, or the Calton Hill, or Hume and Robertson, or Tweedside, or a haggis, or cakes, or heather, or reels and strathspeys, or Glengarry, or all the clans, or Auld Robin Gray, or a mist, or rappee, or second sight, or the kirk, or the cutty-stool, or golf and hurling, or the Border, or Bruce and Wallace, or bagpipes, or bonnie lasses. " A lover's plaid and a bed of heath," says the right poetical Allan Cunningham, "are favourite topics with the northern muse. When the heather is in bloom, it is worthy of becoming the couch of beauty. A sea of brown blossom, undulating as far as the eye can reach, and swarming with -wild bees, is a fine sight." Sir, I have seen it a million times, though I never set eyes on it. Who that has ever read it, is not put into visual possession of the following scene in the " Gentle Shepherd?" A flowrie howm between twa verdant braes, Where lasses used to wash and spread their claes ; A trotting burnie, wimpling through the ground, Its channel pebbles shining smooth and round : Here view twa bare-foot beauties, clean and clear. Or this?— The open field. — A cottage in a glen ; An auld wife spinning at the sunny en'. Or this other, a perfect domestic picture? — While Peggy laces up her bosom fair, "Wf a blue snood Jenny binds up her hair ; K 2 132 THE WORLD OF BOOKS. Glaud by a morning ingle takes a beek, The rising sun shines motty through the reek : A pipe his mouth, the lasses please his een, And now and then a joke maun intervene. The globe we inhabit is divisible into two worlds; one hardly less tangible, and far more known than the other, — the common geographical world, and the world of books ; and the latter may be as geographi- cally set forth. A man of letters, conversant with poetry and romance, might draw out a very curious map, in which this world of books should be deli- neated and filled up, to the delight of all genuine readers, as truly as that in Guthrie or Pinker ton. To give a specimen, and begin with Scotland, — Scotland would not be the mere territory it is, with a scale of so many miles to a degree, and such and such a population. Who (except a patriot or a cos- mopolite) cares for the miles or the men, or knows that they exist, in any degree of consciousness with which he cares for the never-dying population of books ? How many generations of men have passed away, and will pass, in Ayrshire or Dumfries, and not all the myriads be as interesting to us as a single Burns ? What have we known of them, or shall ever know, whether lairds, lords, or ladies, in com- parison with the inspired ploughman? But we know of the bards and the lasses, and the places which he has recorded in song ; we know the scene of Tarn o Shanters exploit ; we know the pastoral landscapes above quoted, and the scenes immor- THE WORLD OF BOOKS. 133 talized in Walter Scott and the old ballads ; and, therefore, the book-map of Scotland would present us with the most prominent of these. We should have the border, with its banditti, towns, and woods ; Tweedside, Melrose, and Roslin, Edina, otherwise called Edinburgh and Auld Reekie, or the town of Hume, Robertson, and others ; Woodhouse- lee, and other classical and haunted places ; the bower built by the fair hands of Bessy Bell and Mary Gray; the farm-houses of Burns's friends; the scenes of his loves and sorrows ; the land of Old Mortality, of the Gentle Shepherd and of Ossian. The Highlands, and the great blue billowy domains of heather, would be distinctly marked out, in their most poetical regions ; and we should have the tracks of Ben Jonson to Hawthornden, of Rob Roy to his hiding-places, and of Jeanie Deans towards England. Abbotsford, be sure, would not be left out; nor the house of the Antiquary, — almost as real a man as his author. Nor is this all; for we should have older Scotland, the Scotland of James the First, and of " Peeblis at the Play," and Gawin Douglas, and Bruce, and Wallace ; we should have older Scotland still, the Scotland of Ariosto, with his tale of " Ginevra," and the new '* Andromeda," deli- vered from the sea-monster at the Isle of Ebuda (the Hebrides), and there would be the residence of the famous Launcelot of the Lake, at Berwick, called the Joyeuse Garde, and other ancient sites of chivalry and romance ; nor should the nightingale be left out in 134 THE WORLD OF BOOKS. Ginevra's bower, for Ariosto has put it there, and there, accordingly, it is and has been heard, let ornithology say what it will ; for what ornithologist knows so much of the nightingale as a poet? We would have an inscription put on the spot — " Here the nightingale sings, contrary to what has been affirmed by White and others." This is the Scotland of books, and a beautiful place it is. I will venture to affirm, sir, even to yourself, that it is a more beautiful place than the other Scotland, always excepting to an exile or a lover; for the former is piqued to prefer what he must not touch; and, to the latter, no spot is so charming as the ugliest place that contains his beauty. Not that Scotland has not many places literally as well as poetically beautiful : I know that well enough. But you see that young man there, turning down the corner of the dullest spot in Edinburgh, with a dead wall over against it, and delight in his eyes ? He sees No. 4, the house where the girl lives he is in love with. Now what that place is to him, all places are, in their proportion, to the lover of books, for he has beheld them by the light of imagination and sympathy. China, sir, is a very unknown place to us, — in one sense of the word unknown ; but who is not intimate with it as the land of tea, and china, and ko-tous, and pagodas, and mandarins, and Confucius, and conical caps, and people with little names, little eyes, and little feet, who sit in little bowers, drinking THE WORLD OF BOOKS. 135 little cups of tea, and writing little odes? The Jesuits, and the tea-cups, and the novel of Ju-Kiao- Li, have made us well acquainted with it ; better, a great deal, than millions of its inhabitants are ac- quainted — fellows who think it in the middle of the world, and know nothing of themselves. With one China they are totally unacquainted, to-wit, the great China of the poet and old travellers, Cathay, " seat of Cathian Can," the country of which Ariosto's Angelica was princess-royal; yes, she was a Chinese, " the fairest of her sex, Angelica." It shows that the ladies in that country must have greatly degenerated, for it is impossible to conceive that Ariosto, and Orlando, and Rinaldo, and King Sacripant, who was a Circassian, could have been in love with her for having eyes and feet like a pig. I will deviate here into a critical remark, which is, that the Italian poets seem to have considered people the handsomer the farther you went north. The old traveller, it is true, found a good deal of the beauty that depends on red and white, in Tartary and other western regions ; and a fine complexion is highly esteemed in the swarthy south. But Astolfo, the Englishman, is celebrated for his beauty by the Italian poets ; the unrivalled Angelica was a Chinese ; and the hand- somest of Ariosto's heroes, Zerbino, of whom he writes the famous passage "that nature made him, and then broke the mould," was a Scotchman. The poet had probably seen some very handsome Scotch- man in Romagna. With this piece of "bribery and 136 THE WORLD OF BOOKS. corruption" to your national readers, I return to my subject. Book-England on the map, would shine as the Albion of the old Giants; as the "Logres" of the Knights of the Round Table ; as the scene of Amadis of Gaul, with its island of Windsor ; as the abode of fairies, of the Druids, of the divine Coun- tess of Coventry, of Guy, Earl of Warwick, of Alfred (whose reality was a romance), of the Fair Rosamond, of the Arcades and " Comus," of Chaucer and Spenser, of the poets of the Globe and the Mermaid, the wits of Twickenham and Hampton Court. Fleet Street would be Johnson's Fleet Street ; the Tower would belong to Julius Caesar ; and Blackfriars to Suckling, Vandyke, and the " Dunciad." Chronology, and the mixture of truth and fiction, that is to say, of one sort of truth and another, would come to nothing in a work of this kind ; for, as it has been before observed, things are real in proportion as they are impressive. And who has not as "gross, open, and palpable" an idea of Falstaff in East Cheap, as of Captain Grose himself, beating up his quarters ? A map of fictitious, lite- rary, and historical London, would, of itself, consti- tute a great curiosity. So would one of Edinburgh, or of any other city in which there have been great men and romantic events, whether the latter were real or fictitious. Swift speaks of maps, in which they " Place elephants for want of towns." THE WORLD OF BOOKS. 137 Here would be towns and elephants too, the popular and the prodigious. How much would not Swift do for Ireland, in this geography of wit and talent ! What a figure would not St. Patrick's Cathedral make ! The other day, mention was made of a " Dean of St. Patrick's" now living ; as if there was, or ever could be, more than one Dean of St. Patrick's ! In the Irish maps we should have the Saint himself driving out all venomous creatures; (what a pity that the most venomous retain a property as ab- sentees !) and there would be the old Irish kings, and O'Donoghue with his White Horse, and the lady of the " gold wand" who made the miraculous virgin pilgrimage, and all the other marvels of lakes and ladies, and the Round Towers still remaining to perplex the antiquary, and Goldsmith's " Deserted Village," and Goldsmith himself, and the birth-places of Steele and Sterne, and the brief hour of poor Lord Edward Fitzgerald, and Carolan with his harp, and the schools of the poor Latin boys under the hedges, and Castle Rackrent, and Edge worth's town, and the Giant's Causeway, and Ginleas and other classical poverties, and Spenser's castle on the river Mulla, with the wood-gods whom his pipe drew round him. Ireland is wild ground still ; and there are some that would fain keep it so, like a forest to hunt in. The French map would present us with the woods and warriors of old Gaul, and Lucan's witch; with Charlemaine and his court at Tours ; with the siege 138 THE WORLD OF BOOKS. of Paris by the Saracens, and half the wonders of Italian poetry ; with Angelica and Medoro ; with the Castles of Orlando and Rinaldo, and the traitor Gan; with part of the great forest of Ardenne (Rosalind being in it) ; with the gentle territory of the Troubadours, and Navarre ; with " Love's Labour Lost," and " Vaucluse ;" with Petrarch and Laura, and the pastoral scenes of D'Urfe's romance, and the " Men-Wolves" of Brittany, and the " Fairy of Lu- signan." Napoleon, also (for he too was a romance), should be drawn as a giant, meeting the allied forces in the neighbourhood of Paris. Italy would* be covered with ancient and modern romance ; with Homer, Virgil, Ovid, Dante, Boc- caccio, &c, with classical villas, and scenes Elysian and infernal. There would be the region of Saturn, during his Age of Gold, and the old Tuscan cities, and Phaeton in the north, and the syrens and fairies at Naples, and Polyphemus in Sicily, with the abodes of Boiardo and Ariosto, and Horace's mount Soracte, and the Cross of St. Peter, and the city in the sea, and the golden scenes of Titian and Raphael, and other names that make us hear the music of their owners : Pythagoras also with his philosophy, and Petrarch with his lute. A circle of stars would tell us where Galileo lived ; and the palace of Doria would look more than royal towards the sea. I dare not, in this hasty sketch, and with limited time before me, indulge myself in other luxuries of recollection, or do anything more than barely men- THE WORLD OF BOOKS. 139 tion the names of Spain, Fontarabia, and Cervantes ; of Greece ; of Persia, and the " Arabian Nights ;" of Mount Caucasus, and Turkey, and the Gothic north; of El Dorado and Columbus ; or the sea-snakes, floating islands, and other marvels of the ocean ; not forgetting the Atalantis of Plato, and the regions of Gulliver and Peter Wilkins. Neither can I have the pleasure of being suffocated with contemplating, at pro- per length, the burning deserts of Africa ; or of hear- ing the ghastly sounds of its old satyrs and iEgipans in their woody hills at night-time, described by Pomponius Mela ; or of seeing the stormy Spirit of the Cape, stationed there for ever by Camoens, and whose stature on the map would be like a mountain. You will be good enough to 'take this paper as nothing but a hint of what such a map might contain. One word, however, respecting a heresy in ficti- tious belief, which has been uttered by Rousseau, and repeated, I am sorry to say, by our excellent poet Wordsworth, the man of all men who ought not to reduce a matter of fact to what might be supposed to be its poverty. Rousseau, speaking of the banks of the Lignon, where the scene of the old French romance is laid, expresses his disappointment at find- ing there nothing like the beautiful things he fancied in his childhood ; and Mr. Wordsworth in his poem of " Yarrow," Visited and Unvisited, utters a like regret, in speaking of the scene of the " bonny bride — the winsome marrow." I know there is such an opinion 140 THE WORLD OF BOOKS. abroad, like many other errors ; but it does not become men of imagination to give in to it ; and I must protest against it, as a flat irreligion. I do not pretend to be as romantic in my conduct as the Genevese philosopher, or as poetical in my nature as the bard of Rydalmount ; but I have, by nature, perhaps, greater animal spirits than either ; and a bit of health is a fine prism to see fancies by. It may be granted, for the sake of argument, that the book- Lignon and the book- Yarrow are still finer things than the Lignon and Yarrow geographical; but to be actually on the spot, to look with one's own eyes upon the places in which our favourite heroes or heroines underwent the circumstances that made us love them — this may surely make up for an advan- tage on the side of the description in the book ; and, in addition to this, we have the pleasure of seeing how much has been done for the place by love and poetry. I have seen various places in Europe, which have been rendered interesting by great men and their works; and I never found myself the worse for seeing them, but the better. I seem to have made friends with them in their own houses ; to have walked, and talked, and suffered, and enjoyed with them ; and if their books have made the places better, the books themselves were there which made them so, and which grew out of them. The poet's hand was on the place, blessing it. I can no more separate this idea from the spot, than I can take away from it any other beauty. Even in London, I find the THE WORLD OP BOOKS. 141 principle hold good in me, though I have lived there many years, and, of course, associated it with every common-place the most unpoetical. The greater still includes the less : and I can no more pass through Westminster, without thinking of Milton ; or the Borough, without thinking of Chaucer and Shakspeare : or Gray's Inn, without calling Bacon to mind ; or Bloomsbury Square, without Steele and Akenside — than I can prefer brick and mortar to wit and poetry, or not see a beauty upon it beyond architecture, in the splendour of the recollection. I once had duties to perform, which kept me out late at night, and severely taxed my health and spirits. My path lay through a neighbourhood in which Dryden lived ; and though nothing could be more common-place, and I used to be tired to the heart and soul of me, I never, hesitated to go a little out of the way, purely that I might pass through Gerard Street, and so give myself the shadow of a pleasant thought. I am, sir, your cordial well-wisher, A Lover of Books. 142 jack Abbott's breakfast. JACK ABBOTT'S BREAKFAST. minimal spirits. — A Dominie Sampson drawn from the life. — Many things fall out between the (breakfast) cup and the lip. — A magistrate drawn from the life. — Is breakfast ever to be taken, or is it not ? — The question answered. " What a breakfast I shall eat!" thought Jack Abbott, as he turned into Middle Temple Lane, towards the chambers of hjs old friend and tutor Goodall. " How I shall swill the tea ! how cram down the rolls (especially the inside bits) ! how apologize for ' one cup more ! ' — But Goodall is an excellent old fellow — he won't mind. To be sure I 'm rather late. The rolls, I 'm afraid, will be cold, or double baked; but anything will be delicious. If I. met a baker, I could eat his basket." Jack Abbott was a good-hearted, careless fellow, who had walked that morning from Hendon, to breakfast with his old friend by appointment, and afterwards consult his late father's lawyer. He was the son of a clergyman more dignified by rank than by solemnity of manners, but an excellent person jack Abbott's breakfast. 143 too, who had some remorse in leaving a family of sons with little provision, hut comforted himself with reflecting that he had gifted them with good constitutions and cheerful natures, and that they would " find their legs somehow," as indeed they all did; for very good legs they were, whether to dance away care with, or make love with, or walk seven miles to "breakfast with, as Jack had done that morning ; and so they all got on accordingly, and cluhbed up a comfortable maintenance for the prebendary's widow, who, sanguine and loving as her husband, almost wept out of a fondness of de- light, whenever she thought either of their legs or their affection. As to Jack himself, he was the youngest, and at present the least successful, of the brotherhood, having just entered upon a smal tutorship in no very rich family ; but his spirits were the greatest in the family (which is saying much), and if he was destined never to prosper so much as any of them in the ordinary sense, he had a relish of every little pleasure that pre- sented itself, and a genius for neutralizing the dis- agreeable, which at least equalized his fate with theirs. Well, Jack Abbott has arrived at the door of his friend's room. He knocks ; and it is opened by Goodall himself, a thin grizzled personage, in an old greatcoat instead of a gown, with lanthorn-jaws, shaggy eyebrows, and a most bland and benevolent expression of countenance. Like many who inhabit 144 jack Abbott's breakfast. Inns of Court, he was not a lawyer. He had been a tutor all his life ; and as he led only a book-existence, he retained the great blessing of it — a belief in the best things which he believed when young. The natural sweetness of his disposition had even gifted him with a politeness of manners which many a better-bred man might have envied ; and though he was a scholar more literal than profound, and, in truth, had not much sounded the depths of anything but his tea-caddy, yet an irre- pressible respect for him accompanied the smiling of his friends; and mere worldly men made no grosser mistake, than in supposing they had a right to scorn him with their uneasy satisfactions and misbelieving success. In a word, he was a sort of better-bred Dominie Sampson — a Goldsmith, with the genius taken out of him, but the goodness left — an angel of the dusty heaven of bookstalls and the British Museum. Unfortunately for the hero of our story, this angel of sixty-five, unshaved, and with stockings down at heel, had a memory which could not recollect what had been told him six hours before, much less six days. Accordingly, he had finished his breakfast, and given his cat the remaining drop of milk long before his (in every sense of the word) late pupil presented himself within his threshold, Furthermore, besides being a lanthorn-jawed che- rub, he was very short-sighted, and his ears were none of the quickest ; so in answer to Jack's " Well jack Abbott's breakfast. 145 — eh — how d'ye do, my dear sir? — I'm afraid I'm. very late," he stood holding the door open with one hand, shading his winking eyes with the other, in order to concentrate their powers of investigation, and in the blandest tones of unawareness saying — "Ah, dear me — I'm very — I beg pardon — I really — pray who is it I have the pleasure of speak- ing to?" " What ! don't you recollect me, my dear sir ? Jack Abbott. I met you, you know, and was to come and " " Oh ! Mr. Abbott, is it ? What— ah— Mr. James Abbott, no doubt — or Robert. My dear Mr. Abbott, to think I should not see you !" " Yes, my dear sir ; and you don't see now that it is Jack, and not James ? Jack, your last pupil, who plagued you so in the Terence." " Not at all, sir, not at all ; no Abbott ever plagued me; — far too good and kind people, sir. Come in, pray ; come in and sit down, and let's hear all about the good lady your mother, and how you all get on, Mr. James." " Jack, my dear sir, Jack ; but it doesn't signify. An Abbot is an Abbot, you know ; that is, if he is but fat enough." Goodall {very gravely, not seeing the joke). "Surely you are quite fat enough, my dear sir, and in ex- cellent health. And how is the good lady your mother ? " " Capitally well, sir (looking at the breakfast table). TOL. I. L 146 jack Abbott's breakfast. I'm quite rejoiced to see that the breakfast- cloth is not removed ; for I 'm horribly late, and fear I must have put you out ; but don't you take any trouble, my good sir. The kettle, I see, is still singing on the hob. I '11 cut myself a piece of bread and butter immediately ; and you'll let me scramble beside you as I used to do, and look at a book, and talk with my mouth full." Goodall. " Ay, ay ; what! you have come to break- fast, have you, my kind boy ? that is very good of you, very good indeed. Let me see — let me see — my laundress has never been here this morning, but you won't mind my serving you myself — I have everything at hand." Abbott {apart, and sighing with a smile). " He has forgotten all about the invitation! Thank ye, my dear sir, thank ye — I would apologize, only I know you wouldn't like it ; and to say the truth, I'm very hungry — hungry as a hunter — I've come all the way from Hendon." " Bless me ! have you, indeed ? and from Wen- dover too ? Why, that is a very long way, isn't it?" " Hendon, sir, not Wendover — Hendon." " Oh, Endor — ah — dear me {smiling), I didn't know there was an Endor in England. I hope there is — he ! he ! — no witch there, Mr. Abbott ; unless she be some very charming young lady with a fortune." <{ Nay, sir, I think you can go nowhere in jack Abbott's breakfast. 147 England, and not -meet with charming young ladies." " Very true, sir, very true — England — what does the poet say ? something about ' manly hearts to guard the fair.' — You have no sisters, I think, Mr. Abbott?" " No ; but plenty of female cousins." " Ah ! very charming young ladies, I 've no doubt, sir. Well, sir, there 's your cup and saucer, and here 's some fresh tea, and " " I beg pardon," interrupted Jack, who, in a fury of hunger and thirst, was pouring out what tea he could find in the pot, and anxiously looking for the bread ; " I can do very well with this — at any rate to begin with." " Just so, sir," balmily returned Goodall. " Well, sir, but I am sorry to see — eh, I really fear — cer- tainly the cat — eh — what are we to do for milk ? I 'm afraid I must make you wait till I step out for some ; for this laundress, when once she " " Don't stir, I beg you," ejaculated our hero ; " don't think of it, my dear sir. I can do very well without milk — I can indeed — I often do without milk." This was said out of an intensity of a sense to the contrary ; but Jack was anxious to make the old gentleman easy. " Well," quoth Goodall, " I have met with such instances, to be sure ; and very lucky it is, Mr. — a — John — James I should say — that you do not l 2 148 jack Abbott's breakfast. care for milk ; though I confess, for my part, I can- not do without it. But, bless me ! heyday ! well, if the sugar-basin, dear me, is not empty. Bless my soul ! I '11 go instantly — it is but as far as Fleet Street — and my hat, I think, must be under those pamphlets." " Don't think of such a thing, pray, dear sir," cried Jack, half leaping from his chair, and tenderly laying his hand on his arm. "You may think it odd ; but sugar, I can assure you, is a thing I don't at all care for. Do you know, my dear Mr. Goodall, I have often had serious thoughts of leaving off sugar, owing to the slave-trade ?" " Why that, indeed " ; " Yes, sir ; and probably I should have done it, had not so many excellent men, yourself among them, thought fit to continue the practice, no doubt after the greatest reflection. However, what with these perhaps foolish doubts, and the indifference of my palate to sweets, sugar is a mere drug to me, sir '■ — a mere drug." " Well, but " " Nay, dear sir, you will distress me if you say another word upon the matter — you will indeed ; see how I drink." (And here Jack made as if he took a hasty gulp of his milkless and sugarless water.) " The bread, my dear sir — the bread is all I require ; just that piece which you were going to take up. You remember how I used to stuff bread, and fill the book I was reading with crumbs ? I dare jack Abbott's breakfast. 149 say the old Euripides is bulging out with them now." '' Well, sir — ah — em — ah — well, indeed, you're very good, and, I 'm sure, very temperate ; but, dear me — well, this laundress of mine — I must certainly get rid of her thieving — rheumatism, I should say ; but butter! I vow I do not " " Butter !" interrupted our hero, in a tone of the greatest scorn, " Why I haven't eaten butter I don't know when. Not a step, sir, not a step. And now let me tell you I must make haste, for I 've got to lunch with my lawyer, and he '11 expect me to eat something; and in fact I'm so anxious, and feel so hurried, that now I have eaten a good piece of my hunk, I must be off, my good sir — I must, indeed." To say the truth, Jack's hunk was a good three days old, if an hour ; and so hard, # that even his hunger and fine teeth could not find it in the hearts of them to relish it with the cold slop ; so he had made up his mind to seek the nearest coffee-house as fast as possible, and there have the heartiest and most luxurious breakfast that could make amend « * People of regular, comfortable lives, breakfasts, and con- veniences, must be cautious how they take pictures like tnese for caricatures. The very letter of the adventure above described, with the exception of a few words, has actually happened. And so, with the same difference, has that of the sheep and hackney-coach, narrated in the " Disasters of Car- fington Blundell." 150 jack Abbott's breakfast. for his disappointment. After reconciling the old gentleman, however, to his departure, he sat a little longer, out of decency and respect, listening, with a benevolence equal to his appetite, to the perusal of a long passage in Cowley, which Good all had been reading when he arrived, and the recitation of which was prolonged by the inflictor with admiring repeti- tions, and bland luxuriations of comment. " What an excellent good fellow he is !" thought Jack ; " and what a very unshaved face he has, and neglectful washerwoman ! " At length he found it the more easy to get away, inasmuch as Goodall said he was himself in the habit of going out about that time to a coffee-house to look at the papers, before he went the round of his pupils ; but he had to shave first, and would not detain Mr. Abbott, if he must go. Being once more out of doors, our hero rushes back like a tiger into Fleet Street, and plunges into the first coffee-house in sight. "Waiter!" " Yessir." " Breakfast immediately. Tea, black and green, and all that." " Yessir. Eggs and toast, sir?" " By all means." " Yessir. Any ham, sir?" " Just so, and instantly." "Yessir. Cold fowl, sir ? " " Precisely ; and no delay." jack Abbott's breakfast. 151 " Yessir. Anchovy perhaps, sir?" " By all — eh? — no, I don't care for anchovy — but pray bring what you like ; and above all, make haste, my good fellow — no delay — I 'm as hungry as the devil." " Yessir — coming directly, sir. (' Good chap and great fool,' said the waiter to himself.) Like the newspaper, sir?" " Thankye. Now for Heaven's sake " " Yessh immediately, sir — everything ready, sir." " Everything ready ! " thought Jack. " Cheering sound ! Beautiful place a coffee-house ! Fine Eng- lish place — everything so snug and at hand — so comfortable — so easy — have what you like, and without fuss. What a breakfast I shall eat ! And the paper too — hum, hum {reading) — Horrid Mur- der — Mysterious Affair — Express from Paris — Assassination — intense. Bless me! what horrible things — how very comfortable. What toast I Waiter!" Waiter, from a distance. " Yessir — coming, sir." In a few minutes everything is served up — the toast hot and rich — eggs plump — ham huge, &c. "You've another slice of toast getting ready?" said Jack. " Yessir" " Let the third, if you please, be thicker ; and the fourth." "Glorious moment!" inwardly ejaculated our 152 JACK ABBOTT S BREAKFAST. hero. He had doubled the paper conveniently, so as to read the " Express from Paris" in perfect comfort ; and before he poured out his tea, he was in the act of putting his hand to one of the inner pieces of toast, when — awful visitation ! — whom should he see passing the window, with the evident design of turning into the coffee-house, but his too- carelessly and swiftly shaved friend Goodall. He was coming, of course, to read the papers. Yes, such was his horrible inconvenient practice, as Jack had too lately heard him say ; and this, of all coffee- houses in the world, was the one he must needs go to. What was to be done ? Jack Abbott, who was not at all a man of manoeuvres, much less gifted with that sort of impudence which can risk hurting another's feelings, thought there was nothing left for him but to bolt ; and accordingly, after hiding his face with the newspaper till Goodall had taken up another, he did so as if a bailiff was after him, brushing past the waiter who had brought it him, and who had just seen another person out. The waiter, to his astonishment, sees him plunge into another coffee-house over the way; then hastens back to see if anything be missing ; and finding all safe, concludes he must have run over to speak to some friend, perhaps upon some business suddenly called to mind, especially as he seemed " such a hasty gentleman." Meanwhile, Jack, twice exasperated with hunger, but congratulating himself that he had neither been jack Abbott's breakfast. 153 seen by Goodall, nor tasted a breakfast unpaid for, has ordered precisely such another breakfast, and has got the same newspaper, and seated himself as nearly as possible in the very same sort of place. " Noiv" thought he, " I am beyond the reach of chance. No such ridiculous hazard as this can find me here. Goodall cannot read the papers in two coffee-houses. By Jove ! was there ever a man so hungry as I am ? What a breakfast I shall eat ! " Enter breakfast served up as before — toast hot and rich — eggs plump — ham huge, Sec. Homer himself, who was equally fond of a repetition and a good meal, would have liked to re-describe it. " Glorious moment!" Jack has got the middle bit of toast in his fingers, precisely as before, when happening to cast his eye at the door, he sees the waiter of the former coffee-house pop his head in, look him full in the face, and as suddenly withdraw it. Back goes the toast on the plate; up springs poor Abbott to the door, and hardly taking time to observe that his visitant is not in sight, rushes forth for the second time, and makes out as fast as he can for a third coffee-house. "Am I never to breakfast?" thought he. " Nay, breakfast I will. People can't go into three coffee- houses on purpose to go out again. But suppose the dog should have seen me ! Not likely, or I should have seen him again. He may have gone and told the people ; but I 've hardly got out of the second coffee-house before I've found a third. 154 jack Abbott's breakfast. Bless this confounded Fleet Street. — Most con- venient place for diving in and out of coffee-houses ! Dr. Johnson's street — ' High tide of human exist- ence' — ready breakfasts. What a breakfast I will eat!" Jack Abbott, after some delay, owing to the fulness of the room, is seated as before — the waiter has yessir'd to their mutual content — the toast is done — Homeric repetition — eggs plump, ham huge, &c. " By Hercules, who was the greatest twist of antiquity, what a breakfast I will, shall, must, and have now certainly got to eat! I could not have stood it any longer. Now, now, now, is the moment of moments." Jack Abbott has put his hand to the toast. Unluckily, there were three pair of eyes which had been observing him all the while from over the curtain of the landlord's little parlour ; to-wit, the waiter's of the first tavern, the waiter's of the second, and the landlord's of the third. The two waiters had got in time to the door of tavern the second, to watch his entrance into tavern the third ; and both communicating the singular fact to the landlord of the same, the latter resolved upon a certain mode of action, which was now to develope itself. \* Well," said the first waiter, " I 've seen strange chaps in my time in coffee-houses ; but this going about, ordering breakfasts which a man doesn't eat, beats everything! and he hasn't taken jack Abbott's breakfast. 155 a spoon or anything as I see. He doesn't seem to be looking about him, you see ; he reads the paper as quiet as an old gentleman." " Just for all the world as he did in our house," said the second waiter ; " and he 's very pleasant and easy-like in his ways." " Pleasant and easy ! " cried the landlord, whose general scepticism was sharpened by gout and a late loss of spoons. " Yes, yes ; I 've seen plenty of your pleasant and easy fellows — palavering rascals, who come, hail-fellow-well-met, with a bit of truth mayhap in their mouths, just to sweeten a parcel of lies and swindling. 'T was only last Friday I lost a matter of fifty shillings' worth of plate by such a chap ; and I vowed I 'd nab the next. Only let him eat one mouthful, just to give a right o' search, and see how I '11 pounce on him." But Jack didn't eat one mouthful ! No ; not even though he was uninterrupted, and really had now a fair field before him, and was in the very agonies of hunger. It so happened, that he had hardly taken up the piece of toast above mentioned, when with a voluntary (as it seemed) and strange look of mis- giving, he laid it down again / " I 'm blessed if he 's touched it, after all," said waiter the first. " Well, this beats everything ! See how he looks about him ! He 's feeling in his pockets though." "Ah, look at that !" says the landlord. " He 's a precious rascal, depend on't. I shouldn't wonder 156 jack Abbott's breakfast. if he whisk' d something out of the next box ; but we '11 nab him. Let us go to the door." Mr. Abbott — Jack seems too light an appellation for one under his circumstances — looked exceedingly- distressed. He gazed at the toast with a manifest sigh ; then glanced cautiously around him ; then again felt his pockets. At length, he positively- showed symptoms of quitting his seat. It was clear he did not intend eating a bit of this breakfast, any- more than of the two others. " 1 11 be hanged if he ain't going to bolt again," said the waiter. " Nab him ! " said the landlord. The unhappy, and, as he thought, secret Abbott makes a desperate movement to the door, and is received into the arms of this triple alliance. " Search his pockets!" cried the landlord. " Three breakfasts, and ne'er a one of 'em eaten ! " cried first waiter. " Breakfasts afore he collects his spoons," cried second. Our hero's pockets were searched almost before he was aware ; and nothing found but a book in an unknown language, and a pocket handkerchief. He encouraged the search, however, as soon as his astonishment allowed him to be sensible of it, with an air of bewildered resignation. " He's a Frenchman," said first waiter. j " He hasn't a penny in his pockets," said second. jack Abbott's breakfast. 157 " What a villain !" said the landlord. " You 're under a mistake — you are, upon my soul ! " cried poor Jack. " I grant it 's odd ; but " "Bother and stuff!" said the landlord ; "where did you put my spoons last Friday ? " " Spoons !" echoed Jack ; " why I haven't eaten even a bit of your breakfast." By this time all the people in the coffee-room had crowded into the passage, and a plentiful mob was gathering at the door. " Here 's a chap has had three breakfasts this morning," exclaimed the landlord, " and eat ne'er a one ! " " Three breakfasts ! " cried a broad, dry-looking gentleman in spectacles, with a deposition-taking sort of face ; " how could he possibly do that ? and why did you serve him ?" " Three breakfasts in three different houses, I tell you," said the landlord ; " he 's been to my house ; and to this man's house ; and to this man's ; and we've searched him, and he hasn't a penny in his pocket." " That 's it," exclaimed Jack, who had, in vain, tried to be heard ; " that 's the very reason." " What's the very reason?" said the gentleman in spectacles. " Why, I was shock'd to find, just now, that I had left my purse at home, in the hurry of coming out, and " 158 jack Abbott's breakfast. " Oh ! oh !" cried the laughing audience; "here's the policeman : he '11 settle him." " But how does that explain the two other break- fasts ? " returned the gentleman. " Not at all," said Jack. " Impudent rascal ! " said the landlord. Here the policeman is receiving a bye explanation, while Jack is raising his voice to proceed. " I mean," said he, " that that doesn't explain it ; hut I can explain it." " Well, how, my fine fellow ? " said the gentle- man, hushing the angry landlord, who had, mean- while, given our hero in charge. " Don't lay hands on me, any of you," cried our hero ; " I '11 go quietly anywhere, if you let me alone ; but first let me explain." " Hear him, hear him ! " cried the spectators ; " and watch your pockets." Here Jack, reasonably thinking that nothing would help him out if the truth did not, but not aware that the truth does not always have its just effect, especially when of an extraordinary descrip- tion, gave a rapid, but reverent statement of the character of his friend in the neighbourhood, whose breakfast had been so inefficient : then an account (all which excited laughter and derision) of his going into the first coffee-house, and seeing his friend come in, (which, nevertheless, had a great effect on the first waiter, who knew the old gentle- man,) and so on of his subsequent proceedings ; a jack Abbott's breakfast. 159 development which succeeded in pacifying both the waiters, who had, in fact, lost nothing ; so, coming to an understanding with one another, they slipped away, much to the anger and astonishment of the landlord. This personage, whose whole man, since he left off their active life, had become affected with drams and tit-bits, and whose irritability was aggravated by the late loss of his spoons, persisted in giving poor unbreakfasted Jack in charge, es- pecially when he found that he would not send for a character to the friend he had been speaking of, and that he had no other in town but a lawyer, who lived at the end of it. And so off goes our hero to the police-office. " You, perhaps, any more than my irritable friend here, don't know the sort of literary old gentleman I have been speaking of," said Jack to the policeman, as they were moving along. " Can't say I do, sir," said the policeman, a highly respectable individual of his class, clean as a pink, and dull as a pike-staff. " No, nor no one else ; " said the landlord. " Who 's a man as can't be sent for ? He 's neither here nor there." " That 's true enough," observed Jack ; " he 's in Rome or Greece by this time, at some pupil's house ; but, wherever he is, I can't send to him. With what face could I do it, even if possible, in the midst of all this fuss about a breakfast?" " Fuss about white broth, you mean?" said the 160 jack Abbott's breakfast. landlord ; " my Friday spoons are prettily melted by this time ; but Mr. Kingsley will fetch all that out." " Then he will be an alchemist, cunninger than Raymond Lully," said our hero. " But what is your charge, pray, after all?" " False pretences, sir," said the policeman. " False pretences !" " Yes, sir. You comes, you see, into the gentle- man's house under the pretence of eating breakfast, and has none ; and that 's false pretences." " That is, supposing I intended them to be false." " Yes, sir. In course I don't mean to say as — I only says what the gentleman says. — Every man by law is held innocent till he's found guilty." " You are a very civil, reasonable man," said our warm-hearted hero, grateful at this unlooked for admittance of something possible in his favour ; " I respect you. I have no money, nor even a spoon to beg your acceptance of; but pray take this book. It's of no use to me ; I've another copy." " Mayn't take anything in the execution of my office," said the man, giving a glance at the land- lord, as if he might have done otherwise, had he been out of the way ; " thank'e all the same, sir ; but ain't allowed to have no targiwarsation." " Yet your duties are but scantily paid, I believe," said Jack. " However, you've a capital breakfast, no doubt, before you set out ?" Not by the reg'lations, sir," said the policeman. jack Abbott's breakfast. 161 " But you have by seven or eight o'clock ? " said Jack, smiling at his joke. " Oh, yes, tight enough, as to that," answered the policeman, smiling; for the subject of eating rouses the wits of everybody. " Hot toast, eggs, and all that, I suppose," said Jack, heaving a sigh betwixt mirth and calamity. " Can't say I take eggs," returned the other ; " but I takes a bit o' cold meat, and a good lot o' bread and butter." And here he looked radiant with the reminiscence. " Lots of bread and butter," thought Jack ; " what bliss ! I '11 have bread and butter when I breakfast, not toast — it 's more hearty — and, besides, you get it sooner : bread is sooner spread than toasted — thick, thick — I hear the knife plastering the edge of the crust before it cuts. Agony of expectation ! When shall I breakfast?" "The office!" cried the landlord, hurrying for- ward ; and in two minutes, our hero found himself in a crowded room, in which presided the all-know- ing and all-settling Mr. Kingsley. This gentleman, who died not long after policemen came up, was the last lingering magistrate of the old school. He was a shortish stout man, in powder, with a huge vinous face, a hasty expression of countenance, Roman nose, and large lively black eyes ; and he always kept his hat on, partly for the most dignified reason in the world, because he represented the sovereign magis- tracy, and partly for the most undignified ; to-wit, a VOL. I. M 162 jack Abbott's breakfast. cold in the head ; for to this visitation he had a per- petual tendency, owing to the wine he took over- night, and the draughts of air which beset him every morning in the police office. Irritability was his weak side, like the landlord's; but then, agreeably to the inconsistency in that case made and provided, he was very intolerant of the weakness in others. To sum up his character, he was very loyal to his king ; had a great reverence for all the by-gone statesmen of his youth, especially such as were orators and lords ; indeed, had no little tendency to suppose all rich men respectable, and to let them escape too easily if brought before him ; but was severe in proportion with what are called " decent" men and tradesmen, and very kind to the poor : and if he loved anything better than his dignity, it was a good bottle of port, and an ode of Horace. He had not the wit of a Fielding or Dubois; but he had a spice of their scholarship ; and while taking his wine, would nibble you the beginnings of half the odes of his favourite poet, as other men do a cake or biscuit. To our hero's dismay, a considerable delay took place before the landlord's charge could be heard. Time flew, hunger pressed, breakfast drew farther off, and the son of the jovial prebendary learned what it was to feel the pangs of the want of a penny, for he could not buy even a roll. " Immortal Gold- smith !" thought he ; " poor Savage ! amazing Chat- terton! pathetic Otway ! fine, old, lay-bishop Johnson ! jack Abbott's breakfast. 163 venerable, surly man ! is it possible that you ever felt this ! felt it to-morrow too ; and next day ; and next ! Ill does it become me then, Jack Abbott, to be impatient ; and yet, O table-cloth ! O thick slices ! O tea ! when shall I breakfast ?" The case at length was brought on, and the testi- mony of the absent witnesses admitted by our hero with a nonchalance which disgusted the magistrate, and began to rouse his bile. What irritated him the more was, that he saw there would be no proving anything, unless the criminal (whom for the very innocence of his looks he took for an impudent offender) should somehow or other commit himself; which he thought not very likely. In fact, as nothing had been eaten, and nothing found on the person, there was no real charge ; and Mr. Kings- ley had a very particular secret reason, as we shall see presently, why he could not help feeling that there was one point strongly in the defendant's favour. But this only served to irritate him the more. " Well now, you sir — Mr. What'syourname," quoth he, in a huffing manner, and staring from under his hat ; " what is your wonderful explanation of this very extraordinary habit of taking three breakfasts : eh, sir ? You seem mighty cool upon it." " Sir," answered our hero, whose good nature gifted him with a certain kind of address, " it is out of no disrespect to yourself that I am cool. You may well be surprised at the circumstances under m 2 164 jack Abbott's breakfast. which I find myself; but in addressing a gentleman and a man of understanding, and giving him a plain statement of the facts, I have no doubt he will discover a veracity in it which escapes eyes less discerning." Here the landlord, who instinctively saw the effect which this exordium would have upon Kings- ley, could not help muttering the word " palaver," loud enough to be heard. "Silence!" exclaimed the magistrate. "Keep your vulgar words to yourself, sir. And hark'e, sir, take your hat off, sir ! How dare you come into this office with your hat on ? " " Sir, I have a very bad cold, and I thought that in a public office " " Sir," returned Kingsley, who was doubly of- fended at this excuse about the cold, " think us none of your thoughts, sir. Public office ! Public- house, I suppose you mean. Nobody wears his hat in this office but myself; and I only do it as the representative of a greater power. Hat, indeed ! I suppose some day or other we shall all have the privilege of my Lord Kinsale, and wear our hats in the royal presence." Jack gave his account of the whole matter, which, from a certain ignorance it exhibited of the ways of the town, did appear a little romantic to his inter- rogator ; but the latter, besides knowing our hero's lawyer, was not unacquainted with the character of Goodall, " who," said he, " is known to everybody." jack Abbott's breakfast. 165 " Probably, sir ; " observed the landlord, " but for that reason may not this person have heard of him, and so pretend to be his acquaintance? He calls himself Abbott, but that is not the name in the French book he's got about him." " Let me see the book," cried Kingsley. " French book ! It is a Latin book, and a very good book too, and an Elzevir. e E libris Caroli Gibson, 1743.' — A pretty age for the person before us truly — a very hale, hearty, young gentleman, some ninety years old, or thereabouts. (Here a laugh all over the office ; which, together with the sight of the Horace, put Kingsley into the greatest good- humour.) You are thinking, I guess, Mr. — a — Abbott, of the ' Odi profanum valgus,' I take it ; and wishing you could add, ' et arceo'* " « Why, to tell the truth," answered Jack, " I cannot deny a wish to that effect; but my main thought, for these five hours past, has been rather of the ' Nunc est bibendum'-f — only substituting tea- cups for goblets." " Very good, sir, very good ; and doubtless you admire the ' Persicos odi,' and the ' Quid dedi- catum,' and that beautiful ode, the ' Vides ut altar %" " I do, indeed," said Jack ; " and I trust that one * I hate the profane vulgar, — and drive them away. f Now for drinking. % Various beginnings of other Odes. \66 jack Abbott's breakfast. of your favourites, like mine, is the ' Integer vita scelerisque purus ?' " " ' Non eget Mauri jaculis neque arcu' (added Kingsley, unable to avoid going on with the quotation) " ' Nee venenatis gravida sagittis, Fusee, pharetra,' There 's something very charming in that ' Fusee, pharetra — so short and pithy, and elegant; and then the pleasant, social familiarity of Fusee." " Just so," said Jack ; " you hit the true relish of it to a nicety ! " " Fussy fair-eater /" muttered the landlord. "A great deal more fuss than fair eating. My time 's lost — that's certain." Kingsley could not resist a few more returns to his favourite pages ; but suddenly recollecting him- self, he looked grand and a little turbulent, and said — " Well, Mr. — a — Landlord — What'syourname, — what 's the charge here, after all ? for, on my con- science, I cannot see any ; and, for my part, I thoroughly believe the gentleman ; and I '11 give you another reason for it, besides knowing this Mr. Good all. It may not be thought very dignified in me to own it, but dignity must give way to justice — ' Fiat justitia, ruat ccelum' — and to say the truth I, I myself, Mr. Landlord — whatever you may think jack Abbott's breakfast. 167 of the confession — came from home this morning without remembering my purse." In short, the upshot was, that the worthy magis- trate, seeing Bidds's impatience at this confession, and warming the more towards his Horatian friend, not only proceeded to throw the greatest ridicule on the charge, but gave Jack a note to the nearest tavern-keeper, desiring him to furnish the gentle- man with a breakfast at his expense, and stating the reason why. He then proclaimed aloud, as he was directing it, what he had done ; and added, that he should be very happy to see so intelligent and very innocent a young gentleman, whenever he chose to call upon him. With abundance of acknowledgments, and in raptures at the now certain approach of the bread and butter, Jack made his way out of the office, and proceeded for the tavern. " At last I have thee ! " cried he, internally, " O, most fugacious of meals — what a repast I will make of it ! What a breakfast I shall have ? Never will a breakfast have been so intensified" Jack Abbott, with the note in his hand, arrived at the tavern, went up the steps, hurried through the passage. Every inch of the way was full of hope and bliss. He sees the bar in an angle round the corner, and is hastening into it with the magical document, when lo ! whom should his eyes light on but the plaintiff, Bidds himself, detailing his version of the story to the new land- 168 jack Abbott's breakfast. lord, and evidently poisoning his mind with every syllable. Our modest, albeit not timid, hero, raging with hunger as he was, could not stand this. A man of more confident face might not unreasonably have pre- sented his note, and stood the brunt of the uncom- fortableness ; but Jack Abbott, with all his apparent thoughtlessness, had one of those natures which feel for the improprieties of others, even when they themselves have no sense of them ; and he had not the heart to outface the vindictiveness of Bidds. To say the truth, Bidds, who was a dull fellow, had some reason to be suspicious ; and Jack felt this too, and retreating accordingly, made haste to take the long step to his lawyer's. " Now the lawyer," quoth he, soliloquizing, " I have never seen ; but he was an intimate friend of my father's ; so intimate, that I can surely take a household liberty with him, and fairly accept his breakfast, if he offers it, as of course he will ; and I shall plainly tell him that I prefer breakfast to lunch ; in short, that I have made up my mind to have it, even if I wait till dinner-time, or tea-time ; and he'll laugh, and we shall be jolly, and so I shall get my breakfast at last. Exquisite moment ! What a breakfast I shall have ! " The lawyer, Mr. Pallinson, occupied a good large house, with the marks of plenty on it. Jack hailed the sight of the fire blazing in the kitchen. " Deli- cious spot!" thought he; "kettle, pantry, and all jack Abbott's breakfast. 169 that — comfortable maid-servant too ; hope she has milk left, and will cut the bread and butter. A home too — good family house. Sure of being com- fortable there. Taverns not exactly what I took 'em for — not hospitable — not fiducial — don't trust ; don't know an honest man when they see him. — What slices ! " But a little baulk presented itself. Jack unfor- tunately rang at the office-hell instead of the house, and found himself among a parcel of clerks. Mr. Pallinson was out — not expected at home till evening — had gone to Westminster on special busi- ness — and at such times always dined at the Mendip coffee-house. Jack, in desperation, fairly stated his case. No result but " Strange, indeed, sir," from one of the clerks, and a general look-up from their desks on the part of the others. Not a syllable of " Won't you stop, sir?" or, " The servant can easily give you breakfast;" or any of those fond succe- daneums for the master's presence, which our hero's simplicity had fancied. Furthermore, no Mrs. Pal- linson existed, to whom he might have applied ; and he had not the face to ask for any minor goddess of the household. Blushing, and stammering a " Good- morning," he again found himself in the wide world of pavement and houses. He had got, however, his lawyer's direction at the coffee-house, and thither accordingly he betook himself, retracing great part of his melancholy steps. Had our hero, instead of having passed his time 170 jack Abbott's breakfast. at college and in the country, been at all used to living in London, he would have set himself down comfortably at once in this or any other coffee- house, ordered what he pleased, and despatched a messenger in the mean while to anybody he wanted. But under all the circumstances, he was resolved, for fear of encountering further disappointment, to endure whatsoever pangs remained to him for the rest of the time, and wait till he saw his solicitor come in to dinner. In vain the waiters gave him all encouragement — " Knew Mr. Pallin- son well" — "A most excellent gentleman" — had " recommended many gentlemen to their house." — "Would you like anything, sir, before he comes?" — "Like to look at the paper?" and the paper was laid, huge and crisp, before him. " Ah ! " thought Jack with a sigh, " I know that sound — no, I'll certainly wait. Five o'clock isn't far off, and then I 'm certain. What a breakfast I shall now have, when it does come. I '11 wait, if I die first, so as to have it in perfect comfort." At length five o'clock strikes, and almost at the same moment enters Mr. Pallinson. He was a brisk, good-humoured man, who had the happy art of throwing off business with the occasion for it; and he acknowledged our hero's claims at once, in a jovial voice, "from his likeness to his excellent friend, the prebendary." " Don't say a word more, my dear sir — not a word; your eyes and face tell all. Here, John, jack Abbott's breakfast. 171 plates for two. You'll dine of course with your father's old friend? or would you like a private room { Jack's heart felt itself at home at once with this cordiality. He said he was very thankful for the offer of the private room, especially for a reason which he would explain presently. Having entered it, he opened into the history of his morning ; and by laughing himself, warranted Pallinson in the hursts of laughter which he would have had the greatest difficulty to restrain. But the good and merry lawyer, who understood both a joke and a comfort to the depth, entered heartily into Jack's whim of still having his breakfast, and it was accordingly brought up — not, however, without a guarded explanation on the part of the Westminster- hall man, who had a professional dislike to seeing anybody committed in the eyes of the ignorant ; so he told the waiter, that " his friend here had got up so late, and kept such fashionable hours, he must needs breakfast while himself was dining." The waiter bowed with great respect ; " and so," says the shrewd attorney, " no harm 's done ; and now, my dear Mr. Abbott, peg away." Jack needed not this injunction to lay his hand upon the prey. The bread and butter was now actually before him ; not so thick, indeed, as he had pictured to himself; but there it was, real, right- earnest bread and butter ; and since the waiter had turned his back, three slices could be rolled into 172 jack Abbott's breakfast. one, and half of the coy aggregation clapped into the mouth at once. The lump was accordingly made, the fingers whisked it up, and the mouth was ready opened to swallow, when the waiter again throws open the door — "Mr. Goodall, sir." " Breakfast is abolished with me," thought Jack ; " there 's no such thing. Henceforward I shall not attempt it." The prebendary, the lawyer, and Goodall were all well known to each other ; but this is not what had brought him hither. The waiter at his coffee- house, where he went to read the papers, and where Jack had had his first mischance, had returned home before the old gentleman had finished his morning's journal, and told him what, to his dusty apprehen- sion, appeared the most confused and unaccountable story in the world, of Mr. Abbott having ordered three breakfasts and been taken to jail. In his benevolent uneasiness, he could hardly get through his day's work, which unfortunately called him so far as Hackney ; but as soon as it was over, he hastened in a coach to Pallinson's, and coming- there just after Jack had gone, had followed him, in less uneasiness of mind, to the tavern. " Well, sir — eh, sir ? — why, my dear Mr. Abbott — John — James I should say — why, what a dance you have led me to find you out ! and very glad I am, I 'm sure, sir, to find you so comfortably situated, with our good friend here, after the story which jack Abbott's breakfast. 173 that foolish, half-witted fellow, William, told me at the coffee-house. Well, sir — eh — and now — I beg pardon — but pray what is it, and can I do anything for you ? I suppose not — eh — ah ? for here 's our excellent friend, Mr. Pallinson — he does everything of that sort — bailiff and house — yes, sir, and no doubt it 's all right — only, if I am wanted, you '11 say so ; and so, sir — eh — ah — well — but don't let me interrupt your tea, I beg." " Luckiest of innocent fancies !" thought our hero, relieved from a load of misgiving. " He thinks I 'm at tea 1 " Jack plunged again at the bread and butter, and at last actually realised it in his mouth. His cala- mities were over ! He was in the act of break- fasting ! " I'm afraid, too," said Goodall, — " eh, my dear sir ? — that the very sparing breakfast you took at my chambers — eh — ah — my, my dear Mr. John — must have contributed not a little to — to — yes, sir. Well, but pray now what was the trouble you had, of which that foolish fellow told me such flams? I'm afraid — yes, indeed — I've had great fears some- times that he ventures to tell me stories — things untrue, sir." " God bless him and you, both of you," thought Abbott. " You 're a delicious fellow. — Why, my dear, good sir," continued he, always eating, and at the same time racking his brains for an inven- tion, — " I beg your pardon — I 'm eating a little too fast " 174 jack Abbott's breakfast. Here he made signs of uneasiness in the throat. " The fact is," said Pallinson, coming to the res- cue, (for he knew that the whole business would fade from Goodall's mind next day, or be remembered so dimly that the waiter would hear no more of it,) " the fact is, Mr. Abbott met me in Temple Lane, where I had been summoned on business so early, that I had not breakfasted; and he said he would order breakfast for me at your coffee-house ; and I not coming, he came out to look for me, and found me discussing a matter at another tavern-door, with a policeman, who had been sent for to take up a swindler ; and hence, my good sir, all this stuff about the jail and the two breakfasts, for there were only two ; but you know how stories accumulate." " Very deplorably, indeed, sir," said Goodall ; " it always was so, and — eh — ah — yes, sir — I fear always will be." " I beg pardon," interrupted Jack ; " but may I trouble you for that loaf? These slices are very thin, and I'm so ravenously hungry, that " "Glorious moment!" The inward ejaculation was at last a true one. The sturdy slices beauti- fully made their appearance from under the sharp, robust-going, and butter-plastering knife of Jack Abbott. Even the hot toast was called for — Good- all having "vowed" he'd take his tea also, since they were all three met. The eggs were also con- trived, and plump went the spoon upon their tops in the egg-cup. The huge ham furthermore was jack Abbott's breakfast. 175 not wanting. And then the well-filled and thrice- filled breakfast-cup ; — excellent was its strong and well-milked tea, between black and green, "with an eye of tawny in it ;" something with a body, although most liquidly refreshing. Jack doubled his thick slices ; he took huge bites ; he swilled his tea, as he had sworn in thought he would ; and he had the eggs on one side of him, and the ham on the other, and his friends before him, and was as happy as a prince escaped into a foreign land (for no prince in possession knows such moments as these) ; and when he had at length finished, talking and laugh- ing all the while, or hearing talk and laugh, he pushed the breakfast-cup aside, and said to himself, " I 've had it ! — breakfast hath been mine ! — And now, my dear Mr. Pallinson, I '11 take a glass of your port." 176 ON SEEING A PIGEON MAKE LOVE. ON SEEING A PIGEON MAKE LOYE. Ut albulus columbus, aut Adoneus ? Catullus. Which is he ? Pigeon, or Adonis ? French intermixture of prose and verse. — Courtship of Pigeons. — A word in pity for rakes. — Story of one baffled. — Instinc- tive sameness of the conduct of the lower animals questioned. — Pope's opinion respecting instinct and reason. — Human Improvability. — Fitness of some of the loioer animals for going to heaven not less conceivable than that of some others. —Doves at Maiano. — Ovid's Bird-Elysium. The French have a lazy way, in some of their com- positions, of writing prose and verse alternately. The author, whenever it is convenient for him to he inspired, begins dancing away in rhyme. The fit over, he goes on as before, as if nothing had hap- pened. We have essays in prose and verse by Cowley (a delightful book) in which the same piece contains both; but with one exception, they are rather poems with long prefaces. ON SEEING A PIGEON MAKE LOVE. 177 If ever this practice is allowable, it is to a peri- odical writer in love with poetry. He is obliged to write prose ; he is tormented with the desire of vent- ing himself in rhyme ; he rhymes, and has not leisure to go on. Behold us, as a Frenchman would say, with our rhyme and our reason ! The following verses were suggested by a sight of a pigeon making love. The scene took place in a large sitting-room, where a beau might have fol- lowed a lady up and down with as bustling a solici- tation : he could not have done it with more. The birds had been brought there for sale ; but they knew no more of this than two lovers whom destiny has designs upon. The gentleman was as much at his ease as if he had been a Bond-street lounger pur- suing his fair in a solitary street. We must add, as an excuse for the abruptness of the exordium, that the house belonged to a poet of our acquaintance, who was in the room at the same time.* Is not the picture strangely like ? Doesn't the very bowing strike ? Can any art of love in fashion Express a more prevailing passion ? That air — that sticking to her side — That deference, ill concealing pride, — That seeming consciousness of coat, And repetition of one note, — * Lord Byron. The house was the Casa Saluzzi, at Albaro, near Genoa. VOL. I. Nf 178 ON SEEING A PIGEON MAKE LOVE. Ducking and tossing back his head, As if at every bow he said, " Madam, by Heaven," — or " Strike me dead." And then the lady ! look at her : What bridling sense of character ! How she declines, and seems to go, Yet still endures him to and fro ; Carrying her plumes and pretty clothings, Blushing stare, and mutter'd nothings, Body plump, and airy feet, Like any charmer in a street. Give him a hat beneath his wing, And is not he the very thing ? Give her a parasol or plaything, And is not she the very she-thing ? Our companion, who had run the round of the great world, seemed to be rather mortified than otherwise at this spectacle. It was certainly calculated, at first blush, to damp the pride of the circles : but upon reflection, it seemed to afford a considerable lift to beaux and belles in ordinary. It seemed to show how much of instinct, and of the common unreflecting course of things, there is even in the gallantries of those who flatter themselves that they are vicious. Nobody expects wisdom in these per- sons ; and if they can be found to be less guilty than is supposed, the gain is much : for, as to letting the dignity of human nature depend upon theirs, on the one hand, or expecting to bring about any change ON SEEING A PIGEON MAKE LOVE. 179 in their conduct by lecturing them on their faults, on the other, it is a speculation equally hopeless. If a man of pleasure " about town" is swayed by anything, it is by a fear of becoming ridiculous. If he must continue in his old courses, it is pleasant to know him for what he is, and that pigeons are not confined to the gaming-table. We followed once a young man of fashion in and out a variety of streets at the west end of the town, through which he was haunting a poor blushing damsel, who appeared to be at once distressed by him and endangered. We thought she seemed to be wishing for something to turn the scale in favour of her self-denial ; and we resolved to furnish it. Could the consequences of his success have rested entirely with himself, we saw enough of the pigeon in him not to have been so ill-bred as to " spoil sport ;" but considering, as times go, that what is sport to the gentleman in these cases is very often death to the lady, we found ourselves compelled to be rude and con- scientious, In vain he looked round every now and then, putting on his best astonishment, and cursing, no doubt, " the indelicacy of the fellow." There we were, low and insolent, — sticking to his skirts, won- dering whether he would think us of importance enough for a challenge, and by what bon-mot or other ingenious baffling of his resentment, we should contrive at once to save our life and the lady. At length, he turns abruptly across the street, and we fol- lowed the poor girl, till she was at a safe distance. n 2 180 ON SEEING A PIGEON MAKE LOVE. We caught but one other glimpse of her face, which was as red as scarlet. We fancied, when all was safe, that some anger against her deliverer might mingle with her blushes, and were obliged to encourage ourselves against a sort of shame for our interference. We wished we couldliave spoken to her ; but this was impossible ; nay, considering the mutual tenderness of our virtue at that instant, might have been dan- gerous. So we made our retreat in the same manner as our gentleman ; and have thought of her face with kindness ever since. To return to our pigeons : — the description given in the verses is true to the letter. The reader must not think it a poetical exaggeration. If he has ever witnessed an exhibition of the kind, he has no con- ception of the high human hand with which these pigeons carry it. The poets indeed, time out of mind, have taken amatory illustrations from them ; but the literal courtship surpasses them all. One sight of a pigeon paying his addresses would be sufficient to unsettle in our minds all those proud conclusions which we draw respecting the difference between reason and instinct. If this is mere instinct as distinguished from reason, if a bird follows another bird up and down by a simple mechanical impulse, giving himself all the airs and graces ima- ginable, exciting as many in his mistress, and uttering every moment articulate sounds which we are no more bound to suppose deficient in meaning than a pigeon would be warranted in supposing the same ON SEEING A PIGEON MAKE LOVE. 181 of our own speech, then reason itself may be no more than a mechanical impulse. It has nothing better to show for it. Our mechanism may possess a greater variety of movements, and be more adapted to a variety of circumstances ; but if there is not variety here, and an adaptation to circum- stances, we know not where there is. If it be an- swered, that pigeons would never make love in any other manner, under any circumstances, we do not know that. Have people observed them sufficiently to know that they always make love equally well ? If they have varied at any time, they may vary again. Our own modes of courtship are undoubtedly very numerous ; and some of them are as different from others, as the courtship of the pigeon itself from that of the hog. But though we are observers of our- selves, have we yet observed other animals sufficiently to pronounce upon the limits of their capacity ? We are apt to suppose that all sheep and oxen resemble one another in the face. The slightest observation convinces us that their countenances are as various as those of men. How are we to know that the shades and modifications of their character and con- duct are not as various ? A well-drilled nation would hardly look more various in the eyes of a bee, than a swarm of bees does in our own. The minuter differences in our conduct would escape them for want of the habit of observing us, and because their own are of another sort. How are we to say that we do not judge them as ill ? Every fresh specula- 182 ON SEEING A PIGEON MAKE LOVE. tion into the habits and manners of that singular little people, produces new and extraordinary dis- coveries. The bees in Buff oris time were in the habit, when they built their hives, of providing for a certain departure from the more obvious rules of architecture, which at a particular part of the con- struction became necessary. Buffon ingeniously argued, that because they always practised this secret geometry, and never did otherwise, their apparent departure itself was but another piece of instinct ; and he concluded that they always had done so, and always would. Possibly they will ; but the conclusion is not made out by his argument. A being who knows how to build better than we do, might as well assert, that because we have not arrived at certain parts of his knowledge, we never shall. Observe the vast time which it takes us, with all our boasted reason, to attain to improvements in our own arts and sciences : think how little we know after all; what little certainty Ave have respecting periods which are but as yesterday, compared with the mighty lapse of time ; and judge how much right we have to say, This we never did — This we shall never be able to do. We have read of some beavers, that when they were put into a situation very different from their ordi- nary one, and incited to build a house, they set about their work in a style as ingeniously adapted as possible to their new circumstances. Buffon might say, they had been in this situation before; ON SEEING A PIGEON MAKE LOVE. 183 he might also argue that they were provided with an instinct against the emergency. One argument appears to me as good as the other. But under the circumstances, he might tell us, that they would probably act with stupidity. And what is done by many human beings ? Is our reason as good for us all on one occasion as another ? The in- dividuals of the same race of animals are not all equally clever, any more than ourselves. The more they come under our inspection (as in the case of dogs), the more varieties we discern in their characters and understandings. The most philosophical thing hitherto said on this subject appears to be that of Pope. " I shall be very glad," said Spence, " to see Dr. Hales, and always love to see him, he is so worthy and good a man." Pope. " Yes, he is a very good man; only I'm sorry he has his hands so much imbrued in blood." Spence. " What! he cuts up rats?" Pope. "Ay, and dogs too! (With what emphasis and concern, says the relater, he spoke it.) Indeed, he commits most of these barbarities with the thought of being of use to man ; but how do we know that we have a right to kill creatures that we are so little above as dogs, for our curiosity, or even for some use to us ? " Spence. " I used to carry it too far : I thought they had reason as well as we." Pope. " So they have, to be sure. All our disputes about that are only disputes about words. Man has reason enough only to know what 184 ON SEEING A PIGEON MAKE LOVE. is necessary for him to know, and dogs have just that too." Spence. " But then they have souls too, as imperishable in their nature as ours V Pope. " And what harm would that be to us." All this passage is admirable, and helps to make us love, as we ought to do, a man who has con- tributed so much to the entertainment of the world. That dogs, like men, have " reason enough only to know what is necessary for them to know," is, of course, no argument against their acting in a new manner under novel circumstances. It is the same with us. Necessities alter with circumstances. There is a well-authenticated story of a dog, who, having been ill-treated by a larger one, went and brought a still larger dog to avenge his cause, and see justice done him. When does a human ne- cessity reason better than this ? The greatest dis- tinction between men and other animals appears to consist in this, that the former make a point of cultivating their reason ; and yet it is impossible to say that nothing of the kind has ever been done by the latter. Birds and beasts in general do not take the trouble of going out of their ordinary course ; but is the ambition of the common run of human beings any greater ? Have not peasants and me- chanics, and even those who flourish and grow learned under establishments, an equal tendency to deprecate the necessity of innovation ? A farmer would go on with his old plough, a weaver with his old loom, and a placeman with his old opinions, ON SEEING A PIGEON MAKE LOVE. 185 to all eternity", if it were not for the restlessness of individuals ; and these are forced to battle their way against a thousand prejudices, even to do the greatest good. An established critic has not always a right to triumph over the learned pig. We have been told by some, that the "swinish multitude " are better without books. Now the utmost which the holders of this opinion can say for the superior reason of their species, is, that pigs dispense already with a knowledge which is unfit for man. They tell us, nevertheless (and we receive the text with reverence), that a day shall come when " the lion will lie down with the lamb ;" and yet they will laugh in your face, if you suspect that beasts may be improveable creatures, or even that men may deserve to be made wiser. But they will say, that this great event is not to be brought about by knowledge. Some of their texts say otherwise. We believe, that all which they know of the matter is, that it will not be brought about by themselves. But we must not be led away from the dignity of our subject by the natural tendencies of these gentlemen. Human means are divine means, if the end be divine. Without controverting the spirit of the text in question, it would be difficult, from what we see already of the power of different animals to associate kindly with each other, (such as lions with dogs, cats with birds in the same cages, &c.) to pronounce upon the limits of improveability in the brute creation, as far as their organs will allow. We 186 ON SEEING A PIGEON MAKE LOVE. would not venture to assert that, in the course of ages, and by the improved action of those causes which give rise to their present state of being, the organs themselves will not undergo alteration. There is a part in the pectoral conformation of the male human being which is a great puzzle to the anatomists, and reminds us of one of Plato's re- veries on the original state of mankind. When the Divine Spirit acts, it may act through the medium of human knowledge and will, as well as any other, — as well as through the trunk of a tree in the push- ing out of a blossom. New productions are sup- posed to take place from time to time in the rest of the creation : old ones are known to have become extinct. Be this as it may, we are not to conclude that the world always was and always will be such as it is, simply because the little space of time, during which we know of its existence, offers to us no extraordinary novelty. The humility of a philoso- pher's ignorance (and there is more humility in his very pride, than in the " prostration of intellect " so earnestly recommended by some persons) is suf- ficient to guard him against this conclusion, setting aside Plato and the mammoth. With respect to other animals going to heaven, our pride smiles in a sovereign manner at this spe- culation. We have no objection, somehow, to a mean origin ; but we insist that nothing less digni- fied than ourselves can be immortal. We are sorry ON SEEING A PIGEON MAKE LOVE. 187 we cannot settle the question. We confess (if the reader will allow us to suppose that we shall go to heaven, which does not require much modesty, con- sidering all those who appear to be certain of doing so) we would fain have as much company as possible ; and He was of no different opinion, who told us that a time should come when the sucking child should play with the asp. We see, that the poet had no more objection to his dog's company in a state of bliss, than the " poor Indian," of whom he speaks in his Essay.* We think we could name other celebrated authors, who would as lief take their dogs into the next world as a king or a bishop and yet they have no ob- jection to either. We may conceive much less pleasant additions to our society than a flock of doves, which, indeed, have a certain fitness for an Elysian state. We would confine our argument to * " Lo ! the poor Indian, whose untutor'd mind, Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind : His soul proud science never taught to stray Far as the solar walk, or milky way ; Yet simple nature to his hope has given, Behind the cloud-topt hill, an humbler heaven ; Some safer world in depth of woods embraced, Some happier island in the watery waste, Where slaves once more their native land behold, — No fiends torment, no Christians thirst for gold. To be, contents his natural desire, — He asks no angel's wings, no seraph's fire ; But thinks, admitted to that equal sky, His faithful dog shall bear him company." 188 ON SEEING A PIGEON MAKE LOVE. one simple question, which the candid reader will allow us to ask him : — " Does not Tomkins go to heaven?" Has not the veriest bumpkin of a squire, that rides after the hounds, an immortal soul ? If so, why not the whole pack 1 It may he said, that the pack are too brutal and blood-thirsty : they would require a great deal of improvement. Well, let them have it, and the squire along with them. It has been thought by some, that the brutal, or those who are unfit for heaven, will be annihilated. Others conceive that they will be bettered in other shapes. Whatever be the case, it is difficult to think that many beasts and birds are not as fit to go to heaven at once as many human beings, — people, who talk of their seats there with as much confidence as if they had booked their names for them at a box-office. To our humble taste, the goodness and kindness in the counte- nance of a faithful dog are things that appear almost as fit for heaven as serenity in a human being. The prophets of old, in their visions, saw nothing to hinder them from joining the faces of other animals with those of men. The spirit that moved the animal was everything. It was the opinion of a late writer, that the immortality of the soul depended on the cultivation of the intellect. He could not conceive, how the sots and fools that abound on this earth could have any pretensions to eternity ; or with what feelings they were to enter upon their new condition. There ON SEEING A PIGEON MAKE LOVE. 189 appears to be too much of the pride of intellect in this opinion, and too little allowance for circum- stances ; and yet, if the dispensation that is to take us to heaven is of the exclusive kind that some would make it, this is surely the more noble dogma. The other makes it depend on the mere will of the Divinity, or (to speak plainly) upon a system of favouritism, that would render a human tyranny unbearable. We are not here speaking of the mild tenets inculcated by the spirit of the Church of England, but of those of certain sects. In neither case would the majority of us have much better pretensions to go to heaven than the multitude of other animals ; nor, perhaps, a jot more, if we knew all their thoughts and feelings. But we shall stray from our subject, and grow more positive than becomes a waking dream. To conclude with the pleasant animals with whom we commenced, there is a flock of pigeons in the neighbourhood where we are writing,* whom we might suppose to be enjoying a sort of heaven on earth. The place is fit to be their paradise. There is plenty of food for them, the dove-cots are excel- lent, the scene full of vines in summer-time, and of olives all the year round. It happens, in short, to be the very spot where Boccaccio is said to have laid the scene of his Decameron. He lived there himself. Fiesole is on the height ; the Valley of Ladies in the hollow ; the brooks are all poetical * At Maiano, near Florence. 190 ON SEEING A PIGEON MAKE LOVE. and celebrated. As we behold this flock of doves careering about the hamlet, and whitening in and out of the green trees, we cannot help fancying that they are the souls of the gentle company in the Decameron, come to enjoy in peace their old neigh- bourhood. We think, as we look at them, that they are now as free from intrusion and scandal as they are innocent ; and that no falcon will touch them, for the sake of the story they told of him. # Ovid, in one of his elegies,f tells us, that birds have a Paradise near Elysium. Doves, be sure, are not omitted. But peacocks and parrots go there also. The poet was more tolerant in his orni-theology than the priests of Delphos, who, in the sacred groves about their temple, admitted doves, and doves only. * The well-known and beautiful story of the Decameron. Mr. Procter has touched it in a high and worthy strain of enthusiasm in his " Dramatic Sketches." f Amorum, lib. ii. eleg. 6. THE MONTH OF MAY. 191 THE MONTH OP MAY. Might not the May-holidays be restored ? — Melancholy remnant of them. — Recollections of a May-morning in Italy. Those who reasonably object to the feudality of the old times, or the extreme inequalities of their con- dition, think that the old holidays were essentially connected with these inequalities, and that we could not have them again without renewing the ancient dependency of the poorer classes upon the givers of Christian dinners, and the beggings from door to door for the May garland. But this does not follow. We may surely rejoice in similar ways, by other means. The object of all true advancement is not to get rid of bad and good together, but to retain or restore the good, to increase it, and enjoy it all better than before. The songs of May have been suspended, not merely because the intercourse has grown less between landlord and tenant, or the lord of the manor and the villagers, but because the singers have had to " pay the piper" for very dif- ferent tunes blown by trumpets, and blown by their own connivance too, as well as that of the rich. They have grown wiser: all are grown wiser: we blame nobody in these our philosophical pages, any more than we desire ourselves to be blamed. All have had something to be sorry for, during con- 192 THE MONTH OF MAY. tests carried on with partial knowledge ; and all will doubtless do away the wrong part of contest, in proportion as knowledge increases. We blame not even the contests themselves ; which in the myste- rious working of the operations of this world may have been necessary, for aught we know, to the speedier abolition of the evils mixed up with them. All we mean to say is, that, as knowledge and com- fort advance, there is no reason whatever why old good things should not revive, as well as new good ones be created ; and, for our parts, if society were wise, comfortable, and in a condition to enjoy itself without hurting the feelings of any portion of it, we do not see how it could help renewing its bursts of delight and congratulation amidst the beauties of new seasons, any more than it could help seeing them, and knowing how beautiful they are. Meantime, as certain patient and hopeful politi- cians, not long ago, kept a certain small fire alive, in the midst of everything that threatened to put it out, which is now lighting all England, and pro- mising better times to the very seasons we speak of, so shall we persist, as we have for these twenty years past,* in keeping up a certain fragrant and flowery belief on the altars of May and June, in these sequestered corners of literature, ready against those better times, and already rewarding us for our per- severance, because the belief is spreading, and the corners beginning to lose their solitude. * Now seveu-and-thirty. This article was written in 1834. THE MONTH OF MAY. 193 Hue ades : — tibi lilia plenis Ecce ferunt Nymphse calathis ; tibi Candida Nais Pallentes violas et summa papavera carpens, Narcissum et florem jungit bene olentis anetbi ; Turn casia atque aliis "intexens suavibus berbis, Mollia luteola pingit vaccinia caltba. Virgil Come, take the presents which the nymphs prepare. White lilies in full canisters they bring, With all the purple glories of the spring. The daughters of the flood have search'd the mead For violets pale, and cropp'd the poppy's head, The brief narcissus and fair daffodil, Pansies to please the sight, and cassia sweet to smell. Drtden. But where shall we begin, or what authors quote, on the much quoted subject of May? It is a prin- ciple with us, in making a selection from our writings, to repeat as little as possible of what has been extracted into other publications; and thus we are cut off from a heap of books which have contributed their stores to the illustration of the season. We cannot quote Brady ; we cannot quote Brand ; we cannot quote Aikin ; nor Hone, nor Howitt, nor ourselves (which is hard), nor the venerable Stowe, nor Forster, nor Pat- more : nor again, in poetry, may we repeat the quota- tion from Chaucer about May and the Daisy ; nor Milton's Ode to May-morning; nor Spencer's joy- ous dance on the subject (in his Eclogues) ; nor his divine personification of the month in the Faerie Queene, Book VI. : nor Shakspeare's passage in Henry the Eighth, about the impossibility of keep- vol. i. o 194 THE MONTH OF MAY. ing people in their beds on May-morning; nor Moore's "Young May-moon," ("young" moon for " new," thus prettily turning Luna into a girl of fifteen) ; nor Thomson's rich landscape in the Castle of Indolence " atween June and May ; " nor Mr. Loviband's "Tears of old May-clay ;" nor Gay on the May-pole ; nor Wordsworth's bit about the month, nor Dr. Darwin's ode (which, luckily, is not worth quoting), nor twenty other poets, great and small ; nor Keats (one of the first), who has de- scribed a May bush " with the bees about it." And so with this we conclude our list of negations ; for even out of things negative, we would show how a positive pleasure may be extracted. But the poets are not yet exhausted on this sub- ject, — nor a fiftieth part of them. How could they be, and May be what it is, especially in the south ? We only wish we had time and space, and a huge library, and could quote all we could think of, the reader should feel as if our pages scented of May- blossom, and ran over with milk and honey. We hope, however, to give him a specimen or two before we close our article. Meantime, in order to get rid of all the melancholy that will force itself into the subject, and make a clear field for our true May- time, we have two observations to make ; first, that if the first of the month turn out badly, it is not the fault of the May- day of our ancestors, which was twelve days later, or what is now called Old May-day (the day otherwise does not much signify ; THE MONTH OF MAY. 195 for it is a sentiment, and not a date, which is the thing concerned) ; and second, that the only remnant of the old festivities now left us, like a sorry jest and a smeared face, is that melancholy burlesque the chimney-sweepers, — melancholy, however, not to themselves, and so far, to nobody else; neither would we have them brow-beaten, but made as merry as possible on this their only holiday ; — but it is melancholy to think, that all the mirth of the day is left to their keeping. If their trade were a healthy one, it would be another matter ; if we were even sure that they were not beaten and bruised when they got home, it would be something. As it is, we can only give money to them (if one has it) and wish them a less horrible mixture of tinsel, dirty skin, dance, and disease. Nevertheless, the dance is something : sacred be the dance, and the desecration thereof; and sacred the laugh of the frightfully red lips amidst that poisonous black. Give them money, for God's sake, all you that in- habit squares and great streets, and then do your utmost, from that day forward, never again to let May-day blossom into those funereal flowers of living and fantastic death. The last pleasant remnant of a town exhibition in connexion with the old May holidays, was the milk- maids' garland. There was something in that. A set of buxom lasses, breathing of the morning air and the dairy, were a little more native to the pur- pose than these poor devils of the chimney. But o 2 196 THE MONTH OF MAY. even these have long vanished. They are rarely to be found, even in the exercise of their daily calling. Milk-maids have been turned into milk-men ; and when the latter, in their transference of the virgin title to the buyers instead of the sellers of milk, call out (as they do in some quarters of the town) " Come, pretty maids," nine old women issue out of the areas in the street, milk-jug in hand, and all hobbling ; — all rheumatic, in consequence of not having been in the fields these twenty years. " My soul, turn from them." Get not rheumatic thyself, nor do thou, dear reader, consent to be old before thy time, and oppressed with cough and chagrin, especially in spring weather ; but get up betimes on a May morning, if it be only in fancy, and send your thoughts wandering among the dewy May-bushes, and the songs of birds. Nay, if you live in the country, or on the borders of it, and if the morning itself be not ungenial, it will do you no harm to venture personally, as well as spiritually, among the haunts of your jovial ancestors, — the men who helped to put blood and spirit into your race ; or if cosy old habit is too strong for you to begin at so short a notice, and the united charms of bed and breakfast prevail over the " raw" air, you are a man too masculine at heart, and too generous, not to wish that your children may grow up in better habits than yourself, or recall the morning hours of your own childhood ; and they can go forth into the neighbourhood, and see what is to be seen, — what beauteous and odorous May -boughs they THE MONTH OF MAY. 197 can bring home, young and fair as themselves, — the flowery breath of morning — the white virgin blossom — the myrtle of the hedges. The voices of children seem as natural to the early morn as the voice of the birds. The suddenness, the lightness, the loudness, the sweet confusion, the sparkling- gaiety, seem alike in both. The sudden little jangle is now here, and now there ; and now a single voice calls out to another voice, and the boy is off like the bird. When we had the like opportunities, not a May did we pass, if we could help it, without keeping up the good old religion of the season, and heaping ourselves and our children with blossom enough to make a bower of the breakfast- room: so that we only preach what we have practised. If we were happy, it added to our happiness, and was like a practical hymn of gratitude. If we were unhappy, it helped to save our unhappiness from the addition of impatience and despair. We looked round upon the beautiful country, and the world of green and blossom, and said to ourselves, " We can still enjoy these. We still belong to the paradise of good-willP Therefore we say to all good-willers, " Enjoy what you can of May-time, and help others to enjoy it, if it be but with a blossom, or a verse, or a pleasant thought." Let us all help, each of us, to keep up our spark of the sacred fire — the same, we may dare to believe, 'which fires the buds them- selves, and the song of the birds, and puts the flush into the cheek of delight ; and hope, faith, and 198 THE MONTH OF MAY. charity into the heart of man ; for if one great cause of love and good- will does not do this, what does, or what can ? May, or the time of the year analogous to it in different countries, is more or less a holiday in all parts of the civilized world, and has been such from time immemorial. Nothing but the most artificial state of life can extinguish or suspend it : it is always ready to return with the love of nature. Hence the vernal holidays of the Greeks and Ro- mans, their songs of the Swallow, and vigils of the Goddess of Love ; hence the Beltein of the Celtic nations, and the descent of the god Krishna upon the plains of Indra, where he sported, like a proper Eastern prince, with sixteen-thousand milk-maids ; a reasonable assortment. In no place in the world perhaps but in England (which is another reason why so great and beautiful a country should get rid of the disgrace), is the remnant of the May-holiday reduced to so melan- choly a burlesque as our soot and tinsel. The necessities of war and trade may have produced throughout Europe a suspension of the main spirit of the thing, and a consciousness that the means of enjoyment must be restored before there can be a proper return to it. We hope and believe, that when they are restored, the enjoyment will be greater than ever, through the addition of taste and knowledge. But meanwhile, we do not believe that the sense of its present imperfection has been suf- fered anywhere else to fall to a pitch so low. In THE MONTH OF MAY. 199 Tuscany, where we have lived, it has still its guitar and its song; and its jokes are on pleasant subjects, not painful ones. We remember being awakened on May-day morning, at the village of Maiano near Fiesole, by a noise of instruments and merry voices in the court of the house in which we lodged, — a house with a farm and vineyard attached to it, where the cultivator, or small farmer, lived in a smaller detached dwelling, and accounted to the proprietor for half the produce, — a common arrange- ment in that part of the world. The air which was played and sung was a sort of merry chaunt, as old perhaps as the time of Lorenzo de Medici ; the words to it were addressed to the occupiers of the mansion, to the neighbours, or to anybody who happened to show their face ; and they turned upon an imaginary connexion between the qualities of the person mentioned, and the capabilities of the season. We got up, and looked out of the window ; and there, in the beautiful Italian morning, under a blue sky, amidst grass and bushes, and the white out-houses of the farm, stood a group of rustic guitar-players, joking good-humouredly upon every one who ap- peared, and welcomed as good-humouredly by the person joked on. The verses were in homely couplets ; and the burden or leading idea of every couplet was the same. A respectable old Jewish, gentleman, for instance, resided there ; and he no sooner shewed his face, than he was accosted as the patron of the corn-season, — as the genial influence without whom there was to be no bread. 200 THE MONTH OF MAY. Ora di Maggio fiorisce il grano, Ma non puo estrarsi senza il Sior Abramo. Now in May- time comes the corn ; but, quoth, he, though come lam, I should never have been here, but for Signor Abraham. A lady put forth her pretty laughing face (and a most good-tempered woman she was). She is hailed as the goddess of the May-bush. Ora di Maggio viene il nor di spina, Ma non viene senza la Signora Allegrina. Now in May-time comes the bush, all to crown its queen-a, But it never would without Signora Allegrina. A poor fellow, a servant, named Giuseppino or Peppino (Joe) who was given to drinking (a rare thing in Italy), and was a great admirer of the fair sex (a thing not so uncommon), crosses the court with a jug in his hand. It was curious to see the conscious, but not resentful face, with which he received the banter of his friends. Ora di Maggio fiorisce amor e vino, Ma ni l'un ni l'altro senza il Sior Peppino. Now in May-time comes the flower of love and wine also ; But there 's neither one nor t' other, without Signor Joe. With this true bit of a taste of May for the reader's ruminations, we close our present article. It would be an "advancement" to look out of a May-morning in England, and see guitar-players instead of chimney-sweeps. # * Since this article was written, the condition of the chimney- sweepers has been greatly mitigated. THE GIULI TEE. 201 THE GIULI TEE* Specimen of Sonnets written on this subject by the Abate Casti. The Giuli Tre (Three Juliuses, so called from a head of one of the Popes of that name) are three pieces of money, answering to about fifteen-pence of our coin, for which the Italian poet, Casti, says he was pestered from day to day by an inexorable creditor. The poet accordingly had his revenge on him, and incarcerated the man in immortal amber, by devoting to the subject no less than two hundred sonnets, which he published under the above title. The Abate Casti is known to the English public, by means of Mr. Stewart Rose's pleasant abridgment, as the author of the Animali Parlanti ; and he is also known to what we suppose must be called the English private, as the writer of a set of Tales in verse, which an acquaintance of ours says " every- body has read, and nobody acknowledges to have * Pronounced (" for the benefit of the country-gentlemen," and for the sake of the euphony in the perusal of our versions) Joolee Tray. 202 THE GIULI TRE. read." The Animali Parlanti is celebrated through- out Europe. The Tales have the undeniable merit which a man of genius puts into whatever work he condescends to execute ; but they are a gross mis- take in things amatory, and furnish one of those portentous specimens of excess on the side of free writing, which those who refer every detail of the world to Providence could only account for by supposing, that some such addition of fuel was necessary to the ordinary inflammability of the young and unthinking. The work before us, as the Florentine editor observes, is in every respect unexceptionable. He informs us, that it is not liable to a charge brought against the Abate's other works, of being too careless in point of style, and an -idiomatic. The Giuli Tre, according to him, speak the true Italian language ; so that the recommendation they bring with them to foreigners is complete. We proceed to give some specimens. The ferti- lity of fancy and learned allusion, with which the author has written his two hundred sonnets on a man coming to him every day and asking him for Tre Giuli, is inferior only to what Butler or Marvell might have made of it. The very recurrence of the words becomes a good joke. Nobody that we have met with in Italy could resist the mention of them. The priest did not pretend it. The ladies were glad they could find something to approve in a poet of so erroneous a reputation. THE GIULI TRE. 203 The man of the world laughed as merrily as he could. The patriot was happy to relax his mus- tachios. Even the bookseller, of whom we bought them, laughed with a real laugh, and looked into the book as if he would fain have sat down and read some of it with us, instead of going on with his business. We shall notice some of the principal sonnets that struck us throughout the work, and wish we could touch upon them all, partly that we might give as much account of it as possible, and partly because the jest is concerned in showing to what a length it is carried. But we are compelled to be brief. It may be as well to mention, that the single instead of double rhymes which the poet uses, and which render the measure exactly similar to that of the translation, have a ludicrous effect to an Italian ear. In his third sonnet, the poet requests fables and dreams to keep their distance : — Lungi, o favole, o sogni, or voi da me, Or che la Musa inia tessendo va La vera istoria delli Giuli Tre. Ye dreams and fables, keep aloof, I pray, While this my Muse keeps spinning, as she goes, The genuine history of the Giuli Tre. Son. 8. — His Creditor, he says, ought not to be astonished at his always returning the same answer to his demand for the Giuli Tre, because if a man who plays the organ or the hautboy were always o 204 THE GIULI TRE. touch the same notes, the same sounds would always issue forth. Sonnet 10. Ben cento volte ho replicato a te Questa istessa infallibil verita, Che a conto mio, da certo tempo in qua, La razza de' quattrini si perde. Tu non ostante vieni intorno a me Con insoffribile importunita, E per quei maledetti Giuli Tre Mi perseguiti senza carita.. Forse in disperazion ridur mi vuo', Ond' io m'appichi, e vuoi vedermi in giu Pender col laccio al collo ? Oh questo no. Bisolverommi a non pagarti piu, E in guisa tal te disperar farb, E vo' puittosto che ti appichi tu. I 've said for ever, and again I say, And it's a truth as plain as truth can be, That from a certain period to this day, Pence are a family quite extinct with me. And yet you still pursue me, and waylay, With your insufferable importunity, And for those everlasting Giuli Tre Haunt me without remorse or decency. Perhaps you think that you '11 torment me so, You '11 make me hang myself ? You wish to say You saw me sus. per coll. — No, Giuli, no. The fact is, I '11 determine not to pay ; And drive you, Giuli, to a state so low, That you shall hang yourself, and I be gay. Son. 13. — The poet does not know whether there is a plurality of worlds, whether the moon is in- THE GIULI TRE. 205 habited, &c. He is inclined to doubt whether there can be a people who had not Adam for their father. But if there is, he longs to go up there and live among them. Nevertheless, he fears it would be of no avail, as his Creditor would get Father Daniel to show him the way, and come after him.* Son. 31. — When an act has been very often repeated, he says that the organs perform it of their own accord, without any attention on the part of the will. Thus mules go home to the stable, and parrots bid one good-morning; and thus, he says, the Creditor has a habit of asking him for the Giuli Tre, and he has a habit of answering " I haven't got 'em." Sonnet 35. Mai 1' uom felice in vita sua non fu. Fanciullo un guardo sol tremar lo fa ; Quindi trapassa la piu fresca eta. Intento alle bell' arti e alle virtu. Poi nel fiero bollor di gioventu Or d' amore or di sdegno ardendo va ; Di qua malanni, e cancheri di la, E guai cogli anni crescon sempre piu. Alfin vengono i debiti ; e allor si Che piu speme di ben allor non v'e, E anch' io la vita mia trassi cosi : E il debito fatal de' Giuli Tre * Father Daniel is author of a work entitled " Travels through the World of Des Cartes." 206 THE GIULI TRE. Ora ai malanni che passai fin qui Solennemente il compimento die. ~No : none are happy in this best of spheres. Lo : when a child, we tremble at a look : Our freshest age is wither'd o'er a book ; The fine arts bite us, and great characters. Then we go boiling with our youthful peers In love and hate, in riot and rebuke ; By hook misfortune has us, or by crook, And griefs and gouts come thick'ning with one's years. In fine, we 've debts : — and when we 've debts, no ray Of hope remains to warm us to repose. Thus has my own life pass'd from day to day ; And now, by way of climax though not close, The fatal debit of the Giuli Tre Fills up the solemn measure of my woes. Son. 41. — He says, that as the sun with his genial energy strikes into the heart of the mountains of Golconda and Peru, and hardens substances there into gold and gems, so the hot activity of his Creditor has hardened the poet's heart, till at length it has produced that hard, golden, and adamantine No ! which has rendered the Giuli Tre precious. Son. 44. — He says, that he was never yet bound to the conjugal yoke, — a yoke which is as pleasant to those who have it not, as it is disagreeable to those who have : but that if he were married, his chil- dren would certainly resemble the proprietor of the Giuli Tre, and that he should see Creditor-kins, or little Creditors, all about him; — Creditorelli. Son. 72. — If a man has a little tumour or scratch THE GIULI TRE. p 207 on his leg or arm, and is always impatiently touch- ing it, the little wound will become a great one. So, he says, it is with his debt of the Giuli Tre. The debt, he allows, is in itself no very great thing, but the intolerable importunity of his Creditor, — Considerabilissimo lo fa, — Makes it a very considerable one. Son. 78. — As various climates and countries give rise to a variety of characters among mankind, — as the Assyrian and Persian has been accounted luxu- rious, the Thracian fierce, and the Eoman was once upon a time bold and magnanimous, so he suspects that the climate in which he lives must be eminent for producing hard Creditors. Son. 79. — He wishes that some logician, who understands the art of persuading people, would be charitable enough to suggest to him some syllogism or other form of argument, which may enable him to prove to his Creditor the impossibility of paying money when a man has not got it. Son. 89. — Philosophers maintain, he says, that if two bodies stand apart from each other, and are dis- tinct, it is impossible they can both stand in the same place. Otherwise one body also might be in several places at once. He therefore wonders how it is, that his Creditor is to be found here and there and everywhere. Son. 96. — He tells us, that his Creditor is fond of accosting him on physical subjects, and wishes to 208 THE GIULI TRE. know the nature of lightning, of the winds, colours, &c. and whether the system of Tycho Brahe is better than that of Pythagoras. The poet answers that it is impossible to get at the secrets of Nature ; and that all that he knows upon earth is, that a man is perpetually asking him for Tre Giuli, and he has not got them. Sonnet 98. Non poche volte ho inteso dir da chi E Galeno ed Ippocrate studio Che vi sono fra l'anno alcuni di, .Ne' quali cavar sangue non si pu6. Se ragione vi sia di far cosi, Se'l vedano i Dottori, io non lo so ; E luogo non mi par questo ch'e qui Di dire il mio parer sopra di cio. So hen che il Creditor de' Giuli Tre Tanti riguardi e scrupoli non ha, 2$k osserva queste regole con me ; Ch'anzi ogni giorno procurando va Da me trarre il denar, ch'e un non so che Ch' ha col sangue una qualche affinita. Often and often have I understood From Galen's readers and Hippocrates's, That there are certain seasons in diseases In which the patient oughtn't to lose blood. Whether the reason that they give be good, Or doctors square their practice to the thesis, I know not ; nor is this the best of places For arguing on that matter, as I could. All that I know is this, — that Giuli Tre Has no such scruple or regard with me, THE GIULI TRE. 209 !Nor holds the rule himself: for every day He does his best, and that most horribly, To make me lose my cash ; which, I must say, Has with one's blood some strange affinity. Son. 101. — The poet alludes to the account of words freezing at the pole ; and says, that if lie were there with his Creditor, and a thaw were to take place, nothing would be heard around them but a voice calling for the Giuli Tre. Sonnet 113. Si mostra il Creditor spesso con me Piacevole ed affabile cosT, Come fra amici suol farsi ogni di, E par che piu non pensi a' G-iuli Tre"; E solo vuol saper, se il Prusso Re Libero Praga, e di Boemia usci ; Se l'armata naval da Brest parti ; Se Annover prese il marescial d'Etre. E poiche da lontano la piglio, A poco a poco al quia calando va, E dice, — " Ebben, quando i Tre Giuli avro ?" Cosi talor col sorcio il gatto fa ; Ci ruzza, e scherza, e l'intrattiene un po', E la fatal graffiata alfin gli da. My Creditor seems often in a way Extremely pleasant with me, and polite ; Just like a friend :— you 'd fancy, at first sight, He thought no longer of the Giuli Tre. All that he wants to know is, what they say Of Frederick now ; whether his guess was right About the sailing of the French that night ; Or, "What's the news of Hanover and D'Estrees. VOL. I. P 210 THE GIULI TRE. But start from whence he may, he comes as truly, By little and little, to his ancient pass, And says, " Well — when am I to have the Giuli ? " 'lis the cat's way. She takes her mouse, alas! And having purred, and eyed, and tapp'd him duly, Gives him at length the fatal coup de grace. Sonnet 122. Oh quanto scioccamente vaneggio, Chi Arnaldo, e Lullo, ed il Geber segui, E lavoro nascosto e notte e di, Ed i metalli trasformar penso : E intorno ad un crocciuol foile sudo, In cui mercuri, e solfi, e sali uni, Ne finalmente mai gli riusci Coll'arte oprar cio che natura opro. Ma oh ! perche si hell' arte in noi non e ! Perche all'uom d'imitar vietato fu I bei lavori che natura fe ! Studiar vorrei la chimica virtu, E fatto il capital de' Giuli Tre, Rompere il vaso, e non pensarvi piu. Oh, with what folly did they toil in vain, Who thought old Arnald, Lully, or Geber wise, And night and day labour'd with anxious eyes To turn their metals into golden grain ! How did their pots and they perspire again Over their sulphurs, salts, and mercuries, And never, after all, could see their prize, Or do what Nature does, and with no pain \ Yet oh, good heavens ! why, why, dear Nature say, This lovely art— why must it be despis'd ? THE GIULI TRE. 211 Why mayn't we follow this thy noblest way ? I'd work myself; and having realiz'd, Great Heavens ! a capital of Giuli Tre, Break up my tools, content and aggrandiz'd. Son. 124. — He supposes that there was no such Creditor as his in the time of David, because in the imprecations that are accumulated in the hundred and eighteenth psalm, there is no mention of such a person. Son. 127. — His Creditor, he tells us, disputed with him one day, for argument's sake, on the immor- tality of the soul ; and that the great difficulty he started was, how anything that had a beginning could be without an end. Upon which the poet asks him, whether he did not begin one day asking him for the Giuli Tre, and whether he has left off ever since. Son. 128. — He says that as Languedoc is still so called from the use of the affirmative particle oc in that quarter, as writers in other parts of France used to be called writers of oui, and as Italy is denominated the lovely land of si, so his own lan- guage, from his constant habit of using the negative particle to the Creditor of the Giuli Tre, ought to be called the language of no. Son. 134. — He informs us, that his Creditor has lately taken to learning French ; and conjectures, that finding he has hitherto asked for the Giuli Tre to no purpose in his own language, he wishes to try the efficacy of the French way of dunning. p 2 212 THE GIULI THE. Sonnet 140. Armato tutto il Creditor non gia. Di quell'armi che Achille o Enea vesti, Onde di tanta poi mortalita La Frigia Fun, l'altro l'ltalia empi ; Ne di quelle onde poscia in altra eta. D'estinti corpi Orlando il suol copri : Ma di durezza e d'importunita E d'aspri modi armato ei m'assali. Ed improvviso in contro mi lancio La richiesta mortal di Giuli Tre ; Io mi schermisco, indi gli scaglio un No : Seguia la pugna ed infieria ; ma il pie Tfa lui volgendo alfin ratto men vo, E vincitor la fuga sol mi fe\ My Creditor has no such arms, as he Whom Homer trumpets, or whom Virgil sings, Arms which dismiss'd so many souls in strings Prom warlike Ilium and from Italy. Nor has he those of later memory, With which Orlando did such heaps of things ; But with hard hints, and constant botherings, And such rough ways, — Avith these he warreth me. And suddenly he launcheth at me, lo ! His terrible demand, the Giuli Tre ; I draw me back, and thrust him with a No I Then glows the fierce resentment of the fray, Till turning round, I scamper from the foe ; The only way, I find, to gain the day. Son. 142. — The first time the seaman hears the horrible crashing of the tempest, and sees the fierce and cruel rising of the sea, he turns pale, and loses both his courage and his voice ; but if he lives long enough to grow grey in his employment, he sits THE GIULI TRE. 213 gaily at the stern, and sings to the accompaniment of the winds. So it is with the poet. His Cre- ditor's perpetual song of the Giuli Tre frightened him at first ; but now that his ears have grown used to it, he turns it into a musical accompaniment like the billows, and goes singing to the sound. Son. 148. — A friend takes him to see the antiqui- ties in the Capitol, but he is put to flight by the sight of a statue resembling his Creditor. Son. 185. — He marks out to a friend the fatal place where his Creditor lent him the Giuli Tre, showing how he drew out and opened his purse, and how he counted out to him the Giuli with a coy and shrinking hand. He further shows, how it was not a pace distant from this spot that the Creditor began to ask him for the Giuli : and finishes with proposing to purify the place with lustral water, and exorcise its evil genius. Son. 189. — He laments that happy age of the world, in which there was a community of goods ;. and says that the avidity of individuals and the invention of meum and tuum have brought an im- mense number of evils among mankind, his part of which he suffers by reason of the Giuli Tre. Son. 200. — Apollo makes his appearance, and rebukes the poet for wasting his time, advising him to sing of things that are worthy of immortality. Upon which the poet stops short in a song he was chanting upon his usual subject, and bids good- night for ever to his Creditor and the Giuli Tre. Not a word of payment. 214 A FEW REMARKS ON A PEW EEMAEKS ON THE EAEE VICE CALLED LYING ; OK, AN APPEAL TO THE MODESTY OP ANTI-BALLOTMEN. Impossibility of finding a liar in England — Lying, nevertheless, allowed and organized as a mutual accommodation, except in the case of voters at elections. — Reason of this, a wish to have all the lies on one side. — The right of lying arrogated by the rich as a privilege. — Vindication, nevertheless, of the rich as human beings. — Social root of apparently unsocial feelings. — (Conventional liars not liars out of the pale of conventionality. — Falsehood sometimes told for the sake of truth and good. — Final appeal to the consciences of anti-ballotmen. The great argument against the Ballot is, that it teaches people duplicity, — that the elector will pro- mise his vote to one man, and give it to another. In short, that he will lie. Lying is a horrid vice, — ww-English. It must not be suffered to pollute our shores. People lie in France. They lie in Italy. They lie in Spain and Portugal. They lie in Africa, in Asia, and America. But in England, who ever heard of such a thing ? THE BARE VICE CALLED LYING. 215 ** What is lying ?" says the English courtier. " Can't say indeed, sir," says the footman. " Nor I," says the government spy. " Never heard of it," says the tradesman. " Never borough -mongered with it," says the peer. " Never bribed with it," says the member of parliament. " Never subscribed the 39 articles with it," says the collegian. " Never pretended to a call with it," says the clergyman. " Never nolo-episcoparfd with it," says the bishop. " Never played a ruse de guerre with it," says the general. « Never told it to a woman," says the man of gallantry. " Never argued for it," says the barrister. "Never sent in a medicine with«it," says the apothecary. " Never jockeyed with it," says the turf-man. *' Never dealt with it," says the man at Crockford's. " Never wrote great A with it," says the underwriter. " Never took in the custom-house with it," says the captain. "Never doctor'dmy port with it," says the wine-merchant. " Never praised or condemned with it," says the critic. " Never concealed a motive with it," says the partisan. " Never puff 'd with it," says the bookseller. " Nor I," says the manager. " Nor I," says the auctioneer. " Nor I," says the quack-doctor. " Never used it in my bread," says the baker. " Nor I in a bill," says the tailor. " Nor I in a measure," says the coalman. " Can't conceive how anybody ever thought of it," says the innkeeper. " Never made an excuse with it," says the fine lady. " Nor I," says the lady's maid. " Nor I," says the milliner. •" Am a horrible sinner, but never went so far as that," says the methodist. 216 A FEW REMARKS ON " Never uttered one to my wife, pretty jealous soul," says the husband. " Nor I to my husband, poor man," says the wife. "Nor I to my mother," says the little boy. " Nor I in one of my speeches," says the king. " Nor I in mine," says the minister. " Nor I at a foreign court," says the diplomatist. " Should never forgive myself such a thing," says the pick- pocket. " Couldn't live under it," says the beggar. " Never saved myself from starvation by it," says the Irish- man. " Nor I got a bawbee," says the Scotchman. " Nor I a penny," says all England. O spirits of Lucian, of Rabelais, of Moliere, of Henry Fielding, of Sterne, — look down upon boroughmongers and their anti-ballot men, in the shopkeeping nation of England, and in the nine- teenth century, protesting against the horrible innovation of encouraging the bribed and misrepre- sented to say one thing in self-defence, and intend another ! Lying is the commonest and most conventional of all the vices. It pervades, more or less, every class of the community, and is fancied to be so necessary to the carrying on of human affairs, that the practice is tacitly agreed upon ; nay, in other terms, openly avowed. In the monarch, it is king-craft. In the statesman, expediency. In the churchman, mental reservation. In the lawyer, the interest of his client. In the merchant, manufacturer, and shopkeeper, THE BARE VICE CALLED LYING. 217 secrets of trade. It was the opinion of King James, that without the art of lying, a king was not worthy to reign. This was his boasted " king-craft," which brought his son to the block ; for if poor Charles was a " martyr," it was certainly not to the spirit of truth. Lord Bacon was of opinion that lying, like alloy in metals, was a debasement, but good for the working. It worked him, great as he was, into a little and ruined man. Pleasant Sir Henry Wotton (himself an ambassador) denned an ambassador to be, " an honest man sent to lie abroad for the good of his country." Paley openly defends the " mental reservation" of the churchman, — of the subscriber to the thirty-nine articles, &c. ; and his is the great text-book of the universities. If you go into a shop for any article, you know very well that you cannot be secure of having it genuine ; nor do you expect the shopkeeper to tell you the truth. The grocer notoriously sells Jamaica coffee for Mocha, the tobacconist his own snuff for Latakia and Macubau, the linen-draper cotton for thread, and British goods for India. Well, granting all this, — says the boroughmonger, — don't you see that it overdoes your argument, and that if we all lie and cheat one another at this rate, we in reality do not cheat, and that the practice becomes comparatively innocent? Excuse me — we answer — you are cheated, or how could you cheat ? and what would be the use of the practice ? You know the fact is general, and may 218 A FEW REMARKS ON often detect it in the particular; but still you are cheated in the gross. And supposing the case to be otherwise, or that the practice becomes compara- tively innocent by its universality (which is to be granted), why not make the duplicity charged against the Ballot equally innocent, by the same process, and for the same general accommodation ? If it were understood that the elector had the same right and necessity to prevaricate for his convenience, as the candidate has to bribe or cajole for his, — if the thing were understood on both sides, and the voter's promise came to be of no more account than the great man's, or than the pretty things said to the voter's wife and children, where would be the harm of it, according to your own showing ? or where the greater vice of it, than that of the famous " king-craft," or of the minister's " expediency," or of the thirty-nine article-man's " mental reservation?" The truth is, that such would and will be the result ; so much so, that candidates will at last cease to practise their tricks and tell their lies, out of a hopelessness of doing anything with the voters. But we will tell the anti-balloter, what the harm will be in the mean while. The harm will be that lies will no longer be told for his sake exclusively ; and THIS IS THE WHOLE REAL AMOUNT OF HIS GRIEVANCE. His grievance is precisely what the prince's is, who likes tc have all the " craft" to himself, and not be deceived by his ministers. It is what the minister's THE RARE VICE CALLED LYING. 219 is, who complains of want of truth in the opposition ; — what the opposition's is, when they cry " Oh ! oh !" against the same things which they did when in place ; — what the wholesale dealer's cry is against the retail, and the master manufacturer's against the workman. The weapons of state and expediency will at length he turned against expediency itself,— against power and monopoly, — and used in behaL of the Many; and this is what the virtuous indig- nation of the Few cannot bear. But an insidious compliment may be paid to " us youth" of the press, — us " philosophic radicals ;" and it may be asked us, " What ! do you advocate lying? You advocate it under any circumstances? You wish a man to say one thing and intend another ? Is the above your picture of society and of human nature ? We thought you had a better opinion of it; — were believers in the goodness of the human heart, and did not take all your fellow- creatures for such a parcel of hypocrites." " My dear sir," we answer, " we do not see you, and we know not who you may be. We know not whether you are one of the greatest liars under the sun, or only a conventional liar, like our friends the statesman and the baker (good and true fellows perhaps out of the pale of their offices and bake- houses). We are also totally ignorant whether you are a man who has a regard for truth at the expense of conventionalities. Perhaps you are. Perhaps 220 A FEW REMARKS ON you are even a martyr to those virtues, with the pos- session of which you are pleased to compliment ourselves. But this we can tell you ; first, that if you were the greatest liar that ever breathed, and ourselves were lovers of the truth to an extent of which you have no conception, and if you were to come to us for help against a murderer, or a bailiff, or a tax-gatherer, or a lying boroughmonger, we should make no scruple to tell a lie for your sake ; and we can tell you, secondly, that our above picture of society and our opinion of human nature, are two very different things ; because we believe the vices of society to result entirely from its imperfect know- ledge, education, and comfort ; whereas we believe human nature to be capable of all good and true things, and to be ever advancing in them, the Ballot itself notwithstanding ; for the very worst of the Ballot is, that it exchanges a lie for the sake of an , individual, into a lie for the sake of the country ; and the best of it is, that it will ultimately do away the necessity of either. With the Ballot must come extended suffrage {that is what you are afraid of). From extended suffrage must come Universal Suf- frage. And from Universal Suffrage must come universal better treatment of man by his fellows ; — universal wiser treatment ; — universal comforts ; — food for all, fire and clothing for all ; education for all, monopolies for none; — hence no necessity for lying ; which is only the resource of the unequally THE RARE YICE CALLED LYING. 221 treated against those whose lies, in pretending a right so to treat them, are far greater and mor vicious. O love of truth ! believer in all good and beautiful things ! believer even in one's self, and therefore believer in others, and such as are far better than one's self! putter of security into the heart, of soli- dity into the ground we tread upon, of loveliness into the flowers, of hope into the stars ! retainer of youth in age, and of comfort in adversity ! bringer of tears into the eyes that look upon these imperfect words, to think how large and longing the mind of man is, compared with his frail virtues and his transitory power, and what mornings of light and abundance thou hast in store, nevertheless, for the whole human race, preparing to ripen for them in accordance with their belief in its possibility, and their resolution to work for it in loving trust ! Oh ! shall they be thought guilty of deserting thee, be- cause, out of the very love of truth they feel them- selves bound to proclaim to what extent it does not exist? because, out of the very love of truth, they will not suffer those who care nothing for it to pre- tend to a religious zeal in its behalf, when the lie is to be turned against themselves ? One of the bitterest sights in the world to a lover of equal dealing, is the selfish and conceited arro- gance with which the rich demand virtues on the side of the poor, which they do not exercise themselves. The rich man lies through his lawyer — through his de- 222 A FEW REMARKS ON pendant — through his footman ; lies when he makes " civil speeches ;" — lies when he subscribes articles ;— • lies when he goes to be married (vide Marriage Service) ; — lies when he takes " the oaths and his seat ;" — but that the poor man should lie ! that he should give a false promise! — that he should risk the direful, and unheard-of, and unparliamentary crime of political perjury ! Oh, it is not to be thought of! Think of the example — think of the want of principle — think of the harm done to the poor man's " own mind" — to his sense of right and wrong — to his eternal salvation. Nay, not that either : — they have seldom the immodesty to go as far as that. But what enormous want of modesty to go so far as they do ! Why should the poor man be expected to have scruples which the rich laugh at 1 Why deny him weapons which they make use of against himself? — in this respect, as in too many others, resembling their " noble" feudal ancestors, who had the nobleness to fight in armour, while the common soldier was allowed none. Yet let us not be supposed to think ill of the rich or of anybody, beyond the warrant of humanity — beyond all modesty of our own, or sense of the frailties which we possess plentifully in common with our fellow-creatures. We think ill, in fact, of no one, in the only bad and deplorable sense of the term, — that sense which would make him out to be something wicked from sheer preference of evil to good, or of harm to others without impulse or THE BARE VICE CALLED LYING. 223 excuse. We are of opinion, that all classes and descriptions of men are modified as they are by- circumstances ; and instead of lamenting that there is so much vice during their advancement towards a wiser condition, we rejoice that there is so much virtue, — so much indelible and hopeful good. 1ST ay, we can see a certain large and gallant healthiness of social constitution in man, in the very circum- stance of vice's taking so gay or indifferent an air during what it supposes to be a necessity, or a con- dition of human nature ; and the gayer it is, in some respects, the better ; not only because of its having the less uneasy or mean conscience, but because it is the less given to cant and hypocrisy, and is ashamed of putting on a grave face of exaction upon others. The very worst of all vices (cruelty excepted) — that pride which seems to make the rich and prosperous hold their fellow-creatures in such slight regard, — is often traceable only to a perverted sense of that identical importance in their eyes, which is grounded in a social feeling, and which, under a wiser education, would make them proud of sympathizing with the humblest. Those courtiers — those Whigs and Tories — those lawyers — those tradesmen we have been talking of, — how shocked would not many, perhaps most of them be, and what a right would they not have to resent it, — if you treated them as liars beyond the pale of their conventional dupli- city? Take the grocer or the linendraper from behind his counter — apply to him in any concern 224 A FEW REMARKS ON but that of his shop, — and most likely he is as great a truth-teller as the rest. There is nothing you may not take his word for. And then see what affections all these people have ; what lovers they are of their families ; what anxious providers for their children ; what " good fellows" as friends and helpers ; and what a fool and coxcomb you ought to consider yourself, if you dared to set yourself up, and pretend that you were a bit better than any one of them, even though circumstances might enable you to be free from some of their errors, — perhaps with greater of your own. Falsehood itself is some- times almost pure virtue, — at least it contemplates anything but the ordinary and unjust results of falsehood ; as in the case of a jury, who deliberately tell a lie when, in order to save a man from trans- portation, or a poor child from the jail, they bring in a verdict of Not Guilty on the principal charge, knowing him to be otherwise. Here the law is violated for the sake of justice, and a lie told for the sake of the beautiful truth that we ought to be humane to one another. But the law should be changed? True: and so should all laws be changed which force just feelings upon falsehood in self-defence ; — and as the rich advance in their notions of justice, and the poor get better fed and taught, all such laws will be changed. In short, dear anti-Ballot people, whoever you are, and granting, for the sake of the argument, that all which you say about the voter's prevarica- THE RARE VICE CALLED LYING. 225 tion will be true (for in innumerable instances we deny tbat it will, and in all it must eventually come to nothing in the hopelessness of applying to him), but granting for the sake of the argument, that all which you anticipate in that respect will come to pass, we have two short things to say to you, which appear to us to sum up all that is necessary for the refutation of your reasoning : first, that before you have a right to ask the voter not to be false to you, you must get rid of your own falsehoods, great and small; and second, that when you do get rid of them, you will be such very conscientious men, that you ivill not have the face to ask him to violate his con- science. VOL. I. 226 CRITICISM ON FEMALE BEAUTY. CRITICISM ON FEMALE BEAUTY. I. HAIR, FOREHEAD. Fault-finding of the old style of criticism ridiculed. — Painting with the pen. — Ugliness of beauty without feeling. — The hand of the poisoner. — Hair. — Under what circumstances it is allowable to use artificial helps to beauty. — Red and golden hair. — Hair of Lucretia Borgia. — Forehead. Criticism, for the most part, is so partial, splenetic, and pedantic, and has such little right to speak of what it undertakes to censure, that the words " criti- cism on beauty" sound almost as ill as if a man were to announce something unpleasant upon some- thing pleasant. And, certainly, as criticism, according to its general practice, consists in an endeavour to set the art above its betters, and to render genius amenable to want of genius (particularly in those matters which, by constituting the very essence of it, are the least felt by the men of line and rule), so critics are bound by their trade to object to the very pleasantest things. Delight, not being their busi- ness, " puts them out." The first reviewer was CRITICISM ON FEMALE BEAUTY. 227 Momus, who found fault with the Goddess of Beauty.* We have sometimes fancied a review set up by this anti-divinity in heaven. It would appear, by late discoveries in the history of the globe, that, as one species of production has become extinct, so new ones may have come into being. Now, imagine the gods occasionally putting forth some new work, which is criticised in the " Olympian Review." Chloris, the goddess of flowers, for instance, makes a sweet-briar : — " The Sweet-Briar, a new bush, by Chloris, God- dess of Flowers. Rain and Sun, 4104. " This is another hasty production of a lady, whom we are anxious to meet with a more satisfied face. Really, we must say, that she tires us. The other day we had the pink. It is not more than a year ago that she flamed upon us with the hearts- ease (pretty names these) ; then we were all to be sunk into a bed of luxury and red leaves by the rose; and now, ecce iterum Rosina, comes a new * Since the remarks in this exordium were written, periodical criticism has for the most part wholly changed its character. Instead of fault-finding, it has become beauty-finding. This extreme, of course, has also its wrong side ; but, upon the whole, is unquestionably on the higher side of the art. There are few poor books, however indulgently treated, that will not soon die ; but the very best books sometimes require aid, because of their depth and originality. It is observable that the indulgent spirit of criticism has increased with its profundity. Q 2 228 CRITICISM ON FEMALE EEAUTY. edition of the same effeminate production, altered, but not amended, and made careless, confused, and full of harsh points. These the fair author, we suppose, takes for a dashing variety ! Why does she not consult her friends? Why must we be forced to think that she mistakes her talents, and that she had better confine herself to the production of daisies and dandelions? Even the rose, which has been so much cried up in certain quarters, was not original. It was clearly suggested by that use- ful production of an orthodox friend of ours, — the cabbage ; which has occasioned it to be pretty gene- rally called the cabbage-rose. The sweet-briar, there- fore, is imitation upon imitation, crambe (literally) bis coda;* a thing not to be endured. To say the truth, which we wish to do with great tenderness, considering the author's sex, this sweet-briar bush is but a rifaccimento of the rose-bush. The only difference is, that everything is done on a pettier scale, the flowers hastily turned out, and a superabundance of those startling points added, which so annoyed us in the rose yclept moss ; for there is no end to these pretty creatures the roses. Let us see. There is the cabbage-rose, the moss-rose, the musk-rose, the damask-rose, the hundred-leaved-rose, the yellow-rose, and earth only knows how many more. Surely these were enough, in all conscience. Most of them rank little above extempore effusions, and were hardly worth the gathering ; but after so much * Cabbage twice cooked. CRITICISM ON FEMALE BEAUTY. 229 trifling, to go and alter the style of a common-place in a spirit of mere undoing and embrouillement, and then palm it upon us for something free, forsooth, and original, is a desperate evidence of falling off! We cannot consent to take mere wildness for in- vention ; a hasty and tangled piece of business, for a regular work of art. What is called nature will never do. Nature is unnatural. The best produc- tion by far of the fair author, was the auricula, one of those beautiful and regular pieces of composition, the right proportions of which are ascertained, and reducible to measurement. But tempora mutantur. Our fair florist has perhaps got into bad company. We have heard some talk about zephyrs, bees, wild birds, and such worshipful society. Cannot this ingenious person be content with the hot-house invented by Vulcan and Co. without gadding abroad in this disreputable manner ? We have heard that she speaks with disrespect of ourselves ; but we need not assure the reader that this can have no weight with an honest critic. By-the-by, why this briar is called sweet, we must unaffectedly and most sincerely say, is beyond our perceptions." We were about to give a specimen of another article, by the same reviewer, on the subject of our present paper : — " Woman, being a companion to Man," &c. But the tone of it would be intolerable. We shall therefore proceed with a more becoming and grateful criticism, such as the contemplation of the subject naturally produces. Oh, Pygmalion 230 CRITICISM ON FEMALE BEAUTY. who can wonder (no artist surely) that thou didst fall in love with the work of thine own hands ! Oh, Titian! Oh, Raphael! Oh, Apelles ! We could almost fancy this sheet of paper to be one of your tablets, our desk an easel, our pen a painting-brush; so impossible does it seem that the beauty we are about to paint should not inspire us with a gusto equal to your own ! " Come, then, the colours and the ground prepare." This ink-stand is our palette. We handle our pen as if there were the richest bit of colour in the world at the end of it. The reds and whites look as if we could eat them. Look at that pearly tip at the end of the ear. The very shade of it has a glow. What a light on the forehead ! What a moisture on the lip ! What a soul, twenty fathom deep, in the eyes ! Look at us, madam, if you please. The eye right on ours. The forehead a little more inclined. Good. What an expression ! Raphael, — it is clear to me that you had not the feeling we have : for you could paint such a por- trait, and we cannot. We cannot paint after the life. Titian, how could you contrive it ? Apelles, may we trouble you to explain yourself? It is lucky for the poets that their mistresses are not obliged to sit to them. They would never write a line. Even a prose-writer is baffled. How Raphael managed in the Palazzo Chigi, — how Sacchini contrived, when he wrote his " Rinaldo and Armida," with Armida by CRITICISM ON FEMALE BEAUTY. 231 his side, — is beyond our comprehension. We can call to mind, but we cannot copy. Fair presence, avaunt ! We conjure you out of our study, as one of our brother writers, in an agony of article, might hand away his bride, the printer having sent to him for copy. Come forth, our tablets. Stand us in- stead of more distracting suggestions, our memo- randums. It has been justly observed, that heroines are best painted in general terms, as in " Paradise Lost," " Grace was in all her steps, heaven in her eye," &c. or by some striking instance of the effects of their beauty, as in Homer, where old age itself is as- tonished at the sight of Helen, and does not wonder that Paris has brought a war on his country for her sake. Particular description divides the opinion of the readers, and may offend some of them. The most elaborate portrait of the heroine of Italian romance could say nothing for her, compared with the distractions that she caused to so many champions, and the millions that besieged her in Albracca. " Such forces met not, nor so wide a camp, "When Agrican with all his northern powers Besieged Albracca, as romances tell, The city of Gallaphrone, from whence to win The fairest of her sex, Angelica." Even Apuleius, a very " particular fellow," who is an hour in describing a chambermaid enters into no 232 CRITICISM ON FEMALE BEAUTY. details respecting Psyche. It was enough that the people worshipped her. The case is different when a writer describes a real person, or chooses to acquaint us with his particular taste. In the " Dream of Chaucer" is an admirable j)ortrait of a woman, supposed to be that of Blanche, Duchess of John of Gaunt. Anacreon gives us a whole length of his mistress, in colours as fresh as if they were painted yesterday. The blue eye is moist in its sparkling ; the cheek, which he compares to milk with roses in it, is young for ever. Oh, Titian, even thy colours are dry compared with those of poetry ! It happens luckily for us, on the present occasion, that we can reconcile particulars with generals. The truth is, we have no particular taste. We only demand that a woman should be womanly ; which is not being exclusive. We think also that anybody who wishes to look amiable, should be so. The detail, with us, depends on a sentiment. For in- stance, we used to think we never could tolerate flaxen hair ; yet meeting one day with a lovely face that had flaxen locks about it, we thought for a good while after, that flaxen was your only wear. Har- riet O made us take to black ; and yet, if it had not been for a combination of dark browns, we should the other night have been converted to the superi- ority of light brown by Harriet D . Upon the whole, the dark browns, chestnuts, &c. have it with us ; but this is because the greatest number of kind CRITICISM ON FEMALE BEAUTY. 233 eyes that we have met, have looked from under locks of that colour. We find beauty itself a very poor thing unless beautified by sentiment. The reader may take the confession as he pleases, either as an instance of abundance of sentiment on our part, or as an evidence of want of proper ardour and impartiality ; but we cannot (and that is the plain truth) think the most beautiful creature beautiful, or be at all affected by her, or long to sit next her, or go to a theatre with her, or listen to a concert with her, or walk in a field or a forest with her, or call her by her Christian name, or ask her if she likes poetry, or tie (with any satisfaction) her gown for her, or be asked whether we admire her shoe, or take her arm even into a dining-room, or kiss her at Christmas, or on April-fool day, or on May-day, or on any other day, or dream of her, or wake thinking of her, or feel a want in the room when she has gone, or a pleasure the more when she ap- pears, — unless she has a heart as well as a face, and is a proper good-tempered, natural, sincere, honest girl, who has a love for other people and other things, apart from self-reference and the wish to be admired. Her face would pall upon us in the course of a week, or even become disagreeable. We should prefer an enamelled tea-cup ; for we should expect nothing from it. We remember the impres- sion made on us by a female plaster-cast hand, sold in the shops as a model. It is beautifully turned, though we thought it somewhat too plump and 234 CRITICISM ON FEMALE BEAUTY. well-fed. The fingers, however, are delicately tapered : the outline flowing and graceful. We fancied it to have belonged to some jovial beauty, a little too fat and festive, but laughing withal, and as full of good nature. The possessor told us it was the hand of Madame Brinvilliers, the famous poi- soner. The word was no sooner spoken, than we shrank from it as if it had been a toad. It was now literally hideous ; the fat seemed sweltering and full of poison. The beauty added to the deformity. You resented the grace : you shrank from the look of smoothness, as from a snake. This woman went to the scaffold with as much indifference as she dis- tributed her poisons. The character of her mind was insensibility. The strongest of excitements was to her what a cup of tea is to other people. And such is the character, more or less, of all mere beauty. Nature, if one may so speak, does not seem to intend it to be beautiful. It looks as if it were created in order to show what a nothing the formal part of beauty is, without the spirit of it. We have been so used to it with reference to considerations of this kind, that we have met with women generally pronounced beautiful, and spoken of with transport, who took a sort of ghastly and witch-like aspect in our eyes, as if they had been things walking the earth without a soul, or with some evil intention. The woman who supped with the Goule in the " Arabian Nights," must have been a beauty of this species. CRITICISM ON FEMALE BEAUTY. 235 But to come to our portrait. Artists, we believe, like to begin with the eyes. We will begin, like Anacreon, with the hair. Hair should be abundant, soft, flexible, growing in long locks, of a colour suitable to the skin, thick in the mass, delicate and distinct in the particular. The mode of wearing it should differ. Those who have it growing low in the nape of the neck, should prefer wearing it in locks hanging down, rather than turned up with a comb. The gathering it, however, in that manner is delicate and feminine, and suits many. In general, the mode of wearing the hair is to be regulated according to the shape of the head. Ringlets hanging about the forehead suit almost everybody. On the other hand, the fashion of part- ing the hair smoothly, and drawing it tight back on either side is becoming to few. It has a look of vanity, instead of simplicity. The face must do everything for it, which is asking too much ; espe- cially as hair, in its freer state, is the ornament in- tended for it by nature. Hair is to the human aspect, what foliage is to the landscape. This ana- logy is so striking, that it has been compared to flowers, and even to fruit. The Greek and other poets talk of hyacinthine locks, of clustering locks (an image taken from grapes), of locks like tendrils. The favourite epithet for a Greek beauty was "well- haired ;" and the same epithet was applied to woods. Apuleius says, that Venus herself, if she were bald, would not be Venus. So entirely do we agree with 236 CRITICISM ON FEMALE BEAUTY. him, so much do we think that the sentiment of any- thing beautiful, even where the real beauty is want- ing, is the best part of it, that we prefer the help of artificial hair to an ungraceful want of it. We do not wish to be deceived. We should like to know that the hair was artificial ; or at least that the wearer was above disguising the fact. This would show her worthy of being allowed it. We remem- ber, when abroad, a lady of quality, an English- woman, whose beauty was admired by all Florence ; but never did it appear to us so admirable, as when she observed one day, that the ringlets that hung from under her cap were not her own. Here, thought we, it is not artifice that assists beauty ; it is truth. Here is a woman who knows that there is a beauty in hair beyond the material of it, or the pride of being thought to possess it. Oh, wits of Queen Anne's day, see what it is to live in an age of sentiment, instead of your mere periwigs, and reds and whites ! — The first step in taste is to dislike all artifice ; the next is to demand nature in her perfection ; but the best of all is to find out the hidden beauty, which is the soul of beauty itself, to wit, the sentiment of it. The loveliest hair is nothing, if the wearer is incapable of a grace. The finest eyes are not fine, if they say nothing. What is the finest harp to us, strung with gold, and adorned with a figure of Venus, if it answer with a discordant note, and hath no chords in it fit to be wakened ? Long live, therefore, say we, lovely CRITICISM ON FEMALE BEAUTY. 237 natural locks at five-and-twenty, and lovely artificial locks, if they must be resorted to, at fi ve-and-thirty or forty. Let the harp be new strung, if the frame warrant it, and the sounding-board hath a delicate utterance. A woman of taste should no more scruple to resort to such helps at one age, than she would consent to resort to them at an age when no such locks exist in nature. Till then, let her not cease to help herself to a plentiful supply. The spirit in which it is worn gives the right to wear it. Affectation and pretension spoil everything : senti- ment and simplicity warrant it. Above all things, cleanliness. This should be the motto of personal beauty. Let a woman keep what hair she has, clean, and she may adorn or increase it as she pleases. Oil, for example, is two different things, on clean hair and unclean. On the one, it is but an aggrava- tion of the dirt : to the other, if not moist enough by nature, it may add a reasonable grace. The best, however, is undoubtedly that which can most dispense with it. A lover is a little startled, when he finds the paper, in which a lock of hair has been enclosed, stained and spotted as if it had wrapped a cheesecake. Ladies, when about to give away locks, may as well omit the oil that time, and be content with the washing. If they argue that it will not look so glossy in those eyes in which they desire it to shine most, let them own as much to the favoured person, and he will never look at it but their can- dour shall give it a double lustre. 238 CRITICISM ON FEMALE BEAUTY. " Love adds a precious seeing to the eye f and how much does not sincerity add to love ! One of the excuses for oil is the perfume mixed with it. The taste for this was carried so far among the ancients, that Anacreon does not scruple to wish that the painter of his mistress's portrait could convey the odour breathing from her delicate oiled tresses. Even this taste seems to have a foundation in nature. A little black-eyed relation of ours (often called Molly from a certain dairy- maid turn of hers, and our regard for old English customs) has hair with a natural scent of spice. The poets of antiquity, and the modern ones after them, talk much of yellow and golden tresses, tresses like the morn, &c. Much curiosity has been evinced respecting the nature of this famous poetical hair ; and as much anxiety shown in hoping that it was not red. May we venture to say, in behalf of red hair, that we are not of those in whose eyes it is so very shocking 1 Perhaps, as " pity melts the soul to love," there may be something of such a feeling in our tenderness for that Pariah of a colour. It must be owned that hair of this complexion appears never to have been in request ; and yet, to say nothing of the general liking of the ancients for all the other shades of yellow and gold, a good red-headed com- mentator might render it a hard matter to pro- nounce, that Theocritus has not given two of his beautiful swains hair amounting to a positive CRITICISM ON FEMALE BEAUTY. 239 fiery. lire-red is the epithet, however it may be understood. " Both fiery-tressed heads, both in their bloom."* We do not believe the golden hair to have been red ; but this we believe, that it was nearer to it than most colours, and that it went a good deal beyond what it is sometimes supposed to have been, auburn. The word yellow, a convertible term for it, will not do for auburn. Auburn is a rare and glorious colour, and we suspect will always be more admired by us of the north, where the fair com- plexions that recommended golden hair are as easy to be met with, as they are difficult in the south. Both Ovid and Anacreon, the two greatest masters of the ancient world in painting external beauty, seem to have preferred it to golden, notwithstanding the popular cry in the other's favour ; unless, indeed, the hair they speak of was too dark in its ground for auburn. 'The Latin poet, in his fourteenth love- elegy, speaking of tresses which he says Apollo would have envied, and which he prefers to those of Venus as Apelles painted her, tells us, that they were neither black nor golden, but mixed, as it were, of both. And he compares them to cedar on the declivities of Ida, with the bark stripped. This implies a dash of tawny. We have seen pine-trees in a southern evening sun take a lustrous burnished * Afi avrpqi avvotppvg tcopa £%0£C idoitra Tag 8a[ia\ag irapsktwra, KaXov Kakov tj/ieg e