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diff --git a/39676-8.txt b/39676-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5fffcb1 --- /dev/null +++ b/39676-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9745 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 64 No. +396 October 1848, by Various + +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/license + + +Title: Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 64 No. 396 October 1848 + +Author: Various + +Release Date: May 13, 2012 [EBook #39676] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BLACKWOOD'S EDINBURGH *** + + + + +Produced by Brendan OConnor, Jonathan Ingram, JoAnn +Greenwood and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images +generously made available by The Internet Library of Early +Journals.) + + + + + + + +Transcriber's Note: + +On P. 462 and 512 of the text version, words within tilde (~) marks are +transliterations from the Greek in the original. The html version +includes the Greek script. + + * * * * * + + + + + BLACKWOOD'S EDINBURGH MAGAZINE. + + NO. CCCXCVI. OCTOBER, 1848. VOL. LXIV. + + + + +CONTENTS. + + + THE CAXTONS. PART VII., 387 + + POLITICAL ECONOMY, BY J. S. MILL, 407 + + LIFE IN THE "FAR WEST." PART V., 429 + + A LEGEND FROM ANTWERP, 444 + + A FEW WORDS ABOUT NOVELS.--A DIALOGUE, + IN A LETTER TO EUSEBIUS, 459 + + CONTINENTAL REVOLUTIONS--IRISH REBELLION--ENGLISH + DISTRESS, 475 + + BYRON'S ADDRESS TO THE OCEAN, 499 + + + + +EDINBURGH: + +WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS, 45, GEORGE STREET; AND 37, PATERNOSTER +ROW, LONDON. + +_To whom all Communications (post paid) must be addressed._ + +SOLD BY ALL THE BOOKSELLERS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM. + +PRINTED BY WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS, EDINBURGH. + + + + + BLACKWOOD'S EDINBURGH MAGAZINE. + + NO. CCCXCVI. OCTOBER, 1848. VOL. LXIV. + + + + +THE CAXTONS.--PART VII. + + +CHAPTER XXVI. + +Saith Dr Luther, "When I saw Dr Gode begin to tell his puddings +hanging in the chimney, I told him he would not live long!" + +I wish I had copied that passage from "The Table Talk" in large round +hand, and set it before my father at breakfast, the morn preceding +that fatal eve in which Uncle Jack persuaded him to tell his puddings. + +Yet, now I think of it, Uncle Jack hung the puddings in the +chimney,--but he did not persuade my father to tell them. + +Beyond a vague surmise that half the suspended "tomacula" would +furnish a breakfast to Uncle Jack, and that the youthful appetite of +Pisistratus would despatch the rest, my father did not give a thought +to the nutritious properties of the puddings,--in other words, to the +two thousand pounds which, thanks to Mr Tibbets, dangled down the +chimney. So far as the great work was concerned, my father only cared +for its publication, not its profits. I will not say that he might not +hunger for praise, but I am quite sure that he did not care a button +for pudding. Nevertheless, it was an infaust and sinister augury for +Augustine Caxton, the very appearance, the very suspension and +danglement of any puddings whatsoever, right over his ingle-nook, when +those puddings were made by the sleek hands of Uncle Jack! None of the +puddings which he, poor man, had all his life been stringing, whether +from his own chimneys, or the chimneys of other people, had turned out +to be real puddings,--they had always been the _eidola_, the +_erscheinungen_, the phantoms and semblances of puddings. I question +if Uncle Jack knew much about Democritus of Abdera. But he was +certainly tainted with the philosophy of that fanciful sage. He +peopled the air with images of colossal stature, which impressed all +his dreams and divinations, and from whose influences came his very +sensations and thoughts. His whole being, asleep or waking, was thus +but the reflection of great phantom puddings! + +As soon as Mr Tibbets had possessed himself of the two volumes of the +"History of Human Error," he had necessarily established that hold +upon my father which hitherto those lubricate hands of his had failed +to effect. He had found what he had so long sighed for in vain, his +_point d'appui_, wherein to fix the Archimedean screw. He fixed it +tight in the "History of Human Error," and moved the Caxtonian world. + +A day or two after the conversation recorded in my last chapter, I saw +Uncle Jack coming out of the mahogany doors of my father's banker; +and, from that time, there seemed no reason why Mr Tibbets should not +visit his relations on week-days as well as Sundays. Not a day, +indeed, passed but what he held long conversations with my father. He +had much to report of his interviews with the publishers. In these +conversations he naturally recurred to that grand idea of the +"Literary Times" which had so dazzled my poor father's imagination; +and having heated the iron, Uncle Jack was too knowing a man not to +strike while it was hot. + +When I think of the simplicity my wise father exhibited in this crisis +of his life, I must own that I am less moved by pity than admiration +for that poor great-hearted student. We have seen that out of the +learned indolence of twenty years, the ambition which is the instinct +of a man of genius had emerged; the serious preparation of the great +book for the perusal of the world, had insensibly restored the charms +of that noisy world on the silent individual. And therewith came a +noble remorse that he had hitherto done so little for his species. Was +it enough to write quartos upon the past history of Human Error? Was +it not his duty, when the occasion was fairly presented, to enter upon +that present, daily, hourly, war with Error--which is the sworn +chivalry of Knowledge? St George did not dissect dead dragons, he +fought the live one. And London, with that magnetic atmosphere which +in great capitals fills the breath of life with stimulating particles, +had its share in quickening the slow pulse of the student. In the +country, he read but his old authors, and lived with them through the +gone ages. In the city, my father, during the intervals of repose from +the great book, and still more now that the great book had come to a +pause,--inspected the literature of his own time. It had a prodigious +effect upon him. He was unlike the ordinary run of scholars, and, +indeed, of readers for that matter--who, in their superstitious homage +to the dead, are always willing enough to sacrifice the living. He did +justice to the marvellous fertility of intellect which characterises +the authorship of the present age. By the present age, I do not only +mean the present day, I commence with the century. "What," said my +father one day in dispute with Trevanion--"what characterises the +literature of our time is--its _human interest_. It is true that we do +not see scholars addressing scholars, but men addressing men,--not +that scholars are fewer, but that the reading public is more large. +Authors in all ages address themselves to what interests their +readers; the same things do not interest a vast community which +interested half a score of monks or bookworms. The literary _polis_ +was once an oligarchy, it is now a republic. It is the general +brilliancy of the atmosphere which prevents your noticing the size of +any particular star. Do you not see, that with the cultivation of the +masses has awakened the Literature of the Affections? Every sentiment +finds an expositor, every feeling an oracle. Like Epimenides, I have +been sleeping in a cave; and, waking, I see those whom I left children +are bearded men; and towns have sprung up in the landscapes which I +left as solitary wastes." + +Thence, the reader may perceive the causes of the change which had +come over my father. As Robert Hall says, I think, of Dr Kippis, "he +had laid so many books at the top of his head, that the brains could +not move." But the electricity had now penetrated the heart, and the +quickened vigour of that noble organ enabled the brain to stir. +Meanwhile, I leave my father to these influences, and to the +continuous conversations of Uncle Jack, and proceed with the thread of +my own egotism. + +Thanks to Mr Trevanion, my habits were not those which favour +friendships with the idle; but I formed some acquaintances amongst +young men a few years older than myself, who held subordinate +situations in the public offices, or were keeping their terms for the +bar. There was no want of ability amongst these gentlemen; but they +had not yet settled into the stern prose of life. Their busy hours +only made them more disposed to enjoy the hours of relaxation. And +when we got together, a very gay, light-hearted set we were! We had +neither money enough to be very extravagant, nor leisure enough to be +very dissipated; but we amused ourselves notwithstanding. My new +friends were wonderfully erudite in all matters connected with the +theatres. From an opera to a ballet, from Hamlet to the last farce +from the French, they had the literature of the stage at the +finger-ends of their straw-coloured gloves. They had a pretty large +acquaintance with actors and actresses, and were perfect _Walpoluli_ +in the minor scandals of the day. To do them justice, however, they +were not indifferent to the more masculine knowledge necessary in +"this wrong world." They talked as familiarly of the real actors of +life as of the sham ones. They could adjust to a hair the rival +pretensions of contending statesmen. They did not profess to be deep +in the mysteries of foreign cabinets, (with the exception of one young +gentleman connected with the Foreign Office, who prided himself on +knowing exactly what the Russians meant to do with India--when they +got it!); but to make amends, the majority of them had penetrated the +closest secrets of our own. It is true that, according to a proper +subdivision of labour, each took some particular member of the +government for his special observation; just as the most skilful +surgeons, however profoundly versed in the general structure of our +frame, rest their anatomical fame on the light they throw on +particular parts of it,--one man taking the brain, another the +duodenum, a third the spinal cord, while a fourth, perhaps, is a +master of all the symptoms indicated by a pensile finger. Accordingly, +one of my friends appropriated to himself the Home Department; another +the Colonies; and a third, whom we all regarded as a future +Talleyrand, (or a de Retz at least,) had devoted himself to the +special study of Sir Robert Peel, and knew, by the way in which that +profound and inscrutable statesman threw open his coat, every thought +that was passing in his breast! Whether lawyers or officials, they all +had a great idea of themselves--high notions of what they were to +_be_, rather than what they were to _do_, some day. As the king of +modern fine gentlemen said of himself, in paraphrase of Voltaire, +"they had letters in their pockets addressed to Posterity,--which the +chances were, however, that they might forget to deliver." Something +"priggish" there might be about some of them; but, on the whole, they +were far more interesting than mere idle men of pleasure. There was +about them, as features of a general family likeness, a redundant +activity of life--a gay exuberance of ambition--a light-hearted +earnestness when at work--a schoolboy's enjoyment of the hours of +play. + +A great contrast to these young men was Sir Sedley Beaudesert, who was +pointedly kind to me, and whose bachelor's house was always open to me +after noon; Sir Sedley was visible to no one, but his valet, before +that hour. A perfect bachelor's house it was, too--with its windows +opening on the Park, and sofas niched into the windows, on which you +might loll at your ease, like the philosopher in Lucretius,-- + + "Despicere unde queas alios, passimque videre, + Errare,"-- + +And see the gay crowds ride to and fro Rotten Row--without the fatigue +of joining them, especially if the wind was in the east. + +There was no affectation of costliness, or what the French and the +upholsterers call _recherché_, about the rooms, but a wonderful +accumulation of comfort. Every patent chair that proffered a variety +in the art of lounging, found its place there; and near every chair a +little table, on which you might deposit your book or your coffee-cup, +without the trouble of moving more than your hand. In winter, nothing +warmer than the quilted curtains and Axminster carpets can be +conceived. In summer, nothing airier and cooler than the muslin +draperies and the Indian mattings. And I defy a man to know to what +perfection dinner may be brought, unless he had dined with Sir Sedley +Beaudesert. Certainly, if that distinguished personage had but been an +egotist, he had been the happiest of men. But, unfortunately for him, +he was singularly amiable and kind-hearted. He had the _bonne +digestion_, but not the other requisite for worldly felicity--the +_mauvais coeur_. He felt a sincere pity for every one else who lived +in rooms without patent chairs and little coffee tables--whose windows +did not look on the Park, with sofas niched into their recesses. As +Henry IV. wished every man to have his _pot au feu_, so Sir Sedley +Beaudesert, if he could have had his way, would have every man served +with an early cucumber for his fish, and a caraffe of iced water by +the side of his bread and cheese. He thus evinced on politics a naïve +simplicity, which delightfully contrasted his acuteness on matters of +taste. I remember his saying, in a discussion on the Beer Bill, "The +poor ought not to be allowed to drink beer, it is so particularly +rheumatic! The best drink in hard work is dry champagne--(not +_mousseux_.) I found that out when I used to shoot on the moors." + +Indolent as Sir Sedley was, he had contrived to open an extraordinary +number of drains on his great wealth. + +First, as a landed proprietor, there was no end to applications from +distressed farmers, aged poor, benefit societies, and poachers he had +thrown out of employment by giving up his preserves to please his +tenants. + +Next, as a man of pleasure, the whole race of womankind had legitimate +demands on him. From a distressed duchess, whose picture lay _perdu_ +under a secret spring of his snuff-box, to a decayed laundress, to +whom he might have paid a compliment on the perfect involutions of a +frill, it was quite sufficient to be a daughter of Eve to establish a +just claim on Sir Sedley's inheritance from Adam. + +Again, as an amateur of art, and a respectful servant of every muse, +all whom the public had failed to patronise--painter, actor, poet, +musician--turned, like dying sun-flowers to the sun, towards the +pitying smile of Sir Sedley Beaudesert. Add to these the general +miscellaneous multitude, who 'had heard of Sir Sedley's high character +for benevolence,' and one may well suppose what a very costly +reputation he had set up. In fact, though Sir Sedley could not spend +on what might fairly be called "himself," a fifth part of his princely +income, I have no doubt that he found it difficult to make both ends +meet at the close of the year. That he did so, he owed perhaps to two +rules which his philosophy had peremptorily adopted. He never made +debts, and he never gambled. For both these admirable aberrations from +the ordinary routine of fine gentlemen, I believe he was indebted to +the softness of his disposition. He had a great compassion for a +wretch who was dunned. "Poor fellow!" he would say, "it must be so +painful to him to pass his life in saying No." So little did he know +about that class of promisers,--as if a man dunned ever said No! As +Beau Brummell, when asked if he was fond of vegetables, owned that he +had once eaten a pea, so Sir Sedley Beaudesert owned that he had once +played high at piquet. "I was so unlucky as to win," said he, +referring to that indiscretion, "and I shall never forget the anguish +on the face of the man who paid me. Unless I could always lose, it +would be a perfect purgatory to play." + +Now nothing could be more different in their kinds of benevolence than +Sir Sedley and Mr Trevanion. Mr Trevanion had a great contempt for +individual charity. He rarely put his hand into his purse--he drew a +great cheque on his bankers. Was a congregation without a church, or a +village without a school, or a river without a bridge, Mr Trevanion +set to work on calculations, found out the exact sum required by an +algebraic _x-y_, and paid it as he would have paid his butcher. It +must be owned that the distress of a man, whom he allowed to be +deserving, did not appeal to him in vain. But it is astonishing how +little he spent in that way. For it was hard, indeed, to convince Mr +Trevanion that a deserving man ever was in such distress as to want +charity. + +That Trevanion, nevertheless, did infinitely more real good than Sir +Sedley, I believe; but he did it as a mental operation--by no means as +an impulse from the heart. I am sorry to say that the main difference +was this,--distress always seemed to accumulate round Sir Sedley, and +vanish from the presence of Trevanion. Where the last came, with his +busy, active, searching mind, energy woke, improvement sprang up. +Where the first came, with his warm kind heart, a kind of torpor +spread under its rays; people lay down and basked in the liberal +sunshine. Nature in one broke forth like a brisk sturdy winter, in the +other like a lazy Italian summer. Winter is an excellent invigorator, +no doubt, but we all love summer better. + +Now, it is a proof how loveable Sir Sedley was, that I loved him, and +yet was jealous of him. Of all the satellites round my fair Cynthia, +Fanny Trevanion, I dreaded most this amiable luminary. It was in vain +for me to say with the insolence of youth that Sir Sedley Beaudesert +was of the same age as Fanny's father;--to see them together he might +have passed for Trevanion's son. No one amongst the younger generation +was half so handsome as Sir Sedley Beaudesert. He might be eclipsed at +first sight by the showy effect of more redundant locks and more +brilliant bloom. But he had but to speak, to smile, in order to throw +a whole cohort of dandies into the shade. It was the expression of his +countenance that was so bewitching; there was something so kindly in +its easy candour, its benign good-nature. And he understood women so +well! He flattered their foibles so insensibly; he commanded their +affection with so gracious a dignity. Above all, what with his +accomplishments, his peculiar reputation, his long celibacy, and the +soft melancholy of his sentiments, he always contrived to _interest_ +them. There was not a charming woman by whom this charming man did not +seem just on the point of being caught! It was like the sight of a +splendid trout in a transparent stream, sailing pensively to and fro +your fly, in a will and a won't sort of way. Such a trout! it would be +a thousand pities to leave him, when evidently so well disposed! That +trout, fair maid, or gentle widow, would have kept you--whipping the +stream and dragging the fly--from morn to dewy eve. Certainly I don't +wish worse to my bitterest foe of five-and-twenty than such a rival as +Sedley Beaudesert at seven-and-forty. + +Fanny, indeed, perplexed me horribly. Sometimes I fancied she liked me; +but the fancy scarce thrilled me with delight before it vanished in the +frost of a careless look, or the cold beam of a sarcastic laugh. +Spoiled darling of the world as she was, she seemed so innocent in her +exuberant happiness, that one forgot all her faults in that atmosphere +of joy which she diffused around her. And despite her pretty insolence, +she had so kind a woman's heart below the surface! When she once saw +that she had pained you, she was so soft, so winning, so humble, till +she had healed the wound. But _then_, if she saw she had pleased you +too much, the little witch was never easy till she had plagued you +again. As heiress to so rich a father, or rather, perhaps, mother, (for +the fortune came from Lady Ellinor,) she was naturally surrounded with +admirers not wholly disinterested. She did right to plague _them_--but +ME! Poor boy that I was, why should I seem more disinterested than +others! how should she perceive all that lay hid in my young deep +heart? Was I not in all worldly pretensions the least worthy of her +suitors, and might I not seem, therefore, the most mercenary? I who +never thought of her fortune, or, if that thought did come across me, +it was to make me start and turn pale! And then it vanished at her +first glance, as a ghost from the dawn. How hard it is to convince +youth, that sees all the world of the future before it, and covers that +future with golden palaces, of the inequalities of life! In my +fantastic and sublime romance, I looked out into that Great Beyond, saw +myself orator, statesman, minister, ambassador--Heaven knows what; +laying laurels, which I mistook for rent-rolls, at Fanny's feet. + +Whatever Fanny might have discovered as to the state of my heart, it +seemed an abyss not worth prying into by either Trevanion or Lady +Ellinor. The first, indeed, as may be supposed, was too busy to think +of such trifles. And Lady Ellinor treated me as a mere boy--almost +like a boy of her own, she was so kind to me. But she did not notice +much the things that lay immediately around her. In brilliant +conversation with poets, wits, and statesmen--in sympathy with the +toils of her husband--or proud schemes for his aggrandisement, Lady +Ellinor lived a life of excitement. Those large eager shining eyes of +hers, bright with some feverish discontent, looked far abroad as if +for new worlds to conquer--the world at her feet escaped from her +vision. She loved her daughter, she was proud of her, trusted in her +with a superb repose--she did not watch over her. Lady Ellinor stood +alone on a mountain, and amidst a cloud. + + +CHAPTER XXVII. + +One day the Trevanions had all gone into the country, on a visit to a +retired minister, distantly related to Lady Ellinor, and who was one +of the few persons Trevanion himself condescended to consult. I had +almost a holiday. I went to call on Sir Sedley Beaudesert. I had +always longed to sound him on one subject, and had never dared. This +time I resolved to pluck up courage. + +"Ah, my young friend!" said he, rising from the contemplation of a +villanous picture by a young artist, which he had just benevolently +purchased, "I was thinking of you this morning--Wait a moment, +Summers, (this to the valet.) Be so good as to take this picture, let +it be packed up, and go down into the country. It is a sort of +picture," he added, turning to me, "that requires a large house. I +have an old gallery with little casements that let in no light. It is +astonishing how convenient I have found it!" As soon as the picture +was gone, Sir Sedley drew a long breath as if relieved; and resumed +more gaily-- + +"Yes, I was thinking of you; and if you will forgive any interference +in your affairs--from your father's old friend--I should be greatly +honoured by your permission to ask Trevanion what he supposes is to be +the ultimate benefit of the horrible labours he inflicts upon you--" + +"But, my dear Sir Sedley, I like the labours; I am perfectly +contented--" + +"Not to remain always secretary to one who, if there were no business +to be done among men, would set about teaching the ants to build hills +upon better architectural principles! My dear sir, Trevanion is an +awful man, a stupendous man, one _catches fatigue_ if one is in the +same room with him three minutes! At your age, an age that ought to be +so happy," continued Sir Sedley, with a compassion perfectly angelic, +"it is sad to see so little enjoyment!" + +"But, Sir Sedley, I assure you that you are mistaken. I thoroughly +enjoy myself; and have I not heard even you confess that one may be +idle and not happy?" + +"I did not confess that till I was on the wrong side of forty," said +Sir Sedley, with a slight shade on his brow. + +"Nobody would ever think you were on the wrong side of forty!" said I +with artful flattery, winding into my subject. "Miss Trevanion for +instance--" + +I paused--Sir Sedley, looked hard at me, from his bright dark-blue +eyes. "Well, Miss Trevanion for instance?--" + +"Miss Trevanion, who has all the best-looking fellows in London round +her, evidently prefers you to any of them." I said this with a great +gulp. I was obstinately bent on plumbing the depth of my own fears. + +Sir Sedley rose; he laid his hand kindly on mine and said, "Do not let +Fanny Trevanion torment you even more than her father does!--" + +"I don't understand you, Sir Sedley!" + +"But if I understand you, that is more to the purpose. A girl like +Miss Trevanion is cruel till she discovers she has a heart. It is not +safe to risk one's own with any woman till she has ceased to be a +coquette. My dear young friend, if you took life less in earnest, I +should spare you the pain of these hints. Some men sow flowers, some +plant trees--you are planting a tree under which you will soon find +that no flower will grow. Well and good, if the tree could last to +bear fruit and give shade; but beware lest you have to tear it up one +day or other, for then--what then? why, you will find your whole life +plucked away with its roots!" + +Sir Sedley said these last words with so serious an emphasis, that I +was startled from the confusion I had felt at the former part of his +address. He paused long, tapped his snuff-box, inhaled a pinch slowly, +and continued with his more accustomed sprightliness. + +"Go as much as you can into the world--again I say 'enjoy yourself.' +And again I ask, what is all this labour to do for you? On some men, +far less eminent than Trevanion, it would impose a duty to aid you in +a practical career, to secure you a public employment--not so on him. +He would not mortgage an inch of his independence by asking a favour +from a minister. He so thinks occupation the delight of life, that he +occupies you out of pure affection. He does not trouble his head about +your future. He supposes your father will provide for _that_, and does +not consider that meanwhile your work leads to nothing! Think over all +this. I have now bored you enough." + +I was bewildered--I was dumb: these practical men of the world, how +they take us by surprise! Here had I come to _sound_ Sir Sedley, and +here was I plumbed, gauged, measured, turned inside out, without +having got an inch beyond the surface of that smiling, _debonnair_, +unruffled ease. Yet with his invariable delicacy, in spite of all this +horrible frankness, Sir Sedley had not said a word to wound what he +might think the more sensitive part of my _amour propre_--not a word +as to the inadequacy of my pretensions to think seriously of Fanny +Trevanion. Had we been the Celadon and Chloé of a country village, he +could not have regarded us as more equal, so far as the world went. +And for the rest, he rather insinuated that poor Fanny, the great +heiress, was not worthy of me, than that I was not worthy of Fanny. + +I felt that there was no wisdom in stammering and blushing out denials +and equivocations; so I stretched my hand to Sir Sedley, took up my +hat,--and went. Instinctively I bent my way to my father's house. I +had not been there for many days. Not only had I had a great deal to +do in the way of business, but I am ashamed to say that pleasure +itself had so entangled my leisure hours, and Miss Trevanion +especially so absorbed them, that, without even uneasy foreboding, I +had left my father fluttering his wings more feebly and feebly in the +web of Uncle Jack. When I arrived in Russell Street, I found the fly +and the spider cheek by jowl together. Uncle Jack sprang up at my +entrance, and cried, "Congratulate your father, congratulate _him_. +No; congratulate the world!" + +"What, Uncle!" said I, with a dismal effort at sympathising +liveliness, "is the 'Literary Times' launched at last?" + +"Oh, that is all settled--settled long since. Here's a specimen of the +type we have chosen for the leaders." And Uncle Jack, whose pocket was +never without a wet sheet of some kind or other, drew forth a steaming +papyral monster, which in point of size was to the political "Times" +as a mammoth may be to an elephant. "That is all settled. We are only +preparing our contributors, and shall put out our programme next week +or the week after. No, Pisistratus, I mean the Great Work." + +"My dear father, I am so glad. What! it is really sold then?" + +"Hum!" said my father. + +"Sold!" burst forth Uncle Jack. "Sold--no, sir, we would not sell it! +No; if all the booksellers fell down on their knees to us, as they +will some day, that book should not be sold! Sir, that book is a +revolution--it is an era--it is the emancipator of genius from +mercenary thraldom;--THAT BOOK!--" + +I looked inquiringly from uncle to father, and mentally retracted my +congratulations. Then Mr Caxton, slightly blushing, and shyly rubbing +his spectacles, said, "You see, Pisistratus, that though poor Jack has +devoted uncommon pains to induce the publishers to recognise the merit +he has discovered in the 'History of Human Error,' he has failed to do +so." + +"Not a bit of it; they all acknowledge its miraculous learning--its--" + +"Very true; but they don't think it will sell, and therefore most +selfishly refuse to buy it. One bookseller, indeed, offered to treat +for it if I would leave out all about the Hottentots and Caffres, the +Greek philosophers and Egyptian priests, and, confining myself solely +to polite society, entitle the work 'Anecdotes of the Courts of +Europe, ancient and modern.'" + +"The wretch!" groaned Uncle Jack. + +"Another thought it might be cut up into little essays, leaving out +the quotations, entitled 'Men and Manners.'" + +"A third was kind enough to observe, that though this particular work +was quite unsaleable, yet as I appeared to have some historical +information, he should be happy to undertake a historical romance from +'my graphic pen'--that was the phrase, was it not, Jack?" + +Jack was too full to speak. --"Provided I would introduce a proper +love-plot, and make it into three volumes post octavo, twenty-three +lines in a page, neither more nor less. One honest fellow at last was +found, who seemed to me a very respectable and indeed enterprising +person. And after going through a list of calculations, which showed +that no possible profit could arise, he generously offered to give me +half of those no-profits, provided I would guarantee half the very +visible expenses. I was just meditating the prudence of accepting this +proposal, when your uncle was seized with a sublime idea, which has +whisked up my book in a whirlwind of expectation." + +"And that idea?" said I despondently. + +"That idea," quoth Uncle Jack, recovering himself, "is simply and +shortly this. From time immemorial authors have been the prey of the +publishers. Sir, authors have lived in garrets, nay, have been choked +in the street by an unexpected crumb of bread, like the man who wrote +the play, poor fellow!" + +"Otway," said my father. "The story is not true--no matter." + +"Milton, sir, as every body knows, sold Paradise Lost for ten +pounds--ten pounds, sir! In short, instances of a like nature are too +numerous to quote. But the booksellers, sir,--they are leviathans--they +roll in seas of gold. They subsist upon authors as vampires upon little +children. But at last endurance has reached its limit--the fiat has +gone forth--the tocsin of liberty has resounded--authors have burst +their fetters. And we have just inaugurated the institution of 'THE +GRAND ANTI-PUBLISHER CONFEDERATE AUTHORS' SOCIETY,' by which, +Pisistratus--by which, mark you, every author is to be his own +publisher; that is, every author who joins the Society. No more +submission of immortal works to mercenary calculators, to sordid +tastes--no more hard bargains and broken hearts!--no more crumbs of +bread choking great tragic poets in the streets--no more Paradises Lost +sold at £10 a-piece! The author brings his book to a select committee +appointed for the purpose; men of delicacy, education, and +refinement--authors themselves--they read it, the Society publish; and +after a modest commission towards the funds of the Society, the +treasurer hands over the profits to the author." + +"So that in fact, Uncle, every author who can't find a publisher any +where else, will of course come to the Society. The fraternity will be +numerous!" + +"It will indeed." + +"And the speculation--ruinous?" + +"Ruinous, why?" + +"Because in all mercantile negotiations it is ruinous to invest +capital in supplies which fail of demand. You undertake to publish +books that booksellers will not publish. Why? because booksellers +can't sell them! It is just probable that you'll not sell them any +better than the booksellers. Ergo, the more your business the larger +your deficit. And the more numerous your society, the more disastrous +your condition. Q.E.D." + +"Pooh! The select committee will decide what books are to be +published." + +"Then where the deuce is the advantage to the authors? I would as lief +submit my work to a publisher as I would to a select committee of +authors. At all events, the publisher is not my rival; and I suspect +he is the best judge, after all, of a book--as an accoucheur ought to +be of a baby." + +"Upon my word, nephew, you pay a bad compliment to your father's great +work, which the booksellers will have nothing to do with." + +That was artfully said, and I was posed; when Mr Caxton observed, with +an apologetic smile-- + +"The fact is, my dear Pisistratus, that I want my book published +without diminishing the little fortune I keep for you some day. Uncle +Jack starts a society so to publish it.--Health and long life to Uncle +Jack's society! One can't look a gift-horse in the mouth." + +Here my mother entered, rosy from a shopping expedition with Mrs +Primmins; and in her joy at hearing that I could stay dinner, all +else was forgotten. By a wonder, which I did not regret, Uncle Jack +really was engaged to dine out. He had other irons in the fire besides +the "Literary Times" and the "Confederate Authors' Society;" he was +deep in a scheme for making house-tops of felt, (which, under other +hands, has, I believe, since succeeded;) and he had found a rich man +(I suppose a hatter) who seemed well inclined to the project, and had +actually asked him to dine and expound his views! + + +CHAPTER XXVIII. + +Here we three are seated round the open window--after dinner--familiar +as in the old happy time--and my mother is talking low that she may +not disturb my father, who seems in thought.---- + +Cr-cr-crrr-cr-cr! I feel it--I have it.--Where! What! Where! +Knock it down--brush it off! For Heaven's sake, see to +it!--Crrrr-crrrrr--there--here--in my hair--in my sleeve--in my +ear.--Cr-cr. + +I say solemnly, and on the word of a Christian, that, as I sate down +to begin this chapter, being somewhat in a brown study, the pen +insensibly slipt from my hand, and, leaning back in my chair, I fell +to gazing into the fire. It is the end of June, and a remarkably cold +evening--even for that time of year. And while I was so gazing, I felt +something crawling, just by the nape of the neck, ma'am. Instinctively +and mechanically, and still musing, I put my hand there, and drew +forth--What? That _what_ it is which perplexes me. It was a thing--a +dark thing--a much bigger thing than I had expected. And the sight +took me so by surprise that I gave my hand a violent shake, and the +thing went--where I know not. The what and the where are the knotty +points in the whole question! No sooner had it gone than I was seized +with repentance not to have examined it more closely--not to have +ascertained what the creature was. It might have been an earwig--a +very large motherly earwig--an earwig far gone in that way in which +earwigs wish to be who love their lords. I have a profound horror of +earwigs--I firmly believe that they do get into the ear. That is a +subject on which it is useless to argue with me upon philosophical +grounds. I have a vivid recollection of a story told me by Mrs +Primmins--How a lady for many years suffered under the most +excruciating headaches; how, as the tombstones say, "physicians were +in vain;" how she died; how her head was opened, and how such a nest +of earwigs--ma'am--such a nest!--Earwigs are the prolifickest things, +and so fond of their offspring! They sit on their eggs like hens--and +the young, as soon as they are born, creep under them for +protection--quite touchingly! Imagine such an establishment +domesticated at one's tympanum! + +But the creature was certainly larger than an earwig. It might have +been one of that genus in the family of _Forficulidæ_, called +_Labidoura_--monsters whose antennæ have thirty joints! There is a +species of this creature in England, but, to the great grief of +naturalists, and to the great honour of Providence, very rarely +found, infinitely larger than the common earwig or _Forficulida +auriculana_. Could it have been an early hornet? It had certainly a +black head, and great feelers. I have a greater horror of hornets, +if possible, than I have of earwigs. Two hornets will kill a man, +and three a carriage-horse sixteen hands high. However, the +creature was gone.--Yes, but where? Where had I so rashly thrown +it? It might have got into a fold of my dressing-gown--or into my +slippers--or, in short, any where, in the various recesses for +earwigs and hornets which a gentleman's habiliments afford. I +satisfy myself at last, as far as I can, seeing that I am not alone +in the room--that it is not upon me. I look upon the carpet--the +rug--the chair--under the fender. It is _non inventus_. I +barbarously hope it is frizzing behind that great black coal in the +grate. I pluck up courage--I prudently remove, to the other end of +the room. I take up my pen--I begin my chapter--very nicely, too, I +think upon the whole. I am just getting into my subject, +when--cr-cr-cr-cr-cr-crawl--crawl--crawl--creep--creep--creep. +Exactly, my dear ma'am, in the same place it was before! Oh, by the +Powers! I forgot all my scientific regrets at not having +scrutinised its genus before, whether _Forficulida_ or _Labidoura_. +I made a desperate lunge with both hands, something between thrust +and cut, ma'am. The beast is gone. Yes, but again where? I say that +that where is a very horrible question. Having come twice, in spite +of all my precautions--and exactly on the same spot, too--it shows +a confirmed disposition to habituate itself to its quarters--to +effect a parochial settlement upon me; there is something awful and +preternatural in it. I assure you that there is not a part of me +that has not gone cr-cr-cr!--that has not crept, crawled, and +forficulated ever since; and I just put it to you what sort of a +chapter I can make after such a----My good little girl, will you +just take the candle, and look carefully under the table?--that's a +dear! Yes, my love, very black indeed, with two horns, and inclined +to be corpulent. Gentlemen and ladies who have cultivated an +acquaintance with the Phoenician language, are aware that Belzebub, +examined etymologically and entomologically, is nothing more nor +less than Baal-zebub--"the Jupiter-Fly"--an emblem of the +Destroying Attribute, which attribute, indeed, is found in all the +insect tribes, more or less. Wherefore, as Mr Payne Knight, in his +_Inquiry into Symbolical Languages_, hath observed--the Egyptian +priests shaved their whole bodies, even to their eyebrows, lest +unaware they should harbour any of the minor Zebubs of the great +Baal. If I were the least bit more persuaded that that black cr-cr +were about me still, and that the sacrifice of my eyebrows would +deprive him of shelter, by the souls of the Ptolemies! I +would,--and I will, too. Ring the bell, my little dear! +John,--my--my cigar-box! There is not a cr in the world that can +abide the fumes of the Havannah! Pshaw, sir, I am not the only man +who lets his first thoughts upon cold steel end, like this chapter, +in--Pff--pff--pff--! + + +CHAPTER XXIX. + +Every thing in this world is of use, even a black thing crawling over +the nape of one's neck! Grim unknown, I shall make of thee--a simile! + +I think, ma'am, you will allow that if an incident such as I have +described had befallen yourself, and you had a proper and ladylike +horror of earwigs (however motherly and fond of their offspring,) and +also of early hornets, and indeed of all unknown things of the insect +tribe with black heads and two great horns, or feelers or forceps, +just by your ear--I think, ma'am, you will allow that you would find +it difficult to settle back to your former placidity of mood and +innocent stitch-work. You would feel a something that grated on your +nerves--and cr'd--cr'd "all over you like," as the children say. And +the worst is, that you would be ashamed to say it. You would feel +obliged to look pleased and join in the conversation, and not fidget +too much, nor always be shaking your flounces, and looking into a dark +corner of your apron. Thus it is with many other things in life +besides black insects. One has a secret care--an abstraction--a +something between the memory and the feeling, of a dark crawling cr, +which one has never dared to analyse. So I sate by my mother, trying +to smile and talk as in the old time,--but longing to move about and +look around, and escape to my own solitude, and take the clothes off +my mind, and see what it was that had so troubled and terrified +me--for trouble and terror were upon me. And my mother, who was always +(heaven bless her!) inquisitive enough in all that concerned her +darling Anachronism, was especially inquisitive that evening. She made +me say where I had been, and what I had done, and how I had spent my +time,--and Fanny Trevanion, (whom she had seen, by the way, three or +four times, and whom she thought the prettiest person in the +world)--oh, she must know exactly what I thought of Fanny Trevanion! + +And all this while my father seemed in thought; and so, with my arm +over my mother's chair, and my hand in hers--I answered my mother's +questions, sometimes by a stammer, sometimes by a violent effort at +volubility, when, at some interrogatory that went tingling right to my +heart, I turned uneasily, and there were my father's eyes fixed on +mine. Fixed, as they had been--when, and none knew why, I pined and +languished, and my father said "he must go to school." Fixed, with +quiet watchful tenderness. Ah no!--his thought had not been on the +great work--he had been deep in the pages of that less worthy one for +which he had yet more an author's paternal care. I met those eyes, and +yearned to throw myself on his heart--and tell him all. Tell him what? +Ma'am, I no more knew what to tell him, than I know what that black +thing was which has so worried me all this blessed evening! + +"Pisistratus," said my father softly, "I fear you have forgotten the +saffron bag." + +"No, indeed, sir," said I smiling. + +"He," resumed my father--"he who wears the saffron bag has more +cheerful, settled spirits than you seem to have, my poor boy." + +"My dear Austin, his spirits are very good, I think," said my mother +anxiously. + +My father shook his head--then he took two or three turns about the +room. + +"Shall I ring for candles, sir, it is getting dark: you will wish to +read?" + +"No, Pisistratus, it is you who shall read, and this hour of twilight +best suits the book I am about to open to you." + +So saying, he drew a chair between me and my mother, and seated +himself gravely, looking down a long time in silence--then turning his +eyes to each of us alternately. + +"My dear wife," said he at length, almost solemnly, "I am going to +speak of myself as I was before I knew you." + +Even in the twilight I saw that my mother's countenance changed. + +"You have respected my secrets, Katherine, tenderly--honestly. Now the +time is come when I can tell them to you and to our son." + + +CHAPTER XXX. + +MY FATHER'S FIRST LOVE. + +"I lost my mother early; my father, (a good man, but who was so +indolent that he rarely stirred from his chair, and who often passed +whole days without speaking, like an Indian dervish,) left Roland and +myself to educate ourselves much according to our own tastes. Roland +shot, and hunted, and fished,--read all the poetry and books of +chivalry to be found in my father's collection, which was rich in such +matters, and made a great many copies of the old pedigree;--the only +thing in which my father ever evinced much of the vital principle. +Early in life I conceived a passion for graver studies, and by good +luck I found a tutor in Mr Tibbets, who, but for his modesty, Kitty, +would have rivalled Porson. He was a second Budæus for industry, and, +by the way, he said exactly the same thing that Budæus did, viz. 'that +the only lost day in his life was that in which he was married; for on +that day he had only had six hours for reading!' Under such a master I +could not fail to be a scholar. I came from the university with such +distinction as led me to look sanguinely on my career in the world. + +"I returned to my father's quiet rectory to pause and look about me, +and consider what path I should take to fame. The rectory was just at +the foot of the hill, on the brow of which were the ruins of the +castle Roland has since purchased. And though I did not feel for the +ruins the same romantic veneration as my dear brother, (for my +day-dreams were more coloured by classic than feudal recollections,) I +yet loved to climb the hill, book in hand, and build my castles in +the air amidst the wrecks of that which time had shattered on the +earth. + +"One day, entering the old weed-grown court, I saw a lady, seated on +my favourite spot, sketching the ruins. The lady was young--more +beautiful than any woman I had yet seen, at least to my eyes. In a +word, I was fascinated, and, as the trite phrase goes, 'spell-bound.' +I seated myself at a little distance, and contemplated her without +desiring to speak. By-and-by, from another part of the ruins, which +were then uninhabited, came a tall, imposing, elderly gentleman, with +a benignant aspect; and a little dog. The dog ran up to me, barking. +This drew the attention of both lady and gentleman to me. The +gentleman approached, called off the dog, and apologised with much +politeness. Surveying me somewhat curiously, he then began to ask +questions about the old place and the family it had belonged to, with +the name and antecedents of which he was well acquainted. By degrees +it came out that I was the descendant of that family, and the younger +son of the humble rector who was now its representative. The gentleman +then introduced himself to me as the Earl of Rainsforth, the principal +proprietor in the neighbourhood, but who had so rarely visited the +county during my childhood and earlier youth, that I had never before +seen him. His only son, however, a young man of great promise, had +been at the same college with me in my first year at the university. +The young lord was a reading man and a scholar; and we had become +slightly acquainted when he left for his travels. + +"Now, on hearing my name, Lord Rainsforth took my hand cordially, and +leading me to his daughter, said, 'Think, Ellinor, how fortunate; this +is the Mr Caxton whom your brother so often spoke of.' + +"In short, my dear Pisistratus, the ice was broken, the acquaintance +made, and Lord Rainsforth, saying he was come to atone for his long +absence from the county, and to reside at Compton the greater part of +the year, pressed me to visit him. I did so. Lord Rainsforth's liking +to me increased: I went there often." + +My father paused, and seeing my mother had fixed her eyes upon him +with a sort of mournful earnestness, and had pressed her hands very +tightly together, he bent down and kissed her forehead. + +"There is no cause, my child!" said he. It is the only time I ever +heard him call my mother by that paternal name. But then, I never +heard him before so grave and solemn--not a quotation, too--it was +incredible: it was not my father speaking--it was another man. "Yes, I +went there often. Lord Rainsforth was a remarkable person. Shyness, +that was wholly without pride, (which is rare,) and a love for quiet +literary pursuits, had prevented his taking that personal part in +public life for which he was richly qualified; but his reputation for +sense and honour, and his personal popularity, had given him no +inconsiderable influence even, I believe, in the formation of +cabinets, and he had once been prevailed upon to fill a high +diplomatic situation abroad, in which I have no doubt that he was as +miserable as a good man can be under any infliction. He was now +pleased to retire from the world, and look at it through the loopholes +of retreat. Lord Rainsforth had a great respect for talent, and a warm +interest in such of the young as seemed to him to possess it. By +talent, indeed, his family had risen, and were strikingly +characterised. His ancestor, the first peer, had been a distinguished +lawyer; his father had been celebrated for scientific attainments; his +children, Ellinor and Lord Pendarvis, were highly accomplished. Thus, +the family identified themselves with the aristocracy of intellect, +and seemed unconscious of their claims to the lower aristocracy of +rank. You must bear this in mind throughout my story. + +"Lady Ellinor shared her father's tastes and habits of thought--(she +was not then an heiress.) Lord Rainsforth talked to me of my career. +It was a time when the French Revolution had made statesmen look round +with some anxiety to strengthen the existing order of things, by +alliance with all in the rising generation who evinced such ability as +might influence their contemporaries. + +"University distinction is, or was formerly, among the popular +passports to public life. By degrees Lord Rainsforth liked me so well, +as to suggest to me a seat in the House of Commons. A member of +Parliament might rise to any thing, and Lord Rainsforth had sufficient +influence to effect my return. Dazzling prospect this to a young +scholar fresh from Thucydides, and with Demosthenes fresh at his +tongue's end. My dear boy, I was not then, you see, quite what I am +now; in a word, I loved Ellinor Compton, and therefore I was +ambitious. You know how ambitious she is still. But I could not mould +my ambition to hers. I could not contemplate entering the senate of my +country as a dependant on a party or a patron--as a man who must make +his fortune there--as a man who, in every vote, must consider how much +nearer he advanced himself to emolument. I was not even certain that +Lord Rainsforth's views on politics were the same as mine would be. +How could the politics of an experienced man of the world be those of +an ardent young student? But had they been identical, I felt that I +could not so creep into equality with a patron's daughter. No! I was +ready to abandon my own more scholastic predilections--to strain every +energy at the bar--to carve, or force my own way to fortune--and, if I +arrived at independence, then--what then? why, the right to speak of +love, and aim at power. This was not the view of Ellinor Compton. The +law seemed to her a tedious, needless drudgery: there was nothing in +it to captivate her imagination. She listened to me with that charm +which she yet retains, and by which she seems to identify herself with +those who speak to her. She would turn to me with a pleading look when +her father dilated on the brilliant prospects of a parliamentary +success; for he (not having gained it, yet having lived with those who +had,) overvalued it, and seemed ever to wish to enjoy it through some +other. But when I, in turn, spoke of independence, of the bar, +Ellinor's face grew overcast. The world--the world was with her, and +the ambition of the world, which is always for power or effect! A part +of the house lay exposed to the east wind, 'Plant half way down the +hill,' said I one day. 'Plant?' cried Lady Emily--'it will be twenty +years before the trees grow up. No, my dear father, build a wall, and +cover it with creepers!' That was an illustration of her whole +character. She could not wait till trees had time to grow up; a dead +wall would be so much more quickly thrown up, and parasite creepers +would give it a prettier effect. Nevertheless, she was a grand and +noble creature. And I--in love! Not so discouraged as you may suppose; +for Lord Rainsforth often hinted encouragement, which even I could +scarcely misconstrue. Not caring for rank, and not wishing for fortune +beyond competence for his daughter, he saw in me all he required,--a +gentleman of ancient birth, and one in whom his own active mind could +prosecute that kind of mental ambition which overflowed in him, and +yet had never had its vent. And Ellinor!--heaven forbid I should say +she loved me,--but something made me think she could do so. Under +these notions, suppressing all my hopes, I made a bold effort to +master the influences round me, and to adopt that career I thought +worthiest of us all. I went to London to read for the bar." + +"The bar! is it possible?" cried I. My father smiled sadly. + +"Every thing seemed possible to me then. I read some months. I began +to see my way even in that short time; began to comprehend what would +be the difficulties before me, and to feel there was that within me +which could master them. I took a holiday and returned to Cumberland. +I found Roland there on my return. Always of a roving adventurous +temper, though he had not then entered the army, he had, for more than +two years, been wandering over the Continent on foot. It was a young +knight-errant whom I embraced, and who overwhelmed me with reproaches +that I should be reading for the law. There had never been a lawyer in +the family! It was about that time, I think, that I petrified him with +the discovery of the printer! I knew not exactly wherefore, whether +from jealousy, fear, foreboding--but it certainly _was_ a pain that +seized me--when I learned from Roland that he had become intimate at +Compton Hall. Roland and Lord Rainsforth had met at the house of a +neighbouring gentleman, and Lord Rainsforth had welcomed his +acquaintance, at first perhaps for my sake, afterwards for his own. + +"I could not for the life of me," continued my father, "ask Roland if +he admired Ellinor; but, when I found that he did not put that +question to me, I trembled! + +"We went to Compton together, speaking little by the way. We stayed +there some days." + +My father here thrust his hand into his waistcoat--all men have their +little ways, which denote much; and when my father thrust his hand +into his waistcoat, it was always a sign of some mental effort--he was +going to prove, or to argue, to moralise, or to preach. Therefore, +though I was listening before with all my ears, I believe I had, +speaking magnetically and mesmerically, an extra pair of ears, a new +sense supplied to me, when my father put his hand into his waistcoat. + + +CHAPTER XXXI. + +WHEREIN MY FATHER CONTINUES HIS STORY. + +"There is not a mystical creation, type, symbol, or poetical invention +for meanings abstruse, recondite, and incomprehensible, which is not +represented by the female gender," said my father, having his hand +quite buried in his waistcoat. "There is the Sphynx, and the Enigma, +and the Chimera, and Isis, whose veil no man had ever lifted: they are +all ladies, Kitty, every one of them! And so was Persephone, who must +be always either in heaven or hell--and Hecate, who was one thing by +night and another by day. The Sibyls were females; and so were the +Gorgons, the Harpies, the Furies, the Fates, and the Teutonic Valkyrs, +Nornies, and Hela herself: in short, all representations of ideas, +obscure, inscrutable, and portentous, are nouns feminine." + +Heaven bless my father! Augustine Caxton was himself again! I began to +fear that the story had slipped away from him, lost in that labyrinth +of learning. But, luckily, as he paused for breath, his look fell on +those limpid blue eyes of my mother's, and that honest open brow of +hers, which had certainly nothing in common with Sphynges, Chimeras, +Fates, Furies, or Valkyrs; and, whether his heart smote him, or his +reason made him own that he had fallen into a very disingenuous and +unsound train of assertion, I know not, but his front relaxed, and +with a smile he resumed--"Ellinor was the last person in the world to +deceive any one willingly. Did she deceive me and Roland that we both, +though not conceited men, fancied that, if we had dared to speak +openly of love, we had not so dared in vain? or do you think, Kitty, +that a woman really can love (not much, perhaps, but somewhat) two or +three, or half a dozen at a time?" + +"Impossible," cried my mother. "And as for this Lady Ellinor, I am +shocked at her--I don't know what to call it!" + +"Nor I either, my dear!" said my father, slowly taking his hand from +his waistcoat, as if the effort were too much for him, and the problem +were insoluble. "But this, begging your pardon, I do think, that +before a young woman does really, truly, and cordially centre her +affections on one object, she suffers fancy, imagination, the desire +of power, curiosity, or heaven knows what, to simulate, even to her +own mind, pale reflexions of the luminary not yet risen--parhelia that +precede the sun. Don't judge of Roland as you see him now, +Pisistratus--grim, and gray, and formal; imagine a nature soaring high +amongst daring thoughts, or exuberant with the nameless poetry of +youthful life--with a frame matchless for bounding elasticity--an eye +bright with haughty fire--a heart from which noble sentiments sprang +like sparks from an anvil. Lady Ellinor had an ardent, inquisitive +imagination. This bold fiery nature must have moved her interest. On +the other hand, she had an instructed, full, and eager mind. Am I vain +if I say, now at the lapse of so many years, that in my mind her +intellect felt companionship? When a woman loves, and marries, and +settles, why then she becomes--a one whole, a completed being. But a +girl like Ellinor has in her many women. Various herself, all +varieties please her. I do believe that, if either of us had spoken +the word boldly, Lady Ellinor would have shrunk back to her own +heart--examined it, tasked it, and given a frank and generous answer. +And he who had spoken first might have had the better chance not to +receive a 'No.' But neither of us spoke. And perhaps she was rather +curious to know if she had made an impression, than anxious to create +it. It was not that she willingly deceived us, but her whole +atmosphere was delusion. Mists come before the sunrise. However this +be, Roland and I were not long in detecting each other. And hence +arose, first coldness, then jealousy, then quarrels." + +"Oh, my father, your love must have been indeed powerful, to have made +a breach between the hearts of two such brothers!" + +"Yes," said my father; "it was amidst the old ruins of the castle, +there, where I had first seen Ellinor--that, winding my arm round +Roland's neck, as I found him seated amongst the weeds and stones, his +face buried in his hands--it was there that I said--'Brother, we both +love this woman! My nature is the calmer of the two, I shall feel the +loss less. Brother, shake hands, and God speed you, for I go!'" + +"Austin," murmured my mother, sinking her head on my father's breast. + +"And therewith we quarrelled. For it was Roland who insisted, while +the tears rolled down his eyes, and he stamped his foot on the ground, +that he was the intruder, the interloper--that he had no hope--that he +had been a fool and a madman--and that it was for him to go! Now, +while we were disputing, and words began to run high, my father's old +servant entered the desolate place, with a note from Lady Ellinor to +me, asking for the loan of some book I had praised. Roland saw the +hand-writing, and while I turned the note over and over irresolutely, +before I broke the seal, he vanished. + +"He did not return to my father's house. We did not know what had +become of him. But I, thinking over that impulsive volcanic nature, +took quick alarm. And I went in search of him; came on his track at +last; and, after many days, found him in a miserable cottage amongst +the most dreary of the dreary wastes which form so large a part of +Cumberland. He was so altered I scarcely knew him. To be brief, we +came at last to a compromise. We would go back to Compton. This +suspense was intolerable. One of us at least should take courage and +learn his fate. But who should speak first? We drew lots, and the lot +fell on me. + +"And now that I was really to pass the Rubicon, now that I was to +impart that secret hope which had animated me so long--been to me a +new life--what were my sensations? My dear boy, depend on it that that +age is the happiest, when such feelings as I felt then can agitate us +no more. They are mistakes in the serene order of that majestic life +which heaven meant for thoughtful man. Our souls should be as stars on +earth, not as meteors and tortured comets. What could I offer to +Ellinor--to her father? What but a future of patient labour? And in +either answer, what alternative of misery!--my own existence +shattered, or Roland's noble heart! + +"Well, we went to Compton. In our former visits we had been almost the +only guests. Lord Rainsforth did not much affect the intercourse of +country squires, less educated then than now. And in excuse for +Ellinor and for us, we were almost the only men of her own age she saw +when in that large dull house. But now the London season had broken +up, the house was filled; there was no longer that familiar and +constant approach to the mistress of the Hall, which had made us like +one family. Great ladies, fine people, were round her; a look, a +smile, a passing word, were as much as I had a right to expect. And +the talk, too, how different! Before, I could speak on books,--I was +at home there! Roland could pour forth his dreams, his chivalrous love +for the past, his bold defiance of the unknown future. And Ellinor, +cultivated and fanciful, could sympathise with both. And her father, +scholar and gentleman, could sympathise too. But now--" + + +CHAPTER XXXII. + +WHEREIN MY FATHER BRINGS ABOUT HIS DENOUEMENT. + +"It is no use in the world," said my father, "to know all the +languages expounded in grammars and splintered up into lexicons, if we +don't learn the language of the world. It is a talk apart, Kitty," +cried my father warming up. "It is an ANAGLYPH--a spoken anaglyph, my +dear! If all the hieroglyphs of the Egyptians had been A B C to you, +still if you did not know the anaglyph, you would know nothing of the +true mysteries of the priests.[1] + +"Neither Roland nor I knew one symbol-letter of the anaglyph. Talk, +talk--talk on persons we never heard of, things we never cared for. +All _we_ thought of importance, puerile or pedantic trifles--all we +thought so trite and childish, the grand momentous business of life! +If you found a little schoolboy, on his half holiday, fishing for +minnows with a crooked pin, and you began to tell him of all the +wonders of the deep, the laws of the tides, and the antediluvian +relics of iguanodon and ichthyosaurus--nay, if you spoke but of pearl +fisheries, and coral banks, or water-kelpies and naiads, would not the +little boy cry out peevishly, 'Don't tease me with all that nonsense! +let me fish in peace for my minnows.' I think the little boy is right +after his own way--it was to fish for minnows that he came out, poor +child, not to hear about iguanodons and water-kelpies! + +"So the company fished for minnows, and not a word could we say about +our pearl fisheries and coral banks! And as for fishing for minnows +ourselves, my dear boy, we should have been less bewildered if you had +asked us to fish for a mermaid! Do you see, now, one reason why I have +let you go thus early into the world? Well, but amongst these +minnow-fishers there was one who fished with an air that made the +minnows look larger than salmons. + +"Trevanion had been at Cambridge with me. We were even intimate. He +was a young man like myself, with his way to make in the world. Poor +as I--of a family upon a par with mine--old enough but decayed. There +was, however, this difference between us. He had connexions in the +great world--I had none. Like me his chief pecuniary resource was a +college fellowship. Now, Trevanion had established a high reputation +at the university; but less as a scholar, though a pretty fair one, +than as a man to rise in life. Every faculty he had was an energy. He +aimed at every thing--lost some things, gained others. He was a great +speaker in a debating society, a member of some politico-economical +club. He was an eternal talker--brilliant, various, paradoxical, +florid--different from what he is now. For, dreading fancy, his career +since has been an effort to curb it. But all his mind attached itself +to something that we Englishmen call solid; it was a large mind--not, +my dear Kitty, like a fine whale sailing through knowledge from the +pleasure of sailing--but like a polypus, that puts forth all its +feelers for the purpose of catching hold of something. Trevanion had +gone at once to London from the university: his reputation and his +talk dazzled his connexions, not unjustly. They made an effort--they +got him into parliament: he had spoken, he had succeeded. He came to +Compton with the flush of his virgin fame. I cannot convey to you, who +know him now--with his care-worn face, and abrupt dry manner,--reduced +by perpetual gladiatorship to the skin and bone of his former +self--what that man was when he first stepped into the arena of life. + +"You see, my listeners, that you have to recollect that we middle-aged +folks were young then--that is to say, we were as different from what +we are now, as the green bough of summer is from the dry wood, out +of which we make a ship or a gate-post. Neither man nor wood comes to +the uses of life till the green leaves are stripped and the sap gone. +And then the uses of life transform us into strange things with other +names: the tree is a tree no more--it is a gate or a ship; the youth +is a youth no more, but a one-legged soldier; a hollow-eyed statesman; +a scholar spectacled and slippered! When Micyllus--(here the hand +slides into the waistcoat again!)--when Micyllus," said my father, +"asked the cock that had once been Pythagoras,[2] if the affair of +Troy was really as Homer told it, the cock replied scornfully, 'How +could Homer know any thing about it?--at that time he was a camel in +Bactria.' Pisistratus, according to the doctrine of metempsychosis, +you might have been a Bactrian camel--when that which to my life was +the siege of Troy saw Roland and Trevanion before the walls. + +"Handsome you can see that Trevanion has been; but the beauty of his +countenance then was in its perpetual play, its intellectual +eagerness; and his conversation was so discursive, so various, so +animated, and, above all, so full of the things of the day! If he had +been a priest of Serapis for fifty years, he could not have known the +Anaglyph better! Therefore he filled up every crevice and pore of that +hollow society with his broken, inquisitive, petulant light. Therefore +he was admired, talked of, listened to; and everybody said, 'Trevanion +is a rising man.' + +"Yet I did not do him then the justice I have done since--for we +students and abstract thinkers are apt too much, in our first youth, +to look to the _depth_ of a man's mind or knowledge, and not enough to +the _surface_ it may cover. There may be more water in a flowing +stream, only four feet deep, and certainly more force and more health, +than in a sullen pool, thirty yards to the bottom! I did not do +Trevanion justice. I did not see how naturally he realised Lady +Ellinor's ideal. I have said that she was like many women in one. +Trevanion was a thousand men in one. He had learning to please her +mind, eloquence to dazzle her fancy, beauty to please her eye, +reputation precisely of the kind to allure her vanity, honour and +conscientious purpose to satisfy her judgment. And, above all, he was +ambitious. Ambitious not as I--not as Roland was, but ambitious as +Ellinor was: ambitious, not to realise some grand ideal in the silent +heart, but to grasp the practical positive substances that lay +without. + +"Ellinor was a child of the great world, and so was he. I saw not all +this, nor did Roland; and Trevanion seemed to pay no particular court +to Ellinor. + +"But the time approached when I ought to speak. The house began to +thin. Lord Rainsforth had leisure to resume his easy conferences with +me; and one day walking in his garden he gave me the opportunity. For +I need not say, Pisistratus," said my father, looking at me earnestly, +"that before any man of honour, especially if of inferior worldly +pretensions, will open his heart seriously to the daughter, it is his +duty to speak first to the parent, whose confidence has imposed that +trust." I bowed my head and coloured. + +"I know not how it was," continued my father, "but Lord Rainsforth +turned the conversation on Ellinor. After speaking of his expectations +from his son, who was returning home, he said 'But he will of course +enter public life,--will, I trust, soon marry, have a separate +establishment, and I shall see but little of him. My Ellinor!--I +cannot bear the thought of parting wholly with her. And that, to say +the selfish truth, is one reason why I have never wished her to marry +a rich man, and so leave me for ever. I could hope that she will give +herself to one who may be contented to reside at least a great part of +the year with me--who may bless me with another son, not steal from me +a daughter. I do not mean that he should waste his life in the +country; his occupations would probably lead him to London. I care not +where my _house_ is, all I want is to keep my _home_. You know' (he +added, with a smile that I thought meaning,) 'how often I have +implied to you that I have no vulgar ambition for Ellinor. Her portion +must be very small, for my estate is strictly entailed, and I have +lived too much up to my income all my life to hope to save much now. +But her tastes do not require expense; and while I live, at least, +there need be no change. She can only prefer a man whose talents, +congenial to hers, will win their own career, and ere I die that +career may be made.' Lord Rainsforth paused, and then--how, in what +words I know not,--but out all burst!--my long-suppressed, timid, +anxious, doubtful, fearful love. The strange energy it had given to a +nature till then so retiring and calm! My recent devotion to the +law,--my confidence that, with such a prize, I could succeed,--it was +but a transfer of labour from one study to another. Labour could +conquer all things, and custom sweeten them in the conquest. The bar +was a less brilliant career than the senate. But the first aim of the +poor man should be independence. In short, Pisistratus, wretched +egotist that I was, I forgot Roland in that moment; and I spoke as one +who felt his life was in his words. + +"Lord Rainsforth looked at me, when I had done, with a countenance +full of affection--but it was not cheerful. + +"'My dear Caxton,' said he, tremulously, 'I own that I once wished +this--wished it from the hour I knew you; but why did you so long--I +never suspected that--nor I am sure did Ellinor.' He stopped short, +and added quickly--'However, go and speak, as you have spoken to me, +to Ellinor. Go, it may not yet be too late. And yet--but go.' + +"Too late--what meant those words? Lord Rainsforth had turned hastily +down another walk, and left me alone, to ponder over an answer which +concealed a riddle. Slowly I took my way towards the house, and sought +Lady Ellinor, half hoping, half dreading, to find her alone. There was +a little room communicating with a conservatory, where she usually sat +in the morning. Thither I took my course. + +"That room, I see it still!--the walls covered with pictures from her +own hand, many were sketches of the haunts we had visited +together--the simple ornaments, womanly but not effeminate--the very +books on the table that had been made familiar by dear associations. +Yes, there the _Tasso_ in which we had read together the episode of +_Clorinda_--there the _Æschylus_ in which I translated to her the +_Prometheus_. Pedantries these might seem to some: pedantries, +perhaps, they were; but they were proofs of that congeniality which +had knit the man of books to the daughter of the world. That room--it +was the home of my heart! Such, in my vanity of spirit, methought +would be the air round a home to come. I looked about me, troubled and +confused, and, halting timidly, I saw Ellinor before me, leaning her +face on her hand, her cheek more flushed than usual, and tears in her +eyes. I approached in silence, and as I drew my chair to the table, my +eye fell on a glove on the floor. It was a man's glove. Do you know," +said my father, "that once, when I was very young, I saw a Dutch +picture called The Glove, and the subject was of murder. There was a +weed-grown marshy pool, a desolate dismal landscape, that of itself +inspired thoughts of ill deeds and terror. And two men, as if walking +by chance, came to this pool, the finger of one pointed to a +blood-stained glove, and the eyes of both were fixed on each other, as +if there were no need of words. That glove told its tale! The picture +had long haunted me in my boyhood, but it never gave me so uneasy and +fearful a feeling as did that real glove upon the floor. Why? My dear +Pisistratus, the theory of forebodings involves one of those questions +on which we may ask 'why' for ever. More chilled than I had been in +speaking to her father, I took heart at last and spoke to Ellinor"---- + +My father stopped short; the moon had risen, and was shining full into +the room and on his face. And by that light the face was changed; +young emotions had brought back youth--my father looked a young man. +But what pain was there! If the memory alone could raise what, after +all, was but the ghost of suffering, what had been its living reality! +Involuntarily I seized his hand: my father pressed it convulsively, +and said, with a deep breath, "It was too late; Trevanion was Lady +Ellinor's accepted, plighted, happy lover. My dear Katherine, I do not +envy him now; look up, sweet wife, look up!" + + +CHAPTER XXXIII. + +"Ellinor (let me do her justice) was shocked at my silent emotion. No +human lip could utter more tender sympathy, more noble self-reproach; +but that was no balm to my wound. So I left the house--so I never +returned to the law--so all impetus, all motive for exertion, seemed +taken from my being--so I went back into books. And so, a moping, +despondent, worthless mourner might I have been to the end of my days, +but that heaven, in its mercy, sent thy mother, Pisistratus, across my +path; and day and night I bless God and her, for I have been, and +am--oh, indeed, I am, a happy man!" + +My mother threw herself on my father's breast, sobbing violently, and +then turned from the room without a word,--my father's eye, swimming +in tears, followed her; and then, after pacing the room for some +moments in silence, he came up to me, and leaning his arm on my +shoulder, whispered, "Can you guess why I have now told you all this, +my son?" + +"Yes, partly: thank you, father," I faltered, and sate down, for I +felt faint. + +"Some sons," said my father, seating himself beside me, "would find in +their father's follies and errors an excuse for their own: not so will +you, Pisistratus." + +"I see no folly, no error, sir--only nature and sorrow." + +"Pause, ere you thus think," said my father. "Great was the folly, and +great the error of indulging imagination that had no basis--of linking +the whole usefulness of my life to the will of a human creature like +myself. Heaven did not design the passion of love to be this tyrant; +nor is it so with the mass and multitude of human life. We dreamers, +solitary students like me, or half poets like poor Roland, make our +own disease. How many years, even after I had regained serenity, as +your mother gave me a home long not appreciated, have I wasted. The +main-spring of my existence was snapped--I took no note of time. And +therefore now, you see, late in life the Nemesis wakes. I look back +with regret at powers neglected, opportunities gone. Galvanically I +brace up energies half palsied by disuse, and you see me, rather than +rest quiet and good for nothing, talked into what, I dare say, are sad +follies, by an Uncle Jack! And now I behold Ellinor again; and I say, +in wonder, All this--all this--all this agony, all this torpor for +that haggard face, that worldly spirit! So is it ever in life. Mortal +things fade; immortal things spring more freshly with every step to +the tomb. + +"Ah!" continued my father, with a sigh, "it would not have been so, if +at your age I had found out the secret of the saffron bag!" + + +CHAPTER XXXIV. + +"And Roland, sir," said I; "how did he take it?" + +"With all the indignation of a proud unreasonable man. More indignant, +poor fellow, for me than himself. And so did he wound and gall me by +what he said of Ellinor,--and so did he rage against me because I +would not share his rage,--that again we quarrelled. We parted, and +did not meet for many years. We came into sudden possession of our +little fortunes. His he devoted (as you may know) to the purchase of +the old ruins, and the commission in the army, which had always been +his dream--and so went his way, wrathful. My share gave me an excuse +for indolence,--it satisfied all my wants; and when my old tutor died, +and his young child became my ward, and, somehow or other, from my +ward my wife, it allowed me to resign my fellowship, and live amongst +my books--still as a book myself. One comfort, long before my +marriage, I had conceived; and that, too, Roland has since said was +comfort to him. Ellinor became an heiress--her poor brother died; and +all of the estate that did not pass in the male line devolved on her. +That fortune made a gulf between us almost as wide as her marriage. +For Ellinor, poor and portionless, in spite of her rank, I could have +worked, striven, slaved. But Ellinor RICH! it would have crushed me. +This was a comfort. But still, still the past--that perpetual aching +sense of something that had seemed the essential of life withdrawn +from life, evermore, evermore. What was left was not sorrow, it was a +void. Had I lived more with men, and less with dreams and books, I +should have made my nature large enough to bear the loss of a single +passion. But in solitude we shrink up. No plant so much as man needs +the sun and the air. I comprehend now why most of our best and wisest +men have lived in capitals; and therefore again I say, that one +scholar in a family is enough. Confiding in your sound heart and +strong honour, I turn you thus betimes on the world. Have I done +wrong? Prove that I have not, my child. Do you know what a very good +man has said--Listen and follow my precept, not example. + +"The state of the world is such, and so much depends on action, that +every thing seems to say aloud to every man, 'Do something--do it--do +it!'"[3] I was profoundly touched, and I rose refreshed and hopeful, +when suddenly the door opened, and who or what in the world should come +in; but certainly he, she, it, or they, shall not come into this +chapter!--On that point I am resolved. No, my dear young lady, I am +extremely flattered;--I feel for your curiosity; but really not a +peep--not one! And yet--well then, if you will have it, and look so +coaxingly--who, or what I say, should come in abrupt, unexpected--taking +away one's breath, not giving one time to say, "By your leave, or with +your leave," but making one's mouth stand open with surprise, and one's +eyes fix in a big round stupid stare, but-- + + +THE END OF THE CHAPTER. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] The anaglyph was peculiar to the Egyptian priests--the hieroglyph +generally known to the well educated. + +[2] LUCIAN, _The Dream of Micyllus_. + +[3] _Remains of the Rev. Richard Cecil_, p. 349. + + + + +POLITICAL ECONOMY, BY J. S. MILL.[4] + + +In the old feud between the man of experience and the man of theory, +it sometimes happens that the former obtains a triumph by the mere +activity of the latter. Cases have been known where the theorist, in +the clarifying and perfecting his own theory, has argued himself round +to those very truths which his empirical antagonist had held to with a +firm though less reasoning faith. He stood to his post; the stream of +knowledge seemed to be flowing past him, and those who floated on it +laughed at his stationary figure as they left him behind. Nevertheless +he stood still; and by-and-by this meandering stream, with the busy +crew that navigated it, after many a turn and many a curve, have +returned to the very spot where he had made his obstinate halt. + +This has been illustrated, and we venture to say will be illustrated +still further, in the progress of the science of political economy. +The man of experience has been taunted for his obstinacy and blindness +in adhering to something which he called common sense and matter of +fact; and behold! the scientific economist, in the course of his own +theorising, is returning to those very positions from which he has +been endeavouring to drive his opponent. The present work of Mr J. S. +Mill, the latest and most complete exposition of the most advanced +doctrines of the political economists, manifests, on more than one +occasion, this _retrograde progress_,--demolishing, on the ground of +still more scientific principles--the value of which time, however, +must test--those arguments by which his scientific predecessors had +attempted to mislead the man of experience or of empirical knowledge. + +When, moreover, we consider, that the errors of the political +economist are not allowed to remain mere errors of theory, but are +pushed forward into practice, thrust immediately into the vital +interests of the community, we must admit that never was the man of +experience and common sense more fully justified in holding back and +looking long before he yielded assent to his new teachers. Stranger +paradoxes were never broached than some that have lived their day in +this science; and paradoxes as they were, they claimed immediately +their share of influence in our legislative measures. A learned +professor, a luminary of the science, demonstrated that absenteeism +could have nothing whatever to do with the poverty of Ireland. So the +Greek sophist demonstrated that Achilles could never catch the +tortoise. But the Greek was the more reasonable of the two: he +required of no one to stake his fortune on the issue of the race. The +professor of political economy not only teaches his sophism--he would +have us _back his tortoise_. + +Although it has been our irksome task to oppose the application to +practice of half-formed theories, ill made up, and most dangerously +incomplete, yet we surely need not say that we take a genuine interest +in the approximation to a sound and trustworthy state of the science +of political economy. That, notwithstanding its obliquities, the new +science has rendered a substantial service to mankind, and is +calculated, when thoroughly understood, to render still greater +service--that it embraces topics of the widest and most permanent +interest, and that intellects of the highest order have been worthily +occupied in their investigation--this, let no strain of observation in +which from time to time we have indulged, be thought to deny or +controvert. To explain the complicate machinery of a modern commercial +state, is assuredly one of the most useful tasks, and by no means the +most easy, to which a reflective mind could address itself. When Adam +Smith, leaving the arena of metaphysical inquiry, in which he had +honourably distinguished himself, turned his analytic powers to the +examination of the common-place yet intricate affairs of that +commercial community in which he lived, he acted in the same +enlightened spirit which led Bacon to demand of philosophy, that she +should leave listening to the echoes of the school-room, and walk +abroad into nature, amongst things and realities. The author of _The +Wealth of Nations_, like him of the _Novum Organum_, struck out a new +path of wisely utilitarian thinking. If the one led philosophy into +the real world of nature and her daily phenomena, the other conducted +her into a world still more novel to her footsteps--the world of +commerce, of buying and selling, of manufacture and exchange. It may, +indeed, be said of both these men, that in their leading and most +valuable tenets, they were but announcing the claims of common sense; +and that, in doing this, they had from time to time, and in utterances +more or less distinct, been anticipated by others. But the cause of +common sense is, after all, the very last which obtains a fair and +potent advocacy; and the philosophy of one age is always destined, if +it be true, to become the common sense of succeeding ages; and it +detracts very little from the merit of an eminent writer who has been +the means of impressing any great truth upon the minds of men, either +at home or abroad, that others had obtained a view of it also, and +given to it an imperfect and less effective enunciation. Let due +honour, therefore, be paid to our countryman Adam Smith, the founder, +on this side of the Channel at least, of the science of political +economy--honour to him who turned a most keen intellect, sharpened by +those metaphysical studies for which his fragmentary Essays, as well +as and still more than his _Theory of Moral Sentiments_, prove him to +have been eminently qualified--turned it from these captivating +subtleties to inquiries into the causes, actually in operation, of the +prosperity of a commercial people. He left these regions of mazy +labyrinthine thought, which, if not as beautiful as the enchanted +gardens in which Tasso imprisoned his knight, are, to a certain order +of spirits, quite as ensnaring, to look into the mystery of bills of +exchange, of systems of banking, customs, and the currency. Be it +admitted at once, and ungrudgingly, that Adam Smith and some of his +successors have done a substantial service in assisting to explain the +machinery of society--the organisation, so to speak, of a commercial +body. Until this is done, and done thoroughly, no proposed measure of +legislation, and no course of conduct voluntarily adopted by the +people, can be seen in all its bearings; the true causes of the most +immediate and pressing evils can never be certainly known, and, of +course, the efficient remedies can never be applied. Our main +quarrel--though we have many--with the political economists is on this +ground--that, having constructed a theory explanatory of the _wealth_ +of nations, they have wished to enforce this upon our legislature, as +if it had embraced all the causes which conspire to the _wellbeing_ of +nations; as if wealth and wellbeing were synonymous. Having determined +the state of things best fitted to procure, in general, the greatest +aggregate amount of riches, they have proceeded to deal with a people +as if it were a corporate body, whose sole object was to increase the +total amount of its possessions. They have overlooked the equally +vital questions concerning the distribution of these possessions, and +of the _various employments_ of mankind. Full of their leading idea, +and accustomed to abstractions and generalities, they forget the +_individual_, and appear to treat their subject as if the aggregate +wealth of a community were to be enjoyed in some aggregate manner, and +a sum-total of possessions would represent the comforts and enjoyments +of its several members. To know what measures tend to increase the +national wealth is undoubtedly of great importance, but it is not +_all_; the theory of riches, or of commerce, is not the theory of +society. + +As political economy arose with a metaphysician, and has been +prosecuted by men of the same abstract turn of mind, it very soon +aspired to the philosophical character of a science. It laid down its +_laws_. But it has not always been seen that the harmonious and +systematic form it has been able to assume was owing to an arbitrary +division of social topics, which in their nature, and in their +operation on human welfare, are inextricably combined. They laid down +laws, which could only be considered such by obstinately refusing to +look beyond a certain number of isolated facts; and they persisted in +governing mankind according to laws obtained by this imperfect +generalisation. + +With regard to the main doctrine of the political economists, that of +free-trade--their advocacy of unfettered industry, whether working for +the home or foreign market--one sees plainly that there is a truth +here. Looking at the matter abstractedly from other considerations, +what doctrine could be more reasonable or more benign than that which +instructs the separate communities of mankind to throw aside all +commercial jealousies, all unnecessary heartburnings--to throw down +their barriers, their custom-houses, their preventive stations--to let +the commerce and industry of the world be free, so that the peace of +the world, as well as the wealth of nations, would be secured and +advanced? What better doctrine could be taught than this? Did not +Fénélon, mildest and best of archbishops, reasoning from the dictates +of his own Christian conscience, arrive at the same conclusion as the +philosophical economist? What better, we repeat, could be taught than +a doctrine which tends to make all nations as one people, and the most +wealthy people possible? But hold a while. Take the microscope, and +deign to look somewhat closer at the little interests of the many +little men that constitute a nation. Condescend to inquire, before you +change the currents of wealth and industry, (though to increase both,) +into what hands the wealth is to flow, and what the class of labourers +you diminish or multiply. Industry free! Good. But is the capitalist +to be permitted, at all times, to gather round him and his machinery +what multitudes of workmen he pleases--workmen who are to breed up +families dependent for their subsistence on the success of some +gigantic and hazardous enterprise? Is he to be allowed, under all +circumstances, to do this, and give the state no guarantee for the +lives of these men and women and children, but what it obtains from +his perhaps too sanguine calculations of his own profit and loss? Is +it any consolation that he bankrupts himself in ruining others, and +adding immensely to a pauper population? Commerce free! Good. It will +increase your imports, and multiply by an advantageous exchange the +products of your industry. But what if your measure to promote this +freedom of commerce foster a mode of industry at home essentially of a +precarious nature, and attended with fearful political and social +dangers, at the expense of other modes of industry of a more +permanent, stable, peaceful character--must nothing still be heard of +but free commerce? Must the utmost amount of products, at all hazard, +be obtained, whatever the mode of industry that earn it, or the fate +of those called into existence by the overgrown manufacture you +encourage? Is it no matter how won, or who enjoys? Is the only +question that the wealth be there? What if England, by carrying out, +without pause or exception, the doctrine of free-trade, should +aggravate the most alarming symptoms of her present social +condition--must this _law_ of the political economist be still, with +unmitigated strictness, urged upon her? She pleads for exception, for +delay; but the political economist will not see the grounds of her +plea--will not recognise her reasons for exception: full of his +partial science, which has been made to occupy too large a portion of +his field of vision, he _cannot_ see them. + +England, by a series of well-known mechanical inventions, extended in +a surprising manner her manufacture of cotton, and with it her foreign +commerce in this article. It is unnecessary to repeat figures that we +have given before, or which may be found in any statistical tables. +Enough that her operations here have been on a quite gigantic scale. +Recollect that _this_ is the channel into which must run the industry +and capital which your measures of free-trade may drive from their old +accustomed course. Look for a moment at the nature of this species of +industry, and ask whether it would be wise to foster and augment it at +the expense of other more ordinary and less precarious modes of +earning a subsistence. An enormous population is brought together, +educated, so far as their industrial habits are concerned, in no +independent labour, but taught merely to perform a part in the great +machinery of a cotton-mill, themselves a part of that machinery, and +trusting, they and their families, for their necessary bread, to the +successful sale of the great stock of goods, the annual amount of +which they are annually increasing. Although the home market may +absorb the greatest portion of these goods, yet the foreign market +takes so considerable a share, that any derangement of the external +commerce throws a large number of this densely-congregated multitude +out of employment. Is there nothing peculiarly hazardous in this +condition of things? Granted that nothing can, or ought to be done to +restrain the enterprising capitalist from speculating too freely with +the lives of men, is it a state of things to be aggravated? Now, at +this juncture comes the apostle of free-trade, and demands (for +illustration's sake) that French boots and shoes be admitted +duty-free. He employs the well-known, and, to its own legitimate +extent, unanswerable argument of the political economist. He tells us +that, by so doing, we shall purchase better and cheaper boots and +shoes, and sell more of our cotton; that, in short, by manufacturing +more cotton goods, in which we marvellously excel, we shall procure +better boots and shoes than by the old process of making them +ourselves. We are evidently the gainers. Let us see the gain. The +gentleman pays something less for his shoes, and is somewhat more +luxuriously shod. The owner of the cotton-mill, too, finds that trade +is _looking up_. To balance this, we have so many shoemakers driven +from their employment--the very steady one of making shoes for their +own countrymen--and added to the number of men working at cotton-mills +for the foreign market,--a mode of industry which we know, by painful +experience, to be precarious in the extreme. We describe the +superfluous shoemaker as going over directly to the artisans of the +factory: we say nothing of the miseries of the _middle passage_; +though in truth this transition is accomplished with pain and +difficulty, and after much struggle, and is rather done in the second +generation than the first, it being rather the children of the +shoemaker that are added to the population of the factory than the +shoemaker himself. + +We see here that the mere calculation of profit and loss, such as it +might figure in a debtor and creditor account, would justify the +extreme advocate of free-trade. But there are, surely, other +considerations which may properly rank a little higher than such a +tradesman's balance of profit and loss; we are surely allowed to +follow our inquiries a little further, and ask who is enriched, and +how? and what branch of industry is promoted, and what destroyed or +curtailed? It is not our object here to contend against what is called +the factory system--we accept it with its evil and its good; we are +not calling for measures directly hostile to it; but we certainly +should exclaim against the sacrifice of a branch of household, stable, +permanent industry, to be compensated by an increase in this already +enormous system of factory labour, which, together with much good, +brings with it so dreadfully precarious a condition of thousands and +tens of thousands of men. The political economist has proved that +free-trade is the condition under which the industry of man, so far as +the amount of its products is concerned, can be exercised with the +greatest advantage: he has established this principle; it is an +important one, and we thank him for its lucid exposition; but he shall +be no legislator of ours until he has learned to submit his principle +to wise exceptions, until he has learned to estimate the first +necessity of steady and well-remunerated employment to the labourer, +until he is prepared, in short, to give their due weight to other +considerations besides that of multiplying the gross products of human +industry. + +We have been viewing the question of free-trade from the position of +an opulent manufacturing people--from the position of England, in +short--and we see that there may be ground even here for exception. +But the case is much stronger, and the claim for exception still +plainer, which might be made out by a less opulent nation, desirous of +fostering its own rising manufactures. These wisely refuse a +reciprocity of free-trade measures. Even on the mere ground of the +increase of national wealth, and without considering the advantage +derived from a variety of employments, and a _due_ admixture of a +manufacturing population, they are fully justified in their protective +policy. The economist will tell them that they deprive themselves of +the opportunity of purchasing cheaper and better goods than they can +produce. We admit that, for a season, they must forego an advantage of +this description; but at the end of a few years how will the account +stand? If the protective duty has fostered a home manufactory that +would not otherwise have existed, (and this is an assumption which the +political economist himself is compelled to admit,) then is there in +that country a new industry--then amongst that people is there more +_labour_ and less idleness, and therefore more of the fruits of +labour. It has created for itself what it otherwise would have had to +purchase with its corn and oil. + +The political economists love an extreme case. In order to test the +universality of the principle of free-trade, we give them the +following:--There is a little island somewhere in the Pacific, and it +grows corn, and grapes, and the cotton plant. Two or three great ships +come annually to this island, bringing a store of Manchester goods, +and taking away a portion of the corn and the wine. But the wise men +of the island meet and say, Let us learn to make our own cotton into +stuff for raiment; so shall we have clothes without parting with our +corn and wine. Would the people of the island be very foolish if they +consented to wear, for a time, a much coarser raiment, in order that +they might practise this new industry, and thus provide themselves +with raiment, and keep their provender? We suppose that the same +unequal distribution of property is found in our island as in the rest +of the world--that there are rich and poor. Now, when a people +exchanges its articles of food for articles of clothing, it rarely, if +ever, parts with what, _to the whole of the people_, is a superfluous +quantity of food. Those who own large portions of the land have a +superfluity of produce, which they exchange for other articles either +at home or abroad; but probably no people ever grew a greater quantity +of corn, or other grain for food, than it could very willingly have +consumed itself, could we conceive it distributed amongst all who had +mouths to consume, and half-filled stomachs to stow it away in. Judge, +therefore, whether our little island would not, in a few years, be +much better off for refusing the visit of the great ships, and setting +to work to weave its own cotton into garments. The political +economists always talk of so much labour diverted from one employment +to another; they seem to have forgotten that there is such a thing as +so much idleness converted into so much labour. + +In the work of John Stuart Mill, to which we have now to call the +attention of our readers, the science of political economy has +received its latest and most complete exposition. Nor, as the title +itself will inform us, is the work limited to a formal enunciation of +abstract principles, (as was the case with the brief compendium of Mr +Mill, senior,) but it proceeds to apply those principles to the +discussion of some of the most vital and momentous questions with +which public opinion is at present occupied. There are things in these +volumes, as may easily be conceived, in which we do not concur--views +are supported, on some subjects, to which we have been long and +notoriously opposed; but there is, in the exposition of its tenets, so +accurate a statement, so severe and lucid a reasoning, and, withal, so +genuine and manly an interest in the great cause of humanity, that we +cannot hesitate a moment in awarding to it a high rank amongst the +sterling literature of our country. This magazine has never been +slow--it has been second to none--in its hearty recognition of great +talent and ability, from whatever quarter of the political horizon +these have made their appearance. We were amongst the first to give +notice to all whom it concerned of the addition to the students' shelf +of the profound and elaborate work, _The System of Logic_, by the +same author. The present is a work of more general interest, yet it +has the same severe character. In this, as in his logic, the author +has sacrificed nothing deemed by him essential to his task, to the +desire of being popular, or the fear of being pronounced _dry_--the +word of most complete condemnation in the present day. Dry, however, +no person who takes an interest in the actual condition and prospects +of society, can possibly find the greater portion of this work. For, +as we have already intimated, that which honourably distinguishes it +from other professed treatises of political economy is the perpetual, +earnest, never-forgotten interest, which accompanies the writer +throughout, in the great questions at present mooted with respect to +the social condition of man. Mr Mill very wisely refused to limit +himself to the mere abstract principles of his science; he descends +from them, sometimes as from a vantage ground, into the discussions +which most concern and agitate the public mind at the present day; +and, if his conclusions are not always, or even generally, such as we +can wholly coincide with, there is so penetrating an intelligence in +his remarks, and so grave and serious a philanthropy pervading his +book, that it would be impossible for the most complete opponent of +the work not to rise a gainer from its perusal. From what else can we +gain, if not from intercourse with a keen, and full, and sincere mind, +whether we have to struggle with it, or to acquiesce in its guidance? +There are passages in this work, didactic as its style generally is, +which have had on us all the effect of the most thrilling eloquence, +from the fine admixture of severe reasoning and earnestness of +feeling. + +For instance--to give at once an idea of the more elevated tone this +utilitarian science has assumed in the work of Mr Mill--it is no +little novelty to hear a political economist speak in the following +manner of the mere elements of national wealth. The author has been +discoursing on that stationary state to which all opulent nations are +supposed to tend, wherein, by the diminution of profits, there is +little means and no temptation to further accumulation of capital:-- + + "I cannot," he says, "regard the stationary state of capital + and wealth with the unaffected aversion so generally + manifested towards it by political economists, of the old + school. I am inclined to believe that it would be, on the + whole, a very considerable improvement on our present + condition. I confess I am not charmed with the ideal of life + held out by those who think that the normal state of human + beings is that of struggling to get on; that the trampling, + crushing, elbowing, and treading on each other's heels, which + form the existing type of social life, are the most desirable + lot of humankind, or any thing but one of the disagreeable + symptoms of one of the phases of industrial progress. The + northern and middle states of America are a specimen of this + stage of civilisation in very favourable circumstances; + having apparently got rid of all social injustices and + inequalities that affect persons of Caucasian race and of the + male sex, while the proportion of population to capital and + land is such as to insure abundance to every able-bodied + member of the community who does not forfeit it by + misconduct. They have the six points of Chartism, and no + poverty; and all that these advantages do for them is, that + the life of the whole of one sex is devoted to + dollar-hunting, and of the other to breeding dollar-hunters. + This is not a kind of social perfection which philanthropists + to come will feel any very eager desire to assist in + realising.... + + "That the energies of mankind should be kept in employment by + the struggle for riches, as they were formerly by the + struggle of war, until the better minds succeed in educating + the others into better things, is undoubtedly more desirable + than that they should rust and stagnate. While minds are + coarse, they require coarse stimuli, and let them have them. + In the mean time, those who do not accept the present very + early stage of human improvement as its ultimate type, may be + excused for being comparatively indifferent to the kind of + economical progress which usually excites the congratulations + of politicians--the mere increase of production and + accumulation. For the safety of national independence, it is + essential that a country should not fall much behind its + neighbours in these things. But in themselves they are of + little importance, so long as either the increase of + population, or any thing else, prevents the mass of the + people from reaping any part of the benefit of them. I know + not why it should be matter of congratulation, that persons + who are already richer than any one needs to be, should have + doubled their means of consuming things which give little or + no pleasure, except as representative of wealth; or that + numbers of individuals should pass over every year from the + middle classes into a richer class, or from the class of the + occupied rich to that of the unoccupied. It is only in the + backward countries of the world that increased production is + still an important object; in those most advanced, what is + economically needed is a better distribution, of which an + indispensable means is a stricter restraint on population. + Levelling institutions, either of a just or an unjust kind, + cannot alone accomplish it; they may lower the heights of + society, but they cannot raise the depths."--(Vol. ii. p. + 308.) + +It will be already seen, from even this brief extract, that the too +rapid increase of population presents itself to Mr Mill as the chief, +or one of the chief obstacles to human improvement. Without attempting +to repeat all that we have at different times urged upon this head, we +may at once say here that, in the first place, we never denied, or +dreamt of denying, that it was one of the first and most imperative +duties of every human being, to be assured that he could provide for a +family before he called one into existence. This has been at all times +a plain, unquestionable duty, though it has not at all times been +clearly understood as such. But, in the second place, we have combated +the Malthusian alarm, precisely because we believe that the moral +checks to population will be found a sufficient balance to the +physical law of increase. We have repudiated the idea that there is, +in the shape of the law of population, a constant enemy to human +improvement, convinced that this law will be found to be in perfect +harmony with all other laws that regulate the destiny of man. A +certain pressure of population on the means of subsistence has been +always recognised as an element necessary to the progress of +society--especially at that early stage when bare subsistence is the +sole motive for industry. When not only to live, but to live well, +becomes the ruling motive of men, then come into play the various +moral checks arising from prudence, vanity, and duty. But the mere +thinness of population will not, in the first place, induce a high +standard of comfortable subsistence. It is a delusion to suppose that +the low standard of comfort and enjoyment prevailing amongst the +multitude is the result of excessive population. If Neapolitan +lazzaroni are contented with macaroni and sunshine, it matters not +whether their numbers are five hundred or five thousand, they will +labour for nothing beyond their macaroni. We would challenge the +political economist to prove that in England, at this present time, or +in any country of Europe, the prevailing standard of comfort amongst +the working classes has been permanently determined by the amount of +population. This standard is slowly rising, from better education, +mechanical inventions, and other causes, and _it_ will ultimately +control the increase of population. That wages occasionally suffer a +lamentable depression, owing to the numbers of any one class of +workmen, is a fact which does not touch the point at issue. We say +that, whether a population be dense or rare, you must first excite, by +education and the example of a higher class, a certain taste for +comfort, for a cleanly and orderly mode of life, amongst the mass of +labouring men; that until this taste is called forth, it would be in +vain to offer high wages, for men would only work one half the week, +and spend the other half in idleness and coarse intemperance; and +that, this taste once called forth, there will be no fear of the class +of men who possess it being permanently degraded by over-population, +unless the excess of population were derived from some neighbouring +country, unhappily far behind it in the race of civilisation. + +We now continue our quotation. + + "There is room in the world, no doubt, and even in old + countries, for an immense increase of population, supposing + the arts of life to go on improving and capital to increase. + But, although it may be innocuous, I confess I see very + little reason for desiring it. The density of population + necessary to enable mankind to obtain, in the greatest + degree, all the advantages both of co-operation and of social + intercourse, has, in all the more populous countries, been + attained. A population may be too crowded, though all be + amply supplied with food and raiment. It is not good for man + to be kept perforce at all times in the presence of his + species. A world from which solitude is extirpated is a very + poor ideal. Solitude, in the sense of being often alone, is + essential to any depth of meditation or of character; and + solitude, in the presence of natural beauty and grandeur, is + the cradle of thoughts and aspirations which are not only + good for the individual, but which society could ill do + without. Nor is there much satisfaction in contemplating the + world, with nothing left to the spontaneous activity of + nature--with every rood of land brought into cultivation + which is capable of growing food for human beings--every + flowery waste or natural pasture ploughed up--all quadrupeds + or birds, which are not domesticated for man's use, + exterminated as his rivals for food--every hedgerow or + superfluous tree rooted out, and scarcely a place left where + a shrub or flower could grow, without being eradicated as a + weed in the name of improved agriculture. If the earth must + lose that great portion of its pleasantness which it owes to + things that the unlimited increase of wealth and population + would extirpate from it, for the mere purpose of enabling it + to support a larger, but not a better or a happier + population, I sincerely hope, for the sake of posterity, that + they will be content to be stationary long before necessity + compels them to it. + + "It is scarcely necessary to remark, that a stationary + condition of capital and population implies no stationary + state of human improvement. There would be as much scope as + ever for all kinds of mental culture, and moral and social + progress; as much room for improving the Art of Living, and + much more likelihood of its being improved, when minds ceased + to be engrossed by the art of getting on. Even the industrial + arts might be as earnestly and as successfully cultivated, + with this sole difference--that, instead of serving no + purpose but the increase of wealth, industrial improvements + would produce their legitimate effect, that of abridging + labour. Hitherto it is questionable if all the mechanical + inventions yet made have lightened the daily toil of any + human being. They have enabled a greater population to live + the same life of drudgery and imprisonment, and an increased + number of manufacturers and others to make large fortunes. + They have increased the comforts of the middle classes; but + they have not yet begun to effect those great changes in + human destiny which it is in their nature and in their + futurity to accomplish. Only when, in addition to just + institutions, the increase of mankind shall be under the + deliberate guidance of a judicious foresight, can the + conquests made from the powers of nature, by the intellect + and energy of scientific discoverers, become the common + property of the species, and the means of improving and + elevating the universal lot."--(Vol. ii. p. 311.) + +These are not the times when truth is to be withheld because it is +disagreeable. There is a morality connected with wealth, its uses and +abuses, not enough taught, certainly not enough understood. The rich +man, who will not learn that there is a _duty_ inseparable from his +riches, is no better fitted for the times that are coming down upon +us, than the poor man who has not learned that patience is a duty +peculiarly imposed upon him, and that the ruin of others, and the +general panic which his violence may create, will inevitably add to +the hardships and privations he already has to endure. If society +demands of the poor man that he endure these evils of his lot, rather +than desperately bring down ruin upon all, himself included; surely +society must also demand of the rich man that he make the best use +possible of his wealth, so that his weaker brother be not driven to +madness and despair. It demands of him that he exert himself manfully +for that safety of the whole in which he has so much more evident an +interest. For, be it known--prescribe whatever remedies you will, +political, moral, or religious--that it is by securing a certain +indispensable amount of wellbeing to the multitude of mankind that the +only security can be found for the social fabric, for life, and +property, and civilisation. If men are allowed to sink into a +wretchedness that savours of despair, it is in vain that you show them +the ruins of the nation, and themselves involved in those ruins. What +interest have they any longer in the preservation of your boasted +state of civilisation? What to them how soon it be all a ruin? You +have lost all hold of them as reasonable beings. As well preach to the +winds as to men thoroughly and bitterly discontented. Those, +therefore, to whom wealth, or station, or intelligence, has given +power of any kind, must do their utmost to prevent large masses of +mankind from sinking into this condition. If they will not learn this +duty from the Christian teaching of their church, they must learn it +from the stern exposition of the economist and the politician. + +Political economists have some of them wasted much time, and produced +no little ennui, by unprofitable discussions on the definition of +terms. These Mr Mill wisely spares us: an accurate writer, by a +cautious use of ordinary expressions, will make his meaning more +evident and precise than he will be able to do by any laboured +definitions, or the introduction of purely technical terms. Such have +been the discussions on the strict limits of the science of political +economy, and the propriety of the title it has so long borne; whether +intellectual efforts shall be classed amongst productive or +unproductive labour, and the precise and invariable meaning to be +given to such terms as _wealth_, _value_, and the like. These will +generally be found to be unprofitable controversies, tending more to +confusion of ideas than to precision of language. Let a writer think +steadily and clearly upon his subject, and ordinary language will be +faithful to him; distinctions between the several meanings of the same +term will be made as they are wanted. He who _begins_ by making such +distinctions is only laying a snare for his own feet; he will hamper +himself and perplex his reader. And with regard especially to the +range of topics which an author thinks fit to embrace in his treatise +upon this science, surely he may permit himself some liberty of +choice, without resolving to mete out new boundaries to which all who +follow him are to conform. If M. Dunoyer, for instance, in his able +and, in many respects, valuable work, _De la Liberté du Travail_, +chooses to write a treatise which embraces in fact the whole of human +life, all the energies and activities of man, mental as well as +physical, he could surely have done this without assailing old +distinctions and old titles with so needless a violence. Of what avail +to call in the etymologist at this time of day, to determine the +meaning, or criticise the application of so familiar a term as +political economy?[5] + +But there is another class of discussions which, although to the +general reader, who is mostly an impatient one, they will appear at +first sight to be of a purely technical character, must not be so +hastily dismissed. These will be often found to have a direct bearing +on the most important questions that can occupy the mind of the +statesman. They are in fact explanatory of that great machine, a +commercial society, upon which he has to practise--which he has to +keep in order, or to learn to leave alone--and therefore as necessary +a branch of knowledge to him as anatomy or physiology to one who +undertakes to medicine the body. Such are some of the intricate +discussions which concern the nature of _capital_--a subject to which +we shall in the first place and at once turn our attention. It is a +subject which Mr Mill has treated throughout in a most masterly +manner. We may safely say, that there is now no other work to which a +student could be properly directed for obtaining a complete insight +into all the intricacies of this great branch of political economy. +The exposition lies scattered, indeed, through the two volumes; he +must read the entire work to obtain it. This scattering of the several +parts of a subject is inevitable in treating such a science as +political economy, where every topic has to be discussed in relation +to every other topic. We do not think that Mr Mill has been +particularly happy in his arrangement of topics, but, aware as we are +of the extreme difficulty, under such circumstances, of making _any +arrangement at all_, we forbear from any criticism. A man must write +himself out the best way he can; and the reader, after obtaining all +the materials put at his disposition, may pack them up in what +bundles may best suit his own convenience. + +We must premise that on this subject--the nature and employment of +capital--there appears to be in one part of Mr Mill's exposition--not +an error--but a temporary forgetfulness of an old and familiar truth, +which ought to have found its place there. Its very familiarity has +occasioned it to be overlooked, in the keen inquiry after truth of a +more recondite nature. The part which the economists call +"unproductive consumption," the self-indulgent luxurious expenditure +of the rich--the part this plays in a system of society based on +individual effort and individual possession, is not fully stated. + +He who spends his money, and lives to do little else, however idle he +may be himself, has always had the consolation that he was, at least, +setting other people to work. Mr Mill _seems_ to deny him utterly this +species of consolation; for in contending against a statement, made by +political economists as well as others, that unproductive consumption +is necessary, in a strictly _economical_ sense, to the employment of +the workmen, and as the indispensable relative to productive +consumption, or capital spent in industrial pursuits, he has +overlooked that _moral_ necessity there is, in the present system of +things, that there should be those who spend to enjoy, as well as +those who lay out their money for profit. "What supports and employs +productive labour," says Mr Mill, (Vol. i. p. 97,) "is the capital +expended in setting it to work, and not the demand of purchases for +the produce of the labour when completed. Demand for commodities is +not demand for labour. The demand for commodities determines in what +particular branch of production the labour and capital shall be +employed; it determines the _direction_ of the labour, but not the +more or less of the labour itself, or of the maintenance and payment +of the labour. That depends on the amount of the capital, or other +funds directly devoted to the sustenance and remuneration of labour." +Now, without a doubt, the man who purchases an article of luxury when +it is manufactured, does not employ labour in the same sense as the +manufacturer, who spends his wealth in supporting the artisan, and +finding him the requisites of his art, and who, after selling the +products of this industry, continues to spend the capital returned to +him, together with the profit he has made, in the further sustenance +of workmen. But it has been always understood, and the truth appears +to be almost too trite to insist on, that unless the unproductive +consumer were there to purchase, the capitalist would have had no +motive to employ his wealth in this manner; and, what is of equal +importance to bear in mind, unless the capitalist also calculated on +being, some future day, an unproductive consumer himself, he would +have no motive, by saving and toiling, to increase his wealth. + +The necessity for a certain amount of unproductive consumption is not +a necessity in the nature of things. All men might, if they chose, be +saving, might spend upon themselves only what is needful for comfort, +and set apart the residue of their funds for the employment of labour, +not, of course, in the production of articles of luxury, for which +there would be no purchasers, but for such articles as the labourers +themselves, now paid from such ample stores, might be consumers of. +The social machine might still _go on_ under such a regime, and much +to the benefit of the labourer. The capitalists would find their +profits diminishing, it is true--they would be more rapidly +approaching that _minimum_ of profit, that stationary state, of which +we shall by-and-by have to speak; but this diminution of profits must, +at all events, sooner or later, take place, and depends ultimately, as +we shall have occasion to show, on higher laws, over which man has no +control. Men might, if they chose, be all saving, and all convert +superfluous wealth into capital; but need we add, men would never +choose any such thing. There is no necessity in the nature of things, +but there is a necessity in the moral nature of man for a certain +portion of this unproductive consumption. The good of others is not a +motive sufficiently strong to stimulate a man to any of the steady +pursuits of industry. When, therefore, his real wants are satisfied, +it must be the gratification of fictitious wants that induces him to +toil and accumulate, or to part with any thing he has, by way of +barter or exchange. From the time when the rude possessor of the soil +consents to surrender a portion of his surplus produce for some +trinket or piece of gaudy apparel, to the present epoch, when men +consent to live frugally and toil hard during the first period of +life, in order that they or their children may afterwards live idly, +luxuriously, and ostentatiously, this same unproductive expenditure +has performed the part of essential stimulant to human industry. It is +not enough, therefore, to say, that it gives the _direction_ to a +certain portion of labour: it affords the stimulant that converts +idleness into industry, and saving into capital. A very much more +dignified being would man undoubtedly be, if desire for the general +good could replace, as a motive of industry, a selfish desire, which +is often no better than what we ridicule in the savage when he +manifests a most disproportionate anxiety, as it seems to us, for the +possession of glass beads, or a piece of painted calico. But to this +point in the cultivation of human reason we have, at all events, not +yet arrived. And let this be always borne in mind--in order that the +class of society designated as unproductive consumers may not fall +into unmerited odium--that others, who are using their wealth in the +direct and profitable employment of labour, are themselves desirous, +above all things, of taking their place in the class of unproductive +consumers, and are working for that very end. + +"Every one can see," writes Mr Mill, "that if a benevolent government +possessed all the food, and all the implements and materials of the +community, it could exact productive labour from all to whom it +allowed a share in the food, and could be in no danger of wanting a +field for the employment of this productive labour, since, as long as +there was a single want unsaturated (which material objects could +supply) of any one individual, the labour of the community could be +turned to the production of something capable of satisfying that want. +Now, the individual possessors of capital, when they add to it by +fresh accumulations, are doing precisely the same thing which we +suppose to be done by our benevolent government."--(Vol. i. p. 83.) +Certainly the individual capitalists could do the same as the +benevolent government, if they had its benevolence. If there are any +political economists who teach otherwise, we hold them in error. We +wish only to add to the statement the old moral truth long ago +recognised, before political economy had a distinct place or name in +the world, that as man is constituted, or rather, as he has hitherto +demeaned himself, (for who knows what moral as well as other +reformations may take place?--the civilised man, such as we have him +at this day, postponing habitually the present enjoyment to the +future, is a creature of cultivation; and who can tell but that +advanced cultivation may make of man a being habitually acting for the +general good, in which general good he finds his own particular +interest sufficiently represented and provided for?)--that, as man has +hitherto acted, this same unproductive selfish expenditure is +indispensable as the motive to set that industry to work, which +ultimately distributes the real necessaries and rational comforts of +life to so many thousands. + +Having, in justice to the class of unproductive consumers, brought out +this homely truth, which, in the scientific exposition of Mr Mill, +seemed in danger of being overlooked, we proceed to a branch of the +subject which, if it appears at first of a very technical and abstruse +description, is yet capable of very important applications. One of the +most striking facts relating to the nature of capital is the tendency +of profits, in wealthy and populous countries, to diminish as the +amount of capital increases--a tendency to arrive at a certain +_minimum_ beyond which there would be no motive for saving, and little +possibility of accumulating. This tendency Mr Mill explains as being +the result, not of what has been somewhat vaguely called the +competition of capital, over-production, or general glut in the +market, but, in reality, of the physical laws of nature--of the simple +fact that the products of the soil cannot be indefinitely multiplied. +Manufacturing industry must be ultimately limited by the supply of +the raw material it fashions, which is furnished by the soil, and the +supply of food for the artisan, furnished also by the soil; it +therefore is subjected, as well as agricultural industry, to the +limits which have been set to the productiveness of the earth. Now, +without seeking for any definite ratio, such as might be expressed in +numbers, between the labour and ingenuity of man and the products of +the soil, it may be stated as a simple fact, which admits of no +dispute, that after the land has been fairly cultivated, additional +labour and additional cost yield but a small proportionate return. + + "The limitation to production from the properties of the + soil," writes our author, "is not like the obstacle opposed + by a wall, which stands immovable in one particular spot, and + offers no hindrance to motion, short of stopping it entirely. + We may rather compare it to a highly elastic and extensible + band, which is hardly ever so violently stretched that it + could not possibly be stretched any more; yet the pressure of + which is felt long before the final limit is reached, and + felt more severely the nearer that limit is approached. + + "After a certain, and not very advanced stage in the progress + of agriculture--as soon, in fact, as men have applied + themselves to cultivation with any energy, and have brought + to it any tolerable tools--from that time it is the law of + production from the land, that, in any given state of + agricultural skill and knowledge, by increasing the labour + the produce is not increased in an equal degree; doubling the + labour does not double the produce; or, to express the same + thing in other words, every increase of produce is obtained + by a more than proportional increase in the application of + labour to the land. + + "This general law of agricultural industry is the most + important proposition in political economy. Were the law + different, nearly all the phenomena of the production and + distribution of wealth would be other than they are. The most + fundamental errors, which still prevail on our subject, + result from not perceiving this law at work underneath the + more superficial agencies on which attention fixes itself; + but mistaking these agencies for the ultimate causes of + effects of which they may influence the form and mode, but of + which it alone determines the essence."--(Vol. i. p. 212.) + +It is to this physical law, underlying, as it were, the commercial and +industrial energies of man, that we must finally attribute that +gradual diminution of profits, observable in advanced and opulent +countries. This is popularly attributed, we believe, and has been +assigned, by some political economists, to over-production; to a +general glut of the market, or, in other words, a preponderance of +supply over demand. Over-production in this or that article may very +easily, for a time, take place; but general over-production, a general +over-balance in the supply, and deficiency in the demand, may be +demonstrated to be impossible. + +The simple but convincing argument against a general glut or +over-balance between supply and demand, which we believe Mr Mill +senior first originated, is this,--that as each producer produces in +order to part with his produce--in order, in fact, to exchange, to +purchase, he must necessarily bring into the market a demand +equivalent to the supply he furnishes. "All sellers," as our present +author expresses it, "are _ex vi termini_ buyers. Could we suddenly +double the productive powers of the country, we should double the +supply of commodities in every market; but we should, by the same +stroke, double the purchasing power. Every body would bring a double +demand as well as supply; every body would be able to buy twice as +much, because every one would have twice as much to offer in +exchange."--(Vol. ii. p. 91.) Of certain articles, there may, of +course, be a superfluity; of certain others a deficiency; but such a +thing as a general over-balance between supply and demand cannot take +place. + +The argument, if it laid claim to a sort of mathematical precision, +might be open to an ingenious cavil. The exchange of commodities, it +might be said, is effected through the instrumentality of money; now, +it is one of the peculiar advantages of money that it enables the +vender to sell at one time and purchase at another; it gives him a +command over future markets; it enables him to postpone indefinitely +one half of the operation of barter. Men who come into a market, +wishing to dispose of their commodities _now_, but not intending to +select what commodity they shall take in exchange, till some future +time, postponing indefinitely the other half of the operation of +barter, and seeking only for money, for that _token_ which will give +them or their children a claim on subsequent markets--do _not_ bring +with them a demand equivalent to their supply. + +The answer to the objection lets us more fully into the real facts of +the case. Those only who wished to sell their produce in order to +_hoard_, would fall under the description of men who bring a present +supply into the market, postponing indefinitely their demand. But the +producer is almost always a man desirous of increasing his wealth--he +does not hoard; he immediately lays out his capital in some productive +manner, in the purchase of food for labourers, and of the raw +materials of industry. But these articles, it happens, cannot be +supplied to him with the increasing abundance he demands; and thus we +fall back upon the ultimate law to which we have alluded. The +manufacturer finds, that every additional demand he makes for these is +supplied at a greater cost. What has limited the profits of the +agricultural capitalist limits his profits also. He cannot sell his +goods at the accustomed advantage. He exclaims that there is a glut in +the market. What he takes for a glut is a deficiency. It is quite +natural and permissible, however, that this phenomenon of the +diminution of profits should be spoken of as the result of a +superabundance of capital, provided only it be understood _why_ the +later accumulations of capital fail to bring the same return as the +earlier. + +A simple law of nature, therefore, is the true cause of this +commercial phenomenon. Countries, after a certain progress in the +career of wealth, must cease to accumulate;--the diminished profit on +capital affording no longer any motive for frugality and toil;--and +they arrive at what may be called the stationary state. "When a +country," says Mr Mill, "has long possessed a large production, and a +large net income to make savings from, and when, therefore, the means +have long existed of making a great annual addition to capital, (the +country not having, like America, a large reserve of fertile land +still unused,) it is one of the characteristics of such a country, +that the rate of profit is habitually within, as it were, a hand's +breadth of the minimum, and the country, therefore, on the very verge +of the stationary state. By this, I do not mean that this state is +likely, in any of the great countries of Europe, to be soon actually +reached, or that capital does not still yield a profit considerably +greater than what is barely sufficient to induce the people of these +countries to save and accumulate. My meaning is, that it would require +but a short time to reduce profits to the minimum, if capital +continued to increase at its present rate, and no circumstances having +a tendency to raise the rate of profit occurred in the mean +time."--(Vol. ii. p. 287.) + +Mr Mill then states what are the counteracting circumstances which +arrest this downward tendency of profits. He mentions the waste of +capital in periods of over-trading and rash speculation, the +expenditure of an unproductive kind, and the perpetual overflow of +capital into colonies and foreign countries, to seek higher profits +than can be obtained at home. This last has a twofold operation. "In +the first place, it does what a fire, or an inundation, or a +commercial crisis, would have done,--it carries off a part of the +increase of capital from which the reduction of profits proceeds. +Secondly, the capital so carried off is not lost, but is chiefly +employed either in founding colonies, which become large exporters of +cheap agricultural produce, or in extending, and perhaps improving, +the agriculture of older communities. It is to the emigration of +English capital that we have chiefly to look for keeping up a supply +of cheap food and cheap materials of clothing, proportional to the +increase of our population; thus enabling an increasing capital to +find employment in the country, without reduction of profit, in +producing manufactured articles with which to pay for this supply of +raw produce. Thus, the exportation of capital is an agent of great +efficacy in extending the field of employment for that which remains; +and it may be said truly that, up to a certain point, the more capital +we send away, the more we shall possess and be able to retain at +home."--(Vol. ii. p. 297.) + +This last observation we have quoted is well deserving of attention. +It is an instance of what we mentioned in the outset, of the science +correcting as it advances its own errors. What follows is a still more +striking instance, and still more worthy of attention. It occurs in +the chapter entitled,--_Consequences of the tendency of profits to a +minimum_. To such observations we have wished to draw the especial +attention of our readers, but could not do so till the previous +exposition had been gone through. + + "The theory of the effect of accumulation on profits, laid + down in the preceding chapter, materially alters many of the + practical conclusions which might otherwise be supposed to + follow from the general principles of political economy, and + which were, indeed, long admitted as true by the highest + authorities on the subject. + + "It must greatly abate, or, rather, altogether destroy, in + countries where profits are low, the immense importance which + used to be attached, by political economists, to the effects + which an event or a measure of government might have in + adding to, or subtracting from, the capital of the country. + We have now seen that the lowness of profits is a proof that + the spirit of accumulation is so active, and that the + increase of capital has proceeded at so rapid a rate, as to + outstrip the two counter agencies, improvements in + production, and increased supply of cheap necessaries from + abroad: and that unless a considerable portion of the annual + increase of capital were either periodically destroyed, or + exported for foreign investment, the country would speedily + attain the point at which further accumulation would cease, + or at least spontaneously slacken, so as no longer to + overpass the march of invention in the arts which produce the + necessaries of life. In such a state of things as this, a + sudden addition to the capital of the country, unaccompanied + by any increase of productive power, would be but of + transitory duration; since, by depressing profits and + interest, it would rather diminish, by a corresponding + amount, the savings which would be made from income in the + year or two following, or it would cause an equivalent amount + to be sent abroad, or to be wasted in rash speculations. + Neither, on the other hand, would a sudden abstraction of + capital, unless of inordinate amount, have any real effect in + impoverishing the country. After a few months or years there + would exist in the country just as much capital as if none + had been taken away. The abstraction, by raising profits and + interest, would give a fresh stimulus to the accumulative + principle, which would speedily fill up the vacuum. Probably, + indeed, the only effect that would ensue, would be that, for + some time afterwards, less capital would be exported, and + less thrown away in hazardous speculation. + + "In the first place, then, this view of things greatly + weakens, in a wealthy and industrious country, the force of + the economical argument against the expenditure of public + money for really valuable, even though industrially + unproductive purposes. _If for any great object of justice or + philanthropic policy, such as the industrial regeneration of + Ireland, or a comprehensive measure of colonisation or of + public education, it were proposed to raise a large sum by + way of loan, politicians need not demur to the abstraction of + so much capital, as tending to dry up the permanent sources + of the country's wealth, and diminish the fund which supplies + the subsistence of the labouring population. The utmost + expense which could be requisite for any of these purposes, + would not, in all probability, deprive one labourer of + employment, or diminish the next year's production by one ell + of cloth or one bushel of grain._ In poor countries the + capital of the country requires the legislator's sedulous + care; he is bound to be most cautious in encroaching upon it, + and should favour to the utmost its accumulation at home, and + its introduction from abroad. But in rich, populous, and + highly cultivated countries, it is not capital which is the + deficient element, but fertile land; and what the legislator + should desire and promote, is not a greater aggregate saving, + but a greater return to saving, either by improved + cultivation, or by access to the produce of more fertile + lands in other parts of the globe. In such countries, the + government may take any moderate portion of the capital of + the country and convert it into revenue, without affecting + the national wealth; the whole being rather drawn from that + portion of the annual saving which would otherwise be sent + abroad, or being substracted from the unproductive + expenditure of individuals for the next year or two, since + every million sent makes room for another million to be + saved, before reaching the overflowing point. When the object + in view is worth the sacrifice of such an amount of the + expenditure that furnishes the daily enjoyment of the people, + the only well grounded economical objection against taking + the necessary funds directly from the capital, consists of + the inconveniences attending the process of raising a + revenue, by taxation, to pay the interest of a debt. + + "_The same considerations enable us to throw aside, as + unworthy of regard, one of the common arguments against + emigration as a means of relief for the labouring class._ + Emigration, it is said, can do no good to the labourers, if, + in order to defray the cost, as much must be taken away from + the capital of the country as from its population. That any + thing like this proportion could require to be abstracted + from capital for the purpose even of the most extensive + colonisation, few, I should think, would now assert; but even + on that untenable supposition, it is an error to suppose that + no benefit could be conferred on the labouring class. If + one-tenth of the labouring people of England were transferred + to the colonies, and along with them one-tenth of the + circulating capital of the country, either wages, or profits, + or both, would be greatly benefited by the diminished + pressure of capital and population upon the fertility of the + land. There would be a reduced demand for food; the inferior + arable lands would be thrown out of cultivation, and would + become pasture; the superior would be cultivated less highly, + but with a greater proportional return; food would be lowered + in price, and, though money wages would not rise, every + labourer would be considerably improved in circumstances--an + improvement which, if no increased stimulus to population and + fall of wages ensued, would be permanent; while, if there + did, profits would rise, and accumulation start forward so as + to repair the loss of capital. The landlords alone would + sustain some loss of income; and even they, only if + colonisation went to the length of actually diminishing + capital and population, but not if it merely carried off the + annual increase."--(Vol. ii. p. 999.) + +Does not all this place the condition of England in a very striking +aspect before us? We have a country here so wealthy, so nearly +approaching that state where its accessions of capital can no longer +be profitably employed, that it wastes its funds in ruinous +speculations, building perhaps useless factories--and, if useless, how +mischievous!--that it sends its money abroad to construct foreign +railways, or throws it away upon South American republics. Yet the +people of this country is degraded and brutalised for want of +education, and it is threatened with political convulsions for want of +a good system of emigration; and you call for education, and you call +for colonisation, and the only obstacle that is opposed to you is--the +want of money! Shame upon England, if this be so! With all her +knowledge and civilisation, she will go down to ruin, rather than +give, in the shape of taxes, for the most necessary as well as +philanthropic purposes, that wealth which she can fling abroad or +waste at home with the most reckless prodigality. + +Of late the Irish landlord has been very justly held up to public +reproof for the hard, unthinking, extortionate manner in which he has +been in the habit of dealing with the soil--or allowing certain +middlemen to deal with it--taking a famine-price for the +land--permitting the miserable cottiers to bid against each other, +instead of fixing an equitable rent, such as would finally have +secured to himself better and more profitable tenants. For his +thoughtlessness or cupidity, whichever it may be, both he and the +country at large are paying a severe penalty. But the Irish landlords +are not the only class that are to blame. That indiscriminate recoil +from all taxation, whatever be its object, which characterises the +upper and middling classes of society in England, is a sad blot in +their escutcheon.[6] + +Before quitting this subject of capital, we must quote a passage +which occurs at an earlier part of the work, but which is in perfect +harmony with the strain of observations we have been calling attention +to. It serves to show and explain the elastic power there is in every +thoroughly industrious country to revive from any temporary loss, or +sacrifice, or calamity. Let but the people with their knowledge and +habits, the soil and a little food, remain, and there is no effort, +and no ruin or desolation from which it would not speedily recover. +Moreover, it is a passage of a certain popular interest, and we are +glad of the opportunity to relieve our pages by its quotation. + + "Every thing which is produced is consumed; both what is + saved and what is said to be spent; and the former quite as + rapidly as the latter. All the ordinary forms of language + tend to disguise this. When men talk of the ancient wealth of + a country, of riches inherited from ancestors, and similar + expressions, the idea suggested is, that the riches so + transmitted were produced long ago, at the time when they are + said to have been first acquired, and that no portion of the + capital of the country was produced this year, except so much + as may have been this year added to the total amount. The + fact is far otherwise. The greater part, in value, of the + wealth now existing in England, has been produced by human + hands within the last twelve months. A very small proportion + indeed of that large aggregate was in existence ten years + ago;--of the present productive capital of the country, + scarcely any part except farm-houses and factories, and a few + ships and machines; and even these would not in most cases + have survived so long, if fresh labour had not been employed + within that period in putting them in repair. The land + subsists, and the land is almost the only thing that + subsists. Every thing which is produced perishes, and most + things very quickly. Most kinds of capital are not fitted by + their nature to be long preserved. There are a few, and but a + few productions, capable of a very prolonged existence. + Westminster Abbey has lasted many centuries, with occasional + repairs; some ancient sculptures have existed above two + thousand years; the Pyramids perhaps double or treble that + time. But these were objects devoted to unproductive use. If + we except bridges and aqueducts, (to which may sometimes be + added tanks and embankments,) there are few instances of any + edifice applied to industrial purposes which has been of + great duration: such buildings do not hold out against wear + and tear, nor is it good economy to construct them of the + solidity necessary for permanency. Capital is kept in + existence from age to age, not by preservation, but by + perpetual reproduction: every part of it is used and + destroyed, generally very soon after it has been produced; + but those who consume it are employed meanwhile in producing + more. The growth of capital is similar to the growth of + population. Every individual who is born, dies, but in each + year the number born exceeds the number who die; the + population, therefore, always increases, although not one + person of those comprising it was alive until a very recent + date. + + "This perpetual consumption and reproduction of capital + affords the explanation of what has so often excited + wonder--the great rapidity with which countries recover from + a state of devastation; the disappearance in a short time of + all traces of the mischief done by earthquakes, of floods, + hurricanes, and the ravages of war. An enemy lays waste a + country by fire and sword, and destroys or carries away + nearly all the movable wealth existing in it: all the + inhabitants are ruined; yet in a few years after, every thing + is much as it was before. This _vis medicatrix naturæ_ has + been a subject of sterile astonishment, or has been cited to + exemplify the wonderful strength of the principle of saving, + which can repair such enormous losses in so brief an + interval. There is nothing at all wonderful in the matter. + What the enemy have destroyed would have been destroyed in a + little time by the inhabitants themselves; the wealth which + they so rapidly reproduce would have needed to be produced, + and would have been reproduced in any case, and probably in + as short an interval."--(Vol. i. p. 91.) + +One of the most interesting portions of the work is that devoted to +questions touching the cultivation of the land--as whether large or +small farms are most advisable. Mr Mill appears to advocate the +latter, and enlarges much on the industry universally displayed by the +peasants of those countries who either cultivate land of their own, or +in which they have a certain and permanent interest. Additional value +is given to these chapters, from the bearing they are made to have on +the vexed questions of the causes and the remedies of the lamentable +state of that unhappy country, Ireland. + +We remember well the impression made upon us on reading, some time, +ago, these passages in Sismondi's work which Mr Mill quotes on this +occasion, where the habits and life of the peasant proprietors of +Switzerland are so minutely, and apparently so faithfully described. +Coupling his description with what our own hasty observation had +taught us of this country, we were disposed to believe that nowhere, +and under no circumstances, does human life wear a more enviable +aspect than amongst these small proprietors, this rustic aristocracy +of Switzerland. But we regarded it, as we still do, as one of those +instances of _compensation_ so general in the moral world. All the +wealth of England could not purchase this sort of pastoral happiness. +At all events, only here and there such a primitive state of things +could exist. It was not necessary for our Norman ancestors to have +added manor to manor: a wealthy commercial state, which gives origin +to great fortunes, must inevitably give origin to large properties. +The same wealth which decides for us that the land shall be cultivated +in large farms, would also decide that it should be divided amongst +large proprietors. It is well to keep in mind that neither of these +facts is, to any material extent, owing to any peculiarity in the +history or the laws of England, but to its commercial opulence. + +Meanwhile we may be permitted to admire "the picture of unwearied +industry, and what may be called affectionate interest in the land;" +the patience, frugality, and prudence in entering into marriage, that +almost always characterise the class of small proprietors cultivating +their own soil. Our own yeomen, at that distant and almost fabulous +epoch when our country obtained the name of "merry England," were of +this description of men. We wish we had space to transfer to our pages +some of the extracts which our author has drawn together from French, +and German, and English writers, all showing the hearty, incessant, +and, as one author calls it, the "superhuman" industry of the peasant +proprietor. + +A great number of such properties England cannot be expected to have; +there may, too, be reasons for not desiring their existence; but one +fact is placed beyond all controversy, both by the testimony of +travellers, and the known operations of the common feelings of our +nature, that they are the most indefatigable of all labourers. If you +wish to convert an idle and improvident man into an industrious and +frugal one, give him a piece of land of his own: the recipe _may_ +fail; but if this does not reform him, nothing else will. + +It is on the condition of Ireland, as we have intimated, that this +description of the peasant proprietor is made particularly to bear. To +substitute for the wretched cottier system, some system under which +the Irish peasant, having a substantial interest in the improvement of +the soil, would be placed under strong motives to industry and +providence, is the great remedy which Mr Mill proposes for the unhappy +state of that country. + +The evils of the cottier system are notorious. A peasantry who have no +resource but the potato field, and who are multiplying as only utter +poverty can multiply, bid against each other for the possession of the +land. They promise rents they cannot possibly pay. They are +immediately and continually in debt; but being there upon the soil, +they can first feed themselves; this they do, and the rest, whatever +it may be, is for the landlord. + + "In such a condition," writes Mr Mill, "what can a tenant + gain by any amount of industry or prudence, and what lose by + any recklessness? If the landlord at any time exerted his + full legal rights, the cottier would not be able even to + live. If by extra exertion he doubled the produce of his bit + of land, or if he prudently abstained from producing mouths + to eat it up, his only gain would be to have more left to pay + to his landlord, while, if he had twenty children, they would + still be fed first, and the landlord would only take what was + left. Almost alone among mankind, the Irish cottier is in + this condition,--that he can scarcely be either better or + worse off by any act of his own. If he was industrious or + prudent, nobody but his landlord would gain; if he is lazy or + intemperate, it is at his landlord's expense. A situation + more devoid of motives to either labour or self-command, + imagination itself cannot conceive. The inducements of free + human beings are taken away, and those of a slave not + substituted. He has nothing to hope and nothing to fear, + except being dispossessed of his holding; and against this he + protects himself by the _ultima ratio_ of a civil + war."--(Vol. i. p. 374) + +That this system must be got rid of is admitted by all--but how? It is +often proposed to convert the cottiers into hired labourers; but +without entering upon (either to admit or controvert) the other +objections which Mr Mill makes to this plan, it is enough to say that +it is, at present, impracticable. "The conversion of cottiers into +hired labourers," he justly observes, "implies the introduction all +over Ireland of capitalist farmers, in lieu of the present small +tenants. These farmers, or their capital at least, must come from +England. But to induce capital to come in, the cottier population must +first be peaceably got rid of: in other words, that must be already +accomplished, which English capital is proposed as the means of +accomplishing." Besides which, it is the characteristic of the English +system of farming, that it employs the fewest number of labourers. +"Taking the number of Irish peasants in the square mile, and the +number of hired labourers in an equal space in the model counties of +Scotland or England, the former number is commonly computed to be +about three times the latter. Two-thirds, therefore, of the Irish +peasantry would be absolutely dispensed with. What is to be done with +them?... The people are there; and the problem is, not how to improve +the country, but how it can be improved by and for its present +inhabitants." + +To wait till the English system of farming can be introduced into +Ireland is tantamount to resigning all attempt to improve the +condition of the people of that country. Something must be done to +prepare the way for the introduction of that system. There are several +schemes afloat for giving or extending a certain _tenant-right_ to the +peasantry. Into these we have not space to enter--for it would take +some to explain the several significations attached to this term +tenant-right. It is sufficient to say, that, whenever the term has any +really important signification, and under it any effective remedy is +proposed, it means this,--that the legislature should interfere +between the landlord and tenant, and assign an equitable rent, and an +equitable duration of the tenancy. Such an act of the legislature +might be perfectly justifiable, and might be found to be as +advantageous to the landlord as the tenant; for the former as much +needs to be protected from his own indolence or thoughtless cupidity, +as the latter from the desperate pressure of want. But we should, of +course, infinitely prefer that such an equitable arrangement between +these parties should be arrived at without the intervention of the +legislature; and we think it would be an indirect result of the scheme +which Mr Mill proposes, or rather advocates. He would begin the work +of reformation by forming a body of peasant proprietors on the waste +lands of Ireland. Carried out with due consideration to the rights of +property, we confess we can detect no objections to this plan. Some +differences of opinion, we believe, exist amongst the best judges as +to the nature of the soil in question, and its capability of being +reclaimed; and on this point we cannot profess to give an opinion: +but, so far as principles of legislation, or the objects in view are +concerned, we cordially approve of the scheme, though we cannot say +that we entertain the same sanguine view of it as the author before +us. It deserves a trial, in conjunction with other measures of relief, +when the temper of that misguided people shall admit of the +application, with any probability of success, of this class of +remedial measures. + +We shall give the project as it is stated in the work before us. After +observing that it is not necessary that peasant properties should be +universal, in order to be useful, nor, indeed, desirous that they +should be universal, he thus proceeds:-- + + "It is enough, if there be land available on which to locate + so great a portion of the population, that the remaining area + of the country shall not be required to maintain greater + numbers than are compatible with large farming and hired + labour. For this purpose there is an obvious resource in the + waste lands, which are happily so extensive, and a large + portion of them so improveable, as to afford a means by + which, without making the present tenants proprietors, nearly + the whole surplus population might be converted into peasant + proprietors elsewhere. This plan has been strongly pressed + upon the public by several writers; but the first to bring it + prominently forward in England, was Mr William Thornton.[7] + + "The detailed estimate of an irrefragable authority, Mr + Griffith, annexed to the Report of Lord Devon's Commission, + shows nearly a million and a half of acres reclaimable for + the spade or plough, some of them with the promise of great + fertility, and about two millions and a half more reclaimable + for pasture; the greater part being in most convenient + proximity to the principal masses of destitute population. + Besides these four millions of acres, there are above two + millions and a half, pronounced by Mr Griffith to be + unimprovable; but he is only speaking of reclamation for + profit: it is doubtful if there be any land, in a temperate + climate, which cannot be reclaimed and rendered productive by + labourers themselves under the inducement of a permanent + property. Confining ourselves to the one and a half millions + of arable first mentioned, it would furnish properties + averaging five acres each to three hundred thousand persons, + which, at the rate of five persons to a family--a rather low + rate for Ireland--answers to a population of fifteen hundred + thousand. Suppose such a number drafted off to a state of + independence and comfort, together with any moderate + additional relief of emigration, and the introduction of + English capital and farming over the remaining surface of + Ireland would cease to be chimerical. + + "'The improvement of waste,' Mr Thornton observes, 'may + perhaps be thought to require a good deal of capital; but + capital is principally useful for its command of labour, and + the Irish peasantry have quite labour enough at their own + disposal. Their misfortune is that they have so much. Their + labour would not be worse applied because they worked for + themselves instead of for a pay-master. So far is large + capital from being indispensable for the cultivation of + barren tracts, that schemes of this kind, which could only + bring loss to a real speculator, are successfully achieved by + his penniless rival. A capitalist must have a certain return + for the money he lays out, but the poor man expends nothing + but his own superabundant labour, which would be valueless if + not so employed; so that his returns, however small, are all + clear profit. No man in his senses would ever have thought of + wasting money upon the original sand of the Pays de Waes; but + the hard-working boors who settled there two hundred years + ago, without any other stock than their industry, contrived + to enrich both themselves and the land, and indeed to make + the latter the richest in Europe.' + + "'The profit of reclaiming waste land,' says the Digest of + Evidence to Lord Devon's Commission, 'will be best understood + from a practice not uncommon in Ireland, to which farmers + sometimes resort. This consists in giving the use of a small + portion of it to a poor cottier or herdsman for the first + three crops, after which this improved portion is given up to + the farmer, and a fresh piece of the waste land is taken on + the same terms by the cottier.' Well may the compiler say, + 'Here we have the example of the very poorest class in + Ireland obtaining a livelihood by the cultivation of waste + land under the most discouraging and the least remunerative + circumstances that can well be imagined.' + + "It is quite worthy of the spirit which pervades the wretched + attempts as yet made to do good to Ireland, that this + spectacle of the poorest of mankind making the land valuable + by their labour for the profit of other people who have done + nothing to assist them, does not at once strike Lord Devon + and his Commission as a thing which ought not to be. Mr + Thornton strongly urges the claims of common justice and + common sense. + + "'The colonists ought to be allowed to retain permanent + possession of the spots reclaimed by them. To employ them as + labourers in bringing the land into a remunerative condition, + (see Report of Land Occupation Commissioners,) in order that + it may then be let to some one else, while they are sent to + shift for themselves where they can, may be an excellent mode + of enriching the landlord, but must eventually aggravate the + sufferings of the poor. It is probably because this plan has + been generally practised, that the reclamation of waste land + has hitherto done nothing for the benefit of the Irish + peasantry. If the latter are to derive any advantage from it, + such of them as may be located on the waste should receive + perpetual leases of their respective allotments--should be + made freeholders in fact, or at least perpetual tenants at a + quit-rent. Such an appropriation of waste land would, of + course, require that compensation should be made to all who + previously possessed any interest in it. But the value of a + legal interest in land which cannot be enclosed or cultivated + without permission of the legislature, can only be + proportionate to the actual yearly produce; and as land in a + natural state yields little or nothing, all legal claims upon + it might be bought up at a trifling expense, or might be + commuted for a very small annual payment to be made by the + settlers. Of the perfect competence of parliament to direct + some arrangement of this kind there can be no question. An + authority which compels individuals to part with their most + valued property on the slightest pretext of public + convenience, and permits railway projectors to throw down + family mansions and cut up favourite pleasure-grounds, need + not be very scrupulous about forcing the sale of boggy + meadows or mountain pastures, in order to obtain the means of + curing the destitution and misery of an entire people.' + + "It would be desirable," continues Mr Mill, "and in most + cases necessary, that the tracts of land should be prepared + for the labours of the peasant by being drained and + intersected with roads, at the expense of government; the + interest of the sums so expended, and of compensation paid + for the existing rights to the waste land, being charged on + it, when reclaimed, as a perpetual quit-rent, redeemable at a + moderate number of years' purchase. The state would thus + incur no loss, while the advances made would give that + immediate employment to the surplus labour of Ireland, which, + if not given in this manner, will assuredly have to be given + in some other, not only less useful, but far less likely to + repay its cost. The millions lavished, during the famine, in + the almost nominal execution of useless works, without any + result but that of keeping the people alive, would, if + employed in a great operation in the waste lands, have been + quite as effectual for relieving immediate distress, and + would have laid the foundation, broad and deep, for something + really deserving the name of social improvement. But, as + usual, it was thought better to throw away money and exertion + in a beaten track, than to take the responsibility of the + most advantageous investment of them in an untrodden + one."--(Vol. i. p. 392.) + +We make no apology for the length of the above extract; the subject is +of great importance; but having stated the proposal in the words of +its principal author (if Mr Thornton can claim the distinction) and +its most distinguished advocate, we have nothing left but to express +our own wish that some such wide and general plan will at all events +meet with a fair trial, when the fitting time shall occur for making +the experiment. + +Any of our readers into whose hands the work of Mr Mill has already +fallen, will be aware of the numerous topics on which it must excite +controversy or provoke discussion. Some of these topics we had marked +out for examination; but we have no space to enter upon a new subject, +and shall content ourselves with closing our notice with an extract or +two from what is the closing chapter of the work itself--_On the +Limits of the Province of Government_. His observations upon this +subject are so temperate and judicious, and conceived throughout in so +liberal and enlightened a spirit, that although there must always be a +_shade_ of difference between such a writer and ourselves, we should +have little hesitation in adopting almost the whole of the chapter. He +draws a very necessary distinction between the authoritative +interference of government, controlling and interdicting, and that +kind of intervention where a government, "leaving individuals free to +use their own means of pursuing any object of general interest, but +not trusting the object solely to their care, establishes, side by +side with their arrangements, an agency of its own for a like purpose. +Thus it is one thing to maintain a church establishment, and another +to refuse toleration to other religions, or to persons professing no +religion. It is one thing to provide schools or colleges, and another +to require that no person shall act as an instructor of youth without +a government license." + +We like the tone of the following remark:--"Whatever theory we adopt +respecting the foundation of the social union, and under whatever +political institutions we live, there is a circle around every +individual human being which no government, be it that of one, of a +few, or of the many, ought to be permitted to overstep; there is a +part of the life of every person, who has come to years of discretion, +within which the individuality of that person ought to reign +uncontrolled, either by any other individual or the public +collectively. That there is, or ought to be, some space of human +existence thus entrenched round, and sacred from authoritative +intrusion, no one who professes the smallest regard to human freedom +or dignity will call in question." + + "Many," he continues, "in latter times have been prone to + think that limitation of the powers of government is only + essential when the government itself is badly constituted; + when it does not represent the people, but is the organ of a + class, or a coalition of classes; and that a government of a + sufficiently popular constitution might be trusted with any + amount of power over the nation, since its power would be + only that of the nation over itself. This might be true, if + the nation, in such cases, did not practically mean a mere + majority of the nation, and if minorities only were capable + of oppressing, but not of being oppressed. Experience, + however, proves that the depositaries of power, who are mere + delegates of the people--that is, of a majority--are quite as + ready (when they think they can count upon popular support) + as any organs of oligarchy to assume arbitrary power, and + encroach unduly on the liberty of private life. The public + collectively is abundantly ready to impose, not only its + generally narrow views of its interests, but its abstract + opinions, and even its tastes, as laws binding upon + individuals; and our present civilisation tends so strongly + to make the power of persons acting in masses the only + substantial power in society, that there never was more + necessity for surrounding individual independence of thought, + speech, and conduct with the most powerful defences, in order + to maintain that originality of mind and individuality of + character, which are the only source of any real progress, + and of most of the qualities which make the human race much + superior to any herd of animals." + +It is not the error which Conservative politicians are liable to +commit, to throw too large a share of the management of affairs into +the hands of a central power; they would, therefore, readily coincide +with Mr Mill, when he observes, that even if a government could +comprehend within itself the most eminent intellectual capacity and +active talent of the nation, it would not be the less desirable that +the conduct of a large portion of the affairs of society should be +left in the hands of the persons immediately interested in them. "The +business of life," he remarks, "is an essential part of the practical +education of a people; without which, book and school instruction, +though most necessary and salutary, does not suffice to qualify them +for conduct, and for the adaptation of means to ends.... A people +among whom there is no habit of spontaneous action for a collective +interest--who look habitually to their government to command or prompt +them in all matters of joint concern--who expect to have every thing +done for them, except what can be made an affair of mere habit and +routine--have their faculties only half developed; their education is +defective in one of its most important branches." + +We must conclude with the following extract, which is so extremely +applicable to the affairs of our neighbours, that we wish we could +make it heard from the tribune of their National Assembly. + + "A democratic constitution, not supported by democratic + institutions in detail, but confined to the central + government, not only is not political freedom, but often + creates a spirit precisely the reverse, carrying down to the + lowest grade in society the desire and ambition of political + domination. In some countries, the desire of the people is + for not being tyrannised over, but in others, it is merely + for an equal chance to every body of tyrannising. Unhappily, + this last state of the desires is fully as natural to mankind + as the former, and in many of the conditions even of + civilised humanity, is far more largely exemplified. In + proportion as the people are accustomed to manage their + affairs by their own active intervention, instead of leaving + them to the government, their desires will turn to the + repelling tyranny, rather than to tyrannising; while, in + proportion as all real initiative and direction resides in + the government, and individuals perpetually feel and act as + under its perpetual tutelage, popular institutions develop in + them not the desire of freedom, but an unmeasured appetite + for place and power; diverting the intelligence and activity + of the country from its principal business to a wretched + competition for the selfish prizes and the petty vanities of + office."--(Vol. ii. p. 515.) + +In quitting this work, we must again repeat that our task would be +endless if we entered upon every topic on which it provokes +discussion. On some of these we may take a future opportunity to +express ourselves. Amongst the subjects we had designed, had space +permitted, for some discussion, are certain heresies, as we think +them, regarding property in land; and some views, rather hinted at +than explained, on the position which the female sex ought to take in +society. In the extract we first made, the reader may have remarked +this singular expression. Speaking of the Americans, he says they have +"apparently got rid of all social injustices and inequalities that +affect persons of Caucasian race _and of the male sex_;" leaving it to +be inferred, that even in America there still remain certain social +injustices and inequalities affecting _the female sex_. There are many +inuendos scattered throughout the book of the same description, but we +nowhere gather a distinct view of the sort of reformation that is +called for. In a writer of another character these expressions would +be encountered only with ridicule; coming from Mr Mill, they excite +our surprise, and, in some measure, our curiosity. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[4] _Principles of Political Economy, with some of their applications +to Social Philosophy._ By JOHN STUART MILL. 2 vols. + +[5] "Mais d'abord va-t-on désigner cet ordre particulier +d'investigations par le nom d'économie politique? Quoi donc! Économie +politique, économie de la société,--c'est à dire--production, +distribution, consommation des richesses? Mais c'est se moquer; on ne +traduit pas avec une liberté pareille. Il ne faut qu'ouvrir le premier +dictionnaire venu pour voir," &c.--DUNOYER, _De la Liberté du +Travail_. + +[6] The discussions upon the income tax reveal a lamentable state of +public feeling on this subject. That this tax might have been more +equitably adjusted, every one but a Chancellor of the Exchequer will +admit. Those who have to insure their lives, or otherwise save a fund +out of their income for survivors, ought not to pay the same tax as +those who can enjoy the whole of their income. But no such +modification as this would have pacified discontent. One often heard +it said that the tax should fall exclusively on realised property. The +prosperous tradesman, with his income of some thousands a-year, was to +pay nothing; the poor widow, who draws her sixty pounds per annum from +her property in the funds, she was to pay the tax. Mr Mill, in +noticing this very equitable proposition, says--"Except the proposal +of applying a sponge to the national debt, no such palpable violation +of common honesty has found sufficient support in this country during +the present generation to be regarded within the domain of discussion. +It has not the palliation of a graduated property-tax, that of laying +the burthen on those best able to bear it; for 'realised property' +includes almost every provision made for those who are unable to work, +and consists, in great part, of extremely small fractions. I can +hardly conceive a more shameless pretension than that the major part +of the property of the country, that of merchants, manufacturers, +farmers, and shopkeepers, should be exempted from its share of +taxation; that these classes should only begin to pay their proportion +after retiring from business, and if they never retire, should be +excused from it altogether."--(Vol. ii. p. 355.) + +[7] In a work entitled, _Over-Population and its Remedy_. + + + + +Life in the "Far West." + +PART V. + + +The Mission of San Fernando is situated on a small river called Las +Animas, a branch of the Los Martires. The convent is built at the neck +of a large plain, at the point of influx of the stream from the broken +spurs of the sierra. The savanna is covered with luxuriant grass, kept +down, however, by the countless herds of cattle which pasture on it. +The banks of the creek are covered with a lofty growth of oak and +poplar, which near the Mission have been considerably thinned for the +purpose of affording fuel and building material for the increasing +settlement. The convent stands in the midst of a grove of fruit-trees, +its rude tower and cross peeping above them, and contrasting +picturesquely with the wildness of the surrounding scenery. Gardens +and orchards lie immediately in front of the building, and a vineyard +stretches away to the upland ridge of the valley. The huts of the +Indians are scattered here and there, built of stone and adobe, +sometimes thatched with flags and boughs, but comfortable enough. The +convent itself is a substantial building, of the style of architecture +characterising monastic edifices in most parts of the world. Loopholes +peer from its plastered walls, and on a flat portion of the roof a +comically mounted gingall or wall-piece, carrying a two-pound ball, +threatens the assailant in time of war. At one end of the oblong +building, a rough irregular arch of sun-burned bricks is surmounted by +a rude cross, under which hangs a small but deep-toned bell--the +wonder of the Indian peones, and highly venerated by the frayles +themselves, who received it as a present from a certain venerable +archbishop of Old Spain, and who, whilst guarding it with reverential +awe, tell wondrous tales of its adventures on the road to its present +abiding place. + +Of late years the number of the canonical inmates of the convent has +been much reduced--there being but four priests now to do the duties +of the eleven who formerly inhabited it: Fray Augustin, a Capuchin of +due capacity of paunch, being at the head of the holy quartette. +Augustin is the conventual name of the reverend father, who fails not +to impress upon such casual visitants to that _ultima Thule_ as he +deems likely to appreciate the information, that, but for his +humility, he might add the sonorous appellations of Ignacio +Sabanal-Morales-y Fuentes--his family being of the best blood of Old +Castile, and known there since the days of Ruy Gomez--el +Campéador--possessing, moreover, half the "vega" of the Ebro, &c., +where, had fate been propitious, he would now have been the sleek +superior of a rich capuchin convent, instead of vegetating, a +leather-clad frayle, in the wilds of California Alta. + +Nevertheless, his lot is no bad one. With plenty of the best and +fattest meat to eat, whether of beef or venison, of bear or mountain +mutton; with good wine and brandy of home make, and plenty of it; +fruit of all climes in great abundance; wheaten or corn bread to suit +his palate; a tractable flock of natives to guide, and assisted in the +task by three brother shepherds; far from the strife of politics or +party--secure from hostile attack, (not quite, by-the-by,) and eating, +drinking, and sleeping away his time, one would think that Fray +Augustin Ignacio Sabanal-Morales-y Fuentes had little to trouble him, +and had no cause to regret even the vega of Castilian Ebro, held by +his family since the days of el Campéador. + +One evening Fray Augustin sat upon an adobe bench, under the fig-tree +shadowing the porch of the Mission. He was dressed in a goat-skin +jerkin, softly and beautifully dressed, and descending to his hips, +under which his only covering--tell it not in Gath!--was a long linen +shirt, reaching to his knees, and lately procured from Puebla de los +Angeles, as a sacerdotal garment. Boots, stockings, or unmentionables, +he had none. A cigarito, of tobacco rolled in corn shuck, was +occasionally placed between his lips; whereupon huge clouds of smoke +rushed in columns from his mouth and nostrils. His face was of a golden +yellow colour, relieved by arched and very black eyebrows; his shaven +chin was of most respectable duplicity--his corporation of orthodox +dimensions. Several Indians and half-bred Mexican women were pounding +Indian corn on metates near at hand; whilst sundry beef-fed urchins of +whitey-brown complexion sported before the door, exhibiting, as they +passed Fray Augustin, a curious resemblance to the strongly marked +features of that worthy padre. They were probably his nieces and +nephews--a class of relations often possessed in numbers by priests and +monks. + +The three remaining brothers were absent from the Mission; Fray +Bernardo, hunting elk in the sierra; Fray José, gallivanting at Puebla +de los Angeles, ten days' journey distant; Fray Cristoval, lassoing +colts upon the plain. Augustin, thus left to his own resources, had +just eaten his vespertine frijolitos and chile colorado, and was +enjoying a post-coenal smoke of fragrant pouche under the shadow of +his own fig-tree. + +Whilst thus employed, an Indian dressed in Mexican attire approached +him hat in hand, and, making a reverential bow, asked his directions +concerning domestic business of the Mission. + +"Hola! friend José," cried Fray Augustin in a thick guttural voice, +"pensaba yo--I was thinking that it was very nearly this time three +years ago when those 'malditos Americanos' came by here and ran off +with so many of our cavallada." + +"True, reverend father," answered the administrador, "just three years +ago, all but fifteen days: I remember it well. _Malditos sean_--curse +them!" + +"How many did we kill, José?" + +"Quizas moochos--a great many, I dare say. But they did not fight +fairly--charged right upon us, and gave us no time to do any thing. +They don't know how to fight, these Mericanos; come right at you, +before you can swing a lasso, hallooing like Indios Bravos." + +"But, José, how many did they leave dead on the field?" + +"Not one." + +"And we?" + +"Valgame Dios! thirteen dead, and many more wounded." + +"That's it! Now if these savages come again, (and the Chemeguaba, who +came in yesterday, says he saw a large trail,) we must fight +adentro--within--outside is no go; for as you very properly say, José, +these Americans don't know how to fight, and kill us before--before we +can kill them. Vaya!" + +At this moment there issued from the door of the Mission Don Antonio, +Velez Trueba, a Gachupin--that is, a native of Old Spain--a wizened +old hidalgo refugee, who had left the mother country on account of his +political opinions, which were stanchly Carlist, and had found his +way--how, he himself scarcely knew--from Mexico to San Francisco in +Upper California, where, having a most perfect contempt for every +thing Mexican, and hearing that in the Mission of San Fernando, far +away, were a couple of Spanish padres of "sangre regular," he had +started into the wilderness to ferret them out; and having escaped all +dangers on the route, (which, however, were hardly dangers to the Don, +who could not realise the idea of scalp-taking savages,) had arrived +with a whole skin at the Mission. There he was received with open arms +by his countryman Fray Augustin, who made him welcome to all the place +afforded, and there he harmlessly smoked away his time; his heart far +away on the banks of the Genil and in the grape-bearing vegas of his +beloved Andalusia, his withered cuerpo in the sierras of Upper +California. Don Antonio was the walking essence of a Spaniard of the +_ancien régime_. His family dated from the Flood, and with the +exception of sundry refreshing jets of Moorish blood, injected into +the Truebas during the Moorish epoch, no strange shoot was ever +engrafted on their genealogical tree. The marriages of the family were +ever confined to the family itself--never looking to fresh blood in a +station immediately below it, which was not hidalgueño; nor above, +since any thing higher in rank than the Trueba y Trueba family, _no +habia_, there was not. + +Thus, in the male and female scions of the house, were plainly visible +the ill effects of breeding "in and in." The male Truebas were sadly +degenerate Dons, in body as in mind--compared to their ancestors of +Boabdil's day; and the señoritas of the name were all eyes, and eyes +alone, and hardly of such stamp as would have tempted that amorous +monarch to bestow a kingdom for a kiss, as ancient ballads tell. + + "Dueña de la negra toca, + Por un beso de tu boca, + Diera un reyno, Boabdil; + Y yo por ello, Cristiana, + Te diera de buena gana + Mil cielos, si fueran mil." + +Come of such poor stock, and reared on tobacco smoke and "gazpacho," +Don Antonio would not have shone, even amongst pigmy Mexicans, for +physical beauty. Five feet high, a frame-work of bones covered with a +skin of Andalusian tint, the Trueba stood erect and stiff in all the +consciousness of his "sangre regular." His features were handsome, but +entirely devoid of flesh, his upper lip was covered with a jet-black +mustache mixed with gray, his chin was bearded "like the pard." Every +one around him clad in deer and goat skin, our Don walked conspicuous +in shining suit of black--much the worse for wear, it must be +confessed--with beaver hat sadly battered, and round his body and over +his shoulder an unexceptionable "capa" of the amplest dimensions. +Asking, as he stepped over him, the pardon of an Indian urchin who +blocked the door, and bowing with punctilious politeness to the sturdy +mozas who were grinding corn, Don Antonio approached our friend +Augustin, who was discussing warlike matters with his administrador. + +"Hola! Don Antonio, how do you find yourself, sir?" + +"Perfectly well, and your very humble servant, reverend father; and +your worship also, I trust you are in good health?" + +"_Sin novedad_--without novelty;" which, since it was one hour and a +half since our friends had separated to take their siestas, was not +impossible. + +"Myself and the worthy José," continued Fray Augustin, "were speaking +of the vile invasion of a band of North American robbers, who three +years since fiercely assaulted this peaceful Mission, killing many of +its inoffensive inhabitants, wounding many more, and carrying off +several of our finest colts and most promising mules to their dens and +caves in the Rocky Mountains. Not with impunity, however, did they +effect this atrocity. José informs me that many of the assailants were +killed by my brave Indians. How many said you, José?" + +"Quizas mo-o-ochos," answered the Indian. + +"Yes, probably a great multitude," continued the padre; "but, unwarned +by such well-merited castigation, it has been reported to me by a +Chemeguaba mansito, that a band of these audacious marauders are now +on their road to repeat the offence, numbering many thousands, well +mounted and armed; and to oppose these white barbarians it behoves us +to make every preparation of defence."[8] + +"There is no cause for alarm," answered the Andaluz. "I (tapping his +breast) have served in three wars: in that glorious one 'de la +Independencia,' when our glorious patriots drove the French like sheep +across the Pyrenees; in that equally glorious one of 1821; and in the +late magnanimous struggle for the legitimate rights of his majesty +Charles V., king of Spain, (doffing his hat,) whom God preserve. With +that right arm," cried the spirited Don, extending his shrivelled +member, "I have supported the throne of my kings--have fought for my +country, mowing down its enemies before me; and with it," vehemently +exclaimed the Gachupin, working himself into a perfect frenzy, "I +will slay these Norte Americanos, should they dare to show their +faces in my front. Adios, Don Augustin Ignacio Sabanal-Morales-y +Fuentes," he cried, doffing his hat with an earth-sweeping bow: "I go +to grind my sword. Till then adieu." + +"A countryman of mine!" said the frayle, admiringly, to the +administrador. "With him by our side we need not to fear: neither +Norte Americanos, nor the devil himself, can harm us when he is by." + +Whilst the Trueba sharpens his Tizona, and the priest puffs volumes of +smoke from his nose and mouth, let us introduce to the reader one of +the muchachitas, who knelt grinding corn on the metate, to make +tortillas for the evening meal. Juanita was a stout wench from Sonora, +of Mexican blood, hardly as dark as the other women who surrounded +her, and with a drop or two of the Old Spanish blood struggling with +the darker Indian tint to colour her plump cheeks. An enagua (a short +petticoat) of red serge, was confined round her waist by a gay band +ornamented with beads, and a chemisette covered the upper part of the +body, permitting, however, a prodigal display of her charms. Whilst +pounding sturdily at the corn, she laughed and joked with her +fellow-labourers upon the anticipated American attack, which appeared +to have but few terrors for her. "Que vengan," she exclaimed--"let +them come; they are only men, and will not molest us women. Besides, I +have seen these white men before--in my own country, and they are fine +fellows, very tall, and as white as the snow on the sierras. Let them +come, say I!" + +"Only hear the girl!" cried another: "if these savages come, then will +they kill Pedrillo, and what will Juanita say to lose her sweetheart?" + +"Pedrillo!" sneered the latter; "what care I for Pedrillo? Soy +Mejicana, yo--a Mexican girl am I, I'd have you know, and don't demean +me to look at a wild Indian. Not I, indeed, by my salvation! What I +say is, let the Norte Americanos come." + +At this juncture Fray Augustin called for a glass of aguardiente, +which Juanita was despatched to bring, and, on presenting it, the +churchman facetiously inquired why she wished for the Americans, +adding, "Don't think they'll come here--no, no: here we are brave men, +and have Don Antonio with us, a noble fellow, well used to arms." As +the words were on his lips, the clattering of a horse's hoofs was +heard rattling across the loose stones and pebbles in the bed of the +river, and presently an Indian herder galloped up to the door of the +Mission, his horse covered with foam, and its sides bleeding from +spur-wounds. + +"Oh, padre mio!" he cried, as soon as he caught sight of his +reverence, "vienen los Americanos--the Americans, the Americans are +upon us. Ave Maria purissima--more than ten thousand are at my heels!" + +Up started the priest and shouted for the Don. + +That hidalgo presently appeared, armed with the sword that had graced +his thigh in so many glorious encounters, the sword with which he had +mowed down the enemies of his country, and by whose aid he now +proposed to annihilate the American savages should they dare to appear +before him. + +The alarm was instantly given; peones, vagueros hurried from the +plains; and milpas, warned by the deep-toned bell, which soon rung out +its sonorous alarum. A score of mounted Indians, armed with gun and +lasso, dashed off to bring intelligence of the enemy. The old gingall +on the roof was crammed with powder and bullets to the very muzzle, by +the frayle's own hand. Arms were brought and piled in the sala, ready +for use. The padre exhorted, the women screamed, the men grew pale and +nervous, and thronged within the walls. Don Antonio, the fiery +Andaluz, alone remained outside, flourishing his whetted sabre, and +roaring to the padre, who stood on the roof with lighted match, by the +side of his formidable cannon, not to be affrighted. "That he, the +Trueba, was there, with his Tizona, ready to defeat the devil himself +should he come on." + +He was deaf to the entreaties of the priest to enter. + +"Siempre en el frente--Ever in the van," he said, "was the war-cry of +the Truebas." + +But now a cloud of dust was seen approaching from the plain, and +presently a score of horsemen dashed headlong towards the Mission. "El +enemigo," shouted Fray Augustin; and, without waiting to aim, he +clapped his match to the touch-hole of the gun, harmlessly pointed to +the sky, and crying out "in el nombre de Dios"--in God's name--as he +did so, was instantly knocked over and over by the recoil of the +piece, then was as instantly seized by some of the Indian garrison, +and forced through the trap-door into the building; whilst the +horsemen (who were his own scouts) galloped up with the intelligence +that the enemy was at hand, and in overwhelming force. + +Thereupon the men were all mounted, and formed in a body before the +building, to the amount of more than fifty, well armed with guns or +bows and arrows. Here the gallant Don harangued them, and infusing +into their hearts a little of his own courage, they eagerly demanded +to be led against the enemy. Fray Augustin re-appeared on the roof, +gave them his blessing, advised them to give no quarter, and, with +slight misgivings, saw them ride off to the conflict. + +About a mile from the Mission, the plain gradually ascended to a ridge +of moderate elevation, on which was a growth of dwarf oak and ilex. To +this point the eyes of the remaining inmates of the convent were +earnestly directed, as at this point the enemy was first expected to +make his appearance. Presently a few figures were seen to crown the +ridge, clearly defined against the clear evening sky. Not more than a +dozen mounted men composed this party, which all imagined must be +doubtless the vanguard of the thousand invaders. On the summit of the +ridge they halted a few minutes, as if to reconnoitre; and by this +time the Californian horsemen were halted in the plain, midway between +the Mission and the ridge, and distant from the former less than +half-a-mile, so that all the operations were clearly visible to the +lookers-on. + +The enemy wound slowly, in Indian file, down the broken ground of the +descent; but when the plain was reached, they formed into something +like a line, and trotted fearlessly towards the Californians. These +began to sit uneasily in their saddles; nevertheless they made a +forward movement, and even broke into a gallop, but soon halted, and +again huddled together. Then the mountaineers quickened their pace, +and their loud shout was heard as they dashed into the middle of the +faltering troop. The sharp cracks of the rifles were heard, and the +duller reports of the smooth-bored pieces of the Californians; a cloud +of smoke and dust arose from the plain, and immediately half-a-dozen +horses, with empty saddles, broke from it, followed quickly by the +Californians, flying like mad across the level. The little steady line +of the mountaineers advanced, and puffs of smoke arose, as they loaded +and discharged their rifles at the flying horsemen. As the Americans +came on, however, one was seen to totter in his saddle, the rifle fell +from his grasp, and he tumbled headlong to the ground For an instant +his companions surrounded the fallen man, but again forming, dashed +towards the Mission, shouting fierce war-whoops, and brandishing aloft +their long and heavy rifles. Of the defeated Californians some jumped +off their horses at the door of the Mission, and sought shelter +within; others galloped off towards the sierra in panic-stricken +plight. Before the gate, however, still paced valiantly the proud +hidalgo, encumbered with his cloak, and waving with difficulty his +sword above his head. To the priest and women, who implored him to +enter, he replied with cries of defiance, of "Viva Carlos Quinto," and +"Death or glory." He shouted in vain to the flying crowd to halt; but, +seeing their panic was beyond hope, he clutched his weapon more firmly +as the Americans dashed at him, closed his teeth and his eyes, thought +once of the vega of his beloved Genil, and of Granada la Florida, and +gave himself up for lost. Those inside the Mission, when they observed +the flight of their cavalry, gave up the defence as hopeless; and +already the charging mountaineers were almost under the walls when +they observed the curious figure of the little Don making +demonstrations of hostility. + +"Wagh!" exclaimed the leading hunter, (no other than our friend La +Bonté) "here's a little crittur as means to do all the fighting;" and +seizing his rifle by the barrel, he poked at the Don with the +butt-end, who parried the blow, and with such a sturdy stroke, as +nearly severed the stock in two. Another mountaineer rode up, and, +swinging his lasso over-head, threw the noose dexterously over the +Spaniard's head, and as it fell over his shoulders, drew it taut, thus +securing the arms of the pugnacious Don as in a vice. + +"Quartel!" cried the latter; "por Dios, quartel!" + +"Quarter be d----!" exclaimed one of the whites, who understood +Spanish; "who's agoin' to hurt you, you little crittur?" + +By this time Fray Augustin was waving a white flag from the roof, in +token of surrender; and soon after he appeared trembling at the door, +beseeching the victors to be merciful and to spare the lives of the +vanquished, when all and every thing in the Mission would be freely +placed at their disposal. + +"What does the niggur say?" asked old Walker, the leader of the +mountaineers, of the interpreter. + +"Well, he talks so queer, this hos can't rightly make it out." + +"Tell the old coon then to quit that, and make them darned greasers +clear out of the lodge, and pock some corn and shucks here for the +animals, for they're nigh give out." + +This being conveyed to him in mountain Spanish, which fear alone made +him understand, the padre gave orders to the men to leave the Mission, +advising them, moreover, not to recommence hostilities, as himself was +kept as hostage, and if a finger was lifted against the mountaineers, +he would be killed at once, and the Mission burned to the ground. Once +inside, the hunters had no fear of attack, they could have kept the +building against all California; so, leaving a guard of two outside +the gate, and first seeing their worn-out animals supplied with piles +of corn and shucks, they made themselves at home, and soon were paying +attention to the hot tortillas, meat, and chile colorado which were +quickly placed before them, washing down the hot-spiced viands with +deep draughts of wine and brandy. It would have been amusing to have +seen the faces of these rough fellows as they gravely pledged each +other in the grateful liquor, and looked askance at the piles of fruit +served by the attendant Hebes. These came in for no little share of +attention, it may be imagined; but the utmost respect was paid to +them, for your mountaineer, rough and bear-like though he be, never, +by word or deed, offends the modesty of a woman, although sometimes +obliged to use a compulsory wooing, when time is not allowed for +regular courtship, and not unfrequently known to jerk a New Mexican or +Californian beauty behind his saddle, should the obdurate parents +refuse consent to their immediate union. It tickled the Americans not +a little to have all their wants supplied, and to be thus waited upon, +by what they considered the houris of paradise; and after their long +journey, and the many hardships and privations they had suffered, +their present luxurious situation seemed scarcely real. + +The Hidalgo, released from the durance vile of the lasso, assisted at +the entertainment; his sense of what was due to the "sangre regular" +which ran in his veins being appeased by the fact, that he sat _above_ +the wild uncouth mountaineers, these preferring to squat crosslegged on +the floor in their own fashion, to the uncomfortable and novel luxury +of a chair. Killbuck, indeed, seemed to have quite forgotten the use of +such pieces of furniture. On Fray Augustin offering him one, and +begging him, with many protestations, to be seated, that old mountain +worthy looked at it, and then at the padre, turned it round, and at +length comprehending the intention, essayed to sit. This he effected at +last, and sat grimly for some moments, when, seizing the chair by the +back, he hurled it out of the open door, exclaiming,--"Wagh! this coon +aint hamshot anyhow, and don't want such fixins, he don't;" and +gathering his legs under his body, reclined in the manner customary to +him. There was a prodigious quantity of liquor consumed that night, +the hunters making up for their many banyans; but as it was the pure +juice of the grape, it had little or no effect upon their hard heads. +They had not much to fear from attacks on the part of the Californians; +but, to provide against all emergencies, the padre and the Gachupin +were "hobbled," and confined in an inner room, to which there was no +ingress nor egress save through the door which opened into the +apartment where the mountaineers lay sleeping, two of the number +keeping watch. A fandango with the Indian girls had been proposed by +some of them, but Walker placed a decided veto on this. He said "they +had need of sleep now, for there was no knowing what to-morrow might +bring forth; that they had a long journey before them, and winter was +coming on; they would have to 'streak' it night and day, and sleep when +their journey was over, which would not be until Pike's Peak was left +behind them. It was now October, and the way they'd have to hump it +back to the mountains would take the gristle off a painter's tail." + +Young Ned Wooton was not to the fore when the roll was called. He was +courting the Sonora wench Juanita, and to some purpose, for we may at +once observe, that the maiden accompanied the mountaineer to his +distant home, and at the present moment is sharing his lodge on +Hardscrabble creek of the upper Arkansa, having been duly and legally +married by Fray Augustin before their departure. + +But now the snow on the ridge of the Sierra Madre, and the nightly +frosts; the angular flights of geese and ducks constantly passing +over-head; the sober tints of the foliage, and the dead leaves that +strew the ground; the withering grass on the plain, and the cold +gusts, sometimes laden with snow and sleet, that sweep from the +distant snow-clad mountains;--all these signs warn us to linger no +longer in the tempting valley of San Fernando, but at once to pack our +mules to cross the dreary and desert plains and inhospitable sierras; +and to seek with our booty one of the sheltered bayous of the Rocky +Mountains. + +On the third day after their arrival, behold our mountaineers again +upon the march, driving before them--with the assistance of +half-a-dozen Indians, impressed for the first few days of the journey +until the cavallada get accustomed to travel without confusion--a band +of four hundred head of mules and horses, themselves mounted on the +strongest and fleetest they could select from at least a thousand. + +Fray Augustin and the Hidalgo, from the house-top, watched them +depart: the former glad to get rid of such unscrupulous guests at any +cost, the latter rather loath to part with his boon companions, with +whom he had quaffed many a quartillo of Californian wine. Great was +the grief, and violent the sobbing, when all the girls in the Mission +surrounded Juanita to bid her adieu; as she, seated _en cavalier_ on +an easy pacing mule, bequeathed her late companions to the keeping of +every saint in the calendar, and particularly to the great St +Ferdinand himself, under whose especial tutelage all those in the +Mission were supposed to live. Pedrillo, poor forsaken Pedrillo, a +sullen sulky half-breed, was overcome, not with grief, but with anger +at the slight put upon him, and vowed revenge. He of the "sangre +regular," having not a particle of enmity in his heart, waved his +arm--that arm with which he had mowed down the enemies of Carlos +Quinto--and requested the mountaineers, if ever fate should carry them +to Spain, not to fail to visit his quinta in the vega of Genil, which, +with all in it, he placed at their worships' disposal--con muchissima +franqueza. + +Fat Fray Augustin likewise waved his arm, but groaned in spirit as he +beheld the noble band of mules and horses, throwing back clouds of +dust on the plain where they had been bred. One noble roan stallion +seemed averse to leave his accustomed pasture, and again and again +broke away from the band. Luckily old Walker had taken the precaution +to secure the "_bell mare_" of the herd, and mounted on her rode +ahead, the animals all following their well-known leader. As the roan +galloped back, the padre was in ecstasy. It was a favourite steed, and +one he would have gladly ransomed at any price. + +"Ya viene, ya viene!" he cried out, "now, now it's coming! hurra for +the roan!" but, under the rifle of a mountaineer, one of the +Californians dashed at it, a lasso whirling round his head, and +turning and twisting like a doubling hare, as the horse tried to avoid +him, at last threw the open coil over the animal's head, and led him +back in triumph to the band. + +"Maldito sea aquel Indio--curse that Indian!" quoth the padre, and +turned away. + +And now our sturdy band--less two who had gone under--were fairly on +their way. They passed the body of their comrade who had been killed +in the fight before the Mission; the wolves, or Indian dogs, had +picked it to the bones; but a mound near by, surrounded by a rude +cross, showed where the Californians (seven of whom were killed) had +been interred--the pile of stones at the foot of the cross testifying +that many an _ave maria_ had already been said by the poor Indians, to +save the souls of their slaughtered companions from the pangs of +purgatory. + +For the first few days progress was slow and tedious. The confusion +attendant upon driving so large a number of animals over a country +without trail or track of any description, was sufficient to prevent +speedy travelling; and the mountaineers, desirous of improving the +pace, resolved to pursue a course more easterly, and to endeavour to +strike the great SPANISH TRAIL, which is the route followed by the New +Mexicans in their journeys to and from the towns of Puebla de los +Angeles and Santa Fé. This road, however, crosses a long stretch of +desert country, destitute alike of grass and water, save at a few +points, the regular halting-places of the caravans; and as but little +pasture is to be found at these places at any time, there was great +reason to doubt, if the Santa Fé traders had passed this season, that +there would not be sufficient grass to support the numerous cavallada, +after the herbage had been laid under contribution by the traders' +animals. However, a great saving of time would be effected by taking +this trail, although it wound a considerable distance out of the way +to avoid the impassable chain of the Sierra Nevada--the gap in those +mountains through which the Americans had come being far to the +southward, and at this late season probably obstructed by the snow. + +Urged by threats and bribes, one of the Indians agreed to guide the +cavalcade to the trail, which he declared was not more than five days' +distant. As they advanced, the country became wilder and more +sterile,--the valleys, through which several small streams coursed, +being alone capable of supporting so large a number of animals. No +time was lost in hunting for game; the poorest of the mules and horses +were killed for provisions, and the diet was improved by a little +venison when a deer casually presented itself near the camping ground. +Of Indians they had seen not one; but they now approached the country +of the Diggers, who infest the district through which the Spanish +trail passes, laying contributions on the caravans of traders, and who +have been, not inaptly, termed the "Arabs of the American desert." The +Californian guide now earnestly entreated permission to return, +saying, that he should lose his life if he attempted to pass the +Digger country alone on his return. He pointed to a snow-covered peak, +at the foot of which the trail passed; and leave being accorded, he +turned his horse's head towards the Mission of San Fernando. + +Although the cavallada travelled, by this time, with much less +confusion than at first, still, from the want of a track to follow, +great trouble and exertion were required to keep the proper direction. +The bell-mare led the van, carrying Walker, who was better acquainted +with the country than the others; another hunter, of considerable +distinction in the band, on a large mule, rode by his side. Then +followed the cavallada, jumping and frisking with each other, stopping +whenever a blade of grass showed, and constantly endeavouring to break +away to green patches which sometimes presented themselves in the +plains. Behind the troop, urging them on by dint of loud cries and +objurgations, rode six mountaineers, keeping as much as possible in a +line. Two others were on each flank to repress all attempts to wander, +and keep the herd in a compact body. In this order the caravan had +been crossing a broken country, up and down ridges, all day, the +animals giving infinite trouble to their drivers, when a loud shout +from the advanced guard put them all upon the _qui-vive_. Old Walker +was seen to brandish the rifle over his head and point before him, and +presently the cry of "The trail! the trail!" gladdened all hearts with +the anticipation of a respite from the harassing labour of +mule-driving. Descending a broken ridge, they at once struck into a +distinct and tolerably well-worn track, into which the cavallada +turned as easily and instinctively, as if they had all their lives +been accustomed to travel on beaten roads. Along this they travelled +merrily--their delight being, however, alloyed by frequent indications +that hunger and thirst had done their work on the mules and horses of +the caravans which had preceded them on the trail. They happened to +strike it in the centre of a long stretch of desert, extending sixty +miles without either water or pasture; and many animals had perished +here, leaving their bones to bleach upon the plain. The soil was +sandy, but rocks and stones covered the surface, disabling the feet of +many of the young horses and mules; several of which, at this early +stage of the journey, were already abandoned. Traces of the wretched +Diggers became very frequent; these abject creatures resorting to the +sandy plains for the purpose of feeding upon the lizards which there +abound. As yet they did not show; only at night they prowled around +the camp, waiting a favourable opportunity to run the animals. In the +present instance, however, many of the horses having been left on the +road, the Diggers found so plentiful a supply of meat as to render +unnecessary any attack upon the formidable mountaineers. + +One evening the Americans had encamped, earlier than usual, on a creek +well-timbered with willow and quaking-ash, and affording tolerable +pasture; and although it was still rather early, they determined to +stop here, and give the animals an opportunity to fill themselves. +Several deer had jumped out of the bottom as they entered it; and La +Bonté and Killbuck had sallied from the camp with their rifles, to +hunt and endeavour to procure some venison for supper. Along the river +banks, herds of deer were feeding in every direction, within shot of +the belt of timber; and the two hunters had no difficulty in +approaching and knocking over two fine bucks within a few paces of the +thicket. They were engaged in butchering the animals, when La Bonté, +looking up from his work, saw half-a-dozen Indians dodging among the +trees, within a few yards of himself and Killbuck. At the same instant +two arrows _thudded_ into the carcass of the deer over which he knelt, +passing but a few inches from his head. Hollowing to his companion, La +Bonté immediately seized the deer, and, lifting it with main strength, +held it as a shield before him, but not before an arrow had struck him +in the shoulder. Rising from the ground he retreated, behind cover, +yelling loudly to alarm the camp, which was not five hundred yards +distant on the other side of the stream. Killbuck, when apprised of +the danger, ran bodily into the plain, and, keeping out of shot of the +timber, joined La Bonté, who now, out of arrow-shot, threw down his +shield of venison and fired his rifle at the assailants. The Indians +appeared at first afraid to leave the cover; but three or four more +joining them, one a chief, they advanced into the plain, with drawn +bows, scattering wide apart, and running swiftly towards the whites, +in a zigzag course, in order not to present a steady mark to their +unerring rifles. The latter were too cautious to discharge their +pieces, but kept a steady front, with rifle at shoulder. The Indians +evidently disliked to approach nearer; but the chief, an old grizzled +man, incited them by word and gesture,--running in advance and calling +upon the others to follow him. + +"Ho, boy!" exclaimed Killbuck to his companion, "that old coon must go +under, or we'll get rubbed out by these darned critturs." + +La Bonté understood him. Squatting on the ground, he planted his +wiping-stick firmly at the extent of his left arm, and resting the +long barrel of his rifle on his left hand, which was supported by the +stick, he took a steady aim and fired. The Indian, throwing out his +arms, staggered and let fall his bow,--tried hard to recover himself, +and then fell forward on his face. The others, seeing the death of +their chief, turned and made again for the cover. "You darned +critturs," roared Killbuck, "take that!" and fired his rifle at the +last one, tumbling him over as dead as a stone. The camp had also been +alarmed. Five of them waded across the creek and took the Indians in +rear; their rifles cracked within the timber, several more Indians +fell, and the rest quickly beat a retreat. The venison, however, was +not forgotten; the two deer were packed into camp, and did the duty of +mule-meat that night. + +This lesson had a seasonable effect upon the Diggers, who made no +attempt on the cavallada that night or the next; for the camp remained +two days to recruit the animals. + +We will not follow the party through all the difficulties and perils +of the desert route, nor detail the various devilries of the Diggers, +who constantly sought opportunities to stampede the animals, or, +approaching them in the night as they grazed, fired their arrows +indiscriminately at the herd, trusting that dead or disabled ones +would be left behind, and afford them a good supply of meat. In the +month of December, the mountaineers crossed the great dividing ridge +of the Rocky Mountains, making their way through the snowy barrier +with the utmost difficulty, and losing many mules and horses in the +attempt. On passing the ridge, they at once struck the head-springs of +the Arkansa river, and turned into the Bayou Salade. Here they found a +village of Arapahós, and were in no little fear of leaving their +cavallada with these dexterous horse-thieves. Fortunately the chief in +command was friendly to the whites, and restrained his young men; and +a present of three horses insured his good offices. Still, the near +neighbourhood of these Indians being hardly desirable, after a few +days' halt, the Americans were again on their way, and halted finally +at the juncture of the Fontaine-qui-bout with the Arkansa, where they +determined to construct a winter camp. They now considered themselves +at home, and at once set about building a log-shanty capable of +containing them all, and a large corral for securing the animals at +night, or in case of Indian alarms. This they effected by felling +several large cottonwoods, and throwing them in the form of a +horse-shoe: the entrance, however, being narrower than in that figure, +and secured by upright logs, between which poles were fixed to be +withdrawn at pleasure. The house, or, "fort"--as any thing in the +shape of a house is called in these parts, where, indeed, every man +must make his house a castle--was loopholed on all sides, and boasted +a turf chimney of rather primitive construction; but which answered +the purpose of drawing the smoke from the interior. Game was plentiful +all around;--bands of buffalo were constantly passing the Arkansa; and +there were always deer and antelope within sight of the fort. The +pasture, too, was good and abundant,--being the rich grama or buffalo +grass, which, although rather dry at this season, still retains its +fattening qualities; and the animals soon began to improve wonderfully +in condition and strength. + +Of the four hundred head of mules and horses with which they had +started from California, but one-half reached the Arkansa. Many had +been killed for food, (indeed they had furnished the only provisions +during the journey,) many had been stolen by the Indians, or shot by +them at night; and many had strayed off and not been recovered. We +have omitted to mention that the Sonora girl, Juanita, and her spouse, +Ned Wooton, remained behind at Roubideau's fort and rendezvous on the +Uintah, which our band had passed on the other side of the mountains, +whence they proceeded with a party to Taos in New Mexico, and resided +there for some years, blessed with a fine family, &c. &c. &c., as the +novels end. + +As soon as the animals were fat and strong, they were taken down the +Arkansa to Bent's Indian trading fort, about sixty miles below the +mouth of Fontaine-qui-bout. Here a ready sale was found for them, +mules being at that time in great demand on the frontier of the United +States, and every season the Bents carried across the plains to +Independence a considerable number collected in the Indian country, +and in the upper settlements of New Mexico. As the mountaineers +descended the Arkansa, a little incident occurred, and some of the +party very unexpectedly encountered an old friend. Killbuck and La +Bonté, who were generally compañeros, were riding some distance ahead +of the cavallada, passing at the time the mouth of the Huerfano or +Orphan Creek, when, at a long distance before them, they saw the +figure of a horseman, followed by two loose animals, descending the +bluff into the timbered bottom of the river. Judging the stranger to +be Indian, they spurred their horses and galloped in pursuit, but the +figure ahead suddenly disappeared. However, they quickly followed the +track, which was plain enough in the sandy bottom, that of a horse and +two mules. Killbuck scrutinised the "sign," and puzzled over it a +considerable time; and at last exclaimed--"Wagh! this sign's as plain +as mon beaver to me; look at that hos-track, boy; did ye ever see that +afore?" + +"_Well_, I have!" answered La Bonté, peering down at it: "that ar +shuffle-toe seems handy to me now, I _tell_ you." + +"The man as used to ride that hos is long gone under, but the hos, +darn the old crittur, is old Bill Williams's, I'll swar by hook." + +"Well, it aint nothin else," continued La Bonté, satisfying himself by +a long look; "it's the old boy's hos as shure as shootin: and them +Rapahos has rubbed him out at last, and raised his animals. Ho, boy! +let's lift their hair." + +"Agreed," answered Killbuck; and away they started in pursuit, +determined to avenge the death of their old comrade. + +They followed the track through the bottom and into the stream, which +it crossed, and, passing a few yards up the bank, entered the water +again, when they could see nothing more of it. Puzzled at this, they +sought on each side the river, but in vain; and, not wishing to lose +more time in the search, they proceeded through the timber on the +banks to find a good camping-place for the night, which had been their +object in riding in advance of the cavallada. On the left bank, a +short distance before them, was a heavy growth of timber, and the +river ran in one place close to a high bluff, between which and the +water was an almost impervious thicket of plum and cherry trees. The +grove of timber ended before it reached this point, and but few +scattered trees grew in the little glade which intervened, and which +was covered with tolerable grass. This being fixed upon as an +excellent camp, the two mountaineers rode into the glade, and +dismounted close to the plum and cherry thicket, which formed almost a +wall before them, and an excellent shelter from the wind. Jumping off +their horses, they were in the act of removing the saddles from their +backs, when a shrill neigh burst from the thicket not two yards behind +them; a rustling in the bushes followed, and presently a man dressed +in buck-skin, and rifle in hand, burst out of the tangled brush, +exclaiming in an angry voice-- + +"Do'ee hy'ar now? I was nigh upon gut-shootin some of e'e--I was now; +thought e'e was darned Rapahos, I did, and câched right off." + +"Ho, Bill! what, old hos! not gone under yet?" cried both the hunters. +"Give us your paw." + +"Do'ee now, if hy'ar ar'nt them boys as was rubbed out on Lodge Pole +(creek) a time ago. Do'ee hy're? if this aint 'some' now, I wouldn't +say so." + +Leaving old Bill Williams and our two friends to exchange their rough +but hearty greetings, we will glance at that old worthy's history +since the time when we left him câching in the fire and smoke on the +Indian battle-ground in the Rocky Mountains. He had escaped fire and +smoke, or he would not have been here on Arkansa with his old grizzled +Nez-percé steed. On that occasion, the veteran mountaineer had lost +his two pack-animals and all his beaver. He was not the man, however, +to want a horse or mule as long as an Indian village was near at +hand. Skulking, therefore, by day in cañons and deep gorges of the +mountains, and travelling by night, he followed closely on the trail +of the victorious savages, bided his time, struck his "coup," and +recovered a pair of pack-horses, which was all he required. Ever +since, he had been trapping alone in all parts of the mountains; had +visited the rendezvous but twice for short periods, and then with full +packs of beaver; and was now on his way to Bent's Fort, to dispose of +his present loads of peltry, enjoy one good carouse on Taos whisky, +and then return to some hole or corner in the mountains which he knew +of, to follow in the spring his solitary avocation. He too had had his +share of troubles, and had many Indian scrapes, but passed safely +through all, and scarcely cared to talk of what he had done, so +matter-of-fact to him were the most extraordinary of his perilous +adventures. + +Arrived at Bent's Fort, the party disposed of their cavallada, and +then--respect for the pardonable weaknesses of our mountain friends +prompts us to draw a veil over the furious orgies that ensued. A +number of hunters and trappers were "in" from their hunting-grounds, +and a village of Shians and some lodges of Kioways were camped round +the fort. As long as the liquor lasted, and there was good store of +alcohol as well as of Taos whisky, the Arkansa resounded with furious +mirth--not unmixed with graver scenes; for your mountaineer, ever +quarrelsome in his cups, is quick to give and take offence, when +rifles alone can settle the difference, and much blood is spilt upon +the prairie in his wild and frequent quarrels. + +Bent's Fort is situated on the left or northern bank of the river +Arkansa, about one hundred miles from the foot of the Rocky +Mountains--on a low and level bluff of the prairie which here slopes +gradually to the water's-edge. The walls are built entirely of +adobes--or sun-burned bricks--in the form of a hollow square, at two +corners of which are circular flanking towers of the same material. +The entrance is by a large gateway into the square, round which are +the rooms occupied by the traders and employés of the host. These are +small in size, with walls coloured by a white-wash made of clay found +in the prairie. Their flat roofs are defended along the exterior by +parapets of adobe, to serve as a cover to marksmen firing from the +top; and along the coping grow plants of cactus of all the varieties +common in the plains. In the centre of the square is the press for +packing the furs; and there are three large rooms, one used as a store +and magazine, another as a council-room, where the Indians assemble +for their "talks," whilst the third is the common dining-hall, where +the traders, trappers, and hunters, and all employés, feast upon the +best provender the game-covered country affords. Over the culinary +department presided of late years a fair lady of colour, Charlotte by +name, who was, as she loved to say, "de onlee lady in de dam Injun +country," and who moreover was celebrated from Long's Peak to the +Cumbres Espanolás for slap-jacks and pumpkin pies. + +Here congregate at certain seasons the merchants of the plains and +mountains, with their stocks of peltry. Chiefs of the Shian, the +Kioway, and Arapahó, sit in solemn conclave with the head traders, and +smoke the "calumet" over their real and imaginary grievances. Now +O-cun-no-whurst, the Yellow Wolf, grand chief of the Shian, complains +of certain grave offences against the dignity of his nation! A trader +from the "big lodge" (the fort) has been in his village, and before +the trade was opened, in laying the customary chief's gift "on the +prairie"[9] has not "opened his hand," but "squeezed out his present +between his fingers" grudgingly and with too sparing measure. This was +hard to bear, but the Yellow Wolf would say no more! + +Tah-kai-buhl or, "he who jumps," is deputed from the Kioway to warn +the white traders not to proceed to the Canadian to trade with the +Comanche. That nation is mad--a "heap mad" with the whites, and has +"dug up the hatchet" to "rub out" all who enter its country. The +Kioway loves the paleface, and gives him warning, (and "he who jumps" +looks as if he deserves something "on the prairie" for his +information.) + +Shawh-noh-qua-mish, "the peeled lodge-pole," is there to excuse his +Arapahó braves, who lately made free with a band of horses belonging +to the fort. He promises the like shall never happen again, and he, +Shawh-noh-qua-mish, speaks with a "single tongue." Over clouds of +tobacco and kinnik-kinnik, these grave affairs are settled and terms +arranged. + +In the corral, groups of leather-clad mountaineers, with "decks" of +"euker" and "seven up," gamble away their hard-earned peltries. The +employés--mostly St Louis Frenchmen and Canadian voyageurs--are +pressing packs of buffalo skins, beating robes, or engaged in other +duties of a trading fort. Indian squaws, the wives of mountaineers, +strut about in all the pride of beads and fanfaron, jingling with +bells and bugles, and happy as paint can make them. Hunters drop in +with animals packed with deer or buffalo meat to supply the fort; +Indian dogs look anxiously in at the gateway, fearing to enter and +encounter the enmity of their natural enemies, the whites; and outside +the fort, at any hour of the day or night, one may safely wager to see +a dozen coyotes or prairie wolves loping round, or seated on their +haunches, and looking gravely on, waiting patiently for some chance +offal to be cast outside. Against the walls, groups of Indians, too +proud to enter without an invitation, lean, wrapped in their buffalo +robes, sulky and evidently ill at ease to be so near the whites +without a chance of fingering their scalp-locks; their white lodges +shining in the sun, at a little distance from the river-banks; their +horses feeding in the plain beyond. + +The appearance of the fort is very striking, standing as it does +hundreds of miles from any settlement, on the vast and lifeless +prairie, surrounded by hordes of hostile Indians, and far out of reach +of intercourse with civilised man; its mud-built walls inclosing a +little garrison of a dozen hardy men, sufficient to hold in check the +numerous tribes of savages ever thirsting for their blood. Yet the +solitary stranger passing this lone fort, feels proudly secure when he +comes within sight of the "stars and stripes" which float above the +walls. + +Again we must take a jump with La Bonté over a space of several +months; when we find him, in company of half a dozen trappers, amongst +them his inseparable compañero Killbuck, camped on the Greenhorn +creek, _en route_ to the settlements of New Mexico. They have a few +mules packed with beaver for the Taos market; but this expedition has +been planned more for pleasure than profit--a journey to Taos valley +being the only civilised relaxation coveted by the mountaineers. Not a +few of the present band are bound thither with matrimonial intentions; +the belles of Nuevo Mejico being to them the _ne plus ultra_ of female +perfection, uniting most conspicuous personal charms (although coated +with cosmetic _alegria_--an herb, with the juice of which the women of +Mexico hideously bedaub their faces) with all the hardworking industry +of Indian squaws. The ladies, on their part, do not hesitate to leave +the paternal abodes, and eternal tortilla-making, to share the perils +and privations of the American mountaineers in the distant wilderness. +Utterly despising their own countrymen, whom they are used to contrast +with the dashing white hunters who swagger in all the pride of fringe +and leather through their towns--they, as is but natural, gladly +accept husbands from the latter class; preferring the stranger, who +possesses the heart and strong right arm to defend them, to the +miserable, cowardly "peládos," who hold what little they have on +sufferance of savage Indians, but one degree superior to themselves. + +Certainly no band of hunters that ever appeared in the vale of Taos, +numbered in its ranks a properer lot of lads than those now camped on +Greenhorn, intent on matrimonial foray into the settlements of New +Mexico. There was young Dick Wooton, who was "some" for his inches, +being six feet six, and as straight and strong as the barrel of his +long rifle. Shoulder to shoulder with this "boy," stood Rube Herring, +and not a hair's-breadth difference in height or size between them. +Killbuck, though mountain winters had sprinkled a few snow-flakes on +his head, _looked up_ to neither; and La Bonté held his own with any +mountaineer who ever set a trap in sight of Long's Peak or the Snowy +Range. Marcelline--who, though a Mexican, despised his people and +abjured his blood, having been all his life in the mountains with the +white hunters--looked down easily upon six feet and odd inches. In +form a Hercules, he had the symmetry of an Apollo; with strikingly +handsome features, and masses of long black hair hanging from his +slouching beaver over the shoulders of his buck-skin hunting shirt. +He, as he was wont to say, was "no dam Spaniard, but 'mountainee man,' +wagh!" Chabonard, a half-breed, was not lost in the crowd;--and, the +last in height, but the first in every quality which constitutes +excellence in a mountaineer, whether of indomitable courage, or +perfect indifference to death or danger; with an iron frame capable of +withstanding hunger, thirst, heat, cold, fatigue and hardships of +every kind; of wonderful presence of mind, and endless resource in +time of great peril; with the instinct of an animal, and the moral +courage of a _man_,--who was "taller" for his inches than KIT CARSON, +paragon of mountaineers?[10] Small in stature, and slenderly limbed, +but with muscles of wire, with a fair complexion and quiet intelligent +features, to look at Kit none would suppose that the mild-looking +being before him was an incarnate devil in Indian fight, and had +raised more hair from head of Redskins than any two men in the western +country; and yet, thirty winters had scarcely planted a line or furrow +on his clean-shaven face. No name, however, was better known in the +mountains--from Yellow Stone to Spanish Peaks, from Missouri to +Columbia River,--than that of Kit Carson, "raised" in Boonlick, county +of Missouri State, and a credit to the diggins that gave him birth. + +On Huerfano or Orphan Creek, so called from an isolated _hutte_ which +stands on a prairie near the stream, our party fell in with a village +of Yutah Indians, at that time hostile to the whites. Both parties +were preparing for battle, when Killbuck, who spoke the language, went +forward with signs of peace, and after a talk with several chiefs, +entered into an armistice, each party agreeing not to molest the +other. After trading for a few deer-skins which the Yutahs are +celebrated for dressing delicately fine, the trappers moved hastily on +out of such dangerous company, and camped under the mountain on Oak +Creek, where they forted in a strong position, and constructed a +corral in which to secure their animals at night. At this point is a +tolerable pass through the mountains, where a break occurs in the +range, whence they gradually decrease in magnitude until they meet the +sierras of Mexico, which connect the two mighty chains of the Andes +and the Rocky Mountains. From the summit of the dividing ridge, to the +eastward, a view is had of the vast sea of prairie which stretches +away from the base of the mountains, in dreary barrenness, for nearly +a thousand miles, until it meets the fertile valley of the great +Missouri. Over this boundless expanse, nothing breaks the +uninterrupted solitude of the view. Not a tree or atom of foliage +relieves the eye; for the lines of scattered timber which belt the +streams running from the mountains, are lost in the shadow of their +stupendous height, and beyond this nothing is seen but the bare +surface of the rolling prairie. In no other part of the chain are the +grand characteristics of the Far West more strikingly displayed than +from this pass. The mountains here rise, on the eastern side, abruptly +from the plain, and the view over the great prairies is not therefore +obstructed by intervening ridges. To the westward the eye sweeps over +the broken spurs which stretch from the main range in every direction; +whilst distant peaks, for the most part snow-covered, are seen at +intervals rising isolated above the range. On all sides the scene is +wild and dismal. + +Crossing by this pass, the trappers followed the Yutah trail over a +plain, skirting a pine-covered ridge, in which countless herds of +antelope, tame as sheep, were pasturing. Numerous creeks intersect it, +well timbered with oak, pine, and cedar, and well stocked with game of +all kinds. On the eleventh day from leaving the Huerfano, they struck +the Taos valley settlement on Arroyo Hondo, and pushed on at once to +the village of Fernandez--sometimes, but improperly, called Taos. As +the dashing band clattered through the village, the dark eyes of the +reboso-wrapped muchachas peered from the doors of the adobe houses, +each mouth armed with cigarito, which was at intervals removed to +allow utterance to the salutation to each hunter as he trotted past of +_Adios, Americanos_,--"Welcome to Fernandez!" and then they hurried +off to prepare for the fandango, which invariably followed the advent +of the mountaineers. The men, however, seemed scarcely so well +pleased; but leaned sulkingly against the walls, their sarapes turned +over the left shoulder, and concealing the lower part of the face, the +hand appearing from its upper folds only to remove the eternal cigarro +from their lips. They, from under their broad-brimmed sombreros, +scowled with little affection upon the stalwart hunters, who clattered +past them, scarcely deigning to glance at the sullen Peládos, but +paying incomprehensible compliments to the buxom wenches who smiled at +them from the doors. Thus exchanging salutations, they rode up to the +house of an old mountaineer, who had long been settled here with a New +Mexican wife, and who was the recognised entertainer of the hunters +when they visited Taos valley, receiving in exchange such peltry as +they brought with them. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[8] From the report to the Governor of California by the Head of the +Mission, in reference to the attacks by the American mountaineers. + +[9] Indian expression for a free gift. + +[10] Since the time of which we speak, Kit Carson has distinguished +himself in guiding the several U. S. exploring expeditions, under +Frémont, across the Rocky Mountains, and to all parts of Oregon and +California; and for his services, the President of the United States +presented the gallant mountaineer with the commission of lieutenant in +a newly raised regiment of mounted riflemen, of which his old leader +Frémont is appointed colonel. + + + + +A LEGEND FROM ANTWERP. + + +I scarcely know why, upon my last passage through Antwerp, I took up +my quarters at the Park Hotel, instead of alighting, according to my +previous custom, at the sign of the blessed Saint Anthony. The change +was perhaps owing to my hackney coachman, who, seeing me fagged and +bewildered by a weary jolting on the worst of European railroads, +affected to mistake my directions--a misunderstanding that possibly +resulted from his good understanding with mine host of the "Park." Be +that as it may, my baggage, before I could say nay, was in the +embraces of a cloud of waiters, who forthwith disappeared in the +recesses of the inn, whither I was fain to follow. It was a bright May +day, and I felt no way dissatisfied with the change of hostelry when, +on looking from the window of my exquisitely clean Flemish bedroom, I +saw the cheerful boulevard crowded with comely damsels and uniformed +idlers, and the spring foliage of the lime-trees fluttering freshly in +the sunshine. And having picked up the commencement of a furious +appetite during my rickety ride from Herbesthal, I replied by a +particularly willing affirmative to the inquiry of a spruce waiter, +whether _Monsieur_ would be pleased to dine at the _table-d'hôte_, at +the early hour of three o'clock. + +The excellent dinner of the Park Hotel was served up that day to +unusually few guests; so at least it appeared to one accustomed to +the numerous daily congregations at the public tables of France and +Germany. Twelve persons surrounded the board, or, I should rather +say, took post in two opposite rows at one extremity of the long +dresser-like table, whose capacity of accommodating six times the +number was tacit evidence that the inn was not wont to reckon its +diners by the single dozen. Of these twelve guests, three or four +were of the class _commis-voyageur--Anglicé_, bagmen--whose talk, +being as usual confined to the rail and the road, their grisettes and +their samples, I did my best not to hear. There was a French singer, +then starring at the Antwerp theatre; a plump, taciturn, +respectable-looking man, in blue spectacles and a loose coat, whom I +had difficulty in recognising that evening when I saw him trip the +boards in the character of the gay Count Almaviva. Next to the man of +notes sat a thin, sunburned, middle-aged German, who informed us, in +the course of conversation, that after spending twenty years on a +cochineal farm in Mexico, he was on his way back to his native land, +to pass the latter portion of his life in the tranquil enjoyment of +pipe, beer, and competency, in the shadow of his village steeple, and +possibly--although of this he said nothing--in the peaceful +companionship of a placid, stocking-knitting, child-bearing _Frau_. +There was another German at table, a coarse, big-headed baron from +Swabia, who ate like a pig, used his fork as a toothpick, and +indulged, to a most disgusting extent, in the baronial and peculiarly +Teutonic amusement of _hawking_. These persons were all foreigners; +but the remainder of the party, myself excepted, consisted of +natives, belonging to the better class of Antwerp burghers. With one +of these, next to whom I sat, I got into conversation; and finding +him courteous, intelligent, and good-humoured, I was glad to detain +him after dinner over the best bottle of Bordeaux the "Park" cellars +could produce. This opened his heart, and he volunteered to act as my +cicerone through Antwerp. Although I had seen, upon former visits, +all the "lions" of the place, it had been under the guidance of those +odious animals called _valets-de-place_; and I now gladly availed +myself of my new friend's offer, and walked out to the citadel. He +had lived in Antwerp all his life; consequently had been there during +the siege, in reminiscences of whose incidents and episodes he +abounded--so much so, that the invalid soldier who exhibits the +fortress was kind enough to spare us his monotonous elucidations, +and, whilst opening gates, to keep his mouth closed. I lingered +willingly on the scene of that unjust aggression and gallant defence, +and saw every thing worth seeing, including the identical arm-chair +in which, as the story goes, old Chassé, gouty as he was brave, sat +and smoked and gave his orders, unruffled by the thunder of French +batteries and the storm of French shot. Daylight began to fade as we +re-entered the town, and passed, at my request, through some of its +older portions, where I begged my Antwerper to point out to me any +houses of particular antiquity, or notable as the residence of +remarkable persons. He showed me the dwellings of more than one of +those great artists of whom Flanders is so justly proud; also several +mansions of Spanish grandees, dating from the days of Alva's rule, +and built in Spanish style, with abundant and massive balconies, and +the _patio_, or inner court. At last I thought of returning to my +hotel, and was meditating an invitation to supper to my obliging +acquaintance, when, as we passed through a narrow and sequestered +street, he suddenly stood still. + +"See there!" he said; "that house, although of great age, has +apparently little to distinguish it from others, equally ancient, +scattered through Antwerp; nevertheless, to us Flemings it possesses +powerful and peculiar interest. And truly no residence of painter or +grandee could tell stranger tales, were its walls to speak all that +has passed within them." + +I looked curiously at the house, but could see nothing remarkable +about it, except that it was visibly very old--to all appearance one +of the oldest in the town. It was of moderate dimensions, built of +mingled stone and brick, to which time and damp had given one general +tint of dingy greenish black. Its door was low, and of unusual +strength; its windows were narrow, and defended here and there by iron +bars. Formerly these bars had been much more numerous, but many had +been sawn off close to the stone-work, in which their extremities +still remained deeply set. A shallow niche in the wall contained one +of those rudely-carved images of the Virgin and Child, once deemed an +indispensable appendage to Antwerp houses as a protection against evil +spirits, and especially against one,--a sort of municipal brownie, the +scarecrow of the honest and credulous burgesses. The features of the +images, never very delicately chiselled, were obtuse and scarcely +distinguishable with age and dirt, but vestiges of blue and crimson +were still discernible on the Virgin's garments. I observed that the +house had the appearance of having once stood alone--perhaps in the +middle of a garden, or, more probably, of a paved court--for it +receded some yards from the line of street, and the open plot in its +front was paved with blocks of stone, worn, here and there, by +frequent treading, whilst on either hand a house of modern +architecture filled up a space originally left between the centre +building and another of corresponding date. There being nothing else +out of the common in the exterior of the house, I concluded that +whatever singularity pertained to it was to be sought in its interior +or its inmates, and I looked to my companion for an explanation. + +"That house," he said, replying to my mute inquiry, "was for centuries +the dwelling of the Antwerp executioner." + +I started at the word. The strange customs, laws, and traditions +connected with the last minister of the law, during the less civilised +ages of the Christian era, had always exercised upon my mind a +peculiar fascination. With fresh and strong interest I gazed at the +building, and for a minute I almost fancied its front became +transparent, disclosing to me the horrid instruments of death and +torture, the grisly rack, the keen broad axe and glittering sword, the +halter and the thongs; whilst in another compartment the headsman and +his aids, sad, sullen men, in hose and jerkins of a blood-red hue, sat +moodily at their evening meal. The momentary hallucination was quickly +dispelled. The door opened, and a tall and comely damsel, whose dark +eyes, and skin of a slightly olive hue, hinted at the possible +partiality of some gay ancestress for a Spanish cavalier, issued +forth, pitcher on head, and carolling a lively air, to fetch water +from the fountain. The smiling, cheerful reality incontinently chased +away the dismal vision. + +"Evidently," said I, "it is now no hangman's abode. Such fresh +flowers bloom not in the shade of the gallows-tree: the walls of the +doomster's dwelling would refuse to echo ditties so joyous." + +"Perhaps," said my companion, with a smile. "And yet a tale is told +that would partly refute one of your propositions." + +"A tale!" cried I, catching at the word--"about what?" + +"About some former occupants of the house. A wild old story, but a +true one, as I believe." + +"My dear sir!" I exclaimed, "did I not fear encroaching on your +kindness, I would beg you to grant me the evening, as you have already +given me the afternoon, and, after supping with me at the 'Park,' to +relate the tradition in question." + +"Willingly," said the Antwerper, good-humouredly, "were I not pledged +to the theatre to-night. We do not often catch such a nightingale as +this Frenchman, and when we do, we make the most of him. But the +legend is in print; I have the book, and will lend it you with +pleasure." + +"A thousand thanks," said I, rather cooled, however, on the subject, +by the discovery that the tale of wonder I anticipated was written +instead of oral. + +"By the bye," said my companion, when we had walked a few yards in +silence, "are you acquainted with Flemish?" + +"The patois of the country?" said I, smiling, perhaps a little +contemptuously--"Perfectly unacquainted." + +"Then you cannot read the legend, for it is printed in that language?" + +"In what language?" + +"In Flemish." + +If he had said in Laputan, I should hardly have been more surprised. + +"I thought the patois was spoken only by the lower orders, and that to +the reading-classes it was as unintelligible as myself." + +"It is not a _patois_, but a language," replied the Fleming, gravely. +"The general use of French is a modern innovation in our country, and +no good one either. Flemish is the original language of the land; and +not only is it much more widely known than you imagine, but several +very eminent writers, both of prose and poetry, compose in no other +tongue, preferring it far before the French, on account of its greater +sweetness and power." + +I began to feel as much ashamed of my non-acquaintance with the +Flemish school of literature, as if I had been convicted of profound +ignorance of a Flemish school of painting. Of course, I made allowance +for a little patriotic exaggeration, when accepting my friend's +account of this host of poets and prosaists, who pass their lives in +writing a language which scarce any besides themselves understand. But +after all, thought I, why should there not be Flemish writers, just as +writers are found in other tongues, equally unknown to the world at +large? Did I not myself, when in Southern France, get shaved, clipped, +and trimmed, in the prune-producing town of Agen, by a literary +barber, hight Jessamine, who had written volume upon volume of poems +in that Gascon dialect which, according to M. Alexandre Dumas, and +other of the highest French literary authorities, is entirely +comprised in the words _Cadedis_, _Mordious_, _Capdedious_, +_Parfandious_, and eight or ten other expletives, equally profane and +energetic,--just as, according to some funny Frenchman, the essence of +the English tongue resides in a favourite anti-ocular malediction? At +any rate, it was neither civil nor grateful to let my kind companion +suspect contempt on my part for what he chose to consider his national +tongue. So I bowed humbly, and expressed my deep regret that a +defective education left it out of my power to read the legend with +which I had desired to become acquainted. The contrite tone of this +confession fully regained me any ground I had lost in my Fleming's +good opinion. He mused for a minute before again breaking silence. + +"Are you bent upon leaving Antwerp to-morrow?" + +"It is my present intention." + +"Change it. Come to the opera to-night, breakfast with me in the +morning, and I will read you the tale between coffee and _chasse_." + +"I have already had the painful honour of informing you that my +godfathers, reckless of baptismal promises, have suffered me to attain +my present mature age in profound ignorance of the Flemish tongue." + +The Fleming looked at me with the half-pleased half-angry air of a dog +pelted with marrow-bones, and as if he smoked I was roasting him. I +loaded my countenance with a double charge of gravity. + +"It is fortunate," he said, "that my sponsors have been less negligent +towards me with respect to French, in which language, if you will take +patience with slow reading, I doubt not of conveying to you the +substance, and in some degree the style of the tale. Nay, no thanks," +added he, forestalling my acknowledgments. "My motives are more +selfish than you think. I want to convince you that if the Flemish +tongue is little known, there are Flemish writers well worth the +knowing." + +There was no resisting such amiable pertinacity. I put off my journey, +breakfasted with my Fleming, and after breakfast--none of your tea and +toast business, but a real good _déjeuner-à-la-fourchette_, a dinner +less the soup--he produced his Flemish volume, and read me in French +the promised story. Seemingly unused to this off-hand style of +translation, and patriotically anxious to do full justice to the +original, he read so slowly that I had time to put down the narrative +nearly verbatim. As it is more than probable that none of the readers +of Maga, numberless though they be as the pebbles upon ocean's strand, +are acquainted with the Flemish, I might have arrogated to myself, +with every chance of impunity, the invention of the tale I now place +before them. But it would go against conscience thus to rob the poor; +and therefore have I taken the trouble to write these few pages, to +explain the source whence I derive the veracious legend of + + +THE DOOMSTER'S FIRSTBORN. + +CHAP. I--THE TAVERN. + +The eve of Whitsuntide, in the year of grace 1507, was unusually dark +and dismal in the good city of Antwerp, over which a dense and +impenetrable canopy of cloud had spread and settled down. It was +owing, doubtless, to this unpleasant aspect of the weather that at +nine o'clock, an hour at which few of the inhabitants were in bed, +profound silence reigned in the streets, broken only by the occasional +dull clang of a church bell, and by the melancholy dripping of the +water which a small dense noiseless rain made to stream from the eaves +and gutters. Heedless of the rain and of the raw fog from the Scheldt, +a man stood motionless and absorbed in thought upon one of the +deserted squares. His back was against a tree, his arms were folded on +his breast, his eyes were wide open; although evidently awake, he had +the appearance of one in a dream. From time to time unintelligible but +energetic words escaped his lips, and his features assumed an +expression of extraordinary wildness; then a deep and painful sigh +burst from his breast, or a sound, half groan, half gasping, like that +with which an over-burthened porter throws down his load. At times, +too, a smile passed across his face--no sign of joy, or laugh extorted +by jovial or pleasant thoughts, but the bitter smile of agony and +despair, more afflicting to behold than a flood of tears. He smiled, +certainly, but whilst his countenance yet wore the deceitful sign of +joy, he bit his lips till they bled, and his hand, thrust within his +doublet, dug its nails into his breast. Thrice wretched was this +unhappy man: for him the pains of purgatory had no new terrors, for +already, during twenty years, he had felt its direst torments in his +heart. To him the pleasant earth had been a valley of tears, an abode +of bitter sorrow. When his mother bore him, and his first cry broke +upon her ear, she pressed no kiss of welcome on his cheek. It was no +gush of tenderness and maternal joy that brought tears to her eyes, +when she knew it was a man-child she had brought forth. His father +felt no pride in the growth and beauty of his first and only son; +often he wept over him and prayed for his death, as though the child +had been the offspring of some foul and accursed sin. And when the +infant grew--although fed with his mother's tears rather than with her +milk--into a comely boy, and ventured forth to mingle in the sports of +others of his age, he was scoffed, tormented, and despised, as though +his face were the face of a devil. Yet was he so patient and gentle, +that none ever saw frown on his brow, or the flush of anger on his +features; only his father knew what bitter melancholy lurked in the +heart of his son. + +Now the child had become a man. Despite his sufferings, his body had +grown into strength and vigour. He felt a craving after society, a +burning desire for the sympathy and respect of his fellows. But the +hatred and persecution that had made his youth wretched, clave to him +in manhood,--scoff and scorn were his portion wheresoever he showed +himself; and if he failed instantly to retire, with servile mien and +prayer for pity, he was driven forth, like a dog, with kick and cuff. +For him there was no justice in the wide world,--submission was his +lot, God his only comforter. + +Such had been the life of the man who now leaned against the poplar +tree, a prey to the tortures of despair. Yet that man's heart was +formed for tenderness and love, his mind was intelligent, his +countenance not without nobility, his gait proud and manly, his voice +earnest and persuasive. At this moment he lifted it up to heaven, +towards which he passionately extended his arms. + +"Great God!" he cried, "since thy holy will created me to suffer, +grant me also strength to endure my tortures! My heart burns! my +senses leave me! Protect me, O Lord, from despair and madness! +Preserve to me the consolatory belief in thy goodness and justice; for +my heart is rent with the agonies of doubt!" + +His voice grew weaker and subsided into an inarticulate murmur. +Suddenly raising his head and starting from his leaning posture, he +hurried across the square and through two or three streets, as though +endeavouring to escape reflection by rapidity of motion. Then his pace +slackened and grew irregular, and he occasionally stood still, like +one who, absorbed in weighty thoughts, unconsciously pauses, the +better to indulge them. On a sudden a shrill harsh sound broke from +his lips; they were parched with thirst and fever. + +"I must drink," he cried; "I am choked by this burning thirst." + +There were many taverns in that street, and he approached the windows +of several, from the crevices of whose shutters a bright light +streamed; but he entered not, and still passed on, for in every house +he heard men's voices, and that sufficed to drive him away. In St +Jan's Street he paused somewhat longer before a public-house, and +listened attentively at all the windows. A transient gleam of +satisfaction lighted up his countenance. + +"Ha!" he said to himself, "no one is there. I can drink then!" + +And lifting the latch, he entered. Hearing nothing, he expected to +find no one; but how great was his disappointment, when he saw a +number of persons sitting at a long table with bottles and beer-cans +before them. The silence that had deceived him was caused by the +profound attention given to one of the party, who enacted the juggler +for his companions' amusement, and who was busied, when the stranger +listened at the window, in certain mysterious preparations for a new +trick. All eyes were fixed upon his fingers, in a vain endeavour to +detect the legerdemain. + +The thirsty youth started at the sight of all these men, and took a +step backwards as if to leave the house, but observing several heads +turned toward him with curious looks, and fearing such sudden +departure might prove a signal for his pursuit and persecution, he +approached the bar and asked the landlady for a can of beer. The woman +cast a suspicious look at her new customer, and sought to distinguish +his features beneath the broad slouched brim of his hat; but, +observing this, he sank his head still more upon his breast to escape +her observation. But whilst she descended the cellar stairs to fetch +him the beer, the whole of the guests fixed their eyes upon him with +no friendly expression. Then they laid their heads together and +whispered, and made indignant gestures, and one of them in particular +appeared inflamed with anger, and looked furiously at the stranger, +as though he would fain have fallen foul of him. The stranger, his +face averted, waited silently for his beer; but he trembled with +anxiety and apprehension. The landlady made unusual haste, and handed +the full can to the object of her curiosity, who drank with hurried +eagerness, and half-emptied the vessel at a draught; then, placing it +upon the bar, he gave a small coin in payment. But whilst the woman +sought for change, one of the guests strode across the room, took up +the can, and threw the remaining beer in the young man's face. + +"Accursed gallows'-bird!" he cried, "how dare you drink in our +company? What can you urge that I should not break your bones here +upon the spot? Thank heaven, thou wretched outcast, that I will not +befoul my hand by contact with thy vile carcass!" + +The unfortunate being to whom this cruel and outrageous speech was +addressed, was the only son of the Antwerp executioner: his name was +Gerard, and he was little more than twenty years old. His parentage +sufficiently explains why he shunned the sight of men, from whom +hatred and persecution were the best he had to expect. What now befell +him always took place when a headsman ventured into the society of +other burghers. + +Patiently bowing his head, the unhappy Gerard gazed vacantly at the +beer-stains upon his garments, without daring by word or deed to +resent the brutality of his enemy, who, continuing to overwhelm him +with abuse and maledictions, at last directed part of his indignation +against the hostess: + +"You will draw no more beer for us, woman!" he said. "To-morrow night +I and my friends meet at Sebastian's. You would be giving us our +liquor in the hangman's can!" + +"See, there it lies!" exclaimed the hostess, terrified for the loss of +custom, and dashing upon the ground the stone pot, which broke in +pieces. "Is it fault of mine if the hangman's bastard sneaks into an +honest house? Out with you!" cried she furiously to Gerard; "out of my +doors, dealer in dead men, torturer of living bodies! Will'st not be +gone, base panderer to the rack? Away to thy bed beneath the +scaffold!" + +The youth, who had borne at first with silence and resignation the +abuse heaped upon him, was roused at last by these coarse invectives +to a sense of what manly dignity persecution had left him. Instead of +flying from the woman's execrations, he raised his head and answered +coldly and calmly. + +"Woman, I go! Although a hangman's son, I would show more compassion +to my fellow-creatures than they show me. My father tortures men, +because the law and man compel him; but _men_ torture _me_ without +necessity, and without provocation. Remember that you sin against God +by treating me, his creature, like a dog." + +So gentle and touching were the tones of the young man's voice, that +the hostess wondered, and could not understand how one so sorely +ill-treated could speak thus mildly. For a moment the woman got the +better of the trader, and, with something like a tear glistening in +her eye, she took up the coin Gerard had given her, and threw it over +to him. + +"There," she said; "I want not thy money; take it, and go in peace." + +The man who had thrown the beer in Gerard's face picked the coin from +the floor, looked at it, and threw it upon a table with a gesture of +disgust. + +"See!" he cried, "there is blood upon it--human blood!" + +His companions crowded round the table, and started back in horror, as +from a fresh and bleeding corpse. A murmur of loathing and aversion +assailed the ears of Gerard, who well knew the charge was false, for +he had taken the piece of money in change that very evening, from a +woman who let out praying-chairs in the church. The injustice of his +foes so irritated him, that his face turned white with passion, as a +linen cloth. Pressing his hat more firmly upon his head, he sprang +forward to the table, and confronted his enemies with the fierce bold +brow of an exasperated lion. + +"Scoundrels!" he shouted, "what speak you of blood? See you not that +the metal is alloyed, and looks red, like all other coins of the kind? +But no, you are blinded by hate, and know not justice. You say I am +the hangman's son. 'Tis true,--God so willed it. But yet are ye more +despicable than I am; and proud am I to resemble neither in name nor +deed such base and heartless men!" + +The words were scarcely uttered when from all sides blows and kicks +rained upon the imprudent speaker. Manfully did he defend himself, and +brought more than one assailant to the ground; but the numbers were +too great for his strength. Oaths and abuse resounded through the +apartment, tables and benches were upset, jugs and glasses broken; the +hostess screamed for help. But the strife and tumult were brief; and +Gerard suddenly found himself in the street, stunned and bruised by +the blows he had received. Settling his cloak, and smoothing his +crushed hat, he went his way, scarce bestowing another thought upon +the scuffle; for things far weightier, far more painful and +engrossing, crowded upon his excited mind. + + +CHAP. II--THE LOVERS. + +Whilst the above occurred in the beer-house, a fair young girl waited +Gerard's coming, her heart beating fast from apprehension that some +evil had befallen him. To the headsman's son she was the angel of hope +and consolation; she alone loved him,--partly, perhaps, because she +knew that the world hated and despised him. Her love had braved her +mother's censure, her neighbours' reproaches, her companions' sneers. +Nay, more than this,--when they shouted after her, by way of scoff, +the office of Gerard's father, or called her the headsman's bride, and +the like, she rejoiced and was glad; for then she felt her love was +noble and pure, and acceptable in the sight of God. For was she not, +in loving Gerard, doing as she would be done by, comforting and +supporting him whom all men oppressed and persecuted? + +This poor girl, whose name was Lina, lived in a small apartment in the +Vlier Street, with her old mother and her brother Franz, a +good-hearted, hard-handed fellow, who worked like a slave for five +days out of the seven, spent half a day in church, and a day and a +half in the beer-house, where he drank and sang to his heart's +content, and which he seldom left without a black eye. During the five +days allotted to labour, there was not in Antwerp a more clever and +indefatigable carpenter; and punctually each Saturday night he brought +his mother a round sum from his earnings, wherefore the old woman had +him in particular affection. + +On the night of Gerard's ill-timed visit to the tavern, Lina sat +opposite to her mother in their humble chimney-corner, a single +slender candle burning between them,--their fingers busily engaged in +lace-making. On the other side of the room stood a joiner's bench, at +which Franz was hard at work. The room itself was clean and neat, and +strewn with white sand; a crucifix and a few pictures of saints +decorated the walls; but otherwise it contained little beyond the most +necessary furniture, for, labour as they would, its inmates' combined +efforts could earn but a scanty pittance. + +Eight o'clock was the usual hour of Gerard's visit, and hitherto he +had never come later without warning Lina beforehand of the probable +delay; but now it was ten, and there were no signs of his appearance. +The maiden knew not what to think of this irregularity, and was so +uneasy and absent that she neither heard nor answered a question put +to her by her mother. + +"Now then, child," cried the old woman, "your wits are surely +wool-gathering. What's the use of fretting? If he come not to-day, he +will to-morrow. There are days enough in the year." + +"True, mother; but I fear some harm has happened to him, that he +misses coming. People are so ill-minded towards him!" + +"Ay, that are they; but then he is the headsman's son, and hatred is +the portion of his tribe. Did not the mob murder Headsman Hansken with +stones, and drown Headsman Harmen, hard by the Kroonenburg tower?" + +"And what had they done, mother?" + +"I'm sure I can't tell. Nothing, I believe. But it so happens, +because the executioners hang many innocent people." + +"Surely, mother, the headsman must do what the judge bids him. Why not +drown the judge, sooner than his servant?" + +"Ay, ay, Lina, but it has always been so. Mind the proverb--'In a +kennel of dogs, the smallest gets fewest bits and most bites.'" + +"That is a stupid proverb, mother." + +And the two women gossiped on, till the old one got weary of watching, +and said to her daughter-- + +"Leave off work, child, and let us to bed. The night grows late." + +The young girl was ill-pleased with the order, for she had not yet +given up hopes of Gerard's coming; but she could think of no pretext +to keep her mother from her bed. After brief reflection-- + +"Mother," she said, "wait a little longer; three more flowers and my +lace is done." + +"Make haste then, dear child, or I shall sleep on my chair." + +"I am not yet for bed," cried Franz from his bench. "I must finish +this sewing-cushion for the landlady at Peerdeken; she is to fetch it +early to-morrow." + +"Boy, boy!" said his mother, smiling and shaking her head, "for a +certainty you drank more last Sunday at Peerdeken than your pocket +could pay for, and now you are working out your debt. Well, +well!--good-night; and forget not your prayers before laying your +heads to rest." + +And with this pious injunction, the good woman got up and entered a +small adjacent closet, serving as sleeping chamber for herself and her +daughter. She could have been but a few minutes in bed when Gerard +knocked at the door, and Franz let him in. + +The young man's face was pale and gloomy, but Lina wondered not at +this, for seldom had she the happiness of seeing her lover's brow +otherwise than care-laden. Slowly approaching her, Gerard took her +hand and pressed it sadly and silently to his breast. This was his +usual greeting. Of words he was habitually frugal, but his eyes +expressed heartfelt gratitude and ardent love. + +"Gerard!" cried Lina, "what is wrong? Your hand is cold as ice! +Heavens! there is blood upon your throat!" + +"'Tis nothing, Lina; I knocked myself in the dark. Happy for me, were +my sufferings only of the body!" + +The words were followed by a deep sigh, and by a look of profound +dejection, that filled Lina with alarm. Gerard's eyes had assumed a +fixed hard look, in which she read the announcement of some terrible +novelty. With the tenderest care she cleansed his neck from the blood, +which flowed from a trifling wound; and taking her lover's hand, +clasped it in both of hers, with a glance of affectionate +encouragement. But he continued to regard her with the same unvarying +gaze, until at last, unable longer to endure the suspense and his +seeming coldness, she sank into a chair. + +"Oh, Gerard!" she exclaimed, "look not thus, if you would not kill me +with your glance!" + +The young man cast his eyes upon the ground, then raised them again to +Lina's face, but this time with an expression of ineffable sadness, +and took a seat by her side. + +"Lina," he said, in a tone betraying the deepest emotion, "give me +patient hearing, for I have much to say. We meet for the last time." + +And without attending to poor Lina's increasing agitation, he +continued-- + +"When children," he said, "we played together, mutually attracted by a +feeling we could not understand, and which has since grown into love. +You knew not, sweet Lina, what it is to be the headsman's firstborn. +You knew not that he who hangs and racks and brands, is laden with +more ignominy than the criminal who suffers at his hands. Later you +learned it, but your pure soul refused to become accomplice of man's +injustice, and you loved me the more, when you found how much I needed +love to save me from despair. And truly, without thee my sufferings +had long since been ended in the grave; for I no longer had faith in +any thing save in the justice of God, and that He reserved me +compensation in a better world. Men persecute me like one accursed; +the blood you have just now wiped was shed by their hatred. But I care +little for pain of body; blest with thy love, my Lina, I would bear +uncomplaining the worst tortures they could inflict. The pain, the +martyrdom is here." He paused, and pressed his hand upon his temples. +"Lina, we have ever indulged a fond dream that some unexpected event +would free me from the headsman's terrible duties. In this expectation +you have sacrificed yourself, and I, blinded by love, have hoped where +hope there was none. Beloved! the illusion has fled, the dream is +past. To-morrow I am no longer the headsman's son, but the headsman +himself! My father lies upon a bed of sickness whence he can never +rise. To-morrow there is an execution, and his odious duties devolve +on me! But think not, Lina, that I will basely claim the pledges given +in hopes of a brighter future. Think not I will expose you to the +disgrace of being pointed at as the headsman's mistress--the +headsman's wife! No, Lina, I come to release you from all promises; +from this moment you are free!" + +Whilst Gerard spoke, a gradual but visible change came over the young +girl's countenance, and when he paused, it wore an expression of +joyful pride--a pride that flashed out of her eyes, and smiled in the +dimples of her cheeks. She felt that exhilaration of the heart, the +consequence and reward of generous and noble resolves. + +"I understand your meaning, Gerard," she said, "and could quarrel with +you for thinking me less devoted than yourself, or less ready with a +sacrifice. O my beloved! thine I am, and thine will I remain, to-day, +to-morrow, and for ever--here or on the scaffold. Gerard, the path of +duty is plain before me; as thy wife, I will console thee for the +cruelty of men, and shed over thy life the soothing balm of love!" + +"Never, Lina, never! What! thou the doomster's wife! A double curse +would be upon me, did I consent to such profanation. Dare I drag you +down into the pit of ignominy and contempt? Never, oh never!" + +"And never," said the maiden, in accents of solemn determination, +"will I abandon thee, Gerard, or annul the pledges by which we are +mutually bound. Whithersoever thou goest, thither will I go; and all +thy efforts shall not detach me from thee. Our lives are indissolubly +united. Think you I would desert you on your solitary path? Friend, +did you but know how proud and happy I feel! With humble confidence +shall I approach the table of the Lord, for my heart tells me the good +and just God approves and blesses my resolve." + +Gerard gazed in wondering and rapturous admiration on the pure and +beautiful countenance of his mistress, now flushed with the enthusiasm +of her generous love. There was something divine in the affection that +thus courted shame and opprobrium for the sake of the loved one. For a +moment his brow beamed with heartfelt joy, and a sigh, but not of +sorrow, escaped his lightened breast. + +"Forgive me, O Lord," he exclaimed, raising his eyes to heaven, +"forgive me that I murmured! In thy great mercy thou has sent an angel +to console me!" + +Whilst this affecting dialogue took place, Franz had continued his +work, without attending to the discourse of Gerard and his sister. +Now, however, having finished the cushion, he put by his tools, took +up his lamp, and approached the lovers. + +"Come, Lina," said he, "I am dead with sleep, and in haste for bed. +You must bid Gerard come earlier to-morrow." + +Although Gerard had still much to say to his mistress, he could not +but take the hint thus plainly but kindly given. + +"Franz," said he, gloomily, to his future brother-in-law, "to-morrow I +must strike off a man's head upon the scaffold." + +"Have a care, then, Gerard!" replied Franz coolly: "if you miss your +stroke they will stone you, as they did Headsman Hansken. However, in +case of mishap, there is one man at least will stand by you to the +last." + +The young headsman looked mournfully at Lina, and approached the +door, a tear trembling on his eyelid. But Lina threw herself +passionately on his neck. + +"To-morrow," she cried, "I will be near the scaffold. Observe me +well." + +And she listened, with clasped hands and tearful cheeks, to her +lover's footsteps, as they grew fainter and more faint, and finally +died away in the distance. + + +CHAPTER III.--FATHER AND SON. + +The house of the Antwerp executioner stood hard by the fortifications, +and was surrounded by a high stone wall, over whose solid portal a red +flag, denoting the occupation of the tenant, was displayed during the +day. The grim ensign had been some hours removed when Gerard knocked +for admission. + +"Has the judge been here, Jan?" inquired the young man of the varlet +who opened. + +"Yes, he has but just left. Your father desires to speak to you." + +Gerard ascended the stairs, and entered the room where his sick father +lay stretched upon his bed. + +The old headsman was ashy pale, and worn to the very bone; the ravages +of a terrible malady were legible in his hollow cheeks and sunken +glassy eyes. But, although sick and weak of body, his mind was still +active and vigorous as that of one in health. With a quick glance he +noted his son's entrance; but he uttered no greeting. Gerard took a +chair beside his father's pillow, sought under the bed-clothes for his +thin and feeble hand, and pressed it anxiously and affectionately. + +"Father!" he cried in an unsteady voice, "tell me my doom! The judge +has been here! Say, must I assume the headsman's office?" + +"My son," replied the old man, mournfully, "I have done my utmost, but +in vain. The judge will not hear of my varlet's doing the duty. +Neither gold nor entreaties softened him. My unhappy son, there is no +alternative. Headsman you must become!" + +Although Gerard had foreseen his fate, this confirmation, destroying +the last ray of hope, was a terrible shock. A cold sweat broke out +upon his forehead, and he convulsively squeezed his father's hand. But +the emotion was of brief duration, and he relapsed into his habitual +calm dejection. + +"To-morrow!" he exclaimed, after a short pause--"Father, to-morrow +destroys my last hope of a future happier than the past. To-morrow I +must dip my hands in the blood of a fellow-creature. To-morrow is the +first day of a life of agony. Thenceforward I am a hired murderer!" + +"My son!" said the old headsman anxiously but firmly, "what must be +must, and against destiny 'tis vain to strive. It were sin to deceive +you. Be prepared for a joyless and weary existence. But there is a God +above, who takes account of human suffering, to repay it in His own +good time." + +Gerard heard but the bitter portion of his father's speech--the +concluding words of comfort escaped his ear. He replied as if he had +heard nothing. + +"I can conceive," he said, "my fellow-citizens' hatred of me. May I +not be called upon, any day and every day, to strike off the head of +one of them, and he perhaps innocent? They think the headsman takes +pleasure in bloodshed, that he gloats over his victim; and yet, if he +shrinks at sight of the sufferer's naked throat, if his trembling +hands refuse to wield the sword, then, indeed, they slay him with +stones, because he is no true headsman, but suffers himself to be +touched by pity!" + +"Often, my son, has this inexplicable contradiction struck me." + +"Methinks, father, 'tis not hard to interpret. In every society of men +a scapegoat is needed, on whom to pour out the superabundant hate and +malice of the human heart, to serve as a ready butt for the brutal, a +safe laughingstock for cowards. But, father!--is there no possible +outlet, no means of escape, unthought of or untried? Is my fate +inevitable--_must_ I steep myself in blood?" + +"My son!" said the headsman, "there is no remedy. See yonder book, +left me by the judge. It is open at the page that seals thy doom." + +Gerard read; then dashed the book violently to the ground. + +"Accursed be the unjust law," he cried, "that sentenced me, whilst yet +in my mother's womb, to a life of infamy and blood! Thrice accursed, I +say, be the law and its makers! What! whilst I lay in my cradle, +smiling at life and at God's glorious works, in happy ignorance of the +future, men had already doomed me to live loathed and detested of all, +like the venomous reptile against which every hand is lifted? Oh, +shame, shame!" + +"Despair carries you too far, Gerard," replied his father, with a +sigh. "I appreciate your sufferings--too long have I endured the like; +but, remember that the headsman's is a necessary office, and must be +filled. God has allotted it to thee, and submission to His will is the +Christian's duty. In resignation and humility wilt thou find peace." + +"Peace!--have you found it, my father? Is it resignation that has laid +you thus prematurely upon the bed of sickness? Were they from the +springs of peace and contentment, those tears that during twenty long +years you shed upon your son's head? You have had courage thus long to +bear it; but I feel not such strength. Oh, that our souls might depart +together, to find mercy and peace before the judgment-seat of the Most +High! But no; I am young, and healthy, and grief does not kill,--at +least not as fast as I would have it. But, praise be to heaven! the +man who fears not death is ever master of his destiny!" + +The headsman raised himself in his bed, and drawing his son towards +him, embraced him tenderly, whilst a flood of bitter tears coursed +over his cheeks, worn and wrinkled by sorrow rather than by years. + +"O Gerard!" he said, "my beloved son, can you cherish thoughts of +suicide, and delight in the sinful project? What! would you precede me +to the tomb, leaving me to drag out in solitude my few remaining days +of misery? Is this kind, Gerard?--is it generous, unselfish? Think of +Him who for our sakes bore a cross, compared to which thine is of +feather's weight. Bear it, in imitation of Him, patiently and humbly. +So shall we meet hereafter in that bright and blessed world where +persecutors are not, and where the weary find rest!" + +These touching and pious words made a deep impression upon Gerard. He +reproached himself for his egotism, and his whole feelings underwent a +sudden and total change. All that day and evening he had nursed +thoughts of self-destruction, which he looked upon as an enviable lot +compared to the long career of blood prescribed to him by the cruel +laws of his country. And now, out of love to his dying father, he must +abandon the idea, and cling to an existence he viewed with deepest +loathing! It cost a severe effort, but generosity and filial duty +finally prevailed, and he made up his mind to the sacrifice. + +"Father!" he exclaimed, "forgive my senseless words--heedlessly and +cruelly spoken. I forget not my duty to you; and, since such is your +desire, I will ascend the scaffold and do my office firmly, horrible +though it be. Let shame and scandal fall on those who force me to a +work so repugnant to my nature. Fear not, my father, but that I will +strike the blow with a veteran's coolness, and bathe my hands in my +brother's blood, as calmly as ever butcher in that of unresisting +lamb. I have said it; the sin is not mine, but theirs who compel me. +Weep no move, father! thy son will become headsman; ay, and with a +headsman's heart!" + +Those who, hearing this bold speech, should have discerned in it a +strong and sudden resolution, to be afterwards borne out by the deeds +of the speaker, would have deceived themselves, even as Gerard +deceived both himself and his father. It was but one of those fleeting +flashes of determination, which persons wavering in an alternative of +terrible evils sometimes exhibit. The resolution was dissipated with +the sound of the words it dictated. These, however, answered their +chief purpose, by carrying joy and consolation to the old man's +heart. + +"I am weary, my son," he said, "yet will I give thee brief word of +advice, the fruit of long experience. To-morrow, when you mount the +scaffold, look not at the mob; the ocean of eyes will confuse you, and +make you falter. Fancy you are alone with the condemned man, and deal +your blow steadily and carefully. If the head falls not at the first +stroke, a thousand voices will cry haro on the bungling headsman: a +thousand arms will be uplifted against him, and I shall never again +behold thee alive. I will pray to God that He mercifully strengthen +thee for the terrible task. Go, my son, and His blessing be upon +thee." + +Whilst the old man thus spoke, with a coolness resulting from long +habit, all Gerard's apprehensions returned with redoubled violence, +and he longed to throw himself on his knees before his father, to +declare his inability to carry out his instructions, and to recall his +promise of supporting the burthen of existence. But affection for his +sole surviving parent, and fear of accelerating the fatal termination +of his malady, stimulated him to self-restraint; and, after a last +embrace, and a murmured "good-night," he retired to his chamber. +There, however, he neither sought his bed nor found repose. The rays +of the morning sun shone upon the unhappy youth sitting in the same +place, almost in the very same posture, he had taken on entering his +room--as mute, as motionless, and nearly as pale, as statue of whitest +marble. + + +CHAP. IV--THE EXECUTION. + +The execution of Hendrik the Mariner was fixed for six in the evening. +Long before the appointed hour, crowds of people, eager to see the +horrible spectacle, thronged through the St George's Gate, in the +direction of the place of punishment. Nothing was more seductive to +the populace of that day than the sight of a grisly head rolling upon +the scaffold, and reddening the boards with its blood. The Antwerp +burghers were not exempt from this horrible curiosity; and Headsman's +Acre, as the field was called in which capital punishments then took +place, was crowded with spectators of all ages and classes, including +women, many of them with their children in their arms, urchins of +tender age, and old men who, already on the brink of the grave, +tottered from their easy chair and chimney corner to behold a +fellow-creature expiate, by a premature death, his sin against +society. Noisy and merry was the mob collected round the tall black +gallows and the grim rusty wheel. + +In the crowd, close to the scaffold, stood Lina, her heart beating +quickly and anxiously, her tears restrained from flowing only by the +reflection that she was there to give Gerard courage, and that weeping +was the worst way to do it. Her brother Franz stood beside her, in +holiday suit, his broad-leafed Spanish hat upon his head, and his +brown cloak over his shoulder, according to the fashion of the time. +Lina had represented to him, in lively colours, the frightful danger +incurred by Gerard; and he, with his usual rough good-heartedness, +swore to break the neck of the first man who threw a stone at the new +headsman. + +It was late, and the shades of evening fell upon the earth, before the +executioner's varlets completed the necessary arrangements on the +scaffold. At the moment these terminated, a cart pierced the throng +amidst general stir and hum of curiosity. The criminal, attired in a +black linen gown, sat with a priest in the hinder part of the vehicle. +Gerard was on the foremost bench, his broad bright sword in his hand, +and one of his assistants beside him. None could divine, from his +countenance, what passed in his mind; his features were fixed and +rigid; his eyes, bent upon the ground, avoided the people's gaze; and +but for the weapon he bore, none could have told which of the two, he +or Hendrik, was the condemned man. Unconscious of his own movements, +he ascended the scaffold, so confused in spirit that he saw nothing, +not even Lina, although Franz several times made signs to catch his +attention. + +And now the varlets would have removed the prisoner from the cart to +the scaffold; but he pretended he had not finished his confession, +which he wished now, for the first time, to make full and complete, +seeing all chance of pardon gone. Perhaps he nourished a vague hope of +escape in the darkness; for heavy clouds drifted across the sky, and +night approached so rapidly that already those upon the outskirts of +the crowd could scarcely distinguish what passed upon the scaffold. So +that the people, fearing the increasing darkness would deprive them +altogether of the show they coveted, began to clamour loudly for the +execution of the sentence. The culprit, still resisting, and claiming +delay, was brought upon the scaffold by force, and made to kneel down. +The headsman's assistant bared the condemned wretch's neck, and +pointed to it with a significant look, as if to say, "Master, strike." + +At sight of the naked flesh into which he was to cut, Gerard started +as from a heavy sleep, and his limbs trembled till the scaffold shook +under him, and the broad-bladed sword fell from his hand. The varlet +picked up the weapon and gave it back to his master, who clutched it +convulsively, whilst the red rod of the superintending official gave +the signal to strike. But Gerard neither saw the rod nor heard the +voice of its bearer. Already a murmur arose amongst the crowd. "Quick, +master! quick!" said the varlet, whose ear caught the ill-omened +sound. + +Summoning all the strength and courage his recent sufferings had left +him, Gerard raised the sword, with the fixed determination to strike a +bold and steady blow, when at that moment the victim turned his head, +and at sight of the impending steel, uttered a lamentable yell. No +more was wanting to upset Gerard's resolution and presence of mind. +They left him on the instant: his arms lost their strength, and he let +the sword fall on Hendrik's shoulder, but so feebly that it did not +even wound him. + +At the chill touch of the blade, the criminal's whole frame quivered +with agony; but the next instant, feeling himself unhurt, and +perceiving the advantage to be derived from his executioner's +irresolution, he sprang to his feet, and stretching out his fettered +arms to the people, implored help and pity, for that he was wilfully +tortured. + +At this appeal the fury of the mob burst forth with uncontrollable +vehemence. + +"Strike him dead!" was the universal cry; "strike the torturer dead!" + +And stones flew about Gerard's head, but in no great number, since, +fortunately for him, they were not plentiful on the field. The unhappy +youth stood for a moment stunned by the uproar; then, folding his +arms, he stepped forward to the edge of the scaffold with the air of +one for whom death has no terrors. + +"Wolves!" he exclaimed;--"wolves in the garb of men! ye came for +blood--take mine, and slake your fiendish thirst!" + +This rash defiance excited to madness the fury of the rabble. Women, +children, and men of the better classes, fled in all haste from the +field, leaving it occupied by the very dregs and refuse of Antwerp, +who pressed fiercely forward to the scaffold, making violent efforts +to seize the headsman, in spite of the resistance of the police and +officials. The uproar and confusion were tremendous. Around Gerard a +number of officers of justice assembled--less, however, for his +protection, than to prevent the escape of the culprit, who made +furious efforts to get rid of his manacles, and continued to appeal to +the people and shout for assistance. At this moment of confusion, when +scarcely anyone knew what his neighbour did, a man ascended the +scaffold, and approached the executioner. It was Franz. + +"Gerard," he said, "Lina conjures you, in God's name, and by your love +for her, to speak to her for one moment. She is below; follow me!" And +he leaped from the scaffold, on the side where the mob was thinnest. +Gerard obeyed the charm of Lina's name. How gladly, he thought, would +he bid his beloved one more farewell before encountering the death he +deemed inevitable. In another second he stood by her side. At the same +instant Franz, stripping off his cloak, muffled Gerard in its folds, +pressed his broad hat over his eyes, and placing Lina's arm in that of +the bewildered headsman, drew them gently from the spot. + +"Go quietly and fearlessly through the crowd," he said, "and wait for +me in the copse beyond the farthest gibbet." + +And seeing that Lina obeyed his directions and led away Gerard, who +followed passively as a child, Franz ran round to the other side of +the scaffold, and set up such a shouting, that the mob, thinking he +had seized the delinquent headsman, rushed furiously in that +direction, leaving a free passage to the lovers. Franz continued to +shout with all his might, and to affect the most violent indignation. + +"Strike him dead!" he cried; "strike him dead! Down with the base +torturer! Throw his carcass to the ravens!" + +And he hurled stones at the scaffold, headed a charge on the police, +and behaved altogether like a madman let loose. Favoured by this +attracting of the attention from them, and under cover of the +darkness, Lina succeeded in getting her lover away unrecognised, for +Franz's cloak and hat completely concealed the headsman's well-known +costume. But before they reached the thicket, the mob got possession +of the scaffold, released the prisoner, and began ill-treating the +officials, to compel them to confess what had become of the +executioner. On finding that this latter personage, the cause of the +whole tumult, had disappeared, a man, one of the lowest of the people, +who had seen Franz throw his cloak over Gerard's shoulders, and who +had watched the direction taken by Lina and her disguised companion, +guessed that the fugitive was no other than the headsman himself, and +immediately started in pursuit. Before he could overtake them, Lina +and Gerard disappeared amongst the trees. His suspicions confirmed by +this mysterious conduct, the ruffian, blaspheming with exultation and +fury, rushed upon the lovers; and, tearing off Gerard's cloak, beheld +the headsman's livery. Thereupon, without word or question, he lifted +a heavy cudgel, and struck the poor fellow violently upon the head. +Gerard fell senseless to the ground. The murderer would have repeated +his blow, but Lina, with the courage of a lioness defending her young, +grappled him vigorously, and clasping her arms around his, impeded his +further movements. The sight of her lover, stunned and bleeding at her +feet, seemed to give her superhuman strength; and bethinking her that +it was better to have one enemy to contend with than a hundred, she +abstained from calling out, lest her cries should bring foes instead +of friends. Fortunately the uproar of the mob drowned the imprecations +of Gerard's assailant, who vociferated horrible curses as he strove, +with brutal violence, to shake off the heroic girl. At the very moment +when, her last strength exhausted, she was about to succumb, Franz +entered the copse, and, seeing Gerard motionless on the ground and his +sister struggling with a stranger, immediately guessed what had +occurred. A cry of rage burst from his lips, and before Lina remarked +his presence, his powerful hands were upon the shoulders of her +antagonist, who lay, the next instant, upon the grass at his feet. + +"Lina!" cried Franz, seizing the fallen man and dragging him in the +direction of the scaffold, "hide Gerard in the bushes; if he still +lives, he is rescued from all he most dreads. Quick! I will return." + +With these words he hurried from the copse, dragging his prisoner +after him so rapidly, that the prostrate man, his legs in Franz's iron +grasp, his head trailing in the dust, and striking violently against +each stock and stone, could make no effectual resistance. As soon as +Franz was within earshot of the mob, he shouted, more loudly than +ever-- + +"The headsman! here I have him--the headsman!" + +"Death to the villain!" was re-echoed on all sides; and from all four +corners of the field the mob, who had dispersed to seek the object of +their hate, rushed towards Franz. When Lina's brother saw himself the +centre of a dense crowd, howling and frantic for blood, he hurled +amongst them the man whom he dragged by the feet, with the words-- + +"There is the headsman!" + +"Death to him!" hoarsely repeated a hundred voices, and as many blows +descended upon the shrieking wretch, whose expostulations and prayers +for mercy were unheard in the mighty tumult, and whom the mob, blinded +by fury, easily mistook in the darkness for the delinquent +executioner. His cries were soon silenced by the cruel treatment he +received; in a few minutes he was dead, his clothes were torn from his +body, and his face was disfigured and mutilated so as to be wholly +unrecognisable. + +Leaving the mob to their bloody work, Franz returned to his sister, +and found her weeping and praying beside the body of her lover, whom +she believed dead. On examination, however, he found Gerard's pulse +still beating. The violent blow he had received had stunned but not +slain him. Fresh water thrown upon his face and chest restored him to +consciousness, and to the caresses of his dear Lina, speechless and +almost beside herself with joy at his recovery. When his strength +returned, the trio crept stealthily from the copse, and safely reached +the town, where Gerard concealed himself during the evening in the +house of his mistress. When midnight came, and the streets of Antwerp +were deserted, he betook himself, accompanied by Franz, to his own +dwelling, and made his unexpected appearance in his father's chamber. + +The old headsman, who lay broad awake upon his bed of sickness, +weeping bitterly, and deploring the death of his unhappy son, deemed +himself the sport of a deceitful vision when he saw the dead man +approach his couch. But when convinced, by Gerard's voice and +affectionate embrace, that he indeed beheld his child in solid flesh +and bone, his joy knew no bounds, and for a moment inspired the young +man with fears of his immediate dissolution. + +"My son, my son!" he cried, "you know not half your good fortune. Not +only have you miraculously escaped a cruel death, but you are also +delivered from the horrible employment which has been mine, and was to +be yours. The accursed obligation that weighed upon our race ceases +with life, and you, my son, are _dead_!" + +"And pure from the stain of blood!" joyfully exclaimed Gerard. + +"Begone," continued the old man, "and dwell far from thine unjust +brethren. Quit Antwerp, marry thy good Lina, be faithful and kind to +her, and heaven bless thee in thy posterity! Thy sons will not be born +to wield the axe, nor wilt thou weep over them, as I have wept over +thee. The savings of thine ancestors and mine insure thee for ever +from poverty; make good use of them and be happy!" + +His voice grew weak with emotion, and died away in inarticulate +benedictions. Gerard hung upon his father's neck, and stammered forth +his thanks. The events of the day appeared to him like a dream. He +could not realise the sudden transition from the depths of despair to +the utmost height of happiness. + + * * * * * + +For many years after these incidents there lived at Brussels, under an +assumed name, the son of the Antwerp headsman, and his beautiful wife +Lina. The old man's blessing was heard, and when Gerard's turn came to +quit a world of cares for a brighter and better abode, brave sons and +fair daughters wept around the dying bed of the DOOMSTER'S FIRSTBORN. + + + + +A FEW WORDS ABOUT NOVELS--A DIALOGUE, IN A LETTER TO EUSEBIUS. + + +DEAR EUSEBIUS,--Whether it be a fable or not that the Lydians invented +chess, to relieve themselves from pain and trouble, and were content +to eat one day and play another, unquestionably amusement is a most +salutary medicine to heal the "mind diseased," and even to mitigate +hunger itself. + +The utilitarian ant would not have had the best of the argument with +the grasshopper,--"dance now,"--if the latter had not insisted on +dancing too long--a whole summer. Even hunger would do its dire work +in double-quick time, if left to fret incessantly on the mind as well +as the fast failing substance. Avert the thought of it, and half a +loaf will keep alive longer than a whole one, eaten together with +cankering care. "Post equitem sedet atra Cura," said the most amiable +of satirists; but Care, the real "gentleman in black," won't always be +contented to sit behind, but is apt to assume an opposite seat at the +table, and, grinning horribly, to take away your appetite "quite and +entirely." You may try, Eusebius, to run away from him, and bribe the +stoker to seventy or eighty miles an hour, but Care will telegraph +you, and thus electrify you on your arrival, when you thought him a +hundred miles or so off. I have ascertained a fact, Eusebius, that +Care is not out of one, but _in_ one, and has a lodging somewhere in +the stomach, where he sets up a diabolical laboratory, and sends his +vile fumes up, up--and so all over the brain; and from that +conjuration what blue devils do not arise, as he smokes at leisure his +infernal cigar below! Charge me not, Eusebius, with being +poetical--this is sober prose to the indescribable reality. Your +friend has been hypochondriacal. It is a shameful truth; but +confession is the demon's triumph, and so the sufferer is +punished--mocked, scoffed at, unpitied, and uncured. The Lady Dorothea +Dosewell had proposed a seventy-fifth remedy. My lady, I am in +despair: I have not as yet completed the fifty-sixth prescription; the +fifty-fifth has left me worse. The Curate, who happened to be present, +laughed at me, as all do, and said, "No wonder--you are like the man +who complained of inveterate deafness, had applied every recipe, and +was cured by the most simple one--a cork-screw. Do set aside all your +nostrums, and spend a week or two at the curacy, and I'll take care to +pack in half-a-dozen novels, and you will soon forget your own in +other folks' woes." + +"I will go," I replied; "but I protest against any woes whatsoever. +When young as you, Mr Curate, I could bear them, and sit out a tragedy +stoically; but shaken nerves and increasing years won't bear the +tragic phantasmagoria now. Sentimental comedy is too much, and I +positively, with shame, cry over a child's book." + +"I fear," quoth the Curate, "it is a sure sign your heart is +hardening. The sympathy that should soften it is too easily and too +quickly drawn off by the fancy to waste, and leaves the interior dry. +Come to us, and alternate your feelings between fancy and active +realities; between reading imaginary histories and entering +practically and interestingly into the true histories of the many +homes I must visit, and you will soon be fresh in spirit and sound +again." + +Let me, Eusebius, use the dialogue form, as in some former letters: +suffice it only to tell you previously, that I took the Curate's +advice and invitation, and for a time did my best to throw off every +ailment, and refresh myself by country-air exercise, in the society of +the happy Curate and his wife, at the vicarage of ----, which you know +well by description. And here we read novels. Even at the Curate's +house did we read novels--those "Satan's books," as a large body of +Puritans call them, whilst they read them privately; or, if seen, +ostensibly that they may point out the wickedness in them, and thus +forbid the use of them; as an elder of the demure sect excused himself +when detected at a theatre, that he "came to see if any of their young +folk were there." How often people do what is right, and defend it as +if it was a wrong, and apologise for what gives them no shame! Thus +the Curate commenced the defence of novel-reading:-- + +CURATE.--What is the meaning of the absurd cry against works of +fiction? If it be true that "the proper study of mankind is man," is +it not wise to foresee, as it were, life under all its possible +contingencies? Are we not armed for coming events by knowing something +of their nature beforehand? Who learns only from the world amid which +he walks, learns from a master that conceals too much; and the greater +portion of the lesson, after all, must come out of the learner's own +mind, and it is a weary while before he has learnt by experience the +requisite shrewdness. Life is too short to learn by a process so slow, +that the pupil begins to decay before he has learnt one truth. The +preparatory education is not amiss. The early tears that tales of +fiction bid to flow scald not like the bitter ones of real sorrow; and +they, as it were by a charm of inoculation, prepare the cheek for the +after tears, that they burn not and furrow too deeply. I cannot +conceive how people came to take it into their heads that plays and +novels are wicked things necessarily. Your Lady Prudence will take +infinite pains that her young people shall not contaminate even their +fingers with the half-binding--and perhaps fail too--and for honest +simplicity induce a practice of duplicity, for fiction will be read. +It is the proper food to natural curiosity--an instinct given us to +learn; and I dare to say that letters were invented by Cadmus +purposely for that literature. + +AQUILIUS.--Say nothing of Cadmus, or the serpent's teeth will be +thrown against your argument. Their sowing was not unlike the setting +up a press; and your literary men are as fierce combatants as ever +sprang from the dragon's teeth, and have as strong a propensity to +slaughter each other. + +CURATE.--Yes, and even in works of fiction we have had the conflict of +authors. They write now as much against each other as formerly. +Fielding proposed to himself to write down Richardson; and religious +novelists of our days take the field against real or imaginary +opponents. Richardson, able as he was, very cunningly set about his +work--his _Clarissa_. By an assumed gravity, and well-managed +affectation of morality, he contrived to render popular among prudes a +most indecent work. The book was actually put into the hands of young +people as an antidote to novels in general. This appeared to Fielding +abominable hypocrisy, corrupting under disguise. And to this honest +indignation are we indebted to him for his _Joseph Andrews_, the +antidote to the very questionable morality, and unquestionable moral, +of the virtue-rewarded _Pamela_. + +AQUILIUS.--I was told the other day by a lady, that there are few +kitchens in which _Pamela_ is not to be found. She detected her own +maid reading it, and was obliged to part with her, for setting her cap +at her son, a youth just entered at College. The girl defended her +conduct as a laudable and virtuous ambition, which the good author +encouraged,--was not the title Virtue Rewarded? So much, for _Pamela_. +You will not, however, surely defend the novel-writing system of +nearly half a century ago--the sickly sentimentalities of the _All for +Love_ school--that restless progeny not allowed to rest on circulating +library shelves till their rest was final--whose tendency was to make +young persons of either sex nothing but fools. + +CURATE.--And whose authors had the fool's mark set upon them, not +unhappily, by Jenner, in his _Town Eclogues_:-- + + "Thrice-happy authors, who with little skill + In two short weeks can two short volumes fill! + Who take some miss, of Christian name inviting, + And plunge her deep in love and letter-writing, + Perplex her well with jealous parents' cares, + Expose her virtue to a lover's snares, + Give her false friends and perjured swains by dozens, + With all the episodes of aunts and cousins; + Make parents thwart her, and her lover scorn her, + And some mishap spring up at every corner; + Make her lament her fate with ahs and ohs, + And tell some dear Miss Willis all her woes, + Whilst now with love and now with grief she rages; + Till, having brought her through two hundred pages, + Finding at length her father's heart obdurate, + Will make her take the squire, and leave the curate; + She scales the garden-wall, or fords a river, + Elopes, gets married, and her friends forgive her." + +AQUILIUS.--And was it not whimsical enough that, in the presumption of +their vanity, upstarted the Puritan school, who had ever declaimed +against novels and dramas, to counteract the mischievous tendency of +these silly love-tales, and wrote themselves much sillier, and quite +as mischievous? + +CURATE.--Are you then audacious enough to pass censure upon _Coelebs_, +and suchlike? + +AQUILIUS.--"Great is Diana of Ephesus!" I abominate every thing Hannah +More wrote--vain, clever, idolised, spoiled woman as she was--her +style all riddle-ma-ree. Read her lauded _What is Prayer?_ and you are +reading a conundrum. An affected woman, she wrote affectedly, with a +kind of unwomanly dishonesty. There was good natural stuff in her too, +but it was sadly spoilt in the making up. + +CURATE.--You will shock the good, or rather the goody folk, who will +insist upon the religious and moral purpose of all her works. + +AQUILIUS.--They may insist, for they are an obstinate race. What +moral, or what religion, is inculcated in this--"A brute of a +husband"--selfish, a tyrant, a gourmandiser--ill-treats an amiable +wife. He scorns patient virtue, and is an infidel. He must be +_converted_--that is the religious object. He must be metamorphosed, +not after Ovid's fashion--there is the moral object. How is it done, +do you remember? If not, you will never guess. By what latent virtue +is he to be reclaimed? Virtue, indeed! would the indignant Puritan +proclaim--what virtue is in poor human rags? He shall be reclaimed +through his vice! Indeed, Madam Puritan, that is a novelty. So, +however, it is. The man is a glutton. On his conversion-day he is +gifted with an extraordinary appetite and discriminating taste. It is +a pie--yes, _a pie_, that converts him to piety. + +CURATE.--Oh, oh, oh! you are mocking surely. A pie! + +AQUILIUS.--Yes, a pie. It is remarkably good--quite delicious. It puts +the brute in good humour with himself and every body, and he grunts +applause, and promises his favour to the cook. At this stage--this +incipient stage of his conversion--a pathetic butler bursts into +tears, and affectionately sobs out the beautiful truth. The cook for +the occasion was his mistress--the ill-treated wife. He becomes a +perfect Christian on the instant; and with the conversion comes the +moral metamorphosis, and the "brute of a husband" is, on a sudden, the +best and most religious of men. Now, in what respect, Mr Curate, would +you bid any of your flock to go and do likewise? Setting aside as +worthless, then, to say the best of it, the moral, the set-up primness +of the whole affair is so odious, that you long even for a little +wickedness to set nature upon nature's legs, that we may at least +acknowledge the presence of humanity. + +CURATE.--We must ask Lydia to defend the writers of her sex. You are +severe upon poor Hannah, who would have been good enough in spite of +her extreme vanity, if the clique had let her alone. Her _Coelebs_ was +to be the novel _par excellence_, the model tale,--and with no little +contempt for all others. + +AQUILIUS.--Your Lydia has too much good sense, and too much plain +honesty, to defend any thing wrong because it is found in woman. The +utmost you can expect from her is not to object to the saintly Hannah, +as was the charity of the Wolverhampton audience, when her play was +acted there. Master Betty was hissed, and this impromptu was uttered, +during a lull, from the gallery-- + + "The age of childhood now is o'er, + Of folly and of whim-- + We dont object to Hannah More, + But we'll _ha-na-more_ of him." + +CURATE.--Yet she is supposed to have done some good by her minor tales +for the poor. Possibly she did--the object was at all events good. + +AQUILIUS.--And here she was the precursor to a worse set, so bad that +it can hardly be said of them that they are "daturos progeniem +vitiosiorem." + +CURATE.--Yes, even wickedly religious. The scheme was, that the poor +should teach the rich, and the infant the man. I remember reading some +of these tales of Mrs Sherwood's. Is there not one where a little +urchin, not long after he is able to run alone, is sent out on an +errand,--an unconverted child,--commits the very natural sin of +idleness, loiters by the way, and lies under a tree. There, you will +suppose, sleep comes upon him--no, but grace. He rises a converted +man-child, an infant apostle, goes home and converts his wicked +grandfather, or great-grandfather. "Ex uno disce omnes." Great was the +outcry against Maria Edgeworth's children's tales, because they did +not inculcate religious dogmas. This was a great compliment to her +genius, for it showed that every sect would have wished her theirs. +She wisely left the catechism to fathers, mothers, and nurses, and +preferred leaving to the parson of each parish the prerogative of +sermonising. + +AQUILIUS.--Some of you take your prerogative as a sanitary +prescription, and sweeten your own tempers by throwing off their +acerbities, _ad libitum_, one day in the week; abusing in very +unmeasured terms all mankind, and their own congregation in +particular--indeed, often in language that, used on week days, and by +any other people, would be looked upon as nearly akin to what is +called "cursing and swearing." So do extremes sometimes meet. A little +thunder clears the air wonderfully; the _lightning may_ not always be +evident. + +CURATE.--All writers, especially novelists and reviewers, assume this +privilege of bitterness, without the restriction to one day out of +seven; hence, to say nothing of the better motives in the other case, +they are more practised in acerbity than amiability. Your medicine +becomes the habit, not the cure. We must have civil tongues the +greater part of our lives. Your literary satirist uses the drunkard's +remonstrance-- + + "Which is the properest day to drink-- + Saturday, Sunday, Monday? + Each is the properest day, I think; + Why should you name but one day?" + +AQUILIUS.--But to return to our subject. Novels are not objected to as +they were; now that every sect in politics and religion have found +their efficacy as a means, the form is adopted by all. And with a more +vigorous health do each embody their principle. The sickly +sentimentality school is sponged out--or nearly so. The novel now +really represents the mind of a country in all its phases, and, if not +the only, is nearly the best of its literature. It assumes to teach as +well as to amuse. I could wish that, in their course down the stream +of time, it had not taken the drama by the neck, and held it under +water to the drowning. + +CURATE.--You are wrong. The novel has not drowned the drama. It is the +goody, the Puritan school, has done the work, and will, not drown, but +suffocate, the noble art that gave us Shakspeare, by stopping up all +avenues and entrance to the theatres--having first filled the inside +with brimstone, or at least cautioned the world that the smell of +brimstone will never quit those who enter. In discussing the subject, +however, I would class the play and the novel together, under "works +of fiction." Why, by the way, did the self-styled religious world that +set up a crusade against novelists--and "fiction-mongers"--show such +peculiar favour to John Bunyan, and his _Pilgrim's Progress_--the most +daring fiction? I believe that very imaginative, nay, very powerful +work, has gone through more editions than any other in our language: a +proof at least that there is something innate in us all,--a natural +power of curiosity to see and hear more than actual life presents to +us--that sends all, from infancy to age, in every stage of life, +either openly or secretly, to the reading tales of fiction. We all +like to see Nature herself with a difference; and, loving "to hold the +mirror up to nature," we prefer that the glass should be coloured, or +at least a shade deeper, and love the image more than the thing. + +AQUILIUS.--Yes; and we indulge in a double and seeming contrary +propensity--excitement and repose. We are safe in the storm--look out +"from our loopholes of retreat," as Cowper calls them, on the busy +world--and in our search after that equally evasive philosopher's +stone, the "~gnôthi seauton~," like to squint at our deformities in +private, and, by seeing them in other folks, we learn our faults by +deputy. + +CURATE.--And what a wonderful and wisely-given instinct is there in us +all, that we may learn to the utmost in one short life--an instinct by +which we recognise as nature, as belonging strictly to ourselves, what +we have never seen or experienced, and have only portrayed to us in +works of fiction. All people speak of the extensive range of +Shakspeare's genius--that he appears to have been conversant with +every mode of life, with the sentiments and language appropriate to +each--that he is at once king, courtier, citizen, and clown; yet what +do those who so admire him for this universality know themselves, but +through him, of all these phases of life? We recognise them by an +instinct, that enters readily into the possibilities of all nature +which is akin to us; and if this be so, the busiest man who is no +reader, may, in his walk through life, see much more of mankind than +the reader, but know far less. Who teaches to read puts but the key of +knowledge into the scholar's hand. It was well said by Aristophanes, +"Masters for children, poets for men." + +AQUILIUS.--True; and if all literary fiction could be withdrawn and +forgotten, and its renovation prohibited, the greater part of us would +be dolts, and, what is worse, unfeeling, ungenerous, and under the +debasing dominion of the selfishness of simple reason. It has always +appeared to me that those who cautiously keep novels from young people +mistake the nature of mind, thinking it only intellect, and would +cultivate the understanding alone. Imagination they look upon as an +_ignis fatuus_, to be extinguished if possible--an _ignis fatuus_ +arising out of a quagmire, and leading astray into one. There is +nothing good comes from the intellect alone. The inventive faculty is +compound, in which imagination does the most work; the intellectual +portion selects and decides, but collects not the materials. All true +sentiment, all noble, all tender feeling, comes not of the +understanding, but of that mind--or heart, if we so please to call +it--which imagination raises, educates, and perfects. Even feelings +are to be made--are much the result of education. The wildest romances +will, in this respect, teach nothing wrong. If they create a world +somewhat unlike the daily visible, they create another, which is a +reality to the possessor, to the romantic, from which he can extract +much that is practical, though it may seem not so; for from hence may +spring noble impulses, generosity and fortitude. It is not true that +such reading enervates the mind: I firmly believe it strengthens it in +every respect, and fits it for every action, by unchaining it from a +lower and cowardly caution. Who ever read a romance that inculcated +listless, shapeless idleness? It encourages action and endurance. We +have not high natures till we learn to suffer. I have noted much the +different effects troubles have upon different persons, and have seen +the unromantic drop like sheep under the rot of their calamities, +while the romantic have been buoyant, and mastered them. They have +more resources in themselves, and are not bowed down to one thought +nor limited to one feeling: in fact, they are higher beings. + +CURATE.--The caution professes mainly to protect women; yet, among all +the young women whom I have been acquainted with, I should say that +the novel-readers are not only the best informed, but of the best +nature, and some capable of setting examples of a sublime +fortitude--the more sublime because shown in a secret and all-enduring +patience. Who are they that will sit by the bed-side of the sick day +and night, suffer privation, poverty, even undeserved disgrace, and +shrink not from the self-imposed duty, but those very young women in +whom the understanding and imagination have been equally cultivated, +so as to render the feelings acute and impulsive?--and these are +novel-readers. Love, it is said, is the only subject all novels are +constructed upon; and such reading encourages extravagant thoughts, +and gives rise to dangerous feelings. And why dangerous? And why +should not such thoughts and feelings be encouraged? Are they bad? Are +they not such as are requisite for wife and mother to hold, and best +for the destiny of woman--best in every view--best if her lot be a +happy one, and far best if her lot be an ill one? For the great mark +of such an education is endurance--a power to create a high duty, and +energy and patience where both are wanted. Women never sink under any +calamity but blighted affection; and we love them not less, we admire +them not less, that they do sink then, for their heroism is in the +patience that brings and that awaits death. + +AQUILIUS.--I have heard Eusebius say that he has made it a point, +wherever he goes, to recommend earnestly to all young mothers to +select no nurse for their children but such as have a good stock of +nursery tales. He has often purposed to write an essay on the subject +of the requisite education for nurses, asserting that there ought to +be colleges for training to that one purpose alone; for, as the nurse +gives the first education, the first impression, she gives the most +important. The child that is not sung to, and whose ear has not been +attentive to nursery tales, he would say, would be brought up to turn +his father and mother out of doors, and deserve, if he did not come, +to be hanged; and if such unfortunate child be a daughter, she would +live to be a slut, a slattern, a fool, and a disgrace. He had no +doubt, he said, believing that all Shakspeare's creations were +realities, that Regan and Goneril were ill nursed, and no readers; and +that Cordelia was in infancy well sung to, and being the youngest, was +set to read romances to her old and wayward father,-- + + "Methinks that lady is my child Cordelia!" + +How full are these few words of the old father's feeling, and +reminiscent of the nursery, of songs, of tales, wherein he had seen +the growth of his "child Cordelia!" Eusebius would be eloquent upon +this subject: I cannot tell you half of what he thought and vigorously +expressed. He used to delight in getting children together and telling +them stories, and invariably began with "once upon a time," which, he +used to say, had, if any words could have, a magical charm. + +CURATE.--Bad, indeed, was the change when story reading and telling +ceased to be a part of education: and what was put in its +place?--stuff that no child could understand or care about. The good +old method once abandoned, there was no end to the absurdities that +followed; and they who wrote them knew nothing about children, or what +would amuse, and, by interesting, improve them. The false system of +cramming them with knowledge, which it was impossible for them to +digest, really stopped their intellectual growth, and checked the +natural spring of their feelings. Wisdom-mongering went on upon the +"rational plan," till the wise-heads, full-grown infant pumpkins, +fatuated, empty of anything solid or digestible; and so they grew, and +grew from night to morn, and morn to night, stolid boobies, lulled +into a melancholy sleep by the monotonous hum of "Hymns in Prose." + +AQUILIUS.--"Hymns in Prose!" Is not that one of Mrs Barbauld's books +for children, I have often heard mothers say, "that is so very good?" + +CURATE.--Oh yes! Here it is in Lydia's library. + +AQUILIUS.--Open it--any where. + +CURATE.--Well, now, I do not think the information given to the child +here is quite correct in its order, for I think the parent of the +mother must be the child's grandmother. "The mother loveth her little +child; she bringeth it up on her knees; she nourisheth its body with +food." + +AQUILIUS.--A very unnatural parent if she did not. It is very new +information for a child. Well, go on. + +CURATE.--"She feedeth its mind with knowledge. If it is sick, she +nurseth it with tender love; she watcheth over it when asleep; she +forgetteth it not for a moment." + +AQUILIUS.--A most exemplary and extraordinary mother--not a moment! Go +on. + +CURATE.--"She teacheth it how to be good; she rejoiceth daily in its +growth." I do not see the connexion between the "teaching to be good" +and the growth. "But who is the parent of the mother? Who nourisheth +her with good things, and watcheth over her with tender love, and +remembereth her every moment? Whose arms are about her to guard her +from harm?" + +AQUILIUS.--Stay a moment--whose arms? Why, the husband's to be sure; +which the child may have seen, and need not have been told as a +lesson. + +CURATE.--"And if she is sick, who shall heal her?" Now, you would say, +the apothecary, and so would the child naturally answer; but that +would not be according to the "rational plan." The riddle is to have +a religious solution--"God is the parent of the mother; he is the +parent of all, for he created all." + +AQUILIUS.--Shut the book! shut the book! or rather put it in the fire, +or one of these days one of your own babes will be so spoon-fed. So +these are hymns for children! Why, the children brought up on this +"rational plan" have set up themselves for teachers, and in a line, +too, sometimes quite beyond Mrs Barbauld's intention. I took up a book +of prayers off a goody-table the other day, written by a boy of six +years old, with a preface by himself, to the purport that his object +was to improve the thoughtless world. At the end were some verses--all +such cherub children love to "lisp in numbers." As well as I can +remember, they ran thus--they are lines on the occasion of its +father's breaking his leg, or having some accidental sickness-- + + "O Lord! in mercy do look down, + And heal my dear papa; + Or if it please thee not to cure, + Do comfort dear mama!" + +CURATE.--Well, I don't think there is a pin to choose between the hymn +in prose and the hymn in verse, excepting that the infant versifier is +rather more intelligible. I saw the little book a month or two ago at +----. I must have called after you; for I suspect some lines in pencil +at the end were your work. Did you write these?-- + + "Defend me from such wretched stuff + As children write and parents puff! + Put the small hypocrites to bed, + And whip the big ones in their stead!" + +AQUILIUS.--At least I will write them in Lydia's, to protect the +future. The child would have been better employed in reading Jack the +Giant-killer. But what think you of Bible stories, adopted for those +of somewhat more advanced childhood--a religious novel made out of the +history of Joseph, price eighteenpence? I picked it up at the same +house, and had permission to put it in my pocket. It is a curious +story to choose, as the writer says, "to entertain my young reader +without vitiating his mind." I mean not the genuine story, but such as +the writer promises it to be; for he says in his preface, "I am not at +all aware of having at all departed from the spirit of the text, nor +from the rules of probability. I have, indeed, ventured upon a few +conjectures and fictious possibilities, which some very grave reader +may perhaps be offended with." The author professes his object to be, +to make the Bible popular; so what the conjectures and fictious +possibilities that may offend very grave people may be, we must guess +by the object--to make it fashionable. But the recommendation to the +young on the score of love, and the "_letting down_" the Bible to the +capacities of the young, must be given in the author's own words: "The +sacred volume is fertile of subjects calculated both to please and +instruct, when let down, by proper elucidation, within the reach of +young capacities. And rather than one class of readers should want +entertainment, let me tell them, that the Bible contains many +histories of love affairs; perhaps this may tend more to recommend it +to attention than all besides which I could say." You will not, +however, conclude that I object to religious novels. It is a +legitimate mode of enforcing doctrines by lives, and showing the +pernicious effects of what is false, and the natural result of the +good. + +CURATE.--And will not the authority of parables justify the adoption? +There may, it is true, be mischievous novels of the kind; but what is +there that may not be perverted to a bad use? We had at one time +irreligious and basely immoral novels; and there have been too many +such recently from the Parisian press--blasphemous, immoral, +seditious. The existence of such demands the antidote. You have, of +course, read Miss Hamilton's "Modern Philosophers?" That work was well +timed, and did its work well, so cleverly were the very passages from +Godwin and others of that school brought in juxtaposition with their +necessary results. It is a melancholy tale. + +AQUILIUS.--Yes; but this quiet woman, whom, as I am told, if you had +met her in society, you would never have suspected of power and shrewd +observation, by her little pen scattered the philosophers right and +left, and their works with them. I read the other day Godwin's "St +Leon"--a most tiresome, objectless novel; the repetitions, varying +with no little ingenuity of language, of the expression of the +feelings of St Leon, are tiresome to a degree. In his _Caleb Williams_ +the same thing is done; but there it agrees well with the nature of +the tale, and well represents the movements of the persecuting Erinnys +in the mind of the victim. I read it at a great disadvantage, it must +be owned, for I had just laid down that tale of singular interest, the +"Kreutzner" of Mrs H. Lee. There is a slight resemblance in some +points to Godwin's style, especially to this expression of the +feelings of the victim; but they are exactly timed to suspend the +narrative just where it ought to stay. Too rapid a succession of +events would have been out of keeping with that incessant persecution, +which tracks more perfectly, because more surely and slowly. The true +bloodhound is not fleet. Cassandra stayed her prophetic speech; but +the pause was the scent of blood, and awful was the burst that +followed. Know you the _Canterbury Tales_? + +CURATE.--Oh yes; and well remember that strangely interesting and most +powerful one of "Kreutzner." I have admired how, in every tale, the +style is various and characteristic. I see, then, that you have taken +to "light reading" of late. + +AQUILIUS.--It is not very easy to say what light-reading is. I once +heard a very grave person accused of light-reading, because he was +detected with the "History of a Foundling" in his hand. He replied, +"You may call it light-reading, but to me there is more solid matter +in it than in most books. I find it all substance,--full weight in the +scale of sense, common or uncommon, and will weigh down a library of +heavy works. And yet you may pleasantly enough handle it--it fits so +well, and the pressure is so convenient. You may even fancy it light +too, for it imparts a vigour as you hold it. And so you can play with +it for your health, as did the Greek king, in the Arabian tale, with +the mallet and medicinal balls which the physician Douban gave him, +with which he was lustily to exercise himself. It was all play, but +the drugs worked through it. There may be something sanatory even in +the 'History of the Foundling.' There is a light-reading which is the +heaviest of all reading: it comes with a deadly weight upon the +eyelids, and then drops like lead from your fingers,--but then, +indeed, it proves light enough in escaping." Fielding's novel is not +of this kind: my grave friend always read it once a-year, and said he +as often found new matter in it. Did you ever--indeed I ought not to +ask the question--notice Fielding's admirable English? Our best +writers have had a short vocabulary, and such was the case with +Fielding; but he is the perfect master of it. The manners he portrays +are gone by. Some of the characters it would be impossible now to +reproduce, and yet we know at a glance that they were drawn from life. + +CURATE.--Comparing that novel, and indeed those of that day, with our +more modern, may we not say, that this our England is improved? + +AQUILIUS.--I hope so: it is at least more refined. But there is a +question, Is not the taste above the honesty? Some say, it is a better +hypocrite. I do not venture an opinion, but take Dr Primrose's +ingenious mode of prophecy, who, in ambiguous cases, always wished it +might turn out well six months hence. + +CURATE.--Now, indeed, you speak of a novel _sui generis_--that had no +prototype. It stands now unapproachable and original as the Iliad. +Yet I have often wondered by what art Goldsmith invested _such_ +characters with so great interest. That in every one he put something +of himself, it has been well observed; hence the strong vitality, the +flesh and blood life of all. I believe the great charm lies in its +simpletonianism--I coin a word; admit it. There is scarcely a +character that is not more or less of the simpleton; and the more +this simpletonianism is conspicuous, the more are we delighted. +Perhaps the reader, whether justified or not, is all along under the +conviction that he has himself more common sense than any of the +company to whom he is introduced, and with whom he becomes familiar. +Simplicity runs through the whole tale--a fascinating simplicity, +distinct from, and yet in happy relation with, this simpletonianism. +The vicar is a simpleton in more things than his controversy, and is +the worthy parent of Moses of the spectacles. The eccentricity of the +baronet, the over-trust and the mis-trust of mankind, at the +different periods of his life, are of the simpletonian school; and +not the least so that act of injurious folly, the giving up his +estate to a nephew, of whom he could have known no good. Mrs Primrose +is a simpleton born and bred, and in any other hands but those of +charitable Goldsmith must have turned out an odious character, for +she has scarcely feeling, and certainly no sense. Simpletonianism +reigns, whether at the vicarage or at Farmer Flamborough's. Yet is +there not a single character in this exquisitely perfect novel that +you would in any one respect wish other than as put before you. There +is a great charm in this simpletonianism: the reader is in perfect +sympathy with the common feelings of all, yet cognisant of a +simpletonianism of which none of the _dramatis personæ_ are +conscious. He thus sits, as it were, in the conclave of nature's +administrators, knows the secret that fixes characters in their +lines; and is pleased to see the strings pulled, and the figures move +according to their kind; is delighted with their perfect harmony, and +looks on with complacency and self-satisfaction, believing himself +all the while, though he may in reality be something of a simpleton, +a person of very superior sagacity. Follies that do not offend, +amuse--they are not neutral: we cheat ourselves into an idea that we +are exempt from, and are so much above them, that we can afford to +look down and laugh: we say to ourselves we are wiser. May not this +in some measure be the cause that all, whether children of small or +of bigger growth, of three feet or six, take pleasure in the jokes, +verbal and practical, of the clown Mr Merryman, and pardon the +wickedness of Punch when he so adroitly slips the rope round the neck +of the simpleton chief-justice, who trusted himself within reach of +the knave's fingers. + +AQUILIUS.--Your theory is plausible; be the cause what it may, our +best authors seem to have been aware of the charm of simpletonianism. +Never was there a more perfect master of it than Shakspeare. And how +various the characters--what differences between Shallow, Slender, +Malvolio, and indeed all his troop of simpletons! None but he would +have thought of putting Falstaff in the category. But let no man boast +of his wisdom; we had laughed with him, but laugh too at him when +simpletonianised in the buck basket. The inimitable Sterne, did he not +know the value of simpletonianism, and make us love it, in the weak +and in the wise, in the Shandean philosophy and the no-philosophy of +the misapprehending gentle Uncle Toby, and the faithful Trim, taking +to himself a portion of both masters' simpletonianism? Did not Le Sage +know the value of this art?--Gil Blas retaining to the last somewhat +of the simpleton, and, as if himself unconscious, so naïvely relating +his failure with the Archbishop of Grenada. And have we not perfect +examples in the delicious pages of Cervantes?--the grave, the wise, +the high-minded simpletonianism of Don Quixotte; and that +contrastingly low and mother-wit kind in the credulous Sancho +Panza--ignorance made mad by contact with madness engendered of +reading? The very Rosinante that carried madness partakes of the sweet +and insane simpletonianism, and Sancho and his ass are fellows well +met, well matched. + +CURATE.--As he is the cleverest actor that plays the fool, so is he +the wisest and ablest writer that portrays simpletonianism. I suppose +it is an ingredient in human nature, and that we are none of us really +exempt, but that it is kept out of sight, for the most part, and +covered by the cloak of artificial manners; and so, when it does break +out, the touch of human nature is irresistible; we in fact acknowledge +the kinship. But the nicest painting is required; the least +exaggeration turns all to caricature. Even Fielding's hand, though +under the direction of consummate genius, was occasionally too +unrestrained. His Parson Adams might have been a trifle more happily +delineated; we see its error in the after-type, Pangloss. What a +field was there for extravagance in Don Quixotte! but Cervantes had a +forbearing as well as free hand. How could people mistake the aim of +Cervantes, and pronounce him to be the Satirist of Romance? He was +himself the most exquisite romancer. His episodes are romantic in the +extreme, whether of the pastoral or more real life. Though it was not +right in Avelanda to take up his tale, it must be regretted that +Cervantes changed the plan of his story. What would the tournament +have been? Some critics have thought all the after-part inferior: +without admitting so much, he certainly wrote it in pique, and +possibly might not have concluded the tale at all, if it had not been +thus forced upon him. + +AQUILIUS.--We must not omit to mention our own Addison. There is an +air of simpletonianism running through all his papers, as one +unconscious of his own wit, so perfect was he in his art; and as to +character, the simpletonianism of Sir Roger de Coverley must ever +immortalise the author--for the good eccentric Sir Roger is one of the +world's characters, that can never be put by and forgotten. What nice +touches constitute it! + +CURATE.--Yes, great nicety; and how often the little too far injures! +I confess I was never so charmed with some of the characters in Sir +Walter Scott's novels, from this carrying too far. Even +simpletonianism must not intrude, as did sometimes Monkbarns and the +Dominie: the "prodigious!" and absence of mind were beyond nature. +Character should never become the author's puppets: mere eccentricity +and catch phraseology do not make simpletonianism. Smollet, too, fell +into the caricature. He sometimes told too much, and let his figures +play antics. The fool would thereby spoil his part. There must be some +repose every where, into which, as into an obscure, the mind of the +reader or spectator may look, and make conjecture--some quiet, in +which imagination may work. The reader is never satisfied, unless he +too in a certain sense is a creator; the art is, to make all his +conjectures, though seemingly his own, the actual result of the +writing before him. "Master Shallow, I owe you a thousand pounds." How +much does the mind accumulate at once, to fill up the history of those +few words! There is no need of more--all is told; while the spectator +thinks he is making out the history himself. + +AQUILIUS.--It is a great fault in a very popular novel writer of the +day, that he will not give his readers credit for any imagination at +all; every character is in extreme. To one ignorant of the world, but +through books, it would appear that there is not a common middle +character in life: we are to be acquainted with the minutest +particulars, or rather peculiarities, of dress and manners. It is as +if a painter should colour each individual in his grouping, in the +most searching light. The inanimate nature must be made equally +conspicuous, and every thing exaggerated. And it is often as forced in +the expression as it is exaggerated in character. He has great powers, +great genius, overflowing with matter, yet as a writer he wants +agreeability: his satire is bitter, unnecessarily accumulated, and his +choice of odious characters offers too frequently a disgusting picture +of life. + +CURATE.--The worst is, that, with a genius for investing his +characters with interest, by the events with which he links them +together, in which he has so much art, that he compels persons of most +adverse tastes to read him,--he is not a good-natured writer, and he +evidently, it might be almost said professedly, writes with a +purpose--and that I think a very mischievous one, and one in which he +is to a certain extent joined by some other writers of the day--to +decry, and bring into contempt as unfeeling, the higher classes. This +is a very vulgar as well as evil taste, and is quite unworthy the +genius of Mr Dickens. And, what is a great error in a novelist, he +gives a very false view of life as it is. There is too much of the +police-office reporter in all his works. _Dombey and Son_ is, however, +his greatest failure, as a whole. You give him credit for a deep plot +and mystery, ere you have gone far; but it turns out--nothing. +Admirable, indeed, are some things, parts and passages of wonderful +power; but the spring that should have attached them has snapped, and +they are, and ever will be, admired, only as scenes. The termination +is miserable--a poor conclusion, indeed, of such a beginning; every +thing is promised, nothing given, in conclusion. Some things are quite +out of possibility. The whole conduct of the wife is out of nature. +Such a character should have a deep cause for her conduct: she has +none but the having married a disagreeable man, out of pique, from +whom she runs away with one still more odious to herself and every +one, and assumes, not a virtue which she has not, but a vice which she +scorns, and glories in the stigma, because it wounds her husband. Such +a high and daring mind, and from the commencement so scorning +contamination, could not so degrade itself without having a stronger +purpose than the given one. The entire change of character in Dombey +is out of all nature--it is impossible; nor does the extraordinary +affection of the daughter spring from any known principle of humanity. +The very goodness of some of the accessory characters becomes +wearisome, as the vice of others is disgusting. + +AQUILIUS.--After all, he is an uncomfortable writer: he puts you out +of humour with the world, perhaps with yourself, and certainly with +him as a writer. Yet let us acknowledge that he has done much good. He +should be immortalised, if only for the putting down the school +tyrannies, exposing and crushing school pretensions, and doubtless +saving many a fair intellect from withering blight and perversion. He +takes in hand fools, dolts, and knaves; but Dickens wants +simpletonianism. He gave some promise that way in his _Pickwick +Papers_, but it was not fulfilled. Turn we now to Mrs Trollope. What +say you to her _Vicar of Wrexhill_? let it have a text, and what is +it? I will not suggest a text--that is your province. I dare to say +you would easily find one. + +CURATE.--Why, I think Mrs Trollope was very unfairly dealt with. The +narrative in that novel was a fair deduction from the creed of a sect; +and if it does not always produce similar consequences, it is because +men will be often better than their creeds. But that fact does not +make her comment unfit for the text, that it told; I should judge from +the abuse that has been heaped upon it--no, not upon it, but upon the +authoress. Why was it not open to her to make this answer to other +works of fiction, as she thought, inculcating evil? What Miss Hamilton +did with the philosophers, she did with the Antinomians. + +AQUILIUS.--It has been the fashion to call her a coarse writer--a +vulgar writer. I see nothing of it in her best works. She takes vulgar +and coarse people to expose them as warnings, and, if possible, to +amend them. We cannot spare Mrs Trollope from our literature. I have +been told by an eye-witness that her American "camp scene" is very far +short of the truth, and that she could not give the details. He must +surely be a bit of a bigot, who would hastily pronounce that even +Greave's _Spiritual Quixotte_ is an irreligious work. There are too +many people interested in decrying the novel of so powerful a writer +as Mrs Trollope, to suffer her to be without reproach both for style +and object. I should rather object to her that she writes too +much--for she is capable, were she to bestow due time upon it, to +write something better than has yet dropped from her pen; let her give +up her fashionable novels. When I say better, yet would I except the +_Vicar of Wrexhill_: for, however unpopular with some, it places her, +as a writer, very high. + +CURATE.--They who oppose themselves to any set of opinions must make +up their minds, during the present generation at least, to receive but +half their meed of praise. Was this ever proved more remarkably than +in the publication of that singular novel, _Ten Thousand a-Year_? It +is a political satire, certainly; but not only that--it has a far +wider scope; but it was sufficiently so to set all the Whigs against +it. And sore enough they were. But has there been any such novel since +the days of Fielding? And it exhibits a pathos, and tone of high +principle and personal dignity, that were out of the reach even of +Fielding. This novel, and its precursor, the _Diary of a Physician_ +will--must--ever live in the standard literature of the country. + +AQUILIUS.--And why not add _Now and Then_? One thing I cannot but +greatly admire in Mr Warren--he is ever alive to the dignity of his +profession. Hating law as I do, in all its courses, ways, contacts, +and consequences, and officials, from the Lord Chief-Justice to the +petty constable; and having a kind of envious dislike to the +arrogation to themselves, by lawyers, of the greater part of the great +profits and emoluments of the country; and seeing, besides, that most +men of any station and property pay, in their course of life, as much +to lawyers as in taxes, the one cried-up grievance; yet I confess that +Mr Warren has put the noble portraiture of the profession, in all its +dignity and usefulness, and in its high moral and intellectual +acquirements and actions, so vigorously before me, that I recant, and +even venerate the profession--against my will, nevertheless. + +CURATE.--How touching are the early struggles with his poverty, in the +person of the young physician himself! with what fine taste and +feeling of the gentleman and the scholar are they written! Perhaps no +novel can show a more perfectly complete-in-itself character than his +Gammon, in whom is the strange interweaving of the man of taste and +sense--even, in some sense, better feeling--with the vile and low +habits of knavery. + +AQUILIUS.--The author differs from most novelists in this, that he +does not make love, by which must be understood love-making or +love-pursuing, the subject, but incidental to his subject. He sets up +affection, rather, in the niche for his idolatry. Tenderness, and duty +linked with it, and made sublime by it, is with him far more than the +"passion," of love. It is life with love, rather than in the chase of +it, that we see detailed in trial and in power. + +CURATE.--It is so; and yet you do not, I presume, mean to blame other +authors if they have made "the passion" their subject. We are only +bound to the author's choice, be it what it may--love, ambition, or, +any other--we must have every feature of life, every notice of action, +pictured. + +AQUILIUS.--Surely: but there is a masculine virtue, seeing that the +one field has been so decidedly occupied, in making it less prominent; +and where it is thus abstinently administered, there is often a great +charm in the conciseness and unexpectedness. Let me exemplify Mr +Southey's _Doctor_. There may be, strictly speaking, or rather +speaking after the fashion of novels, but little love-making; there +are, nevertheless, two little scenes, that are the most touchingly +effective I ever remember to have read. The one is a scene between +cousins--dependent and in poverty, I think, at Salisbury; the other, +the unexpected and brief courtship of Doctor Dove himself. It is many +years since I read _The Doctor_, yet these two scenes have often been +conjured up, and vividly pictured to my imagination. I doubt if +Southey could have told a love-tale in any other way, and few in any +way would have told one so well. + +CURATE.--Those who dwell too unsparingly on such scenes, and spin out +their sentimental tales, and bring the loving pair incessantly before +the eye, do for the most part the very thing which the nature of the +passion forbids. Its whole virtue is in the secrecy. And though the +writer often supposes a secrecy, by professing himself only the +narrator and not the witness, yet the reader is not quite satisfied, +seeing that he too is called in to look over the wall or behind the +hedge; and the virtue he is willing to give the lovers is at some +expense of his own, for he has a shrewd suspicion that both he and the +writer are little better than spies. + +AQUILIUS.--Surely you will admit something conventional, as you would +the soliloquy on the stage--words must pass for thoughts. I find a +greater fault with those kind of novels; they work, as it were, too +much to a point, beyond which, and out of which aim, there is no +interest. These I call melodramatic novels, in which the object seems +to harrow up or continually excite the feelings, to rein the hasty +course of curiosity, working chiefly for the denouement, after which +there is nothing left but a blank. Curiosity, satisfied, cannot go +back; the threads have all been taken up that lead out of the +labyrinth--they will not conduct you back again. Novels of this kind +have greater power, at first, than any other; but, the effect for +which they labour fully produced, the effervescence is over; and +though we remember them for the delight they have given, we do not +return to them. Novels of less overstrained incident, full of a +certain _naiveté_ in the description of men and manners, from which +the reader may make inferences and references out of his own +knowledge, though they will not be read by so many, will be read +oftener by the same persons. Perhaps there is more genius in the +greater part of these novels, but the writers sacrifice to effect--to +immediate effect--too much. Cooper's novels are somewhat of this kind; +and may I venture to say that the Waverley novels, as they are called, +assume a little more than one could wish of this character. Authors, +in this respect, are like painters of _effect_--they strike much at +first, but become even tiresome by the permanency of what is, in +nature, evanescent. It is too forced for the quietness under which +things are both seen and read twice. Generally, in such tales, when +the parties have got well out of their troubles, we are content to +leave them at the church door, and not to think of them afterwards. + +CURATE.--Novelists, too, seem to think that, by their very title, they +are compelled to seek novelties. I have to complain of a very bad +novelty. The "lived together happy for ever after" is not only to be +omitted, but these last pages of happiness are sadly slurred over; as +if the author was mostly gifted with the malicious propensity for +accumulating trouble upon his favourites, and with reluctance +registered their escape into happiness. They do out of choice what +biographers do out of necessity, the disagreeable necessity of +biography, and for which--I confess the weakness--I dislike it. I do +not like to come to the "vanitas vanitatum"--to see the last page +contradict and make naught of the vitality, the energy, the pursuit, +the attainment of years. It is all true enough--as it is--that old men +have rheum, but, as Hamlet says, it is villanous to set it down. You +have, of course, read that powerful novel _Mount Sorel_. You remember +the last page--the one before had been "voti compos"--all were happy; +and there it should have ended. Not a bit of it. Then follows the +monumental scene. You are desired to look forward, to see them, or +rather to be told of their lying in their shrouds, with their feet, +that recently so busily walked the flowery path of the accomplishment +of their hopes, upturned and fixed in the solemn posture of death. + +AQUILIUS.--Yes, I remember it well, and being rather nervous, declined +reading _Emilia Wyndham_, by the same author, because I heard it was +melancholy, and feared a similar conclusion. I agree with you with +respect to biography: and remember, when a boy, the sickening +sensation when I read at school the end of Socrates. I wish +biographers would know where to stop, and save us the sad catastrophe. +It is strange, that you must not read the life of a buffoon but you +must see his tricks come to an end, and his whole broad farce of life +suddenly drop down dead in tragedy. Whatever may be said of the +biographer in his defence, I hold the novelist inexcusable. + +CURATE.--I should even prefer the drop-scene of novel happiness to +come quietly down before the accoucheur and the registrar of births +make their appearance. Why should we be told of a nursery of brats--a +whole quiverful, as Lamb says, "shot out" upon you? It is better to +take these things for granted. Doubtless it is as true, that the happy +couple will occasionally suffer--she from nerves, and he under +dyspepsia; but we do not see such matters, nor ought they to be +brought forward, although I doubt not the authors might obtain a very +handsome fee from an advertising doctor for only publishing the +prescriptions. If they go on, however, in this absurd way, it is to be +feared they will go one step further with the biographers, and publish +the will, with certificate of probate and legacy-tax duly paid. + +AQUILIUS.--We are not, however, as bad as the French. If our novels do +sometimes require an epitaph at the end, they do not make death at +once a lewd, sentimental, frightful, and suicidal act--and that not as +a warning, but as a French sublime act. + +CURATE.--You have read, then, the _Juif Errant_. I am not very well +acquainted with French novels, but have read some very pretty stories +in the voluminous Balzac, most of which were not of a bad tendency. +Did you ever read the Greek novels _Theagenes and Chariclea_, and the +_Loves of Ismenias and Ismene_? Being curious to see how the +Thessalonian archbishop, who lived in the times of Manuelis and Alexis +Commenus, about the year 750, would speak the sentiments of his age on +the passion of love, I lately took up his novel, the "_Loves of +Ismenias and Ismene_." + +AQUILIUS.--I know it not; perhaps you will give me an outline, and +select passages. I have great respect for the old Homeric commentator. + +CURATE.--I remember a few tender passages, and graceful descriptions +of gardens and fountains, and that he is not unmindful of his Homer, +for he refers to the gardens of Alcinous as his model. I confess I am +a little ashamed of the archbishop; but read with more than shame that +Greek novel of Longus, written it is doubted whether in the second or +fourth century, and to which, it is said, Eustathius was indebted for +his novel. Longus's _Daphnis and Chloë_ is a pastoral,--it would burn +well. There are pleasing descriptions in both of garden scenery. +Speaking of gardens and fountains reminds me of the richness of the +_Arabian Nights' Entertainments_, which I am surprised did not before +come into our discussion. How strange is it that, though manners and +scenes are so far from our usages and any known locality, we admit +them at once within the recognised boundary of imaginative nature! +They are indeed fascinating; yet have I not unfrequently met with +persons who professed that they could not endure them. + +AQUILIUS.--Were they young persons?--if so, they must be very scantily +gifted with a conciliating imagination, though they may very possibly +be the most reasonable of human beings. The charm that renders the +_Arabian Nights_ acceptable in all countries appears to me to arise +from this--that vivid are the touches which speak of our common +nature, and what is extraneous is less defined. Indeed, not +unfrequently is great use made of the obscure--such obscure as +Rembrandt, the master of mystery, profusely spread around the gorgeous +riches of his pencil. There is here and there, too, a sprinkling of +simpletonianism in a foreign shape, showing that all nations have +something akin. + +CURATE.--Besides, they have the charm of magic, and a magic which +blends very skilfully and harmoniously with the realities of every-day +life. They were evidently composed in a country where magic was a +creed. Could such tales have been ever the product of this country, so +different from any of our "fairy tales?" though perhaps none of ours, +those that delighted us in our childhood, are of English origin. Magic +of some kind or other must have been adopted in tale at a very early +period. Ulysses' safety girdle, which he was directed mysteriously to +throw behind him, and I believe not to look back, comes undoubtedly +from some far land of faery, from whence the genius of Homer took it +with a willing hand. + +AQUILIUS.--Grecian fable is steeped in the charmed fountain. The power +of the Medusa's head, and the black marble prince's metamorphoses, are +nearly allied. And a Circe may be discovered in many places of Arabic +enchantment. + +CURATE.--Time converts everything into beauty. You smile, thinking +doubtless that age has something to do with ugliness. Perhaps so, +though it follows not but that there may be, personally speaking, to +every age its own beauty, visible to eyes not human, whilst we are +under earthly beauty's fascination, at any rate with regard to fact +and to fable. Time unites them, as it covers the riven rock with +lichen; so the shattered and ugliest idols of remotest ages doth Time +hand over to Fable, to remodel and invest with garments of beauty or +deformity, to suit every desire of the imagination. Strange as it may +seem, it is true that there is in most of us, weary and unsatisfied +with this matter-of-fact world, a propensity to throw ourselves into +dream, and let fancy build up for us a world of its own, and, for a +season, fit us with an existence for it--taking with us the beautiful +of this, and charming what is plain under the converting influence of +fiction. Who understood this as Shakspeare did? His _Tempest_, +_Midsummer's Night Dream_, his _Merchant of Venice_, are built up out +of the materials supplied by this natural propensity. + +AQUILIUS.--How beautiful are impossibilities when genius sets them +forth as truth! Who does not yield implicit belief to every creation +of Shakspeare? I prefer the utter impossibilities to improbabilities +converted into real substantial fact. Let us have _Mysteries of +Udolpho_ uncleared up; it is dissatisfying at the end to find you have +been cheated. One would not have light let in to a mysterious obscure, +and exhibit perhaps but a bare wall ten feet off. I had rather have +the downright honest ghost than one, on discovery, that shall be +nothing but an old stick and a few rags. The reader is put in the +condition of the frogs in the fable, when they found themselves +deluded into wonder and worship of an old log. I would not even clear +up the darkness of ignorance respecting the Pyramids, and will believe +that the hieroglyphics are the language of fables, that are better, +like the mummies, under a shroud. Wherever you find a bit of the +mysterious, you are sure to be under a charm. In _Corinne_ of Madame +de Stael, not the most romantic of authors, the destiny cloud across +the moon you would not have resolved into smoke ascending from a +house-top. Let the burial-place of Oedipus be ever hid. Imagination +converts ignorance into a pleasure. There is a belief beyond, and +better than that of eyes and ears. + +CURATE.--Not at present; at this moment I will trust both. I hear the +carriage, and here is Lydia returned from ----. I hope she has picked +up the parcel of books which I gathered for our reading. + +Now here, Eusebius, our dialogue broke off, and we greeted the +Curate's wife. The box, it seems, had not reached the little town; so, +with a woman's nice tact, Lydia, the Curate's Lydia, had brought us +two novels to begin with. I therefore put my letter to you by, until +we had read them, and I was enabled to say something about them. You +perceive, Eusebius, that I have made some mention in the dialogue of +you, and your opinions upon nursery _fabulous_ education. Lydia +says--for to her we mentioned your whim--that you must come and +discuss it with her; and she will, to provoke you, bring you into +company with some very good people, and very much devoted to +education. She tells me she has a neighbour who burnt Gay's fables, +which a godfather had given to one of her children; because, said she, +it taught children lying, for her children looked incredulous as one +day she told them that beasts cannot speak. The Curate's wife promises +herself some amusement, you perceive, when you come; you must +therefore be as provoking as possible. But now, Eusebius, we have read +the novels brought to us. The first, _Jane Eyre_, has been out some +time: not so the other, _Madame de Malguet_, which has only now made +its first appearance. I do not think it fair, though it is a common +practice with critics, to give out a summary of the tales they +review--for this is sure to spoil the reading. I will resume, then, +the dialogue, omitting such parts as may be too searching into the +story. + +LYDIA.--Well, I am glad we read _Jane Eyre_ first, for I should have +been sorry to have ended with tears, which she has drawn so +plentifully; and not from my eyes alone, though both you men, as +ashamed of your better natures, have endeavoured to conceal them in +vain. + +AQUILIUS.--It _is_ a very pathetic tale--very singular; and so like +truth that it is difficult to avoid believing that much of the +characters and incidents are taken from life, though woman is called +the weaker sex. Here, in one example, is represented the strongest +passion and the strongest principle, admirably supported. + +CURATE.--It is an episode in this work-a-day world, most interesting, +and touched at once with a daring, yet delicate hand. In spite of all +novel rules, the love heroine of the tale has no personal beauty to +recommend her to the deepest affection of a man of sense, of station, +and who had seen much of the world, not uncontaminated by it. It +seems to have been the purpose of the author to show that high and +noble sentiments, and great affection, can be both made subservient, +and even heightened, by the energy of practical wisdom. If the author +has purposely formed a heroine without the heroine's usual +accomplishments, with a knowledge of the world, and even with a +purpose to heighten that woman in our admiration, he has made no +small inroad into the virtues that are usually attributed to every +lover, in the construction of a novel. He, the hero, has great +faults--why should we mince the word?--vice. And yet so singular is +the fatality of love, that it would be impossible to find two +characters so necessary to exhibit true virtues, and make the +happiness of each. The execution of the painting is as perfect as the +conception. + +LYDIA.--I think every part of the novel perfect, though I have no +doubt many will object, in some instances, both to the attachment and +the conduct of Jane Eyre. + +AQUILIUS.--It is not a book for Prudes--it is not a book for +effeminate and tasteless men; it is for the enjoyment of a feeling +heart and vigorous understanding. + +LYDIA.--I never can forget her passage across the heath, and her +desolate night's lodging there. + +CURATE.--But you will remember it without pain, for it was at once the +suffering and the triumph of woman's virtue. + +AQUILIUS.--To my mind, one of the most beautiful passages is the +return of Jane Eyre, when she sees in the twilight her "master" and +her lover solitary, and feeling his way with his hands, baring his +sightless sorrow to the chill and drizzly night. + +CURATE.--But what think you of _Madame de Malguet_? In a different +way, that is as unlike any other novel as _Jane Eyre_. This, too, is +written to exhibit the character of woman under no ordinary +circumstances. + +AQUILIUS.--She reminds me of the Chevalier d'Eon, whose portrait I +remember to have seen years ago in the _Wonderful Magazine_--half man, +half woman. Madame de Malguet is perhaps an amalgamation of the +Chevalier and Lady Hester Stanhope. These, after all, are not the +beings to be exempt from the _tender passion_, but it is under the +strongest vagaries. Love without courtship is the very romance of the +passion; and such is there in the tale of _Madame de Malguet_. The +scene is laid in a little town, and its immediate neighbourhood, in +France; and though a "Tale of 1820," carries back its interest, and +much of the detail of the story, to the horrors of the first French +Revolution. There is consequently a wide field for diversity of +character, and for conflict of opinions, and their effects, as shown +upon every grade of social life; and it is very striking that the +deepest rooted prejudices, ere the conclusion, change sides, and are +fitted upon characters to whom, at the commencement, they seemed but +little to belong. The inborn aristocratic feelings, alike with the +republican habits, meet their check; and I suppose it was the +intention of the author to show the weakness of both. + +CURATE.--I am not certain of that, for I think the innate is preserved +even through the disguise of contrary habits. I know not which is the +hero--the Buonapartean soldier or the English naval captain. There are +some discussions on subjects of life interspersed, which show the +author to be a man of a deeply reflecting mind, and endued with no +little power of expressing what he thinks and what he feels. + +AQUILIUS.--When I found fault with this wet blanket of happiness, the +monumental termination of _Mount Sorel_, I did not so soon expect to +meet with a repetition of this fault. I must pick a quarrel with the +writer for unnecessarily putting his characters _hors-de-combat_. I +think authors now-a-days need not be afraid of the fate of +Cervantes--of having them taken off their hands, and made to play +their parts upon any other stages than their own. + +LYDIA.--You seem, both of you, to forget the real moral of the +story--that a person endowed with a little more than common sense, +general kindness, amiability, and energy of character, may be more +useful in the world than the most accomplished hero. + +CURATE.--You would have found him too a hero, if his actions had been +within the sphere of heroism. I hope to meet with Mr Torrens again. He +has very great powers, and his conceptions are original. + +And now, Eusebius, having written you this account of our dialogue, +and breathed country air, and witnessed happiness, I am, yours ever, +and + + "Precipue sanus, nisi cùm pituita molesta est." + + AQUILIUS. + + + + +CONTINENTAL REVOLUTIONS--IRISH REBELLION--ENGLISH DISTRESS. + + +Seven months have barely elapsed since the throne of Louis Philippe +was overturned, by a sudden and well-concerted urban tumult; and six +have not expired since the fervour of revolution invaded the Germanic +empire, and Italy, torn by the innovating passions, commenced a strife +with the Austrian power. How marvellous have been the changes, how +vehement the action, how powerful the reaction, since those events +commenced! Involved in the whirlwind of anarchy, the greater as well +as the lesser states of Germany seemed to be on the verge of +destruction. Austria, tormented by diversity of lineage, race, and +interest, seemed to be irrevocably broken up; and amidst the rebellion +in Lombardy, the severance of Venice, the insurrection in Bohemia, and +the fierce demand of the Hungarians for independence, it seemed +scarcely possible to hope that the house of Hapsburg could maintain +its existence, or the important element of Austria in the balance of +European power be preserved. Torn by contending passions, a prey to +the ambition of the republicans, the dreams of the socialists, and the +indignation of the loyalists, France resembled a fiery volcano in the +moment of irruption, of which the throes were watched by surrounding +nations with trembling anxiety for their own existence. Italy, with +Sicily severed from the throne of Naples; Rome in scarcely disguised +insurrection against the Papal authority; Lombardy, Tuscany, and +Venice in open revolt; and Piedmont, under revolutionary guidance, +commencing the usual system of external democratic aggression, +scarcely presented a spot on which the eye of hope could rest. +Prussia, the first to be reached by the destructive flame, seemed so +strongly excited, that it was hard to say whether its national unity +or monarchical institutions would first fall to pieces. England, +assailed by Chartism in the one island, and the approaching +insurrection of the Irish in the other; oppressed with a debt to which +its finances, under present management, seemed unequal--having +borrowed £8,000,000 in a single year of general peace--seemed shaken +to its foundation. The distress so generally diffused by the combined +effect of free trade and a fettered currency, appeared at once to have +dried up its material resources and overturned the wonted stability of +the national mind: every thing seemed to be returning to chaos; and +even the most sanguine advocates of human perfectibility, the most +devout believers in democratic regeneration, looked on with trembling +anxiety, and could hardly anticipate any other result from the +disturbed passions of society, but a general and sanguinary war, +terminating in the irresistible ascendency of one victorious power, or +possibly a fresh inundation, over the exhausted field of European +strife, of northern barbarians. + +But truth is great, and will prevail. There are limits imposed by the +wisdom of nature to the madness of the people, not less than the +strife of the elements. Extraordinary convulsions seldom fail to +restore government, after a time, to a bearable form: the letting +loose of the passions of nations ere long rouses the feelings and +alarms the interests, which produce reaction, and restore the +subverted equilibrium of society. Men will not be permanently ruled by +brutal force. Triumph reveals the latent tyranny of the multitude; +power brings to light the selfishness and rapacity of their leaders. +How strikingly have those truths--so often enunciated, so little +attended to--been demonstrated by the events of the last summer! Six +months only have elapsed, and what years, what centuries of experience +have been passed during that brief period! How many delusions has it +seen dispelled, and fallacies exposed; how many pretensions levelled, +and expectations blasted; how many reputations withered, and +iniquities detected! How much has the peril of inflammatory language +been demonstrated, and the hollowness of revolutionary regeneration +established! how quickly have words been blown into the air by deeds, +and the men of eloquence supplanted by those of the sword! "Words," +says Lamartine,[11] "set nations on fire; bayonets alone restore them +to reason." Who has furnished such a commentary on these words as +Lamartine himself? + +Is it the doctrines of the French Revolution which were deemed +seductive, its principles insinuating, its example dangerous? The Red +Republicans, the insurrection of June, the slaughter of a greater +number of men in a single revolt than has taken place in many a +decisive battle, the withering agony of Parisian destitution, the ten +thousand captives in its dungeons; the nightly transportation, for +weeks together, of hundreds of deluded fanatics; the state of +siege,--the prostration of freedom, a military dictatorship, rise up +in grim and hideous array to dispel the illusion. Is it the Io Pæans +of Italian regeneration which have caused the heart of the patriot to +throb all over the world, and led the enthusiastic to anticipate a +second era of Italian independence in the old age of its civilisation? +The defeats on the Adige, the fall of Milan, the dispersion of the +Lombard and Tuscan levies, tell us how miserable was the delusion on +which such expectations rested, and how vain is the hope that a +selfish and worn-out nation, destitute alike of civil firmness or +military courage, can successfully establish its independence. Is it +from Rome that this regeneration of society is expected to arise, and +the reforming pope who is to be the Peter the Hermit of the new +crusade in favour of the liberties of mankind? Behold him now +trembling in his palace, bereft of authority, deprived of +consideration; hated, despised, discrowned; waiting to see which of +the Tramontane powers is to send a regiment of horse to receive the +keys of the Eternal City, and give a lasting ruler to the former +mistress of the world. + +Is it Prussia that is to take the lead in the regeneration of the +world, and from the north that a new Arminius is to issue, to assert +the liberties of the great Teutonic family of mankind? Turn to Berlin, +and see to what a pitiable degree of weakness revolutionary triumphs +have reduced the monarchy of the Great Frederick. Behold its monarch +and its army defeated by a band of students and shop-boys; its arsenal +pillaged by an insurgent mob; and the power which withstood the banded +strength of Europe, a century ago, and fronted Napoleon in the +plenitude of his power, waging a doubtful and aggressive war with +Denmark, a fifth-rate power, and paralysed by processions of +apprentices, and the menaces of trades-unions, in the capital. Is it +Ireland that is regarded as the sheet-anchor of the cause of +revolution, and from the Emerald Isle that the bands of heroes are to +issue who are to crush the tyranny of England, restore the freedom of +the seas, and avenge the long quarrel of the Celt with the Saxon? It +is in Boulagh Common that we must look for the exploits of the new +Spartan heroes, and among the widow's cabbages we must search for the +grave of a modern Leonidas! Is it in the energy, courage, and +perseverance of the army of Tipperary, that we must find the +realisation of the long-cherished hopes of Irish independence, and the +demonstration of the solid foundation on which the much vaunted +prospects of Hibernian success against British oppression is to be +founded! It must augment the admiration which all the world must feel +at the _gallant_ conduct of the Irish, in this memorable struggle, to +reflect that they owed their _success_ to themselves alone; that none +of their arms had been purchased, nor preparations made, with the +wealth of the stranger; that they had spurned the charity of England +as proudly as they had repelled its arms; and that, whatever could be +cast up against them, this, at least, could not be said, that they had +evinced ingratitude for recent benefits, or eaten the bread of their +benefactor while they were preparing to pierce him to the heart! + +Memorable, indeed, has been the year which has given these examples, +and taught these lessons, to mankind. History will be sought in vain +for a period in which, during so short a time, so many important +political truths were unfolded, so many moral precepts taught, by +suffering; or in which, after being for a season obscured by clouds, +the polar star of religion and duty has shone forth with so bright a +lustre. It is a proud thing for England to reflect on the exalted post +she has occupied during this marvellous and trying time. While other +nations, possessed of far greater military forces, were reeling under +the shock, or prostrated by the treachery and treason of their +defenders, she alone has repelled the danger by the constable's baton. +She has neither augmented her army, nor increased her navy; she has +not added a gun to her ships, nor a bayonet to her battalions. She has +neither yielded to the violence of the Revolutionists, nor been guilty +of deeds of cruelty to repress them. If her government is to blame for +their conduct during the crisis, it is for having been too +lenient--for having dallied too long with agitation, and winked at +sedition till it grew into treason. A fault it undoubtedly has been, +for it has brought matters to a crisis, and caused the ultimate +outbreak to be repressed with far greater and more unavoidable +severity than would have been required if the first merciful coercion +had taken place. Had the Habeas Corpus Act been suspended in November, +and the farce of Irish patriotism been hindered from turning into a +burlesque tragedy, for one person whom it would have been necessary to +imprison or transport, fifty must now undergo that punishment. Yet is +this leniency or temporisation, misplaced as it was, and calamitous as +it has turned out, a proud passage in England's story. It is some +consolation to reflect that she conquered the revolutionary spirit, by +which so many of the military monarchies of Europe had been +prostrated, by moral strength alone; that scarce a shot was fired in +anger by her troops, and not a drop of blood was shed on the scaffold; +and that undue forbearance and lenity is the only fault which, during +the crisis, can be imputed to the government which braved the storm +under which the world was reeling. + +Nor is the moral lesson less striking, or less important, which +France, during the same period, has read to mankind. She has not, on +this occasion, been assailed by the Continental powers. No Pitt or +Cobourg has stood forth to mar, by ensanguined hostility, the bright +aurora of her third Revolution. No Louis Philippe has stepped in, to +change its character or intercept its consequences, and reap for +royalty the fruits of insurrection. No bands of Cossacks or plumed +Highlanders have again approached the capital of civilisation, to +wrest from Freedom the rights she has acquired, or tear from her brows +the glory she has won. Whatever she has gained, or suffered, or lost, +has been owing to herself, and herself alone. Europe has looked on in +anxious, it may be affrighted, neutrality. Though undermined every +where by the spirit of propagandism, though openly assailed in some +quarters by scarcely disguised attacks, the adjoining powers have +abstained from any act of hostility. Albeit attacked by a +revolutionary expedition, fitted out and armed by the French +government at Paris, Belgium has attempted no act of retaliation. +Victorious Austria, though grievously provoked, has accepted the +mediation of France and England: when Turin was at his mercy, the +triumphant Radetsky sheathed his victorious sword at Milan, and sought +not to revenge on Piedmont the unprovoked aggression which its +revolutionary government had committed on the Imperial dominions in +Italy. Russia has armed, but not moved; the Czar has left to the +patriotism and valour of Denmark the burden of a contest with the +might of revolutionised Germany. Revolution has every where had fair +play; a clear stage and no favour has been accorded to it by all the +surviving monarchies in Europe. The enthusiasm of Lamartine, the +intrigues of Caussidière, the dreams of Louis Blanc, the ambition of +Ledru Rollin, have been allowed their full development. Nothing has +intercepted the realisation of their projects. If France has suffered +beyond all precedent from her convulsion; if her finances are in a +state of hopeless embarrassment; if forty-five per cent has been +added to her direct taxes, and the addition cannot be levied from the +public distress; if three hundred thousand men have been added to her +regular army; if poverty and destitution stalk through her streets; if +her jails teem with ten thousand captives, and thousands of families +mourn a father or a brother slain on the barricades, or transported +for civil war,--the cause is to be found in the Revolution, and the +Revolution alone. + +The terrible and tragic result of the strife in the streets of Paris +in June, has done scarcely a less service to mankind, by opening the +eyes of the world to the real nature of crimes which recent events had +rendered popular, and restoring their old and just appellation to acts +of the deepest atrocity, which the general delusion had caused to pass +for virtues. Since the successful result of the Revolt of the +Barricades in 1830, the ideas of men have been so entirely subverted, +that no government was practicable in France but that of corruption or +the sword; and treason and sedition appeared to have been blotted out +of the list of crimes in the statute-book of England. So licentious +had the age become, and so much was government paralysed by terror at +the unprecedented turn which the public mind had taken, that, in +Ireland especially, it can scarcely be said, for the last ten years, +that, in regard to state offences, there has been any government at +all. The Repeal agitation--the wholesale liberation of prisoners by +Lord Normanby--the unchecked monster meetings,--the quashing of +O'Connell's conviction by the casting vote of one Whig peer, in +opposition to the opinion of the twelve judges of England--the +unparalleled and long-continued violence of the treasonable press in +Dublin--the open drilling and arming of the people in the south and +west of Ireland--the undisguised announcement of an approaching +insurrection, of which the time was openly fixed for the completion of +harvest--were so many indications that Government had become +paralysed, and ceased to discharge its functions, in the neighbouring +island. + +If matters were not as yet so menacing in England, it was not that the +executive was more powerful or efficient in this country, but that the +English mind was slower to take fire than on the other side of the +Channel, and that more weighty interests required to be subverted +among the Saxons than the Celts, before the institutions of society +were overturned, and anarchy, plunder, and spoliation, became the +order of the day. Yet even here there were many indications of +Government having become paralysed, and lamentable proof that the +public tranquillity was preserved, more by the moderation of its +assailants than the strength of its defenders. The violence and +general impunity of the trades-unions, in both England and Scotland; +the open and undisguised preparations of the Chartists in both +countries; the toleration in the metropolis, on two different +occasions, of a Chartist Convention, which aspired at usurping the +government of the country; the uniform and atrocious violence of the +revolutionary press; the entire impunity with which, on every +occasion, the most dangerous sedition was spouted on the platform, or +retailed in the columns of the journals; the open preparation, at +last, of treasonable measures; and the organisation of the disaffected +in clubs, where arms were distributed, and projects of rebellion, +massacre, and conflagration hatched--were so many indications, and +that, too, of the most alarming kind, that matters were approaching a +crisis in these islands; and that the paralysis and imbecility of a +Government which had ceased to discharge its functions, might prove, +as it did in France in the feeble hands of Louis XVI., the precursor +of a dreadful and disastrous convulsion. + +Thanks to the French revolution and Irish rebellion, this state of +matters has met, for the time at least, with a decisive check. The +eyes of men have been opened; things are called by their right name. +We again hear of treason and sedition--words, of late years, so much +gone into disuse that the rising generation scarcely knew what they +meant. In France the heroes of the barricades have ceased to be lauded +as the greatest of men. Insurrection is no longer preached as the +first of social duties. That which was the chief of civic virtues on +the 24th February has become the greatest of civic crimes on the 24th +June. The soldiers of treason no longer meet with an honoured +sepulchre, nor, if surviving, are they fêted and caressed by royal +hands. If killed, they are thrust into undistinguished graves; if +taken alive, they are immured in dungeons or transported. Universal +suffrage has done that which royalty was too indulgent or too timorous +to do--it has ceased the dallying with treason. It has fought the Red +Republic with its own weapon, and conquered in the strife. It has +erected a military despotism in the great revolutionised capital. +Industry, almost destroyed by, the first triumph of anarchy in France, +is slowly reviving under the protection of absolute power. With +suppression of the trade of the "journaliste," the "émeutier," and the +"homme des barricades," other branches of employment are at length +beginning to revive.[12] + +Nor is the change less remarkable in Great Britain, where government +have not only followed Mr Pitt's example of suspending the Habeas +Corpus Act in Ireland, but have passed a special statute, assimilating +for two years the punishment of aggravated cases of sedition to what +it was by the old common law of Scotland. Great was the abuse which +the Whig writers for half a century bestowed on the Scotch Judges in +1793, for applying the punishment of the Scotch law to the sedition of +1793, and transporting Muir and Fische Palmer, for trying to force on +a revolution by means of a national convention. The "Martyrs' +Monument" in Edinburgh stands as a durable monument of their sympathy. +Lord Campbell, in his _Lives of the Chancellors_, has in bitter terms +exhaled their collected indignation. But scarcely was the ink of his +lordship's lucubrations dry, when he saw fit, as a member of Lord John +Russell's cabinet, to bring in a bill to _assimilate the punishment of +sedition in Ireland to the old law of Scotland_; and under it Mitchell +has been transported fourteen, and Martin ten years--the very +punishments inflicted for similar offences on Muir and Fische Palmer. +The difference is, that for one person transported or imprisoned under +Mr Pitt's system of timely coercion and prevention, in 1793, in Great +Britain and Ireland, a hundred will be transported or imprisoned under +the Whig system of long temporisation and final repression, in 1848. +So true it is, that undue weakness in the prevention of crime is the +inevitable parent of undue sternness in its punishment, and that in +troubled times government incur the reality of severity to avoid its +imputation. + +Not less important, to the final interests of mankind, is the exposure +of the real designs and objects of the revolutionary party, over the +world, which has now taken place. The days of delusion are gone past; +words have ceased to mislead men as to the nature of things. For half +a century, men have been continually misled by the generous and +elevated language under which the democratic party veiled their real +designs. The strength of revolution consists in the power it possesses +of rousing effort by the language of virtue, to render it subservient +to the purposes of vice. But its designs have now reached their +accomplishment: men see what was intended under all this veil of +philanthropic intentions. The revolutionists have been victorious in +Paris; and immediately their projects of spoliation, anarchy, and +plunder, were set on foot, and approached so near their +accomplishment, that a desperate and last effort of all the holders of +property became indispensable, to prevent the total ruin of society; +and carnage to an unheard of extent for three days stained the streets +of Paris, to avert the triumph of the Red Republic, and the return of +the Reign of Terror. The cry for repeal turned into rebellion in +Ireland; and a vast concentration of the forces of England was +requisite to prevent the Emerald Isle becoming the theatre of general +massacre, devastation, and ruin. For two hours the Chartists got +possession of Glasgow, and instantly a general system of plunder and +sacking of houses commenced. The Chartist Convention was long +tolerated in England, and, in return, they tried to overturn the +Government on the 10th April; and organised a general plan of plunder +and conflagration, which was to have broken out in the end of August, +and was only mercifully prevented by the designs of the conspirators +having become known, and the timely vigour of Government having +prevented their accomplishment. The ultimate objects of the enemies of +society, therefore, have become apparent: deeds have told us what +meaning to attach to words. Revolution in France means spoliation, and +the division of property, at a convenient opportunity. Repeal in +Ireland means the massacre of the Protestants, and the division of +their estates at a convenient opportunity. Chartism in England means +general plunder, murder, and conflagration, the moment there is the +least chance of perpetrating these crimes with impunity. + +Ireland has been, in an especial manner, the subject of these general +delusions; and there is perhaps no subject on which foreigners, the +English, and the Irish themselves, have for so long a period been +entirely misled, as in regard to the real cause of the protracted, and +apparently irremediable evils of that distracted country. The +proneness of the English to believe, that all mankind will be blessed +by the institutions under which they themselves have flourished and +waxed great, and the virulence with which party ambition has fastened +upon Ireland, as the battle-field on which to dispossess political +opponents, and gain possession of power, are the main causes of this +long-continued and wide-spread misconception. We have to thank the +Irish for having, by their reception of the magnificent gift of +England in 1847, and subsequent rebellion in 1848, done so much to +dispel the general delusion. To aid in disseminating juster views on +the subject, we shall proceed to disinter from the earlier volumes of +this Magazine, an extract from the first of a series of papers on +Ireland, published in 1833, immediately before Lord Grey's Coercion +Act, and which might pass for an essay on present events. It affords a +striking example, both of the justice of the views there enunciated, +and of the pernicious and continual recurrence of those real causes of +Irish suffering, which party spirit in both islands has so long +concealed from the people of Great Britain. + + "It is in vain to attempt to shake ourselves loose of + Ireland, or consider its misery as a foreign and extraneous + consideration with which the people of this country have + little concern. The starvation and anarchy of that kingdom is + a leprosy, which will soon spread over the whole empire. The + redundance of our own population, the misery of our own poor, + the weight of our own poor-rates, are all chiefly owing to + the multitudes who are perpetually pressing upon them from + the Irish shores. During the periods of the greatest + depression of industry in this country since the peace, if + the Irish labourers could have been removed, the native poor + would have found ample employment; and more than one + committee of the House of Commons have reported, after the + most patient investigation and minute examination of evidence + from all parts of the country, that there is no tendency to + undue increase among the people of Great Britain, and that + the whole existing distress was owing to the immigration from + the sister kingdom. + + "Nature has forbidden us to sever the connexion which + subsists between the two countries. We must swim or sink + together. It is utterly impossible to effect that disjunction + of British from Irish interests, for which the demagogues of + that country so strenuously contend, and which many persons + in this island, from the well-founded jealousy of Catholic + ascendency in the House of Commons, and the apparent + hopelessness of all attempts to improve its condition, are + gradually becoming inclined to support. The legislature may + be separated by act of Parliament; the Government may be + severed by Catholic revolts; but Ireland will not the less + hang like a dead weight round the neck of England; its + starving multitudes will not the less overwhelm our + labourers; its passions and its jealousies will not the less + paralyse the exertions of our Government. Let a Catholic + Republic be established in Ireland; let O'Connell be its + President; let the English landholders be rooted out, and + Ireland, with its priests and its poverty, be left to shift + for itself; and the weight, the insupportable weight of its + misery, will be more severely felt in this country than ever. + Deprived of the wealth and the capital of the English + landholders, or of the proprietors of English descent; a prey + to its own furious and ungovernable passions; ruled by an + ignorant and ambitious priesthood; seduced by frantic and + unprincipled demagogues, it would speedily fall into an abyss + of misery far greater than that which already overwhelms it. + For every thousand of the Irish poor who now approach the + shores of Britain, ten thousand would then arrive, from the + experienced impossibility of finding subsistence at home; + universal distress would produce such anarchy as would + necessarily lead the better classes to throw themselves into + the arms of any government who would interfere for their + protection. France would find the golden opportunity, so long + wished for, at length arrived, of striking at the power of + England through the neighbouring island; the tricolor flag + would speedily wave from the Giant's Causeway to Cape Clear; + and even if England submitted to the usurpation, and + relinquished its rebellious subjects to the great parent + democracy, the cost of men and ships required to guard the + western shore of Britain, and avert the pestilence from our + own homes, would be greater than are now employed in + maintaining a precarious and doubtful authority in that + distracted island. + + "Whence is all this misery, and these furious passions, in a + country so richly endowed by nature, and subjected to a + Government whose sway has, in other states, established so + large a portion of general felicity? The Irish democrats + answer, that it is the oppression of the English Government + which has done all these things; the editors of the Whig + journals and reviews repeat the same cry; and every Whig, + following, on this as on every other subject, their leaders, + like a flock of sheep, re-echo the same sentiment, until it + has obtained general belief, even among those whose education + and good sense might have led them to see through the + fallacy. Yet, in truth, there is no opinion more erroneous; + and there is none the dissemination of which has done so much + to perpetuate the very evils which are the subject of such + general and well-founded lamentation. Ireland, in reality, is + not miserable because she has, but because _she has not been + conquered_; she is suffering under a redundant population, + not because the tyranny of England, but the tyranny of her + own demagogues, prevents their getting bread; and she is torn + with discordant passions, not because British oppression has + called them into existence, but because Irish licentiousness + has kept them alive for centuries after, under a more + rigorous Government, they would have been buried for ever. + + "It is the more extraordinary that the popular party in both + islands should so heedlessly and blindly have adopted this + doctrine, when it is so directly contrary to what they at the + same time maintain in regard to the causes of the + simultaneous rise and prosperity of Scotland. That poor and + barren land, they see, has made unexampled strides in wealth + and greatness during the last eighty years: its income during + that period has been quadrupled, its numbers nearly doubled, + its prosperity augmented tenfold; they behold its cities + crowded with palaces, its fields smiling with plenty, its + mountains covered with herds, its harbours crowded with + masts, the Atlantic studded with its sails; and yet all this + has grown up under an aristocratic rule, and with a + representative system from which the lower classes were in a + great measure excluded. In despair at beholding a nation + whose condition was so utterly at variance with all their + dogmas of the necessity of democratic representation to + temper the frame of government, they have recourse to the + salutary influence of English ascendency, and ascribe all + this improvement to the beneficial influence of English + freedom. Scotland, they tell us, has prospered, not because + she has, but because she has not, been governed by her own + institutions: and she is now rich and opulent, because the + narrow and jealous spirit of her own Government has been + tempered by the beneficial influence of English freedom. + Whether this is really the case, we shall examine in a + succeeding Number; and many curious and unknown facts as to + the native institutions of Scotland we promise to unfold; + but, in the mean time, let it be conceded that this + observation is well founded, and that all the prosperity of + Scotland has been owing to English influence. How has it + happened that the _same_ influence at the _same_ time has been + the cause of all the misery of Ireland? The common answer + that Scotland was always an independent country, and that + Ireland was won and ruled by the sword, is utterly + unsatisfactory, and betrays an inattention to the most + notorious historical facts. For how has it happened that + Ireland was conquered with so much facility, while Scotland + so long and strenuously resisted the spoiler? How did it + happen that Henry II., with eleven hundred men, achieved with + ease the conquest of the one country, while Edward II., at + the head of eighty thousand men, was unable to effect the + subjugation of the other? How was it that Scotland, not once, + but twenty times, expelled vast English armies from her + territory, while Ireland has never thrown them off since the + Norman standard first approached her shores? And without + going back to remote periods, how has it happened that the + same influence of English legislation, which, according to + them, has been utterly ruinous to Ireland, has been the sole + cause of the unexampled prosperity of Scotland? that the same + gale which has been the zephyr of spring to the one state, + has been the blast of desolation to the other? It is evident + that there is a fundamental difference between the two + states; and that, if we would discover the cause of the + different modes in which the same legislation of the dominant + state has operated in the two countries, we must look to the + different condition of the people to whom it was applied. + + "One fact is very remarkable, and throws a great light on + this difficult subject--and that is, that at different + periods opposite systems have been tried in Ireland, and that + invariably the system of concession and indulgence has been + immediately followed by an ebullition of more than usual + atrocity and violence. + + "The first of these instances is the great indulgence showed + to them by James I. That monarch justly boasted that Ireland + was the scene of his beneficent legislation; and that he had + done more to its inhabitants than all the monarchs who had + sat on the English throne since the time of Henry II. He + established the boroughs; gave them a right of sending + representatives to Parliament; and first spread over its + savage and unknown provinces the institutions and the + liberties of England. What was the consequence? Did the + people testify gratitude to their benefactors? Did they prove + themselves worthy of British freedom, and capable of + withstanding the passions arising from a representative + government? We shall give the answer in the words of Mr Hume. + + "'The Irish, everywhere intermingled with the English, needed + but a hint from their leaders and priests to begin + hostilities against a people whom they hated on account of + their religion, and envied for their riches and prosperity. + The houses, cattle, goods, of the unwary English were first + seized. Those who heard of the commotions in their + neighbourhood, instead of deserting their habitations, and + assembling for mutual protection, remained at home, in hopes + of defending their property, and fell thus separately into + the hands of their enemies. After rapacity had fully exerted + itself, cruelty, and the most barbarous that ever, in any + nation, was known or heard of, began its operations. A + universal massacre commenced of the English, now defenceless, + and passively resigned to their inhuman foes. No age, no sex, + no condition, was spared. The wife weeping for her butchered + husband, and embracing her helpless children, was pierced + with them and perished by the same stroke. The old, the + young, the vigorous, the infirm, underwent a like fate, and + were confounded in one common ruin. In vain did flight save + from the first assault: destruction was every where let + loose, and met the hunted victims at every turn. In vain was + recourse had to relations, to companions, to friends; + connexions were dissolved, and death was dealt by that hand + from which protection was implored and expected. Without + provocation, without opposition, the astonished English, + living in profound peace and full security, were massacred by + their nearest neighbours, with whom they had long upheld a + continual intercourse of kindness and good offices. + + "'But death was the slightest punishment inflicted by those + rebels: all the tortures which wanton cruelty could devise, + all the lingering pains of body, the anguish of mind, the + agonies of despair, could not satiate revenge excited without + injury, and cruelty derived from no cause. To enter into + particulars would shock the least delicate humanity. Such + enormities, though attested by undoubted evidence, appear + almost incredible. Depraved nature, even perverted religion, + encouraged by the utmost license, reach not to such a pitch + of ferocity, unless the pity inherent in human breasts be + destroyed by that contagion of example, which transports men + beyond all the usual motives of conduct and behaviour. + + "'The weaker sex themselves, naturally tender to their own + sufferings, and compassionate to those of others, here + emulated their more robust companions in the practice of + every cruelty. Even children, taught by the example, and + encouraged by the exhortation of their parents, essayed their + feeble blows on the dead carcasses or defenceless children of + the English. The very avarice of the Irish was not a + sufficient restraint of their cruelty. Such was their frenzy, + that the cattle which they had seized, and by rapine made + their own, were yet, because they bore the name of English, + wantonly slaughtered, or, when covered with wounds, turned + loose into the woods and deserts. + + "'The stately buildings or commodious habitations of the + planters, as if upbraiding the sloth and ignorance of the + natives, were consumed with fire, or laid level with the + ground. And where the miserable owners, shut up in their + houses and preparing for defence, perished in the flames, + together with their wives and children, a double triumph was + afforded to their insulting foes. + + "'If any where a number assembled together, and, assuming + courage from despair, were resolved to sweeten death by + revenge on their assassins, they were disarmed by + capitulations and promises of safety, confirmed by the most + solemn oaths. But no sooner had they surrendered, than the + rebels, with perfidy equal to their cruelty, made them share + the fate of their unhappy countrymen. + + "'Others, more ingenious still in their barbarity, tempted + their prisoners by the fond love of life, to imbrue their + hands in the blood of friends, brothers, parents; and having + thus rendered them accomplices in guilt, gave them that death + which they sought to shun by deserving it. + + "'Amidst all these enormities, the sacred name of RELIGION + resounded on every side; not to stop the hands of these + murderers, but to enforce their blows, and to steel their + hearts against every movement of human or social sympathy. + The English, as heretics, abhorred of God, and detestable to + all holy men, were marked out by the priests for slaughter; + and, of all actions, to rid the world of these declared + enemies to Catholic faith and piety, was represented as the + most meritorious. Nature, which, in that rude people, was + sufficiently inclined to atrocious deeds, was farther + stimulated by precept; and national prejudices impoisoned by + those aversions, more deadly and incurable, which arose from + an enraged superstition. While death finished the sufferings + of each victim, the bigoted assassins, with joy and + exultation, still echoed in his expiring ears that these + agonies were but the commencement of torments infinite and + eternal.'" + + "This dreadful rebellion left consequences long felt in Irish + government. Cromwell, the iron leader of English vengeance, + treated them with terrible severity: at the storming of a + single city, 12,000 men were put to the sword; and such was + the terror inspired by his merciless sword, that all the + revolted cities opened their gates, and the people submitted, + trembling, to the law of the conqueror. The recollection of + the horrors of the Tyrone rebellion was long engraven in the + English legislature; and it produced, along with the terrors + of religious dissension, the severe code of laws which were + imposed on the savage population of the country before the + close of the seventeenth century. A hundred years of peace + and tranquillity followed the promulgation of these + oppressive laws. That they were severe and cruel is obvious + from their tenor; that they were in many respects not worse + than was called for by the horrors which preceded their + enactment, and followed their repeal, is now unhappily proved + by the result. + + "The next great period of concession commenced about the year + 1772, soon after the accession of George III. The severe code + under which Ireland had so long lain chained, but quiet, was + relaxed; the Catholics were admitted to a full share of the + representation; the more selfish and unnecessary parts of the + restrictions were removed; and, before 1796, hardly any part + of the old fetters remained, excepting the exclusion of + Catholics from the Houses of Lords and Commons, and the + higher situations in the army. Did tranquillity, + satisfaction, and peace, follow these immense concessions, + continued through a period of thirty years? On the contrary, + they were immediately followed by the same result as had + attended the concessions of James I. A new rebellion broke + out; the horrors of 1798 rivalled those of 1641; and the + dreadful recollection of the Tyrone massacre was drowned in + the more recent suffering of the same unhappy country. + + "The perilous state in which Ireland then stood, imperfectly + known at the time even to the Government, is now fully + developed. From the Memoirs of Wolfe Tone, recently + published, it appears that 250,000 men were sworn in, + organised, drilled, and regimented; that colonels and + officers for this immense force were all appointed; and the + whole, under the direction of the central committee at + Dublin, only awaited the arrival of Hoche and the French + fleet to hoist the tricolor flag, and proclaim the _Hibernian + Republic_ in close alliance with the Republic of France. With + truth it may be said, that the fate of England then hung upon + a thread. Napoleon, and the unconquered army of Italy, were + still in Europe; a successful descent of the advanced guard, + 15,000 strong, under Hoche, would immediately have been + followed up by the invasion of the main body under that great + leader; and the facility with which the French fleet reached + Bantry Bay in February 1797, where they were only prevented + from landing by tempestuous gales, proves that the command of + the seas cannot always be relied on as a security against + foreign invasion. Had 40,000 French soldiers landed at that + time in Ireland, to organise 200,000 hot-headed Catholic + democrats, and lend the hand of fraternity to their numerous + coadjutors on the other side of St George's Channel, it is + difficult to say what would have been the present fate of + England. + + "The rebellion of 1798 threw back for ten years the progress + of the indulgent measures so long practised towards Ireland. + But at length the spirit of clemency again resumed its sway; + the system of concession was again adopted, and the last + remnants of the Irish fetters removed by the liberal Tory + administration of England. First, the Catholics were declared + eligible to any situations in the army and navy; and at + length, by the famous Relief Bill, the remaining distinctions + between Catholic and Protestant were done away, and an equal + share of political influence was extended to them as that of + their Protestant brethren. What has been the consequence? Has + Ireland increased in tranquillity since this memorable + change? Have the prophecies of its advocates been verified, + as to the stilling of the waves of dissension and rebellion? + Has it proved true, as Earl Grey prophesied it would, in his + place in the House of Lords, + + Defluit saxis agitatus humor; + Concedunt venti, fugiuntque nubes; + Et minax (quod sic voluere) ponto + Unda recumbit? + + "The reverse of all this has notoriously been the case. Since + this last and great concession, Ireland has become worse than + ever. Midnight conflagration, dastardly assassination, have + spread with fearful rapidity; the sources of justice have + been dried up, and the most atrocious criminals repeatedly + suffered to escape, from the impossibility of bringing them + to justice. A universal insurrection against the payment of + tithes has defied all the authority of Government, in open + violation of the solemn promises of the Catholics that no + invasion on the rights of the Protestant church was intended; + and the starving clergy of Ireland have been thrown as a + burden upon the consolidated fund of England. At this moment + the authority of England is merely nominal over the + neighbouring island; the Lord Lieutenant is less generally + obeyed than the great Agitator, and the dictates of the + Catholic leaders are looked up to in preference to the acts + of the British Parliament. In despair at so desperate a state + of things, so entirely the reverse of all they had hoped from + the long train of conciliatory measures, the English are + giving up the cause in despair; while the great and gallant + body of Irish Protestants are firmly looking the danger in + the face, and silently preparing for the struggle which they + well know has now become inevitable. + + "The result of experience, therefore, is complete in all its + parts. Thrice, during the last two hundred years, have + conciliatory measures been tried on the largest scale, and + with the most beneficent intention; and thrice have the + concessions to the Catholics been followed by a violent and + intolerable outbreak of savage ferocity. The two first + rebellions were followed by a firm and severe system of + coercive government; as long as they continued in force, + Ireland was comparatively tranquil, and their relaxation was + the signal for the commencement of a state of insubordination + which rapidly led to anarchy and revolt. The present + revolutionary spirit has been met by a different system. + Every thing has been conceded to the demagogues; their + demands have been granted, their assemblies allowed, their + advice followed, their leaders promoted; and the country in + consequence has arrived at a state of anarchy unparalleled in + any Christian state. + + "What makes the present state of Ireland, and the democratic + spirit of its inhabitants, altogether unpardonable is, the + extreme indulgence and liberality with which, for the last + fifty years, they have been treated by this country. During + the whole war, Ireland paid _neither income-tax nor assessed + taxes_; and the sum thus made a present of by England to her + people, amounted at the very lowest calculation to + £50,000,000 sterling. She shared in the full benefit of the + war in consequence of the immense extent of the demand for + agricultural produce which its expenditure occasioned, + without feeling any of the burdens which neutralised its + extension in this country. No poor's rates are levied on her + landholders--in other words, they are levied on England and + Scotland instead--and this island is in consequence + overwhelmed by a mass of indigence created in the + neighbouring kingdom, but which British indulgence has + relieved them from the necessity of maintaining. The amount + of the sums annually paid by the Parliament of Great Britain + to objects of charity and utility in Ireland almost exceeds + belief, and is at least five times greater than all directed + to the same objects in both the other parts of the empire + taken together. Yet with all their good deeds, past, present, + and to come, Ireland is the most discontented part of the + United Kingdom. She is incessantly crying out against her + benefactor, and recurring to old oppression rendered + necessary by her passions, instead of present benefactions, + of which her democratic population have proved themselves + unworthy by their ingratitude. + + "Notwithstanding all the efforts of her demagogues to + distract the country, and counteract all the liberality and + beneficence of the English Government, Ireland has advanced + with greater rapidity in industry, wealth, and all the real + sources of happiness, during the last thirty years, than any + other part of the empire. Since the Union, she has made a + start both in agricultural and manufacturing industry, quite + unparalleled, and much greater than Scotland had made during + the first hundred years after her incorporation with the + English dominions. It is quite evident that, if the + demagogues would let Ireland alone--if the wounds in her + political system were not continually kept open, and the + passions of the people incessantly inflamed, by her popular + leaders, she would become as rich and prosperous as she is + populous--that, instead of a source of weakness, she would + become a pillar of strength to the united empire--and instead + of being overspread with the most wretched and squalid + population in Europe, she might eventually boast of the most + contented and happy." + +So far what we wrote in December 1832. We make no apology for the +length of this quotation. So precisely is it applicable to the present +time, that were we to write anew on the subject, we should certainly +reproduce the same ideas, and probably, in a great degree, make use of +the same words. It affords a remarkable proof of the manner in which +Ireland has been influenced, in all periods of its history, by the +same causes; and of the way in which all its natural advantages have +been thrown away, by the indolence and want of energy in its +inhabitants, joined to the unhappy extension to it, through British +connexion, of the privileges, excitement, and passions, consequent on +a free constitution, for which it was unfitted by its character, +temperament, and state of social advancement. + +Need it be said how precisely the same truths have been illustrated in +later times, and, most of all, in the memorable year in which we now +write? The melancholy tale is known to all: it is written in +characters of fire in England's annals. Such was the state of +excitement, anarchy, and licentiousness to which the Irish were +brought under the Whig rule, by the combined operation of the Reform +mania, and the Repeal agitation, that Lord Grey, albeit the most +impassioned opponent of Mr Pitt's preventive policy, was compelled to +adopt it; and the celebrated Coercion Bill of 1833 invested Government +with extraordinary powers, and for a time superseded, by martial law, +in some districts of Ireland, the ordinary administration of justice. +The result, as much as the anarchy which had preceded it, demonstrated +where the secret of Ireland's ills was to be found, and what was the +species of government adapted for its unsettled, impassioned, and +semi-barbarous inhabitants.[13] Instantly, as if by enchantment, the +disorders ceased: midnight fires no longer illuminated the heavens, +midnight murders no longer struck terror into the inhabitants. The +savage passions of the people, growing out of the civilised license +unhappily allowed them under British rule, were rapidly coerced, and, +instead of Ireland exhibiting an amount of agrarian outrage and +atrocity unprecedented in any Christian land, even her worst provinces +returned to their usual, though yet serious and lamentable +average.[14] + +The evil days of conciliation and concession, however, soon returned. +When Sir R. Peel assumed the helm for a brief period in 1835, he said, +that his chief difficulty was Ireland. It was so in truth--not from +the difficulties, great as they were, with which the administration of +Ireland was surrounded, but from the monstrous delusions on the +subject with which the Whigs, then possessed of the chief influence in +the state, had imbued the public mind. So feeble was Government under +his successors, from 1835 to 1841--so thoroughly had they drenched the +people of Great Britain with the belief that severity of rule was the +sole cause of the miseries of Ireland, and that conciliation and +concession were their appropriate remedy--that powers the most +disastrous, privileges the most undeserved, were bestowed on the Irish +people. The very agitators were lauded, flattered, and promoted. +O'Connell was offered a seat on the Bench; the whole, or nearly the +whole, patronage of the country was surrendered into his hands. The +greater part of the police were nominated according to the suggestions +of himself or his party; the Orangemen of the north--the bulwark of +the throne--were vilified, prosecuted, and discouraged; +self-government became the order of the day; municipal reform was +conceded; an ignorant, priest-led, half-savage people were intrusted +with one of the highest duties of civilised citizens--that of electing +their own magistrates. O'Connell, under the new municipal +constitution, was elected Lord Mayor of Dublin; a majority, both of +the constituency and members of Parliament, ere long became Repealers. +The Whig system of governing Ireland, by yielding to its selfish +passions and fostering its political vices, received its full +development; Whig journals, reviews, and magazines, lauded the policy +to the skies, and predicted from its effects the speedy removal of all +the evils which had arisen from the Tory system of coercion and +repression in the Emerald Isle. + +The results were soon apparent. Assured of countenance and support +from high quarters--cordially supported by the Popish hierarchy and +priesthood--intrenched, beyond the power of assault, in almost all the +boroughs--possessed of considerable support or connivance in the rural +magistracy--backed, in many parts of the country, by the torch of the +incendiary or the firelock of the assassin--wielding at once the +delegated powers of Government, the daggers of desperadoes, the +enthusiasm of the people, O'Connell proceeded with the step of a +conqueror in the work of agitation. The Temperance movement, headed by +Father Mathew, came most opportunely to aid its funds, by diverting +the vast sums hitherto spent by the people on physical, to support the +cause of mental agitation. Seventy temperance bands were soon +established to head the temperance clubs; the uniforms of the +musicians were so made, that, by being merely turned, they could be +converted into the bands of so many regiments; the Rent flourished; +whisky-shops were ruined; the grand Intoxicator demolished his +inferior competitors; Conciliation Hall boasted of its three thousand +pounds a-week! The distilleries were bankrupt. The simple, misled +people of England believed that, under the combined influence of +political agitation, municipal reform, and suddenly-induced sobriety, +Ireland was to be effectually regenerated, and the Celt was at once +to leap into the privileges of the Saxon, without going through his +seven centuries of painful apprenticement. Monster meetings became +general. Assemblages said to consist of eighty or a hundred thousand, +and which really contained twenty or thirty thousand persons, were +held in the whole south and west of Ireland. Meanwhile industry was +paralysed; capital shunned the agitated shores; labour was diverted +from the field to the platform; the earnings of the poor were wrenched +from them, by priestly influence and the terrors of purgatory, to aid +in the great work of dismembering the empire. Instead of attending to +their business--instead of working at their lazy-beds or tending their +cattle--instead of draining their bogs or reclaiming their wastes, the +people were continually kept running about from one monster meeting to +another, and taught to believe that they were to look for happiness, +not through the labour of their hands, or the sweat of their brows, +but in swelling seditious processions, listening to treasonable +harangues, and extending the ramifications of a vast and atrocious +Ribbon conspiracy throughout Ireland. + +Society could not long exist under such a system; but it was long ere +the Liberal party saw the error of their ways--when Sir Robert Peel's +government, in 1843, at length became convinced that the evil had come +to such a height that it could no longer be endured, and that society +would be dissolved under its influence. The meeting, accordingly, at +Clontarff was proclaimed down; O'Connell was prosecuted, and a +conviction obtained. But the Whigs were not long of coming up to the +rescue. A majority of three Whig law peers to two Conservative +ones--Lords Lyndhurst and Brougham being in the minority--overruled +the opinion of the twelve judges of England, and quashed the +prosecution. Elated with this victory, agitation resumed its sway in +Ireland; but it did so under darker auspices, and with more dangerous +ends. Organisation, with a view to insurrection, was now avowedly set +on foot; arms were purchased in large quantities; and the Whig +Secretary of Ireland had the extreme imprudence to write a letter, +which found its way into the public prints, and was soon placarded +over Ireland, in which it was stated generally, and without +qualification, that every Irishman was entitled to possess and carry +arms. Nay, this was made the _cheval de bataille_ between the two +parties; and when Sir R. Peel was turned out in July 1846, it was on +the question of the bill for prohibiting _the possession of arms in +Ireland_. The Whigs came into power on the basis of the Irish +peasantry being entitled to be armed. It covers, like charity, a +multitude of sins in Sir R. Peel, that he left office on the same +question. + +But the laws of nature are more durable in their operation than the +revolutions of statesmen. The effects of twenty years' agitation and +disorder in Ireland ere long became apparent. The reign of murder, +incendiarism, and terror, brought down an awful retribution on its +authors. Agriculture, neglected for the more agreeable and gainful +trade of agitation or assassination, had fallen into such neglect, +that the land, in many parts of the country, had become incapable of +bearing grain crops. Nothing would do but lazy-beds, in which often a +wretched crop was raised in the centre of the ridge, on a third of the +land, while the remaining two-thirds were under water. The potato +famine came, in 1846, upon a country thus prepared for such a +visitation--wasted by agitation, disgraced by murder, impoverished by +the protracted reign of terror. Its effects are well known. Ireland, +wholly incapable, from its infatuated system of self-government, of +doing any thing for itself, fell entirely as a burden on England. +Great part of Scotland was wasted by a similar calamity, and in +regions--the West Highlands and Islands--far more sterile and barren +than the south and west of Ireland. But Scotland had not been torn by +political passions, nor palsied by repeal agitation. Scotland righted +itself. It bore the visitation with patience and resignation. It +neither sought nor received aid from England. Not a shilling was +advanced by the Exchequer to relieve Scotch suffering. Ten millions +were given by the nation to relieve that of Ireland: of this immense +sum eight millions were borrowed, and remain a lasting charge on Great +Britain. Hundreds of thousands, raised from the suffering and won by +the labour of England and Scotland, followed in the same direction. In +return, the Irish gave us contumely, defiance, and ingratitude. The +_Nation_ thundered forth weekly its fiendish vituperation against the +people who had saved its countrymen. It was eagerly read by hundreds +of thousands who owed their existence to British generosity. The +beggar gave place to the bully. Great part of the funds, lavished with +misplaced humanity on Irish suffering, was employed in the purchase of +arms to destroy their benefactors; and the unparalleled munificence of +England to Ireland in 1847, was succeeded by the unparalleled +rebellion of Ireland against England in 1848. + +He must be blind indeed who cannot read in this rapid summary the real +causes of the long-continued misery and distraction of Ireland. It has +arisen in a great degree from English connexion, but in a way which +the Irish do not perceive, and which they will be the last to admit. +It is all owing to a very simple cause--so simple that philosophers +have passed it over as too obvious to explain the phenomena, and +party-men have rejected it because it afforded no handle for popular +declamation, and gave them no fulcrum whereon to rest the lever which +was to remove an opposite party from power. It is not owing to the +Roman Catholic religion,--for, if so, how have so many Roman Catholic +countries been, and still are, great, and powerful, and happy? It is +not owing to the confiscation of the land, for confiscation as great +followed the establishment of the Normans in England, and the +victories of Robert Bruce in Scotland; and yet, in process of time, +the ghastly wound was healed in both these countries, and from the +united effort of the Britons, Saxons, and North-men, have arisen the +glories and wonders of British civilisation. It is not owing to the +exclusion, from 1608 to 1829, of the Roman Catholics from Parliament; +for, since they were admitted into it, the distractions of Ireland +have gone on constantly increasing, and its pauperism and mendicancy +have advanced in an accelerated ratio. It is entirely owing to +this,--that _England has given Ireland institutions and political +franchises, for the exercise of which it is wholly disqualified by +temperament, habit, and political advancement_. We have put edged +tools into the hands of children, and we are astonished that they have +mangled their limbs. We have emancipated from necessary control the +Bedouin or the savage, and we are disappointed he does not exercise +his newly-acquired powers with the discretion of an Englishman or an +American. We have plunged a youth of sixteen, without control, into +the dissipation of London or Paris, and we are surprised he has run +riot in excess. Thence it is that all the concessions made to Ireland +have instantly and rapidly augmented its political maladies, and that +the only intervals of rest, tranquillity, and happiness it has enjoyed +for the last two hundred years, have been those in which it has for a +brief period been coerced by the wholesome severity of vigorous +government. Thence it is that Whig solicitude, fastening on the +grievances of Ireland as its battle-field, and winning for the +inhabitants privileges for which they are not fitted, has in every +instance so grievously augmented its wretchedness and crimes. This is +the true key to Irish history. Viewed in this light, it is perfectly +clear, intelligible, and consistent with what has occurred in other +parts of the world. Without such guidance, its annals exhibit a chaos +of contradictions; and Ireland must be considered as a _casus +singularis_--an exception from the principles which elsewhere have +ever regulated mankind. + +The whole machinery of a free constitution--those institutions under +which the Anglo-Saxons have so long flourished on both sides the +Atlantic--are utter destruction to the semi-barbarous Celtic race to +which they have been extended. Grand juries and petty juries, +self-governments, municipalities, county and burgh elections, popular +representatives, public meetings, hustings' declarations, platform +exaggerations, a licentious press, and all the other attendants on +republican or semi-republican institutions, are utterly destructive to +the impassioned, priest-ridden, ignorant Celtic tribes in the south +and west of Ireland. A paternal despotism is what they require. + +We are far from wishing that despotism to be severe--on the contrary, +we would have it beneficent and humane in the highest degree--we would +have it give to Ireland blessings tenfold greater than it will ever +earn for itself in senseless attempts at self-government. We would +commence the work by the grant of sixteen millions of British money, +to set on foot the chief arteries and railroads of the country!--that +grant which, proposed by the patriotic wisdom of Lord George Bentinck, +was defeated by the insane resistance of the Irish members +themselves.[15] We would in every imaginable shape stimulate the +industry of Ireland, and aid the efforts of its really patriotic +children, to extricate their country from the bottomless gulf into +which selfishness, agitation, and the cry for repeal, have plunged it. +But we would intrust little of this grant to the distribution of the +Irish themselves. We would not again be guilty of the enormous error +of committing a magnificent public grant to hands so unfit to direct +it, that we know from the highest authority--that of the +Lord-lieutenant himself--that great part of the fund was misapplied in +private jobbing, and the remainder wasted in making good roads bad +ones. We would execute the works by Irish hands, but distribute the +funds, and guide the undertakings, by English heads. We would deprive +the Irish, till they have shown they are fit to wield its powers, of +the whole rights of self-government. We would commence with a rigorous +and unflinching administration of justice, executed by courts-martial +in cases of insurrection, and by judges without juries in ordinary +cases. A powerful police, double its present strength, should give +security to witnesses, who, if they desire it, should be provided with +an asylum in the colonies at the public expense. "Every thing for the +people, and nothing by them," which Napoleon described as the real +principle of government at all times, should be applied to Ireland at +least during the many years still to run of its national pupilage and +minority. + +The truth of these principles has been so signally demonstrated by the +events of which Ireland has recently, and we lament to say is still, +the theatre, that it has at length forced itself on the mind of the +English people. Most fortunately, the Whigs being in power themselves, +and having the responsibility and duties of government thrown upon +them, have at length come to see the matter in its true light. The cry +that all is owing to English misrule, is no longer heard in Great +Britain. Its utter falsehood has been demonstrated in language too +clear to be misunderstood. Even the Liberal journals, who have shown +themselves most earnest in promoting the cause of reform and +self-government in Great Britain, have come to see how utterly it is +misapplied when attempted in Ireland. Hear the _Times_ on this +subject, one of the ablest journals which formerly supported the cause +of parliamentary and municipal reform, as well in Ireland as in this +country. + + "The slowly gathering wrath of years has been concentrated to + a point. John Bull was--as Jonathan would express + it--"properly riled" at the behaviour of his once beloved + fondling. He could put up with ingratitude; he could despise + insolence; he could treat bravado with contempt. But here was + the most wonderful combination of insolence, ingratitude, + bravado, and cowardice, that history has recorded. Here were + men belching out treason and fire and sword one day, and the + next day sneaking between the bulwarks of a cabbage-garden, + or through the loopholes of an indictment! For such, and on + such, had he been expending, not only money, but care, + anxiety, sympathy, and fear. He was fooled in the eyes of the + world and his own! The only hope for Ireland is in rest, and + a strong Government. Almost every Englishman who has regarded + her with solicitude within late years, is convinced that what + she and her people require, beyond all things, is discipline. + Her gentry require discipline; her middle classes require + discipline; her peasantry require discipline. They should + altogether be disciplined in a rigid but just system, as the + picked Irishmen have been who are distinguished as the best + foremen in our factories, and the best non-commissioned + officers in our army. Political privileges have been tried + and misused; judicial forms have been tried and abused; Saxon + institutions have been tried, and found not to harmonise with + the Celtic mind. It cannot comprehend them; it does not + appreciate them. It arrays liberty against law, and the + technicalities of law against its spirit. It wants that moral + sense, that instinctive justice and fairness, which have been + the soul and the strength of Anglo-Saxon jurisprudence. This + it must be taught by a strong, an irresistible, and, if need + be, a coercive authority. Duty must be impressed on it as a + habit, and then it will be inanealed with its sympathies. The + greatest boon to Ireland would be the rule of a benevolent + autocrat, who would punish all classes and all parties alike + for a breach of social and civil duties--the landlords for + their cruelty, the tenants for their mendacity, the priests + for their neglect of their most momentous function. This boon + Ireland will not get; but we can force upon her that which + comes the nearest to it, the suppression of a vain, vapid, + selfish, and suicidal agitation. If we do not do it while we + may, we shall rue it with bitterness and humiliation + hereafter."--_Times_, September 1847. + +To the same purpose, it is observed in a late number of the +_Economist_, also an able Liberal journal: + + "Irish agitation has run its course, and shown its character. + It has had 'rope enough' allowed to manifest what are its + materials, and what its means--what are the objects it + proposes, and of what stuff its leaders are made. It has + displayed a mixture of ferocity, levity, and incapacity, + which has covered with shame and confusion all its quondam + sympathisers and admirers. Demagogism has been stripped + naked, and has appeared as what it really is--a low, savage, + dishonest enormity--an 'evil that walketh in darkness'--the + epidemic malady of Ireland--an enemy which no concessions can + conciliate, which no mildness can disarm, and with which, + because of its dishonesty, no parley can be held. + + "An open rebellion has been crushed at its first outbreak. A + number of its leaders and organisers are in prison, and the + Government, with a forbearance and adhesion to routine ideas + which verges on the simple, and almost approaches the + sublime, intrusts their punishment to the slow and uncertain + processes of the law--to the courage of Irish juries, and the + integrity of Irish witnesses. The Government allows rebels + who have appealed to arms, and been worsted in the conflict, + to retreat behind the shelter of the law. It is content to + meet an armament with an indictment; nay, more, it is content + to submit this indictment to the judgment of men, half of + whom are in the ranks of the rebel army, and the other half + in its power. It may have been well to try this hazardous + experiment; but the result of it could not long be doubtful. + Accordingly, we find that convictions cannot be obtained. + Rebels, whose guilt is as clear as the day, are dismissed + from the dock because juries will not agree upon a + verdict--and are to be kept safe till March 1849, then to be + let loose to recommence their work of mischief with all the + increased audacity which impunity cannot fail to generate. + They have taken arms against the Government, and the + Government will have proved impotent to punish them. + + "We are not surprised that Irish juries will not convict + Irish rebels. It is too much to expect that they should do + so, even when fully convinced of, and indignant at, their + guilt. It would be almost too much to ask from Englishmen. + Government have a right to call upon jurors to do their duty, + under ordinary circumstances and in ordinary times. In like + manner, Government has a right to call upon all citizens to + come forward, and act as special constables, in all cases of + civil commotion. But it has no right to send them forth, + unexercised and unarmed, to encounter an organised and + disciplined force, provided with musket and artillery: that + is the business of regular troops. In like manner, Government + has no right to expect jurors to act at the hazard of their + lives and property. The law never contemplated that serving + on a jury should be an office of danger. When it becomes + such, other agencies must be brought into operation. + + "It will not suffice to the Government to have acted with + such skill and spirit as to have rendered abortive a + formidable and organised rebellion. It must _crush_ the + rebellious spirit and the rebellious power. This can never be + done by the means of juries. Punishment, to be effectual, + must fall with unerring certainty on every one concerned in + the crime. They must be made to feel that no legal chicanery, + no illegitimate sympathy, can avail to save them. The British + nation, we are sure, will never endure that men who have been + guilty of such crimes as the Irish felons should escape + punishment, and be again let loose on society, to mock and + gibe at the impotence of power. Any termination of the crisis + would be preferable to one so fatal and + disgraceful."--_Economist_, Sept. 12, 1848. + +These articles, emanating from such sources, induce us to hope that +the long-protracted distractions of Ireland are about to be brought to +a close; and that, after having been for above half a century the +battle-field of English faction, or cursed with Liberal English +sympathy, and its inevitable offspring, Irish agitation and +mendacity--the real secret of its sufferings has been brought to +light; and that, by being governed in a manner suitable to its +character and circumstances, it will at length take its place among +the really civilised nations of the world, and become fit for the +exercise of those privileges which, prematurely conceded, have proved +its ruin. + +One circumstance induces the hope that this anticipation maybe +realised, and that is, the highly honourable part which the Irish +enrolled in the police have taken in the late disturbances; the +fidelity of all the Irish in the Queen's service to their colours; and +the general pacific conduct which has, with a few exceptions, been +observed by the numerous Hibernians settled in Great Britain during +the late disturbances. The conduct of the Irish police, in particular, +has been in all respects admirable; and it is net going too far to +assert, that to their zeal, activity, and gallantry, the almost +bloodless suppression of the insurrection is mainly to be ascribed. +The British army does not boast a more courageous body of men than the +Irishmen in its ranks; and it is well known that, after a time, they +form the best officers of a superior kind for all the police +establishments in the kingdom. Although the Irish in our great towns +are often a very great burden, especially when they first come over, +from the vast number of them who are in a state of mendicity, and +cannot at first get into any regular employment, yet when they do +obtain it, they prove hardworking and industrious, and do not exhibit +a greater proportion of crime than the native British with whom they +are surrounded. The Irish quickness need be told to none who have +witnessed the running fire of repartee they keep up from the fields +with travellers, how rapid soever, on the road; their genius is known +to all who are familiar with the works of Swift and Goldsmith, of +Burke and Berkeley. Of one thing only at present _they are incapable, +and that is, self-government_. One curse, and one curse only, has +hitherto blasted all their efforts at improvement, and that is, the +abuse of freedom. One thing, and one thing only, is required to set +them right, and that is, the strong rule suited to national pupilage. +One thing, and one thing only, is required to complete their ruin, and +that is, repeal and independence. An infallible test will tell us when +they have become prepared for self-government, and that is, when they +have ceased to hate the Saxon--when they adopt his industry, imitate +his habits, and emulate his virtues. + + * * * * * + +We have spoken of the French and the Irish, and contrasted, not +without some degree of pride, their present miserable and distracted +state with the steady and pacific condition of Great Britain, during a +convulsion which has shaken the civilised world to its foundation. But +let it not be supposed that France and Ireland alone have grievances +which require redress, erroneous policy which stands in need of +rectification. England has its full share of suffering, and more than +its deserved share of absurd and pernicious legislation. But it is the +glory of this country that we can rectify these evils by the force of +argument steadily applied, and facts sedulously brought forward, +without invoking the destructive aid of popular passions or urban +revolutions. We want neither Red Republicans nor Tipperary Boys to +fight our battles; we neither desire to be intrenched behind Parisian +barricades nor Irish non-convicting juries; we neither want the aid of +Chartist clubs, with their arsenals of rifles, nor Anti-corn-law +Leagues, with their coffers of gold. We appeal to the common sense and +experienced suffering of our countrymen--to the intellect and sense of +justice of our legislators; and we have not a doubt of ultimate +success in the greatest social conflict in which British industry has +ever been engaged. + +We need not say that we allude to the CURRENCY--that question of +questions, in comparison of which all others sink into insignificance; +which is of more importance, even, than an adequate supply of food for +the nation; and without the proper understanding of which all attempts +to assuage misery or produce prosperity, to avert disaster or induce +happiness, to maintain the national credit or uphold the national +independence, must ere long prove nugatory. We say, and say advisedly, +that this question is of far more importance than the raising of food +for the nation; for if their industry is adequately remunerated, and +commercial catastrophes are averted from the realm, the people will +find food for themselves either in this or foreign states. Experience +has taught us that we can import _twelve millions_ of grain, a full +fifth of the national subsistence, in a single year. But if the +currency is not put upon a proper footing, the _means of purchasing +this grain are taken from the people_--their industry is blasted, +their labour meets with no reward--and the most numerous and important +class in the community come to present the deplorable spectacle of +industrious worth perishing of hunger, or worn out by suffering, in +the midst of accumulated stores of home-grown or foreign subsistence. + +The two grand evils of the present monetary system are, that the +currency provided for the nation is _inadequate_ in point of amount, +and _fluctuating_ in point of stability. + +That it is inadequate in point of amount is easily proved. In the +undermentioned years, the aggregate of notes in circulation in England +and Wales, without Scotland and Ireland, was as follows[16]:-- + + Bank of England and Population, + Provincial Banks. England and Wales. + + 1814, £47,501,000 13,200,000 + 1815, 46,272,650 13,420,000 + 1816, 42,109,620 13,640,000 + 1817, 43,291,901 13,860,000 + 1818, 48,278,070 14,100,000 + +Including the Scotch and Irish notes, at that period about +£12,000,000, the notes in circulation were about £60,000,000, and the +inhabitants of Great Britain 14,000,000; of the two islands about +19,000,000--or about £3, 4s. a head. + +In the year 1848, thirty years afterwards, when the population of the +empire had risen to 29,000,000, the exports had tripled, and the +imports and shipping had on an average more than doubled, the supply +of paper issued to the nation stood thus:-- + + NOTES. + + |Aug.14, 1847|Aug.12, 1848|Increase|Decrease | Population | + +------------+------------+--------+---------+------------+ + Bank of England, |£18,784,890 |£18,710,728 | -- | £74,162 | England | + Private Banks, | 4,258,380 | 3,520,990 | -- | 737,390 | and Wales. | + Joint Stock | | | | | 19,500,000 | + Banks, | 2,991,351 | 2,479,951 | -- | 511,400 | | + +------------+------------+--------+---------+ Great | + Total in England,| 26,034,621 | 24,711,669 | -- |1,322,952| Britain and| + ... Scotland,| 3,455,651 | 3,035,903 | -- | 419,748| Ireland. | + ... Ireland, | 5,097,215 | 4,313,304 | -- | 783,911| 29,500,000 | + -----------------+------------+------------+--------+---------+ | + United Kingdom, | 34,587,487 | 32,060,876 | -- |2,526,611| | + + Thus showing a decrease of £1,322,952 in the circulation of + notes in England, and a decrease of £2,526,611 in the + circulation of the United Kingdom, when compared with the + corresponding period last year.[17]--_Times_, Aug. 29, 1848. + +Thus, in the last thirty years, the population of Great Britain and +Ireland has _increased_ from 19,000,000 to 29,500,000; while its +currency in paper has _decreased_ from £60,000,000 to £32,000,000. +Above fifty per cent has been added to the people, and above a hundred +per cent to their transactions, and the currency by which they are to +be carried on has been contracted fifty per cent. Thirty years ago, +the paper currency was £3, 5s. a head; now it is not above £1, 5s. a +head! And our statesmen express surprise at the distress which +prevails, and the extreme difficulty experienced in collecting the +revenue! It is no wonder, in such a state of matters, that it is now +more difficult to collect £52,000,000 from 29,000,000 of people, than +in 1814 it was to collect £72,000,000 from 18,000,000. + +The circulation, it is particularly to be observed, is _decreasing_ +every year. It was, in August 1848, no less than £2,500,000 _less_ +than it was in August 1847, though that was the August _between_ the +crisis of April and the crisis of October of that year. And this +prodigious and progressively increasing contraction of the currency, +and consequent drying up of credit and blasting of industry, is +taking place at the precise time when the very legislators who have +produced it have landed the nation in the expenditure, in three years, +of £150,000,000 on domestic railways, independent of a vast and +increasing import trade, which is constantly draining more and more of +our metallic resources out of the country! Need it be wondered at that +money is so tight, and that railway stock in particular exhibits, week +after week, a progressive and most alarming decline. + +But, say the bullionists, if we have taken away one-half of your +paper, we have given you double the former command of sovereigns; and +gold is far better than paper, because it is of universal and +permanent value. There can be no doubt that the gold and silver +coinage at the Mint has been very much augmented since paper was so +much withdrawn; and the amount in circulation now probably varies in +ordinary times from £40,000,000 to £45,000,000. There can be as little +doubt that the circulation, on its present basis, is capable of +fostering and permitting the most unlimited amount of speculations; +for absurd adventures never were so rife in the history of England, +not even in the days of the South Sea Company, as in 1845, the year +which immediately followed Sir R. Peel's new currency measures, by +which these dangers were to be for ever guarded against. It is no +wonder it was so; for the bill of 1844 aggravates speculation as much +in periods of prosperity, as it augments distress and pinches credit +in times of adversity. By compelling the Bank of England, and all +other banks, to hold constantly in their coffers a vast amount of +treasure, which must be issued at a fixed price, it leaves them no +resource for defraying its charges but pushing business, and getting +out their notes to the uttermost. That was the real secret of the +lowering of the Bank of England's discounts to 3 and 2-1/2 per cent in +1845, and of the enormous gambling speculations of that year, from the +effects of which the nation is still so severely suffering. + +But as gold is made, under the new system, the basis of the +circulation beyond the £32,000,000 allowed to be issued in the United +Kingdom on securities, what provision does it make for keeping the +gold thus constituted the _sole basis of two-thirds of the currency +within the country_? Not only is no such provision made, but _every +imaginable facility is given for its exportation_. Under the +free-trade system, our imports are constantly increasing in a most +extraordinary ratio, and our exports constantly diminishing. Since +1844, our imports have _swelled_ from £75,000,000 to £90,000,000, +while our exports have _decreased_ from £60,000,000 to £58,000,000, of +which only £51,000,000 are British and Irish exports and +manufactures.[18] How is the balance paid, or to be paid? _In cash_: +and that is the preparation which our legislators have made for +keeping the gold, the life-blood of industry and the basis of +two-thirds of the circulation, in the country. They have established a +system of trade which, by inducing a large and constant importation of +food, for which scarcely any thing but gold will be taken, induces a +_constant tendency of the precious metals outwards_. With the right +hand they render the currency and credit beyond £32,000,000 entirely +dependent on keeping the gold in the country, and with the left hand +_they send it headlong out of the country to buy grain_. No less than +£33,000,000 were sent out in this way to buy grain in fifteen months +during and immediately preceding the year 1847. They do this at the +very time when, under bills which themselves have passed, and the +railways which themselves have encouraged, £150,000,000 was in the +next three years to be expended on the extra work of railways! Is it +surprising that, under such a system, half the wealth of our +manufacturing towns has disappeared in two years; that distress to an +unheard-of extent prevails every where; and that the Chancellor of the +Exchequer has been obliged to borrow £10,000,000, in the last and +present session of Parliament, during general peace? + +Let it not be supposed this evil has passed away. It is in full vigour +at the present moment. It will never pass away as long as _free trade +and a fettered currency_ coexist in this country. The disastrous fact +has been revealed by the publication of the Board of Trade returns, +that while, during the first six months of this year, our imports have +undergone little diminution, our exports have sunk £4,000,000 below +the corresponding months in last year. In May alone, the decrease was +£1,122,000; in April, £1,467,000.[19] Beyond all doubt our exports, +this year, of British produce and manufactures, will sink to +£45,000,000, while our imports will reach at least £85,000,000! How is +the balance paid? IN SPECIE! And still the monetary laws remain the +same, and for every five sovereigns above £32,000,000 lent out, a note +must be drawn in! It may be doubted whether a system so utterly absurd +and ruinous ever was established in any nation, or persevered in with +such obstinacy after its pernicious effects had been ascertained by +experience. + +The manner in which these disastrous effects resulted, necessarily and +immediately, from the combined operation of the bills of 1819 and +1844, is thus clearly and justly stated by Mr Salt, in his late +admirable letter to Sir R. Peel on the subject. + + "The potato crop failed, and an importation of food became + necessary; the food was imported at a cost not exceeding one + half per cent on the national wealth. It might have been paid + for in goods or in gold, and the limit of the loss would have + been the amount paid--a sum too insignificant, compared to + the national resources, to have been perceptible--and the + national industry could have replaced it in a few weeks. + + "But the bill of 1819 had made gold the basis of our whole + system; and, therefore, when the gold was exported to pay for + the food, the whole system was broken up; and the bill + provides that this calamity shall in every case be added to + that of a bad harvest; that the abstraction of an + infinitesimal part of our money shall destroy our whole + monetary system; that the purchase of a small quantity of + food shall cause an immense quantity of starvation, by + destroying the means of distributing the food, and employing + labour. If this were the only evil of the bill, its existence + ought not to be tolerated an hour. + + "Instead of placing the national credit and solvency on the + broad and indestructible basis of the national industry and + wealth, you have placed all the great national interest on + gold, the narrowest and most shifting, and therefore the most + unfit, basis it was possible to choose. You could not have + done worse. + + "The gold being in quantity perfectly unequal to effect the + exchanges needful for the existence of society, an immense + and disproportioned superstructure of paper money and credit + became a compulsory result, and a certain cause of + perpetually recurring ruin. + + "In framing the bill of 1819 you do not appear to have had a + suspicion of this consequence; but in 1844, after an interval + of a quarter of a century, this much seems to have dawned + obscurely in your mind; but, alas! what was your + remedy?--enlarging and securing the too narrow and shifting + basis? Not at all; you crippled and limited the + superstructure. You left us subject to the whole of your + original error, and provided a new one! + + "The bill of 1844 provides that, in proportion as the gold + money shall disappear, the paper money shall disappear also! + Out of the money thus doubly reduced, the unhappy people are + compelled to pay unreduced taxes; and out of the inadequate + remnant to discharge unreduced debts, and to provide for the + unreduced necessities of their respective stations. So the + leaven of the law works its way through all society. The + payments cannot be made out of these reduced means, the loss + of the credit follows the loss of the money; the means of + exchange, employment, and consumption are destroyed, and the + world looks with amazement on the consummation of your + work--the wealthiest nation in the world withering up under + the blight of a universal insolvency; an abundance of all + things beyond compute, and a misery and want beyond relief. + + "The sole aim of your bill has been to convert paper money + into gold. I have shown how signally you have failed in this + one object, always excepting your special claim of converting + £48,000,000 of paper money into £15,000,000 of gold, for + which mutation I suspect few will thank you. In all other + respects, the whimsicality of your fate has been to establish + a universal inconvertibility. Labour cannot be converted into + wages, East India estates, West India estates, railway + shares, sugar, rice, cotton goods, &c.; in short, all things + are inconvertible except gold. There has been nothing like it + since the days of Midas. + + "The facts, sir, are of your creation, not of mine. I cannot + alter or disguise them. You have had confided to your + administration, by our illustrious sovereign, this most + powerful state, of almost unlimited extent and fertility--a + people unrivalled in their knowledge, caution, skill, and + energy, possessed of unlimited means of creating wealth, and + out of all these elements of human happiness your measures + have produced a chaos of ruin, misery, and discontent. You + can scarcely place your finger on the map, and mark a spot in + this vast empire where all the elements of prosperity do not + exist abundantly; you cannot point out one where you have not + produced results of ruin. Every resource is paralysed, every + interest deranged; the very empire is threatened with + dissolution. The Canadas, the West Indies, and Ireland, are + threatening secession, and England has to be garrisoned + against its people as against a hostile force; the very + loyalty of English hearts is beginning to turn into + disaffection. Review once more these vast resources, and + these wretched results, and I trust you will not make the + fatal opinion of your life the only one to which you will + persist in adhering." + +This is language at once fearless, but measured--cutting, but +respectful, which, on such an emergency, befits a British statesman. +There is no appeal to popular passions, no ascribing of unworthy +motives, no attempt to evade inquiry by irony; facts, known undeniable +facts, are alone appealed to. Inferences, clear, logical, convincing, +are alone drawn. If such language was more frequent, _especially in +the House of Commons_, the plague would soon be stayed, and its former +prosperity would again revisit the British Empire. + +In opposition to these damning facts, the whole tactics of the +bullionists consist in recurring to antiquated and childish terrors. +They call out "Assignats, assignats, assignats!"--they seek to alarm +every holder of money by the dread of its depreciation. They affect to +treat the doctrine of keeping a fair proportion between population, +engagements, and currency, as a mere chimera. In the midst of the +deluge, they raise the cry of fire; when wasting of famine, they hold +out to us the terrors of repletion; when sinking from atrophy on the +way-side, they strive to terrify us by the dangers of apoplexy. The +answer to all this tissue of affectation and absurdity is so evident, +that we are almost ashamed to state it. We all know the dangers of +assignats; we know that they are ruinous when issued to any great +extent. So also we know the dangers of apoplexy and intoxication; but +we are not on that account reconciled to a regimen of famine and +starvation. We know that some of the rich die of repletion, but we +know that many more of the poor die of want and wretchedness. We do +not want to be deluged with inconvertible paper, which has been truly +described as "strength in the outset, but weakness in the end;" but +neither do we desire to be starved by the periodical abstraction of +that most evanescent of earthly things, a gold circulation. Having the +means, from our own immense accumulated wealth, of enjoying that first +of social blessings, an _adequate, steady, and safe currency_, we do +not wish to be any longer deprived of it by the prejudices of +theorists, the selfishness of capitalists, or the obstinacy of +statesmen. Half our wealth, engaged in trade and manufactures, has +already disappeared, under this system, in two years; we have no +disposition to lose the remaining half. + +The duty on wheat now is only five shillings a quarter; in February +next it will fall to one shilling a quarter, and remain fixed at that +amount. The importation of grain, which was felt as so dreadful a +drain upon our metallic resources in 1847, may, under that system, be +considered as permanent. _We shall be always in the condition in which +the nation is when three weeks' rain has fallen in August._ Let +merchants, manufacturers, holders of funded property, of railway +stock, of bank stock, reflect on that circumstance, and consider what +fate awaits them if the present system remains unchanged. They know +that three days' rain in August lowers the public funds one, and all +railway stock ten per cent. Let them reflect on their fate if, by +human folly, _an effect equal to that of three weeks' continuous fall +of rain takes place every year_. Let them observe what frightful +oscillations in the price of commodities follow the establishing by +law a fixed price for gold. Let them ponder on the consequences of a +system which sends twelve or fifteen millions of sovereigns out of the +country _annually_ to buy grain, and _contracts_ the paper remaining +in it at the same time in the same proportion. Let them observe the +effect of such a system, coinciding with a vast expenditure on +domestic railways. And let them consider whether all these dreadful +evils, and the periodical devastation of the country by absurd +speculation and succeeding ruin, would not be effectually guarded +against, and the perils of an over-issue of paper also prevented, by +the simple expedient of treating gold and silver, the most easily +transported and evanescent of earthly things, like any other +commodity, and making paper always payable _in them_, but _at the +price they bear at the moment of presentment_. That would establish a +_mixed_ circulation of the precious metals and paper, mutually +convertible, and allow an _increased_ issue of the latter to obviate +all the evils flowing from the periodical abstractions of the former. +To establish the circulation on a gold basis _alone_, in a great +commercial state, is the same error as to put the food of the people +in a populous community on one root or species of grain. Ireland has +shown us, in the two last years, what is the consequence of the +one--famine and rebellion; England, of the other--bankruptcy and +Chartism. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[11] Lamartine, _Histoire des Girondins_, i. 83. + +[12] The Prefect of Police had published an account of the situation +of Paris during the last ten days, in which he states that the most +perfect tranquillity prevailed in the capital; that confidence was +beginning to revive on every point; that a slow but incontestible +progress manifested itself in every branch of industry; and that at no +former period, and under no previous regimen, did Paris offer more +respect for persons or more security for property. Orders were +arriving from the departments. The manufacture of articles of luxury +and jewellery partook of that resuscitation, as appears from the +returns of the inspector-general of the hall-mark at the mint of +Paris. The articles of jewellery completed and ordered during the last +five months produced the following receipts:--in April, 9,000f.; May, +11,000f.; June, 17,000f.; July, 19,000f.; August, 36,000f. The number +of workmen reduced by distress to reside in lodging-houses had +considerably diminished. In the preceding bulletin their number was +31,480; it is now 27,308--17,977 of whom were employed, and 9,331 +unoccupied. The houses of confinement contained nearly the same number +of ordinary prisoners, and only 4,058 insurgents of June; 2,909 of the +latter had been liberated since the 26th of July, and 1,005 conveyed +to Havre between the 28th of August and the 4th of September. From the +26th of August to the 5th of September, nine persons committed +suicide.--_Times_, Sept. 11, 1848. + +[13] We mean those in the south and west. The other, of Ulster, are of +British descent, and undistinguished from the rest of the Anglo-Saxon +race. + +[14] CRIME IN IRELAND. + + Serious + Crimes. + + Last Quarter of 1829.--Catholic Emancipation passed in March, 300 + Do. of 1830.-- Do. 499 + Do. of 1831.--Reform Agitation, 814 + Do. of 1832.--Reform and Repeal Agitation, 1513 + + By the Coercion Act the Serious crimes were reduced at once to + a _fourth_ of their number. See _Hansard, Parl. Debates_, Feb. + 9, 1834. + +[15] "It was not so much through the hostility of the English members, +as through the desertion and hostility of the Irish members, (many of +them Repealers,) that in February 1847, Ireland lost the opportunity +of obtaining a loan of sixteen millions of English gold at £3, 7s. 6d. +per cent, to stimulate the construction, by private enterprise, of +railways in your country. + +"Unanimous in Palace Yard, on one Tuesday in favour of the proposition +I then brought forward, on the Thursday se'ennight the same sixty +gentlemen, having seen the prime minister at the Foreign Office in the +interval, voted two to one in the House of Commons against giving +railways to Ireland. + +"Out of a hundred and five representatives which Ireland possesses, +twenty-eight only, if my memory serves me correctly, would vote for +that loan to Ireland. Two-thirds of the Irish representatives present +declined the measure--the rest took care to be _non est inventus_ at +the division, which was the hour of Ireland's need. + +"Read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest the division list, and you +will find many more true friends of Ireland, on that occasion, among +the supporters of the Union than among the Repealers. + +"Is it surprising that, where Irish representatives voted two to one +against the acceptance of that measure, and when but twenty-eight, out +of Ireland's hundred and five, could alone be found to say 'ay,' that +a majority of Englishmen could not be found willing to make a +sacrifice of English interests, to force upon Ireland a boon which the +majority of Irish members rejected? + +"It is not Repeal of the Union that Ireland wants; she wants men to +represent her, who, understanding her material and substantial +interests, are able and willing to promote and maintain them; and will +not, on the other hand, to gain the shouts of the mob, divert public +and parliamentary attention to phantom reforms, that have no +substantial virtue in them--or, on the other hand, sell their votes to +win the smiles, or may be something more valuable in the gift of the +minister of the day.--I am, Sir your humble servant, + + "G. BENTINCK." + +[16] ALISON'S _Europe_, xx., Appendix. + +[17] Small as these numbers are, the amount of notes in circulation is +daily still further decreasing. For the week ending 9th September +1848, the amount of notes in circulation of the Bank of England was +only £17,844,665. It is no wonder the same journal adds--"The Railway +Market was _more depressed than ever_ this afternoon; and prices of +all descriptions experienced a considerable fall. London and North +Western were done at 105; Great Western stand at 18 to 20 +_discount_."--_Times_, 10th Sept. 1848. + +[18] + + Exports, Declared Value. Imports, Official Value. + + 1844, £58,584,292 £75,441,565 + 1845, 60,111,681 85,284,965 + 1846, 57,786,576 75,958,875 + 1847, 58,971,106 90,921,866 + + --_Parl. Returns._ + + +[19] + + EXPORTS. + + | | | | | + |First half |First half |Increase.|Decrease. | + | of 1847. | of 1848. | | | + +-----------+-----------+---------+----------+ + Butter | £62,879 | £71,576 | £8,697 | -- | + Candles | 22,155 | 26,475 | 4,329 | -- | + Cheese | 15,149 | 11,089 | -- | £4,060 | + Coals and culm | 432,497 | 517,925 | 85,420 | -- | + Cotton manufactures | 9,248,835 | 8,023,825 | -- |1,225,010 | + Cotton yarn | 2,628,616 | 2,214,031 | -- | 414,185 | + Earthenware | 429,387 | 365,382 | -- | 64,005 | + Fish, herrings | 37,883 | 31,220 | -- | 6,663 | + Glass | 153,746 | 124,121 | -- | 29,625 | + Hardwares and cutlery | 1,096,956 | 939,523 | -- | 157,433 | + Leather, wrought & | | | | | + unwrought | 163,515 | 119,921 | -- | 43,594 | + Linen manufactures | 1,502,770 | 1,413,819 | -- | 88,951 | + Linen yarn | 315,196 | 236,076 | -- | 79,120 | + Machinery | 541,403 | 398,770 | -- | 142,633 | + Metals--Iron and steel | 2,462,954 | 2,545,650 | 82,696 | -- | + Copper and brass | 849,751 | 546,648 | -- | 303,103 | + Lead | 100,620 | 57,331 | -- | 43,289 | + Tin, unwrought | 72,882 | 73,477 | 595 | -- | + Tin, plates | 235,771 | 259,950 | 24,179 | -- | + Salt | 141,195 | 115,757 | -- | 25,438 | + Silk manufactures | 494,806 | 263,798 | -- | 231,008 | + Soap | 76,686 | 74,166 | -- | 2,520 | + Sugar, refined | 203,628 | 212,298 | 8,670 | -- | + Wool, sheep or lambs' | 95,412 | 58,256 | -- | 37,156 | + Woollen yarn | 444,797 | 291,985 | -- | 152,812 | + Woollen manufactures | 3,564,754 | 2,578,470 | -- | 986,284 | + +-----------+-----------+---------+----------+ + |£25,394,243|£21,571,939|£214,585 |£4,036,889| + + The entire decrease of exports during the half-year is thus + shown to be £3,822,304. + + + IMPORTS. + + | Imported. | Taken for | + | | Home Consumption. | + | | | + | 1847. | 1848. | 1847. | 1848. | + +----------+----------+----------+----------+ + Grain of all descriptions,| | | | | + qrs. | 2,195,579| 1,548,464| 2,547,938| 1,436,463| + Indian corn, qrs. | 2,082,038| 652,788| 2,082,369| 647,470| + Flour and meal, cwts. | 3,382,959| 459,797| 3,860,187| 433,759| + Provisions--Bacon, pork, | | | | | + &c., cwts. | 176,319| 234,398| Free. | Free. | + Butter and cheese, cwts. | 298,568| 291,713| 342,170| 312,394| + Animals, No. | 61,989| 52,345| Free. | Free. | + Eggs, No. |41,299,514|48,791,793|41,276,990|48,786,604| + Cocoa, lbs. | 2,540,298| 2,407,034| 1,764,590| 1,542,119| + Coffee, British, lbs. | 6,394,508|10,227,072|13,545,147|15,158,187| + Ditto, Foreign, lbs. | 5,395,669| 7,704,282| 6,092,252| 3,900,457| + +----------+----------+----------+----------+ + Total coffee |11,790,177|17,931,354|19,637,399|19,058,644| + Sugar--West India, cwts. | 1,288,138| 1,091,375| 994,163| 1,212,726| + Mauritius, cwts. | 884,699| 568,475| 617,681| 470,410| + East India, cwts. | 683,901| 679,279| 710,514| 669,196| + Foreign, cwts. | 1,110,948| 621,301| 622,284| 427,542| + +----------+----------+----------+----------+ + Total sugar | 3,967,686| 2,960,430| 2,944,642| 2,779,874| + Tea, lbs. |30,999,703|32,788,914|23,101,975|24,365,380| + Rice, cwts. | 676,130| 497,038| Free. | -- | + Ditto, qrs. | 32,343| 31,410| Free. | -- | + Spirits, galls | 4,328,426| 4,525,729| 2,282,072| 2,069,720| + Wines, galls | 3,332,866| 3,380,826| 3,264,521| 3,114,158| + Opium, lbs. | 103,708| 83,693| 27,208| 36,985| + Tobacco, lbs. |11,100,328|10,822,184|13,419,830|13,416,118| + Fruits--Currants, figs, | | | | | + and raisins, cwts. | 189,844| 107,644| 194,951| 236,918| + Lemons and | | | | | + oranges, chests | 209,647| 281,362| 206,058| 261,302| + Ditto, at value, £| 773| 2,961| 12,449| 8,463| + Spices, lbs. | 2,250,664| 3,460,497| 1,564,612| 1,632,833| + + + + +BYRON'S ADDRESS TO THE OCEAN. + + +Childe Harold's Pilgrimage undertakes an Idea--that of a proud +spirit, born in a castle, self-driven from the bosom of home, seeking +refuge, solace, renovation, from Nature, of sensibilities worn out +with enjoyment. Or, he brings into play a neglected, unused +sensibility--the joy of the Sublime and the Beautiful. We receive, as +given, a mind gifted with extraordinary powers of will and +understanding--by the favour of birth, nursed upon the heights of +society--conversant with pleasure and passion; and, bearing all this +constantly in mind, we must read the poem. From it large passages +might be selected, in which the scorn, despite, bitterness that +elsewhere break in, disfeaturing beauty and sublimity, are silent; +and the passion of divine beholding stands out alone. Is this the +character--or what is the character, of the celebrated concluding +Address to the Ocean? Few things in modern poetry have been more +universally--more indiscriminately admired; be it ours now to recite +with you the famous Stanzas--and here, sitting beneath the +sea-fronting porch of our Marine Villa, indulge in a confabulatory +critique. + +The Wanderings are at an end. The real and the imaginary pilgrim, +standing together upon Mount Albano, look out upon the blue +Mediterranean. He has generously, honourably, magnanimously, thrown +upon the ground the checkered mantle of scorn, anger, disappointment, +sorrow, and ennui, which had wrapped in disguise his fair stature and +features; and he stands a restored, or at least an escaped man, gazing +with eye and soul upon the beautiful and majestic sea rolling in its +joy beneath his feet. He looks; and he will deliver himself up, as +Nature's lone enthusiast, to the delicious, deep, dread, exulting, +holy passion of--vary the word as he varies it--The Ocean. + +Let us chant--with broken, though haply not unmusical voice--what may +be called--the Hymn. That is a high term--let us not anticipate that it +has been misapplied. Childe Harold, or Lord Byron--for it here little +matters whether a grace of pleased fancy resolve the Two into One, or +show the Two side by side, noble forms in brotherly reflection--here is +at last the powerful but self-encumbered Spirit with whom we have +journeyed so long in sunlight and in storm--delighted, sympathising, +wondering at least, or confounded and angry when he will not let us +wonder--here He is at last himself, in unencumbered strength, setting +like the sun upon the sea he gazes on--the clouds broken through, +dispersed, and vanquished, even if a half-tinge of melancholy +remembrance hang in the atmosphere, radiant in majestic farewell. + + "But I forget.--My pilgrim's shrine is won, + And he and I must part--so let it be,-- + His task and mine alike are nearly done; + Yet once more let us look upon the sea; + The midland ocean breaks on him and me, + And from the Alban Mount we now behold + Our friend of youth, that Ocean, which when we + Beheld it last by Calpe's rock unfold + Those waves, we follow'd on till the dark Euxine roll'd + + "Upon the blue Symplegades: long years-- + Long, though not very many, since have done + Their work on both; some suffering and some tears + Have left us nearly where we had begun: + Yet not in vain our mortal race hath run, + We have had our reward--and it is here; + That we can yet feel gladden'd by the sun, + And reap from earth, sea, joy almost as dear + As if there were no man to trouble what is clear. + + "Oh! that the Desert were my dwelling-place + With one fair Spirit for my minister, + That I might all forget the human race, + And, hating no one, love but only her! + Ye Elements!--in whose ennobling stir + I feel myself exalted--can ye not + Accord me such a being? Do I err + In deeming such inhabit many a spot? + Though with them to converse can rarely be our lot. + + "There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, + There is a rapture on the lonely shore, + There is society, where none intrudes, + By the deep Sea, and music in its roar: + I love not Man the less, but Nature more, + From these our interviews, in which I steal + From all I may be, or have been before, + To mingle with the Universe, and feel + What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal. + + "Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean!--roll! + Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain; + Man marks the earth with ruin--his control + Stops with the shore;--upon the watery plain + The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain + A shadow of man's ravage, save his own, + When, for a moment, like a drop of rain, + He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan, + Without a grave, unknell'd, uncoffin'd, and unknown. + + "His steps are not upon thy paths--thy fields + Are not a spoil for him--thou dost arise, + And shake him from thee; the vile strength he wields + For earth's destruction thou dost all despise, + Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies, + And send'st him, shivering in thy playful spray + And howling, to his Gods, where haply lies + His petty hope in some near port or bay, + And dashest him again to earth;--there let him lay. + + "The armaments which thunderstrike the walls + Of rock-built cities, bidding nations quake, + And monarchs tremble in their capitals, + The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs make + Their clay creator the vain title take + Of lord of thee, and arbiter of war; + These are thy toys, and, as the snowy flake, + They melt into thy yeast of waves, which mar + Alike the Armada's pride, or spoils of Trafalgar. + + "Thy shores are empires, changed in all save thee-- + Assyria, Greece, Rome, Carthage, what are they? + Thy waters wasted them while they were free, + And many a tyrant since; their shores obey + The stranger, slave, or savage; their decay + Has dried up realms to deserts:--not so thou, + Unchangeable save to thy wild waves' play-- + Time writes no wrinkle on thine azure brow-- + Such as creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now. + + "Thou glorious mirror, where the Almighty's form + Glasses itself in tempests; in all time, + Calm or convulsed--in breeze, or gale, or storm, + Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime + Dark-heaving;--boundless, endless, and sublime-- + The image of Eternity--the throne + Of the Invisible; even from out thy slime + The monsters of the deep are made; each zone + Obeys thee; thou goest forth, dread, fathomless, alone. + + "And I have loved thee, Ocean! and my joy + Of youthful sports was on thy breast to be + Borne, like thy bubbles, onward: from a boy + I wanton'd with thy breakers--they to me + Were a delight; and if the freshening sea + Made them a terror--'twas a pleasing fear, + For I was as it were a child of thee, + And trusted to thy billows far and near, + And laid my hand upon thy mane--as I do here." + +These Stanzas may be separated from the Poem--the feeling of readers +innumerable so separates them--as a HYMN TO THE OCEAN. The passage, a +great effort of a great poet, intends a final putting forth of all his +power--it has been acknowledged and renowned as such; and, if it has +failed, a critique showing this, and showing the ground of the +failure, maybe useful to you, inexperienced yet in the criticism of +poetry, though all alive to its charm. + +We observe you delight in the first Four Stanzas--ay, you recite them +over again after us--and the voice of youth, tremulous in emotion, is +pathetic to the Old Man. He will not seek, by what might seem to you, +thus moved, hypercritical objections to some of the words; but, +pleased with your pleasure, he is willing to allow you to believe the +stanzas entirely good in expression as in thought. For here the morbid +disrelish of the sated palate is cleansed away. The obscuring cloud of +the overwhelmed heart is dispersed. The joy of the wilderness here +claimed is not necessarily more or other than that of every powerful +and imaginative spirit, which experiences that solitude is, in simple +truth, by a steadfast law of our nature, the condition under which our +soul is able to wed itself in impassioned communion effectually to the +glorious Universe--where, too, the subjugating footsteps of man, +impairing the pure domain of free nature, are not. "Pathless," +"lonely,"--of themselves bespeak neither satiety nor hostility: there +is "society by the deep sea, and music in its roar!" all quite right. +Here is a heart, in its thirst for sympathy, peopling the desert with +sympathisers. Here is expansion of the heart; and the spirit that +rejoices in the consciousness of life roused into creative activity. +For an ear untuned and untuning, here is one that listens out +harmonies which you, languid or inept, might not discern. "Pleasure!" +"rapture!" "society!" "music!"--a chain of genialities! + + "I love not man the less, but nature more, + From these our interviews." + +What will you require of kindliest humanity from any poet, from any +lover of nature, that is not here? The savage grandeur of earth and +sea have their peril--the fleeing of human homes and haunts--the +voluptuous banishment self-imposed--the caressing of dear fancies in +secret invisible recesses inviolable--these tend all to engendering +and nurturing an excessive self-delight akin to an usurping self-love; +and the very sublimities of that wonderful intercourse, in which, upon +the one part, stands the feeble dwarf Man, in his hour-lived weakness, +and upon the other, as if Infinitude itself putting on cognisable +forms, the imperishable Hills and the unchangeable Sea--that +intercourse in which he, the pigmy, conscious of the divinity within +him, feels himself the greater--he infinite, immortal, and these +finite and vanishing--the power and exultation of that intercourse +may well engender and nourish Pride. Self-love and Pride, tempting, +decoying, bewildering, devouring demons of the inhuman Waste! But the +self-reproved, repentant pilgrim has well understood these dangers. He +knows that the delight of woods and waterfalls, of stars and storms, +may alienate man from his fellow-man. He has guarded himself by some +wise temperance. He has found here his golden mean. From thus +conversing, he "loves not man the less, but nature more." Is this a +young Wordsworth, beginning, in the school of nature, to learn the +wisdom of humanity? + +At all events, here is, for the occasion, the most express and earnest +disclaimer of the mood of misanthropy; and we rejoice to hear the +Pilgrim speak of interviews + + "in which I steal + From all I may be, or have been before." + +From all! that is, from all the ungracious, the harsh, the unkind, the +sore, the embittered, the angry, the miserable! Not, surely, from all +the amiable and all the gladsome; and especially not from the whole +personality and identity of his character. The picture he had given us +of himself was that of a powerful mind, self-set at war with its kind, +yet within an exasperated hate ever and anon unfolding undestroyed, +sometimes hardly vitiated, some portion of its original ingenerate +faculty of love. Here we behold him now as God made him, and no longer +possessed by a demon. Change his rhyme into our prose--and you do not +dislike our prose--and in sober and sincere sadness the Childe thus +speaks--"I steal, under the power of these delicious, renovating, +gladdening, hallowing influences, out of myself--out of that evil +thing which man had made me--rather, alas! which I had made myself +into;--and if long wandering, disuse of humanity, separation from the +scene of my wrongs, and this auspicious dominion of inviolate nature +have in these past years already amended me--if I have been worse than +I am--even that worse and that worst these 'interviews' obliterate and +extinguish." The soured milk of human kindness is again sweetened. Or, +if that be too much to say, at least man, with all the dissonance that +hangs by his name and recollections, is forgotten, suspended--for the +time absolutely lost. If this be not the meaning, what is? + + "And feel + What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal," + +is indeed powerless writing, and the stanza merited a better close. +But the whole stanza protests, proclaims the glad healing power of the +natural world over him. He has described this as well as he could, and +sums up with saying that by him it is indescribable. "I derive from +these communions a rapturous transformation--so great, so wondrous, +that my ignorant skill of words is utterly unable to render it; but, +at the same time, so self-powerful, that, in despite of this my +concealing inability, tones of it will outbreak, make themselves +heard, felt, and understood." Thus Byron sets the tune of his Address +to the Ocean. The first Four Stanzas, therefore, be their poetry more +or less, required, upon this account, enucleation; and further, dear +Neophyte, inasmuch as they are particularly humane, they should take +their effectual place among evidences which separate him personally +from some of his poetical Timons. + +You--dear Neophyte--have called the Four Stanzas beautiful,--that is +enough for us,--and they recall to your heart--you say--the kindred +lines of Coleridge--which we call "beautiful exceedingly."-- + + "With other ministrations thou! O Nature! + Healest thy wandering and distemper'd child. + Thou pourest on him thy soft influences, + Thy sunny hues, fair forms, and breathing sweets, + Thy melodies of woods, and winds, and waters, + Till he relent, and can no more endure + To be a jarring and a dissonant thing + Amid this general dance and minstrelsy; + But, bursting into tears, wins back his way, + His angry spirit heal'd and harmonised + By the benignant touch of love and beauty." + +Thus--we repeat our words--"Byron sets the tune of his Address to the +Ocean." + +The poem, then, is an Address to the Ocean by a Lover of the Ocean. It +seems reasonable, then, to ask, first, what is it natural to expect +that such a poem should be? And if it proves to be something +remarkably different, then to inquire whether any particular +circumstance or condition has intervened which justifies the poet in +following an unexpected course. + +Now, for natural expectation, the theme is one of eulogy; and one may +say, therefore, that praise customarily expresses itself in one or +other of two principal ways--namely, directly or indirectly. We praise +directly, for instance, when, moved by the contemplation of some great +or interesting subject, we single forth, one after another, the +qualities of its character, or the facts in its history, which have +provoked our love, our admiration, our joy, our gratitude. Upon the +other hand, we praise indirectly when we extol the subject of our +eulogy by dispraising another foreign subject, which we oppose to the +chosen one in the way of relief or foil; whether we establish mere +comparison of contrast between the two, or cite an opposition of actual +enmity between them--as if, in hymning Apollo, we should insist upon +the horror and fury, the earth-pollution and the earth-affliction, of +the monster Python. + +A moment of reflection satisfies us that both ways are alike +natural--both, with occasion, alike unavoidable; but it is impossible +to help equally seeing that these two ways of eulogy differ materially +from each other in two respects,--the temper of inspiration which +dictates, animates, and supports the one or other manner of +attributing renown, and the motive justifying the one eulogistic +procedure or the other. The temper of direct praise is always wholly +genial; that of lauding by illaudation has in it perforce an ungenial +element. The motive to direct praise eternally subsists and is there, +as long as the subject eulogised subsists and is there. This, then, is +the ordinary method. If any thing has just happened that provokes the +indirect way--as if Python has just been vanquished--then good and +well; or if the poet, by some personal haunting sorrow, or by an +unvanquished idiosyncrasy, must arrive at pleasure through pain, so be +it: but this method is clearly extraordinary and exceptive to the +rule; and the reason for using it must be prominent, definite, and +flashing in all men's eyes. The other method never can require +justifying--this does always; and if it fail conspicuously in aught, +the very opposite effect to that intended is produced, and the eulogy +is no laud. You may say, indeed, and say truly, that all eulogy shall +be mixed--that naturally and necessarily every subject has its title +to favour by sympathy and by antipathy. Which of the two shall +predominate? We need scarcely answer that question. The mood of mind +in which the Poet sings must be genial and benign, though he may have +to deal in fierce invective. + +Read then, dearest Neophyte, the first Four Stanzas--recite them +again, for you have them by heart. It is not easy to imagine any thing +more completely at variance with all that preamble for the hymn than +the hymn itself. The poet, imbued, as we have seen, with the love of +nature and of man, will breathe on both his benediction. He will +glorify the Sea. And how does he attain the transported and +affectionate contemplation of the abyss of waters? By the opposition +of man's impotence to the might of the sea; by the opposition of the +land subjected to man, mixed up in his destinies, and changeable with +him, to the ocean free from all change, excepting that of its own +moods, the free play of its own gigantic will. For though, +philosophically speaking, the immense mass of waters is in itself +inert and powerless; lifted into tides by the sun and moon; lifted +into storm by raging and invisible winds; yet the poet, lawfully, and +by a compulsion which lies alike upon all our minds, apprehends in +what is involuntary, self-willed motion, wild changeable moods, a +pleasure of rolling--sun, moon, and winds, being for the moment left +utterly out of thought; and it may be that Byron here does this well. +But, what is the worth, what the meaning of the first Four Stanzas--in +which you have delighted, because in them the Bard you love had +deliberately and passionately rejected all hostile regard of man, and +reclaimed for himself his place among the brotherhood--when we see +that hostile regard in all its bitterness, instantaneously return and +become the predominating characteristic of the whole wrathful and +scornful song? + +Was his previous confession of faith utterly false and hollow? If +sincere and substantial, what in a moment shattered it? + + "Roll on, thou deep and dark blue ocean--roll! + Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee." + +This is good in temper so far--nor in aught inconsistent with the +spirit pervading the introductory Stanzas; if the ten thousand fleets +are presented for the magnificence of the picture. But are they? No, +already for spleen. The full verse is + + "Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee--_in vain_!" + +In vain! for what end in vain? Why for one that never was contemplated +by them, nor by any rational being--that of leaving the bosom of the +deep permanently furrowed by their wakes! This is a minuteness of +thinking we shudder to put down--but mend the matter if you can. Try +to imagine something great, if not intelligible--that the attempt +which has failed was, in some titanic and mysterious way, to have +established a dominion of man over the sea, to have yoked it like the +earth under his hand, ploughed it, set vines and sown corn fields, and +built up towered cities. But "that thought is unstable, and deserts us +quite." "In vain," whatever it means, or if it means nothing--(and +will no one tell us what it means?)--still proposes the sea in +conflict with an adversary, and does not contemplate it for its own +pure great self. The whole Hymn is founded on contrast, and therefore +of indirect inspiration. To aggrandise the sea, Byron knows of no +other way than to disparage the earth; and there is equally a want of +truth, and of imagination and passion. If he had the capacity of +worthily praising nature, if he had the genuine love and admiration +for her beauty and greatness which he proudly claims, he has not shown +this here; and we are induced to think that there were in his mind, +faculties, intellectual and moral, stronger there than the poetical, +and upon which the poetical faculty needed to stay itself--from which +it needed to borrow a factitious energy--say wit and scorn, the +faculties of the satirist. + +"In vain," indeed! Imagination beholds ten thousand fleets sweeping +over the ocean--or a hundred of them, or one--and man's exulting +spirit feels that it was not in vain. The purposes for which fleets do +sail--to carry commerce, to carry war, to carry colonies, to carry +civilisation, to bring home knowledge, have triumphantly prospered; +and, of course, are not in the meaning of the poet, although properly +they alone are in the meaning of the word. But, perversely enough, the +imagination of the reader accepts for an instant the pomp of the +representation--"ten thousand fleets sweep over thee"--for good, as an +adjunct of the ocean's magnificence; and in the confusion of thought +and feeling which characterises the passage, this verse of mockery +tells to the total resulting impression, in effect, like a verse of +passion. The reverence which is not intended--not the contempt which +is intended--for these majestic human creations, is acknowledged at +last. The poet, with his living fraternal shadow beside him, is +sitting upon the Italian promontory--love and wonder look through his +eyes upon that sea rolling under that sky--and he speaks +accordingly,-- + + "Roll on, thou deep and dark blue ocean--roll!" + +Roll thy gentle tides on, sweet Mediterranean Sea! to beat in murmurs +at my weary feet! Roll, in thine own unconfined spaces, Atlantic +Ocean! with placid swell or with mounting billows, from pole to pole! +Roll, circumambient World-Ocean! embracing in thy liquid arms our +largest continents as thine islands, and immantling our whole globe. A +fair, gentle, sedate beginning; and at the very next step--war to the +knife! + +The confused, unstudied impression left upon you is that of a powerful +mind moving in the majesty of its power. But it is not moving in the +majesty of power, after one step taken straight forwards, at the +second to wheel sharply round and march off in the opposite direction. +How otherwise, Homer, Pindar, Milton! They walk as kings, heroes, +bards, archangels. The first canon of great, impassioned, profound +writing--that the soul, filled with its theme, and with affection +fitted for its theme, moves on slowly or impetuously--with a glide, or +with a rush, or with a bound--but that it ever moves consistently with +itself, pouring out its affection, and, in pouring it out, displaying +its theme, and so evolving its work from itself in unity--is here +sinned against by movements owning no law but mere caprice. + +How, then, is the glorification of his subject sought here to be +attained by Byron? By means of another subject shown us in hostility, +and quelled. Man, in his weakness, is put in contrast and in conflict +with ocean's omnipotence. Man sends out his fleets, apparently for the +purpose of ruining the ocean. He cannot: he can ruin the land; but on +the land's edge his deadly dominion is at an end. There the reign of a +mightier and more dreadful Ruler, a greater Destroyer, a wilder +Anarch, begins. The sea itself rises, wrecks the timbered vessels, +drowns the crews--or at least those who fall overboard--tosses the +mariner to the skies and on to shore, and swallows up fleets of war. + +Such is the first movement or strain. What is the amount relatively to +the purport of the poem? Why, that the first point of glorification +chosen, the first utterance of enthusiastic love and admiration from +the softened heart and elevated soul of a poet, who has just told us +that there is such music in its roar, that by the deep sea he loves +not man the less, but nature more, is, "All hail, O wrathful, dire, +almighty, and remorseless destroyer!"--surely a strange ebullition of +tenderness--an amatory sigh like a lion's roar--something in +Polyphemus' vein--wooing with a vengeance. All this, mark ye, dear +neophyte, following straight upon a proclamation of peace with all +mankind--upon an Invocation to Nature for inward peace! + +Grant for a moment that Man is properly to be viewed as Earth's +ravager, not its cultivator, and that "his control stops with the +shore," is good English in verse for "his power of desolating, or his +range of desolation, is bounded by the sea-shore;" grant for a moment +that it is a lawful and just practical contemplation to view him +ravaging and ranging up to that edge, and to view in contrast the +glad, bright, universally-laughing Ocean beyond--unravaged, unstained, +unfooted, no smoke of conflagration rising, only the golden morning +mist seeming all one diffused sun. Grant all this--and then what we +have to complain of is, that the contrast is prepared, but not +presented; and that the natural replication to "Man marks the earth +with ruin," is not here. Instead of picture for picture--instead of, +look on this picture and on that--we have + + "on the watery plain + The wrecks are all thy deed." + +That is to say, peace, happiness, beauty, nowhere! Man wrecks up to +the shore. There the tables are turned upon him. There the sea ravages +the land, and wrecks him in return. Merciful Heaven! nothing but +wrecking; as if evil spirits only possessed the universe--as if the +only question to be asked any where were, Who wrecks here? + +Is not this a glaring instance of a false intellectual procedure +arising out of a false moral temper? The unceasing call of the Hymn is +for the display of the subject extolled. And here the beautiful, or +the proud superiority of the "peaceful, immeasurable plain," or of the +indignant, independent, thundrous sea, was imperiously suggested for +some moments surely, if the Poem be one of glorification. But no! We +may imagine for ourselves, if we please, the beauty, splendour, joy, +tempestuous liberty of the unfettered waters; but the love of the +ocean is not in the Poet's mind, as it ought to have been--only the +hate of man. + +As it ought to have been? Yea, verily. Had he not taken the pledge? To +drink but of the purest spring of inspiration--the Fount of Love. And +may he, without reproach, break it when he chooses, and we not dare to +condemn? Of all promises, the promise made by poet of world-wide fame +before the wide world, in his soul's best mood, and in nature's +noblest inspiration, is the most sacred--to break it is a sin, and a +sin that brings its appropriate punishment along with it,--loss or +abeyance of the faculty divine. Byron had sworn to love man and +nature, and to glorify their works, on the very instant he seeks to +degrade and vilify. We listen to a religious overture--to the Devil's +March. We are invited to enter with him a temple of worship--and +praise and prayer become imprecations and curses. It is as if a +hermit, telling his beads at the door of his cell, retired into its +interior to hold converse with a blaspheming spirit. Fear not to call +it by its right name--this is Hypocrisy. + +So much as to the fitness of the mood; now as to the truth of the +matter. + +What is, justly considered, the relation of man to the sea? Is it here +truly spoken? Certainly not. The Facts and the Songs of the world are +all the other way. In history, the ocean is the giant slave of the +magician Man--with some difficulty brought under thraldom--humorous, +and not always manageable--mischievous when he gets his own way. But +compare statistically the service and the detriment, for Clio must +instruct Calliope and Erato. Passion that cannot sustain itself but by +hiding that which has been, and accrediting that which has not been, +is personal, not poetical--is mad, not inspired. The truth is, that +the Ship is the glory of man's inventive art and inventive daring--the +most splendid triumph of heroical art. And--for the history of +man--the service of the sea to his ship has been the civilising of the +earth. The wrecks are occasional--so much so that, in our ordinary +estimate, they are forgotten. It would be as good poetry to say that +all the inhabitants of the land live by wrecking. + +In this first movement or strain, then, two great relations upheld by +man are put in question,--his relation to the land, and his relation +to the sea. The Basis of Song to the true and great poet is the truth +of things--the truth as the historian and the philosopher know them. +Over this he throws his own affection and creates a truth of his +own--a poetical truth. But the truth, as held in man's actual +knowledge, is recognisable through the transparent veil. Here it is +distorted, not veiled. The two relations are alike falsified. For in +order to bring man into conflict with the sea, where he and not the +sea is to be worsted, he must first be made the foe of the earth! "Man +marks the earth with ruin." Is this the history of man on the earth? +Man has vanquished the Earth, but for its benefit as well as his own. +He has displaced the forest and the swamp, the wild beast and the +serpent. He has adorned the earth like a bride; as if he had made +captive a wild Amazon, charmed her with Orphean arts, wedded and made +her a happy mother of many children. Whatever impressive effect such +verses may have on the inconsiderate mind, it has been illegitimately +attained by a preposterous and utterly unprovoked movement of +tempestuous passion, and by two utterly false contemplations of man's +posture upon the globe, which two embrace about his whole mortal +existence. Eloquence might condescend to this--poetry never. + +Note well, O Neophyte! that the calm, contemplative, loving first +line, + + "Roll on, thou deep and dark blue ocean! roll!" + +precludes all comparison with such sudden bursts as "Ruin seize thee, +ruthless king!" &c., and "Quousque tandem abutêre, Catilina," &c.; but +it does not preclude, it invites the killing comparison with + + "O Thou that with surpassing glory crown'd + Look'st from thy sole dominion, like the God + Of this new world,--at whose sight all the stars + Hide their diminish'd heads, to thee I call, + But with no friendly voice, and add thy name, + O Sun! to tell thee how I hate thy beams, + That bring to my remembrance from what state + I fell--how glorious once above thy sphere!" &c. + +Where the speaker is fraught with personal, not as a poet with +impersonal affection--where he comes charged with hate, not with love; +and yet how slowly, how sedately, through how many thoughts, how much +admiration, and how many verses, he reaches his hate at last, which is +his object! But on _that_ soliloquy, dear Neophyte, we must discourse +another day. + +We must go a little--not very much--into particulars; for otherwise, O +Neophyte! believe thou, whatever wiseacres say, there can be no true +criticism of poetry. Let us--and that which might have been expected +will appear,--a detail of moral and intellectual disorder. The stanza +of which we have been speaking begins well--as we have seen and said. +Thenceforth all is stamped with incongruity, and shows an effect like +power, by violently bringing together, in a most remarkable manner, +things that cannot consist--by the transition from the Universal to +the Individual, when for + + "The wrecks are all thy deed," + +which shows us a thousand ships foundering in mid ocean, and the +earth's shores all strewn with fragments of oak-leviathans, we have +instantaneously substituted, as if this were the same thing, + + "When for a moment, _like a drop of rain_, + He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan, + Without a grave, unknell'd, uncoffin'd, and unknown." + +What has happened? What is meant? Is this literally the representation +of some single human being actually dropping, as unfortunately happens +from time to time, from a ship's side into the immensity of waters? +And is this horrible game and triumph of Ocean, which threatened to +annihilate the species, upon a sudden confined to "a man overboard?" +Or are we to understand that, by a strong feat of uncreating and +recreating imagination, this one man, dropped as if naked from the +clouds into the sea and submerged, impersonates and impictures, by +some concentration of human agony and of human impotence, that +universally diffused annihilation of Man in his ships which was the +matter in hand? We do not believe that any reader can give a +satisfactory explanation or account of the course of thinking that has +been here pursued. Upon the face of the words lies that natural pathos +which belongs to the perishing of the individual, which serves to +blind inquiry, and stands as a substitute for any reasonable thinking +at all; and thus a grammatical confusion between Man and a man makes +the whole absolute nonsense. + +Then look here:-- + + "Upon the watery plain + The wrecks are _all thy deed_." + +This is not only not true--it is false. If man, clothed in the thunder +of war, is able to strew ruin upon the land, he, militant, by the same +power, strews wreck and ruin upon the waters; and so the distinction +pretended, whatever it might be worth, fails. And does not the +swallowing of the unknelled and uncoffined, which is attributed to the +sea as the victor of man, take place as effectually when beak or +broadside sends down a ship with her hundreds of souls, when the great +sea, willing or unwilling, appears merely as the servile minister of +insulting man's hate and fury? + + "Alike the Armada's pride and spoils of Trafalgar." + +"Rule Britannia" rings in our ears, and gives that assertion the lie. +Does Macaulay's Ode idly recount an ineffectual muster? Did the Lord +High Admiral of England, with all his commodores and captains, do +nothing to the Armada? With what face dared an English Poet say to the +sea that on all those days "the wrecks were all thy deed?" The storms +were England's allies indeed, from Cape Clear to the Orcades. But only +her allies; and, much as we respect the storms and their services, we +say to the English fleet, "The wrecks were all thy deed." At Trafalgar +the storms finally sided with the Spaniards. "Let the fleet be +anchored," said Nelson ere he died; and, had that been possible, it +had been done by Collingwood. After the fight Gravina came out to the +rescue--but the sea engulfed the spoils. Yet, spite of that, we say +again to the English fleet, "The wrecks were all thy deed;" and the +sea answers--and will answer to all eternity--"Ay, ay, ay!" + +Byron, we verily believe, was the first Great Poet that owned not a +patriot's heart. No pride ever had he in his Country's triumphs either +on land or sea. It seems as if he were impatient of every national +and individual greatness that, however far aloof from his sphere, +might eclipse his own. He has written well--but not so well as he +ought to have done--of Waterloo. The glory of Wellington overshadowed +him; and, by keeping his name out of his verses, he would keep the +hero himself out of sight. But there he is resplendent in spite of the +Poet's spleen. _Verbum non amplius_ for Trafalgar! not one for Nelson. +Not so did Cowper--the pious, peace-loving Cowper--regard his +country's conflicts. At thought of these the holy Harper's soul awoke. +He too sung of the sea:-- + + "What ails thee, restless as the waves that roar, + And fling their foam against thy chalky shore? + Mistress _at least, while Providence shall please_, + AND TRIDENT-BEARING QUEEN OF THE WIDE SEAS." + +That is majestic--and this is sublime:-- + + "They trust in navies, and their navies fail-- + God's curse can cast away ten thousand sail." + +Ay, then, indeed, "ten thousand fleets sail over Thee in vain." Had +Byron Cowper's great line in his mind? The copy cannot stand +comparison with the original. + +If we will try the poet by his words, and know whether he has mastered +the consummation of his art by "writing well," we may cull from +several instances of suspicious language, in this stanza, the +following-- + + "Nor doth remain + A shadow of man's ravage _save his own_." + +What is the meaning--the translation? "There is not on the ocean to be +found a shadow of ravage in which man is the agent. The only ravage +known on the ocean, in which man is concerned, is that which he +suffers from the ocean." This, if false, is nevertheless an +intelligible proposition. But "ravage" is a strange word--a shocking +bad one--applied, as you presently find that it must be, to one +drowning man being "ravaged" by being drowned; and even more strange +still is the grammatical opposition of "his ravage," as properly +signifying, the ravage which he achieves, to "his own ravage" as +properly signifying the ravage which he endures! + +Moreover, what is meant by "remain"? Properly, to linger for a moment +ere disappearing. But the proposition is, that ruin effected by man +has no place at all on the waters. The poet means, that as long as +you, the contemplator, tread the land, you walk among ruins made by +man. When you pass on to the sea, no shadow of such ruin any longer +accompanies you,--that is, any longer _remains_ with you. + +One great fault of style which the Hymn shows is Equivocation. The +words are equivocal. Hence the contradiction--as in this stanza +especially--between what is promised and what is done. Weigh for a +moment these lines-- + + "Upon the watery plain, + The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain + A shadow of man's ravage save his own, + When for a moment, like a drop of rain, + He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan," + +&c., and tell us what they seem to describe. You will find yourself in +a pretty puzzle. A ship? a fleet? myriads of ships lost? or one +drowning man? Surely one drowning man. His own phrase, + + "the bubbling cry + Of some strong swimmer in his agony," + +here pre-appears. But he had bound himself quite otherwise. By his +pledge he should, in contrast with man's wreck active upon shore, have +given man's wreck passive upon the flood,--the earth strewn with ruin +by man's hand, the sea strewn with ruin of man himself,--_magnis +excidit ausis_. + +The words "remain" and "man" have played the part here of juggling +fiends,-- + + "They palter with us in a double sense, + They keep the word of promise to the ear, + And break it to our hope." + +For lend us your ear for a few minutes. The word "remain" is +originally and essentially a word of time, and means to "continue" in +some assigned condition through a certain duration of time; as, for +example, he "remained in command for a year." In this clause of +Byron's, it has become essentially a word that has regard to space +without regard to time. To see that it is so, you must begin with +possessing the picture that has been set before you, and which is +here the basis and outset of the thinking. This picture is--"man marks +the earth with ruin." Realise the picture at the height of the words +without flinching. For example, from the Atlantic eastward to the +Pacific, man ravages. Here Napoleon--a little farther on Mahomet the +Second--farther, the Crusaders--beyond these Khuli Khan or Timour +Leng--lastly, the Mogul conquerors of the Celestial Empire,--a chain +of desolation from Estremadura to Corea. Had land extended around the +globe, it had been a belt of desolation encircling the globe. Corn +fields, vineyards, trampled under foot of man and horse,--villages, +towns, and great cities, reeking with conflagration, like the smoke +ascending from some enormous altar of abomination to offend the +nostrils of heaven--armed hosts lying trampled in their blood--the +unarmed lying scattered every where in theirs; for man has trodden the +earth in his rage, and before him was as the garden of Eden, behind +him is the desolate wilderness. This is a translation of the +hemistich,--"Man marks the earth with ruin,"--into prose. It is a +faithful, a literal translation--Byron meant as much: and you, +neophyte, in an instantaneous image receive as much--perhaps with more +faith or persuasion, because leaden-pacing, tardy-gaited exposition +goes against such faith; but some belief will remain if we, who have +put ourselves in the place of the poet, have used colours that seize +upon your imagination. + +Well, then, if your imagination has done that which the summary +word-picture of the poet required of you, you have swept the earth, or +one of its continents, with instantaneous flight from shore to shore, +and seen this horrible devastation--this widely-spread ravage. You +have not staid your wing at the shore, but have swept on, driven by +your horror, till you have hung, and first breathed at ease, over the +Mid Pacific, over the wide OCEAN OF PEACE--over the unpolluted, +everlasting ocean, murmuring under your feet--the unpolluted, +everlasting heavens over your head. _Here_ is no ravage of man's: no! +nor the shadow of it-- + + --"Nor doth remain + A shadow of man's ravage." + +But how "nor doth remain?" The ravage has gone along with you from +sea-marge to sea-marge. _At sea_ it is no longer with you. Traversing +the land it _remained_ your companion. It _remained_ the continual and +loathed object of your eyes. Now no shadow of it is to be seen--it +haunts your flight no longer. No shadow of it any longer accompanies +your aerial voyage--any longer stays, abides, _remains_ with you. If +the word has not this meaning, it has no meaning here in this clause. +In this clause it cannot mean this--"upon the ocean, the ravage made +by man appears like a flash of lightning, seen and gone,--upon the +ocean this ravage, or some shadow of this ravage, has a momentary +duration, but no more than momentary, no abiding, no _remaining_." +This cannot be the meaning, since of man it has been expressly said +'his control stops with the shore'--that is, ends there, is not on the +ocean at all. Manifestly the question at issue is, not whether +destruction effected by man lasts upon the waters, but whether it is +at all upon the waters; and Byron's decision is plainly that it is not +at all. For he has already said "upon the watery plain the wrecks are +all thy deed." That is to say, any sort of wreck effected by man upon +the flood at all has been twice rejected in express words; and this +word "remain" must imperatively be understood consonantly to this +rejection. + +Byron, then, we see, in denying that wrecks made by man "remain" upon +the "watery plain," takes a word which properly sets before you an +extending in time, and uses it for setting before you an extending in +space. The ravage of which man is the agent does not extend over the +"watery plain"--no, not a shadow of it. + +But pray attend to this--no sooner does the sequent clause "save his +own," take its place in the verse, than the word "remain" shifts its +meaning back, from the signification accidentally forced upon it as +has been explained, and reverts to its original and wonted power as a +word of time! The force of the united clauses now stands thus--"upon +the water there cannot be found a trace of the ruin executed by man. +But of the ruin suffered by him there is an apparition, a vestige, a +_shadow_, a vanishing display, namely-- + + "When for a moment, like a drop of rain, + He sinks into thy depths, with bubbling groan, + Without a grave, unknell'd, uncoffin'd and unknown." + +He plunges, and all is over. The "bubbling groan" is the momentarily +_remaining_ notice of his extinction. + +Now this first equivocation has an immediate moral +consequence--namely, a reaction upon the feelings of the poet. +"Remain," as an "extending in space," acts upon the imagination +expansively here, if it were suffered to act--and if room were given +it to act upon the imagination--inasmuch as "nor doth remain," as a +word of extending in space, marks or helps to mark out the two great +regions into which his lordship divides the terraqueous globe--ravaged +land and unravaged water. But "remain," as an "extending in time," +acts here contractively; and "nor remain" means now "does not outlive +the moment!" and in this manner an entirely new direction or tenor is +given to thought and feeling--for the zeal of diminishing seizes on +the imagination of the writer. He is led to making man insignificant +by the momentariness of his perishing! He has contracted, by power of +scorn, and by the trick of a word, the seventy years of man into an +instant. That is one diminution, and another follows upon it. The +Fleets, wrecked whenever they fight against the water, vanish from his +fancy, as in the shifting of a dream; and he sees, amidst the troubled +world of waters--_one_ man perishing! One mode of insignificancy +admitted, induces another. With the shrinking of time to a moment goes +along, the shrinking of multitude to one! + +The same double-dealing takes place with the word "Man." Man signifies +the individual human being--or the race. "Of man's first +disobedience"--mankind's. "Man marks the earth with ruin"--mankind +does so. "Nor doth remain a shadow of man's ravage"--of mankind's +ravage. "When for a moment, like a drop of rain, _he_ sinks into thy +waves "--that is now the single sailor, whom a roll of the ship has +hurled from the topmast into the waters; or, when the ship has gone +down, some strong swimmer who has fought in vain upon the waters, and, +spent in limb and heart, sinks. And thus the reader, after stumbling +for two or three steps in darkness and perplexity, within a moment of +having left mankind in the annihilating embrace of Ocean, upon a +sudden finds himself set face to face with one man, we shall suppose +"The last man," drowning! + +In the Stanza now commented on, there was a struggle depicted, a +question proposed between Man and the Ocean--which shall be the +Wrecker? The Ocean prevails; Man is wrecked. In the succeeding Stanza +there is, it would seem, another question moved between the same +disputants. No, it is the same. Let us examine well. A moment before, +Man appeared as treading the earth as a Destroyer, his proud step +stayed at high water-mark. Now he appears upon the earth as a +traveller and a reaper--by implication or allusion--by the figure of +"not." + + "His steps are _not_ upon thy paths, thy fields + Are _not_ a spoil for him." + +He walks and reaps the earth; he does not walk and reap the ocean. +This is plainly the process of the "worthy cogitation;" and +unquestionably the assertion is true--true to the letter, but only to +the letter. For, standing on Mount Albano, or on the Land's End, or +here sitting beneath the porch of our Marine Villa fronting the Firth +of Forth, we are poets every one of us, and we will venture beyond the +letter;-- + + "His steps are not upon thy paths!" + +--reply--chaunter of Man's Hope, and of England's Power,-- + + "Thy march is o'er the mountain wave, + Thy home is on the deep." + +There is a dash of sea-craft for you; and, "cheered by the grateful +sound, for many a league old ocean smiles." + +And for the sickle! What! must the net and the harpoon go for nothing? +No harvests on the barren flood! What else are pearl-fisheries, +herring-fisheries, cod-fisheries, and whale-fisheries? "The sea! The +deep, deep sea!" Why, the sea cannot keep its own; cannot defend the +least or the mightiest of its nurselings from the hand of the gigantic +plunderer Man. + + ----"thy fields, + Are not a spoil for him." + +The fields of earth are not. For he ploughed and sowed ere he reaped, +and earned back his own. But on _thy_ fields, no ploughing, no +sowing--all reaping! Sheer spoil. Poor, helpless, tributary, rifled, +ravaged Ocean! + +Then follows a very eminent instance of the fault which has been urged +as radical in these Stanzas--forced, unnatural, wilful, or false +sequence of thought; a deliberate intention in the mind of the writer, +taking the place of the spontaneous free suggestion proper to poetry. +We have had man trying to produce ruin on the ocean, and wrecked, +swallowed up. Now, man tries to walk and reap the ocean. The poet has +outraged mother earth, and her vengeance is upon him. He has +wrongfully and wilfully brought in the Earth, for its old alliance +with man to hear hard words; and he suffers the penalty. Cease, rude +Boreas, blustering railer, for you are out of breath. Mere mouthing is +not command of words; the sound we hear now is but the echo of the +last stanza, and the angry Childe is unwittingly repeating himself,-- + + ----"Thou dost arise + And shake him from thee; the vile strength he wields + _For earth's destruction_ thou dost all despise, + Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies, + And send'st him, shivering in thy playful spray, + And howling, to his gods, where haply lies + His petty hope in some near port or bay, + And dashest him _again to earth--there let him lay_!" + +Here is again the contest, again the ruining upon earth,--nay, he +destroys the earth itself--again the wrecking of the ship. Surely +there is great awkwardness in stepping on from the proof of man's +impotence in the sinking of his ship, to the proof of man's impotence +in the sinking of his ship. "Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies" +may be a vigorous verse, though we doubt it; but if the ship outlive +the storm, which many a ship has done many a thousand times, it can be +turned against the ocean, who has done his worst _in vain_. What is +man's "_petty hope_?" and what means "_again_ to earth?" Is it again +from the skies--or back to the earth from which he embarked? Not one +expression is precise; and so, with some scorn of man's old ally, who +now so roughly receives him,--"there let him _lay_!" There is +something very horrible indeed in insulting a dead man in the Cockney +dialect. + +In all this there is no dignity, no grandeur; Byron does not well to be +angry--it is seldom that any man or poet does--for, though anger is a +"short madness," it is not a "fine frenzy." Such _Te Deum_ true Poetry +never yet sang, for true Poetry never yet was blasphemous--never yet +derided Man's Dread or Man's Hope, when sinking in multitudes in the +sea, which God holds in the hollow of his hand. + +Go on to the next Stanza-- + + "The armaments which thunderstrike the walls," &c. + +Why, here is another shipwreck--only now a fleet of war--before, one +merchant-ship perhaps. The Earth, too, is again implicated, and we +have the same scornful antithesis of Earth and Ocean. Earth with her +towery diadem--Earth, the nurse of nations, trembles at the approach +of armaments, which the ocean devours like melting snow. There has +been, then, a certain progression in the three stanzas. A drowning +man--a merchant-ship tossed and stranded--an armada scattered and +lost. Three striking subjects of poetical delineation, each strikingly +shown with some true touches, mixed with much false writing. One may +understand that in consequence from out the whirlwind and chaos of the +composition, resembling the tumult of the sea, there will remain to +the reader who does not sift the writing an impression of power--of +some great thing done--of Man and his Earth humbled, and the Ocean +exalted. In the mean time, the way of the thoughts, the course of the +mind, by which this ascent or climax is obtained, is extremely hard to +trace, if traceable. The critic may extricate such an order from the +disorder: but observe, that the ascent or climax can be attained only +by neglecting certain strong indications that go another way. Thus, in +the first stanza-- + + "Upon the watery plain + The wrecks are all thy deed," + +includes all that is or can be said more of ship or fleet. Again, in +the next stanza-- + + "Thou dost arise + And shake him from thee; the vile strength he wields + For earth's destruction thou dost all despise"-- + +Here is again said _all_ that is possible to be said. "Thou dost arise +and shake him from thee" being perhaps the strongest expression +obtained at all; and the "vile strength" being precisely the Armadas +described immediately afterwards with so much pomp and pride. Thus +there is really confusion and oscillation of thought--mixed with a +progress a standing still--and this characteristic of much of Byron's +poetry comes prominently out--Uncertainty. Impulses and leaps of a +powerful spirit _are_ here; but self-knowing Power, a mind master of +its purposes, disciplined genius, Art accomplished by studies profound +and severe, lawful Emulation of the great names that shine in the +authentic rolls of immortal Fame, the sanctioned inspiration which the +pleased Muses deign to their devout followers, are _not_ here. + +The strength of Man, proved in contest with Ocean and found weakness, +is disposed of. The Earth, as bound up with Man and his destinies, +came in for a share of rough usage. Now she takes her own turn--in +connexion with Man, but now principal. Here the pride of the words is +great--the meaning sometimes almost or quite inextricable. Recite the +Stanza, beginning + + "Thy shores are empires, changed in all save thee," + +and when the sonorous roll has subsided, try to understand it. You +will find some difficulty, if we mistake not, in knowing who or what +is the apostrophised subject. Unquestionably the World's Ocean, and +not the Mediterranean. The very last verse we were afar in the +Atlantic. "Thy shores are empires." The shores of the World's Ocean +are Empires. There are, or have been, the British Empire, the German +Empire, the Russian Empire, and the Empire of the Great Mogul--the +Chinese Empire, the Empire of Morocco, those of Peru and Mexico, the +Four Great Empires of Antiquity, the French Empire, and some others. +The Poet does not intend names and things in this very strict way, +however, and he will take in all great Monarchies, nor will he grudge +us the imagining the whole Earth laid out in imperial dominions. + +Well then--we again, dear Neophyte, bid you try to understand the +Stanza, and tell us what it means. What rational thought is there +here? With what propriety do we consider the whole Earth as the shores +of the Ocean--when _shore_ is exactly the interlimitation of land and +sea? Is this a lawful way of celebrating the Ocean, to throw in the +whole of the lately despised Earth as its brilliant appendage? The +question rises, how far from the shore does the shore extend--and +whether inwards or outwards? + +But there is a meaning and a good one in a way. ~Ariston men hydôr~. +The water civilises the land. 'Tis an old remark--but how? By ships. +Here, then, are the tables turned. Lately the sea did nothing with +ships but destroy them. Now it patiently wafts them, and by commerce +and colonies the Sea civilises the Globe! Surely this is poetical +injustice. The first glory of the Sea was, that Man could not sail +upon its bosom. The second glory of the Sea is, that, by offering its +bosom to be furrowed by Man's daring and indefatigable keels, +it--ministerially then--civilises the World. The Sea is the civiliser +of the Land--Man is--the Destroyer merely. + +Pray, what is the meaning of saying that the Roman and the Assyrian +Empires are shores of the Sea: and changed, excepting that the same +waters wash the same strands? The deep inland Empires recede too much +from the sea-shore to allow any hold to the relation proposed in the +words, "changed in all save thee." We know the Sea as their limit--an +accident, rather than as a part of their being. The meeting of sea +and land being the limit of an empire, the limit remains whilst the +Imperial State has withered from the land. Does the immobility of the +limit belong more to one element than to the other? And is the Roman +Empire, O Neophyte, more unchanged _in_ the Mediterranean and Atlantic +than it is _in_ the Apennines, and Alps, and Pyrenees, and Helvellyn? + +Every clause that regards Earth is, in one way or in another, +intolerable--small or tortured. "Thy waters wasted them while they +were free," means either "swallowed up their ships, or--_ate away +their edges_!" Alas! that most unhappy meaning is the true one--and +what a cogitation to come into a man's--an inspired Poet's head! "Thy +waters fretted away the maritime littoral edges of the Assyrian, the +Grecian, the Roman, the Carthaginian Empires, whilst those Empires +flourished!" And this interesting piece of geographical, and +geological, and hydrographical meditation makes part in a burst of +indignant spleen which is to go near to annihilating Man from the face +of the Globe! Was it possible to express more significantly the +imbecility of Old Ocean? And has he not been fretting ever since? And +are not the limits the same, as we were told a minute ago? Old Ocean +must be in his dotage if he can do no more than that--and we must +elect him perpetual President of the Fogie Club. + +Such wretched writing shows, with serious warning, how a false temper, +admitted into poetry, overrules the sound intellect into gravely and +weightily entertaining combinations of thought which, looked at either +with common sense or with poetical feeling, cannot be sustained for a +moment. How many of Lord Byron's admirers believe--and, in spite of +Christopher, will continue to believe--that in these almost senseless +stanzas he has said something strong, poignant, cutting, of good edge, +and "full of force driven home!" + + "Time writes no wrinkle on thine azure brow-- + Such as creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now." + +We accept the image; let us grant that the Personification is a fine +one. Nevertheless it does not entirely satisfy the imagination. And +why? Because the thought of the azure brow, on which time writes no +wrinkles, suggests for a moment the thought of the white brow--the +brow of man or woman--the human brow, on which Time does write +wrinkles along with the engraver, Sorrow. For a moment! but _that_ is +not the intended pathos--and it fades away. The intended pathos here +belongs to the wrinkles Time writes on the brow of the Earth--while it +spares that of the Sea. But Time deals not so with our gracious Mother +Earth. Time keeps perpetually beautifying her brow, while it leaves +the brow of Ocean the same as it was at Creation's Dawn. How far more +beautiful has the Dædal Earth been growing, from century to century, +over Continent and Isle, under the love of her grateful children! The +Curse has become a Blessing. In the sweat of their brow they eat their +bread; but Nature's self, made lovelier by their labour of heart and +hand, rejoices in their creative happiness, and troubled life prepares +rest from its toil in many a pleasant place fair as the bowers of +Paradise. + +We approach the next Stanza reverently, for it has a religious +look--an aspect "that threatens the profane." + + "Thou glorious Mirror, where the Almighty's Form + Glasses itself in tempests," &c. + +Suitably recited! let it be suitably spoken of--fearlessly, in truth. +The vituperating spirit has exhausted itself--is dead; and all at once +the Poet becomes a worshipper. From cherished exasperation with the +Creature--from varying moods of hate and scorn--he turns to +contemplation of the Creator. Such transition is suspicious--can such +worship be sincere? Fallen, sinful--yet is man God's noblest work. In +His own image did He create him; and to glorify Him must we vilify the +dust into which He breathed a living soul? Let the Poet lament, with +thoughts that lie too deep for tears, over what Man has made of Man! +And in the multitude of thoughts within him adore his Maker--in words. +But he who despises his kind, and delights, in heaping contumely on +the race of man throughout all his history on earth and sea--how may +he, when wearied with chiding, all at once, as if it had been not +hindrance but preparation, dare to speak, in the language of worship, +of the Almighty Maker of Heaven and of Earth? + +The Stanza, accordingly, is not good--it is laboured, heavy, formal, +uninspired by _divine afflatus_. There is not in it one truly sublime +expression. Nothing to our mind can be worse than "where the +Almighty's _Form_ glasses itself &c.--" The one word "Form" is +destructive, in its gross materialism, alike of natural Poetry and +natural Religion. If it be not, show us we are wrong, and henceforth +we shall be mute for ever. "In all time, calm or convulsed, in breeze, +or gale, _or storm_," is poor and prosaic; and "or storm," a pitiable +platitude after "in tempests." And the conversion of a Mirror into a +Throne--of the Mirror too in which the Almighty's "_Form_ glasses +itself," into the Throne of the "_Invisible_"--is a fatal +contradiction, proving the utter want of that possession of soul by +one awful thought which was here demanded, and without which the whole +stanza becomes but a mere collocation and hubbub of big-sounding +words. "Even from out thy slime, the monsters of the deep are made," +is violently jammed in between lines that have no sort of connexion +with it, and introduces a thought which, whether consistent with true +Philosophy or abhorrent from it, breaks in upon the whole course of +contemplation, such as it is,--to say nothing of the extreme poverty +of language shown in the use of such words as "monsters of _the deep_" +made out of the slime _of the sea_. + +The strain--such as it is--ceases suddenly with this Stanza; and the +Poet having thus got done with it, exclaiming "and I have loved thee, +Ocean," proceeds forthwith to a different matter altogether--to the +pleasure he was wont to enjoy, when a boy, in swimming among the +breakers. The verses are in themselves very spirited; but we must +think--and hope so do you--very much out of place, and a sad descent +from the altitude attempted, and believed by the Poet himself to have +been attained, in the preceding Stanza about the Almighty. + +Why, listening Neophyte, recite both Stanzas, and then tell us whether +or no you think they maybe improved by being put into--our Prose. We +do not seek thereby to injure what Poetry may be in them, but to bring +it out and improve it. + +"Thou glorious Mirror, in which, when black with tempests, Fancy might +conceive Omnipotence imaged in visible reflection!--Thou Sea, that in +all thy seasons, whether smooth or agitated, whether soft or wild wind +blow, in all thy regions, icy at the Pole, dark-heaving at the +Equator, ever and every where callest forth our acknowledgment that +Thou art illimitable, interminable, sublime; that Thou art the symbol +of Eternity--(like a circle by returning into itself;) that Thou art +the visible Throne of the Invisible Deity--Thou whose very dregs turn +into enormous life--Thou who, possessing the larger part of every +zone, art thus a King in every zone; Thou takest thy course around the +Earth,--great by thine awfulness, by thine undiscoverable depth, by +thy solitude! + +"And I, thy Poet, was of old thy Lover! In young years my favourite +disport was to lie afloat on thy bosom, carried along by Thee, +passive, resigned to Thy power, one of Thy bubbles. A boy, Thy waves +were my playmates, or my playthings. If, as the wind freshened, and +they swelled, I grew afraid, there was a pleasure even in the +palpitation of the fears, for I lived with Thee and loved Thee, even +like a child of Thine, and believed that Thy billows would not hurt +me, and laid my hand boldly and wantonly on their crests--as at this +instant I do, here sitting upon the Alban Mount--_and making (as they +say) a long arm_." + +HA! THE DINNER-GONG! + + +_Printed by William Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh._ + + + * * * * * + +Transcriber's Notes: + +Obvious spelling and punctuation errors were repaired, but period or +regional spellings and grammatical uses were retained (inuendo, +substract, Sphynges, etc.). Both administrador and administrator, +hardworking and hard-working, sun-burned and sunburned, were used in +this text, in separate articles. + +P. 390: "had once eaten a pea"; original reads "had once eat a pea." + +P. 429: "savanna is covered"; original reads "savana." + +"A head"(P. 439; "a head of the cavallada") and "a-head"(P. 435) were +changed to "ahead" as in P. 439 ("figure ahead suddenly"). + +P. 476: "eaten the bread"; original reads "eat the bread." + +P. 511: "proof of man's impotence in the sinking of his ship, to the +proof of man's impotence in the sinking of his ship." This repetition +is faithful to the original. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. +64 No. 396 October 1848, by Various + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BLACKWOOD'S EDINBURGH *** + +***** This file should be named 39676-8.txt or 39676-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/9/6/7/39676/ + +Produced by Brendan OConnor, Jonathan Ingram, JoAnn +Greenwood and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images +generously made available by The Internet Library of Early +Journals.) + + +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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