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diff --git a/old/14129.txt b/old/14129.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9f26c52 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/14129.txt @@ -0,0 +1,14879 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, +Volume 4, by Charles Lamb, et al + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4 + +Author: Charles Lamb + +Release Date: November 23, 2004 [eBook #14129] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORKS OF CHARLES LAMB IN FOUR +VOLUMES, VOLUME 4*** + + +E-text prepared by Charles Aldarondo, Keren Vergon, Leonard Johnson, and +the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team + + + +THE WORKS OF CHARLES LAMB + +In Four Volumes + +VOL. IV. + +A New Edition + + + + + + + +CONTENTS. + +ROSAMUND GRAY, ESSAYS, ETC. + +ROSAMUND GRAY + +ESSAYS:-- + + RECOLLECTIONS OF CHRIST'S HOSPITAL + + ON THE TRAGEDIES OF SHAKSPEARE, CONSIDERED WITH REFERENCE TO THEIR + FITNESS FOR STAGE-REPRESENTATION + + CHARACTERS OF DRAMATIC WRITERS, CONTEMPORARY WITH SHAKSPEARE + + SPECIMENS FROM THE WRITINGS OF FULLER, THE CHURCH HISTORIAN + + ON THE GENIUS AND CHARACTER OF HOGARTH; WITH SOME REMARKS ON A + PASSAGE IN THE WRITINGS OF THE LATE MR. BARRY + + ON THE POETICAL WORKS OF GEORGE WITHER + +LETTERS UNDER ASSUMED SIGNATURES, PUBLISHED IN "THE REFLECTOR":-- + + THE LONDONER + + ON BURIAL SOCIETIES; AND THE CHARACTER OF AN UNDERTAKER + + ON THE DANGER OF CONFOUNDING MORAL WITH PERSONAL DEFORMITY; WITH A + HINT TO THOSE WHO HAVE THE FRAMING OF ADVERTISEMENTS FOR + APPREHENDING OFFENDERS + + ON THE INCONVENIENCES RESULTING FROM BEING HANGED + + ON THE MELANCHOLY OF TAILORS + + HOSPITA ON THE IMMODERATE INDULGENCE OF THE PLEASURES OF THE + PALATE + + EDAX ON APPETITE + +CURIOUS FRAGMENTS, EXTRACTED FROM A COMMONPLACE BOOK WHICH BELONGED +TO ROBERT BURTON, THE FAMOUS AUTHOR OF THE ANATOMY OF MELANCHOLY + +MR. H----, A FARCE, IN TWO ACTS + + + * * * * * + + +POEMS. + +[_Those marked with an asterisk are by the Author's Sister._] + +HESTER + +TO CHARLES LLOYD, AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR + +THE THREE FRIENDS + +TO A RIVER IN WHICH A CHILD WAS DROWNED + +THE OLD FAMILIAR FACES + +*HELEN + +A VISION OF REPENTANCE + +*DIALOGUE BETWEEN A MOTHER AND CHILD + +QUEEN ORIANA'S DREAM + +A BALLAD, NOTING THE DIFFERENCE OF RICH AND POOR, IN THE WAYS OF A +RICH NOBLE'S PALACE AND A POOR WORKHOUSE + +HYPOCHONDRIACUS + +A FAREWELL TO TOBACCO + +_TO T. L. H., A CHILD_ + +BALLAD, FROM THE GERMAN + +*DAVID IN THE CAVE OF ADULLAM + +*SALOME + +*LINES SUGGESTED BY A PICTURE OF TWO FEMALES, BY LIONARDO DA VINCI + +*LINES ON THE SAME PICTURE BEING REMOVED TO MAKE PLACE FOR A PORTRAIT +OF A LADY BY TITIAN + +*LINES ON THE CELEBRATED PICTURE BY LIONARDO DA VINCI, CALLED THE +VIRGIN OF THE ROCKS + +*ON THE SAME + +SONNETS:-- + + I. TO MISS KELLY + + II. ON THE SIGHT OF SWANS IN KENSINGTON GARDEN. + + III. + + IV. + + V. + + VI. THE FAMILY NAME + + VII. + +VIII. + + IX. TO JOHN LAMB, ESQ., OF THE SOUTH-SEA-HOUSE + + X. + + XI. + +BLANK VERSE:-- + + CHILDHOOD + + THE GRANDAME + + THE SABBATH BELLS + + FANCY EMPLOYED ON DIVINE SUBJECTS + + COMPOSED AT MIDNIGHT + +JOHN WOODVIL; A TRAGEDY + +THE WITCH, A DRAMATIC SKETCH OP THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY + + + * * * * * + + +ALBUM VERSES, WITH A FEW OTHERS. + +IN THE AUTOGRAPH BOOK OF MRS. SERGEANT W---- + +TO DORA W----, ON BEING ASKED BY HER FATHER TO WRITE IN HER ALBUM + +IN THE ALBUM OF A CLERGYMAN'S LADY + +IN THE ALBUM OF EDITH S---- + +IN THE ALBUM OF ROTHA Q---- + +IN THE ALBUM OF CATHERINE ORKNEY + +IN THE ALBUM OF LUCY BARTON + +IN THE ALBUM OF MRS. JANE TOWERS + +IN THE ALBUM OF MISS---- + +IN MY OWN ALBUM + +MISCELLANEOUS:-- + + ANGEL HELP + + ON AN INFANT DYING AS SOON AS BORN + + THE CHRISTENING + + THE YOUNG CATECHIST + + TO A YOUNG FRIEND ON HER TWENTY-FIRST BIRTHDAY + + SHE IS GOING + +SONNETS:-- + + HARMONY IN UNLIKENESS + + WRITTEN AT CAMBRIDGE + + TO A CELEBRATED FEMALE PERFORMER IN THE "BLIND BOY" + + WORK + + LEISURE + + TO SAMUEL ROGERS, ESQ. + + THE GYPSY'S MALISON + +COMMENDATORY VERSES, ETC.:-- + + TO J. S. KNOWLES, ESQ., ON HIS TRAGEDY OF VIRGINIUS + + TO THE AUTHOR OF POEMS PUBLISHED UNDER THE NAME OF BARRY CORNWALL + + TO THE EDITOR OF THE "EVERY-DAY BOOK" + + TO T. STOTHARD, ESQ., ON HIS ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE POEMS OF MR. + ROGERS + + TO A FRIEND ON HIS MARRIAGE + + "O LIFT WITH REVERENT HAND" + + THE SELF-ENCHANTED + + TO LOUISA M----, WHOM I USED TO CALL "MONKEY" + +TRANSLATIONS FROM THE LATIN OF VINCENT BOURNE:-- + + THE BALLAD-SINGERS + + TO DAVID COOK, OF THE PARISH OF ST. MARGARET'S, WESTMINSTER, + WATCHMAN + + ON A SEPULCHRAL STATUE OF AN INFANT SLEEPING + + EPITAPH ON A DOG + + THE RIVAL BELLS + + NEWTON'S PRINCIPIA + + THE HOUSEKEEPER + + ON A DEAF AND DUMB ARTIST + + THE FEMALE ORATORS + +PINDARIC ODE TO THE TREAD-MILL + +GOING OR GONE + +FREE THOUGHTS ON SEVERAL EMINENT COMPOSERS + +THE WIFE'S TRIAL; OR, THE INTRUDING WIDOW. A DRAMATIC POEM + + + + +ROSAMUND GRAY, ESSAYS, + +ETC. + + + + +TO + +MARTIN CHARLES BURNEY, ESQ. + + Forgive me, BURNEY, if to thee these late + And hasty products of a critic pen, + Thyself no common judge of books and men, + In feeling of thy worth I dedicate. + My _verse_ was offered to an older friend; + The humbler _prose_ has fallen to thy share: + Nor could I miss the occasion to declare, + What spoken in thy presence must offend-- + That, set aside some few caprices wild, + Those humorous clouds that flit o'er brightest days, + In all my threadings of this worldly maze, + (And I have watched thee almost from a child), + Free from self-seeking, envy, low design, + I have not found a whiter soul than thine. + + + + +ROSAMUND GRAY. + + * * * * * + +CHAPTER I. + + +It was noontide. The sun was very hot. An old gentlewoman sat +spinning in a little arbor at the door of her cottage. She was blind; +and her granddaughter was reading the Bible to her. The old lady had +just left her work, to attend to the story of Ruth. + +"Orpah kissed her mother-in-law; but Ruth clave unto her." It was a +passage she could not let pass without a _comment_. The moral she +drew from it was not very _new_, to be sure. The girl had heard it a +hundred times before--and a hundred times more she could have heard +it, without suspecting it to be tedious. Rosamund loved her +grandmother. + +The old lady loved Rosamund too; and she had reason for so doing. +Rosamund was to her at once a child and a servant. She had only _her_ +left in the world. They two lived together. + +They had once known better days. The story of Rosamund's parents, +their failure, their folly, and distresses, may be told another time. +Our tale hath grief enough in it. + +It was now about a year and a half since old Margaret Gray had sold +off all her effects, to pay the debts of Rosamund's father--just +after the mother had died of a broken heart; for her husband had fled +his country to hide his shame in a foreign land. At that period the +old lady retired to a small cottage in the village of Widford in +Hertfordshire. + +Rosamund, in her thirteenth year, was left destitute, without fortune +or friends: she went with her grandmother. In all this time she had +served her faithfully and lovingly. + +Old Margaret Gray, when she first came into these parts, had eyes, +and could see. The neighbors said, they had been dimmed by weeping: +be that as it may, she was latterly grown quite blind. "God is very +good to us, child; I can _feel_ you yet." This she would sometimes +say; and we need not wonder to hear, that Rosamund clave unto her +grandmother. + +Margaret retained a spirit unbroken by calamity. There was a +principle _within_, which it seemed as if no outward circumstances +could reach. It was a _religious_ principle, and she had taught it to +Rosamund; for the girl had mostly resided with her grandmother from +her earliest years. Indeed she had taught her all that she knew +herself; and the old lady's knowledge did not extend a vast way. + +Margaret had drawn her maxims from observation; and a pretty long +experience in life had contributed to make her, at times, a little +_positive:_ but Rosamund never argued with her grandmother. + +Their library consisted chiefly in a large family Bible, with notes +and expositions by various learned expositors, from Bishop Jewell +downwards. + +This might never be suffered to lie about like other books, but was +kept constantly wrapt up in a handsome case of green velvet, with +gold tassels--the only relic of departed grandeur they had brought +with them to the cottage--everything else of value had been sold off +for the purpose above mentioned. + +This Bible Rosamund, when a child, had never dared to open without +permission; and even yet, from habit, continued the custom. Margaret +had parted with none of her _authority_; indeed it was never exerted +with much harshness; and happy was Rosamund, though a girl grown, +when she could obtain leave to read her Bible. It was a treasure too +valuable for an indiscriminate use; and Margaret still pointed out to +her grand-daughter _where to read._ + +Besides this, they had the "Complete Angler, or Contemplative Man's +Recreation," with cuts--"Pilgrim's Progress," the first part--a +Cookery Book, with a few dry sprigs of rosemary and lavender stuck +here and there between the leaves, (I suppose to point to some of the +old lady's most favorite receipts,) and there was "Wither's Emblems," +an old book, and quaint. The old-fashioned pictures in this last book +were among the first exciters of the infant Rosamund's curiosity. Her +contemplation had fed upon them in rather older years. + +Rosamund had not read many books besides these; or if any, they had +been only occasional companions: these were to Rosamund as old +friends, that she had long known. I know not whether the peculiar +cast of her mind might not be traced, in part, to a tincture she had +received, early in life, from Walton and Wither, from John Bunyan and +her Bible. + +Rosamund's mind was pensive and reflective, rather than what passes +usually for _clever_ or _acute_. From a child she was remarkably shy +and thoughtful--this was taken for stupidity and want of feeling; and +the child has been sometimes whipt for being a _stubborn thing_, when +her little heart was almost bursting with affection. + +Even now her grandmother would often reprove her, when she found her +too grave or melancholy; give her sprightly lectures about good-humor +and rational mirth; and not unfrequently fall a-crying herself, to +the great discredit of her lecture. Those tears endeared her the more +to Rosamund. + +Margaret would say, "Child, I love you to cry, when I think you are +only remembering your poor dear father and mother;--I would have you +think about them sometimes--it would be strange if you did not; but I +fear, Rosamund--I fear, girl, you sometimes think too deeply about +your own situation and poor prospects in life. When you do so, you do +wrong--remember the naughty rich man in the parable. He never had any +good thoughts about God, and his religion: and that might have been +your case." + +Rosamund, at these times, could not reply to her; she was not in the +habit of _arguing_ with her grandmother; so she was quite silent on +these occasions--or else the girl knew well enough herself, that she +had only been sad to think of the desolate condition of her best +friend, to see her, in her old age, so infirm and blind. But she had +never been used to make excuses, when the old lady said she was doing +wrong. + +The neighbors were all very kind to them. The veriest rustics never +passed them without a bow, or a pulling off of the hat--some show of +courtesy, awkward indeed, but affectionate--with a "Good-morrow, +madam," or "young madam," as it might happen. + +Rude and savage natures, who seem born with a propensity to express +contempt for anything that looks like prosperity, yet felt respect +for its declining lustre. + +The farmers, and better sort of people, (as they are called,) all +promised to provide for Rosamund when her grandmother should die. +Margaret trusted in God and believed them. + +She used to say, "I have lived many years in the world, and have +never known people, _good people_, to be left without some friend; a +relation, a benefactor, a _something_. God knows our wants--that it +is not good for man or woman to be alone; and he always sends us a +helpmate, a leaning place, a _somewhat_." Upon this sure ground of +experience, did Margaret build her trust in Providence. + + + * * * * * + + +CHAPTER II. + + +Rosamund had just made an end of her story, (as I was about to +relate,) and was listening to the application of the moral, (which +said application she was old enough to have made herself, but her +grandmother still continued to treat her, in many respects, as a +child, and Rosamund was in no haste to lay claim to the title of +womanhood,) when a young gentleman made his appearance and +interrupted them. + +It was young Allan Clare, who had brought a present of peaches, and +some roses for Rosamund. + +He laid his little basket down on a seat of the arbor; and in a +respectful tone of voice, as though he were addressing a parent, +inquired of Margaret "how she did." + +The old lady seemed pleased with his attentions--answered his +inquiries by saying, that "her cough was less troublesome a-nights, +but she had not yet got rid of it, and probably she never might; but +she did not like to tease young people with an account of her +infirmities." + +A few kind words passed on either side, when young Clare, glancing a +tender look at the girl, who had all this time been silent, took +leave of them with saying, "I shall bring _Elinor_ to see you in the +evening." + +When he was gone, the old lady began to prattle. + +"That is a sweet-dispositioned youth, and I _do_ love him dearly, I +must say it--there is such a modesty in all he says or does--he +should not come here so often, to be sure, but I don't know how to +help it; there is so much goodness in him, I can't find it in my +heart to forbid him. But, Rosamund, girl, I must tell you beforehand; +when you grow older, Mr. Clare must be no companion for _you_: while +you were both so young it was all very well--but the time is coming, +when folks will think harm of it, if a rich young gentleman, like Mr. +Clare, comes so often to our poor cottage.--Dost hear, girl? Why +don't you answer? Come, I did not mean to say anything to hurt +you--speak to me, Rosamund--nay, I must not have you be sullen--I +don't love people that are sullen." + +And in this manner was this poor soul running on, unheard and +unheeded, when it occurred to her, that possibly the girl might not +be _within hearing_. + +And true it was, that Rosamund had slunk away at the first mention of +Mr. Clare's good qualities: and when she returned, which was not till +a few minutes after Margaret had made an end of her fine harangue, it +is certain her cheeks _did_ look very _rosy_. That might have been +from the heat of the day or from exercise, for she had been walking +in the garden. + +Margaret, we know, was blind; and, in this case, it was lucky for +Rosamund that she was so, or she might have made some not unlikely +surmises. + +I must not have my reader infer from this, that I at all think it +likely, a young maid of fourteen would fall in love without asking +her grandmother's leave--the thing itself is not to be conceived. + +To obviate all suspicions, I am disposed to communicate a little +anecdote of Rosamund. + +A month or two back her grandmother had been giving her the strictest +prohibitions, in her walks, not to go near a certain spot, which was +dangerous from the circumstance of a huge overgrown oak-tree +spreading its prodigious arms across a deep chalk-pit, which they +partly concealed. + +To this fatal place Rosamund came one day--female curiosity, we know, +is older than the flood--let us not think hardly of the girl, if she +partook of the sexual failing. + +Rosamund ventured further and further--climbed along one of the +branches--approached the forbidden chasm--her foot slipped--she was +not killed--but it was by a mercy she escaped--other branches +intercepted her fall--and with a palpitating heart she made her way +back to the cottage. + +It happened that evening, that her grandmother was in one of her best +humors, caressed Rosamund, talked of old times, and what a blessing +it was they two found a shelter in their little cottage, and in +conclusion told Rosamund, "she was a good girl, and God would one day +reward her for her kindness to her old blind grandmother." + +This was more than Rosamund could bear. Her morning's disobedience +came fresh into her mind; she felt she did not deserve all this from +Margaret, and at last burst into a fit of crying, and made confession +of her fault. The old gentlewoman kissed and forgave her. + +Rosamund never went near that naughty chasm again. + +Margaret would never have heard of this, if Rosamund had not told of +it herself. But this young maid had a delicate moral sense, which +would not suffer her to take advantage of her grandmother, to deceive +her, or conceal anything from her, though Margaret was old, and +blind, and easy to be imposed upon. + +Another virtuous _trait_ I recollect of Rosamund, and now I am in the +vein will tell it. + +Some, I know, will think these things trifles--and they are so--but +if these _minutiae_ make my reader better acquainted with Rosamund, I +am content to abide the imputation. + +These promises of character, hints, and early indications of a _sweet +nature_, are to me more dear, and choice in the selection, than any +of those pretty wild flowers, which this young maid, this virtuous +Rosamund, has ever gathered in a fine May morning, to make a posy to +place in the bosom of her old blind friend. + +Rosamund had a very just notion of drawing, and would often employ +her talent in making sketches of the surrounding scenery. + +On a landscape, a larger piece than she had ever yet attempted, she +had now been working for three or four months. She had taken great +pains with it, given much time to it, and it was nearly finished. For +_whose_ particular inspection it was designed, I will not venture to +conjecture. We know it could not have been for her grandmother's. + +One day she went out on a short errand, and left her landscape on the +table. When she returned, she found it _gone_. + +Rosamund from the first suspected some mischief, but held her tongue. +At length she made the fatal discovery. Margaret, in her absence, had +laid violent hands on it; not knowing what it was, but taking it for +some waste-paper, had torn it in half, and with one half of this +elaborate composition had twisted herself up--a thread-paper! + +Rosamund spread out her hands at sight of the disaster, gave her +grandmother a roguish smile, but said not a word. She knew the poor +soul would only fret, if she told her of it,--and when once Margaret +was set a fretting for other people's misfortunes, the fit held her +pretty long. + +So Rosamund that very afternoon began another piece of the same size +and subject; and Margaret, to her dying day, never dreamed of the +mischief she had unconsciously done. + + + * * * * * + + +CHAPTER III + + +Rosamund Gray was the most beautiful young creature that eyes ever +beheld. Her face had the sweetest expression in it--a gentleness--a +modesty--a timidity--a certain charm--a grace without a name. + +There was a sort of melancholy mingled in her smile. It was not the +thoughtless levity of a girl--it was not the restrained simper of +premature womanhood--it was something which the poet Young might have +remembered, when he composed that perfect line, + + "Soft, modest, melancholy, female, fair." + +She was a mild-eyed maid, and everybody loved her. Young Allan Clare, +when but a boy, sighed for her. + +Her yellow hair fell in bright and curling clusters, like + + "Those hanging locks + Of young Apollo." + +Her voice was trembling and musical. A graceful diffidence pleaded +for her whenever she spake--and, if she said but little, that little +found its way to the heart. + +Young, and artless, and innocent, meaning no harm, and thinking none; +affectionate as a smiling infant--playful, yet inobtrusive, as a +weaned lamb--everybody loved her. Young Allan Clare, when but a boy, +sighed for her. + + * * * * * + +The moon is shining in so brightly at my window, where I write, that +I feel it a crime not to suspend my employment awhile to gaze at her. + +See how she glideth, in maiden honor, through the clouds, who divide +on either side to do her homage. + +Beautiful vision!--as I contemplate thee, an internal harmony is +communicated to my mind, a moral brightness, a tacit analogy of +mental purity; a calm like _that_ we ascribe in fancy to the favored +inhabitants of thy fairy regions, "argent fields." + +I marvel not, O moon, that heathen people, in the "olden times," did +worship thy deity--Cynthia, Diana, Hecate. Christian Europe invokes +thee not by these names now--her idolatry is of a blacker stain: +Belial is her God--she worships Mammon. + +False things are told concerning thee, fair planet--for I will ne'er +believe that thou canst take a perverse pleasure in distorting the +brains of us, poor mortals. Lunatics! moonstruck! Calumny invented, +and folly took up, these names. I would hope better things from thy +mild aspect and benign influences. + +Lady of Heaven, thou lendest thy pure lamp to light the way to the +virgin mourner, when she goes to seek the tomb where her warrior +lover lies. + +Friend of the distressed, thou speakest only _peace_ to the lonely +sufferer, who walks forth in the placid evening, beneath thy gentle +light, to chide at fortune, or to complain of changed friends, or +unhappy loves. + +Do I dream, or doth not even now a heavenly calm descend from thee +into my bosom, as I meditate on the chaste loves of Rosamund and her +Clare! + + + * * * * * + + +CHAPTER IV. + + +Allan Clare was just two years older than Rosamund. He was a boy of +fourteen, when he first became acquainted with her--it was soon after +she had come to reside with her grandmother at Widford. + +He met her by chance one day, carrying a pitcher in her hand, which +she had been filling from a neighboring well--the pitcher was heavy, +and she seemed to be bending with its weight. + +Allan insisted on carrying it for her--for he thought it a sin that a +delicate young maid, like her, should be so employed, and he stand +idle by. + +Allan had a propensity to do little kind offices for everybody--but +at the sight of Rosamund Gray, his first fire was kindled--his young +mind seemed to have found an object, and his enthusiasm was from that +time forth awakened. His visits, from that day, were pretty frequent +at the cottage. + +He was never happier than when he could get Rosamund to walk out with +him. He would make her admire the scenes he admired--fancy the wild +flowers he fancied--watch the clouds he was watching--and not +unfrequently repeat to her poetry which he loved, and make her love +it. + +On their return, the old lady, who considered them yet as but +children, would bid Rosamund fetch Mr. Clare a glass of her +currant-wine, a bowl of new milk, or some cheap dainty which was more +welcome to Allan than the costliest delicacies of a prince's court. + +The boy and girl, for they were no more at that age, grew fond of +each other--more fond than either of them suspected. + + "They would sit, and sigh, + And look upon each other, and conceive + Not what they ail'd; yet something they did ail, + And yet were well--and yet they were not well; + And what was their disease, they could not tell." + +And thus, + + "In this first garden of their simpleness + They spent their childhood." + +A circumstance had lately happened, which in some sort altered the +nature of their attachment. + +Rosamund was one day reading the tale of "Julia de Roubigne"--a book +which young Clare had lent her. + +Allan was standing by, looking over her, with one hand thrown round +her neck, and a finger of the other pointing to a passage in Julia's +third letter. + +"Maria! in my hours of visionary indulgence, I have sometimes painted +to myself a _husband_--no matter whom--comforting me amidst the +distresses which fortune had laid upon us. I have smiled upon him +through my tears; tears, not of anguish, but of tenderness!--our +children were playing around us, unconscious of misfortune; we had +taught them to be humble, and to be happy; our little shed was +reserved to us, and their smiles to cheer it.--I have imagined the +luxury of such a scene, and affliction became a part of my dream of +happiness." + +The girl blushed as she read, and trembled--she had a sort of +confused sensation, that Allan was noticing her--yet she durst not +lift her eyes from the book, but continued reading, scarce knowing +what she read. + +Allan guessed the cause of her confusion, Allan trembled too--his +color came and went--his feelings became impetuous--and flinging both +arms round her neck, he kissed his young favorite. + +Rosamund was vexed and pleased, soothed and frightened, all in a +moment--a fit of tears came to her relief. + +Allan had indulged before in these little freedoms, and Rosamund had +thought no harm of them; but from this time the girl grew timid and +reserved--distant in her manner, and careful of her behavior in +Allan's presence--not seeking his society as before, but rather +shunning it--delighting more to feed upon his idea in absence. + +Allan too, from this day, seemed changed: his manner became, though +not less tender, yet more respectful and diffident--his bosom felt a +throb it had till now not known, in the society of Rosamund--and, if +he was less familiar with her than in former times, that charm of +delicacy had superadded a grace to Rosamund, which, while he feared, +he loved. + +There is a _mysterious character_, heightened, indeed, by fancy and +passion, but not without foundation in reality and observation, which +true lovers have ever imputed to the object of their affections. This +character Rosamund had now acquired with Allan--something _angelic, +perfect, exceeding nature._ + +Young Clare dwelt very near to the cottage. He had lost his parents, +who were rather wealthy, early in life; and was left to the care of a +sister some ten years older than himself. + +Elinor Clare was an excellent young lady--discreet, intelligent, and +affectionate. Allan revered her as a parent, while he loved her as +his own familiar friend. He told all the little secrets of his heart +to her--but there was _one_, which he had hitherto unaccountably +concealed from her--namely, the extent of his regard for Rosamund. + +Elinor knew of his visits to the cottage, and was no stranger to the +persons of Margaret and her granddaughter. She had several times met +them, when she had been walking with her brother--a civility usually +passed on either side--but Elinor avoided troubling her brother with +any unseasonable questions. + +Allan's heart often beat, and he has been going to tell his sister +_all_--but something like shame (false or true, I shall not stay to +inquire) had hitherto kept him back;--still the secret, unrevealed, +hung upon his conscience like a crime--for his temper had a sweet and +noble frankness in it, which bespake him yet a virgin from the world. + +There was a fine openness in his countenance--the character of it +somewhat resembled Rosamund's--except that more fire and enthusiasm +were discernible in Allan's; his eyes were of a darker blue than +Rosamund's--his hair was of a chestnut color--his cheeks ruddy, and +tinged with brown. There was a cordial sweetness in Allan's smile, +the like to which I never saw in any other face. + +Elinor had hitherto connived at her brother's attachment to Rosamund. +Elinor, I believe, was something of a physiognomist, and thought she +could trace in the countenance and manner of Rosamund, qualities +which no brother of hers need be ashamed to love. + +The time was now come when Elinor was desirous of knowing her +brother's favorite more intimately--an opportunity offered of +breaking the matter to Allan. + +The morning of the day in which he carried his present of fruit and +flowers to Rosamund, his sister had observed him more than usually +busy in the garden, culling fruit with a nicety of choice not common +to him. + +She came up to him, unobserved, and, taking him by the arm, inquired, +with a questioning smile--"What are you doing, Allan? and who are +those peaches designed for?" + +"For Rosamund Gray"--he replied--and his heart seemed relieved of a +burden which had long oppressed it. + +"I have a mind to become acquainted with your handsome friend--will +you introduce me, Allan? I think I should like to go and see her this +afternoon." + +"Do go, do go, Elinor--you don't know what a good creature she is; +and old blind Margaret, you will like _her_ very much." + +His sister promised to accompany him after dinner; and they parted. +Allan gathered no more peaches, but hastily cropping a few roses to +fling into his basket, went away with it half-filled, being impatient +to announce to Rosamund the coming of her promised visitor. + + + * * * * * + + +CHAPTER V. + + +When Allan returned home, he found an invitation had been left for +him, in his absence, to spend that evening with a young friend, who +had just quitted a public school in London, and was come to pass one +night in his father's house at Widford, previous to his departure the +next morning for Edinburgh University. + +It was Allan's bosom friend--they had not met for some months--and it +was probable a much longer time must intervene before they should +meet again. + +Yet Allan could not help looking a little blank when he first heard +of the invitation. This was to have been an important evening. But +Elinor soon relieved her brother by expressing her readiness to go +alone to the cottage. + +"I will not lose the pleasure I promised myself, whatever you may +determine upon, Allan; I will go by myself rather than be +disappointed." + +"Will you, will you, Elinor?" + +Elinor promised to go--and I believe, Allan, on a second thought, was +not very sorry to be spared the awkwardness of introducing two +persons to each other, both so dear to him, but either of whom might +happen not much to fancy the other. + +At times, indeed, he was confident that Elinor _must_ love Rosamund, +and Rosamund _must_ love Elinor; but there were also times in which +he felt misgivings--it was an event he could scarce hope for very +joy! + +Allan's _real presence_ that evening was more at the cottage than at +the house, where his _bodily semblance_ was visiting--his friend +could not help complaining of a certain absence of mind, a _coldness_ +he called it. + +It might have been expected, and in the course of things predicted, +that Allan would have asked his friend some questions of what had +happened since their last meeting, what his feelings were on leaving +school, the probable time when they should meet again, and a, hundred +natural questions which friendship is most lavish of at such times; +but nothing of all this ever occurred to Allan--they did not even +settle the method of their future correspondence. + +The consequence was, as might have been expected, Allan's friend +thought him much altered, and, after his departure, sat down to +compose a doleful sonnet about a "faithless friend."--I do not find +that he ever finished it--indignation, or a dearth of rhymes, causing +him to break off in the middle. + + + * * * * * + + +CHAPTER VI. + + +In my catalogue of the little library at the cottage, I forgot to +mention a book of Common Prayer. My reader's fancy might easily have +supplied the omission--old ladies of Margaret's stamp (God bless +them!) may as well be without their spectacles, or their elbow-chair, +as their prayer-book--I love them for it. + +Margaret's was a handsome octavo, printed by Baskerville, the binding +red, and fortified with silver at the edges. Out of this book it was +their custom every afternoon to read the proper psalms appointed for +the day. + +The way they managed was this: they took verse by verse--Rosamund +_read_ her little portion, and Margaret repeated hers in turn, from +memory--for Margaret could say all the Psalter by heart, and a good +part of the Bible besides. She would not unfrequently put the girl +right when she stumbled or skipped. This Margaret imputed to +giddiness--a quality which Rosamund was by no means remarkable +for--but old ladies, like Margaret, are not in all instances alike +discriminative. + +They had been employed in this manner just before Miss Clare arrived +at the cottage. The psalm they had been reading was the hundred and +fourth--Margaret was naturally led by it into a discussion of the +works of creation. + +There had been _thunder_ in the course of the day--an occasion of +instruction which the old lady never let pass--she began-- + +"Thunder has a very awful sound--some say God Almighty is angry +whenever it thunders--that it is the voice of God speaking to us; for +my part, I am not afraid of it"---- + +And in this manner the old lady was going on to particularize, as +usual, its beneficial effects, in clearing the air, destroying of +vermin, &c., when the entrance of Miss Clare put an end to her +discourse. + +Rosamund received her with respectful tenderness--and, taking her +grandmother by the hand, said, with great sweetness,--"Miss Clare is +come to see you, grandmother." + +"I beg pardon, lady--I cannot _see_ you--but you are heartily +welcome. Is your brother with you, Miss Clare?--I don't hear him." + +"He could not come, madam, but he sends his love by me." + +"You have an excellent brother, Miss Clare--but pray do us the honor +to take some refreshment--Rosamund"---- + +And the old lady was going to give directions for a bottle of her +currant wine--when Elinor, smiling, said "she was come to take a cup +of tea with her, and expected to find no ceremony." + +"After tea, I promise myself a walk with you, Rosamund, if your +grandmother can spare you." Rosamund looked at her grandmother. + +"Oh, for that matter, I should be sorry to debar the girl from any +pleasure--I am sure it's lonesome enough for her to be with _me_ +always--and if Miss Clare will take you out, child, I shall do very +well by myself till you return--it will not be the first time, you +know, that I have been left here alone--some of the neighbors will be +dropping in bye and bye--or, if _not_, I shall take no harm." + +Rosamund had all the simple manners of a child; she kissed her +grandmother, and looked happy. + +All tea-time the old lady's discourse was little more than a +panegyric on young Clare's good qualities. Elinor looked at her young +friend, and smiled. Rosamund was beginning to look grave--but there +was a cordial sunshine in the face of Elinor, before which any clouds +of reserve that had been gathering on Rosamund's soon brake away. + +"Does your grandmother ever go out, Rosamund?" + +Margaret prevented the girl's reply, by saying--"My dear young lady, +I am an old woman, and very infirm--Rosamund takes me a few paces +beyond the door sometimes--but I walk very badly--I love best to sit +in our little arbor when the sun shines--I can yet feel it warm and +cheerful--and, if I lose the beauties of the season, I shall be very +happy if you and Rosamund can take delight in this fine summer +evening." + +"I shall want to rob you of Rosamund's company now and then, if we +like one another. I had hoped to have seen _you_, madam, at our +house. I don't know whether we could not make room for you to come +and live with us--what say you to it? Allan would be proud to tend +you, I am sure; and Rosamund and I should be nice company." + +Margaret was all unused to such kindnesses, and wept--Margaret had a +great spirit--yet she was not above accepting an obligation from a +worthy person--there was a delicacy in Miss Clare's manner--she could +have no interest but pure goodness, to induce her to make the +offer--at length the old lady spake from a full heart. + +"Miss Clare, this little cottage received us in our distress--it gave +us shelter when we had _no home_--we have praised God in it--and, +while life remains, I think I shall never part from it--Rosamund does +everything for me"-- + +"And will do, grandmother, as long as I live;"--and then Rosamund +fell a-crying. + +"You are a good girl, Rosamund; and if you do but find friends when I +am dead and gone, I shall want no better accommodation while I +live--but God bless you, lady, a thousand times, for your kind +offer." + +Elinor was moved to tears, and, affecting a sprightliness, bade +Rosamund prepare for her walk. The girl put on her white silk bonnet; +and Elinor thought she never beheld so lovely a creature. + +They took leave of Margaret, and walked out together; they rambled +over all Rosamund's favorite haunts--through many a sunny field--by +secret glade or wood-walk, where the girl had wandered so often with +her beloved Clare. + +Who now so happy as Rosamund? She had oft-times heard Allan speak +with great tenderness of his sister--she was now rambling, arm in +arm, with that very sister, the "vaunted sister" of her friend, her +beloved Clare. + +Not a tree, not a bush, scarce a wild flower in their path, but +revived in Rosamund some tender recollection, a conversation perhaps, +or some chaste endearment. Life, and a new scene of things, were now +opening before her--she was got into a fairy land of uncertain +existence. + +Rosamund was too happy to talk much--but Elinor was delighted with +her when she _did_ talk:--the girl's remarks were suggested most of +them by the passing scene--and they betrayed, all of them, the +liveliness of present impulse;--her conversation did not consist in a +comparison of vapid feeling, an interchange of sentiment lip-deep--it +had all the freshness of young sensation in it. + +Sometimes they talked of Allan. + +"Allan is very good," said Rosamund, "very good _indeed_ to my +grandmother--he will sit with her, and hear her stories, and read to +her, and try to divert her a hundred ways. I wonder sometimes he is +not tired. She talks him to death!" + +"Then you confess, Rosamund, that the old lady _does_ tire _you_ +sometimes?" + +"Oh no, I did not mean _that_--it's very different--I am used to all +her ways, and I can humor her, and please her, and I ought to do it, +for she is the only friend I ever had in the world." + +The new friends did not conclude their walk till it was late, and +Rosamund began to be apprehensive about the old lady, who had been +all this time alone. + +On their return to the cottage, they found that Margaret had been +somewhat impatient--old ladies, _good old ladies_, will be so at +times--age is timorous and suspicious of danger, where no danger is. + +Besides, it was Margaret's bedtime, for she kept very good +hours--indeed, in the distribution of her meals, and sundry other +particulars, she resembled the livers in the antique world, more than +might well beseem a creature of this. + +So the new friends parted for that night. Elinor having made Margaret +promise to give Rosamund leave to come and see her the next day. + + + * * * * * + + +CHAPTER VII. + + +Miss Clare, we may be sure, made her brother very happy, when she +told him of the engagement she had made for the morrow, and how +delighted she had been with his handsome friend. + +Allan, I believe, got little sleep that night. I know not, whether +joy be not a more troublesome bedfellow than grief--hope keeps a body +very wakeful, I know. + +Elinor Clare was the best good creature--the least selfish human +being I ever knew--always at work for other people's good, planning +other people's happiness--continually forgetful to consult for her +own personal gratifications, except indirectly, in the welfare of +another; while her parents lived, the most attentive of +daughters--since they died, the kindest of sisters--I never knew but +_one_ like her. It happens that I have some of this young lady's +_letters_ in my possession--I shall present my reader with one of +them. It was written a short time after the death of her mother, and +addressed to a cousin, a dear friend of Elinor's, who was then on the +point of being married to Mr. Beaumont, of Staffordshire, and had +invited Elinor to assist at her nuptials. I will transcribe it with +minute fidelity. + + +ELINOR CLARE TO MARIA LESLIE. + +Widford, July the --, 17--. + +Health, Innocence, and Beauty, shall be thy bride-maids, my sweet +cousin. I have no heart to undertake the office. Alas! what have I to +do in the house of feasting? + +Maria! I fear lest my griefs should prove obtrusive. Yet bear with me +a little--I have recovered already a share of my former spirits. + +I fear more for Allan than myself. The loss of two such parents, +within so short an interval, bears very heavy on him. The boy _hangs_ +about me from morning till night. He is perpetually forcing a smile +into his poor pale cheeks--you know the sweetness of his smile, +Maria. + +To-day, after dinner, when he took his glass of wine in his hand, he +burst into tears, and would not, or could not then, tell me the +reason--afterwards he told me--"he had been used to drink Mamma's +health after dinner, and _that_ came into his head and made him cry." +I feel the claims the boy has upon me--I perceive that I am living to +_some end_--and the thought supports me. + +Already I have attained to a state of complacent feelings--my +mother's lessons were not thrown away upon her Elinor. + +In the visions of last night her spirit seemed to stand at my +bedside--a light, as of noonday, shone upon the room--she opened my +curtains--she smiled upon me with the same placid smile as in her +lifetime. I felt no fear. "Elinor," she said, "for my sake take care +of young Allan,"--and I awoke with calm feelings. + +Maria! shall not the meeting of blessed spirits, think you, he +something like this?--I think, I could even now behold my mother +without dread--I would ask pardon of her for all my past omissions of +duty, for all the little asperities in my temper, which have so often +grieved her gentle spirit when living. Maria! I think she would not +turn away from me. + +Oftentimes a feeling, more vivid than memory, brings her before me--I +see her sit in her old elbow-chair--her arms folded upon her lap--a +tear upon her cheek, that seems to upbraid her unkind daughter for +some inattention--I wipe it away and kiss her honored lips. + +Maria! when I have been fancying all this, Allan will come in, with +his poor eyes red with weeping, and taking me by the hand, destroy +the vision in a moment. + +I am prating to you, my sweet cousin, but it is the prattle of the +heart, which Maria loves. Besides, whom have I to talk to of these +things but you?--you have been my counsellor in times past, my +companion, and sweet familiar friend. Bear with me a little--I mourn +the "cherishers of my infancy." + +I sometimes count it a blessing that my father did not prove the +_survivor_. You know something of his story. You know there was a +foul tale current--it was the busy malice of that bad man, S----, +which helped to spread it abroad--you will recollect the active +good-nature of our friends W---- and T----; what pains they took to +undeceive people--with the better sort their kind labors prevailed; +but there was still a party who shut their ears. You know the issue +of it. My father's great spirit bore up against it for some time--my +father never was a _bad_ man--but that spirit was broken at the +last--and the greatly-injured man was forced to leave his old +paternal dwelling in Staffordshire--for the neighbors had begun to +point at him. Maria! I have _seen_ them _point_ at him, and have been +ready to drop. + +In this part of the country, where the slander had not reached, he +sought a retreat--and he found a still more grateful asylum in the +daily solicitudes of the best of wives. + +"An enemy hath done this," I have heard him say--and at such times my +mother would speak to him so soothingly of forgiveness, and +long-suffering, and the bearing of injuries with patience; would heal +all his wounds with so gentle a touch;--I have seen the old man weep +like a child. + +The gloom that beset his mind, at times betrayed him into +skepticism--he has doubted if there be a Providence! I have heard him +say, "God has built a brave world, but methinks he has left his +creatures to bustle in it _how they may_." + +At such times he could not endure to hear my mother talk in a +religious strain. He would say, "Woman, have done--you confound, you +perplex me, when you talk of these matters, and for one day at least +unfit me for the business of life." + +I have seen her look at him--O GOD, Maria! such a _look_! it plainly +spake that she was willing to have shared her precious hope with the +partner of her earthly cares--but she found a repulse-- + +Deprived of such a wife, think you, the old man could long have +endured his existence? or what consolation would his wretched +daughter have had to offer him, but silent and imbecile tears? + +My sweet cousin, you will think me tedious--and I am so--but it does +me good to talk these matters over. And do not you be alarmed for +me--my sorrows are subsiding into a deep and sweet resignation. I +shall soon be sufficiently composed, I know it, to participate in my +friend's happiness. + +Let me call her, while yet I may, my own Maria Leslie! Methinks, I +shall not like you by any other name. Beaumont! Maria Beaumont! it +hath a strange sound with it--I shall never be reconciled to this +name--but do not you fear--Maria Leslie shall plead with me for Maria +Beaumont. + + And now, my sweet Friend, + God love you, and your + ELINOR CLARE. + + +I find in my collection several letters, written soon after the date +of the preceding, and addressed all of them to Maria Beaumont.--I am +tempted to make some short extracts from these--my tale will suffer +interruption by them--but I was willing to preserve whatever +memorials I could of Elinor Clare. + + +FROM ELINOR CLARE TO MARIA BEAUMONT. + +(AN EXTRACT.) + +"----I have been strolling out for half an hour in the fields; and my +mind has been occupied by thoughts which Maria has a right to +participate. I have been bringing my _mother_ to my recollection. My +heart ached with the remembrance of infirmities, that made her +closing years of life so sore a trial to her. + +"I was concerned to think that our family differences have been one +source of disquiet to her. I am sensible that _this last_ we are apt +to exaggerate after a person's death--and surely, in the main, there +was considerable harmony among the members of our little +family--still I was concerned to think that we ever gave her gentle +spirit disquiet. + +"I thought on years back--on all my parents' friends--the H----s, the +F----s, on D---- S----, and on many a merry evening, in the fireside +circle, in that comfortable back parlor--it is never used now.-- + +"O ye _Matravises_[1] of the age, ye know not what ye lose in +despising these petty topics of endeared remembrance, associated +circumstances of past times;--ye know not the throbbings of the +heart, tender yet affectionately familiar, which accompany the dear +and honored names of _father_ or of _mother_. + +[Footnote 1: This name will be explained presently.] + +"Maria! I thought on all these things; my heart ached at the review +of them--it yet aches, while I write this--but I am never so +satisfied with my train of thoughts, as when they run upon these +subjects--the tears they draw from us, meliorate and soften the +heart, and keep fresh within us that memory of dear friends dead, +which alone can fit us for a readmission to their society hereafter." + + +FROM ANOTHER LETTER. + +"----I had a bad dream this morning--that Allan was dead--and who, of +all persons in the world do you think, put on mourning for him? +Why--_Matravis_. This alone might cure me of superstitious thoughts, +if I were inclined to them; for why should Matravis _mourn_ for us, +or our family?--Still it was pleasant to awake, and find it but a +dream.--Methinks something like an awaking from an ill dream shall +the Resurrection from the Dead be.--Materially different from our +accustomed scenes, and ways of life, the _World to come_ may possibly +not be--still it is represented to us under the notion of a _Rest_, a +_Sabbath_, a state of bliss." + + +FROM ANOTHER LETTER. + +"----Methinks, you and I should have been born under the same roof, +sucked the same milk, conned the same horn-book, thumbed the same +Testament, together:--for we have been more than sisters, Maria! + +"Something will still be whispering to me, that I shall one day be +inmate of the same dwelling with my cousin, partaker with her in all +the delights which spring from mutual good offices, kind words, +attentions in sickness and in health,--conversation, sometimes +innocently trivial, and at others profitably serious;--books read and +commented on, together; meals ate, and walks taken, together,--and +conferences, how we may best do good to this poor person or that, and +wean our spirits from the world's _cares_, without divesting +ourselves of its _charities_. What a picture I have drawn, Maria! and +none of all these things may ever come to pass." + + +FROM ANOTHER LETTER. + +"----Continue to write to me, my sweet cousin. Many good thoughts, +resolutions, and proper views of things, pass through the mind in the +course of the day, but are lost for want of committing them to paper. +Seize them, Maria, as they pass, these Birds of Paradise, that show +themselves and are gone,--and make a grateful present of the precious +fugitives to your friend. + +"To use a homely illustration, just rising in my fancy,--shall the +good housewife take such pains in pickling and preserving her +worthless fruits, her walnuts, her apricots, and quinces--and is +there not much _spiritual housewifery_ in treasuring up our mind's +best fruits--our heart's meditations in its most favored moments? + +"This sad simile is much in the fashion of the old Moralizers, such +as I conceive honest Baxter to have been, such as Quarles and Wither +were with their curious, serio-comic, quaint emblems. But they +sometimes reach the heart, when a more elegant simile rests in the +fancy. + +"Not low and mean, like these, but beautifully familiarized to our +conceptions, and condescending to human thoughts and notions, are all +the discourses of our LORD--conveyed in parable, or similitude, what +easy access do they win to the heart, through the medium of the +delighted imagination! speaking of heavenly things in fable, or in +simile, drawn from earth, from objects _common_, _accustomed_. + +"Life's business, with such delicious little interruptions as our +correspondence affords, how pleasant it is!--why can we not paint on +the dull paper our whole feelings, exquisite as they rise up?" + + +FROM ANOTHER LETTER. + +"----I had meant to have left off at this place; but looking back, I +am sorry to find too gloomy a cast tincturing my last page--a +representation of life false and unthankful. Life is _not_ all vanity +and disappointment--it hath much of evil in it, no doubt; but to +those who do not misuse it, it affords comfort, _temporary_ comfort, +much--much that endears us to it, and dignifies it--many true and +good feelings, I trust, of which we need not be ashamed--hours of +tranquillity and hope. But the morning was dull and overcast, and my +spirits were under a cloud. I feel my error. + +"Is it no blessing that we two love one another so dearly--that Allan +is left me--that you are settled in life--that worldly affairs go +smooth with us both--above all that our lot hath fallen to us in a +Christian country? Maria! these things are not little. I will +consider life as a long feast, and not forget to say grace." + + +FROM ANOTHER LETTER. + +"----Allan has written to me--you know, he is on a visit at his old +tutor's in Gloucestershire--he is to return home on Thursday--Allan +is a dear boy--he concludes his letter, which is very affectionate +throughout, in this manner-- + +"'Elinor, I charge you to learn the following stanza by heart-- + + "'The monarch may forget his crown, + That on his head an hour hath been; + The bridegroom may forget his bride + Was made his wedded wife yestreen; + + "'The mother may forget her child, + That smiles so sweetly on her knee: + But I'll remember thee, Glencairn, + And all that thou hast done for me." + +"'The lines are in Burns--you know, we read him for the first time +together at Margate--and I have been used to refer them to you, and +to call you, in my mind, _Glencairn_,--for you were always very good +to me. I had a thousand failings, but you would love me in spite of +them all. I am going to drink your health.'" + +I shall detain my reader no longer from the narrative. + + + * * * * * + + +CHAPTER VIII. + + +They had but four rooms in the cottage. Margaret slept in the biggest +room up-stairs, and her grand-daughter in a kind of closet adjoining, +where she could be within hearing, if her grandmother should call her +in the night. + +The girl was often disturbed in that manner--two or three times in a +night she has been forced to leave her bed, to fetch her +grandmother's cordials, or do some little service for her--but she +knew that Margaret's ailings were _real_ and pressing, and Rosamund +never complained--never suspected, that her grandmother's +requisitions had anything unreasonable in them. + +The night she parted with Miss Clare, she had helped Margaret to bed, +as usual--and, after saying her prayers, as the custom was, kneeling +by the old lady's bedside, kissed her grandmother, and wished her a +good-night--Margaret blessed her, and charged her to go to bed +directly. It was her customary injunction, and Rosamund had never +dreamed of disobeying. + +So she retired to her little room. The night was warm and clear--the +moon very bright--her window commanded a view of _scenes_ she had +been tracing in the daytime with Miss Clare. + +All the events of the day past, the occurrences of their walk arose +in her mind. She fancied she should like to retrace those scenes--but +it was now nine o'clock, a late hour in the village. + +Still she fancied it would be very charming--and then her +grandmother's injunction came powerfully to her recollection--she +sighed, and turned from the window-and walked up and down her little +room. + +Ever, when she looked at the window, the wish returned. It was not so +_very late_. The neighbors were yet about, passing under the window +to their homes--she thought, and thought again, till her sensations +became vivid, even to painfulness--her bosom was aching to give them +vent. + +The village-clock struck ten!--the neighbors ceased to pass under the +window. Rosamund, stealing downstairs, fastened the latch behind her, +and left the cottage. + +One, that knew her, met her, and observed her with some surprise. +Another recollects having wished her a good-night. Rosamund never +returned to the cottage. + +An old man, that lay sick in a small house adjoining to Margaret's, +testified the next morning, that he had plainly heard the old +creature calling for her granddaughter. All the night long she made +her moan, and ceased not to call upon the name of Rosamund. But no +Rosamund was there--the voice died away, but not till near daybreak. + +When the neighbors came to search in the morning, Margaret was +missing! She had _straggled_ out of bed, and made her way into +Rosamund's room--worn out with fatigue and fright, when she found the +girl not there, she had laid herself down to die--and, it is thought, +she died _praying_--for she was discovered in a kneeling posture, her +arms and face extended on the pillow, where Rosamund had slept the +night before--a smile was on her face in death. + + + * * * * * + + +CHAPTER IX. + + +Fain would I draw a veil over the transactions of that night--but I +cannot--grief, and burning shame, forbid me to be silent--black deeds +are about to be made public, which reflect a stain upon our common +nature. + +Rosamund, enthusiastic and improvident, wandered unprotected to a +distance from her guardian doors--through lonely glens, and +wood-walks, where she had rambled many a _day_ in safety--till she +arrived at a shady copse, out of the hearing of any human habitation. + +_Matravis_ met her.---"Flown with insolence and wine," returning home +late at night, he passed that way! + +Matravis was a very ugly man. Sallow-complexioned! and if hearts can +wear that color, his heart was sallow-complexioned also. + +A young man with _gray_ deliberation! cold and systematic in all his +plans; and all his plans were evil. His very lust was systematic. + +He would brood over his bad purposes for such a dreary length of time +that, it might have been expected, some solitary check of conscience +must have intervened to save him from commission. But that _Light +from Heaven_ was extinct in his dark bosom. + +Nothing that is great, nothing that is amiable, existed for this +unhappy man. He feared, he envied, he suspected; but he never loved. +The sublime and beautiful in nature, the excellent and becoming in +morals, were things placed beyond the capacity of his sensations. He +loved not poetry--nor ever took a lonely walk to meditate--never +beheld virtue, which he did not try to disbelieve, or female beauty +and innocence, which he did not lust to contaminate. + +A sneer was perpetually upon his face, and malice _grinning_ at his +heart. He would say the most ill-natured things, with the least +remorse, of any man I ever knew. This gained him the reputation of a +wit--other _traits_ got him the reputation of a villain. + +And this man formerly paid his court to Elinor Clare!--with what +success I leave my readers to determine. It was not in Elinor's +nature to despise any living thing--but in the estimation of this +man, to be rejected was to be _despised_--and Matravis _never +forgave_. + +He had long turned his eyes upon Rosamund Gray. To steal from the +bosom of her friends the jewel they prized so much, the little ewe +lamb they held so dear, was a scheme of delicate revenge, and +Matravis had a twofold motive for accomplishing this young maid's +ruin. + +Often had he met her in her favorite solitudes, but found her ever +cold and inaccessible. Of late the girl had avoided straying far from +her own home, in the fear of meeting him--but she had never told her +fears to Allan. + +Matravis had, till now, been content to be a villain within the +limits of the law--but, on the present occasion, hot fumes of wine, +cooperating with his deep desire of revenge, and the insolence of an +unhoped-for meeting, overcame his customary prudence, and Matravis +rose, at once, to an audacity of glorious mischief. + +Late at night he met her, a lonely, unprotected virgin--no friend at +hand--no place near of refuge. + +Rosamund Gray, my soul is exceeding sorrowful for thee--I loathe to +tell the hateful circumstances of thy wrongs. Night and silence were +the only witnesses of this young maid's disgrace--Matravis fled. + +Rosamund, polluted and disgraced, wandered, an abandoned thing, about +the fields and meadows till daybreak. Not caring to return to the +cottage, she sat herself down before the gate of Miss Clare's +house--in a stupor of grief. + +Elinor was just rising, and had opened the windows of her chamber, +when she perceived her desolate young friend. She ran to embrace +her--she brought her into the house--she took her to her bosom--she +kissed her--she spake to her; but Rosamund could not speak. + +Tidings came from the cottage. Margaret's death was an event which +could not be kept concealed from Rosamund. When the sweet maid heard +of it, she languished, and fell sick--she never held up her head +after that time. + +If Rosamund had been a _sister_, she could not have been kindlier +treated than by her two friends. + +Allan had prospects in life--might, in time, have married into any of +the first families in Hertfordshire--but Rosamund Gray, humbled +though she was, and put to shame, had yet a charm for _him_--and he +would have been content to share his fortunes with her yet, if +Rosamund would have lived to be his companion. + +But this was not to be--and the girl soon after died. She expired in +the arms of Elinor--quiet, gentle, as she lived--thankful that she +died not among strangers--and expressing, by signs rather than words, +a gratitude for the most trifling services, the common offices of +humanity. She died uncomplaining; and this young maid, this untaught +Rosamund, might have given a lesson to the grave philosopher in +death. + + + * * * * * + + +CHAPTER X. + + +I was but a boy when these events took place. All the village +remember the story, and tell of Rosamund Gray, and old blind +Margaret. + +I parted from Allan Clare on that disastrous night, and set out for +Edinburgh the next morning, before the facts were commonly known--I +heard not of them--and it was four months before I received a letter +from Allan. + +"His heart," he told me, "was gone from him--for his sister had died +of a frenzy fever!"--not a word of Rosamund in the letter--I was left +to collect her story from sources which may one day be explained. + +I soon after quitted Scotland, on the death of my father, and +returned to my native village. Allan had left the place, and I could +gain no information, whether he were dead or living. + +I passed the _cottage_. I did not dare to look that way, or to +inquire _who_ lived there. A little dog, that had been Rosamund's, +was yelping in my path. I laughed aloud like one mad, whose mind had +suddenly gone from him--I stared vacantly around me, like one +alienated from common perceptions. + +But I was young at that time, and the impression became gradually +weakened as I mingled in the business of life. It is now _ten years_ +since these events took place, and I sometimes think of them as +unreal. Allan Clare was a dear friend to me--but there are times when +Allan and his sister, Margaret and her grand-daughter, appear like +personages of a dream--an idle dream. + + + * * * * * + + +CHAPTER XI. + + +Strange things have happened unto me--I seem scarce awake--but I will +recollect my thoughts, and try to give an account of what has +befallen me in the few last weeks. + +Since my father's death our family have resided in London. I am in +practice as a surgeon there. My mother died two years after we left +Widford. + +A month or two ago, I had been busying myself in drawing up the above +narrative, intending to make it public. The employment had forced my +mind to dwell upon _facts_, which had begun to fade from it--the +memory of old times became vivid, and more vivid--I felt a strong +desire to revisit the scenes of my native village--of the young loves +of Rosamund and her Clare. + +A kind of dread had hitherto kept me back; but I was restless now, +till I had accomplished my wish. I set out one morning to walk--I +reached Widford about eleven in the forenoon--after a slight +breakfast at my inn--where I was mortified to perceive the old +landlord did not know me again--(old Thomas Billet--he has often made +angle-rods for me when a child)--I rambled over all my accustomed +haunts. + +Our old house was vacant, and to be sold. I entered, unmolested, into +the room that had been my bedchamber. I kneeled down on the spot +where my little bed had stood--I felt like a child--I prayed like +one--it seemed as though old times were to return again--I looked +round involuntarily, expecting to see some face I knew--but all was +naked and mute. The bed was gone. My little pane of painted window, +through which I loved to look at the sun when I awoke in a fine +summer's morning, was taken out, and had been replaced by one of +common glass. + +I visited, by turns, every chamber--they were all desolate and +unfurnished, one excepted, in which the owner had left a harpsichord, +probably to be sold--I touched the keys--I played some old Scottish +tunes, which had delighted me when a child. Past associations revived +with the music--blended with a sense of _unreality_, which at last +became too powerful--I rushed out of the room to give vent to my +feelings. + +I wandered, scarce knowing where, into an old wood, that stands at +the back of the house--we called it the _Wilderness_. A well-known +_form_ was missing, that used to meet me in this place--it was +thine--Ben Moxam--the kindest, gentlest, politest of human beings, +yet was he nothing higher than a gardener in the family. Honest +creature! thou didst never pass me in my childish rambles, without a +soft speech, and a smile. I remember thy good-natured face. But there +is one thing, for which I can never forgive thee, Ben Moxam--that +thou didst join with an old maiden aunt of mine in a cruel plot, to +lop away the hanging branches of the old fir-trees--I remember them +sweeping to the ground. + +I have often left my childish sports to ramble in this place--its +glooms and its solitude had a mysterious charm for my young mind, +nurturing within me that love of quietness and lonely thinking, which +has accompanied me to maturer years. + +In this _Wilderness_ I found myself, after a ten years' absence. Its +stately fir-trees were yet standing, with all their luxuriant company +of underwood--the squirrel was there, and the melancholy cooings of +the wood-pigeon--all was as I had left it--my heart softened at the +sight--it seemed as though my character had been suffering a _change_ +since I forsook these shades. + +My parents were both dead--I had no counsellor left, no experience of +age to direct me, no sweet voice of reproof. The Lord had taken away +my _friends_, and I knew not where he had laid them. I paced round +the wilderness, seeking a comforter. I prayed that I might be +restored to that _state of innocence_, in which I had wandered in +those shades. + +Methought my request was heard, for it seemed as though the stains of +manhood were passing from me, and I were relapsing into the purity +and simplicity of childhood. I was content to have been moulded into +a perfect child. I stood still, as in a trance. I dreamed that I was +enjoying a personal intercourse with my heavenly Father--and, +extravagantly, put off the shoes from my feet--for the place where I +stood I thought, was holy ground. + +This state of mind could not last long, and I returned with languid +feelings to my inn. I ordered my dinner--green peas and a +sweetbread--it had been a favorite dish with me in my childhood--I +was allowed to have it on my birthdays. I was impatient to see it +come upon table--but, when it came, I could scarce eat a mouthful--my +tears choked me. I called for wine--I drank a pint and a half of red +wine--and not till then had I dared to visit the church-yard, where +my parents were interred. + +The _cottage_ lay in my way--Margaret had chosen it for that very +reason, to be near the church--for the old lady was regular in her +attendance on public worship--I passed on--and in a moment found +myself among the tombs. + +I had been present at my father's burial, and knew the spot again--my +mother's funeral I was prevented by illness from attending--a plain +stone was placed over the grave, with their initials carved upon +it--for they both occupied one grave. + +I prostrated myself before the spot--I kissed the earth that covered +them--I contemplated, with gloomy delight, the time when I should +mingle my dust with theirs--and kneeled, with my arms incumbent on +the gravestone, in a kind of mental prayer--for I could not speak. + +Having performed these duties, I arose with quieter feelings, and +felt leisure to attend to indifferent objects.--Still I continued in +the church-yard, reading the various inscriptions, and moralizing on +them with that kind of levity, which will not unfrequently spring up +in the mind, in the midst of deep melancholy. + +I read of nothing but careful parents, loving husbands, and dutiful +children. I said jestingly, where be all the _bad_ people buried? Bad +parents, bad husbands, bad children--what cemeteries are appointed +for these?--do they not sleep in consecrated ground? or is it but a +pious fiction, a generous oversight, in the survivors, which thus +tricks out men's epitaphs when dead, who, in their lifetime, +discharged the offices of life, perhaps, but lamely? Their failings, +with their reproaches, now sleep with them in the grave. _Man wars +not with the dead._ It is a _trait_ of human nature, for which I love +it. + +I had not observed, till now, a little group assembled at the other +end of the church-yard; it was a company of children, who were +gathered round a young man, dressed in black, sitting on a +gravestone. + +He seemed to be asking them questions--probably, about their +learning--and one little dirty ragged-headed fellow was clambering up +his knees to kiss him. The children had been eating black +cherries--for some of the stones were scattered about, and their +mouths were smeared with them. + +As I drew near them, I thought I discerned in the stranger a mild +benignity of countenance, which I had somewhere seen before--I gazed +at him more attentively. + +It was Allan Clare! sitting on the grave of his sister. + +I threw my arms about his neck. I exclaimed "Allan"--he turned his +eyes upon me--he knew me--we both wept aloud--it seemed as though the +interval since we parted had been as nothing--I cried out, "Come, and +tell me about these things." + +I drew him away from his little friends--he parted with a show of +reluctance from the church-yard--Margaret and her grand-daughter lay +buried there, as well as his sister--I took him to my inn--secured a +room, where we might be private--ordered fresh wine--scarce knowing +what I did, I danced for joy. + +Allan was quite overcome, and taking me by the hand, he said, "This +repays me for all." + +It was a proud day for me--I had found the friend I thought +dead--earth seemed to me no longer valuable, than as it contained +_him_; and existence a blessing no longer than while I should live to +be his comforter. + +I began, at leisure, to survey him with more attention. Time and +grief had left few traces of that fine _enthusiasm_, which once +burned in his countenance--his eyes had lost their original fire, but +they retained an uncommon sweetness, and whenever they were turned +upon me, their smile pierced to my heart. + +"Allan, I fear you have been a sufferer?" He replied not, and I could +not press him further. I could not call the dead to life again. + +So we drank and told old stories--and repeated old poetry--and sang +old songs--as if nothing had happened. We sate till very late. I +forgot that I had purposed returning to town that evening--to Allan +all places were alike--I grew noisy, he grew cheerful--Allan's old +manners, old enthusiasm, were returning upon him--we laughed, we +wept, we mingled our tears, and talked extravagantly. + +Allan was my chamber-fellow that night--and lay awake planning +schemes of living together under the same roof, entering upon similar +pursuits,--and praising GOD, that we had met. + +I was obliged to return to town the next morning, and Allan proposed +to accompany me. "Since the death of his sister," he told me, "he had +been a wanderer." + +In the course of our walk he unbosomed himself without reserve--told +me many particulars of his way of life for the last nine or ten +years, which I do not feel myself at liberty to divulge. + +Once, on my attempting to cheer him, when I perceived him over +thoughtful, he replied to me in these words: + +"Do not regard me as unhappy when you catch me in these moods. I am +never more happy than at times when, by the cast of my countenance, +men judge me most miserable. + +"My friend, the events which have left this sadness behind them are +of no recent date. The melancholy which comes over me with the +recollection of them is not hurtful, but only tends to soften and +tranquillize my mind, to detach me from the restlessness of human +pursuits. + +"The stronger I feel this detachment, the more I find myself drawn +heavenward to the contemplation of spiritual objects. + +"I love to keep old friendships alive and warm within me, because I +expect a renewal of them in the _World of Spirits_. + +"I am a wandering and unconnected thing on the earth. I have made no +new friendships, that can compensate me for the loss of the old--and +the more I know mankind, the more does it become necessary for me to +supply their loss by little images, recollections, and circumstances +of past pleasures. + +"I am sensible that I am surrounded by a multitude of very worthy +people, plain-hearted souls, sincere and kind. But they have hitherto +eluded my pursuit, and will continue to bless the little circle of +their families and friends, while I must remain a stranger to them. + +"Kept at a distance by mankind, I have not ceased to love them--and +could I find the cruel persecutor, the malignant instrument of GOD'S +judgments on me and mine, I think I would forgive, and try to love +him too. + +"I have been a quiet sufferer. From the beginning of my calamities it +was given to me, not to see the hand of man in them. I perceived a +mighty arm, which none but myself could see, extended over me. I gave +my heart to the Purifier, and my will to the Sovereign Will of the +Universe. The irresistible wheels of destiny passed on in their +everlasting rotation,--and I suffered myself to be carried along +with them without complaining." + + + * * * * * + + +CHAPTER XII. + +Allan told me that for some years past, feeling himself disengaged +from every personal tie, but not alienated from human sympathies, it +had been his taste, his _humor_ he called it, to spend a great +portion of his time in _hospitals_ and _lazar-houses_. + +He had found a _wayward pleasure_, he refused to name it a virtue, in +tending a description of people, who had long ceased to expect +kindness or friendliness from mankind, but were content to accept the +reluctant services, which the oftentimes unfeeling instruments and +servants of these well-meant institutions deal out to the poor sick +people under their care. + +It is not medicine, it is not broths and coarse meats, served up at a +stated hour with all the hard formalities of a prison--it is not the +scanty dole of a bed to die on--which dying man requires from his +species. + +Looks, attentions, consolations,--in a word, _sympathies_, are what a +man most needs in this awful close of mortal sufferings. A kind look, +a smile, a drop of cold water to the parched lip--for these things a +man shall bless you in death. + +And these better things than cordials did Allan love to +administer--to stay by a bedside the whole day, when something +disgusting in a patient's distemper has kept the very nurses at a +distance--to sit by, while the poor wretch got a little sleep--and be +there to smile upon him when he awoke--to slip a guinea, now and +then, into the hands of a nurse or attendant--these things have been +to Allan as _privileges_, for which he was content to live; choice +marks, and circumstances, of his Maker's goodness to him. + +And I do not know whether occupations of this kind be not a spring of +purer and nobler delight (certainly instances of a more disinterested +virtue) than arises from what are called Friendships of Sentiment. + +Between two persons of liberal education, like opinions, and common +feelings, oftentimes subsists a Variety of Sentiment, which disposes +each to look upon the other as the only being in the universe worthy +of friendship, or capable of understanding it,--themselves they +consider as the solitary receptacles of all that is delicate in +feeling, or stable in attachment: when the odds are, that under every +green hill, and in every crowded street, people of equal worth are to +be found, who do more good in their generation, and make less noise +in the doing of it. + +It was in consequence of these benevolent propensities, I have been +describing, that Allan oftentimes discovered considerable +inclinations in favor of my way of life, which I have before +mentioned as being that of a surgeon. He would frequently attend me +on my visits to patients; and I began to think that he had serious +intentions of making my profession his study. + +He was present with me at a scene--a, _death-bed scene_--I shudder +when I do but think of it. + + + * * * * * + + +CHAPTER XIII. + + +I was sent for the other morning to the assistance of a gentleman, +who had been wounded in a duel,--and his wounds by unskilful +treatment had been brought to a dangerous crisis. + +The uncommonness of the name, which was _Matravis_, suggested to me, +that this might possibly be no other than Allan's old enemy. Under +this apprehension, I did what I could to dissuade Allan from +accompanying me--but he seemed bent upon going, and even pleased +himself with the notion, that it might lie within his ability to do +the unhappy man some service. So he went with me. + +When we came to the house, which was in Soho-square, we discovered +that it was indeed the man--the identical Matravis, who had done all +that mischief in times past--but not in a condition to excite any +other sensation than pity in a heart more hard than Allan's. + +Intense pain had brought on a delirium--we perceived this on first +entering the room--for the wretched man was raving to +himself--talking idly in mad unconnected sentences--that yet seemed, +at times, to have reference to _past facts_. + +One while he told us his dream. "He had lost his way on a great +heath, to which there seemed no end--it was cold, cold, cold,--and +dark, very dark--an old woman in leading-strings, _blind_, was +groping about for a guide"--and then he frightened me,--for he seemed +disposed to be _jocular_, and sang a song about "an old woman clothed +in gray," and said "he did not believe in a devil." + +Presently he bid us "not tell Allan Clare."--Allan was hanging over +him at that very moment, sobbing.--I could not resist the impulse, +but cried out, "_This_ is Allan Clare--Allan Clare is come to see +you, my dear Sir."--The wretched man did not hear me, I believe, for +he turned his head away, and began talking of _charnel-houses_, and +_dead men_, and "whether they knew anything that passed in their +coffins." + +Matravis died that night. + + + * * * * * + + +ESSAYS. + +RECOLLECTIONS OF CHRIST'S HOSPITAL. + + +To comfort the desponding parent with the thought that, without +diminishing the stock which is imperiously demanded to furnish the +more pressing and homely wants of our nature, he has disposed of one +or more perhaps out of a numerous offspring, under the shelter of a +care scarce less tender than the paternal, where not only their +bodily cravings shall be supplied, but that mental _pabulum_ is also +dispensed, which HE hath declared to be no less necessary to our +sustenance, who said, that, "not by bread alone man can live": for +this Christ's Hospital unfolds her bounty. Here neither, on the one +hand, are the youth lifted up above their family, which we must +suppose liberal, though reduced; nor on the other hand, are they +liable to be depressed below its level by the mean habits and +sentiments which a common charity-school generates. It is, in a word, +an Institution to keep those who have yet held up their heads in the +world, from sinking; to keep alive the spirit of a decent household, +when poverty was in danger of crushing it; to assist those who are +the most willing, but not always the most able, to assist themselves; +to separate a child from his family for a season, in order to render +him back hereafter, with feelings and habits more congenial to it, +than he could even have attained by remaining at home in the bosom of +it. It is a preserving and renovating principle, an antidote for the +_res angusta domi_, when it presses, as it always does, most heavily +upon the most ingenuous natures. + +This is Christ's Hospital; and whether its character would be +improved by confining its advantages to the very lowest of the +people, let those judge who have witnessed the looks, the gestures, +the behavior, the manner of their play with one another, their +deportment towards strangers, the whole aspect and physiognomy of +that vast assemblage of boys on the London foundation, who freshen +and make alive again with their sports the else mouldering cloisters +of the old Grey Friars--which strangers who have never witnessed, if +they pass through Newgate Street, or by Smithfield, would do well to +go a little out of their way to see. + +For the Christ's Hospital boy feels that he is no charity-boy; he +feels it in the antiquity and regality of the foundation to which he +belongs; in the usage which he meets with at school, and the +treatment he is accustomed to out of its bounds; in the respect and +even kindness, which his well-known garb never fails to procure him +in the streets of the metropolis; he feels it in his education, in +that measure of classical attainments, which every individual at that +school, though not destined to a learned profession, has it in his +power to procure, attainments which it would be worse than folly to +put it in the reach of the laboring classes to acquire: he feels it +in the numberless comforts, and even magnificences, which surround +him; in his old and awful cloisters, with their traditions; in his +spacious school-rooms, and in the well-ordered, airy, and lofty rooms +where he sleeps; in his stately dining-hall, hung round with +pictures, by Verrio, Lely, and others, one of them surpassing in size +and grandeur almost any other in the kingdom;[1] above all, in the +very extent and magnitude of the body to which he belongs, and the +consequent spirit, the intelligence, and public conscience, which is +the result of so many various yet wonderfully combining members. +Compared with this last-named advantage, what is the stock of +information (I do not here speak of book-learning, but of that +knowledge which boy receives from boy), the mass of collected +opinions, the intelligence in common, among the few and narrow +members of an ordinary boarding-school? + +[Footnote 1: By Verrio, representing James the Second on his throne, +surrounded by his courtiers,(all curious portraits,) receiving the +mathematical pupils at their annual presentation: a custom still kept +up on New-year's-day at Court.] + +The Christ's Hospital or Blue-coat boy, has a distinctive character +of his own, as far removed from the abject qualities of a common +charity-boy as it is from the disgusting forwardness of a lad brought +up at some other of the public schools. There is _pride_ in it, +accumulated from the circumstances which I have described, as +differencing him from the former; and there is _a restraining +modesty_ from a sense of obligation and dependence, which must ever +keep his deportment from assimilating to that of the latter. His very +garb, as it is antique and venerable, feeds his self-respect; as it +is a badge of dependence, it restrains the natural petulance of that +age from breaking out into overt acts of insolence. This produces +silence and a reserve before strangers, yet not that cowardly shyness +which boys mewed up at home will feel; he will speak up when spoken +to, but the stranger must begin the conversation with him. Within his +bounds he is all fire and play; but in the streets he steals along +with all the self-concentration of a young monk. He is never known to +mix with other boys; they are a sort of laity to him. All this +proceeds, I have no doubt, from the continual consciousness which he +carries about him, of the difference of his dress from that of the +rest of the world; with a modest jealousy over himself, lest, by +overhastily mixing with common and secular playfellows, he should +commit the dignity of his cloth. Nor let any one laugh at this; for, +considering the propensity of the multitude, and especially of the +small multitude, to ridicule anything unusual in dress--above all, +where such peculiarity may be construed by malice into a mark of +disparagement--this reserve will appear to be nothing more than a +wise instinct in the Blue-coat boy. That it is neither pride nor +rusticity, at least that it has none of the offensive qualities of +either, a stranger may soon satisfy himself, by putting a question to +any of these boys: he may be sure of an answer couched in terms of +plain civility, neither loquacious nor embarrassed. Let him put the +same question to a parish-boy, or to one of the trencher-caps in the +---- cloisters, and the impudent reply of the one shall not fail to +exasperate any more than the certain servility, and mercenary eye to +reward, which he will meet with in the other, can fail to depress and +sadden him. + +The Christ's Hospital boy is a religions character. His school is +eminently a religious foundation; it has its peculiar prayers, its +services at set times, its graces, hymns, and anthems, following each +other in an almost monastic closeness of succession. This religious +character in him is not always untinged with superstition. That is +not wonderful, when we consider the thousand tales and traditions +which must circulate, with undisturbed credulity, amongst so many +boys, that have so few checks to their belief from any intercourse +with the world at large; upon whom their equals in age must work so +much, their elders so little. With this leaning towards an +over-belief in matters of religion, which will soon correct itself +when he comes out into society, may be classed a turn for romance +above most other boys. This is to be traced in the same manner to +their excess of society with each other, and defect of mingling with +the world. Hence the peculiar avidity with which such books as the +"Arabian Nights' Entertainments," and others of a still wilder cast, +are, or at least were in my time, sought for by the boys. I remember +when some half-dozen of them set off from school, without map, card, +or compass, on a serious expedition to find out _Philip Quarll's +Island_. + +The Christ's Hospital boy's sense of right and wrong is peculiarly +tender and apprehensive. It is even apt to run out into ceremonial +observances, and to impose a yoke upon itself beyond the strict +obligations of the moral law. Those who were contemporaries with me +at that school thirty years ago, will remember with what more than +Judaic rigor the eating of the fat of certain boiled meats[1] was +interdicted. A boy would have blushed as at the exposure of some +heinous immorality, to have been detected eating that forbidden +portion of his allowance of animal food, the whole of which, while he +was in health, was little more than sufficient to allay his hunger. +The same, or even greater, refinement was shown in the rejection of +certain kinds of sweet-cake. What gave rise to these supererogatory +penances, these self-denying ordinances, I could never learn;[2] they +certainly argue no defect of the conscientious principle. A little +excess in that article is not undesirable in youth, to make allowance +for the inevitable waste which comes in maturer years. But in the +less ambiguous line of duty, in those directions of the moral +feelings which cannot be mistaken or depreciated, I will relate what +took place in the year 1785, when Mr. Perry, the steward, died. I +must be pardoned for taking my instances from my own times. Indeed, +the vividness of my recollections, while I am upon this subject, +almost bring back those times; they are present to me still. But I +believe that in the years which have elapsed since the period which I +speak of, the character of the Christ's Hospital boy is very little +changed. Their situation in point of many comforts is improved; but +that which I ventured before to term the _public conscience_ of the +school, the pervading moral sense, of which every mind partakes and +to which so many individual minds contribute, remains, I believe, +pretty much the same as when I left it. I have seen, within this +twelvemonth almost, the change which has been produced upon a boy of +eight or nine years of age, upon being admitted into that school; +how, from a pert young coxcomb, who thought that all knowledge was +comprehended within his shallow brains, because a smattering of two +or three languages and one or two sciences were stuffed into him by +injudicious treatment at home, by a mixture with the wholesome +society of so many school-fellows, in less time than I have spoken +of, he has sunk to his own level, and is contented to be carried on +in the quiet orbit of modest self-knowledge in which the common mass +of that unpresumptuous assemblage of boys seem to move: from being a +little unfeeling mortal, he has got to feel and reflect. Nor would it +be a difficult matter to show how, at a school like this, where the +boy is neither entirely separated from home, nor yet exclusively +under its influence, the best feelings, the filial for instance, are +brought to a maturity which they could not have attained under a +completely domestic education; how the relation of a parent is +rendered less tender by unremitted association, and the very +awfulness of age is best apprehended by some sojourning amidst the +comparative levity of youth; how absence, not drawn out by too great +extension into alienation or forgetfulness, puts an edge upon the +relish of occasional intercourse, and the boy is made the better +_child_ by that which keeps the force of that relation from being +felt as perpetually pressing on him; how the substituted paternity, +into the care of which he is adopted, while in everything substantial +it makes up for the natural, in the necessary omission of individual +fondnesses and partialities, directs the mind only the more strongly +to appreciate that natural and first tie, in which such weaknesses +are the bond of strength, and the appetite which craves after them +betrays no perverse palate. But these speculations rather belong to +the question of the comparative advantages of a public over a private +education in general. I must get back to my favorite school; and to +that which took place when our old and good steward died. + +[Footnote 1: Under the denomination of _gage_.] + +[Footnote 2: I am told that the late steward [Mr. Hathaway], who +evinced on many occasions a most praiseworthy anxiety to promote the +comfort of the boys, had occasion for all his address and +perseverance to eradicate the first of these unfortunate prejudices, +in which he at length happily succeeded, and thereby restored to one +half of the animal nutrition of the school those honors which painful +superstition and blind zeal had so long conspired to withhold from +it.] + +And I will say that when I think of the frequent instances which I +have met with in children, of a hard-heartedness, a callousness, and +insensibility to the loss of relations, even of those who have begot +and nourished them, I cannot but consider it as a proof of something +in the peculiar conformation of that school, favorable to the +expansion of the best feelings of our nature, that at the period +which I am noticing, out of five hundred boys there was not a dry eye +to be found among them, nor a heart that did not beat with genuine +emotion. Every impulse to play, until the funeral day was past, +seemed suspended throughout the school; and the boys, lately so +mirthful and sprightly, were seen pacing their cloisters alone, or in +sad groups standing about, few of them without some token, such as +their slender means could provide, a black riband or something, to +denote respect and a sense of their loss. The time itself was a time +of anarchy, a time in which all authority (out of school hours) was +abandoned. The ordinary restraints were for those days superseded; +and the gates, which at other times kept us in, were left without +watchers. Yet, with the exception of one or two graceless boys at +most, who took advantage of that suspension of authorities to _skulk +out_, as it was called, the whole body of that great school kept +rigorously within their bounds, by a voluntary self-imprisonment; and +they who broke bounds, though they escaped punishment from any +master, fell into a general disrepute among us, and, for that which +at any other time would have been applauded and admired as a mark of +spirit, were consigned to infamy and reprobation; so much _natural +government_ have gratitude and the principles of reverence and love, +and so much did a respect to their dead friend prevail with these +Christ's Hospital boys, above any fear which his presence among them +when living could ever produce. And if the impressions which were +made on my mind so long ago are to be trusted, very richly did their +steward deserve this tribute. It is a pleasure to me even now to call +to mind his portly form, the regal awe which he always contrived to +inspire, in spite of a tenderness and even weakness of nature that +would have enfeebled the reins of discipline in any other master; a +yearning of tenderness towards those under his protection, which +could make five hundred boys at once feel towards him each as to +their individual father. He had faults, with which we had nothing to +do; but, with all his faults, indeed, Mr. Perry was a most +extraordinary creature. Contemporary with him and still living, +though he has long since resigned his occupation, will it be +impertinent to mention the name of our excellent upper +grammar-master, the Rev. James Boyer? He was a disciplinarian, +indeed, of a different stamp from him whom I have just described; +but, now the terrors of the rod, and of a temper a little too hasty +to leave the more nervous of us quite at our ease to do justice to +his merits in those days, are long since over, ungrateful were we if +we should refuse our testimony to that unwearied assiduity with which +he attended to the particular improvement of each of us. Had we been +the offspring of the first gentry in the land, he could not have been +instigated by the strongest views of recompense and reward to have +made himself a greater slave to the most laborious of all occupations +than he did for us sons of charity, from whom, or from our parents, +he could expect nothing. He has had his reward in the satisfaction of +having discharged his duty, in the pleasurable consciousness of +having advanced the respectability of that institution to which, both +man and boy, he was attached; in the honors to which so many of his +pupils have successfully aspired at both our Universities; and in the +staff with which the Governors of the Hospital, at the close of his +hard labors, with the highest expressions of the obligations the +school lay under to him, unanimously voted to present him. + +I have often considered it among the felicities of the constitution +of this school, that the offices of steward and school-master are +kept distinct; the strict business of education alone devolving upon +the latter, while the former has the charge of all things out of +school, the control of the provisions, the regulation of meals, of +dress, of play, and the ordinary intercourse of the boys. By this +division of management, a superior respectability must attach to the +teacher, while his office is unmixed with any of these lower +concerns. A still greater advantage over the construction of common +boarding-schools is to be found in the settled salaries of the +masters, rendering them totally free of obligation to any individual +pupil, or his parents. This never fails to have its effect at schools +where each boy can reckon up to a hair what profit the master derives +from him, where he views him every day in the light of a caterer, a +provider for the family, who is to get so much by him in each of his +meals. Boys will see and consider these things; and how much must the +sacred character of preceptor suffer in their minds by these +degrading associations! The very bill which the pupil carries home +with him at Christmas, eked out, perhaps, with elaborate though +necessary minuteness, instructs him that his teachers have other ends +than the mere love to learning, in the lessons which they give him; +and though they put into his hands the fine sayings of Seneca or +Epictetus, yet they themselves are none of those disinterested +pedagogues to teach philosophy _gratis_. The master, too, is sensible +that he is seen in this light; and how much this must lessen that +affectionate regard to the learners which alone can sweeten the +bitter labor of instruction, and convert the whole business into +unwelcome and uninteresting task-work, many preceptors that I have +conversed with on the subject are ready, with a sad heart, to +acknowledge. From this inconvenience the settled salaries of the +masters of this school in great measure exempt them; while the happy +custom of choosing masters (indeed every officer of the +establishment) from those who have received their education there, +gives them an interest in advancing the character of the school, and +binds them to observe a tenderness and a respect to the children, in +which a stranger, feeling that independence which I have spoken of, +might well be expected to fail. + +In affectionate recollections of the place where he was bred up, in +hearty recognitions of old school-fellows met with again after the +lapse of years, or in foreign countries, the Christ's Hospital boy +yields to none; I might almost say, he goes beyond most other boys. +The very compass and magnitude of the school, its thousand bearings, +the space it takes up in the imagination beyond the ordinary schools, +impresses a remembrance, accompanied with an elevation of mind, that +attends him through life. It is too big, too affecting an object, to +pass away quickly from his mind. The Christ's Hospital boy's friends +at school are commonly his intimates through life. For me, I do not +know whether a constitutional imbecility does not incline me too +obstinately to cling to the remembrances of childhood; in an inverted +ratio to the usual sentiments of mankind, nothing that I have been +engaged in since seems of any value or importance compared to the +colors which imagination gave to everything then. I belong to no +_body corporate_ such as I then made a part of.--And here, before I +close, taking leave of the general reader, and addressing myself +solely to my old school-fellows, that were contemporaries with me +from the year 1782 to 1789, let me have leave to remember some of +those circumstances of our school, which they will not be unwilling +to have brought back to their minds. + +And first, let us remember, as first in importance in our childish +eyes, the young men (as they almost were) who, under the denomination +of _Grecians_, were waiting the expiration of the period when they +should be sent, at the charges of the Hospital, to one or other of +our universities, but more frequently to Cambridge. These youths, +from their superior acquirements, their superior age and stature, and +the fewness of their numbers (for seldom above two or three at a time +were inaugurated into that high order), drew the eyes of all, and +especially of the younger boys, into a reverent observance and +admiration. How tall they used to seem to us! how stately would they +pace along the cloisters! while the play of the lesser boys was +absolutely suspended, or its boisterousness at least allayed, at +their presence! Not that they ever beat or struck the boys--that +would have been to have demeaned themselves--the dignity of their +persons alone insured them all respect. The task of blows, of +corporal chastisement, they left to the common monitors, or heads of +wards, who, it must be confessed, in our time had rather too much +license allowed them to oppress and misuse their inferiors; and the +interference of the Grecian, who may be considered as the spiritual +power, was not unfrequently called for, to mitigate by its mediation +the heavy unrelenting arm of this temporal power, or monitor. In +fine, the Grecians were the solemn Muftis of the school. Eras were +computed from their time;--it used to be said, such or such a thing +was done when S---- or T---- was Grecian. + +As I ventured to call the Grecians, the Muftis of the school, the +King's boys,[1] as their character then was, may well pass for the +Janissaries. They were the terror of all the other boys; bred up +under that hardy sailor, as well as excellent mathematician and +conavigator with Captain Cook, William Wales. All his systems were +adapted to fit them for the rough element which they were destined to +encounter. Frequent and severe punishments which were expected to be +borne with more than Spartan fortitude, came to be considered less as +inflictions of disgrace than as trials of obstinate endurance. To +make his boys hardy, and to give them early sailor-habits, seemed to +be his only aim; to this everything was subordinate. Moral +obliquities, indeed, were sure of receiving their full recompense, +for no occasion of laying on the lash was ever let slip; but the +effects expected to be produced from it were something very different +from contrition or mortification. There was in William Wales a +perpetual fund of humor, a constant glee about him, which, heightened +by an inveterate provincialism of north-country dialect, absolutely +took away the sting from his severities. His punishments were a game +at patience, in which the master was not always worst contented when +he found himself at times overcome by his pupil. What success this +discipline had, or how the effects of it operated upon the +after-lives of these King's boys, I cannot say: but I am sure that, +for the time, they were absolute nuisances to the rest of the school. +Hardy, brutal, and often wicked, they were the most graceless lump in +the whole mass; older and bigger than the other boys, (for, by the +system of their education they were kept longer at school by two or +three years than any of the rest, except the Grecians,) they were a +constant terror to the younger part of the school; and some who may +read this, I doubt not, will remember the consternation into which +the juvenile fry of us were thrown, when the cry was raised in the +cloisters, that _the First Order was coming_--for so they termed the +first form or class of those boys. Still these sea-boys answered some +good purposes, in the school. They were the military class among the +boys, foremost in athletic exercises, who extended the fame of the +prowess of the school far and near; and the apprentices in the +vicinage, and sometimes the butchers' boys in the neighboring market, +had sad occasion to attest their valor. + +[Footnote 1: The mathematical pupils, bred up to the sea, on the +foundation of Charles the Second.] + +The time would fail me if I were to attempt to enumerate all those +circumstances, some pleasant, some attended with some pain, which, +seen through the mist of distance, come sweetly softened to the +memory. But I must crave leave to remember our transcending +superiority in those invigorating sports, leap-frog, and basting the +bear; our delightful excursions in the summer holidays to the New +River, near Newington, where, like otters, we would live the long day +in the water, never caring for dressing ourselves, when we had once +stripped; our savory meals afterwards, when we came home almost +famished with staying out all day without our dinners; our visits at +other times to the Tower, where, by ancient privilege, we had free +access to all the curiosities; our solemn procession through the City +at Easter, with the Lord Mayor's largess of buns, wine, and a +shilling, with the festive questions and civic pleasantries of the +dispensing Aldermen, which were more to us than all the rest of the +banquet; our stately suppings in public, where the well-lighted hall +and the confluence of well-dressed company who came to see us, made +the whole look more like a concert or assembly, than a scene of a +plain bread and cheese collation; the annual orations upon St. +Matthew's day, in which the senior scholar, before he had done, +seldom failed to reckon up, among those who had done honor to our +school by being educated in it, the names of those accomplished +critics and Greek scholars, Joshua Barnes and Jeremiah Markland (I +marvel they left out Camden while they were about it). Let me have +leave to remember our hymns and anthems, and well-toned organ; the +doleful tune of the burial anthem chanted in the solemn cloisters, +upon the seldom-occurring funeral of some school-fellow; the +festivities at Christmas, when the richest of us would club our stock +to have a gaudy day, sitting round the fire, replenished to the +height with logs, and the penniless, and he that could contribute +nothing, partook in all the mirth, and in some of the +substantialities of the feasting; the carol sung by night at that +time of the year, which, when a young boy, I have so often lain awake +to hear from seven (the hour of going to bed) till ten, when it was +sung by the older boys and monitors, and have listened to it, in +their rude chanting, till I have been transported in fancy to the +fields of Bethlehem, and the song which was sung at that season, by +angels' voices to the shepherds. + +Nor would I willingly forget any of those things which administered +to our vanity. The hem-stitched bands and town-made shirts, which +some of the most fashionable among us wore; the town-girdles, with +buckles of silver, or shining stone; the badges of the sea-boys; the +cots, or superior shoestrings, of the monitors; the medals of the +markers; (those who were appointed to hear the Bible read in the +wards on Sunday morning and evening,) which bore on their obverse in +silver, as certain parts of our garments carried, in meaner metal, +the countenance of our Founder, that godly and royal child, King +Edward the Sixth, the flower of the Tudor name--the young flower that +was untimely cropt, as it began to fill our land with its early +odors--the boy-patron of boys--the serious and holy child who walked +with Cranmer and Bidley--fit associate, in those tender years, for +the bishops, and future martyrs of our Church, to receive, or, (as +occasion sometimes proved,) to give instruction. + + "But, ah! what means the silent tear? + Why, e'en 'mid joy, my bosom heave? + Ye long-lost scenes, enchantments dear! + Lo! now I linger o'er your grave. + + "--Fly, then, ye hours of rosy hue, + And bear away the bloom of years! + And quick succeed, ye sickly crew + Of doubts and sorrows, pains and fears! + + "Still will I ponder Fate's unaltered plan, + Nor, tracing back the child, forget that I am man."[1] + +[Footnote 1: Lines meditated in the cloisters of Christ's Hospital, +in the "Poetics," of Mr. George Dyer.] + + + * * * * * + + +ON THE TRAGEDIES OF SHAKSPEARE. + +CONSIDERED WITH REFERENCE TO THEIR FITNESS FOR STAGE-REPRESENTATION. + +Taking a turn the other day in the Abbey, I was struck with the +affected attitude of a figure, which I do not remember to have seen +before, and which upon examination proved to be a whole-length of the +celebrated Mr. Garrick. Though I would not go so far with some good +Catholics abroad as to shut players altogether out of consecrated +ground, yet I own I was not a little scandalized at the introduction +of theatrical airs and gestures into a place set apart to remind us +of the saddest realities. Going nearer, I found inscribed under this +harlequin figure the following lines:-- + + "To paint fair Nature, by divine command + Her magic pencil in his glowing hand, + A Shakspeare rose; then, to expand his fame + Wide o'er this breathing world, a Garrick came. + Though sunk in death the forms the Poet drew, + The Actor's genius bade them breathe anew; + Though, like the bard himself, in night they lay, + Immortal Garrick called them back to day: + And till Eternity with power sublime + Shall mark the mortal hour of hoary Time, + Shakspeare and Garrick like twin-stars shall shine, + And earth irradiate with a beam divine." + +It would be an insult to my readers' understandings to attempt +anything like a criticism on this farrago of false thoughts and +nonsense. But the reflection it led me into was a kind of wonder, +how, from the days of the actor here celebrated to our own, it should +have been the fashion to compliment every performer in his turn, that +has had the luck to please the Town in any of the great characters of +Shakspeare, with the notion of possessing a _mind congenial with the +poet's_; how people should come thus unaccountably to confound the +power of originating poetical images and conceptions with the faculty +of being able to read or recite the same when put into words;[1]or +what connection that absolute mastery over the heart and soul of man, +which a great dramatic poet possesses, has with those low tricks upon +the eye and ear, which a player, by observing a few general effects, +which some common passion, as grief, anger, &c., usually has upon the +gestures and exterior, can so easily compass. To know the internal +workings and movements of a great mind, of an Othello or a Hamlet for +instance, the _when_ and the _why_ and the _how far_ they should be +moved; to what pitch a passion is becoming; to give the reins and to +pull in the curb exactly at the moment when the drawing in or the +slackening is most graceful; seems to demand a reach of intellect of +a vastly different extent from that which is employed upon the bare +imitation of the signs of these passions in the countenance or +gesture, which signs are usually observed to be most lively and +emphatic in the weaker sort of minds, and which signs can after all +but indicate some passion, as I said before, anger, or grief, +generally; but of the motives and grounds of the passion, wherein it +differs from the same passion in low and vulgar natures, of these the +actor can give no more idea by his face or gesture than the eye +(without a metaphor) can speak, or the muscles utter intelligible +sounds. But such is the instantaneous nature of the impressions which +we take in at the eye and ear at a playhouse, compared with the slow +apprehension oftentimes of the understanding in reading, that we are +apt not only to sink the playwriter in the consideration which we pay +to the actor, but even to identify in our minds, in a perverse +manner, the actor with the character which he represents. It is +difficult for a frequent play-goer to disembarrass the idea of Hamlet +from the person and voice of Mr. K. We speak of Lady Macbeth, while +we are in reality thinking of Mrs. S. Nor is this confusion +incidental alone to unlettered persons, who, not possessing the +advantage of reading, are necessarily dependent upon the stage-player +for all the pleasure which they can receive from the drama, and to +whom the very idea of _what an author is_ cannot be made +comprehensible without some pain and perplexity of mind: the error is +one from which persons otherwise not meanly lettered, find it almost +impossible to extricate themselves. + +[Footnote 1: It is observable that we fall into this confusion only +in dramatic recitations. We never dream that the gentleman who reads +Lucretius in public with great applause, is therefore a great poet +and philosopher; nor do we find that Tom Davis, the bookseller, who +is recorded to have recited the Paradise Lost better than any man in +England in his day (though I cannot help thinking there must be some +mistake in this tradition), was therefore, by his intimate friends, +set upon a level with Milton.] + +Never let me be so ungrateful as to forget the very high degree of +satisfaction which I received some years back from seeing for the +first time a tragedy of Shakespeare performed, in which those two +great performers sustained the principal parts. It seemed to embody +and realize conceptions which had hitherto assumed no distinct shape. +But dearly do we pay all our life after for this juvenile pleasure, +this sense of distinctness. When the novelty is past, we find to our +cost that instead of realizing an idea, we have only materialized and +brought down a fine vision to the standard of flesh and blood. We +have let go a dream, in quest of an unattainable substance. + +How cruelly this operates upon the mind, to have its free conceptions +thus cramped and pressed down to the measure of a strait-lacing +actuality, may be judged from that delightful sensation of freshness, +with which we turn to those plays of Shakspeare which have escaped +being performed, and to those passages in the acting plays of the +same writer which have happily been left out in the performance. How +far the very custom of hearing anything _spouted_, withers and blows +upon a fine passage, may be seen in those speeches from Henry the +Fifth, &c., which are current in the mouths of school-boys, from +their being to be found in _Enfield's Speaker_, and such kind of +books! I confess myself utterly unable to appreciate that celebrated +soliloquy in Hamlet, beginning "To be or not to be," or to tell +whether it be good, bad or indifferent, it has been so handled and +pawed about by declamatory boys and men, and torn so inhumanly from +its living place and principle of continuity in the play, till it is +become to me a perfect dead member. + +It may seem a paradox, but I cannot help being of opinion that the +plays of Shakspeare are less calculated for performance on a stage, +than those of almost any other dramatist whatever. Their +distinguishing excellence is a reason that they should be so. There +is so much in them, which comes not under the province of acting, +with which eye, and tone, and gesture, have nothing to do. + +The glory of the scenic art is to personate passion, and the turns of +passion; and the more coarse and palpable the passion is, the more +hold upon the eyes and ears of the spectators the performer obviously +possesses. For this reason, scolding scenes, scenes where two persons +talk themselves into a fit of fury, and then in a surprising manner +talk themselves out of it again, have always been the most popular +upon our stage. And the reason is plain, because the spectators are +here most palpably appealed to, they are the proper judges in this +war of words, they are the legitimate ring that should be formed +round such "intellectual prize-fighters." Talking is the direct +object of the imitation here. But in all the best dramas, and in +Shakspeare above all, how obvious it is, that the form of _speaking_, +whether it be in soliloquy or dialogue, is only a medium, and often a +highly artificial one, for putting the reader or spectator into +possession of that knowledge of the inner structure and workings of +mind in a character, which he could otherwise never have arrived at +_in that form of composition_ by any gift short of intuition. We do +here as we do with novels written in the _epistolary form_. How many +improprieties, perfect solecisms in letter-writing, do we put up with +in Clarissa and other books, for the sake of the delight which that +form upon the whole gives us! + +But the practice of stage-representation reduces everything to a +controversy of elocution. Every character, from the boisterous +blasphemings of Bajazet to the shrinking timidity of womanhood, must +play the orator. The love dialogues of Romeo and Juliet, those +silver-sweet sounds of lovers' tongues by night! the more intimate +and sacred sweetness of nuptial colloquy between an Othello or a +Posthumus with their married wives, all those delicacies which are so +delightful in the reading, as when we read of those youthful +dalliances in Paradise-- + + "As beseem'd + Fair couple link'd in happy nuptial league, + Alone;" + +by the inherent fault of stage-representation, how are these things +sullied and turned from their very nature by being exposed to a large +assembly; when such speeches as Imogen addresses to her lord, come +drawling out of the mouth of a hired actress, whose courtship, though +nominally addressed to the personated Posthumus, is manifestly aimed +at the spectators, who are to judge of her endearments and her +returns of love! + +The character of Hamlet is perhaps that by which, since the days of +Betterton, a succession of popular performers have had the greatest +ambition to distinguish themselves. The length of the part may be one +of their reasons. But for the character itself, we find it in a play, +and therefore we judge it a fit subject of dramatic representation. +The play itself abounds in maxims and reflections beyond any other, +and therefore we consider it as a proper vehicle for conveying moral +instruction. But Hamlet himself--what does he suffer meanwhile by +being dragged forth as the public schoolmaster, to give lectures to +the crowd! Why, nine parts in ten of what Hamlet does, are +transactions between himself and his moral sense; they are the +effusions of his solitary musings, which he retires to holes and +corners and the most sequestered parts of the palace to pour forth; +or rather, they are the silent meditations with which his bosom is +bursting, reduced to _words_ for the sake of the reader, who must +else remain ignorant of what is passing there. These profound +sorrows, these light-and-noise-abhorring ruminations, which the +tongue scarce dares utter to deaf walls and chambers, how can they be +represented by a gesticulating actor, who comes and mouths them out +before an audience, making four hundred people his confidants at +once! I say not that it is the fault of the actor so to do; he must +pronounce them _ore rotundo_; he must accompany them with his eye; he +must insinuate them into his auditory by some trick of eye, tone or +gesture, or he fails. _He must be thinking all the while of his +appearance, because he knows that all the while the spectators are +judging of it_. And this is the way to represent the shy, negligent, +retiring Hamlet! + +It is true that there is no other mode of conveying a vast quantity +of thought and feeling to a great portion of the audience, who +otherwise would never earn it for themselves by reading, and the +intellectual acquisition gained this way may, for aught I know, be +inestimable; but I am not arguing that Hamlet should not be acted, +but how much Hamlet is made another thing by being acted. I have +heard much of the wonders which Garrick performed in this part; but +as I never saw him, I must have leave to doubt whether the +representation of such a character came within the province of his +art. Those who tell me of him, speak of his eye, of the magic of his +eye, and of his commanding voice: physical properties, vastly +desirable in an actor, and without which he can never insinuate +meaning into an auditory,--but what have they to do with Hamlet; what +have they to do with intellect? In fact, the things aimed at in +theatrical representation, are to arrest the spectator's eye upon the +form and the gesture, and so to gain a more favorable hearing to what +is spoken: it is not what the character is, but how he looks; not +what he says, but how he speaks it. I see no reason to think that if +the play of Hamlet were written over again by some such writer as +Banks or Lillo, retaining the process of the story, but totally +omitting all the poetry of it, all the divine features of Shakspeare, +his stupendous intellect; and only taking care to give us enough of +passionate dialogue, which Banks or Lillo were never at a loss to +furnish; I see not how the effect could be much different upon an +audience, nor how the actor has it in his power to represent +Shakspeare to us differently from his representation of Banks or +Lillo. Hamlet would still be a youthful accomplished prince, and must +be gracefully personated; he might be puzzled in his mind, wavering +in his conduct, seemingly cruel to Ophelia; he might see a ghost, and +start at it, and address it kindly when he found it to be his father; +all this in the poorest and most homely language of the servilest +creeper after nature that ever consulted the palate of an audience; +without troubling Shakspeare for the matter: and I see not but there +would be room for all the power which an actor has, to display +itself. All the passions and changes of passion might remain: for +those are much less difficult to write or act than is thought; it is +a trick easy to be attained, it is but rising or falling a note or +two in the voice, a whisper with a significant foreboding look to +announce its approach, and so contagious the counterfeit appearance +of any emotion is, that let the words be what they will, the look and +tone shall carry it off, and make it pass for deep skill in the +passions. + +It is common for people to talk of Shakspeare's plays being _so +natural_; that everybody can understand him. They are natural indeed, +they are grounded deep in nature, so deep that the depth of them lies +out of the reach of most of us. You shall hear the same persons say +that George Barnwell is very natural, and Othello is very natural, +that they are both very deep; and to them they are the same kind of +thing. At the one they sit and shed tears, because a good sort of +young man is tempted by a naughty woman to commit a _trifling +peccadillo_, the murder of an uncle or so[1] that is all, and so +comes to an untimely end, which is _so moving_; and at the other, +because a blackamoor in a fit of jealousy kills his innocent white +wife; and the odds are that ninety-nine out of a hundred would +willingly behold the same catastrophe happen to both the heroes, and +have thought the rope more due to Othello than to Barnwell. For of +the texture of Othello's mind, the inward construction marvellously +laid open with all its strengths and weaknesses, its heroic +confidences and its human misgivings, its agonies of hate springing +from the depths of love, they see no more than the spectators at a +cheaper rate, who pay their pennies apiece to look through the man's +telescope in Leicester-fields, see into the inward plot and +topography of the moon. Some dim thing or other they see; they see an +actor personating a passion, of grief, or anger, for instance, and +they recognize it as a copy of the usual external effects of such +passions; or at least as being true to _that symbol of the emotion +which passes current at the theatre for it_, for it is often no more +than that: but of the grounds of the passion, its correspondence to a +great or heroic nature, which is the only worthy object of +tragedy,--that common auditors know anything of this, or can have any +such notions dinned into them by the mere strength of an actor's +lungs,--that apprehensions foreign to them should be thus infused +into them by storm, I can neither believe, nor understand how it can +be possible. + +[Footnote 1: If this note could hope to meet the eye of any of the +Managers, I would entreat and beg of them, in the name of both the +Galleries, that this insult upon the morality of the common people of +London should cease to be eternally repeated in the holiday weeks. +Why are the 'Prentices of this famous and well-governed city, instead +of an amusement, to be treated over and over again with a nauseous +sermon of George Barnwell? Why _at the end of their vistas_ are we to +place the _gallows_? Were I an uncle, I should not much like a +nephew of mine to have such an example placed before his eyes. It is +really making uncle-murder too trivial to exhibit it as done upon +such slight motives;--it is attributing too much to such characters +as Millwood:--it is putting things into the heads of good young men, +which they would never otherwise have dreamed of. Uncles that think +anything of their lives, should fairly petition the Chamberlain +against it.] + +We talk of Shakspeare's admirable observations of life, when we +should feel, that not from a petty inquisition into those cheap and +every-day characters which surrounded him, as they surround us, but +from his own mind, which was, to borrow a phrase of Ben Jonson's, the +very "sphere of humanity," he fetched those images of virtue and of +knowledge, of which every one of us recognizing a part, think we +comprehend in our natures the whole; and oftentimes mistake the +powers which he positively creates in us, for nothing more than +indigenous faculties of our own minds, which only waited the +application of corresponding virtues in him to return a full and +clear echo of the same. + +To return to Hamlet.--Among the distinguishing features of that +wonderful character, one of the most interesting (yet painful) is +that soreness of mind which makes him treat the intrusions of +Polonius with harshness, and that asperity which he puts on in his +interviews with Ophelia. These tokens of an unhinged mind (if they be +not mixed in the latter case with a profound artifice of love, to +alienate Ophelia by affected discourtesies, so to prepare her mind +for the breaking off of that loving intercourse, which can no longer +find a place amidst business so serious as that which he has to do) +are parts of his character, which to reconcile with our admiration of +Hamlet, the most patient consideration of his situation is no more +than necessary; they are what we _forgive afterwards_, and explain by +the whole of his character, but _at the time_ they are harsh and +unpleasant. Yet such is the actor's necessity of giving strong blows +to the audience, that I have never seen a player in this character, +who did not exaggerate and strain to the utmost these ambiguous +features,--these temporary deformities in the character. They make +him express a vulgar scorn at Polonius which utterly degrades his +gentility, and which no explanation can render palatable; they make +him show contempt, and curl up the nose at Ophelia's +father,--contempt in its very grossest and most hateful form; but +they get applause by it: it is natural, people say; that is, the +words are scornful, and the actor expresses scorn, and that they can +judge of: but why so much scorn, and of that sort, they never think +of asking. + +So to Ophelia.--All the Hamlets that I have ever seen, rant and rave +at her as if she had committed some great crime, and the audience are +highly pleased, because the words of the part are satirical, and they +are enforced by the strongest expression of satirical indignation of +which the face and voice are capable. But then, whether Hamlet is +likely to have put on such brutal appearances to a lady whom he loved +so dearly, is never thought on. The truth is, that in all such deep +affections as had subsisted between Hamlet and Ophelia, there is a +stock of _supererogatory love_, (if I may venture to use the +expression,) which in any great grief of heart, especially where that +which preys upon the mind cannot be communicated, confers a kind of +indulgence upon the grieved party to express itself, even to its +heart's dearest object, in the language of a temporary alienation; +but it is not alienation, it is a distraction purely, and so it +always makes itself to be felt by that object: it is not anger, but +grief assuming the appearance of anger,--love awkwardly +counterfeiting hate, as sweet countenances when they try to frown: +but such sternness and fierce disgust as Hamlet is made to show, is +no counterfeit, but the real face of absolute aversion,--of +irreconcilable alienation. It may be said he puts on the madman; but +then he should only so far put on this counterfeit lunacy as his own +real distraction will give him leave; that is, incompletely, +imperfectly; not in that confirmed, practised way, like a master of +his art, or as Dame Quickly would say, "like one of those harlotry +players." + +I mean no disrespect to any actor, but the sort of pleasure which +Shakspeare's plays give in the acting seems to me not at all to +differ from that which the audience receive from those of other +writers; and, _they being in themselves essentially so different from +all others_, I must conclude that there is something in the nature of +acting which levels all distinctions. And, in fact, who does not +speak indifferently of the Gamester and of Macbeth as fine +stage-performances, and praise the Mrs. Beverley in the same way as +the Lady Macbeth of Mrs. S.? Belvidera, and Calista, and Isabella, +and Euphrasia, are they less liked than Imogen, or than Juliet, or +than Desdemona? Are they not spoken of and remembered in the same +way? Is not the female performer as great (as they call it) in one as +in the other? Did not Garrick shine, and was he not ambitious of +shining, in every drawling tragedy that his wretched day +produced,--the productions of the Hills, and the Murphys, and the +Browns,--and shall he have that honor to dwell in our minds forever +as an inseparable concomitant with Shakspeare? A kindred mind! O who +can read that affecting sonnet of Shakspeare which alludes to his +profession as a player:-- + + "Oh for my sake do you with Fortune chide, + The guilty goddess of my harmless deeds, + That did not better for my life provide + Than public means which public custom breeds-- + Thence comes it that my name receives a brand; + And almost thence my nature is subdued + To what it works in, like the dyer's hand."-- + +Or that other confession:-- + + "Alas! 'tis true, I have gone here and there, + And made myself a motley to thy view, + Gored mine own thoughts, sold cheap what is most dear--" + +Who can read these instances of jealous self-watchfulness in our +sweet Shakspeare, and dream of any congeniality between him and one +that, by every tradition of him, appears to have been as mere a +player as ever existed; to have had his mind tainted with the lowest +players' vices,--envy and jealousy, and miserable cravings after +applause; one who in the exercise of his profession was jealous even +of the women-performers that stood in his way; a manager full of +managerial tricks and stratagems and finesse; that any resemblance +should be dreamed of between him and Shakspeare,--Shakspeare, who, in +the plenitude and consciousness of his own powers, could with that +noble modesty, which we can neither imitate nor appreciate, express +himself thus of his own sense of his own defects:-- + + "Wishing me like to one more rich in hope, + Featured like him, like him with friends possest; + Desiring _this man's art, and that man's scope_." + +I am almost disposed to deny to Garrick the merit of being an admirer +of Shakspeare? A true lover of his excellences he certainly was not; +for would any true lover of them have admitted into his matchless +scenes such ribald trash as Tate and Cibber, and the rest of them, +that + + "With their darkness durst affront his light," + +have foisted into the acting plays of Shakspeare? I believe it +impossible that he could have had a proper reverence for Shakspeare, +and have condescended to go through that interpolated scene in +Richard the Third, in which Richard tries to break his wife's heart +by telling her he loves another woman, and says, "if she survives +this she is immortal." Yet I doubt not he delivered this vulgar stuff +with as much anxiety of emphasis as any of the genuine parts: and for +acting, it is as well calculated as any. But we have seen the part of +Richard lately produce great fame to an actor by his manner of +playing it; and it lets us into the secret of acting, and of popular +judgments of Shakspeare derived from acting. Not one of the +spectators who have witnessed Mr. C.'s exertions in that part, but +has come away with a proper conviction that Richard is a very wicked +man, and kills little children in their beds, with something like the +pleasure which the giants and ogres in children's books are +represented to have taken in that practice; moreover, that he is very +close and shrewd, and devilish cunning, for you could see that by his +eye. + +But is, in fact, this the impression we have in reading the Richard +of Shakspeare? Do we feel anything like disgust, as we do at that +butcherlike representation of him that passes for him on the stage? A +horror at his crimes blends with the effect which we feel, but how is +it qualified, how is it carried off, by the rich intellect which he +displays, his resources, his wit, his buoyant spirits, his vast +knowledge and insight into characters, the poetry of his part,--not +an atom of all which is made perceivable in Mr. C.'s way of acting +it. Nothing but his crimes, his actions, is visible; they are +prominent and staring; the murderer stands out, but where is the +lofty genius, the man of vast capacity,--the profound, the witty, +accomplished Richard? + +The truth is, the characters of Shakspeare are so much the objects of +meditation rather than of interest or curiosity as to their actions, +that while we are reading any of his great criminal +characters,--Macbeth, Richard, even Iago,--we think not so much of +the crimes which they commit, as of the ambition, the aspiring +spirit, the intellectual activity, which prompts them to overleap +these moral fences. Barnwell is a wretched murderer; there is a +certain fitness between his neck and the rope; he is the legitimate +heir to the gallows; nobody who thinks at all can think of any +alleviating circumstances in his case to make him a fit object of +mercy. Or to take an instance from the higher tragedy, what else but +a mere assassin is Glenalvon? Do we think of anything but of the +crime which he commits, and the rack which he deserves? That is all +which we really think about him. Whereas in corresponding characters +in Shakspeare, so little do the actions comparatively affect us, that +while the impulses, the inner mind in all its perverted greatness, +solely seems real and is exclusively attended to, the crime is +comparatively nothing. But when we see these things represented, the +acts which they do are comparatively everything, their impulses +nothing. The state of sublime emotion into which we are elevated by +those images of night and horror which Macbeth is made to utter, that +solemn prelude with which he entertains the time till the bell shall +strike which is to call him to murder Duncan,--when we no longer read +it in a book, when we have given up that vantage ground of +abstraction which reading possesses over seeing, and come to see a +man in his bodily shape before our eyes actually preparing to commit +a murder, if the acting be true and impressive, as I have witnessed +it in Mr. K.'s performance of that part, the painful anxiety about +the act, the natural longing to prevent it while it yet seems +unperpetrated, the too close pressing semblance of reality, give a +pain and an uneasiness which totally destroy all the delight which +the words in the book convey, where the deed doing never presses upon +us with the painful sense of presence; it rather seems to belong to +history,--to something past and inevitable, if it has anything to do +with time at all. The sublime images, the poetry alone, is that which +is present to our minds in the reading. + +So to see Lear acted,--to see an old man tottering about the stage +with a walking-stick, turned out of doors by his daughters in a rainy +night, has nothing in it but what is painful and disgusting. We want +to take him into shelter and relieve him. That is all the feeling +which the acting of Lear ever produced in me. But the Lear of +Shakspeare cannot be acted. The contemptible machinery by which they +mimic the storm which he goes out in, is not more inadequate to +represent the horrors of the real elements, than any actor can be to +represent Lear; they might more easily propose to personate the Satan +of Milton upon a stage, or one of Michael Angelo's terrible figures. +The greatness of Lear is not in corporal dimension, but in +intellectual: the explosions of his passion are terrible as a +volcano; they are storms turning up and disclosing to the bottom that +sea, his mind, with all its vast riches. It is his mind which is laid +bare. This case of flesh and blood seems too insignificant to be +thought on; even as he himself neglects it. On the stage we see +nothing but corporal infirmities and weakness, the impotence of rage; +while we read it, we see not Lear, but we are Lear,--we are in his +mind, we are sustained by a grandeur which baffles the malice of +daughters and storms; in the aberrations of his reason, we discover a +mighty irregular power of reasoning, immethodized from the ordinary +purposes of life, but exerting its powers, as the wind blows where it +listeth, at will upon the corruptions and abuses of mankind. What +have looks, or tones, to do with that sublime identification of his +age with that of the _heavens themselves_, when, in his reproaches to +them for conniving at the injustice of his children, he reminds them +that "they themselves are old?" What gesture shall we appropriate to +this? What has the voice or the eye to do with such things? But the +play is beyond all art, as the tamperings with it show; it is too +hard and stony; it must have love-scenes, and a happy ending. It is +not enough that Cordelia is a daughter, she must shine as a lover +too. Tate has put his hook in the nostrils of this Leviathan, for +Garrick and his followers, the showmen of the scene, to draw the +mighty beast about more easily. A happy ending!--as if the living +martyrdom that Lear had gone through,--the flaying of his feelings +alive, did not make a fair dismissal from the stage of life the only +decorous thing for him. If he is to live and be happy after, if he +could sustain this world's burden after, why all this pudder and +preparation,--why torment us with all this unnecessary sympathy? As +if the childish pleasure of getting his gilt robes and sceptre again +could tempt him to act over again his misused station,--as if, at his +years and with his experience, anything was left but to die. + +Lear is essentially impossible to be represented on a stage. But how +many dramatic personages are there in Shakspeare, which though more +tractable and feasible (if I may so speak) than Lear, yet from some +circumstance, some adjunct to their character, are improper to be +shown to our bodily eye! Othello, for instance. Nothing can be more +soothing, more flattering to the nobler parts of our natures, than to +read of a young Venetian lady of the highest extraction, through the +force of love and from a sense of merit in him whom she loved, laying +aside every consideration of kindred, and country, and color, and +wedding with a _coal-black Moor_--(for such he is represented, in the +imperfect state of knowledge respecting foreign countries in those +days, compared with our own, or in compliance with popular notions, +though the Moors are now well enough known to be by many shades less +unworthy of a white woman's fancy)--it is the perfect triumph of +virtue over accidents, of the imagination over the senses. She sees +Othello's color in his mind. But upon the stage, when the imagination +is no longer the ruling faculty, but we are left to our poor +unassisted senses, I appeal to every one that has seen Othello +played, whether he did not, on the contrary, sink Othello's mind in +his color; whether he did not find something extremely revolting in +the courtship and wedded caresses of Othello and Desdemona; and +whether the actual sight of the thing did not overweigh all that +beautiful compromise which we make in reading;--and the reason it +should do so is obvious, because there is just so much reality +presented to our senses as to give a perception of disagreement, with +not enough of belief in the internal motives,--all that which is +unseen,--to overpower and reconcile the first and obvious +prejudices.[1] What we see upon a stage is body and bodily action; +what we are conscious of in reading is almost exclusively the mind, +and its movements; and this I think may sufficiently account for the +very different sort of delight with which the same play so often +affects us in the reading and the seeing. + +[Footnote 1: The error of supposing that because Othello's color does +not offend us in the reading, it should also not offend us in the +seeing, is just such a fallacy as supposing that an Adam and Eve in a +picture shall affect us just as they do in the poem. But in the poem +we for a while have Paradisiacal senses given us, which vanish when +we see a man and his wife without clothes in the picture. The +painters themselves feel this, as is apparent by the awkward shifts +they have recourse to, to make them look not quite naked; by a sort +of prophetic anachronism, antedating the invention of fig-leaves. So +in the reading of the play, we see with Desdemona's eyes: in the +seeing of it, we are forced to look with our own.] + +It requires little reflection to perceive, that if those characters +in Shakspeare which are within the precincts of nature, have yet +something in them which appeals too exclusively to the imagination, +to admit of their being made objects to the senses without suffering +a change and a diminution,--that still stronger the objection must +lie against representing another line of characters, which Shakspeare +has introduced to give a wildness and a supernatural elevation to his +scenes, as if to remove them still farther from that assimilation to +common life in which their excellence is vulgarly supposed to +consist. When we read the incantations of those terrible beings the +Witches in Macbeth, though some of the ingredients of their hellish +composition savor of the grotesque, yet is the effect upon us other +than the most serious and appalling that can be imagined? Do we not +feel spellbound as Macbeth was? Can any mirth accompany a sense of +their presence? We might as well laugh under a consciousness of the +principle of Evil himself being truly and really present with us. But +attempt to bring these things on to a stage, and you turn them +instantly into so many old women, that men and children are to laugh +at. Contrary to the old saying, that "seeing is believing," the sight +actually destroys the faith; and the mirth in which we indulge at +their expense, when we see these creatures upon a stage, seems to be +a sort of indemnification which we make to ourselves for the terror +which they put us in when reading made them an object of +belief,--when we surrendered up our reason to the poet, as children +to their nurses and their elders; and we laugh at our fears, as +children, who thought they saw something in the dark, triumph when +the bringing in of a candle discovers the vanity of their fears. For +this exposure of supernatural agents upon a stage is truly bringing +in a candle to expose their own delusiveness. It is the solitary +taper and the book that generates a faith in these terrors: a ghost +by chandelier light, and in good company, deceives no spectators,--a +ghost that can be measured by the eye, and his human dimensions made +out at leisure. The sight of a well-lighted house, and a well-dressed +audience, shall arm the most nervous child against any apprehensions: +as Tom Brown says of the impenetrable skin of Achilles with his +impenetrable armor over it, "Bully Dawson would have fought the devil +with such advantages." + +Much has been said, and deservedly, in reprobation of the vile +mixture which Dryden has thrown into the Tempest: doubtless, without +some such vicious alloy, the impure ears of that age would never have +sat out to hear so much innocence of love as is contained in the +sweet courtship of Ferdinand and Miranda. But is the tempest of +Shakspeare at all a subject for stage-representation? It is one thing +to read of an enchanter, and to believe the wondrous tale while we +are reading it; but to have a conjurer brought before us in his +conjuring gown, with his spirits about him, which none but himself +and some hundred of favored spectators before the curtain are +supposed to see, involves such a quantity of the _hateful +incredible_, that all our reverence for the author cannot hinder us +from perceiving such gross attempts upon the senses to be in the +highest degree childish and inefficient. Spirits and fairies cannot +be represented, they cannot even be painted,--they can only be +believed. But the elaborate and anxious provision of scenery, which +the luxury of the age demands, in these cases works a quite contrary +effect to what is intended. That which in comedy, or plays of +familiar life, adds so much to the life of the imitation, in plays +which appeal to the higher faculties positively destroys the illusion +which it is introduced to aid. A parlor or a drawing-room,--a library +opening into a garden--a garden with an alcove in it,--a street, or +the piazza of Covent Garden, does well enough in a scene; we are +content to give as much credit to it as it demands; or rather, we +think little about it,--it is little more than reading at the top of +a page, "Scene, a garden;" we do not imagine ourselves there, but we +readily admit the imitation of familiar objects. But to think by the +help of painted trees and caverns, which we know to be painted, to +transport our minds to Prospero, and his island and his lonely +cell;[1] or by the aid of a fiddle dexterously thrown in, in an +interval of speaking, to make us believe that we hear those +supernatural noises of which the isle was full: the Orrery Lecturer +at the Haymarket might as well hope, by his musical glasses cleverly +stationed out of sight behind his apparatus, to make us believe that +we do indeed hear the crystal spheres ring out that chime, which if +it were to enwrap our fancy long, Milton thinks, + + "Time would run back and fetch the age of gold, + And speckled Vanity + Would sicken soon and die, + And leprous Sin would melt from earthly mould; + Yea, Hell itself would pass away, + And leave its dolorous mansions to the peering day." + +[Footnote 1: It will be said these things are done in pictures. But +pictures and scenes are very different things. Painting is a world of +itself; but in scene-painting there is the attempt to deceive; and +there is the discordancy never to be got over, between painted scenes +and real people.] + +The garden of Eden, with our first parents in it, is not more +impossible to be shown on a stage, than the Enchanted isle, with its +no less interesting and innocent first settlers. + +The subject of Scenery is closely connected with that of the Dresses, +which are so anxiously attended to on our stage. I remember the last +time I saw Macbeth played, the discrepancy I felt at the changes of +garment which he varied, the shiftings and reshiftings, like a Romish +priest at mass. The luxury of stage-improvements, and the importunity +of the public eye, require this. The coronation robe of the Scottish +monarch was fairly a counterpart to that which our King wears when he +goes to the Parliament house, just so full and cumbersome, and set +out with ermine and pearls. And if things must be represented, I see +not what to find fault with in this. But in reading, what robe are we +conscious of? Some dim images of royalty--a crown and sceptre may +float before our eyes, but who shall describe the fashion of it? Do +we see in our mind's eye what Webb or any other robe-maker could +pattern? This is the inevitable consequence of imitating everything, +to make all things natural. Whereas the reading of a tragedy is a +fine abstraction. It presents to the fancy just so much of external +appearances as to make us feel that we are among flesh and blood, +while by far the greater and better part of our imagination is +employed upon the thoughts and internal machinery of the character. +But in acting, scenery, dress, the most contemptible things, call +upon us to judge of their naturalness. + +Perhaps it would be no bad similitude, to liken the pleasure which we +take in seeing one of these fine plays acted, compared with that +quiet delight which we find in the reading of it, to the different +feelings with which a reviewer, and a man that is not a reviewer, +reads a fine poem. The accursed critical habit--the being called upon +to judge and pronounce, must make it quite a different thing to the +former. In seeing these plays acted, we are affected just as judges. +When Hamlet compares the two pictures of Gertrude's first and second +husband, who wants to see the pictures? But in the acting, a +miniature must be lugged out; which we know not to be the picture, +but only to show how finely a miniature may be represented. This +showing of everything levels all things: it makes tricks, bows, and +curtseys, of importance. Mrs. S. never got more fame by anything than +by the manner in which she dismisses the guests in the banquet-scene +in Macbeth: it is as much remembered as any of her thrilling tones or +impressive looks. But does such a trifle as this enter into the +imaginations of the readers of that wild and wonderful scene? Does +not the mind dismiss the feasters as rapidly as it can? Does it care +about the gracefulness of the doing it? But by acting, and judging of +acting, all these non-essentials are raised into an importance, +injurious to the main interest of the play. + +I have confined my observations to the tragic parts of Shakspeare. It +would be no very difficult task to extend the inquiry to his +comedies; and to show why Falstaff, Shallow, Sir Hugh Evans, and the +rest, are equally incompatible with stage-representation. The length +to which this Essay has run will make it, I am afraid, sufficiently +distasteful to the Amateurs of the Theatre, without going any deeper +into the subject at present. + + + * * * * * + + +CHARACTERS OF DRAMATIC WRITERS, +CONTEMPORARY WITH SHAKSPEAKE. + + * * * * * + +When I selected for publication, in 1808, "Specimens of English +Dramatic Poets" who lived about the time of Shakspeare, the kind of +extracts which I was anxious to give were not so much passages of wit +and humor, though the old plays are rich in such, as scenes of +passion, sometimes of the deepest quality, interesting situations, +serious descriptions, that which is more nearly allied to poetry than +to wit, and to tragic rather than to comic poetry. The plays which I +made choice of were, with few exceptions, such as treat of human life +and manners, rather than masques and Arcadian pastorals, with their +train of abstractions, unimpassioned deities, passionate +mortals--Claius, and Medorus, and Amintas, and Amaryllis. My leading +design was to illustrate what may be called the moral sense of our +ancestors. To show in what manner they felt when they placed +themselves by the power of imagination in trying circumstances, in +the conflicts of duty and passion, or the strife of contending +duties; what sort of loves and enmities theirs were; how their griefs +were tempered, and their full-swoln joys abated: how much of +Shakspeare shines in the great men his contemporaries, and how far in +his divine mind and manners he surpassed them and all mankind. I was +also desirous to bring together some of the most admired scenes of +Fletcher and Massinger, in the estimation of the world the only +dramatic poets of that age entitled to be considered after +Shakspeare, and, by exhibiting them in the same volume with the more +impressive scenes of old Marlowe, Heywood, Tourneur, Webster, Ford, +and others, to show what we had slighted, while beyond all proportion +we had been crying up one or two favorite names. From the desultory +criticisms which accompanied that publication, I have selected a few +which I thought would best stand by themselves, as requiring least +immediate reference to the play or passage by which they were +suggested. + + * * * * * + +CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE. + +_Lust's Dominion, or the Lascivious Queen_.--This tragedy is in King +Cambyses' vein; rape, and murder, and superlatives; "huffing braggart +puft lines," such as the play-writers anterior to Shakspeare are full +of, and Pistol but coldly imitates. + +_Tamburlaine the Great, or the Scythian Shepherd_.--The lunes of +Tamburlaine are perfect midsummer madness. Nebuchadnezzar's are mere +modest pretensions compared with the thundering vaunts of this +Scythian Shepherd. He comes in drawn by conquered kings, and +reproaches these _pampered jades of Asia_ that they can _draw but +twenty miles a day_. Till I saw this passage with my own eyes, I +never believed that it was anything more than a pleasant burlesque of +mine Ancient's. But I can assure my readers that it is soberly set +down in a play, which their ancestors took to be serious. + +_Edward the Second_.--In a very different style from mighty +Tamburlaine is the Tragedy of Edward the Second. The reluctant pangs +of abdicating royalty in Edward furnished hints, which Shakspeare +scarcely improved in his Richard the Second; and the death-scene of +Marlowe's king moves pity and terror beyond any scene ancient or +modern with which I am acquainted. + +_The Rich Jew of Malta_.--Marlowe's Jew does not approach so near to +Shakspeare's, as his Edward the Second does to Richard the Second. +Barabas is a mere monster brought in with a large painted nose to +please the rabble. He kills in sport, poisons whole nunneries, +invents infernal machines. He is just such an exhibition as a century +or two earlier might have been played before the Londoners "by the +royal command," when a general pillage and massacre of the Hebrews +had been previously resolved on in the cabinet. It is curious to see +a superstition wearing out. The idea of a Jew, which our pious +ancestors contemplated with so much horror, has nothing in it now +revolting. We have tamed the claws of the beast, and pared its nails, +and now we take it to our arms, fondle it, write plays to flatter it; +it is visited by princes, affects a taste, patronizes the arts, and +is the only liberal and gentlemanlike thing in Christendom. + +_Doctor Faustus_.--The growing horrors of Faustus's last scene are +awfully marked by the hours and half hours as they expire, and bring +him nearer and nearer to the exactment of his dire compact. It is +indeed an agony and a fearful colluctation. Marlowe is said to have +been tainted with atheistical positions, to have denied God and the +Trinity. To such a genius the history of Faustus must have been +delectable food: to wander in fields where curiosity is forbidden to +go, to approach the dark gulf, near enough to look in, to be busied +in speculations which are the rottenest part of the core of the fruit +that fell from the tree of knowledge.[1] Barabas the Jew, and Faustus +the conjurer, are offsprings of a mind which at least delighted to +dally with interdicted subjects. They both talk a language which a +believer would have been tender of putting into the mouth of a +character though but in fiction. But the holiest minds have sometimes +not thought it reprehensible to counterfeit impiety in the person of +another, to bring Vice upon the stage speaking her own dialect; and, +themselves being armed with an unction of self-confident impunity, +have not scrupled to handle and touch that familiarly which would be +death to others. Milton, in the person of Satan, has started +speculations hardier than any which the feeble armory of the atheist +ever furnished; and the precise, strait-laced Richardson has +strengthened Vice, from the mouth of Lovelace, with entangling +sophistries and abstruse pleas against her adversary Virtue, which +Sedley, Villiers, and Rochester wanted depth of libertinism enough to +have invented. + +[Footnote 1: Error, entering into the world with Sin among us poor +Adamites, may be said to spring from the tree of knowledge itself, +and from the rotten kernels of that fatal apple.--_Howell's +Letters_.] + + * * * * * + +THOMAS DECKER. + +_Old Fortunatus_.--The humor of a frantic lover in the scene where +Orleans to his friend Galloway defends the passion with which +himself, being a prisoner in the English king's court, is enamored to +frenzy of the king's daughter Agripyna, is done to the life. Orleans +is as passionate an inamorato as any which Shakspeare ever drew. He +is just such another adept in Love's reasons. The sober people of the +world are with him, + + "A swarm of fools + Crowding together to be counted wise." + +He talks "pure Biron and Romeo;" he is almost as poetical as they, +quite as philosophical, only a little madder. After all, Love's +sectaries are a reason unto themselves. We have gone retrograde to +the noble heresy, since the days when Sidney proselyted our nation to +this mixed health and disease: the kindliest symptom, yet the most +alarming crisis, in the ticklish state of youth; the nourisher and +the destroyer of hopeful wits; the mother of twin births, wisdom and +folly, valor and weakness; the servitude above freedom; the gentle +mind's religion; the liberal superstition. + +_The Honest Whore_.--There is in the second part of this play, where +Bellafront, a reclaimed harlot, recounts some of the miseries of her +profession, a simple picture of honor and shame, contrasted without +violence, and expressed without immodesty; which is worth all the +_strong lines_ against the harlot's profession, with which both parts +of this play are offensively crowded. A satirist is always to be +suspected, who, to make vice odious, dwells upon all its acts and +minutest circumstances with a sort of relish and retrospective +fondness. But so near are the boundaries of panegyric and invective, +that a worn-out sinner is sometimes found to make the best declaimer +against sin. The same high-seasoned descriptions, which in his +unregenerate state served but to inflame his appetites, in his new +province of a moralist will serve him, a little turned, to expose the +enormity of those appetites in other men. When Cervantes, with such +proficiency of fondness dwells upon the Don's library, who sees not +that he has been a great reader of books of knight-errantry--perhaps +was at some time of his life in danger of falling into those very +extravagances which he ridiculed so happily in his hero! + + * * * * * + +JOHN MARSTON. + +_Antonio and Mellida_.--The situation of Andrugio and Lucio, in the +first part of this tragedy,--where Andrugio, Duke of Genoa, banished +his country, with the loss of a son supposed drowned, is cast upon +the territory of his mortal enemy the Duke of Venice, with no +attendants but Lucio, an old nobleman, and a page--resembles that of +Lear and Kent, in that king's distresses. Andrugio, like Lear, +manifests a king-like impatience, a turbulent greatness, an affected +resignation. The enemies which he enters lists to combat, "Despair +and mighty Grief and sharp Impatience," and the forces which he +brings to vanquish them, "cornets of horse," &c., are in the boldest +style of allegory. They are such a "race of mourners" as the +"infection of sorrows loud" in the intellect might beget on some +"pregnant cloud" in the imagination. The prologue to the second part, +for its passionate earnestness, and for the tragic note of +preparation which it sounds, might have preceded one of those old +tales of Thebes or Pelops' line, which Milton has so highly +commended, as free from the common error of the poets in his day, of +"intermixing comic stuff with tragic sadness and gravity, brought in +without discretion corruptly to gratify the people." It is as solemn +a preparative as the "warning voice which he who saw the Apocalypse +heard cry." + +_What You Will_.--_O I shall ne'er forget how he went cloath'd_. Act +1. Scene 1.--To judge of the liberality of these notions of dress, we +must advert to the days of Gresham, and the consternation which a +phenomenon habited like the merchant here described would have +excited among the flat round caps, and cloth stockings upon 'Change, +when those "original arguments or tokens of a citizen's vocation were +in fashion, not more for thrift and usefulness than for distinction +and grace." The blank uniformity to which all professional +distinctions in apparel have been long hastening is one instance of +the decay of symbols among us, which, whether it has contributed or +not to make us a more intellectual, has certainly made us a less +imaginative people. Shakespeare knew the force of signs: a "malignant +and turbaned Turk." This "meal-cap miller," says the author of God's +Revenge against Murder, to express his indignation at an atrocious +outrage committed by the miller Pierot upon the person of the fair +Marieta. + + * * * * * + +AUTHOR UNKNOWN. + +_The Merry Devil of Edmonton_.--The scene in this delightful comedy, +in which Jerningham, "with the true feeling of a zealous friend," +touches the griefs of Mounchensey, seems written to make the reader +happy. Few of our dramatists or novelists have attended enough to +this. They torture and wound us abundantly. They are economists only +in delight. Nothing can be finer, more gentlemanlike, and nobler, +than the conversation and compliments of these young men. How +delicious is Raymond Mounchensey's forgetting, in his fears, that +Jerningham has a "Saint in Essex;" and how sweetly his friend reminds +him! I wish it could be ascertained, which there is some grounds for +believing, that Michael Drayton was the author of this piece. It +would add a worthy appendage to the renown of that Panegyrist of my +native Earth; who has gone over her soil, in his Polyolbion, with the +fidelity of a herald, and the painful love of a son; who has not left +a rivulet, so narrow that it may be stepped over, without honorable +mention; and has animated hills and streams with life and passion +beyond the dreams of old mythology. + + * * * * * + +THOMAS HEYWOOD. + +_A Woman Killed with Kindness_.--Heywood is a sort of _prose_ +Shakspeare. His scenes are to the full as natural and affecting. But +we miss _the poet_, that which in Shakspeare always appears out and +above the surface of _the nature_. Heywood's characters, in this +play, for instance, his country gentlemen, &c., are exactly what we +see, but of the best kind of what we see in life. Shakspeare makes us +believe, while we are among his lovely creations, that they are +nothing but what we are familiar with, as in dreams new things seem +old; but we awake, and sigh for the difference. + +_The English Traveller_.--Heywood's preface to this play is +interesting, as it shows the heroic indifference about the opinion of +posterity, which some of these great writers seem to have felt. There +is a magnanimity in authorship, as in everything else. His ambition +seems to have been confined to the pleasure of hearing the players +speak his lines while he lived. It does not appear that he ever +contemplated the possibility of being read by after-ages. What a +slender pittance of fame was motive sufficient to the production of +such plays as the English Traveller, the Challenge for Beauty, and +the Woman Killed with Kindness! Posterity is bound to take care that +a writer loses nothing by such a noble modesty. + + * * * * * + +THOMAS MIDDLETON AND WILLIAM ROWLEY. + +_A Fair Quarrel_.--The insipid levelling morality to which the modern +stage is tied down, would not admit of such admirable passions as +these scenes are filled with. A puritanical obtuseness of sentiment, +a stupid infantile goodness, is creeping among us, instead of the +vigorous passions, and virtues clad in flesh and blood, with which +the old dramatists present us. Those noble and liberal casuists could +discern in the differences, the quarrels, the animosities of men, a +beauty and truth of moral feeling, no less than in the everlastingly +inculcated duties of forgiveness and atonement. With us, all is +hypocritical meekness. A reconciliation-scene, be the occasion never +so absurd, never fails of applause. Our audiences come to the theatre +to be complimented on their goodness. They compare notes with the +amiable characters in the play, and find a wonderful sympathy of +disposition between them. We have a common stock of dramatic +morality, out of which a writer may be supplied without the trouble +of copying it from originals within his own breast. To know the +boundaries of honor, to be judiciously valiant, to have a temperance +which shall beget a smoothness in the angry swellings of youth, to +esteem life as nothing when the sacred reputation of a parent is to +be defended, yet to shake and tremble under a pious cowardice when +that ark of an honest confidence is found to be frail and tottering, +to feel the true blows of a real disgrace blunting that sword which +the imaginary strokes of a supposed false imputation had put so keen +an edge upon but lately; to do, or to imagine this done, in a feigned +story, asks something more of a moral sense, somewhat a greater +delicacy of perception in questions of right and wrong, than goes to +the writing of two or three hackneyed sentences about the laws of +honor as opposed to the laws of the land, or a commonplace against +duelling. Yet such things would stand a writer now-a-days in far +better stead than Captain Agar and his conscientious honor; and he +would be considered as a far better teacher of morality than old +Rowley or Middleton, if they were living. + + * * * * * + +WILLIAM ROWLEY. + +_A New Wonder; a Woman never Vext_.--The old play-writers are +distinguished by an honest boldness of exhibition,--they show +everything without being ashamed. If a reverse in fortune is to be +exhibited, they fairly bring us to the prison-grate and the +alms-basket. A poor man on our stage is always a gentleman; he may be +known by a peculiar neatness of apparel, and by wearing black. Our +delicacy, in fact, forbids the dramatizing of distress at all. It is +never shown in its essential properties; it appears but as the +adjunct of some virtue, as something which is to be relieved, from +the approbation of which relief the spectators are to derive a +certain soothing of self-referred satisfaction. We turn away from the +real essences of things to hunt after their relative shadows, moral +duties; whereas, if the truth of things were fairly represented, the +relative duties might be safely trusted to themselves, and moral +philosophy lose the name of a science. + + * * * * * + +THOMAS MIDDLETON. + +_The Witch_.--Though some resemblance may be traced between the +charms in Macbeth and the incantations in this play, which is +supposed to have preceded it, this coincidence will not detract much +from the originality of Shakspeare. His witches are distinguished +from the witches of Middleton by essential differences. These are +creatures to whom man or woman, plotting some dire mischief, might +resort for occasional consultation. Those originate deeds of blood, +and begin bad impulses to men. From the moment that their eyes first +meet with Macbeth's, he is spellbound. That meeting sways his +destiny. He can never break the fascination. These witches can hurt +the body; those have power over the soul. Hecate in Middleton has a +son, a low buffoon: the hags of Shakspeare have neither child of +their own, nor seem to be descended from any parent. They are foul +anomalies, of whom we know not whence they are sprung, nor whether +they have beginning or ending. As they are without human passions, so +they seem to be without human relations. They come with thunder and +lightning, and vanish to airy music. This is all we know of them. +Except Hecate, they have no _names_; which heightens their +mysteriousness. The names, and some of the properties which the other +author has given to his hags, excite smiles. The Weird Sisters are +serious things. Their presence cannot coexist with mirth. But in a +lesser degree, the witches of Middleton are fine creations. Their +power, too, is, in some measure, over the mind. They raise jars, +jealousies, strifes, "like a thick scurf" over life. + + * * * * * + +WILLIAM ROWLEY,--THOMAS DECKER,--JOHN FORD, ETC. + +_The Witch of Edmonton_.--Mother Sawyer, in this wild play, differs +from the hags of both Middleton and Shakspeare. She is the plain, +traditional old woman witch of our ancestors; poor, deformed, and +ignorant; the terror of villages, herself amenable to a justice. That +should he a hardy sheriff, with the power of the county at his heels, +that would lay hands on the Weird Sisters. They are of another +jurisdiction. But upon the common and received opinion, the author +(or authors) have engrafted strong fancy. There is something +frightfully earnest in her invocations to the Familiar. + + * * * * * + +CYRIL TOURNEUR. + +_The Revenger's Tragedy_.--The reality and life of the dialogue, in +which Vindici and Hippolito first tempt their mother, and then +threaten her with death for consenting to the dishonor of their +sister, passes any scenical illusion I ever felt. I never read it but +my ears tingle, and I feel a hot blush overspread my cheeks, as if I +were presently about to proclaim such malefactions of myself, as the +brothers here rebuke in their unnatural parent, in words more keen +and dagger-like than those which Hamlet speaks to his mother. Such +power has the passion of shame truly personated, not only to strike +guilty creatures unto the soul, but to "appall" even those that are +"free." + + * * * * * + +JOHN WEBSTER. + +_The Duchess of Malfy_.--All the several parts of the dreadful +apparatus with which the death of the Duchess is ushered in, the +waxen images which counterfeit death, the wild masque of madmen, the +tomb-maker, the bellman, the living person's dirge, the mortification +by degrees,--are not more remote from the conceptions of ordinary +vengeance, than the strange character of suffering which they seem to +bring upon their victim is out of the imagination of ordinary poets. +As they are not like inflictions of this life, so her language seems +not of this world. She has lived among horrors till she is become +"native and endowed unto that element." She speaks the dialect of +despair; her tongue has a smatch of Tartarus and the souls in bale. +To move a horror skilfully, to touch a soul to the quick, to lay upon +fear as much as it can bear, to wean and weary a life till it is +ready to drop, and then step in with mortal instruments to take its +last forfeit: this only a Webster can do. Inferior geniuses may "upon +horror's head horrors accumulate," but they cannot do this. They +mistake quantity for quality; they "terrify babes with painted +devils;" but they know not how a soul is to be moved. Their terrors +want dignity, their affrightments are without decorum. + +_The White Devil_, _or Vittoria Corombona_.--This White Devil of +Italy sets off a bad cause so speciously, and pleads with such an +innocence-resembling boldness, that we seem to see that matchless +beauty of her face which inspires such gay confidence into her, and +are ready to expect, when she has done her pleadings, that her very +judges, her accusers, the grave ambassadors who sit as spectators, +and all the court, will rise and make proffer to defend her, in spite +of the utmost conviction of her guilt; as the Shepherds in Don +Quixote make proffer to follow the beautiful Shepherdess Marcela, +"without making any profit of her manifest resolution made there in +their hearing." + + "So sweet and lovely does she make the shame, + Which, like a canker in the fragrant rose, + Does spot the beauty of her budding name!" + +I never saw anything like the funeral dirge in this play for the +death of Marcello, except the ditty which reminds Ferdinand of his +drowned father in the Tempest. As that is of the water, watery; so +this is of the earth, earthy. Both have that intenseness of feeling, +which seems to resolve itself into the element which it contemplates. + +In a note on the Spanish Tragedy in the Specimens, I have said that +there is nothing in the undoubted plays of Jonson which would +authorize us to suppose that he could have supplied the additions to +Hieronymo. I suspected the agency of some more potent spirit. I +thought that Webster might have furnished them. They seemed full of +that wild, solemn, preternatural cast of grief which bewilders us in +the Duchess of Malfy. On second consideration, I think this a hasty +criticism. They are more like the overflowing griefs and talking +distraction of Titus Andronicus. The sorrows of the Duchess set +inward; if she talks, it is little more than soliloquy imitating +conversation in a kind of bravery. + + * * * * * + +JOHN FORD. + +_The Broken Heart_.--I do not know where to find, in any play, a +catastrophe so grand, so solemn, and so surprising, as in this. This +is indeed, according to Milton, to describe high passions and high +actions. The fortitude of the Spartan boy, who let a beast gnaw out +his bowels till he died, without expressing a groan, is a faint +bodily image of this dilaceration of the spirit, and exenteration of +the inmost mind, which Calantha, with a holy violence against her +nature, keeps closely covered, till the last duties of a wife and a +queen are fulfilled. Stories of martyrdom are but of chains and the +stake; a little bodily suffering. These torments + + "On the purest spirits prey, + As on entrails, joints, and limbs, + With answerable pains, but more intense." + +What a noble thing is the soul, in its strengths and in its +weaknesses! Who would be less weak than Calantha? Who can be so +strong? The expression of this transcendent scene almost bears us in +imagination to Calvary and the Cross; and we seem to perceive some +analogy between the scenical suffering which we are here +contemplating and the real agonies of that final completion to which +we dare no more than hint a reference. Ford was of the first order of +poets. He sought for sublimity, not by parcels, in metaphors or +visible images, but directly where she has her full residence, in the +heart of man; in the actions and sufferings of the greatest minds. +There is a grandeur of the soul, above mountains, seas, and the +elements. Even in the poor perverted reason of Giovanni and +Annabella, in the play[1] which stands at the head of the modern +collection of the works of this author, we discern traces of that +fiery particle, which, in the irregular starting from out the road of +beaten action, discovers something of a right line even in obliquity, +and shows hints of an improvable greatness in the lowest descents and +degradations of our nature. + +[Footnote: "'Tis Pity she's a Whore."] + + * * * * * + +FULKE GREVILLE, LORD BROOKE. + +_Alaham, Mustapha_.--The two tragedies of Lord Brooke, printed among +his poems, might with more propriety have been termed political +treatises than plays. Their author has strangely contrived to make +passion, character, and interest, of the highest order, subservient +to the expression of state dogmas and mysteries. He is in nine parts +Machiavel and Tacitus, for one part Sophocles or Seneca. In this +writer's estimate of the powers of the mind, the understanding must +have held a most tyrannical preeminence. Whether we look into his +plays or his most passionate love-poems, we shall find all frozen and +made rigid with intellect. The finest movements of the human heart, +the utmost grandeur of which the soul is capable, are essentially +comprised in the actions and speeches of Caelica and Camena. +Shakspeare, who seems to have had a peculiar delight in contemplating +womanly perfection, whom for his many sweet images of female +excellence all women are in an especial manner bound to love, has not +raised the ideal of the female character higher than Lord Brooke, in +these two women, has done. But it requires a study equivalent to the +learning of a new language to understand their meaning when they +speak. It is indeed hard to hit: + + "Much like thy riddle, Samson, in one day + Or seven though one should musing sit." + +It is as if a being of pure intellect should take upon him to express +the emotions of our sensitive natures. There would be all knowledge, +but sympathetic expressions would be wanting. + + * * * * * + +BEN JONSON. + +_The Case is Altered_.--The passion for wealth has worn out much of +its grossness in tract of time. Our ancestors certainly conceived of +money as able to confer a distinct gratification in itself, not +considered simply as a symbol of wealth. The old poets, when they +introduce a miser, make him address his gold as his mistress; as +something to be seen, felt, and hugged; as capable of satisfying two +of the senses at least. The substitution of a thin, unsatisfying +medium in the place of the good old tangible metal, has made avarice +quite a Platonic affection in comparison with the seeing, touching, +and handling pleasures of the old Chrysophilites. A bank-note can no +more satisfy the touch of a true sensualist in this passion, than +Creusa could return her husband's embrace in the shades. See the Cave +of Mammon in Spenser; Barabas's contemplation of his wealth, in the +Rich Jew of Malta; Luke's raptures in the City Madam; the idolatry +and absolute gold-worship of the miser Jaques in this early comic +production of Ben Jonson's. Above all, hear Guzman, in that excellent +old translation of the Spanish Rogue, expatiate on the "ruddy cheeks +of your golden ruddocks, your Spanish pistolets, your plump and +full-faced Portuguese, and your clear-skinned pieces-of-eight of +Castile," which he and his fellows the beggars kept secret to +themselves, and did privately enjoy in a plentiful manner. "For to +have them to pay them away is not to enjoy them; to enjoy them is to +have them lying by us; having no other need of them than to use them +for the clearing of the eyesight, and the comforting of our senses. +These we did carry about with us, sewing them in some patches of our +doublets near unto the heart, and as close to the skin as we could +handsomely quilt them in, holding them to be restorative." + +_Poetaster_.--This Roman play seems written to confute those enemies +of Ben in his own days and ours, who have said that he made a +pedantical use of his learning. He has here revived the whole Court +of Augustus, by a learned spell. We are admitted to the society of +the illustrious dead. Virgil, Horace, Ovid, Tibullus, converse in our +own tongue more finely and poetically than they were used to express +themselves in their native Latin. Nothing can be imagined more +elegant, refined, and court-like, than the scenes between this Louis +the Fourteenth of antiquity and his literati. The whole essence and +secret of that kind of intercourse is contained therein. The +economical liberality by which greatness, seeming to waive some part +of its prerogative, takes care to lose none of the essentials; the +prudential liberties of an inferior, which flatter by commanded +boldness and soothe with complimentary sincerity;--these, and a +thousand beautiful passages from his New Inn, his Cynthia's Revels, +and from those numerous court-masques and entertainments, which he +was in the daily habit of furnishing, might be adduced to show the +poetical fancy and elegance of mind of the supposed rugged old bard. + +_Alchemist_.--The judgment is perfectly overwhelmed by the torrent of +images, words, and book-knowledge, with which Epicure Mammon (Act +ii., Scene 2) confounds and stuns his incredulous hearer. They come +pouring out like the successive falls of Nilus. They "doubly redouble +strokes upon the foe." Description outstrides proof. We are made to +believe effects before we have testimony for their causes. If there +is no one image which attains the height of the sublime, yet the +confluence and assemblage of them all produces a result equal to the +grandest poetry. The huge Xerxean army countervails against single +Achilles. Epicure Mammon is the most determined offspring of its +author. It has the whole "matter and copy of the father--eye, nose, +lip, the trick of his frown." It is just such a swaggerer as +contemporaries have described old Ben to be. Meercraft, Bobadil, the +Host of the New Inn, have all his image and superscription. But +Mammon is arrogant pretension personified. Sir Samson Legend, in Love +for Love, is such another lying, overbearing character, but he does +not come up to Epicure Mammon. What a "towering bravery" there is in +his sensuality! he affects no pleasure under a Sultan. It is as if +"Egypt with Assyria strove in luxury." + + * * * * * + +GEORGE CHAPMAN. + +_Bussy D'Ambois_, _Byron's Conspiracy_, _Byron's Tragedy_, &c. +&c.--Webster has happily characterized the "full and heightened +style" of Chapman, who, of all the English play-writers, perhaps +approaches nearest to Shakspeare in the descriptive and didactic, in +passages which are less purely dramatic. He could not go out of +himself, as Shakspeare could shift at pleasure, to inform and animate +other existences, but in himself he had an eye to perceive and a soul +to embrace all forms and modes of being. He would have made a great +epic poet, if indeed he has not abundantly shown himself to be one; +for his Homer is not so properly a translation as the stories of +Achilles and Ulysses rewritten. The earnestness and passion which he +has put into every part of these poems would be incredible to a +reader of mere modern translations. His almost Greek zeal for the +glory of his heroes can only be paralleled by that fierce spirit of +Hebrew bigotry, with which Milton, as if personating one of the +zealots of the old law, clothed himself when he sat down to paint the +acts of Samson against the uncircumcised. The great obstacle to +Chapman's translations being read, is their unconquerable quaintness. +He pours out in the same breath the most just and natural, and the +most violent and crude expressions. He seems to grasp at whatever +words come first to hand while the enthusiasm is upon him, as if all +other must be inadequate to the divine meaning. But passion (the all +in all in poetry) is everywhere present, raising the low, dignifying +the mean, and putting sense into the absurd. He makes his readers +glow, weep, tremble, take any affection which he pleases, be moved by +words, or in spite of them, be disgusted, and overcome their disgust. + + * * * * * + +FRANCIS BEAUMONT.--JOHN FLETCHER. + +_Maid's Tragedy_.--One characteristic of the excellent old poets is, +their being able to bestow grace upon subjects which naturally do not +seem susceptible of any. I will mention two instances. Zelmane in the +Arcadia of Sidney, and Helena in the All's Well that Ends Well of +Shakspeare. What can be more unpromising, at first sight, than the +idea of a young man disguising himself in woman's attire, and passing +himself off for a woman among women; and that for a long space of +time? Yet Sir Philip has preserved so matchless a decorum, that +neither does Pyrocles' manhood suffer any stain for the effeminacy of +Zelmane, nor is the respect due to the princesses at all diminished +when the deception comes to be known. In the sweetly-constituted mind +of Sir Philip Sidney, it seems as if no ugly thought or unhandsome +meditation could find a harbor. He turned all that he touched into +images of honor and virtue. Helena in Shakspeare is a young woman +seeking a man in marriage. The ordinary rules of courtship are +reversed, the habitual feelings are crossed. Yet with such exquisite +address this dangerous subject is handled, that Helena's forwardness +loses her no honor; delicacy dispenses with its laws in her favor, +and nature, in her single case, seems content to suffer a sweet +violation. Aspatia, in the Maid's Tragedy, is a character equally +difficult with Helena, of being managed with grace. She too is a +slighted woman, refused by the man who had once engaged to marry her. +Yet it is artfully contrived, that while we pity we respect her, and +she descends without degradation. Such wonders true poetry and +passion can do, to confer dignity upon subjects which do not seem +capable of it. But Aspatia must not be compared at all points with +Helena; she does not so absolutely predominate over her situation but +she suffers some diminution, some abatement of the full lustre of the +female character, which Helena never does. Her character has many +degrees of sweetness, some of delicacy; but it has weakness, which, +if we do not despise, we are sorry for. After all, Beaumont and +Fletcher were but an inferior sort of Shakspeares and Sidneys. + +_Philaster_.--The character of Bellario must have been extremely +popular in its day. For many years after the date of Philaster's +first exhibition on the stage, scarce a play can be found without one +of these women-pages in it, following in the train of some +pre-engaged lover, calling on the gods to bless her happy rival (his +mistress), whom no doubt she secretly curses in her heart, giving +rise to many pretty _equivoques_ by the way on the confusion of sex, +and either made happy at last by some surprising turn of fate, or +dismissed with the joint pity of the lovers and the audience. Donne +has a copy of verses to his mistress, dissuading her from a +resolution, which she seems to have taken up from some of these +scenical representations, of following him abroad as a page. It is so +earnest, so weighty, so rich in poetry, in sense, in wit, and pathos, +that it deserves to be read as a solemn close in future to all such +sickly fancies as he there deprecates. + + * * * * * + +JOHN FLETCHER. + +_Thierry and Theodoret_.--The scene where Ordella offers her life a +sacrifice, that the king of France may not be childless, I have +always considered as the finest in all Fletcher, and Ordella to be +the most perfect notion of the female heroic character, next to +Calantha in the Broken Heart. She is a piece of sainted nature. Yet, +noble as the whole passage is, it must be confessed that the manner +of it, compared with Shakspeare's finest scenes, is faint and +languid. Its motion is circular, not progressive. Each line revolves +on itself in a sort of separate orbit. They do not join into one +another like a running-hand. Fletcher's ideas moved slow; his +versification, though sweet, is tedious, it stops at every turn; he +lays line upon line, making up one after the other, adding image to +image so deliberately, that we see their junctures. Shakspeare +mingles everything, runs line into line, embarrasses sentences and +metaphors; before one idea has burst its shell, another is hatched +and clamorous for disclosure. Another striking difference between +Fletcher and Shakspeare is the fondness of the former for unnatural +and violent situations. He seems to have thought that nothing great +could be produced in an ordinary way. The chief incidents in some of +his most admired tragedies show this.[1] Shakspeare had nothing of +this contortion in his mind, none of that craving after violent +situations, and flights of strained and improbable virtue, which I +think always betrays an imperfect moral sensibility. The wit of +Fletcher is excellent,[2] like his serious scenes, but there is +something strained and far-fetched in both. He is too mistrustful of +Nature, he always goes a little on one side of her.--Shakspeare chose +her without a reserve: and had riches, power, understanding, and +length of days, with her for a dowry. + +[Footnote 1: Wife for a Month, Cupid's Revenge, Double Marriage, &c.] + +[Footnote 2: Wit without Money, and his comedies generally.] + +_Faithful Shepherdess_.--If all the parts of this delightful pastoral +had been in unison with its many innocent scenes and sweet lyric +intermixtures, it had been a poem fit to vie with Comus or the +Arcadia, to have been put into the hands of boys and virgins, to have +made matter for young dreams, like the loves of Hermia and Lysander. +But a spot is on the face of this Diana. Nothing short of infatuation +could have driven Fletcher upon mixing with this "blessedness" such +an ugly deformity as Chloe, the wanton shepherdess! If Chloe was +meant to set off Clorin by contrast, Fletcher should have known that +such weeds by juxtaposition do not set off, but kill sweet flowers. + + * * * * * + +PHILIP MASSINGER.--THOMAS DECKER. + +_The Virgin Martyr_.--This play has some beauties of so very high an +order, that with all my respect for Massinger, I do not think he had +poetical enthusiasm capable of rising up to them. His associate +Decker who wrote Old Fortunatus, had poetry enough for anything. The +very impurities which obtrude themselves among the sweet pieties of +this play, like Satan among the Sons of Heaven, have a strength of +contrast, a raciness, and a glow, in them, which are beyond +Massinger. They are to the religion of the rest what Caliban is to +Miranda. + + * * * * * + +PHILIP MASSINGER.--THOMAS MIDDLETON.--WILLIAM ROWLEY. + +_Old Law_.--There is an exquisiteness of moral sensibility, making +one's eyes to gush out tears of delight, and a poetical strangeness +in the circumstances of this sweet tragicomedy, which are unlike +anything in the dramas which Massinger wrote alone. The pathos is of +a subtler edge. Middleton and Rowley, who assisted in it, had both of +them finer geniuses than their associate. + + * * * * * + +JAMES SHIRLEY + +Claims a place amongst the worthies of this period, not so much for +any transcendent talent in himself, as that he was the last of a +great race, all of whom spoke nearly the same language, and had a set +of moral feelings and notions in common. A new language, and quite a +new turn of tragic and comic interest, came in with the Restoration. + + + * * * * * + + +SPECIMENS FROM THE WRITINGS OF FULLER, + +THE CHURCH HISTORIAN. + + +The writings of Fuller are usually designated by the title of quaint, +and with sufficient reason; for such was his natural bias to +conceits, that I doubt not upon most occasions it would have been +going out of his way to have expressed himself out of them. But his +wit is not always a _lumen siccum_, a dry faculty of surprising; on +the contrary, his conceits are oftentimes deeply steeped in human +feeling and passion. Above all, his way of telling a story, for its +eager liveliness, and the perpetual running commentary of the +narrator happily blended with the narration, is perhaps unequalled. + +As his works are now scarcely perused but by antiquaries, I thought +it might not be unacceptable to my readers to present them with some +specimens of his manner, in single thoughts and phrases; and in some +few passages of greater length, chiefly of a narrative description. I +shall arrange them as I casually find them in my book of extracts, +without being solicitous to specify the particular work from which +they are taken. + +_Pyramids_.--"The Pyramids themselves, doting with age, have +forgotten the names of their founders." + +_Virtue in a Short Person_.--"His soul had but a short diocese to +visit, and therefore might the better attend the effectual informing +thereof." + +_Intellect in a very Tall One_.--"Ofttimes such who are built four +stories high, are observed to have little in their cockloft." + +_Naturals_.--"Their heads sometimes so little, that there is no room +for wit; sometimes so long, that there is no wit for so much room." + +_Negroes_.--"The image of God cut in ebony." + +_School-Divinity_.--"At the first it will be as welcome to thee as a +prison, and their very solutions will seem knots unto thee." + +_Mr. Perkins the Divine_.--"He had a capacious head, with angles +winding and roomy enough to lodge all controversial intricacies." + +_The same_.--"He would pronounce the word _Damn_ with such an +emphasis as left a doleful echo in his auditors' ears a good while +after." + +_Judges in Capital Cases_.--"O let him take heed how he strikes that +hath a dead hand." + +_Memory_.--"Philosophers place it in the rear of the head, and it +seems the mine of memory lies there, because there men naturally dig +for it, scratching it when they are at a loss." + +_Fancy_.--"It is the most boundless and restless faculty of the soul; +for while the Understanding and the Will are kept, as it were, _in +libera custodia_ to their objects of _verum et bonum_, the Fancy is +free from all engagements: it digs without spade, sails without ship, +flies without wings, builds without charges, fights without +bloodshed; in a moment striding from the centre to the circumference +of the world; by a kind of omnipotency creating and annihilating +things in an instant; and things divorced in Nature are married in +Fancy as in a lawless place." + +_Infants_.--"Some, admiring what motives to mirth infants meet with +in their silent and solitary smiles, have resolved, how truly I know +not, that then they converse with angels; as indeed such cannot among +mortals find any fitter companions." + +_Music_.--"Such is the sociableness of music, it conforms itself to +all companies both in mirth and mourning; complying to improve that +passion with which it finds the auditors most affected. In a word, it +is an invention which might have beseemed a son of Seth to have been +the father thereof: though better it was that Cain's great-grandchild +should have the credit first to find it, than the world the +unhappiness longer to have wanted it." + +_St. Monica_.--"Drawing near her death, she sent most pious thoughts +as harbingers to heaven, and her soul saw a glimpse of happiness +through the chinks of her sickness-broken body."[1] + +[Footnote 1: + + "The soul's dark cottage, batter'd and decay'd, + Lets in new lights through chinks which time has made." + WALLER.] + +_Mortality_.--"To smell to a turf of fresh earth is wholesome for the +body, no less are thoughts of mortality cordial to the soul." + +_Virgin_.--"No lordling husband shall at the same time command her +presence and distance; to be always near in constant attendance, and +always to stand aloof in awful observance." + +_Elder Brother_.--"Is one who made haste to come into the world to +bring his parents the first news of male posterity, and is well +rewarded for his tidings." + +_Bishop Fletcher_.--"His pride was rather on him than in him, as only +gait and gesture deep, not sinking to his heart, though causelessly +condemned for a proud man, as who was a _good hypocrite_, and far +more humble than he appeared." + +_Masters of Colleges_.--"A little allay of dulness in a Master of a +College makes him fitter to manage secular affairs." + +_The Good Yeoman_.--"Is a gentleman in ore, whom the next age may see +refined." + +_Good Parent_.--"For his love, therein like a well-drawn picture, he +eyes all his children alike." + +_Deformity in Children_.--"This partiality is tyranny, when parents +despise those that are deformed; _enough to break those whom God had +bowed before_." + +_Good Master_.--"In correcting his servant he becomes not a slave to +his own passion. Not cruelly making new _indentures_ of the flesh of +his apprentice. He is tender of his servant in sickness and age. If +crippled in his service, his house is his hospital. Yet how many +throw away those dry bones, out of the which themselves have sucked +the marrow!" + +_Good Widow_.--"If she can speak but little good of him [her dead +husband] she speaks but little of him. So handsomely folding up her +discourse, that his virtues are shown outwards, and his vices wrapt +up in silence; as counting it barbarism to throw dirt on his memory, +who hath mould cast on his body." + +_Horses_.--"These are men's wings, wherewith they make such speed. A +generous creature a horse is, sensible in some sort of honor; and +made most handsome by that which deforms men most--pride." + +_Martyrdom_.--"Heart of oak hath sometimes warped a little in the +scorching heat of persecution. Their want of true courage herein +cannot be excused. Yet many censure them for surrendering up their +forts after a long siege, who would have yielded up their own at the +first summons.--Oh! there is more required to make one valiant, than +to call Cranmer or Jewel coward; as if the fire in Smithfield had +been no hotter than what is painted in the Book of Martyrs." + +_Text of St. Paul_.--"St. Paul saith, Let not the sun go down on your +wrath, to carry news to the antipodes in another world of thy +revengeful nature. Yet let us take the Apostle's meaning rather than +his words, with all possible speed to depose our passion; not +understanding him so literally, that we may take leave to be angry +till sunset: then might our wrath lengthen with the days; and men in +Greenland, where the day lasts above a quarter of a year, have +plentiful scope for revenge."[1] + +[Footnote 1: This whimsical prevention of a consequence which no one +would have thought of deducing,--setting up an absurdum on purpose to +hunt it down,--placing guards as it were at the very outposts of +possibility,--gravely giving out laws to insanity and prescribing +moral fences to distempered intellects, could never have entered into +a head less entertainingly constructed than that of Fuller or Sir +Thomas Browne, the very air of whose style the conclusion of this +passage most aptly imitates.] + +_Bishop Brownrig_.--"He carried learning enough _in numerato_ about +him in his pockets for any discourse, and had much more at home in +his chests for any serious dispute." + +_Modest Want_.--"Those that with diligence fight against poverty, +though neither conquer till death makes it a drawn battle, expect not +but prevent their craving of thee: for God forbid the heavens should +never rain, till the earth first opens her mouth; seeing _some +grounds will sooner burn than chap_." + +_Death-bed Temptations_.--"The devil is most busy on the last day of +his term; and a tenant to be ousted cares not what mischief he doth." + +_Conversation_.--"Seeing we are civilized Englishmen, let us not be +naked savages in our talk." + +_Wounded Soldier_.--"Halting is the stateliest march of a soldier; +and 'tis a brave sight to see the flesh of an ancient as torn as his +colors." + +_Wat Tyler_.--"A _misogrammatist_; if a good Greek word may be given +to so barbarous a rebel." + +_Heralds_.--"Heralds new mould men's names--taking from them, adding +to them, melting out all the liquid letters, torturing mutes to make +them speak, and making vowels dumb,--to bring it to a fallacious +_homonomy_ at the last, that their names may be the same with those +noble houses they pretend to." + +_Antiquarian Diligence_.--"It is most worthy observation, with what +diligence he [Camden] inquired after ancient places, making hue and +cry after many a city which was run away, and by certain marks and +tokens pursuing to find it; as by the situation on the Roman +highways, by just distance from other ancient cities, by some +affinity of name, by tradition of the inhabitants, by Roman coins +digged up, and by some appearance of ruins. A broken urn is a whole +evidence; or an old gate still surviving, out of which the city is +run out. Besides, commonly some new spruce town not far off is grown +out of the ashes thereof, which yet hath so much natural affection as +dutifully to own those reverend ruins for her mother." + +_Henry de Essex_.--"He is too well known in our English Chronicles, +being Baron of Raleigh, in Essex, and Hereditary Standard Bearer of +England. It happened in the reign of this king [Henry II.] there was +a fierce battle fought in Flintshire, at Coleshall, between the +English and Welsh, wherein this Henry de Essex _animum et signum +simul abjecit_, betwixt traitor and coward, cast away both his +courage and banner together, occasioning a great overthrow of +English. But he that had the baseness to do, had the boldness to deny +the doing of so foul a fact; until he was challenged in combat by +Robert de Momford, a knight, eye-witness thereof, and by him overcome +in a duel. Whereupon his large inheritance was confiscated to the +king, and he himself, _partly thrust, partly going into a convent, +hid his head in a cowl, under which, betwixt shame and sanctity, he +blushed out the remainder of his life_."[1]--_Worthies_, article +_Bedfordshire_. + +[Footnote 1: The fine imagination of Fuller has done what might have +been pronounced impossible. It has given an interest, and a holy +character to coward infamy. Nothing can be more beautiful than the +concluding account of the last days, and expiatory retirement, of +poor Henry de Essex. The address with which the whole of this little +story is told is most consummate; the charm of it seems to consist in +a perpetual balance of antithesis not too violently opposed, and the +consequent activity of mind in which the reader is kept:--"Betwixt +traitor and coward"--"baseness to do, boldness to deny"--"partly +thrust, partly going, into a convent"--"betwixt shame and sanctity." +The reader by this artifice is taken into a kind of partnership with +the writer,--his judgment is exercised in settling the +preponderance,--he feels as if he were consulted as to the issue. But +the modern historian flings at once the dead weight of his own +judgment into the scale, and settles the matter.] + +_Sir Edward Harwood, Knt._--"I have read of a bird, which hath a face +like, and yet will prey upon, a man: who coming to the water to +drink, and finding there by reflection, that he had killed one like +himself, pineth away by degrees, and never afterwards enjoyeth +itself.[1] Such is in some sort the condition of Sir Edward. This +accident, that he had killed one in a private quarrel, put a period +to his carnal mirth, and was a covering to his eyes all the days of +his life. No possible provocations could afterwards tempt him to a +duel; and no wonder that one's conscience loathed that whereof he had +surfeited. He refused all challenges with more honor than others +accepted them; it being well known that he would set his foot as far +in the face of his enemy as any man alive."--_Worthies_, article +_Lincolnshire_. + +[Footnote 1: I do not know where Fuller read of this bird; but a more +awful and affecting story, and moralizing of a story, in Natural +History, or rather in that Fabulous Natural History where poets and +mythologists found the Phoenix and the Unicorn and "other strange +fowl," is nowhere extant. It is a fable which Sir Thomas Browne, if +he had heard of it, would have exploded among his Vulgar Errors; but +the delight which he would have taken in the discussing of its +probabilities, would have shown that the _truth of the fact_, though +the avowed object of his search was not so much the motive which put +him upon the investigation, as those hidden affinities and poetical +analogies,--those _essential verities_ in the application of strange +fable, which made him linger with such reluctant delay among the last +fading lights of popular tradition; and not seldom to conjure up a +superstition, that had been long extinct, from its dusty grave, to +inter it himself with greater ceremonies and solemnities of burial.] + +_Decayed Gentry_.--"It happened in the reign of King James, when +Henry Earl of Huntingdon was Lieutenant of Leicestershire, that a +laborer's son in that country was pressed into the wars; as I take +it, to go over with Count Mansfield. The old man at Leicester +requested his son might be discharged, as being the only staff of his +age, who by his industry maintained him and his mother. The Earl +demanded his name, which the man for a long time was loath to tell +(as suspecting it a fault for so poor a man to confess the truth); at +last he told his name was Hastings. 'Cousin Hastings,' said the Earl, +'we cannot all be top branches of the tree, though we all spring from +the same root; your son, my kinsman, shall not be pressed.' So good +was the meeting of modesty in a poor, with courtesy in an honorable +person, and gentry I believe in both. And I have reason to believe, +that some who justly own the surnames and blood of Bohuns, Mortimers, +and Plantagenets (though ignorant of their own extractions), are hid +in the heap of common people, where they find that under a thatched +cottage which some of their ancestors could not enjoy in a leaded +castle--contentment, with quiet and security."--_Worthies_, article +_Of Shire-Reeves or Shiriffes_. + +_Tenderness of Conscience in a Tradesman_.--"Thomas Curson, born in +Allhallows, Lombard Street, armorer, dwelt without Bishopsgate. It +happened that a stage-player borrowed a rusty musket, which had lain +long leger in his shop: now though his part were comical, he +therewith acted an unexpected tragedy, killing one of the +standers-by, the gun casually going off on the stage, which he +suspected not to be charged. O the difference of divers men in the +tenderness of their consciences! some are scarce touched with a +wound, whilst others are wounded with a touch therein. This poor +armorer was highly afflicted therewith, though done against his will, +yea, without his knowledge, in his absence, by another, out of mere +chance. Hereupon he resolved to give all his estate to pious uses: no +sooner had he gotten a round sum, but presently he posted with it in +his apron to the Court of Aldermen, and was in pain till by their +direction he had settled it for the relief of poor in his own and +other parishes, and disposed of some hundreds of pounds accordingly, +as I am credibly informed by the then churchwardens of the said +parish. Thus, as he conceived himself casually (though at a great +distance) to have occasioned the death of one, he was the immediate +and direct cause of giving a comfortable living to many." + +_Burning of Wickliffe's Body by Order of the Council of +Constance_.--"Hitherto [A.D. 1428] the corpse of John Wickliffe had +quietly slept in his grave about forty-one years after his death, +till his body was reduced to bones, and his bones almost to dust. For +though the earth in the chancel of Lutterworth, in Leicestershire, +where he was interred, hath not so quick a digestion with the earth +of Aceldama, to consume flesh in twenty-four hours, yet such the +appetite thereof, and all other English graves, to leave small +reversions of a body after so many years. But now such the spleen of +the Council of Constance, as they not only cursed his memory as dying +an obstinate heretic, but ordered that his bones (with this +charitable caution,--if it may be discerned from the bodies of other +faithful people) be taken out of the ground, and thrown far off from +any Christian burial. In obedience hereunto, Richard Fleming, Bishop +of Lincoln, Diocesan of Lutterworth, sent his officers (vultures with +a quick sight, scent, at a dead carcass) to ungrave him. Accordingly +to Lutterworth they come, Sumner, Commissary, Official, Chancellor, +Proctors, Doctors, and their servants, (so that the remnant of the +body would not hold out a bone amongst so many hands,) take what was +left out of the grave, and burnt them to ashes, and cast them into +Swift, a neighboring brook, running hard by. _Thus this brook has +conveyed his ashes into Avon, Avon into Severn, Severn into the +narrow seas, they into the main ocean; and thus the ashes of +Wickliffe are the emblem of his doctrine, which now is dispersed all +the world over._"[1]--Church History. + +[Footnote 1: The concluding period of this most lively narrative I +will not call a conceit: it is one of the grandest conceptions I ever +met with. One feels the ashes of Wickliffe gliding away out of the +reach of the Sumners, Commissaries, Officials, Proctors, Doctors, and +all the puddering rout of executioners of the impotent rage of the +baffled Council: from Swift into Avon, from Avon into Severn, from +Severn into the narrow seas, from the narrow seas into the main +ocean, where they become the emblem of his doctrine, "dispersed all +the world over." Hamlet's tracing the body of Caesar to the clay that +stops a beer-barrel is a no less curious pursuit of "ruined +mortality;" but it is in an inverse ratio to this: it degrades and +saddens us, for one part of our nature at least; but this expands the +whole of our nature, and gives to the body a sort of ubiquity,--a +diffusion as far as the actions of its partner can have reach or +influence. + +I have seen this passage smiled at, and set down as a quaint conceit +of old Fuller. But what is not a conceit to those who read it in a +temper different from that in which the writer composed it? The most +pathetic parts of poetry to cold tempers seem and are nonsense, as +divinity was to the Greeks foolishness. When Richard II., meditating +on his own utter annihilation as to royalty, cries out, + + "O that I were a mockery king of snow, + To melt before the sun of Bolingbroke," + +if we had been going on pace for pace with the passion before, this +sudden conversion of a strong-felt metaphor into something to be +actually realized in nature, like that of Jeremiah, "Oh! that my head +were waters, and mine eyes a fountain of tears," is strictly and +strikingly natural; but come unprepared upon it, and it is a conceit: +and so is a "head" turned into "waters."] + + + * * * * * + + +ON THE + +GENIUS AND CHARACTER OF HOGARTH; + +WITH SOME REMARKS ON A PASSAGE IN THE WRITINGS OF THE +LATE MR. BARRY. + + * * * * * + +One of the earliest and noblest enjoyments I had when a boy, was in +the contemplation of those capital prints by Hogarth, the _Harlot's_ +and _Rake's Progresses_, which, along with some others, hung upon the +walls of a great hall in an old-fashioned house in ----shire, and +seemed the solitary tenants (with myself) of that antiquated and +life-deserted apartment. + +Recollection of the manner in which those prints used to affect me +has often made me wonder, when I have heard Hogarth described as a +mere comic painter, as one of those whose chief ambition was to +_raise a laugh_. To deny that there are throughout the prints which I +have mentioned circumstances introduced of a laughable tendency, +would be to run counter to the common notions of mankind; but to +suppose that in their _ruling character_ they appeal chiefly to the +risible faculty, and not first and foremost to the very heart of man, +its best and most serious feelings, would be to mistake no less +grossly their aim and purpose. A set of severer Satires (for they are +not so much Comedies, which they have been likened to, as they are +strong and masculine Satires) less mingled with anything of mere fun, +were never written upon paper, or graven upon copper. They resemble +Juvenal, or the satiric touches in Timon of Athens. + +I was pleased with the reply of a gentleman, who being asked which +book he esteemed most in his library, answered,--"Shakspeare:" being +asked which he esteemed next best, replied, "Hogarth." His graphic +representations are indeed books: they have the teeming, fruitful, +suggestive meaning of _words_. Other pictures we look at,--his prints +we read. + +In pursuance of this parallel, I have sometimes entertained myself +with comparing the _Timon of Athens_ of Shakespeare (which I have +just mentioned) and Hogarth's _Rake's Progress_ together. The story, +the moral, in both is nearly the same. The wild course of riot and +extravagance, ending in the one with driving the Prodigal from the +society of men into the solitude of the deserts, and in the other +with conducting the Rake through his several stages of dissipation +into the still more complete desolations of the mad-house, in the +play and in the picture, are described with almost equal force and +nature. The levee of the Rake, which forms the subject of the second +plate in the series, is almost a transcript of Timon's levee in the +opening scene of that play. We find a dedicating poet, and other +similar characters, in both. + +The concluding scene in the _Rake's Progress_ is perhaps superior to +the last scenes of _Timon_. If we seek for something of kindred +excellence in poetry, it must be in the scenes of Lear's beginning +madness, where the King and the Fool and the Tom-o'-Bedlam conspire +to produce such a medley of mirth checked by misery, and misery +rebuked by mirth; where the society of those "strange bedfellows" +which misfortunes have brought Lear acquainted with, so finely sets +forth the destitute state of the monarch; while the lunatic bans of +the one, and the disjointed sayings and wild but pregnant allusions +of the other, so wonderfully sympathize with that confusion, which +they seem to assist in the production of, in the senses of that +"child-changed father." + +In the scene in Bedlam, which terminates the _Rake's Progress_, we +find the same assortment of the ludicrous with the terrible. Here is +desperate madness, the overturning of originally strong thinking +faculties, at which we shudder, as we contemplate the duration and +pressure of affliction which it must have asked to destroy such a +building;--and here is the gradual hurtless lapse into idiocy, of +faculties, which at their best of times never having been strong, we +look upon the consummation of their decay with no more of pity than +is consistent with a smile. The mad tailor, the poor driveller that +has gone out of his wits (and truly he appears to have had no great +journey to go to get past their confines) for the love of _Charming +Betty Careless_,--. these half-laughable, scarce-pitiable objects, +take off from the horror which the principal figure would of itself +raise, at the same time that they assist the feeling of the scene by +contributing to the general notion of its subject:-- + + "Madness, thou chaos of the brain, + What art, that pleasure giv'st and pain? + Tyranny of Fancy's reign! + Mechanic Fancy, that can build + Vast labyrinths and mazes wild, + With rule disjointed, shapeless measure, + Fill'd with horror, fill'd with pleasure! + Shapes of horror, that would even + Cast doubts of mercy upon heaven; + Shapes of pleasure, that but seen, + Would split the shaking sides of Spleen."[1] + +[Footnote 1: Lines inscribed under the plate] + +Is it carrying the spirit of comparison to excess to remark, that in +the poor kneeling weeping female who accompanies her seducer in his +sad decay, there is something analogous to Kent, or Caius, as he +delights rather to be called, in _Lear_,--the noblest pattern of +virtue which even Shakspeare has conceived,--who follows his royal +master in banishment, that had pronounced _his_ banishment, and +forgetful at once of his wrongs and dignities, taking on himself the +disguise of a menial, retains his fidelity to the figure, his loyalty +to the carcass, the shadow, the shell, and empty husk of Lear? + +In the perusal of a book, or of a picture, much of the impression +which we receive depends upon the habit of mind which we bring with +us to such perusal. The same circumstance may make one person laugh, +which shall render another very serious; or in the same person the +first impression may be corrected by after-thought. The misemployed +incongruous characters at the _Harlot's Funeral_, on a superficial +inspection, provoke to laughter; but when we have sacrificed the +first emotion to levity, a very different frame of mind succeeds, or +the painter has lost half his purpose. I never look at that wonderful +assemblage of depraved beings, who, without a grain of reverence or +pity in their perverted minds, are performing the sacred exteriors of +duty to the relics of their departed partner in folly, but I am as +much moved to sympathy from the very want of it in them, as I should +be by the finest representation of a virtuous death-bed surrounded by +real mourners, pious children, weeping friends,--perhaps more by the +very contrast. What reflections does it not awake, of the dreadful +heartless state in which the creature (a female too) must have lived, +who in death wants the accompaniment of one genuine tear. That wretch +who is removing the lid of the coffin to gaze upon the corpse with a +face which indicates a perfect negation of all goodness or +womanhood--the hypocrite parson and his demure partner--all the +fiendish group--to a thoughtful mind present a moral emblem more +affecting than if the poor friendless carcass had been depicted as +thrown out to the woods, where wolves had assisted at its obsequies, +itself furnishing forth its own funeral banquet. + +It is easy to laugh at such incongruities as are met together in this +picture,--incongruous objects being of the very essence of +laughter,--but surely the laugh is far different in its kind from +that thoughtless species to which we are moved by mere farce and +grotesque. We laugh when Ferdinand Count Fathom, at the first sight +of the white cliffs of Britain, feels his heart yearn with filial +fondness towards the land of his progenitors, which he is coming to +fleece and plunder,--we smile at the exquisite irony of the +passage,--but if we are not led on by such passages to some more +salutary feeling than laughter, we are very negligent perusers of +them in book or picture. + +It is the fashion with those who cry up the great Historical School +in this country, at the head of which Sir Joshua Reynolds is placed, +to exclude Hogarth from that school, as an artist of an inferior and +vulgar class. Those persons seem to me to confound the painting of +subjects in common or vulgar life with the being a vulgar artist. The +quantity of thought which Hogarth crowds into every picture would +alone _unvulgarize_ every subject which he might choose. Let us take +the lowest of his subjects, the print called _Gin Lane_. Here is +plenty of poverty, and low stuff to disgust upon a superficial view; +and accordingly a cold spectator feels himself immediately disgusted +and repelled. I have seen many turn away from it, not being able to +bear it. The same persons would perhaps have looked with great +complacency upon Poussin's celebrated picture of the _Plague at +Athens_[1] Disease and Death and bewildering Terror, in _Athenian +garments_, are endurable, and come, as the delicate critics express +it, within the "limits of pleasurable sensation." But the scenes of +their own St. Giles's, delineated by their own countryman, are too +shocking to think of. Yet if we could abstract our minds from the +fascinating colors of the picture, and forget the coarse execution +(in some respects) of the print, intended as it was to be a cheap +plate, accessible to the poorer sort of people, for whose instruction +it was done, I think we could have no hesitation in conferring the +palm of superior genius upon Hogarth, comparing this work of his with +Poussin's picture. There is more of imagination in it--that power +which draws all things to one,--which makes things animate and +inanimate, beings with their attributes, subjects, and their +accessories, take one color and serve to one effect. Everything in +the print, to use a vulgar expression, _tells_. Every part is full of +"strange images of death." It is perfectly amazing and astounding to +look at. Not only the two prominent figures, the woman and the +half-dead man, which are as terrible as anything which Michael Angelo +ever drew, but everything else in the print, contributes to bewilder +and stupefy,--the very houses, as I heard a friend of mine express +it, tumbling all about in various directions, seem drunk--seem +absolutely reeling from the effect of that diabolical spirit of +frenzy which goes forth over the whole composition. To show the +poetical and almost prophetical conception in the artist, one little +circumstance may serve. Not content with the dying and dead figures, +which he has strewed in profusion over the proper scene of the +action, he shows you what (of a kindred nature) is passing beyond it. +Close by the shell, in which, by direction of the parish beadle, a +man is depositing his wife, is an old wall, which, partaking of the +universal decay around it, is tumbling to pieces. Through a gap in +this wall are seen three figures, which appear to make a part in some +funeral procession which is passing by on the other side of the wall, +out of the sphere of the composition. This extending of the interest +beyond the bounds of the subject could only have been conceived by a +great genius. Shakspeare, in his description of the painting of the +Trojan War, in his _Tarquin and Lucrece_, has introduced a similar +device, where the painter made a part stand for the whole:-- + + "For much imaginary work was there, + Conceit deceitful, so compact, so kind, + That for Achilles' image stood his spear, + Grip'd in an armed hand; himself behind + Was left unseen, save to the eye of mind: + A hand, a foot, a face, a leg, a head, + Stood for the whole to be imagined." + +[Footnote 1: At the late Mr. Hope's, in Cavendish Square] + +This he well calls _imaginary work_, where the spectator must meet +the artist in his conceptions half way; and it is peculiar to the +confidence of high genius alone to trust so much to spectators or +readers. Lesser artists show everything distinct and full, as they +require an object to be made out to themselves before they can +comprehend it. + +When I think of the power displayed in this (I will not hesitate to +say) sublime print, it seems to me the extreme narrowness of system +alone, and of that rage for classification, by which, in matters of +taste at least, we are perpetually perplexing, instead of arranging, +our ideas, that would make us concede to the work of Poussin above +mentioned, and deny to this of Hogarth, the name of a grand serious +composition. + +We are forever deceiving ourselves with names and theories. We call +one man a great historical painter, because he has taken for his +subjects kings or great men, or transactions over which time has +thrown a grandeur. We term another the painter of common life, and +set him down in our minds for an artist of an inferior class, without +reflecting whether the quantity of thought shown by the latter may +not much more than level the distinction which their mere choice of +subjects may seem to place between them; or whether, in fact, from +that very common life a great artist may not extract as deep an +interest as another man from that which we are pleased to call +history. + +I entertain the highest respect for the talents and virtues of +Reynolds, but I do not like that his reputation should overshadow and +stifle the merits of such a man as Hogarth, nor that to mere names +and classifications we should be content to sacrifice one of the +greatest ornaments of England. + +I would ask the most enthusiastic admirer of Reynolds, whether in the +countenances of his _Staring_ and _Grinning Despair_, which he has +given us for the faces of Ugolino and dying Beaufort, there be +anything comparable to the expression which Hogarth has put into the +face of his broken-down rake in the last plate but one of the _Rake's +Progress_,[1] where a letter from the manager is brought to him to +say that his play "will not do?" Here all is easy, natural, +undistorted, but withal what a mass of woe is here accumulated!--the +long history of a misspent life is compressed into the countenance as +plainly as the series of plates before had told it; here is no +attempt at Gorgonian looks, which are to freeze the beholder--no +grinning at the antique bedposts--no face-making, or consciousness of +the presence of spectators in or out of the picture, but grief kept +to a man's self, a face retiring from notice with the shame which +great anguish sometimes brings with it,--a final leave taken of +hope,--the coming on of vacancy and stupefaction,--a beginning +alienation of mind looking like tranquillity. Here is matter for the +mind of the beholder to feed on for the hour together,--matter to +feed and fertilize the mind. It is too real to admit one thought +about the power of the artist who did it. When we compare the +expression in subjects which so fairly admit of comparison, and find +the superiority so clearly to remain with Hogarth, shall the mere +contemptible difference of the scene of it being laid, in the one +case, in our Fleet or King's Bench Prison, and, in the other, in the +State Prison of Pisa, or the bedroom of a cardinal,--or that the +subject of the one has never been authenticated, and the other is +matter of history,--so weigh down the real points, of the comparison, +as to induce us to rank the artist who has chosen the one scene or +subject (though confessedly inferior in that which constitutes the +soul of his art) in a class from which we exclude the better genius +(who has happened to make choice of the other) with something like +disgrace?[2] + +[Footnote 1: The first perhaps in all Hogarth for serious +expression. That which comes next to it, I think, is the jaded +morning countenance of the debauchee in the second plate of the +_Marriage Alamode_, which lectures on the vanity of pleasure as +audibly as anything in Ecclesiastes.] + +[Footnote 2: Sir Joshua Reynolds, somewhere in his Lectures, speaks +of the _presumption_ of Hogarth in attempting the grand style in +painting, by which he means his choice of certain Scripture subjects. +Hogarth's excursions into Holy Land were not very numerous, but what +he has left us in this kind have at least this merit, that they have +expression of _some sort or other_ in them,--the _Child Moses before +Pharaoh's Daughter_, for instance: which is more than can be said of +Sir Joshua Reynolds's _Repose in Egypt_, painted for Macklin's Bible, +where for a Madonna he has substituted a sleepy, insensible, +unmotherly girl, one so little worthy to have been selected as the +Mother of the Saviour, that she seems to have neither heart nor +feeling to entitle her to become a mother at all. But indeed the race +of Virgin Mary painters seems to have been cut up, root and branch, +at the Reformation. Our artists are too good Protestants to give life +to that admirable commixture of maternal tenderness with reverential +awe and wonder approaching to worship, with which the Virgin Mothers +of L. da Vinci and Raphael (themselves by their divine countenances +inviting men to worship) contemplate the union of the two natures in +the person of their Heaven-born Infant.] + +_The Boys under Demoniacal Possession_ of Raphael and Domenichino, by +what law of classification are we bound to assign them to belong to +the great style in painting, and to degrade into an inferior class +the Rake of Hogarth when he is the Madman in the Bedlam scene? I am +sure he is far more impressive than either. It is a face which no one +that has seen can easily forget. There is the stretch of human +suffering to the utmost endurance, severe bodily pain brought on by +strong mental agony, the frightful, obstinate laugh of madness,--yet +all so unforced and natural, that those who never were witness to +madness in real life, think they see nothing but what is familiar to +them in this face. Here are no tricks of distortion, nothing but the +natural face of agony. This is high tragic painting, and we might as +well deny to Shakspeare the honors of a great tragedian, because he +has interwoven scenes of mirth with the serious business of his +plays, as refuse to Hogarth the same praise for the two concluding +scenes of the _Rake's Progress_, because of the Comic Lunatics[1] +which he has thrown into the one, or the Alchymist that he has +introduced in the other, who is paddling in the coals of his furnace, +keeping alive the flames of vain hope within the very walls of the +prison to which the vanity has conducted him, which have taught the +darker lesson of extinguished hope to the desponding figure who is +the principal person of the scene. + +[Footnote 1: + "There are of madmen, as there are of tame, + All humor'd not alike. We have here some + So apish and fantastic, play with a feather; + And though 'twould grieve a soul to see God's image + So blemish'd and defac'd, yet do they act + Such antick and such pretty lunacies, + That, spite of sorrow, they will make you smile. + Others again we have, like angry lions, + Fierce as wild bulls, untameable as flies." + _Honest Whore_.] + +It is the force of these kindly admixtures which assimilates the +scenes of Hogarth and of Shakspeare to the drama of real life, where +no such thing as pure tragedy is to be found; but merriment and +infelicity, ponderous crime and feather-light vanity, like twiformed +births, disagreeing complexions of one intertexture, perpetually +unite to show forth motley spectacles to the world. Then it is that +the poet or painter shows his art, when in the selection of these +comic adjuncts he chooses such circumstances as shall relieve, +contrast with, or fall into, without forming a violent opposition to +his principal object. Who sees not that the Grave-digger in _Hamlet_, +the Fool in _Lear_, have a kind of correspondency to, and fall in +with, the subjects which they seem to interrupt: while the comic +stuff in _Venice Preserved_, and the doggerel nonsense of the Cook +and his poisoning associates in the _Rollo_ of Beaumont and Fletcher, +are pure, irrelevant, impertinent discords,--as bad as the +quarrelling dog and cat under the table of the _Lord and the +Disciples at Emmaus_ of Titian? + +Not to tire the reader with perpetual reference to prints which he +may not be fortunate enough to possess, it may be sufficient to +remark, that the same tragic cast of expression and incident, blended +in some instances with a greater alloy of comedy, characterizes his +other great work, the _Marriage Alamode_, as well as those less +elaborate exertions of his genius, the prints called _Industry_ and +_Idleness_, _the Distrest Poet_, &c., forming, with the _Harlot's_ +and _Rake's Progresses_, the most considerable, if not the largest +class of his productions,--enough surely to rescue Hogarth from the +imputation of being a mere buffoon, or one whose general aim was only +to _shake the sides_. + +There remains a very numerous class of his performances, the object +of which must be confessed to be principally comic. But in all of +them will be found something to distinguish them from the droll +productions of Bunbury and others. They have this difference, that we +do not merely laugh at, we are led into long trains of reflection by +them. In this respect they resemble the characters of Chaucer's +_Pilgrims_, which have strokes of humor in them enough to designate +them for the most part as comic, but our strongest feeling still is +wonder at the comprehensiveness of genius which could crowd, as poet +and painter have done, into one small canvas so many diverse yet +cooperating materials. + +The faces of Hogarth have not a mere momentary interest, as in +caricatures, or those grotesque physiognomies which we sometimes +catch a glance of in the street, and, struck with their whimsicality, +wish for a pencil and the power to sketch them down; and forget them +again as rapidly,--but they are permanent abiding ideas. Not the +sports of nature, but her necessary eternal classes. We feel that we +cannot part with any of them, lest a link should be broken. + +It is worthy of observation, that he has seldom drawn a mean or +insignificant countenance.[1] Hogarth's mind was eminently +reflective; and, as it has been well observed of Shakspeare, that he +has transfused his own poetical character into the persons of his +drama (they are all more or less _poets_) Hogarth has impressed a +_thinking character_ upon the persons of his canvas. This remark must +not be taken universally. The exquisite idiotism of the little +gentleman in the bag and sword beating his drum in the print of the +_Enraged Musician_, would of itself rise up against so sweeping an +assertion. But I think it will be found to be true of the generality +of his countenances. The knife-grinder and Jew flute-player in the +plate just mentioned, may serve as instances instead of a thousand. +They have intense thinking faces, though the purpose to which they +are subservient by no means required it; but indeed it seems as if it +was painful to Hogarth to contemplate mere vacancy or insignificance. + +[Footnote 1: If there are any of that description, they are in his +_Strolling Players_, a print which has been cried up by Lord Orford +as the richest of his productions, and it may be, for what I know, in +the mere lumber, the properties, and dead furniture of the scene, but +in living character and expression it is (for Hogarth) lamentably +poor and wanting; it is perhaps the only one of his performances at +which we have a right to feel disgusted.] + +This reflection of the artist's own intellect from the faces of his +characters, is one reason why the works of Hogarth, so much more than +those of any other artist, are objects of meditation. Our +intellectual natures love the mirror which gives them back their own +likenesses. The mental eye will not bend long with delight upon +vacancy. + +Another line of eternal separation between Hogarth and the common +painters of droll or burlesque subjects, with whom he is often +confounded, is the sense of beauty, which in the most unpromising +subjects seems never wholly to have deserted him. "Hogarth himself," +says Mr. Coleridge,[1] from whom I have borrowed this observation, +speaking of a scene which took place at Ratzeburg, "never drew a more +ludicrous distortion, both of attitude and physiognomy, than this +effect occasioned: nor was there wanting beside it one of those +beautiful female faces which the same Hogarth, _in whom the satirist +never extinguished that love of beauty which belonged to him as a +poet_, so often and so gladly introduces as the central figure in a +crowd of humorous deformities, which figure (such is the power of +true genius) neither acts nor is meant to act as a contrast; but +diffuses through all and over each of the group a spirit of +reconciliation and human kindness; and even when the attention is no +longer consciously directed to the cause of this feeling, still +blends its tenderness with our laughter: and _thus prevents the +instructive merriment at the whims of nature, or the foibles or +humors of our fellow-men, from degenerating into the heart-poison of +contempt or hatred_." To the beautiful females in Hogarth, which Mr. +C. has pointed out, might be added, the frequent introduction of +children (which Hogarth seems to have taken a particular delight in) +into his pieces. They have a singular effect in giving tranquillity +and a portion of their own innocence to the subject. The baby riding +in its mother's lap in the _March to Finchley_, (its careless +innocent face placed directly behind the intriguing time-furrowed +countenance of the treason-plotting French priest,) perfectly sobers +the whole of that tumultuous scene. The boy mourner winding up his +top with so much unpretending insensibility in the plate of the +_Harlot's Funeral_, (the only thing in that assembly that is not a +hypocrite,) quiets and soothes the mind that has been disturbed at the +sight of so much depraved man and woman kind. + +[Footnote 1: _The Friend_, No. XVI.] + +I had written thus far, when I met with a passage in the writings of +the late Mr. Barry, which, as it falls in with the _vulgar notion_ +respecting Hogarth, which this Essay has been employed in combating, +I shall take the liberty to transcribe, with such remarks as may +suggest themselves to me in the transcription; referring the reader +for a full answer to that which has gone before. + + + "Notwithstanding Hogarth's merit does undoubtedly entitle him + to an honorable place among the artists, and that his little + compositions, considered as so many dramatic representations, + abounding with humor, character, and extensive observations on + the various incidents of low, faulty, and vicious life, are + very ingeniously brought together, and frequently tell their + own story with more facility than is often found in many of + the elevated and more noble inventions of Raphael and other + great men; yet it must be honestly confessed, that in what is + called knowledge of the figure, foreigners have justly + observed, that Hogarth is often so raw and unformed, as hardly + to deserve the name of an artist. But this capital defect is + not often perceivable, as examples of the naked and of + elevated nature but rarely occur in his subjects, which are + for the most part filled with characters that in their nature + tend to deformity; besides his figures are small, and the + jonctures, and other difficulties of drawing that might occur + in their limbs, are artfully concealed with their clothes, + rags, &c. But what would atone for all his defects, even if + they were twice told, is his admirable fund of invention, ever + inexhaustible in its resources; and his satire, which is + always sharp and pertinent, and often highly moral, was + (except in a few instances, where he weakly and meanly + suffered his integrity to give way to his envy) seldom or + never employed in a dishonest or unmanly way. Hogarth has been + often imitated in his satirical vein, sometimes in his + humorous: but very few have attempted to rival him in his + moral walk. The line of art pursued by my very ingenious + predecessor and brother Academician, Mr. Penny, is quite + distinct from that of Hogarth, and is of a much more delicate + and superior relish; he attempts the heart, and reaches it, + whilst Hogarth's general aim is only to shake the sides; in + other respects no comparison can be thought of, as Mr. Penny + has all that knowledge of the figure and academical skill + which the other wanted. As to Mr. Bunbury, who had so happily + succeeded in the vein of humor and caricatura, he has for some + time past altogether relinquished it, for the more amiable + pursuit of beautiful nature: this, indeed, is not to be + wondered at, when we recollect that he has, in Mrs. Bunbury, + so admirable an exemplar of the most finished grace and beauty + continually at his elbow. But (to say all that occurs to me on + this subject) perhaps it may be reasonably doubted, whether + the being much conversant with Hogarth's method of exposing + meanness, deformity, and vice, in many of his works, is not + rather a dangerous, or, at least, a worthless pursuit; which, + if it does not find a false relish and a love of and search + after satire and buffoonery in the spectator, is at least not + unlikely to give him one. Life is short; and the little + leisure of it is much better laid out upon that species of art + which is employed about the amiable and the admirable, as it + is more likely to be attended with better and nobler + consequences to ourselves. These two pursuits in art may be + compared with two sets of people with whom we might associate; + if we give ourselves up to the Footes, the Kenricks, &c. we + shall be continually busied and paddling in whatever is + ridiculous, faulty, and vicious in life; whereas there are + those to be found with whom we should be in the constant + pursuit and study of all that gives a value and a dignity to + human nature." [Account of a Series of Pictures in the Great + Boom of the Society of Arts, Manufactures, and Commerce, at + the Adelphi, by James Barry, R.A., Professor of Painting to + the Royal Academy, reprinted in the last quarto edition of his + works.] + + "----It must be honestly confessed, that in what is called + knowledge of the figure, foreigners have justly observed," &c. + + +It is a secret well known to the professors of the art and mystery of +criticism, to insist upon what they do not find in a man's works, and +to pass over in silence what they do. That Hogarth did not draw the +naked figure so well as Michael Angelo might be allowed, especially +as "examples of the naked," as Mr. Barry acknowledges, "rarely (he +might almost have said never) occur in his subjects;" and that his +figures under their draperies do not discover all the fine graces of +an Antinoues or an Apollo, may be conceded likewise; perhaps it was +more suitable to his purpose to represent the average forms of +mankind in the mediocrity (as Mr. Burke expresses it) of the age in +which he lived: but that his figures in general, and in his best +subjects, are so glaringly incorrect as is here insinuated, I dare +trust my own eye so far as positively to deny the fact. And there is +one part of the figure in which Hogarth is allowed to have excelled, +which these foreigners seem to have overlooked, or perhaps +calculating from its proportion to the whole (a seventh or an eighth, +I forget which,) deemed it of trifling importance; I mean the human +face; a small part, reckoning by geographical inches, in the map of +man's body, but here it is that the painter of expression must +condense the wonders of his skill, even at the expense of neglecting +the "jonctures and other difficulties of drawing in the limbs," which +it must be a cold eye that, in the interest so strongly demanded by +Hogarth's countenances, has leisure to survey and censure. + +"The line of art pursued by my very ingenious predecessor and brother +Academician, Mr. Penny." + +The first impression caused in me by reading this passage was an +eager desire to know who this Mr. Penny was. This great surpasser of +Hogarth in the "delicacy of his relish," and the "line which he +pursued," where is he, what are his works, what has he to show? In +vain I tried to recollect, till by happily putting the question to a +friend who is more conversant in the works of the illustrious obscure +than myself, I learnt that he was the painter of a _Death of Wolfe_ +which missed the prize the year that the celebrated picture of West +on the same subject obtained it; that he also made a picture of the +_Marquis of Granby relieving a Sick Soldier_; moreover, that he was +the inventor of two pictures of _Suspended and Restored Animation_, +which I now remember to have seen in the Exhibition some years since, +and the prints from which are still extant in good men's houses. +This, then, I suppose, is the line of subjects in which Mr. Penny was +so much superior to Hogarth. I confess I am not of that opinion. The +relieving of poverty by the purse, and the restoring a young man to +his parents by using the methods prescribed by the Humane Society, +are doubtless very amiable subjects, pretty things to teach the first +rudiments of humanity; they amount to about as much instruction as +the stories of good boys that give away their custards to poor +beggar-boys in children's books. But, good God! is this _milk for +babes_ to be set up in opposition to Hogarth's moral scenes, his +_strong meat for men_? As well might we prefer the fulsome verses +upon their own goodness to which the gentlemen of the Literary Fund +annually sit still with such shameless patience to listen, to the +satires of Juvenal and Persius; because the former are full of tender +images of Worth relieved by Charity, and Charity stretching out her +hand to rescue sinking Genius, and the theme of the latter is men's +crimes and follies with their black consequences--forgetful meanwhile +of those strains of moral pathos, those sublime heart-touches, which +these poets (in _them_ chiefly showing themselves poets) are +perpetually darting across the otherwise appalling gloom of their +subject--consolatory remembrancers, when their pictures of guilty +mankind have made us even to despair for our species, that there is +such a thing as virtue and moral dignity in the world, that her +unquenchable spark is not utterly out--refreshing admonitions, to +which we turn for shelter from the too great heat and asperity of the +general satire. + +And is there nothing analogous to this in Hogarth? nothing which +"attempts and reaches the heart?"--no aim beyond that of "shaking the +sides?"--If the kneeling ministering female in the last scene of the +_Rake's Progress_, the Bedlam scene, of which I have spoken before, +and have dared almost to parallel it with the most absolute idea of +Virtue which Shakspeare has left us, be not enough to disprove the +assertion; if the sad endings of the Harlot and the Rake, the +passionate heart-bleeding entreaties for forgiveness which the +adulterous wife is pouring forth to her assassinated and dying lord +in the last scene but one of the _Marriage Alamode_,--if these be not +things to touch the heart, and dispose the mind to a meditative +tenderness: is there nothing sweetly conciliatory in the mild patient +face and gesture with which the wife seems to allay and ventilate the +feverish irritated feelings of her poor poverty-distracted mate (the +true copy of the _genus irritabile_), in the print of the _Distrest +Poet_? or if an image of maternal love be required, where shall we +find a sublimer view of it than in that aged woman in _Industry and +Idleness_ (plate V.) who is clinging with the fondness of hope not +quite extinguished to her brutal vice-hardened child, whom she is +accompanying to the ship which is to bear him away from his native +soil, of which he has been adjudged unworthy: in whose shocking face +every trace of the human countenance seems obliterated, and a brute +beast's to be left instead, shocking and repulsive to all but her who +watched over it in its cradle before it was so sadly altered, and +feels it must belong to her while a pulse by the vindictive laws of +his country shall be suffered to continue to beat in it. Compared +with such things, what is Mr. Penny's "knowledge of the figure and +academical skill which Hogarth wanted?" + +With respect to what follows concerning another gentleman, with the +congratulations to him on his escape out of the regions of "humor and +caricatura," in which it appears he was in danger of travelling side +by side with Hogarth, I can only congratulate my country, that Mrs. +Hogarth knew _her_ province better than, by disturbing her husband at +his palette, to divert him from that universality of subject, which +has stamped him perhaps, next to Shakspeare, the most inventive +genius which this island has produced, into the "amiable pursuit of +beautiful nature," _i.e._, copying ad infinitum the individual charms +and graces of Mrs. H. "Hogarth's method of exposing meanness, +deformity, and vice, paddling in whatever is ridiculous, faulty, and +vicious." + +A person unacquainted with the works thus stigmatized would be apt to +imagine that in Hogarth there was nothing else to be found but +subjects of the coarsest and most repulsive nature. That his +imagination was naturally unsweet, and that he delighted in raking +into every species of moral filth. That he preyed upon sore places +only, and took a pleasure in exposing the unsound and rotten parts of +human nature:--whereas, with the exception of some of the plates of +the _Harlot's Progress_, which are harder in their character than any +of the rest of his productions (the _Stages of Cruelty_ I omit as +mere worthless caricatures, foreign to his general habits, the +offspring of his fancy in some wayward humor), there is scarce one of +his pieces where vice is most strongly satirized, in which some +figure is not introduced upon which the moral eye may rest satisfied; +a face that indicates goodness, or perhaps mere good-humoredness and +carelessness of mind (negation of evil) only, yet enough to give a +relaxation to the frowning brow of satire, and keep the general air +from tainting. Take the mild, supplicating posture of patient Poverty +in the poor woman that is persuading the pawnbroker to accept her +clothes in pledge, in the plate of _Gin Lane_, for an instance. A +little does it, a little of the _good_ nature overpowers a world of +_bad_. One cordial honest laugh of a Tom Jones absolutely clears the +atmosphere that was reeking with the black putrefying breathings of a +hypocrite Blifil. One homely expostulating shrug from Strap warms the +whole air which the suggestions of a gentlemanly ingratitude from his +friend Random had begun to freeze. One "Lord bless us!" of Parson +Adams upon the wickedness of the times, exorcises and purges off the +mass of iniquity which the world-knowledge of even a Fielding could +cull out and rake together. But of the severer class of Hogarth's +performances, enough, I trust, has been said to show that they do not +merely shock and repulse; that there is in them the "scorn of vice" +and the "pity" too; something to touch the heart, and keep alive the +sense of moral beauty; the "lacrymae rerum," and the sorrowing by +which the heart is made better. If they be bad things, then is satire +and tragedy a bad thing; let us proclaim at once an age of gold, and +sink the existence of vice and misery in our speculations: let us + + "----wink, and shut our apprehensions up + From common sense of what men were and are:" + +let us _make believe_ with the children, that everybody is good and +happy; and, with Dr. Swift, write panegyrics upon the world. + +But that larger half of Hogarth's works, which were painted more for +entertainment than instruction (though such was the suggestiveness of +his mind that there is always something to be learnt from them), his +humorous scenes,--are they such as merely to disgust and set us +against our species? + +The confident assertions of such a man as I consider the late Mr. +Barry to have been, have that weight of authority in them which +staggers at first hearing, even a long preconceived opinion. When I +read his pathetic admonition concerning the shortness of life, and +how much better the little leisure of it were laid out upon "that +species of art which is employed about the amiable and the +admirable;" and Hogarth's "method," proscribed as a "dangerous or +worthless pursuit," I began to think there was something in it; that +I might have been indulging all my life a passion for the works of +this artist, to the utter prejudice of my taste and moral sense; but +my first convictions gradually returned, a world of good-natured +English faces came up one by one to my recollection, and a glance at +the matchless _Election Entertainment_, which I have the happiness to +have hanging up in my parlor, subverted Mr. Barry's whole theory in +an instant. + +In that inimitable print (which in my judgment as far exceeds the +more known and celebrated _March to Finchley_, as the best comedy +exceeds the best farce that ever was written), let a person look till +he be saturated, and when he has done wondering at the inventiveness +of genius which could bring so many characters (more than thirty +distinct classes of face) into a room and set them down at table +together, or otherwise dispose them about, in so natural a manner, +engage them in so many easy sets and occupations, yet all partaking +of the spirit of the occasion which brought them together, so that we +feel that nothing but an election time could have assembled them; +having no central figure or principal group, (for the hero of the +piece, the Candidate, is properly set aside in the levelling +indistinction of the day, one must look for him to find him,) nothing +to detain the eye from passing from part to part, where every part is +alike instinct with life,--for here are no furniture-faces, no +figures brought in to fill up the scene like stage choruses, but all +dramatis personae; when he shall have done wondering at all these +faces so strongly charactered, yet finished with the accuracy of the +finest miniature; when he shall have done admiring the numberless +appendages of the scene, those gratuitous doles which rich genius +flings into the heap when it has already done enough, the +over-measure which it delights in giving, as if it felt its stores +were exhaustless; the dumb rhetoric of the scenery,--for tables, and +chairs, and joint-stools in Hogarth are living and significant +things; the witticisms that are expressed by words (all artists but +Hogarth have failed when they have endeavored to combine two mediums +of expression, and have introduced words into their pictures), and +the unwritten numberless little allusive pleasantries that are +scattered about; the work that is going on in the scene, and beyond +it, as is made visible to the "eye of mind," by the mob which chokes +up the doorway, and the sword that has forced an entrance before its +master; when he shall have sufficiently admired this wealth of +genius, let him fairly say what is the _result_ left on his mind. Is +it an impression of the vileness and worthlessness of his species? or +is it not the general feeling which remains, after the individual +faces have ceased to act sensibly on his mind, a _kindly one in favor +of his species?_ was not the general air of the scene wholesome? did +it do the heart hurt to be among it? Something of a riotous spirit to +be sure is there, some worldly-mindedness in some of the faces, a +Doddingtonian smoothness which does not promise any superfluous +degree of sincerity in the fine gentleman who has been the occasion +of calling so much good company together; but is not the general cast +of expression in the faces of the good sort? do they not seem cut out +of the _good old rock_, substantial English honesty? would one fear +treachery among characters of their expression? or shall we call +their honest mirth and seldom-returning relaxation by the hard names +of vice and profligacy? That poor country fellow, that is grasping +his staff (which, from that difficulty of feeling themselves at home +which poor men experience at a feast, he has never parted with since +he came into the room), and is enjoying with a relish that seems to +fit all the capacities of his soul the slender joke, which that +facetious wag his neighbor is practising upon the gouty gentleman, +whose eyes the effort to suppress pain has made as round as +rings--does it shock the "dignity of human nature" to look at that +man, and to sympathize with him in the seldom-heard joke which has +unbent his careworn, hard-working visage, and drawn iron smiles from +it? or with that full-hearted cobbler, who is honoring with the grasp +of an honest fist the unused palm of that annoyed patrician, whom the +license of the time has seated next him? + +I can see nothing "dangerous" in the contemplation of such scenes as +this, or the _Enraged Musician_, or the _Southwark Fair_, or twenty +other pleasant prints which come crowding in upon my recollection, in +which the restless activities, the diversified bents and humors, the +blameless peculiarities of men, as they deserve to be called, rather +than their "vices and follies," are held up in a laughable point of +view. All laughter is not of a dangerous or soul-hardening tendency. +There is the petrifying sneer of a demon which excludes and kills +Love, and there is the cordial laughter of a man which implies and +cherishes it. What heart was ever made the worse by joining in a +hearty laugh at the simplicities of Sir Hugh Evans or Parson Adams, +where a sense of the ridiculous mutually kindles and is kindled by a +perception of the amiable? That tumultuous harmony of singers that +are roaring out the words, "The world shall bow to the Assyrian +throne," from the opera of _Judith_, in the third plate of the series +called the _Four Groups of Heads_; which the quick eye of Hogarth +must have struck off in the very infancy of the rage for sacred +oratorios in this country, while "Music yet was young;" when we have +done smiling at the deafening distortions, which these tearers of +devotion to rags and tatters, these takers of heaven by storm, in +their boisterous mimicry of the occupation of angels, are +making,--what unkindly impression is left behind, or what more of +harsh or contemptuous feeling, than when we quietly leave Uncle Toby +and Mr. Shandy riding their hobby-horses about the room? The +conceited, long-backed Sign-painter, that with all the self-applause +of a Raphael or Correggio, (the twist of body which his conceit has +thrown him into has something of the Correggiesque in it,) is +contemplating the picture of a bottle, which he is drawing from an +actual bottle that hangs beside him, in the print of _Beer +Street_,--while we smile at the enormity of the self-delusion, can we +help loving the good-humor and self-complacency of the fellow? would +we willingly wake him from his dream? + +I say not that all the ridiculous subjects of Hogarth have, +necessarily, something in them to make us like them; some are +indifferent to us, some in their natures repulsive, and only made +interesting by the wonderful skill and truth to nature in the +painter; but I contend that there is in most of them that sprinkling +of the better nature, which, like holy water, chases away and +disperses the contagion of the bad. They have this in them, besides, +that they bring us acquainted with the every-day human face,--they +give us skill to detect those gradations of sense and virtue (which +escape the careless or fastidious observer) in the countenances of +the world about us; and prevent that disgust at common life, that +_taedium quotidianarum formarum_, which an unrestricted passion for +ideal forms and beauties is in danger of producing. In this, as in +many other things, they are analogous to the best novels of Smollett +or Fielding. + + + * * * * * + + +ON THE +POETICAL WORKS OF GEORGE WITHER + + +The poems of G. Wither are distinguished by a hearty homeliness of +manner, and a plain moral speaking. He seems to have passed his life +in one continued act of an innocent self-pleasing. That which he +calls his _Motto_ is a continued self-eulogy of two thousand lines, +yet we read it to the end without any feeling of distaste, almost +without a consciousness that we have been listening all the while to +a man praising himself. There are none of the cold particles in it, +the hardness and self-ends, which render vanity and egotism hateful. +He seems to be praising another person, under the mask of self: or +rather, we feel that it was indifferent to him where he found the +virtue which he celebrates; whether another's bosom or his own were +its chosen receptacle. His poems are full, and this in particular is +one downright confession, of a generous self-seeking. But by self he +sometimes means a great deal,--his friends, his principles, his +country, the human race. + +Whoever expects to find in the satirical pieces of this writer any of +those peculiarities which pleased him in the satires of Dryden or +Pope, will be grievously disappointed. Here are no high-finished +characters, no nice traits of individual nature, few or no +personalities. The game run down is coarse general vice, or folly as +it appears in classes. A liar, a drunkard, a coxcomb, is _stript and +whipt;_ no Shaftesbury, no Villiers, or Wharton, is curiously +anatomized, and read upon. But to a well-natured mind there is a +charm of moral sensibility running through them, which amply +compensates the want of those luxuries. Wither seems everywhere +bursting with a love of goodness, and a hatred of all low and base +actions. At this day it is hard to discover what parts of the poem +here particularly alluded to, _Abuses Stript and Whipt_, could have +occasioned the imprisonment of the author. Was Vice in High Places +more suspicious than now? had she more power; or more leisure to +listen after ill reports? That a man should be convicted of a libel +when he named no names but Hate, and Envy, and Lust, and Avarice, is +like one of the indictments in the Pilgrim's Progress, where Faithful +is arraigned for having "railed on our noble Prince Beelzebub, and +spoken contemptibly of his honorable friends, the Lord Old Man, the +Lord Carnal Delight, and the Lord Luxurious." What unlucky jealousy +could have tempted the great men of those days to appropriate such +innocent abstractions to themselves? + +Wither seems to have contemplated to a degree of idolatry his own +possible virtue. He is forever anticipating persecution and +martyrdom; fingering, as it were, the flames, to try how he can bear +them. Perhaps his premature defiance sometimes made him obnoxious to +censures which he would otherwise have slipped by. + +The homely versification of these Satires is not likely to attract in +the present day. It is certainly not such as we should expect from a +poet "soaring in the high region of his fancies, with his garland and +his singing robes about him;"[1] nor is it such as +he has shown in his _Philarete_, and in some parts of his _Shepherds +Hunting_. He seems to have adopted this dress with voluntary +humility, as fittest for a moral teacher, as our divines choose sober +gray or black; but in their humility consists their sweetness. The +deepest tone of moral feeling in them (though all throughout is +weighty, earnest, and passionate) is in those pathetic injunctions +against shedding of blood in quarrels, in the chapter entitled +_Revenge_. The story of his own forbearance, which follows, is highly +interesting. While the Christian sings his own victory over Anger, +the Man of Courage cannot help peeping out to let you know, that it +was some higher principle than _fear_ which counselled this +forbearance. + +[Footnote 1: Milton.] + +Whether encaged, or roaming at liberty, Wither never seems to have +abated a jot of that free spirit which sets its mark upon his +writings, as much as a predominant feature of independence impresses +every page of our late glorious Burns; but the elder poet wraps his +proof-armor closer about him, the other wears his too much outwards; +he is thinking too much of annoying the foe to be quite easy within; +the spiritual defences of Wither are a perpetual source of inward +sunshine, the magnanimity of the modern is not without its alloy of +soreness, and a sense of injustice, which seems perpetually to gall +and irritate. Wither was better skilled in the "sweet uses of +adversity;" he knew how to extract the "precious jewel" from the head +of the "toad," without drawing any of the "ugly venom" along with it. +The prison-notes of Wither are finer than the wood-notes of most of +his poetical brethren. The description in the Fourth Eclogue of his +_Shepherds Hunting_ (which was composed during his imprisonment in +the Marshalsea) of the power of the Muse to extract pleasure from +common objects, has been oftener quoted, and is more known, than any +part of his writings. Indeed, the whole Eclogue is in a strain so +much above not only what himself, but almost what any other poet has +written, that he himself could not help noticing it; he remarks that +his spirits had been raised higher than they were wont, "through the +love of poesy." The praises of Poetry have been often sung in ancient +and in modern times; strange powers have been ascribed to it of +influence over animate and inanimate auditors; its force over +fascinated crowds has been acknowledged; but, before Wither, no one +ever celebrated its power _at home_, the wealth and the strength +which this divine gift confers upon its possessor. Fame, and that too +after death, was all which hitherto the poets had promised themselves +from their art. It seems to have been left to Wither to discover that +poetry was a present possession, as well as a rich reversion, and +that the Muse had promise of both lives,--of this, and of that which +was to come. + +The _Mistress of Philarete_ is in substance a panegyric protracted +through several thousand lines in the mouth of a single speaker, but +diversified, so as to produce an almost dramatic effect, by the +artful introduction of some ladies, who are rather auditors than +interlocutors in the scene; and of a boy, whose singing furnishes +pretence for an occasional change of metre: though the seven-syllable +line, in which the main part of it is written, is that in which +Wither has shown himself so great a master, that I do not know that I +am always thankful to him for the exchange. + +Wither has chosen to bestow upon the lady whom he commends the name +of Arete, or Virtue; and, assuming to himself the character of +Philarete, or Lover of Virtue, there is a sort of propriety in that +heaped measure of perfections which he attributes to this partly +real, partly allegorical personage. Drayton before him had shadowed +his mistress under the name of Idea, or Perfect Pattern, and some of +the old Italian love-strains are couched in such religious terms as +to make it doubtful whether it be a mistress, or Divine Grace, which +the poet is addressing. + +In this poem (full of beauties) there are two passages of preeminent +merit. The first is where the lover, after a flight of rapturous +commendation, expresses his wonder why all men that are about his +mistress, even to her very servants, do not view her with the same +eyes that he does. + + "Sometime I do admire + All men burn not with desire: + Nay, I muse her servants are not + Pleading love; but 0! they dare not. + And I therefore wonder, why + They do not grow sick and die. + Sure they would do so, but that, + By the ordinance of fate, + There is some concealed thing, + So each gazer limiting, + He can see no more of merit, + Than beseems his worth and spirit. + For in her a grace there shines, + That o'er-daring thoughts confines, + Making worthless men despair + To be loved of one so fair. + Yea, the destinies agree, + Some _good judgments_ blind should be, + And not gain the power of knowing + Those rare beauties in her growing. + Reason doth as much imply: + For, if every judging eye, + Which beholdeth her, should there + Find what excellences are, + All, o'ercome by those perfections, + Would be captive to affections. + So, in happiness unblest, + She for lovers should not rest." + +The other is, where he has been comparing her beauties to gold, and +stars, and the most excellent things in nature; and, fearing to be +accused of hyperbole, the common charge against poets, vindicates +himself by boldly taking upon him, that these comparisons are no +hyperboles; but that the best things in nature do, in a lover's eye, +fall short of those excellences which he adores in her. + + "What pearls, what rubies can + Seem so lovely fair to man, + As her lips whom he doth love, + When in sweet discourse they move, + Or her lovelier teeth, the while + She doth bless him with a smile? + Stars indeed fair creatures be; + Yet amongst us where is he + Joys not more the whilst he lies + Sunning in his mistress' eyes, + Than in all the glimmering light + Of a starry winter's night? + Note the beauty of an eye-- + And if aught you praise it by + Leave such passion in your mind, + Let my reason's eye be blind. + Mark if ever red or white + Any where gave such delight, + As when they have taken place + In a worthy woman's face. + + * * * * * + + "I must praise her as I may, + Which I do mine own rude way, + Sometimes setting forth her glories + By unheard of allegories "--&c. + +To the measure in which these lines are written the wits of Queen +Anne's days contemptuously gave the name of Namby-Pamby, in ridicule +of Ambrose Philips, who has used it in some instances, as in the +lines on Cuzzoni, to my feeling at least, very deliciously; but +Wither, whose darling measure it seems to have been, may show, that +in skilful hands it is capable of expressing the subtilest movements +of passion. So true it is, which Drayton seems to have felt, that it +is the poet who modifies the metre, not the metre the poet; in his +own words, that + + "It's possible to climb; + To kindle, or to stake; + Altho' in Skelton's rhime."[1] + +[Footnote 1: A long line is a line we are long repeating. In the +_Shepherds Hunting_ take the following-- + + "If thy verse doth bravely tower, + _As she makes wing, she gets power;_ + Yet the higher she doth soar, + She's affronted still the more, + 'Till she to the high'st hath past, + Then she rests with fame at last." + +What longer measure can go beyond the majesty of this! what +Alexandrine is half so long in pronouncing or expresses _labor slowly +but strongly surmounting difficulty_ with the life with which it is +done in the second of these lines? or what metre could go beyond +these from _Philarete_-- + + "Her true beauty leaves behind + Apprehensions in my mind + Of more sweetness, than all art + Or inventions can impart. + _Thoughts too deep to be expressed, + And too strong to be suppressed._"] + + + + +LETTERS, + +UNDER ASSUMED SIGNATURES, PUBLISHED IN "THE +REFLECTOR." + + * * * * * + +THE LONDONER. + + * * * * * + +TO THE EDITOR OF "THE REFLECTOR." + +Mr. Reflector,--I was born under the shadow of St. Dunstan's steeple, +just where the conflux of the eastern and western inhabitants of this +twofold city meet and justle in friendly opposition at Temple-bar. +The same day which gave me to the world, saw London happy in the +celebration of her great annual feast. This I cannot help looking +upon as a lively omen of the future great good-will which I was +destined to bear toward the city, resembling in kind that solicitude +which every Chief Magistrate is supposed to feel for whatever +concerns her interests and well-being. Indeed I consider myself in +some sort a speculative Lord Mayor of London: for though +circumstances unhappily preclude me from the hope of ever arriving at +the dignity of a gold chain and Spital Sermon, yet thus much will I +say of myself in truth, that Whittington with his cat (just emblem of +vigilance and a furred gown) never went beyond me in affection which +I bear to the citizens. + +I was born, as you have heard, in a crowd. This has begot in me an +entire affection for that way of life, amounting to an almost +insurmountable aversion from solitude and rural scenes. This aversion +was never interrupted or suspended, except for a few years in the +younger part of my life, during a period in which I had set my +affections upon a charming young woman. Every man, while the passion +is upon him, is for a time at least addicted to groves and meadows +and purling streams. During this short period of my existence, I +contracted just familiarity enough with rural objects to understand +tolerably well ever after the _poets_, when they declaim in such +passionate terms in favor of a country-life. + +For my own part, now the fit is past, I have no hesitation in +declaring, that a mob of happy faces crowding up at the pit-door of +Drury Lane Theatre, just at the hour of six, gives me ten thousand +sincerer pleasures, than I could ever receive from all the flocks of +silly sheep that ever whitened the plains of Arcadia or Epsom Downs. + +This passion for crowds is nowhere feasted so full as in London. The +man must have a rare _recipe_ for melancholy who can be dull in Fleet +Street. I am naturally inclined to hypochondria, but in London it +vanishes, like all other ills. Often, when I have felt a weariness or +distaste at home, have I rushed out into her crowded Strand, and fed +my humor, till tears have wetted my cheek for unutterable sympathies +with the multitudinous moving picture, which she never fails to +present at all hours, like the scenes of a shifting pantomime. + +The very deformities of London, which give distaste to others, from +habit do not displease me. The endless succession of shops where +_Fancy miscalled Folly_ is supplied with perpetual gauds and toys, +excite in me no puritanical aversion. I gladly behold every appetite +supplied with its proper food. The obliging customer, and the obliged +tradesman--things which live by bowing, and things which exist but +for homage--do not affect me with disgust; from habit I perceive +nothing but urbanity, where other men, more refined, discover +meanness: I love the very smoke of London, because it has been the +medium most familiar to my vision. I see grand principles of honor at +work in the dirty ring which encompasses two combatants with fists, +and principles of no less eternal justice in the detection of a +pickpocket. The salutary astonishment with which an execution is +surveyed, convinces me more forcibly than a hundred volumes of +abstract polity, that the universal instinct of man in all ages has +leaned to order and good government. + +Thus an art of extracting morality from the commonest incidents of a +town life is attained by the same well-natured alchemy with which the +Foresters of Arden, in a beautiful country, + + "Found tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, + Sermons in stones, and good in everything." + +Where has spleen her food but in London! Humor, Interest, Curiosity, +suck at her measureless breasts without a possibility of being +satiated. Nursed amid her noise, her crowds, her beloved smoke, what +have I been doing all my life, if I have not lent out my heart with +usury to such scenes! + +I am, Sir, your faithful servant, + +A LONDONER. + + + + +ON BURIAL SOCIETIES; + +AND + +THE CHARACTER OF AN UNDERTAKER. + + * * * * * + +TO THE EDITOR OF "THE REFLECTOR." + +Mr. Reflector,--I was amused the other day with having the following +notice thrust into my hand by a man who gives out bills at the corner +of Fleet Market. Whether he saw any prognostics about me, that made +him judge such notice seasonable, I cannot say; I might perhaps carry +in a countenance (naturally not very florid) traces of a fever which +had not long left me. Those fellows have a good instinctive way of +guessing at the sort of people that are likeliest to pay attention to +their papers. + + +"BURIAL SOCIETY. + +"A favorable opportunity now offers to any person, of either sex, who +would wish to be buried in a genteel manner, by paying one shilling +entrance, and twopence per week for the benefit of the stock. Members +to be free in six months. The money to be paid at Mr. Middleton's, at +the sign of the _First_ and the _Last_, Stonecutter's Street, Fleet +Market. The deceased to be furnished as follows:--A strong elm +coffin, covered with superfine black, and furnished with two rows, +all round, close drove, best japanned nails, and adorned with +ornamental drops, a handsome plate of inscription, Angel above, and +Flower beneath, and four pair of handsome handles, with wrought +gripes; the coffin to be well pitched, lined, and ruffled with fine +crape; a handsome crape shroud, cap, and pillow. For use, a handsome +velvet pall, three gentlemen's cloaks, three crape hat-bands, three +hoods and scarfs, and six pair of gloves; two porters equipped to +attend the funeral, a man to attend the same with band and gloves; +also, the burial-fees paid, if not exceeding one guinea." + +"Man," says Sir Thomas Browne, "is a noble animal, splendid in ashes, +and pompous in the grave." Whoever drew up this little advertisement +certainly understood this appetite in the species, and has made +abundant provision for it. It really almost induces a _taedium vitae_ +upon one to read it. Methinks I could be willing to die, in death to +be so attended. The two rows all round close-drove best black +japanned nails,--how feelingly do they invite, and almost +irresistibly persuade us to come and be fastened down! what aching +head can resist the temptation to repose, which the crape shroud, the +cap, and the pillow present; what sting is there in death, which the +handles with wrought gripes are not calculated to pluck away? what +victory in the grave which the drops and the velvet pall do not +render at least extremely disputable? but, above all, the pretty +emblematic plate, with the Angel above and the Flower beneath, takes +me mightily. + +The notice goes on to inform us, that though the society has been +established but a very few years, upwards of eleven hundred persons +have put down their names. It is really an affecting consideration to +think of so many poor people, of the industrious and hard-working +class (for none but such would be possessed of such a generous +forethought) clubbing their two-pences to save the reproach of a +parish funeral. Many a poor fellow, I dare swear, has that Angel and +Flower kept from the _Angel_ and _Punchbowl_, while, to provide +himself a bier, he has curtailed himself of _beer_. Many a savory +morsel has the living body been deprived of, that the lifeless one +might be served up in a richer state to the worms. And sure, if the +body could understand the actions of the soul, and entertain generous +notions of things, it would thank its provident partner, that she had +been more solicitous to defend it from dishonors at its dissolution, +than careful to pamper it with good things in the time of its union. +If Caesar were chiefly anxious at his death how he might die most +decently, every Burial Society may be considered as a club of Caesars. + +Nothing tends to keep up, in the imaginations of the poorer sort of +people, a generous horror of the work-house more than the manner in +which pauper funerals are conducted in this metropolis. The coffin +nothing but a few naked planks coarsely put together,--the want of a +pall (that decent and well-imagined veil, which, hiding the coffin +that hides the body, keeps that which would shock us at two removes +from us), the colored coats of the men that are hired, at cheap +rates, to carry the body,--altogether give the notion of the deceased +having been some person of an ill life and conversation, some one who +may not claim the entire rites of Christian burial,--one by whom some +parts of the sacred ceremony would be desecrated if they should be +bestowed upon him. I meet these meagre processions sometimes in the +street. They are sure to make me out of humor and melancholy all the +day after. They have a harsh and ominous aspect. + +If there is anything in the prospectus issued from Mr. Middleton's, +Stonecutter's Street, which pleases me less than the rest, it is to +find that the six pair of gloves are to be returned, that they are +only lent, or, as the bill expresses it, for use on the occasion. The +hood, scarfs, and hat-bands, may properly enough be given up after +the solemnity; the cloaks no gentlemen would think of keeping; but a +pair of gloves, once fitted on, ought not in courtesy to be +redemanded. The wearer should certainly have the fee-simple of them. +The cost would be but trifling, and they would be a proper memorial +of the day. This part of the Proposal wants reconsidering. It is not +conceived in the same liberal way of thinking as the rest. I am also +a little doubtful whether the limit, within which the burial-fee is +made payable, should not be extended to thirty shillings. + +Some provision too ought undoubtedly to be made in favor of those +well-intentioned persons and well-wishers to the fund, who, having +all along paid their subscriptions regularly, are so unfortunate as +to die before the six months, which would entitle them to their +freedom, are quite completed. One can hardly imagine a more +distressing case than that of a poor fellow lingering on in a +consumption till the period of his freedom is almost in sight, and +then finding himself going with a velocity which makes it doubtful +whether he shall be entitled to his funeral honors: his quota to +which he nevertheless squeezes out, to the diminution of the comforts +which sickness demands. I think, in such cases, some of the +contribution money ought to revert. With some such modifications, +which might easily be introduced, I see nothing in these Proposals of +Mr. Middleton which is not strictly fair and genteel; and heartily +recommend them to all persons of moderate incomes, in either sex, who +are willing that this perishable part of them should quit the scene +of its mortal activities with as handsome circumstances as possible. + +Before I quit the subject, I must guard my readers against a scandal, +which they may be apt to take at the place whence these Proposals +purport to be issued. From the sign of the _First_ and the _Last_, +they may conclude that Mr. Middleton is some publican, who, in +assembling a club of this description at his house, may have a +sinister end of his own, altogether foreign to the solemn purpose for +which the club is pretended to be instituted. I must set them right +by informing them that the issuer of these Proposals is no publican, +though he hangs out a sign, but an honest superintendent of funerals, +who, by the device of a Cradle and a Coffin, connecting both ends of +human existence together, has most ingeniously contrived to +insinuate, that the framers of these _first_ and _last_ receptacles +of mankind divide this our life betwixt them, and that all that +passes from the midwife to the undertaker may, in strict propriety, +_go for nothing_: an awful and instructive lesson to human vanity. + +Looking over some papers lately that fell into my hands by chance, +and appear to have been written about the beginning of the last +century, I stumbled, among the rest, upon the following short Essay, +which the writer calls, "_The Character of an Undertaker_." It is +written with some stiffness and peculiarities of style, but some +parts of it, I think, not unaptly characterize the profession to +which Mr. Middleton has the honor to belong. The writer doubtless had +in his mind the entertaining character of _Sable_, in Steele's +excellent comedy of _The Funeral_. + + +CHARACTER OF AN UNDERTAKER. + +"He is master of the ceremonies at burials and mourning assemblies, +grand marshal at funeral processions, the only true yeoman of the +body, over which he exercises a dictatorial authority from the moment +that the breath has taken leave to that of its final commitment to +the earth. His ministry begins where the physician's, the lawyer's, +and the divine's end. Or if some part of the functions of the latter +run parallel with his, it is only _in ordine ad spiritualia_. His +temporalities remain unquestioned. He is arbitrator of all questions +of honor which may concern the defunct; and upon slight inspection +will pronounce how long he may remain in this upper world with credit +to himself, and when it will be prudent for his reputation that he +should retire. His determination in these points is peremptory and +without appeal. Yet, with a modesty peculiar to his profession, he +meddles not out of his own sphere. With the good or bad actions of +the deceased in his lifetime he has nothing to do. He leaves the +friends of the dead man to form their own conjectures as to the place +to which the departed spirit is gone. His care is only about the +exuviae. He concerns not himself even about the body, as it is a +structure of parts internal, and a wonderful microcosm. He leaves +such curious speculations to the anatomy professor. Or, if anything, +he is averse to such wanton inquiries, as delighting rather that the +parts which he has care of should be returned to their kindred dust +in as handsome and unmutilated condition as possible; that the grave +should have its full and unimpaired tribute,--a complete and just +carcass. Nor is he only careful to provide for the body's entireness, +but for its accommodation and ornament. He orders the fashion of its +clothes, and designs the symmetry of its dwelling. Its vanity has an +innocent survival in him. He is bedmaker to the dead. The pillows +which he lays never rumple. The day of interment is the theatre in +which he displays the mysteries of his art. It is hard to describe +what he is, or rather to tell what he is not, on that day: for, being +neither kinsman, servant, nor friend, he is all in turns; a +transcendant, running through all those relations. His office is to +supply the place of self-agency in the family, who are presumed +incapable of it through grief. He is eyes, and ears, and hands, to +the whole household. A draught of wine cannot go round to the +mourners, but he must minister it. A chair may hardly be restored to +its place by a less solemn hand than his. He takes upon himself all +functions, and is a sort of ephemeral major-domo! He distributes his +attentions among the company assembled according to the degree of +affliction, which he calculates from the degree of kin to the +deceased; and marshals them accordingly in the procession. He himself +is of a sad and tristful countenance; yet such as (if well examined) +is not without some show of patience and resignation at bottom; +prefiguring, as it were, to the friends of the deceased, what their +grief shall be when the hand of Time shall have softened and taken +down the bitterness of their first anguish; so handsomely can he +fore-shape and anticipate the work of Time. Lastly, with his wand, as +with another divining rod, he calculates the depth of earth at which +the bones of the dead man may rest, which he ordinarily contrives may +be at such a distance from the surface of this earth, as may +frustrate the profane attempts of such as would violate his repose, +yet sufficiently on this side the centre to give his friends hopes of +an easy and practicable resurrection. And here we leave him, casting +in dust to dust, which is the last friendly office that he +_undertakes_ to do." + +Begging your pardon for detaining you so long among "graves, and +worms, and epitaphs," I am, Sir, + +Your humble servant, + +MORITURUS. + + + * * * * * + + +ON THE +DANGER OF CONFOUNDING MORAL WITH PERSONAL +DEFORMITY. + +WITH A HINT TO THOSE WHO HAVE THE FRAMING OF +ADVERTISEMENTS FOR APPREHENDING OFFENDERS. + + * * * * * + +TO THE EDITOR OF "THE REFLECTOR." + +MR. REFLECTOR,--There is no science in their pretensions to which +mankind are more apt to commit grievous mistakes, than in the +supposed very obvious one of physiognomy. I quarrel not with the +principles of this science, as they are laid down by learned +professors; much less am I disposed, with some people, to deny its +existence altogether as any inlet of knowledge that can be depended +upon. I believe that there is, or may be, an art to "read the mind's +construction in the face." But, then, in every species of _reading_, +so much depends upon the eyes of the reader; if they are blear, or +apt to dazzle, or inattentive, or strained with too much attention, +the optic power will infallibly bring home false reports of what it +reads. How often do we say, upon a cursory glance at a stranger, +"What a fine open countenance he has!" who, upon second inspection, +proves to have the exact features of a knave? Nay, in much more +intimate acquaintances, how a delusion of this kind shall continue +for months, years, and then break up all at once. + +Ask the married man, who has been so but for a short space of time, +if those blue eyes where, during so many years of anxious courtship, +truth, sweetness, serenity, seemed to be written in characters which +could not be misunderstood--ask him if the characters which they now +convey be exactly the same?--if for truth he does not _read_ a dull +virtue (the mimic of constancy) which changes not, only because it +wants the judgment to make a preference?--if for sweetness he does +not _read_ a stupid habit of looking pleased at everything?--if for +serenity he does not _read_ animal tranquillity, the dead pool of the +heart, which no breeze of passion can stir into health? Alas! what is +this book of the countenance good for, which when we have read so +long, and thought that we understood its contents, there comes a +countless list of heart-breaking errata at the end! + +But these are the pitiable mistakes to which love alone is subject. I +have inadvertently wandered from my purpose, which was to expose +quite an opposite blunder, into which we are no less apt to fall, +through hate. How ugly a person looks upon whose reputation some +awkward aspersion hangs, and how suddenly his countenance clears up +with his character! I remember being persuaded of a man whom I had +conceived an ill opinion of, that he had a very bad set of teeth; +which, since I have had better opportunities of being acquainted with +his face and facts, I find to have been the very reverse of the +truth. _That crooked old woman_, I once said, speaking of an ancient +gentlewoman, whose actions did not square altogether with my notions +of the rule of right. The unanimous surprise of the company before +whom I uttered these words soon convinced me that I had confounded +mental with bodily obliquity, and that there was nothing tortuous +about the old lady but her deeds. + +This humor of mankind to deny personal comeliness to those with whose +moral attributes they are dissatisfied, is very strongly shown in +those advertisements which stare us in the face from the walls of +every street, and, with the tempting bait which they hang forth, +stimulate at once cupidity and an abstract love of justice in the +breast of every passing peruser: I mean, the advertisements offering +rewards for the apprehension of absconded culprits, strayed +apprentices, bankrupts who have conveyed away their effects, debtors +that have run away from their bail. I observe, that in exact +proportion to the indignity with which the prosecutor, who is +commonly the framer of the advertisement, conceives he has been +treated, the personal pretensions of the fugitive are denied, and his +defects exaggerated. + +A fellow whose misdeeds have been directed against the public in +general, and in whose delinquency no individual shall feel himself +particularly interested, generally meets with fair usage. A coiner or +a smuggler shall get off tolerably well. His beauty, if he has any, +is not much underrated, his deformities are not much magnified. A +runaway apprentice, who excites perhaps the next least degree of +spleen in his prosecutor, generally escapes with a pair of bandy +legs; if he has taken anything with him in his flight, a hitch in his +gait is generally superadded. A bankrupt, who has been guilty of +withdrawing his effects, if his case be not very atrocious, commonly +meets with mild usage. But a debtor, who has left his bail in +jeopardy, is sure to be described in characters of unmingled +deformity. Here the personal feelings of the bail, which may be +allowed to be somewhat poignant, are admitted to interfere; and, as +wrath and revenge commonly strike in the dark, the colors are laid on +with a grossness which I am convinced must often defeat its own +purpose. The fish that casts an inky cloud about him that his enemies +may not find him, cannot more obscure himself by that device than the +blackening representations of these angry advertisers must inevitably +serve to cloak and screen the persons of those who have injured them +from detection. I have before me at this moment one of these bills, +which runs thus:-- + +"FIFTY POUNDS REWARD. + +"Run away from his bail, John Tomkins, formerly resident in Princes +Street, Soho, but lately of Clerkenwell. Whoever shall apprehend, or +cause to be apprehended and lodged in one of his Majesty's jails, the +said John Tomkins, shall receive the above reward. He is a thick-set, +sturdy man, about five foot six inches high, halts in his left leg, +with a stoop in his gait, with coarse red hair, nose short and cocked +up, with little gray eyes, (one of them bears the effect of a blow +which he has lately received,) with a pot-belly; speaks with a thick +and disagreeable voice; goes shabbily drest; had on when he went away +a greasy shag great-coat with rusty yellow buttons." + +Now, although it is not out of the compass of possibility that John +Tomkins aforesaid may comprehend in his agreeable person all the +above-mentioned aggregate of charms, yet, from my observation of the +manner in which these advertisements are usually drawn up, though I +have not the pleasure of knowing the gentleman, yet would I lay a +wager, that an advertisement to the following effect would have a +much better chance of apprehending and laying by the heels this John +Tomkins than the above description, although penned by one who, from +the good services which he appears to have done for him, has not +improbably been blessed with some years of previous intercourse with +the said John. Taking, then, the above advertisement to be true, or +nearly so, down to the words "left leg" inclusive, (though I have +some doubt if the blemish there implied amount to a positive +lameness, or be perceivable by any but the nearest friends of John,) +I would proceed thus:-- + +--"Leans a little forward in his walk; his hair thick and inclining +to auburn; his nose of the middle size, a little turned up at the +end; lively hazel eyes (the contusion, as its effects are probably +gone off by this time, I judge better omitted); inclines to be +corpulent; his voice thick, but pleasing, especially when he sings; +had on a decent shag great-coat with yellow buttons." + +Now I would stake a considerable wager (though by no means a positive +man) that some such mitigated description would lead the beagles of +the law into a much surer track for finding this ungracious varlet, +than to set them upon a false scent after fictitious ugliness and +fictitious shabbiness; though, to do those gentlemen justice, I have +no doubt their experience has taught them in all such cases to abate +a great deal of the deformity which they are instructed to expect, +and has discovered to them that the Devil's agents upon this earth, +like their master, are far less ugly in reality than they are +painted. + +I am afraid, Mr. Reflector, that I shall be thought to have gone wide +of my subject, which was to detect the practical errors of +physiognomy, properly so called; whereas I have introduced physical +defects, such as lameness, the effects of accidents upon a man's +person, his wearing apparel, &c., as circumstances on which the eye +of dislike, looking askance, may report erroneous conclusions to the +understanding. But if we are liable, through a kind or an unkind +passion, to mistake so grossly concerning things so exterior and +palpable, how much more are we likely to err respecting those nicer +and less perceptible hints of character in a face whose detection +constitutes the triumph of the physiognomist! + +To revert to those bestowers of unmerited deformity, the framers of +advertisements for the apprehension of delinquents, a sincere desire +of promoting the end of public justice induces me to address a word +to them on the best means of attaining those ends. I will endeavor to +lay down a few practical, or rather negative, rules for their use, +for my ambition extends no further than to arm them with cautions +against the self-defeating of their own purposes:-- + +1. Imprimis, then, Mr. Advertiser! If the culprit whom you are +willing to recover be one to whom in times past you have shown +kindness, and been disposed to think kindly of him yourself, but he +has deceived your trust, and has run away, and left you with a load +of debt to answer for him,--sit down calmly and endeavor to behold +him through the spectacles of memory rather than of present conceit. +Image to yourself, before you pen a tittle of his description, the +same plausible, good-looking man who took you in, and try to put away +from your mind every intrusion of that deceitful spectre which +perpetually obtrudes itself in the room of your former friend's known +visage. It will do you more credit to have been deceived by such a +one; and depend upon it, the traitor will convey to the eyes of the +world in general much more of that first idea which you formed +(perhaps in part erroneous) of his physiognomy, than of that +frightful substitute which you have suffered to creep in upon your +mind and usurp upon it; a creature which has no archetype except in +your own brain. + +2. If you be a master that have to advertise a runaway apprentice, +though the young dog's faults are known only to you, and no doubt his +conduct has been aggravating enough, do not presently set him down as +having crooked ankles. He may have a good pair of legs, and run away +notwithstanding. Indeed, the latter does rather seem to imply the +former. + +3. If the unhappy person against whom your laudable vengeance is +directed be a thief, think that a thief may have a good nose, good +eyes, good ears. It is indispensable to his profession that he be +possessed of sagacity, foresight, vigilance; it is more than +probable, then, that he is endued with the bodily types or +instruments of these qualities to some tolerable degree of +perfectness. + +4. If petty larceny be his offence, I exhort you, do not confound +meanness of crime with diminutiveness of stature. These things have +no connection. I have known a tall man stoop to the basest action, a +short man aspire to the height of crime, a fair man be guilty of the +foulest actions, &c. + +5. Perhaps the offender has been guilty of some atrocious and +aggravated murder. Here is the most difficult case of all. It is +above all requisite that such a daring violator of the peace and +safety of society should meet with his reward, a violent and +ignominious death. But how shall we get at him? Who is there among us +that has known him before he committed the offence, that shall take +upon him to say he can sit down coolly and pen a dispassionate +description of a murderer? The tales of our nursery,--the reading of +our youth,--the ill-looking man that was hired by the Uncle to +despatch the Children in the Wood,--the grim ruffians who smothered +the babes in the Tower,--the black and beetle-browed assassin of Mrs. +Ratcliffe,--the shag-haired villain of Mr. Monk Lewis,--the Tarquin +tread, and mill-stone dropping eyes, of Murder in Shakspeare,--the +exaggerations of picture and of poetry,--what we have read and what +we have dreamed of,--rise up and crowd in upon us such eye-scaring +portraits of the man of blood, that our pen is absolutely +forestalled; we commence poets when we should play the part of +strictest historians, and the very blackness of horror which the deed +calls up, serves as a cloud to screen the doer. The fiction is +blameless, it is accordant with those wise prejudices with which +nature has guarded our innocence, as with impassable barriers, +against the commission of such appalling crimes; but, meantime, the +criminal escapes; or if,--owing to that wise abatement in their +expectation of deformity, which, as I hinted at before, the officers +of pursuit never fail to make, and no doubt in cases of this sort +they make a more than ordinary allowance,--if, owing to this or any +accident, the offender is caught and brought to his trial, who that +has been led out of curiosity to witness such a scene has not with +astonishment reflected on the difference between a real committer of +a murder, and the idea of one which he has been collecting and +heightening all his life out of books, dreams, &c.? The fellow, +perhaps, is a sleek, smug-looking man, with light hair and +eyebrows,--the latter by no means jutting out or like a crag,--and +with none of those marks which our fancy had pre-bestowed upon him. + +I find I am getting unawares too serious; the best way on such +occasions is to leave off, which I shall do by generally recommending +to all prosecuting advertisers not to confound crimes with ugliness; +or rather, to distinguish between that physiognomical deformity, +which I am willing to grant always accompanies crime, and mere +_physical ugliness_,--which signifies nothing, is the opponent of +nothing, and may exist in a good or bad person indifferently. + +CRITO. + + + + +ON THE INCONVENIENCES RESULTING FROM +BEING HANGED. + + * * * * * + +TO THE EDITOR OF "THE REFLECTOR." + +Sir,--I am one of those unhappy persons whose misfortunes, it seems, +do not entitle them to the benefit of pure pity. All that is bestowed +upon me of that kindest alleviator of human miseries comes dashed +with a double portion of contempt. My griefs have nothing in them +that is felt as sacred by the bystanders. Yet is my affliction, in +truth, of the deepest grain--the heaviest task that was ever given to +mortal patience to sustain. Time, that wears out all other sorrows, +can never modify or soften mine. Here they must continue to gnaw as +long at that fatal mark---- + +Why was I ever born? Why was innocence in my person suffered to be +branded with a stain which was appointed only for the blackest guilt? +What had I done, or my parents, that a disgrace of mine should +involve a whole posterity in infamy? I am almost tempted to believe, +that, in some preexistent state, crimes to which this sublunary life +of mine hath been as much a stranger as the babe that is newly born +into it, have drawn down upon me this vengeance, so disproportionate +to my actions on this globe. + +My brain sickens, and my bosom labors to be delivered of the weight +that presses upon it, yet my conscious pen shrinks from the avowal. +But out it must---- + +O, Mr. Reflector! guess at the wretch's misery who now writes this to +you, when, with tears and burning blushes, he is obliged to confess +that he has been--HANGED---- + +Methinks I hear an involuntary exclamation burst from you, as your +imagination presents to you fearful images of your correspondent +unknown--_hanged!_ + +Fear not, Mr. Editor. No disembodied spirit has the honor of +addressing you. I am flesh and blood, an unfortunate system of bones, +muscles, sinews, arteries, like yourself. + +_Then, I presume, you mean to be pleasant.--That expression of yours, +Mr. Correspondent, must be taken somehow in a metaphorical sense----_ + +In the plainest sense, without trope or figure--Yes, Mr. Editor! this +neck of mine has felt the fatal noose,--these hands have tremblingly +held up the corroborative prayer-book,--these lips have sucked the +moisture of the last consolatory orange,--this tongue has chanted the +doleful cantata which no performer was ever called upon to +repeat,--this face has had the veiling nightcap drawn over it---- + +But for no crime of mine.--Far be it from me to arraign the justice +of my country, which, though tardy, did at length recognize my +innocence. It is not for me to reflect upon judge or jury, now that +eleven years have elapsed since the erroneous sentence was +pronounced. Men will always be fallible, and perhaps circumstances +did appear at the time a little strong---- + +Suffice it to say, that after hanging four minutes (as the spectators +were pleased to compute it,--a man that is being strangled, I know +from experience, has altogether a different measure of time from his +friends who are breathing leisurely about him,--I suppose the minutes +lengthen as time approaches eternity, in the same manner as the miles +get longer as you travel northward),--after hanging four minutes, +according to the best calculation of the bystanders, a reprieve came, +and I was CUT DOWN-- + +Really I am ashamed of deforming your pages with these technical +phrases--if I knew how to express my meaning shorter-- + +But to proceed.--My first care after I had been brought to myself by +the usual methods (those methods that are so interesting to the +operator and his assistants, who are pretty numerous on such +occasions,--but which no patient was ever desirous of undergoing a +second time for the benefit of science), my first care was to provide +myself with an enormous stock or cravat to hide the place--you +understand me; my next care was to procure a residence as distant as +possible from that part of the country where I had suffered. For that +reason I chose the metropolis, as the place where wounded honor (I +had been told) could lurk with the least danger of exciting inquiry, +and stigmatized innocence had the best chance of hiding her disgrace +in a crowd. I sought out a new circle of acquaintance, and my +circumstances happily enabling me to pursue my fancy in that respect, +I endeavored, by mingling in all the pleasures which the town +affords, to efface the memory of what I had undergone. + +But, alas! such is the portentous and all-pervading chain of +connection which links together the head and members of this great +community, my scheme of lying perdu was defeated almost at the +outset. A countryman of mine, whom a foolish lawsuit had brought to +town, by chance met me, and the secret was soon blazoned about. + +In a short time I found myself deserted by most of those who had been +my intimate friends. Not that any guilt was supposed to attach to my +character. My officious countryman, to do him justice, had been +candid enough to explain my perfect innocence. + +But, somehow or other, there is a want of strong virtue in mankind. +We have plenty of the softer instincts, but the heroic character is +gone. How else can I account for it, that of all my numerous +acquaintance, among whom I had the honor of ranking sundry persons of +education, talents, and worth, scarcely here and there one or two +could be found who had the courage to associate with a man that had +been hanged. + +Those few who did not desert me altogether were persons of strong but +coarse minds; and from the absence of all delicacy in them I suffered +almost as much as from the superabundance of a false species of it in +the others. Those who stuck by me were the jokers, who thought +themselves entitled by the fidelity which they had shown towards me +to use me with what familiarity they pleased. Many and unfeeling are +the jests that I have suffered from these rude (because faithful) +Achateses. As they passed me in the streets, one would nod +significantly to his companion and say, pointing to me, Smoke his +cravat, and ask me if I had got a wen, that I was so solicitous to +cover my neck. Another would inquire, What news from * * * Assizes? +(which you may guess, Mr. Editor, was the scene of my shame,) and +whether the sessions was like to prove a maiden one? A third would +offer to insure me from drowning. A fourth would tease me with +inquiries how I felt when I was swinging, whether I had not something +like a blue flame dancing before my eyes? A fifth took a fancy never +to call me anything but _Lazarus_. And an eminent bookseller and +publisher,--who, in his zeal to present the public with new facts, +had he lived in those days, I am confident, would not have scrupled +waiting upon the person himself last mentioned, at the most critical +period of his existence, to solicit a _few facts relative to +resuscitation_,--had the modesty to offer me--guineas per sheet, if I +would write, in his magazine, a physiological account of my feelings +upon coming to myself. + +But these were evils which a moderate fortitude might have enabled me +to struggle with. Alas! Mr. Editor, the women,--whose good graces I +had always most assiduously cultivated, from whose softer minds I had +hoped a more delicate and generous sympathy than I found in the +men,--the women began to shun me--this was the unkindest blow of all. + +But is it to be wondered at? How couldst thou imagine, wretchedest of +beings, that that tender creature Seraphina would fling her pretty +arms about that neck which previous circumstances had rendered +infamous? That she would put up with the refuse of the rope, the +leavings of the cord? Or that any analogy could subsist between the +knot which binds true lovers, and the knot which ties malefactors? + +I can forgive that pert baggage Flirtilla, who, when I complimented +her one day on the execution which her eyes had done, replied, that, +to be sure, Mr. * * * was a judge of those things. But from thy more +exalted mind, Celestina, I expected a more unprejudiced decision. The +person whose true name I conceal under this appellation, of all the +women that I was ever acquainted with had the most manly turn of +mind, which she had improved by reading and the best conversation. +Her understanding was not more masculine than her manners and whole +disposition were delicately and truly feminine. She was the daughter +of an officer who had fallen in the service of his country, leaving +his widow, and Celestina, an only child, with a fortune sufficient to +set them above want, but not to enable them to live in splendor. I +had the mother's permission to pay my addresses to the young lady, +and Celestina seemed to approve of my suit. + +Often and often have I poured out my overcharged soul in the presence +of Celestina, complaining of the hard and unfeeling prejudices of the +world; and the sweet maid has again and again declared, that no +irrational prejudice should hinder her from esteeming every man +according to his intrinsic worth. Often has she repeated the +consolatory assurance, that she could never consider as essentially +ignominious an _accident_, which was indeed to be deprecated, but +which might have happened to the most innocent of mankind. Then would +she set forth some illustrious example, which her reading easily +furnished, of a Phocion or a Socrates unjustly condemned; of a +Raleigh or a Sir Thomas More, to whom late posterity had done +justice; and by soothing my fancy with some such agreeable parallel, +she would make me almost to triumph in my disgrace, and convert my +shame into glory. + +In such entertaining and instructive conversations the time passed +on, till I importunately urged the mistress of my affections to name +the day for our union. To this she obligingly consented, and I +thought myself the happiest of mankind. But how was I surprised one +morning on the receipt of the following billet from my charmer:-- + +SIR,--You must not impute it to levity, or to a worse failing, +ingratitude, if, with anguish of heart, I feel myself compelled by +irresistible arguments to recall a vow which I fear I made with too +little consideration. I never can be yours. The reasons of my +decision, which is final, are in my own breast, and you must +everlastingly remain a stranger to them. Assure yourself that I can +never cease to esteem you as I ought. + + +CELESTINA. + +At the sight of this paper, I ran in frantic haste to Celestina's +lodgings, where I learned, to my infinite mortification, that the +mother and daughter were set off on a journey to a distant part of +the country, to visit a relation, and were not expected to return in +less than four months. + +Stunned by this blow, which left me without the courage to solicit an +explanation by letter, even if I had known where they were, (for the +particular address was industriously concealed from me,) I waited +with impatience the termination of the period, in the vain hope that +I might be permitted to have a chance of softening the harsh decision +by a personal interview with Celestina after her return. But before +three months were at an end, I learned from the newspapers that my +beloved had----given her hand to another. + +Heart-broken as I was, I was totally at a loss to account for the +strange step which she had taken; and it was not till some years +after that I learned the true reason from a female relation of hers, +to whom it seems Celestina had confessed in confidence, that it was +no demerit of mine that had caused her to break off the match so +abruptly, nor any preference which she might feel for any other +person, for she preferred me (she was pleased to say) to all mankind; +but when she came to lay the matter closer to her heart, she found +that she never should be able to bear the sight--(I give you her very +words as they were detailed to me by her relation)--the sight of a +man in a nightcap who had appeared on a public platform--it would +lead to such a disagreeable association of ideas! And to this +punctilio I was sacrificed. + +To pass over an infinite series of minor mortifications, to which +this last and heaviest might well render me callous, behold me here, +Mr. Editor! in the thirty-seventh year of my existence, (the twelfth, +reckoning from my reanimation,) cut off from all respectable +connections: rejected by the fairer half of the community,--who in my +case alone seem to have laid aside the characteristic pity of their +sex; punished because I was once punished unjustly: suffering for no +other reason than because I once had the misfortune to suffer without +any cause at all. In no other country, I think, but this, could a man +have been subject to such a life-long persecution, when once his +innocence had been clearly established. + +Had I crawled forth a rescued victim from the rack in the horrible +dungeons of the Inquisition,--had I heaved myself up from a half +bastinado in China, or been torn from the just-entering, ghastly +impaling stake in Barbary,--had I dropt alive from the knout in +Russia, or come off with a gashed neck from the half-mortal, +scarce-in-time-retracted cimeter of an executioneering slave in +Turkey,--I might have borne about the remnant of this frame (the +mangled trophy of reprieved innocence) with credit to myself in any +of those barbarous countries. No scorn, at least, would have mingled +with the pity (small as it might be) with which what was left of me +would have been surveyed. + +The singularity of my case has often led me to inquire into the +reasons of the general levity with which the subject of hanging is +treated as a topic in this country. I say, as a topic: for let the +very persons who speak so lightly of the thing at a distance be +brought to view the real scene,--let the platform be bona fide +exhibited, and the trembling culprit brought forth,--the case is +changed; but as a topic of conversation, I appeal to the vulgar jokes +which pass current in every street. But why mention them, when the +politest authors have agreed in making use of this subject as a +source of the ridiculous? Swift, and Pope, and Prior, are fond of +recurring to it. Gay has built an entire drama upon this single +foundation. The whole interest of the _Beggar's Opera_ may be said to +hang upon it. To such writers as Fielding and Smollett it is a +perfect _bonne-bouche_.--Hear the facetious Tom Brown, in his +_Comical View of London and Westminster_, describe the _Order of the +Show at one of the Tyburn Executions_ in his time:--"Mr. Ordinary +visits his melancholy flock in Newgate by eight. Doleful procession +up Holborn Hill about eleven. Men handsome and proper that were never +thought so before, which is some comfort however. Arrive at the fatal +place by twelve. Burnt brandy, women, and sabbath-breaking, repented +of. Some few penitential drops fall under the gallows. Sheriffs' men, +parson, pickpockets, criminals, all very busy. The last concluding +peremptory psalm struck up. Show over by one."--In this sportive +strain does this misguided wit think proper to play with a subject so +serious, which yet he would hardly have done if he had not known that +there existed a predisposition in the habits of his unaccountable +countrymen to consider the subject as a jest. But what shall we say +to Shakspeare, who, (not to mention the solution which the +_Gravedigger_ in _Hamlet_ gives of his fellow-workman's problem,) in +that scene in _Measure for Measure_, where the _Clown_ calls upon +_Master Barnardine_ to get up and be hanged, which he declines on the +score of being sleepy, has actually gone out of his way to gratify +this amiable propensity in his countrymen; for it is plain, from the +use that was to be made of his head, and from _Abhorson's_ asking, +"Is the axe upon the block, sirrah?" that beheading, and not hanging, +was the punishment to which _Barnardine_ was destined. But Shakspeare +knew that the axe and block were pregnant with no ludicrous images, +and therefore falsified the historic truth of his own drama (if I may +so speak), rather than he would leave out such excellent matter for a +jest as the suspending of a fellow-creature in mid-air has been ever +esteemed to be by Englishmen. + +One reason why the ludicrous never fails to intrude itself into our +contemplations upon this mode of death, I suppose to be, the absurd +posture into which a man is thrown who is condemned to dance, as the +vulgar delight to express it, upon nothing. To see him whisking and +wavering in the air, + + "As the wind you know will wave a man;"[1] + +to behold the vacant carcass, from which the life is newly dislodged, +shifting between earth and heaven, the sport of every gust; like a +weathercock, serving to show from which point the wind blows; like a +maukin, fit only to scare away birds; like a nest left to swing upon +a bough when the bird is flown: these are uses to which we cannot +without a mixture of spleen and contempt behold the human carcass +reduced. We string up dogs, foxes, bats, moles, weasels. Man surely +deserves a steadier death. + +[Footnote 1: Hieronimo in the Spanish Tragedy.] + +Another reason why the ludicrous associates more forcibly with this +than with any other mode of punishment, I cannot help thinking to be, +the senseless costume with which old prescription has thought fit to +clothe the exit of malefactors in this country. Let a man do what he +will to abstract from his imagination all idea of the whimsical, +something of it will come across him when he contemplates the figure +of a fellow-creature in the daytime (in however distressing a +situation) in a nightcap. Whether it be that this nocturnal addition +has something discordant with daylight, or that it is the dress which +we are seen in at those times when we are "seen," as the Angel in +Milton expresses it, "least wise,"--this, I am afraid, will always be +the case; unless, indeed, as in my instance, some strong personal +feeling overpower the ludicrous altogether. To me, when I reflect +upon the train of misfortunes which have pursued men through life, +owing to that accursed drapery, the cap presents as purely frightful +an object as the sleeveless yellow coat and devil-painted mitre of +the San Benitos.--An ancestor of mine, who suffered for his loyalty +in the time of the civil wars, was so sensible of the truth of what I +am here advancing, that on the morning of execution, no entreaties +could prevail upon him to submit to the odious dishabille, as he +called it, but he insisted upon wearing, and actually suffered in, +the identical, flowing periwig which he is painted in, in the gallery +belonging to my uncle's seat in ----shire. + +Suffer me, Mr. Editor, before I quit the subject, to say a word or +two respecting the minister of justice in this country; in plain +words, I mean the hangman. It has always appeared to me that, in the +mode of inflicting capital punishments with us, there is too much of +the ministry of the human hand. The guillotine, as performing its +functions more of itself and sparing human agency, though a cruel and +disgusting exhibition, in my mind has many ways the advantage over +_our way_. In beheading, indeed, as it was formerly practised in +England, and in whipping to death, as is sometimes practised now, the +hand of man is no doubt sufficiently busy; but there is something +less repugnant in these downright blows than in the officious +barber-like ministerings of _the other_. To have a fellow with his +hangman's hands fumbling about your collar, adjusting the thing as +your valet would regulate your cravat, valuing himself on his menial +dexterity---- + +I never shall forget meeting my rascal,--I mean the fellow who +officiated for me,--in London last winter. I think I see him now,--in +a waistcoat that had been mine,--smirking along as if he knew me---- + +In some parts of Germany, that fellow's office is by law declared +infamous, and his posterity incapable of being ennobled. They have +hereditary hangmen, or had at least, in the same manner as they had +hereditary other great officers of state; and the hangmen's families +of two adjoining parishes intermarried with each other, to keep the +breed entire. I wish something of the same kind were established in +England. + +But it is time to quit a subject which teems with disagreeable +images---- + +Permit me to subscribe myself, Mr. Editor, + +Your unfortunate friend, + +PENSILIS. + + + * * * * * + + +ON THE MELANCHOLY OF TAILORS. + + "Sedet, asternumque sedebit, + Infelix Theseus." VIRGIL. + + +That there is a professional melancholy, if I may so express myself, +incident to the occupation of a tailor, is a fact which I think very +few will venture to dispute. I may safely appeal to my readers, +whether they ever knew one of that faculty that was not of a +temperament, to say the least, far removed from mercurial or jovial. + +Observe the suspicious gravity of their gait. The peacock is not more +tender, from a consciousness of his peculiar infirmity, than a +gentleman of this profession is of being known by the same infallible +testimonies of his occupation. "Walk, that I may know thee." + +Do you ever see him go whistling along the footpath like a carman, or +brush through a crowd like a baker, or go smiling to himself like a +lover? Is he forward to thrust into mobs, or to make one at the +ballad-singer's audiences? Does he not rather slink by assemblies and +meetings of the people, as one that wisely declines popular +observation? + +How extremely rare is a noisy tailor! a mirthful and obstreperous +tailor! + +"At my nativity," says Sir Thomas Browne, "my ascendant was the +earthly sign of Scorpius; I was born in the planetary hour of Saturn, +and I think I have a piece of that leaden planet in me." One would +think that he were anatomizing a tailor! save that to the latter's +occupation, methinks, a woollen planet would seem more consonant, and +that he should be born when the sun was in Aries.--He goes on; "I am +no way facetious, nor disposed for the mirth and galliardise of +company." How true a type of the whole trade! Eminently economical of +his words, you shall seldom hear a jest come from one of them. He +sometimes furnishes subject for a repartee, but rarely (I think) +contributes one _ore proprio_. + +Drink itself does not seem to elevate him, or at least to call out of +him any of the external indications of vanity. I cannot say that it +never causes his pride to swell, but it never breaks out. I am even +fearful that it may swell and rankle to an alarming degree inwardly. +For pride is near of kin to melancholy!--a hurtful obstruction from +the ordinary outlets of vanity being shut. It is this stoppage which +engenders proud humors. Therefore a tailor may be proud. I think he +is never vain. The display of his gaudy patterns, in that book of his +which emulates the rainbow, never raises any inflations of that +emotion in him, corresponding to what the wig-maker (for instance) +evinces, when he expatiates on a curl or a bit of hair. He spreads +them forth with a sullen incapacity for pleasure, a real or affected +indifference to grandeur. Cloth of gold neither seems to elate, nor +cloth of frieze to depress him--according to the beautiful motto +which formed the modest imprese of the shield worn by Charles Brandon +at his marriage with the king's sister. Nay, I doubt whether he would +discover any vainglorious complacence in his colors, though "Iris" +herself "dipt the woof." + +In further corroboration of this argument--who ever saw the wedding +of a tailor announced in the newspapers, or the birth of his eldest +son? + +When was a tailor known to give a dance, or to be himself a good +dancer, or to perform exquisitely on the tight-rope, or to shine in +any such light and airy pastimes? to sing, or play on the violin? + +Do they much care for public rejoicings, lightings up, ringing of +bells, firing of cannons, &c.? + +Valiant I know they can be; but I appeal to those who were witnesses +to the exploits of Eliot's famous troop, whether in their fiercest +charges they betrayed anything of that thoughtless oblivion of death +with which a Frenchman jigs into battle, or whether they did not show +more of the melancholy valor of the Spaniard, upon whom they charged; +that deliberate courage which contemplation and sedentary habits +breathe? + +Are they often great newsmongers?--I have known some few among them +arrive at the dignity of speculative politicians; but that light and +cheerful every-day interest in the affairs and goings-on of the +world, which makes the barber[1] such delightful company, I think is +rarely observable in them. + +[Footnote 1: Having incidentally mentioned the barber in a comparison +of professional temperaments, I hope no other trade will take +offence, or look upon it as an incivility done to them if I say, that +in courtesy, humanity, and all the conversational and social graces +which "gladden life," I esteem no profession comparable to his. +Indeed, so great is the goodwill which I bear to this useful and +agreeable body of men, that, residing in one of the Inns of Court +(where the best specimens of them are to be found, except perhaps at +the universities), there are seven of them to whom I am personally +known, and who never pass me without the compliment of the hat on +either side. My truly polite and urbane friend Mr. A----m, of +Flower-de-luce Court, in Fleet Street, will forgive my mention of him +in particular. I can truly say that I never spent a quarter of an +hour under his hands without deriving some profit from the agreeable +discussions which are always going on there.] + +This characteristic pensiveness in them being so notorious, I wonder +none of those writers, who have expressly treated of melancholy, +should have mentioned it. Burton, whose book is an excellent abstract +of all the authors in that kind who preceded him, and who treats of +every species of this malady, from the _hypochondriacal_ or _windy_ +to the _heroical_ or _love-melancholy_, has strangely omitted it. +Shakspeare himself has overlooked it. "I have neither the scholar's +melancholy (saith Jaques), which is emulation; nor the courtier's, +which is proud; nor the soldier's, which is politic; nor the lover's, +which is all these:" and then, when you might expect him to have +brought in, "nor the tailor's, which is," so and so, he comes to an +end of his enumeration, and falls to a defining of his own +melancholy. + +Milton likewise has omitted it, where he had so fair an opportunity +of bringing it in, in his _Penseroso_. + +But the partial omissions of historians proving nothing against the +existence of any well-attested fact, I shall proceed and endeavor to +ascertain the causes why this pensive turn should be so predominant +in people of this profession above all others. + +And first, may it not be, that the custom of wearing apparel being +derived to us from the fall, and one of the most mortifying products +of that unhappy event, a certain _seriousness_ (to say no more of it) +may in the order of things have been intended to be impressed upon +the minds of that race of men to whom in all ages the care of +contriving the human apparel has been intrusted, to keep up the +memory of the first institution of clothes, and serve as a standing +remonstrance against those vanities which the absurd conversion of a +memorial of our shame into an ornament of our persons was destined to +produce? Correspondent in some sort to this, it may be remarked, that +the tailor sitting over a cave or hollow place, in the caballistic +language of his order is said to have _certain melancholy_ regions +always open under his feet.--But waiving further inquiry into final +causes, where the best of us can only wander in the dark, let us try +to discover the efficient causes of this melancholy. + +I think, then, that they may be reduced to two, omitting some +subordinate ones, viz.: + + The sedentary habits of the tailor.-- + Something peculiar in his diet.-- + +First, his _sedentary habits_.--In Dr. Norris's famous narrative of +the frenzy of Mr. John Dennis, the patient, being questioned as to +the occasion of the swelling in his legs, replies that it came "by +criticism;" to which the learned doctor seeming to demur, as to a +distemper which he had never read of, Dennis (who appears not to have +been mad upon all subjects) rejoins, with some warmth, that it was no +distemper, but a noble art; that he had sat fourteen hours a day at +it; and that the other was a pretty doctor not to know that there was +a communication between the brain and the legs. + +When we consider that this sitting for fourteen hours continuously, +which the critic probably practised only while he was writing his +"remarks," is no more than what the tailor, in the ordinary pursuance +of his art, submits to daily (Sundays excepted) throughout the year, +shall we wonder to find the brain affected, and in a manner +overclouded, from that indissoluble sympathy between the noble and +less noble parts of the body which Dennis hints at? The unnatural and +painful manner of his sitting must also greatly aggravate the evil, +insomuch that I have sometimes ventured to liken tailors at their +boards to so many envious Junos, _sitting cross-legged to hinder the +birth of their own felicity_. The legs transversed thus +[Illustration: X lying on its side] crosswise, or decussated, was +among the ancients the posture of malediction. The Turks, who +practise it at this day, are noted to be a melancholy people. + +Secondly, his _diet_.--To which purpose I find a most remarkable +passage in Burton, in his chapter entitled "Bad diet a cause of +melancholy." "Amongst herbs to be eaten (he says) I find gourds, +cucumbers, melons, disallowed; but especially CABBAGE. It causeth +troublesome dreams, and sends up black vapors to the brain. Galen, +_Loc. Affect_, lib. iii. cap. 6, of all herbs condemns CABBAGE. And +Isaack, lib. ii. cap. 1, _animae gravitatem facit_, it brings +heaviness to the soul." I could not omit so flattering a testimony +from an author who, having no theory of his own to serve, has so +unconsciously contributed to the confirmation of mine. It is well +known that this last-named vegetable has, from the earliest periods +which we can discover, constituted almost the sole food of this +extraordinary race of people. + +BURTON, _Junior_. + + + * * * * * + + +HOSPITA + +ON THE IMMODERATE INDULGENCE OF THE PLEASURES +OF THE PALATE. + + +TO THE EDITOR OF "THE REFLECTOR." + +MR. REFLECTOR,--My husband and I are fond of company, and being in +easy circumstances, we are seldom without a party to dinner two or +three days in a week. The utmost cordiality has hitherto prevailed at +our meetings; but there is a young gentleman, a near relation of my +husband's, that has lately come among us, whose preposterous behavior +bids fair, if not timely checked, to disturb our tranquillity. He is +too great a favorite with my husband in other respects, for me to +remonstrate with him in any other than this distant way. A letter +printed in your publication may catch his eye; for he is a great +reader, and makes a point of seeing all the new things that come out. +Indeed, he is by no means deficient in understanding. My husband says +that he has a good deal of wit; but for my part I cannot say I am any +judge of that, having seldom observed him open his mouth except for +purposes very foreign to conversation. In short, sir, this young +gentleman's failing is, an immoderate indulgence of his palate. The +first time he dined with us, he thought it necessary to extenuate the +length of time he kept the dinner on the table, by declaring that he +had taken a very long walk in the morning, and came in fasting; but +as that excuse could not serve above once or twice at most, he has +latterly dropped the mask altogether, and chosen to appear in his own +proper colors, without reserve or apology. + +You cannot imagine how unpleasant his conduct has become. His way of +staring at the dishes as they are brought in, has absolutely +something immodest in it: it is like the stare of an impudent man of +fashion at a fine woman, when she first comes into a room. I am +positively in pain for the dishes, and cannot help thinking they have +consciousness, and will be put out of countenance, he treats them so +like what they are not. + +Then again he makes no scruple of keeping a joint of meat on the +table, after the cheese and fruit are brought in, till he has what he +calls _done with it_. Now how awkward this looks, where there are +ladies, you may judge, Mr. Reflector,--how it disturbs the order and +comfort of a meal. And yet I always make a point of helping him +first, contrary to all good manners,--before any of my female friends +are helped, that he may avoid this very error. I wish he would eat +before he comes out. + +What makes his proceedings more particularly offensive at our house +is, that my husband, though out of common politeness he is obliged to +set dishes of animal food before his visitors, yet himself and his +whole family (myself included) feed entirely on vegetables. We have a +theory, that animal food is neither wholesome nor natural to man; and +even vegetables we refuse to eat until they have undergone the +operation of fire, in consideration of those numberless little living +creatures which the glass helps us to detect in every fibre of the +plant or root before it be dressed. On the same theory we boil our +water, which is our only drink, before we suffer it to come to table. +Our children are perfect little Pythagoreans: it would do you good to +see them in their nursery, stuffing their dried fruits, figs, +raisins, and _milk_, which is the only approach to animal food which +is allowed. They have no notion how the substance of a creature that +ever had life can become food for another creature. A beefsteak is an +absurdity to them; a mutton-chop, a solecism in terms; a cutlet, a +word absolutely without any meaning; a butcher is nonsense, except so +far as it is taken for a man who delights in blood, or a hero. In +this happy state of innocence we have kept their minds, not allowing +them to go into the kitchen, or to hear of any preparations for the +dressing of animal food, or even to know that such things are +practised. But as a state of ignorance is incompatible with a certain +age, and as my eldest girl, who is ten years old next Midsummer, must +shortly be introduced into the world and sit at table with us, where +she will see some things which will shock all her received notions, I +have been endeavoring by little and little to break her mind, and +prepare it for the disagreeable impressions which must be forced upon +it. The first hint I gave her upon the subject, I could see her +recoil from it with the same horror with which we listen to a tale of +Anthropophagism; but she has gradually grown more reconciled to it, +in some measure, from my telling her that it was the custom of the +world,--to which, however senseless, we must submit, so far as we +could do it with innocence, not to give offence; and she has shown so +much strength of mind on other occasions, which I have no doubt is +owing to the calmness and serenity superinduced by her diet, that I +am in good hopes when the proper season for her _debut_ arrives, she +may be brought to endure the sight of a roasted chicken, or a dish of +sweet-breads for the first time without fainting. Such being the +nature of our little household, you may guess what inroads into the +economy of it,--what resolutions and turnings of things upside down, +the example of such a feeder as Mr. ---- is calculated to produce. + +I wonder, at a time like the present, when the scarcity of every kind +of food is so painfully acknowledged, that _shame_ has no effect upon +him. Can he have read Mr. Malthus's Thoughts on the Ratio of Food to +Population? Can he think it reasonable that one man should consume +the sustenance of many? + +The young gentleman has an agreeable air and person, such as are not +unlikely to recommend him on the score of matrimony. But his fortune +is not over-large; and what prudent young woman would think of +embarking hers with a man who would bring three or four mouths (or +what is equivalent to them) into a family? She might as reasonably +choose a widower in the same circumstances, with three or four +children. + +I cannot think who he takes after. His father and mother, by all +accounts, were very moderate eaters; only I have heard that the +latter swallowed her victuals very fast, and the former had a tedious +custom of sitting long at his meals. Perhaps he takes after both. + +I wish you would turn this in your thoughts, Mr. Reflector, and give +us your ideas on the subject of excessive eating, and, particularly, +of animal food. + +HOSPITA. + + + + +EDAX ON APPETITE. + +TO THE EDITOR OF "THE REFLECTOR." + + +MR. REFLECTOR,--I am going to lay before you a case of the most +iniquitous persecution that ever poor devil suffered. + +You must know, then, that I have been visited with a calamity ever +since my birth. How shall I mention it without offending delicacy? +Yet out it must. My sufferings, then, have all arisen from a most +inordinate appetite---- + +Not for wealth, not for vast possessions,--then might I have hoped to +find a cure in some of those precepts of philosophers or +poets,--those verba et voces which Horace speaks of:-- + + "quibus hunc lenire dolorem + Possis, et magnam morbi deponere partem;" + +not for glory, not for fame, not for applause,--for against this +disease, too, he tells us there are certain piacula, or, as Pope has +chosen to render it, + + "Rhymes, which fresh and fresh applied, + Will cure the arrant'st puppy of his pride;" + +nor yet for pleasure, properly so called: the strict and virtuous +lessons which I received in early life from the best of parents,--a +pious clergyman of the Church of England, now no more,--I trust have +rendered me sufficiently secure on that side:---- + +No, Sir, for none of these things; but an appetite, in its coarsest +and least metaphorical sense,--an appetite for _food_. + +The exorbitances of my arrowroot and pappish days I cannot go back +far enough to remember; only I have been told that my mother's +constitution not admitting of my being nursed at home, the woman who +had the care of me for that purpose used to make most extravagant +demands for my pretended excesses in that kind; which my parents, +rather than believe anything unpleasant of me, chose to impute to the +known covetousness and mercenary disposition of that sort of people. +This blindness continued on their part after I was sent for home, up +to the period when it was thought proper, on account of my advanced +age, that I should mix with other boys more unreservedly than I had +hitherto done. I was accordingly sent to boarding-school. + +Here the melancholy truth became too apparent to be disguised. The +prying republic of which a great school consists soon found me out: +there was no shifting the blame any longer upon other people's +shoulders,--no good-natured maid to take upon herself the enormities +of which I stood accused in the article of bread and butter, besides +the crying sin of stolen ends of puddings, and cold pies strangely +missing. The truth was but too manifest in my looks,--in the evident +signs of inanition which I exhibited after the fullest meals, in +spite of the double allowance which my master was privately +instructed by my kind parents to give me. The sense of the +ridiculous, which is but too much alive in grown persons, is tenfold +more active and alert in boys. Once detected, I was the constant butt +of their arrows,--the mark against which every puny leveller directed +his little shaft of scorn. The very Graduses and Thesauruses were +raked for phrases to pelt me with by the tiny pedants. Ventri +natus--Ventri deditus,--Vesana gula,--Escarum gurges,--Dapibus +indulgens,--Non dans fraena gulae,-Sectans lautae fercula mensae, +resounded wheresoever I passed. I led a weary life, suffering the +penalties of guilt for that which was no crime, but only following +the blameless dictates of nature. The remembrance of those childish +reproaches haunts me yet oftentimes in my dreams. My school-days come +again, and the horror I used to feel, when in some silent corner, +retired from the notice of my unfeeling playfellows, I have sat to +mumble the solitary slice of gingerbread allotted me by the bounty of +considerate friends, and have ached at heart because I could not +spare a portion of it, as I saw other boys do, to some favorite boy; +for if I know my own heart, I was never selfish,--never possessed a +luxury which I did not hasten to communicate to others; but my food, +alas! was none; it was an indispensable necessary; I could as soon +have spared the blood in my veins, as have parted that with my +companions. + +Well, no one stage of suffering lasts forever: we should grow +reconciled to it at length, I suppose, if it did. The miseries of my +school-days had their end; I was once more restored to the paternal +dwelling. The affectionate solicitude of my parents was directed to +the good-natured purpose of concealing, even from myself, the +infirmity which haunted me. I was continually told that I was +growing, and the appetite I displayed was humanely represented as +being nothing more than a symptom and an effect of that. I used even +to be complimented upon it. But this temporary fiction could not +endure above a year or two. I ceased to grow, but, alas! I did not +cease my demands for alimentary sustenance. + +Those times are long since past, and with them have ceased to exist +the fond concealment--the indulgent blindness--the delicate +overlooking--the compassionate fiction. I and my infirmity are left +exposed and bare to the broad, unwinking eye of the world, which +nothing can elude. My meals are scanned, my mouthfuls weighed in a +balance; that which appetite demands is set down to the account of +gluttony--a sin which my whole soul abhors--nay, which Nature herself +has put it out of my power to commit. I am constitutionally +disenabled from that vice; for how can he be guilty of excess who +never can get enough? Let them cease, then, to watch my plate; and +leave off their ungracious comparisons of it to the seven baskets of +fragments, and the supernaturally replenished cup of old Baucis: and +be thankful that their more phlegmatic stomachs, not their virtue, +have saved them from the like reproaches. I do not see that any of +them desist from eating till the holy rage of hunger, as some one +calls it, is supplied. Alas! I am doomed to stop short of that +continence. + +What am I to do? I am by disposition inclined to conviviality and the +social meal. I am no gourmand: I require no dainties: I should +despise the board of Heliogabalus, except for its long sitting. Those +vivacious, long-continued meals of the latter Romans, indeed, I +justly envy; but the kind of fare which the Curii and Dentati put up +with, I could be content with. Dentatus I have been called, among +other unsavory jests. Doublemeal is another name which my +acquaintance have palmed upon me, for an innocent piece of policy +which I put in practice for some time without being found out; which +was--going the round of my friends, beginning with the most primitive +feeders among them, who take their dinner about one o'clock, and so +successively dropping in upon the next and the next, till by the time +I got among my more fashionable intimates, whose hour was six or +seven, I have nearly made up the body of a just and complete meal (as +I reckon it), without taking more than one dinner (as they account of +dinners) at one person's house. Since I have been found out, I +endeavor to make up by a damper, as I call it, at home, before I go +out. But, alas! with me, increase of appetite truly grows by what it +feeds on. What is peculiarly offensive to me at those dinner-parties +is, the senseless custom of cheese, and the dessert afterwards. I +have a rational antipathy to the former; and for fruit, and those +other vain vegetable substitutes for meat (meat, the only legitimate +aliment for human creatures since the Flood, as I take it to be +deduced from that permission, or ordinance rather, given to Noah and +his descendants), I hold them in perfect contempt. Hay for horses. I +remember a pretty apologue, which Mandeville tells, very much to this +purpose, in his Fable of the Bees:--He brings in a Lion arguing with +a Merchant, who had ventured to expostulate with this king of beasts +upon his violent methods of feeding. The Lion thus retorts:--"Savage +I am, but no creature can be called cruel but what either by malice +or insensibility extinguishes his natural pity. The Lion was born +without compassion: we follow the instinct of our nature; the gods +have appointed us to live upon the waste and spoil of other animals, +and as long as we can meet with dead ones, we never hunt after the +living; 'tis only man, mischievous man, that can make death a sport. +Nature taught your stomach to crave nothing but vegetables.--(Under +favor of the Lion, if he meant to assert this universally of mankind, +it is not true. However, what he says presently is very +sensible.)--Your violent fondness to change, and greater eagerness +after novelties, have prompted you to the destruction of animals +without justice or necessity. The Lion has a ferment within him, that +consumes the toughest skin and hardest bones, as well as the flesh of +all animals without exception. Your squeamish stomach, in which the +digestive heat is weak and inconsiderable, won't so much as admit of +the most tender parts of them, unless above half the concoction has +been performed by artificial fire beforehand; and yet what animal +have you spared, to satisfy the caprices of a languid appetite? +Languid, I say; for what is man's hunger if compared with the Lion's? +Yours, when it is at the worst, makes you faint; mine makes me mad: +oft have I tried with roots and herbs to allay the violence of it, +but in vain: nothing but large quantities of flesh can any ways +appease it."--Allowing for the Lion not having a prophetic instinct +to take in every lusus naturae that, was possible of the human +appetite, he was, generally speaking, in the right; and the Merchant +was so impressed with his argument that, we are told, he replied not, +but fainted away. O, Mr. Reflector, that I were not obliged to add, +that the creature who thus argues was but a type of me! Miserable +man! _I am that Lion!_ "Oft have I tried with roots and herbs to +allay that violence, but in vain; nothing but----." + +Those tales which are renewed as often as the editors of papers want +to fill up a space in their unfeeling columns, of great +eaters,--people that devour whole geese and legs of mutton _for +wagers_,--are sometimes attempted to be drawn to a parallel with my +case. This wilful confounding of motives and circumstances, which +make all the difference of moral or immoral in actions, just suits +the sort of talent which some of my acquaintance pride themselves +upon. _Wagers_!--I thank Heaven, I was never mercenary, nor could +consent to prostitute a gift (though but a left-handed one) of +nature, to the enlarging of my worldly substance; prudent as the +necessities, which that fatal gift have involved me in, might have +made such a prostitution to appear in the eyes of an indelicate +world. + +Rather let me say, that to the satisfaction of that talent which was +given me, I have been content to sacrifice no common expectations; +for such I had from an old lady, a near relation of our family, in +whose good graces I had the fortune to stand, till one fatal +evening----. You have seen, Mr. Reflector, if you have ever passed +your time much in country towns, the kind of suppers which elderly +ladies in those places have lying _in petto_ in an adjoining parlor, +next to that where they are entertaining their periodically invited +coevals with cards and muffins. The cloth is usually spread some +half-hour before the final rubber is decided, whence they adjourn to +sup upon what may emphatically be called _nothing_ ;--a sliver of +ham, purposely contrived to be transparent to show the china-dish +through it, neighboring a slip of invisible brawn, which abuts upon +something they call a tartlet, as that is bravely supported by an +atom of marmalade, flanked in its turn by a grain of potted beef, +with a power of such dishlings, _minims of hospitality_, spread in +defiance of human nature, or rather with an utter ignorance of what +it demands. Being engaged at one of these card-parties, I was obliged +to go a little before _supper-time_ (as they facetiously called the +point of time in which they are taking these shadowy refections), and +the old lady, with a sort of fear shining through the smile of +courteous hospitality that beamed in her countenance, begged me to +step into the next room and take something before I went out in the +cold,--a proposal which lay not in my nature to deny. Indignant at +the airy prospect I saw before me, I set to, and in a trice +dispatched the whole meal intended for eleven persons,--fish, flesh, +fowl, pastry,--to the sprigs of garnishing parsley, and the last +fearful custard that quaked upon the board. I need not describe the +consternation, when in due time the dowagers adjourned from their +cards. Where was the supper?--and the servants' answer, Mr. ---- had +eat it all.--That freak, however, jested me out of a good three +hundred pounds a year, which I afterwards was informed for a +certainty the old lady meant to leave me. I mention it not in +illustration of the unhappy faculty which I am possessed of; for any +unlucky wag of a school-boy, with a tolerable appetite, could have +done as much without feeling any hurt after it,--only that you may +judge whether I am a man likely to set my talent to sale, or to +require the pitiful stimulus of a wager. + +I have read in Pliny, or in some author of that stamp, of a reptile +in Africa, whose venom is of that hot, destructive quality, that +wheresoever it fastens its tooth, the whole substance of the animal +that has been bitten in a few seconds is reduced to dust, crumbles +away, and absolutely disappears: it is called, from this quality, the +Annihilator. Why am I forced to seek, in all the most prodigious and +portentous facts of Natural History, for creatures typical of myself? +_I am that snake, that Annihilator:_ "wherever I fasten, in a few +seconds----." + +O happy sick men, that are groaning under the want of that very +thing, the excess of which is my torment! O fortunate, too fortunate, +if you knew your happiness, invalids! What would I not give to +exchange this fierce concoctive and digestive heat,--this rabid fury +which vexes me, which tears and torments me,--for your quiet, +mortified, hermit-like, subdued, and sanctified stomachs, your cool, +chastened inclinations and coy desires for food! + +To what unhappy figuration of the parts intestine I owe this +unnatural craving, I must leave to the anatomists and the physicians +to determine: they, like the rest of the world, have doubtless their +eye upon me; and as I have been cut up alive by the sarcasms of my +friends, so I shudder when I contemplate the probability that this +animal frame, when its restless appetites shall have ceased their +importunity, may be cut up also (horrible suggestion!) to determine +in what system of solids or fluids this original sin of my +constitution lay lurking. What work will they make with their acids +and alkalines, their serums and coagulums, effervescences, viscous +matter, bile, chyle, and acrimonious juices, to explain that cause +which Nature, who willed the effect to punish me for my sins, may no +less have determined to keep in the dark from them, to punish them +for their presumption! + +You may ask, Mr. Reflector, to what purpose is my appeal to you; what +can you do for me? Alas! I know too well that my case is out of the +reach of advice,--out of the reach of consolation. But it is some +relief to the wounded heart to impart its tale of misery; and some of +my acquaintance, who may read my case in your pages under a borrowed +name, may be induced to give it a more humane consideration than I +could ever yet obtain from them under my own. Make them, if possible, +to _reflect_, that an original peculiarity of constitution is no +crime; that not that which goes into the mouth desecrates a man, but +that which comes out of it,--such as sarcasm, bitter jests, mocks and +taunts, and ill-natured observations; and let them consider, if there +be such things (which we have all heard of) as Pious Treachery, +Innocent Adultery, &c., whether there may not be also such a thing as +Innocent Gluttony. + +I shall only subscribe myself, + +Your afflicted servant, + +EDAX. + + + + +CURIOUS FRAGMENTS, + +EXTRACTED FROM A COMMONPLACE-BOOK, + +WHICH BELONGED TO ROBERT BURTON, THE FAMOUS AUTHOR OF THE +ANATOMY OF MELANCHOLY. + + * * * * * + +EXTRACT I. + +I, Democritus Junior, have put my finishing pen to a tractate _De +Melancholia_, this day, December 5, 1620. First, I blesse the +Trinity, which hath given me health to prosecute my worthlesse +studies thus far, and make supplication, with a _Laus Deo_, if in any +case these my poor labours may be found instrumental to weede out +black melancholy, carking cares, harte-grief, from the mind of man. +_Sed hoc magis volo quam expecto._ + +I turn now to my book, _i nunc liber, goe forth, my brave Anatomy, +child of my brain-sweat_, and yee, _candidi lectores_, lo! here I +give him up to you, even do with him what you please, my masters. +Some, I suppose, will applaud, commend, cry him up (these are my +friends), hee is a _flos rarus_, forsooth, a nonesuch, a Phoenix +(concerning whom see _Plinius_ and _Mandeuille_, though _Fienus de +Monstris_ doubteth at large of such a bird, whom _Montaltus_ +confuting argueth to have been a man _malae scrupulositatis_, of a +weak and cowardlie faith: _Christopherus a Vega_ is with him in +this). Others again will blame, hiss, reprehende in many things, cry +down altogether my collections, for crude, inept, putid, _post coenam +scripta, Coryate could write better upon a full meal_, verbose, +inerudite, and not sufficiently abounding in authorities, _dogmata_, +sentences of learneder writers which have been before me, when as +that first-named sort clean otherwise judge of my labours to bee +nothing else but a _messe of opinions_, a vortex attracting +indiscriminate, gold, pearls, hay, straw, wood, excrement, an +exchange, tavern, marte, for foreigners to congregate, Danes, Swedes, +Hollanders, Lombards, so many strange faces, dresses, salutations, +languages, all which _Wolfius_ behelde with great content upon the +Venetian Rialto, as he describes diffusedly in his book the World's +Epitome, which _Sannazar_ so bepraiseth, _e contra_ our Polydore can +see nothing in it; they call me singular, a pedant, fantastic, words +of reproach in this age, which is all too neoterick and light for my +humour. + +One cometh to me sighing, complaining. He expected universal remedies +in my Anatomy; so many cures as there are distemperatures among men. +I have not put his affection in my cases. Hear you his case. My fine +Sir is a lover, an _inamorata_, a Pyramus, a Romeo; he walks seven +years disconsolate, moping, because he cannot enjoy his miss, +_insanus amor_ is his melancholy, the man is mad; _delirat_, he +dotes; all this while his Glycera is rude, spiteful, not to be +entreated, churlish, spits at him, yet exceeding fair, gentle eyes +(which is a beauty), hair lustrous and _smiling_, the trope is none +of mine, _AEneas Sylvius_ hath _crines ridentes_--in conclusion she is +wedded to his rival, a boore, a _Corydon_, a rustic, _omnino ignarus, +he can scarce construe Corderius_, yet haughty, fantastic, +_opiniatre_. The lover travels, goes into foreign parts, +peregrinates, _amoris ergo_, sees manners, customs, not English, +converses with pilgrims, lying travellers, monks, hermits, those +cattle, pedlars, travelling gentry, _Egyptians_, natural wonders, +unicorns (though _Aldobrandus_ will have them to be figments), +satyrs, semi-viri, apes, monkeys, baboons, curiosities artificial, +_pyramides_, Virgilius his tombe, relicks, bones, which are nothing +but ivory as _Melancthon_ judges, though _Cornutus_ leaneth to think +them bones of dogs, cats, (why not men?) which subtill priests vouch +to have been saints, martyrs, _heu Pietas!_ By that time he has ended +his course, _fugit hora_, seven other years are expired, gone by, +time is he should return, he taketh ship for Britaine, much desired +of his friends, _favebant venti, Neptune is curteis_, after some +weekes at sea he landeth, rides post to town, greets his family, +kinsmen, _compotores, those jokers his friends that were wont to +tipple with him at alehouses_; these wonder now to see the change, +_quantum mutatus, the man is quite another thing_, he is +disenthralled, manumitted, he wonders what so bewitched him, he can +now both see, hear, smell, handle, converse with his mistress, single +by reason of the death of his rival, a widow having children, grown +willing, prompt, amorous, showing no such great dislike to second +nuptials, he might have her for asking, no such thing, his mind is +changed, he loathes his former meat, had liever eat ratsbane, +aconite, his humour is to die a bachelour; marke the conclusion. In +this humour of celibate seven other years are consumed in idleness, +sloth, world's pleasures, which fatigate, satiate, induce wearinesse, +vapours, _taedium vitae:_ When upon a day, behold a wonder, _redit +Amor_, the man is as sick as ever, he is commenced lover upon the old +stock, walks with his hand thrust in his bosom for negligence, moping +he leans his head, face yellow, beard flowing and incomposite, eyes +sunken, _anhelus, breath wheezy and asthmatical, by reason of +over-much sighing:_ society he abhors, solitude is but a hell, what +shall he doe? all this while his mistresse is forward, coming, +_amantissima, ready to jump at once into his mouth_, her he hateth, +feels disgust when she is but mentioned, thinks her ugly, old, a +painted Jesabeel, Alecto, Megara, and Tisiphone all at once, a +Corinthian Lais, a strumpet, only not handsome; that which he +affecteth so much, that which drives him mad, distracted, phrenetic, +beside himself, is no beauty which lives, nothing _in rerum natura_ +(so he might entertain a hope of a cure), but something _which is +not_, can never be, a certain _fantastic opinion_ or _notional image_ +of his mistresse, _that which she was_, and that which hee thought +her to be, in former times, how beautiful! torments him, frets him, +follows him, makes him that he wishes to die. + +This Caprichio, _Sir Humourous_, hee cometh to me to be cured. I +counsel marriage with his mistresse, according to Hippocrates his +method, together with milk-diet, herbs, aloes, and wild parsley, good +in such cases, though Avicenna preferreth some sorts of wild fowl, +teals, widgeons, beccaficos, which men in Sussex eat. He flies out in +a passion, ho! ho; and falls to calling me names, dizzard, ass, +lunatic, moper, Bedlamite, Pseudo-Democritus. I smile in his face, +bidding him be patient, tranquil, to no purpose, he still rages: I +think this man must fetch his remedies from Utopia, Fairy Land, +Islands in the Moone, &c. + + +EXTRACT II. + +* * * * * Much disputacyons of fierce wits amongst themselves, in +logomachies, subtile controversies, many dry blows given on either +side, contentions of learned men, or such as would be so thought, as +_Bodinus de Periodis_ saith of such an one, _arrident amici ridet +mundus_, in English, this man his cronies they cocker him up, they +flatter him, he would fayne appear somebody, meanwhile the world +thinks him no better than a dizzard, a ninny, a sophist. * * + +* * * Philosophy running mad, madness philosophizing, much +idle-learned inquiries, what truth is? and no issue, fruit, of all +these noises, only huge books are written, and who is the wiser? * * +* * * Men sitting in the Doctor's chair, we marvel how they got there +being _homines intellectus pulverulenti_ as _Trincauellius_ notes; +they care not so they may raise a dust to smother the eyes of their +oppugners; _homines parvulissimi_, as _Lemnius_, whom _Alcuin_ herein +taxeth of a crude Latinism; dwarfs, minims, the least little men, +these spend their time, and it is odds but they lose their time and +wits too into the bargain, chasing of nimble and retiring Truth: Her +they prosecute, her still they worship, _libant_, they make +libations, spilling the wine as those old Romans in their +sacrificials, _Cerealia, May games:_ Truth is the game all these hunt +after, to the extreme perturbacyon and drying up of the moistures +_humidum radicale exsiccant_, as _Galen_, in his counsel to one of +these wear-wits, brain-moppers, spunges saith. * * * and for all this +_nunquam metam attingunt_, and how should they? they bowle awry, +shooting beside the marke; whereas it should appear, that _Truth +absolute_ on this planet of ours is scarcely to be found, but in her +stede _Queene Opinion_ predominates, governs, whose shifting and ever +mutable _Lampas_, me seemeth, is man's destinie to follow, she +praecurseth, she guideth him, before his uncapable eyes she frisketh +her tender lights, which entertayne the child-man, untill what time +his sight be strong to endure the vision of _Very Truth_, which is in +the heavens, the vision beatifical, as _Anianus_ expounds in his +argument against certain mad wits which helde God to be corporeous; +these were dizzards, fools, _gothamites_. * * * * but and if _Very +Truth_ be extant indeede on earth, as some hold she it is which +actuates men's deeds, purposes, ye may in vaine look for her in the +learned universities, halls, colleges. Truth is no Doctoresse, she +takes no degrees at Paris or Oxford, amongst great clerks, +disputants, subtile Aristotles, men _nodosi ingenii, able to take +Lully by the chin_, but oftentimes to such an one as myself, an +_Idiota_ or common person, _no great things_, melancholizing in woods +where waters are, quiet places by rivers, fountains, whereas the +silly man expecting no such matter, thinketh only how best to +delectate and refresh his mynde continually with _Natura_ her +pleasaunt scenes, woods, water-falls, or Art her statelie gardens, +parks, terraces, _Belvideres_, on a sudden the goddesse herself +_Truth_ has appeared, with a shyning lyghte, and a sparklyng +countenance, so as yee may not be able lightly to resist her. * * * * + + +EXTRACT III. + +This morning, May 2, 1662, having first broken my fast upon eggs and +cooling salades, mallows, water-cresses, those herbes, according to +_Villanovus_ his prescription, who disallows the use of meat in a +morning as gross, fat, hebetant, _feral_, altogether fitter for wild +beasts than men, _e contra_ commendeth this herb-diete for gentle, +humane, active, conducing to contemplation in most men, I betook +myselfe to the nearest fields. (Being in London I commonly dwell in +the _suburbes_, as airiest, quietest, _loci musis propriores_, free +from noises of caroches, waggons, mechanick and base workes, +workshoppes, also sights, pageants, spectacles of outlandish birds, +fishes, crocodiles, _Indians_, mermaids; adde quarrels, fightings, +wranglings of the common sort, _plebs_, the rabble, duelloes with +fists, proper to this island, at which the stiletto'd and secrete +_Italian_ laughs.) Withdrawing myselfe from these buzzing and +illiterate vanities, with a _bezo las manos_ to the city, I begin to +inhale, draw in, snuff up, as horses _dilatis naribus_ snort the +fresh aires, with exceeding great delight, when suddenly there +crosses me a procession, sad, heavy, dolourous, tristfull, +melancholick, able to change mirth into dolour, and overcast a +clearer atmosphere than possibly the neighbourhoods of so great a +citty can afford. An old man, a poore man deceased, is borne on men's +shoulders to a poore buriall, without solemnities of hearse, +mourners, plumes, _mutae personae, those personate actors that will +weep if yee shew them a piece of silver;_ none of those customed +civilities of children, kinsfolk, _dependants_, following the coffin; +he died a poore man, his friends _accessores opum_, _those cronies of +his that stuck by him so long as he had a penny_, now leave him, +forsake him, shun him, desert him; they think it much to follow his +putrid and stinking carcase to the grave; his children, if he had +any, for commonly the case stands thus, this poore man his son dies +before him, he survives, poore, indigent, base, dejected, miserable, +&c., or if he have any which survive him, _sua negotia agunt_, they +mind their own business, forsooth, cannot, will not, find time, +leisure, _inclination, extremum munus perficere_, to follow to the +pit their old indulgent father, which loved them, stroked them, +caressed them, cockering them up, _quantum potuit_, as farre as his +means extended, while they were babes, chits, _minims_, hee may rot +in his grave, lie stinking in the sun _for them_, have no buriall at +all, they care not. _O nefas!_ Chiefly I noted the coffin to have +been _without a pall_, nothing but a few planks, of cheapest wood +that could be had, _naked_, having none of the ordinary _symptomata_ +of a funerall, those _locularii_ which bare the body having on +diversely coloured coats, _and none black:_ (one of these reported +the deceased to have been an almsman seven yeares, a pauper, +harboured and fed in the workhouse of St. Giles-in-the-Fields, to +whose proper burying-ground he was now going for interment.) All +which when I behelde, hardly I refrained from weeping, and +incontinently I fell to musing: "If this man had been rich, a +_Croesus_, a _Crassus_, _or as rich as Whittington_, what pompe, +charge, lavish cost, expenditure, of rich buriall, +_ceremoniall-obsequies_, _obsequious ceremonies_, had been thought +too good for such an one; what store of panegyricks, elogies, funeral +orations, &c., some beggarly poetaster, worthy to be beaten for his +ill rimes, crying him up, hee was rich, generous, bountiful, polite, +learned, a _Maecenas_, while as in very deede he was nothing lesse: +what weeping, sighing, sorrowing, honing, complaining, kinsmen, +friends, relatives, fourtieth cousins, poor relatives, lamenting for +the deceased; hypocriticall heirs, sobbing, striking their breasts +(they care not if he had died a year ago); so many clients, +dependants, flatterers, _parasites, cunning Gnathoes_, tramping on +foot after the hearse, all their care is, who shall stand fairest +with the successour; he mean time (like enough) spurns them from him, +spits at them, treads them under his foot, will have nought to do +with any such cattle. I think him in the right: _Hoec sunt majora +gravitate Heracliti. These follies are enough to give crying +Heraclitus a fit of the spleene._" + + + + +MR. H----. + +A FARCE, IN TWO ACTS. + +AS IT WAS PERFORMED AT DRURY LANE THEATRE, +DECEMBER, 1806. + + * * * * * + +"Mr. H----, thou wert DAMNED. Bright shone the morning on the +play-bills that announced thy appearance, and the streets were filled +with the buzz of persons asking one another if they would go to see +Mr. H----, and answering that they would certainly; but before night +the gaiety, not of the author, but of his friends and the town, was +eclipsed, for thou wert DAMNED! Hadst thou been anonymous, thou haply +mightst have lived. Bet thou didst come to an untimely end for thy +tricks, and for want of a better name to pass them off--" _Theatrical +Examiner_. + + * * * * * + +CHARACTERS. + +Mr. H---- _Mr. Elliston_. +BELVIL _Mr. Bartley_. +LANDLORD PRY _Mr. Wewitzer_. +MELESINDA _Miss Mellon_. +MAID TO MELESINDA _Mrs. Harlowe_. +Gentlemen, Ladies, Waiters, Servants, &c. + +_Scene_--BATH. + + +PROLOGUE, SPOKEN BY MR. ELLISTON. + + If we have sinn'd in paring down a name, + All civil, well-bred authors do the same. + Survey the columns of our daily writers-- + You'll find that some Initials are great fighters. + How fierce the shock, how fatal is the jar, + When Ensign W. meets Lieutenant R. + With two stout seconds, just of their own gizzard, + Cross Captain X. and rough old General Izzard! + Letter to Letter spreads the dire alarms, + Till half the Alphabet is up in arms. + Nor with less lustre have Initials shone, + To grace the gentler annals of Crim. Con. + Where the dispensers of the public lash + Soft penance give; a letter and a dash-- + Where Vice reduced in size shrinks to a failing, + And loses half her grossness by curtailing. + Faux pas are told in such a modest way,-- + "The affair of Colonel B---- with Mrs. A----" + You must forgive them--for what is there, say, + Which such a pliant Vowel must not grant + To such a very pressing Consonant? + Or who poetic justice dares dispute, + When, mildly melting at a lover's suit, + The wife's a Liquid, her good man a Mute? + Even in the homelier scenes of honest life, + The coarse-spun intercourse of man and wife, + Initials I am told have taken place + Of Deary, Spouse, and that old-fashion'd race; + And Cabbage, ask'd by brother Snip to tea, + Replies, "I'll come--but it don't rest with me-- + I always leaves them things to Mrs. C." + O should this mincing fashion ever spread + From names of living heroes to the dead, + How would Ambition sigh, and hang the head, + As each loved syllable should melt away-- + Her Alexander turn'd into great A---- + A single C. her Caesar to express-- + Her Scipio shrunk into a Roman S---- + And, nick'd and dock'd to these new modes of speech, + Great Hannibal himself a Mr. H----. + + +MR. H----, + +A FARCE, IN TWO ACTS. + + + * * * * * + + +ACT I. + +SCENE.--_A Public Room in an Inn. Landlord, Waiters, Gentlemen, &c._ + + _Enter_ MR. H. + +_Mr. H._ Landlord, has the man brought home my boots? + +_Landlord_. Yes, Sir. + +_Mr. H._ You have paid him? + +_Landlord_. There is the receipt, Sir, only not quite filled up, no +name, only blank--"Blank, Dr. to Zekiel Spanish for one pair of best +hessians." Now, Sir, he wishes to know what name he shall put in, who +he shall say "Dr." + +_Mr. H._ Why, Mr. H. to be sure. + +_Landlord_. So I told him, Sir; but Zekiel has some qualms about it. +He says he thinks that Mr. H. only would not stand good in law. + +_Mr. H._ Rot his impertinence! Bid him put in Nebuchadnezzar, and not +trouble me with his scruples. + +_Landlord_. I shall, Sir. [_Exit_. + + _Enter a Waiter._ + +_Waiter_. Sir, Squire Level's man is below, with a hare and a brace +of pheasants for Mr. H. + +_Mr. H._ Give the man half-a-crown, and bid him return my best +respects to his master. Presents, it seems, will find me out, with +any name or no name. + + _Enter 2d Waiter._ + +_2d Waiter._ Sir, the man that makes up the Directory is at the door. + +_Mr. H._ Give him a shilling; that is what these fellows come for. + +_2d Waiter._ He has sent up to know by what name your Honor will +please to be inserted. + +_Mr. H._ Zounds, fellow, I give him a shilling for leaving out my +name, not for putting it in. This is one of the plaguy comforts of +going anonymous. + + [_Exit 2d Waiter._ + + _Enter 3d Waiter._ + +_3d Waiter._ Two letters for Mr. H. [_Exit._ + +_Mr. H._ From ladies (_opens them_). This from Melesinda, to remind +me of the morning-call I promised; the pretty creature positively +languishes to be made Mrs. H. I believe I must indulge her +(_affectedly_). This from her cousin, to bespeak me to some party, I +suppose (_opening it_),--Oh, "this evening"--"Tea and +cards"--(_surveying himself with complacency_). Dear H., thou art +certainly a pretty fellow. I wonder what makes thee such a favorite +among the ladies: I wish it may not be owing to the concealment of +thy unfortunate----pshaw! + + _Enter 4th Waiter._ + +_4th Waiter._ Sir, one Mr. Printagain is inquiring for you. + +_Mr. H._ Oh, I remember, the poet; he is publishing by subscription. +Give him a guinea, and tell him he may put me down. + +_4th Waiter_. What name shall I tell him, Sir? + +_Mr. H._ Zounds, he is a poet; let him fancy a name. + + [_Exit 4th Waiter._ + + _Enter 5th Waiter._ + +_5th Waiter_. Sir, Bartlemy the lame beggar, that you sent a private +donation to last Monday, has by some accident discovered his +benefactor, and is at the door waiting to return thanks. + +_Mr. H._ Oh, poor fellow, who could put it into his head? Now I shall +be teased by all his tribe, when once this is known. Well, tell him I +am glad I could be of any service to him, and send him away. + +_5th Waiter_. I would have done so, Sir; but the object of his call +now, he says, is only to know who he is obliged to. + +_Mr. H._ Why, me. + +_5th Waiter_. Yes, Sir. + +_Mr. H._ Me, me, me; who else, to be sure? + +_5th Waiter_. Yes, Sir; but he is anxious to know the name of his +benefactor. + +_Mr. H._ Here is a pampered rogue of a beggar, that cannot be obliged +to a gentleman in the way of his profession, but he must know the +name, birth, parentage, and education of his benefactor! I warrant +you, next he will require a certificate of one's good behavior, and a +magistrate's license in one's pocket, lawfully empowering so and so +to--give an alms. Anything more? + +_5th Waiter_. Yes, Sir; here has been Mr. Patriot, with the county +petition to sign; and Mr. Failtime, that owes so much money, has sent +to remind you of your promise to bail him. + +_Mr. H._ Neither of which I can do, while I have no name. Here is +more of the plaguy comforts of going anonymous, that one can neither +serve one's friend nor one's country. Damn it, a man had better be +without a nose, than without a name. I will not live long in this +mutilated, dismembered state; I will to Melesinda this instant, and +try to forget these vexations. Melesinda! there is music in the name; +but then, hang it! there is none in mine to answer to +it. [Exit. + +(_While Mr. H. has been speaking, two Gentlemen have been observing +him curiously_.) + +1_st Gent._ Who the devil is this extraordinary personage? + +2_d Gent._ Who? Why, 'tis Mr. H. + +1_st Gent._ Has he no more name? + +2_d Gent._ None that has yet transpired. No more! why, that single +letter has been enough to inflame the imaginations of all the ladies +in Bath. He has been here but a fortnight, and is already received +into all the first families. + +1_st Gent._ Wonderful! yet, nobody know who he is, or where he comes +from! + +2_d Gent._ He is vastly rich, gives away money as if he had infinity; +dresses well, as you see; and for address, the mothers are all dying +for fear the daughters should get him; and for the daughters, he may +command them as absolutely as----. Melesinda, the rich heiress, 'tis +thought, will carry him. + +1_st Gent._ And is it possible that a mere anonymous-- + +2_d Gent._ Phoo! that is the charm.--Who is he? and what is he? and +what is his name?----The man with the great nose on his face never +excited more of the gaping passion of wonderment in the dames of +Strasburg, than this new-comer, with the single letter to his name, +has lighted up among the wives and maids of Bath; his simply having +lodgings here, draws more visitors to the house than an election. +Come with me to the Parade, and I will show you more of him. + + [_Exeunt_. +SCENE _in the Street. Mr. H. walking, BELVIL meeting him._ + +_Belvil._ My old Jamaica school-fellow, that I have not seen for so +many years? it must--it can be no other than Jack _(going up to +him)._ My dear Ho---- + +_Mr. H. (Stopping his mouth)._ Ho----! the devil. Hush. + +_Belvil._ Why, sure it is---- + +_Mr. H._ It is, it is your old friend Jack, that shall be nameless. + +_Belvil._ My dear Ho---- + +_Mr. H. (Stopping him)._ Don't name it. + +_Belvil._ Name what? + +_Mr. H._ My curst unfortunate name. I have reasons to conceal it for +a time. + +_Belvil._ I understand you--Creditors, Jack? + +_Mr. H._ No, I assure you. + +_Belvil._ Snapp'd up a ward, peradventure, and the whole Chancery at +your heels? + +_Mr. H._ I don't use to travel with such cumbersome luggage. + +_Belvil._ You ha'n't taken a purse? + +_Mr. H._ To relieve you at once from all disgraceful conjecture, you +must know, 'tis nothing but the sound of my name. + +_Belvil_ Ridiculous! 'tis true yours is none of the most romantic; +but what can that signify in a man? + +_Mr. H._ You must understand that I am in some credit with the +ladies. + +_Belvil._ With the ladies! + +_Mr. H._ And truly I think not without some pretensions. My fortune-- + +_Belvil._ Sufficiently splendid, if I may judge from your appearance. + +_Mr. H._ My figure-- + +_Belvil._ Airy, gay, and imposing. + +_Mr. H._ My parts-- + +_Belvil._ Bright. + +_Mr. H._ My conversation-- + +_Belvil._ Equally remote from flippancy and taciturnity. + +_Mr. H._ But then my name--damn my name! + +_Belvil._ Childish! + +_Mr. H._ Not so. Oh, Belvil, you are blessed with one which sighing +virgins may repeat without a blush, and for it change the paternal. +But what virgin of any delicacy (and I require some in a wife) would +endure to be called Mrs.----? + +_Belvil._ Ha, ha, ha! most absurd. Did not Clementina Falconbridge, +the romantic Clementina Falconbridge, fancy Tommy Potts? and +Rosabella Sweetlips sacrifice her mellifluous appellative to Jack +Deady? Matilda her cousin married a Gubbins, and her sister Amelia a +Clutterbuck. + +_Mr. H._ Potts is tolerable, Deady is sufferable, Gubbins is +bearable, and Clutterbuck is endurable, but Ho---- + +_Belvil._ Hush, Jack, don't betray yourself. But you are really +ashamed of the family-name? + +_Mr. H._ Ay, and of my father that begot me, and my father's father, +and all their forefathers that have borne it since the Conquest. + +_Belvil_. But how do you know the women are so squeamish? + +_Mr. H_. I have tried them. I tell you there is neither maiden of +sixteen nor widow of sixty but would turn up their noses at it. I +have been refused by nineteen virgins, twenty-nine relicts, and two +old maids. + +_Belvil_. That was hard indeed, Jack. + +_Mr. H_. Parsons have stuck at publishing the banns, because they +averred it was a heathenish name; parents have lingered their +consent, because they suspected it was a fictitious name; and rivals +have declined my challenges, because they pretended it was an +ungentlemanly name. + +_Belvil_. Ha, ha, ha! but what course do you mean to pursue? + +_Mr. H_. To engage the affections of some generous girl, who will be +content to take me as Mr. H. + +_Belvil_. Mr. H.? + +_Mr. H_. Yes, that is the name I go by here; you know one likes to be +as near the truth as possible. + +_Belvil_. Certainly. But what then? to get her to consent-- + +_Mr. H_. To accompany me to the altar without a name--in short, to +suspend her curiosity (that is all) till the moment the priest shall +pronounce the irrevocable charm, which makes two names one. + +_Belvil_. And that name--and then she must be pleased, ha, Jack? + +_Mr. H_. Exactly such a girl it has been my fortune to meet with; +hark'e (_whispers_)--(_musing_). Yet, hang it! 'tis cruel to betray +her confidence. + +_Belvil_. But the family-name, Jack? + +_Mr. H_. As you say, the family-name must be perpetuated. + +_Belvil._ Though it be but a homely one. + +_Mr. H._ True; but come, I will show you the house where dwells this +credulous melting fair. + +_Belvil._ Ha, ha! my old friend dwindled down to one letter. + + [_Exeunt._ + + +SCENE._-An Apartment in_ MELESINDA'S _House._ +MELESINDA _sola, as if musing._ + +_Melesinda._ H, H, H. Sure it must be something precious by its being +concealed. It can't be Homer, that is a Heathen's name; nor Horatio, +that is no surname: what if it be Hamlet? the Lord Hamlet--pretty, +and I his poor distracted Ophelia! No,'tis none of these; 'tis +Harcourt or Hargrave, or some such sounding name, or Howard, +high-born Howard, that would do; maybe it is Harley, methinks my H. +resembles Harley, the feeling Harley. But I hear him! and from his +own lips I will once forever be resolved. + + _Enter Mr. H._ + +_Mr. H._ My dear Melesinda. + +_Melesinda._ My dear H. that is all you give me power to swear +allegiance to,--to be enamored of inarticulate sounds, and call with +sighs upon an empty letter. But I will know. + +_Mr. H._ My dear Melesinda, press me no more for the disclosure of +that, which in the face of day so soon must be revealed. Call it +whim, humor, caprice, in me. Suppose, I have sworn an oath, never, +till the ceremony of our marriage is over, to disclose my true name. + +_Melesinda._ Oh! H, H, H. I cherish here a fire of restless curiosity +which consumes me. 'Tis appetite, passion, call it whim, caprice, in +me. Suppose I have sworn, I must and will know it this very night. + +_Mr. H_. Ungenerous Melesinda! I implore you to give me this one +proof of your confidence. The holy vow once past, your H. shall not +have a secret to withhold. + +_Melesinda_. My H. has overcome: his Melesinda shall pine away and +die, before she dare express a saucy inclination; but what shall I +call you till we are married? + +_Mr. H_. Call me? call me anything, call me Love, Love! ay Love: Love +will do very well. + +_Melesinda_. How many syllables is it, Love? + +_Mr. H_. How many? ud, that is coming to the question with a +vengeance! One, two, three, four,--what does it signify how many +syllables? + +_Melesinda_. How many syllables, Love? + +_Mr. H_. My Melesinda's mind, I had hoped, was superior to this +childish curiosity. + +_Melesinda_. How many letters are there in it? + +[_Exit_ MR. H. _followed by_ MELESINDA _repeating the + question_. + + +SCENE.--_A Room in the Inn. Two Waiters disputing_. + +_1st Waiter_. Sir Harbottle Hammond, you may depend upon it. + +_2d Waiter_. Sir Harry Hardcastle, I tell you. + +_1st Waiter_. The Hammonds of Huntingdonshire. + +_2d Waiter_. The Hardcastles of Hertfordshire. + +_1st Waiter_. The Hammonds. + +_2d Waiter_. Don't tell me: does not Hardcastle begin, with an H? + +_1st Waiter_. So does Hammond for that matter. + +_2d Waiter_. Faith, so it does if you go to spell it, I did not think +of that. I begin to be of your opinion: he is certainly a Hammond. + +_1st Waiter_. Here comes Susan Chambermaid: maybe she can tell. + + _Enter_ SUSAN. + +_Both_. Well, Susan, have you heard anything who the strange +gentleman is? + +_Susan_. Haven't you heard? it's all come out! Mrs. Guesswell, the +parson's widow, has been here about it. I overheard her talking in +confidence to Mrs. Setter and Mrs. Pointer, and she says they were +holding a sort of a _cummitty_ about it. + +_Both_. What? What? + +_Susan_. There can't be a doubt of it, she says, what from his +_figger_ and the appearance he cuts, and his _sumpshous_ way of +living, and above all from the remarkable circumstance that his +surname should begin with an H., that he must be-- + +_Both_. Well, well-- + +_Susan_. Neither more nor less than the Prince. + +_Both_. Prince! + +_Susan_. The Prince of Hessey-Cassel in disguise. + +_Both_. Very likely, very likely. + +_Susan_. Oh, there can't be a doubt on it. Mrs. Guesswell says she +knows it. + +_1st Waiter_. Now if we could be sure that the Prince of Hessy +what-do-you-call-him was in England on his travels. + +_2d Waiter_. Get a newspaper. Look in the newspapers. + +_Susan_. Fiddle of the newspapers; who else can it be? + +_Both_. That is very true (_gravely_). + + _Enter_ LANDLORD. + +_Landlord_. Here, Susan, James, Philip, where are you all? The London +coach is come in, and there is Mr. Fillaside, the fat passenger, has +been bawling for somebody to help him off with his boots. + + [_The Chambermaid and Waiters slip out_. + +(_Solus_.) The house is turned upside down since the strange +gentleman came into it. Nothing but guessing and speculating, and +speculating and guessing; waiters and chambermaids getting into +corners and speculating; hostlers and stable-boys speculating in the +yard; I believe the very horses in the stable are speculating too, +for there they stand in a musing posture, nothing for them to eat, +and not seeming to care whether they have anything or no; and after +all what does it signify? I hate such curious--odso, I must take this +box up into his bedroom--he charged me to see to it myself;--I hate +such inquisitive--I wonder what is in it--it feels heavy; (_reads_) +"Leases, title-deeds, wills." Here now a man might satisfy his +curiosity at once. Deeds must have names to them, so must leases and +wills. But I wouldn't--no I wouldn't--it is a pretty box +too--prettily dovetailed--I admire the fashion of it much. But I'd +cut my fingers off, before I'd do such a dirty--what have I to +do--curse the keys, how they rattle!--rattle in one's pockets--the +keys and the half-pence (_takes out a bunch and plays with them_). I +wonder if any of these would fit; one might just try them, but I +wouldn't lift up the lid if they did. Oh no, what should I be the +richer for knowing? (_All this time he tries the keys one by one._) +What's his name to me? a thousand names begin with an H. I hate +people that are always prying, poking and prying into +things,--thrusting their finger into one place--a mighty little hole +this--and their keys into another. Oh Lord! little rusty fits it! but +what is that to me? I wouldn't go to--no, no--but it is odd little +rusty should just happen--(_While he is turning up the lid of the +box, _Mr. H. _enters behind him unperceived._) + +_Mr. H._ What are you about, you dog? + +_Landlord._ Oh Lord, Sir I pardon; no thief, as I hope to be saved. +Little Pry was always honest. + +_Mr. H._ What else could move you to open that box? + +_Landlord._ Sir, don't kill me, and I will confess the whole truth. +This box happened to be lying--that is, I happened to be carrying +this box, and I happened to have my keys out, and so--little rusty +happened to fit-- + +_Mr. H._ So little rusty happened to fit!--and would not a rope fit +that rogue's neck? I see the papers have not been moved: all is safe, +but it was as well to frighten him a little (_aside_). Come, +Landlord, as I think you honest, and suspect you only intended to +gratify a little foolish curiosity-- + +_Landlord_. That was all, Sir, upon my veracity. + +_Mr. H._ For this time I will pass it over. Your name is Pry, I +think? + +_Landlord_. Yes, Sir, Jeremiah Pry, at your service. + +_Mr. H._ An apt name: you have a prying temper--I mean some little +curiosity--a sort of inquisitiveness about you. + +_Landlord_. A natural thirst after knowledge you may call it, Sir. +When a boy, I was never easy but when I was thrusting up the lids of +some of my schoolfellows' boxes,--not to steal anything, upon my +honor, Sir,--only to see what was in them; have had pens stuck in my +eyes for peeping through keyholes after knowledge; could never see a +cold pie with the legs dangling out at top, but my fingers were for +lifting up the crust,--just to try if it were pigeon or +partridge,--for no other reason in the world. Surely I think my +passion for nuts was owing to the pleasure of cracking the shell to +get at something concealed, more than to any delight I took in eating +the kernel. In short, Sir, this appetite has grown with my growth. + +_Mr. H._ You will certainly be hanged some day for peeping into some +bureau or other just to see what is in it. + +_Landlord._ That is my fear, Sir. The thumps and kicks I have had for +peering into parcels, and turning of letters inside out,--just for +curiosity. The blankets I have been made to dance in for searching +parish registers for old ladies' ages,--just for curiosity! Once I +was dragged through a horsepond, only for peeping into a closet that +had glass-doors to it, while my Lady Bluegarters was +undressing,--just for curiosity! + +_Mr. H._ A very harmless piece of curiosity, truly; and now, Mr. Pry, +first have the goodness to leave that box with me, and then do me the +favor to carry your curiosity so far, as to inquire if my servants +are within. + +_Landlord._ I shall, Sir. Here, David, Jonathan,--I think I hear them +coming,--shall make bold to leave you, +Sir. [_Exit._ + +_Mr. H._ Another tolerable specimen of the comforts of going +anonymous! + + _Enter Two Footmen._ + +_1st Footman._ You speak first. + +_2d Footman._ You had better speak. + +_1st Footman._ You promised to begin. + +_Mr. H._ They have something to say to me. The rascals want their +wages raised, I suppose; there is always a favor to be asked when +they come smiling. Well, poor rogues, service is but a hard bargain +at the best. I think I must not be close with them. Well, +David--well, Jonathan. + +_1st Footman._ We have served your honor faithfully-- + +_2d Footman._ Hope your honor won't take offence-- + +_Mr. H._ The old story, I suppose--wages? + +_1st Footman._ That's not it, your honor. + +_2d Footman._ You speak. + +_1st Footman._ But if your honor would just be pleased to-- + +_2d Footman._ Only be pleased to-- + +_Mr. H._ Be quick with what you have to say, for I am in haste. + +_1st Footman._ Just to-- + +_2d Footman._ Let us know who it is-- + +_1st Footman._ Who it is we have the honor to serve. + +_Mr. H._ Why me, me, me; you serve me. + +_2d Footman._ Yes, Sir; but we do not know who you are. + +_Mr. H._ Childish curiosity! do not you serve a rich master, a gay +master, an indulgent master? + +_1st Footman._ Ah, Sir! the figure you make is to us, your poor +servants, the principal mortification. + +_2d Footman._ When we get over a pot at the publichouse, or in a +gentleman's kitchen, or elsewhere, as poor servants must have their +pleasures--when the question goes round, who is your master? and who +do you serve? and one says, I serve Lord So-and-so, and another, I am +Squire Such-a-one's footman-- + +_1st Footman_. We have nothing to say for it, but that we serve Mr. +H. + +_2d Footman_. Or Squire H. + +_Mr. H_. Really you are a couple of pretty modest, reasonable +personages! but I hope you will take it as no offence, gentlemen, if, +upon a dispassionate review of all that you have said, I think fit +not to tell you any more of my name, than I have chosen for especial +purposes to communicate to the rest of the world. + +_1st Footman_. Why, then, Sir, you may suit yourself. + +_2d Footman_. We tell you plainly, we cannot stay. + +_1st Footman_. We don't choose to serve Mr. H. + +_2d Footman_. Nor any Mr. or Squire in the alphabet-- + +_1st Footman_. That lives in Chris-cross Row. + +_Mr. H_. Go, for a couple of ungrateful, inquisitive, senseless +rascals! Go; hang, starve, or drown!--Rogues, to speak thus +irreverently of the alphabet--I shall live to see you glad to serve +old Q--to curl the wig of great S--adjust the dot of little i--stand +behind the chair of X, Y, Z--wear the livery of Etcaetera--and ride +behind the sulky of And-by-itself-and! + [_Exit in a rage_. + + + + +ACT II. + +SCENE.--_A handsome Apartment well lighted, Tea, Cards, &c.--A large +party of Ladies and Gentlemen; among them MELESINDA._ + +_1st Lady_. I wonder when the charming man will be here. + +_2d Lady_. He is a delightful creature. Such a polish-- + +_3d Lady_. Such an air in all that he does or says-- + +_4th Lady_. Yet gifted with a strong understanding-- + +_5th Lady_. But has your ladyship the remotest idea of what his true +name is? + +_1st Lady_. They say, his very servants do not know it. His French +valet, that has lived with him these two years-- + +_2d Lady_. There, Madam, I must beg leave to set you right; my +coachman-- + +_1st Lady_. I have it from the very best authority; my footma-- + +_2d Lady_. Then, Madam, you have set your servants on-- + +_1st Lady_. No, Madam, I would scorn any such little mean ways of +coming at a secret. For my part, I don't think any secret of that +consequence. + +_2d Lady_. That's just like me; I make a rule of troubling my head +with nobody's business but my own. + +_Melesinda_. But then, she takes care to make everybody's business +her own, and so to justify herself that way-- + (_Aside_.) + +_1st Lady_. My dear Melesinda, you look thoughtful. + +_Melesinda_. Nothing. + +_2d Lady_. Give it a name. + +_Melesinda_. Perhaps it is nameless. + +_1st Lady_. As the object--Come, never blush, nor deny it, child. +Bless me, what great ugly thing is that, that dangles at your bosom? + +_Melesinda_. This? It is a cross: how do you like it? + +_2d Lady_. A cross! Well, to me it looks for all the world like a +great staring H. _(Here a general laugh.)_ + +_Melesinda_. Malicious creatures! Believe me it is a cross, and +nothing but a cross. + +_1st Lady_. A cross, I believe, you would willingly hang at. + +_Melesinda_. Intolerable spite! + +_(MR. H. is announced.)_ + + _Enter MR. H._ + +_1st Lady_. O, Mr. H., we are so glad-- + +_2d Lady_. We have been so dull-- + +_3rd Lady_. So perfectly lifeless--You owe it to us to be more than +commonly entertaining. + +_Mr. H_. Ladies, this is so obliging-- + +_4th Lady_. O, Mr. H., those ranunculas you said were dying, pretty +things, they have got up-- + +_5th Lady_. I have worked that sprig you commended--I want you to +come-- + +_Mr. H_. Ladies-- + +_6th Lady_. I have sent for that piece of music from London. + +_Mr. H_. The Mozart _(seeing MELESINDA)_--Melesinda! + +_Several Ladies at once_. Nay, positively, Melesinda, you shan't +engross him all to yourself. + +[_While the ladies are pressing about MR. H., the gentlemen show +signs of displeasure_. + +_1st Gent_. We shan't be able to edge in a word, now this coxcomb is +come. + +_2d Gent_. Damn him, I will affront him. + +_1st Gent_. Sir, with your leave, I have a word to say to one of +these ladies. + +_2d Gent_. If we could be heard-- + + [_The Ladies pay no attention but to MR. H_. + +_Mr. H_. You see, gentlemen, how the matter stands. _(Hums an air.)_ +I am not my own master: positively I exist and breathe but to be +agreeable to these--Did you speak? + +_1st Gent_. And affects absence of mind--Puppy! + +_Mr. H_. Who spoke of absence of mind; did you, Madam? How do you do, +Lady Wearwell--how do? I did not see your ladyship before--what was I +about to say--O--absence of mind. I am the most unhappy dog in that +way, sometimes spurt out the strangest things--the most +mal-a-propos--without meaning to give the least offence, upon my +honor--sheer absence of mind--things I would have given the world not +to have said. + +_1st Gent_. Do you hear the coxcomb? + +_1st Lady_. Great wits, they say-- + +_2d Lady_. Your fine geniuses are most given-- + +_3d Lady_. Men of bright parts are commonly too vivacious-- + +_Mr. H_. But you shall hear. I was to dine the other day at a great +Nabob's that must be nameless, who, between ourselves, is strongly +suspected of--being very rich, that's all. John, my valet, who knows +my foible, cautioned me, while he was dressing me, as he usually does +where he thinks there's a danger of my committing a _lapsus_, to take +care in my conversation how I made any allusion direct or indirect to +presents--you understand me? I set out double charged with my +fellow's consideration and my own; and, to do myself justice, behaved +with tolerable circumspection for the first half-hour or so,--till at +last a gentleman in company, who was indulging a free vein of +raillery at the expense of the ladies, stumbled upon that expression +of the poet, which calls them "fair defects." + +_1st Lady_. It is Pope, I believe, who says it. + +_Mr. H_. No, Madam; Milton. Where was I? Oh, "fair defects." This +gave occasion to a critic in company, to deliver his opinion on the +phrase--that led to an enumeration of all the various words which +might have been used instead of "defect," as want, absence, poverty, +deficiency, lack. This moment I, who had not been attending to the +progress of the argument (as the denouement will show) starting +suddenly up out of one of my reveries, by some unfortunate connection +of ideas, which the last fatal word had excited, the devil put it +into my head to turn round to the Nabob, who was sitting next me, and +in a very marked manner (as it seemed to the company) to put the +question to him, Pray, sir, what may be the exact value of a lack of +rupees? You may guess the confusion which followed. + +_1st Lady_. What a distressing circumstance! + +_2d Lady_. To a delicate mind---- + +_3d Lady_. How embarrassing---- + +_4th Lady_. I declare, I quite pity you. + +_1st Gent_. Puppy! + +_Mr. H_. A Baronet at the table, seeing my dilemma, jogged my elbow; +and a good-natured Duchess, who does everything with a grace peculiar +to herself, trod on my toes at that instant: this brought me to +myself, and--covered with blushes, and pitied by all the ladies--I +withdrew. + +_1st Lady_. How charmingly he tells a story. + +_2nd Lady_. But how distressing! + +_Mr. H_. Lord Squandercounsel, who is my particular friend, was +pleased to rally me in his inimitable way upon it next day. I shall +never forget a sensible thing he said on the occasion--speaking of +absence of mind, my foible--says he, my dear Hogs-- + +_Several Ladies_. Hogs--what--ha-- + +_Mr. H_. My dear Hogsflesh--my name--(_here a universal scream_)--O my +cursed unfortunate tongue! H. I mean--where was I? + +_1st Lady_. Filthy--abominable! + +_2nd Lady_. Unutterable! + +_3rd Lady_. Hogs--foh! + +_4th Lady_. Disgusting! + +_5th Lady_. Vile! + +_6th Lady_. Shocking! + +_1st Lady_. Odious! + +_2nd Lady_. Hogs--pah! + +_3rd Lady_. A smelling-bottle--look to Miss Melesinda. Poor thing! it +is no wonder. You had better keep off from her, Mr. Hogsflesh, and +not be pressing about her in her circumstances. + +_1st Gent_. Good time of day to you, Mr.Hogsflesh. + +_2nd Gent_. The compliments of the season to you, Mr. Hogsflesh. + +_Mr.H_. This is too much--flesh and blood cannot endure it. + +_1st Gent_. What flesh?--hog's-flesh? + +_2nd Gent_. How he sets up his bristles! + +_Mr. H_. Bristles! + +1_st Gent_. He looks as fierce as a hog in armor. + +_Mr. H_. A hog!--Madam!--(_here he severally accosts the Ladies, who +by turns repel him_.) + +1_st Lady_. Extremely obliged to you for your attentions; but don't +want a partner. + +2_d Lady_. Greatly flattered by your preference: but believe I shall +remain single. + +3_d Lady_. Shall always acknowledge your politeness; but have no +thoughts of altering my condition. + +4_th Lady_. Always be happy to respect you as a friend; but you must +not look for anything further. + +5_th Lady_. No doubt of your ability to make any woman happy; but +have no thoughts of changing my name. + +6_th Lady_. Must tell you, Sir, that if, by your insinuations, you +think to prevail with me, you have got the wrong sow by the ear. Does +he think any lady would go to pig with him? + +_Old Lady_. Must beg you to be less particular in your addresses to +me. Does he take me for a Jew, to long after forbidden meats? + +_Mr. H_. I shall go mad!--to be refused by old Mother Damnable--she +that's so old, nobody knows whether she was ever manned or no, but +passes for a maid by courtesy; her juvenile exploits being beyond the +farthest stretch of tradition!--Old Mother Damnable! + + [_Exeunt all, either pitying or seeming to avoid him._ + + +SCENE.--_The Street_. + +BELVIL _and another Gentleman_. + +_Belvil_. Poor Jack, I am really sorry for him. The account which you +give me of his mortifying change of reception at the assembly, would +be highly diverting if it gave me less pain to hear it. With all his +amusing absurdities, and amongst them not the least, a predominant +desire to be thought well of by the fair sex, he has an abundant +share of good-nature, and is a man of honor. Notwithstanding all that +has happened, Melesinda may do worse than take him yet. But did the +women resent it so deeply as you say? + +_Gent._ O intolerably--they fled him as fearfully when 'twas once +blown, as a man would be avoided, who was suddenly discovered to have +marks of the plague, and as fast; when before they had been ready to +devour the foolishest thing he could say. + +_Belvil_ Ha! ha! so frail is the tenure by which these women's +favorites commonly hold their envied preeminence. Well, I must go +find him out and comfort him. I suppose, I shall find him at the inn. + +_Gent._ Either there or at Melesinda's--Adieu! [_Exeunt._ + + +SCENE.--Mr. H----'s _Apartment._ + +_Mr. H. (solus.)_ Was ever anything so mortifying? to be refused by +old Mother Damnable!--with such parts and address,--and the little +squeamish devils, to dislike me for a name, a sound.--Oh my cursed +name! that it was something I could be revenged on! if it were alive, +that I might tread upon it, or crush it, or pummel it, or kick it, or +spit it out--for it sticks in my throat, and will choke me. + +My plaguy ancestors! if they had left me but a Van, or a Mac, or an +Irish O', it had been something to qualify it.--Mynheer Van +Hogsflesh,--or Sawney Mac Hogsflesh,--or Sir Phelim O'Hogsflesh,--but +downright blunt------. If it had been any other name in the world, I +could have borne it. If it had been the name of a beast, as Bull, +Fox, Kid, Lamb, Wolf, Lion; or of a bird, as Sparrow, Hawk, Buzzard, +Daw, Finch, Nightingale; or of a fish, as Sprat, Herring, Salmon; or +the name of a thing, as Ginger, Hay, Wood; or of a color, as Black, +Gray, White, Green; or of a sound, as Bray; or the name of a month, +as March, May; or of a place, as Barnet, Baldock, Hitchen; or the +name of a coin, as Farthing, Penny, Twopenny; or of a profession, as +Butcher, Baker, Carpenter, Piper, Fisher, Fletcher, Fowler, Glover; +or a Jew's name, as Solomons, Isaacs, Jacobs; or a personal name, as +Foot, Leg, Crookshanks, Heaviside, Sidebottom, Longbottom, +Ramsbottom, Winterbottom; or a long name, as Blanchenhagen, or +Blanchenhausen; or a short name, as Crib, Crisp, Crips, Tag, Trot, +Tub, Phips, Padge, Papps, or Prig, or Wig, or Pip, or Trip; Trip had +been something, but Ho---. (_Walks about in great +agitation--recovering his calmness a little, sits down._) + +Farewell the most distant thoughts of marriage; the finger-circling +ring, the purity figuring glove, the envy-pining bridemaids, the +wishing parson, and the simpering clerk. Farewell the ambiguous +blush-raising joke, the titter-provoking pun, the morning-stirring +drum.--No son of mine shall exist, to bear my ill-fated name. No +nurse come chuckling, to tell me it is a boy. No midwife, leering at +me from under the lids of professional gravity. I dreamed of +caudle.--(_Sings in a melancholy tone._) Lullaby, +Lullaby,--hush-a-by-baby--how like its papa it is!--(_Makes motions +as if he was nursing._) And then, when grown up, "Is this your son, +Sir?" "Yes, Sir, a poor copy of me, a sad young dog,--just what his +father was at his age,--I have four more at home." Oh! oh! oh! + + _Enter_ LANDLORD. + +_Mr. H._ Landlord, I must pack up tonight; you will see all my things +got ready. + +_Landlord._ Hope your Honor does not intend to quit the Blue +Boar,--sorry anything has happened. + +_Mr. H._ He has heard it all. + +_Landlord._ Your Honor has had some mortification to be sure, as a +man may say; you have brought your pigs to a fine market. + +_Mr. H._ Pigs! + +_Landlord._ What then? take old Pry's advice, and never mind it. +Don't scorch your crackling for 'em, Sir. + +_Mr. H._ Scorch my crackling! a queer phrase; but I suppose he don't +mean to affront me. + +_Landlord._ What is done can't be undone; you can't make a silken +purse out of a sow's ear. + +_Mr. H._ As you say, Landlord, thinking of a thing does but augment +it. + +_Landlord._ Does but _hogment_ it, indeed, Sir. + +_Mr. H. Hogment_ it! damn it, I said augment it. + +_Landlord._ Lord, Sir, 'tis not everybody has such gift of fine +phrases as your Honor, that can lard his discourse-- + +_Mr. H._ Lard! + +_Landlord._ Suppose they do smoke you-- + +_Mr. H._ Smoke me! + +_Landlord._ One of my phrases; never mind my words, Sir, my meaning +is good. We all mean the same thing, only you express yourself one +way, and I another, that's all. The meaning's the same; it is all +pork. + +_Mr. H._ That's another of your phrases, I presume. + + [_Bell rings, and the Landlord called for._ + +_Landlord._ Anon, anon. + +_Mr. H._ Oh, I wish I were anonymous. + + [_Exeunt several ways._ + + +SCENE.--_Melesinda's Apartment._ + +MELESINDA _and Maid._ + +_Maid._ Lord, Madam! before I'd take on as you do about a +foolish--what signifies a name? Hogs--Hogs--what is it--is just as +good as any other, for what I see. + +_Melesinda._ Ignorant creature! yet she is perhaps blest in the +absence of those ideas, which, while they add a zest to the few +pleasures which fall to the lot of superior natures to enjoy, doubly +edge the---- + +_Maid._ Superior natures! a fig! If he's hog by name, he's not hog by +nature, that don't follow--his name don't make him anything, does +it? He don't grunt the more for it, nor squeak, that ever I hear; he +likes his victuals out of a plate, as other Christians do; you never +see him go to the trough---- + +_Melesinda._ Unfeeling wretch! yet possibly her intentions---- + +_Maid._ For instance, Madam, my name is Finch--Betty Finch. I don't +whistle the more for that, nor long after canary-seed while I can get +good wholesome mutton--no, nor you can't catch me by throwing salt on +my tail. If you come to that, hadn't I a young man used to come after +me, they said courted me--his name was Lion, Francis Lion, a tailor; +but though he was fond enough of me, for all that he never offered to +eat me. + +_Melesinda._ How fortunate that the discovery has been made before it +was too late! Had I listened to his deceits, and, as the perfidious +man had almost persuaded me, precipitated myself into an inextricable +engagement before---- + +_Maid._ No great harm if you had. You'd only have bought a pig in a +poke--and what then? Oh, here he comes creeping---- + + _Enter_ MR. H. _abject._ + +Go to her, Mr. Hogs--Hogs--Hogsbristles, what's your name? Don't be +afraid, man--don't give it up--she's not crying--only _summat_ has +made her eyes red--she has got a sty in her eye, I believe---- +_(going.)_ + +_Melesinda._ You are not going, Betty? + +_Maid._ O, Madam, never mind me--I shall be back in the twinkling of +a pig's whisker, as they say. + + [_Exit._ + +_Mr. H._ Melesinda, you behold before you a wretch who would have +betrayed your confidence--but it was love that prompted him; who +would have trick'd you, by an unworthy concealment, into a +participation of that disgrace which a superficial world has agreed +to attach to a name--but with it you would have shared a fortune not +contemptible, and a heart--but 'tis over now. That name he is content +to bear alone--to go where the persecuted syllables shall be no more +heard, or excite no meaning--some spot where his native tongue has +never penetrated, nor any of his countrymen have landed, to plant +their unfeeling satire, their brutal wit, and national ill +manners--where no Englishmen--(Here_ MELESINDA, _who has been +pouting during this speech, fetches a deep sigh.)_ Some yet +undiscovered Otaheite, where witless, unapprehensive savages shall +innocently pronounce the ill-fated sounds, and think them not +inharmonious. + +_Melesinda._ Oh! + +_Mr. H._ Who knows but among the female natives might be found---- + +_Melesinda._ Sir! (_raising her head._) + +_Mr. H._ One who would be more kind than--some Oberea--Queen Oberea. + +_Melesinda._ Oh! + +_Mr. H._ Or what if I were to seek for proofs of reciprocal esteem +among unprejudiced African maids, in Monomotopa? + + _Enter Servant._ + +_Servant._ Mr. Belvil. [_Exit._ + + _Enter_ BELVIL. + +_Mr. H._ Monomotopa (_musing._) + +_Belvil._ Heyday, Jack! what means this mortified face? nothing has +happened, I hope, between this lady and you? I beg pardon, Madam, but +understanding my friend was with you, I took the liberty of seeking +him here. Some little difference possibly which a third person can +adjust--not a word. Will you, Madam, as this gentleman's friend, +suffer me to be the arbitrator--strange--hark'ee, Jack, nothing has +come out, has there? you understand me. Oh, I guess how it +is--somebody has got at your secret; you haven't blabbed it yourself, +have you? ha! ha! ha! I could find in my heart--Jack, what would you +give me if I should relieve you? + +_Mr. H._ No power of man can relieve me (_sighs_); but it must lie at +the root, gnawing at the root--here it will lie. + +_Belvil._ No power of man? not a common man, I grant you: for +instance, a subject--it's out of the power of any subject. + +_Mr. H._ Gnawing at the root--there it will lie. + +_Belvil._ Such a thing has been known as a name to be changed; but +not by a subject--(_shows a Gazette_). + +_Mr. H._ Gnawing at the root--(_suddenly snatches the paper out of_ +BELVIL'S _hand_)--ha! pish! nonsense! give it me--what! (_reads_) +promotions, bankrupts--a great many bankrupts this week--there it +will lie. (_Lays it down, takes it up again, and reads._) "The King +has been graciously pleased"--gnawing at the root--"graciously +pleased to grant unto John Hogsflesh,"--the devil--"Hogsflesh, Esq., +of Sty Hall, in the county of Hants, his royal license and +authority"--O Lord! O Lord!--"that he and his issue"--me and my +issue--"may take and use the surname and arms of Bacon"--Bacon, the +surname and arms of Bacon--"in pursuance of an injunction contained +in the last will and testament of Nicholas Bacon, Esq., his late +uncle, as well as out of grateful respect to his memory:"--grateful +respect! poor old soul-----here's more--"and that such arms may be +first duly exemplified "--they shall, I will take care of +that--"according to the laws of arms, and recorded in the Herald's +Office." + +_Belvil._ Come, Madam, give me leave to put my own interpretation +upon your silence, and to plead for my friend, that now that only +obstacle which seemed to stand in the way of your union is removed, +you will suffer me to complete the happiness which my news seems to +have brought him, by introducing him with a new claim to your favor, +by the name of Mr. Bacon. (_Takes their hands and joins them, which_ +MELESINDA _seems to give consent to with a smile._) + +_Mr. H._ Generous Melesinda! my dear friend--"he and his issue," me +and my issue!--O Lord!-- + +_Belvil._ I wish you joy, Jack, with all my heart. + +_Mr. H._ Bacon, Bacon, Bacon--how odd it sounds! I could never be +tired of hearing it. There was Lord Chancellor Bacon. Methinks I have +some of the Verulam blood in me already.--Methinks I could look +through Nature--there was Friar Bacon, a conjurer,--I feel as if I +could conjure too---- + + _Enter a Servant._ + +_Servant._ Two young ladies and an old lady are at the door, +inquiring if you see company, Madam. + +_Mr. H._ "Surname and arms"-- + +_Melesinda._ Show them up.--My dear Mr. Bacon, moderate your joy. + +_Enter three Ladies, being part of those who were at the Assembly._ + +_1st Lady._ My dear Melesinda, how do you do? + +_2nd Lady._ How do you do? We have been so concerned for you---- + +_Old Lady._ We have been so concerned--(_seeing him_)--Mr. +Hogsflesh---- + +_Mr. H._ There's no such person--nor there never was--nor 'tis not +fit there should be--"surname and arms"-- + +_Belvil._ It is true what my friend would express; we have been all +in a mistake, ladies. Very true, the name of this gentleman was what +you call it, but it is so no longer. The succession to the +long-contested Bacon estate is at length decided, and with it my +friend succeeds to the name of his deceased relative. + +_Mr. H._ "His Majesty has been graciously pleased"-- + +_1st Lady._ I am sure we all join in hearty +congratulation--_(sighs)._ + +_2nd Lady._ And wish you joy with all our hearts--_(heigh ho!)_ + +_Old Lady._ And hope you will enjoy the name and estate many +years--_(cries)._ + +_Belvil._ Ha! ha! ha! mortify them a little, Jack. + +_1st Lady._ Hope you intend to stay-- + +_2nd Lady._ With us some time-- + +_Old Lady._ In these parts-- + +_Mr. H._ Ladies, for your congratulations I thank you; for the favors +you have lavished on me, and in particular for this lady's _(turning +to the old Lady)_ good opinion, I rest your debtor. As to any future +favors--_(accosts them severally in the order in which he was refused +by them at the assembly)_--Madam, shall always acknowledge your +politeness; but at present, you see, I am engaged with a partner. +Always be happy to respect you as a friend, but you must not look for +anything further. Must beg of you to be less particular in your +addresses to me. Ladies all, with this piece of advice, of Bath and +you + + Your ever grateful servant takes his leave. + Lay your plans surer when you plot to grieve; + See, while you kindly mean to mortify + Another, the wild arrow do not fly, + And gall yourself. For once you've been mistaken; + Your shafts have miss'd their aim--Hogsflesh has + saved his Bacon. + + + + +POEMS. + + + + +DEDICATION[1] + +[Footnote 1: Prefixed to the Author's works published in 1818.] + + + * * * * * + + +TO S. T. COLERIDGE, ESQ. + +My Dear Coleridge, + +You will smile to see the slender labors of your friend designated by +the title of _Works;_ but such was the wish of the gentlemen who have +kindly undertaken the trouble of collecting them, and from their +judgment could be no appeal. + +It would be a kind of disloyalty to offer to any one but yourself a +volume containing the _early pieces,_ which were first published +among your poems, and were fairly derivatives from you and them. My +friend Lloyd and myself came into our first battle (authorship is a +sort of warfare) under cover of the greater Ajax. How this +association, which shall always be a dear and proud recollection to +me, came to be broken,--who snapped the threefold cord,--whether +yourself (but I know that was not the case) grew ashamed of your +former companions,--or whether (which is by much the more probable) +some ungracious bookseller was author of the separation,--I cannot +tell;--but wanting the support of your friendly elm, (I speak for +myself,) my vine has, since that time, put forth few or no fruits; +the sap (if ever it had any) has become, in a manner, dried up and +extinct; and you will find your old associate, in his second volume, +dwindled into prose and _criticism._ + +Am I right in assuming this as the cause? or is it that, as years +come upon us, (except with some more healthy-happy spirits,) Life +itself loses much of its Poetry for us? we transcribe but what we +read in the great volume of Nature; and, as the characters grow dim, +we turn off, and look another way. You yourself write no Christabels, +nor Ancient Mariners, now. + +Some of the Sonnets, which shall be carelessly turned over by the +general reader, may happily awaken in you remembrances, which I +should be sorry should be ever totally extinct--the memory + + "Of summer days and of delightful years--" + +even so far back as to those old suppers at our old ... Inn,--when +life was fresh, and topics exhaustless,--and you first kindled in me, +if not the power, yet the love of poetry, and beauty, and +kindliness.-- + + "What words have I heard + Spoke at the Mermaid!" + +The world has given you many a shrewd nip and gird since that time, +but either my eyes are grown dimmer, or my old friend is the _same_ +who stood before me three-and-twenty years ago--his hair a little +confessing the hand of Time, but still shrouding the same capacious +brain,--his heart not altered, scarcely where it "alteration finds." + +One piece, Coleridge, I have ventured to publish in its original +form, though I have heard you complain of a certain over-imitation of +the antique in the style. If I could see any way of getting rid of +the objection, without rewriting it entirely, I would make some +sacrifices. But when I wrote John Woodvil, I never proposed to myself +any distinct deviation from common English. I had been newly +initiated in the writings of our elder dramatists: Beaumont and +Fletcher, and Massinger, were then a _first love_; and from what I +was so freshly conversant in, what wonder if my language +imperceptibly took a tinge? The very time which I had chosen for my +story, that which immediately followed the Restoration, seemed to +require, in an English play, that the English should be of rather an +older cast than that of the precise year in which it happened to be +written. I wish it had not some faults, which I can less vindicate +than the language. + +I remain, + +My dear Coleridge, + +Yours, + +With unabated esteem, + +C. LAMB. + + + + +POEMS + + * * * * * + +HESTER. + + When maidens such as Hester die, + Their place ye may not well supply, + Though ye among a thousand try, + With vain endeavor. + + A month or more hath she been dead, + Yet cannot I by force be led + To think upon the wormy bed, + And her together. + + A springy motion in her gait, + A rising step, did indicate + Of pride and joy no common rate, + That flush'd her spirit. + + I know not by what name beside + I shall it call:--if 'twas not pride, + It was a joy to that allied, + She did inherit. + + Her parents held the Quaker rule, + Which doth the human feeling cool, + But she was train'd in Nature's school, + Nature had blest her. + + A waking eye, a prying mind, + A heart that stirs, is hard to bind, + A hawk's keen sight ye cannot blind, + Ye could not Hester. + + My sprightly neighbor! gone before + To that unknown and silent shore, + Shall we not meet, as heretofore, + Some summer morning, + + When from thy cheerful eyes a ray + Hath struck a bliss upon the day, + A bliss that would not go away, + A sweet fore-warning? + + * * * * * + +TO CHARLES LLOYD. + +AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR. + + Alone, obscure, without a friend, + A cheerless, solitary thing, + Why seeks, my Lloyd, the stranger out? + What offering can the stranger bring + + Of social scenes, home-bred delights, + That him in aught compensate may + For Stowey's pleasant winter nights, + For loves and friendships far away? + + In brief oblivion to forego + Friends, such as thine, so justly dear, + And be awhile with me content + To stay, a kindly loiterer, here: + + For this a gleam of random joy + Hath flush'd my unaccustom'd cheek; + And, with an o'ercharged bursting heart, + I feel the thanks I cannot speak. + + Oh! sweet are all the Muses' lays, + And sweet the charm of matin bird; + 'Twas long since these estranged ears + The sweeter voice of friend had heard. + + The voice hath spoke: the pleasant sounds + In memory's ear in after-time + Shall live, to sometimes rouse a tear, + And sometimes prompt an honest rhyme. + + For, when the transient charm is fled, + And when the little week is o'er, + To cheerless, friendless, solitude + When I return, as heretofore; + + Long, long, within my aching heart + The grateful sense shall cherish'd be; + I'll think less meanly of myself, + That Lloyd will sometimes think on me. + + * * * * * + +THE THREE FRIENDS. + + Three young maids in friendship met; + Mary, Martha, Margaret. + Margaret was tall and fair, + Martha shorter by a hair; + If the first excell'd in feature, + Th' other's grace and ease were greater; + Mary, though to rival loth, + In their best gifts equall'd both. + They a due proportion kept; + Martha mourn'd if Margaret wept; + Margaret joy'd when any good + She of Martha understood; + And in sympathy for either + Mary was outdone by neither. + Thus far, for a happy space, + All three ran an equal race, + A most constant friendship proving, + Equally beloved and loving; + All their wishes, joys, the same; + Sisters only not in name. + + Fortune upon each one smiled, + As upon a fav'rite child; + Well to do and well to see + Were the parents of all three; + Till on Martha's father crosses + Brought a flood of worldly losses, + And his fortunes rich and great + Changed at once to low estate: + Under which o'erwhelming blow + Martha's mother was laid low; + She a hapless orphan left, + Of maternal care bereft, + Trouble following trouble fast, + Lay in a sick-bed at last. + + In the depth of her affliction + Martha now receiv'd conviction, + That a true and faithful friend + Can the surest comfort lend. + Night and day, with friendship tried, + Ever constant by her side + Was her gentle Mary found, + With a love that knew no bound; + And the solace she imparted + Saved her dying broken-hearted. + + In this scene of earthly things + Not one good unmixed springs. + That which had to Martha proved + A sweet consolation, moved + Different feelings of regret + In the mind of Margaret. + She, whose love was not less dear, + Nor affection less sincere + To her friend, was, by occasion + Of more distant habitation, + Fewer visits forced to pay her; + When no other cause did stay her; + And her Mary living nearer, + Margaret began to fear her, + Lest her visits day by day + Martha's heart should steal away. + That whole heart she ill could spare her, + Where till now she'd been a sharer. + From this cause with grief she pined, + Till at length her health declined. + All her cheerful spirits flew, + Fast as Martha's gather'd new; + And her sickness waxed sore, + Just when Martha felt no more. + + Mary, who had quick suspicion + Of her alter'd friend's condition, + Seeing Martha's convalescence + Less demanded now her presence, + With a goodness, built on reason, + Changed her measures with the season; + Turn'd her steps from Martha's door, + Went where she was wanted more; + All her care and thoughts were set + Now to tend on Margaret. + Mary living 'twixt the two, + From her home could oft'ner go, + Either of her friends to see, + Than they could together be. + + Truth explain'd is to suspicion + Evermore the best physician. + Soon her visits had the effect; + All that Margaret did suspect, + From her fancy vanish'd clean; + She was soon what she had been, + And the color she did lack + To her faded cheek came back. + Wounds which love had made her feel, + Love alone had power to heal. + + Martha, who the frequent visit + Now had lost, and sore did miss it, + With impatience waxed cross, + Counted Margaret's gain her loss: + All that Mary did confer + On her friend, thought due to her. + In her girlish bosom rise + Little foolish jealousies, + Which into such rancor wrought, + She one day for Margaret sought; + Finding her by chance alone, + She began, with reasons shown, + To insinuate a fear + Whether Mary was sincere; + Wish'd that Margaret would take heed + Whence her actions did proceed. + For herself, she'd long been minded + Not with outsides to be blinded; + All that pity and compassion, + She believed was affectation; + In her heart she doubted whether + Mary cared a pin for either. + She could keep whole weeks at distance, + And not know of their existence, + While all things remain'd the same; + But, when some misfortune came, + Then she made a great parade + Of her sympathy and aid,-- + Not that she did really grieve, + It was only _make-believe_, + And she cared for nothing, so + She might her fine feelings show, + And get credit, on her part, + For a soft and tender heart. + + With such speeches, smoothly made, + She found methods to persuade + Margaret (who being sore + From the doubts she'd felt before, + Was prepared for mistrust) + To believe her reasons just; + Quite destroy'd that comfort glad, + Which in Mary late she had; + Made her, in experience' spite, + Think her friend a hypocrite, + And resolve, with cruel scoff, + To renounce and cast her off. + + See how good turns are rewarded! + She of both is now discarded, + Who to both had been so late + Their support in low estate, + All their comfort, and their stay-- + Now of both is cast away. + But the league her presence cherish'd, + Losing its best prop, soon perish'd; + She, that was a link to either, + To keep them and it together, + Being gone, the two (no wonder) + That were left, soon fell asunder;-- + Some civilities were kept, + But the heart of friendship slept; + Love with hollow forms was fed, + But the life of love lay dead:-- + A cold intercourse they held, + After Mary was expell'd. + + Two long years did intervene + Since they'd either of them seen, + Or, by letter, any word + Of their old companion heard,-- + When, upon a day once walking, + Of indifferent matters talking, + They a female figure met; + Martha said to Margaret, + "That young maid in face does carry + A resemblance strong of Mary." + Margaret, at nearer sight, + Own'd her observation right; + But they did not far proceed + Ere they knew 'twas she indeed. + She--but, ah I how changed they view her + From that person which they knew her! + Her fine face disease had scarr'd, + And its matchless beauty marr'd:-- + But enough was left to trace + Mary's sweetness--Mary's grace. + When her eye did first behold them, + How they blush'd!--but, when she told them, + How on a sick-bed she lay + Months, while they had kept away, + And had no inquiries made + If she were alive or dead;-- + How, for want of a true friend, + She was brought near to her end, + And was like so to have died, + With no friend at her bedside;-- + How the constant irritation, + Caused by fruitless expectation + Of their coming, had extended + The illness, when she might have mended,-- + Then, O then, how did reflection + Come on them with recollection! + All that she had done for them, + How it did their fault condemn! + + But sweet Mary, still the same, + Kindly eased them of their shame; + Spoke to them with accents bland, + Took them friendly by the hand; + Bound them both with promise fast. + Not to speak of troubles past; + Made them on the spot declare + A new league of friendship there; + Which, without a word of strife, + Lasted thenceforth long as life. + Martha now and Margaret + Strove who most should pay the debt + Which they owed her, nor did vary + Ever after from their Mary. + + * * * * * + +TO A RIVER IN WHICH A CHILD WAS DROWNED. + + Smiling river, smiling river, + On thy bosom sunbeams play; + Though they're fleeting, and retreating, + Thou hast more deceit than they. + + In thy channel, in thy channel, + Choked with ooze and grav'lly stones, + Deep immersed, and unhearsed, + Lies young Edward's corse: his bones + + Ever whitening, ever whitening, + As thy waves against them dash; + What thy torrent, in the current, + Swallow'd, now it helps to wash. + + As if senseless, as if senseless + Things had feeling in this case; + What so blindly, and unkindly, + It destroy'd, it now does grace. + + * * * * * + +THE OLD FAMILIAR FACES. + + I have had playmates, I have had companions, + In my days of childhood, in my joyful school-days, + All, all are gone, the old familiar faces. + + I have been laughing, I have been carousing, + Drinking late, sitting late, with my bosom cronies, + All, all are gone, the old familiar faces. + + I loved a love once, fairest among women; + Closed are her doors on me, I must not see her-- + All, all are gone, the old familiar faces. + + I have a friend, a kinder friend has no man; + Like an ingrate, I left my friend abruptly; + Left him, to muse on the old familiar faces. + + Ghostlike I paced round the haunts of my childhood. + Earth seem'd a desert I was bound to traverse, + Seeking to find the old familiar faces. + + Friend of my bosom, thou more than a brother, + Why wert not thou born in my father's dwelling? + So might we talk of the old familiar faces,-- + + How some they have died, and some they have left me, + And some are taken from me; all are departed; + All, all are gone, the old familiar faces. + + * * * * * + +HELEN. + + High-born Helen, round your dwelling + These twenty years I've paced in vain: + Haughty beauty, thy lover's duty + Hath been to glory in his pain. + + High-born Helen, proudly telling + Stories of thy cold disdain; + I starve, I die, now you comply, + And I no longer can complain. + + These twenty years I've lived on tears, + Dwelling forever on a frown; + On sighs I've fed, your scorn my bread; + I perish now you kind are grown. + + Can I, who loved my beloved + But for the scorn "was in her eye," + Can I be moved for my beloved, + When she "returns me sigh for sigh?" + + In stately pride, by my bedside, + High-born Helen's portrait's hung; + Deaf to my praise, my mournful lays + Are nightly to the portrait sung. + + To that I weep, nor ever sleep, + Complaining all night long to her-- + _Helen, grown old, no longer cold,_ + _Said,_ "You to all men I prefer." + + * * * * * + +A VISION OF REPENTANCE. + + I saw a famous fountain, in my dream, + Where shady pathways to a valley led; + A weeping willow lay upon that stream, + And all around the fountain brink were spread + Wide-branching trees, with dark green leaf rich clad, + Forming a doubtful twilight--desolate and sad. + + The place was such, that whoso enter'd in, + Disrobed was of every earthly thought, + And straight became as one that knew not sin, + Or to the world's first innocence was brought; + Enseem'd it now, he stood on holy ground, + In sweet and tender melancholy wrapt around. + + A most strange calm stole o'er my soothed sprite; + Long time I stood, and longer had I staid, + When lo! I saw, saw by the sweet moonlight, + Which came in silence o'er that silent shade, + Where, near the fountain, SOMETHING like DESPAIR + Made, of that weeping-willow, garlands for her hair. + + And eke with painful fingers she inwove + Many an uncouth stem of savage thorn-- + "The willow garland, _that_ was for her love, + And _these_ her bleeding temples would adorn." + With sighs her heart nigh burst, salt tears fast fell, + As mournfully she bended o'er that sacred well. + + To whom when I addrest myself to speak, + She lifted up her eyes, and nothing said; + The delicate red came mantling o'er her cheek, + And gath'ring up her loose attire, she fled + To the dark covert of that woody shade, + And in her goings seem'd a timid gentle maid. + + Revolving in my mind what this should mean, + And why that lovely lady plained so; + Perplex'd in thought at that mysterious scene, + And doubting if 'twere best to stay or go, + I cast mine eyes in wistful gaze around, + When from the shades came slow a small and plaintive + sound. + + * * * * * + + "Psyche am I, who love to dwell + In these brown shades, this woody dell, + Where never busy mortal came, + Till now, to pry upon my shame. + + "At thy feet what dost thou see + The waters of repentance be, + Which, night and day, I must augment + With tears, like a true penitent, + + "If haply so my day of grace + Be not yet past; and this lone place, + O'ershadowy, dark, excludeth hence + All thoughts but grief and penitence." + + _"Why dost thou weep, thou gentle maid! + And wherefore in this barren shade + Thy hidden thoughts with sorrow feed? + Can thing so fair repentance need?"_ + + "O! I have done a deed of shame, + And tainted is my virgin fame, + And stain'd the beauteous maiden white + In which my bridal robes were dight." + + _"And who the promised spouse? declare: + And what those bridal garments were."_ + + "Severe and saintly righteousness + Composed the clear white bridal dress; + JESUS, the Son of Heaven's high King, + Bought with his blood the marriage ring. + + "A wretched sinful creature, I + Deem'd lightly of that sacred tie, + Gave to a treacherous WORLD my heart, + And play'd the foolish wanton's part. + Soon to these murky shades I came, + To hide from the sun's light my shame. + And still I haunt this woody dell, + And bathe me in that healing well, + Whose waters clear have influence + From sin's foul stains the soul to cleanse; + And, night and day, I them augment, + With tears, like a true penitent, + Until, due expiation made, + And fit atonement fully paid, + The Lord and Bridegroom me present, + Where in sweet strains of high consent, + God's throne before, the Seraphim + Shall chant the ecstatic marriage hymn." + + "Now Christ restore thee soon"--I said, + And thenceforth all my dream was fled. + + * * * * * + +DIALOGUE BETWEEN A MOTHER AND CHILD. + + CHILD + O Lady, lay your costly robes aside. + No longer may you glory in your pride. + + MOTHER + Wherefore to-day art singing in mine ear + Sad songs were made so long ago, my dear? + This day I am to be a bride, you know, + Why sing sad songs, were made so long ago? + + CHILD + O mother, lay your costly robes aside, + For you may never be another's bride. + That line I learn'd not in the old sad song. + + MOTHER + I pray thee, pretty one, now hold thy tongue, + Play with the bridemaids; and be glad, my boy, + For thou shalt be a second father's joy. + + CHILD. + One father fondled me upon his knee. + One father is enough, alone, for me. + + * * * * * + +QUEEN ORIANA'S DREAM. + + On a bank with roses shaded, + Whose sweet scent the violets aided, + Violets whose breath alone + Yields but feeble smell or none, + (Sweeter bed Jove ne'er reposed on + When his eyes Olympus closed on,) + While o'erhead six slaves did hold + Canopy of cloth o' gold, + And two more did music keep, + Which might Juno lull to sleep, + Oriana, who was queen + To the mighty Tamerlane, + That was lord of all the land + Between Thrace and Samarchand, + While the noontide fervor beam'd, + Mused himself to sleep, and _dream'd_. + + Thus far, in magnific strain, + A young poet soothed his vein, + But he had nor prose nor numbers, + To express a princess' slumbers.-- + Youthful Richard had strange fancies, + Was deep versed in old romances, + And could talk whole hours upon + The Great Cham and Prester John,-- + Tell the field in which the Sophi + From the Tartar won a trophy-- + What he read with such delight of, + Thought he could as eas'ly write of-- + But his over-young invention + Kept not pace with brave intention. + Twenty suns did rise and set, + And he could no further get; + But, unable to proceed, + Made a virtue out of need, + And, his labors wiselier deem'd of, + Did omit _what the queen dream'd of_. + + * * * * * + +A BALLAD. + +NOTING THE DIFFERENCE OF RICH AND POOR, IN THE WAYS OF +A RICH NOBLE'S PALACE AND A POOR WORKHOUSE. + +_To the Tune of the "Old and Young Courtier."_ + + In a costly palace Youth goes clad in gold; + In a wretched workhouse Age's limbs are cold: + There they sit, the old men by a shivering fire, + Still close and closer cowering, warmth is their desire. + + In a costly palace, when the brave gallants dine, + They have store of good venison, with old canary wine, + With singing and music to heighten the cheer; + Coarse bits, with grudging, are the pauper's best fare. + + In a costly palace Youth is still carest + By a train of attendants which laugh at my young Lord's jest; + In a wretched workhouse the contrary prevails: + Does Age begin to prattle?--no man heark'neth to his tales. + + In a costly palace if the child with a pin + Do but chance to prick a finger, straight the doctor is called in; + In a wretched workhouse men are left to perish + For want of proper cordials, which their old age might cherish. + + In a costly palace Youth enjoys his lust; + In a wretched workhouse Age, in corners thrust, + Thinks upon the former days, when he was well to do, + Had children to stand by him, both friends and kinsmen too. + + In a costly palace Youth his temples hides + With a new-devised peruke that reaches to his sides; + In a wretched workhouse Age's crown is bare, + With a few thin locks just to fence out the cold air. + + In peace, as in war, 'tis our young gallants' pride, + To walk, each one i' the streets, with a rapier by his side, + That none to do them injury may have pretence; + Wretched Age, in poverty, must brook offence. + + * * * * * + +HYPOCHONDRIACUS. + + By myself walking, + To myself talking, + When as I ruminate + On my untoward fate, + Scarcely seem I + Alone sufficiently, + Black thoughts continually + Crowding my privacy; + They come unbidden, + Like foes at a wedding, + Thrusting their faces + In better guests' places, + Peevish and malecontent, + Clownish, impertinent, + Dashing the merriment: + So in like fashions + Dim cogitations + Follow and haunt me, + Striving to daunt me, + In my heart festering, + In my ears whispering, + "Thy friends are treacherous, + Thy foes are dangerous, + Thy dreams ominous." + + Fierce Anthropophagi, + Spectra, Diaboli, + What scared St. Anthony, + Hobgoblins, Lemures, + Dreams of Antipodes, + Night-riding Incubi, + Troubling the fantasy, + All dire illusions + Causing confusions; + Figments heretical, + Scruples fantastical, + Doubts diabolical; + Abaddon vexeth me, + Mahu perplexeth me, + Lucifer teareth me---- + +_Jesu! Maria! liberate nos ab his diris tentationibus Inimici._ + + * * * * * + +A FAREWELL TO TOBACCO. + + May the Babylonish curse + Straight confound my stammering verse, + If I can a passage see + In this word-perplexity, + Or a fit expression find, + Or a language to my mind, + (Still the phrase is wide or scant) + To take leave of thee, GREAT PLANT! + Or in any terms relate + Half my love, or half my hate: + For I hate, yet love, thee so, + That, whichever thing I show, + The plain truth will seem to be + A constrain'd hyperbole, + And the passion to proceed + More from a mistress than a weed. + + Sooty retainer to the vine, + Bacchus' black servant, negro fine; + Sorcerer, that mak'st us dote upon + Thy begrimed complexion, + And, for thy pernicious sake, + More and greater oaths to break + Than reclaimed lovers take + 'Gainst women: thou thy siege dost lay + Much too in the female way, + While thou suck'st the lab'ring breath + Faster than kisses or than death. + + Thou in such a cloud dost bind us, + That our worst foes cannot find us, + And ill-fortune, that would thwart us. + Shoots at rovers, shooting at us; + While each man, through thy height'ning steam, + Does like a smoking Etna seem, + And all about us does express + (Fancy and wit in richest dress) + A Sicilian fruitfulness. + + Thou through such a mist dost show us, + That our best friends do not know us, + And, for those allowed features, + Due to reasonable creatures, + Liken'st us to fell Chimeras, + Monsters that, who see us, fear us; + Worse than Cerberus or Geryon, + Or, who first loved a cloud, Ixion. + + Bacchus we know, and we allow + His tipsy rites. But what art thou, + That but by reflex canst show + What his deity can do, + As the false Egyptian spell + Aped the true Hebrew miracle + Some few vapors thou may'st raise, + The weak brain may serve to amaze, + But to the reins and nobler heart + Canst nor life nor heat impart. + + Brother of Bacchus, later born, + The old world was sure forlorn + Wanting thee, that aidest more + The god's victories than before + All his panthers, and the brawls + Of his piping Bacchanals. + These, as stale, we disallow, + Or judge of _thee_ meant; only thou + His true Indian conquest art; + And, for ivy round his dart, + The reformed god now weaves + A finer thyrsus of thy leaves. + + Scent to match thy rich perfume + Chemic art did ne'er presume + Through her quaint alembic strain, + None so sov'reign to the brain. + Nature, that did in thee excel, + Framed again no second smell. + Roses, violets, but toys + For the smaller sort of boys, + Or for greener damsels meant; + Thou art the only manly scent. + + Stinking'st of the stinking kind, + Filth of the mouth and fog of the mind, + Africa, that brags her foison, + Breeds no such prodigious poison, + Henbane, nightshade, both together, + Hemlock, aconite---- + + Nay, rather, + Plant divine, of rarest virtue; + Blisters on the tongue would hurt you. + 'Twas but in a sort I blamed thee: + None e'er prosper'd who defamed thee; + Irony all, and feign'd abuse, + Such as perplex'd lovers use, + At a need, when, in despair + To paint forth their fairest fair, + Or in part but to express + That exceeding comeliness + Which their fancies doth so strike, + They borrow language of dislike; + And, instead of Dearest Miss, + Jewel, Honey, Sweetheart, Bliss, + And those forms of old admiring, + Call her Cockatrice and Siren, + Basilisk, and all that's evil, + Witch, Hyena, Mermaid, Devil, + Ethiop, Wench, and Blackamoor, + Monkey, Ape, and twenty more; + Friendly Trait'ress, loving Foe,-- + Not that she is truly so, + But no other way they know + A contentment to express, + Borders so upon excess, + That they do not rightly wot + Whether it be pain or not. + + Or, as men, constrain'd to part + With what's nearest to their heart, + While their sorrow's at the height, + Lose discrimination quite, + And their hasty wrath let fall, + To appease their frantic gall, + On the darling thing whatever, + Whence they feel it death to sever, + Though it be, as they, perforce, + Guiltless of the sad divorce. + + For I must (nor let it grieve thee, + Friendliest of plants, that I must) leave thee. + For thy sake, TOBACCO, I + Would do anything but die, + And but seek to extend my days + Long enough to sing thy praise. + But, as she, who once hath been + A king's consort, is a queen + Ever after, nor will bate + Any tittle of her state, + Though a widow, or divorced, + So I, from thy converse forced, + The old name and style retain, + A right Katherine of Spain; + And a seat, too,'mongst the joys + Of the blest Tobacco Boys; + Where, though I, by sour physician, + Am debarr'd the full fruition + Of thy favors, I may catch + Some collateral sweets, and snatch + Sidelong odors, that give life + Like glances from a neighbor's wife; + And still live in the by-places + And the suburbs of thy graces; + And in thy borders take delight, + An unconquer'd Canaanite. + + * * * * * + +TO T. L. H. + +A CHILD. + + Model of thy parent dear, + Serious infant worth a fear: + In thy unfaltering visage well + Picturing forth the son of TELL, + When on his forehead, firm and good, + Motionless mark, the apple stood; + Guileless traitor, rebel mild, + Convict unconscious, culprit child! + Gates that close with iron roar + Have been to thee thy nursery door; + Chains that chink in cheerless cells + Have been thy rattles and thy bells; + Walls contrived for giant sin + Have hemm'd thy faultless weakness in; + Near thy sinless bed black Guilt + Her discordant house hath built, + And fill'd it with her monstrous brood-- + Sights, by thee not understood-- + Sights of fear, and of distress, + That pass a harmless infant's guess + + But the clouds, that overcast + Thy young morning, may not last; + Soon shall arrive the rescuing hour + That yields thee up to Nature's power: + Nature, that so late doth greet thee, + Shall in o'erflowing measure meet thee. + She shall recompense with cost + For every lesson thou hast lost. + Then wandering up thy sire's loved hill,[1] + Thou shalt take thy airy fill + Of health and pastime. _Birds shall sing + For thy delight each May morning._ + 'Mid new-yean'd lambkins thou shalt play, + Hardly less a lamb than they. + Then thy prison's lengthen'd bound + Shall be the horizon skirting round: + And, while thou fillest thy lap with flowers, + To make amends for wintry hours, + The breeze, the sunshine, and the place, + Shall from thy tender brow efface + Each vestige of untimely care, + That sour restraint had graven there; + And on thy every look impress + A more excelling childishness. + + So shall be thy days beguiled, + THORNTON HUNT, my favorite child. + +[Footnote 1: Hampstead.] + + * * * * * + +BALLAD. + +FROM THE GERMAN. + + The clouds are blackening, the storms threatening, + And ever the forest maketh a moan: + Billows are breaking, the damsel's heart acting, + Thus by herself she singeth alone, + Weeping right plenteously. + + "The world is empty, the heart is dead surely, + In this world plainly all seemeth amiss: + To thy breast, holy one, take now thy little one, + I have had earnest of all earth's bliss, + Living right lovingly." + + * * * * * + +DAVID IN THE CAVE OF ADULLAM. + + David and his three captains bold + Kept ambush once within a hold. + It was in Adullam's cave, + Nigh which no water they could have, + Nor spring, nor running brook was near + To quench the thirst that parch'd them there. + Then David, king of Israel, + Straight bethought him of a well, + Which stood beside the city gate, + At Bethlem; where, before his state + Of kingly dignity, he had + Oft drunk his fill, a shepherd lad; + But now his fierce Philistine foe + Encamp'd before it he does know. + Yet ne'er the less, with heat opprest, + Those three bold captains he addrest; + And wish'd that one to him would bring + Some water from his native spring. + His valiant captains instantly + To execute his will did fly. + The mighty Three the ranks broke through + Of armed foes, and water drew + For David, their beloved king, + At his own sweet native spring. + Back through their arm'd foes they haste, + With the hard-earn'd treasure graced. + But when the good king David found + What they had done, he on the ground + The water pour'd ... "Because," said he, + "That it was at the jeopardy + Of your three lives this thing ye did, + That I should drink it, God forbid." + + * * * * * + +SALOME. + + Once on a charger there was laid, + And brought before a royal maid, + As price of attitude and grace, + A guiltless head, a holy face. + + It was on Herod's natal day, + Who o'er Judea's land held sway. + He married his own brother's wife, + Wicked Herodias. She the life + Of John the Baptist long had sought, + Because he openly had taught + That she a life unlawful led, + Having her husband's brother wed. + + This was he, that saintly John, + Who in the wilderness alone + Abiding, did for clothing wear + A garment made of camel's hair; + Honey and locusts were his food, + And he was most severely good. + He preached penitence and tears, + And waking first the sinner's fears, + Prepared a path, made smooth a way, + For his diviner Master's day. + + Herod kept in princely state + His birthday. On his throne he sate, + After the feast, beholding her + Who danced with grace peculiar; + Fair Salome, who did excel + All in that land for dancing well. + The feastful monarch's heart was fired, + And whatsoe'er thing she desired, + Though half his kingdom it should be, + He in his pleasure swore that he + Would give the graceful Salome. + The damsel was Herodias' daughter: + She to the queen hastes, and besought her + To teach her what great gift to name. + Instructed by Herodias, came + The damsel back: to Herod said, + "Give me John the Baptist's head; + And in a charger let it be + Hither straightway brought to me." + Herod her suit would fain deny, + But for his oath's sake must comply. + + When painters would by art express + Beauty in unloveliness, + Thee, Herodias' daughter, thee, + They fittest subject take to be. + They give thy form and features grace; + But ever in thy beauteous face + They show a steadfast cruel gaze, + An eye unpitying; and amaze + In all beholders deep they mark, + That thou betrayest not one spark + Of feeling for the ruthless deed, + That did thy praiseful dance succeed. + For on the head they make you look, + As if a sullen joy you took, + A cruel triumph, wicked pride, + That for your sport a saint had died. + + * * * * * + +LINES + +SUGGESTED BY A PICTURE OF TWO FEMALES BY LIONARDO DA VINCI. + + The lady Blanch, regardless of all her lover's fears, + To the Urs'line convent hastens, and long the Abbess hears, + "O Blanch, my child, repent ye of the courtly life ye lead." + Blanch look'd on a rose-bud and little seem'd to heed. + She look'd on the rose-bud, she look'd round, and thought + On all her heart had whisper'd, and all the Nun had taught. + "I am worshipp'd by lovers, and brightly shines my fame, + All Christendom resoundeth the noble Blanch's name. + Nor shall I quickly wither like the rose-bud from the tree, + My queen-like graces shining when my beauty's gone from me. + But when the sculptured marble is rais'd o'er my head, + And the matchless Blanch lies lifeless among the noble dead, + This saintly lady Abbess hath made me justly fear, + It nothing will avail me that I were worshipp'd here." + + * * * * * + +LINES + +ON THE SAME PICTURE BEING REMOVED TO MAKE PLACE FOR A PORTRAIT OF A +LADY BY TITIAN. + + Who art thou, fair one, who usurp'st the place + Of Blanch, the lady of the matchless grace? + Come, fair and pretty, tell to me, + Who, in thy lifetime, thou might'st be. + Thou pretty art and fair, + But with the lady Blanch thou never must compare. + No need for Blanch her history to tell; + Whoever saw her face, they there did read it well. + But when I look on thee, I only know + There lived a pretty maid some hundred years ago. + + * * * * * + +LINES + +ON THE CELEBRATED PICTURE BY LIONARDO DA VINCI, CALLED THE VIRGIN OF +THE ROCKS. + + While young John runs to greet + The greater Infant's feet, + The Mother standing by, with trembling passion + Of devout admiration, + Beholds the engaging mystic play, and pretty adoration; + Nor knows as yet the full event + Of those so low beginnings, + From whence we date our winnings, + But wonders at the intent + Of those new rites, and what that strange child-worship meant. + But at her side + An angel doth abide, + With such a perfect joy + As no dim doubts alloy, + An intuition, + A glory, an amenity, + Passing the dark condition + Of blind humanity, + As if he surely knew + All the blest wonder should ensue, + Or he had lately left the upper sphere, + And had read all the sovran schemes and divine riddles there. + + * * * * * + +ON THE SAME. + + Maternal lady with the virgin grace, + Heaven-born thy Jesus seemeth sure, + And thou a virgin pure. + Lady most perfect, when thy sinless face + Men look upon, they wish to be + A Catholic, Madonna fair, to worship thee. + + + + +SONNETS. + + * * * * * +I. + +TO MISS KELLY. + + You are not, Kelly, of the common strain, + That stoop their pride and female honor down + To please that many-headed beast _the town_, + And vend their lavish smiles and tricks for gain; + By fortune thrown amid the actors' train, + You keep your native dignity of thought; + The plaudits that attend you come unsought, + As tributes due unto your natural vein. + Your tears have passion in them, and a grace + Of genuine freshness, which our hearts avow; + Your smiles are winds whose ways we cannot trace, + That vanish and return we know not how-- + And please the better from a pensive face, + A thoughtful eye, and a reflecting brow. + + +II. + +ON THE SIGHT OF SWANS IN KENSINGTON GARDEN. + + Queen-bird that sittest on thy shining-nest, + And thy young cygnets without sorrow hatchest, + And thou, thou other royal bird, that watchest + Lest the white mother wandering feet molest: + Shrined are your offspring in a crystal cradle, + Brighter than Helen's ere she yet had burst + Her shelly prison. They shall be born at first + Strong, active, graceful, perfect, swan-like able + To tread the land or waters with security. + Unlike poor human births, conceived in sin, + In grief brought forth, both outwardly and in + Confessing weakness, error, and impurity. + Did heavenly creatures own succession's line, + The births of heaven like to yours would shine. + + +III. + + Was it some sweet device of Faery + That mock'd my steps with many a lonely glade, + And fancied wanderings with a fair-hair'd maid? + Have these things been? or what rare witchery, + Impregning with delights the charmed air, + Enlighted up the semblance of a smile + In those fine eyes? methought they spake the while + Soft soothing things, which might enforce despair + To drop the murdering knife, and let go by + His foul resolve. And does the lonely glade + Still court the footsteps of the fair-hair'd maid? + Still in her locks the gales of summer sigh? + While I forlorn do wander reckless where, + And 'mid my wanderings meet no Anna there. + + +IV. + + Methinks how dainty sweet it were, reclined + Beneath the vast out-stretching branches high + Of some old wood, in careless sort to lie, + Nor of the busier scenes we left behind + Aught envying. And, O Anna! mild-eyed maid! + Beloved! I were well content to play + With thy free tresses all a summer's day, + Losing the time beneath the greenwood shade. + Or we might sit and tell some tender tale + Of faithful vows repaid by cruel scorn, + A tale of true love, or of friend forgot; + And I would teach thee, lady, how to rail + In gentle sort, on those who practise not + Or love or pity, though of woman born. + + +V. + + When last I roved these winding wood-walks green, + Green winding walks, and shady pathways sweet, + Oft-times would Anna seek the silent scene, + Shrouding her beauties in the lone retreat. + No more I hear her footsteps in the shade: + Her image only in these pleasant ways + Meets me self-wandering, where in happier days + I held free converse with the fair-hair'd maid. + I pass'd the little cottage which she loved, + The cottage which did once my all contain; + It spake of days which ne'er must come again, + Spake to my heart, and much my heart was moved. + "Now fair befall thee, gentle maid!" said I, + And from the cottage turn'd me with a sigh. + + +VI. + +THE FAMILY NAME. + + What reason first imposed thee, gentle name, + Name that my father bore, and his sire's sire, + Without reproach? we trace our stream no higher; + And I, a childless man, may end the same. + Perchance some shepherd on Lincolnian plains, + In manners guileless as his own sweet flocks, + Received thee first amid the merry mocks + And arch allusions of his fellow swains. + Perchance from Salem's holier fields return'd, + With glory gotten on the heads abhorr'd + Of faithless Saracens, some martial lord + Took HIS meek title, in whose zeal he burn'd, + Whate'er the fount whence thy beginnings came, + No deed of mine shall shame thee, gentle name. + + +VII. + + If from my lips some angry accents fell, + Peevish complaint, or harsh reproof unkind, + 'Twas but the error of a sickly mind + And troubled thoughts, clouding the purer well, + And waters clear, of Reason; and for me + Let this my verse the poor atonement be-- + My verse, which thou to praise wert ever inclined + Too highly, and with a partial eye to see + No blemish. Thou to me didst ever show + Kindest affection; and would oft-times lend + An ear to the desponding lovesick lay, + Weeping my sorrows with me, who repay + But ill the mighty debt of love I owe, + Mary, to thee, my sister and my friend. + + +VIII. + + A timid grace sits trembling in her eye, + As loath to meet the rudeness of men's sight, + Yet shedding a delicious lunar light, + That steeps in kind oblivious ecstasy + The care-crazed mind, like some still melody: + Speaking most plain the thoughts which do possess + Her gentle sprite: peace, and meek quietness, + And innocent loves, and maiden purity: + A look whereof might heal the cruel smart + Of changed friends, or fortune's wrongs unkind; + Might to sweet deeds of mercy move the heart + Of him who hates his brethren of mankind. + Turn'd are those lights from me, who fondly yet + Past joys, vain loves, and buried hopes regret. + + +IX. + +TO JOHN LAMB, ESQ., OF THE SOUTH-SEA-HOUSE. + + John, you were figuring in the gay career + Of blooming manhood with a young man's joy, + When I was yet a little peevish boy-- + Though time has made the difference disappear + Betwixt our ages, which _then_ seem'd so great-- + And still by rightful custom you retain + Much of the old authoritative strain, + And keep the elder brother up in state. + O! you do well in this. 'Tis man's worst deed + To let the "things that have been" run to waste, + And in the unmeaning present sink the past: + In whose dim glass even now I faintly read + Old buried forms, and faces long ago, + Which you, and I, and one more, only know. + + +X. + + O! I could laugh to hear the midnight wind, + That, rushing on its way with careless sweep, + Scatters the ocean waves. And I could weep + Like to a child. For now to my raised mind + On wings of winds comes wild-eyed Fantasy, + And her rude visions give severe delight. + O winged bark! how swift along the night + Pass'd thy proud keel! nor shall I let go by + Lightly of that drear hour the memory, + When wet and chilly on thy deck I stood, + Unbonneted, and gazed upon the flood, + Even till it seem'd a pleasant thing to die,-- + To be resolv'd into th' elemental wave, + Or take my portion with the winds that rave. + + +XI. + + We were two pretty babes, the youngest she, + The youngest, and the loveliest far, I ween, + And INNOCENCE her name. The time has been, + We two did love each other's company: + Time was, we two had wept to have been apart. + But when by show of seeming good beguiled, + I left the garb and manners of a child, + And my first love for man's society, + Defiling with the world my virgin heart-- + My loved companion dropp'd a tear, and fled, + And hid in deepest shades her awful head. + Beloved, who shall tell me where thou art-- + In what delicious Eden to be found-- + That I may seek thee the wide world around? + + + + +BLANK VERSE + + * * * * * + +CHILDHOOD. + + In my poor mind it is most sweet to muse + Upon the days gone by; to act in thought + Past seasons o'er, and be again a child; + To sit in fancy on the turf-clad slope, + Down which the child would roll; to pluck gay flowers, + Make posies in the sun, which the child's hand + (Childhood offended soon, soon reconciled,) + Would throw away, and straight take up again, + Then fling them to the winds, and o'er the lawn + Bound with so playful and so light a foot, + That the press'd daisy scarce declined her head. + + * * * * * + +THE GRANDAME. + + On the green hill-top, + Hard by the house of prayer, a modest roof, + And not distinguish'd from its neighbor-barn, + Save by a slender-tapering length of spire, + The Grandame sleeps. A plain stone barely tells + The name and date to the chance passenger. + For lowly born was she, and long had eat, + Well-earn'd, the bread of service:--hers was else + A mountain spirit, one that entertain'd + Scorn of base action, deed dishonorable, + Or aught unseemly. I remember well + Her reverend image; I remember, too, + With what a zeal she served her master's house; + And how the prattling tongue of garrulous age + Delighted to recount the oft-told tale + Or anecdote domestic. Wise she was, + And wondrous skill'd in genealogies, + And could in apt and voluble terms discourse + Of births, of titles, and alliances; + Of marriages, and intermarriages; + Relationship remote, or near of kin; + Of friends offended, family disgraced-- + Maiden high-born, but wayward, disobeying + Parental strict injunction, and regardless + Of unmix'd blood, and ancestry remote, + Stooping to wed with one of low degree. + But these are not thy praises; and I wrong + Thy honor'd memory, recording chiefly + Things light or trivial. Better 'twere to tell, + How with a nobler zeal, and warmer love, + She served her _heavenly Master_. I have seen + That reverend form bent down with age and pain, + And rankling malady. Yet not for this + Ceased she to praise her Maker, or withdrew + Her trust in Him, her faith, an humble hope-- + So meekly had she learn'd to bear her cross-- + For she had studied patience in the school + Of Christ; much comfort she had thence derived, + And was a follower of the NAZARENE. + + * * * * * + +THE SABBATH BELLS. + + The cheerful Sabbath bells, wherever heard, + Strike pleasant on the sense, most like the voice + Of one, who from the far-off hills proclaims + Tidings of good to Zion: chiefly when + Their piercing tones fall _sudden_ on the ear + Of the contemplant, solitary man, + Whom thoughts abstruse or high have chanced to lure + Forth from the walks of men, revolving oft, + And oft again, hard matter, which eludes + And baffles his pursuit--thought-sick and tired + Of controversy, where no end appears, + No clue to his research, the lonely man + Half wishes for society again. + Him, thus engaged, the Sabbath bells salute + _Sudden!_ his heart awakes, his ears drink in + The cheering music; his relenting soul + Yearns after all the joys of social life, + And softens with the love of human kind. + + * * * * * + +FANCY EMPLOYED ON DIVINE SUBJECTS. + + The truant Fancy was a wanderer ever, + A lone enthusiast maid. She loves to walk + In the bright visions of empyreal light, + By the green pastures, and the fragrant meads, + Where the perpetual flowers of Eden blow; + By crystal streams, and by the living waters, + Along whose margin grows the wondrous tree + Whose leaves shall heal the nations; underneath + Whose holy shade a refuge shall be found + From pain and want, and all the ills that wait + On mortal life, from sin and death forever. + + * * * * * + +COMPOSED AT MIDNIGHT. + + From broken visions of perturbed rest + I wake, and start, and fear to sleep again. + How total a privation of all sounds, + Sights, and familiar objects, man, bird, beast, + Herb, tree, or flower, and prodigal light of heaven. + 'Twere some relief to catch the drowsy cry + Of the mechanic watchman, or the noise + Of revel reeling home from midnight cups. + Those are the meanings of the dying man, + Who lies in the upper chamber; restless moans, + And interrupted only by a cough + Consumptive, torturing the wasted lungs. + So in the bitterness of death he lies, + And waits in anguish for the morning's light. + What can that do for him, or what restore? + Short taste, faint sense, affecting notices. + And little images of pleasures past, + Of health, and active life--health not yet slain, + Nor the other grace of life, a good name, sold + For sin's black wages. On his tedious bed + He writhes, and turns him from the accusing light, + And finds no comfort in the sun, but says + "When night comes I shall get a little rest." + Some few groans more, death comes, and there an end. + 'Tis darkness and conjecture all beyond; + Weak Nature fears, though Charity must hope, + And Fancy, most licentious on such themes + Where decent reverence well had kept her mute, + Hath o'erstock'd hell with devils, and brought down + By her enormous fablings and mad lies, + Discredit on the gospel's serious truths + And salutary fears. The man of parts, + Poet, or prose declaimer, on his couch + Lolling, like one indifferent, fabricates + A heaven of gold, where he, and such as he, + Their heads encompassed with crowns, their heels + With fine wings garlanded, shall tread the stars + Beneath their feet, heaven's pavement, far removed + From damned spirits, and the torturing cries + Of men, his breth'ren, fashion'd of the earth, + As he was, nourish'd with the self-same bread, + Belike his kindred or companions once-- + Through everlasting ages now divorced, + In chains and savage torments to repent + Short years of folly on earth. Their groans unheard + In heav'n, the saint nor pity feels, nor care, + For those thus sentenced--pity might disturb + The delicate sense and most divine repose + Of spirits angelical. Blessed be God, + The measure of his judgments is not fix'd + By man's erroneous standard. He discerns + No such inordinate difference and vast + Betwixt the sinner and the saint, to doom + Such disproportion'd fates. Compared with him, + No man on earth is holy call'd: they best + Stand in his sight approved, who at his feet + Their little crowns of virtue cast, and yield + To him of his own works the praise, his due. + + + + +A TRAGEDY. + + * * * * * + +CHARACTERS. + +SIR WALTER WOODVIL. + JOHN, } + SIMON, }_his sons_. + + LOVELL, } + GRAY, }_Pretended friends of John_. + +SANDFORD. _Sir Walter's old steward_. +MARGARET. _Orphan Ward of_ Sir Walter. +FOUR GENTLEMEN. _John's riotous companions_. +SERVANTS. + +SCENE--_for the most part at Sir Walter's mansion in_ DEVONSHIRE; _at +other times in the Forest of_ SHERWOOD. + +TIME--_soon after the_ RESTORATION. + + + * * * * * + + +ACT THE FIRST. + +SCENE--_A Servants' Apartment in Woodvill Hall. Servants drinking--_ + +TIME, _the Morning_. + +_A Song, by_ DANIEL. + +"When the King enjoys his own again." + +_Peter_. A delicate song. Where didst learn it, fellow? + +_Dan_. Even there, where thou learnest thy oaths and thy politics--at +our master's table.--Where else should a serving-man pick up his poor +accomplishments? + +_Mar_. Well spoken, Daniel. O rare Daniel! his oaths and his +politics! excellent! + +_Fran_. And where didst pick up thy knavery, Daniel? + +_Peter_. That came to him by inheritance. His family have supplied +the shire of Devon, time out of mind, with good thieves and bad +serving-men. All of his race have come into the world without their +conscience. + +_Mar_. Good thieves, and bad serving-men! Better and better. I marvel +what Daniel hath got to say in reply. + +_Dan_. I marvel more when thou wilt say anything to the purpose, thou +shallow serving-man, whose swiftest conceit carries thee no higher +than to apprehend with difficulty the stale jests of us thy compeers. +When was't ever known to club thy own particular jest among us? + +_Mar_. Most unkind Daniel, to speak such biting things of me! + +_Fran_. See--if he hath not brought tears into the poor fellow's eyes +with the saltness of his rebuke. + +_Dan_. No offence, brother Martin--I meant none. 'Tis true, Heaven +gives gifts, and withholds them. It has been pleased to bestow upon +me a nimble invention to the manufacture of a jest; and upon thee, +Martin, an indifferent bad capacity to understand my meaning. + +_Mar_. Is that all? I am content. Here's my hand. + +_Fran_. Well, I like a little innocent mirth myself, but never could +endure bawdry. + +_Dan_. _Quot homines tot sententiae._ + +_Mar_. And what is that? + +_Dan_. 'Tis Greek, and argues difference of opinion. + +_Mar_. I hope there is none between us. + +_Dan_. Here's to thee, brother Martin. (_Drinks_.) + +_Mar_. And to thee, Daniel. (_Drinks_.) + +_Fran_. And to thee, Peter. (_Drinks_.) + +_Peter_. Thank you, Francis. And here's to thee. (_Drinks_.) + +_Mar_. I shall be fuddled anon. + +_Dan_. And drunkenness I hold to be a very despicable vice. + +_All_. O! a shocking vice. (_They drink round_.) + +_Peter_. In as much as it taketh away the understanding. + +_Dan_. And makes the eyes red. + +_Peter_. And the tongue to stammer. + +_Dan_. And to blab out secrets. + + [_During this conversation they continue drinking_. + +_Peter_. Some men do not know an enemy from a friend when they are +drunk. + +_Dan_. Certainly sobriety is the health of the soul. + +_Mar_. Now I know I am going to be drunk. + +_Dan_. How canst tell, dry-bones? + +_Mar_. Because I begin to be melancholy. That's always a sign. + +_Fran_. Take care of Martin, he'll topple off his seat else. + [MARTIN _drops asleep_. + +_Peter_. Times are greatly altered, since young master took upon +himself the government of this household. + +_All_. Greatly altered. + +_Fran_. I think everything be altered for the better since His +Majesty's blessed restoration. + +_Peter_. In Sir Walter's days there was no encouragement given to +good housekeeping. + +_All_. None. + +_Dan_. For instance, no possibility of getting drunk before two in +the afternoon. + +_Peter_. Every man his allowance of ale at breakfast--his quart! + +_All_. A quart!! [_In derision._ + +_Dan_. Nothing left to our own sweet discretions. + +_Peter_. Whereby it may appear, we were treated more like beasts than +what we were--discreet and reasonable serving-men. + +_All_. Like beasts. + +_Mar_. (_Opening his eyes_.) Like beasts. + +_Dan_. To sleep, wagtail! + +_Fran_. I marvel all this while where the old gentleman has found +means to secrete himself. It seems no man has heard of him since the +day of the King's return. Can any tell why our young master, being +favored by the court, should not have interest to procure his +father's pardon? + +_Dan_. Marry, I think 'tis the obstinacy of the old knight, that will +not be beholden to the court for his safety. + +_Mar_. Now that is wilful. + +_Fran_. But can any tell me the place of his concealment? + +_Peter_. That cannot I; but I have my conjectures. + +_Dan_. Two hundred pounds, as I hear, to the man that shall apprehend +him. + +_Fran_. Well, I have my suspicions. + +_Peter_. And so have I. + +_Mar_. And I can keep a secret. + +_Fran_. (_to PETER_.) Warwickshire, you mean. [_Aside._ + +_Peter_. Perhaps not. + +_Fran_. Nearer, perhaps. + +_Peter_. I say nothing. + +_Dan_. I hope there is none in this company would be mean enough to +betray him. + +_All_. O Lord, surely not. + + [_They drink to_ SIR WALTER'S _safety_. + +_Fran_. I have often wondered how our master came to be excepted by +name in the late Act of Oblivion. + +_Dan_. Shall I tell the reason? + +_All_. Ay, do. + +_Dan_. 'Tis thought he is no great friend to the present happy +establishment. + +_All_. O! monstrous! + +_Peter_. Fellow-servants, a thought strikes me.--Do we, or do we not, +come under the penalties of the treason-act, by reason of our being +privy to this man's concealment? + +_All_. Truly a sad consideration. + + [_To them enters_ SANDFORD _suddenly_. + +_Sand_. You well-fed and unprofitable grooms, +Maintain'd for state, not use; +You lazy feasters at another's cost, +That eat like maggots into an estate, +And do as little work. +Being indeed but foul excrescences, +And no just parts in a well-order'd family; +You base and rascal imitators, +Who act up to the height your master's vices, +But cannot read his virtues in your bond: +Which of you, as I enter'd, spake of betraying? +Was it you, or you, or thin-face, was it you? + +_Mar_. Whom does he call thin-face? + +_Sand_. No prating, loon, but tell me who he was, +That I may brain the villain with my staff, +That seeks Sir Walter's life! +You miserable men, +With minds more slavish than your slave's estate, +Have you that noble bounty so forgot, +Which took you from the looms, and from the ploughs, +Which better had ye follow'd, fed ye, clothed ye, +And entertain'd ye in a worthy service, +Where your best wages was the world's repute, +That thus ye seek his life, by whom ye live. +Have you forgot, too, +How often in old times +Your drunken mirths have stunn'd day's sober ears, +Carousing full cups to Sir Walter's health?-- +Whom now ye would betray, but that he lies +Out of the reach of your poor treacheries. +This learn from me, +Our master's secret sleeps with trustier tongues, +Than will unlock themselves to carls like you. +Go, get you gone, you knaves. Who stirs? this staff +Shall teach you better manners else. + +_All_. Well, we are going. + +_Sand_. And quickly too, ye had better, for I see +Young Mistress Margaret coming this way. + + [_Exeunt all but_ SANDFORD + +_Enter_ MARGARET, _as in a fright, pursued by a Gentleman, who, +seeing_ SANDFORD, _retires muttering a curse_. + +_Sand_. Good-morrow to my fair mistress. 'Twas a chance +I saw you, lady, so intent was I +On chiding hence these graceless serving-men, +Who cannot break their fast at morning meals +Without debauch and mistimed riotings. +This house hath been a scene of nothing else +But atheist riot and profane excess, +Since my old master quitted all his rights here. + +_Marg_. Each day I endure fresh insult from the scorn +Of Woodvil's friends, the uncivil jests +And free discourses of the dissolute men +That haunt this mansion, making me their mirth. + +_Sand_. Does my young master know of these affronts? + +_Marg_. I cannot tell. Perhaps he has not been told. +Perhaps he might have seen them if he would. +I have known him more quick-sighted. Let that pass. +All things seem changed, I think. I had a friend, +(I can't but weep to think him alter'd too,) +These things are best forgotten; but I knew +A man, a young man, young, and full of honor, +That would have pick'd a quarrel for a straw, +And fought it out to the extremity, +E'en with the dearest friend he had alive, +On but a bare surmise, a possibility, +That Margaret had suffer'd an affront. +Some are too tame, that were too splenetic once. + +_Sand_. 'Twere best he should be _told_ of these affronts. + +_Marg_. I am the daughter of his father's friend, +Sir Walter's orphan ward. +I am not his servant-maid, that I should wait +The opportunity of a gracious hearing. +Enquire the times and seasons when to put +My peevish prayer up at young Woodvil's feet, +And sue to him for slow redress, who was +Himself a suitor late to Margaret. +I am somewhat proud: and Woodvil taught me pride. +I was his favorite once, his playfellow in infancy, +And joyful mistress of his youth. +None once so pleasant in his eyes as Margaret. +His conscience, his religion, Margaret was, +His dear heart's confessor, a heart within that heart, +And all dear things summ'd up in her alone. +As Margaret smil'd or frown'd John liv'd or died; +His dress, speech, gesture, studies, friendships, all +Being fashion'd to her liking. +His flatteries taught me first this self-esteem, +His flatteries and caresses, while he loved. +The world esteem'd her happy, who had won +His heart, who won all hearts; +And ladies envied me the love of Woodvil. + +_Sand_. He doth affect the courtier's life too much, +Whose art is to forget, +And that has wrought this seeming change in him, +That was by nature noble. +'Tis these court-plagues, that swarm about our house, +Have done the mischief, making his fancy giddy +With images of state, preferment, place, +Tainting his generous spirits with ambition. + +_Marg_. I know not how it is; +A cold protector is John grown to me. +The mistress, and presumptive wife, of Woodvil +Can never stoop so low to supplicate +A man, her equal, to redress those wrongs, +Which he was bound first to prevent; +But which his own neglects have sanctioned rather, +Both sancion'd and provok'd: a mark'd neglect, +And strangeness fastening bitter on his love, +His love, which long has been upon the wane. +For me, I am determined what to do: +To leave this house this night, and lukewarm John, +And trust for food to the earth and Providence. + +_Sand_. O lady, have a care +Of these indefinite and spleen-bred resolves. +You know not half the dangers that attend +Upon a life of wand'ring, which your thoughts now, +Feeling the swellings of a lofty anger, +To your abused fancy, as 'tis likely, +Portray without its terrors, painting _lies_ +And representments of fallacious liberty;-- +You know not what it is to leave the roof that shelters you. + +_Marg_. I have thought on every possible event, +The dangers and discouragements you speak of, +Even till my woman's heart hath ceased to fear them, +And cowardice grows enamor'd of rare accidents; +Nor am I so unfurnish'd, as you think, +Of practicable schemes. + +_Sand_. Now God forbid; think twice of this, dear lady. + +_Marg_. I pray you spare me, Mr. Sandford. +And once for all believe, nothing can shake my purpose. + +_Sand_. But what course have you thought on? + +_Marg_. To seek Sir Walter in the forest of Sherwood. +I have letters from young Simon, +Acquainting me with all the circumstances +Of their concealment, place, and manner of life, +And the merry hours they spend in the green haunts +Of Sherwood, nigh which place they have ta'en a house +In the town of Nottingham, and pass for foreigners, +Wearing the dress of Frenchmen.-- +All which I have perused with so attent +And child-like longings, that to my doting ears +Two sounds now seem like one, +One meaning in two words, Sherwood and Liberty. +And, gentle Mr. Sandford, +'Tis you that must provide now +The means of my departure, which for safety +Must be in boy's apparel. + +_Sand_. Since you will have it so +(My careful age trembles at all may happen), +I will engage to furnish you. +I have the keys of the wardrobe, and can fit you +With garments to your size. +I know a suit +Of lively Lincoln green, that shall much grace you +In the wear, being glossy fresh, and worn but seldom. +Young Stephen Woodvil wore them while he lived. +I have the keys of all this house and passages, +And ere daybreak will rise and let you forth. +What things soe'er you have need of I can furnish you; +And will provide a horse and trusty guide, +To bear you on your way to Nottingham. + +_Marg_. That once this day and night were fairly past! +For then I'll bid this house and love farewell; +Farewell, sweet Devon; farewell, lukewarm John; +For with the morning's light will Margaret be gone. +Thanks, courteous Mr. Sandford.-- + + [_Exeunt divers ways._ + + + + +ACT THE SECOND. + +SCENE.--_An Apartment in Woodvil Hall._ + +JOHN WOODVIL--_alone_. (_Reading parts of a letter_). + +"When Love grows cold, and indifference has usurped upon old Esteem, +it is no marvel if the world begin to account _that_ dependence, +which hitherto has been esteemed honorable shelter. The course I have +taken, (in leaving this house, not easily wrought thereunto,) seemed +to me best for the once-for-all releasing of yourself (who in times +past have deserved well of me) from the now daily, and +not-to-be-endured tribute of forced love, and ill-dissembled +reluctance of affection. + "MARGARET." + +Gone! gone! my girl? so hasty, Margaret! +And never a kiss at parting? shallow loves, +And likings of a ten days' growth, use courtesies, +And show red eyes at parting. Who bids "Farewell!" +In the same tone he cries "God speed you, sir?" +Or tells of joyful victories at sea, +Where he hath ventures; does not rather muffle +His organs to emit a leaden sound, +To suit the melancholy dull "farewell," +Which they in Heaven not use?-- +So peevish, Margaret? +But 'tis the common error of your sex +When our idolatry slackens, or grows less, +(As who of woman born can keep his faculty +Of Admiration, being a decaying faculty, +Forever strain'd to the pitch? or can at pleasure +Make it renewable, as some appetites are, +As, namely, Hunger, Thirst!--) this being the case, +They tax us with neglect, and love grown cold, +Coin plainings of the perfidy of men, +Which into maxims pass, and apothegms +To be retail'd in ballads.-- + I know them all. +They are jealous when our larger hearts receive +More guests than one. (Love in a woman's heart +Being all in one.) For me, I am sure I have room here +For more disturbers of my sleep than one. +Love shall have part, but love shall not have all. +Ambition, Pleasure, Vanity, all by turns, +Shall lie in my bed, and keep me fresh and waking; +Yet Love not be excluded. Foolish wench, +I could have loved her twenty years to come, +And still have kept my liking. But since 'tis so, +Why, fare thee well, old playfellow! I'll try +To squeeze a tear for old acquaintance' sake. +I shall not grudge so much---- + + _To him enters_ LOVEL. + +_Lovel_. Bless us, Woodvil! what is the matter? I protest, man, I +thought you had been weeping. + +_Wood_. Nothing is the matter; only the wench has forced some water +into my eyes, which will quickly disband. + +_Lovel_. I cannot conceive you. + +_Wood_. Margaret is flown. + +_Lovel_. Upon what pretence? + +_Wood_. Neglect on my part: which it seems she has had the wit to +discover, maugre all my pains to conceal it. + +_Lovel_. Then, you confess the charge? + +_Wood_. To say the truth, my love for her has of late stopped short +on this side idolatry. + +_Lovel_. As all good Christians' should, I think. + +_Wood_. I am sure, I could have loved her still within the limits of +warrantable love. + +_Lovel_. A kind of brotherly affection, I take it. + +_Wood_. We should have made excellent man and wife in time. + +_Lovel_. A good old couple, when the snows fell, to crowd about a +sea-coal fire, and talk over old matters. + +_Wood_. While each should feel, what neither cared to acknowledge, +that stories oft-repeated may, at last, come to lose some of their +grace by the repetition. + +_Lovel_. Which both of you may yet live long enough to discover. For, +take my word for it, Margaret is a bird that will come back to you +without a lure. + +_Wood_. Never, never, Lovel. Spite of my levity, with tears I confess +it, she was a lady of most confirmed honor, of an unmatchable spirit, +and determinate in all virtuous resolutions; not hasty to anticipate +an affront, nor slow to feel, where just provocation was given. + +_Lovel_. What made you neglect her, then? + +_Wood_. Mere levity and youthfulness of blood, a malady incident to +young men; physicians call it caprice. Nothing else. He that slighted +her knew her value: and 'tis odds, but, for thy sake, Margaret, John +will yet go to his grave a bachelor. + + [_A noise heard, as of one drunk and singing._ + +_Lovel_. Here comes one, that will quickly dissipate these humors. + + _Enter one drunk._ + +_Drunken Man_. Good-morrow to you, gentlemen. Mr. Lovel, I am your +humble servant. Honest Jack Woodvil, I will get drunk with you +to-morrow. + +_Wood_. And why to-morrow, honest Mr. Freeman? + +_Drunken Man_. I scent a traitor in that question. A beastly +question. Is it not his Majesty's birthday? the day of all days in +the year, on which King Charles the Second was graciously pleased to +be born. (_Sings._) "Great pity 'tis such days as those should come +but once a year." + +_Lovel_. Drunk in a morning! foh! how he stinks! + +_Drunken Man_. And why not drunk in a morning? canst tell, bully? + +_Wood_. Because, being the sweet and tender infancy of the day, +methinks, it should ill endure such early blightings. + +_Drunken Man_. I grant you, 'tis in some sort the youth and tender +nonage of the day. Youth is bashful, and I give it a cup to encourage +it. (_Sings._) "Ale that will make Grimalkin prate."--At noon I drink +for thirst, at night for fellowship, but, above all, I love to usher +in the bashful morning under the auspices of a freshening stoop of +liquor. (_Sings._) "Ale in a Saxon rumkin then, makes valor burgeon +in tall men."--But, I crave pardon. I fear I keep that gentleman from +serious thoughts. There be those that wait for me in the cellar. + +_Wood_. Who are they? + +_Drunken Man_. Gentlemen, my good friends, Cleveland, Delaval, and +Truby. I know by this time they are all clamorous for me. + + [_Exit singing._ + +_Wood._ This keeping of open house acquaints a man with strange +companions. + + _Enter, at another door, Three calling for_ HARRY FREEMAN. + +Harry Freeman, Harry Freeman. +He is not here. Let us go look for him. +Where is Freeman? +Where is Harry? + + [_Exeunt the Three, calling for_ FREEMAN. + +_Wood._ Did you ever see such gentry? (_laughing._) These are they +that fatten on ale and tobacco in a morning, drink burnt brandy at +noon to promote digestion, and piously conclude with quart bumpers +after supper to prove their loyalty. + +_Lovel_. Come, shall we adjourn to the Tennis Court? + +_Wood_. No, you shall go with me into the gallery, where I will show +you the _Vandyke_ I have purchased. "The late King taking leave of +his children." + +_Lovel_. I will but adjust my dress, and attend you. + + [_Exit_ LOVEL. + +_John Wood_. (_alone._) Now universal England getteth drunk +For joy, that Charles, her monarch, is restored: +And she, that sometime wore a saintly mask, +The stale-grown vizor from her face doth pluck, +And weareth now a suit of morris bells, +With which she jingling goes through all her towns and villages. +The baffled factions in their houses skulk; +The commonwealthsman, and state machinist. +The cropt fanatic, and fifth-monarchy-man, +Who heareth of these visionaries now? +They and their dreams have ended. Fools do sing, +Where good men yield God thanks; but politic spirits, +Who live by observation, note these changes +Of the popular mind, and thereby serve their ends. +Then why not I? What's Charles to me, or Oliver, +But as my own advancement hangs on one of them? +I to myself am chief.----I know, +Some shallow mouths cry out, that I am smit +With the gauds and show of state, the point of place, +And trick of precedence, the ducks, and nods +Which weak minds pay to rank. 'Tis not to sit +In place of worship at the royal masques, +Their pastimes, plays, and Whitehall banquetings, +For none of these, +Nor yet to be seen whispering with some great one, +Do I affect the favors of the court. +I would be great, for greatness hath great _power_, +And that's the fruit I reach at.-- +Great spirits ask great play-room. Who could sit, +With these prophetic swellings in my breast, +That prick and goad me on, and never cease, +To the fortunes something tells me I was born to? +Who, with such monitors within to stir him, +Would sit him down, with lazy arms across, +A unit, a thing without a name in the state, +A something to be govern'd, not to govern, +A fishing, hawking, hunting, country gentleman? + [_Exit._ + + + SCENE.--_Sherwood Forest._ + +SIR WALTER WOODVIL. SIMON WOODVIL. (_Disguised as Frenchmen._) + +_Sir W_. How fares my boy, Simon, my youngest born, +My hope, my pride, young Woodvil, speak to me? +Some grief untold weighs heavy at thy heart: +I know it by thy alter'd cheer of late. +Thinkest thy brother plays thy father false? +It is a mad and thriftless prodigal, +Grown proud upon the favors of the court; +Court manners, and court fashions, he affects, +And in the heat and uncheck'd blood of youth, +Harbors a company of riotous men, +All hot, and young, court-seekers, like himself, +Most skilful to devour a patrimony; +And these have eat into my old estates, +And these have drain'd thy father's cellars dry; +But these so common faults of youth not named, +(Things which themselves outgrow, left to themselves,) +I know no quality that stains his honor. +My life upon his faith and noble mind, +Son John could never play thy father false. + +_Simon_. I never thought but nobly of my brother, +Touching his honor and fidelity. +Still I could wish him charier of his person, +And of his time more frugal, than to spend +In riotous living, graceless society, +And mirth unpalatable, hours better employ'd +(With those persuasive graces nature lent him) +In fervent pleadings for a father's life. + +_Sir W_. I would not owe my life to a jealous court, +Whose shallow policy I know it is, +On some reluctant acts of prudent mercy, +(Not voluntary, but extorted by the times, +In the first tremblings of new-fixed power, +And recollection smarting from old wounds,) +On these to build a spurious popularity. +Unknowing what free grace or mercy mean, +They fear to punish, therefore do they pardon. +For this cause have I oft forbid my son, +By letters, overtures, open solicitings, +Or closet tamperings, by gold or fee, +To beg or bargain with the court for my life. + +_Simon_. And John has ta'en you, father, at your word, +True to the letter of his paternal charge. + +_Sir W_. Well, my good cause, and my good conscience, boy, +Shall be for sons to me, if John prove false. +Men die but once, and the opportunity +Of a noble death is not an every-day fortune: +It is a gift which noble spirits pray for. + +_Simon_. I would not wrong my brother by surmise; +I know him generous, full of gentle qualities, +Incapable of base compliances, +No prodigal in his nature, but affecting +This show of bravery for ambitious ends. +He drinks, for 'tis the humor of the court, +And drink may one day wrest the secret from him, +And pluck you from your hiding-place in the sequel. + +_Sir W_. Fair death shall be my doom, and foul life his. +Till when, we'll live as free in this green forest, +As yonder deer, who roam unfearing treason: +Who seem the aborigines of this place, +Or Sherwood theirs by tenure. + +_Simon_. 'Tis said, that Robert Earl of Huntingdon, +Men call'd him Robin Hood, an outlaw bold, +With a merry crew of hunters here did haunt, +Not sparing the king's venison. May one believe +The antique tale? + +_Sir W_. There is much likelihood, +Such bandits did in England erst abound, +When polity was young. I have read of the pranks +Of that mad archer, and of the tax he levied +On travellers, whatever their degree, +Baron, or knight, whoever pass'd these woods, +Layman, or priest, not sparing the bishop's mitre +For spiritual regards; nay, once 'tis said, +He robb'd the king himself. + +_Simon_. A perilous man (_smiling_). + +_Sir W_. How quietly we live here, +Unread in the world's business, +And take no note of all its slippery changes. +'Twere best we make a world among ourselves, +A little world, +Without the ills and falsehoods of the greater; +We two being all the inhabitants of ours, +And kings and subjects both in one. + +_Simon_. Only the dangerous errors, fond conceits, +Which make the business of that greater world, +Must have no place in ours: +As, namely, riches, honors, birth, place, courtesy, +Good fame and bad, rumors and popular noises, +Books, creeds, opinions, prejudices national, +Humors particular, +Soul-killing lies, and truths that work small good, +Feuds, factions, enmities, relationships, +Loves, hatreds, sympathies, antipathies, +And all the intricate stuff quarrels are made of. + + MARGARET _enters in boy's apparel_. + +_Sir W_. What pretty boy have we here? + +_Marg_. _Bon jour, messieurs_. Ye have handsome English faces, + +I should have ta'en ye else for other two, +I came to seek in the forest. + +_Sir W_. Who are they? + +_Marg_. A gallant brace of Frenchmen, curl'd monsieurs, +That men say, haunt these woods, affecting privacy, +More than the manner of their countrymen. + +_Simon_. We have here a wonder. +The face is Margaret's face. + +_Sir W_. The face is Margaret's, but the dress the same +My Stephen sometime wore. [_To_ Margaret. +Suppose us them; whom do men say we are? +Or know you what you seek? + +_Marg_. A worthy pair of exiles, +Two whom the politics of state revenge, +In final issue of long civil broils, +Have houseless driven from your native France, +To wander idle in these English woods, +Where now ye live; most part +Thinking on home and all the joys of France, +Where grows the purple vine. + +_Sir W_. These woods, young stranger, +And grassy pastures, which the slim deer loves, +Are they less beauteous than the land of France, +Where grows the purple vine? + +_Marg_. I cannot tell. +To an indifferent eye both show alike. +'Tis not the scene, +But all familiar objects in the scene, +Which now ye miss, that constitute a difference. +Ye had a country, exiles, ye have none now; +Friends had ye, and much wealth, ye now have nothing; +Our manners, laws, our customs, all are foreign to you, +I know ye loathe them, cannot learn them readily; +And there is reason, exiles, ye should love +Our English earth less than your land of France, +Where grows the purple vine; where all delights grow +Old custom has made pleasant. + +_Sir W_. You, that are read +So deeply in our story, what are you? + +_Marg_. A bare adventurer; in brief a woman, +That put strange garments on, and came thus far +To seek an ancient friend: +And having spent her stock of idle words, +And feeling some tears coming, +Hastes now to clasp Sir Walter Woodvil's knees, +And beg a boon for Margaret; his poor ward. + + [_Kneeling_. + +_Sir W_. Not at my feet, Margaret; not at my feet. + +_Marg_. Yes, till her suit is answered. + +_Sir W_. Name it. + +_Marg_. A little boon, and yet so great a grace, +She fears to ask it. + +_Sir W_. Some riddle, Margaret? + +_Marg_. No riddle, but a plain request. + +_Sir W_. Name it. + +_Marg_. Free liberty of Sherwood, +And leave to take her lot with you in the forest. + +_Sir W_. A scant petition, Margaret; but take it, +Seal'd with an old man's tears.-- +Rise, daughter of Sir Rowland. + + [_Addressing them both_. + + O you most worthy, +You constant followers of a man proscribed, +Following poor misery in the throat of danger; +Fast servitors to crazed and penniless poverty, +Serving poor poverty without hope of gain; +Kind children of a sire unfortunate; +Green clinging tendrils round a trunk decay'd, +Which needs must bring on you timeless decay; +Fair living forms to a dead carcass joined;-- +What shall I say? +Better the dead were gather'd to the dead, +Than death and life in disproportion meet.-- +Go, seek your fortunes, children.-- + +_Simon_. Why, whither should we go? + +_Sir W_. _You_ to the court, where now your brother John + Commits a rape on Fortune. + +_Simon_. Luck to John! +A light-heel'd strumpet when the sport is done. + +_Sir W_. _You_ to the sweet society of your equals, +Where the world's fashion smiles on youth and beauty. + +_Marg_. Where young men's flatteries cozen young maids' beauty. +There pride oft gets the vantage hand of duty, +There sweet humility withers. + +_Simon_. Mistress Margaret, +How fared my brother John, when you left Devon? + +_Marg_. John was well, sir. + +_Simon_. 'Tis now nine months almost, +Since I saw home. What new friends has John made? +Or keeps he his first love?--I did suspect +Some foul disloyalty. Now do I know, +John has proved false to her, for Margaret weeps. +It is a scurvy brother. + +_Sir W_. Fie upon it. +All men are false, I think. The date of love +Is out, expired; its stories all grown stale, +O'erpast, forgotten, like an antique tale +Of Hero and Leander. + +_Simon_. I have known some men that are too general-contemplative for +the narrow passion. I am in some sort a _general_ lover. + +_Marg_. In the name of the boy God, who plays at hoodman blind with +the Muses, and cares not whom he catches: what is it _you_ love? + +_Simon_. Simply, all things that live, +From the crook'd worm to man's imperial form, +And God-resembling likeness. The poor fly, +That makes short holiday in the sunbeam, +And dies by some child's hand. The feeble bird +With little wings, yet greatly venturous +In the upper sky. The fish in th' other element, +That knows no touch of eloquence. What else? +Yon tall and elegant stag, +Who paints a dancing shadow of his horns +In the water, where he drinks. + +_Marg_. I myself love all these things, yet so as with a +difference:--for example, some animals better than others, some men +rather than other men; the nightingale before the cuckoo, the swift +and graceful palfrey before the slow and asinine mule. Your humor +goes to confound all qualities. What sports do you use in the +forest?-- + +_Simon_. Not many; some few, as thus:-- +To see the sun to bed, and to arise, +Like some hot amorist with glowing eyes, +Bursting the lazy bands of sleep that bound him, +With all his fires and travelling glories round him. +Sometimes the moon on soft night clouds to rest, +Like beauty nestling in a young man's breast, +And all the winking stars, her handmaids, keep +Admiring silence, while those lovers sleep. +Sometimes outstretcht, in very idleness, +Nought doing, saying little, thinking less, +To view the leaves, thin dancers upon air, +Go eddying round; and small birds, how they fare, +When mother Autumn fills their beaks with corn, +Filch'd from the careless Amalthea's horn; +And how the woods berries and worms provide +Without their pains, when earth has nought beside +To answer their small wants. +To view the graceful deer come tripping by, +Then stop, and gaze, then turn, they know not why, +Like bashful younkers in society. +To mark the structure of a plant or tree, +And all fair things of earth, how fair they be. + +_Marg_. (_smiling_.) And, afterwards, them paint in simile. + +_Sir W_. Mistress Margaret will have need of some refreshment. Please +you, we have some poor viands within. + +_Marg_. Indeed I stand in need of them. + +_Sir W_. Under the shade of a thick-spreading tree, +Upon the grass, no better carpeting, +We'll eat our noontide meal; and, dinner done, +One of us shall repair to Nottingham, +To seek some safe night-lodging in the town, +Where you may sleep, while here with us you dwell, +By day, in the forest, expecting better times, +And gentler habitations, noble Margaret. + +_Simon_. _Allons_, young Frenchman---- + +_Marg_. _Allons_, Sir Englishman. The time has been + +I've studied love-lays in the English tongue, +And been enamor'd of rare poesy: +Which now I must unlearn. Henceforth, +Sweet mother-tongue, old English speech, adieu; +For Margaret has got new name and language new. + + [_Exeunt_. + + + * * * * * + + +ACT THE THIRD. + +SCENE.--_An Apartment of State in Woodvil Hall_. + +_Cavaliers drinking_. + +JOHN WOODVIL, LOVEL, GRAY, _and four more_. + +_John_. More mirth, I beseech you, gentlemen--Mr. Gray, you are not +merry.-- + +_Gray_. More wine, say I, and mirth shall ensue in course. What! we +have not yet above three half-pints a man to answer for. Brevity is +the soul of drinking, as of wit. Despatch, I say. More wine. +(_Fills_.) + +_1st Gent_. I entreat you, let there be some order, some method, in +our drinkings. I love to lose my reason with my eyes open, to commit +the deed of drunkenness with forethought and deliberation. I love to +feel the fumes of the liquor gathering here, like clouds. + +_2nd Gent_. And I am for plunging into madness at once. Damn order, +and method, and steps, and degrees, that he speaks of. Let confusion +have her legitimate work. + +_Lovel_. I marvel why the poets, who, of all men, methinks, should +possess the hottest livers, and most empyreal fancies, should affect +to see such virtues in cold water. + +_Gray_. Virtue in cold water! ha! ha! ha! + +_John_. Because your poet-born hath an internal wine, richer than +lippara or canaries, yet uncrushed from any grapes of earth, +unpressed in mortal wine-presses. + +3_rd Gent_. What may be the name of this wine? + +_John_. It hath as many names as qualities. It is denominated +indifferently, wit, conceit, invention, inspiration, but its most +royal and comprehensive name is _fancy_. + +3_rd Gent_. And where keeps he this sovereign liquor? + +_John_. Its cellars are in the brain, whence your true poet deriveth +intoxication at will; while his animal spirits, catching a pride from +the quality and neighborhood of their noble relative, the brain, +refuse to be sustained by wines and fermentations of earth. + +3_rd Gent_. But is your poet-born always tipsy with this liquor? + +_John_. He hath his stoopings and reposes; but his proper element is +the sky, and in the suburbs of the empyrean. + +3_rd Gent_. Is your wine-intellectual so exquisite? henceforth, I, a +man of plain conceit, will, in all humility, content my mind with +canaries. + +4_th Gent_. I am for a song or a catch. When will the catches come +on, the sweet wicked catches? + +_John_. They cannot be introduced with propriety before midnight. +Every man must commit his twenty bumpers first. We are not yet well +roused. Frank Lovel, the glass stands with you. + +_Lovel_. Gentlemen, the Duke. (_Fills_.) + +_All_. The Duke. (_They drink_.) + +_Gray_. Can any tell, why his Grace, being a Papist-- + +_John_. Pshaw! we will have no questions of state now. Is not this +his Majesty's birthday? + +_Gray_. What follows? + +_John_. That every man should sing, and be joyful, and ask no +questions. + +2_nd Gent_. Damn politics, they spoil drinking. + +3_rd Gent_. For certain, 'tis a blessed monarchy. + +2_nd Gent_. The cursed fanatic days we have seen! The times have been +when swearing was out of fashion. + +3_rd Gent_. And drinking. + +1_st Gent_. And wenching. + +_Gray_. The cursed yeas and forsooths, which we have heard uttered, +when a man could not rap out an innocent oath, but straight the air +was thought to be infected. + +_Lovel_. 'Twas a pleasant trick of the saint, which that trim puritan +_Swear-not-at-all Smooth-speech_ used, when his spouse chid him with +an oath for committing with his servant-maid, to cause his house to +be fumigated with burnt brandy, and ends of scripture, to disperse +the devil's breath, as he termed it. + +_All_. Ha! ha! ha! + +_Gray_. But 'twas pleasanter, when the other saint +_Resist-the-devil-and-he-will-flee-from-thee Pureman_ was overtaken +in the act, to plead an illusio visus, and maintain his sanctity upon +a supposed power in the adversary to counterfeit the shapes of +things. + +_All_. Ha! ha! ha! + +_John_. Another round, and then let every man devise what trick he +can in his fancy, for the better manifesting our loyalty this day. + +_Gray_. Shall we hang a puritan? + +_John_. No, that has been done already in Coleman Street. + +2_nd Gent_. Or fire a conventicle? + +_John_. That is stale too. + +3_rd Gent_. Or burn the Assembly's catechism? + +4_th Gent_. Or drink the king's health, every man standing upon his +head naked? + +_John (to Lovel)_. We have here some pleasant madness. + +3_rd Gent_. Who shall pledge me in a pint bumper, while we drink to +the king upon our knees? + +_Lovel_. Why on our knees, Cavalier? + +_John_ (_smiling_). For more devotion, to be sure. (_To a servant_.) +Sirrah, fetch the gilt goblets. + + [_The goblets are brought. They drink the King's health, kneeling. + A shout of general approbation following the first appearance + of the goblets._ + +_John_. We have here the unchecked virtues of the grape. How the +vapors curl upwards! It were a life of gods to dwell in such an +element: to see, and hear, and talk brave things. Now fie upon these +casual potations. That a man's most exalted reason should depend upon +the ignoble fermenting of a fruit, which sparrows pluck at as well as +we. + +_Gray_ (_aside to Lovel_). Observe how he is ravished. + +_Lovel_. Vanity and gay thoughts of wine do meet in him and engender +madness. + +[_While the rest are engaged in a wild kind of talk_, JOHN _advances + to the front of the stage, and soliloquizes_. + +_John_. My spirits turn to fire, they mount so fast. +My joys are turbulent, my hopes show like fruition. +These high and gusty relishes of life, sure, +Have no allayings of mortality in them. +I am too hot now, and o'ercapable, +For the tedious processes, and creeping wisdom, +Of human acts, and enterprises of a man. +I want some seasonings of adversity, +Some strokes of the old mortifier Calamity, +To take these swellings down, divines call vanity. + +1_st Gent_. Mr. Woodvil, Mr. Woodvil. + +2_nd Gent_. Where is Woodvil? + +_Gray_. Let him alone. I have seen him in these lunes before. His +abstractions must not taint the good mirth. + +_John_ (_continuing to soliloquize_). O for some friend, now, +To conceal nothing from, to have no secrets. +How fine and noble a thing is confidence, +How reasonable, too, and almost godlike! +Fast cement of fast friends, band of society, +Old natural go-between in the world's business, +Where civil life and order, wanting this cement, +Would presently rush back +Into the pristine state of singularity, +And each man stand alone. + + (_A servant enters_.) + +_Servant_. Gentlemen, the fireworks are ready. + +1_st Gent_. What be they? + +_Lovel_. The work of London artists, which our host has provided in +honor of this day. + +2_nd Gent_. 'Sdeath, who would part with his wine for a rocket? + +_Lovel_. Why truly, gentlemen, as our kind host has been at the pains +to provide this spectacle, we can do no less than be present at it. +It will not take up much time. Every man may return fresh and +thirsting to his liquor. + +_3rd Gent_. There's reason in what he says. + +_2d Gent_. Charge on then, bottle in hand. There's husbandry in that. + + [_They go out, singing. Only_ LOVEL _remains, who observes_ WOODVIL. + +_John_ (_still talking to himself_). +This Lovel here's of a tough honesty, +Would put the rack to the proof. He is not of that sort +Which haunt my house, snorting the liquors, +And when their wisdoms are afloat with wine, +Spend vows as fast as vapors, which go off +Even with the fumes, their fathers. He is one, +Whose sober morning actions +Shame not his o'ernight's promises; +Talks little, flatters less, and makes no promises; +Why this is he, whom the dark-wisdom'd fate +Might trust her counsels of predestination with, +And the world be no loser. +Why should I fear this man? [_Seeing_ LOVEL. +Where is the company gone? + +_Lovel_. To see the fireworks, where you will be expected to follow. +But I perceive you are better engaged. + +_John_. I have been meditating this half hour, +On all the properties of a brave friendship, +The mysteries that are in it, the noble uses, +Its limits withal, and its nice boundaries. +_Exempli gratia_, how far a man +May lawfully forswear himself for his friend; +What quantity of lies, some of them brave ones, +He may lawfully incur in a friend's behalf! +What oaths, blood-crimes, hereditary quarrels, +Night brawls, fierce words, and duels in the morning, +He need not stick at, to maintain his friend's honor, or his cause. + +_Lovel_. I think many men would die for their friends. + +_John_. Death! why,'tis nothing. We go to it for sport, +To gain a name or purse, or please a sullen humor, +When one has worn his fortune's livery threadbare, +Or his spleen'd mistress frowns. Husbands will venture on it, +To cure the hot fits and cold shakings of jealousy. +A friend, sir, must do more. + +_Lovel_. Can he do more than die? + +_John_. To serve a friend this he may do. Pray, mark me. +Having a law within (great spirits feel one) +He cannot, ought not, to be bound by any +Positive laws or ord'nances extern, +But may reject all these: by the law of friendship +He may do so much, be they, indifferently, +Penn'd statutes, or the land's unwritten usages, +As public fame, civil compliances, +Misnamed honor, trust in matter of secrets, +All vows and promises, the feeble mind's religion, +(Binding our morning knowledge to approve +What last night's ignorance spake;) +The ties of blood withal, and prejudice of kin. +Sir, these weak terrors +Must never shake me. I know what belongs +To a worthy friendship. Come, you shall have my confidence. + +_Lovel_. I hope you think me worthy. + +_John_. You will smile to hear now-- +Sir Walter never has been out of the island. + +_Lovel_. You amaze me. + +_John_. That same report of his escape to France +Was a fine tale, forged by myself-- +Ha! ha! +I knew it would stagger him. + +_Lovel_. Pray, give me leave. +Where has he dwelt, how lived, how lain conceal'd? +Sure I may ask so much. + +_John_. From place to place, dwelling in no place long, +My brother Simon still hath borne him company, +('Tis a brave youth, I envy him all his virtues). +Disguised in foreign garb, they pass for Frenchmen, +Two Protestant exiles from the Limousin +Newly arrived. Their dwelling's now at Nottingham, +Where no soul knows them. + +_Lovel_. Can you assign any reason why a gentleman of Sir Walter's +known prudence should expose his person so lightly? + +_John_. I believe, a certain fondness, +A childlike cleaving to the land that gave him birth, +Chains him like fate. + +_Lovel_. I have known some exiles thus +To linger out the term of the law's indulgence, +To the hazard of being known. + +_John_. You may suppose sometimes +They use the neighb'ring Sherwood for their sport, +Their exercise and freer recreation.-- +I see you smile. Pray now, be careful. + +_Lovel_. I am no babbler, sir; you need not fear me. + +_John_. But some men have been known to talk in their sleep, +And tell fine tales that way. + +_Lovel_. I have heard so much. But, to say truth, I mostly sleep +alone. + +_John_. Or drink, sir? do you never drink too freely? +Some men will drink, and tell you all their secrets. + +_Lovel_. Why do you question me, who know my habits? + +_John_. I think you are no sot +No tavern-troubler, worshipper of the grape; +But all men drink sometimes, +And veriest saints at festivals relax, +The marriage of a friend, or a wife's birthday. + +_Lovel_. How much, sir, may a man with safety drink? + [_Smiling_. + +_John_. Sir, three half-pints a day is reasonable; +I care not if you never exceed that quantity. + +_Lovel_. I shall observe it; +On holidays two quarts. + +_John_. Or, stay; you keep no wench? + +_Lovel_. Ha! + +_John_. No painted mistress for your private hours? +You keep no whore, sir? + +_Lovel_. What does he mean? + +_John_. Who for a close embrace, a toy of sin, +And amorous praising of your worship's breath, +In rosy junction of four melting lips, +Can kiss out secrets from you? + +_Lovel_. How strange this passionate behavior shows in you +Sure, you think me some weak one. + +_John_. Pray pardon me some fears. +You have now the pledge of a dear father's life. +I am a son--would fain be thought a loving one; +You may allow me some fears: do not despise me, +If, in a posture foreign to my spirit, +And by our well-knit friendship, I conjure you, +Touch not Sir Walter's life. [_Kneels._ +You see these tears. My father's an old man. +Pray let him live. + +_Lovel_. I must be bold to tell you, these new freedoms +Show most unhandsome in you. + +_John_ (_rising_). Ha! do you say so? +Sure, you are not grown proud upon my secret! +Ah! now I see it plain. He would be babbling. +No doubt a garrulous and hard-faced traitor-- +But I'll not give you leave. [_Draws._ + +_Lovel_. What does this madman mean? + +_John_. Come, sir; here is no subterfuge; +You must kill me, or I kill you. + +_Lovel_ (_drawing_). Then self-defence plead my excuse. +Have at you, sir. [_They fight._ + +_John_. Stay, sir. +I hope you have made your will. +If not,'tis no great matter. +A broken cavalier has seldom much +He can bequeath; an old worn peruke, +A snuffbox with a picture of Prince Rupert, +A rusty sword he'll swear was used at Naseby, +Though it ne'er came within ten miles of the place; +And if he's very rich, +A cheap edition of the _Icon Basilike_, +Is mostly all the wealth he dies possest of. +You say few prayers, I fancy;-- + +So to it again. [_They fight again._ LOVEL _is disarmed._ + +_Lovel_. You had best now take my life. I guess you mean it. + +_John_ (_musing_). No:--Men will say I fear'd him, +if I kill'd him. +Live still, and be a traitor in thy wish, +But never act thy thought, being a coward. +That vengeance, which thy soul shall nightly thirst for, +And this disgrace I've done you cry aloud for, +Still have the will without the power to execute. +So now I leave you, +Feeling a sweet security. No doubt +My secret shall remain a virgin for you! + [_Goes out, smiling in scorn_. + +_Lovel_ (_rising_). For once you are mistaken in your man. +The deed you wot of shall forthwith be done, +A bird let loose, a secret out of hand, +Returns not back. Why, then 'tis baby policy +To menace him who hath it in his keeping. +I will go look for Gray; +Then, northward ho! such tricks as we shall play +Have not been seen, I think, in merry Sherwood, +Since the days of Robin Hood, that archer good. + + + + +ACT THE FOURTH. + + +SCENE.--_An Apartment in Woodvil Hall_. + +JOHN WOODVIL. (_Alone_.) + +A weight of wine lies heavy on my head, +The unconcocted follies of last night. +Now all those jovial fancies, and bright hopes, +Children of wine, go off like dreams. +This sick vertigo here +Preacheth of temperance, no sermon better. +These black thoughts, and dull melancholy, +That stick like burrs to the brain, will they ne'er leave me? +Some men are full of choler, when they are drunk; +Some brawl of matter foreign to themselves; +And some, the most resolved fools of all, +Have told their dearest secrets in their cups. + + +SCENE.--_The Forest_. + +SIR WALTER. SIMON. LOVEL. GRAY. + +_Lovel_. Sir, we are sorry we cannot return your French salutation. + +_Gray_. Nor otherwise consider this garb you trust to than as a poor +disguise. + +_Lovel_. Nor use much ceremony with a traitor. + +_Gray_. Therefore, without much induction of superfluous words, I +attach you, Sir Walter Woodvil, of High Treason, in the King's name. + +_Lovel_. And of taking part in the great Rebellion against our late +lawful Sovereign, Charles the First. + +_Simon_. John has betrayed us, father. + +_Lovel_. Come, sir, you had best surrender fairly. We know you, sir. + +_Simon_. Hang ye, villains, ye are two better known than trusted. I +have seen those faces before. Are ye not two beggarly retainers, +trencher-parasites, to John? I think ye rank above his footmen. A +sort of bed and board worms--locusts that infest our house; a leprosy +that long has hung upon its walls and princely apartments, reaching +to fill all the corners of my brother's once noble heart. + +_Gray_. We are his friends. + +_Simon_. Fie, sir, do not weep. How these rogues will triumph! Shall +I whip off their heads, father? + + [_Draws_. + +_Lovel_. Come, sir, though this show handsome in you, being his son, +yet the law must have its course. + +_Simon_. And if I tell ye the law shall not have its course, cannot +ye be content? Courage, father; shall such things as these apprehend +a man? Which of ye will venture upon me?--Will you, Mr. Constable +self-elect? or you, sir, with a pimple on your nose, got at Oxford by +hard drinking, your only badge of loyalty? + +_Gray_. 'Tis a brave youth--I cannot strike at him. + +_Simon_. Father, why do you cover your face with your hands? Why do +you fetch your breath so hard? See, villains, his heart is burst! O +villains, he cannot speak. One of you run for some water; quickly, ye +knaves; will ye have your throats cut? + + [_They both slink off_. + +How is it with you, Sir Walter? Look up, sir, the villains are gone. +He hears me not, and this deep disgrace of treachery in his son hath +touched him even to the death. O most distuned and distempered world, +where sons talk their aged fathers into their graves! Garrulous and +diseased world, and still empty, rotten and hollow _talking_ world, +where good men decay, states turn round in an endless mutability, and +still for the worse; nothing is at a stay, nothing abides but vanity, +chaotic vanity.--Brother, adieu! + +There lies the parent stock which gave us life, +Which I will see consign'd with tears to earth. +Leave thou the solemn funeral rites to me, +Grief and a true remorse abide with thee. + + [_Bears in the body_. + + +SCENE.--_Another Part of the Forest_. + +_Marg_. (_alone_.) It was an error merely, and no crime, +An unsuspecting openness in youth, +That from his lips the fatal secret drew, +Which should have slept like one of nature's mysteries, +Unveil'd by any man. +Well, he is dead! +And what should Margaret do in the forest? +O ill-starr'd John! +O Woodvil, man enfeoff'd to despair! +Take thy farewell of peace. +O never look again to see good days, +Or close thy lids in comfortable nights, +Or ever think a happy thought again, +If what I have heard be true.-- +Forsaken of the world must Woodvil live, +If he did tell these men. +No tongue must speak to him, no tongue of man +Salute him, when he wakes up in a morning; +Or bid "good-night" to John. Who seeks to live +In amity with thee, must for thy sake +Abide the world's reproach. What then? +Shall Margaret join the clamors of the world +Against her friend? O undiscerning world, +That cannot from misfortune separate guilt, +No, not in thought! O never, never, John. +Prepared to share the fortunes of her friend +_For better or for worse_, thy Margaret comes, +To pour into thy wounds a healing love, +And wake the memory of an ancient friendship. +And pardon me, thou spirit of Sir Walter, +Who, in compassion to the wretched living, +Have but few tears to waste upon the dead. + + +SCENE.--_Woodvil Hall._ + +SANDFORD. MARGARET. (_As from a Journey_.) + +_Sand_. The violence of the sudden mischance hath so wrought in him, +who by nature is allied to nothing _less_ than a self-debasing humor +of dejection, that I have never seen anything more changed and +spirit-broken. He hath, with a peremptory resolution, dismissed the +partners of his riots and late hours, denied his house and person to +their most earnest solicitings, and will be seen by none. He keeps +ever alone, and his grief (which is solitary) does not so much seem +to possess and govern in him, as it is by Him, with a wilfulness of +most manifest affection, entertained and cherished. + +_Marg_. How bears he up against the common rumor? + +_Sand_. With a strange indifference, which, whosoever dives not into +the niceness of his sorrow might mistake for obdurate and insensate. +Yet are the wings of his pride forever clipt; and yet a virtuous +predominance of filial grief is so ever uppermost, that you may +discover his thoughts less troubled with conjecturing what living +opinions will say, and judge of his deeds, than absorbed and buried +with the dead, whom his indiscretion made so. + +_Marg_. I knew a greatness ever to be resident in him, to which the +admiring eyes of men should look up even in the declining and +bankrupt state of his pride. Fain would I see him, fain talk with +him; but that a sense of respect, which is violated, when without +deliberation we press into the society of the unhappy, checks and +holds me back. How, think you, he would bear my presence? + +_Sand_. As of an assured friend, whom in the forgetfulness of his +fortunes he past by. See him you must; but not to-night. The newness +of the sight shall move the bitterest compunction and the truest +remorse; but afterwards, trust me, dear lady, the happiest effects of +a returning peace, and a gracious comfort, to him, to you, and all of +us. + +_Marg_. I think he would not deny me. He hath ere this received +farewell letters from his brother, who hath taken a resolution to +estrange himself, for a time, from country, friends, and kindred, and +to seek occupation for his sad thoughts in travelling in foreign +places, where sights remote and extern to himself may draw from him +kindly and not painful ruminations. + +_Sand_. I was present at the receipt of the letter. The contents +seemed to affect him, for a moment, with a more lively passion of +grief than he has at any time outwardly shown. He wept with many +tears (which I had not before noted in him), and appeared to be +touched with the sense as of some unkindness; but the cause of their +sad separation and divorce quickly recurring, he presently returned +to his former inwardness of suffering. + +_Marg_. The reproach of his brother's presence at this hour would +have been a weight more than could be sustained by his already +oppressed and sinking spirit. Meditating upon these intricate and +widespread sorrows, hath brought a heaviness upon me, as of sleep. +How goes the night?-- + +_Sand_. An hour past sunset. You shall first refresh your limbs +(tired with travel) with meats and some cordial wine, and then betake +your no less wearied mind to repose. + +_Marg_. A good rest to us all. + +_Sand._ Thanks, lady. + + + + +ACT THE FIFTH. + +JOHN WOODVIL. (_dressing_). + +_John_. How beautiful (_handling his mourning_) +And comely do these mourning garments show! +Sure Grief hath set his sacred impress here, +To claim the world's respect! they note so feelingly +By outward types the serious man within.-- +Alas! what part or portion can I claim +In all the decencies of virtuous sorrow, +Which other mourners use? as namely, +This black attire, abstraction from society, +Good thoughts, and frequent sighs, and seldom smiles, +A cleaving sadness native to the brow, +All sweet condolements of like-grieved friends, +(That steal away the sense of loss almost,) +Men's pity and good offices +Which enemies themselves do for us then, +Putting their hostile disposition off, +As we put off our high thoughts and proud looks. + + [_Pauses, and observes the pictures_. + +These pictures must be taken down: +The portraitures of our most ancient family +For nigh three hundred years! How have I listen'd, +To hear Sir Walter, with an old man's pride, +Holding me in his arms, a prating boy, +And pointing to the pictures where they hung, +Repeat by course their worthy histories, +(As Hugh de Widville, Walter, first of the name, +And Anne the handsome, Stephen, and famous John: +Telling me, I must be his famous John.) +But that was in old times. +Now, no more +Must I grow proud upon our house's pride. +I rather, I, by most unheard-of crimes, +Have backward tainted all their noble blood, +Razed out the memory of an ancient family, +And quite reversed the honors of our house. +Who now shall sit and tell us anecdotes? +The secret history of his own times, +And fashions of the world when he was young: +How England slept out three-and-twenty years, +While Carr and Villiers ruled the baby king: +The costly fancies of the pedant's reign, +Balls, feastings, huntings, shows in allegory, +And Beauties of the court of James the First. + + MARGARET _enters_. + +_John_. Comes Margaret here to witness my disgrace? +O, lady, I have suffer'd loss, +And diminution of my honor's brightness. +You bring some images of old times, Margaret, +That should be now forgotten. + +_Marg_. Old times should never be forgotten, John. +I came to talk about them with my friend. + +_John_. I did refuse you, Margaret, in my pride. + +_Marg_. If John rejected Margaret in his pride, +(As who does not, being splenetic, refuse +Sometimes old playfellows,) the spleen being gone, +The offence no longer lives. +O Woodvil, those were happy days, +When we two first began to love. When first, +Under pretence of visiting my father, +(Being then a stripling night upon my age,) +You came a-wooing to his daughter, John. +Do you remember, +With what a coy reserve and seldom speech, +(Young maidens must be chary of their speech,) +I kept the honors of my maiden pride? +I was your favorite then. + +_John_. O Margaret, Margaret! +These your submissions to my low estate, +And cleavings to the fates of sunken Woodvil, +Write bitter things 'gainst my unworthiness. +Thou perfect pattern of thy slander'd sex, +Whom miseries of mine could never alienate, +Nor change of fortune shake; whom injuries, +And slights (the worst of injuries) which moved +Thy nature to return scorn with like scorn, +Then when you left in virtuous pride this house, +Could not so separate, but now in this +My day of shame, when all the world forsake me, +You only visit me, love, and forgive me. + +_Marg_. Dost yet remember the green arbor. John, +In the south gardens of my father's house, +Where we have seen the summer sun go down, +Exchanging true love's vows without restraint? +And that old wood, you call'd your wilderness, +And vow'd in sport to build a chapel in it, +There dwell + + "Like hermit poor + In pensive place obscure." + +And tell your Ave Maries by the curls +(Dropping like golden beads) of Margaret's hair; +And make confession seven times a day +Of every thought that stray'd from love and Margaret; +And I your saint the penance should appoint-- +Believe me, sir, I will not now be laid +Aside, like an old fashion. + +_John._ O lady, poor and abject are my thoughts; +My pride is cured, my hopes are under clouds, +I have no part in any good man's love, +In all earth's pleasures portion have I none, +I fade and wither in my own esteem, +This earth holds not alive so poor a thing as I am. +I was not always thus. [_Weeps_. + +_Marg_. Thou noble nature, +Which lion-like didst awe the inferior creatures, +Now trampled on by beasts of basest quality, +My dear heart's lord, life's pride, soul-honor'd John! +Upon her knees (regard her poor request) +Your favorite, once beloved Margaret, kneels. + +_John_. What would'st thou, lady, ever honor'd Margaret? + +_Marg_. That John would think more nobly of himself, +More worthily of high Heaven; +And not for one misfortune, child of chance, +No crime, but unforeseen, and sent to punish +The less offence, with image of the greater, +Thereby to work the soul's humility, +(Which end hath happily not been frustrate quite,) +O not for one offence mistrust Heaven's mercy, +Nor quit thy hope of happy days to come-- +John yet has many happy days to live; +To live and make atonement. + +_John_. Excellent lady, +Whose suit hath drawn this softness from my eyes, +Not the world's scorn, nor falling off of friends, +Could ever do. Will you go with me, Margaret? + +_Marg_. (_rising_). Go whither, John? + +_John_. Go in with me +And pray for the peace of our unquiet minds? + +_Marg_. That I will, John. + + [_Exeunt_. + + +SCENE.--_An inner Apartment_. + +JOHN _is discovered kneeling_.--MARGARET _standing over him_. + +_John_ (_rises_). I cannot bear +To see you waste that youth and excellent beauty, +('Tis now the golden time of the day with you,) +In tending such a broken wretch as I am. + +_Marg_. John will break Margaret's heart, if he speak so. +O sir, sir, sir, you are too melancholy, +And I must call it caprice. I am somewhat bold +Perhaps in this. But you are now my patient, +(You know you gave me leave to call you so,) +And I must chide these pestilent humors from you. + +_John_. They are gone.-- +Mark, love, how cheerfully I speak! +I can smile too, and I almost begin +To understand what kind of creature Hope is. + +_Marg_. Now this is better, this mirth becomes you, John. + +_John_. Yet tell me, if I overact my mirth, +(Being but a novice, I may fall into that error.) +That were a sad indecency, you know. + +_Marg_. Nay, never fear. +I will be mistress of your humors, +And you shall frown or smile by the book. +And herein I shall be most peremptory, +Cry, "This shows well, but that inclines to levity; +This frown has too much of the Woodvil in it, +But that fine sunshine has redeem'd it quite." + +_John_. How sweetly Margaret robs me of myself! + +_Marg_. To give you in your stead a better self! +Such as you were, when these eyes first beheld +You mounted on your sprightly steed, White Margery, +Sir Rowland my father's gift, +And all my maidens gave my heart for lost. +I was a young thing then, being newly come +Home from my convent education, where +Seven years I had wasted in the bosom of France: +Returning home true protestant, you call'd me +Your little heretic nun. How timid-bashful +Did John salute his love, being newly seen! +Sir Rowland term'd it a rare modesty, +And praised it in a youth. + +_John_. Now Margaret weeps herself. + + (_A noise of bells heard_.) + +_Marg_. Hark the bells, John. + +_John_. Those are the church-bells of St. Mary Ottery. + +_Marg_. I know it. + +_John_. St. Mary Ottery, my native village +In the sweet shire of Devon. +Those are the bells. + +_Marg._ Wilt go to church, John? + +_John._ I have been there already. + +_Marg._ How canst say thou hast been there already? +The bells are only now ringing for morning service, +And hast thou been at church already? + +_John._ I left my bed betimes, I could not sleep, +And when I rose, I look'd (as my custom is) +From my chamber window, where I can see the sun rise; +And the first object I discern'd +Was the glistering spire of St. Mary Ottery. + +_Marg._ Well, John. + +_John._ Then I remember'd 'twas the sabbath day. +Immediately a wish arose in my mind, +To go to church and pray with Christian people. +And then I check'd myself, and said to myself, +"Thou hast been a heathen, John, these two years past, +(Not having been at church in all that time,) +And is it fit, that now for the first time +Thou shouldst offend the eyes of Christian people +With a murderer's presence in the house of prayer? +Thou wouldst but discompose their pious thoughts, +And do thyself no good: for how couldst thou pray, +With unwash'd hands, and lips unused to the offices?" +And then I at my own presumption smiled; +And then I wept that I should smile at all, +Having such cause of grief! I wept outright: +Tears like a river flooded all my face, +And I began to pray, and found I could pray; +And still I yearn'd to say my prayers in the church. +"Doubtless (said I) one might find comfort in it." +So stealing down the stairs, like one that fear'd detection, +Or was about to act unlawful business +At that dead time of dawn, +I flew to the church, and found the doors wide open. +(Whether by negligence I knew not, +Or some peculiar grace to me vouchsafed, +For all things felt like mystery.) + +_Marg_. Yes. + +_John_. So entering in, not without fear, +I passed into the family pew, +And covering up my eyes for shame, +And deep perception of unworthiness, +Upon the little hassock knelt me down, +Where I so oft had kneel'd, +A docile infant by Sir Walter's side; +And, thinking so, I wept a second flood +More poignant than the first; +But afterwards was greatly comforted. +It seem'd the guilt of blood was passing from me +Even in the act and agony of tears, +And all my sins forgiven. + + + + +THE WITCH; + +A DRAMATIC SKETCH OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. + + * * * * * + +CHARACTERS. + +OLD SERVANT _in the Family of_ SIR FRANCIS FAIRFORD. STRANGER. + + * * * * * + +_Servant_. One summer night Sir Francis, as it chanced, +Was pacing to and fro in the avenue +That westward fronts our house, +Among those aged oaks, said to have been planted +Three hundred years ago, +By a neighb'ring prior of the Fairford name. +Being o'ertasked in thought, he heeded not +The importunate suit of one who stood by the gate, +And begg'd an alms. +Some say he shoved her rudely from the gate +With angry chiding; but I can never think +(Our master's nature hath a sweetness in it) +That he could use a woman, an old woman, +With such discourtesy; but he refused her-- +And better had he met a lion in his path +Than that old woman that night; +For she was one who practised the black arts, +And serv'd the devil, being since burnt for witchcraft. +She look'd at him as one that meant to blast him, +And with a frightful noise, +('Twas partly like a woman's voice, +And partly like the hissing of a snake,) +She nothing said but this +(Sir Francis told the words):-- + + A mischief, mischief, mischief, + And a nine-times killing curse, + By day and by night, to the caitiff wight, + Who shakes the poor like snakes from his door, + And shuts up the womb of his purse. +And still she cried-- + + A mischief, + And a ninefold withering curse: + For that shall come to thee that will undo thee, + Both all that thou fearest and worse. + +So saying, she departed, +Leaving Sir Francis like a man, beneath +Whose feet a scaffolding was suddenly falling; +So he described it. + +_Stranger_. A terrible curse! What follow'd? + +_Servant_. Nothing immediate, but some two months after, +Young Philip Fairford suddenly fell sick, +And none could tell what ail'd him; for he lay, +And pined, and pined, till all his hair fell off, +And he, that was full-flesh'd, became as thin +As a two-months' babe that has been starved in the nursing. +And sure I think +He bore his death-wound like a little child; +With such rare sweetness of dumb melancholy +He strove to clothe his agony in smiles, +Which he would force up in his poor pale cheeks, +Like ill-timed guests that had no proper dwelling there; +And, when they ask'd him his complaint, he laid +His hand upon his heart to show the place, +Where Susan came to him a-nights, he said, +And prick'd him with a pin.-- +And thereupon Sir Francis call'd to mind +The beggar-witch that stood by the gateway +And begg'd an alms. + +_Stranger_. But did the witch confess? + +_Servant_. All this and more at her death. + +_Stranger_. I do not love to credit tales of magic. +Heaven's music, which is Order, seems unstrung, +And this brave world +(The mystery of God) unbeautified, +Disorder'd, marr'd, where such strange things are acted. + + + + +ALBUM VERSES, + +WITH A FEW OTHERS. + + + + +DEDICATION. + + * * * * * + +TO THE PUBLISHER. + +DEAR MOXON, + + +I do not know to whom a Dedication of these Trifles is more properly +due than to yourself. You suggested the printing of them. You were +desirous of exhibiting a specimen of the _manner_ in which +Publications, intrusted to your future care, would appear. With more +propriety, perhaps, the "Christmas," or some other of your own +simple, unpretending Compositions, might have served this purpose. +But I forget--you have bid a long adieu to the Muses. I had on my +hands sundry Copies of Verses written for _Albums_-- + + Those books kept by modern young Ladies for show + Of which their plain Grandmothers nothing did know-- + +or otherwise floating about in Periodicals; which you have chosen in +this manner to embody. I feel little interest in their publication. +They are simply--_Advertisement Verses_. + +It is not for me, nor you, to allude in public to the kindness of our +honored Friend, under whose auspices you are become a Publisher. May +that fine-minded Veteran in Verse enjoy life long enough to see his +patronage justified? I venture to predict that your habits of +industry, and your cheerful spirit, will carry you through the world. + +I am, Dear Moxon, + +Your Friend and sincere Well-Wisher, + +CHARLES LAMB. + +ENFIELD, _1st June_, 1839. + + + + +ALBUM VERSES + +WITH A FEW OTHERS. + + * * * * * + +IN THE AUTOGRAPH BOOK OF MRS. SERGEANT W----. + + * * * * * + + Had I a power, Lady, to my will, + You should not want Hand Writings. I would fill + Your leaves with Autographs--resplendent names + Of Knights and Squires of old, and courtly Dames, + Kings, Emperors, Popes. Next under these should stand + The hands of famous Lawyers--a grave band-- + Who in their Courts of Law or Equity + Have best upheld Freedom and Property. + These should moot cases in your book, and vie + To show their reading and their Sergeantry. + But I have none of these; nor can I send + The notes by Bullen to her Tyrant penn'd + In her authentic hand; nor in soft hours + Lines writ by Rosamund in Clifford's bowers. + The lack of curious Signatures I moan, + And want the courage to subscribe my own. + + * * * * * + +TO DORA W----. + +ON BEING ASKED BY HER FATHER TO WRITE IN HER ALBUM. + + An Album is a Banquet: from the store, + In his intelligential Orchard growing, + Your Sire might heap your board to overflowing: + One shaking of the Tree--'twould ask no more + To set a Salad forth, more rich than that + Which Evelyn[1] in his princely cookery fancied: + Or that more rare, by Eve's neat hands enhanced, + Where, a pleased guest, the Angelic Virtue sat. + But like the all-grasping Founder of the Feast, + Whom Nathan to the sinning king did tax, + From his less wealthy neighbors he exacts; + Spares his own flocks, and takes the poor man's beast. + Obedient to his bidding, lo, I am, + A zealous, meek, _contributory_ LAMB. + +[Footnote 1: Acetaria, a Discourse of Sallets, by J. E. 1706.] + + * * * * * + +IN THE ALBUM OF A CLERGYMAN'S LADY. + + An Album is a Garden, not for show + Planted, but use; where wholesome herbs should grow. + A Cabinet of curious porcelain, where + No fancy enters, but what's rich or rare. + A Chapel, where mere ornamental things + Are pure as crowns of saints, or angels' wings. + A List of living friends; a holier Room + For names of some since mouldering in the tomb, + Whose blooming memories life's cold laws survive; + And, dead elsewhere, they here yet speak and live. + Such, and so tender, should an Album be; + And, Lady, such I wish this book to thee. + + * * * * * + +IN THE ALBUM OF EDITH S----. + + In Christian world MARY the garland wears! + REBECCA sweetens on a Hebrew's ear; + Quakers for pure PRISCILLA are more clear; + And the light Gaul by amorous NINON swears. + Among the lesser lights how LUCY shines! + What air of fragrance ROSAMOND throws round! + How like a hymn doth sweet CECILIA sound! + Of MARTHAS, and of ABIGAILS, few lines + Have bragg'd in verse. Of coarsest household stuff + Should homely JOAN be fashion'd. But can + You BARBARA resist, or MARIAN? + And is not CLARE for love excuse enough? + Yet, by my faith in numbers, I profess, + These all, than Saxon EDITH, please me less. + + * * * * * + +IN THE ALBUM OF ROTHA Q----. + + A passing glance was all I caught of thee, + In my own Enfield haunts at random roving. + Old friends of ours were with thee, faces loving; + Time short: and salutations cursory, + Though deep, and hearty. The familiar Name + Of you, yet unfamiliar, raised in me + Thoughts--what the daughter of that Man should be, + Who call'd our Wordsworth friend. My thoughts did frame + A growing Maiden, who, from day to day + Advancing still in stature, and in grace, + Would all her lonely Father's griefs efface, + And his paternal cares with usury pay. + I still retain the phantom, as I can; + And call the gentle image--Quillinan. + + * * * * * + +IN THE ALBUM OF CATHERINE ORKNEY. + + CANADIA! boast no more the toils + Of hunters for the furry spoils; + Your whitest ermines are but foils + To brighter Catherine Orkney. + + That such a flower should ever burst + From climes with rigorous winter curst!-- + We bless you, that so kindly nurst + This flower, this Catherine Orkney. + + We envy not your proud display + Of lake--wood--vast Niagara; + Your greatest pride we've borne away. + How spared you Catherine Orkney? + + That Wolfe on Heights of Abraham fell, + To your reproach no more we tell: + Canadia, you repaid us well + With rearing Catherine Orkney. + + O Britain, guard with tenderest care + The charge allotted to your share: + You've scarce a native maid so fair, + So good, as Catherine Orkney. + + * * * * * + +IN THE ALBUM OF LUCY BARTON. + + Little Book, surnamed of _white_, + Clean as yet, and fair to sight, + Keep thy attribution right. + + Never disproportion'd scrawl; + Ugly blot, that's worse than all; + On thy maiden clearness fall! + + In each letter, here design'd, + Let the reader emblem'd find + Neatness of the owner's mind. + + Gilded margins count a sin, + Let thy leaves attraction win + By the golden rules within; + + Sayings fetch'd from sages old; + Laws which Holy Writ unfold, + Worthy to be graved in gold: + + Lighter fancies not excluding: + Blameless wit, with nothing rude in, + Sometimes mildly interluding + + Amid strains of graver measure: + Virtue's self hath oft her pleasure + In sweet Muses' groves of leisure. + + Riddles dark, perplexing sense; + Darker meanings of offence; + What but _shades_--be banish'd hence. + + Whitest thoughts in whitest dress, + Candid meanings, best express + Mind of quiet Quakeress. + + * * * * * + +IN THE ALBUM OF MRS. JANE TOWERS. + + Lady Unknown, who crav'st from me Unknown + The trifle of a verse these leaves to grace, + How shall I find fit matter? with what face + Address a face that ne'er to me was shown? + Thy looks, tones, gesture, manners, and what not, + Conjecturing, I wander in the dark. + I know thee only Sister to Charles Clarke! + But at that name my cold muse waxes hot, + And swears that thou art such a one as he, + Warm, laughter-loving, with a touch of madness, + Wild, glee-provoking, pouring oil of gladness + From frank heart without guile. And, if thou be + The pure reverse of this, and I mistake-- + Demure one, I will like thee for his sake. + + * * * * * + +IN THE ALBUM OF MISS ----. + + +I. + + Such goodness in your face doth shine, + With modest look without design, + That I despair, poor pen of mine + Can e'er express it. + To give it words I feebly try; + My spirits fail me to supply + Befitting language for't, and I + Can only bless it! + + +II. + + But stop, rash verse! and don't abuse + A bashful Maiden's ear with news + Of her own virtues. She'll refuse + Praise sung so loudly. + Of that same goodness you admire, + The best part is, she don't aspire + To praise--nor of herself desire + To think too proudly. + + * * * * * + +IN MY OWN ALBUM. + + Fresh clad from heaven in robes of white, + A young probationer of light, + Thou wert, my soul, an album bright, + + A spotless leaf; but thought, and care, + And friend and foe, in foul or fair, + Have "written strange defeatures" there; + + And Time with heaviest hand of all, + Like that fierce writing on the wall, + Hath stamp'd sad dates--he can't recall; + + And error gilding worst designs-- + Like speckled snake that strays and shines-- + Betrays his path by crooked lines; + + And vice hath left his ugly blot; + And good resolves, a moment hot, + Fairly began--but finish'd not; + + And fruitless, late remorse doth trace-- + Like Hebrew lore a backward pace-- + Her irrecoverable race. + + Disjointed numbers; sense unknit + Huge reams of folly, shreds of wit; + Compose the mingled mass of it. + + My scalded eyes no longer brook + Upon this ink-blurr'd thing to look-- + Go, shut the leaves, and clasp the book. + + + + +MISCELLANEOUS. + + * * * * * + +ANGEL HELP[1] + +[Footnote 1: Suggested by a drawing in the possession of Charles +Aders, Esq., in which is represented the legend of a poor female +Saint; who, having spun past midnight, to maintain a bedrid mother, +has fallen asleep from fatigue, and Angels are finishing her work. In +another part of the chamber, an angel is tending a lily, the emblem +of purity.] + + This rare tablet doth include + Poverty with sanctitude. + Past midnight this poor maid hath spun, + And yet the work is not half done, + Which must supply from earnings scant + A feeble bedrid parent's want. + Her sleep-charged eyes exemption ask, + And Holy hands take up the task; + Unseen the rock and spindle ply, + And do her earthly drudgery. + Sleep, saintly poor one! sleep, sleep on; + And, waking, find thy labors done. + Perchance she knows it by her dreams; + Her eye hath caught the golden gleams, + Angelic presence testifying, + That round her everywhere are flying; + Ostents from which she may presume, + That much of heaven is in the room. + Skirting her own bright hair they run, + And to the sunny add more sun: + Now on that aged face they fix, + Streaming from the Crucifix; + The flesh-clogg'd spirit disabusing, + Death-disarming sleeps infusing, + Prelibations, foretastes high, + And equal thoughts to live or die. + Gardener bright from Eden's bower, + Tend with care that lily flower; + To its leaves and root infuse + Heaven's sunshine, Heaven's dews. + 'Tis a type, and 'tis a pledge, + Of a crowning privilege. + Careful as that lily flower, + This maid must keep her precious dower; + Live a sainted maid, or die + Martyr to virginity. + + * * * * * + +ON AN INFANT DYING AS SOON AS BORN. + + I saw where in the shroud did lurk + A curious frame of Nature's work. + A flow'ret crushed in the bud, + A nameless piece of Babyhood, + Was in her cradle-coffin lying; + Extinct, with scarce the sense of dying: + So soon to exhange the imprisoning womb + For darker closets of the tomb! + She did but ope an eye, and put + A clear beam forth, then straight up shut + For the long dark: ne'er more to see + Through glasses of mortality. + Riddle of destiny, who can show + What thy short visit meant, or know + What thy errand here below? + Shall we say, that Nature blind + Check'd her hand, and changed her mind, + Just when she had exactly wrought + A finish'd pattern without fault? + Could she flag, or could she tire, + Or lack'd she the Promethean fire + (With her nine moons' long workings sicken'd) + That should thy little limbs have quicken'd? + Limbs so firm, they seem'd to assure + Life of health and days mature: + Woman's self in miniature! + Limbs so fair, they might supply + (Themselves now but cold imagery) + The sculptor to make Beauty by. + Or did the stern-eyed Fate descry, + That babe or mother, one must die; + So in mercy left the stock, + And cut the branch; to save the shock + Of young years widow'd; and the pain, + When Single State comes back again + To the lone man who, 'reft of wife, + Thenceforward drags a maimed life? + The economy of Heaven is dark; + And wisest clerks have miss'd the mark, + Why Human Buds, like this, should fall, + More brief than fly ephemeral, + That has his day; while shrivell'd crones + Stiffen with age to stocks and stones; + And crabbed use the conscience sears + In sinners of an hundred years. + Mother's prattle, mother's kiss, + Baby fond, thou ne'er wilt miss. + Rites, which custom does impose, + Silver bells and baby clothes; + Coral redder than those lips, + Which pale death did late eclipse; + Music framed for infants' glee, + Whistle never tuned for thee; + Though thou want'st not, thou shalt have them, + Loving hearts were they which gave them. + Let not one be missing; nurse, + See them laid upon the hearse + Of infant slain by doom perverse. + Why should kings and nobles have + Pictured trophies to their grave; + And we, churls, to thee deny + Thy pretty toys with thee to lie, + A more harmless vanity? + + * * * * * + +THE CHRISTENING. + + Array'd--a half-angelic sight-- + In vests of pure Baptismal white, + The mother to the Font doth bring + The little helpless nameless thing, + With hushes soft and mild caressing, + At once to get--a name and blessing. + Close by the babe the Priest doth stand, + The Cleansing Water at his hand, + Which must assoil the soul within + From every stain of Adam's sin. + The Infant eyes the mystic scenes, + Nor knows what all this wonder means; + And now he smiles, as if to say + "I am a Christian made this day;" + Now frighted clings to Nurse's hold, + Shrinking from the water cold, + Whose virtues, rightly understood, + Are, as Bethesda's waters, good. + Strange words--The World, The Flesh, The Devil-- + Poor Babe, what can it know of evil? + But we must silently adore + Mysterious truths, and not explore. + Enough for him, in after-times, + When he shall read these artless rhymes, + If, looking back upon this day + With quiet conscience, he can say-- + "I have in part redeem'd the pledge + Of my Baptismal privilege; + And more and more will strive to flee + All which my Sponsors kind did then renounce for me." + + * * * * * + +THE YOUNG CATECHIST[1] + +[Footnote 1: A picture by Henry Meyer, Esq.] + + While this tawny Ethiop prayeth, + Painter, who is she that stayeth + By, with skin of whitest lustre, + Sunny locks, a shining cluster, + Saint-like seeming to direct him + To the Power that must protect him? + Is she of the Heaven-born Three, + Meek Hope, strong Faith, sweet Charity; + Or some Cherub?-- + + They you mention + Far transcend my weak invention. + 'Tis a simple Christian child, + Missionary young and mild, + From her stock of Scriptural knowledge, + Bible-taught without a college, + Which by reading she could gather + Teaches him to say OUR FATHER + To the common Parent, who + Color not respects, nor hue. + White and black in Him have part, + Who looks not to the skin, but heart. + + * * * * * + +TO A YOUNG FRIEND, + +ON HER TWENTY-FIRST BIRTHDAY. + + Crown me a cheerful goblet, while I pray + A blessing on thy years, young Isola; + Young, but no more a child. How swift have flown + To me thy girlish times, a woman grown + Beneath my heedless eyes! in vain I rack + My fancy to believe the almanac, + That speaks thee Twenty-One. Thou shouldst have still + Remain'd a child, and at thy sovereign will + Gambol'd about our house, as in times past. + Ungrateful Emma, to grow up so fast, + Hastening to leave thy friends!--for which intent, + Fond Runagate, be this thy punishment: + After some thirty years, spent in such bliss + As this earth can afford, where still we miss + Something of joy entire, may'st thou grow old + As we whom thou hast left! That wish was cold. + O far more aged and wrinkled, till folks say, + Looking upon thee reverend in decay, + "This Dame, for length of days, and virtues rare, + With her respected Grandsire may compare." + Grandchild of that respected Isola, + Thou shouldst have had about thee on this day + Kind looks of Parents, to congratulate + Their Pride grown up to woman's grave estate. + But they have died, and left thee, to advance + Thy fortunes how thou may'st, and owe to chance + The friends which nature grudged. And thou wilt find, + Or make such, Emma, if I am not blind + To thee and thy deservings. That last strain + Had too much sorrow in it. Fill again + Another cheerful goblet, while I say + "Health, and twice health, to our lost Isola." + + * * * * * + +SHE IS GOING. + + For their elder Sister's hair + Martha does a wreath prepare + Of bridal rose, ornate and gay; + To-morrow is the wedding-day. + She is going. + + Mary, youngest of the three, + Laughing idler, full of glee, + Arm in arm does fondly chain her, + Thinking, poor trifler, to detain her-- + But she's going. + + Vex not, maidens, nor regret + Thus to part with Margaret. + Charms like yours can never stay + Long within doors; and one day + You'll be going. + + + + +SONNETS. + + * * * * * + +HARMONY IN UNLIKENESS. + + By Enfield lanes, and Winchmore's verdant hill, + Two lovely damsels cheer my lonely walk: + The fair Maria, as a vestal, still; + And Emma brown, exuberant in talk. + With soft and Lady speech the first applies + The mild correctives that to grace belong + To her redundant friend, who her defies + With jest, and mad discourse, and bursts of song. + O differing Pair, yet sweetly thus agreeing, + What music from your happy discord rises, + While your companion hearing each, and seeing, + Nor this nor that, but both together, prizes; + This lesson teaching, which our souls may strike, + That harmonies may be in things unlike! + + * * * * * + +WRITTEN AT CAMBRIDGE. + + I was not train'd in Academic bowers, + And to those learned streams I nothing owe + Which copious from those twin fair founts do flow; + Mine have been anything but studious hours. + Yet can I fancy, wandering 'mid thy towers, + Myself a nursling, Granta, of thy lap; + My brow seems tightening with the Doctor's cap, + And I walk _gowned_; feel unusual powers. + Strange forms of logic clothe my admiring speech, + Old Ramus' ghost is busy at my brain; + And my skull teems with notions infinite. + Be still, ye reeds of Camus, while I teach + Truths, which transcend the searching Schoolmen's vein, + And half had stagger'd that stout Stagirite. + + * * * * * + +TO A CELEBRATED FEMALE PERFORMER IN +"THE BLIND BOY." + + Rare artist! who with half thy tools, or none, + Canst execute with ease thy curious art, + And press thy powerful'st meanings on the heart, + Unaided by the eye, expression's throne! + While each blind sense, intelligential grown + Beyond its sphere, performs the effect of sight: + Those orbs alone, wanting their proper might,. + All motionless and silent seem to moan + The unseemly negligence of nature's hand, + That left them so forlorn. What praise is thine, + O mistress of the passions; artist fine! + Who dost our souls against our sense command, + Plucking the horror from a sightless face, + Lending to blank deformity a grace. + + * * * * * + +WORK. + + Who first invented work, and bound the free + And holiday-rejoicing spirit down + To the ever-haunting importunity + Of business in the green fields, and the town-- + To plough, loom, anvil, spade--and oh! most sad + To that dry drudgery at the--desk's dead wood? + Who but the Being unblest, alien from good, + Sabbathless Satan! he who his unglad + Task ever plies 'mid rotatory burnings, + That round and round incalculably reel-- + For wrath divine hath made him like a wheel-- + In that red realm from which are no returnings: + Where toiling, and turmoiling, ever and aye + He, and his thoughts, keep pensive working-day. + + * * * * * + +LEISURE. + + They talk of time, and of time's galling yoke, + That like a mill-stone on man's mind doth press, + Which only works and business can redress: + Of divine Leisure such foul lies are spoke, + Wounding her fair gifts with calumnious stroke. + But might I, fed with silent meditation, + Assoiled live from that fiend Occupation-- + _Improbus Labor_, which my spirits hath broke-- + I'd drink of time's rich cup, and never surfeit: + Fling in more days than went to make the gem + That crown'd the white top of Methusalem: + Yea on my weak neck take, and never forfeit, + Like Atlas bearing up the dainty sky, + The heaven-sweet burden of eternity. + + * * * * * + +DEUS NOBIS HAEC OTIA FECIT. + + * * * * * + +TO SAMUEL ROGERS, ESQ. + + Rogers, of all the men that I have known + But slightly, who have died, your Brother's loss + Touch'd me most sensibly. There came across + My mind an image of the cordial tone + Of your fraternal meetings, where a guest + I more than once have sat; and grieve to think, + That of that threefold cord one precious link + By Death's rude hand is sever'd from the rest. + Of our old gentry he appear'd a stem-- + A Magistrate who, while the evil-doer + He kept in terror, could respect the Poor, + And not for every trifle harass them, + As some, divine and laic, too oft do. + This man's a private loss, and public too. + + * * * * * + +THE GYPSY'S MALISON. + + "Suck, baby, suck! mother's love grows by giving; + Drain the sweet founts that only thrive by wasting; + Black manhood comes, when riotous guilty living + Hands thee the cup that shall be death in tasting. + + "Kiss, baby, kiss! mother's lips shine by kisses; + Choke the warm breath that else would fall in blessings; + Black manhood comes, when turbulent guilty blisses + Tend thee the kiss that poisons 'mid caressings. + + "Hang, baby, hang! mother's love loves such forces, + Strain the fond neck that bends still to thy clinging; + Black manhood comes, when violent lawless courses + Leave thee a spectacle in rude air swinging." + + So sang a wither'd Beldam energetical, + And bann'd the ungiving door with lips prophetical. + + + + +COMMENDATORY VERSES, ETC. + + * * * * * + +TO J. S. KNOWLES, ESQ. +ON HIS TRAGEDY OF VIRGINIUS. + + Twelve years ago I knew thee, Knowles, and then + Esteemed you a perfect specimen + Of those fine spirits warm-soul'd Ireland sends, + To teach us colder English how a friend's + Quick pulse should beat. I knew you brave, and plain, + Strong-sensed, rough-witted, above fear or gain; + But nothing further had the gift to espy. + Sudden you reappear. With wonder I + Hear my old friend (turn'd Shakspeare) read a scene + Only to _his_ inferior in the clean + Passes of pathos: with such fence-like art-- + Ere we can see the steel, 'tis in our heart. + Almost without the aid language affords, + Your piece seems wrought. That huffing medium, _words_, + (Which in the modern Tamburlaines quite sway + Our shamed souls from their bias) in your play + We scarce attend to. Hastier passion draws + Our tears on credit: and we find the cause + Some two hours after, spelling o'er again + Those strange few words at ease, that wrought the pain. + Proceed, old friend; and, as the year returns, + Still snatch some new old story from the urns + Of long-dead virtue. We, that knew before + Your worth, may admire, we cannot love you more. + + * * * * * + +TO THE AUTHOR OF POEMS, + +PUBLISHED UNDER THE NAME OF BARRY CORNWALL. + + Let hate, or grosser heats, their foulness mask + Under the vizor of a borrow'd name; + Let things eschew the light deserving blame: + No cause hast thou to blush for thy sweet task. + "Marcian Colonna" is a dainty book; + And thy "Sicilian Tale" may boldly pass; + Thy "Dream" 'bove all, in which, as in a glass, + On the great world's antique glories we may look. + No longer then, as "lowly substitute, + Factor, or PROCTER, for another's gains," + Suffer the admiring world to be deceived; + Lest thou thyself, by self of fame bereaved, + Lament too late the lost prize of thy pains, + And heavenly tunes piped through an alien flute. + + * * * * * + +TO THE EDITOR OF THE "EVERY-DAY BOOK." + + I like you, and your book, ingenuous Hone! + In whose capacious all-embracing leaves + The very marrow of tradition's shown; + And all that history--much that fiction--weaves. + + By every sort of taste your work is graced. + Vast stores of modern anecdote we find, + With good old story quaintly interlaced-- + The theme as various as the reader's mind. + + Rome's lie-fraught legends you so truly paint-- + Yet kindly,--that the half-turn'd Catholic + Scarcely forbears to smile at his own saint, + And cannot curse the candid heretic. + + Rags, relics, witches, ghosts, fiends, crowd your page; + Our fathers' mummeries we well-pleased behold, + And, proudly conscious of a purer age, + Forgive some fopperies in the times of old. + + Verse-honoring Phoebus, Father of bright _Days_, + Must needs bestow on you both good and many, + Who, building trophies of his Children's praise, + Run their rich Zodiac through, not missing any. + + Dan Phoebus loves your book--trust me, friend Hone-- + The title only errs, he bids me say: + For while such art, wit, reading, there are shown, + He swears,'tis not a work of _every day_. + + * * * * * + +TO T. STOTHARD, ESQ. +ON HIS ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE POEMS OF MR. ROGERS. + + Consummate Artist, whose undying name + With classic Rogers shall go down to fame, + Be this thy crowning work! In my young days + How often have I, with a child's fond gaze, + Pored on the pictur'd wonders[1] thou hadst done: + Clarissa mournful, and prim Grandison! + All Fielding's, Smollett's heroes, rose to view; + I saw, and I believed the phantoms true. + But, above all, that most romantic tale[2] + Did o'er my raw credulity prevail, + Where Glums and Gawries wear mysterious things, + That serve at once for jackets and for wings. + Age, that enfeebles other men's designs, + But heightens thine, and thy free draught refines. + In several ways distinct you make us feel-- + _Graceful_ as Raphael, as Watteau _genteel_. + Your lights and shades, as Titianesque, we praise; + And warmly wish you Titian's length of days. + +[Footnote 1: Illustrations of the British Novelists.] + +[Footnote 2: Peter Wilkins.] + + * * * * * + +TO A FRIEND ON HIS MARRIAGE. + + What makes a happy wedlock? What has fate + Not given to thee in thy well-chosen mate? + Good sense--good humor;--these are trivial things, + Dear M----, that each trite encomiast sings. + But she hath these, and more. A mind exempt + From every low-bred passion, where contempt, + Nor envy, nor detraction, ever found + A harbor yet; an understanding sound; + Just views of right and wrong; perception full + Of the deform'd, and of the beautiful, + In life and manners; wit above her sex, + Which, as a gem, her sprightly converse decks; + Exuberant fancies, prodigal of mirth, + To gladden woodland walk, or winter hearth; + A noble nature, conqueror in the strife + Of conflict with a hard discouraging life, + Strengthening the veins of virtue, past the power + Of those whose days have been one silken hour, + Spoil'd fortune's pamper'd offspring; a keen sense + Alike of benefit, and of offence, + With reconcilement quick, that instant springs + From the charged heart with nimble angel wings; + While grateful feelings, like a signet sign'd + By a strong hand, seemed burn'd into her mind. + If these, dear friend, a dowry can confer + Richer than land, thou hast them all in her; + And beauty, which some hold the chiefest boon, + Is in thy bargain for a make-weight thrown. + + * * * * * + +[In a leaf of a quarto edition of the "Lives of the Saints, written +in Spanish by the learned and reverend father, Alfonso Villegas, +Divine, of the Order of St. Dominick, set forth in English by John +Heigham, Anno 1630," bought at a Catholic book-shop in Duke Street, +Lincoln's Inn Fields, I found, carefully inserted, a painted flower, +seemingly coeval with the book itself; and did not, for some time, +discover that it opened in the middle, and was the cover to a very +humble draught of a St. Anne, with the Virgin and Child; doubtless +the performance of some poor but pious Catholic, whose meditations it +assisted.] + + O lift with reverent hand that tarnish'd flower, + That shrines beneath her modest canopy + Memorials dear to Romish piety; + Dim specks, rude shapes, of Saints! in fervent hour + The work perchance of some meek devotee, + Who, poor in worldly treasures to set forth + The sanctities she worshipp'd to their worth, + In this imperfect tracery might see + Hints, that all Heaven did to her sense reveal. + Cheap gifts best fit poor givers. We are told + Of the lone mite, the cup of water cold, + That in their way approved the offerer's zeal. + True love shows costliest, where the means are scant; + And, in their reckoning, they _abound_, who _want_. + + * * * * * + +THE SELF-ENCHANTED. + + I had a sense in dreams of a beauty rare, + Whom Fate had spell-bound, and rooted there, + Stooping, like some enchanted theme, + Over the marge of that crystal stream, + Where the blooming Greek, to Echo blind, + With Self-love fond, had to waters pined, + Ages had waked, and ages slept, + And that bending posture still she kept: + For her eyes she may not turn away, + 'Till a fairer object shall pass that way-- + 'Till an image more beauteous this world can show, + Than her own which she sees in the mirror below. + Pore on, fair Creature! forever pore, + Nor dream to be disenchanted more: + For vain is expectance, and wish in vain, + 'Till a new Narcissus can come again. + +TO LOUISA M----, +WHOM I USED TO CALL "MONKEY." + + Louisa, serious grown and mild, + I knew you once a romping child, + Obstreperous much and very wild. + Then you would clamber up my knees, + And strive with every art to tease, + When every art of yours could please. + Those things would scarce be proper now, + But they are gone, I know not how, + And woman's written on your brow. + Time draws his finger o'er the scene; + But I cannot forget between + The Thing to me you once have been; + Each sportive sally, wild escape,-- + The scoff, the banter, and the jape,-- + And antics of my gamesome Ape. + + + + +TRANSLATIONS. + +FROM THE LATIN OF VINCENT BOURNE. + + * * * * * + +I. + +THE BALLAD SINGERS. + + Where seven fair Streets to one tall Column[1] draw, + Two Nymphs have ta'en their stand, in hats of straw; + Their yellower necks huge beads of amber grace, + And by their trade they're of the Sirens' race: + With cloak loose-pinn'd on each, that has been red, + But long with dust and dirt discolored + Belies its hue; in mud behind, before, + From heel to middle leg becrusted o'er. + One a small infant at the breast does bear; + And one in her right hand her tuneful ware, + Which she would vend. Their station scarce is taken, + When youths and maids flock round. His stall forsaken, + Forth comes a Son of Crispin, leathern-capt, + Prepared to buy a ballad, if one apt + To move his fancy offers. Crispin's sons + Have, from uncounted time, with ale and buns, + Cherish'd the gift of _Song_, which sorrow quells; + And, working single in their low-rooft cells, + Oft cheat the tedium of a winter's night + With anthems warbled in the Muses' spight.-- + Who now hath caught the alarm? the Servant Maid, + Hath heard a buzz at distance; and, afraid + To miss a note, with elbows red comes out. + Leaving his forge to cool, Pyracmon stout + Thrusts in his unwash'd visage. _He_ stands by, + Who the hard trade of Porterage does ply + With stooping shoulders. What cares he? he sees + The assembled ring, nor heeds his tottering knees, + But pricks his ears up with the hopes of song. + So, while the Bard of Rhodope his wrong + Bewail'd to Proserpine on Thracian strings, + The tasks of gloomy Orcus lost their stings, + And stone-vext Sysiphus forgets his load. + Hither and thither from the sevenfold road + Some cart or wagon crosses, which divides + The close-wedged audience; but, as when the tides + To ploughing ships give way, the ship being past, + They reunite, so these unite as fast. + The older Songstress hitherto hath spent + Her elocution in the argument + Of their great Song in _prose_; to wit, the woes + Which Maiden true to faithless Sailor owes-- + Ah! "_Wandering He!_"--which now in loftier _verse_ + Pathetic they alternately rehearse. + All gaping wait the event. This Critic opes + His right ear to the strain. The other hopes + To catch it better with his left. Long trade + It were to tell, how the deluded maid + A victim fell. And now right greedily + All hands are stretching forth the songs to buy, + That are so tragical; which She, and She, + Deals out, and _sings the while_; nor can there be + A breast so obdurate here, that will hold back + His contribution from the gentle rack + Of Music's pleasing torture. Irus' self, + The staff-propt Beggar, his thin gotten pelf + Brings out from pouch, where squalid farthings rest, + And boldly claims his ballad with the best. + An old Dame only lingers. To her purse + The penny sticks. At length, with harmless curse, + "Give me," she cries. "I'll paste it on my wall, + While the wall lasts, to show what ills befall + Fond hearts, seduced from Innocency's way; + How Maidens fall, and Mariners betray." + +[Footnote 1: Seven Dials] + + * * * * * + +II. + +TO DAVID COOK, + +OF THE PARISH OF ST. MARGARET'S, WESTMINSTER, WATCHMAN. + + For much good-natured verse received from thee, + A loving verse take in return from me. + "Good-morrow to my masters," is your cry; + And to our David "twice as good," say I. + Not Peter's monitor, shrill Chanticleer, + Crows the approach of dawn in notes more clear, + Or tells the hours more faithfully. While night + Fills half the world with shadows of affright, + You with your lantern, partner of your round, + Traverse the paths of Margaret's hallow'd bound. + The tales of ghosts which old wives' ears drink up, + The drunkard reeling home from tavern cup, + Nor prowling robber, your firm soul appall; + Arm'd with thy faithful staff, thou slight'st them all. + But if the market gard'ner chance to pass, + Bringing to town his fruit, or early grass, + The gentle salesman you with candor greet, + And with reit'rated "good-mornings" meet. + Announcing your approach by formal bell, + Of nightly weather you the changes tell; + Whether the Moon shines, or her head doth steep + In rain-portending clouds. When mortals sleep + In downy rest, you brave the snows and sleet + Of winter; and in alley, or in street, + Relieve your midnight progress with a verse. + What though fastidious Phoebus frown averse + On your didactic strain--indulgent Night + With caution hath seal'd up both ears of Spite, + And critics sleep while you in staves do sound + The praise of long-dead Saints, whose Days abound + In wintry months; but Crispin chief proclaim: + Who stirs not at that Prince of Cobblers' name? + Profuse in loyalty some couplets shine, + And wish long days to all the Brunswick line! + To youths and virgins they chaste lessons read; + Teach wives and husbands how their lives to lead; + Maids to be cleanly, footmen free from vice: + How death at last all ranks doth equalize; + And, in conclusion, pray good years befall, + With store of wealth, your "worthy masters all." + For this and other tokens of good will + On boxing-day may store of shillings fill + Your Christmas purse; no householder give less, + When at each door your blameless suit you press: + And what you wish to us (it is but reason) + Receive in turn--the compliments o' th' season! + + * * * * * + +III. + +ON A SEPULCHRAL STATUE OF AN INFANT +SLEEPING. + + Beautiful Infant, who dost keep + Thy posture here, and sleep'st a marble sleep, + May the repose unbroken be, + Which the fine Artist's hand hath lent to thee, + While thou enjoy'st along with it + That which no art, or craft, could ever hit, + Or counterfeit to mortal sense, + The heaven-infused sleep of Innocence! + + * * * * * + +IV. + +EPITAPH ON A DOG. + Poor Irus' faithful wolf-dog here I lie, + That wont to tend my old blind master's steps, + His guide and guard; nor, while my service lasted, + Had he occasion for that staff, with which + He now goes picking out his path in fear + Over the highways and crossings, but would plant, + Safe in the conduct of my friendly string, + A firm foot forward still, till he had reach'd + His poor seat on some stone, nigh where the tide + Of passers-by in thickest confluence flow'd: + To whom with loud and passionate laments + From morn to eve his dark estate he wail'd. + Nor wail'd to all in vain: some here and there, + The well-disposed and good, their pennies gave. + I meantime at his feet obsequious slept; + Not all-asleep in sleep, but heart and ear + Prick'd up at his least motion, to receive + At his kind hand my customary crumbs, + And common portion in his feast of scraps; + Or when night warn'd us homeward, tired and spent + With our long day and tedious beggary. + These were my manners, this my way of life, + Till age and slow disease me overtook, + And sever'd from my sightless master's side. + But lest the grace of so good deeds should die, + Through tract of years in mute oblivion lost, + This slender tomb of turf hath Irus rear'd, + Cheap monument of no ungrudging hand, + And with short verse inscribed it, to attest, + In long and lasting union to attest, + The virtues of the Beggar and his Dog. + + * * * * * + +V. + +THE RIVAL BELLS. + + A tuneful challenge rings from either side + Of Thames' fair banks. Thy twice six Bells, St. Bride, + Peal swift and shrill; to which more slow reply + The deep-toned eight of Mary Overy. + Such harmony from the contention flows, + That the divided ear no preference knows: + Betwixt them both disparting Music's State, + While one exceeds in number, one in weight. + + * * * * * + +VI. + +NEWTON'S PRINCIPIA. + + Great Newton's self, to whom the world's in debt, + Owed to School-Mistress sage his Alphabet; + But quickly wiser than his Teacher grown, + Discover'd properties to her unknown; + Of A _plus_ B, or _minus_, learn'd the use, + Known Quantities from unknown to educe; + And made--no doubt to that old dame's surprise-- + The Christ-Cross-Row his ladder to the skies. + Yet, whatsoe'er Geometricians say, + Her lessons were his true PRINCIPIA! + + * * * * * + +VII. + +THE HOUSEKEEPER. + + The frugal snail, with fore-cast of repose, + Carries his house with him, where'er he goes; + Peeps out--and if there comes a shower of rain, + Retreats to his small domicile amain. + Touch but a tip of him, a horn--'tis well-- + He curls up in his sanctuary shell. + He's his own landlord, his own tenant; stay + Long as he will, he dreads no Quarter Day. + Himself he boards and lodges; both invites, + And feasts, himself; sleeps with himself o' nights. + He spares the upholsterer trouble to procure + Chattels; himself is his own furniture, + And his sole riches. Wheresoe'er he roam-- + Knock when you will--he's sure to be at home. + + * * * * * + +VIII. + +ON A DEAF AND DUMB ARTIST.[1] + +[Footnote 1: Benjamin Ferrers--Died A. D. 1732.] + + And hath thy blameless life become + A prey to the devouring tomb? + A more mute silence hast thou known, + A deafness deeper than thine own, + While Time was? and no friendly Muse, + That mark'd thy life, and knows thy dues, + Repair with quickening verse the breach. + And write thee into light and speech? + The Power, that made the Tongue, restrain'd + Thy lips from lies, and speeches feign'd; + Who made the Hearing, without wrong + Did rescue thine from Siren's song. + He let thee _see_ the ways of men, + Which thou with pencil, not with pen, + Careful Beholder, down didst note, + And all their motley actions quote, + Thyself unstain'd the while. From look + Or gesture reading, more than _book_, + In letter'd pride thou took'st no part, + Contented with the Silent Art, + Thyself as silent. Might I be + As speechless, deaf, and good, as He! + + * * * * * + +IX. + +THE FEMALE ORATORS. + + Nigh London's famous Bridge, a Gate more famed + Stands, or once stood, from old Belinus named, + So judged Antiquity; and therein wrongs + A name, allusive strictly to _two Tongues_[1] + Her School hard by the Goddess Rhetoric opes, + And _gratis_ deals to Oyster-wives her Tropes. + With Nereid green, green Nereid disputes, + Replies, rejoins, confutes, and still confutes. + One her coarse sense by metaphors expounds, + And one in literalities abounds; + In mood and figure these keep up the din: + Words multiply, and every word tells in. + Her hundred throats here bawling Slander strains; + And unclothed Venus to her tongue gives reins + In terms, which Demosthenic force outgo, + And baldest jests of foul-mouth'd Cicero. + Right in the midst great Ate keeps her stand, + And from her sovereign station taints the land. + Hence Pulpits rail; grave Senates learn to jar; + Quacks scold; and Billingsgate infects the Bar. + +[Footnote 1: _Bilinguis_ in the Latin.] + + * * * * * + +PINDARIC ODE TO THE TREAD-MILL. + + +I. + + Inspire my spirit, Spirit of De Foe, + That sang the Pillory, + In loftier strains to show + A more sublime Machine + Than that, where thou wert seen, + With neck outstretcht and shoulders ill awry, + Courting coarse plaudits from vile crowds below-- + A most unseemly show! + + +II. + + In such a place + Who could expose thy face, + Historiographer of deathless Crusoe! + That paint'st the strife + And all the naked ills of savage life, + Far above Rousseau? + Rather myself had stood + In that ignoble wood, + Bare to the mob, on holiday or high-day. + If nought else could atone + For waggish libel, + I swear on bible, + I would have spared him for thy sake alone, + Man Friday! + + +III. + + Our ancestors' were sour days, + Great Master of Romance! + A milder doom had fallen to thy chance + In our days: + Thy sole assignment + Some solitary confinement, + (Not worth thy care a carrot,) + Where in world-hidden cell + Thou thy own Crusoe might have acted well, + Only without the parrot; + By sure experience taught to know, + Whether the qualms thou mak'st him feel were truly such or no. + + +IV. + + But stay! methinks in statelier measure-- + A more companionable pleasure-- + I see thy steps the mighty Tread-Mill trace, + (The subject of my song, + Delay'd however long,) + And some of thine own race, + To keep thee company, thou bring'st with thee along. + There with thee go, + Link'd in like sentence, + With regulated pace and footing slow, + Each old acquaintance, + Rogue--harlot--thief--that live to future ages; + Through many a labor'd tome, + Rankly embalm'd in thy too natural pages. + Faith, friend De Foe, thou art quite at home! + Not one of thy great offspring thou dost lack, + From pirate Singleton to pilfering Jack. + Here Flandrian Moll her brazen incest brags; + Vice-stript Roxana, penitent in rags, + There points to Amy, treading equal chimes, + The faithful handmaid to her faithless crimes. + + +V. + + Incompetent my song to raise, + To its just height thy praise, + Great Mill! + That by thy motion proper + (No thanks to wind, or sail, or working rill), + Grinding that stubborn corn, the Human will, + Turn'st out men's consciences, + That were begrimed before, as clean and sweet + As flour from purest wheat, + Into thy hopper. + All reformation short of thee but nonsense is, + Or human, or divine. + + +VI. + + Compared with thee, + What are the labors of that Jumping Sect, + Which feeble laws connive at rather than respect? + Thou dost not bump, + Or jump, + But _walk_ men into virtue; betwixt crime + And slow repentance giving breathing time, + And leisure to be good; + Instructing with discretion demi-reps + How to direct their steps. + + +VII. + + Thou best Philosopher made out of wood! + Not that which framed the tub, + Where sat the Cynic cub, + With nothing in his bosom sympathetic; + But from those groves derived, I deem, + Where Plato nursed his dream + Of immortality; + Seeing that clearly + Thy system all is merely + Peripatetic. + Thou to thy pupils dost such lessons give + Of how to live + With temperance, sobriety, morality, + (A new art,) + That from thy school, by force of virtuous deeds, + Each Tyro now proceeds + A "Walking Stewart!" + + * * * * * + +GOING OR GONE. + +I. + + Fine merry franions, + Wanton companions, + My days are ev'n banyans + With thinking upon ye! + How Death, that last stinger, + Finis-writer, end-bringer, + Has laid his chill finger, + Or is laying on ye. + + +II. + + There's rich Kitty Wheatley, + With footing it featly + That took me completely, + She sleeps in the Kirk House; + And poor Polly Perkin, + Whose Dad was still firking + The jolly ale firkin, + She's gone to the Work-house; + + +III. + + Fine Gard'ner, Ben Carter + (In ten counties no smarter) + Has ta'en his departure + For Proserpine's orchards: + And Lily, postilion, + With cheeks of vermilion, + Is one of a million + That fill up the church-yards; + + +IV. + + And, lusty as Dido, + Fat Clemitson's widow + Flits now a small shadow + By Stygian hid ford; + And good Master Clapton + Has thirty years napt on, + The ground he last hapt on, + Entomb'd by fair Widford; + + +V. + + And gallant Tom Dockwra, + Of Nature's finest crockery, + Now but thin air and mockery, + Lurks by Avernus, + Whose honest grasp of hand + Still, while his life did stand, + At friend's or foe's command, + Almost did burn us. + + +VI. + + Roger de Coverley + Not more good man than he; + Yet has he equally + Push'd for Cocytus, + With drivelling Worral, + And wicked old Dorrell, + 'Gainst whom I've a quarrel, + Whose end might affright us!-- + + +VII. + + Kindly hearts have I known; + Kindly hearts, they are flown; + Here and there if but one + Linger yet uneffaced, + Imbecile tottering elves, + Soon to be wreck'd on shelves, + These scarce are half themselves, + With age and care crazed. + + +VIII. + + But this day Fanny Hutton + Her last dress has put on; + Her fine lessons forgotten, + She died, as the dunce died; + And prim Betsey Chambers, + Decay'd in her members, + No longer remembers + Things, as she once did; + + +IX. + + And prudent Miss Wither + Not in jest now doth _wither_, + And soon must go--whither + Nor I well, nor you know; + And flaunting Miss Waller, + _That_ soon must befall her, + Whence none can recall her, + Though proud once as Juno! + + + * * * * * + + + +FREE THOUGHTS ON SEVERAL EMINENT +COMPOSERS. + + Some cry up Haydn, some Mozart, + Just as the whim bites; for my part, + I do not care a farthing candle + For either of them, or for Handel.-- + Cannot a man live free and easy, + Without admiring Pergolesi? + Or through the world with comfort go, + That never heard of Doctor Blow? + So help me heaven, I hardly have; + And yet I eat, and drink, and shave, + Like other people, if you watch it, + And know no more of stave or crotchet, + Than did the primitive Peruvians; + Or those old ante-queer-diluvians + That lived in the unwash'd world with Jubal, + Before that dirty blacksmith Tubal + By stroke on anvil, or by summ'at, + Found out, to his great surprise, the gamut. + I care no more for Cimarosa, + Than he did for Salvator Rosa, + Being no painter; and bad luck + Be mine, if I can bear that Gluck! + Old Tycho Brahe, and modern Herschel, + Had something in them; but who's Purcel? + The devil, with his foot so cloven, + For aught I care, may take Beethoven; + And, if the bargain does not suit, + I'll throw him Weber in to boot. + There's not the splitting of a splinter + To choose twixt him last named, and Winter. + Of Doctor Pepusch old queen Dido + Knew just as much, God knows, as I do. + I would not go four miles to visit + Sebastian Bach; (or Batch, which is it?) + No more I would for Bononcini. + As for Novello, or Rossini, + I shall not say a word to grieve 'em, + Because they're living; so I leave 'em. + + + + +THE WIFE'S TRIAL; + +OR, + +THE INTRUDING WIDOW. + +A Dramatic poem. + +FOUNDED ON MR. CRABBE'S TALE OF "THE CONFIDANT." + + * * * * * + +CHARACTERS. + +MR. SELBY, _A Wiltshire Gentleman._ +KATHERINE, _Wife to Selby_. +LUCY, _Sister to Selby_. +MRS. FRAMPTON, _A Widow_. + +SERVANTS. + +SCENE--_At Mr. Selby's House, or in the grounds adjacent_. + + * * * * * + +SCENE--_A Library_. + +MR. SELBY. KATHERINE. + +_Selby_. Do not too far mistake me, gentlest wife; +I meant to chide your virtues, not yourself, +And those too with allowance. I have not +Been blest by thy fair side with five white years +Of smooth and even wedlock, now to touch +With any strain of harshness on a string +Hath yielded me such music. 'Twas the quality +Of a too grateful nature in my Katherine, +That to the lame performance of some vows, +And common courtesies of man to wife, +Attributing too much, hath sometimes seem'd +To esteem as favors, what in that blest union +Are but reciprocal and trivial dues, +As fairly yours as mine: 'twas this I thought +Gently to reprehend. + +_Kath._ In friendship's barter +The riches we exchange should hold some level, +And corresponding worth. Jewels for toys +Demand some thanks thrown in. You look me, sir, +To that blest haven of my peace, your bosom, +An orphan founder'd in the world's black storm. +Poor, you have made me rich; from lonely maiden, +Your cherish'd and your full-accompanied wife. + +_Selby._ But to divert the subject: Kate too fond, +I would not wrest your meanings; else that word +Accompanied, and full-accompanied too, +Might raise a doubt in some men, that their wives +Haply did think their company too long; +And over-company, we know by proof, +Is worse than no attendance. + +_Kath._ I must guess, +You speak this of the Widow-- + +_Selby._ 'Twas a bolt +At random shot; but if it hit, believe me, +I am most sorry to have wounded you +Through a friend's side. I know not how we have swerved +From our first talk. I was to caution you +Against this fault of a too grateful nature: +Which, for some girlish obligations past, +In that relenting season of the heart, +When slightest favors pass for benefits +Of endless binding, would entail upon you +An iron slavery of obsequious duty +To the proud will of an imperious woman. + +_Kath_. The favors are not slight to her I owe. + +_Selby_. Slight or not slight, the tribute she exacts +Cancels all dues-- [_A voice within_. + even now I hear her call you +In such a tone, as lordliest mistresses +Expect a slave's attendance. Prithee, Kate. +Let her expect a brace of minutes or so. +Say you are busy. Use her by degrees +To some less hard exactions. + +_Kath_. I conjure you, +Detain me not. I will return-- + +_Selby_. Sweet wife, +Use thy own pleasure-- [_Exit_ KATHERINE. + but it troubles me. +A visit of three days, as was pretended, +Spun to ten tedious weeks, and no hint given +When she will go! I would this buxom Widow +Were a thought handsomer! I'd fairly try +My Katherine's constancy; make desperate love +In seeming earnest; and raise up such broils, +That she, not I, should be the first to warn +The insidious guest depart. + + _Reenter_ KATHERINE. + +So soon return'd! +What was our Widow's will? + +_Kath_. A trifle, sir. + +_Selby_. Some toilet service--to adjust her head, +Or help to stick a pin in the right place-- + +_Kath_. Indeed 'twas none of these. + +_Selby._ Or new vamp up +The tarnish'd cloak she came in. I have seen her +Demand such service from thee, as her maid, +Twice told to do it, would blush angry-red, +And pack her few clothes up. Poor fool! fond slave! +And yet my dearest Kate!--This day at least +(It is our wedding-day) we spend in freedom, +And will forget our Widow. Philip, our coach-- +Why weeps my wife? You know, I promised you +An airing o'er the pleasant Hampshire downs +To the blest cottage on the green hill-side, +Where first I told my love. I wonder much, +If the crimson parlor hath exchanged its hue +For colors not so welcome. Faded though it be, +It will not show less lovely than the tinge +Of this faint red, contending with the pale, +Where once the full-flush'd health gave to this cheek +An apt resemblance to the fruit's warm side, +That bears my Katherine's name.-- + Our carriage, Philip. + + _Enter a Servant._ + +Now, Robin, what make you here? + +_Servant._ May it please you, +The coachman has driven out with Mrs. Frampton. + +_Selby._ He had no orders-- + +_Servant._ None, sir, that I know of, +But from the lady, who expects some letter +At the next Post Town. + +_Selby._ Go, Robin. [_Exit Servant._ + How is this? + +_Kath._ I came to tell you so, but fear'd your anger-- + +_Selby._ It was ill done though of this Mistress Frampton, +This forward Widow. But a ride's poor loss +Imports not much. In to your chamber, love, +Where you with music may beguile the hour, +While I am tossing over dusty tomes, +Till our most reasonable friend returns. + +_Kath_. I am all obedience. [_Exit_ KATHERINE. + +_Selby_. Too obedient, Kate, +And to too many masters. I can hardly +On such a day as this refrain to speak +My sense of this injurious friend, this pest, +This household evil, this close-clinging fiend, +In rough terms to my wife. 'Death, my own servants +Controll'd above me! orders countermanded! +What next? [_Servant enters and announces the Sister._ + + _Enter_ LUCY. + +Sister! I know you are come to welcome +This day's return. 'Twas well done. + +_Lucy_. You seem ruffled. +In years gone by this day was used to be +The smoothest of the year. Your honey turn'd +So soon to gall? + +_Selby_. Gall'd am I, and with cause, +And rid to death, yet cannot get a riddance, +Nay, scarce a ride, by this proud Widow's leave. + +_Lucy_. Something you wrote me of a Mistress Frampton. + +_Selby_. She came at first a meek admitted guest, +Pretending a short stay; her whole deportment +Seem'd as of one obliged. A slender trunk, +The wardrobe of her scant and ancient clothing, +Bespoke no more. But in few days her dress, +Her looks, were proudly changed. And now she flaunts it +In jewels stolen or borrow'd from my wife; +Who owes her some strange service, of what nature +I must be kept in ignorance. Katherine's meek +And gentle spirit cowers beneath her eye, +As spell-bound by some witch. + +_Lucy_. Some mystery hangs on it. +How bears she in her carriage towards yourself? + +_Selby_. As one who fears, and yet not greatly cares +For my displeasure. Sometimes I have thought, +A secret glance would tell me she could love, +If I but gave encouragement. Before me +She keeps some moderation; but is never +Closeted with my wife, but in the end +I find my Katherine in briny tears. +From the small chamber, where she first was lodged, +The gradual fiend by spacious wriggling arts +Has now ensconced herself in the best part +Of this large mansion; calls the left wing her own; +Commands my servants, equipage.--I hear +Her hated tread. What makes she back so soon? + + _Enter_ MRS. FRAMPTON. + +_Mrs. F._ O, I am jolter'd, bruised, and shook to death, +With your vile Wiltshire roads. The villain Philip +Chose, on my conscience, the perversest tracks, +And stoniest hard lanes in all the county, +Till I was fain get out, and so walk back, +My errand unperform'd at Andover. + +_Lucy_. And I shall love the knave forever after. + [_Aside_. + +_Mrs. F._ A friend with you! + +_Selby_. My eldest sister, Lucy, +Come to congratulate this returning morn.-- +Sister, my wife's friend, Mistress Frampton. + +_Mrs. F._ Pray, +Be seated; for your brother's sake, you are welcome. +I had thought this day to have spent in homely fashion +With the good couple, to whose hospitality +I stand so far indebted. But your coming +Makes it a feast. + +_Lucy._ She does the honors naturally-- + [_Aside._ + +_Selby._ As if she were the mistress of the house.-- + [_Aside._ + +_Mrs. F._ I love to be at home with loving friends. +To stand on ceremony with obligations, +Is to restrain the obliger. That old coach, though, +Of yours jumbles one strangely. + +_Selby._ I shall order +An equipage soon, more easy to you, madam-- + +_Lucy._ To drive her and her pride to Lucifer, +I hope he means. [_Aside._ + +_Mrs. F._ I must go trim myself; this humbled garb +Would shame a wedding-feast. I have your leave +For a short absence?--and your Katherine-- + +_Selby._ You'll find her in her closet-- + +_Mrs. F._ Fare you well, then. + [_Exit._ + +_Selby._ How like you her assurance? + +_Lucy._ Even so well, +That if this Widow were my guest, not yours, +She should have coach enough, and scope to ride. +My merry groom should in a trice convey her +To Sarum Plain, and set her down at Stonehenge, +To pick her path through those antiques at leisure; +She should take sample of our Wiltshire flints. +O, be not lightly jealous! nor surmise, +That to a wanton bold-faced thing like this +Your modest shrinking Katherine could impart +Secrets of any worth, especially +Secrets that touch'd your peace. If there be aught, +My life upon't,'tis but some girlish story +Of a First Love; which even the boldest wife +Might modestly deny to a husband's ear, +Much more your timid and too sensitive Katherine. + +_Selby_. I think it is no more; and will dismiss +My further fears, if ever I have had such. + +_Lucy_. Shall we go walk? I'd see your gardens, brother; +And how the new trees thrive, I recommended. +Your Katherine is engaged now-- + +_Selby_. I'll attend you. + + [_Exeunt_. + + +SCENE.--_Servants' Hall_. + +HOUSEKEEPER, PHILIP, _and others, laughing_. + +_Housekeeper_. Our Lady's guest, since her short ride, seems ruffled, +And somewhat in disorder. Philip, Philip, +I do suspect some roguery. Your mad tricks +Will some day cost you a good place, I warrant. + +_Philip_. Good Mistress Jane, our serious housekeeper, +And sage Duenna to the maids and scullions, +We must have leave to laugh; our brains are younger, +And undisturb'd with care of keys and pantries. +We are wild things. + +_Butler_. Good Philip, tell us all. + +_All_. Ay, as you live, tell, tell-- + +_Philip_. Mad fellows, you shall have it. +The Widow's bell rang lustily and loud-- + +_Butler_. I think that no one can mistake her ringing. + +_Waiting-maid_. Our Lady's ring is soft sweet music to it, +More of entreaty hath it than command. + +_Philip_. I lose my story, if you interrupt me thus. +The bell, I say, rang fiercely; and a voice +More shrill than bell, call'd out for "Coachman Philip!" + +I straight obey'd, as 'tis my name and office, +"Drive me," quoth she, "to the next market-town, +Where I have hope of letters." I made haste: +Put to the horses, saw her safely coach'd, +And drove her-- + +_Waiting-maid_. By the straight high-road to Andover, +I guess-- + +_Philip_. Pray, warrant things within your knowledge, +Good Mistress Abigail; look to your dressings, +And leave the skill in horses to the coachman. + +_Butler_. He'll have his humor; best not interrupt him. + +_Philip_. 'Tis market-day, thought I; and the poor beasts, +Meeting such droves of cattle and of people, +May take a fright; so down the lane I trundled, +Where Goodman Dobson's crazy mare was founder'd, +And where the flints were biggest, and ruts widest, +By ups and downs, and such bone-cracking motions +We flounder'd on a furlong, till my madam, +In policy, to save the few joints left her, +Betook her to her feet, and there we parted. + +_All_. Ha! ha! ha! + +_Butler_. Hang her, 'tis pity such as she should ride. + +_Waiting-maid_. I think she is a witch; I have tired myself out +With sticking pins in her pillow; still she scapes them-- + +_Butler_. And I with helping her to mum for claret, +But never yet could cheat her dainty palate. + +_Housekeeper_. Well, well, she is the guest of our good Mistress, +And so should be respected. Though, I think, +Our master cares not for her company, +He would ill brook we should express so much +By rude discourtesies, and short attendance, +Being but servants. (_A Bell rings furiously._) + 'Tis her bell speaks now; +Good, good, bestir yourselves: who knows who's wanted? + +_Butler_. But 'twas a merry trick of Philip coachman. + [_Exeunt_. + + * * * * * + +SCENE.--_Mrs. Selby's Chamber_. + +MRS. FRAMPTON, KATHERINE, _working_. + +_Mrs. F._ I am thinking, child, how contrary our fates +Have traced our lots through life.--Another needle, +This works untowardly.--An heiress born +To splendid prospects, at our common school +I was as one above you all, not of you; +Had my distinct prerogatives; my freedoms, +Denied to you. Pray, listen-- + +_Kath_. I must hear, +What you are pleased to speak--how my heart sinks here! [_Aside_. + +_Mrs. F_. My chamber to myself, my separate maid, +My coach, and so forth.--Not that needle, simple one, +With the great staring eye fit for a Cyclops! +Mine own are not so blinded with their griefs, +But I could make a shift to thread a smaller. +A cable or a camel might go through this, +And never strain for the passage. + +_Kath_. I will fit you---- +Intolerable tyranny! [_Aside_. + +_Mrs. F_. Quick, quick; +You were not once so slack.--As I was saying, +Not a young thing among ye, but observed me +Above the mistress. Who but I was sought to +In all your dangers, all your little difficulties, +Your girlish scrapes? I was the scape-goat still, +To fetch you off; kept all your secrets, some, +Perhaps, since then-- + +_Kath_. No more of that, for mercy, +If you'd not have me, sinking at your feet, +Cleave the cold earth for comfort. [_Kneels_. + +_Mrs. F._ This to me? +This posture to your friend had better suited +The orphan Katherine in her humble school-days +To the _then_ rich heiress, than the wife of Selby, +Of wealthy Mr. Selby, +To the poor widow Frampton, sunk as she is. +Come, come, +'Twas something, or 'twas nothing, that I said; +I did not mean to fright you, sweetest bedfellow! +You once were so, but Selby now engrosses you. +I'll make him give you up a night or so; +In faith I will: that we may lie, and talk +Old tricks of school-days over. + +_Kath._ Hear me, madam-- + +_Mrs. F._ Not by that name. Your friend-- + +_Kath._ My truest friend, +And savior of my honor! + +_Mrs. F._ This sounds better; +You still shall find me such. + +_Kath._ That you have graced +Our poor house with your presence hitherto, +Has been my greatest comfort, the sole solace +Of my forlorn and hardly guess'd estate. +You have been pleased +To accept some trivial hospitalities, +In part of payment of a long arrear +I owe to you, no less than for my life. + +_Mrs. F._ You speak my services too large. + +_Kath._ Nay, less; +For what an abject thing were life to me +Without your silence on my dreadful secret! +And I would wish the league we have renew'd +Might be perpetual-- + +_Mrs. F._ Have a care, fine madam! [_Aside._ + +_Kath._ That one house still might hold us. But my husband +Has shown himself of late-- + +_Mrs. F._ How, Mistress Selby? + +_Kath._ Not, not impatient. You misconstrue him. +He honors, and he loves, nay, he must love +The friend of his wife's youth. But there are moods, +In which-- + +_Mrs. F._ I understand you;--in which husbands, +And wives that love, may wish to be alone, +To nurse the tender fits of new-born dalliance, +After a five years' wedlock. + +_Kath._ Was that well, +Or charitably put? do these pale cheeks +Proclaim a wanton blood? This wasting form +Seem a fit theatre for Levity +To play his love-tricks on; and act such follies, +As even in Affection's first bland Moon +Have less of grace than pardon in best wedlocks? +I was about to say, that there are times, +When the most frank and sociable man +May surfeit on most loved society, +Preferring loneness rather-- + +_Mrs. F._ To my company-- + +_Kath._ Ay, yours, or mine, or any one's. Nay, take +Not this unto yourself. Even in the newness +Of our first married loves 'twas sometimes so. +For solitude, I have heard my Selby say, +Is to the mind as rest to the corporal functions; +And he would call it oft, the _day's soft sleep._ + +_Mrs. F._ What is your drift? and whereto tends this speech, +Rhetorically labor'd? + +_Kath._ That you would +Abstain but from our house a month, a week; +I make request but for a single day. + +_Mrs. F._ A month, a week, a day! A single hour +Is every week, and month, and the long year, +And all the years to come! My footing here, +Slipt once, recovers never. From the state +Of gilded roofs, attendance, luxuries, +Parks, gardens, sauntering walks, or wholesome rides, +To the bare cottage on the withering moor, +Where I myself am servant to myself, +Or only waited on by blackest thoughts-- +I sink, if this be so. No; here I sit. + +_Kath_. Then I am lost forever! + + [_Sinks at her feet--curtain drops._ + + +SCENE--_An Apartment contiguous to the last._ + +SELBY, _as if listening_. + +_Selby_. The sounds have died away. What am I changed to? +What do I here, list'ning like to an abject, +Or heartless wittol, that must hear no good, +If he hear aught? "This shall to the ear of your husband." +It was the Widow's word. I guess'd some mystery, +And the solution with a vengeance comes. +What can my wife have left untold to me, +That must be told by proxy? I begin +To call in doubt the course of her life past +Under my very eyes. She hath not been good, +Not virtuous, not discreet; she hath not outrun +My wishes still with prompt and meek observance. +Perhaps she is not fair, sweet-voiced; her eyes +Not like the dove's; all this as well may be, +As that she should entreasure up a secret +In the peculiar closet of her breast, +And grudge it to my ear. It is my right +To claim the halves in any truth she owns, +As much as in the babe I have by her; +Upon whose face henceforth I fear to look, +Lest I should fancy in its innocent brow +Some strange shame written. + + _Enter_ LUCY. + + Sister, an anxious word with you. +From out the chamber, where my wife but now +Held talk with her encroaching friend, I heard +(Not of set purpose heark'ning, but by chance) +A voice of chiding, answer'd by a tone +Of replication, such as the meek dove +Makes, when the kite has clutch'd her. The high Widow +Was loud and stormy. I distinctly heard +One threat pronounced--"Your husband shall know all." +I am no listener, sister; and I hold +A secret, got by such unmanly shift, +The pitiful'st of thefts; but what mine ear, +I not intending it, receives perforce, +I count my lawful prize. Some subtle meaning +Lurks in this fiend's behavior; which, by force, +Or fraud I must make mine. + +_Lucy_. The gentlest means +Are still the wisest. What, if you should press +Your wife to a disclosure? + +_Selby_. I have tried +All gentler means; thrown out low hints, which, though +Merely suggestions still, have never fail'd +To blanch her cheek with fears. Roughlier to insist, +Would be to kill, where I but meant to heal. + +_Lucy_. Your own description gave that Widow out +As one not much precise, nor over-coy, +And nice to listen to a suit of love. +What if you feign'd a courtship, putting on, +(To work the secret from her easy faith,) +For honest ends, a most dishonest seeming? + +_Selby_. I see your drift, and partly meet your counsel. +But must it not in me appear prodigious, +To say the least, unnatural, and suspicious, +To move hot love, where I have shown cool scorn, +And undissembled looks of blank aversion? + +_Lucy_. Vain woman is the dupe of her own charms, +And easily credits the resistless power, +That in besieging beauty lies, to cast down +The slight-built fortress of a casual hate. + +_Selby_. I am resolved-- + +_Lucy_. Success attend your wooing! + +_Selby_. And I'll about it roundly, my wise sister. + [_Exeunt_. + + +SCENE.--_The Library_. + +MR. SELBY. MRS. FRAMPTON. + +_Selby_. A fortunate encounter, Mistress Frampton. +My purpose was, if you could spare so much +From your sweet leisure, a few words in private. + +_Mrs. F._ What mean his alter'd tones? These looks to me, +Whose glances yet he has repell'd with coolness? +Is the wind changed? I'll veer about with it, +And meet him in all fashions. [_Aside_. + All my leisure, +Feebly bestow'd upon my kind friends here, +Would not express a tithe of the obligements +I every hour incur. + +_Selby_. No more of that. +I know not why, my wife hath lost of late +Much of her cheerful spirits. + +_Mrs. F._ It was my topic +To-day; and every day, and all day long, +I still am chiding with her. "Child," I said, +And said it pretty roundly--it may be +I was too peremptory--we elder school-fellows, +Presuming on the advantage of a year +Or two, which, in that tender time, seem'd much, +In after years, much like to elder sisters, +Are prone to keep the authoritative style, +When time has made the difference most ridiculous-- + +_Selby_. The observation's shrewd. + +_Mrs. F._ "Child," I was saying, +"If some wives had obtain'd a lot like yours," +And then perhaps I sigh'd, "they would not sit +In corners moping, like to sullen moppets, +That want their will, but dry their eyes, and look +Their cheerful husbands in the face," perhaps +I said, their Selbys, "with proportion'd looks +Of honest joy." + +_Selby_. You do suspect no jealousy? + +_Mrs. F._ What is his import? Whereto tends his Speech? + [_Aside_. +Of whom, or what, should she be jealous, sir? + +_Selby_. I do not know, but women have their fancies; +And underneath a cold indifference, +Or show of some distaste, husbands have mask'd +A growing fondness for a female friend, +Which the wife's eye was sharp enough to see, +Before the friend had wit to find it out. +You do not quit us soon? + +_Mrs. F._ 'Tis as I find; +Your Katherine profits by my lessons, sir.-- +Means this man honest? Is there no deceit? [_Aside._ + +_Selby_. She cannot choose.--Well, well, I have been thinking, +And if the matter were to do again-- + +_Mrs. F._ What matter, sir? + +_Selby._ This idle bond of wedlock; +These sour-sweet briars, fetters of harsh silk; +I might have made, I do not say a better, +But a more fit choice in a wife. + +_Mrs. F._ The parch'd ground, +In hottest Julys, drinks not in the showers +More greedily than I his words! [_Aside_. + +_Selby_. My humor +Is to be frank and jovial; and that man +Affects me best, who most reflects me in +My most free temper. + +_Mrs. F._ Were you free to choose, +As jestingly I'll put the supposition, +Without a thought reflecting on your Katherine, +What sort of Woman would you make your choice? + +_Selby_. I like your humor and will meet your jest. +She should be one about my Katherine's age; +But not so old, by some ten years, in gravity, +One that would meet my mirth, sometimes outrun it: +No muling, pining moppet, as you said, +Nor moping maid that I must still be teaching +The freedoms of a wife all her life after: +But one that, having worn the chain before, +(And worn it lightly, as report gave out,) +Enfranchised from it by her poor fool's death, +Took it not so to heart that I need dread +To die myself, for fear a second time +To wet a widow's eye. + +_Mrs. F._ Some widows, sir, +Hearing you talk so wildly, would be apt +To put strange misconstruction on your words, +As aiming at a Turkish liberty, +Where the free husband hath his several mates, +His Penseroso, his Allegro wife, +To suit his sober or his frolic fit. + +_Selby_. How judge you of that latitude? + +_Mrs. F._ As one, +In European customs bred, must judge. Had I +Been born a native of the liberal East, +I might have thought as they do. Yet I knew +A married man that took a second wife, +And (the man's circumstances duly weigh'd, +With all their bearings) the considerate world +Nor much approved, nor much condemn'd the deed. + +_Selby_. You move my wonder strangely. Pray, proceed. + +_Mrs. F._ An eye of wanton liking he had placed +Upon a Widow, who liked him again, +But stood on terms of honorable love, +And scrupled wronging his most virtuous wife-- +When to their ears a lucky rumor ran, +That this demure and saintly-seeming wife +Had a first husband living; with the which +Being question'd, she but faintly could deny. +"A priest indeed there was; some words had pass'd, +But scarce amounting to a marriage rite. +Her friend was absent; she supposed him dead; +And, seven years parted, both were free to choose." + +_Selby_. What did the indignant husband? Did he not +With violent handlings stigmatize the cheek +Of the deceiving wife, who had entail'd +Shame on their innocent babe? + +_Mrs. F._ He neither tore +His wife's locks nor his own; but wisely weighing +His own offence with hers in equal poise, +And woman's weakness 'gainst the strength of man, +Came to a calm and witty compromise. +He coolly took his gay-faced widow home, +Made her his second wife; and still the first +Lost few or none of her prerogatives. +The servants call'd her mistress still; she kept +The keys, and had the total ordering +Of the house affairs; and, some slight toys excepted, +Was all a moderate wife would wish to be. + +_Selby_. A tale full of dramatic incident!-- +And if a man should put it in a play, +How should he name the parties? + +_Mrs. F._ The man's name +Through time I have forgot--the widow's too;-- +But his first wife's first name, her maiden one, +Was--not unlike to _that_ your Katherine bore, +Before she took the honor'd style of Selby. + +_Selby_. A dangerous meaning in your riddle lurks. +One knot is yet unsolved; that told, this strange +And most mysterious drama ends. The name +Of that first husband-- + + _Enter_ LUCY. + +_Mrs. F._ Sir, your pardon-- +The allegory fits your private ear. +Some half hour hence, in the garden's secret walk, +We shall have leisure. [_Exit_. + +_Selby_. Sister, whence come you? + +_Lucy_. From your poor Katherine's chamber, where she droops +In sad presageful thoughts, and sighs, and weeps, +And seems to pray by turns. At times she looks +As she would pour her secret in my bosom-- +Then starts, as I have seen her, at the mention +Of some immodest act. At her request, +I left her on her knees. + +_Selby_. The fittest posture; +For great has been her fault to Heaven and me. +She married me with a first husband living, +Or not known not to be so, which, in the judgment +Of any but indifferent honesty, +Must be esteem'd the same. The shallow Widow, +Caught by my art, under a riddling veil +Too thin to hide her meaning, hath confess'd all. +Your coming in broke off the conference, +When she was ripe to tell the fatal _name_ +That seals my wedded doom. + +_Lucy_. Was she so forward +To pour her hateful meanings in your ear +At the first hint? + +_Selby_. Her newly flatter'd hopes +Array'd themselves at first in forms of doubt; +And with a female caution she stood off +Awhile, to read the meaning of my suit, +Which with such honest seeming I enforced, +That her cold scruples soon gave way; and now +She rests prepared, as mistress, or as wife, +To seize the place of her betrayed friend-- +My much offending, but more suffering, Katherine. + +_Lucy_. Into what labyrinth of fearful shapes +My simple project has conducted you-- +Were but my wit as skilful to invent +A clue to lead you forth!--I call to mind +A letter, which your wife received from the Cape, +Soon after you were married, with some circumstances +Of mystery too. + +_Selby_. I well remember it. +That letter did confirm the truth (she said) +Of a friend's death, which she had long fear'd true, +But knew not for a fact. A youth of promise +She gave him out--a hot adventurous spirit-- +That had set sail in quest of golden dreams, +And cities in the heart of Central Afric; +But named no names, nor did I care to press +My question further, in the passionate grief +She show'd at the receipt. Might this be he? + +_Lucy_. Tears were not all. When that first shower was past, +With clasp'd hands she raised her eyes to Heav'n, +As if in thankfulness for some escape, +Or strange deliverance, in the news implied, +Which sweeten'd that sad news. + +_Selby_. Something of that +I noted also-- + +_Lucy_. In her closet once, +Seeking some other trifle, I espied +A ring, in mournful characters deciphering +The death of "Robert Halford, aged two +And twenty." Brother, I am not given +To the confident use of wagers, which I hold +Unseemly in a woman's argument; +But I am strangely tempted now to risk +A thousand pounds out of my patrimony, +(And let my future husband look to it, +If it be lost,) that this immodest Widow +Shall name the name that tallies with that ring. + +_Selby_. That wager lost, I should be rich indeed-- +Rich in my rescued Kate--rich in my honor, +Which now was bankrupt. Sister, I accept +Your merry wager, with an aching heart +For very fear of winning. 'Tis the hour +That I should meet my Widow in the walk, +The south side of the garden. On some pretence +Lure forth my Wife that way, that she may witness +Our seeming courtship. Keep us still in sight, +Yourselves unseen; and by some sign I'll give, +(A finger held up, or a kerchief waved,) +You'll know your wager won--then break upon us, +As if by chance. + +_Lucy_. I apprehend your meaning-- + +_Selby_. And may you prove a true Cassandra here, +Though my poor acres smart for't, wagering sister. + [_Exeunt_. + + * * * * * + + +SCENE.--_Mrs. Selby's chamber._ + +MRS. FRAMPTON. KATHERINE. + +_Mrs. F._ Did I express myself in terms so strong? + +_Kath._ As nothing could have more affrighted me. + +_Mrs. F._ Think it a hurt friend's jest, in retribution +Of a suspected cooling hospitality. +And, for my staying here, or going hence, +(Now I remember something of our argument,) +Selby and I can settle that between us. +You look amazed. What if your husband, child, +Himself has courted me to stay? + +_Kath._ You move +My wonder and my pleasure equally. + +_Mrs. F._ Yes, courted me to stay, waived all objections, +Made it a favor to yourselves; not me, +His troublesome guest, as you surmised. Child, child, +When I recall his flattering welcome, I +Begin to think the burden of my presence +Was-- + +_Kath_. What, for Heaven-- + +_Mrs. F._ A little, little spice +Of jealousy--that's all--an honest pretext, +No wife need blush for. Say that you should see, +(As oftentimes we widows take such freedoms, +Yet still on this side virtue,) in a jest +Your husband pat me on the cheek, or steal +A kiss, while you were by,--not else, for virtue's sake. + +_Kath._ I could endure all this, thinking my husband +Meant it in sport-- + +_Mrs. F._ But if in downright earnest +(Putting myself out of the question here) +Your Selby, as I partly do suspect, +Own'd a divided heart-- + +_Kath._ My own would break-- + +_Mrs. F._ Why, what a blind and witless fool it is, +That will not see its gains, its infinite gains-- + +_Kath._ Gain in a loss. + Or mirth in utter desolation! + +_Mrs. F._ He doating on a face--suppose it mine, +Or any other's tolerably fair-- +What need you care about a senseless secret? + +_Kath._ Perplex'd and fearful woman! I in part +Fathom your dangerous meaning. You have broke +The worse than iron band, fretting the soul, +By which you held me captive. Whether my husband +_Is_ what you gave him out, or your fool'd fancy +But dreams he is so, either way I am free. + +_Mrs. F._ It talks it bravely, blazons out its shame; +A very heroine while on its knees; +Rowe's Penitent, an absolute Calista? + +_Kath._ Not to thy wretched self these tears are falling; +But to my husband, and offended Heaven, +Some drops are due--and then I sleep in peace, +Relieved from frightful dreams, my dreams though sad + [_Exit._ + +_Mrs. F._ I have gone too far. Who knows but in this mood +She may forestall my story, win on Selby +By a frank confession?--and the time draws on +For our appointed meeting. The game's desperate, +For which I play. A moment's difference +May make it hers or mine. I fly to meet him. [_Exit._ + + * * * * * + + +SCENE.--_A garden._ + +MR. SELBY. MRS. FRAMPTON. + +_Selby._ I am not so ill a guesser, Mrs. Frampton, +Not to conjecture, that some passages +In your unfinish'd story, rightly interpreted, +Glanced at my bosom's peace; + You knew my wife? + +_Mrs. F._ Even from her earliest school-days--What of that? +Or how is she concern'd in my fine riddles, +Framed for the hour's amusement! + +_Selby_. By my _hopes_ +Of my new interest conceived in you, +And by the honest passion of my heart, +Which not obliquely I to you did hint; +Come from the clouds of misty allegory, +And in plain language let me hear the worst. +Stand I disgraced, or no? + +_Mrs. F._ Then, by _my_ hopes +Of my new interest conceived in you, +And by the kindling passion in _my_ breast, +Which through my riddles you had almost read, +Adjured so strongly, I will tell you all. +In her school years, then bordering on fifteen, +Or haply not much past, she loved a youth-- + +_Selby._ My most ingenuous Widow-- + +_Mrs. F._ Met him oft +By stealth, where I still of the party was-- + +_Selby._ Prime confidant to all the school, I warrant, +And general go-between-- [_Aside._ + +_Mrs. F._ One morn he came +In breathless haste. "The ship was under sail, +Or in few hours would be, that must convey +Him and his destinies to barbarous shores, +Where, should he perish by inglorious hands, +It would be consolation in his death +To have call'd his Katherine _his_." + +_Selby._ Thus far the story +Tallies with what I hoped. [_Aside._ + +_Mrs. F._ Wavering between +The doubt of doing wrong, and losing him; +And my dissuasions not o'er hotly urged, +Whom he had flatter'd with the bridemaid's part;-- + +_Selby._ I owe my subtle Widow, then, for this. + [_Aside._ + +_Mrs. F._ Briefly, we went to church. The ceremony +Scarcely was huddled over, and the ring +Yet cold upon her finger, when they parted-- +He to his ship; and we to school got back, +Scarce miss'd, before the dinner-bell could ring. + +_Selby._ And from that hour-- + +_Mrs. F._ Nor sight, nor news of him, +For aught that I could hear, she e'er obtain'd. + +_Selby._ Like to a man that hovers in suspense +Over a letter just received, on which +The black seal hath impress'd its ominous token, +Whether to open it or no, so I +Suspended stand, whether to press my fate +Further, or check ill curiosity, +That tempts me to more loss.--The name, the name +Of this fine youth? + +_Mrs. F._ What boots it, if 'twere told? + +_Selby._ Now, by our loves, +And by my hopes of happier wedlocks, some day +To be accomplish'd, give me his name! + +_Mrs. F._ 'Tis no such serious matter. It was--Huntingdon. + +_Selby._ How have three little syllables pluck'd from me +A world of countless hopes!-- [_Aside._ + Evasive Widow. + +_Mrs. F._ How, sir!--I like not this. [_Aside._ + +_Selby._ No, no, I meant +Nothing but good to thee. That other woman, +How shall I call her but evasive, false, +And treacherous?--by the trust I place in thee, +Tell me, and tell me truly, was the name +As you pronounced it? + +_Mrs. F._ Huntingdon--the name, +Which his paternal grandfather assumed, +Together with the estates of a remote +Kinsman: but our high-spirited youth-- + +_Selby._ Yes-- + +_Mrs. F._ Disdaining +For sordid pelf to truck the family honors, +At risk of the lost estates, resumed the old style, +And answer'd only to the name of-- + +_Selby._ What-- + +_Mrs. F._ Of Halford-- + +_Selby._ A Huntingdon to Halford changed so soon! +Why, then I see, a witch hath her good spells, +As well as bad, and can by a backward charm +Unruffle the foul storm she has just been raising. + [_Aside. He makes the signal._ + +My frank, fair-spoken Widow! let this kiss, +Which yet aspires no higher, speak my thanks, +Till I can think on greater. + + _Enter_ LUCY _and_ KATHERINE. + +_Mrs. F._ Interrupted! + +_Selby._ My sister here! and see, where with her comes +My serpent gliding in an angel's form, +To taint the new-born Eden of our joys. +Why should we fear them? We'll not stir a foot, +Nor coy it for their pleasures. [_He courts the Widow._ + +_Lucy (to Katherine)._ This your free, +And sweet ingenuous confession, binds me +Forever to you; and it shall go hard, +But it shall fetch you back your husband's heart, +That now seems blindly straying; or, at worst, +In me you have still a sister.--Some wives, brother, +Would think it strange to catch their husbands thus +Alone with a trim widow; but your Katherine +Is arm'd, I think, with patience. + +_Kath._ I am fortified +With knowledge of self-faults to endure worse wrongs, +If they be wrongs, than he can lay upon me; +Even to look on, and see him sue in earnest, +As now I think he does it but in seeming, +To that ill woman. + +_Selby._ Good words, gentle Kate, +And not a thought irreverent of our Widow. +Why, 'twere unmannerly at any time, +But most uncourteous on our wedding-day, +When we should show most hospitable.--Some wine! + [_Wine is brought._ + +I am for sports. And now I do remember, +The old Egyptians at their banquets placed +A charnel sight of dead men's skulls before them, +With images of cold mortality, +To temper their fierce joys when they grew rampant. +I like the custom well: and ere we crown +With freer mirth the day, I shall propose, +In calmest recollection of our spirits, +We drink the solemn "Memory of the Dead,"-- + +_Mrs. F._ Or the supposed dead-- + [_Aside to him._ + +_Selby._ Pledge me, good, wife-- + [_She fills._ +Nay, higher yet, till the brimm'd cup swell o'er, + +_Kath._ I catch the awful import of your words; +And, though I could accuse you of unkindness, +Yet as your lawful and obedient wife, +While that name lasts (as I perceive it fading, +Nor I much longer may have leave to use it) +I calmly take the office you impose; +And on my knees, imploring their forgiveness, +Whom I in heaven or earth may have offended, +Exempt from starting tears, and woman's weakness, +I pledge you, sir--the Memory of the Dead! + [_She drinks kneeling._ + +_Selby._ 'Tis gently and discreetly said, and like +My former loving Kate. + +_Mrs. F._ Does he relent? [_Aside._ + +_Selby._ That ceremony past, we give the day +To unabated sport. And, in requital +Of certain stories and quaint allegories, +Which my rare Widow hath been telling to me +To raise my morning mirth, if she will lend +Her patient hearing, I will here recite +A Parable; and, the more to suit her taste, +The scene is laid in the East. + +_Mrs. F._ I long to hear it. +Some tale, to fit his wife. [_Aside._ + +_Kath._ Now, comes my TRIAL. + +_Lucy._ The hour of your deliverance is at hand, +If I presage right. Bear up, gentlest sister. + +_Selby._ "The Sultan Haroun"--Stay--O now I have it-- +"The Caliph Haroun in his orchards had +A fruit-tree, bearing such delicious fruits, +That he reserved them for his proper gust; +And through the Palace it was Death proclaim'd +To any one that should purloin the same." + +_Mrs. F._ A heavy penance for so light a fault-- + +_Selby._ Pray you, be silent, else you put me out. +"A crafty page, that for advantage watch'd, +Detected in the act a brother page, +Of his own years, that was his bosom friend; +And thenceforth he became that other's lord, +And like a tyrant he demean'd himself, +Laid forced exactions on his fellow's purse; +And when that poor means fail'd, held o'er his head +Threats of impending death in hideous forms; +Till the small culprit on his nightly couch +Dream'd of strange pains, and felt his body writhe +In tortuous pangs around the impaling stake." + +_Mrs. F._ I like not this beginning-- + +_Selby._ Pray you, attend. +"The Secret, like a night-hag, rid his sleeps, +And took the youthful pleasures from his days, +And chased the youthful smoothness from his brow, +That from a rose-cheek'd boy he waned and waned +To a pale skeleton of what he was; +And would have died, but for one lucky chance." + +_Kath._ Oh! + +_Mrs. F._ Your wife--she faints--some cordial--smell to this. + +_Selby._ Stand off. My sister best will do that office. + +_Mrs. F._ Are all his tempting speeches come to this? + [_Aside._ + +_Selby._ What ail'd my wife? + +_Kath._ A warning faintness, sir, +Seized on my spirits, when you came to where +You said "a lucky chance." I am better now: +Please you go on. + +_Selby._ The sequel shall be brief. + +_Kath._ But, brief, or long, I feel my fate hangs on it. + [_Aside._ + +_Selby._ "One morn the Caliph, in a covert hid, +Close by an arbor where the two boys talk'd, +(As oft, we read, that Eastern sovereigns +Would play the eavesdropper, to learn the truth. +Imperfectly received from mouths of slaves,) +O'erheard their dialogue; and heard enough +To judge aright the cause, and know his cue. +The following day a Cadi was despatch'd +To summon both before the judgment-seat; +The lickerish culprit, almost dead with fear, +And the informing friend, who readily, +Fired with fair promises of large reward, +And Caliph's love, the hateful truth disclosed." + +_Mrs. F._ What did the Caliph to the offending boy, +That had so grossly err'd? + +_Selby._ His sceptred hand +He forth in token of forgiveness stretch'd, +And clapp'd his cheeks, and courted him with gifts, +And he became once more his favorite page. + +_Mrs. F._ But for that other-- + +_Selby._ He dismissed him straight, +From dreams of grandeur, and of Caliph's love, +To the bare cottage on the withering moor. +Where friends, turn'd fiends, and hollow confidants, +And widows, hide, who in a husband's ear +Pour baneful truths, but tell not all the truth; +And told him not that Robin Halford died +Some moons before _his_ marriage-bells were rung. +Too near dishonor hast thou trod, dear wife, +And on a dangerous cast our fates were set; +But Heav'n, that will'd our wedlock to be blest, +Hath interposed to save it gracious too. +Your penance is--to dress your cheek in smiles, +And to be once again my merry Kate.-- +Sister, your hand. +Your wager won makes me a happy man, +Though poorer, Heav'n knows, by a thousand pounds. +The sky clears up after a dubious day. +Widow, your hand. I read a penitence +In this dejected brow; and in this shame +Your fault is buried. You shall in with us, +And, if it please you, taste our nuptial fare: +For, till this moment, I can joyful say, +Was never truly Selby's Wedding Day. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORKS OF CHARLES LAMB IN FOUR +VOLUMES, VOLUME 4*** + + +******* This file should be named 14129.txt or 14129.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/4/1/2/14129 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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